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Chapter Fifteen
Vanessa was the last to arrive when she met the others the next evening. She knew because she could hear their laughter on the other end of the door, as she stood awkwardly outside the fourth-year boys' dorm. She could hear the twins debating about something they were working on and Lee's deep laugh and Tori's sarcastic drawl. Nearly all of the people in her life who she really loved were in that room, but for some reason she still felt a little nervous about entering. She'd never been in the boys' dormitory before, much less with Fred and George. She rolled her eyes at the ridiculousness of the thought — she could be in their bedroom at The Burrow but not be in their dormitory? She was losing it, she really was.
Why do you make everything so complicated? She thought in irritation and opened the door to enter the room, squashing her nervousness.
She paused upon entering and looked at the configuration of the room. They had moved the beds around to make more room at the end near the window, where they had piled one of their thick comforters and a number of pillows that seemed ungodly. She assumed they had transfigured some because she severely doubted that they had had that many lying around their dorm. In the center of the circle, Fred and George had a number of random knick knacks, a cauldron, and several parchments of notes. Tori and Lee were reclined on opposite ends, both leaning against a set of pillows and were each watching in interest as the twins continued their debate. On the window seat behind them all was a large quantity of food and sweets, and she wondered if they had raided the kitchens prior to meeting.
The four of them looked up at her as she entered.
"What took you so long?" Tori said as a greeting. Nessa rolled her eyes.
"I'm on time, Tori," she said, cautiously maneuvering around the objects at the center of the set up on the floor and picking a corner next to her best friend to relax upon.
"Such a goody-goody," joked Lee with a wink.
"I can't even think of a time George and I were on time," said Fred, his face scrunched up in concentration as he leaned over the notes in front of him.
"Not even when we were born," agreed George, showing the same sort of single-minded focus as his twin. He was looking at a rubber chicken and flipping through a stack of parchment in front of him.
"What is happening?" said Nessa to Tori, as they both continued in silence.
"They're trying to make trick wands," she said with a grin. "They've hit a dead end on everything else so far, so they're going back to the basics, apparently."
"It's not a dead end," said Fred, though his voice was filled with irritation. "We've simply taken a break from our other projects to focus our energies on this."
"And why is that, George?" said Lee with a grin.
"That's Fred," said Nessa and Tori in unison. Fred and George flicked their eyes over to them briefly before looking at Lee again with mischievous grins.
"Nah, I'm George," said Fred, grinning wider as Lee narrowed his eyes at him and looked between the two of them suspiciously. George matched the expression so completely that it was nearly impossible to tell the difference. Lee turned his attention to the two girls sitting across from him, who were both giggling at him and whispering to each other about the chances he would figure it out on his own.
"See, I don't know which of you to believe now," he said seriously, cocking his head as if trying to work out a complicated math problem. "But if I can't tell the difference after four years, there's no way Nessa could."
Nessa straightened indignantly and Tori laughed uproariously at the look on her face.
"What kind of logic is that?" she said, defensively. "I can tell the difference just fine, thank you. And what makes you think Tori can do it and I can't?"
"They have a weird relationship with Tori," he said, dismissively, ignoring the eye roll from Tori and the twins. "She can probably just tell apart through some weird ESP." Nessa snorted, and he raised an eyebrow at her. "Well, how do you tell the difference then since you're so confident?"
Nessa shrugged. "Fred has more freckles for one thing. And George's voice is deeper. And, you know, they feel different."
Lee blinked at her several times. "They feel different," he said slowly as if she'd said something ridiculous. Nessa rolled her eyes.
"Yes, they feel different," she said. "Like their presences feel different."
"Fred's more like a raging inferno," said Tori in agreement. "George is just a tornado."
"Yes, big difference," said Lee with an eye roll. "This is making it all much clearer, thank you."
Nessa rolled her eyes. "One is less chaotic. I'd much rather deal with a tornado than an inferno."
"OI!" said Fred, indignantly, causing George to smirk at him with a raised eyebrow. "What's that supposed to mean?"
"Aha!" said Lee triumphantly. "So you are Fred!"
Tori snorted and rolled her eyes.
"Stellar detective work, Lee." she said sarcastically. Lee threw a pillow at her in retaliation, and she caught it in her hands. "Pathetic. It's no wonder you just announce the games."
Nessa smirked as the two of them began bickering good-naturedly. She shifted so that she was lying on her stomach and pulled some of the notes that were nearest her forward to look at them. The twins were discussing something seriously again and either didn't notice she was looking at their ideas or simply didn't mind. She flipped through pages of ideas they'd written down but had yet to accomplish — trick wands, fireworks, Ton - Tongue Toffees, Skiving treats, Canary Creams, things to cause diversions to assist in troublemaking. The amount of thought they had already put into the joke shop they wanted to open was astounding.
