have you heard what they're saying on the street [edith]

There was something about Muggle spaces that made Cordelia feel so much safer. The only moving images came from televisions, hanging precariously from roofbeams, not from the papers. Fewer people wore such long robes. Cordelia had a theory that those robes were to disguise arm movements, to hide casting spells, from Muggle eyes, but it felt more like they were been hidden from her. Hidden wands. Hidden weapons. Hidden stories. Hidden things made her nervous.

She was a bit early, but another moment at her desk at the Prophet and Cordelia felt certain the temptation to curse out, or just curse, her manager would overtake her. So she had absconded to one of the hundreds of touristy pubs in Covent Gardens. She couldn't remember if Edith had suggested the place or if she had picked it out of the phone book, but it was fine, so far. Cordelia had secured a high table pushed up against one of the walls, far from the folks cheering on some soccer match but close enough to the bar for prompt service. She ran her finger idly around the rim of her vodka soda, watching the door for her friend's arrival.

They weren't close, per se, not in the way Cordy was with Ari and Camm and some others, but they had known each other in school and crossed paths at the Prophet afterwards. And they certainly got on well enough to go for drinks. Still, she was curious what news Edith wanted to share that couldn't go in the owl post.

Patience was maybe not her strongest suite. Cordelia reached for her purse, tossing a pack of cigarettes onto the table. Where was her muggle lighter? After a moment of rummaging, she found the wretched device, looking up just in time to see Edith arrive at the table! "Edith! It's been too long."


@Edith Holthouse

Edith usually avoided Covent Garden for good reason; it took some effort to navigate through the crowd without rubbing elbows with anyone; if she looked too uninterested in an effort to ward off buskers, eventually someone would cotton on that she was a local and ask for directions. Still, not being overheard was worth it, almost.

She found the door to the bar (with, thankfully, a separate entrance from the restaurant proper where there was a handful of tourists lingering) and pushed it open, scanning the bar for her mate. They were mates in a roundabout way, sort of; words in school, more words and a few drinks at The Prophet, less words and more drinks now that she was spending more time with Ariana (and her mum).

She spotted Cordy and made her way over, offering a “Hiya,” as she climbed on the stool. She glanced toward the television -- it looked like one of the last qualifiers for the women’s world cup -- and back to Cordy and her already ordered and delivered drink. “I’m late, sorry, but--” she shrugged her shoulders in a what-can-ya-do sort of way-- “People.”

A waitress had spotted her arrival and hurried over; Edith ordered without too much consideration for the drink specials she had touted off. “G’n’T, thanks,” she said with a nod. They were left alone and Edith turned on her stool: “Not from the can,” she called after the waitress, who offered no indication that she had heard the request.

“How’s The Prophet?” She asked with a cheeky grin, her attention back on Cordy; at least she’d been able to quit before she had been fired -- that was her thing now, apparently. Edith wrote for The Quibbler and even though it was technically freelance, she still wasn’t writing for anyone else; she still wasn’t telling anyone -- maybe just a few people -- about the book she was attempting. Less pressure that way.

The waitress returned with a can of gin and tonic and a glass of ice but Edith was past the point of caring and pulled it toward her with half a smile. “Cheers,” she said, popping open the can and pouring it into her glass; there was almost enough to bubble up over the rim but Edith inhaled the foam before it got the chance.

"Hey, you're here, that's all that matters." Cordelia smiled, twirling the unlit cigarette in her left hand. "Prophet's fine, for the moment. Haven't had anything interesting to cover since they took me off the maintenance strike beat." Most people wouldn't have called that story interesting, but it was her first current events story with the Prophet, and she was itching to do more like it. More interviews, more investigating, less "Top Five Vacation Spots for Wizarding Families with Childen ages Five to Eleven, under 200 Galleons" articles. Plus, there had been some interesting sources to talk to for that story. It was a fond memory now, six months out of the story and six months into something else new and exciting.

