This is just a quick one-shot about Oliver Wood years after the Final Battle. I am personally a Oliver/Katie shipper, but I wanted something different for him here. And Christian Bell is a character who will appear in a longer work of mine.
Disclaimer: I am not J.K. Rowling, no matter how much I wish for her success. I did not create Oliver Wood, although Amelia and Christian Bell are my creations.
It wasn't the Firewhiskey that kept him coming back to The Witch's Tavern; despite his nightmares, he wasn't a drunk yet, and he didn't think he would be as long as he had Puddlemere and Amelia to keep him straight.
"Hey, Wood! Not a bad place to spend the night, eh?" Christian Bell pounded Oliver on the shoulder as he sat down, grinning jovially at the older Keeper. Bell was a young Chaser for the Tutshill Tornadoes and had recently gained acclaim when he subbed for an injured Jeremiah Nolan, quickly becoming the highest scorer on his team. Puddlemere's owner had regretted not signing Bell right out of Hogwarts.
"Not a bad place at all," Oliver answer, smiling slightly at Christian's enthusiasm. Puddlemere and Tutshill players mingled throughout the tavern; it was a popular hangout for the Quidditch crowd, being a short Apparition from the magically-protected stadium they all practiced in. "Did you fellows just get out? Captain Talbanney running you hard tonight?" He directed a lazy salute at Tutshill Beater Lacey Talbanney, who grinned back and raised her tankard of ale.
"She just wanted to make sure we knew all the weak points of Puddlemere's Keeper," Christian said casually, twirling his tankard of butterbeer. He glanced up at Oliver and grinned slightly. Bell had been a quiet, solemn youth when they had first met, but Oliver could tell that he was enjoying his newfound success.
"Ah, well," Wood said, playing along, "just make sure to shoot straight up the middle, then. I hear he hates that, eh?"
"You sitting alone for a reason? How long has that Firewhiskey gone untouched?"
Oliver glanced down in surprise. Bell was right; he hadn't touched this particular glass, although it was his second of the night. He must have been watching Amelia again. "No reason," he answered. "No reason to sulk, no reason to celebrate, so I was just enjoying a quiet moment." He held the glass out to Bell. "You want?"
"Nah," Bell shook his head. "Can't stand the stuff. I'll leave you and your quiet moment alone." He gave Oliver a playful bow and headed over to chat up Puddlemere's attractive female Seeker.
Oliver shook his head. Bell was being playful tonight, but even at his most solemn he felt young to Oliver Wood. Oliver hadn't felt young in years.
That's because you're almost thirty-two and you've nothing to show for it. The voice sounded a lot like Katie Bell, Christian's older cousin and Oliver's former teammate. Katie had always been a voice of reason when Wood couldn't think of anything but Quidditch.
The voice was right. Oliver had spent the last thirty years of his life focused almost solely on Quidditch, and as much as he loved the sport and wouldn't quit playing for anything, lately it hadn't felt like enough.
Maybe it had started when he attended Harry's wedding to Ginny Weasley. Oliver liked to play against Ginny; she was a challenge. Her shots were unpredictable with a wicked curve. The Harpies had been right to snatch her up. But the look on her face after a perfectly executed goal—elation and joy and pride—that was nothing compared to the look she wore on her wedding day, as she walked calmly up the aisle to a beaming Harry. Love did that to people, Oliver found. He wasn't sure what he thought of it, with regards to himself.
Oliver and Katie had stolen away for a quick tryst beneath the Quidditch bleachers after the Second Battle of Hogwarts, just to prove to themselves that they were still alive and that they had lives worth living. But since then Oliver had mostly kept to himself in the romance department. He found that the few times he had tried to date or the (very) few times he had attempted to bring a girl home for the night, the tabloid reporters had jumped all over the news and any relationship was effectively halted. Oliver decided that if he was going to fall in love, he was damn well going to make sure that it was worth the fuss.
The relationship with Katie had been short, fast, and comforting: a remembrance of school-day crushes. It was nice to wake up with someone next to you when the nightmares left you screaming, and Katie had felt the same way. Now she was engaged to Lee Young, and Oliver felt no jealousy that he could recognize. He liked Lee, and he knew Katie was happy. George and Angelina, another loving couple for Oliver to resent, had agreed to stand beside them at the wedding.
Oliver had received his invitation a few months ago; the wedding was next week. Katie had written a hasty postscript at the bottom: Bring a date, Oliver, won't you? And make sure it's not a Quaffle.
That stung a bit, although Wood knew it was just a joke that Katie had written to make him—and herself—laugh. Oliver knew that there were more important things than Quidditch—he'd known that even before the Battle of Hogwarts, when he had carried the dead with Neville Longbottom. He may not have known before the war, but he certainly knew during, when well-known Muggleborn Quidditch players went into hiding and one of Puddlemere's Beaters had been arrested for smuggling fugitives out of the country.
Remembering the glass in his hand, Oliver took a swig, reveling in the sting of Firewhiskey on his throat. It was another reminder that he was alive when so many were dead, although he didn't think he should still need such reminders after ten years. Ten years, he reminded himself, absentmindedly following Amelia with his eyes as she wiped down the bar. He shouldn't still see the dead in his dreams as if it were yesterday. He shouldn't have to carry Colin Creevey on his back every night.
But he did anyway.
The strange thing was that Oliver never saw Colin as he was that day, a scrawny sixth-year with fear in his eyes and a glowing wand in his hand. Instead, the Colin he carried in his dreams was Colin Creevey as he first knew him, a tiny second-year who followed Harry around with a camera and asked Oliver why they called it Quidditch and not Quaffling.
