Into the Belly of the Whale

Percy walked quickly down the street, promising himself that he would only stay for one hour, and he would have only one drink. He could even read a chapter of his book while he was there. He turned the corner and saw the entrance to the new pub. The Belly of the Whale. There it is. A line had formed outside, and people were waiting to get in. Percy hesitated, but he steeled himself and walked to the line. Yes. He could do this. People his age did this all the time. He made his way to the end of the line. Wizards wearing too much cologne and witches in a lot of make-up chatted to each other while waiting in line. Percy looked at them, and, recognizing no one, pulled out his book to read.

The line slowly inched forward. Percy only looked up when new people joined the line behind him. He looked up again when an especially raucous group of wizards started walking past the line. He looked up and straight into the eyes of Oliver Wood.

"Prefect Percy! What are you doing here?" Oliver glided over to him, flanked on either side by wizards he had never seen before. Oliver looked very much the same now as he did at Hogwarts, except for a new scruffiness and the notable absence of a broom for playing Quidditch. Oliver laughed jovially and clapped Percy on his right arm. "Merlin! It's great to see a Gryffindor! I have been around these two Slytherins for too long--has me wanting to take over the world!" Oliver laughed loudly and clapped a dumb-struck Percy on the arm once more. "Well! What have you been doing lately?"

Percy smiled and shook his head. He was still speechless over seeing Oliver again.

"Who are you here with?" Oliver asked, his eyes scanning the line for familiar faces.

"No--no one. I came alone," Percy replied and laughed nervously.

"Prefect Percy? Alone? No! Well, you're not standing in this line. C'mon--I know the witch working the door." Oliver stepped back and lifted the rope corralling the people in line against the wall. Percy ducked and stepped under it, joining Oliver and his two friends on the other side. "Prefect Percy, this is Eric O'Hara and Asher Burden. Both Slytherin, three years ahead of us and under the delusion that this somehow makes them superior. I think they sampled too many of Snape's potions. They play on the Reserve with me. Did you know that I play on the Puddlemere Reserve?"

"I, er, think I heard that somewhere," Percy said, hurriedly walking behind the three of them. They were striding toward the door of the pub. It was almost difficult to keep up with their steady pace. All three of them were athletes, obviously, and not something to which Percy was accustomed to following. Their long strides made short work of the sidewalk, and Percy hopped along behind them, anxious to stay with them. Asher Burden was smaller than the other two, with dark hair and dark eyes. He had a slight frame that suggested nimbleness on a broom and in the air. Percy hypothesized that he was probably the reserve Seeker. Eric O'Hara, on the other hand, was brutish and strong. His neck and shoulders were thick, and he had shaved his head, leaving a shiny dome Percy thought resembled a helmet.

Percy saw people turning to watch them pass. He laughed aloud when he realized that the witches and wizards in line were watching him with envy. Envy! He felt an odd flutter in his stomach. Percy was reminded of his 7^th year when Jaime Collins, a Ravenclaw, saw his Head Boy Badge at the start of term. Jaime had wanted to be Head Boy so bad he could taste it, and had spent the majority of their sixth year telling anyone who would listen how he expected to be Head Boy--as his mum and Dumbledore had been owling quite frequently. Turns out the owling had been in reference to Collins's marks. The stupid Ravenclaw git. Wouldn't it be great if Jaime were in this line right now, watching him walk by with three--Three!--Puddlemere Reserve players.

"Lindsay! Love!" Oliver kissed the cheek of the witch at the door as she smiled and blushed. She ushered the four of them in the door, smiling more brightly as Oliver introduced her to Percy. "The most important wizard you'll ever meet--future Minister of Magic, you'll see!" Once inside, Percy asked Oliver how long he'd been seeing the witch at the door. "Lindsay? Ha! Never!" Oliver turned and faced Percy, their eyes locking. With one eyebrow cocked, he leaned in and whispered into Percy's ear conspiratorially, "She's just not my type, eh, Prefect Percy? Or should I start calling you Minister Percy?" Oliver laughed and playfully punched Percy in his ribs. The four of them made their way over to the bar in the back of the room by weaving through the mass of people.

