"After you." The bell above the doorway rang out as he stepped aside to hold the door for a humpbacked witch with a walking stick. She shuffled in so slowly, a small, rather impatient corner of his mind rued the fact he'd offered. Outwardly his polite smile did not falter even if it did drop from his shadowed blue eyes. It had been a bit of a late night, then again, what nights weren't recently, to make sure that Wednesday morning was clear of all commitments.

Not rushing off to the Ministry on the morning provided a valuable chance to catch up on the log which was in danger of yelling at him again. A few days before it's reminder charms had triggered and he'd shot off his desk chair alone in his flat like scorned cat. Having finally heard it's trick, the last thing he wanted was for it to do it while someone else was around. It was stowed back in his bag to be sure he always had it close by wherever he happened to end up.

He had left Atreus by half past nine, low on decent sealing wax, red ink, and a few more mundane items for business. Being in Diagon Alley to meet provided a handy time before to collect necessary supplies and also to visit the main post office to pick up a heavy parcel from his post office box. Weighing the parcel quickly in both hands, he resolved that yet more granite chips must have arrived. About time too.

Eventually, the humpbacked witch was clear of the doorway and he was clear of being able to act on the internal suggestion of smacking her clean out of the way with the second hand copy of The Dark Arts: A Legal Companion he had just purchased. Emerging outside, he checked the time and headed on his way at last towards his appointment, bag slung across his body from his left shoulder to his right hip.

As it happened, a familiar figure turned out to be making her way there just ahead of him, so he hurried his long strides to catch up, appearing at her right elbow, a flat hand gently extending to rest upon it a moment after he addressed her.
"Ah, good morning!" He greeted Lydia brightly, offering a genuine smile on seeing her. He had been looking forward to meeting up ever since they had arranged things. Although the two of them had spent fleeting time together alone, mostly invited as a friend of her son, Johann had always felt they got along rather well on first impressions, and certainly their Sunday lunchtime conversation had always been fruitful. Feeling he would not easily be able to accept another invitation to Stuart Road, he had instead written to invite Lydia for morning tea instead. Not coffee. Tea. For a wizard who often helped himself to tea in other people's kitchens, it had not escaped his notice.

Pausing on the cobbles beside Arc's mother, he offered her a hug and inclined to kiss her cheek.
"You're looking well. Were you on your way to meet me?" He asked, gesturing ahead of them while other shoppers milled around them. "I was just doing a spot of shopping myself. Shall we?" He offered his left arm to her, still smiling broadly, though at least this time it wasn't the 'too bright lumos spell' forced version as Arc had described it from the last time he'd seen Lydia.

Though Lydia was no stranger to getting invites to tea from people, she was very much surprised to see such an invite from, of all people, her son's friend. It wasn't often that Arc's social circle overlapped with hers, although she supposed that all those invites to lunch from before would have naturally made him feel like giving back. She'd smiled. It tended to be an eventual response to the Hollingburys' generosity, even if it wasn't necessary.

Still, turning down this invite would be, in her opinion, a little impolite. She'd mused over it carefully before lifting her own quill to write an answer. Since Arc had informed her that they were no longer together, she supposed that the Sunday lunch they'd had together was to be their last, at least for a very long time. Meeting face to face, however? She could go with that. She had a lot of time to spare, and besides she had some shopping to do.

With the small bottles of magical fertiliser tucked away in a sealed bag lest their rather strong earthy scent interrupted their tea by tickling their sinuses (and that wouldn't do!) she set off for the place Johann had specified. Though a patron of her friends' houses when having tea, she didn't know Johann well enough to feel comfortable at being invited to his place. Still, all these new places popping up all over Diagon made her feel like she was too old to be a patron, with all their minimalist modern trappings and fixtures she tended to find in Muggle cafés elsewhere in London. And as it so happened, even with Johann's instructions she wasn't quite sure where this tearoom was.

The chilly, crisp air of the morning was broken by a gentle touch on her elbow. She turned on her heel to find her appointment beside her. "Morning, Johann," she exclaimed, accepting his hug and kiss graciously before looking up at him. Always and forever surrounded by men taller than her. "Yes, I was on the way! It's so good to see you again."

