SUMMARY: One-shot. HP has been sent back in time after the 7th book. He realises he won't make it back. TMR finds him at the astronomy tower. It becomes a bonding moment.
Harry lent over the parapet of the Astronomy tower and gazed out as the sun sunk behind the mountains. Before it, the Great Lake shimmered in the warm light. In his hands, he held a small velvet box. As the sun finally disappeared, tears began to trickle down Harry's cheeks. He closed his eyes, opened them again, and looked once more at the box. Inside its white silken mouth sat a small, rose-gold ring inlaid with an emerald.
This ring was Harry's future. However, what he had realised some time ago, but only just admitted to himself, was that it embodied a future no longer within his reach. This future - with Ginny, and possibly their children - was now a distant dream, separated from him across time. Harry eventually slid to his knees and leant against the parapet wall as this thought soaked in.
Harry felt a sob threatening to escape him. What had he done to deserve this fate? After everything he had fought for, he had won the right to a happy ending… only to have it torn away from him as he was thrown back in time.
"Who was the ring for?" A low voice inquired from the staircase. Tom had spoken quietly, but Harry nevertheless stilled at the sound.
"Please leave me alone, Tom," Harry said softly. He stared at the ring in his hand and didn't look up as the other boy approached. To his slight surprise, Riddle slid down beside him.
"You will see her again," Tom said after a while.
Harry contemplated the box in his hands. The emerald still glinted a deep green in the darkening light. After a moment he whispered, "I was going to ask her to marry me the day I was transported here." The moon had risen. Harry continued: "But now I can't have that. Coming here… I've lost everything. Ginny, our future, our friends…" He turned to Riddle, who was looking at him, silently taking in Harry's story. "I grew up an orphan Tom. I had nothing. No friends… no real family. No money or a home. But over the last few years, I've found those things. I've fought for my right to happiness, to possess what other's have. And just as we were finally there, and the time was right - it was taken away…" There was anger creeping into Harry's voice now. The tears dried on his face.
"You will see your friends again in the future."
"Yes, but how long will I have to wait for that? I can't go back. I'm trapped, fifty years in the past… By the time I see Ginny again, I will be an old man."
"There is still hope, Harry."
"But I've tried everything… and the Ministry say they can't help. They don't even care…" Harry fell silent. After a while he said, "…Ginny, my friends - they were my family. I need them. I miss them. I don't want to live without them."
They both sat still in the darkening light. Tom didn't move but waited for his peer to continue.
Finally, Harry angrily continued: "Why is that so hard for me? Everyone else has a family… what the fuck is wrong with me?" He glared up at the sky now, watching the moon rise about of tower. "What the fuck is wrong with this world?"
Tom felt Harry's magic as it flared in anger. He stared straight ahead, before saying slowly, "I gave up on family a long time ago, Harry. Family… is overrated." Tom caressed the ring on his own finger. Harry shook his head without saying anything, still overcome with the sting of injustice. "Look how strong you are, Harry. You didn't become this strong because you had a family. You became this strong through your struggle to survive without one. No one gave you anything in life. No one gave me anything in life. And now, we are more powerful than all our peers."
"I'm not like you, Tom. I don't want power. I want happiness."
Tom stopped himself from sneering. "You think having a family will give you that? Let me tell you, Harry, how families work. They disappoint you. They abandon you. And then you are weaker and vulnerable. The only connections worth having are mutually beneficial. Partnerships… agreements, based on power. Those will give you happiness."
"I disagree, Tom. The greatest joy in life is trusting someone else… and being loved in return…"
"What is love, Harry? It is just another name for co-dependency. I mean, I scratch your back, you scratch mine. It isn't selfless."
Harry looked at Tom now. He remembered seeing him as a young boy in the orphanage in Dumbledore's pensieve, and his anger was tinged with pity. He also understood the feeling of being abandoned and feeling unloved. This was why Tom felt like this. He felt rejected.
"I know what its like to be an orphan, Tom, and I know what it is to feel like… the world is against you, and everyone is selfish… But believe me, even I, the so-called "freak", found friends in the end. Learnt how to love in the end."
"But now you are miserable, Harry, and I am happy," Tom countered. Harry laughed.
"Yes, I suppose you're right about that… but I am only unhappy now because I know what happiness feels like, and it feels like having friends and family. Which I don't currently have. Happiness is other people."
"Hell is other people, Harry," Tom said in reply, his lips twitching.
Harry shook his head. "No, Tom… I want to prove you wrong about that. I want you to know what love is."
Tom looked at him. "I don't need "love", Harry. I've already said that. Nor do I want it. Why would I want to become like you?" Harry stared at him.
"Because… you know, Tom, that life is often shit. And the only thing making it bearable is knowing that you aren't alone in its shittiness. That's why you came to comfort me, isn't it? So I wasn't alone." Harry said, and his lips twitched with the slightest smirk. "Or are you going to tell me you came because your true motive was to discover my weakness?"
Tom looked at him and laughed. Harry continued, "Well, now you know. My weakness is that I want to be loved. Make of that what you will. But… this has also made me realise that you need love, too."
Tom just looked deeply unimpressed. "You are pathetic. Don't make the mistake of thinking I am as well, Potter."
Harry smiled at him.