Now for the OTHER gifts.

THIS one is for Lady-Arre

"Do you realize how obnoxious you are?" 16 year old Katie Bell asked her captain as they traveled in the hazardously cold, whipping wind back towards the castle from the pitch. "Seriously Oliver, consider that your Christmas gift."

"So you really didn't get me anything then?" the seventh year asked, the wind sending is brown wavy hair dancing in front of his equally brown eyes, a smile crossing his jaw.

"Really."

"I don't believe it," he stated simply, his speech thickly embedded in his accent, "you enjoy giving gifts far too much to neglect me."

Katherine Ann Bell rolled her eyes, shrugging her shoulders close to her ears and resetting the broom on her shoulders, far too irked to respond. It was Christmas Eve after all, and at her captains demand—which was masquerading as a request—she trudged out into the dark, towards the pitch, simply to have a catch, simply so he had something to do. Meanwhile she knew perfectly well that he still had a mountain of gifts to wrap and ship out.

Oliver Wood was a procrastinator who abused Quidditch and his team to fit his whiles rather than complete the necessaries. And she was always the prime victim of his whiles. Why, she did not know, when was a given—nearly always. And that was why she was trumping back up to the castle, previously fallen snow reaching nearly her knees and wind punishing her with whips of her own hair. She found it ironic that she was being chastised from the weather she had spent the past two hours in, duly entertaining her obsessed captain.

After what seemed like a far greater span of time than it was, they finally reached the main entrance way of the castle. Katie waited almost impatiently for Oliver to push the large oak doors open as the wind continued to harass her already shivering frame.

"So why didn't you head home for Christmas?" her captain asked her for the third time that day alone.

"My parents decided to head out on vacation and the Weasley's are visiting extended family," she sighed, thinking of how Christmas at the Burrow possibly would've been the nest thing all year, "ergo, here I am."

"With me," he smiled, trying to put an up spin to her dreary explanation with a warm smile.

"With you," she shot him down with a cold tone.

"You don't have to seem so dismal about it."

"I just went on an excursion to the pitch—because you asked me to—in the freezing cold," she said bluntly as they traveled up the first flight of stairs to the common room, "I'm sorry I'm a tad put off."

He slung his free arm around her shoulders, "Your excused."

She shrugged him off, "You're not," she muttered, ignoring his mock pout.

As much as she hated to admit it, Oliver Wood knew her far too well. He recognized her stubborn tendencies, knew how to quell them. Caught the steely gazes in her bright green eyes and softened them. Survived her angry outburst and made her laugh. Found the masked sadness and lent her a shoulder. Realized her pangs and lessened them.

And though his own tendencies and habits could drive her to the brink of despair, he made up for it. Sometimes unfortunately in her eyes, sometimes she wanted to stay forever mad at him, but he never let her. That was almost just as aggravating.

As they reached the third floor she was still pushing upturned snow out of her gold-blonde hair and off her shoulders. Oliver looked at her with a sidelong glance and a sweet smile from her left before turning his eyes back down the corridor. She let out a mental sigh, her previous anger now dissipated, shifting her broom to her right shoulder, she reached over and brushed the snow off his shoulders. Her hand traveled towards the top of his head, sending the left over precipitation to the marble floor, tugging on his ear as her hand fell back down to her side. He looked back to her, his large brown eyes posing a question.

"I hate you," she answered simply.

"Lies," he scoffed with a smile, stopping before heading into the next corridor, "You wouldn't be able to live without me."

"Perhaps," she said coyly, stopping as well, "But without your practices my life expectancy would increase by at least ten years."

"Is that so?" he laughed, pulling his broom off his shoulder and leaning forward on it in what Katie would label as an 'oh so cool' fashion. She mimicked his stance. "I dare say you would be wrong. I'm making you a healthier person Bell."

"Ever hear the expression 'too much of good thing..'?"

"I thought you hated clichés?" he leaned forward farther.

"Oh but I do," she mirrored him again.

"Then why use one as a crutch of your argument?"

