"Ew, ew, ewwww!" Abby cried, stepping inside the house with Roxy the crup at her heels as she held the doggy bag as far away from her body as her arm would stretch. The crup, panting, ran around her feet a few times and then flopped down in the parlor, right where the sun hit the rug.

"Oh, sure, act all innocent," she teased the animal, pinching her nose and moving towards the kitchen. "I don't know how something so disgusting can come out of a cute little crup like you. It makes no sense! Cute things should not poo," she declared, throwing the bag in the rubbish bin and then immediately washing her hands. Abby knew if she didn't pick up after the crup when they went on their walks, the neighbors would complain (it had happened before), and then Aileen would lecture her about it. But it was just. so. gross!

Abigail removed her winter coat, hung the leash on the hook in the closet, slipped off her shoes by the door, and returned to the kitchen to get some pomegranate juice. It was Friday, Aileen's last day of teaching before the holiday began, and then the Winter Festival would start on Monday. Abby couldn't wait. She glanced furtively out the window, and then perched on the couch, sipping at her juice and feeling silly and rebellious. If one drop of pomegranate juice spilled on the cushions, she could hear her sister say, and smiled, patting the crup with her foot.

Her sister was lucky, she thought. Their parents had to deal with far much worse from her, like when she dyed her hair red, or sold her mother's antique brooch, or disappeared for days at a time.

It was just that she could respect her sister. Most of the time. So her little acts of rebellion here weren't that bad; they were more like gifts, really, like the time she'd brought Roxy the crup home without warning.

Abby put the glass to her lips and was about to take a sip when the doorbell sounded, startling her. The crup leapt up at the noise, knocking Abby's foot back, and causing the glass to slide in her hand.

The juice sloshed over the edge, and one, then two drops fell to the white cushions.

Abby stared in horror as the pinpricks of liquid spread out on the fabric to the size of galleons. "No!" She gasped, standing up and running to the kitchen for a towel.

"Hold on!" She called out as the crup barked madly at the door. Abby set her glass down on the counter and returned with towel in hand, frantically wiping at the spots on the couch, which only made them smear.

Finally, she went to the door and unlocked all the locks, then realized as she stood there out in the open that she should have checked to see who it was first. But the red hair, the smiling face was familiar to her.

Abby grabbed his arm and pulled him in, nudging Roxy back with her foot. "Mr. Trevelyan, you have to help me!"

She led him to the parlor and pointed at the offending spots. Roxy took the opportunity to slobber on his shoes.

"Look! Look at that! Because of the bell!" She pouted at him.

"Please vanish it away. Because if you don't, Aileen will die. Just die. And then she'll kill me," Abby nodded, unperturbed by the illogical sequence of those events.

Jonas hadn't been entirely sure what to expect upon his second arrival at the Reid home, but getting dragged inside by the elbow as a Jack Russell terrier attempted to create a swimming pool in his shoe was far from anything he'd prepared for. 

He'd guessed that Hogwarts would still be in session.  Based on what he knew of Aileen Reid and her habits, he'd timed his arrival at the house before she would make it home after her classes.  With any luck, the Runes professor's younger sister would still be staying with her - Merlin only knew that anyone who traveled with a trunk that size planned on remaining for quite some time - which suited his purpose all too well.  The teenaged Squib had struck him as friendly and talkative, and if he were going to be fishing for information, she'd be a much more likely source of it than her all-too-cautious elder sister.

With his automobile safely parked around the corner, he'd given a quick knock to the front door and stepped back to wait.  Jonas wasn't entirely sure what sort of reception to anticipate.  His last encounter with the Reid sisters hadn't exactly ended on the best of terms, and he was half expecting to do a lot of fast talking to even get himself inside the door.  Abby, though, didn't give him the chance as she hauled him inside and, talking as quickly as she had the last time, though minus the bubble gum, showed him two tiny spots on a white sofa pillow as she demanded his help.

It was a sudden and brutal plunge into the world of I Was A Teenaged Squib, and the private investigator couldn't help but shake his head bemusedly.  If it wasn't for the fact that she was asking him to perform magic, he would have been entirely entertained by the introduction.  As it was, explaining to a squib why he didn't necessarily want to cast a spell presented a little bit more of a challenge than talking his way into the house probably would have.

