Gin and Tidings

December 25, 1944

It was Christmas morning and Rosemary was completely alone.

Sure, her parents claimed that they wanted to spend it with her. But there had been an issue at Comet that her father left to attend to and her mother was at some charity event.

Well, she wasn't completely alone, she supposed...She had Zisly, her family's house elf, who would make her whatever she liked for breakfast. She also had gin. Gin was good.

Despite the fact that she already had a nice buzz at ten in the morning, she poured herself another cocktail and settled onto the chaise lounge near the fireplace, staring into the tall flames. She felt exhausted, which was unfortunate considering the fact that professors seemed to be assigning more coursework over the holidays than ever before. It occurred to her that plenty of things would have been far more constructive than drinking, but she had absolutely no motivation to even so much as attempt them.

Over the last three months at Hogwarts, she had done everything in her power to keep up with her coursework, display a constant illusion of happiness, and, most importantly, ignore Tom Riddle. But now that the holidays had arrived and there was no longer anything to strive for or an act that she needed to put on, she allowed exhaustion to overcome her. It felt sort of nice to give in to, in a way, but it was also rather depressing.

She continued to stare into the blaze and downed the remainder of her fourth cocktail, wondering what all of her attempts to maintain a normal, functioning life were even for. As ardently as she had fought and ignored that pestering voice in the back of her mind over the past several weeks, in her fragile, half-drunk state she was forced to confront the fact that without him, everything felt like nothing.

But how could this be? When she first broke things off with him, she had been so sure that it was the right thing to do. And it felt that way for a while; she was relieved that there was no longer a need to choose him over her family or to deal with the tension of her arrangement with Warren. She thought she would regain something if she left him – balance in her life, perhaps.

However, when she truly looked reality in the face, she realized that she hadn't really gained anything. All she really felt was loss. Not only had she lost Tom as her closest friend, the rest of her social circle had slowly begun fading away, too. She rarely spoke to Faye or Markus any longer. The only person she really talked to anymore was Warren, who she still hadn't informed of the split in fear that, if he knew, he would expect her to actually start dating him. And she couldn't exactly break things off with him, either – if she did, her father would just assume that she was secretly seeing Tom again. And even if he didn't, the inevitable courtship of her to someone of his choosing would begin.

But it was clear that she needed to tell Warren soon; he kept acknowledging Tom whenever they passed him in the halls, giving him friendly, "knowing" looks as though they were best mates and the "favor" he thought he was doing them was as trivial as sharing his class notes. She had no idea if Tom knew of Warren's ignorance on the matter or not, but she definitely wanted to put an end to the looks before another confrontation happened.

A chill went down her spine at the memory of that terrible night. It was still vivid in her mind, which was probably a good thing…As much as she missed him, as pointless as her life sometimes felt without him in it, that single memory served as a firm reassurance that she had made the right choice. Because deep down, she knew that the person she missed no longer existed. He had changed somewhere along the line…

And he had certainly kept on changing since then.

Even with all this firmly planted in her mind, the memories of what once was continued to eat at her. Suddenly, as though her body had acted on its own accord, she found herself sitting on the floor of her bedroom with half the contents of her trunk scattered around her, holding a familiar, intricately carved wooden box in her hands. She took a breath and opened it, then promptly closed it once more.

If she was going to proceed, she would need more liquor.

Rose opened the box once more, filled with new courage after another swig of gin. There, staring back at her, was a picture of them at the Sweethearts Ball last February. Professor Beery was on photographer duty all evening and had snapped a picture of them talking while they danced. She had forgotten how happy they were then: so excited, just beginning to fall in love…

Tears stung at the corners of her eyes and she quickly put the picture aside, examining the rest of the box's contents. There was a note they had passed one day in class, various newspaper clippings of Tom's Dueling triumphs, a program from the Tournament, a list of books to read that he had scribbled down for her, and the beautiful sapphire earrings he had given her on her last birthday.

Rose looked down at this modest assortment of things, wishing she could make herself smile at each of them. She yearned to feel that that sort of mellowed nostalgia that would make her simply thankful for the memories, nothing more and nothing less.

