I close my eyes, trying to put myself somewhere else. Anywhere but here, your presence, however faded it is at this point, is getting the better of me. Just leave, would you? But I know that if you do, and disappear completely from my mind, I will have nothing left to hold onto, and life will become a desperate free-fall. Better to embrace the abhorrent lifeline than to steer clear and be nothing still without it. So you stay, for now, in my memory, and by my side. Physical closeness never did anything for you, except romantically. You could just as easily speak to someone through their thoughts wherever they were, but when you found yourself in love, you needed to touch that person, to make sure that they were still real. Or was that me? We grew so disgustingly close that it could have been either, and I wouldn't have noticed.

As I boarded the train, that afternoon, and shut the door behind me, I felt for the first time, a sense of freedom. I no longer needed my mother. I no longer answered to her. I no longer was trapped with people I could all but barely stand to be in the same room with. I was on my own. I could take care of myself. I would prove to everyone that had ever said otherwise, that I could be self-sufficient, and come out alright. With this feeling came great confidence I held my head high as I strode down the corridor, trunk in tow.

I peered into random compartments, telling myself to find one without any people, but almost wishing that there would be none left. I had never really had any friends. You were the closest thing I had ever had to a playmate, and I had never had a chance to fully develop my social skills. I hoped to find someone with whom I could exchange secrets, get into mischief, do our homework together- a friend! Until now it had been a sort of foreign concept that I'd forced myself to accept, so that I might one day make it a reality.

And though I longed for someone like this, half of me told me not to, for fear that I'd embarrass myself in some inexcusable way, and thus be shunned by the entire school. That half said to let the people come to me and then they could come and go as they pleased, never affecting me. I shudder when I think how naïve I was.

I came upon a compartment currently housing only one boy, who looked a bit lonely. I stamped out any internal argument as a rush of adrenaline rose up at the sight of someone and encouraged me to enter. I reached out, my hand shaking with anticipation, and slid open the door. I could see the boy's eyes light up as I did so, as though he'd been waiting for someone as well. I smiled, awkwardly, as I stood outside the compartment. Suddenly I was frozen. I didn't know what to do next. The actual presence of a peer, a potential friend, within a five-foot radius of me was so intimidating that it had struck the panic switch inside of me and adhered my feet to the floor.

"Oh Gods, how could I have even thought to do this?" I wondered. "I don't know what to say, I don't know what to do! I don't think I've even ever been this close to actually speaking to someone my own age before… I'm not ready for this. I can't do this for the next seven terms… I suppose I'll go about my school years as a hermit. I'll…I'll hide away in my dormitory, not speak to anyone during the day! The others will think I'm strange, but I suppose it will be a sure way to avoid anything like this awkwardness… Oh Gods, I need to get out of this…but I suppose I should say something…"

I realized then how ludicrous my thoughts were, but failed to send that message to the bit of my mind still racing with them. "Er, anyone else sitting in here?" I asked, praying that the answer would be 'yes', so that I could hurry along and sit somewhere by myself.

"No," answered the boy, clearly not as misanthropic as I. "You can sit here if you like." But he said this in a manner that indicated "Please, please, sit here! I need a friend as well, and I know that we'll become great chums if you'll just talk to me for a bit! If you leave I shall be quite sad and feel depressed enough to be just as unsociable as you appear to be. Give me a chance!" all in one sentence

I felt something like pity towards him and entered the compartment hesitantly. I sat down lightly, feeling almost primly stiff. We sat in maladroit silence for a few moments, stretching to an eternity of regretful thoughts. The odd boy swept his messy black hair out of his eyes and averted them immediately. I took this chance to get a better look at him. He wore round, thick rimmed glasses, and his pure blue eyes seemed clear and innocent. His facial expression held the subtlest hint of subconscious aloofness, giving him a certain attraction factor that was so unintended, it felt unfair.

"So-" I started, determined to find something to talk about; anything to break this horrendous awkwardness, but before I could think of anything to finish my attempt at conversation, the door slid open once again. A boy stood there, skittish-looking and pale, his eyes darting about the compartment in a less than settling manner: "I-I was w-wondering, if, er, well if, that is, if n-no one is, um, well, see, if no one is, erm, s-sitting here, I c-could maybe, sort of, um…" He looked at us with watery blue eyes, pleading for someone to finish the sentence he seemed to have so much trouble stringing together.

