They weren’t in the living room when she Apparated in. Looking for them she called out their names, and when she didn’t get a reply she called out again, and then again. Not until she called out for them several times did the knowledge that they weren’t at home sink in.
She collapsed on their sofa, pulling a pillow to her, hugging it tight as she cried. Holding the pillow to her face she inhaled the sent that was George’s, knowing that if she grabbed the pillow on the other side of the sofa it would smell like Fred.
She had gotten them these pillows. But then she had picked out the rug on the floor as well as the curtains in their windows. They hadn’t even had curtains before she became their friend. Nor had they had any plants, and their bedspreads had been horrible. They had let her change all that. Letting her decorate their flat in a lame attempt to make up for all the things they did for her. And now she was crying into a pillow she herself had gotten, but that were now so firmly George’s that his sent was imbedded in it.
When she heard the familiar cracks of someone Apparating she was relieved. Then she heard their voices from the hallway. Katie and Angelina’s voices. She should have realized they were with them. Why had she assumed they would be home alone on a Saturday evening? Getting up from the sofa she tried to dry her tears, which wasn’t an easy thing to do when your heart was breaking, but she tried nevertheless, intent on leaving before they knew she was there.
“Hermione!”
Too late. She wouldn’t get out now.
“What are you doing here?” Fred asked surprised. “We thought you were out tonight,” he added.
She couldn’t think straight. Why couldn’t she think straight? She was always thinking straight. Well she needed to leave them alone. She should leave them alone. They were with their girlfriends and they wouldn’t want her imposing, and so she tried to make her excuses, saying that she’d talk to them in the morning, apologizing for disturbing their evening.
“Hermione, stop it!”
It was George’s voice.
“You know you’re always welcome here. There is no need to apologize.”
“We’ll just leave and let the three of you be alone,” Katie said, patting Hermione’s arm sympathetically.
“No, no, you really shouldn’t. I didn’t mean to ruin your evening, and I don’t want to impose…”
“You’re not imposing!” Angelina asserted. “And our evening is over now when we’re gotten out from parent-hell, anyway,” she said lightly. Hermione looked at her, confused. Giving her a scrutinising look Katie then turned to Fred and George, both of them looking very worried.
“You have told her, haven’t you?” she asked.
“You asked us not to tell anyone!” Fred said. Angelina turned around and stared at them.
“Well we assumed you’d tell her!” she said firmly. “I mean you must be daft not to!” she said shaking her head. Confused Hermione let her eyes wander between them.
“We’re not dating Fred and George, Hermione,” Katie then said. “We’re just putting on a show for our parents and relatives.”
“Why?” Hermione asked them, even more confused now even thought her heart did rise a bit at the news.
“We’re gay,” Angelina answered her, slipping her arm around Katie’s waist. “And Fred and George have been helping us keep it from our parents.”
“Why?” Hermione asked again, feeling like an idiot for not being able to come up with anything else to say.
“My parents are very religious Catholics,” Katie said. “They’d either drag me off to confession trying to “straighten” me out or cut me out of their lives if they’d find out.”
“And mine are worse. They insist on having grandchildren. It’s their vision of the future. You meet a nice wizard, get married and have a bunch of kids. Before I pretended to date Fred they’d already set me up on more dates than I care to remember. Two actually being with cousins which I find a bit…disturbing to say the least. You might imagine how happy they’ll be when they find out that there won’t be any cute little wizards and witches running around anytime soon,” Angelina said with a sigh. “Anyway, we’ll leave and the three of you can talk. It’s fairly obvious that you need to talk to someone,” she then said.
Feeling confused, and more relieved than she liked to admit, Hermione watched as the girls took their leave. She heard Angelina tell Fred to go and make some tea. She watched him scuffle of to the kitchen to do as she was told. And then it was only her and George in the room, and suddenly she didn’t know what to say, or where to begin. It wasn’t as if she could just go on and tell him the truth. She didn’t even want to imagine his reaction if he found out she was in love with both him and his brother. With one of them, yes he could probably handle that “ but the both of them? She couldn’t even handle that.
