Twenty minutes after Clemente and Hermione had parted ways at the boathouse, he was sitting once again in the Headmistress's office, having just finished recounting what had happened in the lake. Back on shore, he felt acutely uncomfortable once again, and this office seemed like the nucleus of all his discomfort.

McGonagall cleared her throat.

"Well, this is troubling information for us all. What will the next steps be? Should we involve a Ministry department?"

"Er, no. I mean, not yet. I'll need to talk to my boss. He'll send you an owl. Just make sure the students don't go near the shore. I have some paperwork for you. You can send it back with an owl. I don't need it now."

Clemente pulled a few sheets of parchment out of his bag and tried to discreetly smooth out the wrinkles before handing them over.

"It's all the standard stuff: disclaimer, fee schedule, work proposal, some information about the giant squid's protected status." Clemente himself had drawn up that last one. The office kept readymade sheets on hand for the more common pests they encountered, but there hadn't been one on the giant squid. Clemente had tried to make it as informative and official as possible, but as someone who'd never been strong at compositions, he hoped the Headmistress didn't actually read it too closely.

"Just sign where indicated and send us a copy. We'll need the work proposal back before we can begin."

"Of course. Will you let us know when you'll be back?"

"We will. Like I said, I'll have to talk to my boss about this."

Clemente stood up, and the headmistress rose as well.

"Well, I need to get back to the office. We'll be in touch."

He nodded his head a little and started for the door.

"Yes, thank you. Clemente?"

He stopped and turned back, one hand on the doorknob.

"Do you like your job? I mean, how are you getting on?"

"Work's work." And with that, he slipped out and shut the door softly behind him. On the other side, he leaned against the stone wall and exhaled forcefully.

Done, finally. By Merlin, I need a pint!

Hermione tapped at the Headmistress's door.

"Minerva? It's Hermione."

Silence. Hermione tapped again.

"Hello?"

"The headmistress is not in her office. Did you have a meeting with her?"

Hermione started and spun around. A middle-aged wizard was standing a few steps below her with a disapproving frown pointed at her.

"No, I didn't. I just wanted to speak to her for a few moments. I can send an owl."

Hermione moved to start down the stairs, but the man didn't move out of her way.

"Students should be in their school robes at all times. What is your House?"

Hermione gave a polite smile as she tried to scoot past him.

"I'm not a student here, at least not anymore."

The man still didn't moved out of her way and instead raised his chin and sniffed.

"Regardless, the Headmistress is always referred to by her title, never her given name."

Hermione bristled.

"For your information, but not that it's any of your business, Minerva and I are friends. What is your name? I want to be sure to refer you by name when I tell her how rudely I was treated by one of her teachers."

The man huffed.

"Well, how was I to know that? As I said, Headmistress McGonagall is not in her office. She's in the Dining Hall. It is lunchtime."

As she suspected, the man hadn't given her his name when she'd threatened to complain to the Headmistress. He was obviously a puffed up professor who no doubt lorded over his students with his limited authority.

"Well, in that case, I won't bother her now. Excuse me." Hermione scooted past him on the narrow stairwell, resisting the urge to bump him with her shoulder. Really, Hermione. You're not 13 anymore.

Back at the office, Clemente was unpacking his bag at his desk when he heard voices in the front reception area. Judging from the feminine sounding giggles, the receptionist was currently distracting, or more likely, being distracted by, the owner of the other voice.

Fairly confident he knew who it was, Clemente took extra caution while unpacking his bag, setting the various vials, parchments, Quick-Binding Restraints, and other paraphernalia quietly on his desk. He was already having a stressful day and had no desire to encourage the theme.

Keeping an eye on the open doorway to the reception area. Clemente picked up the empty vials from his desk and started towards the storage closet, then stopped and turned back to his desk when Renee, the receptionist, and her companion appeared in the doorway. His guess had been correct: it was Peter Wilton.

