Chapter One
Oliver Wood flopped onto his bed, broomstick still in hand. Although his body was on the soft furnishings of his Hogwarts bed his mind was still out on the Quidditch field on what he felt was a particularly bad training session.
Fred and Geroge Weasley dominated the entire session but not in a good way. Their sprits were extremely high which normally he found a good thing but there was a time and a place for everything and it was not his pitch. First they had bewitched the bludges to hit him straight in the stomach each time they hit it, no matter their location, then they hexed the snitch so that whenever Harry got near it, it would hover for a second and then disappear entirely. Everyone else found this amusing but not Oliver. They were a week away from their first match against Ravenclaw and he could not, would not let Cedric win, this was his year he could feel it.
The noises downstairs signalled that the rest of the team had arrived back in the Gryffindor common room and hoped that they had some sense to keep out of his way. Sure he had a reputation for being tough on his team but it was only because he knew that they were capable of so much more than they put out, surely that was not a bad thing.
Sighing Oliver let his broom ease down onto the bed as he gave a massive stretch, his legs touching the bottom of the bed. Footsteps on the stairs indicated that someone was headed his way, however he was wrong as the door was thrown open and two ginger heads appeared.
"Aww come on Oliver its not that bad" joked George with a smile as he eyed up Oliver tense and stretching himself on the bed"
"We were only trying to make light of the situation as you had everyone so tightly wound up that they were dreading practice" pipped up Fred his counterpart.
Sighing Oliver propped himself up on his pillows and fixed them both with his patented glare "So you thought it would be best that you disrupt the entire practice instead of telling me this before"
Fred snorted at this "Yeah coz you would listen to us" a slight smile played on Olivers lips at this comment. "Ok so you have point there, but try it again and your running laps of the entire pitch"
Settling back on his bed Oliver closed his eyes hoping that they would get the point and leave him alone, which it seemed they had by dumping the Quidditch gear and heading back out the door, but not before trying to coax him to come down.
"Come on Woody, we're going to get Peeves in some trouble that should cheer you up" said George mischeivously
"Perhaps another time" murmered Oliver without opening his eyes.
Shurgging to themselves the twins recognised a lost cause when they saw one and headed back down to the common room.
Oliver knew that they would never understand why he was the way he was when it came to Quidditch, no one at Hogwarts knew about his father and the way he was raised. His mind drifted back to his early childhood, to the time when he was taught the importance of Quidditch but never knew that it would become his sole obsession in life.