Extra Ordinary (Riddle Era)

Chapter 40

Dear Tom,

That was how the letter started.

Dear Tom.

And then

I've written this letter about a hundred different times in a hundred different ways but it never quite turned out right. This version probably won't be much better but I've decided I'm sending it anyway and whether or not either of us is happy with the final version, I can promise that it will still say exactly what I mean.

Of course, that's the whole problem and the reason this letter has been written so many times: I don't really have anything to say. Other than hello. And I hope you're doing well.

I know the summers can stretch long when you have nothing to fill them with and I know the transition out of a magical life after nine months in it can be hard. I imagine it's only made harder by circumstance. I don't know if a letter eases it at all. It's just words on a page, afterall. But it comes from someone you know from the other half of your life and I suppose delivery from an owl might count for something towards reminding you of that other part of your life.

I hope you won't hate me for this letter, Tom, or for the sentiment behind it. If I know you at all then I know that at the very least this will irk you, but I hope you'll remember that I mean well. That I don't judge. That this isn't sent because I think you need it, per se, but because I think you might like it. Because I think you could use it. Because I think you need to remember that someone knows where you are right now and doesn't care in the slightest except to wish you were somewhere that makes you happier.

But I don't know. Maybe you will decide not to remember. Maybe you will decide to hate me. Just know that even if you do, Tom, I will not apologise for this. We both know better and I won't bother insulting either of us with an apology I wouldn't mean and which you wouldn't want.

I hope you'll respond. And I hope that despite your circumstances, you are enjoying this summer as best as you can.

Best wishes, always,

Lucy Steele

Tom had read the letter more times than he could count. And, much though he hated to admit it, Steele was right. His first reaction had been the sort of simmering, seething anger that was always far too close to the surface whenever he had to spend time in this miserable little corner of muggle London. But she was also right that in some ways, even if he despised that anyone had thought of it, despised even more that it had been her, it did... help. It was a strange, small thing, but there had been something almost soothing about the owl tapping its beak against his window, about untying the envelope from its leg. About having, for the barest of moments, some small connection to the life that had always felt more like his own than the one in this orphanage ever had.

He was also, if he thought about it, strangely, terribly, impossibly glad that it came from Steele. Not just because that letter, coming from anyone else, would have made him far worse than seething. Not just because she was the only one he could come even close to trusting when she said she did not judge. It was also that for a moment, when he read that letter, he could almost hear her voice. Almost see the set of her jaw, the glint of something almost like warning in eyes that did not hesitate to meet his and did not waver once they landed. He could almost imagine the kind of smile she would have said all of it with, that soft one, that was almost halfway to sad. And it would have lingered through the first paragraphs, would have deepened when she wished him happiness, would have started to solidify and turn into less of a smile and more of a flat line, an expression of certainty and determination, when she warned him that she would not apologise. And then she would have paused, and taken a breath, and then smiled again as she bid him farewell.