fiery crash [alex&elias]

may 2001

Things had been getting much better between two particular Regans. After Quinn had decided it was time to fill him in on the whole Oliver situation and then taken her own stay at St. Mungo's, they were just about back to normal. Their semi-weekly dinners got less awkward with each one they had, and she had only slipped up two or three times with regards to not treating him as the victim any more. She was so proud of herself.

The Oliver situation was a whole other issue. They had finally worked out a good routine for seeing each other, which was mostly just sneaking around after they were done with training for the day, either at her house in Falmouth or in London at Oliver's, though Quinn liked to reserve that option for occasions when Elias was not in residence. After the matchmaker had greeted the pair of them with breakfast one morning a couple weeks ago, she had changed her mind about her plan to make him as uncomfortable as possible in his own home, instead preferring to only visit when Elias was at work or at his own quidditch obligations. Plus, the threat of having him come home while she was with Oliver kept her a bit grounded, never letting herself get too distracted, which was exactly what she needed.

Then the quidditch match that she had been looking forward to the least arrived. In four days the Falcons would play United. Usually, she would be extremely confident in her abilities, but after her performance on the pitch this season coupled with Oliver's odd power to either make her forget absolutely everything or make her irrationally angry, this was proving to be the most stressful match ever. The stress of it all, the worry about the relationship, it was enough to make her nauseous. But then there was the thrill of everything to even it all out. Needless to say, the past couple of months had been incredibly confusing.

And due to said quidditch match, the two had decided to not see each other in the week leading up to it, which was going relatively fine until she realized that she had left one of her better good luck charms somewhere, most likely in his bedroom. A small pendant gifted to her by her mother, easily lost, usually tacked on to the inside of the collar of her quidditch robes. It hadn't been in it's usual spot when she arrived to train on Monday, and she had spent the time since then searching her own house and coming up empty, leaving this one last option.

Thankfully Tuesday evening rolled around and she had already planned to be in London for dinner with Alex. Both Oliver and Elias would be out of their apartment for about an hour, and she just so happened to have a key to let herself in. Sneaking around his apartment was probably not what Oliver had in mind when he had given it to her, but she needed that pendant back, both for her own luck and because she didn't want to let it give any luck to her opponent. But instead of swinging by on the way to Alex's, Quinn decided that the better option would be to bring him with her, just in case she needed backup reinforcements company.

She knocked on Alex's door right on time, launching immediately into her plan for their evening after giving her brother a quick hug hello. "I left something at Oliver's the other night and I need it for this weekend," she paused to breathe quickly, but continued before giving Alex the chance to interrupt. "And I need you to come with me." She waved her hand in front of herself to quench any protest before it started. "He's not supposed to be there, but if he is, I'll..." she trailed off, figuring that he knew exactly what she would do. On the other hand, they were both so amped up for the upcoming match that she might try to curse him. Really, either option would not be a good move for her career.

And conveniently, Alex lived close enough that they could walk there in ten minutes. She wasn't too keen to let him see where Oliver lived, but desperate times. She pulled him out the door by his hand, giving it a tight squeeze as he followed her out. "And save the grief you want to give me for later, thanks." She didn't bother posing this as a question, more so a demand. Surely this wouldn't be the only time she asked Alex to break in to his apartment. No, she had a key, this was all perfectly legal. And in case it wasn't, she just so happened to have an Auror with her. All problems were solved.

The ten minute walk took less than that; Quinn was so anxious the past couple of weeks she had been walking everywhere more quickly, which was probably why her lower back was giving her little twinges of pain every now and then. She gave a precautionary knock, putting her ear to the door to listen to any sounds of movement. "No, I was right," she stated, not telling Alex just what it was that she was right about. She fished the key out from the pocket of her shorts and opened the door slowly, still half expecting someone to be inside. But it was empty, and just as clean and tidy as usual. Too clean for Quinn's tastes, and not near enough clutter. It was hard to tell that people even lived here.

But it smelled nice, no trace of that boy smell that so often permeated bachelors' apartments. She closed and locked the door behind them once they were inside, now standing in the living room, lit only by the light of the streetlamps streaming in through the windows. "I guess, um," she looked to her brother, "Stay here?" She hadn't thought this far ahead, and he was already doing his part by even coming along with her in the first place. She added a bit more light to the room with a flick of her wand and took a few steps up the stairs toward's Oliver's bedroom. "Feel free to move stuff around," she said over her shoulder, knowing just how much Elias would love it to find things in the wrong place. She stopped with her hand on the doorknob and twisted around, "If Oliver gets here, you can run interference," she called with a grin before letting herself into the bedroom, leaving the door open so she would still be within earshot.


