Remus Lupin watched the swirling of the crowds in Diagon Alley with an accustomed eye. His parents had dropped him off in the Alley today, trusting him to buy his own supplies for Hogwarts. The boy was so happy he felt like bursting! First, the acceptance letter, now, responsibility for his purchases made him feel very old indeed, and took his mind off his ther problems.

Looking in fascination at the broomstick in the window of Quality Quidditch Supplies, he missed the other kid completely. Running smack into him, they both fell backwards, slightly stunned.

Getting his breath back, Remus studied the other youth. He had long, black hair tied loosely at the nape of his neck. He was slightly grungy, as if he had never had a proper bath, but the air of recklessness hovered around him. Warm brown eyes gleamed merrily and an infectious grin spread over the other's face, making Remus smile too. He got to his feet and reached down to give Remus a hand up.

"Hullo. The name's Sirius Black."

"Remus Lupin."

"Well, Remus you look the knowledgable type. Can you tell me why they don't accept real money here?"

Remus furrowed his eyebrows in confusion until he saw the fistful of money in Sirius's hand. Muggle money, not proper Sickles and Galleons. Laughing, he answered.

"Oh, you'll like this, I think. That is, if you enjoy fast rides."

Grabbing Sirius's black sleeve, Remus tugged him down Diagon Alley to the end. As the crooked Gringotts building came in sight, he watched with delight as Sirius's mouth dropped open.

"How does it stay up!?!?"

"Magic. What else?"

Sirius muttered under his breath.

"Magic. Who'dve thought?"

Remus ignored this, walking inside the building, trusting Sirius to follow him. Sure enough, after the raven haired boy got over his initial shock, he sprinted to catch up. He stopped short again inside, though.

"What are they?"

Remus rolled his eyes.

"They're goblins, dunce. They're in charge of money for the wizarding world, specifically Gringotts Bank."

"Wow."

The youth shoved his companion up to the Money Exhanges desk. What he didn't realize, however, was how much money Sirius had. The boy kept pulling out of the most unexpected places, and by the time he was done, the pile looked to be a considerable fortune. The goblin gathered it all up and counted it out carefully.

"That comes out to 1,072 Galleons, 11 Sickles, and 19 Knuts. Would you like to keep all of this, or purchase a vault?"

"Er...a vault, I guess." Sirius purposely avoided Remus's incredulous stare.

"You will be vault 97. Here is your key. The 5 Galleons will be automatically decuted from your account."

"You haven't given me any of my money yet!"

The goblin gave him a withering look and opened his mouth to explain, but Remus dragged him away.

"Come on, its all in your vault. You have to go get it, it doesn't come to you."

"Oh."

The two managed to get to their respective vaults with no further ado. Remus's parents had given him leave to take out 5 Galleons for his school supplies, which meant everything was going to have to be purchased second hand, but he was just happy to be going to Hogwarts at all. Sirius, as expected, loved the rail carts and wanted to ride in them more, but abandoned them reluctantly after Remus told them there was more in store.

They went to Madam Malkin's Robes for All Occasion's first, where Sirius got nice, new robes and Remus sifted through the second-hand racks until he found some that would fit. A trip to Flourish and Blotts took care of the books, paper, ink, and quills. Sirius fingered a package of ink that disappears after you read it and a package of ink that never runs no matter what you spill on the paper before purchasing two packages of each. There was a mischievious gleam in his eyes that made Remus think he didn't really want to know why, so he didn't ask.

They went to the Apothecary and got basic potions ingredients and cauldrons, as well as the snake hide gloves. A different shop provided them with scales and telescopes, as well as a trunk for Sirius. Then, it was lunchtime.

"Lets get ice cream."

"Ice cream? They sell that here!?!?"

Remus stopped suddenly, giving his companion a sharp look.

"Yes, they do. Why is that so odd?"

"Well, because isn't ice cream...well, a luxury item?"

The look on Sirius's face was odd....Remus would say it was wistful if he didn't know better.

"Um, no...Are you saying you've never had ice cream? And you're how rich?"

Sirius grinned.

