"Ginevra!?" Tom knocked on the bathroom door angrily. Didn't she know there were other people that needed to use that room? Had she forgotten she wasn't the only person in that attic? For Tom, ever since Ginny had gotten in there, she had taken so much time in the bathroom, it was like she had made her home in there. And he was getting late. He could still count on his hand how often he had been late to open the store and he intended to make sure he would keep it that way. "What the hell are you doing there? Please don't tell me you're sleeping in the bathtub again! I swear that this time, I'll let you drown!"
"What?" Ginny suddenly opened the door looking shocked and fully dressed, causing Tom to step back, startled by the sudden movement. "If I die, you will have no one to bring you tea in the evening. You're going to dehydrate and die, drowning inside that cauldron of yours, that you always have your head stuck in."
Tom looked at her, rolling his eyes, and took a deep breath, walking around her to get into the steamy bathroom. "If you think my desire to see you alive is proportional to my desire to drink tea, you'll have a rather unpleasant surprise, Ginevra."
"You sound like one of my brothers!" She warbled melodramatically, walking out of the bathroom to face him, "And I thought that living with you would be some kind of vacation... I don't think I have ever been so disappointed in anyone in my entire life."
"Well, I hope that one day you will be able to overcome your disappointment, as I hope one day to know these brothers of yours and know how they can make you leave the bathroom in the morning at a reasonable hour." He said closing the door with a slam. Ginny shook her head amused, listening to the muffled sound of the shower starting to run inside the small room.
She opened Tom's wardrobe and looked at herself in the mirror inside the door. She had managed to master her new clothes and although none of them were pants, except for those she used to sleep and had brought from the future, she was feeling more like herself.
That day she had a braid, which rested on her shoulder and went down to her chest over the high-necked blouse of a spruce blue, that in turn disappeared inside a black skirt that fell below her knees. Ginny sighed and closed the door. She looked like her grandmother. She decided to put the red shoes on, that laid along the other two pairs she had ordered in front of Tom's bookshelf, to break the dark colours of her clothes and went downstairs.
They were only a few hours away from living together in the attic for a full week and everything was going well, despite their morning routines colliding every day, but other than that, they were surprisingly comfortable.
Which was strange.
Ginny who was already used to the idea of sharing the same building with Tom Riddle and felt comfortable in his presence, something she furtively admitted to herself during the previous night, while hiding behind her mug of tea and watching Tom gesturing to himself as he took notes about what he was reading. That comfort she felt, was the same that she had experience when Tom was her Tom, nothing more than a memory of a Slytherin, her closest confidante and best friend.
She had slept many nights with him dozing off on some pillows pulled against her bed's headboard, more translucent than solid, ready to crumble to nothing if she touched him, almost invisible in the darkness of the drawn curtains of her bed in the Gryffindor's tower. There were also many afternoons passed in a remote corner of the library with him helping her with homework, sitting at her side, the sunlight still going through him, barely able to turn a page alone. Of course she knew Tom had only done those things because he was feeding on her, and getting stronger by each passing moment close to her, but if she ignored that part, they had the same serene and comfortable atmosphere of those days.
The question she asked that morning was: Why Tom seem to have accepted this new status on his small domain made of books and cauldrons? Had he changed the things he was working until she could rent a room in Diagon Alley? Did he feel the same way regarding the situation in which they found themselves? She had no way of knowing, but as she didn't felt less than welcome there, she didn't know what he actually thought.
Ginny was still occupying the couch, it was not exactly the most comfortable place where she had slept, it was small, the cushion was too soft, but it was better than the parched wooden floor she had as a second option.
That was where Ginny spent her time after dinner, wrapped in a warm blanket, ready to sleep.
The hours were spent reading and listening to the radio that Tom had let her bring from the kitchen and listen at a volume so low that it was barely audible, but that was the agreement they had.
The dedication he had to, whatever it was that he was working on, was amazing, Ginny had already realized that there were nights when he probably did not sleep more than a couple of hours. As strange as it was, it was interesting to see the most powerful wizard of the century, building the foundation of what he would be known as.
People were right, knowledge was power.
On that day, Ginny was curious to know what would happen during the weekend, it was the first in which they would have to share the same space for a day and a half. Until then, they had remained relatively isolated in their rooms, but now, they had no choice but to be in each other's company.
When that day was almost over, a letter arrived from Madame Hepzibah Smith, inviting Tom to visit her during the next afternoon, she wanted him to estimate the value of a few of her objects, after the positive opinion her representative had shared.
So the next day, Ginny was going to be alone and without having to worry about what to do with Tom, so she decided to begin her afternoon by having lunch at the Cauldron. The pub was full of families with their children, who were running all over the place causing chaos among the waiters. It was the last weekend before Christmas and everyone wanted to finish their shopping's as soon as possible and go home. Ginny sat on a small free table, in a far corner away from the children and observed the room, smiling absently and thinking about her friends back at home and her family.
