I found myself watching Rose closely over the next few days. I watched her from across the Great Hall as she ate lunch with her Ravenclaw friends, furrowing her eyebrows together as she debated things with them. I watched her as we sat together in class or the library, as she absentmindedly braided her hair or fidgeted with her quill as she thought or read or spoke. I watched as she yawned at breakfast and how her eyes crinkled up when she waved hello to me in the hallways as we drifted past each other, off to different places.

For some reason her comment from the library was bothering me, and I didn't know exactly why, or what to do about it. So I watched her, and hoped she would give away some kind of clue.

"Esther?"

Holly jolted me out of my thoughts. We were sat in the dining hall, but it was between meal times. The room was free for students to use as a hang out and study space a bit less stifled than the library. I had always found it interesting how individuals would revert to their house table despite the lack of affiliation when meals weren't being served. As Sawyer and I were both Hufflepuffs and thus outnumbered Holly, we were sat at our table.

"Esther?" Holly repeated.

"Sorry," I said, flustered. "I have a lot on my mind. Quidditch this weekend, you know."

"Ravenclaw won't stand a chance," said Sawyer. "You guys are miles better than them, you know that."

I shrugged. "Here's hoping." 

"I'm sure Posie will have the snitch in her hand before the whistle has even blown."

"I'm not sure you understand how the game works, Sawyer."

"Right, right, right, of course," said Holly, impatiently.

"Sorry, Holls," I said. "What's up?"

She turned a little red and looked coyly up at the ceiling. "I just wanted to know what you guys thought of my revised plan."

This was really wearing on me. I wanted nothing less than to look at her plan. But I couldn't like Holly know this. She was my friend, she was counting on me for support and advice. So I smiled and nodded and waited as she smoothed out a crumpled piece of parchment on the table in front of Sawyer and I.

She had scribbled over and crossed out a number of things on the list, drawn some doodles, and scrawled things over almost every inch of paper. It was a mess.

Sawyer raised his eyebrows. "Wow, Holls, how do you read that thing?"

"With great difficulty," Holly admitted. "Now, listen, you two. My idea is to ask Albus to help me learn how to play Quidditch."

"Holly, you can hardly fly a broom," I said.

She sighed at me. "That's the point of being taught, isn't it?"

Sawyer backed me up. "You're afraid of heights."

"Well, I fell a long way the other week and I think I'm over it," said Holly, crossing her arms indignantly. "Anyway, the whole point is that I'm afraid. I'm going to need a lot of help to learn to fly properly, to get over those fears."

"How exactly does Albus fit in with that?"

"It'll be just the two of us and our brooms. I'll be clumsy and have bad technique -"

"No trouble there," said Sawyer, teasingly.

"- and it'll be like in those cheesy romance stories, where he'll have to guide my hands into the right place or sit behind me on the broom and walk me through the motions or -"

She trailed off, staring off into space with starry eyes, obviously on another plane of existence, the one of cheesy romance stories.

Sawyer and I exchanged a glance. I was surprised to see him frowning.

"You're really caught up in this, Holly," he said. "Why don't you start small and just talk to him?"

She was pulled back down to earth. "That was part of the first phase of my plan. I have spoken to him. We are friends. But the problem is that I haven't been able to flirt with him because someone or something is always getting in the way. If I ask him to help me with Quidditch, it'll have to be just the two of us."

"I don't know if it'll make much sense, though. I mean, Esther is your friend, too. Has been for longer. Wouldn't he wonder why you're asking him and not her?"

"Maybe that'll help him see me romantically. Anyway, I can always just tell him she's too busy, what with being captain of the up and coming Quidditch champions and all that."

"But he's captain of Gryffindor," said Sawyer. "They're the defending champions. So he's just as busy."

Holly grabbed at her plan, crumpling it back into a ball and shoving it in her pocket. "I haven't even asked him anything yet, Sawyer. Maybe he will say he's too busy. Or maybe he just won't want to. But all I wanted was a little support from my friends, for you guys to nod and wish me good luck and maybe check up with me later about how it went. I know I'm not practical, that my plans are crazy. I know that if he knew how much thought I put into each little move he'd probably be scared off rather than attracted." She slammed her hands down on the table. "I know I'm a nut, okay, Sawyer? I just don't like hearing it from you."

