Chapter - 1

"Lily!" Angela yelled playfully, looking at the maroon mess that was once her beautiful toes. Lily's hand had shook as she completed the work at hand and the nail polish had spilt all over her toes. She raised her face to the ceiling and threw her arms up as well, and with mock plea, "What have I done to deserve this?"

"Thou madeth the mistaketh of asking Lily to paint your nails." answered James Potter who happened to be walking by. He laughed along with Isabella and Angela and made himself comfortable by sinking into a pouf next to Isabella and the fire, across from Lily who was glaring at him.

Sirius Black followed suit and dragged one in between Isabella and Lily. He kept himself busy by pointing his wand at the back of Isabella's head and giving her curly black locks florescent green and pink streaks. He caught James' eye and they flashed each other mischievous grins while the others weren't looking. Isabella in the meantime had stopped laughing at Angela's expense and was absent-mindedly stroking Sirius's own black, smooth hair, with one hand, the other scrawling away at her potions homework that was perched on her lap atop her textbook. Sirius put away his wand and leaned his head on her armchair's arm. At this act, James, Angela and Lily all raised their eyebrows at him. He smiled, closed his eyes and with an uplifted countenance, mouthed the words 'feels nice' while the others stifled laughs. James looked around at them all.

"Where's Remus?" he asked no one in particular.

"He's doing his homework up in the dormitory, he'll be down right about now." said Angela automatically, shuffling around, looking for tissues. She found some but they were no use, the nail polish was already half dry. Remus was then spotted walking down the steps from the fifth year boys' dormitory. Sirius looked at Angela in awe.

"Damn, Angie. Professor Owens was right, you do have a great inner eye!" he said.

"Thank you for the compliment, dumbass, but Remus told me he'd be going up there about ten minutes ago." She looked at everyone irritably after trying stupidly to scratch the color off, "Do you guys have nail polish remover?"

"Oh yeah, a whole bottle full on top of my dresser." James answered sincerely.

"Right next to his nose strips and toner." Remus added as he sat down on the floor, leaning against Angela's chair since she was the only one who sat with her feet not touching the floor but on the chair.

"I take that as a no…" she answered with a sigh, rubbing the tissues against her toes, causing them to tear within seconds. The remains went flying and eventually ended up on Remus' head. He wiped them off, turned around and with a simple incantation and a flick of his wand, the polish was gone in seconds. She thanked him and tried to paint them all over again, this time, using the back of his head as foot support, and as he had nowhere else to sit, he was forced to comply. The common room was unusually crowded today.

"Why are there so many people here?" he asked.

"Didn't you hear Dumbledore's announceme- wait, no, you weren't there. Is your mother feeling better?" Lily asked, looking at Remus, concerned.

"Mother?" he asked puzzled for a second. A pointed look from James and Sirius told him that had been their excuse for his disappearance. "Oh yeah. Well, she's really sick right now, I don't remember what the doctors said she had but they did say that it probably won't go away for a while. My parents have made arrangements with Dumbledore so I can visit her once a month until she's feeling better…" the girls nodded, "So why is it so crowded?"

"Oh, at dinner, Dumbledore announced that this year it's Hogwart's one thousand, two hundredth anniversary, and he's throwing a ball on April 16th. The theme is supposed to be something about how life would be without magic, so we have to wear muggle clothing and stuff… the common room's crowded 'cause everyone's so excited…" Lily answered, looking ecstatic.

"Is that why you're painting your nails…a week in advance…?" he asked Angela with an amused expression.

"Oh please, I could care less about my toenails. I'm painting them because they're getting brittle and it looks nasty, I'm just covering them up…"

"Coming from the girl who could care less…" muttered James.

"What was that?"

"Nothing, I said 'good explanation'…"

"My scalp itches…" said Isabella after a moment of silence.

"And the only solution is to scratch Sirius', right?" Lily answered. They laughed as Isabella blushed and muttered something about thinking it was her dog at which Sirius answered he would willingly be, if she continued with her previous occupation. She pushed his head away from her chair, gave way to temptation, and violently scratched her head. As she scratched, a large amount of fine metallic green and pink glitter came off, showering her and Sirius who was nearest. Assuming that Sirius had placed it there, she smacked him and started brushing her hair on top of his head so he was covered with the glitter.

"Hey! I didn't do anything!!" he yelled indignantly, catching a mouthful.

"Great, now I have to wash my hair!" she said in mock anger. And she stood up and closed her book, folding her homework inside it.

"Its about time!" he yelled after her as she ascended the stairs towards the bathroom.

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"So what was Lily saying about some ball…?" Remus asked a few hours later in the boy's dormitory. He sat on the edge of his bed, slipped off his slippers and lay down on it, he was very tired. Sirius was reading the most recent volume of the 'Fifer the Fearless' comic/adventure magazine, sitting on the floor with his back to his bed. James was putting away his invisibility cloak that he had just used on a trip to the kitchen. Peter was lying on his bed, trying to sleep. Apparently, he was unsuccessful.

"When?" he asked, sitting up. He always had one paranoid thought in his head; he was being left out. "Where was I?" he added almost accusingly.

"At the library, remember?" answered James, looking at him with a curious expression.

"Oh yeah, what were you saying?" he said, his face coloring slightly.

"Lily was saying something about a muggle ball we're having next week…" Remus continued.

"Yeah, its supposed to celebrate Hogwarts twelve-hundredth anniversary or something like that…" Sirius had finally shut his book, put it away and was lying down on his four-poster.

"Don't we dance and stuff at balls?" asked Remus. The others looked at him with 'oh yeah' expressions on their faces.

"That's right, we need dates." Remus was looking at the others with his eyebrows raised, an amused expression at how thick-headed they were.

"That didn't occur to me…" James observed, thinking, "We were up last night looking up you-know-what….we're tired" he seemed to need to justify his answer.

"I'm the one who should be worried, you guys can ask whoever you want to go with you…" said self-pitying Peter sadly.

The other three looked at each other with mild pity. All three were over five foot nine, lean, muscular, and quite handsome at this point, though Peter was a good five inches shorter and a bit more than chubby. Remus, James, and Sirius were all powerful wizards, which was evident if you looked at their grades, they would be competing for head-boy. As to his magical abilities, he was little more than a muggle. "Aww, don't worry about it, just ask whoever you want." Sirius replied kindly. This seemed to assure Peter because they dropped the subject and went to bed after their other two fellow Gryffindors joined them.

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ok, sorry about such a pathetic chapter, I have a lot of work to do, school just started and I'm not going to have much time to write in the future. The point to this so called chapter was to introduce the main characters and their current relationships with each other… please review and if you feel you want to sample a bit more of my pathetic writing, read my other story, "Harry Potter and the Power Pendants" and review that too please…until next time,

Ruby