Suddenly her vision field went black, causing her to stare up at what had just appeared before her.
She looked up and Abraxas Malfoy looked at her amused. "Thinking about someone in particular?" He asked with that smirk that Ginny would love to eventually punch.
"Should I?" Ginny straightened up in her chair and smiled. "What brings you here, Abraxas?"
"The need to fulfil the holiday's tradition forces me to buy something nice for my mother, but we can't go shopping hungry, can we? Are you alone? Do you mind if I sit down?" Malfoy didn't even give her time to answer, beginning to sit even before he finished his questions, and making Ginny raise an eyebrow in disgust. It looked like she would have to stay hungry so that she could disappear from the Cauldron as soon as possible.
"Excited for the Christmas dinner?" He asked, looking at her over the menu that one of the waiters had brought them.
"What dinner?" Ginny had returned her attention to the other wizards sitting around them, trying to hear what they were saying, hoping that would somehow erase Malfoy's existence from the other side of the table.
Malfoy stretched her the menu and she immediately put it on the table without looking at it, while gazing at her like she had two heads, while telling the waiter what they wanted to eat.
Whoever was invited for the Malfoy Christmas dinner, never forgot they had been invited, it was absolutely ridiculous.
"The dinner at my house, the one you will be going to with Tom, to keep his company." The mention of her co-worker's name seemed to draw her attention back to him, and Malfoy noticed this, his lip curling, waiting for her to speak.
"I completely forgot about that, what about it?"
"I asked if you were excited about it!"
"Not particularly, Abraxas." Ginny turned her attention back to the room. "I'm not going."
"Well, you'd be the first person to refuse an invitation." Said Malfoy, half incredulous.
"There has to be a first time for everything, isn't?" Ginny asked sarcastically.
Malfoy didn't contain a laugh before speaking again "Let me guess, things are not well between you two? I'm still not convinced that you're not dating Tom, it's just impossible. Have you seen him? Girls used to fling themselves at him back in our school days."
"Well, I'm not a flustered schoolgirl, Abraxas. And you can believe what you like."
Malfoy looked at her in silence for a moment. "You really have to come, the second part of the dinner involves a lot of dancing, and the guest list promises many potential dance partners."
"Sounds fun, but I don't dance," she said shortly, her lips tightening into a thin line. One of the waiters, arrived at that moment with two glasses and a bottle of wine, which proceeded to open and fill with the red liquid. "I'd rather stay in the store, cooking something that my family would probably be eating that night and read a book until I fall asleep."
"I don't think that's very healthy." Malfoy almost drank the whole glass, making Ginny wonder about a possible alcohol dependence. "The best thing to do in your situation is to go out and have fun, not to muse over things which you have no control over."
Malfoy refilled his glass.
"I believe I'm the only person that can decide over that."
"True. Anyway, talking about Tom, how is he? Don't you usually come eat here?" Malfoy leant over the table, resting his chin in his hands as he held the glass with his fingertips, making the liquid dangle inside the glass.
"He is visiting a client." Ginny said, deciding to ignore the second question that Malfoy had said.
"Hmm..." He drank the second glass and when he was about to speak again, he was interrupted by the waiter that was carrying their food. Ginny immediately began to slurp her soup, trying not to burn her tongue in the process, ignoring the unwelcome presence of the Malfoy, who had decided to refill his glass before starting to eat. "Will you have dinner with me this week?" He casually asked, between mouthfuls.
Ginny felt compelled to stop eating and look at him. "Excuse me?" Certainly she had not heard him correctly.
"Will you have dinner with me? Maybe Wednesday if you're free. I know a place far more elegant than this, that I believe you would love."
"Hmm…" Ginny felt her hunger disappear and looked stunned at Malfoy. "I'm sorry Abraxas but I can't accept."
Abraxas rested the silverware on his plate and looked at her with the air of someone who was not used to get a no as an answer, especially twice in the same day. "So you're dating Tom," he said with an air of finality.
"Abraxas, I know other men beyond Tom, what's up with insisting on this subjects? Can't I only be his co-worker?" She asked, vexed.
"Co-worker? Just that? Not even friends? I just find it really hard to be true, but if you insist..."
"Finally." Ginny went back to eating her lunch.
"Then I must insist on my invitation to dinner, Ginny. If you don't have anything with him, you have to accept." Malfoy began to cut the meat that was still on his plate with more force than necessary.
"The only way for you to accept my refusal is with the condition that I'm in a relationship with your friend?" Ginny had finally finished eating and wiped her lips with the napkin.
"He does not like to share." Said Abraxas, putting the meat in his mouth and chewing as he looked at her. "He can be quite possessive about this things."
"Well, that's not really a good picture of the man I'm working with and sharing a house, don't you think?" She asked, emphasized the word 'house', annoyed, but he wasn't telling her anything she didn't know. "Anyway, Abraxas, my answer is the same, please do not insist." Ginny stood up from the chair in a fluid movement, took some coins from her purse and left them on the table. "Good afternoon Abraxas, I'm will see you around."
