7:15 AM
Donovan's

"Ta-na-na-na-na-ta-na-na-ta... On the floors of To-ky-oh-oh, down in London town's a go-go..." With a mop in his hands, Phillip was gliding around the floor to the brilliant rhythms of Billy Idol. For whatever reason, he had, for once, not arrived back at Rick's completely pissed. Actually Phillip was peppered, both his wallet and his coin purse held a total of  ten sickles, 5 knuts and two pounds. He had scavved fags and beers off of everyone in the Leaky Cauldron, then got dragged to Calaveras by a very hammered tarty blondie, where he ended up coppin' off -obviously- only to have the little trollop pass out on him. Then he made his way to The Sword & Chant, where he drunk a bloke under the table, over a bet, but then... that was it. It was a Sunday, at 5 AM the entire Alley was deserted. Phillip thought it was bloody depressing and he'd gotten a right cob on over his financial situation, so he made his way back to Rick's grumbling all the way.

"O-oh-o-oh, dancing with my-seh-elf, well there's nothing to looose and there's nothing to prove!" Phillip was now, completely enthralled in his dancing, holding the mop like a guitar, jumping around and banging his head while screaming his lungs off singing. He was completely kippered, but there was no way he could sleep. Rick would punch his lights out -barmey, he'd probably one bell him, if he didn't get the shop ready to open, so he tiptoed to the kitchen to make himself a strong cuppa coffee. After a long shower and a lot of cussing and a bloody hell lot more yawns, he was finally ready to get his arse downstairs and start doing his job.

"So, let's sink another drink, 'cause it'll gimme time to thi-i-ink" he was holding the mop close to his body, caressing the handle as if dancing with a partner -because Phillip was mad as toast more often than not "If I had the chance I'd ask the one to dance and I'll be dancing with my-se-eh-lf". Surprisingly he was quite effective in mopping the floor, even with his... one man show going on.

"If I had the chance I'd ask the world to DAAAAAAANCEEEEEEE" he was now sitting on the counter, the mop thrown somewhere on the floor, flailing his legs in the air, his head tilted back, and his hands beating the rhythm on the wood of the counter. And just as he was taking a deep breath to prepare for the outstanding vocal solo, he heard a really loud thump from upstairs followed by the billowing voice of Rick "FUCKING PIPE DOWN". Upon hearing his voice Phillip choked on the breath he was just preparing to take so hard that he fell face-forward off the counter and unto the floor. Gasping as his cough finally ended, he picked himself off the floor, and felt his nose for injuries. Oh it was there, all right, his nose had shifted with a few millimeters to the right... and it was throbbing and leaking blood all over his lips. With a disgusted grimace he wiped his nose with his sleeve and winced when the contact proved incredibly painful.

"BLOODY HELL, MATE! I almost pissed my undies, ya cocknobber! MY NOSE IS BROKEN! I almost sparked out" he fell silent for a second then felt the blood start flowing again. "Oh shag me sideways, it's bleeding again, mate..." he yelled again looking at the stairs.

Up in his office – where he was currently looking over the books, flipping through paperwork and double-checking bills – Rick rolled his eyes. The sound of pen against paper only continued to fill the room, even as the loud, pointed snark of his employee filtered through the floor.

Granted, he could probably stand to be more sympathetic. As much as part of him had merely chalked it up as the inauspicious start of another day at the shop, the soft thump downstairs had sounded painful enough that a quick check-in seemed in order—if only to make sure nothing especially the merchandise had been broken. And mooch or not, the kid was pretty decent help; he always did his fair share of the work (which was more than Rick could say of any of Phillip’s predecessors), and even if he seemed to think mouthing off was part of the job, he was competent at least. (Which was also a lot more than Rick could say of said predecessors.) Indifference – as much as it might be part of the shop’s norm – wasn’t actually part of the paycheck.

Not to mention Rick knew he’d never hear the end of it if any of his sisters caught wind of his… negligence. There would be no hope for him; they’d pretty much adopted the kid already.

He set down the pen with a sigh. God save him from the dramatics of teenagers.

