Tom Riddle sighed and stretched, letting himself slide down the chair until he could not see over the mess of books and papers spread on the desk in front of him. It was almost eight in the morning and once again and he had been unable to sleep, not because he did not want to, but because of the frustration, he felt when he wasn't making any progress with his studies. He knew that made no sense, but he could not find a reason to justify not jumping a few nights of proper sleep during the week to work on his personal projects.
His blue eyes were framed by grey circles, and he let his gaze pass through the spines of the books he had gone through since closing the store the night before: Forbidden Curses; Myths and Legends of Tartary: A summary of old lost spells; How to Hunt Elephants or The Lost Art of Controlling Beasts; Werewolves: Theories about the curse. Tom rolled his eyes and straightened his back. 'Who names these books?' He asked himself frowning.
Tom put the paper he was reading - Potions and Chemistry: A study on Muggle science – over his old diary and looked around.
His room was not large and was located in the attic of the building where the Borgin & Burkes was located, following the shape of the walls and the low roofs. A curtain coming down from the ceiling separated his desk, bookcase, a small couch and the bathroom of the area that held his bed and a wardrobe with his clothes. It generally remained open to allow the sunlight to pass through the circular stained glass window, to light the division in blue and gold tones and keep it warm during the day, which generally did not work very well during the winter.
His bed was undone and it seemed to invite him to lie down, curl up under the blankets and sleep until he had recovered all those lost hours of sleep from the past weeks, but it was an offer that Tom would not accept, even with the start of a migraine over his right eyebrow disagreeing with him.
Tom had a store to open.
He got up and with a hand gestured in the direction of the bed with an unspoken spell, it started to make itself, and then he did the same with the clothes he had left neglected on the couch across the desk, making them levitate to find their way into the wardrobe or a place in the bathroom to be washed later.
He waited for the spell to finish tidying his room and looked back at the clock and sighed tiredly, it was time to start the day.
He showered and then watched his reflection in the mirror space he had cleaned off the water's moisture. The dark circles under his eyes were more pronounced than he thought and his hair seemed to be in need of a cut. Massaging the back of his neck with his right hand, he felt the cold of his grandfather's ring against his skin and looked at it thoughtfully, letting himself revive for a few moments the night he had taken it from them.
Tom closed his hand several times to help him get rid of unrequested feelings and grabbed the brush to comb his hair that dried it with each passing; he was too tired to think about such things.
It did not take him longer to finish and go to the first floor of the store; it was a residential area that no one used much besides him. The attic stairs opened onto a hallway that allowed access to the three bedrooms on the floor, two reserved for the owners for when they needed to stay in the store to take care of some business and another one for guests, which was rarely used. The last door before the stairwell, which went down to the store gave access to a relatively well-equipped kitchen.
Tom entered the room, immediately went to the window, where an owl impatiently waited to deliver the Daily Prophet. It lightly poked his hand when he put the coins in the small wallet that was tied to its leg, making him know he was late.
Tom put the newspaper under his arm and took the injured spot to his mouth, squeezing his lips over it to reduce the pain, while with the other hand he made a spell to lit a fire in the fireplace and fill the kettle of water to make tea. He put the newspaper on the table and took an apple from the fruit bowl and began to eat, reviewing what he had to do during the day, gazing at nothing in particularly while trying to ignore the pulsating pain of the migraine.
The kettle began to whistle in the fireplace and with another wave of his hand, Tom made the cabinets open and a pot, some herbs and two mugs left its inside to float and settle on the table. After a few minutes, the flames became of an emerald green colour and Caractacus Burke came out of the flames, cleaning the ashes of his clothes.
"Good morning Riddle!" He greeted Tom, barely looking at him and disappearing through the door with the newspaper and one of the cups of tea. Tom simply close his eyes when the wizard slammed the front door and the sound went through the building and especially through the inside of his skull, making his head pulse uncomfortably.
He finished eating and stepped down to the store, making his tea float behind him. When he reached the large fireplace that served as the main entrance of the store, he made some wood float to the inside and lit it on fire, leaving the fireplace ready to welcome the clients.
Then he went to the door and made sure that his appearance was correct using the glass reflection as a mirror, and turned the sign to "Open", also tucking the small sign indicating their need for another employee to make sure it would be visible to the outside.
It was precisely nine o'clock in the morning and the Borgin & Burkes was ready.
Tom sat on a high stool behind the counter, the cup of tea steaming beside him and he opened the logbook that the store used to control the stock, and took a sip of tea. With the effectiveness that only magic could have, orders began arriving at the fireplace, fortunately not a lot that day.
The set of boxes gathered on the rug and Tom made them float to him, making them land on the counter; he began to open each package efficiently, then he methodically recorded each object, and put it aside, so that later he could draft a letter to the buyers and give them notice of the order arrival.
