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The Three Broomsticks was...quaint, once Hexy stopped to take it all in. 'Quaint' was a stupid sounding word that suggested rural countryside dirt cottages and peasantry. But for The Three Broomsticks that was nice. More refreshing than Hexy would have ever thought when compared to the castle.

And we don't even get these breaks once a month? What aay ripoff.

"Two butterbeers," Hexy palmed the exact coinage at the counter. "Wait. Do you have any ginger beer? One of those too." Something seemed right about that sour taste, even if as an allergen it was going to bring about the most epic of abilities to belch the alphabet. Maybe even the runic alphabet.

That would surprise Alvis. But then he didn't know, of course...

Hexy took the drinks back to the booth shared with Zoe. Flopping down on the bench, she suddenly felt awkward for her position. Almost...exposed. Even though her shirt and pullover were rather baggy she zipped up her hoodie until it was almost under her chin.

She cracked open the ginger beer first. "So you said your grandparents lived here. You don't actually live here part of the summer, do you?"

Zoe was happy to be within the Three Broomsticks. It was always such a welcoming place, and eating the same thing here multiple times never seemed to get that boring. Maybe it was because the trips were limited, or that the food was just that good. The Ravenclaw preferred to believe the latter.

As Hexy went off to get  drinks, Zoe went and sat down at a booth. The same old boothes, it was nice to have familiar things. Sure, the castle after a while would fall into a pattern, but it was nice to have staircases that never changed, doors that were always in the same place.

The Hufflepuff had come back with three drinks, and the young witch happily took a butterbeer. "Thanks." It was nice of Hexy to get the drinks, it made Zoe more comfortable that she was putting forward effort to be friendly.

Taking a sip of her butterbeer, Zoe answered the question. "Yes in a way. Every summer my mum, dad, Lily, and I stay at their house for four days to a week usually. They have a guest bedroom with four beds. My mum and her three brothers all grew up in that house, the beds are just fixed up a little." She took another sip. "We sometimes spend a day or two with my uncles and aunts from my mum's side, they are all witches and wizards, but they all live in non-magic folk towns. Lily couldn't leave the house there. We can't even bring Lily when we visit people from my dad's side, all non-magic folk."

It was true that they themselves lived in a muggle town, but it was different when Lily was used to the house and knew what needed to be done when Joy was busy with her work. Vacations were leaving her to have fun, not going to work. "So I guess," Zoe finished her thought. "It could be said I live here for a short part of the summer. Do you stay with relative during the summer?"

It was amusing thinking about how Zoe's elf had to be hidden. If Dingy had ever showed up in a muggle environment it would be hard to explain what he was given the sackcloth and pan. But this Lily elf, when she had caught a glimpse of her, was given real clothes. She also kept her hair longer than most female elves.

"You've never tried to convince people Lily is a little kid?" Hexy said with a smirk, the idea just coming to her. "A rather pointy nosed, pointy eared kid?"

Hexy paused momentarily at the query. Another test of the persona integrity. "Just with my aunt. Sometimes. If I'm not doing my own thing."

What kind of an answer was that? A pity parade the likes of a homeless Hufflepuff? There's 'plausible ambiguity' and then there's...

A long swig from the ginger beer drowned out that niggling complaint.

If Casey had made the comment on Lily, Zoe would have given him a glare. Instead, the young witch laughed. "Oh of course," was her reply with a smirk of her own. "Right before we explain she always breathes in from a balloon." The Ravenclaw decided to counter Hexy's witty comment with a witty comment of her own. It was a rather muggle joke, but Zoe didn't recognize that Hexy might not understand it.

Zoe took a drink of her butterbeer as Hexy spoke, nodding after she was done. She put down the glass, which was now much less full. "Do you like it with your aunt?" One of her own aunts greatly bothered the young witch, the only upside was she got to go to a bunch of Quidditch matches because of her.

"Balloon?" Hexy blinked. "Like the balloons with the voice changing gas the Weasley's have in the muggle trick section?" Given the independent streak paired with the chaperone of you own house elf, the Wheezes wasn't hard to visit to aquatint oneself with the merchandise.  Though Peruvian Instant Darkness Powder was being sold in extremely small, measured amounts after the St. Mungo's attack.

Hexy stoppered the ginger beer. The game to still play was ambiguity. Nobody ever poured out their life story on a first meeting, be it real or fictitious. Just enough had to be said to satisfy the questioner with an answer that didn't really say anything.

"She doesn't bother me, though she isn't too exciting." Much of this was being built from almost a Squib aunt Sunanch. A shrug. "She's hands off, many in the family are. Almost ironic given great great grandmother Elfrida."

