WHO: Hippocrates Smethwyck and Rachel Englewood
WHAT: EVEN MOAR CRACK Despite of his love woes, our Smethy manages to snag a savvy new assistant!
WHERE: St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries
WHEN: Today, at 10 to 6
RATING: G

Rachel was so incredibly nervous.

She couldn't believe over how incredibly out-of-character it was for her to be going for a job interview, let alone being nervous about it. She was also in the habit of contrasting her older self's actions with her current actions, and couldn't help but think that in an alternate situation she might have used other less-than-savory means to secure anything like a job. Rachel couldn't deny that her life was very, very different from what it might've been, what she pictured it to be, but a job? Here? She'd never even thought about it when she was briefly considering a working life.

But that had never been seriously, and she had always expected to get married and be a trophy wife. But perfect Pureblooded future brides didn't generally have children out of wedlock and didn't usually get second chances at the lives they could have had.

It had taken some time, but Rachel was over it now, and she was accepting what her life was to be. And she was happy now, because Giada and she were as close as they once had been, before she had made a mess of everything, her outlook on life had really been changing-- and for the better!

And here she was, a girl her former self would never had recognized, at St. Mungo's, anxiously awaiting Hippocrates Smethwyck for their "date."

She saw him enter the lobby and a grin split onto her face. "Smet-" she cried, before clapping a hand to her lips and giggling slightly. "I'm sorry; Healer Smethwyck!"

Hippocrates Algernon Smethwyck, better known as Smeth to people familiar with him, will be honest. When he woke up that morning, he wasn't in the greatest of moods. Even his newly acquired Spider-Man alarm clock couldn't cheer him up. The knowledge that he and Jen were finally over still lay heavily upon him, and for him, he was still massively confused. Jen had broken his heart, but he knew that she was sincerely sorry. However, he was too perceptive to not notice the increasing signs of depression in his old friend and ex-girlfriend. He honestly hoped that she wouldn't do anything too harmful.

But.

He couldn't focus on that now. Like he had said in his most recent entry, the recent firing and suspensions of nearly a half of the St. Mungo's staff left the hospital in a state of dire emergency. The Healers, nurses, and technicians that were permitted to stay were becoming increasingly overworked, and right now, Mungo's needed all the help they could get. People didn't stop getting sick just because of the blood of witches and wizards, Smeth thought sourly as he headed towards the familiar abandoned glass-front store.

It was approximately five minutes to ten, and Smeth found his mood lifting a bit, despite the dreariness of last night. He was getting a new assistant! He wasn't quite sure how Rachel Englewood would measure up, but he knew that she was smart and would learn fast.

"Hey!" he said. Her smile was rather infectious, and his long legs crossed the lobby easily as he took her hand in a firm handshake. "No need for the formalities, Miss Englewood, how are you today?"

She bit her lip. "I'm--I'm wonderful! Nervous, I suppose. But thrilled to leave my old workplace. I wasn't--er--as suited as I thought I would be for the job." Rachel brightened up considerably, though, as she looked around.

"Amazingly enough, I feel like this might be even better for me," she said, mostly to herself, a bit in awe of how majestic and warm the place was, despite the major decrease in staff and the fact that it was a sick ward.

Her stomach did another flip. "I've never done anything like this before," she said, looking at him uneasily. "I mean, I can alphabetize just fine and I'm an excellent reader and absorber of information but this--this is still," she waved her hand at the surroundings, "new to me."

Why did she feel relieved after saying that? This was almost ridiculous.

"How are you?" Rachel added, almost as an afterthought. She winced in her head.

Smeth listened warmly as she spoke, looking thoughtfully at her. He could tell she was nervous, but that was okay! His first day at Mungo's was terrifying. "Don't worry," he soothed. "My first day here? I spill a Pepper-Up Potion all over a patient. Imagine how much I was yelled at for that!" He took a quick glance around the place and let out a mental sigh; without the abundance of Healers and nurses walking (or running, they were often running) around, the hospital felt so... empty.

