One Last Try [HP Jamione fanfic]

Extra Scene - Haunted

Summary: 15th February 1981 - Fabian and Gideon are NOT coping well with the aftermath of the final battle against Voldemort and the Death Eaters. Hermione (their sister) comforts them.

A/N: This is the final extra scene for One Last Try. At some point there will be a companion fic of Charlie's life, but I haven't written it yet. This is a sad one... I'm sorry! But I wanted to show a little bit of how the twins were affected because I love them so much

15th February 1981

Ever since they were little the Prewett twins had been inseparable. They'd delighted in playing jokes and pulling pranks on their older sister and parents as soon as they understood how to.

The first twelve years of their lives had been filled with love and laughter, and the arrival of a new younger sister had done anything but dampen that. Even with the strange sad aura she'd had and (initially) unexplained anguish, she was an added joy in their good lives. School had been satisfyingly challenging for the actual schoolwork, and everything else had been easy and just good.

It wasn't until they got out into the real world that they finally, fully understood the bad things out there, especially when they started working as Aurors. But even with all of that, with fighting a war, they'd had each other, and Marlene, and their family whole and intact.

So, it was a rare occasion for Gideon to see his twin broken down. It wasn't often that Gideon felt the same. Fabian had always been the stronger one, the one more likely to hide his actual feelings behind a joking facade, but they both normally excelled at it. It had always driven Marlene spare whenever she was trying to garner something serious from them. Neither of them had the energy for that now.

All those years, all that love, all that life.

Gone like it had never been there.

Gideon hadn't thought he would emotionally survive their mother's death, and then Marlene... they hadn't even gotten the chance to marry her before the war – Voldemort – took her from them.

"You've got to stop, Fab," Gideon reached out to swipe the half empty bottle of firewhiskey from Fabian's loose grip, but his drunken twin pulled it away before he could grab it. Gideon's new lack of depth perception didn't help either – he was still getting used to only being able to see out of his right eye after all.

"If I stop, I remember," Fabian said, his voice a terrifying monotone.

"Fab–"

"You can't tell me you don't wanna drown yourself at the bottom of a bottle and never emerge Gid," Fabian finally looked up, and Gideon winced at the familiar expression in his eyes – he'd seen it in the mirror every morning since the war ended, "we killed our mother," he said after a long tense silence. One that one of them would have filled with a joke or a prank before.

Gideon wasn't sure he'd ever laugh again at this point.

"I know that, Fab. Do you think I could forget?! Do you think I don't want to be drinking myself to fucking death too? It's our fault!" Gideon suddenly blew up, furious at the implied accusation in his twin's voice, "you remember what 'Mione said, right? When she told us everything. We were supposed to die. Taken out by five Death Eaters."

"But 'Mione saved us."

"At the cost of mum instead," Gideon snapped at Fabian, despite knowing he knew all of this too, "she should've let us fucking die instead."

"Why don't you blame me then?" Hermione's sharp voice cut through the tense atmosphere like a knife through butter, "I'm the one who saved you, and mum died instead. So why are you blaming yourselves? Blame me instead," she looked furious.

Hermione's dark red-brown hair sparked and fluffed up into a curly, frizzy halo around her head as raw magic rose in her. Her eyes flashed as she looked between them and Gideon was painfully reminded again how alike their mother their younger sister was. The rest of the Prewett children took after Geraint in nearly everything, but Hermione was their mother's daughter through and through.

"I got arrogant and our mother died for it. So maybe instead of wallowing here in your self pity and bottles of alcohol," she cast an angry disdainful gaze over the many empty bottles littering the floor of their living room, "you should both go home. Go see dad. Or our nephews. Get out and stop drinking away your sorrows, because if either of you think I'm letting you succumb to your misery after all we've lost you've got another thing coming."

"'Mione–"

Hermione scowled and held up a hand, "Fabian Prewett stop right there. I loved Marlene like a second sister. We all did. We all miss her. Maybe not in the same way you two do, but we're here for you. Please, use us. Lean on us. Let yourself feel it, stop numbing everything, and then you'll be able to heal."

"Hermione," Gideon stopped her sadly, his heart clenching in his chest and clogging up his throat, "we can't forget her and move on."

"Do you think I don't know that, Gid? You know where I came from, what happened just before I left. I lost so much and I kept going when I thought I couldn't. For mum. For you and Fab. For dad, Molly, and our nephews. For James. For my friends. You don't forget, you just learn to live with the pain."

Hermione crossed the gap between them, and drew Gideon into a tight hug. It was only then that he realised tears had started to streak tracks through the days' worth of grime on his face, and catch in the ginger hairs of his scruffy beard. It was the first time he'd managed to cry since the battle when they'd discovered Marlene's body.

He swiped the tears from his face when Hermione pulled away and drew an unresisting Fabian into the same comforting hug. Gideon swallowed and tried not to push the feelings down or away, letting them wash over him in painful waves.

"I miss Marlene," he admitted after a long moment, when Fabian had pulled away from Hermione and reluctantly handed her the bottle.

Fabian's head snapped up and Gideon felt, for the first time since September, like he was looking at his twin properly. The walls that had risen between them in their grief without either of them realising had fallen finally and they were left with their raw grief and the reassurance that the other was there and understood exactly how they felt.

"I do too," Fabian whispered, like he was confessing some terrible secret.

Gideon couldn't see Hermione as he and Fabian finally hugged for the first time in months (they'd been two distant beings existing in the same space but not seeing each other for so long), but he could feel the sad smile she was giving them.

"I'll see you both at the Manor on Sunday for dinner," Hermione informed them, no question in her tone, as she made her way out of the flat.

Gideon pulled away from Fab quickly to turn to their too-wise younger sister, "thank you, 'Mione."

"Thank me by living and working through this."

Gideon smiled, it was small and felt strained, but it was real and there and that was what mattered. Nothing was going to be easy or good, but Hermione was right, they had each other and their family.

A/N: My poor boys! :(