Albus was going to do things right this time.
Once he decided to travel back he considered saving Ariana, changing everything that followed. But if he was honest with himself, and he tried to be in his old age, he was afraid to relive the heartbreak that was Gellert from the beginning. Subdue him, he could do again. But love him first? So freshly, for the second time?
It could never be, the love between a powerful man and a dark lord. Wasn't that why he was here in Wool’s Orphanage?
Albus, spry and auburn-haired, signed the adoption papers. A very small, secretly thrilled Tom Riddle squirmed beside him.
The boy had not yet stolen a single thing, nor hurt a soul, nor heard of a Harry Potter. And he never would.
The time came to confront Gellert earlier than last time.
Tom watched from the doorway, his skinny pet snake named Beedle on his shoulder, as Albus flattened his tie under his waistcoat, put his hat on, and stared in his small mirror for too long.
Despite every attempt otherwise, the heart would not be denied.
The Mirror of Erised had always shown himself and Gellert in an empty room. But their love was contingent upon a burning world. A world on fire set them at odds, but without it they had no reason.
Love was about seeing oneself in the world, and even as foes Gellert, the great love of his life, always gave Albus a reason.
Greatness was thrust upon him and his imprisoned heart.
Their lives became a fairytale. Tom was the talented, princelike son of a hero. He thrived. He was never going to be a selfless and thoughtful child, but he was satisfied. That was all Albus could hope for.
As he feared, and sooner than he hoped, the Dark Lord came for his consort in Tom's fifth year.
Harry's intentions were clear and there was no way Tom could resist him, not when they lit the world aflame for one another, not when they always had.
Albus feared that raising Tom was nothing more than a feeble patch. Because he hadn't managed to convince Tom what he had never learned, himself: to seek a love that humbled rather than stirred ambition. Small pleasures, small lives, small loves.
Parenting, Albus knew, was lying. And whenever he watched Harry spirit Tom out from the Great Hall, he thought of his beautiful mother, and all that she lied to keep the great Dumbledores small and then failed.
Their story: they'd been practicing flying when they came across the body in the broom closet. “We came immediately to you,” Tom said through crocodile tears.
But his lips were swollen, and the body they’d “found” was cold. Harry was glaring at Albus, remorseless, his aura buzzing with a dreadfully familiar dark high. They were holding hands.
Albus had forgotten to fear this heartbreak. If he had done things right, he’d have never seen it again.