with your eyes so bright
Louis knows Anna's off in South America or what-have-you saving the rainforests and their inhabitants for two more months, so he feels absolutely no guilt in breaking into her apartment to try and convince her evil coffeemaker to give him some coffee (The wondrous mysteries of the Muggle world are many, but coffee is Louis' favorite. Louis loves coffee. Louis. Loves. Coffee.)
That - changes a bit when he is confronted by the (very) pregnant woman lying on Anna's couch.
"Hell-o?" Louis says, in surprise.
The woman on the couch mutters a rather long stream of swear words – in French, mind you (and Louis has never been less thankful for Cousin Mathilde's lessons) – before she mutters, "Get me tea." In an accent thick as – well, things which are thick. Like walls. Or Hugo.
"Er?" Louis says, still thinking of thick things (Maria at the paper, and possibly the doorman downstairs). "What – ?"
"Je v - Tea. I want tea, and I am not getting up now, so do it." she says, hands on her belly, teeth clenched.
Louis has... had experience with pregnant women (Luckily, Dom had all her babies in Romania, but Rosie was a total nightmare, and, sweet Circe, don't even get him started on Lucy), so he slips silently into the kitchen with a slightly panicked look at the stove.
"S'pose it's just you and me, then, haha," he mutters as to the kettle as it steams and whistles. He sticks his head back out the door.
"So, err," he begins.
Should he guess if it's, er, Madame or not?
What if she's like Lily, and it's somewhere in between, but mentioning it will just make her burst into tears, because stupid Colin Longbottom's a prick and is actually nervous about proposing but won't admit it or just get over himself and do it, for Merlin's sake – though, obviously, this girl isn't sort-of-engaged to Colin Longbottom – well, she'd better not be, or Louis will have to kill both of them.
Nothing personal, obviously – just family.
"Are you another of Anna's charity cases?" he says instead (rather cleverly avoiding the name issue).
"Charity?" she says in outrage, whipping around to give him a terrifying glare (from a pair of rather pretty blue eyes, but really not the point right now, go away, Louis' libido). "How dare you," she says, in the same offended tone. "I am... a friend," she continues, tossing her hair and turning back around, "I am visiting."
All right, so... not so clever, then.
Good.
Great.
"Aaaagh," he hisses at the kettle, withdrawing into the kitchen "I need backup." (Anna's been exposing him to the wonders of television, too. Old police procedurals, in particular.)
The kettle gives a sympathetic whistle, and a little puff of steam.
"Well, at least I have you," he mutters to it, beginning to prepare the tea, "So…" Louis begins, again, just this side of too intimidated to stick his head back out, "What are you doing in … here?" That's a reasonable topic, isn't it? Ask strange women why they're in his best friend's apartment?
She whirls towards him with another fierce look, and then turns back. "It is not – It is none of your business." She says loudly, and Louis winces. Good plan, Weasley. Or not. Very not.
He lets out a despairing sigh and turns back to the tea. He hesitates a bit before pouring it out, and then dumps it into the largest cup he can find. He grabs his familiar mug off the shelf where Anna's left it, peers hesitantly out of the kitchen again, and mutters, "I dunno how you take your tea -"
"Plain – no milk."
"– Oh. Right…" He pulls his head back, and then pops out once more, "Sugar?"
"Two spoons."
"Okay. Good. And -"
"Nothing else."
"Okay. Okay, cool."
Louis walks out with the two full mugs, concentrating on not spilling anything before he reaches the sofa, then sets hers carefully on the table before retreating behind his own. She really is quite pretty, he thinks wistfully, and if she wasn't so … completely and utterly terrifying, he would probably… not be … hiding behind his tea. In front of her.
He has a sudden vision of Dom derisively muttering that he is an embarrassment to humankind, and he abruptly sets the mug of tea down, just in time to hear the woman muttering what is most definitely a cooling charm – ha!
"You're a witch!" he exclaims excitedly, only briefly pausing to admire the fact that she's actually hidden her wand up her sleeve. "Hi! I mean, well, yeah, hello, but – I'm a witch, too! Wizard! You know."
She stares at him uncomprehendingly, "A wizard? But Anna, she is a -"
"A Muggle, yeah, but I met her after I finished at Hogwarts and started at the magazine – ooh, wait, did you go to Beauxbatons? My mum went there, she says it was brilliant – well, is, still. Wanted both of my sisters to go as well – anyway, you don't have to Obliviate me or anything, is all I'm saying – I've even – no, never mind, I left my wand at home again. But, hey! This is good!"
She's now staring at him as though he's a particularly stupid animal evidencing signs of intelligence, or an exotic rug that's begun to tap dance.
"I do not – did not - come hoping to find … other wizards," She tells him, enunciating the words slowly.
Louis can almost feel his cloud of excitement sailing away into the depths of time and space. "O-oh," He mutters, stymied, "Er."
He's tempted to go for his tea again, but he sits out the awkward lull in conversation, picking at a hole in his jeans as she stares at him over her mug. She finally blows at the steam hovering over her mug and says, carefully, "We have not been introduced…?"
"Oh. Yeah. Louis, I'm Louis." He gives an uncomfortable half-wave, and begins seriously debating the merits of self-mutilation, or whatever that Japanese-person-suicide-y thing is actually called. Anna would know, he thinks wistfully.
She nods, and blows awkwardly on her tea again. Louis fleetingly considers the idea that she might not quite as much older than him as he'd thought, and then hides it when she looks back up at him, in case she can read minds. Or something.
"I am Noemie," she offers slowly, and then sets down her cup.