Disclaimer: I own very little, as you know. Please don't sue me.

Chapter Twenty-Four: For the First Time

I gulped again before Benjamin took a step closer, blinking slowly to try to take in the sight.

"Perhaps, it be best if I step aside? Lana, are you…alright with that?" Oliver asked me, looking right at me.

I nodded simply as he walked off and Benjamin looked me straight in the eye. I noticed Anna wasn't with him which was quite the surprise. At first, I thought it would be possible to avoid the obvious.

"Where's Anna?" I asked, genuinely curious.

"Don't change the subject," Benjamin shot back with narrowed eyes." You and the Quidditch player, huh?"

I put up my hands," It's nothing, Benjamin. I simply came because he offered…we had some things we needed to discuss and-"

"You had things you needed to discuss with an obnoxious, intolerable Quidditch player whom you claim to not like…in fact, unless my timing is off, you should be in detention with him right about now," He said, walking closer to me as McGonagall started leading us back to the castle.

"Benjamin, look I know I lied to all of you and I feel terrible, but honestly I didn't want to make a huge deal out of nothing," I said to him, shrugging my shoulders as I did so for there truly was nothing I could do much other than be honest.

He shook his head," You lied, Lana."

"I know, Benjamin-"

He just grumbled before storming off ahead of me. Quickly, I ran after him and grabbed him by the shoulder, forcing him to look at me," Don't tell the others, please."

He laughed at this," You want me to lie to them?"

"Please, just this once. I swear I'll be honest from here on out, but the last thing I want is a large ordeal," I said, looking right at him. "You know I don't like this type of drama and honestly…why would I go looking for it?"

He bit down hard on his lip before storming off once and for all. Rather than run after him, she just shook her head and looked away, finding that whatever he wished to do, then the would make that decision upon his own judgment. I stood, watching as he grabbed Anna's (who had been up ahead) hand and they walked chipper as can be. Moments later, I felt someone else standing beside me and looked to see that it was Oliver.

I bit the inside of my cheek," That didn't go well."

"Is he going to make your life difficult now?" Oliver asked as we slowly started walking.

I sighed," I don't know. He didn't really give me an answer."

"I suppose we can only wait and see," He said, putting a small smirk on his face.

At this moment, I returned the smirk as we walked, speaking of all sorts of topics as we did so. It wasn't until we reached the castle that we were interrupted by the sound of a younger voice calling after Oliver. Nearly instantly, he stopped to see just who it was.

"Oliver, I finally got down my dive from earlier that you taught me!" The young Gryffindor exclaimed, I believed her name to be Katie Bell. She had come from inside the castle for she was still too young to attend Hogsmeade trips.

"Really? See I knew you had it in you, Bell! I want to see it in action next week against Hufflepuff," He told her confidently.

As she stood beside us, I watched her eyes gaze over to me. She swallowed hard before putting on a smile again," Of course. Just thought I'd let you."

"I'll see you at practice tomorrow, Bell," He said, nodding to her cordially as she started to walk away, but not without waving once more to her Quidditch captain.

"Right," She said, smiling, but I noticed she looked at me as well once more before she scurried off with her other friends.

I looked at Oliver and raised a brow as we came to the Great Hall where we would disperse back to our homerooms," Good job, captain."

He shrugged his shoulders," All in a day's work, eh?"

And with that, we left "detention" to return to the common room where I knew that there would either be turmoil or tranquility.

We entered into a quiet common room where surprisingly enough none of my companions were located. I let out a sigh of relief as I said good bye to Oliver and went to the dormitory to prepare for dinner that evening. All of my companions were sitting upon their beds, whispering reverently as I walked in. As soon as I did so, they shot their heads up and looked I me. I cocked a brow at them as I entered and pushed open my trunk.

"How was detention?" Holly asked, looking at me with a smile on her face.

"Awful. Thanks for asking," I grumbled to her before gathering my clothing and leaving for the bathroom where I started a shower to clean up from the day.

After that short event, no one said another word about detention. There was nothing more to be said and after that Oliver and I were officially done with detention. In fact, the whole topic nearly disappeared…that was until our next Potions test.

Wood must have gotten extremely lucky for the next before the test, I had three other tests to prepare for. Seeing as I had little time to study for Potions, I made my priorities and found that my grade in Potions was worth sacrificing so that my other grades would be higher and less affected. Whenever I walked through the common room, however, I noticed him hunched over both his Potions book and notebook.

"Oliver, what exactly are you doing?" I asked him, briefly forgetting about our bet.

"I'm studying, what else?" He asked, turning to look at me. "We've a bet, you know."

"Oh, right," I said, the idea returning to my mind. "You actually mean this?"

"Of course I do! I take bets very seriously," He said, turning back to his books.

I'm sure you do, I thought to myself before turning and walking back to my dormitory to return to my own studying as I called over my shoulder.

"Happy studying!"

It was the day that we received our tests back in all the classes. I had done well as I expected on most of my tests and the only one I had left to receive was Potions.

I remember walking into the classroom, still happy about my other test results. Whenever I arrived, Oliver was already seated with a smile on his face.

