I'll Catch You (A Harry Potter Fan Fiction)

Epilogue: After Ace

Molly attempted to hide the tears she shed, gripping George's hand so hard he felt it may break. Inside her casket he placed a box of chocolate and on her left hand he placed a tiny, elegant, diamond ring. The plastic of the toy ring was cold against his chest where he kept it on a simple chain, just as Acelynne had worn it, if only for a short period of time.

He had told her he'd get her something better, and not even death would prevent him from making good on his promise.

George had moved back into the Burrow, at least for the time being. The apartment above the shop was cold, and quiet, and not the place he had left it. When George showed up on the doorstep of his family home, suitcase in hand and Pygmy Puff in pocket, Molly wordlessly nodded and wrapped her arms around him tightly. "Welcome home" she had whispered and shed a single tear. For the longest time the house remained silent, with exception for the cracking of the eggshells which the entire family had been walking on.

George holed himself up in his childhood room at the beginning, slowly picking through the childish objects he and Fred had shared. His numbness protected him from the pain these items brought, allowing him to search his mind for the happier memories, forcing himself to honour Fred's memory instead of mourning in it.

As George unpacked his bag, he noticed his missing items. A scarf and a photo. He dug furiously through his suitcase, feeling the pockets of his robe and dumping his belongings out onto the floor.

A tiny squeak from the corner of his room earned his attention. Bart had positioned himself on the corner of his desk, wrapped in a scarf in place of a nest. He made a sound of sadness, something akin to a whine, as he burrowed himself deeper. George crossed the room and found the item he was missing. The photo.

George remembered the day it was taken, offered graciously by Ginny. They had been out in the Orchard, their first summer together when Acelynne had also lived at the Burrow. The summer before everything had first began to go wrong. Acelynne twirled in the sunlight, dancing in and out of George's arms as the sun shown down on her face. They looked so young then. Before the harshness of reality and the dangers of the world had been fully realised. Ace wrapped her arms around George's neck and placed a kiss on his lips, and then picture restarted.

Bart had now sat on George's shoulders, squeaking sadly as he watched the photo replay over and over. George placed the photo beside the nest, and Bart quickly began to drag it back into the depths of the scarf. "I know mate, I miss her too. But she's gone."

The reality of those words stung George like never before. Before he could secure his veil of numbness, the emotions ripped through him like a tide, tearing him apart from the inside. He couldn't stop the floodgates, and such heavy tears began to fall that they threatened to flood the room.

"She's gone." He turned away from the nest and through his tears looked in the mirror, a reflection of his ghost staring back at him. "THEY"RE GONE!" he screamed, his fist connecting with the glass before he could stop himself.

The glass shattered, splintering the skin of his knuckles, leaving it bloody and raw. He continued to sob, the cries threatening to break his ribs. He sunk to the ground, internally drowning in grief as he clutched his bleeding hand.

When the glass had shattered from upstairs, Molly immediately dropped the potato she had been mindlessly peeling. She had known this kind of grief when her brothers had died. The grief she had to keep at bay the night that Arthur was nearly killed by the snake. She felt this kind of grief for her lost son, and for her surviving son, lost in his own special kind of grief.

Quickly, she ushered up the stairs and opened George's door. She found him on the floor, his head cradled in his hands, blood smeared across his cheek. "Oh George." She wanted to remain strong for him, to carry the pain he felt, but her eyes betrayed her as quieter tears began to fall. She knelt on the ground beside her son, pulling him into her chest.