Chapter Thirty-seven

"What if-what if something's happened to him? What if he's breaking up with me?" squealed Delia amidst tears as she dived head first into the pile of pillows on her four-poster bed.

"Maybe he just went home for the Easter Holidays and forgot to tell you?" Carolina offered, rubbing her temples; Delia had been going on about Graham for the past two hours and Carolina had developed a dull ache in the back of her head. It was making studying for her Muggle Studies N.E.W.T. near impossible.

"He would have told me," wailed Delia. "And he was here for the feast two nights ago! Oh, I'm sure he's breaking up with me!" she exclaimed, followed by another round of sobs.

"No, Dels, don't think that," Abigail cooed, patting her best friend's back with a seemingly endless supply of patience. "Why would he want to break up with you?"

"He thinks I'm ugly," Delia yowled and Carolina cringed at the noise. This was useless. She needed to get out of her dorm room if she wanted to commit to memory anything other than the first line of her notes.

She sighed, packing up her bag. She wasn't welcome to study in the Slytherin common room anymore unless she wanted to have a near constant stream of rolled up balls of parchment thrown at the back of her head and Adrian and Miles had taken over her spot in the library, glaring at her whenever she went to look for a table, so she had taken to studying in her dorm room, usually able to tune out the low murmurs coming from Abigail and Delia's gossipping mouths… but not today.

"Where are you going?" Delia nearly yelled at her, lifting her head from out of her pillows. Her face was swollen and her eyes bloodshot.

"I thought I might ask Professor Snape about Graham on your behalf," Carolina lied easily.

"Oh, would you?" Delia asked, sniffing affectedly.

"Sure," Carolina said, rolling her eyes as she turned to the door. Delia was making such a big deal about Graham's absence and she hadn't even asked their head of house yet if maybe he had indeed gone home for the holidays? She had never been the brightest…

But as Carolina hastened through the common room and out the portrait hole, her mind drew a blank of where to go.

It was too windy to study out on the lawn-her notes might blow away-and Umbridge had forbidden students for using the Great Hall for anything but eating…

She walked up from the dungeons, intent on finding an empty classroom and wishing that she was brave enough to prance right into the Gryffindor common room and find Fred-though then she probably wouldn't get much studying done-when an idea popped into her head.

The Room of Requirement!

That was a perfect idea, she thought proudly; the room would probably provide a desk and a lamp and all of the reference books she might need about muggle technology!

She smiled at her own ingenuity, skipping up the remaining staircases to the seventh floor.

When she got to the blank stretch of wall, she closed her eyes and started pacing. I need a place to work, I need a place to work, I need… She opened her eyes. A wooden door-just like one to any classroom-had appeared just in front of her.

She gladly reached out her hand and pulled it open.

"Occupied! Oh, Carolina?" It was George who turned to look at her first, though Fred's head spun around quick as lightning at the mention of her name.

"Lina! What are you doing here?" he asked, jumping to his feet.

"Needed a place to study," Carolina said, hitching her bag up on her shoulder. "What are you two doing?" she asked, eying the mess around where they had been sitting. There were what appeared to be burn marks on the floor and scattered potions ingredients and now that Carolina looked closely, both Fred and his twin were wearing dragonhide gloves…

"Perfecting the whizzbangs," Fred smirked, walking up to her and stripping the gloves off his fingers. "Want to join?"

"Well, I really should be studying-we have to know how to start an automobile for our Muggle Studies N.E.W.T. and I don't have any idea where-"

"Oh, perfect!" Fred exclaimed, grabbing her hand and pulling her closer. "George and I have driven a car!"

"What? Really?" Carolina asked, impressed.

"Yeah, well it was our dad's and it was a flying car, but made from muggle parts, so I reckon it worked the same," he smirked at Carolina's amazed expression. "So how about it? Stay here with us?" he pulled her closer and Carolina sighed, a smile toying at her lips.

