4 November 2011
Friday @ 5:30pm
Alohomocha

"Psst!"

Nemo was pleased to see Abby Reid appear at Alohomocha along with the rest of the After Work crowd. She slipped her way through the line and popped a kiss on the other young witch's cheek. Nemo didn't have many female friends in London, and even though she and Abby weren't close (mostly incidental coffee buddies), Nemo found Abby good company. They both enjoyed a hot drink and an aesthetic, and neither of them had graduated from Hogwarts. Just a step to the left, they both were, from the magical culture of the city.

"You look totally autumnal, girl. Right on."

"Oi, you two in the queue or what?"

Nemo tossed the grouchy old man a quick "shush", and nudged herself and her companion more clearly into the line to order. Nemo didn't need anything - she'd left her crap and cappuccino at the bank of stools along the counter - but she'd wait with Abby.

Abby loved Alohomocha, and was often the one happily fetching orders for Aurors (and sneaking a coffee for herself, obviously), but recently, she'd been haunting the shop after work, before work, even on her days off. It must be the chilly fall weather. After a day of listening to Level Two continue to freak out about the reappearance of Runespoors in London[1], she found herself walking down Diagon Alley and swinging the door open, then glancing around, looking at every customer. Abby waved at the other Ministry sorts who were lucky enough to leave work at a reasonable hour. They huddled around the largest tables, the collars of their robes loosened, their favorite coffees spiked with more than pumpkin spice.

A shadow crossed over her features as disappointment settled in. Whoever she was hoping to see was not here.

When a girl as short as she was swooped in with a kiss on the cheek, Abby stared at her, glancing at her blue eyes, the shaggy cut of her hair. Who was this? Oh. Nemo! How could she forget Nemo, her adorable coffee shop companion?

"Thank you! It is still Jack O'Latte season," she posed in a dark red witchy robe that her mother had bought for her. She'd been reaching for more classic attire lately, hiding her chilled, nail-bitten fingers in the warm sleeves.

Abby glanced at the grumpy man in the queue behind them, then stilled. Gray, wiry hair. Dark, bushy brows. Simple, classic attire. Receding jaw, but with a hint of stubborn strength.

Was he?

Was that him?

He frowned back at her, looking at the freckles on her face, the braid in her hair, her features sharp in profile. He looked into her brown eyes and glanced away, shaking his head.

Abby slowly turned to face the front of the queue. The pentral stormed in her mind and left a trail of thoughts, loud clangs and dull thuds locked away from Abby's understanding. While her head pounded in silent battle, she nearly forgot poor Nemo waiting with her.

The woman at the counter asked what she wanted, already writing her name on the cup.

"A macchiato."

"Sugar? How much this time?"

"No."

"That's a change! Still Abby?" The barista teased, showing her the cup.

"I- yes. Abby."

She offered an Abby-bright smile, paid for her coffee and followed Nemo to her seat. While waiting, she angled her stool toward the queue.

"How was your week?" She managed, relying on the most boring of questions while she watched the old man order lemon and ginger tea.

1.	oh no, runespoors uh oh

Nemo rested her chin in the heel of her hand, relaxing comfortably in the busy cafe. Happy, for the moment, to talk about nothing.

"Halloween at Draco Malfoy's," she said as if it was no big deal even though it had been the culmination of the most eventful October of her life. "Made a killing the other night in Piccadilly. I never play there, but there was this thing going on. Might try and get an internet phone."

"Oh!" as if this next bit was more exciting still, "finally, saw the new Downton Abbey.[1] Getting really tired of this whole Matthew slash Anna bullshit. More old ladies. Grandma is obviously a witch. I have a theory - hey."

Abby was looking past her. Nemo followed her gaze, then looked back at her. "Hey, what's up with you? You know that guy? Is he a creep or something."

She leaned in and whispered darkly with joking eyes, "let's kill him."

1.	Series 2, Episode 7

Nemo said so many things that begged comments and exclamations from Abby. Draco Malfoy's party! Internet (smart) phone! Downtown Abby! A show named just for her!

But she couldn't quite focus on her friend.

She watched the old man find a seat in the corner against the window, where a young man seemed to be attempting the next great novel, his cup of whatever ignored, parchment sprawled out. The young person looked up at the intruder sitting at his table, and made a show of pointing at the cup. Old guy did not care. He looked out the window and remained sitting.