Logic would claim that Clemente should have liked Wilton more than he did, and to be fair, Clemente couldn't really think of a good reason why he wasn't keen on the man. Wilton was a few years older than him and personable, an easy conversationist who would genuinely seem to want to know how Clemente was doing each time he asked. The fact that Wilton was his boss's nephew shouldn't have really been a strike against him either; Peter was working there only on a temporary basis and didn't use his relation to shirk his duties. In fact, he wasn't lazy at all, and he had even come to ask Clemente's advice on a project a time or two.

All in all, he was a well-grounded and intelligent man whose work ethic and social skills would likely take him as far as he wanted to go. Was that why Clemente couldn't warm up to him? Was this jealousy? Clemente had felt jealousy before, and not a few times. He'd spent most of his life jealous of one person or another. As a child, he'd been jealous of the other children in the wizarding primary school. Like him, they were mostly privileged purebloods, but Clemente's family didn't take holidays in France or have box seats reserved for all of the Montrose Magpies games and their inevitable championship game.

At Hogwarts, he'd been intensely jealous of Draco Malfoy. Clemente and Malfoy had met before several times as their families were in overlapping social circles, but it wasn't until Hogwarts that they really spent any amount of time with each other. Clemente had clung onto Malfoy as he was one of the only other students in his year that he'd known, albeit only slightly, and Malfoy's natural predilection towards leadership and Clemente's towards doing as he was told made for a natural relationship. At first, Malfoy's apparent charm, cockiness, intelligence, and indulgent parents were the epitome of all that Clemente wished for. Over time, and as he grew to know Malfoy better, Clemente realized Malfoy's life wasn't as charmed as he'd thought. It even became obvious that his cocksure attitude was a front, a disguise for the insecurity that ate up Malfoy inside.

By 3rd year, he taken Malfoy off the pedestal he'd placed him on, but his own insecurity meant his hunt to identify those who had it better, those who were more than he was in some way, had not subsided. He'd settled on Potter, Granger, and Weasley.

Of course, being a 13 year old who has been raised to look down on Weasley's, Halfbloods, and Gryffindors, Clemente's intense envy manifested itself as intense disgust and dislike of all things trio-related. Once puberty really hit its stride around 4th year, certain parts of Clemente's anatomy began putting forth the argument that maybe the girl wasn't that terrible, but to be fair, this argument was also being made towards almost every other girl in their year, and quite a few above it, as well, although Granger's status as part of the trio and female earned her quite a few more errant quiet-time thoughts. Those proto-feelings fizzled out around the time that Granger and Krum were being seen more and more around the castle grounds. Suddenly the realization that Granger, like most of the other girls in school, fancying Krum meant that she really was a mere mortal, and thus, perhaps not as perfect or special as he had thought. Still, she was one of the trio, and so while any burgeoning tender sentiments had fled, he still judged her and her two best friends as being happier and more fulfilled than he would ever be.

"Ho, Greg! Just getting in? Have a late night at the pub?" Wilton gave him a grin and nudged Renee. "Looks like Greg had a bit too much Firewhiskey," he said in a stage whisper.

"No, I was out early a project. About to leave again."

"Yeah? Which one? Was it the squid at Hogwarts? You should have let him come with you! I've never been to the school."

Clemente, resigned to the fact that he would now have to participate in the conversation, picked the box back up and walked to the supply closet.

"It wasn't that exciting. I wasn't in the castle very long. Spent most of the time out on the lake."

"Either way, I'm sure you had a much better morning than I'll have afternoon. I'm off to Dorset for the boggart job." Wilton pulled a face. "The widow's kids convinced Uncle Ted to send one of us out again if they take their mum out for lunch. Sure you don't want to come with me?"

Despite himself, Clemente smiled a little. Wilton had Apparated back into the reception area last week and immediately fallen against Renee's desk, causing her to yelp and spill coffee down her blouse. Wilton managed to drag himself into a chair using primarily his arms, all while yelling quite a few choice words about crazy old women who live alone. They had finally gotten the full story out of him when he had calmed down. Earlier that week, Owen's Beast Solutions had been contracted for what should have been a cut and dried boggart removal at an elderly widow's home. Granted, it was a little unusual in that the widow had not one but two boggarts in her house. The woman's children decided their mother was much too frail to handle two boggarts, which they believed were likely to take on the form of their not-so-dearly and thankfully departed father.

