Love is the Child of an Endless War

Penny wasn't accustomed to paying her mother's advice any attention. She'd been advised very strongly by her not to become involved with Percy. Sophie wasn't completely wrong all of the time, Penny credited. She just had a very different idea about what Penny's life was supposed to look like than Penny herself did. Sophie had been grimly tolerant of her relationship with Percy until the day Penny announced she was giving up her Healer's training because the strain of her schoolwork and the long hours working at the hospital were taking too much of a toll on her since she'd been made pregnant. Sophie was, first and foremost, an intellectual academic who had devoted the best years of her life, and the best parts of herself, to bettering humankind through science. Any woman, she felt, was capable of producing children, not every woman understood neutrinos and molecular physics. She loved Penny, and had tried to be a good mother for her, but there was more to life than motherhood, and Molly Weasley's ilk was anathema to her. She'd expected better of Penny and had reacted very poorly to Penny's choice of family over career.

George was a better sort of companion for her, Sophie had thought. He'd encouraged Penny to go back to school, and had plenty of money to pay for it. He'd given her a beautiful home, everything she'd ever asked him for, and a good many things she'd never had to. But then he got that baby-making bug on his mind, too. Sophie had seen how important it was to Penny to be able to do that for George. She'd wisely advised them to seek fertility counseling from a knowledgeable medical professional who specialized in reproductive biology and didn't wiggle a stick in the air, but that didn't indicate her endorsement of frequent childbearing. Penny already had the two children, and really, in Sophie's opinion that was one more than was sufficient. Her daughter was far too intelligent to simply function as a womb for some man. And why must it always be some red haired, stick waggling Wizard man? Why couldn't she have fallen for a nice Muggle man the second time around?

Penny understood her mother's opinions all to well. They were worded so eloquently, and frequently, by an impossible to ignore interfering mother that there was never a time when Penny wondered just what it was her mother might be thinking. On occasion, however, Sophie could be surprisingly astute. Though she normally had the emotional cognition of a Hippogriff her last bit of advice hadn't been altogether bad. It was none so simple for Penny, though, as choosing between a good husband and a good lover.

George was the better husband. If Penny had to declare it, it was done. But Percy had not been a bad one. He'd started fighting the war before it even officially begun. As a result of his obligations too much of their precious time together had been spent with him being distracted, anxious, and overburdened with responsibility. He never stopped being loving, or caring for her and Jasper, even though he hadn't spent the time with them she would have liked. Penny knew that Percy had the heart of a warrior and the soul of a writer. He preferred his quill to his wand, but he used them equally well. They had amazing, incredible, sex from their very first time together right to the very last. Penny had thought their physical attraction was magic between them, although Sophie scoffed and said, "It's pheromones." Whatever it was, there was no denying its influence. Percy was the better lover. But George was not a bad one, even if he'd recently made himself an absent one.

George's crush on Penny went back a few good years, but he could pinpoint the very instant that he actually fell in love with her. As Jasper would say, really real love. She'd been sitting at a corner table in his shop endlessly sucking on Sugar Quills to quell the nausea of her early pregnancy with Jasper. Trying to help him and Fred figure out their new accounting system. They were brand new shopkeepers. In those days she'd spent a lot of time at Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes because Percy worked long hours and she was bored being alone in the flat they lived in across the alley. Fred and George needed the help when they'd first gone into business. The friendly, familial relationship just worked out right for everybody involved. Until the day George glanced over at her as she sat pouring over his account books, unconsciously licking the sticky sweet sugar crystals off of her long fingers, and his heart lurched up into his throat nearly choking him to death.

He thought he was doing an admirable job hiding his feelings. On another day, shortly thereafter, Fred walked up behind him, accidentally knocked him across the head with a box of fake wands, bent over and hissed in his ear, "Quit staring at her like that! She's married to your brother and he's going to murder you if he ever catches you drooling over her!" So he hadn't hidden it as well as he thought. Respect for her, and family loyalty, wouldn't allow him to ever deliberately make his feelings known. He'd locked them up tight in his heart all day, and ignored the longing in his body all night. He'd believed himself to be truly in love with Penny from the time he was eighteen years old, but he never really understood what loving her meant until Percy was gone.

