"I'm going to kill you three," James' angry voice followed the ear-piercing scream. "Look what you've done."

The boys, still trying to wake up, took a while to respond to James' ranting. By the time they did, James was out of the bathroom and stood in the middle of the dormitory glaring at Sirius, Remus and Peter. Frank, also woken by the noise, sat up.

"What's all this noise about?" he asked sleepily. His eyes slowly focused and he saw James wearing just pyjama bottoms stood angrily staring at the three. He began laughing. "What happened to you?"

James gaze turned to Frank. "It's not funny," he declared, a hint of a whine in his voice.

What James was referring to, what Frank was finding so funny, was this: James' hair was no longer there, or at least not as it had been. Sirius and Remus had rather clumsily shaved off James' messy mop. Every so often there were clumps of what had just last night been soft raven-coloured hair.

"I'm going to kill you three." He promised again.

Sirius joined in with Frank's and, by now, Peter's laughter.

"Relax mate, we figured you'd be a little upset and wouldn't want to walk around looking like that, so we bought you this…" He motioned for Remus to get whatever they had bought.

Remus came out with a loud vulgar wig. Similar in style to a clown's, its colours were in vivid rainbow tones. Did they honestly expect him to wear that?

James lunged at Remus, crying "My hair, you sons of toads!" as he did. He fought as Sirius dragged him off. James hit him too, but Sirius was too fast and grabbed James' arms before he could do much damage.

"Shower. Go." He ordered, then a quieter tone that James could still hear. "It'll grow back."

James stopped, ready to turn and go after Sirius again but was pushed into the bathroom by Frank who quickly slammed the door shut after him.

"You three are going to wish you didn't do that, you know." He pointed out.

--------

"Everyone's staring," James hissed.

After coming out of the shower he had shaved off the remaining tufts and with it his mood had improved slightly. He would rather have no hair at all than have little bits that reminded him of what he had lost. He was still angry with the guys but he was also quite impressed that they would do such a thing on one of their own. He would, of course, get his revenge. But not yet.

They were in the Great Hall now, sitting at Gryffindor table to eat their breakfast.

"I'm amazed you're not pleased with the attention," Lily's familiar voice commented. "Your over-inflated ego should love it."

James gave her a look of total contempt before turning his back on her.

Remus, who was sat close to Lily, leant over and whispered. "I think he's enjoying it really. He's just annoyed you've picked up on the fact that it's the wrong kind of attention."

Lily laughed quietly making James turn and glare once more, Lily laughed harder. Ignoring it James engaged the boys in conversation, blocking Lily out. Five minutes of ignoring not only Lily but the looks off everyone in the room, too, James had started to forget his hairless situation. He was quickly reminded of it though.

Cold spread over his head, wet stickiness dripped down the side of his face and then came the soft tickling to replace the cold. Laughter and soft whispers filled the room, James spun around immediately

"Evans, what are you doing?" he asked, not at all surprised to find her there considering.

"Sorry," she said, actually sounding apologetic. "It's just, well, I saw that your head wasn't as shiny as a bald person's usually is and thought maybe you would like it to be. The maple syrup was the only suitable thing nearby." She flashed him a grin and left the Great Hall, hearing Sirius' deep laughter and Remus' slightly quieter chuckles the loudest as she did.

"I hate that girl," James grumbled, stabbing his bacon viciously.

"And yet," Peter commented in an enlightened tone, very rare for Peter. "Your life would be oddly incomplete and unfulfilled without her around to show you up."

If looks could kill, Peter would have been dead fifty million times over in that second.

--------

The days passed, January ended and before they knew it, so did February. The shock and stares at James' hairless disposition had quickly ended when a new topic of interest arose; a Ravenclaw who, for all her intellect, had failed to see the problem with a weight-loss charm. She had done it so strong that she became wafer-thin and had almost blown away on her way to the Herbology greenhouses, it was lucky her friends were there.

James had been disgusted attention had been taken away from him ("Which is of more interest to you," he had asked Sirius one night. "Me or a girl with a self-confidence issue?" Sirius had yawned exaggeratedly. "The girl, now get over it. You're yesterday's news," he'd advised.). His actions to become the centre of attention once more only strengthened Lily's argument that he was pleased with the attention he had received in his bald state. His hair was now just past stubble at half a centimetre long.

The only worthy thing of note in that sleepy month was a Quidditch match, which wasn't even that interesting when you thought about it. It was over almost before it even began with Slytherin catching the snitch almost immediately after the starting whistle, certainly before Hufflepuff had a chance to even score a goal. But now, in the month of March, things seemed to be looking quite interesting.

"Good luck today," Lily said, giving Jacob a tight squeeze.

His rolling chortle sounded. "Aren't you supposed to wish your own team that?"

Lily looked back at the Gryffindor team, or more precisely the swarm of people around them, and shrugged. "I think they're getting enough, don't you?"
Jacob smiled at her and nodded.

There was a moments silence when the two of them looked back at the gang once more. In the middle, giving each male member of the team a peck on the cheek was Alex.

"It's a shame my own girlfriend can't do the same," Jacob commented huffily.

Lily smiled at him sympathetically. "Sorry about that. I thought she was getting better, maybe she's going to come by in a minute?"

"Not likely," he said as Professor Dumbledore called for all non-players to take their seats and the players to take their positions in the stadium.

Lily headed off but Jacob's hand caught her own. "Before you go – what did you say to her?"

Lily's eyes twinkled mischievously. "Oh, I used a bit of the Lily-Charm." She said, not wanting to tell him she had all but certified a possible relationship between them, not wanting to tell him she had used him in such a lie.

