Chapter 1: The Beginning
I was running down the corridor of the Hogwarts Express as fast as I could. I would not let him catch me. Not this time. The consequences could be more than horrible. Dreadful, even. Unless, that is, I found what I was looking for so I could put the second part of my "plan" into action.
I took a peek into the compartment I was passing, and the only thing I noticed about the current occupants was that they were a group of laughing boys. Perfect.
I dashed inside, only realizing my mistake after I shut the door. This group of boys was none other than the infamous Marauders. Well, too late now, I suppose.
"Alrighty, so which one of you lucky blokes would be kind enough to be my overprotective boyfriend starting in about…" I paused to look at the watch on my left wrist, "two minutes and twenty seconds?" I asked the now-silent group. For the first time in my entire career at Hogwarts, I looked these boys over. It's pretty odd to say for a sixth year Gryffindor girl, but I had never actually spoken to the blokes in my house and year except to tell them to shut up when I was doing homework or, the more likely pastime, planning some sort of brilliant…plan.
The first person I noticed was Remus Lupin, sitting in the seat closest to the compartment door to my left, looking tired and haggard as was usual for him. I always wondered what made him look so worn down all the time, but I never bothered to voice this question aloud to anyone. He had light honey-brown hair with a couple grey streaks running through it. His eyes were a deep gold, which I had noticed in the past were always full of joy and kindness. I sometimes envied his ability to show these loving emotions at all times. Most people looked at me as the angry yet hilarious redhead who always appeared as though she was ready to either prank or kill someone… or both. These are not my words, but the words of caution I had heard about an hour earlier from a third year to a first year as I had passed by where they were talking, trying to find a compartment.
My eyes then drifted over to Peter Pettigrew, sitting on the same bench as Remus but close to the window, leaving a space between them. He was a small, pudgy boy who I knew was able to speak his mind more than people sometimes assumed. He was actually pretty funny if you bothered to pay attention to what he had to say, but it was rare in itself to hear him talk all that much in public. If he did not look so much like a rat, maybe people would actually be interested in what he sometimes had to contribute to conversations. I heard people say he was not worthy to be a Marauder every so often. Perhaps this was because he seemed to be a bit of a follower. However, I somehow had reason to believe this was because he was not good-looking, not because he wasn't hilarious. Of course, I did not believe he was all that bad-looking. He had blond hair and clear blue eyes, close to the colour of my own eyes.
My blue eyes next alighted upon the jubilant James Potter, who had been sitting across from Peter. His hair was as messy as ever, perhaps even more so than the last time I had seen him at the end of last year. His hazel eyes still held tears of laughter from whatever joke had been told right before I had walked in their compartment to somewhat scar their lives forever. They had not known this yet, of course.
Lastly, I turned my eyes over to none other than Sirius Black, who was sitting across from Remus, to my immediate right. His black hair reached just past the tips of his ears, having a perfectly elegant look, which was in fact a huge contrast to his best friend's unruly locks. His steely grey eyes pierced me, as though trying to figure out why in the world a girl who had never bothered speaking to him before suddenly came barging into his compartment asking to be his girlfriend for an indefinite amount of time. I can't say I blame him, really.
My looking over them lasted for about a span of twenty seconds, which I hoped had not gone to waste. I had given each of the guys pleading looks as I looked at them, which could boost my chances in convincing them, hopefully appealing to the more chivalrous aspect of their Gryffindor personalities. "I only have two minutes left." I said, putting urgency in my voice. I hoped I got the message across that this was important.
"Why should we help you?" James asked of me suspiciously.
"Oh, come on! It's not as if you'll get in trouble for helping me! I never actually get caught! In fact, the things you're always blamed for is actually all me most of the time-"
"WHAT?"
"Oops, I should not have said that, huh?"
At that moment, I heard the telltale banging of compartment doors being opened and slammed shut rather forcefully, making the glass in the Marauder's compartment door rattle.
"Please?" I nearly shouted.
"Alright, get over here," Sirius said to me, patting the seat between him and James. I flew to the seat, and Black had his arm around my shoulders just as an angry Erik Connors appeared in front of the window of the compartment door. I couldn't help but glance at my watch to see that my calculations about when I would need a boyfriend were about a second off. Aw, chocolate balls. So close.
The door opened, revealing the Slytherin covered in the Stinksap that can only come from a mimbulus mimbletonia plant. I had to bite the inside of my cheeks in order to keep a straight face and look of innocence.
"Aleksandra Alison Crystal Genevieve Jacalynn Sarah Giggel!" the slimy snake exclaimed angrily.
