first date -Meleny-

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai scaled the stairs to the loft and found himself actually getting nervous. He wanted tonight to go well and knew that Meleny was the one for him. He straightened his clothes, making sure he looked presentable for her roommates as well. He knew that the McKennas were fiercely protective over Meleny and he would have to get passed them if he ever wanted to be with Meleny. He fixed his long black leather coat and smiled slightly before knocking on the door, it was a few minutes past eight thirty and hoped that he didn't seem like a complete spaz for showing up almost perfectly on time.

Everything was set for the night, he waited for someone to answer and put his hands in his pocket. A nice dinner, stroll around Hyde Park, a nice and simple romantic evening. Hopefully everything would go perfectly.

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

Meleny had arrived to her apartment a few hours after saying goodbye to Kyubok at work. She was in her room with Cadence who was helping her get ready for her date. She had told her about how he asked her out for tonight. Cadence's brother had insisted on meeting him and Meleny figured there was no getting around it. Carlow was as protective of Meleny as he was of his own sister. Cadence had finished doing her hair and Meleny was wearing a reddish pink dress. Meleny heard the knock on the door and grew nervous. "Now don't scare him off." she said to Carlow in a warning tone as they both went to answer the door. Meleny pulled the door open to find Nikolai standing on her porch ready for their date.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai smiled when the door opened and saw Meleny along with a man who he met a few times in passing,
"Hi, you must be Carlow, I'm Nikolai Amsel, I think we met a few times." He held out his hand for the other man, wanting to make a good impression on someone who was obviously very close to her. He shook his hand and then looked at Meleny,
"Wow, you look beautiful." He smiled and knew that she was the most beautiful woman he's ever seen. He couldn't wait to spend as much time with her as possible.

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

Carlow reached out and shook hands with Nikolai. "Yes. its nice to meet you. Please take good care of Meleny." was all he said before he stepped out of the way to give the two their space.

Meleny smiled when Carlow commented her. She blushed and giggled and was surprised Carlow had actually backed off. She knew he was protective but she assumed he found he could trust Nikolai and felt okay about them going out together. "Thanks. You look really handsome." she said to him.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

He smiled at the male and shook his hand,
"You have my word." He smiled at Meleny, really unable to take his eyes off of the woman. She was everything he wanted so tonight had to be perfect,
"Are you ready to go?" He asked, making sure she was ready and he wasn't rushing her out the door, this was his first date in a while so he didn't want to seem like a complete idiot with it. This date was a big deal for him, when she complimented him he smiled and looked down at his dark jeans and black vneck shirt under his long jacket, he tended to wear dark colors, probably all of those years at Drumstrang getting to him,
"Thank you, I wanted to look nice for you."

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

"I just need to get one thing." she said to Nikolai. "Aww. Well You did a good job with the whole looking nice thing." she said and then left the foyer to go back into her bedroom. She picked her clutch bag up off the bed and opened it to check that her house keys were inside. When she saw they were she closed the clutch. She walked back out to the foyer and over to Nikolai. "Ok. I'm all ready. We can go now." she said to him. Cadence had come out of the bedroom to see them off. Meleny opened the door so they could leave. She waved to her roommates and waited for Nikolai to step outside.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai waited for her to get what she needed and stood slightly awkwardly with Carlow, he knew that the siblings meant well, but they would accept that Nikolai would be part of Meleny's life for good. He cared for her deeply and nothing was going to change that. He smiled when she came back out and offered up her arm to him,
"It was nice to meet you again, Carlow, you too Miss. Candence." He walked out the door with Meleny,
"So I was hoping that you like Italian food, I realized I have no idea what kind of food you actually like, panicked slightly, and then realized everyone likes pasta or pizza. Sound good?"

