Author's Note

Thank you all for reading and thank you especially to Melfoy4193, hexinator (don't worry this isn't the end!) and jlchetti for the reviews which brighten my day!

Love,

Wishin' Girl x x

...

The next morning the twins woke up in their own beds for the first time since long before the war had ended, they had been too exhausted the night before to really look around the flat so took the time to admire their family's work in the morning instead.

The walls of Fred's room were painted a pale minty green and all his furniture was made of beech wood. His king sized four poster bed had bright sea blue drapes made of chiffon with ribbon edges and a matching thick pile rug lay over the hardwood floor. His curtains were white and adorned with a thousand brightly coloured tropical flowers which swayed with the breeze currently blowing in through the open window, embroidery hummingbirds flittered between the flowers silently.

Above his dresser was a large round mirror which had a halo of smaller round mirrors all set at slightly different angles to reflect the colours of the room at random. The other walls were adorned with brightly coloured enlarged posters of their products, the quibbler, Ireland's world cup winning quidditch team, the Wimborne Wasps, the weird sisters and a few muggle bands that Lee had taken him to see.

Moving into their open plan lounge and kitchen Fred marvelled at his sister-in-law's eye for making things look beautiful. Their large scarlet sofa and gold coloured armchairs had been expertly repaired and now sat by the brick fireplace on a huge dark teal high pile rug that Fred could bury his toes in. A glass topped wooden coffee table sat in the centre of the room, the bottom of which was already full of their odds and ends, and framed photos of their family filled the mantelpiece.

To one side of the rug was the kitchen, the breakfast bar separated the two living areas and it was just as he remembered it, except much much cleaner. The beech counter tops were pristine and the stove had been thoroughly scrubbed for the first time since they got it. Each cupboard door was still painted a different colour that deliberately clashed with the ones on either side and the fridge was covered in doodles and drawings ripped from his product ideas notebook. Fleur had added cushion tops to the four stools under the bar made of colour changing fabric and had thrown similar cushions onto the sofa and armchairs in the lounge.

Moving clockwise from the kitchen around the lounge rug Fred noticed the entrance area had a new welcome mat and the wall by the door was covered in coat pegs of all different shapes and sizes. Moving on again he got to his favourite area of the flat, behind the sofa was an area separated off by an old potions bench. They used the various drawers in the bench to store quills and inks of every colour. They had a workroom downstairs but this was where George came to do the records and purchase lists for the shop and Fred came to work on product ideas before they started testing.

Next to their workbench was the repaired floor to ceiling bookcase and attached ladder, filled with their old ideas notebooks, experiment scrapbooks, sales records for the shop and second hand textbooks they might find useful in product creation which had been taken with them when they fled during the war. The space behind the desk held an old leather muggle desk chair on wheels and a large bay window seat covered again in the colour changing cushions. The window seat was long enough for Fred to lie down on comfortably, even though he was rather tall, and the bay window, which extended from waist height to the ceiling, overlooked Diagon Alley so you could see all the way from Gringotts on the left to the Leaky Cauldron on the right.

The final wall held the fireplace and two doors which led to the twins bedrooms, with their shared bathroom accessible through either bedroom. Fred banged loudly on the door on the right to wake his twin before searching through the kitchen cupboards and making them both a spot of breakfast.

Fred and George spent their days rebuilding the shop with the help of Lee and Verity before starting to get to work on replenishing their stock and testing out new ideas. After dinner at the burrow each night, as was required according to their mother's strict instructions, George went to Wimborne to hang out with Angelina who played quidditch for the team there and Fred cuddled up with Hermione in an armchair at the Burrow to continue their routine. Fred had requested that Hermione reread Charlie and the Chocolate Factory to him 'so he could see where the inspiration came from for some of the ideas George had written in his notebook'. George was a very diligent brother and had included all the detail Fred could possibly need but this provided Fred with a brilliant cover for what he was really doing.

On the first of October the shop was almost ready to re-open; they had repaired and tested the strength of every inch of the building, the shelves were packed full of fresh stock, Verity and Lee had agreed to manage the shop floor so that Fred and George could work on production and the twins just needed to perfect a few new products for their grand re-opening. They had decided on releasing one new type of fun sweet and a game for families to play together now that the war was over, both inspired by the stories Hermione had read to them.

Their Quick Croquet game pack consisted of five hoops, two mallets which gradually transfigured from large wooden hammers to pink flamingos as the game went on, and if no-one won before the mallets transfigured completely they would simply wriggle free and fly away, and four balls coloured peach, purple, orange and turquoise which would roll around randomly whenever no-one was looking directly at them. Their other new creation was a spherical sweet with a crunchy shell and filled with lemon flavoured sherbet which caused the eater's hair to turn white and for them to grow a bushy white beard and moustache for an hour, very similar to how Fred and George looked after their mishap with the ageing potion in their sixth year.

