"Hello there, my name's Lily. Do you mind if I sit here?"


A small young girl had her head poked into the last compartment on the train. She had auburn hair that went just past her chin, and inquisitive green eyes that almost seemed to have a smile of their own. The compartment had just one occupant: a thin young boy with sandy hair that had been staring out the window as if watching the scenery go by, regardless of the fact that the train was still stationary on the platform.


The boy jumped and looked at her. He had dark blue eyes that conveyed kindness, but something sad lurked in them just beyond reach.


"Oh, er, of course not," he replied, still seeming as if he was half lost in thought. Then, regaining his composure, "By all means, do sit down."


"Thanks." Lily dragged her trunk in (which seemed to be larger than she herself was), hoisted it up, and attempted to slide it onto the luggage rack above her head. Unfortunately, it so happened that she was a foot or so too short to accomplish this, and the trunk promptly crashed to the ground.


“Here, let me help you with that,” said the boy, getting up and grabbing one end of the trunk. With the help of his slight height advantage, the seat, and a great deal of pushing and pulling, the two successfully maneuvered the ridiculously heavy trunk onto the rack.


“Merlin, Lily, what have you got in that trunk?” They both collapsed opposite each other next to the window. “It feels like you’ve got ten cauldrons in there!” the boy exclaimed wonderingly.


“Well, I’m a bit new to this whole, er, magic thing, so when we went to�”what’s it called again? Blourish and Flotts?”


“Flourish and Blotts.”


“Right, that’s it! Anyways, after I got my school books, well,” she looked sheepish, “I got a few extras…”


“Yeah and exactly how many is a few?”


Lily mumbled something incoherent.


“Pardon, what was that?”


“Oh fine! About eleven, okay? I like books and I find this whole entire world very fascinating and you can make fun of me for it but I don’t care!” she said with a huff.


“Alright, alright, no need to get so worked up about it. So,” he said with a small smile and change of the subject, “I gather that you’re a muggleborn first year?”


She looked confused. “What’s a muggle?”


“Oh, it’s just someone without magic in them.”


“Oh, then yeah, that sounds about right. What about you?”


“First year, ha-half-” he looked a bit uncomfortable and cleared his throat, “-half-blood. Er, Dad’s a wizard, Mum’s a muggle. Erm, yeah, that’s about it.”


She continued to look expectantly at him. “And…?”


His eyes widened and he almost looked a little frightened. “And what?” he asked nervously.


“Well do you have a name mister first year half-blood?” she asked exasperatedly.


“Oh, right.” He visibly relaxed and stuck out his hand. “Remus J. Lupin at your service.”


“Well if you’re going to get all formal about it we may as well to it properly!” Lily turned her nose up in the air, grasped his hand, and replied in a snooty tone, “Lily Anne Evans at your service.” They calmly shook hands and then burst out laughing. Speaking in a normal voice Lily said, “Alright, Mr. Remus J. Lupin, I told you mine so you have to tell me yours. What does the J stand for?”


Now it was Remus’ turn to mumble incoherently.


“Pardon, what was that?”


“Okay, okay, you win!” He rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically. “It’s Jacob. There, I said it, are you satisfied? Or would you like my parents’ middle names as well?”


She laughed and said, “Oh no that’s quite all right.” Then thoughtfully, “Remus Jacob Lupin. It suits you.”


“Well I’m just overjoyed to have your approval,” he said sourly, though it wasn’t hard to tell that he was fighting back a grin.


Suddenly the door to the compartment was thrown open by a boy with very untidy black hair. He took a moment to glance and the compartment’s occupants, then yelled down the hallway, “Oy! Peter! I’ve found us a compartment!”


Lily frowned slightly at this presumptuous boy as he and his somewhat smaller friend found a place for their trunks and made themselves at home. The raven haired boy sat leaning against the wall next to the door with his legs stretched out on the seat, and the boy he called Peter sat across from him. Peter was probably about Lily’s size, though a bit rounder, with thin brown hair and light blue eyes. He looked at the tousle haired boy expectantly, obviously waiting for him to make the first contact between them and the original occupants. However, the messy haired boy looked like he was in no rush to do any such thing, and almost looked like he was about to doze off when Lily finally spoke.


“Excuse me gentlemen,”�”at this Peter looked at her a little nervously, for she spoke quite coldly, but the black haired boy merely opened his eyes a fraction more from their half closed state to look disinterestedly at her�”“but I was just thinking that it might have been a tad more polite to ask permission to sit here with us rather than just barging in and assuming it was all right, or at least to have had the decency of introducing yourselves seeing as how you found it below you to do the former.”


