Before my first year at Hogwarts, before I even found Tom, I went with my parents and brothers to buy school supplies one afternoon. We went with Harry Potter. In the shop, something or other happened – I forget exactly what at the moment – but Draco Malfoy ended up confronting Harry over how famous he was. Oh, wait. I remember. Gilderoy Lockhart. Pulling Harry into his little time-bubble.

Gilderoy Lockhart. A waste of the fourth dimension.

It was the first time I had ever seen Draco Malfoy, and I knew right away that he was exactly like me. Let me back up. I knew right away from looking at him that he was rich, because of his expensive robes, and I knew once he'd opened his mouth that he was an arse of the worst kind. Self-flattery here.

Still, he said exactly what I'd been thinking. Sure, I loved Harry back then, but Harry getting sucked into that man – Lockhart's – little fame-bubble was too much. Harry didn't deserve it. Lockhart didn't either, but I wasn't to find that out until later. So as much as I was proud of Harry I resented him.

And as much as I resented Harry, Draco Malfoy accosted him. Angry kid. I almost appreciated it. I didn't understand why at the time, as I fancy I do now. Draco Malfoy, ambitious Slytherin that he was, outshone by Harry Potter simply by the effort of showing up on Harry's part. Time-grappler Draco steals the limelight.

"Leave him alone," I shouted at Draco. "He didn't want any of that." I assumed that I was telling the truth, and now I'm pretty sure that I was.

"Leave him alone." Time-grappler Ginny, who hasn't yet realized what she's trying to do, takes over.

Draco gave me a look of pure contempt. "Oh look, Potter," he drawled, and I'll never forget it – "oh look, Potter – you've got yourself a girlfriend."

Laughter. Well, actually, I can't remember whether there was any laughter or not. There probably wasn't, because I think the only people within earshot were Draco, Harry, and my brothers. But my mind supplied the laughter, as my cheeks went hot and my eyes went red and then misty.

It sucks, the first time you have outside confirmation of how trivial you are. Standing up for my famous crush. Little girlfriend to the rescue. Little girl without a name. Wasn't Harry glad I decided to come along that day. And all that jazz.

I found Tom in my cauldron later that afternoon.

We're nearly there, says Tom.

I give up, I say. I ask, where are we supposed to be?

Black on blacker, the fog goes swirling on; it could be poetic if I were in the right mindset. I don't think I'm in a mindset. You need a mind for that. There's a tugging on the far-distant pinprick that is my body, the far-distant hand that I somehow know is nestled inside Tom's larger hand. Tom is large – as big as the universe – and he's the only thing I can see except for centuries and centuries of black on blacker fog. Miles and miles of wasteland.

Does anything look familiar?

I can't think why it would, then again I can't think anything.

Anything at all?

Only Tom, only the fog, only the wasteland.

Only?

In the sense that that's all I see.

It's not enough?

Enough? No, no, it's not enough. I need more. What more? I'm not sure. I think I need a name.

But we're doing that. We're getting a name. We're stepping out of the fourth dimension.

I don't know who I am anymore. If I am anyone. You need to know who you are to have a name.

But we're stepping out of time.

But maybe us stepping out of time isn't enough. Maybe this isn't something you can do as a we. Maybe you need to do it as an I. I don't think I can do this as a we.

But you made an oath.

But I didn't know what I was saying.

But you swore a solemn oath.

I meant to stay with you forever. Not be eclipsed by you.

Same thing, dearheart.

I meant to know you and be with you forever, not to cease being myself.

The more I know you the less you become yourself. The less unique, the less sovereign, you become. This is the natural progression of your oath.

I give up. Just tell me the answer.

I just did.

I give up. It doesn't make any sense.

It's not supposed to.

Black on blacker fog and it's cold now. It hasn't been cold, or hot, or really anything sensory for so long. Now it's cold, and black, the centuries and the miles laid out before me. And Tom laid out beside me. No. I am the one laid out, looking upwards, and the black fog swirls and parts for what feels like it should be a brief moment.

Where are we?

Don't you recognize it?

How could I? Uneasiness, and trying to conceal the uneasiness is like trying to conceal the fact that I exist.

You've been here before, little Ginny.

I thought so. Really I don't, I just feel so. Tom often doesn't make that distinction.

I'm too into self-honesty.

For your own good.

It is for your own good.

That's not what I meant.

I don't understand you, little girl. If you're going to have anything to crow about in these next few minutes, it's this: still, after months and months of getting to know you, you manage to baffle me every once in a while.

What are you talking about, Tom?

I'm talking about this, Ginny: the more I know you the less of yourself you become. The more of a name we get, the less of a name you get. That's reality.

It's not right, Tom.

So you don't contest it.

It's not right.

It's a fact. Right and wrong are irrelevant to facts. History happens, reality unfolds, and facts just are. I know it. You know it. I know you know it. The universe doesn't listen to our little pleas about what's right and wrong. Bloody hell, people themselves, even though people have invented the concepts, hardly ever listen to them. It's simple enough for a child to grasp, Ginny. You have the facts, and you have the rightness or wrongness that we attach to them after the facts. After all the effects are accomplished. Right and wrong are things we color history with to make ourselves look right. To show that we are good.

You used to worry about right and wrong, Ginny. Especially when it came to your internal feelings, your internal value judgments. You used to worry that you were a bad person. No one is a "bad person," Ginny. No one is a "good person" either, unless they so christen themselves. And there are more of those than you'd be willing to stomach.

It's all facts. It's all reality. What is real? Power is real. Power of money, power of influence, power of strength, power of magic. Power of unpredictability. And what does power get you? It gets you more power. It gets you a name. It gets you out of time.

It makes you immortal.

There's nothing right and wrong, Ginny – contradict me if you will – there's only power. Some people grasp for power and can't get it. They are the weak. They are the trivial, the ineffectual. Some people never want power – they are the weak and the stupid. Some people actually manage to grasp power, and they are the good people. If there's such a thing as good people. They are the ones that history, as well as their own internal judgment, pronounces good.

Disagree if you will. I am right, and you know it. I know it. You know that I know that…

I'm feeling uneasy, but vaguely so. The black fog swirls back again, centuries of the stuff, and the cold retreats to the far distance that is my body. The uneasiness retreats to the far distance that is my soul. I am touching nothing, save for the black fog, and even it isn't touching me but rushing off to touch Tom. And then I can't even see Tom.

It occurs to me to wonder, vaguely, without the hurry that is impossible without a body and the anxiety that is impossible without a soul, if this is how I am going to die.

Even the pain of erasure is muted, sounding tremulous and distant from the far-off pinprick of gray that is my soul.