The other boy smiled shyly but kindly at him. "You can sit here if that's what you were wondering." The small boy nodded so hard I was just waiting for his neck to snap and his head to fly right off his shoulders and shatter the compartment door. I stifled a giggle at that thought, my hereditary dark sense of humor once again apparent.

The pale boy rushed across the compartment and grabbed my hand, startling me as he shook it vigorously. "Peter P-p-pettigrew," he said breathlessly. I nodded and forced a smile at this frail boy that had struck a tender nerve and triggered something deep within my instincts. I didn't realize for another moment of his nervously haggard breathing that he was waiting for a response.

"Oh!" I said quickly, "Er, Sirius Black."

"Pleasure, what a pleasure!" he gasped, and I realized that he had been grasping my wrist in his sweaty palm the entire time as he began to forcefully shake my hand once again.

"I'm James Potter," spoke up the dark haired boy, and Peter jumped as though he'd forgotten there was someone else in the compartment. He turned quickly to James and shook his hand as well.

"W-wonderful," he said in that frantic way of his, "I was so afraid that I'd be sitting alone the entire ride, and my brothers had told me stories about this train- you know some of the older kids can get rather rough, and I was terribly worried that some of them might disturb me in my compartment, so you know it really is great that you two are here, of course, I expected that the train would be rather full, you see…" He continued on rambling for some time, seeming afraid to stop. James and I exchanged grins and raised eyebrows. Eventually Peter stopped and took a deep breath, looking at each of us in turn. "So what house do you think you'll be in?"

"Slytherin," I replied immediately. It was common knowledge that everyone in my family was in Slytherin house, and as much as I hated them, I figured that tradition would uphold itself and I, too, would be sorted into the only house I'd ever thought of.

James furrowed his eyebrows and looked as though he would say something, but changed his mind. Peter spoke up next. "My family's been mostly a mixture of Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, but my mother's side of the family had quite a few Gryffindors, and I think that my great-great Uncle Andrew was a Slytherin, so I'm not really sure, but I'd love-"

James quickly cut him off, to prevent another endless rant. "I'd love to be in Gryffindor. My mum and dad were both Gryffindors and I hear it's the best house." I was saddened when I heard this, knowing I'd be put in Slytherin, because I'd hoped that James was my chance for a friendship. I figured I'd have to repeat this whole ordeal once again to find someone in my own house.

Before anyone could say more, the compartment door swung open and a group of giggling girls stood there. Adding the opposite sex to the mix was a whole knew level of awkward, and I hastily edged back in my seat, wondering why they were here. The one who had opened the door had short chestnut brown hair and strode with the air of someone who thought they had a great deal of power, despite whether they did or not. She had been talking to a friend over her shoulder, and turned to us, still laughing. Upon seeing us, she seemed startled, as though she hadn't realized we were there before. "Oh!" she exclaimed, and then giggled, as seemed to be every girl's device to fill the moments without words. "I didn't think anyone was in here."

I surveyed her entourage out of the corner of my eye, careful not to let any of them catch me looking and make my existence known. There were four girls behind her, all looking just as cocky and self-confident as the chestnut-haired girl. To her left was a tall-ish blonde with piercing blue eyes who finally stopped her seemingly endless giggling and hastily bit her lip and smoothed her grey pleated skirt.

To the right of the chestnut-haired girl, who I took to be the leader of their group, was a petite girl, who seemed a little more quiet than the others- but not by much. She wore a denim skirt and a half-buttoned white Oxford shirt that her long red hair spilled over like a river of blood.

She was in front of another blond, this one with shorter, thicker and darker blonde hair than the other blonde, and appeared rather more plain than the other beauties. She stood with a mildly interested smile on her face, as if this was not the ideal place she'd like to be at this time. She was averagely attractive, though not very enticing, but somehow she fit with the others. My eyes lingered on her for a moment before moving on to the girl beside her.

She was small in stature and her jet-black hair (dyed, it must have been) was pulled back into two French braids snaking along her head to a tuft of raven hair on either side. Her face held a sort of apathetic look, as though she couldn't care less about what was going on, and was thoroughly focused on something one could assume was nearly trivial.

"So, could we, like, sit here?" asked the blonde in front. My stomach dropped at this comment.

"Everywhere else is full," said the blonde in back, apologetically. It took my mind a minute to comprehend this fact, but James was quicker.

