Quote:

Originally Posted by BanaBatGirl

Holy Merlin's Beard, Tanc's kids were TEENAGERS already?! "No waaaaaay," William stared at his old friend a bit. He watched as dragon books and pictures of the family were unpacked, and moved from his desk over to his buddy's to pick up said picture. "That's crazy! Those are YOUR kids?" He pointed at the fame and then at Tanc and then back to the picture before setting it down again. "Well they definitely got their looks from their mother......."

JUST kidding. Hehe. But when did they all get so old?! No wonder he wanted peace and quiet...

"People get kicked out of countries all the time." Or was that just him? Willy shrugged with a small grin, returning to his desk to properly sit down and check over some paperwork that had come in today. "I'm glad you're here though. There's never enough dragon lovers at the Ministry!" But now they had a good start.

"Yes way," Tancred confirmed, quite amused with the way Willy reacted. With every year, his children got older. And it certainly had been long enough for them to be teenagers now. Kids grew up so fast. At that was clear by the pictures he had of them. They weren't adorable babies that needed attention anymore. Now they were teenagers that demanded attention. Parenting was tough, but he would not change it for the world.

Knowing that his friend was joking, he gave him a gentle shoulder punch. "Ouch. I'm so hurt that you don't find me handsome, Willy." He fake-pouted and rolled his eyes. He would get back at him, just you wait.

An eyebrow rose when the man said something about people getting kicked out of countries. Was he hinting at something? Rather than asking, Tancred simply moved on to the next item in his box: his coffee mug. He wasn't one to stick his nose in other people's business. "Thanks, mate," he answered, setting the mug down and going back to the box for the hacky sack and a few other miscellaneous items. "It should be interesting here at the Ministry, especially since we are working together now."

Quote:

Originally Posted by Zoe

"Yes way," Tancred confirmed, quite amused with the way Willy reacted. With every year, his children got older. And it certainly had been long enough for them to be teenagers now. Kids grew up so fast. At that was clear by the pictures he had of them. They weren't adorable babies that needed attention anymore. Now they were teenagers that demanded attention. Parenting was tough, but he would not change it for the world.

Knowing that his friend was joking, he gave him a gentle shoulder punch. "Ouch. I'm so hurt that you don't find me handsome, Willy." He fake-pouted and rolled his eyes. He would get back at him, just you wait.

An eyebrow rose when the man said something about people getting kicked out of countries. Was he hinting at something? Rather than asking, Tancred simply moved on to the next item in his box: his coffee mug. He wasn't one to stick his nose in other people's business. "Thanks, mate," he answered, setting the mug down and going back to the box for the hacky sack and a few other miscellaneous items. "It should be interesting here at the Ministry, especially since we are working together now."

Heheheheheheh. William just chuckled at the shoulder punch and gently set the frame back down on his friend's desk. "I'm hurt that you're so sarcastic," he replied with a grin. Naw, really though, he'd leave Tanc alone for a bit. dude still needed to unpack his stuff and William should probably stop talking before he got himself in trouble with his new superior...

Getting kicked outta countries, yeah. Ahem. "Yeah, you know, between us, we have knowledge of all the major dragon reservations in Europe." Willy twiddled a quill between his left thumb and first finger. "Now we just need some action." And NOT of the mutant kind, thanks. Just to check, William pulled open one of his desk drawers and made sure his spare pair of pants were still there.

Whew, okay. No one had removed those over the break.

Jose has sent two owls to the other staff members on the post team to see if they would kindly meet him at his desk to brainstorm what shops in diagon alley would each person take. It was best to split them the ways to ensure the word out got fast and if anyone had any issues they could contact the department right away. Sitting there he sipped his coffee.

Ember Was having a LOT of fun in the game--and when William lost, she laughed quiiiite a bit, hehe. And when Harmony showed the prizes--she wouldn't get the squiiiish!toy! she squeeee-ed a little on the inside! A cute little wind up owl?! She adored it! She would name it and put it on her desk and UGH. It was cute. She was excited.

