Coin Metal
September 5, 1948
She roams the dingy streets of Manhattan, her second-hand shoes soaked with rain water. The girls before her had left behind a beat down pair of Kerrybrooke flats. Wetness lubricates her wriggling toes, which are undoubtedly blue from the cold. Her hands rub her arms, attempting to keep out the September breeze.
“Tom!” She calls, pacing along storefronts and sidestepping adults. Women shoot her looks of motherly concern, men lift their phone away from their faces, look at Hermione as if she was inconveniencing them, and then return to their calls regarding Wall Street stocks. It makes her feel surprisingly vulnerable.
Heavy charcoal clouds loom over her, threatening to erupt with rain and thunder. Her heartbeat thrums against her skin.
She spots a familiar second-hand jacket, that belonged to Billy Stubbs, across the street. The boy drags a limp body behind him into the opening of an alley. The two shadows disappear behind the alley wall.
Hermione’s feet rush forward without thinking, her arms swinging by her side. She runs across the street, avoiding a slow moving car, eliciting a blaring horn. Her hand clutches onto the brick opening of the alleyway as she stares down the narrow space.
Billy swings a fist. Tom stumbles backwards
“Tom!” Hermione screams.
Billy Stubbs’ head pops up, staring at Hermione with wide eyes. Tom absorbs the punch, not a sound escaping from him. His body ragdolls side to side, moving with a strange rhythm. Where he should have recoiled, Tom is deathly still. His eyes do not convey a glance of urgency or panic, but calm acceptance.
His limpness bears no indication of fear, or pain.
That fucking freak.
Tom crouches on the ground, his hands covering his neck and face. It’s quite clinical, the way he protects his vulnerable veins, ripe with blood. Billy stands above him, cornering him to the alley wall. Puddles of water and car grease pool on the gravelly floor. Tom’s beady eyes look back at her, clouded by stray locks of his dishevelled black hair.
He does not ask for help, does not scream or call for her to assist him.
Hermione is tempted to run away, to pretend she had not seen anything.
Her dignity has had enough. She can feel it, her identity slowly being shaved away and cut into the role of a caretaker, a sister by proxy and a guardian by choice. Hermione knows Tom will only grow around her, adapt so that he depends—expects her to do what she does. And what she does is help, and help, and help with nothing returned.
It hasn’t happened yet: Tom becoming reliant and expectant, a petulant eight year old reaching for her hand. Because when Billy brings down another fat fist, Tom does not relent, he continues to be silent. Hermione knows he can see her, knows he heard her. His body is folded on the ground, but his eyes are trained on her, his pupils a speckle of light in the darkness. Yet, he never asks for help, never expects it.
So why not now, avoid it all. Cut the nip in the bud.
Billy gets bored of the repetitive punching and starts to push Tom into the wall, with a hand on his neck. Tom’s throat glows purple.
Tom’s refusal to fight back has aggravated Billy. Tom gasps for air as silently as he can, methodically shifting under Billy’s weight to clear an airway for better access. Tom does not flail or kick.
Hermione surges forward, hands balling into fists and her heartbeat thundering in her ear. Damn her conscience.
Billy looks back at Tom, grabbing the younger boy by the collar of his raggedy shirt. He lifts his hand, coiling like a cobra to strike.
Hermione shrieks.
In quick footsteps, she races across the narrow alleyway, powerlines trailing in the sky. Hermione leaps and shifts all of her weight into her jump. She slams into Billy. He rocks side to side, heavy bodyweight resisting against Hermione’s momentum. He takes a heavy step back, wobbling away from Tom.
Hermione quickly lifts Tom by his shoulders, patting down his arms and wiping dirt from his pale cheeks.
He stares back at her, emotionless. His hand grips onto her jacket sleeve, soft enough to go unnoticed. Hermione notices.
Tom Riddle is as sickly-looking as orphans come. All skin and bones. Pale and grey. The only redness in his cheeks being burst blood vessels, the orphan flush.
