"Gryffindor!"

Tom Riddle walked to the red and gold clad table in silence despite the din that followed him to the table. The shouting and hooting that came as a welcome from the loud house was something he had never been accustomed to, or had even experienced before. He had expected the polite clapping of people who didn't really want him there, with their eyes staring at him beadily, expecting to find ways to pull him apart. He found hands reaching to pat his shoulder instead, his hands met handshakes, and his eyes met bright grins of welcome.

The other children in the orphanage had never welcomed him like this, or even treated him with any sort of welcome. Tom had been the unwelcome freak for as long as he could remember, being forced to use his magic to protect himself and everything that was his from other people. Yet, he had been accepted with open arms here. One of the Lions, and they didn't care about the fact that his robes were a little frayed from being second hand, or the fact that his trousers were a little too short. His neat hair had been ruffled into disarray already, and he had barely been seated at the Gryffindor table more than a few minutes.

Tom's glance reached the teacher's table, where his eyes met twinkling blue, and the man who had introduced him to Diagon Alley and the Wizarding world sent him a half-smile that was filled with welcome and apology. Tom hadn't been expecting that after the weariness he had been treated with. He had asked to be accepted, and Tom could already see that his request would be granted.

"So, you know our Head of House already?" the black-haired boy that had been sorted not long before him asked with a grin. The boy had caused mutters to rise in the hall for the length of his Sorting, just like his own.

"Dumbledore? Yeah, he delivered my Hogwarts letter," Tom replied, not knowing what to make of the question.

"I'm so jealous! I wish I got one of the Professors to deliver my Hogwarts letter!"

Tom paused. The boy was jealous of him?

"How was your letter delivered then?"

"By owl," the boy muttered despondently. "We get all our mail by owl. It takes away from the excitement of getting your Hogwarts letter if your parents have to go through all their mail to get to it first!"

Tom stared at the boy.

This was… new, and unexpected. Something Tom thought he would be able to get used to, maybe. It was probably going to take some time.

…oOo…

It hadn't taken long to get used to the magical world, not that Tom hadn't had a lot of time to get used to the idea. It was especially easy with the friend he had made during the Sorting ceremony, Harry Potter as he later introduced himself as. Sharing the same dorm had made it difficult for Tom to avoid Harry, not that Tom wanted to… most of the time, at least.

Harry could be a right menace when he wanted to be. The boy was hyperactive at the worst of times, and often dragged Tom into his fights with the Slytherins. And there were a lot of fights with the Slytherins.

Tom often wondered how Harry managed to get out of the duels unscathed. Every single time it seemed like Harry would surely lose, something always happened that caused the Slytherins to either withdraw or lose. It neared ridiculous, and it was over four years since they had entered Hogwarts for the first time.

Between the two of them, Tom gained the house points, and Harry lost them. Their entire house would have been exasperated if Tom didn't get house points faster than Harry lost them, which was a real effort, if Tom were to be honest. Harry was their much loved Seeker, and that protected Harry from them too.

Not that Tom would have let them touch Harry anyway.

Harry was Tom's best friend, and, despite having learnt what that meant only recently, Tom cherished the fact that Harry had never left him to befriend anyone else, even after he had become famous for being the youngest Seeker in their first year. That was when people usually left Tom, when they became famous and didn't need his companionship any longer, but Harry hadn't.

Tom was certain, despite Harry having never actually mentioned it, that most of the fights that Harry had gotten into was because a Slytherin had called Tom a "mudblood." Tom didn't really understand the insult, so it had never made too much of a difference to him, but Harry had clearly taken offense to it. Besides, the two of them knew that Tom had at least some magical heritage. The inheritance test Harry had forced him to take at Gringotts before second year had begun told them that.

It had caused both of them great amusement to think that the Slytherin House was continuously attacking the heir to their founder. Harry had wanted to rub it in their faces immediately, but Tom had wanted to wait.

Those green eyes had given him that look, and it had been extremely difficult for Tom to deny Harry that, so Tom had explained the plan to Harry. The grin that Harry spotted afterwards was one Tom rarely saw, but liked very much. It was a smile that showed that there was much more than Gryffindor in Harry.

Just like there was more than Gryffindor in him.

…oOo…

Tom wasn't sure where this strange feeling was coming from. He had noticed it growing, yes, but he had never noticed it growing this strong. Tom had never expected that feeling to lead to him stunning the Weasley boy for something as silly as hugging Harry. Tom was just lucky that there wasn't anyone else around to see that as even Harry looked startled.

"Tom?"

Septimus wasn't taking Harry away from him – Harry still spent almost every free moment with Tom. There was only the occasional time, like today, where they were parted to study for classes that they didn't share.

Those green eyes questioned him, asking for answers that Tom didn't know. For all Tom's genius, this was a puzzle Tom didn't think he could solve. It was horribly complex with variables that Tom didn't recognise. Everything was a tangled mess in Tom's mind.

He enervated Septimus a moment later, and left without a word.

He needed to figure this out.

