1 The shop was crowded with weekend shoppers when Neville got back. George was at the counter, ringing up some purchases, but noticed right away when Neville walked through the door. He waved his hand and held up a finger, asking Neville to wait a moment.

Neville wandered around the shop, stopping to smile at the memories some of the products brought back, skiving snack boxes, pygmy puffs and the like. Neville noticed that Angelina Johnson was behind the counter, helping George. He wondered if there was anything between the two. Though Neville thought it wasn't likely as he remembered Angelina and Fred being quite close and having an occasional snog in the darkest corner of the Gryffindor common room.

It took about twenty minutes for the crowd at the counter to die down. George came from behind the counter, "Neville! Back already?"

Neville nodded. "I said my hellos, but there wasn't much for me to do there."

George grinned widely. "Let's go," and he motioned Neville to follow him to the back of the store and to the office. But when they got there, George grabbed the yellow ivy and began walking up the stairs to the flat. "Angelina can watch the store for a bit."

"How is Angelina?" Neville asked, hoping to get some information out of George about the nature of his relationship with her.

George shrugged. "All right. She's been a sport, coming here and helping me out when Ron can't."

That wasn't really the information Neville was looking for, but he decided to drop it. He followed George up the narrow staircase.

At the top of the staircase was a door with an old-fashioned lock. George obviously kept the place unlocked, as he turned the doorknob and the door swung open. Neville walked in and looked around. He entered immediately into a large square room. There was a caddy-cornered fireplace, with a few embers still burning. One long overstuffed red sofa was in front of the fireplace. The majority of the rest of the room was taken up with a large work table, piled high with bits of...well it looked like junk. Some dead plants, some dried up beetles, doxy droppings, pieces of felt, small empty capsules, paperwork and numerous other bits and pieces. All of it was covered by a thin layer of dust, suggesting to Neville that Ron had been right and George hadn't been working on his product.

"Would you like the grand tour?" George asked.

"Sure."

"This is my work room, obviously." Neville followed George down a long hall off the far end of the work room. George tapped the first door, "This is the loo," he tapped the second door, "This is my bedroom," The door was closed, so Neville couldn't get a good look. Then George tapped the third door, "This was Fred's room," The hall ended after that and opened up to a surprisingly bright and sunny kitchen. George began rooting through a cupboard and finally came up with a mortar and pestle. "I should keep one of these on my work table," he said absent-mindedly.

"So what do we do?" George asked Neville after they returned to the work room and George surreptitiously used his wand to suck up the dust covering the work table.

"No idea," Neville admitted.

"Well," George said thoughtfully. "We'll just do this trial and error then, right?" He grabbed some leaves off one of the yellow ivy plants and began grinding it up with the pestle. Within moments, a clear yellow liquid began to ooze from the leaves. "Is that supposed to happen?" George asked Neville.

Neville laughed, "No idea," he said again.

George looked up and met Neville's eyes and laughed with him. "All right then, I guess I should be the first guinea pig." George handed Neville a stopwatch, "Time how long it takes my feathers to fall off." George pulled a box of canary creams from under the table, opened it up and grabbed a cream. He took a deep breath, "here goes nothing," he muttered and shoved the cream into his mouth all at once. He chewed thoughtfully and said, mouth full of food, "You know, these really taste quite goo-." He was cut off by yellow feathers sprouting all over his body.

Neville hit the button on the stop watch. He and George were silent as they waited it out. After two minutes and thirty seven seconds, the feathers began to fall off and George was completely feather-less twenty seconds after that.

"So some people are stuck with the feathers?" Neville asked.

George nodded and opened another cream. "OK, time me again."

Neville reset the stopwatch and waited while George ate the second cream. For a second time that day, yellow feathers sprouted all over George's body. This time, immediately after swallowing the cream, he scooped out the contents of the mortar and shoved it in his mouth, making a terrible face in the process. However, no sooner had George swallowed when the feathers began falling off his body.

Neville stopped the watch, "Forty-two seconds," he exclaimed. "Blimey, George. I think it works."

George jumped up and down, "Yes!" he said, pumping his fist in the air. He grabbed Neville by the shoulders, "We did it, Neville!" He leaned in toward Neville and planted a wet kiss right on Neville's lips.

