When Ginny awoke the next morning, she immediately got out of her bed and went to her trunk, where she had returned the diary after reading Tom’s late-night answer multiple times. It didn’t make sense to her that he wouldn’t just tell her what he was thinking, like she did for him. It was true, though, that he hadn’t informed her of the Chamber of Secrets right away, and needed some thinking time first.
It had taken her some time to fall back asleep since she was wondering about what Tom’s real response would be. It was as though he knew that Allie and Cassidy were in the room with her, and didn’t want them to find out what she was doing when she wrote to him. When she had finally fallen asleep, it was with the reassurance to herself that she would turn to October 17 in the diary first thing in the morning.
So, now that it was morning, she would do just that. She had already checked Allie and Cassidy’s beds, and neither of them was still there. She figured they must have gone to breakfast, and silently thanked them for going early.
The diary was on the top in her trunk again, and she picked it up without sparing a second glance for her clothes or other belongings. She sat on the bed as she had the night before and closed the curtains just in case her roommates came back. At last, it was time to read the diary.
The suspense building in her chest, Ginny opened the diary to the page marked October 17. She saw that there was nothing written on this page, and she let a stream of breath out. She was unaware that she had been holding her breath, but now that she thought about it, it made sense. She had been very nervous as to what she would find: perhaps something about how she was a long-lost relative of Salazar Slytherin, adopted, or worse yet, that she wasn’t really both of her parents’ child.
It would have been awful for her to find out that her mother or father had had a relationship with someone other than their spouse, and that she was the product of that. Ginny shook the thought out of her head. That was crazy; it would never happen!
What had Tom meant to tell her, then? And why hadn’t he written it? She looked at the clock: it was indeed morning. She pinched herself hard and winced. She was definitely awake.
Then why wasn’t there anything on October 17?
Frustrated, Ginny slid off the bed and returned to her trunk. She dug past a pair of pajamas and a set of robes, looking for her quill and ink bottle. She knew she had used them the previous day, and that they had to be near. She found them underneath one of her Christmas sweaters from her mother, and brought them to the bed. She glanced at the clock again, and determined she had about ten minutes before she should be at breakfast. That was more than enough time to write an angry letter to Tom.
She reopened the diary to October 17 and dipped her quill in the ink. Carefully balancing the diary on her knee and the ink bottle on her pillow, she began to write:
2 September 1992
Dear Tom,
Where are you? You said you would write on October 17 this morning, but there’s nothing here! Why was I Sorted into Slytherin? My whole family has been in Gryffindor, and I’m worried. I don’t know what my family will think. I really want to know, Tom. Would you please tell me?
She was about to scratch out her letter and start again with a slightly angrier tone when the words disappeared. She smiled triumphantly, knowing from experience that this meant that Tom was going to reply to her.
But nothing showed up on the paper. It remained blank. Ginny flipped through the diary at lightning speed, searching for any sign of writing on any of the pages. It no longer mattered to her that Tom said he was going to write on October 17. She would settle for anything.
Again, the diary was empty. None of the pages showed any sign of writing, even though Ginny knew that they had been written on by her. To any person who didn’t know its true secrets, it was just an empty old diary.
Suddenly a feeling of intense tiredness enveloped Ginny, causing her to lean back on her pillows. She had never been this exhausted in all of her life, and she was afraid that it would last all day and she would fall asleep in one of her first classes at Hogwarts.
She didn’t have enough time to worry, though. Right then and there, her eyes closed of their own accord and she lost consciousness.
***
She was in her dormitory, standing near the door. It looked just the same as it had moments ago, except all three beds were made and none of the curtains were drawn. There was nobody in the room, just her. She turned to the door and walked out of it and down the short hallway into the common room.
It was just as green as she remembered, and she gagged at the serpentine wall hangings. There weren’t many people sitting in the chairs. She recognized the Malfoy boy from Flourish and Blotts, and quickly turned away in case he happened to glance her way and think of the same experience.
She crossed through the common room swiftly, running away from the horrific green and the other Slytherins. It was odd for her to use the word other when thinking of the Slytherins, for she was not comfortable with being one herself. She found that it was becoming easier, though, which was strange.
Once she exited the room, she found herself in the twisting dungeons again. She hadn’t been paying much attention the first time she went through the day before, but found herself going through them as easily as though she had been doing it for years.
Soon enough she was in the entrance hall. Its grandeur impressed her greatly, and she spent a moment marveling at the grand staircase and the huge front doors. She had no idea how it was possible for them to open, since they were so large. She made a mental note to ask Hagrid about it when she got a chance.
To her surprise, her feet directed her not to the Great Hall, but to the staircase. She started up the stairs and continued until she reached the second floor, where she walked until she reached a girls’ bathroom with an ‘Out of Order’ sign on the door.
As Ginny wondered what the significance of this bathroom was, she inadvertently opened the door, ignoring the sign, and walked into the room. She shut the door hastily behind her after checking the hallway to make sure nobody had seen her go in.
