"Fair point, little bro," said Fred, scanning the column. "You can have a bit of Nosebleed Nougat cheap if you like."
"Why's it cheap?" said Ron suspiciously.
"Because you'll keep bleeding till you shrivel up, we haven't got an antidote yet," said George, helping himself to a kipper.
"Cheers," said Ron moodily, pocketing his schedule, "but I think I'll take the lessons."
"And speaking of your Skiving Snackboxes," said Venus, eyeing Fred and George beadily, "you can't advertise for testers on the Gryffindor notice board."
"Says who?" George boasted, looking astonished.
"Says me," said Venus. "And Ron."
"Leave me out of it," said Ron hastily. Venus glared at him. Fred and George sniggered.
"You'll be singing a different tune soon enough, Venus," said Fred, thickly buttering a crumpet. "You're starting your fifth year, you'll be begging us for a Snackbox before long."
"And why would starting fifth year mean I want a Skiving Snackbox?" asked Venus.
"Fifth year's O.W.L. year," said George.
"So?"—
"So you've got your exams coming up, haven't you? They'll be keeping your noses so hard to that grindstone they'll be rubbed raw," said Fred with satisfaction.
"What makes you think we'll crack under the pressure?" Venus said confidently cocking her eyebrows up.
"I might," said Constance raising her hand mildly. Venus shut her eyes and didn't bother to turn around. She kept her gaze firm on the Twins.
"Anyway, it's a nightmare of a year, the fifth," said George. "If you care about exam results anyway. Fred and I managed to keep our spirits up somehow."
"Yeah . . . you got, what was it, three O.W.L.s each?" said Ron.
"Yep," said Fred unconcernedly. "But we feel our futures lie outside the world of academic achievement."
"We seriously debated whether we were going to bother coming back for our seventh year," said George brightly, "now that we've got —"
He broke off at a warning look from Harry. "— now that we've got our O.W.L.s," George said hastily. "I mean, do we really need N.E.W.T.s? But we didn't think Mum could take us leaving school early, not on top of Percy turning out to be the world's biggest prat."
"We're not going to waste our last year here, though," said Fred, looking affectionately around at the Great Hall. "We're going to use it to do a bit of market research, find out exactly what the average Hogwarts student requires from his joke shop, carefully evaluate the results of our research, and then produce the products to fit the demand."
"But where are you going to get the gold to start a joke shop?" asked Venus skeptically. "You're going to need all the ingredients and materials — and premises too, I suppose. . . ." Harry's fork fell and he ducked under the table to retrieve it; his face crimson red.
"Ask us no questions and we'll tell you no lies, Rosario. C'mon, George, if we get there early we might be able to sell a few Extendable Ears before Herbology."
Harry emerged from under the table just as Fred and George walked away. Venus turned to Ron, "What did that mean?" she asked. " 'Ask us no questions . . .' Does that mean they've already got some gold to start a joke shop?"
"They did buy me a new set of dress robes over the summer, it looked expensive too. Don't know where else they could've gotten it." said Ron, his brow furrowed.
Venus, Hermione and Ron shared puzzled looks. Constance was too busy eyeing Blaise Zabini to care and Harry's face had gotten so red Venus thought the Twins spiked his juice. She watched as he pulled the other two away from her hastily.
If Venus wasn't oven-analyzing, Harry was now giving her the cold shoulder.
He has some nerve, Venus thought to herself.
She pried Constance from Blaise's sight and suffered through Constance's daily observations of the Slytherin all the way to History of Magic.
authors jokes. Fred and George when someone dies after bleeding to death from their Nosebleed Nougats:
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