"Right, that's it. I'm going to try it," said James. "I just can't believe I've never thought of this before; it's pure genius."
"She'll kill you if she finds out," whispered Peter nervously. He checked around for the hundredth time to ensure that no-one was listening.
"Stop looking so shifty, Wormtail," warned Sirius. "Everybody's busy doing homework. You're only drawing more attention. And so what if she catches us? Half the fun is the fear of getting caught and this will be well worth it."
The three sat huddled around the fire in Gryffindor common room. Sirius was still managing to look completely relaxed as though they were having the most innocent of conversations. Peter, or "Rat-boy" as Sirius liked to call him behind his back, couldn't sit still. He kept fidgeting and eyeing the Girl's Dormitory suspiciously. James had his wand at the ready when he spoke again.
"Okay. You guys know the plan. You stand there talking and block me from everyone's view. Got it?"
The other two nodded. They got up and moved across the common room. Sirius had specifically left a book on a table near the stairs to the Girl's Dorm. When Sirius got there, he picked up the book and he and Peter immediately began discussing it while facing into the room. James meanwhile, took position behind their backs, pointed his wand at the Girl's Dormitory Door and whispered the charm.
After a minute, nothing had happened, so Sirius whispered to James out of the corner of his mouth.
"Try it again. Maybe say it a little louder this time. I couldn't even hear you the last time."
"Okay, once more. Paws crossed, Padfoot," grinned James.
He pointed his wand at the door again, and in a slightly louder voice, repeated the charm.
"Accio Bra."
Nothing happened.
"Accio Bra!" he whispered desperately.
Sirius was trying to keep a straight face. Peter was failing miserably. Casual observers remarked that it was strange that he should be grinning while discussing History of Magic. James was about to try for a final time when one white, lacy bra came floating down the stairs. As soon as it reached the bottom, James snatched it up and stuffed it inside his robes. None of the Gryffindors had noticed, immersed as they were in homework, studying and games of exploding snap.
"Mission accomplished, messieurs," he said with a triumphant look.
As slowly as they could possibly manage in their excitement, the three made their way to their dorm room. Once inside with the door firmly shut, James produced the bra and began shrieking and whooping with delight.
"Take that, Enchanted Staircase!! I can still get at Lily's underwear!"
Sirius was doubled over laughing and, in between fits, managed to give James a congratulatory clap on the back.
"If you didn't succeed soon, I was going to lose it completely. You looked so daft hiding behind us whispering 'Accio bra'. Wormtail grinning like an idiot didn't help either."
"I can't believe you did it, James! I can't believe it! It actually worked! Accio Bra! Utter genius!" Peter was pacing back and forth, giggling.
"Are you sure it's hers?" asked Sirius.
"Yes," replied James. He stuck his face into one of the cups and inhaled deeply, getting a dreamy look in his eyes. "I'd know her perfume anywhere."
"What size is she?"
James responded with a confused look.
"I… I don't know. How do you tell? I've never actually held one of these in the… eh… flesh before." He held it up to his chest and looked down. "I suppose she's kinda medium."
Sirius rolled his eyes and took Lily's bra off James.
"32B, James, she's a 32B," said Sirius, having examined the label. "Not bad, Evans, not bad." He smirked and threw the bra back to James, who gazed at it with renewed awe. Peter, too, was just staring at it as if he was hypnotized.
"Look at the pair of you. You'd swear you'd never seen women's underwear before!"
Peter looked sheepish, because in truth, he never had and they all knew it. Never to know the touch of a woman, Sirius had joked once to James when Peter wasn't listening. His mother probably keeps her drawers magically sealed with boobytraps. James, on the other hand,should have known better, or so his many tales of midnight trips to the Astronomy tower with assorted girls would have one believe. But then, Lily Evans was a special case.
"So what are you going to do with it now that you have it? Are you going to keep it?" inquired Sirius mischievously.
James looked up from his adoration.
"I don't know. I hadn't really thought that far ahead. I could just keep it, you know, as a trophy… Or I could enchant it so she says yes the next time I ask her out."
