Author's Notes: this is yet another story about Oliver Wood and his relationship with the Gryffindor Quidditch team, Katie Bell in particular. Anyway, I don't necessarily consider it as part of my 'Rule Number Five' series. Here, Oliver is fifteen and Katie is only thirteen, so there is nothing romantic about their dealings, and he certainly doesn't have a crush on her. Anyway, I wrote it ages ago in italian as a chapter of the same story that prompted me to start writing the aforementioned series, so they ca be seen as part of the same 'universe'. This is not a perfect translation of the italian version, I made some small changes, but it is essentially the same.
Disclaimer: as always, not mine.
The consequences of shouting
I always thought the Weasley twins to have some serious impairment of hearing. Or a mental disorder, maybe.
It's not that I had any reason to be against them, of course. They were absolutely amazing beaters - obviously, since my entire team were simply wonderful; Harry, let's spend a couple of words about Harry! He was the most incredible seeker I've ever watched playing, which is something since my father, who is the perfect parent in my opinion, has brought me to watch Quidditch matches since I was two years old, so I can say I've watched a lot of very good players with my own eyes and yet, no one did such amazing things as that little boy I had on my team...wait, we were not supposed to be talking about Harry, were we? Right. The Weasley twins – and, as teammates, the were probably the closest thing I had to friends, back at Hogwarts. Not that I was unsocial or anything, of course – it's just that the only other Gryffindor boy of my year was the twins' older brother, Percy Weasley, who's not exactly my ideal of a good friend. He didn't even enjoy Quidditch! I mean, seriously?
Besides, my duty as Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch Team left me very little time to hang around with people wholly "unconnetted" to the team.
But they were extremely loud, nobody could deny as much. One would only hear them whispering when they were plotting some mischief or other, sitting in some relative dark corner, with their inseparable friend and partner in crime Lee Jordan.
Good boy, that Jordan. And a great Quidditch connoisseur, too. His commentaries during the matches were always impeccably technical. Of course there were those who said he was partial towards Gryffindor, but that was clearly untrue – Our team was simply way better than the others, it was only logical for him to praise our incommesurable skills, wasn't it?
The twins, I was saying.
For as long as I can remember, during practices, technical meetings, warm-up excercises, matches, or at lunch, in our Common Room, while walking around Hogsmeade, in the middle of the corridors or...well, everywhere and in any moment whatsoever, the two of them seemed to always be looking for the best way for their voices to be heard even from Mars.
I remember one day when the former Captain of our team, Charlie (who also happens to be one of their countless brothers), had to stupefy them both in order to obtain bit of calm. He didn't succed, of course. George hit his head against one of the benches of the locker room and ended up in the hospital wing, covered in blood and followed by an apparently heart-broken Fred, who cried and shrieked all the way from the Quidditch pitch, and pretended to tear his hair out of desperation ("if it weren't so silky shining I would tear it away for real!"). The next day, Charlie received an howler from mrs. Weasley, who had been immediately informed of the accident by 'dear Percy'. It was then that I realized how the twins' ability to reach such decibels was of maternal heritage.
As for me, I always ended up voiceless before important matches, for the only way to make it possible for the rest of the team to hear me was to scream louder than they did – or to surpass the bangs, the thumps, the whines that always came from somewhere very close to the bench where Fred and George were seated.
I didn't even try to make them shut up using magic – after George's Bench Accident, they had become incredibly good to fend off any such attempt, at least from the captain on whom they always kept a close eye.
Another thing that irritated me immensely (and against which my screaming had no results at all) was that they always tried to entertain some other player with their whatever-it-was-they-did. And they managed to succeded every time, if not to obtain their victim's attention, at least to divert it from what I was saying.
It all started with Angelina Johnson. She was a classmate of the twins, so they were in each other confidence, at least enough to make her life a real hell since her first day on the team.
