A/N: This was written as a birthday present for 1917farmgirl, who absolutely adores the twins! And I encourage anyone who loves the twins to stop by and give her wonderful story "Healing" a read and review. It is most excellent!

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Fred Weasley sat on the bare floor of his bedroom, leaning against the wall. He and George had finally finished cleaning their room. It hadn't gone quite as they'd planned, but if they ignored the blankets and pillows strewn about and pretended that the swept pile of broken wood in the corner was invisible, the room was spotless. Their older brother Charlie had told them that when it came to chores, all that really mattered was results. Right now, Fred wasn't so sure about that.

Charlie said that their bulging closet doors proved that Fred and George were brilliant beyond a doubt. No one else (save Mum, of course) could have fit everything they owned into that small of a space. He smiled a little. They'd only had to give away their stuffy frogs and an old set of alphabet blocks – and they would be getting new stuff soon. Maybe Charlie was right, being ten already. Everyone knew that once you turned six, you knew everything (as his brother Percy kept saying over and over and over… not minutes after he turned six, Fred never forgot that). Fred glanced at the clock on his wall, right above where the dresser used to be. In two hours, thirty-seven minutes and twenty-six... no, wait. Twenty-five… four…three… Fred gave up on the seconds as they ticked away. "George, we're almost six!" he announced triumphantly. "Soon it will be all the birthday cake and whipped topping we can eat!"

It wasn't just any kind of whipped topping. No, it was the special Muggle kind that came in those metal cans that said "shake well before opening". Dad had brought one home once and Fred had instantly fallen in love with the loud hissing sound, the way he could aim the nozzle into his dish, and the light, airy clouds of sweetness that covered whatever he sprayed. Dad had promised he'd get more, if they were good boys, and on their birthday, which wasn't much longer. Fred and George had tried to be responsible, cleaning their room the fastest way they knew how. Their original plan had seemed simple enough. Mum muttered those cleaning spells at least a hundred times daily, and with Bill's wand that they'd secretly borrowed while he was out… well, to be fair, Charlie had found it first. He was having trouble waiting another year for his own wand and had to have a look, just a little peek. After he was done, they'd wanted to see it too, promising to put it back…

Fred sat up straight all of a sudden. "You did put it back, didn't you?"

George shifted his legs around, his head still stuck in a book, across the room from his brother. "Yeah. I told you. Right away."

"In the box? With the…"

"Silver latch, in the bottom of his school trunk by the red and gold striped socks, yeah," George confirmed, turning a page.

Fred considered a stray marble that had been forgotten a few feet away, but then thought better of it. Five-year-olds might pitch marbles at their brothers, but if he was going to be six in two hours, thirty-two minutes and forty-two… one… forty… Fred flicked the marble at the wall. Seconds were tricky, he thought as the marble bounced off the wall and flew into another direction entirely, landing on the hard floor and rolling to a stop at his brother's feet.

Mum and Dad had said that if they could be extra good, they might even get to have a pet. All they had to do was keep their room clean (which they had, sort of), start helping around the house and watch their baby sister every once in a while. It wasn't like being five. Six was almost grown up already.

Fred fidgeted with the marble while George sat perfectly still, staring at the pages in his book. The growing-up thing wasn't going to happen for a few more hours. This time, he did flick the marble at his brother.

"Ow!" George finally looked up from his book and rubbed his ear. "What was that for?"

Fred shrugged. George pelted him back with the marble. "Ow, George!" Part of the problem for Fred was that his twin brother had an equally near-perfect aim when it came to flicking marbles. He stuck out his tongue at George and before he knew it, they were tousling on the floor, George's book discarded in the corner.

"Wait, wait!" his brother cried out and all action ceased, mid-tumble.

"What is it?"

"Splinter."

"Let's see it," Fred announced, scooting over to George so he could see. If they were going to have their very own pet, they should be able to handle a splinter. The minutes ticked by as Fred and George, and then George and Fred attempted to get the offending sliver of wood out of George's knee.

"We might have to get Mum," Fred offered.

"No, Fred. We can't! Remember what she said?"

"Oh right." Fred sulked. He'd thought about asking for something furry and soft, but George really wanted a baby dragon. There weren't going to be any pets in their future if they couldn't sit in their room for an hour without getting into trouble. He leaned back against the wall and surveyed the bare room. George scooted next to him, shoving a pillow under his knee and holding his blanket around him for comfort. George was brave, Fred decided. His brother was blinking back little tears, but he was strong, that George.

"Ow," George sniffed. "Being responsible hurts."

