Fluture
Author's Note: Hello all! This story does not stand alone, but is Charlie's pov in several scenes throughout Se Revoir. You will need to read that one in order to understand anything about this one-shot. Once I finished writing Se Revoir, Charlie was in my brain, clamoring to tell his side of the story, and since I adore the possibilities of Charlie as a character, I indulged him. So, without further ado...Fluture.
Xxxxx
While he was tempted to cause trouble, Charlie knew he couldn't risk being strip searched in the Romanian Ministry again. He'd miss his portkey to Paris and shorten the already-short time he had to spend with Ginny.
So he kept his mouth shut even when the officials were spouting off nonsense toward him meant to provoke a response. Charlie just stared unblinking at the thin, dark-haired man who was examining his paperwork. It was all in order, but they never failed to want to read every single line, inspect every stamp, and check the magical signatures just to be sure. He had no idea what they suspected him of-he'd lived in Romania for the past fourteen years and had yet to overthrow any governments or join any subversive movements, the Order of the Phoenix aside.
"You go to Paris?" the man asked in heavily broken English.
"Then on to Spain," Charlie answered in Romanian, earning a narrowing of the official's eyes.
"How long?"
"A week," Charlie said. His appointment in Catalonia would only take a day, maybe two, but Charlie was fond of the Catalonian Reserve and would like to take some time there to explore before returning to the Romanian Longhorn Reservation. Plus, there were some great places in Barcelona that Charlie hadn't been to in years. Perhaps Noelia would still be there, with her dark hair, creamy skin, and black eyes that-
"Why Paris?"
The man's question startled Charlie from his reminiscing and he blinked at the man, his mind trying to keep up.
The man gestured toward the paperwork, indicating where Charlie had applied to stop in Paris. "France?"
"My sister lives there," Charlie said.
The man made a hum in the back of his throat as his pinched eyes returned to the paperwork in his hands. His finger traced the words and Charlie sighed heavily, rubbing a newly pink scar on his forearm.
He'd gotten in a few weeks ago when Amyyg, the newest adolescent Ironbelly on the reserve, had been overcome by lust for Friedhit, the dominant white female Opaleye. Charlie had been working with Amyyg and had just been able to get up a partial shield before the dragon displayed a burst of bright orange flame to attract Friedhit's attention. A lick of fire had made it past Charlie's magic and left this newest addition to Charlie's collection of scars.
If he hadn't been so pissed off at the hormonal dragon, Charlie would have accepted the burn with pride. The keepers often shared stories of how they'd acquired their scars, especially when new fresh-faced keepers would arrive at the reserve. Charlie remembered his first year there-barely seventeen-when he'd devoured the stories and naively wondered where his burns would be and the stories that he'd have to tell one day. A horny teenage dragon in the rampages of mating season wasn't on that list.
"And you work with dragons?"
"No," barked Charlie. His patience was growing thin and the sarcastic comments were threatening to leak out. "Unicorns."
The man's eyebrows pinched together and he blinked up at Charlie before glancing back down at the paperwork. "But..it says here-"
"We have unicorns on the reserve, too. Nasty little blighters. Their fire is almost as hot as the dragons."
" But-"
"Bet they didn't teach you that in your Care of Magical Creatures Class, did they?" Charlie said. He leaned over the desk, resting his thick forearms there, purposely trying to make his muscles bulge. "See, that's what you want to believe, that unicorns are docile, harmless creatures that never hurt anyone. Unicorns are killers, you know, not the peaceful innocents we are all led to believe." Charlie pointed to the wide scar that started on the back of his elbow and ran up the length of his forearm, at least six inches. "This one came from Zara. She didn't want her tail combed. This one from Mawu, who didn't want me trimming his hooves. I'd show you where I got gored by Calimerio but we're in a public place."