With much flapping of parchment, the young person gathered his things and left the table and the shop. The old guy rested his coat on the chair across from him, making the table look completely occupied.

Bittersweet amusement broke through the walls that the pentral was building in Abby's mind.

With it, Abby realized she'd glimpsed him at the coffee shop once before, and the pentral hadn't known what to do then. So she'd kept coming back. She'd even visited the bookshop time and time again, looking for him behind the counter and waiting at the door of the back rooms, but he must not work there anymore. He wasn't nearly so old when she'd been alive!

Abby blinked in surprise at Nemo, then leaned in slightly.

"Let's," the girl smiled, copying Nemo's dark tone.

In a second she was Abby again, settling into Abby features and brightness.

"I'm trying to figure out if I know him," she admitted with some hesitance. "Mad, right? Can't remember everything since I got back, which is about as fun as it sounds."

She glanced down, ignoring the pentral's flare of anger in her head. She and Nemo didn't really talk about the nasty aspects of their pasts, which Abby appreciated. They kept it light. Coffee shop talk.

"Abby," the barista left her coffee on the counter in front of her.

"Donnan," the barista called, holding out the cup of tea. Old guy stood up, sighed at the chairs jutting into the aisles, and went to fetch his cup as Abby puzzled over his name.

Nemo bit a grin when Abby played along with her murder gag, but Abby was focused on the man. 'Oh, I know him from somewhere, but I can't remember... Oh, well!' - isn't that how this normally went?  But Abby was fixated, so much that Nemo caught herself watching intently as well.

"Really? That guy?" Nemo was perplexed, and honestly unimpressed.

"I've seen him here before, Abbs. He's just some prick who takes up too much space."

She had to guess things were rough for Abby, with what happened and all. It was an unsettling feeling for a place or person to be familiar but not be able to place them - Nemo could imagine feeling that way all the time. Enough to make one paranoid.

Nemo and Abby watched like a pair of cats as the old man crossed the room. Donnan? An unusual name. Surely, if Abby knew it, she'd remember, but she made no indication it rang a bell.

"Does he feel wrong?" she asked quietly. "Deep in your viscera, Abbers. What's your gut say?"

Nemo gave her a gentle, tickling poke in the ribs.

Abby laughed, startled by the poke to her ribs, and air-swatted Nemo's hand.

"My gut says that I'm addicted to coffee."

Nemo was interested but unconcerned, which was a relief in its own way, and if he was a regular like she said, it fitted with Abby's memory of having seen him here before.

But all the walls the pentral was building! Clearly this guy was important somehow.

Good person or bad person? Abby asked in her own mind. Her gaze turned vague as she sipped at her bitter macchiato.

A heavy silence answered, like the quiet after a slammed door. Then, feelings and flashes of images petered through.

Anger. A sense of abandonment. Looking up to someone, figuratively and literally. Whole afternoons spent sat on a cushioned bench in the back of the bookstore, reading all the latest editions as she listened to the sound of books rustling on displays, colorful covers animated and flashing whenever customers walked by. Helping... him?... lift the lighter boxes, organize stock on the lower shelves. 

And that was it. That was all, for now. Abby and the pentral watched Donnan return to his seat by the window. Abby's feet curled on the rungs of the stool, poised to hop off at any moment.

"It doesn't feel wrong, exactly, just strange," Abby shook her head, neglecting to say it felt really important.

She could just ask him, couldn't she. Move from her seat and ask him who he was. Her feet didn't budge. Abby swallowed. No, maybe she couldn't.

"How was the Malfoy party? Spare no detail," Abby smiled at her friend, partially to distract herself and because she bet Nemo was dying to tell.

Nemo was a witch who'd been too independent too young, and had a healthy wariness of strange men. Her default mode was an untouchable vestment of confidence, and a subdued protectiveness of her friends. In combination, it was a fair enough ward. For these reasons, Abby's preoccupation with this guy Donnan was unsettling.

Nemo watched the man while Abby mulled it over, trying to see what she could divine anything from his clothes or manner. All she could glean was that he seemed unpleasant, and she was pleased she told him off in line. She wasn't convinced by Abby's moderate evaluation. But it wasn't her business.

She perked up at the new topic, content to respect the change of subject.

"It was the picture of pureblood opulence, everything attending delighted to be seen and acting as if their presence was a gift to everyone else," she hummed. "Masquerade, natch."

