8 October 2011 @ 8pm; a Saturday
Death & Co, Diagon Alley

Figaro hadn't seen Fauna in two months, not since he crashed an interview with Solomon Carstairs getting them both in hot water with their respective bosses, and Figaro departing the encounter with a toasty crotch and second-hand red trousers.  For Figaro, time healed most things, turning tumult into a tale. But he'd learned that wasn't the same for everyone. Friendships needed a bit of care. As he let go of his resentment towards Fauna about her role in the fiasco, he realized he had some regrets, so he owled her an olive branch.

8 oct

Fauna, you busy tonight? I've got the night off & we should hang out. Meet me at Death Co at 8?

Fig

Fig showed up and took a pumpkin-spiced stout to a small half-round booth and put his feet up. He was wearing those red trousers, an olive Sellaphix Apothecary shirt, and a slouchy grey knit hat. He had a folded copy of the Daily Prophet and was picking through the Quidditch section. With anyone, Fig might've been nervous his inviation would have been ignored, but Fauna was better than most. Better than all of them, probably.

A few months had passed since the day that Figaro had wormed his way into Carstairs’ office through a combination of trickery and gumption, and by this point, Fauna’s hurt feelings had faded to near-indifference. Figaro likely would not change anytime soon. He opened his mouth, caused some trouble, and didn't seem to understand why his friends would be angry. Rinse, repeat. Though she didn’t feel angry at him anymore, she was over the pattern. Work and friends and potential new romances happily competed for her mind-space, and left little room for older loyalties.

That was what she told herself as she grumbled and muttered over his last minute invite, throwing on a pair of jeans, a black tank, and an oversize red plaid jacket cozy for fall. No yellow. No silly hat. No favorite badger bracelet. She subconsciously donned the black of her uniform and the red she hoped to someday earn.

For a few minutes, earlier that evening, she’d considered ignoring Figaro’s invite, but as she stared at his messy handwriting (much like her own), she felt a pang of worry. The Sellaphix apothecary had closed, hadn’t it? Fauna had read about it in the paper, but had neglected to reach out or inquire about his family. Frowning, she hurried out the door.

At 8:05 pm, Fauna spotted Figaro in a gray hat she’d like to borrow. She slid into the seat opposite him, nudging his feet off the booth in the same easygoing manner she'd had when they'd shared a common room.

“Hey. I like the trousers,” she glanced at his leg, then showed off her red jacket sleeve and smiled tentatively.

Aw, shit. There was still a stink lingering between them. Or is this just how they were now? Boring adults with jobs who have mellowed out now they had bills? Well, that was depressing. Despite the palpable cloud, he lifted his eyebrows and his mood and offered Fauna a big smile.

"Hey! Ah, yea, thanks." He looked over at his leg on the bench. "Got'm a few months ago..." He made a comical wince, hoping the timeline would be unspoken punchline enough.

"How are you doing? Want anything?" Figaro nodded back to the bar. It was Saturday night, neither of them had to work - that was reason enough to celebrate. Plus, old friends, right? Then he looked like he remembered something and shifted to dig into the pocket of his tighter-than-he'd-been-used-to trousers.

He handed her a little parcel wrapped in brown paper.

"Found this. The guy said it's from the 1910's."

It was a tiny book, small enough to fit in your hand. It was Hecate's Hidden Hex Handbook, a fieldguide for the witches of the day, who secretly helped the muggle suffragettes defend themselves from police and commit vandalism.

Figaro nodded, "I looked through it. There's some truly nasty spells in it. Most designed to be mostly undetectable, like, no sparkles or anything. I dunno. Thought I owed you one."

She felt a twinge of guilt over her reluctance as Figaro grinned at her, his manner cheerful as ever. It took Fauna a second when he winced, then she tilted her head. "You got them after you were...? Ohhh."

Count on Fig to wear the trousers like a badge of honor! She put her hand to her mouth and chuckled.

Settling into the booth, she eyed his stout with interest. "What are you drinking?" She might as well, if she was going to be there for a while.

