Early Summer, 1998

"Can you remind me, again, why we decided that getting married was a good idea?" Katie asked, throwing her quill down with a look of extreme distaste.

"Is that a trick question?" Oliver questioned, picking up the abandoned writing utensil that had clearly offended his fiancée and twirling it with his fingers. "It's because we love each other."

"No, I mean why did we decided to have a wedding?" Katie said. "We should have just eloped the second you proposed; it would have solved us so much trouble now."

"Oh, well in that case," Oliver began, "It was because I'd already told my mum I was proposing, and she literally would have killed me if she wasn't invited to the wedding and if we'd brought her along when we eloped not only would it have been incredibly awkward, but then your mum would have been offended when she found out that she wasn't invited."

"And Merlin forbid you ever did something to get on my mother's bad side," Katie said, though she was smiling now.

"I'm not even sure that's possible," Oliver replied honestly.

"But seriously," Katie said suddenly, "After this wedding, let's never get married again. It's just too much work."

"I'm okay with that," Oliver told her. "After I marry you, I promise I'll never get married again, and I'll make sure to keep you from getting married again, too."

"Clearly this is one of the many reasons I love you," Katie informed him.

It was now mid-June and Katie and Oliver had both been busy with their respective Quidditch teams—the Holyhead Harpies were currently undefeated and in first place, while Puddlemere United was in a tie for second. With all of the training they'd been doing, planning their wedding had slipped to the back of their minds. But on this particular night, both Katie and Oliver were home at the same time, for once, and had decided to get some planning out of the way. Finally.

Needless to say, it was proving to be far more stressful than either had anticipated. It also didn't help that both of them would like to do nothing more than curl up and go to sleep for about fifteen hours after a long day of training.

"We're never going to find a date that works for both of us," Katie said now with a shake of her head. There was a calendar spread on the kitchen table between her and Oliver, who also had a blank sheaf of parchment before him, quill at the ready to begin writing down…well, whatever it was that needed to be written down when one was planning a wedding. Clearly he had only ended up with the responsibility because of Katie's aforementioned disgust with the quill.

"I think we'll manage to find something that works," Oliver said thoughtfully, examining the calendar now. "I was thinking winter."

Katie merely stared at him for a moment, her expression unreadable. Then she pursed her lips in a frown.

"Have you changed your mind?" She asked after the moment of silence.

"What?" Oliver asked, looking up with a confused expression. "Changed my mind about what?"

"Marrying me," Katie replied evenly.

Oliver's eyes widened. "No!" He said hurriedly. "Why would you think that?"

"Because winter is awfully far away," Katie replied easily, as if this was the most obvious explanation in the world. "I was thinking we should get married by the beginning of August, at the very latest. After all, there's no time like the present. It's already June; why wait 'til December and the off-season if we don't have to?"

Now it was Oliver's turn to stare at her. Then he broke out into a wide grin.

"And this is why I love you," He informed her. Then, "But there's still the problem of both of us needing to be at the ceremony; our schedules really don't go very well together. I almost think the Professional Quidditch League is plotting to not let us get married because we're keeping them in the dark."

"Maybe not…" Katie said slowly, pulling the calendar closer to herself as she caught sight of a date that Oliver had circled several times in red ink ages ago. She pointed to it.

"That's the World Cup Final," Oliver told her. Then his eyes lit up. "Oh! The World Cup Final!"

Katie grinned. "Exactly. We have a definite five day break for the Final, so we know we're both free. And England hosted last time; they won't again for ages, so it isn't exactly going to be local."

"And it's not as if any team either of us would cheer for is going to be in it," Oliver reasoned. "England never had a chance, what with the war. And don't even get me started on Scotland…"

"Monday, August twenty-fourth it is, then," Katie stated happily.

"Well," Oliver said as he wrote the date on the parchment, "I guess that's a new reason to like Mondays."

"Please, as if you ever had a problem waking up early," Katie teased him. Then she frowned. "Ugh…I guess the next thing we have to do is come up with a guest list."

"Well…" Oliver said again, drawing the word out this time, "I suppose our parents, plus other family. And if we want to keep it small…who else do we want there?"

"Not that I ever really wanted a big wedding," Katie began, "But I feel like keeping it small is going to be another headache."

Oliver nodded his agreement. "Our parents are going to demand an explanation for every name we put on that guest list, since we're obviously not going to be inviting every single person they might want to."

"We'll start simple, then," Katie said resolutely. "Angie and Alicia."

Oliver nodded his agreement immediately, writing the two names down. For most of Katie's time on the Gryffindor team, Angelina Johnson and Alicia Spinnet had been her partners. The three girls practically shared one mind on the Quidditch field. Plus, although the two girls were a year older, they had quickly become Katie's best friends; that would never change.

"Percy," Oliver said then.

"Weasley?" Katie questioned, mildly surprised.

Oliver nodded. "We've always been good friends."