But really she was just sad.

Rose snapped out of her thoughts and hurriedly began tossing everything back into the box as she heard Zisly greet someone at the front door; she had been so caught up in everything she hadn't even heard them knock.

Then, seconds later, Zisly appeared at her bedroom door. "Miss Rosemary, Mr. Warren Cramer is here to see you…" The elf trailed off and gave her a disapproving look as she struggled to stand. Perhaps she drank a bit more than she originally thought. "Should I tell him you're not feeling well?"

Her first instinct (and probably the only rational response considering she was completely plastered and still in her nightgown) was to say 'Yes. Definitely.', but she instead found herself saying: "No. I'll be down in a moment." Apparently some part of her thought it would be a good idea to speak with Warren that morning. Probably the same, stupid part of her that thought looking at her box of Tom Riddle memorabilia was a good idea.

Zisly nodded hesitantly and returned downstairs to inform him, while Rosemary quickly performed a Hair-Smoothing Charm and slipped a silk robe on over her nightgown. Then she teetered down the hall and gripped the railing as she walked cautiously down the staircase to prevent herself from tumbling down it.

Warren was waiting for her in the sitting room and he regarded her with surprise when she finally walked in. "I'm sorry, did I wake you?"

"No," she shook her head, forcing a smile to appear on her face as she slid into the chair facing his. "I'm just not feeling well this morning." She attempted to enunciate her words more than usual so that he wouldn't pick up on her intoxicated state.

He looked at her in concern. "Sorry to hear. Well, I won't stay long. I just wanted to stop in and say Happy Christmas."

"Happy Christmas to you too, Warren."

There was an uncomfortable silence between them for a couple of seconds. Then: "I was wondering if you wanted to visit Diagon Alley with me tomorrow? I thought it might be nice to walk around, maybe get some lunch? If you feel better, of course."

She wasn't sure if he was only asking her as part of their 'act' or if it was because he still fancied her and genuinely wanted to spend time with her, but it was probably a bit of both. "Sure," she nodded. "That sounds lovely." It wasn't as though she really had anything better to do.

"Brilliant." He smiled. "Well, I'll leave so you can rest, then."

Warren stood and she watched him as he put his coat back on, wondering if his smile was fake. Did he think that she had only agreed to go with him as part of their ploy to trick her parents?

A wild thought suddenly crossed her mind: what if everything between them was no longer an act? What if she actually gave him a chance? After all, her parents would make damn sure that she ended up with someone. Plus, objectively at least, Warren was the perfect boyfriend. He was athletic, intelligent, attractive in a stereotypical sense, upbeat, and, unlike a certain person who shall not be named, he wasn't overly cocky or (more importantly) potentially dangerous. Not to mention the fact that he was a pureblood and her family adored him. In theory, when considering these factors alone, she probably should have fallen for him a long time ago. So perhaps, she thought, if she really gave him a chance, she would eventually feel some sort of spark for him.

It wasn't the first time that she had had these thoughts since her relationship with Tom came to an end, but the alcohol and her desperation to get over him after going through her box of mementos gave her the push she needed.

"I've been thinking about what you said to me, back at Comet," she said abruptly, lowering her voice so Zisly wouldn't overhear them.

Warren stopped putting on his jacket and frowned slightly. "I thought we were going to forget that ever happened."

"I know. I just thought that if you still feel the same way…Maybe we should give it a go…"

Please don't make me regret this.

"What about Riddle?" A look of confusion spread across his face, but it transformed into a wide grin as she said:

She took a breath. "We're finished."

"Really?!"

She thought about snapping at him for looking so happy about this news, but her inner exhaustion prevailed instead. "Yes," she nodded.

He didn't ask for any details, which she was thankful of - she would have felt enormously guilty lying about what truly happened to him. Warren was clueless as ever and she aimed to keep it that way. Instead, he walked over to her, leaned in, and kissed her cheek. His clearly elated smile showed no evidence of disappearing anytime soon. "Well, yes, let's give it a go then!"