Abraxas saw her walk away with narrowed eyes, putting her cloak around her shoulders and disappearing to towards the Diagon Alley. He gave a deep breath, wanting to be home, in silence and alone, where he would have all the freedom he wanted to throw his plate against the wall.
He looked at Ginny's glass wine for a moment, still full and untouched before starting to eat again. An excellent bottle wasted.
Ginny closed the cloak the best she could against her body when the cold wind in the yard buffeted her. She took the wand and touched the orange brick wall and waited for them to open the door for the Diagon Alley. She decided that the first place to visit would be her mailbox, so she walked down the street in that direction, avoiding a collision with other wizards and witches who hurried between stores.
That lunch had definitely marked a new chapter in the book of her adventure into the past. Of all the things that were happening, of everything that could have happened to her, the last thing she needed was a Malfoy interested in having dinners with her.
Just him thinking such thing would be possible was already bringing dishonour on to her family.
Slowly, she opened the door of the post, not to scare the birds and headed to her box, feeling her heart almost stop when she pushed the small key in and opened the small door. Empty. Again. It was nearly two months since she had arrived and with the festive season less than a week away she was beginning to feel melancholic. She was undoubtedly grateful for the enriching experience of visiting the Past, it was interesting, but overall pretty nasty, and it was enough. She wanted to go home, to her family, to her friends and to Harry.
She closed the mail door with a sigh and let her hand rest in the wood for a few seconds, she needed a good book for Christmas's night.
The Flourish & Blots was almost the same to what she remembered, without a bookshelf to one side, another one more to the other and the same smell of old books and ink. She climbed the stairs to the top floor, slowly, soaking the atmosphere of the store, letting her hand trail over the spines of the books that adorned the walls. The shop was quite full of wizards, as she would expect, so Ginny went to the less sought shelves in the store and sat on the chair by the small window that left the light illuminate the Muggle literature section. She reached out and took the first book that she could touch on the bookshelf in front of her and leaned back, trying to find a comfortable position for the next few hours.
It was still early when she returned to Borgin & Burkes, choosing to face the crowd to reach the entrance to her Alley, attracting a few curious looks from passer-by, which probably thought it was weird that someone would want to buy something there for Christmas. The contrast between the two streets was astonishing, hers completely empty, with snow almost untouched in the ground. She stopped in front the showcase of the store that she had reorganized; it was in fact the same one that she remembered from that morning when she waited for Kevedo. Ginny, having no key to enter the store, Apparated in the kitchen, startling Burkes' elf who almost dropped the dishes he was carrying in his small arms.
Ginny put her cloak on the back of one of the chairs and sat down with a weary sigh, she opened the brown paper that wrapped the book she had bought in Flourish & Blots and put the volume on the table, the red cover contrasted with the brown of the wood. She ran her fingers over the embossed title and gold paint, Pride and Prejudice, she read, nothing better than the romance between Darcy and Elizabeth to leave her even more melancholic than she already was. It had not been a good choice, but it was what she had.
She read the newspaper until she got hungry, then she had some dinner and went up to the attic, to wait for Tom to return from his visit to Hepzibah Smith. She changed into the clothes she slept in and laid on her couch leaning against her pillow, wrapped in her usual blanket and the new book on her lap.
"It is a truth universally acknowledged..." it began.
Tom's afternoon was much more interesting than Ginny's. Hepzibah Smith kept him busy in her manor all afternoon, and it had been some extremely productive hours for the Borgin & Burkes.
He was expected by the same wizard that visited the store a few days before, and he took him to the drawing room where Hepzibah Smith was waiting.
Tom had done his research on the Smiths, they were not a pureblood family, and the wizard line only went to the early nineteenth century. The family was already relatively well-off, but the first Smith wizard who had left Hogwarts, made sure to increase the family fortune and they were now among the richest, both on the wizard the side, where Hepzibah belonged, as the muggle part.
The house where she lived had been built recently in a Victorian style, with grey wood and high windows, the decoration was elegant but depersonalised, all designed to show off to others.
Hepzibah had a special taste for collecting valuable and particularly rare magical objects, and now she wanted to reassess her earliest acquisitions, know if their current values and see if they would preserve the investment. According to her representative, she had been delighted when he informed her that he had found someone competent for the job.
The drawing room was a very bright room with expensive couches and armchairs scattered all around the room, when the wizard opened the door to enter, Hepzibah raised from her chair, resting her cup of tea on the table with a small clink of the porcelain, and asked him to sit in a high pitched voice. The witch was much lower than Tom, he noticed as he approached her and leant over to kiss her hand, making her smile appreciatively.
Hepzibah seemed to try to compensate for her short stature by wearing colourful and extravagant clothes that made her look heavier than she was, and it contrasted with her very advanced age.
Tom sat down in the chair opposite to Hepzibah and waited for her to finish filling his cup of tea.
