With a wave of unexplainable confidence, I prowl toward the mysterious mirror and ignore the muttered profanities from under Malfoy's breath as I center myself.
"It's just a bloody mirror!" he insists from behind me.
My expression drops as his words appeared to be truthful. But an innate curiosity left me determined to analyze the fascinating contraption.
I stare back at my reflection while narrowing my eyes and leaning closer for a better look. I observe the unruly mop of brunette hair on my head that begged to be brushed. My mouth is bent into a prominent frown and my un-sturdy glasses rest haphazardly on the bridge of my nose.
As I curiously tilt my head to the side, the appearance to the mirror slowly transforms into a smoky substance. The outline of two figures emit from the smoke as they take full form.
A couple in their thirties peer back at me with warm smiles on their faces. My stomach lurches as I instantly recognize the same man and woman from the picture that Hagrid showed me back at my house.
It was my mother and father.
They each hold a hand clenched on either of my shoulders and they lightly nod their head as though they were trying to comfort me. There's a contradicting look of solemn hesitation in my mother's eye, matched by the same look of warning in my father's.
My breath hitches in my throat, and I gesture an encouraging arm toward Malfoy as I take a step closer.
"I think it's my parents," I inform in trepidation. "Come here, look!"
The enchanted image of my parents slowly dissolves as the blonde sticks his head out from behind my shoulder. He skeptically peers down his nose at the mirror while stroking his chin.
"Can you see them?"
"I can't see anything," he insists while shoving me to the side rather forcefully. I glare at my temperamental roommate as I wait for him to see for himself.
Malfoy's eyebrows slowly pinch together as his head curiously tilts to the side. Taking a hesitant step back, he glances between myself and the enchanted mirror.
"Do you see them now?"
"No," he replies with visible unease. "I see my father."
In a manner predictably as ungracefully as he had shoved me out of the way, I eagerly nudge his shoulder and re-center myself.
"Do you think.." The corners to my lips rise as I'm once again reacquainted with the warm smile of my biological parents. "Do you think it's a mirror that shows us our parents or something?"
"That's daft," he dismisses with the quick flick of his wrist. "What'd be the use of that?"
"Maybe it's our fondest memory," I suggest.
"Wrong again," he replies with a snooty disposition. "That'd be impossible. My father has never shown a trace of affection."
I raise an eyebrow at him as I watch him absently wrap his arms around himself in a protective manner. I didn't know much of Malfoy's father other than the fact that than the fact that he deeply neglect his son. It was predictable that he had never received much warmth from his father which, as he pointed out, dismissed my second theory.
"What?" he snarls at me.
"Nothing.. that's just.. really sad." The words fall out of my mouth quicker than I can think. I instantly regret what I said based off his blatant defensive body language.
"Don't pity me, Potter," he warns. His vision falls to the floor as his foot impatiently taps the concrete. "Can we get a move on, then?"
I jolt in place as I feel the sensation of something slithering up my leg. "Got you!" I triumphantly protest while gathering my defiant pet snake from my leg.
"Ah!" As if someone had simultaneously kicked burning hot ash into my right eye, I reflexively clench it shut. While rubbing it relentlessly, the snake continues to curl itself around my wrist. "It burns."
I wait for some sort of backhanded comment to be sent my way, but Malfoy remains patiently quiet. Hot tears stream down my face as I repetitively bat my eyelashes. The distortion in the vision of my right eye innately triggers some sort of emotional response as I let out a frustrated guttural growl. I feel my temperature rise as a deep-seated ferocity emerges from the depths of my chest.
Bent over in pain, I clench my hands on my knees while taking a deep breath.
"Look again," the snake speaks to me.
I glace over my shoulder at the daunting mirror while freezing in place. Straightening my posture, I'm instantly entranced by the new image that was presenting itself. Unexpected alleviation washes over my eye as I blink back the last of the aggravating tear drops.
Transitioning each eye, I shut my left and open the right and cycle back again. My right eye presents a new person standing behind me, and it certainly wasn't someone from my blood line.
My Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, Professor Quirrell, gapes back at me with a sardonic expression. His face is tilted downward and he peers at me from out of the tops of his eyes with a sinister smirk. Similar to the same position that my parents were in, he clutches a hand around my shoulder with an undeniable look of pride.
