Hey, I thought I would update again today, because I'd finished this chapter a few days ago, and I'm really happy because I did well in my GCSEs that I got the results for today =] btw. Thanks for the reviews for the last chapter. They were lovely *grins happily*. Oh, and in the last chapter I used a bit of a scene from Season 1 of Cheers, so obviously I don't own that or anything Harry Potter.

Also, I played about with photoshop a bit the other day and came up with what I imagine Rose and Scorpius to look like, so I thought I'd show you all: http:// i25. tinypic. com/ 2i0q1lh. png

Let me know what you think of the picture and the chapter in a review, please :)

Thanks, G xoxo

-CHAPTER THREE-

"It was lovely to see you again, Rosie," Grandma Molly said, pulling me into a big hug. My parents were still away, so my Grandparents had taken Hugo and I to King's Cross to get the train home with everyone else returning from their Christmas Holidays. The train was slightly shorter at this time of year, as some people stayed at Hogwarts, and others were dropped off in Hogsmeade by their parents.

"Thanks for everything, Grandma," I replied, then when she turned to give Hugo a hug, I hugged my Grandad.

"I'll see you soon, Rosie. Your Grandma will send on anything you forgot," he said with a smile.

"Bye Grandad," I said, just as Lily grabbed my arm and practically dragged me along the platform.

"What the-"

"Lorcan's over there, sucking face with his weirdo girlfriend," Lily said by way of explanation. I felt a sinking feeling in my stomach followed by disapproval of them snogging in a public place.

"I hate him," I said dramatically with a flick of my hair, and I peered behind me. Lorcan dragged himself away from the blonde bimbo entwined around him and as he caught my eye, he smiled. "He smiled at me!" I said in horror, turning to Lily with wide eyes.

"After his pathetic cowardly dumping?" Lily sounded disgusted. "Let me go rearrange his face." I took the role of pulling her arm to stop her going to punch Lorcan, even though I was dying to join her.

I can't believe he smiled at me. How could he even think to so much as look at me after the way he had treated me?

"Let me at him," Lily grumbled, trying in vain to prise her arm away from mine. "I'm going to bat-bogey hex him into oblivion."

"Keep your knickers on, Potter," Guilliano said, as we passed, stepping in front of us and raising an amused eyebrow at Lily. Then something occurred to him, "Or…don't…" Oh boy. The hormones are on the rampage again. Lily looked slightly taken aback – she's never been on the receiving end of Guilliano's disturbing flirting. Mainly because Guilliano knows that if he so much as blinks in Lily's direction, her two brothers will be on him like stinksap. And he might never retain his tragic good looks if something like that happens.

"Go irritate someone else, Zabini," I said, pushing past him with Lily behind me, apparently now finding it difficult to resist the urge to punch Guilliano as well as Lorcan.

"He is such a smarmy git," she said, looking behind her.

"Don't worry, he tries it on with everyone," I reassured her, and she looked quite shocked. "Well, everyone female."

"Urgh!" she exclaimed. "He's like-"

"- a much more perverted male version of you," I finished with a joking grin. Lily furrowed her brows at me, smiling slightly. "You know, dating everyone eligible and of the opposite gender in the school." She burst out laughing. Lily's not a slut, by any stretch of the imagination. She doesn't actually sleep with all the guys she takes on dates, she just seems to date a lot of them. Most evenings she seems to have a study date, and every Hogsmeade visit day she has a proper date. She's extremely pretty, which is probably why she gets so much attention from boys.

Even though she's two years below me (she's a fifth year), we get on so well because we're so close in age. I'm the youngest in my year (being an August baby) and she's the oldest in hers, so we're only just over a year apart.

"I'm slightly regretting this," I told Lily, self-consciously tugging down my skirt as we walked down the train. Understatement of the year. I was completely regretting it.

What was I even thinking?

I was getting a few looks from people along the corridor and, not used to the attention, I was slightly nervous.