"What're you so happy about?" I asked him dropping my books as I took a seat.

"Today is the day I win the bet," He said confidently

I rolled my eyes," You seem a little too sure of yourself."

At this moment, there was silence as Professor Snape waltzed into the classroom looking at all of us with a foul look on his face, as always. He picked up a stack of parchment as he walked to the front of his class. I expected him to comment upon how terrible we all did, but he simply began reading off names.

He ran through all of the names, my own included. As I strolled up to pick up my parchment, I was shocked to see that I hadn't done near as well as I normally do. In fact…I barely passed. I felt Snape's glare on me as he shoved the paper into my hands. It appeared as though Oliver had won this bet unless of course he failed the test.

"Oliver Wood," Snape said dryly as the Quidditch player walked up to retrieve his paper.

Nearly immediately, we all watched his celebration as he nearly danced back to his desk and slammed the paper down in front of me. I looked at it and almost instantly pressed my forehead to the desk.

He had passed with flying colors.

I remember the free day like none other. I remember dreading going to the Quidditch pitch for Oliver would only gloat on his victory over me. I tried avoiding it the whole day and I knew better than to try to lie to Benjamin or anyone else about what I was doing. There was no way I was getting out of the truth, but it appeared as though I wouldn't have to worry about it much anyways seeing as he wasn't speaking to me. Holly hadn't mentioned anything either so I presumed that he hadn't said a word which baffled me slightly, but it seemed that he was too preoccupied with his girlfriend.

As I walked to the practice field, I realized that I really had known how to fly…kind of. I mean, I only barely passed flying lessons first year, but…it would be interesting to say the least.

Whenever I arrived, Oliver had a large box sitting in the middle of the field and I had been to enough Quidditch games to recognize it as the box where the balls for the game were held, as well as the rest of the equipment. He was smirking as I walked on the field; I half-way glared at him as I walked to where he stood.

"You claim to be bad at Potions and ace a test?" I raised a brow at him, crossing my arms.

He shrugged," I studied for quite some time."

"This bet must have been pretty important to you," I added, seeing him adjust the two brooms at his feet.

"Well, its almost shameful that a witch claims to not be able to fly well," He added, looking over his shoulder as he stood beside a broom and waved me to come closer.

Tentatively, I stepped forward and looked down at the broomstick. Almost instantly, memories of my family came flooding into my head as I stared at the piece of over decorated wood. I remembered enough to stick my hand out over the broom.

He chuckled and I looked over to see that he was already atop of his broom and hovering above me," Since you're basically a beginner, you need to say 'up'."

"Oh, right," I muttered before holding my hand over it and saying the word loud and clear. "Up!"

When nothing happened, I glared at Wood, who simply prompted me to try again. I tried several more times and found that absolutely nothing happened. After a few moments Wood came back to the ground and dropped the one he had mounted to the ground. He, too had difficulty lifting the other broom and finally gave up on it.

"Alright, well we can make do with what we've got. Some brooms have got some major personalities-"

"Excuse me?" I asked, nearly laughing.

"What?"

"Brooms do not have personalities," I said adamantly, folding my arms over my chest.

"Oh, then you're the problem, eh?" He teased as I laughed at this. "Fair enough. I was trying to defend you, you know."

I shrugged," I can accept the fact that I'm the problem."

"Well, Little Miss Problematic, why don't you try to mount this one?" He addressed me, dropping his broom at my feet.

I stared at it for a moment before looking at him with a non-interested look on my face. He kept on smiling prompting me to raise my hand over the broom and call out," Up."

Nearly immediately the broom came up to my hand and I smiled at this," Hey, look at that."

"It only took you," He started counting on his fingers.

Quickly, I hit him, prompting him to shut up. He looked at me with widened eyes.

"That's no way to treat a Quidditch instructor, mate," He said before instructing me on what to do next. "Now, that you've successfully retrieved the broom…mount it."

He took a couple steps closer to me as I tried to emulate what I had learned my first year at Hogwarts. As soon as I was standing over the broom, I felt him adjust my hands on the broom.

"Lana, you're not trying to kill the thing. Lighten up," He said, moving my hands to the "correct" position before telling me. "Now, I'm going to be behind you, alright? You're going to be doing the flying…I'm just going to be here in case anything goes wrong."

I felt him standing behind me over the broom as he spoke more directions to me," Now, you just want to think like you're floating."

"Think like I'm-" I questioned and before I could even finish the sentence I felt the broom lifting from the ground and was so taken aback by it that I screamed and nearly fell off due to instability.

Almost instantly, Oliver placed a hand on either side of me to balance me as he chuckled," That's exactly right."

I took a deep breath in and felt his hands drop as I stabled myself. After laughing at myself for a good bit, I heard him once again giving me instructions," Now, its literally all in how you think. Wherever you wish for the broom to go…it should follow. Just be careful because at first-"

Before he could finish, I was already thinking which way I wished for it to go. As we went zooming toward the right, the broom shook wildly as Oliver yelled over the blur," It gets a little jarring! Just think about slowing-"

Before he could complete the phrase, the broom went slamming to an immediate stop, nearly throwing the both of us from it. I felt Oliver jam into me hard as I slid forward on the broom. As we readjusted, he spoke more slowly," Why don't you let me finish my phrases?"

