@Roman Kingston

On this sunny, yet chilly day Adlai has just been measured for her new school robes. She marveled at everything in Diagon Alley. She couldn’t believe that her parents choose to stay at the entrance. When the shop keeper told Adlai the price of the robes, she became confused. What were Knuts, Sickles and Galleons?

She looked down into her coin purse which was filled with Afghan afghani’s that her mother’s side of the family had sent to her as spending money. Could she use those? She began to dig through her coin purse in search of anything else she could possibly pay with.
She had a few króna’s which were left over from her time in Iceland and of course some pound sterling’s, as those were her allowance from that months chores.

“One moment please.” She reassured the shop keeper as she dug further. Magical, near the bottom of her purse were some odd coins that she had never seen before. Had they been there the whole time?- she thought. Some many odd things had happened today, but especially within the last few months. But Adlai was extremely excited.
Pulling the strange coins out of her purse Adlai put them all of the counter. Biting in her lip as a nervous habit she asked, “Is that enough?”

August 10th, 2019.

It’s chilly when the Kingston arrive at the Diagon Alley — after having a quiet and rather awkward lunch at the Leaky Cauldron — which makes both of them shiver; the youngest holding himself tighter over his black trenchcoat. The family is there in order to buy all the necessary supplies for Roman to begin his first year at Hogwarts.

They don’t talk much as they make their way around the Alley. His father continuously mumbles to himself, though, slightly frustrated over something, but Roman doesn’t care enough to ask. The man has been in a sour mood as of late, and the boy knew there wasn’t anything he could do about it. After diverging from his father, who had some business to do at the wizarding bank, Roman walks towards Madam Malkin’s Robes for All Occasions, the perfect place for him to find his uniform needed on the list he received alongside his acceptance letter.

It’s been a very long time since the last time Roman’s been there. His old man didn’t seem to be as interested in fashion as he once was, for some unknown reason. Madam Malkin’s is quite as he remembers; there are clothes hanging around, but the place never feels messy. There are quite a few witches today, some with their kids, looking for the perfect robes for the beginning of the school year.

Walking around, eyes scanning the several clothes displayed, Roman, slightly disinterested, catches the sight of a girl at the counter, who looked confused at the price the shop keeper had just told her for whatever she’s buying. He slithers towards them, just enough to see the price of those robes and the amount the girl was holding. Quickly counting, he concludes that she's needed a bit more money.

“Ya need two more sickles, ya know,” says Roman, trying to pretend he’s interested in the female dresses close to him. He does sound a bit aloof, but not as much as he’d like to be. “Or fifty-eight knuts. Whatevah floats ya boat,”

Adlai looked over to the boy and cleared her throat. “I’m sorry but I’m not sure what that is.” She stated looking down at the pile of a coins she had placed on the counter before turning her attention back to her coin purse where she dug around again looking for anymore of the coins.

A sudden panic rushed over her. What would she do if she didn’t have enough? What would happen if she wasn’t able to get the uniform? Would she have to wear her old schools uniform instead? All these questions zipped through her mind. How she wished her parents would be able to help her with this, but of course they wouldn’t have any idea what any of this is just like her.

She then began to wonder again as to why she was able to do magic and not anyone else in her intermediate family. She had to have inherited it from someone but who? She’d have to poke at her parents someone kind of answer since non of her grandparents knew, I’d they did who knows what would happen.

Adlai kept digging through her bag. She checked all her pockets and even took every other currency out of her bag, making sure that the coins hadn’t made their way into the folds of her paper money.

The girl’s answer makes Roman realize she’s clearly not from a pureblood family, nor a half-blood one, to which he can only sigh, having fun as he watches her trying to find more coins, digging her hand in her bag and pockets, desperate. The shopper, who he now notices looks just a tad bit like the old Madam Malkin, that had retired, states the Daily Prophet last year, is starting to look impatience.

And though he’d love to watch that witch raise her voice to that girl, Roman finds himself slithering closer to her this time, resting his arm on the counter, turned to her, his other hand on his hip. Roman analyzes her, then points at her coins, and says, again with that simple, aloof tone, “Ya know, the gold ones are Galleons, while the silver and bronze are sickles and knuts, respectively,”

Sighing, Roman takes out two sickles from his pocket, as slowly as he can, trying not to get the girl’s attention. He puts the silver coins next to her pile, and, noticing the shop keeper stared at him, they both share a look, and the woman doesn’t say anything about it.

“Oh, look, guess I wrong, after all,” He says, in the fakest surprised tone possible, pointing at the coins again. “It seems like ya have the right amount,” Roman doesn’t like admitting he’s wrong, especially when he isn’t, and, in any other situation he’d buy his stuff and laugh at the poor little muggle-born that didn’t have enough money to buy what they wanted. Boo-hoo!

