N I N E T Y - T H R E E

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On the Sunday after her meeting with Bill, Adeline was preparing herself to visit her family's home for the second time since her family's death. Even though she had been back there once to take care of her parents business on the Muggle end, Adeline still dreaded having to visit the home. Having George, however, was made her feel more prepared to take on seeing it again.

As Adeline hooked her arm with his, George teased, "You need to get your Apparation license one of these days."

"You know bloody well that I'm taking the test in March!" She shot back as she smacked him on the shoulder with her free hand. "And I can do it well enough. I haven't splinched the past few times I've tried."

"And I'm incredibly proud. It is nice to not stitch you up every time you do."

George began to laugh when Adeline elbowed him in the side. "Let's apparate before we get into another argument over my apparition abilities. Do you remember the picture I showed you?"

He nodded, and Adeline braced herself. She had always hated the feeling of Apparition, which was part of the reason she struggled getting to the destination she wanted to. She would become

Even with the pictures she had shown him, George still wasn't prepared for the magnitude of Adeline's family estate. To George, the mansion almost resembled a castle. The enormous home was built with dark gray stones and walls were covered with ivy. Large windows covered the front of the house, but because of the darkness George couldn't see on the inside. Despite the fact that no one was living in the home anymore, the gardens surrounding the estate were still immaculate.

Adeline answered his question about the state of the gardens before he even had to ask it. "The gardeners still come here, along with the rest of the staff."

"You have staff?"

"What? Do you think my parents were getting out in the gardens themselves?" Adeline joked. "The one thing I made sure to do with the house after my parents died was that I kept on all the staff. I set aside a small part of the inheritance to keep them on for at least six months, or whenever they can find a new job. I didn't want them be suddenly out of an income for reasons out of their control. None of them deserve that."

George felt a sudden surge of affection towards his girlfriend and her compassion, and he kissed the side of her head. "C'mon, Addie. Let's go take a look inside."

They walked up to the large front door, and George looked at Adeline and asked, "Do you have a key?"

"Shit," Adeline cursed. "I don't have a key anymore."

George's eyebrows furrowed together, and he looked confused as he gestured to the wand in her hand. "Wait, do you even need a key?"

Adeline let out a loud sigh of defeat, then held up her and wand and muttered, "Alohamora."

George hadn't seen Adeline's family home, besides the time he had showed up in her living room the summer before seventh year. The inside of the house looked nearly as perfect as the outside, if not more. All the furniture and decor were some of the fanciest George had ever seen, and it was in pristine condition. From the elaborate chandelier-like light structure that hung from the ceiling to the ornate white couches, not a single thing had a spec of dust or dirt. George imagined this was what the inside of the house of someone like the Malfoy's looked like.

But, it looked like it hadn't been lived in. There was no sense of home. To George, it almost looked like a museum or a palace. Not a place where people actually lived. It made George appreciate the Burrow even more than he already did. Despite its messiness and how not everything always matched, the Burrow would always be home to George.

Around the foyer, George could see pictures of the family. None of them bore any similarities to the fun, silly photographs George had with his family and friends. Instead, they were formal, stiff portraits of the family members. He recognized her parents from the one time he had encountered them, and there were other people he assumed were family members lining the walls.

George noticed how there wasn't a single photo that included Adeline.

From the picture, George could see that Emily had the same dark curls as Adeline. But, her features were sharper, with high cheekbones and a pointed chin that matched her father's. George wasn't sure it was the features or the expression in her eyes, but Emily's face lacked the same warmth that Adeline's had.

"Let me show you up to my room," Adeline eventually said, breaking George out of his daze. He let Adeline lead him up the staircase and down the hall to her bedroom.

Adeline's childhood bedroom was much larger than any of the bedrooms at the Burrow, and it was the first place in Adeline's home that looked actually lived in.

"Merlin, how many books do you have..." George muttered to himself as he stared at the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves in awe. "How did you even get so many?"

"A combination of factors," Adeline shrugged. "A lot of them I had passed down to me from family members or had gotten as gifts as a child. I did also work in a bookstore during the summers I wasn't at Hogwarts, and I think there might be a few wizarding books hidden in there."

Adeline traced a row of books with her fingers, and she stopped when she reached a specific one. She smiled softly to herself as she pulled out her copy of Matilda from the shelf and showed it to George. "This book was how I first realized something might be 'special' about me."

George walked over to where she was standing and rested his chin on the top of her head. It made him smile to see how worn the copy was. "What's it about?"

"A young girl named Matilda who gets neglected by her family and spends a lot her time alone reading and becoming incredibly intelligent, which her family hates and tries to discourage. She then ends up being enrolled in this school with this terrible headmaster, but a wonderful teacher named Miss Honey who takes Matilda under her wing. While she's at this school, she realizes she is able to move items with her mind," Adeline explained. "When I was little and reading in bed one night, I thought that if I concentrated hard enough, I could move books with my mind like she could. I never thought that it would actually happen."

It made George's heart hurt to hear the similarities between Matilda's and Adeline's lives. "Could I take that book back to the flat with me? For me to read?"

"Take whatever you want. Just tell me and I'll put in my purse," Adeline said with a smile, gesturing to the bag she had put on before her and George apparated to the home. "Hermione taught me about this expandable bag spell. The bag looks normal on the outside, but it can fit a whole room full of stuff in it."

George looked down at the small purse and almost laughed. "It can fit all of these books?"

"Technically, yes. I want to keep all these books, but I'm not going to force them into the small flat. I'll figure out what to do with them another time."

As Adeline chose which books and sentimental items she wanted to take back with her, George wandered around her room to see what else he could discover about Adeline. He was quick to notice her bedside table and the two photographs that sat on it.