…oOo…

Tom avoided Harry for the next two weeks. It was as difficult as Tom had first expected it to be, made worse by the hurt looks that Harry continuously sent Tom's way. Every time Tom caught sight of Harry heading his way with a determined look in his eye, Tom always darted into another corridor – there were many ways to get to any location in Hogwarts, after all.

He made sure to reach every class just as the Professor was about to begin, making sure that Harry had no time to approach him before the class, and hurried out as soon as the class ended. Even if Harry wasn't by his side, Harry was always on Tom's mind, and that was something that Tom had only just realised.

Well, perhaps Tom hadn't been quite accurate with how difficult it had been to avoid Harry, because it had been extremely difficult for the first week and a half. It was much easier now, and not because Tom had grown accustomed to avoiding Harry, because that would be an impossible task.

No. It became easier because Harry, for some reason unknown to Tom, had stopped actively seeking Tom out. Harry stopped sending Tom glances in class, or messages through other people. Harry didn't even bother searching Tom out in the crowd anymore, and sometimes walked right past Tom. He'd like to think that Harry hadn't actually noticed him there, but Tom didn't know whether that was better or worse.

And Tom had to admit, it hurt. He hadn't thought that it would come to this.

Suddenly it was Tom that was pursuing Harry, searching for Harry every time he entered a new room or walked down a new corridor. It was suddenly Tom that was sending Harry messages through other people, because Harry was always busy with something or the other. Tom didn't want to think that Harry was avoiding him, but Harry had never been this busy before.

… unless he really had been and had just cleared out his time to spend it with Tom. Tom could believe that Harry would do something like that, and that just made Tom feel worse for what he had probably made Harry go through. He had never thought that he would be the one to create distance in his relationship with Harry, the fear of Harry thinking that he wasn't good enough and leaving had never left Tom.

"Harry!" Tom shouted to get the other boy's attention.

The boy in question turned around, before smiling without a hint of the hurt Tom had been expecting to see on him, "Tom! Hi!"

Tom was just about to open his mouth to say something else, something that would hopefully extend their first conversation in weeks, when he was interrupted.

"Harry! C'mon! Longbottom was glad that you'd finally stopped ditching half of our Quidditch practices, don't start again now!"

Harry sent a sheepish look behind him, before smiling apologetically at Tom, yelling "Sorry Tom!" as he ran after the other boy.

Tom sighed at Harry's disappearing back. Hopefully he would get Harry at a better time in the future.

…oOo…

Tom cursed himself. He had allowed the rest of last year and the beginning of this year to pass, waiting for an opportunity that he should have known wouldn't come, not while Harry wasn't actively making time to spend with him.

It truly was ridiculous how busy Harry was nowadays. Tom would never have guessed it if he wasn't witnessing it for himself. Longbottom was a right slave driver, despite the fact that Gryffindor won every match anyway. Harry had been the one that had gotten Tom interested in Quidditch, he doubted he would have been interested in the sport otherwise. It had seemed too frivolous and silly when he had first heard about it.

It was Halloween today, the one day that everyone was in the Great Hall regardless of anything else planned. Tom watched as Harry talked animatedly to the group that Tom knew were part of his Care of Magical Creatures class: one of the few classes Tom hadn't wanted to take.

Harry was right there and Tom, you're a bloody Gryffindor dammit!

Tom took a deep breath. Now that he had actually figured that feeling out, approaching Harry out of the blue like this became significantly more difficult than it once was, because it was likely that Harry didn't feel the same about him. Tom didn't care though, he would be happy if he could have Harry's friendship back at the very least. Anything else would just be a bonus.

"Harry? Do you have a minute?"

"Awww, Riddle! Harry just started! You can't take him away from us already!" one of the girls complained.

"It's all right," Harry told them, "This can wait until after the feast. I can see that you're distracted already!"

Most of them laughed, although there were still a few that looked a bit upset about it. Tom couldn't help but marvel at how easily Harry maneuvered around other people, making sure not to upset the majority. Tom wondered if this was only a recent thing, or simply something Tom had never noticed.

"You wanted to speak to me about something?" Harry asked once they were far enough away from the group of people Harry had been surrounded by.

"Harry. I'm sorry for avoiding you like that…" Tom started.

"Don't worry about it. Septimus told me that you were extremely busy and that I shouldn't bother you all the time, that I should just let you be sometimes," Harry shrugged.

Tom's eye threatened to twitch in annoyance. So it was all Septimus's fault then? Not all, Tom corrected himself, just mostly.

"That isn't strictly true. I was just confused about something. I needed some time to think."

"Oh? So you're done thinking now?" Harry's voice had a teasing hint to it.

Tom took that in his stride, hoping that things were at least partially back to normal. "Yeah, I'm done."

"And your conclusion?"

"You'll just have to wait and see. For now, though, can we go back to normal?" Tom asked hopefully.

"There will be lots of upset people…" Harry started slowly, a teasing glint in his eye, "and I doubt we can really go back to what we were…"

Tom could feel the small buds of hope beginning to grow within him.

"But I suppose we can be friends again."

Tom let out a sigh of relief, together with a grateful smile. For now that would be enough.

For now.

Written for OTP AU Competition: Different House!AU

Written for Alchemy Assignment 9: [ridiculous; No first person POV; No using the word "said"]