“ ‘Cocknobber’?” Rick repeated, appearing at the foot of the stairs with a sharp <crack!>. Thumbs hooked loosely onto his pockets and mouth curved into a smirk, he leaned against the banister, clearly amused. If the teen still had it in him to bitch, he’d live. “You’ve got something on your face. You gonna clean that up, or…”

---

Lua had been up since five, having promised her older brother she’d make them toast and tea if he’d give her a ride. It was only slightly bumpy, eating marmalade in the front of the van as Elliot navigated the city proper. When they reached the Leaky Cauldron (which Elliot could not see between the two muggle shops on either side), the van came to an idling stop. Lua finished the last bit of her toast, poured the rest of her tea into her brother’s mug, kissed his cheek, and slipped out of the car and into the cold predawn. “Have a good day at work,” she told him cheerily, to which he smiled and offered a sarcastic, “Always do.” He handed her a bit of holiday money, which Lua pocketed gratefully before heading for the pub. She turned and waited for the van to drive off before she stepped inside. The barman smiled and wished her a good morning, which Lua returned before making way around back, big eyes and curious fingers finding the familiar bricks that lea to a place where magic could be felt the moment one stepped onto the cobbles. She shivered excitedly as the bricks regressed beneath her wand’s gentle tap. Biting her lip in a thrill that even the early hour and grayish, dark blue sky could not dissolve, she stepped into the empty street. Closed signs still hung, slightly disheveled, in window fronts, beneath street lamps and hanging lanterns alike.

She passed a bakery, which was open, but since she’d already had breakfast, she paused only to scratch the chin of a cat lounging languidly on the bench beneath the window. It purred its appreciation, and made a show of climbing to its feet. It followed Lua as she began to move down the main street again, distracting the young Gryffindor from the still-rather-closed status of many of the shops. “You know, I don’t think you can come with me inside,” she informed her new friend conversationally. She had not quite decided where she would go first, but just in general… Oooh.

Lua paused before a shop whose door required she press her face against it and peer around. Everything seemed to be stuff inside the place, whose handsome shelves and wood beams were only beginning to catch light as dawn creeped in. And if the array of things didn’t grab the Gryffindor’s attention, the blond boy playing guitar on a mop certainly did. She recognized him immediately as Phillip Kinsey. Lua pulled from the window a bit, grinning, and reached for the door. She had just slipped through when a voice resonated from somewhere upstairs and her housemate took a magnificent rock star's fall, rendition of “Dancing With Myself” ending abruptly. She stood there, blinking, watching with strange patience as he pulled himself up. She would have offered to help, but the person who Apparated at the bottom of the stairs distracted her.

Lua’s mouth took on a slight o-shape of curiosity and surprise— and, well, the new wizard was quite nice to look at. Like the way Elliot called Freddie’s friends nice when they came around for dinner. (Elliot usually got their attention, too. Her brother had a very pretty face.) The wizard seemed to belong in the space entirely, and yet, he drew the girl’s attention away from the bleeding Phillip Kinsey, the mop causality, the pretty shelves. She bit her lip in a little smile. It wasn’t as if she was happy to see her schoolmate lectured. But he didn’t seem in immediate harm, and Lua couldn’t help finding the situation funny, the echo of the word cocknobber in the man’s American accent.

“Hello,” she said, shuffling forward a bit after the echo of cocknobber. “I have tissues.” Being both a muggleborn and someone who was not, technically, allowed to do magic outside of school, Lua was very used to things the muggle way. She smiled at Phillip and stepped closer, extending a hand full of cottony tissues. “You have a bit there,” she said, ghosting a finger over her own cheek in demonstration. She turned her head to look at the man again. Fit didn’t begin to describe him.

He was about to spout something witty and snarky at Rick when a delightfully feminine voice interrupted him. He turned to look at the source of the voice and couldn't help bring his mouth in a slight 'o', before grinning from ear to ear his pleasant surprise clearly visible in his eyes. "Well, well, well... Aren't ye a sight for sore eyes, ye little cub" he said whimsically as he eyed her from head to toe. He was sure he'd seen her in the common room, so she was Gyffindor, but he couldn't quite remember what year she was. Which was a shame, 'cause she was a very pretty little birdie, and he wouldn't want to creep her out -much- if he were to make a subtle -like Phillip could ever be subtle- move on her, and she turned to be hardly out of her nappies.

