Rose and Scorpius 19 years later

by Slytherpuff and proud

Rose Weasley, Albus Potter and Scorpius Malfoy begin their time at Hogwarts. But will the reputations their parents left stop them from ever getting along? Or will their mutual belief in finding their own paths bring them together? Please enjoy. I aim to write at least 8 or 9 chapters.

4. Chapter 4 FOURTH YEAR

FOURTH YEAR. 22 YEARS LATER

DIAGON ALLEY, TWO DAYS BEFORE SCHOOL STARTS

"Potter." Draco Malfoy nodded to Albus as they walked past each other in Flourish and Blotts.

"Hi." Albus greeted back with a smile. To be honest, Scorpius's dad scared him. As soon as Draco was out of earshot Albus sighed with relief only to be startled by Scorpius's sudden tap on the shoulder. "Merlin's beard you made me jump!"

Scorpius just smiled.

"Wanna walk around outside for a bit?" Albus suggested as the shop became busier and he could see Scorpius's dad coming closer, he did not want another awkward encounter.

"Sure."

The two friends exited the book shop, and what they saw across the street didn't exactly thrill them. Rose was sitting in Florean Fortescue, the ice-cream shop, with Felix Stirling. She was smiling while he talked and talked and talked.

Lily ran past the window but stopped to wave at Rose, who waved enthusiastically back. Hugo was trailing behind Lily and just nodded, not wanting to interfere with his sister's date.

"Albus! Scorpius!" A loud voice cheerfully shouted at them from behind.

Both boys quickly spun to see Albus's cousin Molly, who had finished at Hogwarts but had decided to spend the day with her family, charging up to them. "Hey guys!" she pulled them in for a group hug. "Come on Lucy! Greet your cousin and our friend!"

Her sister Lucy who was now in her sixth year in Ravenclaw came slowly up behind her. "I haven't seen you in a while Albus." Lucy smiled and gave him a quick side hug. She nodded at Scorpius and politely asked how his summer was. Lucy was very smart and slightly boring. She was like a stricter version of her father, Percy Weasley. And the exact opposite to her loud and very friendly older sister.

"Molly, are you still dating Merlin?" Albus asked, genuinely interested in his cousin.

"Oh, well, he's great Albus." Molly didn't seem convinced.

"And what do the parents think of him?"

"I actually think Uncle George is more excited that I'm dating Merlin Jordan. Dad and Merlin get along fine, mum really likes him." Molly didn't seem to be as enthusiastic as before

"And what does Lucy think?" Albus directed this question to Lucy herself.

"I think he's very loud, he never stops laughing, he's overly friendly" Lucy sounded as if she was criticising him "and, well, perfect for my sister." she finished with a smile.

Albus saw his Uncle Percy making his way towards his daughters so Albus left Scorpius's side to go and greet him. Molly and Lucy rushed off too, in Molly's case it was because she saw Merlin and quickly walked in the other direction, in Lucy's case she wanted to buy more books. Scorpius was left alone and couldn't help but turn and watch Rose on her date. They were now coming out of Florean Fortescue and as Rose spotted Scorpius, they made their way towards him.

"Hi Malfoy! I just wanted to say hi, I know you're a friend of Rose's so I thought it best not to ignore you, even though we are on a date." Felix said very enthusiastically then looked at Rose expectantly.

"Oh, hi Scorpius." Rose lifted one hand in a sort of wave as she smiled, although the smile wasn't forced.

"Ooh! I just saw my friend Finley Norwood, I need to go and say hi." Felix rushed out quickly and left Rose with Scorpius.

"How was the rest of your summer?" Rose asked.

Scorpius shrugged. "It was ok, I spent more time with Albus than usual which is nice. Hugo actually came to visit much of the time I was there, we started to get along really well."

Rose grinned. "Yeah, he said. He really likes you, I think he's heard a lot about your quidditch skills from Albus and kind of looks up to you. Are you going to tryout this year?"

"Maybe next year." Scorpius looked over Rose's shoulder and saw Felix practically buzzing on his feet as he greeted many of his Hufflepuff friends. Rose turned to see what he was looking at. "Really Rose? Him? He's a bit springy for you isn't he?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" Rose frowned.

"He's very excitable. Won't you eventually find that annoying?"

"What? Scorpius!" Rose lightly hit his arm. "I thought that if there's one person who won't criticise my relationship with Felix, it was going to be you." Rose sighed. "The truth is, I like him. Yeah he's a bit cheerful but I guess I like that. My family don't really like him and I was counting on you to not hate on him, at least not out loud and to my face."

Scorpius shrugged. "I can try and be supportive, but I think you can do better."

Rose rolled her eyes. "You know what? I'll talk to you later." she did not sound pleased with him. "Felix was going to take me to Cranville Quincy's Magical junk shop."

Scorpius made a face.

"What? The owner is his grandfather." Rose rolled her eyes again and walked off to find Felix.

Scorpius saw her near the group which surrounded Felix, Finley Norwood was there and he shot Rose an angry look. Rose had made him fall, get covered in mud and changed is hair to lime green, (along with his friend Daniel Leyton who was in Ravenclaw,) just last year. Finley had also fallen asleep in history class in their first year so Rose made random objects fly around his head, eventually the entire class joined in, and only then did Professor Binns notice the sleeping student. Once Binns shouted at Finley to wake up, all the objects hovering around him fell on Finley's head. It was safe to assume he hated Rose.

Albus, Lily, James, Roxanne, Fred, Dominique, Hugo and some young blonde kid Scorpius didn't know, suddenly appeared around him. They were all watching Rose and Felix walking towards the junk shop. Felix was very bouncy whereas Rose had her arms folded and was walking at a brisk pace. But she was still smiling.

"How's Rose doing on her date?" Roxanne asked nosily.

Scorpius shrugged.

"Well, she seems to like him." Fred said.

"Please, it's her first boyfriend." James scoffed. "Everyone thinks they like their first relationship at the beginning. Then it all goes down hill within a few weeks."

"A few weeks?! You think they'll last that long?" Hugo seemed slightly alarmed.

"It's her first boyfriend-" Lily spoke up. She was interrupted by James.

"Just said that Lils, keep up."

Lilly gave a short huff. "Let me finish bogey breath." she gave James a small shove. "It's her first boyfriend, we should leave her alone."

"I agree with Lily." Dominique wrapped an arm around Lilly. "Besides, I see Stirling a lot around the Hufflepuff common room. He's really nice, Rose picked a pretty good guy as her first boyfriend."

James scoffed. "You would say that."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Dominique stood straighter defensively.

"I get it." Fred nodded at James in understanding. "Your such a Hufflepuff. Loyal to your cousin's privacy and to your fellow housemates."

"That's not a bad thing."

Fred shrugged. "Never said it was."

"Is it bad to be in Hufflepuff?" the young blonde boy held on to Dominique's arm.

"Of course not Louis." Dominique looked proud. "Hufflepuffs are fiercely loyal. And I mean fierce. You don't ever want to mess with a Hufflepuff."

Louis looked back and forth between all his cousins. They were all nodding. Although they were all, except Albus, Lucy and Dominique, in Gryffindor, they knew not to anger a Hufflepuff. But it was still ok to make jokes, Hufflepuffs are cool like that.

"Actually, that guy Rose covered in mud and turned his hair green last year is in Hufflepuff and I hate him." Roxanne said.

"Oh, Finley Norwid or Norwood, he's a bit bitter about being put in Hufflepuff and so he's pretty much moody all the time." Dominique had to agree that there were some exceptions to the general rule that Hufflepuffs were cool.

"Oh, hi, I'm Louis." The young blonde kid stuck out his hand for Scorpius to shake. "I'm Dominique and Victoire's little brother. This is my first time going to Hogwarts."

Scorpius smiled and nodded. "Scorpius Malfoy, fourth year Slytherin." he introduced himself.

"Oh! You're Albus's friend! Hi." Louis beamed up.

Albus lazily rested his elbow on Scorpius's shoulder. "This here is my best mate. Be nice." Albus mockingly warned his cousin.

Fred let out a small laugh. "Can you ever imagine Louis not being nice?"

They all shook their heads.

"So anyway, back to Rose's first date." Roxanne interrupted the nice family moment.

"What about it?" Dominique asked.

Roxanne shrugged. "I thought we weren't finished talking about it. Ooh! You're going to have to be our eyes and ears Dom."

"What? Why?" Dominique was slightly outraged

"You're the only one in Hufflepuff, we need to keep an eye on Stirling." Fred understood where his sister was coming from.

"Nosey Gryffindors." Dominique mumbled. She new that there would be nothing to report on Felix as he was genuinely a nice guy but she decided to agree with them for Rose and for lack of argument. A thought suddenly occurred to her. "Does this mean that Felix will be her first kiss?"

"Nosey Hufflepuff." James mumbled mockingly only loud enough for Dominique to hear, she rolled her eyes at him.

"Well, ask Lily." Fred shrugged.

"What?" Lily suddenly looked away from Rose and Felix who disappeared into the junk shop

"Rose tells you everything right?" Albus looked at her knowingly.

Lilly nodded.

"Is Stirling going to be Rose's first kiss?" Roxanne asked excitedly and flicked her short black hair.

"Guys, she's our cousin! Lets give her some privacy." was all Lily said in reply.

Scorpius couldn't look at any of them. He stared at his feet thinking about his and Rose's first kiss back in their second year.

The group of cousins dropped the subject as George and Angelina came looking for Fred and Roxanne, then Fluer and Bill came to get Dominique some new books and Louis his robes. Each of them greeted their nieces and nephews as they left to continue shopping.

"It's weird that we're all here at the same time." Hugo suspiciously remarked.

Hugo, Lily, James, Albus and Scorpius were walking towards the ice-cream parlour.

"No it's not." James rolled his eyes.

"Hugo, you idiot, you were there when Uncle George and grandma planned it!" Lily gave an exasperated sigh. "Remember? We're all meeting up, after we go shopping, in the Leaky Cauldron."

"Oh, yeah." Hugo laughed at himself.

"Hugo! Where have you been?! Young man I told you not to go running off, we need to buy you new robes." Hermione crossly shouted across the street as she charged out of Quality Quiddich Supplies.

Scorpius was confused as to why she was in there, as far as he knew Hugo and Rose didn't play quidditch.

"But mum," Hugo complained as he met her in the middle of the street. "I hate buying robes! That old lady always pinches my cheeks."

Lily, Albus and James chuckled behind Hugo.

"It doesn't matter. You're growing very quickly and so you need new robes."

"Bye guys." Hugo sighed as his mother dragged him off.

"Hey Lils, you never answered whether or not Felix will be Rose's first kiss." James smirked.

Scorpius's head snapped to the left so that he could look anywhere but at the other three.

James neglected to notice his parents standing behind him.

"I don't think that is anyones business but her own." Harry said dryly. Then he looked up and smiled at Lily. He had saved her from answering.

Lily looked at Scorpius but didn't say anything. She noticed he had looked away both times she was asked this question. Scorpius couldn't work out if Lily only suspected him or if Rose had actually told her.

"Nice to see you again Scorpius." Ginny called back as she and her family walked away. The family were so busy that they had forgotten to greet him properly until after they left his side.

"Save a seat on the train!" Albus shouted at Scorpius.

Draco suddenly appeared at Scorpius's side. "We need to leave soon."

Scorpius peered around his father to see his mother.

"Your grandfather was in a mood when we left, I'm worried for Petit." Astoria checked her watch twice.

TRAIN TO HOGWARTS

Scorpius was trying to find Albus on the train when Lloyd Parkinson ran straight into him.

"Well well well. If it isn't Malfoy."

Scorpius sighed.

"So I heard Weasel is dating some Hufflepuff."

Scorpius smirked. "What's it to you?"

"I guess that means you're out. She'll no longer have time for you."

"Shut up Parkinson, he's just her first boyfriend." Scorpius regretted his words straight away. "Get out of my way." He tried to leave.

Lloyd laughed "My, my. This is interesting. You really hate her having a boyfriend don't you? Wow, I am loving this. You know, if the happy couple ever really annoy you, there are plenty of Slytherins you could hang out with. Those of us who are not, how shall I say, below your status."

Scorpius just gritted his teeth and shoved past Lloyd. He was more annoyed that Lloyd's stirring had got to him.

Lloyd just laughed as Scorpius stormed off to find Albus.

Meanwhile Rose sat in a compartment with Felix and his twin sister, Robin Stirling who was in Ravenclaw. Robin didn't particularly like Rose as she was close with Finley Norwood.

"You know, Finley normally sits with us on the train. But he refused to be in the same compartment as you." Robin stirred

Rose had to do everything in her power not to roll her eyes.

"Oh, Finley's just in a weird mood right now. He'll be back to normal and be good friends with Rose in no time!" Felix seemed to be in denial that Rose an Finley would never get over the incident last year.

Robin, seeing that her first attempt to make Rose look bad failed, had another go. "Your hair looks pretty Rose," her voice was too sickly sweet, her snarling was picked up on straight away by Rose. Felix on the other hand thought his sister was being lovely. "It looks like an orange bush." Robin gave a small laugh. "Twigs and all."

Robin then stared smugly out the window as Rose indeed found three twigs stuck in the back of her hair. Rose had been sitting outside reading before they had left for the station.

"Hey, now your going out with Rose," Robin feigned enthusiasm. "We can work together in class!" Felix lit up in excitement, thrilled to see his sister liking Rose even if it he didn't realise she was making her sarcasm too obvious. "Yeah, she'll come in handy when I forget my text books, I'll just get her to start talking and the whole bloody boring book will come flooding out for everyone to hear."

Rose distracted herself by standing as she felt herself wanting to reach for her wand and hex Robin. Rose new she needed to get out so she muttered some excuse about finding Lily. Once out of the compartment Rose realised she didn't really have anywhere to go so she actually did what she had said, she went in search of Lily.

She was quickly moving down the corridor, taking quick glances into compartments. She saw Lloyd Parkinson sulking around his friends as she went past him, she saw Roxanne with a bunch of her friends, she saw the girls from her dormitory (of which only Phil waved enthusiastically back) and she saw Mae Blinston with her friends flicking her hair a flirting with some blonde guy…

Rose stopped.

She took a few steps back and took a proper look through the compartment window.

Scorpius had been dragged from the corridor, on his way to find Albus, by Mae Blinston. Once sat down with her, she and her friends giggled and gossiped while he sat awkwardly staring out the window. Mae started flicking her hair, which annoyed him but he decided to ignore because they were friends. It was a shock when Rose appeared in the window, he knew she hated Mae. He knew Mae and her friends were horrible to Rose, but it wasn't like he could escape them. The group of girls were in his year and in his house, he practically had every lesson with them! And saw them all the time in the common room. Scorpius thought it best to get along with housemates, even if it meant ignoring their constant bullying of a friend.

Rose took a deep breath and sent Scorpius a death look. Scorpius pretended as though he hand't seen Rose.

Mae and her friends giggled at Rose. When the ginger stormed off, Mae leaned and said to her friends.

"I guess I can feel sorry for the ugly nerd," she sighed insincerely. "14 years old and still looking like that. I mean if my hair was that disfigured, I'd do the decent thing and hide it under a paper bag so no one has to look at it." the blonde flicked her hair again.

Scorpius stood and left without an explanation to Mae and her friends. Scorpius had to find Albus and tell him that Rose probably wouldn't be speaking to him for the next week as she caught him being friends with an arch-enemy.

SECOND WEEK OF SCHOOL

Louis had been put in Hufflepuff with his sister Dominique which pleased him very much. But you could always see Louis in the Gryffindor common room as he had made good friends with some Gryffindors in his year and he always loved seeing James and Lorcan plan their next funny prank.

Rose and Felix had been going out for three weeks which shocked many people as they seemed complete opposites. Rose was smart and always had her hand up in class to answer questions. Felix stayed quiet in class so not to draw attention to his lack of understanding. Rose loved to read in her spare time. Felix loved to talk. Rose hated mornings. Felix always woke up early and asked any Gryffindor he could find that was also up, to knock on Rose's door and ask her to come and see him. Something which never thrilled Rose, whereas Felix thought he was being romantic. Rose didn't like spending too much time with Felix as she loved quiet time to herself. Felix never wanted to be away from Rose and loved holding hands. When someone made fun of Rose she hexed them or shouted insults back. When someone made fun of Felix he tried to be more positive and friendly to that person, that's how he originally became friends with Finley Norwood. But no one made fun of Felix anymore as they were met with the angry eyes of Rose Weasley and it was best not to cross her unless you wanted your bag to start attacking you or your hair to turn green with white spots.

Rose wasn't a bully, but she was short tempered. If someone was bored, and it was usually Finley Norwood, they would wind up Rose. Rose usually only hexed someone if they were annoying her or being mean to others.

Rose saw these differences and thought them a good thing, at first. Felix denied any differences and insisted Rose was perfect. Such a high opinion freaked Rose out a bit, she knew she wasn't perfect and so was afraid of doing something that destroyed Felix's image of her.

Albus and Scorpius were walking out of their muggle studies lesson when they were suddenly pulled into an empty corridor.