"Mr Riddle..." She started with a smile. "I would like to sincerely thank you for your time, especially when you could be enjoying your free afternoon from work to do other things."
"It's a pleasure Madame Smith, Borgin & Burkes always try to give the best service to its customers, someone would always be available to visit you." Tom replied with his most charming smile and watched amused as the other witch smiled even more.
Tom didn't particularly like his appearance, it was so much like the Muggle filth he killed in Little Hangleton, a constant reminder that his blood was less than pure, the part of him carried that inherently weakness. But it was useful, it transmitted confidence, put women (and some men) at ease, was friendly and was perfectly adapted to the life he had, it was nothing more than another tool that he could use, among many others.
It seemed especially useful at that time because Hepzibah seemed to be regressing to her Hogwarts' schoolgirl days, all blotched and blushed, which had probably been long centuries ago. The afternoon went on, Hepzibah was curious about how he had gotten to work at the Borgin & Burkes, and made sure to share as many tedious details about her life as she could remember, interrupting him every time he tried to speak. Only after serving a brief snack, she finally showed him the pieces that had led her to call him there.
When he finally managed to say goodbye to the witch, he was almost exhausted, she only had let him go after promising that he would return the following week and would come to her New Year Eve's party. But the final part of the evening had been worth it, Tom would have to write Burkes a report about what had happened since he had been quite impressed with what Hepzibah had shown him, and she also had shown interest in exchanging some of her less rare objects, with other of similar value from the store.
Malfoy was impatiently waiting for him in his office at home. "You look positively horrible Riddle!" He said looking him up and down. "Who was the client?" He asked while waving towards the chair across his for him to sit down, as he filled two glasses with firewhisky and put them over the top.
"Hepzibah Smith." Tom said letting himself fall into the chair and massaging the bridge of his nose before pulling the glass to him.
Malfoy laughed. "My sincere feelings, Riddle! Let's toast to the fact you are still alive!" Abraxas hit Tom's glass, making them resounded through the room while they poured down the drink.
"Thank you Malfoy, I needed this."
Malfoy sat down and began to describe what was going on in the Ministry, as usual. Describing the environment after the reopen of the war processes, the current pause due to the abrupt shortage of human resources, since everyone wanted to enjoy the last days of the year to rest, to return to attack the matter with more attention the next year, and avoid any possible mistakes that could have led to that unpleasant situation.
Tom was curious about what these errors could be, but no one knew well, the matter had emanated from the office of a wizard called Umbridge. It was he who was in charge of the operation and insisted on not sharing the information with all the departments. But they expected the Minister to intervene at the beginning of the year and put a stop to his work.
Eventually it was time for dinner and the two wizards headed to the Cauldron. They had arranged a dinner with their usual group, but only some of them had attended. Whoever passed their table would probably think that some former Hogwarts classmates had gathered for a Christmas dinner. The conversation theme, after several bottles of wine and some of firewhisky, didn't go much further than the Malfoy's Christmas dinner, always a popular theme at that time of the year, to Tom's annoyance, and then to their need to create an emblem to represent their group.
They asked for some paper and surrounded Goyle, the only one of them that knew how to draw, each making observations about what should or should not be on the thing, making the wizard draft page after page as the designs were being discarded.
They had decided that there should be a snake, after all, the base of their ideology had been widely developed, founded and published by Salazar Slytherin, so that was an essential element. Eventually, they decided to get the second element, and got their inspiration from the name they used, Death Eaters, so a skull was also made part of it.
The dining area of the pub was about to close when they finally got the design right, the skull in the centre with a snake writhing up from its inside. The Dark Mark, they called it, between laughter and a final toast with firewhisky, before saying goodbye and giving their dinner as finished.
Only when Tom had to held the neared chair to the fireplace in the Borgin & Burkes' kitchen, he realized he had drunk too much. Fortunately, the kitchen was empty and no one saw him lose his balance and hold to the kitchen's counter before entering the hall. When he started to walk up the stairs, the voice of a woman singing reached his ears, and for a moment he thought it was Ginny who was singing, but then heard the music that accompanied the voice and concluded that the idea was kind of stupid. It must be some Muggle that she liked to hear.
He took a deep breath, and opened the door, immediately leaning on the doorjamb.
"Tom?" Ginny looked at him over her pillow, closing the book she was reading, leaving a finger marking the page. "Are you okay?"
"Yes! Why shouldn't I be?" He asked sarcastically, starting to strip his cloak as he walked to his desk, and dropping it on the top, following it with is coat and vest. He was too hot and uncomfortable, so he loosened his tie and unbuttoned the first buttons of his shirt, leaning his hips against the edge of the desk, while massaging the bridge of his nose, as if that would help the room stop spinning. He looked at Ginny, who was watching with a smile from ear-to-ear. "What?" He asked annoyed, he hadn't planned on drink so much and was not enjoying being seen like that.
"You're drunk!" She said.
