A young boy stared at a beautiful scarlet steam engine. To him, it seemed like something that should be in a museum. This was not a place he thought he would ever be: Platform 9 3⁄4. It still felt impossible, his brain refusing to agree with his eyes, but it wasn't. He was about to go to Hogwarts.
Lost in thought, he jerked to a stop right before he would have walked into the back of a slightly overweight woman who seemed to be quietly admonishing a boy too quietly to be heard. The boy seemed to be about his age, although much better fed and a bit taller.
That boy. Suddenly his full attention was on the boy with his neck length pitch black hair, and his high cheekboned, aristocratic face. Even with how he was leaning away from whom Remus assumed to be his mother, the defiance burned in his eyes like the last embers of a great fire. At this moment the train whistle blew and Remus rushed past them to board the train so he could grab a compartment that wouldn't be too full. Well, he was excited to be going to Hogwarts. Boarding the train was an act of finality that would completely alter his world. He wondered if any of the purebloods surrounding him had any of the same reservations or if this was just another day since they had always been on the list for Hogwarts.
Not wanting or willing to face rejection Remus moved past the first few train cars pushing toward the back before he even started looking for an empty compartment. He had just found an empty one and sat down after loading his trunk into the luggage rack. When there was a confident knock on the door to his compartment. It was the boy from before:
"Is there any room in here? I'm avoiding my cousin".
Remus gestured across from him: "Feel free."
Now away from the woman, the boy seemed to have an almost puppy-like quality.
" What house do you think you will be in? '' This was said while he was almost bouncing with excitement. "I think I'll be a Gryffindor, I know I 'm not a Ravenclaw, it is possible I could be in Hufflepuff, and I don't know if Slytherin would be good or bad for me."
Just sitting there, Remus was still in complete shock from the rush of words that had come spilling out of this boy. Rarely being allowed to socialize with other kids, he wasn't quite sure how to react. "Well.. umm I don't quite know?" Remus choked out, having those piercing silver-grey eyes trained on him only adding to the stunned effect.
The black-haired boy, taking his hesitation for lack of knowledge, slowed down just a bit; for the first time, Remus saw him stop to think.
"Are you a Mudblood? I can explain any traditions or manors that you may not know" He attempts to ask with at least some tact.
"No, I know about our world; a halfblood,'' Remus looked down just a little, knowing that the boy was a pureblood from some of the things he overheard the boy's mother saying.
Sirius's eyes widened slightly, the realization just hitting him "I am so sorry I should say that no form of blood status matters."
"My name is Sirius Black.'' He held out his hand to shake with a dramatic flourish," And you are?"
Remus reacts slightly to the name but pushes forward. "Remus Lupin,'' he stated simply with some confidence, making sure to shake Sirus's hand firmly.
They continued in a slightly forced silence as Remus returned to his book and Sirius tried to settle in for the journey. This was quite a sight to behold: although so far he was far more polite than most heirs he was clearly used to comfort. Pulling down the smallest of his three trunks from the rack Sirius turned a knob on the side before opening it. Eventually, Sirius picked a book and slowly the atmosphere of the compartment settled.
Remus couldn't get over the fact that he might have the opportunity to make a friend; he just had to figure out how he would explain away his almost monthly disappearance that he had wired out with Dumbledore. Knowing it would come to him, Remus decided to settle in, he could use this time to make a friend. The biggest challenge would be that this potential friend came from the Black family. Even Remus with no knowledge of the politics of the purebloods knew that any member of the black family was likely to murder him on sight. Even if this Black was different from his family, any pureblood would desert him if and when they found out about his true condition.
The journey passed quietly from thereon out: both actually enjoyed the comfort and silence. This was only occasionally broken by Sirius asking dumb questions. Remus would then give well-thought answers to said dumb questions. One of the longest intrusions on Remus's reading was a long explanation of C.S. Lewis triggered by Sirius asking "What witch is that book about?"
Remus was reading The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe. "It's a made-up story - it has nothing to do with any of the witches with whom you would be familiar. He's a muggle author."
Then it was broken by them sharing food, laughter, and a game of Exploding Snap, both fueled by the sweets that Sirius had spent his mother's money on with great glee. At first, Remus had tried to refuse any of the offered sweets as he had been taught by his family to be frugal and to never impose himself.
"I insist you have some", Sirius leaned in as if he was about "If you force me to eat all of this I may explode, and then you will have my death on your hands"
At this Remus let out a slight chuckle "Fine, give me a licorice wand" With those words Remus began to shuffle the deck for the next hand.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door right before it slid open. The doorway was suddenly filled by a tall pale frame with slight and elegant curves, leading to what could only be described as a beautiful face that was sadly ruined by the manic grin splitting it. "There you are little Siri,'' she mockingly crooned with an almost childish sing-song tone.
Remus watched his jaw clench and his playful eyes harden. "Hello Bella, with what right do you disturb the current Scion of your house?" His tone was icy, almost frigid. It would have been a scary way of being replied to if it wasn't coming from an eleven-year-old boy. With the slight cracking of the voice and the small frame it came from, all it did was send this Bella person into a peel of slightly demented laughter.
"Now now, play nice or I won't" Those words made Sirus gulp and sent a chill down Remus's spine. That was when they both noticed that her wand was in her hand tucked up against her wrist.
A small "what do you want?" was forced out through Sirius' gritted teeth.
The response was a giggle: "Just to check on my little cousin and to remind you not to disappoint your family." And with that, she swept away.
Sirius mumbled quietly "My cousin" before putting his head back down, not wanting to say anymore.
With an uncanny understanding, or perhaps both just hoping the other was thinking the same, they stood and turned to start putting on their robes, knowing they would be at Hogwarts in under an hour. Neither felt like talking much, one wondering if they would lose a new friend because of their family and the other unsure if maybe this was a sign that he should run as far as his legs could take him. Or possibly hoping that this new, tentative friend could understand the pain Remus had had to contend with from the ripe age of 7.
As the train pulled into the station, the two boys returned to some of their previous topics; what had started as avoidance of the previous encounter had slowly transformed into Remus arguing that quidditch was dull because the seeker always decided it. Sirius countered as strenuously as just about any pureblood child would, digging deep to bring up every example of a keeper or seeker deciding the match in the last 150 years. The Hogwarts Express slowly came to a full stop, and they began to gather their things slowly moving out of the compartment. Remus quickly turned to make sure all of his belongings were with him as he slipped his tattered copy of Prince Caspian into his pocket.