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CHAPTER 5- NEVER MESS WITH A MARAUDER ***************************************
Yawning widely as he stretched his arms up above his head, he sat up and reached for his circular glasses. Pushing them up on his nose with his index finger to meet his hazel eyes, James Potter- Prongs to his close friends- looked casually down at his watch.
"9 o'clock already..." James said, his eyes opening wide as he pulled the curtains from around his fore-poster bed and slipped onto plush carpet of his dorm-room.
As he gazed around the room, he noticed he wasn't the only one who had slept in, and moved to the bed to the left of his, drawing the curtains away and poking his head in to stare at the spread-eagled form on Sirius Black, who had drool forming in the corner of his mouth as he snored loudly and held his pillow to his chest in his sleep.
"Padfoot, get up!" James said, swiping the pillow from Sirius's arms and swatting him in the head with it. Immediately Sirius sat bolt upright, obviously startled at the unwelcome wake-up-call.
"I didn't do it!" Were the first words from his mouth before he realised that it had been James who woke him up. When he noticed this fact, he fell backwards onto his bed and reached out to grab his pillow back from James.
"Oh, just you, now lemme go back to sleep." Said the drowsy Padfoot.
"How about no, seeing as it's Christmas Eve and it's quarter past 9 in the morning."
"So?"
"Well, after breakfast, lunch, messing with Snivellus, and dinner, it'll be time for the ball..."
"Oh yeah.. The dance... Still going with Lily?"
"Yes...." James said, looking away and trying to keep his cheeks from burning red.
"Ah, alright... Now.. Breakfast..." Padfoots seemed far more awake at that time, and quickly got dressed as James did the same.
Trudging down the stairs into the common room, Prongs and Padfoot gazed inquisitively about the room.
"Padfoot, Prongs, about time you two got up. Breakfast is almost over, we may have to nick some food from the kitchens instead.."
"Like we've never done that before." Sirius said, rolling his eyes and running a hand through his hair to flatten it out.
James, on the other hand, was rumpling up his hair with his right hand as he stared across the room at a pretty girl with deep red hair who was giggling with a few other girls. Lily Evans, the most beautiful girl James Potter had ever seen.
"You know, if you were to stop daydreaming about snogging her, then maybe you'd realize that she's staring back." Sirius said, elbowing James in the shoulder, bringing him from his contemplations.
"Oooh, James! Finally awake then? What time will you be picking me up later?"
"Oh, well, what time is best for you?" James stuttered out, he had dreamed of going out with Lily since his 5th year at Hogwarts, and only now was she willing to go on a date with him.
"Well, if the dance begins at 8 o'clock, it would be smart to say around half past 7, right?"
James nodded dumbly, and Lily smiled as she went back to giggling with her friends.
"That's nice, now, food!" Padfoot barked as he gazed at Remus, who was waving sheepishly at another one of the girls in Lily's group of friends, who seemed to be blushing and waving shyly back.
Sirius groaned, all of his friends seemed to be into girls, including chubby Peter, who was staring intently at the rump of a skinny blonde girl who was talking with a girl who seemed to be staring at-
"Sirius.. She's staring at you..." James said, nudging his friend back.
"I've noticed."
"Isn't that Ria?"
"Yep."
"Going to the Ball with her?"
"Nope."
"WHAT?" Remus, Peter, and James said simultaneously.
Sirius merely shrugged and looked away, "Don't want a date, not really interested in going in the first place, just going because I think you'll need someone to keep you 3 from drooling too much."
Remus shook his head, Peter went back to staring intently at the blonde girl named Alexis, and James laughed nervously, rumpling up his hair again.
"Anyway, I'm taking the map and headed down to the kitchens, I'm hungry." And with that, Padfoot disappeared from the common room, leaving his 3 best friends to wonder what on Earth was running through Sirius's mind.
*********
Remus stared at the mirror in the boys washrooms prodding his robes and casting minor repairing charms to make his deep red and golden-trimmed dress-robes less like they'd been from a second-hand shop. It was going along quite well, in fact, as Remus had learned many useful household charms over the past years.
