Archive of Our Own

No matter how hard I tried to throw the stupid wand to the ground, it just wouldn’t break.

At this point, I think I’d done everything twice to get it to snap or splinter. I’d even gotten help from some pyromaniacs in the floor below my department to light it on fire.

And yet, there the wand was. My wand. Mocking me from the corner of my desk. I rolled it back and forth with my pointer finger, testing out various curses to see if I could get it to spontaneously combust. No such luck.

How annoying.

“Faux, what the bloody hell are you doing?”

I shoot up, shoving my wand into my robes pocket.

Oliver Wood was giving me a look I couldn’t quite place, but if I had to give it a label, confusion fit decently well.

“Nothing.” I hid my hands behind my back.

“Well, we have an appointment? Don’t we?”

I looked over to my schedule, bright and crimson was Oliver’s name written down- right in-between lunch and a meeting with the Head of Magical Registration.

I smiled politely, opening a drawer and pulling out the same basic manila folder I gave everyone and handed it to him so he could start filling out all the details.

“This time of year is busy for renewals. I’m a bit frazzled.”

“I could tell.” Oliver commented, taking the folder from me and sitting across from me in the comfortable chaise lounge. He didn’t lay down on it, just sat normally.

“Faux.” Oliver’s eyebrow quirked up, and he tapped the manila folder against his knee. “You’ve got ink on your chin. And you look like you’ve been wrestling a niffler.”

I wiped at my face quickly, probably just smearing it worse. The wand in my pocket felt like it weighed ten stone, warm against my thigh like it knew I’d been trying to destroy it for the better part of an hour.

“Occupational hazard,” I said, sliding back into my desk chair and gesturing vaguely at the stacks of renewal forms. “You know how it is. Paperwork gets violent this close to deadline.”

He didn’t buy it. Oliver Wood had been Captain of the Gryffindor Quidditch team — the man could spot a feint from fifty yards out. He leaned forward, green eyes scanning my desk, lingering on the faint scorch mark near the corner where the “pyromaniacs from Magical Accidents” had helped.

“Right,” he drawled. “Violent paperwork. That’s why it smells like burnt wand lacquer in here?”

I opened my mouth, then shut it. Lying to Oliver was like trying to block a Bludger with a teacup — messy and pointless. He’d always managed to see through me, and we weren’t even that close.

“It’s my wand,” I admitted finally, keeping my voice low. I drummed my fingers on the desk, then stopped when I realized I was doing the same rhythm I’d used trying to snap the damn thing earlier. “It won’t... stop. Being a wand.”

Oliver blinked. “As opposed to…?”

“Being in pieces. On fire. Hexed into oblivion. Pick one.”

He set the folder down, unopened. The confusion on his face shifted into something closer to concern, with a dash of that exasperated-captain look he used to give first years who forgot their gloves.

I remember being in school with him, and how ‘fired’ up he could get over a simple sport. Although, I do wish that I had a passion for something.

“Faux, why are you trying to destroy your wand? Renewal meeting or not, that’s not exactly standard Ministry procedure.”

I slumped back. The wand was definitely mocking me now. I could feel it.

“Because it won’t let me quit,” I muttered. “Handed in my retirement to the Head of Magical Registration last week. Thought I’d make it ceremonial. Snap the wand, end the job, nice clean break. Except—” I jerked my thumb at the corner of the desk where it had landed after every attempt. “It’s decided it’s not done with me.”

Oliver was quiet for a beat. Then he stood, walked around the desk, and before I could protest he’d pulled the wand out of my robes. It didn’t burn him. Didn’t spark. Just sat in his palm like any other piece of hawthorn and dragon heartstring.

“Maybe,” he said, turning it over, “it’s not the wand that’s the problem.”

I scowled. “Don’t get philosophical on me, Wood. I have three more renewals after you and I already smell like a campfire.”

He grinned — that lopsided, stupidly confident grin that won him games and, apparently, arguments in Ministry offices. He set the wand down on top of his unopened folder and slid both back across to me.

“Then let’s make it quick. You do my renewal, and after… we figure out why your wand thinks you’re not done yet. Deal?”

The wand rolled once, tapping against my inkwell with a soft clink.

Bloody thing. Wretched object of my demise.

“Fine,” I sighed, pulling out a fresh quill. “But if it sets the chaise on fire, you’re explaining it to Magical Maintenance.”

Oliver just sat back down, smug. “Wouldn’t be the first time I’ve had to file an incident report.”

I dipped the quill and tapped it against the edge of the inkwell. The wand rolled again, like it was trying to get my attention. I shot it a glare.

“Name,” I said, all business now. Might as well get through Oliver’s renewal questions before my office spontaneously combusted out of spite.

“Oliver Wood,” he said, though the corner of his mouth twitched. “But you knew that, Faux.”

“Standard procedure,” I muttered, scribbling it down anyway. “Occupation?”

“Reserve Keeper for Puddlemere United. Part-time Little League Skyball Coach for Puddlemere Youth Division.” He leaned back on the chaise, and for a second he looked like he belonged there — like my dingy Ministry office was just another locker room. “And apparently, a wand therapist.”

“Don’t,” I warned, pointing the quill at him. A drop of ink flicked off and landed on his folder. Perfect. He didn’t even flinch. “Reason for renewal?”

“To keep playing Quidditch legally in Britain,” he answered easily. “To not get arrested for unlicensed spellwork during practice. The usual.”