"You look fab," Lily assured me with a wide smile. I could tell she was happy with her work, and I suppose I did look quite nice. It just felt…different. That's it. Different. My shoulder-length auburn curls were slightly less messy than usual, with the result that it looked less frizzy. My baggy school shirt was gone and Lily had gone with me to Diagon Alley to get some new ones which were much more fitted and clung to my waist. My knee-length skirt had been altered to Lily's advised length, and my school shoes had been replaced with ones with a small heel making me about an inch taller.

"Quit fretting!" Lily told me. "Now, go find Al and the idiot crew." Lily was the only other person in on the secret about mine and Scorpius' fake relationship, and she had been surprised that she hadn't come up with it before. According to her, it was a completely perfect plan.

Which made me start to doubt it sincerely.

"Ok," I grunted in reply, sounding much less than enthusiastic.

"I'll see you later. There's a new guy in my year I want to meet," she said grinning at me, and I grinned back at her. She bounced down the corridor after giving me a quick hug, and I headed towards the Head's compartment were the boy's were probably hanging out, since Scorpius was Head Boy.

I was shocked about it as well, don't worry. I mean, putting Scorpius in a role of responsibility is a complete recipe for disaster. Merlin knows what was crossing the brain of our clearly somewhat loony headmistress when she came up with that ridiculous notion.

I slid open the door to the Head's compartment to find the boys involved in hushed conversation, well, until I walked in that was. They all stopped talking and looked towards the door. Guilliano wolf-whistled like the hair-brained idiot that he is.

"Shut up, doofus," I told him folding my arms, and he grinned a toothy Italian grin.

"Are you ready for this?" Al asked me, checking I didn't want to back down. But, after seeing Lorcan and his stupid new girlfriend at the station, there was no way I was not going to do anything.

I hated his stupid new girlfriend almost as much as I hated him.

"Yes," I said angrily, thinking back to Lorcan and how he had had the audacity to smile at me after all he had put me through. Stupid prat.

"Excellent. Phase one, begins now," Al said, looking at his battered watch.

"Why now? There's no one here," I reminded him, gesturing to the compartment around us.

"Prefect meeting," Scorpius uttered, examining his nails with mild curiosity.

"Exactly," Al stated. "And if the prefects think you're together, then…"

"They'll tell all their friends. Well, the girls will anyway," Scorpius interrupted, earning himself a pointed roll of the eyes from Al. "Then we sit back and let the Hogwart's rumour mill work it's magic." To emphasize his point, he leant backwards and placed his hands lazily behind his head, and winked at me.

"It's guaranteed to reach the dorky ears of Lorcan by the feast," Al finished, then sent a self-satisfied smirk in my direction. "Brilliant, isn't it?"
"Actually, a brain-dead ant could have come up with that," I told him. "But, that's besides the point, I can imagine it being somewhat effective." Al grinned, and I sent him a withering look in return. "Unfortunately, you missed out an essential part of the plan."

"Uh…I did? Which bit?" Al said, his brows furrowed.

"The part where we actually get the prefects to believe that me and ferret features over here-" Scorpius gave out a snort of laughter that would have been unattractive on anyone else. Damn him and his irksome perfection. "-can actually stand each other."

Al waved a hand in the air, as if he was disregarding the matter. "That's easy!" he proclaimed.

"Enlighten me, then," I demanded, folding my arms and raising my eyebrows.

"I like to call it the 'soppy-look-method'," he said, looking immensely proud of himself.

"Care to elaborate?"

Scorpius rolled his eyes and sighed loudly. "Isn't it obvious, ginger? We simply-"

"GINGER?" I repeated indignantly.

"Have you seen your hair?" Scorpius said with a smirk. I narrowed my eyes at him. "As I was saying, we simply give each other pathetic soppy looks, and hold hands and so on."

"And," Guilliano added, looking extremely mischevious, so much so, that I was distinctly aware that was he was about to say would make me roll my eyes and lose faith in men in their entirety. Pervy comment alert. "There may, should the aforementioned stuff not work, have to be kisses."

Despite thinking that a somewhat perverted comment was on it's way, I was more surprised about the actual statement made.

"What?" I breathed, moving my gaze to Al wordlessly begging him not to confirm this. He didn't look particularly happy, but appeared to be aware that this may be the case.

