AN: I know, it's been far too long! I'm sorry! If you have stuck with me, thank you! Special thanks to reviewers: 3 guest users, Lmb111514 and schleifchen, feedback really means the world to me, thank you!

Christmas: 7th Year

Scorpius has spent almost every Christmas since he started at Hogwarts in and out of Potter and Weasley homes. Malfoy manor is not a cheery place in December. His mother decorates it from top to bottom, but no amount of mistletoe can make up for the lack of people. She had happily shooed him out the door to various other family's Christmas parties as soon as he began to be invited to them.

But Rose has been home since September. He has spent almost four months avoiding her eyes in prefect meetings, sitting as far away from her as he can in the dining hall and ignoring the look that crosses her face when she runs into him with Chelsea in the halls. He and Chelsea had started dating at the end of sixth. She is everything that Rose is not. She is blonde and willowy, two years younger than he is, spends hours with her nose in fashion magazines and rolls her eyes at him when he talks about Quidditch. Everything is always easy with her. Nothing phases her. She doesn't get frazzled when she has an assignment due, she doesn't lose her temper and she doesn't get jealous or go out of her way to make him jealous. And every now and again she'll go out of her way to do something really thoughtful. Over the summer she had gotten him tickets to see Puddlemere United, his favourite Quidditch team, and sat through the whole game with him without complaint.

Every time he sees Rose and the fury washes over him and he wants to hurt her and kiss her all at once, he feels a terrible guilt. Guilt for this girl who doesn't make him see red, doesn't put all of his emotions on overdrive, but whom he really cares about.

So this Christmas he goes to a Christmas party at Chelsea's house. He spends quiet mornings with his parents. He and Chelsea spend an evening walking through muggle London looking at the Christmas lights. He enchants the snow in her back garden into reindeer and a sleigh and watches her delighted face as they allow her to pet them... and he avoids the Potters and the Weasleys.

Until Albus arrives at the manor on Old Years Eve.

"Scorpius! My long lost friend! Bosom buddy! Bestest pal!" He cries as he rips the covers from his sleeping friend. "Get up, we're going out."

"Sod off Al." He mumbles, huddling closer to his pillows for warmth.

"No" his friend says happily, yanking the curtains apart and opening the windows. The freezing cold air from outside prickles at Scorpios's bare chest.

"Bloody hell Albus," Scorpius grumbles, stalking toward Al and reclaiming his duvet, "it's early!"

Al looks at him, covers wrapped around his head, shoulders and torso like a very puffy virgin Mary, and begins to laugh. Scorpius throws a pillow at him.

"Oh come on! It's New Year, you always spend New Year with us! I shouldn't have to give up my best friend because you and Rose are recreating the Cold War... we'll ditch the party at 11 before the fogies get too plastered. Dom knows a place near the leaky and we're of age..."

"I need coffee"

"You have legs"

"Some friend you are"

"It's 10am... I was kind enough to have breakfast with your mother before I came up."

"Your charity knows no bounds."

"What can I say, the downtrodden, they need me."

Scorpius snorts.

"Thank you, thank you, I'll be here all week!" Al proclaims, bowing. Scorpius pulls a jumper over his head, ignoring the amateur theatrics.

"Al?"

"Yeah"

"What's the Cold War?"

Grimmauld Place is crowded with guests by the time Al and Scorpius arrive that evening. Everyone has eschewed the formal dress robes that have been required for too many holiday parties already and so they wonder around the magically enlarged rooms in relative comfort. It's rather strange to see war heroes and ministry officials in jeans, reminiscing about detentions with Filch while eating sliders, but after so many years Scorpius is no longer surprised. Ginny Potter writes informal on the invitations and means it.

Dom, looking ready for a good night out in a black sheath dress covered in silver sparkles, greets them with champagne.

"You're late... drink up, or risk falling behind, and the sober do not survive the drunken reminiscing that the old farts are capable of!"

"Dominique, why must you insist on ruining your air of grace and sophistication by opening your mouth?" Al quips.

"I would ask you the same question Albus, however you haven't grace or sophistication to begin with."

"Those who are blessed with my rugged good looks are not called graceful, we're called manly, sexy... brooding." Al replied, sipping delicately at his champagne in irony.

"Have you been charming your mirror into giving you compliments again?"

"Can we find some food before we continue this sparring match?" Scorpius cut in. "You'd think you two would get bored."

"He's pleasant tonight isn't he?" Dom remarked to Al as Scorpius downed the rest of his champagne.

"And he hasn't even seen Rose yet." Al muttered, trailing after Scorpius in the direction of the buffet.

"But oh when he does..." Dom told him under her breath, smiling mischievously.

