Chapter 5

Five hours was all the sleep I got. It had been nightmare after nightmare, any of which I couldn't even remember now as I was in the locker room getting ready. After waking up a few times I'd gotten anxious about not getting enough sleep, which made relaxing and falling asleep utterly impossible.

I sat down on a cold bench while waiting for my teammates to arrive. There I sat, fully Quidditch-attired in the freezing locker room. Everything had been freezing since I had woken up; our dorm room; the Great Hall and the corridor. Freezing and deserted, since it was Sunday and people didn't usually get up until much later than 8 a.m. Worst of all was the walk from the main entrance to the pitch in the October rain. I don't even know if rain sufficed as an accurate description for what was going on outside, but it wasn't nice. Like, it would've been nice if I could've spent the morning in the library reading about peculiar and interesting creatures or something equally equivocal. But for a Quidditch practise, I wasn't sure.

Right then everyone abruptly flew through the door in unison. I stood and said. "Alright hurry up now." Wright wasn't even wearing a jacket.

"There wasn't time." She said dramatically before I'd even asked. It made me smile for the first time that day.

I went up to the door, took a deep breath to compose myself before heading out to set up the gear. I spotted a figure on top of the stands, there seemed to be someone sitting there, but they were far away and the rain was too thick to decipher who it was. It looked sort of comedic though, seeing the stands completely empty except for this one person, whom I was currently refusing to believe was Oliver in an act of revenge, huddled up against the rain.

Running out to the middle of the pitch I actually felt surprisingly comfortable, my Quidditch attire seemed sufficient for keeping me warm. I set down the box with the different balls feeling more excited than usual about a practise. The harsh rain would make this interesting.

I turned to see the rest of my teammates approaching me, they didn't look happy, but I couldn't help but smile as a blow of rain whipped the side of my face. "Alright!" I shouted. "Let's not overcomplicate this. We'll just do what we did last time." Everyone nodded and I bent down to release the snitch. It soared slowly at first and then within a couple of seconds, it had disappeared completely. "To clarify: there's going to be a routine practise today." I kept shouting as they all got on their brooms, thinking it best to get out most of the core instructions right now so that everyone could act independently for the rest of the time, as it would be hard to instruct in this rain.

Ten minutes in I was trying to score on PJ, which was easier said than done. To be perfectly honest, I hadn't seen much of what the others were doing; after the fog had set in it was literally impossible. I hoped they were alive at least. Cedric was worst off. I hadn't seen him since he first got on his broom and flew after the snitch. When I say flew after, I mean arbitrarily choosing a path that probably wasn't even in the general direction of it. I was getting worried for him though.

I could only imagine how much fun the unknown spectator must be having at this. Why even bother? I wondered. Oliver would, I mentally answered myself. I recalled that I had told Oliver that he could watch our practises if he had a reason besides spying. I pondered what his reason could be as I tried to score on PJ once again.

A figure appeared in the blink of an eye and crashed into me. It hurt and I tensed my grip around my broom intensely, I didn't fall off thankfully.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry!" Came Cedric's voice.

"It's alright." I said while stroking my arm. "Honestly I'm just glad I found you. I thought you might be gone forever."

"I thought I was gone forever!" He exclaimed, eyes wide. "I honestly think I was by Hagrid's hut at one point. It was insane." His Devon accent displayed itself more than usual in his frantic state and I had to smile at him, at how cute it was.

Next I spoke to both Cedric and PJ, "We need to gather, you guys land by the hoops down there," I pointed downwards. "I'll tell the others to come too."

Normally I would use the selected signs we had for signalling my wishes from a distance. Today was hopeless however and I had to fly around for several minutes to find the rest of my teammates individually and tell them what to do — such a bother.

When we had all gathered at the base of the hoops I directed my attention toward Cedric, "You never actually found the snitch did you?"

"It was impossible!" He defended.

"I'm thinking that at this rate it's going to take you hours all by yourself. So instead we are all going to help you out." I said enthusiastically and everyone looked at me quizzically.

"Okay." Wright finally said uncertainly and got on her broom, the rest followed her example although reluctantly, and then we were off.