There was hardly any expression of thankfulness or gratitude, no validation for Hermione’s efforts. Not that Hermione had any pride to be hurt. It was an incredibly humbling experience, to be orphaned. Tom, however, was born an orphan. Perhaps that was why hubris remained intact.
Unfortunately, she has no time to wallow in her habit of resenting Tom Riddle for being born an orphan and not orphaned along the way, like she had. She has no time to hate him for being her responsibility—as self-inflicted as it is. Because fresh, light red blood seeps over Tom’s cracked skin. She would feel guilty hating the injured.
“Are you okay?” She whispers, choking back a cry as her hand gingerly grazes the bruise forming on his sharp cheekbones. He’s far too bony for an eight-year old.
While Hermione almost weeps, Tom is unfazed, not even aware of the scab forming on his face.
Tom’s dark eyes look over her shoulder and his mouth parts.
Hermione falters, turning her head to glance behind her.
A heavy arm barrels into her neck, knocking her onto the ground. Hermione’s ear scrapes against the pavement. Her skull vibrates.
She opens her mouth and screams silently, clutching her shoulder.
“Billy.” She pants. “You don’t want to do this.”
Hermione scrambles to her feet, holding her hands up to assuage Billy. Tom stands, stiff as a stick.
“That kid’s a freak.” Billy exclaims, staring at Tom with disgust.
I know that.
Hermione bites back her response, catching her breath.
“The orphanage is expecting guests. The potential adopters.” Hermione says through gritted teeth. She presses a hand to her sore neck. “It’s Adoption Day.”
Billy freezes at that.
“Right now?” His thick tongue rolls in his mouth, slurring his words. Billy desperately needed speech lessons, his thick New York slums accent would hinder his chances of being adopted, Hermione thinks shrewdly.
Hermione nods and leans her back against the wall. Tom wobbles into her arms, Hermione has no other choice but to take him.
Billy nervously scans his surroundings. His throat dips as he swallows and he scampers off, heavy footsteps splashing in water. His backform gets smaller and smaller, before disappearing as he turns the corner.
Hermione’s breathing is suddenly audible, as her pulsing blood quiets down in the shell of her ear.
“Hermione.” Tom whispers, clutching onto the edge of her jacket sleeve.
She sniffs, inhaling her soot-filled snot.
“What are you doing here Tom.” She demands angrily, angling her head down to look at him. He stands inches shorter than her.
Being more physically mature, it occurs to Hermione she could easily beat Tom. Perhaps not as vigorously as Billy, of course.
Guilt overcomes her, quickening her pulse and scratching at her ears. Hermione quickly brushes Tom's hair away from his eyes, a loving expression to redeem herself from her cruel thoughts.
Shuffling, Tom digs his hand into baggy brown pants. He stretches his hand out and unfurls small fingers, revealing the shiny silver of coins. Black dirt is wedged beneath the ivory white of Tom’s fingernails. Hermione takes his hands in hers and observes it with a furrowed brow.
“Get rid of the dirt and trim your nails. Our visitors will want to adopt a clean child.”
“I was going to get the newspaper for you.” Tom says matter-of-factly as he shakes the coins in his hands. The redness on his cheek shifts to purple. The life cycle of a bruise.
Hermione inhales sharply. Warmth flames her heart.
She drags Tom into an embrace, arms snarling across his small back. His sharp nose digs into her bosom and his breathing tickles her skin. There was something quite comforting about holding things. He wasn’t her stuffed rabbit with a belly full of soft, manufactured fur. But his scratchy, rough corduroy jacket would have to do. Hermione settles her chin on his shoulders. Tom smells of car gasoline and coin metal.
“You’ve been out for too long. You’re starting to smell bad. Make sure you wash up.” Hermione murmurs into Tom’s shoulder.
“That was a good lie.” His voice is muffled in her jacket.
“What?”
“People being at the orphanage.”
