Then you tell me that you miss me,

And I'm like 'Oh God, I miss you too.'

-"Miss You," Gabrielle Aplin

---

June 2018

James really thought he'd outdone himself, hiding out up here above the awning to the back entrance. There was a perfectly sturdy, stone protrusion, like a tiny balcony complete with a marble-pillared fence, except there was no door or window leading out to it so he could be sure no one would spot him from inside.

Better yet, he'd flown down and hidden out up here three days in a row without being spotted, both when Anniston entered the building and left in the evening. Course, he still couldn't see anything that was happening, but listening was something and he hadn't put a lot of trust in his previous hiding place, just around the corner. It was too obvious.

Grapfort and Riglock continued to man the place day in and day out. James was almost glad that polyjuice potion didn't even have them fooled, because he couldn't really stomach the thought of spending two knuts a day on crappy potions he'd never use.

He had vanished the first little vial.

James crouched in the little space, knees jammed against the pillars, with his broom balanced precariously against the exterior of the bank. He held it in place, trying to keep it still so it would not scrape against the stone and make noise while he waited.

James heard the crack of apparation at 8:07 precisely. Damn, he was predictable. Down to the minute every day. Then the same conversation as always. "Morning Grapfort. Riglock."

"Mr. Anniston," sneered Grapfort. (James had learned whose voice was whose by now).

"Friday at last, eh?" said Anniston. James imagined him clapping one of them on the shoulder or ringing their knotted little hands in a poorly disguised attempt to be jovial.

"Ah," said Riglock in his eerily high, disconnected voice. "The end of the work week for some. The rest of us toil away protecting wizard gold and possessions without rest."

"Yes, well," said Anniston, brushing off the comment. "We appreciate it anyway. You know that Riggy."

James could picture the look the goblin must have been giving him. He thought it very unlikely either Grapfort or Riglock felt kindly towards nicknames.

Then James made the mistake of trying to shift out of his uncomfortable position. He let go of the broom, slowly, so it would stay in place while he used both hands to lift himself up and shift back an inch to give his legs an extra inch to stretch out in. Unfortunately, the broom did not stay put, as he'd planned. It slid down the wall with a loud scrape until it was leaning against a steep diagonal in the intricate stone carvings a foot or two above his head. Then it slipped down and the handle found the gap between the fence posts. It fell through.

James, crunched up as he was, couldn't exactly lunge for it at the speed he might normally have. He caught it just before the twiggy tail of the broom disappeared through the space, but not before Anniston saw.

"What was-" James heard him say below his place. He held onto the end of the broom, but didn't dare pull it up. Maybe they'd think it was a practical joke?

But that was being far too hopeful.

"Intruder," hissed Grapfort.

One of them tugged on the end of the broom. Had James been smart, he would have let go, but he panicked and gripped it tighter.

"Reducto," said Anniston calmly, and then the stone on which James sat crumbled to dust and he began to fall. James did not wait to hit the ground before he disapparated, but he could have sworn he made eye contact with Anniston before he disappeared.

"You'd best be able to repair that," said Riglock, with his signature dark sarcasm. But then James had gone and rematerialized at the Ministry of Magic.

His heart was pounding, but he didn't waste any time making his way up to the auror's department. He marched straight into GIllespie's office without knocking. "He saw me," he said. "I've got to hold off on Anniston for a while."

Gillespie looked up, alarmed. "How? What happened? I thought you said you'd found a good place to listen in now."

"Not anymore," said James. "Anniston blew it up. My broom slipped down and gave me away. He blew up the place I was hiding and saw me. I disapparated, but it was too late.

I don't think it's the first time he's seen me, either. I just think it's the first time he's seen me when I was definitely spying. He's smart. He'll put it together."

James' heart rate finally began to slow, but he still felt on edge. It wasn't every day one had their seat literally blown apart from underneath them, not to mention being caught eavesdropping somewhere secretive and secure.

"Yes, well, you're right then," said Gillespie, tugging on the ends of his moustache. He frowned down at his desk in thought. "You'll certainly have to give Anniston a rest for the time being. Maybe we'll send Finster out after him tomorrow."

"I wouldn't," said James. "He'll be looking out for it."

Gillespie nodded slowly. "Mm," he said. "Did you get anything on him today?"

James shook his head. "Just the usual. Oddly friendly with the goblins. They're not buying it."

"Alright, well. We'll just have to hope we don't miss out on anything in the next few days before we can give him another try. Why don't you take a shot with Briggs. Take a few hours to go over what you need to and maybe you can catch up with him on his lunch break."

