this is how we grow now [emily]

august 2001

“Watch my seat, won’tcha?” Edith Holthouse didn’t wait for a response before she slipped off her stool, leaving the unoccupied set in the care of a middle-aged wizard who wouldn’t give her the time of day. The Leaky Cauldron was unusually busy; maybe everyone had had a particularly nasty Thursday at work or maybe she was just being ignorant to the time of year it was getting to be. People were coming into the city and staying at the pub so they could have easy access to Diagon Alley’s shopping, but Hogwarts was, thankfully, one of the last things on the woman’s mind.

Edith’s usual group of drinking buddies hadn’t seemed appealing and she had set out on her own for the evening, biding her time until she figured out something better to do. Of course, ‘better’ had quidditch practice, so drinking beer would have to suffice until she gathered up the resolve to switch to firewhisky. And at the rate she was going, it wouldn’t be too much longer.

She pushed her way back from the toilet, ready to reclaim her seat and order herself another drink. But in the two minutes she was gone, her seat had been stolen by another woman. Sure, she had almost the same color hair and was almost the same height, so maybe the seat-saver had gotten confused, but that was really no excuse. At least she was also wearing jeans and a t-shirt, just as Edith was. Maybe she would be reasonable. Edith pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose as she took the last few steps back to the bar.

“Do you mind?” Edith asked, pointing obviously to the barstool this girl was occupying. “No, never mind.” She moved into the space beside the girl and the stool, sidling up close enough to the bar so she could order another glass of beer. “I don’t know why people don't just make more stools.” She spoke on, not minding if she was being paid any attention or if she was just mumbling to herself. “We’re supposed to be fully capable of that right?” She patted absentmindedly at her pocket where her wand was.

As she was talking, the old wizard on the next stool over took his leave and Edith didn’t hesitate to fill his spot. Without missing a beat, she continued on rambling, the alcohol doing all the thinking for her. “I think it has something to do with the elbows. People like having somewhere to put their elbows.” Her own elbows were propped up on the bar in front of her, her chin rested in one hand but her gaze settled on her new neighbor. “Though I guess someone should be able to make a table, too.” She frowned, turning her attentions to her newly delivered pint and taking a large sip of it.

“Whatever,” she finished with a grand shrug of her shoulders. “Point is, that bloke,” Edith pointed at the man two stools away, “Was supposed to save that seat,” she pointed to the stool next to hers, “And he did a remarkably terrible job.” Her words were coming out quickly and just the slightest bit slurred, but she couldn’t find anything wrong with them.

@Emily Fleming

While the night held no specific significance for the Scottish witch, she was certainly exhausted after an arguably unsuccessful day of title searching. She'd spent the last couple days in London at a quaint little hotel -- hadn't bothered apparating to and from home -- and had left Eximius' care to one of her employees while she'd been hunting for new relics and things for the store.

She missed writing a lot. Missed interpreting runes, too. Maybe it was time to loosen her grip on her precious jewel's operations and let other people take hold of the reins now and then. For the time being, though, all she wanted was to sit where almost nobody knew her name (this could've been true almost anyplace, but that was beside the point) and have a glass of wine. Wine fixed everything. It was true, and she wouldn't hear any counterarguments. It was a warm summer night, so she'd left her trenchcoat and most of her things back in her hotel room. She'd stay this one last night and then she'd be back home to her real life. The pressurized air trapped inside the establishment was apparent when Emily had to grunt a little to even get the door to the Leaky Cauldron to open, and then, dainty hands put up in front of her chest as a sort of barrier between herself and others, she weaved her way straight to the bar.

She wasn't sure why she'd been expecting otherwise, but it smelled really bad in here. Smelled like the opposite of cleanliness. Like... heinous body odor and cheap beer. The witch tried not to wrinkle her nose as she waved to the bartender with an insincere smile, leaning in so as not to shout. "Yes, I'd like a glass of red, please. Just the one for now, thanks."

