Falling For

As Fred and his father helped George to bed later that night, I stood in the doorway timidly. They had placed him on his bed, sitting him down so he could stare at the wooden floors of the Weasley family home. Bidding his goodbye, Arthur left the room, leaving Fred and George to sit apart on their single beds.

“Goodnight,” I said from the doorway and they both smiled at me, leaving me to toddle off back down to the girl’s room at the end of the hallway. We were going to be staying at the Burrow for a few days or so until the wedding was over, as Molly needed the entire family to help with preparations. The boys had Verity running the store, planning to pop in every few days to keep track of what was going on.

I would be staying in a room with Ginny and Hermione, of who both good friends that had grown up with each other, which left me awkward and alienated. While they talked, I watched the ceiling; the aging plaster of which had started to discolour from the original white to a now gaudy yellow. I felt so out of place again, which in turn made me feel horrible altogether. Everything had grown so confusing in one night.

I lay awake for hours, breathing softly to feign sleep while I ran my fingers along the cold wall. It was a rough substitute for the warm body of George’s; something I had had not gone without in a long while. It was so odd sleeping alone like that in a small, single bed, nothing to bury into or curl around. It was like being in my first year of school, when the bed seemed to have all the right intentions but felt so foreign regardless.

With the epiphany of my own mortality that night, I began to construct a list of things I had to do before I went back to work within the week. I had to practice my spells for one, which led me to realise that I had to talk to my mother about what was going on (sparing a few details of course). I also had to find a better job, away from the ministry and away from the careful corruption that almost seemed inevitable.

Arthur had received a promotion a month or so back, and so he was then known as Head of the Office for the Detection and Confiscation of Counterfeit Defensive Spells and Protective Objects. He had pulled me along with him to be his secretary, letting me know in secret that it was no longer safe to work towards a better treatment of muggles. This was around the time Fleur had been bugging me about my inability to protect myself.

Everything seemed to be hurrying itself into a downward spiral, not only was the situation worsening - it had also began to squeeze itself into the depths of my mind. Forced to leave my freedom in a small box in the back of my thoughts, I began to think more like an adult who had consequences. I could no longer think of making friends without being paranoid, and I could no longer talk freely in public. Even my mother did not know what was going on in my messy head.

It was some sort of reaction to just sit bolt upright in bed, causing both the girls to jump. I looked over at them, apologizing quietly before slipping my feet out to touch the cool floorboards. Padding along the creaking floor, I slipped out of the room to head towards the previous; all quiet in the house bar from the main bedroom of Molly and Arthur. From the crack beneath their closed door, you could see the soft glow radiating under from the bedside lamp that illuminated their worried faces as they whispered about thing I could not hear and could not bear to.

Slowly and quietly, I opened the bedroom door I had hopelessly found. The weakened glow of wand light was sitting carefully in one of Fred’s hands; in the other was a book. I frowned at him for a moment as he looked up and took me in, confused as to why I was there. When it finally clicked, his mouth pulled into a smile and he cocked his head towards his brother.

“Sleeping.” He told me. “But I suppose you don’t care.”

“Not really.” I mumbled back at him, shifting around in just my sweater and underwear. It wasn’t the first time he had seen me like this, seeing as I wasn’t ashamed of my body as much as I used to be… so seeing me without pants was basically an everyday thing. “I just need to crawl up beside him or else I won’t sleep.”

“You two are ridiculous.” He told me with a cheeky grin and I scoffed at him, slipping into his brother’s bed. George was dead asleep, lying on his back with his mouth slightly open. The night’s events had obviously drained him of any personality, so I found my explanation as to why Fred had resorted to reading a book. “Can I keep reading or is that going to bother you?” he asked quietly, watching me as I pulled the blankets up to my chest.

“No, it’s okay.” I told him, letting my eyes flicker tiredly to the other redheaded boy. I was enveloped by his brother’s warmth, the steady rise and fall of his chest causing the blanket to move like it had its own set of lungs; casually breathing as it nothing had never been wrong. “Knowing my mind I won’t sleep either.”