"What'll you have?" the harried witch behind the bar yelled to them. It was difficult to hear over the music and noise coming from the growing crowd. Everywhere people stood in knots, yelling into each others' ears and laughing. Witches looked at wizards; wizards ogled witches. Smoke hung low in the air, making the already dimly-lit room even darker. Tables and chairs lined the walls, but most of the occupants chose to stand in small groups, knitted together around a large dance floor just to the left of the bar. The space was simple, but filled with pulsating bodies, gyrating in rhythm to music which seemed to have no actual origin, but simply was, and it existed only to make these people dance.

"Four firewhiskeys--Large firewhiskeys, m'dear!" Oliver turned and smiled at Percy. "Is firewhiskey alright? I assume it's what you drink--unless you prefer something stronger?" He laughed again, and clapped Percy on the shoulder.

"You know, with the name of this place, I would have expected bones on the wall or something!" Percy said to the three of them and laughed at his joke. They just looked at him. Oliver smiled and shook his head.

"You've got a strange sense of humor there, Percy." Turning back to the witch behind the bar as she poured their drinks, Oliver lit a cigarette. He exhaled the smoke in a long breath in front of him. The smoke billowed in the air and dissipated, spreading out in the pub, permeating the atmosphere and adding to it his own excitement. Percy saw the smoke coming from Oliver's mouth as Oliver giving to these people some of his excitement. Yes. The excitement of being friends with Oliver.

Percy watched the ease with which Oliver slid the package back into the pockets of his robes and gestured to Asher at the bar, the long, thin cigarette perched between his fingers. Yes. Oliver exuded cool--something Percy would never be as long as he continued to align the corners of newspapers with the corners of end tables.

Oliver looked over at Percy and caught him staring. Percy blushed deeply for having been caught in the act of admiration. Oliver smiled and took another drag from his cigarette. He exhaled another long stream of smoke, his eyes never leaving Percy's. Oliver smiled and laughed. He turned his head only when the witch behind the bar yelled at him how much he owed. Oliver deftly dropped much more than the owed amount on the bar, distributed the drinks to the others, and led his group away from the bar. He pointed at a round table in a back corner, away from the bar and the dance floor.

Oliver and Percy slid into the booth side of the table while Asher and Eric pulled up two chairs to join them. While Eric and Asher launched into a debate over who was the likeliest player to be called up from the Reserve, Oliver leaned in and started whispering to Percy. He told him all the secrets of this pub and its inhabitants. Pointing with the same hand that held his cigarette, Oliver pointed out disgruntled lovers, former athletes, B-list celebrities, and other well-known people.

Percy had listened intently at first, determined to learn all he could about this situation. He wanted to know everyone the way Oliver knew everyone. He wanted a firm grip on how things worked here, and how he should be. Percy's attention waned, however, when he caught sight of Oliver's eyelashes. Oliver was leaned in so closely to Percy that he could see individual eyelashes rimming Oliver's eyes. Percy had never been this close to Oliver before. He couldn't remember having been this close to anyone before. He thought back to the times he kissed Penelope, and his heart sank when he realized how methodically he had undertaken his relationship with her. He had been that close to her, but he never even noticed her eyelashes. Percy wondered whether that could have even been a metaphor for their entire relationship.

Percy took in the other details of Oliver's face: the arch of his cheek bone, the angle of his nose, the exact shade of his lips as they curled around the cigarette yet again before parting to exhale another stream of smoke. Oliver crammed the rest of the cigarette in the ashtray, only having smoked a third of it. He jumped up from the table, jarring Percy out of his reverie.

"Donna! Darling! How have you been?" Oliver grabbed a young witch into a hug and swung her around. She giggled and held on to Oliver. When they stopped, she gently pressed her forehead to his and looked into his eyes. She whispered something, no doubt very intimate, to Oliver, and he smiled. He cut his eyes, just momentarily, at Percy and winked before looking back at the girl and continued their conversation. Percy looked around. Asher and Eric's conversation had turned mildly alarming, and Percy decided that he would rather not try to join it--for fear that he may express the wrong opinion, for he knew very little about professional Quidditch, and either Asher or Eric--or both--may attempt to convince him otherwise in a more physical fashion the he would like.

