Getting To The Point

By Booster

Mr Ollivander looked up slightly surprised as the door bell jingled. A customer? At this time of the year? Most unusual.

Most of the new entrants to Hogwarts had been for their wand fitting last month. October was his own personal relaxing time. From here till Christmas was his slow time of the year. Normally there were only people coming in for replacements for their broken wands. From January onwards, the replacement of his ingredients and the cultivation of the different woods slowly built up in speed and complexity until the great flood of first years into Hogwarts finally subsided.

He got up and left the back room. Entering the front section of the shop, he was further surprised to see a young lady dressed in Muggle clothes looking around speculatively. Rather tight fitting Muggle clothing at that. Her long dark hair cascaded down the back of the red leather jacket over a dark shirt. And were they leather trousers as well?

“Wow. A whole shop of phallic shaped objects. It’s just like home. Or at least my bedroom,” she said aloud, breaking him out of his almost trance.

American as well? Most unusual. He walked forward, his silvery eyes fixed on the woman. “Good afternoon,” he said softly.

Her head shot round quickly. But the rest of her remained where it was, tense like a coiled spring. “Hey there, old guy. Name’s Faith. This Dumbledorf guy said you’d be able to do things for me.” She looked him up and down. “Can’t see it myself.”

Intriguing. “My name is Ollivander. You must forgive me, as I was not aware of your coming,” he frowned. “I will, of course, do the best that I can, but you understand things may be somewhat rushed.” Moving round in front of her, he took out his measuring tape. “Which is your favored arm?”

Faith blinked and lifted her right arm. Before she could say anything, he quickly started measuring and considering the problems ahead of him. Leaving the tape still measuring behind him, he moved to one of the nearby stacks of boxes. Perhaps the oak with the holly and mandrake root combination? There was the sound of a crunch behind him.

Turning around with a 7 inch oak wand in his hand, he noticed that the measuring tape was now almost embedded into the floor and his customer was just smiling wickedly at him. “Oops,” she said.

Raising an eyebrow, he passed her the wand “Try this, Miss Faith. Oak, seven inches, sturdy but still supple.”

She smirked at him. Smirked! “Got my number then, O. I’m a sucker for a good seven inches. Longer is good, but seven seems to be my lucky number.”

Suddenly she launched into a series of athletic moves with the wand grasped in her hand. Blocks and parries, swinging it round and finally finishing with a final deep firm thrust forward at chest level.. Not even out of breath, she looked straight at him and asked “Hey… Not shabby for an old guy there. Any way on working on the girth?”

He had the distinct feeling that he was no longer in control of this situation. Taking the oak wand away, he replaced it with a rather nice rowan six and three quarter wand. “This time my dear, give it a flick of the wrist. Like so….”

She raised an eyebrow at him “So not my usual technique there, O. But what the hey, I’ll give anything a try once. Or twice.” A small jet of flame, about an inch long, came out of the end. “Neato! Handy for lighting my cigs.”

This was definitely going to be a tricky one. Dumbledore was certainly going to owe him for all this. Heavily. Perhaps the beechwood and dragon blood? He was just debating over that or an ebony five and a half when she spoke again “So, this where B got her Mr Pointy then? I never could see why she named it before, but hey! Quality counts in large amounts I hear.”

Named? Dear Lord. He turned round to face her, his face even paler than normal. “Named it? Named it Mr Pointy? Lords above… I’ve never heard of such… such a….” he broke off, almost lost for words.

His visitor had somehow opened up a few of the boxes and was now carefully sighting along the length of his best seven inch “Whatever, Jeeves. So there any trick in choosing which end to whittle down?”

He clutched at the counter in shock. He could almost feel all his years catching up to him in one go “How… how could you even think about doing that to your wand? Your wand!”

She stopped and looked closely at him. He could almost see a dawn of realization spreading across her face. “Ooooo, wait one mo. I get it. Nah, I’m just here to pick up a package for Red.”

She waved her hand back and forth in front of his face “Yo? One wand for Willow Rosenberg?”

Ah yes. The special order from Dumbledore. Eight inches of willow, with Phoenix down and a drop of Slayer blood (though where on earth he’d obtained such a rare substance he had no idea). Wait…. Slayer? Vampire Slayer? Surely not? Not this… this… cavalier creature?

Reaching under the counter, he pulled out the special order, all ready to go in its special case. “Ah.. yes.” Sliding it towards the Slayer, he straightened and tried to pull himself back to normal. “That would be eight gold galleons, then.”

Tucking the box under one arm, Faith laughed and turned towards the door. “Dumblie said to stick it on his account, okay? Seeya!” And with one last tinkle of the doorbell, she was gone and the door was closing behind her.

Well. In all his years… Well. Retiring to the back room once more, Ollivander settled down with his quill, and started writing a most indignant letter to Albus Dumbledore.

 

~Fin~