"I win again, Wormtail."

Remus and Peter were playing chess again and Lupin had checkmated the round-faced boy in what seemed like under fifteen moves.

"I was just going easy on you." Pettigrew said, slumping further down his seat on the Hogwarts Express.

"You've been using that same excuse since first year, Wormie. Just suck it up and accept the fact that Remus beats you at chess." Said Sirius in a bland voice, not even looking up from the article he was reading in the Daily Prophet. It was as if he had to tell Peter off every twenty minutes.

"Mhmmphh…" mumbled Peter as he put away the chess pieces. "We'd better go get changed."

The three boys got up. Remus and Peter left the compartment, but Sirius turned back.

"James?"

James Potter had been staring out the window for what seemed like the past 3 hours. He hadn't even said a word.

Sirius sat down across from James and gave him a pat on the shoulder.

"What's up, Mate?"

James was now drooling into his lap. If Sirius hadn't been sure James was breathing, he would've thought he was petrified.

"Pad— she got prettier." Said James absent-mindedly, still staring out the window.

"Lily? Well, of course. She gets prettier every year, but I bet she still won't want to snog you." Said Sirius with a bit of a laugh.

James still just drooled and stared out the window.

All of a sudden, the compartment door reopened to reveal Remus dressed in his Hogwarts uniform. Behind him stood Wormtail, wearing his uniform, but not looking quite as good in it as Lupin.

The buttons on Wormtail's shirt were being stretched by his round belly and his fly was down. He was carrying his sweater in his left hand. It was obviously too small.

"Petey, did you overeat a bit over the summer?" said Sirius with a slight chuckle.

"No! I just had a growth spurt!" Shot Peter with a crossed look of anger and humiliation.

"Those happen vertically, not horizontally." said Lupin smartly with a satisfied smile.

Peter sunk in to the seat in front of him and one of the buttons shot off his shirt, ricocheted off various walls in the compartment and finally flew into James' mouth, before it fell out into a small puddle of drool in his lap. His eyes were still dead and transfixed on the train window.

Everyone was now staring at James. His mouth had become dry, so he had stopped drooling, but he still looked very peculiar.

Remus sat down beside him and smiled.

"What's wrong, Prongsy?"

James didn't seem to have heard him, but apparently he had because he gave a weak grunt and closed his eyes.

"He's a bit off. He saw You-Know-Who." Said Sirius.

Peter's face went white and Lupin gave a puzzled look.

"Voldemort?" He said in a whisper.

Sirius let out a laugh, "No, you idiots! Lily Evans!"

"She's pretty." Said James in a sort of trance.

"Well no wonder he's acting so weird then." said Lupin, "he's in love."

"Uhhhhh…" moaned James.

"Honestly James, is she sees you like this, she'll have you admitted to St. Mungo's." said Sirius cheekily.

The compartment door opened once again, this time to reveal a stunning redhead with gleaming emerald eyes.

"Who are you boys talking about now?" asked Lily Evans in a flustered voice.

James turned his head away from the window he had been fogging up to see the beautiful girl he had been day-dreaming about for the past 3 hours in real life again. His mouth reopened, drenching his pants once again with drool.

"I think poor James is sick." said Remus, putting his hand to the other boy's forehead.

"He's probably got mono from snogging every witch at the school." Said Lily and left with a huff.

"I told you she's pretty." said James with a euphoric smile.

Lupin was getting tired of James' attitude. He slapped him across the face with one his large, manly hands.

James regained full awareness finally. "What was that for?" he demanded, rubbing his hand on his stinging, pink cheek.

"Sorry, it was getting on my nerves." Lupin said, blushing.

Sirius laughed, "That was bloody brilliant, Moon!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm about to make a habit of it." said Lupin sheepishly.

"Now James, we must go get changed." said Sirius checking his watch. "We only have about ten minutes until we get to Hogsmeade station."

"Right, off we go then. Let's hope we haven't had as much of a growth spurt as Wormtail, here." said James, pointing at Wormtail, who had been snoring loudly for the past ten minutes.

They gathered their robes and left the compartment.

"That was mean!" exclaimed James once they were out of earshot from the compartment. "Shrinking his clothes? That's…brilliant!"

"Why thank you." replied Sirius taking a mock bow, "I do consider myself quite a genius."

The boys laughed and continued to walk down the hall until they reached the lavatories, where each took turns changing.

Throughout the walk back, the boys kept stealing glances into various compartments, checking for cute girls. They looked into one a couple doors down from their own, to find who else but…

"Snivellus!" burst out Sirius as he opened the compartment door to find Severus Snape alone, writing in his potions book.

"What?" said a furious Snape beneath his greasy black hair, hastily stashing his book away.

"How are you doing?" asked James, flashing his cheeky smile.

Severus pulled out his wand. "Sec—"

"No-no, Snivelly! You wouldn't want to be expelled before you even got to school, now would you?" asked Sirius, matching his best friend's grin.

Snape gave a huff and deposited his wand back into his robes.

"There, there Snivellus." said James with a mock comforting voice.

"Go away." grunted Snape.

"Hmph, someone drank some bad pumpkin juice this morning," said Sirius and the two boys walked back to their own compartment.

The train came to a jittery halt, signifying that another great school year was about to begin.