Chapter I

Looking up at the mirror hanging on her wall, she wondered if she looked different. Perhaps a bit gaunt, but considering how she was feeling, she could have looked much worse. Stepping closer to the mirror, she pulled at the skin on her face,checking to see if her cheeks had gotten any puffier, looking for small differences that no one else would have noticed. Her brow was slightly damp, the sweat drying on her bushy eyebrows.

She could never really handle the heat. She faced the winters as if she were a Scot - donning heavier jackets, and not minding the cold (until her toes started going numb, that is), but the heat of the summer always took a toll on her, and it had been quite the hot week. As a kid, this would have been a non-issue: she'd simply jump in the pool, splash around, and let the sun reflect off the water, appreciating that her skin was not prone to burning. As an adult, she didn't find the same joy in water that she once had. The chlorine became itchier, and her hair would take ages to dry….not to mention that she had an unsightly scar on her forearm that she would much rather no one see. That was what led her to wear long-sleeve shirts for the past few months, which would have been fine if the weather had complied, but this English summer seemed to mock her.

Harry noticed that she hadn't been feeling well, but he was a smart guy - he certainly was not going to be the person to tell Hermione Granger that she needed to trade in her jumper for a more weather-appropriate top, especially because he was one of the few people who knew why she refused to change out of it in the first place.

Perhaps she should have been glad to find out that her sudden bouts of illness had a non-weather/jumper related cause, but when looking at the options, she would much prefer suffering a heat stroke.

She was pregnant.

She should have been more surprised, but she was muggleborn, and the life-changing event of stepping into Diagon Alley for the first time had certainly taught her there would always be more to life than she had imagined, and her seven year-long fight with Voldemort had further proven that she could never anticipate the twists and turns of life. Surprises were inevitable. This surprise should not have been a surprise at all, and considering the baby's father….well, he certainly had always loved surprises. But that was the key word, right? He had loved them - but now Fred was gone.

She wasn't there when it happened, and she was grateful for that. She didn't have the time to cry over his lifeless body, a crooked smile forever frozen on his pale face - she had to continue on, there was a fight left unfinished. When that fight was over, he was already gone, no one imagining that she would have liked to say goodbye.

The day of his funeral had been one of the most difficult days she'd ever experienced. Hermione and Harry sat at the very end of the fifth row of chairs. Harry was upset that Fred had passed, but he was mostly concerned for the Weasleys, wondering especially how George would recover. He would periodically look to his right to see Hermione, frozen in place, her eyes rarely leaving the grass beneath their feet.

For everyone in attendance, it was a difficult affair. Fred was far too young and full of life to imagine dead, even with his body sitting mere meters in front of them. It was hard to look at the picture of Fred next to his tomb (if we're being honest, it was hard to find a picture of Fred that George hadn't been in), and see the man's twin sitting in the front row, without mistaking one for the other (if you forgot the "ear" situation), or without pitying George. But as the other Weasleys cried openly, and as the other guests in attendance all felt that pity for George, George sat looking much like Hermione had - staring straight forward, as if looking through the coffin, face frozen.

When the service finished and guests started to leave, Harry watched George walk slowly towards his twin's coffin, while Mrs. Weasley sent a silent look to her brood as if saying, "let them be alone." Harry turned to Hermione to ask whether they should migrate towards the Weasley family or take their leave, but he watched as his best friend's eyes left the ground for the first time that day. She was looking at George, who had returned to the world (if only for a minute) to return Hermione's look.

Hermione had never been a crier. It was something that would come without warning, usually in moments when she was too tired or stressed out to do anything but cry. It sometimes happened when she was looking for a particular edition of a particular book that she swore she had just put down but couldn't find, even after tearing apart her entire room. It sometimes happened when Ron had been mildly insensitive, setting off an underlying feeling of frustration that had already laid dormant in her. But she never cried at funerals, even as a kid. She was practical - death was a period on the sentence of life, who was she to be upset about it? At this funeral, however, she wanted desperately to cry, and she held it in, knowing that it would look quite odd for her to shed tears over a man many thought she never got along with. It would have to wait until Harry escorted her home and deposited her safely in her room.

The familiar feeling of wetness on her cheek brought Hermione out of her memories. She was not a crier. Today appeared to be yet another exception. Stepping back from the mirror, she looked at her full body (or as much as she could see in the mirror). She turned to the side, placing a hand over her belly, which she thought protruded more than usual, but then again, she always thought that about the small, protective pouch of fat on her stomach. Nothing was out of the ordinary. She probably wouldn't have even thought to take the test if her breasts hadn't been sore.

She felt a dull ache pull at her temples - this was quite the quandary, and while Hermione quite liked solving problems, this was not one she thought she'd have to solve: the problem of being pregnant with Fred's child, Fred who had passed not two months prior, Fred whose family had never known of their relationship. Well that's not exactly true, thought Hermione, the man who might be able to help rushing to the forefront of her mind. Oh bugger.

George was doing better than everyone thought he had been doing. He wasn't going to pretend that he wasn't upset - he most definitely was, but Fred's end did not signal his own. Everyone especially thought that because WWW had not yet reopened that it was because he was suddenly uncreative, suddenly incapable of being funny anymore - this was definitely not the case. In fact, he was excited to re-open, even though he would have much prefered to reopen with his favorite business partner, but the grand re-opening was stunted by the damage done to the shop by Death Eaters, as well as a significant lack of stock.

He was never one to sleep in, but now that the shop had been fixed, and the stock was closer to what it originally had been, all he had to do now was wait until the official date of the WWW relaunch, and he was enjoying a bit of time off until then. He putsied around his flat, cup of coffee in-hand, absentmindedly chewing on a piece of toast as he read through the newest edition of The Prophet.

Lost in an article about the brand-new and completely massive quidditch pitch being built near Plymouth, he almost missed the sound of a soft voice through the floo, a voice he hadn't heard in quite some time. "Granger," he called, turning to the floo, "Granger, is that you?"

AN: I hope you like this so far. Just popped into my mind today thinking about the birthday of our favorite twins. I haven't written FF in quite some time so let me know what you think!