"she was the type of person who'd explain how she was going to stab you in the front before she actually shoved the knife in... and you'd let her.
she'd probably even pass the knife to you so you can shove it in your own chest...and you would."
tom...
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t o m h a d slept for another full day before he felt healed enough to take a shower. He stripped off the blanket that had clung to him in a sweaty mess. It was still too painful to move, but his body felt crusted with too many unknown substances for him to rest anymore.
He dragged himself into the bathroom only to stop at his reflection. Evelyn had been right. He looked dreadful. His eyes were sunken into his head from the way he had lost half of his body weight. He had known the Horcrux would take a toll on his body, but he looked close to skeletal.
His shirt, which had once fit him perfectly, hung limp around his shoulders. His collar bones protruded at sharp angles where his buttons had been ripped off. He had a sudden image of himself clawing at his collar, trying to rip out his own throat to end the suffering. Tom turned away from the mirror.
He slowly stripped out of his clothes and let them fall to the ground. He stepped into the shower. It didn't go unnoticed the way his legs trembled. The water fell on his skin and it was as if he was washing away all of his sins.
The water was purifying him of his old self. He had very little memory of everything that was said the night before, but Evelyn's words had burned into his mind. He repeated them in time to the dripping of the water. With sorrow, with understanding, with hatred.
She would be the first he would show how truly capable he was now. How little he cared about any other. Evelyn would be the one crying when he was done with her.
But, as soon as Tom left the warmth of the shower, his anger dimmed. His body throbbed with bone-shattering pain, his mind still fumbling for purchase through the haze of exhaustion.
When he returned to his bed, there was a stack of papers on top of the diary that now held part of his soul. He ripped them up only to realize they were incredibly detailed notes. The handwriting was immediately recognizable from the summer of letters he had memorized.
Evelyn had written pages upon pages of everything he had missed the last couple of days, her perfectly spaced cursive and dutifully drawn diagrams filling every bit of space. He held them as delicately as he could as he climbed back into bed.
His eyes roamed over the knowledge until he saw why even the margins were cramped with words. Evelyn had written commentary on every lesson that had been taught.
'How absolutely stupid it would be to use this charm instead of this one...'
They went on and on like that, each note just as teasing, just as nasty.
'I do not remember all of the professors being so incompetent,' another line read.
Tom smiled at this. It felt as if he was sitting with her in class. It didn't take long until he no longer had the energy to keep reading.
