request from anon: Your writing is truly amazing!! I just read your fake dating with Georgie and I loved it!! I was wondering you would be up to writing a fake dating piece with Freddie?!☺️
word count: 6.9k sorry i keep getting carried away
A/N: ugh. my heart. i cannot deal. thank you all for being so kind, day after day, with each and every piece i write. and thank you, also, for being so patient. i know it’s taking me a while to sift through these requests. it means the world to me! love you all tons
tag list: @mintlibri @seppys-return-to-madness @how-do-life-does @fopdoodledane @fredd-weasley @iprobablyshipit91 @semmelsemi @cottageoflove @laneygthememequeen @snakesonaplane-7 @lupinsx @keoghans @helloallthethingsilove @bobduncanlover | message me if you’d like to be added lovelies!
“Hey, Y/N! Would you mind, for the sake of the entire team, to not be so bloody brilliant during every single match? You’re making us look bad.”
You smile, clutching the quaffle to your chest as you zoom rapidly through the air, leaving dust in your wake as you fly past the Slytherin team members, leaving them baffled and confused before they can fully register just exactly what’s going on. You hoist the quaffle through the hoop and hear a loud roar from the Gryffindor section; you must be up by a hundred points by now. You see Malfoy near the goal posts on the opposite side, looking positively murderous.
You make your way around the interior of the pitch, only to reply to Fred Weasley as you pass by, “I can try, but—don’t you want to win?”
A hearty laugh escapes his lips, and he’s pummeling bludgers left and right with his twin by his side. He wonders now, watching you, if Gryffindor would be as good as they are without you on the team. You’re probably one of the most talented Chasers Gryffindor has seen in years, he reckons. He knew it the first time he saw you mount a broom in a flying lesson your first year at Hogwarts. Since then, inseparable you two had been.
There’s a light, airy feel to the match, which is, to Fred’s surprise, nothing at all what he had expected this morning, especially with Slytherin being the opponent. But you seem to be more in rhythm with the wavelengths of this match than ever before, to the point where Harry is actually taking his time to try and find the snitch—he’s making Malfoy sweat it out a bit.
But when a nasty bludger smacks the end of your broom and you’re knocked to the ground, landing painfully on your arm, Madam Hooch begins shouting out punishments at the Slytherin beaters, McGonagall is rushing to your side with Madam Pomfrey, and Fred, George, and Harry are nearly kicking Malfoy into the ground when his sickeningly irritating mock laughter floats in the air between them.
“Merlin—is a side effect of drinking too much Skele-Gro that you end up a bottomless pit?” you ask nobody in particular as you continue to shovel eggs, toast, bacon and sausage into your mouth. Next to you, George laughs and pats you on the shoulder.
“Glad to see you’re feeling better,” he tells you.
You peer over and smile—your bones in your arm are fully restored, but still in a sling; Madam Pomfrey had insisted. Across the table, Fred is looking rather sullen indeed.
“Brighten up, would you, Weasley?” you kick him playfully under the table and his stoic face breaks into a toothy smile. He’s feeling rather guilty, he is. Wasn’t able to stop the bludger in time. Neither was George. As if you’re reading his thoughts, you tell him, “It’s not your fault, you know.”
“Yeah,” he replies, stirring his spoon in his cup of tea. A bit too loudly, he continues, “Slimy Slytherin beaters—”
“Easy,” you say in a low voice, as the entirety of the Slytherin Quidditch team glances over at your table, and Fred’s gripping his fork tightly in his other hand. “Don’t need any more of us taken out of the next match, do we?”
Another safety measure of Madam Pomfrey’s. No Quidditch for a few weeks, at least. This means, of course, missing the next match: Gryffindor versus Hufflepuff. You’d tried to fight it, but when her mouth had formed into a thin line and she’d crossed her arms indignantly, you knew there was no changing her mind.
Why is it, Fred thinks to himself now, that Slytherins tend to get away with everything? The punishment of the two beaters was absolutely nothing like he’d expected—one detention each with Snape, who had basically grinned at the sight of your broken arm and shoulder. He’s so bloody tired of it, he wants to give them a taste of their own medicine. Perhaps, if he picks George’s brain, he can think of something—
His thoughts are interrupted when you kick him again under the table. “Hello—earth to Freddie?”
“Sorry,” he replies, biting into his toast, “what did you say?”