I hummed, filling out the lines. Date of birth. Wand core. Last recorded spellwork. All normal. All routine. Except my wand chose that moment to levitate half an inch off the desk and thud back down.

Oliver’s eyes flicked to it. “You doing that, or…?”

“Not me.” I set the quill down slowly. “I’m not casting. Haven’t been able to get the thing to listen to me all morning unless it’s to not break.”

The wand shuddered. Then, deliberately, it rolled across the parchment and underlined Oliver’s name. Twice. In red ink that definitely hadn’t been there before.

We both stared.

“Did your wand just…” Oliver started.

“Volunteer to do my paperwork? Yeah.” I pinched the bridge of my nose. Ink on my fingers now. Great. “It’s never done that before. Usually it just sits there and looks judgmental.”

Oliver reached out, careful, and picked up the wand again. It didn’t fight him. If anything, it warmed in his hand. He turned it, frowning.

“Faux, when did you last actually use this? For real spellwork, not… attempted arson.”

I opened my mouth. Closed it.

“…Honestly? Can’t remember. Been months. Since before I requested the transfer out of Auror Dispatch, probably. I’ve been stamping forms and dodging the Head of Registration. Haven’t had a reason to.”

Oliver was quiet. Then he held the wand out to me, hilt first.

“Try now. Something simple. Lumos.”

“Wood, I’ve tried. It won’t—”

“Humor me.”

I scowled, but I took it. The wood was warm, almost smug. I took a breath.

In a hesitant whisper, I muttered, “Lumos.”

Light burst from the tip — not the weak, flickering glow I’d been getting for weeks, but proper, bright, warm wandlight. It flooded the office, catching on the scorch mark and the stacks of manila folders and Oliver’s stupidly surprised face.

The wand hummed in my hand. Content.

I doused the light quickly, heart thudding. “What the hell—”

“Faux.” Oliver was looking at me like he’d just solved a Chaser formation. “You weren’t trying to quit the Ministry.”

I blinked. “I literally handed in a resignation letter—”

“You were trying to quit magic,” he said. “Or at least, pretending you didn’t need it anymore. Desk job, paperwork, no field work. No spells. And your wand’s not having it.”

The wand, as if agreeing, tapped once against the desk.

I swallowed. “That’s… ridiculous. Wands don’t— they’re tools. They don’t get opinions.”

“Tell that to yours.” He nodded at the parchment, where it had underlined his name. “Think it’s got a reason you scheduled me today?”

I looked at the black letters. Oliver Wood. Right between lunch, other meetings, and the Head of Magical Registration. The meeting where I was supposed to finalize leaving.

“…No,” I said, but it sounded weak even to me.

Oliver stood, grabbing his folder and tucking it under his arm, unsigned.

“You know what I think? I think your wand knew you’d try to throw it away. I think it also knew I’m too stubborn to let you fill out forms in peace.” He grinned. “And I think it wants you to remember why you picked it up in the first place.”

The wand rolled into my palm before I could reach for it. I stared at him. “You’re not getting your renewal signed by me today, are you?”

“Not if it means watching you set your desk on fire again, no.” He headed for the door, then paused. “Pub after your shift? Bring the wand. And maybe don’t try to kill it before 5.”

The door clicked shut behind him.

I looked down at the wand. It wasn’t mocking me anymore. It was waiting.

“…Fine,” I muttered to it. “But you’re buying the first round.”

It sparked, just once. Almost like a laugh.

I owled the Head of Magical Registration and cancelled the appointment. I was still thinking about it. Although, I doubt a simple conversation with Oliver Wood would do much for my dwindling love for magic and appreciation for a stupid stick of wood.

*****

It was raining sideways outside, the kind that soaks you in five steps and makes everyone in the pub smell like wet wool and damp ambition. Oliver Wood had already claimed a corner booth, two glasses of emberwhisky sweating on the scarred wood, and that infuriating grin that said he’d planned this ambush days ago.

I slid in across from him, wand still warm in my robes pocket like it knew I’d considered ditching it again on the walk over. Traitor.

“You’re late,” he said.

“You ordered without me,” I shot back, eyeing the amber liquid. “Presumptuous.”

“You always drink this when you’re pissed at inanimate objects.” He’s sarcastic. He pushed one glass toward me. “Figured it was a safe bet.”

I took it, mostly so I had something to do with my hands. The wand tapped my thigh once. Warning shot.

Oliver didn’t fill the silence. He just watched me, green eyes doing that thing where he looked like he was reading a playbook I hadn’t written yet. Then he pulled a napkin toward him and started sketching. Terrible, lopsided thing with scratchy wings.

“Still the worst artist in the world,” I muttered before I could stop myself.

His grin went crooked. “And you still have flyer’s calluses, Faux.” He nodded at my hands. “Desk jobs don’t leave those.”

I shoved my hands under the table so fast I almost knocked over my drink. “Occupational hazard from… filing. Lots of paper cuts.”

“Liar.” He said it easy, like he was calling a pass on the field. Not accusing. Just… sure. “When’s the last time you were up?”

“Up?”

“On a broom. In the air. Where it’s quiet and nothing expects you to stamp it in triplicate.”

The wand went hot against my leg.

I drank instead of answering. The whisky burned, but not enough to drown out the memory: dawn air, cold in my lungs, the city falling away until it was just me and the clouds and the stupid, perfect silence before a dive.

Oliver saw it. Of course he did. Captain’s eyes.