Not a moment later, she heard an almost-biting voice permeating her left eardrum and she turned her head over her shoulder, swiveling on her stool ever-so-slightly to address the frankly unwelcome disturbance. "Sorry, what's that?" She asked, puzzled frown indicating her momentary confusion. Oh. She'd probably stolen her seat. Whatever, then. It wasn't as though reserves could be placed on the ratty old things, now, was it? "Seems the place needs more, doesn't it?" Emily nodded at the other girl in agreement, thanking the bartender with a slight wave as she took the glass of red by the neck. Her long fingers seemed to find a comfortable place after that, nestling around the widest part of the glass to hold it comfortably in her palm as she swirled it around and consequently took a long, much-needed drink.

"Not nearly enough space. And I'm feeling like I've got to shout to hear my own voice," Em lamented, studying the girl next to her curiously. She looked about the same age. Maybe a little younger. "How many of those are you in? You've gotten a pretty good head-start on me, I'd say." Her chuckle barely filtered past her lips, but it was there. That was something about Emily that only a few people noticed. There was nuance, but one had to pay attention to really see it. That was probably a great deal of her issue with the world as it currently was. Nobody paid any attention to detail. Big things were the only things that mattered to people.

"I'll try to be more interesting company than he was, anyway. I'm Emily." She held out a cold hand to the other brunette and gave a tight smile.

How many? ”Er, more than two." Honestly, she might have lost count after that. "But less than ten,” she added with a resolute nod. She had started far too late in the day to be on her tenth pint by now. Silly work always getting in the way of day drinking. Plus, she had some modicum of self control. Sometimes. Either way, she would definitely call that a head start. She couldn’t help that she clearly had her priorities more in order than the other woman.

"Edith," she replied a little loudly, taking Emily’s hand in her own after first wiping it on her jeans to rid it of the condensation from her pint. “I appreciate that.” She nodded. “The interesting thing.” She nodded again before taking another swallow of beer. “You should know though, that wine is not very interesting.” One more nod completed her train of thought.

She caught the eye of the bartender and waved him back over, looking back to her new friend. “Do you want a shot? Have a shot. I’ll buy you a shot.” She turned her attentions back to the bartender, either not interested or not caring if Emily didn’t want one, and ordered two shots of firewhisky. Worst case scenario: Edith would just have to have two shots herself and that would be terrible for no one. But who could pass up a free shot? Certainly not Edith.

Grinning as he walked away, she resumed sitting with her chin in one hand, her beer in the other, her weight pressed up against the bar. “So. What do you dooo?” Edith was far enough into her evening of drinking that she was sincerely interested but hopefully not too far to not respond appropriately. Mostly she was just curious to find out what sort of person came to the Leaky Cauldron to drink wine, as it wasn’t exactly the swankiest of places to drink.

The bartender returned and set down two shot glasses, one in front of each woman. Edith’s hand left her pint glass and found the much smaller glass rather quickly, not giving a second thought to mixing her alcohols. She pushed her slipping glasses back up the bridge of her nose with her free hand as she looked over to her neighbor. “Alright?”

"Pleasure, Edith." The Scottish witch smiled at her counterpart and took another swig of her merlot. It wasn't quite the tastiest thing that had ever graced her palate, of course, but it was something. Em didn't exactly prefer to frequent bars like the Leaky Cauldron, but it was a well-known joint in London and thus she'd ended up walking through its doors. It helped, of course, that it was located in Diagon Alley, where she'd been poking around for texts. Welcomed a lot of wizardkind. Even though she'd been a witch for more than half of her life, sometimes it was still strange to acknowledge that she sort of had a foot in both worlds. Still had muggle family, had grown up in a muggle house, had lived like a muggle, more or less, during the war.

So strange, to have confused, dirty blood, according to people who had never experienced what it was like to be a muggleborn. Emily rather thought she preferred it. It made her more realistic. More pragmatic, more able to survive. More capable and strategic.

