Author's Note: I'd say there was a perfectly legitimate reason for writing this, but I would be lying. I'm not one hundred percent sure where this came from, honestly- it just…kinda happened. I've reread and rewritten and retyped this so many times that my head has spun, and I know that there are important things that I've left out, and certain things that I have definitely taken liberties with- especially, as it stands, Tommy-boy's personality. So, I suggest you take this with a grain of salt, or at least, judge it as AU. I haven't researched much of this, you see, timelines, and such… I just…wrote.
In advance, allow me to explain a few things as they pertain to the story: A) All research that I have done has been post-writing session. For example: I am aware that in canon they are in fact, a year apart. For the necessities of this story, however, they are the same age. B) On Tom's personality and relationship to Minerva in this story- this is my thought process: Tom was abandoned, yes, and stuck growing up in an orphanage. He's all alone, and the first time we meet him with Dumbledore… he's kinda a jerk {though kind of doesn't really cover it}. But, the thing is, Dumbledore isn't completely blameless- he's rather foul during the meeting also. So, here you have an orphan who is stuck on a train and doesn't really have a friend in the world and then BAM! Insert Minerva McGonagall, who as a Firstie, I picture as some kind of amalgamation of Fred and George, Sirius and James, and Ron and Hermione. Really! I see her, in her youth at least, as a playful prankster, who has a highly intelligent side and is, as she is a Gryffindor, loyal to her friends and brave of heart. In my mind, he sees this girl who has everything he can ever want, and he just…Well, who can fight against a Gryffindor's stubborn side anyway? Now, you can either look at him as: a) he's a master manipulator or that b) he has a softer side in regards to his closest friend that he didn't even make on purpose. Or, if you don't like either, take this as AU.
I think this may very well be the longest Author's Note I have ever written. Sorry for the rambling, I'm just attempting to explain the unexplainable: my twisted, convoluted mind. Heh. I don't even get myself most of the time. As I write this, also, I'm doing the research that I should have been doing BEFORE I wrote the story, so… I think I have to change my statement to: "Definitely take this story as AU, because I disregard virtually everything JKR has said in interviews (which I admit to never having heard/seen/read before) about Voldemort and McGonagall."
So, yes, before you comment about how a ton of my information is wrong, note that, yes, I understand that a lot of this isn't canon, but in canon, Riddle probably wasn't best friends with Minerva McGonagall.
Nevertheless, please, enjoy the story! :D
~Rose
Disclaimer: I wish, and have always wished, that I owned Harry Potter. Sadly, I do not and am stuck wishing. Harry Potter belongs to JKR as it always has, not to little, 'ole Rose.
Summary: AU. The kinship that might have been (but probably never was): because Lily Evans and Severus Snape were not the first Hogwarts students to have a friendship that spanned warring Houses. Two lifetimes told in one hundred pieces.
One Hundred Things That Might Have Happened to Minerva McGonagall and Tom Riddle
{-or an excuse for Rose to practice her Roman Numerals.}
I. The first time he meets her is on the train to school- he's all alone without anyone to sit with, and she has nowhere to sit except with him. She takes the seat opposite him with a pained, apologetic grimace and begins to ramble about annoying big brothers who don't care enough about their sisters to save them a seat with their friends.
II. They bond over a shared love of chocolate- he immediately falls in love with Chocolate Frogs- and a similar distaste of jelly beans that taste of earwax and vomit. She brought the candy with her, but shares it with him without inhibitions.
III. He doesn't talk much, instead choosing to sit in silence and listen as the girl regales him with tales of flying cutlery, House Elves, talking books, sports played on broomsticks and other wonders of growing up in a magical household with a wizarding family.
IV. He almost falls out of the boat as they sail up to the school but she grabs him by the back of the robes and pulls him back to safety- all the while laughing at his terrible coordination. She knows from that moment on that he will never play Quidditch.
V. From within the mass of other First Years, he watches his new friend stumble her way up to Sorting Hat- did it really just start singing?- her dark hair falling into her eyes and hiding her nervousness from sight.
