h e r d a r k s o u l

c h a p t e r 1 1

The next time Tom saw Evelyn she was overly invested in a boy's mouth. Or he was of hers. She was pinned against a wall in some dark corridor. Her hands roamed half-heartedly over the boy's chest or shoulders. She didn't seem nearly as into it as the boy she was with.

The boy was rubbing his hands across her body as if she would disappear from below him. His mouth had moved from hers and was quickly moving across Evelyn's neck that she had fully exposed to him. Her head tilted to the side, her eyes staring far away.

Tom hadn't meant to stop and stare and he nearly hexed himself when Evelyn caught him. His eyes found hers and she threw him a grin before bringing the boy's mouth back to hers.

Tom never stopped again, even when he saw her with the same boy three times that week. The boy was found later that Sunday morning, sprawled on the floor next to a window. Evelyn never confronted Tom about it, a little bit to Tom's disappointment.

Tom had needed the boy (whom he had not cared to learn the name of) out of his way. He didn't need the boy whisking Evelyn away for Valentine's Day the following week. He had learned from Malfoy that the kid was going to make some grand gesture that Tom knew Evelyn would hate. Malfoy had agreed and had let it slip that the day was also Evelyn's birthday. He had remembered the fact from when Evelyn had received a birthday card in their first year. Tom had not even known Evelyn existed in their first year, so he was glad that Malfoy remembered everything.

Tom, without meaning to, had started missing Evelyn. Not because he missed her as a person, but because he had grown bored again of his followers' chatter. They never seemed to shut up or stop making a fool of themselves. Tom missed Evelyn's quick remarks and composed manner.

He had been working on a project for months in order to read Evelyn better. Her talent for hiding her emotions from Tom was becoming a clear distraction from him. There was a simple solution that he intended to give to her on her birthday.

***

Tom approached Evelyn as if approaching a deadly beast. He was aware of how little he knew of her ability to attack. She was sprawled on the velvet green sofa she favored in the back of the common room, her mannerism mirroring that of the black cat that was curled by her feet.

"Evelyn?" Tom asked in a tone just above a whisper. Both Evelyn and her cat flicked their eyes up to him in unison, the movement unsettling.

Evelyn returned her eyes to the book in her hand, but the cat watched him with her ears back. Tom didn't step further into the space. His eyes scanned the book title in Evelyn's hands, "How Best to Kill, Volume. II". Tom wondered if Evelyn was purposefully taunting him.

"Evelyn, I need to talk to you," Tom cleared his throat. She slowly lifted her eyes from her book again, not bothering to move anything else. She quirked one eyebrow up, the only sign Tom got to let him know it was okay to continue. "I heard it was your birthday. Dreadful having it on such a day as Valentine's Day."

Evelyn rolled her eyes and looked back at her book, "Quite."

Tom didn't move; he was determined to get her to talk to him again. He had been too worried about her lately, thinking that he may have made her too upset to ever talk to him again or that she simply had deemed him unworthy of her. He was disgusted by his feelings and needed them to stop. If she simply said that she forgave him for his outburst, his mind would go back to normal.