left with the streets [edith]

april 2003

Fergie turned down Whitehall and strode, hands in pockets, towards the door that led to The Burning Beard. He figured his invitation was Emma just being friendly -- they weren’t close, but they’d had enough interactions over the course of their respective careers for him not to overthink going along for a few drinks. Any excuse for a pint, especially somewhere with craft beers.

As he approached the entrance, his attention was caught by a familiar face waiting a few paces down from the faded door. Edith was loitering outside and his first assumption was that she didn’t know how to get in, until he drew closer. “Edith,” he called out, withdrawing his hand from his pocket to wave -- something he gave up on halfway through the motion as he realised he hadn’t waved at her before and who did wave anymore? -- the result was a much more acceptable, if stilted, raised hand. Which he lowered quickly and shoved back in his pocket where it belonged.

“You here for Emma’s?” he asked, not considering the possibility that she wasn’t and that he was committing a potential social faux pas. Fortunately, she was. Just getting some air. Fergie was too polite to question her, but he hesitated all the same. “I’ll see you in there?” he offered in a tone that implied he wanted to see her in there. He would have suggested they go in together if it wouldn’t have looked… well, you know.

Fergie pushed into the bar and skirted around a few small groups milling between the door and the bar. As he got deeper into the pub he spotted Emma, already surrounded by a handful of friends-- including Kate Baker. Duenas? Charlie’s ex-wife, whatever she was going by now. Whose wedding he had attended, less than a year ago -- at which he may have had a bit too much tequila and spent the night with one of her cousins. Merlin, he hoped she didn’t know about that.

He had stopped short of joining the party, rooted to the spot by misgivings. He didn’t approve of anything Charlie had done (or, if the Prophet was to be believed, was doing), but he didn’t want to be put in the position of actively taking a side against him. He didn’t want to take a side at all. Didn’t want to be involved at all. It had been bad enough when Honey had dragged him into everything.

Shit.

Emma would understand. He’d just say he hadn’t felt well. The Scotsman spun around on the spot and walked right back out the door he’d come through, into the daylight. Edith was right where he’d left her -- not that he was surprised, he’d been inside all of a minute. Fergie looked at her, trying not to seem as flustered as he felt. “Fancy a pint?”

@Edith Holthouse

Edith and Emma were friends now, apparently; she still wasn’t sure how it had happened; she decided to blame it  on having to talk to people for her job, now (and she was choosing not to blame herself because she had chosen that job, either). It was still new and Edith was still overusing ‘the look’, the one that said ‘please let’s not talk about the when we saw each other last because we both know it was the war’ but she was trying. Trying. She didn’t have to overreach, though. She’d said she’d go to Emma’s birthday but that didn’t mean she needed be early, or even on time, or really overeager to be there at all.

She fidgeted with the end of her sleeve as she continued loitering on the sidewalk. It wasn’t that she didn’t want to be friends with Emma but it was still hard to relax around her or think about anything other than healing her honest-to-God stab wound.

She wheeled around at the sound of her name -- the jig was up -- but smiled when she saw it was Fergie. She waved back and stopped short of ‘how’d you know Emma’ because it didn’t really matter; everyone knew everyone. “Just getting some air,” she lied, feeling zero obligation to elaborate or come up with a better excuse. She nodded when he said he’d see her in there, offering half a smile along with it. At least there’d be someone else to talk to; it was almost enough to get her moving through the door when he came right back out.

“Er--” Edith had been planning to have her pint in there but the offer to get one somewhere else -- that’s what this was, wasn’t it? -- was hard to pass up. She teetered on the spot for a minute, wondering if she needed to make an excuse to Emma before ditching but-- fuck it, Emma would have another birthday. She’d do better next year. “Yeah.” She nodded and turned toward the right, doing her best to keep her face somewhat neutral as she glanced sidelong at him. “Whaaat’s goin’ on?”

Edith hesitated, and in that lull Fergie opened his mouth to say ‘nevermind’ and just bite the bullet, go back inside (but with reinforcements in the form of Edith, hopefully)—

"Yeah."

He exhaled. Thank Merlin. But then she wanted to know why he’d ejected himself from the situation so quickly and he supposed he owed her that much. “Er,” he nodded his head in the direction that his feet followed a second later, hands in his pockets as they walked along the riverfront. “My friend’s ex is in there,” he said, feeling every bit as childish as it sounded now that he’d said it to someone else, but he didn’t want to embellish the story any further (very famous friend, very public divorce, ex-wife, oh, and the Mexican cousin he’d slept with last summer).

