The dawn of morning was a bright spread of sunlight, the rays creeping in the dark room through the thin fibres of the scarlet red curtains, shielding the empty air from the outside light.
Though there was a bitter chill to this light, and pale grey clouds were starting to form a gathering in the morning sky, preparing to ambush the clear with a blanket of shade.
It was early morning on a Monday, and there was hardly any sound or movement throughout the whole castle. The only audible sound would be either the snores from sleeping witches and wizards, or the odd tweet and hoot from a bird or owl passing by.
Your peaceful slumber was slowly disappearing as your were being gently shook by the shoulder, just enough to wake you with startling. Your eyes lazily opened slowly, desperate to shut again.
"Wakey wakey, Fiona," a gentle whisper skimmed against your ear, once covered by your snuggley duvet.
"Hm... wha...?" Your voice mumbled in complaint, weeping for just five more minutes of shut eye.
The shaking stopped. A small sigh of relief escaped your lungs as you closed your hardly-open eyes again. But then, something licked the side of your cheek like a dog would in greeting to its owner. This instantly woke your entire body and you shot up like a bullet to a target, wiping your face clean from the slobber with your hand. Your now fully-awake eyes looked up to whoever was crouched down on the floor beside your bed, smiling brightly towards you.
"Morning!" Fred greeted a little loudly, beaming a bright eyed and bushy tailed smile.
"Fre-" You stopped your loud words, afraid of waking the others, not wanting the morning to go off with a bad start. Quickly you quietened them down. "Fred, what are you-? How did you get in here?!"
"Through the door?" Fred snorted like that was a fairly dumb question, his hand gesturing behind him towards the door which was wide open.
You rubbed your eyes with the back of your hand before stretching, accompanied by a small yawn. "Why are you here so early? It's..." You quickly checked the clock on your bedside table and your eyes widened at the time. "It's 6:30am!"
"And?" Fred chuckled, smiling innocently like a child. "That gives us more time to spend with each other before we head our separate ways in boring lessons!"
"It wouldn't be so boring if you payed attention once in a while and learnt something," you giggled.
"I refer back to my previous comment," Fred said snobbishly, as if pretending he were one of the Malfoy's.
You smiled and shook your head, amused by his bubbly personality.
"Come on!"
"What?" you asked, curious.
"Get up, get dressed, and then we can go for a walk, or whatever you feel like doing." Fred said cheerfully with a dash of hope that you wouldn't go back to sleep.
You simply stared at Fred with an expression that read 'I am not amused', desperately trying to keep it in hold without cracking up or hug him for his adorableness. Fred pulled out a lollipop from one of his robe pockets and played the puppy dog eye trick, trying to look as sweet as possible, knowing that the eyes always worked. "I brought you a lollipop~"
"Fred, I don't trust you with any kind of sweet treats anymore since you and George started your little joke business." You chuckled, already failing at trying to keep serious.
"Hey, I wouldn't test anything on you! ...nothing too serious on you," He grinned mischievously, earning himself a smack on the arm, playfully of course, nothing too damaging. "Come on, spend some time with old Freddy,"
"Fred, you're not that old. You'll be seventeen soon!"
"And you're fifteen! You haven't reached the grand old age of sixteen where you'll be so old!" Fred put on an old man's voice to add to the affect, gaining himself laughter from his girlfriend. "Come on, pleeease!" He begged, putting on the big chocolate brown puppy dog eyes again.
"Alright, alright!" You gave in with a huge sigh, shuffling out of bed. "Meet me down at the common room, I'll be down in about ten minutes."
"Why?"
"So I can get dressed silly!" You smiled, trying not to speak too loudly.
"Can't I stay and watch?" Fred said playfully, laughing.
"Fred! You are such a perv!" You chuckled shooing him away out of your dormitory so that you could change.
Quietly, you shut the wooden door after him, laughing silently to yourself at how ridiculously adorable, annoying, caring and loveable Fred was.
You stayed true to your words and met Fred down in the common room no longer than ten minutes. It didn't take you that long to get dressed and done up anyway since you don't wear much make up and aren't really that fussed with your hair, all you do is either leave it down or put it up in a ponytail, and today you gave it a quick brush and left it down for a change. There wasn't really any point in wearing casual clothing, seeing as breakfast starts at half seven. Both you and Fred wore your school robes, yours a little neater than Fred's, but not totally spot on like Percy's used to be.