Cordelia choked back a chortle as Edith sucked up the tonic foam. She raised her vodka soda up for a clink. "Cheers!" It burned a little bit on the way down. Intellectually Cordelia knew that alcohol dulled the senses, but one drink made her feel sharper. Fearless.

"Hm, what else is happening? I got finance to cover my trip to America next week, so that's a victory. Not much else happening." Cordelia paused. It seemed rude to ask for a story lead this early in the evening, but with Edith, who knows? She tapped a nail absently against her glass. Better not risk it. "How's freelancing treating you? Anything exciting on the Quibbler beat?"

“Mm, saw that,” she said, nearly sure she really had seen it. Edith nodded to drive her point -- and her assurance -- home. “Maybe they’ll strike again.” She’d never really had Cordy’s problem and didn’t know how to be more sympathetic and she knew any effort she made to seem that way would be wasted. She’d sort of just been handed stories, once she had started down this career path, anyway. She felt bad about that, too; Edith had sort of just stumbled into it, the writing.

She coughed -- “Wrong pipe--” and set her glass back on the table, wiggling her nose to get rid of any residual bubbly sensations.

“Wow, really?” Edith had never been to America; she’d only considered retreating to a cabin in Vermont (and had researched it in the library, too) when all of that fun potentially-life-threatening-Sweden-etc stuff was happening last fall. “What for?” She imagined fashion shows in New York, maybe. To tell the truth, her knowledge of places to go didn’t stretch much farther than that besides maybe ‘California’ but that was only because she wanted to go to Disneyland; she didn’t share that last little tidbit.

Edith shrugged and started in earnest on her drink. “It’s alright.” She had an article every month with a much bigger word allowance than she had been getting at The Prophet and her editor was very hands off. “Lots of time on my hands, though.” For talking to people, finding a good story, for research (going to movies), for a nice little catch up. “Might be looking at shoving everything into a book, dunno.” She did know, and she was doing exactly that.

“Listen though.” Edith turned to face Cordy properly, dragging her drink with her as she did. “I wanted to run something by you.” Cordy was one of the last people she still talked to from the paper and sure, she might not currently write what Edith was after, but it was better than nothing. “It’s..” she trailed off before she remembered where she was. “It’s Ministry related. I’m trying not to step on any more toes like, right now, so…” She trailed off again, this time with her eyebrows raised in a silent ‘wanna hear more’ gesture.

Cordelia nodded, sipping her highball. “One can only hope. Doesn’t seem likely at the moment, tragically.” Had she mentioned her new beau to Edith yet? Maybe after another drink. She wasn’t quite sure how Edith would react to her sleeping with her sources. Probably affirmatively, but she had been a Prefect in school, so who could say?

Edith seemed envious for a moment, and Cordelia allowed herself a little smile. She wasn’t that much younger than Edith, after all, but Cordelia would be lying if she didn’t feel covetousness toward how many scoops seemed to have fallen in her lap, at her age. “Do you remember Oliver Rigby, from school? He was in ‘Puff with me. Anyway, he’s got me an invite to a Banshee party - overseas - and I was supposed to do a piece on summer hols locations, anyway.” It all came out in a giddy school girl rush. Maybe she did like her job, sometimes. “Do you want anything? I’m gonna try to swing by Disney, see how Wizard-friendly it is and such.”

She nodded as Edith talked about her book. It wasn’t completely out of the blue, but book deals don’t grow on trees. Cordelia made affirmative “hmmms” and “ohs” as Edith went on, not wanting to commit to reading something that didn’t exist. Then Edith’s tone shifted.

Cordelia crossed her legs. This was more exciting than drinks. “Two seconds.” She offered Edith a cigarette before lighting her own, and moved the purse onto the table. Like this, Cordelia was pretty sure none of the Muggles in the bar could see her tiny Quick-Notes quill and paper pad wedged between the bag and the wall. “Off the record, I assume?”

