February 18th, 1891 — Hogsmeade Post Office

Magical mishaps were par for the course in his line of work and, usually, he didn't mind them too terribly. It was comical to show up in his office with only half his body visible, after all. However, such wasn't the case when he was stuck working on disenchanting a shop long after the screaming toddler and his mother left. Whatever burst the child had permeated straight through the ground itself it seemed, causing a slippery, icy floor beneath his feet. At least it had stopped snowing on the countless packages scattered throughout the room.

Dory had managed to ensure the front half of the post office wasn't an ice skating rink when he heard the bell chime. The post master wasn't present, having excused himself to go sort out his sore bottom some time ago, which left Dory in a bit of an awkward predicament. "Er, sorry," he called out from his spot near the counter. Then, as he turned to face the newcomer he slipped once more, landing square on his bottom for the millionth time that afternoon. (Or perhaps it was early evening? This was taking far longer than he originally estimated.

"We've had a bit of an accident here today." He tried to laugh from his spot on the ground, his back still facing the newcomer.

  

Clementine was walking on very thin ice, but of course she had no reason to suspect so. Ford wished they'd been well-situated financially and he could afford to just send off for whatever book she'd decided she wanted on a whim, but they just couldn't manage it — so he was taking steps to ensure it didn't happen again. His mother was hopelessly untrustworthy, and no amount of talking to her, he had realized, would make her understand the severity of the situation, so he was taking drastic measures, sending owls to all her typical retailers and asking them, very politely, to limit her credit. He didn't know if this was a thing people did, but if he forewarned them that Mrs. Greengrass was only allowed a galleon a month, for instance, and then they let her walk out with three galleons' worth of product all the same, he could refuse to pay the difference, couldn't he? He felt within his rights to do so — but would probably need to run this by Noble at least half a dozen times before he actually went through with it. Hopefully it didn't come to that point.

He had half a dozen letters in his hand, but only one owl at home, so he'd walked down to the post office after work to dispatch them all more quickly. Once he saw who was inside, though, he nearly turned around and went straight back home. He still didn't know what to think of the conversation he'd had with Mr. Fisk at the Sonata, and he certainly had no intention to carry on another conversation with him until he'd worked it out.

But Fisk had seen him, so leaving would be conspicuous, to say the least. "I can see that," he said, a little uneasily. "I didn't realize you'd taken up a second job at the post office."

  

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Despite his rather informative conversation with Winnie the other night, Dory was still hesitant to consider his impulses as normal. Winnie liked women, preferred them even. Which, was an arousing thought in its own way, but still! How was he to even approach a man like that? Especially a respectable one like Greengrass! More importantly, how would it work?

"Might've been easier if I did," he attempted to joke once he was back on his feet. The process of standing was mildly embarrassing, as he nearly slipped twice more. "This —" he gestured towards the patch of ice he was working on, "— is the work of a rather entitled child who didn't wish to cease playing in the snow, apparently. Bit of a nightmare on my part." Dory slid from the ice to the stable patch nearest Greengrass. "The postmaster will be back in a few minutes if you're willing to wait."

  

Ford didn't want to wait, particularly, but he thought it would make him look a little ridiculous if he said so. Fisk might have noticed that he already had a stack of folded and sealed letters in one hand; there was not anywhere else he could be going with them aside from the post office.

He eyed the counter, across the room. He ought to make his way over, so that he could do his business as quickly as possible once the postmaster returned and then leave, but he wasn't sure how steady the floor was between him and the counter. And — another thought occurred suddenly — if Fisk was going to be here when the gentleman came back, he might overhear Ford sending letters to half the shops in Hogsmeade and Diagon Alley, and ask what he was doing, and then Ford would have to lie about it. The prospect of trying to come up with a feasible lie for Fisk was even more nerve-wracking than the prospect of trying to carry on a normal, simple conversation with him.

"Maybe I'll try my luck later," he said, with a frown. "If you can't make it from one end of the room to the next without falling, I'm not sure I like my chances. I didn't play Quidditch," he said, then balked. Why had he said anything about Quidditch?

He wanted to look away, so that hopefully Fisk wouldn't notice his cheeks getting a shade lighter, but he was too morbidly curious how Fisk would take that to tear his eyes away.

  

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"You could. The offer still stands" Dory suggested without thinking. He realized only a second later what he might've been suggesting they do, but it was too late now to rescind the invitation. Merlin, he had suggested Ford would make a good seeker, hadn't he? A flexible, agile seeker. Bloody hell, why had he said anything at all?!

