It's All My Fault
By. SadieAnnabethMellark
Summary: Bill can't help but feel guilty as he sits by his brother's bedside. He had made him sick. If he hadn't been so selfish, then maybe this wouldn't have happened. Sick!Charlie. Bill is 18 and Charlie is 16.
Disclaimer: Sadly, I am not J.K. Rowling. If I was I would own Harry Potter.
Mid-June – The Burrow
1989
Charlie's POV -
I sat on my bed with 'Dragons of Ireland and England' (a book I had practically memorized) open in front of me, although I wasn't reading it. No, I was too busy watching as my older brother, slowly pulled out his clothes from the closet we shared, folded them and then placed them in his old school trunk. Today, was the last day I'd see him until Christmas, if he could get the time off work. Tomorrow, he'd be gone.
I looked back down at my book, trying to focus on the sleep cycles of the Irish Sharp Fang. Everytime, I started to read, my eyes always traveled back up to where Bill was packing for his trip tomorrow. It was still hard to believe he would not be here over the Summer Holidays, and that I would not see him at school when September came round. I had known he'd be leaving for a good solid three months now, but still the idea seemed foreign to me.
"What's wrong, Char?"Bill's voice broke me out of my shifting thoughts, making me look up at him.
I shook my head lightly, "Nothin'."
Bill gave me a look, "I can tell when you're upset Charlie.", he came and sat on the edge of my bed, "Come on, what's up?"
"It's fine. It's nothing."I told him quickly, looking back down at my book. I could feel Bill's gaze on me, trying to get me to open up, but finally he spoke, "Can you do something for me, Char?"
I looked up at him and nodded, "Yeah."
He looked at me with a small smile, "Take care of them for me, alright? The twins are starting this coming year and they'll be lost and scared at first and then I know they'll be a handful, but keep an eye on them. Perce too, even if he is in 3rd year. And when you come home, make sure to pay some attention to Ron and Gin. Can you do that for me?"
I nodded, "Haven't I always taken care of the younger ones?"
Bill smiled and nodded, "Yeah, I know you have. Just keep doing it, okay?" I nodded once more.
"Thanks, Char." and then Bill was up and packing again.
The next morning, I woke early. The same time as Bill. Both of us dressed in silence as the sun started to come up, and then headed down stairs where we would be able to eat our last meal for six months together, before Bill had to catch his portkey.
Breakfast was also a quiet affair. The twins, Ron, and Ginny had all said their goodbyes last night before Mum ushered them up to bed, so it was just Mum, Dad, Percy, Bill, and I who ate together at this time of morning. Mum kept quietly reminding Bill to be safe and to write every other day. Dad was listening to Percy as he told Dad about his previous school term. And I just sat and ate, soaking up the company of my family.
I stayed silent all the way until we had to start saying our goodbyes. I watched as Mum gave Bill a very tight hug and a kiss on the cheek, reminding him one last time to be careful and to owl. Dad hugged Bill and smiled at him, telling him to be safe. Percy hugged Bill briefly before scampering out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his room to go work on his summer homework.
"Charlie?" Bill stood in front of me now.
"Yeah?"
"Can you promise me one more thing?" he talked quietly, almost whispering.
"Yeah."
"Take care of yourself, while I'm gone."
"I'll do my best."
"Okay. Thanks, Char. I'll see you at Christmas. Send me some letters." and then he hugged me and I hugged him back. It was something we hadn't fully done in a while. Bill had put a comforting arm around my shoulder every once in a while, and I would thump him on the back, but we hadn't truly embraced for at least three years.
"I'll really miss you Charlie." he whispered to me.
"I'll miss you too, Bill." I whispered back as I felt tears prick my eyes. It was true. I would miss my older brother.
And then we let go of each other. It was time for Bill to leave. I watched as Bill carefully took some of the gray powder out of the flower pot and threw it in the flames of the huge roaring fire that crackled happily in the fireplace.
"I'll owl as soon as I get settled." Bill told us with a small sad smile on his face.
"We love you son." Dad told him and then Bill was walking into the flames.
"International Portkey Office." Bill called and with a whoosh he was gone.
