and the boys go on and on

this time, there's a war over jelly beans and chocolate frogs, and the only thing of consequence is that two boys fall in love. a series of moments. Albus/Scorpius.

warnings for: boyxboy love, clichés, next gen ocs, probably some grammar errors, & teenage logic
everything(ish) belongs to jkrowling, title from a song by angus and julia stone

zero

Harry Potter touches his forehead, just once, and waves to both his sons. Then he takes his daughter's hand and wraps his arm around his wife. They exit the building.

one

Albus sees Scorpius for the first time when he defends Rose against some big, burly Hufflepuff.

Scorpius is talking to the larger boy like he's dirt on his shoe, despite the fact that Scorpius is about two feet smaller.

Rose is smiling at the blonde boy, and they're introducing themselves and it looks kind of like a moment, to Albus. The kind of moment in those books and those movies that change people's lives.

Then James – dragging Albus by his wrist – comes up and drags Rosie away. He's repeating all those stories Uncle Ron tells.

The boy looks a little sad, just standing there alone.

Albus finds him on the train, Rosie trailing behind. And so then he makes up some story about the compartments being full – like that ever stopped the Potter-Weasley family – and needing to sit here and hi my name is Al and I'm not gonna answer to anything else and yeah, he decides that they are going to be friends.

Hagrid jumps a foot when he sees them walking together. Scorpius is laughing at the stickers on Al's trunk – Lily and Teddy had covered the entire thing and all Teddy's are obscure bands and all Lily's are dragons and unicorns and princesses, and even Albus's full name in messy, uneven letters – and they are both not listening to Rose talk about thestrals. Then he smiles wider than anything, and that's how first year starts.

1

The hat falls down over his head, and for a few seconds all Scorpius can see is black.

A few minutes later, it's shouting Ravenclaw – it's like it didn't even have to think about it, really, and it makes him happier than anything in the entire world (next to the green eyed boy who had recently smiled at him.)

And then there's Julian Moore (Hufflepuff) and Terrance Mudd (Slytherin) and Briony Neilson (Slytherin) and Kendall Pazier (Gryffindor) and finally, there's Albus Potter and the hat sits on his head for all of seven and a half minutes – Al is muttering to himself, and he looks a bit crazy – but the hat finally announces him to be a Ravenclaw too.

Scorpius would like to think he clapped hard enough that it made up for the Gryffindor's stunned silence.

2

They sneak out to Hogsmeade on a Thursday night, or maybe a Friday morning.

It's technically Scorpius's idea, yeah, you could say that. But Al had to listen to James brag about how he got to go, so really, it was more like Albus's idea, in that the dark-haired boy was whining about it and Scorpius decided to fix it. He didn't like seeing his best friend upset.

But really, they wanted to go before the third years. This way, they get to be the first. Sort of. Whatever.

So they sneak out of the dorm and get their brooms, and then it's only an eleven minute flight to the edges of the town.

(They learn later that there's a passage straight to the sweet shop, but that way was more fun for messy little second years.)

"Let's go to Honeydukes." Albus says, and Scorpius is quick to agree.

It's closed and dark when they get there, and Albus decides that he doesn't want to cross the line into breaking-and-entering.

They walk around for a bit after that, and it's early in the morning and the sky is dark and you can't see any stars because it's too cloudy.

The only place open is some bar that stinks of goats and beer, and the only two occupants are a cat and man resembling a miniature troll. The troll is passed out on the counter.

They're just passing the threshold when they hear a voice. And it sounds like it's from nowhere, all scary and rumbling and gruff and terrifying.

"And what are you two doing out of bed?"

Scorpius and Albus take off running before they can see that the voice comes from an old, dusty portrait of an old man and it takes them sixteen minutes to stop laughing so hard that they can actually breathe.

two

Al knows his brother is a jerk. James doesn't know how to apologize and he's loud and prejudiced and angry and wild and reckless, and only ever truly nice to his mother and sometimes Rosie and usually Lily, or maybe some pretty girls he wants to get alone in closets.

Still. The reaction to Scorpius showing up for breakfast – dropping an entire bowl of porridge on the floor was over reacting.

"This is Scorpius!" Albus says, and yeah, he's aware that his voice was too loud for the morning. But his father is running his hair through his hands so it turns even messier than normal and his mother made this choking noise, and now she's smiling but without her teeth and Lily is sulking because Teddy isn't here, and James –

James's feet are covered in porridge and he's got his eyes narrowed like he's planning something.

"Sorry."

