WICKED GAME!

" None of that compared to the feeling
of Draco bloody Malfoy's lips on hers.
And she hated that b—stard.
... Didn't she? "

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2 AUGUST ; 10:02 PM

I.

It happened at the end of the year, just after Voldemort's return and the End of Year Feast.

She was haunted nightly by the emptiness of her brother's eyes and by the fear that Voldemort's return wrought. Truthfully, the girl already had enough problems besides new trauma and the genocidal murderer; she was getting older now, 'older and prettier' said the boys in her House, and so she went to Dumbledore. For Harry, for herself. She begged him to let them hide the summer away at Hogwarts, and once more — four years in a row, the Headmaster ignored her pleas.

So, that last night before they got on the Hogwarts Express back to hell, she drank.

The Firewhiskey was cartwheeling hotly in her stomach, and the pounding need to escape the rising numbness that came every time they returned to Privet Drive had burrowed beneath the surface of her freckled skin.

They found each other breaking curfew.

They'd said something, some mean and scornful, which wasn't at all surprising. They simply stood in the corridor, staring at one another, both shaken and tear—stained. And suddenly she was marching towards him, and seconds — minutes — hours — later, she had reached him. Her fingers curled around the Slytherin green and silver tie, and when she pulled him close, he came willingly.

Suddenly she was grabbing, kissing, tasting, biting, everything, everything, all at once.

It was a battle not of wills but of their mouths, both searching for a safety that no longer existed. They sought each other's lips greedily, hungrily, because she had never been kissed before, because now she never wanted to stop. Neither of them could be satisfied, not without the other, not now.

A whisper: "We won't tell, not a soul..."

A demand: "Promise me."

"Promise what?"

"Promise me no one will ever know."

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Rose Potter wondered where everything went wrong.

Unfortunately, there was a sh—t load of options.

It could've been fifteen years ago when James and Lily Potter were slaughtered right in front of their infant children. It could've been two months ago when her brother was kidnapped and forced into a ritual which brought Voldemort back. It could've been when she turned pretty and Dumbledore refused her pleas to stay at Hogwarts over the summer again.

Or... or it could've been that very night, when she drank Firewhiskey for the first time and he needed a shoulder to lean on and she wanted to just bloody feel something.

Or maybe it was right now.

Currently, Rose was puking her guts out over the upstairs toilet.

As if this weren't bad enough, it was the hottest summer on record, and she could feel the sweat gathering at the nape of her neck and trickling down her curved spine.

Outside the bathroom door, Aunt Petunia was shrieking again, going on about dirty little girls who brought sickness into her pretty, clean house. This treatment wasn't at all surprising to a scrawny red—headed girl like Rose Potter. Her aunt Petunia was exactly the sort of person who would blame her for getting food poisoning, and if she could blame her for that, she could only imagine what she would do if (when) she found out that Rose was...

Uhm.

Well.

She didn't dare even think the word.

Another violent churn of her stomach sent her lurching back over the toilet, and God, what she wouldn't give to cast a good Scourgify. As she leant over the toilet bowl, choking on sour bile, the bathroom door opened with a soft creek. The girl found herself instinctively tensing for only a second before she felt a familiar press of knees against her thigh and a familiar hand reaching to gather her long red hair from her face.

So softly, Harry asked, "Food poisoning again?"

"Mm." She muttered past tingling, lying lips, "Yea."

Her brother nodded mutely, that same dazed look to his eyes that he'd had for the whole of summer, since Voldemort came back really.

Moments like this made her long for the open air, to escape from all of this shite they were expected to face. The freshness of the air on her face... The swoop of glee in her chest... The rush of wind through her feathers... Perhaps it was in the Potter blood to love flying; though, Rose just did it in a different way than her brother and their father before them. Up there, they were far from the world and all of its problems, and up there, nothing could touch them or hurt them. Not the Dursleys, or evil DADA professors, or even bloody Voldemort.

In the sky, the Potters were free.

As she stayed leaning over the toilet, Harry's hands moved without thinking, instinctively, expertly plaiting her long down her curved spine.

Harry used to plait her hair all the time before Rose learnt how to do it herself.

