Beta: lj user="emansil_12" /. Thank you very much again, my dear. For everything and for always.

Warnings: Reference to canon death (Fred's),

A/N: Ok, so it looks like I'm still not over Fred's death. Here's me writing yet another fic about characters trying to come to terms with it in another attempt for me to do just that.

Written for the 2014 lj "charlieficathon" fest.

JK Rowling created them all and owns it all and is responsible for killing Fred.

George and Lee fell out of the Floo. Their eyes were dull with dark circles under them. Both of them were pale. Charlie hadn't realised before just how pale black skin could look. George's shoulders drooped and his head hung. Lee watched George the way the family watched him these days: with concern.

Charlie had met Lee a good few times over the years. At school he'd noticed the little black kid hanging round with his baby brothers, but Sixth Years don't have a lot to do with Firsties. Lee got in trouble when the twins got in trouble, and that was a lot of the time. Charlie thought they were funny, but he wasn't about to bail them out and end up in shit himself, so he kept his distance. Over summers at The Burrow Lee became the third twin. Then Charlie left school and home and moved to Romania. Lee had been at Bill's wedding, at The Battle, and at the funeral. Charlie had noticed that Lee had grown up, and he'd liked the way the lad had turned out: smart, funny, handsome and sexy.

When they fell onto his hearth that autumn evening neither Lee nor George looked like much of anything except for worn out. Charlie had made up two camp beds in his sitting room and a hearty stew. Lee had brought butterbeer. They ate and drank and passed around the small talk. Nobody mentioned Fred. They all went to bed.

They moped about his place all week. Neither of them commented on his sporadic shift pattern, simply accepting that sometimes he was home and other times he wasn't. Lee made himself useful setting tables and washing up. He watched George. They both watched George sink further into morose stagnation. When he had a full day off Charlie dragged them all out into sunshine.

George walked ahead as though barely aware of his companions, staring into the spaces around the pine trees without seeing their branches.

"Does he talk to you?" Charlie asked. "About Fred?"

"Don't think he's ready yet," Lee replied.

"He could do with it," Charlie observed. "So could you." He looked into Lee's face, tried to get contact between those deep, dark eyes and his own. "How are you doing? You lost your best friend—"

"Not the same, though, is it? I mean losing a twin—"

"Doesn't mean you're not allowed to mourn your best friend."

"And what about you?" Lee asked, meeting Charlie's gaze. "He was your brother."

"I'm—" Charlie looked away. It wasn't as bad as losing a twin. He couldn't say that now, though. George wasn't ready to talk about Fred so they didn't talk about Fred. "I'll be ok."

They quickened their pace and caught up to George.

The owl came a couple of days later. She flew straight to George who wandered off with his letter into the bedroom, while Charlie fed her a treat and Lee swept up feathers. Lee looked tense, expectant of bad news. George returned with his reply and a fully packed duffel bag across his shoulder.

"It's from Angelina," he said as he attached the reply to the owl. "She wants to talk about Fred." He opened the window. Even if he had been facing him, though, Charlie thought George would still have missed Lee's expression of devastation.

"You're going?" Charlie asked.

George nodded and headed for the Floo.

Lee started ranting as soon as George was gone: "He won't talk to me. All this time. I've been with him full time every minute since. Won't mention his name. What was she to either of them? My best friend, your brother, but we won't do. Fred's on-again, off-again occasional shag? If I had a hot-and-cold, casual boyfriend – and Merlin knows I've never had any other sort – then it wouldn't hurt like this if he'd passed on, not like it does that it's Fred. My best friend. For so long! I mean, I know it's not as bad for me as it is for George. But Angelina? Seriously? His fall-back fuckbuddy for the rare nights when he couldn't pull anyone else?"

Charlie wanted to comfort Lee, but he didn't know him well enough to touch him. He hadn't missed the mention of boyfriends but he wasn't going to read anything into it. Not in the state that Lee was in. It had probably been a slip of the tongue.

"He was your brother, for Merlin's sake!" Lee almost wailed. "But George is going to talk to her!"

"Maybe it's a woman thing," Charlie mumbled and shrugged. "Are you hungry?"

"Where's she been all these weeks? It's been me there with him. Then she sends a fucking owl asking to talk about Fred and George just goes! Weeks without saying his name!"

"A drink?"

