A Bit Unhealthy

"So how is Angelina these days, dear?" Mum asks, loading George's plate with Christmas goose.

"Fine," says George.

"How's the baby?"

"All right."

"What's she doing for Christmas?"

"Don't know."

Mum looks at him curiously. "Why not?"

George chews and swallows before answering, hoping that in the delay somebody will distract Mum from the topic. He's somehow avoided this until now, and he'd really rather have a pleasant, Angelina-free Christmas meal with his family.

No such luck, he's done chewing and Mum's still looking at him expectantly. "We're not in contact much," he says casually.

Mum frowns. "Why not?"

George shrugs. "Busy. You know. Christmas."

"George, that's no excuse. The poor girl is sitting at home waiting for a baby, and it's not even a wizarding home with heat and pregnancy potions--"

"She's in a Muggle house, Mum, not a cave."

"But you have to make time to be with her, she needs your support."

George blows out his breath. "Mum. Leave off."

"You have an obligation to--"

"Yeah, well, she doesn't want my help."

Mum frowns. "I thought things were better, I thought--"

"Mum." He puts his fork down, exasperated. "Look, we're not spending time together now because we were, but then we started sleeping together again, and then she broke it off. Again."

"What?!"

All conversation at the table stops at Mum's outburst.

"What happened?" Ginny asks.

"I just told Mum that I was sleeping with Angelina for a while," says George bluntly. "And that I'm not any more."

Percy looks flummoxed. "But... you said you didn't... that it was just the once--"

"It was. And then it was twice, and then it was three times, and eventually I lost count."

The rest of the table is gaping at George, but Ron looks uncomfortably unsurprised, and for some reason that's rather irritating. Ickle Ronnie shouldn't look like he had already figured this out before now, without Hermione around to point it out to him. Lee's one thing - it had been a complete non-shock to realize that he'd clued in, because what the hell, Lee lives with George and he's been friends with George, Fred, and Angelina since they were kids. But Ronnie's supposed to be dumb as a post when it comes to the fine points of male-female relationships - that Charming Witches book he and Fred got Ron was given in the true spirit of brotherly pity - and it doesn't feel great that even he was able to figure out what was going on.

Mum seems to be trying to get her head around this new information. "Well... well, it's... I suppose it's... erm, romantic, sometimes tragedy can--"

George grimaces. "It wasn't romantic, Mum. It was sick." Mum blanches.

"How long were you... dating?" asks Percy.

"We weren't dating," George says impatiently. "What part of 'sleeping with' isn't clear here? We were both doing it for the wrong reasons, and I was glad she had the sense to break it off." Mum makes a soft sound of dismay and George gives her a grim smile. "Are we done now? Can we go back to eating and stop prying into my personal life?"

"I'm not prying," says Mum. "I'm trying to take care of you."

"I don't need you to take care of me," George retorts.

Mum's eyes narrow. "Apparently you do. If you let yourself be taken advantage of by a girl who--"

"Molly," Dad says quickly.

"A girl who what?" George says angrily.

"She's pregnant, with a baby who may have been fathered by two different men," says Mum, her voice tight. "And she starts up some kind of... of... it does make me wonder who else she--"

"Molly," Dad repeats quietly.

George's eyes narrow. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"It doesn't sound as though she's been exactly discriminating, does it?" Mum asks. "Perhaps you should wonder who else could be the father of--"

"So Angelina's a slut now, is she?" said George, keeping his voice steady with great difficulty.

"She might have thought about what she was doing before she went from Fred, to you, within five weeks--"

"And maybe I might have thought about what I was doing before fucking my dead twin's ex, d'you think?"

"George!" says Arthur.

"Oh I see, she can call the mother of her grandchild a slut, but I can't use the word fucking?"

"George."

"And you seriously wonder why Fred and I never told you anything?" George asks scornfully, and Mum flinches as if he'd slapped her.

Something unforgivable is going to be said very soon, and George really doesn't want to go there during Christmas dinner. He tosses his napkin onto the table and scrapes back his chair, stalking out of the dining room and making his way to his old room upstairs. He shuts the door and leans back against it, closes his eyes and counts to ten.