Usually, in times like this, Fred would dig a lolly out of his candy stash and offer it to his brother for comfort, but his lolly stash was gone, had been for three days, just like the furniture and all the toys that couldn't fit in the closet – ever since the moment he'd discovered how brilliant he actually was – and George too, because they always did things together.

Fred scooted closer to his brother. He wasn't feeling so brilliant now. They'd made a right mess of things, sneaking that wand, and his brother had gotten hurt. He didn't have a lolly or a bed anymore. But he had an arm, so he patted George on the shoulder.

George sniffed again. "You think Mum will still let us have the whipped topping?"

"Sure she will. It's our birthday!"

They nodded their heads together and Fred looked sideways at the clock. "We'll get that splinter out, and then we'll turn six and everything will be great." They had plenty of time to figure it all out. Two hours, fifteen minutes and six, five, four…

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For the next half hour, Fred and George's room remained surprisingly quiet. So quiet in fact, that it had the rest of the family a little worried. "Alright, boys," Arthur Weasley announced, opening the door to two sulking faces in the corner. "What happened now?" he asked, concerned for his birthday boys who were ordinarily anything but sulky.

"Splinter," Fred said before his brother could shush him. Arthur stooped down, drew his wand and muttered something under his breath and George's knee was all better.

"Thanks Dad!" Arthur got two arms around his neck, dragging him to the floor.

"Why didn't you tell Mum about this?" he asked, frowning at the twins.

George scrunched up his face. "We thought she'd be mad at us for getting into more trouble."

Arthur chuckled. "Boys, you're not in any trouble. Besides, your mum's not mad. She's…" His words were interrupted by the clanging of pots and pans downstairs. He cleared his throat and continued. "She's just busy in the kitchen."

Their faces weren't convinced, still a little droopy. "Look, first magic is often tricky," he explained to them. "We never know how it's going to come out. We're just happy the two of you weren't hurt. Now step aside. Your presents are here."

Arthur tucked his wand away and motioned through the door as Fred and George's older brothers lugged the biggest box they'd ever seen into their room, followed by several more boxes. Charlie and Bill grunted as they put down the box and Percy slunk in behind them with a large sheaf of parchment. "Why do I have to carry it? Shouldn't they have to help?" Arthur's stern look shushed him as he placed the thick stack in his father's hands. Pretty soon, little Ronnie came in too, followed by their baby sister. "I wanna see!"

Arthur shooed the rest of the family back down the stairs and directed the delivery men up with an even bigger box than before. Charlie took little Ronnie's hand and led him away while Bill scooped up the baby. "Not a baby! I'm two-oo!" shrieked Ginny as Bill threw her over his shoulder. "That's right Ginny, and I'm eleventy-one!" he told her as he carried her off. Percy's complaints could still be heard one flight down. "I never got anything that big for my birthday!"

Arthur had paid extra for the special non-magical home delivery – he smiled at the intriguing Muggle-like tools; frowned at the fact that his twins had slept on the floor for three nights, frowned more as he signed the sales slip, and slipped back into a smile at the explosive way the twins had discovered their magic.

He could recall each of his older sons' discoveries with clarity – his oldest, Bill had been levitating three feet above his bed in his sleep when Molly had gone in to wake him on his eighth birthday. Charlie had been eight as well when he reported that his Chuddley Cannons action figures were arguing failed plays with their rivals on the poster across the room. Percy's toy broom had chased him madly around the house at age seven and a half. Arthur chuckled at how it had taken over an hour for his more excitable son to calm down. The poor boy still slept with the broom outside his door.

Fred and George had been three days shy of their sixth birthday. Being the most unpredictable of his children (and the most precocious: having learned to read so early was both a blessing and a daily trial), they had somehow managed to have all their bedroom furniture simultaneously explode and, with the exception of the splinter this morning, had miraculously remained unharmed in the process. His smile grew as he recalled them wide-eyed and giggling in the middle of all the splintered wood… and then faded as he began to read the assembly instructions.

The spell-resistant furniture had to be manually assembled in order to maintain its integrity, which was going to take longer than he'd expected. He flipped to the second page, and then the third. The diagrams were tricky and the text wasn't clear. He'd been told by the store manager that the instructions were originally written by Nordic Elves. Obviously something had been lost in the translation.

"Can we help?" Two sets of hopeful eyes peeked up over the largest box in the room. Even Percy had come back in, too curious to stay away.

"We're good with tools!" George chimed in.

"And we can read, see?" Fred scrambled around the box to stand in front of his father. "Uncle Merlin's Perpetual…"

"Spell-resistant, anti-charm features…" interrupted his brother.

"Do we have an Uncle Merlin?" Fred scratched his head.

"…prevents spontaneous underage…"

"… magically advanced…."

