[I've written scarily little lately. o_O But, here's a Harry Potter fanfic from a few months ago. Contains Deathly Hallows spoilers.]
"Although you've left, the light's still on..."
George hunched his shoulders and turned away from the slow, mellow voice. Music didn't help. Silence didn't help. The only thing that would help was death itself, but he wished for this scene to never repeat, even without him in it.
He watched the huddle of people milling around the coffin. They were a mass of bowed heads and flapping black robes. They wanted to go nearer, but they wanted to stay away. They wanted to believe Fred would get up and laugh again--but they knew he wouldn't, and they knew that if someone so full of life could be gone, Death was counting their breaths as well.
"...there's no other light, there'll never be dawn..."
Celestina Warbeck's voice faded as George walked further from the gathering. The last of the sun's light was bleeding away. The clouds near the horizon were magnificently crimson and gold--they'd draped Gryffindor banners all over the walls and brought butterbeers from the kitchen and--
He stopped himself. He knew he couldn't spend the rest of his life slipping between reality and reverie.
"You could choose to stick with reverie and live in St. Mungo's, you know."
Without blinking, George turned his head. He found Fred standing beside him, as had so often happened in the week since his death. He wasn't a ghost; he looked as vivid and solid as he had in real life. The corners of his mouth were twitching and his eyes twinkled.
George said nothing. As with the living Fred, he didn't need to speak for his brother to know what he was thinking.
"If all you're gong to do is stare, you may as well look at a mirror," said Fred. "Look," he continued after a pause, a crease forming on his brow, "I need to know you'll be alright."
"I won't." George's voice, lately unused, sounded dry and empty.
"You have to," said Fred. "It's bad enough they lost me--if you give up, they may as well move to Azkaban for all the fun they'll have."
George managed to coax a smile onto his own face.
"That's better," said Fred. He beamed. "Besides, there are just as many of us as there were before."
"George?" said a voice behind him. He glanced over his shoulder and saw Percy, looking concerned. He realized what Fred had meant.
"I'm not going back there," George said. He turned away again. Fred had , of course, disappeared.
"Neither am I," said Percy. "Shall we walk?"
George wordlessly consented and followed his brother. Day was gone, now, except for a wistful reddish glow. The wind buffeted his hair and coldly caressed his spine. The hills in the dark were like the backs of sleeping dragons.
He felt Percy grasp his arm above the elbow. It was a reassuring, grounding feeling, like the moment of transition between nebulous half-dreams and full wakefulness. He remembered Percy's warm, pudgy hand, hauling him away as Ron cried and Fred laughed at the spider that had been a teddy bear--
"I'm glad he forgave me," said Percy, his voice uncharacteristically gruff, jolting George back.
"He was glad you came back."
"Was he really? I felt sure he wouldn't have minded never seeing me again."
"Well he wasn't pining for you, but..." George's voice trailed off.
Percy seemed to laugh, but it sounded more like he was being strangled.
"That's pathetic!" said a genuinely laughing voice on George's other side.
"Look, check the top cupboard in the kitchen, by the window," said Fred. George did not turn to face him, but could still see him in the corner of his eye. "You'll find something. We can't do this forever." And he was gone again.
George and Percy had walked in a broad circle and were nearing the Burrow. They could now see the gathering at a distance. The group was sitting down, except for Mr. Weasley, who stood on a podium and spoke.
"Should we join them?" whispered Percy.
"There's something I need to see," said George, and he moved towards the house a little faster. Percy paused, but continued following his brother.
George flung open the back door of the Burrow and marched to the kitchen. The room that had once been warm and full of life was now vacant and unnaturally tidy. He kept his gaze away from the table, especially the two spots that he and his twin had always occupied. He reached out and gripped the handle of the top cupboard by the window; he held it hard, numb to the way its metal notches bit his fingers.
Slowly, he opened it. Inside was a stack of scrolls and oddments, but he knew at once what Fred had sent him to see. He recognized the wide, flat shape of the clock that had once been a permanent resident of the wall. He pulled it out gradually, a little fearfully, almost reverently.
It had only eight hands. George heard Percy exhale and turn away, but George leaned closer. The hand marked "Fred" was gone, but so was the one marked "George". Instead there was a new hand: "Gred and Forge". As he watched, it swayed from "traveling" to "home".
Although he had spent the preceding seven days in a mist of coldness and disconnect , he felt a little of his former life seeping back. He knew it would be decades before his saw his cohort, confidante, and closest friend again--but he knew he would see him again. In the meantime, he would make do with the elusive but steadfast bridge that had always joined their hearts, and was now a deep and unshakable part of his own.
He raised his eyes and saw the scene he had walked away from. They were no longer just bowed heads and flapping black robes: they were Ginny and Fleur, embracing for the first time in their lives; they were Andromeda gently rocking Teddy in her arms; they were his brothers, their shoulders shaking and their faces pale.
Warbeck had been wrong; there would always be dawn. The night could be long and torturous, but nothing it could do would stop the sun from rising.
"Come on, Perce," George said. He put the clock away again, and draped his arm over his brother's shoulders.
.
