Note: This is supposed to be Peter Pettigrew talking, so the sentences might seem long and rambling, disjointed, or wrongly-grammared ;-).
They don't know what it's like to be scared. They don't know what it's like to be weak, to be frightened, to be stupid.
They were my only friends. They were the only people I'd ever known, ever liked, ever talked to. Maybe I was really interested in James, but they didn't have to make fun of me for it.
James, Sirius, and Remus. They were smart, strong, clever, funny, popular. I was none of those things, but they still treated me like dirt. How did they not know how much it hurt me? It was torture, every day, seeing them. Seeing James score points at Quidditch, see Sirius beat up any kid who got in his way, see Remus ace every class. But I couldn't leave them, I couldn't be all alone, that would be awful, much worse than getting my nose rubbed in my non-skills everyday.
James always told me to be strong, he used to tell me that when I cried, but then James got with that girl Lily, and she hated me. He never talked to me again after that.
Remus would try to be nice to me, but he did it in his own way, letting me copy off his homework and tests, but we were never really friends, not the kind that liked each other, but the kind that let the stupid one cheat off the smart one's paper.
And Sirius? Sirius never had anything to do with me. Any moment I spent with him was full of him talking about how I was an idiot, how I was stupid, how I would never be as good as James, no, never as good as precious James.
The teachers tried to be kind to me, but I could see how they were disgusted by me, by how I would pick my nose, by how I sucked up to James. Flitwick used to give me candy after classes. Once, when he was handing me some chocolate, he accidentally touched my hand. I saw him recoil from me, but then he pretended like nothing had happened, and chatted away about the goddamn weather. There were no sweets from Flitwick after that.
These were the people I called my friends. A stuck-up jock, a bully, a geeky werewolf, and some teacher who thought he could fix all my problems with food.
I was a messed up little kid. I was the kid who everyone laughed at in the halls. I was the one who wore unfashionable clothes, and got mocked for them. I was the one who got picked last in Quidditch games. I was the one who was left when people were told to pick partners for practicing spells. They hated me, and so I hated them.
It's not a surprise, then, that I was used by Slytherin as an spy. When they wanted to know what the Quidditch team's strategies were, I told them. When they wanted to know where some Gryffindor was going to be tonight, I told them. When the cunning snake was afraid of the strong lion, the snake got the help of the sneaky mouse.
You know why I did it? Because they made me feel like I was part of something. James never did that. They patted me on my back when I gave them Gryffindor secrets. Remus was never that proud of me when I passed a test. They never made fun of me, or who I was.
I guess that's why I turned to the Black Arts. Lucius Malfoy and his friends were always talking about them, and I wanted to be like them. I was too stupid to understand the complex spells, but I could do the elementary curses easily enough.
James, Sirius, Remus, and all the other Gryffindors never knew what I was doing. They didn't know that everything they didn't want people to know was known by their worst enemies. They didn't know that a Gryffindor was practicing the Dark Arts. It was better that way.
They didn't know what it was like to be Peter Pettigrew. They didn't know what it was like to not be perfect. They had everything, and I had nothing. They didn't know, and they never will.