@Alex Regan @Elias Dörfler @Oliver Wood

He’d been ready for dinner in and a bottle of wine and a bit of chat, but it was clear from the first second she showed up that Quinn had no plans for a relaxing visit. Her mouth started running at once. Apparently there was some crucial thing that had gotten lost during whatever Quinn and Oliver did, and she was enlisting his help in retrieving it. There was to be no argument. “Now, wait just a second,” started Alex anyway, but she was already pulling him out of the doorway. Her pace was quick, leaving him to hurry along like a duckling in her wake.

“Things going well with Ollie, then?” he asked lightly to her back. It was just too hard for him not to mock her for this. “So well you’d rather break and enter than talk with him? Congratulations.” While he could hardly begrudge her a casual fling, and there were plenty of ill-advised relationships in his past that Quinn could tease him right back about, this kind of passive-aggressive dance was just ridiculous. His sister usually didn’t have this high a tolerance for nonsense. The sex must really be great.

They arrived at Wood’s residence, where Quinn knocked, then put her ear to the door just to make sure he wasn’t lurking inside. Alex snorted. Anyone would think they were about to rob a bank. To his surprise, though, she fished out a key and opened the door. “You had a key this whole time?” he asked. He’d thought she’d brought him along to break in for her or something. But apparently she’d been trusted enough with 24-hour entrance, and still she wanted to avoid the bloke at all costs. He followed her in, baffled.

She instructed him to “run interference” should the need arise. Alex raised his eyebrows. She could have been referring to his conflict resolution skills, but he didn’t imagine Oliver would pay more attention to a stranger he wasn’t shagging than someone that he was. Maybe she just wanted someone to pin all the blame for the whole idea on. He’d been that person enough during their childhood. It surprised him at times like this how unequal their relationship still could be. Quinn had the same power over him she’d always had. He’d drop anything to do whatever she said.

“What did you lose, anyway?” asked Alex as he wandered about the room, falling into a chair and lifting the cover of a magazine. Surely if it had been something embarrassing, she would have done this herself. His contemplation was cut short, though, when he heard a key turning in the lock. “Quinn, he’s coming,” he called, standing and drawing his wand on instinct then tucking it away just before the door opened when he realized how unnecessary that was. He looked up at the man who’d just entered, readying himself to make up some bullshit, but then he realized it definitely wasn’t Oliver Wood.

Confused, his eyes flicked from the key in Elias’s hand to his face. “Don’t tell me he’s sleeping with you too,” he joked.

Tuesday night practices were a regular part of Elias' week, an hour and a half of stress relief that he could count on to prevent the tension of his busy professional life from driving him insane. He was pretty sure that being a beater was the absolute best position to play for that sort of thing, too: his sole task was to fly around whacking a mad ball as hard as he could at imaginary opponents. No time to think about deadlines on reports that he had yet to write or cryptic letters from his parents or colleagues having mysterious breakdowns that he didn't understand.

Unfortunately, Elias had only gotten about thirty minutes of focused defending in before he had heard their captain's whistle calling them back to the ground. Apparently two of their chasers had tried to catch the same pass and collided. Normally they played better than that, Elias was sure of it; it was probably just the upcoming tournament at the beginning of June giving them nerves. All the same, their captain had decided to dismiss the other players and work exclusively with the three chasers on their plays for the remaining hour. He was of the opinion that they could all use more time but hated to argue, so had headed home earlier than usual.

After gathering his things, Elias twisted on the spot and disapparated. He appeared only a few seconds later just outside the interior entrance to his apartment with a soft "pop" and began fishing inside his robes for his key. Before living with Oliver, he could simply have apparated into their sitting room, but living with a professional quidditch player meant certain security steps had to be taken. Having an anti-apparition ward in place was a smart move, international quidditch player or not, but one had to be careful when dealing with anti-apparition wards and Elias always preferred to stay on the cautious side.

As he turned the key and pushed open the door, he realized the lights in the sitting room had been left on. Trust Oliver to forget to turn them off on his way to practice. With a sigh, he pulled his broom in behind him and moved to shut the door when he saw that the room wasn't empty. Elias jumped as he spotted the man who was standing in the middle of his sitting room and definitely was not Oliver Wood. The recent musing about the ward and security measures made him nervous for a moment that someone had broken in to snoop around Oliver's room, but then his mind caught up with what he was seeing and he recognized the face that was looking at him in confusion: Alex Regan, brother of his roommate's secret girlfriend. Probably not a crazed fan, though Elias couldn't completely rule the option out since he was having a hard time coming up with any other explanation for why the younger Regan might be there.

