Well, Phin had officially survived more than a week at Hogwarts, and he thought he was settling in pretty well, all things considered. He was starting to feel more relaxed, at any rate, and he thought he was going to enjoy at least some of his classes--all of them was too much to hope for. But Phin had spent enough time at home with his family to be a professional at suffering his way through unpleasant things, so he'd probably be fine.
(He felt bad just thinking it, but it was true.)
So he'd started off his day in a pretty decent mood on this, the second day of his second week of school, having already gone through all of this routine before. And then the morning mail had arrived, and with it his mother's letter and now Phin was just feeling... confused. He didn't know Jameson Potter very well, having only just meant him in the boats when they came to Hogwarts, but Phin thought he liked him. And he wanted friends. He wanted friends very badly, actually, if he let himself think too hard about it. So he didn't know what to do now.
He was still thinking about this later in the day, when he was leaving Potions and making his way toward the staircase that would take him up out of the dungeons, when he saw his brother coming from the other direction. He crossed the corridor and turned around so he could fall into step with Sirius. He wasn't with any of his friends, so Phin thought it was as good a time to talk to him as any. "Do you know anything about the Potter family?"