"Yeah, I'd love to," he lied easily, trying not to look nearly as amused as he felt, "but domestic spells never were me specialty.  Last time I tried to clean up a spill with a wand, it ended up sinking into the carpet and made the whole bloody mess worse."

Spills were not something he normally had to deal with - after Gwenna had entered her monster phase, he and Anna had decided by mutual agreement to make sure that any white in their London house was firmly outside of the normal play area - but seeing as how millions of housewives cleaned them up without any sort of magical assistance every day, Jonas couldn't imagine that they were that difficult to make vanish.  He stepped out of the way of the slobbering terrier, bending to give it a pat, and gave a shrug in Abby's direction.

"Here, what if we go about it the old-fashioned Muggle way?" he offered.  "I'll give you a hand, even.  Especially seeing as how I'd hate to be the one responsible for your sister rising from the dead," he added wryly.  "Dying's bad enough, but resurrection can't be a good sign in her line of work.  She might start giving the mummies ideas."

Abigail stared at him, skeptical. He wasn't even going to try? She'd hauled him in here, given him her best 'poor me' look, and his only reaction was to claim that cleaning spells weren't his specialty.

What a man thing to say! She let out a huff and frowned at him.

She was about to tell him that he had to be better at spells than she was, hur hur, and make him feel a little guilty, when he offered her a shrug and suggested that they clean up the mess like muggles.

Abby stared at him some more, then glanced at the crup, who was obviously not on her side and wagged her tail at the stranger excitedly.

Ignoring his joke about the mummies, Abigail held up the pomegranate-stained towel in her hand and gave him a sour look she normally reserved for her mother. "Uh, duh, this is the Muggle way. All it did was make it worse. And Aileen doesn't keep any of those... what do you call it... Sir Clean products? She doesn't like using muggle things. I'm lucky she fixed the lights and other things in the house to auto-magic," she explained, a note of bitterness in her voice. 

Abby crossed her arms, wondering why someone she'd thought of as nice and friendly wouldn't help her out. Sure, Aileen was probably still annoyed at him, but Abby had quickly gotten over the 'pretending to be Aileen's boyfriend' tale he'd spun the last time he was here.

And for that matter, why was he here? Aileen had finally told her about the thief who had broken into the house in an effort to get her to be more careful around magical folk she didn't know, but as far as Abby knew, no other artifacts had gone missing. Had they?

The terrier was obviously not satisfied with just one pat.  It was furiously shoving its head under his hand, still slobbering joyfully, and Jonas was left deciding between breaking its heart or continuing to pet it.  He scratched it indulgently behind the ears, nose wrinkling as he could feel a sneeze coming on.

"Yeah, well, there's more to Muggle cleaning than just a towel," he replied in a good-natured tone.  He'd have to wrack his brain to remember exactly what they were; Anna was usually the one who tidied up in the kill zone.  "You know, ah...baking soda," he said ambiguously.  "Vinegar.  Wet towels."

 Jonas recalled all of them playing some sort of vague role, but how and why they helped in cleaning up spills, he couldn't put into words.  Or, he thought with a sudden sense of uncertainty, was that what Gwenna had mixed together to create a volcano for her science project last year?  Maybe it was safer to stay away from cleaning entirely and just take another approach.

"Or," he interrupted himself, extricating himself from the dog as he rose back to his feet, "we just turn the pillows over and they're good as new, yeah?  That's what a Muggle would do, after all," he added with certainty.  "And they're not nearly as bad as your sister might have you think.   Get along all right without any magic at all, they do.  Have one over on us sometimes, even."

Despite Jonas' calm, cheerful demeanor and reassurance that they could solve this, Abby's mood had turned from bad to worse. Her cheeks flushed and she frowned at the couch, suddenly overwhelmed by the mere sight of those spots. He mentioned baking soda and vinegar, but honestly, she didn't know what those things were.

Soda? Didn't people drink soda? Abby shrugged. "Maybe she has some in the kitchen, I don't know," her voice was testy, a little raw. But Merlin, she was not going to cry over spilled pomegranate juice!

