They walked outside to the street at the back of The Leaky Cauldron and caught the Night bus toGilderoy's address on the other side of London. When they got off, Molly looked doubtfully at the great, dark hulk of a building that stoodbefore them. It looked like a disused office block from the outside,but she knew that nothing in the wizarding world was at firstas it seemed, so she held her judgement until they got inside.
Gilderoy tapped his wand on a notice, by a boarded up entrance, which said "Extreme Danger, falling masonry, do not enter". A smart red door appeared and they walked through itinto a large airy hallway, with an attendantsdesk at the far end. Gilderoy sailed past the desk confidently, waving and smiling to the rather plump man behind it. The man looked up at them, waved back and nodded with a curious smile towards Molly, who smiled back awkwardly.
They got into a magical lift,which took them directly to Gildy's front door and after he said a password to open it, they went in.
"Well.. here it is, my humble abode!" Gildy announced, indicating with his hand and hanging up his cloak on a hat stand.
Molly was taken aback, as it wasn't quite what she was expecting. She knew it was probably going to be comfortable and quite luxurious, going by Gildy's usual tastes, but she hadn't imagined anything as extravagant as this. She took in her surroundings, her mouth open in astonishment; tapestries and paintings hung on red and gold painted walls, vases and strange looking sculptures were dotted around on stands, tables or chests of drawers and alarge chandelier hung from the ceiling. A huge, black, velvet covered sofa dominated the middle of the room, with red and gold cushions scattered over it and an equally large black onyx coffee table sat in front of it. Another thing that caught her eye, was a magical painting of a naked lady with her back to the viewer,who was standing in an old-fashioned bathroom. She was washing her self with a cloth and quietly humming a little tune, seemingly oblivious to being observed. Molly raised her eyebrows and shrugged, "Well, there's no accounting for taste." she thought -rather disapprovingly.
Gilderoy, meanwhile, had disappeared into the kitchen, shouting out that he was going to start dinner. He told her that under no circumstances was she to come in and try and help and should just sit back, relax and put her feet up. Molly hadn't needed telling twice and got comfortable on the huge sofa, still curiously taking in her surroundings. An exclamation could be heard coming from his direction, but she just presumed that something must have gone wrong with dinner. As he had told her he didn't want her to come and help, she didn't go and see what though and stayed where she was, even though she really wanted to.
After a few minutes Gildy came back in carrying two glasses and a bottle in his hands and wearing a big grin on his face.
As he sat down beside her, Molly looked at him questioningly.
"What's this in aid of Gildy?" she asked, taking the glass he proffered to her.
Gilderoy could hardly contain himself.
"Well, I suppose I'd better show you!" he said excitedly, showing her a photograph of him self, standing in front of a rather grotty looking building. "I've just this minute been owled - we are now the proud owner of our very own business premises! I didn't know if we were going to get it and now we have!I've been waiting for quite some time for something as good as this to come up, I can tell you. Now,I knowthat maybeI should havetold you first,beforeI bought it, but I didn't want you to get disappointed if we didn't get it, so Ithought I'd keepit quiet until I had it confirmed in writing!" he finished enthusiastically, obviously expecting an equally excited reaction from Molly.
Molly was a little under-whelmed, she recognised the picture as one of the shops in Knockturn alley, one of the better ones admittedly, but not exactly what she'd had in mind. Shewas alsoannoyed that he hadn't discussed it with her first, but knowing what an impetuous person Gildy could be,she knew that thought probably hadn't occuredto him. Nevertheless, she felt thatshe had to show gratitude, as she'd been asking him for a while what they were going to do about premises and he'd obviously thought she'd be pleased.Previously he'd alwaysseemed to skirt the issue, always telling her he hadn't found anything suitable yet, whenever Molly had brought it up so she'd even offered to find something herself, to which hehad replied "No Molly, you have enough to deal with, I'll sort something out for us soon, I promise." She had been worried he'd been putting it off for some reason, while all this time he must have been searching high and low on the quiet and had wanted to surprise her.
"Well.. I..I don't know what to say Gildy! I'm...I'm just a bit taken aback I suppose, as all this time you've been telling me you hadn't found anything yet, so.." She said, hesitatingly, but on seeing his crestfallenexpression, she took a closerlook at the picture, frowning thoughtfully. "Well...I suppose we could make it look better with a lick of paint and a new frontage," she said, brightening, trying to show a bit more enthusiasm.
But then, he looked a little awkward, "Ah well Molly..ahem ..I meant to tell you, but I supposeI got a little carried away with the moment! I'm afraid, we do only have the top floor, so we can't really do anything like that"
"Oh" Molly said dully, her enthusiasm fading again
"Yes.. the building is owned by the people who run the shop on the bottom floor, so we can't do a lot to the outside without their permission, apart from putting up a sign and they don't really like change that much so.." he explained apologetically. Then he brightened considerably and startedsmiling again, "but the inside is yours to decorate as you wish Molly. You can have free reignon that and you cando whateveryou like, as I'm sure you have excellent taste - just like me! And anyway how much room do we need? We only need somewhere to store paperwork and potions don't we?"
