Chapter 10
There must have been a moment, at the beginning, where we could have said — no. But somehow we missed it.
-Tom Stoppard-
"You gotta talk to him eventually," Avery said as he carefully grabbed their mouse before it jumped off the edge of the table.
"I'll talk to him as soon as he apologizes for being a git," Jenny hissed back. She waved her wand at the mouse and muttered an incantation but it didn't transform into a teacup like it was supposed to.
"Bloody hell. Why are you both being so stubborn about this?" Avery groaned.
"I think I'm being perfectly reasonable," she insisted, causing Avery to scoff and mumble something under his breath.
Tom and Jenny hadn't spoken for a week. Tom was firmly convinced that going to the library was nothing to be sorry for, and Jenny was livid that he didn't get it. They had both been pointedly ignoring each other and sitting apart in class. It got to the point when even the professors began to notice.
"Ms. Endall, could you please speak with me after class," Professor Dumbledore requested after the last Transfiguration lesson before Christmas break. He dismissed the other children, leaving just Jenny in the room with him.
"Yes, sir?" Jenny asked, standing and approaching the professor at his desk.
"I've noticed Mr. Riddle and yourself have not been working as partners in class lately." He paused, a pensive look blanketed his face as a thin hand ran down the length of his beard. "Has there been something that's bothering you?"
Jenny considered this for a moment, then said, "No, sir. Tom and I are just having a disagreement."
"If you ever need some guidance, I find that my best choices come after a good night's rest," Dumbledore advised her cryptically.
"Right," Jenny said blandly.
"Have a good holiday, Ms. Endall."
"You too, Professor," she answered back, taking her leave.
As soon as she entered the hallway, Tom was immediately by her side.
"What?" She huffed, trying to walk faster in an attempt to leave him behind.
His long legs easily kept pace with her as he asked, "What did Dumbledore want?"
She scoffed and snapped, "I'm not talking to you. You don't value my time."
"Why won't you tell me?" He insisted.
"Why are you still talking?" She shot back.
"Alright fine!" He said, raising his voice slightly. She stopped and looked at him with her arms crossed. "You win. Okay?"
She blinked, mouth pulled into a grimace. "And?" She urged him.
"And?" He echoed sounding harassed.
"Yes, and," Jenny confirmed with growing frustration.
"And I'll try to spend more time with you?" He tried.
"And?" She asked still not satisfied.
Tom's face grew red with a mix of anger and humiliation as he muttered, "And I'm sorry."
Jenny smiled, "Was that so difficult?"
"You make everything difficult," he said, sounding defeated.
She ignored his comment as she explained, "Professor Dumbledore was just concerned because you and I weren't talking."
"That was it?" Tom asked, skepticism evident in his voice.
"He also warned me about my sleeping habits," she supplied sarcastically.
"I'm not joking, Jenny," he snapped.
"I wasn't either," she said with a shrug. "Why does it even matter? Were you expecting him to ask me something?"
"No," he said. "I'll see you at dinner. I'm going to the library."
In disbelief, she laughed and jokingly called after him, "You're insufferable."
"Happy Christmas, Tom."
"Oh yes, happy Christmas," he said back absentmindedly, barely looking up from his book as he came from the boy's dormitory.
Jenny smoothed a wrinkle out of her skirt and motioned for Tom to sit next to her in front of the common room's fireplace. He took a seat, still skimming the pages of his book intently. With an impatient tut, she yanked the book from his grip and placed it on her lap so she would have his full attention.
"I got you something," she explained. Hurriedly she added, "You don't have to worry about getting me anything. I know we've never really been the gift exchanging type." She pulled a small box into view which had been wrapped carefully in newspaper. She pushed it hesitantly into Tom's hand and watched as his eyes raked over the small parcel.
"Thank you," he said, raising his eyes to meet hers.
Her eyes rolled in response as she said teasingly, "You don't even know what's in it. You can't thank me yet."
"Thank you for the thought," he amended with a smirk. He hooked his finger in the edge of the newspaper and tore the wrapping away revealing a small blue cardboard box. Pausing for a moment he looked towards Jenny as though asking permission to open it. She was watching his face carefully and nodded, urging him to continue.