Her eyebrows shot up as he handed her a gift, one that fit into the palm of her hand. Another notebook? Who had told him she hauled around three?

Fauna opened it, a slow smile creeping up her face as he explained. Not a notebook, but a book of hexes. Perfect! Though she appreciated it less so as a gift, more so that it meant Figaro had thought about her beyond his seemingly random invite to hang out.

Hecate's Hidden Hex Handbook. She flipped through it, vaguely remembering reading mention of it somewhere.

"Thanks!" Fauna glanced up, her expression surprised, and still slightly guarded. "This is badass, Fig." She flipped through a few more pages, then tucked it away in her purse, excited to try a few things out during the next training simulation.

"Should I ask?" She rested her chin in her hand. "How'd it all turn out once you got back to the Prophet? I hear Cuffe has a temper."

To put it mildly!

Fig described the beer he had (a spiced stout with notes of pumpkin and nutmeg), and at an affirmative from Fauna, stood up to go get one for her from the bar. On his feet, he had to hike at the waistband a bit. You'd think tighter pants would stay on more easily?

With a grin, he said. "Oh, I'm bloody famous now. Hold on."

Figaro left her with that, but was back soon enough with a tall glass of dark brown brew. He slid back into the booth and leaned forward to tell the tale.

"Like I said, I'm very famous now, Fauna. I reckon your boss absolutely did owl Cuffe, and surely did use my name. I barely beat the owl back to the Prophet after - oh that's right, Madam Nagde has now seen my puppies, Fauna."

He paused, blank-faced, for effect. Then moved on, his smile returning.

"So I get back to the Prophet, I'm hiding in the ally in these outrageous trousers. I swear they must be Virgil's originally. I'm chain-smoking - "  Fig leaned back to pantomime taking frantic, shaky draws from an imaginary cigarette, "- And from outside I hear Cuffe screaming my name. Like, across the entire building and through probably more than one solid brick wall, I hear my name. I swear, a murder of crows evacuated a tree nearby lighting crackled across the sky."

Fauna blinked skeptically at Figaro as he left to fetch her a drink, and she fidgeted a bit in her seat, feeling more awkward than ever in his absence. Why was she here? What was she doing? Could they really be friends like they'd used to be?

As he returned, prattling on with ease, he paused after he mentioned 'puppies' and Tulojow. Two things that should never be in the same sentence.

"Oh my Merlin," Fauna muttered, face-palming half of her face as a blush crept up her cheeks. She sipped hastily at her beer.

She shook her head, slowly, as he continued his story. He wasn't smoking! Was he smoking? She couldn't help but feel a little like her mum at that moment, gaze tracking his fingers for nicotine stains, leaning over the table ever so slightly to see if she caught a whiff of smoke. No he wasn't! He wasn't smoking, it was all a part of his exaggerated story.

"Uh huh," Fauna prompted him, eyes dancing. She couldn't help it, this was amusing. "And then what," she paused, shrugging a shoulder while her hands cradled the beer mug.

"As the lightning struck, did Cuffe stick his head out the window, and send the, um, I don't know, crows to pluck you up by your trousers and carry you into his office? Where, hold on - he had your name framed at the top of his shit list?"

She winced a little at her ending. She wasn't very good at spur-of-the-moment wit, but she trusted Fig would run with it.

Figaro only hesitated a moment, caught by surprise when Fauna became an accomplice in his semi-fictionalized retelling. He slapped the table between them, delighted, then resumed the tale with a renewed purpose.

"Blake, you've got spies in the Prophet. How else could you have known! Because I absolutely was deposited bodily at the feet of Barney Cuffe and there is a list and my name was on it written in the blood of something. And he says to me, he says..."

Fig paused and held up a thumb for #1.

"'You little shit.'"

He added his index finger for the count of #2.

"'You're the downfall of Rome."

And his middle finger to round things out with #3.

"'And I love you. Also you're not fired and I better not ever see you again or I'll surely murder you myself.'"

He wasn't even trying to keep a straight face anymore. This had turned into a much better way of telling this story.

