Look After You

Bill and I landed in the Weasley's front yard after a little while of flying through nothing but dark air. I slid off the back of our Thestral and stood still for a moment, staring at the ground. What would going inside the house bring? More news of death, of a failed mission? I shivered slightly.

I didn’t even notice the grouping of people standing out on the lawn until Mrs. Weasley was upon us both, hugging first Bill, then me and saying things like, "Bill! Lacey! Thank God, thank God!". Bill and I remained silent.

"Mad-Eye's dead," He said to Mr. Weasley shortly. No one responded for a while, and then he continued, "We saw it. It happened just after we broke out of the circle: Mad-Eye and Dung were close by us, they were heading north, too. Voldemort – " He paused for a second, and I glanced up in shock. Voldemort had been there? Why hadn't I seen him? "He can fly – went straight for them. Dung panicked, I heard him cry out, Mad-Eye tried to stop him, but he disapparated. Voldemort's curse hit Mad-Eye full in the face, and he fell backward off his broom and – there was nothing we could do, nothing…" His voice broke and trailed off.

Fleur bolted from the house just then and ran across the yard, flinging herself at him with a cry. He buried his face in her hair and I looked away, staring around for all the other pairs. I saw Harry and Hagrid, Hermione with Ron next to her. Ginny was there, too, though she hadn’t been flying with the lot of us. Lupin and Tonks stood together to the side. I didn't see Fred, George, or Kingsley. My stomach sank to the soles of my feet.

"Where are Fred and George? What about Kingsley?" I steeled myself for an answer. Mr. Weasley was the one to respond.

"Kingsley had to get back to watch the Muggle Prime-Minister. Fred and George are inside," He looked older as he said, "Fred's fine, but George was hurt pretty badly…"

I didn’t wait to hear anything else. I took off, running on legs that felt barely there across the lawn, through the kitchen half-door, into the living room where George was lying across the couch, pale but seemingly alive. Fred sat on the floor near his brother, and he looked up when I entered.

"Oh, God, I – " I said, my voice shaking so badly, I could barely understand myself. I stumbled toward the couch and knelt by George's head. My hair fell in an orange curtain over my shoulder, and I knew I looked like myself again. He grinned up at me, reaching out a hand to touch one of my cheeks.

"By God, Lacey, I didn’t know you cared about me that much," He pulled his hand away, and I saw tears I didn't know I'd been crying glittering wetly on the tips of his fingers, "I'm not even dead, and you're still crying over me."

Without thinking it through, I leaned in and kissed him full on the mouth, feeling relief and sorrow and rage and every emotion a human can possibly feel tingling in my lips. He must've felt it, too, because he put a shaking hand on the back of my neck and kissed me back. I thought I would collapse with the overwhelming weight of the events of that night, but he held me anchored there and I was grateful for it. Kissing him seemed to remind one distant part of my brain that things were far from over; I couldn’t tap out just yet.

I pulled away, slightly embarrassed but mostly glad that George and Fred seemed to be okay. I couldn’t even entertain the idea of what it would be like if one of them wasn’t.

Fred sat on the floor still, staring with his mouth open slightly. He glanced from me to George and back again, and before he could say anything, I flung myself at him, too, but I decided to hug him instead of kiss him. He patted my back awkwardly a couple of times, then seemed to have a change of heart. He hugged me back, his arms tight around my shoulders. I eventually pulled away and sat limply on the floor, staring at both of them for a moment and trying to get myself under control enough to speak without crying.

"I'm just… so glad… you're both okay." I said haltingly, trying to swallow the knot in my throat.

"I'm fine," Fred waved his hand lightly, "It's George that got the short end of the stick on this one."

George grinned and turned his head toward the back of the couch. His hair was matted with blood. His shoulder shimmered red, and I was so distracted by the macabre sight of it all, at first, to notice the tiny, black hole where his right ear used to be. I felt my eyes go wider and I stared at him in disbelief.

"It's pretty awful, isn’t it?" His smile broadened.

"What –" I said, flailing madly for words because the situation seemed a little ridiculous and horrible at the same time. "George, where is your ear?" I asked, fully aware of the bizarre sound of my statement.

He chuckled. "It was cursed off."

"By Snape," Fred added.

"What a bastard!" I said, outraged. "He was there?!"

"And I thought detention was bad." George mused.

We all looked at each other for a moment, then burst into gales of laughter. It all just seemed completely ludicrous. More relief washed through me, and I laughed even harder. I didn’t even notice everyone else coming in from outside until Ron sat heavily beside me with Harry and Hermione on his other side. Our laughter dulled at the looks on their faces, and I realized that I hadn’t mentioned Moody to either of the Twins.

"What's wrong?" I heard Fred ask, and I knew without looking at him that he wasn't smiling anymore, "Who's – ?"

"Mad-Eye," Mr. Weasley said quietly, though he might as well have been screaming it for the way it echoed around the room, "Dead."

I watched as Bill moved over to a side cupboard and pulled out a bottle that looked much like the one Fred and George had smuggled out to the orchard what felt like several lifetimes ago. Had I really been sixteen once? This night had made me feel so weathered, anything under one hundred seemed impossible.

Bill poured firewhiskey into glasses and, with a wave of his wand, sent them flying through the air to each of us. I caught mine in my right hand, enjoying the way the liquor seemed to warm my palm through the glass.

"Mad-Eye." He said, raising his glass.

"Mad-Eye." The rest of us said in unison. Except for Hagrid, that is. He responded a beat or so after the rest of us, but it didn’t do anything to lessen the sincerity of the toast.

