'𝐄𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐝𝐢𝐞𝐬.'
'𝐍𝐨 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐚𝐧 𝐞𝐱𝐜𝐞𝐩𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧.'
Those were the words that Cordelia Alder lived by, those words reminded her how precious life is and those were the words that Tom Riddle remembered the day he died, until he...
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1st January 1938, London
The new year was ushered in with a quiet dinner on the eve of the year ahead—not with fanfare and loud chatter. On the eve was Tom's birthday, like all the children at Wool's, he too was treated to a celebratory dinner like the previous years and like the previous years, it was a suffocatingly dull affair, so dull in fact that Tom, himself left the moment he had finished his portion of his meal. He didn't even wait for the presenting or opening of his birthday gifts.
Perhaps, he knew in advance that like the previous years, his gifts would be miniscule compared to the other children and he was right. It was the same as the previous years; a chocolate bar from Margaret, an old notebook from Beatrice, a scarf from Mrs Cole and Martha and finally, Cordelia had gotten him a coat with the little allowance she had gotten from her chores and her uncle. All those gifts were left outside his room forming a sad little pile that Cordelia had to kick in through his door. Tom didn't even spare a glance at any of those gifts, only being moderately pleased at Cordelia's gift.
The morning after, he had been quiet—actually, when Cordelia really thought about it, he had been quiet since his argument with Billy on Christmas Eve. The argument supposedly ended with Billy biting Tom—Cordelia didn't really know what happened, she only saw the bite mark on Tom's arm and had only heard about the matter from others. She still found it hard to believe that Billy would even bite someone. It seemed the children at Wool's were gradually losing bits of their sanity, if Amy and Dennis were any indication.
"...What?" Asked Tom when he felt Cordelia nudge him. Cordelia didn't look at him for a second and Tom had to crane his head in front of hers to grab her attention. He had her attention, she was just checking what he was staring at. "Did you want to ask me something?"
Cordelia pulled her chair in and took a moment to observe everyone around the table. Lucy was busy near the hall talking to Martha and Peter who was leaving that day while the others were talking around the table among themselves. No one was paying attention to Tom and her. Nervously, she let out a quiet deep breath and turned to Tom. "Why were you staring at Billy?" She questioned in a quiet voice. She flinched a little when her gaze met Tom's.
His gaze had darkened at Cordelia's question, narrowing in like a snake before the corners of his lips went up as if he was amused by her nervousness. "I wasn't." He calmly went back to cutting up his eggs and placing them on his bread before adding a little bit of beans covered in tomato sauce on top. "Why did it seem like I was? " He asked with a small grin and he took a bite of his toast. Cordelia didn't answer. "Maybe you should stop staring at me and eat."
He motioned towards her untouched, nearly piece of toast and half-finished eggs. Typically they'd have simple porridge with nuts—if they were lucky but for the sake of the beginning of a new year, they were given a full English breakfast. She had no doubt Mrs Cole had broken their winter funds for this and their January was going to be a little rough as usual.
