Chapter Nine

…

20th October (continued)

The Gryffindor Common Room

21:oo hours

…

'Hey Rose, want to go watch Al being shot down by Lizzie?'

'No.'

'How about sneaking down to the kitchens to steal food?'

'No, you go.'

'Do you want company and a fresh bottle of firewhiskey?'

'See Scorp, this is why we're friends?'

…

'Lils, I'm worried about Rose.'

'This is the first match she's ever lost, she was bound to take it hard. Let her be, Erin. There's nothing we can do.'

'She's singing Odo the Hero.'

'And she's only had half a bottle? Blimey! She must be depressed.'

…

'You played really well today Lily. Shame about McClaggen though.'

'Thanks Keegan, you were great yourself. I thought you were going to be sick when we walked out onto the pitch, but you were amazing.'

'I honestly thought I was going to pass out when Coach Hendrix told us to mount our brooms.'

'But you didn't, and that's the main thing.'

'Is Rose going to be okay?'

'Honestly? I don't know. The last time she got this drunk she kissed Scorpius so who knows what will happen?'

'She did what?'

'Don't you remember? It was the year before last I think. Right before she passed out she kissed him. Didn't remember a thing of course, the amount she drank. Broke poor Scorpius's heart.'

'I remember hearing about that. I'd forgotten he used to be crazy about her.'

…

'And Odo the Hero, they bore him back home-'

'-to the place that he'd known as a lad.'

'And they laid him to rest with his had inside out-'

'-And his wand snapped in two-'

'-Which was sad!'

…

'Looks like Scorpius has given up being the responsible one.'

'Hey Erin, come sit with us. Yes, though I didn't know he could carry a tune.'

'Thanks Lily. Surprising isn't it? Would never have pegged him for a musical type?'

'What I'm wondering is where they got all those bottles from. There's enough there to drink a reasonably-sized troll under the table.'

'What do you think Keegan? If you can't beat them, join them?'

'I thought you'd never ask.'

…

22:oo hours

...

The portrait hole swung open to reveal Mack McClaggen who had disappeared after he had been ousted, with so little attempt at servility, from the team. He had the slightly cornered expression of one expecting a thrashing, or at least a well-aimed stinging jinx, and, once through the portrait hole, set off for the seventh year boy's dormitory at a pace akin to a light jog. Still, he had hardly made it a quarter of the way across the common room when a hush descended, from the team, the seventh years, right down to the tiniest first year. Even Rose and Scorpius's mournful lament died away.

Mack didn't go red, but nor would he meet the accusatory eyes of his house. Another few steps – he was near to the staircase leading up to the boy's dormitories – when a parchment aeroplane dive bombed the back of his head. A scrunched up piece of parchment, this time less elegantly spelled and instead just lobbed with brute strength, followed.

'Is it wrong that I'm kind of enjoying this?' Albus asked Lizzie who, despite her less than red-and-gold tie, was always in and out of the Gryffindor common room. (First as family friend, then as honorary Gryffindor, then as girlfriend of James Potter, then as Head Girl.)

The two heads were sat, very deliberately looking in the other direction as the dejected Gryffindors dealt their own silent revenge.

'House pride.' Lizzie replied. 'That the house would protect the first Gryffindor Malfoy, over the sixth Gryffindor McClaggen is wonderful to see. Perhaps people have shorter memories than we suppose.'

'Where quidditch is concerned, I definitely agree.' Albus answered, idly levitating a few crumpled balls of parchment into the fire.

They sat for a few moments more, ignoring the carnage behind them, and Albus looked at Lizzie's hand which was resting on the table, mere inches from his own.

But she's James ex-girlfriend, he thought miserably. If I'd had the courage to ask her before he did- But he hadn't, and so he was reduced to staring at her hands, small with neat half-moon nails, a cut from herbology on her thumb.

As though sensing the direction of his gaze, she withdrew her hands and folded them in her lap, shifting herself slightly.

'Should we stop them yet?'

'If McClaggen is stupid enough to hang around in the common room, then he deserves all he gets', Al said unfeelingly. 'He could have seriously hurt Scorpius, brain damage even.'

'I was actually-' A textbook flew past them, '-thinking more about the state of your common room-' Another crash and this time they both looked around, trying to find the source of the noise. '-And the amount of poorly aimed furniture that is currently flying through the air!'

They both sprang to their feet as someone, it was difficult to work out who through the chaos, levitated a chair at the far wall, and, with a crash, the legs fell off.

'ENOUGH!'

Though Al had opened his mouth to bellow, Rose had gotten there first.

'Let him go. He is not worthy of our time.'

It was apparent the respect (and fear) Rose garnered within her house when the whole common room fell silent. Even the diving aeroplanes ceased their descent, hovering in mid-air.

'He's not even worth it.' Rose muttered, and sank back down in her chair.

McClaggen took the opportunity to scurry upstairs.

…

22:3o hours

...

'Do you want to go to bed?'

It took Rose the best part of an entire minute to work out what Scorpius had said, and even then it took her still longer to remove the unspoken insinuation.

She nodded slowly, attempting to form words and giving up. Instead she allowed Scorpius, who was considerably less drunk than she was, to pull her to her feet, to wrap an arm around her waist, and to more or less carry her across the common room. When they reached the staircase leading to the girl's dormitory Scorpius froze, unsure on how to proceed.

