Chapter 7: Birthday Present

"This is the broom Harry!" Marcus Wood said enthusiastically, presenting him a broom wrapped in cloth. It was the 20th of April and Harry was in Professor McGonagall's office together with Marcus Wood and a few representatives from Nimbus. This meeting was planned through letters between Wood and Harry with McGonagall assistance and supervision.

Harry quickly unwrapped the broom and took a good look at it. If he didn't know the details about the prototype, he would just assume that it's a regular Nimbus 2001.

"Damn, this is some good camouflaging." Harry said, inspecting the broom. He then noticed the name of the broom, hidden at the bottom of the seat. Nimbus Lightning 1.

"Lightning 1, don't you guys name your brooms 2000s?" Harry asked.

"Yes, but this is a whole new model, the 2000 series is completely different from this and the 2001s are just updates on the original design." A representative clarified.

Harry nodded and got onto the broom, levitating slightly above the ground.

"Potter, I would not recommend flying indoors, I very much prefer my office to not be in ruins." McGonagall said.

"Yeah, I know. Just trying it out a little." Harry grinned, before disembarking.

"Well, Jackson here will brief you about the finer details of the broom." Wood said.

Harry didn't exactly understand what Jackson was explaining, it was a lot more technical than he thought it would be, but from what he could gather, this broom focuses mainly on speed and agility, able to make swift adjustments while maintaining it's speed, however, this would require a lot of skill and practise to reach it's complete potential.

"Well, that would be it today, I will give you the finalised contract somewhere next month, just gotta get all the legal documents first. But remember Harry, keep this secret." Wood emphasised.

"Yeah,I know Marcus." Harry chuckled. Despite the slightly hostile start they had when Marcus told Cho to leave, they had gotten more friendly over the many letters they had sent each other throughout the last month.

"Good to see you Harry, and thank you Professor McGonagall for helping us to organise this." Wood said, before making his exit through the fireplace.

Just as Harry was also about to make his exit from the office, McGonagall called him back.

"Yes Professor?" Harry asked.

"Are you aiming to become a professional Quidditch player?" She asked.

"Urm… I haven't exactly thought about it, it's a yes and a no really."

"Hm, Would you care to elaborate."

"Well, I'm a little torn between becoming an Auror and a Quidditch player." Harry said with a shrug.

"An Auror? Why so?"

"Professor Moody encouraged me to become one and being an Auror will probably be a smarter path, seeing as professional Quidditch players retire before 40."

"That's wise coming from a 15 year old, but I have to warn you, becoming an Auror is an incredibly difficult path to walk, you need excellent grades and a lot of training. It's also highly dangerous as well, though I suppose you are used to that." McGonagall said with a smile

Harry laughed at that comment.

"Well Mr Potter, you might want to start working extra hard for both career paths, it would be good to have more than 1 option." McGonagall said to which Harry nodded intently before making his leave to test out the new broomstick.

It was 23rd of April, the day Harry was waiting for is finally here, Harry quickly got out of bed and went towards the meeting point to give Cho her gift, bringing along his Invisibility Cloak to hide it.

While walking towards the meeting place, Harry couldn't help but think about how fast everything had progressed, how close they are now. A few months ago they were dates at the Yule Ball, go even further than that and they weren't even friends. But after the second task and the altercation with Skeeter, it felt like a barrier had been broken and they were getting more comfortable with each other. Originally, the only signs that they were a couple would have been the occasional leaning on each other, occasional holding of hands, and the once in a blue moon peck. Now, they were holding hands almost everywhere they went and as Ron puts it, too uncomfortably cuddly when there was more privacy. They still weren't snogging and all that, but the pecks have become more frequent, so as the occasional kissing on the lips. Even though they were technically not even together since they hadn't made it official, they were essentially a pair already.

When he finally reached the meeting point, he found Cho comfortably leaning against a wall, reading a book, completely oblivious of Harry's presence. Going under his Invisibility Cloak, Harry sneaked up towards her.

"Close your eyes." Harry whispered to her ear, causing Cho to jump, dropping her book in the process.

