A/N: All characters are copyright to J.K. Rowling, all lyrics of 'The War Was in Color' are copyright to Carbon Leaf.
"Are you sure it's up here?"
I was supposed to be looking for the box of Roxanne's old clothes; Ted and Vic were expecting a girl and apparently could do with looking through it.
"Yeah, somewhere towards the back." Mum answered, and I rolled my eyes. Perfect. Dad was in Ottery St Catchpole visiting his parents, so according to mum it was up to me to clamber over the mounds of joke items, a lot of which rather volatile and prone to exploding, to find a box of baby clothes. I carefully edged around a stack of five boxes, labelled 'WWW' and stepped over another one box, already regretting my decision to do this. I'd never admit it but the slight press of the darkness where my wand light didn't touch was unnerving me. I wasn't scared, obviously. Fred Weasley didn't get scared of the dark, especially at 20 years old.
I paused after half jumping over a row of boxes each stacked three-high, having found myself in the middle of the attic. I cast my wand light around towards the back of the room, where the joke shop boxes stopped and tattier looking ones started, labelled 'Quidditch Stuff' and even one labelled 'Crap'. I assumed the one I was looking for would be amongst these, so I continued my expedition across the room, almost tripping over the corner of yet another one, but made it anyway.
The whole back wall was lined with stacks of boxes, some stretching to the ceiling; I could see why dad had done an enlargement charm on the room. I sighed, stretching my back out to prepare for the task ahead, then started from the left and worked right, looking down each column of cardboard boxes. I found the right box in one of the smaller stacks; on the floor beneath a box of my old stuff, just labelled as 'Fred', and an unmarked one. Setting my wand down on the floor, light pointing at the stack, I put my hands on the side of my box and lifted it down with the unmarked one. As I did this however, a rather large spider scuttled from its resting place on the side of the unmarked box and down over my hand, making me jump in the air and drop both of them. After dealing with the spider with a swift stamp of my foot, I turned to pick up the two boxes I had dropped.
I paused. The unmarked box now lay on its other side, with what had been the back facing me, and written on it was 'Fred's baby stuff.' I frowned lightly and looked at Roxanne's; hers had 'Roxanne's baby stuff' written on it. So why did I have one more box than she did? I sat down and pulled the 'Fred' box towards me; it was quite a bit older than the other two. The flaps were undone and I pulled at them, bending them over the other side so the box remained open.
I see you've found a box of my things.
There wasn't much in it, to be honest. But it didn't take me any longer than a fraction of a second to figure out what the box was. It wasn't for me, Fred. It was my late-Uncle, Fred.
Dad didn't ever speak of him. Sometimes my other Uncles or Aunt did, but never dad. I understood completely, I doubt I would have ever gotten over it either, if I had a twin who had died. The only person who'd given me the complete story was Uncle Harry, and even he was still sombre about it.
These old pictures are cool, tell me some stories.
I reached in and pulled out a framed photograph. It must've been developed in Potion; the two black and white figures in it were moving. The only reason I knew who it was was because the two figures looked exactly the same; my dad still had his ear when this was taken, apparently. They were laughing in the picture, arms around each other, identical from the twinkle in their eyes to the dimples in their cheeks. It made me smile slightly, seeing that twinkle in my dad's eyes. I had seen it from time to time, but this twinkle looked as easy and smooth as his broad grin, because his twin was there next to him. What'd happened to rid them of this evidently vital link in my father's life?
Where to begin? Let's start with the end, this black and white photo don't capture the skin.
I knew what'd happened. Voldemort. Death Eaters. A war at Hogwarts. My Uncle was just a casualty of war, and all anyone had to prove his existence with was boxes of items and a grave stone in the Memorial Site. I ran a finger through the dust over my Uncle's and namesake's beaming face. What'd his last few moments been like? Had he known? Did he suffer?
If red is for hell, the war was in color.
I'd never felt frustrated about this subject before, but I did now. What right did anyone have to take his life? I was burning with questions about him, the questions that one point all children want to know about relatives, but never got the answers to them. It wasn't fair.
I set the photo back into the box and pulled out something else; a beater's bat. I couldn't help a grin; mum had told me that dad and Uncle Fred had been the best beaters around during their time at Hogwarts. I liked to think that he'd be proud of me; everyone said I'd inherited my talent at being a beater from my dad. Privately, in the back of my mind, I'd always wanted to live up to the namesake. Since a young age I'd realised that my dad had obviously been close enough to his twin to name his son after him, and I held that with honour. At first, I'd been certain that it was my dad's pride that I was looking for in whatever I did, but truthfully it wasn't about pride, it was a desire to be everything my dad expected me to be; to carry on being a happy, bouncing person by the name of Fred Weasley.
I set the bat back into the box and picked up the only other thing in there; a crumped piece of newsprint. I smoothed it out and read:
Fred Weasley
Beloved son, brother and war hero
Fred Weasley of Ottery St. Catchpole, Devon, died fighting at age 20 in the Battle of Hogwarts on May 2nd 1998. Born on the 1st April 1978 to Arthur and Molly Weasley, celebrated members of the anti-Voldemort movement, Fred was joint owner of of the joke shop 'Weasley's Wizard Wheezes', and was noted in his school days for being a fantastic Quidditch player and inventor.
A memorial service will be held on May 20th 1998 at the Weasley's family home entitled 'The Burrow'.
It wasn't nearly enough. This little scrap of paper seemed to be under the impression that it could do Uncle Fred justice; that a little paragraph was enough to sum up the heartbreak my family had had to plough through in order to carry on their their lives. What'd been the point? Had he, in the end, died for a valid reason?
Now I lay in my grave,
At age 21,
Long before you were born,
Before I bore a son.
The war had been won. That's what the reason was. That was the one thing that every Weasley I had ever spoken to had insisted. They'd won the war, and Fred had been a part of that effort. Because, I supposed, if they didn't hold on to the fact that his death hadn't been in vain, it would have been a lot more painful.
What good did it do?
Well hopefully for you
A world without war
A life full of color