May 4th, 1888 — Puddlemere Opening Gala

Although by no means an avid Quidditch fan, Esther did have a healthy appreciation for the magical sport. She typically attended a few matches scattered throughout the season, with various relations for company, but was not sure she could claim to be enamored of any particular team. She did enjoy watching the Holyhead Harpies and jovially cheering them along while her husband or male relatives cheered the other team, but mostly just for the sake of encouraging some playful rivalry during the course of the game; she would have been quite mortified if anyone she knew had gone to play professional Quidditch!

The attraction of this game was not so much either of the teams in question, nor that it was the beginning of the season, though she knew that the opening for Puddlemere had created quite a draw after their victory last season. Rather, Esther had been intrigued by the idea of a Quidditch match with a party attached, and had bullied as many of her friends and family as she could into buying out a whole swatch of conjoining stand seats. This was sort of a social event (close enough for her tastes, at any rate), but with the promise of some occupation besides socializing to keep the outing from becoming tedious, and outings with a purpose were Essie's favorite types.

Now that she was actually here, though, she was finding the atmosphere a bit overwhelming. There were so many people, and so many of them were drinking or else already drunk, and everything was so loud. She had little Gracie by one hand (having come to the decision earlier to leave the child's younger sister behind at home; four was only barely old enough to think Gracie would enjoy the match at all, and there was no point wasting a ticket on a toddler), but was afraid she had lost most of the rest of the group she'd arrived with. Someone was making an announcement from somewhere — a raffle, she thought. She wasn't paying much mind until her seat number was called out, at which point she dug out her ticket to be sure she hadn't misremembered.

"Oh, my," she commented, half to herself and half to the person next to her. "I think I've won something — though I didn't hear what. Did you?" she asked, hoping it wasn't one of those garish Puddlemere flags she'd seen someone waving about, with the flashing golden rushes. The very notion threatened to give her a headache.

Open to anyone, special invites to: Clara Ross Benjamin Ross Sampson Browne @"Odira Potter" (Roslyn Ross and Justin Ross if they're stooping to the level of stand seats but probably not) Loretta Browne

  

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As far as Sampson was concerned this was, actually, a pretty good use of a social gathering. He was here with an assortment of friends and family members, there was a Quidditch game, and if the announcers would move on and announce the game rather than the raffle then everything would have been perfect. But the cheap beer was pretty good, too.

It was perhaps because he was mid-sip that he didn't hear exactly what Esther was awarded. He looked up, still holding the glass up high, as if being tall and looking around would help him to figure it out.

"One of the flags, maybe," Sam suggested, thinking that maybe Gracie would like to use it as a cape, "I didn't quite catch it."

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What terrible luck, to have won something and have that something be the one thing she had least wanted to take home! She assumed her husband was correct, anyway; she tended to trust him on most things, which was a habit she'd picked up long before they'd married and continued throughout the years.

"Do you think it's worth getting through the crowd for it?" she pondered, wondering if perhaps she could use this as a plausible excuse not to pick up the flag. She really didn't want it, particularly if she had to hang on to it through the entire game. Was there a way to stop it from flashing the golden rushes, she wondered? Surely whoever actually owned those things couldn't want them to do that all the time. They were enough to light up a room at night, she imagined.

"If I don't show up they'll draw some other seat number, won't they?" she asked, meanwhile glancing around at the assembled family members to see whether any of them might appreciate a gaudy flag. She'd gladly pawn it off onto a sister or cousin, so long as she didn't have to look at the thing for too long.

  

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Sam eyed the crowd around them. With eight inches on Esther, he considered himself to have a bit of a built-in vantage point to see everything around them. "I don't think the crowd's too bad," he said, although his wife seemed rather reluctant to go get it.

He added, "I imagine they'll pick someone else if you take a bit, though."

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hi make my brother plz

Esther dithered. She really didn't want to go claim any prize, but she was also concerned that her husband might think ill of her if she didn't. This entire outing had been at least partially her idea, after all (she didn't remember who had initially suggested it but she had certainly been the rallying force behind getting the whole family out and involved), and it would seem strange to act as though she wasn't enjoying herself now. He might think something was the matter, and might ask her about it — or might not, but it might bear on his mind all the same. If he thought that she was angry or disappointed about something, would that sully his own enjoyment of the match?

Well, she couldn't have that. "I suppose I ought to go," she allowed with a subtle smile. "I wouldn't want to spoil anyone's fun. Whatever it is I've won, I'm sure someone will want it." Standing on her tip-toes, she leaned in to give him a light kiss. She never missed an opportunity to kiss him, even if she was only saying goodbye for a moment, and no matter whether they were in their own home or out in public. Sampson was her best feature, after all — the best thing that had ever happened to her, and the achievement she was proudest of and most content with — and she liked showing him off, in her own subtle way, whenever she could.

"Back in a moment, then," she said as she pulled back, pulling Gracie's hand over to his so that he could watch over her while she was away.

  

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He had almost come to expect Esther's goodbye kisses - it would have been more of a surprise if, one day, she left him without pecking him on the lips first. Before their marriage, Sam had never been fond of public displays of affection - at least, none that were so overt as a kiss - but in the years since, he'd mellowed, moved further in his wife's direction.

Left with Gracie, Sam plucked her up off the ground so that she could sit on his shoulders, little skirts arranged carefully around his head. He kept one hand up behind her in case she toppled, but once Grace had her arms wrapped around his forehead, holding on tight.

"Who are you rooting for?" Sam asked his four year old quite seriously.

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hi make my brother plz