April 18th, 1944

The first time Lina ever dreamed about Tom Riddle, it had been over a week since she had spoken to him last.

The dream began in the same dark corridor Lina had met Tom in. She was walking down the hall, looking out for troublemaking students sneaking around after curfew, or conversely, Peeves getting himself into even more mischief, when she finally spotted him.

Tom. Tall, dark, and utterly unearthly, he stood alone by the stained glass window a few feet away from her, peering intently out of it and into the dark horizon.

She found herself approaching him, trying to discover what it was he's looking at, but all she sees is the pitch black skyline with twinkling, tiny stars dotting the dark expanse of sky and brewing storm clouds. Tom turns to her, his eyes just as unrevealing and obscure as the view outside. They dig into her skin, making her shiver with icy anticipation.

"Lina." He whispers. His voice sounds faraway. His cold hand reaches up to her face, thumb stroking the soft skin he finds there. She leans into his touch, closing her eyes at the sensation. She feels his sculpted hand move across her face and drift downwards, where his fingers close lightly around both sides of her jaw. Her eyes open at this, and he stares down at her, his gaze expressionless and eerie.

His fingers begin to dig tightly into her jawbone, and she winces. Lina reaches up to push his hand away, but he squeezes even harder, hard enough for bruises in the shape of his fingerprints to begin to form.

"Tom, please." She breathes. He seems to think it over for a minute, his grip unrelenting and releasing tendrils of sharp pain up the sides of her face, but all at once he releases his tight hold on her, and Lina sucks in a shaky breath. To her surprise, Tom gives her a charming, crooked smile. Lina feels like she might melt.

His hand drifts lower, before it stops at her neck. It dances across the skin, as though he's appraising the flesh there.

Abruptly, he reaches out and closes his fingers gingerly around her throat, not tight enough to cut off her air supply, but with enough pressure to make her begin to squirm and panic in his grasp. Her smaller hand flies up to his, trying to pry his cold limb off of her, but Tom swats her away with his free palm, chuckling.

Tom leans in closer, past her face, his hot breath tickling her ear. All at once, his fingers tighten around her throat, cutting off the flow of oxygen to her brain. She tries to push him away from her, but her legs feel stiff, frozen solid, and she can't move them. Her lungs begin to burn, aching for air.

"Would you die for me, Lina?" He says in a soft, breathy voice. She can't breathe, and her mind feels hazy. He pulls back again, smiling with his teeth, but to her horror, his usual pearly whites are coated in crimson blood. He laughs softly, and it chills her to the bone.

Tom leans in, his lips nearly touching hers. "Better yet...would you live for me?"

At this, Lina was lurched out of her dream abruptly, still panicking, beginning to hyperventilate before she realized that she's really in her bed, safe, and Tom's cold, soft hands aren't closed around her throat and suffocating her. She attempted to quiet her labored breathing, trying not to wake Eden up, who was snoring softly in the bed across the room. Strawberry curls stuck limply to her sweaty forehead, and she felt terribly shaken.

