ALL I REMEMBER

+- Author's Foreword -+

WARNING: UK Orphanages in the 1930's were harsh environments, and this content may not be comfortable for everyone

This story primarily focuses on hurt/comfort, "puppy love" scenes. There is a fully-developed plot, but the core of the story is the relationship development between Tom Riddle and an OC.

This is not a redemption story, meaning the goal isn't someone redeeming or stopping Voldemort. It will explore the concept of redemption and have ethical themes, but none of these characters will be strictly "good" or "evil."

I try to be as historically-accurate and as true to canon as possible. I've researched orphanages, literature, etc. in this time period, so that I might present a realistic setting. If you notice any major inconsistencies, please let me know. After some deliberation, I've decided to only use British English when a British character is speaking. The OC is American to reduce my research time, as well as set up some fun scenes.

I

Muddy-Browns and Grassy-Greens

Domino Dewey could almost be forgiven for her unfortunate joke of a name. Yes, she was very odd, very different, very… unusual. But, perhaps in this case, different was good.

With an angry huff, Deborah Dewey crossed her arms and glared down at the muddied foyer floor. The floral-printed oven mitts she wore poked out from behind her bent elbows, and her frilly, white apron bunched against her generous bosom.

The front door had been left wide open, and all but one child had fled. Mature and mannerly as always, Deborah's knobbly-kneed niece still stood meekly in the doorway. Her feet were planted firmly on the dirty doormat, which no longer looked the practical solid-grey that it was supposed to.

"BOYS!" Deborah yelled up the stairs, promptly receiving the answer of a few delighted shrieks, "Get down here this instant! What kind of example is this for you to set for your cousin?"

As a series of thumps filtered through the thin slats of the wooden-board ceiling above, Deborah glanced back at her much-too-shy niece. Wispy, brown bangs framed her two big, doey eyes, and her thin lips were currently gathered into a miniature frown. The girl looked to be wracked with guilt, even though Deborah had never known her to break a single rule.

Indeed, for a girl who'd been named so carelessly, Domino was one of the most well-behaved children that Deborah had ever met. She hardly ever made a fuss. She was never impolite, and yet effortlessly clever. And, she had the most irritating habit of befriending virtually anything that breathed. Of course, no-nonsense Deborah had to admit that, perhaps, the bulk of her irritation came from jealousy… How had her goofy, single, American brother-in-law raised such a darling, while she herself had raised three troublesome terrors?

"Aunt Deborah, are you feeling alright?"asked the little girl, her small voice echoing in Deborah's ears, as if Domino were on the other end of a long, dark tunnel.

The air grew stale, and the hallways appeared to warp and swoon as Deborah felt her knees go slack. And just like that, Deborah's world faded to black.

James Dewey's insides were twisting and turning and contorting themselves into knots. He hoped one day he'd be able to forgive himself, because he knew his brother surely wouldn't.

"But, Uncle Jim, how will my daddy know where I am?" Domino asked with her abominable, nauseating, torture-inducing innocence.

"Your dad will come collect you when he gets back from his trip, Domino," James snapped, his tone coming across much harsher than intended, "These people will take much better care of you in the meantime… We just can't afford another child at home right now with Aunt Deborah sick and the world going the way it is. You understand, don't you?"

Domino shrunk back and nodded bleakly, kicking at the dusty pavement with her shoe, "Yes. I'm sorry, Uncle Jim."

"There's a good girl," he said approvingly, gently patting her back as he led her past the gloomy, ironwrought gates of Wool's Orphanage.

This place looks nothing like it did in the paper, James thought glumly as he took in the unkempt garden, overgrown fountain, and murky, darkened windows.

Vicious, metal spears lined the high fence that enclosed the small courtyard, and several floors worth of cold, lifeless brick towered overhead. The tall, ominous structure cast a long, dark shadow upon the hapless visitors far below, as if the man and child were walking straight into the gaping maw of a patient predator.

