Note: Hi guys! A few things: I'm a pretty slow updater, and I'm sorry for that. I am a full-time writing student and artist, so this falls pretty low on my list of priorities. However, I love this story and I love you all! Also, I hit 600 reads the other day!!! OMG!!! Thank you guys for your support, it's so encouraging. If you want more content, follow my tik tok @birdc4ge. Finally, I imagine Charlie Bell to look like Manu Rios, but East Asian.
The next week, Fred, George, and Lillie resume their friendship as though nothing had happened. A couple nights a week Lillie sneaks out to meet them in a darkened hallway to smoke in various parts of the castle and grounds, all while miraculously avoiding detection by faculty and house elves. Lillie has a hunch that the twins have a strategy, a way they're so adept at hiding from teachers. She doesn't press the subject, but she resigns herself to quiet observance until she figures out how to get to the bottom of it.
Lillie and Fred haven't been alone since the party, which she is fine with. She figures that the more physical and emotional distance between the two, the easier it will be to get over her feelings. Though Lillie's memories from the night at Gryffindor tower are jumbled, it seemed clear that her assumptions surrounding Fred's feelings towards her were correct; he was definitely gearing up to tell her they were just friends, and that night after the library was simply a fluke. She was glad that she said something first; she spared herself the heartbreak that would surely come from hearing those words come out of his lips.
Charlie, on the other hand, has made his affections known since then. He has taken their physical... proximity on the dance floor at Gryffindor tower as an invitation to touching Lillie at every chance he got. Never inappropriately, but annoyingly all the same. A tug on her ponytail in the Great Hall, an arm slung around her shoulder while walking through the halls. To Lillie, they feel patronizing, like she's a part of some joke of his that she's not in on. She's constantly waiting for the other shoe to drop. She has a hunch that the minute she reciprocates his advances, the chase is over; he'll lose interest, tease her for ever liking him back. He'd insist that it was a game to him, something to pass the time; she'd be left looking like an idiot. It's how men operate.
And if she's being honest, Lillie likes the attention. She's not used to it from men, and receiving it from Slytherin's most popular student is a bit of an ego boost. It wouldn't do her much harm to keep Charlie around for a rainy day; plus, he was a welcome distraction from the "Fred Situation", as Penelope has taken to calling it.
***
"George, did you know you have a genius for a brother?"
George scoffs, "News to me." He's hunched over his breakfast with his head leaning on his palm, his eyes shut in faux-sleep. Three heaping spoonfuls of undissolved brown sugar sit in his bowl of porridge, and it seems that George doesn't have the energy to mix it in. It's six A.M, and the twins have quidditch practice this morning; they're both decked out in their practice gear, a yellow-hued variation on their red playing uniforms. Fred's gear hangs off him in various states of disarray; his shoulder-pads are slung over one shoulder perpendicularly, his goggles sit around his neck, and he's still wearing his pyjama pants (Gryffindor red and gold plaid, sitting low and loose on his hips like he pulled them on in a rush). His hair is somehow messier than usual, and a cowlick makes a chunk in the back stand up, askew.
He clambers on to the bench, sitting facing away from the table so that he can lean backwards on his elbows against it. He pulls a small piece of candy from his pants pocket and sets it on the table in front of George. He sits back, smirking expectantly. George picks it up and examines it, spinning it between his thumb and forefinger sceptically. It's bright green and about the size of a marble. It has a strange, unnatural coldness to it, like it had been recently taken out of a freezer.
"Well," George says, after a moment, "Go on then." He hands it back to Fred. He smiles, lets George drop it into his hand, and tosses it into his mouth. He chews and swallows. After a moment, he clears his throat tentatively, as though he were testing something.
"Mr. Weasley, you've been a very, very naughty boy," Fred blurts out in the high, ringing Scottish accent of Professor McGonnagal. His voice echoes through the nearly empty Great Hall, causing a group of Ravenclaws to snicker quietly and a couple Slytherins to roll their eyes. George's eyes widen in shock and he stares at Fred with his mouth hanging open, his porridge discarded.
"Holy shit!" he exclaims, "How long does it last?"
"Only a couple of seconds," Fred replies, in his normal voice.
"How'd you manage it?"
"It's a variation on polyjuice. I just switched the boomslang skin for siren hair and tweaked some of the ratios. Was up all night brewing."
"And it can be any voice we want?" George asks.
"Yep. Don't even need the person's hair or anything, I guess voices are a bit easier to imitate magically than looks. You've just gotta enchant the thing before you eat it, pretty simple glamour charm."