Sometimes he would stop to read a book whose title called his attention and made a cross reading for evaluating the content, but that day nothing of interest had arrived.
He was already in the second mug of tea when he finished writing the letters and putting them in the envelope, ready for Burke to send them over during the lunch hour. With a gesture, the orders and their warning letters were stored on the shelf behind him.
Tom got up and went to the warehouse. On the previous day evening, a few books and samples of potions had arrived and he needed to sort through them and find a place at the store to display them, it was a task that he would rather do manually, to help the day pass faster, since he had been forbidden of reading during the dead work hours.
It was true that his life was, for now, on standby. He did not particularly care for this job, despite being really good at it.
Sometimes he wondered if he shouldn't have accepted one of those jobs he had refused to work in the Ministry of Magic, especially when he had rather particularly difficult clients or one or other old schoolmate that had never liked him in particular came by and didn't spare him a few derogatory comments about is current situation. It was very annoying, but Tom simply used a smile and some cordiality against them, which proved to be the best way of making them angry for his lack of response and kind of embarrassed when he told me to come back soon while helping them carry their purchases to the fireplace.
Tom returned to the store with the box with the things he needed to display on the store and put it on the shelf perpendicular to the front door, then he fetched the ladder and balanced it against the shelf and stepped up to get to work.
He was balancing a few bottles against his chest when the door suddenly opened, the bell almost blowing out of the holder with the speed. Tom dropped everything he was holding to the ground to be able to balance himself and not follow their path, looking startled at the door.
A very red haired woman was lying on the floor facing the ceiling a few feet away from him and looked unconscious, Tom stepped down a few steps before stopping to watch her slowly sit up, putting her hands on the back of her head where she had hit the floor, and cover her redhead with the hood.
She stretched to grab a piece of a wooden box that was spread before her, but she suddenly turned back and looked at him when he started to get down again. Tom frowned at her confused, preparing to ask if she was okay when her face suddenly adopted a look of pure terror as if he was about to transform into a werewolf or something similar and fainted.
That, was a reaction he was not expecting; the last time someone had looked at him like that was the night he had gotten the ring on his hand.
He jumped the last few steps and approached the woman, lowering himself to his knee, searched for some kind of visible damage on her head but found nothing, it seemed she didn't have anything more serious than a concussion.
He looked at the box she had tried to grab, and noticed the broken pocket watch and finally the snow on the street, untouched again after a brief snowing that had erased Burke's footprints when he left the store earlier. Tom didn't know of anyone who could Apparate in the middle of what looked like a jump, given that the act itself required a good deal of concentration so that the wizard wouldn't leave an arm and a leg behind, not to mention that they wouldn't hit the closed door like she seemed to have.
Tom had no idea what had happened, but whatever it was, it had definitely happened.
Looking back at the woman Tom decided it was best to sit her and wake her, so he took her in his arms, and almost dropped her when Burke suddenly appeared at the door.
"What's goin' on?" He asked in a brusque tone looking at the girl in Tom's arms and then at him, closing the door on his back.
"I have no idea." Tom replayed placing her in one of the two armchairs that stood by the fireplace, then he quickly went into the warehouse to fetch something to wake her up and returned.
He lowered himself again, resting a knee on the floor and put the vial under her nose for a moment, covering it again when she started to move away.
Ginny slowly returned to consciousness, her head felt like it was going to explode at any moment and she was very confused. The first thing she saw was a fire burning in a fireplace, but then her eyes focused on the men in front of her and she couldn't help but grab onto the armchair with all the force she had. To her right was a man with a beard and hair that rivalled with Hagrid's but of an orange colour, he had small blue eyes that seemed to want to punch through her chest and he was leaning down resting his hands on his knees.
Ginny straightened her cloak over herself and closed it on her chest with one hand, feeling uncomfortable.
On the other side was Tom Riddle, one knee on the floor, one hand resting on the armrest and the other hand holding the small vial. He was frowning so much that Ginny believed he would get a wrinkle.
The man was the one that spoke first.
"I'm Burke, co-owner of the Borgin & Burges." He said articulating the words slowly and placing a hand on his chest as if she was slow. "This is my employee, Tom Riddle, and I believe he is as curious as me about what just happened to you."
"Hmm…" Ginny was in a complete loss of words and just looked from one wizard to the other.
"I was in the store on the other side of the street and I still don't believe what I saw..."
Ginny looked at them, didn't know what they had seen because she didn't know what she had just done, so to buy some time she chose to lean forward and hide her face in her hands, resting her elbows on her knees, 'I can't believe this is happening' she thought in panic. 'This is not happening! I am in a coma, I hit my head with more force than I should and now I am in a coma! This is not worth the stupid watch. I'm so dead…'
"I think she's going into some kind of shock," Tom said, parting Ginny's hair that had fallen forward to hide her face making her suddenly straight up to get away from his touch.
