Scorpius stays put. He remains in the Owlery, finishing up a letter he'd been planning to send to his aunt Daphne, though his thought process has been sorely interrupted now. He can't even remember if he planned to tell her something about his mum or something about school.
It's not long before James is stepping into the Owlery, scowl twisting hard at the corners of his lips. His stance is stiff, but not outright aggressive... yet.
Scorpius tips his head and then yawns, rolling his lean shoulders out. He's not in his robes tonight; just half uniform with the sleeves rolled up and his tie a little loose around his throat.
"Can you make the whole nose breaking thing quick?" he asks, as if he really intends to stand there and let James do that to him without a fight.
"What the hell is your problem?" James advances, but he doesn't throw any blows, even if he is lifting a hand to push at Scorpius's upper shoulder. Not an attempt to cause pain, but instead a clear warning: take this seriously. "Back off of Albus. Do you understand?"
Scorpius has both his parents genes, and he's well aware that neither of them were exactly the physical type. Quite unlike James Potter's parents, who had both been Quidditch players in their youth, with his mum continuing to some fame before starting their family. So James has one up on him before Scorpius even lifts a fist.
He steps back as James shoves him. But like father, like son. He can't quite let it go.
One pale eyebrow arches. "Shouldn't you be discussing this with him and not me?"
James rarely gets along with Albus. He finds him weedy, sort of exasperating. Boring, to an extent, but his mother has said time and time again: that's just the way it is with brothers. It's Scorpius's flippancy that has rankled him the most, and if he had Al's calm head, it might have occurred to him that this overblown reaction is exactly what Scorpius was hoping to get out of him.
But who has time for dissection of motivation like that? Instead, he's idly using his thumb to crack the knuckles of the same hand hanging down by his hip.
"Oh, I plan to. I've simply chosen to discuss it with you first."
Fuck. Just the noise of James's knuckles cracking gets Scorpius going. What is it about these damn Potters?
Slowly, Scorpius raises both hands in surrender and leans back. He's got nowhere else to go, back against the dingy wall of the Owlery with Merlin only knew what scraping onto his fine clothes. A soft laugh bubbles out. "Somehow I think I'm getting the raw end of the deal between the two of us."
The bubble of laughter makes him as uncomfortable as the previous topic of conversation, but some of the outright anger eases from his expression. Well - perhaps not the anger, but he does seem less apt to throw a punch now.
"That's what happens to snakes." It's wrong - he knows that it's wrong, that it's not right to make spitting judgments like that, just look at the inspiration for Al's middle name - but that doesn't change his tone. "When do you even see him?"
Oh. Oh, good. No punches! Scorpius can handle things just fine if it's not physical.
He grits his teeth at the insult. It's not like that would be the first time one of the Potters or Weasleys insulted him just because of his house or his last name. Prats, the lot of them.
"See who?" Scorpius taunts, and then huffs a soft laugh, lowering his hands. "Kidding. I dunno. We have Potions and Defense together. There are parties. It's not like everyone agrees with the whole House segregation nonsense like you."
"I don't agree with house segregation," James shoots back immediately, but he feels the tips of his ears warming a little when Scorpius calls him out on that. He holds up his own hands, palms outward as if in a gesture of peace, but his stance is still clearly uncomfortable.
"You're spreading rumors about my little brother, saying things just to piss me off, and so it sort of makes you an idiot for being surprise when it works."
Again: it'll occur to him later that he just admitted to rising to the bait.
Scorpius scoffs. "If you don't believe in House segregation, then why do I get the feeling you'd be just as peeved if your baby bro and I were friends rather than just a fling? I mean, honestly, Potter. Do you think I'm going to drag him to some basement and teach him dark magic? Your dad's a bloody Auror. I wouldn't touch a hair on his head unless he begged me to."
Which, he just kind of accidentally admitted, Al did.
James's expression goes blank. He's struggling for a moment, as if he simply can't parse what Scorpius is saying, before he finally angles his head to the side and asks, "You two are friends?"