After spending a few quiet minutes calming herself down, she settled back down under the covers of her bed. For the rest of the night, Lina couldn't bring herself to fall back asleep. She still felt Tom's stiff fingers around her throat, icy and haunting.

~~~~~~~

Tom wasn't in the Great Hall for dinner the next evening. Lina wasn't sure if she was relieved or disappointed.

Ever since the confrontation with Samuel in the corridor, Tom had acted like nothing ever happened. In fact, he didn't acknowledge Lina at all. She didn't know why it upset her so, or why she still thought about him enough for him to begin to grace her dreams (or nightmares) with his presence.

Lina and Tom had Potions and Astronomy together, but he didn't look at her. In the corridor, his eyes were detached and uncaring whenever they passed by each other on the way to classes. Lina initially thought he may be embarrassed at his rejection or the encounter with Samuel, but the nagging voice in the back of her head reminded her that Tom Riddle wasn't someone who could be embarrassed. Embarrassment was for meek, rosy-cheeked girls like her, not boys sculpted like Greek statues and as intimidating as God.

It was like they had never spoken that night after curfew, like he had never made her head spin with his honeyed words and he had never touched her with those ice cold hands of his that set her skin on fire. Like he and his dark eyes didn't now haunt her dreams as well as her waking hours. She wondered if it had all been a dream. She didn't know why it made her so sad. She felt spurned, even though she really thought to herself that it should be the opposite.

As for Samuel, he had been thoroughly upset by the whole affair. He had been cold and disapproving while Lina apologized profusely and explained what had happened between the two of them, why she was talking to him, detailing how Tom had asked her for a book from Landon and she had agreed to get it for him.

This explanation had been met with, "Did you come onto him? You're too nice, Lina, someone like Riddle was probably foaming at the mouth when you didn't push him away like you should have. Merlin, did you even think about what you were doing?"

This had caused a whole other argument, with Samuel barging away from her in the middle of the courtyard when he refused to put blame on anyone else other than Lina. She detested how ugly jealousy could be, and how she had come away being blamed for something she didn't think she had even brought on herself. This was the first real "fight" she had ever had with Sam, and she felt unbearably guilty.

He wasn't even sitting with her now, like how he usually did in the evenings after classes. In fact, Samuel wasn't in the Great Hall at all. Her eyes scanned the room for him, wondering where he may be. It was unusual for Sam to miss dinner, even if he may still be angry at her.

Her heart leapt into her throat when her eyes finally fell on the Slytherin table, where instead of the empty space she was expecting, Tom was there, and staring right at her. She didn't notice him come in. He didn't look away, but instead kept his dark, perfect eyes locked on hers. A crooked, knowing smirk curved up the corners of his lips.

Lina's cheeks burned. Why wasn't he looking away? If she didn't know any better, it was like he somehow knew about her dream from the night before. By all appearances, he looked amused. The thought of this made her skin prickle with embarrassment and tinges of quiet fear.

Without finishing her food, Lina abruptly got up from the Hufflepuff table and made a beeline for the door. She couldn't handle Tom and his prying eyes, and she wanted to find Samuel. Maybe he had skipped dinner entirely tonight, avoiding her. This made her heart twist with a soft kind of hurt. She bit her lip in thought. Maybe she should just go off to bed early. She wanted to be alone, anyway.

She couldn't get that far, though, because as she turned the corner to head for the stairs down to the kitchens, her heart...broke, all at once. Shattered right there on the stone tiles. Shards spread out at Lina's feet, bloody and broken.

Pressed up against a hard wall a few feet away were Samuel Ryder and Olive Hornby. Her pink lips were pressed firmly to his, and her spindly manicured fingers tugged on his crimson and gold tie, loosening it. One of Sam's hands were tangled in her yellow-blonde hair while another was closed tightly around her waist.

Lina had never experienced a pain like this. It was blinding. Her eyes began to ring with white noise, like the aftermath of being too close to an explosion. That's what it felt like, anyway. Like her heart had just imploded in on itself.

Suddenly, Sam's eyes opened, and they widened when he took in the sight of Lina, trembling with despair a few feet away. All at once, he pushed Olive off of him, his face falling with guilt and sadness.

"Lina-"

"How could you?"

"Lina, please-"

Not wanting to hear another word, Lina turned abruptly on her heel and ran. The sight of Samuel and Olive was burned into her brain, and her heart ached. It was like nothing she had ever felt.

She didn't know how many stairwells she had climbed or how many corners she had turned before she finally skidded to a stop outside of a deserted classroom. Bursting into tears, she slid down the side of a stone wall, burying her head in her hands as teardrops carved down her cheeks in rivulets. She didn't know how long she sat there, blubbering over her broken heart.

The sound of dress shoes firmly tapping against the stone tiles broke her out of her trance, but she couldn't bother to look up. It was probably some random student, or a professor on their way to class. Maybe they would leave her alone and continue on their way. She hoped they would.

Long legs came to a stop right in front of her. Maybe not. Lina kept her bloodshot eyes trained on her flats in front of her.

"Lina."

Tom's voice startled her. Her head snapped up, surprised.

Of course. Of course he would be here to witness my humiliating meltdown.

Lina mentally cursed herself as she began to cry even more at the thought, covering her face with her palms in embarrassment.

"...Here." He said stiffly. It was quiet, and Lina slowly lowered her hands from her face.

A pale hand was offered out in front of her. She stared at it for a moment, chewing on her bottom lip. She took a shaky breath, finally reaching out and clasping her tear soaked fingers in his. She let Tom help her up from her spot on the floor, only to find herself standing inches away from him once she was fully upright. His cologne drifted into her senses, and her stomach lurched in anticipation.

Tom's dark, unrevealing eyes stared into Lina's tear-filled ones. It was silent again. She wished she knew what he was thinking. Suddenly, Tom reached out slowly, his fingers brushing away the tears staining the freckles that covered her cheeks. They drifted down to her chin, which he lifted up slightly, examining and appraising her like he wanted to find something there in her eyes. She didn't know what.

His hands finally left her face, only for one to close softly around her wrist.

"Come with me."

~~~~~~~

"No one will ever be able to knock the wind out of me again. Not like that. Not like you."

-Trista Mateer

~~~~~~~