Still Phillip was Phillip and he couldn't help be anything other than himself around a pretty face, so he eyed the tissue in her hand, gave her a devilishly dazzling smile, arched an eyebrow and said "Would you mind? 'S rather hard without a mirror..." he said falsely apologetically.

Surely wiping blood off a bloke's face wasn't the girl's favorite pastime, but he'd seen an opportunity and he grabbed at it. And surely magic would've been more efficient, fast and useful, but again, her indirect touch on his skin was far better than any magic. Besides, she seemed much too interested in Rick, he'd like some attention for himself thank you very much.

"We're not open yet" he said looking at Rick from the corner of his eye "but I'm sure we can make an exception for a fellow Gryffindor." He smiled and gave her a wink. "Tho, I'm not sure if ye can find anything to interest you 'round 'ere".

Alex wouldn't call what she was doing in Diagon Alley, at an hour when she could happily have been at home asleep, enjoying the breeze, more hunching into herself on the street because she’d raced out of the house without a second, or even first, thought, such as taking a coat worthy of the name or leaving the house at a slightly more sensible time than as early as possible.

Anyway, even if Donovan’s was open, she would probably be kicked out for having a drink with her. Which, since Alex was their most regular customer, even if she'd only bought one thing, was terrible customer service. Of course, Rick seemed to view customers as intrusions into his time, the less aggravating of whom were necessary to sustain his business, so the lack of customer service was easily explicable, if not totally justified.

In any case, by the time she had finished the tea, the only reason she would have been able to answer the question, "do you have a nose?" with any certainty was that she had always had a rather aggravating one and she hasn't noticed it being stolen. Accordingly, it was with relief that she discovered that, for some reason (Alex would have placed good money on Phillip, assuming she could get the odds) the shop was open out of normal hours, and stepped into the thrice blessed warmth. She didn’t travel too far in, arrested by the tableau before her, before a gust of wind prompted her to shut the door behind her and step inside.

“I shouldn’t waste your sympathy, he’s a lost cause,” Alex advised the younger girl- apparently a Gryffindor, but Alex had only the vague impression of familiarity that suggested she was a student to support that. And, of course, Phillip’s word. “Why are you bleeding on everything?” Alex asked Phillip, sounding more curious than compassionate, before staring at Rick disapprovingly, “Why aren’t you helping him?”

Rick – twenty-eight-years-old and a werewolf – met the fourteen-year-old’s stare with an incredulous one of his own. No matter how much disbelief it carried like the blankest of What’s, she still was, apparently, real, and in no hurry at all to change that any time soon. And Alex – good, dependably smart-mouthed Alex, who had become as much of a fixture in the shop as a persistent layer of dust – only made things even worse by showing up.

And opening her mouth. Goddammit, it wasn’t even eight yet—just too damn early for this shit. What was it with kids ignoring the plaque by the door? Nine to five, it said, not whenever you damn feel like it-

He refused to be judged by a girl who wasn’t even legal yet. (By American standards, yes, but as far as the American was concerned they were the only ones that mattered.) Refused.

“Shut up,” he scowled, glaring at Alex and relieved to focus on his annoyance with the little harridan instead of the weird, wide-eyed look the girl was giving him. That way lay headaches. Having been up since early morning after a late, late night—and now facing a day that was hardly getting better—Rick’s temper was dangerously thin. Hair on end like hands had been repeatedly run through it (which it had –from stress) and jaw still darkened by a rough five o’ clock shadow, Rick wasn’t at his best when he pushed away from the banister and stalked over, passing by Phillip and Lua and meeting Alex halfway. He made sure to stand between her and them – effectively blocking her view of them – and folded his arms, his previous good mood obviously soured.

“He’s got it under control,” the werewolf jerked his head at the pair behind him, glare still trained on the Ravenclaw. “Why’re you here, at…” He made a show of glancing down at his bare wrist. “seven nineteen? That’s almost two hours before we actually open, by the way.”

