Harry Potter and the Year of Surprises by erinpotter

April Fool's Day

Not mine

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After Easter, all the fifth and seventh years really knuckled down. There was only four weeks till their exams. Hermione and Ginny were sometimes waking up in the middle of the night, reciting a definition or an incantation. Ron and Harry were both putting on a ‘not really bothered’ face, but they each knew how worried the other was. Sometimes, when Hermione and Ginny went to bed, they would both sneak into the common room to revise together. Ron was keeping up well with Harry. It was probably because Harry had his head boy duties as well as the quidditch captain duties. He was pretty tense and when he was practising quidditch, he really pushed the team – if they were better, they wouldn’t have to practise as much.

On the first of April, the four friends were granted permission to go t Fred and George’s birthday party. Hermione had almost not gone, but Ron managed to persuade her that she really needed the break. So, on Saturday the first of April, Harry, Hermione, Ron and Ginny made their way to Grimmauld Place. They had to stay there all day and help with the decorations. Harry wanted to know why it wasn’t at the Burrow.

‘Well,’ said Molly, as she made a chocolate cake, ‘most of the Order will be here and we thought that because this was more central, it would be easier. And it's bigger than the Burrow.’

Harry helped Ron tie up an extremely large banner over the fireplace. On either side, there was a picture of a baby Fred and a baby George. Harry looked at their eyes. They had the same mischievous then that they did now. 

Ginny and Hermione were assigned to the job of looking after Rhiannon and Sirius. Harry and Ron were glad. There was usually a really tense atmosphere around them lately that both boys thought it would be better to spend a little time away from them.

Harry and Ron put up most of the decorations, with a little help from Remus. Molly had told them to put them up the muggle way, it was more reliable. Harry didn’t think so, but he didn’t want to argue with Molly Weasley. Arthur arrived home from work early to ‘oversee the preparations’. Harry guessed he wanted to get away from the office for a while. Remus had told him that Arthur had been at the office twelve hours a day, seven days a week. 

Fred and George were due home at about seven o’clock. By this time, Molly had mountains of food ready and the house was looking pretty good with all the decorations. Ginny and Hermione came downstairs at ten to seven, looking quite worn out. 

‘Babies cry a lot.’ Hermione moaned.

‘And why must they use so many nappies?’ Ginny asked, rhetorically.

‘Well, at least they are sleeping now.’ Ron reassured them.

‘They only sleep for a few hours at a time.’ Hermione informed him. ‘We’ll have to check on them at about nine, then eleven, then one!’ 

‘It's not their fault. Anyway, Tonks will deal with them later on.’ Harry said. 

By this time, all the guests had arrived. There was Dumbledore, Mundungus, Moody, Bill, Charlie and lots more members of the order. There were also a few people from Fred and George’s class at school. Lee was there, as Angelina and Katie. Then Harry noticed an extremely familiar face.

‘Look!’ he pointed out to his friends. ‘There’s Erin!’

They rushed over to greet her.

‘Erin! What are you doing here?’

‘Well, I am going out with Fred. I can't not be at his birthday party!’

‘Yeah, I suppose not!’ 

At five to seven, everyone was told not to find a hiding place. It was to be a surprise. Harry, Hermione and Ginny all squeezed behind the sofa. Fred and George didn’t arrive until ten past seven, and by that time, everyone was rather annoyed at being squished into a hiding place for fifteen minutes. Most people only gave a half-hearted ‘surprise!’ but Harry and Ron, jumped out from behind the sofa, threw their arms in the air and shouted. ‘Surprise! Happy birthday!’ extremely loudly.

Fred and George were genuinely surprised. Fred rushed over to Erin, holding his arms out, and George was left to shake everyone’s hand and thank them for coming.

‘Fred I am going to kill you,’ he said, nursing an over-wrung hand.

Fred simply laughed. They were rather embarrassed about all the baby photos everywhere. George whispered to Harry. ‘Mum must have a secret stash of them somewhere. Fred and I were sure we destroyed every baby picture we ever seen of ourselves.’

Harry laughed and told the rest of them. 

The party soon got into full swing. None of the four still at school took any alcohol. They had to go back to school tomorrow and continue with their revising.

‘I bet the work’s really piling on, isn’t it?’ Fred asked Ron, slightly smirking.

‘Yeah, I wish I could leave and walk into a fantastic job, like you two!’

‘Ah, dear bro, only the magnificently talented are able to do that. Besides, mum would have a heart attack if three of her sons decided to rebel.’

At about eleven o’clock, Molly brought the cake in. It was enormous! There was about forty candles on it and about seven layers of chocolate! Harry could see Ron's mouth start to water. Everyone sang happy birthday and when they were finished, George and Fred leaned in to blow out all the candles but – 

BANG!

The loud noise scared the twins so much their heads went flying into the cake. No one laughed. The noise had come from the back garden. Remus stood on the table.

‘Everyone calm down! It could be nothing! We’ll wait and see.’

Everyone stood in living room, facing the kitchen door. If someone (or something) was going to come in, it would come in the back door, through the kitchen and into the living room. Harry heard the back door open and close and listened as everyone took a deep breath and reached for their wands. He could hear heavy footsteps make their way slowly to the living until finally; their owner appeared in the doorway. 

He was a tall, good looking man, with black hair that fell into his eyes. He was holding a helmet in one hand and his other was tucked in his pocket. The man grinned. 

‘Alright, everyone?’