In the newly repaired and enlarged workroom behind the tills, Fred was working on the new sweet's packaging and growing increasingly frustrated that he just couldn't get it right.

"George" he called through the open doorway "would you run upstairs and grab my notebook please? It's on my bedside table." he continued after hearing his twin's affirmative reply.

"What's the problem?" asked George as he returned with the notebook, flicking through the pages filled with colourful diagrams, inspiration and annotations.

"I can't get the colour right on this packaging" Fred sighed and rested his head in his hands, he'd been working on this for hours but every time he thought of the inspiration for the product his mind wandered to Hermione's warm body snuggled in his lap as she read the children's story out loud.

George suddenly starting to turn the pages much more slowly, his eyebrows raising as he studied the contents.

"So when you told me you're 'happy for her and ready to move on' was that before or after you drew these?" George accused his twin in a mocking tone.

He turned the notebook to show Fred page after page of sketches of Hermione's face and detailed studies of her eyes, lips and hair.

Fred lifted his eyes quizzically to look at what his brother was showing him before groaning loudly and letting his now bright red face fall heavily onto his workbench.

"I still love her" he admitted quietly "I'm really trying to not let it get to me but… help me?"

With those last two words he looked up at George so forlornly that his twin took pity on him and sat down opposite ready to hatch a plan.

"How do I look?" Fred asked, emerging from his bedroom in a pair of ripped jeans and a bright blue t-shirt of the muggle band 'The Verve' which made the electric blue of his eyes stand out even more than usual.

Fred had been relatively muscular before the war but had become much more buff leading up to the final battle. Obviously he lost muscle mass while in the coma but with the help of playing quidditch with his brothers and rebuilding the shop he was almost back up to his pre-coma size. This meant that the cut muscles in his shoulders and biceps were obvious through the snug t-shirt, hopefully compensating for the large yellow and grey bruises poking out from the neckline of his t-shirt and down his arms. Even with their bruise remover paste these would take another few months at least to heal given how much of his magical reserve his body had already used to keep him alive and heal his more serious injuries.

"You look almost as attractive as I do" George replied with a wink "but you should probably get a second opinion. Hermione left her Alice in Wonderland book here the other day, you should send her a patronus to let her know."

With an exaggerated eye roll Fred pulled his wand out of his pocket and sent his silver magpie to Hermione about her book, both twins knew he would use any excuse to see her.

A few anxiety-filled moments later Hermione stepped out of the floo wearing a yellow polka dot apron and covered in flour.

"Evening" She greeted them both, giving George a wave and Fred a kiss on the cheek while being careful to keep her mucky apron away from him in the process but still getting a mix of flour and rosewater lip balm on his cheek. With a giggle she brushed his cheek clean and a dark blush spread in the wake of her soft fingertips.

"Fred wants a second opinion on his outfit" called George from the kitchen as he grabbed them each a bottle of butterbeer from the fridge.

Fred blushed even more at this and puffed up his chest slightly as she raked her eyes up and down his body appraisingly.

"You look really good" said Hermione softly, meeting his gaze and momentarily getting lost in his eyes "what's the occasion?"

"You remember that Italian assistant healer at St Mungo's?" George stepped in when he realised his brother was just speechlessly staring at Hermione "Well she slipped her contact details into Fred's luggage when we left the hospital and they're going on a date tonight."

"Oh" Hermione prevented her face from falling at the idea of Fred dating someone by taking a long swig from her butterbeer "well then your date is very lucky, you look great."

The three chatted about nothing of consequence as they finished their butterbeers, Hermione curled up in an armchair and the twins lounging across the scarlet sofa. George didn't miss the way Hermione kept checking out Fred's body as his t-shirt pulled across his chest and rode up to show a well defined V shape of muscles around a trail of ginger hair from his belly button to his belt.

The bell that could be rung from the shopfront tolled, startling the three and causing Hermione and George to race to the bay window and peek down at the woman by the front door. With an exasperated sigh and fond smile at their childish antics, Fred stood and grabbed his wand.

"Don't do anything I wouldn't do" George called out as a farewell.

"Have fun" Hermione said reluctantly as she eyed the gorgeous woman waiting on the street below in a skin-tight red mini-dress and stiletto heels.

Fred painfully dragged his eyes away from the messy girl with frizzy hair and made his way down the many flights of stairs and out onto the street to greet Carina.