Still furious. Counts to twenty. No change. Counts to thirty.

Who the hell did she - how could she - what an interfering old-

He hits the back of his head against the door and closes his eyes again, welcoming the distraction of the slight pain, and feels a deep urge to take out his wand and make a few things explode in here.

He takes a deep breath. This was his and Fred's old room, and much as blowing things up might have been one of their favourite pastimes, he doesn't really want to damage anything here. Not their Weird Sisters curtains, not the posters on the wall, not the char marks all over the furniture or the spot on the floor where they worked on their Portable Swamp, still vaguely green and soggy years later. No matter how angry his mother has made him.

Because bloody hell, that was catty. Not that he's been feeling terribly charitable towards Angelina lately, but... Mum was completely out of line. Judging Angelina, the girl Fred loved with all his heart, the girl who might have been her daughter-in-law if only things had turned out differently...

Merlin, if Fred were here they'd probably both just leave. Fred would've let him know that he completely agreed with George, that Mum deserved to have them both just leave her Christmas dinner - whatever George needed to hear, because much as they both loved their friends and family, it was them against everybody else and it was bloody rare that they would take the third party's side, no matter what the other twin had done.

... and maybe that wasn't always such a good thing.

George sighs, running a hand through his hair. He has started to realize that there were a few times in the past when he or Fred definitely should've told the other he'd gone too far, instead of agreeing with him on principle. Times like... tonight's dinner, actually.

He glances around their room, and his eyes fall on a picture, still tacked on the wall, taken right after the Gryffindor Quidditch team won the Cup in his and Fred's fifth year. He gazes at the team for a few moments - Oliver, Harry, Alicia, Katie, Angelina, himself, and Fred. He smiles slightly at their gleeful looks, the way they all jump up and down and hug each other, and the huge grin on McGonagall's face.

God, what he wouldn't give to be back in that moment, to feel that young and alive again.

Instead, he's here. And he may still be young, but without Fred around, he's having to learn what it means to be a grownup.

He takes a deep breath, opens the door and goes downstairs. It doesn't feel great that his family stares at him in shock, not having expected him to come down at all.

"I'm sorry," he says to the room at large, ruthlessly suppressing his discomfort. "That was out of line."

Mum has tears in her eyes and he put them there, damn it. This is one of those times when Fred would've made a sarcastic quip and they would've just left her miserable.

"Mum, I'm really sorry," he says instead.

They're all open-mouthed, and Mum stands and hurries to him. "Of course, dear," she says, and hugs him close. She forgives anything, in anybody. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have said... I just don't want you to get hurt. By Angelina or by anybody."

He nods. "I know." He swallows hard, hugging her tightly. "Just don't... don't judge her. None of this has been easy on her either."

Mum nods and motions him to his seat, and the conversations resume awkwardly. George doesn't bother to join in, preferring to just watch the interactions among the family. It's a full table, with Mum, Dad, Bill, Fleur, Charlie, Percy, Ron, Hermione, Ginny, and Harry. Ginny and Hermione are home from school, Charlie's got three new scars and a temporary patch over one eye, Percy's just been promoted, and Fleur is five months along, expecting her first in mid-May. There's a lot to tell each other, a lot of catching up to do - though not as much as in previous years, as they've all been keeping in touch a lot more since the war.

It's palpable, the difference among them. They're all smiling and mostly enjoying themselves, but the atmosphere is definitely subdued. Fred's absence is felt as keenly as if Mum had set an extra place setting at the table and left a chair empty.

They finally finish and drift into the living room. George finds himself listening to the Wireless, his mind drifting off to the music, and finds himself wondering if things had turned out differently, if Angelina would've been with them this year.

He's glad she's not.

He misses her friendship; chatting with her, showing her new ideas for the shop. He misses feeling somehow less empty, less alone, when he's with her. And yes, he misses the rest of what came with her too; misses the taste of her mouth, the way she moaned, the way she made him feel, the way her fingers drew shivers from him and her muscles tightened around him as she climaxed. He even misses the fact that she sometimes allowed herself to blur the line between him and Fred. He doesn't miss the guilt, though, or the self-disgust. The feeling that if Fred could possibly manage it, he'd come back from beyond the grave to kick George's arse to hell and back. The sense of having failed him, of denigrating his memory. And as much as he feels he should be angry at Lee for having interfered, he can't help but be grateful instead. He and Angelina exchange occasional dry, factual owls - latest midwitch checkup went well, shop will be closed Christmas Day - but that's about it.

