A Handful of Summer [Penelope]

[cordelia regan smith]

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June 2028

Since moving into the apartment in Horizont Alley a few years prior, a number of roommates had come and gone. Apparently that was normal for young adults, though it never ceased to make Cordelia extremely nervous about who would fill in the empty rooms. Getting used to the same people had helped her break out of her shell, to the point where learning of a new resident only caused slight discomfort, mostly in the form of worries about how loud they would be and whether or not she knew them yet. According to her mum, whom she complained to frequently about things of this nature, that was completely normal. Change was supposed to be good though, and nothing could even come close to being as scary as the interview process she'd gone through for her job. Comparing the odd characters she met through that to former classmates that she probably knew definitely made the whole ordeal easier.

Cordelia had never considered herself to be the warm and hospitable type. Eli probably disagreed with her, but she didn't trust what he said most of the time. To make up for this and to show that she wasn't purposely ignoring new roommates when they first moved in, she had taken to getting them a variety of baked goods from the Pi Pâtisserie down the street as a welcoming gift of sorts. It had yet to fail. Luckily she was vaguely familiar with the new girl that was moving in, Penelope Bainbridge, and had seen her working at the florist across the street. Which also made her second guess about whether or not getting goodies from the local bakery was a smart idea or not. They changed their menu frequently, but it was still coming from the same place. She hoped that didn't seem too convenient and reflect back as laziness.

Currently, she was pacing up and down the hallway that connected to most of the bedrooms, white pastry box in her hands, thinking of all of that. All she had to do was knock and hand them over. Why did it have to be so difficult being proactive like this? Taking a deep breath, Cordelia stopped her back and forth routine and put her hand up to Penelope's door, knocking twice.

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Although she had lived away from home while attending Hogwarts, Penelope had never lived totally apart from her siblings before. She had shared a dormitory with Persephone and Peyton at school because they were triplets and all three in Hufflepuff, and then she had lived at home since she had finished school. It would have been okay to live at home with her family for longer, but she had known that it wasn't reasonable to think that she could live at home forever. Her parents also had mentioned something more than once about wanting to ensure that she developed her own identity separate from that of her sisters, and so Penelope had begun looking for a place of her own.

Her primary concerns were that she needed to live somewhere safe and affordable. Fortunately, she found that and more with a flat in Horizont Alley across from her work that a group of people who had been in the year above her at Hogwarts had named the "Puff Palace". It wasn't actually a palace, but it might as well have been one. She also had the benefit of being flatmates with Raphael McLaggen. He was one of her neighbors at home, and they had known each other since childhood. That also definitely helped to reassure her parents that she wasn't going to be in any danger living on her own, since she wouldn't really be alone much at all.

Coming from such a large family, Penelope didn't think that it would be hard to live with so many people. The majority of them were former Hufflepuffs, too, which helped matters. Maybe it was silly of her, but she had moved her bed from her bedroom at home into her room in the Puff Palace. She wanted to make sure that she would be comfortable in the flat, and that seemed like a good way to do it. She had also bought a bouquet at the end of her work shift prior to moving in to give her room a cozier feel from the start. It didn't totally feel like home, but it was… close, she supposed.

Realizing that it would be a good idea to figure out who her flatmates were other than Raphael, Penelope opened her bedroom door to the hallway and noticed a girl whom she recognized as having been in the year above her at Hogwarts pacing back and forth with something in her hands. Penelope, who wasn't sure if she was there to deliver something, stood in her doorway. "Erm, hi?" she hesitated.

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Cordelia was like an abraxan caught in lumos light as the door suddenly whipped open in front of her. Even though that was exactly what she wanted, it still felt sort of sudden, as if it wasn't on her own terms. She stepped back slightly to give space between herself and Penelope, who she realized she only sort of recognized now. What Cordelia did know was that her new roommate was one of three - triplets. Had she gotten Penelope confused with one of her sisters?

Regardless, they were both staring at one another in Penelope's doorway. Cordelia obviously had a way of making everything unbelievably awkward without even trying, and could already feel her grip tightening around the cardboard edges of the pastry box. "I-I-I wanted to we-welcome y-you..." she stuttered out, already finding it hard to make eye contact with her new roommate. She held up the box, in a way that semi hid her face, and out far enough that Penelope would have to take it. "From P-P-Pi-Pi...the bakery."

