Motivation ⌁ Tom Riddle ✔

35

Lonely. Affected with or causing a depressing feeling of being alone. That's exactly how I'd felt for the next few days despite the fact that I was always surrounded by people. There was no telling whether or not it was the work of the Horcrux but I was certain that it wasn't. The amount of guilt that was stuffed into my stomach was too much to comprehend, grasp even. Everything was dishevelled. And people, especially his sister, grew suspicious of Olly's whereabouts. It was hard for me to keep someone's death private, especially seeing the worry spread over that particular person's sister. I had already chewed my fingernails to the point where they stung whenever I pressed on something; even my fingers had bite marks. Guilty. Culpable of or responsible for a specified wrongdoing and conscious of, affected by, or revealing a feeling of guilt.

School work and anything anyone said certainly went through one ear and straight out the other; it was hard for me to focus on anything. There were too many pinching sensations in my body and I knew it was wrong of me to keep this to myself - between just Tom and I. I often heard groups of girls giggling about how Colette had cried at night for her brother, to see him again, that he'd come back and forgive her; she thought the reason he'd gone missing was because of her. Although Colette wasn't a particularly nice person, it was still hard for me to let this go on, let her believe her brother was only missing temporarily.

"Please," she'd whimpered through one lesson from the front of the class, quiet enough for our teacher not to have heard. A few people snickered, guffawed, laughed under their breaths. Colette had been way too unkind for these people to care a single drop about her. "Please, one of you lot has to know where he is."

That part was true. In fact, two of us knew where he was. Tom risked a slow glance at me from the opposite side of the class, a look of warning in his eyes and it was as though I could hear him telling me to keep quiet. I tilted my head to the side, giving him a look, a pointed one, trying to scream at him that I couldn't do this anymore; it was too difficult. But all he did was simply shake his head and turn away.

"Abigail," I heard her voice whisper again. "Abigail, please. If you have heard anything...if the rumours are true..."

My head automatically snapped up at this.

"What rumours?" I demanded, completely unaware of the fact that I'd been in class and our Herbology teacher wasn't a very pleasant one.

"Who's talking?" he half shouted half spat onto the class - exactly why the front row was always empty. "Quiet!"

"That he wandered into the forest and got eaten by some creature," Colette shuddered and parted her lips, narrowing her eyes for a swift second. "Wouldn't be surprising coming from this excuse for a school."

I shook my head and went back to my work, and that was the last day Colette had asked me about Olly. Part of me did wonder what Tom had done with Olly's corpse, but I was never brave enough to ask.

And as the days passed and drew on and on, the teachers began to grow suspicious and had contacted the twins' parents. Colette burst into a fit of tears everyday. Tom gave me the same look everyday. And the difficulty expanded everyday. Eventually, the Headmaster had given the school a big, long speech about Olly's disappearance, and during the entire thing, my palms grew sweaty and my heart was frozen, I was bound to stop breathing if he continued. The harsh swallows I was forcing down was so loud I thought I'd draw attention.

A hand gripped mine from under the table. I turned slowly to see Chris giving me a reassuring smile.

"Don't worry too much," he'd said. "We'll find him."

Despite the screams in my head, I nodded. Colette's sobs could still be heard from the Slytherin table, and a pair of green eyes watched me threateningly. I didn't understand why he was so worried; he didn't murder the boy.

"Felix Felicis," Professor Slughorn announced in his usual, chirpy voice, his bright attitude awakening the class. He held up a vial of gold liquid in his hand, and explained the state of its necessity. I watched with my fist shoved into my cheek, but I paid no attention. Brianna hummed under her breath from beside me, a tune that was too content.

Slughorn moved over to a vial rack and placed the vial into it and explained further into its depths.

"Brianna, please," I whispered, growing tired of Brianna's tune.

"What?"

"Shush."

"You shush," and with that, she continued her humming.

It was obviously expected that I was unable to pay attention, focus on a single thing for days with only a dead boy clouding my thoughts, popping up every second of every minute of every hour of every day. I didn't know how long it would last, but I was sick of it. Not to mention this unexplainable anger that would come and go at random moments... though it was clear what had caused it.

I stood quickly from my seat, shoving the chair back with a loud scrape. I had no clue what had washed over me, but it was bad.

"BRIANNA, FOR THE LOVE OF MERLIN, SHUT UP!"

Everything fell quiet with a pop, a few quills dropping here and there, Professor Slughorn stuttering up the front, and Brianna staring up at me with eyes the size of planets and jaw dropped, lips quivering small whimpers. I could feel the anger seeping through my body - I didn't know where the anger had come from. It was just...there. It was like how you could feel sad for a moment, and laugh and be all happy the next. The quick transition in emotions. Only it had never been the other way around for me. And there was no reason as to why I should have been angry and taken it out on one of my fellow friends, especially right in the middle of class.

"Er...uh...is there a problem, Ms Benjamin?"

I broke my regretful gaze from Brianna and took a sharp glance at the potion's teacher. Slughorn stared back at me curiously, wrinkles forming on his forehead from the deep furrow of his brows. Students all over the room were watching me, glaring at me, or were happy that the class had paused. I stammered all over the place, my mouth twitching, opening and closing, not knowing what words to have said. Brianna glared ahead of her, and Emily was giving me the biggest look of disbelief.

I shook my head at the teacher and slowly sat back down in my seat, hands shaking. It was still quiet for a moment, even after I'd took my seat again. As the class continued, I was not able to catch Brianna's attention any more.

"What the bloody hell is wrong with you?" Emily asked me when class was over, catching me in the middle of a corridor. She speed walked to keep up with me as I'd been walking at a pretty quick pace. "You embarrassed the life out of her!"

"I'm sorry, OK?" I exclaimed, exhaling annoyingly. "I didn't mean to snap at her. I was trying to pay attention and she was bothering me."

"No, that's not it," Emily snapped, stepping in front of me to stop me from walking. She stared at me, eyes slightly squinted, and her head shook slowly. "You've changed. You really have."

The disappointment and defeat in Emily's tone was enough to replace my sudden anger with, once again, more guilt.

"You just..." she continued, "...you are very mysterious all of a sudden. You keep things from us. You lie. Everything. It's recognisable, Abigail, you cannot hide it - no matter how hard you try to. Others may not be capable of doing it, but I can read you just as easily as I can read a book. You're just different now."

Before I could protest or ask Emily to further her point, she spun on her heel and headed off into the opposite direction, not once glancing over her shoulder.

"Emily!" I called out, but just as I'd predicted, she ignored me and eventually disappeared out of sight.