She took in the shadows under his eyes as he offered her his arm with a "Shall we?" "Of course, Johann," she said, taking up his offer. "You're too kind, dear. Where are we going, again? I have your instructions, but, ah, Diagon Alley changes so much if you don't visit every nook and cranny often, and I'm not sure if I'm on the right path."

"It's just up here," Johann replied kindly, gesturing with his free arm to the alley ahead of them. "I think it was called something a little fancier once." He squeezed Lydia's arm gently with his own as they walked along. There was a little passageway between two of the shops on their left, a painted sign for Cobbles inscribed on the wall just inside the entrance. As they drew close, he slowed their pace and relinquished Lydia's arm.

"After you," Johann gestured forward gently down the narrow passageway, painted in bright white paint to offset the fact the light from the Alley didn't reach all the way down. One after the other they climbed the slight incline on the cobbles, taking them away from the main drag of shops. Then ahead, on the right, was a low doorway set into the wall, it too painted bright white, with thick glass panels. The narrow space opened up on the left into a little cobbled courtyard, and what little November sunshine that could break through the cloud reached them again.

It was too cool at this time of year to sit out comfortably, but despite this a darker skinned wizard with an incredibly bushy beard and very long black hair sat with a pot of tea at a table a few feet from the door. The smoke from his pipe snaked up through the air in complicated patterns.
"Johann." The fellow greeted in a deep voice, which sounded like it might have come from his boots. The linguist gave a dip of his head in reply, before the wizard puffed again on his pipe, sending up a plume of smoke that resembled a bird. It was a fair spectacle, but they hadn't come to observe.

"Here we go, mind the steps…" Johann spoke suddenly to Lydia, bending down a little to open the low door, holding it open so she could step inside ahead of him.

Once inside, the height of the door seemed a little more sensible, what with the few steps down to the floor of the tea room. A fireplace at the far end heated the room more than sufficiently. Mismatched chairs clustered around little round tables, and calligraphic blackboard menus hung from the walls. The place was fairly quiet, though four old witches were occupying a corner table, with oversized teacups and a stack of cakes visible on their table. A wizard and a rather imposing looking owl were sat in the other, sniffing two different tea canisters held by a rather patient teenage waitress.
"That one. No… that one." He decided, the owl hooting.

"Hope it's not too … kitsch." Johann stated from behind Lydia, stooping with the low beamed ceiling. He'd already smacked his head on the first as they got clear of the undersized door, and wasn't about to make the same mistake twice. One hand was rubbing his forehead. "Livens up a bit at lunchtime, honest."

He gestured to a table beside a rather lovely looking grandfather clock that was equidistant from the door and the witches in the corner, looking to Lydia's approval before he ducked another beam and pulled out a seat for her. Once sorted, he made his way around the other side and slid his long coat from his shoulders, folding it over the back of the third chair at the table between them. Despite only being dressed for work in a deep navy suit and a white shirt without tie, he looked overdressed for where they were.

"I meet a client here sometimes, her choice. I think she's trying to feed me up on the cakes." He explained to Lydia. "They are rather good, but not quite your Sunday lamb."

"Kitsch?" Lydia surveyed the tearoom with delight. "Hardly, Johann. Haven't you been in our house? I can live with kitsch."

At the mention of Sunday lamb, Lydia smiled. "You know, maybe once in a while I should make you some lamb youvetsi if you miss it. Just let me know if you do, yes?"

She surveyed the little place with much interest. It didn't make her feel too old, no, but at the same time she didn't feel as if a place like this was meant for little old ladies. She'd admitted once or twice to Mordecai that she sometimes felt a little old for certain places and activities. His reply had always been to remind her that there was a long way to go for the both of them, and that age was just a matter of the mind. He'd smiled too. It was rare to see her husband smile these days.

"So how have you been of late, Johann?" she asked. "Work, life? I've never really asked you about your work in detail, honestly, but government matters are government matters. What do you do, really? You come back with the most fascinating stories about people not of Britain and far-flung places. I suppose you do a lot of international travel, so Department of International Magical Cooperation? External affairs, negotiations, that sort of thing?"

"If I miss it?" Johann replied, eyebrows rising and a smile breaking out across his face, "Of course I miss your cooking, but too much of a good thing spoils me." He winked, "Don't go out of your way on my account." He reached his hand out momentarily to rest his fingertips on her arm to assure her he meant so.