  

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Ford had been expecting some reaction, now that he had a slightly clearer idea of the subtext of the conversation, but he hadn't been expecting that. A furtive look, maybe, or a slight flush of the cheek, or maybe, maybe half a smile and a hint of mischief in his eye. Not — an open invitation. He had no idea how to respond to that, and for a moment he just stared at Fisk.

Maybe he was really only talking about Quidditch. (Ford did not believe that).

"That's — good to know," he said, after much too long of a pause.

  

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Well, fuck. Definitely the wrong thing to say.

Dory flushed and glanced towards the back of the shop where the postmaster had scurried off to. Would it be improper to call out that he had a customer? Would Greengrass take that as a sign that they couldn't be friends or anything of the sort.

Thankfully, before he could try and save face, a hole in the ceiling that had escaped Dory's attention opened up, pouring rain and debris over the two men. As if acting on instinct, Dory rushed towards Greengrass and pushed him from the falling wood beam.

  

Ford hadn't really been aware of what was happening at all, until he found himself on the floor with Mr. Fisk more or less on top of him. The ceiling seemed to have given out (the ceiling being on the verge of giving out would have been relevant information for Fisk to have told him, Ford thought with very distant irritation), and Fisk had pushed him out of the way of a good deal of falling debris. He could see it piled up just where he'd been standing, and it looked large enough that it might have given him quite the bump on the head, to say the least. He should have been grateful for Fisk's intervention, but it did mean that Fisk was — a lot closer than Ford was comfortable with. Ford had propped himself up on his elbows as soon as he'd gotten his bearings, just on instinct. He wanted to see what had happened, after all, and he didn't have a good view of it from flat on the floor. Raising his head did take the space between Mr. Fisk's face and his own from a foot and a half down to maybe six to eight inches, however, and as Ford refocused from the debris to Fisk he was painfully aware of each of them.

A longer space of time passed than Ford would have liked. He'd gotten caught up staring at Fisk's lips and hadn't yet managed to think of something to say. He eventually forced his eyes up to the other man's — he thought, but did not ask: why haven't you gotten up yet? A part of him already knew the answer, of course.

"Um," was what he eventually said.

  

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His first thought was a rather reluctant admission that he likely required Hatchitt's assistance with this one. The floor was a challenge on its own without the added complication of the fucking ceiling collapsing. Hatchitt was going to have a field day with this one.

The second, and perhaps the more pressing one, was how close he was to Greengrass. Their lower halves were practically flush, causing both of their issues to be obvious. Both. Greengrass' body was reacting just as his was. Dory mimicked his expression, dropping his eyes to Ford's lips and back up again. If Greengrass was a woman he would've already taken great liberties with her. Hell, he would've been reaching for his wand to somehow turn the post office into a den or a closet or something with even a semblance of privacy. But, Greengrass was a man.

The third was that he ought to already be rising to his feet, which was punctuated by Greengrass' stare and uncomfortable um. Dory rolled off him immediately and willed the universe to spare him the indignity of an obvious tent in his trousers. One brief, daring look down proved that it was at least slightly visible. Which, fuck. How could he explain that?! "Sorry. I thought the floor was the only issue remaining." He said sheepishly, not making eye contact.

  

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Ford could do little more than continue staring as Fisk rolled away. He glanced at the other man by his side and shifted his legs slightly to try and get rid of a sudden tightness in his pants. He was a little shell-shocked by it, still — mostly the sudden closeness, but maybe for the sake of appearances he could claim it was by the unexpected roof collapse.

He should probably say something, but he had no idea what. He coughed, a little awkwardly. "Uhm. Yeah," he said, not sure in the slightest what he intended to convey with this unimpressive collection of syllables. "Yeah, unexpected."

  

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Dory nodded. Unexpected indeed. The hole in the ceiling was intimidating in size and water dripped from its edges. It must've been ready to burst for hours. Merlin, how had he missed that? "Are you alright, at least?" He asked quietly, still not making eye contact as he willed his body to focus on the more pressing task at hand rather than how terribly he regretted rolling away from Greengrass.

  

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Ford couldn't believe how casual Fisk seemed to be about this whole thing. Of course, casual wasn't really Ford's thing, at least when it came to potentially awkward conversational moments, but given how long they'd just stared at each other and how loaded the stare had been he was amazed that anyone had the ability to speak in full sentences following. Maybe Fisk had a lot more experience in matters like this (matters like what? Ford couldn't ignore the tension in his body when the other man was around or how clouded his head got when they talked about "quidditch" but he still hadn't really parsed together what else could happen. It was leading somewhere, but he didn't know what lay down that path and there was no one he could have asked).