“Hermione, what happened tonight to make you come here?” he asked quietly.
“Nothing really,” she lied, deciding that maybe it was best that she didn’t tell them anything at all. She didn’t want to risk their friendship. So what if her heart broke. She could live with that. She couldn’t live with losing them as her friends.
“Oh, really? So that is why you are standing in our living room, still wearing your cloak although you’ve obviously been here for quite some time “ crying if I’m judging from the way the pillow is soaked through,” George said matter-of-factly. Hermione looked down. She hadn’t been aware of the fact that she was still wearing her cloak, and now she fingered it nervously, her fingers trembling too much for her to unclasp it.
She started when she felt George’s hands cover hers, moving them away from the clasp, helping her. Closing her eyes she couldn’t help but to shiver, wishing that there was another reason for him to unclasp her cloak other than just helping her out.
“Hermione, what on earth happened tonight?” George suddenly asked, jerking her back to reality from the obvious fury in his voice.
It wasn’t like George to be angry like that for no good reason, and she hadn’t told him about her feelings so why would he be angry now? Confused she looked at him, staring down at her robes.
“Answer me? What did he do to you? Why are your robes torn?” he answered growing ever more agitated, spitting out the words through gritted teeth. “I swear if that bastard hurt you I’ll rip him apart! I’ll kill him with my bare hands!”
Confused Hermione continued to stare at him for a while, before it dawned on her what he was saying. Looking down she could see that her robes had been ripped, even if she couldn’t remember it happening.
“No, no, George he didn’t, that must have been when…oh George I made such a mess of things tonight, and I wasn’t nice to Victor and he didn’t do anything wrong “ I did,” she said, unable to hold back the tears.
Almost instantly she could feel George pulling her into his arms, holding her tight as he walked her over to the sofa and sat her down. Still holding her, he rocked her like he had so many times before. She didn’t speak. She didn’t tell him what happened, or why it happened. She couldn’t bring herself to do that. How would she be able to when she knew that the moment she did, she might just lose her two best friends and end up completely alone?
And why shouldn’t she? Her feelings were wrong, she knew that. George and Fred were completely different persons. Only those that didn’t know them well enough thought otherwise. And while playing around with their similarities they really didn’t appreciate when people assumed that one would think and feel the same as the other, just because they looked alike. But then that was her problem, wasn’t it?
If they had been the same person she wouldn’t have any problems choosing, she would just pick either of them. But now she wanted both of them. And she knew it was wrong. She knew that the chances of them accepting this were slim to say the least. And unfortunately she knew that she wouldn’t be able to stand it much longer if she wasn’t allowed to tell them about her feelings.
“What happened?” Fred asked, coming into the room carrying the tea Angelina ordered him to make. It had been thoughtful of her, but Hermione really didn’t feel like having tea. All she wanted was her two best friends to hold her and tell her everything would be alright “ which of course it wasn’t.
“Dunno yet,” George said simply, and Hermione could feel Fred sitting down next to her, and when he stroked her hair and squeezed her arm and urged her to tell them what was wrong Hermione felt as if she never wanted to move again.
Slowly Hermione told them some of what happened. Not everything. Not the why “ just the facts. She told herself it wasn’t lying to withhold the reasons for her actions. It wasn’t lying not to tell them everything. And she wished she had been able to convince herself that it wasn’t immoral to withhold information just to keep them close to her.
And they did stay close. Holding her they told her that she hadn’t done anything wrong, and that she really couldn’t go on with something she didn’t want to do, and of course it would be difficult for her to sleep with someone other than Ron. Hermione laughed. She couldn’t help it. She knew it wasn’t the thought of Ron that kept her from making love to Victor. It wasn’t even her utter lack of feelings for him. It was her feelings for George and Fred. Those where the feelings she hadn’t been able to betray.
“What’s funny?” Fred asked confused.
“I just never…Ron and I never…” she admitted, glad to have something to say other than the truth.
“You didn’t?” George asked, lifting her face up so he could see her eyes. Hermione simply shook her head.
“We kind of assumed you had,” Fred admitted from behind her back, but Hermione hardly heard him, for suddenly she didn’t care anymore. Her heart was beating too fast, and George’s face was too close, and if she didn’t do this now then she never would, and she couldn’t live with them not knowing, and so she leaned up and kissed him.
She wasn’t surprised to feel him start to pull back, and even if she expected it she could feel a wave of disappointment wash over her. But then he stopped. And then he leaned in and kissed her back, and suddenly all was right with the world, and it was not the sort of kiss she imagined from him, it was softer, more tender, and it was perfect because she loved him and he was kissing her and who cared about anything else?
And then Fred shifted and started to move, and things weren’t perfect anymore. It wasn’t enough. She knew she should settle, but it wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. And if she allowed Fred to leave then everything would be ruined, and so she grabbed his arm and pulled him closer, refusing to let him go.
“Hermione, I…” he started and as Hermione pulled back from George she could hear the disappointment in Fred’s voice. “Just let go, and I’ll leave the two of you alone.”
“And if I don’t want you to go?” she asked, almost holding her breath, expecting them both to fly of the handle. Neither did. Instead they said nothing and for what felt like an eternity Hermione waited for one of them to do or say something, yet she couldn’t look up. She couldn’t speak. She could just wait.
“What do you mean?” Fred’s voice then asked. Hesitant, tentatively.
“That I…Oh gods I’m deprived,” Hermione exclaimed, finding speaking to be too much to handle. Burying her head in her hands she refused to look up. Not until George firmly pulled her hands away and Fred grabbed her chin and made her look up at the both of them.
“Look, I’m just going to ask here, whom do you want? We both love you. It’s your choice really, and we won't interfere with it. We’ll accept your decision “ what ever that might be, even if it’s neither of us,” Fred said simply, his voice a bit shaky as he spoke.
“You love me?” she asked.
“Of course we do,” George answered. “But we swore we wouldn’t try anything. That it would be hurting each other, and you. But we also decided that if you were ever to become interested in one of us, the other would back down, that we would leave it up to you if that was the case,” he explained.
“So if you choose George I will back down,” Fred said looking at her as if he already knew what she was going to say, ready to step up and leave.
“Would you hate me if I said I don’t want to choose? That I love the both of you,” she whispered so faintly they wouldn’t have heard her if she hadn’t been so close.
“You love…the both of us?” George asked surprised.
Hermione nodded, biting her lips out of nervousness.
“That’s why I couldn’t go through with it tonight, that’s why it would never have worked with Victor. I tried, I really did try, and I know I’m horrible and that it’s probably wrong but I love you and I can’t make myself stop and I can’t choose, please don’t ask me to choose,” she rambled, unable to stop herself.
“Don’t choose,” George then whispered in her ear, slipping her arms tighter around her. “Or what do you say, Fred?” he then asked looking at his brother. Fred nodded slowly, thoughtfully, then he smiled.
“Don’t choose,” he said, leaning in to kiss her, and just like that everything was perfect again, and she was surprised to find out that it was Fred’s kisses that were passionate and possessive, that there weren’t playful at all, that it was him who bruised her lips from the sheer force of his kiss. And it didn’t matter that she’d been wrong. It was perfect anyway. And as George dusted kisses along her neckline and shoulders, and Fred claimed her mouth with his own she realized that she suddenly didn’t care what the rest of the world would think. She didn’t care that this was supposed to be immoral, that this was really something to be considered as wrong, because it wasn’t wrong. It couldn’t be. Victor had been wrong. Victor had felt wrong. This felt right, so very right and this was the way it was supposed to be, and that was all that mattered.