"Moony, you won't believe what I've just found." Came Sirius's voice from the next room over. I thought I could guess. I was sure it would be something evil. Everything in this house was. We were 'cleaning' his parents' house. Well, it was his house now. And as I was also staying there, I had to help make it livable.
"What did you find?" I asked just to humor my old friend. He was caged up again, but he was at least safe. But I think the thought of always having walls around him was starting to get to him.
"Just come in here and see." Was his reply. I didn't really want to get up. I was almost done polishing my cabinet, and then the room that I had been working on for a week would be done. But, I had been working all day. I deserved a break.
When I got in there, I saw nothing out of the ordinary. The room was as dark as ever, and there was still a lingering stench. Then I found Sirius sitting on the floor. "You called?" I asked.
"Look at this. I found it in a box of my old stuff." He said, handing me an old picture frame. I looked down at it. There were six smiling people waving up at me, but only one caught my attention. "It's from our first year, I think." He said.
I nodded. "It's from when we first got off the train." I smiled. "I was so scared of all of you."
He looked up at me. "You had a good reason to. Especially with her being her nosy self."
I let out a tiny laugh. "Remember how we all met?"
I stared up at the scarlet train. I had wished to be on it for so long, and now that I was here, I could only think of one thing to say. "Mom, are you sure they didn't make a mistake?" I asked, ready to turn around at any moment.
"They didn't make a mistake, Remus. Now stop being a scaredy cat and get on that train." She replied jokingly. She was always trying to joke to make me feel better.
"But what if they can tell?" I asked fearfully. That has always been my worst fear. If too many people found out my secret, I'd never be able to have any friends. Not that I had ever really had any. I didn't like to get close to people outside of my family because I was afraid they would find out. Now I highly doubt if most people have the common sense to put the pieces together.
"Are you going to tell them?" I shook my head quickly. "Then they won't know. Dumbledore has a whole plan worked out to keep it secret. Now hurry up and get on the train so you can find a seat." She gave me a kiss on my forehead and pushed me onto the train.
I looked down the aisle to see teenagers everywhere, all of them scrambling to find an empty compartment. I felt so small and insignificant around them, so I just pushed my way to the back of the train. I ran into the very last compartment (which was blissfully empty), where I thought I might find some peace and quiet.
"Hello?" but then again, I hardly ever got what I thought I would.
"Yes?" I said looking at the door of my compartment. It was now open, and there was a girl about my age standing there. She was slightly pretty, but I was too busy being angry with her for interrupting my short-lived solitude to really notice.
"Can I sit here?" she asked, motioning to one of the seats right across from me.
"Go ahead." I said, pulling out a book, thinking she might get the hint that I wasn't in a talkative mood at the moment.
"Hi, my name's Amanda." She said, extending her hand for me to shake. Obviously she couldn't take hints.
"I'm Remus." I said, briefly shaking her hand and going back to my book.
"Wow, cool name! Are you named after that one founder of Rome?" she asked.
"I guess so." I said, closing my book. I thought I might as well try to have a normal conversation, since she was apparently not going to let me read. "So, are you a first year too?"
"Yes." There was actually silence for a minute. "Man, I can't believe my mom made me get here so early. The train isn't leaving for at least another ten minutes."
"Eh, I wanted to get here early so that I could find somewhere to sit." I said. She looked like she was about to respond, but she was cut short.
"Oh, dearest cousin of mine, you did save me a seat, right?" the question came from one of the two dark-haired boys that were now standing in the doorway of the compartment.
"Yes, Amanda dear, one for me as well." Said the other one, sliding next to her and slipping his arm around her shoulders."
"You all can sit here." She said sarcastically, motioning to the two seats next to her, though the second boy already occupied one of them.
"Well, Amanda, aren't you going to introduce us to your friend?" said the first one, glancing over at me.
"Oh, yeah. Sorry. Remus, this is my cousin, James Potter." The first boy waved. "And this is his best friend, Sirius Black."
"You forgot to mention that I am the love of your life." He said, scooting a little closer to her.
"That's because you are not, never have been, and never will be." She replied, removing his arm from her shoulders and moving away from him. I let out a laugh in spite of myself. He glared in my direction for a second.
"Did you find that funny?" he asked me through clenched teeth.
"Would I be laughing if I didn't?" I replied, surprised at my own daring.
It was then that James burst out laughing, unable to contain it anymore. "You're O.K. So, are you pure-blood or muggle-born?" he asked when he could finally catch a breath.
"Pure-blood, you?" I replied.
"Same. So is Sirius over here." He said, punching Sirius on the arm.
