Emmeline Vance

“It certainly will.” Maya says pleasantly- raising her finger to the get the waiter’s attention.

“It seems I shall be leaving soon.” She says soothingly to the waiter “Since Miss Vance only appears to be interested in wasting my time-please put the bill on my tab.” 

She turns her smile back to Emmeline as the waiter leaves.

“As sweet as you are, my dear, and as talented as you may be, you have what, four, five years before you become too slow on your broomstick to remain relevant? Before the next sweet young thing rises up through the ranks and takes your place-maybe she’ll be smart enough to take someone up on an offer when it’s in front of them.”

Her smile grows as she brushes her hair over her shoulder and opens her Green Berkin bag to drop her phone into.

“If you don’t know why you’re here, Miss Vance, I will not be wasting my time. If the possibility of maintaining your athleticism and youth and establishing a legacy along with it isn’t interesting to you then you certainly aren’t interesting to me.”

Maya pulls out her lipstick and uncaps it, opening her lips just slightly as it applies itself.

“So-your choice, my darling-am I staying? Or was this a waste of both of our mornings?”

Em reaches out, takes her wrist in her hand, and motions Maya Zabini to stop.

“Stay,” she says plainly, unsure of why she’s done it at all, and retracts her hand quickly, embarrassed. “Sorry. I...it’s a brand deal, isn’t it? I’m represented by Narcissa Black - I’m sure you know her. Or her team told you of me. Or told your team to tell you to know of me.”

Her words become a jumbled mess as she tries to pull herself together. She’s suddenly hyper aware of the space between her legs, the heat of the room in general. She pulls a stray hair from behind her head and puts it in front of her shoulder because a girl from her Hogwarts days told her that that’s when she looked her cutest.

“Are you unsure? One too many bludgers to the head?”

Maya lets her smile linger, knowing its effect as soon as she sees the way Emmeline looks back at her. Her team frequently found attractive looking relatively well known people-or ones on the cusp of being so-to represent Philosophie on social media. When they seemed promising-or at the very least someone they figured Maya would enjoy toying with-they sent them to her. This was going to be the most fun Maya’s had in days-and she might possibly get business done in the meantime.

“Well, lets assume you know your own occupation, Miss Vance. My social team did mention that they were looking to expand with more accomplished athletes-I can tell by the way you carry yourself you fit into that category, though of course, you’ll forgive me for not knowing for certain, I have far too busy of a schedule to follow….sports.”

She says the word the way the average person would say “roadkill.” She takes a delicate sip of her mimosa and feels Emmeline’s eyes on her.

“All that aside, Em-may I call you Em?-I don’t think you really heard me, so I’ll repeat myself-which I never do so consider yourself….special.”

Maya puts her drink aside, folds her hands into a plateu in front of her on the table and looks Emmeline directly in the eyes.

“What can I do for you? What’s missing in your life, Em? What can Philiosophie power for you?” 

“I think I understand my occupation thoroughly, Miss...Zabini, was it? Sports aren’t for everyone. They involve a strategic mind and quick thinking. And I would never want to imply that you have either.”

She’s entranced by Maya, but something deliciously wicked within Em decides it wants to play with her, give her more time to drink Maya in. She knows her face explains it all, but there’s part of that she likes. It makes her heart flutter despite herself.

She sits down across from Maya and uncharacteristically takes a drink from her mimosa glass. She doesn’t know what compels her to do it, other than the fact that it feels as though her arms are working outside of her control. She sips delicately and sets the drink down with a wink, even though her throat stings from the strength of the drink.

Brunch Meetings || Open

“Thank you so much for inviting me out, it means so much to me.” Maya lied, smiling over her mimosa. She was here on obligation and little else-the drinks helped. “So-”

She pauses for a drink and offers a winning smile only the elite would know was utterly fake.

“What can I do for you?”

“Uh...” Em tried to gather her thoughts as she sat across from Maya. The Maya Zabini who, just days ago, had agreed to meet with her regarding Philosophie.

And Emmeline Vance was nothing if not hopeful.

“I’m Emmeline Vance...seeker on the Holyhead Harpies?”

Snivellus. 

The name ignites something, a fury deep, low, searing and hot within him. Lily chose this woman? A specimen of glaring inferiority, who was trying to duel him by the looks of it. The urge to spit fire bubble in his throat and it takes alll shreds of preservation and love for Lily to swallow it. 

“Well then I consider myself lucky that you didn’t have the ability to look down from your high horse and see me– how does it feel now? Skulking around the hallways in the middle of the afternoon, like a fucking rat who doesn’t want to be seen or exposed for who they truly are while most people are away at work. My oh my, Lily truly is a lucky one to find someone like you. Does your courtship come with a closet for her to step into?” He sneers at her, hating her arrogance and the fact that he fell for what was clearly intended as anger inducing bait. 

