A Shipwreck In The Sand [Frankie]

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

3:21AM. The green, digital numbers were typically a dull afterthought during the daytime, their only important function was to operate as a timer for the microwave they were attached to. In the dark, their neon glow splashed across the wall opposite the microwave. A teakettle nestled on the back burner of the stove, blue flames tickling it’s underbelly to boil the water inside. The kitchen was tiny, but good enough for one person. She barely cooked as it was, her parents always trying to convince her that it was better to keep the family unit together for meals. They seemed to forget that she was stuck in the shop with them all day too. There were other reasons too; Nell hated seeing her sister’s scowl glaring back at her across the dinner table. It was bad enough to get it during work hours, but at home too? What happened in the shop should stay in the shop, but her sister didn’t know how to do that. Letting things go was a sign of weakness in her eyes. A failure.

Nell was, according to the eldest Ollivander child, a bundle of failures when it came to wandmaking. Too much time spent on carving out a quality piece of wood? That wasn’t efficient for the business. Deviate from the family’s trade of only producing wands with three cores? A crime punishable by banishment from the shop. There were also the never-ending criticisms about not being a good enough wandmaker. Most apprentices would have at least moved onto a junior wandmaker position by their fifth year of training. Nell was on her seventh, though not by her own choice. Her sister had long put off allowing her to make wands for the shop. To test her chops with the family’s skills. That was her downfall though, because Nell knew she could produce decent wands. She had been selling them on the sly for a few years now, utilizing materials she bought on her own when she had a little extra saved up or taking scraps of wood that were going to be tossed if they stayed at the shop. Her small apartment was equipped with the tools to allow her to slowly pick away at her craft whenever she had the free time to do so. It was better than bending over to her sister for the rest of her life.

And that was what she was currently working on – a new wand for her private sales. Acacia wood with a hippogriff feather. An extremely loyal wand with only one wielder for life. That sort of bond was too much for herself. Nell preferred friendly wands, ones that let her create beautiful magic and works of art. The one currently propped up on a mount and under the scrutiny of her sharp eyes was the sort for an Auror or for a person that knew how to actually use a wand. She was currently in the process of engraving a design on the handle when a sharp knock came from the front door of her apartment, causing her to almost chip the wood as her tools jumped off of it. Glasses pulled off her nose, where they returned to their normal spot hanging from her neck, Nell peeled her work gloves off and strode over to the door, furious that someone was bothering her this late in the evening. She didn’t even both to look through the peephole before she whipped the door open.

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

FRANKIE HAD NO CONCEPT OF THE TIME AS HE could barely see. His head was delightfully fuzzy so that the world did a funny little spin when he lifted up his chin. All he really knew was that he'd been drinking for a very long time, so long in fact that he'd been thrown out of the bar he'd settled in to. Though that probably had something to do with the fact that he couldn't keep his head up very well.

He'd barely been released a week, his 'health' a primary concern that made eyes linger on him and mouths purse painfully. He saw it in his parent's stares, how much of a burden he had become. It had been his only task, to leave and do something off his own back, and he'd failed spectacularly. If that wasn't reason to drink, he didn't know what was. He just wasn't drunk enough to think going home was a good idea. So, he'd wandered the streets of London until he could see a little better, and then he'd kept walking until he'd come upon his little sister's block of flats.

Frankie only remembered her address because he'd memorised it while he'd been away. Sending the odd letter so that she knew he wasn't dead - a courtesy she received only because of his lingering regret in leaving her with their elder sister. The fact that it'd ran on a loop in his head made very little sense to him, but it was his best bet as he fought with the loose, rusty catch on the outside door, pulling and pulling until it yanked free clumsily. He climbed the stairs slowly, blinking heavy lids and mumbling senselessly to himself. He hadn't the capacity to call ahead.

When he found her door, with its ornate brass number plate, he slumped against it for a moment, head resting on the cold wood until his breathing wasn't so heavy. He knocked while still leaning his full weight on it, gripping the frame fruitlessly and muttering what he hoped was 'Nellie' through the heft of it. The wood made his lips taste like polish and dirt, but he didn't seem to mind with his eyes closed and scruffy cheek turned on to it lazily.

