holding on {t.r.}

Hogwarts - 1943

"Tom-"

"Don't make this difficult," Tom warned. Alexandra pulled the time turner from his hands, testing his patience.

"I'm not going home. Not yet," she insisted. "This isn't the plan."

"You are going home, love, and our plan is going to be executed. You're going to kill Dumbledore, or I'm going to kill you," he told her. "And the Malfoy boy."

"You read my mind," she glared, taking a step back as her heart fell to her feet. Only one other person knew of her feelings for Draco, and that was Dumbledore. She didn't believe Dumbledore would share this information with Tom, but she wasn't positive he wouldn't. "When?"

"A few nights ago you were particularly distracted. It was quite easy, actually," Tom bragged. "He looks just like his grandfather. I'm sure he's just as weak."

"You're jealous," Alexandra pointed out, chuckling lightly.

"You're wrong," Tom stated sternly. Alexandra shook her head.

"I don't think I am."

"I suggest you be quiet before I change my mind," he warned once again, ripping the necklace out of her hand. "1996, correct?"

"I'm not-"

She was interrupted when she felt herself being pushed back against the wall. Tom magically held her so she couldn't move, careful not to touch her, and the look in his eyes was one Alexandra didn't recognize.

"This isn't you," she said, afraid of what he was going to do.

"You don't know who I am!" He yelled.

"You're Tom Riddle, born from a muggle father who abandoned you before you were born and a mother who died shortly after. You grew up in an orphanage where the kids made fun of you for being different, until you showed them what being different meant. You tormented them, but they never knew it was you because they didn't understand your magic... your power," Alexandra began. "You've never felt love before, and now that you have-"

"My mother died seeking love, Alexandra, a love that could never be returned. Love is weakness. I am not weak. I am going to be the most powerful wizard in the world, and love isn't going to stop me from achieving that," Tom told her. "You mean absolutely nothing to me, don't you understand?"

"Tom-"

"Nothing!"

Tom intended to render her unconscious, but hesitated. Instead, he released his hold on her and watched as she fell to the ground and caught her breath.

"If you truly wish to stay," Tom stated, kneeling down to her level and holding out the time turner. "Destroy it."

Alexandra took the time turner, her only way home, and watched burst into flames in her hands. Her heart was destroyed with it, knowing she would never again see the people she's known and loved all her life. She was stuck; trapped in a time that wasn't hers.

Tom stood up, nodded a farewell and exited the room leaving Alexandra to cry as she held her life in her hands and wondered what could have been if he had sent her home.

Soon, neither Alexandra nor Tom would have any recollection of Alexandra's time in the future. Until then, Alexandra spent her time remembering the friends she had, the ones she lost, and the memories she made until they slowly disappeared with the life she once knew.