“Thought so,” he said, soft now. He spun the napkin so the little sketch faced me. Not a snitch. A feather-token — the thing skyball chasers fought over. “You miss it.”

“I don’t—”

“You’re trace warding sigils on your glass.”

I froze. Looked down.

There, in the sweat on my glass, was a perfect protection loop. Clean. Instinctive. I hadn’t even noticed my finger moving.

Shit.

Oliver’s hand covered mine before I could wipe it away. Warm. Callused in all the same places mine were. Not trapping. Just… there.

“Breathe,” he said. “You’re not on trial.”

I yanked my hand back like he’d hexed me. “I’m not— I’m fine. I just want out. Some of us don’t live for magical applause.”

The words came out sharp. Too sharp. My voice cracked on “out” and I hated him a little for hearing it.

He didn’t flinch, and he didn’t seem angry at how I’d just insulted him. Just leaned back, took a slow sip, and studied me over the rim.

Setting the glass down with a soft clink, he leaned in, elbows on the table, close enough that I could see the faded white line through his eyebrow. Old injury. Skyball. Bludger equivalent.

“You spend all day telling people they can’t use magic off-license, then you go home and try to commit wand-icide. Hypocrite looks good on you.”

I kicked him under the table. Hard. He’s being an ass.

He just kept grinning. “But I think your wand’s a stubborn bastard. Like its witch.” He tapped the napkin. “So you’ve got two options. Keep fighting it and smell like a campfire the rest of your life…”

My wand chose that moment to slide out of my pocket on its own. It rolled across the table and stopped dead, pointing straight at him.

“…Or,” Oliver finished, not even looking at it, “you let me take you flying at dawn. No forms. No Bureau. Just you, me, and the stupid sky.”

Warmth hit behind the ribs. Not the whisky. Not the pub fire. It was the way he said “just you” like it was the easiest thing in the world. Like I wasn’t three renewal forms and one resignation letter away from disappearing.

I wanted to say no. The word was right there, safe and familiar.

Instead, I stared at the wand.

It sparked once. Smug.

Oliver’s smile went soft. Dangerous. “Is that a yes?”

“I didn’t—” I dragged a hand through my hair, probably smearing ink I’d missed earlier. “If I go, you sign your renewal. Tonight. Properly. No more ‘wand therapist’ commentary in the margins.”

“Deal.” He stuck his hand out across the table.

I looked at it. Then at him. Then at the wand, which had the audacity to nudge my fingers.

I took his hand. His grip was solid. Flyer’s grip. Grounding.

“Don’t read into it,” I warned. “This is just… temporary insanity. Brought on by smoke inhalation.”

“Sure,” he said, hand squeezing mine, quick, before he let go. “And Faux?”

“What.”

“You don’t have to love magic today. You just have to stop trying to kill it.”

My throat went tight. I covered it by draining the rest of my whisky.

“Shut up and sign your form, Wood.”

He laughed, full and unguarded, and pulled the crumpled manila folder out of his jacket. I watched him sign. I watched my hand, steady for the first time all day, as I countersigned.

My sigil on the glass was still there, slowly dripping down, but not gone yet. Remnants of what used to be my everyday as an Auror. Tracing protection and casting spells and defending.

“Meet at dawn, Puddlemere Field,” Oliver said, standing. He dropped a few coins on the table- value enough to cover both of our drinks, then paused. “And Faux? Wear gloves. It can get cold above the clouds.”

He walked out, leaving the feather-token napkin behind.

I picked it up. Folded it once. Twice. Slipped it into my pocket next to the wand.

“…One flight,” I told it. “That’s it. Don’t get ideas.”

*****

I wake up with my heart pounding aggressively in my ribcage. Panting. I can feel the cold sweat dripping down my spine and disappearing into the fabric of my light blue tank.

I run a hand over my face.

I dreamt seeing her again.

My cousin, lying in a pool of her own blood.

It had been a horrible occurrence, and I never intended it to go that way. Not with Celia dead. Not with my back to the wall, hands shaking as I screamed for back-up to help me properly bind the Nundu.

How an East-African Nundu managed to get into the alleys of England was beyond me. Its leopard form was stalking me, watching my next move. Sleek, black fur rippled with magic under the skin. Eyes a deep yellow shade. Celia’s arm hanging in its mouth. It purred.

When back-up finally arrived, I was throwing up and curled over my knees, my mouth had gone dry with terror.

And my wand was still lying in the puddle of metallic crimson surrounding Celia’s body. Her mouth was open, frozen mid-spell.

The event circulated around in the news for a month or so.

Auror Run-In With Deadly Nundu.

Auror Celia Faux Dead

Nundu Killed Cousin of Acclaimed Auror

Therapy for Aurors? Let’s Debate.

I was on hiatus for almost half a year. I couldn’t pick up my wand without feeling tears prick up in my eyes.

I clambered out of bed, going to the bathroom and throwing water onto my face. When I looked into the mirror- I saw a failure. I downed a glass of water.

Her bedroom door was open. I peeked into it.

Her books lay open on her bed, blankets askew. Her Auror awards hanging up on the walls. Her wand was sitting on the chest of drawers- I put it there when I had gotten home that night.

I don’t enter the room. I just slam the door shut, sliding my back against the birch wood. I can hear Celia snapping at me still, telling me to get our brooms ready because she wanted to go for a race. She loved midnight air the best, and it always made her curly black hair shine.