Loving her meant forcing her to put one foot in front of another every single day when she would have just as soon laid down and died. It meant standing there beside her every step of the way. Refusing to back down when she fought going on. Refusing to look away from her pain, when many times it would have been much easier for him if he had. Loving Penny meant making sure that she and the children were cared for, it meant caring for them himself if he had to. Love, George learned painfully, was a flaming sword he'd thrust willingly into his chest, stuck up tight against his heart to burn there for her with pain and with joy. Loving was a big responsibility, and a big risk. There had always been a chance that she wouldn't reciprocate his feelings.

George was in the habit of getting what he wanted out of life, though. He worked hard for what he wanted, and what he couldn't work for he'd fight for to the brutal bloody end, even if it meant fighting mean and dirty. Technically then, he was a fighter, not a lover. George would have willingly admitted to himself, to her, and to Fred, but not to another living being on the planet, that the act of physical love with Penny had not come easily for him. His first time in bed with her he'd been as nervous as a virgin. Actually, he had been a nervous virgin. George was much shyer than his brothers when it came to romance. He wasn't as clueless about it as Ron, but then again who was? Prior to his relationship with Penny he'd dated a couple of girls, kissed a few more, intimately caressed one or two, but he hadn't had much more experience than that. Stretching out next to Penny in the bed she'd shared with his brother was guaranteed to make him feel inadequate. It was a bed she'd been loved very well in. The ghost lover who took possession of her in unguarded moments and caused her to cry out his name in her sleep left little to dispute in the matter.

George had dreamt awake and asleep about loving her since he was eighteen years old. At twenty-three the reality of Penny encouraging him to touch her in all the ways he'd wanted to for so long had been something quite different from his fantasies. For one thing there had never been milky breasts or nursing infants in any of his erotic dreams. Even taking care of lover's first hurdles such as time and location by buying her a mansion and moving into it with her, where she'd willingly slept with him in his new bed hadn't made their intimate moments much easier. They didn't have endless hours to spend alone discovering all of one another's secrets. He had an endlessly booming business to run; Penny was still nursing Phil, usually at least once during the night in their bed. And she had just begun home educating the frighteningly clever Jasper by day; who also happened to be a frightened insomniac by night. He frequently refused to go to sleep unless he was securely wedged between them in their bed.

Arthur Weasley had passed on his genes for flaming passion in full measure to three of his sons. Percy, Bill, and Charlie all got their fair share, which left George, Fred, and Ron holding up the shorter end of the capacity for physical devotion DNA strand. George made up for the dearth in experience and his hereditary lack with his inherent kindness and a loving urge to give Penny pleasure, thus continually striving towards his goal of making them both happy. They'd slowly grown their amorous encounters over time from tender albeit awkward ones, into quite pleasant and comfortable ones, moved on to mostly pretty damned decent ones, and lately had been making serious inroads towards having some that were frequently fantastic. Now that the specter had returned to her in full flesh and blood form George was making himself an absent lover. And it wasn't doing a thing for their marriage.

When Jasper's fever abated Penny and George brought him home from the hospital to recover and put him to bed in his own room. Where he was no less cross for having "Troll Invasion: Stomp through the Muck" allowed in there with him. When he found out that his Gryffindor teammates feted a new Keeper in his absence he started to cry and could not stop. Even though his sobs hurt his incision because they were the deep felt sort that worked their way out from his belly on up. While he wailed into his mother's soft lap, in the manner that is reserved only for very disappointed children and desperately grieving adults, Jasper didn't care one little bit if he did sound like a baby. There was just no justice in the world for a displaced Keeper with a missing appendix, an unrequited love for a girl who was doing it with another boy, and a father whose recent return from the dead was causing uproar and chaos in his life and between his loving parents. His existence was simply too overwhelmingly awful to be born stoically.

It took the combined efforts of both of his parents to settle him down to sleep that night. Neither one of them chided him for crying, or tried cajoling him into a better mood. His mother gently petted his silky curls, and his uncle patted him understandingly on the back. In view of the fact that they were both completely knackered it wasn't surprising when they themselves fell sound asleep too. One on either side of Jasper in his double bed, with their fingers interlaced together over his heart while he slumbered.

George was wracked with guilt and blamed himself for Jasper's misfortunes. Needlessly so, Penny thought, she'd forgiven his part in the debacle and told him so a week ago already. Neither one of them had realized that Jasper's stomachaches were being caused by an inflamed appendix. Of the two of them, she was the trained Healer and should have been the one to know better. But George wouldn't forgive himself that he'd lost that stupid mirror in jail. Penny pointed out to George that Jasper had another five years at Hogwarts to try out for the team, and as good as he was undoubtedly they'd find use for him again. She did not try pointing this out to Jasper because the very words "Quidditch" and "Hogwarts" set his little lip to trembling.