"Right," George says, obviously impressed, but reluctant to show it. He turns back to his porridge, now cold, and stirs it halfheartedly. The Great Hall is filling up now, and students shuffle into the hall in droves, ready to eat. "Well, who are we going to prank with it first, then?" As George asks this, Fred looks around. He sees Lillie talking animatedly to a girl he thinks is named Ella. Suddenly Charlie Bell dips his head between the two girls and pecks Lillie on the cheek before rushing back to the Slytherin table, his posse of Purebloods cackling. Ella is yelling various obscenities after him, and Lillie calmly gives him the middle finger as he retreats.
"I think I've got an idea."
***
Lillie and Fred have Advanced Transfiguration together. They always noticed each other, of course. Fred always made a scene with his near-constant disruptions to the class, yet his boyish charm seemed to get him out of any real trouble. It was hard not to notice Fred. Lillie's presence, on the other hand, is a little more subtle. Everyone in the class knows who she is; she's bright, and is a dependable force in the class. She's the student who only answers when her classmates cannot, who would rather whisper the correct answer to her neighbor than say it herself.
Of course, Fred noticed her beauty right away. He'd never had a class with her before, which made sense, as this was one of the only advanced classes he'd taken in his time at Hogwarts. Fred is smart--giften, even-- but, as McGonagall would say, a bit "misguided". She sat two rows behind him, so he didn't actually see her face until the second day of the class. He'd been late coming back from lunch, and rushed into class with his books levitating behind him, charmed to follow his every move (he was at the point in the term where he still cared about being on-time, so he was rather stressed about his tardiness). He bustled into the classroom, still chewing the final bite of the cheese toastie that he took to-go. Lillie remembers the moment very clearly; though it was apparent he was rushing to take his seat, he still had that cool, unapologetic swagger about him. She recalls it coming off as arrogant, haughty even. She didn't like him at first. She thought he was self-important, with a lack of respect for authority. She wondered why he was even in Advanced Transfiguration.
Lillie didn't know that as he made his way into the classroom, Fred set eyes on her for the first time. It wasn't a movie moment by any means; his world didn't stop, time didn't slow, none of that "sappy mugggle shit", as he would've called it.
Her gaze stuck out in harsh contrast to the rest of the bored expressions that stared back at him. Her face wasn't much different, really; she was probably as annoyed as the rest of the class. Fred is not one to be easily embarrassed. He is quite good at rolling with the punches, able to shake things off without much thought. If he's being honest, his status at school makes it pretty easy to be confident. In most people's eyes, he could do no wrong. But, in that moment, in Professor McGonnagall's Advanced Transfiguration class, he felt himself wither under her stare. He hadn't even done anything so embarrassing; people were late to class all the time. For some reason, his mere existence in her presence was cringe-worthy, as though she were criticizing his every move.
He took his seat as his ears burned a vibrant shade of scarlet that rivaled the sweep of fiery hair on his head. He was uncharacteristically quiet that day, only managing a few quietly uttered quips to the Ravenclaw sitting next to him. Every time he even considered causing a disruption, he could feel Lillie's gaze boring into the back of his head, like she was reading his mind, judging it. He chanced a few glances at her, trying to subtly twist his body to look. She was always either looking at McGonagall lecturing or scribbling dazedly on a piece of parchment. Whenever she answered a question in class, he took advantage of the moment and looked at her. He would nearly turn around in his seat, and continue to stare until a couple seconds after she stopped speaking. If she noticed this, she never gave any indication. In fact, it was as though she were carefully avoiding his gaze.
Class continued this way, with Fred chancing glances and suppressing his more disruptive outbursts. After a while, he began to be bothered by her refusal to meet his eyes. It became a sort of game for him, a way to pass the time. He sat himself across the classroom from her so that he could more easily meet her eyes. He never did it too much, or in a way that was creepy. But, for a couple minutes a day he would simply look, willing her to meet his gaze. At moments he thought he could tell when she noticed his gaze on her. He could see her tense and shift in her seat. She would always start scribbling with her quill when she thought he was staring, like she was trying to distract herself. Sometimes, though, she would break. She would give him a glance, just a moment where their eyes met before they would dart back to the parchment in front of her. This always felt like a victory to Fred. It'd put him in a good mood for the rest of the day, like he'd just one a Quidditch match or pulled off a particularly challenging prank. He'd sit back in his chair, his ankle resting on his knee, and suppress a knowing smirk.
Now, since the two have become friends, they sit together. Fred had practically begged her to sit in the back with him (he really just wanted her there so he could stare at her without McGonagall noticing), but Lillie made him settle for a nice spot in the middle of the room. It was a very Lillie place to sit; it straddled the line of precocious and lazy, a perfect harmony of attentiveness and courtesy. Fred begrudgingly agreed, figuring it was better to be in the middle with Lillie than in the back alone. He'll admit, his new seating partner has given him the necessary motivation to participate in class.
Today, McGonagall is giving a lecture on advanced glamours, but Fred isn't paying her much attention. Instead, he watches Lillie's quill trace looping, weaving doodles in between her notes.
