He was not always so bad.
I… You have to realize that all I have is retrospect, all I can do is look back, look back over and over and over again and ask myself why it happened or if it had to happen at all.
I should have seen it coming, I cry to myself in despair. I should have noted the signs and seen where they inevitably led rather than hoping and praying and believing that they could possibly lead anywhere else. What glorious irony, that I, who had seen so much, had somehow missed everything that led me to where I am today.
And when swallowing bitter irony is all that's left to you, falling into endless despair forever, it's so hard to do anything else.
Except, he was not always so bad, and there are times that I can so easily imagine an ideal world where his best and brightest qualities shine. He is so intelligent, so passionate, so driven and glowing and yes sometimes even admirable. So that you can hardly look at him without feeling blinded.
More than that though, he was my brother, my only real companion in this world for those first eleven years of my life. For all that I insisted that other people mattered, that the other orphans mattered, Tom and I had been isolated for so long that just as I was undoubtedly his world he was mine.
I wish that I lived in some other world, that we both lived in some other world. A world where we could have grown together, even gone to Hogwarts, and stepped out of its gates hand in hand, with Tom's smile filled with light and joy as it had so often been when he was small.
He'd show me a snake in the orphanage yard, whispering to it and holding it up towards me, watching as it flicked out its tongue in greeting and whispered a shy and hissing, "Hello", and laugh at my stunned and startled expression at the idea that snakes could talk and think.
Because that was Tom Riddle too.
And even now, even after everything that he's done, after everything I've done, and I've failed to do, I miss him.
Every moment, every second, I miss him. I miss what he was, I miss what he could have been, I perhaps even miss what he is and whatever he's doing now.
I imagine whatever worlds he's inhabiting, exploring, and conquering now. I picture him a proud young man, tall, dark, and so terribly handsome walking through the streets of London, Paris, or perhaps even Tokyo. I imagine the fire in his pale eyes, mirrors of my own, that reflect so much of the world inside of them. I picture the smile that curves his lips upwards, and even though I can't help but imagine he's unhappy, that some part of me vindictively wishes he is cursed with misery until the end of time, I hope that happiness has somehow managed to find him. And I hope, that when he looks at the early morning sky or the rain, when he looks at his own growing and changing reflection, he remembers me.
No matter what he's done to anyone else, what he's going to do, and what he's done to me I… I can't help but miss him.
And god, I wish I didn't. I wish I could coldly shut him out and simply shut down, remind myself of Billy's rabbit, of Dennis and Amy, of every single moment he had proven himself a monster but I…
This doesn't interest you, does it?
Or, perhaps it does, but perhaps you don't find it much of an excuse. I wouldn't, and it isn't really, an excuse that is. I have no excuses, I've come to accept that. Or, if not accept it, then acknowledge it.
I am not merely my brother's hapless victim if I am indeed his victim at all.
These are simply the consequences I face, the weight and burden I must bear for my complicity and my silence. This, this place I've ended up in, the end of my story, is simply kismet. And if I hear his voice echoing in my mind, screaming in agony and despair and reaching out towards me, calling my name and searching, or else whispering it in a strange and earnest sorrow, then that is my burden as well.
You don't need excuses for me, I make none for myself.
No, I only have a story and I believe I left off in January 1938 with the arrival of Albus Dumbledore.
Well, that was certainly a moment, wasn't it? Not an easy one either. That was, I think that was when something of a wall came up between Tom and me.
Maybe I never saw it, maybe we'd always been teetering on a knife's edge, ready to fall off on opposite sides from one another. Maybe our world was just so small then that we couldn't gravitate away from one another until we left the orphanage. I don't think so though, even looking back I don't think that's it.
Tom never really forgave me for not telling him about Hogwarts, or, if he did, then he never forgave me for my abilities and foreknowledge that he didn't have. Before then, he'd once said, that we were like two sides of the same coin, that his telekinetic abilities complimented my vast mental wisdom and adult awareness. In other words, we were different in and both powerful in our own way, there was no real competition or rivalry between the pair of us.
Then Dumbledore comes out of nowhere, I recognize him, and more he says that Tom and I share a singular gift. Suddenly it's not equal and opposite, but instead Elizabeth having something that Tom, for whatever reason, does not. I didn't realize it at the time, wouldn't realize it for years, but that weighed on Tom.
That through some act of fate, some genetic lottery, through even the fact that we were fraternal rather than identical, we were not one in the same after all.
Then there was Diagon Alley and the wands, Tom getting one, and me another but not the brother wand that was instead stored away for some future witch or wizard. Tom was so quiet as we'd taken the terrifying wizard trolley (which apparently prided itself on making the sharpest turns possible) back to the orphanage, he'd stared out the windows, looked at the darkening sky and curled his fingers around his purchased wand until they were bloodless.
