Pet

*~*~*~*~
FOURTEEN
~*~*~*~
Harry stacked a tray of clean glasses on top of another tray of glasses behind the bar. He straightened up, feeling a little self-conscious as the bartender openly gave him a “once over”. The dinner crowd was drifting away and the drinkers were beginning to arrive. Harry was glad his shift was almost over; he was tired and sore. He ducked beneath the arm of Mark, the huge bouncer and slipped back into the kitchens. He heard the men call out comments about his “tight, little arse” and ignored their laughter when he did not rise to the bait.

Harry mentally shrugged. He had been so desperate to find a job that he hadn’t looked past the “Help Wanted – Dishwasher” sign to realize that Fiddlesticks was not your usual gentleman’s club. Not too far from the business district, the Club catered to the business crowd during the day. The dining selections were limited, but quite good. Harry had sampled most of the items in the menu; the cook thought he was too thin and needed fattened up a bit.

Harry soon decided, however, that the customers came for items that were clearly off the menu. Fiddlesticks featured scantily clad dancers and waitresses as well as a variety of “entertainers” who used private back rooms. There were a few comedians and transvestite singers in the late afternoon lineup who overlapped into the night time crowd.

Harry peeked into the kitchen storeroom. Rose was asleep in a borrowed port-a-crib one of the dancers had brought in for her. It was a miracle that the manager of the club permitted him to bring the newborn to work with him, but Harry sensed Sid Toffler wanted more from him than just his dishwashing skills.

One of the strippers caught Harry’s eye.

“Emmy,” she called. “Be a love and zip me up.”

Emmy. Harry snorted. The “girls” had given him that name. To defray the curiosity about his infant daughter, Harry had spun a tale about an under-age former girlfriend abandoning Rose at birth and disappearing. The waitresses and dancers, many of them single mothers, adopted Harry as one of their own. Teasing him one slow afternoon, they tried to decide what his stage name might be if he ever became a male stripper.

It was Mark that called out the name “Emerald Dream”. They had all had a good laugh over that moniker, but the joke stuck. They began to refer to the slight, young dishwasher as “Emerald” or “Em” for short. Harry didn’t really mind; the farther he was from the name “Harry Potter” the safer he felt.

Harry was tossing his apron into the laundry basket when Sid approached. Sid made him nervous because he always tried to touch him when they talked.

“Hey, Kid.”

“Hello, Mr. Toffler.”

“Told ya…call me Sid. Night dishwasher quit…need you to stay until closing…pays time and a half.”

~*~*~*~
Lucius stood in the doorway of his concubine’s vacant bedroom. He had spent the past ten hours searching the manor and grounds for any trace of his pet or the newborn. He contacted Dr. Eeylops’ office but was informed that the mediwizard could be of no help; apparently the elderly wizard had accidentally oblivated himself with his own wand while traveling by floo to visit his brother in Diagon Alley.

Dobbins had tried tracking Harry the Muggle way with a search dog, but the snow had fallen heavily for several days and all traces of them vanished at the stable door. It was possible that Harry escaped through the forest, but it was just as possible that he was eaten by one of the carnivores inhabiting the woods. Although he kept the thought to himself, the old Squib hoped Harry flew out on one of the hippogriffs or thestrals; he had been quite friendly with some of the mares and snow would not have deterred either breed.

~*~*~*
Harry paused at the doors leading to the kitchens when he heard an especially loud “whoop” from out of the crowd. On stage, a young man was stripping out of an exaggerated sailor suit to The Village People’s “In The Navy”. Harry watched the practiced moves as the dancer teased the audience.

Shifting the heavy bucket of dirty barware, the slender wizard gave one last glance at the nearly nude dancer and backed through the swinging door. He sidestepped a partially disrobed waiter pinned to the wall by a customer in the narrow hallway.