Peter merely looked quizzically at her, but his bolder friend said, “Nice speech, but completely unnecessary. I mean, would you have turned us away if we had asked?”


“Well, probably not, but�””


“Exactly. See? There’s no problem here.”


Lily huffed angrily but closed her eyes, took several deep breaths, and seemed to be whispering to herself, “Be the bigger person…be the bigger person…be the bigger person…”


Suddenly the insolent young boy, who had closed his eyes as if to fall asleep, interrupted her little calming routine by loudly stating, “I don’t know, that seems like it would be a bit difficult for you. I mean, you’re a little on the short side aren’t you?”


Lily’s eyes flew open and narrowed momentarily, before she put on a blank face and said with as much control as she could through clenched teeth, “I merely meant that it would have been far less rude if you had asked permission, and thus we could have started off this nice little relationship we have going here a little easier. And as it seems you will not be taking the big leap of just telling us your bloody name any time soon, I’ll just go ahead and begin.”


Lily stood up, but before she could do anything else Remus said, “Take it easy Lily.”


“Don’t worry Remus, I’ve got everything under control.” She turned to Peter, who looked quite terrified at being the focus of her attention and who flinched when she took a few quick steps and held out her hand to him. She smiled kindly, and he shook it hesitantly. “Hello there. My name is Lily Anne Evans. I believe I heard that your name is Peter, correct?” He nodded. “Well Peter, I would be most delighted to hear your full name, and that includes your middle name. Go on, I won’t blackmail you with it or anything silly like that.”


Peter flicked his eyes to his friend, who appeared to be fully asleep now, then said, “Peter Philip Pettigrew.”


“Peter Philip Pettigrew,” she repeated thoughtfully. “That’s a good name. I like the alliteration.”


Peter just looked confused, and Remus said, “You know Lily, I think you’re far too smart for your own good.”


She just grinned at him and turned to Peter’s friend. “Excuse me?” He didn’t respond. She poked him a few times. “Hello? I would appreciate it if you would wake up for a minute,” she said a little louder. Still there was no response except for a light snore. Lily rolled her eyes. “Hey! Wake up!” she yelled. He shifted a little, but did not wake up. Lily was getting angry with him now, and was convinced that he was faking just to annoy her. Well, she thought, he’ll soon regret ever messing with me!


So she balled her fist, took aim, and punched him squarely on the arm.


“OUCH!” That woke him up. He looked at her with a combination of pain, anger, and bewilderment. “Merlin, what did you do that for?”


Lily allowed herself a quick smug smile before saying cheerily, “Oh good, you’re awake! I’ve just been introducing myself to your friend Peter. Now, my name is Lily Anne Evans, and I think we’re going to be great friends. What’s your name?” The boy just glared at her. “Well in that case, if you’re going to be like that�”” and she took stance to hit him again.


“Wait! Okay fine, I’ll tell you my name, just don’t punch me again, alright?” Lily crossed her arms and waited. “It’s James Potter. There, happy now?”


“Not quite. Middle name?”


He grinned at her. “Don’t have one,” he said teasingly.


“Liar. Fine, if you won’t tell me then I’ll just make one up for you. I think Harold will do nicely. James Harold Potter.” She looked thoughtful again. “Yes, that will do nicely.”


James looked indignant. “What? You can’t just make up my middle name! That’s ridiculous! Besides,” he added, “Harold is a stupid name,” at which Lily promptly punched him again.


“Oy! What was that for then?”


Lily looked livid. “Harold is my father’s name you dolt!” Then she looked thoughtful again. “But you are partially right. He’s always hated being named Harold, thinks it’s stupid. No, he only lets people call him Harry. James Harry Potter. How’s that then?”


“My name is James Andrew Potter,” he mumbled dejectedly.


Before Lily could reply a whistle sounded and the train began moving away from the platform.


“Oh, it must be eleven o’clock then,” said Lily absently.


“Nice one Sherlock,” James spat sarcastically.


Lily glared but chose not to respond. Then she looked intrigued by something. “Are you a muggleborn, half-blood, or, erm, what would the other one be called?”


“Pureblood,” offered Remus.


“Yeah, okay, muggleborn, half-blood, or pureblood?”


“The Potters are purebloods, though it’s more by chance than actual breeding,” said James. “Why?”


“Oh, well, I was just curious as to how you would know about Sherlock Holmes, that’s all,” said Lily.