"Come on, you convinced me to stay through the Easter Holidays-you might as well spend them with me…" Fred whispered, grinning.

"Fine, fine," Carolina said, dropping her bag from her shoulder. He was right after all, they only had about five more days until the Twins' agreed upon departure date.

"Ace!" Fred exclaimed, pulling Carolina in for a kiss, to which she responded enthusiastically.

"Oy! This isn't a bloody broom cupboard!" George yelled, interrupting them with a scowl.

"Sorry mate," Fred responded, breaking off the kiss and smiling cheesily at his brother, pulling Carolina over to where they had been working. "So, library not up to your liking today?" he asked, addressing Carolina as she sat down next to him, her book bag in tow.

"Adrian and Miles are camped out there and Delia's gone off her rocker about Graham disappearing-"

"Hasn't turned up then, has he?" George intercut, smirking.

"No, and apparently he never said he was going home for the holidays-wait a minute! How did you know he was missing?"

"Well, you just told us, didn't you?" George replied casually.

"No-it sounded like you already knew…" Carolina eyed him suspiciously.

"I may have pushed him into the vanishing cabinet on the first floor," Fred muttered, examining the fire salamander tail he had been dissecting before Carolina's arrival.

"You did what?!" Carolina yelled.

"Well, to be fair, he was trying to take points away from us-getting a little too power hungry with this new Inquisitorial Squad bollocks," George said, defending Fred.

"And I'm sure you did something to deserve getting points docked," Carolina eyed them sourly, despite the fact that she had noticed the newfound Inquisitorial Squad far too often enjoyed abusing their powers.

"No!" Fred said defensively, looking up from the salamander tail. "He got what he deserved," he added darkly.

Carolina turned to George with a raised eyebrow, searching for an explanation.

"He was saying some nasty things about you, actually," George told her. "All about how you're shacking up with a blood traitor, about your mother's howler, called you a few names that I don't think you'd want repeated, so Fred here told him where he could shove it and he threatened to dock fifty points for lip so-"

"So we pushed him into the vanishing cabinet," Fred finished, raising his eyebrows as if daring Carolina to be mad at them still.

"I don't need you to defend me," she told them, sighing, though she was touched that he cared as much as he did.

"I know," Fred responded. "I reckon you're able to take care of yourself what with all the D.A. practice, but when you're not around, someone's got to defend your honor!" he added, flashing her a valiant smile.

Carolina chuckled. "I suppose…" she said, before an expression of worry overcame her face. "So he's inside the vanishing cabinet? Can he get out?"

"We thought he'd be able to-it's broken after all," George said thoughtfully.

"Though, if he hasn't returned, then probably not," Fred added, a devilish grin appearing on his face.

"Hm," Carolina frowned, making a mental note to actually notify Professor Snape of Montague's whereabouts.

"In the meantime, why don't I tell you about the time George and I flew a muggle car across England," Fred said, leaning back in his chair.

By the time the twins had finished with their story, adding interludes to answer Carolina's questions about the different gears and how the engine worked, and then details about how Harry and Ron had crashed the car into the Whomping Willow, only to find the vehicle alive and thriving in the Forbidden Forest three years ago, some time had passed and the afternoon was almost over.

"Bugger, is that the time?" Fred said, looking down at his watch. "I have my bloody careers meeting with McGonagall."

"Useful," George hummed, before adding on "mine's tomorrow first thing… don't know what she expects with scheduling separate meetings for us…"

"I'll be back in fifteen," Fred said, stowing his wand in his back pocket.

"That short?" Carolina queried.

Fred shrugged, "We've already found a storefront for the shop. There's not much she can advise us on, though maybe she'll want to pre-order some products…"

"Right…" Carolina said, unconvinced as Fred swaggered out the door, before turning back down to her notes on muggle automobiles.

She paused, suddenly realizing that she was now alone with George for the first time… Fred had always been there.

She peaked up from her notes, observing him. He was copying down what looked to be an ingredients list for a longevity potion.

