“You must have chaos within you to give birth to a dancing star.”
-Friedrich Nietzsche
Nobody knew precisely what had happened to Scorpius Malfoy on the first Tuesday evening of September, but everybody agreed that he had been changed. The sight of his unoccupied table in the library had become so customary that by the early days of October some of the more rambunctious students would sit in the empty chair on dares, then dash behind bookshelves giggling, as though they had done something brilliantly adventurous.
Althea had laughed when Lilah shared her version of the Tuesday Evening Episode, which involved Madam Pince, several trolls, some of Peeves’ rudest language, and a lot of pumpkin juice. She found the gossip about Scorpius to be both ridiculous and slightly pathetic. However, after weeks of Scorpius shooting glances across classrooms “ glances which Althea meticulously avoided “ she had begun to wonder just what she’d done. The freeing honesty of that night in the library had dissipated with the daylight, and now all that was left was the feeling that perhaps she ought not to have said so much.
Then, in mid-October, something happened.
“Thea.”
Althea was ignoring Lilah. It was the easiest thing to do when Lilah got too chatty in class, and since Althea wasn’t exactly adept at potion-making she generally tried to pay attention when Professor Slughorn was lecturing. Today, however, Lilah wasn’t taking the hint.
“Thea.”
Althea continued to scribble notes on her parchment, dotting her i’s ferociously.
“Althea Burbage! If you do not answer me in the next five seconds I will open this note from Scorpius Malfoy myself!”
This was, of course, hissed very quietly from across the table, but Althea jumped as though Lilah had shouted it.
“A note. For me. From Malfoy?” Althea whispered, half to herself. It took her a moment to register the information. Then, as though shocked awake, she looked at Lilah, who grinned and tossed the note into her lap. Althea scrambled to unfold it and, again ignoring Lilah’s background chatter, read the single line of angular print:
S.M.
In the background, Lilah was still sighing about the note, but Althea was not listening. She was also not listening to Professor Slughorn’s lecture. All she could think about was Scorpius’ sudden request “ a request she was bound to fulfill. Why, oh, why had she offered to help him attain Muggle books? Why had she ever provided that link? Why couldn’t she and Scorpius Malfoy let each other alone, pretend that there was nothing to connect them, nothing to disturb their carefully crafted distance? Why had she ever gone into the library that night in September?
Because there was something else at work besides the past, Althea thought to herself, and that was the present. And things in the present, it seemed, were becoming more confusing than anything that had happened in the past.
Althea was so absorbed in reverie that the dismissal of the lesson did not faze her for several minutes. Even when Lilah thrust her books into her hands and told her that they’d be late for Charms if they didn’t get going, Althea was transfixed by thought. Very carefully she folded up the note and tucked it into her pocket, followed Lilah out of the dungeons, and proceeded through the rest of the day in a haze of contemplation.
It took until that night, ensconced behind the deep blue hangings of her four-poster, for the realization to finally established itself in Althea’s mind. She was not shocked; it had been building all day “ really, all the days since that night in the library. The reason that she had looked at Scorpius, spoken to Scorpius, offered Scorpius aid (albeit of a feeble kind) was that she did not want to break the connection they had made when their eyes had met at the start of term. That indecipherable meaning that had spanned their stares...Althea had deciphered her end. And she very much wished she hadn’t, because it was only going to make everything more torturously complicated.
Althea turned her head upon on her pillow and reached out one finger to touch the binding of the book that lay on the edge of the bed, its gold-embossed title gleaming faintly. It was Great Expectations. She would deliver it immediately. She knew by now the futility of waiting when it came to Scorpius Malfoy.
He was exactly where she expected him to be.
“I didn’t think you’d get here tonight.”
Althea slid the leather-bound book across the table without speaking.
“Thank you.”
She nodded, looking anywhere except at his eyes, which was difficult as Scorpius seemed to want to catch her gaze.
“Well,” said Scorpius, after the minutes had stretched into a tightness, “I suppose you’ll want to be going.” He seemed “ disappointed?
“Can I ask you a question?”
Scorpius looked apprehensive, but he nodded.
“Scorpius,” said Althea, “what if I told you that I want to be friends with you? What would you do?”
Scorpius didn’t answer.
“Would you turn down a friend, Scorpius, for the sake of your self-imposed punishment, for your ridiculous guilt? What would you do?”
His eyes were dark depths now, stormy with confusion.
“It’s so simple, Scorpius. It isn’t even a question at all.”
And Althea reached for his hand and took it.
It was surprisingly warm, and very soft, but for a callous on the pad of his middle finger. Althea knew that it came from holding a quill the wrong way, because she had one herself. She liked the look of her smaller, tanner hand in his large, pale one. She liked the feel of it, too. Slowly, unblinking, she raised her eyes to his.
“I don’t know.”
“You don’t know what?” asked Althea.
“About being friends,” said Scorpius. The words felt clumsy on his tongue; Althea could hear it in the way he spoke, and feel it in the growing warmth of his hand “ which she was still holding. Why was she still holding his hand?
“What is there to not know?” she asked.
“I don’t think...that we can be friends,” said Scorpius, looking both pained and perplexed by his own statement. “I can’t explain why. I do want to be. It’s just this feeling...there’s something...Althea, I “”
Suddenly, the warmth of his hand was too much, and she let it go.
“I have to get back,” she said, standing up. “Enjoy the book. It’s one of my favorites.”
“Althea, wait.”
She stopped and turned around.
“What does being friends entail, exactly?”
Althea was as surprised as Scorpius to hear herself laugh.
“It entails talking instead of note-passing, and saying hello when we see each other, and maybe even sitting together in the library,” she said, smiling at Scorpius’ attentive expression. She half expected him to whip out a sheaf of parchment and begin taking notes. “Don’t worry “ it’s the simplest thing, being friends.”
Walking back to her dormitory, however, Althea wondered if what she’d said was true. Her only good friend was Lilah, and their relationship consisted of chatter on one side and tolerance of said chatter on the other. Who was she to be lecturing Scorpius on friendships? And who was she to be a friend? She had little more experience, it seemed, than the boy she was trying to help.
Althea fell asleep both dreading and desiring the dawn.