"Are you going to be alright?" Fred asked, taking note of the pale green hue underlying Hermione's cheeks as they stepped out of the bushes in the back garden. He deliberated, trying to judge whether or not he should be holding her hair away from her face. He also felt a little guilty, knowing his side-along abilities were probably still a bit lack-luster.
"Yeah, just a second," she said tightly, closing her eyes and bracing an arm on the garden wall beside them.
Fred nodded and gave her some room to breathe, taking advantage of the opportunity and looking around curiously.
"This is your house?" he asked a second later, eyes wide.
Hermione cracked a lid open to look up at him. Her color was already a little better.
"Yes," she said slowly. "Be a bit odd to randomly apparate into a stranger's garden, no?"
"Yeah, it's just…" Nice. It was really nice. "I mean, I didn't know you were…"
She arched a brow, clearly not following him.
"Just a bit bigger than I was expecting," he finally finished lamely, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck.
"Oh." Hermione looked at the building like she hadn't noticed it, the last in a row of looming Victorian townhouses. "We still have a bit of time before your dad gets here… do you want to see inside? I think I have my house key."
He considered before giving in to his curiosity and nodding.
Hermione dug in the pocket of her bag and produced a small brass key, contrasting the one he'd given her to the shop. She then proceeded to the door that led inside from the garden and turned it in the lock.
Fred followed her in and confirmed that the inside was just as nice as the outside implied it would be. They crossed a small mudroom into a kitchen twice the size of The Burrow's, polished and practically sparkling. There were a number of trinkets and items that he didn't recognize on top of the counters, pushed beneath the cupboards.
"Mum isn't much of a cook," Hermione explained, "but she's a complete nutter about keeping everything tidy."
She led the way through to the living room, a large fireplace flanked by sofas with what he identified as a television set in one corner and a grand piano in the other. "I took lessons when I was younger," she said, gesturing to it.
They continued on in this way, Hermione pointing at various things and Fred nodding but remaining silent. He could tell it was setting her on edge, but he hadn't quite figured out how to respond yet; what to say.
Finally, they went upstairs and she opened the door to her bedroom. As one might have predicted, one whole wall was comprised of bookcases, each packed and stuffed to the brim. There was another fireplace, light stone with a dark mantle, and a four-poster bed with gauzy white linen hanging from the canopy. The furniture was all a rich, dark cherry color.
Hermione leaned on the edge of the mattress and watched him look around. He saw a scrap of parchment tucked between two books on her desk with his own writing from New Year's Eve earlier that year.
He paced along the shelves, eyes catching on titles that he'd heard her mention before, or seen her toting around. There were hundreds of them.
"I don't understand," Fred finally said, turning to face her. He was standing beside one of the massive windows that looked down into the garden.
"Don't understand what?" Hermione coaxed patiently.
"Why do you spend so much time at The Burrow?"
He didn't mean for it to be offensive at all; it was a genuine question. Fred was eighteen, grown and out of the house. He didn't have any lingering illusions about his family's financial status, and he was having a difficult time wrapping his head around why Hermione would opt to share a tiny room with his sister every holiday, wait in a queue for an hour to take a shower, when this was an option.
"Is that what's bothering you?" She looked a bit relieved as she strode across the room to stand beside him.
"I just… Harry staying with us makes sense. I helped break him out of the Dursley's once, so I know how terrible it is there. But you clearly don't need to."
Hermione nodded, not seeming outwardly upset. "Well, I suppose it goes without saying that my parents live rather comfortably." She went and leaned against the bed again, looking around the room and squinting, like she was trying to see it from his perspective. "Despite what people might assume in seeing this place, I didn't have the best childhood, Fred. My mum and dad are lovely people, really, but I think they always knew that I was different. Things happened around me, as they do with all magical children. Objects would disappear and then reappear. They'd put me to bed only to come downstairs and find me waiting for them in the kitchen a moment later, asking for another bedtime story. And I don't blame them for keeping me at arms-length as a result; they didn't understand what was happening, and I'm sure it was distinctly unnerving. Then by the time we knew that I was a witch and not an alien or demonically possessed, it was like the opportunity to bond had sort of… passed. At this point they're more like flatmates that occasionally ask me to sweep up or take the rubbish bins out."
Fred went to sit beside her, watching her distant expression and feeling a bit bad for bringing it up, however unknowingly.
A tiny part of him also wondered why a rubbish bin would need to travel, but he elected not to give it a voice.
"Anyway, that's not to even mention the kids at school. Between my hair, my teeth and my proclivity to lug enormous books around, they weren't exactly kind. But the first time I went to your house, back during the summer before fourth year… I don't know. It was like getting a glimpse of what my life could have been like, growing up with magic – siblings too. Not feeling like an outcast or needing to censor myself. Everything about it, about your family, was warm and welcoming; George cracked a joke at my expense and your mum offered me breakfast before I was even fully in the door."
"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to make you uncomfortable," Fred backtracked, reaching out to take her hand.
"You didn't. I didn't even think about it, honestly. It hadn't occurred to me that you've never seen where I grew up." She glanced sideways at him and a sly grin appeared. "If it had, I would have recommended we get here with a bit more time to spare."
"Is that so?" Fred asked. He was suddenly very aware that they were sitting on a very empty bed, in a very empty house.
"Mmhmm," Hermione hummed. She turned more fully toward him, rose onto her knees, and slung a leg over the tops of his thighs, straddling him. Despite having already performed valiantly no fewer than three times in the past 12 hours, his cock twitched to attention as she dipped her head and pressed her lips to his throat, just over his pulse. "I spent a fair few nights in here pining after you last summer, you know."
"Well, while you were busy pining, I was picturing your ass and having a wank," Fred teased, allowing his head to drop back. Hermione snorted inelegantly, grinding her hips lightly against his. His fingers flexed, one hand on the top of her thigh and the other reached around to squeeze her aforementioned ass.
"If we're quick, maybe –" She was abruptly cut off by a knock at the back door. They both made disappointed sounds and she climbed off, straightening her shirt and running a hand through her hair with a sigh. "Right. See you at dinner next weekend?"