ONE

Just outside the village of Ottery St. Catchpole on a warm summer morning, two identical boys slept sound asleep in their bunks. Their fiery red hair was visible just above the comforts of their home knitted blankets, and large thin feet hung over the edges of the bed of the top bunk lazily. The boys' breathing was heavy as they dreamt dreams of opening their own joke shop, giving kids all new ways to wreak havoc at Hogwarts (their school of witchcraft and wizardry). However, their fantasies were cut short by a loud shrill voice that belonged to their mother ringing through the rickety house.

"RISE AND SHINE MY DEARIES, IT MAY BE SUMMER BUT I WILL NOT LET YOU SLEEP IN PAST NOON! ALL OF YOU, UP!" Although the voice was yelling and sounded angry, all the children who heard it knew that their mother meant well and could only want the best for their children. But perhaps the best for her twin boys was not waking up during their summer holidays before ten o'clock; perhaps the best was to let them sleep until their bodies forced them to wake.

George grunted from the bottom bunk and rolled over to his side, facing what their mother referred to as 'a tremendous disaster' but to him and his brother was the start of their career. He rubbed his eyes and with the echo of his mother's voice still ringing in his ears he sat up and –

"AGH!" He yelled, slouching over. He had just hit the bottom of Fred's bunk with the top of his head; even the mess of red hair hadn't softened the blow. He muttered silently under his breath and eyed his brothers' foot and a mischievous grin filled his face.

George stood carefully and checking that his brother was sleeping soundly he reached thin fingers towards his twins foot and began to wiggle them in a very quick succession.

Fred jolted with a start when he felt the fingernails tickling is feet, loud laughter erupted from his mouth and he began to twist and turn wrapping his blankets around him. Eventually, his brother's fingers subsided and Fred sat atop his bed, slightly hunched over to avoid hitting his head of the ceiling grinning at his twin.

"Shall we go down and see what-"

"-Mum has made for breakfast?" George finished Fred's sentence and Fred hopped off the bed and joined his brother as they bounded down the rickety staircase and into their kitchen to greet their mother.

All bitter thoughts about being woken before the stores in the village had time to open were driven out of the twins' mind when they saw a feast of a breakfast laid out of the table before them. Fred and George took seats beside each other and began to grab as many sausages, scrambled eggs, and bits of bacon and toast as they could before digging in to the scrumptious meal.

"Ummy deares' we are umbled by your licious reats" George said through a mouth full of bacon.

Molly Weasley smiled appreciatively at her two boys and tousled their hair, scolding George for talking with his mouth open and then turned towards the staircase to yell up to the rest of her children.

Minutes later, Ginny-the only girl and youngest of the Weasley clan-emerged from the staircase in a light housecoat and took a seat across from her brothers in silence. Soon after Ron-a tall gangly boy who was best friends with Harry Potter-stumbled down the last few steps and closed his eyes as he lay on the floor. Moments later Harry Potter came down the stairs looking just as tired as Ron had and prodded his best friend in the side, helping him up and then joining everyone at the breakfast table.

"Where's Percy mum?" Ron asked sleepily staring at his mum, this caused him to accidentally dip his toast into his pumpkin juice and pop it into his mouth. Fred and George sniggered silently as their brother stopped chewing for a moment, considered the taste and then shrugged and resumed to swallow the pumpkin tasting toast.

"At the Ministry with your father, you know he's got himself a job now!" Mrs. Weasley huffed and magically cleaned up the kitchen with one swipe of her wand.

"Oh righ, what's he doin again?" Ron asked, fully aware that he was dipping his toast in his pumpkin juice and biting it off with a satisfied grin. Fred and George glanced at each other with the same worried expression on their face-they knew their brother was strange but dipping toast into pumpkin juice was downright mad.

"Wiping Fudge's arse I suppose" said George who received two things: a grin of appreciation from his twin and a smack on the head with a large cooking book from his mother whose face was reddening with anger.

"Come off it mum! He was only joking," Fred winked at his brother, sister and Harry all of whom were now stifling their laughter across the table. This earned him a smack as well and both he and George muttered apologies to their mother who straightened herself up and began to clear away the empty dishes.

"He is working in the Department of International Magical Co-operation, and if you two do not smarten up in your studies you will be the ones waiting on the streets offering to wipe your brother's arse!" Mrs. Weasley yelled, speaking of the poor academic performances of both twins.

"Don't you fret over a thing mum -"

"-Yeah we've got everything figured out -"

"-Sort of -"

"- We're going to open up a joke shop in Diagon Alley!" Fred and George grinned from ear to ear; this was their dream as they'd been planning with their close mate Lee Jordan since third year. They had yet to figure out all the fine details but they each had a general idea of what they were going to do with this idea.

Their mother's eyes narrowed and after she'd finished piling bacon on to Harry's plate (Ron stole at least half) she rounded onto the boys and her usually cheery face was worried and angry.

"No, no, no! Certainly not! You will work at The Ministry like your father and Percy!" She shrieked.

"But mum, we don't want to be like Prissy Percy -"

"- And because our minds are … creatively different we thought it best to-"

"- Do something different, don't fret we've got it all figured…oh no!" Fred groaned and pointed to the half open window where two owls could be seen in the distance. Mrs. Weasley hobbled over to the window and opened in just in time for the two sophisticated looking barn owls soared through the window each with a neat letter tied gently to their legs.

Fred and George scrambled over each other to get out of the kitchen and away from the owls. These were their OWL results, knowing very well that neither of them did anywhere near as well as Percy – or the other older Weasley boys - they knew that it would be in their best interest to get as far away from their mother as they could manage.