"Is that to make the whizzbangs last longer?" Carolina asked curiously.

"Yeah…" George mumbled, not looking up.

"I don't think you'd want to add any of those ingredients-they're mostly wet ones and would counteract the powdered erumpent horn which is most explosive when it's dry."

"Do you have a better idea, then?" George snarled, finally meeting her eyes.

"As a matter of fact, I do," Carolina said proudly.

George raised his eyebrows. "And are you going to tell it to me?"

"A gemini charm," Carolina said simply, before expanding upon it after George gave her a confused look. "You want to create a reactionary gemini charm, something that is triggered whenever anyone tries to stop them from going off."

George's mouth formed a slight 'o' shape. "Like say, if you hit one of them with a vanishing charm-"

"It would act as a gemini charm, yes, so that the more someone wants them to stop, the more whizzbangs there are."

"That's bloody genius!" George cheered.

Carolina smirked. "I know."

"Now I know why Fred keeps you around," he joked.

"Among other reasons," she said smugly.

"Nope! Don't want to hear about that!" George exclaimed, waving his hands and causing Carolina to burst out laughing.

"Right you are!" she agreed, smiling at him. Fred's twin was much easier to get along with than she first thought.

"You have any idea on how to get them to form shapes? Like animals or objects?" George asked excitedly.

Carolina thought for a moment. "I suppose an avifors charm would turn it into a bird, or caninus into a dog… actually, I imagine that the theory behind inanimate-into-animate transfiguration would apply-"

"Right, let me get this down," George said, pulling out his quill and quickly scribbling onto the parchment in front of him, before looking up at Carolina expectantly. "Well, don't stop there!" he said, amusement in his eyes.

Carolina grinned back at him, appreciating that he was taking her thoughts so seriously.

The following four days sped by in a blur, much faster than Carolina would have liked them to. While she attempted to stay on top of her N.E.W.T. studying schedule, Fred's imminent departure made it difficult to do so. Instead, she barely got an hour or two of study in each morning, before joining the twins in the Room of Requirement where they would collectively work on what the boys were now calling 'Weasley's Wildfire Whizzbangs,' as they had managed to turn the small explosions into something gigantic.

Delia was still moping around about Graham's disappearance, making staying in the dormitory practically unbearable, so Carolina yielded almost all her time to the company of her boyfriend; if anything, for the first time in her life, she was rather enjoying forgoing her studies.

After spending the first day with them, she had decided to hold off on notifying Snape about the vanishing cabinet, knowing that the Potions Professor would ask her how she had found out and she'd have no choice but to reveal the twins' involvement or face the suspicion that she had put Graham in the cabinet. She didn't want Fred (or George) to receive any more detentions on their final days in the castle, preferring that Fred spend his evenings with her.

And those evenings were probably her favorites of any of their time together…

When they'd get hungry after brainstorming and testing the whizzbangs, George would head over to the Great Hall for dinner and Fred and Carolina would sneak away to the kitchens, before gallivanting off to their favorite hidden alcoves, staying up past curfew and exploring each other with desperate abandon.

In fact, the approaching deadline of Fred's departure made Carolina even more certain of the emotions she had felt on his birthday. She hadn't mentioned any of it to him, of course, but she could feel it bubbling up inside of her…

She wanted him to know how she felt, to understand how much she cared for him, how much she… loved him.

At night, she would practice saying it, casting a silencing charm around the curtains of her four poster bed and whispering it into her pillow with her eyes closed. "I love you."

She felt ridiculous, but she supposed that was how one was supposed to feel at times like this.

So, by the twins' last day, all of the pressure to make him understand how she felt had been stewing inside of her, making it near impossible to focus on anything besides being in his presence. She knew she had to let him know someway, somehow before he left… but she didn't know exactly how. And she wasn't sure she could say it to him without knowing that he felt the same way… she didn't know if she could handle the shame if he… She took a breath in, unable to finish the thought.