"Because then you wouldn't think I didn't see the one above us," her eyes widening with the joy of defeat, his not needing to look up to where he knew perfectly well mistletoe was hanging. "Fred told me his plan to plague the castle with them before he left."

"I hate you," he muttered darkly, staying stationary as she practically skipped down the corridor, broom sluing back up on her shoulder.

She stopped and looked back at him, his best pathetic stance performed in perfect form. Bambi eyes, slumped shoulder, lowered head, bad posture, the full nine yards. She rolled her eyes exasperatedly before strolling back to him, wishing his big brown eyes weren't bearing into her so sharply.

"No you don't," she stated simply yet softly.

"I know," he muttered, standing straight again, the act gone but the sentiment still true, "And I wish I could hate you for it sometimes," he added before continuing down the same marble hall she had just retraced.

The chaser stood where she was for a moment, she glanced up at the cliché above her, scowled at it before catching up to him.

"I know what you mean," she said once in stride with him on his left. His eyes posed the question once again. "Sometimes I would love nothing more than to hate you," he looked almost mildly shocked, "and sometimes I'm close," she continued, "but normally that's only right after practice, when me and Fred are just straight complaining, comparing who has the worst bruises of the day. And I really hate you then," she smiled as she looked down at her shoes, "but then you have to come in all beaming and proud that we got so much accomplished before dawn and you clap everyone on the shoulder. And that makes mine hurt even more and I want snap at you for it, but I can't."

She took a quick glance at him, felt her cheeks flush as she turned her eyes back to the ground, still seeing his bear into her with their usual shining light. Feeling him stop once they reached the end of the corridor rather than see him stop, she stopped as well. But it was a delayed stop, leaving her five feet in front of him.

Turning back to her captain he was, once again, just looking at her. Not blankly however, just so full—of what she wasn't sure—that they looked empty.

"That's not helping you know," she sighed, shaking her head a bit and slumping her shoulders. "It's not fair that I blurt all that out and you just look at me." She folded her arms in response to his continued silence, "You're making it that much easier to hate you."

He looked down at his shoes with a "hmm" of a chuckle before taking three, long and easy strides over to her. Just to look down at her.

"I hate you," she glared at him.

He gave her another small laugh before gingerly brushing his lips over hers.

"Got you twice," he smiled quite gleefully mischievously, not unlike Fred.

"What are you talking about?" she called after him as he started up the flight of stairs, grabbing his outreached hand and catching the stairs right before they shifted.

"Well you clearly don't hate me," he stated, pulling the gloves off his hands and shoving them in his pocket before doing the same with hers. "And I caught you in a cliché." He watched his chaser tilt her head to the right, saw the confusion in her eyes underneath her gold bangs, "look."

And she did so duly, following the trail his eyes lead her to.

She groaned when she saw the mistletoe, hating him ever so slightly until she felt his fingers laced with hers. Then she couldn't have even if it was her single wish.

MERRY CHRISTMAS ARRE!!

I know you (along with several other badgering readers) have been pining for oliver. So there, I give you oliver. And look what you made me go and do, I like him all over again. Not such a bad thing, but hey, why not? Hahaha. Now for the mushy, warm, sentimental part of this note.

I'm starting to think you know me better than my friends who belong to my corner of the world. Lemme tell you, its something crazy. I was in my room today and i found a print out of my birthday present that you wrote me. And so I read it for what must be like the 20th time, and I read my pen marks all over it and everything. And on every page I had written at least two times 'you know me way too well' or YKMW2W for sort. and its completely, utterly true. I really have no idea what I would do without your daily emails aka the one im prone to reply late to. I truly would be lost. I tell you everything that bothers me and everything that makes me smile and everything that just gets me mad. And you make me feel better about everything im upset with, make the good seem great, and take the red out of my vision. And try to explain the way of the aussies like thirty times because I cant grasp it. And listen to my rants of basically nothingness. You're an amazing author, rantee, and above all friend.

lots o love and happy new year too everyone!