Flipping through further pages, she could see rough sketches of the product with selling points for each. In Fred's untidy scrawl, he had listed taglines for some of the products and general ideas for how to approach the invention. George's handwriting was slightly neater than his brother's, though not by much, and he had made corrections on the sheet and listed out any attempts they had already made in creating them, along with the outcome of each. The notes were incredibly detailed and the ideas themselves were extremely complex. It was clear from the number of attempts they had tried on some of the products that they had not yet mastered very many of their ideas yet but based on the amount of detail and thought they had already put into each, she had little doubt that they'd manage each and every one of them.
The ideas themselves were creative, but the theory of the magic that had to be used to invent them was even more so and she became enraptured by the pages in front of her. She'd never seen magic used in such an imaginative way and some of the spell work that would go into the products was beyond even her own knowledge. She wondered how much time they had spent researching the theory behind the spell work. Despite their obvious disinterest in academia, it was clear how incredibly brilliant and talented they were.
"The Transfiguration is the easy part," said George, suddenly, leaning over to grab one of the pages she was holding and jolting her back to the present. "I can do that part in my sleep. It's figuring out how to get it to change back, that's the issue."
"Why didn't the Tempus Mora spell work?" said Nessa, curiously. "Wouldn't it just turn back to the chicken once the time delay expired?"
Fred and George looked up at her as if they'd forgotten she was there and she blushed. Tori and Lee were in the middle of a game of wizard's chess and she had no desire to join, but the topic at hand was interesting enough to hold her attention. Fred shook his head slowly.
"We thought so too, but finding the correct time frame is tricky," he said by way of explanation. "Too long and people will have lost interest or realized the wand is a fake and gone to find their real one."
"Too quick and they don't have the time to even pick it up or even get it out of the store before it changes back," added George with a rifle. "Then we tried to have the wands sense movement —"
"- with the thought process that wand work requires some form of movement. Once the person would try to 'cast' their spell, the wand would prove to be a trick."
"- but of course, sensing movement also means the movement of picking the wand up, so that hardly worked either."
"Couldn't you overlay the charms?" queried Nessa, pulling the notes back toward her again and reviewing their attempts. They'd tried each individually but seemed to have given other spells consideration after the fact. "The time delay could be used to prevent the movement charm going off once someone picks it up instead of being used to reverse the Transfiguration, couldn't it? It's still tricky, I think, because you'd have to overlay it in such a way that neither the movement nor time delay spell is more prevalent than the other."
"It could, but then we'd still be in the same boat, wouldn't we?" said Fred in interest. "We've eliminated the chances of the wands turning back into the chickens too soon, but we've still got to pick how long before movement would be considered as a factor."
Nessa hummed in agreement, considering for a moment. "What you really need is a means for the wands to recognize that they're being used, so to speak. Once someone picks up the wand, the time delay for the movement charm would begin. Like a domino effect — one charm begins and sets off the other."
"Interesting," said George, dipping a quill in ink and scribbling down the thought process. "So, we'd have to overlay the spells in a certain order to start the next."
"And determine what form of touch you want to set off the first one," said Nessa suddenly. "If I put my finger on one does that suffice or does it need to be lifted?"
George nodded and scribbled some more, and Fred was flipping through a textbook on Advanced Charm work she suspected had been taken from the library. George began transfiguring the objects in front of him into wands and she watched as they inspected them closely, looking for any sign that the magic had not truly hidden their true appearance. She had just opened her mouth again to ask about the inventions some more when the door opened and Ginny stepped in, looking awkward.
"Ginny?" said Lee, Tori, Fred and George, all four of them sounding confused.
Ginny looked at Vanessa in question, who just smiled kindly at her and waved her over to the spot next to her on the floor. The younger Gryffindor hesitated briefly, looking back at the door, but ultimately decided to take up the offer and settled herself between Nessa and George. The others looked at her in confusion for a moment longer before Vanessa rolled her eyes.
"I invited her," she said by way of explanation. "Now, quit staring at her. It's uncomfortable."
The twins shrugged and went back to working on their products, muttering to themselves quietly about the best spell to use to signify the trick wands were being used. Ginny seemed to relax as Lee looked away as well and back at his chess game with Tori. Tori ignored their game and grinned over at the two red-headed girls in front of her, raising herself off of her stomach to settle back near Nessa again.
