Remember When?

It was one thing to live near Diagon Alley and another thing entirely to hide in Muggle London rather than in the Wizarding World because it was easier to keep to himself. But he still had to make stops in the local stores to get the things he needed. While he would have been tempted to just sell his items in Knockturn himself, Simon was not particularly intrigued by the idea of being recognized. In Diagon Alley, oddly enough, the chances seemed to be lower. Maybe because it was mainly filled with store owners who didn't look long enough to care, or people on their own errands. Sure, he was a good-looking man, but apparently not enough of one to pull attention from too many people.

It had also been a few years, now. And perhaps the case had been too unsure for people to completely panic over. Simon didn't know.

Oddly, it was his accent that caught the most curiosity. So he was unfortunately quite silent while out and about. It was rather lonely, admittedly, but he could stand just about anything after Azkaban. Legitimately. At any rate, his Diagon Alley trip was over just in time for him to get back and dig out the item he was expected to have ready to show the antiques buyer when she arrived. In his line of work - if one could even call it that - he was paid in curious pays. And this item was one of them.

From the box, he lifted a small glass object, and he very nearly dropped it right away. He'd been told what it was, of course. But it had never worked on him before. He hadn't forgotten about the woman's visit, and had completed all of his errands. So Simon had no idea why the horrid thing turned a deep, stormy black. It did, however, make him want to sell the thing as soon as was physically possible.

Elsie liked her job.

She had spent an entire lifetime being subjected to the life of a well-dressed failure. She was a weak witch, a rotten student, a disgrace to the family legacy. To be fair to herself, she was a bit proud of that last one. But, in reality, she had never been good at a job, any job. She had been so bad as a secretary in America, she had almost been murdered. Now that was a crappy secretary.

Actually, she couldn't really recall exactly what had happened with that job. Just that things got dicey and she moved in with Claire. Meh, she was probably just over-exaggerating again.

Back on track! This job was made for her. It combined her two favorite things: shopping, and being condescending to people with money. She knew she managed to get the best prices, and she knew her manager's didn't care what tactics she used, and so she often took the most entertaining route. Claire had inspired an unfortunate charitable streak that meant she often made up for her good sales by paying a little extra for items when someone was truly in need, but she tried to keep that to a minimum. Things were finally going right for her and as much as she wanted to help, she couldn't risk that. She had her best friend, she had Dimitri, and she had this job. Everything was perfect.

Though, Dimitri had been in France since Christmas. She knew he was busy, helping put up an art gallery dedicated to orphans or cancer or something sad, and she had been much too busy to visit him. Elsie had become a much more patient person since meeting her boyfriend, but she still got a little ancy. What was the delicate way of putting it? Mama need to get her some.

Gross.

She would tell Claire that later to see the blonde gag.

Before long, she had reached the door in question and knocked, rearranging her hair and adjusting her grip on her purse. She liked to be a picture when first meeting someone.

And with the slight, dimpled smirk on her face, she certainly was one.

Simon nearly dropped the remembrall again when a knock sounded at his flat's door. Steadying himself, he tucked it back into its box, shaking his head. Whatever it was, he'd remember eventually. And he would no longer have that stupid thing to point it out to him, either.

Crossing the room, Simon was just glad that he'd been bored enough to clean his flat the day before, because recently he'd been in a bit of a funk. What he really needed, he thought, was to get out more. Merlin help him, but he was getting a bit stir crazy.

When he opened the door, it took him a minute to properly look at her. He'd half been glancing back towards the remembrall and half been wondering if he was still banned from Satan's. Then again, he didn't think he'd ever been told off officially, after the thing with the Minister. Maybe he could write Jack. But that would have to happen later, because now he really was looking at her, and Simon could immediately feel the amusement spread across his face.

His arms crossed over his chest and he returned her smirk, though his was probably a bit more blatant. He hadn't recognized her name before, but it made him want to laugh a bit. Of all the people to come knocking at his door, it would be Elsie Norton. He held the laugh in, but his tone was amused when he greeted her.

"I was sure I'd heard your name before," he informed her. "I don't think I've seen anyone from Durmstrang in.. ages, really. Come on in."

Simon stepped back to give her room to pass him, then let the door swing shut. "I've got it just over here," he added, crossing to the box so he could hold it out to her. "I'm sure you're meant to ask questions about this thing before buying it, so ask away."

And, with the air of someone who had certainly not been to prison and had nothing at all to hide, Simon sat himself down on his couch and gestured for her to take a seat at the other end, should she wish to.

One would expect artifacts of value to fall into the hands of the pure and wealthy - the sorts that Elsie knew, having grown up in the circles of the elite. And while those sorts held the majority of the artifacts Elsie was after, they weren’t the ones doing the selling, weren't the ones in need of money. She usually had appointments with those fallen from wealth, or having scrounged and stolen and were looking to liquidate their findings. So, all things considered, it wasn't very often that Elsie recognized one of her clients.