"Woah, whats going on?" Albus was disorientated. He turned around and smiled. "Rose? What's with all the sneaking around?"

"I kind of miss hanging around with you guys." Rose answered truthfully

"Felix driving you crazy?" asked Albus

"No, well, kind of. I really like him but he always wants us to hang out together or with his friends. Plus, he's always complementing me." Rose slumped to the floor.

Albus chuckled. "Really?"

"Yeah, apparently I have nice nostrils. Did you know that?"

Scorpius and Albus shrugged at each other and joined her on the floor. They had all jus finished their last lesson of the day and had an hour before dinner.

"Why are you still with him Rose? He's your first boyfriend, no one really expected you guys to last this long." said Scorpius.

Rose scowled and Albus elbowed him in the stomach.

"I don't care what other people expect. I like Felix, and I've tried setting up ground rules like I want to be left alone for at least an hour everyday but every time he speaks, all he ends up saying is a compliment. And he's so nice, I don't know if saying I want to be away from him briefly, will hurt him. I mean, have you ever seen him sad?"

"Actually, no I haven't. Wow, that kid is cheerful enough to even rival Hugo." Albus smiled.

"Anyway, lets not talk about me. I want to hang out with you guys. So what's been going on?"

"Not much, Mae is being super friendly to Scorpius." Albus replied. Rose rolled her eyes.

"Rose, you know that muggle children's book you were reading?" Scorpius changed the subject.

"Yeah, 'Alice in Wonderland.' "

"I was doing some research on it, then we were talking about muggle literature in class today, and I was wondering if I could borrow it sometime?"

"Sure! You're going to love it! I'll ask mum to send it in the post."

"Thanks."

Albus realised that they were still sitting in the middle of a corridor

"Wait, Rose, you want us to hang out in a corridor?" Albus raised his eyebrows.

"Well I saw Felix was the first to leave your muggle studies class, he's probably out looking for me now and he's not going to look for me back here, so I won't see him until after dinner!" Rose said smugly, proud of her plan.

"You're going through all this trouble to get away from him? Rose, if he's that clingy, he doesn't deserve you." Scorpius tried to sound comforting but instead he just sounded mean.

"Oh shut up Scorpius." Rose rolled her eyes. "I actually think he's too nice and I don't deserve him."

"Well, your opinion is wrong." Scorpius stood up and looked down at Rose.

She stood to match his eye level. "So my opinion doesn't matter? You know what, your opinion doesn't matter. He's my boyfriend, so stay out of it."

"I'm not saying your opinion doesn't matter, I'm just saying it's wrong. I'm your friend, I'm trying to make you see that Felix is a mistake."

"A friend would let me make this, so called mistake, because they would understand that I really like Felix." Rose took a step forward.

"Albus, back me up and tell her that Felix is wrong for her."

"Albus, tell Scorpius to stay out of my personal life."

They both looked at Albus expectantly. He was still sitting on the floor.

Albus gave an awkward look to the both of them and shrugged. "I'm staying out of this."

Rose stared at Scorpius angrily, then huffed. "I'm going to find Lily. If I'm lucky I can get to the common room without running into Felix and Lily can keep everyone away from me while I sit and read."

Unluckily Felix did find her. He was waiting right outside the Gryffindor Common room door. The fat lady portrait was glaring at him. The fat lady was the first to speak to Rose.

"Young lady, I don't like this thing drooping around. Get rid of it." She made a shooing motion at Felix, who only laughed.

"She's been like that the whole time. She's a real character."

The fat lady huffed and stormed off into another painting. Rose could not get into the common room without the fat lady at her portrait. She was now stuck with Felix.

"How are you?" Felix asked. "I missed you."

Rose let out an uncomfortable laugh. "I'm fine."

"I'm glad that you're fine. You're so wonderful Rose that you deserve to be more than feeling fine. Tell me about your day!"

"My whole day?" Rose grimaced.

"Absolutely!"

"Well, how about another time? Right now I think I want to go in and see my cousins."

Rose started scanning the nearby paintings in search of the fat lady.

"Alright, if you insist." Felix wouldn't stop smiling. It irritated Rose. "But you are the most kind, generous and caring person I know and you need to tell me how I can make your day."

'Leave me alone.' Rose thought but only grunted quietly out loud. She was still searching for the fat lady when Felix popped his head very close to hers, his chin just centimetres from her shoulder. It startled Rose and she instinctively moved to grab her wand but stopped herself halfway.

"Whatcha thinking?" Felix asked with a curious grin.

"That I hate it when people make me jump. It makes me want to hex them nastily." Rose grumbled. That was not reaction she was hoping for, Rose could only guess that she wanted to make herself seem bad so that Felix could find at least one flaw. "Oh dear, did I cross a line by thinking about hexing someone for practically no reason?"

"Yes you did. You crossed a line right into my heart. I'm not s huge fan of being startled either! Merlin, we have so much in common!" Felix held Rose's hand and she pulled away.

Then she spotted the fat lady who was back in her portrait. Rose practically sprinted to her and rushed the password in a whisper so Felix wouldn't hear. The fat lady understood and winked at Rose before opening the door.

"Rose, my angel!" Felix grabbed her hand gently again before she could rush into the common room. "Are you ok?"

"I'm fine. I'm just tired." Rose gave a fake yawn.

"I'll meet you here so we can walk down to dinner together."

"Actually, no. I'm tired, I'll just go straight to bed. I'll see you tomorrow." Rose said

Felix looked concerned. "Well, ok then. You get your beauty sleep, not that you need it, and I'll see you bright and early tomorrow morning." He leant in and kissed her on the cheek.

Rose disappeared into the common room and Felix skipped off whistling. A ghost and a few people in the paintings shouted at him to be more quiet.

BEGINNING OF OCTOBER, HOGSMEADE TRIP

"Felix, stop it."

"What? You just fit so perfectly-"

"Ugh, stop it with the whole 'perfect' thing."

"But you are. I wish you could see what I see. I've never been so happy in my life and it's all thanks to you."

"See! Look! You're doing it again. Stop grabbing my hand, I can walk without holding your hand."

"Oh sorry, I can't help it. You're so cute and sweet, I guess I just want to be with you all the time and the only way to do that is to hold your charmingly dainty hand."

Then a bitter growl was followed by silence.

This is all Albus and Scorpius heard from Rose and Felix behind them as they walked down to Hogsmeade.

Everyone was allowed to go to Hogsmeade slightly earlier in the day than usual as the teachers and care takers needed as many students as possible out of the castle so that they could clean up the mess that James and Lorcan had made with their latest prank. This time a large blue puddle, which seemed to be alive, was stuck outside the history of magic class. Rose personally believed, and most agreed, it was a portable swamp the two boys had charmed the colour blue, not that the school needed another swamp in the corridors, there was already one left by Rose's uncles, George and the deceased Fred, outside an old office which no one used anymore as it was simply too difficult to get to and from.

Albus looked at Scorpius with a concerned face, Scorpius muttered to him.

"She's not happy, why doesn't she break up with him?"

Albus didn't answer until they had lost Rose and Felix in Honeydukes. Albus was looking at a lollipop.

"You know why. Everyone is just waiting for them to break up, Rose hates doing what everyone expects. And Felix genuinely is happy with Rose, I think if we weren't so young he would propose to Rose so that he could spend forever calling her perfect and denying her flaws. Well, not flaws, but, you know, things that don't add up to his perfect image of her."

"The little things that make a person." Scorpius mumbled remembering what he had once said to Rose, that was the only time he could remember opening himself up and being his true self with Rose. "A proposal would effectively get Rose to dump him." Scorpius nodded.

"Yep. Maybe her saying 'no' to his proposal would be the first flaw of Rose's he ever saw."

"What proposal?" Lorca suddenly popped up behind Scorpius, James following immediately.

"Oh, nothing." Scorpius brushed them off.

"Have you guys seen Rose around?" Albus kind of changed the subject

"She was in the Three Broomsticks. She did not look happy." Lorcan answered.

"That Norwid kid was talking to her boyfriend, they were both ignoring her. And Stirling was trying to hold Rose's hand put she kept on snatching it away." James didn't sound interested but Albus knew that his brother was concerned for their cousin.

Rose managed to convince Felix to give her some space while she went to visit her uncle George in the Weasley shop. On her way, she ran into Scorpius. He looked as though he was deciding between buying an Weasley's Snowstorm, a snow-globe with a model Shrieking Shack inside and a metal spray pump on top that dispensed magical snow when pressed, or to buy a Weasley's Wet Whether, a tall glass jar with an umbrella-shaped lid that contained some type of enchantment that created artificial rain. Rose smiled a popped up behind him.

"I recommend the Weasley's Wet Whether. When people get drench in the artificial rain, they think that they are just imagining it for a moment, then they realise its real and panic. Then it's so funny because they can never find out where the water is coming from and end up thinking it's just a leaky roof." Rose chuckled. "I kept on using my one of Hugo and Dad all the time over the summer holidays."

"Yeah, thanks Rose." Scorpius muttered unenthusiastically as he refused to look at her.

Rose was confused. "What's up with you?"

Scorpius sighed. "I'm just not sure I trust your judgement right now." he shrugged, still not looking at Rose.

"What's that supposed to mean?!" Rose demanded. A few students standing nearby looked to see who was speaking so loudly, upon realising it was Rose, they quickly looked away and moved on.

"It's just that your judgement has been a little off recently, especially in the relationships department."

She rolled her eyes and huffed, "Get over yourself Scorpius." Rose spun and charged in the direction of her Uncle's office for a visit.

MIDDLE OF OCTOBER

Rose was leaving their care of Magical Creatures class in a hurry. She wanted to find a quiet place outside in the courtyard, as it wasn't too cold yet, to finish her potions essay then visit Hagrid. And she wanted to do all of this without running into Felix. If she was honest with herself, she was getting annoyed with his constant positivity and insistence that she could do no wrong, that she was perfect for him, that they should never be separated.

Finley shouted behind her. "If you don't like spending time with Felix, do us all a favour and dump him, Weasley! Let him see you for the monster you are!"

Rose stopped herself from retaliating with a hex and continued walking. Scorpius caught up with her.

"Oh, hey." She smiled.

"Hey. Why are you running off?"

"I want to do my homework without Felix trying to hug me."

"Potions essay?"

"Yep."

"Do you mind if your friend Scorpius sits with you to do it, I made two plans yesterday and I'm not sure which one to use."

Rose grinned up at him. "Scorpius, are you asking me for help?"

"Actually I lied, I figured me and Albus haven't spent time with you without arguing in a while."

Rose sighed. "Let me just ask Daniel if he can tell Albus where we are." She quickly moved to briefly speak to Daniel then came back to Scorpius's side.

"You're friends with Leyton now?" Scorpius was confused. Rose had covered in mud and change the hair colour of both Daniel Leyton and Finley Norwood in the previous year. Finley hated her ever since.

Rose shrugged. "Yeah, at the end of school last year he actually came up to me to apologise. He said that Finley was bored so he picked on me and Daniel felt like he had to join in 'cause Finley was making fun of him too."

"And you believed him?"

"Not everyone is bad Scorpius." Rose sat down on a bench but Scorpius remained standing.

"I guess, some people are good. In fact, some people are so nice that they can be smothering and clingy and that's when you know to dump them. Because they no longer make you happy." Scorpius was obviously talking about Felix. Rose stood, her fists clenched in frustration.

She groaned and rolled her eyes. "I know Scorpius! I know you don't like my boyfriend. But in the end, it's not up to you, is it?

"I'm just saying that he's not right for -" Scorpius calmly spoke.

"Oh, so you know what's best for me? And my opinion about my life doesn't matter?"

"I never said that." Scorpius almost snapped. "But, Rose, I know you."

"At least you know me." Rose muttered but Scorpius heard.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Scorpius almost raised his voice.

"Well, you seem to know me pretty well, but sometimes I feel like I hardly know you at all!" In her frustration Rose began to pace back and forth. "Albus knows you well, you tell him everything. You claim that I'm one of your best friends but I hardly know you! You're a closed book!"

And just like that every little thing that had mildly bothered Rose about Scorpius came flooding out into a full blown argument. His constant comments about her relationship; his criticisms of her friends; the fact that he barley shared anything about himself with Rose; his grandparents and the fact that they hated her and her family even though she had never met them in her life; the fact that he had a house elf; his relationship with Mae, the very girl who had mercilessly laughed at Rose behind her back since first year; and the fact that whenever he was with Mae, he completely ignored Rose.

Scorpius just stood there taking it all. The cool and collected Scorpius had gone for a brief hike leaving him only feeling anger and impatience at Rose's issues with him. For most of her accusations, he couldn't defend himself for. For the rest, he told himself that he had simply stopped caring about Rose's opinions of him.

"Look Rose, it's just hard to be your friend when you do stupid things like date that guy! And you know what? Maybe your opinion shouldn't matter if all it does is make you do stupid things and have a go at me." Scorpius was almost shouting, he had to to cut over Rose's own anger.

"You know what Malfoy," she spat with daggers in her eyes. "If it's so hard to be my friend, I guess I'll make it easier for you. " Rose walked away.

"Rose? What are you doing?"

"We're not friends anymore Malfoy. I can't stand you!" She shouted over her shoulder, quickly spun and sent a hex at him. "Colloshoo!"

Scorpius was left with his feet stuck to the ground. Albus arrived, quickly running around the corner, as Scorpius was trying different spells to unstick his shoes.

"Hey, I just saw Rose storm past me. She was mad. Any idea what's wrong-" Albus noticed Scorpius's shoes. "What happened to you?"

"Rose happened." Scorpius said through gritted teeth and finally freed his shoes.

"What did you do to her? What did you say?" Albus was almost shouting in defence of his cousin.

"What did I do?! Albus, she stuck my shoes to the ground!"

"You know she only hexes people if they provoke her."

"I might have criticised her boyfriend one too many times. Long story short, apparently we're no longer friends." Scorpius slumped on to the bench.

Albus sighed and joined him on the bench. "If my best friends are no longer friends and one of the just happens to also be my favourite cousin, you can't 'long story short' me. I need to know what's happened. Maybe I can fix this."

"Sorry, but I think this time it's beyond repair." Scorpius resigned himself. He told Albus the full story, about what he had said and about how everything Rose had a problem with was right and justified. He hadn't exactly been the best of friends to her.

After Scorpius had finished, Albus just sat staring at nothing in front. He took a long time to answer so Scorpius muttered 'Avis' and a flock of birds fluttered around them, following Scorpius's wand and he traced random shapes in the air.

"All I'm going to say is, be prepared for all my cousins and my siblings to take Rose's side."

"Will they hex and insult me?"

"I doubt it, you didn't target the family specifiably. They'll probably just ignore you."

"And you?" Scorpius was nervous

"You're still my best mate. Plus we share a dorm and you're, like, my only friend in Slytherin, so it would be inconvenient not to remain friends."

Scorpius had to smile at Albus's awkward choice of words. "Inconvenient'?" he asked. "Wow, you really know haw to keep someone around."

Albus gave a small chuckle. "Well, I've gotten used to you. You're not bad in my books, Rose will come around one day and remember what a good friend you are."

"I wasn't a good friend to her."

"True, but you are to me. And that counts for something." Albus patted Scorpius on the back. "We should get to dinner sticky shoes."

"Not a new nickname I hope."

Albus and Scorpius stood from the bench and slowly made their way to the hell. "Hmm, now I think about it, sticky shoes is a terrible nickname. I'll to think of another. Hey! Maybe next time Rose hexes you it will inspire a nickname!"

That night Scorpius did not sleep at all. He simply sat in his bed staring out the window until the sun came up. In the Gryffindor girl's dormitory, Phil and Mel saw something they had never witnessed before. Rose was crying her eyes out and refused to tell them why. Anna on the other hand pretended to be asleep. Rose had found new friends in Phil and Mel and she hoped to hold on to them for as long as possible.

END OF OCTOBER, ROSE'S BIRTHDAY

Rose had had quite possibly the worst birthday of her life. The day started out nice as she opened presents from her family and friends. But as soon as she stepped out of the common room Felix was there, he was being extra clingy, Rose had to use a secret passageway that James had told her about once, just to get to class on time as Felix was not leaving her alone for a second.

It had been a week and a half since Rose and Scorpius had stopped being friends and now their screaming of insults, arguing and hexes were becoming a regular ordeal. Albus usually took a few steps back and let them at it. So Rose's birthday also had a brief argument with Scorpius included, just as they were lining up for potions class. Rose ended up with parchment following her around and Scorpius had horrible breath which could be smelt all over the castle whenever he opened his mouth. Rose's birthday continued with Mae Blinston openly laughing in her face and Finley Norwood insulting Rose to Felix's face. Rose tripped down a flight of stairs. Dropped all her books and as consequence lost her charms essay which was due in two hours. After she explained to the professor Rose was given an extension until the end of the day, she spent lunch rewriting the essay at the Gryffindor table while Felix insisted on holding her other hand. And on top of all that, she couldn't spend more that ten minutes with her best friend Albus as Scorpius stood glaring at them and Felix found Rose's new hiding spot.

