"She's a nightmare, honestly. It's no wonder she hasn't got any friends!"

Fred, hidden rather ignominiously behind a tapestry outside the Charms classroom in a tangle of limbs with his twin, winced. He recognized his brother's voice instantly. After all, their younger brother was the reason they had been holed up in this blasted corridor for the better part of a quarter hour.

Evidently, the object of his brother's ire also heard his words, as an owl's nest of brown hair came flying past their hiding place, choking back a sob.

"I am tempted to revise our prank, Brother Mine, to be slightly less charitable to dear Ronniekins," George solemnly informed his other half once the first-year Gryffindors had bumbled past.

"Too true. To think, we-good, kind brothers-were planning on making bubbles come out his ears-"

"-and then he goes on insulting little firsties and besmirching our honorable Weasley name!"

A passing fourth year Hufflepuff nearly tripped and stared at George in horror upon hearing this pronouncement.

"Mostly honorable Weasley name!" Fred amended with no less enthusiasm.

They ambled back to the Common Room, alternately wondering how their dearest brother had gone so far astray ("Do you think we left him with Percy for too long that one time?") or what sort of retribution was fit for their brother ("I'll bet he won't have any friends if his ears slowly leak gobs of wax at all hours!)

They settled down into two chairs by the fire.

"What about a charm that only let's him speak wrong answers in class?" George offered.

"First, that sounds impossible to pull off-but brilliant and we should work on it. Second, how would anyone notice the difference between Ronnie's normal time in class?"

"Too true. I often wondered what you'd gotten in exchange for my getting all the looks. Must have been brains."

"Forge, did you just call me ugly?!"

"Never. You know you're a beautiful flower, dearest," George twirled his finger through his twin's hair inexpertly, getting it tangled and yanking Fred's head sharply to the side.

"Ouch! You maniac! Leave my poor tresses alone!" He massaged his scalp dramatically before adding, "Where's Lee? We should get him in on this. An outside perspective on our dearest brother's punishment might be just what we need!"

George whipped a tattered piece of parchment from his sleeve and whispered "I solemnly swear I'm up to no good." Both twins watched as ink bled across the paper, loops and whorls dancing around each other to sketch out the entire castle. They scanned the parchment looking for their friend's name.

"Bugger," Fred swore, pointing to a dot at the far left side.

"She could just be using the loo," George suggested.

Both of them watching the tiny dot marked "Hermione Granger" sitting stationary in the girls' lavatory. They half-heartedly watched the parchment, willing the girl they'd seen run past them crying to move out of the room. But with a younger sister at home (and a shared bathroom), they were rather familiar with the custom of holing up for a good cry.

The other dots in the castle were quickly converging on the Great Hall; the feast was clearly about to begin. Fred's stomach rumbled in anticipation; the Halloween feast was among their favorite meals of the year.

Hermione's dot remained stuck in the lavatory.

"I reckon we should go fetch her and redeem the family's honor," George finally stated.

"Too true. Need a good pretense though. If she's anything like Ginny, she'd be mortified to be 'rescued.'"

"I'm sure we'll think of something on the way." George had already scuttled towards the portrait hole.

Fred ran in the opposite direction, shouting something about "supplies." He emerged moments later with a dented cauldron and a few flasks of miscellaneous ingredients they used for their pranks.

"I figured 'brewing something in the bathroom for the feast' is about what a firstie would expect from the infamous Weasley twins, eh?"

"We're infamous now? When did that happen?" George grabbed the cauldron as his twin hopped out of the portrait behind him.

They both stopped to wink at the Fat Lady as she admonished them to behave.

*** JP ** JP ** JP ***

They stood about ten paces away from the lavatory door, checking their map one last time that their firstie-in-distress was still inside.

Fred started their dialogue, "Come on, quick. This lavatory is always empty."

They bumped the door open and noisily started clanging their props into one of the sinks.

"Did you bring the bat tongue?"

"Of course I did, you nitwit. I wouldn't just forget a key ingredient-" Fred cut off as if he were surprised to hear a sound in the bathroom.

"Is someone there?" he called.

A sniffle and a muffled "don't worry I'm not coming out" came from the stall at the end.

George nodded and both brothers approached the stall.

"That seems to be a rather unfortunate stance. See, we were planning on using this bathroom for nefarious purposes, so anyone in this bathroom needs to be either or a co-conspirator or sworn to secrecy."

"Fred and George?" the shaky voice queried.

"The mysterious lavatory recluse knows us! I told you we were infamous!" Fred trilled.

A choked laugh echoed through the small room.

"Lavatory loner has rather a better ring to it, I reckon," George offered.

There was silence on the other side of the door, followed by more quiet sobs.

George shot a panicked look at his twin.

"Hermione," Fred offered, "what's wrong?"

"You're… right! I am a loner… with no friends but my books! I-I- thought it would be different here, that's I'd have friends…" her words fell away into wracking cries.

"Sometimes we can be loners too. We're a bit of a package deal, you know. I don't think we properly made any friends until after holidays our first year. Too wrapped up in talking to each other," Fred offered.

There was silence from the other side of the door.

"Hermione?"

She still didn't respond.

Fred nodded meaningfully and tilted his head towards the sink.

"Well, I suppose we better finish this prank potion for our pesky younger brother. Then what do you reckon, go to the kitchens and grab some food to take up to the Common Room?"

"Good idea, Gred. I wonder if any Restroom Recluses, Lavatory Loners, or Stall Solitarians would want to join us?"

They worked quietly to whip up an ageing potion; Fred was pretty sure they could get it to localize to only Ron's face, which somehow seemed much funnier than turning all of him into a withered old man.