The official stared at each scar just a bit too long and Charlie nearly laughed when he swallowed audibly. Without much fanfare-really, what could he say to a man who dealt with murderous unicorns for a living?!-the man quickly signed the paperwork allowing Charlie to step into the line to receive his portkey to Paris.
Authorization in hand, Charlie glanced back over his shoulder once more before leaving the office. "Unicorns," he whispered, making the man's eyes grow wider.
The exchange left a smile on Charlie's face that lasted well into his quick trip to Paris. It was time to check on Ginny again. It'd been at least six months since his last visit, and although they kept in touch regularly via letter, Charlie knew that he needed to see her often to be able to gauge how his little sister really was. Ginny was good at hiding her feelings-far too good-but she had little tells that Charlie could pick out in person much better than he could in writing.
She was waiting at that charming little café where she worked, Amis Enchantés, sitting at a small table in the direct sunlight. Charlie slowed his step when he first saw her, trying to delay being seen by her, just yet. He wanted to be able to read her face before she put on the mask she wore so often.
Her hair was brilliant in the sun, glinting red that reminded him of when she'd been young, running around the garden at the Burrow, carefree and freckle-faced. She'd grown into a beautiful young woman over the past years, through those awkward teenage years when Charlie would sneak over to Beauxbatons a few times a year to see her, and into this successful, mature woman who seemed to have the whole world in front of her.
But Charlie knew better. She wore a mask, a thick skin that was meant to protect her from the world around her. It reminded Charlie of a chrysalis, the tough outer skin a caterpillar built to protect itself while it transformed into a butterfly. Magical butterflies often built very thick, almost impenetrable cocoons, staying in them for years before they emerged as the most beautiful magical insects imaginable. Charlie had called Ginny Crisalida for years, the Romanian word for cocoon, before realizing how hopeless it sounded.
Now he called her Fluture. Butterfly.
One day, he hoped that he'd be able to see her emerge from this self-exiled state she'd been living in, this protective cocoon, and be the woman he thought she really might be inside it all.
She was deep in thought as he watched, her brow furrowed, a fathomless expression on her face. Oh, how he wished he could read her mind, just for a few moments, to be able to see what her thoughts were, to see if there was any progress. There were times over the years that he thought...maybe, but then something would change in her eyes, leaving them closed off and little light in them again.
Ginny looked up from her thousand-yard stare and her expression brightened when she saw him walking down the street. For the briefest moment, there was a sense of joy there that Charlie hadn't seen in many years before Ginny schooled her face once more and the familiar smirk took its place.
"Hello, Fluture."
Charlie hopped the low fence that separated the cafe from the sidewalk and plunked down on the chair opposite his sister. He knew she'd offer him food-this was their tradition when he arrived in Paris-and he couldn't wait. His mouth was already watering for a taste of the rich meats and cheeses.
Ginny ordered when he told her what he wanted and Charlie tried to pick out the little clues about what was going on in her life by how she moved, how she looked. Her hair was pulled up in some sort of fancy twist, leaving a few tendrils that framed her face, and there was a hint of shine on her lips. Gloss. Huh. He hadn't seen her wear anything approaching makeup in years, not since Beauxbatons and the time he'd come to see her, only to find her face covered with colorful goop that so many of the teenage girls wore. He'd been unable to stop himself from telling her that she was prettier without it. She hadn't written to him for months, but the next time he'd come, she'd been fresh-faced and Ginny once more, not some made-up French floozy.
"Are you ever going to tell me what that means?"
Charlie blinked at her, trying to catch up. "What?"
"That name you call me."
He'd never told her what his various nicknames meant, and he didn't plan on telling her now. It wasn't that he thought she'd be offended, but more...that he wasn't ready to have the idea that she might emerge from her cocoon crushed. It was still...magical to him, and he planned to keep it that way. Maybe one day. "You'll have to learn to speak Romanian."
"Branleur," she growled at him.
Charlie just laughed. He knew exactly what she'd said. She sometimes forgot that he lived on a dragon reserve where the keepers off-time was spent at seeing how vulgar they could really be in every conceivable language and cultural context. It was an amateur insult, at best.