“I was saying—” you begin, and Fred notices his twin is now down a few seats talking with Ron and Ginny, leaving you two alone, “would you mind helping me pack up my bag after breakfast? It’s proving rather difficult with one arm since I have this sling across my other shoulder—”
Before you can finish, you both hear a group of Hufflepuffs from the table over discussing something animatedly. Fred catches bits and pieces of the conversation—he swears he hears ‘bludgers’ and ‘poor girl’ quite a few times. Before he knows it, they’re standing up and waltzing over to the Gryffindor table—more specifically, toward you.
“Oh bloody hell,” you mumble under your breath and look at Fred with wide eyes. You don’t need to say anything else for him to understand. Leading the pack of distraught looking Hufflepuffs is—Fred’s least favorite person in the entire world, and that’s including Malfoy—your ex boyfriend.
“Hey, Y/N,” he says awkwardly as he approaches the table at once before you and Fred are able to escape. He looks down at your shoulder and says in a tone Fred can’t decipher as sarcastic or genuine, “real sorry about your arm. Terrible thing those beaters did. Are you okay?”
With a slight eye roll from you and a laugh he tries very hard to suppress, Fred finds himself lost in his thoughts again. He’s transported almost immediately to the common room, to a very late Monday night after a very long detention with Professor McGonagall.
When he sprang through the portrait hole that evening, ready to divulge to you just exactly how he’d landed himself in detention the night you were both supposed to continue your weekly Monday traditions of exploding snap over small glasses of Butterbeer, he was a bit taken aback when he saw you crying in the corner, peering out of a window at the starry night sky. Immediately, his insides turned.
“Y/N?’ he asked when he finally reached you, nervous of how you were going to react to his very late arrival.
You sniffled a bit and wiped your tears away with your shirtsleeve. He felt surprised when you said softly, with no twinge of anger, “W-where’ve you been?”
“I’m so sorry,” he said, sitting across from you on the window ledge. He let his bag fall to his feet with a dull thump. “McGonagall caught Georgie and me right after class—I was dragged to immediate detention without being able to come back to the common room to tell you—I could use a good butterbeer right now..” but his voice trailed off when he noticed that you weren’t really listening. Your eyes were letting tears escape with no effort, and he spotted your hands trembling against your knees. You weren’t upset about the game of exploding snap. His heart sank into his chest when he realized this was something deeper. “Hey,” he said, placing a hand over yours, “are you okay?”
“H-he,” you started, and Fred could tell that you were embarrassed. You couldn’t even look him in the eye. “It’s over. He broke up with me.”
“W..what?” Fred asked, his hands suddenly felt extremely cold. He squeezed your knee and waited.
“He said he.. sees me as a friend,” you told him, and Fred shook his head in utter shock, “he doesn’t.. feel anything a-anymore. I think..” you continued, your voice slightly higher than before, “I think there’s s-someone else.”
You threw your head into your hands and began wailing. Fred had never, ever, ever seen you cry before, but he didn’t like it. He wanted to do everything in his power to make it stop, make you smile, make you happy.
“What a complete git,” he told you before pulling you into his arms. You were nearly on his lap. You rested your head on his chest and let out painful sobs for a few minutes while he thought, in a panicked state, of words to say. You’d always been tough. Independent. Happy-go-lucky. So to see you in this emotional, co-dependent, messy state—he felt strange. Off balance. It made his heart hurt.
“Hey,” he said after a few minutes once your tears seemed to slow, “how about we make you some tea, get you into some comfortable pyjamas, and then we can talk through it—how does that sound?” When he noticed you were about to argue after pointing to the butterbeer and cards on the table even though he knew you didn’t really want to play, he continued, “Nah—not really in the mood to get my arse kicked by you tonight.”
You laughed through a hiccup and squeezed his hand tightly before pulling his arms around you again. “First, can you—can you just stay here with me?”
He felt you tense up beside him and he knew that you were trying your hardest to fight back more tears rising to the surface. He pulled you closer to him and wrapped his arms tighter around you, enclosing you in the warmth from his own body.
“Okay then,” he replied and felt you relax beside him, “I can do that.”
“Maybe we can—we can talk it over.” Fred’s brought back to the present when he feels yet another light blow to his shin from you under the table. He blinks and looks into your eyes, which are wide, and he feels himself go weirdly alert.
