Chapter Two: Setting Up Shop

While Angelina didn't move into her new home as fast as she had originally hoped, by August she found herself at the front door of Weasley's Wizard Wheezes. She had spent a majority of her summer at home with her parents or hanging out at the Pitch with her dad. She had realized that she may not have a career in Quidditch as an actual player, but she did have a great in road to becoming a coach. Throughout the summer she had met up with her various school friends. Angelina, Fred, George, Alicia, and Lee had become regular Friday fixtures at the Dastardly Wizard, a wizard's club in London. She and Fred often went on various dates: quidditch games where they would both loose their voices or quiet dinners at quirky restaurants. Life after Hogwarts was a wondrous mix of freedom and pleasure: they were young, without responsibility.

Fred had her come on a Saturday morning so they could spend all day getting her settled in the flat and showing her around the shop.

"You going to actually come inside or stand here looking at it all day Johnson?" George walked up to her, a copy of the Daily Prophet tucked under his arm.

"Well I'd love to just go inside but there's no telling what kind of strange security charms you guys have in place."

"You know us all to well."

"Pride myself on it."

"I just got back from making you copies of the keys, so here's one for the flat, one for your bedroom, and one for the shop."

"One for my bedroom?"

"Your dad was around a few days ago, grilling me and Fred about the 'sanctity of your space.' I think he even put a special charm on it so neither one of us could go in or he threatened to at least."

"Sorry about that."

"Hey if Ginny started sharing a place with two guys, all of us Weasley men would do the same thing." His smile was like Fred's but different, one of the main reasons she had always been able to tell the twins apart. "Well that's enough chatter let's get you upstairs."

"Where's Fred? Still asleep?" George quirked an eyebrow at her, "Sorry that was a dumb question."

"Anyway there's a gate here to the right which leads to the back stairway, follow me."

Angelina had prepared herself for the worst, very cramped quarters with two of the world's messiest men. She had been prepared to bring a female eye and her instincts had never failed her. But when George opened the door to her new home, she was nothing short of surprised. Upon entering the flat she noticed how dark it was, things strewn about the floor in every which way, dishes piled up in the kitchen. She could smell the loo without seeing it and there were at least six bags of trashed piled by the door.

"Thanks for cleaning for me."

George cracked a smile and a careless shrug, "Too busy doing real things like coming up with new products and working the floor, you can see why we need you."

"To be your maid?"

"Oh no way, we just need help. I mean there is a lot of stuff going on and we definitely need an extra set of hands. You're room is back this way." She followed him down the hall, to her left one door was firmly shut obviously Fred's. Through the next door way she got a glimpse of George's room which was in no better state than the common areas. "This here is your room; the loo is at the end of the hall."

George opened the door to her room, she could tell the paint was new and the wooden floors were freshly polished. There was a queen-sized bed, dresser, and desk inside. She could tell Fred had something to with it the walls were a nice mint-green and her trunks, which she had sent ahead, were in a neat stack on the far side of the room.

"He was up all night."

"I'm sure."

"I've got a few more errands to run, orders to place, groceries to buy…anyway I'll be out for awhile. Think you'll be alright?"

"Yeah, I'll just unpack and stuff."

"When Fred gets out of bed make sure he shows you the ropes downstairs, we're having you start immediately."

"You got it."

"Oh and Angie…."

"Yes George?"

"Really glad you're here." He gave her a fraternal peck on the cheek and whisked out the door.

She had always been a friend of George's. In fact he was the first Weasley twin she actually met, the one who convinced her into trying out for the house team and the one who had given her the support to keep after Fred. She couldn't imagine a better place for her to be at the moment.

With that in mind, Angelina headed straight for Fred's room.

Fred Weasley was asleep in his bed, one arm wrapped around his pillow, sheets tangled about his waist. The creak of his door caused him to stir.

"C'mon George give me at least five more minutes."

"Not George." The voice was female. For a second he was disoriented, he made for his wand which was on the bureau next to him.

"Stupefy."

Angelina managed to successfully block him with a shield charm. "Even in your sleep you're slow."

Fred was now sitting up in bed, his bare chest visible, breathing heavily. "You're scared the shit out of me Angie."

"I live here Fred."

"Yeah but this is a recent development, you remember MadEye 'CONSTANT VIGILENCE.'"

"Well I'm glad one of your school lessons actually stayed with you."

She was a vision in his door way, long gone were the tiny braids: her long hair falling in soft waves down her back, half of it pinned up. She wasn't wearing any make-up, the way he liked it. Her look was earthy, natural, basic, and essential. Her white blouse provided a pleasing contrast to the caramel tone of her skin, while her jeans hugged her body in ways Fred only dreamed about.

"Come have a lie in with me."

"Fred it's already 9:30."

"What's your point?" Of course she fell into bed with him, just as he new she would. They lay there side by side contemplating the ceiling, the late morning light streaming through the curtains. He could smell her scent, just like the magnolias that bloomed in the garden at the Burrow. Here she was in his bed, he moved his hand to link his fingers with hers and drifted back to sleep wondering if this wasn't all part of his dream.

Angelina could tell by the regulation in his breathing, that Fred had gone back to sleep. She slowly extricated her fingers from his grasp and snuck quietly out to unpack her belongings.