Scorp's voice it too quiet, too soft – it's different from normal. It sounds like he's apologizing for showing up this early – and he shouldn't because they'd planned this out, like some kind of adventure, and both of them had been pretty excited about it last night – but also like he's maybe apologizing for being himself. He sounds scared.

"C'mon, Scorpius." His dad says. His dad is talking in the same soft, sad voice. Like he's remembering things he doesn't want to remember. "Have some bacon."

His dad gives him extra slices, but Albus doesn't say anything. Scorpius needs to eat more anyway.

Albus explains now – still in this awful overly loud, overly happy voice, like he's overcompensating for everyone else's silence.

"So, see, it was like 3 AM last night, or in the morning or whatever, and me and Scorpius were sending letters and they were in London for some reason – like visiting the Zabini's or something, I guess for Christmas, yeah that'd make sense – and I hadn't seen him in forever, dad, and it's not like you and Uncle Ron are apart for more than a week anyway, so I told him he should come stay here, and then I remembered that James had left his broom in the shed and he hadn't locked it so I decided to go pick him up and his mum said it was fine–"

And Albus very specifically doesn't mention that he'd almost fallen off over London or that Scorpius's mom had been asleep when they'd talked to her and he'd just taken her silence as a yes, or that they'd both screamed like little girls when they saw Lily's cat.

He stops his story as James not-so-accidentally spills his cup of orange juice all over Scorpius and fails to even pretend to look upset about it.

Yeah. James is a jerk – and also, insanely clumsy because that's all he's been doing this morning is dropping things like some kind of jerk face and sometimes, times like these and times like when he breaks his toys or won't let Al borrow his broom, even just for a bit.

Scorpius has gone very still and Albus is reminded of this story Scorpius told once. About this time he and his mother were at Diagon and someone started throwing hexes at them and his mother had just told him to keep walking.

And then Albus is glaring at James and talking so fast and low to his best friend – talking about nothing, talking about how horrible James can be, and how they can go to next door and Miss Laney always has cookies and how one time she helped him put this white muggle thing in James's. It was called alum and it dried out his mouth worse than any spell, and so Albus just talks about nothing while Scorpius listens and grips his chair so tight that his knuckles go white.

His mother waves her wand to dry Scorp off and forces James to apologize – he doesn't really, just says sorry in this whiny little voice– and his dad ruffles both Al's hair and pats Scorpius on the back and says something about how he'd better floo Malfoy before they file a kidnapping charge.

Albus grabs Scorp's hand before anyone can realize they technically did something wrong and they go off to play in the backyard.

3

"I think I'm in love." He says to Albus one day in third year.

Rose Weasley is sitting at the Gryffindor table, eating a bowl of soup almost agonizingly slowly. Her hair is curly and wild and all around her face and her eyes are bright and her cheeks are a little bit sun burnt – it's still warm outside and she'd spent all of yesterday swimming.

Al jumps a little bit and dribbles jam onto his robes.

"Really?" He says.

"Yeah."

"Who?"

And when he says Rose, Albus doesn't even pretend to be surprised.

(They go on one "date," at Pudifoots. He stutters through it and they don't talk, so after she insists they're better off as friends. He watches her walk away, and thinks that means maybe later.)

three

"So – when you get back from Austria?" Albus asks.

He doesn't need to ask, because he's got the date memorized – but he does anyway.

Scorpius looks up.

They're on the train again, this time back to London. For summer.

And Scorpius is off to Austria with the Nott's, because some of the Greengrass family resides there apparently. It's all stupid, because instead of the whole summer they actually wanted to have together, Scorpius is spending half of it with his grea.t aunt six times removed, and Albus will be with his family, which is the same thing as being alone anyway.

"July 17th."

"Ick."

"Yeah?"

"Can't you just run away again?"

"Last time that happened –"

Albus laughs, thinking back to second year.

"That was fun."

"No it wasn't." And then Albus is laughing again, and he throws a chocolate frog at Scorpius, just because.

Scorpius rips it open – the card that falls out has Hermione Granger written on it. Scorpius crumples up the wrapping and throws it back.

Albus rips open a box of Bertie Bott's and starts picking out the horrible flavors – everything but strawberry jam, Al isn't a fan of jelly beans – and throwing them. Then Scorpius manages to lodge a half melted frog in Al's hair and –

It's on.

4

Scorpius is sitting in front of the fire when he hears Albus come in.

There's a letter burning. He can see the first three words of a paragraph. Have heard about – he doesn't want to know what his grandfather is talking about.