After what felt like a lifetime, the door gave way and Frankie promptly fell inside. He'd been gripping the frame hard enough that it stopped his full momentarily, but his hands were sweaty and clumsy so they soon slipped. He hadn't the coordination to catch himself and after clipping somebody on the shoulder, he landed face first in her hallway, where he lay silently for a moment as his mind caught up.

"Nellie," He slurred, lips scraping against the ground. "I 'fink... I broke... your door." He let out a long groan and shuffled on to his back, feet hanging out over the jamb and welcome mat. He couldn't see past a hazy blur, and she he wasn't entirely sure if it was Nellie's shadow looming over him at all. He just assumed so, belching a little in to his throat as he squinted up at her. 

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

The incessant pounding of the fist on her door had Nell equally worried that something bad had happened and that she was about to be reported for a noise violation by a neighbor. The residents of her building didn’t mess around at all and it was almost lucky that she had the ability to charm her walls to reduce incoming and outgoing noise. Blasting music or movies was the highlight of most of her evenings, not to mention being totally oblivious to the neighbor’s infant child wailing at all hours.

But the hallway immediately outside of her apartment door was not charmed, and the person’s rough raps against her door were surely going to draw some sort of ire if she didn’t hurry up. Looking through the peep hole would have been the smartest thing to do. Wand makers apparently had a habit of disappearing a lot during rougher periods of magical history, her own great-grandfather’s kidnapping being the event in question that her parents always liked to bring up. That and they didn’t like that she lived in a muggle apartment building. Money never seemed to be a problem for them, but living in Diagon Alley or getting a house in one of the communities was too much for her. The safety those locations provided was eclipsed by the anonymity of living amongst muggles. She preferred it that way.

So instead of being ‘safe’, Nell ripped her apartment door open and a person came stumbling in, falling too fast for her to even think of trying to catch them. It was all one fluid motion and she didn’t realize it was her brother until he started to mumble something, his face smooshed into the floor. Frankie was absolutely blasted. She could feel and smell it radiating off of him when he flipped around onto his back and started to mention her door being broken. “I think you have other things to worry about Frankie,” she said disapprovingly, moving around to where her brother’s head was and grabbing him by the shoulders. She hadn’t seen him this bad in a long time, and especially not since he moved back in with their parents. “Come on, have to close the door or the neighbors will think I’ve killed someone again.” Nell pulled, attempting to get his legs past the range of the door so she could shut it. The runner in the hallway bunching up under her brother’s weight as she did so.

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

LAYING ON THE FLOOR OF NELL'S ENTRYWAY, Frankie might have fallen asleep if he'd been left there. Alas, one moment he was blinking at the ceiling, the next there were a pair of mystery hands on his shoulders and a wobbly - but familiar - face staring at him, screwed in concentration. He felt the tug, and his body begin to shift ever so slightly, but hadn't the motor skills to use that to sit up. "Oop," He said, snickering through his nose. "Up we go." Except they weren't.

After a moment, he had the good sense to pull his knees up. If only to stop Nell pulling and shoving at them. But, this of course, reminded him of his hideously uncomfortable boots. Clumsily, he bent one foot and balanced it on one knee, pulling at the laces until they knotted. "You get a lotta visitors, Nellie?" He slurred, his mouth thick and dry as he pulled at the heel of his boot until it gave and then tossed it on the ground somewhere. It took him a few tries, but he managed to get a hold of the other one. Sitting up to see it better, his head lolling slightly as she tried and failed to concentrate.

"You were such a lil' weirdo," He mumbled, snickering to himself, it shook his shoulders gleefully. With the other shoe off, he tossed it in to the abyss and lifted his wobbling head, searching for her blindly. "Wands," He said, as if it was a full sentence, lifting one hand to point at her knowingly. "You... you married wands." And then he was shifting on to his knees, grabbing at her as he pulled himself up to a standing. "M'hungry," He stated, pursing his lips as he stumbled past Nell and wandered down her hallway in search of a kitchen. He'd never been in her flat before then, but he'd find it, if it was the last thing he did. And it might be, as he fell in to the wall more than once. A picture frame falling from the wall because of it.

