Disclaimer: Harry Potter and everything related to it (characters, settings, etc, etc.) belongs to the amazing J. K. Rowling.

Author's Notes: Okay, I'm happy that people did review, so you get to get another chapter. (:

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The result of what had happened did not turn out for the best, in the end.

After taking his time brooding and sulking and being extra antsy, James returned to his old self with newer and stronger motivation to win over Lily Evans. Sirius knew that something was about to go wrong eventually when he saw the cunning look in his friend's face one morning, hair dripping wet of just emerging from a wakening shower.

"Lily Evans must surrender!" he shouted and struck what he probably thought was a heroic pose, "…to my charm." He concluded the drama by licking his palm and slicking back his already wet locks. Then he turned and shot his three friends a glare, all of which were trying to keep straight faces. Remus coughed hastily and smoothed down his robes before looking to Sirius and Peter.

"Shall we go down to breakfast, then? Prongs can follow us when he's done getting ready," he told them in a barely controlled voice. The other two nodded without argument and quickly followed their leading friend. Once out the door they burst into fits of laughter as they were unable to contain it any longer.

When they finally managed to get down to the Great Hall on their own two feet without having to throw themselves upon each other for support, James had caught up with them. He kept shooting them suspicious looks and they tried to act normally by sending him smiles. After they were finally seated (James sandwiched between a widely-smiling Sirius and Remus) and were halfway through their meal, Dumbledore clicked his spoon against his goblet to usher for silence and attention. The noise volume lowered into nothing, and heads turned toward the staff table, all awaiting the headmaster to make his announcement. He did not. Instead, the head girl (who had not been noticed due to her extremely short height) and the head boy (who had not been recognized due to his extremely tall height) spoke from up front.

"As you all know, Halloween is only two weeks away from now. Every year it passes without anything special, apart from the feast, occurring. This year, however, Jack here," Isabel Brookes gestured to the head boy, "and I have thought to make this event slightly more exciting."

Jack Muller picked up from there, "With the professors' permission, we are pleased to announce that we will be holding a Halloween costume event right here in the Great Hall after the evening feast. While everything has been arranged, we still need all prefects and some volunteers for the set up. There will be a notice on your respective house's bulletin board tomorrow for those willing to volunteer."

"Please do so if you are able to! The Great Hall will need a lot of work to be decorated accordingly and there are other things to be done. As this is an event arranged by students, please behave yourselves so that our professors will not change their minds and take it away!" Isabel grinned at the snickers from the crowd.

"Have fun choosing—and perhaps making—your costumes!" Jack concluded before they both stepped off.

As cheers and hoots erupted from the crowd, Sirius turned to grin at his friends.

"My grand Halloween prank… has been slightly altered."

—————

"So I'm expected to help in the set up," Moony said later that day at lunch after going through their lessons for the morning, "Since I'm a prefect. Hey, why don't you guys volunteer?"

Sirius gasped and clutched his chest in fake horror, "Me? Volunteer? What has this world come to?"

Remus rolled his eyes as Peter chuckled and said, "Sure, I would do it."

All three turned expectantly to James, but they should have known better. He was too busy drilling holes into Lily's head with his eyes. Sirius mock slapped his forehead.

"James?"

"Uhh, right," he answered before turning back to his meal. Remus chose to ignore the fact that that had not been a definite answer and decided to drop it. The rest of their lunch passed rather uneventfully, unless you counted Sirius rapidly blinking as he ogled Remus whenever he saw James shooting Lily a look. Sirius was unknowingly making Remus uncomfortable, and so the werewolf had been in a hurry for their lunch period to end. By the time their after-lunch lesson (which was Transfiguration) approached and they were walking to the assigned class, however, he wished that they were back in the Great Hall.

James had seen Lily walk with her (admittedly also pretty) friend behind them and stopped in the middle of the corridor, eyes shining with what turned out to be a disastrous idea. Lily naturally tried to dodge him when she saw who was blocking her way, but he carefully moved in whichever direction she did, making her (and her friend, who followed every step) unable to pass.

