"Fam, I love sleeping," Fig quipped. And he did. He was one of the lucky ones who never had any trouble crashing and waking up plenty rested. He kept long hours, but once he was down he was properly out.

At mention of Moira, Figaro's first reaction was a sideways glance. People seemed confused about this sudden friendship with his former housemate, which whom he'd barely interacted with back in school. Word seemed to spread easily among their cohort, but he supposed romantic interpretations of their interactions at Sasha's Halloween party were understandable. Kurby as well had made the mistake.

"Just friends. She'll stab you in the ear if anyone implies otherwise," he said in a grinning warning. Fig had always been better friends with girls; he wasn't sure why.

"No, we have a good time. Get into loads of trouble."

He picked up a case from the rack and tipped it so Sasha could see. It had on it a some kind of classic painting of a perturbed young woman with the caption, 'gosh being a princess is exhausting'.[1] He raised his eyebrows.

"My fancy is dually stricken."

1.

The Case

Sasha felt a familiar pang of jealousy but, after allowing himself the liberty of acknowledging it for just the briefest moment, he carefully packed it away.  It hadn't taken long for him to realize those reactions had pushed a number of his classmates away over the last few years; it had taken him a little longer to start figuring out strategies to deal with those reactions. 

The missed beat lasted only a moment and, when it had passed, he offered a genuine grin and nodded his head.  "I can't argue with those activities.  But, if you ever do need the therapy of crashing through fences or escaping cops, its a standing invitation." 

"Luckily, Moira can't really reach my ear," Sasha quipped back, matching Figaro's grin.  Which was, of course, an exaggeration - even if magic wasn't a question.  "You both get into trouble?"  The dubiousness in Sasha's voice was readily apparent.  "Why do I feel like it's more her following you into trouble?" 

Sasha snorted and reached out to take the case from Figaro, rotating it in his hand.  It only occurred to him after the snort that he wasn't sure if the other was being serious.  "You're not ... I mean ... if that's what you ... are you pulling my leg?  I've been told I have the EQ of a neanderthal." 

For a moment, Sasha stood in the aisle of the electronics store with a sardonic-narwhal-themed phone case in one hand and a sarcastic-renaissance-princess-themed phone case in the other.  Finally, he snorted a laugh before shrugging.  "Want it personalized?"

To Sasha's further comments regarding the particular dynamics of his and Moira's friendship, Figaro offered a pointed middle finger by way of itching his nose.

"Follow, dragged, same difference," he ended up conceding. If it wasn't for Figaro, Moira's  wildest night would be reading the last chapter of a mystery book first. That was no way to live. She had to get out and live a bit - that and she was kind of a boss.

When Sasha expressed doubt in his case selection, Figaro looked a little offended. "What, you don't like it? It's sick. Look at her, she's hilarious. It's objectively the best one." He was serious. And Sasha seemed to have caught on.

"But, no, I don't have a phone. Which one are you getting?" Fig leaned over to see and echoed Sasha's snort. "Narwal. Nice."

M - Brief, good-humored though inappropriate, language

---

An arched eyebrow inched up at Figaro's wordless opinion, followed by the pensive nod of a practiced over-thinker.  "Pointed, yet possessing of a remarkable degree of subtlety.  I'm impressed." 

With a chuckle, Sasha shrugged and lowered his hands.  "Ja, I've been told Moira and I have that trait in common.  It's good to have someone to drag us into the world."  For him, it was Anton and now Abby.  Apparently, Figaro had filled that role for Moira.  Which was good. 

However, Figaro's insistence on his style choice was further evidence that the former Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff had very different tastes in phone paraphernalia.  "She looks like she's doesn't have two fucks to give and ..." he lifted the case and looked a little closer.  "I'm not even convinced it's a girl."  But, if that was his choice, that was his choice.

"It's my patronus," he offered, mouthing the secrecy-questionable word, in response to Figaro's astute observation of his case choice.  "But, I was in the Blue House.  I have deductive reasoning skills worthy of Rowena's pride.  I know you don't have a phone hence why my question was not 'do you have a phone'."  He turned and started crossing back to the glass case and the ever-attentive Amir.

Oh, right! Fig had forgotten Sasha's absolutely bizarre Patronus form. He remembered the reaction of the NEWT Defense Against the Dark Arts class when Sasha's silver gossamer came together as a narwhal of all beasts. The speculation ran wild for a day or two, about what qualities had made it a good match.

Figaro decided not to care about Sasha's evaluation of his phone case preferences. It was funny and incongruous and classy and ironic and that was all Figaro needed to sustain.  If he had a phone. Which he didn't. Sasha got sassy with him and Figaro grinned and meandered after him.