My chin goes heavy atop my folded arms. I can feel the heaves in my body as I cry. Hot, messy, and raw. Visceral.

It should have been me.

*****

I sit there on the floor outside Celia’s room until my legs go numb and the tears stop coming hot. They just… stop.

The house is quiet. Too quiet. The kind of quiet that happens after you’ve screamed and the walls didn’t scream back.

My wand is on the kitchen table where I dropped it after the pub. It hasn’t moved. Hasn’t sparked. It’s just waiting. Again. Always waiting.

I push to my feet, every joint protesting, and go to my own room. My broom’s in the corner, leaning against the wardrobe like a shadow fiend. Department-issued Cleansweep Eleven. Dented from the last time I used it — chasing down a rogue Erumpent six months before the Nundu.

Before I decided magic was safer on paper than in my hands.

I run my thumb over the handle. The grip’s worn smooth. Flyer’s calluses. Oliver was right about that, the bastard.

Dawn’s in twenty minutes. Puddlemere Field’s a quick Apparation if I don’t splinch myself.

I dress on autopilot. Thick blue jumper, crows embroidered on the left breast and silver accents on the turtleneck. Second-hand gloves — “It can get cold above the clouds,” he’d said. Like he knew I’d need the reminder. Like he knew I’d come.

Celia’s door is still shut. I press my palm flat against it. The wood’s cold.

“I’m not promising anything,” I whisper to her. To the books. To the wand on her dresser. “But I’m not setting it on fire today. That’s something, right?”

No answer. There never is. But the weight in my chest shifts.

I grab my broom. At the kitchen table, I hesitate. Then I hold out my hand.

The wand rolls across the wood and into my palm. No spark. No smugness. Just warm. Present. It’s fighting to be back into my life, but I wasn’t going to give in that easily to its pleads.

“One flight,” I tell it, echos from last night with Oliver at the bar. My voice doesn’t shake. “Don’t get ideas.”

It doesn’t argue.

The crack of Apparation is louder than I remember. Or maybe the world’s just been quieter lately. It sounds like breaking a piece of burnt sugar over a pudding dish.

Puddlemere Field smells like dew and cut grass. The sky’s that deep, bruised purple before the sun commits to shining. And there’s Oliver, already in the air, doing slow, lazy loops like he’s got nowhere else to be. Like he knew I’d show. His brown hair is a little overgrown, it needed to be cut. It curls onto his neck and mingles with his black turtleneck.

Oh, goody. He and I were matching- almost.

He spots me and drops into a dive, pulling up at the last second with a grin that cuts through the cold.

He knows he’s handsome- I’m sure of it with the way he arches an eyebrow at me stretching my arm slightly.

“You came,” he calls, not surprised. Never surprised. “Thought I’d have to send a search party. Or your wand would drag you here itself.”

I mount my broom. The wood creaks. My skin stretches over my knuckles where I put my hold, then eases when my grip relaxes.

“Shut up, Wood,” I say, but there’s no bite in it. “You said we’re going above the clouds.”

“Race you there?” His eyes are on my hands. Steady now without a tremor in sight.

I look down at my wand, tucked into the holster against my calf I swore I’d never wear again.

Celia’s laugh is in my head. “You always lose, cousin. Too scared to dive.”

My throat closes. I swallow past it.

Then I kick off, rushing away from Oliver’s hovering.

The ground drops away. The wind hits my face, cold and real and loud. For a second it’s too much — the height, the memory, the Nundu’s eyes in the dark. My grip falters.

But the broom holds. The air holds. And Oliver’s beside me, not ahead, not behind. Matching my pace. Guarding my flank like the Bludgers in life are only hypothetical.

“Faux,” he shouts over the wind. “You don’t have to love it today!”

I take a look at his face, it isn’t so much boyish as it is optimistic. His nose had been broken a few times, so it had a few bumps on the bridge. The cold air is nipping at his face, causing pink to blossom across his skin. He has a mole on his jaw, right at the midpoint between his ear and chin.

I remember his words. You just have to stop trying to kill it.

So I don’t. I breathe. I climb.

We break the cloud line together. The sun spills over the top of the world, gold and honest and unasked-for. It lights up the mist below us until we’re flying over an ocean of light.

And for the first time in a year, my chest doesn’t hurt.

It just aches.

Oliver pulls up beside me. He doesn’t say anything. Doesn’t need to, because if he ruined this silence, I’d slap him. He’s trying to read the play.

Slowly, I pull the wand from its holster. It’s warm. Waiting for me. It felt like a lot of things lately were just waiting for me to make a choice. To give up or press forward. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do next. The answer isn’t clear.

Oliver stretches his arms out, accepting the breeze. He exhales.

I don’t cast. Not yet. I just hold my wand, let the sun catch on the hawthorn, let the wind whip past us both.

“It should have been me,” I say. The wind takes it, but Oliver hears it anyway.

He knows what I’m referring to. Who wouldn’t. I’d become the model for why being an Auror wasn’t always the best option.

He nods. Once. Doesn’t offer platitudes. Just says, “Maybe. But it wasn’t.”

Celia’s voice, this time softer, “When you’re in the air, just let it take you where you need to go.”

I close my eyes. Open them.

Below us, England wakes up. Renewal forms. Head of Magical Registration. A thousand reasons to quit.

Above us, just sky.

I look at Oliver. “If I hex you off this broom, is that a violation of my Auror code?”

He smirks, “Probably.”

He dives.