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

Attempting to drag her brother down the hallway was futile. Not only did he weigh a lot more than she had anticipated, he was all dead weight and impossible to move while squirming around. By sheer luck she managed to get his legs over the door frame and quickly motioned with her hand for the door to shut, one of the few wandless spells she could actually do. Being a wandmaker nullified the need to go wandless, always having a spare few lying within reach. She also had to be a master of wands, even the temperamental ones, because that was ‘part of the job’, as her sister put it. Nell didn’t exactly like forcing the tough ones to bend to her will, but she had to do it to prove a point. They were still tools despite being living, breathing magical items with a semblance of self-awareness and intelligence. Which was something her brother was severely lacking right about now, suddenly trying to sit up while she was in mid pull.

Frankie was trying to pull his shoes off, and, after about a minute, managed to do so with one of them, tossing it into the air and barely missing Nell’s face by inches. At that, she let go of his shoulders, retreating a few feet away from him as he started working on the second shoe. “Yeah. I bring boys back all the time,” she said, not trying to hide the sarcasm at all. Frankie was drunk. Sarcasm didn’t work on drunk people. There had been a few boyfriends over the years, some her brother knew about and others he didn’t, probably because he wouldn’t have liked them. They never lasted long anyways, not enjoying her stubbornness and constant reminder that she was a workaholic.

Nell wanted to say something else about his inebriation, but her brother unknowingly cut her off, instead causing her to purse her lips at him. A weirdo married to wands? Of course she was married to the job. She was good at it! The second shoe came off while she shook her head in disappointment, flying towards the front door and leaving a boot-print where it made contact. Deciding in that moment that it was better to placate a drunken Frankie than to combat him, Nell helped pull him to his feet, though admittedly it was difficult. She ran into the same dead weight problem again, and this time he was practically crawling up in order to stand.

Without saying anything more than a mumble about being hungry, Frankie stumbled down the rest of the front hallway, leaving Nell in the dust. She didn’t want to get in his way again, afraid that he’d accidentally pull her down or unknowingly cause significant damage to the apartment. “It’s to the right,” she called after him, grimacing as he slammed into the wall and caused a picture to come crashing to the ground behind him. Swearing under her breath, Nell danced around the glass shards and to where her wand was in the living room, quickly placing the smashed picture back to how it was supposed to be before turning into the kitchen where her brother would hopefully be, drowning himself in whatever food she had inside the fridge.

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

HEARING HIS SISTER SAY THAT SHE 'BROUGHT boys' back to her apartment almost sobered Frankie up, whether she was serious or not. His face went slack, stopping what he was doing as he pointed a wobbling finger at her and swore, "You better fucking not, kid." Though the heat of his voice was weakened by his obvious slur, and the way his body swayed and wobbled as he looked at her shakily.

This only lasted a moment as he was quickly distracted by the task of standing up. He felt ravenously hungry all of a sudden and almost got lost on his way towards the kitchen. She had yelled 'right' behind him, but Frankie had to stop and look at his thumbs for a minute before he could head in the right direction. He'd truly lost any kind of sophistication he thought he had. He used to be smart, or so he thought.

The kitchen was small, and Frankie almost whacked his head on a cupboard over his head as he yanked the door of the fridge open and tried to bend down to look inside. He found a bowl covered in tinfoil and something wrapped in cellophane, which he tucked under his arm as he grabbed the handle of a milk carton and took it with him to a dining chair. He left the fridge door wide open, already hunched over the bowl in his hand as he tore off the tinfoil and let it drop on the floor.

He barely even inspected what was inside, simply lifting the bowl to sniff it suspiciously before reaching it and plucking out a twirly piece of pasta, which he promptly shoved in to his mouth. "Where's... your spoons, Nellie?" He yelled without seeing her, her name a jumbled mess in his mouth as he chewed noisily. He was already digging in with his hands, licking his fingers as he gorged himself without even tasting the contents properly. 