Aaaaaand--down to business! She listened carefully to her boss and nodded. FIRST ASSIGNMENT. And they MIGHT get to go to DA and talk to people! Ooooh Ember sure hoped so because--well--that would be fuuun! And she could get an ice cream--stop and get some caaandy. ANd. you know. Do work, too, duh. She followed Jose--who was in CHARGE--into the work area and just sighed and smiled at hime. "Hi. I'm Ember, in case you didn't catch my name, love," she said in a generally friendly way, twirling her turquoise hair around in her finger. While they waited for the other person, she just kind of...put her hands on her hips and looked around..wow. She was really here...working..at the ministry...

"And I've already been thinking--there are eighteen or so shops in Diagon--there's only two of us--" and then she made a face. "Sure there are more in pest division, right? Maybe they just missed the meeting?" She tilted her head a bit. But maybe not. He would know...

His head was in his coffee cup as he heard someone come his way "HI Ember!" he said as she looked rather excited. "yes, your correct. But I think its best to only go to the shops that have any type of food in them, I think those are the places that would be targeted by the churpuflzes." he said as he thought that it was best not to give the people to much information.

"lets just pop in and say if they have any questions or concerns that they can contact us and just have a quick look around.. its best not to scare them and just give them as little information as possible" he looked over at the lady. "what do you think?" he asked, it would be less shops and totally quicker too.

Ember smiled. "Jose...right?" she asked, thinking back to the meeting. They were both pest people, then?! Heh. This should be so much fun! He wasn't old--he was cute--eager to woooork--they would make a great pair!

Wait. Cute?! Ember just shook her head and focused on the task at hand. PESTS. She wondered if he was a junior one, like her, or a senior one--hmm. She would ask him eventually.

At his suggestion..she just...nodded..."Right. Well. Maybe at least a bit of information?" She didn't want them to not be able to spot if they had pests or not? "But I agree--too much might just scare them." Churpuflzes...hmm. She remembered hearing about the infestation at the ministry not too long ego. "How many of the places sell food? I know there's Leaky and Florean's..." she said softly. "What about the places with animals, too?" Since there would be animal food in the storages and whatnot. She just wanted to make sure that they did their job well. Ember was a bit of a perfectionist!

She was excited. New assignments after such a long stay away from work. She couldn't stay still during that time and she was almost driven crazy from staying still for so long.

Uli heard a soft 'hoot' after the meeting had finished and they had been given their assignments, they'd be getting to head down to Diagon Alley and looked over to see an owl fly over to her. Looks like she's going to meet up with the rest of her division to figure out who was doing what in which shop. She headed over to the desk she had been asked to meet this 'Jose' person at and spotted another person at the desk, talking to a man sitting at the desk, cup in hand.

She walked up and gave a short wave. "Seems like I'm the last one here" she chuckled. I'm guessing that you're Jose? She looked between the two, and stopped at the other woman that was standing at the desk. You must be another of the Pest Division, eh? She grinned. Uli's the name, if you didn't know and I take it you've been brainstorming on what we should do?

Jose nodded to Ember when she said his name.. "Yes i am" he gave her a kind smile.. it was so good to be working with people and nice people to honest, so far he had no issues with anyone. "yes, I agree.. a little bit of information is completely fine" while he was talking he felt like he was being a bit stiff.. he needed to loosen up a tad, these were his co-workers.. he could have fun..

Taking another sip of the awesome coffee he listened to her talk.. "hmmmm.. they like to ride on the backs of other animals so were down to food places like you mentioned… the leaky, Florean's, the joke shop and the sweet shop.. and pretty much the pet shops as well.. we will also have to check out Knockturn Alley" he added as he heard another person come up to him and Ember.



