London - Novemeber, 1996

In the middle of the year 1996, Percy was forced to admit something horrible.

Voldemort was back.

Harry Potter hadn't been lying. Dumbledore hadn't been lying. His brothers hadn't been lying. They'd all been telling the truth.

The Ministry was nervous. The Minister had the Auror program taking in twice as many trainees as normal. He was making plans for protection. Perhaps he was even making plans for war.

War. That was what it might come to.

Percy had been almost six when the last war had ended. He had only a few, fleeting memories of it. And, of course, he remembered the day Harry Potter had defeated You-Know-Who.

But another war…

Percy hadn't spoken to his family in almost two years. Sure, they'd been right. But how could he go back to him now? His pride was hurt, his image was practically destructed. So he continued to dodge his father at work and he continued to hang on to every word that the Minister said and he continued to be the perfect little employee.

And he continued to gain power.

In the middle of the year 1996, Audrey Cain was still oblivious to the war. She was super excited for her trip to America and then, that summer, she went with two of her best friends. They had an amazing time. She returned home and went back to school in September.

Against Audrey's prediction, they hadn't seen each other in a very long time. But they didn't give much thought to each other. To Percy, Audrey was a Muggle. To Audrey, Percy was just some guy. Sure, he was pretty cute and his hair was amazing… but he was just cabbage guy.

Right?

They'd met two times already, two strikes, but fate hadn't given up yet. Fate had one more strike left, and he was going to try again.

Neither of the two admitted to having seen each other until years after it happened.

No, not Percy and Audrey.

Percy and George.

The Weasley family always assumed that Arthur was the only one who even had the chance to come in contact with Percy.

But it had happened twice actually. One time they'd met, George'd simply nodded at Percy and allowed Percy to continue on his way.

The other time, it was just after George and Fred had opened their joke shop, both George and Percy happened to be in the same part of Diagon Alley. Percy was there on work duties. He was being sent to hang up wanted posters. George was on his break.

They were outside of Ollivander's, in fact.

It had been a rough day for George. He'd gone to visit his mum the night before because his dad was working so late and she'd burst out crying in the middle of his visit about how she hadn't seen Percy in so long. George had to spend the night at the Burrow, attempting to calm her down.

Then that morning, one of their shipments had been late and they weren't able to offer the product they'd promised.

And now this. Percy was just strolling around, full of I-work-for-the-Ministry pride, hanging up wanted posters as though advertising a concert.

George was just so angry…

He slid in front of Percy. "Hello, brother," he greeted, a smirk pulling at one side of his lips.

"Fred, I…"

And his dear brother couldn't even get his name right.

"I'm George," George spat.

Percy tugged at his collar uncomfortably. "Oh. Hello, George. It's nice to see you."

"Yeah, I wish I could say the same."

Percy glanced back at the bustle of Diagon Alley. The storefront of Ollivander's wasn't very crowded in the middle of the school year. "How's Mum doing?"

George's wand appeared out of nowhere. "Don't call her that."

"I…" Percy's eyes had widened to the size of Galleons.

"You know she cries over you almost every day? You know that she misses you so much that she can barely look at the family clock anymore? Your hand is always pointing at work. Never at home."

"George, I have to go…"

George's wand rose.

Percy dashed away. Maybe he should have thought to apparate, but he was too flustered, too astonished by his brother's appearance, his brother's anger. He ran all the way through Diagon Alley, pushing past children ogling at broomsticks and mothers pushing strollers and goblins making their way to Gringotts and witches and wizards on dates. He dropped wanted fliers on the ground as he went. He ran through the Leaky Cauldron out onto the streets of Muggle London.

When he glanced back, he saw that George was still running after him, though he'd had the wisdom to stuff his wand back into his robes.

Still, the sight of two grown men in robes running through Muggle London must have been some sight. I'm surprised the Muggle Police didn't arrest them right there.

Percy had unknowingly led George to right outside of the apartment building that Audrey lived in and Audrey had chosen that very moment to come out of the door, wearing sneakers and running clothes.

"Percy!" she exclaimed when she saw him, surprised that she still remembered his name. "Hi! What're you…?"

"Can I come into your apartment building?" Percy asked. He didn't wait for an answer. He just pushed her back inside and followed.

George ran right past the building, cloak flaring behind him.

Audrey stared at him in confusion. "Were you being chased?"

Percy looked down at her. "Um… kind of."

"Who was that? He kind of looked like you…"

"Just some random guy," he assured her. "I'd best be going now…"

"Wait!" she said, grabbing his arm. "I'm not working today and I'm going to be bored out of my mind. Any chance you want to go grab some dinner later?"

