Sirius
The letter came today. I had been expecting it for ages. Regulus was dead jealous. He is really looking forward to going to Hogwarts. We've heard stories from the pure-blood kids from around our neighbourhood – stories of giant squids and poltergeists, and also tales from mum and dad. They've told us that there are four houses in total, but that Slytherin is the best house. I've only ever met children from Slytherin. Mum tells me that it's because pure bloods are the best at magic and have better ideas than muggle borns or half bloods- except she calls them mudbloods. My Uncle Alphard and cousin Andromeda told me that they are called muggle borns. "Mudblood is a rude word," they said, "and is only used for rude people." I asked mum about this. She slapped me around the face. She told me to keep my mouth shut and that she was my mother and knew how to talk. Since You-Know-Who has grown in power she thinks everything to do with non-magic folk is bad. I suppose she must be right.
Mum took me to buy my school stuff yesterday. Now it's all been packed up our house elf Kreacher. He's really weird and calls You-Know-Who the Dark Lord like he's some sort of leader. Mum and Dad have caught on. When I asked Mum about it, she got really annoyed like with the Mudblood thing. She told me not to question her opinions anymore. I was a bit confused though, still. I don't think You-Know-Who has such a good way of getting his point across. He's always killing, while other politicians just use words. I suppose it catches people's attention…
Anyway, now we're at King's Cross Station, Mum, Regulus and me. Mum dressed us in muggle clothes, but she didn't wear any. She got a lot of funny looks, walking to the station. She muttered darkly every time we passed a muggle, getting her own back. Me and Regulus were really embarrassed. Before I went through the barrier, Mum hesitated then pulled me aside, with her sharp nails.
"Don't you dare talk about loving mudbloods while your with the other Slytherins, or I swear I'll send you such a good dose of hexes in the post, you won't even have a mouth to talk with," she hissed. I nodded and ran towards the brick wall; glad to be rid of her as her elbow had been digging into me very hard.
I got onto the train with my bags and found an empty compartment. After hoisting my luggage onto the rack above the seats, I decided to climb up next to them, tucking my legs in to stay on. A few moments later a boy of about my age walked in. He looked up and saw me.
"Oh my gosh!" he said, "I'm really sorry… I mean… um… what are you doing up there?" I thought about this for a moment. What was I doing up here? I had thought, on the spur, of the moment, that it might be fun to sit up here, but I didn't answer the boy.
"Um… gee," said the boy, struggling to find words to deal with my silence, "Uh, can I sit up there too?" I stared at him for a moment, worried that he was mocking me. Deciding against it, I smiled.
"Yeah, sure," I said, "There's loads of room." As he pulled himself up, after dumping his small bag on the seat, I got a better look at him. He had a thin, worn face with pale brown hair and blue eyes. He also had some scars across his face and a few fresher cuts too, over his nose. They looked painful.
"How'd you get those cuts across your face… um, I'm sorry I don't know your name…" I asked. The boy chose to answer the second question.
"Remus; Remus Lupin."
"Uh, hi Remus. I'm Sirius Black." The boy looked mildly surprised at this but said nothing. I asked again about the scratches.
"Cat," said Remus, quickly. There was a pause.
"So," asked Remus, "are you a first year too?"
"Yeah. Yeah I am."
"Mmm," said Remus. There was another awkward silence and I found myself getting cramp in my curled up legs.
"It really isn't that fun sitting up here is it?" I said.
"You want to get down?" replied Remus.
"OK," I said and we returned to our seats, laughing.
James
I found an empty compartment and sat down after heaving my bags on to the luggage rack. As the train started to pull away from the station a kid came in, pulling his suitcase behind him. He had greasy hair and a hooked nose. I thought he looked a bit odd, but I was determined to be as nice as possible.
"Hi, I'm James Potter. What's your name?"
"Severus," said the boy and gave a sniff. I couldn't help but give a snort of laughter at this. The kid looked at me angrily.
"You are a pureblood aren't you?" he asked, suspiciously. I was outraged. No normal person cares about what parentage someone has. I looked at him coolly.
"I really don't think that matters, does it," I said, equally as coolly as my stare, "I bet you're from one of those pure blood families, aren't you. And I bet you support You-Know-Who as well, don't you?" The kid looked at me strangely.
"Of course I'm a pure blood," he said, before making for the compartment door.
"Oh," I called after him, "And wash your hair out 'Snivellus'." I then burst into laughter at the name I had invented for the boy.
Once I had calmed down, the compartment door opened again. A fat kid walked in with mousey hair.
