Accio Evans

Chapter 18: Pumpkins

Recap: the marauders decided they need to plan something to mark the Halloween feast and in turn cheer u a sombre Hogwarts population. Jessica decides although she's still heartbroken by her parents death she wants to be happy again and enjoy her final year so she sets about to cheer up her friends.

"Merlin's pants!" Hestia squealed as the pumpkin seated on the table in front of her exploded, spraying her and Sirius, who was sat next to her, in hundreds of pieces of detonated pumpkin flesh. The hall fell silent, turning round to stare, Hestia flushed maroon, thoroughly mortified as she attempted vainly to pull the orange stings from her curls but to no avail. Avoiding eye contact, she failed to notice frank tucking his wand into his sleeve and the enthusiastic grins that were sent his way by the other Marauders and the wicked grin that crossed Sirius' face, despite the dousing in pumpkin.

"Nice one Jones look lik- " Frank started, but was cut off by another explosion at the Slytherin table, Remus attempted to conceal his wand from sight, but Lily noticed, so this was what the boys had been doing all afternoon? Craning her neck, Lily managed to catch a glimpse of Avery and Mulciber covered in destroyed pumpkin, glaring at the Marauders who were snickering to themselves. Before anyone had a chance to blink, more explosions occurred, one at the Hufflepuff table, two at Ravenclaw, a moment of silence, then all hell broke loose.

Decorative pumpkins scattered around the wall, up and down the house tables began to detonate like orange bombs covering the hall in a stringy mess of pumpkin flesh and seeds, lodging in the clothes and hair – Lily was 99% sure she had a pumpkin seed stuck in her ear. Pandemonium ensued, some of the younger students, who had not had the joy of several years of marauders pranks, screamed, but on the whole, the students mostly burst out laughing, helping to pull pumpkin flesh from their friends robes, or laugh at the way the seeds landed in someone's hair. A vast majority of the students, perhaps maybe not the first years, had worked out who was behind the trick; it wasn't exactly difficult when a group of five boys were almost crying with laughter as Professor Dumbledore grinned away at Professor Slughorn pulling pumpkin seeds from his waistcoat pocket. Everywhere Lily looked, every person was covered head to toe in gooey pumpkin but it seemed the entire student population was grinning ear to ear, thankful for a reason to smile – even if it was due to a mischievous group of boys and a misguided idea that exploding pumpkins would not land tem in detention.

"Good Godric, it's all in my hair!" Jessica giggled, pulling strings of pumpkin from her blonde tresses.

"Mine too!" Remus added, long strings of pumpkin flesh hung from his hair almost like a very odd orange tassled hat, Jessica burst out into laughter and Alice wasn't far behind. It was nice to see Jessica smile again, Remus concluded, nothing had been quite the same since she had received the letter, she'd been quiet and withdrawn, it just wasn't right, it wasn't Jessica, but to see her smiling again was fantastic, and even if it was at his expense.

Sneaking a glance up towards the teachers table, James was pleased to see all the teachers laughing too 'Phew!' James thought, 'Fingers crossed for no detention!' Professor Flitwick was laughing and pulling pumpkin from the hair of Professor Slughorn who was cackling too - although that be down to the shots of firewhiskey James had seen him down during the starter - and Albus Dumbledore remained seated in his chair, grinning like Cheshire cat despite the seeds and pumpkin pieces now covering his beard and face. Even Minerva McGonagall cracked a smile.

Once all the pumpkins had exploded (and everyone was covered head to toe in orange strings and seeds) chatter broke out in the hall, people pointed at their friends and laughed, pulled seeds out of their hair and generally smiled – it was almost like the horrors of the world outside no longer existed.

"Ready for the next bit boys?" James questioned, to which the reply was three heads nodding so much their heads were in danger of coming loose and rolling around the floor.