Nemo was conflicted if she found it all delightful or grotesquely pretentious. She'd enjoyed herself thoroughly, so it was a combination of both.

"Apparently the former Minister of Magic was there. And the editor of the Daily Prophet. And Draco."

Abby waved her hand in the air and grinned distractedly. "Minister of Magic, Daily Prophet reporter - who cares? All I hear is that you're on a first name basis with the Draco Malfoy."

She was just teasing, not really expecting Nemo to have gotten the chance to talk to Malfoy, party host/recluse. Abby was privately surprised that her friend had been allowed into the party at all. Purebloods were known for their love of masquerades and their snooty behavior, it was true, which also meant that wixes who called themselves Nemo never made it past the door.

Their loss, obviously!

Her gaze strayed to the little table by the window where Donnan was sipping his tea and reading a book. He had a proper bookmark, even. Of course he did.

"Did you wear a mask? Did you take selfies? 'Cause that's what you can do with an internet phone." She raised her eyebrows. "What was he like? What were your impressions of his macabre mansion?"

Ugh, now she wished she had gone! The Reids had received invites, and Abby had been planning on attending all the Halloween parties, but she just hadn't made it to that one. She had shown up to her sister's house, all ready for them to head out together, only to find Aileen had changed her mind. Whatever his politics, Aileen had said, she could not support someone who'd used to hold conferences in the common room with the likes of Crabbe and Goyle, forcing all the other Slytherins to their dormitories with the likes of Bulstrode and Parkinson.

It was only later that Abby had wondered how exactly Aileen had known that. She'd just finished school when Draco had been an ickle firstie. But whatever! Abby did not pretend to understand the Slytherin collective consciousness.

"Yes, the whole thing. I found this sick crow mask in Soho, Abbers, I could haunt you with it. But um ... yeah ..."

She drummed her fingers on her chin, trying to decide how to describe Draco Malfoy.

"He's ... it's like he wants something back that he never had," she said nodding slowly. "I mean, he's a total weirdo, slightly sinister, but not even sinister. Like, semi. I dunno. I got to poke around the place, but it's absolutely massive.  Labyrinthine. Dunno, next time I'm going to see if I can find the catacombs. I heard there were catacombs."

Abby was glazing off again. She did that.

"Okay, girl, you're not going to let it go. Want to figure out who he is?"

Abby had no idea what Nemo meant with her sinister but not sinister talk, but did tune in to the word 'catacombs'. What? For serious? Below the Malfoy manor?

It was the sort of thing she would have jumped at years ago when she'd been the type of person to wander into ancient tombs and wander out unscathed. She really had, too. It helped, having friends like Naomi Foley and professor friends like Tapendra Trishna and professor sisters like Aileen.

Now? Wow, good luck with that, count her out, bring an Auror friend!

Everyone had one of those, right?

Abby forced a smile, grateful but uncomfortable with her attention.

"Nope! I'm good."

She shifted in her chair, still unable to move her numbed feet. Abby drummed her fingers on the counter, trying to distract herself from the numbness of her hand. The pentral was plotting a plot. Abby wasn't sure she wanted to know what it was.

Abby looked up as a customer walked by, smelling of smoke. She remembered a woman who'd waltz into the bookstore in a cloud of cigarette smoke, her dark brown hair cut in a stylish bob, her eyes framed by cat eye spectacles. Sometimes she'd stop at the counter and argue with... him, but most of the time she'd head to the bench in the back, the nook where the little girl curled up. She would drop muggle classics atop the stack of wizarding novels. Then they'd go out to amusement parks and zoos and concerts and the movies. She had loved the movies. Willy Wonka. Bedknobs and Broomsticks. The Railway Children. She'd try to tell.... Donnan? He'd listen. He'd always liked listening to stories.

Shit, she was spacing out again. Abby wrapped her chilled fingers around her cup of coffee.

"Random question for you," Abby focused on Nemo, all the while trying not to think too loudly. She shut a door in her mind and tiptoed through another set of doors.

"Do you by any chance know Sasha my lovely boyfriend, Raine my lovely flatmate, Virgil my lovely friend, orrrrr Fauna who is just lovely?"

They were safe. They knew all about her pentral problem. They could be contacted should she start acting batshit.