"George," Bill says, coming to sit next to him. "I'd, erm, like to ask you something."

"Yeah?"

Bill seems nervous. "Fleur and I have been talking about names for the baby."

"Already?"

"Well, Fleur more than me," says Bill. "She had an idea... but I wanted to talk to you first."

George frowns at him. What possible input could he give to the naming of Bill's child?

"It's not that we want to name her Fred or anything," says Bill hastily, mistaking his puzzlement for disapproval because that idea hadn't occurred to George yet. "For one thing, it's a girl."

"You know that already?"

"Well, normally the spells that figure it out wouldn't work until about the sixth month, but with Fleur's Veela blood and all... apparently, they 'know deese tings.'"

George nods.

"Anyway. We've been told the due date won't be mid-May after all. It's... it's May 2."

George starts. The Battle of Hogwarts. The day Fred died.

Bill swallows. "Fleur says Veela are also well-known for their tendency to carry exactly to term... seems to think it's ridiculous that other witches only have a rough estimate of when they'll give birth. So that's most probably when she'll be born. Might not be, Fleur's only a quarter Veela, so maybe..."

George nods sympathetically. What a crap birthday.

"And well... it's a hell of a day to be born. So Fleur wants a name that will point out what's good about that day. Because everybody will be thinking about what's bad about it. In this family at least."

"What does she want to call her?"

Bill hesitates. "Victoire."

"Victory," George says, and finds himself smiling slightly. "That's a heavy name to give a kid."

Bill looks at him curiously. "You don't mind?"

"Why would I?" says George. "It's a good name."

"I just... I don't want anyone to feel that we're dismissing anyone who was lost that day. If she does end up being born then. It was a victory with a heavy price."

"It was, yeah," George agrees. "But it was a victory. It's not dismissing anyone, reminding people of that."

Bill nods and smiles, relieved. "Good. Yeah, that's what Mum and Dad said too." He hesitates briefly. "Does your-erm, have you and Angelina talked about names?"

"Angelina has, yeah," he says shortly. He's not pleased about her choice and she knows it, but he really does not want to discuss it with anyone in his family.

Bill seems to sense his reluctance to pursue the topic. "Feels weird that you'll be the first dad among all of us," muses Bill.

George shrugs. "Or uncle," he points out.

Bill nods uncomfortably, but doesn't comment on that either. "Only... I always assumed I'd be the first. Showing you little ones how it's done. As usual."

George smiles wryly. "Yeah, well, you're still doing that. I'm just showing how it shouldn't be done."

Bill frowns. "George--"

"Forget it," says George quickly. "Yeah, tell Fleur I said it's a brilliant name. 'Scuse me," he stands up, "I'm off for more sherry cobbler."

ooo000ooo

The call comes in late afternoon. Angelina was supposed to have lunch with George and Lee at the Leaky, first time they've seen her in weeks, and she doesn't show up. George calls her on the telephone, resisting the urge to shout into her mother's recording machine - without seeing another person, it's hard to tell anybody's listening.

Hours later, his Floo fires up and there's some witch he doesn't know telling him Angelina Johnson has been taken to St. Mungo's.

It feels like his stomach drops down to his feet. "What? When?"

"Ten hours ago."

"Is she--"

"She's all right," says the witch. "It's just a difficult labour--"

"She's all right," Angelina's mum repeats when he runs into the hospital, minutes later, after leaving a note for Lee to find when he gets home. "Healthy, anyway. The baby's apparently all right too, though it's breech. Don't know how they know that; there's no proper ultrasounds or baby monitors. Or hospital hygiene." She sniffs disapprovingly. "It's like one of these new-age birthing clinics, no surgical masks or anything. In my day we were hygienic."

George has no idea what she's talking about.