Fred was patiently waiting for you, perched on one of the arms of the armchair, tapping his feet against the flooring and smiling from amusement from the tap, tap, tap his shoes made. His childish nature always brought a smile to your face. His charming smile and gorgeous brown eyes though, they always sent a butterfly to flutter from its resting spot and explore the calm emptiness, replacing it with shyness, like they sent you back to the moment where you and Fred very first met. And his red hair, those fiery red strands of his that glowed like a fresh flame crackling out from the firewood, as red as a little robin's chest, as soft as ribbons yet as scruffy as a dogs.
Fred's focus on his tapping stopped immediately as soon as he heard the light sound of feet coming towards him. He smiled brightly.
"Heya! What do you want to do?"
You shrugged, smiling. "I really don't mind!"
You curiously looked at Fred as he randomly dodged your response by looking at the clock in the common room, as if waiting for the next few seconds to go by.
"Three... two... one..." Fred muttered to himself. A bright smile replaced the small one he wore before, getting brighter as he turned round to look at you again. You opened your mouth to speak but it soon closed after Fred reached into one of the larger pockets in his robes and pulled out a small dark red box, holding it in his hand gently. Fred sat beside you on the sofa closest to the fire and kissed your cheek softly, whispering. "Happy birthday,"
Your eyes widened, filled with surprise "I completely forgot about my birthday," You then noticed the little red box he held in his hand, his fingers nervously fiddling with it for some strange reason. Your eyes softened, as did your words from the sight of his thoughtfulness. "Fred... you didn't have to get me anything, I told you this before that I didn't want-"
"I know, I know, but this present is different."
"Different?" You asked curiously, a little confused. Fred nodded lightly, chewing his lower lip a bit. "Fred? Are you alright?"
Fred nodded lightly again, twitching a smile before taking a deep breath, slowly allowing the air to be released from his lungs before taking it easy, trying not to have a panic attack.
That's when Fred fell silent. He placed his free hand gently on top of one of yours that rested on your lap.
"I have two things to say," You nodded, gesturing for him to go on. "One; I'm leaving Hogwarts," Your heart sank instantly. Fred was...leaving? But there was still half of school left! It wasn't like he had that much time to wait for the end of his seventh year.
"What? Fred that's... that's ridiculous! You can't leave Fred! Why are you leaving?"
"George and I are finally setting up a shop in Diagon Alley, a joke shop. Harry gave us the money he won last year, well, he forcefully gave it to us because he said he had no need for it," Fred chuckled dryly, seeing that his lighter words weren't warming your now miserable mood. "Look, this is something George and I have dreamt of since we were kids! And Umbridge is completely taking over the entire school; she's banned our products, she gives us detention nearly every week, she won't let boys and girls near each other, don't you remember us sneaking? Because of her. I can't stand it anymore, Fi-Fi! But it's not like I am throwing my life away because I'm not, we're not. George and I are starting a business, one which we think that will do well; people need a laugh these days with what's happening at the moment. But I'm not leaving you, I won't let this break our contact. I'll write to you as much as I can, every week if that's what you want! We'll still see each other in the holidays, I promise."
You could see how much Fred wanted this. How much he wanted his life to be worth something, to be able to achieve something and actually make it in this world. This could get him the life that he wanted; to be able to get nice things instead of constant second hand items, to be able to save up for a home himself maybe, to live a life full of happiness.
You sighed heavily, unsure. Your eyes broke contact with Fred's, directing them down to the floor.
"What's the second thing?" You asked quietly, almost in whisper.
That's when Fred fell silent once more. His eyes were growing sad. He blinked a couple of times to remove himself from the down-feeling and restored his nervous excitement. Fred took another deep breath, smiling.
"Fi-Fi, you have made me smile the first day I met you back home, when I was a complete idiot. Actually, nothings changed there. But back to my point; we've had a ups and downs, a few downs but most of them ups throughout our time together. Well, I'm not very good at these sort of things... I guess that I'll keep it short and sweet. Fiona, Fi-Fi, pumpkin..."
Fred handed you the box gently into your hand, waiting for you to open it up and see what was inside. You did just that. You carefully clicked open the small red box lid to reveal a silver ring with a sparkling jewel that glistened in the light. You blinked in utter surprise at the beautiful ring shining up at you. Fred smiled a small nervous smile and slid off the sofa, climbing down onto one knee with a shaky voice.
"...m-marry me?"