It was a depressing day at the burrow. Harry Potter, Ron Weasley, Hermione Granger, and Ginny Weasley were all sulking in the family room. They were wearing midnight black dress robes and black dress shoes. George Weasley was in the kitchen rummaging around in the refrigerator for something sweet to eat. He needed it after what had happened lately. There had been so many deaths. Remus Lupin and Nymphadora Tonks both died, leaving their infant son, Teddy Lupin, all on his own. Tonks' mother, Andromeda, had generously taken him in. But they brought him over a lot to visit.
George remembered back to their funeral, which had been one conjoined event. There were a lot of people he didn't know, and a lot of what was left of the Order. They were buried in Godric's Hallow, a fact that somewhat surprised him.
George's twin, Fred Weasley, had also died in the battle of Hogwarts. It was a raging battle, but he died for a good cause. Soon after, Harry defeated Voldemort, the Dark Lord. Fred was not there to see it, for he had passed away shortly before that.
As soon as George found a slice of chocolate cake on the top shelf of the refrigerator, his mother, Molly Weasley, came downstairs, tissue in hand. She was sniffing and blowing her nose into the tissue. As soon as George turned around, he could see tears shimmering on her face. Ginny heard the dreadful sound of her mother's fateful sobbing. She was about to stand up and comfort her when Harry put a gentle hand on her shoulder, telling her to let her mother handle the situation on her own.
Suddenly, the doorbell rang, and without Mrs. Weasley even having to answer the door, in walked Bill and Fleur, the fairly new couple, both dressed in black robes. "Oh," cried a saddened Fleur, running over and embracing Mrs. Weasly into a gargantuan hug, "Mrs. Veasley, I am so sorry about vat happened. Eet eez a tragedy!" Everyone in the room noticed her lovely French accent.
"Thank you, Fleur. Are you ready for the funeral? It will begin in a few minutes," sobbed Mrs. Weasley. She walked toward the back door and out into the yard, her flaming red hair bobbing up and down with every step, Bill and Fleur following.
Ginny suddenly stood up and raced out the back door, following her mother. Ginny's hair was straight and like the rest of her family's, flaming red. Her brown eyes were filled with tears. Being respectful to the Weaslys, Harry got up to follow Ginny out the door. That left Ron and Hermione alone on the cream-colored couch in the burrow.
"Ronald," she started, but Ron was apparently too upset to talk. "He died for a good cause. He died for all of us in trying to defeat Voldemort! And we completed that task!"
"Yeah, I guess," stated Ron, scooting over to hug Hermione. "I just really miss him. If I miss him this much, I wonder how George must feel. I mean, Fred was his twin!"
"There, there, Ron," said Hermione, trying to comfort him, "it'll all turn out okay in the end. Let's go outside to attend the funeral." She planted a kiss on his forehead.
Ron remembered back before he and Hermione were dating. They were playing Marry, Do, or Kill with Harry in the backyard. "Ron, you aren't saying much," Hermione had commented. "It's your turn, anyway."
Ron gulped. "Well, I would kill Harry, if I had to, marry Hermione, and do, um, Hermione!"
Hermione shook her head, disgusted. "Why not just marry or do?"
"Because," Ron had tried to explain, "I wouldn't want to marry anyone else," he finished, ears flushing scarlet. Well, that sounded a lot better in my head, he had thought to himself.
Hermione grunted, unimpressed. "Yeah, and doing anyone else is just out of the question."
"Well," said Ron, thinking this was extremely unfair, "What would you have said?"
"Marry Harry, do Krum, and kill Ron," she said, as if reciting from one of her textbooks.
Ron scowled and ran inside. Harry and Hermione heard a door slam.
Hermione laughed, but later she had come in and kissed him. After saying she was joking, of course.
In the backyard, there was a white marble coffin lying on the ground. Encased in it, was Fred Weasley, dead as a doornail. He would never laugh or cry or breathe again. His face was as white as the coffin he was lying in. Pale and lifeless, the last laugh lingering as if frozen on his face. Everyone was gathered around the coffin and hovering over Fred's corpse. The coffin was open for visitors to look at Fred. They could even touch him for a short while.
There were a lot of the same people there were at Bill and Fleur's wedding, Harry observed. He glanced across the yard to Teddy Lupin, who was squirming around joyfully in Andromeda Tonks' arms, and didn't know a thing about what was going on. His hair was rapidly changing colors from turquoise to pink, to white, to grey, to green, and so on, just like his mother, Nymphadora. He was especially clingy to Mr. and Mrs. Weasley. He got a bit scared when he was somewhere with many unfamiliar people, like most babies do, but was somehow still comfortable with Harry, Hermione, or any of the Weasleys. He nearly jumped out of Andromeda's arms to hurry over to Mrs. Weasley, but Mr. Weasley stopped him at the last second.