"You alright, Lina?" came Fred's voice from beside her. He must have noticed her slip into her thoughts yet again.

"Yeah," she said, shaking her head, attempting to focus on the task in front of her: adding the finishing colors to the whizzbangs, "yeah."

"I can't believe you bastards are leaving tomorrow," groaned Lee, having joined them on their final day at school.

Carolina nodded hesitantly in agreement, unable to fully articulate her thoughts on the matter.

Not only was she devastated to be apart from Fred, but she found that she quite enjoyed George's company and would be missing him as well.

Fred flashed her a worried glance, while George carried on the conversation: "Me neither-and to think, I'll leave this place without ever getting to see the giant squid."

Carolina snorted, the comment having broken her away from her reverie. "You've never seen the giant squid?"

George shook his head in response.

"He swims by the Slytherin common room all the time," she said, astounded. "You've both seen it, right?" she asked, turning from Fred to Lee.

"Yep," Fred said as Lee nodded.

"Are you blind? If you just sit on the lawn for ten minutes you're near guaranteed to see a tentacle or two…" she said incredulously.

"Oy, no need to be rude on my last day!" George shot back, grinning.

"I would have liked to have slipped a dungbomb into Mrs. Norris's cat food," Fred said wistfully, causing the three other occupants of the room to burst out laughing.

"Well, you two can't say you haven't taken advantage of all that the castle has to offer," Lee said reasonably after the laughter had calmed down.

"True…" George sighed.

"Wait a minute," Fred said turning to Carolina, "back in February-when we went to Hogsmeade-you said there was someplace in the castle that I didn't know about!"

"Did I?" Carolina asked, trying to recall their conversation. "Oh!" she yelped, suddenly remembering. "Yeah… I think so, well you might know about it, but I doubt you've ever been," she said, an idea emerging in her head as she turned towards Fred's curious face.

"Really?" he asked, curiosity present in his voice.

"Yup," Carolina said, smirking and leaning closer to him on her elbows.

"And you're not going to tell me?" he asked, raising his eyebrows slightly and leaning towards her too.

"I could show you," she said, trying to sound as seductive as she could, despite the sudden rush of what felt like a million bees zooming around in her stomach.

George scoffed. "And I reckon you only want to show Fred this mystery place, even though it's my last day too," he said crossly, despite the laughter in his voice.

"Oh, sod off," Fred muttered, eyeing Carolina wolfishly as she leaned back innocently in her chair.

"I reckon it's almost dinner time," Lee said, his eyes darting between Carolina and Fred awkwardly.

"Yeah, we'll see you two later," George said, standing up and pushing his chair in. Lee followed, and soon enough, Carolina and Fred were alone.

Carolina took a breath in. The way he was looking at her made her nervous and excited at the same time.

"There really is a place, you know," she said, adjusting the collar of her shirt which suddenly felt far too tight around her neck.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Lead the way," Fred said, making to get up from his chair. He held the door open for her and her heart raced at the thought of where she was leading him.

They walked in silence down the empty corridors and Carolina felt a heightened awareness of the distance between their bodies-the few centimeters between their hands swinging side by side, the uneven paces of their footsteps.

They descended two flights of stairs, before approaching the statue of Boris the Bewildered.

As they walked towards the fourth door to the left of the statue, Carolina had a sudden moment of panic; what if Umbridge had changed the password when she had become headmistress? It seemed like a relatively banal, easily overlooked detail, but it was possible that the High Inquisitor had indeed ensured that all of Carolina's privileges had been stripped.

Still, it was worth a try…

"You're really not going to tell me where we're going?" Fred asked as they stood in front of the door.

"It's how I avoided your bloody lizard skin prank last year," Carolina said, eying him casually

"Really? I did always wonder how you did that…"

"Citrus rose," Carolina said in a hushed whisper, ignoring him. She heard a click as the door unlocked itself.

