⧟  stana katic, cis female, she/her /  this is me trying by taylor swift + dried flower petals littered everywhere, stacks of books beside a too neat bed and the wind blowing her hair, pulling it from the crasp of a broken clip.  ⧽  ââ  hey, isnât that ROLANDA HOOCH? i read a daily prophet article on them, once ; the FORTY FIVE year old [ half blood ] WITCH is a [ RAVENCLAW alumnus who has gone on to be a HOGWARTS QUIDDITCH COACH AND PROFESSIONAL QUIDDITCH COMMENTATOR]. iâve heard they can be quite COMPASSIONATE & INTUITIVE , but i donât know⌠they came off very EVASIVE & ARGUMENTATIVE in that interview. it really is hard to know what to believe these days though, isnât it? Â
tw: death, murder, war
Imagine a little cottage by the sea. The sound of the waves there to ease one to sleep and to gently rouse them to wakefulness. The best that England had to offer. Thatâs what Rolanda Hoochâs parents used to tell her as they would sit out on the deck eating their dinner, little Roâs legs crossed underneath as she nestled happily in between her mums. Mama was her biological mother and a powerful witch at that with Mum being a woman that Mama had met surely after Rolandaâs birth and the subsequent leaving of her father. Mum was a muggle who got broiled up into the world of magic and children and took it like a camp. Thatâs how Mama used to talk about it.
Roâs childhood was as idyllic as one could be. Surrounded by blue skies and plenty of books with parents that loved her. It seemed like nothing could go wrong. Even once she hit Hogwarts and had to figure out what homesickness was and how to deal with it or through all the trials and tribulations that all teenagers go through, she was good. Ravenclaw had become another home and she became the seeker for Ravenclaw at just thirteen. To this day, Ro says that was one of her best achievements. It wasnât until the later years of Hogwarts where the world that was so bright and colourful slowly started to turn grey and dark and the places that once held wonder now held fear.Â
Upon graduation, Rolanda was offered a spot with the Holyhead Harpies. Their seeker was about to retire and little Ro (not that she was little anymore) had a reputation. With rumours of Voldemort and his army becoming more than just whispers, she was determined to enjoy something and so she grasped that chance with two hands. It was also upon graduation that like many others in her year, she joined the Order. This was done without the knowledge of either one of her mothers. She knew how they would react and everyone was so certain that those who didnât know anything would be space. Sometimes, she wished she also knew nothing but she did and her position on the team gave her a unique chance to travel and scout that most did not have. She never did much actual fighting.Â
She wishes she had. After all, her lack of fighting or time at home didnât save Mama and Mum. She was twenty years old and was so excited to be home after a long season. It was supposed to be a surprise. Turns out, she was the one in for a surprise. The dark mark was visible before she had even walked down the lane.
Her memories of that night are spotty. Even now. She knew that there was someone holding her. Someone from The Order, many someoneâs maybe. She knew that there was crying and that there was ash, because it had stuck to her tears and gotten in her eyes. Her home was gone and for no reason at all then her Mama was with a muggle. Senseless. Thatâs what it was.
Time became a blur after that. The next year was different homes and another season that pretended that the world wasnât about to fall apart. Perhaps that was the right thing to do because before it could, Lily and James Potter died and little Harry Potter killed Lord Voldemort. She was twenty-one, yet like everyone else her age, she felt twice that.
As the world recovered, she endeavored to do the same and gave everything to Quidditch, grasping for the joy that the First had just about taken from her. She was Seeker for the Holyhead Harpies for another nine years. In that time, she found love, a wonderful man by the name of William Picard. He was a wizard from America. He was so kind and so good and at twenty-nine when she gave birth to his child, a beautiful boy by the time of Adam, it finally felt like she had grasped onto life again.Â
Only a few months after he was born, at her first game back after maternity leave, a particularly nasty bludger knocked her off her broom. It should have been an easy fix but even magic couldnât fix the damage it had done to her hip. It wasnât that sheâd never fly again, it was that playing at a professional level had fallen from her grasp. She was newly thirty years old and sometimes still that hip causes her pain. It was okay though, because she had William and Adam and she would find something else. Right?
And find something she did. Six months after the injury, Albus Dumbledore contacted her. Hogwarts was in need of a Quidditch Coach and he thought she would be perfect for the job. Turns out he was right. Her days were spent at Hogwarts before she would head to Hogsmeade and apparate home.. Somedays Adam would come in with her and others William would have him. It wasnât necessarily easy to figure out, but they made it work. Somewhere amongst all of that Ro also began to commentate for the British and Irish Quidditch league. Things were good.
And then in 2012, Voldemort came back. There isnât much to say about the three years following, other than that Ro felt like she was twenty years old again, scared for her family and trying to pretend at work that things were okay. In January of 2014 however, doing so became much harder. She had eagerly left Hogwarts that day, desperate to be out of the dark and fearful place it had become. That day however, she apparated to a painfully familiar sight. The dark hovering over her home. William and Adam, only ten years old, were inside. It happened again. She had wanted nothing more then to run then, but instead she had simply gone back to Hogwarts and sent a Patronus to a member of The Order. Students needed her.Â
Then May Fourteenth happened and once again the world had to rebuild. She threw herself into it, desperate to continue to ignore what had happened, what she had lost. Stopping was out of the question because if she did so, she was certain she would unravel. And unravel she did when it all finally caught up to her. After all, she was now a widow (even if they had never officially gotten married) and a mother without a child. Who came back from such a thing?
Itâs been six years now and sometimes she almost feels like the woman before the Second War. After all, she works at Hogwarts again (but now she lives there) and still travels occasionally to commentate (but now there is no one to send letters too). Even so, she knows that to be false. Especially now as history seems to be on the brink of repeating itself. Well, at least she has no family to get killed this time.
---
if you read all of that iâm very proud! i certainly did get a little carried away there. either way, i would love to plot and am open to most things! i hope you like her, sheâs a new character for me so iâm very much still figuring her out!