"Thief extraordinaire, at your service."

Remus sighed. Obviously, his new friend wasn't going to tell him the truth right now. Oh well.

"Ok, you must try this stuff. It's great."

At Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlor, Remus ordered a chocolate cone while Sirius devoured a mammoth split with ten scoops of different flavors, a banana, chocolate, strawberry, and pineapple sauce, chopped nuts, sprinkles, hot fudge, seven cherries in various places, and loads of whipped cream. When he was done, there was so much ice cream all over his face that Remus took a picture with the camera he'd gotten for his birthday after he had finished cracking up.

Sirius wiped his face with supreme, but feigned, dignity.

"What's next?"

They went to Eeylops Owl Emporium where Remus picked up his barn owl, who was being vetted. Sirius tried to pet her through the bars of her cage, and she promptly bit him.

"Artemis doesn't really like any one other than me. I wouldn't try to pet her if I were you."

"Now you warn me," Sirius muttered, sucking on his sore finger.

The next stop was Magical Menagerie, where Sirius wanted to buy a cat. When the two boys walked in, the manager was help a customer extract remove a few Butterflirds (a cross between a hummingbird and a butterfly) from her hair, so they began looking at the kittens on their own. Since they were all over the store, not locked up in cages, they had to work a bit to find them.

"What do you think of that one?" Sirius pointed to a black kitten that was tumbling energetically over a ball of yarn.

"Nah, its cross-eyed. Go for that one." Remus gestured to a calico delicately washing her paws.

Sirius opened his mouth to say something, but a charcoal colored kitten chose that instant to jump onto his shoulder from a nearby slug aquarium and promptly batted his nose with her paw. He was so startled he close his mouth again. Remus picked the cat off Sirius's shoulder and almost dropped her when she slashed viciously at his arms. Putting the kitten down quickly, it gave him a look full of scorn and immediately began winding her lithe body around Sirius's legs.

"I think the choice has been made for me." Sirius grinned and picked her up, where she butted her head up under his chin. Remus laughed.

"I believe you are right."

They brought the cat over to the saleslady, who had finished extracting slugs from the other witch's hair. She took one look at Sirius's armful and started.

"Oh, my! Oh my indeed!"

"What?"

"I never thought Scorn would take to anyone! Well, young man, you must be the only person in the world Scorn likes. I take it you want to buy her?"

"Right on the money."

After Sirius finished paying for Scorn, the two made one last stop - Ollivander's. Scorn leaped from Sirius's arms as soon as they entered, wrestling with an empty box while the two boys peered dubiously around.

"He-hello?"

A man popped out from behind a shelf of wands.

"Ah yes. Remus Lupin. And Sirius, Sirius Black, is it not? I've been waiting for you."

The boys exchanged looks with some trepidation as the old man turned his back. Only a moment passed, and Mr. Ollivander was thrusting wands into both of their hands.

It took a while before Remus found his match. The wand was 11 inches, made of teak, with the core of unicorn hair.

"Ah yes," Mr. Ollivander intoned as he fingered the wand one last time. "This hair is from a fine mare, a virgin warrior type, who had a particular reputation as a werewolf killer."

He eyed Remus and the boy shivered under his gaze, taking the wand back with quite a bit of reluctance.

Sirius took even longer to get a wand before a rosewood wand, 12 and 1/4 inches, with dragon heartstring showered red and gold sparks into the air. Mr. Ollivander had nothing of note to say about his wand, Remus noted with jealousy.

It was dusk when they left the wand shop, and Remus noticed Sirius looking a bit worried.

"What're you thinking about?"

His friend bit his lip.

"Its just...well, how do we get to Hogwarts?"

"Oh, right. Well, so far as I know, the Hogwarts Express - that's the train that takes us to Hogwarts - leaves from Platform Nine and Three-Quarters from King's Cross - you know where that is, right? Oh, and eleven o'clock on September 1st. I think that's it."

The confusion cleared from his companion's face.

"All right then, I'll see you in a few days."

Remus watched as his new friend - no, first friend walked away into the Muggle world without a second look back.