*****

It was a pattern now.

Oliver was really good at hovering.

And I had picked up a part-time job. Only because he had bothered me about it for two weeks straight.

“That looks great Lukas!” I shout, watching as the nine year old did a low spin around the field, reaching out to grab the Snitch.

Oliver was also on a broom, hands on his hips as he watched the game playout. When Lukas caught the snitch, I cheered and blew the whistle hanging around my neck.

The fifteen or so kids came down from the sky, standing around me in a circle. Little League Skyball, Puddlemere Youth Division. I knew some of the kids’ parents- some were Celia’s friends at school. They would drop their kids off sometimes, and look at me with an unspoken sympathy. I could mostly let it roll off. Other times it itched for the rest of the day.

“Okay, everyone make sure to practice physical conditioning, eat all your meals, say thank you to your parents, and don’t forget to get a little bit of broom riding in each day. We’ll meet again next month, that first Wednesday.”

The kids nod, grabbing their brooms and running around to greet their parents. The last kid’s parent finally wrangles them away from the pitch, leaving behind only the scuffed grass, a forgotten water bottle, and the smell of damp leather.

Oliver lands beside me with a soft thud, rolling his shoulders. “Lukas is getting cocky. Three catches in a row.” There’s pride in it. “You’re good for him.”

“Don’t.” I’m already stuffing whistles and score charts into my crossbody bag. My voice comes out sharper than I mean it to. “I’m just here because you wouldn’t shut up about it.”

“Sure,” he says. Easy. Not pushing. He picks up a rogue Quaffle and tosses it into the crate. “And because you haven’t set anything on fire in three weeks.”

My wand, holstered at my calf, gives a warm pulse. Smug bastard. I didn’t toss it into the depths of my bag anymore- I let it assume a comforting return to the holster that I started wearing regularly again. My supervisor at the Magical Registration commented about it. I just shrugged in response to his observation.

We fall into the routine we’ve built. I check the Bludger straps for wear. He collects stray gloves. No forms. No Ministry. Just sky and kids who don’t know my name from the Prophet next to “Nundu” and “Dead.”

When the pitch is empty, he holds out his hand waiting to take my broom from me. “Brooms in the shed?”

It’s nothing. We’ve done it a dozen times. I reach out my Cleansweep. His fingers brush mine as he takes it.

I flinch.

Hard.

Not a little jump. My whole arm jerks back like I’ve been burned. The broom clatters to the grass. For a second I’m not at Puddlemere Field. I’m in an alley. It’s dark. There’s blood. There’s Celia’s arm—

“Faux.”

Oliver’s voice cuts through it. He’s two steps back now. Hands up, palms out. Not touching. Not crowding. His broom’s on the ground too, like he dropped it when I did. I can see the way he’s hesitant, his Adam’s apple bobbing slightly. He anxious to see if he’s done the right thing or not.

The air saws in and out of my lungs. The Nundu’s eyes are gone. It’s just dew and cut grass and Oliver Wood looking at me like I’m not a mess, just someone figuring it out.

“Too much?” he asks. Quiet. Steady. Captain assessing an injury on the pitch. My injury, my wound to carry.

I can’t speak. I nod. Once. Jerkily.

He nods back. With no disappointment in the words, he says, “Tell me when it’s not.”

Then, like it’s the most natural thing in the world, he glances at my broom on the ground.

“Cleansweep’s been pulling left since you took that dive last week. Want me to check the tail twig alignment?”

Broom maintenance.

Something in my chest cracks. Cracks, like ice in spring. I drag in a breath that doesn’t taste like copper.

“Yeah,” I manage. My voice is gravel and like sand in my teeth. “It’s been… sticky. On the low rides.”

Oliver crouches, all business now, and hauls both brooms toward the shed. He doesn’t look at me again until we’re inside, and even then it’s just a glance. “Hand me that clamp?”

I do. Our fingers don’t touch. The shed smells like wood polish and old rain. Safe.

He works. I watch his hands. He tightens a binding, tests the bristles, mutters about “Puddlemere’s budget not covering new tailwork.”

“Celia would’ve done it herself,” I say before I can stop it. The name drops between us like a landslide. “She charmed her own brooms. Said Ministry standard was absolute trash.”

Oliver doesn’t freeze. Doesn’t go soft. He just keeps working. “She sounds smart,” he says. “Bet she was faster than you, too.”

A laugh rips out of me. Wet. Surprised. I can feel the dampness in the corner of my eyes, “She was. Bloody show-off about it.”

“Good.” He sets the broom down, tested. Holds it out, hilt first. Not directly to me. To the empty space between us. He’s offering something that others usually just take, he gives me space, “Try it next practice. See if she was right about Ministry standard.”

I take it. Our fingers don’t brush.

The wand at my calf is warm, it starts at the base and crawls up to the tip.

“Wood,” I call out. My voice is steady now. “If you ever pity me, I’ll hex you off your broom for real.”

His grin is lopsided. Dangerous. Gentle in the way you want the boy you like to smile at you. “Wouldn’t dream of it, Coach.”

Coach. Not Auror. Not failure. Just, coach.

I shoulder my broom. He holds the shed door open. We walk out into the late afternoon sun, not touching, not talking. But the space between us isn’t empty anymore.

Celia’s voice, for once, doesn’t sound like a ghost. It sounds like wind. About time you stopped falling, cousin.

*****

The first real rainstorm of autumn hits on a Thursday.

