A.N. - There's a prequel one-shot to this multi-fic that I wrote on my profile called 'An Aerial Approach'.
As it stands this is un-Beta'd, if you're interested in betaing this story, please let me know.
I own very little, I'm well into my overdraft and, unlike Robert Galbraith, I'm not JK Rowling who owns the characters and settings that I play with here.
Hermione Granger
There was an owl on my desk. Originally, I'd told myself that if I ignored the owl then said owl would go away and leave me to merrily continue with my work. Merrily may have been an exaggeration, of course, but the sentiment remained: I did not want to read this post. Firstly, I had a large enough pile of letter, papers and reports to trudge through without adding another to the list, but that was the easy excuse; the real reason I was avoiding eye contact with the owl that was eyeing me with contempt was because I recognised it as Molly Weasley's owl. With Molly Weasley's owl came another invitation. Another invitation to Sunday lunch, Sunday lunch with Ron and his family, admittedly they were my family too, and I loved them dearly, but Molly was relentless with her attempts to mend the rift between myself and Ron. Molly believed that the pair of us were a match written in the stars, as sickening as it sounds, and no amount of protesting from either of us held much sway over her fantasies.
When the owl begun to peck and scrape at my sleeve, the vicious little thing, I yielded to its attack, taking the envelope and trying to discard it into the precariously overflowing inbox; the owl remained, pointedly looking between the inbox and myself, the stiff implication in its stature telling me it knew the game I was playing and that it could wait me out as it required a reply even if I didn't want to give it.
Hermione,
We look forward to seeing you on Thursday evening, I do hope you've not forgotten, you're awfully busy nowadays. You work too hard, dear.
We're sitting down around 8, after everyone has got in from work; Percy insists he can't get there a minute before and that we're not to start the celebrations without him. He's bringing Audrey, so if you get the chance to talk to Ronald or the twins, do tell them to be on their best behaviour.
Molly.
"Oh, Merlin," I swore under my breath, earning another glare from the self-righteous owl.
Molly Weasley's birthday, how had I forgotten? The owl hooted, dropping more hints, and I turned back to it settled next to my inbox. Ah, the inbox. That's how I'd forgotten. At first glance my wire tray with precariously balanced papers didn't look over full, sure you'd assume it'd take a few hours to hit bottom but you wouldn't think there was too much there, not enough to swamp me; but then at first glance you wouldn't notice the expanding charm either.
I hastily wrote a reply to Molly, assuring her that I hadn't forgotten (although I had) and that I would certainly pass on her messages to Ron and the twins if I saw them (which I most likely wouldn't); the twins hardly left the shop nowadays and when they did it was to go to their homes with Angelina and Katie. Angelina Weasley née Johnson had relented and married Fred four months earlier, one of the things that Fred had promised her was a home separate from George, an idea that, after 5 years of sharing a bathroom with her husband's twin was quite a selling point; unbeknownst to her, her husband and his twin had each bought a semi-detached house and it wasn't unusual for her to wake up in the night to hear Morse code being tapped from one side of their bedroom wall to George and Katie's conjoining one. Katie and George was a more recently development but still one with promise, the pair had rekindled the hints of romance from Hogwarts at Angelina's birthday two years ago and had moved in with George when they'd relocated from the flat above the shop.
The owl left, but not before knocking over as many papers as it could, cheeky sod, sending my inbox pile flying and leaving me on my hands and knees cleaning up the devastation. The excessive amount of parchment related to my work as a trainee solicitor in magical law, a field I both relished and regretted simultaneously. While my work interested me to no end, I genuinely loved the subject matter and truly believed that I could have a positive impact on the magical community I was still just a trainee and, as one of the most experienced and meticulous trainees at the practice, I was in constant demand. This demand had, somehow, increased over the past six months, the breakup with Ron freeing up my spare time and reducing me to a paperwork machine. I'd soon learnt, after leaving Hogwarts, that being the 'Brightest Witch of her age' was a double edged sword.
Oliver Wood
It was amazing how well sound carried through the Puddlemere stadium, truly amazing. Noteworthy too, if there was anything that I'd take from today it was to tone down the yelling. Not that I did too much yelling nowadays, in the past ten years I'd definitely matured from the aggressively enthusiastic 17 year old Quidditch captain I'd been at Hogwarts. Admittedly I was still aggressively enthusiastic, I just didn't yell so much, the yelling was up to our coach, James Lewis, but he seemed to enjoy it a fair bit.
