"Welcome," said Head Master Dippet, "to another year at Hogwarts. We have teachers ready to teach, and students hopefully ready to learn.

"As I say every year, the Forbidden Forest is forbidden, hence it's name, and Mr. Filch would like me to remind you that Fanged yo-yo's, Cackling Cakes, Hag's Hashbrowns and other various instruments of destruction are completely unallowed. If you have a thing similar to these, you must receive permission from a teacher, myself, or Mr. Filch.

"Third years and up with signed permission slips are the only students leaving Hogwarts on the various days to visit the village of Hogsmeade.

"Now I shall stop blabbering while our tummies are rumbling, so - feast!"

Dippet spread his arms wide, and the feast appeared before their eyes. Chicken, potatoes, corn on the cob, peas, gravy, warm, fresh bread, soup, salad, and little glass trays of mints.

"Dig in!" James shouted.

James sat in the middle of the Gryffindor table, beside Sirius, who was sitting beside Allan Cooper, the other Gryffindor first year, and Remus and Peter sat on the other side of the table.

"So welcome to the 'Big G', boys." Remus said.

"Glad to be a 'Big G', Remmy." Sirius said.

"Better than Slytherin!" Allan said, turning his shaggy head to glare at the Slytherins.

"Yeah, green isn't my colour, anyways." James said, after donning his Gryffindor robes in a bathroom, along with his new friends. He too turned his head to look at the table next to theirs. A boy caught his gaze - a first year. He was sitting alone, with long hair, greasy to the point of where James thought he had never heard of shampoo before. His nose was long and oblong, like it had been jammed in a door every other day. His complexion was pallid, and sent a shiver up and down James' spine. He spinned his fork around in his potatoes, and licked the creamy vegetable off the fork.

"Look at that bloke." James said, trying to laugh.

Peter laughed quietly, and Sirius said something under his breath, and Allan just say there in pity for the boy.

"Who is that?" Remus asked.

"I don't know." James said.

He turned back to his plate.

When the feast was finished, James stood up, stretched, and scratched his chest, yawning. Sirius followed him, and Allan. Peter was finishing his apple pie, and Remus rubbed his eyes tiredly.

"First years come with me! I am Gryffindor Prefect Michael Chase." James turned his head to see this boy. He was tall, and well-built, muscular. He was handsome, with his brown curls, and baby blue eyes. "Follow me!" he shouted.

The five boys followed him, to a portrait of a fat woman in a pink dress.

"Password?" she asked, making some of the first years jump. Sirius didn't.

"Pumpkin strudel!" Michael said, as the portrait swung open, a door in the wall. Michael let the new students enter first, then followed them.

Inside of the Gryffindor common room, a fireplace warmed the room to a comfortable temperature, with a few couches around it. There were a few scattered tables with chairs, and a few paintings on the wall, but other than that, the room was bare.

"Welcome," Michael began, stretching his arms and sweeping them around him, "to the Gryffindor common room. This is where you will do homework, study, and socialize. There are the stairs, where the dormitories are held. Boys on the left, girls on the right. Your things are already stationed there."

"Yeah!" James yelled, and he and the other four plopped themselves down on the couches by the fireplace. "Welcome to the first year of fun! Living from laugh to laugh, attacking the girls with stink pellets."

"Yeah!" Allan called. A small group of the five first year Gryffindor girls sat in the corner, at the table. Marcia Elmwood, she was short and slightly plump, with a round face, dark brown eyes, and shoulder length chestnut hair. Then there was Amy Ellis, a pretty girl with long blonde hair, James knew her as a sort of air-head. Then there was Brigette Darcy, a weight-obsessed girl with short blonde girl with blue eyes, and a worried look to her face. Painting her toenails was an ugly girl, Tara MacIntyre, neither plump nor skinny, short, and freckled, annoying, and with a ponytail with dirty blonde hair. Then there was what caught James' heart in a swirly wave of emotions. Lily Evans. Beautiful. Siren. Angel. Seraph from a distant world where beauty is a mere nothing.

"Lord, look at her. Lily." James said, turning to his friends.

"Nah, Amy, she is a piece of art."

"Amy is nothing compared to this angel."

"James, you're not going soft already? Don't be naff, now." Allan said.

Marcia got up from the table, and with a large grin over her face, she ran up to Allan, and smacked him in the back of the head.

"Fag! Queer!" She yelled. "Homo!" She stammered through the giggles.

"Hey!" Lily shouted, jumping to her feet.

James leapt up as well, followed immediately by Sirius.

"Allan's no queer. Got it?" Sirius shouted at her, rage filling every possible area it could.

"You pick on him we'll pick on you ten fold what you did. Savvy?" James said with testiness.

"I was joking with the poor kid, come on get a life."

"Oh, so if he's different you've got to mock him?

"Hhhhmp!" she muttered, and she left.

Sirius and James seated themselves.

"Allan, you're not - are you?" James asked carefully.

"No, no I'm not." Allan answered.

"Good." Sirius said, gulping. "Looks like we've got a bully on our hands.

"Don't you dare bully the damn kid! He's not a fag!" James heard Lily say to Marcia. Even with the distortion of rage, her voice was the sweetest sound James had ever heard.