Through the Hoop

The first things Angelina saw when she stepped groggily out of her bedroom the next morning were the two owls waiting for her. Archimedes, who was by nature a loner, had apparently flown off in a huff rather than share his roost with them. Angelina took the letters but didn’t bother to open them until she’d had a shower and put together some breakfast; then, feeling a bit more alive, she opened Oliver’s reply.

She was a bit disappointed to see that Oliver hadn’t responded directly to her teasing; the letter was just a note, really, with the name of the restaurant and the time, 1:00 pm. On the other hand, he hadn’t reacted negatively, so it was probably a good sign.

The second letter was from Mr. Dorkins, and was both good and bad:

Johnson,

Two things: first, I’m very pleased with how you handled the press yesterday. They weren’t exactly fair, but you managed to keep your temper – I’m not sure I would have in the situation.
Secondly, I’ve been asked by the mail room to inform you that if you don’t start picking up your mail immediately they’ll have to start handing it over to you without screening it, or burning them to make room. I went down to have a word with them, and discovered that they aren’t exaggerating even a little. I can arrange to have them sent to your flat, but you may run out of space very quickly; and you won’t have any time to respond to them anyhow seeing as we’re leaving for Tutshill this afternoon. If you plan to light any parchment bonfires, please inform security beforehand.

- Mr. Dorkins

Angelina raised an eyebrow; she’d only been with the team a few days, surely there couldn’t be that much mail for her already? Deciding to see for herself, she tossed on some clothes to Apparate to the stadium. But as she stepped out the door she stopped short and stared. Someone had scorched letters into her door! When she stepped back she could see that there was an entire message that ran from the wall on one side of the door to the other:

QUIDDITCH IS A MAN’S GAME!

It took Angelina half an hour to track down the landlord, and just one minute of furious words before he accompanied her back to the flat. After staring in shock for about five seconds he began apologizing profusely; “I’ve housed Cannons players before, but nothing like this has ever happened!”

Angelina bit back her retort; there was no way the man could have anticipated the defacement. “I’m the first woman Quidditch player, at least according to some wankers,” she pointed out while rubbing her forehead tiredly. “This won’t be the only time this happens.”

“Oh, yes it will,” the landlord replied, his jaw stiffening. “Ms. Johnson, I take care of my flats and my tenants. I assure you that this message will be gone by this evening, and more wards than you can name will be cast to prevent anything similar occurring.”

Angelina was utterly shocked by the landlord’s reaction. “Thank you! Half expected you to tell me I wasn’t welcome here, if this is what’ll happen with me around,” she admitted.

The landlord smiled grimly. “Ms. Johnson, my professional integrity aside, my parents raised me a Cannons’ fan, just like the last eight generations of our family. The last time the Cannons took the league, my great-grandfather was a second-year at Hogwarts; I’d like to see our team win again while my grandparents are still alive. I can’t stop all those idiots who want to sacrifice our first decent chance in decades, but at least I can make certain you aren’t harassed in your own home.”

After a bit more conversation, and Angelina thanking the landlord again, she Apparated to the stadium. Not knowing exactly where the mail room is, Angelina headed to Mr. Dorkins’ office. “Hello, Johnson,” Mr. Dorkins greeted her when she knocked on the frame of his open door. “Here to see about your mail?”

“Yeah. Why don’t they just shrink all the mail?” Angelina asked. “I mean, they are wizards, right?”

“Yes, and that’s what they are doing,” Mr. Dorkins agreed, walking around his desk and leading Angelina out of the office. “Some of the players have all their mail shrunk until the off-season, and then deal with answering it or not. But the volume of mail you’re getting is…unusual.”

“I bet. How much of it is hate mail?” Angelina asked grimly.

“Oh, they never open your mail,” Mr. Dorkins said, looking shocked at the idea. “Unless it’s a package that might contain something dangerous. They just scan all the mail for Curses or Hexes.” He smiled sympathetically. “The team leaves the responsibility for fan mail to the players.”

“Lovely.”

Mr. Dorkins led Angelina to a room on the ground floor. When they stepped in, Angelina wrinkled her nose; half the room looked like the Owlery at Hogwarts, and smelled about the same too. The other half was mostly taken up with desks, all of which looked reinforced; there were some that appeared scorched. Angelina found herself appreciating that the team arranged for this much help with the mail. The walls of the room were partitioned off, and each section had a player’s name above it. There were rows of shelves in each partition. Angelina did notice hers seemed to have the most mail, but not so that the area was overflowing.

Mr. Dorkins led Angelina to a desk in the center of the room; it seemed to be the center of the chaos. When they reached the desk the woman sitting there looked up. She was an older woman with steel-grey hair, and it looked like she’d have been quite tall if she hadn’t spent decades hunched over desks. “Ah,” she said in a bitter tone as her eyes fell on Angelina. “Finally decided to take your blasted mail?”

“Er, yeah. I heard you were getting a bit swamped…”

“A bit swamped? A bit swamped?” The woman exclaimed, her bitterness overcome by complete incredulity. “Johnson, I’ve had to assign almost two thirds of the workers here to just your mail! And it doesn’t show any sign of slowing! Less than a flipping week and you’ve forced me to rearrange my entire department!”