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

Meleny closed the front door behind them and locked it with her keys. She turned to face Nikolai and she started laughing. "Are you kidding me? I love Italian food. I was born in Italy after all. and who doesn't like pizza or pasta? I think that idea is muy magnifico." she said and laughed some more at her use of Italian. She hadn't spoke the language in years since coming to London when she was younger to attend Hogwarts. She started speaking English all the time. "I really miss eating Italian food. My mother made the best Italian dinners whenever I would come home for the summer from school." she said. She hadn't spoken of her mother lately afraid it would stir up all the memories of her death from when she was sixteen. Meleny was 33 now and she still missed her mother a lot but lately with her life in a state of calm she rarely felt upset about it anymore. She was sure her mother would've been glad she was moving on. However Meleny lamented the fact that she had died before she could ever become a grandmother (however not that soon) but that is every mother's dream, meet her boyfriend or whatever Nikolai was at this point (they were only on their first date after all), or see Meleny's children go to Hogwarts someday in the future. Meleny had saved her mother's Italian cooking recipies after she had died. She figured she could use them someday and planned on cooking one of them for Nikolai at some point when they got to a certain point in their relationship and she knew she would cook them for her future children as well. Children was the one thing Meleny really wanted although she would be patient enough to wait for the right time. She didn't want to wait until she was too old to have children and close to dying of old age. She wanted to be able to live to see her children to go Hogwarts and her children have children of their own when they're ready if she lives that long.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai felt his face blush a little when when Meleny reminded him that she was Italian, he always forgot that about her since she didn't have any sort of accent other than her British one. He kinda felt a little silly and knew he had to shake that off if this date was going to go well.
"Oh, Italian would be perfect then." He walked with her down the stairs and to the local but well known Italian restaurant that he loved to go to and wanted to take Meleny to. He opened the door and thought about all of the new things he wanted to get to know about her, she never really talked about her mother. He got them a table and sat down,
"Tell me more about your mother, does she still live in Italy?" He had no idea anything about her past, they really just talked about Order stuff and other current things like that. He smiled at the waitress and took the menu from her, hoping that this date would go well for them.

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

When they got to the restuarant Meleny hadn't expected him to ask the question that he had. She sat down with him at the table and mulled over his question in her head. She figured it couldn't hurt telling him. She wanted to get to know him better too and they only ever talked about the Order. She would tell him anything he wanted to know. "um...no she doesn't. When my sister and I were 9 years old we moved here to England because my mother liked to travel a lot and my father's job made it so we had to move here anyway. However, my mother never went back to Italy. She um....died here in 1996." she told him. She figured she would get the whole story out of the way now before he asked any questions and if he had more after that she would answer them. "My father had done it with the killing curse. He was a Death Eater until Voldemort's downfall. She had gotten in his way because we were trying to save the house elf he was mistreating." she said with some embarrassment. Meleny wished he hadn' asked such a question on their date but at least now he knew why she never talked about her family or what passed for one. She hoped he wouldn't think badly of her just because her father was a dark wizard and she was glad he hadn't asked anything about her sister because her sister was the same way. "I'm sorry if that story made you think any differently of me. I am nothing like my father. When I was younger I was embarrassed to even have the same last name as him." she said. She wished she could've prevented her mother's death or even had a somewhat more normal family. She prayed he wouldn't reconsider this date and any future dates because of what he had learned about her family. She was glad she had not told him about her sister. It was more horrid details that she was worried would change his view of her if the story about her father hadn't already. She hadn't even told him how her father used the cruciatus curse on her to let off steam and her sister gave her a black eye when she was fifteen. He had been upset because Meleny was a blood traitor and he wanted her to be more like her sister, mindlessly hating muggleborns and half-bloods like purebloods should. Meleny almost wished her father had disowned her or something but then she would've been on the streets looking for a place to live. However she was hoping if he had done that her mother would've left and they would've lived together far away from him. Instead he thought pain would teach her a lesson. Meleny sat anxiously in her seat waiting to see how he would react to her story.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai didn't think he could mess up any more than he already did with the whole Italian comment, but asking about her mother turned into the worst mistake he could have made that whole night. Nikolai listened to what she said, his face turning pink every time she mentioned something else terrible about her past. Her father killed her mother, her father was in Azkaban, what else could he mess up on on the first date? This had to be some sort of world record.
He reached over and held her hand and smiled at her, trying to give her some reassurance,
"I'm sorry I asked, but you're not your family. You're different from all of them because you're an amazing person. I was raised to go to Durmstrang, they teach Dark Arts there. I never let that define who I am, and you never let it define you."
Merlin he hoped that that made it better. He didn't want to ever loose Meleny and if he lost her to something like this he would never forgive himself.

