ALBUS POV

It was almost time for breakfast, and Scorpious was not coming out of the bathroom.

"Scorp! What the hell are you doing that is taking 30 minutes?!" I yelled, banging on the door. "You can't take this long preening!"

At this remark, Scorpious emerged from the bathroom, looking much the same as when he went in, but I just shrugged it off and we walked down to breakfast. It was Saturday, which meant first trip to Hogsmeade, and it also meant Manons Birthday, and a surprise/Halloween party, with Gryffindor.

As we entered the great hall, I noticed it was only Rose sitting at the Ravenclaw table, and there was no Manon or Lorcan. Or any sight of Heather or Roxy for that matter. We plonked ourselves down next opposite Rose, who was smiling at Scorpious and completely oblivious to my presence. Geez.

Rose was wearing a flowery dress, with leggings and boots. Scorpious must have found this adorable, because he would not stop staring at her. Get a room, I thought. I had quickly put on a blue jumper and jeans, Scorpious having spent considerably longer on his appearance.

"Where is the birthday girl?" I wondered, after about 5 minutes.

"She said something about the common room, she'll be here soon" Rose mumbled, through a mouthful of toast.

About half a minute after I was informed this, Roxy, Heather and Manon walked in.

"Hey, Birthday girl" I smiled at Manon. She leaned in and gave me a brief hug, thanking me in the process. She sat down next to me, Heather and Roxy sitting opposite. That was when I noticed how different they all were.

Roxy was wearing an old Quidditch jumper and a black skirt thing, Manon was wearing an oversized jumper and leggings, a black beanie and black combat boots. Heather was wearing a t shirt, I think with the same band as Lorcan had worn once, and jeans, with these odd converses which looked like she had doodled on them.

We were halfway through breakfast, discussing our Hogsmeade trip and other odd topics, when Lorcan ran in, seemingly out of breath. Heather raised an eyebrow at him.

"Hey, sorry I'm late. Happy birthday, Manon" He smiled widely at her. She smiled back, blushing slightly, and passed him some coffee. I could have sworn Lorcan blushed. What was the world coming to?

I glanced back at Heather and Roxy, who were both looking at Scorpious and Rose in admiration. Heather suddenly whipped her head round. I forgot she had this weird thing where she can sense people looking at her. Weird, I tell you, and awkward. I scratched my head, and looked away, she just laughed at me.

When Rose announced it was time to go, we got up and walked out of the hall as a group. I felt around in my pockets for my form which said I could go to Hogsmeade, suddenly feeling faint as I couldn't feel it.

I felt something tap on my shoulder, and I turned around, still in a state of panic, to see Heather with her arm outstretched, holding my Hogsmeade form, an eyebrow raised in amusement. I muttered 'thanks' and she looked at me.

"I'm sorry, what was that?" She smirked.

"THANK YOU HEATHER" I glared at her. I knew we were gradually getting over our 'hatred' for each other, after she beat me in that ancient runes mock paper. I did tell her it was only a mock paper, but she would have none of it. I liked being friends with her, but there were still times she relit that little flame of frustration in the pit of my stomach. But in a way I liked it, it kept me on my toes.

She skipped off gleefully, kicking up the crispy orange leaves on her way over to the others. I shook my head in wonder, and followed her.

We reached Hogsmeade, our first stop being Honeydukes. Obviously. I grabbed a handful of peppermint creams, my favourite, and a packet of chocolate frogs. I paid quickly, then joined the others outside, Lorcan nabbing one of my peppermint creams. I hungrily tore open my chocolate frog, to see the card I got. What a surprise when I turned it over and saw my dad. That would come to a total of 37 cards I had with my dad on. i pocketed my sweets and we walked across to The Three Broomsticks.

It was nice and warm inside the tavern, and we bagged a booth at the back, closest to the fire.

Roxy and Rose were soon in deep conversation about the Yule Ball, again. Scorpious, Heather and Manon began a heated argument about the top Quidditch team. I rolled my eyes at Heathers clear enthusiasm in this topic.

I turned to Lorcan who was fiddling with his butterbeer, and then I remembered the request Roxy had asked me to complete.

"Hey, Lorcan. Do you think you could distract Manon for the next half hour? I think the girls want to get their present?" I asked, in a low voice.

He seemed to be contemplating this for a moment, and the agreed. I watched as he hesitantly asked Manon is she would like to go for a walk with him, and she nodded, I think she preferred being outside anyway. I knew Lorcan had already got her something, so he didn't need to come with us anyway.

