The black night

CHAPTER 4

Everyone was running around in a flurry organising their belongings as no-one would be going back to the Burrow for a few weeks. Harry and Ron had basically packed everything they would need so didn't have to worry to much.

All of a sudden there was a massive BANG from the kitchen. Harry and Ron were pulling their things down the stairs when Mrs. Weasley pokes her head out looking very dishevelled and VERY angry. "FRED, GEORGE, WHERE ARE YOU TWO, GET DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT". Mrs. Weasley tramped out looking very black, her clothes were charcoaled along with her face and hair which was also standing on end. She slapped out a small flame that had ignited on her apron when Fred poked his head out from the top of the landing. He was trying to look meek but he wasn't doing a very good job of it. "We are both up here Mum, George is in the bathroom and I am just organising everything, why?, do you need us to help you?". Fred tried to put on an innocent face and started to flutter his short eyelashes a little which only succeeded in making Mrs. Weasley even more aggravated, (if it was possible).

"YOU KNOW PERFECTLY WELL WHY I AM CALLING YOU, SO, YOU TO FOUND IT AMUSING TO BLOW UP THE SINK DID YOU". She stopped, took a breath and then started up again. "GET DOWN HERE THIS INSTANT, YOU TWO NEVER GROW UP, NOW BOTH OF YOU ARE GOING TO SIT HERE UNTIL THIS KITCHEN IS BACK TO NORMAL, I EXPECT IT TO BE FINISHED WHEN I COME BACK….".

"What is going on?', Mr. Weasley entered the room looking extremely tired and pale. "It was only a joke Dad, we will fix it…", George entered from the lounge room looking worried, Fred came down the stairs to join him. "We only did it to make a few people laugh, you have to admit that Mum does look very funny..". Fred trailed off from the look on both his parents' faces.

"Now is not the time for jokes, both of you, clean this mess up now, okay, we need to leave in 15 minutes". Mr. Weasley left the room looking very withdrawn and Harry realised that he would have had a very rough night. Mr. Weasley had always been so up-beat, Harry didn't remember seeing him like this very often. This made him question what Ron's dad was doing last night and wonder if his dream was somehow connected to a new plot of Voldemort's.

"Harry, look", Ron gestured for Harry to look into the kitchen at the mess his two brothers had created. Harry had to stifle back a laugh, he couldn't believe the chaos, he wondered what they used, a new mini 'bomb'?. The entire kitchen was black, even the clock was coughing up black smoke. The reason why the two boys were both holding back laughs was because of the effect the smoke had on everything in the room. The belonging in the kitchen were slowly being turned upside down as the smoke rested upon the device. So far, a sink and oven were both hanging from the ceiling and the table was drifting up to meet them. The smoke drifted over towards Harry and Ron and before they knew it, both of them felt themselves slowly being twisted upside down. Their feet implanted themselves onto the ceiling and they both found themselves stuck.

A loud scream came from the living room, it was Mrs. Weasley. "Oh my God, help, what's happening to me?, FRED, GEORGE, WHAT HAVE YOU TWO DONE?". Ron and Harry looked at each other, so the smoke had an effect on Mrs. Weasley as well. "BOYS, WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TO YOUR MOTHER?".

"HELP, HARRY AND I ARE STUCK AS WELL!!!!". Ron called out and his father came rushing into the room. Fred and George followed, not far behind with a look of anticipation on their faces. As soon as they saw Harry and Ron, followed by the entire room, their faces lit up into great big smiles. "Very funny boys, now, how we get them, your mother and the entire kitchen the right way up?". Fred and George looked at each other, their smiles vanished. "Well, we..a… sorta haven't done this before, so, as of yet, we don't know how to fix everything". Fred answered for the both of them, they were looking beseechingly at Mr. Weasley, hoping he wouldn't get very angry, but it was all in vain. "WHAT, ARE YOU TELLING ME THAT YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW THE REVERSE SPELL, BUT YOU DECIDED TO CONDUCT THIS 'EXPERIMENT' ON YOUR OWN FAMILY!!!. MIND YOU, YOUR OWN MOTHER AND BROTHER AND A GUEST WHO HAS ALREADY BEEN THROUGH ENOUGH ALREADY!!". Mr. Weasley was growing very red in the face. "We know how to do it, maybe you could reverse it?". This was asked by a very meek George.

Before Mr. Weasley could reply, a loud indistinguishable yell was heard coming from the living room. "Okay you two, come with me and we will find out how to get your mother down, then we will get these two down. The three of them left the room, Harry could then hear some mumbling and occasionally see a few sparks flying from the room. Mrs. Weasley screamed a few times so Harry knew they had some near misses. For what felt like an hour later, the four of them appeared, Mrs. Weasley rubbing her head. Then, Mr. Weasley conducted a spell and Harry and Ron felt themselves slowly float down to the ground again, both with very sore heads. Fred and George whispered a small apology to Harry, he shook his head, "I'm not worried, it was funny watching the room, although my head does hurt". Ron's parents just walked out of the room, both looking very angry and upset about the entire incident.

"What were you thinking?", Ron asked his brothers feeling unease about his parents. "You really picked the wrong morning to play one of your jokes, Dad had a hard night and Mum is really worried".

" We know Dad had a hard night, we thought that the kitchen might make him laugh, it looks like we were wrong, oh well, at least we know how to reverse the spell". The brothers then set about cleaning up the kitchen and getting rid of the smoke which out to be a difficult job. Every now and then it would start to affect one of them and they would start to drift upwards, but now they new how to stop it so it only took a couple of minutes and quite a few spells to clean up the room.

Harry and Ron left Fred and George to clean up the kitchen and went back to Ron's room to get their suitcases and bring them down the stairs. By now it was already 7:30 so everyone else in the family were already by the door. Mr. Weasley was putting spells on all of the suitcases to make them light, the spell had such an effect on all of them that they were all floating in the air, 20 or 30 cm from the floor. Harry and Ron didn't take long to drag their cases down the stairs, so their's soon joined the family. Eventually, just after 7:30, there were 7 cases all floating by the door.