So it was in that particular Weasley household early on a mid-winter morning a few days after they'd brought Jasper home that Percy popped over to have a chat with his brother. He figured that George owed him a favor, or two, or a thousand, and he had a very specific one in mind. George was pouring milk onto Phil's Crunchy O's for her breakfast because Aloysius had a bad case of house-elfin chill blains. He claimed cold weather set them off, and he was currently engaged in negotiating his contract with George to include a month off during the winter to holiday in sunny, warm, Greece as part of his total compensation package. If Penny had not been so fond of the exploitative creature George would have cheerfully holiday'd him right out of the door onto his gray, wrinkly ass.

Jasper had cried himself to sleep again the night before, and could be overheard mumbling, "Pass the Quaffle you idiot!" in his dreams. Phillipa did not want to go to school today; she wanted to stay at home and romp her pony through the new snowfall. Penny was still sleeping; presumably she had passed a bad night. George wasn't sleeping in close enough proximity to her to know that for certain, but he'd guessed lately from the pallor of her skin and the massive circles under eyes that she wasn't feeling well. And he knew she got up often in the middle of the night to check on her son, because he met up with her in the corridor on his way to doing the same.

He also knew then that she was not sleeping naked beneath the eaves of his mother's attic, enraptured in Percy's arms. Visions of her doing that very thing haunted his wakeful nights, anyway. George wasn't necessarily counting abstinence from Percy on her part in his favor. Since Jasper was still feeling so rough Penny rarely left his side. He was waiting for some sign from her, any small signal, that she wanted him to return to the bed with her. He hadn't actually considered the possibility that since he was the one who had moved out of it that she felt the moving back in was up to him. He suffered considerably from the strain on their marriage and the lack of intimacy with her; it was showing in his eyes, and the very atypical not cheerful expression on his face.

"Good morning, George," Percy greeted him smiling and eerily happy sounding when he Apparated inside of George's kitchen as though he owned it.

"Percy," George grumbled suspiciously in return.

"Hello, Father!" Phil piped up with alacrity. Her undead father was so handsome. She thought he looked just like a prince in a fairy tale, except that they didn't usually have freckles, spectacles, or red hair. It didn't matter to Phil. He was good looking enough that she was quite utterly smitten with him, anyway.

"Hello, darling," Percy returned equally smitten.

"I am not a darling. I am a princess," Phil reminded him.

"My apologies your majesty," Percy corrected himself. Making her a courtly bow.

George had a heaving urge. He thought quite bitterly, and not for the first time, that his brother, a consummate pretender, had been born into the wrong century. Too bad, really, he'd have made a better ancestor than a close relation.

"Are you a Knight?" Phil interrogated haughtily.

"No, I am a Scribe," Percy admitted.

"Scribe's aren't any good. They can't slaughter dragons. Uncle George is a Knight." Phil too easily dismissed a scribe's significance in the fairy tale realm.

"You would be surprised by how many dragons are laid low by a ruthlessly sharpened quill, my lady." Percy defended his choice of weapon to his daughter.

"Better go get ready, Phil," George interrupted, feeling almost too ill to stand it. "The bus will be here shortly."

"I'm not going to school," Phil said.

"Yes, you are. And don't give me any cheek about it, either. Or I'll have your pony made into Rufus chow." George threatened her with his very evilest mock evil eyebrow.

"All right!" Phil flounced out of the room, slightly fearful. "He has already eaten the plush pony Father Christmas brought for me! I suppose you will let him eat the real one too!"

George descended onto his chair, distrustful of Percy. "Too bad you can't stay to breakfast, Percy. My house elf is under the weather, or I'd offer you something."

Hardly astonished by his brother's lack of hospitality Percy snorted, "As though I ever let you starve in The Burrow for the lack of a house elf."

It was true, George remembered, that whenever Mum was too ill, exhausted, or close to bordering on nervous collapse for cooking, that Percy had always been good for fixing an omelet or a toasted cheese. But he disliked the memory. He'd grown comfortable with not feeling this combination of ruthless familial devotion and seething hatred he shared with his older brother. Why couldn't Percy have been normal like the rest of them were? Not everyone could be Fred, who was basically just like having another one of himself standing around whenever he needed one, but couldn't Percy function on the same level of compatibility as Ron, or Ginny did? Even Bill was preferable.

