Philophobia III

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philo•pho•bia
(n.) fear of falling in love.

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Summary; Tom Riddle is fighting extremely hard against his strengthening feelings for a certain Harry Potter. Someone give him a lesson on 'how to show someone you love them without being a douche'.

Takes place in Riddle's era in Hogwarts, while Harry is still Gryffindor and Tom is still Slytherin.

Lucius and Draco are cousins, Hermione and Ron are included, and they are all the same age as Tom/Harry.

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The next morning, Tom was still in shock. He couldn't keep his eyes from trailing to Harry from across the Great Hall during breakfast.

And since when had Potter turned into Harry?

Potions was first, and it caused Tom to tremble. Harry was truly terrifying. How was he the only one who was scared?

As Tom slowly made his way to Potions, he found Harry in the middle of a courtyard next to a grand tree. He was crouched down on the ground for Merlin knows what, and Tom couldn't help but stick around, out of curiosity, to see what he was doing. Mere seconds later, he stood up straight with a little bird in his hands and tried to reach up to place it on the branch with its siblings and mother, but he couldn't quite reach.

That's adorable. Tom harshly fought against the tidal wave of possessiveness and respect, but it was too late. He walked over and gently cupped the bird out of a confused Harry's hands and easily placed him on the branch.

"Thanks," Harry murmured as he pushed a stray strand of hair (it's not like it was rare for him) out of his face. Did he always do that? "I saw him fall off the tree and he couldn't get up so I came over and helped him. Am I late for class?."

"I could tell," Tom replied, surprising even himself with the soft tone of his voice. "And no, Potions starts in five minutes— walk with me?"

Harry nodded, so the two boys walked together to Slughorn's classroom. It was an awkward silence before Harry spoke.

"Listen, about yesterday, I just want to say I feel really bad about the way I acted."

"Pardon?" Tom asked, mystified. Had he done anything wrong? Tom couldn't remember a single thing Harry could have done to make him need to apologize— maybe because he wore Amortentia, but he didn't know Tom knew he had worn it. "Why would you need to apologize?"

"I wore Amortentia around you yesterday," he admitted, twiddling with his thumbs. "But I promise it was just because I didn't want to smell bad! I wanted to prove you wrong, so I wore some around you, but when you said I just smelled like myself I thought it hadn't worked... then Hermione came up to me and said I smelled like all her favourite things, and I knew it had worked. Tom, do you like me?"

There was silence again as Tom dealt with the increasing anxiety he was feeling. What would happen is he said no? What would happen if he said yes? Was Harry a soulless enough person to make fun of Tom and backstab him? No, Harry is a Gryffindor— he wouldn't do that to Tom. He might as well tell Harry what he had been telling himself for over 12 hours now.

"I think so," Tom answered, "but I didn't really know before yesterday. You're not very quiet— Lucius and Draco told me they overheard you talking about Amortentia. I put two and two together."

"Oh," Harry said, "I promise I didn't want to mislead or anything, I just didn't want to smell like... what was it, rotting pineapples? Very creative, Tom."

Tom found himself chuckling. "Why thank you. I try to be as imaginative as I can be while completely destroying my enemies' will to carry on." He tried to ignore his beating chest and shaking hands. He was not scared of Harry. No way would he shy out of this.

They came to a stop in front of Slughorn's doors. Tom was about to open the door but instead felt a hand on his arm. He turned around to see Harry biting his already red and luscious lips. How could Tom had never focused on them before? Harry reached up for Tom's collar, yanked his head down, and gave him a lingering kiss to his left cheek before entering the room, leaving Tom alone.

A very red Tom alone.

Harry Potter just kissed his cheek!

Tom's hand migrated to his cheek, gently holding the spot where Harry had just placed his lips. It was warm and tingly.

This is it. This is what a heart attack feels like.

He felt like he was on Cloud 9— why had he been scared of this?

With a tiny smirk, Tom pushed open the doors and confidently strutted to Harry. He was going to win himself a little Gryffindor.

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The next day was a Hogsmeade weekend, so Tom and Harry decided to go together. As they walked together on a warm May afternoon, they surely attracted some attention— after all, they were supposed to hate each other— but they really didn't care.

They walked and joked and just talked about many things, and by the time the evening came, Tom had fallen deeply for Harry. However neither of them wanted to go back to the castle just yet, so they went to The Three Broomsticks for a butterbeer.

"Did you know that in fourth year I made friends with a dragon?"

Tom raised an eyebrow unconvinced and looked at Harry, who was taking a sip out of his drink. "Is that the year you realized you're bisexual, or are you being literal here?"

Harry chocked on the sip of butterbeer. "Tom!" He laughed. "No, I mean seriously! It was a Hungarian Horntail— yes, I know that's dangerous, 'Mione already lectured me— and I named her Iggy."

"You named a Hungarian Horntail Iggy?"

"Yup," Harry nodded, "and she must've liked it, because she didn't kill me."

Tom laughed. There was something about a fourteen year-old boy (who wasn't very tall) taming a Hungarian Horntail and naming it Iggy that made it funny. "That's adorable," he complimented. "You must introduce me to her sometime."

A red blush appeared on Harry's cheeks. It really complimented him— Tom should make him blush more. "I will. She'd love to meet you. Just make sure you bring chunky peanut butter."

"Will do," Tom agreed, "I'll make some sandwiches and we could make a picnic out of it."

Harry giggled and scooted towards Tom. They were sitting on a bench circling a table, so now they were sitting hip to hip.

Here's an opportunity, Tom thought. It's now or never.

Tom yawned and draped his arm across Harry's shoulders, who happily leaned his head on Tom's shoulder.

Hell yes! Go Tom! Who's the man? You're the man!

The the sky was starting to get darker and darker and it was time to go home. The date must have been a success, if the kiss they shared at the end was anything to go by.

Maybe Tom was able to fall in love, after all. It isn't hard to fall in love when someone was willing to catch you.

FIN

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