Never Forgotten- Prologue
George lowered his aching body onto the stately brown bench. It was a fair spring day. The sun was shining but it wasn't too hot and there was a faint breeze. He should have felt happy. But he didn't. He looked down at wrinkled hands that shook slightly even as they gripped firmly onto the shoebox he rested in his lap. He looked out on a sea of headstones, some new and some old.
"A lot of Weasley's here," he muttered to himself. He didn't notice the figures approaching, making their own slow way up the hill, he only spotted them once they stood beside him and, looking up at the sky, sighed in contentment, "Fred, sit down." The old man greeted one of them. Fred sat, lounging more comfortably than George did. The old man squinted at the boy wondering the grave yard and cursed.
"What?" asked Fred some-what bemused. George took a few minutes to answer. His wit had once been legendary but these days the thoughts were slower, harder to form.
"You know," he started finally, "Its only seems like it's been a few years since I could look in the mirror and not see Fred staring back at me," He mused.
"He was only 20 last time you saw him, Dad… although I don't suppose it's hard to imagine how he would have aged."
"No, but he stayed that way in my head. He was young and I was old… I found my reflection easier to bare. And now look," George nodded in the direction of the teenage, red haired boy meandering through the grave stones, "If he's not a recessive Weasley gene… how did he even end up with that red hair?!" Fred, George's son, watched his own son as he knelt to look at a particular grave stone and shrugged. "Part of the reason I married your mother was because none of our children would look like me. Fate is laughing at me now." Fred ran his hair back through his own black hair, recognising one of his father's bleak moods.
George hadn't been prone to them as a boy, Fred was told, but when his brother died…. Not just his brother; his twin, the other half of himself, these bleak moods had become a part of his dad. They descended suddenly and grew heavily and then suddenly they would lift again and the cheeky, quick-witted man would be bounding around the living room again. It pained Fred to see his father so morose. He never noticed his father's age until these moods descended. He could still be the light of the room when he was chipper.
"What have you got there, dad?" Fred asked, nodding towards the shoebox. George smiled at the box and ran his hand over the lid gently.
"My mind… isn't what it used to be," he said, "Some days yesterday is a mystery to me… but 70 years ago is still as clear as day in my head." He lifted the lid to reveal a horde of photos, a few scattered chocolate frog cards, a small Irish flag and a few worn pieces of parchment. Fred smiled at his dad then sat back and relaxed again, turning his face towards the sun.
"Why don't you show me some dad?" He asked.