If You'll Have Me | George Weasley

Chapter 22

THAT HAD STUCK WITH HER those next few days. It replayed in her head as she aided the twins in setting up their shop. As she helped them move into their flat above it. It stayed with her as George spoke of the winter and the business they would get from kids who were bored from staying inside from the cold. It stayed when his smile would fall at the thought of her leaving, and when he brought up the idea of reserving a drawer in his dresser just for her, on nights that they would be working late at the shop and she was too tired to go back to the Burrow.

I don't think that you've given me much choice.

There was hope in those words, and they pushed away the anxiousness each time that she thought of the moment that her parents would arrive in the Cadillac to take her away. And quickly, she had learned to replace that worry and instead, think about what might happen when she would come back to England. Not when she would leave.

She was not sure at what point she decided she wanted that with him; The future with the art studio and the bedroom in his flat being theirs... But it became an idea that she entertained a lot, even amidst the chaos that stirred in the Burrow, and when she was in conversation with Angelina; Who was beautiful and had no shortage of interesting stories to tell—But not even she could keep Eleanor's mind off of him.

He had been paying no mind to her, working tirelessly with Fred on the Pygmy Puff display, but her eyes found their way back to him every time. Even when his and Fred's bickering had fallen to silence, and there was nothing to draw her attention to him anymore. His eyes always seemed to meet hers, too.

"How did we get so lucky?" Angelina says as Fred curses from the next room over, and she leans back in the lawn chair that they had taken from the Burrow. "Y'know, I'm surprised that they've moved as fast as they have—With the shop and everything."

"It has happened quickly." Eleanor takes a moment to look at the shop around them, which was somehow more cluttered with boxes of inventory which were now emptied upon the shelves. "Think you'll pick up a job here?"

"I told Fred that I'll help if they need it, but I'm already so busy with work as it is. They'll probably end up hiring a bunch of people anyhow, depending on how busy they get."

Eleanor nods, and allows her eyes to flick up curiously at the blocky stairs that led to their flat. "Do you think you'll end up moving in with him?"

Angelina looks shyly to her feet, a smile spread across her lips, and shrugs. "I'd like to live with him eventually." She says in a low voice, as if Fred had been right beside her. "But we aren't... We don't really have a label yet. Much like you two."

Angelina nods toward George, who was now standing behind the front desk with his twin, sorting through a pile of paperwork with shared looks of confusion on their faces, as if whatever was written on the papers was done so in a foreign language.

"We aren't anything." Eleanor tells her after a moment, but the words are stalled. She had said them before, and believed them whenever she'd sworn it to Ginny in the past... But now, they didn't feel truthful. Angelina had seen through her anyhow.

"Oh, please. Anybody with a pair of eyes could see that you two adore each other." Angelina's grin was wide and all knowing, like their situation was transparent; A mere reflection of her own with Fred. "Besides, what's this I hear about a drawer?"

Elle quickly lifts her gaze in her direction, mouth fallen open in some shock at her bold comment, but a shy smile quickly spreads across her lips. "How do you know about that?"

"Fred can't keep a secret." Angelina says in a hushed voice as George starts toward them, a look of annoyance on his face. "Apparently neither can this one."