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

The reaction to her mentioning boys being in her apartment could have been almost anything; Nell didn’t know that it was going to be the one her brother came out swinging with though. Despite his obvious drunkenness and the fact that he struggled to get through his words, it was frightening how serious he was. How she constructed her life had nothing to do with how her siblings viewed her (though she certainly went out of her way to get under her sister’s skin as much as possible). Frankie’s bold warning wasn’t going to change anything. “If you want the couch for the night, straighten up, okay?” she warned him, hopefully as a reminder that this was her apartment; her sanctuary. He was always welcome, but when he was drunk he had to abide by her rules. She had a feeling it would fall on deaf ears though, his apparent hunger taking precedent as he continued stumbling down the hallway and into the kitchen. At least he was aware enough to hear the directions she had given him.

Stopping in the doorway to the kitchen, she grimaced at the disaster Frankie had already made. The refrigerator door was wide open and he had collected the milk carton and a couple bowls of leftovers from inside. Those were supposed to be dinners for later in the week. Frankie demanded a spoon for the pasta he was shoveling out of one of the bowls, and she had half the mind to let him continue hand-feeding himself. She thought better of it when envisioning how much worse the mess would be without a utensil in his hand.

Flicking her wand at the drawer that contained the utensils, a fork and spoon shot out and laid themselves on the table next to her brother, a drinking glass soon following. Getting the milk carton out of his hands was probably the most important task at hand; one wrong move and she would be cleaning milk off of the floor for the foreseeable future. Another wave had the drink poured and the carton back into the fridge, shutting the door behind it. Nell took a seat opposite her brother at the table, “So what has you out this late, Frankie? I thought this wasn’t going to happen anymore.”

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

FRANKIE BARELY HEARD NELL'S SOFT WARNING, nor did he heed it as he stumbled in to her small kitchen. His head was filled with cotton wool, and there was a very incessant buzzing noise in his ears. Perhaps the hum of the fridge, or the alcohol had muddled his hearing - he wasn't certain, but he didn't have the attention span to solve the mystery regardless. Either way, he was in no position to straighten up at all. But, had Frankie heard, he wouldn't have believed her. Nell was tough, but she felt sorry for him - that he knew with certainty.

Licking cold pasta sauce from his thumb, Frankie lifted a bleary head as a spoon, fork and cup wandered in to his field of vision. His mouth moved on auto-pilot, chewing clumsily as he watched the utensils float gracefully through the air and land on the table beside him. He flickered his wobbling gaze over to Nell, his sauce smeared lips pulled down at the corners. He swallowed hard, covering his mouth with a closed fist before he snapped, "Why'd you do that shit when I'm here?!" Magic was a sore spot for Frankie no matter what, but the alcohol made it too easy for him to say so unchecked. "You know I don't like it, and- 'nd the- f'cking drawer is right over there!"

His words came out in a rush, his dirty hand knocking a closed tub on to the ground as he pointed in the direction of the cutlery drawer angrily. His face was flushed with booze and irritation as he reluctantly grabbed the fork in a curled fist and stabbed it in to the open pasta tub. If he'd been sober, he'd have stood up and retrieved his own out of spite, but he didn't trust his legs to cooperate at that moment. Instead, he jammed a forkful in to his mouth, errant pieces of pasta curls sticking out of the corners as he chewed furiously.

He continued to chew silently for a beat longer, licking his lips and staring down at the tub when she asked him the burning question. The one his therapist asked him, the one his parents asked. All with varying tones of concern and disappointment. He couldn't even avoid it in Nell's voice - although she sounded more sad and frustrated than anything else. He poked the pasta, a clumsy elbow falling off the edge of the table as he looked up. "Make a lotta promises, eh?" He said sadly, his lips pulling in to a thin and dry smile. "Promise this is the last time..." He added, but it was a whisper they both knew was a lie. 

