Percy sighed as he stared out the window on to the grounds of Hogwarts. A week had passed since he first woke up and he was starting to heal nicely. The danger of any immediate problems had passed and he had been allowed some Skeleton Grow potion so his broken bones were almost completely healed. And other then a few minor twinges they didn't trouble him at all. The cuts and bruises that had been decorating him were also almost completely gone. All and all he was fine. And incredibly bored.

"Gah!" he cried in frustration spinning away from the window and plopping back down on his bed with a pout.

"Bored little brother?" Bill asked looking up from his book to give Percy an unsympathetic look.

"Yes I'm bored and don't call me little."

"Well it's only for a little while longer and then mum and Poppy will let you walk the grounds a bit."

"Oh I'm sure mum will let me, when I'm old and can barley see straight," Percy complained.

"Mum's had a pretty rough time, she thought she had lost you so I think it's more then fair for her to get to coddle you for a while Percy," Bill replied giving Percy a stern look.

At that Percy's petulant expression melted some but he refused to meet his brothers eyes.

"But she didn't lose me Bill."

"She thought she lost you when you supposedly turned on us and joined Fudge. Do you know how much she cried then Percy, when you let us believe all those things you said?"

"I didn't have a choice Bill. You had to believe that I'd betrayed you," Percy whispered.

"Why? Why did you have to do it?"

"Because."

"Because why Percy? Why did you have to turn your back on us?"

"Because it was my job Bill! No one else's. Dumbledore was counting on me to do this for him and I couldn't let him down."

Bill sighed and put his book down on a nearby table, crossing the distance between them he turned Percy around to face him. With one finger he gently tipped his brothers face up to his. Bill felt a horrible pang of guilt that his brother had gone through so much and the whole family had thought he was a traitor.

"Your to much like me you know that Perce."

Percy smiled slightly at that, "how so?"

"Both of us, Charlie too were so concerned with pleasing others that we lost sight of what we wanted. We were so focused on being the perfect sons, and students. We were sinking Perce, drowning in our own accomplishments."

"And what did we do?" Percy asked quietly.

"Charlie and I ran, and you Perce you embraced the water. I guess that's what makes us different. You tried to stick it out. And that's always been your problem Percy, not knowing when it was okay to run."

Percy gave a bark of laughter and tore his head away from Bill's grasp. Stepping back from his brother he stared at Bill with a bitter expression on his face.

"I've been running since first year Bill. I just didn't do it in the same way as you and Charlie. Dad and mum have always been proud of you. You were their oldest, their shining star in their eyes you could do no wrong."

Percy looked to Bill ready for an argument but upon seeing the blank expression his brothers face he kept going. Percy had needed to get this off his chest for years. And now that he had someone to listen it was all coming out like a steam roller.

"You have no idea what it's like to live in someone else's shadow. To accomplish something and be told that it was good but that if I tried harder next time I would be as good as Bill was or Charlie was. I tried so hard Bill. I tried to be like you and Charlie but I just wasn't good enough. No matter what I did I just wasn't you."

Bill was across the room arms around Percy in the blink of an eye, holding his brother for dear life. He couldn't believe he'd missed it, these feelings his younger brother was harboring. Was he so caught up in the things said that he didn't see the mask his little brother was wearing.

"Oh gods Perce, you don't have to be me. And you shouldn't try to be me. Merlin knows my choices have all been bloody stupid over the years. I am not the greatest person in the world Percy. I've done some really dumb things that I'm not proud of. When I left home I was so biter. Everyone expected so much from me. I had to be the perfect student, the perfect brother and the perfect son. So I ran. And I spent some time off on my own living for me. And I found what I'd been looking for."

Percy pulled away slightly to look up into his brothers face, "What did you find?"

"I found myself Percy. I realized that all this time I'd been living my life for other people and not me. And that's no life at all Perce. When it comes down to it at the end of the day you have no one else to answer to but yourself. Are you living for you? Or are you living for everyone else?"

Percy frowned, "I don't know Bill mum and dad-"

"Don't worry about mum and dad. No matter what happens they'll always love you I found that out the hard way, something about a parents unconditional love. You need to focus on you for once Perce, to hell with everyone else. You deserve a rest from constant expectations. Live for yourself Percy nobody else can live for you and you can't be anyone else. Your you and no matter what other people want nothing's ever gonna change that. I think it's time you saw that for yourself."

Percy sighed and leant back into Bill's arms.

"When did you get so wise Bill?" Percy asked voice muffled from Bill's shirt.

Bill laughed and ruffled Percy's hair like he used to when Percy was younger, "I think it was when the twins latest invention exploded it must have knocked some sense into me."

"Or when you fell down the stairs at the Burrow after telling the twins off for said explosion," a voice cut in.

Both boys turned to the door to see Charlie standing there. The expression on his face left no doubt that he had heard the earlier conversation. He crossed the room to join the other two and tugged them over to the window where they saw the twins, Ron, Ginny, Harry and Hermione all playing a game of Quidditch. How they had talked Hermione onto a broom was a mystery. Silence reigned between the trio as they watched the twins bewitch the snitch to fly up Hermione's skirt her screams and their's being audible from the window as she in turn bewitched their pants to fall down repeatedly.

"Serves them right," Percy sniffed his intellectual mind being more sympathetic to the distress of another with like intellect. Great minds think alike.

"Hmm well I think I heard her tell them they had the mind of a three year old only not so developed earlier," Charlie offered a slight smirk on his face.

Percy waved his hand in the air in dismissal of the comment and airily he replied, "Well they do, only I think a two year old would be more to their standards."

Charlie and Bill shook their heads in mock disapproval. But their eyes shown with relief that their younger brother was back to his more sarcastic self. The topic of earlier not forgotten in their minds just pushed to the back in light of more happier circumstances.

"Perce?"

"Yes?"

"Were glad your back with us."

"So am I Charlie, so am I."