Sirius isn't going to lie, not to himself and not to anyone else if they ask: he has high hopes for his roommate. Well, why not? A boy his age, comfortable with his sexuality, possessing of a healthy libido. Why shouldn't he consider the possibility that he may get to share his room with a Sebastian Flyte look-alike - Brideshead television series version, not the awful film remake - in a cricket jumper and polished Oxfords?
Even if they don't spark up a private dormitory romance, he's sure they'll be friends. He imagines the two of them sitting cross-legged on their beds on a rainy night, drinking hot toddies in their pyjamas, probably tossing a wooden croquet ball around, chatting about big ideas.
The thought is comforting enough to keep his mind off James' retreating form as he goes through the tedious task of enrolment (a woman with severely straightened hair spends five minutes telling him that the matriculation card gets him into the building, and the key gets him into his room), and then he's sent on his way.
He manages to get himself lost more than once. The hall is nicknamed Castle, but he isn't one of the lucky few sleeping in the Castle Keep itself. Sirius has instead been placed in the 19th century extension with the rest of the rabble. It's pretty enough. Lots of pointless alcoves and stone floors and leering oil paintings, but they're not enough to keep his interest when he's becoming increasingly lost and frustrated, in that order, and eventually he has to stop and ask a chirpy American girl who looks like she knows the 411 where to go.
"Most of the boys sleep on the B floor," she says, glancing at his key tag.
"Right. And where am I?"
"You're on D."
And so back down two flights of stone stairs. The lift's too full of anxious Freshers to bother with, piled in like defensive penguins. It's not Sirius' fault he's lost; in some apparent attempt at keeping the charm and the character of the old building intact, there are hardly any signs or proper corridors. Most of the rooms stem off into little annexes, and when he eventually finds his room it's in a kind of tacked-on wing at the very back of the B floor, beyond a huge stone foyer and behind two heavy swinging doors. It's the sort of thing Mrs Potter would love, but honestly, it's just a bit too ornate and pseudo-Medieval for Sirius to take seriously.
He's panting and rather warm now, so he pauses before the door emblazoned with a golden B3 to fix a smile on his face and push the hair out of his eyes. Always best to make a good first impression, he imagines Mr Potter remarking in his hearty boom. Sirius shoves open the door, letting it swing and thud against the nailed-down stopper.
On the bed furthest from the door lies a small, portly boy. He's lounging in nothing but a pair of pyjama bottoms, a huge set of headphones resting on a head of curly hair with the volume so high Sirius can hear exactly what song it is (Who Gon Stop Me), and an enormous bag of Kettle chips balanced on his very pink chest. No wooden croquet balls are immediately visible.
Sirius blinks. Sebastian Flyte this ain't.
"Hello!" he says, nonetheless.
The boy doesn't hear Sirius. He whistles to Kanye and shoves another handful of crisps into his gob.
Changing tack, Sirius turns and slams the door shut. The boy jumps up in alarm. The headphones slip from his head as he gives Sirius a ghastly deer-in-headlights look, crisps now scattered in a messy heap between his legs.
"I'm assuming this one's mine then, is it?" says Sirius, pointing to the remaining bed, the one directly under the biggest sash window in the room, light puddling all over the vacuum packed duvet.
He dumps his duffle bag down on top of it and drags his case over. In a moment of slight desperation he double checks the tag on his key, but no, there it is - B3 on the tag and B3 on the door. This is the place.
It's not a bad room. Cream walls, beige carpet, and a dear little blocked up fireplace, the mantelpiece of which has already been adorned with Miniature Heroes and a can of Lynx. It's quite big, enough to accommodate two desks besides the wardrobes and beds, not to mention two fully grown boys. For the first time the thought hits him - two fully grown boys - with startling clarity. This is the person he'll be sleeping next to for the rest of the year. This boy, with his Kettle Chip crumbs and rumpled plaid bedding. There's four feet between them, if that. Sirius wonders, anxiously, if the boy is a mouth-breather.
As it happens though he believes in fate, and if fate has brought them together then Sirius hasn't the authority to question it. Everything happens for a reason (he reminds himself of this, again, in the Mr Potter voice). He stands abruptly, strides across the room and thrusts out a hand.
"Anyway, I'm Sirius Black. Good to meet you!"
He immediately regrets this upon seeing the sorry state of the boy's greasy hands, but his palm is being clasped before Sirius can change his mind.
"Peter," the boy nods. "Peter Pettigrew."
"Pleasure," Sirius replies, discretely wiping his hand on his jeans. "Where you from, Pete?"
"Carlisle."
"Dartmouth myself. What are you studying?"
"Geology."
"Oh, rocks and junk. Nice. Lots of rocks around here, being near the coast and that."
He smiles down at Peter still staring up at him from the bed with wide eyes. When it's obvious he isn't going to return the question, Sirius continues.