"What's your name?" Asked Burke, still speaking really slowly.
"Ginevra, my name is Ginevra." She finally said, and decided that it was better to assume she really was in the same space as Tom Riddle, and it was her best interest to be careful and not do anything dumb.
"What happened to you?" Tom asked.
"I... I was attacked..." said Ginny deciding to take a leap of faith while the facts about Voldemort's life invaded her mind. She supposed his precedent, Gellet Grindelwald also had followers around the country after he was arrested, doing the same kind of things that the Death Eaters did. "Grindelwald's men..."
"Grindelwald!?" Exclaimed Burke "There haven't been an attack related to him in..." Borgin filled his cheeks with air and looked at Tom for help. "At least eight months." Tom finished looking up at his boss.
"Publically known" whispered Ginny with a knot on her throat trying to save her lie "I guess I was in the wrong place at the wrong time."
Tom shook his head in confusion and prepared to make the ultimate question that would transform her small lie into a monster, but Burke put a hand on his shoulder. "Here we respect the privacy of our clients." Tom looked at Burke and raised to his feet, putting his hands behind his back.
Ginny began to rise, infinitely thanking the wizard by that policy, but it was not something surprising attending the kind of customers they had, in fact, it was completely expected. Ginny felt dizzy and took a hand to her face when her vision started to go black and did not notice she was starting to fall back to the armchair.
Tom moved forward to hold her, putting a hand on her back and grabbing her forearm. Ginny automatically tensed and looked at him. "Thanks." She said without taking her eyes from his, who held the same colour and shape she remembered, but were framed with deep dark circles. Tom took back the hand that rested on her back and let the other slip from her forearm to her hand, wanting to make sure she was not going to fall.
Suddenly the two received a shock from the contact, Tom took several steps back until his back was against one of the sides of the fireplace and Ginny fell back on the chair, both alternately looked at their hands and to the other with suspicion, Ginny feeling particularly disturbed and with a sense of déjà vu.
"What just happened?" Asked Burke, looking from one to the other, absolutely lost. When no one answered him, he chose to go to the door to pick what was left of the watch, using a spell to make sure that even the small screws that had fallen between the floorboards would safely be inside the box.
Ginny raised from the armchair again motioning to Tom that she did not need help when he stepped forward. "I think it's not a good idea given that…" She did not need to finish the sentence for him to understand, but she did not look at Tom to see what his reaction was. Probably was not going to see anything, as her former best friend, was an expert at keeping all his emotions behind a perfect and impassive mask.
She walked around the chair and stood next to Burke, who handed her the box. "I believe that the pieces are all inside." When Ginny took the box, Borgin took the opportunity to hold her hand and stare at her in silence, probably enjoying the proximity. By the fireplace, Tom rolled his eyes. "Burke!" He said in an authoritative tone, making the other wizard look at him surprised and drop Ginny's hand, that was looking at Burke like she was about to start sending spells in all directions.
Burke coughed embarrassed and chose to open the door for her.
Ginny wasted no time to make her exit, turned to Burke and thanked the kindness with which she had been treated and moved forward, the toes of her boots a few inches away from the snow, now full of footprints that marked Burke's entrance. She looked at the door to her left and touched the glass where she could read the ad that asked for an employee, and then looked at Tom.
She could not find anything to say, she did not thank him, smile or express any emotion in those seconds they shared a gaze. Ginny opened and closed her hand to ward off the impression his touch had left on her skin and that insisted on not going away, and stepped forward.
Burke smiled at Tom after having accompanied her more or less visible rear under her cloak disappear and also left, crossing the street to whatever the business he was attending in the store across the street.
Tom collapsed down in the chair where Ginny had been sitting and rubbed the bridge of his nose to try to somehow relieve the migraine that had increased in the last half-hour. In front of him, the flames in the fireplace adopted an emerald green colour and Tom rose to his feet. "Welcome to the Borgin & Burkes, how may I help you?" He said with a brief smile, opening and closing his hand behind his back, which still was bothering him.
He decided he was going to take the weekend off and sleep until Monday. He clearly needed it.
Ginny walked the same path she had done almost an hour ago, noticing a couple of stores with bright colours, which indicated they had been opened recently. Several footprints marked the snow, and there were orange lights coming to the outside from all the stores she passed by. She looked up, but the sky was no longer blue, but a dark grey that promised more snow during the day.
Her head continued to hurt, her right hand was still sensitive with the shockwave she shared with Tom, and her emotional system was almost broken. She picked up some speed, trying to put as much distance as possible between her and the damn store, struggling not to run and call unnecessary attention to herself.
