Aubrey Daniels watched in nervous anticipation as the serious looking witch who had introduced herself as Professor McGonagall lined all the incoming first years into alphabetical order. That meant she would be the third person to be “sorted”, whatever that meant. She was standing in between a boy with floppy dark hair who looked completely calm and a girl with bright red hair who was standing on her tiptoes, trying to see into the Great Hall in front of them.
 
 
 

By halfway through third year, Aubrey realized that she and her friends were starting to grow up. Maybe it was because her friend Mary had suddenly become completely boy crazy. Before this year, Aubrey hadn’t given much thought to boys before, except how annoying they were. Maybe that was because the boys she was around the most were Sirius Black and his gang.
 
 

                Fifth year started off with a bang right after the feast on the very first night back at Hogwarts. James and his gang were sticking close to Aubrey, Lily, and Mary as they left the Great Hall. Maybe it was because of the very strange conversation James and Lily on the train on the way to school. James asked Lily to go out with him and she laughed in his face.
 

                Aubrey stood at Platform 9 ¾ at King’s Cross Station staring at the black and burgundy train in front of her. This year, her last year of school, neither of her parents had come to see her off. She had taken a cab to the train station by herself.

                She was starting to realize she was doing a lot of things by herself.
 

It was Friday night and Lily was hoping to sneak off to the grounds with Mary, Betsy and the Marauders (as they boys were calling themselves these days). She was a little concerned because Aubrey had disappeared after dinner, but perhaps she needed some alone time.
 

Aubrey woke the next morning with a splitting headache and stayed in bed past noon. Finally, she managed to drag herself out of bed, pulling on a soft grey t-shirt and pulling her hair back in a messy ponytail. It was all she could manage, and besides, it wasn’t like she had anyone to impress anymore.
 

“You’re getting pretty good at this detention thing.” Sirius commented, dropping into the seat next to her in Professor Brandy’s classroom.
                Aubrey shrugged. “Well, what can I say, I learned from the best.”
 

Aubrey had no real plans for the weekend other than catching up on some homework and some much needed sleep. She was considering going into Hogsmeade, she was in dire need of a new quill (she probably destroyed hers with all those extra lines in detention) and was thinking of looking at some new clothes.

“So,” Sirius said, sliding into his seat in the Transfiguration classroom. “Want to talk about you starting fires at the breakfast table?”

“Was that you we heard yelling out there?” Lily asked innocently.
Sirius leveled her with a stare, they all knew James had come back in here and told her that he and Aubrey had been having a fight in the stairwell. Lily cleared her throat. “Alright, let’s try that again, what are you and Aubrey fighting about now?”

“I can’t believe you have detention again tonight.” Mary commented as the Gryffindor girls got ready for their last day of classes before the weekend. “I’ve never been in detention.”
“You’re lucky. It’s boring.” Aubrey remarked, clipping sparkly earrings in.
“Yeah but at least Sirius will be in there with you.” Mary said, grinning. “So it won’t be too bad. Sirius can make anything fun.”

Aubrey approached the table in the library where the four Marauders were sitting. Remus was helping Peter with his homework, James was measuring his Transfiguration essay, and Sirius was leaning back in his chair, balancing it on two legs, twirling his wand between his fingers.
“Nice to see you’re working so hard.” Aubrey commented, approaching the table and taking in the blank scroll of paper in front of Sirius.

“Do you think I’m crazy?” Aubrey asked, plopping onto the pouf next to Sirius in the musty attic classroom where Divination classes took place.
“Is this a trick question?” Sirius asked warily. James snorted.

Casper Rowe was a scare. Sirisu was starting to think that perhaps James was right and he should just tell Aubrey how he felt about her. But every time he felt like the timing might be right, she would go and make one of those comments about how she wasn’t ready to date again yet. He was trying to be patient and respectful for her, but those were admittedly not two of his best traits.

“He’s going to drop that.” Remus scoffed. They both watched for a minute as Peter levitated an enormous pumpkin over the heads of some delighted first years, who squealed in excitement.
“You should probably go intervene, Head Boy.” Sirius commented.
“Hm.” Remus grunted, not budging from his armchair.

“Now, tell me again.” Mary said from their table in the library. “You and Sirius snogged…but he’s not your boyfriend?”
“People can kiss without automatically becoming boyfriend and girlfriend, you know.” Aubrey commented wryly, not looking up from her Potions assignment.

  Casper was definitely staring at her now, both of them probably remembering that the last Hogsmeade weekend had been their disastrous date. They hadn’t talked more than a ‘hello’ since then, but things were definitely a bit awkward between them.