A/N: Okay, so I haven't gotten any reviews, but I don't care and I since this story has already been pre-written I shall upload the chapters until the end. To anyone reading this. I do hope you're enjoying it...

Chapter 3

A week passed with Serena trying very hard to become friends with the Marauders. Lily was actually amazing, and helped her out as much as anyone could have expected. She or one of the others was always there to take her to her classes, even though she knew well enough where they all were.

The morning after she had arrived, she had told them all where she had come from, that her parents were still living in France, and that she had been going to Beauxbatons but this year, she had gone ahead of her parents to get settled at this new school before they moved back to England. It was all a great whopping lie, and she had to say she was surprised at what a good actress she was.

She was also surprised at how easy it was to be in the Marauder's company. They reminded her sharply of her old friends. James was so much like his son that it was hard at first to be in his company, and Remus and Hermione could have been long lost cousins, both always with their noses in a book. Sirius was the one that got under Serena's skin though, always teasing her and making fun of her last name and anything else he could think of. Lily though assured her that this was his normal way of dealing with anyone he considered a friend. Serena nodded at this explanation, but she still got annoyed with Sirius more then she liked. But even with that annoyance, she was even MORE annoyed with herself, since she kept finding herself looking at him, wondering over and over again how this man had become the one Harry had described.

After a week, Serena went to sleep one night, but she didn't get much sleep.

Serena descended the stairs into the common room after a night of fitful sleeping. She was still wound tight thinking about everything she had to accomplish, and she only had a year to do it. A year to enter the confidence of the Marauder's, to find some proof that Peter was up to something, and to make everyone else believe it. Not to mention her mind kept wandering to the enigma that was Sirius Black. Serena yawned and stretched trying to get her mind off one tall raven haired boy, before opening her eyes to see that there was James waiting for her in the room.

"You don't look like you got too much sleep." James rose an eyebrow at the bags under her eyes and her constant yawning.

"I find it hard to sleep somewhere new... Even a week isn't enough for me to like the bed yet." Serena said hesitantly. She shifted her bag on her arm. "But I am hungry...?"

"Right. We can go down now. Lily and the rest went down already. Lily asked me to wait for you though. I take longer to get ready."

"You know I can find the hall now." She grinned at him. "Must take a long time to get your hair that messy." Serena smiled, recalling the way Harry's hair did the same thing, though not by his choice.

"How did you..?" James muttered. "Lily told you didn't she..." He accepted that as the truth and led her down to the Great Hall, where breakfast was already progressing. They walked down the Gryffindor table, to where Sirius, Lily, Remus and Peter were already eating. James sat down immediately next to Lily, and Serena went to sit on her other side, when she paused like a deer caught in the headlights. She was staring across the great hall at the Slytherin table, and at two people she recognized immediately.

Severus Snape and Lucius Malfoy. How had she missed seeing them for an entire week?

"Is Strangeblood's head addled?" Sirius asked, looking at her like she was strange. Though she must have looked the crazy, half crouched ready to sit down, and staring in horror across the hall. Sirius eyes followed to where she had been looking. "Do you know Malfoy or Snivellus?" He asked suspiciously.

Serena caught herself, and calmed down. She sat down and shook her head at Sirius across from her. "No. They remind me of people I knew is all..."

"You're going to want to stay as far from them as possible. They're disgusting slugs." James said emphatically. Lily sighed, shaking her head, apparently used to this outburst. "They'd sell their mothers to the devil if it would get them in good."

Sirius was nodding along with James, but Peter and Remus stayed quiet. Remus likely since he didn't want to encourage his friends' vendettas, but Serena suspected Peter's reasons for staying quiet were all together different.

"They must have some good qualities? No one can be all bad." Serena said, trying to look surprised. She looked at Peter. "Anything at all Peter?" She asked him directly, he squeaked at the question, jumping in his seat.

"Wormtail here isn't used to people asking him questions." Sirius laughed, patting Peter on the back. "He gets nervous. But to answer the question. No. Nothing good at all." He stared Serena straight in the eye, telling her more with that look, more then with words that he was absolutely serious.

For the millionth time, Serena stared at Sirius and wondered how this man could be the same one that Harry had described to her. She really wished that she had come back to the past forewarned that he had been this attractive. She was already finding it difficult to look him in the eye without feeling her stomach do turns. She broke her eyes from his stare and looked instead at Remus, who she found far safer, and who unlike Sirius didn't get under her skin at all.