He then suggested turning over the pillows, and Abby forced out a snicker. Aileen would know. She'd come home, stare at the cushions, and notice that they weren't exactly aligned. Her older sister had certainly noticed when Abby had tried turning over the rug to hide Roxy's little accident a while ago. There was no use hiding evidence with Aileen's overly delicate senses.

He went on to tell her that's what a muggle would do, sure thing, and that muggles weren't as awful as Aileen said. Abby got the sudden urge to defend her sister, but he was right. Muggles made Aileen uncomfortable and she avoided them as much as she could.

"I know that," she insisted. Muggles had a one over on her most of the time, not just sometimes! She was the one who couldn't get along without magic, and that embarrassed her, not being able to clean up a simple mess by herself.

Shaking her head, she flipped over the cushion and readjusted it in the couch with more energetic force than was necessary.

"Problem solved, for now." Abby sat down and stared at him. "I'm not sure why you're acting so weird, but whatever."

He didn't seem like the type who would refuse to do magic for her just to make her feel bad, but Abby didn't know what else to think.

"How come you're here?" She asked bluntly. "Did Aileen lose something again?" Abby emphasized the word to show she was in on the whole story of the stolen Egyptian dagger. Or so she thought.


(OOC note: Their whole situation reminds me of this scene from Big Bang Theory. Had to share!)

"Not as far as I know, but it's good to be pre-emptive about that sort of thing, don't you think?" Jonas returned cheerfully, flashing her a lopsided smile.  He had been about to keep on at it, to continue riffing on the subject, when his brain actually managed to catch up to both his mouth and the conversation.

For once, lying obviously wasn't going to get him anywhere.  He had come to the Reid residence specifically to get information, and making up a story (other than his cover story, which unfortunately was not exactly a story but more an uncomfortable truth) was not going to help him get it.  Abby was already obviously irritated, though whether with him or something else, he couldn't be sure.  Telling her a lie would just push her farther out - he needed her to feel in.  If he were going to work any questions into the conversation and get an honest answer, it would have to be a conversation that she wanted to take part in.

And, ironically, his cover-not-really-a-story was something that she could obviously identify with.  Jonas wasn't sure if she'd jump at it or think that he was mocking her, but it was likely to be one or the other.  If he played his hand right, he might be able to get more out of her this way.

"Well," he said, hesitating, as he looked around for a seat.  The sofa was out, but he laid claim to a chair instead.  That unfortunately put him well within range of the Jack Russell, which seized the opportunity to begin jumping against him to try and get his attention.  Sighing, Jonas conceded and began to scratch its head.  He knew he was going to pay for this later when he ended up sneezing all afternoon.

"To tell you the truth," he said, "she's not the one who lost something this time.  Can you keep a secret?"  He gave the girl a considering look, raising an eyebrow at her.  "I'd hate to put you in a spot, but this isn't the sort of thing I want getting about."

"Roxy, no," she told the crup, adopting her sister's best professor voice when the creature attempted to hop into Jonas' lap. Roxy gave her a remorseful, aww you're killing me kind of look, then circled around once and settled at the man's feet. Abby's mood improved slightly when she saw the pool of drool creeping towards Jonas' footwear.

Abby fidgeted with the towel in her hands as she listened to his response. She was surprised to find that he seemed concerned about something.

Could she keep a secret? Despite her irritation, she perked up a bit and tilted her head at him. Could she ever!

"Of course I can," she informed him breezily, opting to leave out the 'duh' that had almost escaped her lips. "I know I talk a lot, but I can figure out when not to say things, you know."

She did have a tendency to blurt out pesky truths before thinking, and sometimes she said things that she shouldn't just to annoy and anger her family. However, like most teenagers, she kept some thoughts, feelings, and areas of her life guarded from adults.

So yes, she was capable of keeping a secret. Whether she would or not was a different matter.

"Is this a secret even from Aileen?" Abby wondered, realizing for the first time that Aileen wouldn't be home for a while yet, and Jonas hadn't asked where she was.

"'Cause... I dunno," she shrugged, uncertainty flickering across her face. They didn't always get along, but the two sisters trusted each other.

The red-haired man smiled crookedly.  "Nah, it's what I came here to talk to her about," he replied honestly.  "But the pair of you seem like you're pretty close - even with the pomegranate juice," he added, a twinkle in his eye, "so I reckon she might tell you anyhow.  And who knows?  Maybe you'll have some advice for me."

