A/N: Don't you find it annoying how there's a stupid little repitition of the first line every time I update? Yeah, here's chapter two. I thought I'd update quickly, because actually that first chapter was really unsatisfactory. Even in Word, it was only four pages. Soooo, I love you all, I hope you like this.
Disclaimer: I don't own Ginny or Tom or Hogwarts or the Wizarding World or Dippet or Dumbledore or Flitwick or Slughorn. However, I do quite a lot of other characters, as I made them up, and the plot is entirely mine.
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Chapter Two: Rumours
As it dragged its heavy body from the station, Ginny turned back to the doorway, her scarlet hair falling over her shoulder and into her face, holding onto one of the doors tightly, and watching as the tall, lean figure of Tom Riddle became smaller and smaller. The message finally sank into her brain that she wouldn't see that quiet young man until Christmas. She missed him painfully already.
xxx
"Oh, you may not think I'm pretty
Don't judge on what you see
I'll eat myself if you can find
A smarter hat that me…"
As the Sorting Hat began its legendary song, to which Ginny knew all of the words, she fidgeted and waited for the food to arrive. She turned in her seat to beam at her two best friends at Hogwarts – in the late 1950's, at least.
Originally, Ginny had been from her own dreadful, war-struck time. Somehow, crazily, she'd wound up here, which was a very long story consisting more or less of time-travel, tears, and falling in love with the enemy. The master-plan had been to kill Tom and go home, but she'd fallen not only for him, but also for this era and the people in it, and had vowed that the only way she'd leave 1959 was at New Year's Eve when it transferred into 1960.
Grace Hartwin, tall, slim, and with brown curly hair, grinned back at her. Alden Philips – the same height as Ginny (basically, a midget), dark-haired, and of a tanned complexion – smiled slightly in response. A Head Boy badge gleamed on his chest, reminding Ginny that she had a message for him.
"Oh, Alden," she whispered, leaning across the table to him. "Tom mentioned you, before I left. He said to tell you that he left a recommendation of how to organise the Prefect rotas for you… in one of the drawers of the desk, I think."
Tom had been Head Boy the year before, and had, seemingly, heard that Alden had been selected as the next.
Alden nodded. "Tell him I say thanks."
The Sorting began with Emmett Abbey, a snivelly boy who went to Gryffindor, though Ginny could see no bravery in his pasty face. It moved on quickly, and Ginny was alarmed to see a thin, pale-haired girl named Imogen Hooch with a pointed, pixie-like face also be sorted to Ravenclaw – Madam Hooch, the future flying teacher. Her surprise only continued to increase when she saw a thin brown-haired girl with glasses.
"Minerva McGonagall!"
The future Transfiguration teacher walked nervously forwards, fiddling with her collar and a curl of hair that had fallen into her eyes.
"GRYFFINDOR!"
However, her surprise turned to shock as a frighteningly familiar face appeared on an eleven-year-old girl.
"Heather Tristanebury!" called Professor Dippet, reading out from his parchment list of names.
A hush filled the Great Hall.
The girl was easily recognisable without her name being called. She was small and chubby, with her robes slightly too long, rolled up at the sleeves so that they wouldn't cover her pudgy hands. Balanced on her snub nose were thick-rimmed glasses, but even these could barely be seen due to the heavy brown fringe across her forehead. The hairstyle was different – instead of pigtails, this Heather had a pageboy bob – but the similarity was chilling.
Ginny leaned towards Grace, who was staring at Heather Tristanebury with an equally stunned face.
"That's Moaning Myrtle's sister, isn't it?" Ginny verified in an undertone.
Grace nodded.
And then Ginny noticed something even more alarming.
Everyone was staring at her.
Many people's eyes were flickering between Ginny and Heather, Ginny and Heather, and then, after a while, to the empty seat on the teacher's table, reserved for the Charms teacher.
She didn't understand the connection.
"HUFFLEPUFF!"
Ginny jumped. She hadn't realised that Heather had reached the Sorting Hat, but she applauded noisily, along with everyone else who had woken up from their stupor.
