"Juniper, come! You need to get on! Juli will help with your luggage!" My mother yells at me in her heavily accented English.
"Coming," I murmur, looking around at the huge crowd one last time before quickly hugging and kissing her goodbye. "I'll see you in June, Mum. I'll miss you!"
"Have a great year, darling," Mum says, smiling brightly, making her high cheekbones even more pronounced. I grin back and fight through the throng of people onto the train. I paused, sticking my head out the window.
"BYE, MUM!" I yell, waving like mad till the train rounds the corner and she is out of sight. Then I turn and come face-to-face with a boy. He's got sort of long, wavy dark hair and brooding eyes.
"Oi, look where you're going next time, why don't you?" he says rudely.
"I've been standing here! You're the one who needs to look out!" I reply angrily. The boy raises his eyebrows, looking both affronted at my rudeness and slightly impressed.
"What?" I demand. "Don't get that much?" I turn on my heel and stride down the cramped train, searching for my sister. It takes a few minutes for me to realise that the boy is following me. "Go away," I hiss.
"Nah," he says, shoving his hands in his pockets. "I'm heading this way too…ah. Here we are. I believe your sister's already in there…" he opens the compartment door, and Juli hops up.
"June! Hi!" she grabs my heavy trunk and tosses it up into the luggage rack with a grunt. I plop down next to her with a nod at the other four already in the compartment.
"Tight squeeze," murmurs a small, nervous-looking boy.
"I think its cosy," says a skinny boy with glasses and unruly hair, winking at the fiery redhead beside him. She snorts, pushing him away.
"As if, Potter. I'm Lily, Lily Evans," she adds to me, smiling and holding out a hand.
"Juniper Blasnik," I whisper. The long-haired boy snort-laughs, while another, sandy-haired and tired-looking boy looks at him disapprovingly.
"Sirius, knock it off."
Sirius glowers at him for a second. "Fine."
"Seriously…" the boy with glasses whispers, grinning. Sirius whacks him across the head.
"SIRIUS!" bellows Glasses Boy, whacking him in turn.
"Quit it!" I yell. "It doesn't matter! I get laughed at all the time. I don't care." I hear Sirius mutter something under his breath and glower at him, but he simply raises an eyebrow and doesn't elaborate.
"Anyway," says Lily, "This is Remus, James, Sirius, obviously—and Peter."
Remus, the sandy-haired boy, smiles. James gives me a cocky grin, and Peter, the nervous-looking boy, smiles—well—nervously.
"And you know me, obviously," adds Juli. I jump—I'd almost forgotten that my older sister was there. "So! How've your summers been?"
"All right," answers Remus, shrugging. "Nothing really happens at my house."
"Yeah, except at full-"
"SIRIUS!" hisses James, jerking his head from side to side. I look at them curiously before Peter hastily fills the silence.
"Well, I spent most of my summer reading. Professor McGonagall told me that I needed to keep my average up. I've always been all right on Charms, but that's about it. I hope I'll be better this year," he says anxiously.
"Nah, you'll be fine," says James confidently. "I flew around my backyard, mostly. I got Dad to bewitch some rocks to fly around, in place of the Snitch, y'know…how was your summer, Sirius?"
"Awful," says the long-haired boy glumly. "Mum kept shrieking 'bout how much shame I was bringing on the family, not being in Slytherin. Dad didn't say much, but he's kind of timid next to her anyway."
"I kind of avoided Petunia," murmurs Lily. "She kept coming up behind me, telling me off for being there. Asked why I was home if I was so special…she doesn't really understand why it was me and not her, I suppose."
It's a moment before anyone says something else. Then, in a cheery voice, James announces, "Hey, the lunch trolley's here! I haven't got a ton of money with me, so cough up…We'll have the lot," he adds to the plump, smiling woman.
"All right, one of each?"
"Nah, 'bout six of each. I reckon we've all got enough." James holds out his hand for money, and Juli and I quickly put in a few Sickles and Knuts. Lily adds three Sickles, Remus tosses in a few Knuts, Peter counts out fifteen Sickles exactly before adding them, and Sirius throws in a few gold Galleons. Shoving a fist in his jeans, James comes up with five Galleons, seven silver Sickles, and three bronze Knuts, adding to the total.
