On Saturday morning, the first weekend in April, an owl arrived for Caiti. The owl in question looked rather battered and harried like it had flown quite a distance at a very fast pace.

She untied the letter quickly and offered her own goblet of water to the owl looking alarmed.

"This had better be important," she told the owl. "Or else you shouldn't be working so hard. I can wait another day for a letter."

But when she slit open the envelope it became immediately clear that this particular message was time-sensitive. Caiti stood up so fast she banged into the table, sloshing water all over the place, including all over the owl who squawked and ruffled his feathers indignantly before he flew off again.

I'm playing this afternoon, Marlowe had written hastily. His handwriting was a mess, but she could feel the excitement and nerves in each of the words scrawled on the parchment.

Walters is out because his wife's in labor and McSorley's just come down with dragon pox. Fingal would usually be put in next, but he's at his sister's wedding, so of the other three of us they're putting in me and Liam O'Reilly. Dad's coming to pick up you and Elliot at eleven. Tell Elliot because I haven't got time to write him a letter, too. Dad's letting Professor Ossett know he's coming. Can't wait to see you. Love you. Marlowe.

He had written all of this in one big block of text, not even skipping down the page a bit to sign his name.

Caiti was vaguely aware that Amelia was talking to her from across the table, trying to get her attention, but she ignored her and hurried down the Ravenclaw table looking for Elliot. She found him where he and his friends usually sat, down at the far end nearest the staff table.

"Elliot," she said hurriedly. "Marlowe's playing today. Your dad's coming to get us at eleven."

"What?" he asked. Caiti thrust the letter out to him.

"No way," Elliot breathed.

"I know," said Caiti. Her stomach was flip flopping all over the place. She was so anxious for him.

Amelia appeared at the end of the table with them. "What's going on?" she asked.

"My brother's gonna play in a real match," said Elliot excitedly.

Amelia's eyes widened and she looked at Caiti to see if it was true. Caiti could only nod. She had been saying all year that she thought he'd get to play at least once before the end of the first year of his contract. She only realized now that saying that and having it actually happen were two very different things.

She knew Marlowe was a very good quidditch player. He wouldn't have made it on the team at all if he weren't. And by the sounds of his letter, he'd passed up at least one other person who could've played that afternoon, which was a good sign, but professional quidditch was not quite the same as playing against Hogwarts students, some of whom were twelve or thirteen years old.

Elliot handed the letter back to her and she looked it over again, this time, with Amelia peering over her shoulder.

"I wish I could go," she said.

"Honestly I wish you could, too." She felt like she might be sick. It'd have been nice to have Amelia there to prattle on about things and distract her from how nervous she felt. She was reminded of how it had felt watching Sean compete in the Triwizard Tournament. He'd obviously been qualified; His name had come out of the Goblet of Fire. But knowing this didn't make it any easier to watch.

—-

Several hours later, she sat in between Elliot and Mrs. Finnegan high up in a violently orange section of the crowd. Caiti had not had a single orange thing in her wardrobe so she'd used a color changing spell on one of her shirts for the occasion. She'd told Marlowe she'd start buying Chudley Cannons gear when they started making things with his name and number on the back.

Caiti looked around the field. She had seen it before but never from up in the stands. There were quite a lot of empty seats — as was typical for a home game at the Chudley Cannons field — but in this particular section, there seemed to be a number of very dedicated fans. Marlowe had apparently gotten someone to procure them very good seats for free, so they sat in the front row of the highest section of the stands.

A number of wizards with orange pointed hats emblazoned with the two black Cs of the team logo walked up and down the aisles selling concessions and there were enchanted banners hanging from the stands opposite them that flashed advertisements for all the team's sponsors. Caiti watched these just to keep herself occupied while she waited for the match to start.

Elliot and Mr. Finnegan were talking on Caiti's left, but Mrs. Finnegan was staring around at everything with wide eyes. She had never seen a quidditch match before. Not a real one anyway. Only Marlowe's little league, which hardly counted as there were no bludgers, no snitch, and the brooms only rose five or six feet off the ground.

It was so strange to Caiti, who had grown up watching Marlowe play, that this would be his parents' first time seeing him in a real match.