Oliver drained his glass. He wanted Colin to stay dead; he didn't need anymore waking nightmares.
"Another one?" Amelia leaned up against Oliver's table and wiped a curl out of her face. It was a busy night but the tavern was clearing out now that the patrons were Apparating back to their homes.
"Just a butterbeer," Oliver answered, handing her his empty glass. "Thanks, Amy." She nodded and headed towards the bar. He couldn't help but watch her go.
It was hard not to like Amelia. After joining Puddlemere, Oliver had learned that The Witch's Tavern was a regular team hangout. After games they retreated there to either celebrate or commiserate. A win meant that Amelia—who had been listening to the game on her radio—would have pitchers of ale and empty glasses ready for them, and she would spend the night teasing them and making sure that no one drank too much. For those who did, Amelia cooked up a mean Sobering Potion.
A loss meant that Amelia would have Firewhiskey and shot glasses ready; their favorite corner of the tavern was empty for them to sulk and ruminate over what had gone wrong. She neither avoided them nor tried to cheer them up. She was a delightfully unassuming character, perfectly suited to serve close-knit Quidditch teams.
They only attended the tavern as a team on game days, but many members came by individually during the week after practices. When not dealing with a touchy team in need of sympathy, Amelia drifted through the tavern with a pensive look on her face, her movements strong and practiced. She was of medium-height and strongly-built from balancing trays. Her lush brown hair was often pulled back into a loose bun, although today she had let it loose. Oliver found it distracting.
Amelia wasn't particularly pretty, he mused, studying her face. She had a strong jaw line, but many of her features were quite small. Not abnormally so, but it provided a contrast with her normal-sized nose. Her eyebrows were winged. Often, when speaking to one of her regular customers, the right eyebrow was raised in amusement.
Oliver loved that right eyebrow. He didn't know why.
"Here you go, Oliver," she said, handing him his butterbeer with an eyebrow raised. He wondered how long she had been standing beside him.
"Sorry—thanks, Amy."
"You're welcome." She cocked a smile at him and walked away, clearing empty glasses and pitchers as she went with a wave of her wand. The tavern was almost empty.
"Unobtrusive."
She stopped, turned. "Sorry?" That eyebrow was raised again.
Oliver froze. He hadn't meant to say that aloud. "Unobtrusive. That's—that's a good word for you. You—you're very quiet. It's—nice."
She smirked. "I'll try not to talk to you too much anymore, then, since you like it when I'm quiet." She started to turn again.
"I—that's not what I meant!" Oliver panicked. "I just meant—you always know what to do. When the team is here. And when we lose. You're—comforting. You never bother anyone."
A smile—he surprised her. "Why thank you, Oliver," she said, twisting the wet rag in her hands. She hesitated. "You—you're quite unobtrusive yourself. I never mind having you in my tavern." And suddenly overcome with embarrassment, she walked quickly back to the bar to rub furiously at a knothole in the wood.
He smiled. That could have gone worse.
He hadn't lied. Amy was a comforting presence. On nights like this, sometimes they would chat over the bar. They weren't close, but they were friends of a sort. She knew that he only liked Firewhiskey with the team or on nights when he was thinking hard and needed something to do with his hands. He knew that she never drank any of the alcohol she served, not even when the team begged her to join in on a round of shots.
She knew that he had an underdeveloped sense of humor, but that he was gradually learning to recognize a joke and play along. He knew that she liked to make ironic comments during conversations with drunk patrons, to see if they could catch on. Sometimes they did, often they didn't.
She knew that he missed Hogwarts like he missed the father he had lost at age five. He knew that the witch her tavern was named after was her grandmother, who had raised her while her parents traveled the world.
But that was it. That was all he knew, and he wanted to know more. He wanted to know about the picture she kept behind the bar; it didn't move, so he knew it was a Muggle photograph. He wanted to know how she had learned to stay so calm during bar fights, and when she had learned that adding peppermint to a Sobering Potion made it taste less like carbonated spinach. He wanted to know what her hair felt like against his hand.
It had taken him a while to figure it out, but there were more important things than Quidditch. Harry, Ginny, and Katie had figured it out. Even Christian Bell spent Sundays with his family (his two elder brothers were Quidditch correspondents for the Daily Prophet and the youngest was captain of the Gryffindor team at Hogwarts—it was a Quidditch-mad family).
Oliver wanted someone there with him when he woke up crying for Colin Creevey. He wasn't positive, but he thought he'd like to see if that someone could be Amelia. He stood up.
"Hey, I've got a crazy idea," he began. Amy looked up; she had been relaxing in a chair, pointing her wand at a broom as it swept the tavern floor. The room was emptied of other life.
"A crazy idea, Oliver?" she said, teasing him. "I didn't know you had it in you." Even her jokes were quiet and welcoming.
"I'll have you know that crazy ideas are my specialty," he smiled. "But this one is crazier than usual. See, I have this wedding to go to…"
Her right eyebrow went up.
"… and I kind of need a date. Do you think the tavern could get along without you for a night?"
She smiled at him, a new smile that he hadn't seen before. She had a dimple in her left cheek. He found that he liked that dimple almost as much as he liked her right eyebrow. "Are you asking me to be your date, or are you just asking about the tavern?"
He smirked, more confident than before. "Both."
"Ah, well, in that case, I suppose the tavern could get along without me for a night. I guess there's only one question left to ask."
"Oh, yeah? What's that?"
She smirked at him again. "Do you dance as well as you fly?"
Oliver froze. "No. Is that important?"