Anything you recognize doesn't belong to me. Shakespeare's poem is in the public domain. I still don't own it, though, as much as I would like to.

Written for the 20 Week 20k Challenge. This chapter uses the prompt "infatuated."

Written for the 10, 20, 30 Chapter Challenge, which gave me the titles for the chapters. I'm using them out of order.

But especially written for Nayla (The Original Horcrux) for her sixteenth birthday. Happy birthday, Nay! For this chapter, I'm using your prompt: "There's loads of boring stuff in between, like Sundays, Tuesdays and Thursday afternoons."

(I tried my best to write this in British English without a Beta. Feel free to Britpick. And if you would like to be my official British Beta/Britpicker, please let me know.)

Courtney has fallen asleep in my arms, and I carefully stand to take her to bed. Antares and Cassiopeia wait on the couch, making no indications of getting up. Courtney is three now, and she looks just like me. She is our surprise baby, born nine years after her next-youngest sibling, and she's both a delight and a terror. I smile, brushing her sweaty hair from her forehead as I lay her down. I was a delight and a terror myself, and so was my husband. She stirs when I walk away, but I know she won't wake.

In the living room, my older children still wait anxiously for me. At twelve and fourteen, they insist they are too old for bedtime reading, and yet here they are, waiting as always. Every night, we cuddle up together, all four of us at first, when Courtney's still awake, and I start with her favourite stories. But I always move on to material more suited to Antares and Cassi. And they always stay to listen. I grab my favourite book of poems from the shelf and open to a dog-eared page. "Let me read you one of the best," I say.

Sonnet 116

Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
Oh no! It is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken
It is the star to every wandering bark
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come:
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

"Why do you love that poem so much, Mum?" Antares asks me as I finish reading it aloud.

"My Mum - your Nana Hermione - used to read it to me all the time. She said she wished she understood it better before she started dating your Papa. I wish I understood it better, too, when I was at Hogwarts."

"You understand it now, though, right, Mum? You understand everything. What's it mean? And what's a bark?" Cassi asked.

"A bark is an old-fashioned word for a ship."

Ever logical, Antares says, "Well, then why doesn't he just say ship?"

"Bark and mark rhyme; ship doesn't. Poets can use some strange word choices for the sake of rhyme. Anyway, the poem means that love - true love - is steadfast. It doesn't change when a person changes, it doesn't leave when beauty leaves. True love is dependable. I have that kind of love with your father, even if I didn't always realise it."

Cassiopeia looks at me, eyes wide and strawberry-blonde hair messy from a long day. "You and Dad weren't always in love?"

I smile, thinking back to the day we met on Platform 9 ¾ and everything that passed over the seven years that followed. "No, not exactly. Though perhaps we always were, even when we didn't act like it."

Antares has dropped his small pretension of apathy. "What did happen with you and Dad at Hogwarts, anyway? You said Nana and Papa Weasley and Gramma and Granddad Malfoy used to hate each other. And then one day you and Dad got married. That's all you've ever told us. What happened in between?"

I tousle his hair and grin. "You don't want to hear that story, surely. In between the day we met and the day we married, there's loads of boring stuff, like Sundays and Tuesdays and Thursday afternoons. Ordinary Wizarding Levels and ordinary wizarding days. I wouldn't want to bore you."

"Then skip the boring parts! Tell us all of the good things that happened between you!"

"And the bad," adds Cassiopeia, with pensiveness I think she gets from my mum. "It won't be a good story without the bad."

"That's a great idea, Cassi. In fact, I think I will tell you the very worst."

"The very worst?" asks Antares, his eyes wide. "There is a very worst part of your story?"

"There is," I admit. "After all, there is a very worst part of every story. For us, it was our sixth year. As it happened, I was absolutely infatuated with him."

"Where's the bad in that?" Antares asks. "Infatuation is a good thing to have for your future spouse!" In a moment, his certainty turns to doubt. "...Right?"

"Yes, it is. My infatuation, sweetheart, is only the beginning."

I let my mind drift back to Platform 9 ¾ until I feel like I am really there, immersed in the details. Mum and Dad were off saying goodbye to Hugo, a fourth-year; I was searching out Kavya Goldstein and Scorpius. That summer, we hadn't talked much. My family had visited my mum's parents in Australia for most of our holiday, and owls back to Britain were rare - and expensive. I wrote only to let them know my O.W.L. results and what classes I would be taking as a N.E.W.T. student.

I found Scorpius first, brooding alone near the edge of the platform, away from the crowds. His parents weren't here, but that didn't surprise me. After first year, they dropped him off without any pomp and left the moment he was on the platform. As I approached, I couldn't help but notice how much Scorpius had grown up in just a few months. He was inches taller, certainly, but it was more than that; it was the way his face had filled out and became more square, the way he held his shoulders, the hint of stubble on his face. He was my best friend, and now he was breathtaking. I felt even plainer with the contrast now evident between us; I hadn't learned to tame my hair yet, and my face still bore the signs of an awkward adolescence. I hadn't grown since fourth year, either, and barely reached his shoulder.

For the first time since first year, I felt awkward around him. "Um, hi, Scorpius," I finally managed, though we'd been standing there facing each other for nearly a minute.

"Hi, Rose." Normally this was the cue when we would fall into a best-friends hug or start bantering about his thin, pointed nose or my crazy hair. But neither of us did. We just stood there, staring, while I wrung my hands and he shifted from foot to foot.

