the seven virtues [tom riddle]

dear tom

July 1944, Godric's Hollow

DEAR TOM,

The candle wavers on the nightstand, and, perhaps, it has grown vexed at me as well, just as everyone else has. They say I write to a ghost, and, conceivably, they are correct—you remain a remnant of my past that, even after a year and a half, haunts the echoing cathedral of my soul. Though, I suppose you also ignite offerings inside, and keep me afloat when sanity seems to slip away.

I am a fool, yes. I do not send those letters, nor do I wish to. My conscience converses with your tongue, and so I try to appease it by pretending I still have enough valor left in me to write to you. Sometimes, the page is filled with scratches, cuts from where I pressed too hard because all I wanted to do was drive the pen through your skin. I blame you for a lot of things in my life. I am not sure whether you deserve them all, but it brings me comfort. Other days, I simply gawk at a blank parchment, because no words would ever entirely paint the portraiture of my affection.

Abandonment is not something I am unused to, and yet your silence hurts me most. You odious, heartless creature—I thought there was truth in your embrace, in the way you caressed my face as if I held you whole. How absurd of me to believe that your ambitions lay beyond your superficial desire of stringing me along through your own darkness.

I will have you know that I am surrounded by people now, juvenile faces that glisten with virtue.

Two siblings—they are the moon, and the sun, threads of obscurity and light weaved into a galaxy of probabilities. When one falls, the other rises, and sometimes, they find common ground to bring balance to. I have never seen such devotion. I envy it in every possible way.

Then, there is the matter of the empath. She wears an emotionless mask, because how could she ever deal with her own feelings when those of others overwhelm her on a daily? Gloves perpetually cover her hands, and she wishes to touch no one.

Lastly, the Blood Witch—wilderness braided in her auburn locks, she is a child of the forest. Few people manage to pass through life the way she does, with such grace and assurance. Nothing baffles her, and she twirls her destiny around her fingers.

I feel empty in a whole house. Though I have learned to care for them greatly, I cannot help but curl between my sheets and glance out the window, where moonlight bleeds into the sensation of touches—cold, unforgiving, reticent. Every night, I wonder how much time will slip by before I have to face the end.

And it scares me.

Not death. That is your domain, and I would be heedless to step in it.

But what comes after. Doom tarries me, so much so that I believe it takes your contour, jeering at my missteps and taunting me. You are a devil that will never leave me, but I have grown accustomed to your depravity. I let your ghost follow because I would rather have that than no piece of you.

You once told me that I was afraid of living, and not of death. You were wrong, Riddle. I fear neither. I fret that, after I am gone, nobody will mourn me. Because part of me knows that, at the end of it all, I will be beyond salvation. Perhaps, I already am.

And the only part of my soul that remains unsullied is the one that cares for you, the infatuation of a naive girl. So, I write you letters, and even when you haunt my every move, I let your presence console me because I am senseless. Relentlessly, I yearn that you will respond, and it is pitiful how I desire for something I know you are not capable of—caring for me is well beyond your expertise. Darkness creeps from within, from outside, and the only thing that brings me warmth is my hatred for your indifference.

So, call me a fool, Riddle. Tell me that I am an absurd woman for holding onto the last thread that keeps me balanced, which so happens to be you, because, for all your lack of compassion, my humanity garrotes from our shared connection. The remembrance of your lips, and how you trailed your finger on my side whenever your putrid soul desired something, or your poisonous fangs sinking into my innocence—your methods of corruption remind me that I used to be whole once. A person worthy of being cared for, remembered.

I know you are not mine anymore. Your silence and absence have made that clear.

But, when this all ends, mourn me. And if I am still alive, mourn for who I used to be. That is all I ask.

Yours truly,

Varya

THE END

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please read my last author note if you are curious what happens next <3