---

The night was still and cold, unusually quiet. A thin sliver of a moon hung low in the charcoal sky, its silver glow casting no light upon the dark streets of London. Dark shadows played across the alleyways; spindly trees stretched out towards the stars with bare branches. At this hour, a little after eight in the evening on the last day of the year, most families would be crowded into living rooms and kitchens; into neighbor’s houses with food and champagne. Waiting for midnight, children would pop crackers and play, and adults would talk the night away to usher in the new year. But for one person, a girl who stumbled blindly along the sides of a grimy alleyway in an unlit part of town, this night held no cheer.


Dark, lanky hair fell in front of a washed out face, obscuring her eyes and cheeks from view. As the girl slowly picked her way around piles of rubbish, she panted heavily, and a faded cloak hung limply around her shoulders, clinging damply to her sweat soaked skin, its tattered edges trailing along the ground as she walked. A swelled stomach protruded from the girl, who looked as though the burden of child was too much to bear. After several strained minutes, she leaned against the cold, dirty bricks, resting, her breath heaving and hanging in the air. She moved on, coming into the dim street, her head swiveling left and right, searching among the storefronts and brick buildings…


But she saw at last what she was looking for; a faded grey looking building, dismal even in the daytime, with square windows and a small plaque to the left of the door- Children’s Home for the Unfortunate. They would help her there. She had no other choice. He had left… With sharp pains shooting up her spine, the girl made her way across the narrow road, stumbling on the cobblestone lane a bit and pausing at the threshold of the Home. She lifted a hand to knock, but again hesitated. She closed her eyes and a face flashed across her heavy eyelids, a man...


“A child?” his voice echoed in her mind. An upset voice. Horrified, even. His expression mirrored his tone. Shock. Anger. Bewilderment. Horror. And to her disappointment, no love. What she had once seen in his eyes had vanished with the last potion she had slipped into his drink.


The girl choked on the doorstep, a sob constricting her airways. For a minute she sagged against the bricks, her hands resting on her womb, tears knotting up her hair and freeing tracks of dirt down her cheeks. She inhaled and exhaled shakily, rasping in the night air. If only she could stay right here, in the quiet of the street in the evening… But the baby would not wait. She felt it within her, pulsing, stretching. It wanted out.


“Quiet,” she murmured to her child, righting herself before the old wooden door. “So tired,” she added, before tapping twice on the door with a dirty finger. But with a cry of shock the girl felt something rip inside her as she waited for the door to open, please open, and hot fire filled her body from the belly up as the darkness took over…


“Good ‘eavens!” a young maid exclaimed, standing in the doorway. “Mrs. Ackley!” she called over her shoulder, taking in the girl with sympathetic eyes. “Bridget, Abbey, come ‘elp me,” she ordered, and the girl was helped immediately inside by two other maids in creamy white aprons and blue dresses.

---

The girl looked to be forty, but Abigail Drabbly knew she could hardly be twenty, a little older than Abbey herself- girls who came to the Home were always young, unmarried- the story was the same. Premature lines sketched deeply into her features; dark, permanent circles underlined slightly off eyes. The child inside her was impatient, eager to escape from her womb, so Abbey and another maid turned a bed quickly and lifted her onto it, shouting at the others, who were enjoying the slow evening, to fetch supplies to aid in the delivery.


“Yes, just lay down there real nice and everything will be fine,” Abbey soothed, propping a pillow and placing it behind the hot, sticky neck of the girl, who didn’t seem to notice Abbey was even there, but cried out in shock and pain. Mrs. Ackley, the head of the Home, came running from her room upstairs, her hands wringing worriedly.


“What’s her name?” she questioned, her voice hushed and directed at the maids. Abbey turned towards the girl on the bed, placing a hand on hers. The girl’s nails were grimy and long, filth lining the underneath of them.


“What’s your name?” Abbey asked firmly, speaking slowly and clearly. At first there was no response, but then the girl’s eyes rolled around to Abbey as if seeing her for the first time.


“Wha…” she muttered, her face suddenly flushed as with a fever.


“Your name, do you know your name?” Abbey repeated.


The girl showed no sign of recognition of Abbey’s question. But she was clutching her thighs, her stomach. She gasped again, sucking in air like a shored fish.


“The fire,” she moaned, “put the fire out.”


Abbey’s eyes grew wide as she looked at the others. “Something’s wrong with ‘er,” she muttered, scanning the girl’s frail body.


“Don’t be ridiculous, Abbey. She’s jus’ delirious from the fever, comes from the child,” Mrs. Ackley responded, hovering over the girl.


“It’s somethin’ to do with the child, I know it,” Abbey said, looking down at the girl.


The circle of maids waited worriedly for a quarter of an hour while Abbey alternated dabbing her forehead, cheeks, stomach, and legs. Her body was a feverish red color, blood rushing everywhere…


The girl’s lips trembled. A maid handed Abbey a damp cloth, which she placed on the girl’s forehead and dabbed her cheeks. As she cooled down, she seemed to be coming into consciousness.