"I don't want any breakfast," Percy said. He helped himself to a seat. "I want to move into your guesthouse, and I want my bed back."

"You can have the bed," George answered shortly. "But you will move into my guest house when pigs sprout wings and soar all around outside of Gryffindor Tower."

"Oh, come on, George," Percy wheedled before bringing out the bullwhip. "You and Penny have let my cottage out to some crazy old lady with an excess of cats, and I can't stand much more of sharing a room with the ghoul. To say nothing of listening to Remus howling every night in Mother's bed. It unnerves me."

"I can sympathize with that," George admitted. "Still, I don't want you next door."

"Don't be absurd, George," Penny berated him crossly, coming into the kitchen still in her red silk pajamas and her dressing robe. "Hello, Percy. Of course, you are welcomed to use our guesthouse. I'll get it ready for you myself since the elf is out of commission. You can move into it tomorrow."

George threw her a look, an actual look. He never gave her a look. Startled by his animosity, Penny felt tears burning the backs of her eyes. "How can you object to Percy using the guest house?" She would force him to reveal his pique, and damned be the consequences. "When you've offered the use of it to every other member of your family? What has gotten into you, George Weasley?"

He responded with a snarl. Returning to his toast with a vicious consumption, far too wrapped up in his irritation to notice that he'd upset her beyond what she was already. Percy didn't miss a thing. Jumping up to give Penny a hello kiss on the cheek he asked, "Are you feeling all right, sweetheart?"

That did it. George hurled his toast onto the plate, standing up to confront his sibling interloper. "Would it be too damned much for me to ask you to refrain from hitting on my wife while you're standing in my kitchen?"

"She's my wife as well," Percy prodded maliciously. "In case you've forgotten, I started calling her sweetheart when I was fifteen years old. Get over it, George."

"I don't care what you call her!" George roared. "I do object to you starting a snogging session with her in front of my face!"

"Well, all right then," Percy returned with exaggerated calmness. Having successfully provoked his usually implacable brother. "In order to cater to your childish insecurity I will refrain from ever touching her again. Will that be all right with you, Penny? According to George, he can't handle you sharing friendly affection!"

"Sod you, Percy, you poncy ass git!" George shouted, working himself into significant rage.

"Poncy?" Percy replied staring down at his own faded dungarees and the sweatshirt he'd borrowed from Lupin that read, "The Few, The Proud, The Metamorphic. Werewolves United Forever Against Discrimination," then at George's perfectly pressed gray wool trousers, his elf spit-shined black loafers and gray cashmere sweater. "You have the nerve calling me poncy when you've started to dress like someone who has just stepped out of the Abercrombie and Witch catalog!"

"Will you both stop this, already! I can't take this anymore from you, either one of you!" Penny insisted furiously.

George turned to stare at her. Surprised to see that she looked as though she might cry, and was fully prepared to bust Percy's face for upsetting her so, when she continued shouting. "Your constant having a go at one another is making me feel ill! I could hardly drag myself out of bed this morning! Now there's a knot in my stomach the size of grapefruit!" Receiving an unfortunate whiff of George's coffee in the midst of her tirade made her stomach lurch, and she gagged behind her hand before rushing out of the room.

Shaken, Percy glanced up at George, who towered over him for a change because he had sat back down, blasted with shock, when Penny started screaming at them. Feeling more than a little ill himself he pronounced with absolute certainty, "There is no mistaking that look on her face, George. She's pregnant!"

Quite a bit more shaken, George fell back into his chair too, and agreed, "She was a rather remarkable shade of green, wasn't she? She's actually pregnant! I don't believe I've done it!"

"Of course you did it, George, you moron," Percy rumbled miserably. "I've only been back at home for three weeks."

Percy Apparated away in high dudgeon. Returning to his mother's attic to sulk companionably with the ghoul. George allowed him to leave un-taunted. Under the circumstances he was feeling gracious. Digging through his pockets for spare change he gave Phil money for her lunch and a kiss. Then saw her safely onto the school bus in a numb sort of haze.