I drank, welcoming the burn in my throat and stomach. It gave me something to think about aside from Moody and all the blackness. And the falling, Moody falling. I shook my head vigorously.

The topic of conversation turned abruptly to who had betrayed the operation, and no one could seem to agree. Lupin seemed to suggest Mundungus on the grounds that he had disapparated when faced with Death Eaters. Bill said no, he had just been scared. Fleur kept saying that someone had just been careless, and I saw half the eyes in the room dart toward Hagrid, who remained completely oblivious with his face buried in a handkerchief.

"No," Harry said loudly, a fierce look on his face, "I mean, if somebody made a mistake and let something slip, I know they didn't mean to do it. It's not their fault. We’ve got to trust each other. I trust all of you. I don’t think anyone in this room would ever sell me to Voldemort." He glared around firmly.

"Well said, Harry." Fred said after a minute of silence. He inclined his head a bit and raised his glass.

"Yeah, 'ear, 'ear." George said, and I turned around to see a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth.

More talk followed, but I tuned it out, concentrating hard on the liquor in my stomach rather than Harry's talk of wanting to leave. I wanted to curl up somewhere warm and sleep for a long time, my brain wiped clean of memories of invincible men, falling through the darkness like broken dolls.



Everyone drifted off sometime after midnight, either strolling out the kitchen door so that they could disapparate outside the protective boundaries around the Burrow, or to various beds around the house. I chose the latter, helping Fred get a woozy George off the couch and upstairs to their bedroom. We deposited him on his bed, and I quit the room for the bathroom, wanting nothing more than to wash the dry tears off my face and brush my teeth.

I almost ran into Harry as he bounded down the stairs, obviously headed in the same direction I was. He smiled apologetically and motioned for me to go first. I did, grabbing a towel and wetting it under the faucet before making room for him at the sink. He leaned against it, staring at himself in the mirror.

"Don’t beat yourself up, Harry." I said quietly. His reflection glanced at me and he sighed.

"I'm trying not to."

"You know we're all here because we want to be," I reached out to place a hand on his arm the way my grandmum used to when she was trying to stop my crying.

"That's the point, though," He turned to look at me with torture in his eyes, "None of you should want to be here. If someone else gets hurt, or worse! I don't know, Lacey." He ran a hand through his hair.

"Harry, you idiot." I said softly, "D'you think Moody wanted to die any other way? I certainly don't. Boy, you don’t have to do this all by yourself. Imagine how we'd all feel if you tried." He nodded stiffly, and I could tell that he wasn't having any of it.

I finished washing my face, brushed my teeth with Harry still in the doorway, told him 'good-night', and went back up to the Twins' bedroom.

They were both awake, and seemed to have been talking before I entered the room. Fred's mouth was frozen, mid-sentence, and it remained that way while I snatched the second pillow off his bed and flopped onto the floor with it.

"What're you doing down there?" George asked, gazing at me from his bed. From where I was, I could only see his eyes over the edge of the mattress. He looked puzzled.

"Going to sleep." I replied, nuzzling my face into the pillow.

"You haven’t slept on the floor in ages, though." He said, his eyebrows knitting together.

"So? I don't want your ear-hole blood all over me while I sleep." I said, making a face.

"Stuff it." he said, pushing away from the edge of the bed and settling himself closer to the wall. There was enough room for me that way. I sat up, eyeing him warily.

"Lovers." Fred hissed from his own bed, drawing the 's' out between his teeth. I shot him a nasty hand-gesture and stood, gingerly lying on my back in the empty space.

"I knew it, you know," Fred said, shrugging and closing his eyes. "I knew it would end up being you two." He grinned over at us.

"It's not 'us two'," I said, glancing at George who was staring at the ceiling and obviously listening.

"But you kissed him." Fred argued, propping himself up on an elbow.

"I was relieved to see him alive. You too, actually, if you don't remember."

"Sure, but you didn't snog me."

"I didn't snog anybody!" I glared across the room at him.

"Lacey, don't lie to yourself." Fred said condescendingly.

"Drop it, Frederick." George said, but he was grinning.

Fred grumbled and turned out the light, then flipped onto his other side to face the wall. George chuckled and put his hand behind his head. The other one rested across his stomach. I waited until I could hear Fred's soft snores from across the room before I spoke again.

"Sorry about that, by the way." I whispered in the darkness. I felt George shrug, his shoulder bumping against mine.

"'S no big deal. I probably would have done the same thing if I had seen you lying there with an ear missing."

I didn’t mention that I hadn't noticed his lack of an ear at that point.

"What's it like, not having an ear?" I asked, turning my head to face him. He still looked up at the ceiling.

"Well, it sort of hurts." He murmured, "But I can still hear alright, so I guess it doesn't really make any difference."

"Except that you're asymmetrical now." I chuckled.

"That's not very nice," He said in a quiet voice, and I felt the bed shift slightly. I imagined him reaching his hand up to brush his fingers over the tiny hole in the side of his head.

"If it'll make you feel better, you can curse one of my ears off," I considered for a moment, "Or Fred's. I give you permission to do it to him, too."

"Nah,our mum will finally be able to tell me and Fred apart. And I wouldn't curse your ear off. Don't be stupid."

"I'm not being stupid, I'm trying to make you feel better about being a weirdo with one ear."

"Shut up and go to sleep, Lacey." He sighed, nudging me with his elbow.

I sort of wanted to turn over and burrow into his side – he was still wearing one of his hand-knitted sweaters – but I didn’t. I figured that one bout of over-the-top affection was enough for one day.

I clasped my hands together on my stomach, forcing my muscles to relax. Moody didn't cross my mind more than once, and I was able to sink into a deep, dreamless sleep.