She was living through hazy days at this point. Her head was constantly pounding, the blood in her veins creating a beat throughout every thought she had. She had gotten sick again that morning and her body was still trembling in after shocks. She was thinking about avoiding mirrors and reflections from now on. She had glanced at herself this morning and her collar bones were getting quite portruding and her face was thinning slightly, hollowing her cheeks and her eyes had circles under them and she was paler. Her eyes looked wild. She had tried to transfigure, after all, it was her genetic gift, but for the love of Merlin she could only seem to change the palor of her skin into something resembling her normal skintone, somewhat hiding her dark circles, the rest had to be done with make-up.

She ran a hand through her hair frustratedly and walked almost sleepily down the hall, despite it being mid-afternoon. She paused near the opening of one of the rooms when the fire place lit up and she poked her head in curiously, watching as Charlie came through, Selena standing poutily beside him before she shot through the room like a firebolt and up the stairs, presumably to her room.

Aero turned her head and raised a questioning eyebrow. Charlie threw his arms up and raked his hands through his hair with a tense laugh.

"What did you do to her?" Aero asked curiously.

"I didn't - I didn't do anything to her! She's been acting up all weekend, screaming at me and slamming doors and stomping her feet and - I think something's wrong." he said, deflating at the end.

Aero pursed her lips, eyes running over his slumped figure.

"Wrong how? She only threw a tantrum."

"Only a tantrum?"

"She's a child, a very young one. Obviously she's going to have fits."

Charlie shook his head.

"You don't get it. You weren't there. She...I was making her pancakes, you know, like she likes? But she tossed it to the ground and said...well she said I didn't 'make them like daddy' and ran to her room."

Charlie put his hands over his face and shook his head as he sat down.

Aero leaned against the doorframe and watched him. She sighed.

"Charlie...she lost her parents. Both of them, at the same time. She's not old enough to understand it, but she's old enough to notice it. We may have lost our friends but this girl...she lost, basically her whole world. I think she's entitled to be angry and moody."

Charlie leaned back and looked so lost at that moment Aero wondered if she should find his mother.

"How are we supposed to help her though? I mean...we've given her the most stable life we can give her, right? I mean, I know we don't know a thing about kids, let alone parenting one, and yeah she sometimes has to go to Romania with me, and here she's living in a rebellion headquarters but...we're not messing her up, right?" he asked frantically, his eyes panicked as he caught her eyes.

Aero bit her lip and crossed her arms. Her heart beat increased and her stomach tried to turn itself inside out but she looked collected as ever on the outside.

"We're trying our best, and that's all Des and Shane asked. We're trying."

"What if it's not enough?" he asked quietly.

Aero was silent for a moment.

"It'll have to be, because that's all we have."


Fred searched through the whole apartment. He couldn't find his damn purple suite jacket. It had to be around somewhere, unless George had taken off with it, which happened quite frequently really, he was always tearing through his closet. Fred slumped against the bed, long legs splayed out across the bedroom floor and he ran his hands messily through his hair, making it stick up at odd ends.

Aero probably knew where it was, she generally kept track of things instinctually. But he was kind of avoiding her at the moment. Well, alright, maybe not avoiding, per se, but if he wanted to avoid serious conversation and the nagging in his brain everytime he noticed how off she was, he kind of had to steer clear of her. It sounded wrong, he knew that. There was nothing right about actually having a desire to go days without seeing the woman he's supposed to love. Which he does, both love her yet have the desire to avoid contact. Which was confusing on it's own. And hard. Because technically, they sort of maybe kinda sometimes lived together. Occassionally.

He groaned loudly, banging his head against the bed post. Things weren't nearly this hard back in school. Which was actually a lie, now that he thought about it. Their relationship was many things, but easy had never been one of them. They were determined to stay together though. They showed that by the many times they ended up together no matter what. But this time...Fred felt like it was different.

Yes, different, that was what it was. Something was different about them this time. Something had changed without either one of them noticing. He felt a little blindsighted. He thought they were fine and then WHAM, they weren't. It was like being hit with a bludger when he wasn't looking.

Aero was different. She was always a quite person, never really sharing her emotions and whatnot. They tended to scare her. Which Fred understood, because on the rarities Aero showed what she was feeling underneath that collected mask of hers, he was a bit frightened himself. She could be a bit intense. But now...

Now she was quite on a whole different level. Quite, like she was detatched, like it wasn't just a collected air she hung around herself for whatever reason she did. This was like she really didn't feel anything. A detatched sort of air was around her now. Fred frowned and wondered when it even started. Had it been at school? He would've noticed then, wouldn't he? Admittedly, things weren't quite the same after the times they fought and left each other, but he never noticed anything too dramatic. It might've just started after school then. Maybe. He wasn't sure. Bloody fucking hell.