She spent most of the morning placing pictures on the wall, hanging up her clothes, making up her bed. It was calming work and it made Angelina quite content to know that Fred was sleeping down the hall, the whole scene quite domestic. Once her room was finished, she decided to make headway in the loo and kitchen. Her mother had sent her with all sorts of cleaning supplies, while Angelina could obviously do a simple charm, her mother had taught her the muggle way to keep house. It was a part of her non-magic self that she was loathe to relinquish.

She moved on to the living room, folding various articles of clothing, opening windows to let in fresh air, checking corners for dust, and fixing cushions. By noon she has made definite headway and Fred still wasn't awake.

"Hey Angel." He had caught her unawares, on her hands and knees scrubbing their kitchen floor. She had on tatty house clothes, old football shorts from when she was younger and a tank-top that showed off her ample bosom all to well to the man watching her.

"It's about time." She looked up at him, a piece of hair falling into her face from the messy ponytail that was trying to restrain it.

"You know I'm not a morning person."

"Got that seeing as how it's almost 1 in the afternoon."

"You want to head down to the shop." He was scratching his head, still not completely awake. He wore low slung pajama bottoms that were flirting dangerously with his hips, almost daring Angelina to tug on them to see if they would fall.

"You want to put some clothes on?"

"Not really."

"Tease."

"Don't I know it?"

"Let me finish this floor and Ill be right down." Fred turned to exit.

"Oh and Fred?"

"Yeah?"

"My face is up here."

From the tips of ears forward, Fred Weasley flushed the color of a man caught in the act.

"So you'll mainly be in charge of using that winning personality of yours to help with the customers and ring up sales. And you'll have to help with restocking and stuff." Fred had led her down to the shop and had her in the main room which was full of shelves of Weasley creations.

"Register and the books?"

"Books?...Angie, I thought you knew this was a joke shop?" To Angelina's surprise he wasn't kidding.

"No Fred. Books like accounting, management, the budget. You and George do have all those right?"

His face was blank; it appeared that the Weasley twins didn't have a clue."

"Damn Fred, you need to have balance sheets, make sure you're actually making money."

He gave this due consideration and with a smile on his face pronounced "Well there you have it, you can do that too."

She smiled, leave it up to herself to actually introduce responsible business tactics to the twins, she was amazed they had remained open as long as they had.

"C'mere I want to show you something."

He led her down an aisle whose theme could be loosely described as pink everywhere, obviously this section was dedicated to their female clientele. Fred picked up a box and pushed into her hands.

"A daydream charm?"

"Yep, these kept me going when I couldn't be with you."

Her caramel cheeks colored, to know that Fred daydreamed about her assured her that she was not the only one left unsatisfied by their separation.

"And how were these daydreams?"

"Oh Miss Johnson, I would not want to insult your maiden ears, but trust me if I had known you owned shirts like the one you've got on now, you probably would have been wearing that in the beginning instead of your school robes." His voice had turned warm and sensuous; it flowed over Angelina like warm butterbeer.

"What do you mean beginning?"

As he moved behind her to replace the box on the shelf he whispered in her ear "That is to say that by the end of it, you don't have clothes on at all."

His hand was on the small of her back, while the other turned her to face him.

"It was nice waking up to you this morning, even if I did think you were trying to kill me."

At this she could only laugh, she decided to play coy. Skipping free of his light hold she moved to the counter, sitting next to an antique looking machine, "So this is the register Ill be manning?"

Fred, not in the least discouraged decided to play the game her way for awhile, "Yeah, its fairly simple, buttons with numbers. Think you can handle it?"

"I can handle anything." She winked.

"Would you be able to handle it if I did this?" He had been too quick for her this time, his hand moving upward to cup her breast, teasing her nipple through her shirt, while his other hand moved up her arm and shoulder to the base of her neck.

"Fred…"

"I do love it when you moan my name."

"C'mon we have to stop."

"Why? No one is here. It's just you and me, with you on the counter just like I've imagined since we bought this place."

With that she grasped his t-shirt to pull him the last few inches that separated their mouths. He got lost in the taste in her, daring her to go places they had never gone before. In that moment, she was the only thing that existed for him, her touch the only thing he could feel, her scent the only thing he could smell. The way she whispered his name was music to his hears, the tinkling bell above the front door was not.

"Oi twin! Can't molest the employees, the girl could sue for sexual harassment." George walked in, impossibly cheery over the scene.

Angelina took this as an opportunity to escape, knowing at that moment she had let Fred go farther than she had ever dared to before. "Right, well I'll just head back upstairs and finish cleaning. She took off through the back, not looking back, knowing that if she did she'd see a very disappointed Fred.

"Dammit George!"

George chuckled. "I'm sure you'll have plenty of opportunities, she does live with us now mate."

"Not the point, we were in the middle of a moment."

"Well now you and I can have a moment while you help me get these bags upstairs."

Shopkeeping had never been an aspiration of Angelina's but within the first two weeks of working at WWW's, she seemed to realize that she may have missed her calling. The upbeat pace of the shop made sure that she never had a dull moment and at night she busied herself getting the accounts in order, believe it or not the twins were turning a comfortable profit.

Her job may have been easy, but her living situation was far from it