"Oi!" said Lee. "We weren't finished yet and I was winning!"
Tori smiled at him innocently and cocked her head to the side. Nessa narrowed her eyes suspiciously, but before she could figure out what her best friend was going to do next, her leg shot out and knocked the chess board so that some of the pieces went flying. Lee shouted indignantly.
"Oh no!" said Tori with fake chagrin. "I guess we'll just have to have a rematch. But maybe later because I'm gossiping with Nessa and Ginny right now. Sorry, Lee."
Ginny and Nessa giggled as Lee looked at her in indignation and threw his hands up in the air. He looked at Nessa imploringly, who just grinned at him with a shrug of apology. The twins didn't seem to have much interest in helping him either, as they snorted and went back to tinkering again. He huffed and rolled his eyes but focused on what the twins were doing instead.
Nessa and the other two girls huddled closer to each other, shutting the boys out completely and speaking in hushed tones about the students at Hogwarts. Nessa was not much a fan of being part of the actual gossip, but she did like to partake, though she tried to make sure it was only ever in the presence of her own friends and never around other students. She didn't want to be the reason someone was gossipped about either, even if she did like doing it. The twins and Lee never had much interest, so Nessa really only got to partake when Tori and Ginny were around and she had been so frequently upset during the year, that they had not really had a chance to gossip together at all.
As Tori was whispering excitedly about a piece of gossip she'd heard while in the girls' loo, Nessa couldn't help but smile at how at ease Ginny appeared to be. It had been so long since the three of them had really spent much time together and she'd missed the summer days where they'd spent their free time giggling in Ginny and Tori's bedroom. The days had seemed lighter then, without worrying about Harry and Ginny constantly. She relaxed some more as Ginny eagerly joined in on the conversation and began to seem more like the younger girl she'd known over the summer.
Ginny started giggling about how she'd heard Cedric Diggory had a tattoo on his back, but no one knew what it was. Some of the fourth-year girls had tried to catch a glimpse of it when he'd been changing for Quidditch practice, but they'd been caught by Filch before they could.
"You know, Nessa has a crush on Diggory," whispered Tori conspiratorially to her adopted sister, shooting a smirk in Nessa's direction.
Nessa rolled her eyes as Ginny gasped excitedly. "No, I do not, Ginny. I only said he was attractive."
"That's the same thing," said Tori dismissively. Ginny giggled.
"No, it is not," Vanessa laughed. "You can find someone attractive and not fancy them. I've no interest in dating Cedric Diggory."
"He's got really pretty eyes though, doesn't he?" said Ginny, giggling. Tori hummed thoughtfully.
"Sure, I suppose," she acquiesced. "I really think it's more in the body. He's very strong, you know. I saw him helping Trelawney carry some crystal balls up to the Divination Tower. I'd have followed him all the way up there except I didn't want Trelawney to tell me I was going to die a horrible death again."
Nessa snorted at Ginny's look of horror.
"Don't worry about it, Ginny, Trelawney says that to everyone she meets. Divination is a crock anyway." She paused thoughtfully as she considered the previous conversation. "I guess it could be that he's got that strong and silent thing going on. Plus, you know, I think it helps that he has such nice hair."
"Oh, absolutely," agreed Tori, gathering a pile of sweets from the window seat and placing them nearer to them. Ginny reached forward and grabbed a pumpkin pasty eagerly and Nessa snatched a sugar quill. "I mean, really, you've got to have a bloke with nice hair. What would you run your hands through when you're snogging if they didn't?"
"Victoria!" scolded Nessa through her laughter as Ginny fell into a fit of giggles. "You don't have to say everything that comes into your head, you know."
Victoria scoffed. "Thinking before you speak takes time, Vanessa. Besides, Ginny's not a child, she knows what snogging is." She eyed her best friend knowingly. "And, really, just imagine, snogging someone like Malfoy and you put your hands in his air and there's just a load of gel."
Nessa scrunched up her nose in distaste, both at the thought of snogging Malfoy, but also at the thought of getting gel in her fingers. Ginny grinned.
"Or someone like Snape," the younger girl said. "Just a handful of grease."
Tori shuddered at the thought. "You know, I'm not sure which of those is worse, honestly."
"Why don't you snog them both and then let us know?" Nessa jibed.
"Well, for one thing, I'd rather swallow hot coals than snog either of those two," said Tori seriously, causing Nessa to laugh loudly and briefly grab the attention of the twins and Lee. "And for another, even if snogging Snape wasn't completely illegal, he can't stand me anyway. You could probably convince him though."