"Wait." Fig had caught on. He trotted a few steps to catch up. He kept his voice low. "Mate don't buy me a phone. I can't pay you back. It's fine."

The Sellaphixes had made a steady living, although the last couple years had been rough. Just so, Figaro had been raised to keep out of debt and pay back favors, and big gifts could be embarrassing. Frankly, Figaro was just having a good time shopping and not blowing the cover of the Wizarding World.

"I wasn't expecting you to pay me back.  Besides, they're not that expensive."  It wasn't exactly the truth - but it wasn't entirely a lie, at least not for him - but, he was consciously counting on Figaro's ignorance of the muggle world to help conceal the magnitude of the lie.  It might even work, if Figaro hadn't noticed Amir's eyebrows shooting up to his hairline in obvious, yet silent, commentary. 

But, despite his minor slip, Amir seemed to pick up on the indications of a moment and turned to help another customer on the opposite side of the counter. 

Sasha set the two cases on the counter and shrugged, turning slightly towards.  "They're really bloody useful.  Abby has one - so does Fauna and Jonas.  I mean, you might end up interviewing a mug- someone for work.  Or, need to keep in touch with a squib," he offered, dropping his voice to a whisper. 

"Consider it a late birthday gift.  Or, apology gift.  Combination of the two.  Whatever.  It's no big deal."

"Alright, whatever," Fig shrugged, conceding.

Figaro stuck his hands in his pockets. Sasha was wealthy and could do whatever he wanted with his money and if he insisted on buying Fig a phone, Fig wouldn't object. What a hardship, being gifted a fancy muggle gadget that would talk to him in the mornings.

He followed Sasha through the store, wondering what the hell a 'Jonas' was and chuckling at the absurd notion he'd ever be interviewing anyone for work. Now a squib or two he knew. Abby of course, and Léonie from the Blackwood.

Sasha's code words and whispering were a little bit adorable, his careful but deft muggle-world-mode. 

"Apology, what though? You burn my broom?" For the life of him, he couldn't remember what slight Sasha might owe him for.

Sasha was surprised, and relieved, when Figaro didn't offer much more of a protest about the phone.  Even despite having the ability to use magic, Sasha still found his phone incredibly useful.  For all the wonders of the wizarding world, there really wasn't an effective way of communicating instantaneously when you were a ways away from a person - at least, not without having a fireplace handy. 

He shrugged and extended his credit card to Amir, along with his own primary telephone number. 

But, Figaro's obviously placed chuckle caught Sasha's attention and he glanced towards the other.  "What ... I know I don't know a lot about journalism but isn't interviewing ... you know ... a big part of it?"

"I haven't been the best friend the last few years," Sasha admitted, once the transaction and phone line account paperwork had been completed.  "And, maybe I'm worrying about it too much but ... it was a long week.  I'm reveling in the joys of doing something nice."

He was heading into a top-secret, potentially dangerous job and it was nice to know he still had friends on the outside.  But, if Figaro really didn't think an apology was necessary, he wasn't going to push it. 

"Where to next?  Food?  Smelly inedible stuff?  Home improvement?" 

Ah ha. The apology was for Sasha stuff. That way of treating people that was unique to the singularity that was Sasha, a level of conscientiousness that was at best charming and thoughtful (like taking Figaro out to see the muggles and buying him a present) but at its worst was shame misplaced on what was kind of normal. Sasha didn't press it, though, and neither did Figaro.

"Nah, we're good," he added as casual reassurance. If Figaro was honest, he had been about as good a friend to Sasha as vice versa. Both of them were just caught up in their own stuff. A lot had happened this autumn and Figaro was as happy as Sasha to be just having a laugh.

The three choices laid out before Figaro were as intriguing as the X-Box options. Food was too easy (although he could eat), home improvement probably meant more clever muggle machines, and 'smelly inedible stuff' sounded a lot like his icebox. He needed a moment to decide, but a sunglasses hut caught his eye.

"You do know I'm not a journalist, right?" Figaro said and wandered across to the kiosk. He put on a pair of large shades that looked like they belonged to a rich white divorcee who owned a yacht and was mean to servers in restaurants. Fig pivoted on his heel.

"I'm an assistant. I assist. I'm ... journalism adjacent. I'm on notice as well. Double notice," he said poshing up his accent a little. "You know how it is, darling."

Anyone who had grown up with a younger sister in the muggle world was fairly familiar with the carefree nature of mall shopping.  Sasha had offered suggestions in an attempt to fulfill his role as a tour guide but it was clear Figaro was already picking up on native, mall-going culture. 

His adaptability was really rather impressive.  Sasha followed Figaro as the other crossed the corridor to the sunglass kiosk, glancing over the array of shades. 