"Alright," said James. His head spun. He'd been at work all of a half an hour and already it had been almost as eventful day as when he'd witnessed Mallory McGill's accidental burst of magic. "Alright. Okay." He shook his head. "Yeah, I'll see what I can do."

James exited the room, because he didn't feel quite up to sitting at Gillespie's cluttered table in the back corner of the office, doing review research to the soundtrack of constant throat-clearing and mutterings. He headed into one of the conference rooms instead and pulled the folder out of his pocket. He'd shrunk it to be able to carry it without needing a bag, so he tapped it now with his wand to return it to it's original size, and then flipped past the well-worn pages on Anniston and to those on Briggs.

With his mind still on the events of the morning, James found it hard to concentrate, but he managed to force his way through three readings of the documents, taking special care to memorize Briggs' snivelly, watery-eyed, round face.

---

The clicking of heels followed James down the hallway as he headed out later that morning. He glanced back as he pushed the door open, although he was already pretty certain who it was. He wasn't surprised to see Elise, dressed in thin, summery robes in navy blue with narrow sleeves, instead of the usual billowing ones. He'd always liked when she wore blue. James held the door open with his back to let her out, expecting no more than a polite thank you, but instead she stopped right in front of him and said, "James." There was something breathless about her voice, like she was maybe a little nervous. She glanced back down the hall and then at him again.

"Elise," he said. "Hi." He let the door fall shut and they were left alone in the quiet of the hallway outside the auror's office. A few people slid past in one of the glass elevators, watching them, and he had the strangest sensation of being trapped inside a fishbowl. Though he had no idea what Elise's intentions were, something about this moment, about talking to her at all, felt very private.

She pushed the sleeve of her robes up on one arm. "How are you?" she asked after a long pause.

This caught James off guard even more than the fact that she had willingly sought out a conversation with him. Certainly she'd been more receptive to him since they'd bumped into each other last Saturday. She'd said hello to him in passing a few times, even put her hand on his arm to say sorry after she accidentally bumped him yesterday afternoon. He'd dearly wished she hadn't done that, because her touch had brought up a lot of old feelings.

But not once had she gone out of her way to talk to him, and now she had and she hadn't even asked him about work. She'd asked him how he was.

James found himself so stunned at this new development that he didn't know the answer.

"Alright," he said, because he couldn't think of anything else to say. After a beat, he added, "How are you?"

"Fine," said Elise.

They stood in uncomfortable silence. James stuck his thumbs in his pockets. Elise pushed her other sleeve up. "You're going to tail Briggs today?" she asked.

He nodded.

"Good. Uhm- try the Leaky Cauldron, alright? He has lunch there most Fridays."

"Yeah," said James. "I will. Thanks." They stood there another few seconds and then James took a step back to go.

"James?" she said. He stopped. God, it was silent. There was absolutely no one in the hall, not even a memo whizzing by. The elevator slid down again, carrying a new set of blank, staring faces. He watched Elise's face. She was nervous; he could tell. Her chest rose and fell like she'd just run hard, and her blue-grey eyes were wide, fixed on his face. It took way too long for her to speak again, but when she did, it sounded as though she was asking despite her better judgment. "D'you wanna come over sometime?"

"Okay," said James at once. His whole body buzzed.

"Okay," she repeated. The breathlessness came back into her voice.

"When?" asked James.

Elise pressed her lips together. Her eyes flicked down and up again. She inhaled, held the breath at the top, and then shook her head the tiniest bit. She let the breath back out. "Tonight, maybe?"

"Yeah," James heard himself say. The rest of him had floated out of the room already. This felt more than strange. They had not been in the same place in so long, had not looked each other in the eye and spoken like they were not strangers. "Yeah, I'll just... meet you back here."

James felt relieved that the bit of him that had remained present was the logical, matter-of-fact part. The part that made plans.

"Okay," said Elise again. "Okay, well... I'll let you go. I'll uhm- I'll see you later, I guess."

She stepped back towards the door, pulling her wand out to let herself back in, and suddenly at the sight of her leaving, the rest of James came swooping back into the room, almost knocking the wind out of him as he really realized what was happening here. It was a lot to take in. A lot. It had been so long.

"Elise," he said. It was her turn to stop. She turned back around. Her face seemed extra white. "It'll... it'll be good to talk. I've missed you."

Elise didn't say anything, but her mouth became very tight and her eyes pinched in at the corners. She nodded once and then she went back inside the department and James was left to sort himself out on the way to the fireplaces on the main floor that would take him to the Leaky Cauldron. Already he found himself considerably less interested in whatever Briggs might be doing than what Elise might have in mind for that night.

