Did I Edit This? No :) - Tumblr Posts

this idea just came to me rn: reader and tom have been writing secret notes to each other and leaving them around the castle for the other to find and reader finally gets the courage to confess/flirt in a message but for some reason the note never gets to him :( and its kinda angsty bc reader takes his lack of response as a rejection but ends with him finally finding it

A/N: I went feral when I read this so obviously I had to write it ASAP. I changed the premise only slightly, I hope you enjoy!!! And thanks for the super cute idea, I'm really feeling the soft fluff tonight 🥺💖

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

Ink From The Well

Summary: “We sit at the same desk,” he calls after you. When you looked over your shoulder he’s still standing there with a glint in his eyes that makes you suspect that he’s already put two-and-two together. “Though you already knew that,” Tom continues, head tilting back a little as he smiles. [GN reader ★ no pronouns ★ ambiguous house ★ fluff ★ mutual pining]  Wordcount: 3.1k Warnings: none

ℙ𝕖𝕣𝕞𝕒𝕟𝕖𝕟𝕥 𝕋𝕒𝕘𝕝𝕚𝕤𝕥

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The Potions dungeon is always cold, always a little damp, and only ever lit by sickly yellow lights hanging in grim iron cages from the hewn stone ceiling, but it has an ethereal, sinister sort of beauty to it. The Charms classroom is nearly the reverse, bright and wooden and polished, smelling faintly like fresh popcorn and lined with teetering stacks of bound parchment. The Greenhouses are beautiful too, burnt orange bricks lined with vibrant green weeds, gnarled tables bowing under the weight of strange, colourful plants, and vein-like vines spreading up across the grubby glass ceiling panes in a way that always casts the sunlight into dappled streams. There’s something to love about every classroom the castle, but there’s one that you love most of all.

Transfiguration isn’t necessarily your best class, and Dumbledore isn’t necessarily your favourite teacher, and yet walking into his classroom fourth period on Tuesdays and first period on Fridays never fails to make you smile like nothing else can. It’s not so much the classroom itself that you love, but rather where in the classroom your desk sits. It’s in the back row, first on the left from the door.

Because that just so happens that, in second period on Wednesdays and fifth period on Mondays, Tom Riddle sits down at the very same desk.

Professor Dumbledore likes to ask questions with two correct answers so that even when you answer correctly, he can still be a little bit more correct than you, you’d written absently one day on a scrap of parchment. You’d rolled the scrap between your fingers until it was a twig-thin scroll and discarded it into the inkwell of your desk when the bell rang, forgotting about it completely until the following Tuesday. Perhaps you would have missed it if you hadn’t remembered the note, leaning forward to check if it was still there. You’d not been expecting much but your brows had raised in surprise when you’d caught sight of a little square of very yellowed parchment sitting in the bottom of the well, nondescript and folded along perfectly aligned edges.

You’d pulled it out quickly, replacing it with your ink pottle and sitting back without anyone noticing – though you hadn’t had a chance to open the note until Dumbledore turned his back to write up a very long explanation of the dormant life potential of live creatures transformed into inanimate objects.

You’d pulled the square note from under your textbook and unfolded each razor-sharp margin to reveal a single sentence written in an alluring slanted script.

And in this practice, is it Dumbledore’s intention to challenge his students or to insist on retaining the intellectual high ground?

There had been a strange exhilaration to it. Someone had actually found your absent thought, someone had taken the time to indulge in writing out a reply. Your response, which you’d left folded up, flat, and covert in the bottom of the inkwell just like the stranger, had read;

Conscious or subconscious?

It had been at the forefront of your thoughts walking to class that Friday, your heart skipping a beat when you’d peeked into the ink well as you’d sat down and found another yellowy square of parchment.

Your implication is not lost on me.

Your excitement had dwindled, your smile slowly fading. It wasn’t much to reply to. Fearing that the close-ended comment had been a subtle request to end the strange exchange, you’d left the inkwell empty when the bell had rung, and an entire month had passed before you’d scribbled out another note to the stranger in a fit of boredom.