VI. He tries to tell himself that he isn't the least bit upset when she's Sorted into Gryffindor and he into Slytherin- that he isn't at all disappointed that they aren't together- but he's only lying to himself.
VII. She gets terribly, terribly lost on her first day of classes and winds up bursting into Potions almost ten minutes late. He laughs at her, right alongside the rest of the class and, for a long second, she fears that Slytherin prejudices have already started to sink into him- but then he points to the empty seat next to him and she sits down, much to the shock of the other Slytherins and Gryffindors.
VIII. They share three classes- Potions, Defense Against the Dark Arts and Transfiguration and both are secretly glad that Flying isn't one of them. They won't admit it to each other, but neither one of them is particularly graceful on a broom.
IX. His other friends don't want him to be friends with her, and her brother thinks that he's a bad influence on her, but neither of them listens well to advice.
X. His best subject is Transfiguration, and his worst is Potions. She excels in Potions and is terrible at Transfiguration. Both shine brightly enough in Defense Against the Dark Arts that they can't wait until they're allowed to start Dueling each other.
XI. They fight for the first time when one of his other friend calls her a terrible name and he doesn't stick up for her right away.
XII. Two days later, his apology comes in the form of a box of chocolates and a note that says he hates that she is mad at him.
XIII. She doesn't actually speak to him until he apologizes in person and tells her that he was a git for not standing up for her in the first place and promises that it will never-ever- happen again and can she please forgive him?
XIV. Her response comes the next day in the form of a piece of chocolate, enwrapped in a note that says one word: fine.
XV. She goes home for the Christmas holiday and he stays at school. Come December 25th, he is only mildly surprised to find a present from her at the foot of his bed.
XVI. She's bought him a plush snake and a box of Bertie Bots Every Flavor Beans- with only the disgusting ones left in the container.
XVII. She laughs loudly as she opens her present from him in front of her parents and brother: it's a plush cat and bunch of Chocolate Frogs.
XVIII. They study together for exams by the lake, during the hotter-than-usual spring.
XIX. After two hours of review, she gets bored and pushes him into the lake.
XX. He pulls her in right alongside him.
XXI. A good two and a half hours later finds them in the library, attempting to dry their notes- unfortunately, they realize that their attempts are futile and that the ink and parchment are ruined. Neither one is terribly concerned about it, though- it's not like they actually need the studying.
XXII. They pass their exams with flying colors- first or second in their various classes, depending on what the particular subject was.
XXIII. They part ways at King's Cross- she goes off with her family, promising-swearing-to write him every day and he goes off to find a cab to take him back to the orphanage.
XXIV. She never writes.
XXV. When September rolls around, she finds him sitting on the train, curled up in a compartment all by himself, his nose buried in a Defense book, much like she found him the year before. She takes the seat across from him without saying a word.
XXVI. He doesn't speak to her for an hour and she makes no move to initiate the conversation either.
XXVII. After that hour is up, however, she cannot handle the silence any longer and bursts out in frantic apology: her stupid Gryffindor brother let slip to her parents that she was best friends with a Slytherin and her bigoted, prejudiced parents successfully prevented her from writing to him all summer and would he please accept her apology and bloody talk to her already?
XXVIII. He's so caught up- and unexpectedly touched- by her including the phrase "best friend" in her apology that he can do nothing more than nod mutely in forgiveness.
XXIX. Second Year starts off much the same as the first, albeit with her running into Defense Against the Dark Arts late. This time, after apologizing to the teacher, she takes her seat beside him and begins angrily plotting revenge against Peeves under her breath.
XXX. The professor informs the class that they will begin dueling the following week, and they are pleasantly pleased to discover that they both are really quite as good at it as they assumed that each other would be.
XXXI. They both know that they have other friends besides each other and neither really cares much for the other's-but usually they don't say much about it, and deal with the problems that arise themselves.