He popped the lid off the box revealing a golden disk. The top was detailed with an etching of snakes and vines both entangled in one another, looping around the perimeter of the circle. Lifting the object from the box, he ran his fingers against the smooth center and along the bumpy etching. The center was so polished the two orphans could see themselves looking back, Jenny's face pulled into a nervous smile and Tom's eyes masked with a calculating stare, watched them. He ran his finger along the far edge of the disk and felt a hinge, on the opposite side was a small button. His finger lingered on the button for a moment, allowing the cool metal to warm in his palm. Upon depressing the button the glossy, golden mirror swung forward revealing a clock and a note fell into Tom's lap.
He placed the pocket watch gingerly into the box, snatched up the note, and unfolded it. His eyes were met by Jenny's large, looping writing which read, 'Happy Christmas, Tommy! Maybe with this pocket watch, you'll be able to keep track of how long you're in the library. - Jenny'.
Tom looked up from the note to see Jenny's anxious eyes studying his expression. "Thank you, this will be very useful," he said with a smile as he slipped the watch into his robe pocket.
"Oi, Riddle," a person called from across the common room. Jenny looked up confused, but soon recognized the owner of the voice as Mulciber, Lestrange's friend. She had seen him several times in passing, mostly hanging around Lestrange or Tom, but she had never been given the opportunity to directly interact with him. She had hoped to take advantage of him staying over the Christmas break, but he mostly kept to himself when Tom didn't need him.
"What, Mulciber?" Tom nearly snarled, not even attempting to hide his irritation.
Mulciber paled, losing his nerve, "I wanted to let you know that I think I found something."
"Found what?" Jenny asked.
"After reading about the Chamber of Secrets I got curious as to where that could be located." Tom explained, "Remember last year? I found a private common room and when I tried to show you it was gone. I think maybe the entrance could be tied to that."
"You're still stuck on that story?" She asked with a scoff.
Tom's face darkened, "It's not a story."
"If it's not, why find the entrance?"
He shrugged nonchalantly and shot back, "Why not?"
She blinked and stared at him for a moment. She trusted him didn't she? Besides, Salazar Slytherin's heir is supposedly going to cleanse the school of dirty blood and Tom himself didn't think his mother was a wizard, he wouldn't be safe from the monster if it was released. She smiled and simply responded, "Alright, but don't be disappointed when your story isn't real."
He considered this for a moment and nodded, then he spoke to Mulciber who had been silent throughout their exchange, "Alright, show me what you found." He stood and followed Mulciber out of the common room leaving Jenny alone.
She sat staring at the flames waving on the fire for a moment and idly ran her fingers along the corner of the book in her lap. Then it struck her, this was the book Tom had been reading. Mulciber must have distracted him causing him to forget to retrieve it from her. Her eyes floated over to the common room door guiltily waiting for Tom to barge in and demand his book back, but it didn't come.
She flipped through the book, scanning the pages. The material was very informative, but also very gruesome, it went into detail descriptions of how each spell affected its targets, or more appropriately victims. She curiously allowed her eyes to jump from the exhaustive explanation of the Imperius Curse to the word kill, which was brought up a lot in the description for the Killing Curse. The incantation, Avada Kedavra, was underlined lightly in pencil, seemingly by the previous owner of the book. Which was quite odd, Jenny couldn't help but ponder what a wizard would be doing with a muggle pencil.
Before she had much time to consider this, her eyes became fixated on familiar handwriting, also written in pencil along the margin of the book next to a spell entitled, Cruciatus Curse. Tom's smooth handwriting spelled outSilencio, the spell for silencing a target. Her eyes slid down along the book's text and, to her horror, it explained in detail the pain a person under the effects of the spell would feel. Below the description was a printed in sketched image of a person appearing to be writhing on the ground, face contorted into an oddly familiar look of anguish, the bold text next to it simply said the incantation,Crucio.
