Trapped in the Past (Tom Riddle x Reader)

6 - Apparition Lessons and Unexpected Apparitions

Late in the month you have to join the Apparition lessons.
You are already eighteen and you have to act like a sixteen year old girl whose birthday is in summer.
You didn't have much chance to practice with Apparition in your time, so you stand nervously as you attend the first of the twelve lessons to get the license.
There's just half of the students of your year. Riddle is amongst them.

It's Saturday morning and you still feel sleepy. You don't want to be a show off, so you plan to just stand and watch the bloodbath that usually happens when students can't apparate perfectly.
You almost wish that Riddle lose a finger or an ear, but unimpressively he's the first one to succeed in apparating without flaws.
He is the master of determination.
But soon the attention is gathered around those who splinched.
The show is so disturbing that you don't even try to apparate. You just stand still until the awful morning ends.
The only ones to enjoy the accidents are some Slytherin boys, who can't stop snicker sadistically.
A couple of them got rewarded by being splinched as well.

"I'll never learn to Apparate. I'd rather fly on a broom for the rest of my life" Ellie says, deeply traumatized by that first lesson.
At least she is still in one piece.
"You can succeed in time for the exam in May. Do you want to bet?" instead of touching your lunch, you offer her your hand, that she watches with disgust.
"It's not so awful as it seems. It's like learning to walk. At first you scratch your knees and bump everywhere, then you walk without even thinking about it" Prefect Bagnold says from the other side of the table.
That's definitely not how it feels, since when you walk, you don't feel choking and have a little panic attack.

Lesson Two arrives too soon and you want to believe that time is playing tricks with you.
You are helpless as you face another traumatic weekend.
You're growing more restless as you know that you need to start practicing for real.
Few more students succeed in apparating properly.
Riddle looks like one of the staff, after taking the disturb of jumping from one circle to another few times.
You avoid looking at him, but you can swear he was smirking at your pretended failure.
Enough.
You need to apparate, no matter if it's been so long that you didn't practice, since you were a fugitive.
Maybe if you focus hard enough you can jump also in time and go back to your world...

You feel the familiar choking sensation, then you struggle to find your balance and you bump against a wall.
No, not a wall.
A chest.
Instinctively your fingers grab the fabric of a uniform, but they quickly release it when you look up and you're stick by the dark eyes glaring at you.

"Sorry" you mumble frightened and stumble away, slipping away from his hands that have grabbed you.
How can you apparate against Riddle? Of all the places?
You almost crushed your face against him.
Disoriented, you stagger to find your spot again, while people are snickering at you.
You close your eyes and focus on your wild breathing, hating how your skin flushed, hating how people wouldn't easily forget that moment.

"It's not that bad. You managed in doing what most of us girls can only fantasize about" Ellie tries to comfort you after you fled to your room "Imagine if I were you. I'd fall splinched in his arms. A bit romantic, but very disturbing".
You're still so mortified and ashamed as you roll on your bed to try to get rid of your haunting thoughts.
"I think I indeed got splinched and lost my heart" you say dramatically.
Ellie gasps "Do you mean you're in love with him?".
You freeze and shut your eyes open.
"No!" you shout "I just... It was nonsense".
She doesn't believe you.
Totally forgetting about the horrors of the apparition lessons, she grins like a predator at you, as if you can't hide from her.
"What I heard if that you lost your heart because you gave it to him".
No matter how much you deny it, she doesn't change your mind.
And half the school seems believing the same.
Gossip is something you can't avoid, no matter how you struggle to ignore it.
You do anything to stay away from Riddle and luckily he seems doind the same, although he doesn't look affected by the gossip and the attention.