"Where have you been so early in the morning?" Alicia asked me as soon as I walked in our Dorm door.
"Uh..." I clutched Wood's blanket around me tighter like a shield as I searched for an excuse. I hadn't really thought about this eventuality. "I was sleeping."
"Where?" Angelina asked, eying my blanket.
LIE, screamed my brain.
Well, obviously. That's a given.
"The... (a range of locations flashed through and were discarded by my mind: Pitch/Great Hall/Dungeons/Castle/Lake/Boon-docks/Common Room) ...library?" I said.
Both girls turned back to brushing their hair. "Weren't you in there to study for exams?"
"Yeah," I admitted. "But it's really quiet in there. Perfect for sleeping."
"I think the silence is meant to be perfect for studying."
I wrinkled my nose. "I liked it there. Maybe I should be a librarian."
Angelina looked at the ceiling for patience. "Katie, you are the least quiet person I know. You can't even sleep quietly."
"What does that mean? Are you saying I snore?"
"No. You sleep talk, you daft cow."
Cold dread filled me. What if I'd talked when I'd been with Wood?
The short of it: Bell had. What Bell (Slept) Said: The Long of it.
BELL: Cleansweeps.
BELL: (frown washes over face) We can't ride Cleansweeps in the next Match; Slytherin all have Nimbus'.
WOOD: Go back to sleep Bell. You're sleep-talking.
BELL: ... I refuse to practice on a Cleansweep.
WOOD: Right, the Captain's decided we'll have practice on Cleansweeps.
BELL: (tragically) Nooo, Wood. No practice.
WOOD: Early practice. We'll need to get up early to be prepared to run a Match on Cleansweeps.
BELL: (grits teeth) How early?
WOOD: Obscenely early.
BELL: (muffled growls)
WOOD: Did I mention it's raining outside?
BELL: Merlin curse it.
WOOD: (voice almost cracking from subduing laughter bubbling up throat) And you're going to be late, so that's double warm-ups for you.
BELL: (said with real heat) Goddamn you, Oliver.
WOOD: ...hmm...
WOOD: Actually I think the rain's might be stopping.
BELL: (brief smile flickers over face)
WOOD: And we're not using Cleansweeps. They're too slow.
BELL: (A rhapsody of smiles)
WOOD: And you don't have to do extra warm-ups.
BELL: (ecstatic smile)
WOOD: In fact, let's say practice is cancelled. Completely, totally, I surrender cancelled.
BELL: (snuggles into Wood's shoulder)
What preceded was a true and accurate transcript of the conversation transpiring between sleep-talker Katie Bell and highly-amused-and-highly-awake Oliver Wood.
"Come on, pyscho, it's breakfast time," Alicia said.
"Swiftly followed by Quidditch training," I groaned.
Angelina and Alicia gave a wicked smile. "Somehow I think Wood won't be able to make it today."
Suspicion slammed into me with the speed of the Knight Bus. "Why can't Wood make it?" Did they know where I'd been last night?
Alicia looked blankly at me. "Last night was his birthday."
I twirled one finger in the air in a whoop-dee-doo motion. "Happy birthday, Wood. He'll still call practice on his birthday. He'll probably make it twice as long, as a present to himself."
"Considering Fred and George gave him their birthday present first, I think we'll be safe."
Angelina hit my shoulder with her hair-brush. "The count-down timer, remember? With the really unpleasant surprise that would happen to Wood when it hit midnight?"
Oh yeah. That count-down present. The one I gave to Marcus Flint last night instead.
The two girls practically skipped down to the Breakfast hall.
I trudged behind them.
Well, it'd be an unpleasant surprise for some people.
"Surprise," I muttered when we all noticed Wood leaning against the Breakfast table, in all his fit glory.
Angelina and Alicia handled the disappointment well. If it was me, there'd be tears.
Alicia cut her eyes to George and narrowed them. George merely shrugged. Angelina mouthed, 'What went wrong?' to Fred, who replied silently with, 'Dunno.' A typical Weasley response to wayward magic.
The boys of Gryffindor's Quidditch team were already at the Hall, eating breakfast and not one of them batted an eyelid when I slid in next to them still in last night's clothes. I was notorious for wearing anything except the approved Quidditch robes in protest of early-morning practice sessions.
"Happy birthday, Wood," I muttered as I grabbed some toast from the toast racks. I'd told people to fuck off and die in cheerier tones.
Wood waved his hand in the air as if my words were a swarm of gnats he wanted to disperse.
Wanker.