As she turned the doorknob, she could almost hear the blood rushing in her ears, her heart pumping overtime, producing the nervous energy that was sprinting through her body.

Hesitantly, she pushed it open, revealing the cream tiled floors and high stained glass windows of the prefects' bathroom.

As she stepped in and inhaled, the soothing scent of the oils helped to calm her nerves. This was what she wanted, even if it felt like it was light-years out of her comfort zone.

"Welcome to the prefects' bathroom, Fred," she said, turning and smiling at him.

Fred's wolfish grin expanded as he took in the room. "I can't believe you waited until my last bloody night here to show this to me! And to think, I was taking cold showers after Kenneth bloody Trowler used all the hot water just yesterday morning!" he said, walking over and inspecting the many faucets that lined the swimming pool sized bathtub.

Carolina shut and locked the door, then walked over and joined him, before turning the faucets on.

"Wait a second! You're not Head Girl, anymore…" Fred continued, raising an eyebrow. "I don't think you're allowed to be using this place… Isn't there something about that in the prefect code book?" he winked, mocking her.

"Well, I figure coming here pales in comparison to sneaking out of the castle late at night!" Carolina argued back as the tub began to fill.

"You seem to have lost your evasion to rule breaking," Fred responded. "Hang on, are you running a bath?"

Carolina nervously ignored his question, preferring to respond to his first statement. "Well, as Ulick Gamp put it in his journals, when the entire system has been corrupted by tyrannical, hegemonic powers, breaking the rules becomes the moral imperative of the civilian," she mumbled, blushing.

"What?" Fred asked, looking a little lost with his mouth agape.

"Or, I suppose, you've been a horrible influence on me," Carolina amended, adding a coquettishly smile despite the fact that the bees were still swirling busily through her insides.

"Horrible? I take offense to that!" Fred said, but once again Carolina ignored him.

She found it easier to focus on the task at hand-unbuttoning her blouse, if she wasn't trying to come up with a witty remark to satiate him.

Quickly, despite her shaking fingers, the blouse was off, and the skirt and tights and mary-janes soon followed so that she was only in her knickers and bra, and without looking at Fred, she stepped into the near-overflowing tub.

"Well, are you coming in?" she asked, finally turning to face the redhead who had an expression of utter shock written across his face.

"Blimey, Lina," she heard Fred whisper, before he hastily tried to rip off all his clothes at once.

Carolina felt a smile form on her cheeks as she watched him nearly trip over his own trousers when he tried to pull them off, before stepping deeper into the water. She didn't know from where this sudden bout of fearlessness was coming; all she knew that she didn't want him to leave tomorrow…

Finally, a rather flustered Fred, in only his boxers, lowered himself into the pool across from her. Carolina found herself blushing as she admired his body, now slick wet and gleaming with the warm water.

He paddled towards her from across the tub. Closer and closer he swam, until he was right in front of Carolina who subconsciously took a step backwards, feeling the cold tile press against her back.

The way he was looking at her made her breath catch and her chest tighten, while her arms and legs felt useless and awkward. She could see her own wonderment reflected in his blue eyes. All there ever was were his eyes…

Hesitantly, Fred brought a silent hand up to Carolina's cheek, tracing his thumb over her cheekbone, then down to the corner of her jaw, lower and lower down the side of her neck, until it latched itself into her bra strap, tugging it off her shoulder, before doing the same to other one.

Biting her lip, Carolina brought her hands up and behind her back, carefully unclipping her bra. It floated up to the top of the water, just in between them. She turned her eyes up to look at Fred's nervously.

His mouth was open, his breathing heavy, and his eyes lingered on her white bra, floating in front of him, before they traveled up her chest and caught hers.

He took a step closer. "Lina," he whispered, looking into her eyes searchingly and Carolina instantly knew what he was looking for. He needed to know the same thing that she needed to know.

