She had been greeted by a blur of red and a sudden crushing hug as she appeared on the other side of the barrier. A startled laugh escaped her as she stumbled before hugging Hugo back just as hard. He grinned up at her happily as she ruffled his hair and ushered him ahead of her and off to the side so they could get out of the way of other newcomers to the platform.
It was plenty of time for the guilt and loathing to start threading low through her stomach and toward her chest.
"So...how is...everyone doing?"
Hugo leaned against his trolley, focusing on picking at something on the handle as he shrugged, "About the same as when you left."
She clenched her jaw and nodded sharply.
Hugo's hand shot out to grasp her elbow, "I didn't mean...I mean...it's fine." Rose looked back at him with a frown. Her brother huffed in frustration, "I get it. We get it. Gran was actually relieved you were taking care of yourself."
Rose blinked, "Oh."
He offered a small smile, "Yeah." He dropped his hand, "And I realized what you had been trying to do for me, having me visit friends all the time so I just...kept doing that. So...thanks for watching out for me."
Her eyes started welling up and she reached out abruptly to tug him back into a tight hug.
"I did miss you, though," he mumbled into her shoulder.
"I missed you too, you sap," she grumbled back.
Hugo pulled back with a withering look, "Who's the sap here?"
With a grin she ruffled his hair again, "Did Mum have anything for you to give me?"
Hugo shook his head and opened his mouth to say something when an arm slid around her shoulders. She had a moment where she thought it was Scorpius, but when she looked over she saw the shock of black hair and recognized Albus. She pushed down the feeling of disappointment. There was a line, after all.
"So where were you the past couple weeks?"
Rose rolled her eyes, "Hello to you, too, Albus."
He smiled, "Hi, Rose. So where were you the past couple weeks?"
She scrunched her face up as if in thought, "Hm...you know what? I think it was…," she snapped her fingers, "Oh, right! It was none of your business!"
Albus laughed, "Fine, fine. Lily, James, Fred, and Roxy have already laid claim to a couple compartments for us."
Hugo chimed in as they started for the Express, "James better not have taken my window seat! I called it!"
Rose exchanged a knowing look with Albus before they both burst out laughing, much to Hugo's dismay.
The train ride was at once lovely and torturous. It was so nice to spend time with her family - and it had only been two weeks since she'd last seen them. Her time away had seemed so much longer than that. And yet it seemed like it had ended so quickly.
They touched gently on what they all knew so far about their grandfather's disappearance, but there was no information that Rose hadn't already been aware of. It was easy to see how the past few weeks were wearing on each of them even as they tried not to show it.
Rose didn't mention her plans to do her own amateur investigation to her brother or cousins. She had learned her lesson about roping people into her plans. They seemed more than happy to trust the adults to find him. It wasn't that she didn't trust them to find her grandfather, but more the fact that if she didn't try to do something she would lose her mind.
Though she was disappointed that her mum hadn't sent a letter with any news with Hugo, she also had to admit she hadn't had high hopes for it to begin with. Especially now that she was headed back to school, she was worried Mum would rather withhold than share much information in an effort to keep Rose safe and focused on school.
She understood the intent, but railed against it anyway. Her mother knew she'd be doing her own research on it...keeping information from her would only slow her down, not keep her out of it. Maybe she could ask Scorpius to talk to his parents...or maybe she would be too cowardly to do that. She hoped not.
The first few days of everyone returning to Hogwarts proved to be both a welcome and detested distraction from her research plans. It was a relief to allow herself to be caught up in her prefect duties and catching up with her friends, but amidst her being too busy to spend any time investigating, she was inundated with questions about her grandfather. It was a constant and painful reminder of what she wasn't getting done.
Was there any news? Was there anything they could do for her? For her family?
The worst was the insensitive, 'How long before a funeral is held?'
It was good that Emma and Sophie had been there to catch her punch before it landed and ushered her back to the dorm for the rest of the lunch break.
It was near the end of the first week as Rose sank down onto one of the plush chairs in the Gryffindor common room after finishing her patrols, body heavy with exhaustion. She rubbed her eyes, wondering why she had offered to pick up Elliot's round after he'd been sent to infirmary. It was his own silly prank that backfired that got him there in the first place.
She felt like she was just running from one thing to the next. There had barely been any time to breathe.
Taking a slow inhale, she tried to force some of the tension out of her neck and shoulders. They refused to cooperate. Abandoning that hopeless task, she glanced over at one of the windows in the common room to see the moon. It was still early enough. The common room was almost empty with only a few first years playing chess in the corner and a group of girls giggling over Witch's Weekly on the couch on the opposite end of the room from where Rose was sprawled.