"Isn't it?" Emily had to choke on her breath when Edith suggested that her wine was boring. Maybe it was, anyway. It was sort of pretentious, she knew, to be drinking wine in a bar like this, even if it was dishwatery wine that left a sour aftertaste on her tongue. The people here drank cheap beer and firewhisky. The other woman was offering her a shot, then, and Emily didn't feel comfortable declining. She hadn't started a brawl with her over the stolen seat and she thought that was plenty enough to accept the gesture, so, she complied. "Sure, I could go for a shot."

Hard liquor wasn't Em's favorite. Didn't go down the hatch so smooth, but she was willing to save face and knock the spicy amber liquid right back. So she did. As soon as they came, she set her wine glass down to replace it with a much heavier, miniature glass. The Ravenclaw exhaled in preparation and put it to her lips, tipping her head back with squinted-shut eyes. God, it was vile, but maybe she needed to get drunk. It had certainly been awhile -- the only kind of drunk she ever got was weepy wine-drunk by herself in her flat, and that was just pathetic.

"Well," Emily began to answer Edith, leaning on the heel of her palm, "I take care of a bookstore in Scotland. I'm a historian. A writer, a runes specialist, a linguist. I sort of just do bits and bobs. I've many different interests, so it's a bit hard to pick just one." She'd go into more detail if she knew her audience, but it was safe to assume she didn't after only having met her five minutes ago. "What about you?"

Em knew it wasn't smart to drink wine, then liquor, then wine again, but all of her sense had fluttered away out the door when she'd walked in, it seemed. She finished the quarter-full glass she still had and ordered another, waiting for a snarky comment about the equally-boring choice of second drink. "I'm doing great. I think."

Edith mimicked her neighbor’s actions as she tipped her head back, her eyes shut tight and her mouth vastly underprepared for the flavors she was introducing. Ever single time she did this, she thought it was a great idea. That is, until she had followed through and had to deal with the aftertaste and burn of firewhisky. But just like every other time, two minutes would pass and she would once again think it a great idea to have another one.

She listened intently as Emily described her job, nodding to show that she was doing so. “Ministry,” Edith answered with a shrug. There were some days where she elaborate on her choice of career, going into detail about how great her created memory replacements were. Other days, she didn’t want to get into it, considering the hell that her now-employers put her through during the war. And there were some days when she would say some other job completely, but Emily had caught her off guard with her question, even though Edith had just asked her the same thing.

Surprising herself, Edith refrained from voicing her opinion about the second ordered glass of wine. Instead, she took another gulp of beer, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “But a bookstore sounds really great.” She nodded excitedly, remembering proudly and fondly the next thing she said: “I was in the advanced reading class in primary school.” She pushed her glasses back up the bridge of her nose, the lenses having slipped with all of the nodding she was going. “I’ve been looking for something to buy my parents.” She realized immediately after saying this that she might need to go into more detail about just what she was hoping to buy for it to make any sense in the conversation. After a beat, she added, “A book, I mean.”

Her glass was nearly empty, she realized as she took another swallow. She ordered another pint when the bartender returned with Emily’s new glass of wine. “The faster you drink that, the faster I’ll buy you another shot.” She grinned, motioning the slightest bit to the glass of red.

“Do you ever see any old Shakespeare?” On numerous occasions, Edith’s parents had told her over and over again what they would do to add a classic edition of Shakespeare’s plays or sonnets to their collection. She had no idea why they really wanted it; having an older transcript wouldn’t improve their acting skills at all, especially since they already thought they were God’s gift to the stage. “Like, incredibly old?” Edith was focusing more on the ‘bookstore’ and ‘historian’ parts of Emily’s description about herself, glossing over the other tidbits she had offered.

Edith's answer to the question about her own occupation was rather short and finite, so Emily nodded once, avoiding pressing any further. Emily assumed if she wanted to talk about it, she'd have elaborated more. She sort of felt bad for having said as much as she had about her own profession. Maybe it had all been just a pleasantry, and that wouldn't have been surprising, because people talked about their work and the weather to fill in uncomfortable gaps with small talk. Emily couldn't fault Edith for that, if that were indeed the case.

