Growing Pains

“...I’m sorry, what?” I asked my brother, my jaw on the floor. 

“I will be teaching at Hogwarts this year. We’ve taken precautions to make sure everyone will stay safe. I hope you can be excited for me pumpkin,” he says sounding disappointed in my initial reaction. It’s not that I’m not excited, I truly am. A whole year at Hogwarts with Remus, I’m over the moon. I just haven’t talked to him about Harry, as a matter of fact, no one has. I wanted to tell him the second I met Harry, but it was too much to put in a letter. Then, we were left at Hogwarts over Christmas, and I started to get really close with Harry. I didn’t know how Remus would react, and I really wanted to be able to stay friends with Harry. I was going to tell him when we came home after our third year, but he left for the summer again. It was another hard decision for him, but I understood that he had to and I knew I had Fred and George to help me through. 

This summer, I had absolutely no excuse. The Weasleys were in Egypt for a whole month, which meant I had a whole month to tell him in private. For the month they were away, I stayed at our cottage in Yorkshire. Remus usually preferred to stay there alone, which is why I basically lived with the Weasleys. But this summer, I had no choice. I’m 15 now, so Remus would let me travel into towns alone, which I did a few days a week. The rest of the week, I spent my time sitting in the field around our cottage either reading or daydreaming on a blanket. I would spend hours lost in my books. When I wasn’t reading, I would lie down, looking at the sky, wishing the end of summer would come faster. 

When Fred and George told me they would be leaving for a month, my heart felt like it shattered. The three of us were closer than ever, which didn’t even seem possible since we were already incredibly close to begin with. But before they left, I got into a fight with Fred. I kept telling Fred and George how much I would miss them and how the rest of my summer would be incredibly boring without them. George had the reaction I was expecting, he said he would miss me too and that he would send me as many letters and pictures as he could. Fred, however, had an annoyed expression whenever I brought it up. When I finally asked him what was wrong, he flipped out at me, “Merlin, Cass, we spend every single day together. When we’re at school, you’re always there. When we’re home, you’re always here. This is an exciting trip for my family, I don’t care if it ruins your summer.” To say his words hurt me is an understatement. I felt like he had just punched me in the stomach. For him to make a point to say that it’s his family made me feel sick. I always struggled with feeling like a burden to the Weasleys, and Fred had just confirmed my deepest fear. I can still feel the venom is his voice when he said “my family.” He knew what he was saying, and he had to know how I would take it. They left the next day, meaning we didn’t get a chance to talk about what happened. 

George kept his promise and sent me photos and letters when he could. In one of his letters, he mentioned Fred. He said he was not his normal self on the trip and he told George he really needed to talk to me when they got back. I knew I had to talk to him, but I had already decided that I would distance myself from him when we went back to Hogwarts. It would be tough, since I still want to see George, but I knew I would have my other friends and now, my brother.  

Remus told me about the plan to stay at the Leaky Cauldron the night before we left for Hogwarts. The Weasleys were getting back the day before and wanted to make sure they had time to get all their school supplies and be right next to Kings Cross for our departure the next day. I asked if he would be staying with us, and he said he would meet us on the train. 

On August 31, I packed my trunk and Remus took me to the Leaky Cauldron. I was hoping to get there before everyone, but when I walked in, a table full of Wealeys, plus Harry and Hermione, greeted me with smiles and hugs. 

“Cassandra, dear, we missed you so much,” she said, pulling me in for one of her infamous hugs. “Fred, George, take her stuff up to your room and give her the presents we brought her.”

“Molly, you didn’t have to,” I said, feeling guilty she spent what little money they had on me.

“Nonsense, your family! If we had won just a few more galleons, we’d have brought you with us. Now, go get settled and then we’ll be off to Diagon Alley,” she said, gesturing for me to go upstairs. George was already half way up the stairs with most of my stuff, but Fred was waiting at the bottom for me. Molly’s reassurance that I was seen as part of their family helped me calm down as I walked towards the tall ginger at the bottom of the stairs, but there was still a part of me that wanted to cry and hit him as hard as I could. 

“Hey,” he said softly as I walked towards him. I gave him a small smile and continued to walk past him. Whatever he has to say, it can wait until were upstairs, away from his entire family. When I get to the room the three of us are sharing, I run to George and hug him as tight as I can. He picks me up and spins me around. 

“I missed you!” I squeal in his ear. I see Fred’s face as George spins us around the room and I can tell he’s hurt by the welcome I gave his twin and not him. George puts me down and says,

“Yeah, but I missed you more,” I can see he’s looking past me at his twin, who must’ve made a face because George quickly said, “Well, we can catch up downstairs, I’ll let you get settled.” He raced out the door and I turned to face Fred. Not wanting to talk first, I started to dig through my bag for the money Remus had given me and my supply list for the school year. He walked over at sat on the bed my stuff was on. He grabbed my hand and I stopped looking in my bag. I looked at his face, and for the first time realized that he had tears in his eyes. I wanted to feel bad, but after what he said, and after all the tears I spent on him this summer, I thought this was fair enough. We continued to look at each other in silence. 