Nessa's face scrunched again, and she ignored the smirk on Tori's face at her obvious distaste.
"That's disgusting," said Nessa firmly. "For a lot of reasons."
The three of them laughed and spent the next few hours speaking about nothing and everything. By the time they were running out of things to talk about, the pile of sweets before them was dwindling fast and the twins and Lee had packed up their knick knacks and started a game of Exploding Snap. After they had played a round, they stretched and made their way over to join the three younger girls.
"What's all this giggling about, then?" said Lee, settling next to Ginny and ruffling her hair affectionately. Vanessa smiled as the gesture reminded her of the same one George had used in the library. "If it's about George still sleeping with his baby blanket, we already know."
Tori burst into laughter as George lobbed one of their textbooks at him and missed him by half an inch as he ducked. Fred grinned and took a seat next to Tori, stretching out across the blankets and draping an arm behind her casually. George ignored the laughter and matched his brother's position, squeezing between Ginny and Nessa and forcing them apart, earning him a huff from both girls. He winked at them in response.
"Actually, we were debating if Angelina was right when she told us she heard that you still sleep with your teddy bear," said Nessa innocently. The twins and Tori laughed as Lee straightened in a panic.
"That's a lie, right?" said Lee, eyeing her seriously. She kept her face purposefully blank and shrugged. "She cannot possibly think I still sleep with a teddy bear. Tell me that's a lie. She's lying, right, Ginny?"
Ginny was covering her mouth with one of her hands to hide her grin, but she looked torn between telling him the truth and her loyalty to Nessa, who was smirking now as Lee tried to read her expression. She seemed to take pity on him and nodded her head. Lee sagged in relief.
"Bloody hell, Nessa," he said wearily. "Don't scare a bloke like that. I'd almost lost hope in getting her to go out with me after that."
Nessa snorted. "How many times is it that she's turned you down now?"
"I count at least fifty-seven," said Fred, munching on a licorice wand. Tori raised a disbelieving eyebrow.
"Nah, it's at least sixty-four by my count," she said with a questioning look at Lee, as if he would give her confirmation. He stuck his tongue out at her instead, which sent Nessa and Ginny tittering.
"Alright, alright," said Lee in exasperation over the laughter of his friends. "Someone find something else to distract us all before this gets out of hand."
"We could play a game," said Ginny, helpfully. Lee patted her on the back cheerily.
"I always knew you were the brilliant one, Ginny, thank you," he said, raising an eyebrow at Vanessa in challenge, who just grinned at him, unabashed by her earlier swipe at him. "What games do people play at sleepovers?"
"I wasn't aware this was a sleepover," said Nessa in confusion at the same time that Tori said, "I don't know…spin the bottle? Truth or Dare?"
"We can't play Spin the Bottle with Ginny," said George with an eye roll. "That's horribly awkward."
Ginny grimaced and Fred nodded fervently. Tori sniggered at their obvious discomfort and Nessa rolled her eyes.
"And I'm not playing Truth or Dare with Fred and George," said Nessa hurriedly, causing the twins to grin mischievously at her. "I'm not being dared to run around this castle like a fool."
"Such trust you have in us, Vanessa," said Fred with mock disappointment. She ignored him completely.
"We could mix the two?" said Lee. "Spin the bottle and whoever it lands on has to answer a question truthfully. Eliminates the dares and the snogging."
Nessa hesitated as the others shrugged. Dares might have been the most concerning part of playing Truth or Dare with the twins, but she wasn't entirely certain that being truthful wasn't dangerous in its own right. The others seemed to have agreed in her hesitation and she sighed, resolving herself to whatever would happen. It's not as if they'd have any idea if she was lying, other than Tori.
Lee grabbed an object from his trunk that was shaped like an aerial and oddly squiggly.
"Secrecy Sensor," he said, spotting her quizzical look. "Detects lies and concealment. My dad gave it to me. Of course, it goes off constantly with these two around," he jerked his head at the twins, "but I figure it'll keep us honest."
Nessa tried not to glare at him. Maybe they could all read her mind at this point. George grabbed one of the extra pillows and transfigured it into an empty bottle, setting it in the middle of the circle. She waved her wand and muttered a quick Silencing Charm in the event that their other dormmates came back while they were playing. She hardly needed the entire school talking about anything embarrassing she had to spill during this game.
"Youngest first?" said Lee, deferring to Ginny. She grinned and reached forward to spin the bottle.
