Chapter Six

Curiosity had filled Tom from the second the sobs filled his ears. Ringing through the halls like a loud, melancholic song - the crying filled him with such a sadness he didn't understand why. He didn't know who it was, but crying was linked with sadness in some sort of way it was in Tom's nature to help those he thought needed help.

This girl (he could tell it was a girl) needed help, and he wished to help. He thought more for other people before he thought of himself. He could barely walk, dragging his bad ankle with a limp and ignoring the throbbing in his eye whilst he tried his best to navigate the halls and find the crying.

It seemed that he was on the right track when the crying started to get louder and louder. The thought that it was one of his friends, Donna or Jack or a friend had entered his mind and even if it wasn't, he still wanted to make sure the person (friend or not, stranger or not) was okay.

Cassandra had entered his mind. He knew it wasn't her because he left her behind with the boy he didn't know and the marks on her neck and his very evident. He didn't want to think of it, he wondered, actually, if he was latching on to the sound of crying and the thought of helping someone in need so that he didn't need to think of his own feelings and emotions - that he could maybe shut out how he felt and ignored it for as long as possible, and somehow help someone else in the process of that.

He knew that was exactly what he was doing.

When he turned the next corner, he knew he was close. He was very close in fact that he was sure she was in this hall, he just didn't know where. He was quiet as he walked, he wasn't sure if walking on his leg was making it worse but the thought of that didn't exactly cross his mind at that given moment.

The seats on the windows were indented greatly and when he finally came across the third window seat, he knew he found the suspect of the crying. Tears streamed down freckled cheeks, with red hair falling over her shoulder and her head leaning on the wood.

She was a Slytherin and he knew her. Well, for a brief few hours back in first year when they found each other on the train ride to Hogwarts and they made a vow to be best friends, he knew her, but he didn't anymore. He couldn't think of the reason as to how he even remembered - but that train ride to Hogwarts gave him more confidence than anything else and it was all down to the girl who hadn't quite realised he was there.

He realised then that maybe he could return the favour. Maybe just comfort an almost stranger for the time she helped him all the way back in first year.

"Analise, isn't it?"

She jumped, she gasped. Her sobs stopped, her tears stopped streaming spare for the ones already on her cheek and she hurried to wipe the excess tears from her face. She was in robes, wizard robes - very fashionable ones in the wizarding community, Tom knew that from the gold buttons and the quality fabric, but he had a hard time finding robes fashionable when he had the opportunity to wear jeans.

"Sorry," he said hurriedly, "I didn't mean to uh...scare you."

She finally looked up. He recognised the pain in her eyes, and she recognised the physical pain in the bruise over his eye. She knew that face, a vague memory from years ago but also it was Tom. She knew him because everyone knew him and many of her peers that she acquainted herself with had very mixed feelings about the boy.

The decent ones that didn't completely and totally despise muggleborn's said he was okay. The ones who did...well she didn't listen to what they had to say all that much, she just had to make sure she endured their company enough but that didn't mean she had to listen to them.

"It's Ana," she finally said after what Tom felt was forever. It was incredibly awkward, and he had stuffed his hands in his pocket, "not Analise."

"Oh." He frowned, "I thought-"

"You're not wrong," she cut him off suddenly, straightening herself up and pulling at her long-sleeved robes, "I mean, well...it is Analise, but I prefer Ana."

"Well, you could've just said that," he grinned. He was kind and she had heard that and she could remember that too, back when she was eleven and scared and the world was nice, and she was naïve, and a friend was a friend regardless of the blood that ran through them.

The world was not nice anymore.

"I didn't know anyone would be over this part of the castle." Her voice was quiet, she murmured and Tom and to really listen just, so he could hear what she was saying. He didn't know if it was a bad thing that she was the last person he expects to find, and when he took a seat on the empty space, she flinched away from him.

"I was...taking a stroll," he hummed, ignoring her previous action and leaning his head on the window, "and I heard crying, so I thought I ought to see if you were okay."

"You don't even know me," said Ana. She seemed rather confused as to why he would even possibly think to check on her when he didn't know her, it just didn't make any sense. She wasn't his friend, she was a random stranger and maybe at some point they had been very close to being friends once upon a time in a world were people were nice and bad things didn't happen and people didn't need to grow up, but they weren't friends and he didn't know her.

"So?" he practically scoffed, and she frowned, "you were sad, I heard. It's as simple as that."

She thought for a moment. Was it really as simple as that? not in her house, it wasn't, that wasn't what she grew up to believe. If she was sad, she had to fix that problem on her own, she didn't have the sort of comfort, her parents didn't have the beliefs that if you cried they had to check to see if she was okay - they treated it as though it were her fault no matter what happened.