"What? No!" He denied, vehemently.
"Sure, you're not." Ginny couldn't stop laughing.
His brow furrowed and he pulled away slowly from his desk. He reached his pocket and pulled out a crumpled paper and smiled amused at it. It had been the perfect night to recover from that afternoon with Hepzibah Smith. When he sat down, he could still smell the witch's perfume, very expensive, bought in Paris, as she had insisted on sharing. He needed a shower.
"What do you have there?" Ginny asked walking a few steps closer to him, amused by his behaviour and noticing when he lost balance again and rested against the desk.
"A stupid sketch Goyle did." He said, folding the paper.
"Let me see." Ginny demanded with a smile, her fingers grasping for it.
Tom looked at her thoughtfully. "No."
"Oh come on! Let me see Tom." She said closing the distance between them, trying to take the paper from him, causing him to take his hand to his chest in a protective gesture.
"Ginevra, I do not want to share this with you."
"Don't be like that, just one look!" Ginny fell against Tom when he raised his arm above his head, trying to use their height difference to his advantage.
"You are unbelievable! I'm not going to show it to you! It's personal!" Tom couldn't resist and also started to laugh, putting his arm around her when he felt the desk start to skid back with their weight, pushing her away from it. Ginny didn't miss an opportunity when it presented itself, grabbed his waist, making him bend and lower his arm enough for her to get to the paper and make him release her.
Ginny walked a few steps back smiling victoriously and turned her back to him. "Whatever, I don't care." He muttered, entering the bathroom and turning on the shower loudly.
Tom's exit came at the right time because Ginny had to sit on the couch, her stomach turning. The Dark Mark, still on that page, but that she knew so well how it moved, blurred some sides by Goyle's fingers. Why? Why did she have to travel for a period of Tom Riddle's life when he was creating Horcruxes in lockets and doing these things? Why hadn't she time travelled to a period where the most exciting thing in his life were the exams to finish the 7th year at Hogwarts and she wouldn't even need to cross his path?
Ginny dropped her head to hide her face on her knees and took a shaky breath. Why the universe hated her so much?
"Are you alright?" Tom asked.
Ginny looked at him, his hair still wet, the sleeves of the sweater he liked to sleep with pulled up to his elbows, and leaning against the doorjamb. "Yes, I was just in pain by how stupid this looks." She said getting up from the couch with a shaky grin and approaching him. "Snakes and skulls? I expected that a group of wealthy Slytherins would have a more elegant taste with their drawnings." She said, returning him the paper.
His expression froze in place for a moment and he closed the door behind him, resting his back against the smooth surface. Ginny had returned to the sofa and picked up the radio, turning the small device off before placing it on the bookshelf, muting Billie Holiday for the night, brushing a strand of hair behind her ear. Her back was to him when her heart swooped and shuddered beneath her ribcage when he grabbed her, pushing her against the shelves, causing spell books to clatter to the floor, as he put his hands on both sides of her head, pinning her in front of him, his eyes looking a terrifying ice-blue in the dim firelight.
"What I find stupid, Ginevra," he said, softly, dangerously, his dark pupils boring holes into her eyes, as her heart hammered in a momentary terror. "Is why I can't seem to understand how can you know that me or Malfoy, or any of the people with whom I dined tonight, were Slytherins when we were at Hogwarts."
Ginny gasped, cursing her lack of forethought. "Please, Tom." She laughed shakily, pushing him back, taking advantage that he had not yet recovered from his dinner. "Everyone knows that Abraxas Malfoy is a Slytherin." He looked at her for a long moment before using a hand to steady himself.
"And on that day I met you in the Cauldron, and Abraxas gave me company while I waited for my food, he told me you were classmates. One doesn't need to be particularly smart to conclude that you're in the same House as him, in relation to your other friends, I suppose I just made an assumption."
"He has a penchant for talking too much." said Tom, begrudgingly.
"Yes, oftentimes he says more than he needs to." Ginny looked at him, rolled her eyes at the memory of what had happened at lunch.
"What?" Tom frowned at her expression.
"We had lunch today, he sat down on my table not even giving me time to say if I wanted his company or not." Tom's expression was once again expressionless, concealing how angry that information made him. "You have to talk to him Tom, he is starting to be very annoying, insisting we have a thing going on, trying to make me go to his stupid party."
Tom smiled and approached her, making her shiver and have a sense of déjà vu, she knew that smile, that walk, those gestures, and she couldn't do anything, she wasn't able to react when he pulled her to him, asking her to continue.
It was like she was eleven again.
"He really isn't being very receptive to the idea that I don't want to go to his Christmas dinner." She complained on Tom's shoulder, in a low voice. "And today he insisted on taking me to dinner this Wednesday, he also didn't like that I've refused." She felt him hold her tighter when those words left her lips.