But then Edith exclaimed something about the bookstore, and Emily's attention piqued, her yellow-green eyes lighting up and twinkling. "Yeah. It's in Scotland," Emily told her, as if that bit of information mattered. Edith was a witch. She could apparate places if it were necessary, especially if she worked at the Ministry. The witch's expression changed again when her companion mentioned primary school. Primary school? Hmm. That was interesting. While she knew it was entirely inappropriate to bring up or ask about, Em felt she had some ground to do so, at least. She was a muggleborn witch, too, after all. "Primary school, like, muggle school?" One sculpted brow arched at her and she swigged down the rest of her second glass. "I'm muggleborn, too." Emily said boldly. The alcohol was liquid courage. There was a reason it was called that, and as much was becoming apparent as she drank more.

"'Nother shot and we'll talk about the book." The brunette grinned at her new friend, rubbing her lips together while she chewed on what Edith had asked her. Shakespeare? He hadn't been a wizard, not to her knowledge, but he was still highly revered among fiction-writers in the wizarding world. His writing was so profound that there had been some waffling and speculation, anyway, as to his roots.

To put it plainly, Emily nodded firmly a couple of times. "Yeah. I see some old Shakespeare. Couldn't tell you any texts in particular off the top of my head, but if you wanted to come into the shop, we could certainly poke around. See what we could dig up for your folks, I think."

“Scotland,” Edith repeated, figuring it best to not get into all the reasons she didn’t want to go any farther north than she had to, wanting to stay as far away from Hogwarts as she possibly could. That was definitely not important now. “Brilliant,” she said instead, taking another swallow of beer to add to width of her grin. She nodded excitedly at the question of muggle school, mid swallow and unable to voice her response.

Emily was muggleborn too? “Me too!” Edith blurted out, though clearly her mate had already figured that out. She raised a hand to offer a high five, clearly unashamed that she was this proud of her heritage. She nodded some more to emphasize her point, unable to possibly draw any more attention to herself. In any sober conversation, their words could turn to the war, to sit in an awkward silence as they both refrained from asking each other about what they did to save themselves. But thankfully, this was certainly not a sober conversation.

“Agreed.” Edith was waving over the bartender again without a second thought, picking up her empty shot glass and shaking it back and forth a couple times in front of her. “Two more, please,” she said, extra emphasis on the ‘please’. Feeling successful as the bartender busied himself with the firewhisky, Edith turned her attentions back to Emily. “I would love that.” She paused between her words, hoping to make it clear that she was not being facetious. She might go to her grave claiming she didn’t also appreciate Shakespeare, but his plays did have that certain nostalgic quality about them.

Their shots were set in front of them and Edith lifted hers up, her fingers holding it aloft in front of her. She tipped it just the slightest bit in Emily’s direction, offering a very paraphrased line from Shakespeare: “Good company, good whisky, good welcome, good people.” She knocked back her shot, closing her eyes and scrunching up her face as the flavors hit her mouth again. She nearly coughed, again regretting the shot, setting her glass down and trading it for her other. Nothing like an alcohol chaser to cleanse the palate.

“So this book, then.” She was resting her chin in her hands again, the smile on her face impossibly wide. “Let’s do this.”

"Mm-hmm, Scotland." Emily confirmed. It was a little bit teetery territory, she knew. After that whole cluster that had happened at Hogwarts, she could understand the aversion to going anywhere close to it. The area Emily lived in, though, was a relatively good mix of muggle and magical people. It was easy to mask oneself there. She mimicked her friend and picked up her shot, muttering a light "cheers" before she put it to her mouth and swallowed it all in one burning, hard gulp. Ugh. Nasty. Shots always seemed like a good idea until they'd already been swallowed, and then they just left you in a pool of regret.