Ohh another employee, great more people to spread out. "don't worry your not late" he said to the new comer as he took more sips of his coffee.. "we've just discussed which shops get priority over others." he told the other girl and she was talking about the pest division.. "yes that is us" he smiled as she also gave her name.. "Very nice to meet you Uli.. I'm Jose Mora, Junior Pest Advisor." he didn't want to be rude and introduce Ember for her but he gave her an encouraging look to let her know that he was done introducing himself. more coffee and he was going to need it because they had a bunch of work to do.

Ember looked up as someone else joined them! Yay! She beamed and could have HUGGED the girl--only she didn't because...well...weiiiirrrd! She just remained smiley and nodded. "Hi, Uli--yes, I'm new, Ember--just graduated Uni--" she explained, and she was happy someone else had joined them because now the task seemed WAY less daunting, right?

She let Jose do the explaining to her, and just nodded lots and lots and smiled here and there. Right. He was taking her suggestion about the pet shops! Whooooh! She felt PRODUCTIVE. Now to work!

"So we have Florean's, Leaky, Weasley's, Sugarplum's--" she named the ones that had food. "And then The Owl Emporium and The Menagerie as well--" uhuh. And oh no. He mentioned Knockturn? She made a face. "Should we do KNockturn together?" she asked. She knew SHE wouldn't feel comfortable there all by herself. That did NOT seem like her cup of tea at all. And her hair would probably attract...unwanted attention.

"So...who should get which shops? And what exactly should we tell them about pest control? We should make little simple fliers for them to keep in the back--easy enough to whip up--I think we should all be on the same page about what we say and whatnot." Riiiiight?

The dark haired witch gave a weird, questioning smile to the other witch who was nothing but smiles. How can anyone be so.....happy? Smiley? She didn't know. They then went back to business. Uli nodded when Ember named off the shops they would be stopping to first. They all had food, that she knew, and any creature would love to get their teeth into anything they could eat. Knockturn Alley was mentioned. As much as she didn't want to admit it, there were shops in the creepy part of Diagon Alley that had creature sensitive merchandise too.

"I agree with Ember, Knockturn Alley should be handled together, to avoid stirring up trouble. Personally, I think that should be handled last, but that's me." She looked between her two co-workers.

Listening to Ember talk she had just graduated.. wow this made him feel very old, but it was nice to hear the girls talking and then she was listing off the places.. "Yes that sounds like a plan to me" he said as she didn't sound to excited about going into Knockturn Alley. "there aren't to many shops so we can go to Knockturn Alley together" he didn't want to send two women to that scary place even if they were together, not that he didn't believe that they couldn't handle themselves but he was just being a wary wart. Uli… that a girl she said the same thing as him.

Smiling at them he wrote down the list of shops they needed to visit.

looking at his list he thought that it would work and that should cover all the shops. "looks like theres only ten places to go. we will be done in no time" he told the ladies with a smile.

"No, I completely agree, Uli. Last and together." Lots of nodding and widening of her eyes at Jose so that he would agree, too. Even if he didn't agree, she and Uli could just do it together themselves, yes?

She had never even BEEN down Knockturn--oh, well, yes she had, but only once, and it was for gardening purposes. But luckily she had found other alternatives to going down to the sketchy part of Diagon. "Yep, all sounds good. We should decide who gets what shops, now?" She asked Jose, since he was in charge. "Should we just go down the list? Like you get the first three, I get the next three, and Uli gets the last three?" And there was still...one more..Knockturn, which they would all do together! How wonderful! Hehe. "Does that sound good to you two?" she asked quickly, looking both excited and..flushed and whatnot. SQUEEEE. Her first real 'mission' from her boss! It would be so FUN!

COULD SHE USE A CLIPBOARD?! She would SOOO use a clipboard! Yep yep! "We will be starting this...tomorrow?" she asked. "We should also go over what to say--I wasn't here for the chizpurfle invasion--" she said with wide eyes.

She thought Jose and Uli were being so NICE and PATIENT and ugh! Good coworkers were amazing! Ember would have HUGGED them had she not thought it was completely bonkers to do! But she hoped ONE day she would close enough to her fellows that she could be all the hugggggy that she wanted to beeee!

