Chapter 5: Neighborhood Bonding (by: Frostie)

Gabe jolted back to reality when he heard a solid thud and a muffled shout outside his door. He jumped from the chair that he was sitting in and threw the book on top of the junk that had accumulated on the coffee table. He ran towards the door and poked his head out to see a younger woman kneeling on the floor, trying to pick up three grocery bags' contents, and cursing under her breath. "Are you OK?" he asked, quickly bending down to help her.

"Yes, fine…" she muttered, "I'm just the biggest klutz in the world, that's all." Gabe smiled and proceeded to pack up the food. She still had not looked up at him until they finished. "Thank you very much," she said. "I can take it from here."

And she looked into his face. She had rather long auburn hair and sparkling green eyes. She looked back at him and they stood in silence for a moment. "No, let me," Gabe insisted as he broke the rather awkward silence and took the two bags she was holding in addition to the one he had picked up.

"Thanks," she said. She walked towards the door directly across the hall from his and fuddled with the lock. Once she got the door open she led the way inside. "Put them right there, on the table," she said, throwing her keys into a mixed pile of clutter and mail. "More bills," she muttered under her breath. "You would think they couldn't come up with anything more to bill me for…" She stopped in mid-sentence and started to slap herself on the head to Gabriel's horror. "How inconsiderate of me, I'm Brooke Donahue." She extended her hand.

"Gabriel Malfoy," he said, smiling sweetly as he took her hand in his and she shook it firmly.

"You the new guy across the hall?"

"Yeah. I really haven't gotten to know my neighbors too well yet."

"Oh that's fine," she said, starting to put her groceries away. "Malfoy…that's a rather—well—unique name."

"I guess."

"What nationality?"

"British."

"Ah." She didn't sound convinced, but dropped the subject. "So what do you do?"

"Me? Oh. I…uh…teach."

"Really? Where?"

"Oh…um…I teach at an elementary school."

"You mean Kennedy five blocks down?"

"Yeah! Kennedy, that's the one."

"It's a good school," she said, gesturing with the celery she had in her hand before it reached the fridge. "My niece and nephew go there. You might know them…?"

"Haven't got the names down just yet," he said, chuckling slightly.

"I don't blame you. It's always difficult during the first few days."

"Yeah." Another rather awkward pause.

"Huh. So are you British?"

"Yes. What gave me away?"

"Oh, just the accent…" She smiled, now throwing a box of cereal in a rather messy cabinet.

"I forget about that sometimes," he laughed. "So what do you do?"

"I'm a waitress. The clumsiness doesn't help much, but it gets me through med school."

"Studying to become a doctor?"

"Yeah. Sometimes I think I'm crazy for doing it, but I'm hoping it'll pay off in the end. As you can tell I don't have much free time to clean house." She chuckled yet again as she gestured around the kitchenette and living room.

"I don't blame you. It must be busy."

"Oh believe me, it is," Brooke replied as she put the last can of tuna in the cupboard and went towards the living room to plop on the couch.

Gabriel took this as a sign to leave. "Well then I should probably get going. It was a pleasure to meet you, Brooke."

"You too, Gabriel."

"Gabe is fine."

"Gabe then," she smiled at him. "I'll see you later?"

"Most likely. Good night."

"Good night."

Gabe turned and walked out the door and towards his own apartment. She was a sweet girl—in fact, Gabe could envision them even dating sometime…but then he realized she was Muggle and that might upset his parents. Gabe paused a moment and a smile crossed his face as he opened his own apartment door when he realized something: he didn't have to care what his parents thought of him. He turned, looked at Brooke's apartment door, and then walked inside his own.

For the next few weeks, in between teaching and sending constant updates to Dumbledore, Gabriel took the time to purposely run into Brooke—not literally, of course, but he would wait for her to leave her apartment in the morning and then he would walk out a few seconds later, acting surprised to see her. He also had decided to take up jogging, since she would go out with her dog every morning at 5:30 a.m. However, he quickly realized that the forms of exercise Muggles used was much more strenuous (and took twice as long) as a good old ride on a nice broomstick. He had tried to keep up with Brooke the first day, but realized that he couldn't. Blaming himself for getting out of shape, he let her go on ahead as he turned back to the apartment complex.