"I'm doing English Literature. I thought about doing Film Studies, but it doesn't sound great, does it? A degree in Film Studies? I know that makes me sound like a snob, but I'm not, really. S'just I know a lot about it already, and I feel like university should broaden your mind, make you do things you wouldn't normally expect to. You know?"
Wordlessly, Peter shrugs. What's his problem? Sirius' eyes dart about the room in a sudden search for suspicious objects. Peter Pettigrew seems the type who might be into questionable activities, the way he's looking so shifty.
Sirius turns back to him.
"Are you alright?" he asks sharply.
Suddenly, alarmingly, as though Peter is a tap and Sirius' words have burst him, the boy begins babbling.
"Sorry," he blurts out. "I should've waited till you arrived to ask which bed you wanted, but I got here this morning and I was so knackered I took a nap. If you want to swap, honestly, we can. I hope you don't think I was trying to steal the best bed for myself. Not that this is the best bed, they're both the same really. We could move them about? Oh, but I think they're bolted to the floor..."
Sirius watches him, startled. Truth be told, he would have rather liked Peter's bed instead of the other, but glancing down he sees it has been adequately Kettle-chipped already. Maybe he doesn't much want it after all.
"Chill out, you nutcase," he says, finding himself chuckling. "It's fine."
Of course, it's not really fine. It's not fine that Peter has the bed in the darkest corner of the room, and it's not fine that he's the spit of a young Tommy Cooper. It's far from fine that he's taking some wank subject like Geology. But there's a world outside this room, historic Durham and beyond, and as long as Peter isn't going to ruin Sirius' chances with prospective bed-guests, things will run smoothly.
So Sirius relaxes and unzips his hold-all and has a closer glance at his quarters. His accommodation fees are clearly being put to good use: he's got his very own cork board, and even a lamp.
"You can stick that on speakers if you want," he says, turning and nodding to Peter's iPod.
"I haven't got any..."
"That's alright, I have." He pulls his own mini dock from the bag and tosses it across the room. It lands on Peter's stomach, and he squeaks.
Unfortunately, Peter's taste in music leaves little to be desired (shuffle presents them first with That's My Bitch, followed by Dirt Road Anthem) but Sirius is kind enough not to comment. He leaves Peter alone and starts to unpack. Text books, alarm clock, laptop, various leads which may or may not possess a purpose, who knows? Then his baby: the most recent edition of 1001 Movies to See Before You Die, lovingly creased, dog-eared and annotated like a journal. He slides it onto the shelf above his desk. It looks a bit bare, sitting there on its own, so he puts the leads beside it.
Then he rolls out his duvet and blanket, plumps up a couple of pillows, and flops back on the bed.
"C'estfait!"
Peter blinks, bopping his head to Aztechnical. "Is that it?"
"Eh?"
"What about your clothes? Don't you have any posters? Or wash stuff? Or study stuff? Or... shoes?"
"It's all in there somewhere. Oh, but I'll tell you what I do have." Sirius sits up again, leaning and scrabbling for the box beside his case, the one Mrs Potter so lovingly pressed into his hands like a mother sending her son off to war. He rips the lid off. "Bis-cuits! That's French for biscuits."
And oh, the sweet woman has given him an array. Shortbread and gingerbread and cookies and more of those delectable jammy dodgers. He licks his lips instinctively and hears Peter creep over.
"Are they homemade?" he asks, awed.
"Yep."
"Did your mum make them?"
"Er - sort of. Here." Sirius shakes the box and, bless him, Peter actually tries to refuse at first.
It's about three more minutes before the two of them are lying on their respective beds, crumbs adorning their clothes (Peter has since had the decency to pull on a Swizz Beatz t-shirt), the feast in the box rapidly decreasing. The ice has officially been broken with the help of butter, caster sugar and jam, a delicious solution to an otherwise sticky situation.
As they chat, Sirius learns that Peter moved to Carlisle four years ago, that he got into the university by the skin of his teeth, not quite reaching his predicted grades but by some stroke of luck being taken on anyway, and that living an hour away means his mum expects him home every other weekend.
"You're lucky you live three hundred miles off," he says miserably, "or your ma'd be nagging at you to come home all the time too."
The idea of this is absurdly funny to Sirius, and he answers Peter's questioning look first by licking the jam from his fingers.
"I'm used to being away from home," he explains. "I've been at boarding school my whole life."
"Really? God, poor you. This is the first time I've ever shared a room with another bloke."
"We had our own rooms, it wasn't like an Enid Blyton book. But it's fine living in close quarters anyway, you make better friends."
"Have any of your friends come to Durham?"
"No... but my best mate James is at Newcastle up the road. What about you?"
Peter shakes his head. "My friends all think Durham a bit... you know. Most are at Manchester or Leeds, one of the big cities."