Uli smiled at their agreement and folded her arms across her chest. Not in annoyed or angry way, but in a comfortable way. Who knew that her group would be so, well, agreeing and not the arguing and bickering types. "Sounds like a plan to me" she said when Ember gave the idea of just going down the list and assigning who should get what shops. "Simple and easy way to assign who gets what." Her eyebrows went up then down when she spoke. Ember mentioned on what they needed to say, she joined it. "Nor was I" she chuckled. "Don't want to start assignments going in not knowing what to say, they'd think you don't know how to do your job!"

She looked over to the list of shops Jose wrote down. "Shouldn't take too long" she murmured, looking at the last three shops on the list, before Knockturn.

Weasley's Wizard Wheezes, Magical Menagerie, Sugarplums Sweet Shop. Those would be her three and they weren't really that far apart from each other.

Luckily with her job, January didn't have to stay inside all day. She got to travel a little bit around the area and then come back to file things away. That's what she was doing today. Filing. Putting together the paperwork of the closed files and organizing them all into one place. Writing reports, too. Those were always SO much fun. Hah.

She didn't pay much attention to who was already there at the office. January really just wanted to get it done. Once it was, she could go home and relax. Maybe she'd go over to Vic and Lucie's for dinner...

Well... okay. They would talk by his desk. William said nothing more but gestured for Alysson to walk with him. He led her to his desk and let her have his seat, while he borrowed one from another desk.

Oh, JanJan was in! He gave her a tiny wave but not a smile, because..... William didn't feel much like smiling right now. Today had been too strange for that. Instead, he just waited for Aly to say something.

Alysson did in fact notice January but didn't really acknowledge her. Not because she was trying to be rude but mainly because it only occured to her that they HAD in fact just passed the other woman when they'd already reached William's desk.

Maybe she could go say hi after...this.

Sitting down in his offered seat, Alysson, too, waited. For William to say something. Which he apparently wasn't going to do. That became clear after a few seconds (minutes? days? weeks? months?) of silence.

"You really ARE avoiding our level." Which they'd discussed but somehow Alysson hadn't thought he'd actually do it.

So......... how bout that silence then? It gave him time to think about the weirdest trip to the Healers he'd ever had.... until Alysson spoke, of course. Then he paid attention to her.

"Yeah," he confirmed. "Yeah I am. Avoiding. No one on that floor really cares for me, it seems. I don't think I'm missed." He cleared his throat softly and picked up a pen from his desk so he'd have something to twirl/play with in his hands. "Look, Alysson--- you didn't have to come all the way up here to remind me of that. I'm fine with minding my own business." On his own floor. Keeping to himself, as good employees did.

"........"

It didn't happen too often that Alysson found herself at a loss of what to say. And it was particularly rare for that to happen twice in ten minutes. As it were though, she was once again just looking at William, her brain trying to comprehend what he'd just said. And insinuated.

She swallowed, her eyes trying to search his. "You know that's not true." Or did he? He should. Alysson folded her hands in her lap, suddenly feeling majorly out of place for no apparent reason.

"I do care."

Did he? Did he know that wasn't true? Or did she want him to think that wasn't true? Because she wasn't doing a very convincing job of making him think --- or feel --- otherwise. But William's slightly raised eyebrows said all of that. His brown eyes broke away from hers after a moment and down at his pen again.

"You sound like you're trying to convince yourself of that, Alysson, and... I don't want you to have to do that." She didn't have to pretend to care for him, honest. "I'd rather....." be left alone? "Just not pretend, okay? You don't have to go through the motions with me."

He didn't believe her.

Aly lowered her gaze to the pen in his hands as well, without actually seeing it. What was he......she WAS convinced. Only he clearly wasn't. And that was all her fault. He probably had every right to doubt her feelings for him. "I do care." She said it more quietly this time, fully aware that it probably did not convince him either. Saying things multiple times didn't make them sound more genuine.