XXXII. It is, however, when his other friends hit her with a hex in the hallways before Potions that he realizes- sometime during taking the hex off of her and viciously berating his other friends for initiating a duel in between classes - his other friends really hate her.
XXXIII. She sneaks him into the Gryffindor Common Room that Halloween for a party. She is dressed up as a noble woman out of some fairy tale and he has Transfigured his hair and robes to make himself look like Merlin. To the pair's relief, everyone at the party either doesn't notice that he's a Slytherin, or is too drunk to care.
XXXIV. He discovers that night, that the saying is true: Gryffindors really do throw the wildest parties.
XXXV. That year they don't part ways at Christmastime. Instead, she invites him to come home with her and celebrate the holiday with her and her family.
XXXVI. He reminds her, regretfully, that her parents didn't allow her to write him that summer, to which she responds that after the dressing down she gave them for being prejudiced gits he has nothing to worry about.
XXXVII. When the Knight Bus pulls up to the long, expansive driveway, he feels his jaw bottom out as he stares up at what can only be called a mansion. Next to her, lounging with relaxed ease, her brother laughs at his expression and the death grip he has on his chair, and tells him that he really should see their summer home.
XXXVIII. After touring the seventy roomed home, and throwing his meager trunk into the room he'd be staying in, she tells him, almost embarrassedly, that her family comes from a really old and noble line- that one of her ancestors was a younger son of Godric Gryffindor.
XXXIX. Her parents throw an impressive Christmas party that he, nevertheless, finds himself taking no joy in. That is-until he sees her come down the stairs in glittering green robes that light up her bright green eyes. Suddenly, he notes, everything seems just a little brighter.
XL. He tells her over hors d'oeuvres that she would have made a stunning Slytherin with how great she looks in the green dress robes.
XLI. She is so taken aback by his comment that her face darkens to match the exact shade of Gryffindor scarlet.
XLII. Later, when they are dancing, he watches her hair fall from its elaborate style around her neck in loose curls, and he decides that he much prefers it down around her shoulders.
XLIII. This time, when he tells her as much, she pulls her hair out of the bun immediately and it is his turn to blush fantastically as her hair falls to frame her face.
XLIV. She discovers that he is a Parselmouth when he stops a giant snake-that some drunken fool must've Conjured- from attacking her.
XLV. She is silent for a long moment after the situation calms down, and when she finally does speak to him again, it is to inform him that she is highly unimpressed by the showing of his ability and that he should have done something significantly more impressive to demonstrate it to her.
XLVI. The next morning, he opens his present from her, and she laughs richly, telling him that is amazingly more appropriate than ever.
XLVII. The snake dies in their Fourth Year, but while it is alive, he calls it "Sheshuna" which he tells her means "from the heart."
XLVIII. She names the kitten he has bought her after him.
XLIX. He spends the rest of break getting to know her and her family and discovers, grudgingly, that for a bunch of Gryffindors they aren't so bad.
L. Her brother spends the rest of the break regaling him of prank wars that he and his sister used to have before he left for Hogwarts and some of the more elaborate pranks that she came up with after he started school. He also discovers, for the first time, the awful nickname that tormented her for the entirety of her childhood.
LI. She vows never to forgive her brother for telling and proceeds to call the older boy by an equally embarrassing nickname for the rest of the break- and threatens him with the same should he ever refer to her by the name.
LII. Months later, when they should have been studying for finals and choosing their electives for the next year, she informs him that she has been researching genealogy spells, instead, and that, maybe, by casting one, he can learn more about his family and where his Parseltongue ability comes from: it is after all, she admits, characteristic of Salazar Slytherin himself.
LIII. He casts the spell, alone, in a room that he found one day by himself. He is only partially shocked to discover that his mother, not his father, hails from the Slytherin line itself.
LIV. He never tells her of this revelation, but she figures the secret out easily enough when he starts walking around the school with a greater air of confidence. Eventually, she tells him that since she told him about the spell he has acted like he owns the school itself.