Percy pretty much blanched at her and Audrey instantly withdrew. "Do you mean like on a date?" Percy asked incredulously.

Audrey shrugged. "I guess."

Percy looked over her. He hadn't gone on a date since he and Penelope had broken up at the end of their seventh year for "career purposes." (It had been a mutual decision.) But there was something about Audrey…

"I'll pick you up at seven," he announced, and he walked out of the building.

Audrey stared after him for a long moment before she recovered herself and went on the run she'd been planning the whole time.

See? Fate knew there was something there. Fate knew they were meant to be together. And after Fate's third intervention, they had started to realize it too.

At 6:59, Percy stood in his apartment, staring at the clock. He was going to Apparate to the alley outside of Audrey's apartment building, but he didn't want to be too early, and he didn't want to be too late. About twenty seconds after the clock had changed to 6:59, Percy turned and was shot to the alley. He flattened his hair and straightened his clothes. Then he walked up to her door.

At 6:59, Audrey walked out of her door. She wasn't really sure if Percy was the kind of guy that showed up twenty minutes late, so she wasn't in a rush. She knew it would take her at least two and a half minutes to get to the lobby, more if the elevator stopped a bunch of times on the way down.

At 7:03, their eyes met.

Now that they were at the restaurant, Audrey was starting to regret asking Percy in the first place.

It was unbelievably awkward.

They'd walked to the restaurant in near silence with only "how are yous" attempting to break the sheet of ice between them.

And now they were sitting there, waiting for the waiter to come take their order.

Percy does look cute, though, Audrey thought as her eyes skimmed the menus without obtaining any information. She glanced at him over the top, but he was avidly studying his menu. Audrey frowned and picked out a meal to order before placing her menu back on the table.

After a few minutes of carefully reading every single thing on the menu, Percy finally decided what he wanted and he placed the menu on top of hers and looked at her.

Audrey was staring at him.

Percy awkwardly shifted his eyes to the rest of the restaurant. He couldn't look into Audrey's eyes. Not when she looked like that. Her dark hair had been pulled out of her usual ponytail and her makeup was subtle, but gorgeous. She wore a little black dress and, oh Merlin, Percy couldn't look at her.

"How… how are you doing?" he asked, just to say something, because silence was not working very well.

Audrey held in the smirk. "I'm doing pretty well. How are you?"

"I'm doing great."

The waiter came and took their orders and then they were left in silence again. Audrey was hit with the sudden recollection that she knew almost nothing about Percy and she wasn't really sure how to start a conversation.

Luckily, he did it for her. "How was your trip to America?" Percy asked after grappling through his mind for something to ask her about.

Audrey's eyes lit up. "Oh, it was amazing. I had more fun than I've ever had in my entire life."

"What did you see?"

"We went to New York and we went shopping on 5th Avenue – you would not believe the number of people that are on that street at any moment of the day. And we saw a Broadway play. We went to the Statue of Liberty and the Empire State Building. We also went to a bunch of museums." Audrey paused to try and remember what else they'd done. "It was a pretty touristy trip," she admitted.

"Erm, what was the best part?" Percy questioned.

Audrey shook her head. "I couldn't even pick. It was all too amazing, all too different than London… I couldn't pick."

Percy must have felt something similar to what Audrey felt when he'd described his trip to Egypt: awe, respect, amazement. Here she was, gushing about the intellect, the awe-inspiring scenes, the miracles that she'd seen. The level of excitement in her voice…

They spent the rest of the night discussing all of the places on their bucket lists and then he walked her home as they continued to talk. Both of them wanted to walk along the entire route of the Great Wall of China, however improbable that goal was. They both wanted to go to Athens.

When they arrived back at Audrey's apartment, she asked for his phone number.

"My phone number," Percy repeated. He recalled his dad's love for these ridiculous contraptions, though he wasn't even positive what it was that they did. They were just some Muggle item. "I don't have one."

Audrey stared at him in disbelief. "You don't have a phone?" she repeated. Her jaw had gone slack with the shock.

Percy shook his head.

For a moment, Audrey wondered if he was lying to shake her off. But it didn't add up. He seemed to have enjoyed the night almost as much as she had.

"How about… I leave a message with your doorman?" Percy asked, rather stiffly.

But she knew what it meant.

"That would be… great." Audrey leaned onto her tiptoes and she kissed Percy's cheek. "Goodbye, Percy."

An entire night had gone by, and Percy had given not a single thought to the war that had been troubling him so much. Percy couldn't believe that this girl, this Muggle girl, had made him forget.

He was not looking forward to work the next morning.

Oddly enough, Audrey had no desire to go to work the next morning either. She was rather hoping that she would be able to spend the whole day with Percy.