She felt lost and without any idea about what to do next.
The Diagon Alley, contrary to what had been when she had been there that morning, was now almost empty, probably because of the bad weather that was coming.
Ginny would have preferred the crowd, where she could lose herself among the other wizards, touch them while passing them by and be sure they were real and that she was not dreaming this situation up. The stores on that street were also not much different than she remembered, and she felt a little consoled by the familiarity of them.
She abruptly stopped and looked around, taking a deep breath several times and let her gaze fall back to the hand that Tom had touched.
Deciding that first it was best to find a place to stay, and since she was not in imminent danger, she opted for the obvious place. Not wanting to waste any more time she Apparated to the Leaky Cauldron and went inside the pub, which was almost empty. Ginny went to the reception and recognised a young Tom, with hair and a moustache, with more muscles than the one on her time, which made sense since she should be at least 50 years in the past.
She asked for a room for the weekend, and wrote her first name and shortened the second with a small comma at the end when he gave her the book.
The pub was the same; it probably was that way since 1500 when Dodderidge Daisy had built it, except for the bathrooms and indoor plumbing. Blessed the architect who decided that those were essential things any construction should have.
The room overlooked the Muggle street, that was the same as she remembered, if she ignored the Muggles were dressing, making them look a lot more formal than she was used to seeing, and all the cranes above the buildings.
Ginny plopped down on the bed and put her arm over her eyes, tired of the things that looked the same but were not the same, the pain in the back of her head that was radiating to the front and making her feel sick, and the feeling on her hand.
Ginny looked at her hand and watched it carefully. There seemed to be no sign that something had happened, there was no mark or wound, just a dormant feeling and she could not help but wonder if he felt the same.
'How old is he exactly?' she asked herself, feeling weird with the question, all of it had been too real to discard it as a side effect of her fall.
Deep inside, she still believed all of this was a dream and Kevedo was now kicking her in the head for daring to try to steal him, but it was Tom Riddle that had been with her in the store, and Tom Riddle had been dead for two years now. His body buried next to his father's at Little Hangleton in some kind of final act of humiliation.
The last time she had seen him, Tom was 15 or 16, but now he seemed to be not much older than herself, maybe 20 or 21 years. He was taller, his face had become more defined and Ginny had to agree that the expression "he had good looks" that Harry had used when sharing the biography of his arch-enemy with her, was kind of right.
She already knew that, of course, but his looks had become more refined after losing his teenage features.
"Damn… what now?"
Ginny could no longer lie down and started pacing through the room, pouring the contents of her pockets in the desk, and rearranged things around to make it feel more like it belonged to her, while her thoughts remained at the Borgin & Burkes.
If she was not mistaken about his age, it meant that Tom should not take much longer to disappear during those ten years Harry told her about and return to ask for the position of Dark Arts professor.
Ginny remembered her own words that morning, how she would kill him if she had the chance.
Apparently, the Universe had heard her and provided the opportunity, and now it was up to Ginny to decide what to do with it.
Now things were different, it was not really Lord Voldemort that had held her hand, or the same wizard who was responsible for her brother's death, or caused all that chaos in the future, that wizard would take at least 10 years to be fully himself.
She knew that because of the diary.
Ginny had never killed anyone, and was definitely not ready to kill Tom Riddle, at that point, he already had some practice at murdering other wizards, so even if she decided to try her luck, the odds of killing him before he killed her, were very high.
She let her head rest on the bed again and covered her eyes with her arm, there was a more important question than what to do with Tom Marvolo Riddle, and that question was "How the hell did I get to the past!?" Ginny asked aloud.
Sitting up and with a gesture of her wand, she called the watch's box to her. No one travels back in time without some kind of help, it was impossible, it was a kind of magic that could only be used trough an object, which left the pocket watch as the only explanation for what happened. She touched the display with the tip of her wand and muttered the spell that should fix it, but nothing happened, Ginny tried again and got the same result. The problem could not be the spell, she had used it repeatedly, that was one of the basic spells that all the wizards controlled on the second day of classes.
Ginny carefully took the watch from the box. The glass was broken and the hands had fallen, the display seemed to be made of dragon's bone and marked thirteen hours in Roman numerals, and even the numbers were not represented usually since the watchmaker opted for writing 4 with four uppercase IIII. The back was decorated with a floral pattern and a stylish "S". Ginny immediately linked it to Salazar Slytherin, but as Slytherin was a Dark Ages wizard and pocket watches were something more recent in History, she dropped the idea.
Perhaps it belonged to a Slytherin, but not the one who built the school, or perhaps it belonged to another wizard whose name started with "S", she had no way of knowing. Ginny needed more time to think, and above that, she needed to rest and recover from the abrupt meeting with the ground she had in the morning.