"Maybe you could enchant it so that she feels compelled to kiss Severus in the middle of Potions the next time she wears it. It would be funny to watch her get sick in her cauldron afterwards!" cackled Peter.
"Ugh!" James nearly gagged with disgust. "I wouldn't give Snivellus the pleasure of a kiss from Lily and besides, I couldn't be that cruel to anyone. Kissing Snape… Yuck!"
Suddenly James had an idea and he put the bra on his head.
"You know, these things are kind of like headphones."
Sirius and Peter looked confused.
"You know, headphones, you learned about them in Muggle Studies. Muggles use them to listen to the radio through. You attach them by a cable to a radio… and the sound comes down the cable into the headphones…"
"Oh, those things!" said Peter. "I suppose they do kind of look them, but where's the radio?"
James turned to Sirius and began to adjust imaginary dials on his chest.
"You'll do as a radio, Padfoot!"
Sirius laughed as James wiggled his hands in front of his chest.
"Calling Moscow… come in, Moscow… this is James. Over"
At this point, Remus entered the room. He had just returned from prefect duties and the sight that greeted him was, well, amusing, to say the least. James was standing in the middle of the room, with a bra on his head (Merlin knows where he got it) and he was playing with imaginary breasts on Sirius' chest, while Peter was in a heap with laughter.
"What on earth have you got tangled in your antlers today, Prongs? Is that a bra?"
James stood up quickly and the bra slipped off his head. Sirius met Remus' eyes with a grin.
"Our boy James here managed, with no small amount of ingenuity, to obtain an item of Ms. Lily Evans' underwear, and is currently using them as headphones to communicate with Moscow, whoever he is, by means of me, the radio."
"It's a city, Sirius!"
Sirius rolled his eyes. "I know."
"He used an Accio charm Remus! An Accio charm! It was so clever, you should have been there!" piped up Peter
Remus didn't know where to look. On the one hand, he wanted to join in the triumph of James' victory over the enchanted staircase to the Girl's Dorm. On the other, he knew if they were caught, there would be so much detention their heads would spin.
"Are you mad? What if you were caught?"
Sirius came around beside Remus and put an arm around his shoulder.
"Yes, we are mad, Moony but you knew that already. And we didn't get caught so what's the problem?"
"She's down in the common room now!" replied Remus. "She could return to her room any moment. What if she notices some of her clothes are missing? And Merlin only knows what a mess one of your spells made of her trunk."
"Simple," said James. "I'll just nip downstairs now and slip it quietly into her bag. She won't even notice."
"Yes she will! Give it to me! I'll give it to one of the house elves in the morning and he can pass it off as laundry". Remus made to go for the bra but Sirius was quicker.
"Oh no you don't!" he shouted as he tackled Remus onto his bed. James made for the exit quickly as Remus tried to escape Sirius' clutches. But within seconds, Peter, who was watching the proceedings with amusement, and Sirius and Remus, who were a tangle of limbs on the bed, all heard a large commotion outside their room.
The three rushed out to find that James was lying in a heap at the bottom of the stairs. Apparently, in his haste, he had tripped on the hem of his robe and had gone crashing down the steps. He landed, with the bra somehow having managed to wrap itself around his head, in front of the staircase, right at Lily's feet.
"Hiya Evans! I found this and I was returning it to you. Fancy going out with me?"
Lily stared and the rumpled heap at her feet. She spotted her underwear wrapped around his head and the infuriating grin on James' face. Her cheeks went red with embarrassment.
"JAMES POTTER! I'M GOING TO KILL YOU!" she shrieked. She then launched herself on top of James and began throttling him. To his credit, he did his best to fend her off while trying to disentangle himself from her bra, but to no avail.
Remus, Sirius and Peter made no attempt to help and fell about the common room laughing.
"Aren't you going to stop her?" asked another prefect.
"I would," answered Remus, "but as a prefect, this is the best punishment I can think of for James. And as a friend, this is the closest he's ever managed to get to Lily, I wouldn't want to spoil his fun!"