LV. When they begin deciding what courses to take at the end of the year, she contemplates Divination for all of ten minutes until she meets the Divination professor, who watches her with her strangely milky eyes and tells her that one day, she will smile when he dies.
LVI. She never tells anyone about this strange and horrifying (and completely false, of course) prediction.
LVII. He signs up for this class, however, along with Care of Magical Creatures and Ancient Runes. She signs up for Ancient Runes, Muggle Studies- which he thinks is a waste of a class and refuses to take- and Arithmancy. It will be the first year that their schedules are not identical.
LVIII. The next year they debate what forms they would take if they were to become Animagi, but that discussion has such an obvious answer, that it doesn't take much time.
LIX. Shortly thereafter, the discussion changes to a heated talk about which form would be more useful and interesting to become: a cat or a snake.
LX. That year, she finds out that she has a silly interest in anagrams, and she fools around with the letters of his name, and he with hers.
LXI. He comes up with "Vain Mage" with her name and she tells him that he is dreadful at anagrams; she comes up with "Lord Voldemort" with his, and she thinks that it sounds terribly evil.
LXII. This is something that she never forgives herself for.
LXIII. When their Fourth Year, rolls around, it is her brother's last year at Hogwarts and she decides that she will not let him forget it. She spends the entirety of the year pranking the entire school, focusing mainly on her brother and her best friend. In retaliation, the two boys "accidentally" let slip her ridiculous nickname.
LXIV. Its sometime around the beginning of Fifth Year that everyone starts to believe that "best friends" is synonymous with "dating" and the whole school gets it into their heads that the two Prefects simply must be a couple.
LXV. After dealing with the subsequent teasing for months, she finally asks him, shortly before Christmas, if he has any feelings for her more than just as a friend.
LXVI. He tells her not to be ridiculous- they are best friends and his intentions towards her are purely platonic.
LXVII. Her heart breaks so loudly after he replies that she is surprised that he doesn't hear the sound.
LXVIII. She doesn't invite him to for Christmas that year, telling him that the party is at the Potter Manor, and that she hasn't been asked to bring a guest- which is all true, but all she knows is that she is just glad that she doesn't have to face him after such heartbreak.
LXIX. By the time she returns from break, he is dating a fellow Fifth Year Slytherin.
LXX. Her heart breaks again, and she doesn't talk to him for two weeks after she comes back to school.
LXXI. His new girlfriend can't stand the fact that he is best friends with both a girl and a Gryffindor at that, and gives him an ultimatum.
LXXII. To her immense relief, he hasn't fallen so far off the wagon that he picks the girlfriend. He and the girl break it off by mid-March.
LXXIII. Come the spring, and their O.W.L.s, and despite the "just friends" label floating over their relationship, she brushes his cheek with a tiny kiss, and wishes him the best of luck before the Potions exam.
LXXIV. Later, with a laugh, she kisses his lips briefly before the Transfiguration O.W.L., in an unnecessary- because with all the help he has given her, she now rivals him in the subject- hope that some of his skill will brush off on her.
LXXV. Its at King's Cross Station though, in full view of her parents and brother, that he kisses her, dramatically and romantically for the first time, and tells her that maybe a "just friends" label isn't good enough anymore.
LXXVI. They become an official couple right there and then.
LXXVII. They spend more time together that summer, than they ever have before.
LXXVIII. When they get their O.W.L. grades, she is shocked to find that they have matching O's in almost all classes, except for his Divination and her Astronomy grades.
LXXIX. They celebrate these scores by spending a day together at her house.
LXXX. She thinks she can't be called a romantic at heart, but she discover that both he and she are, when he plans a romantic picnic by the lake where they had spent so many overly heated afternoons studying for their exams.
LXXXI. Shortly after school starts again, she watches as he begins to spend more time with his other Slytherin friends than he does with her, and she watches as his behavior begins to change.
LXXXII. She comes to the saddening realization, sometime after Christmas, that the title of girlfriend falls lower on the scale of importance than best friend after he skips a day that they had planned to spend together because he was spending time with one of his other friends.
