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Tweak says, "loves!"

Lucy Spinks (addingvalue) wrote in finnigans_rpg,
@ 2014-08-25 18:17:00

Entry tags:

character: ginny weasley, character: lucy spinks

Welcome to the Wizarding World
Who: Lucy Spinks and... open!
What: A long overdue return
Where: Diagon Alley
When: Monday, late afternoon
Rating: SFW

Though she loved her job, Lucy was still making the most of her bank holiday Monday. She'd slept in until ten thirty - which was late for her - and then met up with a friend for shopping and lunch in Covent Garden. Once she'd seen her friend disappear back down onto the Piccadilly Line, she wandered aimlessly. Or at least, she told herself it was aimless. Actually, her feet took her almost directly to the Charing Cross Road. To a specific place on the Charing Cross Road, actually.

Between an indepedent bookshop and a record store, there it was. The Leaky Cauldron. Lucy was almost surprised she could still see it. She'd stopped thinking of herself as a witch years ago. She'd never been a good once, barely able to reliably produce 'lumos' and 'alohamora' let alone the more complicated spells demanded by her OWL and NEWT level courses. Her wand, dug out from her Hogwarts Trunk which she'd been using as a shabby-chic coffee table, was in her handbag. It had felt odd in her hand when she'd held it. The journal which had arrived - by owl! - to her muggle flat was there too. She'd happened to glance at it that morning and seen the pages, which had been empty when it arrived, filled up with various handwriting.

Lucy didn't know what all this was about. Presumably it had something to do with her one magical outburst in seven years - just a few months ago - but the address of the pub on 'Monument Alley' meant nothing to her. Taking a breath, she forced herself to walk through The Leaky Cauldron. No one spoke to her and she made it outside to the courtyard. There, to her great relief, someone had already opened the doorway and she was able to slip in after them without having to try her wand.

She walked slowly down Diagon Alley, taking in both those shops that had changed since her last visit here and those that hadn't. Florean Fortescue's seemed to have changed hands, but Flourish and Blotts was the same as it had ever been. With so much to look at and take in, Lucy wasn't paying particular attention to the people around her.

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jazzing
2014-08-25 06:50 pm UTC (link)

Ginny Weasley was late. Ginny Weasley was later than late. In fact, Ginny Weasley was later than she had been for anything in her entire life. Ginny Weasley really needed to not get into heated arguments with the table next to hers during lunch about whether an all-girls' team was still warranted in the year 2004.

Exactly 17 minutes ago she was supposed to be sitting in her editor's office, discussing plans for the upcoming week. Those 17 minutes had been well-spent putting her opponent into the mud (verbally, not physically), but now she was paying the price.

It was going to be easier to make a mad running dash for it than Apparating (Ginny tended to mis-Apparate when rushed), so she ran across the cobblestone streets, ducking left and right around people, robes flying behind her as she made her way to her offices.

One woman didn't move left like Ginny had anticipated and her Seeker skills kicked in; she stopped, pirouetted, and whirled right - directly into someone who hadn't been there just a moment ago. Ginny didn't have any papers to go flying, nor did the other woman (which was really a blessing) and Ginny, still light on her feet, jumped up quickly to offer the downed woman a hand.

"I am so so sorry," Ginny said. Had it been a Slytherin she might have led with something a little different, but Ginny didn't recognize the woman at all. She was about her age, but she wasn't DA at all - which was about how Ginny remembered anyone these days. Nope, nothing familiar about her at all.

Ginny shook her head as she realised she'd been peering intently at the woman. "Are you from around these parts?" That seemed the easiest way to figure out who she was.

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addingvalue
2014-08-25 07:25 pm UTC (link)

"It's okay," Lucy said, accepting the hand and getting to her feet with relative ease. It wasn't the first time she'd been sent tumbling to the floor, not even the first time this week - though it usually happened on grass, not cobblestone. "No damage done, I don't think." She liked to think of herself as pretty tough. She dusted off her jeans, not noticing the woman staring at her.

The question, then, caught her by surprise. She bit her lip and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, genuinely not sure what to say. "London," she eventually offered, shaking her head slightly. "Not this part, though. I haven't been here for years." She wasn't even sure what she was doing here. What had drawn her to take a look at the world she'd walked away from years ago? Still, there was no harm in it, and she did just about have the right to be here. (She'd had to remind herself of that fact several times before getting her wand out of storage.)

