3. The First Train Ride

The day Lily had been so eagerly awaiting had finally arrived, and she now found herself standing in front of the barrier to Platform 9 ¾. Now that she was here and saying her goodbyes to her parents – who, being non-magical, were unable to pass through the barrier – the fact that she wouldn't be seeing them again for nearly four months dawned on her. The thought saddened her and as she pulled away from her mother's embrace Lily fought back the tears that were threatening to fall.

Wishing her parents could accompany her through the barrier Lily turned away from them and prepared to pass through to the magical world.

The instructions she'd been given had said to walk through the divide between platforms nine and ten, and that it was best done at a fast pace if she was nervous. Lily looked at the solid brick wall. How was she meant to walk through that, and at a fast pace? She couldn't help thinking that the faster she walked at it the more painful it would be when she crashed into it.

Knowing that if she looked back at her parents she wouldn't be able to withhold her tears, Lily grasped the handle of the trolley, took a deep breath, and headed nervously for the brick wall, squeezing her eyes shut just as the trolley was about to make contact with the wall. Except the trolley didn't make contact, it went straight through the wall, as did Lily, her eyes still tightly closed.

When the strange, fuzzy sensation she had felt whilst passing through the barrier had stopped, Lily opened her eyes. She was standing on platform 9 ¾, her parents were nowhere in sight, and she couldn't help but be amazed that she had just walked through a solid brick wall. She was torn between being excited about what other wonders she would discover in the magical world, and nerves at having to discover them without her parents.

Lily made her way towards the bright red steam engine in front of her, her nerves becoming more prominent with every step.

After reaching the train, she lifted her trunk onto it and started dragging it up the corridor in search of a free compartment. Lily's usual confidence had abandoned her, and as she passed groups of friends greeting each other warmly, exchanging holiday stories and news, she couldn't pluck up the courage to ask if she could sit with them. So when, half way along the train, she saw Remus sitting in a compartment on his own she felt relief flood through her. Despite not knowing him well, just the sight of a familiar face cheered her.

'Hello Remus. Do you mind if I join you?' Lily asked, her confidence slowly creeping back.

Not noticing that the door had slid open Remus looked up from the book he was reading in surprise. He wasn't sure whether to feel pleased that Lily liked him enough to share a compartment with him, or annoyed that his plan to keep himself to himself was already failing.

For the last two weeks Remus had spent much of his time thinking about Hogwarts, and how the only way his secret was assured of staying secret was by secluding himself from the other students. He knew that was going to be hard, exceptionally hard, but he also knew that that was the only way to make sure that his secret did not become common knowledge. As much as he wanted to make friends and enjoy his time at Hogwarts, he kept telling himself that it was more important to actually complete his education and not get kicked out. Dumbledore had been kind enough to offer him a place and he, Remus, was not about to ruin the chance that had been given to him.

But, as he looked up at Lily's smiling face, Remus told himself that having company for one train ride was not going to hurt, and he was just going to have to be extra careful about what he said. So he laid his book down on the seat and proceeded to help Lily load her trunk into the luggage rack.

Lily settled into her seat, and as she began talking about herself Remus started to relax. As long as Lily didn't start asking Remus questions there would be no reason for Remus to accidentally say anything that he shouldn't.

Just as Lily was telling Remus about her sister, a short, plump boy appeared in the doorway looking slightly red in the face and thoroughly overexcited.

'I wish mum had put a lightening spell on my trunk, I think she's packed everything but the kitchen sink,' the boy said, smiling widely at Remus and Lily. 'Are these seats free?'

Lily looked at Remus, feeling it wasn't her place to say yes or no since he had been in the compartment first.

'Sure,' Remus replied.

'Thanks, I don't think I could drag this trunk much further. I'm Peter.'

Almost as soon as Peter had sat down, and Remus and Lily had introduced themselves, the door opened again. This time a petite girl stood in the doorway.

'Don't mind if I join you, do you?' she asked, dragging her trunk into the compartment not waiting for an answer.

'Of course not,' Peter replied happily. 'The more the merrier.'