"Anyway, the midwife - oh excuse me, midwitch--" the word is said with another disdainful sniff, "says she'll be all right, it'll just take time." She pauses. "Angelina told me to tell you that you can stay, if you want to." The warmth and welcome in her voice could freeze Butterbeer. "Not that she wants you anywhere near the birthing room, mind you." She turns and goes back down the hall.

Angelina's in pain, and it's all he can think of as he paces up and down in the waiting room for over an hour, occasionally trying to read an insipid Witch Weekly or incomprehensible Quibbler. He can't focus long enough to make sense of any of the articles, and eventually gives it up as a bad job.

He's startled when Angelina's mother comes back into the room. "Oh. You're still here," she says gracelessly. "Well, she wants you to come in." He blinks, astonished, then quickly follows her down the hall.

Angelina's sitting up in some sort of reclining chair, breathing hard, looking exhausted, and as her eyes meet his he's taken aback by the pain in them. She holds out her hand and he takes it, moving to her side and suppressing a wince as she squeezes his fingers painfully. She's silent, pushing for a few moments, and then she relaxes. Apparently the contraction is done.

"How are you doing?" he asks. Angelina's eyes are closed, and she shakes her head.

"She's doing fine," says an unreassuringly young-looking midwitch. "The baby's doing well too; he's just taking his time."

"He?"

"A fine, healthy baby boy."

A boy. George nods numbly, and the midwitch gives Angelina a sympathetic look. "All right, then, dearie? Another one coming, I want you to push, push hard now, there's a good girl..."

The world narrows down to the midwitch's calm, cheerful words, Angelina's hand crushing his, and her quiet groans as she pushes. Pastel walls and birthing chair, Angelina's dark skin a grayish shade and her eyes dulled by pain, faint scents of soothing herbal potions and sweat. For hours, it seems, he's by her side, and he doesn't know that he's helping at all, as he has no idea what to do or say, but she doesn't seem to want anything more from him than his presence. At the midwitch's suggestion, he puts a damp towel on her forehead and helps her count through the contractions, wishing he could take the pain from her. Wishing there was some form of safe magic that could hurry up the baby, get this agony over with. Wishing with all his heart that it was Fred here with her, instead of him.

And then with a rush of blood and disorienting suddenness, it's over. He's looking at Angelina's face and almost misses the baby as he makes his entrance into the world.

Then there are baby monitoring spells, healing spells for Angelina, all sorts of incantations and bursts of light, and he just holds her hand.

"He's all right?" she murmurs, her eyes closed. George looks over at the baby. He's lighter-skinned and has even less hair than George had expected, but it's hard to tell anything else, what with the blood and goo all over him. Good set of lungs, though.

"Looks all right. Bit squashy-looking."

Angelina smiles faintly. A Healer murmurs something about doing a few more tests, shoos George and Mrs. Johnson away, and closes a set of curtains around Angelina's bed. It feels like he's been here forever and has lost all awareness of the world outside the birthing room, so it's a bit of a shock when a mediwitch lets him know that his parents are in the hospital. He has a moment of panic - who's been injured this time? - before she goes on to say that they'd like to come in and see the baby.

What?

He goes to the door and looks into the hallway and there are his parents. Lee must have contacted them. And there's Bill and Percy and Ron - not Ginny, right, as Ginny's back at school. He opens the door and his family turns around, all staring at him. He tilts his head towards the room, letting them know they can come in if they want, and wonders if he's ever felt this tired before. He rubs his jaw and winces at the roughness of stubble, and briefly wonders if his eyes are as bloodshot as they feel.

Angelina's mother tries to smile, unsuccessfully, as the Weasleys come trooping in. Mum makes the introductions, her voice uncharacteristically shy, her eyes darting over to the curtained-off section of the room. The Healer pokes her head out and motions George over and all conversation stops.

"You all right?" George says to Angelina, and she nods, gazing at the baby in her arms. He seems to have been cleaned up a bit, but still looks rather squashy.

"Just wanted to say thanks," Angelina says quietly.

George nods. "Erm, my family's here. You don't have to see them if--"

"No, that's all right," she says. "You can open the curtain."

He draws the curtain open and Mum makes a small sound like a gasp. Everyone's eyes are glued to the small bundle in Angelina's arms. Angelina looks up at him and gives him a tired smile and sits up slightly, wincing a bit. George is by her side in an instant, helping her.

