Not About Angels (A Tom Riddle Story)

Chapter 71

She wiped the tears from her eyes and told herself that she was ready. 

Gabriel stood before her, his eyes concerned, asking her why she was crying again.

It was Quiddich practice that afternoon, and he asked why she looked like she had been crying.  

She told him that she had just ended a phase of her life. That she had just watched her old life break to pieces in front of her, but also that she was ready to start a new one. 

As she ran away from Tom Riddle, she realized how stupid she had been along. How he did not love her. How he didn't even have the decency to care. The tears were over, she decided. She was determined to lock him away in the deepest, darkest corner of her heart and throw away the key.  

Gabriel nodded, and couldn't help but feel a little bit of hope rise in him. Perhaps, now, they can finally begin with a clean slate. 

"Wool! Get over here. Do I need to correct your broom stance again? After all these years?" he yelled, a faint smile on his face. She walked over, feeling that the old Gabriel was back again.

"Sorry, Gabe."

"Don't apologize to me. When you crush the Ravenclaws next week, I'll accept your apology."

"Yes Captain!" She said, smiling, forcing herself to put the past behind her, forcing herself to usher in a new era.  The past was behind her, she decided. It was time to let her heart go. It was time to move on. 

..............................

Penny. You see, Penny had a secret. All these years, Penny hid a heavy, heavy secret in her heart. 

She's cruel. But not for no reason, of course. Although harsh by nature, she targets Abigail for a very, very specific reason. 

Penny's secret was one she never spoke out loud, to anyone. 

Penny had a secret, and it was eating her alive, inside out.  

There was never much romance in Penny's life. In fact, romance and love were lost concepts to her since the beginning of her childhood. Her father was a poor soldier, lost in the war. Her mother, an equally impoverish seamstress, struggling to make ends meed for her children. 

One day, her mother got sick of it all. The blood, sweat, and tears. She prayed, but no one answered her prayers. 

She sent them away. 

Penny's brother didn't make it through the winter. That January, she buried his cold corpse with her bare hands. 

As she cried, sitting on the earth, ready to give up all hope, she saw him.

Tom Riddle.

The thin boy walked closer, and handed her a single flower. "Put it on his grave." He said, his voice was cold, but she couldn't help but find warmth in them. 

"Why?" She asked, her voice shaking from tears. 

He didn't say anything, but only nodded briefly, briefly meeting her tear-filled eyes with his dark ones. Somehow, he made her smile, even in the direst circumstance. She found him so utterly beautiful.  

It was the only truly kind gesture anyone had ever done for her. The only time when they were kind to her for no reason, and never wanted anything in return. She latched on to that, deep i the abyss of her heart. 

She was cruel, still. She was cruel because she was empty. She was cruel to Abigail because Abigail had the thing she had always, always wanted the most.