FIC: Meant for Each Other by likecharity
Title: Meant For Each Other
Author: likecharity
Rating: PG-13?
Warnings: Surely I don't have to warn for incest in this community? Haha. Er, I suppose I'll warn for a smidgen of het - it is told from Angelina's POV after all.
Disclaimer: Don't own.
A/N: Oh God, this was so hard to write. :/ It really just...refused to be written at all, for such a long time. There were certain bits that flowed for me, and certain bits that were just so stubborn and I kept hating. I hope you like it anyway.
Summary/Prompt: Angelina realizes that Fred and George are meant to be lovers before either of them does.
Everybody knew the twins were close. It was the kind of thing that was impossible not to know. The kind of thing you noticed only a few minutes after meeting them. But the things I noticed - well, I always thought you'd have to know them a pretty long time, not to mention pretty well, to start wondering the way I did. Of course, the twins had other friends, ones they'd known as long as me, some longer - hell, they had family members who'd known them their whole lives, and who was I to argue with that, even if I could tell them apart by the backs of their heads, the sounds of their voices, the way a collar was turned up or down or the way shoelaces were laced?
But I was sure that nobody else saw them in quite the same way. I guess they got attention from other girls - they were attractive guys, why wouldn't they? - but nobody gave them the same sort of attention I did. I'm not even entirely sure how it started. I suppose it started with a crush. The smallest of all crushes, though, at least in the beginning. It was a crush that was so subtle and quiet that it crept into my mind and took up residence there for weeks without me paying it the slightest bit of attention. And then one day just before Quidditch practice, Katie elbowed me in the ribs and hissed, "Oi, are you staring at Fred Weasley?” and that was when it hit me. I opened my mouth to protest but I had nothing to say. I had been staring. In truth, I suppose I'd been staring at both of the twins, but I couldn't work all of this out so quickly - Fred was the one Katie had mentioned, and when I realised she was right, I drew the only conclusion I thought possible.
It was only a few days later when Alicia asked me the question that, I suppose, started the whole thing off. We were in the common room, sitting on one of the sofas, and out of the blue she had suddenly asked, "If you fancy Fred, d'you fancy George as well?" Katie had laughed and said, "They're twins, Al, but they're different people!" Alicia just shrugged and replied, "Yeah, but they look the same!". I hadn't spoken, because my brain had just answered Alicia's question very suddenly, and it had surprised me so much I couldn't even speak. "I think she does," Katie said, tilting her head to one side and looking at me.
It's important for you to understand that before this, I hadn't had much interest in boys at all. Choosing Quidditch over dates and make-up, I guess I'd always been considered kind of a 'tomboy', but it wasn't something I ever called myself. I found certain boys good-looking, of course, but it never seemed to go much further than that. And maybe this was the reason that the Fred-and-George crush very nearly took over my life. It was nothing I'd ever felt before. I thought about them all the time, found myself watching them whenever they were nearby. I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep - I suppose that part was all very typical. When I think about it now, this period must have only been a few weeks long, though at the time it felt like years.
It must have been because of the amount of time I spent watching them that I noticed the things I did, otherwise the whole school would have picked up on it - though whether they'd take it the way I did, I couldn't say. I simply saw it as brotherly affection at first, and even when that was all it was to me, I still found it a little bit intriguing. And then I realised just how much they actually touched each other. It was a simple observation, but I started to become obsessed with it, grabbing hold of it and taking it with me wherever I went, desperate to see a hand grab a shoulder, an arm slip ‘round a waist. On two occasions I saw them hug, in celebration, and I couldn't help staring at the way their bodies fit together like two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Once I was almost certain they were holding hands, but the way their robes fluttered in the breeze and their sleeves seemed to merge together, I couldn't be sure.
I began to watch other pairs of male best friends, intently, trying to see if they acted the same way, and found they didn't. I mentioned this observation to Katie and Alicia, pretending I was comparing it to how often female best friends had physical contact. Alicia had laughed, and Katie shook her head and said "Ange, it's because they don't want to look gay."
She was right, of course. And I think deep down I knew that was the reason even before I'd asked, but I needed some sort of confirmation. Once I had it, though, I had to start thinking about what exactly it meant. Male friends A and B, and male friends C and D, are worried about touching each other in case others think they are gay. Male friends E and F touch each other openly and do not appear to worry about it. What does this mean? Of course the answer I kept coming up with was 'Because male friends E and F are brothers', but for some reason it just didn't seem to be enough.