I hadn't planned it to be, I would've never guessed it would be, but it was actually extraordinarily amusing — all of us, searching for the snitch in the thick fog. It went unsaid, but we all got really competitive during the quest, everyone seemed to have made it their own ambition to be the one who caught the damned thing. I'd rarely had so much fun at a practise. Normally we would all be divided into small groups and each group would do their own thing. There was a completely different dynamic today on the pitch. Despite us all competing against each other, we were connecting in a way we didn't usually get to. It took us a long time and the fog had almost entirely cleared, along with the rain, when Cedric finally caught the snitch, flaunting his skill at the task. We all cheered and applauded him.

When we got back on the ground everyone was laughing about funny things that had happened in the air. I felt good being able to look out on the field with somewhat clear vision again and a big grin on my face. A grin which disapparated as soon as I spotted Oliver trudging toward us. I let the others chatter while I walked and met Oliver, completely taken by his still remaining presence on the pitch after the whole snitch-seeking extravaganza.

"You're still here?" I called in surprise once in hearing distance.

"Thankfully — it was quite a show." His eyebrows were raised in a superior expression, while at the same time looking like he was about to let out a laugh.

I began to feel nervous, unsure of how to act around his ambivalence. Could I make a joke to diffuse the tension between us or was he about to dive headstrong into his typical nemesis-escapade?

"So… you came to watch?" I fumbled.

Oliver watched me carefully. Looking for any sign of discontent I'm sure. "There's no rule, right?" He asked.

I sighed loudly, my predisposed perception of his intention was confirmed, and it tired me to no end. "Right," I began. "And as we all know, you usually sit out in freezing rain to watch my practises, so you figured you might as well continue as 'there's no rule about it'?"

There was no longer any hint of a laugh slipping out of Oliver at this point, nor out of me. "Never mind what I usually do, I'm here now anyway, I hope that isn't a problem?" He asked nonchalantly, without looking my way.

I shrugged, although my eyes squinted viciously, "No problem. I just don't see the point in coming out here in the freezing rain."

"What can I say? I just really love Quidditch." He shrugged.

I was about to question his motives, knowing very well that he only came out here for payback. Arguing this to him seemed silly however. To question Oliver's love for Quidditch and what he would or wouldn't do to watch it would be chewing more than I could actually swallow.

"It appears so." I settled on instead. I walked back to my teammates, expecting him to leave then, but he followed me and greeted everyone cheerfully, almost suspiciously cheerfully if you asked me.

"You wanna stay for this as well?" I asked tentatively.

"Yeah. I mean, like I said before—"

"You love Quidditch." I mocked his tone of voice, slightly harsher than I had originally intended to.

I paused to collect myself. Everyone was looking at me expectantly, but I'd been thrown off my course when Oliver was suddenly apart of our routine. "Right!" I finally began, "Let's do the… thing where we go around the group..." I made a circle with my finger.

"How eloquently put." PJ joked, causing everyone to laugh, even Oliver seemed to think it was funny. I gave him a reproachful look and to my surprise he seemed to cool off instantly once he'd caught sight of it.

I then moved on to PJ and gave her the same foreboding stare, but only replied with an attempt at an unbothered beam. I shrugged it of, furrowing my brows in concentration. I was trying to find my way back to that focused Willow we'd seen not ten minutes ago. I brought my fingers to my temple. "You know what I mean! Where everyone says something they did good — Cedric, you start."

Oliver laughed, "That's silly." He said, as if he wasn't quite yet content with my level of frustration.

"We've been trying to tell her." Wright agreed.

"Is everyone against me today or what?" I exclaimed wide-eyed. "I thought we agreed it was constructive! A good way to go through everything, have a discussion and get everyone involved so that we can learn from each other!" I ranted in one whole breath.

"Alright Will, calm down. We're only teasing." Oliver laughed. At first it was like he didn't realise he'd said it. But when he received befuddled looks from all of us the realisation dawned on him; not only had he failed to use my surname, but he had also replaced it with my Quidditch name.

We all give each other nicknames on the team, so that it's easier to shout on the pitch. Now, my friends and I have gotten so used to our names through the years that we always use the short versions, that's why we say Wright and not her first name, which is Aurora. No one outside of our team ever uses them, not even Bianca, except for PJ's nickname, as it wasn't given to her for Quidditch purposes.