"Why didn't you follow on?"
"My mum wanted me to come here."
Sirius suspects Peter Pettigrew is the kind of boy who does everything his mummy tells him to, and for a moment he considers the idea that this will make for a much more entertaining roommate than some beautiful hedonist.
Then Peter belches and scratches his arse, and Sirius re-thinks his ideas. The guy already seems far too comfortable in his presence for Sirius' liking. He scrunches up his nose.
"Got a girlfriend back home, Peter?"
"Me?" Peter lets out this really weird, parrot-like laugh that makes Sirius jump. "No, not me. I expect you have. A girlfriend, I mean."
"Oh?"
"Well..." Peter, delightfully, suddenly blushes. "Just a guess."
"I haven't actually. One has to keep oneself on the market, you know? Free and single, that's the way I like it." Sirius shrugs. "Also, I'm gay."
It has the desired effect. Peter is in the midst of tipping the last few bits out of his Kettle chips bag down his throat, and he chokes so hard that the crisps that don't end up sprayed all over the floor slide down his chin in a revolting potatoey drool. Even as Sirius laughs Peter is still coughing up his guts, round face crimson. It seems an age before he stops.
"You're joking," he says weakly.
"Certainly not." Sirius sprawls out lazily on the bed like a cat, arms behind his head. "It's best you know, Pete. On the off-chance you happen to walk in on my fine self in a somewhat compromising position, I'd rather we be at the stage where we can be blasé about the whole thing. Oh, don't look so worried. It's fine. I won't be offended if you're having it off with a girl in here. I'm all about tolerance and equality, honest."
It only feels strange after he's said it. Sirius realises then that he hasn't once had the opportunity to be blunt about this sort of thing to anyone. Even if it's just to dumpy old Peter it feels nice to be open about it, as though a little bit of the weight that's been clamping down on him for the past half a decade has been chipped away. Bloody hell, someone ought to stop him! Next he'll be out on the streets of Durham in drag.
"Alright, just... no funny business, yeah?" Peter mumbles after a very long time.
"Does that in-or-exclude wanking over your sleeping body?" asks Sirius, and he barks out a wild laugh when several pillows and an empty Kettle Chip bag are lobbed directly at his head.
Sirius has always been a sociable fellow. It's probably to do with the way he's been brought up. His mother and father were forever inviting Very Important People round to wander their grand old house in London at leisure, in order that they could pounce on them with some preposterous business proposal over a fine meal of filet mignon and blood-coloured wine not an hour later.
Sirius was always there with his little brother to help fill seats, to pass the out of season asparagus, to answer prying questions about the curriculum at Saint Faustus's Boarding School, to listen to a catechism on the etiquette of the world of business and, more than anything, to prove that Walburga and Orion Black could raise a respectable child.
It's not something Sirius likes to remind himself of very often, but his exposure to such situations as a kid undoubtedly aided in him becoming the person he is today: bold, brazen, loquacious Sirius Black who could surely charm the pants off the Queen, if he so wished.
That's why, once he tires of the burbles of Peter Pettigrew - the burbliness of which increased tenfold upon Sirius revealing his preference for the male form - he wanders out of the room and begins exploring his new college at will, chatting to anyone who happens to catch his eye.
It's the only way to get off to a good start, he thinks. He'll never understand the people who lock themselves away in their room "until they're ready" to come out and socialise. Sirius has always been headstrong. It's always worked so far in his life and it's why things usually turn out in his favour; the more mates you have, he thinks, the less likely you'll end up moping around at any time looking like a sad old twat.
The wardens have put on some kind of buffet thing in the dining room that's rather wankily been passed off as "brunch", and though he's not very hungry after having consumed vast oceans of biscuit, he strolls on down anyway. Peter's caught up with him now and is dawdling along after him, but when they enter the 'Great Hall', Sirius shakes him off and wanders round by himself. It's a gorgeous room, all vaulted ceilings and stained glass windows. It's brimming with people, and for one rather sickly sweet moment it reminds him of being back at school on wintry mornings with everyone desperate for hot food.
Rounding several pieces of ornate furniture and dodging a couple of girls who eye him with none-too-subtle interest, Sirius spots two boys sat atop one of the tables, chatting to each other. He puts his cavort down Memory Lane on hold for a moment as he strides over with natural determination.
It doesn't cross his mind that they might not want to talk to him. It's Freshers' Week and besides, everyone always wants to talk to him. Wherever he goes people gravitate towards him. He can't help being a human honey pot.
And anyway, as it happens, they don't mind at all. They give him identical broad smiles when he greets them, and Sirius realises they're twins, one redhead, one blond. It's the blond, who looks a tantalising mixture of Boyd Holbrook and River Phoenix, that he's instantly attracted to.
But it's the redhead - who pings so hard, and whose wild hair really is nudging towards red rather than orange - who flashes him a coy smile. Nevermind. Better to have the ginger fancy you than neither.