“I don’t think so,” you say to your ex now, almost laughing a bit; he’s looking rather annoyed and stunned at being turned down. You swallow over a lump in your throat, “Besides, I’m—I’m seeing someone else, so, I think you’d better leave.”
“What?” he says breathlessly, almost looking heartbroken. Is he trying to mend his ways after watching you hit the ground with a loud splat! a few days ago? Fred’s insides turn. “Since when?”
“Since..a few weeks ago.” Fred can sense the panic in your voice as he watches your eyes shift from your ex to your breakfast plate and to him, a cherry red color flooding your cheeks and the tips of your ears. And without a second thought, you say, “Right, Fred?”
And Fred’s agreeing before he can fully digest your words, he’s nodding without breaking your gaze, he’s smirking at you without remembering there are other people around him. Finally, he looks up into the very baffled face of your ex boyfriend. “Yeah, we are—so—I’d bugger off if I were you, mate.”
“You two?” he asks, looking at Fred with what can only be described as pure anguish. “Together?”
“It’s time to go,” whispers another Hufflepuff, pulling the very distraught looking boy in front of you both back to their table before he can say anything else to you. Fred watches as he slumps in his seat and rubs his head, as if confused. Then, he turns back to you and raises an eyebrow.
“Oh, Freddie, I’m sorry!” you shake your head rather quickly and bring a hand to your mouth in shock. “I panicked, I just—he kept trying to ask me to grab lunch with him, I didn’t know what to say to get him to leave me alone, ‘m so mortified. We can just—pretend it never happened, you don’t have to do anything, I can just deal with whatever it is he has planned, it’s fine—”
“Hey.. take a breath,” he laughs and teases you before reaching across the table and squeezing your hand. “It’s fine, I get it. Besides,” he takes a quick bite of an apple and smirks at you, “I’m honored you chose me to be your fake boyfriend.”
“Well, you’re the only one here, silly.”
He pauses to consider this, and then says, “I’m going to pretend you didn’t say that and tell you again how honored I am.” You laugh at this, and he grins cheekily at you as he continues, “I mean, imagine if you’d done that to George, he would’ve stumbled over his words—you know how he gets under pressure sometimes—gets flabbergasted, he does. You’re lucky ‘m quick on my feet.”
“Well then,” you reply, sipping your tea as Fred watches your nerves subside, “glad to have you along for the ride, Weasley.”
It’s difficult watching the team’s practice. Fred had told you to maybe stay in, not watch, he’d fill you in later on your replacement. You’d insisted on coming anyway. But he was right.
They’re not completely out of sync—the third year Chaser they snatched up is pretty good for never having really played before. But if Fred’s being completely honest, he misses you on the pitch more than anything else. It’s just not the same without you.
You enter the Great Hall for dinner, and you’re so annoyed at doing everything one-armed that you nearly rip the sling right off of your shoulder, even though Madam Pomfrey had insisted on wearing it for two more days. Okay, maybe you did it a little too fast. “Ow,” you say, rotating your shoulder back and forth to stretch the muscles, as if they’d been asleep for months and months. You furrow your brow in pain.
Fred snorts before sipping his pumpkin juice. “How’d that feel?”
“Not the greatest,” you admit, taking a seat next to him.
Just then, he slings an arm around your shoulder and places a light kiss to your forehead, taking you by surprise. You turn to him with a raised eyebrow. He places his cup gingerly on the table. “Git sighting, on your right.”
You stealthily look on the other end of the Great Hall, your ex trying his best to look distracted, but there’s no chance in hell he didn’t see this exchange between you and Fred. Solemnly, he follows his fellow Hufflepuffs from the hall.
You both hadn’t even noticed George, Ron, and Harry take their places beside you at the table, eyes wide and faces flushed.
“When the bloody hell did this happen?” Ron nods at the two of you, shoving pork into his mouth.
“I’d like to think if my two best friends got together, they would’ve at least mentioned it to me—how long have you two been sneaking around?” George teases you with a wink.
Both you and Fred let hearty laughs escape your lips, as if to say, Sneaking around? You’re out of your mind, but instead, you both say, “We’re just faking.”
“Come again?” Ron and Harry chorus together.
“Faking—you know, Ronniekins, pretend.” Ron’s ears turn a bright scarlet color. “Just for fun. Y/N’s lovely ex bombarded her the other day after her injury, kept bugging her to grab a bite with him, so she very politely took me by surprise and told him, before consulting me, that we’re dating. Of course I obliged—being the lovely gent I am.”
