Chapter 1

Dear Tom

Do those words ring a bell? If they don't, they should. I wrote them over and over in your diary a few years ago, at the top of paragraphs containing all my childish secrets. Above paragraphs containing my silly, pitiful little worries and fears. Paragraphs containing my love.

Do you remember now? Of course you don't. You don't exist anymore. The person that used to be you is now a balled thing with red eyes and a face like a snake's who calls himself lord Voldemort. That's what your evil deeds did to you. You are no longer Tom, although Tom was not much better in personality in the end. Are you proud of what you've become? Of course you are. Why do I bother asking?

So I'm writing this letter to you, because Luna said it might help. She's the only one I've confided my slightly less childish little worries to this year, because she has an open mind and nothing shocks her. She said that it would help to get rid of some of the weight I've been carrying around with me for five years.

For five years you've been haunting my nightmares. Always present, always there to torture me. As if you hadn't done enough. I dream of your betrayal. How you forced me to write my own death warrant and walk down for the last time into that chamber. The cruel things you spat at me. That I had never mattered to you. That I was a stupid fool to have honestly thought that you loved me. That anyone could love me. That you had used me because of my idiocy; because I was gullible. That you had used me to hurt people I cared about and that you would use me to kill Harry Potter; my big crush. I went on to date him, you know. He said he loved me, the same way that you did. But as you told me; love is for the weak. The weak like me.

And sometimes I just dream of long cold corridors. I run through them, always thinking I see you at the end. Then you disappear around the corner and you're nowhere to be seen when I reach it. I search and search, and I never find you, but I hear the echo of your laugh sometimes. Why I search for you, I don't know.

Then there are the other dreams. They aren't really nightmares, but I wake up with my pillow drenched in tears all the same. Do you remember when my tears would fall onto the pages of your diary? Did that give you strength? Do you remember that I once wrote that I loved you in my own blood on your pages when you were so angry that I threw you away? And that time you pretended to be jealous that I still had feelings for Harry? That satisfied you. I suppose because it gave you what you needed to become stronger.

Anyway, in the other dreams you take me into the diary as you sometimes would, and we would walk through your memory of Hogwarts. I dream of that picnic you prepared for us in a clearing in the forbidden forest. I was never afraid when I went in there with you. We sat in the moonlight eating dark chocolate cauldrons and drinking champagne. And I dream about that harp you brought which you enchanted to play music while you danced with me. Sometimes I dream of sitting with you next to the lake on a warm afternoon, and how you used to play with my hair and say that the sun made golden streaks in it. You said that the sun gave me some of its rays and had turned my hair into a fire. And we locked fingers and you trailed little patterns in the water with your other hand. I dream of the astronomy tower where you kissed me for the first time. Softly, and then more passionately, and I thought the fire in those handsome dark eyes meant that you loved me. I suppose it was something else. It doesn't stop me from dreaming of it though.

And you betrayed me. You betrayed me! I hate you! I hate you, but I also love you. And I've never stopped. I still love the bastard who grew up to be the thing that caused all this shit that I'm dealing with now. That's besides the memories of you. My brother, my best friend and my ex boyfriend are all on the run. The ex boyfriend that you so want to kill. And my best friend, a mudblood who you wouldn't even think twice about wiping off the face of the earth along with all the others you've had murdered. Or perhaps you'd just send her to Azkaban to suffer like some of the others. My entire family are in danger. You would have them tortured and killed for information. Hell; maybe just for being blood traitors. And you are the cause of what's going on at school. The reason my friends are being tortured by the Carrows. The reason Hogwarts isn't a happy or safe place anymore. The reason half our friends didn't come back this year. You are the reason Dumbledore is dead.

You always loved Hogwarts so much. Would you want to be in a Hogwarts like this one though, I wonder? I don't think even you would like it here. Of course you wouldn't be tortured, but the entire atmosphere is different. It's all suspicion, lies, danger… You don't hear much laughter in the corridors anymore. You caused it to be like this.

And I don't really understand, you know. I don't understand how someone so logical could end up starting a war over something so unscientific. Why do you hate muggles and muggleborns? Is it something that happened to you in that orphanage you never wanted to talk to me about? Because there's no scientific reason at all why muggleborns are below purebloods. And what would we gain by ruling the muggles? They can't do much for us. And what is so wrong about not possessing magic? I don't think you can really explain that. Yes, we are lucky and we are more powerful. We evolved differently to them. But is being different a cause for killing them? Why didn't you decide to hate gingers, for example, because they have a different hair colour to you? I must say, I'm disappointed. You used to tell me to be logical when I was doing my homework. You would explain to me in great length why it made more sense to add this or that ingredient to my potion first. If we argued about something, you would tell me I was letting emotion make me irrational, and you would explain to me in small steps how you came to your conclusions. I thought you were wonderful. But this obsession to dominate is irrational, and it involves emotions of hate that cloud rational judgment. Didn't you say emotions were a weakness?

So here I sit, debating with someone who doesn't exist. Someone that I am opposing along with my friends in the DA. I am fighting against you, and we are all rooting for Harry. We are all hoping he will kill you. Isn't it ironic? I still love the person you were, and am working towards the destruction of the person you've become. And when we all fight in that final battle, I might kill your supposed "friends" like you killed mine. I only wish I could see you one last time. If I did though, I don't know what I would do. Would I want to hold on to you, or kill you? Maybe I would do both. Maybe you would kill me first. And if you did, I would finally be rid of you. You would not have my mind to live in anymore.

So now I'm going to bake cauldron cakes with Luna. After that, I'll sit at the fire in the common room and listen to Finnegan's stupid jokes. And tonight I'll sneak out with Nevil and write messages of hope on the walls to make the Carrow's and Snape angry. And these are all things you'll never understand. The things I'm fighting for. Laughter, friendship, … love.

I love you, and goodnight

Ginny