“Mercy,” Abbey muttered, watching her patient closely and curiously.

“Where am I?” the girl whispered finally, her head swiveling to look at all of them.


“You’re at the Children’s Home,” Mrs. Ackley answered from over Abbey’s shoulder. “You came to us.”


“What’s your name?” Abbey asked kindly, a hand on the girl’s.


“Merope,” the girl muttered. “Merope Riddle.”


Abbey placed a hand on Merope’s head, running a hand through the tangled locks. Merope Riddle sounded like a name from the circus… maybe this girl had run away to join up and had gotten into trouble there.


With a start Merope attempted to sit up, but lay back with a cry. “The child,” she sobbed, “Where is my child?”


“Abbey- the child has to be delivered,” Mrs. Ackley snapped into her train of thoughts, bustling around the room importantly now that the tense spell had broken. “We must hurry if both are to survive- she has had a long, sad journey, it seems,”


For the next three hours, some of the longest in Abigail Drabbly’s life- though a very quick delivery- they encouraged and helped and cleaned and comforted Merope, easing her through the birth. But it was a difficult one. Abbey had never witnessed a more pain inducing, stressful labour in her time at the Home, and never did after. As the baby, a boy, appeared finally right into Mrs. Ackley’s arms, Abbey swore she would never have a child.


It cried out of the womb, but minutes after it had adjusted to the warm air of the orphanage, it quieted. A half an hour passed while they cleaned mother and child, rinsing the dried blood and changing the white sheets of the bed. Midnight drew closer. When they were through, Abbey helped wrap the baby in a dark blue blanket. It looked healthy, though pale. But as it gained strength, the mother on the bed seemed to lose strength. With care Abbey handed the bundle to her, placing it in her weak arms.


“His name,” Merope gasped, “Tom Marvolo Riddle… Tom’s his papa’s name; Marvolo his grandpapa’s… he would’ve wanted…” and trailed off, her eyes fluttering.


Mrs. Ackley gestured at the other maid, Bridget, to write the name down. “Very nice name, Tom, respectable,” she replied, looking down at the girl absentmindedly. “Now, we need to get you some rest, and some food”- here she motioned for Abbey to go to the kitchen- “And…” but paused as Merope shook her head against the words.


“Yes, my dear?” Mrs. Ackley questioned, leaning in towards her as if to listen better. Abbey turned towards the bed; she had already been on her way to the kitchen for a tray of soup, but hesitated at the doorway. The room went silent for a moment except for ragged breaths from their refugee and a small cry from the boy in her arms.


With a last struggling breath, Merope Riddle whispered faintly through chapped lips, “I hope he looks like his papa,” and shuddered back against the white sheets, her greasy hair matted against her forehead and sweaty face relaxing into sweet sleep for the first and last time in her life.

---

Before he even opened his eyes, Tom Riddle knew what he would see returning his empty stare at the ceiling. Even keeping them closed against reality, he could imagine the faded white walls and slightly cracked plaster spider-webbed against the dull background. In one corner it was particularly bad- paint was peeling back around the edges of the walls in curled spirals, floating to the floor when someone moved up above. The plain room was made even plainer by the presence of a stiff wooden chair and somewhat matching wardrobe in which Tom kept his things. It was all neat; Mrs. Cole would never allow the orphans to be untidy, but Tom also kept it personally spotless, everything in the same place, without having to be told.

He lay there for several more minutes, listening closely for sounds of movement in the building. But it must have been early, for he heard only the slow ticking of his bedside clock. He opened his eyes. It was seven thirty-five, on a Saturday. No one would be up. But he could not go back to sleep, so he rose and dressed with the efficiency of one who had performed a task endless times before. He put on socks, grey trousers, a grey shirt, and combed his hair over with a small black comb. He put the small buckled black boots on his feet. He made his bed, stretching the thin brown blanket into perfect corners and propping the pillow upright. He checked the time again- only seven fifty. He put a hand to the door and leaned his thin head against it; no sounds came from the still halls. Tom sat on the bed- he paced, sat some more. Every minute or so he glanced at his wardrobe, as if drawn to it, but resisting.

He had had that dream again. It seemed like no matter how hard he concentrated, it just kept coming back. Tom closed his eyes momentarily, his hands clenching the bed covers with the memory of it. It always started the same…

He was eating breakfast at the long table in the orphanage, a thick brown porridge that stuck in his throat. He looked around. Just like any other morning, none of the other orphans sat near Tom… nothing was different, except… and then the dream shifted. He looked closer at the other orphans. He didn’t know any of them. Their faces weren’t familiar. And the orphanage, it wasn’t the orphanage at all-

Finally Tom heard doors opening and shutting, feet pattering down the hallways. The orphanage was waking. A maid knocked on his door; poked her mousy head in.