When he was 12, he went to Azkaban for a visit. They only went because his grandmother had cried about it, and his father had given in. His father spent the entire time staring pointedly at a wall, all stiff and awkward, and his mother was angry and glaring and kept making snide remarks. His grandmother is near tears and mutters luciusluciuslucius under her breath the entire time, like a prayer.

Scorpius remembers sitting on the ground, staring at the marks made by fingernails and shattered sticks, veering away from the Dementors and his grandfather's beady-eyed stares.

And then the letters had started.

The first two had been berating him about being sorted into Ravenclaw instead of Slytherin, and the next three about the despicable Potters and how he might want to choose his friends better, and Albus thinks of Harry Potter smiling at him over the breakfast table and Lily Potter laughing and Ginny Potter cooking him extra bacon and no eggs, because he doesn't like them, and then Albus – just Al, and after that he stops reading them and starts burning them.

"Your grandfather?" Albus asks.

Scorpius doesn't respond, because Al already knows the answer.

The dark haired boy sinks down onto the floor next to him.

"My mother sent me a letter today." And he pauses, waiting for Scorpius to talk. He doesn't. "She thinks I should try harder – you know. They got the letter from Davies about my Transfiguration grade. And then, you know. She thinks I should get Rose or James to tutor me. Even suggested Hugo. Apparently he's a whiz kid at it. And then my dad… Well. You know."

"Yeah." Scorpius says, because he gets it.

They don't talk anymore.

four

"This is your fault." Albus mutters, because it's true.

Albus always tries to be a good kid. He's polite and he opens doors for people and he doesn't get caught in broom closets with random people and he doesn't run away like Lily's always trying to do. Scorpius, on the other hand – Scorpius attracts trouble.

"Is not." Scorpius whispers back.

Albus, on principle, does not like detention. But he especially does not like detention with Professor Thyne. Thyne is the Muggle Studies professor, and Al doesn't even take that class. But his idea of a good detention is to clean the trophy room without magic, and then Albus has to stare at things like First in Class, 2017, First Year – Rose Agatha Weasley or Hogwarts Award for Services to the School: Harry Potter and a shiny, silver and crystal cup that he's heard too many stories about.

Because Albus really needs more reminders that he's not measuring up to the rest of his family.

"You're the one who wanted to go exploring." He says to Scorpius, scrubbing at a dusty plaque that lists the Head Girls from 1949 –1972. There's a scratch over the name Damara Dodderidge that he's just making worse.

"You're the one who was stuck talking to that portrait. I was trying to warn you."

Albus throws his scrubber at his best friend mostly because he's right.

(The portrait had greasy, tangled hair and it was located in the dungeons. He told Al things about green eyes and girls with red hair and something forbidden. Albus liked to listen.)

five

"Catch, Potter." Scorpius puts some odd kind off emphasis on the er. It sounds familiar, but Al can't place it.

So instead of actually trying, he catches the quaffle and throws it back.

(He maybe doesn't want to think about Scorpius right now, or look at his face too hard, or his neck, or that part of his chest that can be seen through his Quidditch uniform, or anything really.)

Because, yeah, they're both on the Quidditch team. For Ravenclaw, of course. They're both Beaters. Al, because he inherited a bit of his parent's talent – nowhere near as good as James, but not as bad as Lily – and he can be a bit passive aggressive, so hitting the rest of his family (Dom is a Keeper and James and Fred and Lou are Chasers and Roxy is the reserve Seeker and that's basically the entire Gryff team) with heavy balls is pretty fun, and Scorpius because he has good aim and wants to prove something, but both of them because they work best as a team.

It's the first practice. First game is against Slytherin.

"Yo – idiots. Quit playing around. We have to discuss strategy. Ravenclaw has a good team this year." Their captain is, of course, Johanna Wood. Only a 5th year, like them, but damn good.

Her blonde hair is in a French braid, and Albus had the biggest crush on her in second year. Scorpius still liked to tease him about that.

Scor is making faces behind Johanna's back. She's going to make them do extra laps again. Still. The last time that happened (two days ago) they'd turned it into a race and it ended with both of them collapsed on the ground, breathing too hard to even laugh.

Al's about to make a face back at Scor, when the blonde stops. He's waving now, and mouthing something, but Albus can't make it out.

He looks behind him to find Rose Weasley sitting in the stand – Scor's new girlfriend, of course, because they decided to try it out again. Apparently one disastrous date in third year wasn't enough to stop true love.

