Chapter Four:

Remus seemed reluctant to answer Peter's question. He was pretending he had not heard anything his friend said and calmly turned away to put his book and other belongings in his bag. Only when he finished doing this and was about to leave the compartment did he realize he could not get out, because his way was being blocked by all of his friends, who were still staring at him expectantly.

"What?" he asked, trying to sound as casual as possible but not quite succeeding.

"Are you serious, Moony?" Peter said, snorting loudly.

James lacked Peter's patience. "Come off it!" he said, crossing his arms. "You and Mary having that telepathic moment a minute ago - what was up with that?"

Remus shrugged. "Beats me."

Sirius scowled. "Yeah right, and I'm a female Unicorn having the hots for Hagrid."

Remus sighed before hoisting his bag over his shoulder. "Fine. It was just a look of understanding. At least that's what I think it was. Mary was simply checking if it would be okay to leave you behind, James. If that answer is not satisfactory or she was referring to something else, I must have missed it. Can we go now? In about a minute the Express will depart and we'll all be heading back to King's Cross station instead."

Peter shrugged, apparently buying Remus's obvious lie, and set out to leave the train and find them a carriage. Even James, who was shaking his head in disbelief, decided to leave it for now and follow Peter instead. Sirius however lingered behind while watching Remus walk out.

"You coming, mate?" his friend asked after a moment, poking his head back around the compartment door.

"Yeah, yeah," he muttered absent-mindedly.

As Sirius was following Remus out of the train, he simply could not stop thinking about how Mary had been smiling at Remus. There was definitely something going on between those two. No matter how hard his friend was denying it, Sirius was not buying it one bit. He knew smiles like that. A smile Mary certainly had never given him. With a jealous pang in his stomach, he continued to try and make sense of what the exchange between her and Remus could have meant. Suddenly he got struck by a terrible thought: what if Mary fancied Remus?

Sirius frowned. He recognized Remus was a fine bloke and all, but when it came to getting girls, Sirius was in a completely different league. Remus may be incredibly nice and smart (most girls at Hogwarts liked hanging out with him), but he was also kind of shy when it came to the opposite sex. One of those inconvenient side-effects that comes with being a Werewolf, apparently. Sirius on the other hand had girls falling for him wherever he went. But what was starting to annoy him more and more, was that his charm did not seem to have the same affect on Mary. On the contrary, she seemed to be downright allergic to it.

He suddenly stopped in his tracks: that must be it! The reason Mary was attracted to Remus instead of him was because his friend was nice and less... presumptuous. Perhaps if he acted more like Remus for a while, that would to the trick. He could... pretend to be studying a lot, hold off playing pranks and be righteous and nice - just nice without being flirtatious - to Mary, and find out if that would change anything. Without any of his friends figuring out what he was trying to do, of course. Brilliant! He smirked for having come up with such an ingenious idea.

"Sirius, these things won't hang around here forever, you know. We're already late for the feast," James called, interrupting Sirius's thoughts. He quickly hopped onto the very last of the horseless carriages waiting for them at the station's entrance. As soon as he closed the door, the carriage set off to Hogwarts.

Sirius put his hand under his chin and stared out of the window. It was a remarkable clear night; hundreds of stars were shining down on them from the sky. Apparently he was named after one of them, but he had never been able to tell which one it was. He had never thought of asking his parents about it, and now it was too late. He would never figure it out, because he was never going to speak to them again. He vigorously shook his head to get rid of the familiar sharp ache in his heart. It was better this way; he was better off this way.

"What's up your mind, mate?" Remus asked, who was watching him closely.

"Nothing, everything's cool."

"I bet Padfoot's just thinking of another way to win Mary over," James grinned.

Sirius grinned back confidently. "Right you are, Prongs. I hereby predict Woods will be dreaming about me and my ravishing self before the end of the month."

"But… Doesn't Mary like, hate your guts?" Peter asked.

Sirius hit him playfully around the head. "If only you had learned as much about women as I have, Wormtail, you would know love and hate aren't that far apart."

"Exactly," James piped in. "Which is why this year I will conquer Lily's heart."

"Yeah well, in your case you'll find that distance to be practically irreconcilable."

They all laughed before realizing the carriage had arrived at Hogwarts. The four of them quickly jumped out and bolted up the stairs of the castle. When they were about to enter the Entrance Hall, they spotted a group of anxious-looking first years waiting alongside Professor McGonagall, preparing themselves to walk into the Great Hall. When McGonagall noticed the four latecomers, she narrowed her eyes and beckoned them to line up in front of her. "You are late. Where have you been?"

"Well, that's actually quite a funny story, Professor," Sirius replied, determined to make his "act like Remus"-plan do the trick. Remus usually stood up for them if they had done something mischievous, and often got away with it too. "Someone, we assume one of the Slytherins, bewitched our carriage and made it take off in the opposite direction-"

"-Mr. Black, do you know what is making the carriages move?" McGonagall interrupted, narrowing her eyes at him.

"Er well no, not exactly. But…"

"If you did, you would never pretend that a bewitched carriage is the reason for your lateness. Thirty points from Gryffindor. ("But Professor!") And if I catch you lying like that again, you will be cleaning cauldrons for a month. Have I made myself clear?"

"Yes, Professor."

"Off you go then. The Sorting Ceremony will take place in a few minutes."

The four guys walked on without a word, eager to leave McGonagall behind, and headed into the Great Hall. When they approached the Gryffindor table, Lily, Mary and Brice were all looking at them in a reproachful manner.

They cautiously sat down opposite the girls. Sirius – making sure he had flopped down across from Mary - remembered his new resolution and shot her an apologetic smile. "Our carriage was having some technical difficulties. It didn't seem able to move forward, so we had to fix it first. That's why we're so late."

Contrary to what he was expecting (this was another excuse Remus could have come up with), Mary merely glared at him. "Do you plan on sitting here all night? Because if that's the case I will have to look for another seat."

Sirius blinked, taken aback by this latest vicious sneer. "No, of course not, you were here first," he muttered. "I'll just go then..." He quietly rose and sat down on the other end of the table, next to Remus.

As he was watching how McGonagall and the group of first years walked into the hall for the Sorting Ceremony, he silently tried to reflect on what just happened. So far his "being Remus"-act was not going well. In the last five minutes he had managed to piss off both McGonagall and Mary. He scratched his head, feeling quite disheartened. This was not how he had imagined things to go at all. Apparently being Remus was not everything either.