𝚜𝚝𝚘𝚕𝚎𝚗 𝚍𝚊𝚗𝚌𝚎. fred weasley

𝚡𝚕𝚟𝚒𝚒𝚒. 𝚙𝚊𝚝𝚝𝚎𝚛𝚗 𝚝𝚘 𝚝𝚑𝚎 𝚋𝚊𝚛𝚛𝚎𝚕𝚜

  ✦✧✦

     The next morning, Cress wakes up late, body entangled clumsily with Ginny's. The moment would be nice, but Cress is sweating in places she's never sweated, and her legs are screaming with pain, and Ginny's foot in her face is what woke her up in the first place.

     A groan slips past her lips. Outside the room, Mrs. Weasley calls for the both of them. A moment after that, Cress hears her mother calling for her, asking her to come down for breakfast before they have to go. Ginny grunts, the noise barely loud enough for Cress to hear. It's a wonder Mrs. Weasley does, but the woman shuffles away with Blythe two moments later, and Cress blinks into awareness, rubbing the crink in her neck.

     "Fuck, I shouldn't have fallen asleep," she mutters, stretching until all the bones in her body crack. She pushes Ginny's foot out of her face, weakly, and the girl twitches before pulling it away altogether.

     "No kidding," Ginny grumbles back, throwing the duvet off her; it covered every inch of her body except the foot that was almost shoved up Cress's nostril. "Do you know how rude it is to fall asleep on someone who's trying to tell a story?"

     "Sorry," Cress says sheepishly, but she's not really embarrassed. Despite the irritation in her neck, she slept well. "You can repeat it to me later, if you must. Something about a wardrobe and a quill?"

     "Bathrobe and a spill," Ginny retorts, wood creaking underneath her feet. "Seriously, did you even listen?"

     "To be fair, I was exhausted," Cress tries, rubbing her eyes. One of the buttons on her pajamas is undone, and she works on fixing that before standing with Ginny, who leads her into the corridor and towards the kitchen. "It's not that I wasn't listening, it was that my body physically couldn't."

     "Excuses, excuses," Ginny says, but she doesn't sound angry, only tired and grumpy -- acceptable since she just woke up. She pulls Cress into the dining area where a plate is already made for the both of them.

     Everyone is already eating, so Cress takes her seat beside Ginny and tries to force herself to eat some porridge and eggs. Her mother's warm gaze pierces into her back, but Cress doesn't glance at her, even when the porridge starts tasting like paste after two bites and the eggs are left to cool with it. Conversation is light, and then they're all scurrying along to get dressed to head to the Knight Bus.

     Cress trails behind her mum, yawning, trying to take her mind off the fact that she's actually returning to Hogwarts. Knots start turning in her stomach, and her palms start clamming up as she puts on her winter clothes, Blythe piling a scarf and a hat on top of her head for extra measures. The mittens she shoves on Cress's hands do nothing to help with the heat curled within them. She wonders if it's a good idea.

     St. Mungo's still feels like the better option at this point. While she'll get to see Jonah and Marigold and Axel and Mallory, there's a hesitance to return to the toxic part of the school -- i.e., Umbridge and Parkinson and everyone else.