The Sorting finished some fifteen minutes later with Celine Xavier, a pretty French-looking girl who went to Ravenclaw.
"I know her," whispered Grace excitedly, pointing to the new Ravenclaw addition. "Her sister, Fabienne, was in my brother's year." Jacob Hartwin had graduated two years previously, and was an architect for the Ministry. "Their whole family is very rich and very clever."
"And very attractive," said Alden with a vague look in his eyes.
Ginny's mouth fell open. "Alden!" she cried, horrified. "She's eleven!"
Alden went red. "I meant Fabienne, stupid, not Celine," he said irritably.
"Oh, thank Merlin." Grace looked relieved, though still jealously cross. She had dated Alden for a short period time, but had broken up messily.
The food appeared, and Ginny tucked in gleefully. Dominic, Alden's younger brother, a second-year, appeared briefly to say hello, before returning to his friends. Ginny smiled fondly to remember the Essex accent that Dom had spoken with last year. Dinner finished fairly quickly; Ginny and Grace said goodbye to Alden as he headed off to show the new first-years to their dormitories and then to his own dormitory.
"It's weird, having him go to the Head dorms," said Ginny thoughtfully as they descended to the Slytherin common room.
"Why," Grace said slyly, smirking, "who are you used to visiting up there?"
Ginny ignored this comment with flaming cheeks.
Their trunks had already been delivered to the seventh-year Slytherin girls' dorm by the caretaker, Epaphras Weasley – no less than Ginny's grandfather, aged approximately twenty-five. Also already in the dormitory was Claude Felina Bastet, Ramira Xau, and Avani Mohana. In the first ten minutes of Ginny arriving at the 1950's Hogwarts, Claude had proved a spiteful toad, and Ramira and Avani her back-ups. Ramira was alright, behind Claude's back, but was too much of a coward to speak up for herself and show that she liked Ginny.
"Home sweet home," sighed Grace, flopping onto her bed. She reached over and unlocked her trunk without getting up, and removed her pale-blue nightgown from it.
Ginny also started to unpack. Upon the bedside table she placed a moving photograph that had been taken over the summer. It showed a tall, dark-haired young man, only the barest hint of a smile on his lips, with his arm around a beaming redhead. Tom and Ginny.
"Ooh," said Grace, who didn't miss a trick. She smirked again. "Nice picture."
Ginny grinned, though her face caught fire. "I like it too."
Flora Roosevelt, the sixth and final seventh-year Slytherin, perked up at the prospect of some gossip before the first day had even started. "Are you still going out with him?"
"Yes," she bristled defensively, irritated by the slight emphasis on still. She tugged her own nightgown over her head, ending the conversation. She wasn't comfortable talking about Tom when there were so many secret things that she knew and had to guard for him.
The lights turned out except for one, next to Grace, who usually fell asleep reading. They climbed into bed. Ginny turned over, closed her eyes, and prepared to sleep.
"You're not getting away that easily!" said Grace, and flew onto Ginny's bed, landing with a crash on top of the redhead. "I have chocolate and a hyper-drive a mile wide!"
Ginny groaned. "Oh, Merlin."
Flora clambered over to join in the conversation, perching on the end of Ginny's bed. "So what did you do on your summer holidays? I went to Spain with my family and my friend's family. And we stayed in a big villa by the beach, and a Spanish boy told me that I was beautiful!" she said happily, pulling on a lock of blonde hair, smiling.
"Lucky," said Grace. "No-one thinks I'm beautiful."
Ginny spared a glance for her friend and noticed that Grace had changed slightly over the summer. For one thing, her hair was less an explosion of brown curls; instead, soft waves formed around her already-pretty face. The most noticeable thing, however, was by far that she seemed to have shrunk. This wasn't true, though. It was just that she hadn't grown, while everyone else was starting to catch up to her height.
"Aw, you are!" Flora cooed.
"Sure, you're beautiful," Ginny said. "You're totally prettysville." The fifties' slang came naturally now. "Your hair looks really nice."
