Dedicated to all my darling reader's who have ever worked in a shop, because you know it's no walk in the park. Oh and WARNING: there's like one instance of bad langauge. I tried to give up swearing as my new year's resolution I lasted an hour...

The Trouble with Work.

"And as you can see there's a space for an office, and maybe even a storage space at the back. So what do you think?"

"Uh…." Ayla said hesitating.

"It's perfect. We'll take it!" Marcus replied, his enthusiasm overflowing.

"Great, give me a couple of sec's to find the paperwork and we can make this all official." the estate agent said, grinning a little too widely. Ayla had been unnerved by her straight away, she'd never know anyone so happy or less inclined to blink.

"Exactly what is this perfect for?" she asked. "We don't need a shop, do we?"

"Well, I've had an idea. I want to spend the next year saving money for the wedding. And I'm not playing professionally anymore so this seems like a good idea." he replied.

"What? What seemed like a good idea? Buying an empty shop, with no stock to sell?"

"We have stock. Or we will have by the time this place is ready."

"What stock? Where? Is it invisible? Seriously Marcus just tell me the whole story will you? I'm trying to play catch up here and you're being all mystical, Jedi-mastery on me. It's bloody annoying."

"Selling baby clothes." he said simply.

"What baby clothes?"

"My clothes. The stuff I knit."

"You don't have enough. Not enough to male any kind of profit anyway. Have you really thought about this? You know nothing about business. How is this going to work?" Ayla said, getting ever so slightly frantic.

"Yes I've though about it, I've even done some research into the area and I may not know much about business or running a shop, but I know a witch who does." he said smiling sweetly.

"You're not dragging me into this." she said sharply.

"Oh come on! All the market research I've done shows this can't fail. And we can work together. I'll make the stuff out back and you can work behind the counter selling it."

"Marcus, you've never worked in a shop so I know that you don't understand that it is hard work. It may look easy, but it's not. It's not all sitting around all day and smiling. The customers are rude and annoying, and are never, ever right. And it's long hours. I don't want to go back to standing on my feet all day, everyday."

"So you'll have a chair."

"But the customers Marcus. They're the main problem."

"They're kind of essential though. If you want to make money. You can have an assistant! Kris! She can do all the customer stuff. Plus it's people buying baby clothes, how bad can they be?"

"Probably as bad as Quidditch Players." she muttered under her breath.

"Ok guys, here's all the paperwork. I'll need a deposit, but we can sort that out back at the agency. So if you'll sign on the line?"

"Can you give us a second Candy?" Marcus asked.

"Sure!"

Marcus pulled Ayla a few steps away and looked her in the eyes.

"Think about it baby. It could be ours. How cool would that be?"

Ayla looked back into his pleading features and sighed. She glanced around at the dirty, dusty surroundings. It was a small shop at the end of a bland looking muggle street. She signed again.

"You really want this don't you?" she asked.

"It'll be great. I'll make it great, I promise."

"Oh ok. Give us the paperwork Candy, we'll take it."

"Really?" Marcus asked, almost suppressing his glee but not quite, as a grin spread over his face.

"Yeah. But you'll have to convince Kris to do customer service. She's worked in a shop before. She knows what it's like."

"How could she resist me?"

"I often wonder that myself." Ayla said to herself as her fiancé bounded away to sign the baby work.

Within months the shop was flourishing. There had been occasional hiccoughs along the way, but it seemed like there was very little to dent Marcus's overwhelming enthusiasm for his little empire. Unbeknown to Ayla, he had had the idea for sometimes and had half of his stock stored away in his attic.

The two slipped into a routine. Each morning they'd leave for work, Ayla would man the front of the shop, with Kris's help. Marcus would spend his time out the back. There he would check the stock, replacing the best sellers was a daily activity, most of his time was spent knitting. At the end of the day they would travel home together, eventually one of Jacob's granny's would drop him home, and the small family would settle in to a cosy night together, before repeating the same the next day.

"I got a call today." Marcus said one evening.

"Yeah? Big order?" Ayla asked, handing him a cup of tea as she sat next to him on the sofa.

"Uh…no."

"So who was it?"

"It was the uh, coach for a team in Bulgaria."

"What did he want? Are we moving into Quidditch uniforms now?"

"He wanted to sign me."

"Oh. What did you say?"

"I didn't know what to say. I mean I was flattered."

"But?"

"But we're doing the shop now. I talked you into it."

"You should have said yes." Ayla said simply.

"What?"

"Marcus you love to fly. You know that better than I do. And you miss it. I know you do, I've caught you gazing out the window on clear days so often it's hard not to notice."

"Yeah but…"

"But nothing. You love Quidditch. It's in you. And you love it. It's that simple. You have an opportunity to do what you love again. You should do it."

"But-"

"Stop saying but! Marcus no offence but we don't need you in the shop anymore. If anything you're just in the way. If you don't take the job I'll fire you."

"You can't fire me, it's my shop!"

"So quit. Go do what you love."

"I love working with you."

"It's not like you work with me. The only time we see each other is on the way in, the way home and lunch. You won't miss me. If anything we'll probably see more of each other this way. Call the guy back."

"We don't have a phone."

"So floo him! For fuck's sake Marcus you're making this too difficult."

"I don't want to let you down."

"So floo the coach and make me proud."

"Really?"

"Yes really. Do you think I'd have spent the last Merlin knows how long convincing you if I didn't mean it?"

"Ok." Marcus said, putting his now cold tea on the floor. "I'll go floo him."

"What team?" Ayla called as he the room.

"Krum's!" he shouted back, a huge smile echoed in his voice.

Ayla sighed as she lay back on the sofa, men were such hard work.

p.s any mistakes blame my dog, he kept barking while I was typing/reading through. More coming soon. I was going to post all the oneshots I have left but I couldn't find two, and then I did, but my backs hurting and I'm sick of typing. In other news: two essays done, three to go! Wooo.

I know I said there was only one oneshot left, I lied. I keep finding them dotted around my house. Someone come sort out a filing system for me? Please?