"From the most noble and ancient house of Black." Said Sirius in a sarcastic singsong voice.
"So I guess you are, too, huh Amanda?" I asked, looking over at her.
"Actually, no. I'm half-and-half. My mom's a muggle; my dad's a warlock. When they got married, my family wouldn't talk to him for ages, at least not until I was born." She said all of this too cheerfully. "Oh, hello!" she said, looking at the door to the compartment.
I followed her gaze. There was a pretty redhead girl and a pudgy brunette boy standing in the doorway. "Can we sit here? Everywhere else is taken." Said the redhead in a meek voice.
"Sure. There's two seats right here." I said, pushing my stuff to the ground to make room for them. The boy sat down immediately. The girl, however, stared around at all our faces before cautiously sitting down.
"My name's Remus Lupin." I said, trying to make them feel more comfortable.
"Lily Evans." Said the Redhead.
"Peter Pettigrew." Said the boy. Of course then James, Sirius, and Amanda introduced themselves in turn, Sirius claiming he and Amanda were going out and getting shot down again. That seemed to ease the tension, as the whole rest of the compartment broke out into laughter. Sirius just glared again.
We got to talking for the next couple of hours, my book completely forgotten. We found out that both Lily and Peter were muggle-born. Sirius found that news unsettlingly exciting.
"Oh, wow! So do you all have tellyfones like my dearest Amanda does?" he asked, once again wrapping his arm around her shoulders. This time she cringed, but didn't pull away.
"Yes we have telephones." Said Lily. She was finally opening up. "At least, I think Peter has one."
"I do." He said. An awkward silence ensued. After a few minutes, there was a knock on the compartment door. Since I was the closest, I opened it. Standing there was a pretty witch with a cart full of food.
"Snack cart!" she said brightly.
"I'll go see if the others want anything." I said before quickly retreating to the safety of the compartment. "Hey, you all can get snacks now. There's a cart full of them outside." I said to the group.
"Thank God! I'm starving." Exclaimed James as he jumped up and raced out the door.
"I second that opinion." Said Sirius. Then he leaned in towards Amanda. "Would you like anything, my sweet?" he asked, lowering his voice to something that must have been appealing, and Lily let out an audible sigh next to me.
Amanda looked up at him and smiled. "If I want something, I can get it myself." She said, pushing him away. He just shrugged and ran after James. She began to follow him, but looked back at the three of us remaining. "Aren't you all going to get anything?" she asked.
"Why not?" said Lily and Peter.
"No money." I said, blushing deeply. It's not like my family was poor or anything, I had just forgotten my money. Obviously that wasn't what they thought, because Amanda gave me a patronizing look.
"Oh, O.K." She said at last, walking out the door. I was left alone for about five minutes, but I really didn't mind. I had my book, and silence was something that I always appreciated.
"Remus?" it was Amanda. With her around, it would be pretty impossible to ever get any reading accomplished.
"Yes?" I said, looking up. Her arms were completely full of snacks.
"I bought some extra snacks, if you want any." She said, offering me a cauldron cake. I slowly accepted it, marveling at the fact that she just happened to offer me my favorite food.
"Thanks. I am starving." I said, taking a huge bite out of the cake. She sat down in one of the seats next to me and opened a box of Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Beans.
"Maybe if I sit over here Sirius will leave me alone." She said with a giggle. Pretty soon everyone came back, Sirius and James each carrying more than Amanda did. Lily took her seat, and Peter took Amanda's old one. Both Lily and Peter seemed afraid to taste their food.
"Ha! I got a Nicholas Flamel!" said James triumphantly, looking at his chocolate frog card. "Now I have all of them." He waved the card in Amanda's face.
"James, my dear cousin, in case you have forgotten, I completed my collection a couple of months ago." She said with the air of one explaining that one plus one equals two to a toddler.
"Oh yeah." He said softly, a defeated look on his face.
"Well, then you wouldn't mind giving me that Dumbledore in your hand." Said Sirius, eyeing the card in Amanda's hand.
"Why not? I have literally hundreds of him at home." She said, handing her card over to him. "Hey, it's getting kind of dark now. That must mean we're getting close. We should probably get changed now."
I could see her point. The sun was nearly fully set. I silently thanked my luck that tonight wasn't a full moon. That could have been disastrous.
"We'll be back in a second." Said Lily as she and Amanda went to the bathroom to change.
The four of us got changed pretty quickly, and in silence, except for James and Sirius arguing over whose robes were whose. When we were done, we just sat there for a minute, talking and laughing at Sirius's corny jokes and James's slightly dirty ones.