While Lily agreed with Peter, Remus wasn't so sure – although he didn't show it. The girl introduced herself as Abigail, and sat down next to Lily, already chatting excitedly as though she'd known the others all her life.

Having arrived at Kings Cross station much later than they had planned, James Potter and his parents hurried past the muggles waiting for trains on platforms nine and ten, and through the magical barrier to Platform 9¾.

The platform was crowded and noisy, parents calling out last minute instructions and goodbyes to their children. The Hogwarts Express was gleaming in the sunlight, steam billowing from the engine, children waving through the windows. It was due to leave at any minute and James noticed that he was the only student to have not yet boarded the train.

'Come on, James, quick!' Mrs Potter said panicking. She wasn't used to being late and hated being so now.

'You know, Mum, if you had just let me carry the chocolate cake separately we would have been here minutes earlier and we wouldn't have to rush!' James couldn't help but wind his mother up as he and his father followed her, weaving through the crowds of waving parents and empty trolleys towards the Hogwarts Express.

Mrs Potter glanced round at James. 'Nice try, James! If I hadn't insisted on putting it in the trunk, I would never have known you had hidden your broom in there. And you would have been in trouble on your first day at Hogwarts.' Mrs Potter said this with a hint of amusement in her voice.

James had thought he'd been so clever waiting for his mother to have checked and re-checked his trunk before putting his broom in it. But when his mother had emerged from the kitchen with a big tin containing one of her delicious chocolate cakes, James had realised his plan wasn't going to work and started making excuses for his mother not to put it in his trunk. As always, his attempt to fool his mother had failed.

'Ah, son, really it's your fault, not your mother's. If you'd hidden your broom under your other stuff, you wouldn't have needed to waste time making excuses to keep her out of your trunk and she never would have discovered it. You've so much to learn.'

James laughed as his father winked at him with a grin.

'Don't encourage him, Harold. He's mischievous enough without your help.' Now standing in front of the train, Mrs Potter turned and hit her husband playfully on the arm.

While James tried to stifle his laughter, Mr Potter quickly removed the grin from his face, replacing it with a mock apologetic look, and set about loading James's trunk and owl cage onto the train.

'I'm going to miss you,' Mrs Potter said, pulling James into an embrace. 'It's going to be so quiet around the house without you, too quiet!'

James squeezed his mother a bit tighter. He would miss his mother, a lot, but at the same time he couldn't wait to get to Hogwarts, and mix with wizards his age. At home the only magical children he mixed with were his parents' friends' children, and they were all quite a bit older with completely different interests to him.

'You will write, won't you?' James could see his mother's eyes glistening with tears as she released him from the embrace.

'Of course I will, every week.' James said.

'Make sure you do! Now go on, get on that train.'

After kissing his mother on the cheek, having his hair ruffled by his dad and getting the expected warning to be good, James stepped onto the train, pulling the door closed behind him just as the whistle sounded. As the Hogwarts Express pulled slowly out of the station, James stood at the window waving to his parents.

Once the train had rounded the bend and his parents were no longer in sight, James turned away from the window, picking up his trunk and owl cage. Nearly all the students had settled into their compartments now, and as he made his way along the corridor James began to regret waving to his parents for so long. He didn't much fancy spending the whole journey to Hogwarts sitting on his trunk in the corridor, but that was preferable, he thought, to spending the journey with a bunch of giggling girls or boring, prefect wannabe's – which the only compartments with any space left seemed to be occupied by.

At the very end of the train James was relieved to finally find a compartment with only one occupant; an occupant who was neither a giggly girl nor, from the look of it, a bookworm. The raven haired boy was slouched back in his seat, feet rested on the seat opposite him, twirling his wand in his fingers.

James slid the door open and poked his head in. 'Alright if I join you?'

The boy turned away from the window, pausing in his wand twirling. He looked James up and down, as though sizing him up, before nodding. 'Sure.'

'Thanks,' James said, dragging his trunk into the compartment and lifting it onto the overhead storage rack, along with his fluff ball of an owl. 'I'm James Potter.'

'Sirius Black,' the boy replied, resuming his wand twirling.

'Are you a first year too?' James asked, throwing himself into the seat opposite Sirius.