"And you'll have to learn French to know what I just said."
"Don't have to," he said, "I can guess."
Humor had always been a meeting ground for the siblings, and it helped ease some of the tension between them.
"How are you?"
Charlie knew she wasn't ready to talk about herself just yet. It often took her an hour or so before she softened up and would let some little tidbit of her life slip. So he told her about his life back in Romania, telling her about Amyyg and his unsuccessful attempt at mating with Friedhit. Then he told her that his boss was thinking of promoting him. The news would not go over well with his other family, as it meant a probable lifetime commitment to living in Romania, but he knew that Ginny would be happy for him.
"How about you?"
"Good." The answer came too quickly. Ginny's eyes flitted away from him and her body language screamed the lie. Charlie fought the urge to snap at her.
"That's it?"
She shrugged a shoulder. "Yeah, I mean...things are good."
"You always have a story about work, or your crazy roommate, or shopping, or something," Charlie scolded. "I come all this way to see you and I get 'good.' Things are either better or worse. They're seldom just good."
A shadow passed over her features, shattering the mask for a brief moment, allowing a wave of grief and exhaustion to show through.
One of the waitresses from the cafe came out just then, drawing both of their attention away. Charlie was immediately intrigued. She was edgy, with dyed hair and the hint of a shiny tattoo peeking out from the top of her uniform shirt. Her eyes sparkled at him, an open invitation to flirt.
"Who do we have here?" she asked as she settled their order in front of them. Her knee rubbed along Charlie's thigh shamelessly.
"Ines," Ginny said, "this is my brother, Charlie."
"Pleased to meet you." She presented her hand to Charlie in that strange French way they had and Charlie pressed his rough palm to hers, giving a firm handshake. One of her eyebrows-pierced with a silvery stud-rose slowly and she chewed on the corner of her lip.
"Likewise."
They chatted for a few moments more, Ginny's presence a mild distraction in the back of his mind. Charlie couldn't seem to help it. He was a virile, young man who didn't get to see many women. The female keepers at the reserve really weren't much to look at, and there were only a few women in town that Charlie hadn't already dated his way through. He wasn't really on the lookout for 'something serious', but always on the prowl for 'right now'.
"I like her," he said when Ines had finally excused herself, a little look over her shoulder at him. He would definitely be taking to her again, despite Ginny's warnings. He knew that his sister could guess at his reputation, and, really, what was the point in hiding that he had a healthy sexual appetite?
He picked at the food, humming in pleasure when the flavors mixed in his mouth, accented by the mild beer she'd ordered for him.
"There's really nothing more that you can say other than 'good'?"
Ginny hesitated and just when he thought she might explode in anger at him, or quip something horribly nasty at him, she snatched his other beer from the table and drank deeply. Normally, she wasn't one for beer, instead drinking wine when they were eating together.
"Good is...about as good as it gets with me, Charlie."
Strange. That was the first honest answer he could remember her giving for a long time when he pressed. The emotions-whatever it was she was feeling-were close to the surface today and Charlie wondered what was going on in her life that had floated them to the front of her carefully constructed facade.
"Don't get me started on that, Ginny."
They'd had this conversation before, but it was generally one-sided while Charlie probed and poked at the past, trying every conceivable angle to get her to respond. It was a delicate operation, somewhat akin to getting a dragon to trust him, Charlie realized. You had to build trust with the great beasts before you began prodding them to do what you wanted, to behave in such a way, or to respond to a situation in another way. Ginny was very similar.
He stared down at the charcuterie board, or what was left of it, and picked at the food there, popping nuts into his mouth and moving the pungent olives out of the way.
"Do you...do you think I close myself off?"
The question shocked him. "Yes," he answered, unable to say anything else.
She winced and stared off into the bright, sunlit street. "Ouch."