Hermione pulls Tom away, he reluctantly lets her, his hands still clutching her jacket. She almost wants to pry him away.
“That’s not a lie. That’s why I came looking for you.”
Tom tilts his head to the side.
“Really?” He asks calmly, the kind of calmness unbecoming of a toddler.
Realisation hits her. Hermione grabs Tom’s hand, encasing his cold fist in hers.
“We need to go.” She says, dragging him out the alleyway and onto the streets. Tom silently follows her, allowing her to pull him behind her.
They pass parks and tall apartment buildings, which Hermione glances at wistfully.
“Tom.” A sudden feeling of anger blossoms in her chest. “Why did you have to go out and get involved with Billy?” She snaps, keeping her attention on navigating the thin sidewalks of New York.
Grey tinges everything her eyes land on. Not a ray of sunshine spared.
Tom remains silent.
Hermione halts, whipping around to glare at Tom. He tilts his chin up, eyes meeting hers.
“I’m sorry.” He blurts tonelessly after a moment of deliberation.
Tom, surprisingly well-versed in social etiquette, knows when to say sorry, but lacks the nuance that makes it believable. He says ‘sorry’ without meaning it.
She squeezes her eyes shut.
“Tom. No one is going to adopt you if you look like this.” Hermione murmurs, bending her knees so that the two are eye-level. She pulls her jacket sleeve over her hand, wiping dried crusts of blood from Tom’s chin. He leans into the gesture, greedily basking in all of her undivided attention.
His lip quivers and he keeps his eyes trained on Hermione, watching the way she breathes, the gentle curve of her lip.
-
Hermione and Tom return themselves on the orphanage front-door, slipping in with watchful eyes. Several cars line up by the boulevard sidewalk, round and skeletal in their industrial flourish.
“Where have the two of you been?” Mrs. Benson asks, dragging Hermione by her ear. Her eyes spark with tears but with one glance at Tom, Hermione dries up. She swallows thickly and follows obediently. Tom follows them.
It was quite typical for Mrs. Benson to shift the blame onto Hermione, to take her by the ear but not lay a finger on Tom. Hermione hates Tom even more for this.
Mrs. Benson slams the front door and storms through the foyer, Hermione in tow, Tom in addition.
“Are you not going to answer me?” The elder woman demands.
Tom looks at Hermione. She shakes her head. Nothing good would come out of the truth. He nods and keeps his lips in a thin line.
“Hermione. Tom.” Mrs. Benson sighs. “The potential parents have already met the children and are leaving now. The two of you have come too late.” She finally lets go of Hermione’s ear, only to observe the two orphans' injuries with a shrewd eye.
“I am very sorry, Mrs. Benson.” Tom answers robotically.
“I as well.” Hermione nods her head solemnly.
Her fingernails dig into her palm. Hermione had just lost an opportunity for both of them to escape the orphanage. Quite the opportunist, she thinks bitterly.
“Have any of the other children been adopted?” Hermione asks.
Mrs. Benson shakes her head grimly, reflecting her hidden desire to be rid of the burden that were orphans.
“I figured so, not with their uncouth vernacular.” Hermione mutters.
“The two of you shall see yourselves to bed. None of this behaviour is to continue.” Mrs. Benson says, waggling a reprimanding finger to Hermione.
Hermione and Tom nod as Mrs. Benson leaves, her heels clicking on the floor as she heads to her own quarters.
“I’m sorry Tom.” Hermione says quietly, walking down the hallway towards the bathroom. Tom follows her with quick footsteps.
“For what?”
“Making us late. Today could have been your lucky day.” Our lucky day. My lucky day.
Hermione pushes open the bathroom door and grabs the wooden stool. Tom steps on top, as per routine, his bony knees protruding under the flimsy material of his pants.
The two look into the mirror. Dried droplets of water stain the glass. Hermione wipes it with her fingers. Tom’s curly black hair is dishevelled, small pebbles and rocks lost in tangles of curls. The tip of his nose is red from the cold and the scrape on his cheek has taken on a strange green tinge.
