Lives Lived and Lives Lost

Life #20: Dog groomers

Life # 20: That time Harry and Tom were dog groomers

Innsbruck, Austria, 1985

"I cannot believe it's come to this," Tom muttered as she moved the clippers over the small dog's back. "I used to be a feared Dark Lord. Now look at me. I'm grooming a Shit Zu."

Harry snorted and wiped her forearm across her forehead to get rid of some sweat. "You mean Shih Tzu. And stop complaining. I thought you were done being a Dark Lord after that disastrous attempt twenty lives ago." Harry studiously avoided Tom's affronted gaze, though she was unable to hold back a grin. Who knew that one day Harry Potter would be able to joke around with Tom Riddle about being Lord Voldemort?

They truly had come a long way in the twenty lives they'd led so far and it frequently still amazed Harry that they'd eventually had become friends with the person who'd caused them so much grief in their first life. It had taken ten lives before they'd called each other a friend but since that moment their relationship had grown in ways that Harry could never have imagined. They'd even gotten married and raised a family together in life number 15 and 18.

Who'd have thought? The Dark Lord who'd once taken Harry's family away from him had given him two whole new, loving families in return.

Tom rolled her eyes but kept suspiciously silent as she continued to shave the small dog on her table.

"Do you want my dog instead?" Harry was soaked pretty much top to bottom as she was busy deshedding a massive St Bernhard named Ruben that barely fit in the specialized metal bathing tub.

Tom gave Harry a careful look before shaking her head and turning her attention back to her own canine customer. Some of Tom's red curls had come loose from her ponytail and it gave her an adorably frazzled look. "I'll stick to my Shit Zu, thank you. I'm just saying that as far as career choices go, this isn't something I'd ever expected I'd end up doing."

Harry turned the water back on and vigorously moved the nozzle across the St Bernhard's side. Large, wet clumps of hair fell to the bathing tub floor. "At least we have a normal life and a career this time."

"There is that," Tom said quietly in absolute agreement, head ducked as she concentrated on shaving her dog's front legs.

Their previous life, number 19, they'd met in 2077 as young adults in Portugal, where they'd both been born. Well, what had been left of Portugal, because some five years prior the world had pretty much ended in a nuclear holocaust. A couple of countries got in a pissing match, one crazy leader pressed the red button, other crazy leaders followed his example and that was all it took to create an apocalypse filled with destruction and radiation, quickly followed by a nuclear winter that lasted for years. Harry and Tom had both been men and they'd tried to eke out an existence for a few decades in a world that was far too cold and far too empty. Eventually, when it became clear that Tom had gotten cancer, probably in his bones, they'd both ended it with a quick slash to their wrists.

It had been an interesting experience, to say the least. It had also been their first time living in a world that was no longer recognizable as the type of human society they'd been used to. All central governments the world over were gone, with only small, local communities barely hanging on through famine and disease.

So it had been a bit of a relief to be reborn in Austria in fairly modern times. They had met a few years prior, when Tom had been fresh out of school and working the reception desk of a small hotel. Harry had been training as an official dog groomer at that point and had persuaded Tom to join her so they could eventually start their own little business. They now had a busy grooming salon attached to their small home on the outskirts of Innsbruck, one of Austria's most beautiful cities. Yeah, as far as Harry was concerned, they had gotten plenty lucky this time around.