Rosemary was quite relieved that he hadn't tried to kiss her on the mouth in fear that he would taste the alcohol on her and that it would still feel like kissing a cousin. She stood and walked with him to the front door, where he kissed her cheek again and said, "I'll see you tomorrow…for our date."

For the next few hours, the whole scene would play on a loop in her head and she would wonder what exactly she had been thinking. Had she gone completely mental? How was she going to miraculously develop feelings for Warren?

But she would, she kept telling herself. It would just take time.

There was another part of her that worried what might happen if Tom found out that they were actually going steady – would he try to attack Warren again? Then again, wouldn't he have already done so if he was going to? After all, she had continued her fake relationship with Warren even after she and Tom were through. Would he really be able to tell the difference between their fake dating and actual dating?

If he's still reading your thoughts, then yes.

This was perhaps the most unnerving part of their entire breakup: he had left her extraordinarily paranoid – even inside her own mind. Did he know that she missed him almost all of the time? Did he know about how wary of him she had become? Was there anything that she could still hide from him?

"I'm thinking most of the time, so it doesn't really lend to a smile." – Elizabeth Grant

"Are you sure you don't want to go?"

Tom nodded without looking up from his copy of Declassified Duels of the Last Century: An Auror's Tale, quickly growing annoyed with Beaumont's pestering. He had spent Christmas alone for years and was perfectly fine with it; why should this one be any different? Wasting his day with Raoul's old mates from school and their families was precisely the last thing he wanted to do.

"Suit yourself," the sponsor finally gave in. "But just know that you're missing out – Marcel's wife makes the best plum pudding you'll ever taste."

Tom said nothing in response, hoping that he would finally take the hint.

"Last chance…" he said expectantly, as though he actually thought that Tom would be sufficiently tempted. When Tom simply shook his head in response, still refusing to look up from the pages, Raoul said resolutely: "Very well, then. I'll be back this evening…Help yourself to whatever you can find in the kitchen."

Beaumont left shortly after and Tom was finally alone, free to enjoy his reading in peace. He finished the book in the next hour and moved on to Sites of Historical Sorcery, which was considerably less interesting.

It was then that he realized the house was silent; so silent, in fact, that it was almost distracting. Tom continued his attempts to pour himself back into his reading once more, but was only partially successful. He felt inexplicably restless all of a sudden.

He sighed and marked his place in the book, even though he had only ventured a few pages into it. While he stood to stretch his legs, he glanced around the room for something to occupy himself. There were a few issues of Duelist's Weekly scattered upon a nearby coffee table, the contents of which he had already read at least three times. A wizard's chess board also caught his eye from across the room, but playing against himself didn't sound all that enjoyable either.

Instead, Tom found himself striding over to the window and glancing down at the various passersby on the crowded street below. There were several couples walking hand-in-hand, beaming like ignorant fools, and at least a dozen small children running about. Muggles.

Tom scowled and turned away from the glass, wondering why Beaumont had settled for a house in the middle of an area teeming with Muggles. If the house itself was any indication, it wasn't as though Raoul couldn't afford to live somewhere that was far more removed from Muggle society. Through his time at Wool's Orphanage, during all those summers in which he had been forced to return from Hogwarts, Tom had learned to loathe the city and its overabundance of Muggles. Wizarding-only places like Diagon and Knockturn Alley were his sanctuaries in London. Then again, he knew from his own housing search the previous summer that finding a flat in Diagon Alley was extraordinarily rare and those in Knockturn Alley were surely far too sordid for Raoul's taste. Nor did he strike Tom as the type to live outside the city in a more rural area. So, even though Tom absolutely detested it, he supposed that Raoul's choice in location made sense.