Hermione grabs a towel and runs it beneath the sink, squeezing excess water out of it. She balls it up and runs it over Tom’s arms, blood and dirt smearing over the yellow fabric.
Tom reaches for Hermione’s neck, his skinny hand running over the sloping bones framing her shoulder.
Hermione freezes. It was times like these that she remembered Tom was still a child.
“Billy hurt you.” Tom frowns.
The corner of his lips twinge. Hermione’s skin itches.
-
That night, Hermione could not fall asleep. She stares at the ceiling adorned with old, pre-Industrial wooden beams. She bitterly wishes her parents would have died after the war, so Hermione could have at least been admitted to a more modern orphanage.
Sleep did not find Hermione because Hermione knew Tom. And she knew he had a penchant for extreme measures.
Hermione sits up on her bed, looking around the large room. Other girls shift in their sleep, beds lined up against the wall. Hermione scratches her neck and pushes her covers away, gently placing her feet on the floorboard. She takes a flashlight from her nightstand and wipes the mucus from her eyes. Her hand shakes as she turns the knob of the door. Footsteps creak on the floor, and her shadow trails after her. The winding corridor swallows her in darkness. Cars honk beyond the orphanage walls and the electricity whirs in the walls.
The door to the boys quarters is left ajar. Hermione shivers.
She pokes her head in, looks askance, then slinks her entire body. Toes peek from under blankets, wiggling at Hermione as she stalks between the rows of beds. Instinctively, she walks the same route, zig-zagging between the beds before she arrives at Tom’s.
The sheets are folded into a square, and his flat pillow lays primly on top of it.
Tom’s bed is empty.
Hermione’s breath stutters and she immediately heads to the door. She wipes the sweat off of her hand and onto her grey nightgown.
The flashlight shakes up and down as she bounds down the corridor. Her socks skid on the floor as she turns a corner. The air gets colder and colder; the hallways brighter and brighter.
A window has been opened.
Wind rustles and howls, a breeze flowing directly into Hermione’s hair, casting her curls in the air. Window panes creak. Hermione looks down the hallway, doors to her right, windows to her left.
Tom stands on a wooden chair, on his tip-toes, arms outstretched mid-air and out of the window.
Hermione bounds down the corridor, her breath hitching.
“Get down.” She demands.
Her footsteps slow as she approaches Tom, stopping at the base of his chair. Hermione peers out the window and angles her flashlight upwards. A string dangles from outside the window, a string thick enough to be a leash.
Hermione traces the flashlight along the string, slowly, downwards.
A rabbit, hung by its neck.
Blood.
All highlighted by the neon yellow of her flashlight. She jerks, stepping backwards and clamping a free hand over her mouth.
The rabbit spins slowly by its noose, rocking side to side like a metronome.
It eventually twirls to face Hermione. Its soft, plump white belly is split open with a clean incision. No signs of torn flesh or jagged lines. Hermione looks away before the rabbit can turn any further.
Tom tips his head to the side and stares at her blankly, innocently.
Hermione pokes her head out of the opened windows, her neck craning to look upwards. The leash is tied to the upper floor’s balcony railing, rough knots illuminated by the moonlight.
Ducking her head back in, she grabs Tom’s wrist, so as to avoid touching the blood on his hands, and yanks him off the chair. He falls gracefully to his feet, quickly walking to match Hermione’s pace.
She drags him into a closet, flicks on the switch and shuts the door.
Dust flies upwards and fills her nostrils. The two children lean against the closet shelves, piss-yellow light emanating from the lightbulb on the ceiling.
“Who’s blood is this.” Her voice wavers, scared. She shakes Tom’s hand violently.
His frail body shakes as well.
Hermione clicks her flashlight off and tosses it onto the shelf behind her.
“Tell me, Tom.” She pleads.
