Chapter 7

There was a deathly silence as the two stared in confusion.

"Ha!" shouted Lee in delight. "What a turn of events this is!"

Fred and George said nothing.

"You sure one of you isn't on Polyjuice potion?" Lee continued.

"What's Polyjuice potion?" they said together.

Lee looked like Christmas had come early. "You said that together! Oh my life, this is too brilliant, I've got to go and tell Angelina, she'll love this!" And with that he hurried out, leaving Fred and George alone, staring at each other.

Several minutes had passed before Fred cleared his throat. He held out his hand to George.

"I'm Fred."

"I'm George."

Silence.

"So..." Fred coughed awkwardly. "Are you going to say it or am I?"

"Say what?"

"That we're twins."

George said nothing.

"I mean, we must be," Fred continued. "We're identical. No other option. Unless you're on this Polyjuice potion, whatever that is," he added as an afterthought.

"No, I'm not. This is me. One hundred per cent. You sure you're not?"

"Yep, absolutely. Makes sense, a couple of people have said they've seen someone exactly like me."

"Yeah, I know the feeling. I've had it several times."

Silence.

"You're fostered then, too?"

"Yeah."

Silence.

"So I guess we need to know more about each other then?" Fred said, smiling. "I know it's tough, but come on, we need to try."

"Yeah, suppose we do."

Silence.

"Okay, I'll start. My foster parents are called Philip and Janet Johnson. I have an older sister called Helena and a younger brother called Sam. I went to boarding school and I hated it. And now I'm here." He grinned, and George smiled back weakly. "What about you, George?"

"My adopted parents were called Neil and April Croft. They had a son called Ben. Neil died on a night out drinking. I was glad to see the back of him. Ben made my life at school hell. April hated me so made my life at home hell. Now I'm coming here, I'm never going to see them again."

Silence.

"I'm sorry about that, George, I really am," Fred said quietly.

"Yeah, so am I."

Silence.

"You're coming to Hogwarts now though," he said cheerily. "You can try to forget about them now, you've got a new life ahead of you." He paused. "You've got me now."

George looked up at his twin, but his eyes still showed immense sadness. "But at least you've had someone in your life. You've had a family. I've been kept a prisoner."

"But now you're free. Try and forget the past, just look forwards."

"It's hard when they've left your mark on you."

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing, only, its impossible to forget them."

Silence.

"George. I'm your family now. Your real family."

"But you've already got a family."

"I have, and now you're in it."

George smiled, the first true smile, one that touched his eyes and made then glitter in the exact way that Fred's did.

"Thanks, Fred. It means a lot."

At that moment, Lee burst into the compartment. "Angelina loves you two already, and she hasn't even met you! She said the twin thing is brilliant."

Fred and George laughed at their absurdly excitable new friend.

"So," Lee continued, "what's your last names?"

George said "Weasley" and Fred said "Johnson" at the same time.

"But, I suppose it's Weasley and Johnson," Fred continued. After a glance at George, he decided.

"It's Weasley." George gave Fred an unreasonable expression. Was it gratitude, or something completely different?

"Fabulous!" Lee cried. "You two are actually brilliant! The fun we're going to have in lessons- you'll be confusing the teachers, doing each others tests- it's going to be fabulous! As long as we're in the same house of course..."

"House?" said George, looking puzzled.

"Yeah, there are four houses at Hogwarts, Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw and Slytherin. You basically live with the people in your house, so all I can say is, you'd better be in my house, both of you."

"You can't guarantee we'll be in the same house though," George said. Fred looked strangely at his twin, as if slightly hurt by the comment. "I mean, we've known each other for ten minutes, and yes, we may look the same, but we're still different people inside."

Lee looked disappointed. "Well, that might change. The main thing is that you'll be in Gryffindor. I will be, hopefully, just like the rest of my family. I don't want to break tradition!"

There was a brief silence before Lee jumped up. "I need some food, the trolley is way down the other end of the train, I saw it on the way to see Angelina, but I can't wait any longer. Want anything?"

George shook his head but Fred reached into his pocket and gave Lee a handful of coins. "Just buy anything and everything, I want to try as much as there is."

"Okay, I might be a while then. See you both in a bit."

On Lee's leaving, Fred turned to George and said: "What's up, George? You can tell me you know."

"There's nothing wrong, honest."

"I can tell you're lying. Don't even pretend to me."

George sighed. "It's just, this whole thing. Knowing I could have had someone by my side through it all. Knowing that I needn't have been alone. It's frustrating and unfair. It makes me think, why?"

"Why did they abandon us?"

"Yeah, exactly."

Fred paused for a moment. "I honestly haven't got a clue. But they must have had a good reason, right?"

"I don't know. Doesn't seem to me that anything is a good enough reason to leave your kids."

"You're right, yeah. I have a feeling though, a feeling in my gut, that they didn't want to lose us." He grinned mischievously. "I mean, who would want to lose us? Look at us, we're perfect."

"Completely perfect," George agreed, laughing with his twin. "You know, I've just realised, having you here is a blessing, I can look at how amazingly attractive I am all day."

"And we can learn to-"

"-finish each other's sentences-"

"-and swap places-"

"-to confuse the teachers."

The twins looked amazed at this moment, and then both suddenly had a look of glee on their faces, like a sudden epiphany had appeared in their minds at the same time.

"Brilliant," they said together.

A/N: So, what do you think? Do you think its realistic enough? I found it tough, I have to be honest. I could only ever imagine the twins together, until this idea came up for this story, and now it seems so unbelievably difficult to write them as two separate people. Really hard for me, this chapter was, so please review and give me your thoughts! All reviews are greatly appreciated. Thank you for reading! Special thanks to SkyeElf, KatiePennn, Spiralling-Down, TwinFan, GeorgieForever, and PotterheadWhovian for your lovely reviews :)