Lydia's eyes glanced about the place, and Johann sat back to reach for one of the little menus tucked against the sugar bowl on their table, offering it towards her to also examine the varieties of tea they had on offer.

The questions began as soon as Lydia's eyes had done a lap of the room. It wasn't overly surprising, the two of them hadn't ever shared conversation alone for longer than a little washing up once, or passing conversation in the hall. Mordecai or Arcturus were normally also present and party to it. However, their conversation over lunches and dinners at Stuart Road had given him enough indication that he and Lydia got on enough to be bold to invite her for tea alone during Mord's office hours.

What Arc would make of it, he didn't know, but since he had been warned away from coming round to the Diagon Alley flat by Elixa just before the turn of the month, this was the closest he got to figuring out what might be going on with his dear friend.

"Good, thanks," he replied casually to the first opening query, but stopped to listen to the rest of them.
".. never really asked you about your work in detail, honestly…" The linguist tilted his head curiously at Lydia, realising she was quite right. He in turn did not usually want to bore people with discussion of work, especially not in social situations, though when it dominated his waking hours, sometimes it was inevitable.

He chuckled at the mention of fascinating stories.
"I'm flattered you feel they are quite so fascinating, Lydia," he replied with a hint of humour in his voice. He reached for the other menu and lay it open on the table before him, though didn't examine it immediately.
"I am more officially a translator, it is the bread and butter of my time at the Ministry. A lot of documents to check and change, then meetings to accompany different Departments to at home and abroad. I have a small team of colleagues, which unofficially I'm now in charge of, though I'm not there all the time at the moment, so we manage ourselves." He gestured faintly with his hands as if to balance them, and glanced upwards as he considered things.

"Sometimes there are more puzzling official matters, of course, but that makes up for the majority. Outside, I keep a small collection of private clients. I translate manuscripts for the odd publisher, rewrite manuals for the charms on self-assembling furniture which is manufactured abroad, write letters, check contracts, even teach a few people. That's how I came to know here, I meet a retired witch whose son has married into a French family, and she wants to improve her French before she moves out there with them to live out what years she has left. It hardly feels like work, so if we go past the hour chattering, I don't charge her the extra."

Johann shrugged and smiled, painting perhaps a very neutral, upbeat account of his actual work. There were many assignments and clients he couldn't allude to, in his defence, but equally there was no point speaking of something negative to Lydia. They were here to be social, and he would far more use the balance of the positive conversation to ask after Arcturus, and of Mord. Though he couldn't put his finger on it, something in the way the Hollingburys had been the other week had made him wonder if they were worried about Arc's father.

"But the travel, well, that's just my thing. I get itchy feet. You must feel that what with going out to Malaysia? You've travelled, haven't you, what with the family out in Greece?" He asked, fingers going to the pages of the menu, turning it to the list where the tea was. He quite fancied Nilgiri that morning.
"Where your next trip, do you think?"

Lydia listened to him, aware that she at some point should be looking at the menus. But frankly she found people fascinating, and perhaps had been spending too much time in the house of late with her plants. Plants were pleasant to be with, but not exactly competent conversation partners.

She'd always been interested in her son's friends, and would not deny wanting to know more about them for her son's sake. Of course she'd never voice this, not even to her son, but it was very hard to not be a mother when she'd been so for the past thirty years. Taking the menu from him was, at least, something she could manage without being a mother.

The housewife listened intently to him, her chin on both her hands in rapt attention, but relaxed enough to enjoy it. She didn't interrupt him the whole time she was talking and considered his question to give him time to peruse the menu if he wished. "I'm not going anywhere, not in the near future - Greece, perhaps, in the summer as usual, but I would be loathe to stay there when Arc can't be in Greece as well. Usually we go every Christmas and in the summer, but it seems Arc has imposed upon himself to stay in England until October next year." She sighed. "He would miss Greece very much, but he assures me it's worth the sacrifice. I do hope so."

She looked down at the creamy-white menu with its thin green swirls growing around the edges of each page, forget-me-nots blooming as she turned the pages. While slightly distracted by the minor error of the forget-me-nots not growing in clusters, her eyes alighted on Kashmiri. Definitely that.