Roman isn’t nice, and he’s proud of saying that. He doesn’t go around being a goody-two-shoes, handing random strangers money and explaining to them how the wizarding currency worked. No, thank you very much. He’d very much prefer to just watch and laugh at her face, and yet, here he is.

Today’s certainly been a weird day, the boy thinks to himself, more displeased than he once was. Roman wishes to leave and get away from that girl, but he doesn’t because he still has to buy his robes. So, he turns to the witch at the counter, that is now focused on taking the money, in order to finish the girl’s purchase and say, tone arrogant and cold, “Dark robes,”

He takes a piece of parchment from his pocket and hands it to her slowly, not breaking eye contact. The witch’s eyes are piercing blue and she looks like she wants to say something to him, but she stays quiet, which Roman’s thankful for. “My measurements,” He tells her before crossing his arms, looking away from both of them, feeling a bit safer knowing that he sounds exactly like the arsehole he can be. “Though I won't mind the robes being a bit longer,”

Adlai looks up to the pile of coins on the counter as the witch behind it nodded. So she did have enough. A sigh of relief escaped her lips. Though the boys tone did sound very phony when he told her that he was wrong. It was the same tone her grandfather would use when she won a game of cards, which meant that he had let her win.

“Thank you.” She said to him, knowing he must have spared the last two coins she was missing. Though it seemed like he desperately didn’t want Adlai to know he did. She wanted to repay him non the less for explaining to her what the name of these coins were, even if it ended up that he didn’t pay the last of the coins.

She gave him a smile which revealed her crooked teeth. “What’s your name?” She asked, thinking it as a common curtesy. This was Adlai’s first time shopping on her own, or being on her own in general. He looked like he was also attending Hogwarts, so maybe she’d be able to make a friend before she arrived at the magical school, that would give her some piece of mind.

[quote][quote]After her question, Roman takes his time to look at that girl, slightly curious as to why she’d want to keep talking to the likes of him. Her teeth are crooked, he notices when the girl smiles at him. She’s shorter than him, too, like most people are, considering the boy’s way above the normal height for an eleven-year-old.

He raises his neck, in order to look more arrogant, and overall bad so she didn’t prolong the conversation any longer. It’s not that he has anything against her per se, the boy just doesn’t like making unnecessary small talk to people he’d never see again. He doubts that the kid is going to be sorted into the same house as him, so there’s no need to play friendly.

“Roman Kingston,” he says, in the most annoying tone he can find in his arsenal; it’s that mix of fake kindness and politeness he often used with random strangers, especially to those co-workers father invites home every month to talk about… Work, or whatever the hell adults talk about.

Of course, he doesn’t ask her name back, because he’s Roman and he simply doesn’t care. Clearly avoiding her, he drags his eyes across the store. The place is getting fuller and fuller, it seems. He just has to wait until the witch brings his robes, then he can leave. Father is probably still at the bank; the old man loves to take his time when doing the simplest things, so Roman still had plenty of time to go around the Diagon Alley to explore some more.

There are a lot of things he needs to buy, and the boy would love to have some time for himself to spy the Magical Menagerie. He doubts the old man will buy him a pet; Virgil Kingston doesn't like animals, for some reason. Probably has to do with mum, Roman thinks bitterly, making a face. She's always the source of all my problems...

Anyways, yes, he has a lot of things to buy, but the most important thing of all: his wand. Ollivanders can be found right at the end of the street, Roman noticed when he walked towards Madam Malkin's. Wanting to get out of there, he looks over his shoulder, but the witch behind the counter is still nowhere to be found.

Then, his dark eyes land again on the girl, and Roman sighs, almost defeated, then says, “Wot's yars, anyway? Ya're clearly not from a wizarding family, are ya?”

“Roman Kingston...” Adlai mutters to herself.
“I’m Adlai, Adlai Rod.” She sticks her hand out to him after she had smoothed out her ankle length skirt, pushed any stray hairs back into her hijab and leaned back, making sure she wasn’t slouching.
“And yes I’m absolutely not from a wizarding family. I come from a long line of farmers, barbers and tailors.”

Adlai was actually quite proud of her lineage. Everyone in her family was very clean cut and knew how to run their business and worked hard, that is everyone but her aunt, Margaret-Vikortia, from what she knows. Adlai aspires to be exactly like her parents. Though now that she will be attending Hogwarts her future work method may be very, very different.

“How about you? Do you come from a wizarding family?” She asked before realizing that it was a stupid question. Of course he was, how else would he know how much money she needed. She began to fiddle with her fingers, again another nervous habit. How could she save herself from something as embarrassing as asking an idiotic question. Could her being a
muggle-born save her from any kind of spite she may endure? Or will it just make matters worse for her?