In truth, she didn't realize who this was until he cracked a grin and spoke. Not many people had truly liked her at Durmstrang, she had always been too loud and too American. But Elsie had endeavored to socialize as much as possible, having always preferred company to solitude. So, even though there was a chance she was wrong, her instincts filled in the gap, and she was pretty sure she had the name right, even though the face had changed and grown.

"Marek?" she said, lifting an eyebrow as a smile flickered onto her face. "Wow - who would have guessed!" She smiled, finding herself looking forward to this appointment now that it had a social element. She stepped inside and said, “Same here. They sure do like staying over there in the cold. She smirked.

She took the box from him and gestured towards the couch. “May I sit?” She swept over on his assent and sat, placing the box in front of her on the coffee table. She waved her wand, concentrating, and then looked up, almost grave. “Nothing happened.” She couldn’t keep the act up long, grinning widely as she waved a hand. “Nothing’s supposed to happen if it’s not cursed. My predecessor lost a finger when he forgot to check for curses. There’s a few more, too.”

She tapped the box with her wand, glad for the practice she had undergone to ensure she could do these spells on command, every time – she wasn’t so good at the whole magic, thing. You know. Half of her identity.

“So, how have you been?” she asked, as she made a figure eight motion over the box.

"It's plenty cold for me here," he agreed with a grin. "They say it's meant to snow all weekend, you know. May find myself going for drinks to warm up, though that's no hardship."

In truth, the friends he'd had at Durmstrang - had they not become absolute rubbish, of course - would not have been surprised by his choice of activity, as their card games rarely ended sober. That was when he'd learned that the stuff his parents liked was pathetic and never enough to get the job done. In this case, Simon didn't want to get drunk. But there was this little pub that had been calling to him for reasons he couldn't explain. It was as if he already knew he liked the place.

Relaxing into the couch as she began checking the item. But she was up for small talk, it seemed. Perhaps because of school. Or perhaps she was more friendly than he'd thought as a younger student. She seemed unaware of his stint in Azkaban, which was well enough as far as he was concerned. So he stuck to the positives.

"I've been busy with work. I sell potions supplies, and some of them pay with odd objects like this one," Simon gestured towards the box. "But it pays well enough. This flat suggests otherwise, I suppose, but I'm saving up for something grander."

A lie, sort of. He didn't know when he would move out of this blasted place. Guilt had kept him after Kosta stayed there, but now he had just enough tucked away to get a nicer-looking place. As it were, his was relatively sparse and not particularly colorful. But it was fine enough for the moment, he'd decided somewhere along the way.

"As it were, i got sick of needing help from my family." Another lie. But sort of true if he rephrased that to, I got sick of waiting for them to believe me. So whatever. He would count it. "They're back in Poland anyway, so I'm just enjoying a bit of freedom after the years in that castle. You've been busy, I'd guess?"

"Oh god, is it?" she all but moaned at the news of snow. Elsie couldn't be bothered to keep up with anything practical it seemed. How many times had she stepped out in a sundress to only be dragged back into her apartment by Claire, wrapped in a cardigan, scarf, and warming spell, before she was allowed out her way. There was nothing professional nor ladylike about Elsie's disdain for the weather news, but it was genuine. Between the accent, choice of words, and the Norton-brand drama, there was something remarkably Elsie about the statement. "I'll just floo out of here. Go somewhere warm, and then have some warm drinks just to spite the snow." She grinned.

She quietly filed away the information that he sold potions supplies. Not that she was a potioneer herself, but she had learned a thing or two working out of Knockturn, and it seemed potioneers were always on the lookout for ingredients not readily available through mainstream ways. She wasn't looking to get involved anything questionable, of course. Her life was going far too well for her to risk any of it.

But she got bored. One day she might enjoy a little risk.

She smiled, setting down her wand as she slowly reached out to pick up the box. "I like the flat. It's home-y." She glanced up and offered a smile. She turned the box over to check the latch and he continued on. She groaned sympathetically at his comment regarding family and said, "Been there. It's nice to cut that cord. A hassle, sure, but it's nice."

(As if she hadn't survived off of her parent's money for years and still enjoyed the comforts of the wardrobe they had paid for.)

She was ready to delve into the box, but he turned the question towards her affairs and she straightened up a bit, glancing over at him and offering a smile. "I have. Finally found a job that doesn't make me want to kill everyone, and vice versa." She laughed - file away the term dramatic irony, folks, it'll be useful for later. "I'm living with Claire Bishop- oh but you probably remember her if you bothered to remember me. Blonde goddess, mind of a genius, grace of a queen. Yep, she's the roomie. Just trying to stay out of trouble beyond that, I guess."

She wasn't sure why she hadn't brought up Dimitri. She often jumped at even smaller opportunities to describe in full detail the French demigod that had stolen her heart. Perhaps it was how long he had been away. Perhaps it was because he was a little more distant. Maybe she was just hungry and wanted to get this over with so she could get lunch. Elsie rarely bothered to analyze her own motives - she never got anywhere anyway.