It landed on Fred, who looked far too comfortable despite the fact that he could be answering potentially embarrassing questions in front of his friends. Nessa wondered idly if he was ever nervous about anything. Ginny contemplated for a minute or two before her face suddenly broke out into an evil smile. Tori grinned and sat up eagerly, eyeing the younger girl in anticipation.
"How was your first kiss?" said Ginny innocently.
Nessa nearly choked on the drink she'd been taking, and her eyes shot to Tori's. Her best friend had schooled her features into a blank expression, but Nessa could see the amusement sparked in the gray depths. Nessa bit her lip to keep from laughing as Fred hesitated.
"Fine," he answered shortly, causing the Secrecy Sensor to vibrate.
Nessa could feel her body shaking as she tried not to let out the laugh she was holding, and Tori hid her face from Fred's view as he glared at her. Their eyes met again briefly and the two of them erupted into laughter immediately, sending Ginny over with them. The three of them were laughing so hard that they didn't hear Fred explain to Lee that he'd chipped someone's tooth until he had fallen into a fit of laughter with them. It was several minutes before the girls had calmed enough to pay attention to the group again. Fred sat petulantly with his arms crossed, still glaring at Tori.
"I can't believe you told her that," he said, ears slightly red at the edges. Tori snorted and rolled her eyes.
"It wasn't me, genius," she said, grinning at his embarrassment.
"Well, it wasn't George!" he said indignantly.
"It was me," said Nessa, calmly, with a smirk. Tori sniggered as Fred's jaw dropped. "She needed some ammunition against her teasing brothers. Who am I to deny her that glory?"
"Alright, Potter," he said, grinning dangerously. "Let's play this your way, then."
He leaned forward and flicked the bottle only hard enough to pass Tori around the circle and have it land directly on Nessa. She was glad her pride wouldn't allow her to back down, despite the small churning in her stomach at the look on his face. He leaned forward with a grin and she, stubbornly, did the same until they were eye-to-eye, both smirking at each other.
"How was your first kiss, then?" he repeated cockily. "No one's is ever really that good."
Nessa snorted and rolled her eyes. "Pathetic. I expected better from you, Weasley." She leaned back in her seat again and raised an eyebrow at him defiantly. "I haven't had one yet."
When the sensor didn't go off, he narrowed his eyes at her before smirking dangerously. She braced herself for whatever suave statement he was going to make in an attempt to make her uncomfortable.
"I'm happy to show you, darling," he said, grinning at the blush that immediately painted her cheeks. She glared at him, ignoring George tensing beside her at the remark.
"No thanks," she said smoothly. "I like my teeth the way they are, thanks."
This comment sent the others into another round of laughter and Fred groaned, rubbing his eyes in irritation.
"This was a horrible game to play," he admitted, pointing an accusing finger at Vanessa. "And this isn't over, Potter."
-o0o-
It had been a few hours of playing before the group of them had fallen asleep, splayed across the blanket on the floor. Ginny was the first to succumb, her head lolling onto George's shoulder and signaling that it was time for the rest of them to quiet down. It had been a relief to all of them that one of them had finally fallen asleep. They'd all thoroughly embarrassed themselves and had only continued playing due to stubborn pride and a desire to cause embarrassment in someone else so that theirs could be forgotten.
Fred had been correct in stating that he would find a way to humble Vanessa as she had to admit that she'd once had a 'friend' tell her primary school crush that she'd fancied him, and he'd run away from her instead of responding. She'd spun the bottle so quickly after that that she'd nearly flung it across the circle by mistake. After Ginny had been forced to admit to her brothers that she liked Harry's eyes best, Tori had admitted she'd once fancied Lee, and George had adamantly refused to admit whether he actually still had his baby blanket, they'd all seemed to agree that some things were really better left unspoken.
Falling asleep had been a blessing after all of the excitement of the evening and it had taken only minutes before Nessa had succumbed. It felt like only minutes of blissful oblivion when she was startled awake by a blood-curdling scream.
She shot up immediately with a gasp, her heart pounding in her chest, and nearly banged her head against George's when he did the same next to her. Amid the panicked scrambling of the others, it took several seconds for Nessa to register who was screaming. Ginny, who was laying on the other side of George, appeared to be consumed by some kind of night terror, her head and legs thrashing.
Nessa shot over to her and shook her shoulders violently as the others stared at them in surprise.
"Ginny!" she yelled frantically when the younger girl continued screaming and did not open her eyes. "GINNY! Wake up!"
She jumped violently when the red head below her shot up with a crazed look in her eyes and gasping for air like she'd been suffocating.
"Merlin, Ginny, are you alright?" said Tori, weakly from her spot next to Fred.
