Weakness (Tom Riddle: Enemies to Lovers)

Chapter 18

I briskly walked through the corridors heading anywhere far from the other students. As I trudged along, my thoughts flashed back to the night I told Selene my deepest secret, just our second year at Hogwarts.

Selene and I were sitting on the floor in between our beds while our roommates slept. We both used the lumos spell to light the area around us. While we giggled and whispered to each other in our pajamas, Selene had confidently said to me, "In order to authenticate our friendship we need to tell each other our deepest secret."

"What do you mean?", I asked.

"We'll only be true friends after we tell each other something we have never told anyone.",  she replied sounding very sure of herself.

I hesitated for a minute, but naively decided Selene was the person I trusted the most, so it could be no harm. "Ok, I'll tell you my secret.", I agreed. 

She looked at me seriously and said, "We have to promise to never tell a soul. I mean like, don't even recite this to your cat, don't write it down, nothing!". 

"Ok, I promise.", I replied, nodding my head, "Do you want me to go first?" I was now a bit excited, I'd never had a friend as close as Selene and was eager to form this 'authentication.'

She nodded, "Sure.", she had a genuine look on her face that was easy to trust.

I hesitated for a second but then confidently said, "I was conceived from a love potion." 

Selene's jaw dropped, "Oh my Merlin are you serious?" 

I looked down at the rug we were sitting on, now a little self aware of what I just said. I hesitated to continue, "...yes?" 

"But... but, I thought people born of love potions were heartless and cruel because they couldn't have feelings.", Selene exclaimed, now looking frantic and almost scared.

"Selene, shhhh, you're going to wake everyone up!", I whisper yelled, waving my arms at her. "Just let me explain, please." 

She didn't say anything and just looked at me with wide eyes, so I continued,"You see, there is a way to break the curse, kind of a 'love prevails over all' situation but with very specific conditions. My sister and I broke it for each other. I was the first child in my family born under the influence of a love potion, doomed to suffer the curse all my life. My sister Brooke was born a year after me, also under the influence of a love potion." 

Selene looked as if that was the weirdest thing she ever heard. Still frantic she said, "So what happened, what did you have to do?" 

I sighed, "I'm getting to that. Anyway, Brooke and I were very close, we spent every second we could together, but being that we were both born of love potions, the connection we had meant something more."

Selene was hanging onto my every word. "Basically, Brooke and I formed a bond strong enough to break the curse. Since this bond was introduced at such a young age to two children who suffered the same fate, it was very strong. By the time I was eight and Brooke was seven you'd never be able to tell our situation. We gave each other the ability to live a normal, emotion filled life."

"So both people need to be victims of the curse in order to break it?", Selene reiterated. 

"Yes exactly" 

"And it can only happen when they are children?" 

"Somewhat, because children are impressionable. Because of this the important events they experience are much more impactful to their lives. As someone conceived of a love potion grows older it becomes more and more difficult to break free of.", I explained.

"That's incredible, I've never heard of that before.",  Selene replied sounding fascinated. 

"That's because it's not the case for most. Love potion children aren't common and even if they did meet they might not be able to form a connection." 

"But there must still be some hope for older victims, right?" 

I thought for a second and said, "Maybe teenagers, but definitely not adults, and even if the curse is broken as a teenager there are complications. Usually by then they can only feel emotions for the person who broke it, not anyone else, so it's pretty useless."

"Thank goodness that wasn't the case for you, I couldn't imagine us not being friends.", Selene said looking relieved.

 "Me either", I replied with a wide smile, "So what's your secret?" 

Selene looked at me blankly for a second, but then said, "My secret was just that I cheated on all of Professor Dumbledore's tests."

 We both started at each other not knowing what to say and then burst out laughing. "I guess you should have gone first.", I said.

By then we had made too much noise, and Olive sat up in her bed rubbing her eyes, a frizzy mane of brown hair around her face. "What are you guys doing?", she said in a confused daze. 

"Oh nothing", Selene said, and we both laughed to ourselves while getting into bed.    

I came back from my daydream, feeling significantly more upset than before. Just as I was turning a corner I heard footsteps approaching behind me.

"Christine!", Tom Riddle called after me.

I ignored him and kept walking. Why should I give him any attention after he acted like I was invisible this morning. He caught up with me though, and grabbed my shoulder stopping me from moving further down the hall. I turned around and looked at him, feeling pure anger run through my body.

"What the hell do you want." I said while jerking my shoulder away from his grasp. "You didn't acknowledge my existence ten minutes ago but now you're chasing me down the hall? Just get away from me, you seem to always want to anyway."

Tom pulled my wrist hard and grabbed my chin, turning my face in a locked position where I was looking right in his eyes, his stare hollow and cold. A chill was sent down my spine and I felt his grasp getting tighter and tighter.

"Don't you dare speak to me like that.", he hissed at me.

For the first time I was not just intimidated by Tom, but downright scared of him.

"Tom please, let go of me..." I said through a strained voice.

As fast as his eyes turned cold they were back to normal, his face expressing a realization of what was happening. Tom let go of me and I stumbled backwards to the ground. My wrist was sore from his grasp, I had no doubt it would bruise. I rubbed my chin as Riddle walked away, despair washing over me as I tried to make sense of what transpired.

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Authors Note-

Ok so obviously I know all that stuff regarding the love potion isn't true, but I am taking the creative liberty to make it true in this story. I hope you guys enjoyed the chapter, thanks for reading!