"Yes?" I asked, trying to sound as innocent as possible. It would have been pretty convincing had he not known it was me in the first place. At least, I'd like to believe so.
"Don't play innocent," he snarled, "you just threw Stinksap in my face!"
"Well, I had good reason!" I told him.
"And just what might this reason be, exactly?"
"You asked me out when I had quite obviously just told you to leave me alone!"
"Well-"
"Wait a second," Sirius said to Erik, finding his cue with perfect timing, "Do you mean to tell me that you were hitting on my girlfriend?"
"Considering Aleksandra is not your girlfriend, I am going to say no."
"Excuse me," I said, "but his girlfriend prefers to be called Aleks, not Aleksandra."
The look of astonishment on his face made all the trouble I had gone through completely worth it. He seemed at a loss for words, only able to glare at Sirius and me. Then, after about a minute of this, he finally responded.
"Fine. I'm sure your parents would love to hear about this new development, Aleksandra." I blanched for a second, but quickly recovered from the not-so-hidden threat in his statement. He must not have noticed the flicker of emotion that passed over my face, because he just turned around angrily and walked back to his own compartment, shutting the door behind him with more force than was necessary.
Almost immediately, the Marauders started cracking up. And, although I was horrified of what my parents would do once they found out I was dating the biggest disgrace to purebloods everywhere, I gave in and started laughing with them.
"So what was all of that about?" James asked, once the raucous laughter had died down.
"Well… You know. Long story short, I've grown up in a family of pureblood fanatics." I answered.
The room grew silent for a few moments, and I looked at the boys who had just helped me out of trouble. They seemed apprehensive or maybe even…..concerned. Apparently, they understood the implications of growing up in a family like mine. Oh, but of course they did. I was in the presence of a Black after all. And not just any Black, but the Black that was said to be rejecting the prejudices he had grown up with.
The Black in question then turned to me and said, "Well, I am more than happy to help."
With that said, the atmosphere of the room changed to cheerful and we continued in a light conversation about the shape of Snape's nose compared to an eagle's.
As the train slowed to a halt, I headed to one of the doors that opened up to Hogsmeade Station. The boys were still in their compartment, as I had left to find my friends and go up to the feast with them. I'm not sure if the boys had even noticed if I had left. Ah, well.
I was having difficulty finding my friends in the crowd, so I decided that I would enter the next carriage I saw, despite the consequences I may have to endure from my mates for not finding them. Opening the carriage door that was right in front of me, I hopped in without looking to see who was in there. For the second time that day, that was my big mistake.
As I sat down, I looked around to see Erik and all his Slytherin friends. He was smirking at me, while his friends gave me looks of surprise and confusion. I felt weird in a compartment full of Slytherins. There was too much arrogant purebloodedness in there for me to be at all comfortable.
"So, Aleksandra-"
"Aleks."
"-Did you finally decide to come to our side?" Erik continued, ignoring my interjection. This line kind of made me want to laugh, with all the irony in that statement. And I would have laughed, had he not said it in total seriousness.
"No," I said slowly, "It appears that my arrogant prat radar is just malfunctioning. All I wanted was to head up to the feast and find my friends as soon as possible, so I jumped in the nearest carriage. However, I do believe I need to hop out and find some more… pleasant company."
But as I was finishing my sentence, the carriage started to move. This would only happen to me.
"So, Aleksandra," started one of Erik's stupid smirking friends, Stephen, "Where's your boyfriend?"
"Oh…" This question caught me slightly off guard, as I had almost completely forgotten what happened a few hours ago. "He's with his friends."
"Why isn't he with you? He seemed pretty protective of you back on the train. He wouldn't want you in a carriage with a bunch of big, bad Slytherins, now would he?"
"Well, Erik," I said sweetly, "He's much less controlling than you, of course. So I don't think he needs me next to him at every second of the day, do you? "
And for once, timing worked for me as the carriage came to a halt and I opened the door. "Good day, gentlemen." I said as I hopped out. I stumbled for a bit, but was caught by a pair of strong hands before I could fall face first in a puddle of mud. I turned to see that my saviour was none other than Sirius Black.
"Where did you go, Aleks? We were looking everywhere for you." He said in a voice that betrayed no sign of acting. He actually sounded sincere. Even I almost believed him.
"Oh, I was looking for my friends. Didn't find them, jumped into a random carriage, and here we are." I told him, opening my arms to show my point.
"Oh, alright," he said, "but why that carriage in particular?"
"I didn't realize my mistake until after it started to move. Trust me; I did not enjoy the ride at all. I feel like I need to shower so I can get all the prat-ness off." I said, only half joking.
