Captain - An Oliver Wood Fanfiction

Chapter 17 - Because I'm a girl, you dumbass

Erin's words and actions had left a far bigger mark on Oliver than he had expected. Seeing Erin cry because of something he did hurt him. He felt like that time she was angry at him for getting her splinched. She was right. Ever since they had become friends, all he had done was hurt her in some way. For a couple of days he convinced himself that she was better off without him, but her words kept replaying in his head. Should have expected it after last year. She had referred to something that had happened last year twice already and he just couldn't remember any event where he had hurt her. They barely even talked in the previous years.

He hated that she was mad at him. He couldn't focus, he couldn't think of anything else and he had a hard time just being happy. But she didn't want anything to do with him. The things she had said to him ... He had never seen her this angry before.

"Katie?" he asked one night when he was staring into the fireplace aimlessly again.

"Yeah?"

"Do you think I'm not empathetic?" he asked. "Like, do you think I don't care about other people's feelings?"

It was quiet for a while and Katie didn't exactly know what to say. She wanted to support her friend, but she couldn't deny that Oliver lacked some empathy sometimes.

"You do care", she said. "You just sometimes have trouble showing it." Oliver sighed. He did care about Erin's feelings. He knew that because he felt crappy every time she was unhappy. Why was he always the cause of her being unhappy? He just wanted to go back to when they were good friends, but then it'd only be a matter of time before he'd mess it up again.

"Hey, Wood. You can talk to me, okay? I'm here for you", Katie said, realising her friend was way more hurt than she initially thought. Oliver sighed again.

"I had promised Erin that I wouldn't tell you guys about her new move. I found out about it by accident."

"But you did tell us", Katie said.

"Yeah, exactly, and now she doesn't ever want to see me again."

"Have you tried apologizing?"

"Of course I have", Oliver said. "She wouldn't even listen."

"No, Wood, have you actually tried properly apologizing?" Oliver had no idea what she meant by that.

"Let me guess, she's angry at you because she thinks you don't care about her?"

Oliver immediately remembered Erin's words. I thought that I meant at least something to you. I thought I meant enough for you to just keep the one promise we made.

"How do you know?" he asked, completely freaked out by Katie's psychic abilities.

"Well, because I'm a girl, you dumbass. Girls care about trust because the amount of trust there is in a relationship determines how strong a relationship is", Katie said. "She's not angry because Angelina blocked her shot. She's angry because you broke her trust. You made it seem as if she didn't mean much to you because it was so easy for you to break a promise."

Oliver fiddled with the hem of his shirt. Why were girls so complicated? He never meant to hurt Erin, he just wanted to win. But sacrificing her secret for a quidditch match was stupid. At that moment he just didn't realise how much she cared about such things.

"How would you feel if she'd gone to a teacher, telling them about your little late night spying sessions on Slytherin?" Oliver frowned.

"She'd never do that."

"Exactly, because you trusted her with that and that means a lot to her. And if she'd tell anyway, would you forgive her right away? Would you immediately trust her again?"