The night was growing weary, and daybreak was approaching at a rapid pace. The candles flickered warmly within a Gryffindor dormitory, withered so that they were barely anything more than pools of melted wax that flickered and waved with pale light. Four boys had not gone to sleep yet. Four boys that each sat in their own beds, blankets drawn to their chins in an effort to protect their bare feet along with the rest of their bodies from the cold that seeped in through every crack in the stone walls, pressured in by the drifts of snowflakes that fluttered outside.
"Come on Paddy!" One of the boys exclaimed, drawing his knees to his chin as a wide smile spread across his handsomely narrow face. After a moment's pause he drug his fingers through the insatiably messy hair that topped his crown. The pale hazel eyes of James Potter peered at the other three boys from behind square spectacles, especially at the boy in the bed beside his, who was smirking at him, "I could definitely get Evans to go on a date with me!" He exclaimed.
"And shag you?" The boy who James was speaking too grinned mischievously at his friend, who was managing to look as though he were trying to think it over, "Face it Prongs! She'd sooner touch a slug than you!" The young man, who had shaggy, pitch black hair that fell to frame his tanned face full of handsome features and pale grey eyes with thick, girlish eye lashes in an extravagant manner.
"That's not true!" James exclaimed, only to be interrupted by a boy with straw-like brown hair and large, pale, amber eyes interrupted from across the room where he had been leaning against his headboard, a book held only inched from his freckled nose.
"Actually James, Sirius has a point. She has rejected you for the last three years, what makes you think this year will be any different?" Remus Lupin didn't even bother to take his eyes off the pages of the book he was reading as he stated this in a calm and collected manner, though earning a glare from James.
"I, on the other hand," Sirius continued, placing a hand to his collarbone in a conceited manner, "Could date and successfully shag any girl in this school."
"No you couldn't!" James exclaimed, frowning at his friend, "Are you telling me you'd like to bring a first year up here?" He asked, blinking in fact innocence at his friend, who faked retching sounds and motions.
"No! I mean girls our age!" Sirius replied, grinning in a sheep-dog kind of way at his best friend.
"Still." James replied, pushing his glasses further up on the crooked bridge of his nose, "You probably couldn't get a Slytherin to date you. Shag you maybe, but I'm pretty sure none of them would risk being seen in public with you."
Sirius looked down at his hands, his friend had a point. Or did he? Sirius had the kind of charm, and the kind of looks that created the opportunities for him to grace any girl to the point where he could get her to do anything.
"I'll bet you." James continued, mischievousness sparking behind his glasses, "That I'll get a date with Lily by the end of the year, and you won't have been able to get even one Slytherin girl to go to Hogsmeade with you."
Sirius perked slightly at the word 'bet'. Sirius thrived on competition, and his friend knew it, "You're on! The stakes?" He quirked an eyebrow, silently hoping for nothing that involved pink hair, as their last bet had.
James tapped his chin thoughtfully for a moment before grinning wildly, "The loser has to, at the end of the year feast, announce, to the entire castle, their boundless love for…Professor McGonagall!"
This earned a chuckle from Remus, who was apparently listening intently to their conversation, as he always did, "You two…" He mumbled, turning a page in his book with a slight smirk.
"You're on!" Sirius leaned over the gap between his bed and James', shaking the other boys hand, "Now help me think of some Slytherins."
"There's Alecto Carrows." James replied, settling into a laying position as he removed his glasses, placing them on his bedside table. Sirius continued to lean against his headboard, silently mouthing everything he knew about Alecto to himself.
"Next." He replied, shaking his head. Alecto was small and pale, with stringy hair and beady eyes. He would rather attempt on one of the decent looking Slytherins.
"Katherine Rodgers?" Remus piped up from the other side of the room, glancing over at the two of them, "The blonde one."
Sirius shrugged, closing his eyes and picturing the chatty blonde in his mind. Chatty…yuck. Talk was cheap and Sirius preferred for his girls' mouths to be working on something other than words. Particularly against his mouth.
"Hestia Jones." James piped up, eyes shooting open in triumph.
Sirius nodded. Hestia Jones was good looking, A shapely girl coming from a myriad of ethnicities, most prominent being her Indian descent. With long black hair and thickly lashed deer-like eyes…And though he perceived her as a bit of a bitch, he wouldn't have any problems staring at her for whatever length of time he had to.
"Okay then. By the end of the year you'll have gotten Lily Evans to date you, and I'll have gotten Hestia Jones to date and shag me." Sirius replied. An outsider may have thought that the odds were stacked in James' favor. But Lily Evans was a fortress; James could barely speak to her without having to fear for the safety of his genitals.
Sirius smiled contentedly, shifting into a sleeping position, on his back and staring at the ceiling as the candles extinguished themselves. He could hear the steady breathing of Remus and Peter; both must be sleeping. He could tell James was awake though; probably pondering the same things he was.
How did a Gryffindor go about asking a Slytherin out?