He surveyed his team and cleared his throat guiltily. "Sorry for waking you up early unnecessarily-" there were mutinous grunts from the breakfast table, "-but I've decided to cancel practice this morning."
Okay, that was a genuine surprise.
Spoons dropped from stunned fingers and clinked into cereal bowls. Oatmeal splattered onto laps and pumpkin juice sprayed over Daily Prophet headlines. I frowned, experiencing a sudden and intense sense of déjà vu. But then it passed and I dropped my head to my arms, fervently trying to fall back asleep in my spot.
The conversation continued around me.
"Maybe the timer did something after all. Maybe it changed Wood's personality."
"You said this day would never come. Pay up."
We were a competitive bunch, us sportspeople.
Rolling his eyes, George fished up a bag of clinking coins and threw it at his brother.
"And you said it'd only be cancelled if he was dead."
Fred sighed and slid the bag of bet winnings down the table runner towards the girls.
"Did you cancel practice because we've somehow already won the Cup by a default or bylaw?"
"No." Alicia scowled and pushed the money to Angelina.
"Did you get into Puddlemere?"
"No, the re-trials have been postponed again. Still sorting out paperwork with what happened with Cally influencing the try-outs with her Veela powers."
"Why don't we ask Wood his reason for cancelling practice?" Alicia suggested. "Instead of playing this absurd guessing game."
All pairs of eyes cut to Wood. He just shrugged under their scrutiny.
"I have a prior commitment."
I cracked open an eye in surprise, just in time to see all eyes swing to me. If our bets defaulted I got paid out instead, because I was constantly lobbying for the abolition of early-morning practice, so I got any Other-Case scenario.
Angelina lobbed the coin purse at me. I fumbled and almost dropped it, until my fingers caught the leather loops of the draw-string. Wood cut a glare at me then looked away as if shamed by the catching skills of his top Chaser. Whatever. I caught it, didn't I?
Alicia waved her hand airily. "Since when has anything double-scheduled with Quidditch come out as your higher priority?"
"I have to help Bell cram for her exams," Wood explained breezily.
I dropped the Galleons all over the floor.
"That's great, Wood," I recovered and I swept up my winnings before reaching for the butter knives. "But now there's no practice I'm planning on going back to bed." Not your bed, I flushed the same colour as the raspberry jam on my toast.
My skin kept zinging randomly, heat waves rolling over me as if I was still back in Wood's bed. That wasn't a normal reaction, was it? It felt like I was fevered.
Wood set his palms down on the table across from me, his ring finger still a little crooked from that nasty catch last year, and I struggled not to look up as I slathered my toast with more jam. "I will see you in 10 minutes on the Quidditch Pitch." He leant in and dropped his voice to a husky rolling Scots whisper. "And Bell, if you're not there, I'm coming looking for you."
I lifted a goblet to my lips with feigned casualness and he stalked out of the Hall.
"Wood's a bit of a flirt, isn't he," I muttered sarcastically into my juice.
Alicia rolled her eyes. "And you only just noticed now?" she said in all genuineness.
I stopped sipping my juice. "Seriously?"
"Right detective in the making, you are." Alicia loved Who-dunnit novels.
Angelina giggled. "Oh Merlin, Katie, you can be really thick sometimes."
"How long's he been..."...Hot? No Katie, stop trailing off into dreamworld and finish the sentence "... like that?" I couldn't bring myself to say 'flirty' because I still didn't believe he was capable of it. He was a living embodiment of Quidditch, that was it. I mean, his love letters would be Quidditch plays and attack formations. Bouquets would be replacement Nimbus broom twigs.
"Since always," Alicia mushed around the museli she shovelled into her mouth.
"He's not like that on the Quidditch Pitch. He's all intense and grumpy and pedantic."
"Not the first year he was coach," Angelina revealed.
"Ah... those were the times... the glory days of fun and one-hour practices..."
"Wood wasn't always a manic coach? Where was I when this happened?"
"There," Alicia crunched. "Not paying attention."
I always pay attention. Well, in a way that means I mostly never pay attention.
"He tried flirting with you, Katie," Angelina explained. "When you first made the team."
"Did he?" I practically screech. A few heads turn, looking for the source of the screeching, probably expecting a red Howler to be floating above a chastised head. I lowered the octaves a little. "I mean, did he then?"
"Yeah, but you were too busy doing stunts on your broomstick, whizzing around tipping off hats and side-swiping people so your broom's sticks scratched peoples' skin – remember how you used to always do that, like the immature nutter you are - so Wood gave up being subtle and just went all business when dealing with you."