When Oliver realised what he'd said he almost flinched. "Sorry!" He blurted.

"Why are you sorry?" I asked in frustration. Why is he so uptight about the name thing? But instead of waiting for a reply I turned to Cedric again, motioning for him to begin.

"…I mean, how can I not bring up how I finally caught the snitch after a whole practise had been dedicated to catching the bloody thing?" He said proudly.

Jason gave a small applause, "And not only catching it, but cleverly managing to divert my course when I was just about to dive for it." He smiled at Cedric, who bowed.

Once we were finished the smile from before had made its way back to my lips and my frustration had disapparated instead. "I think I might just keep flying for a bit." I told the team, "You guys go ahead."

"Aren't you meeting Graham in the library?" Wright asked, acting as my assistant.

"Right!" I slapped my forehead in distress. "What's the time?" I asked them, but Wright's words were caught only by the wind as I had already broke into a jog toward the locker rooms.

When I entered the dimly lit library an hour later it was the first time that I'd felt warm that day. I walked further inside to Graham's and my usual spot. I had a specific spot with each one of my friend groups, but ours was particularly fortunately placed. It was in a corner with a couch, a chair and close to a fireplace, which meant extra heat. Perfect for a day like this.

Graham was emerged in his parchment, writing fiercely. He looked up for a second and greeted me with only a small gesture of his hand.

I threw myself on the couch and snuggled down into a horizontal position on the couch, not even bothering with a greeting in return. I could tell he was busy right then and didn't want to do anything to disrupt him. I watched him as he wrote and I could see that he was smiling at what he was writing. Which would be odd, seeing as he was clearly doing homework, but knowing Graham it was a common fact. It meant that he was being brilliant and he knew it.

After a while his hand stopped moving and he sat up straighter while stretching his back and examining his work with a satisfied smirk. He turned to me, "I'm brilliant," he said self-righteously. I smiled with a shook my head against the soft cushion I was laying on.

Graham lay down with his head to the right of mine and I moved so that we were both staring up at the ceiling.

"That can't have been a pretty practise." He said moments later, referring to the rain that had begun to thunder against the windows once again.

"It was super fun!" I chimed, to his amusement.

"Of course it was." He said sardonically. "I mean, how can Quidditch in the thick fog not be fun? It's not about seeing the ball after all; it's about feeling the ball and about the kinship of being together in that moment and knowing that you are a part of something greater, some magical force that can't be seen, but you can only be discerned spiritually! …It's just all very spiritual, your practises, I would assume."

I shoved his face lightly with my hand, "What are you on about?" I asked, obviously apprehending that it was plain mockery and choosing to ignore the miniscule envy I felt at him being able to phrase himself so seamlessly. "Are you on a high from that paper you're writing?"

"The paper writes me, Willow." I shoved his face with my hand again.

He grabbed hold of my hand to stop me from shoving him, "I didn't know it was beating Graham day?" He said.

I tried to detach myself from his grip, "I didn't know it was annoy Willow day…" I bickered back. "…Speaking of; guess who came to watch our practise today."

Graham finally let my hand drop, "Oliver Wood." He said without needing to ponder for even a second.

"You guessed right." I said bitterly. "There he sat in the freezing rain all throughout! All because I had been waiting for Alicia and the others on his practise! Can you believe it's finally been confirmed? — He's mental!"

"Did you cause a scene again?"

"Not really… It's just frustrating, that's all." I thought back to the way Oliver had laughed at the constructive criticism segment. "…And he questioned my methods!" I added in a flurry.

Graham was quiet and I could tell he was thinking. I let him be. Curiously I waited for him to give me some hint of what was on his mind.

"How come Wood and you are not friends?" He asked finally.

"Maybe because he comes to my practises in an act of revenge, questions my methods while he's at it, and always seems to be wanting to pick a fight with me." I said sourly.

"No, but really?" Graham pushed, seemingly not thinking I was being genuine.

"Really." I asserted.

He was quiet again, and once more I let the seconds tick by while I curiously waited. When he'd finished his thinking again he said, "It's just, you're quite alike if you think about it."

I let my curiosity take the lead instead of being offended and asked, "What do you mean?"

