Nora struggled through the crowded airport, her duffle bag banging heavily against her leg. Peering over her shoulder, she could see Elaine close behind, pushing through the tightly packed people.
"You go outside and get a cab!" Elaine called, and Nora nodded back. She practically leapt into the revolving door and hurried outside, raising her arm to hail one of the curious looking black English taxicabs. As the cab pulled up, Nora heard Elaine come up beside her.
"Whew! What a crowd!" Elaine gasped. "I thought British people are supposed to be polite." Nora laughed. As the cab drove through the narrow streets of London, she felt absolutely elated. She could hardly believe they were actually here.
During their final year in high school, Nora Cane and Elaine Glitwick had planned a last vacation together before college started. They had decided to go to London, and their parents had willingly provided the money for their tickets, though any spending money had to be earned on their own. They each took up odd jobs: Elaine worked in a nursery and pre-school program; Nora found a job in a store called Transformations, which sold things like crystals and tarot cards. Nora had saved nearly a thousand dollars working for the entire school year, though it caused her to form an aversion towards incense and candles. Nevertheless, she thought, it was worth the sacrifice. They managed to get out of the little town of Green Leaf, and now she was looking forward to spending three weeks filled with sightseeing with Elaine.
The cab dropped them off at a small bed and breakfast, and Nora couldn't help noticing that this part of London seemed a lot different from the one they had just driven through. Elaine seemed to have the same thought.
"A lot different from the ad, don't you think?" She said, nervously looking around. Nora nodded. The streets were very narrow, filled with broken cobblestones, and it was somehow darker, almost shadowed, even though it was midday and the sun was shining in full force. The bed and breakfast was a small, ramshackle Tudor, with a small wooden sign hanging outside, The Rose Inn written on it in peeling paint, and there was a lopsided chimney sticking out of a poorly shingled rood. The windows were small and dark, and seemed covered in a thick coating of soot and grime. Elaine was looking glum now, but Nora shrugged.
"I don't know what we were expecting for 25 dollars a night." She said, smiling at Elaine. Elaine nodded, but continued looking upset. "Let's go in." Nora urged, "Come on, we can't stand out here forever. Who knows, perhaps it looks better on the inside than the out." Elaine nodded again, and they picked up their bags and pushed open the small wooden door.
They stepped into a small, dusty parlor, with a rickety wooden reception desk. There was no one at the desk, and Nora looked doubtfully at the rusty bell.
"I'm afraid it will break if I breathe on it." She hissed to Elaine, who finally cracked a smile. Nora took a deep breath, reached out, and lightly tapped the bell, which emitted a surprisingly strong DING. A man stepped out of the back room. He was fairly tall, and he seemed young, though there was a sprinkling of gray hairs among the light brown ones on his head, and his forehead was lined with slight wrinkles. His hazel eyes looked at them almost wearily, but he smiled showing even white teeth.
"Welcome, ladies. What can I help you with?" He said in a deep and slightly hoarse voice.
"I think we had a reservation here." Elaine said, giving him an appraising look. Nora, however, smiled warmly in return.
"Yes, a reservation for Elaine Glitwick and Nora Cane." She said helpfully. He nodded, and flipped open a leather bound book, filled with lists of names.
"Ah, yes. Here you are...three weeks, I believe, a double. I've set aside the best room here for you." He reached up and pulled down a key from a rack behind the desk, and stepped out. "Let me carry your bags for you." Nora thanked him, and handed him her bag. Elaine did not, and clutched her bag tightly.
"Er, no thanks, I think I've got it." The man shrugged as if he half expected it and started up the rickety stairs on the side of the parlor. Nora shot Elaine a disapproving look, before turning to follow him. Elaine hesitated before following them slowly.
The man showed them to a spacious, sunlit room with a large queen sized bed. Nora stopped in the doorway, looking around almost with shock. This was nothing to what she had expected. Unlike the rest of the inn, this place was spotlessly clean, with beautiful mahogany furniture and pine floors. Nora inhaled the scent of cleaner and, she was almost sure, sunlight. The man deposited her bag on the bed and turned to face her.
"Will this be fine?"
Nora heard Elaine stop dead beside her, and, smiling broadly, said, "This will be perfectly fine. Thank you Mr...um.."
