headweasel (headweasel) wrote in fourteenshades, @ 2014-06-13 20:17:00 |
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Current mood: | worried |
AGE THREAD - Arthur & Molly
WHO: Molly Prewett & Arthur Weasley
WHAT: Molly wakes to find Arthur much older
WHEN: Early morning 6/13.
WHERE: Her room in the castle.
RATING: Low
STATUS: Mostly completed via gdocs.
Over the last several weeks, Molly’s nightly routine had changed rather drastically, but in the best way possible. It was becoming uncommon for her to go to bed without Arthur there, for she had quickly gotten used to waking up with his arms wrapped around her. She felt safe and whole with him there, and it was a heady and addictive feeling that she didn’t want to give up. Ever. Nothing that would make her brother frowned happened on the nights that Arthur was there. She lay with her head on his shoulder, her arm across his middle, and her hand either rested over his heart or in his. They talked. They laughed. They sometimes kissed, but Arthur never pushed things further than she was ready for, and, for the most part, both seemed content just being together.
Smiling as she started to wake up and become aware of her surroundings, she felt that Arthur had rolled onto his back sometime in the last few hours. Rolling over, her eyes still closed and ignoring the fact that her brain wanted to wake her up fully, Moly snuggled against the warmth of Arthur’s side. He felt softer than he did when they fell asleep, and, sleepily, she opened her eyes to see if he’d gotten up and changed in the middle of the night.
In the early morning light, Molly gasped and sat up. She didn’t move to get out of bed. She didn’t scream or try to wake the man who was sleeping beside her. She gently, her fingers barely brushing over his skin, traced the lines of his face, and she knew, without a doubt in her heart, that it was Arthur. Slowly, she lay back down, careful not to jostle him, and put her head back on his shoulder. She would let him sleep a little longer because she needed to figure out how she was going to explain why she was suddenly much younger than he and prove that she was, in fact, herself. And she’d have to get him to believe about this place, and she hoped he wouldn’t feel like a dirty old man when he saw her and learned her age.
********
Poor Molly. She was right, of course, Arthur was much older than when he went to sleep. He hadn’t felt any change taking place. It was like the young twenty-year-old just vanished to be replaced by this sixty year old version.
The light streaming in roused him a few minutes after Molly settled back down. He blinked his sleepy eyes, yawned, and stretched. What day was it again? Did he need to get to work? He turned over to glance over the clock, but found it wasn’t there. Strange. Did it fall on the floor? He had knocked it off when it sounded the alarm before so anything was possible. “Molls? What day is ---- AGHHH!” Now he was wide awake. “Sweet Godric! What the hell is going on?” He yanked the covers to pull around himself, but got caught up in them and rolled right off the bed. “Oooomph!”
********
Molly hid her face as Arthur began to stir. She knew it was shocking, and, until he hit the floor, she wouldn’t look at him or say anything. Slowly, on her stomach, she inched to the edge of her bed and peeked down at Arthur. She smiled at him uncertainly, tsking at how he was tangled in the blankets.
“Are you all right? You didn’t hurt anything? I know it’s a shock, but I am Molly, and you’re older than you were when we fell asleep last night.” She didn’t sit up. She didn’t want to give him another shock by showing him what she slept in. “Once I know you’re all right, I’ll tell you everything.”
*******
“Alright? I am not bloody alright! I must have hit my head!” The girl was definitely Molly, but Molly from years ago and he was definitely sixty so there was no other explanation. “I must never have come in from the shed,” he reasoned. “I got to tinkering with that car again and the hammer-head thing hit me. That is it. Right. I am at Mungo’s and I am hallucinating.”
*******
Molly couldn’t help the smile the spread across her features. “Do you often dream of me younger?” She was teasing him. She couldn’t help it. He looked so bewildered, and he was still obviously her sweet Arthur. “You’re not in Mungo’s. You haven’t hit your head, and you’re not hallucinating. When we went to bed last night, you were twenty, but you’re in a magical village. Something’s happened, so you’re older. Much older, than you were last night.” She reached a hand down to him to help him sit up. “I’m very real, Arthur.”
********
“No! I mean, yes. I mean, yes, I dream about you, but not because you are not enough, but…” He only shook his head. Everything was insane. He accepted her hand, mostly to see if he could feel it. “You are real,” he agreed. “Magical village? Are we in danger? What about the children? And grandchildren? And, blimey, you don’t even know what I am on about.” He sat on the bed, silently thanking his lucky stars that he slept in his night robes last night. “This isn’t the work of Death Eaters, is it? They never give up, even after all this bloody time!”
