Crime of the Century | Remus Lupin (o.h)

Chapter Two

The platform was alive with families waving goodbye to their children who were off for another year at Hogwarts. As Estrella exited the bathroom on the train, pushing her wet hair out of her eyes, she could clearly separate the first years from the rest of the students. It was always so obvious, the leg-holding, the tears on both the student's and parent's account and of course the million goodbyes. 

Estrella had no one to say goodbye to when she was a first-year, she hadn't even known the Wizarding World even existed until a few weeks before she had found herself on the platform. 

It was overwhelming, to say the least, but the faculty at Hogwarts had always tried to make the orphan as comfortable as possible and had placed special modifications to adapt to her lifestyle.  But even the teachers didn't know the true extent of Estrella's past, her family, what had happened, nothing. But Estrella didn't even have those answers herself. All she had was her wit, instincts, determination and an unhealthy lying habit which had got her out of too many difficult situations in the past. 

"Estrella!" A voice called from down the passageway of the train and before she could even respond she had already been pulled into the nearest empty compartment by the bubbly blonde. 

"It feels like it's been forever!" The same voice called out again, the face of Bridget Lynx swimming into view. 

"That's because she didn't respond to our letters once again." Alastair Latimer, the other half of Estrella's friendship group added. "Where do they even go? Do you just not get them? Or too lazy to respond."

Estrella cringed internally thinking of all the letters than must turn up every holiday to that abandoned cottage just out of London. The fake address had been one of the first lies to conceal her life and it had stuck true even after all these years. 

"Yeah, I was really busy these holidays, sorry. My mum has just gotten a new job so it was just a lot of helping her to prepare." 

"Didn't your mum get a new job last summer?" Alastair asked suspiciously. 

"Aha, yeah. Lots of job hunting for her."

Alastair and Bridget quickly shared a look, opening their mouths to probe further but thankfully the train took that exact moment to depart, giving Estrella to breathe out a sigh of relief.  

She hated lying to her two only friends but she knew that admitting to them what was really going on, the fact that she didn't have the loving family life or the two-story house. She had absolutely nothing. And for Estrella, she didn't want to risk her friendship with Alastair and Bridget over such trivial details. 

Once Bridget and Alastair were finished waving frantically at the rapidly disappearing platform, they finally turned back to Estrella, all previous thoughts of a discussion disappearing just as quickly as they had appeared. 

"So, how were the holidays for the two of you?"

By the time the train had pulled into Hogsmeade Station, night had already set in. Brightly lit lanterns had been put in the path towards the horseless drawn carriages, they created a nice atmosphere a lot better than last year when the rain had automatically put a damp spot on everyone's excitement for the new year. 

Climbing into one of the carriages which happened to be empty, Estrella rested a fist against her jaw, watching as other students climbed into the other carriages, eager for her first glimpse of the castle, her second home. From there it would just be the welcome back feast which had Estrella's stomach clench in anticipation before she would finally have the best night's sleep that she had had in the last two months. 

One by one the carriages pulled out, however, the carriage that Estrella, Bridget, and Alastair hadn't moved until of course they were joined by four others, because they of course just had the best luck in the world apparently. 

Estrella wasn't a stranger by far to the popularity and reputation that came with the four boys sat across from them. God, even the first years had heard of them before they had even made it to the castle for the first time. James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew weren't worth a second of her time and Estrella was quite content with ignoring the newcomers to return to her previous position but of course, she never had such luck. 

The carriage bumped its way up to the castle as Estrella was counting down the minutes until they arrived at the castle. It was bad enough that she actually had to share a house and year level with them but she truly didn't want anything to do with any of them. They were tricksters, practical gods in their own minds, they had absolutely everything handed to all of them on a silver platter and it ignored Estrella to no end. The only two that she could nearly tolerate were, of course, Remus Lupin and Peter Pettigrew. They actually cared about their studies and work although Estrella did often wonder if Remus' position as Prefec was a ploy just for the boys to get away with even more. 

Estrella knew that she wasn't exactly a model for such behavior but at least she still attempted to make things right by making more deserving people happy. 

But at the end of the day, none of them appreciated the opportunities given to them and unfortunately, it didn't look like something any of them would actually learn anytime soon. 

"Hey, you!" A voice called out loudly but as Estrella had already been blocking out the discussion that was occurring between Bridget and Sirius regarding how her holiday were. 

Bridget like what seemed like the vast majority of the female population at Hogwarts had fallen into the bottomless pit that was losing your head to one of the four boys. Her current crush, of course, fell onto the only and only Sirius Black, which explained the reddening of her cheeks. Estrella was already anticipating a word by word recount of the event later on in their dormitory hence she had decided to block it out in the first place. 

"Hey!  You, Miss Little Ray of Sunshine over there! Are you going to join the conversation over here? What's got you so glum?" 

"I'm just thinking about the hundred and one ways that I could throw you out of this carriage right now," Estrella said, her eyes finally shifting from the landscape outside towards the boy. "But if you can think of anyone just let me know, I'll add it to the list."

"Oooh, she's a feisty one, isn't she?"

"Shut your mouth, Black," Estrella replied without missing a beat, never so grateful for the fact that the carriage was finally coming to a stop. "You are all intolerable. I honestly can't believe the amount of stuff you all get away with all the time. Well, have a great evening because I can't bear to be in any of your presences for much longer."

Estrella hurried off the carriage, Alastair and Bridget trailing behind her. 

"What's gotten into you, recently?" Alastair asked. 

"Nothing just needed to let off some steam I guess."

"Great, now Sirius is never going to ask me out, considering my best friend just went off at him and his friends," Bridget complained. 

"Believe me, Bridget, there's plenty of boys out there a hundred times better than Sirius Black. He's really not worth the energy. None of them are.