“Nope.” She really only remembered Cordelia from more recent events; she’d only started hanging around people far younger -- four years was still a big age gap in that direction, she thought -- the past year or so, since all her writing stuff started in earnest. Before that, she had done a pretty good job of avoiding everyone she’d known in school, though she supposed she was still doing a good job with that because, again, four years younger.

But she continued anyway, not slowed by Edith’s failure to recognize a name. She’d heard of Banshee, at least, though she had never really been able to get into their music. “Cool,” she said, sincerely. Edith loved free alcohol, anyway; pity Cordy’d have to work a little still.

She opened her mouth to ask why it mattered if Disneyland was wizard-friendly but pivoted instead to nodding enthusiastically. “I’ve always wanted one of those hats--” she let go of her drink and cupped her hands near her head-- “With the ears.” She snorted and had another swallow of her gin-and-mostly-tonic.

Her eyebrows were still raised as Cordy asked for two seconds and handed her a cigarette. “Thanks.” She held onto it but didn’t light it, rolling it between her thumb and forefinger to keep herself from fidgeting in some other way. She shifted to only raising one eyebrow, looking at the quill with pursed lips before deciding to ignore it all with a roll of her eyes. “For now, at least.” Edith nodded, had another swallow, rolled the cigarette some more.

“It might be nothing,” she started, nearly sure it wasn’t nothing. “You know how I used to be an obliviator, right?” She didn’t assume anyone had memorized her resume, despite including it in more than one article. “This woman I used to work with--” woman probably narrowed it down too much considering they were outnumbered in that office-- “Just got a promotion but she was never very…” she paused and grimaced slightly. “Careful? Does a bit of a slapchop job on memories.”

She took a break for another swallow, then continued: “Basically, the obliviation procedures need an overhaul. Oversight. Something.” She hoped Cordy was following along, somehow, that it was a bigger issue than Edith couldn’t explain without rambling, or ‘raving like a lunatic’ as someone had described her. But Cordy, she wasn’t an ex-Obliviator with a bone to pick, so maybe.

Cordelia got the sense that Edith was less than fully impressed, but what else did she have to share? Her life, her career too, was just treading water. Work, write, drink, smoke, with breaks for Michael. The most exciting thing to happen to her since January was this trip.

She should be thankful for that. Cordelia had already lived through interesting times, and she wouldn’t wish that on her worst enemy. But yet, she was restless.

Cordy let out a laugh as the woman across from her mimed the infamous Mickey Mouse ears. “I’ll put it on the list.” She took another sip of her highball, before getting businesslike.

Pushing her lighter across the table, just in case, the younger woman took a drag off her cigarette. Edith had been an Obliviator, that rang true, and Cordelia nodded to show yes, she did remember. Right after the war. Cordy frowned - this sounded a little like interoffice drama, not something she could actually use for anything, right until “Does a bit of a slapchop job on memories.” The implications of that… Cordelia shuddered a bit despite herself. The whole Obliviation thing scared her, frankly, and intrigued her - who would she be, if she could forget that year?

“Wait”, she said, rewinding a few words in her head. “So there isn’t any check on Obliviations right now? I- I think everyone just sort of assumes there is a load of oversight in place for everything in the Ministry, now.” The ‘now’ was unnecessary, but she added it as a filler as she searched for her next question. “Has she wiped anything - anyone, specifically, that would be a problem?”

She’d explained as much as she could without going into detail, which she really only wanted to do if Cordy seemed interested in writing anything; otherwise, she knew other staff at The Prophet; surely someone didn’t live in the Ministry’s pocket.

But Cordy perked up a bit with her Wait. She grimaced. “There’s some oversight.” Paperwork was reviewed, anyway. “Field work is like… you usually pair up with someone from the Excuse office or the like.” She had to pause for a drink but she continued as soon as she could. “No one’s exactly checking back in on muggles after the fact, y’know.” No more magical interference after they’d already interfered.

