AN: I figured it's my duty as a writer to work my way through every overwrought AU in the fandom. So here we are!

A new chapter of my other story Ancient Curiosityshould be up tomorrow!

DISCLAIMER: Don't own anything

Confessions

Hermione took a deep breath as she took the first step into the Burrow for Sunday Lunch. It would be her first one since she'd broken up with Ron two months ago, and the only reason she was truly there was because Ginny had threatened her with unmentionable jinxes if she were to skip out on the eighth one in a row. Plus, Christmas was coming up, and she didn't exactly fancy the idea of spending the holidays alone in her new flat feeling sorry for herself. That and her healthy fear of her fiery friend, had her where she was now. Halfway inside the doorway of her ex-boyfriends home.

She sighed.

She shut the door behind her, blocking off the onslaught of snow. The front room was empty. She could hear the loud, excitable yells and laughter of everyone in the house and had to take a moment to gather her courage. She'd been assured by nearly every member of the family (save Ronald) that she was more than welcome to come back, and that they rather were hoping she would. But did they really mean it?

She was just about to turn and walk out when someone jumped down the last couple stairs and paused at the sight of her.

"Hermione!"

She had about two seconds to notice the scar running behind his ear and down his neck and recognize him as Fred rather than George, before he was lifting her in the air in a tight hug. She squeaked and wrapped her own arms around his neck.

"Fred!" She answered with as much cheer as she could muster. His warm chuckle against her made her sink even more into his delightful warmth and take a deep breath in. Something about Fred always made her feel like she was home.

"That's less impressive that you can tell us apart now that I've got this great big scar on my neck," he said with another loud laugh.

"Honestly, Fred, I could tell before!" She rolled her eyes despite knowing that he wouldn't be able to see.

He pushed his nose into her loose and slightly damp curls, and said through a sigh, "Yes, I know."

He slowly lowered her and touched her nose affectionately with his pointer finger before pulling her out of her thick muggle coat.

"I've missed your lovely presence, my dear," he said with his usual air of mischief. She turned to him and studied his expression. He gave her a ludicrous wink, but she could see in the slight twitch of a frown and concern in his eyes, that he genuinely meant it. She sucked in a desperate breath of air and focused on the line of his jaw rather than his so very earnest blue eyes.

"I've been very busy at the Ministry. You know how I am! Always working," she said with a dismissive wave of her hand and a laugh that could barely even count as such considering how pained it sounded. He just shook his head at her sadly.

"I meant what I said in that letter. George and I both did. You are always welcome," he said seriously, and she flushed at his tone.

She shook her head and said shortly, "Well, I'm here now, aren't I?"

He flinched before giving her a wide grin that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Right then. Well, come along. Mum's made an absurd amount of food, considering how many people decided they were going to show up today."

Hermione had to hold back a gasp when Fred grabbed her hand to lead her to the dining room like she hadn't been there a million times before. He didn't even release her hand when he pulled her into the room and every head at the table swiveled to stare at her.

"You actually came!" Ginny squealed from her spot beside Harry. Hermione had barely dropped Fred's hand before she was sandwiched between Ginny and Mrs. Weasley in a tight hug. She very nearly cried, and it was only when Mrs. Weasley mentioned her weight loss, that she realized how desperately she had missed being a part of this family.

"This just won't do! Come sit! Remus wave your hand! See! Right beside him, we've got your seat saved, same as always!" Mrs. Weasley chirped happily as she pushed her in the direction of the amused Remus.

She was so flustered that it took her sitting down to realize that her usual seat was directly across from the person she least wanted to see. She flicked her eyes across his face and said anxiously, "Hi."

The majority of the table seemed to hold their breath before Ron shook his head and said, "Good to see you, Mione." When he finally met her gaze she had to take deep breaths to stop her emotions from boiling over. His eyes held the same thing they'd held the day she had packed up all her things and left the flat. Desperation. Anger. Guilt.