"Here," she says, and he's surprised to see that she's holding the baby up to him. George carefully takes him from her. He weighs almost nothing, and he's tinier than George could've possibly imagined. Floppier, too, but George knows enough to make sure and support his head.

He's not prepared for the baby to open dark eyes and gaze up at him intently. Doesn't know what he's supposed to feel, and he finds himself carefully touching a tiny hand with his forefinger, a small shock going through him as the baby immediately grasps it firmly, gaze still fixed on his own.

"Maybe your Mum would like to hold him," Angelina suggests quietly, and George is a bit startled. He looks at his mum.

"What's his name?" Mum asks, and George glances at Angelina.

"You're sure?" he asks

Her mouth tightens slightly. "I'm sure," she says, and her voice has a slight edge.

"What's his name?" asks Mum again. George carefully puts the baby in her arms.

"His name is Fred," says Angelina. "Fred Alexander Johnson."

Mum's eyes fill with tears. She looks down at the tiny brown infant, his small fists waving vaguely and his mouth open in a minuscule yawn. "Hello, Freddie," she whispers.

ooo000ooo

George's first two months as a father pass uneventfully. In fact, he hardly notices he's a father - uncle, whatever - because he hardly ever sees his son. Once a week, he Floo-calls Angelina and they have a terrifically awkward conversation. She sends pictures by owl. He holds the baby three times, pretty much at his mother's insistence when she annoys him into actually going to Angelina's place. It feels uncomfortable and unnatural, and it's nothing he's all that keen to repeat too often. He copes by throwing himself into the shop with single-minded intensity, and he lives, eats, and breathes Wheezes. The shop has never had so many new products, or made so much money.

He knew Angelina didn't want him involved. It's different, knowing that in theory, and living the reality.

ooo000ooo

Good times at the shop can translate into good times for the family as well. The entire family's laughing as the last child - Mum - is finally turned back to herself.

"That was priceless," Charlie's red-faced with laughter, and the rest of them can't contain themselves either - at tiny Hermione's tantrum over the sweets, at mini-Dad earnestly insisting that he could turn a plug into anything he wanted it to be, at little Fleur putting a doily on her head to look pretty - and it's definitely one of the most fun gatherings they've had in a long time. It's funny, birthdays have been rather strained events this year, but this one, Ron's, is a big success. And it's mostly due to Ron and George having spiked the punch with Wheezes' Wee Ones juice. It almost feels like the old days, Ron thinks. Like Fred's still here, in a way, smiling down at them all.

Though it's a bit odd to think of Fred with angel wings, beaming down at them beatifically from some serene beyond. Not unless the wings can be made magenta with lime-green polka dots and the beam become the sort of smirk that usually meant trouble for the rest of them.

Then Charlie asks George, "What about you? Hardly fair for you to be the only one not de-aged! Even Ron took some, and he knew what was in the punch!"

George's grin dims a bit and Ron quickly jumps in. "Nah, that's part of the perk of being the inventor," he says. "You don't have to take it yourself."

"Dragonbollocks," says Charlie, laughing. "He never used to weasel out before."

George shakes his head. "I'll take just about any one of my products any day. Just not this one."

"Why not?"

"It's supposed to be fun, Charlie."

"Right, yeah - you were a fun little kid!"

"We were, yeah," says George.

Charlie shakes his head, a bit impatiently. "Come on. You were brilliant on your own too--"

"Charlie," George says evenly, "try to remember what I was like when Fred was in St. Mungo's that time with the gnome poison. Now multiply that by about a million."

"Oh come on, live a little," Charlie says, and it's clear he's had too much to drink. The rest of them have clued in, but Charlie's being thick.

