If you’d told me that buying second-hand school supplies would lead to me chatting with a centuries-old dark wizard, I would’ve laughed in your face. Then I’d have asked if you were related to Trelawney. But here we are.
It all started in Flourish and Blotts. Every summer, the Weasleys make the yearly pilgrimage to Diagon Alley for school supplies, and it’s exactly as chaotic as it sounds. Seven kids (okay, only five were still in school, but close enough) running around a magical shopping district with Mum in full-on Herding Cats Mode. Add in Ron’s constant whining about his rat, Fred and George’s attempts to turn everything into a prank war, and Percy’s smug Prefect energy, and you’ve got the perfect storm.
I should’ve known something weird was going to happen when I managed to slip away unnoticed. It’s not easy to disappear when you’re a Weasley—we’re like a pack of Howlers in human form—but that day, no one noticed me duck into a quieter corner of the shop.
That’s when I saw it.
A plain black leather diary, sitting on the shelf like it was waiting for me. Nothing special—no title, no gold embossing, not even a cool snake design. It looked like the kind of thing Hermione would use to organize her study schedules. But for some reason, I couldn’t stop looking at it.
I picked it up, and the second my fingers touched the cover, a weird chill shot up my arm. You know that feeling you get when you’re walking down a dark hallway, and you know someone’s behind you, but when you turn around, there’s no one there? Yeah. That.
Most people would’ve put it back and walked away. But not me. I shoved it into my bag and told myself I’d figure it out later.
That night, after everyone had gone to bed, I pulled the diary out. The cover felt colder than before, but I ignored it. I was too curious.
I flipped it open, half expecting it to be filled with someone else’s notes or doodles. Nope. Completely blank.
I frowned. What kind of person buys a diary and never writes in it? Was it cursed? Haunted? (Honestly, if you live in a magical family and don’t consider the possibility of curses, you’re just asking for trouble.)
There was only one way to find out.
I grabbed a quill, dipped it in ink, and scribbled on the first page:
Vipera Weasley was here.
The words vanished. Just…poof. Gone.
I stared at the blank page, my heart pounding. Then, slowly, new words appeared in neat, elegant handwriting:
Hello, Vipera. My name is Tom Riddle.
Okay, so at this point, I should’ve freaked out. Talking books? Never a good sign. But instead, I wrote back.
“Who are you?”
Just a student who once attended Hogwarts. Like you.
That was the beginning. Over the next few weeks, Tom and I talked every night. I didn’t tell anyone. Not my brothers, not Pansy, not even Draco.
At first, I was suspicious. Who wouldn’t be? A diary that writes back is the kind of thing Dumbledore would confiscate in two seconds flat. But Tom wasn’t just a diary. He knew things. Things about Hogwarts, about magic—things no book in Flourish and Blotts could teach me.
He told me about Slytherin’s history, about ambition and power. About how the world wasn’t just black and white, good and evil. It was something far more interesting.
“You’re different,” he wrote one night. “You see beyond the lies your family tells you.”
I chewed on the end of my quill. “What lies?”
That you’re supposed to be just like them. That loyalty to the ‘good guys’ is the only path. You want more than that. You want to be remembered.
He wasn’t wrong. I’d never said it out loud, but I’d thought it a thousand times. Why should I spend my whole life in the shadows of my brothers? Why should I stick to rules that only seem to hold people like me back?
One night, I decided to test him. “What do you think about the Dark Lord?”
For a moment, the page stayed blank. Then, slowly, the ink appeared:
Why do you ask?
“I admire him,” I wrote back. “He’s powerful. People fear him, but they also respect him. I want that.”
The ink swirled on the page like it was alive, and Tom’s reply felt like a whisper in my head:
You’re not like the others, Vipera. You could have that, too.
Over time, Tom became more than just a voice in a diary. He became a mentor. He told me about his time at Hogwarts, about the Chamber of Secrets, about how Slytherin wasn’t just about ambition—it was about legacy.
“You’re destined for more,” he wrote one night. “I can feel it. You’ve got the ambition, the intelligence. You just need guidance.”
I hesitated before replying. “Guidance from who? You?”
Why not?
He had a point.
One night, as the rest of the castle slept, I found myself sitting in bed, the diary open on my lap.
“Tom,” I wrote, “do you think I could be like them? The Death Eaters?”
Do you want to be?
“I don’t know,” I admitted. “I just… I want to matter. I don’t want to be another forgettable Weasley.”
The words appeared slowly, like he was choosing them carefully:
You admire the Dark Lord.
“Yes.”
Why?
“Because he doesn’t care what anyone thinks. He does what he wants, no matter the rules. And people remember him for it.”
The ink swirled, and his response sent a chill down my spine:
Then maybe you should stop caring what people think, too.
I stared at the words, my mind racing. Tom was right. If I wanted to matter, I couldn’t let anyone hold me back—not my family, not Dumbledore, not anyone.
That night, I made a decision. I didn’t know it yet, but it was a decision that would change everything.
Looking back, I should’ve been more careful. I should’ve asked more questions, dug deeper. But at the time, all I cared about was that Tom saw something in me that no one else did. He didn’t see me as Ron’s sister, or a Weasley, or just another Slytherin.
He saw me.
And for the first time in my life, I felt like maybe, just maybe, I could be someone worth remembering.
TO BE CONTINUED•••
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and then Add to home screen.