Lee collapsed into a chair with his head between his hands. "Thanks. A drink. Anything. Thanks."

When Charlie handed Lee the Firewhiskey, Lee said much more quietly: "I know that's not the point. I'm not being fair. It's what's good for George that matters."

"It hurts, though. Hurts me too."

"I lie there across from him all night, just watching him. Sometimes I freak myself out thinking he's Fred."

"All night?"

"Haven't slept since it happened. I'll be alright. George sleeps, that's what matters."

"Maybe a night off? With him not here, you'll be able to relax?"

Lee shrugged. "Hope so."

The next morning, though, Lee's eyes were as red-rimmed and dark-ringed as ever. That evening Charlie plied him with drink and filled him with food.

"I remember Mum bringing these bundles back from St Mungo's, two armfuls with a shock of red hair each," he began. "Even she couldn't tell them apart, but it only took me a few months. Fred was the reckless one; it was in his eyes even when he wasn't pushing over Percy's brick towers."

"I never understood that: the people who couldn't tell them apart. I knew it was Fred who'd shoved a Bowtruckle into my dread that first day and George who'd given it away because he couldn't stop laughing."

"What did you do?"

"Filled his bed with frogspawn."

"I meant about the Bowtruckle… never mind."

"By the first Friday all three of us were up in front of McGonagall blaming each other for the damage the wet-start fireworks had done to a passageway we weren't even supposed to know about."

Charlie laughed. "Friends for life."

"After that we had to be. Can't imagine school without Fred. It would have been dead boring. I mean, it was me and George who worked out the details and got in the supplies, but more often than not it was Fred's ideas. When I came out it was water off a duck's back. 'All the more girls for us', Fred said. He never covered up in the shower once he knew like the other lads did. Same with my skin colour and my blood status. No problem; get on with it."

They must have mentioned it when Lee came out, told him that their big brother was gay, too. They'd been the same with him, they'd rushed off to finish their game of mountaineering up the bookcase as soon as he'd stopped talking and after that they'd treated him the same as they ever had.

"Don't suppose you know which one of them it was who blew a hole through Dad's Encyclopedia Wizmagica do you? They closed ranks, Mum had to punish them both."

Lee laughed. "Percy never let them forget that one! Centaurs to Goblin Silver wasn't it?"

"It was a couple of volumes, quite near the beginning, so that sounds right. Couldn't be fixed either. Mum blew another fit when Fred suggested they sneak into Flourish and Blott's and swap them with the whole ones on the shelves." Charlie shook his head. He realised that he was smiling. He had laughed; Lee had laughed. Lee was smiling.

Lee was talking softly. "Did you ever get to see him in a match? Fred wouldn't stop going on about his big brother the Seeker, the Quidditch Captain. He was so keen to impress you with his Quidditch skills. He was going to be the best Beater in the world. According to him, of course, he already was the best before he'd even picked up a Bludger."

They talked into the night and when Charlie wished Lee a 'good sleep', Lee replied that he'd got a full belly, and empty head and more alcohol than blood, so he fucking well hoped he'd sleep.

Charlie woke dehydrated in the night and found Lee already in the kitchen. Charlie drank water.

Lee said, "I just lie there thinking about him and I don't drop off."

"Tomorrow we should get out of the cabin, get some fresh air, do something," Charlie suggested.

"I've eaten enough of your cooking. It's time I paid you back. When your shift finishes we'll go out for a meal; I'm paying."

They talked about Fred again in the restaurant and they talked about George: how worried they'd both been, when he might be coming back, what he might be doing. They drank nice wine. There was a candle on the table.

"This could almost be a date," Charlie observed.

Lee laughed. "Yeah, mate. Right."

"Why not? We've got all the ingredients."

"Could be if you weren't straight!" Lee grinned at Charlie.

Charlie was stunned. "Straight?" That big 'coming out' speech to his family which had been so important to him had mattered too little to the twins for them to mention it to their best friend? Their gay best friend? "I'm not straight. Not even slightly."

Lee's brow furrowed. He stared into his wine. He was probably thinking something similar to what Charlie was thinking. After a few minutes, he looked up. "Could be then." He shrugged.

They continued as before, except that they both stole glances when they thought the other wasn't looking.