She really wished she had Eli with her to help. His natural enthusiasm and ability to vocalize a lot of what she was thinking had been so helpful the last few years. At the same time, she knew she needed to do things on her own. She had been working on it, of course, but putting it into practice was always hard right at the beginning. "I-I'm Cordelia...m-my room is right there," she pointed with one hand down the hallways. Because that totally specified which room was hers. There wasn't even something to make hers stick out over the others. At some point she knew she'd have to explain the deal with Eli as well, but figured it would be better to let him do that. She had no clue what the proper way to phrase it would be.

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

When the older girl began to speak to her, Penelope realized that she recognized her because of her noticeable stutter more than anything else. She explained that she wanted to welcome her to their shared flat, and she held up the box that was in her hands and held it out towards her. "From P-P-Pi-Pi… the bakery."

"Oh," Penelope stated as she took the box, hoping that she hadn't sounded rude initially. "Thank you." She smiled at the older girl, but she felt sort of guilty that she didn't have anything to give to her in return. Hopefully, she would be able to make up for that somehow, since they would be living together.

"I-I'm Cordelia," the older girl said to introduce herself. "M-my room is right there."

From the gesture that Cordelia made to indicate her bedroom, she didn't seem to have been very clear about which room was actually hers, but Penelope, who didn't want to make her first real interaction with one of her flatmates any more uncomfortable than it had started out, nodded as though she understood. She imagined that she would figure out which room actually was Cordelia's soon enough. "I'm Penelope," she replied to Cordelia, trying to remain upbeat to get rid of the previous awkwardness. "Rafe told me about this place. We were neighbors growing up."

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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There were times where Cordelia wished her family, before it sort of blew up with her dad’s proclivity for cheating, had lived in Godric’s Hollow. Instead, the Smith family had stayed in Inverness, which was great and all because there was a magical community there, but she also felt a tad left out at times. Maybe it would have helped with her stutter and social anxiety more before going to school. There seemed to be a sort of comradery between her peers that grew up in Godric’s Hollow, and she had first witnessed it with Lily. Which, by Penelope’s statement of being neighbors with the McLaggens, meant the Potters had to be on the same street as well. Cordelia had never personally visited the community, despite being invited by Lily years ago, but sort of had a visual picture of how things were set up. And her dad sort of knew the McLaggen’s dad from school as well.

“So y-you know Lily too?” she asked despite knowing that the answer would be an obvious ‘yes’. Who didn’t know Lily? A strange friendship had formed there, and while they hadn’t been able to do much the last few years because of the Potter girl being made to repeat a school year, Cordelia still tried to pop by the Weasley joke shop every other week. Lily always seemed happy to see her.

Cordelia swayed awkwardly back in forth in place, unsure of how to continue the conversation. “Err…do y-you have any q-questions about the flat?” she asked while looking down at her feet. It only then occurred to her that her name was on her door, with Eli’s firmly shoved underneath it. Hopefully he’d be back in time to explain to Penelope because she really didn’t know how to. Things just sort of…happened? “Raphael p-probably told y-you the attic is a d-d-darkroom for our photography?” Cordelia added, thinking that was sort of important. That was the first thing she’d committed to when moving in. It seemed to have paid off now that there were three photographers living in the flat.

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Cordelia asked her if she knew Lily, and Penelope nodded without even needing to know which Lily she was talking about. "Yeah," she answered happily. Of course she knew Lily. Trying to figure out who didn't know Lily Potter would have been the real question. Between how famous her family was and how unforgettable she was, sometimes it felt as though everyone knew her. In Penelope's case, the Potters were also their neighbors in Godric's Hollow, which she imagined Cordelia must have known, either through Lily or Raphael.

After that, Cordelia checked if she had any other questions about the flat and added that Raphael had probably told her that the flat had a photography darkroom. "Yeah," Penelope replied again. "I was a bit confused by it before, but it makes sense, doesn't it?" Having a darkroom at home was a bit unusual, she thought. She had never heard of anyone having one, at least. It was also sort of cool, too. Though she wasn't a photographer and wasn't entirely sure how to use a darkroom other than the fact that it could be used to develop photos, it would be useful if she were to decide to pick up photography at some point. "So you're a photographer, too, then?"