He couldn't feel bad for saying what needed to be said. "I don't lie to you, Ginny. Never have." He'd always prided himself on being completely honest. Charlie didn't lie, not even to spare someone's feelings. He might bullshit someone, like he'd done earlier today at the Romanian Ministry, but that wasn't really lying in his mind. Besides, storytelling was a time-honored Dragon Keeping tradition.
Her face pinched, a pained expression there. "I know."
Charlie thought hard about how to say what he wanted to say. Ginny rarely gave him the chance to bring up anything about the past, so he had to take care to do it right because it might be the only chance he ever got.
"I think that you're a little bit broken inside, still. And I think that's okay. We all are, honestly. But I also think that you worry about letting people into your life. You don't want to be responsible when they get hurt, because you always think that they will."
Images of Ginny's gaunt, haunted face as she'd stared at Percy's coffin came into his mind. It was the one thing he couldn't bring himself to forget about his brother's funeral. That look of pure deadness that had been there. The only thing that he could compare it to had been when he'd seen Hagrid carrying Harry's lifeless body from the Forbidden Forest at the Battle of Hogwarts. Harry'd worn the same look-dead, the life drained from him, his body slack in Hagrid's arms.
Ginny had seemed the same at eleven years old, only standing at the graveside, her body responding as it should, even if her soul was absent.
"Everyone gets hurt, Charlie," Ginny said, "even in a good relationship. We're human and we don't always watch what we say."
"Yeah, we all do stupid things. And our choices aren't always the best, but you can't protect everyone. I'm not even sure you realize you're doing it."
"I know very well what I'm doing," snapped Ginny. "It's been pointed out to my recently."
He thought about that and wondered who was brave enough to talk to Ginny about the past. The family had basically stopped talking about it, even to Charlie, and seemed to hover just out of reach-where Ginny allowed them to stay-just to be a small part of her life.
Maybe it was Marie, her crazy roommate, who was trying to get Ginny to face what had happened. Charlie had met her a couple of times and they got along okay, but despite her eccentric ways, Marie had never struck Charlie as particularly brave. And he guessed that it would take someone pretty damned brave to begin working through Ginny's issues.
"That's good," said Charlie. "We all need a kick in the arse now and again. But I'm also talking about how you try to protect other people by limiting your connections with them. You saw what it did when you went to someone you loved and trusted with something big. You told Percy about the diary, and then he ended up getting killed."
Ginny's face paled. "Don't."
"But that wasn't your fault," he continued. "There was nothing you could do to stop it, or even to mitigate Percy's actions. He made his own choices, Ginny. You don't seem to see that in the situation."
"Don't blame him," she bit out. "It wasn't his fault."
"Why not? He was acting like a prat. There were people he could have gone to that would have helped. Instead, like he always did, Percy handled it himself."
Charlie fought the urge to stand up and shout Percy's name over and over again. Why couldn't she see it? Charlie had loved his little brother, but Percy was a prat, to put it mildly. He'd always been so sure of himself, headstrong and almost reckless, in a way. He'd always been so sure that he was right and he often needed a good knock upside the head to dislodge that idea from his mind.
"He was trying to protect me."
"Maybe," said Charlie, "but now can you see that his choices played a part in this? What about the twins? They saw that something was going on with you and didn't say anything. And Ron-"
"Not their fault." Ginny was almost seething now and Charlie felt a thrill of triumph. Anger was acceptable because it was a raw emotion, real and tangible, when Ginny had been anything but for years. And sometimes anger was necessary to burn off the hurt until the real issues could come to the surface. Charlie was pretty sure he knew what those issues were, but they were Ginny's to work through and nobody could do it for her.
"What I'm saying, Ginny, is that you need to see the entire picture, not just the pieces that involve you." Charlie pushed away the empty food board and sat back in his chair, watching her closely.
"I'm being prideful," Ginny said, a strangely distant look in her eyes.
