Fred was settled in his armchair with a soup bowl filled with Phoenix tears rum, the bowl was something that held sufficiently large enough volumes of alcohol and therefore it would do the job as a drinking vessel in his opinion. His eyes, as was now usual for his day off, were fixed once again on the front doors of Flourish and Blotts bookstore further down the Alley in the vain hope of catching a glimpse of her. He had missed this ritual the previous Wednesday due to him spending the day lashing out from his temper at receiving that blasted letter, but his heart ached for a mere glimpse of her and hope dragged him back here again this week.

He had just taken another large swig of the burning rum when he saw her. His heart stopped.

Her long, brown curls shone caramel in the summer sun and bounced as she marched purposefully down the street directly towards… directly towards Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes he noticed with a pulse of excitement and nerves. Not feeling like this was how he wanted her to see him, and desperately hoping she was coming to see him, he shot out of the chair. Banishing the rum back into the bottle and dumping the bowl in a sink full of hot water he cast speedy cleaning and tidying charms around the open plan lounge and kitchen, vanishing any rubbish as he went. Checking out the window he gave himself two or three more minutes at least until she got all the way up through the shop and leapt into the shower with his toothbrush already in his mouth.

By the end of three minutes his teeth and body were clean, he was wearing fresh clothes and was about to go down into the shop in case she was down there when he heard a deliberate knocking on the door. With nerves fluttering like pixies in his stomach he stepped forward and opened it.

"Hey" she said nervously tapping her feet "can I come in?"

"Of… of course, please." He ushered her inside, distracted by how particularly pretty she looked close up today. "Would you like a drink or something to eat?"

"Oh, no thank you. I've just got here from your parents' place." She explained and they shared an understanding smile "I actually came to ask you a favour."

He was about to say 'anything', which his heart was screaming in his chest, when his brain remembered that she had said she would try and find a way around him having to marry the Nott girl and stopped himself in case she was going to offer to marry him instead out of pity or concern or a false sense of duty. He couldn't do that to her. He wouldn't do that to her. He loved her and had dreamt of marrying her so many times over the many years they had known one another, but he could not live with himself knowing that he had stolen her future happiness from her and destroyed her chance of finding a husband she loved as much as he loved her.

"I need a new set of shelves in my lounge, I got a load more books for work and I'm now in danger of being engulfed by the swamp of books every day." She elaborated in an anxious tone without looking at him "I asked if your dad could make them but your mum said he's so busy that it would be best to ask you since I need them done quickly."

"Of course I will. I'd love to." Fred blurted out so embarassingly quickly that he almost kicked himself for it.

"Thank you" she finally raised her deep chocolate eyes and looked at him, disarming him with a wavering smile "and I'm sorry about last week. I was being interfering and… I'm sorry."

She had barely finished her apology when he swept her up into his warm arms.

"No. I'm the one who's sorry." He countered "I was sharp with you when you were only trying to be kind. Please, please can you forgive me?"

Nestled softly against him, Hermione rested her cheek against the top of his jaw and breathed out all the worry she had been carrying about Fred's reaction since the week before.

"Are you going to marry her?" She heard herself ask and in response she both heard his affirmative reply and felt him nodding against her cheek.

She began to pull away slightly but Fred wasn't ready to let her go. He held her close and nuzzled at her cheek with his freckled nose, slowly inching their lips closer together. Her heart was pumping fiercely as she felt his lips gently brush against her own. All of a sudden the thick scent of rum came through on his breath and hit her, despite the strong toothpaste he had used, and Hermione froze.

'He must have drunk a lot for me to smell it through that toothpaste' she thought as his nose nudged hers again gently 'and he just told me he's marrying her.'

Her heart shattered like a fragile glass ornament thrown from a tenth story window but she masked her features expertly to not give it away. Dealing with post traumatic stress since the war had given her an expertise in that particularly useful skill. Mustering her strength and enduring her mask was firmly set in place, Hermione turned her face away and pushed lightly on Fred's strong arms so that she was released.

"I need to get back to work, I'm doing testing in the lab this afternoon." She muttered as she extracted herself from his hold. "Bye Fred."

Without bearing to look at his face again lest her carefully plastered on mask of indifferent were to crack, she left.

The afternoon was long and stressful but Hermione soon became lost in her work and by seven o'clock she had acheived some substantial results on her first round of testing. It took her a while to finish the official log of her results and pack everything away safely, so it was nearly nine o'clock when she arrived home to her flat to a pleasant surprise.

Fred had clearly spent all afternoon working on her shelves as they were already finished, put up and loaded with her books. He had made her three beautiful sets of book shelves from mahogany wood then vanished and polished them until they shone. The edges of every shelf were curved and the top corners fluted elegantly with tiny, intricately carved bowtruckles cheekily peeking over the top and around the sides of each set and giggling at each other.

All of the piles, stacks and heaps of books from all around the floor of her lounge had been added to the bookshelves for her, she noticed with glee that each individual shelf held a single stack, even if that meant the shelf wasn't full, to ensure he hadn't mixed up any of her organisation. She also noticed that he had then cleaned the lounge for her and placed a bottle of her favourite wine, an enormous bunch of delicate purple hyacinth flowers that symbolised apology and a small handwritten note.

Hermione,

I am so, so sorry for my mistake earlier and stepping over the line. I hope you can forgive me and that I haven't completely destroyed our friendship. You are so important to me.

I hope you like the bookshelves.

Yours always,

Fred

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