LXXXIII. It is during their Sixth Year that the Chamber of Secrets is opened, and she watches in horror as students are injured left and right. She, along with the rest of the school, is terrified when the young Ravenclaw girl is killed.
LXXXIV. When he discovers who opened the Chamber of Secrets and what has been let out, she cheers and is proud of him, but can't help but wonder how in the world the Third Year Gryffindor could possibly be responsible. He had always seemed so kind to her.
LXXXV. She breaks up with him right after their final exams and resists the urge to hex him thoroughly, instead, choosing to just tell him, sadly, that the dating aspect of their relationship just wasn't working, and she was the furthest thing from happy that she had ever been.
LXXXVI. They're back to friends, and after the Trace is removed from her magic, she Apparates both of them to Diagon Alley to shop for their school supplies at the end of the summer.
LXXXVII. To celebrate his appointment of Head Boy, she buys him a new snake, which she names for him: Nagini. To celebrate her appointment of Head Girl, he buys her a pretty golden necklace with his earnings from a new job he takes that summer.
LXXXVIII. That year, their interests and studies begin drifting apart. She begins taking extra classes with their Transfiguration teacher, as she hopes to eventually teach the subject herself-as she has found, after getting a hang of the subject that she greatly enjoys it-, and he begins immersing himself deeper and deeper into the Dark Arts and their Defense as he spends more and more time with his other friends- and it is during that year, that she notices a truly terrible change in him.
LXXXIX. They both graduate with the highest number of N.E.W.T.s in their Year, and as the first and second in their class: he is first, she is second. They part ways after graduation, touching base with each other only occasionally, and eventually, after a thirteen year friendship- including almost six years of barely speaking, cease any and all contact with each other.
XC. He doesn't come to visit her the day he sees Dumbledore to ask for the Defense Against the Dark Arts position and she is disheartened because she hasn't seen him in almost five years-and hasn't talked to him in over four.
XCI. When she returns to her classroom, after the Headmaster tells her about the meeting, she finds a box of chocolate on her desk. Accompanying it, there is only a note, wishing her good health, and signed "Lord Voldemort."
XCII. She can't bring herself to eat even half of them before she throws the box of chocolate, and the golden necklace, that once rested on her neck, across the room with a broken sob. This incident is the last correspondence that they ever have.
XCIII. She muses one day that their friendship had been oddly reminiscent of Salazar Slytherin and Godric Gryffindor- close and amazing, and then drastically brutal when it ended, and when she watches Severus Snape and Lily Evans struggle through a friendship across warring Houses, she feels a strange sense of déjà vu and pities the two of them: she knows that it will not end well for either youth.
XCIV. She spends many evenings in deep discussion with her mentor about him, and she laments that she never saw his betrayal coming.
XCV. Her mentor reminds her that her old best friend was a master manipulator and could fool almost anyone into believing anything. She, sadly, wonders out loud to him if any of their relationship was ever real and if he ever cared about her at all.
XCVI. She is torn when she discovers that he has died after attacking the Potters' household, but is pleased at the strange irony that such a terrible, powerful, evil man couldn't kill a little baby boy.
XCVII. During the First War, when he personally kills her brother, nieces, nephews, and parents and wipes the entire line-except her- from the face of the planet, he laughs and the sound is colored with insanity and joyous sadism.
XCVIII. Later, during the Second War, when he thinks back on his friendship with her, he attempts to remove it from his memory: it was the lowest point in his ascent to power, and he pretends to himself that the relationship never meant anything to him.
XCIX. Like trying to resolve himself that the separation of the two of them between two Houses didn't bother him, he knows that he is only trying to fool himself into believing in something that isn't true.
C. As warned, in the end, when she watches his body fall to the ground with a satisfying thud of finality, she allows herself a smile: small and bitter.
End.
Author's Note: So, uh. Yeah. –laughs weakly- I have a terrible feeling that this isn't the end of this 'Verse for me.
Review, please! They are my bread, butter and inspiration!
~Rose