I guess there was some sort of a mental block there, because for the next week or so I got no further. My thoughts seemed to be trying to reassure me - of course Fred and George don't have to worry that people will think they're gay, because they're brothers - quite obviously so - and nobody would think that they were a couple.
* * *
But then one evening in the Gryffindor common room, I was struck by a very strange thought, one that confused me even more than everything that had been happening in my head so far. I stopped seeing Fred and George as brothers just for that evening, and instead saw them as a couple. It just sort of happened, in my mind, but then it wouldn't go away. I realised that they would be an incredibly perfect couple, and once I'd realised that, it was too late to go back. Of course there was a tiny part of my brain that protested - but, you do remember they're brothers? - but I firmly ignored it, at least for the time being.
I had to mention this to somebody, so that night I tried my best to sound as casual as possible, and brought the subject up with Alicia. I guess I said something like, "Aren't Fred and George really good together?" and because she knew I fancied the twins, she immediately started teasing me. Once I got her to shut up - thanks to a few well-aimed cushions - I attempted to explain myself better. "Don't you think they're almost like a couple? No, shut up, let me explain! I mean, they're always finishing each other's sentences, and you almost never see them apart, and they're just so close."
"Angelina, they're close because they're twins, not because they're - " she sniggered, "Boyfriends. I mean, that's incest."
"I know," I said right away, even though her referring to it as 'incest' had inexplicably caused a wave of anger to surge through me. I sighed, looking down at my hands, fidgeting in front of me on the bed. "Obviously. But, just try and imagine. I mean imagine they weren't twins, weren't even brothers, but they still acted that way?"
The second I said it I knew it was all wrong. It wasn't how it was in my head, anyway, I'd had to change all of this around to get it to the point where Alicia would be able to understand. But by voicing some of it, I'd managed to work out which bits were right and which bits were wrong. When I said 'imagine they weren't twins', it took something away from what I was saying somehow. It was the fact that they were twins that made them such a perfect couple, but my brain couldn't get any further just yet - it just kept making me feel guilty for thinking such a thing, guilty and confused, wondering how the fact that two people were related could possibly make a relationship better, however hypothetical the situation was.
Alicia had just frowned. "I guess I sort of see what you mean," she'd said, "They do act like a couple sometimes. But not properly. I mean it's not like they're going around kissing in public - good thing, too - but I can see your point, with the finishing of the sentences and the touching and everything. And I think if two people who weren’t related acted that way, they would probably make a good couple. But I think with Fred and George - well, I think that's just the way twins are."
I guess I just nodded and went to bed. I still had so many of my thoughts to work out. I knew that technically, such a relationship would be incest, but I couldn't see it in the same way. Incest was a word used to describe a creepy father raping his helpless daughter, not...not this. Fred and George seemed perfect together, so perfect that I couldn't even imagine them apart.
I used to think of myself with each of them separately, right at the start, because it never occurred to me to think of it any other way. But each time I did this - a daydream in a boring class, or letting my hands wander and my mind run wild late at night - something seemed to be missing. I began thinking of them together - me sandwiched between the two of them, identical bodies on either side of my own - and it excited me so much I thought I must be sick. But after this recent revelation, I began to feel like an intruder in my own fantasies. Sometimes in my mind the twins would be pushing me away. I had dreams where I would lean in to kiss Fred, and he would turn away in favour of his brother's lips instead.
I was beginning to think I was going insane, but the more I watched them, the more convinced I became. I couldn't find any solid proof, of course, but I felt almost certain that the twins were lovers.
* * *
The next day, I decided that if I saw one more clue - a significant touch, something they said to each other, anything - that it was true. If nothing happened all day, it wasn't true, and I was crazy. I felt nervous about my plan, but I was just so sure that I wasn't imagining things that by lunch that day, I was feeling confident that one of the twins would slip up and do something to convince me.
And that was when Fred Weasley asked me to go to the Yule Ball with him.
* * *
Of course, I didn't keep my promise. Fred inviting me to the Ball with him just made things even more intriguing. Did this mean I was insane? Did it mean I'd imagined everything? Possibly. Did it mean Fred and George were going through some sort of rough patch, maybe George had done something to hurt Fred and as revenge he was asking me out? Did people - their family, maybe! - find out about their relationship, and now they had to try to cover it all up by going out with girls? My mind was a complete mess of questions, and I'd barely even thought about the actual Ball. Everywhere, girls were fussing with hair potions, charming the heels on their shoes not to break off, practicing their dancing - and there I was, not even thinking of being with my date, but thinking of my date being with his brother.