When we were sure they were gone, we got up and left, Scorpious insisting to pay for our drinks, which we all let him.

Scorpious and I had decided to get Manon something together, because I was broke. We separated from Heather, Rose and Roxy and went back into Honeydukes. We knew that her favourites were exploding bon bons and droobles bubble-gum, so we filled up an especially large bag with the two, Scorpious including the odd fizzing whizbee, which was ruining the perfect pink and blue colour scheme.

"Do you know what Lorcan got her?" Scorpious mused, as we walked out of the shop, chewing on a piece of bubble-gum.

"No, he isn't telling anyone because he thinks we will tell her" I said, smirking. I knew he had spent a while on it however; he was always late to dinner.

Scorpious too smirked, and we walked into Weasley Wizard Wheezes, My uncle's shop. I waved at George who was peeking out from behind the till. We wandered round endless rows of jokes, and we waited patiently for the girls to finish their shopping. When finally they had paid, we walked out, bumping into Teddy and Victoire on the way.

"So what did you get her?" I asked them

"I got her a pygmy puff, I know how much she wanted one" Heather said, revealing an adorable little pink ball of fluff. This certainly brought out the feminine side of Scorpious. He was cooing over it for about 3 whole minutes.

"I got her some Patented Daydream charms" said Rose, swinging her back of goodies around her legs.

"I got her some Wakefields Off The Record Glow In The Dark Bubblegum" Roxy smiled, and I envied Manon for the amazing presents she was going to get.

At this moment, Lorcan and Manon came round the corner, and this caused us to whip our bags behind our backs and smile at them. They both looked breathless, and cold, but more breathless.

HEATHER POV

I noticed how flushed Lorcan and Manon looked as they returned, and smirked knowingly at Roxy. We didn't actually know if they liked each other, but we had decided that they should.

As we walked up to the castle, I noticed Albus was catching up with me. I felt an odd swoop in my stomach, and had to stop walking momentarily. Was I ill? I brushed it off as nothing, and turned to speak to Albus.

"Hey, Al" I think we had gotten over our beginning of term 'tiff' and we had settled with just the odd teasing. That didn't mean I liked him, though.

"Hey Heather, how's it going?" He said, green eyes glowing against the black hair that fell in front of his eyes. I was about to answer when I felt my foot catch on a bit of ice.

Just as i braced myself for the fall, I felt a strong pair of arms stop me, picking me back up with ease. I turned around to see Albus chuckling to himself, so I hit him hard on the arm, and he faked a gasp. Just when I was about to thank him. Pfft.

When we reached school, it was time to give Manon her presents, so we all gathered in the Ravenclaw common room and sat in a circle. I hoped she liked her Pygmy Puff!

It was an hour later, and Manon loved all her presents, and would not put Lucian, the name she had given the Pygmy Puff, down. But I think Lorcan's gift topped them all.

Anyway, we were now starting to get ready for the Halloween party, and all of us girls were in Rose and Manon's dorm room, but the party itself was in the Gryffindor common room, because it was originally just for Gryffindors, but other people were coming anyway.

We had all researched muggle ideas for costumes, and I had decided on the Mad Hatter from one of my favourite muggle books, Alice in Wonderland. Manon had gone for a Batman dress thing, which was quite skin tight… Rose was a very slutty peter pan, but she thought that Scorpious would like it, and he no doubt would, but so would another 50 boys at the party. Roxy was in a Cat Woman costume, which took her about 20 minutes to get into, and not much was left to imagination.

We combined as a joint force to tame Roxy's wild curls into a presentable bun, which took us another 20 minutes.

"No,no, no, Heather! I said bun not braid!" Rose yelled. "Well you could have said!" I yelled back. "Guys SHUT UP!" Manon yelled over us. The attempt to do Roxy's hair was draining us. When it was complete, we decided it was worth putting our friendship on the line.

Manon started a complex braid around her head, curling the rest of it, so it was like a braided headband. While in Hogsmeade, Manon and I had gone to Humble's Hairdressers, and Manon had had the ends of her golden hair dip dyed a deep aqua, permanently. I had gone for a pink colour for the ends, but it was only semi-permanent. My parents would be mad if I came home with hair like that. I left my blonde/pink hair down in waves, And rose had hers pin straight with her little peter pan hat on.