James, a few feet to the right of Remus, was trying to make his hair look both like he had just hopped off of a broomstick, but not so messy all at once, and failing dismally.
Peter was busy biting on his fingernails, as he was so nervous that a girl was actually willing to spend 4 hours with him in public. He soon realized he had little to no nails left to bite and instead pulled a cookie from his pocket and began to nibble at it.
Sirius Black, though, was quite bored, leaning against the wall and yawning boredly as his friends attempted to make themselves better looking (or in Peter's case, worse) for the girls they planned to meet.
"You all look fine, now would you hurry up already?" He barked after another few moments, checking his watch lazily.
Remus finally finished, looking at himself in the mirror, seemingly satisfied with the way his Head Boy badge was covering the only hole left in the trim of his robes quite well.
James sighed, giving up on the fact that his hair would never lie properly, and merely decided to do the same thing he always did, rumple up his hair and leave it be.
Peter finished his cookie, choking slightly on the last bite until Sirius pounded his back ad forced the chocolate chip chunk to come flying from Wormtail's mouth and go soaring across the room.
"Finally. You've been in here an hour!" Sirius grunted, staring down at his watch, which read 7:30 across it.
"An hour?! It's half past 7?! LILY!!!!" James shouted, darting from the washroom with peter and Remus in tow, as it had been 7:30 that the boys had promised to meet their dates.
"Blimey." Sirius muttered under his breath as he stuffed his wand into a pocket on the inside of his black and silver dress robes, just in case he got bored.
*********
"Why hello Black. No date? Didn't think so. After all, what girl would go with YOU?!" Lucius Malfoy asked with a sneer, giving Sirius and appraising look.
"Shut up Malfoy." Sirius growled low under his breath, staring daggers at Lucius.
"Even Potter's got a date... Hmm. How dreadful. How does it feel to be single while an untidy boy with glasses gets a girl?"
"I said SHUT UP MALFOY!" Sirius growled once more, this time a little louder.
A greasy-haired boy a few steps behind Lucius Malfoy sneered and stepped a little closer.
"Oh, angry that you haven't got a date Black?" Severus Snape asked with a slight chuckle.
"And where's yours Snivellus? That imaginary girlfriend of yours?" James said, stepping forwards with Lily right behind him.
"I'd much rather have an imaginary date then be spending the night with a mudblood..."Snape sniggered.
"Don't you dare call her that!" Remus said, stepping to the opposite side of Sirius as James, a pretty brown-haired girl with golden amber eyes clutching his arm as though it was her lifeline.
"And who's this, Lupin? A cousin or did you have to pay her to come? Wait, sorry, I forgot, you haven't the money to guy a date..."
Remus's cheeks turned a bright red as he shouted out, "NO!" In an undignified manner.
Peter cowered behind the group, but cast a dark look at Lucius that made the Malfoy laugh.
The next thing Lucius knew he was lying on the floor, at least 4different curses having struck him at the same time.
"Hmm, The Jelly-legs curse, didn't see anyone use that.." James said thoughtfully, staring down at the unconscious Mafloy who had suddenly sprouted tentacles from various places on his face.
"That was me." Lily said merrily, noticing Snape had darted off, presumably to find a teacher, "And I think we had better get out of here. If anyone asks, we didn't do it."
"You know what, I'm beginning to like that girl of yours Prongs." Sirius said brightly as they darted off, leaving Malfoy on the floor, twitching violently now.
"Wouldn't happen to have the map, would you Sirius?" Remus said cheerily as the pretty girl attached to his arm was still jogging next to him.
"Of course." Sirius said, whipping a piece of parchment from his robes and tapping it lightly as he muttered the password so only the map would hear.
As the ink lines spread out across the page, they quickly took a detour to the left, as Professor McGonagall was heading in that direction, and would surely ask why they were running so quickly through the halls.
Checking the map at regular intervals, they managed to slip into the Ball unnoticed, and started a conversation with a few Ravenclaws that were at a table near them.