He paused, rubbing his chin with one hand.  This wasn't a conversation that he was particularly looking forward to having once, let alone twice, but at least he'd already braced himself for it.  And, as he'd already said out loud, who knew?  If this was the price he had to pay to get his foot in the door of the Reid household, he was willing to take it.  It was worth it to get a handhold in the Runespoor investigation.

"So you know that I was helping your sister find that dagger," he said, nodding to Abby.  "Ever since I found it - to the day, near as I can tell - me magic hasn't been working right."  There was a preponderance of evidence besides, but he could leave that part out.  Jonas had no intent of telling either Reid sister about his assistant's similar struggles if he could help it.  He owed Lexus that anonymity.

"No spells, no charms, I can't even get into Diagon Alley on me own," he said simply, mentally counting off the offenses.  "It's a bloody right frustration, I can tell you that.  And I had someone test the wand, so I don't think that's the problem.  It's me.  Hence the lack of cleaning spells," he added, giving Abby a dry smile.  "But it's a bit easier to make excuses than it is to explain why I suddenly can't cast anything, don't you think?"

Abby relaxed when the investigator said that he planned on telling Aileen the secret anyway. She was just the first to know. Sitting up a little straighter, Abby dropped the attitude. She could have eavesdropped or wheedled the information out of Aileen, but it was nice, really nice, that Jonas would confide in her freely. The hesitancy and grim expression from the normally carefree man clued her in that this was serious.

As he talked, her facial expression changed from attentive, to confused, and then to shocked. Abby's mouth was set in a little 'o' by the time he confessed that he couldn't visit Diagon Alley without help.

She'd heard about that! The 'magical epidemic', or whatever it was called.

Oh no, Aileen wouldn't like this at all.

Abby put her hand over her mouth and shook her head. "I am so sorry." She felt the urge to pat his arm or make a reassuring gesture, but remained perched on the couch, leaning forward.

"I was mad at you for not, you know, casting Scourgify! And then you tell me this," she waved her hand helplessly.

"Merlin," Abby played with a strand of her hair, twisting it around her finger.

"Are you sure it's not a coincidence?" Her eyebrows drew up and together. "Because that's - that's a really huge deal. Major. To think a dagger could cause... such..." Abby didn't even know how to say it. Squibness? An epidemic of squibness? Abby might have laughed at the idea at any another time, but now it was just frightening.

"Aileen's going to flip." Forget pomegranate juice spills. Abby was off the hook! Her older sister clearly had much bigger things to worry about.

Jonas imagined that the varied and various reactions to a story like this could be an anthropological study in itself.  Having a Squib who had gone her entire life without magic apologize to him because he'd been momentarily inconvenienced was a bit disconcerting.  The irony was tangible.  He almost corrected her, almost pointed out that it wasn't really something that anyone needed to apologize for, as if he'd just been told that he'd come down with some awful disease or only had a week to live, but he stopped himself in time.

"Yeah, I reckon that it might be a coincidence," he began, before catching himself again.  Logically, yes.  But in terms of what he needed it to be, no.  "Except the timing of it seems a bit odd, don't you think?" he asked with a frown.  "I know your sister said that bloody thing was cursed, so I figured it was worth looking in to."

All in all, he was extraordinarily grateful that if it was a curse, it had been one that was only mildly irritating rather than something that could have caused serious harm.  Jonas had spent a few hours pouring through his (admittedly Muggle) books on Ancient Egypt the night before, and there were plenty of far worse curses that had been recorded there.  The one with the donkey sounded particularly uncomfortable.

Abby, though, seemed to be buying into this particular curse with gusto.  Her assertion of her sister's reaction left no mystery as to how serious she found the predicament.

"Well, she's seemed pretty unflappable to me, from what I've seen of her," he replied honestly.  "I just reckon it's better to come to her than to go somewhere else where word's going to get out.  Be bad for business." 

Jonas paused, his forehead creasing, as if the thought had just occurred to him.  Frowning, he gave Abby a quizzical look.  "Your sister'll keep it quiet, won't she?  Don't you two have a brother or two at the Ministry?" he asked, allowing a note of concern into his voice.  "She's not going to feel obligated to report something like this to one of them, is she?"

