Emma turned on the wireless to hear Lee Jordan's voice, doing the radio commentary for Quidditch for the WWN. She sat down with her mug of tea, listening to the familiar sounds of Lee telling her all about what was going on in a game of Quidditch. The names were less familiar than the ones in school, but he still had all of the passion he'd had when they were young. She leaned her head back into Fred's favorite armchair and inhaled his linger scent as the feel of a day off soaked over her. They would have a small Order meeting that night, but she was enjoying just letting herself relax for once.

The door opened and she heard a heavy sigh, looking up to find George coming in covered in sweat. She smiled.

"Rough time with the mail orders?" she asked.

"I just got attacked," he groaned. "By a pygmy puff."

Emma nearly dropped her mug with surprise.

"You're joking," she said dryly.

"No," he groaned, pouring himself a large glass of firewhiskey and chugging it before pouring another. "No, I'm serious. A pygmy puff bit me."

"I'm... I'm sorry," she said carefully. "Did it... hurt?"

"No," George admitted, sitting down across from her and pouring his third glass. "No, then it tried to mate with my finger."

Emma just blinked at him, putting her mug down carefully so that she didn't actually drop it when she got another surprise, and she tried to run over his words in her mind for a moment to make sure he'd actually said what she thought she'd heard.

"I'm sorry," she said softly. "You... you had a pygmy puff try to shag your finger?"

"Yeah, that's more or less it," George said, wincing after his fourth glass of firewhiskey. He waved the empty bottle. "Do we have more of this?"

Emma shook her head.

"I need to get some more next time I'm doing the shopping," she said, secretly glad they'd only had one for this particular bizarre incident."

"I might go to the pub," he groaned.

"And tell Tom and the patrons that a small ball of fluff tried to shag your hand?" Emma said dryly. "I'm not entirely sure that's a good idea."

"You're probably right," he groaned, leaning back on the couch and groaning. "Fred gave me the rest of the day off, said I looked about to be sick."

"And so you came up here to drink?" she asked sympathetically.

"No, I went out back to be sick first," George said casually. "Then I came up here to drink."

"That would explain the sweat," Emma muttered without really thinking about it.

"Sweat?" George said, confused.

"Yes, you're covered in it," she said, rolling her eyes. "Take a shower, try not to hit your head or drown."

"Yes, ma'am," George said, frowning at the empty firewhiskey bottle in his hands for a moment before setting it down and heading off to shower.

Known that George liked to sing when showering drunk, Emma turned up the match and returned to her tea.

And then her mind started to wonder... How exactly did a pygmy puff try to shag George's finger?

She felt horrible thinking of such a thing, but at the same time she really was curious, and there was nothing more interesting to her in that moment than anything that didn't have to do with the Ministry, and that had unfortunately presented itself in George being sexually assaulted by a ball of fluff.

"No," she told herself, swallowing down more tea. "No, I really don't want to know."

But the more she told herself that she really, truly did not want to know, the more active her imagination became, trying to picture just what it might have looked like, while becoming more and more repulsed by the thought.

She looked down at her cup of tea, which now suddenly looked remarkably unappetizing, and decided that she needed a shower, too.

Turning off the wireless she heard George's terribly monotone, off-key voice screeching, "Come, stir my cauldron, and if you dooo it riiiiight!"

She plugged her ears with her fingers and headed to the bathroom she shared with Fred.

She pulled off her clothes and climbed into the shower, turning on the water and adjusting it quickly as possible to drown out George's terrible rendition of Celestina Warbeck.

Emma took a while rubbing herself with body wash to get rid of the unclean feeling that didn't seem to want to go away after the incident that happened to George.

Part of her was wanting Fred, as she'd had only one shower in the past few weeks that hadn't included her husband, but she also recognized how awkward it would have been to have a steamy shower with her husband right after hearing about George's plight.

Perhaps she ought to be laughing about it, she mused. After all, it was a bloody joke shop. Surely someone would be able to find humor in the whole thing. Perhaps Fred was downstairs laughing about it somewhere, wondering what was taking George so long. There would be jokes about George wanking to thoughts of the pygmy puffs and then there would be no piece in the flat until the jokes got old and stopped, or something better came along.

Or George got something worse on Fred. Which seemed rather unlikely, considering.

Emma shuddered again, scrubbing a bit harder.

No, Emma could not get out of her head the idea of George wanking to a pygmy puff, so she was contemplating Obliviating herself for several minutes before giving up, deciding that it was all useless, and going back to her tea, which had unfortunately gone cold.

George came out a minute later, still shuddering.

"I see you showered too," he said, his lips upturning.

"Don't ask," Emma demanded. "Warm up my tea and I'll make you a snack before you go back to work."

"Done," George said, kissing her cheek. "And we'll not speak of this to Fred."

"Deal."

