The Secret Journal of George Weasley
I hear his voice in my head. There's always the perfect opening for a punchline, Fred always said. I always knew it a split second after he did. Now, I still feel him make the joke, and I think of it a split second after he does. Except he doesn't, really. He doesn't because he's gone.
He's dead. Finito. Caput. Stick a fork in him.
That last one was Fred's.
For awhile, I couldn't make jokes anymore. I think I forgot how. It was almost as if the jokes died with Fred.
Who am I kidding? Our jokes were always pretty dead.
I'm not sure if that one was me or Fred.
After awhile, they did start to come back – the jokes, that is. My case of the funnies seemed to regain its strength, slowly but surely, as did Fred.
I mean, I'm not crazy, at least not any more than normally, but Fred was always a part of me, and I was always a part of him. When he died, the part of me that was in him died, too. The part of him that was in me, though…
During his funeral, I started laughing. I knew everyone thought I was going absolutely nuttered. For a moment, I thought I was, too. You see, I was standing by his casket, looking down at my own dead face, and suddenly I heard Fred say, as clearly as if he were standing next to me, "It's not so bad. I've heard the chicks are totally digging the pale, drawn look this year."
I lost it; laughed my head off. For two seconds, I forgot that Fred was dead. He was completely alive and making incredibly stupid jokes that only the two of us could truly appreciate the intricacy of.
In three seconds, it was over. Fred was dead again. But the joke was still there.
I still don't understand it. How can he be dead, yet I still feel him?
I don't know. But I wouldn't trade it for all the best jokes, or even the most stupid ones, in the world.
