AMOR FATI . . . fred weasley

XI. i, PLEASE COME HOME FOR CHRISTMAS,

25th december

WELL I'LL BE DAMNED, HERE COMES YOUR GHOST AGAIN / BUT THAT'S NOT UNUSUAL, IT'S JUST THAT THE MOON IS FULL
— JOAN BAEZ

.·。.·゜✭·.·✫·゜·。..·。.·゜✭·.·✫·゜·。.

IS IT REALLY CHRISTMAS if you don't wake up with your head feeling like it's been trampled over by an entire herd of Hippogriffs?

Which, for the record, has never actually happened to Joey, thankfully. Don't get her wrong, she does love Hippogriffs, but she imagines being squashed by a dozen of them would be a bit scary and also feel like the worst hangover ever. And trust her when she says that this is the worst hangover ever.

She doesn't have a clue what's going on, but she knows it must be morning still, watching the sunlight stream in softly through the windows, honeying the bedsheets. Through the peeling-paint of the window, the sky is a milky blue, reminiscent of dreamland, adorned with the soft petals of... snow? Snow. Merlin's mismatched socks, yes! Joey feels all the silly festive giddiness blossoming inside of her. And it's the best feeling, you can't convince her otherwise!

Then she realises where she actually is, and her first reaction is, Oh. My. Venus. Seriously. Help?

It's not so much being in the twins' bedroom, because Joey may or may not have slept here a lot during the summer (shush, don't tell Molly!). It's not so much being in Fred's bed that makes her insides flip-flop, because even though she's convinced she'll never be used to it, she has slept beside him before. (Because of the nightmares and nothing else, obviously!) No, it's the fact that...

She's curled up against his side, like a cat, her knees just grazing the curve of the waistband of his pyjama bottoms, her head buried against his chest. Her left hand lounges gently against his sternum, but her right hand is a whole other story: fingertips resting against the exposed skin of his collarbone, like they're tracing the freckles there.

Plus his right pinky hovers over her left, still slightly-outstretched, almost like they went to sleep holding them, almost like... Shit, what happened the night before?

OK. Joey remembers lots and lots of Firewhisky - duh - and Fred ruining Bill and Frances' nearly-kiss - emphasis on nearly - and then... and then... Oh, the flipping Firewhisky!

She just had to go and kiss him, didn't she?

Drunk Joey must be even more daft than Sober Joey, it's official, because that is quite probably one of the stupidest things she has ever done. Yeah, admittedly, it did feel good (read: literally the best thing to happen to her, ever), but she's meant to be getting over him. Truth is, she wants him so badly she aches. But she knows - Venus, how she knows - it'd be selfish and insensitive when everyone else she's ever adored has ended up - well, there's no way to dance around the subject - dead.

His chest is a dream, though, and waking up snuggled against it even more so. Joey knows this indulgence is stupid, like, it's going to cause her so much more pain in the long-run, but she just can't bring herself to leave the sanctuary of his side.

So she doesn't. Instead, she presses her cheek against the leathery skin of the back of his neck, which isn't sun-kissed so much as sun-embraced. The feathery hairs there glint metallic in fierce winter light, and yeah, they tickle, but Joey truly could not give less of a...