Home is where the rats are [Sami]

It was three years since You-Know-Who had finally been defeated, but in some ways Hunter was still living with the aftermath. During that year he had lived mostly by his wits and his rats, having been thrown out of his lodgings by a pureblood landlord who wasn't brave enough to accept that Hunter could prove pureblood ancestry on at least one side of his family. At least that's what the young man liked to think. Even in the face of overwhelming evidence he didn't like to imagine that anyone could take advantage of a situation to throw out a tenant simply because they didn't dress and speak right. But since then, Hunter had moved from one temporary room to another, sometimes renting, sometimes living with Jimmy, sometimes sleeping on the sofa of a friend.

Despite his rather transient career this situation meant he'd managed to save some money and had decided that the time had come to find a permanent place of his own. Preferably a flat in London, though he was willing to consider other suggestions (he could apparate, so it wouldn't matter if he lived a way out, right?) - and of course, it had to be somewhere that was willing to take his rats.

That was the potentially tricky part. Even amongst the wizarding community there were people who didn't like rodents, much less as house guests. Hunter was ready to state his case, that rats were actually a lot cleaner than cats (they didn't need a litterbox), took up a lot less space than dogs (and they didn't bark if you left them alone!) and you would get a tidier place than you started with, because his rats would eat any bits of debris they found on floors or corridors. So, dressed in his best jeans and a blue shirt that actually had a collar he pushed open the door of the magical letting agent on Diagon alley, a cheerful smile on his face as he prepared to seek a new home. The woman behind the desk smiled, but was evidently in the middle of writing a letter, so Hunter started looking at the various pictures of properties that were displayed on the walls, glancing up as he heard the door open again.

@Sami Sadik

Sami was tired of living in a guesthouse. It felt like he had not really arrived yet and he had definitely arrived! His Quidditch team had won the league with him as their keeper, for Merlin's sake! He was here to stay. He had no intention whatsoever of leaving again. Not in the foreseeable future anyway. He had looked for a nice place to stay in Falmouth but the town itself did not interest him enough to actually like any of the flats he looked at. It was boring and he could always just apparate to his practice sessions from any other place anyway.

London was more something he liked. The city was alive, there was a lot to explore, it was just a thousand times more interesting than Falmouth. However, even for wizards it was not easy to get a good flat in London. True, a small flat could be magically expanded but at least a small flat had to be there for that, Sami had done his homework, had researched already a few times and yet he had not found anything nice yet. He was not opposed to taking a muggle style apartment somewhere but that was hardly anything to come by easily. In fact, he felt that in the muggle world apartments were even harder to find than in the magical world.

Feeling almost defeated, Sami had decided that it was time to go to a magical letting office. Maybe he'd at least find a temporary solution there. He could still keep looking for his dream flat when he had found a place to live for the time being. In his imagination a perfect flat was rather spectacular but even with his more than decent pay as a Quidditch pro he could hardly afford something like that easily.

He pushed the door of the letting office open and stepped over the threshold. He hoped to be recognised as a famous Quidditch player but he had not been in England for very long now. Maybe his face was not well known yet, after all. He was dressed in dark jeans with a maroon coloured shirt. His sneakers made no sound as he stepped further into the room. He offered the woman behind the desk a beaming smile. If it would help, he'd flirt with her, even ask her out. He just really wanted to get a nice place to live now.

Since the woman behind the desk seemed busy, Sami hesitated for a moment. Should he interrupt her and count on his star bonus? This might backfire though. Either the woman would find him arrogant and obnoxious or the other man in the room would get mad at him. Either way, it was too much of a risk now. He could as well wait.

Sami examined the other person present in the room. The man looked as though he was around his age, give or take a few years. His dressing style made him assume that he was familiar with both magical and muggle lifestyle. That was always a plus. Sami felt that he could not connect well with witches or wizards that displayed their pureblood supremacist views by always wearing wizarding robes.

"Hey," he said in a low voice as he stopped next to the other man, "found anything nice yet?" He nodded at the pictures on the wall.