When George Weasley decided to propose to Angelina Johnson, there were some things that he was a hundred percent positive about. Chief among these was that he loved her.
Then there were the things that he was almost, but not entirely, sure of. Namely, her love for him. Oh, he knew she loved him – she told him so nearly every day. But there was always that little voice in the back of his mind saying that it wasn’t enough, that he was moving too fast, that she’d say no.
And then there were the things that really had him worried, the things where he simply had no clue. Things like how Angelina would fit in with the family.
It was a real concern. True, she had met them all, and true, they all seemed to like her. But George couldn’t help remembering that the first time she had been introduced to his parents it was as Fred’s girlfriend.
They had made their piece with that, put it behind them. It was Fred who had first drawn them together and George liked to think that his twin would be happy for them. Whether his mum would be pleased was another matter entirely.
And then there was the sheer number of relatives. Not all of his siblings were married, but even so, the Weasley clan was pretty big. And they were picky. George could still remember the hell they had put Fleur through, and even though that had worked out, he didn’t want to put Angelina through that. And that was just his immediate family. With the Weasleys suddenly finding themselves famous at the end of the war, huge waves of Weasley and Prewett cousins began to appear, all eager to be part of the family. The Weasleys being who they were, everyone was welcomed with open arms.
It was a lot to take in, and George couldn’t stop thinking about it in the hours before his date with Angelina. A thousand doubts assailed him, but in the end, it was all for naught.
Because of course Angelina said yes, and of course the family welcomed her with open arms. Their wedding was a simple jeans-and-a-tee-shirt affair, and if their best man was absent, his presence was clearly felt throughout.
And of course everyone loved Angelina. They would have loved anyone who made George look complete again. They welcomed her with open arms and folded her neatly into the fabric of their lives. But what no one expected was the love that Angelina had for them. She, too, had had a large family before the war. However, many had been killed and most of the rest fled. She threw herself into the Weasley family with gusto, helping Molly in the kitchen, explaining Muggle devices to Arthur (her mother had been muggle born), and generally doing everything she could.
It was Angelina who had understood Molly and Arthur’s loneliness as their children departed and who had come up with a solution. “Why don’t you invite everyone here?” she asked Molly one day as they cooked. “Just open up your house for the last two weeks of summer.”
“They won’t come,” Molly said, shaking her head. “They have their own lives now.”
“They’ll come,” Angelina promised. And come they did. No matter where they lived, the Burrow was home, and the Weasley clan began to gather there every year. It was rare for anyone to stay for the entire time, but for two weeks, the Burrow was once again full of laughter and love.
Time passed, and a new generation of Weasleys began to appear. They grew up spending their summers at the Burrow, relying on their grandparents for everything and anything. Those precious two weeks became the epitome of happiness for those children and eventually they began to bring their friends. It expanded, and Angelina just expanded with it.
There were many things that George Weasley worried about in his life, but as he watched his wife running around his childhood home helping plan for the summer, wondering about how she would fit in with his family was not one of them.
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