Finally, after Lee had paid the bill, Charlie asked in what he hoped was a flirtatious tone, "So, how far do you usually go on a first date?"

"I keep promising myself I'll hold out until the third date before I go all the way," Lee said. "But I never muster the will power."

"I hope tonight's not going to be the one time you find that self-discipline," Charlie said , slipping an arm round Lee's waist as they walked home.

Lee chuckled and he didn't pull away. They started kissing at Charlie's front door which he unlocked with Lee's hand on his arse. He hurried into his kitchen all ready to pull Lee inside after him, but he found it occupied.

A tall, solemn-faced girl with braided hair sat on a stool by the window. George stood next to her.

"Hi Ang," Lee said behind Charlie, his voice tight.

"I'm sorry," George said.

"We weren't doing—" Charlie started.

"I wasn't thinking. I just dumped Lee here, landed you with a guest you barely know, stranded him."

"That's ok. Lee's ok."

"Good." George nodded. "He's great. He's been looking after me, watching over me. I've been ungrateful."

"It was a bad time," Lee mumbled.

"We've been talking. Me and Angelina. We talked a lot. We should all talk. I need to see Mum and Dad, too. They lost a son. I've been so wrapped up in myself, I didn't think about them."

"They understand," Charlie said. "They've been worried about you. It's not the same for the rest of us. Twins…" He shrugged.

"But he was your brother." George turned to Angelina. "He meant a lot to a lot of people. Isn't that right? That's it isn't it?"

"You're not alone." She squeezed George's hand.

"I keep reliving his last moment, that hex, the falling stone—"

Angelina stroked George's arm. "He wants to go through it with everyone who cared about Fred. Catharsis."

So they sat round the kitchen table. Angelina and George sat close; Charlie and Lee kept looking at each other over the table. It was an important night, a good night, but it hadn't been the night Charlie had had in mind. He felt he had to offer his own bed to Angelina out of gallantry. George and Lee went back on their camp beds. Charlie transfigured a couple of chairs for himself.

George assumed that Lee was going to go to The Burrow with him and Angelina the next morning. Lee hesitated. He looked at Charlie, but Charlie couldn't say anything. George was the one who needed to be looked after.

It was Angelina who noticed Lee's reluctance. "You tired?" she asked him.

He nodded. "I'll follow you in a few hours."

George took hold of Lee's collar. "You know what we need?"

Lee shook his head, looking wary.

"A night in the Hog's Head. One of our long, late, notorious ones. With drinking games."

Lee laughed. "Maybe not tonight, though, eh? Maybe a few quiet beers in the Leaky. A proper chat."

"Absolutely spot on as usual, Mr Jordan!"

"We have a plan? Seven o'clock? You'll be alright on Diagon Alley? People might say…" Lee trailed off.

"Got to face them sometime. Yeah. I'll meet you there so I can't wimp out and make you stay in drinking with me instead. Seven at the Leaky." George patted Lee on the back.

Lee and Charlie watched George and Angelina Floo away.

"Couldn't leave now, could I?" Lee asked, still looking into the flames. He turned to Charlie, "Got to finish that first date or we won't be able to have the second."

"I definitely want at least a second," Charlie heard himself saying. "More after that, too."

"Now, where were we?"

Charlie moved towards Lee. He held his face. "Well, I remember we'd got to this part." He kissed Lee.

Lee kissed back. He wrapped his strong arms round Charlie's broad back. They pressed together, legs pushing between legs. Charlie pushed his hands up into Lee's thick, soft dreadlocks, grasping them, pulling Lee closer.

Lee backed Charlie against the fireplace, making him yelp at the singe to his calves.

"There's a bed. Let's use my bed," Charlie suggested.

"But Ang was in it. It'll smell of girl."

"Couple of freshening charms—"

"Don't want to wait."

"So much comfier." Charlie pulled Lee into his room.

They slung a freshening charm each at the bed as they undressed each other, then fell onto it. Lee's dark, muscular thighs encircled Charlie's pale hips. They gripped each other's shoulders hard and frotted against each other.

"All night…" Lee grunted. "I lay there all night thinking… about… about this, you… so many different things we'd do—not going to last, though."

Charlie nibbled softly on Lee's earlobe before whispering, "Plenty of time for all that on all the other dates." He surprised himself by how breathless a rasp his voice was.