At twelve on the dot, the announcer's voice rang out around the stadium to announce the start of the match and the players from the opposing team. One by one, the Wigtown Wanderers flew up into the air, circled the pitch, and then fell into line in the middle of the field.

As the seventh player took his position, Caiti's heart started to beat very quickly. The home team would come out next.

"And now, your very own... Chudley CANNONS," he boomed over the crowd. "Give it up for your chasers, Damon MACKEY, Eoghan MAGUIRE, and Brennan LYNCH."

The orange supporters all around them clapped and Caiti did her best to clap along, already peering over the edge of the stands to see if Marlowe was visible down on the ground. She wondered how he felt just now.

"Your beaters," continued the announcer, "Liam O'REILLY and Marlowe FINNEGAN!"

Caiti's stomach squirmed at the sound of his name. His whole family had jumped to their feet at his name, cheering louder than anyone else around them and Caiti stood too, clapping hard, but her mouth felt too dry to call out. She could see him now, looking calm and capable on his broom. She'd never seen him in his team robes before and it was strange to see him in orange and black rather than blue and bronze. She watched him and O'Reilly clap each other on the shoulder with this look of excited determination as they found their places in line.

He was going to do well. Caiti could feel it. She didn't even listen to the names of the keeper and seeker, too focused on what Marlowe was doing, but applauded vaguely, only sitting back down when the referee made to release the balls and start the match.

Marlowe and Liam O'Reilly zoomed in opposite directions the moment the snitch was released. She could tell almost immediately there would be more structure to the decisions he made. The chasers moved as a unit, switching from one side of the field to the other so fast it was hard to keep your eye on them.

"This feels like a tennis match," said Mrs. Finnegan, her head bobbing from one set of goalposts to the other. No one scored in the first ten minutes. It seemed like every pass was intercepted by the other team's chasers, and of the few attempts anyone made at the goal, no one was able to outsmart the keepers.

Caiti searched the air again for Marlowe just in time to see him whack a well-timed bludger towards the Wanderers' keeper, causing him to miss a save. Caiti started to smile, clapping loudly as the announcer called out that there were ten on the board for the Cannons.

"Wait, what happened?" asked Mrs. Finnegan.

"Marlowe hit a bludger that stopped their keeper from blocking that goal," Caiit said, grinning now.

"Oh," said Mrs. Finnegan with a look on her face like Caiti had just spoken a foreign language, but she began clapping loudly, too.

In the next half an hour, the snitch was spotted and lost again three different times. The Chudley Cannons scored three more goals and the Wanderers scored six, putting them up twenty. Someone called a timeout and all the players swooped down to the ground.

Behind where Caiti and the Finnegans sat, someone said, "You know I think we have a shot at winning this one."

And someone else said, "I don't know the beaters, but they're not bad."

"Must be new."

"The one that's mostly been playing right field's good. Makes smart choices."

Caiti's heart swelled with pride.

—-

Marlowe had not dared look in the stands. He knew where Caiti and his family were sitting and he didn't want to see them. He wanted them there, but at the same time, the thought of them watching this match was nerve wracking.

Still, he felt confident so far. He was having fun. It was a perfect spring day — sunny, but not bright enough to be in his eyes; warm, but not hot. And afterwards, no matter what happened the rest of the match, he would get to see Caiti.

The timeout was spent discussing which plays the chasers should try, but all the coach said to Marlowe was, "Keep it up," and he felt bolstered even more.

When play resumed, Marlowe managed to thwart another pass and a goal within the first few minutes. It was coming back to him, what this felt like. He'd always loved being a beater, because he got to watch and play. The chasers were often in their own world. The seeker was always in his own world. Keepers, too, rarely needed to pay attention to anything beyond their end of the field.

But in Marlowe's position, he had to keep an eye on what everyone was up to. He had to look for opportunities to assist his teammates and to get in the other team's way. He had a partner, but also had autonomy. It was a perfect position.

No, he had never scored a single point in all the years he'd played. He wasn't often credited for winning his team the match. But it was a role that took quick thinking and attention to detail. It wasn't just about hitting the bludger as hard as you could. It mattered when and where you hit it — a balance of planning and smart impulses.

