Brazil wasn't that far. Jonah had just spent several weeks there, after all. It seemed ridiculous that his parents couldn't manage to plan a vacation for a few days, acquire tickets to the Quidditch World Cup, and let him experience the event in person. Surely the shop would manage for a few days without his mother working there. Surely the healers in training wouldn't mind a few days without his father watching their every move. It seemed to Jonah that since everyone would be stopping everything to attend the match (or at least await the result of the game from home), it would be no big deal if they were gone for a few days.
But no. His father had collected him from the summer exchange program (which he was pretty sure he'd only been sent to in the first place because his parents were tired of him) and, despite his protests, brought him straight back to London. Parents could be so thick sometimes.
At least he had convinced his parents to let him visit Aldo for the weekend. His parents' lack of enthusiasm was not creating the environment he wanted to be in while listening to the match on the WWN. Having arrived on Saturday morning, Jonah had had a full 24 hours to talk nonstop about the match to Aldous and his younger brother. He had even been allowed to bring along his broomstick and had spent the afternoon in the yard tossing a Quaffle back and forth. At least, he had tossed the Quaffle and Aldo had tried his best to catch it. It was the spirit of the thing that had mattered.
Jonah was dressed in Bulgarian colors. He wasn't old enough to really remember the last time that Bulgaria had been a finalist in the World Cup, but the story of Krum's catch had been told so many times in the years since that he felt as though he had been there. Feeling he couldn't wait any longer, Jonah prodded Aldo awake. "I brought you a red Gryffindor hat you can borrow, if you don't have anything red to wear."
