Absit Omen RPG

Frank wasn't sure what to do. Mairead was a Traveller who famously kept strictly to themselves - Mairead seemed to Frank the same way. People would be nicer to her if she wasn't so stand-offish, he was sure. He didn't get her.[1] And now he was worried that Mairead was going to hex Eirene and the whole thing would be blown. He winced and touched Eirene's arm, hoping to draw her away. He offered a truly weak smile to Mairead as he tried to deescalate.

"Good to see you, Mai. Glad you're not - it's good - dancing sounds excellent. Just here to have fun, you know. Music's fire."

He gave another wee tug on Eirene wishing for a drama vanishing spell.

1.	Frank is not well-educated on the oppression and discrimination Travelers face and most of what he knows is based on harmful stereotypes.

Dear Eirene,

It's really great that your internship is going well. I am a little jealous actually because it sounds very interesting and exciting! Things are sometimes very quiet at the apothecary and I can only re-arrange the mushrooms so many times.

Have you considered studying plant and poisonings healing? I found an old book of my mother's about that and have been going through it. I'll bring it with me next time I see you. It's fascinating how many plants out there are just waiting to kill us. Ha ha! My dad's been teaching me to brew a few things. (Nothing deadly, though.)

By the way, my parents were very impressed with you. My dad was insufferable OF COURSE but I could tell he liked you. I wish they wouldn't have acted so surprised though! They treat me like the baby of the family sometimes. You probably understand. I think they'd like it if I ended up with a Healer.

Come visit the apothecary any time. We are open every day except Monday.

Regarding E.L.F - this is astonishing! I thought the curse was impossible to reverse. I wonder why no one has been working on it before now. It seems so obvious. It's the like Ministry has been more concerned with punishing werewolves than helping them. Do you remember Kurby Bagnold? He is a werewolf hunter and a friend of our family. I wonder what he thinks of it. We should definiately tell Zeta.

I'm headed to Diagon Ally for supplies soon. We should go together. Crossing my fingers for your prefect badge soon!

Frank jumped to see Eirene arrive. Summer was hard for relationships and he'd missed her - letters weren't the same as basically getting to be roommates with your best friend like it was at school. Going from seeing each other every day to a few days and miles of parchment had been a shock, but now it was nearly over.

"Eirene, you look great!" he said, having to speak loudly over the crowd. Allura hadn't got nearly the same warmth of greeting from Frank; he had found this last term that he really didn't like her all that much.[1] There wasn't anything he could do about her being there through - he was the one out of place and get the group in trouble so he itched his nose and greeted Tim.

"Really productive," Frank answered regarding how his summer went. "Awesome, I mean. My brother comes here all the time."

But something was wrong with Eirene. Frank followed her gaze. "It's Mairead...!" he gasped matching Eirene's volume but not contempt.

"I heard she transferred to America."

1.	27 Jan 2012 - Rattle Rattle! Hiss!

"I thought Eirene," Frank Sellaphix replied to Noriko Wakahisa. Frank was not yet fifteen. That is to say, he wasn't even half-way through fourteen. If Noriko had nerves about being out on her own for the first time, Frank's had more to do with criminal prosecution.

He'd gotten taller over the summer and even bought some newer smarter clothes that he thought made him look grown. His blonde hair was effortlessly, meticulously shaggy, and he wore a light fashionable scarf over a blazer. His trainers were a pale blue.

"You look nice," he said to Noriko. Leave it to Frank to almost always end up in a social group of girls-slightly-older-than-he-was. It didn't usually bother him, because girls were usually more mature and less gross, but when their chosen activity had an age restriction, it put him into an ethical conundrum.

"I told my parents I was at Fig's," Frank explained. His older brother was nearly twenty, and lived on his own now. They weren't currently getting along, and Frank didn't feel guilty exploiting him for an alibi. "This is the worst thing I've ever done. Didn't Eirene say she was coming?"

He and his girlfriend hadn't seen much of each other over the summer. Both of them were busy with holidays and internships and working the shop, but they'd exchanged many owls.