"Well, don't worry about it, I won't let you go anywhere you don't want to go." He said in the same low tone she remembered from all those years ago, as he began to walk towards the bed, causing them to fall on the sheets. "Tom! What the hell are you doing?" She asked trying to get him off her, feeling crushed, the spell broken. But Tom didn't answer, merely taking away her hands that hold on to his sweater and let himself fall beside her, pulling her with him so that she could rest her head on his shoulder.
"You were right..."
Ginny groaned uncomfortable when his cold hand found the space between her pants and sweater, and Tom's fingers traced an arc on the curve of her waist, where it rested, making her cling tightly to his shirt and raise her head.
"I drank too much, and I'm feeling exhausted. The dinner, that crazy Hepzibah Smith in the afternoon..."
"And how will this help me with Malfoy?"
"I'm marking you as mine, I'll explain tomorrow."
"What? By making me sleep here? I can tell you that'll not work. Let me go."
"That's what you think Ginny." He muttered pulling the covers over them with a gesture.
Ginny felt appalled by him using her nickname for a moment. "Let me go to the couch, Tom!" His answer was pulling her impossible closer to him and ignoring her request, entangling his legs on hers.
Ginny took a deep breath, resigned, she just had to imagine she was again eleven years and Tom was sixteen, and he was casually lying next to her reading a book while... killing her slowly, because if she thought about what was happening in reality, this would be even worse than sharing her fears and secrets with his Horcrux and opening the Chamber of Secrets.
Ginny woke up the next day with Tom sleeping with his back to her. She had eventually been able to fall asleep as well, more importantly, she had woken alive and well, and it seemed he had won back some of his senses during the night and released her from his grip.
She breathed deeply, enjoying the only good thing the night had brought her: good rest from not waking up curled on the couch thinking that that would be the day that her head would get stuck between the couch's pillows.
Deciding to start working on forgetting that had happened during the night and return to their normal life, Ginny started to raise, she was hungry and wanted to sit at the kitchen table with the perspective of sleeping there when Tom had those dinners with the Death Eaters, because she never wanted to have that night happen again.
Tom, who was asleep until that moment suddenly turned to her and looked over his shoulder, leaning on his elbow. "What the hell do you think you are doing?" He asked coldly and looking at her with hostility.
"Getting up to go have something to eat?" Ginny asked him back, making Tom look at her confused with her answer.
"No, I want to know why are you in my bed?"
"Don't you remember what happened last night?" Ginny looked at him in surprise and she could not help but smile and feel infinitely relieved at the prospect of him forgetting what had happened, even if it wasn't very likely.
Tom shook his head and sank back on the mattress, covering his face with his hands. He groaned in pain.
Ginny began to laugh, better than seeing a young Lord Voldemort leaning on the furniture to keep himself from falling after a night with way too much alcohol, was to see a young Lord Voldemort suffering the consequences of such night. "It would be surprising if it didn't hurt! I don't know how you got up the stairs! You got here, you showed me a stupid drawing of a skull eating a snake, changed clothes and when I asked you to speak with Abraxas to make him stop inviting me to go out with him, you decided that the best way to do that was…" Ginny raised her hands, making quotation marks with her fingers to emphasize the words that she would say next. "Mark me."
Tom rubbed his face and let them fall parallel to his body, while Ginny laughed. "It was weird, Tom, you were really weird." She said, biting back as Tom determinedly stared at the ceiling, his way of coping with such embarrassment, probably, she had never seen him like this. "You shouldn't drink so much!" She gave him a pat on the leg. "But since you look like you're dying, and I'm hungry, I'll bring you breakfast to bed, and we can agree to forget this ever happened."
Tom watched her cross the room, pulling her pants up and disappearing down the stairs. There was something about that night that he should remember, but thinking about it was painful and so he opted to put in on the list of things to do during the afternoon.
Ginny returned with some toasts and tea, and sat on the bed, placing the tray on the blankets in front of her. Tom sat down and held his mug, pulling his legs up and resting his arms on his knees. "Don't get used to this! Next time, you'll have to go make your own food." She said starting to laugh again. "I'm only doing this because I feel bad for finding this whole situation more fun than I should probably find. I never expected to see you like that.
Tom looked at Ginny in a way that made her silence. "I sincerely ask if you could forgive me."
"What?" Ginny looked at him amused, not knowing exactly how to react, since when did he apologise for anything?
"I was not…at my best behaviour. It shouldn't have happened."
"Don't worry about it Tom, nothing bad happened…"
Tom smiled in that way that meant that he was going to say something awful. "Just like that other time."
Ginny frowned preparing herself for whatever was coming next, turning pale while trying to remember something that should not have happened with the Horcrux, and if he was going to make a reference to anything like that.
She couldn't avoid feeling paranoid every time he said things like that.
"You really don't remember what happened? Really?" It was his turn to laugh at her.
"What happened?"
"That night the Aurors were here, and I let you sleep here, I tried to wake up to check out the Aurors emptying the store across from us, and I don't know why, but you embraced me by the neck and you pulled me into a quite uncomfortable position and…" Ginny began to turn red. "Called me Harry. Who is this Harry?"
