Wormwood Try Outs (Mary & Victoria)

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"What Jake doesn't know, won't hurt him." Victoria repeated to herself each day as she snuck down to the pitch to practice on the school broomsticks. Truth be told, flying didn't come naturally to the Wormwood, but she had set herself a goal. She would get on the Wormwood team this year, and she wouldn't give up. Why did she want to play Quidditch? Because she truly believed it would make Jake proud to see her flying.

Like they'd always said she would, long ago, before her accident.

She remembered, even if Jake had forgotten, the way her big brother had insisted that she would be able to fly on a broom like him one day. Victoria had never given up hope on that information, and she was certainly not giving up now. When the notice had gone up on the notice board in the common room, Victoria had been worried. Mary had given a week's notice that Quidditch trials would be held.

A week to learn to fly...

On the Saturday afternoon, Victoria had skipped down to the pitch, trying to keep up her own good cheer for the day. She was incredibly nervous, but she truly believed she was ready. Victoria had known Humphrey had wanted to try out for the Keeper role, so she had decided not to try for that. Chaser seemed a rough position to play and Beater was much the same. But the idea of chasing a little golden ball. Now that, that was exciting.

Smiling to herself as she opened the broom cupboard, Victoria took out the school broom and headed to the middle of the pitch, wondering when Mary was going to get here.

Graduate Posts : 551 Join date : 2013-07-25 Age : 30

Quidditch Captain. Mary was the Quidditch Captain. She got the notice along with her Head Girl badge and she had a hard time believing it was actually true. It was a huge honor as well as responsibility and she was beyond excited. She wasn't particularly worried about the team, she knew everybody would do their best. There weren't a lot of people in Wormwood that liked sports, but those that did were just as determined to play good as she was.

Sadie and a few other players left them last year, when they graduated and it was time to find new players. Mary put up a notice in the Common Room about the tryouts and had seen a few students excited about it, which made her quite happy. It wouldn't be too good if no one was interested this year.

She woke up early on Saturday to go jogging and do her routine work out. She was getting better and didn't get tired as soon as she did last year and couldn't wait to tell Jake about her progress. After her work out, she spent her time planning patrolling for Prefects until it was time to go down to the pitch.

Mary changed to her Quidditch robes, took her broom, a pad and a pen and walked down to the grounds. There was a small group of people already there, waiting for her. She felt weirdly powerful and also quite nervous. What if people were only there to make fun out of her, to taunt her what a terrible Captain she was- no. She shook those thoughts out of her mind and blew the whistle she had in a pocket.

"Good afternoon, everybody! I want you to form groups depending on what position you want to play. Keepers here, chasers, beaters and finally, seekers here." Mary said loudly, indicating where she wanted each group. The two players that were still on the team, Anna and Jim went to their respective groups; Anna to chasers and Jim to the beaters. They were good players and had already proved they deserved to keep their places on the team.

"Alright! Keepers first. Anna here will try to score, each one of you gets five shots. You will go up one by one and the one who saves most shots, gets on the team. If you even think about cheating, you'll be in detention for a month. Is that clear?" She smiled to herself when they all nodded nervously.

After the Keepers and the Chasers all tried out, Mary had a few names scribbled down on her pad. She had a bit of a headache and told the Seekers to go next instead of Beaters.

"Seekers! We'll be using this Snitch here." She held it up in her gloved hand. "The one who catches it first is on the team. Same goes for you as everybody else. Fair play. No cheating and I mean it. Go!"

She saw Victoria in the small group and sent the young witch a reassuring smile. It was wonderful to see her there, but she was rather worried for her. It was still quite soon after the surgery and she didn't want anything bad to happen to Victoria.

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As each group moved forwards to take their turns, Victoria watched intently after she'd wished them all good luck. Checking out the flying skills of each person and thinking to herself about how she could use some of the moves herself. A knot was forming in the witch's stomach as she continued to watch, Mary seemed to be in the zone and the usually sweet witch slightly frightened Victoria.

But she refused to let her nerves get the better of her, not now.

"Seekers! We'll be using this Snitch here."