“It did not happen like that—”
“You’re absolute rubbish at lying, you know.”
You throw your hands up in surrender, your face a nice light shade of rosy pink. “I panicked!”
“Precisely,” Fred and George say together. “And how long are you two planning on keeping this little scheme going for?” George asks.
You and Fred turn to each other. It is now revealed, Fred realizes as he watches as you peer into space, that you have no plan. He leans back in his seat, looking rather satisfied at the fact that you haven’t come up with any details at all. “I—I hadn’t thought of that. I just kind of.. went for it. I was acting on the very daring nerve that comes with being a Gryffindor!”
“Right you were,” says Fred through a mouthful of potatoes, “barely skipped a beat, she did. Reckon she couldn’t wait for it to happen—she nearly pounced on me right in front of him.”
The boys roar with raucous laughter. You roll your eyes and turn your attention to George, Ron, and Harry, who are now wiping away tears from their eyes. “You don’t really believe him, do you? This will not last long. Believe you me. It was purely a spur-of-the-moment adrenaline rush decision.”
You turn back to Fred and ask in a sweetly sarcastic tone, “Yes, Freddie?”
“I’m invoking a rule. No falling in love with one another.” He winks and bites into his chicken.
You scoff at him, while the others chuckle again. “Ah yes, darling—because that’s so very likely.”
When Fred finds you sitting underneath a large oak tree in front of the castle, he laughs softly when he sees you in quite a frazzled looking state: your hair is in disarray from pulling at it, the bags under your eyes make it look like you haven’t slept in days, and he can almost feel the pain radiating from your tired muscles.
He sits down next to you in the grass and teases, “You’re quite a sight for sore eyes.”
“Oh, shove off,” you reply, not even looking up from your books. But after a few seconds of silence, the two of you fall into fits of laughter.
Fred nods at the books you’re so very immersed in. “What’s so important?”
“D’you think,” you begin, flipping the pages rapidly, “if I can find a spell that can produce a change in thought process on another human being, and somehow manage to stealthily pull it off and use it on Madam Pomfrey, she’ll change her mind and let me play in the next match?”
Fred cocks his head to the side, peering admirably at you, and smiles sweetly. “It doesn’t look very likely.”
“Ugh, I thought you’d say that.”
“But hey—there’s always obliviate,”
“Honestly, it’s getting to the point where I’m actually considering it.”
“Sure,” he says teasingly again, “I’d pay quite a lot of galleons to see you use any type of magic on a staff member, let alone something as dangerous as a memory charm.”
You cross your arms defiantly. “Don’t think I’ll do it?”
“No,” he smirks, “I know you won’t do it.”
You narrow your eyes at him and give in. Fred can’t help but laugh. “Okay, well—it would be really dangerous! But c’mon—I’ve gotten involved in a fair share of mischief with you and your brother; need I remind you of the time you landed me in detention my second year? A mere twelve year old, in detention…”
“Reckon that’s when you put this whole fake boyfriend thing into action, did you? When you fell for me all those years ago?”
“Ha-ha, you’re wickedly hilarious, Freddie.. seriously, funniest bloke I’ve ever met..” Your voice trails off when you notice something a few feet away, but Fred’s still thinking about how you called him the funniest person you know, even if it was in a sarcastic tone. But deep down, he knows you’re completely serious. He can feel his heart begin to soar a bit. His meandering mind is interrupted yet again by someone walking along the water’s edge—an unwanted visitor. Quickly, you shift yourself closer to Fred and say in a hushed voice, “Hurry—put your arm around me!”
He can’t help but stifle a laugh at your extremely flustered state. “Anything for my girl.”
You fit in so comfortably in his body that he doesn’t even notice how much time passes by. You spend the afternoon immersed in books, while Fred is resting against the tree, falling in and out of sleep with breaks to fix some malfunctions on some very small inventions of his and George’s. Each and every time he looks up, he notices the very curious looking ex boyfriend of yours watching you both, as if he’s trying his very hardest to prove that the two of you are just pretending. And each and every time Fred turns his attention back toward his inventions, he finds himself pulling you tighter and tighter into his arms.
You and Fred are walking rather reluctantly through the corridors to your next class. If only you both had a free period, you’d be able to catch up on some work. But alas, here you both are, walking very, very slowly to Defense Against the Dark Arts.