"I was just there to play Quidditch," I mumbled. Me and my one-track mind.
I crunched on my toast, lost in thought. When I raised my eyes I saw Alicia and Angelina considering me, one covertly over the edge of her paper, the other openly staring.
"I think she's ready for The Talk." They traded several loaded messages with their silent looks alone, then as one, turned to me. It was eerily creepy and could put Fred and George to shame. In fact, the twins were listening quietly for once.
"Let's put this in terms you'll understand, Katie," Angelina said.
"You know how Oliver's a Keeper?" explained Alicia.
I snorted. "That soon, Leesh? If you want him, you can marry him."
Alicia swatted me with her wand. "I give up. Angelina, you're tagged in."
Angelina slid her elbows over the table and leaned in closer to me. "Hun, Leesh meant Oliver plays a Keeper."
"I know, Angelina, I do occasionally-" mostly never "-pay attention during practice."
"So he plays defensive."
"And?"
"And you're a Chaser."
"So?"
"So for the love of Merlin, go chase him!" Alicia weighed in.
"Shut it Alicia, you abandoned play on the conversation." She swung back to me. "You play offense, so get on the offensive: make your move first. You make good passes to us during Quidditch –," she waggled an eyebrow at me. "Why don't you make some better ones to Wood after Quidditch?"
"Snog the haggis out of the Flying Scotsman!" Alicia barracked.
I sat, stunned at the suddenly left-turn of events breakfast had taken. I don't know how to respond to that.
At that moment my 9 minutes and 59 seconds of glory obviously expired, because Wood appeared in the dining Hall, duffle over his shoulder, glower on his face. Lovely to see you too, Sunshine. His wand was in hand and pointed in my direction.
I'd been forcibly Levitated from my bed on so many countless mornings, and Leg-Locked when I'd mistakenly tried to bolt that time in second year, I knew Wood was serious in his archaic Hunt-You-Down threat.
I stood up and reached for the toast I hadn't managed to eat.
There was a bang and it disintegrated into shreds and crumbles. Wood's work no doubt.
I smiled at my table. "My Prince Charming calls."
The day outside was going to be beautiful: perfect temperature, playful breeze bringing sounds of the Giant Squid's tentacles leisurely slapping at the lake's surface. At the moment though, it was still the unformed thought of a morning, slowly taking shape through the cold grey pre-dawn light.
The wind pushed some of my hair into my yawn.
Enough 'of what a beautiful morning' crap: in my mind a perfect morning is a morning best slept through.
Wood's mouth was open too, but not in a yawn. Vapour was steaming from Wood's breath like he was a man possessed. I was trying not to get distracted by making shapes out of the steam dissipating out of his lips. Then I tried not getting distracted by Wood's lips.
"Bell, you study like you play Quidditch," Oliver barked. I jolted back from dream-land. Don't mistake his tone: wasn't a compliment. The unsaid subtext was not, 'You study like you play Quidditch' read: awesomely. He meant it accusatorily.
"Hey!" I protested. "I'm good at Quidditch!"
Wood crossed his arms over his chest, folding his fingers into his biceps. "You lack commitment during practice," he diagnosed.
I looked into his honey brown eyes, flat with candour, and I choked down an outraged sound. Unfortunately, Wood took this as a 'do go on'.
"You lack discipline, routine, organisation and you're sporadic in your attention. You expect to pick everything up effortlessly, so when it doesn't come easily to you, you become discouraged and distracted."
Great pep-talk Wood. Definitely going to ace those tests now.
"The difference between my studying and my Quidditch is I'd actually prefer to be out here at half-past-night's-arse-crack practicing Quidditch right now."
Wood seemed to expect this answer. His lips slid sideways in something that might have been the beginnings of a smile. "Why not do both?"
He flicked his wand at the duffle bag at my feet, which I assumed was full of text books and quills for studying. Instead a Quaffle launched itself into Wood's hands.
"It's called positive association," he explained, tossing the ball between his palms. I followed it's movements with my head like a puppy tracking a treat. "You like Quidditch, so if you're studying on the pitch, some of that happiness might bleed over."
Maybe this was making sense.
"Okay?" I agreed suspiciously.
Wood gave a dazzling smile currently brighter than the sun. "Great. Warm-up time." Immediately the Quaffle disappeared. "Bridges."
The old bait-and-switch, I groaned inwardly. When will you learn, Katie? I sunk to push-up position on my palms and balls of my feet. Maybe I'd learn faster if I'd studied better, another voice argued in my head.
