(A/N) Erm, anything you recognise is JK Rowling's, of course. This is also my first fanfic, so I'm uber-nervous, and would much appreciate it if you could review? Just added a little bit onto the end of this, it introduces a couple of things and it didn't really fit anywhere else.

I was running through fields of gold, my arms thrown out, embracing the hazy sunshine, perfect temperature and ambiance. What a blissful life I led. At the other end of the field stood Michael Summerby, Chaser of the Wasps and the England national team in all his chiselled Adonis glory. He began running to me, arms inviting me in, calling my name...

"... Miss Coote?"

Damn. If there was anyone that wasn't Michael Summerby, it was Severus Snape. And he looked like Christmas had come early. This was not good. I had already had six detentions with him this year, one more and I may as well ditch my hopes at the Ministry and start an internship with Mundungus Fletcher. I looked around at Oliver, panicked. He mouthed something back at me. I shook my head desperately, and mimed writing something down. He rolled his eyes.

"Miss Coote!"

I smiled at him as sweetly as I could; given the man was a torturous old bat.

"The answer, Miss Coote, would be much appreciated. Especially sometime today." He sneered back, twisting his nasty little mouth into a predatory grin. Eugh. I kept my gob shut. In moments such as these, it was wise not to reply, as I had learnt the hard way.

"If this question stumps you so, might I suggest rethinking the career at the Ministry? Your lack of understanding of the basics of poisons and antidotes, which you should have learnt six years ago, does cast some light on your mental ability, does it not?" he sneered, and turned his attention back to the board.

"Bezoars." I stated calmly. The suspense was thrilling. Snape froze, in the middle of waving his wand. He cocked his head to the side and slowly swivelled round to look at me, his eyes blazing.

"What did you say?" he bit out, his lips curling over his teeth. He strode over to my desk and bent over me, so that his face was directly above mine. I had to give it to him; the man had his intimidation techniques down pat.

"Bezoars?" I squeaked. It was now hurting my neck to make eye contact with him, so I looked past at the rest of their class. They sat crouching back against each other, leaning as far away from Snape as possible. It had been a while since he got this angry. Laura Branstone from Hufflepuff looked as though she was about to cry.

The shadow looming above me moved, and I found him staring down at my best friend, who was quaking with fear.

"Wood, would you care to cast some light on the situation?"

Oliver took a deep breath, composing himself and opened his mouth. A feeble whimper came out. Flint and Higgs, who usually spaced out in these kinds of situations, began laughing, only to be given the 'Severus Snape: Serial Killer' look.

"Coote, Wood, twenty points from Gryffindor." He glared down at me. "Each." He whipped around, his black robes flapping behind him, and made his way back to the front of the classroom.

Well, that was better than was expected. Oliver didn't agree.

"Oh, come on, I fell asleep. I'm lucky I'm not on the Hogwarts Express right now!" I said, dodging a couple of first years as we made our way down the corridor. Oliver rounded on me, glaring.

"I know! Seriously, Ella, you can't keep sleeping in his class. NEWTs are a couple of weeks away. Literally! The Charms practical is in twelve days! Days, Ella!" he shook my shoulders.

"I've been accepted into the Department of International Magical Cooperation, and you've got Puddlemere. We just need a pass in Potions and we'll walk in. A pass, Ollie!" I cried, shaking his shoulders. "We can do that. I can do that." We continued along the corridor toward the Great Hall.

"I know you can do that. You could get an O if you tried. I just don't want you to fail your NEWTs and end up eating the cockroaches on Knockturn Alley for breakfast lunch and dinner!" The man was insane.

"Ew. Why would you do that?" a small voice asked from my elbow. My little brother was walking behind us, looking bewildered and slightly disgusted.

"I'm not going to do that." I sighed. "Ollie here is just being a moron." The moron glared at me.

"No, he's not. Oliver's cool. Hiya, Oliver!" Ritchie beamed. I rolled my eyes. Ritchie had hero-worshipped Oliver since he was five years old, and had practically stalked him in his first two weeks at Hogwarts. Oliver, being Oliver, lapped up this sort of attention.

"Ritchie!" he grinned and they knocked knuckles, entering into what must be one of the most imaginative and long handshakes ever conceived. In the middle of the Entrance Hall. As people pointed and laughed at the three of us. Wonderful. Finally, they finished, and Ritchie began to root around in his bag. He produced a small parcel and a letter, and held them out to me.

"What's this?" I asked, pulling the brown paper off the parcel.

"Muggle sweets from Great-Grandma, I think she made them herself." replied Ritchie, eyeing the fudge distastefully. That was worrying. Great-Grandma was ninety-seven years old and almost completely blind. "I think she put gravel instead of sugar."

