Enchanted Hearts III: The Gifts

[ A/N: Sorry for the delay, guys!! I was visiting my grandma and she's ... well... technologically challenged: as in, No Computer. Anyway, back to our story! Nicole gets a letter from her parents allowing her to invite a friend of her choice to their mansion in switzerland for the summer and she feels torn between who to invite. When Tom finds out that the answer isn't obvious... well... You'll See... Please r/r!! ]

Nicole sat with the still angry Myrtle and peace keeping Hagrid two weeks after the Halloween party and watched as the owl post came in. She had always found the school's mail system amazing, but had never gotten any mail herself. At least, not until this morning.

As the three friends watched, ten tawny owls slowly made their way towards their end of the table, carrying a rather large crate and set it on the floor by Nicole's feet. The hall had gone deadly silent as this took place and was then filled with a sudden burst of excited discussion. Looking at the huge parcel made Nicole sigh. Why did her parents have to single her out? Why, why, why... ?

" What's in there, Nicole? " Myrtle asked, her voice perking up more then it had in the last two weeks combined.

" Your guess is as good as mine, honestly. What I want to know is, how are we going to get it upstairs? " Nicole said, trying to hide her slowly rising anger. She had, until this point, managed to avoid being the center of attention and she had decided from talking to Tom that it was best to stay out of the lime light.

" I've got 'er, guys! " Hagrid said, lifting the parcel once they had finished eating and starting to carry it to the Gryffindor commonroom.

" Hey, take it to the south corridor. " Tom said, walking up to them, " I wanna see this too! "

" Buzz off, Riddle. I'm guessing that this is full of junk-food and you only wanna see it so you can steal it from Nikki! " Myrtle snapped.

" Its too heavy to carry all over the school, Tom. I don't want anything to happen to Hagrid from carrying it. " Nicole said, looking at him and sighing, " Not trying to exclude you, but it would be a lot easier to take it directly to Gryffindor tower. "

" Have it your way. " Tom muttered, giving her an icy stare and walking away.

" Man that guy ticks me off! " Myrtle said, once he was out of earshot, " He's just too pushy! "

#####

As it all turned out when the crate was opened, they would have been just as well off opening it in the south hall, because it was separated into four smaller crates, each marked with a name. One was for Nicole, obviously, and the other three were marked Myrtle, Hagrid (?), and Tom. Nicole smiled at her parents thoughtfulness as she handed Hagrid and Myrtle their boxes and looked at her own with longing.

" WOW! " Myrtle said, opening hers before Hagrid had even managed to until the ribbin that had been wrapped around his, " Ohhh... New dress robes! Cool!! And... Whoa... Look at all the chocolate frogs and dooble's best blowing gum...!! Tell your parents thanks! This is just amazing! They're pretty cool muggles to have figured this much out! "

" 'EY! They got me a... Guide to Caring for Magical Creatures! I've wanted this book forever! And... Mmm.... Lots of Chocolate Frogs and Dooble's blowing gum here, too! Tell 'em thanks for me, Nicole! " Hagrid said, grinning from ear to ear.

" I will, guys. " Nicole said with a smile, glad to know that not everything in the crate had been entended for her, " Look, I need to take this to Tom so he can open it. My lord... what did they put in here..? Did they buy Diagan Alley for him...? Oh, boy...! "

" I'll take it for ya, Nicole! " Hagrid said, lifting both Tom and her parcels off the floor. " C'mon! Where'd he say... South Corridor? "

" Yeah. " Nicole said, " See ya, Myrtle! "

" Bye, Nikki! " Myrtle said, between bites of chocolate frog, " And thanks again! "

#######

Tom Riddle sat, resting his head in his hands and waiting for Nicole to show up. He knew she would, of course, because they were best friends. Their little spat was neither the first or the last that their friendship would endure. However, Tom mused, she needed to learn a lesson from this one. That was without question. She had made him look like a fool and now she would pay for it.

" Any sign of her yet? " A boy with a pinkish complexion and plump figure asked, poking his head around the corner, " Man, she's gonna get the scare of her life! "

" Remember, Cabbe, just scare her. Don't hurt her. " Tom said dully for the seventh time in ten minutes. Scratching his head, he asked himself again why he had gotten such an idiot involved in the first place. Only the sound of footsteps coming down the narrow hall pulled Tom back into the present.