"Sounds…like…a…..great…plan," I said, trying to catch my breath.

"Now, try to ease yourself to go up and to the right," He said calmly, trying to catch his own breath.

I gathered my thoughts and let out a deep breath as I gathered my mind. Much more slowly, the broom began to lift us up and to the right. I still couldn't bring myself to look down, but to feel the gentle breeze through my hair as we slid upwards through the air. He congratulated me before continuing on.

"Aye, that's it Lana," He said as we came to a gentle stop.

"Now, let's just get comfortable going all directions," He said carefully.

I can't remember how long we spent flying around the pitch, going every which direction. In fact, I found that eventually I was actually…enjoying flying. Now, I wouldn't say those exact words to Oliver…he didn't deserve that much satisfaction yet, but it wasn't until later that the day seemed to go downhill.

Already, the sun had began to set and we both needed to get back to the ground. We were at nearly the very top of the pitch, looking down over the peaceful landscape when Oliver spoke.

"I suppose its nearly time to return to the castle. Now, to go down…let's take it nice and slow," He told me and my grip on the broom tightened slightly.

I took a deep breath in before imagining the broom traveling down toward the ground. At first, it was nearly perfect…we were going at just the right pace and I truly was enjoying the experience after I realized we would not go crashing into the ground face-first. Oliver complimented the ease of the descent and just as we were roughly one-hundred feet above the ground, there was a jerk.

"Lana?" Oliver asked as the broom came to a halt and began jerking to the left and right.

"Oliver, what's going on?" I asked tentatively, tightening my grip.

"Oy, I assume you aren't thinking like this, eh?" He asked as the broom took another wild turn.

"Yeah, I thought it be loads of fun to try and get us killed!" I yelled sarcastically as the broom nearly flipped upside down. "Oliver! How are we-"

"Lana, just stay calm, alright?" He told me with a strong, steady voice. "Listen, I'm going to grab you alright and I need you to hold on to me. For these next couple moments, just…trust me, alright?"

I could only wonder what he was planning on doing with this incredibly ridiculous and frightening moment. Not wishing to argue though, I slid myself closer to Oliver and felt his arm wrap around my midsection. I held on tight to his arms as the broom continued to swing us every which way. Looking down, we were still quite a ways above the ground and if we fell…it certainly wouldn't mean a quick trip out of the Hospital Wing.

"Oliver…" I started to ask something, but I stopped for the broom had taken a whole different course at this moment.

It was barreling toward the ground, literally trying to smash us into the ground. I squeezed Oliver's arms so tightly that I felt as though I was going to cut off circulation. That was hardly at the top of my worries for in a matter of seconds we would be gone. However, right as we were hovering just above the Games, I heard Oliver holler.

"Hold on tight, Lana!"

And just as he did so, he threw the both of us off of the side of the broomstick. My heart felt as though it would beat out of my chest as we fell through the air. It was almost as if my nightmares of falling from a broom were coming true, only this fall was not nearly as long. Through several brief moments of free fall, we found ourselves rolling wildly through the grass before coming to a complete stop.

After realizing that we had, in fact, survived, I opened my eyes and looked around. I felt that my hands were still latched on to Oliver. The position in which we landed couldn't have been more awkward. I saw that I laying directly on the Quidditch captain, looking down at him. My eyes widened slightly as he looked up at me before asking with a strained voice," Oy, you alright, Lana?"

Finding that I was closer to him than I ever had been before, I tried to move out of his personal space, but ended up misplacing my hand and actually falling closer.

"I'm fine," I said, still finding this very embarrassing and uncomfortable. "Thank you though…for the lesson and….kind of saving my life."

He laughed," Kind of?"

I shrugged as best as I could from the position I was in," Alright, alright…saving my life. You're not hurt are you?"

He winced slightly as I tried to move again," I'm sure its only bruised. I've fallen from higher than that before as you saw a couple days ago."

This was absolutely true. He tried to move up to his elbows as I readjusted once more. We had fallen at such an awkward angle that getting up without violating each other's personal space once more was nearly impossible. This time, however, was even closer than the other two.

It was at that moment that I saw the Quidditch captain for the first real time. There was something about his brown eyes and kind smile that actually made me feel horrific for ever thinking anything terrible about him before. He had just put his life on the line for me and I had hardly even given him the time of day before. There was a certain warmness growing in my stomach as I looked at him when I really should have been getting up.

I felt his hand still on my lower back and in all honesty, I can't explain how or when it happened, but our lips met. And it wasn't completely horrendous...in fact, it was nearly perfect and sent a rush through my body. For the first time, I truly appreciated the Oliver Wood not everyone seemed to know.

Nearly just as soon as our lips met, however, they were ripped apart...for we had company.

A/N:There was a lot going on in this chapter, but I just couldn't find an appropriate place to cut it off. Any idea who found them? Please, review! I love to hear opinions and a big thanks goes out to those who have already.