"Potter." She said through tightly gritted teeth. She tried to sidestep him but James quickly reacted. Sirius, Remus, and Peter watched this odd type of a waltz with increasing interest from the sidelines.

"I think that's a signal for 'leave-me-alone-or-you're-dead' right there, mate," Sirius told James helpfully.

James merely shot him an angry look and turned back to Lily, "Listen, I just wanted to say—"

But he didn't get to finish. Lily had pulled out her wand and immobilized him, kicking him out of the way before huffily proceeding with her nervous friend to class. The kick caused James to fall straight on his face, and Sirius was sure that had he been able to make any sound, he would have groaned in pain. He and his two other friends stared wide eyed for quite a while at their unmoving friend before realizing that something must be done. Remus was the one who reacted first. He pulled out his wand and muttered a counter spell, though he quickly regretted it. All three of them quickly clapped their hands to their ears when James roared with pain the second he became mobile. Apparently he had been holding it in.

"My face!" he screamed, "My handsome face!" his hands clutched at it frantically, "Did something happen to it? That fall must've squished it. Is it squished?"

Remus acted as though he was inspecting said face just for the sake of James' (and his, and Sirius', and Peter's) sanity (ies). Finally, he said, "No, James. I swear to god, you're almost as bad as Sirius."

"What! I'm not like that! He's such a pansy. I worry about my looks in a manly way." Sirius replied angrily.

The werewolf narrowed his eyes. In an attempt to prove himself right and Sirius wrong, he reached out and ruffed his friend's black hair. It felt smooth and nice between his fingers, but that wasn't the point. The effect was instant.

"NOOO! My hair! My goddamn beautiful hair! How dare you touch my hair? I spend hours doing it in the morning. It is now ruined!" he smoothed frantically at it, looking horror-struck, "Does it look okay now? Are any strands out of place?"

Remus picked his fallen wand from the floor and said coolly, "Thank you for proving my point." With that, he strode off to class, Peter at his heels.

James stayed behind with Sirius to get a bite, "At least I used manly terms." Done what he had stayed for, he followed their two friends. Sirius was the last to leave. He pouted and muttered obscenities all the way to Transfiguration.

As a not very uncommon thing, James and Sirius were late for class. What was uncommon was Peter being late for a class other than a morning one. And yet rarer still, Remus—who was a prefect, always got perfectly on time, and never managed to be late even once in his entire schooling career without perfect, completely acceptable reasoning—was also late for class. Professor McGonagall was not happy at this, and got angrier still when they explained lamely that they had been ' sidetracked ' (from Moony), 'delayed' (from Prongs), 'busy' (from Padfoot), and 'uhhh' (from Peter) all at the same time. In the end, she ducked points and gave them detention for being late, and took away yet another five points for wasting class time when James and Sirius tried to argue her out of a detention on a Saturday.

Dinner arrived to have Sirius and James finished bashing McGonagall and in renewed moods, both with also fresh determination. James was determined to have Lily as his girlfriend by the end of the year at the very most, and Sirius was of the mind that the upcoming Halloween prank absolutely must be the biggest prank they would pull so far. He finally managed to tell his three friends about it since he had been too busy discussing the arranged costume event at breakfast and mocking James at lunch.

Remus was wide-eyed, "No way. That's outrageous and will get us into a lot of trouble if it is found out it had been us. Which, I might add, is highly likely."

"Oh my god, don't be such a spoilsport!" Sirius pouted.

"It sounds brilliant to me. I'm with you, mate." James immediately made his support known.

"YES!" Sirius shouted, giving James a high-five.

Peter merely shrugged and Remus shook his head, knowing that he would have to try and talk them out of it, or it was not going to be good for any of them… at all.

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End notes: So this costume event pops up… I think it adds flavor! Review, you know you want to. (;