"Yeah! Yeah, of course you can!"

Peter moved as though to rise, assumably to greet each one as enthusiastically as he had us, but luckily, James nonchalantly put a hand on his arm to stop him. The girls smiled as they sat down, shooting cryptic glances at each other and –what else- giggling like we were stand up comedy from the Witching Hour.

"I'm Rhonda," said the girl with short brown hair. Apparently this set a trend for the others who all began to introduce themselves.

"I'm Lily."

"I'm Terralyn."

"I'm Sage."

"I'm Kitty."

I listened and caught most of their names. The dirty-blonde haired girl had sat down next to me and now turned and smiled shyly. "Hi, I'm Sage Tollins."

I was horrified that on my first day in common society I had encountered not one but two situations of the most potential humiliation I'd ever felt in my life. However, I tried not to show this by my face, because I found that a part of me didn't want her to move away from me.

"I'm Sirius," I replied, figuring it was the safest answer with the least amount of words, thus minimizing my chance of embarrassment.

"Sirius…?" she questioned, a curious look on her face.

"Black," I quickly filled in. She nodded politely, but I could tell she didn't recognize the name. Was she perhaps Muggleborn? "So, did the rest of your family attend Hogwarts as well?" I tried to word the question in the most polite and indiscreet way possible.

She laughed in response. "Oh, no. As far as I know, I'm the first in my family to be a witch. My mum wasn't all too sure about letting me come, in fact. She thought it was some sort of joke. But Professor Dumbledore visited with her and I think she was quite smitten."

I laughed, and it felt good to know that I was actually carrying on a successful conversation- with a girl, no less. Sage continued talking, filling the dialogue with the story of how she got here, and I just sat and stared into her eyes, listening intently and nodding. She had beautiful eyes. If the rest of her was rather plain, her eyes were something completely different. They were bright, glowing amber, with rings of green around the edges and specks of blue and yellow spattered about like wildflowers in a meadow. They shined with emotion and spoke along with her voice in a language so mystic, I could only stare and let the words wash over me like a cool ocean wave. A moment later I realized she'd finished her story, and I looked about the compartment.

Peter was sitting rather awkwardly next to the raven-haired girl (Terralyn, I think), who looked like she wanted to strangle him for just sitting there. Rhonda was babbling to James, but he was paying minimal attention to her. Instead, he was gazing at the small redhead (Lily, if I'd heard correctly) with a look of utmost infatuation. I wondered if that's what I looked like gazing at Sage. Suddenly, a horrible thought came to mind.

You. I'd forgotten about you. You had let your unmovable guard off of me for a millisecond, and in that moment, I had broken free. Apparently, you had seen fit to put that wall up again, for now I was in the middle of raging internal war. I was momentarily blown away by my seeming carelessness, but more than that, I was abruptly angry. I was angry at you for having this power over me, not the first time I'd felt this way. I was like a dog whose leash had been lengthened, if only by a foot, and who thought to run free, only to be painfully snapped back by the lead that had not, in fact, disappeared.

I was planning on breaking away from my family when I came here. I hadn't originally included you in this decision, but now that I had experienced a mere taste of what was to come, what with girls – such a pathetically forbidden world- and friends – you couldn't possibly begin to understand that - and all the other promises that Hogwarts held, I saw that you yearned to hold me back. It was then that I began to see that you were not the goddess I had sought you out to be. You were a mere mortal, just as susceptible to life as I was, and all I saw you as now was a jealous bitch who wanted to tear me away from my greatest desire: to be free of anyone's restraints.

Well jolly good for me to figure this all out, but I then realized that I felt no release from your bonds. As though figuring out their evil scheme was enough to banish the villain. You had no intention of letting me go. This anger and frustration was what you lived for. You fed off of it. It seemed absurd to be thinking of this, when, ever since I'd seen you, I'd idolized you. It was a truth I didn't want to believe. I tried to put it out of my mind, knowing that straining on your leash would only bruise my throat, and dwelling on my glimmer of hope that you might one day disappear if I didn't think of you often enough.

When I broke out of these consuming thoughts, I saw James and Peter changing into their school robes, and no girls to be seen. James grinned. "We figured that whatever you were thinking about must be pretty important for you to just…drift off like that, so we decided not to bother you." He and Peter exchanged a smile and I felt myself blush slightly. They must have thought I was dwelling on Sage.

"If only they knew…"