Coach Pierce
February 26, 2010 1:58 PM
Meeting with Oliver Abbott by Coach Pierce
At the beginning of the year, Amelia Pierce had been told that none of the teams had assistant captains (and in Aladren's case, they didn't even have a captain). Teams were still in the process of forming, and assistants were needed immediately. She hadn't known any of the players involved, so she took the easy way of selection. She'd picked the oldest non-senior on each team and appointed them. Where there had been more than one option, she'd gone to Amelia Fox's notes, and decided based her decision on the former coach's assessment of their relative abilities.This year, she had a better idea of who the players were and was willing to give each of the captains a choice in the matter. So she sent an email to both of the assistants that would be promoted to captain next year and arranged a time to meet them in their common rooms.
Right now, a few minutes before the second of those meetings, she was in Crotalus, looking for Oliver Abbott. When he arrived, she stood up, "Captain-to-be Abbott," she greeted him with smile and an outstretched hand. "Don't worry. I'm here wearing my Quidditch Coach hat, not your Head of House hat. I just wanted to talk to about your responsibilities for next year and see if you had any ideas about who you'd like for your assistant."
As they sat down opposite each other on two of the common room couches (it had been a deliberate decision to hold Oliver's meeting in the common room instead of her office, to keep it informal and equitable to Thomas Fitzgerald's meeting), she approached the more immediate decision first. "Did you have a preference on who I appoint - or don't appoint - to the assistant position or should I just assign someone to you?" In Oliver's case, the question was particularly important because his sister was one of the leading options. Whether he got along with her or not would have a direct impact on the decision.
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Coach Pierce
Meeting with Oliver Abbott
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Oliver Abbott
March 09, 2010 3:59 AM
Meeting with Coach Pierce by Oliver Abbott
Being apprehended by the Head of House on your way into the commons would be enough to throw most people off balance; even Oliver, who was sure he hadn't broken any rules of late, instantly got a twitchy feeling. It didn't improve much when he was told it would be about Quidditch - he wondered why Helena wasn't there. What had happened to her? But in the following seconds Oliver's brain calmed itself back down as the Coach explained what she was there to discuss."Oh," Oliver replied not-so-eloquently. He went over the team in his head, once Helena had been removed from it. Lutece was in Oliver's year so that struck her off immediately (which was just as well, for several reasons). That left a first year, a second year, a third year, and his sister. From what Oliver understoos about the little Helena had shared, Marissa had been pretty much bribed and bullied to sign up as Seeker, and Theo... well, he'd only been playuing Quidditch one year. It was impossible to tell to what degree he would improve. Ethan was a fair Beater, but there were times Oliver doubted his committment - nothing had been said or done outright, it was just a gut feeling. As for Charlie... Oliver was pleased to say he was proud of her Chasing skills, but he knew little about her leading capabilities. Would she even cope with managing a team, let alone do it well? he didn't know.
All in all, it felt as though each choice would be a gamble, but none moreso than the next. "Not really," Oliver replied. "None of them have been on the team all that long, so it's..." he paused to find diplomatic words, "it would be tricky to know how any of them would be as a captain." The selfish streak in him acknowledged that he didn't really care, because by that stage he would have left the school and Crotalus Quidditch games would be a thing of the past. "You, uh, can assign someone," he finished, feeling lame for not taking the responsibility of choosing someone. But then again, if he didn't choose for himself, nobody could say he was biased for picking his sister. Or, on the other hand, Charlie couldn't hate him for not picking her. It was win-win.
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Oliver Abbott
Meeting with Coach Pierce
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Coach Pierce
March 16, 2010 4:05 PM
Still meeting with Oliver Abbott by Coach Pierce
So, no opinion voiced either way on the issue of his sister. He probably didn't want to sound biased, which Amelia could certainly understand given her own decision that needed to be made regarding next year's Pecari Captain. It was probably even harder when it involved a sibling rather than a distant cousin with no real personal connection.But since he wasn't nixing Charlotte Abbott, she thought the two could work together more seamlessly than any of the other options. "I was thinking I'd assign you sister, so unless you have an objection to that, I think that's who we'll go with."
She gave him a chance to object and then continued by going over the basics of his responsibilities. Helena had already explained most of them already, in all likelihood, but it was safest to make sure she hadn't missed anything. "I'll let you give Charlie the good news unless you want me to do so. Beyond that, you're responsible for putting up sign-ups in September, running try-outs and practices, and getting me your team roster within three weeks of school starting. Just drop into my office or send me an owl to let me know when you want to reserve the Pitch for Crotalus. Anything else you want to ask me while I'm here?"
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Coach Pierce
Still meeting with Oliver Abbott
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Oliver
March 18, 2010 5:58 PM
... yeah. by Oliver
I was thinking I'd assign your sisiter, so unless you have an objection to that, I think that's who we'll go with."Oliver knew he blinked. "Uh yeah, sure. No objections." Of course his parents were going to kill him. Why hadn't this fact occurred to him before? It was okay for him to be captain, because he and Julian had always been into sport, and boys will be boys, and his parents didn't like him all that much, anyway. But Charlie was their baby, their little girl. She liked pink and ponies and pointe. There was no way they'd stay sane if they found out she'd be leading the Crotalus team.
"Oh, I can tell her," Oliver offered when it came to who should pass on the news. That way Oliver could congratulate her, while at the same time make it painfully clear that their parents were never going to find out.
Then the meeting prgoressed to a basic overview of Oliver's duties once Helena had graduated, but he'd been shadowing her on and off for the past year; he knew what was expected of him. Plus he was kind of looking forward to making those pre-game speeches, and discovering whether he did a better job than Geoff or Helena.
"Nope, no further questions," Oliver replied, pushing his hands into his pockets in a semi-gesture that he was done. "I'll go let Charlie know now. Thanks."
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Oliver
... yeah.
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