Evermore

Chapter 4

Gold Rush – Taylor Swift

Gleaming, twinkling,
Eyes like sinking ships on waters so inviting,
I almost jump in

For some reason unbeknownst to her, Isabella found herself feeling nervous at Wednesday, at around seven-thirty in the evening. She had just finished up her dinner and was watching Adrianne portion a chocolate cake between herself, Isabella, Daniella and Jonathon when the feeling hit her gut. Isabella did not bother to bring this up with her friends; she knew what they would insinuate, what crazy theory they might just bring up, and so she ate her cake in silence.

Why would she, of all people, have a crush on Fred Weasley?

Yes, he was good-looking, and Isabella could not deny that he was funny and charming, but Isabella primarily found him annoying. And in her mind, the case was closed. After all, she had just (several months ago now) broken up with her boyfriend, and between her home life and OWLs, she did not feel like having a boyfriend. Any small thoughts Isabella may have possibly had about the Weasley twins therefore locked away and forgotten, never to be seen again.

For now.

That small monologue in Isabella's mind seemed to bring her peace, and she wasn't even sure how she had come to that conclusion in the first place. Isabella carried on with her cake as if she didn't just have a small mental blip, listening to her friends' conversations. And then, when it reached seven forty-five, Isabella gathered up her things and bid goodbye to her friends, ignored their little sly smiles and headed off to the agreed meeting point so she could ready herself. Fred was already waiting for her outside of McGonagall's classroom, whistling as he looked at some paintings surrounding the classroom. At the sound of Isabella's footsteps, he stopped and his usual beaming grin took over his face.

"You're early," Isabella greeted, stopping just short of Fred.

"Hello to you too," he responded, running a hand through his hair. Isabella beckoned for him to follow her into the room. "I'm eager to make a good first impression, teach."

"If only you approached your actual lessons with that attitude, Weasley." Professor McGonagall was at her desk at the front of the classroom, but stood up and with a wave of her wand, packed herself up. "I wish you luck, Yaxley."

"I don't quite think there's enough luck in the world to help me deal with him," Isabella mumbled as the professor left.

"Hey! I have feelings."

"Likely story. Okay, Fred. Let's start with Transfiguration, we'll have an hour for each subject. We'll do Arithmancy as well today, then History and Charms on Friday. What about Transfiguration are you struggling with?"

"Really going straight for it, aren't you?" They'd settled at a table and sat side by side, but Fred had turned his entire body to face Isabella. Of course, his grin hadn't let up, even at the sight of Isabella's indifferent look and determination to get working.

"We haven't got a lot of time and I've never tutored anyone before; I want to make sure we're really getting to the source of the issues," Isabella explained, pulling out the notes she'd bought from her bag. Fred still didn't move to pull anything out.

"You have tutored before," Fred said assuredly. Isabella gave him a confused look and stared at him, now just unimpressed that he was wasting time. "Me and George loads; whenever we've struggled in group work we have with you. That's why I asked. You explain things well, even if you don't have a boatload of patience. Sorry."

"Oh. I was wondering why you asked me over a Ravenclaw," Isabella admitted, turning her attention to her neatly organised notes. "So, the root of the issue? What do you struggle with?"

"Also, you're smarter than any of the Ravenclaw's in our year. You're always top of the class," Fred continued. Isabella lifted her head in annoyance, but let her lips twitch ever so slightly for the compliment. He was wrong, but it was nice of Fred to say.

"That's kind of you to say," she told him. "Back to-"

"It's true, though, ask anyone."

"Okay. Can we get back to this?" Isabella asked with an air of impatience, tapping her notes. Her insides, on the other hand, felt warm, with something fluttering in her stomach. Maybe she just wasn't so used to being complemented. Isabella felt Fred's confidence in her was misplaced, but telling him that would only distract Fred from his work.

"Sorry." Fred's grin was suddenly sheepish. "I think the theory. It's boring."

"To you," Isabella snorted. "So we just need to make it fun, because if you don't understand the theory, the actual spells are never going to come along properly. Let's start with…"

By some plight of Merlin, Isabella managed to keep Fred focussed for the large majority of the two hours. She helped him break the Transfiguration theory down to the point some of his spells were a lot neater and could manage the same with Arithmancy. Isabella could see that Fred's spell work was completely fine and suspected that he wouldn't need tutoring in Charms so long as he managed to take in the theory the same way he did for Transfiguration.