The only thing that went right for her was her visit to Hagrid. Although she had no idea that her journey back to the castle after visiting Hagrid would reinforce the worst day ever feeling.

Rose managed to make Felix give her some space after dinner when she dropped off her barely finished on time re-wright essay to her charms professor. She took advantage of this alone time to go and see Hagrid. She felt bad as the rest of her family had visited him a few times but she had yet to visit the giant since term began.

Hagrid was as funny and loveable as ever. Rose hadn't had the chance to talk to Lily yet about her problems with Felix's clinginess. So she told Hagrid who didn't exactly say, but heavily implied, what everyone else had been saying. That Rose deserved someone who was more suited to her.

On her way back to the castle, Rose could see Felix waiting for her. And he could see her. There was no way out of it, she would have to talk to him. Rose found that even talking to Felix was irritating her recently as they never had a proper conversation, it was always just him sitting there complimenting her. She found it exhausting trying to keep up with all his high praise. Rose felt like she couldn't be herself infant of him for fear of breaking his illusion. He was too nice a guy and Rose didn't want to be the one to hurt him.

The sun was setting and she savoured the moment of silence before Felix joined her.

"Why hello there perfect girl." Felix came beaming over to Rose and instantly held her hand. "I was thinking, we could make us having a walk around the courtyard a birthday tradition every year for the two of us. Of course, we can't when we leave Hogwarts, unless of course we find a house with a courtyard in the back. But once we have a house, I guess a back garden will do fine for our little walks."

Rose didn't look enthusiastic but Felix ignored it. Rose never joined in when he talked about their possible future together or when he planned their ideal home. In fact, it freaked Rose out a bit but she never said anything in fear of hurting him.

"I'm sorry about Finley being mean about you earlier, and I saw Mae was being horrible too. And I'm sorry I couldn't wake you up early so that we could spend more time together, I would've been there but your cousin Dominique stopped me and talked with me for a while."

Rose smiled. She guessed the Dom had done it on purpose knowing that Rose would not have wanted to see Felix so early.

"Not that your cousin talking to me is a bad thing." Felix added quickly. "I bet you had to hang around with your cousins and those girls from your dorm. Sorry."

"I actually love hanging around with my cousins. And those girls from my dorm, they're my friends. I've liked going out with you, but I also like being away from you sometimes, we don't have to spend every waking hour together. I like having time to myself and I like having time alone with my friends." Rose said what she had been wanting to say ever since she came back to Hogwarts with the clingiest boyfriend imagined. "And while we're at it," Rose forcefully squeezed her hand out of Felix's grasp and pushed him away slightly as they walked. "I don't like holding hands this much."

"But," Felix seemed a little hurt and confused. "Well, I just assumed you would rather be with me, because I appreciate you more than anyone else and I know how special and perfect you are."

"That's another thing! I'm not perfect!"

"Yes you are." Felix's scoff seemed like he was patronising Rose. He gently stroked Rose's cheek which made her leap away from him. "You just don't see what I see. And you know what, there's something I've been dying to tell you!"

Rose felt like she knew what was coming.

"No." she muttered quickly to herself. Felix didn't hear her and continued in his ecstatic way.

"I"

"No."

"Love"

"No!"

"You!"

"Stop Felix! You've developed a mildly delusional obsession" Rose gritted through her teeth, she saw his disappointment and she continued calmly, "you've projected all these fantasies onto me, you're expecting a perfect person and I can't live up to that!" She sighed and lazily leaned against the ivy covered wall in the courtyard. "It's like, you've fallen in love with the idea of a person, not the actual person."

After a few minutes silence, where Felix tried to control himself so that he wouldn't cry, he turned to look at Rose, his eyes pooling. "But you are perfect, Rose. You just don't see it and I'm trying to help you. You're smart, kind, brave, charming and a load of other things too!"

Rose shook her head. "Nobody's perfect Felix. And I'm certainly not. I can be selfish, quick to judge, I have a short temper and little patience, I can hold a grudge. And I hurt people like you, not intentionally, but, look, you're one of the nicest people I've ever met and I've hurt you."

"So, this is a break up?" Felix sniffed.

"It has to be. You're very kind to see all the good qualities in me, but, Felix, to be in a working relationship, you can't ignore all the bad things about a person simply because they don't fit the perfect image of them that you've created in your head. I could never live up to that and you would've ended up disappointed in me and realise that you've wasted your time."

Felix gave a heavy sigh and stood. He stuck out his hand which Rose shook heartily.

"Well, I need to go to my dorm before I start crying in the middle of the courtyard."

Rose looked around to see that the courtyard was empty, but she knew that anyone could be hiding behind a pillar or come around the corner at any time and see them.

"Friends?" Rose asked as she still held on to Felix's hand.

He stroke her thumb with his. "Of course."

Rose patted his shoulder and quickly left just in case Felix had anything else to say. She went straight to the Gryffindor common room to find Lily and tell her what had just happened. The two girls sat talking on Rose's bed until Phil, Anna and Mel came up to go to bed.

Lily got off Rose's bed and said goodnight to the other three girls, before she left the room, she turned to look at Rose.

"Are you happy?"

"Very. I feel a sense of release, although I so still feel a bit guilty."

"You shouldn't, it's been a long time coming."

Rose sighed, "I know."

"Goodnight Rose, happy birthday."

"Thanks. Goodnight"

Lily left and Rose flopped on her bed.

"What's happened Rose?" Phil was concerned for her friend.

Rose looked at Anna who seemed bored and then at Mel who was trying not to seem too nosey.

"I broke up with Felix. But, I'll talk to you about it tomorrow Phil."

Anna rolled her eyes and went to bed. Mel gave Rose a small smile while Phil gave Rose a hug.

"I'm sorry you had to break up with him on your birthday Rose, but it was about time. It just didn't look like it fit."

"Your right." Rose slipped under her duvet. "That break up was long overdue."

Phil sat awake for a few hours while the rest of the girls slept. She thought back to the night that Rose had come back to the dorm crying because she lost Scorpius as a friend, Phil compared it to what had just happened. Rose had just broken up with her first boyfriend and had not shed a tear in front of anyone. Phil was very concerned for her friend, when Phil had broken up with Finley Norwood in her first year. Yeah they had only dated for a week, but he was her first boyfriend and she was very upset when he dumped her because he was bored of a relationship that no one noticed. Of course he didn't say those words exactly, he actually came up with some lame excuse, but Phil knew the real reason.

DECEMBER

It had been two months since Rose and Scorpius stopped being friends. Their constant arguments and hex attacks were no longer entertaining to students passing by as they happened nearly everyday, in fact it became so regular that the teachers stopped punishing them both after the first few weeks. Most of the teachers simply ignored the arguing unless they were too loud or a hex or jinx got too close to another student. Although their hexes and jinxes were always on point, they were both very skilled for such a young age.

It was usual to see Scorpius walking happily with Mae Blinston or with Albus, then Rose with Phil and Mel quite happily chatting away to each other. Then suddenly. BAM. An argument would break out between the tall blonde and the messy red head simply because one got in the way or the other loudly mumbled an insult.

Sometimes someone else would try to join in, such as Finley Norwood, who disliked both of them. Rose and Scorpius would be screaming at one another and Finley would shout something at both of them. There would be silence as Rose and Scorpius glared at him, they would call him Norwid, he would get angry and insist his name was Norwood, he would be jinxed by both at the same time. Then they would continue arguing. This happened on multiple occasions, Finley simply didn't understand they Rose and Scorpius simply couldn't care less that he hated them. Once he even had to spend two days in the hospital wing as he had been hit by two tickling spells at the same time and wouldn't stop laughing.

Felix Stirling also tried to come to Rose's defence every now and then. Which Scorpius found hilarious and would make fun of her even more. Eventually Mel or Phil would be able to get him away from Rose long enough for the girls to slip away after Rose sent one more hex at Scorpius.

A similar thing kept on happening to Scorpius as well, if Mae was there, she would throw herself in front of Scorpius to stop Rose from hexing him. It never worked. Rose just ended up hexing them both and Scorpius couldn't retaliate as Mae was in the way.

The only person who found the arguing still amusing was Albus as he was always the one to see Scorpius and Rose with their 'injuries'. Many a time had Scorpius come back to the common room with bats flying out of his nose or jelly legs or enlarged teeth. Then Albus would be visiting his cousins in the Gryffindor common room and see Rose with multi-coloured hair or covered in some sort of goo or leeks sprouting out of her ears.

Albus wasn't the only one who visited his cousins, often they visited him. In particular, Hugo visited the Slytherin Common room. He got along well with Scorpius and he liked hanging around with other guys as his best friend was Lily who had other female friends.

By the persuasion of Ron, Hermione had stopped sending howlers to Rose. She managed to only get away with receiving three. Ron's argument had been that at least the arguing isn't exactly hurting anyone and at least she's practising defending herself and her grades haven't suffered at all. In fact, it had helped her grades, she and Scorpius were constantly in competition as to who could do better in class. This happened especially in potions, the only class other than herbology that Gryffindor shared with the Slytherins. Their professor eventually had to keep on pairing Rose and Scorpius together so they didn't kill each other when arguing over who's potion was better. Their working together meant that the classroom was quiet as neither wanted to talk and both were concentrating hard so not to mess up. They always received the highest marks.

CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS

Rose and Hugo were at home. Hermione was still at work as everything had piled up despite her brilliant organisation and Ron was out buying last minute presents he had forgotten to buy for his siblings.

Rose had just sent off her presents to Phil and Mel and, because she was in a good mood, a small present to Anna who didn't mind Rose, but often get annoyed whenever she started speaking. Although if Rose was talking about Albus, Anna was all ears.

Rose sat in the living room, her feet tucked under her, a book in her lap and a mug of tea balanced carefully on the edge of the sofa. Hugo had been writing back and forth to Lily when he popped int the living room and slumped on the sofa next to his sister with a sigh. Rose quickly caught her tea before it spilled everywhere.

"Hugo!" She shouted annoyed that he had not seen her tea.

"Sorry." he mumbled.

Rose put down her book at stared curiously at her brother. "What's up?"

"Nothing."

"Well, obviously something is wrong and you need my help with it, otherwise you wouldn't have willingly sat next to me then sigh very loudly."

Hugo looked suspiciously up at her. "You're too smart for your own good. Did you know that?"

Rose stood to go to her bedroom, "Well, if you don't need my help…" she shrugged waiting for Hugo to stop her.

"Fine then." Hugo admitted defeat. "But I don't think you'll like me very much for asking."

"Hugo, just ask."

"Ok, well I've recently become pretty good friends with someone you hate…" Hugo hesitated.

Rose shook her head in a sarcastic sad way. "You've got to be more specific."

Hugo's shoulders dropped. "Oh come on Rose, you don't hate that many people. And you know exactly who I'm talking about."

Rose pursed her lips with disapproval. "I know you've gotten close to Malfoy, why do you want my help?"

"Albus said that Scorpius has a small gift for me for Christmas and I don't know what to get him."

Rose thought for a while. Hugo was getting a bit impatient.

"Is dad still out?" Rose eventually spoke.

"Umm, yeah." Hugo was confused.

Rose darted upstairs, Hugo shrugged and followed her into her bedroom where Rose was scanning her book shelf.

"Ok Hugo, what I'm about to do you can't tell anybody. This never leaves this room."

Hugo was freaked out by Rose's serious face.

"Promise me Hugo!" Rose insisted as she took a step forward with something clutched behind her back.

Hugo instinctively took a step back away from her and just nodded.

"Well, here." Rose handed Hugo an old book and they both sat on her bed.

"'Alice in Wonderland' ?" Hugo finally looked at the tattered book. "This was grandmas, she and mum used to read this to us all the time."

"Yeah, and it was one of the things she passed down to me. Malfoy told me that he would love to read it someday and I promised to let him borrow my copy." Rose placed a hand on the book. "That was before we stopped being friends. But a promise is a promise. So you can let him borrow this as a Christmas present and maybe buy him his own copy some other time."

"Thanks." Hugo sighed and hugged his sister. He knew how much this book meant to her. "I think this is perfect. And I promise I won't tell anyone that it's really from you."

"No one would believe you."

"I guess not."

CHRISTMAS DAY

Rose had just finished helping a newly pregnant Victorie with the washing when Teddy Lupin came in the room. They started hugging and being all cute so Rose had to get out of there. She could see Albus out of the corner of her eye, he was emptying the bins outside so Rose quickly slipped out of the house to help him.

"Thanks. You know, I can't wait until we can use magic outside of school." Albus said as he and Rose emptied the last bin then skipped off to grab old broomsticks from the shed.

"I know, is it me or are chores getting more tedious?" Rose smiled in agreement.

Albus and Rose circled the Burrow a few times before stopping and hovering by a tree. Albus sat still but Rose was skilled enough to lay back and still remain hovering perfectly still and with exact balance.

"So you'll never guess what I got in the post." Albus swung his legs and broke the comfortable silence.

"Oh yeah?" Rose sat up ready for the challenge. "Give me three guesses."

Albus scoffed. "Alright, but I don't like your odds."

"Ok, first guess, a letter from Annabella Gardener declaring her undying crush on you."

Albus burst out laughing and almost fell off his broom. "No! But you're definitely going to have to tell me more about this Anna thing once you've finished guessing."

"What if I was making it up?"

"I doubt it Rose, I know when you're lying."

Rose shrugged, it was true. Albus knew her too well. "Second guess, Uncle Charlie sent you a pet dragon?"

Albus couldn't stop laughing now and his broom sank lower and lower until his feet were barely above the ground. Rose quickly joined him.

"I'm guessing that's a no. Alright, third and final guess, hmmm." Rose took a while to decide. "Ooh! A howler sent by James and Lorcan, which James himself hid until the time when it would explode then gave it to you."

"That's your guess? A howler from James hidden by James just so it would explode? Come on Rose, you know James's pranks are better than that."

"I'm not finished! James and Lorcan charmed it to explode with some sort of paint or the entire stock of Doxy eggs from our potions professor's storage cupboard."

"No, what I got in the post was-"

"Ingenious idea Rose!" Jame interrupted his little brother. "Definitely going to try a howler full of doxy eggs on someone. But who?" James turned and asked Roxanne who was coming up behind him.

"I have a list or two." Rose mumbled quietly but Roxanne heard and burst out laughing.

"What is Rose guessing?" Fred suddenly appeared. Rose and Albus didn't see him arrive.

"What I got in the post yesterday morning." Albus explained. "Anyone else wanna guess?"

"Ooh! A Niffler!" Rose said excitedly.

"Niffler?" Roxanne was baffled.

"Nifflers are rodent-like creatures with a long snout and a coat of black, fluffy fur. Native to Britain, they live in burrows as deep as twenty feet below ground. Nifflers are gentle by nature and can even be affectionate towards their owners. However, they can destroy belongings looking for sparkly objects, and for that reason it is inadvisable to keep them as a house pet." Rose said proudly.

"Thanks for the lecture Rose." Roxanne grumbled.

"Yeah. Anyway you've run out of guesses Rose." Albus rolled his eyes.

"So, is that a no?" Rose asked but her only reply was Albus pushing her off her broom. Which didn't hurt as they were very close to the ground. She picked herself up and brushed off the snow.

"The head of a troll!" Roxane suggested

"Ew." Fred looked disgusted and took a step away from his sister. "An old boot which turned out to be a portkey which is how you got here?"

"Oh, dear Fred." James gave a look of mock disappointment. "That was a boring guess. Ok! My turn! I'm going to go with-"

"James you were there when the letter arrived!" Albus looked at his brother as if he were an idiot. "I got a letter form a certain Mr Stirling."

"Bloody hell." Rose mumbled bitterly. "What did he want?!" she was annoyed at Felix.

"He wanted me to ask you to get back together with him." Albus shrugged and got off his broom.

Rose flopped to the ground, not caring that the snow was getting her trousers wet, and slapped her forehead with the palm of her hand. "Why can't he leave me alone? He was clingy while we dating and now he's turned into some sort of stalker-ex."

"Yeah, once I read that letter, then James stole it from me and read it out loud in the kitchen," Albus put an arm around Rose. Roxanne and Fred were trying to look sympathetic and James put on his 'saint' face. "We forced Lily to talk."

A twig hit Albus in the back of the head.

"Nice aim!" Hugo grinned at Lily as it was the youngest Potter who threw the twig at her brother.

"You weren't meant to tell her Albus, I was going to!"

"Anyway," Albus continued. "Lily told us that the daily letters you get are from Felix not, as you claimed, from your mum complaining about you fighting with Scorpius."

Rose huffed and stood. "Well, now you all know. But his letters have become less frequent, which I'm think is a good thing, but Lil-."

"I think he's just building up to something big. You should worry Rose, you really should." Lily seemed older than she was.

Rose changed the subject "I'm going inside to raid Hugo's stash of chocolate frogs, anyone else coming in?"

"Hey! Rose, they're mine." Hugo protested when all of their cousins agreed to take Hugo's chocolate frogs.

