It all started with the party hat. Or maybe it was the streamers that caught Momo's attention. Konoha sat still as a rock in the center of the couch, that paper party hat perched on the top of his head and the colorful streamers draped around his shoulders. Momo reached down to take the streamers from him, in the process of putting up decorations for the party. And then she stopped.

"Hey, Mary, c'mere!" she called, taking a half step back so she could grin at the full picture. "Doesn't he look sort of look like a christmas tree, all decorated like that?"

Mary crawled out from behind the couch, where she'd fallen after trying to pin up the other end of the garland. Her knees were scuffed, but she peered at the boy on the couch, her mouth making a little 'o'. "You're right! He seems to be pretty happy..."

Konoha blinked at them both as Momo fished out her phone. "Is it ok if I take a picture?" she asked, and he nodded. "I just put them on him for a second, so they wouldn't fall on the floor," she added to Mary, who giggled and waited for the picture flash before skipping to Konoha's side.

"Good job sitting still," she told him in full earnestness, petting his head like he was a puppy, and Konoha's eyes shut for just a moment. "I wonder if he'll let us put other stuff on him?"

And from there it spiraled out of control.

Konoha's patience was infinite. That was the only explanation for the fact that he was still sitting there, now wearing a clown nose and with Mary braiding his hair into pigtails. "Your hair's so soft!" she told him, combing her fingers through the white strands. "I wish mine was straight like this. It'd be way easier to brush..."

"It'd still be long though, right?" Momo replied absently, squinting at Konoha as she adjusted the top hat on his head, tilting it back and forth. She didn't want to mess Mary up, but maybe it was better at a rakish angle like this...?

Mary lifted a strand of her own hair to frown at in consideration, mulling it over. Her scrutiny was interrupted by Kano loudly entering the room.

"Danchou said to check on the decorat- oh."

He stared for several long seconds, in which Momo and Mary exchanged worried glances. Were they about to get in trouble? Kano didn't seem like one who cared about things like 'getting things done on time' or 'fulfilling orders', but he was a more senior member of the dan compared to them.

Then, his mouth spread into a wide grin, and he edged around the coffee table to see better, hand coming up to cover his mouth as if to stifle giggles.

"What's this? I didn't know it was a costume party..."

"Um!" Mary waved her hands as if to defuse any wrong assumptions. "He just sits so still, we decided to dress him up, and we lost track of time..."

Kano didn't even glance her direction, still snickering at Konoha's strange garb. Konoha tilted his head, looking as though he would ask what the joke was any second now.

"Dress up, huh..." Kano mused, before flashing them both thumbs up. "I think I have just the thing!"

Momo and Mary waited excitedly while Kano hauled in a box of what looked to be various costume pieces. "You wouldn't know this, Kisaragi, but I'd expect you to remember," he chided Mary. "Everyone goes all-out at Halloween- we always have, ever since we were small. So we have all of this left over!"

They dug through the box, in search of the perfect dress up items, and even Konoha joined in the search, scooting closer to peer down into the depths. He prodded at a prop gas mask, and shook out a crumpled chef hat with a curious expression.

"What about a crown?" Mary asked, admiring the shiny plastic gem on the front. Momo took it from her and turned it over with an interested expression.

"Oh, no," Kano replied with a giggle, "it absolutely has to be cat ears."

"...Do I want to know why you're holding that?"

The three of them froze, caught red handed, while Konoha continued to shuffle through the box. Shintaro peered at them from the doorway, one foot half off the ground as if he would flee any second now, as soon as things got too weird for him. He glanced at the cat ears in Kano's hands, and then over at Momo, the question in his eyes clear.

"...We're dressing Konoha up!" Momo said after a second, grinning as if there was nothing strange about it at all. Perhaps to her, there wasn't.

"Don't bully him, c'mon guys," Shintaro replied with a grumble, shouldering between them to pluck the clown nose off of the tip of Konoha's nose. Konoha barely reacted. "Kido's got us setting up a music playlist in the other room, if you want to come help," he offered, giving the poor kid a way out of this madness.

"No way! I want to see him in the ears first," Ene piped up unexpectedly from Shintaro's phone. Momo and Shintaro barely flinched, but Mary almost fell over in shock, still not used to her sudden appearances.

"I guess we did go a little overboard..." Momo said sadly after a second, looking down at the glittering cape in her hands, but before she could fold it up and put it away, Konoha's quiet voice made them all look up.

"I don't mind," he said. They were too stunned to respond, so after another moment he added with a soft expression almost like a smile, "It's fun. To spend time with my friends."