"Since this is your first day, you'll shadow me. Well, which is the only thing you'll be doing as my assistant." He gave her a smile, big green eyes twinkling. He couldn't help it, after months of hard work and even harder work ahead of him, he was quite excited to have an assistant.

He headed into a hallway, where the supply closet was located. As he walked over, he checked over his shoulder to make sure Rachel was following. "Here," he said, rummaging through a shelf full of robes. "Iiii'm going to get you a size small." He passed her a set of light purple robes. He reached for a pair of green Healer robes and placed them over his clothes.

"I know we clash but hey - look at you! Looking the part already."

Rachel's grin got even wider. "Purple's my favorite color," she told him, shrugging into her new robes and preening.

He even knew colors that matched and colors that didn't.

That was more than she could ask of almost any male that she knew.

This was exactly the place she had to work.

"I can't imagine the patient was very upset over you spilling Pepper-Up Potion on them! I here it work porously as well as when digested!" she looked at him with a twinkle in her eye.

Rachel wasn't surprised that the remaining staff at St. Mungo's was stooping to taking people in almost literally off the streets. The hospital would've felt noisier and more lively if it had been filled with a bunch of ghosts. And not of the friendly, talking kind.

She did feel better about a Healer goofing up on the job, though. "I can't believe you messed up," she teased. "Look at you now! You're horribly dignified, you know, even for a Ravenclaw."

Smeth scrunched his face up as he fixed the collar of his robes, attaching his silver name tag to it. "I guess," he said, with a small laugh. "I guess I can't really think of myself as dignified - I mean, everyone remembers everyone from school days, right?"

He started down the hallway and stopped abruptly, almost causing Rachel to slam into him. "OH I nearly forgot!" He pulled a clipboard out of his pocket, thick with stacks of paperwork. "These are my patients' information papers. They're ordered in the same room order as I'm going - I double-checked last night for you. And!"

He reached deep inside his pocket, producing a silver pin with Rachel Englewood, Healer Assistant to Healer Smethwyck engraved on it. "I know you'll do a fantastic job, so I made this for you! Technically you get after two weeks, but like I said, I'm really confident that you'll do the job well." He handed it out to her, unable to keep a warm smile off his face.

"I--what--are you, oh, Merlin." Rachel, who was still trying to maintain balance from nearly crashing into Smeth, felt her eyes widen slightly, as she reached for the pin, her fingers brushing his as she held it in her hand.

"This--it--it really means a lot, that you think that," she gave him a very big, very unsure smile. She grasped the pin in her hand, almost afraid to put it on, and a little embarrassed at the sudden swoon of emotion. And she thought the crazy hormonal mood swings were supposed to be gone after your stomach stopped entering rooms before you did.

She strove to get onto a more professional, less idiotic-grinning page. "Who--er, who is the first patient on the list, Healer Smethwyck?"

Well, the grin was super hard to wipe off. She wasn't even trying that hard, anyway.

Smeth beamed back. But his grin slowly vanished as he shifted his weight from one foot to another. "Uh, actually... that would be you." For some strange reason completely unbeknownst to him, he felt himself blushing slightly. "It's just... Mungo's policy, all new workers must have a quick, standard procedure. Now I know you're not carrying dragon pox or Spattergroit, or anything crazy like that, it's just... for the sake of rules."

He led her into the nearest empty room, closing the door behind him, hoping that she wouldn't be offended by this sudden change of news. "It'll be really quick, nothing more than ten minutes. You won't even have to take off your clothes." He said the last sentence quickly and looked anxiously at her, hoping against hope that his brand new assistant would leave him not an hour after he had hired her.

Her eyes widened. The grin turned into a half-grin half-"O" and she looked hesitantly into the room.