Rose shrugged and Hugo just let her go with it. He was going to share them with his cousins anyway on the train back to Hogwarts, it didn't hurt to do it earlier. They invited Lucy, Molly, Dominique and Louis to pig out with them, they happily agreed and so did Molly. Molly didn't seem her usual self but denied it to anyone who asked. She had just started her new job and recently broke up with Merlin Jordan, for reasons only Lucy knew. And neither sister was telling anyone anything.

CHRISTMAS DAY, MALFOY MANOR

Lucius Malfoy had recently found out that Scorpius was no longer friends with Rose Weasley, so the entire family were subjected to listening to why Lucius hated the Weaselys for the entire dinner. It was long and boring. Scorpius may have fought with Rose everyday, but he still wasn't thrilled to hear his grandfather drone on about how they had more children than sense and how they were a disgrace to the wizard name.

Scorpius's father didn't say much, but the fourteen year old knew that he was pleased to no longer have his son friends with a Weasley. Astoria also didn't say much, but that was because she thought it a shame that Scorpius had lost a friend.

He had something to look forward to though, Albus was coming to visit the next day.

JANUARY

Felix's letters to Rose had completely stopped after Christmas, something which Rose contributed to the fact that Albus had written back to him saying that Rose would never date him again. This meat that Rose was in a better mood, her arguments with Scorpius were still almost daily, but that was nothing to ruin her mood.

Scorpius and Albus had their first charms lesson of the new year with Hufflepuffs. they were learning how to summon objects and they overheard the Professor telling a group of Hufflepuff girls how proud he was of his student Weasley in Gryffindor. They were attempting to summon tea cups from one side of the room to the students standing on the other side of the room, without breaking them. Felix was having trouble even getting the tea cup to move, where as Mae's tea cup seemed to smash itself every time it was lifted a centimetre.

"Oh, she's very skilled, very skilled indeed. She managed to summon the tea cup without breaking it on her fifth try! Yes, very skilled indeed." the professor was more muttering to himself, about Rose, than anyone in particular

Scorpius tried four times. Each time it got closer and closer before it smashed. He was determined not to go over five tries. He wanted to beat Rose.

"Is there something I'm doing wrong professor?" Scorpius eventually asked for help.

The professor looked astonished at the question as Scorpius was doing the best in the class so far. The entire class heard the question and stared angrily at Scorpius. He was doing well, the rest were failing miserably, and he had the audacity at ask for help. They all groaned at him then tried a few more times.

"You're doing fine young Malfoy. So long as you have the teacup clearly in mind, you should be able to summon it with ease!" the professor answered with a spring in his voice.

Albus laughed. "Worried you're not gonna beat Rose, huh?"

Scorpius nodded. He closed his eyes and thought about what the professor had said. He envisioned the teacup. held out his hand and said clearly 'accio'. It didn't work. The teacup was almost at his hand before it fell to the ground and smashed. Scorpius rolled his eyes at his own failure. But on his sixth try, the teacup came to him straight away. He grinned, until he realised that Rose had beaten him. Again.

Meanwhile Rose was in Transfiguration turning a hedgehog into a pincushion. The professor told them very proudly that Scorpius had only taken four attempts to make the transfiguration. Rose felt a surge of competitiveness and managed the full transformation within three attempts. It earned her fifty points for Gryffindor as she was the only one, despite being in a class with Ravenclaws, to successfully master the spell.

Of course, at the end of the day, when Scorpius and Rose eventually crossed paths in the corridor, he was crushed to know that she had beaten him in both subjects. They both left that corridor with multicoloured hair, although Scorpius's was curly and possibly fluffy enough to rival Rose's natural fluff. Rose had radishes coming out of her ears and large buck teeth. Scorpius had been attacked by some spell he did not recognise which caused a blow to his crutch and, although he had no pain in his right leg, could not stop limping.

Rose spent her days visiting Hagrid, hanging out with Phil and Mel, dodging Felix and making sure she knew what James and Lorcan's next prank was going to be so she could warn her friends and make sure they weren't anywhere near.

Fourth year was the year before they started O. and so the work load kept on piling up to prepare them for the following year. Rose found the only way to stay on top of this was to spend a few hours every evening in the library. This also turned out to be a great chance to be with her best friend everyday without Scorpius. While Rose refused to let Albus copy her essays for potions, charms and transfiguration, she did check through his work so he ended up the correct answers anyway.

These daily homework sessions in the library also presented an opportunity for Rose to make a new friend. Katie Webb. She was the famous 'friendless Ravenclaw.' But Rose had no idea why, the girl was an absolute delight. She was smarter than Rose and therefore they enjoyed spirited conversations where Rose learnt more than she actually said. Katie got along with Albus as well, when she wasn't talking about lessons and interesting facts, that just bored him. It was like having a smarter Rose, just less argumentative, a lot taller and she had dead straight black hair.

Scorpius used the evenings to do his homework in the Slytherin common room. Unluckily for him, Mae Blinston liked to sit and watch him, or sit and talk at him, or sit and complain to him, or sit and bitch and moan about Rose, or sit and drool over him. She changed up what she did every few days, but mostly she was there to flick her hair and flirt while trying to distract Scorpius from his work.

One morning, in potions class, Rose was slightly stressed but still happily sitting with Phil and Mel and Scorpius on the other side of the class. They were making notes when the professor announced that they were to get into their usual pairs to attempt the preparation for Girding potion so that they could start brewing the potion straight away the next day.

Rose and Scorpius begrudgingly made their way to their usual table near the professor's desk at the front of the class. They scowled at one another.

"Weasley."

"Malfoy."

They curtly acknowledged each others presence.

They heard a snigger behind them, unmistakably from Albus. The pair ignored him and turned to the task at hand. The professor had given them small containers so that they could measure out their ingredients ready for the following lesson. Needless to say it was done with a few squabbles of what 'a measure of doxy eggs' meant or whether or not to toast the dragonfly thoraxes then or wait until just before they put it in the potion. These tiny arguments made the tension and irritation between Rose and Scorpius grow. When the professor announced the class were dismissed, Rose and Scorpius turned around to see the entire class had spilt ingredients, already blown up stuff in their faces and squirted some sort of goo across the classroom. And this was only the boring preparation, not the actual potion brewing. The professor dreaded the next lesson where the real mess would begin.

Rose and Scorpius looked at one another with mildly suspicious surprise. Despite hating each other, they had made practically no mess or mistakes compared to everyone else.

They really did work well as a team.

This realisation did not sit well with either of them. So, with a huff and a bitter glance, Scorpius and Rose left the class. The professor peeped over at their desk and smiled. He had done well to put them together.

FEBRUARY, THE DAY BEFORE VALENTINE'S DAY

"Guess who's got a date!" James triumphantly sat between Rose and Fred.

"I thought you already had a girlfriend." Fred's eyebrows knit together in confusion.

James shrugged. "I had to break up with her."

"Why? and who are we talking about?" Roxanne appeared opposite them. She had been talking to someone on the Ravenclaw table.

"James broke up with someone we didn't even know he was dating." Rose shrugged and continued eating her toast."

"Oh, Lucile?" Roxanne guessed.

"No, haven't dated her since third year."

"You idiot, you dated Lucile again last year." Rose chimed in.

"Oh yeah." James smirked. "Merlin, that was a mess."

Fred was still confused. "Then who did you recently date? And for how long were you with her?"

"And why'd you break up?" Roxanne chimed in.

Rose smiled as she took another bite of toast. Her family were so nosey.

"Bea. She's in Ravenclaw, a sixth year."

"Ooh, an older woman." Rose teased

James grinned and wiggled his eyebrows. "We only dated for a week."

"Who? All your relationships last two weeks at the most." Lorcan joined them now. "Apart from Lucile, but she's always been special t-." James kicked Lorcan under the table to shut him up. "So which girlfriend are we talking about?"

"Bea." Roxanne answered.

"Oh, well she did not like me." Lorcan scoffed and grabbed a handful of toast. "Apparently I'm some sort of 'bad influence' on James. But my dad would say it's the other way around," he looked mockingly sympathetic at James. "sorry mate."

Understanding dawned on James's cousins. There was no way James would continue dating a girl if she hated his best friend.

"Wait, Bea is Lucy's friend."

"Yeah, I realised that too late and Lucy told Professor Stockett that me and Lorcan put biting jinxes on all the doorknobs in the dungeon classrooms including the Slytherin common room."

Fred nodded in approval. "Good on Lucy, sticking up for her friends!"

"Yeah, alright." James rolled his eyes. "But the thing is, it wasn't us."

They all paused for a moment, then stared at Rose.

Rose suddenly stood, leaving half her toast untouched. "Well, would you look at the time." She pointed at her empty wrist.

"Rose?" James said suspiciously.

Rose only grinned.

"No way?! Really?!" Lorcan was excited and impressed.

Rose leant on the table and slyly took another bite of her toast. "Maybe."

"Awesome!" Lorcan and James said at the same time. Both giving her a high-five. Roxanne laughed and Fred looked disapproving.

"So who are you going out with on Valentine's Day?" Roxanne asked.

"Mabel, Gryffindor."

"No! James! She's, like, my only female friend. The rest seem to hate me." Roxanne was suddenly alarmed. She was right though, she was a bit tomboyish and some girls were intimidated by her. And the fact that the majority of the friends she hung out with were boys who had girlfriends who didn't like their boyfriends hanging around with another girl.

Before she knew what was happening, someone gently grabbed Rose by the wrist and was leaning her away from the Gryffindor table. It was Felix. Rose rolled her eyes as her cousins glared at him. But eventually each one had to leave Rose behind to go to class.

Phil and Mel were waiting for Rose just outside the hall after breakfast. There was nothing Rose could do to get out talking of to Felix, so she agreed to go to the quiet and empty end of the Hufflepuff table to talk.

"Wonder what he's talking to her about?"

"It's obvious isn't it?" Phil shrugged.

"Huh?" Mel Fawley wasn't the brightest spark.

"It's Valentine's Day tomorrow and it's a Hogsmeade weekend."

Mel's mouth made a perfect 'o' shape as realisation dawned. Melissa Fawley came from a rich pure-blood family, but her parents were not prejudice. In fact they embraced Mel's friendship with a muggle born such as Phil and with Rose who had a muggle born mother. Although sometimes, when Phil came to visit, Mel's parents could be quite embarrassing as they often treated muggle borns as a novelty and bragged to their friends at fancy social events at how their open mindedness had brought them a daughter who loved muggle borns. They didn't mean to act this way, they were genuinely proud of Mel and her siblings for not caring about a friend's family background.

Then, this 'fascination' with a family so different to their own, could be found within Phil's muggle family also. Her mothers found all wizard families very intriguing as they wished to understand their daughter's new world.

By the time Rose caught up with her friends, breakfast was over and they were rushing to charms which they had with Ravenclaws.

Rose was not in a good mood and as they wrote down notes about the summoning charm, she was pressing so hard with her quill that in was practically carving into the desk.

Phil and Mel did not get a chance to talk to Rose until lunch time.

"I have to find a date within the next few hours!" Rose burst out angrily to them.

"What?" Phil and Mel asked at the same time.

"Bloody Felix came up to me, acting all sympathetic because he just happened to notice that I don't have a date for Valentine's Day! Ugh, that guy is getting on my nerves! He's so bloody persistent."

Lily couldn't help but overhear this. She slid along the bench at the lunch table and joined in the conversation.

"Rose, you think Valentine's Day is stupid, why start caring now?"

"Because of that creep!" Rose violently stuck her head slightly to the left to indicate to Felix on the Hufflepuff table. (He was staring at Rose and gave a small smile and a wave when he noticed Rose look back.) "He gave me a look of pity and offered to get back together with me. Then he started whining about how he missed me so I stopped listening and revised part of my Ancient Runes homework in my head."

Mel smiled. "Just come to Hogsmeade with me and Phil. Single girls weekend thing!"

"Oh, actually," Phil said guiltily. "I have a date for tomorrow."

"Ooh! Who?" Mel excitedly turned to Phil and forgot Rose's problem.

Lily rolled her eyes. It wasn't that she hated Rose's friends, it was just that she preferred them when they were no where quiet. But, for Rose at least, Lily could stand to be around Phil and Mel.

"Well, he's a Gryffindor and someone we all know." Phil teased them with hints. Only Mel was biting.

"Ooh just tell me!"

"For your sake I hope it's not one of my cousins." Rose mumbled.

"It's Sulli! He asked me out yesterday, and I was going to tell you but I wanted it to be a surprise." Phil squealed.

Rose was in a bad mood so, despite how happy she was for her friend, the squealing gave her a headache.

Phil was referring to Sullivan Earls, a Gryffindor who was best friends with Grant Hathaway and Wesley McLaggen. Most girls had a crush on Grant and Wesley but when they were taken, Sullivan was the next best thing.

Lily coughed which snapped Phil back to Rose.

"Right, sorry Rose." She reassuringly squeezed her friends arm across the table. "But, if you think Valentine's Day is pointless, why even bother getting a date?"

Rose ran her hands through her hair. "Felix really wants to get back together and seems to have it in his small mind that if I'm not with anyone, then I'm obviously keeping myself available for him! He even said 'if you find yourself lonely, just know that I'll always love you.' He wants to meet up tomorrow and I know that if I'm not with a date, he will ask me out again."

"Then just don't go to Hogsmeade." Lily suggested.

"Won't work." Phil shook her head and answered for Rose. "Felix is kind of obsessed with Rose, if he knows she isn't going to Hogsmeade, he'll stay too and find someway of cornering her."

"Hey, what if you come with us as we are about to leave the castle, so Felix sees you and assumes you're leaving too. But at the last minute go back inside without saying a word. You me and Phil can walk near the back so you can slip away."

"No, Mel. That's the most ridic-" Rose paused and sat up a little taller. "That might actually work. And it's great because I still have a Magical Creatures essay to finish about Manitcores. And I will know for sure that Felix won't be in the castle to stalk me!"

Lily chuckled at Rose. "Good luck, you sound like you'll have a thrilling Valentine's Day."

"It's a normal day which has been given a pointless meaning. So I'm going to be doing some normal homework on the pointless day."

Mel took a while to understand Rose's sentence.

"Did you know, that Valentine's Day actually celebrated the death of Saint Valentine. He was imprisoned for marrying Christian couples, and when he refused to renounce his faith, they executed him."

"Ugh, nobody cares Rose." Lily rolled her eyes, but was still smiling at her cousin's archive of pointless knowledge.

Phil laughed. "Trust Rose to make Valentine's Day boring."

Mel scoffed and joined in. "Trust Rose to make Valentine's Day about death."

What Rose didn't know, was that Scorpius was having a very similar problem. Mae Blinston had asked him out and when he said no, she made a pouty face briefly then went back to flicking her hair and flirting with him.

"Just say yes, let her date you for a few weeks just to get it out of her system." Albus shrugged and tried to give advice.

"But, when we break up, we wont be friends anymore."

"Then only go to Hogsmeade with her."

"Al, you know she'll read more into it. And once again our friendship will be over."

"Sorry mate," Albus mumbled while eating his sandwich. "but I think there is no way around this without you and Mae losing a friendship."

Scorpius sighed "If only she would stop flirting and asking me out, then our friendship would be fine."

Albus scoffed. "Are you kidding? Your friendship with Mae is practically built on her flirting with you. Look, if you're really that concerned, don't go to Hogsmeade tomorrow."

"Worth a try. Anyway, what are you doing tomorrow?"

"Got a date." Albus smugly grinned. "Girl in Ravenclaw, in our year. Her name is Katie Webb."

"Is that the girl who has no friends?" Scorpius didn't mean to sound horrible, but it was true.

Poor Katie Webb was a friendless Ravenclaw. This was mostly due to the fact that Robin Stirling, the most popular Ravenclaw, was threatened by how smart Katie was and therefore disliked her.

"So how come you've got a date with her."

Albus shrugged. "To say she hasn't any friends isn't exactly true. I mean, Rose is nice to her. When I got to the library to get Rose's help on stuff, Katie is always there and I started talking to her once when she borrowed a book off Rose. I found that she was actually really nice and I asked her out on a date."

"Al, You have got to be one of the nicest Slytherins in history."

Albus smiled. "We're not all bad."

"Speaking of history, did you know that Valentine's Day actually celebrates the death of Saint Valentine. He was imprisoned for-"

"Yeah yeah, whatever." Albus rolled his eyes. "Some guy died on some day so we made some pointless event out of it. Mate, I get the same history lecture from Rose every year."

Scorpius's shoulders slumped slightly. (try saying that five times fast). Rose had beaten him again.

VALENTINE'S DAY

Mel's plan had worked. Rose went along with Phil and Mel and their dates, Mel had found one within minutes of their conversation the day before, Felix saw her and tried to walk with them but luckily Mel distracted him. Rose fell to the back of the group and slipped back inside the castle without anyone noticing.

Rose got up to the library, set out all her books and began her homework. She was surprised not to see Katie Webb in their, 'maybe Albus actually did ask her out' she thought.

Rose was alone in the library for about an hour before the last person she wanted to see walked in.

Scorpius Malfoy.

