I'd Draw You Smiling

We made our way back to the castle just as the sun was setting. Filch had abandoned his post momentarily to yell at Malfoy, Crabbe, and Goyle for something they had done. They stood and looked solemn until they caught sight of the three of us, strolling arm in arm through the gate, at which point they sneered and mouthed filthy words in our direction. Filch either didn’t notice or didn’t care. He didn't stop screaming, in any case.

"I hate that little piss." I growled, shaking my head.

"Who, Malfoy?" George asked, stuffing a Hiccup Sweet into his mouth, "Yeah. He's a twit." A loud hitch in his breathing echoed across the grounds and he and Fred began laughing.

"Right now, though," Fred said between chuckles, "We're sort of in his debt. He's thoroughly distracting Filch and we'd have detention for months if he caught us with half this stuff."

"Months? Term ends next Friday." I nudged his ribs with my elbow and he shrugged.

Neither of them said anything as we trudged up the stairs and into the entrance hall, now crowded with people headed toward the Great Hall for dinner. We didn't stop, having eaten our collective weight in sweets from Honeydukes only an hour or so earlier. The route to the common room was second nature to us and we chattered aimlessly without paying attention to where we were going, finally arriving successfully in front of the portrait of the Fat Lady. She looked rather excited.

"The final task is in three days!" She chirped.

"Banana Fritters." the Twins and I said in unison. The Fat Lady, looking slightly disgruntled, swung forward to admit us.

We clambered through the portrait hole and into the common room, which was completely empty, save for the three of us. The table Lee had been occupying that afternoon was cleared off, but three large and bulbous book bags sat heavily on the floor beside the chair he'd been sitting in, clearly not out of use quite yet.

I slumped down on the overstuffed couch, my head resting on a throw pillow and my feet on the low table between the couch and the fire. I groaned, clutching my stomach and rolling onto my side.

"Damn those Chocolate Frogs." I sighed, staring into the fire through a curtain of orange hair that had fallen over my face. Fred and George laughed from their spots in red velvet chairs at opposite ends of my couch. I looked at first one, then the other, grinning as I did so. They were still completely spellbound by their birthday presents.

"I'm feeling rather smug." I said, sitting up slightly.

"I was under the distinct impression that you were feeling rather fat." Fred mumbled, holding the label on the Grow Your Own Warts Kit so close to his face that his eyes were crossed. I threw my pillow at him and he gave me a sour look.

"That wasn't very nice." I crossed my arms, "And you wonder why I call you an arsehole."

"You were the one clutching your stomach and cursing chocolate treats." George chuckled, still hiccupping.

I shrugged and nodded, then stretched out again. Fred, who was seated by my head, reached out and absentmindedly tugged at my hair. George, on the other hand, untied my shoes with the tip of his wand and knotted them again with his fingers. They both looked incredibly distant, though I didn’t bother asking why. 'Heart to Heart' conversations weren't within our comfort zone, which really said a lot because our discomfort zone was ridiculously miniscule in comparison.

"Boys," I said, looking into the fire again, "What do you suppose we'll all be like when we're old?"

The both looked up at my question, their faces pensive.

"I don't really know," Fred muttered, glancing over at George, "I always figured we'd own a joke shop somewhere, but I never figured on actually growing up. I hope I'm not boring." He made a face of disgust and ran his hand through his hair.

"Me, too," George agreed, "And I hope I have eighty-five kids and twenty-four wives and more money than Gringott himself."

"I'll be a dotty old man," Fred laughed, standing and hobbling to the fire, acting out his own description, "I'll never match my clothes, and I'll be a ginger for life. And I'll have one wife and ten kids – five sets of twins, mind you – and I'll be so happy I won't know what to do with myself." He grinned, his teeth flashing in the fire light, "I'll live until I'm three-hundred-and-thirty-six, and when I die, they'll erect a statue of me on the front lawn of Hogwarts. It'll be grand."