"Muggleborns are the best witches, if you ask me," Em continued on. "Best of both worlds, y'know. One foot in and one foot out. Muggle street-smarts, they're useful, y'know? Not everyone knows that." She shook her head. People could be so ignorant sometimes. They were giant hunks of stupid, brainless meat. They had the knowledge of flies who would inevitably die in three days. That was how empty-headed they seemed. It was all beyond her how they even got out of bed and functioned with how little they tended to know as a general population.

She had to grin, though, when Edith mentioned good company. Really? That was nice to hear. "Hey, I'm counting myself among the lucky ones tonight. It's not often you find worthy companionship at the Leaky Cauldron, now, is it?" Emily laughed, a little more open than usual, thanks to the booze. "Not that I come here often. Not usually my scene, but I guess I was supposed to come tonight." She was rambling, she knew, but that was okay. She assumed Edith was drunk enough not to care.

"Right now, though?" Emily frowned, then tried hard to hold in a burp, which she failed to do. Her fist flew up to beat gently at her mouth a few times. "Oh, god. This is why you shouldn't mix alcohols, right?" She wasn't going to throw up, though. Not yet. "I guess we could. Bit of a far walk, though. I'm not quite confident we could apparate without getting splinched, but... maybe we could. If you're any good at it."

Edith beamed as Emily stated her fact about muggleborn witches. It was true, after all. She really was great and she could only assume that Emily was great too. “I know,” she replied with a very serious expression and an even more serious nod of her head. Not everyone necessarily agreed with them, what with that minor detail of the war and being on the run and all, but that didn’t matter right now. What really mattered now was the alcohol coursing through her veins and the prospect of finding the perfect present and the new friendly witch sitting beside her that Edith, for once, didn’t hate.

“Almost like destiny,” Edith breathed, her eyes wide, attempting to continue her serious expression but breaking into a grin seconds later. “No, I’m here all the time so it was only a matter of time.” She laughed, not exaggerating just how often she was in this pub. Until her actual favortie pub started serving firewhisky, she would have to keep coming back. Still, she had to admit that she was glad Emily had chosen to show up, feeling much more confident about drinking with a stranger than drinking alone (though she wasn’t opposed to that, either).

The woman nodded some more as she laughed. “Guess you can’t go back to wine now.” Edith stopped to consider for a moment if apparation really was a smart idea. But she had either had enough to drink to be confident enough in her abilities or enough to not care that it was a horrible idea. That’s what hospitals and healers were for, right? Without drunken mistakes like that, what would they really have to do?

She decided to go with the ‘confident’ route though. “Remember how muggleborn witches are the best?” She raised her eyebrows at her new mate and jabbed a thumb towards her own chest. “Best.” It was her preferred method of travel, after all, and she used it for work every day, and she had done it successfully while intoxicated and had yet to get splinched. They’d be fine. She glanced down at her watch, trying to do the mental math to figure out when Elias ought to be done with quidditch, but the numbers and the hands made no sense. She shrugged to herself before looking back up at the witch next to her. “Absolutely the best.”

She listened to the address a couple times, repeating it to herself as they made their way outside the pub towards the entrance to Diagon Alley. “No takebacks,” she said, offering her left arm for Emily to grasp. She nodded, trying to be as reassuring as possible, and with a pop they were being squeezed through the darkness, alighting in another alley, much the same as the one they had just left though it was certainly a different one. She glanced down at herself, didn’t notice any glaring discrepancies, and decided to call it a successful apparation. “Look right?” She assumed that Emily would know where they are and barring any oopsiedaisies with the directions, they ought to be fairly close to the books.

"Guess I can't. You're right," Emily admitted, and it wasn't too often she admitted someone else was right. If she was so comfortable doing that now, she could daydream about what she and Edith's friendship could develop into. Other women tended to find Emily... to be too much. To know too much, to be too full-on. But Edith? She seemed equally full-on. She was clearly much more confident in her practical magical skills than Emily, and that was fine -- Emily would be the first to offer up the fact that she wasn't great at practical magic aside from Potions. Their strengths could bond them into quite the duo, couldn't they?