“The fact that you’re positioned to duel is pathetic, Vance. Drop your wand and scurry along.”

Something rooted deep in her soul tells her to put her wand away. Not just him, but the anger he brought forth, the anger she knows in her heart she dragged out of him. Em puts her wand away and stands, confounded, realizing her mistake. Realizing what she had done.

If this guy is Lily’s roommate, she’s ruined chances of being with Lily...probably forever. He’d tell her everything that had transpired. He’d ruin Em for her. He’d ruin everything.

Emmeline dashes towards the flowers, pulling them from the glass so quickly she shatters it. Sighing, she pulls her wand back out again and repairs the glass on the floor.

“You. Don’t. Know. Anything. About. Me.” She tastes the words on her lips. What do they mean anymore? “You’re pathetic and sad. And you’ve ruined a perfectly good bouquet.”

The gift and curse of his ability is to be able to see the wave building and cresting, though without knowing her as well he is surprised to see himself on the end of her wand. He draws his wand out lazily, more out of sensible precaution than any real fear of what she might do to him. 

After all, her position was far more precarious. 

“Emmeline Vance, Slytherin, a year above me in school– clearly not a complete imbecile given the company you keep, Holyhead Harpies Seeker, though perhaps your perception is only incredibly adept on the pitch. Probably thinking that I’m–  what? Egotistical and repulsive?” He uses his wand to send his tea back over to the table. 

“You’re not wrong. But then again you don’t know the first thing about me either.” He pauses, the corner of his lips turning into a sneer. 

“Do you even know my name?” 

She chuckles darkly, letting her feet root where they stood. Em leans into her dominant leg, remembering her dueling training. Root, stand, prepare. She thinks of the list of spells in her head she could cast, the things she could do to put him in his place.

“Your name?” And then she remembers. “Snivellus. You’re that kid who...Lily roomed with you?”

He sighes, barely avoiding the rolling of his own eyes. 

“It’s not the item, it’s the action.” He shifts his weight from one foot to the other. “And I don’t see how you would be able to poison Lily through flowers unless you put a poisonous salve on the petals, and most of them have recognizable scents. Ingestible toxins have a far harder time making it through skin into the bloodstream, so if you did go that route you’d give her a headache and a sore throat at best.” 

Severus relishes in the staring game, her litany of thoughts proving to be a colorful commentary– he always equated it to the sensation of watching someone through a two way mirror. 

“Well, what? Would you like to me say that I expected a more extravagant arrangement from someone of your fame and success?” 

“Go to hell, you prick.”

She pulls out her wand and aims, but has no other plan besides making him look like the asshole he is. Why can’t he just stay in his hidey hole and leave well enough alone? And why did Lily - pure, sweet Lily - have to room with someone as egotistical and repulsive as this guy?

He bites back the grin that threatens to overtake his entire face. Oh this is fun. The spikes of anxiety in her mind are direct results of his probing and he couldn’t be more delighted in the fae of discomfort. 

“It’s…fine?” He lets the word fall as flatly as she did, acknowledging the clumsiness of the exchange. 

Severus turns the mug once, twice, takes a sip and refuses to let himself wince at the ice cold black tea that fills his mouth and he swallows, loudly. 

“Well, Lily is my best friend and roommate, and an old Hogwarts chum comes knocking one day to bring her flowers. If the roles were reversed would it matter to you?” He asks, eyebrows raising. Even if he wasn’t a bastard, the point is valid and he knows it. 

She nods, even if she doesn’t want to. “Sure. Yeah, you got me; I poisoned the flowers. Go check. So happy you could figure me out after you let me in. Some roommate you are.”

Em waits for him to move, but he doesn’t focus on the flowers; his eyes remain on hers, as if his gaze halts her in her tracks. She could move; no curse bound her to her place, but she froze in response. 

Watching as he fingers the daisy petals, she wonders if he’ll find something there that isn’t there. She imagines him ruining what hasn’t begun. Her thoughts unmercifully migrate towards friendship destruction, towards the shame she worked so hard to swallow. The world she’d made coming undone.

It’s mostly a game to Severus, watching Em move around their house as he remains stationary. His eyes follow her, noting the confidence in her hands as she finds a glass amid their managerie of things in their kitchen– neat and tidy they would never be. 

Her body and her mind, like most people, move concurrently. Severus tracks the way in which she flips through emotions with intense scrutiny. Given their unfamiliarity with one another it comes in waves of mixed specificity. Stress, Fondness, Soup, Discomfort. The fourth is a familiar feeling, though the third very specific thought leaves him completely perplexed. 

He likes the idea that she’s squiriming in his presence– it’s been so long since he’s been able to be around someone that wasn’t Regulus or Lily, and he missed being a bastard. 