"I do get itchy feet, but it's satisfied by a wander into Muggle London, usually." She left the menu open so she wouldn't forget. "I may not have left all of the Muggle world behind. I love the world of magic, but sometimes it's rather refreshing to go out there and people-watch. Eavesdrop on conversations, even if I've left behind all their science and technology." Lydia moved the menu over to one side of the table, smiling slightly. "To think that once upon a time I used to dream of magical worlds, and then once I'm in it regularly go back to the ordinary."

"Ah yes, he mentioned." Johann spoke softly in response to Lydia's mention that Arc couldn't go away. It had been when he'd been to visit the house in Stuart Road. Taken too much leave what with the sabbatical to Malaysia, and a brush with Miranda Elliot made it difficult.
".. he assures me it's worth the sacrifice…"
"I hope it is." He nodded gravely, thoughtful. "He works very hard." Far too hard, in his opinion, though as much as he admired the dedication and recognised the workaholic approach, he also saw it as a potential coping strategy.

Lydia moved on effortlessly to his comment of itchy feet, and with it he looked up properly, smiling a little more again for the topic.
"Always interesting to indulge in a little eavesdropping," He winked, tilting his head a little to indicate the group of witches behind him who were discussing the Leaky Cauldron explosion. Not too much of a surprise given it was a recent event and everyone was discussing it.

The very patient squib waitress appeared to take their orders and also elaborate on the cake selection if they might also take a slice. She didn't linger too long, and seemed to be relieved to serve them as opposed to the indecisive wizard and his owl.

Once alone again, Johann cleared his throat a little and shuffled.
"Arcturus works awfully hard," he began, blue eyes studying Lydia's reaction carefully. "I know he takes his job very seriously, but I can't help but think he's going to overdo it. Like he's got something to prove since he got back from the trip." He rubbed at the point of his chin thoughtfully. "He's alright, isn't he?"

At the mention of her son, Lydia touched the fingertips of her hands together, looking down at her olive-complexioned hands. "Oh, Arc. Truthfully I can't tell you much, we only see him on weekends, but of course. He's truly passionate about his work, and being challenged over his capabilities will make him very competitive."

She sat back in her chair. "Why do you ask?  I assume you still keep in contact with him? Surely much more than he does with his parents. You are his friend, after all. Even we're surprised he'd make friends with you; if you tracked his movement for over a year you'd only see him move between home and workplace most of the time. Hardly him to make friends with a Ministry employee, of all people, but here we are."

Lydia sighed. "But yes, you are right. He is a bit of a workaholic. I suspect it's to deal with whatever's happened in the past, to prevent his mind from slipping back into darker times, especially how he was immediately after the war. I suppose he thinks he hides all of that very carefully, but I have experience watching other people falter to it and I had to keep an eye on him without his knowledge to make sure he doesn't tread the same path." She fiddled with a corner of the napkin in front of her on the table. "He is married to the job, shall we say. A little too much. I've given him advice on reeling it back a little, but unfortunately his seventh year and the summer leading up to it did a number on his social skills. I hope you don't find him a little too...negative."

Johann drew breath to answer her question about why he was asking, but Lydia continued on. He had a sudden example of where her son got it from - the need to speak many questions aloud and give information in one go. He folded his arms onto the table before him, and crossed his ankles beneath the table, gaze not leaving Lydia all the while.

"I don't," Johann answered eventually. "And he is a workaholic," there was a ghost of a smile on his features, acknowledging takes one to know one.

"I ask because, well, we haven't seen a lot of each other of late. We had a … well, we didn't really, but well, a mutual acquaintance has suggested I have done something to offend him." Johann frowned, "It's not the reason I invited you out, it's just coincidence, Lydia." He assured her, in case the witch thought she had been asked out to tea to be drilled about what her son had or hand't said about his former boyfriend. "When we did meet last week, he was distant, but it was a professional situation, I hardly expect him to be otherwise." Johann shrugged. He recalled that Arcturus had explained away their meeting as an interaction at the hospital of a professional nature, stretching the truth a little and replacing it with Johann's sporadic summons to a ward to translate for foreign patients. It was an altogether simpler and more palatable truth.

The waitress was approaching with the tea, and Johann sat back, allowing her a captive audience as she showed them how the tea leaves were and advised them on their tea strainers to catch them, before lifting the most delicious looking selection of cake slices from the tray to sit between them with the milk and sugar.