5 Months Later
November 1989 – Hogwarts – Hospital Wing
Bill's POV -
I was the only one sitting next to him now. Mum and Dad had gone home to feed Ron and Ginny, Percy had led Fred and George back to the common room to get them to do some homework, and all of Charlie's friends had disappeared off to only Merlin knows where. Now it was just the two of us. Charlie looked thinner than the last time I had seen him. He was diffidently paler and the dark circles under his eyes showed he hadn't been sleeping well, even before the accident.
"Come on, Char." I lent over and whispered in his ear, "You gotta wake up and get better. You're missing a lot, you know." Charlie didn't stir. Carefully, I brushed a stray curl of his fiery red hair off his forehead.
"You gotta stop doing this to yourself, Char." I was whispering to him again once more, "Madam Pomfrey says that you're gonna be just fine. You just have to open your eyes." Still, Charlie didn't move. Didn't stir. Not even when I took the cool cloth off of his forehead, dunked it in some cold water, and placed it back on his feverish forehead after wringing out the excessive water.
I laid my head down against the bed, still looking at my unconscious and very sick brother. He was suppose to take care of himself. He promised me he would. I was already so worried about him before I left for Egypt, and that only multiplied by five once I was actually gone. And then the letters came.
At first it was okay. Charlie and I wrote to each other almost every day. And it was like that for the first few weeks. Charlie was okay. And then the letters started coming less often and they were shorter. At first, I knew it was suspected. Charlie was 16 and busy. He was becoming more independent, which was a good thing, not that I didn't mind him needing me. But, when school started is when I became more worried for my brother. Percy had mentioned that Charlie mostly stayed in his room or out in the back garden during the summer, but I figured he was probably writing mostly to his friends and his girlfriend, Eliza. Dad said that he was a little high-strung, which I figured probably had to do with the amount of homework he had to do and all of the quidditch training he was trying to fit in before the season started.
But, it wasn't until school had started that I had become more worried. The twins told me that he looked frazzled. Like he didn't quite know what exactly to do with himself. One of our good friends, Ben, who I had asked to keep an eye on Charlie, had mentioned that Charlie was having trouble in his classes and with his homework. Percy seemed worried about Charlie as well.
I tried writing to Charlie, asking what was going on, but Charlie only wrote a few times and they were all very quick responses, such as: "Everything's fine. Percy and the twins are good. Is Egypt good?" and that would be all I got. Everything's fine. Apparently, it wasn't. Maybe the twins were okay and maybe Percy was okay, but I knew that Charlie was not.
I knew I shouldn't have accepted to be enrolled in the summer training courses. I should've waited until the fall to go to Egypt. It would've been easier on Charlie. It would've been easier on me. But, yet, I was selfish. I was just so excited to go and live my dream that I had forgotten when I had sent back the forms how hard this would be on both Charlie and I. I had forgotten how much my eldest younger brother still needed me. I had forgotten how close we truly were.
And now we were both paying the price. Charlie had come down with Widower's Flu and he wasn't getting better. Madam Pomfrey had said that a normal healthy person would be able be sick for about a week and then be fine, but a sick or frail person wouldn't be able to fight of the infection very well. Obviously, Charlie hadn't necessarily been healthy before he caught it. And it was all my fault.
"I'm sorry, Char." I whispered to my closest brother as he continued to lay still.
I ended up staying next to Charlie all night, changing out the cloth every ten minutes or so. Madam Pomfrey had tried to take over a few times, but after one daring look she cleared off for a while. Charlie still hadn't made any progress and I was fighting off the sleepiness. And then I heard a soft whimper. My eyes flew open, sleep no longer trying to consume me.
"Charlie?" I asked quietly. Charlie's eyebrows crinkled slightly as he let out another soft whine.
"Come on, Char." I chanted quietly, encouraging him to open his eyes, "Come on. You can do it, Charlie." I repeated this over and over again as I watched Charlie's forehead crinkle and his eyebrows scrunch.
"Bill?" Charlie's voice was soft and weak. His eyes were still closed.
"Yeah, Char, I'm here. I need you to open your eyes." I took the cloth of Charlie's forehead, wet it, and replaced it. He still had a burning fever, but it seemed to have gone down slightly over the hours I had been sitting with him.
"Bill?" Charlie asked as his eyes finally started to blink open. I could've cried when I caught a slight peek at his normal brought blue eyes, but I was able to hold in the tears of relief.
"That's right Charlie. I'm right here." I told him, my voice cracking slightly.