"I then I says to him, I says: 'Barney, lover, my captain... you have no idea ... how high ... I can fly.' And then I transcended to another plane and iced my puppies."

He giggled. He really should stop calling them puppies. "No but really, he chewed me out hard. I thought I was sacked, hundred percent. I've never - Fauna, truly, never. Never been ripped like that. I was seriously going to cry."

Fauna chuckled at his theatrics, then laughed at his 'downfall of rome'. She waved her hand at him, as if to get him to quit with the wit, but of course he couldn't.

She made a paltry effort to hang on to her annoyance and distrust, knowing she'd sternly stare down her reflection in the mirror later and wonder why she couldn't stand up for herself, but it all started to slip away as she realized she'd missed laughing with him. His playful immaturity cracked her up more than it annoyed her when they'd been schoolmates, and that held true even now.

"Well you know, that's what happens..." she trailed off, sipping at her beer. She couldn't even scold him.

"It is terrifying."

She shook her head.

"Just the amount of spittle itself! How can someone produce that much when they're yelling?" She brushed imaginary spittle off her shoulder. "And their face is just going to pop, like an angry pimple, and they've got the veiny forehead going on, and just. It's just awful.

She pointed at him, bringing up his last point.

"You're trying not to cry, but it makes it so you can't talk, and they're still wanting answers, and for you to be, I don't know, on point." She imitated a lower voice, "Do everything I say without question!"

Fauna rolled her eyes.

"That happened to me days before you showed up.[1] I've had to go by the book, since."

Though she usually followed the rules at her job, her mouth twisted to the side, understanding just how he felt.

1.	All hands on deck

Now Figaro was dreadfully curious. Fauna was painting a vivid picture of someone who'd been there. She was a poet of abuse, honestly, easily roasting her taskmaster with careful and accurate turns of phrase. Fig had, once, entertained becoming an Auror. Once, after his dad was arrested, an Auror had sort of taken him under the wing. But the aspiration was short-lived. He didn't have the disposition and he had good reason to surmise it would be just a terrible place to work.

What he hadn't quite considered was what it meant for Fauna, Briar, Raine and the rest of them to endure it. Yeah, he understood now, why she'd been an insufferable, earnest, suck-up when he'd been there. He'd been smiling during her story, but looked a bit penitent by the end.

Figaro drummed his fingers on the table and winced. "Well, bollocks, Fauna. I didn't know."

He was a breath away from actually apologizing, but even though time had passed, he still wasn't actually sure he regretted anything. But that didn't mean he was happy that Fauna was clearly under a lot of pressure. (And he certainly had no sweet thoughts for Raine Almasy.)

"Did you get it again after?" He hoped not. She had, as she said, done it by the book.

Was that almost an apology? She blinked, then shrugged, a rueful smile tugging at her mouth.

Her dramatic retelling had not been designed to make Figaro feel guilty, but it was an added benefit. Scolding and anger and hexing never seemed to get through to him. Instead, giving him something to relate to worked better. It was the Hufflepuff way. 

"No," she said easily. "That was, um," she faltered. "I mean, I'd pissed off Pratt."

Fauna made a slight face. She didn't plan on doing that again, at least not for as basic a reason as forgetting to take notes.

"I've actually never seen Carstairs lose his cool, isn't that mad? But yeah, I mean, he gave you the information he wanted to give and nothing more, so he was fine with it, and," she tilted her head at him, "you didn't convince me to say anything I shouldn't have before that point."

Ten points for Auror training and remembering Figaro: A History.

She sipped her beer, realizing that the information Carstairs had given him likely felt like a pittance now that the pentral problem continued to grow. Still, he must have moved on to other stories for the Daily Prophet.

"How is it? At the DP? Um, besides all the yelling." Fauna paused, her eyebrows furrowing. "It's not all yelling, is it?"

She'd heard Thursby and Groust were good people, level-headed. He'd probably made loads of friends at the office. Figaro lounged in his seat across from her, looking like he frequented pubs and cafes every night.