“How’s the team holding up? I’m dying to get back out there with you.”
“Miss me that much, do you?”
You narrow your eyes and the unmistakable sound of mock laughter from Fred bounces off of the walls. “I miss Quidditch is what I mean. It’s killing me that I can’t join you lot—especially with the match just a week away.”
Fred smiles softly at you, feeling a twinge in his heart, knowing that you won’t be able to play, regardless of your completely healed shoulder. “I know. It’s killing us, too. But come the new year, you’ll—oi, bloody hell, does he just spend his time following us around, or something?”
Fred nods in the direction of the unwanted visitor yet again, and he grabs your hand quickly and continues to walk down the corridor, careful to avoid eye contact. That is, until he corners you both.
It’s not in a violent sort of way—but rather, curious. You’re both bracing yourselves for yet another attempt at getting you to rekindle things, when he takes Fred by surprise. “Why is it, Weasley, that whenever I see you two around, you very quickly grab her hand or sling your arm around her shoulder? What is this—just a ploy?”
“Come on,” you say to him softly, and Fred’s feeling very, very nervous that your facial expression will tell your ex everything he needs to know. “Leave us alone, would you? We’ve got class.”
“Prove it to me, then,” he says now, crossing his arms. “If you two’re really together, then kiss her.”
“What?” you both say aloud, flabbergasted. You look at Fred, who’s doing his very best to bite back a smile, and it’s becoming difficult to not laugh in your ex’s face.
He smirks at the both of you, his cronies surrounding him doing the same thing. Fred squares him up, and it’s easy to tower over him, Fred’s 6’3 frame swallowing him nearly whole. “I don’t think that’s such an odd request—kiss your girlfriend, Weasley, and I’ll leave you be.”
It’s obvious to the both of you, now, that he is basically waiting for you all to admit that yes, you’ve been faking, the entire time it hasn’t been real. You open your mouth to speak and Fred notices the panic in your eyes, the truth bubbling up inside you. So he does the only thing he can think of—he wraps his arms tightly around your waist, pulls you close to him, and presses his lips to yours.
You try very, very hard to hold back your surprise, because you’re extremely aware of the group of Hufflepuffs now watching you both share a kiss that is supposed to look like it happens all the time. You’re sure you’ve lost your voice now. His lips are soft, softer than they look, and Fred’s finding it difficult to remember why you two haven’t been doing this the entire time. He pulls away very, very slowly, hovering close to you with a cheeky grin on his face, before breaking completely and taking your hand in his again, squeezing tightly. Fred notices the scarlet color of your face now, turns back toward the stunned man in front of him, and replies, “Is that all? My girlfriend and I have class, if you don’t mind—”
You swiftly walk your way through the group and you and Fred nearly fly down the hallway, his face as red as his hair, his smile as bright as the sun, and you bring your hands to your lips and you swear you can feel the electricity surging through them, just as they had when Fred kissed you just a few seconds ago.
“You were going to tell him!” Fred’s laughing now, outside the entrance to the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom, but he can feel his heart thundering in his chest due to the heat of the moment. There’s nothing quite like an adrenaline rush. You reply, “He—he knows we’re lying!”
“Well, now he doesn’t,” Fred replies with a cheeky wink. “C’mon—I made you a deal, didn’t I? Couldn’t let that git get the last word. Now he’s got no bloody idea what’s going on.”
“How can I ever thank you?”
Fred swallows over a lump in his throat, peering deeply into your very bright eyes. He knows what he wants to say, and he’s about too, but something stops him. Something holds him back. Instead, he grins, shakes his head, and slings an arm across your shoulder, making sure to hold onto you just a little bit longer this time.
Fred, George, Ron, and Harry are sitting in the library looking positively ghastly. Ron and Harry are very reluctantly working on a Divination essay that Hermione had finished a week ago, while the twins are racking their brains to finish this petty assignment from Snape.
You wander inside and Fred notices, for the first time in a few days, that your sling is back on your shoulder. Concern floods through his body. “Hey,” he says, immediately pulling you into his arms, “are you okay? Is it bothering you?”
You’re positively beaming—that’s the only way Fred can describe is. Your smile is quite bright, looking happier than you have in months, even with your arm in a sling. “Yeah,” you tell him sweetly, taking a seat next to him, “hurts a little. Probably just slept on it funny, or something.”