"Just because you don't care for me doesn't mean everyone else feels the same," Scorpius says, a little tersely, because hey, how is it James Potter's business who he's friends with or why?
"Is this conversation over? I was in the middle of something."
man i am really enjoying this thread, thank you <3
"No," James cuts him off, and he takes a step forward to emphasize it. Sure, he has Scorpius nearly pinned against the foul (fowl) Owlery wall, but he's not going to let him escape right after an admission like that. "What do you two even have to talk about? You've got nothing in common. Nothing. You can't be friends."
That little step closer puts James in Scorpius's personal bubble. And Merlin does he hate when people bully him like this.
"Name one thing you know about me besides my last name," he spits coldly. "How in bloody hell would you know we've got nothing in common if you don't even know me? Now, step aside, or I'll make you step aside." Look at that, it's even got Scorpius flustered enough to be a little red himself.
"You apparently like sucking prick, judging from how much you gloat about it," he shoots back, and he'd feel a little guilty if pride weren't the main force driving him right then. James is similarly red, but it's from a combination of things here: frustration, confusion, a million other things he can't name. "Stay away from my brother."
"Well there you go," Scorpius snarls, leaning in a little to test just what James might do. "I like sucking prick. Your brother likes sucking prick. Maybe we sit around all night and discuss how much we like sucking prick." Now Scorpius is just pressing his luck.
It's reflex, more than anything else, panicked and flustered and angry: he reels back when Scorpius leans in, attempting to swing his fist - hard - into Scorpius's face. Whoops.
Scorpius doesn't have time to dodge, and James isn't exactly weak. The punch lands hard against Scorpius's jaw, and there's a resounding crack of a noise that sounds suspiciously like a broken tooth. As Scorpius reels, he sinks to his knees from the punch, and when he spits the coppery taste out of his mouth, he realizes it's blood.
"Yeah, well, I warned you," James hisses back, but he can feel sudden anxiety knotting up in the pit of his stomach. He's not an ignorant first year anymore - neither his parents nor the school were going to be pleased with this. "...come on, let's get to the infirmary."
Scorpius jerks away from James's insistence. "Don't touch me." His words are sharp bitten and cold. He gets back to his feet, embarrassed that he's so physically weak that one punch brought him to his knees. On the plus side, James looks sick with guilt. Or maybe he's just pissed he could get in trouble for this.
With a scoff, Scorpius glares. "You've done enough damage for one night, don't you think?"
"I assumed you just looked fragile, I wasn't expecting you to actually be made of porcelain." His knuckles hurt, but he's not going to rub them in front of Scorpius, not right after that. Antsy, he glances down at the blood he'd spit, before cutting his eyes back up to his face. "Oh, come on. Just hex me or something to make it even."
Scorpius scoffs. "Hex the son of Harry Potter? You must be mental." That was probably the only reason he hadn't raised his wand yet against James. The Malfoy name certainly still carried some weight, but more in a negative way. People couldn't forgive his father's crimes, even now that Draco was nothing more than a glorified paper-pusher at the Ministry.
"I blew your brother; you punched me - why don't we call it even?"
"Doesn't matter who I'm the son of-" James Potter II, you are the biggest hypocrite to have ever attended Hogwarts. "-this is between you and me, and my dad has nothing to do with it."
He inhales a sharp breath through his nose, though, seeming to deflate at that last comment.
"So you weren't making that up. That's actually a thing that happened."
"I already told you I didn't make it up," he snaps, nudging his way past James so he can get his back off the wall. His skin feels all prickly. There's probably owl dung in his bloody hair, Merlin's soggy y-fronts. Maybe he regrets pushing James to this point. Just a little.
"You two are way too young..." They're hardly two years younger than him, but that doesn't seem to matter: he's pretty sure Scorpius isn't lying now, and his mind is hurtling through a half-dozen different reasons as to why he and Al shouldn't be friends, ever, period.