---

Lua returned Phillip’s grin, her big smile made all the bigger by the word cub, which was both fitting and somehow a sign of Gryffindor friendliness. Though she was distracted by the older man, who held as much or more appeal than the treasures of his shop, she heard Phillip’s words and registered them a moment later. “Oh! Sure, of course.” Lua wasn’t squeamish. She kept the tissue, pinched it softly between ever-painted nails (currently the faces of gingerbread men, who were occasionally cheeky right back to the likes of this older Gryffindor or certain Ravenclaw friends, winking and smirking merrily, some mustachioed and others with freckles), and reached up to dab carefully at the older boy’s face.

She only looked back at the man once. (For the moment. It was probably best to focus.) Apparently the shop was closed. Oops! Lua's face said as much. It was the visual manifestation of oops. (And might have been begging, just a little.) Would he let her stay? And help out Phillip, with his nose and his injured mop guitar? And, well, look around? She looked back to Phillip in time to catch his wink. She couldn’t help smiling back. She smiled a lot in general, but. He was brazen, had that effect. Being a Gryffindor seemed to be a good thing around here, which was good news. Maybe it was a common room away from the common room...

“What sort of shop is this?” She asked, polite but intrigued, not discouraged by the range of unamused expressions on the man’s face. Maybe it was just how his face was. It was still very nice to look at. She was sure he knew how to smile, though. Somewhere in there. Everyone did. She was careful with the tissue this time, held it back a bit as she looked between them. “It all looks interesting to me,” she countered pleasantly. One glance in the window had been enough to draw her in. (The cool, older Gryffindor’s solo performance had helped.) And one glance around now was enough to keep her here (especially the unamused looking man, whom Lua did not find terrifying in the least).

Another Hogwarts student appeared— also older, but less recognizable to Lua, who had seen Phillip more often in the common room. Lua greeted her with a smile, but didn’t put down the tissue. She didn’t think anyone was a lost cause. She turned back to the boy, continued to dab the tissue against his face, clear away the blood.  “Have you slept?” She asked him, well meaning. The contrast of red against his fair, sharp-cheeked face had caught her attention again. He wore tired well, if he was tired. “You look sort of like my brother after a night out. I think he thinks he’s a vampires sometimes,” she joked. She squinted with not-very-judgmental-at-all knowingness, still smiling. She had encountered a vampire in Hogsmeade once and he seemed lovely. “All done!” She pulled the tissue away.

When the man told the older girl to shut up, Lua looked at him again, parted her lips in surprise. Maybe he hadn’t slept. It wasn’t very nice, but… she suspected that he wasn’t going to throw anyone out of the shop, not really. “Is there somewhere I could throw this away?” She asked, meaning the tissue.

"Artifacts of sorts, love. Rick -that'd be the dangerous looking bloke, that seems to 'ave caught yer fancy-" he smirked "he's an artificer. He makes things, dunno if they 'ave much use, but they're pretty. Come this way, love, we'll get you sorted" he said to the young girl but before he could gently (and not so subtly) put his arm around her to guide her through the store, she came in.

Phillip scowled and sighed deeply as he saw the Ravie menace, Carstairs. He had a a mind to just tell 'er to bob off the second she entered. "Oh, look the mithering stray just entered" he grumbled under his breath.

"Don't be at it so early in the morning, Carstairs" he said the second she finished taking the mickey at his nosebleed. "Ignore her, darling" he said sweetly to the pretty little cub, before turning and skenning at Carstairs. "She's all fir coat n' no knickers, this one" he said loudly so everyone would hear him.

He glared at Alex, but still took the time to appreciatively stop at her chest and hips, and smile leeringly, before he promptly decided she could do Rick's napper in, if she so liked. He was busy. He looked back at the firein' Gryffindor and grinned at her. "Nah, sleep's for the dead, sweet. I went and tried to get well ratted. Ye know, on a binge, but that's sort'a hard when yer peppered –I'm not whingein or anything, in 'e end 't was well sound, well hard. Managed to kip off some booze off some poor sods and mardarses 'round our way. Sounds like me and yer brother have a tad in common, ey?" he grinned and shook his head laughing.