To her shock Scorpius did not sit on the opposite side of the room to Rose, but only sat one table over. Rose shrugged, deciding she didn't care, and went back to writing.

Scorpius looked around to see that the librarian was nowhere to be seen and scooted up so that he sat opposite Rose.

"What do you want Malfoy?" She practically growled.

"Ooh, not a friendly." Scorpius smirked. "So, no date today Weasley?"

"None of your business Malfoy."

"If it helps, I don't have a date either."

"Naww, nobody wants to go out with selfish stuck up Malfoy?" Rose feigned sympathy. "Then all is right with the world." She added bitterly.

"Well, how do you know someone didn't ask me out and I said no?" Scorpius said defensively.

"Because I don't care enough about you to find out." Rose stood, shovelled all her books into her arms and moved to a table on the opposite side of the library.

Rose tripped and her books went flying everywhere. Again she was shocked by Scorpius, he did not laugh at her. Rose picked up her books, refusing to look in Scorpius's direction.

Rose had not been sitting at her new table for longer than ten minutes when Scorpius came and sat with her again.

"What are you doing?" Rose snapped.

"Just doing what we always do Weasley, annoy the hell out of each other." Scorpius smiled. The smile irritated Rose more than it should have.

"Well, congratulations. You've successfully annoyed me enough that this bad mood will last all day."

"What do I win?" Scorpius said with a cocky grin.

"This." Rose was about to hex him when the headmaster walked in with a cheerful spring in his step.

"Why, Miss Weasley, Mr Malfoy! It is wonderful to see you two having the ability to get on. You know, you two are such great academics, and now I see that you can go a day without causing disturbances, I guess you truly are great role models! You know with prefects being chosen and all- alas! I've said too much." The headmaster beamed down at them.

Rose could do nothing but lower her wand very slowly in hopes that the headmaster did not notice that he interrupted an argument. Rose and Scorpius smiled awkwardly at the headmaster, who noticed but mistook it as something else.

"Oh! But I must be interrupting something special here, this being Valentine's Day and all! Well-"

"No sir, you've got it wrong-"

"Sir we're not-"

Rose and Scorpius tried to interrupt but the headmaster just gave them a knowing smile.

"I know chemistry when I see it! But don't worry, your secrets safe with me," he tapped his nose twice. "enjoy your chance at young love." The headmaster grinned and chuckled all the way back to his office.

Rose couldn't speak or even move. She just stared wide eyed at the open door where the headmaster had left. Scorpius turned slightly pink and fidgeted with his wand, also not daring to look at Rose.

After what seemed like hours, Scorpius finally stood up making a scraping sound with his chair which snapped Rose out of her trance.

She huffed and scooped her books into her bag. "Well done!" She said sarcastically. "Now the headmaster thinks we're going out and that there's- there's, you know-" she didn't want to say it but the word forced its way through. "Chemistry!"

Rose stormed out of the library but stopped in the door way. "This is all your fault." She bitterly said through gritted teeth.

"My fault?!" Scorpius took long strides to catch up with Rose in the hallway.

"Yeah! You could've left me alone. You could've sat on the other side of the library in silence rather than bugging me. Or better yet, you could've just left!"

"Hey! I was trying to be nice! I saw you doing that Manticore homework and I'd thought I'd help." Scorpius shrugged, he knew he was lying. He just hoped Rose didn't notice.

Rose snorted. "When have I ever needed your help?"

"Fine, then maybe I thought you could help me do the homework!" Scorpius was pulling at straws. When he first saw Rose in the library, his first instinct was to leave, but then he thought that perhaps they could try and get along for a day. It was Valentine's Day after all and they both were alone and seemed to be in a sluggish mood.

"No, Malfoy. My opinions don't matter to you, you've always made that much clear." Rose spat at him and stormed off to the Gryffindor common room.

Scorpius was left staring after her. 'I guess she hates me more than I thought.'

FEBRUARY, DAY AFTER VALENTINE'S DAY

Rose was in a fowl mood. Everybody could see it. It was as if steam was blowing out of her ears. She sat down with a thump at the Gryffindor table. The Gryffindors in her family who sat near her, not so subtly moved a few inches away. Even Albus could see Rose's bad mood from the Slytherin table. He was going to see if she was ok but he had second thoughts. Albus was still trying to get used to the whole, 'Scorpius and Rose aren't friends' thing. Although Scorpius next to him also seemed worried for Rose. Albus saw his other cousins who weren't in Gryffindor, Lucy, Louis and Dominique, were also straining to see what was happening on the Gryffindor table.

Eventually Lily took the brave step of talking to Rose.

"Hey." She greeted as she gingerly sat opposite Rose.

Rose grunted in reply.

"What's wrong?"

Rose grunted in reply.

"I hate Valentine's Day." she grumbled.

"Yeah, I know, you think it's pointless, you told me so yesterday. But, it was yesterday."

"Hate is a strong word. I think I chose poorly. I didn't hate valentines day before, I only thought it was pointless, but yesterday I began to hate valentines day."

"Huh? Is this some sort of riddle from that muggle book you always read?"

"'Alice in Wonderland' ?"

"Yeah, that one."

"No."

Lily frowned in confusion. She looked over to her other cousins who were obviously listening in but none of them seemed to understand Rose either. Only Fred replied, and that was only with a shrug.

"Rose? You wanna make more sense?"

Rose sighed. "I now hate Valentine's Day because I didn't realise how stupid and clingy and lovey-dovey people get. And people won't leave you alone. They see it as an excuse to get all sickly romantic and stupid. And stupid people you thought were over you, stupidly remind you that they are always there no matter what." Rose was agitated.

"You said stupid four times." Lily smiled hoping to cheer Rose up. It didn't work.

"Look," Rose pulled a piece of parchment out of her pocket. "A certain stupid person sent me this yesterday."

Her cousins suddenly became very interested in the piece of folded parchment and forgot that they were pretending not to listen in. They all scooted closer to Rose and Lily. Lucy came over from the Ravenclaw table and Dominique and Louis came from the Hufflepuff table, to sit down with them. Curiosity also got the better of them. Before Lily opened the parchment she asked Rose a few questions, knowing that their cousins were dying to know what was on the parchment and stalling would wind them up.

"Is this a letter?" Lily asked.

Rose nodded.

"But you only got the Daily Profit in the post yesterday, I remember. How was this sent to you?"

"Well, the sender found a way to have it slipped under the door of my dormitory. I don't know how, and it creeped my out a little bit."

"LILY JUST OPEN IT!" James almost shouted at his sister. Not knowing what was on the parchment was driving him crazy.

Lily finally opened the parchment and read quietly out loud so only her cousins could hear. The rest of the school pretty much knew by now that if the Weasleys and Potters were huddled together, you're best to to interferer or eavesdrop.

Dearest Rose,

Every time I'm near you nothing else in the world matters, even when we just stand in an awkward silence while we line up for class, I still feel happier than I've ever been. We haven't really spoken much since we broke up but I don't know what it is about you, I've never met another girl who has the same effect on me. Happy valentines day.

Yours ever devoted,

Felix Stirling

James and Roxanne were desperately trying to hide their giggles. Rose noticed their suppressed miles and sighed.

"Go ahead, someone needs to laugh at it. I'm too weirded out to laugh and Lily is too polite."

"So how did this get under your door?" Hugo asked

Rose shrugged. "I thought one of you guys might have done it?"

They all shook their heads and she believed them. Her family didn't mind Felix while he was dating Rose as he was nice but as soon as they broke up, they honestly admitted that they found him annoying. Rose knew that none of them would do anything to help Felix contact her. Not that they could really stop it all together as Rose still had a few classes with Felix.

"One of the girls in your dorm? Would they have done it?" Dominique asked with genuine concern

"I asked, they didn't know who Felix was until I dated him and I'm sure they would have given it to me directly rather than leave it stuck half way under our door."

"This is very strange. I can't imagine he could have guessed the Gryffindor password or entered with someone else. Even if that was possible, someone would have noticed that he wasn't a Gryffindor and he never would have known which was your dormitory." Lucy knitted her brows in concentration.

"There are no secret passage ways into he common room." James helpfully eliminated that possibility.

"Now that is a bit creepy. And clingy. Poor Rose." Hugo patted his sister's arm, he didn't sound sarcastic at all. In fact he was a bit freaked out himself.

"Is there a charm he could've used?" Roxanne spoke a bit too loudly, but no one in the hall seemed to be listening in, they were all busy with their breakfast talking amongst themselves.

"Not one that I know of." Rose rested her head in her hands.

"I hate to interrupt a family moment," Professor Stockett head of Ravenclaw and the games teacher, came up to the Gryffindor table, "But unless there is a family emergency that requires all of you, I suggest you lot go to class."

They looked around to see that the hall was empty except for them. They all hurried to grab their bags, hurrying apologies to Professor Stockett as they left the hall. Rose had potions next with Slytherins, at least she could try to get Albus away from Scorpius long enough to tell Albus.

Scorpius however, seemed have other plans. They were only making notes so luckily she wasn't partnered with him, but Scorpius didn't leave Albus's side which forced Rose to do what she did best after class.

"Hey, Albus. I need to talk to y-" Rose called from behind Scorpius and Albus who were making their way to charms while Rose was meant to be going to history.

"Get lost Weasley, no one wants you here." Scorpius groaned.

"Malfoy, this doesn't concern you. So don't worry your tiny brain and run along now." Rose crossed her arms and raised her eyebrows expecting him to comply.

"I don't take orders from you Weasley."

"Shame." Rose said in a monotone voice. She turned to Albus, "Can we talk for a moment?"

Albus began to follow Rose to a quiet part of the corridor when Scorpius followed behind.

"Shove off Malfoy!" Rose shouted over her shoulder, she didn't need to turn around to know he was following. He persisted and Rose briefly spun around and pointed her wand at him. "Petrificus Totalus" She put him in a full body-bind. "Stay." She instructed with a sour smile.

Once she had shown Albus the letter, they were already late for their next classes and agreed to meet up after lunch without Scorpius.

"I swear, if Malfoy turns up I'll use my bat-bogey hex."

Albus looked warily at Rose, to be honest he was slightly scared for Scorpius. "You know what, I'll give him a heads up."

Rose nodded and was about to walk away when Albus spoke again.

"By the way, I know you weren't at Hogsmeade yesterday and you might not have noticed, but Scorpius wasn't there either. Well, when I got back he was in a weird mood. I was just wondering if you saw him around the castle, or if you saw anything happen."

Rose took a deep breath and contemplated whether or not to tell Albus what had happened. "Well, I was- he joined me in the library and we almost got into a fight. Then the headmaster came along-" Rose sighed. "You know what, just ask Malfoy."

Rose walked away, Albus frowned with confusion then helped Scorpius out of the full body-bind.

When Albus read Felix's letter, he was angry.

"What is wrong with that guy?! I thought he was nice, but now he's just stalking you!"

"Woah," Rose gave a small laugh. "Calm down there Al."

"How can you be so calm about this?"

"Because I've had over 24 hours to get used to it."

"But you shouldn't have to be used to it Rose."

"I know." Rose sighed. She could've hugged Albus, he was such an understanding person.

"Wait, is this why you weren't at Hogsmeade? You were avoiding him?"

Rose nodded.

"Maybe you're right, maybe Valentine's Day is pointless."

"How was your date with Katie?" Rose excitedly changed the subject.

"Oh, well umm…" Albus shrugged. "She's nice, and I think we'll be good friends but…"

"But?"

"It was so awkward! We didn't have much to say to one another. When we got back to the castle, she even said that, and I quote, 'It was really nice hanging out as friends'! Which I don't mind."

"Ooh, change of subject. Did you know James has another new girlfriend?"

Albus chuckled. "What else is new?"

They continued to talk for the rest of lunch then they had to go their separate ways as Rose had Ancient Runes and Albus had Muggle studies.

MAY

Scorpius had managed to both ruin and improve Rose's day. First, he had ruined it, kind of, by starting a argument and a hexing match on their way to Magical creatures class. Then improved it by failing miserably in Herbology to use the Orchideous incantation, a spell that conjures a bouquet of flowers from the end of the caster's wand.

It was a Friday night and Rose was in the library on her own. Albus had only one essay to do and Katie Webb had been so badly teased by Lloyd Parkinson, the Slytherin in the year below, that she had refused to come out of her dormitory after her last lesson. Rose made a mental note to hex Parkinson for good measure when she next saw him.

Scorpius was in a bad mood. His failure in Herbology had humiliated him. Although it wasn't really a failure, the majority of the class had not been able to complete the incantation within the lesson, it only seemed like a failure as he had been beaten by Rose. And now he needed her help.

Albus was sitting in the Slytherin common room with Hugo who had come to visit and was badly loosing.

"Hey, have you seen Weasley?" Scorpius asked Albus.

Albus shrugged. "You've got to be more specific. There's a Weasley sitting in front of me, and then about six others dotted around the castle. Then hundreds around Britain and one in Romania."

"Romania?" Scorpius was confused.

"Uncle Charlie lives in Romania and works with dragons." Hugo answered.

Scorpius sighed. "Ok then, where's you sister?" He asked Hugo.

But Hugo and Albus were not looking at who the question was directed at. They both knew he was looking for Rose but they didn't want to make it easy for him, it was funnier this way. So Albus answered.

"Lils is probably somewhere in the Gryffindor common room."

Hugo shook his head. "Nah, last time I saw her she was sneaking down to the kitchens because she made some bet with James and now owes him a tray of biscuits."

Albus chuckled.

Scorpius rolled his eyes. "Do you know where Rose is?" He hadn't called her that in such a long time, it felt weird in his mouth.

Albus smiled. "Probably still in the library. I was with her only half an hour ago and she still had a few more notes to make."

Scorpius gave an exasperated sigh.

Mae Blinston had overheard the conversation. She flicked her hair and strutted up to the three boys.

"Why are you looking for Weasel?" she scoffed.

Hugo and Albus stood at once, giving death stares to Mae.

"Don't call us that!"

"That's my family!"

Scorpius managed to slip away as Albus and Hugo shouted at Mae. Eventually the prefects had to get involved and Hugo was told to leave.

When Scorpius got to the library, he took a deep breath and swallowed his pride. He needed help with this incantation. It was either ask Rose or ask her friend Phil, who Scorpius had never spoken to in his life so he thought it best to ask the former, even though she hated his guts.

Scorpius knew deep down inside, so deep that he tried to force it even deeper away and out of his thoughts, that he really didn't mind being around Rose. Even if being around Rose meant arguing and walking away with jelly legs or spots on his forehead that spelt 'arsehole'. Sometimes, against his will, Scorpius found the highlight of his day was a screaming match with Rose. And that infuriated him, he and Rose were now enemies and he missed her as a friend.

He heard a disgusted sound come from one of the desks in the library and he walked towards it. It could only be Rose. He was right.

"For Merlin's sake, what do you want now?" Rose rolled her eyes but did not stop writing her notes.

"I need your help." Scorpius muttered bitterly.

"You need my-" Rose finally looked up. "I thought we established that my opinions don't matter to you?" Rose was just as bitter as Scorpius now.

"Yeah but," Scorpius sat uninvited opposite Rose, she scowled. "That Orchideous incantation threw me today, and if it turns up in the exam in two weeks, I'm screwed."

"Why should I care about your exams?"

"I'll pay you?" he suggested

Rose scoffed. "Oh, you poor little rich boy. Don't you know that money can't buy you everything?"

"Then what do you want?"

"Let's just say, if I help you, then you owe me. Deal?"

Rose stuck out her hand for him to shake. Scorpius was reminded of the first time he met her on the train. He looked at her hand suspiciously.

"Owe you what?"

"Not sure yet, I guess we'll find out someday."

Scorpius shrugged and shook her hand. Rose went back to making notes and Scorpius sat looking expectantly at her.

"We're not starting now." Rose snapped. "It's Friday night, I want to finish this last paragraph then go back to the common room to spend time with my friends."

"Then when can you teach me?"

Rose thought for a moment. "Hogsmeade weekend tomorrow, you wanna try then?"

Rose knew she was using Scorpius to get out of going to the village alone again. It may not be Valentine's Day, but Felix cornered her twice last time, in the Three Broomsticks, to ask her out. She couldn't take it anymore.

Scorpius was about to laugh in her face and refuse to use up his Hogsmeade weekend to study with her, then he remembered how Mae always got extra flirty once outside the Hogwarts doors and decided that practicing incantations with Rose would save his friendship with Mae better.

"Alright then. I'll meet you here after everyone leaves."

Rose nodded and went back to making notes, Scorpius got the hint and left her alone.

"YOU'RE DOING WHAT?!" Albus shouted at Scorpius in the common room later that evening.

"Shhh, keep your voice down!" Scorpius looked around to see that quite a lot of people were staring at them.

"Yeah! But… I thought… But you hate each other! Why is she helping you?!" Albus spluttered when Scorpius finally convinced him to go and talk in their dormitory.

"Not sure, I didn't really expect her to say yes." Scorpius shrugged. "I offered to pay her."

Albus snorted. "Bet she took that well." His eyebrows knit in concentration. "I guess Rose can't hate you as much as I thought."