They fell to the floor and scampered up but Mrs. Weasley had grabbed each boy by their bare shoulders and forced them back into their chairs. The boys sulked and untied the letter that was addressed to them, once the owls were free of their delivery they nipped at some toast and flew away.

Reluctantly the twins opened their letters and hid the results from their mothers prying eyes. After surveying their results and nodding in acceptance the boys swapped and scanned each others. Unsurprisingly they each received only three: Care of Magical Creatures, Charms, and Transfiguration.

"THREE OWLS EACH!" Mrs. Weasley roared snatching the twins results and sinking into an empty chair. "I never imagined – how – where did we go wrong?" She wailed, throwing the parchment back onto the table.

Fred and George shrugged, they felt a pang of guilt for disappointing their mother but had she really expected them to get as many OWL's as Percy and Bill? Had she been ignoring all the owls she'd received from the Headmaster the past six years? Had she turned a blind eye to her trouble making twins?

"You two had better get your act together – both of you! Or…or else…" she ended with a frustrated sigh and shook her head before getting up and walking over to the empty sink.

"Don't worry mum!" Fred lifted himself from his place at the table and walked over to his mother and placed a loving hand on her back, rubbing it softly. George followed suit and rubbed her other side, resting his chin on her sloping shoulder.

"Yeah mum, cheer up! We'll make it, trust us!" George batted pale lashes up at his mother whose eyes were glistening with tears.

"Oh alright, alright, no more nonsense but if I get one more letter from Albus I will have both of you sent straight home!" She warned, blinking away the tears and the twins nodded in agreement, thankful that their mother had yet to see their room lately. If she got wind of the inventions they'd been creating she'd have their heads.

Fred and George had always been troublemakers, ever since they were young. They pulled pranks on everyone around them, and took little interest in their school work. It wasn't until around Christmas of their fourth year when they were unsatisfied with the selection of jokes that Zonoko had to offer and began to fiddle with the dungbombs, attempting to make them shoot out sneezewort, the success of their experiment sparked the idea of toying with other items and then finally, the decision to create their own line of joke items for their own amusement and perhaps own their own shop.

After breakfast the boys slipped back up to their room and began to sort through their inventory, George nicked small boxes of, Ton-Tongue Toffees, Canary Creams, Nosebleed Nougats, Puking Pastilles, and Fainting Fancies and sat cross-legged on the carpet in the middle of their room while Fred sprawled face up beside him. These sweets were their most recent developments, well, not so recent. They'd been working on the toffees for sixth months and only perfected them weeks ago, and the others had been created months before the end of term and were still needing to be fixed.

"D'you reckon we should … y'know … uh …" Fred stammered, trying to find the right words to express what he was thinking at the moment.

"Go on then, spit it out," George encouraged his brother, examining a Canary Cream carefully between his fingers. Fred usually burst out with statements and never took the time to think about what he was saying so when he stuttered and stared off into space with a certain look in his eyes George could tell that he was thinking deeply.

"Well I just thought that – er – you know … never mind." He shook his head and reached his long arm out and took the small yellow cream biscuit from George's fingers and popped it into his mouth. He immediately transfigured into a bright yellow canary chirping wildly as he flew around the room for a few fleeting moments and then a small burst of feathers later and Fred was standing at the edge of their bunk with a wide smile on his face.

"Everything is – AGH!" Fred let out a yelp of surprise as he peaked down his knickers, George scrambled to his feet as Fred's trousers fell to his ankles and he stared at him with a pained expression on his face. "They're – just – can't – gone!" He breathed staring at his twin who wore an identical expression of pain and shock.

"You – no – that can't have – how!" George yelled, his brain working a mile a minute. They took all the necessary precautions before charming the cream; they checked the spells over and over, and they'd tested them on themselves a week ago! How could something have gone so horribly wrong?

George was pulled out of his thoughts when a loud bark of laughter made him turn his head and gape at his brother. Fred was lying on his side clutching his stomach and pounding on the floorboards with his fist, his face was steadily growing red and he gasped for breaths between roars of laughter.

"You – should've – seen – your – face!" Fred breathed. He was sitting upright with his trousers round his ankles now and his hand was clutching his aching stomach. He grinned up at his twin who scowled.

After several minutes of lighthearted bickering the twins turned back to their latest invention: Nosebleed Nougats. They had yet to perfect the end that caused the nosebleed; instead they found that the candy gave them an enormous headache that could only be stopped by a gentle hum of any choice song by The Weird Sisters.

"Whys it do that?" Fred asked after the boys had eaten dinner and were now lounging about in their room, too full to continue tinkering with the nougats. Fred had endured a rather awful headache before dinner that had him in tears, and what was even worse was having to listen to The Weird Sisters crooning over lost loves.

George merely yawned and crawled onto his bottom bunk, snuggling up to his home knitted blanket, letting his eyelids fall over large brown eyes. He neither knew, nor cared why the nougats kept giving them foul headaches, he wanted to know how to fix it, but that could wait till morning.

Fred watched as his brother drifted off to sleep and then stored the boxes back onto a shelf before extinguishing the light and climbing up the ladder to the top bunk. He swore when his head hit the ceiling and continued scowling at it through the darkness as he lay on is back.

As the minutes passed he began to wonder if he and George could make it with their joke-shop business, the inventions were tedious and sometimes Fred found himself wondering whether it would be best to just follow what their mother wanted and take jobs at The Ministry.

No way, he told himself, there's no fun in a desk job.