The Ball surprised me, though. I had been worrying the night before, worrying that perhaps all of this was just in my mind, and I was risking what could be a good relationship with Fred just because I was obsessing about some incestuous fantasy. But the Ball went just as I had expected - or rather, just as I had hoped. At the beginning of the evening, Fred was cheerful and jokey - his usual self - and though I watched, I didn't catch him looking over at George (who was sitting on his own gazing into space when he wasn't half-heartedly dancing with various girls who had, like him, come alone) until well into the night.
As time went on, though, he just started to seem a little...off. When I asked him if he was okay, he only linked his arm back round my waist, beaming, and said, "Why wouldn't I be? I'm with you!". But there was a sadness in his eyes, something I kept trying to catch but it just kept on slipping away, and I couldn't get to the bottom of it. I realised then that Fred and George were not lovers. But there was definitely something wrong with the way things were. I don't think Fred had any idea that I could tell something was wrong, but I could, and I desperately wanted to do something about it, I just couldn't put my finger on what exactly it was, and there was nowhere to go from there.
When we tired of dancing and socialising, I asked him if he'd like to go sit on the steps outside. My heart fluttered in my chest when I saw that his eyes immediately flickered over to where George had been sitting, but when he saw his brother was no longer there (I had seen him leave, he had gone up to bed a few minutes before), he nodded and led me outside.
Sitting in the cold air on the stone steps, everything seemed much more real. Things were clearer, sharper somehow, than in the bustling, busy hall with its lights and decorations.
"Are you okay?" I asked Fred for the sixteenth time that night.
He sighed. He grinned, then the grin faded and he sighed again. I touched his arm, wanting to squeeze his answer - the truth - out of him.
"It's just weird, I guess," he mumbled, so quietly I had to lean in to hear him.
"What's weird?" I asked softly.
He sat up straight suddenly, and laughed, but it was a hollow laugh and it wasn't fooling me for a second. I knew he was laughing to cover something up, even if it was just his embarrassment at being honest with me.
"Nothing," he said. "Nothing's that weird. It's not a big deal. I guess it's just a little odd not being with George. I mean, we've done everything together practically our whole lives. I kept asking him if he was going to ask anyone to the Ball, but he never did, and it was funny, 'cos I thought we'd go out like, the four of us - you, me, him, his date - and have a good time. But it's just me with the date. Which is weird."
I frowned. I felt his pain, and that was when I learnt what it was. Fred and George were not lovers, but they needed to be. They just hadn't realised it yet. I could see that the confusion was killing him, I could see the way he was trying to work out this new feeling, figure out what it meant. I could see that it was hurting him to block out the idea from his mind. I knew all of this from watching him - and George - for so long, going through a similar thought-journey myself.
"Don't get me wrong," he said suddenly. "The date isn't weird. The date's been wonderful, actually, you know, in fact-"
He paused, then grinned and lowered his voice. I was hoping desperately that he would say what I wanted him to say, but it wasn't for the reasons he would have assumed if he knew.
"In fact," he said again, touching my arm. "I would be honoured if you would accompany me upstairs. Would you like to do that?"
I laughed. "Are you asking me to go up to your room with you, Fred Weasley?" I asked, feigning shock.
"I am if your answer's yes!"
I tried to hold back a smile, but it crept across my mouth anyway, and I sighed. "Yes,"
"Yes?" he asked.
"Yes," I repeated. "Quickly. Before I change my mind."
* * *
Sometimes I look back on that night and wonder if I made a huge mistake, but these thoughts only come back after a bad break-up, or when I've been stood up on a date, and I regret because it makes me feel worse, which in turn makes me feel better. But the truth is, what I did that night was the best thing I ever did in my life.
Fred crept into the room with me behind him, and peered around. I saw his face fall when he saw the one bed with the curtains pulled shut around it, but then he turned back to me and said, "Ah, that's George's bed, but he's asleep and no one else is up here, it'll be fine,"
"Are you sure?" I asked, searching his face.
"It's fine," he repeated. I stared at George's bed, feeling suddenly uncomfortable. This had been what I was hoping for, wishing for, but it suddenly felt all too real again, and I wasn't sure if I could go through with it.