"I'm sorry." She looked back up at him then. "I..." ???? "I'm sorry it took me so long to come here." It really wasn't about that but it was the best she could do for now. It was a start at least.

Shrugging seemed to be all William was capable of at the moment. So shrug again he did. He shrugged at her insistence that she cared and shrugged at her apology, if that's what that was.

What did she want him to say? Willy set the pen down on his desk and let out a soft sigh, followed by a long and tense pause.

"I don't think this is working," he admitted finally. This meaning.... them. As a couple. Who never saw each other and were too proud and/or stubborn to admit fault. Something like that. It was making him uncomfortable and awkward and a little bit sad.

Or it was an ending.

Because apparently the conversation was over now. Not just the conversation. Them. Aly inhaled sharply, but apart from that did not show any sign that she was surprised by his words. She wasn't. It was her job to be good at picking up on things. Now she just felt sad. She kept her eyes downcast for a few moments of silence.

Then she looked back up. "I'm sorry. I'm just not good at...I'm..." Alysson was usually good with words but right now the ability to form full sentences was failing her. So with a sigh she simply got up from her chair.

She wiped at her cheeks absently before taking a small step closer to him. "I do care. And I'm....I'm sorry you don't know that." Because that was obviously her fault. She smoothed out her skirt and took a deep breath.

Okay.

Well, he'd said it. Said what he thought and felt. But didn't Alysson have anything to say about in return? William peeked at her as the silence grew, but what he saw in her expression wasn't a comfort at all. And now she was standing up to go, so he found himself awkwardly standing up too, like a tall pole in her way.

"I-- I'm---" wait, was she crying?! He hadn't expected her to cry! Honestly! That wasn't.... what.... Willy swallowed a lump in his throat but kept his hands by his side uselessly, both of them curling inward to a fist. He couldn't just give her a hug now, not when he'd said things weren't working out. But she deserved more than that, right? More of an explanation?

"I don't feel the same way about you anymore," he finally found his words, "as I did.... back when we went on that matchmaker date.... I-- I care about you, but I want-- I want us to be happy. I want you to be happy. I don't think you're really happy with me." And he was sort of admitting that he wasn't happy either. Despite distance no longer being an issue, he seemed to see less of her than ever, and it wasn't working for him when he did see her.

Sorry? :[ He had a bit of a helpless expression as he looked down at her.

Alysson just wanted to leave.

She didn't want to discuss this any further. She didn't want to talk about it or think about it in his presence. It was done. Over. Finished. It hadn't been feeling right for a while now but she'd chosen to ignore it, simply hoping that it would get better again. That didn't mean she hadn't been aware of the fact that they'd been drifting apart. It was just........sad.

"Sorry." She wiped at her eyes and cheeks again in an attempt to remove all traces of tears. "It's...you're right." And then she forced a laugh as if to convince him that she was fine. FUNNY. No it really wasn't but she was sort of running on autopilot right now. She just wanted to leave. Why had they done this in here. At work. In his office. At his desk.

There probably wasn't a WORSE place for this than here.

Looking up at him she hesitated for a second before raising her head to give him a lingering kiss on the cheek. "I need to go." And with that she stepped around him. She just wanted to leave.

So now would....not be a good time to ask if they could still remain friends?

William was getting the impression that Alysson wanted very much to leave, and for him to shut up so that she could just leave. So he obliged, surprised to hear her agreeing with him and apologizing and.... laughing?! "Don't," he muttered softly, "don't be sorry." She hadn't done anything wrong, really, they just hadn't worked out is all.

The surprises continued when his now-ex gave him a peck on the cheek and walked away. He didn't look after her, no, he just numbly touched his cheek where she had kissed him. Eventually, William put the spare chair back and then calmly walked back around to his desk and sat down.

Well...... that was done. Um. What had he been working on earlier today?