For her physical health, but above all, mental health, so she decided to take the rest of the day to recover and get her thoughts in order.
The next morning was not as gentle as the day before, and Ginny had to sit in the chair by the desk, with her head between her legs to be able to stop the panic attack she had when she woke up and remembered that she was not in 2000, but as Tom, the innkeeper, had told her the day before, in 1946.
She was in 1946, she had fallen in the store where Lord Voldemort worked and did not know how to get back to her own time, where probably a very angry Kevedo was tapping his foot waiting for her. Without quite knowing how to approach the situation, Ginny decided that the wisest course of action was to curse the Order's genius that had decided to send one single person to steal one of the alleged, more powerful followers of Lord Voldemort.
'Who could those creatures be?' She asked herself.
Ginny was starting to feel lucky for not being dead, this had been the worst plan ever for a mission, and perhaps a beating session would be more appropriate than a curse for those guys, that if she could find her way home.
Ginny measured her options; she could not get in touch with her family at The Borrow and ask for help, it probably would cause major disturbances in the future, despite knowing she would be very well welcomed. She was too old to go back to Hogwarts, and without any documents, she probably could not apply for a job, and that was something important since she would need to work in order to pay for the room, eat and find someone to repair the watch.
Where would she even find someone to help her with it? It had to be someone she trusted, someone who would not disappear with it since it obviously was a very powerful object.
Dumbledore would be the ideal person to help, but he was dead.
Ginny almost fell down the stairs on her way to the pub and get something to eat when she remembered that Dumbledore was dead in the future, but now he was likely to be re-decorating the office of the Principal at Hogwarts, or at least he would still be a professor, she was not sure, she just knew he was alive.
It was almost midnight and Ginny was still working on the draft of the letter she was planning to send to professor Dumbledore. There were too many crumpled paper balls around her then she was proud to admit too, and she wasn't even close to briefly explain what was happening and what she needed. However, she had managed to reduce the number of pages from twelve to just four and was almost satisfied with the consistency of what she wrote.
Ginny stretched and decided to end the day, her head still ached around the spot she had hit on the floor. Going to bed and pulling the blanket over her head and looking at her hand, that at least no longer bothered her, she closed her eyes falling asleep, her last thoughts to Tom Riddle and what he was doing at that moment.
Tom Riddle at that moment was asleep. Not since the previous day because the store also opened on Saturday's mornings, but definitely slept all night and almost failed to open the store on time, he also had an unplanned nap in his desk before dinner, while trying to finish the paper from last day. He had almost fallen asleep at the kitchen table after dinner, listening to the radio and reading the misadventures of Dr Frankenstein. A fantasy novel for Muggles, a historical novel about the monstrosity created by the wizard that led to the creation of tough laws on the use of Alchemy and Muggle science, which still raised debates about it.
His last thought as he lay down on his bed were not to Ginny, despite having analysed his hand carefully for a moment, it was about the efficiency of the nights he spent awake studying and their impact on his life. They were very productive of course, but he was not interested in dying from exhaustion, after all, he was still kind of mortal, with only two Horcruxes.
Nevertheless, Ginny was present in his dreams that night, and he was quite disturbed about it when he drank his tea the next morning, holding the Daily Prophet without reading it.
Tom dreamed he was back in the Chamber of Secrets, again with 16 years; he was walking down the hall flanked by statues of snakes and stopped in the centre of the large Chamber at the foot of the statue of his ancestor, who watched impassively from above. Tom was not sure what he was doing there, he was not supposed to be there and he kind of had that period closed on his diary, rarely thinking about it this day.
His attention was caught by the sound of footsteps in the corridor and for some reason, he could not help but smile, he could not avoid doing it since he was not in control of his body.
A girl was walking down the hall, her small steps echoing all around the Chamber, she should not be more than 11 years old; a student of the first year and her red hair was pulled back in a ponytail.
His attention was completely focused on her, he couldn't hear what she was saying, or what he was answering back and was taken by surprise when his body leant down and hugged her tightly to him. He put one knee on the floor and felt her face buried in the crook of his neck, her hands clinging to his shirt, her breath on his skin. He was feeling alive, as he had not for decades...
The details were beginning to disappear as Tom absently looked at the newspaper on his hands. His dream did not make any sense, especially the part where the childish version of the woman with whom he had been for thirty minutes last Friday's morning, appeared in the Chamber.
He definitively had to sleep every night, he decided, at least four hours, obviously the lack of rest was doing him some harm.
It was after lunchtime when Ginny went downstairs to the pub's dining area to have some food. She had managed to finish the draft of Dumbledore's letter and needed to take a break before going on re-read it again and make sure everything was in it.