James suddenly looked a little embarrassed. “Well,” he said, looking at the floor, “you see, my dad’s really interested in muggle literature, and really just muggles in general, but especially muggle literature, and he’s read a bunch of muggle books to me, and, well, yeah…” he trailed off.


Suddenly Lily burst out laughing, and James turned beet red.


“You don’t have to laugh at me! It’s not really all that funny anyway,” he said with a frown.


Lily only shook her head. “No, no, I’m not laughing at that! I mean, come on, I’m muggleborn for goodness’ sake, I think it’s great that you’ve been exposed like that!” She grinned and fought back another fit of giggles. “It’s just that you seem so embarrassed about your dad reading to you! You just look really funny with your face going all pink and staring at the ground and�”” But she was interrupted by another fit of giggles. James looked quite cross, but before he could snap a reply, the door of the compartment was once again opened. This time there stood in the doorway boy of average height with hair so brown that it was almost black and stormy grey eyes that seemed to be filled with laughter.


“Hullo, mind if I join you? My compartment was filled with a bunch of my nasty cousins, and they’re really no fun.” He spotted the look on James’ face. “Oy, what’s wrong with you? If you want me to go so badly, you’ve just got to say so. No use having a hissy fit about it!”


“No, it’s fine, you can stay. Evans here was just making fun of me about something stupid�””


“I was not making fun of you, silly,” Lily interjected in a placating tone. “I apologize for laughing at you. There’s really no reason to be so upset though. You did look a little funny!”


“Lily,” Remus whispered, “I don’t really think that’s helping.”


“Well, either way, we’ve got a new compartment-mate and we must complete the formalities!”


So Lily went through the process of finding out the new boy’s middle name and introducing him to everyone else. They discovered that his name was Sirius Orion Black and a pureblooded first year. James perked up upon hearing the name “Black.”


“You’re a Black?” he asked cautiously. “Isn’t your family, like, insane about purity of blood?”


“Well, if you are as well, then you may as well know right now that I am a muggleborn, and proud of it,” said Lily haughtily.


Surprising everyone, Sirius suddenly looked excited. “Wow, really? You’re muggleborn? That’s so cool! My mum’s never let me actually meet one before. Actually, now that I think about it, I’ve really only met a few half-bloods, and the rest have all been purebloods. So you grew up with muggles and didn’t know you were magical?” Lily nodded, and Sirius gazed at her with wonderment. “Wicked!”


Lily laughed at his awe and said, “Well, Sirius Orion Black, you seem like a pretty decent chap to me. Just as long as you don’t have a problem with me, I don’t have a problem with you.”


Sirius smiled charmingly and started to say something, but was interrupted by James saying, “Really Sirius, mate, you don’t want to get too friendly with this one. She’s really quite the snippety little wench.”


Lily looked indignant. “I beg your pardon!” she cried.


But Sirius only shook his head and sighed, looking at James with pity in his eyes. “James, you’re getting your education off too a really bad start. If you want to get any girls at all while we’re at school, you’re going to have to learn to at least be a bit less rude to them.” He grinned mischievously. “Or at least to their faces.”


Lily clicked her tongue disapprovingly and looked out the window. James frowned at her and said to Sirius while still looking at Lily, “Come on, it’s boring in here, let’s go find something to do.”


Sirius looked at him perplexedly. “Um, James? We’re on a train. What in the world could there possibly be to do?”


Now it was James’ turn to grin mischievously. “I’m sure we’ll find something to amuse ourselves.”


The two began to leave the compartment, but when James saw that Peter was planning to follow, he turned to him and said confidentially, “Hey Peter, maybe you’d better sit this one out. Don’t want you getting hurt or anything.”


Peter looked unnerved. “Erm, hurt?”


Sirius just looked confused. “Hurt, James? Um, once again, we’re on a train. What exactly are you planning on doing?”


James merely shrugged. “Prepare for the worst, I always say.”


When they had departed, Lily immediately blew up. “That stupid little boy! Acting like he’s king of the whole bloody world, just waltzes in here and starts being the rudest prat�””


“Hey,” Peter interrupted in what Lily could only assume he thought was a dominating tone, “don’t talk about James like that! He’s my friend!”


Lily looked at him in pity. “Peter, it’s obvious he just pushes you around. How did you even become friends with him in the first place?”


“Well, I moved near him and his family a few years ago, and since there were no other kids in the neighborhood we ended up playing a lot.” He frowned again. “James is my best friend! He doesn’t push me around!”