Ron wants to give his brother a swift kick, but George gives him a pitying look and puts down his glass, apparently deciding to stop hinting to Charlie to drop it and just get this over with. "I did take it. Found out that you don't forget the knowledge you had as an adult; you just don't know what to do with it." Charlie's grin falters. "I wasn't going to test it on myself, because I thought that's what would happen, but I got splashed with it when the next cauldron over blew up." He pauses. "I knew Fred was dead, but I couldn't understand why he couldn't come back. I wanted Dad or Mum to bring him back, because they always could before. Ron nearly went spare trying to figure out how to settle me down - he couldn't - and trying to find the antidote. Floo-called Percy in a panic when I worked myself into a tantrum because he refused to get Mum and Dad - wild magic and everything, started blowing up things in the lab." Ron briefly meets Percy's eyes before they both look away. "Remember Fred's tantrums when we were little? Think I outdid them all - hit and kicked both of them, even bit Ron when he was dragging me out of the lab and up the stairs. Eventually made myself sick, threw up on Percy, and ended up crying myself to sleep in Ron's lap. Not amusing in any way, for anybody."

Nobody has any idea what to say. Finally Charlie speaks up, shaken. "George, I--"

"Forget about it," George said dismissively. "You couldn't have known."

Ron clears his throat, wondering if he'll ever be able to forget George's small face blotchy with crying, the way his angry shrieks changed to heartbroken sobs as he clung to Ron. The feel of his little body, warm and damp with sweat and tears, gradually going limp in Ron's arms as Ron cradled him close for an hour, wishing he could provide comfort for the adult George the way he could for the child sleeping exhausted on his lap.

"In a way it's good that it happened," George says, "because we decided to add cheering potions to it. Didn't want anybody else to regress straight into misery." Charlie's mouth opens, then shuts, and George rolls his eyes. "It's all right, you wanker. Bloody hell, don't apologize for bringing up the topic," he says irritably, and Charlie nods numbly.

Ron looks away, remembering himself and Percy silently sitting by George's bed that night, Percy holding George's small hand in his, so that he wouldn't wake up alone if the potion didn't wear off in his sleep. George had woken up hours later, back to himself, with a raging headache and feeling, he said, like the Hogwarts Express had steamed right over him. Twice.

A distraction. They need a distraction, because George really, really hates being pitied, and Ron looks at Percy and silently wills him to ask something, say something, discuss cauldron thickness,anything.

"What kind of cheering potion?" Percy asks. "Because you are aware that the gold-based ones need to be prepared in pewter-coated cauldrons only, right?"

Ron thanks Percy silently as George picks up the thread, probably a bit more enthusiastically than he normally would. Which is good; hopefully they can all move past this. And Ron can fervently hope, without much faith, that the rest of the family isn't thinking of just how deeply George is still hurting, because Ron can't really think of anything else at this moment.

It had been the first thing George had asked about. Where was Fred. Why couldn't Fred come back, why wouldn't Ron ask Mum and Dad to bring him back, wasn't Fred lonely without George. When the veneer of adult restraint and common sense was gone, what was left was horrifying pain and loneliness. Brokenness. Hidden beneath a relatively well-adjusted, successful businessman who is 'moving on'.

It's enough to make Ron want to throw a few tantrums of his own, have Mum and Dad come and hold him through the night. But they can't. They're all past that, and grief over Fred isn't anything that anybody can be comforted out of, no matter their age.

The party starts to pick up a bit again, and Mum goes to get more pudding, guaranteed to raise spirits. She'll probably make sure Charlie doesn't have more alcohol; though really, Charlie's quite likely to do that himself.

It's going well though, Charlie's thick-headedness aside. The Wee Ones juice was a big hit, as Ron had hoped it would be. Most of their child-related products are, especially the ones they've been making in the last few months. It hasn't escaped Ron's notice that George is doing stuff that's more for kids, and he wonders if George is aware of that at all. Wheezes has always been very kid-friendly - except for the defence products and the adult line that George started last year - but there have been noticeably more products aimed at very small children in the last few months. He's mentioned it to Hermione, who promptly theorized that perhaps George needs to feel like he has some connection to children, since he's being denied much of a connection to his own child. Ron's not sure she's right, but it does seem to make sense.

Doesn't matter. Right now there's a party to steer away from melancholy, because Angel Fred is probably a little pissed off. Or maybe it's just time for Ron to get his own head out of gloomy territory. Angel Fred would probably very much approve of Ron escaping the party with Hermione for a bit, and trying to see if he can get a special birthday boy treat of his own. He makes a mental note to do just that. Later.