Though they were both in Ravenclaw, ate three meals a day together, and saw each other every afternoon and evening, and all weekend, Frank and Eirene still found things to say in their intricately folded notes, charmed to protection and written in cipher. They passed them to each other in dead drops and passing in the halls, as if they couldn't simply slide them to each other when they passed the potatoes at supper. One such note follows.

19 Apr 2012

E - I have to admit, I don't have much use for Careers Day as I already know what I'll be doing after Hogwarts, as you know. I'm still going to go, though. Maybe there will be professional potion-makers or herbologists I could learn from. I like Prewett, but he's only a teacher. ( I am making no mention of Malfoy deliberately.) Are you going to talk to the St. Mungo's table? I could go with you. My family supplies dittany to St. Mungo's. - F

Frank stood at the bottom of the stairs, feeling all at once horrified, ashamed, embarrassed, and indignant.

"It's your own fault," he said crossing his arms. He opted to blame Figaro rather than fess up that none of this would have happened if he hadn't stolen the mobile. Figaro ignored him and came down the stairs to head to the back garden once again. The screen was going haywire, but that was typical for muggle electronics when inside the veil of the Sellaphix home's enchantments.

Frank followed at a distance. "Is it broken?" There was a concerned note in his voice now. Figaro continued to ignore him as he approached the fence. Frank kept well out of reach. Figaro and Frank's conflicts had very rarely come to violence, but it had been a long time since Frank had pushed him this far. And in fairness to Frank, the opposite was also true.

The mobile's screen settled down and began to respond to Figaro's taps and swipes. He already had several responses to Frank's messages to the group chat.

There was a photo response from Abby Reid, Anton Schafer and Sasha thought he was drunk at 2pm, and both Sasha and Gris offered advice.[1]

2:12pm, 5 Apr 2012 - Anton
You need help, bro?  Are you really stuck or just drunk?

2:13pm, 5 Apr 2012 - Gris
Lmao. Try Mayo

2:13pm - 5 Apr 2012 - Sasha
Just use a wand to break the railings.
But, are you drunk?  If so, maybe don’t cast by your head
2:13pm - 5 Apr 2012 - Sasha
Do you need me to come over

Fig scrolled up to see what they were all talking about. Typical Frank, utterly incapable of actual nastiness. Fig typed out a quick response.

2:16pm, 5 Apr 2012 - no. frank stole my phone. best he coudl come up with

"Is it broken?" Frank asked again.

Figaro held it up so Frank could see the cracked screen.

"You shouldn't have been such a loser," Frank insisted. "Mirror of Erised revelations are actually really personal and it's not funny to speculate on what someone else saw."

Figaro sighed, irritated by his brother's indignation and headed past Frank back inside. "Merlin, you're sensitive. Why are you so embarrassed about it?"

He was unrepentant, honestly unable to imagine what Frank saw that he'd be so protective about. Figaro was an open book and almost completely shameless.

"I'm not embarrassed, it's just private!" Frank insisted, following.

"Same thing!"

"No, it's not!"

The back door slammed behind Frank who stood behind Figaro who was back at the laundry closet. Figaro sighed again - Frank wasn't going to drop it.

"Look," he began again, to make some attempt at brotherly advice. "I don't know what you saw, but if it's true to you, just bloody own it. If you don't make a big deal about it, no one else will."

Frank frowned and crossed his arms. "That's easy for you to say. No one expects anything out of you. People expect things from me."

Figaro looked over his shoulder at his little brother. His voice had broken over the fall and had shot up a few inches. He wasn't a little kid anymore but Figaro couldn't imagine what pressure he could be under. He sniffed.

"It's true!" Frank insisted. "You can mess up and nobody cares! I have to be perfect because you're a fuck-up! Actually, who cares? Make fun of me all you want, I don't care anymore."

With that Frank stormed off, back up the stairs to their room where he grabbed his things. Presently he stomped back down the stairs to head out the front door.

Figaro called at his back. "Hey! Where are you going?"

"None of your business! And stay out of my room forever!"