She had summarily described everything that seemed relevant. Who she was, the war, the mission and the watch (she even added a small illustration of it), it seemed perfect, but Ginny had no basis of comparison to be sure; so she ate her lunch slowly, savouring each ingredient as if it were the first time she had them.
There were only two decisions left to make, and they were about how to survive on daily bases and what to do about Lord Voldemort. She decided that combining both was the best scenario for her situation.
The Borgin & Burkes needed a new employee, and it seemed to have a friendly policy towards shady people, which could possibly not apply to employees of course, but Burke looked like one of those men who could hire her for her looks alone and not for who she was and what she had done in the past, so it was definitely worth to take a shot there.
She was sure she was not going to have problems getting the job.
That would take care or her money needs but it would also let her keep her enemy close. Ginny remembered how Tom could be nice and polite if he wanted, which he seemed to be trying to be now, because if he wasn't he would no longer be working at the Borgin & Burkes. In addition, she had an idea that Harry had mentioned that Tom was particularly good in the job he had on that store, so it should be somewhat easy to see him every day without fear of being killed.
Ginny wasn't sure it would be wise to put her future at risk by working with him and possibly end his life, she couldn't even start to imagine the impact it could have.
She was almost certain that the alternative would be to be stuck at some house far away from London waiting to know how to go back to the future from someone in the Ministry. That did not seem acceptable, and the possibility of having a small chance to decide over Tom's life was what led her to decide not to mention Tom Riddle as the source of the war to Dumbledore.
'Maybe it was better to not even mention the war...' she thought since Dumbledore probably would want to know who they would be at war with. Ginny took a deep breath feeling frustrated. After all, the draft was not finished as she thought it was, Ginny needed more time to think about what to write, she needed to know exactly what she wanted to do.
Tom woke feeling refreshed that Monday's morning, the dark circles were almost gone, his desk was clean and ready for a week of work he expected to be very productive, especially now that he had decided to get some sleep every night.
He sat at the counter holding a mug of tea with both of his hands, enjoying the warmth of the water that made it throw the ceramic, and that pleasantly contrasted against that particularly cold morning.
Tom had to light up several extra candles to be able to see the space around the store since the sky was heavy with dark clouds, which promised the snowfall of the year. It was the perfect time to study and he was there, waiting for the orders to arrive, bored.
Sometimes life was not fair, he thought, allowing himself to daydream about the little book he had found the day before, stuck behind his bookshelf that he had somehow missed and was full of small illustrations of wizards flying.
His attention diverged to the ceiling when someone upstairs exited the fireplace and made one of the chairs fall to the ground. Tom looked at the clock on the wall and then to the stairs when Burke started to stumble down the stairwell. It was too early for his boss to be there on a Monday, but when the wizard almost tripped and fell on the last few steps, Tom was sure that Burke probably did not even know it was Monday.
Burke went through Tom and made a sort of bark that was equivalent to a good day and took Tom's mug from his hands. When he reached the fireplace, he fell back on one of the armchairs and stretched his legs, crossing them at the ankles. A few moments later the fire crackled and became emerald green and a jumble of boxes of various sizes struck him in the legs, causing another guttural sound from the man.
Tom, behind his desk, wrinkling his nose to the smell of cheap alcohol that plagued the store, took the wand from an inside pocket of his jacket and called the orders of the day with a spell to his side with a resigned look on his face, like of someone who didn't watch that show for the first time.
The morning passed slowly and Tom took his time to record the new orders.
Outside begun to snow, inside, Burke had fallen asleep in front of the fireplace and was softly snoring, Tom decided to drown out the unpleasant sound by turning on the radio, and an excerpt from the opera Tristan and Isolde by Richard Wagner (the only Muggle composer whose music he tolerated), spread around the store.
It was with some surprise that he saw Ginny enter the store, after all, she did not look like she would ever be close to the store ever again when she had left.
She was wearing the same clothes from last week and the hood pulled over her head to protect her from the snowfall, her loose red hair fell down as she lowered the hood, just like when she was young.
Tom frowned and stopped that line of thought there, because he had never seen her before Friday and that dream was just something that his exhausted mind had made up, from where were this thought coming?
Burke woke startled with the sound of the bell and looked around the back of his armchair, and stood up noticing it was a client. His smile widened when he recognised Ginny and extended his hand, hesitating a moment when he did not remember her name for a moment, but he gave her a warm welcome anyway and told her to sit on the armchair opposed to his.
"How can I help you, Miss Ginevra?" He asked when they were finally comfortable. "You didn't forget anything on our floor did you?"
"No Mr Borgin, fortunately not, what brings me here is a matter of another nature." Said Ginny uncomfortable and looked down sheepishly, using her favourite trick to influence Percy to do what she wanted back in the days.
"Oh really?"
