Title: Hurt

Author Name: Marzena

Rating: M

Spoiler: none so far.

Genre: Hurt/Comfort (and a teensy bit of romance, I guess)

Era: Hogwarty-Eulenpost-Universe

Main Character(s): GW, IG

Ship(s): GW/A (FW/K mentioned; formerly ChW/A and GW/L mentioned)

Summary: Timeline Year 4. A take on what happened at/after the annual Christmas Dance.

Disclaimer: This story is based on characters and situations created and owned by JK Rowling, various publishers including but not limited to Bloomsbury Books and Scholastic Books and Warner Bros., Inc. No money is being made and no copyright or trademark infringement is intended. All names/characters mentioned which are not known in the books/movies are people that we know or created.

Author's Notes: Ummm yeah. Happy couples are boring couples. Therefore I had to break up the romance between Adora and Charlie and try something new. Gotta love the drama xD Besides, I'm really into the twins these days. Let's see where this will us …

I guess when people are hurt - really, really hurt - they kind of lose their common sense. And that's about my only explanation for what had happened. There we were in that shabby-looking old room, and the next thing I remember … is, well, silence. I'd been crying, crying about Charlie leaving, being jealous of Evanna for spending time with him during her internship, blaming myself for the whole mess, and George, he'd been complaining about Lucy-Anne and their breakup, about what she'd said to Darryl, about Darryl in general, about the nice little scene we'd stumbled on earlier, about how she'd apparently just moved on without a second glance. And then, well … silence. I was still sitting there on the old sofa, tears all over my face, my hair a mess, my dress all dusty from following George through moldy and creepy old secret passages. And George was sitting across from me, looking so angry and hurt, and he, too, had dust over his dressing robes. And there it was - the silence. The thoughts. The need to hurt back the people who'd hurt us. The sudden urge to show them that we didn't need them. That we were perfectly fine without them. And the second I had those thoughts, I looked into George's eyes and saw them widen, realizing that he, too, had those thoughts. And that's when I knew that there was nothing I could do about what would happen next.

Okay, fine, I have to admit, there's always something you can do to prevent stuff like that from happening. Unless you're on drugs, which we weren't. But if you don't want to fight it, if you've lost everything in one night and you think you've got nothing else to lose, well … try to fight it, won't work. Didn't work in my case. But then again, I didn't even try. I just went along with everything that happened next.

We kissed – or, to be more accurate, we were all over each other. You couldn't call that kissing anymore. It was more like, well, kissing, touching, groaning, well, you get the picture. And the ripping of clothes. Which, actually, is a lot more difficult in real life. Books usual describe it as a one-sentence-action. Believe me, takes a lot more time than that. Especially if those clothes happen to be Christmas Dance dressing robes. Good thing we had our wands. Magic really helps a lot sometimes.

Well, I guess I'd never thought this would ever happen. To me, of all people. With my ex-boyfriend's brother. But in that very moment, I couldn't care less. It felt wonderful. It made me forget. There was no more pain, no more hurt, no more bad feelings, doubts, blame, worries. There was just … well, us. The things we did. Primal instincts had taken over. I was living the moment, going along with whatever happened next. This was so much better than all the pain I'd been going through just a few minutes ago. I wanted this to last forever.

However, it didn't last forever. The next morning came. And with it, naturally, came guilt.

Thinking back, I'm still astonished how different things can get. Looking back, I can see the innocent little princess falling for her first crush, trying not to be pushed into something she didn't want to do, experimenting with kisses and a little bit of making out. I can see her going through her first breakup and then realizing she'd been in love with her best friend for a while now, entering a more mature relationship, becoming a woman, thinking about a future together, a life together. Then in all came tumbling down like a house of cards, when her prince decided that saving the princess from dragons wasn't all that great – but working with dragons oh so amazing. So the princess got left behind for bloody dragons and turned to, well, to keep it in royal terms, the jester for comfort. Comfort turned about to be not so comforting, since the jester had his own problems to deal with. In general, the lesson learned is – well, love sucks. Never fall in love. Never let yourself care. But we're only human and it's in our nature to care and to love, whether we're muggleborn or witches and wizards. It's also in our nature to make mistakes, and sometimes, primal instincts just take over, no matter how old or how experienced we are and no matter that we should know or do know better. In this little fairytale, the princess and the jester spend the night in a dusty and cold old secret room in the castle, and since fairytales are usually read by children, I'll just say 'spend the night'. However, you're not a child, so I guess you get the picture. And sometimes, well, fairytales have not-so-great endings. Or, as we know from Sunset Avenue, fairytales can go bad.

And so I woke up, with an aching back from the bloody old sofa and a murderous headache, looking around that shabby old room, taking in the dust and the pieces of clothing's thrown all across the dirty floor, and George's warm (and naked) body right next to time. I tried to close my eyes again, hoping that when I would open them again, I'd wake up fully dressed in my own bed, alone, or preferably with Charlie, who would tell me that he'd finally chosen me over Romania. But of course, when I opened my eyes, the picture remained the same. Me. George. Naked.

Next to me, George began to stir, and when he finally opened his eyes and took in the same view I'd just seen, a few seconds of awkward silence passed.

"Ahhh … morning", he finally said, slowly pulling himself up into a seating position on the sofa, still next to me.

"Umm … morning", I replied; trying to cover myself with my arms and hands, since I was still, well, naked. At least George noticed that and got hold of my midnight blue ball gown, covering both of us with the smooth fabric.

"Soooo …"

"So …"

Gosh, it was really, really awkward. There was nothing left of the raging emotions from the night, nothing left at all expect guilt and shame and the nagging question of what would happen next.

"So I guess we really did it …"

"Looks like it …"

"Hmmmh, I think I have a really clear picture in my mind of you trying to dig your non-existent fingernails into my back, screaming my name. So yeah, we definitely did it."

I think I turned beet-red when he said this, desperately searching my mind for an answer. I didn't … did I? I had a lot of blurry pictures in my mind, but I couldn't recall any specific situation.

There was a grin on his face and he playfully pulled at one of my tangled curls. "I'm trying to lighten the mood here", he explained. "You look like you're about to start crying."

"I'm not!" I indignantly said, slapping his fingers away. I wasn't some silly girly-girl who'd go all teary-eyed on him now. What had happened was my fault as much as his. I knew that.

"Good for you." He was becoming more and more the George I knew, now that the first few awkward moments of realization had passed. "You know, you should consider yourself lucky. Fred and I did a survey once. 70% of the girls here at school want to … well, they want to shag a Weasley twin at least once during their time at Hogwarts."

He looked at me expectantly and I rolled my eyes at this, hoping Fred would never go as far as telling Kerri about that. She'd probably throw that stupid survey into his face. Along with the nearest piece of furniture she could get hold of, probably.

"Really?" I said, trying my best to sound sarcastic, even though I'd rather hide away somewhere and die of shame. "That's what you two do in your free time? Coming up with surveys on how many girls want to, well, do it with you? Gee! You know, if you'd put that much effort in your studies, you'd probably be winning all class prizes at the end of the year."

"Booooring." He gave me one of the cocky smiles he was famous for. "Besides, you know what the really weird part is?"

"Weirder than you and your twin doing surveys on how many girls want to do it with you!"

He ignored me and just continued. "Well, neither you nor Kerri were on that list", he said.

My head felt like exploding and I closed my eyes, massaging my temples. "If you or Fred had ever approached me with a survey like that, I'd have slapped you with it and then set the parchment on fire", I grumbled.

"Exactly my point." I still had my eyes closed, but I knew he was smiling at me. "It's weird that in the end, you end up with the one person who … well, who never followed you around, practically begging you to drag her into the nearest broom closet."

"And who's your ex-boyfriend's younger brother", I said, not finding this one bit amusing. I knew he was just trying to lighten up the mood, to pass this off as a joke, but right now, I felt miserable and I just wasn't in the mood for jokes.

There was another minute of silence, and then he sighed.

"Yeah, or that", he quietly said. "Listen, Adora, I know I'm not the person you want to sneak into broom closets with. And you know you're one of my closest friends and …"

"I know I'm not the person you want to kiss senseless in a dark and dirty and smelly broom closet, yeah yeah." I opened my eyes again, but avoided to look at him.

"What happened tonight in this room …"

"Stays in this room", I firmly said. "I swear, Georgie, if you ever tell anyone – especially Fred or Lee! – I'll blast you with the Killing Curse! I swear!"

He started laughing. "My, we're fierce today, aren't we? But honestly, I hope you know that I don't run around telling people such personal things. I'm not …"

His face hardened, and instantly I reached out and touched the bare skin of his arm with my fingertips. I knew what – or rather, who – he was thinking about just now.

He smiled down at me. "Anyway, I won't tell", he said. "We both shouldn't. Makes it easier to, you know …"

"Leave it all behind? Yeah …"

"Still, you know, you're my friend. Always will be. And we'll probably be seeing a lot of each other during these winter holidays. So we should just accept the fact that this has happened and … hey, it wasn't that bad, was it?"

There was that mischievous smile again, and I couldn't help it, I had to smile back.

"Actually, I kind of get it why you've got such a huge percentage of girls wanting to drag you into broom closets", I smiled.

"Aaaah. Well, I take that as a compliment, then. And if we're ever doing a survey on how many girls actually shagged a Weasley twin …"

"I swear, if you ever connect my name with something like that, well, there's always the Killing Curse waiting!"

Grinning, he climbed off the sofa, not bothering to cover himself, and started to pick up his clothes from the floor.

"Well, wouldn't be worth it anyway. Believe it or not, but there aren't that many. Not even if you count both me and Fred."

"Errr, yeah, whatever." I covered my ears. "Please no more information on your, well, sex life, okay? I'm going to sneak into my dormitory now, trying to get some sleep."

… and probably crying my eyes out. Over my own stupidity and over losing Charlie and well, over everything and life in general. Being a teenager just sucked, whether in the magical world or not.

"That's probably a good idea", George just said. "We need some time to, well …"

"Let this all sink in properly."

"Yeah, exactly."

We dressed in silence and then stumbled back through the dirty old corridors and passages, back into the main castle and then off we went into our beds. But as for sleeping … well, I think anyone can guess how that went.