"Yeah, you are. What you went through…" A wave of exhaustion nearly overcame him. He'd thought that he'd worked through these emotions long ago, come to terms with what had happened, but he was beginning to think that it was a wound that would never properly close. And maybe it wasn't meant to ever heal. "Nobody should have had to do that, but...you did. And you're still alive-"
"Thanks to Harry."
There was a softness in her voice that perplexed him. Charlie thought about Harry and his few interactions with Ginny, relayed by Ron to Charlie just after Harry had pulled Ginny from the Chamber. She'd never mentioned Harry to Charlie, not once, in all these years. And now…
"Yes, thanks to Harry. But you've survived because of you. Harry pulled you out of that place, but it's been you that's held yourself together for this long."
"I'm not together," Ginny protested. "Far from it, I assure you."
"That's something you can fix."
There was too much in his head, too many pieces that were floating around in there, unwilling to come into a picture that Charlie could figure out.
"I need to piss," he told her absently. "Be back. Want another beer?"
Ginny didn't seem to hear him, so Charlie stood and went into the café. Ines was behind the bar and spotted him the moment he walked into the dimly lit interior.
"Loo?" he asked.
She jerked her head to the side and tossed the towel she was wiping her hands on to the counter. "Follow me. I'll show you."
Charlie grinned, his earlier deep thoughts forgotten for the moment. His thought train derailed as he watched Ines' shapely ass lead him toward the far back corner of the place.
"Here." She motioned toward the door, and had his bladder not been threatening to burst, Charlie might have pulled her in with him.
"Wait for me."
She grinned and gave him a little nod.
Ines was waiting in the even darker corner of the hall when he came out. She wasted no time pulling him into a heated kiss, rubbing against him.
Charlie groaned, all in on the lustful embrace. Ginny had warned him that Ines was wild and she was proved right. Generally, Charlie wasn't one to be bothered with foreplay, but this was a bit...extreme, even for him.
"Can you get away tonight?" she whispered in his ear when Charlie backed her against the wall, rubbing in all the right places.
"Yeah."
"This is my place." She pushed something down deep into the pocket of his worn jeans, purposely caressing him in the process.
Charlie swore into the skin of her neck and gave one last bite to the flesh there. "Ten?"
"Yeah."
He broke away, forcing himself to remember that his little sister was waiting for him.
"I need more food," he finally said. Ines straightened herself, smirking when Charlie watched her adjust her skewed shirt.
"Same thing?"
"Yeah," he said. "I'm a growing boy. Need my energy."
"You'll need a lot of it tonight," she said as she walked away, taking his hand and dragging her with him to the bar.
They flirted as Ines ordered his food, sharing dark, promising looks while the kitchen put together his order.
"You are the Dragon Trainer, no?" Ines asked as she leaned on the bar toward him. A tiny bit more of her tattoo was showing and Charlie watched with interest as the paw of some magical animal was revealed. The other bartender scolded her, but Ines made a rude hand gesture behind her back in his direction and he walked away, shaking his head.
"Ten," she said when she handed over his food. "Don't be late."
Charlie nodded his head and levitated the food out to the patio, where Ginny was still lost in thought.
Ginny seemed a little bit annoyed with him over his date, but she let it go quickly, startling him with a question he never thought he'd hear her ask.
"Did you know about the plan to bring me to France?"
That time had been such a mess in their family. Charlie had come home immediately after hearing about Percy and Ginny, but he was ashamed to say that his thoughts had been less than generous at the time. He didn't blame Ginny, who had been so very young, but he had a very hearty anger for Percy, his parents, Fred and George, and even Professor Dumbledore. It had taken him quite a while to work through those feelings after returning to the reserve and taking time to put them in their place.
"Not until after." His father had written a letter to both he and Bill, who was abroad in Egypt at the time, and told them of their decision.
