Dear Andrea,
Of course I’d write again soon. I’m glad to hear that you want to concentrate on your studies, but don’t work yourself too hard. They’re just tests, after all. I guess it affects some of your options after Hogwarts. I wouldn’t know really, this is sort of what I’d planned on for a while. Merlin, I don’t even know what you’re planning on after school! What sort of boyfriend am I?
Andrea, please inform me of this minor detail about you.
Business is absolutely booming. It’s hard to believe I was leaving Hogwarts two weeks ago. Fred and I have been working almost nonstop in the shop. I’ve never been busier, but I’ve never been so proud except for when we won the Quidditch cup two years ago. It’s really amazing though. I wish you could be here to see it all!
I really miss you, too. I miss your beautiful eyes and the way they light up when you laugh. I miss the way your head fits on my shoulder after a long day. I miss your sage wisdom. I miss your sweet words as they roll out of your mouth, letters aren’t quite the same. Here I am getting all sentimental! See what you do to me?
Mum is finally coming to terms with everything that’s happened. I think. She’s even come by the store a couple of times and brought us some lunches. We’re staying with a friend in London. I think he’s very glad for the company. People are always coming and going from his house and so he’s always glad to have people staying with him for extended periods of time.
Missing your smile,
George
P.S. Give Peeves a hello from me and Fred.
Andrea folded up the letter, which she’d read maybe a dozen times over the past few days, and shoved it angrily back inbetween the pages of her Arithmancy book. She was finding it hard to focus on the review assignment that had been set to them by Professor Vector that day in Arithmancy. There were still seven minutes before they’d be dismissed for break. That gave Andrea the time she needed to plot.
Sophie was driving her crazy.
Andrea knew that Sophie was a smart girl. She always had been a very studious person, and it made her classmates wonder why she wasn’t in Ravenclaw, but she’d really turned up the heat now that O.W.L.s were creeping ever closer. Somehow Dean and Seamus managed to avoid Sophie often enough to keep up some semblance of sanity, but Andrea was beginning to lose it.
Right after George had left, the constant studying had been fine. Now she was over the separation factor. She and George exchanged letters frequently, and she’d come to terms with the fact that those letters would have to suffice for now. That’s not to say that she didn’t check the common room’s notice board everyday, multiple times a day, in hopes of there being an announcement for a trip to Hogsmeade, even if she was mad George hadn’t told her he was leaving her high and dry. However, she was jumping back into the life that had been neglected for a while.
During the school year she, Sophie, Roderick and Edward had all been having romantic relationships of some sort. Now Roderick no longer had Sarah, and Sophie and Andrea had been freed from their men, so they started to all gravitate toward one another again. Andrea was spending more time with Dean and Seamus again, as well.
It was a good thing she was nearly finished with the Arithmancy review problems for the day. It was getting harder to concentrate on anything. Studying was not appealing, and when she did study for lengthy amounts of time, she didn’t retain anything she went over because she got distracted by little things that reminded her of George.
She drummed her fingers unceasingly on the desk. The students around her would’ve been shooting her irritated looks had she not cast a small Silentium across the surface of her desk. She rested her chin on her other hand, propping her head up by her elbow. Out of the corner of her eye she could see Sophie bent over her review assignment. In front of her was Siobhan Murphy, who appeared to be asleep. Siobhan usually sat in the back of class, the last to arrive and the first to leave. Andrea had learned not to be fooled by the nonchalance the Slytherin put off - the girl was nearly the top of the class.
Andrea wasn’t even sure that Siobhan was really asleep. Her red hair was falling into her face, and her eyes were closed, but Andrea wouldn’t wager on it.
Andrea liked the color of Siobhan’s hair. It was so vibrant and fiery.
The cool spring evenings were giving way to warm summer nights. Andrea couldn’t complain too much because she did love summer, but she also enjoyed sitting around a fire before heading off to bed. She had spent dozens of evenings in front of the fire with George, laughing, kissing, talking, watching the flames and flickering sparks and snaps-
That’s it! she thought.
Exploding Snap was her answer.
~*~*~
The castle grounds were gleaming in the sunlight as though freshly painted; the cloudless sky smiled at itself in the smoothly sparkling lake, the satin-green lawn rippled occasionally in a gentle breeze: June had arrived, but to the fifth years this meant only one thing: Their O.W.L.s were upon them at last.
