Slipping into the booth, he placed the walking cane to one side, eyebrows raising at the young waitress who skipped over to take his order.
"Coffee?" she drawled in her thick bronx accent, holding the pot out towards him.
"No, tea please" he requested in his clipped English accent "and toast, done on one side"
The girl frowned at his odd request before skipping away.
He stared out into the cold December morning watching the New Yorkers hurry along the sidewalk going about their daily business.
He listened to the conversations of the people in the diner, smiling to himself at their ignorance to all that had taken place over the summer in England. If ignorance is bliss, then they were certainly a blissful group. He gripped his Father's walking cane remembering why he was in New York. Not in hiding, no, but working with the American Ministry to help draw out those remaining Death Eaters who had fled after the War to New York.
In the aftermath of the War, his Father in Azkaban, his mother trying to lead a life of seclusion and anonymity, it was down to him to repair the damage; to rebuild their lives and reclaim their name. Working with the Ministry was his way of achieving this. He had learnt, a hard and painful way, that modesty would set them free: property only bred notoriety. It took more than combat gear to make a man and thus he confronted his enemies not as a soldier of War but as a hit wizard, in a sharp suit, crisp robes and his Father's cane at his side.
The waitress brought over his tea and toast and he smiled before turning to the sound of the bell above the door. In walked the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life, and she turned, her warm hazel gaze searching the diner as she took off her overcoat and gloves, running her hands through her curls. Spotting her partner and lover, the young woman smiled, before sliding into the booth signalling the young girl to come and take her order of coffee and a bagel as though she were a true New Yorker.
Turning to him she grinned "Having fun, Draco?"
He quirked an eyebrow at her "I feel like an illegal alien, being an Englishman in New York, Granger."