One of them was a photograph of her, Estelle, Melanie, and Ophelia on the shore of the Great Lake years ago. It was before Adeline lost her eye, and something in George's chest melted when he saw the large, genuine smile on her face. It was so rare he saw that smile from her anymore. Nowadays, it was often twinged with a hint of sadness or stress from everything going on around them. It was subtle, but George always noticed it.

The second photo was one George recognized. He had never seen it, but the memory played constantly in his mind because it was one of the best nights of his life. The Yule Ball had come to mean so much to George because it was the night he had finally gotten th e courage to tell Adeline how he felt about her.

George felt her stand next to him, and he turned his head to see her peering over his shoulder. "I was wondering where that photo of us went..." Adeline said to herself with a soft smile. "It's one of my favorites."

"Let's put it up in our room," He suggested. She nodded in agreement and tucked both the photo of her and George and the photo of her friends in her bag.

As she did, George spotted an unfamiliar device in the corner of her room. It was a large square contraption with a circular disc in the middle and a needle in the middle. "What's that?" He asked her as he gestured over to it.

"It's a record player." Adeline picked up one her records and explained, "You take one of the record discs, put it on the player, and it plays music. It's similar to those huge machines Professor McGonagall pulled out for Yule Ball practice way back in the day."

"What record discs do you have?"

"I like classical records, maybe a few crooners and oldies. Plus, a bunch of pop albums. My favorite record is my ABBA one. I could give you a real Muggle music education with these."

"What the hell is ABBA?"

Adeline immediately slid the record in her bag. "That's going to be the first record we listen to."

On one of the nearby shelves sat Adeline's old radio. It had been used less and less over the years, especially since Adeline couldn't bring it to Hogwarts with her. Still, she picked up, turned to George, and asked, "Your dad's been tinkering with Muggle radios, right? Plus, aren't you, Fred, and Lee coming up with that radio network to keep people informed during the war if it starts getting worse? We're going to need to distribute a lot more radios."

George thought about it for a moment, then nodded in agreement. As Adeline carefully placed the radio in her bag, she told George, "If your dad wants any Muggle items he can come ransack this house anytime."

"You have no idea what you're asking for with that. Are you sure that's something you want to bring on yourself?"

Adeline laughed. "I'm completely sure."

After they finished sorting through what Adeline wanted to take back to the flat with her, she showed him throughout the house. While he felt lost in the maze that was her home, George would like to hear the stories she would tell

They eventually reached the living room, the one place in her home he had briefly seen a few years before. Adeline muttered a spell and the fire immediately started in the fireplace. She sat down on the couch in front of the fireplace and gestured for him to sit next to her. Once he did, Adeline curled into George's side, and he instinctually wrapped his arms around her.

As she looked around the living room, she admitted, "I never want to live somewhere like this again."

"I'd never want to live somewhere like this either," George agreed. He looked down at her and asked, "Where do you want to live?"

"I want to live somewhere in the countryside. Where we're surrounded by fields that our kids can run around or play Quidditch in, and we can lie down in them at night to look up at the stars or spend our afternoons planting in the garden. Maybe we could even get a few pets: a cat and a couple magical creatures that won't burn down the house. A home that just feels cozy and where the furniture doesn't match entirely, but it still looks perfect to us."

Adeline went quiet for a second as she realized, "I'm saying all of this, and I'm not even asking what you want. Is that something you would even want?"

"Everything you're describing is my dream, Addie," George responded with a grin so wide that it hurt his cheeks. "A dream that I want to live out with you."

There were two words that Adeline had said that George's mind couldn't stop going back to.

Our kids.

George had always known he wanted kids. Even after he teased his younger siblings when he was younger, he would be the first to care for them when they were hurt or injured. As he grew older, George's desire to have kids only grew stronger, especially as his relationship with Adeline grew.

"We've never really talked about kids before," George eventually started, prompting Adeline look up at him. "I know I want kids in the future, and I don't want to have them with anyone else but you."

"I want kids," She agreed, making George's heart soar. "But I can't bring them into a world like this. I don't want children unless You-Know-Who is gone."

George nodded. "I have no idea why my parents had so many kids during the war. I'm so scared of accidentally having a kid and then dying before they can even grow up. Merlin forbid, our kid ends up an orphan."

Adeline didn't say it, but based on the look on her face, George knew that was a fear of hers as well. Both of them were terrified as it was of losing the other in the war: a child would only intensify those fears.

"Just so things are clear," She continued, a small smile growing on her face. "I will not be having seven kids like your mum."

"How would you feel about five?"

Adeline's mouth dropped, and she almost wanted to laugh. "Are you the one pushing them out?" When George went silent and pursed his lips together, Adeline said, "I want three at most. I don't want any more kids than that."

"And that's okay with me. All I really want is to raise kids with you one day, no matter how many we have. I want to build a family with you."

Adeline kissed George's jaw before resting her head on his shoulder. "You really seem like you've thought about this a lot."

He held her even tighter as he responded, "I think a lot about a future after the war. It keeps me wanting to fight when I feel like I'm going to lose hope."

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a/n:

hi guys !!

this chapter ended up being more from george's pov...but i really like that decision ?? it just felt more natural discussing adeline's house from his pov because it was his first time seeing it and understanding even more why adeline is the way that she is.

a huge ice storm hit my area, and i literally haven't left my house for a week. i can't go for a walk because the sidewalks are sheets of ice and ik so many people who have slipped and fallen, and i do NOT want to take that risk. also...started my final semester of college ?? and considering i started this book during my first semester of college that's fucking INSANE to me ?? i cannot believe how quickly the years have flown by.

i hope you all enjoyed the chapter !! leave a vote, comment, and tell me what you think !! have a wonderful day !!

- g ♡