Apparently, Wilton had knocked her door at the appointment time, only to be hit in the right leg but a somewhat feeble Jelly Leg Jinx that originated from the front parlor windows. Shaken, but still standing, he had turned to face his attacker, only to find his attacker was an approximately 97-year-old woman peering through her drapes. He opened his mouth to explain who he was and why he was there but was interrupted when she sent another jinx his way. Skipping and dodging his way backwards toward her front gate, he managed to avoid her onslaught but was stymied at the gate, as he couldn't figure out how to unlatch it without turning to look at it. Deciding to risk a quick look, he turned a bit and was promptly hit on the right buttocks with a Jelly Leg Jinx, which gave his already shaky right leg the rigidity of a wet noodle. He fell forward at the waist over the gate, presenting an irresistible target for more jinxes. He slowly somersaulted over the top and in the relative safety of the leeside of the fence, Apparated back to the office.

"I can't. The botanical garden in Cambridge has a gnome infestation again, and I've got paperwork backed up" he called from the closet.

"Alright, alright." Wilton held his hands up in a surrendering gesture. "But if you're not back too late, a few of us are going down to The Black Hart for a pint after work. You should come out with us."

Clemente closed the closet door a little harder than necessary. Wilton was friendly, but he didn't really get it. Turning back towards his desk, he caught Renee scowling at Wilton and waving her hand in front of her neck. Wilton was ignoring her.

"I won't have time."

"You never know. Anyways, I need to go." Wilton gave a brief wave. "Renee, tell Uncle Ted that if I get hit in the arse again, I'm suing for hazard pay."

Renee remained in the doorway, and after they heard the pop of Wilton Apparating away, she lifted her hand and inspected her lime green nails.

"What a shame you can't come out with us. The Black Hart was my Danny's favorite pub."

Clemente kept his head and didn't look up at her. Her brother, Danny, had been killed by one of the giants Voldemort had loosed on Muggle London.

Renee walked back to the reception area and picked up her purse.

"I'm going on my lunch break."

Clemente scowled at her back. Because there must always be someone in the office in case of emergency calls, he was stuck there until Renee or someone else came back. This was a typical Renee maneuver. Whenever he was the only one there, she tended to take extended lunch breaks, particularly when she knew he had an afternoon appointment out of office. If he was lucky, someone else would come in, and he could leave.

Today he wasn't so lucky. It was forty-five minutes later when Clemente, who was halfway through his paperwork and all the way through all of the snack food he had in his desk, heard a pop from the reception area. A moment later, another coworker, Prisha Nita, came through the doorway and dropped her bag on her desk, a bloody rag wrapped around her hand.

Clemente straightened his papers and stood up.

"Are you going to be here for a while? Renee is on lunch."

"Yes, I'm done with appointments for the day. Do you have any extra cleaning potion?"

Clemente reached in his bag and placed a bottle of purplish liquid on her desk as he passed it.

"I'm in Cambridge if anyone asks."

Prisha nodded. "Sure. Thanks for the potion."

Six hours and roughly six dozen gnomes later, Clemente Apparated back into the office to drop off his bag. The office was quiet, with everyone else having gone home for the day. With nothing and nobody waiting for him at his flat and no desire to go to The Black Hart, Clemente took off his robe and settled in to finish his paperwork. It wasn't really as pressing as he had implied it was, but he was a little behind. He had just opened the folder when he heard footsteps coming from the back room.

"Greg! Have long have you been back?" Wilton came into the office area.

Shit, Clemente thought.

"Not long, just working on this."

"Well, leave it and come with me to The Black Hart! All of this will be here in the morning."

"I really am behind, Wilton. I've got to finish this."

"Bullshit. You can finish that tomorrow. I looked at your schedule. Just come out for a little bit. Here, take your robe and give me that folder." Wilton had picked up his robe and was holding it out. "I'll even buy you a pint if that's what it takes."

Feeling somewhat strong-armed, Clemente stood up and took his robe. This was not the first time Wilton had invited him out, and it looked like he wasn't going to be able to avoid it this time. He'd stay five minutes and then leave, Wilton be damned.