"Well thank you very much, miss" he said still grinning once she was done. "Ye have a very light hand, ye know—soft too" he added quickly as he saw her interest going to Rick and Alex. "Matter of fact, yer quite lovely, aren't ye?" he smiled charmingly. He slipped his wand from his back pocket and vanished the bloodied tissue, before putting it back and taking a bow, indicating the way before.

"Well, miss if you would care to join me in a tour of the facilities, I shall be ever most obliging" he said imitating a perfect posh British accent. He laughed and waited for her to go before him "There ain't much ye might fancy ye know. We got some pretty fishies, metal, and enchanted to look alive, some pretty plants and flowers, made o' metal again –Rick's bloody obsessed with metalwork" he said exasperated as he led her toward the right of the room, where the creepy metal fishes swam in mid-air.

Alex's eyes? They rolled. Superbly. Alex was good at eye rolling, and if her cheeks reddened as well, it was only slightly so, and anyway, they were already rosy from the freezing cold wind. "While you're a tragic excuse for a jester, unaware that his audience laughs at rather than with him," she retorted around Rick, who was shielding Phillip from her- a ridiculous gesture, because if Alex had intended to attack Phillip she wouldn't have hung around insulting him beforehand.

When Rick had finished speaking, Alex shrugged vaguely, making a gesture with her hands that hopefully suggested she was at the shop as a result of complex and unfathomable reasons, which quite possibly had a large deal to do with the butterfly effect, Babbity Rabbity, and the colour blue, and nothing to do with the fact that because her entire family had convened for Christmas and she didn't fancy being lectured about her awful life choices (which would probably include turning up at a shop to avoid her family, if they were aware of it).

"But Phillip said you were open," she pointed out, rather than answer Rick's question, "And if you send me back out into the cruel streets, I'll probably get frost bite. I could die. And then I would feel that I had to haunt you, which would be unfortunate because I'd really rather not be a ghost. Of course, that would probably ruin the moral lesson, because you'd be too busy being grouchy at me to care about being responsible for my death," Alex finished, taking in a breath and giving Rick her most hopeful reasonable expression.

It didn't last long, turning into a withering glare directed at Phillip, who was wrong. And not doing his job properly, of course, but mostly, he was wrong. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence, but it was still vexing for him to speak about the things in the shop so offhandedly, especially because he was able to make them than a worm was able to fly. Mindful of the time, she bit down the comment she wanted to make, warily looking back at Rick.

Rick threw the pair behind him a peevish glance, just long enough to watch Phillip say something to the kid, all charm and grins—and give Rick’s name away like it was candy. One eye twitching underneath a heavy brow, he faced Alex again, somehow looking even more sour without moving so much as a muscle. “Phillip says a lot of things,” he said flatly, still glaring. “Dumb things, usually. And there are ways of removing ghosts.” Half of which were hardly permanent, but they worked, that was the important thing.

…Okay, fine, so only a few were guaranteed. But that was beside the point.

She wasn’t budging, though, even when she looked away to scowl at Phillip. Like a barnacle she was still planted in front of Rick, too stubborn to move, and the wizard wondered, sincerely curious, what he’d done in a previous life to attract so many bullheaded teenagers in this one. Even Phillip – who gave him lip nearly as much as she did – even his employment hadn’t actually been intentional on Rick’s part.

Rick met Alex’s stare a bit longer before visibly relenting, releasing a deeply aggravated sigh. “You underestimate your talent for being a complete pest,” he retorted. “You’d be too noisy to ignore. Now, was there something you wanted? I told you the new shipment–” of Antikythera mechanisms, that he’d ordered a month ago, “–doesn’t arrive until Wednesday. And I’m not working on the armillary sphere ‘til then-”

Off to the side, the door to the basement creaked open and a wet, black nose peeked through. When it was swiftly followed by a large, vaguely lupine head, pushing the door even wider to let the rest of its large, thickly furred body through, Rick’s glare returned full force. “And now you’ve woken my dog,” he grumped. “Upstairs,” he ordered it, pointing toward the back of the shop.