I looked over at Scorpius. He was giving me that look that boys give girls sometimes (and that he gives girls most of the time). You know, the look that implies that in his mind you are prancing around in a pair of lacy knickers. And nothing else.

Yeah, that look.

"Well," I said, regaining my composure and formulating a reply. " I'll be trying my hardest to avoid that situation at all costs." The boys exchanged a group smirk (a Slytherin tradition, I believe). "And, I'm sure Scorpius will help me avoid it."

Guilliano snorted inconceivably loud.

"After all, I'm not his type, being intelligent and thus capable of constructing a sentence consisting of more than monosyballic words," I announced in as blasé a way as possible, throwing a smirk in Scorpius' direction.

"It's not my fault I've never met an intelligent girl I'd want to date," he replied, shrugging nonchalantly.

"More like, you've never met an intelligent girl that would want to date you," I replied, with a fleeting grin. Guilliano snorted loudly again just as the compartment door slid open.
"Attractive, Zabini," came Lily's sarcastic voice from the doorway. She was sneering at Guilliano as though he was a pile of owl droppings (I'd hazard a guess that she was thinking about the comment he made earlier). He blinked at her blankly. "No, really, you'll pull the girls in droves with that."

I burst into silent giggles at the flabbergasted look Guilliano was now sporting. "I do pull the girls in droves," he spluttered back defensively.

"No offence, but I find that extremely hard to believe," she smarted back, giving a good impression of being ignorant of his 'player' status, then turned her attention to me. "The prefect meeting is in ten minutes, you and…" she eyed Scorpius with disdain, "…Malfoy have to see McGonagall beforehand."

"Let's go," Scorpius said with a one-eyebrow-raised look at me, standing up and straightening out his designer cashmere jumper. Why is it that he got looks and money?

Life is shockingly unfair.

"Whatever," I muttered, getting up and self-consciously tugging the back of my skirt down.

*

"Valentine's Day?" Scorpius exclaimed, sounding distinctly horrified, when McGonagall had left the compartment. "We have to arrange a ball for Valentine's Day?" He gestured towards to the substantial pile of parchment that McGonagall had put on my lap claiming that they would come in useful. Looking at the first one – an advert for everlasting toilet roll – I was finding it difficult to see how much of it would be entirely useful.

Oh, and the next one: Self-cleaning dragon-hide gloves. Yes, that's exactly what everyone wants at a romantic ball.

"Please tell me you know what Valentine's day is," I sighed, neatening the pile of parchment.

"Of course I do," Scorpius said, though the look in his eyes told the absolute opposite. My jaw dropped open in amused shock. He didn't know what Valentine's day was.

Who could be that ignorant? Just because he's the product of generations of pure-blood breeding doesn't give him an excuse to be utterly nonplussed by a common muggle holiday. Where has he been living? A magically protected cardboard box?

"You don't know what Valentine's day is?" I asked, incredulous averting my attention from another completely unrelated-to-balls advert on the pile on my lap.

"Do I look like I've ever taken a Muggle Studies class?" he said, gesturing to his decidedly Slytherin appearance – complete with green and silver tie, and determinedly conceited look in his eyes. The honest answer is: No. No, he does not look like someone who would go within a twenty foot radius of a Muggle Studies classroom. Because he looks 100% Slytherin.

"You don't have to go to a lesson to know something simple as what Valentine's day is," I told him. "It's general knowledge."

He scowled, "Please remember, I spend my summers locked in a stupid manor, listening to lectures from my grandfather, not frolicking around the streets of Muggle London absorbing pointless information. So, are you going to tell me what it is?"

I raised my eyebrow before continuing. "It's a muggle holiday to celebrate love. Basically, you give cards to people you fancy."

Scorpius snorted loudly and burst into laughter. I furrowed my brows, confused as to why this was so hilarious. "Come on, Weasley! I'm not falling for that crap – I mean, a holiday to celebrate love!"

"You don't believe me? Have none of your girlfriends-" I emphasized the word to show that I thought his definition of the word was slightly warped. "-ever given you a card saying they love you?"