He'd asked me when we stepped off the bus, quietly, in a soft and shaking voice, "Lizzie, why do you think you didn't get the brother wand?"
All I could do was look at him, at his wide blue eyes that expected me to know everything in the world, and all I could do was shake my head and say, "I'm sorry, Tom, but I don't know."
He hugged me so tightly, only eleven and so terrified, as if he was afraid I'd disappear right then and there, like all those years of my existence had only been some wonderful dream that was now ending…
And perhaps it was, perhaps even then, it already was.
The world, I think, simply wasn't wide enough for the pair of us.
Fall, 1938, Tom and I boarded the Hogwarts Express with secondhand luggage, secondhand books, secondhand school supplies, secondhand clothing, a bag of dwindling coins, and firsthand wands all we had to our names. We sat alone in a compartment, two unwanted and unknown muggleborn orphans, watching the green hills of England then Scotland rolling by, and there we divided four Hogwarts houses between us to best pick our destiny.
And even now, not even in the corner of my mind but at the front of it as if he's still sitting here beside me with that boyish smile and delighted eyes, I can hear him asking, "But Lizzie, why would anyone want to go anywhere but Slytherin?"
Lizzie just gave him a look, peering over the top of the Transfiguration school book they'd both read at least twelve times already. Although Lizzie, he had to admit, found the book beyond fascinating in a way even Tom couldn't.
Of course, the idea of any magic, of mutating things and changing their form, appealed to him on a level he couldn't even describe. The acts described there, the extent a wand could help, him, everything he'd done until now was simply parlor tricks. With a wand in hand, he'd realized, he and Lizzie truly could become masters of the universe.
If he had to pick a favorite though, even before taking any classes, he'd say that there was something about Defense Against the Dark Arts that appealed to him. Maybe it was the action of it, the adventure, of using magic in battle and duels as Tom had always used it against the likes of Dennis at the orphanage. He could so easily picture himself, glowing wand in hand, striking out against a sea of opponents.
Tom still read through all the books with equal energy and attention, making sure to memorize and note everything the way he always did so that he could better catch up to Lizzie. And here, he realized with some shock, he'd always had an edge over Lizzie in the practical application of magic (she'd known everything, sure, but as far as he knew she'd never used it), and for once he might be the best rather than simply second best.
It was such a strange thought, almost liberating, for all that he hadn't chafed at being second best to his sister (it had always been that way and, being his twin, in many ways Lizzie was just an extension of himself so it wasn't as if he was really losing) it seemed so odd that for once he might be ahead of her. He could look over to her and guide her way like she had him through so many different subjects, show her how to use her gifts like he did and fight back against the faceless, muggle, mob…
Point being though, as far as the fervent studying from January until August was concerned, Tom didn't have a favorite. Lizzie though, she read all the books certainly, read them more than once, but she had an almost unnatural focus on Transfiguration.
The first time she'd finished it, sitting curled on her bed, she'd looked almost in awe, then almost terrified, as if she'd just seen the burning bush and realized it was the face of God. Then she'd looked at him and she'd said, "Tom, if this is real… The kind of energy it'd take to do something like this, to do it stably without disastrous consequences… How? How is it possible?"
She hadn't appreciated his almost annoyed answer, given while he was laying in his own bed, staring at the Potions text book and kicking his legs back and forth idly, of, "Magic, Lizzie, obviously."
Sometimes, he couldn't help but think, Lizzie really did get entirely too lost in that head of hers. Right now, for instance, Tom was more than done with Transfiguration for the moment and instead focused on their immediate future, maybe the most important decision of their lives, the Hogwarts houses that he'd read about.
"Lizzie, I said, why would we want to go anywhere but Slytherin?" Tom repeated, with more insistence this time, waiting for Lizzie to actually put down the damn book and talk to him already.
Finally, with a sigh, Lizzie set down the well-worn book and turned her attention to him. She leaned forward, that sober, serious, familiar adult look showing up on her face again as she studied him. Then a wry smile as she admitted, "Well, to be honest, the idea of sorting children on such… broad stereotypical features rubs me the wrong way. A human being is more than his ambition, his bravery, his tenacity, and his wits, but instead should be the sum of these and more."
Tom laughed, it was such a Lizzie answer to give to this sort of thing, "None isn't an option, Lizzie, and neither is all of them. So, given that, why not Slytherin?"
Here a grimace appeared on her face, as they really got into the crux of the argument of Lizzie's typical bullheaded disapproval, "Well, ambition and cunning aren't… bad things, I suppose. But… What kind of a person aspires to be those above all else? And to what end, where would that ambition take you? I can't say I personally have any grandiose ambitions."
