how it feels to be alive {tom riddle}

fifty-five: nail polish

NAIL POLISH

The following week before Christmas break consisted of mid-year examinations, so Tom was highly concentrated on excelling of course.

Lucia found the long nights studying in the library to be incredibly frustrating. She would sit tapping her quill against the parchment out of boredom until Tom would wordlessly make it fall from her hands in annoyance, shooting her an irritated glance before returning to his work.

It didn't help that Tom was also serving detentions for the incident with hurting Tobias, meaning there was even less time outside of school they had together.

Sometimes she'd try to slide up next to him and begin tracing her hand up is thigh teasingly in an attempt to get him to leave the library for the dorms, but the efforts were always unsuccessful. He would clasp the hand on his thigh in his own, and bring it to his lips to place a kiss on it before settling it back on her own lap.

"Why do you even care about these exams?" Lucia would exclaim.

"Why don't you care about these exams?" He would reply with a quirked eyebrow.

It was only on the Friday, when they both walked out of their final exam that Tom's focus could be pulled to anything but a book.

Lucia had chosen not to tell Tom about the Tobias incident under the staircase, knowing it would probably just result in ropes around the other Slytherin again. The violence was just not something she wanted to experience again, and from the shocked look on Tobias' face, she felt he'd been punished enough.

She had seen the Slytherin throughout the week though, but he had either avoided her gaze or sent her a glare filled with more than the usual amount of hatred. He still had red stripes over his body, but they were healing gradually despite the many potions and essences he seemed to be using on them.

Lucia and Tom were now watching the Hogwarts Express pull into the station to take students home for the holidays from the Astronomy Tower, the high whistle echoing throughout the grounds from in the distance.

Lucia brought a cigarette to her lips as she sat with one leg on either side of the parapet. Tom was a couple of metres away, leaning against the stone wall with a book in his grasp.

"I'm so glad lots of people will be going home for the holidays." Lucia exclaimed, leaning back against the stone behind her and bringing one leg up to rest level with where she was sitting. "And best of all, hardly any prefects around to snitch about the Christmas antics."

A biting breeze nipped at Lucia's legs, her short tartan skirt and sheer black stockings not providing much protection from the winter air.

"True indeed." Tom observed without much emotion lacing his tone, his eyes remaining fixed on the small book in the grip of his large hands.

Lucia looked across at the Forbidden Forest, blowing a large cloud of smoke into the sky as her eyes grazed along the tops of the trees.

"What are you reading?" Lucia queried, finally bringing her attention back to inside the castle.

"It's about the repercussions of time travel into the future." Tom looked up from the page to Lucia, "It seems apparent there haven't been any changes of my doing, but I do think it important to research the possibilities."

Lucia huffed and let her head rest back against the stone behind her, "My brain is hurting, we've done enough academic shit already this week. Can't you put the book down and have a bit of fun?"

"I think our ideas of fun differ quite a lot." Tom quirked an eyebrow.

"Whatever." Lucia rolled her eyes, pulling out a bottle of black nail polish from the pocket of her jacket and sitting it on the stone as she unscrewed the top. The cigarette hung loosely from her lips as she swiped the small brush on the sides of the small glass bottle, before bringing it to her fingernails and painting them with the ebony liquid carefully.