Angie was an incredibly serious and attentive girl, other than being an amazing chaser (the best one, at least during Charlie's days as a captain). She diligently followed every passage, every explanation, she always made very reasonable remarks and during matches she was always able to do exactly what she had been told to do while practising. But, according to Fred and George, it was unthinkable that anyone should be interested in what the captain had to say. So, they started their personal crusade to, as the put it, "save Angelina's sanity". They wrote her notes, sang her songs, improvised weird dances, commented on Charlie's every move, did impressions of Professor Sprite (and very good they were, I must admit it. George had a real talent for it), asked her to chose the next Slytherin they would hung upside down in the Great Hall and so on.
Unfortunately for them, Angelina was too serious a person to let them toy with her in such a way. And, most of all, she could be violent, if she wanted to. After having repeated, with reversed roles, the infirmary scene (George didn't tear his hair out, but carried a bucket with him "in order not to inondate the corridors with tears"), the twins decided it would have been funnier – and safer – to dedicate themselves to Alicia.
Alicia too was in their same year, and during the previous months she had always interceded with Angelina on their behalf, begging her not to send them both to the San Mungo every time they took a seat next to her during practice.
Obviously, she didn't even try to resist the twins. As soon as they started talking to her, she turned her back on me whispering (at least she was able to speak in a low voice).
Unluckly for Fred and George, though, things didn't go too well with Alicia either. Being the most polemic person I have ever met, as soon as I said even a single word she didn't like she jumped up from her seat and started yelling at me, calling me a psychotic dictator, instantly forgetting whatever it was the twins were speaking of. As a consequence of her behaviour, since turning their attention to Alicia, Fred and George had started plotting way less than they did before, which of course prompted them to find a new ally. They didn't even consider Harry – for all that he was probably the best player in our team, he had a marked tendency to sit still and dazed during our meetings which rendered him unsuitable for the twins' purposes.
The only choice left was Katie, obviously. And, just as obvious, she was all to happy to comply.
Good Merlin, not to say that she wasn't a good player, quite the contrary. She had always been extremely focused and rigorous during both practices and matches. A coup of months of good work, and she would have become a better chaser then Angelina herself and, consequently, the best in the entire school, it was plain to all who knew something of Quidditch. Unfortunately, though, she had a tendency to laugh coarsely after every word pronounced by one of the freckled members of the team. I saw her sitting next to them during lunch and dinner, bringing with her a handful of classmates who looked at the beaters with ridiculously dreaming eyes. And before a match the Weasleys escorted her around the castle to prevent the Slytherins for trying and send her to an early grave.
So, when Fred and George started seating next to her during my pre-match and post-practice discourses, I lost Katie. In fact, she became the unofficial third Weasley twi (for her birthday they gave her a ginger wig as a gift, and she showed up to the next practice wearing it, and with her face covered in hand-painted freckles).
Unlike Alicia, Katie really couldn't lower her voice. She was even able to spend more than two hours with her neck unnaturally twisted toward Fred and George, speaking about dungbombs, shrieking shacks and the colour of Snape's pants – when they weren't talking about a certain "dictator with his broom up his backside", who apparently spoke with a pronounced scottish accent and loved to fix practice sessions at four o'clock in the morning.
All right, I admit it, it was not Katie who used to say that. But she found it incredibly funny, going by the half hour-long fit of laughter that possessed her every single tim she heard this description.
The thing, with Katie, was that I couldn't tell her off as I did the others. I could rebuke her, ask her not to raise her voice, but I wasn't able to threaten to kill her as I did Fred and George, for example. She and Harry were kids, I couldn't look at them the same way I looked at the others in the team. She was only thirteen, and so tiny, with her deer eyes and that snub nose of hers, she managed to look even younger that she actually was.
That's why I couldn't do anything other than accept the situation. Besides, Katie played tremendously well even without hearing a word of what I said, right?
WRONG.
Katie didn't play well at all, when she ignored me. Rather, she tried to get killed, when she didn't listen to me.
Holy Merlin!
I was in the hospital wing, looking at an unconscious Katie Bell wearing a big bandage over her head, and clenched my right hand around my knee, trying to tear it away from my leg in an effort to release my anger.