She turned away from the door and surveyed the bathroom. It was more run-down than she had expected when thinking of bathrooms at Hogwarts (which she hadn’t often) and was quite beat up. The wooden stalls were worn down and chipped, as were the mirrors and sinks. She walked over to the sinks and looked in the mirror, shocked at how dirty it was. Was this bathroom never cleaned?
Gross, she thought, and turned around.
Unfortunately, her body returned to face the mirrors and sinks, and she studied the different taps carefully. They were normal copper, but one of them had a mysterious symbol carved into it. She touched it slowly, almost as though it might break, and rubbed off some of the grime around the symbol. It still wasn’t quite clear, but she thought it resembled a snake. It reminded her of the Slytherin common room, and she gagged again. She was in a disgusting bathroom with a serpentine tap. She needed to get out, now.
“Hmm,” she heard someone say behind her. “What do we have here?”
Ginny turned around and saw a ghost floating behind her, an inquisitive look on her face. The girl’s lank hair was pulled into pigtails and her thick glasses formed circles around her pale eyes. She studied Ginny, biting her tongue.
“Now why would you want to be in here?” she asked. “Everybody complains about Moaning Myrtle. . .”
“Still here, are you?” Ginny heard herself say, and clamped a hand over her mouth. How would she know how long Myrtle had been there? She hadn’t even knowing there was a Moaning Myrtle until today.
“What’s that supposed to mean?” questioned Myrtle, backing away from Ginny.
“Oh, I—“ Ginny started, meaning to apologize for her unintentional words.
“Don’t bother!” exclaimed Myrtle. She sobbed and dived swiftly into the nearest toilet, crying all the way. Ginny could still hear her sobbing, and made a mental note not to come into this bathroom again for the rest of her time at Hogwarts.
Once Moaning Myrtle was gone, Ginny walked back over to the sinks and continued studying the snake on one of the taps. When she felt confident that it was a snake, she backed up and cleared her throat. Digging back in her memory—or was it her memory? She certainly had never been here before—she thought of what she wanted to say.
“Open up,” she said, but instead of the actual words it came out as a series of hisses. Shocked, she jumped and gasped. What had just happened?
As she tried not to hyperventilate, the tap spun quickly and glowed with brilliant light. She stared at it in awe and was able to watch when the sink began to sink, right through the floor. She leaned forward and looked into the hole it had left. There was a corpulent pipe in the sink’s place, which reminded her uncannily of the one from her endeavor with Tom in August, when he had first told her of the Chamber of Secrets.
The Chamber of Secrets!
That had to be where she was going, she thought. She began to feel nervous about going; she hadn’t seen the basilisk that Tom had told her about, but she knew from her conversations with him that it killed with a glance. What would happen if it looked her in the eye now? It was just a dream, after all.
Against her better judgment, she jumped into the hole.
It was as though something had caused her to jump besides curiosity. Like maybe someone else was telling her to go ahead and hurl herself into an unknown hole to a dangerous place with a deadly creature. Under any normal circumstances, Ginny would have left immediately and told her mother about the bathroom and its secrets. But today it felt right to just take the risk. She was at Hogwarts now; she could make her own decisions.
The hole was slimy, dark, and long. The walls were even more repulsive than the rest of the bathroom, and Ginny tried to keep her arms at her sides and her feet slightly elevated so as to not get too much grime and dirt on her body. She slid for what seemed like hours before the slide straightened out and she flew out the end, landing in another pile of wet gunk.
She sat up and wiped herself off to no avail; the slime was caked on her body too thoroughly to just swipe off. Standing up, she rubbed her back where she had landed. This was not a good situation. How would she get back up that never-ending chute?
Ginny decided she would worry about it later and started walking down a long tunnel. She vaguely remembered this from her tour with Tom Riddle, and before long she was in the Chamber of Secrets itself. It was just as she recalled it: huge, serpentine, and watery as the bathroom above.
She walked forward into the chamber, attempting to step around the countless puddles of water. By the time she reached the gigantic statue of the man, her feet were soaking wet and she could tell that some of the water was soaking through her shoes onto her socks.
This time it wasn’t Tom who was talking, but her. She heard the hissing sounds and realized they were coming from her own mouth. The large mouth of the statue opened slowly and she heard slithering behind it. She hurriedly closed her eyes on impulse and waited for the basilisk to pass before opening them again.
When she could see once more, she kept her back turned to the beast and issued its orders:
“You know who I am,” she began, not knowing where her words were coming from, “for you have worked with me before. I wish you to continue what we have started. Stop for no one. Go.”
The words came out as hisses once more, and Ginny knew what she was saying but couldn’t understand what was coming out of her mouth. The basilisk hissed in response, and she closed her eyes as it slithered back into the statue’s mouth. She heard the stone sliding back into place and opened her eyes again.
The basilisk was gone.
Spellbound by ravenclaw1997
Chapter Notes:Thanks as usual to my mom for beta'ing!
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Chapter Endnotes: Thanks for reading! And thanks to J. K. Rowling and Albus Dumbledore for the quote I used as the chapter title. I know they would want you to review. . . .