“Be careful,” he tells you, snaking an arm around your waist and pulling you closer to him, completely ignoring the assignment in front of him, “let me know if you need to go to the hospital wing, okay?”
You nod and begin to slowly pull spell books from your bag when you notice the others across the table, looking at you both with what can only be described as mischievous grins.
You and Fred look at each other, and then at them. Fred’s hand tightens around your waist. “What?” you ask together.
“You know he isn’t here, right?” Harry asks you both. George and Ron are focusing very hard on their parchments, and are not doing a very good job at stifling their laughter.
It’s almost immediate that Fred unwraps his arm from your waist, and your face is burning with color, and Fred’s insides are beginning to tighten due to embarrassment. But before he can speak and defend his actions, you speak up, “Oh, erm—could’ve sworn I saw him—must’ve been my eyes playing tricks on me, then. Anyway..”
The rest of the afternoon is spent in utter silence, recovering from that tiny slip up and moment of embarrassment. And one by one they leave—first Harry, then Ron, and then George—who, by the looks of it, is nowhere near done with his assignment—but he claims he has somewhere he needs to be, and vanishes through the doors of the library before either you or Fred can do anything.
About an hour later, you ask Fred, “Could Snape be any more vile? Why did he assign this stupid essay again?”
Fred laughs softly, “because some Ravenclaw started insulting his teaching methods in the middle of the lesson—remember?”
“Oh yeah,” you say, the memory coming back to you now. Brightly, you say, “Hey—want to get back at that Ravenclaw and plan some elaborate type of prank to make this whole assignment just a little bit more bearable?”
Fred turns toward you with a surprised expression on his face. He smirks and shakes his head in admiration, “I think I’m becoming a bad influence on you.”
You bat your eyelashes at him and say, “Maybe. Would that be such an awful thing?”
And then he pulls you nearly all the way into his lap, begins tickling you and poking you in the ribs, and you begin to flail in his arms and laugh hysterically, when Madam Pince angrily shushes you from the other end of the library. You flip your hair out of your eyes and regain your composure, and Fred is suddenly very aware that you’re still seated in his lap, your face only inches from his, the bright color of your eyes sparkling in the sun flooding in from the windows. Right. You’re not actually technically together. He swallows thickly and watches as you bite down on your lip. You’re both about to say something, hearts thundering loudly in your chest, when suddenly you break the silence and slide yourself off of him, back into your seat and say, “We’d better head to the feast, Freddie. Don’t want to be late.”
“Anyone fancy a game of exploding snap before bed?”
Ron’s sitting in the middle of the huddle, finishing the last of his dessert from the feast, while everyone around him is slumped in their seats looking positively exhausted.
George says sleepily, “Can’t mate—we’ve got a late night practice tonight.”
“D’you think Angelina will give me a beating if I just sleep through it?” Fred asks nobody in particular, his eyes closed.
“Yes,” you, Harry, George, Ginny and Hermione say together.
“Oh fine, you lot are out,” Ron waves his hand in the direction of the Quidditch players and then glances excitedly at you, Ginny, and Hermione. “Ladies? Anyone? Feeling kind of lucky this evening.”
Ginny snorts at this. “You? Lucky? Luck would be me not absolutely obliterating you in a game—not you winning. That’d be a miracle.” Her older brothers chuckle quite animatedly at this comment; it’s certainly woken them up a bit.
You grin at Ginny and then say to her very angry and embarrassed looking brother, “What she means to say, Ron, is that we’re all kind of exhausted due to lack of sleep, because someone—” you shoot a glance toward another Gryffindor girl on the other end of the Great Hall, “—put an amplifying charm on some Muggle contraption of hers last night, music kept us up till nearly dawn.”
Ron turns back toward his brothers now, looking confused. “No way you could’ve heard that from the girls dormitory, or Harry and I would’ve been up all night, too! So why are you two so bloody exhausted?”
“Usual mischief,” Fred and George chorus together, winking at the youngest male Weasley.
Ginny picks up her bag and says to the group, “I’m heading to bed. You two coming?” she glances at you and Hermione.
You glance back and forth between Ginny and Fred and bite your lip. You’re absolutely knackered, but you wonder whether you should go to practice, just to be there, just to watch, just to show you’re still devoted. Fred picks up on this and shakes his head. “You’re tired—go to bed. Promise you’re not missing much. Reckon we’ll all be rubbish due to exhaustion, anyway.”