Aunt Petunia liked to spread the same lies about Rose as she did about Harry; that the two young Potters were feral and criminal children who were helpless against their lying, stealing, violent natures. Rose supposed that having her hair in fuzzy and wild disarray helped Aunt Petunia serve that image, but Harry wasn't going to stand for that.

His birthday was 31 July and hers was 1 August, born three hours and fourteen minutes apart, and Rose used to be convinced that during those three hours (and fourteen minutes), Harry somehow learnt to become her protector.

Harry had been her only defender, her first and best friend, for always and forever.

Her brother got her shaky and sweaty self to Dudley's second bedroom, tucking her in and wiping her forehead with a cool cloth, and when he curled up in their squashed twin—sized bed beside her, she listened to him whimper in his sleep and she imagined her life spill out like a knocked—over glass of wine that she desperately tried to sop up before it reached the carpet (looking suspiciously like Aunt Petunia's carpet). It was slipping away from her, and her hands weren't quick enough to stop it before it made a mess.

Rose saw herself trying to protect her baby, who she already and instinctively loved more than herself, from Uncle Vernon and his endless fury. From Aunt Petunia's vicious taunts and insults. What would Dudley's Potter Hunting look like now, when she had a baby in her arms?

Rose heard herself saying those d—mning words to Remus and Sirius: "I'm pregnant."

Swiftly, sharply, like speaking with a knife for a tongue.

The whole conversation unfolded in her head. She knew exactly how it would go. Remus would hide his pale and saddened expression. Sirius would grow tight—faced, his lips white, anger like a tidal wave until it gave way to disappointment and then acceptance.

"Well, Rosie, we'll just have to deal with it, won't we?"

She imagined her stomach growing, stretching past the point where she could hide it. She imagined herself walking through the wide cold corridors of Hogwarts — a place that used to be her one refuge. Crowds would part and students would steer clear, pointing and whispering behind their hands.

"Don't get too close to the pregnant Potter girl. It's contagious."

What would Hermione say? Or Ron and the rest of the Weasley's? Oh God, no, what would Harry say?! She could already imagine Pansy Parkinson's smirking face, and the rest of Slytherin's mockery. She absolutely and completely refused to think about Draco Malfoy.

Yes, she refused.

Oh God.

Even now she had to take a deep breath, struggling to stifle the growling little voice in her head that mocked: You are dirty and disgusting, and that will never ever change. Why would anyone want you?

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In the blur of roaming hands and whispered names, questions filled her weary soul.

Frightening questions, ugly ones.

Had he ever done this before? What did he want out of this? Would he keep his promises? How could he bear to touch her? How could she even risk touching him?

It didn't matter, she decided. It didn't matter because she'd never been touched like this before, not really — not in any way that made her feel real, because her heart was always safely out of reach and she wore her pain like an armour. And it didn't matter, she decided, because right here, right now, he was making her feel real. Real and good. So, they could have this — just for tonight, and it would always be just for tonight, so yes, they could have this.

For once in her life, she let herself stop thinking.

"What do you want?" He whispered against her lips.

Anything. Everything. Nothing at all.

Instead, she breathed right back: "You."

When he brought his lips hers again, it was fierce and angry and deep. Their kisses were desperate and bruising and perhaps the best thing that had ever happened to her. They were the sort that hungered for a thousand and another thousand more. There was no gentleness in the way they pulled at one another's clothes, just a frantic sort of hunger that couldn't be sated.

Somehow he had backed her up against the wall, still kissing — never stopping, tangled in one another, all frantic hands and heavy breaths and desperate need and 'can I please' and 'don't stop, don't ever stop'.

And they didn't.

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Perhaps Petunia Dursley was right. Perhaps her niece was a criminal.

A little known fact about Rose Lily Potter: she was an excellent thief.

The thieving had begun when she was young, borne out of desperate need and necessity.

When she was four, she stole bread rolls when Aunt Petunia's back was turned and slipped them into her pockets for the Potter siblings to eat later. When she was six, she stole a pair of shoes that Dudley didn't even want so Harry would stay warm through winter. When she was eight, she stole a Walkman from the backpack of the meanest boy in second grade.

And she wasn't sorry, not at all.