Abby nodded slowly. The timing did seem odd. But privately, Abby felt that if Jonas wanted Aileen to believe him and take responsibility, he would need proof. Proof that his loss of magic was connected to the dagger. Because otherwise, Aileen could react in all scary kinds of ways, and though she might seem unflappable to him, Abby saw her when she dropped her guard. Her older sister could be nice, caring even, but also frighteningly cold.

He told her that he thought it better to come to Aileen first with the news, and Abby realized - yeesh! - he could have gone to St. Mungo's, or Magical Law Enforcement first with his suspicions. Of course, he was trying to cover his own hide and avoid scaring away future clients, but in a way he was doing Aileen a favor too.

"Right. That's good of you."

When he asked about their brothers, Abby widened her eyes and let out a giggle. She shook her head and put her hand over her mouth as if he'd just said something hilarious.

"Merlin, no. Sorry, it's just-" Her shoulders shook slightly and she gave one more shake of her head before willing the laughter away.

"We do have two brothers at the Ministry - Trevor and Simon. But," she sobered slightly. "I haven't even seen Simon since I was like, ten. I don't think Aileen's seen him for years, either. And Trevor, well, they still talk," she admitted. "But they're not close. Not anymore."

Abby studied Jonas for a moment. "Maybe you two can solve it together! You're nice. She trusts you. Mostly."

She grinned at him, "It'll be like Shamrock and Holmes."

The burst of laughter was all that he needed.  Jonas did his best not to look as if he were listening too closely, filing this impression away with his other knowledge of the Reid family relations.  He felt a bit like he were an anthropologist, out to reconstruct some sort of tribal power dynamic, or an undercover spy searching for chinks in an enemy government. 

Simon and his siblings didn't talk - which he'd more or less known, but the confirmation was helpful.  Aileen hadn't told her younger sister about her recent run-in with the Reid family's black sheep, which was slightly interesting.  The fact that Aileen and Trevor weren't close anymore was especially interesting, but not anything that he could follow on without seeming overly suspicious.  He mentally noted it as a point to return to later if he could find a way to bring it up again.

Jonas couldn't help but smile crookedly at the observation that he was 'nice,' as well as the notation that Aileen mostly trusted him.  He wasn't sure whether or not to trust Abby's perceptions of her older sister, but it would  make things a bloody hell of a lot easier if she did.

"Who?"  It took him an embarrassingly long moment to place what she was talking about.  Some fan he was.  "Sherlock Holmes," he corrected, flashing her a lopsided smile.  "And it's just one bloke.  He's got an assistant, but he's a little bit of a duffer in most of the movies.  There's better detective teams.  Wolfe and Goodwin, Steed and Peel, Randall and Hopkirk..."

It occurred to him that Abby, even as a Squib, didn't seem to be very Muggle-savvy.  In many ways, Squibs seemed to be the equally unfortunate opposites of Muggle-borns, and they faced a similar lack of acceptance in magical society.  Jonas had met a handful over the years, but he'd never known one very well.  Coming from a pureblooded family, not being able to wield a wand had to be a struggle.

"You ever been to Baker Street?" he asked off-handedly.  "It's in the Muggle part of London, but it's not that hard to get there.  They've got a little Sherlock Holmes museum there.  You should stop in, maybe pick up some tips to give to your sister if she's going to be taking on detective work as a part-time hobby."

"Ohhh," Abby blinked, feeling a bit foolish that she'd misremembered the name, but glad that he caught onto the joke she was trying to make. Abby secretly wished that Aileen and Jonas would solve this magical epidemic together, and not just because it was the good, responsible thing to do. But because, Merlin help her, she wanted her sister and the investigator to pair up! It would be so romantic. Like in those novels she read, where the hero and the heroine were thrown into some kind of adventure together (in this case, defeating mummies and saving the world from squibness), and of course they started off arguing and hating each other, but in the end! In the end they overcame their differences and spent the rest of their lives in love.

Nevermind that Aileen might trust Jonas, but often got a twitch in her eye after he grinned too much or overstayed his welcome. Nevermind that unlike Abby, she didn't seem to have a thing for redheads. Nevermind that she tended to go for the stuffy, completely pureblooded sorts! Abby had decided that this must happen, and it would. Even if only in her daydreams.

