This was previously posted in my Random Drabbles story - but moved to Rose Drabbles for easier organization.

Title: Unrequited
Pairing: Scorpius/Rose
Rating: PG-13
Word Count: 1459
AN/Warnings: Written for Ski000Girl – who was having an awful, no-good, rotten day.

Until fifth year, Rose had paid no attention to Scorpius Malfoy. He was just another boy in her year, who wasn't a cousin, wasn't a Gryffindor, and did not compete against her on either the Quidditch Pitch or in the classroom. He was frankly immaterial to her existence. Then one day, near Halloween, when Rose was headed toward the library to get a bit of research in before dinner, Scorpius Malfoy came barreling around a corner and literally knock her over. Her books went flying, she ripped one of her knee socks, and her hair came loose from its holder, completely obscuring her vision.

"Godric-all-to-hell-and-back," the Malfoy boy swore softly, glancing over his shoulder as if he was afraid someone would catch him.

He whipped out his wand and with a spell he summoned all Rose's books and papers into a tidy pile. He then reached down, grabbed her hand, and yanked Rose to her feet. Before she could murmur any sort of response, he shoved Rose's books into her arms, gave her wink, and took off running down the hall again.

From that moment forward, Rose was extremely conscious of every move made by Scorpius Malfoy.

0-0-0

Rose approached her cousin, two days later for information. "James, what do you know about Scorpius Malfoy?"

Arching an eyebrow and leaning back in his chair, he answered her question with one of his own. "Why do you want to know?"

"He ran me over in the hall the other day. I'm curious."

James shrugged. "He's mostly a screw up, always getting detentions, never doing his school work. He's supposedly a good flier, but can't be arsed enough to try for the Quidditch team or go to practices. He's an all around loser."

Rose nodded, more intrigued than ever.

She cornered Albus the next day after their Care of Magical Creatures lesson. "Tell me about your dorm mate."

"Which one? Flint? Parkinson? Davis?"

"Malfoy."

Al made a face.

"That bad?"

"He can be alright. But he doesn't care about anything normal. He's into all this Muggle-shite, like skateboarding and basketball."

Rose made a mental note to read up on whatever basketball was next time she visited her Mum's parents. "Who does he hang out with?"

"Not many people, Francesco Zabini and a couple of Muggle-born Hufflepuffs."

"Is he – is he dating anyone?"

Al frowned at her. "You don't want to get involved with him, Rosie. He's not a dependable guy."

She blushed. "I didn't say I wanted to date him. I'm just being nosy."

"Never known you to be inquisitive about anything without a bigger purpose."

"Maybe I'm maturing."

"Maybe."

"Just answer the question, Al."

"To my knowledge, he's not dating anyone."

"Thanks," she smiled, before shifting the topic of their conversation to the upcoming Slytherin Quidditch match against Ravenclaw.

0-0-0

Rose spent the next several weeks learning everything she could about Scorpius. She figured out his class schedule, knew when he liked to come down for meals, found where he and his friends liked to meet on the grounds, and became an expert on his detention schedule. Monday and Wednesday evenings he scrubbed the Great Hall with Filch. Saturday afternoons he worked in the Greenhouse with Professor Longbottom. And Tuesdays and Thursdays he worked through whatever punishments he'd received from the faculty the previous week. According to Rose's calculations he would have to stay at Hogwarts least two weeks after the term ended just to get all his detention hours completed.

With each piece of information Rose learned about Scorpius, she became more intrigued. Although they were nothing alike and Rose had never been one for rule-breaking, she imagined the two of them as star-crossed lovers – kept apart by House and family loyalties.

Once her research into Scorpius' daily schedule was complete, Rose began to search for evidence that he felt the same attraction as she did. She watched him from across the Great Hall during mealtimes, trying to see if he looked her way. She smiled at him when they passed in the halls between classes hoping he would smile back. She made an effort to walk by him and his friends when they were outside, in case he wanted to call her over for a chat. While none of her efforts produced any obvious signs that Scorpius was interested in her romantically, Rose suspected he might consider her too much of a 'good girl' to be possible date material. She thought about trying to get a detention just to give him a nudge of encouragement, but couldn't think of anything to do that wouldn't upset her Mum or Dad.

Rose's dilemma on how to attract the attention of Scorpius Malfoy began to consume more and more of her free time. She thought about going straight up to him and asking if he would accompany her to the next Hogsmeade weekend, but rumor had it that he had been banned from leaving the school grounds for his entire academic career due to some mishap involving a giant dung bomb and his eagle owl. So she was left with having to rely on gazing longing at him from afar and sighing deeply whenever he was in earshot as her main efforts to gain his notice. Both of them turned out to be exasperatingly unsuccessful.

Rose's fascination with Scorpius continued in spite of her friends' obvious distaste for him. One evening, Rose got caught playing 'truth or dare' with the other Gryffindor girls in the common room. She had selected 'truth' because of her last two dares – flashing the Gryffindor boys with her bra and singing 'Hail Britannia' at the top of her lungs – had been extremely embarrassing. Of course, had she know that her 'truth' question was going to be – Who do you fancy? – she would have taken her chances with another dare.

"Ur… I sort of like… Scorpius Malfoy," she'd muttered.

"Gross!"

"Yuck!"

"He's so pointy."

"And pale."

"And strange."

"You know, Rose," her cousin Lily interjected. "Rich Thomas really likes you. If you gave him the slightest encouragement I'm sure he'd ask you out."

The other girls nodded. Rose looked over at Rich just as he glanced up from his Wizard's Chess game and smiled at her. While he was cute and popular and smart, he simply didn't make her heart race the way Scorpius did.

Rose spent the rest of the term trying to gage Scorpius' level of interest in her. She was pretty sure he had smiled at her twice in November and then in early December he had brushed up against her satchel as he had sprinted down the steps of the Astronomy Tower in an effort to escape Professor Sinistra. Sure, it wasn't exactly a declaration of undying love, but it was something.

On the day before Christmas holidays began, Rose decided that enough was enough. She would simply take matters into her own hands. If Scorpius was too shy or insecure to approach her, then she would go to him. Rose was certain that once she'd made it clear that she was available and liked him, he would make the next move. So that evening at dinner, she made her away across the Great Hall to the Slytherin table. Scorpius sat at one end next to Zabini. He was apparently describing some stunt he'd pulled off because his hands were making a number of swooping motions.

"Excuse me," she stated, as she stood across from him.

He continued to talk to Fracesco, unaware that she was there.

"Excuse me," she stated a bit louder.

This time he did look up and then looked around behind him to see exactly who Rose was addressing. Not seeing anyone, he turned back toward Rose. "Yeah?"

"Hi. I was… um… I was just wondering if you had any plans for the holidays."

Scorpius looked confused again. He looked at Fracesco, who just shrugged in response.

"Uh… yeah. I'm going to skiing in Chamonix. It's got some of the steepest drops in all of France. The powder is radical. They got fourteen advanced pistes and night-skiing for the truly adventurous. The night life rocks though, so I'll probably spend most of my evenings trying out the club scene."

Rose nodded. She had no idea what he was talking about. "Um… well, have a good holiday."

"Thanks," Scorpius smiled and nodded in response.

When it became clear he wasn't going to say anything else, Rose turned to head back to the Gryffindor table. She obviously needed to rethink her strategy. Before she could take two steps, however, Scorpius called out to her. "Hey! You have a Happy Christmas too, Ruth."

Flushing a deep red, Rose wondered if the holiday break was long enough to mend a broken heart.