"I let it grow out a bit," Grace said. She was obviously uncomfortable with the level of compliments, and tried to turn the conversation away from herself. "What about Gulistan, then?" she asked of Flora.
At the mention of the Ravenclaw that she liked, Flora frowned. "I don't know. He hasn't ever said a word to me… apart from 'can I borrow your textbook' once, in Potions…" she sighed. "And this Spanish boy was a Muggle, so I can't owl him… I'd have to send a letter to him using the post… and that costs Muggle money…"
Grace and Ginny made sympathetic noises and made feeble suggestions for a while, before asking about Grace.
"Well, Ginny stayed over for a while… then I went to France to our holiday home for the rest of the holidays," Grace said. "I visited all these really interesting Wizarding places."
"Oh, cool," said Flora.
Ginny kept quiet. She was hoping that if she didn't say anything, then she wouldn't be noticed, and they wouldn't ask about her summer.
"What about you, Ginny?"
Damn.
She fiddled with a strand of her hair. "Erm… I stayed two weeks with Grace in France… and then I got a part-time job in the Daily Prophet – you know, getting people coffee and stuff." (When she had been working there, she had been surprised to see another girl working there, in her twenties, with blonde curly hair, named Marianne, who was more often than not seen with the delivery-man, John Skeeter.) "And, um… then I spent some time with Tom."
"Ooh!" squealed Flora loudly, making Claude, Ramira and Avani look up in irritation from the other side of the room. "With Tom, eh?"
She gave the blonde a withering look. "Just… no."
Flora looked disappointed. "So nothing happened?" she asked hopefully.
"Nope," said Ginny brightly. Then a frown creased her eyebrows as she recalled something that had been bugging her. "Why was everyone staring at me when Heather Tristanebury was sorted?"
Grace bit her lip, and busied herself with plumping her pillow, pretending that she hadn't heard the question. Flora began to sing. She sang a lot, as she had quite a nice voice, but this spontaneous singing Ginny could tell was just so that she didn't have to answer.
The silence (apart from the singing) was awkward. Ginny stared at them for a while, but it was apparent that no-one was going to say anything. She was tempted to ask Claude, who was watching her reaction with narrowed eyes, but decided that she wouldn't stop that low.
"So how about that chocolate pudding?" Grace interrupted the music, beaming at them.
Ginny was glad for talking instead of just the echoing of her thoughts in her head, but she was determined to pry the truth out from them. She sighed. "I'm just going to go to sleep." She didn't bother to answer what Grace had said. She stretched her mouth in a fake yawn. "Sorry, you guys. I'm so tired."
Though she closed her eyes immediately, and buried her shoulder in the mattress comfortably, she didn't sleep for a long time.
xxx
"So, Ginny," said Claude, combing her halo of tight blonde curls, "now that Riddle's not here, who do you think you're going to get it on with next?"
The redhead glared at her. "I'm not getting it on with anyone," she said coldly.
"Oh, wait, that's true," Claude agreed snidely. "You're a Mudblood – no-one else would have you, anyway! Only Riddle would have you, because he was as close to mud as you could get, right?"
Avani laughed; Ramira gave a feeble giggle.
Ginny clenched her hands into fists, restraining herself from hitting Claude around the face. Professor Dippet, the current Headmaster, had decided for her new life that she was to be a Muggleborn – in these days, they were still quite rare, as wizards were only just getting used to the idea of mixing with Muggles. He had hoped that the rarity of her blood status would attract the attention away from any other abnormalities (i.e., being from future). It hadn't worked. She had more attention that she would have ever had before as a pureblood.
"She got Reeve, didn't she?" retorted Grace, defending her friend.
A grateful glance was passed to the brunette. 'Thanks', Ginny mouthed quickly.
Claude sniffed. She fluffed up her hair and checked her lipstick before flouncing upstairs to the common room. Avani sent a heavy-lidded glare at Ginny before following, and Ramira trailed behind.
Ginny tied the belt of her pleated skirt and then headed upstairs to breakfast with Grace and Flora.
Alden was waiting for them in the Entrance Hall, and with them, progressed to the Great Hall for breakfast.