Alex broke the stunned silence first. Elias could decipher little sense in the other man's words, so he simply side-stepped them, preferring not to be the butt of whatever joke he was making. "I'm sorry, have I missed something?" If Alex had been on the doorstep, he would have assumed the man was here to see him, but Alex seemed just as surprised as he did that they had run into one another. All the same, Alex had somehow managed to come up with a line that made the tone light and Elias felt the need to match it. He relaxed his posture, tucking his wand and key away inside his robes as he shut the door. "If you wanted to see me, you could have just written."

Quinn’s gaze darted around the room. Oliver was definitely not the tidy one in this apartment living situation. Usually it didn’t bother her, but today the clutter was just in the way of her ultimate goal. Plus, she had actually made it two months without doing any extensive snooping and now she was ruining that too. Reluctantly, of course. She took a few steps into the room, willing the pendant to jump out at her. Finding a little fleck of gold shouldn’t be this hard. This didn’t bode well for Saturday.

What did she lose? Quinn toyed with the idea of telling Alex the truth; if there was one person who could understand the importance of the pendant it would be him, but her consideration was short lived. "My dignity," she called back instead, which really wasn't far from the truth. She was currently on her hands and knees peering under Oliver's bed, pushing aside a sock with an outstretched hand, her nose scrunched up as much as it possibly could be.

She pushed herself up into a sitting position, leaning back on her heels, her eyes searching around the room. Just as she was about to add a loving “Mind your own business,” to her earlier declaration, Alex’s voice carried up the stairs with perfect clarity: he’s here. Ughhhh. No, thank you. Surely Oliver would give her absolute hell for this, something about how she couldn’t go a few days without getting to look at his gorgeous face. While he wouldn’t be completely wrong, she wasn’t about to admit that she wanted to see him. Never mind that wasn’t the reason she was here at all.

Was United just going to skip training this week? Were they already giving up, even before they met the Falcons on the pitch? Which hex should she use to distract him before he could make fun of her for being here? Shifting her weight to her toes, Quinn stood up, suddenly realizing that she hadn’t completely thought through what Oliver and Alex meeting actually meant. That was probably something she should be there for.

Or, alternatively, she could figure out how to leave through the window. Alex could handle himself, that much she was sure of, and she could just make it up to him later for abandoning him.

No, that wasn’t an option. Quinn sighed as she left the bedroom, pausing on the landing when she heard her brother’s voice again, quickly followed by one that was most assuredly not Oliver’s. She wasn’t sure which roommate option was worse, but after two more seconds of consideration, she was positive the worse and more embarrassing option was Elias. The woman took a step backwards and retreated back into the bedroom, unsure of when she made the extremely adult decision to hide. She tucked her hair behind her ear, as if that somehow afforded her a better opportunity to eavesdrop.

“What, do you live here?” Alex rounded the coffee table and looked around, partially to try and detect traces of the other man’s residency in the room and partially just to look casual and unruffled. “Well, someone could have told me that.” He quickly glanced upstairs, where he heard no movement. Bitch.

“I’m not here for you, sorry to disappoint.” He tossed Elias a smirking grin over his shoulder. “Quinn sent me. I’m supposed to find something she left last time she was here. She was busy, but I live nearby and I’m too good a brother.” He hoped Quinn had the good sense to get out somehow, or at least stay well hidden. If Elias found out she was here then they’d both look like idiots. There was no amount of justifying themselves that could fix that, because there was really no justification for this besides that Quinn was being a dirty coward.

He idly looked underneath one of the throw pillows on the couch. “I’d imagine it’ll be in Oliver’s room,” he said. “Unless they branch out into other rooms when you’re out. At least—“ He chuckled. “I hope you’d be out.” Making Elias uncomfortable was the best tactic he could think of at the moment to distract from the flimsiness of his story. Or maybe he was just pretending it helped because it was fun. “Anyway.” He heaved a dramatic, put-upon sigh. “I was on my way up to look around; I’ll be quick and then I’ll get out of your hair. Unless, of course, you’d like me to stick around?” That would serve Quinn right, having to sit around while he and Eli hung out for however long. He gave the other man a pleasant, yet subtly hopeful smile.