Foolish stupid silly thoughtless rude superficial little girl. So it's more important to laugh at Fred's and Jordan's stupid jokes than listen to me telling you to duck your head, is it? Besides, what reason do I have to even be in the field, right? Why am I even part of the team? I'm completely useless, am I not? If there were a dummy in my place, I bet ten galleons my adorable teammates would give it more attention than they give me.
During our match against Slytherin (filthy, disgusting bastards, unable to play withouth cheating!), Lee Jordan had delighted the audience with some stupid joke about Flint's teeth, that apparently had something to do with a discussion he had previously had with Fred Weasley, most probably while the latter should have being practising. Meanwhile Katie Bell, being Katie Bell, was doubled up with laughter, in precarious equilibrium on her broom.
For Merlin's sake, you KNOW one of Slytherin players favourite hobby is trying to kill Katie Bell, why in Morgana's name can't you be more careful?
Of course, she just CANNOT be careful, and manages to get hit by a bludger right on the head, in spite of my efforts to gain her attention.
Slowly, Katie opened her eyes, keeping them fixed on the ceiling.
"Bell" I said, coldly. She turned her unfocused gaze on me.
"Wood" she replied, with unsteady voice.
"Glad to see you're still alive."
"It appears so. What happened?"
"You thought it a good idea to entertain the entire school by doing acrobatics, Bell." It was quite obvious Katie had no idea of what I was talking about.
"You weren't paying attention to the game because of that idiotic Weasley and you got hit by a bludger."
"Oh."
"Yeah."
"It's not the Weasleys' fault, though. I've been stupid."
"Of course it's their fault, they should concentrate on the game instead of on insulting the Slytherins, but it's your fault, too. You've entered the team a couple of months ago and you already consider yourself so good to be able to play without listening to your captain?"
"I'm sorry, Oliver, I didn't mean to..."
"No one ever means to do anything, is that not so, Bell? I told you a thousand times to duck up but no, you were too occupied laughing."
"I didn't hear you, there was a lot of noise, I'm so sorry..."
"Of course you're sorry, you almost DIED because of your reckless actions."
"Oliver, I'm sorry because I didn't do what you wanted me to, not because I was hit..."
"Oh, so you're NOT sorry you've been hit by a budger? You're not sorry for leaving your team short of a player in such an important match?"
"OF COURSE I'm sorry I've been hit, but because I almost died, not for leaving the team without a player! Besides, Oliver, you think every match is the most important in the tournament."
"That's because every match is the most important, always! And, because of you, we could have lost today!"
"You're right, and I suppose that, as soon as I'll be able to leave this bed, you shall send me back to it after giving me some cruel punishment worthy of Filch."
"You're spending way too much time with those criminals that are the Weasley twins, Bell."
"Oh, shut up, Oliver! The only important thing is that we won the match, is it not?"
"How can you know we won?"
"Because if we hadn't, you wouldn't be here, but rather trying to drawn yourself in the shower. Besides, you said as much."
"Did I?"
"You said, we could have lost"
"When did I said so?"
"While yelling at me."
"With those friends of yours, you dare speak to me of yelling, Bell?"
She moved to unswer, but was prevented by a fuming Madam Pomfrey. "MISTER WOOD! Stop shouting like a mad man and leave immediately, miss Bell needs rest! It doesn't take half an hour to leave a box of chocolate frogs on a nightstand!"
Katie shot me a questioning glance. "Chocolate frogs?"
I didn't answer, occupied as I was apologising to Madam Pomfrey.
She then sit up, grimacing a little, and took from the nightstand a little box of chocolate frogs (well, little if compared with the amount of stuff brought by the Weasley twins – when I bought it it looked a perfectly acceptable size).
The nurse threw me out of the room, but before she could close the door I could hear the feeble 'Thank you' from Katie.
Then she WAS able to speak in a low voice. I would like to know why the hell she never took the trouble of doing so.
AN:I hope you liked it :) I certainly enjoyed writing it first, and then translating and modifying it. I love the Gryffindor team, and I never find enough stories about them, so wanted to contribute with something of my own.
As always, I'm not an English-speaker, so please help me pointing out my mistakes! Happy new year to all of you!
Ly