Brave New World

Albus Potter’s love affair with the Muggle world had begun long before he’d even been fully aware of its existence. As a very young child, he’d only been aware that there were two kinds of books on their shelves- and while both sometimes spoke of magic and fairytales, one set was threaded through with a kind of…….awe, and wonder, that the other simply did not have. For all that it was the same subject, one spoke of realities and the other dreams; and the difference was all too palpable.

Usually wizards who fell in love with the Muggle side of humanity admired and gaped at their innovation, their technology- and Albus wasn’t a complete exception to that. It was just that their art and literature had snagged him first- and it was almost reasonable to ask why. Why read imagined, garbled accounts and ideas of creatures and concepts instead of meticulously detailed records by witches and wizards who were actually aware of their existence? Maybe because as ironic as it sounded, the Muggle world hadn’t lost the magic in its eye yet. Albus didn’t know what it was, that enigmatic, wondrous swirl to the words of Frost and Keats and Wordsworth, their observations of even natural things that Muggles could see, that transcended the boundaries, the definitions of magical and non-magical.

Maybe that was part of the reason why the Muggle world still had innovation. The spark of curiosity, the desire for discovery- that led them to peer into space and dive into the oceans and study microscopic organisms. Not like their Wizarding counterparts, fearful of change and progress and walled in by their own minds.

Not everyone in the wizarding world was like that though.

Albus resisted the urge to glance up the staircase for the fifth time, knowing his eyes would only find an empty landing and a closed door. There was still bustling noises drifting down the landing though, a wardrobe door being opened and shut, rustling of cloth, and the general sounds of a woman getting ready to step into an entirely new world that she’d only been taught to fear and deride since her birth.


He wouldn’t have been able to do it, Albus could admit; throw himself into a situation that he had minimal knowledge and zilch experience of. Expose himself to the scrutiny and possible judgement of people he’d been taught to hate, had he hypothetically been born in that sort of family. And maybe that was ironic, how much more alike he was to the very close-minded, fearful wizards he’d been issuing a tirade against, than Athena Goyle, pureblood extraordinaire.

He didn’t have to be that harsh on himself though- because most wouldn’t have been able to do it. Whatever mettle it was that Athena was made of………it was far from common.

Footsteps. Albus half-turned in his chair, small smile rising unbidden to his lips. His fingers continued to fidget with the smooth, rectangular device he’d picked up earlier this morning from an Apple store not two blocks away. Of course, Athena would need more than an iPhone six by three inches wide to deal with her university assignments but….one step at a time. Maybe she could entertain herself by playing whatever it was the Muggles did when they stopped in the middle of the road and made bizarre throwing motions in empty space.

“Ready?”

(Yours is perfect. I need to work on my Althea feels. Haha.)

Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, Athena Goyle found herself stood before a mirror, her feet planted shoulder width apart. She finished buttoning the cream blouse she’d chosen to wear, hoping that the pink flower pattern on it would make her appear suitably well-meaning. She readjusted her skirt: a black, knee-length, floaty affair, and slid her feet into her shoes.

There. Ready.

Her hair was spilling down over one shoulder in gentle waves, her face was made up just enough to allow her to blend and, as she poked her arms into the light jacket she’d bought on impulse when passing a Muggle boutique on her way home from work, she took one last glance in the mirror, hoping to draw some confidence from the woman she saw there: the woman who could do this day and do it well. Athena couldn’t say the same about herself.

Picking up her bag, Athena left her room before she had the chance to back out, get back into her pyjamas and clean the bathroom like she had been meaning to for the last few days. It was fine – just about bearable – but it had been nagging on her and she knew that she vastly outnumbered the clean and tidy Potter with a small army of messy Rookwoods. It was undeniably her fault the bathroom was in a state that her twitchy, Pureblood sensibilities took affront to.

She wanted to clean it, but first her life had to begin. Perhaps her desire to clean it was more born out of the need to avoid her life beginning again. She’d been quite happy in the bookshop, sardonically commenting on the comings and goings of the Hayeses and their compatriots. She’d been quite happy with Albus, too, and the odd little family they had. Now, though, there was something else, something that she’d wanted to do but was still, even on her first day, almost too terrified to go through with it.

Her phone buzzed. She looked down and a smile lit up her features before she could stop herself. Taking the stairs two at a time she bounded south and arrived clumsily into the room Albus was occupying – only just catching herself on the door frame.

“Albus! Albus! Albus! There’s that big blue thing! He’s outside. C’mon! We need to go!”

Her grin was insatiable, her worries about the day ahead momentarily absorbed by the joy a simple game could bring.