CHRYSALIS - FRED WEASLEY

CHAPTER 6

Note: Hi guys! A few things: I'm a pretty slow updater, and I'm sorry for that. I am a full-time writing student and artist, so this falls pretty low on my list of priorities. However, I love this story and I love you all! Also, I hit 600 reads the other day!!! OMG!!! Thank you guys for your support, it's so encouraging. If you want more content, follow my tik tok @birdc4ge. Finally, I imagine Charlie Bell to look like Manu Rios, but East Asian. 

The next week, Fred, George, and Lillie resume their friendship as though nothing had happened. A couple nights a week Lillie sneaks out to meet them in a darkened hallway to smoke in various parts of the castle and grounds, all while miraculously avoiding detection by faculty and house elves. Lillie has a hunch that the twins have a strategy, a way they're so adept at hiding from teachers. She doesn't press the subject, but she resigns herself to quiet observance until she figures out how to get to the bottom of it.

Lillie and Fred haven't been alone since the party, which she is fine with. She figures that the more physical and emotional distance between the two, the easier it will be to get over her feelings. Though Lillie's memories from the night at Gryffindor tower are jumbled, it seemed clear that her assumptions surrounding Fred's feelings towards her were correct; he was definitely gearing up to tell her they were just friends, and that night after the library was simply a fluke. She was glad that she said something first; she spared herself the heartbreak that would surely come from hearing those words come out of his lips.

Charlie, on the other hand, has made his affections known since then. He has taken their physical... proximity on the dance floor at Gryffindor tower as an invitation to touching Lillie at every chance he got. Never inappropriately, but annoyingly all the same. A tug on her ponytail in the Great Hall, an arm slung around her shoulder while walking through the halls. To Lillie, they feel patronizing, like she's a part of some joke of his that she's not in on. She's constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. She has a hunch that the minute she reciprocates his advances, the chase is over; he'll lose interest, tease her for ever liking him back. He'd insist that it was a game to him, something to pass the time; she'd be left looking like an idiot. It's how men operate.

And if she's being honest, Lillie likes the attention. She's not used to it from men, and receiving it from Slytherin's most popular student is a bit of an ego boost. It wouldn't do her much harm to keep Charlie around for a rainy day; plus, he was a welcome distraction from the "Fred Situation", as Penelope has taken to calling it.

***

"George, did you know you have a genius for a brother?"

George scoffs, "News to me." He's hunched over his breakfast with his head leaning on his palm, his eyes shut in faux-sleep. Three heaping spoonfuls of undissolved brown sugar sit in his bowl of porridge, and it seems that George doesn't have the energy to mix it in. It's six A.M, and the twins have quidditch practice this morning; they're both decked out in their practice gear, a yellow-hued variation on their red playing uniforms. Fred's gear hangs off him in various states of disarray; his shoulder-pads are slung over one shoulder perpendicularly, his goggles sit around his neck, and he's still wearing his pyjama pants (Gryffindor red and gold plaid, sitting low and loose on his hips like he pulled them on in a rush). His hair is somehow messier than usual, and a cowlick makes a chunk in the back stand up, askew.

He clambers on to the bench, sitting facing away from the table so that he can lean backwards on his elbows against it. He pulls a small piece of candy from his pants pocket and sets it on the table in front of George. He sits back, smirking expectantly. George picks it up and examines it, spinning it between his thumb and forefinger sceptically. It's bright green and about the size of a marble. It has a strange, unnatural coldness to it, like it had been recently taken out of a freezer.