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

The power to not snap back at her brother when he freaked about her magic usage had been built up over the last seven years of working for Veronica. With her, there was always something wrong, and the ability to grin and bear it (and ultimately hate ever single second of it) had led to quite possibly the best poker face in the world. If she actually knew how to play the game she wouldn’t still be making wands. So despite the impending headache that inched closer and closer every time Frankie made a ridiculous demand or accusation, Nell didn’t budge. “And I’m over here.” She wasn’t going to trust him to stand back up and wobble over to the drawer when it looked like he was perfectly content with using only his hands. The addition of utensils didn’t deter the speed at which he shoveled his food down either, which still wasn’t impressing Nell at all. If he kept going at that rate, she was going to be doing a lot more cleaning than she had signed up for. Still, he was better off here in this state than he was at their parents’ house or, god forbid, the shop or Veronica’s place. She probably wouldn’t even give him the time of day when he was sober, let alone hold back on calling the police on him if he stumbled up to her door drunk.

She was trying not to show her disappointment at his current state but it leaked out in her words. They both knew that he wasn’t supposed to be drinking. It had never led him to a good place, and here he was once again, probably trying to swim through the darkness of his own mind while simultaneously drowning himself in alcohol. “Yeah…okay,” she mumbled, suddenly not wanting to look at him at all. He had a problem that he couldn’t run from. No matter what he ended up doing in between, Nell always saw him when he retreated back to the drink. “It’s going to kill you Frankie. I know you know that, and maybe you don’t care, but I do.” She was sure she had said that exact line before, maybe even a few times over the years. Watching him self-destruct was hard to do when she couldn’t act on it without retaliation. “So don’t promise anymore until you know you’re done for good.”

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

HAVING SPENT MUCH OF HIS LIFE STOMACHING his parent's crippling disappointment, Frankie thought himself a bit of an expert. He could put on a game face, pretend it didn't matter. And, over time, he'd convinced himself that it was true. But, he had a weakness, just as anyone else. Frankie had never been able to bear his little sister's disappointment. She had always accepted him as he was, even when they were children and she treated him as something of a project. She was, quite honestly, his favourite. And to know that he had let her down in any way almost killed his appetite.

Fork dangling from a limp wrist, Frankie stared at his sister for a beat. He didn't even chew, food pouched in one cheek as he thought about the right thing to say. A way for her to stop worrying and not lie all at once. "'M not gonna die," He muttered softly, finally breaching the deathly silence that had fallen over them. And then he kicked her shin under the table and did as he always did. Acted like it wasn't a big deal, dipping his fork back in to the tupperware and shoving another clump of cold pasta in to his mouth. "Tried that already, remember?" He said around a muffled bite. "Didn't agree with me."

But, ultimately, Nell was right. She always was. And Frankie knew that, beyond the booze and the food. That's why he always ended up at her door, because he could rely on her to make sure he woke up the next day. And, despite the inevitable lecture he was sure to get, it was better than risking going home. "'M gonna be fine, Nelly." He said with fake cheer, the alcohol making it easier to fake a smile. "Just you wait and see." What neither of them were likely to say was that she could be waiting quite some time. Frankie wasn't sure he'd fall back on his feet, but he wanted Nell to think there was a possibility that he just might. So that, at least, she kept opening the door for him night after night. 

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

She desperately wanted to fight her brother on his stance, but she knew it was futile in his current state. His irrationality had already reared its ugly head a few times, and if he was willing to get snippy over her usage of magic, there was no telling what would appear if she tried having a come-to-Merlin moment with him about his drinking. Expressing her disappointment in the only way she knew possible was the most she could do until he asked for the help he desperately needed.

Frankie’s additional quip about already chasing death left a sour taste in her mouth, and that was it. Forgetting that was impossible to do so soon, and the fact that he was already making light of it was concerning. That should have been a lesson learned and instead it turned to a guiding light, leading him along the line of life and death, dancing back and forth. That was her opinion on it though, and no amount of warnings could stop him from excess drinking if he really wanted to do it. “You’re not a cat. We don’t have nine lives,” she said after a moment of silence. “You’re lucky to get a second shot. If you want to waste this one away too…” Stopping herself, Nell bit down on her lower lip. She wasn’t sure what she wanted to say to him. Give it a shot? He didn’t need any more encouragement, he was doing well enough on his own already.

