In love with a Weasley (Charlie Weasley)

GOF 2

By twelve o'clock our school trunks were packed with our school things and all our most prized possessions. Harry had emptied his hiding place under the loose floorboard of all food whilst I double-checked every nook and cranny of our bedroom for forgotten spellbooks or quills, and taken down the chart on the wall counting down the days to September the first, on which he liked to cross off the days remaining until his return to Hogwarts.

The atmosphere inside number four, Privet Drive was extremely tense. The imminent arrival at their house of an assortment of wizards was making the Dursleys uptight and irritable. Vernon had looked downright alarmed when Harry informed him that the Weasleys would be arriving at five o'clock.

"I hope you told them to dress properly, these people," he snarled at once. "I've seen the sort of stuff your lot wear. They'd better have the decency to put on normal clothes, that's all."We had rarely seen Mr. or Mrs. Weasley wearing anything that the Dursleys would call "normal." Their children might don Muggle clothing during the holidays, but Mr. and Mrs. Weasley usually wore long robes in varying states of shabbiness. We were both anxious about how rude the Dursleys might be to the Weasleys if they turned up looking like their worst idea of wizards. Vernon had put on his best suit. To some people, this might have looked like a gesture of welcome, but we knew it was because Vernon wanted to look impressive and intimidating. Dudley, on the other hand, looked somehow diminished. This was not because the diet was at last taking effect, but due to fright. Dudley had emerged from his last encounter with a fully grown wizard with a curly pig's tail poking out of the seat of his trousers, and Petunia and Vernon had had to pay for its removal at a private hospital in London. It wasn't altogether surprising, therefore, that Dudley kept running his hand nervously over his backside, and walking sideways from room to room, so as not to present the same target to the enemy. Lunch was an almost silent meal. Dudley didn't even protest at the food. Petunia wasn't, eating anything at all. Her arms were folded, her lips were pursed, and she seemed to be chewing her tongue, as though biting back the furious diatribe she longed to throw at us. "They'll be driving, of course?" Uncle Vernon barked across the table.

"Er," said Harry. "I think so," Uncle Vernon snorted into his moustache. Normally, he would have asked what car Mr. Weasley drove; he tended to judge other men by how big and expensive their cars were. But I doubted whether Vernon would have taken to Mr. Weasley even if he drove a Ferrari.

We spent most of the afternoon in our bedroom. Finally, at a quarter to five, We went back downstairs and into the living room. Aunt Petunia was compulsively straightening cushions. Vernon was pretending to read the paper, but his tiny eyes were not moving, he was really listening with all his might for the sound of an approaching car. Dudley was crammed into an armchair, his porky hands beneath him, clamped firmly around his bottom.

"You" Aunt Petunia spoke suddenly pointing at me. "Hide that hideous thing on your neck this instant. We don't need to see that" I pulled my hair around further to cover my neck. Harry looking angrily at her, I shook my head at him it's not the worse she's said since she first saw it. We left the room and went to sit on the stairs in the hall.

"You okay Ror" His eyes found mine.

"I'm fine Harry she's said worse I don't care anymore what she says" Five o'clock came and then went. Uncle Vernon, perspiring slightly in his suit, opened the front door, peered up and down the street, then withdrew his head quickly.

"They're late!" he snarled at us.

"I know," Harry said whilst I sat next to him looking down at my lap subconsciously making sure my hair still covered my neck before deciding to just put my hood up to hold it more in place. "Maybe - er - the traffic's bad, or something." At half past, we heard Uncle Vernon and Aunt Petunia conversing in terse mutters in the living room.