Disclaimer: I do not own any of the characters except Rachael, Nicole, Abi, and Mr. and Mrs. Evans

A/N: now this is at James' point of view again so don't be confused (

Chapter 9: the difficult task

***********************

James woke up and immediately felt cold. Perhaps it was because it was the month of November now. Or perhaps it was because Nearly Headless Nick was sitting on the edge of his bed.

"Oh, sorry there James," Nick said cheerfully as he drifted out of the room through the wall. "Didn't realize you were there! I'll leave now."

Still grumbling about his frozen feet James climbed out of bed and found that Sirius was already awake.

"Guess what, James?" Sirius said excitedly. "I just heard – the dance floor is open! And they're having an opening dance where the Hogwarts students are invited to!"

James rubbed his eyes and squinted at Sirius skeptically. "You didn't say anything about it last night," he said. "How did you just find out this morning?"

"Well, it gets around," said Sirius slyly. "So have any idea who you're going to ask out?"

For once in his lifetime, James did not have an answer to that question. He had just broken up with Nicole, so she was out of the question. Perhaps Rachael his dream crush?

"If you're thinking about Rachael, she's out of the question. She's going with Arthur Weasley," Sirius said suddenly.

Ok, that made it more harder. Unless maybe… Lily?

"Probably Lily," said James casually.

"LILY?!" exploded Sirius shaking with laughter. "Her? She's not even cool!"

"So what?" said James. "What about you? Who will you take?"

"Ummmm… I was thinking Abi," said Sirius in a quiet – not so confident voice.

"Oh!" said James grinning. "I suppose she's more cool that Lily, eh?"

"Shut up," Sirius snapped.

Throughout the day all the talk was about the new dance floor and every body talking about who they were going with or what they were going to wear. Dumbledore even made a brief announcement about it that morning.

"We have decided to have an extra Hogsmeade weekend this weekend, due to the fact that nearly everyone is attending the dance," he had said. "Please plan on attending (if you wish) this Saturday night at 7."

So now the hard part was asking Lily to the dance. Yet he was surprised at how nervous he was to do this, asking girls out before had always been a breeze. That night he decided to wait until the commonroom was nearly empty before asking her. This took a while, as people were still excitedly anticipating the coming dance. Finally, it was just him, Sirius, Lily, Abi, and a couple of prefects completely absorbed in their books. James cleared his throat and approached the table that Lily was working on her homework. She looked up, puzzled.

"Uh Lily…" he began. "I was sorta wondering if you would go to the dance with – with me." He had never felt so emberassed, even though he had done that tons of times. He felt his cheeks turning a brilliant shade of red, anticipating her answer. She hesitated and then said…

************************

A/N: Again I am leaving you hangin there but don't worry! Chapter 10 will be up tomorrow Please be kind and review! (