"Of course," Elias replied, looking at Alex uncertainly. Had the man's time in the dome damaged him more than he had let on the last time they had met? It was strange enough that Alex was here, but the fact that he didn't seem to know whose apartment it was at all was on the brink of concerning. Elias' confusion quickly evaporated and was instead replaced by surprise as Alex continued talking. Apparently he wasn't the only one in on the secret of the love affair between the Falcons' seeker and United's keeper. Elias couldn't help laughing a bit at Alex's comment; true, it was unsettling to imagine what Quinn and Oliver might get up to while he was away, but it was relieving to know that he was finally not the only other person in the country who was in on the secret.

Now that he was sure there was no threat, Elias turned away from Alex to hang his cloak and drop his key in the small bowl beside the door. "What did she lose, anyway?" he enquired. It seemed odd for Alex to be wasting time lifting up throw pilows when he could just summon whatever it was that had been misplaced. Surely it wasn't such a valuable object that Quinn would have placed an anti-summoning charm on it; otherwise, why would she have lost it? At Alex's suggestion that he pop upstairs to dig through Oliver's room on Quinn's behalf, Elias turned back around and gazed at Alex with one eyebrow raised.

"Maybe it would be better if I took a look. I'm not sure Oliver would like a stranger looting his bedroom. But you're welcome to stay," he offered in response to Alex's suggestion. "Oliver won't be back for at least an hour, but I suppose if we can't find whatever Quinn is missing, he would know where to find it." He was hardly going to turn away a guest, even if that guest had arrived unannounced and with the primary goal of snatching some unknown object from his roommate's possession. "Would you like a drink?" He moved automatically toward the kitchen, where the fridge was stocked with a variety of beverages, alcoholic and otherwise.

"If she lost something, she could have just asked me to send it to her," he pointed out from the next room. "That would have been a lot simpler than you breaking in. How did you get in here, anyway?" He appeared back in the doorway and paused to look at Alex, eyeing him critically. Their apartment was supposed to be locked against the more basic attempts at entry, and he somehow doubted that Alex had used dark magic to force his way in. No lost trinket was that important. It seemed more likely that Alex had abused his position as an Auror somehow to gain entry. "I'm sure United's security team will be interested to know that their wards failed to prevent a break-in." Unless, of course, Oliver had simply forgotten to lock the door on his way out. Not impossible.

Elias set the drinks down on the coffee table, but instead of sitting, retrieved his broom from where it was still leaning against the wall by the front door. "I can take a quick look through Oliver's room if you would prefer not to wait for him to return. Did Quinn give any detail at all of what we're looking for?" Even if Alex wasn't exactly sure what his sister had lost, it seemed unlikely that Quinn would have offered no detail at all for her brother to work with.

Quinn was perfectly positioned to listen to the conversation between the two men downstairs. While she wanted no part of it, she didn’t let that stop her from reacting to it. She rolled her eyes almost immediately, not regretting her decision to not fill in Alex on every little detail of Oliver’s living situation. And now was not the time to flirt, Alex. Merlin. She wasn’t sure exactly what sort of interference she had wanted her brother to run, but this was not it. She needed to invest in some less attractive friends.

But then: Quinn sent me. Forget less attractive friends. She needed to find a new favorite brother. Now she definitely couldn’t leave the room. This plan was falling apart fast. Run interference, Alex, not pretend she wasn’t here at all. Would it have been so hard to just say she was upstairs? That wasn’t unheard of. Now she had officially missed the window of making her presence known.

Well, at least Elias wasn’t upset. Not that Quinn particularly cared how he felt about the situation, but he would be much easier to deal with if he was in a bad mood. She smirked as Alex mentioned her and Oliver branching out, but the smirk was gone as soon as she remembered that she was now mad at Alex, despite how right he was about the whole situation. And now he wanted to hang out with Elias? They weren’t supposed to be friends. She vaguely remembered them sitting together at a match or two, but they should have been paying attention to her, not making friends with each other.

She could fix this. She and Oliver might have agreed not to see each other, but how upset could he actually be if she was waiting to greet him when he got home, draped across the bed, conveniently undressed? Elias and Alex could decide how to deal with the noises they heard.

But none of that was going to work if Elias came upstairs. She heard his suggestion and looked around frantically. She wasn’t sure when she decided that hiding would be her best option, but it didn’t matter. There were no options. And despite Alex already ruining this reconnaissance mission, Quinn couldn’t completely rule out that he wouldn’t try to stop Elias from coming up the stairs, either physically or magically, because how often did he really not follow through on what she asked him to do?

