Teenage Kicks
A/N Beta'd by Sarah (PutMoneyInThyPurse) and dedicated to Mench who really needs cheering up right now (hugs mench)
Bill Weasley - Father of Six
"How often do I ask for one night, Billy? Just one night for myself, that's all I want, and you begrudge me that, do you?"
"Please don't call me Billy, Mum," Bill groaned as he drowned in the guilt trip his mother was laying on as thickly as possible.
"Your father doesn't get the chance to have a night like this. He doesn't get invitations to Ministry functions and probably never will do again. One night Bill, just one night off, that's all I'm asking of you."
"Okay!" Bill huffed as he found it impossible to take the pitifully downtrodden look in his mother's eyes any longer.
Bill Weasley really hated babysitting and everything it entailed. He hated being the oldest, he hated that being the oldest didn't mean being the biggest, cleverest, funniest, cutest or the golden child who could do no wrong. Being the oldest meant he had to set the example. He had to watch his language. He had to change nappies and tell bedtime stories and stop fights and prevent accidental intra-sibling transfiguration while cooking and cleaning and never having a girlfriend because he's far too young for that sort of thing!
He was too young to have a proper girlfriend but he wasn't too young to be the surrogate father of six when his mother was too tired or busy or bloody pregnant again! When his mother wasn't making doe eyes at him to give her a moment's respite from the Weasley family nightmare until he felt like an utter sod for even complaining about babysitting for just one night.
Just one night.
He could do this for just one night.
"Pretty boy over there is not telling me what to do!" Charlie declared with his arms folded and his eyes wide with outrage.
"Bill is in charge, and you are one of his charges, Charlie Weasley, so you will do exactly what he tells you when he tells you, and you will not complain, do you understand me?"
Charlie exhaled deeply and looked at his feet with a petulant pout that a big tough young wizard like him really wasn't able to pull off successfully.
"Yes Mum," he murmured, so low that it was barely even audible.
Bill watched as his mother patted Charlie on his cheek and stood on tip toes to plant a sloppy kiss there with her brazen red lipstick, leaving a mark that Charlie knew from experience wouldn't rub off for at least three days. Bill smirked at Charlie's embarrassment as he kissed his fingertips and then patted them onto his right buttock. Charlie waited for his mother to turn around to walk over to say goodbye to Bill in a similar fashion and then he mouthed the words 'kiss mine' while making the wanker sign at his brother with a scowl.
"Thank you for this, Bill," his mother whispered as she hugged him tightly and gave him her own tattoo kiss mark on the cheek before frowning up at his messy hair, "You really will have to let me get this cut before you go back to Hogwarts, Bill, I'm sure it's against some kind of rule."
Bill shrugged his mother off with a huff, while Charlie silently chuckled and waggled his finger as if telling his brother off for letting the side down with his scruffy hair.
"Mum, will you lay off the hair for one second please?"
"Come on now, Molly," Bill was thankful for his father's interruption, "it's time to go. Don't worry Bill, I've caged the twins for you!"
Bill laughed at this while his mother looked horrified.
"You've what?"
"A joke Molly dear, only a little joke, a parting joke to our responsible sons before we...er, well...part."
"Nice save, Dad," Charlie grinned.
"Right well let me finish doing the rounds then, stop holding me up with all your silly nonsense," she fussed as she shoved her husband out of the way and Bill and Charlie shared a weary sigh as they followed her through to the kitchen where Fred and George were playing with something called a finger trap that their Dad had brought back for them from work. They were connected by their thumbs, their middle fingers, their little fingers and their big toes.
"As I said, Bill," their father smiled as he patted the delighted yet undeniably restrained twins on the head, "I've caged them for you."
"Cheers Dad!" Bill said as he watched his mother bending over at an odd angle to kiss each of them on the cheek and tell them to behave for their big brothers.
"For everyone 'cept Percy!" Fred yelled and George let out a gurgled giggle of agreement before losing his balance and falling over backwards, pulling Fred down with him.
There was a merry little chuckle from the far corner of the kitchen, and Bill saw something that would have been hysterical had it not been for the fact that he was now the one who had to deal with it. His baby brother Ronnie was standing in the corner on a copy of the Daily Prophet, dripping from head to foot with something brown and pungent.
"What on earth happened to you?" their mother exclaimed as she shook off her cloak, with no inclination to leave one of her children in that state while she went out gallivanting for the evening.
"Got dirty!" Ronnie said chirpily.
"How?" his mother demanded.
Ron looked at the twins and then back to his mother before putting his finger to his lips and making a shushing sound before whispering his response.
"Nobody pushed me into the compost," Ronnie said with wide eyes before looking back at Fred and George and whispering even louder then his real speaking voice, "I told you I wouldn't tell on you."