They talked about the decision to protect Ginny and Charlie was surprised at how angry Ginny sounded at it. She'd always seemed to understand the choice, and even agreed with it when it had been brought up in the past. Now, it seemed, the issues she had with being hidden away in another country were bubbling up. And Charlie understood that, in a way. They had been protecting her, trying anything they could to save her in any way they knew how. Being angry at their parents was a simplistic way of looking at it, Charlie thought. There was so much more to the decision than probably either of them had ever considered.
"Ten years is a long time, Ginny. Maybe it's time to start thinking about-"
"I am."
"-forgiving them."
"Is that what you think I've been doing all this time, punishing them?! Charlie...it's more about punishing myself, I assure you."
"Then start forgiving yourself." He knew that was at the heart of it all. Ginny was carrying so much guilt-not just for Percy's death, but for the people who had gotten hurt, or even inconvenienced by her choices so long ago. And she'd never been allowed to really work through it and begin forgiving herself.
"Charlie...did you leave because you couldn't forgive them for something? Is that why-"
"Me?" He laughed. "No. I left because I'm a barmy arse who loves dragons."
It was early in the morning when Charlie got dressed. Ines was sprawled on top of her bed, completely nude, but smirking happily up at him.
"You leave today?"
"In an hour," he said, looking back over his shoulder. "I told you this wasn't-"
"I'm not looking for commitment, you ass," Ines said with a laugh. "But I enjoyed it. If you pass this way again…" She gave a little shrug and Charlie watched as the tiger that was tattooed on her chest purred in contentment.
"Good," Charlie said. He was more interested in pleasure than permanent, anyway.
He finished getting dressed and was just about to apparate away when he stopped and looked at her. "How close are you and Ginny?"
Ines laughed. "I will not be telling her about tonight, if that is what you mean."
"Good," he said. "But I meant...are you a friend?" He ruffled his hair, unsure what exactly he was meaning to ask. "I just…"
"We are friends," Ines said. She sat up and pulled her uniform shirt over her shoulders, leaving it unbuttoned.
"How is she?" Charlie asked. "She doesn't...she's very private with me. She doesn't tell me much about how she is."
"Ginny is...private, yes," Ines said. "But…" She chewed the corner of her lip, measuring her words. "But I think she has a new boyfriend. Maybe from her other work?" She thought about it and shook her head. "He was there a few weeks ago and she was...happy? Maybe not. But she has been taking more time away from the café."
Charlie thought about that for a minute before nodding. He didn't mind the idea of Ginny dating someone, as long as the bloke treated her right.
"Does she seem happy to you?"
Ines made a face and threw up her hands slightly. "I do not know! Ginny is...hard to read. She is happy one moment, sad the next."
"Yeah, I know."
"I will watch her for you. The next time you come I will tell you more."
Charlie nodded and pushed the thought to the back of his head.
"One more kiss?" Ines asked. She sat up onto her knees, shifting the shirt she wore more open. Charlie groaned and leaned across the bed, letting himself get lost for a few minutes more before he really had to go or miss his portkey to Spain completely.
"Come help me?"
The question was less of a question and more of a commandment. Bill had a way with doing that, as many older brothers do, Charlie decided.
He tilted his head back, looking upside down over the back of the sofa where Bill stood. "With what?"
"Setting up tables in the garden," Bill said as he hooked his thumb over his shoulder.
"I just got here," Charlie said with a whine.
"Yesterday."
"I'm tired."
"You slept for twelve hours, you tosser," Bill hissed. He sent a stinging hex to the side of Charlie's neck. Charlie slapped his hand to the sore spot and returned a nasty word toward his older brother.
"Careful," Bill warned. "Teddy's wandering around here someplace. Tonks' give me hell if he learns more curse words."
Charlie cackled out a laugh. He'd already taught the little sprog two new Romanian words that were highly questionable since arriving yesterday. He grinned at Bill and measured his brother in the role of fatherhood. It looked good on Bill, in a weird sort of way.
"You going to help, or just stare at me all day?"