Not when they had food in their bellies, not when her brother had shoes on his feet, not when she had Nirvana, The Smiths, Radiohead, and PJ Harvey, (and sometimes even ABBA as a guilty pleasure) to keep her company.

Through the years, music had become not only Rose's one escape from the world — both Muggle and magical, but also her main connection to her mum. Apart from having her father's eyes, Rose might look just like her mother, but in truth — beyond the fact that she was kind and she had green eyes, she knew very little about her. This, however, she knew: Lily Evans Potter had fantastic taste in music. Pink Floyd, Ramones, The Clash, Bowie, Queen, and more of course.

Through her music taste alone, Rose felt like understood Lily more than she ever had before.

Because somehow Lily had gone down in history as only this: sainted wife and holy mother.

Quietly, worriedly, Rose hoped that wouldn't be her fate.

Anyway: music. If she had her way, Rose would put on her headphones and listen to music every second of every day. It was a better way to spend the rest of her life, in any case. She listened to it during lunches at Hogwarts and she listened to it while flying at Quidditch practise and today, she listened to it on her way to the shops, as it was her turn to do the chores and it was a pleasant excuse to get the hell out of that house.

Before she left, Uncle Vernon was staring at her again.

Badgirl—dirtygirl—badgirl—dirtygirl.

Her aunt's husband was always staring at her; he certainly had for as long as she could remember. She felt the weight of his leering eyes like a lashing wound against her skin, like the belt that he used to take to Harry's back. It used to make her sick. It used to make her cry. Now, she knew that his staring at her was at least better than him touching her. Whenever he touched her, it was like the worst sort of electricity, a livewire being strung through her skin.

Shocking and painful and heart—stopping.

No one knew, and if they ever found out, she was sure that no one would care because she looked small and sad and dirty, and he had dark secret thoughts about her, because she was small and sad and dirty. And no one gave a single sh—t.

Somehow she thought people would give a sh—t now that she had peed on a stick and the strip turned pink.

Badgirl—dirtygirl—badgirl—dirtygirl.

With High and Dry roaring in her ears, loaded up with groceries for the week, Rose tried not to hyperventilate while she sweated on the way back to Number Four. Bloody hottest summer in years. Bloody Aunt Petunia and her refusal to take the car, insisting Rose walk all the way to the shops herself. The girl thought it might be her punishment for sicking up in the bathroom yesterday. So passively aggressively sadistic, it was sickening.

With plastic bags in both hands, she tried to think cool thoughts.

Cool thoughts to distract her from the cold hard truth.

Rain storms. Snow angels. Ice cream. The mere thought of ice cream made her stomach churn. Morning sickness, her brain supplied. Her mouth still tasted like bile. Oh God, oh God, a baby— Ice baths. Air conditioning. Hospital rooms. Oh God, oh God—

It wasn't until Wisteria Walk that Rose noticed her breaths visible as white puffs in the air. She was suddenly cold, unnaturally so. Goosebumps rose on her skin. The tips of her fingers went numb. Almost like when...

No, oh no, something was horribly wrong.

Horribly, terribly, awfully.

Wrong—wrong—wrong.

With a rising sense of dread, the girl sprinted as fast she could the rest of the way to Number Four. When she burst through the front door, she dropped the groceries and skidded into the sitting room to find Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon huddled around Dudley who looked even more dim—witted than usual. This was impressive. Then, across the room in the kitchen, Harry was sat against the counter, back pressed to the floral wallpaper, expression more than a bit dazed.

"Harry?!" Rose rushed to her brother immediately, cupping his chilled face in her hands, startled by his goosebumps beneath her fingers. "What is it? What's happened?"

It took Harry a moment to snap back to reality, jumping when he met her eyes — green on golden.

"Dementors..."

"What?" It was almost too impossible to believe. "Dementors here, in Little Whinging?"

Distantly, quietly, Harry murmured, "I'm expelled."

Rose was speechless.

"I cast a Patronus, and I got expelled for Underage Magic."

"Oh Harry..."

