[Editing] Expecto Patronum: Harry Potter One-shots

17 - Escapee [Barty Crouch Junior x Reader]

[Part One] 

The tea was cold. Not only cold, but it was horribly too sweet. Mrs Weasley's teaspoons were the size of ladles. It also had the colour of Peeves the Poltergeist - a sign of drenching the poor teabag in too much milk. If I could pick my own ingredients, I would pick a spoonful of honey and would take my tea black. It wasn't because I particularly enjoyed this kind of tea but, rather, because it was how my brother Felix had made it.

The Weasley's kitchen table was overflowing with auburn-haired offspring. Fred and George were elbowing each other and were having what seemed to be a heated discussion involving one of their joke products, Ginny was spreading some jam over her toast while narrowly avoiding Ron's grabbing fingers as he reached for the streaky back bacon. Hermione Granger talked in her airy and know-it-all manner of speech while Harry nodded politely, intensely staring into his cup of cold tea as if he was planning on drowning himself in it. I studied my own dun cup of tea and felt the same.

"All right - all right!" Mrs Weasley chirped, "Don't eat all of the bacon, Ronald! Leave some for the rest of us! Like you, Ginny dear, you can't surely be eating just that. You've been thinning up like grassroots lately. Fred, George, keep away your freaky products - I'm sure Harry's just being polite. Yes," As if she had been counting off a list, she turned her good-natured glance to me. It always seemed to soften. "(Y/n) dear," her voice had rumbled to a whisper, "are you all right? You look pale."

"I always look pale," I murmured and, under the scrutiny of Mrs Weasley's stare, reached for the eggs and started spooning some onto my plate. I hadn't reached for much in my time at the table - I had eaten a few runny dollops of eggs, a fried tomato, two bangers and even a shrimpy piece of bacon I had managed to knick under Ronald's nose.

I sipped my tea again. The coldness of it reminded me of the early time. It was just over three in the morning and the Weasley family was yet to set out - and I along with it. I was about the furthest thing you could get from a Weasley - except for a Malfoy, I suppose. It was out of extraordinary kindness that Molly and Arthur had even let me into their homes. I was in Fred and George's year in Hogwarts, but we were never on wonderful terms. It was my brother, Felix, that had been best friends with Bill Weasley. They were only letting me come with them to the Quidditch World Cup because of their wonderful bond.

When the meal was cleaned up - every piece of bacon devoured, courtesy of Ronald - I was furiously buttoned-up in my enormous khaki mackintosh while Mrs Weasley maternally fluffed up my woollen hat and, just before I could escape, I had my Slytherin scarf knotted at my throat. It was everything I had not to be coerced to wear the gloves she had thrust onto me. I straggled to the back of the group as we marched through the forest; Arthur at the head of the group, barking at the slower stragglers to keep up. Ginny and I talked a little as we walked through the clearing.

"So, you're in seventh year, yeah?" Ginny asked politely.

"Yes," I replied.

I wasn't very good at small talk.