Sawyer's eyes widened and he began stammering something about how she wasn't a nut, he hadn't said that, he hadn't meant to imply that, even. I began stuttering along with him to calm her down, back him up. But Holly wasn't listening. She had made up her mind, and when Holly made up her mind, she was inexorable. She snatched up her scarf, bag, and books in one fell swoop and marched out of the Great Hall with her stuff scrunched up in her arms in front of her, a scowl on her face. Her bouncing curls even seemed angry as they jumped around after her. She didn't turn back to look at us once.

Sawyer and I exchanged a look. I wasn't surprised to see him frowning this time. He was blinking back tears.

"I didn't mean to come across like I didn't support her," said Sawyer. He wiped angrily at his eyes.

I put an arm around him. He leaned his head on my shoulder.

"I should go talk to her," he said.

"You know Holly. You have to give her a little time to cool down."

"She's never been angry at me like this. I didn't mean that I didn't support her plan. I was trying to help her out." Sawyer wiped at his eyes again. "I think."

"You think?"

He shook his head vehemently against my shoulder. "No I don't."

"Well, do you think or don't you?"

He sat upright again. "I don't think I was trying to help Holly," said Sawyer. "I think I'm fed up with all this Albus nonsense. She won't shut up about it, won't talk about anything else. She's never even spoken to him properly. They're not super close or anything."

"I'm guessing you don't believe in love at first sight."

"Not really," he said grumpily. "How can she be so infatuated without knowing him at all?"

I patted his shoulder. "I think that's exactly how infatuation works, Sawyer. You don't know anything else about the other person."

"I guess you're right," he said. "I just hope Holly comes around to thinking that, too." He sighed. "I suppose you think I'm being selfish and a bad friend."

"Of course not, Sawyer. Why would I think that?"

"Because all Holly wanted was support. And I was selfish and a bad friend."

"You were just giving your honest opinion. And I get where you're coming from, anyway. I've also been getting tired of this whole Albus thing. Really tired. And you don't even know that -"

I stopped myself.

"I don't even know what?"

I shook my head and fidgeted with my hands in my lap. "Sorry, I should've been more careful. I'm afraid I can't tell you exactly. It's a secret."

"Oh."

I looked up at him. I felt guilty now that he knew there was something I was keeping from him, even if it wasn't my place to tell him about Scorpius. But I also felt the exhaustion of what I'd been dealing with. Even though Rose also knew at this point, she wasn't as close with Holly, so she didn't feel the full extent of it.

"I'll tell you this, though," I said. "Somebody else has a crush on Albus. And I've had to deal with two sets of plans, two sets of ramblings on about him. I have to listen to them both, all while knowing that I had another friend trying to accomplish the same thing."

"That sounds really exhausting," said Sawyer.

I felt guilty for telling Sawyer even this much, but I also felt a slight sense of relief that somebody else knew at least enough to sympathize with me. "It's been wearing on me, yeah."

"And you can't tell me who this other person is?"

"I'm afraid not. I made a promise. I trust you, of course, but I couldn't do that to" - I had to catch myself before I could say Scorpius's name - "my other friend."

He nodded. "I understand. Can I ask one thing, though?"

"I'll only answer if I can without giving away who it is."

"Does this other person love Albus, or is it another infatuation?"

