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CHARLIE WAKES UP TO THE SMELL OF BREAKFAST AND THE SOUND OF WRESTLING. He stomps down to the kitchen, seeing Fred and George in a tangle of limbs in the middle of the floor. Instead of his mother standing at the stove, he sees Carina's messy morning hair.
"Where's mum?" He grumbles sleepily.
"Gone to market," three voices chime. Charlie frowns, plopping into a chair at the table.
"I hate it when you do that," he sighs. "How do you even do that?"
Carina turns to give him a cheeky smile over her shoulder. "Charlie, we're twins. Try and keep up."
"Separate sets," he says flatly. She carries over a cup of tea and places it in front of him, kissing him on the temple as she returns to cooking.
His face burns red when the twins wiggle their eyebrows at him. Ginny enters the room, rubbing sleep from her eyes. As usual, her eyes instantly find Carina. His heart swells when he watches Carina hand Ginny a teacup, already prepared just for her, and brushes the hair from her face.
"Can we play quidditch after breakfast?" Ginny pleads. Molly had banned quidditch until Carina's return after Charlie accidentally broke Bill's nose.
Carina's eyes flutter over to Charlie, and she tilted her head slightly. It was a classic Carina move. It was the beginning stage of her pouty puppy dog eyes. Not that he ever told her no, but he couldn't when she pulled out the big guns.
"Sure, Gin," Charlie smiled lazily. His sister's eyes lit up, and any traces of sleep left her features. The twins also perked up from across the table.
"We're playing quidditch?" Bill yawned, patting Carina on the head and accepting his tea.
She began transferring plates to the table, allowing the conscious Weasley's to tuck in. The remaining two redheads came down before long, and Carina finally sat down beside Charlie.
Blueberry pancakes were Charlie's favorite breakfast. The only thing that topped them were Carina's blueberry pancakes, and today was his lucky day.
"I'll just do the washing up, and I'll come outside," Carina laughed when Ginny bounced at her side. "Go ahead with Charlie."
Percy never liked quidditch, so the teams split were even at three players. Charlie got Fred and Ron that day. Fred, with no complaint, was their beater. Charlie and Ron disagreed on who would be their seeker.
They argued for several minutes before Carina approached. Charlie saw Ron's intention in his eyes a moment too late.
"Carina, tell him to let me play seeker!" Ron whined.
"She's not the boss of me, Ron," Charlie huffed.
As if.
"Charlie, can't he be the seeker just this once?" She asked softly. Honestly, he'd already given in. Her head tilted, and her bottom lip jutted out.
Fine, she might be the boss of me, he thought helplessly.
"Fine," Charlie sighed. Carina immediately lost the puppy dog eyes and smiled widely at him.
"Yes!" Ron cheered, taking off towards his siblings.
Carina watched Charlie cross his arms and give her a fake angry look. She giggled and went onto her toes to pinch his cheek.
"You're supposed to be on my side, doll."
"Says who?" She joked.
Charlie's siblings watched as Carina laughed uncontrollably while Charlie threw her over his shoulder. Their brother ran in circles, pretending to drop the girl every now and then.
"Come on already!" Ron whined loudly. Charlie put Carina down and started the match with his family.
-
Carina helped Molly in the garden later that day after the Weasley bunch had all gone out for another round of quidditch following lunch.
"Are you excited for your final year at Hogwarts, dearie?" Molly grunts, yanking a stubborn weed.
Carina wiped a bit of dirt from her forehead and hummed, "I'm a bit nervous. I haven't the faintest idea what I'll do after this year."
The older woman turned to Carina and slid off her working gloves.
"Charlie seems to think you'll be a magizoologist," Molly said delicately, watching the girl closely.
Charlie did say that's what he envisioned the girl doing after school, but Molly could read between the lines plain as day. Carina will be a brilliant magizoologist, and I will go with her.
"Charlie has high hopes," Carina chuckled airily. "It would be a dream come true, but it's an incredibly sought after career. The odds of it working out are slim."
Molly Weasley felt her heartstrings tug at the look of resigned defeat on Carina's face. The way she spoke was neither bitter nor sad... it was almost wistful.
"That doesn't mean it can't happen," Molly soothed. Carina looked up from the garden and let her gaze wander over to her best friend zipping around on his broom.
Her eyes followed him for a moment before she said, "I don't want him to be disappointed."
And it was true. Carina and Charlie had similar goals for themselves. They both wanted to continue their study of magical creatures after Hogwarts, and bollocks if Charlie wouldn't do so.
Not only did her friend have the marks for it, but he had the extracurriculars to match. Charlie captained the quidditch team for Gryffindor and made prefect. He had an excellent resumé, and Carina was so proud of him.
It only upset her that her chances were much lower, and it would break her heart to let Charlie down. They had similar goals, and they'd always imagined they'd accomplish them together.
"Oh, dear," Molly gave her a watery smile, admiring the girl's love – platonic or not – for her son. "There's not a thing in the world you could do to disappoint that boy."