George jumped up and joined his brother by the fire, grinning as well. "Our kids will rule Hogwarts and give everybody absolute hell after we're gone. My statue will be right in the middle of the entrance hall, and I'll be sculpted doing the most glorious vulgar gesture. And when I die, I hope they toss me in a delivery crate from Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and send me to the moon." He did a sort of jig and laughed, loud enough to echo off the ceiling.

"Lacey," Fred said, running over and throwing himself down on my couch, his arm around my shoulders, "Will be a ginger for life, too. She'll have fifty ginger babies with some ginger bloke, and they'll be so painfully normal, it'll be sickening. Her ginger daughters will be dorm wives to our ginger sons and we'll all be really happy!" He looked jubilant.

"And our families will inter-marry and weave a complicated web of decent and no one will know who belongs to whose family after a while. We'll be a dominating race of skinny, freckled gingers and we'll collectively rule the world someday," George added, throwing himself down on my other side, "Oh, it'll be grand."

He and Fred chuckled again, quieter now, staring at me with wide, shining eyes. I grinned and rolled my own eyes.

"That was very touching." I said.

"No," said Fred.

"This is touching." George concluded, and he and Fred both put their heads on my shoulders, "Where is Collin Creevey when you need him?"

I sighed and patted their cheeks before they straightened, both gazing at me curiously. They simultaneously leaned back against opposite arms of the couch, still staring.

"Lacey," Fred said, "You haven’t told us what you think you'll be like. I'm curious."

"Me too, Lace." George's teeth flashed again.

"Ah, well," I began slowly, thinking hard, "I'll probably live a quiet life like my mum and dad. I'll pop out a couple of kids, send them on their way, and that'll be that."

"See? Like I said: painfully normal." Fred's eyes narrowed, "Where's the fun in a life like that?"

"In the 'normal' part." I insisted.

"So, no magic, then?" George asked. I hesitated.

"No. No magic."

"What about us?" Fred said, suddenly serious.

"I don't know. What about you?" I stole one of George's hiccuping sweets off the low table I'd been resting my feet on and popped it into my mouth in an attempt to lighten the mood.

"Dunno," said Fred. "Be hard to be friends if you, you know, dropped off the face of the Earth."

I didn't say anything but understood him to be right. There was a long minute of silence, during which I huccupped with my hand over my mouth. Fred was looking at me carefully, uncharacteristically serious.

"We're loosening you up while you're at the Burrow." George promised after a while. He knotted his hands behind his head, "We're going to get completely schnockered on Fire Whiskey and go dance naked on the lawn."

"Not naked." I corrected.

"Oh, yes." They said together, identical grins spreading across their faces, "Naked."

Other people began arriving in the common room, mostly the nameless faces that are always crowded around the bulletin board or sitting in groups on the floor. One boy glanced at the three of us with a mixture of longing and admiration and I felt sort of bad for him. He noticed my gaze and scurried away, his face a new shade of pink. I smiled to myself and relaxed against the back of the couch, my inner voice saying things like, 'I probably should be studying' and 'Is that thunder I hear?' and 'I wonder when the house elves come up to make our beds and tidy things up'. My brain whirred contentedly.

The room stayed at a nice, consistent amount of people for a while. Some came in while others went up to bed. The Twins and I never had to make room for anyone near the fire. We sat for a long time, watching the flames and not saying anything.

I must have dozed off, because suddenly it was darker and Fred and George were standing up. I watched them stretch until their shirts lifted and exposed a few inches of their bare stomachs. They yawned in unison and smiled sleepily down at me.

"We're headed up to bed now, Lacey." George said.

"G'night." Fred yawned again.

They each ruffled my hair and headed off in the direction of the boys' spiral staircase. When I turned to watch them go, I realized I was alone in the common room, wide awake and hungry. I leaned forward, put my elbows on my knees, and stared down at the headlines of a Daily Prophet that someone had left on the low table between me and the fire. Everything seemed to be about the Triwizard Tournament and Harry Potter. I saw a brief mention of some woman named Bertha Jorkins, who seemed to be missing. Other than that, nothing caught my eye.