Tom watched her amused, seeing her get progressively redder, until her skin was almost the same colour as her hair, as she absorbed not only the fact of what she had done but also the fact that she called him by the name of the person he would hate the most. 'He will hate in the future… not now…' Ginny corrected herself.
"Harry is my boyfriend's name. Well, ex-boyfriend, it's complicated."
"Hmm." Tom nibbled one toast, clearly finding it more interesting than her story.
"It's very complicated."
Tom discarded the bread and reached for the tea. His stomach didn't seem ready for solids, but fortunately, the headache was going away. They finished breakfast in silence, Tom enjoying the absence of sound and Ginny feeling embarrassed by what had happened and what she couldn't remember.
"What are the plans for today?" She eventually asked, putting the plate on the tray.
'Well, it's Sunday. There is nothing to do today." Tom said.
"You're not going to work in one of those mysterious things of yours?"
'Probably, but only later, as you said, when I don't feel like I am dying. Why? You want to do something with me?'
Ginny felt herself slightly blushing, and she jutted her chin out defiantly. "I wanted to know so that I decide something for me. So far, my plan is to have a nap."
"I think you have a solid plan there." Tom remarked, his lips curling in amusement, taking a sip of tea.
"It is, isn't?"
"Well, we could play a game until lunch." Tom suggested blithely. She threw him a sideways glance, an eyebrow perking up. "Do you like chess? I haven't played in years."
Tom disappeared between the panels, searching for another shower, and Ginny went downstairs to the kitchen, with the tray resting on her hip, with directions to where to find the chessboard in the cupboards. When Tom arrived she was arranging the pieces on the worn wooden table.
The most feared wizard of the century was an excellent chess player, as she expected, slaughtered her between stories about the one person with whom he liked to play, a Hufflepuff that he had divided his desk with on his first Potions class, and that introduced him to this variant of the game during the recess. It also had marked the beginning of successful team on that class, every time the Slytherins had classes with the Hufflepuff.
When Ginny asked if he still saw her, and played a game for the sake of old times, she was left speechless, not knowing what to say when he shared that someone had freed a monster in Hogwarts and she was one of its victims. She had been so frightened by what had happened, that her parents had been forced to take her home and he hadn't seen her since.
Tom watched her carefully, waiting for her to say something, for a reaction, a question about it, after all, they were some of his best memories from school. He wanted her to ask how one of the safest schools in the country could allow such thing to happen, but she did not say anything.
Instead, Ginny leant forward, muttering a few words to her king and smirked back at him, telling him it was his turn to play.
The chess pieces had decided to defend Ginny's intentions, using every trick they knew to help her win, it got to a point that whenever Tom was not looking at the board, his own pieces would move to favour her game. She should thank Ron for that trick one day.
The rest of the morning passed quickly, with them arguing over the board and him cursing the pieces. When it was his turn to lose a game, he raised from the chair and announced he was going to the Cauldron to grab some food for them, to her great amusement.
Feeling completely recovered, Tom spent the afternoon at his desk, working, and Ginny chose her couch, alternating between reading a few pages of the new book and dozing off, ignorant of the fact that Tom was not focused at all on what he was supposed to be doing, and was instead looking at her, thinking about what had happened the night before.
What had happened, was now a fresh memory, and Tom couldn't decide what made him more disturbed about everything that had happened so far. Her arrival to the store was not a turning point in his life, things remained pretty much the same, even when she had moved into his couch, things didn't change, but maybe that was due to be used to sharing his room with someone else for most of his life.
He already had decided that whatever was going between them was weird, Tom took a deep breath and slid down in his chair, balancing the book he was reading upright on top of the desk so that it would cut Ginny from his field vision.
What he had done that night was completely unnatural behaviour for him, he had never done anything like it and he never thought he could do something like it. What had crossed his mind? But worse than that was the fact that she was not the least shocked by what had happened, he did not know any woman who would accept what had happened with the same swiftness with which she had accepted it.
Why had he held her in his arms and ask her to tell him more about what was bothering her? If he ignored the second part, where he basically forced her to sleep with him, the action seemed normal.
He rubbed his eyes and focused his gaze on his diary, half hidden under a pile of books. He closed the book in front of him and straightened in his chair, pulling the black notebook to him, opening it on the first page.
"Will you tell me what is the matter with Ginevra, or will I have to force it out of her?" He wrote, watching the paper absorb the ink.
"I don't think that's a good idea."
"I have this horrible feeling that you know her, that she knows what you are and that somehow she knows me, and it doesn't make any sense."
"You're right, it doesn't. Don't worry. "
"I really shouldn't?"
"You should be how you think it would be the best for you." Tom wet the tip of the pen in the ink and looked at Ginny, that was still sleeping across the room on the couch. One arm had slipped and her hand rested on the floor while the other held the book she had been reading. "Why do I feel that she belongs to me?"