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

Meleny smiled when he held her hand. She was relieved to hear his view of her hadn't changed just because of her past. He was right when he said she was different from her family and she shouldn't let their actions define her and at that moment she promised herself she wouldn't. "It's ok. You asked and I told you. You had no way of knowing that my past was so bleak. I don't talk about it that much. " she explained. Her smile brightened when he had said she was an amazing person. She was shocked to hear he had gone to Durmstrang. She remembered a professor from there that came to her school when she was fourteen for the triwizard tournament that was happening that year. The professor seemed like a very shady character to her. However the news that Nikolai had gone to Durmstrang didn't affect her view of him. She thought he was a lovely person regardless of the fact that he attended a school that taught the Dark Arts. It was a shock to hear but Meleny did want to get to know him better and she wondered what else she didn't know about him. "Thanks. That helps a lot. I admire that you don't let the fact that your school was known for the Dark Arts define you. I think you're a lovely person regardless of that fact." she said and blushed a little and laughed at how sappy she sounded.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai knew that a lot of people assumed that everyone from Drumstrang was instantly trained to be a Death Eater. He smiled at her,
"Yeah, I went to Drumstrang until I was fourteen, then I went to Hogwarts. Sorted into Ravenclaw." He sipped his water, happy that they both had the sort of history that some people would be ashamed of, but they embraced.
"My little sister has only gone to Hogwarts, she's in Ravenclaw as well. Her name is Calina." He loved his baby sister so much, he really only had her for family, well, her and a cousin on his father's side who he always fought with. They were like brothers, only Nikolai was treated like the immature baby brother when ever they were together. The one thing he was grateful for was that Vasch was staying in Russia, or Germany, or where ever he was currently researching. As much as he loved his cousin, he hated him too. He smiled when she said that he was a lovely person,
"Thank you Meleny, so tell me more about yourself. How did you decide to be a healer?" He held her hand, enjoying the contact with her. With this rocky start, hopefully it could turn into a wonderful date.

[Meleny Christina Aldridge]

Meleny enjoyed how much she was learning about Nikolai tonight. She had no idea he even had a little sister. She wondered what it must've been like for her to have her brother working at school and having to attend his class. She figured it was probably an awkward experience in some ways because of the protocol professors have to follow with their students. "Calina, eh. That's such a pretty name. I've never heard that name before. I would like to meet her one of these days." she said. Normally that would've been an opening for her to talk about her own sister but her sister wasn't normal so she didn't."Well I decided to be a healer because it just seemed like the natural step to take towards helping people after leaving the ministry." she explained. She smiled liking the feeling of his hand in her's.

[Nikolai Viktor Amsel]

Nikolai looked over the menu when she said that his sister had a pretty name,
"She's the best, she wasn't too happy about me being her professor when I first started, but we've been able to spend a lot of time together. It's been worth it." He was happy that he was able to see Calina more often.
"I would love for you to meet her, would kinda make this all much more serious, huh?" He wanted to be serious with her and he was hoping that she wanted that from him as well. He wanted to have a family and get married one day. He listened to what she said about why she became a healer and smiled,
"And saving people's lives is just an added bonus?" He laughed and saw the waitress return,
"Um, pasta with pesto please?" He asked, "and whatever wine goes well with it." He handed back over the menu and looked at Meleny. The waitress smiled,
"And for you miss?"