About ten minutes after we were all done, Amanda and Lily came back. However, now they had one extra person with them.
"Hey James! Look who we forgot was coming." Said Amanda, pointing to the girl who was now standing next to her. Their resemblance was shocking. They had the same brunette hair reaching to the middle of their backs, the same fair skin, and they were about the same height.
"Well if it isn't Elizabeth Snape." Said James.
"And the little prat known as James Potter." She replied, a smirk on her face. "You do realize that since I couldn't find you, I was stuck with my cousin the entire time."
"Oops, sorry Beth." He said, trying not to laugh. "But it's not like we were really that hard to find.'
"Well forgive me if I didn't want to lug a suitcase and an owl all over the train." She said indignantly.
"No pain, no gain." Said Amanda, ignoring Beth's glare as she took her seat next to me again.
"Hey, when do you plan on introducing me to your twin?" asked Sirius impatiently.
"Oh, yeah, sorry. Beth, this is Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew. Everyone, this is Beth Snape." Said Amanda. "And we're not twins." She finished, glaring at Sirius.
"Well, someone seems a bit upset. You really need to lighten up. Stress kills, you know." Said Sirius, ducking a swing from Amanda.
All of the sudden the train came to a halt and a prefect came and ushered us out, assuring us that all of our belongings would be in our rooms later.
"Let's hope it's not like airport luggage." Said Lily. James, Sirius, and I just stared blankly as the others laughed. I had no clue what an 'airport' was, or why air had anything to do with luggage.
"Firs' years over here!" came a booming voice from behind us, making us all jump. I turned around and saw the biggest man that I had ever seen in my life. "Firs' years, this-a way!" he repeated. We started walking toward him with varying degrees of apprehension on our faces.
"Hey, you all, wait a second!" shouted Beth. All of us who were in the compartment stopped and turned around. "I wanted to get a picture to send to mom." She said, holding up a camera.
"Fine, but hurry up." I said, glancing over at the rest of the first years, who were now gathering by the lake. If we didn't' get over there soon, we might be lest behind.
"Ok, stand over there by the train. I'll take it." She said excitedly. We all squished together in front of the train while Beth succeeded in blinding us all with the flash from her camera.
When we could finally see in the spaces between the blue dots, we realized the other first years were about to leave.
We ran, finally catching up to the group. "Now, only four people to a boat." Said the man, either not noticing or not acknowledging the seven of us who were out of breath.
James, Sirius, Peter, and I all crammed into one boat, while Amanda, Beth, and Lily got in one with a rather disagreeable looking girl. "Looks like they got stuck with my dearest cousin Bella." Said Sirius, as he and James started cracking up. Peter let out a hesitant giggle, but I just smiled, wishing I had my book with me. And that was how the rest of the boat ride went, James and Sirius goofing off, and me just sitting there.
When we finally got out of the boats, a rather formidable looking teacher met us. "Welcome to Hogwarts. My name is Professor McGonagal. You will be sorted into your houses now. Follow me." She said, leading us into a giant dining hall, in front of what seemed the entire school. Not the best way to start off the school-year."
The hat sang a song, which told us that when we put it on, it would tell us what house we would be in. Great. I thought. Now we're supposed to trust a hat. "Black, Bellatrix." Said McGonagal. We all waited with baited breath.
"SLYTHERIN!" it yelled as soon as it touched her head. The table on the far right broke into polite applause as she took of the hat and walked over to it.
"Black, Sirius." He wore it for what seemed like an eternity before it pronounced him a Gryffindor. The line was moving at a fairly fast rate, Lily was another Gryffindor, and Huffelpuff seemed to be the house of the year.
"Lupin, Remus." Said McGonagal. I slowly walked up to the stool and pulled the hat onto my head.
"Hmm, plenty of courage. Brilliant mind. Could be loyal, if towards the right people. And... what's this? Oh, I see what you are. Then there's no other choice. I guess you'll be a GRYFFINDOR!" it finished triumphantly. I yanked it off and ran over to the table, finding an empty seat next to Sirius, who was laughing at the expression on my face.
Everything else was pretty uneventful. Peter, Amanda, James, and Beth finished up Gryffindor. A slouchy looking guy who I guessed was Beth's cousin was the last Slytherin. The food was great, the prefects were bossy, and the four-poster beds were the most comfortable things that I had ever been on. In short, the perfect way to end a stressful day.
A/N: hello. As you can see, I've figured out how to work this crazy site. Oh, and beth and Amanda are based off of me and my twinï just so you know. Well, please review, but I'll keep writing even if you don't just to spite you, though the chapters will come sooner with reviews!