The Ministry Ethics Committee was kind of a joke, in Edith’s opinion. Telling Cordy -- and having her tell everyone -- was the next best thing to something more ‘official’.

“It’s only a problem depending on who you ask?” She rolled her eyes as she continued: “They’re only muggles.” She sighed and had another drink. “I doubt she’s like, wiping memories of their mums, or anything, but you kind of have to--” she held her hand aloft and twisted her fist as if she was obliviating Cordy without a wand, which mostly looked like she was turning an invisible screwdriver-- “Focus, only get what you’re supposed to get.”

She shrugged again as if it wasn’t such a big deal to her, mostly to just soften the blow if Cordy didn’t want to write about it. “You don’t need to take the five, ten minutes before the magic, y’know?” She nodded, answering her own question. “And now with her being in charge, being the one reviewing the paperwork…” She trailed off; with Pam reviewing things, her way of doing things could be more commonplace. She finished her drink with another swallow and motioned for their waitress to come back.

‘Some’ oversight. Cordelia could hear the air quotes dripping off the word. She frowned. Dad worked for the Excuse office, still, if only part-time. If he had known about this, he would have mentioned it, right? She couldn’t imagine her father, with his own mind still slightly scrambled from Azkaban, would be so cavalier about other people’s memories.

She took another drag off her cigarette, taking care to blow the smoke out into the bar and not into Edith’s face. “Only muggles,” she repeated, just trying to wrap her head around the lack of empathy necessary to do a job like that and not… not care. Cordy stifled a laugh at the demonstration of the spell, but it was only a small laugh. She was familiar with that spell, for reasons she didn’t care to recall.

Edith seemed so - not cavalier, but casual about such disturbing news. Cordy glanced around, but the only familiar face was the waitress, coming back to take Edith’s order again. Edith wouldn’t be mentioning this at all if she didn’t care. Who was Edith performing for? Cordelia, or herself?

Cordelia took another sip from her drink as she waited for the waitress to go. “Okay,” she began when the Muggle had finally moved away. ”So, obviously, this is a story, I know that, you know that.” Next to her, the Quick-Notes quill had stopped moving. With one hand she gently flattened it against the page, as if to shut it up. “And I get why you aren’t pitching this yourself.”

God, she wanted this story so badly, but she had to be smart about it. “Does this person have any pull at the DP, that you know of?” If she went ahead with this, she needed to know that the story wasn’t going to get caught and killed. “Is she from like, an old family, or a rich one?”

Edith ordered another gin and tonic -- the real drink, not the canned kind, for maximum efficacy if she needed to continue sitting there with Cordy after she’d said no to this article idea -- and watched the waitress leave before nodding again. “Yeah?” All she’d said so far was ‘okay’ but that was better than ‘fuck, no,’ which she might have been expecting.

“I know that.” She nodded again, continued nodding through Cordelia saying she knew why Edith shouldn’t be the one writing anything. Her name was rubbish, essentially. She had it out for the Ministry, something like that.

“I don’t know.” Everyone had an uncle that worked somewhere it seemed, but-- “I skived off that day in class, the brief history of the rich and famous families.” It was a fair question but Edith didn’t think before she spoke. “Sorry, just--” She shrugged. “Maybe.” She glanced down at her hands for a second, then back up. “Look, I know it’s a lot to ask and if you don’t feel comfortable--” She couldn’t blame her.

The waitress was back and Edith took hold of her glass almost immediately, finding comfort in having something in her hands. “I’ll help, if you want.”

Cordelia snorted. “Don’t apologize.” She felt that way too, trying to navigate the complicated web of bullshit that was the old wizarding families of Britain. Her family was muggles all the way up within three, four generations, even if the Leighton name threw people for a second. “Just wondering if you knew.”

