For a few hours Scorpius and Rose just wandered around the Malfoy Manor. They knew they had to eventually study, but Rose refused to give up the opportunity to peruse an old pureblood house. For a minute she could have sworn she saw a moving oil painting of Scorpius, but he dragged her away when she tried to look.
"I don't know why if there wasn't a painting of you I couldn't just go in there." Rose huffed determinedly.
Scorpius gave her a dirty look. "Because it's off limits Weasley."
"Oh whatever," She rolled her eyes. "Drama King."
"Do you want to study?"
"Not yet," Rose sulked thinking of all the potions she didn't want to learn."
Scorpius grinned, slipping his hands in his trouser pockets. "I figured. Well we can go see the lake."
"It's dark out."
"That's the best part." He gave her an excited look. "Believe me, it's a good thing."
Rose let out an exaggerated sigh trying to seem annoyed, but then, before she could think anything of it she looped her arm through his and followed him out the back. Scorpius didn't mind, at first he didn't even notice until her fingers tightened around his forearm. Immediately he tugged her body closer. It wasn't planned, he just did it and once he did he had to stop himself from pulling away. If his parents say anything he'll just say he wanted to make sure she didn't trip over anything. Even in his head he knew that was very convincing, but as soon as he felt arm tighten on his he found it was a good enough reason for him.
It was warm out with a mild spring wind breeze. Rose once again was wearing a dress, but it wasn't as fancy as the one from the night before. It was a blue sundress that just flowed out, tugging back under her bust and the ends brushing the tips of her knees. He wanted to tell her she was beautiful, but he didn't. Instead he just stepped through the sprightly spring grass to the lake shed. Right before they arrived she began to skip a little in excitement.
"This place is so beautiful, but where the hell are you taking me Scorpius?"
"Alright…" He unhooked arms with her and wrapped his arm behind her waist. "Look behind the shed."
She gave him an unsure look. "If this is how I'm mysteriously set on fire…."
"Would you just look?"
"Fine! I shall look!"
The sky was dark, but there was a soft blue glow near the hollow of the moon. The water from the small manmade lake crept up the low rock bed keeping it from spilling over to the grass.
Rose's gaped for a moment, before breaking into a wide bright smile. There were hundreds of fireflies bouncing around the shed lighting up the grass beneath it like Christmas lights.
"Why are they all here like this?" She breathed in amazement.
"It's a spell." Scorpius said simply not looking at the lightning bugs.
She noticed his gaze, and smiled as slid his arm around her shoulder. The fireflies lit the space between them, and Scorpius's face tensed. Rose didn't understand why, but her question caught in her throat when his eyes locked onto hers. The look on his face wasn't one she'd ever seen him show. She didn't quite know what it meant.
"Rose…" He whispered feeling strange. But then as quickly as he had leaned in he pulled away, standing an inch away from her.
Scorpius stared at her his breathing was erratic as he tried to figure out what was bubbling up in his chest. But no matter how long he looked at her he couldn't figure out what it was. It wasn't new, he knew that, but he also knew that whatever it was, was stronger now. He wanted ask her if she felt it to, if he was crazy or if he was just imagining it all, but he didn't. He couldn't bring himself to ruin it.
"Are you okay?" She asked biting the side of her lip.
"Yeah," He nodded, "Yeah, but um," He blinked and scratched the back of his neck. "We should get inside and study."
Rose forced herself to walk behind him, crossing her arms.
In the middle of the Malfoy library Scorpius and Rose were huddled behind one of the large antique tables with all of their schoolwork piled in front of them.
For the first hour Rose roamed around the room, eyeing the hundreds of books longingly before finally giving in and studying. Scorpius said nothing, but just walked behind her patiently, watching her reactions to the various books.
She wanted to ask why he was being so weird earlier, but she had a feeling she wouldn't like the answer so instead she threw herself into her books and tried not to look at him directly. This relationship was infuriating and beginning to truly drive her crazy. What were they? Friends? Boyfriend Girlfriend? Or just something random? She hated even thinking those questions because it made her feel like a preteen girl with spots, but there was no steer clearing of this. Rose needed to know what this was and she was doing everything in her power to not be the one to bring it up. Maybe at her parent's house she could have the courage to ask him, but not here, not when his parents could pop in at any minute.
So instead of dragging whatever was going on through the mud, she forced them to go through their Potions review sheet and just tried not to look at him. At first she thought that if she didn't look directly at him she wouldn't think about it. That lasted about ten minutes before she started twitching under the table. She could do this. All she had to do was hold out one day; just one day and she could confront all of their problems.
"Okay, I don't get this." Rose muttered pointing to something in her textbook. "How are you supposed to add this with that? Wouldn't that make the cauldron explode with the mixture?"
"No," He leaned over his arm brushing over the textbook as he circled an ingredient. "This is what you always skip over. If you don't add newts tongue, then it will."
Scratching the edge of her hairline, Rose yawned tilting her head in thought. "Oh…alright."
"Is this sticking? Or no?"
"I don't know." She mentioned furrowing her eyebrows as leaned on her arm. "I feel like I get it but every time I do the potion I get one of the elements wrong."
He gave her a sympathetic smile. "Why don't we take a break soon?"
"Might as well it has to be time for dinner soon right?"
"I'll check with my mum."
Scorpius closed their books and stacked them under their notes in a perfectly organized fashion. She smiled as he did it. She was completely on edge with him, but she couldn't stop herself from laughing at him. It was funny to her that he didn't even know that it wasn't a natural impulse for everyone to immediately clean up. It was just him. He glanced over and caught her looking at him with a smirk.
"What are you looking at?"