Phil knew something was wrong. Uncle George had a faraway, dreamy look on his face. "Uncle George, can I have another pony?" Phil asked, testing the presence of his mind in the moment.

George muttered absently, "Maybe for your birthday, love."

Phil was frowning at him as she waved good-bye through the school bus window. Having Father come home undead was definitely making life more interesting. She just wasn't certain it was a good sort of interesting.

George made some toast, no butter, light on the strawberry jam, and a pot of tea, heavy on the honey and lemon, no milk. He brought it up to Jasper and sat him with him while he didn't eat it. Lost in thought, considering what he ought to do about the state of his marriage. It seemed rather obvious now that the time he'd spent not sleeping, and alone, in the spare room might have been better spent in bed with Penny trying to talk things out. She'd gone back to bed. The door was closed and he thought he heard her weeping in there.

Jasper was upset about her crying, and the quarrel downstairs, of which he'd heard every single word. "You're having another row?" he accused George, turning up his little freckled nose at the proffered tea and toast. "Are you trying to give me ulcers? At this rate I'll never get back out of bed; much less ever fly again!"

He was feeling better, but still stuck in bed. That gave him too much time for thinking, which George knew from hard won experience was not a good thing for Jasper. The situation between he and Penny was beginning to distress the children. It was the very last thing George wanted, and the very last thing that Jasper needed. "I'm sorry you heard all of that, Jasper." George apologized.

"Mummy is having a baby! I knew she was! And you've made her cry!" Jasper retaliated consumed with disappointed ire. There was no excuse for this farcical absurdity in his estimation. Mum and Uncle George tucked him in every night then took off in separate directions down the corridor. He knew because he counted footsteps. These grown-ups were just ridiculous. Any nitwit would have realized by now that Mummy was in love with him and wasn't married to her undead husband anymore. Any nitwit but the one sitting in front of him and his stupid older brother, that is.

George, feeling persecuted in his turn, exhaled heavily. "I haven't meant to upset Mummy, and I didn't know that she's having a baby. I've only just realized it."

If that didn't beat every one of the worst excuses Jasper had ever come up with he wasn't sure what would. "Oh, really, Mr. Loving is a Big Responsibility? You didn't know that what you were doing was making a baby? Since you were the one that explained it all to me, I'm finding that a little bit difficult to believe just now."

"Loving is a big responsibility. You're right, Jasper, I should have known about the baby. I won't make any excuses. Mummy and I haven't been talking much lately because we've been preoccupied with other things, but that isn't any reason not to try. We are going to work things out. I promise you. I'll talk to her tonight. All right?" George tried to reassure him.

"I suppose it will have to do," Jasper conceded reluctantly, flopping back onto his pillows. "Are you just going to leave her crying all alone in there?"

George cocked his head towards Jasper's open door, listening quietly for a moment. "She's stopped crying, now. I think she just needs some rest, Jasper. Making babies is hard work, and Mummy has been under a lot of stress. I'll talk to her later today. Want to play exploding snap for awhile?"

Successfully putting off the dreaded confrontation George let Penny rest, and kept Jasper occupied until he fell asleep. By then it was time to get Phil off the bus and think about having dinner. It was too bad Percy had gone home in a funk. He would have managed something amazing with the stuff in the refrigerator. George was far more skilled at nicking food than cooking it. Phil wanted spaghetti. A fairly brainless endeavor, George had managed to master the fine art of boiling water and tossing pasta into it. Jasper sat at the kitchen table for the first time since he'd come home. Picking at his pasta, without the sauce, but with extra cheese. Phil slurped hers up like she'd never see another plate of spaghetti again for as long as she lived. Penny came downstairs and gagged at the smell of garlicky, marinara sauce. George offered her a conciliatory cup of tea with lemon and a handful of soda crackers. She rewarded him with a pale smile.

Departing to her office Penny finished her tea and a handful of crackers. Then she did a decent imitation of studying while asleep. Sitting straight up at her desk. George played 'Troll Invasion' with Jasper. More pleased than he should have been when he trounced Jasper's pathetic troll into bloody oblivion. Phil debated with him the necessity of her learning her spelling. George was feeling hard pressed to convince her she needed to learn it. Phil was his princess after all, and would never want for anything whether, or not, she ever learned to spell. He prodded her into it after thinking that Percy would have plenty to say about his daughter not being able to extemporize rhyming poetry for any occasion when she was older. He wouldn't just be imagining his brother's disapproving voice ringing in his ears if he failed to raise the children properly, now he'd actually have to listen to it.

