"Don't move. Who are you? How did you enter? What—"
"Hello, Abraham.... Surprise!"
Quinn and Abraham stared at each other as they stood in Abraham's restaurant. Abraham's jaw was slightly ajar as his hand raised, froze with a wand pointed at Quinn.
"Quinn... Quinn, what are you doing here?" Abraham asked, seemingly trying to figure out what was happening here. "H-How did you get here? The Floo's not lit yet, and you can't apparate in here."
Quinn raised his hand to the front and gently lowered it. On Abraham's end, he felt his wand hand being pushed down.
"Let's get that wand not pointing, shall we," said Quinn. "As for answering your question, I didn't come through the Floo, nor did I apparate here," he pointed at the corridor that he had used to enter the dining area, "I came through the front door like a normal person— you know, opened it and walked inside— don't worry though, I locked it after me.
So, how are you, Abraham?" he asked.
"No, no, no," Abraham raised his other hand up, showing Quinn his open palm, "you have to answer me why you're here first."
"Hmm, isn't that obvious? I came here to meet you."
"To New York? From Herefordshire?!"
"It's not that far, you know. It's just over the pond, as they say, and I didn't even take a boat, popped up using a Portkey and took Floo to a node in New York, then wandered my way here to the building. Even had a fair share of pizza on my way."
Abraham stared at Quinn, his face still showing disbelief.
Quinn realized what the man was thinking. It was, after all, very creepy and crazy to pop up at someone's workplace without notifying them, especially when that space was closed off from outside entry.
'Whatever, I own the place,' he thought, ignoring that it wasn't okay, even for the landlord to enter a tenant's place without their permission.
"I assume Lia doesn't know you're coming here," asked Abraham, sighing.
"Nope~, I didn't tell her," Quinn exchanged MagiFax with Lia every week, and she was clueless about his visit to America and that Quinn was visiting Abraham. "If I told her that I was coming here, she would've tried to stop me, or told you I was coming, or be here in person to breath down my neck... I'm taller than her, though."
"That does sound like her." Abraham once again breathed a long sigh. "Then may I ask why you're actually here?"
"I'm in New York for some work," said Quinn, pulling a table and two chairs from the corner with a wave of his hand. "As for why I'm here specifically, I wanted to see how my lessee was doing— need to know if you'll be able to make rent this month."
"Wait, what? Lessee, what do you mean?" Abraham asked Quinn, who sat down by the table.
"I own the place, Abraham; you signed a lease to use this space, making me your landlord."
"What?! I didn't know that!" Abraham, who had sat down on his chair, immediately stood back up, pushing his chair back.
Quinn glanced at the falling chair, and it stopped falling and stood straight up. "Of course, you wouldn't know. I wasn't the owner when you leased this place; I only recently acquired it as part of one of my few investments here in America."
"Did you... did you buy it because I have my restaurant here?" Abraham asked.
"Partially, yes. It was one of the reasons behind why I bought this place," he had bought it from Lia after all. "The other reason is the prime real-estate this space is. Upper Manhattan, especially a magical building, is just a great investment. I'm impressed that you're doing well enough to pay rent for this place— it's really, really high."
Abraham sank back down on the chair, his shoulders slumping.
"Don't feel down; nothing's going to change," said Quinn, chuckling. "I don't have the time or motivation to directly take care of rent and other things here. You'll be interacting with whomever you have been interacting with, and things will remain the same."
"... I don't know what to say," Abraham sighed. "I don't know how I should feel about you owning the space for my restaurant."
"Restaurant? No, no, my dear Abraham," Quinn raised his finger and waved it around, "I own this entire building."
Lia had only owned Abraham's building, and she had only sold that to Quinn. But after that, Quinn had gone out of his way to buy the entire building from all the individual owners to obtain the ownership of the entire building.
"The entire building?!" Abraham all but yelled. "Oh my god... so much rent."
Quinn laughed. Eighty percent of the lots in the building were occupied, and Quinn was receiving rent from them every month, and he was sure that incoming times, the management agency handling the building would have it running at its full capacity.
"So when do you open?" Quinn asked.
"Dinner service starts at five," said Abraham.
Quinn looked at the time, and it was three. He looked around the restaurant, and it looked deserted. "You have employees, right? Where are they?"
"They're out for lunch. I think they're about to return."
"You don't have a staff meal?"
"We don't do staff lunch usually. My staff likes to go out after prep work and before the dinner service starts. They're about to return."