[quote][quote]The boy lowers his eyes to the hand pointed in his direction after the girl introduces herself. He doesn’t even need to think about it. Roman only nods as a response, with a small, but so arrogant smirk on his very punchable face. He crosses his arms and looks around once more, glaring at the identical twins that had just walked in, laughing about something.

“Clearly, I am a pureblood,” He runs his fingers through his black hair, answering her stupid question, not sparing her another glance. The rest of the sentence, something along the lines of “are you dumb?”, dies before it can come out of his mouth, for some reason to which Roman frowns, very displeased with himself.

Part of him, the small and relatively good part that is always shoved deep inside his heart, tells him that he’s already been acting too rudely, but he tells it to shut the hell up and that he didn’t care, but Roman doesn’t comment anything mean to Rod, though he feels like it. Dear Merlin, something’s really wrong with me today, the boy thinks to himself, shaking his head.

He’ll have a lot of things to tell his house-elves; stories, questions, and opinions, the boy concludes, making a mental note to himself. It’s embarrassing, come to think of it, those three elves are the only company he has back at home. Well, they’ll surely be very happy to hear the great master Roman talking about his day while they cook dinner and do the rest of the dishes and that’s what matters.

The witch comes back with his outfits, with a weird looking smile on her face, and with that, he knows she’s finally recognized him. She hands him his clothing in a special bag with a big ribbon on it, and says, “It’s on the house. A gift.” Roman squints his eyes in her direction, wondering what excuse she’ll use. “After all, it’s not every day a boy starts his school adventures, right, my darling? How’s your mum, by the way? Working on her new album, I suppose? I’m her biggest fan,”

“Right,” he says, more to himself than her and her fake big smile falters a little. “Of course ya are,” Roman stares right her face, his expression empty and cold, eyes dark and emotionless. It makes him smile, bitter and sick at his stomach, the mention of his mother and the fact that the witch doesn’t even give him the time to accept the present before asking what she wants to know.

He looks down and chuckles, shaking his head, gladly taking the gift from her. Running his fingers through his hair, continuing to laugh; a big, fake smile — just as fake as hers — on his pale face, as the boy ignores the sting in his heart.

“Nice excuse, I’ll give ya that, too bad I dunno anythin’ ‘bout my mum,” The witch’s left eye twitches, as she keeps her fake smile, not wanting to lose her composture. “Thanks for the gift, ma’am,”

Pure blood?- Adlai thought herself. Again not knowing what that meant. She’d heard the terms muggle and pure blood be used a lot today. Someone even calling her a muggle, but she didn’t think much of it and started using the term herself not knowing if it were a bad thing or not.

As Adlai observed how Roman behaved for the next few seconds she stuck a label onto him, “Grandpa...” she said out loud instead of in her head as she would have preferred. She closed her purse and took her school robes off the counter thanking the witch before slowly making her way to the door. She heard small snippets of Roman and the witch’s conversation, something about an album. Perhaps he was a musician or someone in his family was, maybe they both just liked the same kind of music or they both liked the same artist. Adlai didn’t know. But what she did know is that she’d like to meet Roman again, even if he came off as a sour apple.

Would her parents believe her if she told them what happened today? Would they decide that it was best not to send her to Hogwarts in the end? She decided it would be best not to tell them everything that happened today, who knows what they’d say if they knew the truth.

[quote][quote]Her little comment is loud and it seems that almost everyone in the store has heard it. Roman snaps his head in the sound of the girl’s word, crossing his arms, still holding his back. The witch behind the counter lets out a snicker, not having to pretend to be nice anymore, which makes him glare at her as well, now wanting to leave more than ever. The boy clenches his jaw, frowning at Adlai.

“Grandpa?” repeats the boy, in a controlled tone, but enough for anyone to notice that he’s slightly offended by that. Roman has never been called a grandfather before, and even though he’s been called way — way! — worse, it still makes him irritated. “’Scuse me?”

It makes him question what about his behavior made that girl think of an older man, or even worse, her own grandfather. He's sour mood can easily be compared to one of those old, grumpy, pureblood wizards, but no one dared to point that out to him. Roman clicks his tongue, and looks away, regretting being remotely nice to her when he gave her those two sickles.

Grandpa... Haha, so funny, he complains to himself, eyes glued to the door of Madam Malkin's, bitter. Roman doesn't usually get insults to get to him, and, now that he thinks about it, he doubts that such a girl like Adlai had meant to offend him in any way. Whatever, he thinks. It's not like he cares about what a muggle-born has to say, anyways.