The witch absolutely knew without a shadow of a doubt that apparition while this drunk was a terrible, terrible idea. She also knew, however, with equal certainty, that if she refused, it would kill the buzz and the excitement of the new friendship right off. Not usually one to let go of her sensibility, Emily decided to take a chance. She crossed her arms decidedly and nodded curtly at Edith, acquiescing to the notion that she might be losing a body part tonight. Hopefully it wouldn't be anything too important. Maybe an ear or something. She could be artsy and romantic like Van Gogh that way and just say she'd cut it off for a lover.

But then everyone would attribute her to being a Van Gogh stan, so maybe not her ear. Maybe a toe. That would be okay. It would make wearing Birkenstocks hard, but it'd just have to be what it was.

"Alright. Why the hell not?" Em blurted abruptly, reciting the address of Eximius to Edith a couple of times so she could visualize in her mind's eye. After a moment, the two strutted out the joint together, and Emily felt the instability of her legs intensify when she began to rely on them to carry her weight and balance her. It would all be fine, of course. They were capable witches. Muggleborn witches! And she was going to make a sale. Perhaps they'd just camp out in the shop tonight. That might be kind of fun.

"Okay. Okayokay," Emily muttered to herself, shuddering a little and closing her eyes to prepare herself for the move. She'd never been great at apparition. It wasn't her favorite thing in the world, but it was awfully convenient. Wincing hard, she let go of Edith's arm and opened her eyes to scan their surroundings. "Yes!" Emily exclaimed, trying her best not to sound too surprised. A hand clamped down on Edith's shoulder. "That was amazing. You really are the best," Em said in a hushed voice, feeling the alcohol run another sharp course through her veins. "Come on, come inside."

She fumbled with her keys a moment and jimmied the lock open when she got her fingers to stop shaking for a minute, and then gestured grandly to their brand-new and also ancient surroundings. "What do you think?"

'Why the hell not?' was honestly the best reason for anyone to do anything and was probably the only reason she did most things. And thankfully, that reason really panned out for them as Emily confirmed that they had appeared in the correct spot. "Fantastic," she breathed, knocking the relief from her voice as fast as she could. She had been extremely confident in the last apparation but she was highly doubting that she would be able to do it again with the same level of gusto.

She nodded along enthusiastically as she received her compliments, returning the gesture of hand on shoulder as they congratulated each other. "You're the best too, though," she agreed, though she was certainly going to accept the 'best' moniker for as long as she possibly could. The woman nodded a couple more times, dropping her hand as she was beckoned towards the door.

What was an appropriate distance to follow someone at? Edith was a step behind Emily, standing awkwardly close as she fumbled with the keys in the lock, watching curiously over the other girl's shoulder as she did so. She followed her inside, nodding some more as she took in their new surroundings. It was most definitely a bookstore, so at least that much was true. And it at least smelled old, so there was hope after all that she might find what she was after.

She pulled a book from the closest shelf at random, half expecting it to bite her or yell at her but it fell open easily to a page somewhere near the middle. The words, at this point of Edith's lack of sobriety, were awfully fuzzy, and she tipped her glasses down the bridge of her nose, peering over the rims to take a closer look. After a few more seconds she realized it was clearly not in English and she snapped it shut and slid it back on the shelf.

"This is amazing." She walked inside the shop a few more feet, wasting no time before catching the edge of a rug with her toe and lunging forward, breaking her fall with the bookshelf in front of her. The whole world flashed before her eyes, fast forwarding to the mental image of knocking down this bookshelf with her weight, then it crashing into the next shelf and so on and so on, but nothing budged. It took her a beat to realize that she was leaning on a rather stationary shelf. "Good thinking," she added, recovering herself and straightening back up, trying to be as casual as possible and look like she had planned that completely. "Just checking that they wouldn't move, of course."