Tom looks at her, sharp eyes tracing the planes of her worried face.
“It’s the rabbits.”
Annoyance rises and she pushes it down with a deep, calming breath.
“Who’s blood is this, Tom?” She echoes.
“It’s the rabbits.” He repeats obstinately, his brow furrowing in annoyance.
Hermione stares at him with a hopeless stare, her shoulders deflating. She turns Tom’s palms over in her hands, collecting his fingers in hers. Blood pools in the creases of Tom’s skin, sticky and warm like syrup.
“Billy Stubb’s rabbit.” Tom finally says.
Hermione purses her lips. A tuft of white fur is wedged in Tom’s index nail.
“What did you do?” She asks breathlessly, even though she knows.
Tom is quiet. Guilty.
Hermione steps back, the wooden shelves poking into her spine.
“You can’t do this Tom.” Hermione says quietly, her hands trembling at the sight of blood. “No one is going to adopt you if they knew.”
“Not because it’s bad?”
“What?” She snaps.
“I can’t do this, not because it’s bad, but because other people won’t like it?”
“So you know what you did is bad.” She counters.
“No.”
“Look at you, talking back to me like you did something right.” Hermione snarls, throwing Tom’s hands away. His arms flail at his sides.
Tom peers at her. Anger rises in her throat.
“Tom. You can not do these things again.”
“Why?”
“No one is going to adopt a psychopath.” Hermione says sharply.
“Why do I need to get adopted?”
Hermione throws her head back, closing her eyes. The onslaught of a headache follows her movements.
“So you can leave.” She answers. “Do you seriously want to stay here? At the orphanage?”
Tom does not answer.
Perhaps it was because Tom had lived here his whole life, abandoned at the orphanage steps by his dying mother, that he did not know a life beyond sharing toys with other parentless children and eating meals at a cafeteria. Hermione, however, knew.
Hermione, with her fading memory, remembered going to school, returning home to parents with a house and her own bedroom. Although it was slipping away from her, Hermione carried herself with the dignity of a child who still had parents. Which she did not, not since 1942. World War Two proved to be quite disastrous.
“Tom. I read the newspaper. They’ve been closing orphanages since the war ended, we could be next. You need to get adopted so you can go to a good school and work a nice, respectable job.” Hermione explains.
“What about you?”
“I read in the newspaper too, that younger children have a higher chance than older children at being adopted. You have a better shot than I do.”
“Twelve is not old.” He counters.
“Twelve is not young.”
“Is too.”
“Are you arguing with me right now?” Hermione crosses her arms.
Tom looks down at his shoes.
“Go.” Hermione orders. “Wash your hands and go to sleep.”
“I’m sorry.” He responds automatically.
“No, you’re not.” Hermione places her hand on the closet door, twisting the handle and cracking the door open. “Now, go.” As if she was talking to a dog.
Somehow, she knows Tom did not feel an ounce of regret for what he did to Billy Stubbs’ rabbit. He gazes at his bloodied hands with fascination, not disgust.
“Don’t make me go.” He whispers. Tom’s still face waits for her imploringly.
“I don’t want to see blood. Go wash your hands.”
“I did this for you.”
Bile burns the back of her throat. She catches a glimpse of the browning blood on Tom’s hands.
Hermione shakes her head weakly, her mouth goes dry.
“Tom. Please wash your hands.” I don’t want you to get caught.
“Can I sleep in your bed tonight?” He takes a step forward, a hand reaching for hers.
Hermione darts back. Tom’s eyes narrow in frustration.
“Please wash the blood off.” Hermione murmurs quietly. Tom stares at his hands with furrowed eyebrows, observing them with exasperated confusion. As if he could not tell why it was so repulsive. “I don’t want blood to get on my sheets.” Hermione adds, looking at the ceiling.
She knows Tom has a smug smile.
Hermione opens the door, collects her flashlight, and leaves, her nightgown smelling faintly of iron.
She’ll have to say it was coin metal.