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If she entered his establishment one more time, and tried to flirt with him one more time, he swore he was going to pitch her out the door into the manure pile. Every single day since his brother's death, that woman came to his pub, already tipsy from that blasted sherry she preferred to drink with her "tea readings", and flirted with him. Every single day, she would sit at his bar, and mope, and whine, and flirt in a rather repulsive hero-worship manner, and get royally pissed on firewhiskey.
Then came the rants. Merlin, if the woman ever came to her meager senses and realized she wasn't a bloody Seer, or even a passably believable quack when it came to Divination, she could probably go into business as a Howler. No need to gain a sore throat by yelling into the bespelled letter. Just hire Sibyll Trelawney to put the situation to voice, and be done with it!
But lately it seemed that there was a new addition to her usual repertoire of weepy hysterics, and it came in the form of a four-legged creature. No, not his goat, though privately he wondered if she'd try to make a pass at his pet when she failed to turn Aberforth into his brother's replacement. The silly wench never realized that her former "lover" had been gay. One chance meeting-turned-shagging when they were both absolutely smashed was not enough to constitute a relationship, but woe betide him if he reminded her of the fact.
No. Now, courtesy of a certain centaur who shared her Divination teaching duties, he could count on her coming to his pub not only tipsy, but angry, and usually ready and willing to yell her foolish head off.
And it was all because the creature told her, rather flatly, every single day, that she hadn't a chance in the world with Aberforth...because he was in love with someone else. And that particular someone, Firenze had jested, just so happened to be Firenze.
If Aberforth hadn't heard the story from Firenze himself the day before, he never would have believed it, thinking that Sibyll was reaching the point of desperation where she would resort to reverse jealousy or some nonsense like that. It wouldn't be the first time he would have heard of a woman trying some crackpot stunt like that, nor, he suspected, would it be the last.
All the same, it had been worth every odd look in his pub that night to hear Firenze recount the arguments, the pair of them laughing so hard by the end of the tale that Aberforth was surprised none of his patrons owled St. Mungo's. The centaur, he decided, was all right for someone who liked his brother enough to work for him.
WHAM! The door to his pub slammed open then shut, admitting the very person he didn't want to see.
"I CAN'T BELIEVE THAT CREATURE'S NERVE!"
Aberforth sighed, reaching below the bar for a bottle of firewhiskey. Here we go again...