* * * * * * * * * * * *

When the children had been put to bed, he and Penny stood staring self-consciously at one another in the middle of the upstairs corridor. "I'd like to talk with you," George ventured.

"Would you?" she responded a little irritably. "Well, there's a novel approach to dealing with what's gone wrong between us, George. It'll beat all hell out of sulking in the spare room for another night, though. I think." Whirling on her bare feet she stalked off in the direction of their bedroom. George started to feel a bit annoyed. He stalked after her.

She went straight into the master bath and began drawing herself a tub full of steamy water. He plunged in after her as she was pouring a capful of rose scented bubbles under the geyser.

"What are you doing?" George inquired, arms crossed, thumping his foot impatiently. Trying hard to remain calm and not turn this occasion into a bloody ugly row.

"Getting ready to take a bath?" Penny replied staring at him bemusedly.

"I said I wanted to talk with you," he protested as steam from the hot water began filling the bath encasing them both in a swirl of rose-scented mist.

"So?" Penny said still looking puzzled while fumbling with the frog fastenings of her red silk robe. She nodded pointedly in the direction of the commode. "Sit. And we'll talk."

"There's a fine thing!" George stated resentfully. "We haven't slept together in three weeks but now you want to take a bath in front of me?"

"Don't you dare whine to me about sleeping alone, George Weasley!" Penny snapped. Hardly willing to abide another belligerent boy in a snit after weeks spent coddling her cantankerous son. "You're the one who has been sulking in the spare room all of this time!"

"I haven't been sulking," he disputed her accusation crossly. "I've been giving you some space."

"You've been giving yourself some space! All that you've needed is for Jasper to teach you how to build a blanket cave," Penny retorted sarcastically trying to hide how much his recent remote censure was hurting her. "I am sore. I am tired. And I fully intend to have myself a nice hot bath, right now. If sitting in here with me while I have a bath offends your delicate sensibilities, now I've become a fallen woman in your eyes, you can wait outside. I'll be done in half an hour."

George wasn't likely to pass up the chance to watch his beautiful wife bathing in a thousand months of Sundays. He sat down on the lid of the commode. "I didn't say I was offended."

Penny had pulled herself up to her full height, over-flowing with righteous indignation. She was prepared to glue his ears back to his head with reproaches about his recent immaturity. The indignant wind fell from her sails when he sat down, but she still felt hurt. He hadn't denied the fact that she'd fallen from his good graces.

The bathroom mirrors fogged over while they glared at one another. It was getting very steamy in there. Her robe was beginning to feel sticky and uncomfortable. Fully dressed, George perched himself on the edge of the commode lid. Plenty irritated to judge his expression. His ears were flushed, whether from annoyance or warmth she didn't know. There was no mistaking the jealous fury snapping in his hazel eyes, but at least he wasn't going anywhere. Maybe, finally, they would be able to talk it all out.

Grabbing a hairbrush from the vanity Penny ran it through her curls with a few quick strokes and tied her hair up with a ribbon. She felt oddly discomfited with him staring at her, but after six years of marriage it wasn't as though he'd never seen her taking a bath before.

The bath was an enormous, ancient claw foot tub he'd recovered from a manor sale while they were remodeling. George had it re-glazed to its glory day white, and refitted into their master bathroom. It was huge enough to accommodate two bathers. They knew that because they'd tried it out together more than once. G

George had easily managed the renovation of the house they lived in. He'd managed almost as easily to make her his wife, and to love her children as his own. She told him often that she loved him, but he never seemed to manage to completely believe her. Sometimes she thought that he and Jasper were both just waiting for the moment when her attention wasn't focused completely on them. Believing that if they allowed her to look away, she'd be gone. Magically disappeared from their lives.

Penny finished unfastening her robe. Nonchalantly dropping the pile of red silk into George's unsuspecting lap before stepping into the tub. He fumbled with the silk as it slid off of his knee, the action arousing him, the way it was meant to. Penny slid under the bubbles quickly, in one graceful motion, but it gave George a good look at what he'd been missing. He paid careful attention, especially to her breasts and her belly. On intimate inspection they did appear to be a little fuller and rounder than he remembered.

Sighing contentedly, closing her eyes, Penny eased under the soft bubbles. George sighed too, not such a contented sound.