Fergie found them the first muggle pub they walked past and gestured at it -- Edith shrugged, in a ‘sure’ kind of way -- and he opened the door for her. It was a pokey little place, but it wasn’t empty. They both sidled up to the bar and Fergie pulled his wallet out quickly. “I’ll get it,” he offered -- was only fair, dragging her away from the party—

“What about you?” he asked, quizzical eyebrow raised. She’d been loitering with intent rather than just going inside -- she didn’t smoke, he thought, so… Fergie paid, and Edith took that opportunity to relocate to a booth. Fergie followed after her and sat across the tiny wooden table. Snug. “You don’t have to tell me,” he said quietly, realising now that he might have been overstepping.

Fergie hesitated and Edith shrugged as if to say he didn’t really have to answer if he didn’t want to but he either didn’t see her or couldn’t interpret her wordless gestures precisely enough. “Oh,” she said as he gave his very-much-to-the-point explanation. She’d never had an ex, or really any mates she was close enough with to really care about their exes, but she tried to sympathize without explaining her social shortcomings. “Awkward.”

He pointed out a pub and she shrugged; she had no real preference. Beer’d be as expensive there as it was at the next pub. It was small a small place and there were less people there than she’d witnessed enter the last one -- dealing with a crowd on top of dealing with any Emma-adjacent issues hadn’t been top of her wishlist -- and she relaxed. Almost. She was still being social.

“Oh, thanks.” Edith smiled and accepted Fergie’s offer to pay without much hesitation, stopping just short of mentioning that she had been planning to get at least a few pints deep at the last party, so it was only fair she did here, too. She ordered the Fursty Ferret with a soft snort.

What about you? “I’m gonna grab us a table.” It wasn’t like the place was filling up but she was pretty good at stalling for time. She grabbed a seat at a half booth and wasted no time before having a large swallow of her beer. She smiled as Fergie found her -- not hard to do in a pub this size -- and shrugged as he said exactly what she had been hoping he would; once he had said it though, offered her the out, she thought that might make it into an even bigger thing than she was trying to play it off as.

“We’re not close close, Emma and me.” She kept a light grip with both hands on her glass. “We just happened to reconnect a few weeks before her birthday, so…” She trailed off with another shrug, glancing up and meeting Fergie’s eye. “Last saw her at the Battle--” she said it quickly, not allowing herself to take it back-- “And I don’t know how to make that not awkward.” She shrugged again and had another swallow.

“Not as bad as avoiding my mate’s ex, though,” she added with a small laugh.

“Oh,” he said. Fergie lifted his beer -- he’d gone for the bitter -- to his lips and sipped at it. His eyes met Edith’s mid-sip when she elaborated and he lowered his glass, licking the head from his lips. “Right, yeah,” he grimaced. “I can see how that might… yeah.” Awkward was right. He felt awkward and it wasn’t even his issue. He had one entirely his own. Good thing it wasn’t a competition because he thought Edith would definitely pip him.

“Guess we both escaped then,” he smiled, trying to joke about it but giving up at some point when he realised that sounded horrible. "It's not that bad but, it was… I'd rather stay out of it."

“She won’t mind,” he added at a lower volume, talking mostly to his beer. He had another drink, gazed around the little pub. There was a low hum of chatter but nothing compared to what it would have been like in The Burning Beard. He brought his focus back to Edith and decided he probably preferred this, right now. Just a quiet pint.

“I bought The Quibbler last week,” he said, out of nowhere, just for something to talk about -- hadn’t thought this bit of squirrelling her away from the party through. “Read your article,” he smiled warmly. “I’m glad someone’s still writing about— you know, the war, the good stories,” he said, a little more seriously, his fingers sliding up and down the condensation on his glass. He didn’t know if Edith had quit The Daily Prophet or been fired, but neither would make it appropriate for him to suggest her writing was probably better suited there. In fact, saying that at all could have been misconstrued as an insult. “I erm, it’d be good if more people could read those pieces, you know.”

She’d glossed over the battle and Fergie took his cue from her to do the same. “Yeah,” she agreed, leaving it at that. She had another (larger) swallow of her beer.

Edith returned his smile with something closer to a grin. “Guess we have.” It still sounded bad, whatever he said to the contrary, but she didn’t push the point. “Can’t blame you,” she said with a shrug. Edith could hardly handle her own drama at the best of times; she didn’t think she had any more mental space to cram anyone else’s issues in.

She nodded, had another drink when he did, looked at him when he looked away. “I think she’s having another thing on Monday.” Fergie looked back at her and she took her turn glancing around the pub; she had no idea if Emma’s drinks on Monday were as well publicized as tonight’s but-- she wasn’t really planning on going to that, either, thought now that she thought about it, it might have been a better choice. It’d be a workday for most people, maybe a more bearable night out.

