On the first morning, I was woken up by a loud alarm at 7 o' clock sharp.
"AH, SHIT!" Sirius cried out.
"HOW DO WE TURN IT OFF?" James yelled.
"THERE!" I shouted, pointing to a huge alarm clock that was even taller than me and sitting in the corner of the dormitory. I ran up to it and gave it a kick. From that, the alarm stopped.
There was a note stuck to the alarm, saying: This will go off every weekday morning at exactly 7 o' clock.
"Great," Peter grumbled.
"C'mon, let's go down to breakfast," I laughed.
The four of us walked down to the common room and out to the Great Hall. There was bubbly chatter throughout all of the students as they ate through their cereal, toast, eggs, and bacon.
James, Sirius Peter and I joined the rest of Gryffindor at the table, in our robes, which had turned from plain black to Gryffindor-themed overnight. Professor McGonagall came around, handing out our timetables.
"Charms first," I said through a mouthful of cereal.
"Professor Flitwick," an older student told us. "He's pretty chill."
Professor Flitwick, the head of Ravenclaw, was this short little wizard who didn't know how to control a class. He started the class by just giving an introduction to Charms, and eventually everyone got pretty bored and started chatting over the top of Flitwick's long, boring, talk.
After Charms we had Defence Against the Dark Arts and double Transfiguration.
Defence Against the Dark Arts was taught by a young woman who seemed to be in her early twenties, with golden hair tied back into a curly ponytail, lightly tanned skin, and bright brown eyes. Her name was Professor Lancaster, and according to her, this was her first time teaching, after graduating from Hogwarts just two years ago. Despite her lack of experience in teaching and her young age, she was by far the best teacher of the day.
She started the lesson by introducing herself, and getting us to all introduce ourselves to her. She then informed us about the reality of the Dark Arts that were forming, as a Dark Lord named Lord Voldemort was gathering followers.
"The adults on the good side are also forming an army," she told us. "And, when you all graduate, this class should have trained up enough to be able to join this army and fight the Dark Magic."
"Do you fight against the Dark Lord?" Lily Evans asked.
"I did," Professor Lancaster said with a smile. "But then Professor Dumbledore asked me to come teach you lot."
Defence Against the Dark Arts was definitely the best class, in my opinion, and I was very excited to continue studying it for the next seven years.
Transfiguration was taught by the head of Gryffindor, Professor McGonagall.
Unlike Professor Flitwick, McGonagall had the ability to keep the class under control, and if someone spoke when they weren't meant to, she would give them a look that could probably make Lord Voldemort stop was very strict, but very kind, fair, and good at her job.
The next day we were introduced to two new subjects, Potions, and History of Magic.
Potions on a Friday was a double with Slytherin, and was taught by a fat, bald, old man, the Head of Slytherin, Professor Slughorn.
He was kind, and good at Potions, but was a bit of a pushover, and had very obvious favourites. So obvious that at the end of the lesson, he asked Lily, Severus, a girl from Slytherin called Monifa Blanchet, and myself to stay behind.
"See you in a bit," I said to Sirius, James and Peter, shrugging. Once everyone had left, Slughorn spoke to the four of us.
"Mr Snape… Miss Blanchet… Miss Evans… and Mr Lupin!" he said with a smile. "It's a little tradition of mine that whenever the new first years come along, I pick out one boy and one girl from every house to join a club of mine, called the Slug Club. I hope you can all make it to the first meeting this Sunday morning at 8, in my office. Just try and find the slug club members from older grades on Sunday and they'll help you get there. Alright, hope to see you four at the meeting!"
"So… what did Slughorn want you for?" Sirius asked once I'd come out to lunch.
"Wants me to join some club," I shrugged.
James snorted. "Poor you, you're stuck with that greasy, snivelly boy, Snape."
"Snivellus Snape," Sirius said, grinning at me.
Peter and James laughed loudly, but I just rolled my eyes.
"What do you even have against him, honestly?" I asked.
"He's in Slytherin, and overall is just a prat," James scoffed.
"Whatever," I said. "We have a meeting this Sunday morning."
But one other thing was on my mind: Sunday would be the morning after the full moon. I would be physically and mentally exhausted, and most likely bleeding. Usually I needed a full day to recover after the full moon before I could function like a normal person again, to go to this meeting would be incredibly stupid thing to do, I knew that. But I was so desperate for people to like me — to think I was cool, and this meeting was the perfect opportunity to make more friends. The responsible side of my brain was cursing me for these irrational thoughts. It seemed like the responsible side of me was having a huge battle with the desperate, lonely side of me.
Transfiguration was after break, and I couldn't concentrate much with the Battle Royale that was taking place in my head.
After Transfiguration, we had the most boring, slow class in the whole wide world, called History of Magic. It was taught by a ghost, called Professor Binns. He told us to get out a notebook and quill, and take notes as he spoke. And he spoke for the entire lesson.
Sirius and James were both asleep by the end of the lesson, and I was trying to pay attention and take as many notes as I could, but it was hard to concentrate. At the end of the class, he set us an a thousand word essay due next Wednesday.
"How the heck am I meant to do an essay with nothing to go off," Sirius complained.
It was after dinner, and we were all in the dormitory talking about History of Magic.
"Should've taken notes," I said.
"Can you please do it for me Remus… please…!" Sirius ran up to me and was begging on his knees.
"Mine, too!" James cried out.
"Mine too!" Peter said.
"Guys, you should have taken notes!" I said.
"If he was a bit more engaging, maybe we would have," James said, sadly.
I looked down at my friend's begging faces. "Ugh, fine."
"Thank you, Remus!" Sirius stood up and hugged me tightly.
Four thousand words over a weekend which was full of werewolf transformations and some club — how hard could it be?