Throughout his entire life, Percy Weasley always had everything planned out.
He knew what he wanted, he knew what goals he wanted to achieve. Percy wanted a great career at the Ministry of Magic, make a lot of money, marry his girlfriend Penelope Clearwater, have two kids; one boy, one girl. It all sounded perfect.
He always succeeded throughout Hogwarts; a prefect, thirteen O.W.L.S., Head Boy. Then, after he graduated he got hired by the ministry and practically ran a department by himself. Everything was coming true. It was when he was given the job of junior assistant was when things started to go wrong, family wise at least.
When he told his father about it, Arthur basically told Percy he didn't deserve it, or was just too stupid to realize that Fudge only wanted to use him to spy on the family. Either way to look at it, it was both insulting and hurtful and if his father didn't realize that, then Percy had nothing more to say to the man.
Then one day, he saw something that would change his life forever. Apparently, it had been discovered that Harry Potter was training an army on Dumbledore's behalf in some secret room inside of Hogwarts.
'I knew you were lying,' Percy wanted to say to Potter as he dragged him and this girl named Cho Chang into Dumbledore's office. Fudge was going to have Dumbledore arrested and sent to Azkaban, but the headmaster managed to flee. It didn't matter though, it would only be a matter of time before they captured him. Fudge then asked Percy to search the school for anything else that looked suspicious. When he did so, he found something.
The Mirror of Erised.
Percy had always heard about it but never seen it. He knew the mirror showed the most desperate desire of a person's heart when they looked into it, a vision that had been known to drive some men mad.
He didn't know if he should or not, but Percy couldn't help himself. Walking closer to the mirror, Percy stood in front of it and looked. He was sure it was going to show him as the Minister of Magic, but it didn't. Percy was staring at himself, looking no older than the age he was now. He was sitting at the dinner table at the burrow. His father was sitting with too, just talking and laughing when suddenly his mother came into the room with bowls of food. The three of them just sat together, talking and smiling, peacefully eating dinner at this circular table with only three chairs before the image finally faded away.
"I don't understand." Percy muttered to himself.
Where were the others? No Bill, no Charlie, no Fred, no George, no Ron, no Ginny. None of them were around. It was just him by himself with his mother and father. Happy being by himself. Happy just being an only child.
That night, Percy couldn't even sleep as he thought about that image over and over.
And that's when everything started to go wrong.
It turned out that Harry Potter had been telling the truth all along. Voldemort was back as Fudge saw him with his own eyes and he to resign in disgrace. Even though Percy still got to keep his job, that didn't matter. He had really burned a bridge with his family. The things he had said to his father about his job, their house, their lack of money. If he went back home, he would have to deal with Fred and George's taunts and jeers, Ron and Ginny's hateful looks. Who knows how long they would hold the fact that he was wrong over Percy's head. That's when Percy's mind went back to the mirror's image. Merlin, why did he have to have so many siblings? Right now, they probably expected him to come crawling back with his tail between his legs any day now, begging for forgiveness.
If that's what they expected, they weren't going to get it.
So, life just went on. Percy continued to ignore his father at work, most of the time not even bothering to look at him if he ever did see him. It just went on, week after week until it became month after month. He finally got a letter from his mother, telling him that Charlie was going to be back, so they were going to have a big family reunion, she begged him to be there, but Percy just threw the letter away, he didn't go.
A day after that reunion had happened, that's when Percy received a letter from Charlie. He couldn't help but smile as he opened it, Charlie had been his favorite brother, they've always had a great relationship, but he was curious as to why he was writing him.
Hey Perce;
I've been biting my tongue about this whole thing and have been trying to stay out of this whole thing, but when you didn't come to our reunion, it occurred to me that maybe I'm doing you more harm by not trying to talk some sense into you. Percy, I think you're really being a complete prat over this 'feud' I guess you could call it you've got going with Mum and Dad. And if you're not bloody unhappy right now, you should be because they certainly are. Do you know what your estrangement is doing to them? Do you know that Bill is going to get married soon? Bill is afraid to invite you to the wedding because he's afraid you won't even come to that.
Look, now things are clear, so can't you just admit you were wrong? Dumbledore was right, your bosses were wrong. You've always been the most rational one out of all of us, so I don't understand why you're being completely irrational about this. Can't you make up with them? I hate to think of you all being so miserable, lonely and pig-headed over this.
We're angry with you, but we can work things out. That's what families do. You're losing us Percy. We don't want that and deep down, I know you don't want that. Make things right before it's too late.
Your brother,
Charlie.
Furiously, Percy crumbled up the letter and threw it as far away from him as he could. Charlie and Percy had been were an odd paring, certainly, but then, they were the two oddballs of the family, so why not? Of all the people who might have spoken to him like this, Charlie should be the last.
'Complete prat...should be unhappy...you were wrong...pig-headed...losing us.'