This class is 30% people trying to impress Dumbledore, 5% Dumbledore actually being impressed, 15% him saying the phrase “now I’m sure the problem here immediately presents itself,” 20% an unhinged monologue, and 30% watching the guy next to me create monstrosities that defy imagination out of common household items

And there it was. A reply waiting for you three days later as if the month-long silence had never occurred.

You’ve left very little allowance for actually practicing Transfiguration in those calculations. Perhaps Dumbledore would be more impressed if his students spent less class time writing to strangers and more time paying attention to his unhinged monologues.

Which had made you retort with a sarcastic accusation that they, too, were spending class time writing to strangers, and then they’d replied with an equally sarcastic invitation to compare grades, and that had been that. A reply waiting for you in every single Transfiguration class, not a single one missed, each note growing a little longer until you started to wonder what would happen if one of the other students who sat at that desk took a peek into the inkwell by chance between your conversations.

You hadn’t had any idea exactly who you’d been writing to until one fateful Wednesday when, after realising a little too late that you’d left your textbook sitting beneath your desk the previous day, you dashed back to the Transfiguration classroom during break to retrieve it. The double doors were open, the previous class was still filing out, Dumbledore calling after them about the upcoming due date for the very same essay he’d assigned you yesterday.

You wait for the crowd to clear a little, craning your head around the door to see if you can pre-emptively spot your book on the ground under your desk when you catch sight of the person still sitting there. At that moment he’s placing a tidy stack of notes into a simple black folder and sliding it into his bag, head bowed to his task and leaving you to stare quite freely at his very striking profile. You watch frozen as Tom Riddle stands, slings his bag over his shoulder, leans forward, and in a fluid series of very nonchalant motions, picks up a capped pottle of ink and drops a small cleanly folded square of parchment into the empty inkwell in its stead. He turns and steps through the door into the corridor as he stows his ink in his bag, looking up curiously when he notices you standing there motionless.

You stare at him, coming to terms with the impossible realisation that apparently, you’re very good friends with Riddle, the jewel in Slughorn’s crown, most likely to be Minister for Magic before 40, and current record holder for number of Outstanding O.W.L.s in Hogwarts history. Plus there’s the whole thing about him being catastrophically gorgeous.

Tom has paused in front of you, expression polite but with a definite hint of amusement as he clicks his bag shut. “Are you quite alright?” he asks, lips just barely quirking.

“Yes,” you say hastily, turning for the door and leaning down to seize your book off the ground where you’d left it. “I forgot my book,” you mutter as you pass him with averted eyes, hoping it’s enough of an explanation to write off your slightly erratic behaviour as you try to flee the scene.

“We sit at the same desk,” he calls after you.

It’s your turn to hesitate. When you looked over your shoulder he’s still standing there, lips still quirked, a glint in his eyes that makes you suspect that he’s already put two-and-two together.  

“Though you already knew that,” Tom continues, head tilting back a little as he smiles.

“I just found out,” you say, waving a little sheepishly at the door.

He turns to you, striding closer with intimidating ease and his smile visibly growing as he watches your eyes widen – but he moves straight past you with nothing more than a single quiet comment in your ear, lilted with humour. “I await your reply.”

You don’t tell anyone. Not even your friends. Everyone is in love with Tom and you can’t help but suspect that things would quickly get out of hand if anyone found out that you’ve been in close correspondence with him for the past four months, even if you hadn’t technically known it yourself. And things had already become hard enough now that you knew who was reading the notes you left, and whose hand was penning his replies.

You try very hard not to think about it too much, you try not to wonder if he smiles when you write something funny, if he looks forward to your answers to his questions, if he thinks about the notes outside of class like you do. Maybe he’s just bored. Maybe he’s just messing with you. Maybe it had been the anonymity he’d liked about the interactions, and now he’s just humouring you.