He chuckled, and then turned us both around to head up to the castle. Only then did I realize that he had his arm around my shoulders. It made me slightly uncomfortable, but I didn't move it since I could still feel Erik's eyes on us. I couldn't wait until we were out of his sight so we wouldn't have to pretend like this anymore. It made me slightly uncomfortable to be this close to a guy in this way.
We entered the Great Hall, and as we headed to Gryffindor Table, I broke away from him to sit with my friends, who were sitting at the very end of the table, like usual. I knew that the Marauders always sat more towards the middle, so I was relieved that I wouldn't have to pretend to be Sirius's girlfriend during the Sorting and the feast.
However, he seemed to have other plans, because he followed me to my seat and sat down next to me. One of my best friends, Marie, noticed our company first, raising an eyebrow at me. She then proceeded to nudge Julianna with her elbow, and they both sent questioning looks in my direction.
If Sirius sitting with us wasn't weird enough, the remaining Marauders then proceeded to sit around us as if this were a regular occurrence in our lives. As if the Gryffindor girls that have always done their best to lay low had always been a part of their social group. However, as one may venture to guess, this was not normal at all.
The seating arrangement separated the Marauders from each other, because they seated themselves as if they were our body guards or something… Sirius sat at the very end of the table, with his back to the wall. I sat next to him, with James on my left. Remus sat across from Sirius, Marie next to him. Julianna sat next to Marie, and Peter sat next to her. I'm not going to lie; this was very, very weird for us. I think we were just grateful that we weren't separated at the time, though. The shock that the most popular guys in the school were sitting with us didn't seem to faze us one bit.
"So, Aleks," Julianna said, trying to start conversation without sounding awkward, "What happened on the train, then? You never came back to find us. The last I heard from you was when you called Erik an overbearing evil little cockroach whom you wouldn't marry if your life depended on it, then threw our last bit of Stinksap at him and ran as if the devil himself were after you… Which, I suppose he was." She added as an afterthought.
"Oh, and you need to buy us some more Stinksap." Marie added, "I have something planned for our dear dorm mates over there." She said, gesturing down the table to Lily, Isabelle, Katherine, and Katarina.
The boys were watching us with indifferent looks on their faces. But I could tell that they never knew the lay-low Gryffindors acted like this around each other. And then something seemed to register in James's mind.
"Hold on," he said, "You are not doing anything to Lily. She'll think it was me again!"
I remembered the last time we did something to Lily and James got blamed for it. I winced, thinking that I wouldn't want to be in that kind of position either. However, he had nothing to worry about.
"James," I said, "You do realize the last time we did something to her in our dorm and she blamed you was in Second Year, right?"
He nodded, clearly not understanding what I was getting at.
"And," Marie said, seeing that we needed to take this slowly, "You do realize that we do something to her at least once a week, right?"
Comprehension seemed to dawn on all the Marauders as she said this.
"So that's why she always chases you three around the Common Room. I just thought she was still overreacting over whatever Prongs had done that day." Sirius mused.
Julianna, Marie, and I all shared smirks.
"Yeah," Julianna said, "We were hoping everyone would think that. We always planned to do that every time Jamesie-boy here made her upset, as it was our cover so we would never be seen as pranking idiots by the general population…. Err, no offense."
"None taken," said Remus, a twinkle in his eye, "You are pranking idiots anyway, even if you are so clever at hiding it that most of the school's population does not see you as such."
The boys started laughing when they saw huge grins on our faces. Hey, we're proud of our accomplishments, even if we do get called idiots for them.
"But anyway-" Marie said as she turned to me.
"-What happened on the train after you ran?" finished Julianna.
"Well, let's see," I said, playing the day's events in my mind, "I ran into the Marauders, got a boyfriend, was yelled at by dearest Erik, who threatened to tell my mother about said boyfriend, talked about Snape's abnormal nose shape,-have you ever noticed that it looks like an eagle's?- ran into Erik and cronies again, made Erik look like a fool,-although he really doesn't need my help to do that- and was saved from being a klutz and falling into a mud puddle by my 'boyfriend….' Yep, that pretty much sums it up."
They took all of this in, and then Marie raised her eyebrow at me again, seeing that I was avoiding a key factor in my explanation of my day's journey.
"Who's this boyfriend you're talking about, then?"
Sirius held out his hand for her to shake, "Hello, I'm Sirius, Aleks's new boyfriend."
A/N: So this is my new story that I actually already like much better than the other stories I have tried posting on fanfiction. Um, so if you would review, it would be lovely. If you don't, I'll just assume that you didn't like it, so I'll take it down. I don't really see the point of continuing if no one enjoys it.