She found herself frozen, willing the pencil markings off the page, but they wouldn't budge. Her mind raced as she thought of Tom, her Tommy, flipping through the same pages as she was, although instead of horror he felt curious, maybe even a scientific distance from it. She could picture him sitting in the quiet of the night in the orphanage studying the text and penciling in notes within the margins. A sadistic voice in her head whispered darkly, 'Maybe even tips for better use.' Knives dug into her heart as she shoved the thought away unable to bare considering that possibility. A wicked part of her entertained the idea for a moment, producing the evidence that lingered under her nose, Tom's roommate's sudden change in cleaning habits, Lestrange's rapidly depleting snootiness, Avery and Rosier's placated response to Tom's demands and constant belittling. Bile crawled up her throat as she snapped the book closed.
With a single shaking hand she held firm to the book and walked to Tom's room, legs wobbling like a newborn calf. She dropped the book on top of the other Borgin and Burke's books stacked on his trunk which caused the pile to topple over. Feeling very ill she peeled back Tom's bedding and laid down, pulling his blankets over her head and hiding from the light in the comforting safety of her childhood friend's scent. Her nerves tore through her as she shivered under the thick blanket and curled herself into a ball. Soon her breath evened out, shortly after her heartbeat matched her steady breathing. Sleep slipped her mind away, sparing her from reality.
She woke to Tom leaning over her, a questioning, if not slightly worried, look in his eyes. "Good morning," was all he said to her.
"Hi," her mouth choked out.
"You're in my bed," he stated the obvious.
She nodded, face flushed in embarrassment as she sat up, leaning her head against the wall.
"You haven't slept in my bed since we left Wool's," he said, suspicion creeping into his voice as he began drawing his own conclusion. His eyes scanned over her for a moment, laying heavy scrutiny on her bare arms and face. "Has someone been bothering you?" His voice was trained with cautious calmness.
"No, I—" she started but Tom spoke over her.
"Don't lie to me," he insisted. "You used to only sleep in my bed when you were scared or nervous."
"I was just waiting for you to get back from the library," she quickly lied. "I accidentally fell asleep." Then she added as an afterthought, "Hogwarts isn't Wool's, I'm not being picked on. Besides, barely anyone is here over Christmas to do that."
He studied her expression for a moment then finally nodded, accepting her word as truth. "I wasn't in the library though," he corrected her.
"You always go there. I had assumed that was where whatever Mulciber wanted to show you was," she explained easily.
Tom shook his head, "No, he thought he found that common room, but he ended up just getting us lost." He rolled his eyes in annoyance, but his line of sight got caught on something at the end of the bed. Jenny followed his stare to the Borgin and Burke's book he had accidentally left with her.
"I brought it back up. Since you forgot it in your rush to see what Mulciber found," she explained hoping to get ahead of any suspicions Tom may have.
"I see," he murmured distractedly, a clouded expression masked his face.
"What time is it," she asked trying to divert his attention.
"It's almost dinner time," he answered looking back towards her.
"I'm going to go freshen up then," she announced climbing out of his bed and rushing to the door. "See you there?"
"Hmm," she turned to look at him, he was running his fingers along the edges of the books and looking over the one she had flipped through with heavy scrutiny.
"Tom?" She asked, causing him to look up.
His expression was unreadable as he said, "Yes, see you then."
He never did come to dinner that evening.
"We're friends right?" The question bubbled from her mouth without much thought as Avery moved his queen.
They had fallen into a routine after everyone returned from Christmas break. Jenny would sit with Tom in the library after classes. Tom would read whatever it was he was interested in that day and Jenny would revise for classes. Afterward, they would return to the common room, Tom would go to his room to finish homework, and Avery would play a game of Wizard Chess with Jenny as Rosier coached her by whispering tips. Once Avery beat her, Tom would usually return to the common room and request Lestrange, Rosier, Avery, and Mulciber to join him for a tutoring session on Defense Against the Dark Arts. Jenny once tried to come with but Tom refused to allow her, saying some rubbish about her not needing extra help and just being a distraction.
"Of course we're friends," Avery assured her as he watched his pawn get demolished by one of her bishops.
"So we would tell each other things right?" She asked sheepishly.
Avery looked up from the chess board, eyes narrowing as he teasingly said, "Are you trying to distract me? Is Rosier teaching you dirty tricks?"
Rosier butted in and defended himself, "This is all her! I've been zoned out the last three turns."