Fiddlesticks was never boring, Harry decided. After nine o’clock four evenings a week, the clientele and the dancers changed. The dancers were all young and male; some looked more feminine than others but all were easy on the eyes. For the most part, the customers were usually well behaved, not at all like the rougher edged crowd drawn to a bar further down the street. The rough looking men in leather unnerved Harry as he passed by on his way home late at night.

~*~*~*~
Mark looked up from his newspaper as Sid called the young dishwasher into his office. He scowled. Harry was a good kid, a little too quiet, a little too polite, but not at all naïve. The small man kept his secrets close to his chest, and that had sparked the curiosity of more than one employee at Fiddlesticks, Mark included. They had all teased and rudely propositioned the attractive sprite at one time or another, and Harry always blew them off with good humor, but Sid Toffler didn’t tease.

Mark set his newspaper aside and headed to the door of Sid’s office. He didn’t need to lose a reliable dishwasher because Sid couldn’t keep his cock in his trousers.

Sid held out an envelope to Harry and pulled it back when the young man reached for it. Mark knew Sid paid Harry his wages “under the table” and in cash, but this envelope was too thin to be a pay packet. Harry reached for the envelope again.

“I had to pull a few strings to get this for you, Kid. Give us a little kiss to show your appreciation…”

“Please, Mr. Toffler…I don’t…” Sid silenced Harry’s protest by pushing him against his desk and forcefully kissing him. The manager’s hands ran over the slim body as Harry’s muffled objections went ignored.

Mark was about to interrupt when a collection of shot glasses exploded on Sid’s bookcase. Shattered glass hit the floor. Sid turned in surprise, releasing his grip on Harry. Using the distraction, Harry grabbed the thin envelope and shot out the door.

*~*~*~
The white blond wizard searched the bedroom, looking for any clue. Harry’s school bag was missing along with a change of warm Muggle clothing and a winter cloak. He vaguely remembered his pet having some Muggle currency, but he didn’t remember that there was much of it, and he had confiscated the key to the Potter Family Vault in Gringotts.

Harry had not fled to his aunt and uncle in Little Whinnig and the normal escape routes to Europe were still being closely guarded. The Weasleys were dead, Lupin was dead, and Black was dead. The house at 12 Grimmauld was empty. Hogwarts had fallen. Beaubaton had fallen. There would be no sanctuary for his readily identifiable concubine in Wizarding Britain, but Harry did have a two-day head start. He could be anywhere, and having been raised a Muggle, could fit in either world.

Lucius sank onto the mattress; Harry’s scent was strongest there. He was angry at his little pet, but he was also frightened for him. What had possessed Harry to run away just after giving birth? His pet was defenseless against wizard and Muggle alike.

He shifted on a lump in the bedding and extracted two books hidden between the mattresses. One was a book on Wizarding Law and the other was titled, “Rights of a Natural Child in Wizarding Society.” Lucius thought back on all the times he had seen his concubine picking through the stacks of books in the family library and began to wonder exactly what the young man had been reading. Obviously the books on Quidditch, childcare and camping in the Scottish Highlands had been diversions.

~*~*~*
Mark was making his final security check in the empty club; it was an hour past closing time and he was getting ready to set the security alarms before heading home. A baby’s wail echoed in the empty hallway.

The large man traced the source of the wails to one of the dressing rooms. He could hear Harry’s soft shushing sounds of comfort. Mark opened the door, remembering that the dishwasher often showered before leaving. Washing dishes in the cramped kitchen was hot, sweaty work.

Harry, with only a towel wrapped low on his hips, had Rose over one shoulder, rubbing her back in soothing motions. He grasped the towel as it began to slip, but missed it. It pooled at his feet.

Mark enjoyed the view; small and compact, Harry was even prettier with his long hair cascading down his back. Harry turned toward the door, realizing he and Rosamond were not alone. Mark wolf-whistled at the blushing young man. The whistle was cut short when the bouncer saw the thin red scar across Harry’s lower abdomen and the tattoo of the basilisk on his hip.

“Fuck, Harry…you’re a wizard!”

*~*~*~