"Accidental…"

"Ten year warrantee!" Fred exclaimed, reaching the end of his multisyllabic babble.

George looked at his brother, then back at Arthur. "It said 'magically advanced'. Does that mean we're brilliant?"

"Of course you are." Arthur grinned down at his twins. All of his children were brilliant.

Fred jumped up and down. "Does it fly?"

"Is it blue?"

"Can we eat it?"

Arthur steered Fred and George away from the boxes and into the doorway. "It's your new bed boys, and you'd better go downstairs while I put it together." He could imagine all sorts of unhappy accidents with Fred and George in the room trying to help assemble the monstrosity. "And stay out of your mother's way. Don't touch your cake; she's been working on it all morning."

Their faces fell. "What are we supposed to do then?" asked George.

"Go play with Percy." Percy gave him a horrified look and the twins put on their almost-six pouty faces.

"Do we have to?" whined George. "It's our birthday."

"Yes," Arthur said, trying to sound grave. "You're all brothers, even on your birthday." If anyone could keep the twins out of trouble, it was Percy.

The brothers three sulked as they left the room and Arthur heard the twins' exuberance return moments later. "Hey Percy! Wanna see a marble trick?"

"Ow Fred! That's my ear!"

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One hour, nine minutes and countless seconds to go, Fred and George bellied up under the living room couch, charged by Percy with watching little Ronnie while their baby sister napped in her playpen in the next room. It wasn't so much that they had to watch their little brother, as it was having to watch him abuse their old toys.

"On our birthday even!"

"Well, we are almost six."

"I guess that means we're old enough to be in charge."

"Not for another hour."

"Yeah."

Ronnie had nine blocks high now, and instead of reveling in his architectural accomplishment, the three-year-old knocked them over in a flurry of hands and feet and giggled.

"He's not so brilliant," George snickered.

Fred nodded. "Not like us. We'd have had the tower up to eleven blocks by now, even at his age."

"Maybe you don't get brilliant until you're six."

"Almost."

"Almost, yeah."

Ronnie's tower was now ten blocks high, this time pummeled by a toy broom.

"Watch it, Ronnie! Don't break that broom. It was my favorite!"

Arthur came downstairs unrolling his sleeves and looking a little frustrated, and then brightened at his youngest boy in the living room. "Alright, Ronnie." He snatched the giggling boy off the floor and lifted him high in the air. "Bed's done. Let's go find your mum and see how she's getting along."

"Whee!" said Ronnie as they disappeared out the back door.

A full minute ticked by and no one else came in or out of the room. "Did he see us?" George asked.

"Usually does."

"Not this time."

"Huh."

They crawled out from under the couch and sat on the floor in silence. Fred looked at the living room clock and sighed. He hadn't expected to be forgotten. Everyone else was busy and no one came in to ask them to help. If Charlie had said they were brilliant and Dad thought they were too…

His face brightened. "Let's go be responsible!"

George giggled. "Right. I still want a baby dragon."

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Fred scrambled to his feet and followed his brother into the kitchen. He dragged a stool over to the sink and clambered up. Outside the kitchen window, his eyes widened at the picnic table set up with streamers and balloons. Mum bustled around, pointing fingers at Charlie and Percy. Bill was probably out there somewhere. Fred nodded to himself. He really wanted to help too, even if it meant being ignored once in a while.

Fred looked around at the pots and pans in the sink. The birthday cake sat on the counter in its three-tier majesty. A pitcher of lemonade was at the ready as well. And there stood two cans of whipped topping, just like his dad had promised. He knew what to do with those! Fred grabbed one and hopped off the stool.

George got up on the stool next and turned on the water. "I'll wash the pots and pans. You dry."

"Alright."

"Help!" Ginny said, looking up brightly from her playpen.

"Babies can't help, Ginny," George said from the sink.

"Not a baby!" she said, firmly stamping her foot, looking quite put out at being penned up. Then she started to wail.

"What do we do?" asked Fred.

George turned the water off. "Mum sings."

George and Fred tried a few nursery rhymes, slightly off-key, and were promptly rewarded with a pelting of stuffed frogs.

"What about a story?" Fred suggested.

"Once upon a time…" chorused the twins, whose efforts were paid in another pelting, this time with a fuzzy bunny.

"Oi, sis. That was my favorite stuffy until three days ago!" squeaked Fred.

"Out!" Ginny demanded.

"Look," George said, trying to be stern like Bill, "even if we wanted to, Mum says not to pick you up."

"Yeah," Fred added. "And babies are supposed to be…"

"Not a baby!" shouted Ginny, her little face turning pink.