But of course, of course Runt ignored his owner. As Rick huffed in irritation, the utonagan lightly nosed Alex’s hand in greeting and sauntered toward the Gryffindors instead.

When Rick looked at Alex again, his scowl was nothing short of accusatory.

Artifacts of sorts. The vague description only further kindled Lua’s imagination, which was quickly filling in the blanks with all sorts of ideas. But then Phillip seemed to read her mind where the man called Rick was concerned. Her lips parted and she made to speak, but was unsure for the moment what to say, as if someone had stolen her breath. (It wasn’t often that Lua Taylor didn’t have something to chatter about). Her large eyes darted from Phillip’s cool profile to the gruff-ier man. She looked back at Phillip again, wondering how he had known. But sometimes you could just tell— Lua could tell when she saw a classmate staring at another when they were supposed to taking History notes. Other times, she was oblivious. But really, anyone with eyes could see that the man was very nice to look at, as interesting as the artifacts that dotted his shelves.

Phillip had been on the verge of ushering her away when the other girl appeared. Lua wasn’t sure ignoring her was the best idea, and it certainly wasn’t the nicest. She didn’t know the girl well, but she had never seen the telltale signs of unlike-ability that Phillip vocalized now. In general, Lua did not dislike people. The girl seemed lovely, quick and silvery with her tongue, curiously annoying Rick, who seemed more easily annoyed than anyone Lua had ever met. He looked like needed a hug, really.

“You could be twins,” she agreed through a grin, thinking of her brother and his own semi-frequent returns home as the sun was rising. Lua knew a lot about twins. It had sounded like a long night, too, definitely. Long being another word for fun. She had plans to go adventuring around London while home, too… but maybe not have quite the sort of adventures Phillip had had. More like… following stray cats around empty streets and popping up in a closed shop at the break of dawn. Maybe she would invite Connor to a Bikram Yoga class. She thought he was ready. “If you ever need a hangover recipe, I have lots.” Her family was full of them, and they were all lovingly weird. Not that he needed one; he seemed very lively, that kind of late-teenage invincible the boys in Lua’s year were beginning to emulate. Or trying to.

His compliment registered while her eyes were still on the man, at whom she was looking intently, waiting for directions to the trash bin as if they would be particularly charming. The tissue was gone from her hand by the time she looked back at Phillip. She glanced down quickly and back up at the towering blond, her expression thankful and bright. “Thanks!” she said, for both the compliment and the handy work; her cheeks were bunched, and slightly rosier than usual. It wasn’t everyday that a mop-guitar-playing Seventh Year who conquered sleep and bloodied tissues both told her she was lovely, or that she had soft hands. Usually it was her grandmother saying those sorts of things. Lua's Trace meant that she could technically get in trouble for doing even minor wandwork, but Phillip Kinsey was old and skilled enough that it took no effort and got him into zero trouble. It must have been useful, being seventeen.

"My Vanishing Charm still needs practice,” she confessed unabashedly as he led her away from the brooding man and girl with whom Phillip seemed to have all sorts of not-subtle tension. “I think it’s something in the wrist… that’s what a Ravenclaw told me.” Her eyes swept from Phillip’s cheekbones to the fish he pointed out. There really were all sorts of interesting things to look at in this place, boys, men, and metal fish alike. She reached careful fingers toward an angelfish, hardly grazing it, and smiled. “Did you help make any of these? Do you think he could make an elepha— Hello,” she said cheerily, dropping to her knees reflexively to hug the giant dog who had bumbled over to them. “What’s your name?” She wrinkled her nose in a smile as the dog bestowed canine affection, and looked over his head to his owner, as if he had the dog's voice on hand. Getting Lua Taylor out of the shop now would be something a task.

"Phillip says a lot of things. Dumb things, usually."

Phillip turned to sken at Rick with all the hurt in the world cramped on his kite. "Hey! I'll have ye know, people love me for me sparkling conversation" he said frowning and huffed, not really offended, but, hey—rude. "Scrooge" he muttered before turning back to what was obviously way more interesting: precious little Gryffie.

He grinned dumbly, thinking there could be a twin out there for him and then proceeded to stare at the lassie with big eyes that said 'I've found Atlantis!' "Yes, oh my bloody God, yes! Hangover recipes—all of them! Give them to me! All your hangover recipes are belong to us" he said grinning, while making grabby hands at her.