Fred took my hand and led me to his bed, where we sat cross-legged and facing each other, awkward, for a few seconds. In all my fantasies, I had never imagined things would be awkward. Especially because I was with one of the twins. But now I knew why, and instead of feeling upset or angry, I felt sorry, sorry for Fred and for George, who, I was sure, was not asleep.
I smiled at Fred, and did the only thing I could do - I kissed him. It felt horribly wrong, for so many reasons. I wanted to be kissing him, but only if he had no twin, no twin in the bed next to his, wide awake. I didn't want to be kissing him when I knew that deep down he wanted to be kissing somebody else, even if he hadn't realised it yet. I didn't want to be kissing him when someone else wanted it much more than me.
He was the one who broke off the kiss, though, which surprised me.
"Are you okay?" I asked. Seventeen.
"I'm sorry," he whispered, and grinned again, that cover-up grin he was using again so he didn't appear too vulnerable. He didn't know I knew him so well I could see through it all. "It's just a little weird, with my brother in the next bed.”
I nodded. I shut my eyes. I took a deep breath and opened them again. I unbuckled my shoes and placed them next to me on the bed, ignoring Fred's puzzled expression. I slid slowly and quietly off the bed, and padded across the floor towards George. I turned back once and saw that Fred had slid along after me, and was sitting on the side of his bed, now, his legs over the edge. He was watching me, and his expression showed something I had never seen in him so clearly before - fear.
I pulled open the curtain and found George sitting up, shirtless and confused in bed, his eyes wide, which was exactly what I had expected. He hadn't expected any of this, clearly, and he jumped a little, then grinned sheepishly. I climbed onto the bed and shuffled along so that I was next to him. Both twins looked at me, but neither asked what I was doing.
"George," I said softly, and I took his face in my hands, and pressed my lips against his. It felt even more wrong than kissing Fred, because Fred was sitting right there near us, watching us. But I knew I was helping him, helping both of them. I hoped that as Fred watched me kissing his brother he felt something, felt something that he recognised as jealousy, and I wondered if he would know which of us he was jealous of. With my eyes closed, I reached out and gestured to Fred to come and sit with us. I heard him slip off his bed and climb onto his brother's.
I kept gesturing, kept kissing George, and for a worryingly long time nothing happened. But then I felt his lips join ours. My heart seemed to want to rise and sink at the same time. I felt George freeze. I felt his heart pounding. I felt his hesitation, his desire to move away. But I also felt his desire to keep kissing, to keep moving his lips, and just as I had hoped, he followed that desire.
A kiss with three people involved is messy and complicated, especially when two of the people are pretending to each other they really don't want to be involved at all. But I slowly, so slowly detached myself, my lips slowing, stopping, then leaving, my hands running along their backs until I was touching air. I sat back for a long moment, watching the two of them, and I was embarrassed to find I had tears in my eyes. They had not slowed down, not moved away from each other, as I left. Fred brought a shaky hand up to his brother's freckled chest, and George kissed him desperately, frantically, as though his life depended on it, Fred pushing right back towards him with the exact same intensity.
They were kissing as though it was what they had been searching for, for as long as they could remember. I had been right. I got off the bed, paused long enough to see that they had not even stopped to look at me when I moved, drew the curtains, crossed the room, grabbed my shoes, and left, shutting the door behind me. I knew I had shut that door forever, but in that moment I felt fine about it. I knew I had done them the biggest favour in the world, and I knew that this was how things were meant to be, and if I had stayed there, had done something with Fred, I would have been putting a barrier between the two of them that they might never break down, I would have been shutting off their suspicions and their wonderings forever.
A part of me wished, of course, that I had stayed between the two of them, but I knew that I would have only been in the way - an intruder, the way I was in my fantasies. I knew that they only wanted each other, and I couldn't have brought myself to interrupt that. They thanked me, the next day, in their blushing, goofy, grinning way, and they asked me not to tell a soul. I laughed at them, and said that it wasn't a problem, that they never would have gotten anywhere without me anyway, and I'd just had to do something. Fred took me aside afterwards and apologized nearly as many times as I'd asked him if he was okay the night before, and he began to explain the way he'd been feeling, the way he'd always known there was something missing in his friendship with his brother, the way it felt when he finally realised what it was...
I cut him off because he didn't need to tell me. I knew about it all already, and I'd known from the beginning. Fred and George were meant for each other, and that was just the way things were supposed to be.
