Chapter Four:
The Diary

Tom found me in the morning, curled up cat-like on the floor where I had fallen asleep, wand and book clutched to my chest.

"Danielle?" he called softly, shaking my shoulder, when his entire being seemed to change. He had spotted the wand.

"Where did you get that?" His voice was strained. I blinked at him in exhaustion, shifting to a more comfortable position. I noticed an odd glimmer in his eyes as his hands seemed to itch with the need to grasp the rotting wood. His disposition frightened me, and though I unconsciously tried to hide my discoveries from him, I felt my arms move out of their own accord and hold the wand out to him.

"I-It is Salazar Slytherin's wand," I told him, and his fingers brushed against mine as he took it, gazing at the engraved name hungrily.

"Tom?" I questioned nervously, placing my hand on his shoulder.

He jumped at my touch. I was relieved to see his eyes return to normal, and he grinned apologetically. "Where did you find it?" His tone was the softer one of the Tom I knew.

I pointed to the small opening on the bookshelf. "There."

Tilting his head to one side and narrowing his eyes, he regarded the hole with a curious eye, deeply immersed in thought. "Brilliant," he murmured to himself, and I joined him by the shelf, my joints stiff from sleeping upon the floor.

"What is brilliant?"

He shook his head. "Was there anything else with it?"

I chewed at my lip as I withdrew the little black book. He seemed to be expecting it, though why, I did not know.

"Ah, yes..." He gently turned each crinkling page, searching.

He looked dissatisfied once he reached the end, apparently finding nothing, and prepared to cast it aside.

But before he could release it, I grasped his thin wrist gently, my heart beating unnaturally fast. "I am sorry," I blushed. "Let me keep it."

He opened his mouth to protest, but then thought better of it. "Fair enough."

I tucked it away into the pocket of my robes, an idea forming in my mind.

I smiled, eager to begin my project.

Over the course of the next week, I worked feverishly at every spare moment I had. Tom never asked about it, and so I never told him anything. Christmas drew closer with each passing day as a white blanket of snow engulfed the castle.

I did not see him much during that time. He was always holed up somewhere, hiding away from the bustle of Hogwarts. I never really knew where he went when he disappeared, though I supposed he was in the Slytherin common room. Once, I was even curious enough to ask about him.

"E-excuse me?" I called cautiously to a girl I recognized was in Slytherin. Her hair was long and jet black, cut short in the front to form perfectly straight bangs.

She turned to me with penetrating brown eyes that narrowed when she saw who I was. For a moment, I thought she would not even speak to me.

Mockingly, she asked, "What is it, filthy Ravenclaw?" Her voice was soft and cruel, which was the Slytherin way.

I tried to keep my lip from quivering. "H-has Tom Riddle been in the common room–er, is he there now, perhaps? I mean... er..." I felt tears prick at the corners of my eyes at my stupidity.

"And why, pray tell, would I tell you that?" she asked, though she looked at me curiously as she put her back to me, turning to leave.

Then she stopped. "But no. He hasn't. Strange someone like you would ask."

After that, she seemed to forget I was there, or else had decided to ignore me.

I thanked her and stumbled away feeling foolish. I was worried about the safety of my friend.

We were friends, right?

That was a new concept. The only friends I had ever had had been inanimate objects, and I was constantly plagued with that fact. I did not want to lose the only person my age that had ever been kind to me.

I had always dreamt that a friend was someone with whom I could share my deepest secrets, or at least we would know each other very well.

I realized that I still knew so little about Tom. He had not spoken much, and so I barely knew him, and yet... I felt I knew everything about him. It was an odd, frustrating and satisfying feeling, one I was willing to admit.

But was I willing to admit the other feelings I had tried to bury and cast out from my heart? I was not ready to accept them for fear that they would never be returned.

And as these feelings started to grow and develop further, it began to get harder to look Tom Riddle in the eye at times.

On Christmas Eve, I carefully wrapped my project in a sheet of delicate white paper that rumpled the longer I touched it. I attached a small card with a velvety green ribbon, making sure that I had formed each letter perfectly of the calligraphy I had used. I was sure that he would be proud of at least that, as I was determined to prove I had learned something from our lesson. I also kept a quill and ink bottle easily accessible, in case he did not have one with him when I gave him the present the next morning.

Or perhaps I would give it to him that night.

I contemplated for a moment before deciding it would be best to catch him ere he retired to his common room for the night.

I clutched the parcel to my chest and raced to the dungeons, ignoring the stares I was receiving from my peers. I had to find him, I had to find–

"Tom!" I cried breathlessly as I spotted him in a corner, conversing with another Slytherin, who sneered at me nastily.

I heard Tom excuse himself and I rushed to meet him.

But when he was finally in front of me, my mind fogged and swam and I blushed, swaying and staring down at my feet.

"Danielle?" he asked patiently.

It took me a moment to recover, but I eventually did, and I held out the parcel to him, murmuring, "Happy Christmas."

He took it, smiling quizzically as he slowly unwrapped it, pulling out the little black diary. "But this is-?" He furrowed his brow and opened to the first page, staring at it intently.

Then he grinned. "Ah... but you have done something clever to it, have you not?"

I smiled, my lips curling secretively. "But of course."