She immediately looked away and met the intrigued eyes of Fred who was sitting just a couple seats down from Ron and glancing curiously between his brother and herself. Hermione averted her eyes back to her plate as conversation picked up, and Molly started yelling all the way across the table at Sirius for the motorbike he'd bought Harry as an early Christmas present. She found sitting by Remus to be just as wonderfully enlightening as always when he began to tell her stories about little Teddy's new obsession with muggle comic books, and soon the pain at being seated across from Ron flew to the back of her mind and she found herself laughing as Harry jumped in and talked about an accident while babysitting for Tonks and Remus that involved metamorphmagus abilities, a pizza delivery man, and a whole mess of Aurors.

"It was positively dreadful, Mione. I was so embarrassed, and it was in front of all my coworkers too. Oh, Merlin, I'll never live it down!"

Hermione was giggling to herself as she reached forward and snatched one of the five biscuits Ron had put on his plate without even thinking about it. It wasn't until she'd taken a large bite that was at least half the biscuit and swallowed it down that someone's startled scream reached her ears.

"Hermione, don't eat that!"

Hermione, after years of being around the twins, immediately dropped the offending item, but it was too late. She looked down the table in horror and waited for something completely humiliating to happen. Everyone in the table was staring at her with various expressions, and she noticed vaguely that Ron was pushing his plate far away from him as if just the proximity could prank him.

"What did you do?" She directed at Fred and George in a voice mixed with both anger and a good amount of anxiety. Fred had paled dramatically and was staring down at the half eaten biscuit on her plate, and George was scratching the back of his neck anxiously. As far as she knew, she didn't feel any different.

"It's a new product that we wanted to test on Ron," Fred said quietly.

George gave Fred a sorry look that she didn't understand before turning to her with a mildly scared expression. "It makes whoever ingests it divulge their deepest secrets. They won't be able to leave until they've finished."

Hermione paled and immediately clapped a hand over her mouth as Molly started yelling at the twins. She shut her eyes tight and was about to try and get up to flee when she felt the first push from her own conscious. She banged her hand down on the table in frustration. She could feel whatever they'd tried to trick Ron with compelling her to stay in the chair, and she mourned the fact that she'd never been very good at fighting compulsion magic.

Everyone stared at her as her face turned bright red, and she essentially yelled, "I had the biggest crush on Remus in my third year!"

She heard Sirius's guffaws quickly followed by Tonks giggling response, "I knew it!"

She made eye-contact with Sirius as his laughs died off and she groaned before saying, "You too, Sirius. In my fifth year." She buried her face in her hands as a new round of laughter broke out.

"Should've just told me, kitten. I'd have waited for you," he said in his usual flirtatious voice, and she didn't have to look at him to know that he'd winked most dramatically.

"I had sex with Viktor Krum in fourth year!" She practically screeched, and she gasped in mortification after the words left her mouth. The only person who knew that little bit of information was Ginny who immediately started giggling. Ron had known that there had been someone else before him, but she'd always refused to tell him who.

Molly tsked, and Arthur got very uncomfortable. She could see Ron's face turning red in anger, and she turned away from him. As a result she looked right at Sirius as he wolf-whistled and called out, "Didn't think ya had it in ya, Hermione!"

Remus covered Teddy's ears when he asked loudly, "What's sex, daddy?"

"Why don't you tell him?" Sirius asked her, and this time she didn't miss the wink he sent her way.

When Fleur's light voice admonished Sirius for embarrassing the girl she bit her lip to try and hold it in, but she still found herself saying very loudly, "I never truly disliked you, Fleur. I just pretended I did, so Ginny wouldn't kill me. I respected you and thought you were perfect for Bill!" The French woman gasped and put her hand to her chest as Ginny called Hermione a filthy liar. She peaked at Fleur between her hands and added involuntarily, "Especially after you healed me when Bellatrix..." she didn't want to finish it, but this product seemed to have no pity for her as it forced the words out of her lips despite how she gritted her teeth, "tortured me in Malfoy Manor." She finished with a gasp, and she found her eyes filling with tears. The only people in the room that knew about what had happened at Malfoy Manor were the people that had been at Shell Cottage, and she'd sworn them all to secrecy.

The laughter in the room had completely stopped, and she could feel shocked eyes on her as she glared down at Fred and George's horrified expressions and said through panicked breaths, "Make it stop!"

She vaguely registered George saying something miserably about not having an antidote.