.

Rose is trapped in conversation with an achingly earnest young ministry official when she sees Scorpius over his shoulder. Henry's extreme passion for the minutiae of Goblin rights, while admirable, is about as interesting as feeding flobber worms, and she wishes she could shoot a look at Scorpius and have him rescue her with a breezy excuse like he would have two years ago. Instead she watches him grumpily picking over the selection of finger foods. She pulls at the top of her dress and wishes she was in jeans for the hundredth time. He's in a grey crew neck sweater which screams old money and looks effortlessly fantastic. She feels a stab of longing for the gangly boy who wasn't quite used to the length of his own limbs, even as her fingers itch to feel the soft wool.

Not so long ago it would have been easy. She could have gone up to him, put her hands on his shoulders and rocked onto tiptoe to whisper some stupid piece of gossip or personal joke to him. She could have slipped her hand into his and pulled him onto the dance floor to rest her cheek against his chest. She could have dragged him by the elbow to the dessert table or brushed imaginary lint off him or adjusted his already perfect collar. There were hundreds of excuses to touch in public, they'd found them all. But now she dared not even cross the room to greet him. He starts to look up, as though he feels her eyes on him. She quickly snaps her attention back to Henry's impassioned face and tries to feign interest.

.

She's across the room talking to some guy who clearly didn't understand the meaning of the word informal. He is gesticulating, dress robes billowing with each movement, and she's nodding along with that little crease between her eyebrows that she gets when she's concentrating. His fingers clench of their own accord and the paper plate in his hand crumples slightly. Dress robe guy shifts a little so Scorpius can see more than just her face. Every year she wears her Weasley Christmas sweater to this party. It's always green. There's usually an enormous Christmas tree or poinsettia emblazoned across her chest. With her red hair she jokes that she looks like a muggle Christmas elf, but she still wears those sweaters every year. She claims its so that all of her grandmothers knitting is not wasted on a garment that only gets worn once, but he is certain that she secretly loves those sweaters. This year she hadn't got the casual memo either. This year she's definitely let Dom have her way.

She's wearing a wine red strapless dress. The material is artfully draped, emphasizing her every curve while appearing to barely skim her skin. If he tugged gently on just the right fold of cloth the whole thing would come loose like a poorly wrapped towel. He's picturing it before he can stop himself. Already there are so many miles of creamy skin on display that his mind barely does any construction. Her hair is pulled softly back so that her shoulders are totally bare save for a stray curl that caresses her neck. He can feel that soft skin under his fingers, can imagine tracing a line across her collar bone, over her shoulder, down her bare arm- first with his fingers then with his lips. He can still hear the soft intake of breath she draws if he touches her just the right way. The top of the dress reveals just the barest hint of cleavage, the skirt skims her knees, it's almost demure... except with every change of weight the material shifts, clinging and floating, revealing tantalizing momentary glimpses of the shape of her. He could run his palms down her sides and trace that outline. His fingers could creep under that shifting, flirting hemline. He could almost feel the gorgeous, supple legs wrapping around him, her breath on his neck, her lips...

"Scorpius, you're dropping mini quiches all over the floor; Kreacher will not be pleased." Dom teases, interrupting his line of thought. Scorpius snaps back to reality.

"Fuck quiches" he growls, pulling his wand from his back pocket and vanishing the mess in one vicious swipe. Then he turns and storms off.

He nurses a glass of Firewhiskey in the corner of the lounge for the remainder of their time at the Potters'. Fred finds him and rattles on about some new products at the joke shop for a while. Albus and James try to engage him in a Quidditch debate. Lily even brings him a slice of cake. He remains morose and Rose remains on her side of the party.

At 11 Al brings him three more shots of Firewhiskey.

"I have to apparate"

"You can side along with me, if I have to deal with you like this for another minute I will feed myself to my uncle Georges carnivorous rabbit."

Scorpius throws back the shots, summons two more and downs them too.

"Alcohol poisoning here we come" He says as Al grabs his arm and the familiar yank through space begins.

The 'place near the Leaky' is an empty muggle clothing store. The windows have been papered over with 'For Rent' posters. Dom blows into her hands, stamps her feet against the cold and ushers them onto the steps leading to the doors.

"The password is 'Armadillo scales', go on, I have to wait for James and... the others."