Given Beaumont's numerous eccentricities, it really shouldn't have come as much of a surprise anyway. And numerous they were, indeed: in the short amount of time that had passed since Tom arrived for the holidays, he had discovered plenty more. One of which that continued to baffle him was the fact that someone who was as wealthy as Raoul was lacked a house elf. Even more puzzling was how spotless the house was, as though it had scarcely been lived in. Perhaps, he thought, Raoul simply spent all of his nights with the women he flirted with in pubs…or maybe he invited them over and they ended up cleaning his flat for him the next morning…

Tom shuddered in disgust at the thought and made his way upstairs to the guest bedroom in which he was staying. He propped his back against the foot of his bed after retrieving his diary from his trunk, opening it to the numbered list of all twenty-seven things he wanted to accomplish over the holidays. With only partial satisfaction, given the fact that he felt especially unproductive that morning, he crossed out: 5. Read Declassified Duels.

On the blank page opposite the list, the words "Is that all?" suddenly appeared.

"Yes," he scrawled back, rolling his eyes.

He could tell that the fifth-year version of himself was rolling his eyes right back at him when he read: "Don't fall off course again…the last thing we need is another Rosemary Horton situation."

Tom glared down at the diary before abruptly tossing it back into his trunk, frustrated by this blatant reminder of his nearly year-long blunder. But then, realizing he had little motivation to do much of anything other than sit and talk to himself (as loony as that might sound), he hastily removed it once more and opened it back up to the same page.

"Far from it," he started. "There are plenty of things I've already planned for when I return to Hogwarts, as you know."

"True enough…But there are some things that will be much more difficult to accomplish at Hogwarts – namely, discovering the source of Raoul Beaumont's wealth and power…"

That was #3 on Tom's list. While the thought had crossed his mind several times that morning after Raoul told him he would be out for the day, he remained rather hesitant. The prospect of snooping through the belongings of someone as exceptionally private about his wealth as Raoul was made him uneasy. What if he was caught and Raoul was angry enough to revoke Tom's sponsorship? It was for this reason that he hadn't dared to use Legilimency to find out – a glimpse of Raoul's past was by no means worth losing his place in the Tournament.

Then again, snooping around the house was far less risky than attempting Legilimency and Beaumont was supposed to be gone for hours. Not to mention the fact that the source of Raoul's influential position was something Tom had been mystified by for months…

In the end, predictably, Tom's curiosity won out and he found himself striding down the hall toward Beaumont's office. He opened the door and glanced around: the walls inside were filled with plaques recognizing his role as a leading sponsor in the Tournament and there were nearly two decades worth of photographs featuring him and his team from each year. Looking around at the lot of it was sort of depressing, in a way – was the Tournament all that Raoul had in his life? Not that Tom cared…he supposed he just found it rather pathetic.

He sat down at the sponsor's desk and tried a couple of the drawers – locked. Fortunately, a few simple Unlocking Charms was all it took and Tom immediately began exploring the contents of each. The top left drawer was where he began, flipping through a large stack of papers which he quickly recognized as the personal files of Beaumont's current team – including his own. Normally getting his hands on such valuable information would have been more than enough to distract him from the task at hand, but thanks to the access that his position as Raoul's scouting assistant had granted him, he had taken the opportunity to memorize each file's contents weeks ago.

The other drawers also held little that was of interest to him: an assortment of quills, a deck of self-shuffling playing cards, a few Fizzing Whizzbees wrappers, and a small bottle of Firewhiskey. Tom drew his wand, locking up the desk once more. He supposed he should have known that if he wanted answers, he would have to do a bit more digging.

With this in mind, he began combing through the house from top to bottom as thoroughly as he possibly could (given the residence's considerable size). During his pursuit, a number of things struck him, but perhaps the most prominent of all was just how tidy every inch of the place was. This particular revelation left no doubt in his mind: Raoul Beaumont was hiding something. Why else would a middle-aged man, living entirely alone, keep his house this clean?

Although, when he was still empty-handed nearly an hour and a half later, he was beginning to get discouraged. His relatively advanced Detection Spell that he casted room-by-room should have been sufficient to, at the very least, point him in the direction of any sort of protective magic guarding Beaumont's alleged secret. But once again, his spell had turned up nothing and he was faced with the prospect of manually searching the entire room. It was perhaps unsurprising that room after room of this pattern was causing the project's intrigue to vanish exponentially.

