George Weasley woke up that morning in a funk. Of course, that probably had something to do with the events of the previous night: the Death Eaters had crashed his brother's wedding, and the Order had just barely managed to keep them off the Burrow's property. He opened his bleary eyes to peer over at his twin brother, Fred, who was still snoring away… though not for long.

"Blimey, is it morning already?" Fred asked as he awakened abruptly.

"That is when they call it when the sun comes up," George responded drily, gesturing out their window. Fred's only response was to chuck his pillow at George's head, making them both roar with laughter.

The twins bounded down the stairs and into the kitchen, hungry as a pair of young wolverines, ready to devour anything their mother might have made for breakfast.

They were totally unprepared to see the people already sitting at the table.

"Karin?" said Fred, stopping dead in the doorway to the kitchen; George, who was right behind him, ran into him. "Caitlin? What are you two doing here?"

The Fawcetts looked up from their tea mugs for a split second; Caitlin broke eye contact almost instantly to stare mutely back down into her mug, while Karin gave Fred a small smile before looking away quickly. George exchanged a puzzled glance with Fred before venturing, "Uh, mum…?"

"Quiet, you two," Molly Weasley said menacingly from the stove, passing her two sons plates of bacon and eggs. "Don't you dare give these two a hard time." She looked sympathetically at the two fugitives: Karin looked close to tears, while Caitlin kept staring into her mug of tea like it was the only thing in the world that mattered. George was worried by both of their behavior. Neither of them were acting like he remembered them doing, and he was almost afraid to find out what had changed them.

Breakfast that morning was an awkwardly silent affair. The twins ate as quickly as they could, trying to get away from the triplets before one of them blew up at them. Silent tears were now streaking down Karin's face, while Caitlin was picking mutely at a plate of eggs without eating a single bite. Ginny kept looking at the two girls, as though torn between wishing to comfort them and being afraid to touch them. When Fred and George had finished eating, they bolted out of the kitchen into the garden, where they found their father having a whispered conversation with Kingsley Shacklebolt.

"Dad," Fred interrupted without preamble, "what the bloody hell are Caitlin and Karin Fawcett doing in our kitchen?" George nodded to show that he shared Fred's concern.

"Now boys," Arthur started, "don't make this any harder than it already is."

"What's wrong with them?" George asked them with concern, perhaps more seriously than he had ever done in his entire life. "They're acting so weird, not like themselves at all…" Realization was beginning to dawn on him. "What happened to those two last night?" He addressed Kingsley, who had been going around all night with other Order members, trying to stop the Death Eater attacks occurring all around the country.

"The Fawcetts' house was raided in the middle of the night," Kingsley responded gravely in his low, slow voice. "Their father, a prominent Muggleborn in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, was killed, and their sister Sylvie was taken to Azkaban."

Fred and George both started, then shared horrified glances with each other. Sylvie, a girl they had known forever, one of their best friends growing up, was in Azkaban? It just didn't seem possible… it wasn't right that something that horrible could happen to someone like her.

"So Cate and Karin are here…" Fred began slowly.

"Because they have nowhere else to go!" Arthur responded somewhat fiercely. "We're their neighbors, and we can help keep them safe since we're in the Order. …You aren't going to make this difficult, are you?" he ended almost desperately. He had no idea what had made his sons abruptly stop speaking to the Fawcett triplets in their second year, but he sincerely hoped that whatever had happened wouldn't make the girls' stay in his home awkward or unpleasant.

"No, we won't, Dad!" said George placatingly, holding up his hands.

"Just… just don't bring up that thing that happened in second year, whatever it was…"

"We won't," said Fred reassuringly, though from the glance he threw his twin's way George could tell that Fred was as confused as he was. The twins started to make their way back to the kitchen, having their own whispered conversation.

"What was Dad talking about?" Fred murmured. "What happened in second year?"

"I don't remember," said George contemplatively, racking his brains to try and recall what had driven them apart from the Fawcetts. "All I remember is that we just stopped talking, but I don't know why…"

"It must have been something really bad," said Fred, worried. "Otherwise, why haven't we spoken to them since?"

But George shook his head. "If it was really bad, we'd remember what it was," he asserted. The two walked into the kitchen to face the Fawcetts, who were relatively dry-eyed now, although Caitlin still looked pensive and stoic.

"Hey," Fred began sympathetically to Karin, who looked far worse for the wear than Caitlin did, "I'm sorry to hear about what happened…" But at his words, Karin burst into tears again. "I didn't mean to make you cry…" Fred murmured apologetically, right before Karin grabbed him for support as she continued sobbing. Caitlin just stood there, her eyes darkened as though a shadow fell across her face. Karin's tears had done nothing to catalyze her own; she was practically catatonic, unresponsive to her sister's grief as she slowly pushed past the Weasley twins into the garden alone with that incalculable expression on her face. Shooting a glance at Fred, who was rubbing Karin's back and whispering words of comfort as she shed tears, George made his way after Caitlin into the garden.

"Cate!" he began as he approached her. He stopped dead at the look on her face. "Talk to me," he said gently. "How are you, er… doing?"

Caitlin looked up: her eyes were still dry, although she looked so lost and troubled that George felt another stab of worry for her.

"Sylvie," she began hoarsely, as though she had almost forgotten how to talk. "I let her go… I was holding her hand, and I let her go…" She looked at the gnomes running through the bushes, though it was clear that she was not seeing them at all. "How could I have done that?" she ended in a whisper.

"It's not your fault…" George began, but Caitlin had begun to move away slowly and jerkily, obviously still in shock over what had happened. It was clear that she was denying herself the comfort she so obviously needed. George followed her, placing a reassuring hand on her shoulder.

"It's all right," he said firmly, doing his best to reach out to his estranged best friend. "You're going to be fine. All three of you." His heart leapt to see some sign of hope appear in her deadened eyes.

"I hope so," she whispered. "I really do… I need her to be all right," she said to him almost pleadingly, as if there was something he could do to get her little sister out of Azkaban, or bring her father back to life, or undo all the terrible things that had happened in the last twelve hours.

George didn't say anything, just enveloped her in a hug as he did his best to comfort her. Though she clung to him for support, however, she didn't let a single tear fall. George worried about the way she was coping with this; wasn't crying supposed to make you feel better? Well, he reasoned, perhaps it's not so unusual for her. After all, she's never really been the crying type. All George could do was pat her somewhat awkwardly on the back and try to be there for her when she was so obviously hurting yet refusing to let herself release her emotions.

"Oi! You two!"

George and Caitlin looked up, startled, to see a grinning Fred and feebly smiling Karin standing by the broomshed, holding four of the Weasleys' old broomsticks. "Fancy a game of Quidditch?" Fred continued, holding out George's old broom expectantly.

Caitlin blinked dazedly, coming briefly out of her catatonic state that she had stayed in with George all morning. "Sure, sounds like fun," she responded in a weak attempt at lightheartedness. She broke away from George to follow her sister and Fred to the clearing where they had played Quidditch so many years before. George smiled wryly; he could see right through Fred's transparent attempt to cheer the triplets up, but at the same time he was glad one of them had thought of something.

They mounted their brooms and began a game of two-on-two Quidditch, Fred and Karin versus George and Caitlin. It was only too obvious that the Fawcett triplets were trying too hard to enjoy themselves; that they, especially Caitlin, were trying to forget what had happened the night before. And for a while, it seemed to work: being on a broomstick brought a little more life into Caitlin's eyes, and as Karin swerved past him for a goal he could have sworn that he heard a laugh escape her lips. The Weasley twins and Fawcett triplets played Quidditch all afternoon, until it was too dark to see and they were forced to come back inside for dinner.

Dinner was much less uncomfortable than breakfast had been, although the table was a little more subdued than usual. At least Caitlin wasn't blindly staring at her plate the way she had at breakfast, thought George somewhat hopefully. And once or twice, he swore he caught her smiling at Fred's and Ginny's jokes, or even gazing at him when she thought he wasn't looking. In spite of himself, George grinned. Perhaps there was hope for her after all.

When dinner was over, the Weasleys and the Fawcetts all gathered in the living room, making lighthearted conversation. Well, Fred and Karin were, anyway. George sat awkwardly next to Caitlin, unsure of what to say. What did you talk about with someone you had refused to see for eight years?

"So," he began uneasily, "um… what have you been up to since Hogwarts?" He sincerely hoped that he could keep the conversation away from the topic of last night, not wanting to upset her.

Luckily, she seemed to be thinking along the same lines, since she smiled and replied, "Well, right now I'm working in Flourish and Blotts, but some day I want to start training to be a Healer."

George laughed easily. "I wouldn't expect anything less from the Ravenclaw Head Girl like you," he said jokingly.

"I wasn't Head Girl," she replied tersely, her smile fading. "That was Karin." She gestured over at her older sister, laughing with Fred.

