A prompt given to me by ToraDansu, brought on by our re-watching the series together and realizing someone needed more hugs as a child. XD
Tom Riddle gave a soft sigh as he looked up at his reflection in the mirror. He was currently hiding in the boy's bathroom, trying to figure out what was wrong with him. There were few problems that his capable mind could not overcome, given the chance, but this… This was beyond him.
He slammed his fist onto the white surface of the sink, muttering under his breath. There was a… A bubbling inside him. He didn't bubble. Girls bubbled. They giggled and tossed their hair and looked at him when they thought he wasn't looking.
Tom Riddle did not bubble.
He examined and dissected and worked things out that other students hadn't even thought to wonder about. He was better than them. Better than this feeling welling up inside him and bloody bubbling.
With a twisted scowl, he left the bathroom, hurrying to his next class. Whatever these feelings, (God what an awful word!) were that were swirling inside of him, they would be crushed like all the others had been.
And then hopefully ground into the carpet under the heel of the Slytherin boy's shoe.
As Tom entered the Great Hall, he felt that same bubbly feeling from before strike again. Tom noticed, with no little chagrin, that it happened at the exact moment that his eyes landed on a girl at the Gryffindor table.
She was laughing, flicking her long blond hair over one shoulder as she turned to look at the boy sitting next to her. She was bubbling.
That was not what Tom Riddle did.
And yet there was a tiny lump in his throat that he couldn't manage to swallow and a flicker of warmth in his chest that had certainly not been there before.
And before Tom Riddle knew it, he found he was in love.
That was also something Tom Riddle did not do.
The sheets of his bed were cool and comforting to his flushed skin. He was blushing. Blushing! And all because of one blond-haired, blue-eyed girl in Gryffindor. A girl whose name was unknown to him, because she was there and he was here. And it was a well known fact that Slytherins did not mix with Gryffindors. Ever.
And certainly never in romantic matters.
He slapped his palm to his forehead. Romantic Matters. Those words managed to instill more disgust and despair into him than any summer vacation at that loathsome orphanage had.
And that was certainly saying something.
Tom rolled over, sighing softly as he buried his face into the pillows. This was ridiculous. Pining over some female with pretty eyes…
Wait, what?
Her eyes weren't pretty. They were just blue. Plain blue…
Like a robin's egg. Or the sky on a warm summer's day…
"Stop it, you utter imbecile." Tom muttered into his pillow, a growl rumbling through his chest. "She is nothing. Just another girl."
With sparkling eyes and rippling golden locks…
The pale boy rolled over and looked up at his feeling, a cold lump settling in his chest next to the warm flutter.
He knew that feeling. He'd had it before.
It was defeat.
Whatever this thing was, whatever was happening to him, he wanted it to end. To simply move on and put this stupid infatuation behind him.
To get over her and pretend like none of this had ever happened, because this wasn't worth wasting his time over. She wasn't worth wasting his time over.
He sighed and slapped a hand over his eyes again.
This was all just a terrible, horrible, incredibly insipid waste of time.
Just bloody wonderful.
I probably had too much fun writing for him, but eh. I'll take it. XD
All characters and locations belong to: J. K. Rowling