"Right." Oliver and I peered at the offensive brown squares. "Well, thanks. I'll, erm, see what I can do with them. Don't forget to write a thank you letter." I reminded him.

Ritchie grinned. "Already done, sis. And that's a letter from Mum. I got one too, but I haven't read it yet."

"Great, thanks, Ritchie." I smiled.

"Welcome. You owe me two Butterbeers, yeah?" At my nod, he waved and ran into the Great Hall to find his friends.

"You use him as a postal service and pay him in drinks?" Oliver questioned, chuckling. I shrugged.

"He can't go to Hogsmeade, and I can't be bothered to get up early enough for the post." I replied. "It's win-win."

We approached the Gryffindor table, sat down, and in silence, piled our plates high with roast potatoes, pasta and salad, and ate. Once the feeling of starvation had abated somewhat, I fished the letter from Mum out of the pocket I had stuffed it into and cracked open the wax sealing the parchment shut.

Dear Ella, it read.

I hope everything's going well, darling. We haven't heard from Professor McGonagall in a while, so I'm assuming you haven't got many detentions from Professor Snape recently. That's a relief. I'm sure you've been revising hard for your exams, so I'm not going to patronise you by going on about that, but you're doing so well, dear. It would be a shame if you let things slide and you didn't get what you've worked hard to achieve.

Right, I'm coming to the good bit now. Jem and Lea came home for lunch on Sunday with the most wonderful news! They're having a baby! Can you believe it? Your Dad and I are so excited, and you brothers will all be Aunt and Uncles. She's due in December, so it's a little too early to know whether it's a boy or girl yet, but they're hoping to find out soon. They'll probably know more by the time you and Ritchie break for the summer. I'll let you know as anything comes up, of course, but you'll be home in about three weeks anyway. All the boys are coming home in August, for the World Cup.

Anyway, I'd better write to Ritchie and let him know.

Love you, darling,

Mum

P.S. I think Great-Grandma Lester sent you some fudge. Do be careful when you eat it, will you? Dad chipped a tooth.

That was not expected. Jem was my eldest brother, the first of six, including me and Ritchie, and he had been married to Lea for a year now. I guess it wasn't too shocking; with five brothers, I was pretty much guaranteed to become an aunt sooner or later. I passed the letter over to Oliver, who was looking at me questioningly, and glanced over to Ritchie, who had obviously just finished reading his. He was looking down the table at me, grinning widely. I smiled back.

"Lea's pregnant? That's great! Congratulations, Auntie Ella." Oliver grinned, pulling me into a one-armed hug. He read on. "'All the boys are coming home? All of them?"

"Well, since she wrote 'all', I'm assuming they all are, Oliver." I cocked an eyebrow at him.

"I'm not stupid, El. I thought Rob was in Australia?" I nodded. Rob was Jem's twin, and had been in the Australian outback, researching Old Magic, as he called it. Julian was three years younger, at twenty three, and Henry was twenty one.

"I guess he's coming down. Jules, will, of course. He's not exactly going to miss the World Cup, is he? And Henry is such a homebody anyway. Mum's been trying to get rid of him for years."

"I can't wait for the World Cup!" squealed Oliver. I laughed.

"Just don't take it too seriously, yeah? I don't need to have you mooning around after England get knocked out in the heats."

"England are not going to get knocked out in the heats." He growled.

"Oh, of course they are. Only Greg O'Hare's any good, and you can't win a game with one decent Chaser."

"Ricky Peasegood-" he began.

"Is inconsistent. And doesn't perform well under pressure." I finished.

"Fair enough." he paused. This was new. Oliver Wood never let up, on anything, and Quidditch was especially serious business. When the Gryffindor team were approaching the finals of the Cup, poor little Harry Potter looked as white a sheet for about three weeks, and I was pretty sure the entire team was avoiding their captain whenever possible.

"I'm now supporting Ireland." he announced. Of course he was.

Before we knew it, the NEWTs were upon us like a bad case of dragon pox. It was unpleasant and nasty, but you only had to go through it once. I had taken seven subjects, each with two exams; of which I had done eight.

Tomorrow was Potions theory and Ancient Runes, both of which would be dreadful. I could work my bum off if I was so inclined, it wouldn't make any difference. Nothing would go in. Nada. I closed the fat, hardback book and began to hit myself on the head with it, willing something to go in and stay there.

"Merlin, get a hold of yourself. You'll knock your skull in." Oliver grabbed the book and chucked it to the other side of the fireplace.

"Good, then at least I would have never finished a Potions NEWT for them to give my grieving parents my grade." I wailed, collapsing on the rug in the common room. Oliver glared at me.