'Yeah, at last I'm off to Hogwarts.'

'I couldn't wait to come either; I've been driving my mum mad for the last month,' James said. 'I think she's actually quite glad I've finally left.'

James's jovial tone indicated that he didn't really believe that. Sirius, on the other hand, felt pretty sure that his mother was glad to see the back of him.

'So what house do you want to be in?' Sirius asked, changing the subject.

'Gryffindor,' James replied, not needing to think about his answer. 'My dad was in Gryffindor, and he says it's the best house to be in. Mum disagrees though. She was a Ravenclaw, and I think she'd rather me follow her footsteps than my dad's. Though really, I don't think they care which house I'm sorted into as long as I behave myself.'

'And she thinks that being in Ravenclaw would make you better behaved?' Sirius snorted.

'Well, maybe she thinks I'll become a bookworm,' James replied with a shrug. 'What about you?'

Sirius shifted in his seat slightly before he replied. 'I guess Gryffindor would be good.'

'Were your parents in Gryffindor then?'

Sirius snorted again, his face filled with amusement. 'No! They were in Slytherin. In fact, my whole family has been for many generations.'

'So why do you want to be in Gryffindor?' James asked in confusion. He would be proud to be in the house that either of his parents had been in.

'Well, I have been told many times that I should, no sorry, that I will be sorted into Slytherin.' Sirius grinned. 'Let's just say I don't like being told what to do.'

James seemed more than satisfied with that answer and grinned back at Sirius, feeling that he and this boy were going to get on rather well.

'Do you know anyone else at Hogwarts?'

'Only my cousin Narcissa, who, I'm sure, has been given her orders to keep an eye on me.' Sirius answered, his eyes darkening slightly despite his smile. 'She even tried to make me sit with her today, but, as I said, I don't like being told what to do. That'll probably be the first thing she writes home to mother about!'

James felt sorry for Sirius. He couldn't imagine having someone spy on him and reporting his every move to his parents. He remained silent for a few moments, until an idea began to form in his head.

'Are you up for a bit of fun then? Give your cousin something to actually write home about?' James asked, his eyes lighting up with mischief.

'Of course! What do you have in mind?' Sirius leant forward in his seat, intrigued by what James had planned.

'Well, I have a box of Persistent Pong Dung Bombs I've been dying to try!'

The train was now trundling speedily through the grassy meadows of the countryside, the witch with the food trolley had been and they were well on their way to Hogwarts. Abigail had hardly let Lily, Peter or Remus say a word since she had joined them, and was now telling them about receiving her letter.

Lily listened with interest, every so often popping a Bertie Botts Every Flavour Bean in her mouth.

'I didn't believe it at first, I chucked my letter in the bin. It wasn't until Professor McGonagall showed up at my house and made the plates and cutlery dance around on the dining room table that I realised it was real.'

'Really?' Lily asked, amazed that a professor had actually been to Abigail's house and performed magic for her. 'Wow, I almost wish I'd thrown my letter away now, just so I could have had a demonstration.'

'Well, you'll be getting lots of demonstrations soon,' Peter stated in a muffled voice, having just stuffed a Chocolate Frog in his mouth, 'and doing it yourself too!'

'That's very true, Peter,' Lily laughed, offering her Every Flavour Beans around. 'I'm really nervous about actually doing magic though. I spent the last two weeks reading all my new text books so that I'm not completely clueless when it comes to actually doing the spells.'

'Really?' Abigail asked in amazement. 'I spent the last weeks of my holiday having fun with my friends. Magic can't be that hard, you just have to wave your wand and say a few words, I don't know what you're worried about.'

Remus, who had been happily sitting silently listening to the conversation going on around him, raised his eyebrows at Abigail's statement. She was going to have quite a shock when she started her lessons, he thought. If only magic was that simple. He decided not to say anything though, he had a feeling Abigail wouldn't believe him anyway if he told her just how hard performing magic was.

Peter was thinking exactly the same thing as Remus. Even though he'd been brought up around magic, he was still worried about not being able to perform magic as well as the other students. He too had spent most of his free time over the holidays reading through his text books but, unlike Lily, he didn't think it was going to help him be any less clueless when it came to the lessons.