He stopped grinning. "Yeah, I seem to get a lot in February, which is weird because my birthday's in – "

"Point proven," I interjected, returning to flicking through the pile of parchment with a satisfied grin.

" – October," he looked thoughtful for a moment. "That would explain a lot."

I rolled my eyes as he grinned like some five year old that had just tied his shoelace for the first time.

"Bugger," he said, peering behind my shoulder. I began to twist my head around but he grabbed one of my hands bringing my attention back to him. "One of the prefects is waiting outside.

"Ok, that's lovely," I said sarcastically. I tried to pull my hand out of his grip in vain. He was clutching it tightly. "Can – you – get – off – " He didn't loosen his grasp.

"Look at me, Ravendork," he ordered, so I looked up under heavy-lidded eyes giving him a look of contempt.

I huffed. "Ravendork? Puh-lease! What is it with you and your pathetic insu – "

"I said, there's a prefect standing outside the door," he said, sounding irritated that his point apparently wasn't getting across. Except it was. I completely comprehended that a prefect was standing outside the door. Hemight need someone to repeat something ten times before it penetrates his abnormally thick skull, but I, however, got it the first time.

"I got that, thanks," I told him. "But, it's a prefect not a ruddy dementor, so do you think you could perhaps stop cutting the blood supply off to my fingers?" I said mockingly in a sickeningly sweet voice.

"I said," he repeated, gritting his teeth and still not letting go of my hand. I could barely feel my fingers any more. "There's a – "

"Yes, I KNOW!" I screeched back. "There's a PREFECT!" Scorpius and I locked eyes, and with a raise of his eyebrows and a significant nod of his head I realised what he was trying to say. A prefect outside, meant we had to start acting all lovey-dovey and pathetic. Woop-de-doo.

"Oh…there's a prefect outside," I said grinning, and in an understanding voice.

"What do we do?" he demanded, the grip around my wrist getting more painful than ever.

"Uh…hug?" I suggested.

"Yeah," he said thoughtfully. "Shuffle over, and I'll put my arm around you."

I crinkled my nose. "Eww, no!"

"Rosie…" he said threateningly, frowning at me.

"Sorry," I grinned. "Involuntary reaction." He rolled his eyes as I scooted over to next to where he was sitting and he put a lean arm around my shoulders just in time for the compartment door to slide open and several prefects to traipse in looking miserable that they were back at school after the holidays.

I stood up, taking care not to vomit whilst I gave Scorpius a soppy look and addressed the few prefects that had arrived. "Is this everyone?"

One of the girls nodded, and a fifth year Gryffindor spoke up, "Everyone else is at school."
"Great," I said, the sarcasm in my tone obvious. "Well, you'll have to pass the message on that we're staying with the same patrol partners."

"Lucky me," Scorpius purred, from next to me, rubbing my lower back. I felt my cheeks flush, and several of the girls sat up straighter with their highly tuned gossip sensors picking up everything going on all of a sudden.

"Yes, well," I stammered. "Anyway, we're also having a Valentine's ball and it would be great if some of you could help with the organization, so if any of you want to help you should come and see me or…" I took the time to look at Scorpius and shut my eyelids with a deep sigh when he stared back, licking his lips in a deeply disturbing manner. "…or…" The gossiping fifth year prefect girls giggled, mistaking my reluctance to say his name whilst the owner of the offending name was sitting there trying to look seductive, for love. His attempts failed due to the fact that I generally want to vomit when I see his features anyway – I have no doubt, that if his techniques were applied on another girl they would immediately succumb to his charm. "Or Scorpius."

"There was no need to get tongue-tied," he informed me under his breath, as the prefects left the compartment (the girls looking just about ready to roast me alive with jealousy, at the same time as being delighted about new gossip). "I know I'm amazing, but better girls than you have been speechless around me, so don't let it get you down."
I picked up my schoolbag and shoved him out of the way taking care to swing it into his groin area. I will have to sterilize that bag later, but it was worth it to hear the elaborate collection of swear words that spilled from his mouth when my aim was spot on.

Bingo.