“I didn’t mean it, what I said before I left. It came out all wrong. I’ve been thinking about what to say to you for a month, and I still haven’t found a way to explain what I meant. But I want you to know that I am truly, so sorry. I understand if you’re still mad at me, and you can take all the time you need.” I sat on the bed facing away from him. I didn’t want him to see me cry, he doesn’t deserve any more of my tears. 

“Freddie, I don’t have a family of my own. I have Remus. He’s great, but he’s literally all I have. You can’t even begin to imagine the burden I feel like for your family. But time after time, your mum and dad, Charlie, Bill, George, hell even Ron, have told me that they are happy I am a part of your family. Do you know how it feels for the person you care most about to tell you that you’re not wanted?” I realized what I said and my heart feels like it stops. As much as I tell myself it's just in a friendship way, I have always felt something different with Fred. My heart flutters when we hang out, just the two of us. He can make me smile just by being in the same room as me. I immediately stop my thoughts and try to think of how I can fix what I just said. Fred and I cannot happen. Ever. I turn to face him and continue so he doesn’t have time to think about what I just said, “Fred, I just thought we were so close, and to hear that you don’t feel the same-” I’m cut off by Fred coming closer to me. Before I realize what he’s doing, his lips are on mine and his hands are cupping my face. Fred Weasley is kissing me. And I kiss him back. For a second, everything feels so right. It feels like this is how it was supposed to happen. And just like that, I am snapped back into reality. I pull away and we sit there looking at each other, and I realize that this was a mistake. I stand and start to dig through my stuff again to find what I need for Diagon Alley so that I can get out of here and we can begin to pretend that this didn’t mean anything. 

“Cass, wait. Can we talk about this? I didn’t mean-” 

“You didn’t mean what, Fred? You didn’t mean to kiss me? Or is that just your way of apologizing?” I finally have all my stuff and I start to race towards the door. “I need space, Fred. I’ll ask Ginny and Hermione if I can stay with them tonight,” I say as I’m walking out of the room. 

“Please, Cass, come back,” I hear him call, but I am already down the stairs. Hermione must see the panic in my face because without saying a word, she locks arms with mine and we head toward Diagon Alley. Before we leave, I turn around to see Fred at the bottom of the stairs, tears running down his face, with a present in his hands. 

As a result of being close to Harry and Ron, I also became close with Hermione. It was nice to have another girl on my side. I love Ginny, and she’ll always be like a sister to me, but our age gaps made it more like a sibling relationship than a friendship. Especially now, with my Weasley boy problems, I needed someone outside of the family to talk to. Hermione didn’t push me to talk right away, instead, we just started shopping around for everything we needed. Hanging out with Hermione and talking about how excited we were for this school year almost took my mind off of what happened earlier. Almost. Once we had all our supplies, we decided to go to Florean Fortescue’s for some well-deserved ice cream. We sat in a comfortable silence until I finally spoke up, “Fred kissed me.” Her eyes widened as she took a bite of her ice cream. 

“I don’t know what I was expecting you to say, but it definitely wasn’t that,” she said. “Are you okay? Like, how did this happen?” 

“I’m… not really sure how it happened. We got into a fight before they left and he was trying to apologize and he just, came over and kissed me, I guess,” Trying to recall the memory was difficult. I feel like I blacked out when it happened. I barely remember what happened before or after. I tried to focus on eating my ice cream, but I had no appetite. “Mione, what do I do?”

“You know what I’m going to say, Cass,” She was right. I had to talk to him. 

“How am I supposed to talk to him about it? Mione, I can’t be anything more with Fred, ever. It will ruin literally everything,” Hermione didn’t answer. I looked up from the melted bowl of ice cream I was playing with to see that she was looking past me. From the look she had on her face, I could tell immediately who it was. I didn’t turn around to look. 

“Hello, ladies,” George said walking up behind me, putting his hands on my shoulders. “How was your shopping? Got anything cool and not school-related?” He joked and Hermione gave him a glare. Fred went up to the counter and George pulled a chair up to our table. 

“I think I’m going to check on Ron and Harry and make sure they are actually getting what they need. We can talk later, Cass. See you, George,” she said as she got up to leave. I gave her the nastiest look I could make. Why on earth would she leave me here alone after what I just told her? When she walked behind George’s chair, I could see her mouth ‘talk to him’ and I responded by rolling my eyes. 

When Hermione was gone, George said, “What was that nasty look for? I could almost feel the fire coming out of your eyes, Cass.” I know he wasn’t the him Hermione was talking about, but maybe telling him would help me figure out how to fix this situation. 

“It’s just… something happened earlier with Fred and I was angry that Mione was leaving me alone with you two, that’s all.” Perfectly worded, I thought. Enough to let him know something was wrong, not enough to let him know the extent of my problem. 

“What are you two scheming up over here?” Fred said, setting down a cup of ice cream in front of George and taking the seat Hermione was in. I felt frozen, how could he sit across from me acting like nothing happened? Once I looked at his face, I immediately regretted that thought. His eyes were red and puffy, clearly, he was not ignoring our situation. 

“Nosey, nosey, brother. I was just making fun of Sassy Cassy over here,” George laughed and I punched him in the arm. He fell out of his chair and pretended like he was incredibly wounded by my silly little punch. We both laughed as George made a scene. Fred and I looked at each other, laughter still on our faces. We were going to have to talk about what happened today, but maybe everything will be okay.