Professor McGonagall had sent a note home to the families of third years over the summer informing them that they would be covering Voldemort's second rise to power that year in history of magic, so Rose and Albus' parents had taken upon themselves to inform them of their involvement before they had to hear it from Binns, their monotonous history professor.
Rose had been shocked, to say the least. She always knew her family had fought against him, but that they had left Hogwarts 7th year to destroy his horcruxes? (It was hard enough to imagine her mom leaving Hogwarts early at all.) And Uncle Harry was the one that finally killed him? She always thought the scar was a Quidditch accident.
James had approached them afterwards. "Welcome to the club. I need all signatures and weird doohickies of our parents' you can scavenge. I'm selling them on this weird website thing Grandpa showed me. You get 70% on anything you bring." Rose hadn't brought him anything, because frankly that felt a bit weird, but that night Albus asked both his parents to write and sign a note saying he was allowed to take "Care of Magical Creatures", even though Rose knew for a fact a note was not required.
So she knew already when they started going over it, but some of her classmates obviously didn't because after the first day they started treating Albus more like a god than usual, which was saying something—he was the best seeker in a decade, and Rose found herself in more company than normal, to the point where it was a bit suffocating.
And then they got to the point in the unit where Draco Malfoy joined the Death Eaters.
That day was double history with Slytherin, so Rose had a full view of Scorpius in a corner with his head in his hands and the entire class, Slytherin and Hufflepuff alike, glaring at him as if the sins of his father had all been placed on him.
After class was dismissed, everybody stopped looking at Scorpius, only to all flock to Rose to ask more questions about her parents. She saw Scorpius seize the opportunity and nearly flew from the room like a bee.
"Hey, so sorry," she said to the crowd. "I gotta go...bathroom. Bye!"
And she flew from the room like a bee going after its friend.
She found him in a corner with a book on charms pulled out. His face was tight and his eyes didn't move across the page.
"Hey," she said, gently touching his shoulder.
Scorpius looked up at her immediately and all the anger they both half expected to come boiling over at her just didn't come. In fact, the anger faded as he looked at her face.
"It's not as if anyone really talked to me before, anyway. So no loss."
"Did you know?"
"Yeah. He's really sorry about it. Always told me to watch my choices, showed me his dark mark just before I left first year to make sure I remembered. Did you know?"
"Not about your dad."
He groaned. "You must hate me."
"No, I really don't. I know you, and you're not bad. And your dad…well, you just said he was sorry. Those were hard times. He was really young."
"He was as old as your uncle."
"But he didn't have friends."
Scorpius looked straight into her eyes for the longest time and everything was calm and slow and right.
"That's true," he said, eyes locked tight onto hers.
Rose leaned her head back against the wall, all the while refusing to break eye contact.
"We make all the difference to each other, you know? We make each other's worlds. We make each other think, show each other who we are. Friends are a wizard's greatest treasure." She laughed softly. "Rose Weasley."
Scorpius actually smiled a bit.
"We can get matching t-shirts," he murmured, then glued his eyes right back to the same spot on his book.
Rose smiled, and nudged him until he met her eyes again. "Yeah."
They stared at each other, until Rose felt Scorpius slowly drift forward. Her heart started racing, and without knowing at all what was going on, she rested her head on his shoulder, so he couldn't lean any more. She could hear his heartbeat in his neck, it was just as fast as hers. She felt his hand brush hers and somehow they ended up holding each other. Scorpius laid his head on hers. He let out a low, once syllable laugh.
"What?" Rose asked, suddenly worried.
"Nothing," he said, "Treasure makes me think of pirates, so I was picturing you in an eye patch."
Rose laughed so hard her head ended up falling into Scorpius' lap.
"And you! With a parrot following you!" She gasped for air. "Merlin, if it's supposed to be repeating you, that'll be the quietest parrot on the sea!"
She kept on laughing her head off and eventually Scorpius found it contagious.
When the laughter finally died down, Scorpius absently used his free hand to brush a red curl out of Rose's face, his book now on the floor beside him.
Rose's smile lingered, until she suddenly realized what was happening.
Rose shot up, almost knocking heads with Scorpius.
"I should go." She said frantically, as if she may forget if she waited a few more moments to say it. "People will wonder where I am."
"Of course." Scorpius tried to work his face back to its normal bored-looking state. "I'll... See you around Rose."
"See you around," she called back.