"Producing a convincing glamour is not accomplished by changing the features as a whole," McGonagall says.
Fred watches her pen meander along the sides of her page.
"Can anyone tell me," McGonagall continues, "how one does produce a glamour?"
She's writing her name now, in huge, curving letters. He smiles at this; he forgets how ordinary she can be. It's endearing. The quill has dried up, he can hear the faint scratching on the rough paper. Her slender hand reaches to dip it back into the well, adjusting her grip on the pen accordingly. Her hand hovers over the page, and he can practically see the gears turning in her head, trying to decide what to draw next. She--
"Mr. Weasley, any thoughts?"
Fred is snapped out of his reverie by her shrill voice, starting slightly. He can feel Lillie's gaze on him, no longer dazedly focused on the parchment.
"Yes, actually. Well," he pauses for a second, forming his answer, "A glamour won't hold up well if the wizard casts the spell on the face as a whole. Rather, they should focus on one feature that will change the face the most, and charm that. That's why a glamour is different from, say, Polyjuice potion. It's much easier to do, but not as convincing, on the whole."
McGonagall purses her lips, nods, and moves on. It is apparent that she had hoped to catch Fred unawares. He feels a familiar tickle of pride in his navel, one that always comes when he knows he's gotten on a teacher's nerves. It was an easy answer, as he'd just researched the exact concept in his quest to make the "Jargon Jumbling Jawbreaker", as George had coined it.
He glances back at Lillie, wanting to see what she'd drawn while he wasn't looking. Instead, he found her eyes already on his. A smile played at the corners of her mouth, and she mouthed a quiet "good job" before pressing her lips together and turning back to her notes. He smiled back at her, uncharacteristically shy, before also turning to his own (blank) parchment.
Later, groups of two are instructed to pair off into groups to practice wandwork. Being seat partners, Lillie and Fred pair off together in a corner of the room. The task is to change something about the other's features. Lillie is aiming to make Fred's hair blonde, and Fred is trying to make Lillie's nails turn a lacquered red. They're standing a good five feet away from one another, keeping a polite (yet awkward) distance. Though they've technically "worked it out", before their fight, they would've been leaning against the wall, shoulder-to-shoulder and mildly flirting.
"Fuck!" Lillie whisper-shouts, letting her wand-hand fall to her side. "How did you do it so quickly?" she asks as she looks at her newly manicured hands.
Fred feels awkward. He scratches the back of his neck, "Dunno. Erm, 've practiced before, I guess."
"I just, Godrick! I can't get this movement right. I think I don't have enough force when I do the flicking motion."
"Yeah, when I do it I support my wand with my index finger."
Lillie looks at the wand in her hand, squinting, trying to understand what he'd just said. After a moment she looks at him, a perplexed look on her face.
"What?"
"You shift your hand, Wenlock."
"What?"
"Move your hand, so your pointer finger is under and your thumb is on top," Fred makes a move forward, like he wants to come and help her, but he stays rooted in place.
"What does that even mean, Fred?"
"I dunno how much clearer I can be, you're not listening," he says, giving an exasperated chuckle.
"Well you're not making sense!" she shoots back, her voice raising slightly on the last word.
"Here, just--" Fred steps forward and lightly grabs Lillie's wrist at the same time, pulling her to him. They both freeze, for a moment. This is the first time either of them had established physical contact since the night after the library. Lillie can feel all her anger melt away at the feeling of his warm hand looped around her wrist. Fred looks down at her face before focusing on her hand, gently twisting it so the palm faces upwards and folding her pinky, ring, and middle fingers downwards.
"Can I touch your wand?" Lillie nods, and he positions the wand so that it rests on her index finger, nestled next to her middle finger and thumb. He drops his hands, letting them caress hers slightly as they fall to his sides. He takes an awkward step back. "Alright. Give that a shot, then," he says, quietly. She casts the spell, flicking her wand using the newfound leverage her hand position provides. Suddenly, Fred's fiery mane changes to a golden, honeyed blonde, as though it had been that way his whole life.
"Well?" Fred asks when Lillie doesn't say anything, "Did it work?"
Lillie just smiles and laughs, offering him a hand-mirror that is laying on the desk next to them. He holds it to his face, looking surprised, then satisfied.
"Blimey. Handsome bloke, aren't I?" he says as he turns his head right to left, angling the mirror to see as much of his new hair as possible.
"Well, it's not revolting," Lillie replies, shaking her head. She is actually in awe; she thought blond would look awful with his pale complexion and brown eyes. Instead, the color seems to light him from within, bringing out the brown freckles that dot his face and the bronze that dapples his cheeks from hours of Quidditch playing. She'd never let him know of her thoughts, of course. Instead, she hides them in her vault of all her other pleasant Fred memories, where she stuffs them away, keeping them from herself.