While you remember
Disclaimer: I don’t own Harry Potter characters. It’s so necessary to say because you all obviously thought I did. :)
Warnings: spoilers for HP and DH
My take on what happened to Weasley twins after the Deathly Hallows. One-shot.
Please, read and review.
While you remember.
George is sprawled on his bed, staring blankly at the ceiling above him. Sometimes it seems to be so low that he thinks he would reach it by just lifting up his hand.
“I see you’re having your fun, my dear Forge”
George turns his head and looks across the room where Fred is sitting on his bed, cross-legged. When did he come in, George wonders silently, rather amused because lately Fred’s been in a habit of appearing and disappearing without George ever noticing him. Not that George has something against it.
“You know, I sometimes wonder how we lived here before. The place is just pure boredom! ‘Specially when Mum forbids us to work on our products! She seems to have forgotten we are of age now” George complains to his twin, who in return merely flashes him a charming smile with a lot of teeth in it. Despite of his sore mood, George finds himself grinning back.
“GEORGE!” Mrs. Weasley shouts from the first floor and George sits straight on the bed. “Come down, the dinner’s ready!”
“I’m here too, by the way, thanks for inviting” Fred shouts back with an expression of fake hurt but Mrs. Weasley doesn’t respond.
Shrugging, George gets up and goes downstairs, Fred closely following him. As they pass Ron’s room, George wonders aloud where the hell is Ron and it causes some tingling feeling inside him for some reason as if he’s supposed to know something but can’t remember it.
“Come on, move your handsome ass, Your Holeyness” Fred jokes from behind him and the tingling feeling in his stomach increases. Your Holeyness. Why Fred called him that? He’s supposed to know that, this particular word-combination is familiar to him as if someone - Fred - has already called him that but George can’t bloody figure out when or where. He should know that, he must remember -
“George!” their Mum calls again, making him snap out of his stupor.
“Coming, coming!” Fred yells, rolling his eyes dramatically. George smirks at him.
Today there are five people gathered on dinner at the Burrow: Mrs. Weasley, Harry, Hermione, Fred and him. He comes to the table, greeting Harry and Hermione with a smile and seeing Fred doing the same.
“Sit down” Mrs. Weasley says, motioning to the one free chair to Hermione’s left.
“How nice of you, Mum” Fred remarks, his voice dripping with sarcasm and George snorts. Everybody looks at him.
“Ok, and where will Fred sit? Or have you punished him again so he’s to eat from the floor now?” George says, quirking his eyebrows at his Mum.
Mrs. Weasley stops dead in her tracks suddenly, pained and horror-struck expression on her face, as if she’s just had a rather unpleasant meeting with a Bogart. Hermione drops her spoon and Harry chokes on his pumpkin juice. Now that he looks closer he sees there’re only four plates on the table, as are four glasses, spoons and knives. George frowns at his mother and Fred behind him fells silent, looking on the floor with his eyes closed tighly.
“F-Fred?” Mrs. Weasley stutters with the fakest smile George has ever seen. “He’s…” She clears her throat. “Is he- I mean, he wants to eat too?”
It all looks terribly wrong, George feels as he absent-mindedly rubs his left ear. He noticed he had some problems with hearing with this ear; he should go and have it checked at St Mungo’s. His right one is alright, but the left seems to be deaf.
He looks around and sees the identical expressions of pain and sympathy on Harry’s and Hermione’s faces. Mrs. Weasley’s eyes are full of tears now and she bravely tries to blink them back. George doesn’t like it, not one bit of it, and most of all he doesn’t like that he understands nothing in what’s going on and Fred beside him is silent.
“What’s wrong?” he asks no one in particular, watching as all of them get tense at once. The room is silent, and the tension is so tangible it could be cut with a knife. George turns to Fred once again.
“Fred, what’s going on?” he demands, with a back of his ear hearing Mrs. Weasley try to repress a sob at his words. Fred looks him in the eye, his smile sad.
“I think you know what’s going on, Forge”
“No, I don’t”
George frowns, confused and bewildered, feeling lost and anxious for some reason and he looks around the room once again, desperately trying to find an answer anywhere. The tingling sensation in his stomach now turns in a full-fledged headache. He rubs his temples, screwing his eyes shut for a moment.
Percy’s voice in his head…
Did I mention I’m resigning?
He heard that, yes, he definitely heard that somewhere, he just can’t remember when. His head hurts as hell and he clutches it violently, trying to remember, angry with himself for not managing it…
You are joking, Perce… - Fred - I don’t think I’ve heard you joke since you were…
Oh Merlin, his head hurts, and the voices in his head are cutting him apart…
No - Fred - No!