Walking over to the couch he swoops down to pick up his mug, idly turning it in his hands. 

“So why does one bring daisies in the middle of the afternoon to an apartment she knows the recipient won’t be at?” He asks, biting his tongue before he could offer an implication. 

Em stops in her tracks. She ties her fingers behind her back, as if their presence is alluding something to him that she doesn’t want being said. As if they are betraying her need to feel invisible to him.

“None of your business,” she says plainly, biting her lip. “She’ll know.”

She reaches for something else to say, something that would assure her that he heard what she’d said: it’s none of his business. But maybe his days of being a hermit in their tiny apartment make the man hungry for drama, and Em desperately doesn’t want to provide it.

Anything but that.

Severus shifts, one foot dangling off the couch as he nurses a cup of tea too cold for enjoyment. The morning has been quiet, the chirping of birds puncuating the sounds of his own breathing, and he relishes the calm. 

It seems to last only a moment before the corner of his mind pinches, the presence of someone in his sphere with a mind that just sits askew of what is comfortable. It’s familiar, but he cannot place immediately– a fact which sours him. WIth the sound of the knock he exhales loudly, setting his tea on the table, an act that would leave no impact on it when it was revisited. 

He feels a pitch of anxiety and notes it with curiousity, casting a cursory glance at himself to make sure that he was at least decent. 

He pulls the door open with an arched eyebrow and the body attached to the mind clicks together- Emmeline Vance. 

Flowers? The cogs in his brain churn for a moment before he remembers that he is standing in front of this woman and he earmarks the information to return to later, once she’s left. 

“Charming.” His tone is flat, though he enjoys that clearly this experience is nerve-wracking on some level. 

“She’s at Mungos… which you probably knew already.” He sits in the silence for a moment before remembering the one downside to living with Lily Evans– he stull had to be a decent person. 

“Would you like to come in?” 

“Er...sure.”

Em swallows the breath caught in her throat, pretending that “this is all fine, why should you be worried,” as she steps through the front door. She passes the roommate - whose name she cannot remember - and walks into their kitchen. She’s hit with the memory of soup, the last time she and Lily saw one another, and hides the grin that creeps up her cheeks.

“Should I just put these anywhere?” She hates that she didn’t bring a vase, forcing Lily to use one of her own cups, but this was so impromptu and out of character for Em that she hadn’t come prepared. Searching through the menagerie of kitchen supplies, used recently and dearly, she finds a tall water glass and fills it.

Em eyes Sev, leaning against the wall. She feels analyzed, undressed in some weird way, and her skin crawls with the thought of him thinking anything about her, watching her steps. She puts the flowers on the center of the dining table, rearranges them so they look the best from the front door, and steps away.

On a sunny Friday afternoon, Emmeline Vance Apparates to Lily Evans’s doorstep, brushes off her shoes on the doormat, and knocks politely. She knows Lily is at Mungo’s, so it won’t be her answering, and so her heart pounds a little harder at the thought of interacting with her dark and brooding roommate. 

She taps her fingers on her hips as she hears the footsteps approach the door. She inhales, letting the cool afternoon air fill her lungs and give her courage.

This is just the roommate. Who cares what he thinks of her?

The door opens.

“Hi. Uh. Dropping off...flowers for Lily. You look...alive.”

Benjy: you are??? cool.

Benjy: actually cool not in a pervy way.

Benjy: thanks for telling me. and for saying i have a nice ass.

Benjy: its definitely going to go to my head

Benjy: did she say she wanted to meet us? i didnt read past the first few lines imo

Emmeline: stop talking. i got it. your ass is class.

Emmeline: and yes; surprise! we're both wearing masks.

Benjy: ah she let the tabs know about that? that was ages ago. and she was shit in bed.

Benjy: i moreso was referring to getting caught with my pants down and arse out with another lad, but maybe you have safesearch on

Benjy: that would track for you tbh

Benjy: oh come on Vance you want a piece of this dont lie ;)

Emmeline: what a shame. the girl. not the guy.

Emmeline: i definitely don't have safesearch on, but it does beg the question as to what she wants with us.

Benjy: gonna pretend thats a typo

Benjy: do you not keep a phone up your arse with your head? google me, love. theres actual results if you do

-delay-

Benjy: at least we like each other and are great friends

Emmeline: pretend all you want. at least your energy is being used for useful things.

Emmeline: Yeah, just looked up your results. lets see here...you're shagging the falcons' seeker? she's fit, so good on you, but i hear she's awful in bed.

Narcissa: I imagine. I just wanted to check in with you and make sure you're doing all right. Please let me know if there's anything you need/want to talk about. It's been awhile since we've had a proper meeting.

Emmeline: I mean, yes, but that usually means things are going well.