The morning's incident with Anniston was forgotten.

---

James arrived at the Leaky Cauldron to find it predictably packed. Friday afternoons in summer were prime-time for socializing, everyone out celebrating the anticipated end of the work week. A quick glance around told James that Briggs hadn't arrived yet so he strolled over to the bar and ordered a gillywater and a plate of fish and chips. He carried his drink over to an open table in the center of the room that arguably put him in listening distance of almost every table in the place, placed the number they'd given him for his food on the edge of the table, and sat down to wait.

He went over everything he knew about his suspect in his head, eyes trained on the door. Uriah Briggs worked as a salesperson for Cleensweep in their big showroom. He was well known for making bad deals. That is, deals that were very good for Cleansweep and very not good for the customer. He had two boys, a sixth year named Joel who was a bit of suck-up - not that James ever fell for it, but he knew quite a few of the other professors did - and a fourth year called Allan who just didn't make much of an impression at all. Both, like their father, were Slytherins.

James knew as well as anyone that Slytherins weren't the only wizards who went bad. Anniston, for example, had been in James' own house, Ravenclaw, though not at the same time. He had graduated before James ever received his Hogwarts letter.

James also knew that not all Slytherins were anything close to bad. Anna, for example, though snarky and a little cold, was a perfectly nice, law-abiding citizen, who happened to have been in Slytherin.

Still, biased or not, James wasn't surprised that a sneaky, underhanded businessman like Briggs would have been involved in a movement like this one.

James food arrived before Briggs did, and he felt his attention slipping away from the task at hand and back towards Elise. He wondered if "come over" meant their house. He hadn't asked. He just couldn't picture Elise anywhere else. That house had been her find, her dream, her project. She had loved every inch of it, and James had loved it, first because she had, and later because it really did have all the charm she had seen from the start.

He wondered how it looked now.

James, stomach squirming, found it difficult to eat. He couldn't remember ever being this nervous to see a girl at any point in his life. But then, Elise was the only girl he'd ever really been in a serious relationship with. There had been other long ones, but his investment couldn't even begin to compare. More than this, though, his and Elise's relationship had ended unresolved to say the least. There was a lot he had not dealt with that he probably should have.

James had almost forgotten what he was doing here at all when Briggs burst through the door, sporting a name badge with his own smiling picture pinned to his chest. He had a head of thick, blonde hair that was almost certainly fake, a large, round belly, and perfectly circular, watery blue eyes.

"Hey there, Tom!" he boomed, grinning over at the bartender with every single tooth showing. James did not even have to pretend he wasn't watching because every head in the restaurant had turned. Three other men, each wearing a badge like the one Briggs wore, followed him in. They made a big show of shaking hands with Tom across the bar and then seated themselves around a circular table just to James' right. He could not believe his luck.

He actually felt glad now that he had only picked at his food, because it gave him ample reason to remain there, listening in, in the shape of six fish sticks and a large handful of chips.

"So anyway," said Briggs as they all took their seats. "I told him what he had to consider was the length of the broom's life, right? The Cleansweep Seven... it's an alright model, certainly, but it's been around for ages, hasn't it? The Cleansweep Thirteen's only been out a few years, yeah? More glimmer for your galleon if you know what I'm saying." He raised his eyebrows and gave each of his companions a significant look, wearing a smirk disguised as a wholesome smile that James had seen his eldest son wear all too often. "Course I didn't point out that it doesn't matter when the model was introduced, because all the products are brand new, aren't they?" His voice rose several decibels as he went on and he finished, smacking the table. They all roared with laughter.

James took a sip of gillywater, peering at Briggs red face over the rim of his glass. He wanted to be able to read the tags on the other wizards' robes so he could make up a list of the people Briggs associated with, but he'd been putting off getting glasses and his vision wasn't what it used to be.

"Bet he thought he made 'imself a great deal, eh? What a sucker," said the man to Briggs' left.

Briggs shook his head and continued to belly laugh as though he'd just told the world's funniest joke. "Best part is," he wheezed, looking straight at the man who'd just spoken. "Best part is he bought four of 'em! For him and his wife and kids! Four thirteens, Harv!"

They all began to laugh again, Briggs to the point of tears. He wiped at his eyes with the back of his hand and James slid his napkin off the table and onto his lap, jotting down "Harv - Harvey?" He stuck it under his leg, just in case.

