Disclaimer: I own nothing except the plot.

******

"George…"

"Yeah?"

"I've been thinking …"

"Really?"

"Yeah."

"About what?"

"You know…"

"No, what?"

"Our little problem…"

"Which one?"

"You know…"

"No, I don't."

"Macmillan…"

"Oh, what about it?"

"Maybe we should leave him alone."

"You serious?"

"Yeah…"

"But I thought you… no you want this, I want this, we almost had him…"

"Idiot, I didn't mean like that."

"What did you mean then?"

"I mean we could let him come to us."

"He's not gonna do that…"

"We could try, right?"

"Suppose…"

"George?"

"Yeah?"

"You think Lee's asleep?"

"Don't know, why?"

"I can't sleep and we could you know, if you wa-"

"DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE WHEN I'M IN THE ROOM YOU PERVERTS!"

"Maybe not tonight, Fred."

******

Ernie was chewing and enjoying his toast at breakfast when he suddenly felt Justin's presence disappear. "Justin… where you going?"

"Err…" was all Justin could utter and stared at his best friend sceptically from where he was standing. Ernie gave him a pleading look and swallowed. "I was just going to talk to Wayne," said Justin and pointed over his shoulder with an obvious look on his face.

"Oh good," said Ernie and took a deep breath. "Just don't leave without me ay? Hannah has already gone with Susan and…"

"Don't be silly, why would I ever leave you to walk alone to class?" said Justin in his teasing tone. "Don't tell me little Ernie's afraid of something… or should I say someone?"

"I'm not afraid of anyone," blurted Ernie as he turned slightly red.

"Who is it?" asked Justin, he could clearly tell when his best friend was lying.

"No one," Justin gave him a disbelieving look. "I-I… eh… you won't tell anyone?" Justin raised his eyebrows, of course he wouldn't. "You can't tell anyone, not even Hannah."

"Ernie, you know I never would," scoffed Justin and sat down beside Ernie again, he turned his voice into a whisper and asked again. "So who is it?"

"The twins," whispered Ernie, nearly impossible to hear as he leaned into his best friend. Justin's eyes went wide and stared at Ernie a bit confused, he hadn't expected this.

"What? Wait… what twins?" asked Justin, even if he already thought he knew.

"The Weasley twins," whispered Ernie and gazed around the table to see if someone was eavesdropping.

"Yeah, course, thought so but why? I mean they aren't really- what a?" They both jumped as a great grey owl almost crash landed on the table before them and drew everyone's attention, the owl looked rather tired. "That owl is a bit late isn't it?"

"Yeah," agreed Ernie and reached for the letter. "Who'd ever send me letters?"

"Your parents?" said Justin matter-of-factly.

"It's not from them," said Ernie and turned red when he read it.

"Who's it from then?" asked Justin.

"Them…" replied Ernie trembling.

"What? Let's see," exclaimed Justin and tried to grab for the piece of parchment.

"No," snapped Ernie and tugged the letter to his chest but Justin wasn't unsuccessful. He read the letter rapidly and gave his best friend a curious look; it wasn't a very long letter.

"What offer? What's it about?" asked Justin, they had now both returned to their normal speaking tone and was, because of the owl, gaining some attention from both fellow Hufflepuffs and others.

"Justin!" said Ernie in a low begging tone and grabbed the parchment and decided it was time to leave the hall. "I can't tell you!"

"Why not? What offer? What do they mean by 'same place as the first time'?" Justin was deeply curious and walked after his friend out of the great hall as they gained even more attention. "Ernie! Tell me! Why are you afraid of them? Ernie! Ernie, you forgot your bag, Ernie…" Ernie stopped and murmured, turned and walked past Justin back in to the hall, Justin followed suit and continued his questioning without any response from the blond boy. It wasn't until they reached class Justin finally gave up.

******

"Whoa, did you see that?" asked Fred and stared at the blond Hufflepuff ran out of the hall again.

"Course I did," muttered George and focused on his breakfast tiredly. It hadn't really been necessary for either of them to actually attend breakfast this day. They could have slept since neither had class until after lunch but Fred had insisted to spy on Ernie when he received their letter. George wasn't happy about this at all since they had spent almost all night developing new products. Fred however, seemed to have all the energy in the world, he had during the night served as tester and maybe that was the reason for it.

"You think he'll tell him about it? You think he might want to join too?" asked Fred but received a slap almost instantly. "Oi, that hurt!"

"Pervert!" muttered George.

"You're calling me? I'm not the one that wanted to use my wand as- Ouch, what the heck was that for?" George gave him an ironic look that said 'we're in public' but no one seemed to have noticed.

"You know you'll pay for this later yeah?" muttered Fred and stuffed his mouth with food.

"Why later?" asked George and rose with a mischievous smile.

******

During dinner next day Ernie knew the letter by heart but still hadn't made his decision, the holidays were near and the DA meeting last night had been almost excruciating, it had been the last one. Justin who was still being refused more information had tried to corner the twins after the meeting but hadn't succeeded and he wasn't even remotely happy about being left out.

"Ernie, just do it, will you," said Justin and glared at his best friend.

"But-"

"If you didn't want to do it you wouldn't have this much trouble deciding now would you?"

"You don't even know what it's about."

"Tell me then…"

"No, I can't," bellowed Ernie and Justin sighed; he had been doing that a lot lately.

"Just do it," repeated Justin.

"Where are they anyway?" asked Ernie.

"Who? Them? Maybe they're already there waiting for you…"

"No, I mean like I haven't seen them today, have you? I haven't seen any of the Weasleys when I think about it," said Ernie and gazed at the Gryffindor table.

"Notice that now, have you?"

"Huh?"

"Never mind, just go to wherever you're supposed to and meet them."

"Ok, I'll do it," said Ernie and rose instantly. "I'm bloody doing it! Oh fuck I'm going to hell!"

"Wha- what?" Justin dropped his fork and watched shockingly as his best friend left the great hall.

******

Can't believe this took me so long to write, but I hope you liked it. So obviously you know what's happening to Ernie now, aw poor Ernie. I hope I didn't fuck up the timeline again.