"Bill. I don't feel so good." Charlie mumbled and then he tried to sit up ever so slightly. I would've pushed him back down, but he was starting to look a little green, so I helped him sit up. I reached for a bed pan that sat on Charlie's bedside table, but unfortunately I wasn't quick enough. Charlie had vomited all down the front of him and all over his blankets.
As Charlie started to sob quietly, I rubbed his hot back gently, "It's alright, Char. It's okay." Charlie didn't respond to my words really though, as he continued to sob and heave as I held the bed pan in front of him so he wouldn't get any more sick down the front of him, "You're gonna be okay."
The Next Day
Hogwarts – Hospital Wing – 11:00 PM
I passed Mum and Dad as they left the Hospital Wing for the night, knowing that I would be by Charlie's side all night.
"How is he?" I asked quietly as Mum gave me a soft hug and stood on her tip toes to give me a kiss on the cheek.
"He's doing a lot better. His fever broke around noon and Madam Pomfrey says that he's been getting better." Mum reported, her voice just barely above a whisper, "He's asleep now.".
"He's been wanting to see you." Dad told me just as quietly.
"I figured he would. I've been wanting to talk to him."
"Don't you dare wake him, William Weasley." though she was quiet, Mum's voice was stern.
"I wasn't going to, Mum. I promise."
"Good. Because your brother needs his rest."
"I know Mum. I promise I won't wake him." Mum nodded at this and smiled softly.
"Goodnight, sweetheart." she told me and then hugged me once more.
"Night, Bill." Dad smiled and then he led my mother down the hall, away from the hospital wing and around the corner.
That left me to go watch over my younger brother as he slept, just like I had last night and a few nights before that once I was able to get back to England. I quietly slipped through the doors of the hospital wing that was clothed in darkness and then made my way down the row of beds to Charlie's bed. Like Mum had said, Charlie was curled up under the sheets, fast asleep. I smiled softly to myself, glad that my brother was getting better and resting peacefully, as I took my place in the chair beside his bed.
I don't know how long I sat there just watching my brother to make sure he was still doing fine, but after a while Charlie's eyes blinked open and he looked at me.
"You should be sleeping." I whispered as I moved closer to him.
"I wanted to see you." he mumbled sleepily.
"I'll still be here in the morning. You should go back to sleep"
"I missed you." he told me in response.
"I missed you too, Char. I was so worried about you."
"I'm sorry."
"About what?" I asked truly puzzled as I looked at him.
"I'm sorry I made you worry." Charlie looked so guilty saying this.
"I'll always worry about you and the rest of the family. It's part of loving some one. And if anyone should be sorry, its me."
"What?"
"It's all my fault that you got sick."
"No it's not, Bill." Charlie told me, "It's nobody's fault. Everybody gets sick."
"If I hadn't left, you would have taken better care of yourself, right?" Charlie was already fighting to keep his eyes open as he shrugged, so I knew I would have to cut off our conversation.
"You should sleep." I told him as I pulled the covers up higher on him.
"I wanna talk some more." he whined slightly.
"I'll still be here when you wake up later." I reassured him.
"You won't leave?"
"Nope. I'll be right here the whole time."
"Promise?"
"I promise, Char. Now get some sleep."And with that, Charlie's eyes fluttered closed once more.
THE END
A/N: (Wow. It has been a while since I have written anything. Two weeks almost. For all of my followers, please don't flame me. I have had like a writing crisis. My creativity levels have been down to an all time low for the past two weeks and everything I write I have been scraping mostly (especially chapter five for 'Wish Granted' attempts). Anyways, I have been working on this all week and I am not really sure how well it turned out. I mashed like three of my ideas for BillxCharlie bonding fics together, hoped for the best, and got this. So I hope you enjoyed it.
But I want to tell you a little bit about Widower's Flu. It is a disease I completely made up so don't try to Google it or anything. It won't turn up on WebMD. So, my idea for this disease/infection was that it was sort of like normal flu. The symptoms include high fever, nausea, vomiting, dizziness, paleness, and loss of sleep. It is only contagious to others if the infected person kisses another person who does not have it. Anybody could technically come down with it randomly, but usually Widows or Widowers come down with it soon after they lose their significant other since they are under a lot of emotional strain and physical strain.
Anyways, I know Bill and Charlie are more OOC and all, but I thought I did an okay of writing their characters. Let me know what you all think. Your reviews give me more motivation to write. Don't for get to R&R. Thanks. S.A.M.)