It was different knowing Harry, I supposed. He's a nice kid, but he isn't all that fascinating. Other than, y'know, the whole 'defeating Voldemort' thing, but even that was easy to forget about. He wasn't particularly different than anyone else.

Behind me, someone clambered through the portrait hole and landed softly on their feet. They yawned and I turned around.

"Ronald! What were you doing out so late?" I grinned at him

He looked startled, then realized it was me and relaxed, striding over and melting into an armchair, "'S not that late, is it?" He looked down at his pocket watch and shrugged, "Only twelve thirty. What're you doing up?"

"Nothing, really. I fell asleep after coming back from Hogsmeade and now I'm not tired," I watched him reach into his bag and remove a paper bag of plain rolls that he must've stolen from dinner. Really, I don’t think he ever stopped eating.

"You know you want to offer me one of those." I said, pointing at the bag. He sighed and held the bag out to me, and I took one from the top of the pile, "Thanks. Your brothers and I skipped dinner and now I'm absolutely famished."

"No problem." He said, stuffing one of them into his own mouth.

"You never told me why you were out so late." I said nonchalantly.

"Yeah, well…" He ate another roll and looked into the fire.

"Ron, come along. I'm practically your seventh sibling." I tossed a pillow at him lightly. He deflected it and sighed.

"You can't tell Fred and George. They'd take the mickey out of me if they knew." He said. I drew a cross over my chest and leaned in a bit closer. He continued, "I was out on the Quidditch pitch. Y'know, practicing."

"Ronald!" I grinned, clapping my hands excitedly, "You want to play?"

He shrugged, I gasped again, "You do! Ron, that's wicked! Will you go out for the team next year?"

"No, probably not next year," he replied, "I'm rubbish."

I chuckled. "You're not rubbish, you idiot."

"Just don't tell Fred and George, alright? They'll figure it out sometime, but I'd rather it not be right now."

I promised I wouldn’t and he stood, towering above me almost as much as his brothers had. He glanced longingly over toward the spiral staircase and I nodded.

"Glad we had this talk, Ronald." I grinned up at him.

"Yeah, right. Okay." He nodded uncertainly and tossed the empty bag onto the fire, where it turned to ash in a matter of seconds, "See you later, then."

"'Night." I called after him as he bounded up the stairs.

I reclined across the couch again, watching the shadows on the ceiling and feeling like I didn't really want to go sleep in my four-poster. I tugged the ratty old throw off the top of the couch and huddled under it, the side of my face against the velvet of the one pillow I hadn't thrown at anyone.

"Lacey," Ron muttered from over near the stairs. I hadn't heard him enter, so I sat bolt upright, my pulse irregular and too fast.

"Christ, Ron, give me a heart attack!" I clutched my chest.

"Sorry." He grinned, shrugging.

"What do you want?" I asked, not completely unkind.

"Well, it's honestly something I've been thinking for a while. And you're going to throw something at me, so I'm going to stay over here."

"Fine."

"Okay. Marry one of my brothers, alright?" he looked at me warily and I stared back, dumfounded.

"Ron, go to bed. You're talking nonsense."

"No! No, I'm not. You're already pretty much one of the family, right? Just make it official," he seemed to think for a moment, then spoke again, "I mean, you’d have to choose between Fred and George, of course. But marrying one's like marrying the other, right? I mean, they're my brothers and I know that if they could they'd both marry you, but, y'know, they can't."

"Ron, honestly. Go to bed now before I come over there and throttle some sense into you."

"I'm going. But, really, I think that's what's best," He turned and climbed up a few steps, then paused and turned around, "It'll probably happen, anyway. Even if you think it's mental now."

"Stop being stupid. Go on, off to bed. And don't sneak up on me again, please. I'd like to keep a regular pulse for the rest of the evening."

He grinned and set off again, disappearing around the first bend in the staircase. I lay back down across the couch and buried my head beneath the blanket. As much as I hated it, Ron's words echoed in my head, loud enough to drown out the storm raging outside and the sound of the fire popping itself to death on the hearth.