Sirius Black
Sirius wakes up in darkness. He isn’t sure what woke him up. The birds aren’t awake yet, and the sun hasn't risen. He shakes his head and sits up. He can figure out what woke him later. He grabs his watch, but could hardly make out what it said. Sirius knows that it’s early. That much is obvious. But how early? Four? Five? The exact time doesn’t really matter. Sirius groans and flops back into bed. He'll probably never get back to sleep.
Instead of sleeping, Sirius thinks of what today would bring. He is going to Hogwarts today, but what then? Will he get sorted into Slytherin like the rest of the Black family? He hopes not. Already he doesn’t like that idea, but his mother is determined that she will see him “bring honour to the House of Black” and “be top of his class”. Sirius isn’t quite sure what he thinks of this. Bringing honour to the House of Black doesn’t seem like much fun, and being the top of his class just sounds like a lot of work-although Sirius probably could be, he just doesn’t want to. Not that his mother cares what he thinks. Honestly, Sirius would have rathered to just make a few close friends and prank everyone he met, but he is pretty sure that his family wouldn't like that idea too much. Oh well. Sirius never really cared what his family thought.
Eventually, Sirius gave up on any idea that he might go back to sleep. By then, a little light had found its way into Sirius’s room. Sirius got out of bed and threw open the window. The fresh breeze did wonders to help wake him up. He then stands in front of his mirror and begins to brush his hair- which was incredibly tangled. Sirius is a fairly good-looking boy, with a slightly pale face, high cheekbones, long black hair and grey eyes.
By the time his hair is unknotted and he is dressed, it is around 6:00. As Sirius wanders downstairs to the kitchen, he starts to feel the excitement sink in. He is actually going to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry! Today! This will be an excellent chance to get away from his family! When he gets to the kitchen, he sees his little brother, Regulus, already there.
“Hello!” Sirius says cheerfully as he perches himself on the counter.
“Good Morning,” Regulus responds dully. He doesn’t want his only sibling to leave.
Just then Walburga Black comes in. She is a strict, 44 year old woman- and Sirius and Regulus’s mother.
“Good morning, boys,” she says. “Sirius, get off the counter and sit at the table like a normal human.” Sirius hops off the counter and sits down at the table.
“When are we leaving for King’s Cross?” Sirius asks as he pours milk into his cereal.
“10:00,” Walburga replies curtly. “Are you packed?
“Yes, Mum,” Sirius responds with an eye roll.
“Don’t you roll your eyes at me! And remember-”
“ Yeah, yeah, try to get into Slytherin, bring honour to my family, don’t associate myself with mud bloods. You’ve only told me about a million times.” Just then Sirius’s father comes in, and breakfast goes as it usually does- Sirius’s mother and father talking about something or another (today it is how outraged they were that Hogwarts let in mudbloods), Regulus listening intently, and Sirius mostly getting forgotten. Sirius is ok with this, as it gives him more time to speculate about Hogwarts.
Eventually, everyone finishes breakfast and Sirius races up to his room. In all honesty, he isn’t completely packed. He still needs to hunt down a Potions book and find a way to hide a bunch of fireworks (he plans to set them off as a celebration for Halloween).
Once he has found the missing Potions book (it was under his bed) he turns his attention towards the fireworks. He doesn’t want them going off too early, so he needs to pack them carefully. After much debating, he finally decides that the best way to hide them is to wrap them carefully in an old blanket and hide it at the bottom of his trunk. By 7:30, Sirius’s trunk is fully packed. He does one last sweep of his room, finds Quidditch Through the Ages , stuffs it in his trunk, then drags his trunk downstairs.
For the next few hours, Sirius tries to keep himself busy. Eventually, he resorts to taking Quidditch Through the Ages back out of his trunk and lying on his bed while reading it. Finally, It was time to go. Sirius felt like he had waited for an eternity.
Once the entire family got to the station, it was 10:40. At the station, Sirius gets a trolley and hoists his trunk onto it. Since he grew up in a wizarding family, he knows all about Platform 9 ¾, and knows to run at the barrier, no matter how hard it looks. On the other side would be Platform 9 ¾, just as his parents had told him it was. Once he gets through, he sees that the platform is crowded and noisy, and there are owls swooping everywhere. On the train tracks, wrapped in smoke and bright scarlet, is the Hogwarts Express.
One by one, the rest of Sirius’s family arrives on the platform.
