In the Melancholy Moonlight, Part 4: Nebula

Chapter 189: Doing What We Do

LUCY:

The first week of life with the twins settled into a routine almost immediately.

Wake up at 6.

Write to Harry. Wish him a good morning. Offer jailbreak. Hide diary underneath pillow.

Read a chapter of Lord of the Rings. Then read another and another and another, because stopping after just one was impossible. Take a swig of wideye potion from the flask beside my bed. Realize it's almost 7 and rush through the routine of getting dressed, applying makeup, braiding my hair, brushing my teeth.

Brace for impact. Twins come bursting in because they hear the water running from wetting my toothbrush, "Killer Queen" by Queen blasting from Fred's Walkman as they serenade me. Make vague threats about places I could shove said Walkman. Never actually follow through on said threats because I secretly love their good morning routine.

Head downstairs as a three-person unit. Try coffee with a new ingredient, and hate it. Attack the nearest twin with a retaliatory wandless spell of one kind or another. Smile as both twins comment on how impressive my wandless magic is and how it's getting stronger by the day.

Have a hurried breakfast. Drink more wideye potion. Head downstairs. Make sure all of the shelves on the third floor are in order and fully stocked while Fred checks the first floor and George checks the second.

Open the shop at 9:00. Do whatever needs to be done. Close the shop at 6:00. Restock the shelves while Fred counts the earnings from the day and George gets started on dinner, then go help with dinner.

Eat dinner, usually sprawled on the floor of the den instead of in the kitchen while music from someone's Walkman provides a soundtrack to our conversation. Attempt to wash the dishes, and end up with more soap on our uniforms than on the dishes instead due to sudsy warfare. Listen as the twins brainstorm new product ideas while baking a batch of cookies, with or without their help depending on the complexity of the recipe, and offer a few ideas of my own. Eat a bunch of cookies, say good night, go upstairs, shower, talk to Harry as long as my eyes are capable of staying open. Go to sleep, hope the nightmares stay away, read more Lord of the Rings if they don't, and do it all over again in the morning.

And so forth and so on.

I learned a lot that first week.

I learned that I hated coffee, even with mint, cinnamon, honey, butterbeer, or pumpkin juice in it. I learned that Fred was incapable of making toast without burning it but he had perfected the art of making waffles. I learned that George's scrambled eggs were absolutely incredible but he couldn't flip a pancake to save his life. I learned that George had the worse bedhead but Fred had the uglier pajamas.

I learned that Fred's favorite cookies were white chocolate macadamia nut — and I learned what a macadamia nut was that same day. I learned that George claimed to love all cookies equally, but I noticed that he always had the most chocolate chip cookies when they were available. I learned that George went to bed late and woke up early but that he was a deep sleeper for the short time that he was in fact asleep. I learned that Fred went to bed earlier and woke up later than his twin, but his sleep was much more fitful and he often wandered the flat in the middle of the night because he had an idea or something on his mind and the only way to find any kind of consolation was through movement.

While the morning and evening routines were generally consistent and the twins were becoming increasingly predictable, each day was a new adventure. On Tuesday, I organized the back room. On Wednesday, I was back behind the cash register and helped a Ministry official purchase 500 Shield Hats because many of their employees couldn't even cast a proper Shield Charm. On Thursday, a boy I recognized as a Ravenclaw decided to sample every Skiving Snackbox product at once, so we had to close the store for an hour in order to properly sort him out and vanish all of the, ah, various bodily waste products that were violently ejected from him. On Friday, Henry and Gretch paid us a visit, so George gave the two a grand tour of the store after hours while Fred and I counted the day's earnings and made sure to blast "Come and Get Your Love" by Redbone from George's Walkman throughout the shop on a loop. Saturday was the busiest day, and it passed in such a whirlwind of activity all three of us fell asleep in the back room the second we closed up shop and didn't wake up until well after midnight.