However, Isabella could tell that Fred focussing for all that time was finally taking its toll, and he was slipping by the last half hour. By the time it was quarter too, Isabella sighed and placed her quill down, realising her lost battle.

"I think we're done for the day," she said, rubbing the point of her head where she felt a headache coming on. "I've done as much as I can."

"Well, you lasted longer than I thought." Fred's grin returned at what Isabella supposed he took as good news.

"You lasted longer than I thought," Isabella retorted, pulling something out of her bag. "Here. A reward." She handed Fred the chocolate frog.

"For me?" His eyes twinkled, and Isabella suddenly realised how close they were sitting to each other. Within their shared classes, they usually sat at four-person tables, where at most they would just bump knees, or behind one another. Now, Isabella was very aware their legs were touching, and they were shoulder to shoulder. This close, Isabella could see all the freckles that spattered across Fred's face in various shades of brown, and that his eyes were the colour of fire whiskey. He smelt good. When Isabella realised she'd made eye contact, she dropped her eyes back to the table to continue packing away.

"Motivation," she mumbled, feeling very betrayed by her brain all of a sudden. Isabella just wasn't very used to sitting close to a man, that was all.

"You put the fear of Merlin into me and George the first time we all worked on a group project together," Fred reminded her cheerfully. "Trust me, I have the motivation to behave." Trust me. Isabella snorted.

"And I still reward you two at the end of every school year," she reminded him, rolling her eyes. The ghost of a smile on her lips betrayed her.

"Can we request this year-"

"No. Now let's go, I have to walk you back to your dorm," Isabella ordered, standing suddenly from the chair.

"What a gentleman." Isabella did not indulge Fred as he packed his stuff up.

As it was nearly ten o'clock at night, the hallways were scarce, only the chattering of portraits and ghosts and the flickering light of candles keeping the hallway alive. Isabella let Fred chatter her ears off as they strolled towards the Gryffindor tower. Isabella found that she quite liked not having to say anything, simply letting the words float around in her head as she took in his sentences so she didn't let herself slip into the other sinking whirlpool of her head. When they reached the portrait of the Fat Lady, they came to a stop and stood for a minute.

"Thank you," Fred offered. Isabella returned him a small smile.

"Well, you did point out it was the gentlemanly thing to do."

"Isabella Yaxley made a joke? Surely not." They both let out a small laugh. In the back of her mind, Isabella noted it was the first time he'd really made her laugh, but of course, she wouldn't recognise that thought.

"No, for the tutoring stuff," Fred said a minute later. "I appreciate it."

"It's no problem," Isabella simply replied. She didn't have to say anything else, and so she didn't, no matter how much she wanted to. Why did she want to stay here and keep talking with Fred Weasley? So strange. "See you in potions tomorrow."

"Nothing nicer than double Snape first thing in the morning." They bid each other goodbye and Isabella made her way to the Slytherin dungeons, trying to keep a smile off her face. Honestly, what was wrong with herself? Isabella suspected she had spent too much time with Adrianne and Daniella. She was only doing Fred a favour. Fred had asked for her help, above anyone else, simply because he trusted Isabella knew what she was doing and how to keep him on track.

Any other funny feelings could shove themselves up Peeves' butt-crack.

But still, Isabella let the smile hang on her face, even when she returned to the girls' dorm, and when her friends asked her how the study session went, she simply replied, "Very well," and got ready for bed with no other comment.

However, when Potions arrived the next morning, in the cold, dark dungeon, Isabella realised something had shifted in the air that she wasn't sure could be put back. It seemed that Fred had now declared they weren't just acquaintances, who could say hello in the halls and work on projects together, but that they were friends.

Isabella was thankful Snape had made the class work in silence today, because Fred seemed absolutely giddy about something, and Isabella couldn't quite work out if she wanted to know why.

Snape made his usual sweep of the classroom, and when he arrived at Isabella's table, made his first non-potions-related comment.

"Glad to see your scar has healed up, Yaxley," Snape commented in his usual drawl. Isabella kept her focus on stirring her potion, wondering why Snape never chose to stay out of her business.

"The salve Madam Pomfrey gave me worked perfectly," Isabella told the professor, peering over her cauldron's edge.

"Madam Pomfrey did tell me you thought it not important to mention to your parents?"

"Well, sir, it's just my parents are quite too busy to worry about a little scar."

"I thought your mother stayed at home all day." Isabella pointedly did not look up from her cauldron.