" Hey, Tom! " Nicole shouted, running down the hall with Hagrid following her. Turning the final corner, Nicole ran face-first into Cabbe. " Oh, sorry! Have you seen Tom? " she asked, not bothering to see who it was.

" Why would I tell you if I had, mud-blood? " Cabbe sniggered, " Oh, Tom! Your little play-mate is here! "

" Grr... You bite your tongue, you over-grown rat! " Nicole said, standing up and brushing her thick velvet robes off, " Where is he? "

" He doesn't want to be disturbed, mud-blood! " Cabbe said, raising his voice. " Now get lost before I decide to beat you up! "

" Yer not gonna touch 'er, ya big creep! " Hagrid said setting the two crates down carefully and coming into view, " Now scram! "

Cabbe took one look at Hagrid and ran screaming in the other direction. Nicole sunk to the floor in a fit of laughter, " Thanks, Hagrid. I think I should be all right now. "

" Man I don't like that guy... " Hagrid said, proceeding to sit down next to Nicole, " What do ya reckon's in Tom's crate, anyway? "

" I honestly don't know, really. I'm sure its good, considering what they got you and Myrtle. I'm still dying to see what they got me, but I can wait. That's funny, maybe he actually decided not to show up. Weird... " Nicole said, standing up again and looking around, " Tom? This place is startin' to give me the creeps... Its too quiet, Hagrid... "

" Yer right. Maybe we should go back to th' tower. You could always give it to him t'morrow, ya know... " Hagrid agreed turning around after picking up both crates, but then dropping them both suddenly. " Nicole look out! "

Nicole turned around just in time to see Hagrid fall to the ground in a full body bind. Standing beside him with a look of triumph on his face was Tom." What are you doing?! " Nicole shouted, her eyes growing wide in surprise.

" Just playing around. " Tom said, watching as she reached for her wand and laughing when she discovered it was not there. Slowly he drew the slender willow-branch out of the sleeve of his cloak and waved it in front of her nose, " Looking for this? "

" Am I that transparent? " Nicole asked, her voice dripping sarcasm as she reached forward to take the wand from his hand. To her annoyance, Tom pulled it just out of her reach as she was about to grasp it. " Give that back, Tom! "

" I think you can afford to ask a little more kindly then that, Nicole. " Tom said, waving her wand around aimlessly and watching as little red sparks danced in the air. " Facinating, isn't it? I could use this wand... "

" That's MINE! " Nicole said, completely losing her temper and jumping at him, knocking him to the ground and grabbing the wand from his hand. " And it will do you a lot of good in the future to remember that. Locomia! "

Hagrid scrambled to his feet, his black eyes glaring at Tom with a type of fury Nicole did not recognize, " Y-yer a two-timin' double-crossin' inconsi'erate jerk, Riddle! Get outta my way! "

" Hey, Hagrid! Are you okay? " Nicole shouted after him, but he just kept walking. He did not want to let Tom get him so angry that he did something rash.

" What are you doing here, Nicole? Its past midnight. " Tom asked, looking at her troubled expression and then finally seeing the crates. " What are these? "

" Never mind that for a minute, Tom. That was mean! Why'd you go and do that to Hagrid? What did he do to you? " Nicole asked, her wand still clutched protectively in both hands.

" To be honest, I thought it was you. It really was supose to wind up being a joke of sorts. I didn't expect you to be such a coward that you would bring a body guard. "

" If you lift one of those crates the reason for my 'body guard' will become clearer. " Nicole muttered, " See that one. It has your name on it. My parents sent you presents. They sent stuff for Hagrid and Myrtle, too. And the other one is for me. I wanted to wait so we could open them togather. "

" Ohhh... " Tom said, now feeling like a fool as he once again looked at the two heavy boxes, " Yes, that does make sense, doesn't it? Well, shall we open them, then? "

" Are you going to apologize to Hagrid tomorrow? " Nicole asked, sitting down beside one of the crates and looking at him. He felt pangs of guilt as he noticed she was still holding her wand with some caution.

