'Cause I may be bad, but I'm perfectly good at it.' - Rihanna, S & M

"OH MOTHERFUCKING GRACE IT'S COLD."

"Wakey wakey time, Allie-poo." Rose sticks her tongue out at me. She is still in her pyjamas, but her ginger shoulder-length hair is now shiny and straight instead of the curly mess it usually is.

"Fuck you." I try to grab the duvet but she holds it out of my reach, leaving me with no option but to get up.

So I get up. And clobber Rose with a pillow, messing up her hair that I know she spent more than an hour on this morning.

"ARGH!"

Oh shit. One rule I should have learnt a long time ago: don't piss off Rose Weasley in the morning.

She jumps on me with a war cry and tackles me to the ground.

We roll about the floor, bumping into the mattresses that Scor, Sander and I slept on, which are pretty soft, but then we knock into all three of the girls' beds.

I'm pretty sure I'll have bruises everywhere by tomorrow.

"STOP CLAWING MY FACE YOU DIRTY WENCH."

"THIS IS PAYBACK FOR MESSING UP MY HAIR."

You know how big my biceps are? Pretty damn big. I work out, for God's sake. But I can't get my practically underweight cousin off me.

"YOUR HAIR WAS MESSY IN THE FIRST PLACE." Okay, I lie; her hair wasn't that bad when I woke up. But now it's a total birds' nest. Success.

"YOU EVIL LITTLE CHOBO." Did I mention that my cousin is completely, utterly, off-the-wall bonkers? She may be the brightest witch of her age, but you wouldn't know it from the amount of crazy jackshit that comes out of her mouth.

At this point I'm not fighting back, just trying to stop her damaging my perfect face.

And my hair.

My hair.

With a furious snarl I manage to throw her off me and back away quickly.

We face each other from across the room like angry predators.

I touch my hair gingerly.

It's all there. Oh thank God. My hair is my saving grace. If my body and face were to somehow go to waste, my hair would save me.

But Rose isn't done trying to kill me. She is fuming. Her hair is puffed around her face like some kind of demented ginger halo, her face is a horrendous tomato red, I can practically see the smoke coming out of her nose…..and she's now got a stiletto in her hand.

Oh this girl plays dirty.

Options flit through my mind.

Charge at her? That's a stiletto she's got in her hand. Those hurt like crazy when they're stuffed up the wrong place. Trust me; I've got too much experience courtesy of a couple of crazy exes.

Dive under a bed? There's no way I would fit under there, and even if I could somehow squish myself in, I wouldn't put it past the mental bint to roll under after me.

So, ever the brave Gryffindor, I make a break for the door. Just as I reach for the handle and can practically taste salvation, it opens from the other side. I am about to cry (manly tears, I assure you), but then realise that the door is now effectively shielding me from the stiletto missile that Rose is about to launch at me. I nearly collapse in relief.

Scorpius walks in with Lysander and Emma, neatly dressed in uniform and smiling, with a steaming cup of coffee in his hand.

Did I ever tell you how much I love that boy?

He spots the feral Weasley in the corner and hesitates.

I step forward and give him a shove towards her.

Rather him than me.

He turns and scowls at me, but then takes a deep breath and turns back to Rose, body tense.

Godric, Scorpius Malfoy has a nice arse when he tenses.

Meh, he's got a nice arse all the time.

The guy in question gently wrestles the shoe from Rose's grip, carefully giving her the coffee instead.

We all watch with baited breath as Rose lifts the cup to her lips.

And drinks.

And drinks.

Then she smiles.

And we all sigh in relief.

Oh Merlin, I love you. More specifically, I love Scorpius Malfoy. I pull him into a very relieved (man) hug for saving me from the monster that is Rose Weasley without her daily caffeine fix.

I then rush to the boys' dorm to get into uniform, style my hair, and escape Rose's slightly reduced wrath once she has finished her coffee.

When we meet in the common room at quarter past eight, thankfully Rose seems to have forgotten our earlier 'disagreement.' Emma has styled her hair quickly, no lengthy straightening necessary, so Rose is now admiring her hair in her compact mirror.

As we walk down to the Great Hall for breakfast, I join Ria who was conspicuously absent during this morning's debacle.

"You know I don't wake up unless there's music playing, so I slept through it." She laughs when I ask her where she was.

"How the hell did you do that? Rose was screaming her head off, bloody drama queen."

"Actually, according to her, you attacked her for no reason, messed up her hair on purpose, and then tried to beat her up, yelling about how you're so jealous of her beautiful hair. Scorpius came in and saved her before you pulled out your machete to cut off her locks."

