EARLY CHILDHOOD 1862-1872

The Abernathys are very poor.

Not dirt poor, Lorcan's job helps them stretch things, but they're never quite secure in their housing and livelihoods. Kieran's birth in 1862 doesn't necessarily help, but neither does the second baby born in the next year - who dies of scrofungulus.

His existence throughout childhood is a mostly lonely one - his parents are not disinterested in their children but they are busy most of the time, and in the times they are not they are often preoccupied with one another.

Erin starts leaving Kieran with a senile quarter-vampire next door during the day after that. Things become increasingly strained between Kieran's parents, not that he's necessarily aware of it.

In 1865 Kieran's sister, Fallon, is born late in the year. When she's old enough to be mostly weaned - which Erin opts to do young - she joins Kieran at the neighbor's. He loves her more than anything. Erin becomes a wetnurse.

In 1866, another bout with scrofungulus leaves Kieran's father sterile. Obviously Kieran doesn't know this at the time, but it becomes relevant later.

Kieran begins to run errands for neighbors for money in 1867, #thehustle, and demonstrates magic shortly thereafter. Luckily for him, errands sometimes involve learning to read, and the pseudo-nanny-watcher-person takes literacy very seriously. In 1870, Erin gives birth to a baby, Daniel and things start to fracture seriously between Kieran's parents. Erin also receives a raise from her employer. These things are related.

In 1872, Erin has another illegitimate baby, although this one dies. Kieran begins to suspect that something is off - his parents argue quietly and severely whenever they think he is out of earshot.

HOGWARTS 1873-1878

Kieran receives his Hogwarts letter in 1873 and is able to attend due to his father's job and the Hogwarts first year scholarship. He's sorted into Hufflepuff without any drama, and becomes immediate friends with Miss Eileen Buchanan, who is ostensibly his other half.

In 1875, Kieran selects COMC as his elective. Over the summer break, his mother gives birth to another surviving baby, Seamus. The truth about his half-brother's parentage comes out in a full family row, which Kieran feels super awkward about.

1877 brings Fallon to Hogwarts, where she's sorted into Gryffindor. This produces a strain on family finances, but it's Kieran's O.W.L. year, so they can swing it - just this once. He receives decent-veering-good O.W.L. results, especially in DADA and Charms, but drops out of school because Fallon deserves a chance, too.

EARLY ADULTHOOD 1878-1882

He gets a job managing a Diagon Alley apothecary with his O.W.L. scores, although the apothecary is mostly going under. Shortly after graduating, Kieran starts drinking a lot more than he used to - with hindsight this can be viewed as when his casual alcoholism really gained roots.

In 1879, Kieran's father dies under dubious circumstances that have him half-convinced he just ran off. Between his wages, his mother's, and Fallon's scholarship, she's able to remain in school.

The apothecary goes under that same year, drawing Kieran to work as Gringotts security, and sell his blood to the vampire Ishmael, who he has a dubious friends-with-benefits situation with. This is also the year that he moves into a tenement flat with Eileen, seeking an escape from the general dysfunction of his family home. Theirs is a purely platonic relationship - Eileen is the only person Kieran has 'come out' to at this time - but cohabitating is not entirely unheard of in the working class.

It gives him the freedom to do art, to take up boxing, to sometimes, rarely, have a man over, and it gives him the freedom to escape the careening ship that is his blood family.

And then he meets Jude.

THE AUGUREY 1882-1884

Finn and another friend bring Kieran to the Augurey Beak Cafe for an activist club meeting, and it's a fascination that keeps him coming back.

Not for the activism, maybe for the bar. But really it's fascination for the blond leader of the group, Jude Wright, a spitfire who feels more passion about literally anything than Kieran has ever felt in his life. He can't help but be fascinated, and he can't help but come back. A moth to the light.

Eventually fascination becomes love, and Kieran only sees it when he realizes that other people do. But not Jude. Never Jude.

LYCANTHROPY 1884-1887

In October of 1884, Kieran is attacked by a werewolf in the Forbidden Forest. It's near enough to dawn that the wolf turns back before Kieran is ripped apart, and he's transported to St. Mungo's by the guilty-feeling werewolf. Checked in while unconscious, Kieran wakes up and flees once he realizes where he is. He's lucky enough that his friend, Finn, is a healer - and a secret visit is enough to keep him alive, although he perhaps would have been better off otherwise.

He has to ask Jude for a favor - magically reinforced chains. Jude obliges, because of course he obliges, and Kieran is left feeling awkward and in-debt and chaining himself to trees every month. He quits Gringotts and is able to pick up a job as an intern for the DP's crime and politics department -- the odd schedule of a reporter allows him to be dodgy for a few nights a month.

In March, 1886 Jude ambushes Kieran and forces him to confess. For months Kieran is awkward and shifty and upset, and betrayed, and it takes him a very long time to come close to forgiving Jude. But of course he does, eventually. Later in the year, he's promoted to a full reporter.

And then, of course, Kieran singlehandedly takes down the Wizarding Government.

Perhaps not single-handedly. He somehow escapes his binds on a full moon night in August, and wakes up just outside Irvingly with burn marks down his side and the strong sense that he did something wrong. Days later, it comes out: Topaz Urquart was turned into a werewolf.

He spirals. Minister Urquart resigns. Stressed about work but even more about everything that's happening - people are targeting werewolves and a little girl's life is ruined - Kieran sends her a letter. And then he sends her more. He is seeking penance but he knows he can't earn it -- and he can't tell anyone, as much as he wants to.

Until, very suddenly, he has to tell someone. In November of 1887, Kieran turns up on Jude's doorstep after discovering that the werewolf tried to chew through his leg to free itself.

He has a confession to make.

1887-Present

He admits to Jude that he turned Topaz Urquart, and that things are no longer working - they come up with a new strategy, and now Kieran goes to the attic of Jude's flat every month for the transformations. There haven't been critical errors since, and it sends them into a weird new phase of their relationship - they are very close and around each other much of the time, but when they are around each other it is mostly about Kieran's lycanthropy.

He meets Mrs. Morwenna Skeeter, another werewolf and head of the Ministry's Department for the Regulation and Control of Magical Creatures. The two reach a weird alliance.

Kieran accidentally reveals to Ishmael that he is a werewolf, expanding the little circle of people who know. He's alarmed when Jude confesses that he's trying to become an animagus in 1889, and worried that Jude won't be able to manage it. It's this alarm that sees him writing to an M in 1890, seeking more information on his condition.

1891 brings Kieran to a strange quest for the DP - who is Marlowe Forfang, namely - and if he doesn't kiss Jude this year Beanie's gonna lose it.