There wasn't anything else she could think of to say. Rose tugged Harry close, wrapping her arms tight around him while he leant most of his weight against her chest. The anger would set in soon, right after the shock passed and the truth was processed. Dumbledore wouldn't let this happen... would he? He very well might. He let this happen, didn't he? Dementors in Little Whinging, where he forced them to return again and again and again. Rose had long ago learnt not to put her faith in the Headmaster of Hogwarts.

Back in the sitting room, their relatives were still on the verge of a mental breakdown, and deciding to step in before it got worse for her and her brother, Rose informed them more than a bit begrudgingly:

"Chocolate helps."

"My poor little Duddikins," Aunt Petunia cooed over their cross—eyed cousin, "I've your favourite chocolate in here, Duddy, just here—,"

Aunt Petunia scurried from her precious son's side to the bags that Rose had dropped on the floor. Only a few seconds of rustling plastic passed before, a quiet hiss:

"What is this?"

At that truly chilling tone, Rose knew instantly what her aunt had found amongst her purchases, and it was only they two who could immediately recognise such a thing: a long white stick with a pink plus sign. It took everyone else a few seconds, and Dudley maybe not at all.

Harry's eyes went wide, panickedly darting to her face, "Rosie...?"

"I..." Rose turned bright red, enough to match her hair. "That's just..."

"No!" Aunt Petunia screeched at such a decibel that made everyone jump, already descending into hysterics, "Not again! I'm not doing it again!"

Vernon's face was red as ever as Rose had ever seen it, and Harry quickly, instinctively wrapped his hand around her wrist.

"I have had enough of being forced to raise freakish babies!" Their aunt was still shrieking, her perfectly coiffed hair falling all over the place, "I will not be saddled with yet another one! I can't do it, I can't—!"

"I will not have her in my house any longer!" Uncle Vernon bellowed, "Not with a b—stard child!"

Rose instinctively flinched, as she always did when he raised his voice at them.

Harry glared furiously at their uncle and opened his mouth to shout back, but Aunt Petunia beat him to it.

"But what about that great freak school master had to say? He said they had to be here, for those blood thingies— and oh, but Vernon, the neighbours! What will they think?! What have you done, you stupid girl?!"

Rose was breathless with her panic, trying uselessly to dismiss, evade, lie, "Listen, just—,"

"Little lady..." Uncle Vernon turned on the girl, face flushing to purple, beady eyes bulging, "You should've learnt to keep your mouth shut and your legs crossed!"

Rose shied back from his fury while Harry shifted in front of her, already bracing for a fight.

Aunt Petunia pointed a long finger and accused, "I should've known you'd be just like your mother: a little slut!"

And just like that, a line had been crossed.

"F—ck you!" Harry swore vehemently, leaping to his feet and jabbing a finger at their aunt's chest, "Don't you ever talk to my sister like that again!"

Uncle Vernon stood and shoved her brother in one shockingly fast movement, throwing him so hard that the back of his head hit the pink and white wall with a loud bang. Cringing but ultimately indifferent as always, Aunt Petunia had merely looked away while Dudley's already blown—out eyes widened even further.

"Harry—!" Rose quickly moved to save him, but Aunt Petunia grabbed her — and with a grip so tight and painful, she couldn't break free.

"What did you say to my wife, boy?" Uncle Vernon hissed.

"I said..." Harry didn't submit this time, teeth baring, "Don't talk to my sister like that."

Vernon's face was practically purple with his anger, "Should have known a girl that pretty would've turned into a cheap whore—,"

Harry drew his head back and spat straight in their uncle's face.

Rose gasped in equal parts awe and horror.

"Get out!" Uncle Vernon raged, smacking her brother across the face, hard enough to make him bleed, "Get out of my house, filthy little deviants!"

It took all of Harry's strength to throw their massive uncle off of him, before he wiped his bleeding nose and stood tall to scream, "We left! You didn't throw us out! We left!"

"And don't come back here looking for handouts, you fr—!"

Harry took Rose's hand, and they slammed the door of Number Four Privet Drive behind them before Vernon could insult them any further.

Together, the Potter twins ran.

This was like before Third Year, the summer that Harry's accidental magic turned Aunt Marge into a giant weather balloon. It was glorious. Unfortunately, in retaliation, Aunt Petunia had (without warning) smacked Rose across the face, and Harry had shoved their aunt down before grabbing Rose's hand and pulling her the hell out of there.