Fergie said he’d bought The Quibbler -- Edith looked at him to see if he was joking, about to ask for his money back or something -- and that he’d read her article. She raised her eyebrows just a touch. It was hard to keep eye contact with someone saying nice things about anything she’d done, but she managed. The good stories. “Yeah.” The last one was good, anyway, though she’d had some personal issues with it (that she wasn’t going to get into now). It’d been an interview with someone who helped muggleborns get out of the UK during the war, keep them in a little network until it was safe to come back; there’d been interviews with some of the muggleborns, too.

“It would, yeah.” He wasn’t wrong. “If you can get more people to read The Quibbler, go right ahead.” She smiled softly and had another drink, vaguely wondering if he could tell the muggle parents he liaised with that it was required reading or that it was the most trusted news source or-- probably not. She had another drink, removed her hand from her glass once she’d set it down, once she realized she’d drained half already.

“You know, your mum’s the one that put me in contact with him.” The bloke helping the muggleborns. “I’d have interviewed her, too, but we’ve done that already.” He knew that, right? Maybe he didn’t; that’d been back when she was still using a pen name but it was obviously her; she didn’t clue him in on any of her thoughts because it didn’t feel like a jokey kind of moment. Instead she caught his eye again, unsure when she had glanced away. “She’s nice, your mum.”

Edith tried to make him feel better (he assumed) by telling him there was another thing on Monday, to make it up to Emma -- and that probably would have worked had he known about it. Rather than make Edith feel worse, he decided to roll with it; “Oh, right, yeah.” He sipped at his beer. “I think I’ve got… a thing.” Or he’d make one up between now and when Edith pressed him for more information, if she did. He wasn’t bothered about not knowing about it -- he didn’t know Emma that well.

The Quibbler was easier to talk about -- he hadn’t thought that sentiment would ever cross his mind, but here he was. Or perhaps he’d spoken too soon, because Edith didn’t really respond beyond a yeah. Maybe she was just as comfortable as he was about getting positive feedback. Or maybe it was because he’d referred to something war-related as good -- not that he’d meant anything about the war had been good but— Merlin, he needed to calm down, she knew he hadn’t meant that. Surely. He had another drink.

Fergie laughed then, glad she at least knew (and could acknowledge) that The Quibbler wasn’t exactly popular reading -- moreso than before the war, maybe, thanks to their turn as a legitimate source of news while the Prophet was used as You-Know-Who’s puppet, but as long as they kept writing stories about Crumple-Horned Snorcacks and Moonfrogs any of the serious articles would always be seen as less credible.  “Are you gonna pay me for my services?” he grinned, then realised that sounded awful and quickly lifted his beer to his lips.

“Was she?” Fergie blinked, mildly impressed. “Aye, I remember,” he nodded, “she harps on about it every now and then when she’s telling my sister off for her column inches,” he smirked. Did Edith know about Honey? Maybe he shouldn’t have brought her up, Honey’s appearances in the Prophet weren’t anything to boast about. He glanced around the small pub, then looked back at Edith. “She’s alright.” His lips tugged up at one end. “No, she’s great, really.” He nodded, again, a little more to himself this time. “She and my sister butt heads a lot but, different generations, different ways of doing things... “ he trailed off. He glanced at her glass, then his. “You want another? Same again?”

Edith’s eyes went wide as he mentioned his services--he didn’t mean it like that but that’s where her mind went immediately-- and she had another couple swallows of her drink because she could feel herself blushing and maybe she could pass off the blame to the alcohol. She set her glass down and cleared her throat.

She nodded, happy to move on to a more palatable topic of conversation: Fergie’s mum. “Wow, really?” She probably should have asked after his sister then, if she’d had things printed, too, but his mum kept talking about her column and she was stuck on that. She’d really only talked to one person--Dean--after interviewing them but she doubted that he went around harping on about it. (Blabbing about Edith writing anonymous articles, yes, but nothing more than that).

But Fergie smiled and so did she; “Just alright?” He clarified and went on and Edith nodded along before having another drink. She set her glass down with just a touch of her pint left. “Oh, sure. I’ve got old parents, too.” She’d had a proper introduction with Fergie’s dad just before the interview and figured he and her dad were around the same age; their mums could be, too, though Edith’s mum had been lying about her age for so long that Edith didn’t think she knew the real answer anymore.

Of course, Edith and her parents’ differences weren’t generational so much as… everything else, like the muggle/magic thing or that she’d kept them in the dark about basically everything that had happened since she turned eleven-- she finished off her drink and glanced at Fergie, reminding herself to stop thinking about that shit and have drinks with a mate like a normal person.

“Er—“ Fergie was offering another round and she nearly took him up on it but she pivoted at the last second and decided to take her turn. “No, I’ll get ‘em. What’d you have? Any good?” She was mostly asking to figure out if she should change her own order.