Author: likecharity
Rating: PG-13?
Warnings: Surely I don't have to warn for incest in this community? Haha. Er, I suppose I'll warn for a smidgen of het - it is told from Angelina's POV after all.
Disclaimer: Don't own.
A/N: Oh God, this was so hard to write. :/ It really just...refused to be written at all, for such a long time. There were certain bits that flowed for me, and certain bits that were just so stubborn and I kept hating. I hope you like it anyway.
Summary/Prompt: Angelina realizes that Fred and George are meant to be lovers before either of them does.
Everybody knew the twins were close. It was the kind of thing that was impossible not to know. The kind of thing you noticed only a few minutes after meeting them. But the things I noticed - well, I always thought you'd have to know them a pretty long time, not to mention pretty well, to start wondering the way I did. Of course, the twins had other friends, ones they'd known as long as me, some longer - hell, they had family members who'd known them their whole lives, and who was I to argue with that, even if I could tell them apart by the backs of their heads, the sounds of their voices, the way a collar was turned up or down or the way shoelaces were laced?
But I was sure that nobody else saw them in quite the same way. I guess they got attention from other girls - they were attractive guys, why wouldn't they? - but nobody gave them the same sort of attention I did. I'm not even entirely sure how it started. I suppose it started with a crush. The smallest of all crushes, though, at least in the beginning. It was a crush that was so subtle and quiet that it crept into my mind and took up residence there for weeks without me paying it the slightest bit of attention. And then one day just before Quidditch practice, Katie elbowed me in the ribs and hissed, "Oi, are you staring at Fred Weasley?” and that was when it hit me. I opened my mouth to protest but I had nothing to say. I had been staring. In truth, I suppose I'd been staring at both of the twins, but I couldn't work all of this out so quickly - Fred was the one Katie had mentioned, and when I realised she was right, I drew the only conclusion I thought possible.
It was only a few days later when Alicia asked me the question that, I suppose, started the whole thing off. We were in the common room, sitting on one of the sofas, and out of the blue she had suddenly asked, "If you fancy Fred, d'you fancy George as well?" Katie had laughed and said, "They're twins, Al, but they're different people!" Alicia just shrugged and replied, "Yeah, but they look the same!". I hadn't spoken, because my brain had just answered Alicia's question very suddenly, and it had surprised me so much I couldn't even speak. "I think she does," Katie said, tilting her head to one side and looking at me.
It's important for you to understand that before this, I hadn't had much interest in boys at all. Choosing Quidditch over dates and make-up, I guess I'd always been considered kind of a 'tomboy', but it wasn't something I ever called myself. I found certain boys good-looking, of course, but it never seemed to go much further than that. And maybe this was the reason that the Fred-and-George crush very nearly took over my life. It was nothing I'd ever felt before. I thought about them all the time, found myself watching them whenever they were nearby. I couldn't eat, I couldn't sleep - I suppose that part was all very typical. When I think about it now, this period must have only been a few weeks long, though at the time it felt like years.
It must have been because of the amount of time I spent watching them that I noticed the things I did, otherwise the whole school would have picked up on it - though whether they'd take it the way I did, I couldn't say. I simply saw it as brotherly affection at first, and even when that was all it was to me, I still found it a little bit intriguing. And then I realised just how much they actually touched each other. It was a simple observation, but I started to become obsessed with it, grabbing hold of it and taking it with me wherever I went, desperate to see a hand grab a shoulder, an arm slip ‘round a waist. On two occasions I saw them hug, in celebration, and I couldn't help staring at the way their bodies fit together like two pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Once I was almost certain they were holding hands, but the way their robes fluttered in the breeze and their sleeves seemed to merge together, I couldn't be sure.
I began to watch other pairs of male best friends, intently, trying to see if they acted the same way, and found they didn't. I mentioned this observation to Katie and Alicia, pretending I was comparing it to how often female best friends had physical contact. Alicia had laughed, and Katie shook her head and said "Ange, it's because they don't want to look gay."
She was right, of course. And I think deep down I knew that was the reason even before I'd asked, but I needed some sort of confirmation. Once I had it, though, I had to start thinking about what exactly it meant. Male friends A and B, and male friends C and D, are worried about touching each other in case others think they are gay. Male friends E and F touch each other openly and do not appear to worry about it. What does this mean? Of course the answer I kept coming up with was 'Because male friends E and F are brothers', but for some reason it just didn't seem to be enough.
