"Right! James, do be good and make sure you behave yourself, and don't let me hear that you've -- you've blown up a toilet or --" "Blown up a toilet? I've never blown up a toilet. Great idea, though, thanks, Mum."
Mrs. Potter looked as though she were on the verge of tears, whether from anger or from pride, James could not tell, although he supposed it could have been both. She was very confusing sometimes, but James loved having her as a mother. Mrs. Potter had begun to push James's trunk onto the Hogwarts express, and James hurried to help her. Mr. Potter was standing close by, talking to a pair of wizards with a slightly annoyed expression on his face, although James could tell he was doing a good job of hiding how angry he really was, as these wizards seemed to have said something quite offensive.
Suddenly, James realized that most of the other children had gotten onto the train already, and he rushed to hug both his parents goodbye.
Once he had hugged both his parents, expressing as much love as he possibly could in those hugs, he had rushed onto the now crowded train and attempted to find a seat. He searched almost the entire train until he found one that was empty, at the very end of the train.
He approached the only student who was sitting in the train, and almost shouted, "I'm James. James Potter. And who are you?" The other child looked extremely confused.
"Why are you shouting?" The boy inquired in a much more quiet and appropriate voice. James thought for a moment. He had not realized he was shouting. He was simply sticking to the promise he had made himself to always act confident at his new school so that he had the best chance of making friends and succeeding, although his parents had told him this was silly, and that he should just be himself.
As the train slowly began to move, James's attention was drawn back to the boy who was already sitting in the compartment, and who had resumed his absentminded staring out the window, which he had been doing before James had arrived and accidentally shouted at him. James tried to be more polite and friendly on his second attempt, asking in a normal voice whether he could sit down in the compartment, and sat down upon receiving a brief nod indicating that he was welcome to. The two boys sat together in an awkward silence for a few moments.
Although he prayed that they would, no good ideas for how to start a conversation popped into James's head, and so he sat in the same awkward silence for almost ten minutes, hoping that the quiet boy would break the silence first. He still sat staring out the window, and James stared at his reflection in the glass. He would have been quite handsome if not for the expression on his face, which James could not quite read, but anyone could tell that it was definitely not a happy expression.
Finally, after what felt like an hour to James but was probably only about ten minutes, the strange boy spoke up. His voice was quiet and contemplative, and hesitant at first, although James's warm expression seemed to encourage the boy to become more confident as he continued. James sat and listened quietly, which he did not usually do.
The boy introduced himself as Sirius Black.
"Brilliant!", James responded in what he hoped was a more normal tone. "Fancy some Chocolate Frogs?"
He smiled and held out the stash of Chocolate Frogs that his parents had packed him. Sirius accepted them with a strange expression on his face. Again, James had never been the best at reading what was going on in other peoples' heads, but he decided not to worry about it.
James set the rest of the Chocolate Frogs on the seat between them, and they began to unwrap them and inspect the cards they had gotten, while munching loudly on the Frogs.
Sirius's face, which had begun slightly happier after he had begun eating the Chocolate Frogs, now fell again. "I got Salazar Slytherin. I don't like him much," he explained to James.
Although James was confused, he did not want to pry, and decided to simply nod and smile. He had not been able to decipher Sirius's cryptic expressions until now, but he realized that Sirius was fully smiling. His smile was wide and he looked hopeful for the first time since James had met him.
They continued to unwrap and eat the Chocolate Frogs, occasionally speaking to each other briefly, until they were interrupted by two people barging into the compartment.
"I don't want to talk to you," the girl was saying, her voice constricted, and James began to listen to their conversation, although he made it seem as if he was completely absorbed in his Chocolate Frogs. "Why not?" The boy replied. "Tuney h-hates me. Because we saw that letter from Dumbledore."
James chanced a glance at the girl, and his breath felt like it had stopped for a moment. Sirius smirked so that only James could see him, and James shoved him lightly in response.
"So what?" James had stopped watching the girl, but he could feel that she was incredibly upset.
"So she's my sister!"
"She's only a --"
"But we're going! This is it! We're off to Hogwarts!"
James caught Sirius's eye, and they grinned at each other. They had spent most of their time together so far eating Chocolate Frogs and comparing their cards, but when they did talk, they had talked mostly about how excited they were to be going to Hogwarts. Sirius looked much very handsome when he was talking about things that he was excited about. Now, they broke eye contact and returned to eavesdropping on the boy and girl.
The girl was stunningly beautiful, with shoulder-length thick, dark red hair and almond-shaped eyes that were the most beautiful shade of green that James had ever seen. The boy, on the other hand, was skinny, with overlong black hair and mismatched clothes, looking distinctly like someone who was either extremely underfed or extremely unhappy.
He finally stopped staring at the girl when he heard the boy mention Slytherin, one of the four Houses at Hogwarts.
"You'd better be in Slytherin," the skinny boy had said.
"Slytherin?"
James seemed to have finally mastered the tone of voice that he had been going for when he approached Sirius earlier, as he saw the slightest bit of intimidation in the eyes of the boy. But the girl, unlike James, Sirius, and her friend, did not seem to be looking for a fight. "Who wants to be in Slytherin? I think I'd leave, wouldn't you?" James asked Sirius.
James's remark was not rewarded with another one of Sirius's rare smiles. "My whole family have been in Slytherin," he said. "Blimey," said James, "and I thought you seemed all right!"
Sirius smiled his wide smile again. "Maybe I'll break the tradition. Where are you heading, if you've got the choice?"
"Gryffindor, where dwell the brave at heart! Like my dad. Got a problem with that?" James asked the boy, who had made a small, disparaging noise.
"No," he replied, "If you'd rather be brawny than brainy ---"
"Where're you hoping to go, seeing as you're neither?" Sirius interjected.
"Come on, Severus, let's find another compartment." The girl had spoken up, and she got up to leave, and while James was quite disappointed to see her go, he followed Sirius's lead and teased the two students as they stomped out the door.