She opened the box and let out a cluck of appreciation for the object. "Interesting," she said. "Looks like an old Remembrall prototype. We've gotten a few of the really old ones, ones that used elephant tusk and whatnot - oh, yes, looks like there's some ivory in the binding." She glanced up at him. "Does it work?" And then, to be cheeky, she added with a grin, "I mean, as best you can remember."

Simon nodded slowly at the mention of Claire, so casual about it that his shoulders moved a bit with the motion as well. "Yes, I remember. She and that Quidditch player were quite a thing." Which, of course, Simon recalled all the more for his years at Puddlemere United.

He hadn't seen either of them in ages, though, so he just shrugged, as if to say he had no idea what they were up to now.

The question about the remembrall had him sitting forward, his jaw a bit tense. "Well, now. I'm not sure. I'm typically pretty careful about scheduling my days and remembering meetings. With who I work for and who I work with, ... it isn't wise to miss an appointment," he explained a bit warily. "But when I picked it up, it turned this odd murky black color. So, perhaps it does work. But I didn't expect it to."

Shrugging, he reached out, lifting it from the box. It whirled up into a mess that rather resembled an angry storm cloud. "See? Before, I thought it was because I forgot how I knew your name. Which, obviously, I should know by now."

He held his hand out towards her, offering Elsie the chance to pick it up. Perhaps he was just more of a mess than he realized, and she would clear it up as well. "I'm not sure how you test whether or not something like this works, to be fair. But perhaps you have a contact who does."

Oh goody. They were talking about Robin Ivanov.

She couldn't be happier.

In truth, it had been a long time since she had thought about Robin. Claire had let slip the whole they-think-he's-dead but awhile back and Elsie had once again been forced into the role of comforter, casually disinterested in the man himself as she invested herself in her friend, who had also tried her best to appear unshaken. A traitorous feeling of loss had snuck into her, slowly but certainly, betraying what she had thought was only feelings of hatred for the Ivanov.

Apparently, there was still some fondness left.

Still, the mention only brought a small frown to her lips now. "Yes, they were. But-" she said, forcing her face to brighten as she chirped, "times change."

Yes, they did.

She listened thoughtfully to Simon's explanation and she tilted her head, eyes still tracing the curved shape of the item. He took it, demonstrating the remembrall's abilities. It was a tricky thing, wasn't it, diagnosing an item meant to demonstrate forgetfulness. She offered Marek a small smile and said, "Well, I'll settle this. I know for a fact-" as if someone could "-that I haven't forgotten a thing so-"

And that was when she took the remembrall, and it turned murky as well, strange flakes of something luminous within the murky cloud. Her eyebrows quirked together and she tilted her head, another frown tugging at her lips, almost a pout. "Well, that can't be right." She stared at the little artifact, certain it was somehow wrong, even though she knew she'd rather it be working - more valuable that way.

She glanced up and then allowed for a small smile to pull her lips outward. "No matter. I have people. I know someone who could figure out a way to test this bad boy, I just need to shoot her an owl and arrange a meeting. How quickly are you looking to get rid of this thing?"

Simon was trying to clear his head a bit, but when Elsie picked up the remembrall, it did the same thing to her. And that was truly unsettling. "Perhaps it's broken," he offered slowly, squinting at it.

Not for too long, of course, as they say bad expressions had a way of sticking on a person's face. And his face was just much too pretty to be ruined, thanks.

So he nodded at her assurances that she could have someone find out one way or the other about the blasted thing. At least that could be handled. Simon had a number of things in his life that, arguably, needed to be handled, and he had not been making much progress on any of them. Whoops. It was like something had stolen his drive from him, and now he couldn't put anything back in gear.

He really needed to not make Muggle-based analogies if he wasn't going to spend time with his family. It just made him think of home far too much.

"I don't really have a preference," he shrugged, internally wincing at the way his accent felt heavier on his tongue than it had before. "Just don't have a use for it, myself, so I figured I might find someone who did. If it's broken, though, I realize it may not be worth much at all."

Simon just shrugged, reaching over to his coffee table. From atop the glass insets, he picked up a pad of paper and offered it to her. "You can send something off from here if you'd like, but I am really not in much of a rush."

It could certainly be broken, but even if it was, she hoped to figure out exactly how and why it was broken. There was a chance she could buy it for cheaper and get it re-charmed before marking it up in the store. And if it simply could not be coaxed back into working, perhaps she could still take it off Simon's hands for a fraction of it's original price. There were enough inexperienced buyers would would like it just as decor or a talking piece. And if Simon really needed the money, she didn't mind being a pal about it.

What was the point of influence if you didn't abuse it every now and then?

"I'm sure there's an easy fix," she said, hoping to reassure him. "The woman I'm writing is a mega-genius. Weird, but the best ones always, aren't they?" He slid her the paper and she offered him a bright smile, grabbing a pen to quickly scrawl out the note to Jet. That finished she sat up and began to fold the note, tilting her head as she looked at Simon curiously. "Hey. What are you up to today?"