"Maybe, or I just happen to be enemies with someone who, unluckily for me, is actually a nice person, nice enough to help the person she hates. Which then makes Malfoy the bad guy, and Weasley the loveable and undeserving victim."

"Rose is no victim, when you two duel you're so evenly matched that neither comes out looking a victim or the bad guy." Albus sighed. "But she is a good person, I know she hates a few people, but no one she hates enough that she would want to see them fail. Rose likes to help if she can, and if you ask. Besides, the people she hates, she hates for a valid reason."

"Thanks mates." Scorpius sighed, rolled his eyes then rolled on to his bed, face down.

"Well, you said so yourself, you weren't a good friend to her."

Scorpius did not answer. He had no way to defend himself.

THE NEXT MORNING

Rose had had a good morning. She had a nice lay in, she avoided bored looks from Anna, she hadn't tripped over anything and only dropped her hairbrush once. Mel had successfully distracted Felix, who had been waiting in the entrance hall for Rose, and the lovely houses-elves had a special tray of biscuits saved for her in the kitchens. Rose found an empty classroom, shoved her Herbology book and biscuits on a stacked pile of chairs, then waited outside the library for Scorpius.

His lateness dampened her mood.

After ten minutes, when Scorpius still hadn't turned up, Rose gave up and made her way back to the empty classroom to collect her stuff. But on the way she heard someone crying. Rose popped her head around a corner to see a lumpy tapestry shaking and the sound of sobbing echoing from behind it. Rose yanked back the tapestry to find a first year Gryffindor boy, who she had seen around the common room a lot, was crying.

Rose wasn't good with crying people, she felt awkward. Luckily, but to her annoyance, Scorpius turned up. He looked at her questioningly then comforted the first year. Through sniffles the boy was able to tell them that some third year Slytherins had stolen his rugby ball.

Rose suddenly stood and charged in the direction that the first year had pointed. In the next corridor she found Lloyd Parkinson and his friends laughing and attempting to pop the rugby ball. Rose flicked her wand and shouted 'Immobulus' , a freezing charm. She yanked the rugby ball away from Parkinson just as Scorpius ran around the corner after her.

"Weasley? What did you do?!"

Rose scowled at the group of Slytherins and then at Scorpius. "I'm going to find a prefect or a teacher. You stay with the kid and leave them frozen." she indicated to the group of boys.

Scorpius dared not mess with Rose when she was in such a fowl mood. He went back to the first year Gryffindor and found a bit more about him. His name was Kibwe Smith and was a friend of Rose's Hufflepuff cousin Louis, he was a muggle born with an African mother and an American father. They lived in Seattle in America so he only got to see his parents during the summer holidays. He had been scared of coming to a wizard school as he had been told by his older brother, who was also at Hogwarts and was a year older than Scorpius, about the two wizard wars and the old hatred of muggle borns. This made Scorpius even angrier at Lloyd for picking on a kid that was worried enough about being a muggle born without some older kids picking on him. They gave Slytherin a worse name than they already had.

After a while, Scorpius ran out of things to say and Kibwe stopped crying. Scorpius didn't think anything needed to be said until he heard Professor Stockett shouting at Lloyd and his friends. Scorpius tried to cover up the sound by talking about Kibwe's brother.

"So, what's his name?"

"Mosi. He's in Ravenclaw."

"Oh, Smith!" Scorpius suddenly remembered. "Mosi Smith, he plays keeper right?"

Kibwe seemed to suddenly cheer up as he swelled with pride. "Yeah! You know him?"

"Well, I've seen him play quidditch but that's about it."

"I know Mosi, he's friends with my cousin Roxanne." Rose appeared beside them.

Kibwe gave a cheeky smile. "Oh, I know Roxanne. She's always with my brother, he even offered to visit her during the summer holidays last year."

"He offered to fly all the way from America just to see her?"

Kibwe shrugged. "Actually, now we both know that we're wizards, we travel a lot. Sometimes by broom, with my grandparents. But mostly we use the floo network."

Rose looked horrified at the idea of how unsafe it was for muggle grandparents to take young kids on broomsticks across the Atlantic ocean. Kibwe noticed her face.

"Oh, no, don't worry. Both my dad's parents are squibs so they know all about the wizard world and how to fly safely on brooms. It was just, during the wizard war, even though it was predominantly in the UK, my grandparents went into hiding and shut off the wizard world all together and never told my dad or anyone else about the world they came from. My brother and I turning out to be wizards and finding out that his parents were squibs was quite a shock for my dad. He was worried mum might leave him because it was so overwhelming, but she actually took it better than he did."

Rose surprised them all, including herself, by hugging Kibwe.

"I'm so sorry that your grandparents felt the need to hide themselves. And I'm sorry that there are still idiots who have such prejudices. But most of us are good, most of us don't care where someone comes from."

Kibwe smiled. "Thanks for getting my rugby ball back. I have another muggle born friend who was teaching me the difference between American football, English football and Rugby."

Then, with a grin, he ran off.

"Ok, time to learn." Rose snapped her fingers in Scorpius's face. "Orchideous." Rose muttered the incantation and successfully wrapped a wreath of pink roses around Scorpius's legs. She then charged off to the empty classroom remembering the tray of biscuits she hoped were still in there.

Scorpius rolled his eyes and tried to hop after her.

The next few hours were spent with Rose repetitively demonstrating the incantation to Scorpius, there was a huge pile of flowers and wreaths almost as high as the table. Scorpius eventually managed to produce tiny individual daises but Rose wouldn't let him give up until he had made one long, continuous daisy chain. Once he achieved that, he got cocky and excited to do more. So rose taught him how to do complicated wreaths with multiple flowers. Finally, he made a wreath he was happy with. They both started eating biscuits and seeing who could hook a wreath around the dusty candelabra on a shelf in the corner of the room.

"Can't wait to give this to Albus." Scorpius grinned as he held up a very neat wreath of lilies. "Maybe I'll attach it somewhere permanently on him."

"Oh, Merlin, I can just imagine Lily's smug face. She would never let him drop it and she would embarrass him so much with the whole 'naww my brother's so cute' act."

They laughed together and ended with a sigh. Scorpius, still smiling looked at Rose.

"This is nice, I'm glad we're able to get long. I guess the headmaster was kind of right on Valentine's Day."

Rose's smile disappeared and she just nodded as she hopped up to sit on a table.

Scorpius hesitated, he leant against the far wall and stared intently and Rose's face before he dared himself to ask. "Do- do you think we can go back to being friends?" his voice wobbled slightly, he was irritated at himself for sounding so nervous.

Rose seemed to hold her breath.

"No." she said in an almost whisper, then cleared her throat. "I never truly felt like you trusted me enough to have a lasting friendship. And when my opinions stopped mattering to you-"

"But, look, for the past four hours we managed to get along just like old times!" Scorpius interrupted Rose. He wished he hadn't, Rose sent him a scowl.

"I can't be sure that you won't do the same thing again if I suddenly get close to someone you don't like. I know Felix was wrong for me, but what you did was worse than any poorly chosen boyfriend. I can't be made to feel excluded and untrustworthy and like a burden to someone who claims to be a friend! I will admit, that to Albus at least, you are a great friend. But for some reason, I seem to be different and I don't like it." Rose looked at the floor and swung her legs back and forth.

Scorpius could have sworn that he saw tears threaten in her eyes. He looked away.

"Thanks for the help with the incantation." Scorpius truly meant it, but his voice was monotone and he sounded insincere.

Rose's head snapped in the opposite direction as Scorpius moved towards the door, he figured that his suspicions about her trying not to cry were true and he turned away so that he wouldn't see. Scorpius knew that Rose hated crying, she hated feelings that made her cry too, and worst of all, people who made her cry.

"I'll see you in the corridor for our next argument then." Scorpius mumbled as he closed the door and slowly made his way back to the Slytherin common room.

"Yep." Rose whispered when she heard the door shut.

Rose suddenly jumped off the table in frustration and paced up and down the room muttering angrily to herself. "Stop crying! Stop it! He's not worth it. The loss of his friendship and any hope of ever being friends, is not worth pathetic tears!" Rose stopped in the middle of the room and looked down at the pile of flowers she and Scorpius had produced using the Orchideous incantation, with a hasty flick of her wand a bluebell flame set the pile alight then she quickly put it out.

Rose made sure her eyes weren't puffy, although she hadn't actually cried, then flung the door open to go back to her dorm. She stumbled and fell over something on her way out. A wreath of red roses was neatly placed against the door with a note attached, at least it was neat until Rose had tripped. The note simply read.

Thanks Weasley.

Rose let out a shaky sigh and slipped the note into her pocket and carefully carried the wreath to her dorm hoping that no one saw, they might start asking questions. Rose was lucky that the common room was empty apart for a few first years who didn't take any notice of Rose as they were too busy arguing over the rules of quidditch with open Herbology textbooks in front of them, they were obviously getting distracted. When Rose was halfway up the stairs to her dormitory, she heard many loud voices entering the common room behind her. Students were back from their Hogsmeade trip. She shoved the wreath into her trunk and slid it back under her bed. Rose only just managed to get her book out and look as though she had been there the whole time, when Anna walked in the dorm in a huff.

Anna angrily shook off her coat and threw it on her bed, she didn't even see Rose. Anna flopped on her bed and made a growling sort of sound.

"Umm, Anna?" Rose spoke cautiously.

Anna sat up with a start and looked as though she was going to scream. "Merlin! Rose you made me jump! How long have you been in here?!"

Rose shrugged. "I was in the library for most of the day, only really got back to the room myself." Rose kind of told the truth. "Anything you want to talk about?" Rose felt impelled to say despite herself. She was only trying to be polite.

"Not with you." Anna mumbled more bitterly than she meant. "Sorry," she grunted, "It's just been a confusing and aggravating day."

Rose nodded even though Anna couldn't see. She had to agree with Anna there.

Rose ended up hearing what happened to Anna at Hogsmeade as they all sat down to dinner, as Anna spoke as loudly and as quickly as usual. She was annoyed because, that despite all her flirting, Albus still didn't seem to notice her and that he was more interested in the 'friendless Ravenclaw', referring to Katie Webb.

Anna seemed to think that Albus and Katie were dating, when in fact they were just friends. People were so used to seeing Katie on her own, that when she actually did have a friend they assumed it was something else.

When everyone sitting near them at the Gryffindor table had gone, Rose told Lily about her day with Scorpius.

"He made you cry again?" Lily was a mix of disbelief and pity. She herself, Rose's own cousin, had barely seen Rose cry whereas Scorpius had seen her cry three times and made her cry once before.

"No, no I didn't cry!" Rose defended herself. "I said I almost did, the key word is almost."

Lily rolled her eyes and smiled. "And let me guess, you did that ting where you started pacing and told yourself off for even thinking about crying?"

Rose nodded. "I tell you too much."

"No you don't." Lily put a comforting hand on Rose's crossed arms. "I like that I have a cousin I can share everything with and I know shares everything with me. 'Cause with friends, you can tell them stuff but you never know if they'll remain your friend forever. But a cousin is someone you can't get rid of."

Rose laughed. "And this is why I tell you stuff, you make me feel better."

"Just doing what I do." Lily grinned and open her arms proudly. "Right, I need to go back to the common room. Hugo promised to help me with that Herbology essay. He's weirdly good at that subject."

Rose once again found herself in the staircase leading to her dormitory when she heard voices. She heard Anna talking very loudly, and by the sound of what she was saying, it was not a conversation Rose was meant to be hearing. So she decided it was best not to suddenly burst in. It would be too awkward.

"-got it all wrong. I'm not saying that I hate her, because I really don't. I just don't get why you guys suddenly hang around her so much now. It used to be just the three of us! Now she's always around."

"I don't get what your problem is!" Rose recognised Phil's voice. "Rose is nice to you and we always try to include you in everything we do, but you run off with Robin or start pining over Albus."

Anna scoffed. "That's another thing! She always makes it so obvious when I talk about Albus that she is bored of me."

"I don't think she's bored, I just think that she'd rather not talk about what you find attractive about her cousin." Mel's small voice spoke up in defence.

"You guys have just ditched me for some walking red bush with a know-it-all cockiness. It's ridiculous, I'm better than her! Even Mae Blinston agrees! Why would you ditch me?" Anna was sounding more and more whiny. Rose almost wanted to burst in just so Anna would feel guilty.

"Anna!" Mel squeaked in astonishment.

"You started hanging out with us less and less before we hung out with Rose. Don't blame us! Plus, Rose is great. Yeah, sometimes I feel dumb around her because she's some sort of super brain. But she's also really kind and is always happy to help us. Even you Anna, she would help you if you asked." Phil said.

"Look, I just started hanging out with Robin because, because- I don't have to justify myself to you!" Anna seemed to have confused herself.

"Well, we're not justifying our friendship with Rose to you! She's nice, we share a dorm, we're in most of the same classes, she's funny and she is always polite to you even if you're not!" Phil seemed to be getting louder as she spoke more proudly about her friend.

"Just try to be nice." Mel pleaded. "If you can't stand to be around her for too long, then just stop hanging around with us. It's not that we don't want you there- and we'll understand that you are still our friend-, but you get on better with Robin and-"

"And Rose is now really part of our little group. We don't want to loose her." Phil finished Mel's sentence.

"Ugh fine." Anna let out an exasperated sigh. "I can do civil and polite, like I said, I don't hate her. I just don't get on with her as well as you guys do. She's more of a mutual acquaintance." Anna paused. "You do realise though, as soon as she and Malfoy make up, she's just going to ditch you."

Rose felt herself clenching her fists.

"I don't think she and Malfoy will ever be friends again." Mel sighed. "You're not there, Anna, when she and him fight. You get the feeling that there has been a real betrayal of friendship."

"Don't get on the wrong side of Rose." Phil added.

"But I think it takes a lot to get on her bad side." Mel defended Rose again.

"Yeah." Phil agreed. "And you're wrong Anna, even if they are friends again, Rose won't ditch us. She's almost as loyal as a Hufflepuff."

"I'm surprised that she isn't in Hufflepuff." Mel said thoughtfully. "I mean, she's loyal but Merlin forbid you get on her wrong side. All Hufflepuff traits."

"She's smart like a Raven claw too." said Phil.

"Speaking of! Me and Robin were in Honeydukes today and.." Anna changed the topic and started waffling on about something Robin said about some guy she had a crush on. Rose took this as a good time to go inside.

"Hey! Rose!" Mel excitedly interrupted Anna, who rolled her eyes and slumped in her bed. "Where were you?"

"Oh, I went to talk to Lils." Rose hopped into the bathroom to get changed.

When she came out, Mel and Anna were talking quietly and in hushed tones on Anna's bed and Phil patted her own bed to invite Rose to talk to her.

"You went to talk to Lily?"

Rose nodded.

"Anything you want to talk about with me? I know that you only go out of your way to find Lily if there's something important to talk about."

"Oh, it was nothing." Rose brushed her off, she turned her head to see that Mel and Anna had stopped talking. "I'm fine, Lily just wanted to talk about homework and stuff." Rose shot a look to Phil.

"Talk when the gossipers aren't around?" Phil barely whispered.

Rose gave a small nod.

END OF JUNE

The exams were finally over and Albus lay by the lake on his stomach, his face full of grass. Scorpius and Mae were sitting next to him, the latter was talking his ear off. She was starting to get annoying but Scorpius seemed to be getting along with her fine, so Albus didn't bother to join in. Albus suddenly sat up as he heard a familiar giggle. He could see Rose walking past talking to Phil and Mel, Anna was rolling her eyes behind them.

"Hey!" Albus called to his cousin and left Scorpius with Mae.

"Oh, hey Al!" Rose grinned at him when he got closer.

Anna's mood suddenly changed, she went from being extremely bored to overly flirty.

"Why hello there Albus, funny seeing you here." Anna's voice was high pitch. It made them all cringe.

"Umm, we've been going to the same school for four years and we're in quite a few classes together. Why is it funny to see me?" Albus frowned in confusion. 'Is she a complete idiot?' Albus thought.

"I meant here, right now, talking to me. It's so nice of you to take the time to come and find me." Anna placed her hand on his arm.

Albus went slightly pink and awkwardly took a step back. "Umm, sorry but I was actually going to talk to Rose." he was embarrassed.

Rose held in the urge to laugh at Anna's clear annoyance and Albus's inability to recognise flirting.

"What can I do for you?" Rose took Albus away from her friends.

Albus shrugged. "Nothing, I just wanted to speak to you about the holidays-"

But before he could continue, Rose interrupted.

"Sorry Al, but I'm not going to the beach with your family this year."

"Because of Scorpius?"

Rose nodded. "I think your parents do very well at keeping the peace between you, James and Lily, but add me and Malfoy into the mix…" Rose shrugged. "They'd bloody tear their hair out."

"Yeah, I guess."

"Besides, I'll have a whole week without an annoying little brother in the house, I wouldn't miss that for the world!" Rose playfully punched Albus's arm. "Although mum has threatened me with some sort of summer activity club."