"Mr. Potter, Mr. Black, Mr. Lupin, Mr. Pettigrew, Ms. Evans, Ms. Esprit, would you all follow me?" Their resident Transfiguration teacher said as she came up behind them.
"Yes Professor?" James asked innocently, as the group stood up and followed Professor McGonagall from the Great Hall.
"Mr. Snape seems to believe that you boys were the ones that cursed Mr. Malfoy..."
"We were at the Ball Professor." Sirius lied, quite easily in fact.
"Mr. Malfoy seems to believe so as well..."
"They were with us, Professor!" Lily said brightly, not lying.
"Are you sure Ms. Evans? I wouldn't want you to be lying for them, as it would surely mean a detention for you as well."
"She's not lying Professor. Lily was right, the boys were with us the entire time..." The amber-eyed girl with Remus said merrily.
"Alright, Ms. Esprit, you and Ms. Evans have never lied before and I trust you aren't now..." Minerva McGonagall said, her lips thin and giving the group a stern look.
As the group headed back to the Ball, James looked considerably happier, and Sirius seemed to almost be skipping along. Remus, however, was looking rather disappointed with himself, but the way his friends (and his date) seemed to be skipping along and were almost ready to burst into song, it made him feel much less worried. He hadn't lied at all, so it wasn't his fault, Lily, Sirius, and Maya had been the ones to bend the truth..
Sirius seemed to be light on his feet and much happier with the Ball, as he had gotten away with cursing Malfoy. Though no matter how many girls that came up and asked him to dance he always refused as politely as he could. Why, was the question that his close friends seemed to be thinking.
Noticing the questioning looks and finally deciding to give up, he said simply, "I don't need a ball-and-chain to keep me from doing the stuff I love, and having a girl think she could stop that simply by me dancing with her wouldn't be fun... Besides, since when am I the type to want a girlfriend?"
James shrugged, and answered for the entire group (including Lily and Maya, who seemed rather angry with him saying the idea of having a girlfriend was like having a ball-and-chain), "Never."
CHAPTER 5- NEVER MESS WITH A MARAUDER ***************************************
Yawning widely as he stretched his arms up above his head, he sat up and reached for his circular glasses. Pushing them up on his nose with his index finger to meet his hazel eyes, James Potter- Prongs to his close friends- looked casually down at his watch.
"9 o'clock already..." James said, his eyes opening wide as he pulled the curtains from around his fore-poster bed and slipped onto plush carpet of his dorm-room.
As he gazed around the room, he noticed he wasn't the only one who had slept in, and moved to the bed to the left of his, drawing the curtains away and poking his head in to stare at the spread-eagled form on Sirius Black, who had drool forming in the corner of his mouth as he snored loudly and held his pillow to his chest in his sleep.
"Padfoot, get up!" James said, swiping the pillow from Sirius's arms and swatting him in the head with it. Immediately Sirius sat bolt upright, obviously startled at the unwelcome wake-up-call.
"I didn't do it!" Were the first words from his mouth before he realised that it had been James who woke him up. When he noticed this fact, he fell backwards onto his bed and reached out to grab his pillow back from James.
"Oh, just you, now lemme go back to sleep." Said the drowsy Padfoot.
"How about no, seeing as it's Christmas Eve and it's quarter past 9 in the morning."
"So?"
"Well, after breakfast, lunch, messing with Snivellus, and dinner, it'll be time for the ball..."
"Oh yeah.. The dance... Still going with Lily?"
"Yes...." James said, looking away and trying to keep his cheeks from burning red.
"Ah, alright... Now.. Breakfast..." Padfoots seemed far more awake at that time, and quickly got dressed as James did the same.
Trudging down the stairs into the common room, Prongs and Padfoot gazed inquisitively about the room.
"Padfoot, Prongs, about time you two got up. Breakfast is almost over, we may have to nick some food from the kitchens instead.."
"Like we've never done that before." Sirius said, rolling his eyes and running a hand through his hair to flatten it out.