"Thank you," Johann spoke and nodded, letting her go and looking back to Lydia. "He does hide it, I see that too." He agreed. "It's just felt like it's been over compensation lately, more than it was before he went away. I'm sorry we were gone so long the day we came round for lunch." He paused, finding a lighter tone from somewhere, "That and all those times, is more the reason I invited you out. A very small way of saying thank you." He raised a hand, "I know, I know you'll say I don't have to, but let me, Lydia." He sat back, lifting the lid of his teapot to check the colour of the tea steeping. "Which did you get, Kashmiri?"

Lydia waited until the waitress had finished her demonstration and Johann had spoken before addressing what she'd heard. Despite her age she tended to have a fairly good memory and retention rate - something that her husband suggested Arc had gotten from her. "All right, I'll let you have just this once," she said a little cheekily. "A thanks is a thanks, I won't turn it down. I suppose you've had too much experience with my son on the typical Hollingbury lack of acceptance of gratitude. You're welcome, Johann, very much so."

She watched him as he checked the tea. "Yes, it seems quite appealing from the description alone. Oh, you don't have to apologise, I assumed you two were having a private conversation. I am not going to police whatever my son does, I trust his judgement." Lifting up the cover of her own teapot to check hers as well, she was somewhat thankful for living with an amateur tea brewer, though she didn't say. Mordecai's particular tastes both made him a little difficult and educational to make tea for.

"I hope you two haven't gotten into a particularly bad disagreement," she said casually, lowering the teapot lid with a clink. "He finds it difficult to express his emotions, and he really isn't that great at social communication. He used to be, but alas, war changes people." She knew that all too well. "We'd both like him back. He probably has never mentioned any of that to you, but I wouldn't be surprised on that, either." A sigh accompanied her checking, again, of her tea. It was almost ready.

"You're asking me as a way of checking up on him, given your circumstances?" she asked, raising her eyebrows. "I don't have a problem with that, just afraid that I can't give you much of an answer myself."

"… I assumed you two were having a private conversation…" Lydia had assumed correctly. Had she realised her son had been sat on his late sister's bed sobbing his heart out about her? That he'd then turned it around that he was still hung up on Johann despite running away to his research on the other side of the world?

Without realising, his hand had clenched around the teaspoon in his fingers and he made a conscious effort to put it down and flatten his hand as Lydia raised the lid of her teapot and examined what was within.

"I hope you two haven't gotten into a particularly bad disagreement."

I hope not either. Johann though to himself as Lydia elaborated, as a mother often did, to defend her son and suggest calm reason behind the falling out. Ever the war, ever the scar upon a whole generation of British witches and wizards.

"Not intentionally, Lydia." Johann admitted when she asked if he was checking up on Arcturus through her. "I just… we've both moved on to other people, but I still consider him a very dear friend. Perhaps that's not an option to us both. I just, if you mention we've taken tea together, just let him know I asked after him. For all I know we're like ships in the night at the moment." He shrugged and assembled his tea strainer above his cup and poured.

"It'll work out. I shouldn't have brought it up." He forced a smile, "Which one of these cakes do you fancy?" He gestured to the selection they'd ordered, purposely changing the subject, though inevitably it would return - Arcturus was Lydia's only surviving child after all. He wouldn't blame her for having him as a specialist topic.

"What do you miss most about the Muggle world?" He asked returning to an earlier comment Lydia had made, "Do you not get the best of both in Stuart Road?"

There was something about Johann's tone that made Lydia decide to drop the topic of her son. He hadn't been hostile or negative in any way, it was his reluctance to continue on the subject. She was curious, but she knew better than to continue if that were the case.

"I'll let him know," she replied casually as she turned to the cakes on offer. Her eyes roved over ones that were familiar, and a few not so familiar that she would know them off the top of her head. After some heavy consideration that was nonetheless decisive and satiating her own curiosity at the same time, she finally settled on a square of green sponge with white cream and a delicate iced green flower on the top. The flower gently spun clockwise as she looked at it, as if it knew.

"I...is that key lime?" she asked, pointing. The flower spun anti-clockwise. "Is that a yes or a no? Either way, I'll have that, it looks delicious. Anyway...your question. I don't miss the Muggle world as much as I like to think I do. To me, the vehicles, the engines, the science of that world, they're all still strange things, and yet they're just as normal to a Muggle as magic is to us. They live very ordinary lives compared to us, I think." She picked up her teapot and tipped it over her cup. "Oh, this smells wonderful."