"So how's the little one?" Charlie asks George a while later, and Ron's impressed. The rest of them - excluding Mum - tend not to ask George, fearing broaching a rather sensitive subject. Charlie's not a dragon keeper for nothing.

George shrugs. "Getting bigger. Mum sent you the last pictures?"

"Yeah, very cute. Is his hair really that red?"

"No, not really, that was just the lighting. It's mostly dark. He doesn't really look much like us, other than the nose."

It's odd, the way George looks whenever someone asks him about the baby. Like he's not sure if he wants to talk about him or not. Ron can't even imagine what it's like for him to know there's a living breathing human being out there who's his - Ron's decided to just ignore the whole "could be Fred's" thing - but has almost no relationship with him whatsoever.

"So weird that our lot's having kids," Charlie muses. "What d'you suppose yours'll look like?" he asks Bill.

"Hopefully like her mother," Bill says, grinning.

"I hope not," Charlie laughs. "I can just see it now, all the boys at Hogwarts letting each other know, Do NOT look too long at Vicky Weasley, unless you want her curse-breaker dad to send your bollocks all the way to Egypt without you."

"Call her Vicky and Fleur will probably hex your bollocks all the way to Egypt without you," Bill laughs. "You do remember she was a Triwizard Champion, right?"

"Right, sorry, Victoire." Charlie makes a show of anxiously looking around for Fleur, who is deep in conversation with Percy's current girlfriend.

"George," Bill asks curiously, "what was Angelina going to name the kid, that had you all tight-lipped about it at Christmas?"

George blinks. "Exactly what she named him," he says.

Bill's eyebrows go up. "What part of that didn't you like?"

"Well, he should be a Weasley, for one," says Percy.

George shakes his head. "It wasn't the Johnson I minded. She didn't marry either one of us; why should she give our last name to the kid?"

"You didn't like Alexander?" asks Percy.

"No, that's fine. I just didn't want her to name him Fred."

Puzzled looks all around. "Well... all right, I suppose naming him for Fred when she's not sure who the father might be is a sort of..." Percy trails off. "It's not terribly sensitive, I suppose, but--"

"I suppose it would be, if I gave a toss about that," George says impatiently. "Which I don't."

"Then what's the problem?" asks Charlie. "Why not name him Fred?"

"Because Fred's gone," George says bluntly. "I don't see the point in pretending he lives on, in a name given to a kid who may or may not be his son, and who'll never meet him or know anything about him other than what other people tell him. Especially since she's not terribly keen on any of us being around him long enough to tell him anything. About Fred, or anything else."

Ron winces, thankful that his little fantasy of Angel Fred watching over them is just that, a fantasy. He's not sure how Angel Fred would feel about the bitter way George is dismissing him.

"So you never did tell me," George says, turning to Bill, "what did Fleur's midwitch say about the Puking Pastilles antidote?"

Bill blinks, but picks up immediately. "Oh! Right, yeah, well I took it to her and she checked it and says it's fine for pregnant women. It's apparently pretty close to the potion they normally give out, but more effective, she said. She'd like to talk to you about getting more."

"You're joking."

"Asked if you'd ever considered going to work as a Potions Master."

George makes a face. "Ugh. Don't think my hair's greasy enough for that."

Bill laughs. "No. Well in any case, I brought it back to Fleur... and she still wouldn't take it."

"Because she's still pretending Veela don't get nauseous, or because it comes from a joke shop?"

"Joke shop."

"You've married a wise woman, Bill," chuckles George.

ooo000ooo

"What is it?" George quickly ushers Angelina into the office and closes the door behind them the next Monday. Her eyes are reddened and she looks like hell, and she's dropped in, out of the blue, without the baby.

"It's Freddie," she says, her voice unsteady.

His heart stops beating. "What? What's happened?"

"He's all right," Angelina says quickly, reading the panic in his voice. "He's fine. He's... but I can't."

"Can't what?"

Angelina shakes her head, her eyes bleak and her voice hoarse. "I can't. I've tried, it's - I'm too messed up. I can't, and... and my mum, she's - she keeps saying I'm being selfish and not thinking of what he needs, and I can't... I can't keep doing this on my own."