"Scared us half to death," said Fred, who was stiller than Vanessa had ever seen him and was eyeing his younger sister in concern.
Ginny didn't respond for a second, looking around the room as if expecting something to jump out at her and ignoring the rest of them completely. She started wringing her hands in a way that Nessa recognized as one of her own coping mechanisms when she was anxious. Without thinking, she placed her hand over her friend's in the same way George had always done to her. It seemed to jolt Ginny back to the present in the same way he usually did for her.
"Ginny?" she questioned cautiously, her face concerned, but her tone remaining open enough to suggest she was safe to talk if she wanted to.
"I —" said Ginny, looking close to tears as George began rubbing her back and not meeting anyone's eye. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to wake everyone. It was just a nightmare."
"Are you sure, Gin?" implored Tori. "That was — er — intense."
Ginny shifted uncomfortably and raised to a stand. "I'm sure. I'll just go sleep in my dorm so you guys can get some sleep. I'm sorry —"
Nessa's arm shot out to grab her wrist immediately and she pulled her back down to sit between her and George.
"You don't have to go," she said, firmly. "We're fine. You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to."
Fred looked like he wanted to argue, but Nessa shot him a pointed look and he just frowned instead.
"What about the other dormmates?" whispered Ginny anxiously.
"I put up a Silencing Charm earlier, they didn't hear anything," said Nessa consolingly.
"C'mon, Gin," agreed George, settling back into his position and holding his arms out for her to crawl into. "It's alright. Just go back to sleep."
Ginny hesitated a moment but obeyed and laid down next to her older brother, still looking rather tense. Lee hesitated slightly but followed their lead and laid back in his own spot, content with letting Nessa and George handle whatever was happening with the youngest Weasley. Fred and Tori looked torn between playing off the awkwardness and forcing their sister to talk to them. Nessa met their eyes and shook her head once. Tori sighed forlornly, but nodded anyway and pulled a still debating Fred back to lay down. If the muttering between the two of them was any indication, Fred was not all that happy about the decision.
Nessa shifted to lay on Ginny's other side and the younger girl moved away from her brother and settled on her back between the two of them. Nessa met George's eyes briefly when he shifted to lay on his side and face his sister. Neither of them were going back to sleep until Ginny did in case she got any wild ideas to leave once everyone had fallen asleep. After a nightmare like that, Nessa didn't entirely think she should be alone, and George seemed to agree.
She closed her eyes even though she had no intention of sleeping, only to spare the younger Gryffindor of being stared at until she fell asleep again. After several tense minutes, Lee's snores started up again and Tori and Fred's muttering subsided, signaling that the others had succumbed to sleep once more. Nessa knew Ginny had not fallen asleep, however, as she kept shifting from her back to one of her sides restlessly every few minutes. When her friend shifted onto her back again with a heavy sigh, Nessa opened her eyes to look at her.
"Sleep, Ginny," she said, gently. Ginny looked at her nervously and sighed again.
"I'm trying, it's just —" she hesitated, shifting again so that she was on her side and they were eye-to-eye, her back to George, who was clearly listening to the conversation, despite his own eyes being shut. "I'm afraid if I go back to sleep…that I'll be back there."
George opened his eyes and started to rub her back again. Nessa hummed thoughtfully.
"That's happened to me before," she agreed quietly, trying not to wake the others. "Like the nightmare lingers after I've woken up and picks up where it left off when I go back to sleep."
Ginny nodded, her eyes filling with tears again.
"It always happens with this one," she admitted weakly. George stilled behind her and opened his mouth, but Nessa shook her head minutely before he interrupted. "I really don't want to go back there again."
"Where is 'there'?" she queried gently. When Ginny seemed nervous to speak again, she added, "You don't have to tell us…if you really don't want to. Except it might help. I used to tell Harry about my nightmares as a kid to keep them from coming back."
"Did it work?" she asked, curling her legs up and shifting closer to her brother. George laid his arm out underneath her and continued to rub her back soothingly with the other.
"Sometimes," Nessa admitted. "It helped remind me I was in a safe place. Not covered in tarantulas."
Ginny giggled briefly and George relaxed minutely at the sound, smirking at Vanessa in amusement. She ignored him as Ginny spoke again.
"Ron's afraid of spiders," she said, conversationally. "Fred turned his teddy bear into one once when he broke his toy broomstick."