“Right…” She wasn’t convinced, but she also wasn’t required to be his babysitter. If he said he could do it, she wanted to see that actually happen. The only thing she could do now was make sure he was safe when he came stumbling to her front door. He would do the same for her if they reversed roles. “I’ll go get the couch ready for you. Clean yourself up once you finish eating.” Leaving the kitchen behind her, she re-entered the living room and flicked her wand a few times, moving all of her wandmaking equipment to the side in an orderly fashion and opening her couch up to the sleeper sofa within it. Another swish and she had the extra set of pillows and bed sheets she kept for guests on it, ready for whenever her brother came stumbling out of the kitchen.

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

THOUGH HE CERTAINLY DIDN'T FEEL INVINCIBLE, Frankie didn't feel as close to death as Nell thought he was. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that he had been at one point. The drinking was just a way of forgetting where it had landed him. Back living with his parents, with Ronnie lording her success over him like a great big baby grand piano dangling over his head. He felt fine. Or, so he kept telling himself. Nell always had a way of peeling back his outer layer and peering at the rot within.

"I'm not asking for 9," Frankie garbled, a scoff rattling his lips as he licked pasta sauce from his cheek, tongue poking out obscenely. "I- I think two is reasonable." He said with wide, innocent eyes. But, it was hard for him to deny the logic of Nell's concerns. It wasn't like the same as when Ronnie would titter at him. Nell actually cared about what happened to him, so it made it hard for him to fully ignore her. Even full of whiskey and pasta. "'M not wasting it." He grumbled, dropping the fork, his appetite suddenly gone. No matter her logic, Frankie wasn't in the mood for a lecture.

Suddenly, Frankie blinked and she was gone. His attention wobbling in and out of focus. He vaguely recalled something about the sofa, but he couldn't be sure. The pasta was no longer as appetising as he'd first found it, sitting like a rock in his gut as he recalled all the reasons Nell was right about him. And how, despite the fact that they disagreed on just about everything, both Nell and Ronnie had very similar perspectives when it came to his outlook. They just came from two very different places.

The chair clattered to the floor as Frankie stood, and he jolted with fright, his vision blurring as he clumsily reached down to right it, knocking the plastic tub and fork down on the ground. He grunted, blinking black from his eyes as he stared down at the mess of pasta and sauce all over the linoleum. After a second of thought he slumped down on the ground beside it, picking up each piece of pasta individually and dropping it back in to the tub. Where Nell had gone, he wasn't sure, but he tried his best to clean up his mess, even rubbing the smeared sauce away with the sleeve of his t-shirt. 

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

Galen Francis Ollivander

10.01.2024

Magic made everything infinitely easier, and Nell wasn’t going to deny that she did feel a little bad using it in front of her brother. But she always had – they all had. Normally he didn’t seem to care about it. Only when he was drunk did it come out, and it was enough tonight where Nell decided that bar anything awful happening, she would reduce her usage in front of him. Having the pillows and blankets set up on the sofa for him was the last of it for the night, and she even went as far as to arrange them in better locations with her hands. Frankie would probably appreciate that if he wasn’t absolutely blasted right now.

Standing back to observe her work and decide if there was anything else her brother might need for the night (like a trashcan, should he need it), a crash came from the kitchen. Nell was through the doorway in a matter of seconds, but she could already tell that Frankie hadn’t fallen. He was sat on the floor picking up pieces of pasta that were splattered all over. “Hey, it’s fine,” Nell said quietly as she knelt down in front of him and reached for the hand he wasn’t using to pluck up the pasta. “Frankie, go clean yourself up. I got the couch set for you.” She stood back up, keeping her hand positioned so she could help him stand if he needed it.

The mess wasn’t nearly as bad as it could have been. If he had fallen there definitely would have been blood – anyone this drunk would bang themselves up pretty good. Nell wasn’t terrible with first-aid spells but dealing with a bleeding and drunk brother would still be a pain. “I’ve got the rest of this. You need to sleep.” She felt like their mum when Nell had made the mistake of stumbling home drunk a few weeks after graduating from Hogwarts. Her dad had been disappointed and grumbled something about there being ‘another one’, or at least that was what she thought she remembered him saying, while her mum had basically babied her right to bed after getting some water and a little food in her. Somehow it all came full circle.