"Penny, you're pregnant. Why didn't you tell me?" he asked disbelieving and perhaps just the littlest bit sad. As much as he'd wanted a baby, as hard as they tried, he couldn't understand her keeping such news to herself. Penny opened her eyes, studying him appraisingly. George wasn't a handsome man in the way that Percy was. They shared the red-hair, freckles and fair skin, but the comparison ended there. George was shorter than Percy, although not short. He had the compact build of a powerful athlete. His forearms were especially impressive since he'd developed so much dexterity wielding a Beater. Even though he and Fred were successful businessmen they still spent more time goofing around on the Quidditch pitch than they did behind their desks. George didn't have Percy's classic profile, or his stunning sex appeal, but he did have oodles of boyish charm, and a knockout grin that lit up a room better than sunshine. When he was smiling that is. He wasn't smiling at her now.

"Yes, it seems that I finally am," she admitted quietly.

"How long have you known?" he asked, his jangled nerves un-soothed by what should have been the best news he'd ever heard.

Penny wasn't very good at keeping track. Though since she'd already been pregnant twice the signals were unmistakable. Figuring in her swollen aching breasts, unabated nausea, lethal exhaustion and constant bordering on emotional breakdown she'd calculated about two months. "I need to make an appointment to be sure but I'm probably seven or eight weeks along now. I realized right about the time Percy came home." She confessed finally feeling a sense of relief at the loss of her closely held secret.

George ran his hand up the back of his neck to administer a self-massage. "I guess this complicates things a bit doesn't it?"

Penny laughed ironically, clearly not the least bit amused. "Complicates things? Yes, George, children do have a way of complicating things. It's not as though you didn't realize it before we started this enterprise."

"That's not what I meant," he said tersely. "Too many children aren't a problem in this relationship. It's the extra husband I'd like to be rid of. Why haven't you told me about this before now?"

"I wasn't feeling very inspired to share intimate confidences with you while you refused to deign sleeping with me," Penny replied tartly, raising one long leg out of the tub to scrub it, resting her toes on the pewter geyser she'd picked out with him seven years ago while sitting on her old sofa in the cottage she'd shared with Percy.

"You're still in love with him," George blurted out accusingly. "What do you expect me to do?"

"George, I'm sorry if you're hurting right now, but we are all hurting. It's not something I would have ever done to you intentionally. I hope you realize it."

"Oh, I see! Somehow your tongue accidentally found its way into his mouth. Well, now I feel much better," George said frostily.

"Will you just stop with that, already!" Penny pleaded exasperated. "I kissed him! We were married for five years, we have two children together, and I thought he was dead! Don't you think those are extenuating circumstances? Couldn't you show a little bit of reasonable compassion about this?"

"Will showing compassion entail tolerating the two of you "getting carried away", anymore?" George bit out sharply.

Penny closed her eyes again in frustration. Refusing to meet his censorious stare. Her skin flushed brightly, maybe from the warmth of the bathwater, maybe from the strength of her emotion. George guessed maybe he'd embarrassed her, and he wasn't exactly sorry. Actually, he wasn't sorry at all. Her lip quavered ominously, however, and he relented in small measure. "Okay, you want me to forget about the kiss? I'll forget about it. I'm an easy-going guy. I'll let it go. But I am not a freaking saint! Is it really necessary for him to move in next door to us?"

"No, George," she agreed decisively. "You are no saint. I just never figured you for a coward."

"What in hell is that supposed to mean?" he said, raising his voice in annoyance. "I didn't come in here to start a quarrel with you!"

"Naturally," she shot back. "You never do want to quarrel, but maybe quarreling is just what it is that we do need to do. I'm hardly going to pack up and leave you over a bloody ugly row. I'd think you'd know that by now. Though, if you refuse to fight then there's no chance of you losing is there? And heaven forbid that George Weasley loses. You're just too damned used to getting everything that you want using money and subterfuge!"

That was true enough to be downright painful. George flinched, retaliating with "Don't hold anything back on me now, Penny! Why don't you tell me a little bit about how you really feel?"

Penny threw her washcloth down into the bath sending a stream of hot water splashing onto his trousers. "Fine!" she agreed irritated in her own right, "I'll do that! You want to know how I really feel? I really feel like I'm going to vomit! That's right! Vomit! I've felt like I'm about to vomit every minute of every day for the last three weeks!"

