"Tom?"
Harry's voice was faint compared to Tom's frantic flipping of pages, but he heard anyway.
"Over here."
He scowled down at his essay, clicking his pen incessantly, ballpoint to his cheek, and elbow practically glued to the desk.
"Tom? What are you doing?"
Harry's voice loomed just over his head and Tom scribbled another line down.
"Homework."
"But we don't have any more homework for the year! Summer-"
"Professor Dumbledore said that I didn't participate actively enough during class. This is to bring my grade back up to an A."
"Dumbledore? What! But you take so many notes!"
Tom's stomach clenched, along with his fists, and he pressed the pad of his thumb onto the top of the pen, releasing it with a sigh. He set the pen down, pointer finger running over the indent left on his thumb with a forced absence.
"He said I had to speak."
"That's not even in the criteria for the class."
"I know. I told you he hates me."
"Why?"
"I don't know. He doesn't trust me."
"He has no reason not to trust you! Sure you're a bastard," Tom snorted at this, "but you can't make up a bunch of bullshit just because of that. Not participating my arse- you probably participate more than our whole grade put together."
"That's touching Harry, but unless you talk to him yourself, he won't listen to reason."
"He shouldn't be listening to me and not you either."
"Favoritism, it happens."
"Well it shouldn't and it's not fair. In fact, I will go talk to him."
"But I've almost finished the essay."
Harry looked at him with clear incredulity.
"So you're just going to let him get away with it? You're just going to give him the essay?"
"What else am I supposed to do?"
"You're Tom Riddle! Do something all charming and sweet and change his mind."
"And he's Albus Dumbledore, I don't think I'll ever be able to change his mind without some true miracle."
"But you make miracles happen all the time. You make them happen so often, I'm starting to think you're the miracle."
Tom smiled, head still bent toward the desk, and warmth clung to the inside of his chest like hair to a balloon, and his thoughts fizzled in place like static.
"Tom?"
"It won't work for me this time."
Still, he kept his smile.
"But-"
"Harry, it's alright."
He looked up from the desk at last and held out a hand to Harry.
"Come with me to give it to him?"
"Yeah, okay. I'm still gonna give him a piece of my mind."
He took the offered hand. Tom squeezed it in a supportive gesture, picked his pen up again with his other hand and wrote out his last line.
"Then off we go."
Tom stood and pulled Harry closer, pressing a kiss to his head and bringing his fingers through Harry's hair, feathery like quills and softer than fur; he closed his eyes for a moment before Harry's voice waded through the silence.
"Don't fall asleep on me now, Dumbledore, remember!"
"I do," he pulled away enough for Harry to see his smile; "come, my Harry. To Dumbledore we go."
Tom grabbed his essay and left the library with Harry's hand still in his.