" Yes, I will. " he said finally, sighing, " Are you going to apologize to me? You blew me off this afternoon. "

" Yeah, I'm sorry. I just didn't want everyone staring at me. My parents have a tendancy to make that nearly unavoidable... " Nicole sighed, lying her head against Tom as he sat down beside her and wrapped his cloak around them both.

" Well, ready? " Tom asked, looking at the crates longingly and placing them so they were easier to reach with a wave of his wand, " You go first. "

Nicole grinned. She had been waiting to open her crate all day and was not at all disappointed. Inside she found two new books, 'Charms for all occassions' and '1000 years of magical History'; a beautiful jeweled flute, new dress robes for the yule ball, fortune telling gems and lots of candy.

Tom eyed all of the new things in amazement, as he had never seen anyone get so many beautiful things in one box. He also noticed that they had given her a rather large bag full of money in case they had missed anything she might want.

" They did pretty good. They just missed a couple books I wanted. " Nicole said, carefully placing everything back into the box, " I'll read the note tomorrow. "

" You're so lucky! " Tom said, staring at Nicole's calm expression in amazement, " I'm going to open mine now. "

" Yeah, go for it. " Nicole said, smiling, " I mentioned a few of the things you told me you had always wanted to get... I think you should like what's in there if they didn't good it up. I told them to make sure they included the recipts. "

" Whoa! " Tom said, his mouth hanging open as he undid the lock on the beautifully painted crate to discover it was a seven-layer trunk, something he had always thought would be neat to have. This in itself would have been a beautiful gift, but as he unlocked each layer he found it was crammed full of something delightful. The first layer was filled with beautiful new quills, jarks of brightly colored high quality ink and thick cream colored parchment. The next contained what seemed to be endless mounds of candy, all neatly sorted by what type it was; the third was full of books, which Tom realized were all from a list he had secretly been composing; the fourth contained several bags of gold galleons; the fifth, new robes, a hat, dragon's hide gloves and a fine robe of royal purple velvet for the yule ball; the sixth all new muggle clothing to wear when he was not in class and the seventh, a brand new cauldron, telescope, test tubes, scales and the most beautiful broom Tom had ever seen.

" You okay? " Nicole asked, holding back a giggle.

" Please don't wake me up... This is a nice dream... " Tom muttered, staring at the crate in disbelief. Nicole looked at him, trying her hardest to understand, and pinched his left wrist firmly, " Its real... Its all real! Th-thank you! "

" Your welcome. Glad you like it. " Nicole said, smiling, " Took me a lot of work to get all of the stuff ordered. I had professor Verynn and Professor Giles help me a bit. "

" Y-you planned all this? " Tom said, staring at Nicole in amazement.

" Yes, I did. I wrote mom and dad and told them about you and the others and sent them my term one marks. They were so proud that they sent me a letter telling me to get myself and you guys what ever I wanted, so I did. "

" Won't they be mad about this? I can't even begin to imagine how much the things you got me must have cost. "

" Well, if you add up all of the things I bought it doesn't even come to one tenth of wshat they normally get me at Christmas. "

" I feel so... I can't even think of the word... " Tom said, standing up and helping Nicole to her feet, " We both need to get to bed. Let me walk you back to Gryffindor tower. We can talk more about all of this in the morning. "

" Thanks. " Nicole said, smiling, " And don't you dare try and tell me to send those things back, Tom Riddle! I wanted to do that. I've never really had any friends before, so I had fun trying to figure out what I could do for them now that I have the opportunity. "

" You're too clever. " Tom said, looking at her and smiling as they reached the fat lady, " Good night, Nicole. I'll see you tomorrow, I hope. Maybe we could go and have a picnic? "

" Okay! " Nicole said smiling and then turning to the fat lady she whispered, " peppermint cherry"

Tom smiled as he watched her enter the commonroom and make her way up to the girls dorm with her crate. Once he knew she was safely in bed, he picked up his own and headed for the Slytherin dorm feeling light as air.

[ End Note: I hope that you liked it! Sorry it took so long, guys!! I've always felt terribly sorry for poor Tom, having grown up in an orphanage and everything. I just HAD to do that!! Anyway, I think that the next chapter is going to be the yule ball. :) I can't wait to write that one. Please r/r and tell me what you think. :) -- Kat ]