James, on the other hand, was rumpling up his hair with his right hand as he stared across the room at a pretty girl with deep red hair who was giggling with a few other girls. Lily Evans, the most beautiful girl James Potter had ever seen.
"You know, if you were to stop daydreaming about snogging her, then maybe you'd realize that she's staring back." Sirius said, elbowing James in the shoulder, bringing him from his contemplations.
"Oooh, James! Finally awake then? What time will you be picking me up later?"
"Oh, well, what time is best for you?" James stuttered out, he had dreamed of going out with Lily since his 5th year at Hogwarts, and only now was she willing to go on a date with him.
"Well, if the dance begins at 8 o'clock, it would be smart to say around half past 7, right?"
James nodded dumbly, and Lily smiled as she went back to giggling with her friends.
"That's nice, now, food!" Padfoot barked as he gazed at Remus, who was waving sheepishly at another one of the girls in Lily's group of friends, who seemed to be blushing and waving shyly back.
Sirius groaned, all of his friends seemed to be into girls, including chubby Peter, who was staring intently at the rump of a skinny blonde girl who was talking with a girl who seemed to be staring at-
"Sirius.. She's staring at you..." James said, nudging his friend back.
"I've noticed."
"Isn't that Ria?"
"Yep."
"Going to the Ball with her?"
"Nope."
"WHAT?" Remus, Peter, and James said simultaneously.
Sirius merely shrugged and looked away, "Don't want a date, not really interested in going in the first place, just going because I think you'll need someone to keep you 3 from drooling too much."
Remus shook his head, Peter went back to staring intently at the blonde girl named Alexis, and James laughed nervously, rumpling up his hair again.
"Anyway, I'm taking the map and headed down to the kitchens, I'm hungry." And with that, Padfoot disappeared from the common room, leaving his 3 best friends to wonder what on Earth was running through Sirius's mind.
*********
Remus stared at the mirror in the boys washrooms prodding his robes and casting minor repairing charms to make his deep red and golden-trimmed dress-robes less like they'd been from a second-hand shop. It was going along quite well, in fact, as Remus had learned many useful household charms over the past years.
James, a few feet to the right of Remus, was trying to make his hair look both like he had just hopped off of a broomstick, but not so messy all at once, and failing dismally.
Peter was busy biting on his fingernails, as he was so nervous that a girl was actually willing to spend 4 hours with him in public. He soon realized he had little to no nails left to bite and instead pulled a cookie from his pocket and began to nibble at it.
Sirius Black, though, was quite bored, leaning against the wall and yawning boredly as his friends attempted to make themselves better looking (or in Peter's case, worse) for the girls they planned to meet.
"You all look fine, now would you hurry up already?" He barked after another few moments, checking his watch lazily.
Remus finally finished, looking at himself in the mirror, seemingly satisfied with the way his Head Boy badge was covering the only hole left in the trim of his robes quite well.
James sighed, giving up on the fact that his hair would never lie properly, and merely decided to do the same thing he always did, rumple up his hair and leave it be.
Peter finished his cookie, choking slightly on the last bite until Sirius pounded his back ad forced the chocolate chip chunk to come flying from Wormtail's mouth and go soaring across the room.
"Finally. You've been in here an hour!" Sirius grunted, staring down at his watch, which read 7:30 across it.
"An hour?! It's half past 7?! LILY!!!!" James shouted, darting from the washroom with peter and Remus in tow, as it had been 7:30 that the boys had promised to meet their dates.
"Blimey." Sirius muttered under his breath as he stuffed his wand into a pocket on the inside of his black and silver dress robes, just in case he got bored.
*********
"Why hello Black. No date? Didn't think so. After all, what girl would go with YOU?!" Lucius Malfoy asked with a sneer, giving Sirius and appraising look.
"Shut up Malfoy." Sirius growled low under his breath, staring daggers at Lucius.
"Even Potter's got a date... Hmm. How dreadful. How does it feel to be single while an untidy boy with glasses gets a girl?"
"I said SHUT UP MALFOY!" Sirius growled once more, this time a little louder.