After everyone had had a last look at Fred Weasley, the coffin was closed. The ceremony began. "We are gathered here today," started the minister, "to mourn the death of Fred Weasley. He had six siblings and was planning to grow up and have many children. Unfortunately, that did not happen. Fred Weasley died in the Battle of Hogwarts on May fifteenth.
"Molly and Arthur Weasley, please come forward to watch your son be buried."
The two distraught parents stepped forward and towards Fred's white marble coffin, and Harry suddenly thought of his own parents, who died saving him. "I always hoped that I would die before my children," sobbed Mrs. Weasley. I guess I was wrong!" She broke out in a fit of gasping sobs, and Harry felt sorry for her.
Fred's coffin was being lifted and dropped into the 6-foot hole of earth. Fred was being buried in the Weasleys' backyard. It is an odd place to have a coffin—in someone's backyard—but it was what Mr. and Mrs. Weasley wished to do with their son's dead body.
After he was buried, everyone proceeded back inside. Bill and Fleur stayed at the burrow, but not for very long, as Mrs. Weasley had warned them that she didn't have much room. Harry and Hermione were both staying overnight with the Weasleys because Harry had nowhere else to go and Hermione made her parents forget they even had a daughter.
Everyone sat around the table to talk about their favorite memories with Fred. "Hey," said George, "at least we have good memories about Fred. Like when we opened Weasley's Wizard Wares and we made the sign about U Know Poo."
Mrs. Weasley started to sniff so she excused herself from the table.
Later that evening, Ron went to the kitchen to get some milk, Harry and Ginny sat down on the couch again, staring at the blank wall in front of them, and Hermione went to use the upstairs bathroom. Her footsteps could be heard stomping up the stairs. "What's her problem?" Harry asked Ginny.
"I don't know, Harry," Ginny replied in a harsh tone. "Maybe RON WILL KNOW!"
"Wh-what would make you think I would know?" stuttered Ron. "I'll just go and check on her."
He got up from the wooden kitchen chair and ran up the stairs, mumbling to himself. Harry could hear him say the words "moody" and "connection" and even a few curse words.
"What was that?" asked Harry after Ron had left.
"Well," replied Ginny pointedly, "they've been going out for about a month but that's all I can think of." She paused and scratched her head. "Come to think of it, that's all we know about their relationship!"
Harry's eyes widened. "You don't think…?" Harry's voice trailed off.
"I'm way ahead of you," she muttered. "Whatever," she continued. "We should just leave them at it."
When Harry got tired enough, he decided to go up to bed. He was sharing Ron's bedroom, but it wasn't too terrible, though Ron did snore.
Harry swung open the door and turned white in seeing what was behind it—Ron and Hermione on the bed—lying on top of each other.
"Wha-?" he sputtered, disgusted, though not too incredibly shocked.
Flustered, Ron sat upright and Hermione stood. They had both turned scarlet, and were covering themselves with bed sheets, staring at Harry.
"Uh, I was going to go to bed, now."
"Wha—oh, yeah" Ron replied. Hermione left, gathering up her clothes on the way. "Sorry, mate," Ron said after she had left.
"Uh, yeah, okay," Harry replied awkwardly. "Can this day get any weirder?"
Harry slept fitfully, but he didn't dream of Voldemort. Instead he dreamt Ron and Hermione got married and Fred hadn't died. Instead, Ginny had died, and Harry was with Cho Chang, his girlfriend from fifth year. Cho was drowning, and Harry was turning into a snake. But the snake wasn't Nagini, as Harry had expected. Instead, it was the basilisk from the Chamber of Secrets. It thrashed around in skin and bones, apparently hurt from something Harry didn't understand. Then he was in the Weasley's backyard. The Weasleys and a very pregnant Hermione were all yelling at him. Then, Ron started yelling, "The British are coming! The British are coming!", even though they were all British in the first place. Everyone in the yard was blaming him for Ginny's death, but it wasn't his fault. He had to get away. All this yelling…then, he was running, to where he didn't know. And the Weasley's were chasing after him, except for Hermione, who was waddling along at a slower pace, along with all of their gnomes. The Weasleys got tired quickly, though, and they stopped. But Harry kept running, and the gnomes continued after him, along with the chickens; Ginny's, Lupin's, Tonks's, Sirius's, Dumbledore's, Snape's and his parents' ghosts; and Mrs. Weasley's household clock that tells her where each of the family members are. He was slowly losing speed, and just when everything caught up with him he woke up.