After Molly had nodded her conceded agreement, he began to open the bottle of wine using magic. It took a little while, as he kept having to say the correct pulling out spell several different ways before he got it right. Molly felt tempted to help him, but it was obvious he was trying to impress her, so she just waited patiently instead mulling things over.
Her initial worries on the location and size of the property, had now faded somewhat, asGilderoy had managed to successfully convince her it would be alright. "What does it matter where we are based?" She reasoned "As most people are now finding us through word of mouth anyway and won't even have to come to our office, so it I'm sure itwon't matter what it looks like - or where it is."
Thereluctant cork suddenly came flying out from the bottle, after Gildyhad managed to say the spellcorrectly at last. It wentspeeding across to the other side of the room like a bullet out of a gun and embedded itself firmly in the wall. This madeMolly give out a little squeal of surprise as it had narrowly missed her face. Gilderoy, of course,directed the blame squarely at the bottle, saying that there must have been too much pressure inside it, makingthe corkreact a little violently to being released. He poured the wine into both of their glasses and they clinked them together in celebration, before drinking.Gilderoy quicklyemptied his glass, then went back to the kitchen to check on dinner.
Mollywas veryimpressed, with him doing them a meal, as he hadn't seemed the type to do his own cooking. Arthur had never cooked all the time they had been married, well at least not in the house. Then she remembered that it might have been due to the fact that he had said that, whenever he tried, she began "looking over his shoulder and nagging." But shefelt this was just and excuse though, as from her point of view, she wasn't "nagging", she wasonly trying to help by offering him constructive criticism.
After a few more minutes Gilderoy brought dinner in, setting it down on a rather overlarge dining room table with tall backed chairs, just outside the kitchen. As Molly walked over, he dimmed the lights a little and put on some soft music. Molly thought that he may have done it to make her feel more relaxed, but it only served to make her more nervous as it seemed to make it more intimate. Shealready felt a bit guilty about being there without Arthur knowing and she wished she had told him the truth on the note she had left for him, as for the first time in their twenty years plus of marriage she had lied to him. The note said:
"Gone to do a job at a client's house, seeing as you aren't going to be in and I may not be back until late."
They both sat down at one corner of the table and Gilderoy refilled Molly's now empty glass with more wine. The food he had prepared really was delicious and she enjoyed it very much, for the most part the fact that she hadn't had to cook it! When she complimentedhim on it, he went all false modesty, sayingthat itwas just something he "whipped up". In reality though he was very flattered by her remarks, as he loved to be thought of as good at something, even if he wasn't.
The sad truth was that Gilderoy couldn't actually cook at all, he had used a little magicaltrickery. He had got hold of an old muggle cooker, from one of his dubious associates, that had been 'magically enhanced'. All you had to do was put in all the required ingredients on a tray into the oven part, tell the cooker what you wanted it to cook, then it would do it for you and call you with a little bleep when it was done. Using a muggle appliance like this was of course illegal, but that didn't bother Gilderoy one bit, as he felt the risk of getting caught was quite small in the present climate.
After they had eaten, Gilderoy told Molly to go and sit down on the overlarge sofa again, while he went to get some more wine. Molly didn't usually drink much, and only then at parties and special occasions, but tonight shewanted to enjoy herselfa bit, for once and also hoped it might relieve her nerves a little.
They chatted for a while about general things and observances and Molly did begin to relax,then they came to a lull in conversation. Gildy was sitting with his head proppedup one arm, smiling at her intently. Molly, smiled back, wishing he wouldn't look at her like that, as it made her feel uncomfortable. She felt a blush steadily start to creep over her cheeks, so she looked down to try and hide it.
"Why so tense Molly? You're not still worried about being here are you?" Gilderoy drawled softly, reaching out to touch her shoulder with the hand he'd been leaning on.
"Of course not! Why should I be?" Molly answered trying to sound convincing, but his touch had made her blush even more. The way she felt about him made it very difficult to be in such close proximity without a little awkwardness.
He gave her an amused and unconvinced look.
"Oh Molly...just relax! We're just two friends enjoying a pleasant evening together, that's all. What could be wrong with that? He said smiling, his hand squeezing her shoulder gently, as if to comfort her.
"Nothing.. I suppose..." Molly answered falteringly, still looking down into her glass. I'm just not used to doing this sort of thing that's all. You see I've never really had the time before, what with looking after my family and everything" she added, shrugging and looking up briefly to smile at him.