Rose was clearly in no state to traverse the stairs without a fair amount of help, and as Scorpius couldn't go up without turning them into a helter-skelter of doom, he changed direction, leading her towards the boy's dormitory.

The curtains around Mack's bed were tightly pulled, and Keegan and Al were still in the common room, their beds were empty. Sean was snoring lightly, deeply asleep.

'Scorpius?'

'I'm here. I'm going to get you into bed okay? Then I'll sleep on the floor.'

Scorpius wrangled her onto the mattress, and pulled off her shoes, then hurried to the bathroom to pour a glass of water which, after a little encouragement, she downed.

'Scorpius-' One of Rose's arms flailed slightly, catching him in the stomach. Her hand curled into the fabric of the shirt he had changed into after his shower. 'Don't leave...'

When they'd been kids, just starting at Hogwarts, Rose used to get nightmares sometimes and crawl into bed with Albus. Then one day, when Albus was in the Hospital Wing with a shattered knee (lesson learned, and to this day he never went near the Whomping Willow again), she crawled in with her new best friend.

Scorpius hadn't known what to do, never having sisters or brothers. But instead of kicking her out, he passed her his handkerchief, and rolled over so she could have some blankets.

As the years passed Rose grew out of her nightmares, but when things were really bad, she still crawled in beside him. Like that night back at the end of fifth year. The night she had kissed him and Scorpius had thought his heart might explode through his chest. He'd hugged her close all night, and when she'd woken in the morning, he'd waited with baited breath-

And she hadn't remembered anything. And his heart was broken al over again.

He'd never told anyone about the long-standing crush on Rose, though he had suspected that he wasn't the subtlest of fifteen year-olds. But after that night, he gave up hoping that he might be anything more to her than friends. That summer he finally stopped hoping and said yes, when Isabelle asked him out for coffee. That was the summer, he told himself now, that he grew up.

'Don't leave me.' She murmured now, and Scorpius slipped under the blankets next to her, drawing the curtains closed. She clung to him, burying her face in his chest, and he wrapped his arms around her, until the quiet regular sighs of her breathing told him that she'd fallen asleep.

…

23:oo hours

…

'I can't stand this any longer. I'm going to bed.' Erin set her barely-touched glass down on the floor by her seat and stood, running a hand through her dreads.

It was as though Erin's departure had triggered the exodus as dejected Gryffindors decided, too, to call it the end of a miserable day. A few grimaced understandingly at Albus, Lizzie, Lucy, Lily and Keegan who were huddled by the fire, but many averted their eyes, not wanting to humiliate the team any further. Soon the common room cleared, leaving only the four by the fire, occasionally passing around a bottle of butterbeer.

It was only when Lucy fell asleep in her chair that Lizzie offered to put her to bed before heading back to the Hufflepuff dormitories. Once they were gone, Albus departed too, having only stayed to be near Lizzie. That left Lily and Keegan alone by the fire.

Due to the cramped nature of the common room earlier when nearly the whole house had squashed in to commiserate in numbers, Lily had perched herself on the arm of Keegan's chair, idly swinging her legs. Now, despite the empty chairs, she hadn't moved.

Keegan was watching the fire when she broke the silence.

'Are you sad that we lost?'

'I guess', he replied. 'I'm more sad for Rose than anything, because this meant so much to her. But mostly I'm just glad that I got to spend so much time with you guys. Especially you.'

He hadn't meant to let this slip, and he felt Lily turn to look at him but he continued to stare resolutely at the fire.

Perhaps it was the quiet, or the butterbeer, but for some reason he kept talking.

'You know I tried out for the team so I could talk to you. Sounds slightly creepy, though I don't mean it that way-' He tried to work out where he was going with this unsolicited speech, decided he didn't know, and kept going anyway. '-But I could never work up the courage to talk to you. I was the geek in my year, and you were so popular...'

He trailed off and finally looked up at her. Her eyes were a dark brown, flecked with gold, and she was watching him, not with repulsion but with something he couldn't place.

'Keegan', she said slowly. 'I think you better kiss me now.'

'Are you sure?' He whispered, and she leaned into him.

'I'm very sure.'

Kissing Lily was everything Keegan had ever hoped and more. The feel of her soft lips against his own, the silky texture of her hair against his fingers, then tugging her forwards so she was splayed across his laps, her own fingers knotting into his hair. His glasses were steaming up, and they kept bumping into Lily's nose, but neither of them seemed to care.

They might have kissed for minutes, hours, or even several moonlit nights, but when they pulled apart, Lily seemed as disorientated as he did.

Keegan desperately sought around his befuddled brain for something to say and before he could think his tongue was blurting:

'Did you want another tutoring session at some point?'

Lily reached up and pushed a curly spring of hair off his forehead, then slid his glasses from his nose, sliding them onto her own.

Through the blur that was now his world, he saw her eyes, framed large and beautiful.

'I want it now', she whispered, and leant forwards to kiss him again.

A.N.

Just a short one I know, but I wanted to upload this on Sunday as promised.

What did you think? I couldn't help myself – I really wanted to put a kiss in this chapter! Did anyone get the Hinny reference?

Review!

Love and hugs

A.A.A.