Written for the Quidditch League Fanfiction Competition
Team: Wigtown Wanderers
Position: Captain
Prompt: IT
Word count: 1,073
When Percy was young, the one thing he wanted more than anything was to be older. He wanted so desperately to be trusted with something big, to be allowed to stay up and work, to enter a room and have everyone listen to him. It wasn't a big dream, as dreams went, he thought. He didn't want to run off to tame dragons or seek adventure against deadly curses. He just wanted responsibility. He wanted his father to look at him with complete trust as he gave young Percy an Adult Task.
As each new Weasley sibling came along, Percy worked hard to always look out for them when his father wasn't around. His mother was often at home, though Percy made sure that she took breaks from looking after seven children—six, really. He wasn't a child, after all. Bill and Charlie helped of course, they were older than Percy and were expected to. Even so, sometimes Percy resented them for being older than him, for those precious extra few years they had that made them more deserving of trust.
So Percy worked harder. He closed the gap between the age of his brothers and his own experience. He didn't need to play Quidditch in the backyard, so instead he helped his mother with laundry. He could do without a special and rare trip to Diagon Alley for ice cream, he didn't really need it. Instead he could use the quiet of the house (minus the ghoul still rattling and moaning upstairs) to study for Hogwarts—which he only had three years to prepare for.
Step by step, rung by rung, Percy steadily climbed the ladder to becoming an Adult where he could finally be given tasks that mattered. When his letter finally came, Percy felt ready. He'd take on this challenge of school and master it, just as he had all the other tasks he'd taken on. He asked his parents if he could make his own way to Platform 9¾, but they refused. He was, it seemed, still a child in their eyes. No matter, Percy would just have to turn his journey to school into a watch of his younger siblings. There were too many now for his parents to easily keep track of, and the twins could be nightmares if they felt like it (which they often did).
Percy could not understand their attitudes. It was like they felt no urge to grow up, no urge to be taken seriously. All they wanted was to have fun and laugh, even if it got them in trouble. They couldn't understand him, either. It was like their own little tug-of-war game between the twins and Percy. Fred and George would constantly try to get Percy to join their games, to lighten up and have some fun, while Percy would be chasing after them to finish the books Mum had found and be serious for once. They were the very definition of childish and Percy could think of no worse thing.
As soon as he stepped onto the Hogwarts Express, Percy split determinedly away from Bill and Charlie to find his own compartment. He didn't need his older brothers watching over him, he was just fine on his own. He easily found a compartment with someone who didn't mind sharing and settled down for the ride. This was it; this was where he finally got his independence and could show how responsible he was. First years couldn't be Prefects, but Percy knew that's where he would end up. Perhaps he could even have that role sooner—he was sure the current prefect of Gryffindor (where he would obviously be sorted) wouldn't mind an assistant. From there it would only be a short hop to Head Boy.
Percy sat at his desk in the Ministry of Magic and wondered how things had ended up as they had. He was currently Junior Assistant to the Minister for Magic himself, he had people under him he was responsible for, his opinion was asked for and—sometimes—taken onboard. He was a recent graduate of Hogwarts, working in a position many older than him had applied for. He was an Adult—and everything was shit.
There was a war going on outside and he was supposed to pretend it didn't exist. His youngest brother, Ron, was one of the most-wanted criminals in Britain, along with his friends Harry Potter and Hermione Granger. Fred and George were also on the run, hiding away and spreading news through their radio station that Percy listened to every time it broadcast—just so he'd know they were still alive. His sister was trapped in a school that should be a safe haven but had instead become a prison akin to Azkaban, except the guards weren't dementors—they were Death Eaters.
Was this the life that he had hoped for when he was a kid? Constant worry and headaches? Battling family loyalty and paid duty? He didn't know how to turn his brain off, he didn't know how to stop and find some happiness in the constant fear-filled drudgery that was working in the Ministry of Magic during the second Wizarding War in Britain. You-Know-Who was back and it was worse than all the tales he'd heard. Before, he'd always imagined that he'd have a way out; that he'd be clever enough to never need to be worried about a knock on his door. Now he wished he'd paid attention to Fred and George when they tried to whisper their secrets to him, all their tips and tricks for getting away with mischief.
It seemed like every day he heard about another classmate going missing or turning up dead somewhere. Each and every one of them hunted down by the monster they were too afraid to give a name to. There was a capital letter to the word 'He' now, that always meant You-Know-Who, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, the Dark Lord. He was out there, and He was coming for them all.
Percy sat at his desk and wished he could retreat under the covers to keep it all far away from him. He wished that he could run into his parent's room and seek comfort and reassurance. But he couldn't. Because he was an Adult, and Adults were the ones who dealt with the monsters so that children could play unafraid.
Percy wished he was one of those children, instead of an Adult. But there was no going back now.