"Well you should get used to doing this sort of thing! It's about time you started thinking about 'you' a little bit more Molly, as you have always put others and your family first, and they don't even appreciate it! You put yourself down far too much sometimes as well and you shouldn't! You're an incredibly talented woman Molly, not to mention clever, witty, creative and the owner of two of the most gorgeous brown eyes I've ever seen!" He said, making her smile with appreciation and blush even more, though shrug doubtfully. "I discovered a long time ago, that if you don't believe in your self, no one else will! All you have to do is think about what you want, then make it happen" Gilderoy added, with unusual insight. Then he reached for the bottle again to refill both their glasses.
Molly held out her glass smiling and he filled it up. She hadn't really kept an accurate count of how many she'd had and was beginning to worry about having too much. She was just thinking that this would definitely be her last glass when Gilderoy suddenly got up and walked round to the back of the sofa. Molly turned round curiously
"What are you doing Gildy?" she asked, slurring her words slightly. Her head span on this sudden movement, taking her by surprise and making her instinctively put her hand up to steady it.
"Just sit back and relax Molly, I'm going to help you get rid of all that tension" he said, gently pulling her back and unclipping the robe that fastened around her neck.
"What are you doing?" she asked, turning round again and wincing at the dizziness this caused her.
He smiled with his head on one slightly on one side. "I'm going to give you a massage of course! Now, just sit back and enjoy!"
Molly just didn't seem to have the energy to argue, so she ignored the tightening in her belly that told her this might not be a very good idea. Anyway a massage sounded nice so she smiled andtold him "Okay." Then she rather nervously leant back again trying to calm the butterflies in her tummy, which only got worse when he slid the straps of her dress down her arms a little way.
"I've been complimented on my technique you know.." he announced, beginning to rub her gently, "and I've never had any training of any kind either, I suppose it must just come naturally to me!" he added rather boastfully
After her initial reluctance, Molly gradually began to relax andget into it. She was really enjoying the wayGilderoys surprisingly deft fingers worked away on her knotted muscles and after a while she began to moan appreciatively at the wonderful sensations, she was beggining to feel. She hadn't had a massage in years, even though she had often longed for one, but there just never seemed to beenough time. She reflected on this with sadnesss, as she remembered thatArthur used to be so good with his hands too.
She closed her eyeswith sheer bliss;it waslike she was being pampered - which made a nice change.
"Molly, why don't you let me do the rest of your back?" Gildy asked after a indeterminable length of time, at least to Molly.
"I..I don't know Gildy.." Molly said uncertainly, suddenly noticing how muzzy her head felt and frowning in confusion. She felt like she was floating around underwater and couldn't seem to think clearly. One thing she did know, though, even through the fog in her brain, was that she had definitely had too much to drink andfelt an immediate need to lie down in the hope that it would calmthe spinning.
"Gildy...my head, it feels so strange.."she managed, as she fell face forward on the sofa
"That's right.. .now, let's just get this out of the way shall we?.." Gilderoy said softly. Molly felt him slowly pulling down the zip at the back of her dress and knew she should probably stop him, but she just couldn't bring her self to. It was like she was in a dream, a very nice dream, one in which all your worries and fears just didn't matter anymore.
Then she felt another sensation begin to erupt in her lower belly and she moaned as his hands began to glide up and down her back smoothly. As she sank further into the soft velvety surface of the sofa, the sensation got stronger and stronger. She couldn't work out what it was at first, although she recognised it. Gildy meanwhile although still carrying on with the massage, was fidgeting awkwardly on the edge of the seat cushion. Then suddenly he stopped with an almost theatrical sigh.
"Oh, it's no good Molly, I just can't do it like this, it's just too uncomfortable. Why don't we go to my bedroom, where there's more room?" he suggested
This normally would have set off warning bells in Molly's mind, but in her present befuddled state, it didn't and right now a bed sounded like a very good idea. She agreed and with his help, sat up, giggling at the way her head span like a top when she did. Still giggling she held on to his neck as he helped her to her feet. Standing made her head spin even more and she lurched unsteadily forward, but Gilderoy just about managed to keep her upright. For some reason she seemed to find the fact that the room was spinning extremely funny and couldn't stop giggling.
Then she began to realise what the growing sensation was in her belly. Could it be that she was actually feeling ..turned on? No that just wasn't possible, she knew she fancied Gilderoy, but to feel like this? No, you had to be in love with someone first, didn't you? Was she?..Was she in love with him? But she just couldn't think straight enough to work out what she really felt, so she gave up. She decided to worry about whether this was wrong or right later when her head had cleared a bit.
Gilderoy helped Molly stagger her way across to the bedroom and allowed her to flop onto the bed, which caused her to giggle helplessly again. Shestretched out gratefully, feeling quite dwarfedon thehuge four poster. Then she felt Gildy get on the bed next to her and hardly even noticed or caredwhen hebegan to slip off her dress completely.