[Galen Francis Ollivander]

nobody.

AGAIN FRANKIE BLINKED AND NELL'S FACE WAS floating in front of him. Pale and drawn with concern. He reared back, almost falling against the cupboards behind him, the doors rattling as his back brushed against them. It was noise over noise and his head rattled like an empty tin can, ringing in his ears. "Where' you come from?" He slurred, his nose wrinkled as he wiped his sticky, tomato fingers on the front of his t shirt. She kept telling him it was fine, but he already knew that.

Watching her stand, Frankie registered that she was talking about the sofa and felt his aching body yearn for it. Her hand wobbled in front of him and he almost reached for it before second guessing himself, hands still sticky. Instead, he struggled to his feet on his own, skidding slightly on the spilled sauce. He snagged the edge of the counter at the last minute, grunting as he pulled his body up as if it were a dead weight. "Hmph," He moaned, his stomach roiling and head spinning. "Think your pasta's rotten," He mumbled, not considering the sheer amount of alcohol he'd consumed as the culprit.

However, as he turned on his feet and looked at Nell, he felt something knot his gut. He didn't like the way she was looking at him. Like he was wounded. Like he was weak. He'd got to the couch, like she'd asked, almost slipping on the floor again as he crossed the kitchen. He had to grab her to steady himself and when he had, he pulled away like her touch burned.

"You know," He muttered, strangely sober as the thought hit him. "I ain't lookin' forward to the day you give up on me, Nellie." His hands felt like cold fish at his sides. 'When', like it was a promise. "You've always been my favourite." And then he walked out of the kitchen, not even stopping to clean himself up as he stumbled all the way to the living room and fell over the arm on his way down to the couch cushions, face first. He was snoring soon after.

eleanor gwendolen ollivander

NEVERLAND at ADOXOGRAPHY 2.0!

[eleanor gwendolen ollivander]

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Somehow she hadn’t considered the state that her brother was truly in. Obviously he was drunk, and the really sloppy kind of drunk that had him on the ground more often than not. That was also why he had shown up at her door instead of falling asleep on the stoop of the shop, or attempting to break down Veronica’s door. Merlin have mercy on him if he ever did that while black out drunk. There would be one Ollivander locked up in Azkaban and the other six feet under. But looking down at Frankie as he picked pasta off of the kitchen floor and mumbled about wondering where she came from really solidified that he had absolutely no idea what was going on and most likely wouldn’t remember it the next morning. He was babbling on about the state of her pasta - which wasn’t off because it was made earlier in the day – and she silently took offense to that. Sure, wood shavings tended to find their way into every little nook and cranny of her apartment from being at the shop all day, but her food wasn’t tainted with them and the final product certainly wasn’t indigestible. The alcohol was talking for Frankie.

Walking alongside her brother in the kitchen, Nell held her hands out on both occasions where it looked like he was about to fall over again. The first instance wasn’t the drunkenness as much as it was an effect of it - slipping on spilled marinara sauce from the bowl of pasta now strewn across the floor. The second tipsy wobble was alcohol induced though, and she felt the full weight of her brother on her as she pulled him back into an upright position, Frankie immediately continuing his stumble towards the couch and spouting more drunken nonsense. Except these words stung, even if there wasn’t any thought put into them. The way he phrased it would have been a perfect fit for Veronica or even their parents. But not her. “I’m not giving up on you,” she said lamely. “But please go to sleep.”

Her words wouldn’t mean much though, because Frankie had already passed out. Letting out a deep exhalation, Nell whipped her wand around her head, sending off a few cleaning charms to the kitchen and a few more to close up the apartment for the night. A trashcan slid its way across the living room floor right up to where Frankie’s head was on the couch, a glass of water at the end table right next to it. Satisfied with doing everything she could, Nell extinguished the lights in the living room and let her brother snore away. He was going to have a hell of a morning when he woke up.

[END]

Galen Francis Ollivander ● 462 ● Different Child by Roo Panes

MADE BY VEL OF GS + ADOX 2.0