A click from the other side of the room sounded.

"It's solitudinarian," she offered as she splashed water over her face.

George winked at his brother.

"Well, know that you're out of the lavatory, you're really none of those things. Come on, let's all go to the kitchens, load u on as disgustingly much food as we possibly can, go to the common room, and eat that mound of food," Fred suggested. He swept a dramatic bow and offered his hand to Hermione.

George bumped him with his hip and sketched an ever bigger, more absurd bow. Hermione giggled and grabbed both of their hands.

"What potion did you make?"

"Well, it's mostly an aging potion…" George started as the trio walked out of the tiny girls' lavatory.

**JP ** JP ** JP **

An hour later, Fred and George were busy showing and re-telling their greatest feats to a rapt audience of one, who'd they ensconced in the biggest, comfiest chair in the common room, her lap laden with treats from the House Elves. Their haul was, in fact, the best they'd ever gotten; the elves seemed to love Hermione as much as she'd loved them. She had asked all of their names, how they liked Hogwarts, how they liked baking and cooking, and hugging each of them who brought over food. One of them had even braided her hair.

Fred was just about to launch into one of their crowning achievements-and, coincidentally the reason Professor Snape never turned his back on them in the Potions classroom-when the portrait hole burst open and their classmates poured in, shouting. Percy was trying vainly to impose order on the unruly bunch.

"Did they just say 'troll in the dungeon!'" George gasped. He frantically looked for Lee, who was, fortunately, beelining towards them.

"Where were you guys?" Lee asked, unceremoniously dumping himself onto the floor and digging into the chicken pot pie. "Halloween feast, your favorite? Anyways, interrupted by Quirrell stuttering about a troll in the dungeons! He fainted. Everyone got sent back to their dormitories!"

"Don't the Slytherins live in the dungeons?" Hermione piped in.

Lee looked up from his pie, startled. "Uh, yeah."

The twins immediately burst into laughter.

"I can't-" Fred started.

"-WAIT to see-"

"-you mean HEAR-"

"-how many Howler's from Slytherin parents-"

"-Dumbly will get tomorrow!"

"Half a galleon Malfoy wets his pants," Lee joked.

"Do you reckon his father will hear about that, or will that be the one thing he hides?" Hermione mused.

"I love her!" Lee cackled, "Where did you find her? Is she ours? Can we keep her?"

He gazed at Hermione with big puppy dog eyes, making her giggle again. Fred and George both felt their hearts lift a little; they'd done a good job cheering up the little bullied firstie.

George snapped, "She can be our mascot! We've never had a mascot before!"

"Ooh, I've always wanted a mascot!"

Hermione rolled her eyes but the smile never left her face as she continued munching on her dinner.

** JP ** JP ** JP **

It was almost Christmas-time at Hogwarts. Hermione had sort-of become their little mascot. She was still much of a loner, not making many friends in her year, but she stuck to Fred, George, and Lee like a loyal puppy. She was quick-witted, clever, and extremely loyal. While she didn't seem to relish in pranks the way the boys did, she happily helped brainstorm and troubleshoot spells and potions, especially if it meant learning new, more advanced techniques. She even come out with after hours a handful of times, once even feigning an outburst of tears when they were caught by Professor Sprout; the twins had explained they were looking for her when she hadn't come back to the common room as she tearfully choked up about being chased by Peeves, allowing all of them to get off without detentions or even lost house points. Apparently (Lee had his sources among the first years) she had toned down her aggressive answering in class but the fact that she was now moving on to even more advanced material and spells had not escaped the notice of her classmates or her teachers.

Sitting at the Gryffindor table, Fred looked fondly at the bushy-haired brunette who was whispering furiously with his brother. He's always fancied he and George were excellent big brothers; their foundling sibling Hermione seemed to prove it. He reckoned they were mostly a good influence-she was definitely happier and he personally considered after-hours rule-breaking a formative character-building exercise.

His fond reverie was broken by the voice of Lavatory Brown (Hermione always smothered a grin when he said it): "I mean she's such a boring swot. All she does is read and hang on the third year's coattails. I can't believe they haven't kicked her to the curb yet."

Fred felt his face getting flushed. He immediately glanced at Hermione to see if she'd heard, and saw she was sitting as still as a statue. He was readying a response when he heard his brother pipe up.

"Reckon they just feel bad for her. Or maybe they're experimenting on her for their pranks! Gotta use someone no one will miss…"

"I rather think they'd experiment on you if that was the criterion," Hermione calmly intoned.

Fred and George burst into laughter. Apparently they'd trained her well!

"Aww, Ickle Ronniekins, better try attacking something a little less ferocious next time-"

"-we'd recommend Puffskeins-"

"-they're probably about your speed."

"But don't worry, we still love you! Why we remember when you were just a little tyke…"

"Gah! I get it!" Ron had stood up, face scarlet, and was already stomping away from the table.

"I'm sorry I was mean to your brother," Hermione whispered looking timidly between the twins.

"Don't worry about it! We've adopted you as our little sister, which pretty much makes him your brother too, if my understanding of genealogy doesn't fail me…" Fred replied cheerily.

"Hey! You can't just unilaterally adopt her! What if I wanted to adopt her?" Lee interjected.

"She definitely likes us better," George sniffed.

"Undoubtedly," Fred agreed.

"Hermione?" Lee asked hopefully.

"I would like to announce that I am currently holding auditions and accepting bribes for the position of favorite big brother," she announced grandly.

"Done!" the three third years chorused.