Angelina felt like she was being chewed out by Professor McGonagall after losing Gryffindor a bunch of points. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “Er, I hope no one was hurt…”

“Wilson should be out of St. Mungo’s tonight,” the woman said shortly. “They managed to get rid of the flippers.”

“Er, good.” Angelina forced herself not to ask about how the flippers had got there in the first place.

“Julie, I was thinking Johnson might benefit from one of those auto-answer spells you have,” Mr. Dorkins said, trying to distract the woman as she appeared to heat up again. “I doubt she’ll have time to answer it all.”

“I should think not,” Julie muttered. She pulled open a drawer and took out a small box about a foot across, which she handed to Angelina. Angelina looked inside and saw what looked like thousands of tiny, tiny bits of parchment; her mail, shrunk to a manageable size. “Be sure you’ve got a lot of room before you Enlarge this,” Julie said sharply. Then she opened another drawer and withdrew a few sheets of parchment. “These should do for you,” she told Angelina, sounding resigned. “There’s one spell you should run first; it can detect if there’s any mail from people you know personally and separate it out for you. Then there’s a few different ones for pleasant answers, and one just in case you want to reply to a nasty one,” she added with a wry grin.

“I wouldn’t recommend that,” Mr. Dorkins said quickly as Angelina took the parchments. “It’s not wise to antagonize them. Pattinson got into a vicious back-and-forth mailing with some irate fan a few years ago, and the guy ended up attacking Pattinson right in the middle of a restaurant. If there hadn’t been a couple off-duty Aurors there it could’ve gone very bad.”

Angelina shivered, thinking of something similar happening later when she met Oliver for lunch. “I think I’ll skip it.”

Angelina thanked Julie, who seemed mildly mollified but cautioned her to expect another batch of mail twice the size by the time the Cannons returned from their road trip. After saying goodbye to Mr. Dorkins Angelina returned to her flat, where two wizards were already removing the offensive message from her door. Muttering a thank you, she let herself in and locked the door.

Seeing she had a bit of time before meeting Oliver, she cleared her living room completely out, levitating her furniture into other rooms. Archimedes, who’d decided to return, watched Angelina with an expression of utter disbelief. He squawked in surprise when Angelina cast the Enlargement Charm, and her living room was literally engulfed in letters. Angelina stared gobsmacked at the drifts of parchment, which were actually taller than her in places. What the BLOODY HELL have I gotten myself into? She asked herself for what seemed like the millionth time.

Angelina worked out the spell to separate letters from people she knew. There were only three; one from her parents, which was basically a not-so-subtle attempt to make sure she was all right. Angelina didn’t mind, though – she figured that was what parents were for. The second letter was from Madam Hooch, congratulating Angelina and offering support and advice. Angelina decided to write back later and ask why Madam Hooch hadn’t pointed out there were no women Quidditch players.

The third letter, however, shocked Angelina so completely she nearly passed out when she saw the return address: Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore, Headmaster’s quarters, Hogwarts Castle. She suddenly felt very small, and her skin felt tight and hot; the attention of Dumbledore was something she’d mainly avoided while at Hogwarts. Angelina wasn’t comfortable under the spotlight – as was evidenced by her reaction to the press – and someone as powerful and influential as Dumbledore created quite a spotlight on his own. And as Angelina had seen from the way her friend Harry Potter had been treated most of his life, the spotlight pretty much guaranteed drawing both good and bad attention.

In seven years at Hogwarts, Dumbledore had only spoken directly to Angelina once, to congratulate her after Gryffindor captured the Quidditch Cup her fifth year. Even that little attention had made Angelina nervous, and Dumbledore had apparently sensed it and not pressed her further. So why, after more than two years without even a single word, has he written directly to me? Angelina toyed nervously with the envelope before concluding there was nothing more serious inside but a congratulations for a former student. It couldn’t be anything else, she told herself firmly. I’d bet he forgot I existed until he heard I was playing Quidditch. And I heard he was a Puddlemere fan…maybe he heard my name while listening to the game yesterday. Finally convinced, Angelina took a deep breath and cracked open the letter; and it was exactly the opposite of what she expected:

Dear Ms. Johnson,

My most heartfelt congratulations on your successful entry into the world of professional Quidditch. I had heard some years ago you had aspirations of that ilk, and hoped you would pursue them with bravery befitting a Gryffindor, which you have.

I believe by now you will already have experienced some of the more unpleasant aspects of being a woman in the Quidditch league; sadly, many of the best female students who have flown the pitch here at Hogwarts have been forced to pursue their dreams in other countries as a result of the rather steadfast bias within our own.

I feel certain you will wish to succeed in your career through your own determination and will, and I have no doubt you are capable. However, I wish to tell you that what you are doing is a fine thing, and deserving of both respect and aid; and that you have mine, for what it is worth. Should you ever wish aid in your endeavor – even if in secret – or simply feel the need for a sympathetic and impartial ear, I offer my humble services to you; feel free to contact me by owl at any time.

Yours,
Albus Dumbledore