Chapter Text
Oliver Wood wasn’t the kind of person to get overly emotional. Passionate, yes. Intense, absolutely. But sentimental? No.
Then Harry Potter walked into the Great Hall, drowning in hand-me-downs and overshadowed by a Weasley, and Oliver’s brain whispered something alarming:
**“That one. I want that one.”**
Oliver didn’t even flinch. He accepted this new truth as if he’d always known it. As if the universe had simply slotted a puzzle piece into place.
Harry Potter sat on the stool. The Sorting Hat wobbled on his head for what felt like hours. Oliver leaned forward slightly, watching.
“C’mon,” he muttered. “C’mon, be a lion, kid.”
The hat yelled **“GRYFFINDOR!”** and Oliver grinned. *Mine now.*
*****
Harry plopped down at the Gryffindor table, blinking behind round glasses. Oliver was there two seconds later.
“Hi. I’m Oliver. Fifth year. You’re Harry. I like you.”
Harry blinked slowly. “...okay.”
“I’m your unofficial older brother now.”
Harry paused. “Cool,” he said, and started shoveling mashed potatoes onto his plate like he hadn’t eaten in a week.
Oliver frowned. *Note to self: Feed him regularly. Who let this kid arrive starved? I will fight them.*
“Do you like Quidditch?” Oliver asked.
Harry lit up like a firework.
“Oh,” Oliver said softly. “You’re perfect.”
*****
Harry, it turned out, was *weirdly* quiet. He spoke mostly to Ron and Hermione, nodded politely to upper years, and said “thank you” *every time* someone handed him something.
In the common room, he saw Harry flinch when Seamus raised his hand too quickly.
Oliver’s jaw clenched. *Right,* he thought. *Cool. So I’m murdering the Dursleys.*
But also: Harry had somehow pissed off Filch three times, convinced Peeves to throw water balloons at Snape, and was once seen chasing a chicken around the courtyard “for reasons of national security.”
“Harry,” Oliver said, catching him with dirt under his nails and a frog in his pocket, “what exactly did you do to get banned from the third-floor corridor?”
Harry blinked at him. “Technically I’m not banned. They just said they’d expel me if I went back.”
“…That’s not better.”
“I wasn’t *alone.* Ron dared me.”
Oliver sighed deeply. “So you’re a gremlin.”
Harry shrugged. “I’m efficient.”
*****
Oliver, always on the lookout for good Seeker candidates, dragged Harry to the pitch one morning before breakfast. McGonagall had muttered something about “natural talent” and “pure instinct” and “for Merlin’s sake, *watch him*.”
Two minutes into practice, Oliver stood in stunned silence as Harry spiraled upward like he’d been born on a broom. He caught the practice Snitch in under sixty seconds. Backwards.
Oliver may have cried a little.
Harry, floating above him, looked faintly confused. “Did I do it wrong?”
“No,” Oliver said hoarsely. “You did it *perfectly.*”
And then, without thinking, he asked, “Who taught you to fly?”
Harry shrugged. “No one. I just… guessed.”
*****
By October, Oliver had become a menace.
- He carried extra snacks “just in case Harry didn’t eat enough at dinner.”
- He stared down Snape during every Potions class.
- He loudly declared that *anyone* bullying first years was “volunteering for Bludger practice.”
- He declared the Quidditch team “Harry’s Unofficial Security Squad.”
Fred and George approved.
“If anything happens to him,” Oliver growled once, watching Harry try to hex his own shoelaces, “I will rain fire upon this castle.”
Katie Bell raised an eyebrow. “He just lit his homework on fire by accident.”
“That’s *not the point”*
*****
Harry didn’t say much about his home. But one night, Oliver found him asleep in the common room, curled in a too-small jumper, arms wrapped tight around a pillow.
Oliver quietly draped a blanket over him and sat nearby, broom maintenance kit untouched in his lap.
“Don’t worry, Harry,” he murmured. “I’ve got you.”
Harry never said anything about it. But the next morning, he sat beside Oliver at breakfast, leaned into his shoulder a little, and passed him the toast first.
It wasn’t much.
But it was everything.