They had their wands and the clothes on their backs and nothing else.

If she looked farther out into the distance, between the tightly—packed brick houses, she could see the endless terrain of Surrey suburbs, and beyond that, the snakelike trail of power lines that led to London, and beyond that, Scotland and Hogsmeade and Hogwarts which they could never reach on their own so they would have to get used to being hungry and dirty and hurt and used up, again, because the Potter orphans had nowhere else to go.

"Stop, stop," Harry finally pulled her to a halt near the park, both of their chests heaving when they looked at each other, "This is way too dangerous for us to be out in the open like this; you've gotta fly out of here—,"

"No way in hell am I leaving you! Especially since we only left because of me—," her throat closed up and suddenly she couldn't say another single word.

Harry was watching her with such a wary, nervous expression that it made her heart hurt.

"Rosie..."

"I'm sorry," she was wringing her hands, "I'm so sorry, I didn't plan for it to happen, it just— it happened, and I don't want you to hate me, please don't—,"

With a huffing sigh, Harry immediately pulled her tight against him, cupping the back of her head so she could hide her face into his shoulder just like she had for the past fifteen years of their lives.

"All right, yea? It's all right," her big brother (of three hours (and fourteen minutes)) promised, "We're gonna figure this out, Rosie."

Then, when a group of witches and wizards descended upon them just as they were turning the corner from Wisteria Walk to Magnolia Crescent, Rose could almost believe he was right.

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When it was all done and over, they stayed for a bit against that wall — sweaty foreheads pressed together, chest against chest while they tried to catch their breaths. His lips were swollen with the ferocity of their kisses, and her tongue tasted of him — mint and rainwater and moonlight and some smugness too. Without a word, they righted their clothes, they didn't meet each other's eyes, and they went their separate ways — back to Gryffindor and Slytherin.

When she woke up the next day (with a raging hangover, mind), she was almost glad it had happened. Glad and yet could hardly believe it had happened at all.

For as long as she could remember, she was badgirl—dirtygirl—badgirl—dirtygirl. She felt this deep within herself, within the words that Petunia bruised her with, within the way Uncle Vernon stared at her most times. For years, no one had wanted her. For years, she had been pushed around, yelled at, made fun of, and now she found someone who had picked her.

Her.

Rose Lily Potter.

It made her feel real for once in her d—mn life. His was the first touch that she actually felt in years, suddenly seen for herself and not merely his sister or their daughter. Of course she loved her brother and godfathers and friends, but none of that compared to being drowned in those angry kisses, in the warmth of his solid body against hers, in the addicting want that pooled in her stomach and tugged at her heart. None of that compared to the feeling of Draco bloody Malfoy's lips on hers. And she hated that b—stard.

... Didn't she?

ANNIE SPEAKS

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woooo! let's do this thing! it's kind of a short intro, but i hope it was enough to hook ya! we kinda got to dive a little in rose's mind here, as well as seeing a few flashbacks... which were a bit spicy. sorry about that, lol. this won't really be a spicy story, btw, i can't write smut, i just can't. sorry about that too lol

also, i feel like it's important to say, this is a romance so it may romanticise a lot of these topics, when in reality they're really not romantic at all. i'm a big believer in supporting teen moms, not teen pregnancy... soooo there's my two cents on that. don't be dumb, kids, lol.

another important note if you didn't read my earlier one: this story will sort of follow the plot of ootp before diverging completely in alternate universe territory. be prepared to get whiplash a few times, hope that's okay lol. since i've made two hp stories now, i didn't just want to recreate what i've already written if that makes sense?

the updating schedule should be about once a week, i'm hoping? i'm thinking fridays, what do y'all think?

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NEXT TIME IN WICKED GAME!

"Eventually, you're going to start showing. It's not just going to go away."

"Oh, but Merlin, they're gonna flip." Ron cringed and tugged hard on his hair, "How the bloody hell are you going to tell them, Ro?"

"Simple." Rose scoffed with confidence she did not at all possess, hiding her face in her brother's bony shoulder. "I was thinking something along the lines of, 'I'm pregnant. Can you pass the potatoes?'"