"Nah, ja," Sasha confirmed, with a slight shrug.  "I assumed you weren't a full journalist, yet," Sasha confirmed as Figaro picked up an impressive pair of power shades.  "I won't be an actual Unspeakable my first day of work.  But, that's the end goal, yes?  You don't intend on being ..."  Sasha hesitated for a moment, just now becoming aware that his understanding of Figaro's position at the newspaper involved a healthy array of assumptions.

Even as he came to that realization, he also realized he had nothing better to go off of.  So, he continued, though his tone made no attempt to hide his new found uncertainty.  "You're only journalism adjacent until the kids below us graduate and ... you move up the ladder?" 

The glasses Figaro had chosen were making it difficult to impart the proper amount of gravity to the conversation.  "On double notice as in ... they're going to can you?"  Sasha asked, hoping Figaro realized the grin he was fighting had nothing to do with the meat of the conversation.  "What for?"

"You sound like my mother, darling," Figaro purred as Sasha began what was surely a well-meaning interrogation of his future. It was just like Sasha, to carry this sense of purpose and urgency all the time. All of Figaro's previous suggestions that his Ravenclaw mate relax had gone mostly unsuccessfully. And everyone's suggestions that Figaro pick a direction and put forth a dedicated effort had been similarly fruitless.

Figaro slid off the divorcee glasses and returned them to the rack, happy that he'd managed to at least slightly amuse his friend, the kind facilitator of this muggling adventure.

"I don't want to be a journalist," Figaro tried to explain while he looked for his next pair to try. "I don't know what I'm going to be and what's the rush, right? Can't be bothered. I'd shrivel into a little shrivvelly shrivel-fig if I had to do one thing my whole life. Here. Put these on."

Figaro handed Sasha a pair of spectacles with perfectly round frames and neon blue lenses. They'd look lovely with his complexion.

"And ha," Figaro chuckled. "Yeah, I attracted the attention of the lord high editor by getting the head of the MLE on record about that mist thing in Keswick. Strictly speaking a fat lot of it was my fault, but I do like to take a rap, don't I?"

It had been an absolutely stupid series of events and he'd pissed of every other cast member even tangentially involved.

Figaro slid on a pair of extremely shiny aviators and looked in the little mirror. He saw himself repeated on into infinity.

"You seriously didn't hear about that?"

Sasha chuckled, his shoulders hitching up in an apologetic sort of shrug.  "Not intentional, I assure you," he offered, picking up a pair of black wayfarer frames with dark grey lenses.  "I could try to sound more like my mother, if that would help."  He slipped on the sunglasses and stepped in front of the mirror. 

But, no.  That definitely would not help.  However, it was now apparent that Sasha had been making false assumptions based solely on Figaro's first choice of employment.  Slowly, he shrugged his shoulders.

"Honestly, I'm kind of relieved you don't want to be a journalist," he admitted.  "And, I don't think there's any rush," he confirmed, exchanging the clunky black frame for the round lenses Figaro extended to him.  "It took me forever to figure it out and my best friend still doesn't know."  He pointed at the frames on his face and shrugged, looking for Figaro's verdict. 

"Why'd you go with the DP for a first job, if you didn't want to be a journalist?  Seems like a lot of stress if you're not looking to reap the benefits in the end."  Even from the outside - and as one for whom past experiences had left him jaded about the industry as a whole - the stress inherent in journalism seemed obvious.  It was an intrusive industry whose business model was based on airing dirty laundry - either personal or political; stress and disgruntled acquaintances seemed an obvious side effect.

As seemed to have been the outcome of the mist thing in Keswick.  "Wait - no-"  He shook his head, confirming he hadn't heard about the saga of Figaro versus the DMLE.  "No.  I've been ... I'm kind of on the other side of all of that and it's about all I can handle.  So, I've been ignoring the parts that I don't need to worry about.  But, what did you get him to say?  And, why did that ... isn't that kind of what you're supposed to do?  I mean, Skeeter's goal was to basically get me on record with whatever she wanted."

Figaro ought to have understood that his and Sasha's aspirational framework would be different - Sasha had always been goal oriented and, like, in his own way interested in making some impact in the world. You could tell about how thoughtful he was and how much he put into school work, that is, twice as much as anyone else. He also shouldn't have been surprised that Sasha didn't approve of journalism. The papers had never done him any kind of service. And, to be honest, the Sellaphix family had been in the paper enough times and not in a flattering light. Even Figaro being a suspect in a burglary had earned him a few inches in the back tucked in between the results of a mock-turtle race and a Lancashire man who was selling glow-in-the-dark sheep.

Nevertheless, if found himself feeling protective of the Prophet and all the cool people he'd gotten to know, especially the reporters.