"Alright," Katie said with a shrug. She actually hadn't thought the two boys were particularly close while at school, but chose not to question Oliver. If he said they were friends, then she believed him; she knew living with someone for seven years could do that, no matter how pompous of an appearance someone might put on.

What Katie didn't know and what Oliver would probably never tell her was that, while he and Percy had been close during their Hogwarts days, he had felt rather bad for the other man when they had run into each other again after going their separate ways with the end of their schooling. Oliver had long been used to listening to Percy go on about all of his views on just about everything that came to mind, so it was easy for him to ignore the other man's narrow-minded views on the Ministry at the time when he found out that Percy was no longer on speaking terms with the rest of the Weasley family. Even if all that rekindling their friendship meant was meeting up for drinks every so often and talking about Percy's work, Oliver felt that the other man needed some kind of contact with the world outside of the Ministry. Especially after that, the pair would always remain close friends, of this Oliver was certain.

"Leanne," Katie said, once she saw that Oliver had finished writing. She was as easy a person to justify as Angie and Alicia; Leanne had been Katie's best friend at Hogwarts even before those two. She had always been there for Katie and Katie would always be there for her. Katie couldn't imagine her wedding day without Leanne.

"George," Oliver spoke now. He, too, was a member of Oliver and Katie's longtime Gryffindor team and, more importantly, their good friend. They never would have considered the thought of not inviting him, even though it went without saying that they knew George would probably have a difficult time reuniting with the old gang so shortly after his twin's death. But, then again, maybe having the old gang around would help him to get his mind off of things for a bit.

"And Lee, too," Katie agreed, attempting to think of any more close friends from their Hogwarts days. "What about…Harry…?"

Oliver paused in his writing now. Yes, Oliver had been Harry's captain for three straight years, with the third being the year Harry won the Quidditch Cup for Oliver, when all was technically said and done. And yes, Katie had been on the team with him for six years—though that sixth year was a bit of a stretch. But Katie and Oliver hadn't really been friends with him, per se. While the other six members of the team had spent much of their time together, Harry had always gone off with his own friends.

"I think yes," Oliver said with a small nod. "He's always been there for us when we needed him—on the pitch and off, even if we weren't as close with him as with everyone else."

"And I suppose," Katie chipped in now, "when you get right down to it, how our relationship began all leads back to Harry in the end, doesn't it? And, added bonus: I'd say the savior of the wizarding world is basically an expert at avoiding the press. He can be our good luck charm."

Oliver nodded again and added the name to the list, before looking up at Katie once more.

"Charlie Weasley," He stated.

"I thought he must always be referred to as The Great Charlie Weasley?" Katie teased Oliver, grinning cheekily at him.

"So we're agreed then," Oliver said happily, turning back to the parchment.

Charlie Weasley had been Oliver's very first Captain, the one who first gave Oliver a real shot at playing the sport he had always loved. And for all that there were several years between them, Charlie and Oliver had always gotten along great and they had kept in touch after Charlie left school…even if he had committed the greatest tragedy known to mankind and left Quidditch behind in favor of dragons.

Katie was frowning when Oliver looked back up from happily adding Charlie's name to the list.

"Who?" He asked simply.

"Ron Weasley," Katie replied, her frown deepening. "We did only play together for about a season and a half, and we were never very close. Really, I only thought of him because it seems like we're inviting half his family."

"So we'd be sending him a pity invite?" Oliver clarified. "I think I'll go with a 'no' on this one."

"I had a feeling you might," Katie said, her frown quickly morphing into a small smile as she shook her head. Katie had long-since forgiven Ron for the horrendous nosebleed he'd given her during their first practice together, all those years ago. After all, Katie Bell most certainly does not hold grudges. But even though he hadn't even been there, seeing as it was Katie who'd been injured, Oliver most definitely did.

"And while we're talking about people not to invite," Oliver began tentatively, "I really don't want to invite anyone from Puddlemere. Even if they are the people I spend a majority of my time with these days, I doubt inviting an entire professional Quidditch team will make for a small wedding."

"Make that two teams," Katie corrected him. "We don't need to invite the Harpies, either. And really, in the long run, this is just going to make things more interesting for us, seeing as the only people we plan to tell about our marriage are the people being invited to the wedding. All of our teammates—not to mention the rest of the world—can be completely in the dark."

"That's bound to keep things interesting for a few years, at the very least," Oliver said with a small chuckle. He looked over the short list they had come up with. "Eight people, plus our parents, and whatever family the insist upon."

"Huh," Katie commented thoughtfully. "You know, for the first time, I honestly feel like we're actually going to pull this off."

Naturally, this probably meant that everything was going to turn out to be a complete disaster, but Oliver and Katie were more than used to taking those sorts of things in stride. After everything they'd been through together, a bit of wedding mayhem was probably in order. But as long as they were together, what did it really matter at this point?