A Knut for Your Thoughts

Slightly Less on Accident

The second time it happened was during the summer before her sixth year. Hermione had arrived early to the Burrow that summer, after a rather lengthy argument between her and her parents. The Grangers didn't like the idea of Hermione returning to Hogwarts after everything that had happened in the Ministry. And there was a war coming, naturally they were worried. But Fred truly believed there was no safer place than at Hogwarts.

Initially, Fred and George were going to continue living at the Burrow and commute to the store every morning. The flat above the shop needed a great deal of work that frankly, neither of them wanted to provide. But this was proving to be too difficult. They would return to the house well into the night and leave early the next morning. And of course, their mum insisted on staying up until they returned. No, it would be much better to simply move to the flat above the shop.

It was during this transition that Hermione arrived to the Burrow. Fred and George were recklessly throwing their things together in boxes to take to their flat when Hermione paused by their open door to say "hello."

"Hello, Granger," Fred and George replied together.

"I was wondering about your shop," she said pleasantly. "How is it? Ginny said that you've been quite busy lately."

"Why, Granger," said George, "you sound nearly proud of us."

"Well, I haven't seen the shop for myself yet, so I'm not sure I can be yet."

"Mum was planning a trip to Diagon Alley later this month I believe," Fred interjected absentmindedly. He was staring at an old book of ideas he had just found under his bed. "You can see it then."

"And what will I be seeing exactly?" asked Hermione. "Impressive magic or the minor inconveniences that we Prefects will have to deal with this year?"

"Come now, Granger, what do you take us for?" Fred said in outrage. "They'll be major inconveniences." To that, Hermione just shook her head and left the room. Fred hardly noticed, consumed by the book he had just found. He flipped through the pages, landing on the potion he had tried to create only a few months prior. He had never been able to finish it, as he and George left Hogwarts in a rush, pushing all thoughts of failed potions to the back of his mind.

But staring at the potion ingredients, he knew that he had nearly gotten it right. He could try again. And if it did fail again, well then, he'd only have to listen to Granger's thoughts for a few hours. With sudden determination, Fred placed the book into his trunk. He was going to try again with the potion. Perhaps, this time it really would work.

It wasn't hard to recreate the potion that night. He and George were able to test it out on their employee, a lovely girl named Verity, the following day. Of course, neither of them had warned her that they were going to play a pranks on her. They believed it was the only true way to run a joke shop.

Verity thundered into the backroom, her anger thoughts reverberating around them. The glare she'd given them was more than enough proof of her anger, but her thoughts just amplified that. Verity Apparated back to her flat without an explanation. Granted, she didn't need to give one.

So, Fred had been able to prove that he'd gotten the potion right the first time. It really did work perfectly. He and George were able to start selling the potion within the week. The potion was so popular they had sold out of the product the first day they introduced it. Since then, Fred had been steadily creating the potion in the backroom to keep ahead of the orders.

While he was working one day, a thought popped into his mind. Why had the potion been incorrect before? He'd just used the same ingredients as he had before. Truly, he'd done everything exactly as he had before. But it had worked differently. Why?