Lily sighed and said, “Well, I guess we’ll just have to agree to disagree then. But Peter, at least consider finding a few new friends at Hogwarts. I mean, it’s understandable that you played together when it was just the two of you, but there will be a lot more opportunities for friendships while we’re at Hogwarts. Don’t pass them all up just out of loyalty for James.”


Peter looked determinedly at the wall, and Lily ended up staring out the window. Remus started reading a book, and Peter eventually dozed off. The only sound in the compartment was his quiet snores.


About five minutes later there was a thump outside the compartment. A split second later the door crashed open, waking Peter up, and the two missing boys barreled in.


“QUICK! Shut the door!” Sirius cried frantically. Lily noticed that they both had armfuls of sweets and were extremely out of breath. James slammed it shut and pulled the curtains closed. An eerie calm filled the room, and James and Sirius caught each other’s eye. They immediately burst out laughing.


“That was wicked mate!” James cried excitedly.


Remus, Lily, and Peter looked at them in bewilderment. “What in Merlin’s name did you guys do?” Remus exclaimed wonderingly.


James and Sirius began speaking in rapid succession.


“Well, we went exploring�””


“Found the trolley�””


“Got some candy�””


“Some?” said Lily incredulously. The two went on as if she hadn’t spoken.


“Got a bit hyper�””


“Ran up and down the train�””


“Four times�””


“Sugar high really set in�””


“Found the cousins�””


“Bugged them a bit�””


“Insulted them a lot�””


“Avoided their hexes�””


“Just barely�””


“Ran back down the train�””


“Yelling like madmen�””


“Realized we ran the wrong way�””


“Ran back down the train�””


“Yelling like madmen�””


“Narrowly avoiding the cousins�””


“Ran into the wall�””


“And finally�””


“Found our way back in here,” Sirius finished with a triumphant smile. Then he spotted the mound of sweets they had dumped on the seat. “Hey, candy!” he cried, and began stuffing his face, with James not far behind.


Lily, Remus, and Peter stared at them a bit longer, Peter in awe, Remus in amusement, and Lily in complete bewilderment. After a minute or so Remus picked up a box of Bertie Bott’s Ever Flavored Beans and began munching on them as he read, Peter ate some candy until he fell asleep with a bit of licorice still hanging out of his mouth, and Lily shook her head and muttered just one word to herself before going back to staring out the window.


“Boys.”

A contented silence ensued James and Sirius’ raucous return, only interrupted occasionally by a loud belch from one of the two candy crazed boys. These disruptions always earned a reproving glance from Lily, but, for the most part, the hyperactive boys seemed quite oblivious to her glares. The only proof that either of them ever saw her disapproval was a slight smirk on James’ face after a particularly impressive burp.


A few minutes passed in peace with Lily staring unseeingly out the window, Remus reading, Peter dozing, and the dark haired boys continuing their unhealthy antics, until a slight click of the latched compartment door being tried returned Lily to the present. Looking around, it seemed to Lily that none of the boys had noticed the attempted intrusion. However, this was quickly changed as several loud thumps shook the door. Peter started and gracefully fell off the seat.


“Open up in there,” a muffled voice shouted through the door.


Lily and Remus looked curiously at the door, until they noticed James and Sirius. The two gluttonous boys had frozen in their frenzy and turned their heads slowly to look at the door. They both looked like two deer caught in the headlights: wide-eyed and terrified.


James set down the Chocolate Frog he had been about to eat, and Sirius audibly gulped down the candy in his mouth. “That voice sounds familiar,” he said, his voice shaking slightly.


James got up, crept to the door, and peeked through the curtains. He suddenly sprang back and whispered furiously to Sirius, “It’s them! It’s your cousins!”


Sirius looked stricken. “Quick! Hide!” He and James immediately began scrambling around trying to somehow hide themselves from view. James only paused for a nanosecond to look at Peter, Remus, and Lily and whisper urgently to them, “One of you will have to cover for us!” The three looked at one another.


Peter gallantly reacted first. “One-two-three-not-it!” he cried shrilly, and dove into a corner, apparently trying to get as far from the door as humanly possible. More thumps shook the door.


Remus and Lily stared at each other for a moment before Remus said weakly, “Erm, not it?” Lily merely frowned at him and he amended apologetically, “I’m sorry Lily, but I’m a really bad liar. I’m great at telling when people are lying, but not at actually lying. I don’t think I could pull it off, and I don’t think it would be a good idea, given Sirius and James current relationship with these, er, cousins, for said cousins to find them.”