If you don’t feel comfortable. Cordelia sat on that for a minute. Should she feel uncomfortable? Shouldn’t she be afraid that her reputation as a journalist would go the way of Edith’s if she took this? She couldn’t think of anything like that right now, but now that Edith pointed it out… Where was her self-preservation instinct? Edith was clearly expecting Cordelia to be apprehensive at the very least. In some ways, she was the same stupid girl she was five years ago, running into battle with no understanding of what was about to happen. At least this time, she was trying to figure out what the fallout could look like in advance.

The waitress was back and Edith grabbed the G&T with some anxious fervour. Edith said ”I’ll help, if you want,” at the same time at Cordelia said “Right, so, could you get me in with your old work friends?” Cordelia looked at Edith for a second, took another drag. “I think I’ll need your help,” she said, taking a minute to process what Edith had offered. “I don’t know if I will be able to get this to print, but I want to try.” She couldn’t just ignore a story like this being thrown into her lap.

She was shaking a little - excitement? Nerves? Maybe a bit of both. Cordy put out her cigarette - thank god this place still had ashtrays on the tables. “Thanks,” she said after a moment, “for offering this one to me.” God, she hoped she had first crack at this. Maybe Edith shopped it around before. She tried not to think about that.

She talked over Cordy, tried to backtrack, nearly talked over her again. She nodded -- work friends -- and figured that deserved a bit more clarification. “Yeah. Sort of. Not obliviators.” Edith hadn’t left her group on the best terms; she quit without leaving notice, talking her way out of how her contract stipulated she give at least two weeks’ notice because she was pretty sure she’d made her boss feel bad -- that little wartime hiring/firing/rehiring fiasco she had reminded him about. “In the department, though. Yeah.” She was on better terms with the Accident Reversal Squad, anyway.

Edith chewed on her lip, nodding again. “You’ll get it farther than I could.” There had to be someone at The Prophet who’d want to run it-- for fuck’s sake, Edith had managed to get a column in there a year ago. Worst case scenario, it could run in The Quibbler, four people would read it, and nothing would come of it. That was more like… absolute worst case scenario.

She had more of her drink, a few quick gulps, chewing on an ice cube as she set her glass back on the table. “Oh.” Cordy was thanking her and it caught her off guard. “Sure.” She wrinkled her nose, glanced away for a second before looking back. “And if at any point you want out, that’s cool, too.” It’d have more weight coming from someone more objective, with no obvious ill will toward the Ministry, anyone that wasn’t herself. She didn’t have too many people left at the paper to ask, though.

“I’ve, uh--” she nodded again, the realization that this might actually be happening starting to hit her. “I’ve got notes at home. Do you think you could come by sometime this week?” She drummed her fingers on the tabletop. “Around tea, maybe?” Her boyfriend would still be at work then (and Edith had just decided that it’d be better if she didn’t go round advertising more anti-Ministry writing). She was already grabbing her backpack from the floor to fish out something to write with.

Not Oblivators. "I can work with that," said Cordy, frowning slightly. It would be good to talk to an Obliviator, a current one, at some point. Absently, Cordelia pulled her notebook out from where it sat squished against the wall and her purse, jotting down notes. Obls - q Mry, Ari, DA etc. She wrote in a flowing shorthand of her own bastardized devising. Where did Mary work these days, anyway? She knew that her other friend kept bouncing around the Ministry like a ping-pong ball.

"You'll get it farther than I could," said Edith. Cordelia started to deny it, then realized that if anyone would recognize the empty fawning of a reporter it would be the woman across from her. Cordy admired Edith deeply, but Edith had made enemies. More enemies than Cordy had known, apparently. Even at her stupid, vapid desk in Style and Culture, Cordelia probably could get this - if this became something - further along the process. At least to an editor's desk. It was unpleasant to realize. Edith deserved better than her current lot. A reputation on par with her work and service to wizarding Britain. Not passing stories to junior journalists who were literally just sitting and waiting for the old guard of reporters to die.