"Willow, I've never seen anyone play Quidditch for as long as you and not lose interest after a few hours. When you finally step of the pitch, or when you're dragged of, you still continue to ramble on about it with the same undying enthusiasm. It's ridiculous!" He stopped to let the words sink in. "And I've never seen anyone heckling his teammates the way Wood does in the corridor. You two go about it in quite different ways, but the passion is the same, exactly the same. It all comes down to Quidditch for both of you in the end."

A high pitched, "Umm..." was all that escaped me. Being dragged under the same comb as Oliver was not something I typically enjoyed, but Graham was making a good point, and I wasn't sure how to discredit it.

"I've also never seen you hating this much on a Gryffindor, which is an interesting turn of events." Graham said with a pleased tone of voice. It was a well-known fact that Slytherin and Gryffindor had an unspoken rivalry, and Graham approving of my opposition to one did not come as a surprise.

I furrowed my brows, once more regretting the harsh words I'd used against Oliver in my head yesterday. "Hopefully it'll pass."

I think Graham sensed my discontent and spoke with more empathy henceforth, "It's quite peculiar to me… You know how we said that one time that I have one of those logical brains and you have one of those fun brains." We both laughed, "Well, this is one of those things that doesn't add up in my logical brain. You usually get on really well with Gryffindors."

"I still get on well with all Gryffindor's," I argued, "it's just that not all Gryffindor's get on well with me."

Graham laughed again and we lay there quietly until Graham's break was over and he had to get back to his books. I however, was too comfortable and warm to open a book. I stayed put until I drifted into a sleep.

Graham woke me an hour or two later. I sat up drowsily. "Why do I keep falling asleep in the library? Why do I never get anything done?" I queried once I'd regained full consciousness.

"I don't know, but dinner is being served as we speak and I think we better get down there before all the good stuff is gone." His bag was already around his shoulder and a book was in his hand that hadn't fit in his bag.

"Alright." I said and stood, not needing to gather my things as I hadn't even un-gathered them in the first place.

Upon entering the gigantic hall we power walked, almost ran to the Slytherin table. We half sat/half stood in the same motion as we heaved food unto our plates, not wanting to miss out on any of the better foods.

"I reckon you need some more of that." Graham said and heaved an embarrassing amount of mashed potatoes onto my plate.

"Dude, stop." I laughed, trying to stabilize my grip on the plate from the unexpected extra weight.

"Penderghast." I heard Oliver's voice behind me.

My eyes shut on accord as if in an attempt to salvage my pulse, to just take a moment to myself before I inevitably had to enter another round with Oliver.

"You always seem to want something with me Oliver, why is that?" I challenged once I'd turned his way.

His eyes glazed over Graham and the rest of the people at the table with a sceptical expression. "Why are you sitting here?" He asked curiously.

"So that I can have nice conversations with nice people. So far it's not going very well." I said with fake patience and a hard stare. He looked at me for a long time then, as if trying to figure something out. I didn't bother to wait for him to do so, because I felt an urge to tease him instead. "Must be a mouthful," I began, and then paused for effect. "Always using my last name, even in casual conversation." I played with the word on my tongue for a bit. "Penderghast, Penderghast, Penderghast… it's a bloody awful name to be honest. Long. Complicated. Containing lots of different letters. Must be tiring." I said with faux empathy. "You know, nothing bad will happen if you just say Willow instead." I stated reassuringly and crossed my arms. "The name isn't cursed." He was still looking at me intensely. Come to think of it, I wasn't even sure why I wanted him to call me Willow.

"Why do you want it so bad?" He asked, as if reading my mind.

This shut me up. I hadn't thought of that. Before waiting too long and admitting insecurity I asked, "Want what?" My eyes didn't really meet his.

"Why do you want me to say your name so bad?" He repeated calmly.

"Ohh, Wood, say my name!" I heard someone behind me exclaim in fake desperation and a couple of following laughs. Damn Slytherins.

I blushed, but we both ignored them. Without waiting for an answer, he turned and walked away, probably thinking he'd won, but I couldn't let that happen. "You're too uptight!" I shouted after him in an act of actual desperation. But he didn't even turn around and it only caused more people around the hall to acknowledge the scene.

He'd caught me off guard. Now I was left wondering if he'd originally come over to make amends.

6 September 2018