********
She laughed again. “Because dreams aren’t better than the real thing.” She sat up and made sure the quilt that was, somehow, still on the bed covered her bare legs. “Because once the wish comes true, you don’t wish for anything else. You don’t need to.”
She kept a hold on Arthur’s hand, even after he was settled on the bed. Part of it was because she thought it would anchor him. The rest of it was for her. “We have seven kids, eleven grandchildren, and at least four great-grandchildren that we know of here. Charlie is married to Draco Malfoy’s daughter in this village. Only in this village, and they’re going to have a baby, too. In this village, Charlie, Ron, and Ginny are our children here. The grandchildren: Jamie, Albus, Lilu, Dominique, Molly, Roxie and, Victoire. The great-grandchildren: Bell, who is Roxy’s adopted daughter, and Polaris, who is the daughter of Scorpius Malfoy and Lilu.”
She took a deep breath and thought for a moment. “I don’t think I’ve forgotten anyone. I hope I haven’t. I’ll feel awful if I did.” Molly regarded Arthur for a long moment when his other questions returned to her. “Oh! This isn’t the work of the Death Eaters. We’re all safe. We’re also coping with wrong ages. I’m 16, which makes me younger than most of our kids and grandkids who are here.” She smiled sadly, “And I’m so much younger than you now that Gideon might actually have the right to say something about you staying here at night.” She touched his cheek. “Four years is one thing, but forty-four?” She shook her head.
********
Some of what she said was familiar, but other things sounded downright bonkers. Somehow forty-four years between him and his wife trumped the random Malfoys now sprouting on his family tree. “Well,” he said, “Maybe if I go back to sleep, I’ll go back a better age.” He could handle many things, but not having his wife didn’t make that list. He was still fairly young by wizarding standards, but back during the war he often thought (selfishly) he’d rather go first. Molly was a survivor. He wasn’t. Or so he thought anyway. He needed his wife. For that reason? He clung to her hand. He couldn’t brush her cheek or play with her hair, but he could hold her hand. Her age didn’t prohibit that.
********
“No. I’d rather have you here at any age than not at all.” She looked at their hands, moved her thumb over his knuckles. They felt the same. His hands were obviously older, but hers fit his just the same. “Your friendship is just as important to me as everything else, Arthur.” She brought his hand to her mouth and brushed her lips over the back of his hand quickly then let them fall back to the bed. “You do have a cottage here, but you live with Gellert Grindlewald. Charlie and Cressida are living in the Burrow, and I’m certain they’ll let you stay there.” She met his eyes. “I’d prefer it if you did, actually. If you’re not here, I’d like you to be there and not with Grindlewald.”
********
Arthur blinked like a confused kitten. “Why in Merlin’s name would I be living with Grindlewald? And the Burrow is here? In some crazy village where my wife is a ch--- sixteen and grandkids are older than they ought to be and---you know? Some of this is actually pretty brilliant. It is amazing magic, isn’t it?” The curiosity was getting the better of him.
********
Molly started to giggle lightly as Arthur rambled. “It’s a long story, but, from what I’ve gathered, some witch made a village similar to this, then George and Fred took over, and you have the place where we are now.” She thought about it all for a moment. “It is amazing, and I think they put Grindlewald with you because they trust that you won’t let him get into too much trouble if you can help it.” She shrugged. “It’s what I would do if I were in charge. Pair the people I don’t trust with ones I do who can take care of things if they need to.”
she looked at him sidelong, her laughter now only in her eyes. “Are you sure you’re okay?”
********
“Fred…” It is not that Arthur never spoke about his slain son, but it dawned on him that Molly hadn’t listed him and George earlier, which had to mean hand or not, they weren’t there. He was so close to seeing his son again, but it remained impossible. It was like a punch to the gut. He cleared his throat. “Fine, fine, except I’ve no idea how I’ll manage to leave this room without looking like some dirty old man.” He cracked a smile. “Are you?”
********
Molly’s heart clenched, and she tightened her grip on Arthur’s hand. She knew the story, of course, and it hurt her to think that one of her babies dies in the future. The sadness in Arthur’s eyes just then all but destroyed her. Subconsciously, she moved closer to him and put her head on his shoulder. It was chaste. There was nothing but comfort in her mind.
She smiled. “You’ll leave without a kiss,” she told him, matter-of-factly, though her tone was edged with disappointment. “We’ll explain to anyone who asks that you fell asleep here last night when we were talking and turned a different age while you slept.” She looked up at him and nodded. “I’m sad that you likely won’t be staying here at night anymore, but at least you’re still here.
********