It’s not sideways rain like the night at the pub. This is the kind that turns Puddlemere Field into a marsh and makes the Ministry roof leak in three places. I spend the morning rerouting complaints about soggy renewal forms, my wand tucked in its holster, warm against my calf like it knows I haven’t tried to kill it in weeks. Like I’ve been getting happier.

For my lunch break I Apparate to the youth pitch out of habit — we don’t have practice, but the equipment shed has a loose hinge I meant to fix. Small, ordinary thing. The kind that keeps my hands busy. The kind I knew Celia would manage in an instant.

When I get there, the shed’s locked. The field’s empty. And Oliver Wood is standing in the middle of it, soaked to the bone, arms out, face tipped to the sky like he’s picking a fight with the clouds. Each strand of hair has water dripping from it.

He doesn’t have a broom. Doesn’t have a coat. Just his Puddlemere practice kit clinging to every line of him and that stupid, stubborn set to his jaw.

“What are you doing?” I shout over the rain. My jumper’s already plastered to me. My hair’s a disaster I’m sure of it.

“Testing ward integrity!” he shouts back. “Field’s not supposed to flood until November!”

“Insanity!”

“Probably!” He laughs, full and unguarded, and it cuts through the grey clouds in a way it shouldn’t. “You gonna arrest me, Faux?”

My wand pulses. Interest.

I roll my eyes, but I’m already moving. Not toward him. Toward the shed. I pull my wand — no hesitation, no tremor — and tap the padlock. “Alohomora.”

I’d been managing small spells here and there. Slowly restoring my capacity for magic. I could open doors, turn on and off the lights, and cast a few simple charms. My wand seemed less like a cage. More like a friend.

It clicks. The door swings open and I duck inside. Dry. Mildew and broom polish and the sudden, sharp quiet of being alone.

Oliver doesn’t follow me. He stays out there, rain hammering his shoulders, because he’s Oliver and proving a point about his special wards is apparently more important than hypothermia.

Idiot.

I grab the only umbrella in the shed. Tiny. Charmed pink, with little Snitches on it. Belonged to one of the kids. Mandy, maybe. She was a cute girl- unless you gave her a Bludger Bat, then she was the toughest little rugrat you’ve ever seen.

My throat tightens anyway. The umbrella’s handle is slick in my grip.

Outside, Oliver’s still there. He’s shivering now, but he’s watching the sky, not the shed.

I could stay dry. I could hex the hinge from here and leave. I could pretend this isn’t anything.

Or.

I step out.

The rain hits immediately, cold and hard. I walk. Not to him. Past him, toward the center of the pitch where the puddles are deepest. I stop. Open the umbrella.

Pink Snitches bob over my head, covering exactly one person. I’m soaked from the knees down, my jumper’s ruined, and I look like a wet, angry pigeon.

Oliver turns. Blinks rain out of his eyes. Water tracks down his neck, disappearing under his collar. His chest is heaving — from cold or from holding himself back, I can’t tell.

I don’t say anything. I just tilt the umbrella. A fraction. Just enough that if he walked over, half of him would fit.

He stares at me. At the umbrella. At the space under it. His jaw works. I see him calculate it — distance, risk, whether I’ll bolt if he gets it wrong.

For three heartbeats, nobody moves. The rain is the only sound.

Then Oliver moves. Slow. Deliberate. Like he’s approaching a Snitch that might change direction. He doesn’t grin. Doesn’t speak. He just steps into the space I made, careful not to take all of it. Careful not to touch.

He fails.

His chest brushes mine. Barely. Fabric and rain and heat.

I go rigid. Every muscle in my body locks, waiting for the panic, the alley, the blood.

It doesn’t come.

What comes is him. The solid presence of him. The way he smells like grass and rain and something annoyingly alive.

We stand there. Two people under a child’s umbrella in a storm, both of us soaked anyway, both of us pretending this is somehow logical. Like the past few months haven’t been escalating to this. I bet Celia was teasing me from her grave. She always said I’d end up with someone athletic.

“My gloves are in your office,” he says after a minute. Quiet. Rough. Not a question. Not a push. A statement of fact, like the score of a game.

“I know,” I say. My voice doesn’t shake, but it’s not steady either. “You left them. Again.”

“Keep forgetting.”

“Sure.”

His mouth twitches. Not quite a smile.

The wand at my calf is steady.

I don’t lean into him. But I don’t step away, and that feels like a spell I don’t know the counter to.

The rain drums on the pink Snitches. Oliver’s breathing is uneven. Mine is too.

He’s still looking straight ahead at the rain, jaw tight. “If you tell me to move, I will. Promise.”

I consider it. I should. It would be safer. It would be smarter. It would be what I’ve done for a year — step back, shut down, slam doors.

Then I consider him. I consider his light, that inner draw he had that kept pulling me closer to him. Relentless optimism. Relentless in seeking me out. Bringing the magic back into my life. Bringing feelings I forgot I could possess.

I shift. Half an inch forward. My feet slot in between his.

He sucks in a breath. Audible. Sharp. His whole body goes still like he’s been hit with a Body-Bind, like if he moves wrong I’ll vanish. I consider it for a moment. Just disappearing and pretending this was all the weather’s doing. Rain causing hectic behavior.

“Don’t,” I demand. The word’s scraped raw.

He goes even stiller, if that’s possible. “Don’t what?”

“Don’t move.”

The breath he lets out isn’t a laugh. It’s not relief. It’s something lower. Hotter. Something that sounds like restraint breaking.