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jazzing
2014-08-25 09:06 pm UTC (link)

Haven't been here for years - that said all she needed to say to Ginny. "Muggleborn?" Ginny asked quietly. Without waiting for a response, she continued, "It's gotten better. I mean, it's not perfect, but hey, we won the war. I'm sorry you felt you had to stay away - I know Kingsley was trying to make sure everyone knew they could come back. It's just not right to stay away from your birthright, you know? So what brought you back?"

She could afford to be even later (19 minutes and counting) to talk to this woman; she was certain her editor would understand. The unfairness of it was going to hit Ginny like a sack of bricks later. It wasn't fair that whomever this was had stayed away for so long. It wasn't fair they hadn't found her earlier and brought her back. Nothing about the war had been fair, but this simple injustice tore deeply at Ginny.

The idea that this woman could have been caught by the Snatchers didn't even occur to Ginny until it was too late (that was a problem with Ginny, from time to time), so she really hoped it was just a case of fleeing and never coming back, otherwise she was going to have to eat some serious crow.

And if there was one thing Ginny hated more than anything, it was eating crow.

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addingvalue
2014-08-25 09:45 pm UTC (link)

Lucy hadn't even answered in the affirmative before the stranger started telling her she should have felt she could come back. She didn't feel quite right, accepting the apology when it hadn't truly been the war that had kept her from Diagon Alley. Nor, though, did she feel inclined to talk about the real reason she'd stayed away. Not here on the street with a stranger. "I knew I could come back," she said, when she could get a word in. "I mean, Professor Sprout wrote to say I could go back to school, if I wanted, but... I had a job by then, and..." And why was she spilling her life story? Lucy stopped.

As for what had brought her back, she couldn't entirely say. "Someone sent me a journal," she eventually admitted. "From... Finnigan's? It says that's on Monument Alley, but I don't know where that is." She'd never been overly familiar with wizarding London even while she'd still been at Hogwarts. After third year she usually found at least one free weekend to go and get anything she needed from the shops.

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jazzing
2014-08-26 07:16 pm UTC (link)

Oh, a job. Still, Ginny couldn't help but pity the woman. Kicked out of a world that was yours by birthright simply because of a few bigots ... it still made her blood boil.

At the mention of Finnigan's, Ginny brightened up, "Oh, yes. Seamus Finnigan, He was a Gryffindor with Harry. He opened up an ace new pub on the new Monument Alley - uh, after the war, rebuilding, dedication to those who fought, you get the picture. It's not that far from here, if you wanted to take a look."

Ginny Weasley was absolutely the latest she'd ever been in her entire life, and any moment now, an owl was going to come find her. Or a Howler, but she didn't think her editor the type to send a Howler before an hour was up. Hopefully.

"Oh, and the journals are a new thing too - have you looked at yours? It's like a messaging board, like we had in the Common Rooms at Hogwarts, only it live updates and connects to any other journal. Brilliant bit of magic, even if you can't see where it keeps its brain."

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addingvalue
2014-08-26 07:57 pm UTC (link)

Seamus Finnigan. The name rang a vague bell among Lucy's memories, though she hadn't thought anything of the name when it had only been a pub. There had been few enough students in her schoolyear at Hogwarts that Lucy could recall most of their names, if she tried. There'd been far fewer than in her busy Sheffield primary school. Seamus Finnigan, Gryffindor. She nodded, she could picture him - shortish with blond curls. "I think he was in my year." Could he have sent the journal? But how would he have known where she lived? And why would he bother, they had never talked beyond 'pass the watering can' as far as Lucy could remember.

She forced herself to snap back from memories that had been undisturbed for years. Did she want to go to this pub? Was Seamus still in touch with others from their year? With Susan and Hannah, Ernie and Justin? Lucy's heart lifted a little at the thought. They'd been her friends and she'd always felt bad that she'd never sent word she was okay, but she'd got rid of her owl when she was banned from school, not wanting to attract attention. She looked up at the woman who'd crashed into her. "Could you point me in the right direction? You looked like you were in a hurry before."

She didn't want to delay this stranger any further, but couldn't hold back from murmuring. "It's brain?" with a slight not of alarm. She hadn't thought the journals were sentient.

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