There were two options she could easily have seen herself making-- neither of which were really appropriate or desirable to her right now. Rachel had a sneaking suspicion that, earlier, she might have thrown an enormous tantrum and refuse to do anything or be near this man and any of his co-workers on the basis of "principle" or she would have pulled the man in by his robe collar and been the one to give him an inspection.

But she wasn't that girl anymore. That didn't mean she didn't have to embrace the hell out of awkward situations like this, though.

"Oh, Smeth," she turned as she walked backwards into the room, that infuriating big, silly grin she couldn't get rid of still plastered to her face. "That isn't the first time a boy's told me that."

A huge wave of relief washed over him. So she wasn't going to run screaming from the room, throwing things at him. Most excellent. That relief transferred to another smile on his face, in addition to the infectiousness of Rachel's smile - which was really, really infectious for reasons he was unclear of - and he produced his wand. He wasn't quite sure of how to respond to Rachel's last remark, so he pointed to a nearby chair. "Sit here, and say 'ahhhh'," he instructed.

As Rachel complied, he moved closer to her, an inch barely apart from her. "Mmmhmmm," he murmured as he waved his wand over her, the wand eminating a faint humming noise. "Very good."

"Oh actually - if you could turn your head this way -" Without thinking, he lifted a hand and placed it under her chin, so that she was facing him directly.

For reasons unknown he nearly dropped his wand as her eyes met his.

Butterflies.

Butterflies in her stomach.

A lot of butterflies in her stomach--they seemed to be reproducing rather quickly.

But his eyes were so green, why had she not noticed this before?

It was his wand. Whatever check-up he was doing, that must be part of the after-spell effect. Funny he shouldn't mention it, but it was probably so procedural to him that he didn't even think about it.

She wondered if soft hands were mandatory for Healers.

Rachel cleared her throat, unsure of what exactly had just happened. "Do-do you--please don't tell me you're going to swab my throat. It's so uncomfortable. When I was little, the Healers always used to jab one spot that I know they weren't supposed to, but did any way, and it wasawful."

And now she was rambling. What happened to that cool demeanor she was normally so pleased she could maintain.

It was probably the lack of sleep. Maybe. He didn't have his usual cup of coffee that morning. Mmhmm. That explains everything. It probably also explains why he had to blink and take a moment to realize what Rachel had just said.

"Oh! No, no, don't worry, but I will have to listen to your heartbeat." Some Healers chose to listen to heartbeats with a spell, Smeth like to do it the Muggleway. It was the only procedure he liked to do the Muggle way. He pulled out a stethoscope and placed it over her heart, concentrating the best he could. For reasons unknown, he found it really hard to concentrate. Again, he chalked it up to a simple lack of proper caffeine.

"Alright!" he declared a few moments later, pulling off his stethoscope and stuffing it in his pocket. "Perfectly normal, perfectly healthy, no dragon pox, no Spattergroit." He took Rachel's hand and shook it. "Good to go, Healer Assistant Englewood."

It was silly-- she knew she didn't have dragon pox or Spattergroit, but hearing it like that, his voice, Rachel couldn't explain or deny the wave of relief she felt. Not only that, but she felt amazed that she didn't have any of those things, and maybe a little like Healer Smethwyck was just too amazing at his job.

But she wondered if Smeth had heard her heartbeat speed up when he listened to it.

The cold metal, no doubt! He was much more personal than other Healers; she liked that he used different, seemingly-more thorough methods! It was just the temperature of the freezing metal that made her heart do funny things.

"Well, that's a relief!" she grinned, as soon as her heart stopped trying to flutter out of her chest. The metal had been removed from her chest, there was no reason for it to behave so madly! "I can tell you, I was quite worried. I'm not sure I could explain how I contracted Spattergroit, but you had me going for a moment there."