"He's lying, Mum!" Fred said as he tried to point with one of his trapped fingers.
"He can't lie to save his life!" their mother boomed at the cowering twins, "I will see to you two when I get back."
She pulled her cloak back on and took their father's arm.
"Get me out of here before I change my mind, Arthur," she said tensely.
"Mummy?" Ron asked sadly as he seemed to wonder what he had done to make his mother so cross.
She melted immediately and leaned down low to search for a clean spot to kiss goodbye before simply blowing him a kiss into his face, which made him smile again.
"Be good Ronnie. You do whatever Bill tells you, all right?"
"Stay on the paper!" Ron said in a very dramatic deep voice before grinning jovially again.
"Excuse me?" his mother said as she stepped back to take in her son's rapidly swinging moods.
"'Swot Bill said, I'm staying on the paper so your floor don't get dirty."
"Doesn't get dirty, Ronnie," his mother corrected him with a smile.
"It didn't!" Ronnie protested as he pointed around himself at the spotless floor.
Bill and Charlie shared an amused glance at each other as their mother gave up on the conversation with Ronnie altogether and looked around the kitchen for her two missing children.
"Where's the baby?" she blinked.
Ronnie's face fell and he looked at the twins again with wide eyes before looking back at his mother and seemed to be speaking while concentrating very hard at the same time.
"Ginny's on paper too."
The twins groaned and leaned into one another while their mother informed them that they would pay for whatever they had done to their baby brother and sister in more ways then they could imagine, just as Percy wandered into the kitchen and right into Ronnie, who stumbled off his newspaper and fell flat on his face, leaving a Ronnie-shaped brown splat on the kitchen floor.
Charlie laughed so hard that he could hardly stand, and had to stagger away into the living room to calm down, although he could still be heard through the walls howling as if this was the funniest thing he'd ever seen in his entire life so far.
"Ugh," Percy looked disgusted and began to wipe the foul smelling slime from his knee; "there's brown stuff on my trousers!"
"Never mind that dear," his mother said as she stepped over Ronnie, who was still stuck to the floor in a star shape, and planted a kiss on his cheek, "Bill will sort you all out when we're gone."
A new roar of laughter shook the foundations of the Burrow at this and Bill found himself trying to glare at his brother through the solid wall.
"But I can't use my wand outside of school. Can't you Scourgify 'em both for me now mum?" Bill pleaded.
"What part of 'night off' seems to be escaping you Bill?" his father said with a cheeky wink as he took a step towards the back door of the Burrow.
"Bye bye then dears," their mother waved as their Dad opened the door for her to step outside and prepare to Disapparate, "behave yourselves for your brother, and kiss Ginny from me when she's clean, won't you?"
"Yeah bye Mum, bye Dad, have a good time!" Fred waved with George's arm.
"Oh and Bill," his father leaned in to him to nod down at Ronnie at their feet, "I've a crowbar in the broom shed if you need it. Do try not to leave him there for too long, he'll set."
With a friendly pat and a wink his father followed his mother out the door and closed it behind them. Bill listened until he heard the two cracks of his parents' Disapparation and turned to take in the disastrous sight that was the Burrow's kitchen. Charlie's laughter had subsided now, and he was carrying Ginny through to set her down in the kitchen table. She was covered in the same goop as Ronnie and wrapped in a blanket that was now welded to her body.
"I think her nappy needs changing, but how you're gonna get to it through all that is beyond me."
"Thanks Char," Bill said as he felt the first stirrings of a nervous breakdown brewing up inside of him.
"No problem, Billy-boy," Charlie said as he rubbed his hands together and waved to his collected siblings, "I'm off. Have fun."
"Oi!" Bill snapped as he jumped over the twins' tangled bodies and ran after Charlie down the hall, where he was standing at the front door and slipping on his jacket, "Where d'you think you're going?"
"Out," Charlie shrugged.
"Um...no you're not!" Bill said as if waiting for the punch line to what had to be a very bad joke.
"Um...oh yes I think I am!" Charlie mimicked with a broad grin as he opened the door.
"You are going to help me with this lot," Bill gestured over his shoulder with his thumb.
"You're going to make me are you pretty boy?" Charlie stepped up to look his brother in the eye.
"I'm older then you. I'm in charge, you heard Mum."
"Yeah well you're also shorter then me and weaker then me and you know what else? Right now 'gorgeous'...mum's not here so I'm off out for the evening and you're gonna do sod-all to stop me...'cause you can't!"
Bill seethed as his brother smirked and swung the door closed behind him.
"Be good for Mummy Billy, children!" he called just before the door shut.
Bill stared at the closed front door and wished he had a different life and a different family. Then he took a deep breath in and turned to begin chiselling his siblings apart.