He accepted the broom with a nod, rolling his eyes. "I don't own any tight trousers anyway. And no, you won't," he added with emphasis. At her warning, Robbie lifted his eyebrows and answered, "Of course I'd pay, but I won't manage to break it, will I?" It looked sturdy enough; far stronger than the brooms the Quidditch teams used, heavier to hold, he remembered sharply, than the broom Cedric had used at school.
He tried to remember Madam Hooch's lesson way back in his first year, standing to the left of the broom, holding it with his right and wordlessly willing it to fly. He glanced up as Alicia effortlessly swung up into the sky, grateful that she wouldn't necessarily see him struggle onto the broom and awkwardly kick off from the ground. It wasn't that he was big, was it? He'd seen bruisers far heavier than him at Quidditch matches, Keepers and Beaters chosen for their size, but somehow managing to keep themselves on their brooms without so much as their hands to grip onto the wood. It must have been being brought up a Muggle, he reasoned, letting himself off the hook. There was something not quite right, even after all these years of using magic, about flying around in the air with a broom between your legs.
Despite his shaky start, Robbie found the broom very steady. His wobbly balance wasn't enough to shake the broom, never mind the wind that got stronger the higher they climbed. He was still travelling relatively slow though, and he let himself smile at the feeling of being this high off the ground. It was pretty cool actually. "This is a good broom, Al!" he called to her. "What make is it?" He peered down at the wood of the handle, looking for the label, but not finding one.