"Imagine what he'd get outta them muggles with an 'ead like that. Trick a wizard that good... boy I'd reckon you could rob a muggle blind and get 'im to do it willingly."

James straightened up at this, straining to read the tag on the speaker's robes. He was a grimy little thing with a long, hooked nose and the skinniest, lankiest limbs James had ever seen. He thought he read an "S" but most of the badge was covered up by the folds of his robes.

"I don't know Leon," said Briggs. "You give me a run for my money. You fellows hear what he got last week outta that old woman?"

Leon slid down in his chair, head thrown back in silent laughter. James added "Leon" to the list, still trying to get a glimpse of the last name.

"Yeah, tell it," said Harv. James got the feeling they'd all heard this story multiple times and still couldn't relive it enough.

"Alright, alright." Leon sat up again and James was able, squinting, to make out the second word. "Smith," he was pretty sure. "So this old woman," continued Leon. "Gotta be like a hundred or summat. She comes in and she says she wants a birthday present for her great granddaughter so I ask her how's old is she? And get this. Get this. Alright? The woman says... she says, she's one year old."

The laughter at this drowned out everything else in the room. Heads turned towards them from everywhere, many faces wearing identical perturbed expressions. James spotted several eyerolls.

"I says," continued Leon, grinning gleefully around at his raptured audience. "So I says, you want summat she can grow with, right? Summat that'll last her. And she left..." Here Leon and Briggs looked at each other and burst into laughter all over again. The others were quick to join in. Leon had tears coming down his face. He clutched at a stitch in his side and, gasping, tried to finish his story. "She left with our top racing broom. Pro quality and everything. Two hundred fifty big ones for a baby that can't even walk yet."

"Think what he'd get outta them old muggle ladies," boomed Briggs. He raised the pitch of his voice to a grotesque imitations of of a woman's. "I just can't find a broom that'll clear up all the dust in my home. I'm just at wit's end!"

"Ah m'aam, this one here picks up every last speck of dust. You'll never have to sweep again after one use," chimed in the man on Briggs right who's name James hadn't heard yet.

"Don't even need a dustpan!" said Harv.

Briggs shook his head slowly. "Boy I'd reckon we're ready to start selling to the muggles any day now. Imagine when the kids find 'em in the closets," he said. The gleam remained in his eye, but James couldn't miss the way he'd purposely lowered his voice.

It was only a slight tonal shift that set James on real alert, but something told him the conversation had taken a turn. He was sure it had moved out of jokes and hypotheticism and into a real, solid, intentional plan.

If only he could get proof, some kind of a lead.

But then he got an idea. If Cleansweep was planning to start selling to muggles in the hopes of exposing wizardry, Briggs - though a respected salesman, wouldn't have been high-up enough in the company to make the call. All of these men, though clearly - and dishonestly - doing well for themselves, were carry-it-out kind of workers. They were not the ones giving the orders.

The corruption, if there really was any, was higher up. Cleansweep was not a small business.

---

James' head was spinning by the time he left Gillespie's office that evening. They'd spent over two hours dissecting his report, compiling lists of potential suspects at Cleansweep, and pouring over old notes that could, potentially, have a connection to what James had overheard.

Though he'd was truly invested in the conversation, he'd found it harder and harder to ignore the constant nudging presence in his subconscious at the afternoon went on, reminding him that Elise would be waiting for him soon, and that, already, she sat just two rooms away.

As soon as he stepped into the hallway, the buzzing feeling had come back. He felt like he was seeing everything from somewhere two feet behind his body. Elise's door was open so he knocked on the wall, and poked his head in. She looked up from her desk, and for ten seconds straight they just stared at each other.

"Just give me one minute," she said at last. "You can uhm... you can sit if you want."

James didn't want, but he sat down so as not to be too awkward and tried not to stare at her while she finished writing something down. After what felt like ages, she put down her quill, locked away all her files and notes, and said, "Okay uhm... you're ready to go?"

James nodded. He didn't feel like he could speak. He wished a little bit that he could have gone home to Raigan first, who would definitely have given him beneficial advice. At the same time, he didn't think any more time to anticipate would have done him any favors.

Perhaps Elise had been thinking along those same lines when she suggested tonight.

They stood, Elise grabbed her robes and her bag, and they headed out of her office and down the hall, James behind.

When they stopped to apparate, he turned to her with a question in his eyes. She knew without hearing what he'd been about to ask, because she said. "It's the same place."

"Right," said James, stomach turning over. He was both relieved and terrified by this news. The last time he had been there was not one of his happiest memories. But there was no time to dwell on it.

They disapparated.