Everything Changes // Fred Weasley

chapter 37: facing fears

May 31st, 1995

The entire castle seemed to be on edge as exam season approached. You couldn't so much as drop a pencil on the stone floor of the library without being met with death glares from overworked Ravenclaws and frustrated Hufflepuffs.

I made a point those last few weeks of the school year to avoid the typical study spaces. Even if I wanted to study there, they were usually already full of students by the time classes finished for the day, and on the weekends they would start filling up before breakfast even started.

Luckily for me, I didn't have to worry about exams until the end of summer, so instead of wasting my last few weeks of the school year in the library, I wasted them elsewhere in the castle. Mostly I found myself hidden away in my usual study nooks or window cubbies, either listening to music or buried in yet another textbook, because even though my exam wasn't until the end of summer, it covered a lot more subject matter than any of the exams that everyone else was studying for.

The weekend before the first exams began, I was walking the halls with Naomi, discussing our plans for the summer holidays. We were both determined to get her to her mastery class, whether or not our parents changed their mind on the matter.

In between studying for exams, Naomi had been researching the muggle concept of emancipation, which we had learned about from a muggle friend of ours who went through the entire process when she turned sixteen. It was hard to research the topic while at Hogwarts, considering the library didn't have many books covering muggle law. Naomi and I had a few meetings with the muggle studies professor, Professor Burbage, who went out of her way to procure the law books stating the process of emancipation.

It was much more difficult than we had anticipated. We needed to have a permanent living place other than our parents' house, which I would be able to find easily once leaving Hogwarts, but I would have to do it without my parent's knowledge, which would be the hard part. We also had to have a steady income, which would also prove to be a bit difficult once we left Hogwarts for the summer. Even knowing all the hurdles we would have to jump through for the process to work, Naomi and I both decided it would be worth it in the end.

If only muggles followed the same rules that wizards did.

If that were the case, Naomi and I would be legal adults just a week after we came home for the summer.

It didn't seem likely that a judge would grant us emancipation, considering we didn't have any of the required qualifications. But we figured that if we simply brought up the idea to our parents without mentioning the fact that we didn't qualify, then there would be two possible outcomes.

They realize they were in the wrong and allow Naomi to attend her class.

Or—

We both become emancipated from our parents and start our adult lives earlier than we had planned.

I could handle either outcome, although the second one was a bit daunting. I had enough money saved for a down payment on a small apartment, but Naomi had nothing, considering all the time I spent at a job during secondary school she spent at Hogwarts with no means to make a single cent. I would be able to provide for us for a little while, at least until we returned back to Hogwarts for our seventh year, but after we graduated was a different story.

Naomi would hopefully be busy with her internship, where she would make little to no money at all, and I — well, who knows what I would be doing. Probably working minimum wage at a tiny coffee shop or fast food joint on the weekends, trying to cover the bills for the both of us while attending Hogwarts during the weekdays, attempting to catch up on my studies.