"What classes do you have first?" he asked as they sat down.
"Um…" Grace one-handedly dug in her robes pocket, clutching to her bagel with the other hand. She fished out her timetable and flipped it open, stuffing part of the bagel into her mouth. "' haff Tanshhfiggashun."
"Come again?" Ginny asked.
Grace swallowed her bagel down. "Transfiguration," she translated.
Alden and Grace began to chat happily about classes and other trivial things; meanwhile, Ginny looked around the Great Hall, seeing things that she hadn't seen before.
Dominic, Alden's little brother, was sitting at the Ravenclaw table and talking to the beautiful Celine Xavier, his face glowing with happiness. Jack Swithin and Claude were sitting together, showing that they'd got back together over the summer holidays. Scott Reeve, Ginny's ex-boyfriend from last November, was sitting… alone, surprisingly, instead of surrounded by a group of adoring younger girls. Abraxas Malfoy was entertaining a group of his friends with a – from the hand actions – rude joke. Avani looked strangely lonely as she picked at a salad. Ramira was glaring at Penelope Dann, the Head Girl in Ravenclaw; clearly she had wanted the position.
Ginny realised now why Tom always sat back quietly and watched other people. So much could be learnt from about thirty seconds of observation. How much could be understood from years of it?
"-you even listening, Ginny?"
She started and turned back to her friends, who were looking at her curiously. "What, sorry, I wasn't paying attention," she confessed.
"I said: did you know that Professor Alcippe was only a temporary replacement? Professor Dippet's hired a permanent teacher now," Alden said.
"Aww." Ginny pouted. "I liked Professor Alcippe."
Last year, the Charms teacher, Professor Vander, had been murdered by a 'serial killer who had fled the castle after killing' – in reality, it had been Tom's alter-ego. Professor Alcippe had replaced him.
"I wonder who it'll be now?" Grace said thoughtfully.
She was interrupted by a flurry of wings and paper as a thousand owls swept into the Hall. Usually Ginny didn't care for the post – she borrowed Grace's edition of the Daily Prophet instead of buying her own, and as all of her family were not only dead, but also forty-eight years into the future, she had no-one to write to. Now, though, she looked up hopefully.
Her heart swelled two sizes when an owl swooped down and landed on the rim of the bacon platter. It blinked at her, hooted softly, and then took off again, leaving an envelope behind.
Biting her lip to stop the giddy smile from breaking out on her face, Ginny opened it with her unused butter-knife. She pulled the letter out.
On the front, before she'd even unfolded the letter, was the neat cursive of Tom Riddle, saying Please move away from your annoyingly curious friends.
Ginny looked over pointedly at Grace, who was leaning towards her surreptitiously and, indeed, trying to read what she was holding. Grace coughed and moved back into her own space.
"See you in Transfiguration," Ginny told her friends, and stood. She slung her schoolbag onto her shoulder and moved from the Great Hall. She slipped through the grand doors and stood silently against the wall. Her fleeting heart made her fingers tremble as she opened it.
Ginevra,
Thank you for leaving Philips and Hartwin behind you.
She smiled. He knew her so well. The people in the Hall were leaving as the first-class bell rang. She pressed herself tight against the wall so that no-one would see her and ask to see what she was reading, or ask to accompany her to class. She doubted that anyone would except Alden, Grace and Flora (and maybe Scott, if he had the nerve), but you could never be too sure.
Yesterday, as I expect you remembered, was my first day attempting a career in Flourish and Blott's. It wasn't as hideously terrible as I had feared. Mr. Flourish is still in charge of the shop, however, I learnt that Mr. Blott died a few years ago. All that I really have to do is put back books when inconsiderate children run amok in the shop, pulling everything out of their rightful places. It wasn't interesting, but it paid.
I trust you gave Philips the message. Also – hopefully – you obeyed my wishes and haven't put yourself in any mortal danger. How are you? I heard that Professor Alcippe was only a temporary measure; who is Vander's replacement? I don't have much else to say, I'm afraid, so I'll leave it at this: I'll see you soon and I hope to hear from you.