Carolina brought her hand up out of the water and pushed it through Fred's hair, slicking back the strands that had fallen into his face. Slowly, she took a step forward and pushed the bra out of the way, before bringing her other arm out of the water as well and resting it on his shoulder.

She took a breath in, before standing on her tiptoes, and gently bringing her lips to his.

That was all the encouragement that Fred needed and suddenly her back was against the tiled wall once again, and her naked chest pressed up against his, and his hands were clutching her lower back, running through her wet, tangled hair, down her arms, and her legs were wrapped around his waist, and he was pulling off her underwear, and then his.

When Carolina would recall this night many years later, she would remember the distinct image of their undergarments, floating away across the pool, turning gently in the waves that were emanating from their bodies together.

Some time later-Carolina wasn't sure how much later, but her body had turned pruny and the water was only lukewarm at best-she found herself stepping out of the pool, her hand clasped in Fred's.

He carefully wrapped a towel around her, a content smile playing across his face. Carolina admired how relaxed he looked-she hadn't seen him like that in a while; he'd been working so hard on the fireworks and setting up Weasley's Wizard Wheezes-his eyelids were half lowered, his cheeks were rosy and his chest rose slowly, up and down. She watched in silent awe, forgetting how much her body actually ached, as he grabbed a towel for himself, dragging it across his body, shaking it through his hair.

There were so many parts of him, so many little hairs on his body, so many freckles, so many fingers and toes and eyelashes and they were all here with her. All of them were hers, she found herself thinking as he raised his head, finished toweling, and smiled up at her.

"Fred," Carolina said quietly, stepping closer to him. The tile was cold on the bottoms of her feet but she could feel electricity pulsing through her. She wrapped her arms around him again and his smile widened. "I love you," she murmured, leaning in but when she kissed him, something was wrong.

His lips weren't moving like they normally would, his arms weren't around her.

Carolina took a step back, feeling her stomach plunge somewhere deep within her.

"Carolina, I-" Fred started, a look of regret crossing his face.

"Oh my god," Carolina whispered, feeling horrified, mortified even. "Oh my god," she repeated, taking another step back.

"No! Lina-I just-I don't, you know, I don't think-I'm sorry!"

Carolina grabbed her wand, rapidly summoning her clothes to her and casting a vicious drying spell to her soaking undergarments.

"Listen, I really like you," Fred started to say.

"Don't bother!" Carolina spat back at him, pulling her underwear and skirt on, not bothering with her tights and bra.

"You know, like more than my mates!" Fred continued desperately.

"That's rich, more than your mates," Carolina snarled. She couldn't believe what she'd just done. She'd felt so sure beforehand that he had felt the same way as her. And he didn't. She felt used, misled… hurt.

How could she have let herself do that with him? Lose her virginity to him, and he didn't even love her back? She was such a fool, such an utter, complete fool.

She felt tears welling up in her eyes, whether from sadness or from her pride being hurt beyond repair, she wasn't sure. All she knew was that she needed to get out of there; to get away from Fred and the useless explanations he was flinging at her as she dressed.

"It's not you-I'm just not-you know, I've been spending so much time thinking about the shop-and I didn't know-Lina, I'm sorry, could you just stop moving for a second?"

"I'll see you around, Fred," Carolina muttered darkly, finally back in her clothes. With her cloak pulled tightly around her, she ran out of the prefects' bathroom, ignoring his pleas for her to stop and to come back.

Author's Note: And we're back from that little break! Ahhh, this chapter was difficult to write! Semi-based on my own life when I told someone I loved them and they said they liked me more than most people... ha. (But, also not based on my life at all because I didn't lose my virginity in the Hogwarts Prefect Bathroom!) Anyways, hopefully Fred and Carolina's respective actions/reactions feel in character. I tried to channel my inner 18 year old while writing this and pull out their immaturity/pride/lack of emotional intelligence. HOPE IT WORKED AND AS ALWAYS, THANK YOU FOR THE REVIEWS. YOU ARE ALL THE GREATEST!