I guess there was some sort of a mental block there, because for the next week or so I got no further. My thoughts seemed to be trying to reassure me - of course Fred and George don't have to worry that people will think they're gay, because they're brothers - quite obviously so - and nobody would think that they were a couple.
* * *
But then one evening in the Gryffindor common room, I was struck by a very strange thought, one that confused me even more than everything that had been happening in my head so far. I stopped seeing Fred and George as brothers just for that evening, and instead saw them as a couple. It just sort of happened, in my mind, but then it wouldn't go away. I realised that they would be an incredibly perfect couple, and once I'd realised that, it was too late to go back. Of course there was a tiny part of my brain that protested - but, you do remember they're brothers? - but I firmly ignored it, at least for the time being.
I had to mention this to somebody, so that night I tried my best to sound as casual as possible, and brought the subject up with Alicia. I guess I said something like, "Aren't Fred and George really good together?" and because she knew I fancied the twins, she immediately started teasing me. Once I got her to shut up - thanks to a few well-aimed cushions - I attempted to explain myself better. "Don't you think they're almost like a couple? No, shut up, let me explain! I mean, they're always finishing each other's sentences, and you almost never see them apart, and they're just so close."
"Angelina, they're close because they're twins, not because they're - " she sniggered, "Boyfriends. I mean, that's incest."
"I know," I said right away, even though her referring to it as 'incest' had inexplicably caused a wave of anger to surge through me. I sighed, looking down at my hands, fidgeting in front of me on the bed. "Obviously. But, just try and imagine. I mean imagine they weren't twins, weren't even brothers, but they still acted that way?"
The second I said it I knew it was all wrong. It wasn't how it was in my head, anyway, I'd had to change all of this around to get it to the point where Alicia would be able to understand. But by voicing some of it, I'd managed to work out which bits were right and which bits were wrong. When I said 'imagine they weren't twins', it took something away from what I was saying somehow. It was the fact that they were twins that made them such a perfect couple, but my brain couldn't get any further just yet - it just kept making me feel guilty for thinking such a thing, guilty and confused, wondering how the fact that two people were related could possibly make a relationship better, however hypothetical the situation was.
Alicia had just frowned. "I guess I sort of see what you mean," she'd said, "They do act like a couple sometimes. But not properly. I mean it's not like they're going around kissing in public - good thing, too - but I can see your point, with the finishing of the sentences and the touching and everything. And I think if two people who weren’t related acted that way, they would probably make a good couple. But I think with Fred and George - well, I think that's just the way twins are."
I guess I just nodded and went to bed. I still had so many of my thoughts to work out. I knew that technically, such a relationship would be incest, but I couldn't see it in the same way. Incest was a word used to describe a creepy father raping his helpless daughter, not...not this. Fred and George seemed perfect together, so perfect that I couldn't even imagine them apart.
I used to think of myself with each of them separately, right at the start, because it never occurred to me to think of it any other way. But each time I did this - a daydream in a boring class, or letting my hands wander and my mind run wild late at night - something seemed to be missing. I began thinking of them together - me sandwiched between the two of them, identical bodies on either side of my own - and it excited me so much I thought I must be sick. But after this recent revelation, I began to feel like an intruder in my own fantasies. Sometimes in my mind the twins would be pushing me away. I had dreams where I would lean in to kiss Fred, and he would turn away in favour of his brother's lips instead.
I was beginning to think I was going insane, but the more I watched them, the more convinced I became. I couldn't find any solid proof, of course, but I felt almost certain that the twins were lovers.
* * *
The next day, I decided that if I saw one more clue - a significant touch, something they said to each other, anything - that it was true. If nothing happened all day, it wasn't true, and I was crazy. I felt nervous about my plan, but I was just so sure that I wasn't imagining things that by lunch that day, I was feeling confident that one of the twins would slip up and do something to convince me.
And that was when Fred Weasley asked me to go to the Yule Ball with him.
* * *
Of course, I didn't keep my promise. Fred inviting me to the Ball with him just made things even more intriguing. Did this mean I was insane? Did it mean I'd imagined everything? Possibly. Did it mean Fred and George were going through some sort of rough patch, maybe George had done something to hurt Fred and as revenge he was asking me out? Did people - their family, maybe! - find out about their relationship, and now they had to try to cover it all up by going out with girls? My mind was a complete mess of questions, and I'd barely even thought about the actual Ball. Everywhere, girls were fussing with hair potions, charming the heels on their shoes not to break off, practicing their dancing - and there I was, not even thinking of being with my date, but thinking of my date being with his brother.
