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‘Oh, mate… well… he was quite old for a hamster.'
'Make him better,’ Fred demanded tearfully, thrusting the very still little ball of fur towards him.
George winced. 'I… think it might be past that. He looks quite stiff…'
'Use magic!'
'It doesn’t work that way.'
'It did for Uncle Harry!’ Fred howled. 'Twice! He says it was love, and I loved Beelzebub a lot!'
'I know you did,’ said George gently. 'And I wish you would all stop asking Uncle Harry about that because I don’t think any of you realise how not normal he is. He’s clearly setting expectations, and it’s not fair on the rest of us mere mortals that can’t pull off a Jesus trick.’
Fred stood there, sobbing, looking faintly ludicrous surrounded by boxes of explosives, brightly coloured costumes, and products that frequently made strange noises. The back office of Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes did not seem like the right kind of place to explain the concept of death to a seven year old, but clearly this was where it was going to have to be.
He pulled his son onto his lap, and let him tuck his head under his chin as he continued to wail. 'He had a good old life, didn’t he?’ said George. 'And it’s not a bad way to go - he couldn’t have asked for more, that hamster. Spoilt rotten, he was.'
Fred cried harder. George tried very hard to think about all the things people had said to him when his brother died, but none of them seemed quite right for such a little boy that had lost his hamster.
'Can’t he come back as a ghost?’ Fred asked. 'A hamster ghost?'
'Well, maybe he could have done, but he decided not to. 'Cos now he can go and be with other hamsters that have gone up to the great running wheel in the sky, rather than being laughed at by other ghosts.’
'Why would they laugh at him? He was really tough.'
'I know, but compared to the Bloody Baron, a hamster ghost is pretty funny.'
'Nothing’s funny anymore,’ said Fred miserably.
'I know it’s not,’ said George. 'But it will be again, a little bit at a time.'
Fred sniffed, still looking down at the, quite dead, hamster in his cupped hands, while George rubbed his back and wondered what else to say.
'No it won’t,’ said Fred stubbornly, sounding strikingly like Angelina. 'No, I’m never going to be happy again. I refuse.'
'Well… OK,’ said George carefully. 'Look - Freddy - ’ He turned his son around, and looked carefully into his coffee-coloured, brown freckled face. 'I know it feels really awful. Really horrible. And it’s not something you can put into words, because even when other people have also lost hamsters, it’s not the same because this was your hamster. And you might feel sad for a while and then gradually feel like you’re better, and then suddenly ages later you might start thinking about hamsters all the time, or you’ll see other people with their hamsters, and you’ll feel sad again and it might feel like you’re going backwards. But you’re not, you’re just learning to live without Beelzebub. And eventually you’ll still feel sad, but it won’t get in the way as much, and you can be happy at the same time.'
'I’ve still got Satan,’ sniffed Fred, wiping his snotty nose on the back of his wrist.
'Yeah, exactly. There you go,’ said George hurriedly, thinking that he probably should have led with, 'you have another hamster’ before talking him through what the process of grief looked like.
'But Beelzebub was my favourite,’ Fred gulped. 'Why did he have to go first?'
'I dunno, mate, there’s a million cheesy sayings I could tell you for that, about the best hamsters being called first or because he packed so much more into his little life or whatever, but honestly sometime’s it’s just bad luck and things are unfair.'
'I don’t know whether to bury him or cremate him,’ Fred suddenly said, seriously.
'I - what? Do you even know what cremation is?'
'Yes,’ said Fred indignantly, looking up at him with watering eyes. 'I’ve been to one.'
'No you haven’t,’ said George, frowning and thinking very hard.
'I have, everyone stood around and watched; there was a fire and a big pole, and the pig rotated-’
'That was a hog roast.'
'Oh.’
'Let’s just bury him this evening, all right? Then I don’t have to save room at dinner. Where do you think he’d like to be buried?'
'In his cage. Beneath the wheel. So Satan can visit him when he wants.'
'I think it’s going to have to be outside somewhere, and we can bring Satan to him,’ said George patiently. 'You can’t get the legally required six foot deep in that cage. How about in the orchard at Nana’s? Then you’ll see him every Sunday, won’t you?'
'Yeah,’ sniffed Fred quietly.
'All right then. I’ll let Nana know. Why don’t you look for a nice box for him?'
'OK.'
George watched his son carefully place the hamster on the desk, slip down off his lap, and hurry across the office, where he promptly stuck his head in the packaging bin and began flinging cardboard boxes around. He was a tough little thing - tougher than George was. He’d be all right.
He really did need to talk to the others about how to explain that Harry was very much the exception to the rule, though.