James suppressed a shudder as he pulled Domino down the short, stone walkway and up to a shaded arch, which overlaid two massive, black doors. He rapped twice on one of the thick, paneled doors and grimaced as the heavy thing creaked slowly open.

A tall, willowy, and heavily-freckled young woman peered around the crack in the door. As was the fashion for a modern woman of the thirties, her burnt-orange hair was swept back into a neat bundle of curls and waves, and she wore a prim, collared, button-up dress. After glancing once at James and then twice at young Domino, she propped the door more-widely open and called to a Mrs. Cole.

Heels clacked against hard stone, and soon a stern, middle-aged woman appeared, pulling open the closed second door with one firm thrust. As James took in the woman's sharp, gaunt features and her prematurely-greying hair, he had no doubt that this was the orphanage's matron.

At a loss for words, he avoided the woman's cold stare and gave Domino a light shove towards the door. The girl hugged her small suitcase closer to her chest and stepped forward, whispering a tentative greeting to the two older women.

As was his nervous tendency, James slipped his hat off his head and wrung it about in his hands, his mouth opening and closing mechanically as he searched for something - anything - to say. Finally, when he could find no words and could take no more of the women's accusing stares, James turned on his heel and fled back down the worn, stone path. Moist beads of the morning's chilly fog brushed past his face as he raced through the rusty gate.

He spared not a single glance back as Domino cried out Uncle Jim and the wrought-iron gate slammed definitively shut.

Strong scents of fresh grass and thick mud mixed together as rebellious weeds poked out of cracks in the wet pavement. Dreary, noontime rain had splattered the cement with puddles, luring worms, bugs, and other wildlife to play in the patchworked pools. Nature was slowly reclaiming the orphanage's cramped courtyard - and it was all the better for the young Tom Riddle.

See, other children were too fragile, too weak to expose themselves to the elements. They'd rather cower inside Wool's Prison than taste sweet freedom in the drizzling rain. Sure, some of the more adventurous orphans would join him outside, but they'd always congregate in their little social circles. They'd chatter away under one of the protective porch awnings or lounge in a safe corner of the yard. Sometimes they'd even chase each other around the stone fountain, though they thankfully never asked Tom to play.

No, Tom didn't need them. They said he was too smart, too quiet, too… weird. Dennis had even taken to calling him "circus freak," after Mrs. Cole drank one too many drinks on New Year's Eve and let Tom's story slip.

It was no matter though. Tom had gotten his revenge on Dennis - and his crony, Amy. One day he'd get his revenge on this entire orphanage.

Suddenly, Tom spotted a small flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. Jumping to his feet, he crouched low and crept slowly towards the gap between the edge of the fountain and the fence. There, on the ground beneath a clot of tangled vines, slithered the unmistakable form of a small, thin garden snake.

It wove gracefully through the grass, propelling itself forward with spring-like thrusts of its winding, curving muscles. Two yellow bands flanked its pointy face, and its olive-green scales gleamed against the dewy grass.

Tom reached for a stick, intent on poking the creature, so that he could watch it squirm. However, as he snatched up a stick from a deep crack in the pavement, the snake abruptly stopped.

"... wait… musssst ssstay ssstill… can't sssee me…" hissed the snake, its voice a low, raspy whisper.

"Of course I can see you, you stupid snake," Tom spat, though he privately thought that this talking snake must be the smartest animal he'd ever seen.

"It speaks?" replied the snake uncertainly.

Tom snarled, "Of course I speak! I'm not an idiot!"

Two silent seconds passed, and then the snake wound around on itself, turning to leave.

"Hey!" Tom cried out in surprise, "Where do you think you're going? Stop!"

If there was one thing Tom hated, it was being ignored. His whole life seemed to consist of people meeting him and then summarily casting him aside. His own mother had abandoned him here, this place where they tossed all the kids that weren't special.