"I would like you to tell that to her and see how well it goes down," Isabella grumbled. Before she could get scolded for talking so rudely to the professor, someone on the other side of the classroom dropped something, and it caused a very loud noise. Isabella was not quite adjusted to sudden loud noises; unfortunately for Isabella, they were a telltale sign at home that she was about to face some sort of traumatic experience- maybe the Crucio, ever her parents' favourite, maybe a simple slap, or perhaps a heavy, solid object heading for some part of her body. Cruelly, she knew her parents were aware of this, so for their idea of fun, would just smash something simply to torment her.

And so someone in the classroom simply smashed a bowl, and Isabella was still mentally at home just enough that she visibly jumped at the noise, and caused herself to spill some potion onto herself. Furthermore, her potion was still unfortunately at a potent enough stage that it stung her.

"Straight to the infirmary, Yaxley," Snape sighed, eyeing Isabella with quite an unreadable look. "Weasley, please escort her and her stuff. Your potion would have caused harm had it been completed, anyway."

"Which one?" Fred, ever the cheeky git, asked the professor. If her arm wasn't quite burning, Isabella might take the time to admire his bravery and stupidity. She might also admire how Fred's hair looked coppery in the dungeon light, plastered to his forehead due to the sweat of the steam. It had gone messy from how often he'd run a hand through it during the session, a telltale sign he was stressing out. Wait, how did Isabella know that?

"Whichever one I'm closest to." Isabella was sure Snape had considered murdering the twins at some point in his career and honestly didn't blame him.

"Let's go, Fred," Isabella mumbled quietly, blinking rapidly to stop the tears that threatened to follow. Merlin, how could she be so stupid? It was just a stupid bowl that had smashed. In her classroom. Isabella was in no danger of torment at that moment in time, so why did she have to react that way? The exact spot the potion had landed was now burning, and Isabella suspected it might burn a hole in her wrist. Stupid. Stupid girl.

"Talk to me," Isabella requested, louder than she thought it would come out.

"Hmm?" Fred blinked at the sudden statement as they hurried through the corridors.

"Say something. Distract me," she pleaded, nearly yelling, trying to mentally convince herself to relax.

"Oh. Okay. Erm, I've started talking to every cat I see in these hallways, just in case it's McGonagall. George and I actually got her cat treats for Christmas, but we didn't say it was from us, just in case she took it the wrong way. You know what she's like. Or maybe not, I guess, because you don't have a penchant for the life I live." Fred trailed off in thought, evidently thinking about something. Isabella left him for a moment before getting his attention again.

"Fred, if you don't keep talking to me, I'm going to realise exactly how painful this burn is, and then you're going to have to deal with me crying and possibly passing out and maybe screaming," Isabella warned.

"Oh! Sorry." Fred threw Isabella a more sheepish grin. She wanted to yell at him. "I never really asked. How was your Christmas?"

"I don't want to talk about my Christmas. Tell me about yours."

"We saw my second oldest brother, Charlie, in Romania. Our oldest brother, Bill, joined too. It's been a little while since we saw the both of them, much less together. It was nice. They're Ginny's favourite, but when they're not around, me and George are her favourites. She really missed them, too, clung onto them and followed them around like when we were all younger. They're cool. Even Percy thinks so, he's just too up his own arse to think any different." He didn't carry on once they stepped into the infirmary; Madam Pomfrey was waiting in the doorway and helped Isabella towards a bed.

"Snape sent a memo ahead," the nurse explained, half-shoving Isabella onto the bed. If Isabella was paying more attention, she would've noticed everything on the bedside ready to help heal her. "Nasty burn, but it shouldn't hurt too bad. Unfortunately, the healing process won't be so painless." The nurse eyed Isabella worriedly, and Isabella turned her head to Fred, who was hovering at the foot of the bed.

"Keep talking," Isabella directed Fred. "Please."

"This seems vaguely unlikely you, Izzy-Belly. In fact, I don't think I can ever recall a moment, other than a minute ago, where you were asking me to talk instead of shut up. Positively begging! At least you asked the right person. Could you imagine if you asked yourself? At least you had the sense to ask me. You've really had quite a chaotic start to the term, haven't you?"

"Don't make this a group activity," she ordered, trying not to look at whatever damage was left behind on her arm. Her eyes found Fred's instead, and she noticed that although he was keeping a light smile there was a glint of something else in his eyes, something she only ever really saw in Adrianne and Daniella. She couldn't find it in herself to break eye contact though; it was strangely reassuring.