He went over those words again and again until to his shock, Percy could feel tears start to build. That was it then Percy decided he wouldn't be reading any more letters from any member of his family that sent one to him, no matter what it may be about. Besides, Charlie, like the rest of them, had missed the point of this whole thing that happened between him and his father entirely. Percy didn't take offence because his father and the rest of them disagreed with Percy over Fudge versus Dumbledore. Percy took offence because his father refused to believe he had earned his promotion through merit, rather than through some weird scheme to allow Fudge to spy on Dumbledore through the Weasley's.
Percy didn't know how to fix things with his parents because he wasn't going to apologize.
Once again, Percy's mind went back to the mirror's image.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Two nights later, Percy heard a knock on the door. He groaned; had one of his brothers come to cuss him out for missing the family reunion? Maybe punch him in the nose? He opened the door with a glass of vodka in his hand and to his surprise, Penelope was standing there.
"Hi," Penelope smiled.
"What are you doing here?" He asked.
"We were supposed to go out tonight. Don't you remember? I came by your office, but you were gone."
"Oh, yeah. I'm sorry Penelope, I completely forgot. I've had a lot of work lately." He invited her in, Penelope then glanced closer at Percy and saw he looked really bad. His eyes were blood-shot as if he hadn't slept in two or three days.
"Are you alright?"
"No," he admitted.
"What's wrong?"
They walked together till they were sitting on the sofa. Percy picked up a regular photo of himself with his family. Percy was on the far-right, his father Arthur was standing next to him with his arm around his shoulder, Arthur's other arm around the shoulder of Ron who standing on the opposite side of his father. Fred and George were on the far left. Molly was in front of the boys with Ginny next to her. They all had smiles on their faces, Percy had told Penelope this picture had been taken right before Ginny was to enter her first year at Hogwarts.
"You all look so happy," Penelope smiled as she admired the photo.
"Well, we weren't," Percy nearly snapped. "Or at least I wasn't." Percy took another sip of vodka before picking up a pair of scissors and began cutting the picture, cutting Ron, Ginny, Fred, and George out until he only showed Percy with his parents. Penelope just watched, puzzled.
"Do you know how lucky you are?" Percy finally asked.
"How do you mean?" Penelope responded.
"To not have any siblings."
She shrugged.
"I would have liked to have a little brother or sister."
"You wouldn't have wanted one, believe me."
Penelope's brows furrowed; the mood was really growing dark in the apartment complex.
"Percy, you're acting really strange. Tell me what's really the problem."
Another drink of alcohol, Percy just stared straight ahead as he then whispered;
"I want to be an only child."
Percy had really begun to think about this over the last several days. He thought about every problem he had ever had to deal with while growing up or at school. Directly, or indirectly it was almost always because of his siblings. His younger ones at least. Percy imagined how life would be so much better if they were gone.
Gently, Penelope put a hand on Percy's shoulder. She knew about her boyfriend's family problems. She never brought it up as she knew it was a sore subject for him, but she didn't know things had gotten this bad. "I'm sorry Percy, but as long you have five brothers and one sister breathing in and out, that's never going to happen."
After taking another shot of vodka; Percy shrugged.
"Well...perhaps it's time they stopped breathing in and out."
After he said those words, the only noise that could be heard was the ticking of the clock hanging on the wall. Penelope could only stare at her boyfriend. Had she just heard him right? Was he serious? Percy continued to stare at the wall in front of him. After what felt like an eternity, Penelope finally found her voice;
"Percy...?"
That was the only thing she could get out before Percy continued;
"What if...they each just went away?"
Penelope finally was able to recover from the shock of Percy's words and suddenly jumped up to her feet.
"Percy, do you have any idea what that would do to your parents? If they lost one child, let alone six!"
"I could use the memory charm on them, they could forget that they ever had any other children." Percy looked up at Penelope who was could only stare at him in disbelief over what Percy was talking about doing. He continued on with; "I've always been my mother's favorite child, and my siblings all know that. I'll make my father proud of me again with all I accomplish at the ministry. I'm the only child they need."
Penelope couldn't listen to any more of this. She quickly snatched the glass of alcohol from Percy's hand. "Alright, you've had far too much to drink." That was it, that had to be why her boyfriend was in this mood. "You need to get into bed and sleep this off, now."
Percy rolled his eyes, but thankfully didn't argue with her. Penelope gently led Percy to his room and he collapsed onto his bed. She threw the covers over him and watched over her boyfriend until he dosed off which only took a few minutes. She closed his door, but even though this discussion was no longer happening, and she was getting farther and farther away from Percy's apartment, Penelope couldn't stop her hands from trembling. What her boyfriend had said really scared her. It scared her so much that she actually contemplated going to see Percy's father tomorrow morning to tell him what had been said by his third born son.
"No."
Penelope thought that to herself. She took a few deep breaths as she finally got herself to calm down. Doing that would probably end up doing more harm than good. "Percy wouldn't do that. He would never do something like that."