Lily threw up her hands in exasperation and huffed angrily. “That’s not fair! I mean, I don’t have any reason to defend those two maniacs.” She paused as the cousins banged on the door again and said maniacs’ search became increasingly frantic. She folded her arms and said incredulously, “Fine, if the need arises, I’ll cover for them! But this is completely ridiculous. I mean, we’re in a compartment. Where could they possibly hide?”

---

Six figures stood outside the compartment at the end of the train. One was restless, one almost serenely at ease, one bored, one alert but calm, and one stiffly silent.


“Bella,” whined a frail, sour looking little blond girl, “why are we waiting so long? We know they’re in there! We’ve looked in every other compartment.”


Bellatrix Black tossed her long black hair over her shoulder and smiled sardonically at her younger sister. Though there was only two years difference between them, Bella’s darkened eyes made it seem to be much more. “Cissy,” she crooned, though it was cold and was almost a hiss, “you must have patience. We want to make them squirm, make them surrender and open the door themselves because they can’t stand waiting for their fate any longer, before we pulverize them.”


“She has got a point though, Bellatrix,” said a bored looking boy with platinum blond hair that was leaning against the wall with his arms crossed. “This is getting to be quite tedious. I understand your reasons for waiting, but my patience is waning.”


“Just a little longer, Lucius, and then�”” She was interrupted by the sound of the latch being lifted.


“Finally,” grunted Geoffrey Goyle as his ever present companion Victor Crabbe wrenched open the door. Bellatrix smiled smugly at the group, but it quickly disappeared when she saw who stood in the doorway.


A young girl with thick auburn hair and dark green eyes regarded them coolly. “May I help you?”


A boy with stringy black hair, pallid skin, and a rather large nose recovered first. “We’re looking for two boys that ran in here a few minutes ago. Have you seen them?”


The girl frowned slightly. “There are two boys in here, but neither has left the compartment since the train left the station.”


The boy regarded her suspiciously. “You’re sure of that?”


She looked affronted. “Well, if you don’t believe me, you can come in and look if you’d like.”


Bellatrix stepped forward and, giving the girl a slight push, stood in the doorway of the compartment. She surveyed the room through narrow eyes, but the girl seemed to be telling the truth. A boy sitting next to the window with an open book in his lap was looking at her with a puzzled expression on his face, while another plumper boy sat rigidly as close to the wall as he could across from him and appeared to be having a rather intense staring contest with the floor. She noted with a smirk of satisfaction a bead of sweat trickle down the side of his face. However, it quickly disappeared when she realized that her younger cousin and his obnoxious friend still eluded her. She rounded on the girl and quickly interrogated her.


“Why was the door locked?”


“We were hoping for some privacy.”


“And the curtains closed?”


“I find people walking past the window quite distracting.”


“Why are there five trunks for only three passengers?” Bellatrix looked triumphant, but this bold little girl didn’t miss a beat.


“There were two other girls in here. They left a while ago because Peter kept farting.” Peter’s eyes widened and he turned crimson.


“And why didn’t you leave?”


“I was the only girl smart enough to realize he was making fake fart noises.”


Bellatrix’s eyes flicked to the seat. “And what about all this candy?”


“Peter’s mum didn’t want him to go hungry before the trolley came round.”


Bellatrix swept the compartment with her eyes once more, glared at the girl, then lead the way back down the train. The others followed, except for the pale faced boy. He stood in the doorway for another moment, staring at the girl. She stubbornly held his gaze for a few seconds before he narrowed his eyes and spat in a low voice, “Liar.” Then he, too, was gone.

---

No one moved in the compartment for a full minute. Finally, Remus got up, made his way around the still standing Lily, and poked his head out the door. He shut it, latched it, and made sure the curtains were firmly shut before turning, looking around the compartment, and saying in a low voice, “They’re gone.”


Lily immediately collapsed on the seat looking dazed and muttering something that distinctly sounded like, “Boys. How did I end up in a compartment by myself with four other boys?”, Peter gave an audible sigh of relief, and, after a bit of rustling, clanging, and noises of discomfort coming from the direction of the ceiling, the two dark haired boys tumbled down from the luggage rack into a heap in the middle of the compartment. They remained tangled for a moment before sitting up on the floor with their backs leaning against the seats. James spoke first.


“Merlin, it’s lucky we’re so skinny, mate, or we wouldn’t have fit behind the trunks and we’d be dragon food right now.”


“Yeah,” echoed Sirius hollowly, “dragon food.” He suddenly snapped to attention as if awakened from a reverie. “James?”


“Yeah?”