Victoria looked to Mary instantly when she heard her position. There were three people going for this role, all girls. The other two looked highly confident in themselves and all three watched Mary intently. The small flash of a smile her way was all the encouragement Victoria needed as Mary let go of the Snitch. The other two girls zoomed off almost instantly, but Victoria merely paused and closed her eyes.

"You will get the Snitch," she whispered to herself, before mounting up. Opening her eyes, Victoria kicked off, flying forwards slowly for a moment as she located the Snitch. "COME HERE YOU LITTLE GOLDEN BALL!" Victoria called out, letting out a soft giggle before she zoomed off. Her eyes never moved from the ball in question. Not to take in her surroundings, or the whereabouts of any other person. This was her time to shine.

The young witch led flat on her broom, soaring through the skies without thinking about how high she was going, or how fast. The adrenaline rush was the key to everything in that moment. The other two girls were good, but she was better.

The youngest Wormwood had to keep repeating those words as she flew.

Ten minutes passed, Victoria's eyes solely on the Snitch. So much so that she neither saw the near miss with the posts, nor the Bludger that whistled past her, only just missing her head. Truly, Victoria was not the kind of player to give attention to anything but the Snitch, something she knew was the best way to go about the whole thing. She flew high, and plunged towards the pitch as the Snitch did, scraping the ground at times and only turning from the stands just in time to save herself damage.

Fearless.

It was a minute later, as the sound of the wings grew louder that Victoria knew it was her chance. Where the other two trial Seekers were she didn't know as she readied herself. "One..." Flutter, flutter. "Two..." Flutter. "Three!" Pounce!

Victoria let go of her broomstick, pushing herself with the footholds as both her hands thrust through the air and around the small ball. The ground hit her about two seconds later. "Gotcha, little fella!" Victoria announced, not paying any notice as her broom hit her body, nor the scratches from landing.

Sitting up triumphantly, Victoria looked for Mary, holding up the Snitch. "I got it! Does this mean I get to be Seeker?" She called across the pitch, grinning from ear to ear.

Graduate Posts : 551 Join date : 2013-07-25 Age : 30

Mary watched as the two other girls shot up in the air instantly and narrowed her eyes in concern as Victoria stayed on the ground. Soon enough, however, the young witch flew up as well and everything seemed to be okay.

She watched all of them intently as they were flying around and her headache lessened slightly. At least with the Seekers, there wasn't anybody hitting each other in order to get the Quaffle, like the Chasers before had done. She knew, however, that the Beaters would only get worse and she was glad she put Seekers in between.

It wasn't particularly exciting, watching the three girls flying around, looking for a tiny golden ball, though. She distracted herself with observing their flying techniques. Victoria and one of the other two girls were very good and the third one was barely keeping up. Mary felt a bit sorry for the third girl, but there wasn't anything she could do.

Victoria and the other girl - Nancy, Mary remembered - were now flying dangerously close to the stands and the ground. The new Captain strained her eyes and kept her wand at the ready in case she needed to mend any bones.

Her ominous thoughts came true a few moments later when Victoria hit the ground. Mary blew her whistle to signal the Snitch has been caught and ran towards the younger girl. She breathed a breath of relief when Victoria sat up, it hopefully meant she wasn't hurt. A fleeting image of Jake strangling her passed through her mind and she decided not to mention any of this to the DADA Professor.

"Are you okay? Anything broken?" she called out as she was running and was happy to note that Nancy had avoided colliding with the ground. Nancy and Christina, the two other Seeker try outs landed next to Victoria and Nancy looked furious. As soon as Mary got closer, she went off on a rant how she should be Seeker and not Victoria. Mary acknowledged her with only a glance and then knelt down to make sure Victoria is okay.

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"Are you okay? Anything broken?"

Victoria looked up from the small Snitch in her hands to the Quidditch Captain and grinned from ear to ear. "Course I'm okay, why wouldn't I be okay?" Victoria asked sweetly, before looking down to see her knees were a little scraped but nothing that wouldn't heal. "That was absolutely fantastic! Look, I caught the Snitch! Aren't these things cute? It's true that they replace the Snitch each time, right? So I can keep this one, can't I?"

As Nancy started to talk, Victoria stood from her temporary seat on the floor and pulled her fellow Wormwood in to a hug. "You did absolutely amazing, but I guess today was beginners luck, you can have the Snitch if you want, otherwise I'm going to get quite the collection!" She offered, hoping to appease the older witch who only looked more affronted and stormed off a moment later.