Nessa tried not to cringe at the thought of holding a spider instead of her teddy bear, but something must have shown on her face because the two Weasley siblings started laughing quietly. She rolled her eyes at them both, but she pushed the thought away and focused on Ginny again. She'd become accustomed to waiting for the younger girl to distract herself from admitting what was on her mind. She'd learned quickly that sometimes the best thing to do to get her to open up was to say nothing at all and let her work up the courage to speak.
As they looked at each other in the dark, Nessa watched her tense up slowly, a sure sign that she was working herself up to talking about it, but wasn't quite sure yet. George flicked his eyes between the two of them curiously. Eventually, Ginny sighed and looked away.
"I don't really know where it is," she admitted quietly. "Well, at first I do. It always starts in one of the Hogwarts bathrooms. But then it gets really dark, like I'm in some kind of tunnel. But when I keep walking, there's just…bones everywhere. Animal bones, I think, and I can't walk anywhere without stepping all over them. And I can never figure out how to get out. I just walk and walk, but there's no exit."
"That sounds awful," said Nessa when she stopped talking. She had a feeling there was something else because she wasn't sure that would cause anyone to scream so horribly into the night, but she didn't want to press too hard in case she clammed up.
"That part isn't really so bad," conceded Ginny quietly, playing with the red-and-gold tassels on one of the pillows. "It's more the feeling that gets me during that part. The longer I walk, the more afraid I am, but even though I want to stop, I can't. Like I'm being forced to keep going even though I'd rather be anywhere else. And then…"
She paused again and George smoothed her hair down a couple times. Nessa admired him for being so gentle with her, especially in front of someone else. She'd seen brothers pretend like they cared little for their siblings when they were in front of their friends before and it was always something that had irked her. As if caring about a family member was something to be embarrassed about. She'd never gotten that impression from George.
"It's only a dream, Ginny," he said softly. "I promise. Nothing's going to hurt you in here."
Ginny hesitated a little longer but sighed again.
"Well then, I hear something behind me and it's…it's big. I don't know what it is, but it keeps getting closer and there's nowhere for me to run, you know? No place to hide because it's just this long space of nothing that I've been walking forever. But then I can tell it's behind me and I turn around and…I can't tell what it is, but I can see fangs and these big, yellow eyes before I wake up. And I don't know why but the eyes…they're the worst part."
George and Nessa didn't say anything for a moment as she finished. Nessa couldn't help but wonder how long she'd been hiding having the nightmare for. It certainly explained why she always looked like she was getting so little sleep as of late. She'd mentioned the nightmares a couple times before, but she'd never thought to pry. Everyone had nightmares occasionally and she hadn't realized that they were getting as bad as waking up screaming. Of course, she'd been looking so peaky lately, maybe it was ignorant of her to have not assumed they were causing her issues.
"You know, I don't think that really helped to talk about," said Ginny suddenly. Nessa met her eyes and burst out laughing and had to cover her mouth to avoid waking the others. Lee grunted in his sleep, but didn't appear to be awake.
George raised his eyebrows when Ginny started giggling as well and shook his head in disbelief.
"I don't understand the two of you," he said honestly, but he was smiling at his sister anyway as she continued laughing. When she'd gotten herself under control and Nessa appeared to have come back down to sanity, he nudged his sister pointedly and said, "Well, why don't you tell us what will help then? I'm rubbish at this kind of thing anyway."
Ginny sighed and shrugged.
"I don't know," she admitted, solemnly. "Nothing really helps anymore."
George frowned at this.
"Mum used to sing to us."
Ginny shot Nessa an imploring look.
"Please don't let George sing to me, Nessa. He's horrible," she said, desperately.
This remark sent Nessa into another bout of laughter and made George poke his sister in the side in admonishment. He was scowling at her, but there was a twinkle in his eye that hinted he wasn't really bothered by her remark.
"Fine, then Nessa can do it," he said, grinning as she immediately stopped laughing and looked at him incredulously. She started shaking her head vigorously and he spoke over her. "You aren't going to deny my precious sister some comfort, are you, Nessa?"
Ginny elbowed him, but she was giggling and didn't make any attempt to argue as Nessa's eyes narrowed.
"I don't even know any Wizard songs," said Nessa, pointedly as if this prevented her from having to do it. George raised an eyebrow at her defiantly.
"You know Muggle ones don't you?" he pressed expectantly. Nessa stared at him for a moment before rolling her eyes and sighing in irritation.
"Fine," she said with a glare. "I'll sing one. For Ginny," she said when he smirked at her. She motioned for Ginny to get comfortable and then pointed an accusing finger at George. "But if you aren't asleep after this, that's not my problem. And don't look at me."