And he couldn't deny she had been dwindling lately. She had lost quite a few pounds, nothing that sent alarms buzzing in his head, like she was trying to starve herself to death. But she looked more...she looked tinier. Her skin was paler too. She ahd been drinking more. She drank hard stuff, like Sirius did. Maybe she picked it up from him. Tonks seemed to drink hard when she happened upon a glass. Maybe it was just a genetic preference? On more than one occassion, he'd catch her lighting something up around the place, but the window would be open to air it out so he didn't raise a fuss, he would often be too distracted really to ask about it.

He shook his head. Nothing was wrong with Aero. Or him. They just had some issues they needed to work through, and they'd do that because they always did. Nothing ever got between them, not for long anyways. Not that Bulgarian twat, or Angelina who he still needed to remind at least every other day to stop writing him, or her family or anything. They were Fred and Aero, had been together since third year and would be until they both died. That's just how their story went.

He crawled onto his knees and got ready to stand when his eyes flicked straight forward towards the trash can on Aero's side of their bed, filled with tons of paper. It wasn't anything he was concerned about, just observed. George and he were constantly throwing messed up plans they sketched out in there and Aero probably had irrelevant paper work or something shoved in there. And while he noticed the envelops in there, several in fact that seemed un-opened, he ignored it and made his way to the shop downstairs, shouting at his twin to unhand his dragon-scaled jacket at once before he lit his hair aflame. The letters were soon forgotten, sitting at the bottom of the trashcan, unread and still sealed.


She leaned against the doorframe, watching her moody goddaughter repeatedly run a small pink brush through the golden silky hair of one of her dolls. She recognized the doll, it was from Desarie, from Selena's second birthday. Her little room had really filled up with all sorts of knick-knacks and toys. Neither Charlie nor Aero recollected having this many toys as a child. But Mrs. Weasley had brought over Charlie's old toys from when he was a baby, saying that 'with the way Charlie was infatuated with his dragons, she'd likely never get another grandchild from him'. She seemed quite putoff and distressed when Aero told her she couldn't remember any toys she'd played with when she was little. She had mainly just played with Draco, amusing him with his own toys.

The dollhouse Dean and Darius had gotten for her was in the middle of her room, actual little burning candles hung in holders on the walls and talking little portraits that sounded more like a comforting hum in the quiet of the room than an actual conversation. It was quiet in the room though, which alone set Aero off. Selena was a very loud player. She liked to constantly talk to her dolls and stuffed animals and jump around her room and on the bed, though Mrs. Weasley told her almost five times a day not to jump on her bed (Aero couldn't mind, herself, as Selena looked more than happy flying into the air and giggling, and as long as she didn't miss the bed on her way down...)

Aero rapped her knuckles gently against the wood in a way of knocking and Selena pursed her lips in a sort of I'm-determined-to-ignore-you sort of pout. Aero rolled her eyes and pushed herself slowly into the room, folding herself onto the floor so she could look up at Selena on the bed.

"You wanna tell me what's gotten you all buggered?" she asked softly.

Selena shook her head fiercely and Aero bit her lip, nodding and glancing about the room.

"Charlie's rather upset, you know."

Selena's brow furrowed for a brief moment and continued on in her stoicness a moment later.

"Did something happen at Charlie's?"

When the little girl didn't reply Aero felt a wave of exhaustion hit her but now wasn't the time to zone out. Selena was troubled, and that troubled her guardians.

"He told me about the pancakes. That he doesn't make them like your daddy does."

Selena's eyes got all big and green and watery as she stared at her doll.

"He's awful sorry about that, Lena. He didn't mean to upset you. But...he can't really make them like your daddy, can he?"

Selena shook her head slowly and her chin wobbled.

"Lena, I know this is all really confusing and really scary. I also know it's okay to cry, because you don't understand any of this and you miss them. I know you just want your parents back, love..." Aero said gently, watching with an ache in her recently hollow-feeling chest as a tear fell down Selena's little rosy cheek.

Before she could blink Selena was launching herself off the bed and Aero only had time to curse quickly before Selena was clinging to her, though the force of her jump had rocked Aero back and one hand had to jut out behind her to steady them. Her stomach lurched. She wrapped the little sobbing girl in her arms and one hand rubbed circles on her back while the other held the back of her golden head and her little face nuzzled its way into the crook of her neck and warm tears splashed onto her skin.

"Shh, it's alright. I've got you, baby. I'm so sorry." she whispered, rocking them.

Selena's legs wrapped around her waist and her tiny body heaved with a trambling sob. Aero sat and comforted her as best she could, whispering soft nothings into her hair and holding her like she'd crumble if she let go. And all the while she couldn't help but feel this smothering force of heart-stopping guilt wash over her as she held the sobbing child of her murdered friends, who clung to her, the reason she was crying in the first place, in return. This situation was all kinds of wrong and she felt a part of her heart break off at the realization.


I know this was an insanely short chapter, and an insanely long wait, but the next chapter should be up soon and should be longer. I just wanted to put something up, you know? I love you all for the reviews I've been getting, really! I love knowing your opinions! (I was so sad writing this Selena, because I stupidly thought it would be a good idea to listen to Ed Sheeran's 'small bump'. His songs make me cry.)