the moon is no door ↠ Tom Riddle

07

Feeling flustered and annoyed, Saffron decided to visit the music department. She knew that playing the piano a little would be the perfect way to soothe her nerves. Like usual, no one was there. It was dim, eerily quiet, and smelled a little dusty. The ceilings were high and she suspected the rooms here had been charmed for good acoustics because they didn't echo too much. It was lonely in a wistful, almost beautiful way.

The specific room where they kept the piano was a somewhat small, satellite room off the main music hall. It had an entirely glass wall that looked over the rolling hills beyond the Hogwarts grounds and there was a skylight in the ceiling, leaving the room generously bright.

As soon as she entered the room, she immediately felt better. There were not many places in the castle where you could just be alone for however long you wanted. Sure, there were corners and corridors where people weren't likely to come across you, but there was no place quite as isolated as the music department. Even though they still did have music classes at the school, there were few, leaving it all to Saffron most of the time.

Usually, she didn't like to be alone, but it was nice when she wanted to play and not have to think so much.

The piano looked just how she had left it the year before—an elegant, black concert grand piano. It wasn't charmed, it was just an instrument, plain and simple. It was beautiful, though. She wondered how much it was worth. Probably twice as much as her upright at home.

Saffron sat on the old chair and it creaked under her weight. She positioned her fingers over the keys of slightly yellowing ivory, and closed her eyes, letting her mind choose a song to play.

A fugue by Bach was the first piece she thought of. It was one of her favorites to play, the melody was pretty catchy and she often found herself humming it absentmindedly. She played it more quickly than how it was written, but she often made things a bit faster than they were supposed to be. It drove her music teacher mad while she was taking lessons as a child.

After playing through all the pieces by Back she knew, the uncomfortable feeling began to subside. The stinging on her arm wasn't stinging as much either.

When she figured she had been there for long enough, she couldn't tell how much time had passed. It felt like she was in some sort of daze as she played. She was worried she had missed part of dinner, judging by how low in the sky the sun had gotten.

Quickly, she went to open the heavy door that separated the piano room from the rest of the music hall. She turned around to close the door in too much of a frenzy to spot the dark figure standing at the other end of the hall at the double doors.

Then, she turned around again, and saw him standing completely still, watching her carefully from afar. With a shot of adrenaline, she gasped, "Oh, Merlin!" She leaned against the wood door behind her. After taking a couple deep breaths, she said, "Riddle, don't scare me like that!"

"It's not my fault you were frightened, I was standing completely still."

"That's what was scary about it! This tall, silent creature, standing in the shadows and staring at me," she said. "No one is ever in here. Why are you in here?"

The realization that Riddle was standing alone with Saffron made her face feel hot and the rest of her feel cold. It was not good to be in such a secluded part of the castle alone with him. If he was to do something, there was no way for her to protect herself.

It wasn't that she felt he was actually planning to hurt her. Even though she saw what he was to become, she wasn't quite sure just how much of that evil was already in him and how much he was going to develop over the years. What she was truly worried about was him discovering how much she knew.