It’s useless. You’ve been wondering who was on the other end of the notes since the beginning, wondering exactly which of your peers is made up of this striking mix of shrewd humour, clear intelligence, and measured charisma, and it’s very, very hard to continue as if things are normal once you know that it’s him.

It’s not really that surprising that he evidently noticed your replies shortening, becoming steadily more stilted and less familiar as your nerves get the better of you – though you’d hardly expected him to be so blunt in pointing it out, and you definitely hadn’t anticipated how he’d apparently been interpreting your distance.

Were you disappointed that it was me?

You reread Tom’s note countless times. It lies open and looming at the head of your desk for half the lesson as you try very hard to focus on the class to no avail.

Is this seriously what he’s been thinking? Is it a joke? Is it supposed to be so clearly ridiculous that you’re supposed to understand it as just his way of coaxing the real answer out of you?

You write out your reply, knowing it’s the overly cautious way forward but unable to bear the thought of misinterpreting him.

What do you mean?

In the three days before you get his answer, you find yourself actively avoiding any situation in which you might see him – you attend meals at peak hours to get lost in the crowd, you avoid the library like you’ll disintegrate if you set a foot inside, and you don’t dare stray near the 6th floor on Saturday when you know for a fact that Slughorn is hosting some poncy get-together in his office.

When you finally sit down on Tuesday at your desk, you don’t even pretend to pay attention to Dumbledore starting the class at the front of the room. You seize the yellow parchment square from the inkwell and hastily flatten it on your desk.

I’ve noticed that you’ve been somewhat different since we met. I’m sorry if you were disappointed to learn of my identity, if you’d like to retire our correspondence I promise to let it go gracefully.

Your eyes widen. You pick up the tidy little square and hold it a little closer, barely believing what you’re seeing.

The parchment bears tiny little ink marks, the faded ghosts of letters adjacent to the pitch black carefully constructed script of his insane note. You could just barely make out some of the words – reserved, one of them seems to say, apologies, says another, a couple more faint letters here and there but nothing else you can properly decipher.

It’s heart-wrenchingly obvious what the marks are.

Tom must have drafted the note at least once before leaving this final version for you, his ink bleeding through onto the parchment below.

Dumbledore’s open hand suddenly appeared in front of you and you jump out of your skin, looking up with burning cheeks and a thundering heart. “Note-passing is not tolerated in my classroom I’m afraid,” Dumbledore says kindly, “now please hand it over, and content yourself with note-taking for the remainder of our lesson.”

You crumple up Tom’s note into a ball over the snickers of the rest of the class, placing it in Dumbledore’s hand and ducking your head in embarrassment as people cast looks your way from all over the room. Dumbledore nodded and made his way back to the front of the classroom, and you try to ignore the way people were still giggling at you.

Tom had drafted the note. He’d drafted it.

It’s this more than anything he’d actually written that makes you consider actually answering him honestly.

When everyone’s attention finally slides away from you and Dumbledore is helping a trio of boys at the front of the class with their Augor charms, you surreptitiously tear off a scrap of parchment. You carefully write out your reply, hoping that Tom doesn’t pay half as much attention to your handwriting as you do his. If he did, he might notice that your lettering is a little more shaky than usual.

I wasn’t disappointed at all, Tom, kind of the opposite. You just make me nervous.

You fold it very hastily just to get your own nearly-confession out of your sight before you second-guess yourself, slipping it underneath your ink pottle. Your heart’s beating too fast considering nothing’s actually happened yet.

It takes all of twenty minutes after class ends for you to regret being so honest. You have to force yourself not to go back and retrieve your note before Tom’s lesson the following day, dreading someone seeing you and demanding an explanation. Instead, you throw yourself into a series of distractions that are almost successful in keeping your mind off your square of parchment sitting in that little wooden nook waiting for Tom’s elegant fingers to lift it from its hiding place.

You don’t know what the hell to expect when you sit down on Friday, but nothing could have prepared you for what you found in your inkwell when you leaned forward.