"Hi there," he said, "can I sit with you? It's just that I got really scared when some big girls came into my compartment…"
"Oh, OK," not very pleased to share my compartment with kid like him. He did not seem to notice my annoyance and his face broke into the most enormous grin.
"So are you a first year?" I asked.
"Yup, are you?" he replied. I nodded. The boy then proceeded to tell me about his family. After about five minutes of his rambling, I began to get really bored.
"I'm going to find a new compartment," I told him, mid one of his sentences, "this one smells." I was lying through my teeth but the boy sniffed the air, and said, "Wow, it does smell bad. Can I come with you?"
Jesus, this boy was a creep.
Sirius
The compartment door opened again and in walked a skinny boy with messy black hair and glasses, with a short, dumpy kid with mousey hair. The first boy gave a quick grin before saying, "I'm James and this is… uh… what is your name, kid?" to the boy behind him.
"Peter," the boy replied.
"OK," I said, "Well, I'm Sirius and this is Remus." Remus gave a grin when I said his name.
"Can we come in?" asked James.
"Sure," I said.
"So," said Remus, in the same long, drawn out way he had said it earlier, "did all your parents go to Hogwarts too?" James answered first, "Yeah, both of them." Then I had my turn, "Well my father did, but my mum went to Durmstrang." James squinted suspiciously at me. Peter was next, "My mother did, but not my father. He's a muggle, you see."
"Oh," I said, surprised, "So you're a half blood then?"
"What!" said James, suddenly. Remus sighed.
"Well, it's just that I've never met a half blood before so…" I said, petering out by the look James gave me.
"Like there's any difference!" exclaimed James. Remus tried to come to my rescue.
"Sirius isn't like that," he said, but James interrupted him.
"What is your surname?" he asked rudely.
"Black," I said quietly to the obnoxious boy standing over me. Meanwhile Peter was picking his nose. The window was rattling because of the wind. James had a nasty glint in his eye.
"I knew it!" he said, triumphantly, "From the moment I walked in and smelt the disgusting pure blood stench - you sit at home all day in you fancy mansion, supporting You-Know-Who, while there are poor muggle borns, who are twice as good as magic as you'll ever be, being slaughtered by your death eater family!" I was livid. My family wasn't like that. I was going to say so, as well, but Remus got there first;
"James," he said sharply, "Sirius didn't mean what you thought he meant, OK? And you better shut up about him right now or I'll make you shut up!" And with that he brandished his wand threateningly at James' chest. James looked like he had choked on his own saliva. For the first time after saying his name, Peter spoke.
"Maybe we had better go," he said, but James was stubborn.
"No," he said resolutely. "We're going to stay and prove to Black here that he can't always have his own way." Remus glared at James and he stopped talking, but walked over to the opposite side of the compartment as far away from me as he could get and sat down, putting his bag on his lap. Peter copied and they both sulked, staring out of the window.
Remus
I launched into a discussion about Quidditch with Sirius. I was very angry with James. Sirius was a nice guy, despite his family and family beliefs. Over our chatter, the driver's voice sounded, magnified by magic.
"Please close all windows. Please close all windows. We are experiencing high winds," rang out her voice. Sirius looked over at our already closed window.
"I think we should open it," he said with a glint in his eye, very much like the one James had had earlier. I was shocked. Hadn't he heard the driver? James found it very difficult not to suppress a grin, and after pondering for a moment, got up and helped Sirius pull on the rattling window, to slide it open. Peter followed obediently.
"Guys," I said as they tugged, "I don't think we're meant to…" But the rest of my words were drowned out by the enormous gust of wind that roared as the window opened. Leaves, twigs, grass and rubbish swirled in, as the icy jets blew towards us. Sirius and James were laughing. I ran over to try and shut the window. The others eventually made their way over to help.
"That was cool!" said James once the window had been shut. He seemed to remember he was supposed to be moody and sulking and so the smirk left his face and he went and sat down again, mimicked closely by Peter.
"That was stupid Sirius," I said.
"Yeah, well, it was fun wasn't it," replied Sirius, with a smile. I shook my head vaguely, neither agreeing nor disagreeing with him.
As we approached the castle, we pulled our robes over our muggle clothes and I combed my hair, although James made no attempt to flatten his messy hair which stuck up all over the place. We got off the train, and I hoped, purely from tales of Hogwarts that I had heard, that I would be sorted into Gryffindor – of course you could never be sure. But I knew where Sirius would be, despite being the most friendly pure blood I had ever met; Slytherin.