He paced across the floor of Raoul's bedroom, contemplating whether or not he should simply abandon his search and pick something a bit more productive to do from the list in his diary.

Yes, he thought. This is completely and utterly pointless.

With that, he turned and walked briskly toward the door, only to find himself stop in his tracks just before he reached it. There was something that itched at him: he had already invested a good chunk of time that afternoon and it would be a complete waste if he didn't find out at least one thing related to Raoul's climb to considerable power and wealth.

Just this last room, he bargained with himself as he opened the bottom drawer of Raoul's nightstand.

Amidst yet another collection of junk, a gleam of silver caught his eye. He reached for it, which turned to be a badge with "MAGI, Inc." in large, embossed lettering and Raoul's name etched just beneath it. The name of the company was annoyingly familiar; wherever he knew it from was just out of his memory's reach.

So…Raoul was a desk jockey at one point? Obviously he didn't have that high of a position; surely if he did, the house would be littered with evidence of this. Beaumont certainly didn't strike him as the type to miss a potential opportunity to brag about his accomplishments. Convinced that he had merely stumbled onto a piece of ancient history, perhaps a memento from an internship Raoul had held before acquiring his riches, he tossed it back into the drawer and strode out of the room.

Enough was enough, he supposed. Clearly his hunt had been a complete waste of time. Perhaps he would simply work up the nerve to use Legilimency on Raoul over the holiday; all he knew was that he wasn't willing to waste any more time or energy on it that afternoon. His time and energy were way too important for that.

He walked downstairs and toward the living room to start in on Sites of Historical Sorcery once more; it wasn't too late to get at least one productive thing done that afternoon. Even with his resolve to end his search, that business: MAGI, kept popping into his mind. Where on Earth had he heard of it before that day? Was it one of the donors to the Tournament?

A temporary distraction from all this came in the form of a small, folded piece of paper just near the door, which Raoul must have dropped on the way out. Tom crossed the foyer and hastily unfolded it. He recognized it immediately as a clipping from The Daily Prophet and in the middle of the page was the headline: Albus Dumbledore Presented Award for Spell Mechanics Consulting at MAGI.

So that was where he recognized MAGI from. He had read the article earlier that week – well, half of it at least, before he could no longer stand to listen to the ridiculous praise

But what he didn'tremember were the words written next to the article in Beaumont's familiar scrawl:

25th, 4 p.m. Dragon's Breath Pub.

But wasn't Beaumont with his friends? Tom glanced up at the clock – 4:45. Why was he meeting someone in the middle of the afternoon on Christmas, of all days? More importantly, who was he meeting?

Curiosity burned within him for the second time that day. The pub was just down the street…he could just walk there, see whoever it was that Raoul was meeting with, and come back, completely unnoticed.

As he set out into the cold, his mind was racing with questions that begged to be answered. What was Raoul's actual connection to MAGI? Why was that old fool, Dumbledore, doing Spell Mechanics consulting for them? What exactly was MAGI, anyway?

All but one of the pub's windows was covered in frost. Tom stepped closer to the glass, spotting the two men almost instantly, and stopped abruptly in his tracks. He was so taken aback that he failed to notice the filthy Muggles that occasionally bumped into him on the crowded street.

There, sitting across from Beaumont and looking positively chummy, was none other than Albus Dumbledore.

I know, I know. I'm the worst. I feel terrible for posting a day late, but I'm still trying to figure out my school/writing/work/social/sleep balance. Your patience while I work through everything is most appreciated!(:

Thank you so much to my lovely reviewers: x2leoj, LimitedLegendFTW, Lady Ravanna, Mrs. WaylandOdinsonBlack, Oksanallex, OptimusPrimegirl123, Queentakesjack, A regrettable decision, and RosiePosie15!

Also, I know that Rose is probably super annoying to some of you right now, but she'll become a much more dynamic character very shortly! There's lots of exciting stuff coming your way - this is only the beginning of Part II, after all, and I plan to have just as many twists and turns in the next 48 chapters as there were in Part I!(; See you next Wednesday (or possibly earlier to make up for posting a day late)!