Later that day, Fred sat down beside Emma on the sofa and gave her a big, sloppy kiss on the same cheek George had kissed earlier and it was all she could do not to burst out with nervous laughter.

"You all right?" Fred asked, frowning.

"Yeah, just thinking of something," Emma said quickly, kissing his lips to distract him. "Not important."

"Right," Fred sighed, kissing her more eagerly, obviously forgetting whatever it was that he'd sat down for in the first place.

That is, until George cleared his throat and the pair jumped apart.

"Wow, you two get going quickly," he teased. "Fred, mate, I've promised to see Mum tonight, I'm going to try to get her to do a load of laundry when I'm there. Got anything you want to throw in?"

"Ah, yeah, my white shirts all have work stains on them," Fred said thoughtfully, running his fingers absently through Emma's hair. "Just make sure none of Emma's stuff is in there. Wouldn't want her freaking out."

George snorted.

"Yeah, I'll make sure none of Emma's underthings end up in my laundry pile, thanks. I'm not totally stupid."

"Are you not?" Emma teased, raising an eyebrow at him.

George raised both of his eyebrows at her, smiling lopsidedly in his way.

"You know, Emma, I think we've been a bad influence on you," he said with a boisterous laugh. "You're cracking jokes now like a true prankster. Sure you don't want to run while you can?"

Emma just giggled, shaking her head as Fred kissed her temple.

"Have fun with Mum tonight," Fred teased. "Work your laundry magic!"

George waved his hand, hurrying off to ready the laundry so he could shrink it and take it with him.

"Why is he always the one who brings laundry?" Emma asked.

"Because he's a bit more charming," Fred muttered as George left. "Mum always seems to fall for it when he gives her the long list of things that's keeping him from getting his laundry done, how horribly it's messing up his dating life that he doesn't have a clean flat to bring birds back to, all that. She wants grandchildren."

Emma frowned at that, looking down at her lap and wondering what would happen when Molly finally did find out that they'd gotten married. Would all be forgiven if Emma produced a grandchild?

Could Emma produce a grandchild so quickly?

She shivered cuddling closer to Fred.

"What's wrong?" he asked, running his fingers through her hair again, petting it back out of her face. "Feeling well?"

"Just thinking about things," Emma admitted slowly. "Your mother for one."

"Ah, yeah, sometimes I shiver when I think about her too," Fred teased, grinning cheekily. "It's a reflex, no shame in it."

Emma swatted at him playfully.

"Not like that," she laughed. "No, I was thinking about when we finally tell her that we got married. How she's going to react..."

"I see," Fred sighed, nodding. "That would make me shiver too. Was it the mention of grandchildren that did it?"

"A little," she admitted, resting her face against the curve of his neck. "I feel like...like she is going to expect so much of me once we tell her, especially because we kept it from her."

"Dad will talk to her-"

"When has Arthur ever managed to properly talk down your mother?" Emma asked, amused. Fred just smiled and shrugged, shifting so he could look down at her. "Exactly. You don't think she'll demand grandchildren right away, do you?"

"Demand?" Fred repeated with a hollow laugh. "Not really her style. Pester? Perhaps." Emma clicked her tongue disapprovingly and he laughed more emotively. "You're too good at that. No, I mean, I think it would help smooth things over, but I really don't think she would feel right demanding it of us. Knowing my mother, it's not to say that she wouldn't drop poorly veiled hints at us and go on at Bill in a way that would apply to both of us as well, but it's not like we see her enough for it to be too big of a problem." Then he frowned slightly. "Why, were you thinking you wanted to have kids, or didn't want to?"

Emma blinked.

It was a fair, very good question. She looked up at Fred's concerned eyes and wondered what the right answer was.

"I don't really know," she admitted. "I haven't really thought about it very much. What...what do you want?"

His frowned softened as he thought, searching her eyes carefully as his brain worked, fingers still working through her hair.

"I'm honestly not sure that we're ready for kids right now," he said slowly. "We just got married. You're working a lot, and I'm pretty busy." He frowned just a little. "And we're in a war. But... by the time we tell Mum those things may have changed and I... I really love you. The idea of you carrying my child is not only incredible but... Well, it's really sexy. And I think we'd make cute children, don't you?"

Emma giggled as he kissed her eyebrow.

"Think of the ginger overload," she laughed.

"I want a little girl," he whispered against her ear, "who looks just like her mother." He kissed her earlobe. "She'll never hear me say no, but she'll be so, so loved."

Emma could feel warmth rising up in her stomach at the thought of a child with Fred.

She was drawn into a confusing merge of thoughts as Fred pressed his lips to hers, full of the hunger and passion he'd had before George interrupted them. She was only vaguely aware that they had the flat to themselves for the night as Fred pushed her down on the sofa, mouth still hungrily exploring hers, fingertips running up the hem of her skirt in a familiar and delicious way that made her shiver all over again.