“Ah, up as usual before I get ‘ere,” she remarked, glancing once at Tom sitting motionless on his bed.

He nodded. “Don’ miss breakfast, we’re leaving at nine, but I ‘spect you’ll be ready to go,” she added, a slight shadow crossing her features. Tom nodded again.

She turned to leave.

“Wait,” he called.

“Something yah need, Tom?” she asked, surprised, and he flinched slightly at the use of his given name.

“Where are we going?” he asked, his voice measured.

“Oh, a little ‘scursion to the sea today, Tom,” she answered, eyeing him curiously. This day had been planned for weeks.

He turned towards the grimy window and the maid was gone.

---

At breakfast Tom kept expecting something to be different- he glanced around more frequently than usual and more than once had another orphan break his gaze fearfully because he was peering too closely. He just wanted to be sure that he knew all of them.

Tom returned to his porridge. He sat alone; he had since he could remember. Nothing was different. It had just been a dream. He lifted his spoon to his mouth, but it tasted the same. He grimaced, scowling slightly down into his bowl for a moment. Life here was grey enough without lumpy bland porridge on the side. He finished quickly and rose, barely making a noise as he stepped past the other tables and glanced at Mrs. Abigail Cole, the middle-aged matron who tried to manage the full orphanage with the help of only a few maids and a whisky every so often. She had been married once, a Henry Cole, but he had run off long ago. She’d sworn she would begin using her maiden name again, Drabbly, but never had. That’s when she started on the drink.

---

The demure hands on Tom’s clock read half past eight. He sat on his bed again, facing the muted window, studying the tracks of dirt creasing the glass. If there were some way he could stay here instead of going to the sea again, another year, another dull trip… He listened to the silence. The sound of seconds ticking by magnified in his ears, swelling to a soft roar.

Tick, Tock. Silence. Tick, Tock. Silence. Tick, Tock. Silence. Tick- Knock.

“Tom?”

Mrs. Cole’s voice leaked through the plain wood door, slightly muted.

“Yes?” he answered, not bothering to raise his voice or turn around.

His door opened a crack; the matron inserted her face into his room.

“Tom?” she repeated.

“Yes?” he replied, turning his head to look into her eyes.

She frowned slightly, blinking once.

“Mrs. Cole?” he questioned, staring at her.

“Ah, yes, Tom. I’m here to remind you of the visitor you’ll be receiving this evening, after our trip,” she said hesitantly.

Tom scowled and turned towards the window again.

“I won’t see another doctor! I know what you’re trying to do. You want me gone!” he told her forcefully, his voice rising quickly.

“Tom, Mr. Paris can help you�”

“I won’t talk to him. Tell him not to come.” Tom ordered.

After thirty two Tick, Tock. Silences, he heard the plain wood door shut.

---

The salty air assaulted Tom’s senses. Brine dried oxygen, driven by an angry wind, brushed through his hair; his nose, his ears. It whushed around him. He hated it. He felt dried out; a shell.

The ragged group of orphans and maids were behind him, slowly picking their way over the cruelly jagged rocks to reach the kinder shore below. They made this sea-side excursion once a year, in the early spring, and Tom dreaded it every time. Something about the openness of the ocean bothered him. He much preferred the closeness of the cliffs that rose into the sky behind them.

He found a large, lone boulder to sit on, facing not the crashing foamy waves but the cliffs leaning down on the group. He felt almost as if he blended into the stone, wearing these disgusting grey clothes. Not that he would ask for anything different. Mrs. Cole always did her best, if in her own way, for the children. “These clothes are better than no clothes at all!” she would say.

Shouts of the other orphans met his ears. They were dashing into the water and delighting themselves with silly games. The maids were holding the littler ones, and a group was forming figures and buildings from the gravelly sand.

8 years. That’s all he had left here. Then he would be free. After the orphanage, he would find his father. They’d told him his mother had died giving birth to him. So he would find his father and ask why he had left. Probably for some grand cause. He wouldn’t have just abandoned Tom and his mother.

He looked at the cliffs, rising high above him. They stood strong against the wind that tormented Tom, like a shield. Perching on his rock, he coldly appraised the cliffs, swaying in the chill tidal breeze stiffly. He shut the noises of the wind, then the maids, then the orphans… and finally the sea from his head. He couldn’t stand the noise.

Silence.

Now, his mind wandered to the small grass struggling to take root in the patchy shore beneath his rock. It was dark green, and long tendrils sprouted from the base of the boulder in a sickly attempt to grow.

Glaring at it, with the salty wind whirling noiselessly around him, Tom wished the little plant could share the misery he felt.

He wished it to shrivel like he could not.

To curl up and away from this never ending grey existence.

Of course, it did. It always worked.

Tom grinned.

Silence.