Their teachers were no longer setting them homework; lessons were devoted to reviewing those topics their teachers thought most likely to come up in the exams. Andrea’s plan, Operation Exploding Snap Tournament, was working so far. Edward and Roderick didn’t need a reason to play the game, but the thought of organizing a house-wide tournament in the common room seemed like an even greater way to spend the end of the year. Many of the other Gryffindors were signing up.
Andrea didn’t know quite what Sophie thought of all of this. She didn’t seem to suspect Andrea’s hand in any of it. Andrea was actually a little worried. Was her best friend studying so much that she didn’t realize what was going on? Maybe Sophie needed some sort of intervention. In the meantime, she had to make sure that Operation Exploding Snap went smoothly, but she also had to avoid a lot of the girls from other houses. The Unofficial Fred Fan Club was still going strong, and they still wanted Andrea to come and speak at one of their meetings.
However, Andrea didn’t want to come and talk about Fred and George. Now that she was over the shock of George’s sudden disappearance, she was really beginning to analyze things. At first, she’d been so overwhelmingly sad and surprised, and she’d had to figure out what to do from day to day now that the Twins were gone. Now that she’d finally adjusted to life without George, she realized that she was very angry.
George had not said one thing, and it was obvious that he knew he was probably going to leave. He’d planned the special afternoon, he’d had everything packed away for transport. Even worse was that he’d nearly told her, and then hadn’t at the last moment. He’d never even said that he loved her back.
Oh, she knew he cared, but she felt like George could have played things a lot differently. So three days after the last letter she’d received from George, Andrea sent off a letter in reply.
I’m going to play Quidditch. Glad your mum likes the shop.
~*~*~
[Hermione] was not the only person acting oddly as the O.W.L.s drew steadily nearer. Ernie Macmillan had developed an irritating habit of interrogating people about their study habits.
“How many hours d’you think you’re doing a day?” he demanded of Harry and Ron as they queued outside Herbology, a manic gleam in his eyes.
“I dunno,” said Ron. “A few . . .”
“More or less than eight?”
“Less, I s’pose,” said Ron, looking slightly alarmed.
“I’m doing eight,” said Ernie, puffing out his chest. “Eight or nine. I’m getting an hour in before breakfast every day. Eight’s my average. I can do ten on a good weekend day. I did nine and a half on Monday. Not so good on Tuesday -- Only seven and a quarter. Then on Wednesday --”
Andrea, while watching the whole scene play out, thought that Harry looked rather glad to have Professor Sprout call them into the greenhouse at that moment. Once Sprout had given them their task for the day, repotting the starts for Aldaisins, and set them to gather their supplies, Andrea went to get a jar of soil while Sophie got the plant from the table Professor Sprout had set them out on.
At the soil bin, Andrea found herself elbow to elbow with Harry. “Hello,” Andrea said.
Harry looked up in mild surprise. “Hi.”
“All of this studying for O.W.L.s is a bit mental, yeah?”
Harry gave a snort of assent.
“I don’t know about you, but I spend about eight hours every day trying not to study.”
Harry laughed. “You either know it, or you don’t, though I’m finding there’s a lot I can’t remember for the life of me.”
“I begin to go mental with worry when I study too much.”
“I know what you mean.”
Andrea finished filling her pot and then went back to where Sophie was waiting for her. They potted the Aldaisin without much trouble and quickly enough that Professor Sprout let the two go a few minutes early. On their walk back to the castle, Sophie asked Andrea if she wanted to study in the common room or in the library that night.
“Oh, I can’t study with you tonight, Sophie.”
“Why not?”
“Tonight’s the big Exploding Snap tournament, I can’t miss it! The entry fee was four Galleons and seven Sickles.”
“I bet I could talk to Ed and Roderick and get them to give you your money back,” Sophie offered.
“Oh, I don’t know...”
“No, I’ll talk to them about it, you just leave it to me.”
Andrea only shrugged. It was Friday night, and she really didn’t want to study; that was why she’d told her brother to make it tonight.
~*~*~
Sophie wasn’t on time to dinner, so Andrea sat next to Dean and Seamus. It wasn’t too long before Sophie finally did show up. She sat down with a small smile, then started filling her plate. After two bites of steak and kidney pie, Sophie set down her fork, crossed her arms to lean on the table and looked pointedly at Andrea.
“What?” Andrea asked after she’d swallowed her bit of food.
“You want to tell me what’s going on?”
Dean and Seamus began their own private conversation, and Andrea looked down the table to see Roderick, who shrugged at her. Sophie watched Andrea expectantly. Andrea stabbed her roll with her knife and then turned to face her best friend.
“I can’t study,” Andrea confessed. “I need this little break, and I need to have the breaks every now and again.”
“I wondered when you were going to admit that,” Sophie laughed. “I’ve been waiting for you to ask for a study break for weeks.”
“You have?”
“I admit I didn’t suspect all of your ‘stealth’ scheming. It’s been very entertaining, though, now that I think about it. I’ll just study by myself tonight.”
“No, Sophie, you need a study break as much as I do. Especially if it took something as big as Operation Exploding Snap to blow my cover,” Andrea insisted.
“Yes, Roderick did think I was pretty crazy for assuming that they’d make you pay an entry fee when you were family, not to mention the one who inspired the idea for the whole event in the first place.”
“It’s settled then. I’m forcing a study break on us.”
“So, what will we do tonight?”
“There’s always the Snap, but my original plan was to do something mindless and brain numbing with Lavender and Parvati,” Andrea said with a shrug. “Lavender said she had something planned anyway.”
“Wonder what that could be?” Sophie pointed at an owl headed their way.
The owl landed near Andrea’s hand and stuck his foot out. Andrea untied the small package, which couldn’t have been any larger than one of her fingers. The owl then rubbed its head affectionately against her hand before flying away. She pulled the tag from it, and opened it to read To Andrea - Needs Engorgio Charm.
It was from George.
Her heart fluttered even though her blood boiled. Andrea pulled out her wand, cast the enlarging charm, and then opened the box. Inside was a small sack of Swedish toffees, a small box of chocolate, a pint of her favorite Fortescue ice cream, some yellow roses and a package of something called “Andrea’s Invisibility Gum.”
Well, at least he’d gotten the point that she was upset.
~*~*~
“Ready?” Andrea asked Sophie before they left their room. They were going somewhere they hadn’t been in years: Lavender and Parvati’s room. The other two girls just seemed so different.
“I’m ready,” Sophie answered. They looked at each other and rolled their eyes before going to meet their company for the evening. When they opened their bedroom door, Lavender and Parvati were already sitting in the room between the bedrooms, and there was a giggling group of girls all around them, most of them fourth and sixth years, but there were a few third years as well.
“Finally!” Lavender cried. “We’ve been waiting for the two of you! Now that everyone’s here, I’ll explain the rules of the game. Parvati and I came up with it. It’s called ‘Seek the Hidden.’”
“Yes,” Parvati chimed in. “Everyone needs one of these necklaces,” she explained, passing them around the group. “You wear this, and the charm emits a bit of a wave of magic. Lavender and I will be the Seekers, and the rest of you all hide. We find you by using our own Seeking Stones to tell when we’re getting closer to or farther away from someone.”
“This sounds like Hide and Seek,” one of the fourth years said. Her friends gave her an odd look. “It’s a Muggle game.”
“And Hot/Cold,” one of the sixth years added.
“The charms,” Lavender continued, “also make it so that only those playing the game can hear you, so you shouldn’t attract Filch or anyone else, but you’ll still be visible, so keep yourselves discreet.”
Sophie and Andrea looked at each other. This was definitely impressive. It would take quite a bit of clever charm work to create these charms with all their properties. Lavender and Parvati finished explaining the game, setting the boundaries, and then the girls left through the common room, separating in the hall to go different ways. It was never defined that one of the rules was that you couldn’t hide in the same place with someone else, but they all assumed that was the case. The boundaries for hiding were very large, making it so the game could last a very long time. Andrea knew just where she was going to hide.
After following a series of corridors and staircases, Andrea finally approached the statue of Boris the Bewildered, passed by it, and stopped in front of a statue of a large warthog. She pulled on the tusk that was actually a lever, and a series of stones in the wall sunk back and slid to the side, creating the entrance to the twins’ old secret lab. Just as she’d hoped, there were still comfy couches, making it a good place to hide. The chances that Lavender and Parvati would even be able to find the entrance to the room were almost impossible anyway.
However, couches weren’t the only things left in the lab. There were a few open boxes, only half full with various joke products. There were a few notes scattered here and there, as well. There were a few papers openly left out on a table, and Andrea picked them up. Across the top were the words ‘Operation Serious Sirius Chat.’ Andrea frowned slightly as she scanned the rest of the pages. Then she saw something that made her stomach boil with guilt. There, on the back of one of the pages, was the same thing scribbled over and over again.
GW + AB
It was there about five times. There was a scraping sound, and Andrea jumped in a panic because that meant someone had just opened the secret door. She stood still, holding her breath, with her eyes on the door. The person entered, and gave a small scream.
“Andrea?” the intruder questioned.
“Ginny?” Andrea couldn’t mistake the pretty girl with the vibrant red hair, but she was surprised that she’d turned up here.
“Sorry, I didn’t know anyone would be here, though I guess it’s obvious you would’ve known about the twins’ lab.”
“Well, it’s the perfect place to hide.” Andrea smiled.
Ginny nodded. They would both hide here. “How are you doing?”
Andrea shrugged. “I sigh a lot lately.”
Ginny smiled, obviously able to guess what Andrea had been feeling of late. “He actually writes to me about you to get information, but I told him I wasn’t going to get involved and that he could get his own information from you. He said your last letter was a little short.”
“‘Little’ would be an understatement,” Andrea groaned.
“If you do want to talk, I won’t be telling George anything. George has been a complete git as far as I can tell, but he’s a decent git who cares about you.” Ginny smiled reassuringly, and Andrea smiled back at her.
“It feels like he should’ve told me he was leaving. It’s obvious to me now that he knew it was probably going to happen, and I just want him to have told me that.”
“Blokes do not know how to use their brains,” Ginny laughed.
“No,” Andrea agreed, “no they don’t. But Fred and George did know how to stock this room.” Andrea pulled a box out from under one of the work tables that she’d remembered had butterbeers and sweets. There was a rustle of parchment as she moved the box, and when it was out of the way, it revealed more notes for products. For one product in particular. “Patented Daydream Charm Research,” Andrea read aloud. Ginny gave her a curious look.
“What sort of daydreams, I wonder?” Andrea asked, settling in with a butterbeer to examine this new evidence. She remembered vaguely that George had once mentioned them, and that Fred had been making vast improvements. Improvements that George was highly impressed with, since he didn’t even have anything to do with this research. Andrea actually guessed that George was more surprised than impressed. Especially because of what was on these notes.
Ginny and Andrea poured over the numerous pages of parchment in awe. All of it was in Fred’s handwriting, and it held many more details than the girls cared to know about. “Do you know what this means?”
Andrea gave an astonished laugh. “It means Emeline Bingham was wrong. We were all wrong.”
“Fred wasn’t the most disgusting Don Juan ever.”
“He was just a tremendous opportunist.”
~*~*~
In Transfiguration, Professor McGonagall took a few minutes to explain to her Gryffindors what to expect during the weeks of O.W.L. examinations. Some of the Muggleborn students seemed a little more nervous after their head of house’s words, but for the people who had older siblings or other family that had suffered through the tests, the information didn’t bring much to light that they didn’t already know. Andrea actually did pay attention, though. She was starting to get more than a bit nervous about the exams.
“It isn’t bad enough they’re torturing us with tests, but they’re going to spread it out over two weeks?” Harry asked conversationally as he sat down next to Andrea. Professor McGonagall had split the class up into pairs to review the Chameleon Object transformation spells.
“I know,” Andrea groaned. “I can not wait until exams are over!” Andrea tried not to feel too sore over the fact that Harry was making much more progress with the initial camouflaging of his quill than she was.
Harry’s quill then suddenly burst into flames, and she tried even harder not to laugh at this fact. Harry dropped his head down on the desk. Andrea put out the tiny fire, and then they both laughed together silently. Harry may have been making progress, but setting it on fire could definitely be considered a step back.
They spoke rather genially. Especially considering the fact that Andrea had punched him once. It actually was a great opportunity to tell Harry what she’d been waiting to tell him for ages. But she couldn’t just tell him the big secret now - in the middle of Transfiguration. One didn’t have heart-to-heart conversations that revealed lifelong secrets in the middle of class. Andrea just couldn’t do it. But she did think through the whole conversation in her head. It was good to practice what she would’ve said. However, Harry’s half of the dialogue in her mind made her a bit worried. She would wait.
Transfiguration was not a place for revealing life-altering secrets. Besides, it would be good to start building a friendship first. It would make things easier later.
The Mystery of the Lightning Bond by electronicquillster
Chapter Notes: After an eternal hiatus, I've finally produced an acceptable chapter. It's long and I hope that some sort of consolation, but I really must thank all the people whonaggedencouraged me to keep going. There's only a little bit left, so a review to let me know of anything you'd like to know about before the story ends would be good. I'm gonna be tying up all the loose ends.
And fear not, you will find out what the lightning bond is in chapter 22. *wink*
As in other chapters, large sections of italics that aren't letters are direct quotations from Order of the Phoenix, approximately pg. 706 area of the book, the chapter entitled "O.W.L.s" for those interested.