Victoria didn't understand, she'd thought it was a nice idea...

"So does this mean I get the place?" Victoria asked hopefully, reaching up to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear as she looked up to Mary with excited and hopeful eyes. Merlin knew she'd been practicing around the clock for this, and though she wasn't yet perfect, she wanted to prove she could do everything all the other students could do too.

Graduate Posts : 551 Join date : 2013-07-25 Age : 30

Mary grinned in relief as Victoria started talking rapidly about the Snitch and she stood up, facing Nancy. "She caught the Snitch and you didn't. It's simple, really." She didn't really care if she offended the girl or not, this was the Quidditch pitch and she was the Captain. If someone got offended because someone else was more competent, then so be it.

She had to repress a smirk when Nancy scoffed indignantly and stormed off. It was just like Victoria to offer someone else the Snitch she wanted to have. And, apparently, it was like Nancy to get insulted by that.

"Yes, you're on the team. Christina, I'm sorry. Better luck next time." Mary smiled kindly to the girl still standing by and she replied with a dismissive wave and a grin. The girl congratulated Victoria and then walked away, saying something about having to study anyway.

"And you can keep the Snitch, yes. We used the one from the last game, anyway."

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"She caught the Snitch and you didn't. It's simple, really."

The tone made Victoria wince a little bit, confrontation wasn't her best art, so the young witch decided to bake Nancy some cakes to make amends for the small misunderstanding. Victoria didn't want Nancy to feel bad about the whole thing, she'd put up a good fight for the Snitch after all.

"And you can keep the Snitch, yes. We used the one from the last game, anyway."

Victoria's eyes went wide as she realised she'd done it, she had made the Wormwood squad. Not through luck, not through being Jake's sister, but on sheer skill she had obtained something that was going to make her whole family so very proud of her. Without hesitation, Victoria threw her arms around Mary, pulling her close. "Thank you, thank you, thank you! I won't let you down, I promise, I'll work really hard!" Victoria insisted, letting go and turning back to her broom and picking it up.

"What days are training?" She asked, looking up to Mary with her final question before she would hurry off to write to Jake and possibly find Humphrey or Jax to tell them the good news.

Graduate Posts : 551 Join date : 2013-07-25 Age : 30

The Head Girl laughed as Victoria practically threw herself in a hug and hugged the girl back. It was refreshing to be hugged and not yelled at. It's only been three weeks since school has started and apparently, being Head Girl and the Quidditch Captain meant people letting their frustrations out on you.

"I have no doubts of you working hard, Victoria." Mary chuckled. "Also, um, you might not want to mention falling off your broom to your brother... I'm not saying you should lie to him! Just, I know he wouldn't like you falling." she said, a bit nervously.

"Our first practice is Tuesday, 5pm. Hopefully I'll be able to work out the definite days until then." Planning Prefect patrols was hard enough, but planning Quidditch practice was near impossible. Everybody had something on the days nearly every day and Wormwoods being Wormwoods, they absolutely refused to move their study dates.

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"Also, um, you might not want to mention falling off your broom to your brother... I'm not saying you should lie to him! Just, I know he wouldn't like you falling."

Victoria let out a soft giggle at Mary's words. "I didn't fall, I pounced on the Snitch! And it worked! And don't worry about Jake, he will be proud!" Victoria insisted, trying to make Mary understand that she had absolutely nothing to worry about in that moment, especially not regarding Jake, anyways.

"Our first practice is Tuesday, 5pm. Hopefully I'll be able to work out the definite days until then."

"Tuesday, at five." Victoria nodded, making a mental note for later on. With that, Victoria gave Mary another quick hug and skipped off in the direction of the broom cupboard. She was incredibly happy, so very, very happy about what she'd managed to achieve so early on in the year. All that remained now was proving that she deserved her position on the team, and she didn't plan on failing at that either.

» Wormwood Try Out for team (Michelle & Mary)
» Relaxing in the Gardens (Mary & Victoria)
» Mary McNeely
» Team Red (Ares and Mary)
» Team Red (Mary, Brayden, Jaden, Henley)