Harry's hand on her shoulder was gluing her to the chair, and when she turned to look at him, bright red and panicked, she felt another force itself out of her. She couldn't look away from his concerned emerald eyes once she started speaking.

"My parents didn't really decide to stay in Australia like I told you. Every mindhealer I went to told me I would never be able to reverse the memory charms I put on them without causing serious damage, and I didn't want to burden you or anyone else when everyone was so happy after the war and I was so sad."

She gasped in surprise at her own admission and finally was able to jump to her feet, her chair slamming against the ground loudly in the silence of the room and Harry's hand falling limply to the side. He looked so disappointed and pitying that she had to turn away. Her entire body was shaking, and she knew if she didn't get out now, she would burst into tears or worse.

"Mione…" Ron's voice made her entire body freeze, and she shook with the effort to both flee and keep what she knew was bubbling up from breaking out. "I didn't… Why didn't you tell me!" He said angrily.

She whipped her head around to look at him and glared through her tears. "You never asked."

With that statement she clapped a hand to her mouth and tried to hold her breath, but they must've made whatever they put in that biscuit extremely potent because after just a few seconds she was gasping and letting out her next confession while staring at her ex-boyfriend.

"I know you cheated on me. I came home early from work the night I left you. I saw Lavender's things all over the living room, and I heard you two in our bedroom. That's why I broke up with you, and I didn't say anything to anyone because I was so ashamed that someone who was supposed to love me, could do something so awful to me. So I ran." She paused and sucked in a deep breath before whispering, "Our bedroom, Ronald! How could you!"

She squeezed her eyes shut and knew she had just one more confession before she would be able to leave. She could hear everyone around her gasping and Molly's soft, disappointed sobs, but she ignored all of them in favor of trying to convince her own mind that this next secret wasn't true, just so she wouldn't have to say it. When her head started getting light-headed from repressing it, she opened her eyes and looked down towards Fred who for some reason had tears in his eyes. She let out one heart-wrenching sob before the words fell out of her mouth.

"I'm in love with Fred."

Before anyone could react or stop her she sprinted from the room and didn't even manage to grab her coat before she threw the front door open.

She started running desperately in the snow to try and get past the anti-apparition wards that a paranoid Bill had put up after the war.

She heard multiple voices calling her name, and someone chasing her in the snow. Before they could reach her, she finally felt the ripple of magic and apparated away.

Fred had never felt like such a bastard in his entire life.

He watched as she disapparated just ten or so feet from him before finally stopping. He took about two seconds to catch his breath before he spun and ran back to the house without even thinking about it.

He was back in the house in seconds, pushing past a concerned Harry and Ginny and not even registering as they followed him back into the dining room. Everyone was still there, having loud discussions in the aftermath of what had happened, but for the second time that night, all conversation stopped and all eyes turned to him as he stormed into the room.

He ignored everyone and snatched a biscuit off the plate in front of Ron and started towards the floo, but not before stopping and pointing at Ron from across the table.

"I'll be dealing with you later," he said menacingly before running to the floo and calling out, "Hermione's flat!"

He was surprised when no one in the house tried to stop him, and before he knew it, he was stepping out into a flat that was so completely Hermione. It was filled with cozy furniture and books shoved in random places, and the walls were covered in pictures of her friends and family. He paused in the hearth and listened closely.

There was a bang from a hallway to the left, followed by what sounded like muffled sobs, and Fred's heart constricted painfully.

"Mione?" He called in warning before making his way towards the hallway. The noises paused, and he turned the corner right as Hermione came out of what must have been her bedroom, already dressed in what looked like one of Harry's or Ron's old Quidditch Jerseys and a soft pair of flannel pajama pants. It wasn't until another pained sob left her mouth that he realized she was pointing her wand at him.

"I have half a mind to curse you horribly for what you have done, Fred Weasley," she said determinately.

Fred immediately threw his hands up, and she gasped at the sight of the biscuit in his hands. He winced when a hurt and confused expression took over her face before it morphed into anger.

"Didn't get enough of a show before, did you? Come back to figure out more of my secrets?" She shook her head and sniffled, "Well I'm sorry to say, you know them all now!"