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Merlin, that was such a stupid question to ask. Everyone knew who Lily was, not to mention that she was a Potter. By default she was going to be popular from the day she was born. Cordelia had always assumed that her friend had figured that out fairly early in life and just rolled with it because outright rejecting the fame would be worse. Supposedly one of her brothers had done that, and a number of texts with rolling eye emojis and Albus’s name attached to them told Cordelia all she needed to know about the middle Potter. Weirdly, she felt like she could maybe get along with someone that was against the grain like that.

The fact that they (collectively, as a group) had decided to convert the attic into the darkroom instead of leaving it open as a room for more roommates, probably said a lot about their obsessions. Only recently did they really have a chance to utilize any sort of digital camera in the area, as even if they wanted to, they couldn’t because of Horizont being where it was. Resorting to good old faithful film was so much easier though, and she liked the hands-on approach to it much more than sitting at her computer digitally manipulating the grain and exposure.

”Err yeah…” Cordelia responded, unsure of why that sounded embarrassing coming from someone else. ”I-I work for the Quibbler…t-taking photos.” And that was actually the part she was ashamed of, because most of what she went out to capture didn’t actually exist. The only positive to that was that anything else she took photos of while on assignment was hers to keep. So the half-baked, almost tabloid type pictures that were printed in the magazines really weren’t all that bad at the end of the day. ”Wh-What about y-you? For work, I-I mean.”

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Cordelia replied that she was a photographer, as Penelope had assumed based on her having brought up the darkroom. Whether it was because of her stutter or because she wasn't sure of herself, it was hard for Penelope to tell, but Cordelia seemed to be slightly nervous about confirming that she was a photographer. There was nothing wrong with being a photographer, though, Penelope thought. Even if she didn't do it for work and just did it as a hobby on the side, that was cool. Penelope couldn't say that she was similarly artistically gifted in any way. She could draw something well enough to get a point across if she had to, for example, but she also wasn't going to be making anything that any museum would want to put on display.

It turned out that Cordelia worked for The Quibbler as a photographer, which was… interesting, to put it in a way that wouldn't sound offensive. Penelope bobbed her head in a slight nod and tried not to be judgmental about it. The Quibbler was a magical publication, but its reputation was less prestigious than most others. Occasionally, the magazine would publish something that made for informative journalism, and it had done so historically, but a lot of it seemed to have no basis in anyone's definition of fact.

That didn't mean that Cordelia believed in everything that was published in The Quibbler, though; Penelope reminded herself of that. A job was a job, and they probably paid Cordelia well enough to photograph whatever it was that they needed photos of to support their articles.

"Wh-What about y-you? For work, I-I mean."

Luckily, Penelope wasn't embarrassed to say what she did for work. Her job wasn't the most prestigious position a person could have, either, but she also didn't want the stress of training to be an Auror or trying to keep the Ministry of Magic running or getting hit with Bludgers sent hurtling towards her by people twice her size. "Oh," she started, "I work as a cashier at Forget-Me-Knot Florist." It was nice to be surrounded by flowers all day, and most of the customers who came into the shop weren't too disgruntled. "Mostly, I work the till, but I also sort of help out with whatever my boss needs from me, really." She supposed that was probably the case for most jobs, not that she had held any others for comparison. Part of staying hired was doing what the boss wanted and not messing up.

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Cordelia had begun to nervously pull on her sleeves as she spoke, the wrists of her shirt already pulled and warped from the repeated action over the years. She knew she needn’t feel weird about her job. Anything that paid was seen as decent work, and it wasn’t like The Quibbler had horrible morals as a publication. Quite the opposite really. It was all harmless folly. She was paid to go out and take pictures of things that didn’t exist and then provide them back to the editor. An empty photo was almost as good as getting the real thing. Her only stipulation was that they credited her as an anonymous photographer, because, well, she didn’t want any future work to be hampered by what The Quibbler put out. The portfolio she had crafted over the years from her own personal work proved she was a competent photographer.

In the interim, Penelope had answered her question: she worked at the florist in Horizont Alley. Cordelia had been there a few times, mostly trying to see if there were any bouquets she could buy to make the flat look a little more lively amongst the chaos that typically existed. At first, she had been concerned about the constant hustle and bustle of her roommates going in and out. After a few months, she realized that this was just how things were, and at least she had a room to herself (though it was shared now).