O'Reilly had just sent a bludger hurtling towards the Wanderers' chasers down at the other end of the field and Marlowe got ready as it started whizzing towards his end of the pitch. Keeping one eye on where that bludger was, he scanned the pitch, looking for where it might be best to send it.

His own teammates had the quaffle now and he was about to try and get in the way of the keeper, but that was when he saw the two seekers suddenly take off in the same direction.

Marlowe hesitated. He would have to be very exact if he was going to make this worthwhile. He didn't want to risk hitting their own seeker.

He almost didn't do it. He almost aimed for the keeper as planned, but his team was only down thirty points. If Sutton got the snitch, they'd win.

Before he could talk himself out of it, he wheeled around to get at the bludger from the other side, swung the bat hard and then watched as it spun towards the two seekers, praying the curve he'd tried to throw on it worked and that it would swivel at the last second to get at the Wanderers' seeker without distracting Sutton.

He didn't move while he watched, fingers crossed on the handle of his broom.

Both seekers were so focused on the snitch neither of them noticed it until, Marlowe imagined, the unmistakable whistling sound of an approaching bluder made it impossible not to.

The other seeker swerved just enough as he glanced back at it and Sutton reached out his hand, leaning forward further to speed up.

The Wanderers' seeker tried to catch up, but just as Marlowe had hoped, the curve he'd put on the ball made it hook left and cross right into his path. He had to break hard to avoid it snapping through the handle of his broom and ended up doing a sort of forward roll in midair. Unfortunately, this meant that Sutton got hit in the elbow as the bludger's path was cleared, but not before he'd closed his fist around the snitch.

The referee's whistle blew, and the announcer called out, "CANNONS WIN! ONE HUNDRED NINETY TO SEVENTY!" and all around, the fans cheered. It was the first game they'd won all season. It was the first game they'd won since Marlowe had signed his contract last Spring. Usually, they let the other team run up such a big lead that even the times Sutton did catch the snitch, they ended up losing.

Marlowe hung in the air in shock, watching as his other teammates all crowded around Sutton to offer congratulations. The noise in the stands was unlike anything Marlowe had heard in all the matches he's witnessed since he joined the team. At least, it was unlike anything he'd ever heard at this particular field. Usually this level of cheering was reserved for the opposing team.

Marlowe started to make his way over to the others, but before he got there, several others had turned and started heading for him. Sutton was in the lead, holding his elbow, and flying only with his knees.

"That was your bludger?" he shouted, and at first Marlowe thought he was angry, but when Marlowe nodded, he said. "Damn, you have a good arm. I think you shattered my bone."

Sutton did look awfully pale, but he was grinning.

"Sorry about that," said Marlowe sheepishly. "I wasn't aiming for you."

The rest of the team surrounded the two of them, offering high fives, and looking for explanations of what exactly had gone down. "I just tried to distract the other seeker so you could get it," Marlowe said. "It wasn't quite as smooth as I'd hoped, but-"

"But it worked anyway," Sutton grinned. He tried to reach out and clap Marlowe on the back, but doing so seemed to make him a little woozy and Marlowe and O'Reilly quickly caught him around the middle. Slowly and awkwardly, they helped him fly back to the ground and got him fixed up with the medi-wizards waiting below.

Marlowe felt strangely calm and self-aware. He thought to himself: you just played in a professional quidditch match. You just helped win the game. You didn't fuck it up.

None of this was likely to sink in for days.

He and the other team members were interviewed by reporters from the Daily Prophet and Marlowe felt so buzzy and floaty that he couldn't remember any of what he said immediately after the words left his mouth. He hoped it had been coherent.

He wanted to be through with them so he could go change and meet his family.

As Marlowe followed the rest of the team towards the locker rooms a quarter of an hour later, he heard a very familiar voice and stopped short before he turned into the door. Caiti was standing at the gate apparently arguing with the security wizards about why she should be allowed through.

"Will you take my broom for a second?" Marlowe asked, holding it out to O'Reilly who was standing nearest him.

"Yeah," he said, taking it. "Why-" But he stopped before he'd finished his question, because Marlowe was already jogging towards the gate.

"Caiti," he called, grinning, and she turned and saw him. "She's good," he said to the security wizards. "She's with me."