The true irony was that this really wasn't that much of a lie. They were that hands off in the O'Doherty family. Prep a child for school then let them be educated for seven years until they had the foundations to do great by the family name. Didn't help that the bloody manor was so big that it always felt empty.

"Yes," the young witch replied with a supressed laugh. At least Hexy knew what she was talking about. Hopefully she understood the joke, or else Zoe had just made a bit of a fool of herself.

Zoe suddenly felt a ping of sympathy for the Hufflepuff that sat before her. She had never known what is was like to have a family who just let you be, expected you to do things without help themselves. Everyone in her family had always helped her out when she needed it, even annoying Aunt Jacquline.

"I'm sorry about that Hexy." The Ravenclaw looked down at her drink when she said this. She wanted to show her sympathy, but she felt so strange doing so. Hexy didn't seem to care on the outside, Zoe didn't know if she was the same on the inside.

Zoe quickly tried to add something. "I guess my family is quite the opposite. Always checking on me, talking to me, helping me. Sometimes being too hands-on. Most of my aunts and uncles want to know what I've been learning in school, and each one seems to have a different subject they want to hear the most about." It was a rather shallow complaint, but she wanted something to be unhappy about.

This was strange. Was Zoe always this caring and it was hard to see? It probably had the same compassion for keeping on a freed house elf. "Why should you be sorry, you don't even know anything about me."

You better not, or I'm going to have to quickly figure out how different the memory extraction spell is when performed on another person.

"Not like the Claggins should mean anything to you unless Professor Jowd spouts more trivia." The phrase was punctuated by a pronounced belch. Hexy didn't feel the need to excuse herself, only a simpered smile at Zoe to see how she would take it.

At first, it surprised Zoe the way that Hexy reacted. The Hufflepuff had been like that before, wondering why the Ravenclaw was kind to her. Her first impression of this was that Hexy thought that she was untrustworthy or thought she was mean, but then it dawned on Zoe that Hexy sat alone at the Great Hall, had a hands-off family, and seemed like a loner. Hexy probably never had people give her sympathy or help.

"But that's not true Hexy, you are telling me things about you. I can be sorry for someone I know little about. Sympathy works that way." Zoe hoped this was a good enough explanation, but still added something. "I feel sorry for you because I don't know what I would have done without my family helping me."

After the burp the young witch gave the Hufflepuff an amused smile and chuckled softly to herself. It was as if Hexy had done it on purpose. "And if you really wanted to know why I'm being kind to you when I just met you, it's because of something my dad taught me. 'Show respect to all unless they have committed a terrible deed or fail to show respect themself.' It's just how I show respect."

Zoe gave an sudden, small laugh. "Listen to me! I'm being way to serious." The young witch rose from her bench. "C'mon, let's get our food. We came here to have fun."

Huh.

Hexy blinked a few times. When it was phrased that way...this definition of sympathy sounded suspiciously similar to pity, deplorable pity, but there was something genuine on Zoe's face. This was certainly the most insight she had ever seen into how Zoe thought. Something she couldn't find out about as Casey.

Her hand nursed the left side of her head, sore with contemplating the little principles Zoe used. No wonder she was always ready to snip back at...

"What? Oh food." Hexy felt flung to the edge of that awkward precipice again as she followed Zoe, just like the night at Spellpunks. Something unknown and frightening. One fear, more minuet because the Three Broomsticks was not as unknown of a location as a teen nightclub, was looking at the house menu as if it was written in a foreign script. Was there anything even edible when it met the almighty list of food allergens?

"What do you usually get?" But after the floundering question came the renewed confidence, that sense of the freedom given to persona with nothing pre-bagagged. No reputation, no first impressions, no expectations. That desire for fun, be it dancing or seeing Sellaphix get punched in the face (always entertaining) or guzzling ginger beer and not giving a damn afterwards for the urps that escaped her lips. Fun without limits.

Such as seeing the limits of one charade... "Well, since you're sharing so much, I guess I can tell you my real name. Though it's kinda embarrassing so you have to swear not to laugh."

"The cornish pasties," was Zoe's answer. The little pockets of mainly meat and potatos were a favorite of hers. "They make really nice ones here." The young witch was of course oblivious to the fact that most of the things on the menu wouldn't work for Hexy. She just assumed that the Hufflepuff hadn't been to the Three Broomsticks often enough to know the menu well.

