The Language of Flowers | Fred Weasley

21:L A U R E L - glory

I had never realized how hard pretending was, until I tried it for myself. The hard part at first was avoiding the urge to cast a spell on Fred when his back was turned, or to set a prank in wait for him in the common room. Then the hard part was convincing everyone that we no longer hated each other. It took every ounce of self-control I could muster to stop myself from being cheeky towards him at every turn.

But the worst part was acting like a couple. Doing regular couple things with someone who I've spent the last five years despising was like trying to teach a dog how to read, impossible. Sitting with him at lunch, walking with him to the common room, all of it made me sick. At least it did get easier over the two weeks, pretending to like Fred was now as easy to do as put on a cloak, and as easy to take on and off as well. The thing about pretending though was that after a time, it became reality.

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After finishing lunch, everyone ran outside to enjoy the freshly fallen snow. The houses separated themselves around the courtyard, and the space the Gryffindors had claimed as wide open and perfect for a snowball fight. The snowball fight had broken out between the fourth year Gryffindors, the Weasley twins, and Lee, the teams split up by year.  I wasn't one to just sit around and watch the fight, and never was Ginny. We collected a few others who were willing to get their hands dirty just hours before the ball and we set up our plan.

I peeked around the tree I was hiding behind, a snowball in hand. I spotted Ron, who was hiding behind his fort as he threw his snowballs over towards Fred and George, and I gestured towards him to Ginny. She grinned, tossing one of her snowballs up into the air and catching it gracefully. Jo, Angelina Johnson, and Katie were also all lined up behind the trees scattering the courtyard, each with their own collection of snowballs. We had the boys surrounded.

Ginny leaned around her tree discreetly, giving the signal to the others from their hiding spots. She gave me one final nod and we jumped out of our hiding spaces, running towards those already having the snowball battle.

There was a desperate scramble to take cover from behind the boy's hiding places as we ran up as close as we could. Without giving the boys time to retaliated, I threw my snowball as accurately as I could towards Fred, watching with joy as the snowball landed perfectly, right between his neck and his jacket collar.

I laughed gleefully as I threw my last snowball towards the fourth year court before I retreated out of the firing zone.

"Oh you're dead, Hawksley!" Fred screamed. I laughed again, ducking behind the newly built 'girl's fort'. While Jo, Ginny, Angelina, Katie, and I went for the offensive attack, Adhera, Maria, and Lavendar Brown, a fourth year I didn't know too well, built our fort. 

Fred's cry was echoed by the rest of the boys, who quickly turned all of their energy towards us, their battle forgotten.

"Maria, help build the fort up, use your wand. We'll get the snowballs." Ginny commanded from her spot. She was laying on her belly to avoid getting hit by her brothers, a brilliant idea. I was crouched down, avoiding enemy snowballs as best as I could. I grabbed a handful of snow, my hands shaking from the cold but since it was nearly impossible to make snowballs with gloves on, my hands would just have to suffer. Maria pulled out her wand, casting a spell that made our forts look similar to the other two.

"Hey! Magic is cheating!" Ron called.

"We started after you, its only fair!" Ginny yelled over our wall as she passed out her snowballs. I grinned, giving one of my snowballs to Joanna.

"That was fun. Did you see their faces?" Joanna beamed, tugging her scarf carefully over her neck. Her cheeks were flushed, I must look the same, I realized, pulling my hat down a bit further.