Fred took a careful glance toward her and rather than answering, shoved the entire biscuit in his mouth and swallowed it down after barely chewing. Her eyes widened, and slowly her wand arm dropped to her side.

"Fred, what are you doing! You don't have to do that…" She watched as he quirked a brow at her and waited for the cookie to take effect.

He was shocked by the strength of the compulsion and even more impressed that Hermione had been able to move at all while under it.

He understood immediately her feelings of frustration when his first impression started making its way up his throat.

"Lee was the first person I snogged, and it was in first year. We were trying to teach each other how to do it, but it was so bad and uncomfortable we swore to never speak of it again."

Hermione's nose scrunched up, and she started chewing thoughtfully on her bottom lip.

Since he wasn't fighting the compulsion, his secrets came way quicker than hers had.

"In my third year, I visited you nearly everyday in the Hospital Wing after you got petrified because I didn't want you to be alone."

Her eyes widened, and her wand fell from her fingers. "You did what?" She asked in disbelief.

"When I was sixteen, I had a truly terrifying sex dream that involved McGonnogal and a sexy school girls outfit."

She gasped, and his lips twitched upward when she snorted.

"In fifth year…" he had to pause and take a deep breath. "... I had big plans to ask you to the Yule Ball because I fancied you, but then Ginny told me you already had a date."

Her hands both went to her cheeks, and her mind seemed to be working a mile a minute.

"I snuck Krum multiple Puking Pastilles and continued to prank him through all of fifth year. Ginny and George helped."

Her pretty blush turned full red, and she narrowed her eyes at him. "He thought something was seriously wrong with his health, you prat!"

He opened his mouth to apologize but instead he said, "When you got hurt in the Department of Mysteries, I had nightmares about you dying. George and I slept in the same bed for two months afterward because he always helps calm me down."

He refused to break eye-contact despite how weak the confession made him feel. When she took a step closer to him, he knew he'd made the right decision. Her fingers twisted anxiously in the worn fabric of her jersey, and her warm brown eyes stared at him with nothing but understanding.

"When George lost his ear, I couldn't sleep in my own bed for even longer than that."

She stepped even closer and suddenly he could smell her soft, subtle lavender perfume and make out the freckles crossing her cheeks.

He reached out a hand, and she didn't even hesitate as she took it. A flare of hope burnt its way through him, and he gulped before whispering, "And I'm in love with you too."

He let out a visible sigh of relief when the compulsion ended.

He opened his mouth to say something, but before he could the small witch had vaulted herself into his arms. He immediately caught her and held her close in the exact position they'd been in just before lunch. She pulled back so that their foreheads were pressed together.

This close he could make out all of the colors of her eyes, and he couldn't quite believe just how many shades of amber there were. One of her hands ran across his shoulder to cup his cheek, and he shivered as her thumb brushed across the corner of his mouth.

"You mean it?" She asked quietly.

There was a vulnerability and fear in her voice that he guessed could've only been the result of his younger brother's mistakes.

He pushed their noses together affectionately and let all of the sincerity he felt seep into his voice.

"Of course, I mean it," he whispered.

Her legs came up to wrap around his waist, and he didn't think he'd ever felt something so sinfully amazing.

"I intend to keep you forever, Hermione." She sniffled softly, and he spread his hand wide against the base of her spine. "If you'll let me that is. If not, I'll have to do it against your will, and that's technically kidnapping. I don't know about you, but it might be awfully hard to proceed to the happily ever after part of this if I'm in Azkaban. Mind you, I think I could make it-"

She interrupted him by pressing her lips against his in the softest of kisses. When she broke away they were both grinning rather stupidly at each other.

"I've been dreaming about that moment for at least five years. Although, your snot was an interesting addition." She pulled her hand back and smacked his arm, but she still laughed.

"Shut it, Fred Weasley!"

The product never made it to the shelves, but Fred found he didn't really mind his weeks of experimentation going to waste when he had Hermione.

AN: I KNOW! Another one of my fics where Ron gets the short end of the stick! Not to worry, he doesn't get bashed as much in the other stories I'm working on!

I hope you guys enjoyed. Let me know what you thought, and let me know if there are any requests for other AU's that I haven't done yet. No guarantee I'll do them, but send them my way anyway!