Neville's eyes widened, too stunned to kiss back. The kiss lasted only a few seconds before George let go and turned around. George turned back to his work table and began speaking fast, almost maniacally. "We might be on to something, you know? With this yellow ivy. I think what I should do next is call those customers who couldn't moult, maybe offer them some sort of gold incentive to come try the creams with the yellow ivy. Maybe offer to pay for their stay in St. Mungo's if it doesn't work. I'd better get more yellow ivy though. We just might be able to get these back on the shelves in a few months if I can get enough." By the time George had finished babbling, Neville had backed up to the door. His back pressed against the door and his fingers running over his lips. What, exactly, had George meant by kissing him?

George got quiet and still, his back was facing Neville, but he seemed to sense Neville's nervousness. He grabbed on to the work table, "I'm sorry, Neville," he said so quietly Neville wasn't quite sure he'd heard correctly.

"It's all right," Neville said just as quietly, his voice cracking causing Neville to writhe in embarrassment. "I should go," he said a little louder.

George turned around. "No! Stay. I'm sorry, I just...I won't do it again. All right?"

"Are you...?" Neville trailed off.

"What?" George was suddenly looking everywhere except at Neville.

"Are you, like that? You like blokes?"

The blush rose in George's face so fast it caught Neville off guard. He nodded slightly.

"Oh." Neville said faintly. He heard himself saying, "Me too." Saying it to Luna was the first he'd ever admitted to it. He didn't think he'd have to admit it again so quickly.

"I thought so." George said.

They both stood there, quietly for a moment. Not speaking, facing each other. George's hands were in his pockets and he was rocking back and forth on his feet. Neville was still pressed against the door. Both wanted to say something, both were scared to say something.

"So..." George said.

"So..." Neville repeated.

They locked eyes and began laughing at their mutual discomfort. Neville decided to do something uncharacteristically bold for him. He spoke up, "You can do it again. You know, if you want to."

"Yeah?" George asked.

"Mmm-hmm." Neville nodded.

"All right then," George took a tentative step towards Neville, licking his lips nervously. When he got to the door, he leaned in and pressed his lips softly to Neville's. Neville was expecting it this time, and was able to respond to the kiss immediately.

George pressed his whole body in to Neville's causing the door knob to dig in to Neville's back. Not that Neville cared. His body was singing, he felt impervious to pain.

They stayed like that, standing, kissing, for several minutes. Neville wrapped one arm around George's waist, while George had his hands on Neville's neck and running fingers through his hair. Their mouths opened and they licked their way in to each others' mouths.

They were startled apart by a knock on the door. "George?" Angelina Johnson's voice rang out. "We're getting a bit of a crowd down here!"

"I'll be right down," he said. George looked at Neville, whose lips were bright red and seemed to be pulsating. All George wanted to do was to stay up here and kiss those lips over and over. But...business was business.

"I have to go down there," he said apologetically.

"It's all right," Neville said. "Maybe I should go?" He didn't want to go.

"No. No," George insisted. "Stay here. I'll come back up when I can."

"All right," Neville agreed easily.

George darted down the stairs. Neville took a look at his surroundings and sat on the overstuffed sofa. He was breathing hard, trying to wrap his head around what'd just happened.

He'd known he was gay for a long time. Really since he was about twelve and had a horrible unrequited crush on Harry Potter. By fifth year, he was pretty well over that crush and came to think of Harry as a great friend. He'd always had a certain affection for the Weasley twins, who were so much who he wanted to be. Loud, outgoing, friends with everybody- they were everything Neville wasn't. He'd never really expected to find out either one of them was gay, though this last week he had been wondering more about George, particularly after George winked at him.

This was Neville's first kiss. He hoped he did all right. All of a sudden, he began to feel self-conscious about his kissing abilities, though George's reaction to the kiss suggested he'd done just fine.

Neville sat back in the chair and rubbed his eyes. He didn't want to do this. He didn't want to over-analyze anything. He didn't want to get too excited about George until he knew more about what George wanted. More kissing? A bit of snogging? An actual relationship?