The Ball surprised me, though. I had been worrying the night before, worrying that perhaps all of this was just in my mind, and I was risking what could be a good relationship with Fred just because I was obsessing about some incestuous fantasy. But the Ball went just as I had expected - or rather, just as I had hoped. At the beginning of the evening, Fred was cheerful and jokey - his usual self - and though I watched, I didn't catch him looking over at George (who was sitting on his own gazing into space when he wasn't half-heartedly dancing with various girls who had, like him, come alone) until well into the night.
As time went on, though, he just started to seem a little...off. When I asked him if he was okay, he only linked his arm back round my waist, beaming, and said, "Why wouldn't I be? I'm with you!". But there was a sadness in his eyes, something I kept trying to catch but it just kept on slipping away, and I couldn't get to the bottom of it. I realised then that Fred and George were not lovers. But there was definitely something wrong with the way things were. I don't think Fred had any idea that I could tell something was wrong, but I could, and I desperately wanted to do something about it, I just couldn't put my finger on what exactly it was, and there was nowhere to go from there.
When we tired of dancing and socialising, I asked him if he'd like to go sit on the steps outside. My heart fluttered in my chest when I saw that his eyes immediately flickered over to where George had been sitting, but when he saw his brother was no longer there (I had seen him leave, he had gone up to bed a few minutes before), he nodded and led me outside.
Sitting in the cold air on the stone steps, everything seemed much more real. Things were clearer, sharper somehow, than in the bustling, busy hall with its lights and decorations.
"Are you okay?" I asked Fred for the sixteenth time that night.
He sighed. He grinned, then the grin faded and he sighed again. I touched his arm, wanting to squeeze his answer - the truth - out of him.
"It's just weird, I guess," he mumbled, so quietly I had to lean in to hear him.
"What's weird?" I asked softly.
He sat up straight suddenly, and laughed, but it was a hollow laugh and it wasn't fooling me for a second. I knew he was laughing to cover something up, even if it was just his embarrassment at being honest with me.
"Nothing," he said. "Nothing's that weird. It's not a big deal. I guess it's just a little odd not being with George. I mean, we've done everything together practically our whole lives. I kept asking him if he was going to ask anyone to the Ball, but he never did, and it was funny, 'cos I thought we'd go out like, the four of us - you, me, him, his date - and have a good time. But it's just me with the date. Which is weird."
I frowned. I felt his pain, and that was when I learnt what it was. Fred and George were not lovers, but they needed to be. They just hadn't realised it yet. I could see that the confusion was killing him, I could see the way he was trying to work out this new feeling, figure out what it meant. I could see that it was hurting him to block out the idea from his mind. I knew all of this from watching him - and George - for so long, going through a similar thought-journey myself.
"Don't get me wrong," he said suddenly. "The date isn't weird. The date's been wonderful, actually, you know, in fact-"
He paused, then grinned and lowered his voice. I was hoping desperately that he would say what I wanted him to say, but it wasn't for the reasons he would have assumed if he knew.
"In fact," he said again, touching my arm. "I would be honoured if you would accompany me upstairs. Would you like to do that?"
I laughed. "Are you asking me to go up to your room with you, Fred Weasley?" I asked, feigning shock.
"I am if your answer's yes!"
I tried to hold back a smile, but it crept across my mouth anyway, and I sighed. "Yes,"
"Yes?" he asked.
"Yes," I repeated. "Quickly. Before I change my mind."
* * *
Sometimes I look back on that night and wonder if I made a huge mistake, but these thoughts only come back after a bad break-up, or when I've been stood up on a date, and I regret because it makes me feel worse, which in turn makes me feel better. But the truth is, what I did that night was the best thing I ever did in my life.
Fred crept into the room with me behind him, and peered around. I saw his face fall when he saw the one bed with the curtains pulled shut around it, but then he turned back to me and said, "Ah, that's George's bed, but he's asleep and no one else is up here, it'll be fine,"
"Are you sure?" I asked, searching his face.
"It's fine," he repeated. I stared at George's bed, feeling suddenly uncomfortable. This had been what I was hoping for, wishing for, but it suddenly felt all too real again, and I wasn't sure if I could go through with it.