"If you're offering options-"
"I'm not," Bill said. He jolted the sofa and nearly upended Charlie off it completely.
"I'm coming, you arse." Charlie got up, taking his time to stretch and flex, causing Bill to roll his eyes.
"Mum wants dinner in the garden tonight," Bill said, as if their mother hadn't already told Charlie half a dozen times since his arrival. "Since the weather's nice, she thought it would be good."
"Fine."
They went outside, passing through the kitchen, where Teddy was standing on a kitchen stool next to Grandma Molly, getting a lesson in how to charm vegetables to dance around a plate.
Both men shared a glance. "She didn't let me touch a wand until I was eleven," Charlie grumbled. "Grandkids really do have it the best, don't they?"
Bill laughed and clapped him on the back. "Let's chuck a few gnomes for old-time's sake."
Charlie scowled at the little potato-like creatures. "I thought we were just-"
"Yeah, well, it needs to be done. Don't want to have them mucking up dinner, do we?"
They began spinning and tossing the little demons one at a time, making it a competition to see who could get them furthest.
"Heard from Ginny lately?" Bill asked.
Charlie watched his garden gnome fly, giving a little fist-pump when if far exceeded Bill's last throw.
"Yeah," he said. "Stopped in Paris a few weeks ago, before I went to Spain. We had lunch together."
Bill nodded and tossed another, adding a little spell to propel it further. Charlie would protest the cheating, but he'd already planned to do the same to his next shot.
"How is she?"
Charlie thought back, remembering how he'd been surprised that she was willingly talking about the past, at least a little bit. She hadn't mentioned anything more in her latest letter, but Charlie didn't think much of it.
"She's...good, I guess. She's...Ginny. It's hard to tell, honestly." He spun his gnome while the little blighter screamed "geroff! Let me go!" and then let it go, watching it sail high and long.
"Yeah."
"Have you written to her lately? Or gone to visit?"
Bill didn't answer for a long minute. He walked around the garden, kicking at clumps of longer grass and flushing a few more gnomes out of hiding. "You know I don't go-"
"Yeah, right." Charlie nodded. "I remember. But, seriously, what are the chances that you'd run into-"
"In Paris," Bill said, "and with my luck, pretty great."
Charlie thought about that as he studied his brother's scarred face. He didn't know exactly what had happened between Bill and Fleur, just that Bill had shown up at the dragon reserve after leaving France and had spent almost a month fall-down drunk before he sobered up and moved back to England.
"It's funny, isn't it?" Charlie said. He snatched a fat, waddling gnome off the stone fence as it tried to evade him and began to spin it around.
"What is?"
"The way things turn out," Charlie said. "I mean, I didn't expect…" He trailed off, unsure how to express the ideas that were churning in his mind. "The way things change, how our choices affect things. I don't know what I expected out of life, I guess, but it's different."
"Yeah. I guess I see what you mean."
"Do you think you and Tonks will get married?"
Bill faltered in his toss and Charlie congratulated himself on the timing of the question. "Maybe," he finally said. "We haven't really talked about it, or anything. I mean-"
"But you love her."
"Yeah," Bill said. "I do."
"And you don't think it's too soon-"
"We haven't even…" He huffed and scowled at Charlie. "We're being pretty cautious. There's a whole lot of issues that need to be considered, but…"
"And you don't think it's wrong to want to be with her?" Charlie pressed. "I mean, Remus was our friend."
Bill swore and glared at him, but Charlie just grinned. He knew exactly the right buttons to push to get Bill all worked up. Always had.
"You really are an arse," Bill said. "But...no. I don't think it's disrespecting him at all. I think...I think that we both needed a friend after the Battle. And I think that Remus would want her and Teddy to be taken care of."
"I get it," Charlie said. He perched himself on the rock fence that bordered the garden and watched Bill search for more gnomes. "I just wanted to hear you say it, make sure you're not messing her around."
Bill glared over his shoulder.