It was as though he was trying to tell me something; to coax me to obey his demands.
And I'm all but consumed.
"What is it?" Malfoy asks with genuine curiosity in his tone.
"Quirrell," I simply reply.
"The famous Harry Potter; the illegitimate love child to the stuttering buffoon, Quirrell?" he muses. "If your theory stands correct.."
"Shut up," I bark at him. "He's not my father you prat."
Keeping my left eye shut, I curiously peer into the reflection, searching for answers. Our professor gradually nods his head while directing a finger toward my lower body. It's in that moment that I notice a protrusion from the pocket to my pants in the reflection; about the size of a golf ball.
"He's.. he's trying to point out something in my pants," I ogle while gripping my slacks.
"Grown a stiffy for our professor, have you?"
My visional contact is broken as I send an agitated eyeroll toward my roommate. He shoots back an amused smirk, but the consequential incredulous glint in his eye matched my hesitation.
Quirrell continues to encouragingly nod his head as my fingers trace over the lump in my pocket. My index finger slips into the fold as the snake continues to lure me with its native speech.
"Find the stone," it tempts, "And I will give you infinite power. Join me, Harry Potter.."
"What's the insufferable reptile saying now?" Malfoy asks impatiently.
"It's.." My mind goes blank as I feel the sudden urge to keep this sentiment to myself. Not only did I sound barking mad to reveal that the snake was trying to direct me toward some sort of unidentifiable stone, but it also felt like an intimate subject that was solely meant between myself and the perplexing creature. "It's telling me to make sure I finish my homework," I lamely reply. "Before break is over. Or I'll be in trouble with Quirrell.."
Malfoy replies with some sort of 'pfft', dismissive response while flicking the back of his hand at me. But his expression softens as he tilts his head to the side and his eyes critique the serpent now wound around my wrist. "Have you told Dumbledore?" he asks with detectable concern.
"That I was gifted a pet snake?"
"No," he replies firmly. "It seems as though undisclosed presents aren't that unusual for someone such as yourself."
"Then how do you mean?"
"The fact that you can speak to it, you daft thing," he reprimands, the sound of irritation returning to his voice. "Not just everyone can speak parseltongue."
"Well.. no.. I haven't."
"And your eye?"
I awkwardly scratch the back of my head while my eyes dart from side to side. I'm growing increasingly uncomfortable in the conversation, presumably due to the fact that I'm growing increasingly guilty with each question thrown at me.
There were many things that I hadn't told Dumbledore, and there were many things that innately told me I shouldn't.
I was gifted with a plethora of odd features, some unbeknownst to its origins, and it was something I had grown used to. I didn't need the headmaster's help in discerning my freakish abilities.
"Look again."
Uncontrollably abiding by my snake's unsettling demands, I glance one more over to the mirror and freeze in place.
The reflection exhibits a wide smirk on my face which doesn't match my current expression. Both of my eyes shine a yellowish tint against the glass, representing the transfiguration of my healthy eye being overcome by the other. My pupils are morphed into precise serpentine slivers, in the shape of diamonds, against the murky yellow backdrop of my irises.
In the reflection, my face cracks into hearty laughter as the Hogwarts castle appears behind me, engulfed in flames. I stand tall beside Quirrell who joins in on the sinister snicker.
"I can promise you a life of eternity and riches beyond wealth," the snake speaks as if it were narrating the picture transpiring before me. "We will make an unstoppable force, laughing in the faces of our enemies."
A powerful surge of adrenaline rushes through the course of my body as I'm brought back to the present. I have the urge to both vomit and scream as I take a tentative step back. The blood rushes from out of my face as I turn to Malfoy who gapes back at me incredulously.
"You look as though you've seen a ghost," he reads my expression.
I open my mouth to say something but nothing comes out. A bellowing meow can suddenly be heard from down the corridor relieving myself from the compromising conversation.
"Shit!" he hisses as his face turns an equivalent shade of ivory. "Filch!"
Scurrying to our feet, we rush toward the invisibility cloak and drape it over our heads. I keep a firm grip on my pet snake while shoving Malfoy in the direction of the exit. As we tiptoe out of the corridor, I never lose sight of the daunting mirror.
By use of the utterly convenient undisclosed Christmas present, I make a promise to myself that I would soon return.