⋆𝐃𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠⋆ - 𝐓.𝐌.𝐑

𝟎𝟎𝟔 - 𝐀 𝐁𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐭𝐨 𝐏𝐢𝐜𝐤

⋆

𝗦𝗲𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗺𝗯𝗲𝗿 𝟯𝟬, 𝟭𝟵𝟰𝟰

Her legs were hanging off the Astronomy tower balcony, nearly touching the invisible plate-shaped ward at its base, she knew it was there - from both her Sense and personal experience. They couldn't make salvation easy for her, could they?

Such thoughts would earn her a whack on the head from Jacques' kitchen spoon, but he wasn't here, was he? It's been barely a month and this place was already getting to her again - every school year would have her turn even more antisocial and withdrawn, only for her to arrive back at the orphanage and try to puzzle out what brought on this inexplicable months-long bitchfest.

Sure, she could name some grievances that might explain the early onslaught this year - and try to ignore the fact 'early' got a new definition each year - she cringed to herself, her hands rubbed at the railings as if to wipe away the snarky voice. Remarkably enough, despite holding barely a footnote in her previous manifestos of misery, Riddle got his own chapter this time.

What an achievement.

Elizabeth's first point of discontent was her nearing sixteenth birthday, October 14. It was a shite date in her opinion - it felt wrong on her tongue - it made her a Scorpio moon which sucked arse because everyone knew it was the worst moon sign to have. She loathed her birthday because each one marked an sudden, incremental worsening in her wellbeing, which meant she'd have to allocate even more effort towards keeping herself alive.

She wondered if she'd even be conscious for her seventeenth. She doubted it.

Her birthday meant she was nearing her expiration date, an ever looming fact over her head, she gave up on escaping her fate somewhere during her fifth year on God's green earth, and now welcomed it for it was - a relief from her sordid existence. Nevertheless, every passing birthday scared her because of the unlikely chance that she wouldn't die young.

She didn't know how to live.

Her health was her second point, she never made it the first because the feeling of dismissing it to second made her feel like she had a semblance of control over it - pathetic, right? - it affected her appearance greatly, and while she didn't consider herself vapid, she did find it upsetting that her hair was brittle and prone to falling out in chunks. That her skin was sallow and almost translucent, making her spidery veins stand out as though she was a vampire. It wasn't nice being a living trigger for the human instinct to beware from corpses.

In Hogwarts, her feelings of inadequacy had deepened, walking amongst the other students like a mortal in the halls of the gods. She supposed selective breeding had some pros because even the most unfortunate cases paled in comparison to her. The same way Hephaestus would still trump Adonis.

She just wanted to feel pretty, was it such a vain wish to have?

Of course, that all paled in comparison to the pain. Elizabeth considered herself a master occulemens, she'd taken to the mind arts with zeal after discovering their benefits in the realm of compartmentalization, it was what got her through the day. But it wasn't a cure, just a temporary solution to a problem. Her veins still felt like the Phlegethon flowed though them and her bones still felt like hollow wind instruments, rattling with agony - simply, a little more muted.

And bearing all of that pain daily was rewarded by the exhaustion. Sure, she pushed herself harder than most others would in her position, but she had to in order to seem like she was in their position. Any time she felt like going easy on herself, there would be an incessant, little noise in her mind, urging her to push past her breaking point.

If that voice killed her in the end, would he make it good? Would he make it holy?

Her third point of discontent was Dumbledore, as expected. With the end of neither war in sight, the man's speeches had become more and more cultish in nature. Transfiguration lessons had become a breeding ground for his 'Glory of War' rhetoric - she couldn't even remember him having one normal lesson this year, he had immediately started on his bullshite once the class's syllabus was in their hands.

The way he would go about it infuriated her further, sitting on his desk with one foot propped on his chair, the picture of nonchalance while glamorizing war to minors. It was a dangerous sentiment to impart upon impressionable minds, but she didn't expect him to get any reprimand for it. Albus Dumbledore, the congenial Transfiguration Professor who didn't heave work on his students and talked to them like adults - "he knows what it's really like out there, mate" - the man had managed to build himself a cult of personality in Hogwarts, most of the students supported his bid for the headmaster position unquestionably.

He talked about war like it was something sacred, as if the fifth years hanging on to his every word should feel honored if they were to be drafted into the war against Grindelwald right this second, he spoke as if he expected them to be willing to die for a chance at victory. They were teenagers with existential insecurities and misplaced illusions of grandeur - she wondered, not for the first time, what he told the firsties - and the bitter truth was that most of them would die for him, for what he described.

There were also his inherent biases, which Elizabeth was already aware of but her minor obsession with a certain Slytherin forced her to fully acknowledge. Dumbledore was an utter tosser towards the serpent house as a whole, and her student in particular.

Another strike against him, then.

And that led us to her final point for the evening, Riddle himself. While he didn't seek her out anymore after the Mulciber incident - the git was left with scarred hands and had to relearn how to hold his wand, serves him right - that unspeakable fucking tension between them was still going strong, and she was left with a horrid headache after every minor interaction. As if her body fought against even acknowledging his presence.

He made her ribcage live up to its name.

She took to sitting with her back to the Slytherin table during meals, finding that his eyes boring into her back was a meagre torment in comparison to prolonged eye contact - she would leave the great hall only to find her back completely racked with knots, as if he had tied them himself during the meal.

Kink- sHUT UP!

And then there was the issue of Potions' class; their assignment was far, far from over and would likely take until Imbolc to finish - if she ever got her hands on a time turner, she had a mile-long hit list that included that potion's inventor - and it looked like Riddle was making the most out of every minute they were in close contact. Their shared competence meant that they had ample free time in between steps and once the potion didn't need his attention any longer, he would turn all of it on her, prodding at her boundaries and interrogating her like his own personal pet project.

He treated her mind like free real estate and tried to enter it several times unsuccessfully - she had to hand it to him, he was a good legilemens, she was simply better. He seemed to get off on his own failures, though, grinning maniacally every time her defenses would kick him out. Elizabeth wondered who got more enjoyment out of their pairing, him or Slughorn.

Despite his best attempts, she remained dismissive, of course. Her answers were short and toneless, yet not unkind. Something within her urged her to antagonize him, to push him away, but her little bout of limerence tempered that other radical down.

She called it limerence because that's all that it was, she'd swear it on her dead paren-

"Get down from the railing, Warren."

⋆

A/n. Lmao hi. This chapter is mostly an insight into Myrtle's thought process and priorities, also writing about someone complaining is so relaxing for some reason.

Don't get mad at me for the Scorpio moon slander, I am a Scorpio moon and I stand by my words.