Stumble - A Fred Weasley Fanfiction

Chapter 9: 317 Days Before

Addie was still awake when she heard someone coming down the stairs. She shut her eyes, trying her best to appear asleep, but she was always a terrible actor. She heard the footsteps pad across the floor into the living room and then stop. "I know you're not asleep," Fred's voice came from across the room, and Addie reluctantly opened her eyes and sat up.

"Can't sleep either?" she asked him.

Fred shook his head, running a hand down his face. There were deep purple bags under his eyes, and a slump to his shoulders that spoke of pure exhaustion. She patted the spot beside her and Fred plopped down, leaning his head back against the couch and closing his eyes. "I am so tired," he said. "But I can't make myself actually sleep. Every time I close my eyes I picture him falling from that tower."

Addie hadn't let herself think about that part. It was one thing to know that Albus Dumbledore was dead. It was entirely another to accept the fact that he had been killed by a man he had once worked with. That he had been killed by a curse and fallen hundreds of feet to the ground below. Every time Addie found herself thinking about it, she had shut it from her mind.

"I'd tell you to try not to think about it, but that'd be pretty useless advice," she told him.

Fred nodded in agreement. His eyes were still closed. "George hasn't had any issue, apparently. He's been snoring for hours."

"Well, why don't you go back to your place then? It'd be quiet at least."

Fred shook his head. "We can't go back. It's not protected like the Burrow." Addie knew the Burrow had protective spells on it to keep unwanted guests out, but she had assumed that they would have the same protections placed on the flat above the joke shop. "Besides," Fred added with a yawn. "I think it's best to be with family right now."

"Yeah," Addie answered, but her voice broke. Fred cracked open an eyelid to peer at Addie, who was sitting on the couch, looking lost. She was thinking of her own mother, the only family she had left. It was hard to have family that didn't understand what was going on in the wizarding world. She would never want to inflict upon her mother the knowledge of just how horrible the world may become if You-Know-Who got into power.

"Hey," Fred said, grabbing Addie's attention. "Don't look so sad. You count as family now."

Addie gave him a small smile. "Do I really?"

"Of course you do," he told her. "We have a very loose term of family around here. If you eat our food, sleep in our beds, and we kind of like you, you're in. It's that simple. Just ask Harry."

"Thanks." They were silent for a moment. "How was the Order meeting?"

Fred sighed, shaking his head. "It was a mess. Everyone was yelling, and arguing, and then crying. Everyone's too emotional right now to think reasonably."

"What do they think You-Know-Who's going to do now that Dumbledore's gone?"

"Well, they already know he's got spies in the Ministry, and its quite obvious that he'd want to take over. But they're more worried about Hogwarts. No one wants him to get his hands on the students." Fred shuddered at the thought, and Addie herself felt bile rise in her throat as she imagined Hogwarts run by He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named. "But no one knows what he's up to, so there isn't really much to plan."

"How will they find out?"

"You-Know-Who has his spies, but so does the Order. They'll figure out what they need to know one way or another." And with those words, he collapsed sideways, falling onto the couch so that his head landed in Addie's lap. Addie froze, startled at suddenly having a man's head in her lap. She wasn't sure what to do, whether she should kick him away or not.