After some very entertaining hours of staring at the celling, Tom heard a loud explosion underneath the common room. He snapped out of his trance, wondering what it was. After that, he heard loud cheering.

"Again with their stupid tricks..."

The explosion was of course caused by Abraxas and his buddies below.

"Seems like it's time to get up."

After that, Tom reluctantly got up, got dressed and prepared for the day. He looked at his timetable: he had eight classes today, prefect and head boy duties. He was a bit worried, though, because he only got two and a half hours of sleep. Still, Tom assured himself that he would do all of this perfectly, as he always did. First on the list was transfiguration. Tom had already read most of his books over the summer, so the chances were slim that he wasn't going to perform perfectly. He finally got to the classroom, which had an open door. He looked inside and realized that it was... empty? Tom stood outside the door, wondering why there wasn't anyone attending class. Then, when his stomach gurgled, he knew why.

"Oh, right, breakfast, I forgot."

He speed-walked across the castle, going down staircases until he finally got to the great hall. When he got there, the food was already placed on the tables. Because he got there late, he drew a bit of attention to himself. Some students looked at him, but most didn't care. Although, most of the looks came from the Slytherin table. They were of course from Abraxas and his small gang. Abraxas was smirking.

He sat down as far away from them as possible, not because he was scared, but because they were annoying and he didn't want his face to be covered in treacle tart. The food options were large, but Tom distinctly searched for pancakes. To his delight, he found them. Maybe by eating he could force his body to stay awake until the end of his duties? He grabbed as many pancakes as he could. There were strawberry, lemon and sugar, apricot, cherry and chocolate flavored ones.

While other Slytherins stuffed their faces, Tom remembered his manners, even if he was even hungrier then them. It would be bad to make another bad impression after he got here late.

With that out of the way, he left the great hall with the other students and finally headed to transfiguration class. As Tom expected, it wasn't anything special or difficult, plus today was the first day of school. The task was to turn toads into toadstools. After his dreaded professor, Dumbledore, finished explaining what they needed to do, he lent them some enclosed toads. They took out their toads and started trying to do their task. Almost immediately after taking out the toad, Tom managed to transfigure it into a toadstool on his first try, with a swift motion of his wand.

"Excellent job, Mr. Riddle. 10 points to Slytherin.", Dumbledore exclaimed.

Tom appreciated the act, but he was still nervous every time Dumbledore spoke to him.

A few rows behind him was Abraxas, desperately trying to perform the task. He noticed that Tom had already finished, so that made him mad. Tom was counting his attempts, because he didn't have anything else to do at the moment.

"So this is what they call "pureblood superiority"..."
"No wonder those people are ludicrous."
"Let's hope that he doesn't ruin the rest of us along the way."

Abraxas' toad was staring at him with a confused look. It wondered why a pale little gremlin was staring down at him and waving a stick aggressively. Tom, of course, didn't have a toad to look at, instead, a neat little toadstool lay on his desk. It looked very appetizing, but it was poisonous, so there was no chance of eating it.

Some time later, Dumbledore brought the students who finished their task another batch to practice on. Tom finished his task within a few seconds, so he kept himself busy by turning them back into toads, and vice versa.

Finally, when the class ended, Tom transfigured them all back into toads and put his wand in his pocket. After that class, he was on his way to the history of magic class.

This class wasn't particularly demanding, sometimes it even got a bit boring. Even so, Tom scribbled notes as the teacher lectured them, not wanting to miss anything. Although, since the class wasn't very interactive, it made Tom realize just how much he desired to sleep.
Aside from scribbling those notes, he was in a fight with himself, struggling not to fall asleep, or to even look suspicious. He didn't want to ruin his reputation even more. After some time, the class ended, and Tom stood up from his seat, although ungracefully. It looked like he was a bit nauseous.

Next class was muggle studies. Luckily, since Tom lived with his muggle parents, he didn't have to study, read, or even pay that much attention to what the teacher was saying. What was important to him was that he knew when the tests would be, and when the teacher asked the questions.

Up next was, however, DADA. It was Tom's favorite subject, with charms coming close to it. He read his DADA textbook multiple times, wishing to know all about this year's programme, and more. However, this class wasn't what Tom expected. Instead of learning about the chameleon ghoul, they were having a revision.

