Cage
“You’ve got an hour.”
Any response Harry could have made died in his throat when the guard opened the rusted, metal door.
The room could have been mistaken for a cupboard.
It was small, cramped, and unfurnished. There were no paintings, no desks. There wasn’t even a place for him to put his bag. All it had was a chair, a single bloody chair in the centre of the room facing a wall-sized square made of glass.
Harry tried not to make a face, already regretting coming here in the first place.
He knew it would be bad.
Prison wasn’t a pleasant place in England; it wasn’t difficult to imagine that America would be the same.
It was the first thing he’d considered when he’d made his choice to come to America, in the first place. It hadn’t been easy, convincing himself that it was the right choice, that it was the only way he could finally move forward from what happened, and yet—
Harry knew what he was getting himself into. This small, sterile place shouldn’t have come as such an unpleasant shock.
And yet—
It had.
Somewhere, deep down, Harry had had the faint hoped that it wouldn’t be that horrible, that he wouldn’t have to think about the fact that he was seeing his ex-best friend in prison and not over drinks at their local pub.
It was stupid, absolutely bonkers, but that hadn’t stopped him from hoping, hadn’t stopped his stomach from clenching tight with pain when he stepped inside.
This room that looked too much like that cupboard under the stairs, like that hellhole back in the Dursley’s home that he hadn’t thought about since he’d left.
And now Tom was living in one, had to live in one until the bloody rest of his life. He didn’t wish that on anyone, even when—
“He’ll be here in five minutes.”
Harry blinked, thoughts scattering at the low click of the door closing shut behind him. The guards had left him alone.
Five minutes.
Harry’s chest tightened at the same time his heart began to race.
Five minutes, and I will see him.
Harry sat down on the chair, unsure of what to expect, of what he could even say. He hadn’t talked to Tom in years, not since the news broke out.
Gods, how did anyone visit their loved ones in prison?
Closing his eyes, Harry tried to focus on his own breaths as he waited and not on the slow drip of the seconds ticking by, on the terrified murmurs in the back of his head telling him that he shouldn’t be there, that he should leave.
There was a clock on the opposite side of the glass window, but Harry couldn’t make out the numbers. The glass blurred the hands, muddled the minutes.
In and out.
Harry breathed in through his nose and out through his mouth.
“Hello, Harry.”
Harry jumped in his seat, a rush of fear and something that he refused to identify swimming in his veins.
“It’s been a long time, hasn’t it?”
Harry tried not to panic, forcing himself to suck in steady breaths to calm himself and level Tom with the coolest glance he could muster.
This was it.
The moment he’d been waiting for since he’d made his decision.
It was foolish to think that anything could have prepared him for the reality of Tom.
Harry tightened his hands into fists, stomach churning with anger and distress, with longing and hurt.
Tom was sitting in front of the window, arms carefully tucked over his thighs. His hair was well kept even though he wore it longer than Harry remembered, his skin still as bloodless. He looked normal, the same way he had when Harry had last seen him, except—
Harry’s breath caught.
His eyes.
Those were different.
There was something to them now that Harry didn’t recognise, a glint mixed in with a familiar sliver of humour.
Harry swallowed, bracing himself for the task at hand. He wasn’t here for pleasantries, wasn’t here to catch up.
“Why did you do it?”
Tom’s expression didn’t change. If he was bothered by Harry’s lack of greeting, he didn’t show it.
“Why did you kill him?” Harry pressed, fingers beginning to shake and hating himself all the more for it when Tom’s gaze flickered to his hands and back to his face. It couldn’t have been more than a second, but Harry felt its weight like a layer of mesh.
“Is that really what you’ve come all this way to ask, Harry?”
Tom’s lips lifted into a smile as he asked, his eyes flashing with delight. Harry’s jaw clenched.
No.
“Yes.”
Tom tilted his head to one side, assessing, dark ringlets falling in his eyes in a way that they’d never had before as Tom appraised him. Harry’s skin began to crawl.
“Liar,” Tom purred, a hand coming up to press against the cage of glass separating them. “If you can’t be honest with yourself, at least be honest with me, for old time’s sake.”
Harry froze, throat catching when Tom slowly rose from his seat and pressed his other hand against the glass. He was no threat, no genuine danger, but Harry’s mind still shrieked with panic.
Leave. Leave. Leave. You have to leave.
It took every shred of strength Harry possessed to remain sitting.
“Do it.”
Tom’s eyes were smouldering, intent. There was no breath, no twitch that Tom didn’t catch. Harry knew it, could feel the inspection, the dissection, like a physical touch.
Tom had always been able to see right through him.
The circumstances might have changed, but that never would.
I can read you like an open book, a voice so much like Tom’s whispered in the back of Harry’s head.
Harry sucked a slow, steady breath to shake off his unease. He’d been dreading this from the moment he’d stepped on the plane, since he’d first set foot in the prison.
It was a question he’d planned to ask, but on his terms.
Tom had taken that luxury away from him.
“Coward.”
Harry was on his feet before he realised it, vision turning red with rage, stomach tightening with violence.
Coward.
His anger was like a scream, a fire devouring anyone and anything in its path. Harry couldn’t think past the flames, couldn’t breathe through the knots in his stomach demanding that Harry show Tom exactly how much of a coward he was.
Harry pressed so close to the window that his nose touched the glass, hands slapping hard against it.
“Why did he look like me?” Harry snarled, hands curling into fists to stop himself from punching the glass like he wanted to. He’d only hurt his hand if he did—this shit was bulletproof anyway.
Tom’s lips twisted, something feral flashing in his gaze. Malicious.
It was like a bucket of ice water had been tipped all over Harry’s head, like his rage had been sucked straight out of him, leaving only horror behind.
“Because I wanted it to be you.”
Harry’s mouth opened, but no words would come. The words were like stones in his stomach, weighing him down, dragging him down to the bottom of the ocean. They were lost.
“Because I—“
“Shut up,” Harry said, refusing to listen any longer, to let Tom say anything else. Something was in his throat, like a lump, a stone. Harry couldn’t swallow past it, couldn’t breathe through the block.
I wanted it to be you.
I wanted it to be you.
I wanted it to be—
Harry left, unable to stomach the look in Tom’s eyes, the stupid fucking smile on his face.
He just needed to get away, to get out—
I wanted it to be you.
Harry didn’t make it far. He got as far as the car park before he was vomiting everything he’d had for lunch, tears and snot streaking down his face. It was difficult to breathe, to think about anything but those words.
Those fucking words.
I wanted it to be you.
Harry wish he’d never come.