"Everyone, Miss Evans, includes your lovely self. Please be seated," Dumbledore's voice echoed through the stadium causing Lily to blush furiously.

"I think you better go," Jacob laughed before heading to his position on the stadium.

Lily took the first available seat, a seat in the Ravenclaw section.

----

The captains shook hands, the balls were released, the whistle was blew and immediately 15 players flew up into the air, though only one remained stationary. The remaining 14 seemed to blur past the crowd.

"…And Suldron passes to Somers, who passes it back to Suldron. An expert throw there as he throws to Wenham but not good enough, Ravenclaw now in possession of the quaffle. Abers to Andrews to – no, wait he's taking it all the way to the goal and a quick pass to Patil who scores! Ravenclaw lead 70 to 30. – Come on Gryffindor, what's wrong with you today?"

Lily found herself cheering for her Ravenclaw friends with the rest of the stand. She had only been to the inter-house Quidditch final the previous year and the atmosphere there had been so different to this one, tenser. She realised that she was enjoying this game more than before.

----

"- Gryffindor fighting back now as they take a 10 point lead. The score now stands at 100 to 110."

James cheered, they were back in the running now. He shot a sneer over to the Ravenclaw stands where that traitor Evans was sat. How dare she not support her own house? He felt a sense of anger rising inside of him at her blatant treachery.

Ravenclaw scored again and he groaned inwardly. They were now drawing. If he was playing they'd have won by now, but no! Suldron had to take him off the team and now there was a chance they'd, Merlin forbid, lose. He'd have to make sure they didn't, but how?

"- Wenham shoots it past Porkiss and he scores! Gryffindor are in the lead once more!"

James raised his arms to clap and cheer when he was momentarily blinded by light reflecting off glass. He grinned; he knew just what to do.

----

Jacob kept his eyes trained around the pitch in search of anything that glittered. He heard it whiz past him and his eyes followed its path.

"And is that…? There's something right by Ravenclaw seeker, Andrews junior's head. Called Andrews junior, so as not to get him confused with his older brother, Ravenclaw's captain and chaser. Should be an easy snitch to catch…Where's he going?"

All the other players had stopped as they heard that and the audience became eerily still.

Jacob was on a dive towards the ground, his arm getting ready to reach out and grab, while the Gryffindor seeker, O'Connor, was headed towards the glinting thing that had previously been behind Jacob. Then, all in one moment, everything changed. The glinting stopped; Jacob's hand clasped around cold metal and a deafening rumble erupted from the stadiums. Jacob touched down on the ground, hand around the snitch and arm up in triumph.

----

"I don't believe it! Ravenclaw win 260 to 120. Jacob Andrews catches the snitch!"

James stared blankly at the pitch. That wasn't how it was supposed to go. Andrews was supposed to see the light and go after it when James moved it, not go after the real snitch.

'Stupid Suldron for taking me off the team. Stupid O'Connor for falling for such a pathetic trick. And stupid Andrews for not.'

Too lost in thoughts of this ilk, James didn't notice the incident going on below him.

----

Lily stood up and cheered like the rest of them then headed the swarm of people running to congratulate Jacob and the other Ravenclaw's.

Lily threw her arms around Jacob who responded by wrapping his arms around her waist and spinning her round excitedly, chanting "We won, we won, we won," over and over.

"You won," she affirmed, giggling as his jubilant mood rubbed off on her.

"You," he said, drunk with happiness. "Are my good luck charm."

They stopped spinning but they remained like that stationary for less than a moment before cries of protest and annoyance sounded. The two broke apart and turned in time to see Alex pushing her was through the crowd.

"Get your paws off my boyfriend," she growled, glaring at Lily.

"The only one with paws around here is you Alex," Lily retorted, turning her back on Alex to talk to Jacob.

Alex dragged her by the hair though and forced Lily to face her. "How dare you?" she spat, delivering a sharp slap to Lily's face.

Lily was stunned and Alex looked like she was going to take advantage of that when Jacob stopped her.

"I think you'll find," he said calmly. "That she was giving as good as she got and to be frank Als, I don't blame her. You're not a very nice person and I don't think we should see each other anymore."

He too turned his back on Alex, seeing if Lily was okay.

"You…You…This is all her fault. She's poisoned you against me. Ooh, she's going to pay."

Jacob stood between Alex and Lily. "You did a good enough job of that yourself and if you lay one finger on her you'll have me to answer to," he promised dangerously. "Come on Lils, I'll get you inside."

With his protective arm around her shoulder, Lily allowed herself to be led away by Jacob. She slowly found her voice.

"And you are my hero," she said quietly, smiling up at him.

A/N: My exams are over 'til the summer YAY!

What do you think there? Can you see a relationship there? I know Rachael already said one would be cool, but what about the rest of you?

Sam, I really hope there are no missing words in this chapter, but my head's to fried to go back and check, so if there is, I apologise right now.

Jen, I have loads planned for later years, pretty much all after 3rd year but it'll take me a while to get there because I'm struggling to get second year written. As you can see, I've just skipped an entire month and a half. sigh I don't know why this year is so difficult.

Always-Blond (who from now on will be called 'Blondie', provided you have no objections?) I'm really glad you like it, it's always nice to hear I've got new readers :D

I know I haven't done individual responses for a while, have I? But I wanted to fill up that 4th page, and now I'm onto the 5th rolls eyes

He he, I think I'll go now because I have nothing more to say…nothing that you want to hear anyway.

Rae