His head turns. Just a fraction. Enough that I can feel his breath near my temple, can see the rain on his lashes, the pink his cold’s brought to his lips.

We’re too close. This is too close. I can count the freckles the sun brought out on his nose from dawn flights. I can see the white scar through his eyebrow. I can—

I stop breathing.

He notices. Of course he does.

He doesn’t move closer. He doesn’t move away. He just exists there, soaked and solid and waiting on my word, and it’s worse than if he’d grabbed me.

We stand there until the rain eases. Until the pink Snitches stop rattling. Until I’m not sure if I’m shaking from cold or from the fact that I chose this.

When we finally walk back to the shed, I don’t give him the umbrella. I just keep holding it over both of us. He has to duck his head to fit, and his wet hair brushes my cheek.

Neither of us says anything about it.

“Still cold above the clouds?” he asks. Like he did that first dawn.

“Freezing,” I say. And then, before I can stop myself, before I can think: “But you were right. About the view.”

His eyes flick to me then. Green, dark, and unreadable. Intense. Like he’s memorizing the words. Like he’s deciding if he’s allowed to keep them or not.

*****

Celia was better at dealing with mean people than I was.

The Head of Magical Registration slams a packet of papers down onto my desk. His tie is slightly askew and his hair is sticking up in the back where his cowlick is. It’s all the various times I’ve tried to resign, and then all the times I revoked my resignation. It does look like a mess from where I’m standing now.

“Well, Faux? Care to explain why you’re being so finicky? I’ve had to explain to the Minister your whole quitting magic thing three times. You’re too hot and cold.”

Saehee gives a deep exhale, rubbing his temple. I can hear his stomach growl. A Niffler stole his kimchi today at lunch.

If Celia was here, she’d respond with a retort about giving space to let her figure it out. I wasn’t like that though.

“I’ve been going through a lot lately. You know that Saehee.”

“I do. I don’t understand the grief you’re experiencing, but I can’t keep covering for you. I need a final decision on my desk. And by final, I mean final and official. No more back and forth.”

I bite down on my lip.

“Okay.”

Saehee’s mouth turns into a thin line, “I miss her too.”

He shuts the door gently behind him. Saehee was going to propose to Celia. They were a good couple. The best. He held doors open for her, and she would always hug him from behind at workplace events- which made his ears go red.

Now he was stuck pushing papers around on tables about my problem with processing her being gone.

Ok.

*****

My wand’s on my desk. Not mocking me. Not waiting. Just… there. Existing. Like we’ve called a truce. The clock is ticking. Counting down until the end of the day. It’s ten to five o’clock. I spin around in my office chair a little.

Back at home, I’ve packed up Celia’s things. I sent them to my Aunt and Uncle. I kept Celia’s journals though. She was a good journal-er. I kept her wand too. Her mom said I should be the one to keep it. I wasn’t quite sure what I was going to do with the empty space in my flat yet.

There’s a knock. Not Ministry-sharp. Hesitant.

“Come in,” I say, and immediately regret it when I see who it is.

Lukas. Nine years old. Snitch-catching menace. Holding my Cleansweep Eleven by the handle with both hands like a sword he’s returning to a knight.

His dad works in Publishing. I guess Lukas came to work with his father today.

“You forgot this,” he says, solemn. “At the field, in the shed. Coach Oliver said you’d need it.”

Coach Oliver.

I take the broom. My hands don’t shake. “Thanks, Lukas. You should be home. It’s nearly dark.”

He nods, then doesn’t leave. He’s looking at my desk. At the wand. At the pink umbrella leaning in the corner — I hadn’t had the heart to leave it in the shed. I’d give it back to Mandy at tomorrow’s evening practice.

“Are you still scared of flying?” he asks.

The question hits like a Bludger to the ribs.

Kids. No filter. No forms. Just truth.

“No,” I say before I can lie. “Not anymore.”

He considers that. Lukas, all bark no bite, sits in my chaise lounge, hands gripping the edge of the seat and leaning towards me. “Coach Oliver says you’re the bravest flyer he knows. Even when you’re scared.”

“Did he?”

“Yeah. He said you dive anyway.” Lukas shifts in his spot. “My dad said you used to catch bad people. Like my comic books.”

I get up from my chair, couching down next to him so we’re eye level. He’s got mud on his cheek. “Your dad’s right. I did.”

“Will you do it again?”

Celia’s wand sits on her dresser. Her voice in my head: When you’re in the air, just let it take you where you need to go.

Oliver’s voice, lower echoes in my ear: You don’t have to love magic today. You just have to stop trying to kill it.

I look at my wand. It doesn’t spark. Doesn’t roll. It just warms now.

“I don’t know,” I tell Lukas. Honest. “But I’m not hiding from it anymore.”

That seems to satisfy him. He smiles brightly, gap-toothed with a lisp. “Good. Because Coach Oliver said next practice is seeker drills. And he said you’re leading.”

Of course he did.

“Tell Coach Oliver,” I say, standing up while ruffling Lukas’s hair, “that if he volunteers me for things without asking, I’m hexing his broom bristles.”

Lukas giggles and darts out, shouting “Yes, Coach Faux!” down the hall.

I sit back down. The office is quiet. No scorch marks today. Just the faint smell of rain and a manila folder on my desk that wasn’t there this morning. It must have just got magicked there by the mail system. Always bringing things to my desk for me to go through.