They moved in tandem to urgent, breathless climaxes, followed by soft, gentle kisses as they lay together. Charlie sat up so that he could look down at Lee. Lee's eyes were closed. His dreadlocks lay askew across Charlie's orange pillow. Sweat glistened on his dark skin, highlighting the perfect contours of his muscles, the dip of his belly, the juts of his hipbones. It clung with the come to his black curls of body hair. His chest rose and fell, rose and fell. Charlie realised that Lee was asleep. He lay down beside him and pulled the blankets up over them both.

Lee slept all that morning. Hunger woke Charlie at lunchtime and he prepared a tray for two and brought it back to bed, but still Lee slept on. Charlie pottered about quietly, putting the camp beds away, cleaning up his cabin, preparing supper. He was working the dawn shift so he settled back into the bed in the late afternoon and drifted back to sleep again beside Lee's relaxed form.

He was woken by a Floo whoosh and a called out, "Hey! Is Lee still here? I tried his place. I need to find him, I can't—"

Charlie just had time to adjust the blankets for modesty's sake before an agitated George appeared in his bedroom doorway.

"I can't face—oh." George deflated further, taking in the scene on the bed. "Right," he said.

Charlie waited, frozen and struck dumb, waiting for his brother's reaction. Beside him, Lee stirred finally and rubbed his eyes groggily as he sat up. Charlie decided that their nudity would be better covered if he sat, too.

"George," Lee croaked. "I thought we were meeting later. What time is it?" he stopped for a moment in slow, drowsy thought, then turned to Charlie. "Did I sleep?"

Charlie felt an uncontrollable, fond smile take over his face. He nodded.

"Brilliant," Lee croaked.

"I came to say that I can't face it. I thought you'd be back at your flat, but I can see—" George took a deep breath. "The Leaky, it'll be full of people we know. They'll ask, or they'll say something, or they won't, they'll just look and, oh Lee! I thought I could but I can't. I thought we could get a quiet drink at your flat instead, but you're—"

"Don't worry about it, mate. Step at a time," Lee said.

George stood in the doorway, on the threshold, not coming any closer, looking at the two of them and then looking away. He said, "I expect you're wondering why we never said. Well, we never told either of you that you were both—We discussed it and we decided not to."

Charlie and Lee both made noises like "Eh?" or "Huh?" and they leaned forward, closer to George. There was no need to ask who he meant by 'we'. The twins.

"Because we knew that this would happen," he waved a hand towards the bed. "When you came out to us, Lee, we knew that if we'd told you that our cool, Quidditch Captain, Dragon-wrangling big brother was gay too, then you'd have wanted to—" he indicated the two of them in the bed together again.

"George!" Lee exclaimed. "I was twelve!"

"Well, maybe not— exactly that..."

"And?" Charlie asked. "I mean, not all gay men jump into bed with all the other gay men, so why were you convinced that—? But then anyway why go to such lengths to prevent—well, this?"

"Lee was iour/i best friend! We didn't want him to like you better than us!" George stopped as though becoming as aware of the whine in his voice as Charlie was. "Oh, Merlin! We were twelve." He took a deep breath. "But once we'd decided. Well, we couldn't back down. Could we? We couldn't change it?" He shuffled backwards. "I'll go."

"I thought we were going for a drink?" Lee asked.

"But don't you want to…"

"I've got work early. I have to be in the pens before sunrise," Charlie said.

Lee pushed back the blanket and got out of bed. George spun full circle to face away from his nudity; Charlie indulged in some staring. That was one fine body he'd got himself access to. Lee tutted at both of their reactions, before grinning and offering Charlie a few poses.

"How dilapidated is my flat looking now?" he asked George as he hunted for his clothes around the floor. "It's been months."

"Looks ok from the outside. And I peered in some windows. You appear to have left some slices of green fur in pizza boxes on the coffee table and a pint mug of cheese in grey water."

"Yeah, that was for some good reason apart from me being a slob." Lee nodded.

"Right. I knew that. But apart from them it looks habitable."

"Circe! I don't envy you the smell," Charlie lay back down.

"I'm great at freshening spells, though, aren't I?" Lee grinned and winked at Charlie.

Charlie couldn't stop himself from grinning back. They looked at one another. Charlie said softly, "Tomorrow come back here?"

"Second date. Wouldn't miss it," Lee replied.