So I had better finish this one next! Enjoy!
Monday morning after the League Dinner, Oliver was up with the sun, anxiously sitting at the kitchen table waiting for the morning prophet. The paper was set to announce the seeds for the double elimination playoff tournament that would consume the world of professional quidditch for the next three months. The seeds were important and likely to determine if you made it to the final games. Higher seeds had the advantage of playing at home as well. Puddlemere was optimistic about a second seed with their 10-2 record, but there were no guarantees.
Katie sleepily drifted into the kitchen and began making French toast, the fact that she didn't have to be at the hospital until ten a blessing. She was currently doing a rotation with primary care medicine, which mostly consisted of routine visits by the elderly witch and wizard. A bit too simple if you asked her, but she had plenty of time to plan the wedding.
"Still no news?" she asked glancing at the clock. It was nearly seven thirty, and the fact that the post hadn't arrived was a bit unusual.
"Of course not," groaned Oliver pulling at his hair. "I'm guessing we will have a second seed and have an off week next week, but I want to know what the bracket looks like. The Falcons had a great run at the end of the season that could mean that their lower seed could knock out a higher seed pretty quickly. There are so many possibilities!"
"No sense in worrying too much, luv. I'm sure you guys will have a plan. The first games will be this weekend. If you have an off week, maybe you could take Davie to a couple games and sit in the players boxes. Take notes on the competition, if you will."
"That's a good idea, Kates. I'm guessing you're working this weekend?"
"Three night shifts in a row. I'm transitioning to a new rotation this weekend. I'm going to be working the bites ward, and this weekend happens to be a full moon."
"Well be careful," ordered Oliver with a frown just as Davie wandered into the kitchen, still wearing his pajamas. The sleepy little boy rubbed his eyes and sat down next to Oliver who filled a glass of pumpkin juice for him.
"It's here!" exclaimed Oliver, practically exploding to get the paper as the owl flew through the open window. The still half asleep Davie startled next to him and nearly spilled his juice if it hadn't been for a quick spell by Katie.
Minutes later, Katie smirked into her frying pan as Davie and Oliver discussed their weekend gameplan for attending the first round games with mouths half full of French toast.
Davie and Oliver watched the Cannons pull off a surprising win over the Wasps, Hollyhead destroy the Catapults, and Falmouth upset fourth seeded Portree. The Cannons were set to play Puddlemere in the next round, making for a shockingly easy match up. Oliver and Davie spent the entire weekend together, taking notes in their 'Secret Playbooks' and eating processed junk food that Katie never would have permitted in such large quantities. The Cannons and Wasps game went late into the night, Davie falling asleep in his seat before being startled awake at two A.M. when the Cannon's seeker caught the snitch, causing the crowd to roar with delight.
The following week Puddlemere destroyed the Cannons with Katie and Davie cheering loudly from the family box when Oliver shut out their chasers. His observations from the week before had really paid off. The small soon to be family spent the rest of the weekend at matches around the country where they took notes and ate too much junk food for the second week in a row, surprisingly Katie didn't raise an eyebrow to the multitude of donuts and hot dogs. Unfortunately, she was the one puking after the Hollyhead-Montrose match where she ate too much candy floss watching Hollyhead lose.
Week three was a loser's bracket week, with only teams that had already been eliminated once playing. They once again headed to the Hollyhead match, this time against the Pride of Portree, and when Katie found herself tossing up the candied pumpkin chips she bought to snack on, she ended up staying home for the rest of the weekend. Davie, however, had a blast attending the games with Oliver and his coach Burt and Burt's son Mikey. The two seven year olds may have escaped their guardians and explored the stadium for a few hours during the match that went over eight hours due to a particularly evasive snitch.
Week four, Puddlemere blew past the Magpies to reach the semifinals of the first round, a faceoff between the top two teams in the league as the Arrows had also cruised through the tournament to this point. That gave them time off for week five, which allowed them to watch both games. Hollyhead and Falmouth remained the most intensely fought rivalry in professional quidditch, the all witches team Hollyhead facing the wizard's only club of Falmouth. It proved to be one of the very best games of the playoffs, and when the Harpies won, the stadium positively rumbled with noise.
"Are you okay?"
"I've an awful headache from those Harpy fans," moaned Katie after the match. Davie had been exhausted and Ollie had put him to bed quickly upon returning home. He had returned to their room to find her lying on the bathroom floor.
"Why are you laying on the floor?" he asked, somewhat confused by his fiancée and her strange behavior.
"I felt a little dizzy and I have this headache… and I was brushing my teeth, and I just thought it best to lie down. The tile is lovely and cold. I almost even feel better," she explained.
"Come on, luv. Let's get you to bed," scoffed Oliver, bending over and picking her up.
"NO!" moaned Katie. "You are making the room spin, Wood!"
Oliver frowned, setting her in their bed. Putting his hand against her forehead he attempted to check her temperature. "You maybe feel a little clammy?" he said. "I'm not a healer!"
"I've been off for a couple of weeks, maybe I should go in and be evaluated before work. I could have picked something up when I was doing all those geriatric primary care appointments. Why don't you sleep on the sofa tonight in case I'm coming down with vanishing sickness or the dragon pox!" she suggested. "I don't want to give you anything during the playoffs."
"Let me get you a glass of water and some pajamas, then we'll go into the healer first thing tomorrow," suggested Oliver, concerned that Katie was feeling ill enough that she would see a healer. She never seemed to take care of herself first, so for her to go to the healer, she must really feel sick.