Inside: one renewal form. Already filled out.

Name: Oliver Wood
Occupation: Reserve Keeper, Puddlemere United / Part-time Skyball Coach
Reason for renewal: See attached.

In the attachment is a ripped up piece of paper. It’s a sketch of the skyline at sunrise. The tops of the clouds have a haze to them. Genuinely, it’s a badly done drawing. But the effort is there. In Oliver’s chickenscratch handwriting is a small message at the bottom.

In case you forgot the view. Or that we’re not done yet.
Dawn tomorrow?
— Oliver <3

I smirk at the way he signs his name. Such a dork.

Then I do something I haven’t done in a year without a grimace. I do it this time with ease. With self-assurance.

I cast.

“Accio coat.”

My Auror jacket flies off the hook and into my hand. It still fits. I might not be going back to Auror work, but that doesn’t mean I can’t wear my history.

On my way out, I dropped the packet of papers Saehee left me. Signed. I was going to stay in magic. I wasn’t going to run away from it anymore. I wasn’t going to use magic as an excuse for Celia.

Magic use could be concurrent with the experience of missing her. I didn’t have to pick one or the other.

Two things can happen at the same time. Even if it causes some discombobulation. That’s the reality of it; as I was beginning to realize.

Outside, the clouds have broken. The last light is gold, honest, and unasked-for.

I’m not promising Celia I’ll love magic again.

But I’m not trying to kill it.

And for today, that’s enough.

I have dawn tomorrow.

*****

EPILOGUE: DAWN, SIX MONTHS LATER

Puddlemere Field doesn’t flood anymore. Oliver fixed the wards. Or threatened them. Same thing, with him.

It’s 5:03 AM. I’m late.

He’s already in the air, because of course he is. Lazy figure-eights above the cloud line, like the sky’s his personal waiting room. His hair’s shorter now. Finally listened to me about the curls getting in his eyes.

I mount my Cleansweep — not Ministry standard, Celia was right — and kick off. The air’s cold enough to bite, but I wore gloves. He taught me that.

He drops to meet me at the cloud break.

“You’re late,” he says.

“You started without me,” I say.

“Presumptuous of me.” His mouth twitches. “Figured you’d show.”

The sun isn’t up yet. Just that bruised purple that means it’s coming whether we’re ready or not. Below us, England’s still asleep. No renewal forms. No Saehee. No Lukas yet — he’s got a Skyball match at noon and I promised I’d be there, human, with both feet on the ground. Above us, just sky. And him.

“Coach Faux,” Oliver says, testing it. He still does that, sometimes. Like he thinks I’ll revoke the title. “Seeker drills at 9?”

“7,” I correct. “Lukas wants to practice dives before the match. Says he’s too scared.”

Oliver snorts. “You tell him what you told me?”

“That fear’s part of it?”

“That you dive anyway.”

I roll my eyes. “Don’t get smug.”

“Yeah?” He edges his broom closer. Not touching. Never touching, unless I say.

The wand at my calf is warm, not from wanting to be used- but from an actual spell of warming on my body. I think of Saehee’s cowlick. Of Celia’s wand on my dresser, next to mine now. Of pink umbrellas in my office closet and Auror jackets I wear to youth games because the kids think it’s “wicked.”

Two things can happen at the same time.

I can miss her.

And I can be here.

Oliver goes still. Not body-bind still. Not panic still. The other kind. The kind that happens when someone finally passes you the Snitch and you realize you’re allowed to close your hand around it.

“Faux,” he says. My name. Not Coach. Not Auror. “Can I—” He stops. Rewrites. Captain learning new plays. “May I?”

The wind’s loud. The sun’s a threat on the horizon. I could say no. I’ve said no for a year. I’ve said no to wands and brooms and doors and myself.

I look at his hands on his broom. Flyer’s calluses. Matching mine. Except now, mine are fresh again like his. Not just a memory of use.

Just a lean. Just a shift of weight, the kind you use to correct a drift in the air. My broom drifts with me. His doesn’t move, because he won’t, until I do.

Close enough now that I can see the scar through his eyebrow. The freckles. The mole on his jaw. The pink is already on his lips from the cold.

“Yeah,” I say. “You may.”

He doesn’t lunge. He doesn’t grab. Oliver Wood, who dives for everything, tips forward like he’s asking permission with his whole body.

His forehead touches mine first. Checking first. His nose bumps mine, clumsy. He huffs a laugh against my mouth, breath clouding between us.

“Sorry,” he whispers. “Terrible form.”

“Shut up, Wood,” I whisper back.

And then I close the rest of the distance.

It’s not fireworks, it doesn’t have to be.

It’s cold, and chapped. His hand comes up, hovers near my jaw, doesn’t touch until I nudge into it.

When we break apart it’s because we have to breathe, not because we want to. The sun chooses that moment to spill over the clouds. Gold. Honest. Unasked-for. Like Celia. And, like Oliver too.

“View’s better up close,” he says, his voice shaky and smitten at the same time.

I shove his shoulder. He doesn’t even drift.

“Faux?”

“What?”

“We’re not done yet.”

My wand pulses once at my calf. Expectant. What’s Oliver going to do now?

I take a shot in the dark, assuming I know what he wants, “Race you down?” I say. “Lukas might already be expecting us.”

Oliver grins — that lopsided, game-winning, argument-winning grin. “You’ll lose.”

I don’t let him get a headstart.

Because I was already diving down.