The first time Florean Fortescue met Severus Snape, he was mid-charm, putting the finishing touches on his latest creation. The bell at the door of his shop tinkled its merry tune to tell the proprietor of Fortescue’s Ice Cream Parlour someone had entered the premises.

“Be with you in a tick!” he called from the small but tidy back room he only half-jokingly referred to as his “lab”.

With a sigh and a longing glance at the creamy concoction simmering contentedly away in the cauldron, he stowed his wand and cast a hurried Stasis Charm on his work, wiping his hands on the nearest of the many Magi-Kleen-n-Dri sterilising towels strewn about the room. As he quickly changed into a fresh apron, he told himself for the hundredth time that he’d have to bite the Bubotuber and hire a year-round assistant for the shop, even though the winter custom usually dropped to less than half its summer volume. He could afford it now, and he wouldn’t have to interrupt his experiments to wait on customers, although he enjoyed that almost as much as coming up with new experiences for them to try.

When he stepped through the door to the shop proper, he was greeted by the welcome sight of Minerva McGonagall.

She was accompanied by a tall, thin man Florean had never met but whom he recognised at once from the photos that had littered the pages of the Prophet almost ten years ago.

This living reminder of the dark times made the familiar mixture of anxiety and grief well up in Florean, but it was matched, and eventually overcome, by his habitual curiosity about people and their appetites. He wondered what this new visitor hungered for.

The man needed feeding up, without question, but more than that, Florean thought, he needed cheering up.

And no simple Cheering Charm, either.