Lily sat outside with Hugo enjoying the free time, the sun, and the leaves beginning to fall from the trees. All of the older students had gone to Hogsmede, leaving her free from over-protective siblings and ever-annoying friends. Since the successful revenge on Rebecca Rowle, she had come to regard Scorpius as a sort of friend, the sort that annoys you to no end sometimes. Friday, on the way to Transfiguration, he had pulled her leather hair tie out of her hair and would not give it back. She had turned to say hello to Rose as she was passing by and when she looked back at Scorpius he was staring at her strangely.
“Lily, why do you keep going to that old attic room?” Hugo’s question startled her out of her reverie.
“How did you know I was going there?”
“I saw you headed down that corridor a couple times after History of Magic so I followed you. I went up in there after you had left one time, but all I saw were a bunch of old desks and picture frames.”
“I like to study there.” She didn’t know why she lied. After all, there was no harm in talking to the ghost, but for some reason, she wanted to keep Tom to herself.
“Funny place to study. What’s wrong with your common room?”
“Well it’s hard to study there with Malfoy around,” she giggled thinking of how just last night he had stolen her wand and taken it up to the boys dorm, refusing to let her in because “Zabini was changing.”
“Hey, did you know James told Albus, Rose and I to stop picking on him?”
“No. I thought he hated Malfoy.”
“Yeah, me too. When I asked why, he just said, ‘Leave him alone, he’s a good bloke.’ Weird huh.”
“Yeah.” What could have gotten into James.
“Albus had a fit about it though, said Malfoy fancies you.”
“What! Al’s mental. He just likes to pick on me, that’s all.”
“That’s what I thought, but Al swears he knows Malfoy fancies you.”
“Well, surely James wouldn’t tell you to lay off him if he thought Malfoy fancied me.”
As though he heard her say his name, James walked up to the two of them, Rose and Albus close behind. James threw a handful of candy into each of their laps.
“Thanks,” Lily said tearing open a chocolate frog. She pocketed the card with a picture of her father on it to add to her collection later.
“How was Hogsmede?” Lily asked Al.
“Great! You should see Uncle George’s joke shop! It’s brilliant.”
“We saw your friend there,” James said.
“Malfoy?” James nodded.
“He seemed to be having trouble deciding what to buy.” Lily noticed Al’s frown.
“Why do you hang around him?”
“Partly because he’s the only one not trying to hex me every waking hour and partly because…he’s fun. He makes me laugh.” She smiled at the thought. Al murmured under his breath.
“Lay off him.” James frowned at his brother.
“Are your roommates still picking on you then, Lily?” Rose interrupted the staring match between the Potter brothers.
“Yeah, they put spiders in my bad last night. Lucky I’m not as scared of them as Uncle Ron is.” They all laughed.
“You should prank them.” James said.
“James! You’ll get her into trouble.” Rose squealed.
“Me and Malfoy are working on it.” She ignored Rose. Al grumbled again. The siblings and cousins spent the rest of the afternoon chatting by the lake before parting ways to get ready for the Halloween feast.
Delicious smells wafted from the Great Hall when Lily finally made it to the Great Hall. Large pumpkins hung in midair around the room. She walked to the Slytherin table practically drooling as she passed mounds of food. Scorpius was busy talking to a group of third year boys with his back turned and didn’t notice her when she sat next to him.
“Well, I wouldn’t marry anyone whose blood wasn’t pure,” said Thaddeus Nott, a boy with spiky brown hair and a pug nose.
“If she has the right figure,” Scorpius drew an hourglass in the air with both hands. “I would marry a mudblood!” The boys all laughed and nodded enthusiastically.
“36-24-36, that’s the only girl for me.” Christopher Goyle, burly dirty-blond haired, banged his fist on the table to emphasize his point.
Lily sat listening to them continue to list off “qualities” they wanted in a spouse and wondered why Scorpius’s words disappointed her so much. Is that all he really cares about? It wasn’t as though it mattered what kind of girls he liked, but she had expected more from him. She looked down at her perfectly normal sized eleven-year-old chest and sighed. Did all boys want that sort of girl? Did Sharpe? She looked over at the dark boy sitting next to Nott. Pleasant chills went up her spine. He is cute.
Scorpius finally turned and saw her, his face immediately turning red.
“Hey Malfoy. Enjoy yourself in Hogsmede?”
“Umm…yeah. I mean yeah. Here, thought you might like this.” He tossed a variety pack of skiving snackboxes into her lap.”
“Thanks! These are brilliant. Uncle George gave me a puking pastille once so Mum wouldn’t make me help with spring cleaning.”
“I thought they might come in handy with a certain dark-haired roommate of yours.” They exchanged identical evil grins. They both turned back to their meal, but every once in a while Lily caught him looking at her with a worried expression on his face.
“Hey Zabini,” Nott grinned at the black boy sitting across from Lily and Scorpius. “I heard Prissy Pucey fancies you!”
Lily’s head shot around at this. She waited impatiently for Sharpe’s response. He just smiled. Frustration welled up in her. Could he like Prissy? Prissy Pucey wasn’t the prettiest girl by far, but she was a second year and very curvy for her age. Lily looked down at her chest dejectedly. Perhaps there was a spell to increase body proportions. She would look it up in the library tomorrow. Taking another bite of Treacle she wondered at the look Malfoy was giving her.
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