"You are so weird?"
Scorpius grinned widely. "Look whose talking."
He bent lower like he was going to say something to her and he might have, if Mr. Malfoy didn't walk in at that exact moment, but he did, so they shifted away from each other and tried to act like he didn't interrupt anything at all.
Rose cleared her throat and stood up as they prepared to leave. She didn't want to spend any more time with Scorpius's father than she had to. He still had yet to say anything rude or intimidating to her, but still just his mere presence at the hovering around the room put her on edge. It was his silence and stony gaze that threw her off. Everyone Rose knew was talkative and not big on eye contact. Maybe it was a Malfoy thing, because Scorpius did it too. But since it had been a while since Scorpius had treated her like how his father was, it startled her a bit. It didn't help that he looked uncannily like his son, it was almost as if Scorpius himself was giving her the look of cold distant, disapproval.
Not in the mood to get in a verbal battle with Mr. Malfoy, she crossed her arms and waited for Scorpius. She hoped he'd do something to cut down whatever speech his father had planned.
Scorpius noticed the tightness in her face, scowled at his father, before pushing aside the books and stepping in front of Rose. "We're going to get cleaned up for dinner."
"Scorpius I would like to speak with Rose for a few moments if you don't mind." Mr. Malfoy said calmly.
"I don't mind," He lied easily, "but father I physically can't move far enough away from her for you to talk to her."
"Yes, I have thought of a solution for that." Mr. Malfoy took out his wand, flicked it and his son dropped to the floor fully unconscious right next to Rose.
Rose gaped and bent over to check on him. "Scorpius?! Scorpius!"
"He's fine," Draco shrugged sitting down at the table predatorily. "Please sit."
Rose gave Scorpius's sleeping body a nervous look, but she held her ground. She didn't know why, but this had become so kind of power struggle and if he really wanted to talk to her alone this bad she would hold out long enough to hear why because really, what else was there for her to do?
"I have a few questions for you if you wouldn't mind," He said lightly, as if he didn't just attack his son.
She threw her hands up in disbelief and then finally decided to play along, as it didn't seem she had much of a choice. "Of course Mr. Malfoy. Why not?"
"What is your relationship with my son?"
She let out a low whistle and started shaking with silent laughter. "Oh-kay, you're not messing around...Um the honest answer is I have no idea."
"Well what would you like to happen?"
Rose shifted in her seat, tensing as she moved. "I…I don't know."
"Well maybe if I explained my position to you, it would clarify yours."
Not seeing how his opinion would do anything to help or hinder this situation she shrugged, gesturing for him to continue. "By all means…Because I really can't see how this can get any more uncomfortable."
"My son wants to become a healer. He has worked his entire life to restore the Malfoy name and go against the damage the generations before him have caused and I don't want him to have anything get in the way of that." Mr. Malfoy paused for a moment before continuing. "I don't have a problem with you. You are bright, driven and seem to be kind, but you are a distraction, and I think you know that."
Rose wanted to protest. She wanted to tell him that none of this was any of her business and that she was highly offended that he wouldn't think it was acceptable to talk this way to her.
But she didn't.
She didn't yell, she didn't scream, she didn't protest because it was all the reasons Mr. Malfoy provided and more that was stopping her from fully confronting her feelings.
She just sat there silently staring back at him because despite her hatred for him, and despite her anger at his words, she knew he was right. Scorpius and her would never work and it was stupid and reckless for them to lie themselves by trying.
Her eyes began to water as her face hardened and she demanded. "Well what do you expect me to do? Be mean to him? Making him hate me so he stays away from me? Because we've done that and yet we keep coming back. So what is your plan?" She let out a low half-hysteric laugh. "Because I really could use a back up option."
"Just say no to him. Maybe over the next few days he won't give up, but as soon as this curse is lifted he will, when your situations set in and he realizes it's the smart thing to do."
Rose clenched her knuckles so hard they became white. "And what if that doesn't work? What if he keeps coming back?"
"He won't." He said with absolute certainty. "Because he doesn't love you."
Draco Malfoy had said a lot of things that had insulted her, but this was so far past the line she didn't even know where the line was. Any politeness or sense of elderly respect was gone and she was just fueled with all of the resentment and anger she'd been trying to get away from. Her hands began to shake as she struggled to keep together. Within seconds she lost control and couldn't hold back anymore.
"And what makes you think you know that?" Rose demanded viciously, "What makes you think you know your son at all?"
"I know my son."
Rose shook her head, her eyes silted in loathing. "No, you don't."
Mr. Malfoy eyed her for what seemed like an eternity before rising to his feet. "Well that's your opinion. Now I hope you enjoy the rest of your time here and remember what I said."
"And you do the same." She snapped at him.
Like she could forget what he said. Like she could act like any part of that was remotely acceptable. Apart of her wanted to check on Scorpius like a normal considerate human being, but Rose wasn't in the state to do so. She needed a minute to process what just happened and understand what she was going to do about it, and there wasn't a way in hell she could do that if Scorpius was awake.
So she sat there, her bare arms crossed over her chest, crossing her legs Rose finally decided that this wasn't worth it. It wasn't worth the anxiety. It wasn't worth this…this bullshit. She needed to stop living in this imaginary romantic lala land. This was over and as soon as Scorpius woke up she'd tell him that.
Her eyes slid over to his sleeping body and her heart dropped. He was flat on his stomach with his arms spread along his sides as his light blond hair fell into his pale face.
It was all just words at this point, but would she actually be able to let him go? She liked to think it would be that simple, that she would be able to walk away from him and disconnect from her feelings, but as she looked at him her heart broke and she honestly didn't know if she could.