“George?” someone is shaking him. “George, please, look at me!”
He opens his eyes slowly, afraid that pain would be back any moment and shifts his gaze to Hermione who is holding his forearm in death grip. She’s still calling him, but he doesn’t hear her as he one more time looks at Fred near him.
Shaking his head silently and muttering the word ‘damn’, Fred turns on his heels and leaves the room and George can hear him walking upstairs. Without saying a word, he follows him.
When he’s out of the room, he hears his mother sobbing. He looks around to see Harry hug her so she can cry on his shoulder.
“What’s w-wrong w-with him, Her-mio-nee?” she stutters through sobs and Hermione rubs her eyes wearily, her face awfully pale as if she’s just see something terrible. George fails to understand what has just happened in the kitchen so he tries to hear Hermione’s answer.
“I- I told you already, Mrs. Weasley” she says uncertainly, sounding tired and broken. “We think its post-trauma effect. Or schizophrenia. He just-” she exhales shakily “can’t deal with it”
George doesn’t get what the long word means so he just shrugs to himself, thinking about what exactly he can’t deal with, and goes upstairs, back to his room, where Fred must be waiting for him.
Stepping into their room, he doesn’t find Fred there. George’s gaze accidentally shifts to Fred’s bed. It looks cold and unused, the sheets and smooth and untouched which is strange because Fred has just sat there. Fred’s bedside-table is covered with an inch layer of dust and George stares at it, comprehension downing on him, cruelly and mercifully and he feels as if something heavy inside him just fell and broke, making his heart race in his chest.
“I’m dead, remember, Forge?”
He turns around sharply to see Fred standing behind him, but George is sure he was alone in the room second ago.
“Did you- Did you just Apparated?” He asks his twin shakily, furrowing his brow, because, God, he already knows the answer and he doesn’t want to hear it.
“George, I am dead, remember?” Fred says again.
NO! FRED! NO!
“Oh” George breathes out and his mouth goes dry in a moment. “Yeah… yes, I remember. You d-died in a Battle”
Fred nods, looking at him sadly and lovingly. George nervously swallows a lump in his throat and whispers “So it means you’re not here?” and when Fred doesn’t respond he blurts out “Fred! Please, talk to me, Fred!”
“You’re imagining me, bro” Fred says softly with a heavy sigh. “I’m a figment of your imagination. Hallucination. Fantasy. Pick one you like”
George quickly turns around, tears in his eyes, as the realization strikes him and the feeling of loss is so overwhelming, so painful that it swallows him whole, he doesn’t have strength or will to fight it, he’s in so much pain…
What can possibly happen to us, Forge? It’s not the first battle we’re in, is it? After all, such genius people like us don’t die so young and terribly handsome, so you don’t have to worry, bro
He cries then, loudly and with a great effort, falling on his bed, when his legs no longer hold him, and sobs in a pillow, the pain turning him insides out, cutting him to shreds, and the gaping hole in his soul doesn’t seem to have any ends or bottom. He feels a hand on his shoulder, warm and familiar, the hold is firm and he recognizes Fred immediately, only this time he knows it isn’t Fred.
“We had this conversation yesterday, bro, you should remember”
George bites his lip hard, painful, drawing blood there, because he bloody can’t remember anything like that, anything from yesterday at all.
His hand goes up to rub his left ear and his heart stops dead when he finds no ear there.
Snape did it
“I- Fred, I love you” he whispers, choking with tears and sobs.
“I love you, too, bro”
“You are d-dead” he can’t quite say this word.
“So what? Death is nothing to a Weasley twin! It can’t prevent me from being with you, now can it? Together we’re unstoppable!”
George tries to smile but fails poorly, tears still running down his cheeks.
“Look, you hear me, you talk to me, isn’t it enough?” Fred asks him.
“But others can’t -“
“Oh, really, as if we actually need others! You’re here, George and I’m here. We’re together. We need no one else.”
George nods and for suddenly he wants nothing more than to fall asleep. Fred’s hand is still on his shoulder and as he slowly drifts to sleep he thinks Fred’s words through and he can’t help seeing a flaw in them.
“Fred” he mutters sleepily. “If you’re not real, I would need someone else”
“I know”
“But you said -“
“You don’t have to worry about what I said” came Fred’s muffled voice.
“Why?”
“Because you won’t remember anything tomorrow”
When George falls asleep, Fred is no longer in the room.
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