Tom frowned then, felt that edge of annoyance grating on him when Lizzie, again, just didn't get it. She always was just not getting it, well, not always, but often enough that he wondered if she really knew what she was saying. He supposed he appreciated their differences, that they thought differently from one another and complimented each other, but all the same he just wished…
Finally, he said, stiffly and rather darkly, "I do. And I want… I want everything, I want this world and everything in it. I want power, I want money, I want choices, Lizzie! Don't you want that?"
Didn't they deserve it just as much if not more than anyone else did?
She smiled, laughed, but it was a delighted young thing that made her look and act Tom's age versus Mrs. Cole's, so he smiled back, "Well, when you put it like that, then by George I think I do want to be in Slytherin."
"Of course, you do," Tom said with a nod, crossing his arms as he huffed, "It's clearly the best house."
Its mascot was even a snake, and if that wasn't a sign, if that wasn't some kind of an omen then Tom was as dull and stupid as Dennis.
"Still," Lizzie mused, and odd smile on her face as she stared out the window at the scenery, so different than the gray streets of London, "There's more to life than merely ambition and power, Tom."
Tom said nothing, just looked out the window, staring at his own mulish reflection. He'd had this conversation enough times with Lizzie to know it was just something they'd never truly agree on, something she just couldn't see. That in the end, the orphanage, good, evil, even this Hogwarts place, everything was about power.
Life was power and who had it, nothing more, and nothing less.
The rest of the train ride passed in an easy silence, Lizzie returning to her books and Tom staring out the window, waiting for Hogwarts to appear in the distance. Hogwarts, it was supposed to be wonderful, all of the books had described a great castle that had stood unnoticed by the common man, by muggles, for centuries.
It would be far more of a real home than the orphanage.
More, perhaps, Tom wondered if they could find their father. If their father was in the magical world, that perhaps he somehow hadn't known about Lizzie or Tom in the orphanage, that their mother had simply never told him and…
Tom flushed, bitterly looking away from his reflection, reminded that he'd never come across the name Riddle in the book for History of Magic. Malfoy, Black, Potter, and so many others but never Riddle.
Eventually they put on their Hogwarts uniforms, far more worn than the ones that had been on display in the shop window, and then they were exiting with their trunks and towards the small mob of first years called over by the ground keeper. Tom glanced at their peers, all around the same height as him and Lizzie, and he couldn't help but notice how their clothes were so much finer, their trunks scuffed and worn and clearly secondhand…
Looking at him and Lizzie, they would glance for a moment, and then some would even sneer as if they could tell just by staring that Tom and Lizzie didn't fit some expectation, some mold, and he had no idea what it was.
Just as they had sneered down at the pair of them in Diagon Alley…
In the end Tom and Lizzie ended up in a boat with two chattering redheads, a pair who prattled on about anything and everything and the sort of test they thought might wait for them inside the castle. They grinned across as Lizzie introduced them, "I'm Lizzie Riddle, and this is my brother Tom."
"Riddle?" one asked, "Are you muggleborn then, or are you from America you've got…"
"No, no I just have an accent because… I have an accent," Elizabeth said with a small laugh, "Tom and I are muggleborn."
Suddenly, judging by the looks on their faces, Tom knew that one did not want to be muggleborn, that Tom didn't want him or Lizzie to be muggleborn. A glance at Lizzie's face and she had that resigned look again, like she knew the same thing as Tom, but wasn't going to insist that their father could have been magical or anything but instead just accept that this was the way things were.
Like she accepted everything that had ever happened to them! Accepted their fate and place in the world as if there was nothing either of them could do about it.
Well, Tom wouldn't, didn't, he never had! He turned his attention past the chattering idiots in their boat and towards the castle, tall and glowing across the lake, and he vowed that he'd take it for himself and his sister. No matter how she protested or sighed, he'd get into Slytherin, and he'd take this whole country for the pair of them!
Except, when the hat fell first onto Lizzie's head, it sat for a long time and at the end gave a great cry of "RAVENCLAW!"
And Tom, staring after her, her looking back at him and smiling as she walked out of his reach, couldn't help but wonder if he could so easily walk the path he needed to without her by his side…
The world, suddenly, seemed terribly large in a way it hadn't only a few days ago. Like something had just shifted unexpectedly between the pair of them. Something Tom could never have prepared himself for.
Some part of him had thought it was inevitable that she would follow him to Slytherin, that she had to, if only because they were twins. That perhaps, this even meant that he had to go to Ravenclaw…
Still, the hat only hesitated for a moment, only whispered of greatness and glory, and then it was shouting "SLYTHERIN!"
Author's Note: And we're back after god only knows how long. It's resurrect-a-palooza people. Yes, it's good to be back, this will be fun, we'll have lots of fun here. Essentially though I realized this was too good of a story to let truly rot into nothingness so here we are.
Thanks for reading and reviewing, reviews are appreciated.
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter