Written for Misty because I looked into your faves and saw lotsa angst.
Prompts used: Write about George Weasley. Write about something bad happening in light. Write a romance. Include snow.
WC: 803
Some people say blood tastes like metal. Others say that it tastes like sweat and salt.
George says it tastes like a morgue, like something dead and invasive and reminiscent of bitter things lost. He tastes a lot of blood on the battlefield of Hogwarts, the memory of his brother's red hair flashing through his mind as blood spurts from his enemies. He sees his brother's blank eyes in their eyes as they fall, their faces framed by the early daylight.
It's almost better that they battle in the light, because otherwise George thinks he wouldn't be able to blink without seeing red and green slashes under his eyelids.
Daily, he goes through the motions. The Wizarding Wheezes was supposed to be a joint business venture, and he knows it. The letters he writes to Fred say as much, syllables scrawled across a page dripping with regret and nostalgia and anger. Years later, children who are too young to recall the horrors of the war bounce into his shop, smiling, winding up little metal toys and watching them wobble across the shelves. George sees himself in those toys.
These children can go to Hogwarts without being slammed with the force of a thousand losses and a million memories all at once. These children make the world move on.
It's a Monday when Angelina walks in with her child. George hasn't kept up with her since they both graduated Hogwarts. He supposes that she and Fred were never anything serious, but it still makes something bitter stir in his heart when he sees that she's moved on.
"When will we get to go to Dad's place?" one of the kids whines.
"Sean, would you like to pick something out?"
George doesn't mean to overhear, doesn't mean to notice how Angelina avoids the question, but they're quite a loud bunch.
When she looks his way to where he's arranging new arrivals behind the counter, he puts on the wide smile he musters for each of the customers and gives a wave. She smiles grimly back. Whatever.
Angelina strides towards him with hesitant steps, and George wonders what she's here for until she asks the question: "What do you think my daughter would like for Christmas?"
That's right. It's almost Christmas.
"What kind of girl is she?" George asks in return.
For a split second, Angelina looks stricken, but she transitions smoothly into a smile. "Well, she liked the trains I got her last year."
"Oh, what kind of trains?"
Angelina bites her lip. "They're at her dad's place."
She doesn't know. Okay. "Let me see if I can help you find something."
Angelina comes back.
He barely notices her, since all of his attention is focused on excitedly talking to the child before him, but he notices. She stands in a corner, arms crossed, watching him.
When the child bounces away, he manages to steal a glance at her and finds her expression less frightening than thoughtful.
He picks out a trainset that he thinks her daughter would like, and then he sends her on her way, not expecting to see her again any time soon.
But she comes back.
Between bits of conversation he learns that she likes black tea without sugar, that she likes to walk outside when it rains, that she loves her children more than anything, that she plays the violin.
She learns that he runs this shop and that he can still regurgitate the same tried jokes in attempts to deflect any questions.
There is one question that catches him off-guard, and he can't seem to find a response before his heart grips his tongue and he says yes, unwilling to see Angelina's disappointment.
"I'm going to visit Hogwarts soon, just to look around. Would you like to come?"
Angelina is delightful and everything that reminds him about what was good at Hogwarts. The Yule Ball. The pranks. The Quidditch pitch games in the day and kisses at night. The winks across the tables in the Great Hall. Everything that leads to everything that was bad, and George doesn't like to think about it.
George Apparates to the edge of school grounds before he can think twice. It's the date and time that Angelina set. He wonders if she's so lonely that she had to call in the brother of her late ex-boyfriend because she couldn't find anyone else.
The gesture was so innocent that he was trying to not think of it as a date.
"Hey!" he calls with a wave when he spots her. Together they make it to the castle.
Slowly, he lets out a breath, lets the feeling of being linger in the air.
The world does not come crashing down. Instead, snow flurries float down from the sky.
Angelina smiles and takes his hand in hers.