"She better watch out before I actually pull a machete on her. And it won't just be to cut off her hair."

"Oh you like it kinky do you?"

"Babe, get the handcuffs and I'll show you just how kinky I like it."

Ria grins at me as we slide into our seats at the Gryffindor table. "Sticks and stones may break my bones but chains and whips excite me."

Scor slides in next to her and leans into our conversation. "S and M, huh?"

"It's never too early for sex." I grab a banana and lick it suggestively, winking at him.

"Albus Potter, if you want to eat that banana I suggest you unpeel it first."

I whirl around to see Professor Longbottom. He raises his eyebrows at me.

"Er…..bananas taste better this way, Professor, didn't you know?"

I am so shit at bullshitting.

Scor and Ria are cracking up behind me; no help whatsoever.

Thankfully Emma saves me. "Do you have our schedules, Professor?"

"Oh yes," our Head of House stops looking at me weirdly and instead smiles at his daughter, "Here you go, Em. Try to control Al, won't you?" He shakes his head as he walks away.

I grin. "Prof Longbottom so wants a piece of me."

"Here." She pushes my schedule at me to stop me perving on her dad.

I scan it quickly.

"Looks like I got everything I applied for." Lysander says. "What about you guys?"

"I really wanted to take Earth Magic, but there wasn't enough demand, so it's not being offered as a subject anymore." Rose is actually upset.

Scor grabs her schedule and looks down it whistling quietly. "Ro, you have one free period. Ri and I have four. Why the fuck are you taking so many classes?"

She snatches the paper back, looking affronted. "I don't know what career I want to go into yet. I just want to keep my options open."

"Sweetheart, you'll be great at anything you do."

Rose smiles slightly.

Ladies and gentlemen, presenting Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy, natural charmer extraordinaire.

Then I actually take in what he said. "Hey! How'd you get four free periods? I only got three, and I actually tried to take as few classes as possible!"

Rose scowls at me. Godric, she has mood swings. It's probably her time of the month.

Ria takes my schedule and compares it to her own.

And then she laughs. And laughs.

And I know what she's laughing at.

"Bitch, Ghoul Studies is all the rage right now."

"Ghoul Studies?!" Now Lysander, Scor and Rose are laughing at me too.

I pout. "Em, tell them."

They look at her in shock. "You're taking it too?"

"Yeah," she raises an eyebrow when they dissolve into laughter again, "At least it's more interesting than Arithmancy or Divination."

That shuts up them.

1 point for team Embus.

"I'll have you know that Arithmancy is a well-respected subject." Lysander says in a posh voice, Rose nodding along, "Though I can't say the same for Divination."

"We're taking it 'cos it's easy to ace, so shut your whore mouth." Scor narrows his eyes at him.

Maybe he's on his time of the month too.

"BLACKSTER!" Oh fucking hell, not him again.

Ria beams and springs up. "J-DAWG!"

Then she and my brother run towards each other in slow motion and he pulls her into a hug, twirling her off the ground.

And no, I don't even pretend to understand the weird relationship James and Ria have, but I do remember the first time they met.

After our eventful Sorting and Welcome Feast in first year, we were all following Melinda Brass, the then Gryffindor prefect with perfect legs, up to see our common room for the first time, when Lauren Zyke, a dumb Slytherin in our year, stopped us with a few poorly chosen words.

"Hey, Malfoy. How come you're not in Slytherin? Wasn't your father a Death Eater or something? Heard he massacred a load of people in the War, the evil douchebag."

She may be a bitch, but she gives good head when drunk.

Scorpius tensed and Lysander, ever good at reading emotions, quickly stepped in and held him back. Not that Scor would have hit her. The guy's too bloody charming to ever hit a girl.

But in a whirl of black hair and robes, Zyke was clutching a bloody nose and screaming her head off while Ria proceeded to rearrange her face.

"STOP, STOP, SOMEONE MAKE HER STOP." Zyke's still a coward. She really should have seen it coming.

"YOU CUNT." Yes, even in first year, Ria knew the worst swear words. "DON'T YOU EVER INSULT DRACO MALFOY IN FRONT OF ME."

Back in first year, Lysander was still the tall (slightly smaller then), skinny guy he is now, but Scor, while hot, was also tiny, which is why Lysander managed to hold Scor back from diving into the fray and preventing his best friend from committing murder.

I was just standing back and enjoying a good girl fight (not that Ria fights like a girl. She could even give me a good run for my money in a fight), which is why I was pissed when my do-gooder brother charged in and pulled Ria off Lauren. He held her while Lauren ran away, and somehow managed to calm her down.

And ever since that day, James and Ria have always been close.