Shy little Eloise Moreau found herself the proud owner of Ollivanders after his death in the war. Now she's left to cope with the loss of her mentor while attempting to run a business.
When Charlie Weasley drops by one day in hopes of buying a new w...
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Two and a half weeks had passed since the conversation about Charlie's Romania decision had gone horribly awry. Eloise had been facing the issue the same way she did all of her problems: ignoring it completely and throwing herself into her work. She was exhausted, but not only that, she was frustrated with herself and with the situation. She knew she reacted poorly, but she also meant a lot of what she said. She wanted to apologize, but she hadn't figured out how to go about it yet.
When Kiera sent her an owl that morning and asked her to drinks at the Leaky, she wasn't sure if she felt relieved or disappointed that it wasn't a letter from Charlie. Her guilt at that sentiment might have been part of why she responded with an eager affirmative.
She was tucked into a familiar booth in the dingy pub, waiting for the vivacious quidditch player to return from fetching their drinks from the bar and cringing at one of her more recent memories from the Leaky.
"What's that face for?" Kiera asked brightly, tossing her dark locks over her shoulder as she slid into the seat across from her and handed her a brightly colored cocktail that was smoking and spectacularly orange and red.
"Nothing relevant. What is this?" she quickly changed the topic, hoping to distract her scatterbrained friend.
She laughed. "Honestly, I don't know what's in it. One of my teammates turned me onto them. It's called the Fiery Phoenix. You've got to be careful though, it's got firewhiskey in it, but you can hardly taste it."
Eloise took a tentative sip, and was relieved to discover that it had none of the burn of the whiskey. It was sweet and spicy, and surely dangerous to consume if she didn't pace herself.
"How's quidditch?" she asked politely.
Kiera guffawed, saying, "Eloise, honestly. I know you don't care about quidditch. Honestly, it's refreshing to have a friend that doesn't care that I play pro. A little bit of an escape."
"It's the decent thing to do, to ask about someone's work!"
"Well, we've been training pretty intensely, so it's been busy. It's physically taxing, but it's kinda nice to have a break from regular matches, which are doubly exhausting," she caved in, and Eloise managed to follow as Kiera told her about the new flying formations that the Holyhead Harpies have been practicing. When Kiera launched into a story about a bludger incident and an incident with her captain's quidditch robes, she laughed so hard that her fiery drink came out her nose.
As they chatted and caught each other up on their lives, Eloise found herself reflecting about how nice it was to have a friend like this. Other than Charlie, she hadn't found herself particularly close to anyone since Bekah moved to the States before the war. Damn it, she had been doing so well about not thinking about the wizard.
As if on cue, Kiera's grew somber as she asked, "So, are you gonna spill about your handsome Weasley, or am I gonna have to keep hinting at it until you've no choice?"