"Unfortunately, I will not be able to go home for a while, and I find myself suddenly without access to my assets..." Ginny continued keeping her eyes fixed on the floor. "I remembered having seen the sign announcing that you needed someone and decided to come and...
Burke looked at her, not to her chest where he had been looking since she passed through the door, but in fact to her. Assessing her words and the risk inherent in her application. "Riddle" Called Burke looking at the counter and signalling him to approach. "What do you think?"
"Without any kind of information about what she previously did its har..." Burke raised his hand silencing him. "No Riddle, what I want to know is if you think she will bring more customers to the store..." Burke raised his eyebrows almost to his scalp, emphasising the word "customers". Tom frowned at his boss and adopted a neutral expression, thanking himself for the wise decision of getting all those extra hours of sleep during the weekend and the benefit they had brought to his patience's levels.
Ginny looked from Burke to Tom with a scared expression, but quickly adopted a neutral expression as well, when she finally realised why Borgin had spent all that money to buy his partner's side of the business. Burke was an idiot. A perverted idiot that would hire her just to have her walk around the store for his own pleasure.
Just like she had guessed.
Borgin turned his attention to Ginny and took her hand. "You are hired, Ginevra." Ignoring the disgust that Burke's hand was causing her, Ginny smiled and tried to look grateful for the opportunity. "When can I start?"
"This afternoon of course!" Borgin affirmed while standing and pulling her with him. "Let me show you around the store!"
The visit was quite time-consuming, Burke decided to describe in great detail some of the most valuable objects they had and the amount of protections put in the cabinets and shelving to protect them. Tom followed them, hands behind his back, helping Burke with some details whenever he looked back at him in panic.
"If you don't have access to your belongings and money, where are you staying Ginevra?" Asked Burke when they finished the visit and approached the counter.
"In the Leaky Cauldron." Said Ginny. "Fortunately, I have enough until the end of the month."
"The Leaky Cauldron?" Burke gave a huge laugh. "Borgin and I like to give accommodations to our employees. Tom, as a permanent employee to the store, is taking up the attic; I would like you to stay in the guest room, while you are with us."
Ginny took a deep breath, she had not foreseen this option since she didn't mind living in the pub.
She had money all right, but not to the end of the month as she had said, and she was depending on Tom to open a small exception for her to stay the last week without paying until she would get her paycheck from the store. "I will think about your offer Mr Burke, thank you for your consideration," Ginny said with a smile, and finally managing to take her hand from Burke's grasp and move away a few steps from the wizard. "Can I use your fireplace; it really is too cold to walk outside?"
"Yes of course!" Burke put his hand on her back and only took it off when it was necessary to hold the pot with the Floo powder. "I can't promise that I will be here to welcome you, but certainly, your new co-worker will be here after lunch."
"Thank you again, Mr. Burke." She smiled at the wizard who she would prefer to punch. "Mr Riddle." She said to Tom, who merely nod and sit on the stool behind him.
Ginny was having trouble swallowing her food back at the Leaking Cauldron, the offer of a room at the Borgin & Burkes stuck in her throat. The proposal was not tempting, especially when there was a good chance of her being murdered by Lord Voldemort during the working hours, and she didn't want to increase that risk through the night, particularly with the prospect of Burke entering her bedroom in the middle of any given night on top of that.
"Tom!" Ginny waved to call the other wizard.
"Do you need anything else?" He asked with a smile. "Another butterbeer?"
"Oh no, it's okay. I was wondering if I could stay here a few nights and pay them at the end of the month... I can..."
"No! That's out of question, policy of the house since 1747." Ginny opened her mouth to try to convince Tom, but he gave her no chance. "It was decided when the third floor burned down because of a client who didn't keep his word and didn't want to leave the room."
"But…"
"It's out of question."
Tom and Ginny looked at each other in silence for a moment.
"It's a firewhisky then." Ginny finally said.
Completely in a bad mood, Ginny went upstairs to her room. She had no choice but to accept the offer.
She had nothing to pack, and she did not dare to leave the watch alone in the room for even the smallest amount of time. Looking around, already thinking how she would miss that bed, the desk where she had written all those drafts and the trash can where she burned all the papers to eradicate the evidence of her story.
With the prospects of living at the Borgin & Burges, she would miss the small room as much as she missed her bedroom at The Borrow.
Closing the door behind her and holding her head up in a gesture of defiance to the uncertain future, that the decision of moving to a room under the same roof where Lord Voldemort lived and occasionally Burke as well, brought her.
Leaving a coin in a small bowl next to the pot with the Floo powder, Ginny took a handful of it and threw it into the fire. She had no reason to save the money she had with her now, the short time she expected to live, would be absent of expenses, except in food and perhaps her funeral arrangements.