“Okay,” you finally reply, albeit begrudgingly. Fred places a quick kiss to your cheek, the group stifles laughter, and you, Hermione, and an extremely baffled Ginny make your way upstairs to the common room, leaving the boys to their jokes in the very crowded Great Hall.
When you enter through the portrait hole, Hermione wishes you both a good evening before heading up the stairs. This leaves you and Ginny alone in a completely desolate common room. You remove your shoes and stand across from the fire, letting the warmth of the flames radiate through your body, when Ginny clears her throat.
“Care to tell me what’s going on between you and my older brother?” she says cheekily, grinning at you. She so very much resembles all of her siblings.
You laugh softly, running a hand through your hair and stretching your arms behind your head. “I thought Ron would’ve told you.. It’s nothing, Ginny. Promise. We’re just pretending. My ex has been strangely remorseful about the breakup lately, trying to get me to talk to him and what not—Fred’s just helping me out a bit.”
“By pretending to date you?”
“Yeah..” you say a bit guiltily now. “Yeah, it sort of happened in a moment of panic. Don’t worry, though. None of it’s real. Just till it gets the other one out of my way—then we’ll go back to normal.” You turn back to face the fire and it suddenly feels much, much hotter than before.
“But this is the normal you actually want, isn’t it?”
This takes you by surprise. You turn back slowly, now facing Ginny, and she’s wearing a genuine grin. “I—I dunno what you’re talking about.”
“I’ve watched Fred and George for years,” Ginny tells you, “admiring their recklessness and rebellion—but in turn, this also means I see who they get on with.”
She smiles softly, looking a little sulky actually, which is so very unlike Ginny. And she confides in you, and she’s acting very vulnerable which makes your heart soar, “I’d give anything for Harry to look at me the way you look at Fred.”
You swallow over a lump in your throat, and Ginny can easily sense your nervousness. She reaches out and places a gentle hand on your shoulder. In a very hoarse, soft voice, as if your vocal chords have been strained, you plead, “Please, please don’t tell him.”
She doesn’t respond to this exactly, but you know she’ll keep her lips sealed. She asks, “How long?”
“I—I dunno,” you tell her truthfully. You bite your lip to keep your heart jumping out of your throat, “over time, I suppose.” You continue to tell her of how everything unfolded, how Fred had jokingly told you to not develop feelings for him, how he’d kissed you that one day in the corridor.
There’s a few moments of silence between you both, but there’s nothing uncomfortable about it. In fact, it’s the most comfortable you’ve ever been with one another—secretly longing for the boys who don’t seem to look at you both the way you so deeply yearn. Finally, Ginny breaks the tension and says, “Your secret is safe with me. Just be careful, okay? I don’t want to see you get hurt again.”
Is this her way of telling you that Fred doesn’t feel the same way as you? That these feelings you have for him are a hundred percent one sided and are not at all reciprocated? It’s as if she’s reading your thoughts, because she tells you, “I’ve no idea how he feels—he doesn’t tell me anything at all, real git that he is,” you both laugh at this exchange, and Ginny echoes herself, “Just be careful.”
“I will,” you reply, now realizing that she’s has given you quite a lot to think about, “Thanks, Gin.”
Fred’s feeling positively blue, if you will. He’s standing smack in the middle of the corridor in his Quidditch robes after a truly rubbish weekend practice, staring at the spot you were just standing. It’s like you’re still there, he can still smell your perfume, but he reckons you’ve probably already made it back to the common room by now.
Just then, he feels a hand on his shoulder. He jumps in surprise, and turns around only to be face to face with George and Ginny, who laugh at his skittishness.
“You alright, mate? Coming to the Great Hall?”
“Yeah.” Fred’s voice sounds vastly different in his own ears; it’s hoarse and broken, and he doesn’t understand why. He coughs a bit, and then echoes himself, “Yeah,” except he doesn’t believe it, and neither do his siblings.
George stops bouncing his broomstick between his hands at once. He looks once at Ginny and then back at Fred as the corridor begins to fill with students, “What’s going on?”
“Sh-she ended it,” he replies, and the words feel foreign in his mouth.
“Who, Y/N? The.. fake thing?” George asks, lowering his voice. “Maybe the git is finally leaving her be.”
“No, that’s not it. She wouldn’t tell me. She was.. weirdly quiet. She told me that she was worried things are going to get messy and she’s afraid rules are being broken on her end.. has she said anything to either of you? What is she even talking about?”