"Don't be so morbid, child. Pick up that Runes book if Potions is so terrible."

"No, it's depressing." I sulked. Oliver looked me exasperatedly.

"What do you want me to do about it, Ella? You have to revise. Or do you want me to read you a Beedle the Bard tale?"

"Don't patronise me, Wood." I warned. He had the audacity to laugh at me. Percy Weasley, the only other person left in the common room, glared at him from a window seat.

"And what are you going to do about it, Coote? Look at you, sprawled out on the rug in your furry pink slippers and bunny pyjamas." He had a point. I certainly didn't look too threatening in my current
situation, especially with my short brown hair sticking up in all directions.

"Sod this," I said, standing up. " I'll wake up early and revise."

"No, you won't." he looked at me from where he sat cross-legged on the floor.

"Yes, I will." I flounced towards the stairs leading to the dormitory. Pausing, I sheepishly retraced my steps back to the fireplace, where
Oliver stood grinning, holding out my books. Murmuring a thanks, I held them to my chest and stalked back towards the stairs.

"Smooth, Ella." he called.

I turned back from my position on the second stair and shot him a sarcastic grin and my middle finger. "Good night, Oliver."

"Oh for heaven's sake," cried Percy from the window. "Are you leaving or not?" he demanded.

I glared at him and continued up the stairs. To be honest, I'd be glad to never Percy again once we left school. I'd heard he was up for a
place in the Ministry too, but hopefully we'd keep out of each other's way.

Reaching the top of the stairs, I pushed open the door to the seventh year girls' dormitory.

"Ella!" cried Edie Jenner, throwing herself at me, and using me as a shield. "Tell Audrey to stop chasing me."

I looked at her. "What did you do this time? Use her shampoo or her hairbrush?"

"Shampoo," snarled Audrey, advancing from the bathroom, wet hair slapping her face. Honestly, she looked like the lovechild of Hades and a Fury. It was terrifiying and, to be fair, Gryffindor or not, it really wasn't my problem.

"Sorry, mate. You're on your own." I dodged out of the way just as Audrey lunged. With a shriek, Edie lept onto a bed, pulled close the drapes and cast an Impenetrable Charm on them.

"Fine, you can stay there! You're going to have to come out for Potions in the morning!" Audrey yelled at the drapes.

"Oi, don't tell her she can stay in there! That's my bed..." sighed Holly, looking ruefully at the drapes. She had been going through her trunk and had realised too late what was going on.

I caught Lisa's eye as I made my way over to my bed. Dropping the books on the bedside table, I jumped into bed and pulled the covers up, relishing the immeadiate feeling of comfort. Lisa, who was in bed with her Runes textbook, rolled her eyes at me.

"They've been at it since eight. Five bloody hours of this," she flapped her hands between the beds opposite, "since Audrey got out of
the shower and realised that her shampoo bottle only had a third left in it."

"This is nothing. Julian and Robert, my brothers, borrowed Jeremy's Cleansweep to go play and broke it by accident. He was about thirteen, and had just made it onto the house team. He went on such a rampage, they ended up hiding out with our Muggle grandparents for three weeks." Lisa looked aghast. To be fair, it didn't take much for her to do that. Even the slightest whif of scandal or gossip sent her reeling.

"Julian? Is he still playing for the Magpies?" Audrey sighed dreamily. Eugh. Audrey Cavendish had a thing for 'older men' and guys who played sports, which would have been fine because I did too to some extent, but the object of her affections happened to be my brother. I had spent the last six years fervently hoping it was just a passing phase, which had simply never passed. I shot her a withering glance.

"Yes, and his girlfriend, Fran, plays for the Harpies." I snapped, feeling guilty immeadiately afterwards. I didn't mean to sound like such a hormonal nutcase, I was just tired, and stressed and I hadn't revised for bloody Potions. "I'm sorry," I sighed. "I'm just really tired. I'll probably get up to revise for Potions as well, so I'd better go to bed."

Lisa nodded. "It's almost two in the morning, and we all have Potions in the morning." I pulled out my alarm clock, sent from my Muggle-born Mum's side of the family, and pressed down a little button at the back. Damn piece of plastic had better not fail me now.

It did, and I overslept the next morning. Oliver nearly had an anuerysm when I told him. He was almost as worried about the whole thing as Percy, who seriously looked like he'd rather give birth to an Arcomantula than sit another exam. But it went better than I thought it would, or hoped it would. I hadn't bothered to revise poisonous spotted plants, and they hadn't even come up, so maybe I would get by. I would just have to wait for the results.

Plus, and I'm not sure if I'm allowed to ask this, but I would love a beta? Please respond if you would like to do it? Thanks :)