"Either you've been following me these past couple weeks or we have an uncanny liking to the exact same things and are on the exact same time schedule," Brooke said one day as they walked up to their apartments together, since Gabriel had just happened to come home at the exact time as her yet again.

Gabe took a deep breath in. Now or never, he told himself. "Yeah, about that…I've been meaning to ask you something for the past couple days," he said rather uncomfortably, fumbling with his keys. "Would you…this is going to sound so spontaneous but…would you…I don't know, want to go out with me sometime?"

Brooke turned to face him. "Seriously?"

"Yeah."

"Of course! I've actually been secretly wanting you to ask me out ever since you got here and helped me with my groceries that one day." She grinned mischievously.

Gabe laughed, relieved that she had said yes. "You're still a klutz, though."

"I know. I'll always be one. You've just got to learn to deal with it. Where do you want to go?"

Grinning, Gabe thanked himself for doing his research. "I hear there's a great rendition of Phantom of the Opera playing. Not on Broadway, since I'm on a teacher's salary—but it's a small local theater about five blocks down there, next to the park."

"Oh, I've been there! Sounds great. Well…I work every night until next Wednesday…and I have classes every afternoon but Sundays and every other Saturday…"

"Sunday afternoon it is then!" Gabe said ecstatically. He had hoped a matinee would have worked out, then they could go out to dinner afterwards and he would have more of a chance to talk to her.

"Sounds great. See you then," she waved as she walked back into her apartment.

"Bye."

What the heck is that weird ringing sound? Gabe asked himself as he was interrupted yet again while sitting on his couch grading papers. He looked around frantically. It wasn't the doorbell; he had figured that one out when his landlord came to see him right after he had moved in. He looked and looked until he realized it was that weird device the Muggles call a "telephone". He ran over to the cordless phone and picked it up. "Hello?" he asked. It kept on ringing. "Hello!" he asked louder. It kept on ringing. Finally, Gabe remembered that he had to press the "talk" button in order for it to work. What odd little extra steps Muggles put into their daily lives! "Hello?"

"Hello, Gabriel," came a familiar icy voice from the other end of the line: his father.

"Oh, hi, Dad. What's new?"

"Oh, nothing much, I was just calling to see if you could visit one of my old friends over there in America later on this afternoon. He would probably be able to help you round up some more of the Dark Lord's followers. How is that coming along, by the way?"

"It's great. I've for sure found about a dozen people who would be willing to help in the effort against Dumbledore," Gabe quickly lied.

"Wonderful. You have no idea how proud I am of you, son." Gabe rolled his eyes. "Just a few years ago I thought you were a lost cause, but you've proved yourself worthy of our trust—as well as the Dark Lord's."

Wait until you see what I'm doing against you, Dad, Gabe thought. He then picked up the same sleezy tone that his father had used. "Thank you, Father. You have no idea how much I appreciate being back on the Dark Lord's side." He cringed. Why was he saying this? "However, I'm sorry to say that I won't be able to visit your friend today." How do I get out of this one? Tell the truth. "See, I have a date in a couple hours."

Lucius sounded thrilled as he chuckled fondly. "Found yourself a nice American witch while on the job, have you? Good boy. It's always good to have a bit of…fun while working, don't you think?"

"Yes, that's for sure," Gabe chuckled, just for good measure. "I promise to go and visit…who was it you said?"

"Wes Wadsworth. You may have heard me talking about him a few years back, when he made significant contributions to the Dark Lord and his followers. A good old friend."

Gabe cringed yet again. Wes Wadsworth was a well-known Auror torturer, one who slipped by even people like Alastor Moody. "A good old friend," Gabriel repeated sleezily. "I promise to go visit him as soon as I can."

"Oh, it's no rush, son. I just thought it may cut your work in half."

"Thank you, Dad. I must get going now."

"Of course. I'd hate to keep you idle for too long. Bye, Gabriel."

"Goodbye, Father."

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

OK, so it got a bit romantic-comedy-ish at the beginning, but I kind of like it. How about everyone else?