She took one last frantic look around before completely giving up her search and heading out the door. “Sorry, Alex!” Quinn called, coming loudly down the stairs. “I told you it wasn’t here. I’m sure they wouldn’t like us being he—“ she stopped short, two steps up from the bottom landing, a look of mock surprise on her face. “Oh hi, love,” she slowly descended the final stairs. “I see you’ve met my brother,” she said with a smile, shooting a look towards Alex that sharply contrasted with the mood on the rest of her face.

“Earring,” said Alex, quickly making up some small thing from which a person was easily separated. “She wants to wear them someplace tomorrow, they’re pretty nice.” His story was embarrassingly weak, he was rather out of practice, but it would probably work as long as the roommate wasn’t too nosy.

There would be no such luck for him. “That’s fair, I guess,” he said as Elias responded skeptically to his proposal. “I wouldn’t want some stranger poking around in my things either.” He couldn’t very well say otherwise without sounding incredibly questionable, but if Elias decided to actually go look around the whole thing would fall apart quite embarrassingly. “Oh, I don’t need anything—thank you, though,” he replied when Eli offered him a drink, careful to seem like he was paying attention instead of searching for a plan B.

Elias was looking increasingly suspicious, though, asking him how he’d gotten in. “Oh, she gave me her key,” said Alex, almost surprised by the seriousness of the question. Did he really think he’d have forced himself in for an earring? That would explain his wariness. “No, don’t worry—I’d have told her to just suck it up if she wanted me to break in.” He shrugged innocently. “But she had the key, so I figured it would be alright.” Elias still looked somewhat dubious, so Alex decided to go down a tangential road to deflect some of the blame for this mess from himself. “I did think it was sort of weird she wanted me to come while he was out,” he said, as if admitting it after consideration. “I don’t know what’s going on with them, but I guess it’s none of my business.”

Though he had hoped Eli might forget about wanting to accompany him upstairs, he had no such luck with that either. “Alright, then,” he said, as trying to stop him would lead to his story’s collapse even quicker. Though, collapse was inevitable now. Even if Quinn had managed to sneak out a window or something, they still wouldn’t be finding any earrings unless he had made a very lucky guess—or, he mused, if Oliver was coincidentally being very unfaithful. “It’s silver, with a red stone,” he said, describing a pair of earrings he’d seen Quinn wear. “I’d recognize it.” His hand drifted over his wand in his pocket as Elias moved toward the stairs. Quickly he weighed the benefits of taking him out somehow while his back was turned, but when he realized they’d probably run into each other again he decided against it. That would only work if he also did a memory charm, and he sure as hell wasn’t bringing that kind of spell to this kind of petty drama. His ethical standards may have been pretty low, but they were existent.

Thankfully, Quinn chose the moment to announce herself, flouncing downstairs and affecting clueless surprise. The idea that she might have missed their entire conversation was laughable and Eli didn’t seem to be buying it, but Alex had to hand it to her for trying. "I told you," he said to Elias with a rueful sigh and a small crooked grin. "I'm too good a brother." He still looked stupid for lying so flagrantly, but if he played it right he could minimize his culpability. Quinn was the one who’d dragged him here with almost zero information, after all.

It was pretty clear his sister blamed him, though, by the look in her eye. “It’s my fault, then, is it?” he asked her, raising his brows. “What, was I supposed to let on you were here? Your whole cloak-and-dagger act could’ve fooled me.”

"Her key?" Elias repeated, surprised. He supposed it wasn't that odd for a man to give his girlfriend a copy of a key to his apartment, but wasn't that the sort of thing that happened far down the line? Oliver and Quinn hadn't been together all that long, and he had rather been under the impression that their relationship was more physical than anything else. Not that either of them would talk to him about it for more than a few seconds before changing the subject, so he supposed things could have gotten more serious without him being aware. All the same, notification that another key to his apartment had been made might have been nice to know.

Not wanting to seem too out of the loop, Elias gave a nod. He supposed that answer made sense of how Alex had gotten in, anyway, though why Quinn hadn't simply written about the earring or come to get it herself was beyond him. "I don't really know much, either," he admitted in response. The pair were, for some unknown reason, determined to keep him out of their relationship. "You'd think that living with them, I'd get more of a sense, but they've been secretive about it from the start."