Scorpius is a few feet away now, but he turns to grin at James. "Do you really believe that...or are you just jealous? Because if it would shut you up, I'd offer to blow you as well."
Scorpius rolls his eyes. "Well, fine, then. Let's just cut to the chase. Why don't you tell me what will shut you up and make you leave so I can help out?"
He removes his half-written letter from his pocket, clearly intent despite the fact that he's still swallowing blood, to finish the damn thing.
i feel sort of gross for shipping them laughs into hands
He inhales, clearly with the intention to say something, to argue somehow, but instead his eyes just land on the letter. He is completely dumbfounded for one of the first times in his life, and finally James just shrugs, an expression of utter defeat.
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But tell me where you are, or I'm owling your father.
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Ironically, I'm in the owlery.
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switching to prose because it's easier for me :3
With a sigh, he pockets the half-finished letter.
Stupid James Potter. Ruining all his fun.
works perfectly for me!
"Malfoy."
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"Can you make the whole nose breaking thing quick?" he asks, as if he really intends to stand there and let James do that to him without a fight.
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He steps back as James shoves him. But like father, like son. He can't quite let it go.
One pale eyebrow arches. "Shouldn't you be discussing this with him and not me?"
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But who has time for dissection of motivation like that? Instead, he's idly using his thumb to crack the knuckles of the same hand hanging down by his hip.
"Oh, I plan to. I've simply chosen to discuss it with you first."
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Slowly, Scorpius raises both hands in surrender and leans back. He's got nowhere else to go, back against the dingy wall of the Owlery with Merlin only knew what scraping onto his fine clothes. A soft laugh bubbles out. "Somehow I think I'm getting the raw end of the deal between the two of us."
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"That's what happens to snakes." It's wrong - he knows that it's wrong, that it's not right to make spitting judgments like that, just look at the inspiration for Al's middle name - but that doesn't change his tone. "When do you even see him?"
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He grits his teeth at the insult. It's not like that would be the first time one of the Potters or Weasleys insulted him just because of his house or his last name. Prats, the lot of them.
"See who?" Scorpius taunts, and then huffs a soft laugh, lowering his hands. "Kidding. I dunno. We have Potions and Defense together. There are parties. It's not like everyone agrees with the whole House segregation nonsense like you."
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"You're spreading rumors about my little brother, saying things just to piss me off, and so it sort of makes you an idiot for being surprise when it works."
Again: it'll occur to him later that he just admitted to rising to the bait.
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Which, he just kind of accidentally admitted, Al did.
Oops.
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It's not even angry, just baffled.
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"Is this conversation over? I was in the middle of something."
man i am really enjoying this thread, thank you <3
i was just thinking the same thing~ :D
"Name one thing you know about me besides my last name," he spits coldly. "How in bloody hell would you know we've got nothing in common if you don't even know me? Now, step aside, or I'll make you step aside." Look at that, it's even got Scorpius flustered enough to be a little red himself.
ahaha awesome
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Scorpius doesn't have time to dodge, and James isn't exactly weak. The punch lands hard against Scorpius's jaw, and there's a resounding crack of a noise that sounds suspiciously like a broken tooth. As Scorpius reels, he sinks to his knees from the punch, and when he spits the coppery taste out of his mouth, he realizes it's blood.
"Prick," he snarls, face red.
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With a scoff, Scorpius glares. "You've done enough damage for one night, don't you think?"
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"I blew your brother; you punched me - why don't we call it even?"
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He inhales a sharp breath through his nose, though, seeming to deflate at that last comment.
"So you weren't making that up. That's actually a thing that happened."
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"But don't worry. It won't be happening again."
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Scorpius is a few feet away now, but he turns to grin at James. "Do you really believe that...or are you just jealous? Because if it would shut you up, I'd offer to blow you as well."
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He removes his half-written letter from his pocket, clearly intent despite the fact that he's still swallowing blood, to finish the damn thing.
i feel sort of gross for shipping them laughs into hands
"Forget it."