If someone hurt her, she shouldn't have let them do it. If she cried, she shouldn't be so weak.

"You really do belong in Hufflepuff," she finally whispered. She could remember the feast, back when she was eleven when she knew the boy. When she was sorted into Slytherin after a very conflicting sorting, when she knew she had to be in Slytherin, but the hat disagreed. She didn't though, and no matter how horrid some of the students in her house could be - no matter the pureblood superior lies that were spread that their blood was better than that of a someone like Tom, she was proud of her house.

Her house was not one of evil.

Her house was one of ambition.

"Why were you crying?" he finally asked. She had been occasionally wiping the tears away when more begged to spill. He was sure that this was the most he had ever spoken to her for first year, there was something about her.

"How did you get the black eye?" she asked. He must have gotten into a physical fight, it was such a muggle thing to do - a muggleborn thing to do, too. Someone magical had their wand, they could inflict damage onto someone with a flick of their wrist and have them writhing on the floor in pain, the person who hurt Tom did damage with their fists. She was curious.

If anything, the very idea of a human who lacked magic - a muggle - it didn't repulse Ana, not in the slightest. She didn't feel like she was superior to anyone without magic, or anyone in general. She didn't feel like anyone was inferior to her just because of who they were born.

Truly, if anything, muggles fascinated Ana. Her entire life her family were practically dependent on magic, they did everything through magic. The food on the table was there through some sort of magic...the help they had in their home would use magic for every little thing.

So, the very thought that people could go their entire lives and survive without it was nothing less than intriguing and Ana had always strived to know more. She couldn't though. Her family was very well known in the wizarding community. Her father worked in the ministry and her mother was a writer, and everyone knew their beliefs as purebloods - she was expected to carry on that tradition.

They knew the...lord personally. The man who had invoked such deep hatred on the muggleborn's, she did not like him, but she had to do what her parents did or there would be consequences she didn't want to think of. She was terrified of him.

"I was looking out for two of my closest friends," he said, smiling. He was leaning against the window with his good eye closed. He couldn't open the one that had a bruise over it, it was far too swollen, and the throbbing pain seemed as though he had another heart right in his eye, "someone was giving them shit and I didn't like it. Saying the fact that they were guys and together - they're not, by the way...well, I don't think they're together but even if they are it doesn't fucking matter - well, anyway this shithead was given them grief and I just started swinging. Throwing punches until he was on the ground and he managed to sock me before my friend pulled me off him."

"Woah," Ana muttered. She wasn't sure what she expected but whilst it wasn't that, she couldn't say she wasn't surprised. Tom had a reputation, and his friends - the tight-knit group of friends she had occasionally seen him with, were part of that reputation. He'd do anything for them, the black eye shows.

"Now tell me," Tom beamed at her, as though his entire day hadn't gone to shit - like he wasn't holding everything together with a tearing piece of thread, "why were you crying? I told you about my eye. It's only fair."

"It really doesn't matter," she trailed off. He didn't deserve to be trapped under the weight of her burdens, she didn't know him, and he was the last person who she would even think to tell. It was by mere coincidence that he stumbled upon her, and she wasn't going to overshare every detail of her messed up life.

"It does when you're sobbing like you were," Tom said. He didn't sugar coat it. She still looked evidently sadder, like she was completely exhausted, and Tom wondered if there was anything he could do to help her. He was a helper, it was in his nature.

"Look, Tom," she took a deep breath. She didn't want to hurt his feelings, but she didn't need him getting involved in potentially dangerous matters. They weren't friends, she couldn't have a friend like him - it was too risky, "I know you want to seem like this hot shot, charming guy who can make everyone happy, but it doesn't fucking work with me, alright?

Why I'm crying is none of your business, and it won't ever be your business so please just leave me alone alright?! You don't have to pretend to care about me like I'm your best friend or some shit, I'm not! I'm nothing to you and you're nothing to me so please just fucking go, please. I'm not some hopeless case you can fix with your perfect, nice and humble Hufflepuff personality - my crying and my business don't concern you!"

He sat for another minute in an almost unbearable silence and Ana's cheeks had heated considerably with guilt and embarrassment. Then, after an eternity, Tom stood. He didn't say another word, he merely granted her wish and walked away.

He walked, and he heard her sniff and knew that maybe walking away wasn't what he should do - but it's what she wanted.

All he knew as he turned down twisting corridors and unfamiliar halls, was that he really was having the worst fucking day.