Nikki smiled excitedly. She had ordered a couple of the phoenix feather quills for her higher end customers and none of them had seemed as interested in them as she hoped. They were extremely rare which should have made them more popular, but most of her customers had their preferences. These quills apparently just weren't it. "Right this way," she said pleasantly, leading her to the small section in the back curtailed to the wealthier crowd where the quills were on display.

"Here you go. I ordered several thinking some of our customers would like the rare option, but most haven't seem interested," she stated. It was true. After testing the quill herself she would have bought one if it weren't so expensive. However, with having to pay her rent and eat, it wasn't really an option. Perhaps someday. "If there is anything else I can help you with, please let me know."

Quills weren’t exactly something that Harry would consider all that exciting of a birthday present, she knew, but she always got him more than one gift, regardless. Normally, she got him something that she thought was interesting, and then something that he thought was interesting as well. It worked out all right, and Hermione didn’t think that he would dislike a phoenix quill, at the very least. He could use it for his work, and it was incredibly nice quill, after all—assuming that she could even find one. It had been more difficult than she would have imagined it to be, though she supposed that it made sense that such a rare creature would not have many quills around, obviously. She knew that Dumbledore had had a phoenix feather quill, but obviously he had just gotten that from Fawkes. Since that was the only phoenix that Hermione had ever seen, it was obvious that she was having trouble finding such a quill.

But the smile on the woman’s face led her to believe that she might actually have been right to ask this time, and could be getting lucky in actually finding one. Then she would just have to determine a gift that Harry would actually certainly enjoy, which would more than likely have something to do with Quidditch. That was something that never failed, obviously. Her own smile widened as the woman directed her toward the quill, glad to hear that she had actually been successful in tracking these down. “That is rather odd,” she commented, thinking that any of the customers here that liked the more rare options would have gone for this type of quill in particular. Hermione examined the quill, finding that they were as exquisite as she had thought they would be, and that Harry certainly would potential appreciate this as a gift, though she would obviously still throw in something else to be sure. She picked up the quill, laughing slightly under her breath at how her purchase had expanded to the point that she could hardly even carry all of it at once and headed back over to the counter as the woman spoke again, “No, I think I’m all set now. Got what I came for and then some,” Hermione added, setting all of her purchases down. Somehow, coming here to get a new quill and ink for herself for work today had turned into that, plus new ink for Adaline, new quills for the boys, and a birthday present for Harry. Now she certainly would choose to head home before work in order to drop some of this off, if only to hope that it would give Liam and Deacon the incentive to do some of their schoolwork.

Ringing up the purchases, Nikki made sure to wrap each item and then bagged them. She had found over the years that the items, especially the inkwells traveled better bagged, even they were to be shrunk down to fit in a pocket. "Your total today will be 48 galleons and 5 sickles," she stated. She smiled. This was the only part of her job she disliked, though it was part of the job.

"Please come again soon, and I hope your paperwork goes well,," Nikki said with a smile, handing the woman her bag of purchases. They got a lot of repeat business, but she found adding personal touches always seemed to help. She just wished those personal touches worked better with her family. It was no secret they had issues, though she supposed she hadn't really been trying there. Maybe she should forgive her brother, attempt to make amends and have a relationship. That would go a long way to make her parents happy, but how could she forget the fact that he practically abandoned her during her childhood years. She had needed him then and he was long gone. Hell, he barely even took the time to write home.

No, forgiveness would not come easily. Turning back to her work she tried to clear her mind, focusing on sorting through the stock to see what to order.

She supposed it wasn’t exactly uncommon for her to walk into this particular shop and come out with more than she had originally anticipated. Hermione simply enjoyed writing supplies, finding it do be far more practical than shopping for clothing all of the time, even though that was a habit that she could at least tolerate at this point. She had definitely learned that first impressions were important and that clothing had something to do with that, and she had found it important to learn more about fashion, enough to dress well, she supposed. Just, in her mind, she did think that writing supplies like quills and new inks were far more interesting, particularly quills. Her daughter was more interested in the inks, and she knew that Adaline would definitely enjoy this new ink that she had purchased. Her sons would probably not appreciate the quills as much, though it still might be incentive enough to even glance at their schoolwork and the like, however unlikely that was. That would require them getting off of their brooms long enough to do just about anything and that was very unlikely. But of course, she had wanted to get them something as well. Hermione did hope that Harry would like the quill, but she knew that she’d get him a back-up gift as well.

Hermione passed over the funds that were required with a smile, knowing that it was quite a bit pricier than she had anticipated, but she knew that the gifts would be worth it, obviously. “I’ll certainly be back,” Hermione stated, her smile widening, since it was a shop that she definitely found herself in more often than not and she knew that Adaline would more than likely want more of this ink when it came back into stock. “That seems incredibly unlikely, but I’ll definitely try.” She added, with a laugh, knowing that paperwork was going to last nearly all day, but it was obviously something that she was used to so she wouldn’t complain. Once she took the bag back from the woman, she smiled once more, “Have a great day,” she said, politely, “and thank you for all of your help.” The woman had been incredibly helpful, after all, since Hermione’s purchase had gone from a few things for herself to something for everyone in her family, but she really didn’t expect anything less than that when coming into this shop. With that, Hermione headed to the door, knowing that heading home to drop this all off would certainly be another nice little stall before she couldn’t put off going to the Ministry any longer.

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