Nothing.

Absolutely nothing.

You sit back, stomach sinking so hard your throat closes up like you’re about to be sick. It’s the first time in half a year he’s not left you a reply.

It had been really stupid to read into those marks, he’d probably just been writing notes for class overtop of the note. It had been really stupid to read into any of this, now that you think about it. You drop your ink pottle into the well, jaw tight, wishing you weren’t this disappointed.

There’s nothing there the following Tuesday either, the nook sits empty and dusty and silent. When Friday comes and there’s still no note you start to accept with grim, hard-to-swallow shame that your confession hasn’t gone unanswered at all. The silence is his answer.

Maybe it had been a ruse after all. Maybe he’d lost all interest in the game when he’d found out you’re just like everyone else in the school, harbouring feelings for him. You have no trouble coming up with increasingly mortifying reasons for his silence over the week that follows, and  you very quickly come to the resolute decision that you need to put the entire ordeal out of your head – clearly Tom already had.

You’re winding your way back to your common room after a late night finishing Slughorn’s assignment on the ethics of using fairy blood when you hear the footsteps.

Someone was running somewhere nearby, echoing through the vaulted stone ceilings and airy corridors, and you pause at the corner looking around curiously as the footsteps seem to be getting much, much louder. You jump back a bit as Tom suddenly skids to a stop in front of you.

You blink at him, stunned. His normally pale face is flushed, the black waves of his hair slightly stuck to his forehead, his lips parted and he’s breathing hard, his tie askew and his usually perfect robes hanging slightly off one shoulder. He’s leaning forward a little, squinting at you as he tries to catch his breath.

“Tom,” you say in utter astonishment.

“He just gave it to me,” Tom says through hard breaths, lifting a small scrap of paper in his hand that, with a feeling much like being impaled through the stomach with a large icicle, you instantly recognise as your note. “Dumbledore.”

“Dumbledore just gave you my note?” you ask dumbly, still very bewildered by his appearance.

Tom nods. “I went to ask him some questions, about some of the comments he left on my essay,” he manages to say, his dark brows pulling together and his chest still rising and falling a little more than usual. “And afterwards, he asked if I recognised this.”

You find yourself wishing violently Dumbledore had thrown the thing out. “He caught me reading yours the other day,” you mutter, holding your books a little tighter to your chest and looking away. “He must have seen me hide it.”

“He just gave it to me,” Tom repeats, holding it out a bit more.

“Well he may be a little unhinged but he’s still pretty sharp,” you quip, turning your shoulders away and hoping he takes the hint and lets you leave. “I’m not surprised he knew it was for you, I suppose he recognised your handwriting in the first one –”

“You don’t have to be nervous,” Tom interrupts loudly.

You go very still, staring at him again. Tom’s lips press together, and he finally lowers the note.

“I just wanted to tell you,” he adds with a slight frown, and if this wasn’t Tom Riddle you would have sworn that there was something almost awkward in the way he averts his gaze from yours.

“Did you run here?” you ask suddenly, even though the answer is very obviously yes.

Tom’s uncomfortable look intensifies, and you watch him shift slightly on his feet with a mixture of deep gratification and a sudden bursting fondness so intense you feel a smile appear on your lips.

“How did you know I was here?” you add curiously, turning back to him.

“I saw you when I was in the library earlier,” Tom says quickly, sliding the note into the pocket of his trousers like he’s hoping you somehow won’t notice. “I thought I might still catch you.”

You nod slowly. Tom’s eyes are now flicking between yours and the smile on your lips like he’s trying to figure out exactly what this combination of emotions means and someone’s timing him to do so.

“Well,” you say after a long second, taking a step back down the corridor and savouring the sight of him standing there with his ruined hair and dishevelled uniform before you have to turn away. “I await your reply.”

He nods wordlessly, watching you retreat, and you bite back your smile as you force your eyes off him and hurry away.

Maybe you’d been a little too harsh on Dumbledore after all.