1.	Texts provided by the characters' respective writers in the #group_texts channel in Discord.

Frank was the first of the three. His eyes went wide and his stomach did a flip. For some reason, it had not occurred to him until just now that they must all view the Mirror one at a time. Alone. The sudden flush of anxiety and adrenaline felt like a combination of having got his Hogwarts letter and waiting to hear what would happen to his father, like ... sweet doom or bittersweet fate.

He wiped his palms on his shirt and adjusted his bag's strap on his shoulder. He gave a little wave to the other students who were no doubt growing impatient for their turn. Someone coughed, "smellaphix!" but Frank paid the immature nickname no mind. He approached the Mirror which was far bigger up close. It loomed in its ornate dark-wood frame. Frank had to skirt around the velvet rope. There were little brass footprints settled into the marble to show you where to stand. The whole time he approached, he managed to avoid looking into the glass, it wasn't until his feet were positioned that he looked up.

Frank saw ... himself. His outfit, his blonde hair that had been mussed by the professor just now, the brown school bag slung across his chest. Behind his reflection wasn't the grand hall of the museum, but a warm wooden space with the wrought iron balcony winding above - it was his family's shop filled to the brim with all the finest ingredients and potions. His reflection waved at him and Frank couldn't help but smile. It was like a photo, but it was real eye contact. He lifted his hand to wave back, then realized that everyone would see him waving stupidly at a mirror.

He let his hand drop to his bag and only then did he look fully at who was standing next to his happiest reflection. It was another boy that Frank didn't recognize and truth be told Frank would not be able to recognize him if he saw him again, as if he were completely anonymous, as if he only imagined he was seeing him. But he was handsome and Frank felt a fluttering in his stomach. Looking down, he saw they were holding hands.

Frank felt a new pang this time, not of doom, but of unexpected comfort. He didn't know how long he stood there, but presently he was guided gently away to wait on the other side.

Yeah. He needed to come up with something else to tell Eirene.

Frank smiled at Greer encouragingly, feeling a well-up of pride for having successfully included her. There was also a warmth knowing that Greer might understand more than most what it was like, to have had your family messed up by the Ministry. He'd rarely talked about it before, just with Eirene who was of course very kind.

But Eirene - she was sullen again and being rather snippy. Frank couldn't consider that Eirene was one of those people who would ever be unkind to Greer Who'd Been Through So Much, so he couldn't understand why she was acting this way. Frank didn't know what to do about it.

"Eirene has great plans for the summer, actually," Frank prompted. "Right? You were telling me...?"

She'd been excited - maybe talking about that would snap her out of the funk.

Far up ahead, the docent shuffled mirror-viewers away and waved the next group forward. They reset the hour glass and the queue shifted forward. The way the mirror was positioned, it had its back to the queue so that only those who stood before it could see. People close to the front could only crane their necks to see the reactions of the viewer, be it looks of delight, dismay, or confusing.

The Headmaster had to snap his fingers to get the attention of the students behind them who seemed to be distracted from their impatience by the opportunity to socialize. Behind the Headmaster, Frank literaly hopped into the vacated space between the velvet ropes. His stomach, too, jumped in anticipating.

Frank was surprised that Greer had a positive opinion of lawyers. On some level, he and Greer had something in common about lawyers; that for awhile their life had been interrupted by too many meetings, and ultimately, their families pulled apart by Ministry lawyers' interference.

"Who was your lawyer?" he asked, perhaps too directly. There probably wasn't anyone at school who knew all the details of Greer's removal from her family, but pieces of the story got around.

"Was it Ms Crowe? She's our family's lawyer. She got my dad out of Azkaban. She's weird, but quite agreeable, actually."

It was common knowledge that Frank and Figaro's father had been to prison as it had been in the paper a few years ago.

Eirene had a ten-year plan? It hadn't occurred to Frank that you could have one of those so he certainly hadn't put one together. For a moment his future flashed in his mind, all fog and flashes of indistinct light; he quickly shook away the feeling. He'd be like Eirene. He'd make a ten-year plan, maybe when he got home.

"Thanks. My dad," Frank said regarding the peanut brittle, proud to hear that Greer liked it, Greer who never liked anything. Maybe she was starting to have a little fun after everything she'd been through, which was good for her. Eirene, on the other hand, hadn't taken any of the peanut brittle. It was probably because she was so focused.

