the painter // george weasley //

11

The Course of Empire - Destruction, Thomas Cole, 1836

"Silencio"

The silence and the stillness, broken only by the occasional grunt or snuffle of a few sleeping portraits in the other room, was unbearable to her. She lifted her wand at her studio door and it shut closed, making the wall it was on shake and cause a few frames to crash to the ground and somehow made the stickiness of the tape holding up this magazine page she had ripped out a few weeks ago come undone and float to the floor. She walked over to the picture frames that had fallen.

She noticed the shards of glass around it, picking it up and turning it to face her. She had once again ruined another thing. A photo of her and her brothers. Her in the middle, holding Max in front of her, one arm around his chest with the other messing up his hair. He looked annoyed but he also looked happy. The triplets were behind her, with the goofiest smiles, nudging each other as Otto and Anthony stood on either side, peering over everyone and laughing to each other at their siblings childish play. Now surrounded with the spider webbing of the broken glass of the frame.

She had just come home from another meeting. It was her second meeting with this new family, they weren't the nicest of people and she figured it was because they lost their only child and the ministry had asked them to talk to this random American and let her paint their child's portrait. She didn't take it personal when the father talked back to her and made her feel small. It wasn't her fault, she reminded herself after the 2 hour meeting she had booked for them. This wasn't her fault.

That was until she got home. It is her fault. It's all her fault. She welcomes herself into people's homes, ask them to talk about their dead loved ones and then leaves two hours later not knowing how they feel after the meeting. Well, she does know how it feels because she still grieves everyday. And of course this terrible meeting, with these terrible people. Okay, maybe they aren't terrible. They are sad, and they are definitely not the Weasleys. Her past month with them, they were so nice and welcoming. They had so many stories, she figured all her meetings would be like theirs after them. But they aren't, they are hard and they are tiring. Because how does someone go week to week, talking about dead people that she doesn't know and then go home and paint them. Just hoping she doesn't fuck up and piss the family off more.

Like today, she said something wrong. Something that didn't sit right with the father, she didn't mean it in a wrong way. He just took it that way, but she let him be angry at her. Because he is allowed to, he is grieving. She has to do this, it's her job. She was given this task, so she has to deal with her bad days. Even when the meetings fall on his birthday.

It's his birthday.

Today is Theo's birthday.

He would of been 21 years old today.

She looked down the photograph in her hand and threw it across her her living room. The room is small, so her throw wasn't far and just ended up crashing and breaking into more pieces when it hit the other wall.

"Silencio" she whispered

There was a vase on the side table next to her. She picked it up and looked at it. It was just a terra cotta pot she got in Arizona once when she went to that thunderbird farm. She found it at this little gas station off the highway. She was waiting for her best friend Riley to finish up in the bathroom, when she was walking around the store and stumbled upon the vase. It's a boring one, no glaze on it. Just bare clay with a small black drawing of a cactus in the middle. But it was off centered and crooked, so she bought it. She thought it was funny, just sitting next to a shelf of muggle chips and cans of soda.