Accomplices

Chapter 3: Troublemakers

September 1st, 1975

Hagrid had woken me up early today. He took me to King's Cross Station to catch the train to Hogwarts. It was to leave at 11 and it was currently 10:36 a.m. Hagrid said the train was at Platform 9 ¾. I didn't understand what he meant, since there was no such thing but it wasn't until we had gone there that I understood. Going through the wall wasn't the worst thing in the world but it definitely caught me off guard. Maybe Hagrid telling me to run into the wall without explanation would cause anyone confusion.

Through the wall, there were multiple children around my age, some older and some young, gathered around their families saying their farewells. I turned to Hargrid to give him one last word before boarding the train.

"Well, jus' take this train here and it'll lead yer straight ter Hogwarts. I'll meet yer there once you've arrived."

I nodded, "Thank you for your help Hagrid. I'll see you soon."

I shook his hand and walked off to board the train. With one last look at Hagrid and one last wave I hopped on. There were a few kids walking back and forth near me but since I was one of the last group of people to board there wasn't much traffic. Unfortunately, there appeared to be only full compartments near me. I walked down the aisles for a couple of minutes until I finally arrived at the last one that was completely empty. Before I could enter, I heard loud voices from behind and turned to see who it had come from.

"I told you we should've gotten on earlier, Padfoot! Now all the compartments are full" said a tall, dark haired boy leading their pack.

"It's not my fault Moony was running late!" said another, trailing closely behind him.

"In my defense-" piped up a third voice.

"Oh, shut it Moony!" said the first two boys together.

I saw they were heading in my direction and in order to avoid the awkwardness of having to explain my stares I jumped inside the compartment quickly and sat down. I sat near the window and avoided eye contact with the door, hoping the boys would see the room was occupied and pass by to find another. Unfortunately for me, that was not the case and they opened the door.

"Um, excuse me?" a voice called. I turned my head to see the dark haired boy from earlier with 3 others right behind him. "Do you mind if we join you? I'm sorry to bother you but every other compartment appears to be full."

At this point, there was no avoiding them so I nodded, gesturing for them to have a seat. The four boys walked in, with two sitting across from me and two sitting next to me. I leaned even farther towards the wall, trying my best to stay away from the boy next to me. It's not that there was anything odd about him, he seemed fairly normal. He was the first boy, the one who had spoken to me, with dark black hair (that stood up in strange and random places) and glasses. Again, he seemed fine, however I wanted to limit my interaction with others as much as possible.

"And who might you be?" said the boy across from me.

I looked towards him. He was the boy who had been referred to as 'Padfoot'. He also had dark black hair but his was much longer. Yet, what kept me from thinking he was perfectly normal was his face. His grey eyes shone with a glint of mischief in them and his eyebrows were raised questioningly. Finally, his smirk. His smirk seemed to be permanently plastered onto his face and for a second, just a millisecond, something in me wanted to wipe it clean off. Instantly, I didn't want any interaction with him.

"Wouldn't you like to know?" I said.

"Oh?" Sirius raised an eyebrow, "is that an accent I hear? An American perhaps? How fun."