"I'm not saying I won't be a reporter, but I took the job because it seemed fun and it is. I mean, it's wild. Everyday is something different, there's always something insane happening. I have to do all kinds of stuff. Even the night shifts - we just play cards and wait for something interesting to happen. And there's, you know, interesting things like this - de facto broom messenger. You meet all kinds of people. Like Queen G, you know Witch Weekly," Figaro chuckled remembering that bizarre interaction.

He was rambling on, actually always happy to talk about his job partially because everything seemed to think it was a shit gig. All his friends had gone off to high-powered fancy Ministry jobs but Fig was happier than all of them.

"But there's a pecking order. You don't just preempt Tempy Cartwright and lie your way onto Level Two, some arsehole. I honestly don't know what I was trying to do - just have a laugh and see Fauna, but you now how she is, and it went off the rails. And then Raine Almasy hexed me in the bits. You seriously didn't hear about that? I thought everyone knew. Virgil found out."

He flipped of the aviators on top of his head, deciding they were perfect and that he'd buy them.

Slowly, Sasha's brows furrowed into a confused scowl.  For someone who had just finished proclaiming he had no interest in being a journalist, Figaro definitely sounded like someone who enjoyed being in journalism.  The former Ravenclaw stood in silence for a few breaths, replaying the conversation in his head to try and pinpoint what he'd missed. 

He knew there was a good chance this was just Fig being his usual indecisive self but Sasha also knew he was prone to focusing on the thesis statement of a conversation at the expense of the nuanced details. 

"So, you're not wanting to be a journalist but you're content dabbling in journalism for the time being?" Sasha presented as a concise summary, wanting to make sure he'd come to the appropriate conclusion.  If that was the case, all the power to him.  It still seemed like a lot of stress and work for a temporary gig but maybe the dynamic nature of both the Prophet and the mentality of being able to move to something new was what Figaro needed.  Or, Figaro really wanted to be a journalist but he was afraid of the commitment of acknowledging he was where he would be for the foreseeable future. 

Either way, it wasn't Sasha's job to freak him out.  So, Sasha opted for saying the opposite of what he would have said to himself. 

"If you're having fun and making ends meet, than that's what really matters.  I mean, I'm sure there are lots of potential niches you could find your way into.  Life's more than work.  Or school."  That sounded right, right?  That seemed to be the catch phrase on Pick A Random Sitcom Out Of A Hat.

He shook his head and shrugged his shoulders at the name drop from the other wizarding periodical.  "I don't really know who that is, but I'm not really a regular follower of Witch Weekly.  But, it sounds like it was crazy?"  At least, that's what he gathered from the context clues.  And from the Doonsebury comic and watching The Wire.

Figaro's story meandered from an impersonal, life lesson-esque 'you don't' to a much more personally involved 'Raine hexing him in the bits' and Sasha managed to keep pace, realize that all of it related to being on notice.  Twice.  "Yeah no - Final Fantasy is epic like that.  I got a fireball to the shoulder from some 12 year old from Brooklyn who called himself The Storm the other day."  He'd caught the kiosk-tender's confused glance out of the corner of his eye and had slipped in the little tidbit while tugging the round-rimmed shades off and swapping them for a similar pair but with deep violet lenses. 

"So, you lied your way onto Level 2 just to see Fauna?  But, you ended up being on notice for what you got Carstairs to say about the pent- Keswick mist?"  There had to actually be more to the story, especially since Raine hexes were involved.  He assumed it had to do with the content of whatever he gleamed from the Department Head.  "What did you get him to say?"

   "So, you're not wanting to be a journalist but you're content dabbling in journalism for the time being?"

Figaro grinned broadly. "Yeah, sure, that works. We'll go with that."

And just like that, Sasha started talking nonsense. Figaro looked at him like he was crazy, but then caught Sash's glance at the kiosk kid. Figaro literally bit his lip and scratched his nose. Right. Remember where you are. Sasha was still trying to puzzle out the particulars of the story and Fig had to acknowledge his summary was piece meal which would have sufficed for just about anyone else, but not his friend Sasha. Hey, he'd make a good journalist!

Figaro kept that to himself and smiled. "No, no no. I thought I'd just see if Fauna had anything new and I was going to trot it back to the reporters and maybe get a date or a pat on the head or something. Stupid, I know. But Fauna misunderstood and stuck me a room with Solomon Carstairs who'd already planned to go on the record with Tempy Cartwright. So it wasn't what he said, it was whom he said to. Which was me."

He clicked his tongue and shrugged. "And I might have mentioned Raine's insane murder-Aunt which prompted her. Beating me at a video game. Oh, and saw Madam Nagde. Remember her?"

By now he'd set the sunglasses down on the counter and was poking through a handful of muggle coins and bills.