”Th-That sounds fun,” Cordelia answered rather plainly, unsure if there was a better word for it. She did find it interesting. ”D-Do you sell m-magical plants too? L-Like for p-potions…” Not that she was in the business at all. Slug & Jiggers solved all of those problems for her, because she honestly didn’t trust herself not to accidentally blow up her cauldron in the middle of the living room again. She could develop photographs but had seemingly lost the ability to expertly brew a potion. Probably because there was little to no need for it anymore.

Pulling on the wrists of her sleeves again, Cordelia tried to think of where to take the conversation next. They were going to be living together now, so she figured if she got over her own awkwardness sooner rather than later, it would be for the best. ”Y-You can use spells to m-make y-your room b-bigger if y-you want…the l-l-landlord is fine with it…” she said slowly, trying to carefully say each word. It didn’t really matter much, because first encounters like this always ended up the same way for her despite working on it over the last few years. ”I-I had to add an extra closet r-recently…” Because despite not having a whole lot, having two people in the same bedroom sort of made her realize how small the rooms actually were originally.

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Cordelia replied and said that working at Forget-Me-Knot Florist sounded fun, which it usually was. Sometimes, there would be less-fun tasks that she had to do, like when Aurelia had mistakenly received a shipment of Mandrakes and they had to repot them. That one was more entertaining in hindsight, actually, since she could laugh about it. On a similar note, Cordelia asked if they sold magical plants for potions ingredients.

"Yeah, some of them." Some flowers could be used as potions ingredients, though, and they didn't really ask what people were buying their floral arrangements for unless they wanted some sort of personalization with their purchase. "My boss is a trained Herbologist, though," Penelope noted, "so she has experience with loads of stuff." Advertising that Aurelia kept a Venomous Tentacula probably wasn't a good idea, but she imagined that Aurelia could contact her suppliers if Cordelia was in need of something specific that she was having trouble finding elsewhere.

Beyond the subject of her work, Cordelia informed her that their landlord didn't mind if they magically enlarged their rooms. Cordelia, for example, had added another closet to hers.

"Oh, that's nice to know." Penelope thought that it might come in handy to enlarge her room at some point. It was plenty large enough for just her, but it might be cramped if her sisters ever wanted to spend the night. "Are there any rules about having guests?"

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Even in all of her awkward glory, it was good to feel like she had connections with people that worked at different shops in the area. Some scared her more than others, like the girl at Flourish & Blotts who was always aggressively trying to chat with her when it happened to be just the two of them in there. Or Mrs. Ollivander, who still made Cordelia cross the street whenever she passed the wand shop, all these years later. She hadn’t even been the one that sold her first wand to her, but seeing her inside the shop glaring was enough to make her retreat to the other side of the alley each and every single time. There were other curious characters around, of course, each with their own quirks that she felt made the shopping district what it was. She was just as weird in her own ways, and she figured most saw her running around with her camera and found it as strange, if not more, than whatever they did in their day to day lives. Magickind and artistic photography weren’t known to complement one another.

When it came to guests, she honestly didn’t know. Cordelia shrugged. ”Y-You should ask someone else…I-I d-don’t have guests usually…” Which was hilarious considering Eli had been for quite a while despite having his own room. That also was the reason this room for Penelope had opened up. ”M-Most of the time it doesn’t matter be-because everyone uses s-silencing charms on their rooms.” That had been one of the first things she’d cast on her own upon moving in. Not only did she want everything in her room to stay there, she also didn’t really want to hear what the rest of the building was up to. After seven years of living in the Hufflepuff dorms, peace and quiet were absolutely necessary. That and no one needed to hear the voice she used when talking to her cat. It wasn’t exactly the most flattering thing in the world, especially with her stutter still hanging on.

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Despite having lived there for at least some time longer than she had, Cordelia didn't seem to know anything more than she did about what the rules were for having guests around. In fact, she shrugged her shoulders in response and said that she should ask someone else instead, since she didn't usually have guests. Penelope felt bad for her, mostly because she couldn't imagine not having guests. At her house—or her parents', she supposed—there were always people there, to where it was strange to have a moment of peace and quiet.

Most of the time, added Cordelia, it didn't matter anyway. Everyone, she said, used Silencing Charms on their rooms.

"Oh, erm…" Penelope chimed in as she could feel her cheeks getting warmer. She wasn't planning on having those types of guests. "I was just thinking my sisters…" That probably wasn't what Cordelia had meant, though, she realized after another moment.