George responds quickly with a, “No, nothing,” whereas Ginny hesitates a bit, and then responds, “No, Freddie. She hasn’t.” But Fred can sense that his little sister isn’t giving him all of the info. Had she talked to you? Does she know what’s going on? Then George nudges his brother and asks a bit cheekily, “Does this make you upset?”
“No, no, of course not!” Fred says a bit aggressively, but both of his siblings just cock their heads to the side, as if to say, Really, Freddie, we can see right through you. “I—I mean—I just.. thought we were having a bit of fun.”
“Yeah,” George begins, while Ginny remains quiet by his side, “okay, you were having fun, but.. what I’m asking you, Fred, is—do you maybe want to be with her for real? And that’s why you’re upset?”
When Fred doesn’t answer, Ginny finds her voice. “We know, Fred.”
George and Ginny say together, “That you fancy her.”
Fred runs a hand through his hair. He’s feeling aggravated now—he doesn’t like when his mind and thoughts get picked apart by people closest to him, especially when he’s trying on his own to piece together exactly how he feels. But he comes to realize, as his heart begins to beat faster when he thinks of you, that his siblings are right. He’s felt this way for a very, very long time.
Without showing just how much he really feels for you, Fred tells them, “Yeah, erm, okay, I—maybe I have some.. feelings,” he says through gritted teeth and George can’t help but stifle a laugh at his twin’s nervousness. Fred punches him in the arm. “But she kept saying that she’s breaking rules—but what rules? I haven’t the foggiest what she’s on about! I don’t even know if she feels the same way!”
“Fred,” Ginny says quietly, “you jokingly made one rule with her when you two began this whole ridiculous stunt.” When Fred just looks at his sister quizzically, wondering what the bloody hell she’s on about, she opts to continue, “you told her you’re not allowed to fall for one another.”
Realization hits Fred like a ton of bricks, George throws his hands up in confusion, and Ginny pushes on Fred’s chest and grins cheekily at her older brother, leaving poor George baffled beyond belief at this secret language his other two siblings seem to have. Ginny nods in the direction of the common room, “Just go get her already, would you?”
And Fred’s flying through the corridors and up the stairs, he’s pushing past students and professors alike, he’s running hands through his messy, windswept hair and he’s climbing through the portrait hole, only to find you sitting on the ledge near the window looking out at the stars, just as you had all those long months ago when he found you crying.
“Hey, Freddie,” you say when you turn to face him. “Everything okay?”
He doesn’t answer—he pushes past the desks and chairs blocking him from you and does the one and only thing he wants to do, the only thing he’s ever wanted to do for as long as he can remember now—he scoops you up into his arms, presses his forehead to yours, and kisses you. For real, this time.
Your surprise is overridden by the slight, exasperated moan that escapes your lips before you wrap your hands around the back of his neck. His fingers are dancing across your hip bones and then make their way up your back and into your hair. He kisses you once, twice, three more times before fully breaking, and hovers close to you again before pulling away completely to see the sparkle in your eyes, the bright smile plastered across your face.
As you push down any nervousness rising to the surface with a quick swallow, you say, “So.. where’ve you been?”
Fred laughs haughtily now, remembering that time all those few months ago when you’d say the exact same thing in a completely different context. He’s finding it beyond difficult to not kiss you into oblivion right now, especially as you bite on your bottom lip to try and suppress a very large grin.
“Sorry, love, I got tied up with my thoughts—but I can stay here with you now.”
He pulls you into a tight embrace before his lips find yours again. You can both hear voices outside the portrait whole. It’s obvious to you now that you have mere seconds before your alone time will be so very rudely interrupted by fellow Gryffindors.
“I broke the rules,” you tell him with slight tears in your eyes, playing with the baby fine hairs at the nape of his neck.
“Me too,” he admits breathlessly, swiping his thumb across your cheek. “I broke them a long time ago.” His heart begins to thunder inside of his chest at the feeling of your lips forming a smile against his, and he’s almost positive you can hear it—but he doesn’t care. He wants you to know you get his heart racing—more than pranking, more than firewhisky, more than Quidditch—more than anything or anyone in the entire world. He continues after another small kiss, “I reckon some rules are meant to be broken, though, aren’t they?”
reblogs & feedback are always appreciated, darlings. thank you for reading and requesting, much love x
