George always knew it would be hard to live without Fred. Ever sense they were kids his heart would quicken whenever he couldn't immediately find his other half. He could only relax when they were back together. How it should be.
He really didn't want to bury him. That just made it all final.
At the wake, he leaned over and kissed his brother's forehead one last time. His mum wanted to bury him in his Weasley sweater, but George had pitched such a fit that she had given up. Instead he was buried in one of their matching suits. He was the last person to see him, alive and he was the one to close the lid of the casket.
He cried when the lid shut. That dull thud sealing his brother off from the rest of the world.
By the time they made it to the cemetery he was all cried out. He just watched silently as they lowered his brother into his grave. He refused to put dirt on his casket, he wanted no part in this.
The next day he came back to the fresh grave and sat at the foot of his brothers grave. He told him every joke he could remember. He was there from sun up till sun down.
He went back to the Burrow to sleep and was back at his brother's grave before the sun came up the next morning to tell him jokes again.
He did this every day for two weeks.
Sometime during the third week Harry started joining him.
The first day Harry sat and listened to his jokes, laughing at the ones that were especially funny. Together they walked back to the Burrow.
The next day Harry added a few of his own jokes. George didn't think they were that good, but at least he was trying. Fred would have wanted him to be nice.
The day after that, when there was a pause in the jokes Harry said, "It doesn't really get any easier."
George stared at Harry.
Harry pulled him into his arms gently and George sobbed into his shoulder. For the rest of the day Harry recited all of the jokes he could remember from the previous days.
Harry was woken by a crashing sound.
He sat bolt upright and made his way cautiously to the nearest bathroom.
George was standing in front of the sink, his bloody knuckles bleeding onto the counter. Harry walked in and placed his hand under cold running water, then set about putting the glass in the rubbish bin.
Harry dried off George's hand gently and bandaged the cuts. He was rubbish at healing magic.
They walked back towards their beds, but Harry stopped in the hallway. He picked up a rag that was on the window sill and used it to cover the small mirror that hung on the wall.
Harry smiled weakly at George, who smiled back. Together they made their way through the house covering all the mirrors with whatever they could find.
The next morning no one asked about the mirrors and no one took down the coverings.
A week later Harry broke the string of jokes again. "You think he laughs at the jokes?"
George was silent for a moment. "He always laughed at my jokes. No matter how stupid they were. He was always the funnier one."
The next week Mrs. Weasley stopped them before they could walk to the grave one morning. "I need something from the shops in Diagon Ally. Would you boys go pick them up for me?" She handed George a short shopping list and squeezed his shoulder gently.
"Sure mum…" George said. His voice was void of all emotion, and Harry could see how much it broke Mrs. Weasley's heart to hear her son speak like that.
Walking around Diagon Ally everybody stared at them as they walked past. Without meaning to Harry lead them past George's shop.
George placed his hand gently on the door and just stood there for a while. "I'm sorry," he whispered and followed Harry.
Every morning from then on Mrs. Weasley gave them another shopping list, and every time people looked at them with pity. Every once in a while, someone would as George where Fred was, or mistake him for Fred.
George wouldn't answer these people, just stare at them with a blank expression. Harry would make up some stupid excuse and move them along quickly.
Finally George it was all too much.
"Harry can go on his own this time," George said, handing the list to Harry.
Mrs. Weasley frowned. "I would really like you two to go together."
"I want to go visit Fred," George said.
"He isn't going anywhere. And you can see him when you get back," Mrs. Weasley stated calmly.
George just pushed his way past her and walked in the direction of the grave, his face never breaking its blank expression.
The next day Mrs. Weasley handed the list to Harry and they went their separate ways again.
Eventually the lists stopped, but Harry no longer went to the grave with George.
George hadn't talked to anyone in a couple of weeks. He had stopped attending meals, stopped bathing.
It had been months sense the last battle, and Mrs. Weasley wanted George to start moving on. She vowed to confront him about it tomorrow.
That morning George put on Fred's old sweater and went out to his grave.
"I've put a lot of thought into this," he placed his hand on the grass that was growing above his brother. "It's been really hard. I don't…I need to be with you."
He cast a cutting curse on his left wrist and watched as the blood soaked into the ground, he hoped it would reach Fred. He laid down next to his grave, placing his right hand over the stone marking Fred's name. He was becoming light headed, and when his vision went back he was filled with a sense of relief. "It's like we always said. There is no me without you."
Harry watched as the grass stopped moving around George's mouth. He would never tell anyone that he was there that night. No one would understand that he was saving George by doing nothing.