Percy scanned the room looking for other witches or wizards he might have known. No one's face stood out to him, and seeing that Oliver was tied up in his conversation with Donna, Percy leaned back in his chair, unsure of what to do next. Everywhere he looked, people were laughing, dancing, talking and enjoying themselves. No one else was just sitting. He looked once more at Oliver, who was still gazing into the eyes of Donna, and took out his book. He tucked the bookmark into the space between the last page and the back cover and resumed his spot in the story. He had made it through another chapter and just started a new one when Oliver snatched the book out of his hands. He closed it without replacing the bookmark, and Percy swallowed an anguished cry while trying to maintain control over his panicked face.

"What on earth are you doing?" Oliver was smiling incredulously at Percy. He was leaned over the table, almost nose to nose with Percy, who had no idea how he should respond. In his mind, all Percy could think was how long it was going to take to find his spot again. "I know you were a prefect, Percy, but a book?" Oliver clucked his tongue and set the book in front of Percy on the table. Oliver retook his seat by Percy and lit another cigarette. "Listen, you two, none of us are going to be called up to the actual team any time soon. We are doomed to a life of being on the Reserve. Now, stop arguing and finish your drinks!" Oliver commanded to Eric and Asher. He looked at Percy's still-full glass. "You, too! Am I the only one here who has actually had firewhiskey before, or are all of you still students at dear, old Hogwarts?" Oliver laughed and pushed Percy's glass closer to him. "Drink!"

Percy held the glass cautiously. He had never had more than one glass of firewhiskey in one sitting before, and he wasn't sure that he wanted to know how he would respond to another drink. He turned the glass in its place on the table, attempting to buy time while thinking back to the promise he had made himself earlier that evening about having only one drink. He looked up at Oliver, who was watching him with one eyebrow cocked, as though appraising him. Percy was fighting a bitter internal battle: One side of him wanted to pass and tell Oliver that he had to go home. The other wanted to slam that glass of firewhiskey down his throat and order another round, like he had seen other people do.

"Aw, c'mon, Prefect Percy! Don't tell me you are still following all the rules like you did at Hogwarts?" Oliver taunted him. His words echoed the taunts from the twins that still played in the back of his mind. His inner battle was lost--he picked up the firewhiskey and finished it in one swallow. When he set down the empty glass, he looked up at Oliver and suddenly, his throat and esophagus caught fire. Percy started to cough violently and tears sprang into his eyes. "Perce? Perce, are you all right?"

Percy struggled to catch his breath again. He looked over at Oliver from the corner of his eyes and nodded weakly.

"It...it just went down...went down the wrong way," he lied. Percy coughed once more to clear his throat. "Want another? I'll buy this round."

"Absolutely!"

"Eric? Asher? Another?" Percy offered another round of drinks. They all took him up on it, and he made his way to the bar. It seemed that he made it to the bar more quickly when he was following Oliver the first time than he did when he went on his own this time. Percy arrived at the bar, and after 10 minutes of waiting, finally screamed his order for another round of firewhiskeys to the witch. While he was waiting, a pretty girl he'd never seen before approached him and asked if he had a cigarette she could smoke. When he replied that he didn't, she playfully frowned, winked and walked away. He gathered his glasses of firewhiskey after paying the witch and walked back to the table, flabbergasted at what just transpired. Yes. She had winked at him...but why?

"Thanks, Perce! Perce?" Oliver waved his hand in front of Percy's face in the effort to get his attention. Percy was staring at the place at the bar where he had just been standing. Percy suddenly came to and looked at Oliver. "What did that girl ask you, Perce?"

"Well...she wanted to know if I had a cigarette. I told her no." Percy took a big swallow of his drink. He grimaced at the taste of it and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand.

