Who: Patience and Fred What: comforting Fred, we hope D: When: Wednesday evening/night Where: St. Mungo's Warnings: SAD. Status: Incomplete
It was wrong, it was all wrong. Everything was awful, so many of Patience's worst nightmares had come true. The people she loved most in the world were still alive, but the people they loved - and people that Patience had loved, too, even Barty Crouch, the man she'd never met - were lost. They were gone.
She had not thought herself capable of leaving Chastity's side, but her twin was safely asleep for a few hours at least. She wouldn't need Patience until she woke; she was safe in their home. Just for good measure, Patience let both of their dogs into her house, King and Cerberus, and left them curled by the sofa next to Chastity. She didn't know how to do a charm to alert her if her sister woke, but she had done some of her own wards on her house, along with the ones that Chas had done; she strengthened them now, forcefully locking out everyone except herself. She would have left them open to Fred as well, but she doubted he would be leaving the hospital anytime soon, and she could always change them to let him in if he came home with her. She was taking no risks with her sister's safety.
Merlin, it felt so odd to be the protective one. She had always known that she would step up and do whatever was necessary to protect Chastity if it was ever required of her, but she had not imagined that it would happen this soon. She couldn't bear the thought of losing her sister, not now, especially not because she had been careless with her safety while she was in a drugged sleep. Especially--
Oh, god, George was dead. Fred's brother, his twin brother, Patience's friend, one of the amazing redheads that made up the wonderful Weasley family, with his quick grin and playfulness. She didn't want to believe it, but she did; it was a hollow feeling inside her, a new kind of despair now that her sense for her sister's emotions had faded, leaving only her own pain. How could he be dead? How could any of them - how could this all have happened? It was beyond Patience's ability to comprehend fully.
She was struggling with it, wiping furiously at the tears running down her cheeks, when she found Fred. Wordlessly she moved over to him and hugged him tightly, one hand going to the back of his head to thread through his hair, her lips pressing against his temple. Oh, Fred.