"So what do you all think of the teachers here? After a week I think I've got them pegged, but sometimes first impressions are wrong." She asked him, smiling slightly at the surprised look on his face.

"Most of them are fine."

"Especially McGonagall." Sirius whistled, winking at the teacher who was at that moment trying to have a conversation with another teacher. She rather commendably ignored Sirius. Serena wasn't so sure she was going to have that ability.

"Anyway..." Remus rolled his eyes. "They're all pretty much okay, the only exception is... "

"Professor Slughorn." Everyone, excepting Lily, said at once.

"He's not that bad..." Lily said, standing up for her Potions teacher.

"Not that bad..." James shook his head, his messy hair falling into his eyes. He pushed it from in front of his glasses and turned to look at Serena. "Lily likes Slughorn, because she is his favourite Potions student. Slughorn though ignores you completely if you don't prove you're worth his attention."

"And all of you don't?" Serena asked surprised. She had expected James at least to have caught Slughorn's eye since he was notorious at least to her, as being able to pick out future star students.

"Well he's tried to get Sirius and I to join his little Slug Club..." James sneered at the name of the club. "But the minute we dropped Potions from our Newt list, he ignored us. He didn't really like us giving up his subject."

"How he could have expected differently I don't know. We all would have failed the OWLs if Lily hadn't been nice enough to help us out a bit." Sirius shuddered at the thought of taking more Potions classes.

"He's really not that bad." Lily said directly to Serena, ignoring all the boys.

"Hmm..." She nodded, but her attention had strayed once again to the Slytherin table, where she was watching Snape and Malfoy carefully. An idea had clicked in her head. If Peter Pettigrew had been involved with Voldemort, then he must have made his connection to the death eaters here at Hogwarts. It was highly likely that the connection had been made with one of those two...

Sirius propped his head on his hand and watched the girl sitting across from him. His blatant staring though was completely ignored since she was staring off the side at something. The raven haired man found himself intrigued and highly confused by this girl who had suddenly shown up only a week ago. She was, as Moony had pointed out more then a few times, extremely pretty. Her hair fell in auburn wavy curls down her back, which he had already noticed she had trouble keeping out of her face since she kept pushing it back. It really was her eyes though that were striking, since they were a bright purple colour, that he had never seen before. Of course add to all that her pert nose with it's few freckles sprinkled over it, her full lips, and her even fuller figure, and she was certainly very attractive. But Sirius was entirely used to attractive girls, he had a different one every week or so. The thing about this one was that for some reason she intrigued him. Though that could be because he seemed to have absolutely no affect on her. Quite the opposite in fact, she never looked at him more then she had to, and seemed to get annoyed with him on an hourly basis.

The second day she had been there she had gotten angry with him for making fun of her name, something he didn't understand since her name was funny anyway. The third day he had been given hell because he had played a small prank on her, just setting a frog in her lap. Everyday after that she had found plenty of things wrong with him. His hair was too long, he was slacking off in class, he was disturbing her study time... Every time he even looked at her he found her looking at him, a rather glum expression on her face. He had tried smiling charmingly at her, but she had merely huffed and turned away. He had asked all his friends what he was doing wrong, but none of them had any answer. Lily had just smiled at him, and said 'It's about time', as if he even knew what that meant. The handsome, charming student was intrigued by a girl, and he didn't know what to do about her. He was also worried over Remus' obvious attraction for her. Though he wasn't sure if he was worried for Remus, or for himself.

Blinking away his thoughts, Sirius frowned when he saw Serena was still staring, deep in thought at something. He waved a hand in front of her face.

"You had better not be falling for Malfoy." He said harshly, realizing she was staring at the Slytherins again. In his head he had sounded playful trying to charm Serena into looking at him, but once it passed his lips it sounded harsh and accusatory even to his ears.

Everyone looked at him in shock, including Serena who blinked rather confused, red coming to her face as she turned to glare at Sirius. He had gotten what he wanted, she was looking at him, but certainly not in the way he had intended.

"Who I may or may not be falling for is in no way your business." Serena said angrily, standing up suddenly, angry at the accusation, disgusted even. "I haven't known you that long but you're easy enough to read. You think every girl would be happy to fall in love with you. Any girl who falls for you would be a fool." She turned in a huff and stalked out of the hall, leaving everyone staring at Sirius, who was staring at her retreating back.