He chuckled against her mouth and Emma gave in, letting him drive her crazy.

When he fell asleep against her chest that night, Emma had a hard time falling asleep in spite of the exhaustion she felt.

She felt as though she was letting Katie down every moment she wasn't spending on finding the source of that necklace. She also felt as though the leads she'd followed with Professor Dumbledore, who'd told her that dropping it would be better than what she was doing, were pointless.

It was like he didn't want her to find the attacker.

Forgetting for a moment that Fred was sleeping on her chest, Emma sat bolt upright.

"Mmm, whassamatter?"

"Oh, love, I'm so sorry," she sighed, kissing his head. "It's just that I think I might have realized something."

"What's that?" he groaned. "Is everything all right?"

"It's about work, darling," she said, kissing his forehead as moved to become more level with her. "About Katie."

"What is it?" he demanded, shaking his head slightly to wake himself up.

"I think that Dumbledore doesn't want me to make a complete report," she said quietly. "I think he wants me to drop it."

"Why would he want that?" Fred asked, confused.

"Why indeed?" Emma muttered, sitting up a bit more, frowning. "Fred, do you think he already knows who did it?"

"I dunno," Fred said with a frown. "I suppose it's possible. You think he's laying a trap?"

"Maybe," she whispered, licking her lips thoughtfully and balling the sheets up in her hands. "If it's a known Death Eater he could easily turn the tables on them with the support of the Auror office. His word is back to being good now. So there must be a reason for not saying."

She remembered something Sirius had told her about a murder at Hogwarts years ago, future Death Eaters killing another student. Dumbledore knew who had done it, Sirius was sure of it, but he did nothing.

"You don't think it was a student?" she whispered. "I mean, could it have been?"

"I don't know, darling," Fred sighed, rubbing his temples. "I don't know half what you do about this whole affair."

Emma sighed, running her fingers through Fred's hair, thinking.

"Well, it happened on a Hogsmeade weekend, at Hogsmeade."

"True."

"In a public bathroom."

"Right."

"But the problem is where did they get the artifact and how did they get it to Hogsmeade," she groaned. "There aren't any shops for things like that in Hogsmeade, so it had to be bought elsewhere."

"Maybe someone sent it to Hogsmeade for them to pick up," he sighed. "You know, by post. They pick it up, they go to the loo, they curse someone into doing the rest."

"And it's a sloppy plan, of course," Emma said, considering his idea. "Because Katie would have been stopped and searched at the gates. It's a bid of desperation. Like a student doing the bidding of Voldemort." She nodded. "But where did they get the item in the first place?"

"What about the shops you-"

"Wait," she muttered. "Something your father said, something..."

She leapt out of bed, going over to where she kept all of her papers on the case, flipping through, looking for what she'd scribbled down of what Arthur had said, trying to remember what it was that seemed so important at the time.

"Snape lied to me," she muttered, frowning. "He lied to me, I'm almost sure of it."

"So?" Fred asked. "So he lied to you. What does it mean? What does it matter?"

"If he would admit it," Emma said slowly, "I would drop the matter."

"What do you mean?" Fred asked. "What's the point of that?"

"If Professor Snape would be willing to admit to me that he lied to me," Emma reasoned, "it means he's done it for the Order, which means Dumbledore feels it's important. Dumbledore may not always be right, but he's right more than most, and so I'd be willing to drop the matter knowing that Katie's not in any real further danger. After all, if I'm not serving the Order through my job, what am I doing?"

Fred snorted, shaking his head.

"What makes you think Snape would ever admit it?"

"I'm not sure," Emma admitted. "I'll have to go to Hogwarts in the morning."

"You've got a meeting in the morning."

How had Fred remembered that? Even Emma had to check her planner to keep track of all the ridiculous meetings.

"Right," she sighed, putting the papers away and climbing back into bed. "When can I go to Hogwarts?"

"Your next day off is early November," he muttered, curling up against her again. "You could go then. Until then, you could suspend the report."

"I'm not sure that will fly," she said thoughtfully. "Then again, I'll have more time to work on other files."

"That's the spirit," Fred sighed. "Tonks won't mind the delay, and from the sound of things nobody else seems to even want the report in the first place."

Emma didn't want to tell him that even Tonks didn't seem to want the report. Emma was the only person who really wanted to know what had happened to Katie Bell, and if she was right, the person responsible would probably get away with it.

Her stomach churned as she thought of Sirius, wondering if he might not be right about the greater good requiring a very high price to be paid.

Fred fell asleep again far quicker than Emma could do, especially once she was energized and excited about her new thoughts. Calming down her brain wasn't an easy task in the best of times, Ravenclaw that she was, but she tried to just focus on the feel of Fred's weight on her chest, the smell of his hair. Emma closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the pillow, trying to formulate as sleep began creeping up on her slowly the words she would say when she finally had her audience with Professor Snape.