"That's not a good thing," Jenny scolded with a laugh, "you're supposed to be helping!" Then she looked back to Avery humor leaving her expression as she asked, "But really if I told you two something I would need your discretion."
Avery's eyes flickered between Jenny to Rosier and back to Jenny before he finally nodded and said, "Rosier and I won't say anything. Is it bad?"
"I—" she hesitated, picking her next words with deliberation, "I don't know."
"That's good," Rosier piped up.
"Well," Jenny reminded him, "just because I'm uncertain doesn't mean it's good."
"Get on with it," Avery moaned. "All this beating around the bush is nerve-racking."
"I was reading—" Jenny began but stopped short as she spotted Tom emerging from the dormitory.
"You haven't finished your game yet?" Tom asked, strolling across the common room to the table they had gathered around.
"Not yet," Jenny answered, eyes scanning the board to avoid Tom's questioning gaze. Avery had always won before it was time for their tutoring session.
"You're one move away from winning, Avery," Tom noted dryly. "Distracted?"
Avery looked pale as he hurriedly moved his piece. They watched in silence as Jenny's king was beaten down.
"We'll get him next time," Rosier muttered to Jenny while patting her back.
"Not with your strategies obviously," Tom said sarcastically. Then changing gears he listed, "Avery, Rosier, Lestrange, and Mu— Bloody hell where's Mulciber?"
Lestrange perked up in his corner near the fireplace and answered, "He got detention."
"How?" Tom's voice was dripping with venom.
"I don't know," Lestrange answered, appearing to regret having ever produced an answer in the first place.
"Doesn't matter I suppose," Tom finally said, anger dropping from his face in a second, transforming back to a neutral mask. He turned and began walking to his dormitory, the three remaining boys following close behind, leaving Jenny to clean up the game of Wizard Chess.
The fireplace illuminated her as she went through the repetition of repairing the pieces. She'd gather the chunks of each piece, wave her wand, and continued until the set was whole again. Although she was sure there was a more efficient way to repair the set, she found herself doing it this way each evening as it was a nice time filler when she didn't want to go back to her room yet. This also gave her an opportunity to practice casting nonverbal spells.
She had just completed repairing all the black pieces and was beginning to work on the white, repairing the queen first, when Mulciber walked into the common room, huffing like he had just run across the castle.
"Mulciber," Jenny called to him.
He nodded towards her in acknowledgment as he hurriedly moved towards the boy's dormitory.
"Wait," she said, dropping the queen, allowing it to break again on the floor in her rush to stop him. Her legs quickly carried her in front of his path, causing him to stop short before he reached the stairs.
"What?" He asked gruffly, brow dropping in irritation.
She readied herself as she strategically mentioned, "Tom's angry with you." Eagerly she studied the effects her statement had on him. His eyes widened and the blood drained from his cheeks, which was quite an accomplishment as they had been bright red from running. "I would give him time to calm down. Maybe we can play some Wizard Chess, then if he gets mad about you not coming to tutoring you can blame me and say that I asked for some company."
She saw the resignation in his face moments before he agreed with a soft, "Alright."
They made quick work of setting up the new game. The fireplace housed just a few muted flickering flames by the time Mulciber said, "Check," indicating he was one move away from checkmate.
When Jenny's knight got pulverized for the second time that night she said, "Good game." Then after a moment, she asked, "Why did you get detention?"
He blinked, surprised by the sudden line of questioning, "Er, Professor Dumbledore caught me in the halls after hours."
"Why were you out after hours?" She asked with little tact.
"Endall, I really gotta be going," he said, uncomfortably tugging on his shirt.
She nodded once and he got to his feet, retreating from the room as though it caught on fire. She called after his fleeing form, "Goodnight."
AN: The state of this story: (nothing bad promise). Okay, so as of chapter 9 this fanfiction was 30k words. I originally started this story thinking it would only get that long or to 50k. Obviously, we are nowhere near the end of this story. So here's the plan, I've had a loose, not public, update schedule set in my head, for the sake of full disclosure, I plan on updating this every other Friday so today is 5/10/19 so next update will be Friday of 5/24/19.
Thank you all who reviewed. I've been having a very rough time lately and reviews always put a smile on my face