I Know The End {Fred Weasley, ACT I}

Chapter 16- Fight Club

Eleanor began smoking when she was fifteen. It started off as a social thing, only ever smoking at parties or with the twins late at night. It didn't feel like a big deal then. Everyone other than Alfie smoked from time to time.

It was during her sixth year that it became a greater issue. Smoking without company is a cry for help.

Fred and George had been distant since the Quidditch World Cup. At that time, she was withholding two big secrets from Fred. One being her own, of which she would have loved to tell him if she could guarantee her feelings were reciprocated. The second was George's, another she wished Fred knew but it was not for her to share. She was determined never to allow either of those secrets to build a wedge between them. But Fred had a secret of his own and he didn't seem to care that his was creating a fracture in their friendship. It stung worse than she liked to admit.

She wracked her brain, reflecting back on the Quidditch World Cup, trying to come up with an explanation as to why the twins were acting so withdrawn. She couldn't think of anything she had done that night. In fact, she had hoped that night had pushed her one step closer to being honest with Fred about her feelings. It had been a good night. Well, except for the Death Eaters, of course.

Since returning to the Burrow, she had become the odd man out in their triad. She often found them huddled together, whispering in serious tones over fresh parchment. When she approached them, they'd immediately stop talking and hide whatever they were working on. The first time she asked them what they were going on about, they brushed her off with a joke. The second time she asked, they told her they didn't know what she was talking about. The next few times were the same, although they both seemed to become more aggravated with every mention of it. She felt annoying, and she had never thought the twins would be the ones to make her feel so unwelcome. It made her feel a little better to see they treated Lee the same way once they returned to school, but she had thought she ranked higher than that to them.

She found herself spending more time with Harry and Ron than usual. Fred and George sought her out when they wanted to spend time with her, but those times were becoming few and far between. When they did hang out, all appeared normal, but then they would go and spend a whole day out of sight. She was going over their every interaction in her head, wondering what small thing she must be doing to piss them off. She felt like a fraction of herself without them, which was an issue in and of itself. Could Eleanor Potter only be Eleanor Potter with Fred and George Weasley? Fred and George seemed complete without her, but she was empty. Had she fixed herself with their friendship to such an extent that she wasn't sure who she was without them? Was it normal to feel so broken up at any slight change in the way their friendship worked?

Ron told her not to worry about it. He was the only one she trusted with these thoughts. They weren't telling him what they were up to either, although that wasn't surprising. He would have been one of the last people they told. She'd run over things she had said and done with Ron, and he couldn't find a flaw. His advice was to ignore them until they told her what they were up to. She thought it was a good strategy, and truly did want to follow through with it, but she just couldn't. Every time the twins came around, no matter how many days they had gone treating her like an outsider, she jumped at the opportunity to talk to them.

It was mid-October when everything finally came to a head. The school was abuzz with excitement as the start of the Triwizard Tournament grew nearer, especially for those in their sixth and seventh year. Everyone was trying to determine who the Hogwarts champion would be, and how the champion would be chosen. The way in which the champion was to be picked was a topic of great interest because it would be the determining factor in whether or not underage wizards would attempt to enter themselves into the tournament.