Just as Elias moved to ascend the staircase and return his broom to his closet, Quinn appeared at the top of the stairs. He stepped back in surprise, once again trying to make sense of the sudden appearance of a stranger in his home. He looked over at Alex at once, eyebrows raised, and waited for whatever confused explanation the man would offer this time. He was not impressed with the deception from the two of them; they couldn't really think him so stupid as to actually believe that Quinn hadn't known he was there, or that anything Alex had said was true now.

"Hello," he replied. "I see you're making good use of your new key." Really, he couldn't blame either of them. Quinn obviously had Oliver's permission to be here (though it would have been nice if he had been asked), and Alex had only been going along with Quinn's ideas, trying to be a supportive sibling. Elias knew how that could be, though his sisters and younger brother usually didn't ask him to do such irresponsible things. He simply looked on as the two bickered over Alex's handling of the situation, waiting for them to ask for his forgiveness or try to work their way out of the embarassing situation. He had no intention to lecture them, really; the awkwardness was enough punishment really, and he always preferred to just let things like this go. "I guess I should get another butterbeer."

Quinn raised her brows back at Alex, throwing up her hands in mock defeat. "Lying about everything was your decision," she put her hands down and shrugged. "You really are a good brother, though." Her face softened, genuinely meaning what she said. "The best," she added with an unexpected change of heart. She had a sudden urge to hug him and leave right away to make up for everything that had just happened, but she couldn't leave without setting Elias at ease.

She turned back to the only occupant of the room with a right to be there and pulled him into a hug before she started making excuses for herself. "Oh, yes, my new key," she agreed with a nod, deciding that Elias didn't need to know that she had had it for over a month now. "You know I don't want to disturb your sleep when my presence is requested late at night." Quinn smiled as she shrugged and explained why she had a key in the first place. "Just looking for that earring," she added, suddenly hoping that she wasn't wearing the earrings he had described. She tugged on her earlobe, hopefully passing it off as just an overly exaggerated hand gesture as she talked about earrings, but mostly just to find out which earrings she had in. But she was only met with a wave of relief as she realized she hadn't been wearing any earrings at all. Great, almost in the clear.

"But yes, I'd love one, thank you," she smiled again at the offer of a butterbeer, not wanting to be rude (or any ruder than 'breaking in' already was), but also not wanting to overstay their welcome, if there was one. She stole a glance at the clock on the wall; there was still plenty of time before Oliver should be home, and surely they would be able to handle the situation much better the second time if he decided to come home early. "Practice must have been either really good or really bad to warrant cutting it short," she called after Elias as he left the room, doing whatever she could to get his attention off of whatever was going on. She had already lost track of whatever story Alex had told, and telling anyone about the lost pendant would just tarnish its luck.

She took another look around the room for her pendant, though she knew that looking in this room was futile. She hadn't disrobed in the living room in a couple weeks, at least, so there was little chance that it had somehow fallen off in here. It was looking like the most plausible reason it was missing was that one of her cats ate it and she sighed, finally coming to the conclusion that putting an anti-summoning charm on it (for sabotage reasons, of course) perhaps wasn't the smartest idea.

She took a seat on the sofa, pulling Alex's arm with her so he would take the seat next to her. Instead of dropping her voice to a whisper, Quinn continued in Spanish: "Sorry, we'll leave soon." She paused, eyeing the two drinks already on the coffee table and remembering her annoyance earlier at Alex and Elias being friendly. "It'd be really nice if you could keep your flirting to a minimum."

Alex was about to grudgingly admit his error in judgment when Quinn praised him unexpectedly, her expression changing from annoyance to what looked like genuine affection. “I mean, yeah,” he said, surprised but not about to question it. “Look at the depths I’m willing to sink to for no reason.” World’s Best Brother wasn’t quite enough of a consolation for his pride to recover from also being the World’s Dumbest Brother, but it did help.

He turned to Elias then and sighed heavily one last time. Hopefully he would be just as quick to forgive. “Well, I’m sorry, there appears to have been a miscommunication,” he said. “Which might have been helped by there being any communication at all, but, you know.” He had half a mind to also clarify that he was usually a better liar than this, just for the sake of his reputation, but he didn’t think that particular trait would be any help in endearing him to Elias at the moment so he skipped to begging for forgiveness. “Anyway,” he said with an apologetic quirk of his lips, “if you could pretend I’m not such an idiot in the future, I’d be grateful.” Eli seemed like a nice enough guy to actually consider it.