I lo (crossed out) Si (crossed out)
Tom
Ginny folded up the letter. She knew what the scrubbed out words meant, and it was nice to know that he cared; he just wasn't comfortable with expressing how he felt.
She sighed, and tucked the piece of parchment into the inside pocket of her robes, where it wouldn't fall out. Then she hurried up the stairs to Transfiguration, where she was two minutes late.
"What'd Tommy-boy say?" asked Grace as soon as Ginny slipped into her seat.
"He said to mind your own business," she retorted.
"You just made that up."
"Yeah, I did." Ginny stuck out her tongue. "Nosey."
Professor Dumbledore began to instruct them on Transfiguring themselves. As soon as he had said this, the class began cheering and getting excited. However, he explained that for today, they were just going to be changing hair colour. They threw themselves into the tasks with delight.
Ginny could already do this, as she and everyone else had done this last year, but it was entertaining, and this Transfiguration lasted for much longer and was much better quality. Because of this, it was also much harder.
Half an hour later, Ginny looked in the mirror to see, with a gasp, that she had a bright purple highlight down the side of her hair. "Yes!" she shrieked. "Look at me! Wow!"
Alden turned to her. He'd Transfigured his eyes from brown to blue.
Ginny scowled. "Show off."
She managed, over the course of the lesson, to turn her hair completely purple. She then found that she had no idea how to change it back. She sneaked out of the classroom with fabulously violet hair, but was spotted almost immediately, by Professor Dippet, no less, as she headed towards Astronomy with Grace. She went back down to Dumbledore to ask him to change it (Dippet had things to do, he said, but Ginny liked to think that he wasn't smart enough), before continuing.
The lessons were becoming painfully hard, as now this was the NEWT year. This was the year that counted. This was the year that determined whether, once you'd graduated, you'd be a Somebody or a Nobody.
Potions was excruciating. Ginny wasn't bad at Potions – on the contrary, she was quite good at it – but she didn't understand what they were supposed to be doing, and when she finally understood, it was too complicated for her to follow. She was set extra homework, an addition to the fourteen-inch essay on a subject that she'd couldn't get her head around already needed.
After that, she had a free-period, during which she sat with Alden and made him explain what the Potions lesson had been about. By the time she understood, the free-period was over, and she'd achieved nothing except comprehending what she should have understood during the lesson.
"This is stupid," Ginny complained as she headed down to lunch with Alden, having agreed to meet Grace at the bottom of the Entrance Hall stairs. "It's the first day, and we already have so much homework. I mean, if-"
She stopped. Heather Tristanebury was walking towards her.
The eleven-year-old met her eyes, and flinched. She shrank back against the wall and waited for Ginny to move on, but the redhead didn't. She stared at the younger girl, hoping for someone to tell her why she was so afraid, until Heather's eyes filled with tears and she ran.
"What the hell is everyone's problem with me?" Ginny demanded, watching the first-year's escape.
"Be nice," Alden said. "This is, after all, the school where her sister was killed."
"Yeah, and so why is everyone taking it out on me?" she snapped.
Alden's tanned cheeks turned ruddy, and he didn't answer.
Anger bubbled inside Ginny's chest. Something was going on, and it involved her, but no-one would tell her what it was! Why would she have anything to do with Myrtle's death?
Maybe because you're in love with the person who killed her.
She froze.
It couldn't be that.
Because, for that to be the answer, that would mean that everyone knew. That everyone knew that he killed them. That he had an alter-ego. That he was evil.
And that was bad.
"Are people talking about me?" Ginny asked carefully, squashing her irritation, replacing it with her curious-face, as if she wasn't annoyed – why, she only wanted to know what was happening!
"No," said Alden, too quickly.
"Really?"
"No-one's talking about you."
"Are you sure?"
"Yeah, I'm sure. What's up with you today?" Alden frowned.
She huffed. "Nothing." Fine. So he wasn't going to tell her. She was just going to have to find out another way.
