Hogwarts: a school of Witchcraft and Love (Tom Marvolo Riddle x F!reader)

Chapter 4-08

You wouldn't be able to say when it all started...

Just that it did.

And that it was inevitable.

It was like searching for a needle in a haystack, trying to pinpoint when the moment occurred that his wants and your needs clashed and charged to the point you couldn't decipher what was what.

To want and to need—two things that could collide and seemed to always be mistaken as one and the same. In reality, they couldn't be more farther apart.

You could live without obtaining your wants, but you couldn't survive without your needs. It would be unimaginable to compare wanting the latest broomstick to needing water to stay alive.

If only as a person it could be easy to pick and choose without having to involve emotions. There was nothing more dangerous than a want that harnessed a staggering amount of feeling behind it.

If you were told that you were too afraid one more time, you might grow a tail and bark like a dog yourself.

Clocking in at fifty failed attempts and counting to expel the foreign energy out of you, at the mark of fifty-two, you were about to throw in the towel and call it a day, shooting off another spell, numb fingers feeling the slick wood.

The tang of sweat clung to your pores as if you had taken a bath in it. You spilled all but blood, in vain. Even listening to Binns' undead lectures was more uplifting than enduring your junior instructor's eyebrows furrowing at your every fail.

You had had it. "I quit!"

"No, you aren't. Try again." And why would the culprit not paste the heavy, "And better," while he was at it? It perfectly set the tone for what you could expect from this experience. " I don't want to hear any whining until after you did what I told you."

Your toes curled, and so did the sure grip of your fingers around your trusty wand which wasn't so trusty right now, which was a brilliant add on for your session. 

You would have thought that Tom would have mercy on you because of your long-standing familiarity with him. You expected that, now that the day came that he finally, finally taught you so you could figure out the strand in your magic together, it would be a thrill.

And it was thrilling, alright...

But the thrill lay in pleasing him, not the gentleness you could only dream about. Delight stemmed from meeting his perfectionist standards and the rare moments that you could secure his approval.

His teaching style would give military sergeants a run for their Galleons. Served you right for daydreaming about how he would give others a hard time with their homeworks.

Think he would go easy on you just because you were close? Ha! Forget about it. That meant nothing. The assumption that his closeness with you would soften his harshness was gone. Gone down the drain.

Absolute obedience—minimal complaints. Those were his conditions to help you.

Yes, you heard that right.

Conditions.

Conditions, like this whole drill was some kind of favor. Even more unbelievable was how he spun the story to suit how he liked it, making it seem like this was all your choice, your idea.

Phrases like, "this is the best for you," made you believe that making you snotter was beneficial when it made you feel bad about your imperfections.

Lowered your wand too much? Take out the ruler to lift it higher and keep it arrow-straight. Dropped your arm a millimeter? Back to magical jumping jacks.