Fred didn't want his baby sister to start yelling. When she yelled, her face turned red like a cherry and she got really, really loud. Besides, if the baby exploded while he was in charge, he'd never get a baby dragon. "Here, Ginny. You can help."

Ginny's face brightened immediately as Fred handed her the two cans of whipped topping. "Help!" She giggled.

"It says to shake well. Can you do that? Shakey shakey!" Fred waved his arms about. Ginny got the idea and started shaking the cans.

George was done with the pans. "You dry them and put them away. I'll start on the pots."

It took a little while, but Fred finally managed to get the pans and the pots into the cabinet under the sink. The stack wobbled a bit, with the round pan on the bottom, followed by a square pan, a 3-litre pot and then another pan on top of that, but when the cabinet door was closed, no one would be able to tell. "There." He was very proud. And responsible. "Should we mop the floor?" Fred opened up the cupboard and stood on his tiptoes to get the kitchen rags down. They were definitely brilliant now.

All of a sudden, they heard two distinct "pops" from behind them and a loud hissing sound, followed by Ginny's giggling. Fred and George both froze. "Uh oh," the twins said to each other. Together they turned to see Ginny empty the contents of the spray cans all over her playpen.

"Snow!" squealed Ginny, clapping her cream-covered hands together gleefully. Fred grabbed the kitchen rags and frantically wiped at the floor where the white cream had run out of the pen. They might have time to fix it before the party, maybe. "Quick, George. Grab something and wipe!" He looked over at his brother who was staring forlornly at the mess. Then he glanced over at the clock and stopped too. He wanted to cry. The kitchen was messier than it had been when they started, and Ginny was covered in their whipped topping. It was going to be the worst birthday ever in three, two, one…

Percy bolted through the back door just as the clock struck noon. "Mum sent me in for the pitcher of lemonaaaayy…." He sputtered, slipped in the cream and skidded across the floor. He spun around once and landed on his bum, sliding backwards in front of the playpen full of frothy goodness with a delighted Ginny chanting "Snow! Snow!" and landed with a thunk against the kitchen sink cabinet.

"Are you…" George was interrupted by a loud crash from inside the cabinet. "…alright?" Fred finished for him.

Percy had a big scowl on his face, which turned to absolute horror as the three brothers watched the pitcher of lemonade teeter over the side of the counter… and then magically right itself on the counter.

"Everything alright in here?" Arthur asked, poking his head into the kitchen. "What on earth have you boys been up to?"

Fred and George looked at each other helplessly.

"Err…" Fred began.

"We were washing up?" George offered.

"We didn't touch the cake!" Fred nodded, bobbing his head up and down. "And whipped cream is edible…" he added, as little Ginny attempted to stick her fist into her mouth.

By this time, Bill and Charlie had come around the corner to see what all the commotion was about and were trying not to laugh... Percy had gotten up by then and was wiping himself off with the kitchen rags. "I only came in to get the lemonade for Mum," he complained. "And they… they…" he didn't know how to finish as his scowl was slipping. Even little Ronnie was giggling now.

"Go on then and bring out the lemonade." Arthur suggested. "It's time for the party and your Aunt Muriel is thirsty." He flicked his wand at the floor and muttered one of Mum's cleaning charms. Then he scooped up Ginny from her "snow". "We'll get you cleaned up and celebrate a birthday, won't we?"

Fred and George stared forlornly after their brothers and dad after they left to go outside. "We tried to be responsible." Fred sighed. "But I don't think we're getting that baby dragon."

"I guess we're not brilliant enough," George said behind him.

The mop went swish swish in the background. There was hardly any whipped topping left in the kitchen. In a few minutes, it would all be gone. None left for the cake. Fred sulked. That would have been the best part. As they dragged their feet out of the kitchen, Bill came back in and passed them in the hall, giving them two thumbs up. What was that for? Then Charlie came around the corner and pulled them aside.

"Here," he said, handing them a shoe box. "This is a present from me to you." Fred and George looked up at their older brother. "A present?" Fred gulped. When he peeked inside the box, he gasped. "Look George! Chuddley Cannons action figures!" Then he looked up at his brother Charlie. "But these are yours."

"Now they belong to you two. You lot are so lucky to be born on April first. I can't wait to see what prank you come up with next year." He winked. "And if you let me in on it, I'll help! Happy April Fool's!" Then he walked outside.

Was that why no one had gotten mad? Fred couldn't believe it. Maybe he'd been trying too hard. And maybe, just maybe they'd found something better to do than take care of a baby dragon.

Fred and George looked at each other incredulously. Then George snorted. "You mean we get to make messes and blow up furniture on our birthday and everyone thinks it's funny?" They both broke out into huge grins, the kind of grins that only six-year-old boys can make.

"Brilliant!"