Next it was makeup. I was awful at this part, so I asked Manon for help. She worked away on my face for 10 minutes flat, and then stepped back and admired her work.

I gasped at my new face. I looked amazing. My grey/green/blue eyes were lined with a dark black with a smoky finish, and my skin was flawless. Manon smirked at my reaction and began to work on her face. I finished the touch with my converse and knee high socks. Rose grabbed her bow and arrow, and straightened out her dress and glanced up at me.

"OH. MY. GOD. Heather you look Hot!" I rolled my eyes. So did she to be honest, if a bit on the slutty side. Roxy gave her nod of appreciation, her face now concealed by a black mask.

"We should go, I think the boys are waiting downstairs" Manon said, her face complete with black cat liner.

We nodded and followed her downstairs, and I suddenly felt nervous. What if I looked to over the top? But I just shrugged to myself, and walked into the common room.

ALBUS POV

We had been waiting for a good five minutes, and finally I heard footsteps on the stairs. I turned away from Lorcan, who was dressed as Robin? I think it was some superhero. Scorpious was dressed as Captain Hook, from the muggle book Peter Pan. I had not really put much effort in, I was some kind of muggle idea of a vampire.

When the footsteps got closer, I turned around. My mouth dropped open. So did Scorpious'. So did Lorcan's. I momentarily forgot how breath. They really had put in effort. But my attention shot straight to Heather. Was it even Heather? She looked stunning, and my stomach did a cartwheel. Her blonde hair was wavy and the ends were pink, her outfit flattered her figure and her eyes popped due to the eye makeup.

"Kindly collect your jaw from the floor, Albus, someone might step on it" Heather laughed, a tinkly sound. I snapped out of my trance and quickly shut my mouth. She was still laughing.

We followed the others out of the Ravenclaw common room, and into the hallway. We ran quickly to the Gryffindor Room, and Heather whispered the password, and we stepped in.

Instantly the sharp smell of Firewhiskey and some other concoctions flew up my nostrils. I coughed and Lorcan laughed at me.

Loud music was pounding out of the speakers Jamie Wood had provided, who was also the Dj. It was some muggle band which Lorcan, Heather or Manon probably knew. I accepted a drink from an older year student, walking around with a tray of red cups. I gulped it down, burning my throat. I suddenly felt more alive, and made my way to the middle, where Scorpious and Rose were. We danced for a good 10 minutes, and I began to feel tired. I dodged through couples and friends, including an intoxicated Fred and Teddy. I sat down on one of the sofas, which had been pushed to the side.

"Having fun?" A voice said. Heather.

"Yeh, you don't look over the moon though?" I asked, she just shrugged.

"Not really my scene" She shouted over the music.

I glanced onto the makeshift dance floor and saw Roxy, Rose and Scorp still going.

I turned my head back to Heather, who was staring out onto the Quidditch pitch. I knew she was a Chaser for the team, I had played her before. I was Seeker on the Slytherin team.

"So, have you got a date to the ball yet?" I asked making conversation.

She looked at me suspiciously. "No, why?"

"No reason, just wondering. Neither have I. Don't really see the point"

"Neither, I couldn't care less If nobody asked me." She shrugged. A wild idea shot through my head. I wasn't sure whether it was due to the alcohol, but I thought, why not?

"Hey, how about we go together?" I shouted.

"What?" She yelled back.

"I said, shall we got to the ball together?" I shouted again, it was the damn music.

"I can't hear you, Al!" She yelled.

"I said"- suddenly the music cut out- "DO YOU WANT TO GO TO THE BALL WITH ME?"

Everybody froze, apart from Jamie Wood, trying to repair his disk. Oh my god, everyone had just heard me ask my 'enemy' Heather McAffrey, to go to the ball with me.

"-AS FRIENDS" I made sure to add, and everyone sighed and went back to their conversations, and the music started up again.

I remembered Heather hadn't answered me yet, and when I turned back to her, she still had her mouth open in shock.

"Kindly collect your jaw from the floor, Heather, someone might step on it" I smirked. "So how about it?"

"How about what?" She asked.

"Please don't make me say it again, you know what. As friends?"

She shrugged. "Why not? Sure, Al, I will go to the ball with you" I felt that swoop in my stomach as she smiled at me, returning to daydreaming afterwards.

I got up dizzily. I had just asked my 'worst enemy' to the Yule Ball.