His smile faded and he kept reading, flicking through the pages as I rolled over to curl into George’s side and drew patterns on the soft skin of his torso where his nightshirt had pulled up. He stirred a little, causing me to flinch. I did not want him to wake and frighten, or trigger some post-traumatic stress episode or something along those lines.

Instead, his eyes scarcely opened, brown irises sneaking a quick glance over my face before barely smiling. His arm pulled around me and tugged me into his chest where I then lay there, his breathing softening to that of sleep. Even though I was wide-awake I closed my eyes, not feeling so alone anymore.

“I nearly lost him tonight.” Fred suddenly said, causing my eyes to shoot open. Staying quiet, I heard Fred sigh. “We nearly lost him.”

“I know.” I spoke quietly, as not to wake George. Still, I did not move from my position. “I know we did.”

“I don’t know where I’d be if he died.” He told me, his voice so fragile it probably could have broken if I had blinked. I stared at the buttons on George’s shirt, twisting them with my forefinger and thumb. “You know, I can’t imagine it. It would be like wandering around missing half of yourself.”

My eyes pricked with tears at his voice. Just his voice was killing me, ripping at my heart with its small, child-like fingers, and devouring my insides with its awkwardly brittle teeth.

“I think if he died, then I’d die too.”

The tears fell on George’s chest as my body cringed. I rolled over to face Fred, George, in turn, rolling to face the wall (still deeply asleep, I assure). When Fred saw my wet face, he offered no consolation. We looked at each other, my mouth quivering with doubts and fears and his equally the same. His face destroyed me, the way it paled in comparison to it’s usual demeanour, his top lip jarred between his set of teeth like a broken child without a hope. I had to look down at the floor to stifle my hiccups, feeling the pain that he felt.

“I know I seem like such a prat sometimes, Mignon, but I want you to know that George means the world to me. He and I are the same person.” He breathed out. I looked up to see him staring back down at me, eyebrows knitted together in some sort of pleading “If anything ever happens to me, Min…” he started.

“Please don’t start with this, Fred.” I begged him, pushing myself up to get a proper look at him. My face had scrunched up, and I could barely see through the tears that continued to filter out of my already watery blue eyes. “You’re not going to die and neither is he.”

“But what if we do?” He asked me, his wand shaking now due to his hands inability to stay still. We were in a repulsive showdown, lying in the flashing lights of his hand-me-down wand. It hurt to look it him and it hurt to think. “If anything happens to me Mignon Fidere, I want you to look out for him to the best of your ability.”

It took a moment of silence for my tears to stop rolling, my face falling as I nodded solemnly back at him. He sniffed, finally smiling coyly at me.

“I wasn’t sure if I liked you at first… when George introduced us. I didn’t like the thought him having fun with someone else, you know? But you make him happy, I suppose.” He told me with that same smile, my bottom lip wobbling in aftershock of my initial tears. “You have to take care of him now.” He grinned, “I can’t imagine you ever getting rid of him, though.”

“Not so soon anyway,” my smile was crooked, chest heaving with the shudders of the terror that had just passed. “I love George so much.” I spoke. “I love you too. You’re my brother as well.” My smile was weak and his face softened from his dying panic to a tender thought. “And I’ll take care of you too… You know one of the first things he ever said to me was that you two were a package deal, and I’m okay with that.” I shrugged, flopping back down beside George. Fred comforted himself in his bed, fluffing up his pillow. “And I know sometimes you’re a prat. A massive one, actually, but you make him happy. Happier than anyone else can.” I ended in a whisper. “So, if anything happens to me…”

He laughed softly and I smiled, chewing on my lip before he let out a massive sigh.

“Well that was nice and emotional.” He snorted at me and I laughed quietly as George returned to my side; curling around me like a vine as he usually did when he dreamt.

“Yeah, now that was weird.” I stared at the ceiling, still sniffling from my tears. The fear of the unknown still cancelled out my acceptance to the Weasley family, so I felt I was on a windy placebo, unable to place a stable foot but still waiting to be swept away with the tornado that often threatened our life.

“I mean it though.” He said and I closed my eyes.

“I know.”

“Good night, Mignon.” He whispered and I whispered too.

“Good night.”