A greasy-haired boy a few steps behind Lucius Malfoy sneered and stepped a little closer.
"Oh, angry that you haven't got a date Black?" Severus Snape asked with a slight chuckle.
"And where's yours Snivellus? That imaginary girlfriend of yours?" James said, stepping forwards with Lily right behind him.
"I'd much rather have an imaginary date then be spending the night with a mudblood..."Snape sniggered.
"Don't you dare call her that!" Remus said, stepping to the opposite side of Sirius as James, a pretty brown-haired girl with golden amber eyes clutching his arm as though it was her lifeline.
"And who's this, Lupin? A cousin or did you have to pay her to come? Wait, sorry, I forgot, you haven't the money to guy a date..."
Remus's cheeks turned a bright red as he shouted out, "NO!" In an undignified manner.
Peter cowered behind the group, but cast a dark look at Lucius that made the Malfoy laugh.
The next thing Lucius knew he was lying on the floor, at least 4different curses having struck him at the same time.
"Hmm, The Jelly-legs curse, didn't see anyone use that.." James said thoughtfully, staring down at the unconscious Mafloy who had suddenly sprouted tentacles from various places on his face.
"That was me." Lily said merrily, noticing Snape had darted off, presumably to find a teacher, "And I think we had better get out of here. If anyone asks, we didn't do it."
"You know what, I'm beginning to like that girl of yours Prongs." Sirius said brightly as they darted off, leaving Malfoy on the floor, twitching violently now.
"Wouldn't happen to have the map, would you Sirius?" Remus said cheerily as the pretty girl attached to his arm was still jogging next to him.
"Of course." Sirius said, whipping a piece of parchment from his robes and tapping it lightly as he muttered the password so only the map would hear.
As the ink lines spread out across the page, they quickly took a detour to the left, as Professor McGonagall was heading in that direction, and would surely ask why they were running so quickly through the halls.
Checking the map at regular intervals, they managed to slip into the Ball unnoticed, and started a conversation with a few Ravenclaws that were at a table near them.
"Mr. Potter, Mr. Black, Mr. Lupin, Mr. Pettigrew, Ms. Evans, Ms. Esprit, would you all follow me?" Their resident Transfiguration teacher said as she came up behind them.
"Yes Professor?" James asked innocently, as the group stood up and followed Professor McGonagall from the Great Hall.
"Mr. Snape seems to believe that you boys were the ones that cursed Mr. Malfoy..."
"We were at the Ball Professor." Sirius lied, quite easily in fact.
"Mr. Malfoy seems to believe so as well..."
"They were with us, Professor!" Lily said brightly, not lying.
"Are you sure Ms. Evans? I wouldn't want you to be lying for them, as it would surely mean a detention for you as well."
"She's not lying Professor. Lily was right, the boys were with us the entire time..." The amber-eyed girl with Remus said merrily.
"Alright, Ms. Esprit, you and Ms. Evans have never lied before and I trust you aren't now..." Minerva McGonagall said, her lips thin and giving the group a stern look.
As the group headed back to the Ball, James looked considerably happier, and Sirius seemed to almost be skipping along. Remus, however, was looking rather disappointed with himself, but the way his friends (and his date) seemed to be skipping along and were almost ready to burst into song, it made him feel much less worried. He hadn't lied at all, so it wasn't his fault, Lily, Sirius, and Maya had been the ones to bend the truth..
Sirius seemed to be light on his feet and much happier with the Ball, as he had gotten away with cursing Malfoy. Though no matter how many girls that came up and asked him to dance he always refused as politely as he could. Why, was the question that his close friends seemed to be thinking.
Noticing the questioning looks and finally deciding to give up, he said simply, "I don't need a ball-and-chain to keep me from doing the stuff I love, and having a girl think she could stop that simply by me dancing with her wouldn't be fun... Besides, since when am I the type to want a girlfriend?"
James shrugged, and answered for the entire group (including Lily and Maya, who seemed rather angry with him saying the idea of having a girlfriend was like having a ball-and-chain), "Never."