Quinn looked around the restaurant, and Abraham noticed the gaze.
"Do you have any questions?" he asked.
"Yeah, how many people do you serve here?" Quinn asked. "I ask this because I'm presuming this is the dining area."
The dining area, as far as restaurants were concerned, was small— from what Quinn could tell, it was barely big enough to fit two to three tables. Quinn had been quite a few of them, magical and non-magical, low-end to high-end, street food to fine dining.
"We serve fifteen reservations daily," Abraham glanced around his workplace. "Each party can be anywhere from a single patron to a party of ten, and we will prepare accordingly."
Quinn nodded, recalling going to numerous restaurants with the model Abraham used. They were high-end and exclusive, aiming to provide the best experience with a very personal touch to the guests. And from what Quinn could put together with the rent and the number of people Abraham served, he could tell that the restaurant was high-end with a niche clientele.
Abraham pointed around the small room, "This is just one of the fifteen rooms in the restaurant. Our guests require privacy, and luckily America is famous for its spatial magic services, so we stretched the space as widely as possible and divided it into these fifteen rooms along with our other requirements."
Quinn glanced at the wall behind Abraham and sent out a pulse of magic. 'Ah, it's indeed stretched out with spatial magic,' he thought, sensing the magic all around the room.
He knew that America was known for its spatial magic. Lia had commissioned the briefcase that she had gifted him from an American craftsman. That briefcase had become home to what could be arguably said to be his entire life.
"You must see a lot of politicians as patrons," said Quinn.
"Having a place in New York, especially in Manhattan, does make the guests who run in political circles."
Manhattan was the home to the headquarters of The Magical Congress of the United States of America (MACUSA,) making it the hub for magical American politicians and bigshots who were related to bureaucracy and politics.
"What do you guys serve?"
"French cuisine as that I was what I was trained in," Abraham said with pride. "We, however, don't provide a menu— we provide a set menu that changes regularly as we experiment and learn with our craft. Guests, however, can tell us in advance what they want to eat, and we will prepare it for them. We keep records of all our guests. For example, if you eat here, then we will keep a record of what you ate, and the next time you visit us, we can customize your menu— if you want to eat something from a previous visit, we can provide that, or if you desire to eat something new, we can make sure of the dishes you ate the last time repeat.
We also take feedback from our guests to learn their tastes and preferences to provide a personal experience. The more you visit, the better we would know you, and thus get a better experience than the last time."
Quinn stared at Abraham with slightly raised brows, impressed with what he heard. He knew that selling an "experience" was a good business model, and in his view, Abraham's restaurant was implementing an innovative version of that.
"Wow," he uttered, clapping soundlessly. "When Lia introduced you as a restaurateur, she wasn't lifting you up, was she... you said that you worked in a place much different from this one— you must've thought a lot about this."
Abraham nodded. "I left a great job that I was very comfortable with to start my own restaurant, so I had to be sure that I was going to do something that would be successful. I thought about it for an entire year before spelling the charm," he then smiled, "Lia helped me a lot when I was thinking on how to do things."
"Ah, I can feel the love," Quinn said with exaggeration. He then paused and leaned forward to ask seriously. "Lia's not going to come here today, is she?"
"Lia? No, we aren't set to meet for a couple more days."
Lia, with her responsibilities, was a busy person, and with her job that took her all over the globe, she couldn't stay in a single country like an average person. Abraham, in his job as the head chef and owner, too was a busy individual— it took a lot of research and experimentation to run a place like he wanted to run, and to keep guests happy, he had to be constantly doing something new which took time to do with the level of service that was promised.
As such, from Quinn knew, his sister and her boyfriend didn't have a relationship that looked like the ones that many others their age had.
"When do you two spend time together, if you don't mind me asking," asked Quinn.
"It's difficult for a non-resident to come in American with a Portkey," started Abraham and shook his head with a wry smile. "But apparently, it's not a big deal for your sister; she said she can Portkey here every day without any problem, so we did contemplate that but decided against it.
I start my day late and work till late, whereas Lia starts her days early and works till evening, so our times don't match for us to meet every day. Moreover, I'm busy at weekends, so we decided to spend time together on Wednesdays and Thursdays— she comes here, and I leave the kitchen to my second in command and partner on those two days— I'm lucky to have a great staff."
'Well, as long as they're happy with their relationship,' thought Quinn and then asked, "Do you have a room here in the restaurant where I can rest for a while?"