She hadn’t decided by the time she’d reached the bar--all of ten seconds later-- and decided to just go for one of each, which would have been quite a feat if they had more than four beers tapped. She made two trips back to the table rather than attempt carrying four pints at once and she shrugged as she sat down again. “I couldn’t decide,” she explained with half a grin that faltered after another second. “Did forget which one was which, though.” She picked up one of the gold colored ones and pointed at the darker two pints. “One of those is the bitter, though.” She grinned again before she had a sip.

“Yeah, you’d think running Honeydukes for almost thirty years would be her claim to fame but…” Fergie smiled, before the expression slipped and his cheeks warmed slightly -- that had sounded almost boastful, hadn’t it? He knew he was allowed to be proud of his family’s success, but he never wanted to be obnoxious about it. That was Honey’s job.

Edith said she had old parents too and Fergie perked up -- which was a strange thing to do but it was something else to talk about, and not so much about his own family. “Do you?” His Dad had passed seventy a couple of years ago, which did sound old when he thought about it, but his Mum was (“only”) sixty, which wasn’t that old because she would have still been in her early thirties when he was born but— How old were Edith’s parents then? And for that matter, how old was Edith?

He hadn’t really been confronted with the fact he didn’t recognise her from school -- not properly, anyway -- until now. They’d both been Prefects -- that much had come up in conversation over the last couple of months -- but it must not have been at the same time, or Fergie hoped not because the alternative was that he had (rudely) forgotten her. He almost asked, but decided he could wait to find out -- it was a bit leery to ask how old someone was.

Edith got to her feet before Fergie did. “You sure?” He wasn’t the type to keep tabs on who was paying for what (unless he was always paying). “Er, the Badger Bitter. Aye, it’s pretty good actually.”

Fergie almost wished he had gone to get this round -- then he would’ve been too busy rehearsing his order in his head to be able to think about anything else. Still, she didn’t take too long and he wasn’t able to go on too many tangents. He rose his eyebrows in confusion when she dropped off the first two pints and announced she was going back for more.

“Party time, is it?” he asked with a smirk when she finally sat back down. He shrugged at her indecision (he’d been there before). “We’ll just pretend we’re having a flight.” He picked one glass up -- the one that he thought was the same shade of amber as the what he’d had just before, but upon sipping it realised it wasn’t the bitter, but it was good, whatever it was. He leaned to peer at the bar. “What one’s this?” he asked her, then watched as she sipped from two of the glasses, then apparently decided which one she wanted to drink first.

“You like beer then?” he asked, grinningy softly; seemed like a dumb question given she’d bought four pints for two of them, but he was in need of a drinking partner that wasn’t Charlie -- and it wasn’t like Charlie drank beer for the taste, either.

“Aye, party time.” It was a small poke at Fergie’s accent but it was all in good fun. “I’d already psyched myself up for the party when you found me,” she finished, speaking normally again as she grinned. She hadn’t completely psyched herself up, might have skipped being social altogether if Fergie hadn’t arrived—or left?—when he had.

She nodded at pretending to have a flight—instead of Edith being either a) indecisive or b) an alcoholic—and took a sip of one (not the Fursty Ferret, apparently) as she watched him do the same, nearly worried he’d hate her choice. “Er--” she twisted and leant to look at the taps, squinting to make out the writing on the tap handles. “Wicked Wyvern,” she decided, turning back and sitting properly again, hitting his knee with hers—it was a small table—and readjusting so they weren’t touching anymore. “How is it?” She took a large sip of the other golden colored one (the Fursty Ferret) and decided to have a good go at the other, trading them off again.

Did she like beer? “Hate it.” She stayed serious for maybe half a second before she laughed. “No, it’s alright.” She was pickier about it now that she could afford to be—didn’t love a cold lager all the time, mind—and she’d unintentionally had these sorts of flights often. “You too, I s’pose.”

…

[[ out ]]

Fergie smirked at her imitation of him, his expression softening to a grin. “Is that what that was?” he teased (if she could give it she could take it) -- but if that was her ‘psyched’, Merlin help him when she wasn’t. A small part of him worried if teasing Edith about it was the smart thing to do, but she’d seen him go in there and come right back out, tail between his legs, so hopefully she wouldn’t feel like he was genuinely attacking her.

His grin widened at Wicked Wyvern, and at a safer change of topic— before it faltered briefly when her knee bumped his. “Some names they’ve got,” he said, just to have something to say. If he didn’t know any better he’d wonder if they were a wizarding brewery. “Not bad,” he answered, having another sip just to be sure. “Hoppy. Bit fruity.”

The Scotsman laughed when Edith laughed -- he hadn’t thought for even a second that she could hate something he’d seen her drink like juice. “Alright?” he echoed, glancing pointedly at their four beers. Him too? “When it’s wet,” he smirked. Fergie tilted his glass to look at it, then shrugged softly, smiling back at her; “When it’s too early for a whisky, aye.”

...

[ end ]