Reluctantly, the security guards stepped aside and Caiti shoved through the gate and hurtled towards him.

"Hey," Marlowe laughed, holding his arms open for her.

"Oh my god!" she shrieked. You were amazing!" She threw her arms around his neck the moment she'd reached him and though Marlowe had braced himself for the impact, he still stumbled backward from the speed she'd come at him with. When he was steady again, he lifted her up, and she wrapped her legs around him and kissed him on the mouth. Cameras flashed around them and Marlowe smiled so much they couldn't hold onto the kiss for long.

Behind him, the guys all wolf whistled and cheered, but Caiti didn't seem to mind. She didn't even seem to notice.

"You're a professional quidditch player!" she said, as though she'd only just realized. Her whole face seemed wide open — eyes round and lips parted.

Marlowe laughed, but honestly it was just now finally sinking in for him, too.

"I know," he said. "It's nuts."

"It's completely insane," she said. Caiti kissed him again before she let herself back down to the ground. "Oh my god, I'm so proud of you. I mean, seriously. You're like a different player. You seem so confident. You're so- you're so professional." She spoke very fast.

Marlowe laughed again. He was so glad she had been there.

"And you won!" she said. "You actually won! And I don't mean the team, I mean you. You won! They wouldn't have won without you."

"They might have," said Marlowe, embarrassed.

"Don't be modest," said Caiti indignantly, but she couldn't stay peeved at him for long and she threw her arms back around him, bouncing up and down on her toes.

Marlowe squeezed her back tight and they swayed side to side. The Prophet reporters were starting to close in and Marlowe whispered to her, "We're about to stir up the gossip magazines again."

"Who cares?" said Caiti, and Marlowe grinned again.

"Where's everyone else?" he asked. "My parents and Elliot."

"Oh, I have no idea," Caiti told him. "I ran down here as soon as the game was over. I've been arguing with that security guard for like half an hour. They might still be in their seats for all I know, but they're all really excited. You need to teach your mum about quidditch though, because she didn't have a clue what was happening."

"Good to know," he laughed. "Lessons will commence tomorrow."

They grinned at each other, Caiti bright-eyed and so pretty.

"Can I introduce you to the team?" he asked.

"Okay," she said with a funny little smile.

He slipped his hand into hers and turned back towards the lockers rooms where, by the looks of it, most of the team was watching them.

"So this is the famous Caiti," said Patrick Donnely, standing with his arms folded and a pleasant smile on his face. "We've all heard lots about you."

"This is Patrick Donnely," said Marlowe. "He's a keeper and he's been on the team about as long as I've been alive."

"They only keep me around for moral support these days," he joked, holding his hand out to Caiti.

"Nice to meet you," she said, shaking his hand.

Marlowe introduced her to the rest of the players, and when they'd made it around the whole group, Liam O'Reilly said, "Well you must be right proud of your boy, then. Did us a favor there at the end, didn't he?"

"Course I'm proud," said Caiti easily, glancing up at him with a small smile.

"Well, he's pretty damn proud of you, too," said Damon Mackey. "Should've heard the way he went on about you after that presentation of yours."

Caiti's smile grew a little bigger.

"You really won that prize then? That potions one?" said Eoghan Maguire.

Caiti nodded.

"What? You thought I made it up?" asked Marlowe. "It was in the papers and everything."

"I'm only teasing," Maguire grinned. "Seriously impressive stuff, though," he added to Caiti. "I remember reading about that in school and all."

"Thank you," said Caiti.

Joe Benson, the manager, poked his head out then. "Get in here you lot," he called. "I want to debrief so we can all go home"

"We aren't going home, Benson," said Mackey, apparently outraged. "We just won a match if you didn't notice. I've got a couple of pints calling my name."

"Fine, then I want to debrief on the match before you go home or before you go out and celebrate. Whichever suits you."

They all started to file in and Marlowe said, "I told my dad to meet me near the concessions after the match so go wait there and maybe you'll meet up with them. I'll be out as soon as I can."

"Okay," Caiti agreed. She started to turn, but he pulled her back, kissed her one more time, and then smiled and squeezed her hand one last time before he caught up with the team.