It was kind of strange that Edith was standing so close behind her as they stumbled like baby deer into the bookstore, but that was alright. For once, Emily didn't mind someone being in that close of a proximity to her after only having met them moments previously. Edith didn't annoy her. She was charismatic, and while they might've had very different superficial interests, Emily could tell that she was intelligent. Intelligence and a sharp wit were the #1 qualifiers -- without those things, you might as well've been absolutely useless to her. Maybe that was a terrible thing to say. It was alright.

All the shelves in the center were a rich walnutty color. She wasn't sure if that was the actual wood or the finish of the wood, but they were beautiful nonetheless. And they were charmed -- to make sure that people (like Edith, at the moment) didn't klutz around and knock them all over. "Thank you," Emily mumbled, her voice shaking as she giggled at her new friend, and then it grew, bubbling out into a full-blown cackle while she bumbled around. This was too much. She was thankful that she was the owner -- if one of her own employees did this, they'd be walking out the next day.

When her laughter finally fizzled out and ceased, she nodded more seriously. "I had someone charm them pretty firmly so that people wouldn't knock them over. Things can be expensive on those shelves, but," She tapped on one of the clear glass cases that was near her desk as she tripped up onto the platform, "The stuff in here is worth... a shitton. Like... a lot of galleons." Normally she was a bit more articulate, but that wasn't happening now. That was fine.

"Here, come on," She told Edith suddenly, hopping back down to lead her to the 'S' section. "Back here's where all the old Shakespeare texts are." Emily paused a minute and narrowed her eyes, trying to focus her vision on the titles and letters in front of her. They all just looked like black fuzz. "Can you read any of that?" The witch queried nervously, pulling a face. This was a little disheartening.

“Oh yeah, sure thing, anytime.” Edith cleared her throat, grinning and doing her best not to laugh at herself. But as Emily laughed at her she couldn’t help but do the same, the whole thing much funnier than it would have been if she had all her faculties in tact. “Good for them, really,” she managed to say, clutching her side with one hand as the stitch in her side bit at her from laughing so hard. She cleared her throat again and nodded that she was listening and following along closely with everything her friend was saying.

She peered at the titles on the shelf she was still half-leaning on, trying to spot something that would jump out at her as something that warranted being expensive. She was mentally crossing her fingers that she wasn’t leaning up against any Shakespeare texts, as this whole plan would fall through once she actually counted her money and compared that to price tags. But whatever, she could worry about that later.

Edith took large steps, looking rather silly but being quite effective at not tripping over anything again, taking care to walk down the exact middle of the aisle. Even if the bookshelves were steady and firm standing where they stood, she wasn’t sure if her face could handle another flush of embarrassment like that if she tripped again. “Ooh,” she cooed as Emily tapped on the glass case, looking properly in awe as she pulled up close enough to peer through the pane herself. Her face was close enough to the glass that her breath fogged it up immediately and obscured the titles, though she was pretty sure she saw the word ‘Hounds’ before it disappeared. It was probably for the best, anyway, as she probably had enough alcohol in her system to try to pretend that she could afford something in there just to be able to take a closer look.

She followed along back through the shelves, stopping short in front of the Shakespeares. “Of course I can read,” she replied, almost taken aback at the insinuation that she couldn’t. It took her two seconds too long to realize that she wasn’t asking about her literacy, but rather her actual ability to see the letters. “Oh, I—“ she squinted at the books directly in front of her face. It took a minute, but the more she squinted, the clearer things became, little letters coming into focus and forming actual words. “Yes!” she exclaimed, almost too excited about something so simple.

Thing fingers tipped a text from the shelf, the leather soft in her hands. She turned it front-cover up and held it close to her face, nodding as she read the word ‘Sonnets’. “How old is this one?” she questioned, waving it in front of Emily’s eyes, her care from seconds before nearly vanishing.