"...you didn't convince me to say anything I shouldn't have before that point."

Figaro couldn't help making a face at that and tried to wipe it off with a drink of beer. It had struck a nerve, but he wasn't sure which one. At least Fauna didn't seem cross with him about it anymore. Getting screamed at by their bosses provided a sort of mutual sympathy, that neither of them really had a lot of control right now.  Both just trying to keep their heads above water. A wiser wizard would have been able to apply the same benefit of the doubt to Raine Almasy.

Fauna asked him about life at the newspaper. Figaro shook his head. He still couldn't believe this was what his life was now. He shook his head, grinning wide, amazed at it all.

"It's boring," he said, nodding and looking elated. He then added, "until it isn't. Then it's absolutely mad. One minute I'm cleaning the press the next minute everything blows up. Papers flying around, reporters flying around, Cuffe barking, and I'm being Side-Alonged to some Quidditch match or crime scene or  .. a bloody frog fashion show."

"I just work all the time. I never see anyone." Figaro sighed smugly. "I'm a comer, Blake. Actually, I'm lower than a dog there, but it's pretty incredible."

Fauna chuckled at his colorful description, glad that Fig was having fun between getting yelled at. She could relate, though she could not imagine Figaro working constantly without also having a social life to balance it out.

"You don't see anyone? What about the frog people. The fashionable frogs," she sipped at her beer. "Or other... dog... people?"

He should know better than to let her make jokes while she drank.

"You know what your next assignment should be?" She widened her eyes. "Find out who was ballsy enough to taint the chocolates at the Ministry yesterday. You heard about that, right? Everyone acting dopey. All of Level Two - er, not me - embarrassing themselves?"[1]

Definitely her.

"Redeem yourself. And don't get hexed," Fauna smiled impishly over the rim of her glass.

1.

Twue Wove

"Oh my god," Figaro wiped his face with his hands at Fauna's terrible jokes. She was sweet, but wow. Forgivable. Her cheeks were getting pink.

"Redeem myself?" he echoed. "Pfft. There's zero chance I'll be allowed at the Ministry again in the next decade, and even less Cuffe would allow me to live should I dare attempt anything resembling journalism again."  He made a zero-shape with his fingers and looked through it.

He hadn't heard about whatever chocolate tainting Fauna was talking about. It sounded hilarious, but he was getting closer to sorting out what had been bothering him. Fig had thought that he'd just put that whole business behind him and had successfully laughed it off for weeks, but something just wouldn't stop eating at him.

Fingers drumming on the table, he said, "It's honestly getting old. I do lunch deliveries, but people hear I work at the Prophet and suddenly no one will talk to me. It doesn't make any sense."

"Also, don't say balls."

Fauna covered her mouth with her hand and laughed, shoulders shaking. Oh Merlin, she hadn't even meant to reference the hex, but then he said don't say balls, and she'd realized why.

She took a deep breath. "Sorry." Her mouth twitched.

"So, what do you mean no one will talk to you?" She sipped at her beer, eyebrows furrowed slightly. "Do you mean people like me when I'm at the Ministry trying my best not to get fired," she said playfully. "Or um, after hours. People in general, I guess?" Fauna glanced around the pub.

She had absolute confidence that Figaro could worm his way into the Ministry if he wanted to and uncover the mystery of the chocolate prank, but he seemed really down about his chances. Maybe Cuffe had upset him more than he'd let on earlier.

Figaro took another drink and sighed. How many times was he going to have to apologize to Fauna for that? Sure, it was funny, but he hadn't actually caused any problems on Level Two, had he? He let it go. Wouldn't do any good to keep arguing about it.

"All of it," he answered with a shrug. "I don't know. Just this feeling I get. It's like, do people really believe I'm going to go running off and blab to some reporter about whatever? I mean, first of all, I don't know how to properly emphasize how little I matter there. And that's fine. That's I want. And second, that's not even how it's supposed to work. There are rules. Like, properly asking questions and off-the-record and all that."

He rolled his eyes. "I don't even know what I want people to do. I just want it to be normal again."