"Because she belongs." Said the Horcrux.
"That makes no sense!"
"Don't worry."
Tom waited until the ink disappeared to close the notebook and put it back underneath the books it was before. He put his elbows on his desk and rubbed the bridge of his nose, the Horcrux was not helping. It was now obvious she knew what the diary was, that her attitude was due to the fact that they have already crossed, and he probably had not left a good impression. But Tom had never seen her before that morning, where she didn't quit fell inside the store... unless it had happened in the future.
It was absurd, but it would explain things, whatever he had done in the future had left an impression on her, it explained the déjà vus, the terror and discomfort, it also seemed to be the only explanation for what happened that night. The way she had held him to tell him the conversation with Malfoy, seemed like something she was used to doing.
However, it did not explain why he had pulled her into such an intimate embrace, a gesture that he never shared with anyone like that. Well, maybe was some part of him that was feeling bored of being alone in that attic for so long, with only books to keep him company, but still…
They should have been intimate, by the way, things were that drove him to fell protective of her when he thought Malfoy was interested in her, that weird thought he had on the first night she slept in the attic, how she seemed to fit so well in his bed.
Tom shook his head, it was not that kind of intimacy, which was something new, probably coming from the fact that he was starting to find her… very attractive.
Tom stood up and walked over to Ginny, sat on the couch's edge, against the curve of her waist and took her hand from the ground, caressing it gently with his fingers.
If she had in fact, travelled from the future, it would make sense, that she reacted to him in ways she was used to, but he was not supposed to act like she expected him to, he was not supposed to be aware that something like this was happening. There was something more he was not understanding.
Ginny opened her eyes and laced his fingers through Tom's. "What are you doing?" She asked, watching him under the semi-closed eyelids, still half asleep.
"Nothing." He said, with a mischievous smile, not sharing that he had wanted to see what she was dreaming about, see if he could catch another memory without being noticed.
Ginny freed her hand from his and held it up, brushing his hair from his face to see him properly. "You are lying."
"I would never lie to you," he said in a whisper.
"That's another lie." Ginny replied with an amused smile. "You're being kind of creepy, Tom, don't you have potions to make or something?" She asked turning to her side, pushing him off the couch and forcing him to rise so he wouldn't fall.
Tom looked at her, amused, and shook his head. He was in need of a drink, so he went downstairs.
When Ginny went downstairs to dinner, she found Tom sitting at the table reading while Borgin's elf put the plates and silverware on the tablecloth.
"The Borgins are coming to eat with us?" She asked, running her fingers through her wet hair from having just showered.
"No, he came to clean the guest room and I convinced him to stay and make our dinner."
"That was a good idea." Said Ginny lively, sitting in the chair beside Tom, watching the small elf with her face resting on her hand.
Dinner went calmly, with Ginny discussing with the elf the best way to make some a specific desserts and Tom reading his book. When they finished Ginny stayed in the kitchen, having persuaded the elf to stay with her to help her cook, and promised to write a letter to Mrs Borgin explained what had happened so no one would punish him. Tom preferred to return to the attic, he wanted to re-read a few things about Horcruxes and that seemed to be the perfect time to do so.
Tom was walking out of the bathroom when Ginny entered the attic, almost colliding with her.
"What?" She asked, irritably, when he didn't move back.
"You smell really good." He murmured, a curiously unfocused expression on his face.
"What?" Ginny smiled uncomfortably, not sure of what she had just heard.
Tom closed the distance and embraced her, pressing his face to the crook of her neck and taking a deep breath.
"Tom, you're being really creepy again, what the h..." Ginny began to ask but stopped when he put a hand on the back of her head, grabbing her hair.
She smelled of lavender and vanilla.
"I don't want you sleeping on the couch."
Her heart stopped.
"I want you to stay with me."
Ginny tried to push him away, put some distance between them, but all that did was make him drop his hand back to her waist and pull her closer to him.
"Have you been drinking again?" She asked with a nervous laugh. Tom didn't answer her, just pushed her until his legs touched the mattress. "Tom? What are you doing?"
"Ginny, please."
"Tom, don't." Ginny held onto his sweater tightly.
Tom ignored her and pushed her down. After a few moments of Ginny struggling to free herself, she managed to push him away enough to look at his face. The light coming through the window was not enough for her to see all the details, but she could see enough, the messed hair, an amused smile, a slight red tint to his eyes?
Ginny rolled her eyes and tried to push him away again. "You are nothing more than a manipulative bastard. Whatever you're trying, it's not working."
He started to laugh and pulled her closer to him. "Don't be ridiculous, sleep."
Ginny ignored and tried again, he was really heavy. She only stopped when Tom pulled her leg, paralysing her during the brief moment his fingers traced the fabric of her pants until they reached her waist. "Aren't you comfortable? Don't you feel like you belong here? Can't you feel it?"
She did not answer.
"Sleep."
A/N: Kudos to my beta sinsinnatus from Tumblr!