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Cordelia hadn’t realized the implications of what she had said regarding the silencing charms. That had been a stock spell she’d used the second she moved in, and even implored her original roommates to do the same. Because who didn’t want complete silence from their room? It was blissful not hearing everyone else’s alarm clocks, music, or whatever they got up to. Personally, she did it because she enjoyed her privacy to an extreme level. Talking to her cat aside, she didn’t want anyone else to hear her conversations when she was in her own space. And vice-versa; everyone was allowed to have an expectation of personal privacy. It made everything that much more comfortable, in her opinion.

When Penelope explained that by guests, she meant her sisters, Cordelia slowly nodded her head in acknowledgement, because that had sort of been what she was implying. Or friends, or whatever. But with the way Penelope said it, she also realized that the combination of guests and silencing charms could also be interpreted a different way, especially coming from someone who shared a room with her boyfriend. Her eyes widened and she started to sputter a bit, but no actual discernable words came out for a few seconds. ”N-N-No that would b-be fine I-I’m sure…”

Now she was embarrassed. Cordelia could already feel her face reddening, and she started to anxiously fiddle with her hands as she looked down at them. How did she come back from this? ”I-I-I j-just meant that I-I d-d-don’t know when everyone has g-guests…b-b-because of the ch-charms.” Her stutter had regressed big time, having not been that bad in years. Eli probably would have laughed this right off, but she couldn’t do that. It wasn’t built into her to be able to navigate embarrassment in that way. ”Y-You w-wouldn’t hear m-me anyways b-because m-my room is far enough away and the ch-charm b-but yeah…” Merlin, she was only making it worse now!

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[penelope raisa bainbridge]

June 2028

Cordelia clarified that she was sure that having her sisters over would be fine, which was what Penelope had wanted to know in the first place. The rest of that conversation had gone down a different path than she'd intended, and she was pretty sure that it was her fault. (Brígh and Addy had corrupted her, hadn't they?) The older former Hufflepuff blushed, too, as she said that she had only meant that she didn't know when other people had guests because of the charms. Taken the more innocent way, that was good; it meant that they were all courteous flatmates (or tried to be), and Penelope got the feeling that that was a rarity. That was the benefit of living with mostly Hufflepuffs, wasn't it?

By the time she added that she wouldn't hear her regardless because of the distance between their respective bedrooms and the Silencing Charms, Cordelia's stutter was even more pronounced. Penelope felt bad that they had both thoroughly embarrassed themselves, and she wanted to avoid making it any worse. She initially just nodded in response to what Cordelia had said, trying to buy a little bit of time to think over her word choice so that she wouldn't accidentally imply anything else.

"Sorry for the, er, misunderstanding." Penelope apologized first and foremost, making an effort to clear that up. "That's great, though, that everyone can just… peacefully coexist." (She really hoped that there wasn't a double meaning there.) "I've got six siblings, and we don't always get along, so…"

cordelia regan smith

[cordelia regan smith]

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Trying to reset the embarrassment in the moment was impossible for her. She’d made a lot of progress over the years, which is what had kept her from completely shutting down right now. She was going to be thinking about this exact encounter for years too. At least it wasn’t anything worse and all just a misunderstanding. Cordelia would be mortified otherwise. ”N-No its fine,” she basically repeated to Penelope. Peaceful coexistence, as her new housemate was putting it, was basically the point of renting the place. They each had their own space away from the rest, and the shared areas always had something going on. Even she ventured out now, even if it was just to sit on one of the couches to watch the rest of them. It was sort of like having a miniature Hufflepuff Common Room, plus a Ravenclaw. Dealing with far less people was so much enjoyable for her than the common room had ever been though.

”Yeah…that’s a lot,” Cordelia admitted when Penelope stated the number of siblings she had. She’d known of the triplets, obviously, and then the two older twins, having run into the one a few years prior in Knockturn Alley, and Cara occasionally at Fortescue’s when getting ice cream. Cordelia didn’t dare tell Penelope that Cara scared her, the intensity of her glare always making it seem like she had to rush to choose her ice cream flavor. And then there were the other two, who she had never interacted with before. She did know the oldest was a Quidditch player, and that was about it.

”Umm…” Cordelia started, tugging at the hems of her sleeves as she tried to think of what to say next. ”If y-you need any help, f-feel free to ask m-me or Eli.” Penelope hadn’t inquired about the fact that both names were on her room door, but there was a chance Raphael had already told her about that. It sort of just happened naturally, so there really wasn’t any way to explain it in her opinion.

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