"Zhu? Is that you?" Cho asked, eyes wandering around the general direction of where the sound came from.

"Yes, close your eyes!"

To his delight, Cho reluctantly closed her eyes.

"No peeking, otherwise you won't get your gift." Harry said, to which Cho made an unhappy grunt. Satisfied with Cho's compliance, Harry took off the Invisibility Cloak.

"Open both of your hands." Harry said, Cho muttered something about hating surprises before finally doing as he asked.

"Careful, it's a little heavy." Harry said, before gently placing his gift into the palms of Cho.

"You have to guess what it is before you open your eyes." Harry teased, knowing that the anticipation to see the gift was killing her.

"What! How am I going to guess it by only feeling?" Cho protested.

"Well, the game is the game, so start guessing." Harry teased.

Cho soon began feeling the gift, Harry had to hold onto an end of it to ensure that it didn't fall and break.

"It's really long." She commented.

Harry laughed at that comment mischievously making Cho confused, till she finally understood what he was thinking.

"Merlin's beard Zhu, it's not that funny." Cho said, trying to hide a smile.

"Anyways, you still have to guess what it is, you should start guessing otherwise we will be stuck here for quite a while."

"Is it a stick?"

"What, why would I even give you a stick?"

"It was just a guess of its length and texture!" Cho protested, cheeks glowing a little red as she realised how stupid the guess was.

"Keep guessing"

"I don't-" Cho paused as she finally felt the other end of the gift. "No way…"

"Yes?"

"No way you got me a broomstick."

"Is that your guess?" Harry asked, feigning innocence.

"Yes."

"Tada! You are correct!" Harry said sarcastically.

"Can I finally open my eyes?" Cho said impatiently.

"Yes yes yes" Harry replied.

Cho opened her eyes and stared at the broomstick Harry gave her, it wasn't any broomstick, it was his Firebolt.

"WHAT!" Cho yelped.

"Do you like it?" Harry asked, genuinely curious.

"Is this-"

"Yes, it's a Firebolt, mine specific-" Harry said before getting interrupted by Cho throwing her hands onto him.

"I love you Zhu." She whispered, before giving him a peck on his cheek.

"Is that all I get? Only a peck?" Harry teased.

"Oh shut up, it's not even a new one." Cho replied playfully before leaning on him to give him a kiss on his lips.

"That's better." Harry said, "Let's see you test it out shall we? Perhaps a race."

"Why did you give me this though?" Cho asked, as they walked towards the courtyard after a short detour to the Gryffindor common room to retrieve Harry's prototype broom.

"I figured that since I will have a new broom from working with Nimbus, I might as well give the Firebolt to you, especially because of what you said about becoming a professional Quidditch player."

Cho however, stared at him with a weird look, almost like a frown, the look she gives when she was thinking very hard about something.

"What?" Harry asked, puzzled.

"Did you sign the sponsorship just so that you can get me a better broom?" Cho asked suspiciously.

"What? No… Well it's part of the reason, but I did not sign the sponsorship just so that I can give you the broom, I signed it because it's actually a really good deal, you getting a better broom was just one of additional benefits, like a win-win." Harry confessed, seemingly satisfying Cho as her stare and frown became the warm smile he had grown to love.

"You know Harry, this is probably one of the best gifts you can ever give." Cho said, "However, this is a second-hand gift… not exactly something you would get for a birthday present, hm?"

At this statement, Harry gave Cho a blank stare to which Cho couldn't stop laughing at.

"Kidding, but hey, no more second-hand gifts next year." Cho teased.

"Yes mam, anyways, I don't exactly have anything else as valuable as that in my possession, other than my cloak maybe, but no way I'm giving that away." Harry smirked as he got onto his broom.

"I'm going to smoke you." Cho said confidently.

"You wish." Harry said, before zooming into the Hogwarts scenery.

Hey Infinitesalt here

Just wanna add that I made some changes to the last chapter because I realised that Cho flew a comet 260 rather than a cleansweeper :)