The seventh year boys' dorm was not a place many people would choose to spend their time. The exceptions, of course, were the marauders. Lying on his neatly made bed, Remus Lupin, a boy with sandy brown hair and who looked to be slightly ill, was reading the book "Hogwarts, a History" for about the third time. Kneeling by his trunk looking for a quill and ink, was Peter Pettigrew, a chubby, short boy with dirty blonde hair and a mousy look about him. James Potter, a boy with messy black hair and glasses, lay on his messy bed reading a quidditch magazine, staring intently at all of the pictures of the newest models of broomsticks. He was scribbling with his quill on the margins of the magazine, and anyone who knew even who he was could guess what he was writing. Across the room, holding his wand, was Sirius Black, known to the other marauders as Padfoot. He held his wand out, and kept attempting to transfigure James' quill into an earthworm. Yes, that's Padfoot for you. Sirius soon grew tired of not being able to distract James by transfiguring his quill, so he sighed loudly. "Jamesie, could you quit drawing little hearts with Lily's initials in them?" James blushed. "Who says im drawing hearts?" He said defensively. Remus smiled. "Prongs, whenever you're thinking about her, your eyes sort of wander off, like someone could shoot a stunning spell at you and you wouldn't even notice. You can't hide it." Sirius could no longer tease James, as he wasn't paying attention. "I'm bored," he whined. "Jamesie-poo, go get us some chocolate frogs or something from hogsmeade! I'm hungry!" James just grunted something inaudible, but Remus's head shot up. "Chocolate?" he said loudly, "Where?!" Sirius's face broke into a grin. He started yelling. "OMYGOD! I JUST ACCOMPLISHED THE IMPOSSIBLE! I GOT MOONY TO LOOK UP FROM HIS BOOK! I'M SOO AMAZING!" Remus rolled his eyes. "Wow, Padfoot, I didn't know you were capable of using three- syllable words! Maybe in a couple of years you'll be able to use them without screaming at the top of your lungs." Sirius pouted. "You're just mad, Moony," he began, "because i've been to the broom closet more than you have. And now you're just trying to find ways to make fun of me." He stuck out his bottom lip like a two-year-old. "Padfoot," James called from across the room, "we'll be jealous of you when-" A loud explosion sounded from across the room, where Peter was. Peter looked up, his hair was blackened from the sparks. James spoke. "-We'll be jealous, Padfoot, when Peter accomplishes a spell within a week of hearing about it!" "Hey!" Peter cried indignantly from over by his trunk. "I was just trying to summon my quill, but then for some reason, this happened! Maybe I got the incantation wrong..." Remus looked up from his book. "Wow," he said. "Now I'm truly amazed. Both Padfoot AND wormtail used words with three or more syllables, maybe next Lily will actually say yes when James asks her out!" James scowled. "Fine, Moony, just for that, I'm going to ask her out. Maybe she really WILL say yes!" He was about to walk out the door when Padfoot called out to him. "Hey, prongsie?" he said in a fakely sweet voice, "If Lily does say yes, you can't come into our dorm with her, Heather Weber and I already reserved it for tonight, and three's a crowd, so use Lily's room!" James picked up a stale chocolate frog that had gone uneaten and threw it at Sirius's head. On the way out, he smirked, as he heard Sirius's disgusted yell, signalling that he had indeed been hit.

Entering the common room, James saw the back of Lily's head, recognizing her immediately by her shiny red hair. James was feeling a bit nervous, seeing as he had asked Lily out about 559 times, and her answer was always NO. He walked slowly towards her, not at all looking forward to hearing her answer yet again. Lily heard him walking, and turned around. "Potter? What do you want?" she said, in a cold voice. Of course, she wasn't mad at him, nor did she want to be rude. But seeing as she had a reputation for being rude to him, she couldn't actually be nice and polite. Lily was trying to cover up her true feelings, but there was no denying. Yes, Lily Evans was falling for James. Secretly, she wanted James to ask her out again. He hadn't asked her out since March, and now it was May. She was always ready to say yes to him whenever he spoke to her, but he never asked. Whenever he spoke to her, it was concerning Head duties, as Lily was head girl and James was head boy. She found it ironic that when she wanted James to ask her out, he kept his mouth shut, yet when she used to hate his guts, back in fifth year, he just couldn't avoid the urge to yell out, "hey Evans, come to Hogsmeade with me!"

James smiled nervously at Lily. "Well, Evans, actually..." James fell silent, pausing to think. Whenever he asked out Evans, she always turned him down. He reconsidered. Should he risk asking her, just to be turned down again? Would it really be worth it, just to end up in the hospital wing from being at the receiving end of one of the fiery redhead's curses? No, it would be best to just play it cool and ask her some question about head duties. Then out of nowhere, a clever idea came to him. "...actually, I was just thinking–– " Lily put on a look of mock surprise. "You can think? Wow, Potter, I didn't know you had it in you!" James gave her a playful scowl. "– yes, I was thinking, and I decided to run my idea by you. Since it's almost Christmas time, we should have a Christmas ball, for fourth years and up. The younger years can stay for dinner but then have to leave." Lily looked impressed. "You know, that's a good idea. But it seems a bit boring, a lot of schools have Christmas balls." James grinned wickedly. "Well, that's where my thinking part comes in," he cleared his throat. "My amazing idea, Lilykins, is that the girls must ask out the guys, and EVERYONE must show up with a partner!"

Lily gaped at him. She just let her jaw hang open for a minute or so until James looked at her questioningly. "Evans? You don't have to serve as a human flycatcher, you know." Lily's mouth snapped shut. "No," she said. "Definitely not. No one will come! Not every girl wants to show up with some arrogant, bloated head-up-his-arse excuse for a guy!" James pouted. "I'm not like that. And a lot of people will come, after all it's a very original idea!" Lily took a deep breath. "Fine, we can run the idea by Dumbledore. But if no one shows up, I am blaming it ENTIRELY on you!" James gave Lily one of his winning smiles, and nodded his head in agreement.