"Greetings, dear students. I hope you all had an amazing summer and plenty of time to relax", professor
Merrythought exclaimed,
"I must tell you that today's planned lecture was rescheduled for another day. Recently, there was a boggart outbreak near Hogsmeade, and some of the boggarts are really close to our school. I advise you to not go far from the school outside, and most definitely the forbidden forest, as always. Anyway, today's lecture will be a revision of how to defend yourself when facing a boggart. As you may remember, we use a spelled called "ridikulus" against these creatures. Their goal is to feed off of their victim's fear, so try your hardest to not get scared of them. Instead, cast the spell on them to make them look, well... ridiculous! As the spell suggests. Alright, the student whose name I say will come out and practice.", she finished and started looking at her list of 7th year students.

"Frona Juneberry!", she called.

In front of the other 7th years, a short, Hufflepuff, curly-haired brunette girl with freckles appeared. She looked at the twitching closet in front of her. It made her a little nervous.

"Don't be scared! That's what it wants. Everything will be alright.", said the professor.

With that, she opened the closet, and out of it came a sphinx. It started blurting out some riddles to Frona, and she looked at it with confusion and fear.

"Ridikulus!", she shouted.

With that, instead of blurting out riddles, it started telling dirty jokes and swearing. It also gained a ridiculous clown outfit. With that, the whole class started to laugh, even Tom. The next few students were mostly the same, their boggarts were creatures. Spiders, snakes, hippogriffs, pixies, even butterflies? That one made Tom laugh ever harder. Although, some students didn't have creatures, they had darker problems. For example...

"Abraxas Malfoy!"

The blonde Slytherin walked in front of them, trying to look confident, with his wand out. He walked over to the closet, and out of it didn't come out any creature. Instead, his parents came out.

"You disgrace."
"You are an embarrassment to the Malfoy name."
"I wish you weren't my son."
"We would be better off without you."

Abraxas was really uncomfortable because of this, and he struggled to cast the spell. Tom was also uncomfortable, because it reminded him of his past.

Those uncomfortable past thoughts saddened him.

After Abraxas' struggles, professor Merrythought helped him to cast the spell. His parents were now wearing "funny" muggle clothes, which made Abraxas a little relieved. He let out a mild laugh and went back to the rest of the students, though he wasn't so confident and assertive anymore. A few more students went to practice the spell, most their fears being measly creatures. It made Tom laugh a little again, helping him forget what he just thought of. As the last student of the bunch went back to them, professor Merrythought called:

"Tom Riddle!"

Tom stepped out from the rest of the students, and stood in front of the cupboard. His last boggart class before this one didn't go as great as he thought it would. When he was a little 3rd year, the boggart shaped itself like a corpse. HIS corpse.

Today, Tom thought of it a little lighter, he wasn't scared of death anymore. But he will never forget the way his lifeless, white eyes stared at him, and the way his body was all stiff, pale and leathery. Now, he hoped it would be better, because he was over that fear for a longer period of time. Professor Merrythought unlocked the cupboard. Out of it came a boy with black hair with curly bangs and Slytherin robes. An empty, sinister smile was plastered on his face, which was the most unnerving part of him. Tom stood frozen in front of him, staring. He was so blinded by fear that he couldn't cast the spell.

The rest of the class was looking at that strange sight.

Tom Riddle was the school's most successful student, why would he, of all the things in this world, fear himself? Some of them even found it funny, it was such a silly thing to be scared of yourself. Those silent giggles and whispers didn't help Tom one bit, his mentality started to break. Professor Merrythought got worried.

"Mr. Riddle?"

She called, but he didn't respond.

"Mr. Riddle, are you alright?"

Again, he didn't respond. All he heard were the whispers, giggles, and the voice in his head.

"See? You'll never get rid of me. One way or another, I always come back to you. Do us both a favor and stop resisting, we both know that I will come out victorious in the end."

"MR. RIDDLE!", she shouted.

Tom finally snapped out of his trance and became aware of his surroundings. His professor had a mixed look of anger and worry, she never saw Tom zone out or become worried so severely.

"Ridikulus!", she shouted, without any enthusiasm.

The boggart's head boy and prefect badge were taken away from it, and it was given test scores that had troll grades on them. The boggart's face contorted into a disappointed frown. Tom didn't care. His sanity still hadn't returned to normal. As he walked back without a word to the rest of the students, they all moved out of his way. Tom's face was pale and he looked like he'd seen some unspeakable horror. In everyone else's eyes, he only saw himself, but in Tom's eyes, he saw his worst nightmare. The thing that tormented him day and night. No matter WHAT he did, it wouldn't go away.

After a few more students demonstrated the ridikulus spell, the class was over. This was the longest class of Tom's life. He left the classroom and head to lunch. He went down numerous staircases and floors, when suddenly, he heard someone shouting down the hall:

"Catch me if you can, four-eyes!"