"Lupin, Remus Lupin. You can call me Remus. Dinner's at 3, lavatory is down the hall to your left, and if there is anything you need, don't hesitate to phone down to me." He said, gesturing to an old fashioned telephone on a bedside table. Nora nodded in acknowledgment and stepped further into the room to allow Elaine to enter. She sidled in cautiously and gaped around the room. Remus walked past them, and, after a final
"Thank you, Remus" from Nora, closed the door.
"This room is wonderful!" Elaine gasped. Nora looked at her with mock severity. "Well, Miss Fusspot finally likes something."
"You didn't like it from the outside, either!" Elaine shot back.
"At least I was willing to give this place a chance! Look how lucky we are. Best room in the house, he said, and I believe it." Nora declared, looking around the room again. Elaine dropped her bag onto the bed with a thud and glared at her friend.
"And then there's you letting a perfect stranger take your bag." Nora rolled her eyes.
"Elaine, he's the one who owns this place. It's not like he would suddenly bolt out the door with a bag full of women's clothing. I keep anything valuable on myself, anyway, don't you?" Elaine looked away, and Nora sighed. Elaine's head snapped around again.
"I still can't believe that you could be so friendly with a complete stranger. Something about him creeps me out. It's like he doesn't know how to act or even wear his clothes." Nora giggled, and Elaine continued to glare at her. "It's not a laughing matter, Nora Regina Cane."
"All right, calm down, Mother. There's no need to employ the middle name tactic. I don't know; I feel like we can trust him. I don't think he'll rob us blind, and hey, he's going to feed us tonight. That'll save us some cash." Nora stated. Elaine finally stopped glaring, shrugged, and started opening her bag. Nora watched her closely, then, deciding their argument was over, started unpacking her own bag.
At three p.m, they headed downstairs, having showered and changed, feeling refreshed and more optimistic, their earlier argument all but forgotten. There were four other people sitting at the large mahogany dinner table: a stooped over, wizened old man with thick spectacles, a tall gangly woman swathed in an assortment of many scarves and flowy material, also wearing spectacles which made her eyes seem oddly bug-like, a short man in a pinstripe outfit with a bright violet bowler derby and flushed, round cheeks, and an older man with a mop of gray hair and a bushy mustache. Elaine and Nora glanced at each other before settling at one end of the table. Nora couldn't help overhearing some of the conversation the other guests were having.
"Well, I heard that Dumbledore has been having problems up at the school. Seems that several people nearly died there, and one of the teachers lost his entire memory." The wizened old man was saying.
"It's true, quite true, Diggle," The woman in glasses answered, nodding sagely, "Seems we had a problem with You-Know-Who, or what used to be him, when he once went to the school. Of course, I had foreseen it all. Although I did miss the part where poor Professor Lockhart lost his memory. Poor man, a great teacher, or so I've heard."
"Was it amnesia?" Nora asked, breaking in. Everyone turned to look at her with surprise.
"Amnesia, dear?" The woman asked in mild indignation. "I do believe that is a Muggle term."
"Muggle?" Nora was completely lost. Diggle looked at her carefully, then whispered into the woman's ear, and she raised her eyebrows. "Oh, of course, forgive me, I had no idea that you were a..."
Before she could finish, Remus Lupin swept in carrying a heavy tray loaded with meat and potatoes. "Here we are!" He said brightly. "Dinner's served." He placed the tray in the middle of the table, and filled everyone's glass with a strange looking orange liquid. Elaine and Nora looked at it doubtfully, but, once seeing the other guests start taking hearty swigs, took an experimental sip.
It was deliciously cool, and Nora knew she could taste pumpkin. She raised her eyebrows in surprise, saying, "This is wonderful. What is it called?"
The man in the bowler derby said, "It is pumpkin juice. Lupin makes one mean barrel of pumpkin juice. Tell us Lupin," He continued as Remus settled himself at the end of the table, next to Nora, "What is your recipe?"
Remus smiled. "It's an old family secret."
Nora turned to face him. "Well, it is delicious, whatever the secret recipe is, Mr. Lupin." He smiled again, looking down at his plate.
The rest of the dinner turned out to be as delicious as the pumpkin juice, which Elaine, Nora, and the other guests drank liberal quantities of at the urging of Remus Lupin. Nora listened with interest to the conversation going on around her, though she noticed that they seemed to be holding back. Probably that infamous English reserve.