He had been annoyed enough to confront her leaning over the rim of the tub, now he winced and drew back a little. He wondered when her skin had developed that pale green hue, and why her frequent trips to the bathroom hadn't attracted more of his attention. He'd been wrapped up in jealousy and anger, but he hadn't neglected her intentionally. Penny continued to rail at him. Starting to feel guilty, George took it on the chin.

"You know what else I feel? Worn-out. Pushed to the very outermost edge of the envelope. Bordering on madness. That's how. I've had a seriously ill child to care for and I've been worried to distraction about him for weeks. In addition to that worry, I've been watching my husband withdraw from our marriage as though it were over the day his dead brother walked back into my life! I feel ill. I feel tired. I feel pregnant. Pregnant with your child, George, and I haven't even been able talk to you about it. Do have any idea how lonely these past weeks have been for me? Or how much I've missed you? You are such an idiot if you think I'd go through all of this again for anyone in the whole world but you!"

That tirade burned out every last ounce of energy Penny had left, even the bit she'd been storing up for just such an occasion. Sputtering out on the verge of tears she disappeared entirely beneath the bubbles. When she came back up for air, George was waiting. Only this time he was smiling. Shoving a cascade of dripping curls off of her nose she glared at him. "Why are you grinning at me that way now that I've ripped your head off?"

"I'd forgotten how cranky you get when you're pregnant," George responded still smiling, but he was serious when he said, "Penny, I'm sorry about all of this. Really, I am. I knew you weren't feeling well and I shouldn't have let this situation drag out the way it has. I don't mean to pester you in the bath. I realize you've hardly had a moment to yourself these past few weeks with Jasper being so ill. I just want for things to be right between us, again."

"You aren't pestering me. I want things to be right too, George. I want that more than anything. It's been forever since we've had a conversation that didn't revolve around Jasper's temperature, or how much he's eaten or slept. Arguing with you about Percy is such a distraction it's almost a relief." Penny sighed, feeling spent, emotionally overwrought and desperately in need of relaxation. "I want you to know I've told Percy already that I won't leave you. He's found a way to torment you and I don't doubt he's enjoying every minute of it. He was jerking your chain today and I will say you've been making yourself an easy target for him. Sometimes I think all of this nonsense is more about the two of you than it is about me. It's some twisted sibling grudge thing that a beleaguered only child like myself will never understand. All of this tension has got me wound tight as a top. I could surely use a glass of wine."

"What kind would you like?" George asked getting up off the commode offering to get her some.

Penny narrowed her gaze at him. "You're going to get me a glass of wine? No lectures about not drinking alcohol while I'm pregnant? No dire warnings that a single glass of wine will compromise my maternal morals? Not a bit of scolding?"

George grimaced. "That's absurd, Penny, I hardly think a glass of wine will hurt the baby. But having you all worked up the way you have been lately can't be good for either one of you. I think there are occasions to break the rules, you're not married to Percy Weasley anymore, you know?"

Penny crooked a finger at him beckoning him closer to the tub. He considered for a moment that she might pull him in and try to drown him, and then also considered it wouldn't be a bad way to die. So he took a chance and answered her summons. When he got close to the edge she urged him even closer until his nose was only an inch away from hers. Dragging two dripping arms out of the tub she draped them around his neck and pulled him close enough to kiss, and when she was through she said, "I'd like a glass of white wine please. Open the new bottle we got as a Christmas gift from your Australian Sugar Quill supplier."

Dazed a bit from the tantalizing lip-lock that came complete with a dash of sweet pink tongue he hadn't tasted in weeks, George stumbled away from the tub to do her bidding. Glaring at her mid-swoon he asked suspiciously, "Are you trying to worm your way back into my good graces by enticing me with sex?"

"Is it working?" she asked with a suggestive smile and a flutter of dark curly lashes.

"So far so good," he admitted with a shrug. "White wine you said wanted?" He was surprised he'd remembered what it was he was going for.

"Yes, please. You're such a dear."

"When I come back you'd better be out of that tub," he warned her turning to leave, "or I'm coming in there with you."

Penny called after him, "I knew you were smart enough to figure out who my husband was without the advice of your solicitor. It just took you a little bit longer than I expected."

George didn't turn around but he called back over his shoulder, "I may not be as intelligent as Percy is, love, but at least I'm not a pedantic."