"Borgin & Burkes!" She said in a light tone as she entered the green flames.
Tom was sitting in one of the armchairs in front of the fireplace when Ginny came out of the flames and tried to clean her clothes from the ashes. "Just in time to open the door, Miss… hmm… I don't think I understood your last name." He said, getting up and heading for the door to turn the small sign to 'Open' and unlock the door.
"You can call me Ginevra, or Ginny if you prefer." Ginny followed him to the door and then back to the armchair, suddenly feeling very young and sat down. "We are more or less the same age are we not? It would be a bit formal to us to go by our last names... Tom? Right?"
Tom just smiled at her, that same smile that she remembered seeing him do when he pulled her into the diary and showed her something.
Ginny could barely control the urge to escape that feeling and kept her sitting on the edge of the chair, but she knew there was no reason for it, at least for now. Tom did not know who she was, he had no idea who he would be, what he would do and the chaos that he would bring into the world.
He was just a wizard around her age, with a relatively boring work, which had already killed several people, true, but he had no reason to kill her unless she did something really stupid like being honest.
Ginny forced herself to stir straight on the armchair and took off her cloak, letting it fall behind her back, crossed her legs and rested an elbow on her knee and her face on her hand, focusing all her attention on Tom, and applied the social skills she had learned in those potions lessons with Snape and the Slytherins.
"Right... Ginevra." His choice to use her full name was not a surprise, Ginny knew that he didn't use it as a matter of politeness but because he didn't like the abbreviation 'Ginny', and he only began to treat her so when the possessions started, and not always. "Mr Burke had some businesses to attend and left to my responsibility to find you some tasks. Our need for an employee was directed more at someone to take international business, but Mr Borgin made it clear that he preferred that you would stay here, a kind of assistant to help me with my work."
'Sure... assistant.' Ginny thought, tightening her lips.
"I admit I haven't had time to decide what tasks to assign you since most days are quite calm." Tom rose from the armchair. "So, you have visited the main part of the store, it seems appropriate to visit the warehouse now... let's see if I can find some kind of inspiration."
Ginny had not paid much attention during the visit to the store; she had felt quite distracted by Burke's hand since it had found the space between her cloak and sweater, and no matter how much she tried to step back from his hold, he would follow her.
She had focused on counting to ten so that she wouldn't hex him.
The visit to the store's warehouse did not take a lot of time since Tom did not have the need to impress her as Burke seemed to have.
Ginny rested against the counter when the visit was over and got ready to the big question Tom was about to do "Have you decided about whether or not to accept the guest room?"
"No, I haven't decided about Mr Burke's offer, I need to carefully review my finances first" Ginny smiled at Tom. "Well, let's go upstairs anyway." Tom continued with a brief nod of understanding. "Mr Burke asked me to show you where you would live if you accept the offer."
Tom climbed the stairs ahead of Ginny, entering the kitchen. There was not much to see, the kitchen was small relatively to The Burrow and the same for the kitchen in Sirius' house. The room that Tom has indicated as hers was not particularly impressive, was modestly decorated in grey tones, the double bed under the window overlooking the backyard and what should be the rear of a muggle house had nothing to call home about.
It also had a desk and a wardrobe that would be empty for a while, until Ginny bought some suitable clothes to the period in which she now lived. She saw many skirts in her future, she thought bitterly, preferring the collection of trousers and jeans she had left at home.
The afternoon started without any accident, Tom had provided a second stool for Ginny to be able to sit behind the counter with him and asked her to begin indexing the logbook that he had ended that morning.
It didn't take long for the first customer to appear, a witch who tried to sell them a doll possessed by a particularly evil spirit that Tom refused to buy, indicating a store a few doors down specialises in that kind of cursed objects.
She had been distracted seeing him interact with the witch, cordial, serious, kind of worried to have to hold the creepy doll after finding what was lurking beneath the porcelain.
Tom seemed so normal.
But in the middle of the afternoon Ginny felt particularly exhausted and on the verge of a nervous breakdown and Tom dismissed her, she didn't even ask way in order to not waste the opportunity to get away from him.
At some point, she started to have flashbacks of her first year at Hogwarts, and she almost runs to the fireplace.
Later, Tom was almost letting his volume of Frankenstein touch the empty plate that had held his dinner. His new partner had spent a quite uncomfortable afternoon at his side, her body tense as if she was preparing to run and with something very stressful on her mind.
They had not talked much, he himself did not know very well what to do with an assistant when the amount of work that the store had was perfectly possible to manage alone. On the other side, after she almost started crying when he asked if she was well, he decided it was unwise to make any kind of small talk, and deciding to be proactive and avoid any contact more than necessary and send her home earlier.
He did not know what had happened, but did not bother himself with it, her problems were hers and he did not care.