“I think it’s something in the wrist… that’s what a Ravenclaw told me.”

"Wrist, schmist" he said waving at the empty air and scowling. "Nowt bout the wrist. The secret is to not over think it, if ye just let it flow to ye, it will come out mint" he said smiling before he frowned and cringed. "But, ye know, just scratch that. Taking advice on magic from me is a disaster waiting ta happen. If ye have issues with potions, tho... I'm yer man" he said putting his fisted hands on his hips and posing with a Roman profile. "And don't ye go listening to Ravies! They're all harpies and smartarses" he grunted while giving Alex a deadly glare.

Before he could answer to her question however, the man—or, well, dog of the day made an appearance. "Runt! Ma maaaaan" he exclaimed, crouching down to scratch behind his ears. "Oh, you sexy furry beast" he said affectionately, before glaring at Rick. "Yeah, boy, show him who's the man" he turned back to ruffle the dog's fur. "Pfft, who needs upstairs. We've got this lovely lady here and me—Me! Yer homie, yer most devoted walker, yer avid fan" he laughed into its fur as he gently headbutted the animal, before winking at the lovely creature hugging Runt. "This, m'lady is the most astounding, the brave, the gorgeous, the sexiest piece of—errrr, furry arse London has ever seen! This is the one and only, Runt" he wagged his eyebrows at her, grinning from ear to ear.

"I know, I know—when ye look at this beauty, ye'd expect something epic, like, like—like Romulus... Zeus! Optimus Prime! Oh, oh, I know—Wolverine! Som'it heavy, ye know?" he asked zealously, before turning to scowl at Rick. "The creativity of Mister Tall, Dark and Broody stops at cogs and metals, I s'ppose" he said nonchalantly with a deep dramatic sigh, before shaking his head disapprovingly.

If Alex were the kind of person who doubted the sense of her decisions, she might have backed down before Rick, but as she wasn’t, she continued to stare. For all her supposed confidence, her shoulders slackened a little when he sighed, grudging even in defeat. It wasn’t something that troubled Alex, and having been promised (if not in so many words, it was implied from what he’d said) that she could stay inside, she smiled a little more happily.

“Your kind words warm me,” she said instead, sounding almost proud of the insult, “And I know it isn’t due to arrive today.” Which was something she should use as evidence when she made her suggestion – her reason for coming today, even if she hadn’t planned to arrive at the crack of dawn. And anyway, she could hardly make it now, with Phillip standing around to laugh at her and Rick even grumpier than usual because he was expected to interact with teenagers. Better to wait until Rick would be more amenable to the idea, and she wouldn’t be thrown out at the slightest excuse.

Smiling at Phillip’s analysis of her house – which was hardly insulting, although she wouldn’t call it complimentary either – Alex bit back an insult at the expense of Gryffindors. House was no guarantee of skill in any department, and each house had its share of inept morons – even if with Phillip, Gryffindor had slightly more than fair. “At least we know what we’re talking about,” she retorted instead, something Phillip couldn’t contest since he was terrible at spells by his own admission. It wasn’t exactly a unique talent, but there weren’t many who had so little ability at spell casting as him, and it at least made for exciting lessons.

Giving Rick an appalled look at the suggestion that Runt, the best canine ever to exist, be dismissed, Alex willingly offered her hand in greeting, smiling as he moved on to Phillip and an adoring Lua. But it seemed that Runt’s arrival had further cemented their position – Runt was obviously far happier to see them than his owner, and didn’t seem at all concerned about the accusation of an early awakening.

Much as admitting ignorance (even if it was, as Alex assumed, on the matter of Muggle culture, hardly something she could reasonably be expected to be knowledgeable about) galled her, Alex was curious to hear why Phillip had chosen those names to represent Runt. “How is naming something after a mythical character creative? And who is Wolverine?” The name was said in a parody of Phillip’s accent, not the nicest thing Alex could have done, but running the risk of mispronouncing the vowels in her own wasn’t one she wanted to take. Having to ask was humiliation enough.