"My bad." His smile was weak as Fred held up his hands. "Very well. It's just, that now that you've asked me to talk, I don't actually know what to talk about. Performance anxiety or something. Don't take that the dirty way. My mind's just gone blank. To be honest, I really am trying my best not to look at it, but Merlin's left buttocks, Iz, it looks bad. You honestly have the highest pain threshold I've ever seen." Despite the pain, Isabella snorted.

"If only you knew."

"I would say I have a normal level of pain threshold; maybe higher than the average person. Better than all my siblings, probably, other than Charlie, but that's just because he deals with dragons, and my mum's probably quite high too; but she's had-" Fred stopped to count "-seven children, which would be fair enough."

"Tell me more about your parents," Isabella encouraged, wincing…

"Ah. Well, they're a bit silly for having seven children, but they're just in love. It's very annoying, you know, but I suppose it's cute, and it's healthy for Ginny; she knows to never settle. My dad would do anything to make my mum happy, and as long as my dad's happy mum is too. I think that's why they had so many of us, cause they just love love. Also, I think they never heard of birth control. All of us have actually walked in on them at least one-" Isabella watched Fred shudder at the supposed memory- "so then we got them a lock for their bedroom, but it really made it worse because we could hear it, and then the thought sticks with you." Isabella kept giving Fred prompts for another half hour, and then finally, Madam Pomfrey stepped away from Isabella's arm.

"Lucky you came to me in good time, I was able to clean it up very nicely," the nurse explained. "Unfortunately, it will leave some scarring, and it will still be quite painful for a few days, but you still have an arm. Now, I assume that if I ask you if I should write your parents, you will parrot me the same excuse as the start of the week?"

"It's only a very small injury," Isabella nodded. "They've got more important things to do." Once again, Madam Pomfrey harumphed, but nevertheless set Isabella aftercare instructions and informed her she would not be leaving the infirmary until the next day. When she finally departed from the bay, Fred placed himself in the chair next to Isabella's bed. The frown hadn't quite dislodged itself from his face.

"Isabella, wouldn't your parents-"

"No," Isabella cut him off firmly, adjusting herself in the infirmary bed. She'd only ever had to stay overnight a handful of times, and much preferred the bed in her own dorm. "They really wouldn't. It would be a hindrance to their time."

"But you're their daughter. Wouldn't you want them to visit?"

"It's honestly okay," Isabella said softly, offering Fred a gentle smile. "They're not that kind of parents." Fred didn't look impressed, but from all she'd gathered about his family, they seemed like they came from another world. Isabella knew enough about the Weasley family, but she still reckoned she'd rather grow up as one of them. There wasn't enough money in the world to make what her parents did to her okay.

"Well, I'm sorry," Fred said, finally, sensing the topic coming to a close. Isabella could tell he hadn't really accepted it but moved the conversation on anyway.

"Thanks for staying with me, I really appreciate it," Isabella said. "I know I didn't show it, but it hurt like a motherfucker. Like my arm was actually on fire. I do have a pretty high pain tolerance, but that was reaching my limit."

"It was honestly no problem," Fred told her, finally relaxing into a smile. His whole body had relaxed now that Madam Pomfrey was done, and he inspected Isabella's wrist himself. It felt strangely intimate, and his touch warmed her arm, but Isabella did her best to not appear rattled. They chatted quietly for a little while longer, and then it was lunchtime, and Isabella's friends plus George joined them in the infirmary. Isabella greeted the group, and Daniella and Adrianne instantly hopped onto the bed with her, making themselves comfy.

"Thanks again," Isabella told Fred earnestly. "I might have gone insane if I was sat here alone."

"Please. An excuse to get out of lessons, especially a Snape special, and to hang with you?" Fred's blinding grin was finally back. Isabella felt fluttery again. "Easiest thing I've ever done. We'll swing by later, give you some space. Bye, girls." And so the girls bid them goodbye.

When the girls left for their afternoon lessons, Isabella took a nap, and when she woke up at dinner time, awoken by her friends, there was a large gift basket on the table, filled with all sorts of yummy goods that Isabella remembered mentioning to Fred that afternoon with a card signed from the twins, Ginny and a Mrs Weasley.

You only had to imagine the smiles on Adrianne and Daniella's faces.

author's note

thanks for reading guys. hope you're enjoying :)