"Go on," Charlie said. "Call me that name again, the one you called me earlie. I'm starting to believe it's my given one."
"Funny."
"Ginny called me something much worse last time I saw her."
"You do have a way of charming people." Bill tried not to laugh, but Charlie could see the corners of his mouth tilt up slightly.
"What really happened with Fleur?"
Bill sat next to him on the fence and they looked at the back of the Burrow. "She wasn't who I thought she was," Bill said. He shook his head and Charlie took the hint to back off.
"Come on, let's get the tables. Mum will yell if we don't get them done soon."
"We need a few extra chairs," Bill said. "Harry's bringing a friend. A girlfriend."
Charlie nodded but the mention of Harry's name stirred something in his memory. "What's he about, these days?"
"Working with Dad," Bill said. He opened the doors on their father's storage shed wide and lit his wand to peer into the dark interior. "Been working some strange case lately that has him traveling all over. I think he went to France, recently. Ron was babbling on about it the other day, but I was distracted at just the wrong minute, I think. Teddy thought that Harry said he had a friend who was a ghoul, not a girlfriend. He got all worked up about it. Tonks told him what a ghoul really is, took him up in the attic. Kid hasn't stopped whining about it since."
There was a fondness in his voice that made Charlie smirk. "You're such a...dad, these days."
Bill turned around to quip something in response, but just ended up smiling. "Thanks."
"Who's the girlfriend?"
"No clue."
They wrestled two folding tables out of the corner, levitating piles of old Muggle junk out of the way until they had them out in the garden.
"I think she's French," Bill said once they'd charmed the grime off the tables and spread the table covers that their mother had sent zooming out to them.
"Who?"
"Harry's girlfriend. Ron said something about him meeting her over there."
"Oh."
Charlie thought about that and a strange thought popped into his head. "Oi, you don't think… Nah."
Bill finished charming the old lanterns to float around the edges of the garden. "What?"
"Well, wouldn't it be ironic if Harry's girlfriend turned out to be someone we know?"
"Like who?"
Charlie peered at him, a wicked smile spreading on his face. "Like Fleur, or-"
"It's not," Bill said. "Ron already asked."
Charlie laughed and slapped his brother on the shoulder. "Well, I guess we'll find out soon enough. Still, who would be crazy enough to date that skinny little blighter?"
Bill snorted and shook his head.
Charlie had his suspicions when Bill mentioned that Harry's girlfriend was French. He hadn't said anything aloud, just in case it didn't turn out how he thought, but the moment that he'd seen Ginny walk into the garden, her hand clasped tightly in Harry's, Charlie had to bite his lip to hold in a whoop of joy.
There was still a shell in place, Ginny's expression shielded carefully to hold in her emotions, but when she looked up at Harry the beauty of the light in her eyes nearly stole Charlie's breath away.
There she was, his little butterfly, just beginning to break out of her cocoon and realize that she had wings.
"Hello everyone."
"Hello, Fluture. Fancy meeting you here."
She let out a shuddering breath and nodded. "Hi, Charlie. Glad you made it alright."
"You too."
The new boyfriend that Ines talked about had to have been Harry. And he was likely the one who had gotten Ginny to face part of her past. A new respect for Harry Potter blossomed in him. She looked at Harry again, a fleeting glance, and Charlie nearly launched himself over the table to kiss Harry on the lips. What the boy had done was nothing short of a miracle.
Throughout the night, Charlie watched as the couple interacted. He saw the soft touches, the encouraging glances, the way that Harry would look to her to make sure she was alright, and the way that she would nod toward him, reassuring him that she was fine. No matter what, Charlie knew that despite the hurdles still in her way, Ginny was now home, and she might not be fine, but she was on her way back. And he would do everything he could to help her in any way possible.
And he would beat Harry's arse at their race, just to make sure he knew that Chosen One or not, Charlie wouldn't be outflown by anyone and that Harry'd better keep Ginny happy because big brother Charlie was always only a portkey away.