As she was sizing him up for a romantic adventure with her sister, he wondered if she'd ever been to Baker Street in Muggle London.

"Nope, I've never been," she said casually, then hesitated. "I don't really understand the whole Underworld thing?" She paused. "Underground? With the little metal bubbles that move in a line like ants. And even if I managed that, I'd probably be totally obvious with like galleons and sickles and things. Because they don't use our kind of money, do they? So, hmmm. Maybe. I'd probably need a tour guide."

She tapped her finger to her chin. "If I asked Aileen, well honestly, she wouldn't be much help, and she'd get this 'ew' look on her face. It's not that she doesn't like muggles- the people, you know," Abby tried to explain her very optimistic, naive view of her sister. "But she doesn't like their transportation methods and all the weird stuff they use."

Her eyes lit up, as if an idea had just come to her. "But you! You get that stuff. You could definitely take me to the... Sherlock... Holmes museum," she nodded happily. "And Aileen too. If you wanted to, of course."

Abby looked at him hopefully. Everything she'd said about not quite understanding the Muggle 'Underworld' was true, but also very convenient for her scheme.

The tactic was, somewhat amazingly, working even better than he had hoped.  Jonas had just been intending to plant the seed.  Even as a Squib, Abby was obviously the progeny of a pureblooded family line, and he hardly expected her to jump at the chance to spend a day amongst Muggles.  He'd hoped that maybe if he talked it up, worked at it a bit, that she might agree to something, if only to give him an excuse to return to the Reid household once more.

But the teenager surprised him.  Not only did she seem genuinely excited about going to the Sherlock Holmes museum - an enthusiasm that more people should really share, Jonas thought - but she'd come to the conclusion that he could take her there entirely on her own.  And she'd suggested that her sister could come as well.  The idea of spending a day, an entire day when he could cajole and listen and feel out the family dynamic and dig for information on Trevor Reid, with the two sisters was better than Christmas.  Eleor would be bloody lucky to get an opportunity half as good.

"Well, I don't know," he said, rubbing a hand over his chin to hide his smile.  Jonas did his best to swallow the gleefulness in his voice, if only to play the part.  It wouldn't do to seem too excited.  This would work best if Abby was convinced that it was her own idea.  Then she could convince Aileen herself.

"I'd hate to intrude if  you two wanted to spend a day together.  It's been a while since I've gotten to play the tour guide, though," he admitted thoughtfully.  "You reckon she wouldn't mind me tagging on?  Maybe we could stop by one of the museums to look at some of the Egyptology displays.  Make an outing out of it, yeah?  There's plenty to do in the city.  And Muggle transportation is right entertaining once you get a handle on it."

If it were up to Abby, she would have gone to the museum with Jonas and somehow sent for Aileen right then and there, today. Her knee bounced excitedly. It was too bad the museum was probably closed already.

"Noooo you wouldn't be intruding!" She scoffed, piping up and almost cutting off the last word of his sentence. "Aileen won't mind one bit." What a lie. Abby grinned, "She loves all those scholarly artifacts at museums."

If 'right entertaining' meant Muggle transport was 'right terrifying', well, Abby could surely handle it, and if Aileen got that white-faced pursed mouth look, she'd just give her a little nudge. Towards Jonas, of course. Stick her foot out and make her sister trip, because she was evil like that. He'd have no choice but to catch her!

Jonas seemed a bit bashful, but interested, at least. Score one for Abby!

"Oh, you know what? Aileen and I are going on a trip to Cairo in a few weeks. I am sooo looking forward to it. We'll have to do the museum trip before then."

She was tempted, very tempted, to invite Jonas on their Cairo trip, but the super annoying voice of reason in her head told her that would be trying too hard. Also, Aileen would never forgive her. And she should probably wait and see how their museum outing went first.

"We're going to go shopping, and she's going to introduce me to what she does on excavations. A modified version, 'cause no magic," she raised her hands slightly and wiggled her fingers, as if to say 'look Ma, no hands'. "Anyway, because you're more familiar with muggle tools and whatnot, maybe you can give her tips during the museum thing."

This was all working out so well!