Albus stubs his toe on a rock when he touches down.

(They don't win the match against Ravenclaw.)

5

So he doesn't know exactly when it starts.

Maybe because he's been dating Rose for two months now, and he has no desire to kiss her or touch her or do anything more than talk with her, and only sometimes at that.

Maybe it's because he looks forward to seeing Albus more than anything else. Maybe it's because he gets electrical snaps every time he looks into emerald eyes. Maybe it's because two weeks ago, after their match against Slytherin, Albus pressed his lips really quick against his and Scorpius hasn't felt better in his entire life since then.

(Only then Al had been avoiding him for the past forever and oh god – sometimes, sometimes he just doesn't know what's going on with his life.)

Al's sitting next to him now. Just at breakfast – just another, everyday thing and Scorpius sits perfectly still. Al is the one fidgeting – fidgeting and muttering to himself and picking at his nails in that disgusting way that Scorpius hates, but he can't bring himself to tell Al to stop.

Al shuffles a little.

Their thighs brush.

Scorpius coughs.

He hates this. He hates this more than anything – and even more than that, he just wants his best friend back.

6

Scorpius wakes up with a body next to him that was not there two hours ago when he fell asleep.

He definitely fell asleep alone.

Only then he recognizes that insane mop of hair and that hand that is curling around his arm and –

"Al? The fuck are you doing?"

"Hi." Albus says. Scorpius stifles a groan, because Al is one of those drunks. He can't just be like Scorpius and feel sick after two drinks. It's completely unfair.

"You're touching my leg."

"Do you remember when I kissed you?"

And then – that's a moment Scorpius has been trying to repress. The Quidditch match and the crowd and how no one saw them, mostly because they were behind a pole and mostly because everyone was too busy watching Johanna do her famous victory dance. And hey c'mon i need to talk to you and do you – um, well and then Al's lips on his and something like fire and electricity and hurricanes.

Only instead of that, he says "yeah," really quietly.

Albus presses kisses to his chest and oh god. The kisses start trailing up to his neck, all bites and licks and everything.

There's one at his mouth, one quick and chaste and nothing like the others.

Then Al is snoring into his shoulder, and Scorpius lies very quietly and doesn't sleep.

six

It's January. January and bitterly cold and awful. Al's least favorite weather. And Scorpius knows that, but he still dragged him up here.

Al swings his leg back and forth. It's a good thing he's not scared of heights.

"I broke up with Rose." Scorpius says – maybe just to break the silence.

"Really?" Albus responds.

Right now, in this moment, he doesn't know what to think. Because a part of him is always going to want to be the best man at Scorpius's and Rose's wedding and have the world go one, just like that. But another part of him thinks of early mornings and playing gobstones til 3 AM and having candy wars and sneaking of to Hogsmeade and that first time, when they got drunk together and Scor threw up on his shoes, and he thinks he'd rather die than let that go.

So there's something warm and fuzzy rising up through his chest. And he can't help but think about how – in his dad's sixth year, about this time, he was watching his mentor die and scaling cliffs and getting his second girlfriend.

"I love you." They both say, at the same time. It's not like it's the first time it's been said, but something about this one is different.

Scorpius kisses him, so hard he almost falls off the tower, but then there are thin, white hands pulling him back up.

7

Two days before the start of their seventh year (7 months and 5 days after the kiss, about two hours after their most recent one), Albus drags Scorpius to one of Weasley-Potter Sunday lunches.

It's basically about twenty more people than needs to be packed into a house that should be falling apart, but the food is good and only three people so far have flashed Scorpius death glares – and okay, he dumped Rose, James has always hated him, and it's the same with Mr. Ronald B Weasley, so he's not surprised.

Al's grandmother – who is short and smiling and loud, so his heart twists a bit as he thinks about Rose – is just about to serve dessert when Albus stands up.

He grabs Scorp's hand too, and tugs him up into a standing position.

"So. We're dating. And I love him. And – the end."

And suddenly his lips are on Scorp's, and he's happy.

(Somewhere, in the background of the kiss, people are putting up a fuss. But they'll get over it.)

seven

They're back at Hogwarts, after that.

Albus is on a couch, reading a letter, and Scorpius has his arm around him. They're doing homework, like good little Ravenclaws.

Out of life, Albus doesn't think he wants anything more than this.

0

They get off the train – for the last time – holding hands, and it's something like the end of an era.

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and - if you couldn't tell: numbers written out are albus, numerical numbers are scorpius, and it goes with whatever year they're in.