I thought of the way Scorpius lit up when Albus was around. "I think it's love," I said.

~~~

I felt some ghost pain in my head as the bludgers were released from their case in the middle of the Quidditch field. Heather patted my arm.

"I'll do a better job of keeping those guys away from you this match," she said. "I promise."

"It wasn't your fault," I said.

"I know. But I'll double down on those buggers all the same. Eh, Geronimo?"

Geronimo nodded in agreement. The two beaters bumped their bats together in solidarity.

I grinned at the pair of them and turned to the rest of my team. "Feeling good?" I asked.

They pounded their broomsticks and cheered in response. We were playing Ravenclaw, the only team we were guaranteed to beat. I didn't want to let optimism get in the way, but I couldn't help get swept up by the energy. Finally a game we didn't have to worry so much about, didn't have to strategize into oblivion.

"Play it safe today, guys," I said. "We need this victory to guarantee our spot in the top two."

"Their squad is practically the same as it was last year," said Hugo, "and we beat them pretty easily. We've only gotten better since then."

"They could've gotten better since then, too," I warned.

"Yeah, yeah," said Mona, laughing. "Calm down, captain. Let's go get 'em."

The team cheered for that.

I held strong. "Play it safe," I repeated.

My advice was not heeded for very long. I reached my goalposts seconds after the whistle blew. As I turned around to orient myself with the beginnings of the match, I noticed Mona down the other end of the field. She was spiraling gracefully around the Ravenclaw chasers, but stopped abruptly in her tracks before lobbing the quaffle over her shoulder to Hugo. He swooped in and punched the quaffle straight through the center post.

"That's ten points to Hufflepuff, earned in the first ten seconds of the game," came Rehmat's commentary, booming across the pitch. "Very impressive early performance from Dice."

Mona mocked a royal wave to the crowd as she zoomed by, ruffling Hugo's hair as she zoomed past him.

Posie was circling above me. "They didn't listen to you," she said, laughing.

"When do they ever?" I joked back.

We watched as Geronimo flipped himself upside down to swing wildly at a bludger, almost losing his balance on his broom altogether. I looked to Posie and together we rolled our eyes and laughed.

Geronimo and Heather batted the bludgers back and forth as well as at their targets. Hugo and Cassie put a lot of the combinations they had practiced with me last year to use. At my goalposts, I glided back and forth, practically yawning. Mona looped acrobatically through the air not as strategy, but because she could. She was literally flying circles around the Ravenclaw team. Only Posie had to give the game her full and undivided attention, it seemed.

It was a fun game.

So much of our previous season had been stressful. We had a reputation and we were determined to do what it took to change it. Our hard work had been successful, but that just meant our current season had a different level of stress to it. Now we had a reputation we had to keep up, had to surpass. Quidditch had become something to strategize, coordinate, drill into our heads. There was pressure to succeed, to do better than we had before, to make our house proud and ourselves prouder.

But this game was just fun. Heather laughed maniacally as she hit the bludger, not calculating her every maneuver with the bat, worried she'd mess up the trajectory. Cassie let loose and attempted shots I knew she would normally overthink. Clearly nobody else was heeding my advice to play it safe, so I let myself be more daring in my defense, venturing further from my posts, being more aggressive in my encounters with the opposing chasers. Not that the quaffle was often making its way dangerously close to my end of the pitch.

Even the Hufflepuff spectators were joining in on our energy. We were quickly leading by a large margin. There was no nail biting tension, no moments that left them at the edges of their seat, worried. They danced, cheered, made up songs and chanted them at us, waving their yellow scarves over their heads as we scored, throwing them for the chasers to catch and throw back as they soared overhead.

The whole team felt lighter, felt like we were working together and enjoying it. There was no stressful atmosphere, no pressure. Only us and the sun on our faces and the air rushing past as we soared across the sky.

It was pure Quidditch. The reason we'd picked up broomsticks in the first place. 

Only Posie had a proper game face on. But then, as a seeker, she was used to the pressure. It came with the job. But when she caught sight of the snitch, she allowed herself to give into the carefree attitude of the rest of the team. She soared up after it, practically flying ninety degrees straight up. As the snitch arched over her head, she arched with it, looping her legs around her broom, flying upside down. From that position, she reached out and plucked the snitch from the air.

I almost felt bad for Ravenclaw. They hadn't stood a chance, and we'd gone a bit overboard in our showmanship.

When we landed on the pitch after the final whistle, we tackled one another in hugs, eventually falling into a canary yellow heap in the grass.

 I almost felt bad for Ravenclaw.   

Almost.