Quinn did her bit, hugging her friend and accepting his drink offer. Interestingly, she didn’t correct the earring part of the story. It made Alex raise his eyebrows again, insatiably curious to know what she’d really  lost and why she was being so cagey about it. He’d make her tell once they were back at his. However, it looked like it’d be a wait. Quinn was making conversation with Elias as he fetched another butterbeer. Alex glanced at the table. Eli had brought him one even though he’d declined. Sometimes the man was so good it was awful.

His sister pulled him down beside her on the sofa. She assured him in Spanish that they’d leave soon, and then also took the opportunity to admonish him for flirtatiousness. He wondered how clearly she’d heard them from upstairs. “Oh, please,” he replied with a soft snort. “It only looks like flirting because you’re so unfriendly.” He then lowered his voice a little, instinctively despite the language barrier between them and the other man. “Did you find your thing?” he asked. And a little more teasingly, “What was it really, was I close?”

Elias raised an eyebrow at Quinn’s sudden mood change: the compliments, the hugging -- not much like the Quinn he knew and certainly not consistent with the bickering he had just witnessed. Confused but deciding to let it go, he returned her hug as Alex apologized for the whole incident. Elias nodded understandingly, offering a small smile in return. “Believe me, I understand. Being a brother comes with its own set of odd responsibilities.”

Quinn released him and he blinked at her comment about coming over in the middle of the night. He knew more than he’d like to about what Quinn and Oliver got up to; walking in at the wrong time just once was enough to make sure he learned his lesson. It was probably for the best, then, that she was keeping her surprise visits to the hours that he was sleeping and didn’t have to be involved in whatever they were getting up to.

“Right,” he agreed shortly, hopefully making it clear that that was all that needed to be said on the subject. “I’ll be right back,” he promised, moving into the kitchen again to fetch the third butterbeer. He pointed his wand at the bottle and popped the cap off for her as he walked back toward the living room. The two siblings were conversing in rapid Spanish, and it took Elias a moment before he caught up with what they were saying. He was a bit rusty, but he caught most of Alex’s defense and questions.

He handed the bottle to Quinn as he asked, “Is there something I should know? What were you looking for?” His own Spanish didn’t sound nearly as musical and smooth as theirs did, his German accent making the Rs too soft and the vowels too nasal, but he was sure he got his point across. “There’s no need to treat me like I’m stupid,” he added in English, trying to keep the tartness out of his voice. He was happy to entertain them and forgive their silly stunt, but continuing to act like they were getting the best of him was touching a nerve.

“Oh, honestly," Quinn retorted, rolling her eyes almost excessively. The unfriendly option would have been to hex him and run before he knew what was happening. If anything, she had been overly friendly by staying around and gracing everyone with her presence. But sure, whatever Alex wanted to think. Her face fell as he asked her about what she was looking for, once again reminded that she hadn’t been able to find it. “Well, no,” she started, almost smiling as he asked if he had been close in guessing it was an earring.

She was just about to fill him in, almost giving in to the fact that she had lost the pendant forever so there was really no point in trying to keep it a secret anymore. “Very close, but…” she trailed off as Elias handed her a bottle. Thankfully, she hadn’t had the chance to take a sip as she might have lost it when he joined their conversation, in iffy but obvious Spanish. She tried to recall what exactly they had said, though she was fairly certain it had been nothing overtly negative about him. If anything, the worst thing she had said was about Alex.

“I didn’t know your Spanish was so good,” she settled on saying, rather than answering either of his questions or admitting that she was at any sort of fault here. She had a surprised look on her face, but she hoped he would interpret that as surprise at how good he was, not at his having any knowledge of the language at all. She’d have to worry about that later, how that hadn’t possibly come up before as she was fairly certain that she had mentioned that her mother’s family was Spanish. She was almost offended that he hadn’t offered up that little tidbit of information about himself until now.

She switched back to English as Elias did, shooting a quick look at her brother before she continued. “I wouldn’t dream of it, Elias.” She sighed dramatically, hopefully making it look like it was the hardest thing ever to tell the truth. “Alex doesn’t know what I was looking for either, so he’s not to blame.” She nodded quickly, attempting to mend that mar on their relationship as quickly as possible. “I didn’t want to bother you, but I also didn’t want to run in to Oliver.” She added, like it should be so obvious the reasons why she didn’t. “We play each other on Saturday,” she offered this superfluous bit, just in case anyone else in the room wasn’t as up to date on her schedule as they out to be.