The last part was said as an afterthought and George snorted, but closed his eyes anyway. She ignored the smug look on his face and tried to think of something to sing that wasn't so upbeat it would be inappropriate for this setting. She hated this. When George cleared his throat expectantly, she reached over and cuffed him on the ear. Ginny laughed lightly as he swore.
Sighing loudly, she settled on one she had heard first in one of her own dreams and then on a few occasions when her aunt and uncle had listened to it on the wireless, an act which Nessa suspected was far too ordinary for them to do regularly. She started the song softer than was likely necessary, even with the others sleeping not far from her.
Wise men say
Only fools rush in
But I can't help falling in love with you
Shall I stay?
Would it be a sin?
If I can't help falling in love with you?
Like a river flows
Surely to the sea
Darling, so it goes
Some things are meant to be
Take my hand
Take my whole life too
For I can't help falling in love with you
For I can't help falling in love with you
Like a river flows
Surely to the sea
Darling, so it goes
Some things are meant to be
Take my hand
Take my whole life too
For I can't help falling in love with you
For I can't help falling in love with you
Nessa sighed heavily and opened her eyes again to look at Ginny. She'd not even realized that she'd closed her eyes at all, but pretending she was alone and singing was much easier than acknowledging that she was surrounded by other people. She relaxed a little when she noticed the younger girl was already sleeping and grinned — Harry was the same way, oddly. He was the only other person she'd sang in front of, but he'd always been easy to comfort when he'd woken up at night when they were children. She was grateful for that fact, considering her aunt Petunia would ignore him when he'd cried in the middle of the night and let Nessa deal with him instead.
She jumped violently when George spoke into the silence.
"I don't know what you were so worried about," he said matter-of-factly. "You have a beautiful voice."
Nessa blushed at the compliment.
"Thank you. I don't really sing much anymore. Not since Harry got older. Aunt Petunia used to ignore him when he woke in the middle of the night and it was the only way I could get him to stop crying most of the time."
"The muggles you live with are a real piece of work," he said darkly. She shrugged. "I find it hard to believe that they'd listen to a song as gentle as that one."
"They don't really listen to music much at all, to tell the truth," she said, laughing when George made a sarcastic noise of surprise. "I'd heard that one before, though. In a dream. My mum was singing it to me and my dad. She might have been singing it only to him though, honestly, because he had this really stupid grin on his face," she said, laughing at the image, despite the pang of sadness she felt when she recalled it. "I didn't really realize it was a real memory until the song came on the wireless a few years ago."
George shifted so that he was on his side again and looked at her over his sister's head. He eyed her a moment before he spoke.
"Do you remember them?" he said gently.
Nessa shook her head slowly, feeling the prick behind her eyes that accompanied any thought of her parents. The movement helped clear the feeling a little as she met his eyes to respond.
"Not really," she whispered, as though admitting it out loud was disrespectful to them. "I remember more than Harry does. I think he resents that sometimes," she played with the tassel on the same pillow that Ginny had done only minutes earlier. "I only remember a few things. Most of them are hazy though and hard to tell if they're real or just my imagination."
There was a moment of silence after this admission. She didn't really enjoy speaking to others about her parents because what was there really to be said? What could anyone say that would make it any easier? It was one of the reasons she and Tori had bonded so easily — a shared trauma that each understood wasn't really something that needed to be talked about and never pushed the other to do so. It was comforting to have another human being in the world, outside her brother, who knew how she felt without having to ask.
"Well, thank you," said George, finally, as if sensing her change in demeanor and knowing she didn't like the direction the conversation was going. She relaxed a little, but looked confused. "For helping Ginny. And inviting her — I haven't seen her that happy since the summer."
She smiled sadly because the words were an echo of her earlier thoughts. She could only wonder how long of a reprieve they'd really given the youngest Weasley before the real world rushed back in again.
-o0o-
Long chapter, whew! I've had this idea in my head for awhile, but it's taken me ages to figure out what song would make sense to place here that wasn't obviously too recent or too upbeat to be used in this situation. And I'm not much of a Beatles fan (Don't judge me! lol) which made things a little more difficult. All rights to the song belong to Elvis Presley and not me, obviously.
Writing Ginny's gradual descent into her final possession is extremely difficult to do, but I'm trying to time up the occurrences with how they're mentioned in the original book. I've always felt a little bad for Ginny and the effects the experience had on her was largely ignored in the books (Granted, the books weren't about her), so I'm trying to make the symptoms themselves obvious without giving it away too completely to Nessa. We shall see if Vanessa will ever figure out what's happening with her.