“Come along,” Walburga says stiffly. She leads her two boys and her husband through the crowd and to a less crowded spot.
“Now listen up….” she started saying, but Sirius wasn’t listening. Instead, he wanders over to the train and stares up at it in wonder. He is amazed at the sheer size of it. How can something possibly be that big? From afar it looked slightly smaller, but it is actually HUGE. Well of course it was. How else would they get all those kids to Hogwarts? Sirius’s staring was cut short by his mother, who grabs his wrist and yanks him back towards her.
“What are you doing?” she screeches, just as the conductor shouts, “Leaving in 5 minutes! 5 minutes!”
“Mum! I gotta go!” Sirius exclaims.
“Fine, but we better not get any letters that you’ve landed yourself in detention for blowing up a toilet or something idiotic like that!” Walburga yells as her oldest son disappears into the train.
Once inside, Sirius breathes a sigh of relief. He is finally away from his nagging family! Sirius makes his way down the train looking for a not-so-full compartment. Eventually, he comes to a compartment with only one boy in it. He is reading a muggle book, with his back leaning against the wall. He has light brown hair, brown eyes, and a light dusting of freckles. He looks like he’s a couple inches taller than Sirius. If Sirius is being totally honest, he is kind of cute.
“Do you mind if I sit here?” Sirius asks. “Everywhere else is full.” The other boy looks up from his book and smiles.
“Not at all. There's plenty of space,” says the boy.
“Thank you. I’m Sirius Black, by the way.”
“Remus Lupin”
“What are you reading?” Sirius asks as he sits down.
“ The Ember in the Forest . It’s quite good. It’s a Fantasy book about elves” Remus explains. Just then, the door opened.
“Hi,” says a boy with black, messy hair that stands up in the back and glasses. “Do you mind if we sit here? Everywhere else is full.”
“Not at all. But what did you mean by ‘we’?” asks Remus.
“It’s just me and Peter,” says the boy as he sits down. A smaller boy with mousy-brown hair scuttles in behind him.
“My name’s James Potter, and this is Peter Pettigrew,”
“Remus Lupin”
“Sirius Black”
“You're part of the Black family?,” asks James.
“Yeah?”
“Huh. I always thought that your family was… you know…” he trails off, but Sirius knows what he was trying to say. Sirius grins.
“Evil? Threatening? Murderous? Hard to deal with? Psychopaths? Yeah, my family does have that sort of vibe to them”
“I was going for bad, but I suppose that works too. No offence or anything, you don’t seem so bad.”
“None taken!” Sirius says brightly. “My family does sorta suck.” James smiles, as if relieved that Sirius wasn’t mad at him. But why should he be? His family is a bunch of evil, threatening, murderous psychopaths. James turns his attention to Remus.
“What are you reading?” he asks.
“It’s a fantasy book about elves. It’s called The Ember in the Forest .”
“Huh. It sounds interesting. Who’s your favourite character?"
“Probably Neka. She's a really awesome assassin moon elf.”
As the train continued on its journey, Sirius began to learn more about the boys he shared a compartment with.
Remus was pretty quiet, but once you got him talking about a book, he could talk forever. Remus was also very smart, and was a half-blood - that meant that one parent was a wizard and the other was a muggle. His birthday was March 10. All the boys were certain that he would be a Ravenclaw- he was certainly smart enough.
James had endless energy, and wanted to play on the school quidditch team. He was a pureblood, and was convinced that he would be a Gryfindor. He also loved pranks, and was amazing at school. His birthday was March 27.
Peter was fairly quiet, and looked up to James a lot. He wasn’t very smart, or very athletic, but he was good at sneaking snacks into his room in the middle of the night. Also, he was James’s neighbour. His birthday was August 30.
At one point during the ride, Sirius and James got into an argument about which was the better quidditch team: the Chudley Cannons or the Holyhead Harpies. The endless banter only stopped when the Trolley Witch came around and asked in her creaky, old voice if they would like anything. James and Sirius both got up and bought as many sweets as they could carry. They dumped it on one of the seats and then sat down. Peter’s eyes gleamed hungrily when he saw the mound of sweats, and even Remus looked up from his book. As they all shared the sweets, Sirius learned something else about Remus- he loved anything chocolate. The four of them all shared a box of Bertie Botts Every Flavor beans. Peter had the absolute worst luck with them, but James always seemed to get the good flavours.