It wasn't James yelling now though, it was Billy Trenton the Puddlemere captain, although by the sounds of it he wasn't intending to be captain for much longer. I sat with the rest of the team, none of us making eye contact, waiting for today's training to get going, except there wasn't going to be any training until the bosses and Billy quit yelling at each other. So here we were, awkwardly listening in as Billy adamantly insisted to James and Jack Abrams, Puddlemere's manager, that actually he'd had enough of 'getting knocked out while darting around risking his neck to get a stupid red ball through three equally stupid hoops'.
"Bet his wife's got something to do with it," whispered Anne Sullivan at my side.
Carol, Billy's wife, was notoriously disapproving of the state her husband returned to her in game after game, Billy had a penchant for taking beautiful risks in the air but he could never fully handle the fall out afterwards. So it had come to this, just after the second match of the season and their captain was leaving them, the wife had had enough, he'd had enough and that was that. Jack didn't like it? Jack could do one. That's what he'd said. There's that penchant for risks again. Maybe it was good he was quitting, nobody with a value for their life told Jack Abrams to do one and if they did then they surely were a few sickles short of a galleon.
"-AND WHERE IN THE NAME OF MERLIN AM I GOING TO FIND ANOTHER BLEEDING CHASER AND CAPTAIN TWO MATCHES INTO THE BLOODY SEASON?" Jack was roaring, actually roaring. If I didn't have a sense of self-preservation, I'd probably have pulled out some of that muggle snack 'popcorn' that Chrissie is always eating.
The season wasn't going brilliantly though and I could understand Jack's apprehension at losing one of his boldest players, let alone his captain to boot. We'd won both games but the first had only been by the skin of our teeth and we'd missed out on points not getting the Snitch. See, in the Quidditch league, there were five points up for grabs per game, they add up quickly and it's easy to get behind, you get three points for a win and two additional points for a Snitch catch. After Saturday's match, a brutal four hour match that we won 380-140, we were fourth in the league, which wasn't bad but nothing to get complacent about. Billy had left the pitch with a dislocated shoulder, a concussion and a disgruntled Carol; in all honesty his resignation wasn't a surprise to anyone paying attention.
The yelling had stopped now, a door was slammed, the slap of boots against the floor, we all tried to look busy but it was clear we'd been hanging on every word when Billy stormed into the locker room, "you guys hear all that, 'eh?"
We all murmured confirmations, it seemed that nobody wanted to face up to the fact that we'd been, unintentionally, eavesdropping. The bigger concern, certainly in my case, was what the bloody hell was going to happen to the team now? I felt betrayed, if I'm honest, he was our captain, our leader, he'd led me onto the pitch for five years now; I'd never played a Puddlemere game that he hadn't led. I stood up, overwhelmed with sentiment, and pulled him into a very awkward hug that I regretted instantaneously, this hadn't been my best move, "what the bloody hell are we going to do without you up there, 'eh, mate?"
Hermione Granger
The smell of coffee drew my eyes up from the paperwork in front of me, only one person made coffee that strong smelling in this building, she was the only other person who stayed as late as me.
"Hermione, dear? You want a coffee?" Matilda called out from the kitchenette down the hall.
I turned my eyes back to the paperwork, I could take it home or do it here but it needed to be done tonight and as I was more susceptible to sleep in my own home I called out my request for the caffeine she was making.
"It's ten o'clock again, Hermione, and it's only Monday; how many times were you in over the weekend?" the coffee Matilda presented was strong, milky and sweet. I sipped appreciatively, willing the caffeine to take action, I tried to avoid magical energy potions but the lethargy of office work built up and caffeine was a Muggle vice I embraced truly.
"Oh, just Saturday, I needed to work on Mr Carpenter's Furnunculus case, the research wasn't 100% ready for his meeting today." I lied, I came in Sunday too. She didn't need to know that though, I could already feel the reprimand she was building up to brewing, a strong and as scolding as the coffee in the pot.
"Hermione, its researching spelled boils, you didn't need to sacrifice your Saturday." The look she was giving me clearly stated that she knew I'd been in Sunday too, darn, I'd need to start working from home.
"It needed to be done, Matilda! Besides, I had nothing better to do."
"Because you spend so much time here, you've made this office your priority; you're going to be stuck if you don't put your foot down with this workload soon."
"That's a bit rich, isn't it? You're still here at 10pm too." My tone grew defensive, the woman in front of me worked just as hard as I did, if not more, she was in no position to chastise me.
"Yeah, I am, so I speak from experience. Don't make my mistakes. Have a life. Else you'll end up 53, doing someone else's paperwork at ten o'clock in the evening because it's your best option too."
She walked away back to her office and as I watched her turn the corner I realised she was right, and it petrified me.