"Well," said Benson quietly when Marlowe came through the door. "I think we've got the doubters out from under us, don't we?" Benson gave him a little smile and Marlowe sheepishly returned it.

He clapped Marlowe on the back and said. "You did good. I've got notes, but you did good."

"Thanks," said Marlowe. "I was— thanks for letting me play."

—-

Caiti and the Finnegans went out for a late lunch after Marlowe was free to leave. They walked into the village and sat at a little pub, chatting about the match and about Marlowe's success. Marlowe began trying to explain some of the basics of quidditch to his mum, insisting all along that he had done this hundreds of times before, and she had them all belly laughing as she tried to explain back to Marlowe what he was relaying to her.

They sat around long after they'd finished eating. It was so nice, Caiti thought, to be away from school and to have a break from everything. It was nice to feel normal and untroubled and celebratory. She had had to be so serious about everything since the Christmas holidays ended. It was good to laugh.

At some point, though, Marlowe leaned over to his dad and said something Caiti couldn't hear. His dad nodded and Marlowe got up. He put a hand on Caiti's shoulder and said, "Come with me."

So Caiti stood, too, and as she followed him out, he took her hand.

"Where are we going?" she asked.

Marlowe shrugged. "I just wanted to talk to you," he said.

She smiled down at her feet. They walked down the cobbled streets outside the pub, heading towards a little park they had walked to sometimes that summer. The sun was just starting to get down, but it was still bright out, and the air was warm. It finally felt like spring.

"You'll be home so soon," Marlowe said. "The more warm days we have, the more I realize how close it is."

"Yeah," Caiti agreed. "It felt like it was going so slowly and now all the sudden it's almost done."

"How're you feeling?"

"About what? Graduating?"

"Yeah. And NEWTs. And I don't know... leaving Hogwarts, I guess. Your research. Everything."

Caiti thought about this.

"I guess I feel alright," she said. "I think I'll be sad when it's really over and I know I'm not going back. But this year hasn't really felt like Hogwarts anyway. It's not like it used to be."

They sat down on a bench along one of the slanted pathways crossing through the green space. Caiti watched a little wren hopping around and thought about his other questions.

"NEWTs will be fine, I think. I mean I'm not looking forward to it, but I'm not worried. I'm not taking anything I'm awful at anymore."

"You weren't awful at anything."

Caiti just laughed through her nose. "You were never in class with me," she said. "You wouldn't know."

"Yeah, I would," he said. "Plus I saw your O.W.L. results. There was nothing you couldn't have taken. Just stuff you chose not to take."

"Stop flattering me," she said. "I've had my fill of compliments for the next two years."

"I'm not making any promises."

Caiti bumped him with her shoulder, but Marlowe let go of her hand, slid his arm around her waist and kissed her. She hadn't been expecting it. Heat rose in her cheeks and the back of her neck

It was crazy how he still made her feel like this.

"What about your research?" Marlowe asked when they broke apart. "You haven't updated me in a while." Their faces were still close and Caiti's stomach still felt all squirmy. It took her a minute to process the question.

"Well, I haven't done much lately," she said. "N.E.W.T.s, you know?"

She sat back. She couldn't think straight that close to him.

"I'm taking care of my plants, though. I have seven now," she said. "And the first one's doing really well, but the others are just getting started. Professor Munslow's trying to help me figure out a way to move them all safely at the end of the year and I'm going to have to use some of the grant money to either build some sort of greenhouse or rent out space in one or something."

She stopped and thought if there was anything else notable. "I guess the other thing is I'm trying to figure out who to choose as my mentor, so I've been writing to a couple of people, and I think I'm going to meet with one of them at the last Hogsmeade weekend."

"Who is it?"

"Her name's Alora Serpen," Caiti said. "She seems nice from her letters. She seems calm."

Marlowe just looked at her.

"What?"

Marlowe smiled and shook his head. "Nothing," he said. "I'm just proud of you."

"Me too," Caiti said. "You really were amazing."

"We're not talking about me right now," Marlowe said, brushing off the compliment. "We did that all dinner."

Caiti just smiled. "I'm not making any promises," she said, and this time, it was Marlowe's time to bump her shoulder.

And Caiti's turn to kiss him.