"Oh," was all George had to say about that. An awkward silence descended between them, marked by the absence of all the years they should have had together. If he hadn't stopped speaking to the Fawcetts all those years ago, he would have known that Karin, and not Caitlin, had been Head Girl. For a moment he considered asking her why the triplets had stopped talking to the twins, but he didn't want to upset her any more at the moment.

"So how about you?" asked Caitlin, who was obviously also trying to keep things neutral between them.

Relieved, George began talking about Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes and the work he and Fred had accomplished in the past year. Caitlin listened attentively, laughing at funny anecdotes George told about his misadventures in inventing items for the shop, her eyes full of amusement and admiration that her friends had achieved so much in the year they had been out of school. Eventually they moved away from the topic of the joke shop and began sharing stories from Hogwarts, the moments that the five teens should have shared together. George felt another pang of guilt for not being there, but he wasn't ready to broach the subject of their falling out quite yet.

"George!" she cried abruptly, staring at the side of his head.

"What?" he asked, genuinely confused.

She pointed at his injury, clearly shaken. "Your... your ear's gone," she finally ventured.

"Bloody hell, it is?!?" George feigned shock, clutching at the side of his head, making her chuckle at his antics. He smiled, used to making light of his injury since he had lost his ear in the aerial battle two weeks earlier. He would never really get used to being permanently disfigured, perhaps, but he wasn't about to add some hurt no one could fix to the growing list of things troubling Caitlin Fawcett.

The four of them stayed up until the early hours of the morning, talking and laughing, making the Fawcetts look marginally more cheerful as the night progressed. By the time they all headed up to bed, with the Fawcett triplets staying in Charlie's old room across the hall from the twins, George was hopeful that he had started to help his old friend start to recover.

"Blimey," said Fred sleepily from the bed across the room, "Karin and Caitlin… I didn't think we'd ever see them again."

"Me neither," George responded, rolling over to look at his twin. Fred's eyes were shining in the darkness, and George could tell he was thinking about Karin. George sighed, wishing that he could make Caitlin care as much about him as Fred did about Karin.

Across the hall, Caitlin was thinking. Not about Sylvie and how she could help her, or how she could get revenge on the Death Eaters, but about George. Next to her, she heard Karin sigh happily.

"Do you think Fred likes me?" Karin asked abruptly. Caitlin gave her sister a withering look. Not even twenty-four hours out of danger, and Karin was already obsessed with some boy?

"Since when have you cared about boys so much?" she asked her triplet curiously.

"Since never, you know that!" Karin responded defensively, reddening in the dark. "I just…" She paused, obviously choosing her words carefully. "There's something about to go on between us, I think," she concluded finally, "and he's really cute," she added excitedly.

"George is cuter," Caitlin said absentmindedly, making Karin squeal and sit up in her bed.

"I knew it!" she said triumphantly. "You fancy him, don't you?"

Caitlin rolled her eyes, even as she could feel her face reddening. "Don't be daft," she said with every ounce of contempt she could muster. "He's just… nice. A good friend," she added firmly as Karin gave a snort of laughter.

"You've only been speaking to him for one day," said Karin, still trying to hide her giggles.

"So've you and Fred!" said Caitlin defensively, sobering Karin.

"Touché," Karin conceded, lying down again. But then she propped herself up and asked, "Do you believe in love at first sight?"

Caitlin shrugged. "I guess," she mumbled, considering the notion for a moment. "Mum and Dad did, anyway…" She trailed off; this conversation was getting dangerously close to unwanted territory. Her dad had often told her that he and her mother had fallen in love at first sight, that from the moment they laid eyes on each other they had known who they wanted to spend the rest of their lives with. Of course, her mother had never been able to confirm that story: she had died of dragon pox when the triplets were only four years old.

"Well," said Karin thickly, since she had obviously been thinking along the same lines as Caitlin, "I guess this would technically be love at second sight, anyway." The two sisters shared a halfhearted giggle.

"True, true," said Caitlin, half-sarcastically. "Well, good night, Kare Bear."

"Good night, Cate," responded Karin, smiling as the two sisters went through the bedtime routine they had followed ever since they were little girls.

"Good night, Sylvie," the two triplets chorused automatically, and then froze as they remembered that their little sister wasn't there to answer them anymore. Stifling her sobs, Karin rolled over and pretended to go to sleep. Caitlin, on the other hand, wouldn't let herself cry over her sister's fate; she let the sound of Sylvie's name fill her with determination to rescue her sister, before something truly terrible happened to her. Then she paused, and whispered into the darkness, so softly that Karin couldn't hear:

"Good night, George."

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