The right path

Thirty

Some minutes ago two kids were seen barging into the Leaky Cauldron, all sweaty and panting, demanding a table in a secluded corner. Normally, it would have been an odd sight, considering the muggle war that was raging just outside the protection of the magical world, and the horrors it brought within. Normally, nobody would risk themselves by entering the pub through that very door that served as communication between safety and hell. But this was not the first time those boys had arrived in such manner, it was actually the fifth time they came, so it was not weird whatsoever to see them anymore.

Right now, the bartender was watching them amused. It had been quite some time since he had seen faces of pure bliss after tasting his questionable stew. But who was he to judge? Every single time they came, those two boys demanded to be served food as if they had been starving... which wasn't so far from reality, but he didn't need to know that.

As of now, said boys were talking in hushed voices, their faces revealing little to nothing about the topic of their conversation. They were weird, for kids' standards, as they seemed completely engrossed in what they were talking, never laughing or creating a ruckus as other children may have done. Each and every time. They were just...there. The bartender shrugged his shoulders and continued on with his day, seeing as it would be some time until they left. He had a lot of clients to tend to, too, so wasting his time analyzing human behavior was not on his list. That didn't mean he could not wonder. After all, they had always done the same. The only difference between now and the first time they came was their postures.

At first they seemed pretty on edge, warded, but with time they had started to relax in their seats.
That was a good sign, at least it meant that they had started to trust their surroundings while on a safe ground. It was unhealthy to live foverever stressed, even more so for younglings as those.

Another thing that has gradually been changing was their facial expressions. Somehow, they seemed years younger the more they stayed at the bar. It almost was as if they were smiling inwardly, too, which was strange considering that for the untrained eye, they had a perfect Slytherin mask at all times.

Some hours went by without any interruptions, and it was nearing the time those boys would up and leave. But they didn't. In fact, not only were they still sitting there comfortable and relaxed, but one of the boys had cracked a smile, trying to suppress his laughter. The green eyed one, that was. Oh, and that was just the beginning. Soon enough, the boy started to full on laugh, and the bartender could swear he could catch a glimpse of a tear escaping the boy's eye after a while.

Nobody knew what had caused that fit of laughter, but the whole bar was laughing, snickering, or smiling after a while of hearing it. Even that other boy, who was the most reserved of the two. At first, the bartender noticed, he was looking at the shorter boy with something akin to surprise, or maybe as if he thought the other boy was crazy. Then, slowly but surely, a smile appeared in his face. It was brief, and almost imperceptible, but it was there. And if the bartender was being bold enough, he could even say that he saw when a pair of emerald eyes shimmered with satisfaction after catching the slip up. But why would the laughing boy in question be satisfied by it?

There was no way for the bartender to know, but Harry was indeed satisfied with the progress he had made since the very first time they came to the Leaky Cauldron. It had been two very harsh weeks, as Riddle had remained as hermetic as ever.

The first day they came, Harry had mostly stuck to academic stuff, their side projects and some inconsequential stuff. It looked like Tom wanted to ask something about the incident in the bomb refuge, but never did ask. He seemed a little bit distant, and barely even react when Harry tried to crack some jokes.

Of course, that only meant Harry had to try harder. With James fueling his determination, he dug his way into personal information, slowly but surely. At first, he had shared some of his real childhood memories, some of them involving his events of accidental magic. Ones that didn't involve the Dursleys, naturally, since he was supposed to have been living with a caretaker, alone and isolated for the most part (not that it was drastically different from his childhood anyway). One curious thing was that Harry didn't want to feed Tom lies at any given point. He refused to break his trust, even when that made things difficult in the long run if he wanted to maintain the veracity of his background story.

Still, even after all of that opening up, Tom had refused to let slip any important details about himself. There was a vague mention of him being an orphan since birth, and knowing about magic until he was eleven, finally providing an explanation to his bursts of accidental (and not so accidental) magic. Not much, but Harry was sure no other magical soul knew about it, since purebloods would probably take it as weakness if you had just learned about magic at the age of eleven. The fact that Tom had been so in tune with his magic to have the control he had at that age was probably the thing that saved him from being the odd out among purebloods, despite them having magical instruction from the moment they came out of the womb.

Today, however, progress had been exponential. Firstly, Tom had at last shared something meaningful with Harry. He had admitted to not knowing who his parents were, despite suspecting he was a descendant from Salazar Slytherin himself. He had also mentioned his research on the matter and, believe it or not, subtly told Harry he was open to him being helpful if he so wanted. Combined with the obvious threat of killing him multiple times over if he so much as whispered a word to anyone else, of course.

Harry had obviously promised to never let any information leak, and offered his help enthusiastically. However, sensing that the current topic was over for the time being, he decided to let Tom ask a question, whichever that popped in his mind. Yet, he could have never been prepared for the situation that arose. Tom had just asked who James was.

That was absolutely the most complicated and difficult question Harry could think of. Not only because he had promised to himself to never tell a personal lie in these conversations, but because he had no idea of how to explain who James was, even to himself.

James had laughed his face off in their mindscape at the awkward silence that followed the question, even more so when he saw a glimmer of jealousy cross Tom's face while waiting for an answer. It didn't help Harry's case at all, at first, but he then had a flashback of the Weasly twins teasing Ron while on a similar predicament, and he suddenly had an answer. James was probably the closest thing he had to an older brother, even if it was a bonkers version of himself from the future. So that's what he said. James was a brother figure, the closest thing he had to a family.

Tom, having heard Harry's anguished cries at the refuge, assumed that James had left Harry at some point in life. He didn't know that it still hadn't happened, but he felt the need to share his own experience. He didn't know why, but he wanted Harry to know. Some part of him yearned to have just another thing in common with Potter. It made him feel that he was part of something. That somehow someone cared.

It was then that Harry had learned something that even James had never known, and had them both shocked, in multiple levels. Because Tom Riddle had said, clearly, that once upon a time, life in the orphanage had not been as bad, when an older boy, whose name was already forgotten, had been around to keep him company. That boy had been apparently adopted just before Tom's fourth birthday, and his departure had caused the first magical manifestation Tom could remember. And Harry could almost feel the despair and hurt little Tom must have felt at that time, because that boy was probably the only person that has showed a little love to a lonely kid in an orphanage. And he could start to understand why Tom had become the way he was today, after facing rejection and fear from the others since such a young age.

Their gaze connected, and the tingly sensation that had almost become normal when they were together intensified and became an electric buzz quite difficult to ignore. Suddenly, they became one, and everything in the universe made sense. Because at that very moment they knew, at the very bottom of their consciousness, that no other person in the planet could understand them as much as they did.

And at that very moment, Harry, being the awkward person he is, had to make something absolutely stupid and ruin the moment. Such as choking on his own saliva.

But that, surprisingly, was what had caused the laughing fit that crossed the entire pub. Because Tom Riddle had just made a joke to mock Harry. Tom Riddle didn't joke, ever. So of course, Harry was caught off ward, lost his cool, and ended up laughing his ass off.

Overall, it had been a good day, even with the awkwardness of their interactions. After all, it showed the beginning of something with the potential of being great.