The other option, of course, was that Fisk was acting just fine because despite all indications to the contrary, he hadn't cared about that long silent moment after they'd both tumbled to the ground. It was possible that when he said Quidditch he really meant Quidditch. Possible, but unlikely, Ford thought. He couldn't have explained it, but he had a feeling neither of them had meant Quidditch, even if Ford still hadn't put the pieces together on what they were actually talking about.

Ford pushed himself up to a sitting position and glanced at Fisk, still on the floor next to him. He'd placed his hand on the ground to support himself and Ford had a sudden thought: what would happen if he put his hand on top of Fisk's? It was reasonably within the realm of accidental touch, but they'd both know it wouldn't have been accidental at all. Ford's heartrate picked up at the thought. It might be just the push needed to get them from this tense stage to whatever followed, whatever stop was next on the obscured path. Did he want to go down that way? Did Fisk?

He couldn't. This was all well and fine as a fantasy, to wonder what might happen, but he was in no position to actually take leaps into the unknown. He cleared his throat; it was suddenly dry and very tight. "Yeah, I'm fine. Thanks to you."

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   Dorian Fisk

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He swallowed thickly. The room may have been covered in ice and snow but Dory had an inferno raging within. His cheeks were flush, his shoulders tense. There was no denying his attraction now, not after the minute spent valiantly resisting the impulsive urge to kiss Greengrass. (Would Greengrass have even kissed him back?)

"Would hate for you to be the one requiring a hospital visit," he replied in reference to their first meeting. One daring look over to the other man proved to Dory he had to get off the ground before making a regrettable mistake.

His hand mistakenly grazed Greengrass' as he made to stand. It was a split second of a touch, but enough to make Dory's cheeks blush with embarrassment. Once standing, Dory offered the same hand to Greengrass to help him up. "I, erm, should probably send a letter to my squad to request help with this one." He said both awkwardly and reluctantly.

  

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Ford went stiff at the contact, brief as it was. Had Fisk done that on purpose? It was too much to be a coincidence, after Ford had just had the same thought. Could Fisk tell what he was thinking? Was his expression or his body language giving him away and making it that obvious that he was preoccupied with something much more tantalizing and exciting than a collapsed roof?

He pulled his hand away and forced his eyes elsewhere. He could collect his letters, that's what he could do. They'd all tumbled out of his hand when Fisk had pushed him, and now they were mostly soaked. He could see ink leaking through some of the parchment already. That was almost a relief — it was a good excuse not to stick around and wait for the post office worker to return.

"And I ought to go home, I suppose — that's it for these letters." He started to rise on his own before he realized Fisk had extended a hand (since he had been so pointedly not looking at him). He looked at it for half a second, debating whether or not he wanted to touch the other man again... but he didn't want to be rude. Reluctantly, Ford grabbed his hand and climbed to his feet.

  

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Greengrass' delay in accepting his outstretched hand caused Dory's cheeks to flush once more. Clearly, there was an underlying tension to all their interactions thus far. The conversation about the dancer was the most obvious, of course, but even when they spoke back at the art exhibit there was something lurking beneath the surface. Something peculiar and intriguing and, well, arousing.

He nearly dropped his hand back to his side when Greengrass finally accepted it. "They might be salvaged with a charm or two," Dory suggested whilst making certain to not hold onto Greengrass' hand for a second longer than what could be considered proper. "At least its water and not some other substance. Alchohol in particular is always tricky to work with." He was rambling, and not in a good way. Dory shifted on his feet before turning back to the desk behind them. "Right. I should attend to that. Best of luck with your letters. My apologies for the ... push and all." And the firmness pressing into you, he thankfully left unsaid.

  

"Your apologies?" Ford asked dryly, with a glance at the gaping hole in the ceiling and then down at the pile of debris. It had obviously been for his benefit that Fisk had shoved him, despite the awkwardness that had followed, and even though he knew it was just a conversational tick he had never been one for accepting unwarranted apologies. "Hardly. You're my hero."

That had been intended as a joke, but in the half-second of dead air that followed it Ford wished he'd said something else. This wasn't the time or place for jokes, nor was it the ideal time to just say whatever came to mind without thinking it through. That was what had gotten them talking about Quidditch, last time.

"...Anyway," he said abruptly, when he'd decided he'd rather press on than hear anything Fisk might have said in response to that. "I'll give the letters a try at home. Best of luck with... this," he concluded, with a vague wave at the post office.

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   Dorian Fisk

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