"Well, what's wrong with me then?" asked Katie, still feeling under the weather the next morning. They had dropped Davie off with Oliver's parents and come in on a Saturday. "Is it vanishing sickness? Did you run a test for Dragon Pox? I was in the infectious disease ward about a month and a half ago."
"Well, Healer Bell, it would seem you have a classic case of pregnancy. Nothing that won't resolve itself in a matter of months," drawled Healer Clearwater, the emergency ward Healer that had taken her case. "I can put you in for a referral to one of the teammembers up in the Labor and Delivery Ward. You are about six weeks along by my guess. I'm surprised you didn't notice the symptoms yourself."
"Merlin," gasped Katie, eyes wide as she looked over at a panicked looking Oliver.
"Good thing we're already planning an April wedding, huh?" he joked, causing her to sputter.
"Oliver!" she exclaimed. "The media catches wind of this and it will be all the papers talk about! What are we going to tell your parents?"
"Well, we don't have to tell anyone anything yet. Let's just set up a healer appointment for next week sometime, and we'll go from there. And I'm sure my parents will be thrilled," he answered calmly. "Besides, we were planning on starting a family eventually, this is just a little sooner than we planned. Heck, I told you I wanted an entire quidditch team, so I guess we had better start soon huh?"
"Ha. Ha. Not funny! We are not breeding an entire quidditch team like the Weasley's," Katie assured Brian Clearwater. "I couldn't possibly stand that many mini-Olivers running around."
Since Katie's pregnancy was a secret, naturally the entire team and their families knew by the time the next match rolled around.
"So I heard it's twins," said Bonnie, taking the seat beside Katie at the biggest game of the playoffs so far. The Number 1 Seeded Arrows were facing off the Second Seed United, and both were undefeated in the tournament so far. Whoever lost this game would be knocked down into the losers bracket and their only shot to win the tournament would require beating the winner of the Harpy-Magpie game running tomorrow. Katie was hoping Puddlemere won as that would mean she wouldn't have to sit through another game tomorrow, but she knew if they lost, Oliver would drag them all to Montrose to see the game. With a wedding and a pregnancy, she was more than a little overwhelmed.
"Don't even joke about something like that!" scolded Katie. "A set of Wood twins would surely destroy Hogwarts, or at least the quidditch pitch in their competitiveness. Can you imagine the quidditch battles!? No thank you. I'm hoping this one is a sweet girl who has a thing for having both feet solidly on the ground thank you very much. I don't need any more fanatics in this family than the two I already have."
"Didn't you play quidditch in school?" asked Bonnie with a frown. "Oliver said you were a great chaser!"
"I had a thing for the gryffindor captain…" sighed Katie. "But yes, my offspring is likely doomed to play this dangerous game. Maybe she'll be a seeker?"
Oliver took Katie and Davie for pizza after the game, the family celebrating one of the largest wizarding sporting victories of the past three years in a little hole in the wall in muggle London.
"So next week then?" pronounced Oliver, finishing off the last of his pizza.
"I guess so," answered Katie. "I mean, we sent out the invitations, telling everyone it would either be next week if Puddlemere won today, or it would be in four weeks after the tournament finished. We'll be married before the next time you step out onto the pitch for a professional game."
"It's not going to be too rushed for you? Everything is ready then?" he asked, looking over to see Davie playing an arcade game in the corner. "You're not having second thoughts are you?"
"Of course not, are you!?"
"Not possible… I've wanted this longer than you know, Kates," he answered taking her hand gently in his. "Everything will work out great, and we can let my parents know about the baby after the wedding. Maybe invite them along to that sonogram thing you have scheduled for the week after. I'm sure they would like that."
"Sounds like the perfect plan, Ollie," choked a hormonal and teary eyed Katie.
"I came up with it in my 'Super Secret Playbook'," he replied with a wink.
Oliver Wood wouldn't be Oliver Wood if he didn't get married on a quidditch pitch.
The Puddlemere pitch was decked out in the gold and blue team colors and bursting with flowers. Chairs had been set up on the pitch, and a small dais had been raised just below the home team hoops, where Oliver was frequently seen fifty feet in the air. White roses wrapped around the bases of the hoops all the way to the top, and long ribbons of gold and blue ribbon draped between them elegantly framing the dais. Oliver stood next to Percy and George Weasley and Riggs, his groomsmen while Leanne, Alicia, and Angelina lined up on the other side wearing golden dresses that looked elegant opposite the men's navy suits. Oliver was unable to suppress a boyish grin when his bride appeared in the middle of the field (via portkey bouquet of course), arm in arm with Davie who walked her down the aisle between the guests with all the self assurance and solemnity of a wizard ten times his age. And when the wizard overseeing the proceedings asked who gave this man to this woman, he proudly answered, "I do."
It was a beautiful ceremony, and the party afterwards wasn't too bad either. All of their friends had managed to make appearances, even the ever elusive Harry Potter who made a big show of kissing the bride while Oliver scowled. The party didn't die down until past three in the morning, but Davie had gone home with Mikey and his parents to spend the weekend. Although they couldn't take a honeymoon, they were going to spend a couple of days alone before Davie was returned to them on Tuesday.
As Oliver's parents saw them off, they invited them to the upcoming healer appointment, and Katie felt as if a huge burden had been lifted. Snuggling up to her husband that night, she sighed contentedly just before falling asleep wondering at how different her life was from just nine months ago and how different it was sure to be in nine more.
Please review! I have maybe 2 or 3 more chapters left of "epilogues" that I have thought out. Love hearing what you think! Thanks so much for sticking with this story! Keep your eyes peeled for my sequel to this one. E.A.