Remus:
As he boarded the train and watched Sirius bounce off after Lily, Remus reflected on their brief conversation. He knew Lily better than his friends. James might dispute that with his years of observations and attempts to ask her out, but Remus was the only one who spent any real time with Lily. As prefect partners, they did rounds together for a whole year, and contrary to popular belief, rounds were usually pretty boring. It was a lot of wandering around the castle at night and not seeing another soul. They talked, played games, and got to know each other. And something about Lily today felt different. He didn't know why, but he felt like she wasn't being fully truthful about her summer, but he couldn't see why her vague answer would have been a lie. Shaking his head - both at the thoughts in his head and the scene he saw involving Sirius, Lily, and Emmaline Vance in front of him - he made his way into the traditional marauder compartment where he found the other half of the group.
James and Peter had clearly arrived early as they had already settled in and started a rather intense looking game of exploding snap. Peter - being Peter - looked up as Remus entered. A loud explosion and a puff of smoke announced Peter's loss. James cheered as he looked up. "Hey Moony! Thanks for helping me out there! Sorry Wormy."
"Sorry Pete. Hey Prongs," Remus sighed and collapsed onto a seat across from James rubbing his temples.
"Any chance you saw Padfoot?" James asked Remus as he cleared up the mess from the exploding snap game and restored Peter's eyebrows with a flick of his wand. " He ran off a while ago.
"Oh yeah. We ran into Lily - " James looked up immediately at the mention of Lily's name, "and after we helped her with her trunk, Sirius just sort of followed her to the compartment where Marley and Emma were. I saw them arguing with him before I came in here."
"Oh," said James who was clearly trying to pretend he wasn't dying for an update about Lily. "You ran into Evans. How is she?"
"I'm not really sureā¦" Remus trailed off. This response just increased his friend's frustration level, but Remus was more concerned about Lily. How was she really? Why did she lie? His musings were interrupted by a bang as the compartment door was flung open with some force. There in all of his arrogant glory stood Sirius Black.
"Can you believe 3 girls just slammed a door shut right in my face?"
"YES." All 3 of the other marauders replied in unison, knowing exactly which 3 girls their friend spoke of.
"It was so rude!" Sirius complained. "I was just trying to say hi and that I missed them over the summer."
"Sure you were, Padfoot," Peter said rolling his eyes.
"So how are our fellow 6th year Gryffindors doing?" James asked failing to mask his interest in one particular Gryffindor.
"They kicked me out!" Sirius whined.
"Of course they did, Padfoot. You annoy them." Remus pointed out. "They don't like your sexual jokes."
"Really Moony? I thought they loved me. Why wouldn't they appreciate my sense of humor?"
"Because you aren't funny Padfoot."
"Well that's just hurtful Prongs. So. What's going to be our first prank of the new school year?"
"Well that seems like something we should talk about!" James looked happier than Remus had seen him in a long time. Peter clapped his hands together with excitement.
Despite his friends' excitement, Remus couldn't get into the prank playing as much as he usually did. It wasn't just Lily. His summer hadn't exactly been pleasant either. Parents were so complicated. Even his best friends didn't know everything. His friends knew about the guilt from his parents' involvement in his being bit by a werewolf, they didn't know the full extent of what he dealt with at home. He never invited his friends over. He usually didn't go to their place. He made excuses about his lycanthropy, but the truth was, he had controlling parents. They were so concerned with their own lives and their guilt over him becoming a werewolf in the first place that Remus often felt they forgot that he was still alive. He didn't die in the attack. He still had a life, as different from what they had expected for him as it may be.
Remus's musings were interrupted by James's voice. "Padfoot. I don't think Moony's going to let us do that the first night of school."
"Hmmmm?" Remus looked up at his friends who had all turned their attention his way. "Sorry. What are we talking about?"
"Well I don't know about you guys, but I've never felt more fascinating," Sirius commented, rolling his eyes. The other two laughed. "We were talking about breaking into the Slytherin common room and - "
"No." Remus interrupted with authority.
"But Moony," whined Sirius, "you haven't even heard my idea yet! Don't shut it down so quickly!"
"Padfoot. We haven't even set foot in the castle yet, let alone started classes. We're not breaking into another house's common room this early in the term. We have plenty of time for all sorts of pranks this year. Let's just get settled tonight and focus on eating a ton of food at the welcome feast." Remus enjoyed pulling pranks with his friends, but he wasn't in the mood, and as a prefect, he figured he should at least not do something that would be so easy to get caught so early in the year. He couldn't help but notice James seemed rather relieved at Remus shutting down Sirius's plans. As much as James would never admit it, Remus knew he didn't like the pranks where they got caught, and breaking into another house's space increased the chances of getting caught tenfold. Thankfully the talk of food distracted Sirius enough to turn the conversation to excited guesses of what would be included with the feast that night. Beyond the normal food items, the house elves always threw in a few unexpected surprises. This conversation was one that Peter - a boy who famously loved food - enthusiastically joined. Somehow the talk of food lasted them the rest of the train ride to Hogwarts.