While Lily hoped that Abigail was right, that magic wouldn't be too difficult, she knew that if it required seven years of teaching it wasn't going to be as easy as Abigail seemed to think. And from the looks on Peter's and Remus's faces, Lily could tell she was right.

'Well, I hope it's not too difficult,' was all she said to Abigail though.

Abigail was about to say something but stopped at the sound of laughter coming from outside, and turned to look out of the window into the corridor instead. Lily followed her gaze just in time to see two dark haired boys running up the corridor.

James and Sirius burst into the end compartment, breathless from running and laughter, and threw themselves into their seats.

'I've always thought Narcissa looked like she had a bad smell under her nose,' Sirius said through his laughter. 'Now she really does!'

Both boys started laughing even harder. Their plan had been executed perfectly, much better than they had thought. The door of the compartment had been left slightly ajar, enabling Sirius and James to slip the dung bombs into the compartment un-noticed and get far enough away before they actually went off.

The Persistent Pong Dung Bombs would now be letting off a horrendous stench which would linger on the clothes, hair and skin of all the occupants of that compartment for at least twenty four hours. The thought of it filled Sirius with joy, and left him eager to plot his next attempt at revenge. And he was pretty sure James would be more than willing to be his accomplice.

'I wonder when the witch with the food trolley will be round,' Sirius said as the laughter died down.

'I think we missed her,' James said. 'We ran passed her a minute ago. I'd have thought you would have noticed that, seeing as you nearly ran into her!'

'Oh yeah, I forgot about that,' Sirius grinned. 'Damn, I'm starving.'

Giggling at how Sirius had managed to forget that he'd nearly sent the trolley witch flying only moments ago, James stood up and reached into his trunk. Pulling out a tin and a pack of cards, he turned back to Sirius.

'Well, it's a good job my mum made me one of her delicious chocolate cakes then, isn't it?' James said, opening the tin and offering it to Sirius as he sat down again.

Taking a slice of cake, Sirius said, 'You know, I think this year is going to be even better than I thought.'

James, who had been thinking the same thing, nodded silently as he bit into his piece of cake.

James and Sirius spent the rest of the journey playing Exploding Snap, and only remembered to change into their school robes as the Hogwarts Express pulled slowly into Hogsmeade station. By the time they had packed away their things and changed, the train had stopped and most of the students had got off and were making their way out of the station.

After pulling his robes over his head, James ran his fingers through his hair, at which Sirius started laughing.

'I don't know why you're bothering, your hair looked worse before you changed!'

'Well we can't all have shiny, silken locks like you,' James said good-humouredly, grabbing his wand from the seat.

Sirius stroked his hair jokingly and then flicked it out of his face as he turned to leave the compartment. Giggling once more, James hurried after him, jumping off the train onto the lamp lit station.

Both boys looked around them, unsure of where they should go, until they noticed an extremely large, hairy man at the other end of the platform, standing twice as tall as the students already gathered around him. Holding a bright lantern, he was summoning the last of the first years in a loud, gruff voice.

Sirius and James hurried down the platform towards him.

They were the last of the first years to reach him, and close up he was larger and hairier than they had first thought. As well as being over twice the height of the first years, he was also nearly as wide as they were tall. His face was almost completely hidden by a tangled mass of black hair and a wild black beard. From behind all the hair, he smiled down at the students, his black eyes glinting in the lantern light.

'Alrigh', I'm Rubeus Hagrid. Now yeh all 'ere, I'll be takin' yeh across the lake to Hogwarts, follow me!'

He led them down a narrow sloping path through a thick cluster of trees, the only light coming from the lantern that Hagrid carried. As they neared the end of the path, the trees began to thin and the path widened until it opened out into a clearing next to a lake, a row of wooden boats lined up on the edge of the water. The castle across the lake stood tall and proud, the turrets and towers protruding high into the sky, the many windows flickering with light, reflected perfectly in the still, glass like, water of the lake. It was an amazing sight, and many of the new students stood staring at it in awe.

When Hagrid ushered them all into the boats, Sirius and James jumped into the nearest one and grinned at each other as they started floating magically across the lake.