A smile tilted up the corners of her lips as she watched them animatedly talk to each other in hushed tones. If the blushes on some of their faces were any indicator they were probably referencing some article about how to properly snare a dashing young wizard and discussing which techniques they could try on their crushes. Rose wondered who they had in mind.
She wondered if Scorpius was on their list.
A frown flitted across her face and she pushed herself up and moved toward the dormitories. She had her own articles to browse, after all. She already felt guilty about not having been able to do any checking in so far this week. Tonight, however, she ignored the temptation of her bed, and grabbed the black case from her trunk, careful not to make too much noise and wake any of her roommates up.
Crawling back out through the portrait, she waved casually at the Lady who yawned and returned the gesture before settling back down to sleep. Some of the perks of being a prefect was that she could have any reason for being out after hours and she also knew the patrol schedules. Not that every prefect memorized the schedules for all of the houses, but Rose was determined to be as rule-abiding as she could while bending them just a bit for the cause. Getting caught would do her no good.
She moved down the darkened corridors, accompanied by quiet snores from the portraits she passed. The stairs had a bit of fun with her before settling her on the right landing. As she reached the north tower, she took off her robes, laid them on the floor, and sat down on top of them as she pulled the laptop out of the bag. Though the object itself originated from muggles, her mum had charmed the battery to never die when it was realized that the castle would have no plugins and Rose was distraught at not being able to contact her cousins on the Granger side in second year.
Rose took a moment to rest her head back against the cool stone with her eyes closed, basking in the quiet. No voices. No distractions. If she wasn't careful she'd fall asleep and she wouldn't be lucky enough to wake up with a blanket kindly draped over her.
She opened her eyes and sighed. She'd seen Scorpius in the halls and they shared some classes, but beyond the occasional cool nod of greeting they hadn't spoken...or interacted in any meaningful way. The guilt would seep out every time she kept walking past or tamped down the urge to ask him a question in class about the topic being taught. It just oozed through her, waiting for the perfect time to twist the knife.
"I'll follow your lead once you get settled."
It wasn't Scorpius that wasn't prepared for the ramifications of having a public friendship, after all. It was why he had insisted she go ahead without him. It mortified her that he could tell she was unsure about taking that step. What sort of person was she that she had gone along with it?
Rose clenched her jaw as she opened the laptop, its light flooding the darkened alcove into stark relief. She wasn't sure how the castle felt about technology being used within its walls, but so far there had been no magical repercussions. Focusing her attention on the screen, she took a few minutes to respond to some notifications and messages from her Granger cousins. They were under the impression that she and Hugo went to a boarding school with terrible internet service. She loved that it wasn't an entirely inaccurate description.
After finishing her responses, she spent the rest of her time poring over multiple news sites, working her way through the local sites near where her mum had told her her grandfather was last seen before branching out nationally and even a few international sources. Her eyes were burning from staring at the screen and her shoulders ached from hunching over the laptop by the time she finally closed the computer. The non-wizarding world seemed as ignorant about Arthur Weasley's whereabouts as she was. She packed everything up, donned her robes once more and, after a long stretch to try and loosen her shoulders and back, she started back down toward the common room.
The Prophet hadn't had anything in it beyond the repeated article that continued to take up its small space in the corner. Right now she felt as if she knew more about the non-wizarding world than the one she was currently immersed in. Her mum's lack of communication thus far was frustrating.
As she approached the portrait she made a decision. She had to see if she could find a different source for information. She already felt ashamed of the plan that was forming in her mind, but...it was better than the nothing she had been willing to extend since school started.
She was going to have to speak to Albus about borrowing a few things.
AN:
Okay, first off - my sincere apologies for the radio silence. October hitting like a train sort of ran into the rest of the year for me! And, in all that time, I didn't get a chance to build my buffer back up like I'd hoped. :/
** So, for the time being this story will update once a month.**
I do have a bit of buffer left so that will help me not stress out about it, but the longer time frame will hopefully let me continue getting everything settled down in the real world without feeling awful about leaving all of you on the ropes.
Anywho...We officially made it to Hogwarts! Woohoo! We also finally get to meet some secondary characters beyond Hermoine and Skilt (though don't tell him that I called him a 'secondary' character! haha) I was really looking forward to adding this scene with Hugo. My goal with the rewrites was to make things a little bit more realistic so we can see how these actions that are taken might affect the other people in Rose and Scorpius's lives rather than just using them for plot devices and moving on. I dunno. I'm rambling. I'm just really proud of how the revised story has grown so much from it's predecessor.
Alright, I'll stop now, but thank you to everyone who is still invested and a HUGE thank you to those who have left kudos and those lovely comments. They mean the world to me and really do help motivate me to write knowing that others are enjoying this weird little story that I've made up in my head. Thank you again and I hope you all are having a lovely start to 2022!