Smeth really, really did not want to dwell on why his heart was suddenly lifted when she said that. He really didn't. Or why he happened to feel bashful when he was touching her during her checkup. For Merlin's sake, he had just ended a painful try at a very painful relationship, plus he had no caffeine or coffee, in addition to how stressed he was and how very glad that he now had an assistant. Phew. He knew there were logical reasons to this craziness, he just knew it. Although those logical reasons were very complicated, there were logical reasons nonetheless.

Wow, he had just repeated "logical reasons" more times than he could count.

He opened the door and motioned Rachel outside. His long legs crossed the brightly-lid corridor in a hurry, and he had to slow down so Rachel could catch up. Walking fast had became a habit as Healers were always rushing all over the place. "I'm usually work in Creature-Induced Injuries, but now they assigned me to take care of Spell Damage."

Rachel was going to have to grow longer legs if her job was to start shadowing Smeth-- the man moved fast. Re-adjusting her robe as they walked (quickly) down the corridor, she was amazed at how much there was to do here. It was pretty obvious that they were struggling to keep up with the demand for Healers, if they were switching around Healers and their specialties.

There was a lot to learn-- Rachel was going to have to make sure she was organized, thorough, and efficient--and learning to speed walk would probably help a lot. She'd have to make sure her stomach was pretty cast-iron, though, because some of the patients had pretty gruesome maladies that needed attention.

She couldn't deny that she felt very self-satisfied, knowing that this was a respectable job title she'd be holding and would her father be so pleased to see that his vapid darling daughter could do more than just employ her fashion skills. Of course, Rachel had come about the job in an unconventional way, but she was positive that didn't affect her ability to do it well. And who knew? Maybe she'd even pick up a few Healer tricks.

"I can't thank you enough for this, Smeth, I really can't," Rachel confessed somewhat sheepishly as the day winded down. "I'm not used to people taking chances on me like this, and I promise you you won't regret it."

It was funny that her heart kind of quickened when she said this, and there was no cold metal pressing against her chest.

Feeling exhausted and overwhelmed was not an unusual feeling for Healers, and Smeth was no stranger to exhausted and overwhelmed when it came to the end of a work day. However, he found that today had flew by relatively quickly with Rachel as his new assistant. Truth be told, he hadn't really interacted with Rachel in school, although she had been in his House. To be honest, he had been a bit intimidated by her, although they had spoken quite a few times and were on relatively friendly terms. She had just been so - pretty and haughty and one of those hoity-toity Pureblood girls that Slytherins usually threw themselves after. To be quite honest, he would have never pegged Rachel as the type to even come near a hospital unless she had to - but something about her enthusiasm in her journal comments last night made him take complete faith in her. And his confidence and faith in Rachel had pulled through.

They had spent a busy morning and afternoon checking up on patients. Rachel had stood to the side, taking furious notes as Smeth performed his Healery duties. They had time to relax during lunch and spent an enjoyable hour talking about funny stories during their Hogwarts days. Then it was back to running around the hospital - Smeth was careful this time about slowing down his pace, or at least until Rachel got used to it.

"It's really no problem," he said sincerely as they walked to the entrance. He took off his green robes, folding them over his arm. "I was just really glad to show you the robes, and you did a great job of picking up everything really quickly!" Rachel really did, after visiting one patient suffering from Scrofungulus, she had pointed out the symptoms in a new patient in the waiting room before he did. Smeth had been highly impressed. "I know I won't regret it. See you tomorrow, same time, same place?"

And for that, there was truly, truly no explanation for how giddy it made her when he said "same time, same place."

Truly, honestly, no explanation.

She knew, obviously, that this was not going to be the easiest job in the world. But she also knew that there was not much Smeth could have done to make her feel more at ease in her new job than she was already.

She was helping, she was being selfless, and she kind of liked it.

It was the Ravenclaw in her.

It had to be.

But that didn't change the fact that she was still grinning that stupid grin that had only gotten bigger with those last words.

"Tomorrow, same time, same place," Rachel repeated decisively, with a tilt of her head. "And looking more forward to it than you know, Healer Smethwyck!"