Disclaimer: All recognisable characters are the property of JK Rowling.
Last Laugh
"How many times did I say it?"
George flicks his eyes down and across to Ginny, standing at his side, her knuckles white on the windowsill and her face fixed beyond the pane of dusty glass. Somehow, he knows exactly what she means.
"Heaps."
"Every week? Every day, maybe?"
"More, I reckon."
Ginny's shoulders heave, and George, without quite realizing what he is doing, repeats their mother's old saying.
"Big sigh for a little girl."
Ginny's mouth twitches, minutely, but her eyes stay on the night sky, black and heavy as a cloak as it falls over their overgrown garden.
"Not so little now."
She sways, just enough to rest her arm against his, and George squeezes his eyes shut against the swooping clash of grief that rolls right over him, again.
"We all said it, Ginny. Now and then."
So don't feel bad about it, he means, and Ginny almost smiles this time, as her small frame begins to tremble. There is a flash of white, beyond the window, and George follows the path of the solitary gnome as it dashes amongst the camellias. Memory stabs inside him; Fred, chasing the little buggers across the yard, swearing all the while. A furious wave of laughter suddenly rises like sick in his stomach, and he is terrified of opening his mouth lest the very force of it split him in two. Tears spring up in his eyes, and it is Ginny, in a wavering voice, who says the words.
"Drop dead, Fred."
It's too much; all at once he can't seem to breathe or see or think, knees quaking beneath him; but it isn't the dreadfully familiar tremor of loss, not this time. Ginny turns to him, eyes wide and wet in the dark, and winds her warm fingers through his. He feels the tears, hot and hysterical, and knows that if their mother were to hear them they would be better off dead too, but he is hopeless to resist, now,
He chokes on the first bubble of laughter, and it feels so foreign, clawing up his insides and spewing from his mouth like something wild. Ginny curls an arm around his back, and through the feral sound of his own laughter he hears hers, too; pouring out of her as she screws up her little, freckled face, and they tumble in a heap to the kitchen floor. All he can do, it seems, is laugh like a madman; the same stupid words ringing in his head.
"Drop dead Fred! Drop dead Fred!"
Over and over they chant, tears streaming and hands clutching their sides. It won't be long before the whole house is awake, but for now they lie, limbs tangled and tears running in rivers, staring blindly up at the cobwebbed corners of the ceiling. Ginny shifts, throwing an arm across his chest, and George grins, helplessly, through the tears.
"He would've loved that joke."