Nemo sipped patiently on her coffee, watching Abby, watching the man, wondering a bit at the strangeness of it. Nemo's nudges concerning the grouchy old specter had thrice been received only coyly, so Nemo backed off.

When Abby began to ask Nemo if she knew her friends, she shook her head. They ran in completely different circles; the pair of them had only met here at the cafe by chance. Wait, did she say Virgil?

"Oh, wait, I know a Virgil." It was an uncommon name. She smiled, remembering the little song she'd composed for him.[1]

"Virgil Carstairs?" she asked. Abby confirmed.

Nemo laughed, "yeah, I know him from Startdust Theatre. I play in Camden all the time. His dad owns the theatre. I can't believe you know him too - oh, from work. You both work at the Ministry." 

The young American witch sat back. Magical London was small, it was.

1.	14 Oct 2011 - Wayfaring

Abby straightened, grinning. Virgil and Nemo were both musicians, and Virgil's father ran Stardust. That made sense. She wondered if they ever played music together.

"Yessss," Abby slapped her hand on the table, relieved to latch onto something familiar, and especially glad that Nemo knew one of her friends who knew.

"I think he mentioned you!" No, he hadn't.

Abby sipped at her coffee, struggling to find a subtle way to tell Nemo that she needed help. Doors opened in her mind as the pentral reached out, half-listening to her thoughts and conversation. Any mention of a Carstairs made Flower Girl suspicious.

"We do send memos to each other at the Ministry - way too many! - but I actually met him at the party that Raine threw for me in August. Welcome back, sad sap! Him, Nicholas, Ari," she smiled. "They're good people."

She leaned in confidentially, "Now, I can't say that they'd explore the catacombs with you, but I can't say they wouldn't, either."

She could say that maybe they'd convince Nemo not to go, which was what Abby was aiming for, because she really did feel like a sad sap sometimes.

Nemo couldn't help thinking of Virgil's disapproving reaction to her hapless quest for unicorn blood, but he'd positively brightened at the prospect of returning to the vampires' pub. She also couldn't help thinking of Nick's 'pajamas'. The thought made her giggle and lean in as well.

"Virgil, maybe. B & E might be too much for him. No idea about Nick," she said, "all I know is he doesn't like underwear."

She sipped her drink, and came up saying, "Mm, but here's the thing, Abbers. It's my secret. My big con. My skeleton to every nook and cranny."

Nemo held up her spooky fingers in suspense. "Fake it. Confidence. Just, like, breeze through like you belong, right? Just stroll on and vibe it. I believe in auras and if you practice you can fool anyone. Only thing holding me back is I look twelve."

And vampires seeing right through her. But that was a special case.

Abby laughed, for real this time, remembering Nicholas showing up at the slumber party sans pajamas. Nemo summed it up! She had a way with music and with words.

She looked at Nemo curiously, then started nodding when she mentioned confidence. Oh, Abby knew! She knew all about faking it till you made it. If Nemo was implying that Abby needed a confidence boost, she was absolutely right. Like Nemo, she'd spent much of her life pretending, using her charm, using her gift for gab, but sometimes it just wasn't enough. Sometimes life knocked you down and your pentral stood up.

"You do not look twelve," Abby nudged her arm. "Nemo, you colorful clownfish[1], you are short and sophisticated, tiny but mighty!"

Abby nodded, also tiny but mighty.

"Just keep swimming those stormy seas. Maybe we'll find Nicholas a pair of trousers for his trout," she laughed, hiding behind her coffee, and almost, almost forgot about the mysterious old guy sipping tea by the window.

1.

Nemo!

Soon, Nemo was clapping and giggling. "Tiny but mighty," she laughed. "Trout, oh my god. Excellent, well! You're a fishmonger![1]

"I do look twelve though," she insisted, breathy trying not to laugh. "Actually," he held up a finger. "I get more tips when they think I'm an orphan. I just stack on about twenty of those little rubber bracelets and cha-ching."

Movement caught Nemo's attention and she changed to a whisper.

"Ya boy's on the move, Abbs. Whatsay we tail 'im?"

Sure enough, the gentlemen had stood from his seat eyes on his open pocket watch. Abby had hinted heavily that 'it's nothing' but Nemo was curious and she rather liked to know things.

"Or not. I mean, we'll probably never see him again so why bother..."

She winked.

1.	Hamlet quote that snuck it's way into The Last Unicorn, a VHS that Nemo loves.