Neville sat up. God, a relationship. Stop he told himself. No use getting your hopes up. Neville needed to stop thinking. He needed something to do, some way to keep busy. He stood up and started wandering around the flat. He peeked into the loo. It was small but clean. He skipped over Fred's room, but did open George's door and looked inside. It was a nice sized room, much of the space taken up by a large four-poster bed, not unlike the beds at Hogwarts, though a size bigger. It had a burgundy and gold bed spread and about ten pillows. Neville wondered who would need that many pillows. The walls were mostly bare, save for a picture of the Weasley family from a few years back plus a picture of the Griffyndor quidditch team. The people in both pictures began waving wildly as Neville walked into the room carefully.

Neville looked closely at the photo of the Weasley family. Unlike most people, he'd never had trouble telling Fred and George apart. So alike in looks and demeanor and attitude, nearly everyone considered Fred and George one and the same. And in many ways, they were. Nearly inseparable, it made sense to most that they were one machine, Gred or Forge, whatever you wanted to call them. But Neville could always tell George by the slightly more rounded look of his shoulders. Or by the fact that Fred was an incurable flirt, while George occasionally had a more difficult time maintaining eye contact. Those are the types of things Neville noticed about people.

In fact, as Neville reflected on it, it was surprising that he didn't consider that George may be gay until just last week. You'd think that his own gayness coupled with his ability to read people would somehow clue him in to others' homosexuality, but Neville had remained unsuspecting, and always, always convinced of the fact that being gay was a sentence to lifelong loneliness. Neville wondered if George had ever told Fred. Neville hoped so. He'd hate to think that Fred had died not knowing who his twin really was. That George had never gotten to truly open up to his brother, his best friend.

Neville wandered out of George's room and shut the door carefully behind him. He made his way into the kitchen. Maybe it was the sight of the kitchen that did it to him, but Neville was suddenly famished. He searched the ice box and the cupboards and found the makings of bangers and mash. Methodically, and using his wand for the first time in months, Neville began making lunch for himself and George.

Neville had just finished making lunch when George burst back in to the flat.

"Sorry about that," he apologized.

"It's all right," Neville assured him, "It's your business. Look, I made you some lunch."

"Thanks, you didn't have to."

Neville shook his head, "No. I wanted to."

Neville and George sat at the table quietly, somewhat awkwardly. The were about halfway through eating when George said in a soft voice, "I'm glad you came to the shop last week, Neville. People have been wondering where you've been."

Neville blushed and shrugged. "I just haven't felt much like being out."

"I don't blame you," George said. "But blimey, Neville. You're famous!"

Neville laughed bitterly. "I know. I've got the fan mail and book deal requests and job offers. I don't want a single one of them."

"But Neville, you've got to do something. You can't just have a lie-in for the rest of your life at your Gran's house."

"I don't want any of those things. People died. I got the mail and the interview requests and job offers because people died. It's sick."

George gave Neville a hard look. "Fred would want you to take advantage. He'd think you're being a bloody idiot turning down these offers."

Neville shrugged. "I still don't want it."

"Then what do you want?"

George was challenging Neville, and Neville was glad for it. No one had questioned his desire to stay in bed for months on end. His Gran had been willing to let Neville work things out for himself without throwing him out to the real world. But maybe what he needed was to be thrown out to the real world.

Neville shrugged. "I don't know. I don't know what I'm qualified for. Finding a sword in a hat and killing a snake doesn't exactly qualify me for much of anything. It just means I'm damn lucky."

George leaned back in his chair and smiled at Neville. "I think I've got just the thing for you. Herb Ignatius runs the greenhouse and nursery where I buy a bit of plant that I need for my product. He's looking for help."

"Where is it?"

"Wales."

"I haven't passed my apparition exam. I can't get to Wales."

"So take your exam."

"George." Neville stopped and thought. "It's not that I don't appreciate it. I just haven't even attempted apparition since sixth year. And then I wasn't any good at it."

"So, you'll get good at it. I can help."

Neville shifted uncomfortably. "You'd help?"

George smiled, the biggest smile Neville had seen from him so far, "I'd love to."

Neville took a last bite of his food and nodded his head. "Let's do it."