Shrugging, Quinn finally turned her attentions to the drink in her hand, taking a small swig but changing her mind halfway through. It wasn’t like she had never had butterbeer before, but the taste was far from what she had been anticipating, somehow. Maybe it had just been so long since she had last had it and was much more familiar with what real alcohol ought to taste like.

Alex couldn’t hide his surprise as Elias cut into their conversation in passable Spanish. His mouth fell open a little and curved into an incredulous smile, one part shocked and embarrassed, another part just impressed. He was liking this bloke more and more the more he refused to be outwitted. “Any other languages we ought to know about?” he teased, crossing his arms and leaning back on the couch. “An bhfuil aon Gaeilge agat? There we go, then.” He nudged Quinn with his elbow. “For future reference.” She had clearly had no idea about the extent of Elias’s polyglottism either, by the look on her face. Alex was a little bit satisfied that at least this misstep wasn’t his fault.

Thankfully she threw only herself under the bus, though not all the way, of course. At this point Alex was deadly curious what she’d enlisted his company to find. Nothing could possibly require this stubborn a commitment to privacy. If Quinn would just explain herself, he thought, it would smooth over a great deal of the awkwardness. But Alex doubted she would. She’d sidestepped the subject for long enough now that he figured she was just holding onto it out of principle, and that no matter what her target was it’d be underwhelming now compared to the mystery. It was what he’d have done too. He wondered whether Elias would prod her more or just give up, and hoped it was the latter. Once they left he’d find out himself, of course, but he was approaching his humiliation threshold and didn’t know that he’d survive any more public interrogation.

“Well,” he began, giving Quinn a solid clap on the leg and pushing himself up from the couch. “I think we ought to just leave before we embarrass ourselves any further, honestly.” He lifted his untouched butterbeer and tipped it toward Elias. “Sorry again, from the bottom of my heart—we should visit some other time, really. I’d like to get off on a better foot if I can.”

Linking his arm with Quinn’s, he gave the other man yet another apologetic smile and then hoped his Spanish hadn’t been good enough to catch the talk of flirtation. He honestly hadn’t had any intentions of it since early on in the quidditch match they’d attended, and he didn’t want to make Elias uncomfortable. Because he quite liked him, now. Loneliness and cheekbones were no reason to alienate a potential friend. That was, if tonight hadn't done the job for him.

He looked back to Quinn then, and sipped his butterbeer expectantly. She had better have a very, very good explanation for this, and he couldn’t wait to hear it.

The looks of surprise on the siblings' faces when he spoke in Spanish was almost enough to make up for everything that had happened so far. Elias wasn't normally the type to care about getting the best of people or a situation, but in this particular instance he felt the Regans had gone a bit far: entering his home without real permission, lying, and then trying to carry on a secret conversation while he was in the room. It was just bad manners. So, all in all, seeing Alex's embarrassment and Quinn's shock gave him the feeling that they might finally have learned their lesson.

"Oh, it's not, really," Elias admitted, not wanting to get too ahead of himself and his abilities but appreciating the compliment all the same. He hardly believed Quinn meant it, but it was kind of her to say it all the same. He supposed it might have come up at some point in the past that she spoke Spanish, but clearly he had never revealed his own abilities and was glad of it now. He laughed in response to the nonsensical sounds Alex spilled out, hardly believing that was a real language at all. "Not unless either of you plan to start chatting in Russian."

Elias settled into his own chair, taking a swig of his butterbeer as Quinn continued making excuses. He knew well enough that the new couple would be facing each other that weekend and had been extra careful around Oliver all week because of it. The last thing he wanted was to set his roommate off before such an important, at least personally, match. Elias had yet to decide which team he would be rooting for, if any at all, but the events from the day made him feel that he might be leaning more toward Puddlemere this time around.

"I am looking forward to it," he told Quinn with a wink, wondering whether she still expected him to sit in the Falcons section after all this. In all fairness, though, they had been friends much longer than he and Oliver had. "Any inside information on which team I ought to put my galleons on?" He looked to Alex then, assuming her brother wouldn't want to miss the match now that it was clear he was in on the Oliver secret. "I suppose we'll see one another there."

Elias took the bottles back from Quinn and Alex silently, grateful that Alex at least hadn't opened his if he wasn't going to drink it. He followed them to the door, glad of the opportunity to make sure Quinn really left and didn't try to sneak upstairs again. Elias offered his hand to Alex for a quick shake goodbye, not wanting the man to think he wished him ill. "Until this weekend, then," he said with a final nod before closing the door behind the siblings and all the madness they had brought into his home with them.