Al mutters the password and the doors dissolve. They step into a darkened entrance that has been partitioned off from the rest of the room with flimsy looking plastic curtain. They hadn't heard a thing from outside but now the music is deafening. Strobes of luminous light and the outlines of dancing bodies can be seen through the plastic and Scorpius thinks it looks kind of like kelp at a disco. An officious looking witch demands to see their wands. She must have some kind of spell on her voice because he has no problem hearing her, but Al has to shout into his ear to be heard. She performs a quick age check spell on their wands and when she has confirmed that they're of age and taken their gold, luminous bands wind themselves around their wrists and tie neatly. They're shoved through the curtains by an influx of new patrons and confronted by the full glory of a makeshift wizarding nightclub.

The walls and concrete floor have been charmed so that swirls of fluorescent light slither in lazy patterns from one to the other, creating an ever changing array of colour, light and shadow. Strange swathes of scented mist that remind him strangely of stingrays, glide between dancers, leaving a momentary trail of scent in their wake. Glassware floats above the heads of hundreds of dancers. He watches as a girl near him holds up her hand and one of the glasses zooms obediently toward her. She taps her wristband against it, mutters something and it fills with amber liquid. The band includes a Merman on some kind of mouth organ. The huge tank he's in is surrounded by adoring girls (and a few boys) and the light from the walls and floor refracts through the water and reflects off his scales creating a glow around him. There are globular sculptures dotted around the room on podiums, morphing shapes languorously to the music as if dancing. Small groups of drunken patrons climb up onto the podiums with them to show off before diving back into the gyrating crowd. The general effect is an overwhelming onslaught to the senses.

"This place is great right?" Dom screams as she passes, holding Rose's hand and dancing her way into the crowd. Scorpius holds his hand up for a drink.

Rose gives herself over to the music, gyrating with the crowd, losing time, embarrassment, identity. At last everything is simple. Alcohol burning down her throat. Music pounding in her ears and vibrating through her flesh, loud enough to drown out all thought. Bodies swaying, grinding, undulating all around her. It's been so long since she's felt this good.

He catches glimpses of her in that fucking dress no matter how he tries to loose her in the crowd. Her movements are almost unearthly. He feels like Odysseus surrounded by siren song, and the more he drinks the less comprehensible it becomes that he's supposed to stay away from her. She and Dom draw male attention and that jealousy that belongs uniquely to Rose flares up in him. Al has spotted Charley, the hospital wing intern, and is making tentative overtures. James is grinding with his current girlfriend on a podium. Molly and Lucy have arrived and Molly is already trying to confiscate Lucy's drinks and prevent her falling into the merman's tank. Dom is rather preoccupied with being sandwiched between two men and doesn't notice the rather handsy creep who is all over Rose. He watches her go from relaxed and absorbed in the music to tense and uncomfortable in minutes. The guy is behind her, grinding up against her, his hands against her torso holding her fast against him, she pulls his hands away and turns, but he takes it as an invitation to slip one of his legs between hers and grind face to face. The crowd presses close and there's nowhere for her to go. He sees her looking around for one of her cousins and trying to create space between herself and the creep while maintaining her cool. He's already pushing towards her. He reaches for her hand, pulls her through a tiny gap between two other couples and then she is against him. She steps away, managing to create a minuscule amount of space between them. She looks up at him and mouths 'thank you'. He shrugs, then looks over her shoulder at sir-creeps-a-lot who is watching them, assessing their relationship. He nods toward him and then offers his hand. She looks over her shoulder and understands, he's offering to buffer. She puts her hand in his.

He spins her gently so he's standing behind her, rests his hands on her hips and begins to sway slightly to the music, trying to keep a bit of space between them, but also staring down the other guy, making sure he knows to back off. He's already plastered so he doesn't notice her relaxing back into him, doesn't consciously fan his hand across her lower abdomen, doesn't remember when McCreepy fades into the background, doesn't register her hand reaching up to graze the back of his neck. They share her next drink and she turns to give it to him. Her hands loop naturally around his neck when the next song is a slower one, his rub unconsciously up and down her back. Everything is warm. All the edges are hazy. She is so soft and so very much his and he doesn't really remember why he's supposed to be angry with her and they melt into each other.

The fireworks that announce midnight go off in a hundred tiny explosions, breaking them out of their trance. He wrenches his lips from hers and inches apart he looks at her with sudden clarity. Their torsos are plastered together. One of her hands is still in his hair. He has a hand on her ass while the other cradles her neck. And one of her legs is hooked over his hip because kissing had apparently not been quite inappropriate enough. Their breath mingles and they are frozen while people cheer and sing around them. Her eyes acquire a deer-in-the-headlights look. He's not sure what she sees in his face but it isn't good. She pulls herself away, wipes her fingers under her mouth, correcting some of her smudged lipstick and murmurs something that could be 'I have to go' before disappearing into the crowd.

He remains rooted to the spot while the celebrations continue around him.

AN: Thank you for reading! Feedback is much beloved!