+THIS STORY WAS PREVIOUSLY DELETED BY ACCIDENT!! I'M SO SORRY TO THOSE WHO HAVE REVIEWED AND HAVE LISTED ME IN THEIR FAVORITES AND ALERTS!! (I THANK YOU, BTW, ALL OF YOU C: )+

Title: A Love Story: A Lesson in Muggle Studies and a Quidditch Romance

Summary: Marcus/Oliver. What started as a great semi-secret relationship between the two turns into something neither of them ever thought possible. Mpreg.

Pairings: Marcus/Oliver, Terrence/Becca (OFC), Adrian/Darla (OFC), mentions of Harry/Draco

Warnings: Mpreg, slash, cousin incest (Adrian/Darla), cursing

Rating: R

A/N: please note that I have not read the last two books, and I don't really plan to. I sort of fell out the potter carriage a while ago and it was only just recently that I've been bitten by the Marcus/Oliver firebug yet again c: I guess you could say this is slightly AU as I'm not keeping everything in canon and am not keeping the characters very IC (but then again, how can you tell? They don't get much exposure on the Potter world unfortunately. Or I guess fortunately, because that makes it easier to shape them into whatever story line we want :D)

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter and the characters, and no money is being made with this, but this story is mine.

1: The Quidditch Match

It was pouring all over the pitch. The sky was darker than Lord Voldemort's heart and the players were little more than flying buckets of water, leaking as much as the rain clouds overhead. There were giant enchanted torches all about the perimeter of the pitch, providing light but ignoring the rain and winds and never harmful to the touch. The ever-present lightning, however, seemed to provide much more luminance over the game than the firelight, flashing like paparazzi over the latest celebrity scandal.

Today's match was Slytherin against Hufflepuff and in all his five years at Hogwarts Oliver never saw Hufflepuff lose so badly. Marcus Flint, the Slytherin team Captain, star Chaser, and Oliver's own rival, shot a goal past the frazzled-looking Hufflepuff keeper. For a moment, he felt a little bad for her, but in Quidditch there is no room for sympathy.

"Another ten points to Slytherin!! That makes the score 360-nothing! Hufflepuff better get a move on, or not even the Golden Snitch could save them now!!"

The game was nearing its fourth hour and neither team Seeker has been able to come close to catching the Snitch, the ball that, with a 150-point prize, would usually mean victory. If within the hour no one catches the Snitch, Cedric Diggory, Hufflepuff team Captain and Seeker, will ask for Marcus's consent on ending the game, because at this point, any beginning determination to win the game has left.

"AND THE SNITCH IS CAUGHT!! TERRENCE HIGGS MAKES A BRILLIANT CATCH JUST AFTER ADRIAN PUCEY SCORES SLYTHERIN'S 370TH POINT, MAKING THE TOTAL SCORE 520 TO NOTHING! CONGRATULATIONS SLYTHERIN ON A JOB WELL DONE!!"

The stands erupted with noise as everyone stood up to cheer for Slytherin; Gryffindor, Ravenclaw, and the winning team's house (and whether it was out of relief for the game ending or genuine praise is anyone's guess). Oliver himself was clapping and yelling, because even though Gryffindor and Slytherin hold a slight animosity towards each other in just about anything anyone can think of, a game well played is a game well played. Since the match was in their favor, Slytherin had even kept cheating down to a bare minimum.

The Hufflepuff stands were especially quiet, and all around Oliver, the students evacuated the stands to get out of the storm and head quickly to dinner, but he was in no hurry to go just yet. Dinner was only served once you sat down, so there was no threat of a cold meal, and he was no stranger to being outside in inclement weather. He was, after all, the Gryffindor Quidditch team Captain--if he could not stand to play in this kind of weather, then there was no hope for him in the future. He watched as 14 players flew to the ground and dismounted, the Hufflepuffs a lot less ecstatic than the Slytherins. Cedric himself was looking a lot more burned about the loss than his teammates. Oliver knew that if he ever experienced such a staggering defeat he would just die. 'Or perhaps cry, depending on the opponent and the fairness of the match.'

Moving his attention from the losers to the victors, he noticed the lot of them taking their time towards the Slytherin locker rooms despite the dangerously near lightning, the deafening thunder, the crushing winds, and the freezing rain. They were prancing about, whooping and hollering and wrestling, making a general fool of themselves as they celebrated the only way winners knew how. It brought a smile to Oliver's face, imagining how good it must feel to win 520/nothing in a Quidditch game. He watched as Marcus, Adrian, and Terrence ran around, the loudest of the group and the last to enter the changing rooms.

Sitting there in the rain and lightning, he reflected on his relationship with the Slytherin Captain. They have been playing for their respective teams for equal amounts of years, Oliver since his third year and Marcus since his fourth. People assumed their rivalry had started as soon as they acknowledged the other's existence, but that was not exactly the case. Oliver, not wanting to be another Gryffindor cliché, had wanted to befriend people from all sorts of houses, including Slytherin. When he tried to approach Marcus a few days before their first game with a warm smile, an outstretched hand and a wish for good luck, he met a semi-confused and semi-disgusted stare, before Marcus spoke. "Come Friday, our house is gonna crush your little team to bits before you can even say Albus Dumbledore sucks on pregnant pigeons so you can just keep your filthy little 'good lucks' all to your damn self, we don't need them." He dislodged himself from his lean against the shady tree Oliver found him on and walked away without as much as a backwards glance. Spurned, Oliver too walked away and spent the day beating himself up for such foolish hopefulness. How dare he think that he could befriend a Quidditch player from a different house? 'Silly me.' he thought, angry with himself and hating how sensitive he was being.

After that, Oliver started to get things a little more and stopped trying to find excuses as to why he did not like or could not agree with a Slytherin other than the simple fact that they were Slytherin. Being from different years--and therefore having different schedules--Marcus and Oliver hardly ever saw each other when off the pitch. When they did, they argued heatedly when one's taunts got a little too competitive and fresh for the other's liking, and have only once ever been in a near-brawl. That incident was on the pitch, when they were arguing whether a penalty awarded to the Slytherin team was fair or not.

He did not realize how long he's been sitting out there contemplating his and Marcus's rivalry until a particularly severe bolt of lightning struck the corner of the seat-box he was seated in, and Oliver decided now was a good a time as any to start heading back to the Great Hall to eat dinner. His friends were probably wondering what he was up to anyway.

"Where ya been, mate?!"

"We were wondering if you hadn't drowned on your way to the Great Hall or something!"

"Are you alright?"

Fred and George's alternating questions and statements were something Oliver had quickly gotten used to when he first met them their first year.

"Sorry 'bout that. I'm fine, really. I just wanted to do a little last-minute watercharms practice before the teams came out. Our final exams for the year are coming up, and I honestly don't know if I'll do well this time around." Oliver tried to reassure them, but he could not tell if his fib was working or not.

"Aw, you'll do fine, mate. Don't sweat it!" George said, and Fred clapped him on the back.

Two weeks later, everyone was saying goodbyes and promises, boarding the Hogwarts Express to leave the school and head back home. Already Oliver was anticipating the next time he could mount his broom to fly around and practice his game. For now, though, it was all he could do to talk to his roommates and teammates and classmates about anything and everything they could possibly think of.