Albus chuckled. "Like what?"

"Not sure, but it's bound to be some sort of muggle club, which will be fun I guess. I know a few years ago I did this muggle sports club, I sucked at it, but it was fun. And then, one summer, mum made me and Hugo take dance lessons." Rose rolled her eyes at Albus's amused face. "Long story short, Hugo is surprisingly good at dancing and I am unsurprisingly bad."

Albus became jealous. "Muggle activity club! Rose! You have to tell me everything about it and write to me everyday!"

Rose laughed. "Sure Al."

SUMMER HOLIDAYS

Hugo had finished packing for his week at the beach with the Potters, and was just saying goodbye to his parents when Rose came down the stairs.

"Hugo! Quick question before you go, have you seen my 'Alice in Wonderland' book?"

Hugo looked alarmed and spoke quickly in one breath. "No-I-haven't-you-must-have-lost-it-bye."

Rose suddenly looked menacing and dragged Hugo by his ear out the backdoor, ignoring their parents's confused faces.

"Ow ow ow ow ow! Rose! That hurts!"

"That's the point. Now where's my book?"

"Umm, about that. When I gave it to Scorpius, he mistook it as a gift to keep rather than borrow. And I felt so awkward that I just let him keep it!" Hugo then added quickly while racing back to the house. "Have a nice week! Bye."

"HUGO NEVILLE WEASLEY!" Rose shouted. But by the time she got into the house, he had disappeared into a puff of smoke into the floo network.

"Now, Rosie." Ron sat Rose down at the kitchen table. "Your mum and I have found the perfect activity for you this week."

'The dreaded activity clubs' Rose groaned inwardly.

"Honestly Ronald, activity is not the right word, she's not a child." Hermione then sat next to Rose. "We were just thinking that you might want to be an assistant to myself or your dad or someone else in the family. It would give you some great work experience."

Rose sat up straight, feeling very excited.

"But I must warn you, that helping your mum in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, would just mean paperwork rather than actually helping in the field."

Rose slumped a little, but she was still excited.

"And helping your father at the Weasley store headquarters, would just mean stacking shelves rather than actually gaining useful work experience." Hermione retorted.

Rose giggled a little at her parents little rivalry. "You know what, I'd love to work in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement." She smiled sympathetically at Ron. "Sorry dad, mum wins this one."

"She always wins." He mumbled under his breath.

Rose giggled again.

"That's because I'm always right." Hermione grinned.

"You're right." Ron stood and kissed Hermione, then added. "You're brilliant." before going into the living room.

"So, there is going to be another girl there at the same time as you, but she'll have her last day at the same time as your first day. Just one day of overlap but I hope the two of you can get along. Everyone likes her at the office."

"I didn't know someone was leaving your department."

"No no, she's just been helping for the week. That's what gave me the idea for your activity this week."

"How old is she?"

"You're age. Her father is an American who recently came here from France-"

"You've lost me." Rose stared blankly at her mum.

Hermione rolled her eyes. "We recently had a transfer to the Aurors office, an American man who lived in France with his French wife, who is half Veela, and their daughter recently came to England. Lovely family." she smiled.

"So… the girl is one quarter Veela?"

Hermione nodded.

"So… she's ridiculously beautiful like aunt Fleur."

Hermione shrugged. "I guess so."

Ron had obviously heard their conversation from the other room and shouted. "As you're grandfather says 'you should never go for looks alone'. Although I was lucky, your mother is beautiful, smart, kind, brilliant and scary."

"Oh, shut up Ronald." Hermione rolled her eyes and retorted. But her cheeks were red, obviously flattered by her husbands compliments. She added in a quieter and softer shout. "I love you too dear."

Rose mimicked gagging sounds. Hermione rolled her eyes once again and gently swatted Rose's arm.

"You'll fall in love one day Rose, and then you won't find this quite so sickly."

Rose laughed. "Anyway, this girl who is a quarter Veela and ridiculously beautiful, has she and her family permanently moved to England?"

"Yes, oh and I do hope you get along. She is going to be attending Hogwarts from September and she is a little nervous. I was-"

"-hoping that this 'coincidental' overlap day of both of our work experience would make us friends." Rose finished her mums sentence, knowing her plan.

"Well, miss smarty pants, yes. It's only one day that you have to be nice and it's just so that when she gets into Hogwarts, she has at least one familiar face."

"See! I told you our Rosie has your brains." Ron shouted from the other room again.

Rose beamed in delight.

"And I agreed with you!" Hermione defended herself. "Anyway, Ronald, if you will speak to us, at least have the curtesy to be in the same room!"

"Nope, that's all I wanted to say." Ron shouted back. They could almost hear the grin in his voice.

"Rose," Hermione turned back to her daughter. "Can you please be nice and try not to scare anyone. Just for one day?"

"Mum! I'm a nice person, I am and can be nice. And since when am I scary?"

Ron scoffed loudly from the other room. The women ignored him.

"It's just that, we get quite a few letters saying that you've hexed someone again or that you've had a screaming match in the corridors again."

"Just one person mum, I only ever do that to Malfoy."

"Your own cousins are wary about getting on your wrong side. Even dear Hugo is a little scared of you and he's known you his entire life!"

Rose sat up and grinned smugly. "He's my little baby brother, he should be scared of me. It builds character."

Hermione gave and exasperated sigh. "Well what about that boy in your first year?"

"Oh, well I only hovered objects around Finley's head because he was sleeping in class." Rose defended herself.

"And those girls in your second year?"

"They started it! And Mae only had horns for a few days."

"And those two boys in your third year?"

"Now they really deserved it. Neville can back me up on that one!"

"But this year has been your worst." Hermione was sterner now.

Rose shrank a little in her seat. "Alright! I promise to not scare anyone."

"Thank you." Hermione sighed with relief. "I'll get you up tomorrow around seven and we'll go together."

THE NEXT DAY

Hermione and Rose were at least half an hour early for work. Rose rolled her eyes when she realised. There was no one else in the office, not even her mum's boss was in yet. At least Rose thought no one else was in yet until she heard someone quietly humming from a tiny office at the very end of a long hallway.

"Rose," Hermione said, she seemed a little stressed. "You're new office for the week will be at the end." She indicated to where the humming was coming from. "I'll be in to help you set up in about twenty minutes, at the moment though I have a few things to attend to."

"Sure mum, see you later." Rose smiled and slowly made her way towards the humming as Hermione rushed off in the opposite direction.

Rose soundlessly pushed open the door that was already ajar. She saw the most beautiful girl she had ever seen in her life. She had startlingly blue eyes and blonde, almost white, hair that shone as bright as the sun and had multicoloured highlights throughout. She wore an electric blue suit with a red t-shirt underneath. Rose could see under the desk that the girl wore grey boots with pink laces on her left boot and green on the right.

The humming stopped.

"Umm, can I help you with anything?" Her voice was warm and inviting.

Rose smiled to cover up her embarrassment, the girl had obviously noticed her staring. "Yeah-sorry-umm." She stuck out her hand. "I'm Rose Weasley, I'm here to start my week of work experience."

The girl positively beamed at Rose.

"Weasley! So you're Mrs Granger-Weasley's daughter! How exciting to meet you." She shook Rose's hand vigorously.

"Oh, yeah. I'm technically Granger-Weasley but I often find it easier just to go by Weasley. But can call me Rose." Rose blurted out and she had no idea why.

The girl just grinned "My name is Lunette Tinker."

"So my mum told me that you will be attending Hogwarts."

"Oh, yes." Lunette suddenly sounded very nervous and Rose could've sworn that her multicoloured highlights in her hair turned grey. "It was sad to leave Beauxbatons, but I always think it's best to move boldly onwards and unafraid of toil."

Rose's smile grew. She instantly like this girl.

"Well, at least you'll know one friendly face. So, what have you been up to this week?"

Lunette, who's hair was back to being multicoloured, showed Rose around the office and Hermione barely had to check in for five minutes before Rose sent her away saying that Lunette had told her everything. Rose and Lunette got along famously. In their lunch break Rose told Lunette all about the Hogwarts houses and classes while Lunette told Rose about herself and her life in France.

"My grandmother is a Veela from Bulgaria, she moved to France and married my French grandfather. So my mother had lived in France her whole life but is half Bulgarian and Veela."

"So where's your mixed accent of French, American and Bulgarian?" Rose asked.

"Well, my father was always at work and my mother was always looking after my grandmother and was hopeless at English so they hired and Englishman to teach me the language. I guess I picked up his accent. My father is American and a Metamorphamagus, which comes in handy for his work-"

"Oh," realisation suddenly dawned on Rose. "That's why your highlights keep on changing colours. You're a Metamorphamagus too."

Lunette grinned, her hair turned bright pink and her face morphed into a cat with blue whiskers. "Yeah, I think being a Metamorphamagus has helped my accent somehow." She hesitated before speaking again. "I'm worried people might think I'm a freak."

"Are you kidding?! People will think your so cool!" Rose gently nudged her, "And if you stick with me, no one will pick on you."

Lunette suddenly looked quite alarmed, her face returned to normal and her hair turned firetruck red. Rose laughed.

"Don't get me wrong, I'm not a bully or anything. It's just that I have one specific rival and we often have duals in the corridors. People know not to get on the wrong side of me." Rose remembered to add, "No on ever gets hurt! These duals are more spiteful and harmless hexes just to wind each other up. Plus, my cousins are always on my side, and there are a lot of them."

Lunette sighed in relief and her hair changed back to normal.

"I'm sorry, I interrupted you." Rose shook her head. "You were talking about your American father."

"Oh yeah, well he was traveling the world after he quit his job in America, he met my mother and they soon married so he just stayed in France."

"You know, my Aunt Fleur is a quarter-Veela. And she went to Beauxbatons."

"Oh yes, I know about her. Our headmistress Olympe Maxime often speaks of Fleur Delacour and her bravery in the Battle of Hogwarts. I understand that her children attend Hogwarts too?"

"Yep, Fleur married my uncle Bill. They have Victoire who left Hogwarts about four years ago, she's now married and has a kid on the way. And then there is Dominique who has just finished her fifth year and Louis who has just finished his first year, they are both in Hufflepuff."

"Wow. Thank you Rose, you've really made me feel more at ease with this whole moving to a new school."

Hermione waited until both she and Rose had just entered the house to ask her about her first day.

"It was great mum, she's really nice."

"Oh that's wonderful!"

Hermione was in a terrific mood for the rest of the day. Ron noticed as soon as he got home and raised his eyebrows in question to Rose.

"Her plan worked and I'm friends with the new girl." Rose offered as an explanation.

Ron just nodded and smiled. "Oh Rosie, we forgot to tell you this morning-"

"What?"

"Let me finish. I was saying that we forgot to tell you, Teddy has a surprise for you and all your cousins."

"What's the surprise?" Rose was grinned.

Hermione laughed. "There is no way we are going to tell you. It's Teddy's surprise and he's very excited for you all to find out."

Rose looked at her parents suspiciously. "But you guys know?"

They nodded.

"So I'm guessing that none of my cousins know except Victoire but all my aunts and uncle and grandparents know?"

They nodded again.

Rose flopped onto the sofa and grumbled. "I'm never going to be able trick anyone into telling me am I?"

Ron just laughed. But hermione was shocked.

"Rose Minerva Granger-Weasley! You don't trick people into telling you things do you?"

Rose raised her eyebrows. "Just my cousins and Hugo, I know their weak spots and after knowing them for fifteen years, I have a lot of dirt on them. Secrets don't stay secrets for very long if I want to find out."

"What kind of dirt do you have on them?" Ron was intrigued and Hermione hit his arm.

"No dad, if I tell you, I'll loose all my credibility as a secret master and blackmailer." Rose smirked

"Oh, and we wouldn't want to tarnish the reputation of a blackmailer." Hermione huffed and walked out of the room. Ron just laughed again and Rose sat smugly reading her book.

HUNSTANTON

"Hey, I got a letter from Rose." Albus grinned when the owls came with the post that morning.

The Potters, Hugo and Scorpius were two days into their camping holiday at the beach. Scorpius subtly rolled his eyes at Albus's announcement. They were all sitting around the breakfast table, the smell of coffee, orange juice and burnt toast hung in the air.

Albus continued when he saw that his family were interested as to what the letter said. "She's doing work experience with Aunt Hermione and, wow, she made a new friend."

Hugo huffed and crossed his arms. "I've been gone for two days and she hasn't written to me at all, I'm only her brother."

"Yeah, well maybe that's because she's in a mood with you because you gave away her favourite boo-" Lily stopped herself and looked at Scorpius startled. Her spoonful of cereal halfway to her mouth.

Hugo elbowed her in the stomach and Lily's spoon dropped back in the bowl, spilling it all over Harry's toast.

"Thanks Lil" Harry sighed with a small smile on his face.

Ginny flicked her wand and cleaned up the mess. Lily and Hugo excused themselves, having a muttered argument that no one else could hear apart from the odd word while they washed up their breakfast cutlery. Scorpius watched them suspiciously and he planned to get the truth out of Hugo sometime soon.

"Oh, Teddy has a surprise for you guys and your cousins." Harry announced.

"Ooh! What is it?" Lily bounced up to Harry.

"A surprise." Ginny answered for him. The couple shared a smug smile.

"No way, you have to tell us!" James insisted.

"Who's Teddy?" Scorpius muttered to Albus.

"Teddy Lupin, my dad's godson. But he's always been practically family and then became actual family when he married my cousin Victoire."

Scorpius nodded in understanding. Albus, Hugo Lily and James begged their parents to tell the surprise but Harry and Ginny wouldn't budge.

"I was thinking we could go up to the funfair today, then there's going to be a bonfire later this evening." Ginny spoke up and changed the subject as the children were scattered around the tent.

He was greeted with grunts of agreement and nodding of heads.

"But that means best muggle behaviour for all of you." Harry warned.

As they walked up to the town Harry explained some ground rules and Scorpius listened intently where as Albus, Lily and James, who had heard these rules hundreds of times, only rolled their eyes.

"Do not say anything like 'Merlin's beard!' or 'Merlin's pants!' if you really must say something, say 'oh my god'. Muggles have no idea who Merlin is. Another rule, you guys go to a…" Harry waited for one of his children to finish the rule.

"A tiny boarding school in Scotland called ." Albus said in a bored monotone voice.

Ginny tried to hide her chuckle.

"Good. And if anyone asks what your favourite subject is?"

"We change the subject or say 'oh sorry, I just remembered I have to tell my brother something' or something on the lines of that." Lily rolled her eyes

"Well done, and the same goes if there's a question you can't answer. Now, everyone left their wands in the tent right?"

They all grumbled a yes.

"Now, me and Harry aren't going to the bonfire. So we want Hugo and Lily back around nine, it's still light out around then. But Albus, Scorpius and James, you can all stay out until ten if you want." Ginny said.

Finally Harry and Ginny were satisfied that they were ready and they arrived at the funfair. Scorpius was very excited, he always was when the Potter's took him with them to muggle events, although the bonfire later that night was new to him. The only bonfires Scorpius had ever really heard about were in History of Magic when witches and wizards were hunted and burnt. The thought scared him a little.

Ginny and Harry gave the children money and then left them to themselves. James turned to Scorpius.

"Another rule, if anyone asks. we're all friends and we don't dislike Scorpius because he was a crappy friend to our cousin." said James, then he walked off by himself to an ice-cream parlour.

Lily nodded seriously and Hugo and Albus just looked awkwardly at each other. Hugo and Albus were the only ones who still talked to Scorpius, the rest of Rose's family had taken her side, they didn't hate Scorpius but they didn't talk to him.

Lily dragged Hugo off to go on a ride and left Albus and Scorpius to wander around on their own.

After some time Scorpius spoke. "So, I guess your cousins really hate me thanks to my rivalry with Weasley."

"Hate is a strong word, they certainly don't hate you. My cousins have just taken Rose's side and so they're trying to ignore you. But that's hard for Lily and James to do when you're my best friend."

"And Hugo is going against all odds and being nice to me?"

Albus smiled. "He actually really wanted to be your friend before the whole rivalry with Rose happened. But rest assured, Rose scares us all enough that if she really didn't want us to be friends with you, we wouldn't."

"So she doesn't mind that her own brother and her favourite cousin are close friends to her enemy?"

"I guess not." Albus shrugged then dragged Scorpius to the biggest ride he had seen so far.

After a few hours, it was time for lunch and Scorpius and Albus got off a disappointingly slow rollercoaster to go and get food. Scorpius was annoyed that the rollercoaster wasn't that good but Albus looked as though he had just been on the ride of his life.

"Amazing!"

"Really? I thought it was boring compared to the one that dropped straight down." Scorpius said after swallowing his first chip, he thought the food was amazing.

"Not the ride, the girl I saw sitting opposite us."

Scorpius thought back. He and Albus were facing forward and two girls were facing them in a four seater carriage. Albus and Scorpius were bored so they talked to each other, but neither of the girls seemed to know each other is neither spoke. One was definitely younger than them and the other was a pretty blonde with multicoloured streaks in her hair. Scorpius had to agree that the colourful haired girl was very pretty.