The topic of conversation rested mainly on the recent escape of a dangerous convict, and Nora noticed they seemed awfully worried about this. Some man called Sirius Black had broken out of a high security jail, and was now being searched for by the whole of England.
"What did he do?" Nora asked. They all looked at her again, and again, she felt as if she should know something. Remus answered.
"It is said that he killed 13 people at one time with a bomb about 12 years ago. They convicted him immediately." Nora detected a note of sadness in his voice, and pondered it. Did he know one of the people killed? Or was he simply distressed at the senseless waste of life? She looked at Elaine and saw the same question written on her face. But Remus didn't elaborate any further. He merely stood and started clearing away plates.
It was out of habit that Nora stood and asked, "Would you like help with the plates, Mr. Lupin?" He shook his head, smiling.
"No, that's all right. I still have dessert coming up; plum pudding if you would care for any. Oh, and call me Remus. Being called Mr. Lupin is too formal for me."
Nora sat back down. Elaine pinched her arm and gave her a look of what the hell were you thinking? Nora shrugged. She found herself beginning to not care about whether Remus was into convict rights or not, and started forming an outline of plan for their next day in London. She was sure that Remus, and perhaps some of the others would willingly point them in the right direction of the interesting spots of the city.
Nora sat in front of the dresser mirror brushing her hair. Her mother always said that her hair was her best asset. It flowed thickly down her back in deep chestnut tresses, with natural golden highlights that shone in the sunlight. She tied it back into loose double plaits, and attached them at the nape of her neck, keeping them out of her face, and preventing them from becoming tangled.
She sat for a moment, staring into the mirror. Almond shaped brown eyes looked back at her in puzzlement. Nora couldn't understand why Elaine was acting so peculiarly recently. Right now she was in the beautiful green bathroom down the hallway. It seemed almost as if Elaine were frightened to be here. She hadn't spoken at all during dinner, and when Nora was forced to introduce the two of them, Elaine had merely nodded in response to the greetings from the guests at the table. Nora decided she would talk to her about it.
Her thoughts next fell on Remus Lupin, the shabby looking innkeeper. She wasn't sure what it was, but something about him was attractive. Perhaps it was the way his eyes looked at a person as if he could see the whole of him or her, or the way his deep voice carried an undercurrent of compassion. Whatever it was, she found it unnerving how quickly she had become charmed by this strange Englishman. She tried to brush the thought from her mind. He couldn't be under thirty, and she was eighteen. Sure, something like this would have worked in the 19th century in a Jane Austen novel, but never in the 21st century, with the current social restrictions. Nora also felt that she wouldn't be seeing all that much of him anyway. There was too much to do.
Elaine came back into the bedroom, her face pale and drawn. Nora was instantly worried. "Elaine! What's wrong?" She asked quickly.
"I...I was walking back from the bathroom, and I passed that Lupin guy, and...and..." She trailed off.
"And what?" Nora prompted. Elaine shrugged. "He just gave me a strange look, that's all."
"What kind of strange look?" Nora asked. Elaine shuddered, looking fearful.
"It can be only described as wolf-like." Nora couldn't help it; she burst into laughter. Elaine looked hurt and angry, but Nora couldn't stop.
"Elaine," She sputtered, "Don't be ridiculous. Wolf-like?" Elaine frowned at her.
"It can only make sense. After all, his last name means wolf in Latin." By this time, Nora was in full hysterics, and had practically fallen off her chair. Elaine stomped over to the bed, and pulled back the covers. "You may not be worried about our safety," She said, "But I am, and I definitely don't like this guy." She climbed into the bed without another word, turning off the bedside light.
Nora snuck back into the room after her own visit to the bathroom, and climbed into the bed next to Elaine, turning out her own light. She lay for a long time in the dark, staring up at the ceiling. She could tell that Elaine hadn't fallen asleep either. Nora didn't know what had gotten into her best friend, but she didn't want to be on no speaking terms with her for the entire vacation.
"Elaine?" She ventured.
"Hmm?" Elaine rolled over to look at her. Nora took a deep breath.
"I'm sorry, Elaine. I should be more watchful as well. It's just that I'm so excited to be here, with you. We'll never get an opportunity like this again. Please, be patient with me?" Nora could see Elaine's shadowy face smile and nod. "Thank you." Nora said feeling relieved. See, she told herself, everything's going to be all right.