She remained silent until she'd poured enough and set the pot down. "Perhaps what I miss from it most is living a life as ordinary as that. Excitement is all very well, but when you reach a certain age...well." She chuckled. "I hope I don't need to go all old person on you with 'at a certain age things need to slow down'. I don't actually believe in that, but a breather is nice once in a while. Like right now."

Lydia watched him pick the cakes both of them had selected with care and plate them gently. "Do you get many breathers, yourself?" she asked, turning her blue eyes up at him. "I don't suppose so, the Ministry's always a busy place getting things done, but even a break for two minutes would count. If a concept of such a break exists - the last time I was there, some people took two hours to have their breaks, and some none at all." She smiled fondly at him. "Are you the former or the latter?"

"Slow down?!" Johann echoed with a shake of his head at Lydia, all well meant, just that she shouldn't slow down. Lydia wasn't old, she wasn't even sixty yet, and roughly the same age as his own mother. "Never. Don't slow down, that's how they get you." He winked but didn't explain who or what he meant would get her, only that he was sure something would.

The wizard served them both with cake while the witches at the table nearby chuckled, their shared joke unheard but providing amusement for more than a moment. Johann choose a fruitcake with some sort of icing, not quite as sweet or acidic as some of the others they had been brought. He was still feeling a little careful of what he ate, lack of appetite and the potions causing stomach pains didn't help. He wasn't particularly drawn to sweet things, besides this though. In the last year he'd been more likely to buy something sweet for Arcturus instead.

"Do you get many breathers, yourself?" Lydia asked, and Johann laid a cake fork down on his plate beside the fruit cake, his lips twitching beneath a slightly thoughtful frown, "I don't suppose so, the Ministry's always a busy place getting things done, but even a break for two minutes would count. If a concept of such a break exists - the last time I was there, some people took two hours to have their breaks, and some none at all. Are you the former or the latter?" As Lydia drew breath, Johann laughed a little in a relaxed manner.

"I confess I am the latter, I am a bit of a workaholic." He gave a shrug, "I have the schedule in the time, like today, sad as that sounds. The Ministry is a busy place to get things done, but true to governments anywhere, there are those civil servants amongst us who know the rules and do the bare minimum. But no, it hasn't got to chaining us to our desks quite yet." Johann confirmed, "Why were you a two-hour lunch fiend in Transport - I can't imagine you were, you're far too principled." He winked.

"Two-hour lunch fiend?!" Lydia gasped in mock indignation. "What do you take me for, Johann Storm?" She laughed and reverted to her normal manner of speech. "No, Transport was a busy place the last time I was there, and no doubt it still is. Had to eat at our desks, keeping an eye on the network and monitoring for the slightest suspicious activity."

She picked up her cake fork and gently teased apart the bright green sponge. It smelled good, not too sweet. "Completely off the wall, I suppose, for you," she said, watching Johann navigate around his selection with his own fork, "but what sort of foods do you enjoy or turn down? Apart from my cooking, I'm sure that everything that comes from my hands you'd willingly eat, even if it was unfamiliar to you."

The housewife gave him a playfully shrewd look. "Or would you?"

He laughed with good humour as Lydia played along, and it felt awfully good to do that. He felt a little more cheerful for it, (not that he had been particularly sad).
"All seeing eyes," He nodded at her description of them always watching for suspicious activity. It paid great dividends to keep in cahoots with Transport. It was the only reason he tolerated Higgins and his interest in how to fix fireplaces and collect what he found stuck in the floo.

"Perhaps not now you'd put it like that," Johann replied to her question about food, giving her a look of exaggerated suspicion. "You are a fine cook, so I always have the greatest confidence." He added in more sensible tone and smiled in appreciation, putting aside his cake fork a moment to answer.

"There's few things I'll willingly turn down, and that's normally for the state of it - can you every abide anyone who asks for well done steak for instance?" He gestured with both hands, raising his voice a little - realising and dropping it again self-consciously. "I'm a man of simple culinary pleasures, though I get cravings for things. Roast beef with yorkshire puddings the other day. Sausage, cheese, smoked fish… phad thai from a street vendor, blini, and lately the strongest cravings for chips in newspaper." He shrugged. "Try anything once, me.  You? What makes you ask?"