Bridges, for those of you lucky bastards who've never known the torture of Gryffindor Warm Ups under Oliver 'Cromwell' Wood's regime, consisted of extended push-ups, where you held your weight on your arms and toes, back perfectly level (hence the 'bridge' comparison), and stayed in that position until such time as Hitler – I meant my coach – deems necessary.
"One." Wood counted for me. But instead of progressing to 'two' like a normal person, he flicked his wrist, summoning whatever else was in the bag. I winced, expecting a Bludger. Hey, the day could get worse: Oliver could totally kick a girl when she's literally down on the ground. A battered copy of 'A History of Magic' snapped into Wood's open hand. "Bell," he said, offhand, "Did you know the 3 Broomsticks was used as a headquarters in the 1612 Goblin Rebellion at the Hogsmeade?"
"Really Wood?" I puffed, arms shaking from holding my body in the 'up' position of the bridge. "Fascinating. Let's get a drink there and relive the history. You can play the Goblins, I'll play the Wizards' side."
Wood gave a broad grin in triumph, and I recognised that smirk every time he saved a particularly nasty goal from Slytherin, or whenever I sunk a Quaffle across the Pitch. I had a feeling I'd chosen the losing team in the stupid Goblin Rebellion analogy.
"Repeat it."
I lifted my gaze from the green grass of the Pitch. Really, Hagrid did a superb job grounds-keeping.
I raised an eyebrow at Wood, keeping it steadier than my trembling arms. Wood looked down at me, his eyes like honey and coffee and warm things. "I'm a parrot now?" My ground-up angle magnified the curve of his lips, making his smile more pronounced. And not an ounce of double-chin on the man; he was all sweeping jaw-line and sharp cheekbones.
"Just repeat the fact, Bell, then you can stop holding the bridge."
I huffed out a breath. "Fine. 1612 Goblin Rebellion at the Hogsmeade."
"Two," Wood resumed counting. I released my elbows from their arm-lock and almost crashed face-first into the grass. Like I'd almost crashing into Oliver's face this morning, in his bed. Don't get distracted, I cautioned myself.
From my view of greenery, I heard the pages turn as Wood delicately flicked through the parchment. "Were you aware that Urg the Unclean came into his name during a public dunking at his village pond in 1796? He refused to bathe afterwards and fought his first rebellion there three months later." There was an expectant pause from above me.
"No, Wood," I gritted out, my voice ruffling the grass beside my face. "I was clearly not aware of this delicious morsel of information. It's even better than my incinerated jam sandwich from breakfast. I feel I could live off learning."
Sarcasm was lost on Wood. "Better repeat it then." He toed my foot. "Up you get."
I heaved into another bridge.
Fifteen minutes later we'd cleared two chapters and Warm-Ups were officially over. I was physically exhausted, but mentally studying hadn't been as taxing as I'd expected. My arms were as floppy as the Giant Squid's tentacles, but I'd call that a win. Point 1 to me.
I wasn't really zoned in to Wood's next lot of instructions, because I stopped listening once he said the magic word: broomsticks.
So I was sort of surprised to find myself in the air with a Quaffle in hand, in front of the goal posts, with Wood on his broom bellowing out some question from a book he held open. Wood, interestingly, positioned himself behind the posts, to retrieve my shots once they'd gone through. So he was serious in letting me score some goals.
The Hoops had large multi-coloured flashing light-bulbs floating above them labelled A, B and C.
"Is this a multiple choice test?" I bellowed at him.
"Haven't you been listening?"
"No."
Wood snapped the book closed. "I'm not repeating myself."
Fine. I could totally wing it. I did most practices and that worked out quite well for me. That was almost my approach to tests, which did not work out quite so well for me.
I took careful aim and pitched the Quaffle towards the left hand hoop. There was a deep 'BWONG' sound and the Quaffle was summarily rejected by the hoop. It ricocheted back towards my face at ten times the speed I'd thrown it.
That was unexpected.
I caught it firmly with two hands, cushioning it, but even then the recoil was too powerful. It jolted my grip, threatening to slam into my stomach. I reared back on my broomstick in counter-balance and even that didn't do the trick. I'd have to roll with it.
I twisted a full somersault in the air to absorb the impact, locking my legs around my broom handle to stay seated, since my hands were full.
When I was nicely horizontal again, with the ground below me and the sky above and my braid back over my shoulder, I narrowed my eyes at Wood, hovering innocently behind the goal posts.
"Got some kick to it," I accused neutrally.
"That's because it was a spectacularly wrong answer. Not even close."
Point 1 to Wood.
I was determined that would be the one and only point he scored.