Of course, she should've been more clear. The indignance in Edith's tone made Emily snort a little and she covered her mouth, pausing just a second while the other woman squinted as pitifully as she had just a moment ago. "See, not as easy as you'd--" and then she was cut off by a joyful exclamation of success. Thank god one of them could read. Surely, she wasn't going to let Edith go anywhere by herself. They'd stay here for the night and then she could be off in the morning. Emily didn't like the idea of her apparating by herself where no one could help her if she got a little splinched. Was there such a thing as a little splinch? They all seemed sort of like a big deal.

Emily didn't say anything as she watched her new friend scan the titles and select one, and she noted the way that she handled it. Gently. The way a book should be handled. The way everyone should already know how to handle one, in fact. It was completely and absolutely beyond her how people could waltz into specialty shops like this one and treat the merchandise like garbage. If it weren't for the notion that she had to make some amount of money every month to support herself, she'd be scolding every other Tom, Dick, and Harry who patronized the store.

"Lemme see." Emily uncharacteristically slurred the first two words together and took the book gently from Edith's freezing-cold hands. Her own fingers flipped the cover open and she had to squint hard to read any of the small text bunched up at the bottom of the first page. "Well, here, this says... mmm. Seventeen.... Seventeen ninety-four." One curt nod punctuated her likely-misplaced self-assuredness, and she snapped the front shut to hand it back to Edith in a manner much too confident for someone in her current state. "Old enough for your parents, you think?" Emily frowned a little, genuinely curious. Shakespeare was active in the 1600s, after all, so she couldn't be expecting too much older than that. Em doubted she'd find it, anyway.

The brunette craned her neck to try to have a look at the softly-ticking clock mounted on the other side of the room and groaned, unable to make out which hand was which. It was proving nearly impossible to discern whether it was half four in the morning or six-twenty. Either of those times were undesirable, so she clapped her friend hard on the back at first and then lightened her touch, patting her shoulder awkwardly as if to counteract her initially aggressive move. "You'll sleep here tonight. I don't want you going out there alone like that, please. We can make it all cozy."

“Seventeen ninety-four?” Edith looked at her friend with a puzzled look, her face scrunched up in concentration as she tried to do the math in her head. She knew an endless amount of useless Bard trivia thanks to her parents and knowing that he died in 1616 was near the top of the list. “That’s uh,” she paused, not getting much farther than the fact that those two dates were at least one hundred years apart. “Yeah that’s old enough.” She nodded, flipping the book over in her hands, casually brushing off her lack of ability to do some simple subtraction. And all she had was a few pints of beer and shots of whisky to blame.

The hand on her back caught her completely off guard and Edith stumbled forward the tiniest bit, her glasses slipping down the bridge of her nose as she did. “Like what?” She asked, seconds later after she had recovered herself. But she knew that Emily was referring to how drunk Edith was and she was very prepared to fight her on that. “I can apparate.” She had apparated the both of them here, after all and had been sobering up (reluctantly) since they had arrived.

Plus, she would certainly never use the word ‘frisky’ to describe herself, but she would be falling far, far from the truth if she denied that she wasn’t somewhat planning to see Elias before the night was over, and staying in Scotland for the night definitely impeded those plans. Never mind that she wasn’t really the type of girl to sleepover somewhere, involvement of alcohol be damned.

But thinking she was sober enough to apparate was no match for her lack of coordination as she took another step forward to prove her point and managed, for the second time in five minutes, to catch her foot on the edge of a rug and stumble forward into the thankfully permanently-placed bookshelf. She braced herself with her free hand, her other hand clutching the sonnets tighter to her chest. “Oh good god damn,” she laughed as she turned around to lean back against the shelf. “Never mind,” she said, her laughs turning into a sigh. Maybe staying here wouldn't be the worst idea, especially if it really was cozy. That was already miles ahead of the level of comfort her own apartment afforded her.

She straightened up and handed the book to her new friend with a grin. “Maybe you should hold onto this.”