Albus wouldn't stop going on about her and his food was getting cold. Eventually Lily and Hugo joined them. Lily was annoyed at her brother's nonstop chatter about some girl he saw, so she stuffed a load of chips in his mouth to shut him up.

"So what's her name?" Hugo asked.

Albus wasn't listening, he was staring off into the distance. Hugo laughed and Lily rolled her eyes. Hugo then asked Scorpius the same question.

"No idea, we didn't speak to her."

"Merlins beard!" Albus exclaimed under his breath then hid his head under the table, pretending to tie his shoe laces.

Scorpius, Hugo and Lily looked over to where Albus had been staring. The multicolour haired girl was coming their way.

"Umm, excuse me, but I believe your friend dropped this earlier." The girl said boldly and held out a tiny moleskin pouch for Albus, who was still hiding under the table. The girl looked at him skeptically. "Is your friend ok?" She cautiously asked Lily.

Lily grinned. "He's my brother, he's an idiot."

The girl smiled back. Albus suddenly lifted his head up, banging it on the table as he went.

"Ow! I'm not an idiot Lily." Albus rubbed the back of his head where he had hit it.

This time the girl tried to hide her smile.

"Maybe idiot isn't the right word, maybe just painfully awkward." Hugo tried to make Albus look better. His cousin sent him a grateful look in reply.

"Oh, I think this is yours." The girl finally gave Albus back his moleskin pouch.

Albus turned a bright shade of red as he mumbled a shy 'thanks'. The girl hesitated slightly before slowly turning away. Albus's eyes widened, he kicked Scorpius under the table.

"Ow! mate, why?" Scorpius muttered.

"You're Mr Manners, ask her name." Albus muttered back.

Scorpius rolled his eyes but still called after her. "Umm,"

The girl quickly turned around.

"Dreadfully sorry, but we never got your name. I'm Scorpius, this is my friend Albus, his younger sister Lily and their cousin Hugo."

The girl shook hands with each of them in turn apart from Albus who just chuckled, turned bright red and hit his forehead on the table in embarrassment.

"He's normally more articulate than this." Lily explained. "Our eldest brother James is also around here somewhere."

The girl smiled. "Cool, I guess I'll have to meet him another time. I'm Lunette."

"Are you coming to the bonfire tonight?" Hugo asked.

"As a matter of fact, I am. My mother is very excited to find out what a bonfire is." Lunette's eyes widened. "is-, is like- umm, here. She's- she's french and I- I umm, guess they do it a bit differently here. Er, ok. See you later." Lunette ran off, mortified at what she had said. 'Tu es complement débile' she told herself that she was a complete idiot. 'all muggles know what a bonfire is, now they'll think you're really weird.'

As it happened, the four of them only thought that her sudden departure was strange. They didn't notice her slip up which might have been obvious to a muggle.

"Perhaps she had somewhere to go." Scorpius offered as an explanation.

Albus still had his forehead on the table. "No, I must have put her off." He mumbled then grunted. "Hugo's right, I'm so awkward."

By that time Lily and Hugo had already run off to go on another ride.

"I've heard some girls at school say that you're charmingly awkward." Scorpius wanted nothing more than to cheer his best friend up.

Albus laughed and lifted his head up. "Thanks for trying to cheer me up mate. It's ok though, I'm used to girls not noticing me, Lunette will probably actively avoid me at the bonfire tonight."

"Don't worry, I'm sure that we will never see her again. There are thousands of muggles here, you probably won't have a chance to see her at the bonfire."

"You've got to stop saying 'muggle' so loudly."

Albus heard a familiar squeal and looked to his left. Lily, Hugo and James weren't too far away and he could hear his sister excitedly telling James that there would be fireworks at the bonfire. The two boys stood and put their newspaper, which had held their lunch, in the bins. Albus wasn't looking where he was going and collided into the back of someone. She fell hard on the ground.

"Sorry! Sorry! That was my fault!" Albus quickly blurted and stuck his hand out to help the girl up. He squinted as the sun was in his eyes and did not see that it was Lunette until she had jumped up and tried with all her might not to laugh.

"It's alright." her attention was drawn to someone behind Albus, she waved and hurried off, not without calling back to Albus. "Bye."

Albus hit his forehead with his palm. "The universe hates me."

Scorpius rolled his eyes and held in a laugh. "The universe does not hate you."

Once they got into a queue for a ride, Albus continued his proof that the universe hates him.

"Just look at it, I'm fifteen years old, most guys have had crushes and girlfriends, but I never really have."

"You went out with the friendless Ravenclaw once." Scorpius shrugged.

"Don't call her that, her name is Katie. But that was so awkward and didn't work out because I'm so awkward! And Rose told me that Anna had a crush on me for a while and I never picked up on it. another piece of proof that the universe hates me."

"How is that proof?" Scorpius scoffed.

"I'm not blessed with the 'gift' of picking up hints. Apparently my dad was the same, well according to my mum. Anyway, I've finally found a girl who I really like and I keep on making a fool of myself." Albus paused and thought for a second before he groaned. "Oh Merlin," he mumbled. "She found my moleskin pouch, she's a muggle and probably thought that I'm some creepy kid who carries around a furry wallet!"

Scorpius's eyebrows knit together. "Wait, I meant to ask about that pouch. Aren't they meant to be really rare?"

"Yeah, Hagrid gave every one of my cousins a moleskin pouch on our first day at Hogwarts. Well, not the first day, but the first time we visit him he gives us the pouch."

"Your family are really close to him?"

"Yeah, especially my siblings and Rose and Hugo, 'cause our parents were so fond of him. That's why we visit him most weeks."

"We've gotten off topic," Scorpius quickly changed the subject back. He had never felt very close to anyone except Albus and the usual feeling of envy was drawing near. Albus had so many people who loved him and who he loved while he had a tiny family who were rarely not arguing. "I still don't believe the universe hates you."

"I'm the odd one out in my family." Albus said bluntly.

Scorpius understood immediately. There was nothing he could say to this to make Albus feel better. Scorpius had tried in the past as the topic of Albus being put into Slytherin came up a lot, nothing ever made him feel better.

Albus sighed heavily. "Sorry, it's probably best not to get into that discussion right now. I'm trying to have fun at the beach with my best friend."

They finally reached the ticket booth and there was no need to talk. The young man at the ticket booth was possibly the most grumpy and bored person they had ever seen. His face had a permanent bored look on it, he chewed gum loudly and he leant on the tiny desk so lazily that he barely moved his arm to give and receive money. When the young man realised that Scorpius and Albus were staring at him, he glared at them and the two best friends hurried on to the ride.

As soon as they were off the ride Albus saw James and waved. James shook his head and went back to chatting up some girl who wouldn't stop flicking her hair and giggling. Albus rolled his eyes and as he did he saw Lily was also rolling her eyes. She had a habit of not liking any girl James dated but wouldn't admit her protectiveness.

By the time the bonfire started, Albus had put Lunette to the back of his mind and managed to enjoy himself. He and Scorpius chatted to group of muggles around their age and bought some popcorn from a stand.

"Hey, Al!" Lily came bouncing up to her brother. She was pumped full of sugar and so was very hyper. As was Hugo who skipped up next to her.

"They have hot chocolate and stuff over there!" Hugo pointed to a large table. "James bought a drink for some girl."

"Does she have a name?" Albus asked.

"Well I don't think James could remember her name so he sneakily let her introduce herself. And I don't think he was all that happy for us to talk to him while he's trying to be 'cool' and flirty. But I think he stopped minding when she told us her name. It was something like Naomi? or Natasha? or Nessy? is that even a name? maybe it would be if it was short for Vanessa, but that wasn't her name. or maybe it was Nathan?" Lily was waffling again. "Nathan? Is Nathan a girls name? Or is it unisex? like Ashley or Nick. Nick! Was Nick her name?"

"I thought it was Jenny." Hugo slipped in between Lily's waffling.

The sudden interruption started her and she stopped talking for a while.

Lilly shook her head. "Anyway, do you know what time it is?"

Albus turned to look at Scorpius who always carried around a watch with an 'S' on it for Slytherin. A present from his grandfather.

"It's 8;45pm."

Lily gave a begrudging 'thanks' to Scorpius and she and Hugo left to go back to the tent.

"We've got about an hour left, what do you want to do?" Scorpius asked as they stood watching everyone around the bonfire.

"Well, the fireworks should be going off in a minute or two. Shall I get us both a drink?"

"Sure, I'll be over here with these guys." Scorpius indicated to the group they had recently been talking to.

Albus got over to the drinks table. The young man there was the same grumpy teenager from the ticket booth earlier that day. he scowled at Albus and threw two bottles of cola at him.

"They're free." He grunted as Albus got his wallet out. "All drinks are free. But the fix ones have been shaken loads so open it away from me."

Albus smiled, said thank you politely and made his way towards Scorpius. He was almost there when a small and gentle finger tapped him on the shoulder, Albus spun around to see Lunette smiling at him. She was around the same height and even in the glow of the bonfire she was beautiful. Albus could have sworn that her hair was multicoloured earlier in the day, but now it was soft red orange and yellow, just like a fire. They seemed to glow and change like the themselves.

"Hi. It's Albus right? Remember me? I'm the girl you met earlier, I'm Lunette." She felt that she had to explain herself as Albus was just staring blankly at her.

Albus was so startled to see Lunette and that she was actually talking to him, that he dropped the bottles of cola. They rolled down the beach and he had to run and fetch them.

Lunette laughed a little. "So are you here at Hunstanton just for the day or are you camping somewhere?"

Before Albus could answer, both bottles of cola exploded in his face. Lunette jumped back and avoided getting herself covered while Albus just stood there embarrassed covered head to toe in cold and sticky cola.

"Umm, I'll see you later." Lunette looked sympathetically at Albus and quickly jogged away. She hadn't meant to be rude, only that she thought it was best to leave him as he was embarrassed enough.

Luckily, not too many people had noticed and even fewer laughed. Scorpius and James came running straight to Albus's aid. James was one of those who was laughing, but at least he was trying to help. They found him a towel and the three of them walked back to the tent. James holding Albus's shorts and Scorpius holding his t-shirt each at arms length away and only holding on to the dry parts.

"The universe hates me." Albus said dryly.

This time Scorpius couldn't help but agree.

The fireworks started and lit up the beach in front of them, in the distance they could see Harry, Ginny, Hugo and Lily sitting and watching the fireworks from outside the tent. Scorpius looked at James and Albus, laughing as James chased Albus with his own shorts and then he watched Harry put his arm around Ginny and Lily pushed Hugo lightly as they laughed together. Scorpius had to change his mind, the universe did not hate his best friend. Albus had a wonderful family who all loved each other. 'And I'm lucky to have him as a friend.' He thought to himself.

MALFOY MANOR

When Scorpius used the floo network to get home through the kitchen fireplace, he was greeted by the sight of a very exhausted Petit cooking something over a hot stove. She was too small to reach the wooden spoon in the large pot, which was itself just as tall as her, so she was using a chair and standing on her tiptoes. She did not notice Scorpius. She was muttering in a high pitch voice to herself.

"Bad Petit, bad Petit. Must not burn the soup again. Master will not be happy, master will not be happy. Bad Petit, bad Petit."

Scorpius watched her curiously as he tried to make out what she was saying. Only when Petit took a hot empty tray out from the oven without oven gloves on and started hitting herself over the head with it, did Scorpius intervene.

"Bad Petit, bad Petit!" She repeated louder this time with each hit.

Scorpius ripped the hot tray out of her hands and through it on the table as he was also not wearing anything to protect him from the scold.

"Master Scorpius! You're back! Your mother will want to know," Petit smiled at him then started muttering to herself again. "tell miss, tell miss. Must not burn the soup again, must not burn the soup again. Master will be mad-"

"Petit!" Scorpius said quickly to grab her attention, he then knelt down in front of her. Petit stopped and looked like a dear caught in headlamps. "Why were you hitting yourself?"

Petit's voice became even squeakier as she whined. "Petit left the soup for too long and burned the pot. Master saw and shouted at Petit. Dinner is an hour late." Petit sniffed. "Petit had to punish herself."

"Petit," Scorpius filled with sympathy, "You shouldn't harm yourself. I'm sorry about my grandfather. Can I help you with anything?"

Petit sniffed again. Her eyes widened and ran to the chair and pulled herself up to look over the pot and into the soup. "The Soup!" She almost shouted in worry. But she sighed with relief as soon as she saw that it was ok.

Scorpius looked around the kitchen to see if there was anything that needed to be done. He soon busied himself preparing cutlery and plates to be taken to his grandparents and arranged them on two large black trays with sliver handles decorated with intertwined snakes.

"Thanks you master Scorpius." Petit noticed that he was helping.

"Anytime Petit, just ask and I'll come running."

Petit only nodded. A timer went off and her head shot to look at the oven then she looked horridly over to the soup again and back and forth she looked from the pot to the oven.

"I'll get it." Scorpius smiled and opened the oven, two bread rolls were warming in the oven and he quickly popped them on the plates.

Scorpius had been home almost three hours before anyone else in the Manner knew other than Petit. The house elf took the tray on food to his grandparents and then sat and talked to Scorpius as he made and ate his own dinner.

"Scorpius!" Astoria was surprised to see her son sitting happily at the table in the kitchen. "Dear, when did you get in? Why didn't you come and find me?"

"Sorry, I got a bit carried away." he looked at Petit was had just started washing up.

"Alright," Astoria sighed. She looked over by the fireplace and saw Scorpius's bags. She flicked her wand and they flew up to his room. "It's getting late, why don't you say hello to your father and then go to bed. We can have a nice chat about your holiday over breakfast. Does that sound good?"

"Great. Thanks mum." Scorpius yawned and went around looking for his father. Her eventually found him in the library across the hall from his own room. "Dad?" Scorpius gently called.

Draco had fallen asleep in a car in front of the large windows while reading alchemical manuscripts. He suddenly woke up and squinted and Scorpius. "Is that you son?"

"Yeah, hey dad. I was going to say hi and then go to bed."

"Very well, goodnight. I'll see you in the morning and we can have a proper conversation then." Draco packed up his manuscripts and exited the library with Scorpius.

When Scorpius closed the library door, he was surprised to see Astoria smiling at him in the hallways. Draco wrapped one arm around her waist and why both grinned at him. Scorpius looked at them suspiciously but decided to drop it as he was tired.

Once in his bedroom, Scorpius found a letter from Hogwarts sitting neatly on his bed. He opened it and read the neat handwriting showing that he had passed all his exams with Os for Outstanding. He grinned and thought it best to wait until morning to tell his parents the good news. Scorpius placed the letter back on his bed before realising that there was a second letter behind it and something heavy in the envelope.

Dear Mr Malfoy,

We are pleased to inform you that been selected to serve as Prefect for Slytherin house. Your school record shows that you have ambition, the ability to lead others and are resourceful, which Slytherins have long been lauded for.

We are certain that you will continue to be a model for your peers and will take your new responsibilities seriously. Enclosed please find you Prefect Badge, to be worn on your robes at all times. Congratulations!

Head Master

Scorpius grinned for ear to ear and couldn't help himself doing a little dance around his room. This could not wait until morning, Scorpius burst out of his room to find that his parents were still standing in the corridor staring at his door.

"You knew?" Scorpius hurried out.

"The letter was heavier than usual. We guessed." Draco smiled proudly.

"Well done by little Prefect!" Astoria cried and hugged her son.

GRANGER-WEASLEY HOUSE

"Hugo!" someone called cheerfully to him as he landed into the fireplace into the living room. He looked around but no one was there, he then found them all in the kitchen eating dinner with one empty place setting specially for him.

"Hey guys." Hugo kissed Hermione on the cheek and hugged Ron before piling rice onto his plate. "So how's everything been at home? Did you all miss me."

"Of course we did sweetheart." Hermione rubbed his shoulder.

"It's good to have another man in the house." Ron winked cheerfully at Hugo.

Rose only shrugged.

"Rude!" Hugo accused Rose.

Rose ginned. "It was nice being an only child but it's still nice having you back."

"Thanks. Oh, did my letter come though? Lily Albus and James got their but me and Scorpius never did."

Rose and Ron couldn't help but grit their teeth as they heard Scorpius's name. But neither said a word. Hermione handed Hugo his letter, the boy ripped it open and smiled. He had gotten A for acceptable in all of his exam except Herbology where he got an E for exceeds expectations.

"How did your exams go?" Hugo turned to his sister.

Rose nodded as her mouth was full. once she stalled she smiled at him. "And I'm a Prefect!"

"Shoot, now James and Lorcan won't be able to do any pranks without getting detentions or losing points. You always know when they're got a prank coming."

Rose only shrugged but she had a sneaky smile. "I don't always know. Besides, if they tell me about a prank, I will never know if they're telling the truth unless it is actually done right in front of my nose."

Hugo grinned. Rose knew that everybody loved James and Lorcan's pranks, just as long as they weren't caught up in them. Rose herself always found the duo amusing and so she wasn't going to stop the fun, Prefect or not, just as long as nobody got hurt or in danger.