An American at Hogwarts

Chapter Eight

When we came out of the locker room, Oliver was already there, standing in the center of the pitch with a wooden chest and two broomsticks.

"Hey," I called, raising my hand to wave. "Thanks again for helping me out with this."

"My pleasure. Time spent on Quidditch is time well spent. Now, how much do you know already?"

"Angelina gave me the basic run-down last night. Before that, I'd never heard of it."

"What?" Oliver exclaimed, straightening up and giving me a shocked look.

"Okay, before you start your rant, we're gonna take off and start warmups," Angelina decided before I could respond. Oliver's mouth was still hanging open looking at me as Angelina and Alicia shot into the air on broomsticks.

I didn't know whether to be amazed or make a bad joke about witches.

"How could you not know anything about Quidditch?" Oliver demanded, still clearly shocked.

"I'm from the muggle world, we don't have broomsticks and magic flying balls."

"You've been missing out then. Quidditch is the greatest sport in the world."

I wasn't sure about that, but I also wasn't about to argue with him.

"Well, since Angelina gave you the basics, let's jump right in," he said, gesturing for me to come over to the brooms. "This is one of the things you learn first year that you can't practice in the muggle world. Just hold your hand over the broom and say 'up' to make it jump into your hand."

I gave him a skeptical look, but moved over anyway. I put my hand over the broom.

"Up," I said. Nothing happened. "Up... Up..."

"Hold on. Say it like you really think it's going to happen."

I glanced at him, and realized he was right. If this was ever going to work, I had to get out of my own way. I had to believe I could actually do it if I wanted any chance of success.

I cleared my throat. "Up."

To my amazement, the broom shot into my hand. I barely managed to catch it I was so surprised.

"Woah! That's awesome!" I exclaimed.

"Nicely done," said Oliver, smiling. "Now comes the tricky part: flying it."

"Any advice?"

"Just lean the way you want to go. I'm sure you'll do fine."

"Alright..." I threw one leg over the broomstick, then glanced back at Oliver.

"Just push off," he instructed. I took a deep breath, then pushed off the ground as hard as I could. To my amazement, instead of promptly falling back to earth, I was gaining altitude on a broomstick.

"Wooo!" I yelled as I rose into the air. "This is amazing!"

"Good job!" called Oliver. I could see him rising into the air beside me. "Now try turning!"

Cautiously, I leaned to the right, and the broom went with me. I leaned left, up, and down, and to my surprise it was a lot like flying my dad's Iron Man armor.

I tried turning a few more times, quickly getting comfortable. Despite the obvious differences, steering was almost exactly like steering the armor.

"You're a natural!" Oliver yelled as a flew a few laps around the pitch.

"My dad has a machine that works kinda like this!" I called back.

"Let's try adding in some challenge then." He darted back towards the ground and to the unopened chest. I was curious, so I followed him.