Fred took my hand and led me to his bed, where we sat cross-legged and facing each other, awkward, for a few seconds. In all my fantasies, I had never imagined things would be awkward. Especially because I was with one of the twins. But now I knew why, and instead of feeling upset or angry, I felt sorry, sorry for Fred and for George, who, I was sure, was not asleep.
I smiled at Fred, and did the only thing I could do - I kissed him. It felt horribly wrong, for so many reasons. I wanted to be kissing him, but only if he had no twin, no twin in the bed next to his, wide awake. I didn't want to be kissing him when I knew that deep down he wanted to be kissing somebody else, even if he hadn't realised it yet. I didn't want to be kissing him when someone else wanted it much more than me.
He was the one who broke off the kiss, though, which surprised me.
"Are you okay?" I asked. Seventeen.
"I'm sorry," he whispered, and grinned again, that cover-up grin he was using again so he didn't appear too vulnerable. He didn't know I knew him so well I could see through it all. "It's just a little weird, with my brother in the next bed.”
I nodded. I shut my eyes. I took a deep breath and opened them again. I unbuckled my shoes and placed them next to me on the bed, ignoring Fred's puzzled expression. I slid slowly and quietly off the bed, and padded across the floor towards George. I turned back once and saw that Fred had slid along after me, and was sitting on the side of his bed, now, his legs over the edge. He was watching me, and his expression showed something I had never seen in him so clearly before - fear.
I pulled open the curtain and found George sitting up, shirtless and confused in bed, his eyes wide, which was exactly what I had expected. He hadn't expected any of this, clearly, and he jumped a little, then grinned sheepishly. I climbed onto the bed and shuffled along so that I was next to him. Both twins looked at me, but neither asked what I was doing.
"George," I said softly, and I took his face in my hands, and pressed my lips against his. It felt even more wrong than kissing Fred, because Fred was sitting right there near us, watching us. But I knew I was helping him, helping both of them. I hoped that as Fred watched me kissing his brother he felt something, felt something that he recognised as jealousy, and I wondered if he would know which of us he was jealous of. With my eyes closed, I reached out and gestured to Fred to come and sit with us. I heard him slip off his bed and climb onto his brother's.
I kept gesturing, kept kissing George, and for a worryingly long time nothing happened. But then I felt his lips join ours. My heart seemed to want to rise and sink at the same time. I felt George freeze. I felt his heart pounding. I felt his hesitation, his desire to move away. But I also felt his desire to keep kissing, to keep moving his lips, and just as I had hoped, he followed that desire.
A kiss with three people involved is messy and complicated, especially when two of the people are pretending to each other they really don't want to be involved at all. But I slowly, so slowly detached myself, my lips slowing, stopping, then leaving, my hands running along their backs until I was touching air. I sat back for a long moment, watching the two of them, and I was embarrassed to find I had tears in my eyes. They had not slowed down, not moved away from each other, as I left. Fred brought a shaky hand up to his brother's freckled chest, and George kissed him desperately, frantically, as though his life depended on it, Fred pushing right back towards him with the exact same intensity.
They were kissing as though it was what they had been searching for, for as long as they could remember. I had been right. I got off the bed, paused long enough to see that they had not even stopped to look at me when I moved, drew the curtains, crossed the room, grabbed my shoes, and left, shutting the door behind me. I knew I had shut that door forever, but in that moment I felt fine about it. I knew I had done them the biggest favour in the world, and I knew that this was how things were meant to be, and if I had stayed there, had done something with Fred, I would have been putting a barrier between the two of them that they might never break down, I would have been shutting off their suspicions and their wonderings forever.
A part of me wished, of course, that I had stayed between the two of them, but I knew that I would have only been in the way - an intruder, the way I was in my fantasies. I knew that they only wanted each other, and I couldn't have brought myself to interrupt that. They thanked me, the next day, in their blushing, goofy, grinning way, and they asked me not to tell a soul. I laughed at them, and said that it wasn't a problem, that they never would have gotten anywhere without me anyway, and I'd just had to do something. Fred took me aside afterwards and apologized nearly as many times as I'd asked him if he was okay the night before, and he began to explain the way he'd been feeling, the way he'd always known there was something missing in his friendship with his brother, the way it felt when he finally realised what it was...
I cut him off because he didn't need to tell me. I knew about it all already, and I'd known from the beginning. Fred and George were meant for each other, and that was just the way things were supposed to be.