"Yeah," Abraham looked towards a corridor leading out of the dining, "we have a room in the back... but are you sure that you don't want to go rest wherever you're staying."
"I'll go there after I return from my outing during the late night. Right now, I would like if I could just jump up from here because if I go there, I would need to meet up with a bunch of people waiting for me and sit down with them for a while," Quinn sighed.
His living arrangements here were handled by the people employed by Wests, which meant even though this was a personal trip, there were people who knew Quinn was visiting. That meant there were going to be West Executives who would like to meet the grandson of George West and do some bootlicking and get acquainted. So if he went at night, he wouldn't have to deal with those people until tomorrow, or... never in his trip if he went out early and returned late.
"I have no problem with that," Abraham said, "you can rest in the backroom; I will ask my staff to stay away from the room."
"Thank you, that'd be much appreciated."
.
- (Scene Break) -
.
"That ends today's briefing," said Abraham looking at his staff. "I hope everyone's clear with their tasks and today's profile."
" " "Yes, chef!" " " replied the staff of 'Restaurant Astier.'
Abraham closed his notes for the day and smiled as his employees, but then noticed that suddenly their eyes strayed to the side, looking behind him. He turned and saw Quinn standing at the kitchen door, dressed in a suit that was different from the casual jacket he wore before.
"Quinn?" he called. "Is it time for you to go out?"
Quinn shook his head before waving towards the staff with a charming smile. He stepped forward, retrieved an envelope from his pocket, and handed it to Abraham, who looked at the familiar envelope with wide eyes.
"... You have a reservation for today," Abraham said, raising the reservation invitation letter that Restaurant Astier sent to its guests.
"Yes, I'm booked under the name Balbh East," Quinn pointed at the letter card and then grinned, "Surprise~!"
Abraham's eyes went down to the letter card and then up to Quinn, and as he did that, he couldn't help but think how similar Quinn was to Lia in some aspects, and more importantly, he made a note not to spend an evening with both of the West siblings together.
"... I will show you to your seat," said Abraham.
They exited and followed along a corridor with fifteen doors in it. They stopped in front of door number four, and Abraham opened it up for Quinn to step inside. The dining room was decor-rich, yet it was simple. Quinn could see a lot of things like a magical gramophone and walls with paint that moved seemed to move slowly to change patterns over time. In the middle of the room sat an ornate table with two chairs.
"Room four, from what I remember, has a reservation for two guests" Abraham frowned as he read the reservation letter card, then looked up at Quinn. "Someone else will be eating with you?"
Quinn looked away from the room and nodded, "Yes, I'm meeting with someone here." He took out his pocket watch to check the time, "They like to be on time, so I guess they're about to arrive."
As soon as Quinn said that, a hemispherical glass globe on a wall, which had been empty, suddenly lit up with a flare of green flames rushing under the glass.
"What is that?" Quinn asked.
"It seems you were right about them being on time," said Abraham. "Your guest has arrived at the Floo in the reception room."
Quinn glanced down on his clothes, and they straightened up. He held his hand behind his back and positioned himself so he was looking away from the door. Soon he heard a jolly yet old voice.
"Thank you, little lady," said the voice.
"Good evening, sir," Abraham greeted the smiling old man with eyes that seemed to shine with an eye-catching light. "I'm Abraham Astier, the Head Chef of Restaurant Astier. I'll be preparing your courses this evening."
"Hoho, I'm looking forward to it, Abraham. I don't usually come to establishments like these."
"Please look forward to an enjoyable time, sir," said Abraham. "Please enter, sir; your companion has already arrived."
"Oh?" the old voice chuckled... sounds of footsteps... "Quinn... oh my, haven't you grown tall."
Quinn, who was acting as if he didn't know about the arrival, turned to gaze upon the old man with a smile,
"And you have grown older, Mr. Alan."
Alan D. Baddeley's already wide smile stretched wider, accentuating his smile wrinkles on the side of his eyes.
"That happens with time, my dear child."
The master and student had reunited.
.
-*-*-*-*-*-
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Alan D. Baddeley - MASTER - Hello, little ones. It has been a long-long while.
Quinn West - Balbh East - I don't approve of this disrespect! Why was I bumped down the list?! Move me up this instant!
Abraham Astier - Restaurant Astier - Wonder who's the old man.
FictionOnlyReader - Author - Who better than the GOAT himself.