They met Grace at the bottom of the stairs and progressed to the Great Hall. Though Ginny said hello, she wasn't paying attention to Grace's chatter. She was working out a plan to find out what was going on.
xxx
She had decided on the plan rather quickly. It wasn't terribly complicated – in fact, it was simple, that she had wondered if it would work. For a week, she had been spying on Claude, Avani, and Rosalind O'Keefe, a Hufflepuff made of the same material as the first two. They were such gossips that she had been sure that one of them would be sure to let something slip.
However, nothing had been said from any of them. It was her free period now, and though she was supposed to be doing her homework, she was instead trying to find any of her three victims to eavesdrop on them.
"How hard can it be to find three loud, attention-seeking bimbos," she muttered to herself as she searched the dungeons again.
Ginny had looked everywhere, but to no avail. Now, she was searching the underground part of Hogwarts one last time before she headed back to her dormitory to do her homework.
"Here, ditzy, ditzy, ditzy," she sang under her breath. As she reached the darker areas, she lit her wand for aid.
The candles mounted on the walls were further apart from each other in this part of the dungeons. Few people came down this far, so the need for lighting was less.
I don't think any of them would be down here, said the rational part of Ginny's brain, let's go. But the irrational and more fun part said, ooh, darkness… what's down there?
Shadows danced like the waltz of death, black silhouettes flickering and twirling – all her own, but a thousand of them, making her feel as though she was anything but alone.
"Hello," she called into the gloom. She probably shouldn't have had that much sugar on her cornflakes that morning. "Anyone down there? Hellooo!"
No-one answered. She didn't really expect anyone to.
The temperature steadily declined as she went further down until she found that she was shivering. As she realised that she should probably go back up to the dormitory to do her homework now, she walked into a wall.
"Ow," she complained, rubbing her forehead. She groaned. "Well, that was stupid."
Trying to remember which way she'd come, Ginny made her back towards the Slytherin common room. She would visit this place later, when she had more time. It was interesting, and she wanted to explore.
Homework was calling her when she got into her dormitory, but she had only just reached for her schoolbag when she heard footsteps and the noisy voices of Claude, Ramira and Avani chatting.
Perfect opportunity!
She leapt to her feet and raced across the room, slipping into her wardrobe and closing the door behind her, leaving the door only the tiniest crack open so that she could hear what was being said, and also so that she could get out later.
"Urgh, I hate Divination," said Ramira. "It doesn't teach you anything."
"It's fantastic!" said Claude, and though Ginny couldn't see her, she could tell from that tone that her eyes would be gleaming in that unpleasant way of hers. "If you can get it right, you can see the future! Imagine knowing all the gossip before it happens!"
That was so typical of Claude. Ginny rolled her eyes.
"We don't need any more rumours," Ramira said quietly. "We have enough already."
Aha!
"You can never have too many rumours," Avani retorted, and for a second Ginny thought that they were going to move away from this subject and talk about something else, but then Avani continued. "Though we have got our hands pretty full right now. I mean, there are so many theories that it's impossible to work out who's right!"
"You know what my theory is?" Claude said thoughtfully, chewing loudly on a piece of gum.
"What?" Avani and Ramira leaned closer, eager as ever for their leader's words.
"It's her!" Claude shrieked with laughter, and the other two joined in.
"Well, duh, it's her… but why? That's what I want to know. I mean, it's not even like it's a jealous rage of killing purebloods or anything. They're all scum like she is."
Fury rose inside Ginny, magma in a volcano, and she fought it down before she erupted. She didn't want to leap out and strangle them all. Her temper could be lit like flint and steel.
"Vander – half-blood. Riddle – half-blood. Myrtle – Mudblood…"
"Well…" Claude drew out the word for suspense. "I think that maybe there's something wrong with her. You know, up here." She tapped her skull. "Because I can't see any other reason. Honestly."
"Maybe she was under the Imperius."
"Puh-lease!"
"Ramira, so far she's killed two people, tried to kill a third – who knows who's next?"
"She sleeps in our room!" wailed Avani.
"Let's go through it one more time," said Claude. "We can work it out if we don't miss any details. 'Kay?"