"My dad and I are the cooks in the family, actually." Figaro mostly ate cheese from what Frank could tell.

"But, I thought the essay was supposed to be about history of it or how it's enchanted, depending." Depending if you wanted credit for History of Magic or Charms class. "I'll do both probably, because why not? Did you know the inscription - you know, the backwards writing at the top - apparently that's not original? The whole frame is relatively recent, from when it came to England, actually." (He'd read this on the third plaque they'd passed.)

"My brother's seen the mirror by the way. He said he saw himself as having goat legs and a bathtub full of cottage cheese."

Frank realized he was talking too much again and laughed it off and casually shifted his weight to be a little closer to Eirene, not yet trying to take her hand as to not make things awkward for Greer.

"Eirene's mum is a healer," he offered. "I'm going to be an herbologist like my mum and a potion-maker like my dad."

Frank Sellaphix didn't understand why Eirene Antonopoulos didn't seem quite herself. He hadn't said as much, but had instead been trying to coax out of her a better mood.

"And I said, it's not what you want to see, actually," he explained. "Becuase what you want to see might be different than your heart's desire. It's really common for people not to know what they truly want or to just think they know what they want but either be fooling themselves or totally clueless. And then he said, 'good luck with that' and vanished my toothbrush."

Frank rolled his eyes at his own story of his older brother Figaro's maturity. "And he said to say hi."

Remembering not to leave Greer Grant out of the inside joke, Frank explained. "My older brother - Figaro - he thinks he's hilarious."

For the special occasion, a special class trip to see a priceless historical artifact with his girlfriend, Frank had dressed as smart as he could manage with what he had available. Neat trousers, a shirt with buttons (not from his uniform), a light coat, and his favorite blue scarf. Figaro had interfered with getting his hair just right, but Frank had managed to fix it. Rafe had sent his son with plenty to snack on, and Frank had shared with Greer who Frank knew didn't have a dad to load them down with provisions. He felt bad for Greer which is why he'd convinced her to join him and Eirene!

Frank Sellaphix was engaged a veritable symposium about a hotly contested question on a recent History of Magic quiz. Nearly everyone had got it wrong, which had prompted Professor Greyfriar to assign blame to his poor teaching and award everyone the points. However, Ravenclaw would not be satisfied with free credit, not when the actual fact of it was still up for debate.

"But that doesn't make any sense! Look, here - it says she was raised from the dead. Vampires aren't dead and an inferius isn't that same person brought to life it's just --"

Someone interrupted Frank which annoyed him. But then, the interruptor was interrupted by a second interruptor who pointed at the head table.

It took Frank a moment to find whatever anomaly was more important than grades but when he did, he clamped his hand over his mouth and hunched down on the seat. There was a grinning jack-o-lantern hovering over the head of none other than the controversial professor Malfoy.  Frank tore his eyes away to scan the room, looking for whoever might be doing it. There were loads of people who didn't like Malfoy, he'd even heard people say they outright hated him.

"Actually, there's not a curse anymore," Frank countered Tim quickly. "And the one there was on the Defense professor. There'd be no reason to curse Charms. Charms are ... fiddly."

Frank liked charms well enough because they were very useful, but Charms weren't dire. It would be like cursing Herbology.

"And if there was a curse, who'd have motive? And wouldn't someone have removed it by now? I don't know, Tim. I just don't know."

As he spoke though, he kept his attention at the head table where the professors seemed to be chatting with her all friendly-like.

It all happened so fast! One minute they were all dutifully following the chants, but then Zeta got pulled into an argument with some adults, some people started pushing, Eta was on the ground with a bloody mouth, and there were messages painted in the sky in red! Not good messages.

Frank grabbed Eirene's hand for steadiness and cast around for an adult. Eta's big sister was helping her, and he thought he saw some older kids run into Zonko's, but the red writing in the air, who had done that?! And now Zeta was looking straight at him and Eirene with orders. Frank's eyes went wide.

"Us? Uh, right." Frank fumbled for his wand and aimed his wand in the air at the two bright red messages. "Finite incantatum!"