Ten years after I began at Hogwarts, Sebastian Sallow is back. And he's Professor Sallow now. He disappeared after the fall of Ranrok and Rookwood, after I lost Professor Fig, and after Ominis and I couldn't keep him from losing himself. But I never...
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"Good MOOORRNiiingggg, SirrROOOOnnaaaa!"
I sing an awkward melody of random notes, as obnoxiously as I do every morning, upon bounding through the doors of the the Three Broomsticks, mere steps from my home's front door.
Sirona Ryan, the inn's keeper and everyone's friend, rolls her eyes and gives me a pity laugh as she tends to a few early-morning guests who are sitting, and now stiffening in their surprise of me, at the bar and various tables around the main room. She says it's not funny anymore since I do it every. single. day. I'm committed to it, now. At least that's what I tell myself - that I'm in too deep. But I know myself well enough to know I enjoy being silly, and dancing on the line between the ridiculous and mildly irritating is a particular specialty of mine.
"Oh, it's still funny, Sirona. It'll never not be funny." She'll laugh again one day. She'll see.
"If you say so!" A smile secures into the corners of her mouth. There it is.
I half sit, half lean against a stool at the high bar counter as I wait for Sirona to come around. I can't wait to tell her about Professor Weasley's letter. I can't wait for a hot mug of coffee. But most of all, I can't wait to tell her about my dream. Phew! Absolutely wild.
In actuality, I'm not certain she'd claim our friendship to be as close as I would. I'm sure she has a way of making everyone feel the way she makes me feel -- that we're the closest of all. But I don't mind. I tell her everything, regardless. And I'm grateful for her listening ear, support, and confidence. Friends like her have been difficult to make since I graduated Hogwarts, and difficult to keep from Hogwarts as we've all gone our separate ways.
Sirona has rooted for me since the beginning, and I, her, as long as I've known her. I run the occasional errand for her and supply her with a steady stream of wild herbs, fruits, and vegetables I find on my walks, adventures, and work assignments. I can't stop myself from collecting interesting things, and it's a mutually beneficial synthesis for me to not have to worry about what to do with everything I pick up. The secrets she keeps for me (and the pity laughs) are payment enough.
As gracefully as a ballerina's well-practiced pirouette, Sirona glides behind the bar, plucks a singular mug from a lone hook towards the back corner, and suspends it in the air with a flick of her wand before it crashes to the floor. She guides it to me with a swish as a small, spherical glass pot with an ornate brass handle and flange joins the mug in the air, pouring as it goes, both landing gently on the counter in front of me.
"You're a goddess."
"I know!" She winks. "I still don't understand how you Americans actually enjoy that."
"Mmmm! Mud water!" I growl, using Sirona's favorite coffee synonym, as I sip from the edge of my delicious, hot black coffee, peering up through my eyebrows and bouncing them playfully towards Sirona.