"Thanks, dears." the woman passes out our feast of junk food, still smiling warmly.
"Right, divvy it up round us," says Lily, passing me a Pumpkin Pasty. I take a hesitant bite, my eyes widening.
"Good, isn't it?" Remus says, smiling. I nod eagerly, devouring the rest.
"Haven't you had this stuff before? I mean, what year are you?" asks Sirius rudely.
"Third," I whisper.
"Surely we'd have known you by now. And if you're third year, you should have already had this stuff." I bristle at Sirius' remark.
"I never said I was third year here," I hiss angrily. "And keep your nose out of my business."
Looking surprised, Sirius raises his hands in surrender.
"She got you, Sirius!" chortles James, high-fiving me. I give a rueful smile, my anger having evaporated.
We chatter on for a couple of hours before Lily notices the darkening sky. "Oi!" she yells, breaking up my and James' Exploding Snap game. "We've got to change into our robes, we'll be there soon."
Soon after, the train screeches to a stop and we all stand, taking our things out with us, into the corridor. We join the crowd of people all getting off the huge train, and eventually climb off, relatively unscathed.
James, who is in the front, beckons us over to a carriage. I see a beautiful skeletal horse pulling it, but do not comment, because I know what it is.
"Can anyone else see the Thestrals…?" I murmur to Lily. She smiles and nods.
"I can, and Remus. Beautiful, aren't they?" I nod, suddenly grateful for Lily. I'm not sure why. Maybe it's her confident but sweet demeanour. She's very…welcoming. At my old school, I was mocked a lot. I suppose that all I can hope for is that the students here are at least a trifle more welcoming.
"What's the matter?" asks Remus, looking at me with sympathy. "Nervous?"
I giggle. "That obvious, eh? Well…yeah. I am pretty nervous. It's just that all the people at my old school were, for lack of a better word, crazy prats who only cared about themselves."
Remus laughs. "Well, here, you've only got the Slytherins to worry about. Especially Narcissa and Bellatrix Black…oh and Lucius Malfoy. S'long as you steer clear of them, you should be just fine."
"Black?" I ask, with a glance at Sirius.
"His cousins," Remus murmurs in a low voice. "He's—er—not exactly fond of them, to say the least."
"Ah. Blimey, this place is huge!" I say, looking up in awe.
"Eh, you get used to it," says James airily, laughing when I look at him with a look of disbelief.
"I'll help you navigate," says Lily, smiling warmly. Although I don't think she's stopped smiling once.
Bit odd.
Bit creepy.
Bit—"ARRRGH!" I yell as a torrent of water splashes down on me.
"Peeves!" exclaims Lily indignantly, looking up. I follow her example, and am surprised to see a poltergeist cackling at us. I whip out my wand and swear at him until he flies away, still cackling gleefully.
"What a warm welcome," I mutter, shivering. "Have any of you lot learnt how to get this water off?"
Remus shakes his head. "We haven't covered that yet, but you can probably ask McGonagall, or one of the prefects."
"I'm f-f-freezing," I say, teeth chattering.
"Let's get inside the Great Hall, then, it's much warmer," replies Lily sympathetically, leading me past a gaggle of older girls, most of which who fawn at Sirius and James as we pass.
Sirius pauses, winking at one who looks like she's about to faint. "Come on, Sirius!" yells James impatiently. "I'm starved!" Sirius grudgingly slouches after us into the Great Hall, where the long House tables are filling up rapidly.
"Over here," says Lily, leading us over to a fairly empty spot at the Gryffindor table.
"Oh, I hope Dumbledore hurries up, I'm starving…" James moans, clutching his stomach. I giggle at his dramatic performance, and Sirius stares at me, his expression unreadable.
"What?" I demand, self-consciously patting my still-soaked curls.
"Nothing…" he looks away and starts up a conversation with James. I look at Lily with a shrug, and we all turn towards the long table reserved for teachers as first years file in, looking terrified. I smile reassuringly at a small girl, who returns it half-heartedly before her friend grabs her sleeve and she turns away.
We all wait as Professor McGonagall sets down a shabby old hat.
"What is that?" I whisper to Lily.
"That's the Sorting Hat. Ooh, I wonder what the song will be this year!"
I stare at her in astonishment. A singing hat? This place just gets weirder and weirder.