"Well, Perce, as you do not have any cigarettes, that would be the correct answer," Oliver responded, smiling. He spoke slowly, as though explaining it to a small child. "Next time, though, have some cigarettes."

"But, I don't smoke," Percy responded, confused.

"Perce. You have so much to learn about women. Always carry a pack of if a cigarettes--for when a pretty girl asks for one." Oliver reached in his pocket and pulled out a new package of cigarettes. "Here--take these and keep them for the future." Oliver pulled out his already-opened pack and pulled one out. He lit it and exhaled. "You want one?" he asked, looking at Percy. Percy hesitated. Yes. He could do this, too. He cautiously pulled one cigarette out of the pack and held it gingerly between his index and middle fingers. "Let me light it for you," Oliver offered. Percy put the cigarette in his mouth and leaned forward to the lighter. He looked up at Oliver, and they looked at each other while Percy breathed in. Oliver had a small smirk on his face while he watched. Suddenly, Percy coughed violently and grabbed for his drink. He took a long swallow of his firewhiskey, but that only made the situation worse. He continued to cough while Oliver laughed and clapped him heartily on the back.

"Why do you do this?" Percy croaked to Oliver, wiping tears from his eyes and continuing to cough.

"It takes some getting used to, Perce. Try this: The next time you smoke, breath in from the cigarette, take the cigarette out of your mouth and breathe in again. If you feel like you're going to cough, just swallow or take a sip--not the whole thing--of your drink. Then exhale." Percy tried twice more to smoke the way Oliver suggested. He found that it got easier, but he still had trouble understanding why so may people did this voluntarily. Oliver stubbed out another half-smoked cigarette. "Are you coming out again tomorrow night, Perce?"

"I, er, I suppose I might," Percy lied. He was still somewhat shaken by the cigarette episode and felt completely out of place in this environment. He stubbed out his half-smoked cigarette and looked at his watch. "Merlin! I had no idea it was so late! I have to get back to my flat! I have work tomorrow!" He looked up, panic-stricken and reaching for his bag. When he saw Oliver's face, he froze. No. This was not how he was supposed to act here. "I mean, I have to get up extra early tomorrow, you know...because of some stuff...that I have to do..." Percy tried to backtrack his way out of acting so uncoolly in front of Oliver and his friends, who were now looking at him as though he were some exotic creature in a zoo.

"Right," Oliver responded, knowingly, "Well. I was going to say that you should meet us at the Leaky Cauldron around 5:30 tomorrow for some dinner before we come over here. That is, unless you are working late, too?" Percy wasn't sure what to say. He never left the Ministry before 7:00pm. He wanted to make sure that everything was finished and taken care of before he left work. "But if you don't want to--"

"No, no! I mean, yes--I would like that. It's just...it's just been so long since I have seen you and all. Yeah--that would be great."

"Great, then we'll see you there! How about another round--my treat?" Percy looked again at his watch. As it stood, he would only be getting 6 hours of sleep--if he didn't go into the Ministry early like he had planned.

"I--I can't, Oliver. I really have to get home. Tomorrow night I can stay out later--it is Friday, after all." Percy stood and slid out from behind the table. He grabbed his bag and put it over his shoulder, pretending to adjust the strap while waiting for Oliver's response. Yes. Tomorrow night would be different.

"OK, Perce. We'll see you at the Leaky Cauldron at 5:30, then." Percy smiled and nodded. He turned ans started making his way to the door. "Perce!" Oliver called. Percy stopped and turned back to the table. "Perce! Tomorrow, leave the book at home!" Oliver smiled and coolly waved bye. Percy waved back and walked through the crowd. Yes. He would be very, very tired tomorrow, but he knew it was worth it. He had been missing out on this life for too long. He had been wasting his time, sitting at home and making sure all of his magazines lined up correctly. His pantry was organized alphabetically, for Merlin's sake! No. Oliver wouldn't do anything like that. Oliver would probably laugh his head off if he knew...if he knew just exactly how uncool Percy was.

Tomorrow, though. Tomorrow would be different.