"I'm Sirius Black."
"Hi, Sirius Black," Redhead grins, and while his face isn't as dramatic and striking as Blond's, he has a lovely North-Eastern accent. "I'm Fabian. This is my brother Gideon."
They shake hands and begin chatting easily, and Sirius thinks it's going swimmingly as it transpires that Gideon is studying English Lit too, Fabian opting for Classics.
"Did you mean to come to the same university?" Sirius asks them.
"What, you mean did we wake up this morning and realise we're both being carted off to Durham?" says Gideon. He wrinkles his lovely nose and says bitterly, "No. Oxford knocked me back. Durham was Fab's first choice, my fourth."
He says it as though Durham is the pit of the earth.
"Oh."
"Course, I'm at Hatfield," Gideon goes on. His cool eyes are already darting around the rest of the room. Is he actually bored? "Your college's rival. I'm just helping my little brother here get settled in. We haven't not shared a room for, well, all our lives really!"
"Imagine that!" says Sirius, though since learning the fitter twin isn't at this college and doesn't appear to be much bothered about Sirius anyway, even as a mate, he's quickly losing interest.
"There's a party at Gid's halls tonight, Sirius," Fabian pipes up.
"Not one here?"
"I think most people here are just going to the Union for clan warfare. You should come with us though. Are you rooming with anyone? Bring them."
Sirius agrees because he gathers it isn't the done thing at university to refuse parties. Plus he's dying to get out and make the most of his first week. He's not got much money either since his loan hasn't come through yet, so hopefully a party at Hatfield might just mean free booze.
Who knows, he might even get lucky on his first night. Maybe this Gideon Prewett is a little more free-spirited when intoxicated and if not, well, he's heard Hatfield is full of rugby players.
It's dark by the time he returns to his room. He finds Peter in there on his MacBook, pudgy face lit only by the screen.
"Alright, Pete?" he says cheerfully, starting up his own laptop. "Settled in then, have you?"
"Mm."
"Coming to the Hatfield do?"
"The what?"
Sirius doesn't answer for a few moments as his desktop loads and he opens Facebook. He's only been gallivanting about Castle for a couple of hours and already he has six friend requests, including one from Peter.
"There's a party at Hatfield tonight. Might be fun, might it?" He peers over the top of the screen when Peter doesn't answer. "Come on, you can't stay in all week. You have to make your friends now, it'll just get harder later on in term."
"Who made you King of the Universities?"
Sirius frowns. "I read it online. Student Room, they have everything. It's like a vast ocean of '90s emoticons and people asking embarrassing questions so I don't have to."
It only takes a little more nagging to get Peter to relent and accept the Hatfield invitation, and to Sirius' surprise he actually has the decency to slouch off for a shower. Maybe Peter wants to go out more than he's letting on. He's probably one of those sad people who've come to university with the intention of losing their virginity.
Roomie gone, Sirius reaches into his pocket and pulls out his phone. He's a bit surprised, a bit hurt even, to see the empty inbox. He'd felt sure James would text him. James always texts first. It's just a thing they have.
Bastardizing 'the thing', Sirius churns out a quick message - how's it goingjamie?- before texting Mrs Potter to thank her for the fine way in which she regaled him with baked goods.
Finally alone, he's now forced to actually consider the realities of university; that he's three hundred miles from home, that James hasn't found time to send him one measly text, and that he's sharing a room with Beans from Even Stevens. It's a sad situation but then, Sirius never expected leaving home to be easy.
His phone vibrates back at him within minutes - so James isn't too busy to talk then - and the reply flashes back at him in the growing darkness of the room: flat is amazing!shower'salready broken. u? roommate?
It's at this moment that Sirius allows his inner Petulant Child to shine through. He can't lie. A horrible part of him sort of hoped, in an awful, twisted kind of way, that James would find his new flatmates unbearable. The idea that James is having fun without him is unpleasant, to say the least.
Annoyed, he texts back: sharing with a fatswot. He feels bad as soon as he's sent it. After all, Peter can't help being fat and swotty. Well, he probably can, but he doesn't seem such a bad sort really.
Quickly, Sirius tacks on another text: nahhe's alright really. Then with a sigh he sinks into his pillows and stares at the slanting ceiling above him, waiting for Peter to get out of the shower so that he can spruce himself up to an adequate degree.
The phone vibrates yet again, but when Sirius scrabbles to read it all he is greeted with is James' simple message: LOL. Dismayed by the lack of invitation for conversation, he throws the phone back on the bed and curls up on his side. Eighteen years he's been waiting for this day, and it's surprisingly mundane.
He can only hope that swanning off to the Big Hatfield Party with those fit twins and Peter will liven things up considerably. Or even just a bit. Sirius would settle for just a bit.