"Coolsville."
"Right. So, the year before she shows up, Myrtle – a Mudblood – is killed. In a girls' bathroom. Which means it has to be a girl, so it could be her. She turns up for no reason and gets sorted into Slytherin, even though she's a Mudblood…"
"You would have to seriously evil to get into Slytherin if you're mud," Avani chimed in helpfully. "So far, it fits."
"Last year, Vander – a half-blood – is killed. She 'finds' them. How did she know where they were? A first-year is a witness, but she's too traumatised by watching a murder to say anything-"
"Maybe her memory was modified afterwards," suggested Ramira. Ginny scowled. She had, previously, thought that Ramira was on her side.
"-yeah, that too. Riddle – a half-blood – is at the scene of the crime, dying, and set up with a knife. I think that she tried to kill both of them, and tried to make it look like it was Riddle, but hoped that he wouldn't survive. That's why the area around him was cursed."
"But she went out with Riddle!" Avani said.
"She still is going out with him."
"Precisely! Because now she looks even more innocent! She wouldn't date someone that she wanted to kill, would she? Or that's what she wants you to think. Now that he's out of school, she'll probably kill him. He has no friends. No-one would notice that he was missing… until he turned up in a ditch… in pieces!"
Claude snarled the last few words, lighting her wand beneath her chin to cast shadows and create a dramatic effect. Ramira and Avani laughed nervously; the thought of the ex-Head Boy being dismembered was something they clearly didn't find as gut-wrenchingly funny as Claude did.
"But… Claude, she wasn't here last year, when Myrtle was killed," Ramira pointed out.
"But Riddle was." Claude's voice was smug. Ginny could imagine the disgusting smirk on her pretty lips. "Last year, I went to the library to meet Jack for some… alone-time, shall we say… and on my way back, down to breakfast, guess what I say? Riddle, shaking and twitching… and Peregrine holding him." She leaned closer, lowering her voice so that Ginny had to strain to hear her next words: "he was possessed."
Ginny's blood ran cold. Claude had seen Tom's attack, and had recognised what it was… but had got the wrong idea. She closed her eyes and took deep breaths to calm herself down. She closed her vicious temper into a little box and locked it tight.
So that was why everyone had been staring at her. They thought that she was the murderer. That was why Heather Tristanebury had been so terrified of her. She thought that because she was a Muggle-born, and related to Myrtle, then Ginny would kill her, too.
Kill her too? I haven't killed anyone!
Then they moved on to talk about cute guys in the school, which Ginny had to endure the torture of for about twenty minutes before they decided to head up to dinner.
She made sure that they had definitely gone before getting out of the wardrobe. Her legs were cramped, and her foot had gone to sleep, so she was uncomfortable, and had to sit on the edge of her bed for a while, waiting for the feeling to come back, before she could follow them to the Great Hall.
Stupid people thought they could just say things like this.
There was going to be hell to pay.
xxx
A/N: -gasp- I haven't said this yet, so I'm going to say it now. Four things. Firstly: there's obviously going to be limited Tom in here, as he's not at school anymore, but I fit him in wherever I can, and most things are related to him. Secondly: this fic is going to be nice and angsty. I've done a Stephanie Meyer – the first story is romantic and the second is all depressing. Don't you think that love stories are more interesting that way? Thirdly:So that the chapters are long enough for your satisfaction, I squish several chapters into one big one. Because of this, things happen more quickly, and also the whole fic is probably going to be shorter than Rewind. Fourthly: I have an obsession with Cute Is What We Aim For now. I LOVE 'em. Just wanted to say.
Next Time:
Ginny slammed her schoolbag down onto the table in front of Grace and Alden. "Do you think that I'm a murderer?" she snapped.
They both looked up in alarm. Alden looked as though he was going to say something – perhaps deny it. Ginny doubted that he would deny, but even if he did, Grace glanced behind her anxiously, as though afraid that someone would overhear, and she gave them both away.
"Don't worry about other people," Ginny said icily. "They all think I'm a psychopath too, so you don't need to trouble yourself."
xxx