“I don’t think we should leave the compartment any more before we get to Hogwarts.”


“Good plan, Sirius, good plan.”


They both jumped when Lily cleared her throat loudly. She looked at them meaningfully. James only frowned in confusion.


“What’s gone and crawled up your bum then, Evans?”


Lily couldn’t take it any longer. “Well I think I deserve just a little bit of thanks for saving both your stupid arses from being completely obliterated!” she exploded in anger.


James only grinned ignorantly. “Blimey, Evans, you’ve been cursing like a sailor this whole trip! Bloody this and arse that.” He put on a concerned visage. “You should really try to control your language a bit more.”


Lily looked as if she was about to burst when Sirius stood up, kneeled in front of her, laid his hands calmingly over her clenched fists, and said in a solemn tone, “On behalf of both myself and my esteemed colleague here, I do thank thee, fair Lady Lily, for aiding us in our time of peril.”


Lily’s frown lessened just a bit as she took in Sirius’ mock gallantry. “Fine. But you guys owe me. Big time.”


“Of course! Your wish is our command! You need only ask and�””


Lily’s eyes snapped to James, who hadn’t been paying any attention to Sirius’ thanks and had returned to eating candy, and she interrupted coolly with narrowed eyes, “Especially you, Potter.”


James looked at her with a frown. “What are you on about now Evans? Sirius and I were both in the same amount of trouble�””


“�”and yet he was the only one with the decency and/or intelligence to thank me for helping you two loonies when I had absolutely no reason to! And thus I deem it fair that when I call upon you to fulfill the favors you owe me, you must complete the bigger favor. Fair? Yes, I think so.” She turned to Sirius to signify that the conversation between herself and James was officially over.


“Whatever,” James muttered. His disposition seemed to have taken a turn for the worse. He stopped eating candy, which was a miracle in itself, and took up Lily’s previous position of staring out the window silently, yet another wonder.


Lily interrupted the sudden silence. “Sirius, exactly how many cousins do you have at Hogwarts? I mean, if you have many more than what we saw just now, it seems like you’re going to have a bit of trouble keeping yourself from bodily harm,” she reasoned.


“Well,” he amended, “I guess it’s not entirely true that they’re all my cousins. Officially, at the moment, of that group, only Narcissa and Bellatrix were really my cousins. I’ve kind of lost count of how many I actually have, but it really doesn’t matter how many are legally related to me. First off, any that aren’t my cousins now will probably end up being related to me sooner or later, and secondly, all my family’s in Slytherin, so I usually just group them all together.” He grinned. “It’s easier to just consider them all related to me than to actually figure out which ones really are.” Suddenly his face fell and he went quiet.


“What?” asked Lily concernedly. “What’s wrong?”


Sirius hesitated, then said haltingly, “Well, it’s just, you know, it’s like I said. All my family’s been in Slytherin. But, I guess maybe you’ve noticed,” he gave a small feeble smile, “I don’t exactly get on well with my family. But there’s never been a Black at Hogwarts that wasn’t put in Slytherin.”


“Oh, I remember reading about Slytherin! That’s one of the four Hogwarts houses, right?” Lily asked eagerly.


“Yeah. Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin.” He sighed dejectedly. “I don’t think it’d be any fun being in Slytherin, but blimey, my family would go ape if I was put anywhere else. Especially Gryffindor. I dunno if you’ve heard, but Slytherins and Gryffindors don’t exactly think of each other very fondly.”


Lily thought for a moment, then spoke. “You know Sirius, I don’t think you should worry about it too much,” she advised. “I mean, judging by what I’ve read of how we get sorted, you’ll end up where you belong. Maybe it’ll be Slytherin, maybe one of the others. But you know what? When I compare you to all those lovely Slytherins that I just had the pleasure of chatting with, you don’t seem anything like them. So maybe your family might become a bit, er, distraught. But I can tell you now, if you’re happy wherever you end up, then that’s what’s important, not what your family thinks.”


Sirius had listened quietly throughout, and now a smile slowly lit up his face. “Thanks Lily,” he said. “That really means a lot to me.”


She smiled warmly, then gasped and looked down at the seat between them. Sirius had crept his hand over until it was grasping her own. She looked at him in surprise, only to find him meeting her gaze with a grin. Lily blushed and smiled shyly, fitting her slightly smaller hand into his.


The other occupants of the compartment, for the most part, seemed oblivious to this little exchange. The only evidence that any of them had noticed it was a slight smile on Remus’ face as he read and a distinctly sour look on James’. Peter, however, slept on.