"You two plan on going to school this year? Or are you trying to break the record for world's most awkward staring contest? Let's go!" Kavya called from the window of the train. I smiled awkwardly, apologetically, at him and he nodded without familiarity, all pretension and courtesy, before following me on board.

As if looking at Scorpius wasn't enough, Kavya had decided to pick that summer to grow from child to adult as well. Her acne gone, her chest filled out, she even had hips for Merlin's sake. It was hard not to sulk as the train took off and I looked out the window for a quick wave goodbye to my parents. I faked a smile for them; after all, I was with my two best friends, on my way to school, dropping History of Magic... it was set to be the best year of my life.

"Everything okay?" Kavya asked me when Scorpius got up to talk to some of his Slytherin friends who had passed by. "Did you get bitten by a kangaroo or something while you were gone?"

I rolled my eyes. "Funny, Kav. It's just... you two seem so different. And I seem so much the same. It's like you guys grew up without me."

A mock look of understanding crosses Kavya's face. "Of course! How could you forget? Time passes backward in the southern hemisphere, so while you were Down Under, you were getting younger while we got older!"

"Oh, naturally. Why don't you and Scor go spend some time Down Under, then? Give me a chance to catch up?"

Kavya pondered this, her face serious for a few moments. "That's okay. I don't feel like getting eaten by a boa constrictor or something."

"Get your facts straight, Kavya. You're a Ravenclaw!"

"Yeah, poor you two," Scorpius said, reopening the compartment door. "If only you'd been sorted into Slytherin. I might like you both more."

"Impossible," Kavya responded, then looked between us with a smirk on her face. Unfortunately, I knew exactly what she was trying to imply. My brain was still searching its catalogue for a proper comeback when the compartment door slid open again and I was spared the need to think of something witty.

"Bryan? What brings you to this part of the train?"

"Prefect duties," he said in a voice that was somewhere between diplomatic and patronising. "Like the ones you're supposed to be on, Rose. And you, Scorpius."

"Right," I said. "Er, we'll be over in a minute. See you later, Kavya?"

"I guess. You two go be responsible. Mum's still upset you were made Prefect over me, Rose. She wanted me to continue after her and Dad. That's how they started dating, she tells me. Every. Fricking. Time. Prefects are mentioned. Apparently my chances at a husband are dashed now." She spoke mockingly, but I could hear the serious undertones to her words. I didn't want Prefect anyway; she could have it if it were mine to give away.

Scorpius and I walked down to the front compartment side by side, but still we didn't seem comfortable around each other, and couldn't manage anything to say. I didn't like the way we became strangers over a summer apart. How strong could our friendship be if it didn't last such a short time away? Abernethy Finnigan looked at the two of us, sitting stiffly by each other, and said, "You two, your turn to patrol."

Bryan Macmillan looked like he was about to protest, but we were out of the door before he could say anything. Our formalities continued as we began to walk the train, but we found a compartment with the curtains drawn and inappropriate noises coming from inside. "Open up," Scorpius said, banging on the door.

"Just a minute!" The voice was young, and when the girl opened the door, her shirt's buttons didn't align. There was a boy in the corner straightening a tie I was certain wasn't there a moment ago.

"You two better watch it," I said, sounding more like my mother than I wanted to. "Once we're at Hogwarts that sort of behaviour will get you detentions, lost house points, and maybe even worse. For now, if I see these curtains closed one more time, I'll make sure something happens between you two, and you won't like it one bit."

"We were only-"

"Whatever. Don't let that happen again."

"Fine," she replied, finally sounding her age, and appropriately afraid of me.

"Merlin's Beard," Scorpius said as we walked away. "Those two were what, third years?"

"I think so. The girl is a Ravenclaw, if I remember right. Kids these days, it's crazy what they get themselves into."

"I know. I mean here I am, nearly seventeen, and haven't yet snogged anyone."

"Scorpius Hyperion Malfoy! You know that's a lie." I wished it wasn't.

His eyes gleamed. "It depends on how you define snogging, really, doesn't it? Certainly not like that," he said, gesturing back toward the compartment we'd just investigated.

"You and Emma Davies last year?" I accused. "I had the misfortune of opening that broom closet." Worst day of my life so far, that was. Nothing like investigating a between-class snogging and finding the boy you love engaged in a very thorough exploration of someone else's mouth.

"And that never happened again, Rose. I swear." I didn't know why he found that fact so important to tell me, but I tried not to think about it too much. I knew I would be spending the hours before bed analysing everything he told me. For the time being, I was just happy that hours after reconnecting, we were finally talking like the old friends we were.

"Bedtime," I say firmly, glancing over to the clock.

"But Mum! You hadn't even gotten to Hogwarts yet!"

Antares pauses, and looks like he is pondering whether to say something or not. His curiosity wins out, though. "Did you really find third-years snogging?"

"Unfortunately, yes. And if I hear of either of you doing that next year - or any time at all you're at Hogwarts - there will be quite the talking-to."

"All right," they say in unison, but Cassi adds in a rushed whisper I'm sure I'm meant to hear, "I solemnly swear you won't find out."

I raise my eyebrows at her. "Do you have someone in mind, Cass?"

She blushes, then hops up from the sofa and makes her way down the hall. "It's bedtime, right Antares?"

"Right," he agrees, and I'm left smiling, waiting for Scorpius to come home.