The brats’ varying looks of outrage and dismay boxing him in – strengthened, of course, by Runt’s disregard – Rick’s expression darkened further, all pinched and snarly and six different kinds of annoyed. Oh, the arrogance of youth.

Find a man who liked being sassed in his own kingdom  shop and Rick would show you his fist.

As they began to bicker, Rick rolled his eyes (in his opinion, both Houses seemed stupid) and headed for the door; no way was he sticking around for this. None too gently he shouldered past Alex, grinning a quick, smug grin as he did. And even as Phillip picked at his naming ability, it didn’t disappear so much as ebb a little, giving way to a smirk. “Romulus is a shit name,” Rick informed him, as he grabbed a jacket off the coat rack and shrugged it on. “So is Zeus.” Naming your pet after a god– or any myth, actually –was best left to library hermits and pretentious assholes, in his opinion. It was probably the least creative thing you could do. “And your muggle pop culture crap. You’re even shittier at this than I am.” At least Runt had been one, when he’d named him.

Shoving his hands into his pockets, Rick rifled through them. “Some… comic book thing,” he answered Alex before Phillip could, frowning when his hand closed around an unfamiliar shape. Pulling it out, the wizard held it up to light—some kind of sorry-looking knot of rubber bands, copper wire and string, it turned out to be, with a paper clip bent out of shape stuck into it- oh. “Anti-hero, all mutton chops and metal claws.” Fingers seemingly pinched at a random spot, pulling back a few bands that had the paper clip straightening and the copper wires twisting, until his ears were picking up a very faint, high-pitched screee that had Runt’s head sharply turning–

He let it fly. Several noisy crashes later – when it had knocked some displays over, a few right off their shelves until it shot through one glass casing, causing a glittering shower of glass – it was embedded in the wall, eight feet up and, conveniently, above a ton of stuff Rick just had shoved to the side, paper clip stabbed into the plaster as the wires felt around, like feelers. Somewhere on the floor, a mechanical fish flopped about helplessly; the shop was a mess.

Rick blinked… and grinned even more widely than before, as he looked back at the kids’ wide-eyed faces. “I want this place clean before I get back,” he said, looking from Alex to Phillip as he looped a scarf around his neck and opened the door. “Remember—we open at nine.”

He shot Lua a glance; the grin softened into a small, dry smile. “Welcome to Donovan’s, kid.”


The door slammed shut behind him.

---

Lua grinned, pleased to help. “I can write them down and give them to you when term starts,” she suggested. “There are a few I might not know…” And then there were her father’s methods. He and her brother often took to colorfully debating the best cures for hangovers. Surely wizards had different ones, but Lua thought the muggle ones worked well enough because her brother still hadn’t been sacked from his job.

She nodded, taking his advice at face value. Not over-thinking it made sense. She preferred that way of life (though living consciously was also very important to the fourteen-year-old). Potions was definitely not her best subject, and so she would also take up Phillip on his offer the next time she stumbled on her homework. “I know some really great Ravenclaws.” Her closest friends were, in fact, Ravenclaws and Slytherins. She didn’t think any one house could be written off so immediately. Even the supposedly antagonistic house of Slytherin had its saving graces.

The dog took the spotlight, easily. “Runt,” she repeated, delighted. It was fitting because it wasn’t. She giggled at the nicknames offered up— the others seemed to quickly take up a serious debate on each one— rubbing his face and scratching his ears. That the man knew about muggle comic books meant that he, too, probably had some kind of interaction with muggle culture… or else he had been very good muggle studies student! While Lua’s older brother was the go-to man for hangover cures in her family (though, again, her father would also like claim the title), it was her twin brother who could occasionally be found reading those comic books.

She jumped as the little ball of stuff went flying through the shop, knocking into the things. It finally stopped and her eyes immediately fastened upon the grinning man. She was a bit nervous now (it would be silly for even Lua not to be). She pet the dog absently as she stared, but felt her heart flutter a bit, curiously, as his belated welcome. She smiled in return. She watched him until the door between his face and the rest of them.

“Do you want help cleaning up?” She asked earnestly, looking between the pair of them.