"Here." Cordelia pushed her notebook across the table (quill off still from when she had pushed it down) from where she had been hiding it behind her purse. If the Muggles gave the mini-quill any attention, Cordelia was pretty sure she could pass it off as a novelty pen. Those were in, right? The gel pens with the feathers on them. Ugly things. "I can slip out from the office for a moment, sure." Especially if she kept eating lunch at her desk, Craig couldn't complain if she took a real lunch hour, probably. "Tomorrow? Thursday?" It would be best to do it before she left for America, she thought. She could work this one off the side of her desk if she told Craig she was doing trip prep.

Edith nodded once. Cordy could work with that. Maybe she knew someone who knew someone who could get her a word with a currently-employed Obliviator, though off the top of her head Edith had no clue who in the office would be good to talk to. She didn’t want to worry her already, or scare her off before she had really thought through what sort of work this might be.

She didn’t deny that she’d get it farther and that was something. A good start. Edith had another swallow of her G&T, appreciative that it seemed a bit more G than T.

Cordy pushed the notebook toward her and Edith stopped fumbling with her backpack. She slid it the rest of the way into her bubble, picking up the quill and hesitating for a second before writing down her address. She went slow as she scratched it out; she avoided quills if she could be she didn’t care enough to go back to fishing out a pen. “Just--” she finished writing and pushed the notebook back, glancing at the notes at the top of the page before she caught Cordy’s eye again. “Tomorrow’s better. Owl me if you’ll be after five.” She tapped her fingers on the tabletop for a second. “Don’t be after five.” She didn’t want to have to explain who was coming over or why or what all those papers were about or-- Edith nodded again to get her point across.

She didn’t think she needed to tell her why she didn’t want to just owl all her notes to her in the first place so instead she picked up her drink and finished it. “And on that happy note,” she started, offering a quick grimace as the gin started to hit. “I should go, make sure I’ve got everything in order.” And apparate before the gin really started to hit. “We’ll talk tomorrow,” she said with another nod, reaching for her backpack again and pulling out enough cash to cover her drinks.

“Thank you. Really.” She had slid off her stool and caught Cordy’s eye. “This’ll be good.” She hadn’t planned to cut things so short but she could barely concentrate on having a conversation, not now that this story might get out there the way it was meant to. That, and she knew her notes were a mess and she didn’t want to make this any harder for Cordelia than it had to be. She nodded again before she headed out the door, figuring she’d have to walk a fair way before she got anywhere uncrowded enough to apparate.

[[ out ]]

Edith pushed the notebook back across the table - she seemed slow with a quill, slower than Cordy would have expected. Not that she could judge - Cordelia preferred pens, too. Seemed she wasn't the only one. She nodded, looking at Edith's handwriting instead of her friend. Tomorrow. Easy. Don't be after five. Cordelia glanced up, but beyond general jumpiness Edith's face was inscrutable. "Before five," she echoed. "Got it."

It was like Edith had flipped into some other mode in the last few minutes. Cordelia wasn't sure what had shifted, why Edith had gone from affecting indifference to the whole thing to a bundle of nerves. Had it suddenly become real to the other woman? There was a wave of apprehension in Cordy's gut. Maybe the younger witch didn't know what she had just gotten herself into. Edith downed the last of her drink and was bouncing already. Cordelia half slid off her seat but paused when Edith made eye contact. She didn't really know what to say - it felt like they had just sat down - but Cordelia managed a smile. "I know it will be."

Edith nodded back at her and slipped into the crowd, leaving Cordelia at the table with an almost empty glass, a half-smoked cigarette, and so many questions. Now that Edith was gone, of course. Just her luck. Cordelia dogeared the open page of her notebook with Edith's address, scribbled TOMORROW, TEA underneath. She would need to brainstorm a little white lie for Craig, then.

Cordelia drank the last dregs of her vodka cran and flagged down a server. "Cheque, please."

[[out]]