Zoe was a bit surprised when Hexy said she'd tell the Ravenclaw her real name. Hexy seemed like the name of a witch from a magic family, but then again it also seemed like a nickname. The young witch really wasn't sure what to expect. "I won't laugh at it Hexy! You didn't laugh at my stuff so I wouldn't laugh at yours." It was the fair trade of kindness that Zoe lived by, like how the muggles said what goes around comes around.

Wait, people ate Cornish Pictsies? Oh. Pasties. That was a pastry that sounded like a pasty white patsy that decided to blab something he shouldn't...

Damn that word! Now she couldn't get it out of her head!

"Alright, one of those," though Hexy couldn't figure out if there were anything to watch for in the dough, meat, potato or gravy.

Though her face was straight, there was the mental image of a great intake and exhalation of breath. Okay. This was significant because this new identity was going to be authenticated now. Not just a whim, a simple disguise like times past, but a character. A new person. Things that were just for fun before needed to carry meaning.

Ok.

"It's short for Hexmerelda. Hexmerelda Claggin."

That is so stupid sounding this really shouldn't work. The internal critic was hushed and shunted aside.

The young witch thought the name over. "Hexmerelda..." she repeated softly to herself, then smiled. "I like it! It's such a witch name. The last person in my family to have a cool name like that is my Grandad, and even his is from non-magic folk." Zoe actually did like that name. Her name was so boring, so normal, so muggle. Most famous witches and wizards had really cool and odd names. "I mean seriously, Zoe, how plainer can you get than that?"

Zoe then went and ordered the two cornish pasties before coming back to Hexy. "The food shouldn't take too long." She contemplated what to ask now that she seemed to have Hexy's trust. "I'm guessing your parents are magic, with your name and the fact that you live in Hogsmeade."

Score 1 for Hexy then. Everything presented in an authentic manner and Zoe did not doubt the story. By wizarding standards this was actually low key of a name, some people named their children after spells or astronomy terms, not like any of that helped their grades in those areas.

"You think Zoe is plain?" Hexy found that odd. It was short and probably did not stand for 'zoetrope' but she considered it uncommon. "Not unless you are supposed to be life turning."

For her ears only there was an internal snicker. Apparently some part if her thought that was funny even if it really wasn't a proper joke in the first place. Before an index reference of Greek words and a related incantation were dredged up...

"Magic enough, everyone tries to keep hold of some wizarding culture even though we're mixed. The Claggins are descended from Elfrida Clagg[1] that Chieftainess of the Wizard's Council. You know, tried to classify Beings as those that could speak, made the Golden Snidget a protected species."

This was all true. Having Hexy be connected to something real, however obscure, was better than trying to force a new name out of nothing. "My aunt and I just moved here."

1.

HP wiki

"Plainer than some other non-magic names. Uncommon, yes, but not very interesting." Zoe didn't understand Hexy's joke, so she ignored it altogether. "My middle name is nice, though. Arietta. I like the sound of it with my last name, Arietta Torret. It was my great-grandmother's name."

How interested! Hexy sure had some noticable heritage. "My family isn't from anything like that. We were actually French first, with the last name 'Touret'. They left and moved to England in the 14th century and then changed the 'u' to an 'r' so they no longer had a French name." Zoe rarely told anyone about her heritage, but since Hexy had shared hers the young witch felt it was on topic.

Zoe continued with her family's magic lines. "We used to be pureblood, but in the 18th century the blood purity started to dilute, and my Grandad is the last living pureblood Torret. But we still never had pureblood fame or fortune, the only real thing our family was known for, if anything, was our talent at charms and our slight connection with fairies."

Ah, so Hexy lived with her aunt. "Have you or your aunt met my grandparents yet? They're quite friendly, I'm sure that I could introduce you." The fact that Hexy had told her before that they liked privacy seemed to be gone from Zoe's mind.

Huh. So the name Torret wasn't just an 'n' dropped from the word 'Torrent.' Apparently there were more French magical families not of Beauxbatons than Hexy had ever realized. The French academy was not as elitist by blood as Durmstrang but family was important over there. That made three that emigrated out to form other magical families, or however a half French/half Japanese counselor and a fish freak where spawned. Then you had the graduating wonder twins the Fayettes, infamous 'clone troops' of the MLE.

Speaking of, time for the next layer to the cover story...

"No, we haven't met. I suppose I could visit but my aunt..." Her eyes darted about the room then she leaned in close across the table, hand placed over her ginger beer as if the words might get trapped inside to be played back later. "Do you read the Quibbler? Like, this month's issue they printed at the end of September? It's total trollop but they are right about something we don't want people to know about."