Albus/Scorpius: As Long As I've Got You By My Side

An Intense Intertwinement

As Albus and Scorpius continued with their classes, they found themselves having to work through piles of homework that seemed to be ever-growing and increasing in difficulty. Scorpius took this new development in stride, for he could not bear the underlying stress of procrastination. Albus, on the other hand, was perfectly content just sitting by the fireplace in the Slytherin common room and watching Scorpius suffer through his History of Magic essay. That is, until Scorpius looked over his shoulder and saw that Albus had abandoned his own essay in favour of watching his friend write.

"Albuuuuusss", he whined, "could you at least pretend to do your work?"

Albus gave a laugh and picked up his quill once again.

"Alright, alright, I'll start writing- for real this time...".

"You'd better be telling the truth, or I'll have to make you write this essay...", said Scorpius, lowering his voice and leaning closer to Albus with a wicked gleam in his eye,

Albus felt his stomach flutter, and he leaned down over his parchment, so that his reddening face went unnoticed by Scorpius.

SSS

As time went on, Albus began to find it more and more difficult to hide his more-than-just-friendly feelings towards Scorpius, but he was still unable to identify just what said feelings actually meant. Scorpius, on the other hand, had figured out that what he felt towards his best friend was definitely romantic. He did not, however, have any idea what to do about it. He was terrified that Albus wouldn't return his feelings, so he figured that his best bet was trying to get rid of them. Unfortunately, this was proving to be impossible. After all, there was no one else he could turn to when he was having an anxiety attack, nor anyone whose arms felt quite so warm and secure around him. There was also not a single other person with whom Scorpius would rather spend his time. So how exactly could he solve his predicament?

=(-)=

This was a stupid idea, Scorpius mentally berated himself as he walked towards the Hufflepuff table in the Great Hall. It was lunchtime, and Albus had needed to stay behind in Transfiguration to ask the teacher a question. He'd insisted that Scorpius meet him in the Great Hall instead of waiting, which gave Scorpius the perfect opportunity to carry out his plan.

Finally, he came across the person for whom he'd been looking. Lily Luna Potter was sat at the end of her House's table with a couple of other first years. Suddenly, Scorpius felt rather foolish for coming to someone two years his junior for advice, but he pressed on.

"Lily?", he asked.

Upon hearing her name, the youngest Potter sibling turned around.

"Oh, hello, Scorpius", she said brightly. "What brings you to my humble abode?"

"I...er...came to ask you a question...about Albus. But you have to promise not to say anything to him about-"

"About the fact that you're hopelessly in love with him?" Lily interrupted.

"What the- but- how did you...?" Scorpius spluttered, his face becoming paler.

"I hate to break this to you, but it's pretty obvious", she said matter-of-factly. "Luckily for you", she continued, "my brother is about the only person who hasn't noticed".

Scorpius let out the breath he didn't know he'd been holding.

"Although, on second thought, I don't see how that's lucky, really. Albus feels the same way about you, see, and I think you'd do the world a favour if the two of you weren't so stupid- er, no offence..." Lily trailed off.

She had spotted her brother entering the Great Hall.

"Well Scorpius, it's been nice talking to you, but the object of your affections will be looking for you if you don't go over to him right about now".

Lily pointed towards Albus, who looked over at his sister and waved.

"Go on, now", said Lily, giving Scorpius a little push.

With that, she promptly turned back around, leaving a bewildered Scorpius to stumble back to the Slytherin table.

As Scorpius walked towards Albus, he pondered the things that Lily had said. He couldn't believe that she'd been able to see through him so easily... But there was one thing she must have been wrong about: there was no way that Albus could possibly feel the same way about him! Feeling more lost than before, he sat down next to Albus and tried to pretend like everything was normal. Unfortunately for Scorpius, that didn't work out very well.

"Are you okay, Scorpie?" asked Albus, concerned. "You're looking a bit pale".

"Yeah, I'm alright", Scorpius replied distractedly. "Just thinking".

"What about?"

"Just...you know...random things".

Something didn't feel right to Albus. He turned back to his lunch in silence, wondering if he'd done something wrong.

=(-)=

That evening, things had just about gone back to normal. Albus and Scorpius were alone in their corner of the Slytherin common room, doing (or avoiding, in Albus's case) their homework.

"Come on, Albus", said Scorpius. "That Charms essay isn't going to write itself!"

Albus just sighed and rolled over on the rug, upon which he was lying. He looked at the back of Scorpius's head with a mischievous look in his eye.

"Albus...", warned Scorpius. "Pick up your quill, now...".

Finally, Albus sat up. He leaned over to Scorpius, looking straight into the other boy's eyes. Smirking, he said in a low voice,

"Make me".

As he dropped his quill, Scorpius's stern look turned into a catlike smile, and he tackled Albus to the ground.

The two boys wrestled for a few moments, until Scorpius finally pinned Albus to the floor. He looked down at his friend's face, who was looking straight back at him with an unreadable something in his eyes. Unconsciously, Scorpius loosened his grip on the over boy's wrists, his face slowly moving downwards. This gave Albus the perfect opportunity to bring his arms up and put them around Scorpius's neck. Before he could even process what he was actually doing, he pulled Scorpius down and pressed their lips together. It felt like the best, most natural thing in the world. And Scorpius was kissing him back.

Needless to say, the homework was left forgotten that night.