An Exquisite Pain

New Year's Eve

It wasn't until New Year's Eve that Danielle actually attempted to read Wuthering Heights. The past six days had been a whirl of her frantically endeavoring to finish her homework, as a result of leaving all her work to the last minute. She only left her room to eat or hurry to the air-raid shelter in back of the orphanage. (There had been several more air-raids, but Danielle had learned to more or less stay calm.)

At precisely one o'clock that afternoon, she finished the last word of her History of Magic essay and threw her quill down, sighing in relief. School started again in four days and she was more than ready to go back.

Must be the Ravenclaw in me, she thought, shoving her books into her bag in a very un-Ravenclaw-like way. Now she could spend the rest of her vacation reading and, hopefully, relaxing—something she hadn't been able to do as of yet.

Alyssa and Dylan were probably soaking up the sun on a beach in Spain somewhere. Danielle only had to take one look out the window to receive a rude reminder that she most definitely wasn't in Spain.

Think happy thoughts. She imagined herself lying on the hot sand, feeling the sun saturate into her skin…with Dylan cracking jokes and Alyssa laughing beside her…Riddle shirtless…wait, what?

To distract herself from the admittedly not too unpleasant image of Riddle wearing nothing but shorts, she repeated over and over to herself, He's Voldemort. Remember, that evil psychopath who killed your grandparents and went after your parents because they were Muggle-borns? Yeah, him. Stop finding him attractive.

But that's because he kind of is…

Not for long. Soon he'll resemble a diseased snake. And have no nose.

Wait, how do I know that? No one's ever whipped out pictures of him. So how do I know exactly what he looks like?

"Stop!" Danielle said out loud. "I can't take this anymore."

Hearing voices in your head again, are we, Danielle? Perhaps that's what the problem with Riddle is—

"SHUT UP!"

Perhaps napping so soon after finishing a strenuous load of homework wasn't a good idea. After her dream of a shirtless Riddle chasing her down a sunny beach while her textbooks floated peacefully in the sky, Danielle woke up disoriented. She barely remembered where she was at first and wondered why her brain hurt so much. Then it all came rushing back to her and she sighed. Billy said there was a New Year's Eve party tonight…I might as well go. I have nothing better to do anyway.

But until then, Danielle had nothing to do. She glanced over at Wuthering Heights lying abandoned on her nightstand and grabbed the book. I'm going to need glasses after all this reading during the holiday…

Her worries were soon forgotten, however, the second she opened the book. She hadn't read a novel for pleasure in so long…perhaps it was exactly what she needed.

The sky was growing dark outside when there was a rap at her door. "Clara!" Billy called. "Mrs Cole says it's time for dinner!"

Danielle was rather abruptly jerked out of the tale of Catherine and Heathcliff. "Coming," she said, folding back the corner of the page she was on and hurrying to the door.

"What were you doing in there?" Billy asked.

"Reading," said Danielle. "The book you got me for Christmas, remember?"

"Oh yeah, Wuthering Heights," Billy said. "What part are you at?"

"Er, Catherine just came back from the Lintons' house," said Danielle. She was distracted by the sight of Tom Riddle ahead of them. Merlin, isn't today his birthday? Mrs Cole said he was born on New Year's Eve…he's sixteen then. At the table we can all sing a rousing chorus of "Happy Birthday Voldemort!"