Fortunately, Tom had discovered his secret power. He was special - his mother had made a mistake! But, of course, that mistake didn't matter anymore, because now Tom could make people stay. Yes, yes, bad things always happened to the fools that displeased him…

Tom squinted his eyes and furrowed his brow as he concentrated on summoning his secret power.

"You soiling your nappy, Tom?" boomed the deep, grating voice of one of Tom's top-ten least-favorite idiots.

"Dennis," Tom growled, clenching his fist tighter around the wet stick in his hand and then spinning around.

"Whatya doin' standing and hissing at the wall, you circus freak?" Dennis asked with a cruel laugh.

"I can show you, if you want. It'll be just like the cave," Tom replied coolly, tacking on a cruel smile of his own.

The cave had been the site of Tom's great triumph over Dennis Bishop and Amy Benson. Two summers ago, the orphanage had taken the children out on their brief, annual, beach holiday. Amidst Amy and Dennis' teasing and taunting, Tom had successfully lured the obnoxious couple into a creepy cave he'd found hidden along the side of a wave-battered cliff. There, in the privacy of this most epic lair, he was finally given the chance to demonstrate his secret power, to show them both who was really in control.

Since the incident, Amy and Dennis had behaved like skittish animals around Tom, never daring to cross him in front of the matron or the teachers at school. Unsupervised at the orphanage, it was another story, of course, but Tom still considered this state of affairs to be a marked improvement to their former bullying.

Amy badmouthed him at every opportunity, but she had taken to avoiding him at all costs. The much-more-daring Dennis had taken the opposite approach, making a habit of following and watching Tom warily, as if at any moment Tom might transform into a monster, turn, and strike. Thankfully, all Tom had to do was mention "the cave," and Dennis would scatter, leaving Tom happily alone.

"Okay, okay, okay!" Dennis stammered in a hurry as he defeatedly held up his hands in a gesture that Tom was sure would serve him well in his likely future career, "I was just… checking on you. Ya were acting even weirder than usual. I'm going..."

Dennis walked away cautiously, not turning his back on Tom once until he'd finally reached the front porch.

Glancing back at the snake, who was now curled up unassumingly in the grass, Tom considered Dennis' claim that he'd truly been "hissing" instead of talking, as well as how surprised the snake had been when Tom first spoke. Perhaps this was yet another use of Tom's secret power…

Gleefully, Tom walked over and squat down in a patch of grass by the brick fence.

Then, he beat the wooden stick against a muddy spot on the ground, hissing commandingly, "Come here, snake! Let us speak!"

Domino felt even more awkward than usual. Everyone kept asking the same questions. What's that accent of yours? What's an American doing in London? Why'd your family leave you?

She had just finished explaining for, perhaps, the fifth time that she'd been visiting her British cousins in Croydon, when Mrs. Cole arrived to usher the crowd of children outside. Pot-bellied Mr. Cole was trying to install a bunk in Domino's new room, and he was having quite the rough time of transporting it with herds of small children ogling about.

"Domin-o, you can come play with us if you like," giggled Amy Bishop as she curled one of her long, golden braids around a stubby finger.

"Okay, thanks," Domino replied simply, though she doubted she could stand much more of her roommate's attention-mongering or needless grandstanding.

Satisfied, Amy and the rest of her gaggle of girls skipped merrily over to one of the better-kept stretches of grass along the courtyard fence. The girls squealed as the humidity hit their hair and sent it into a fit of frizzles.

Domino sighed deeply as she at last enjoyed a moment to herself, a chance to take in and process her new surroundings. Standing beneath the sheltering, brick arch that protruded from the orphanage's front door, Domino surveyed the now-crowded courtyard.

A slight haze blanketed the scene before her, the light London drizzle streaking from sky to earth, like the fuzzy streaks sometimes seen on those fancy, new television sets. As she peered through this rainy interference, she spotted nothing but a blur of miserable, dull colors, as even the orphans were dressed in uniforms of dreary slate-grey. Blotting out the greens of the grass and the dark-reds of the brick, the children currently clustered together along nearly every available stretch of wall and patch of pavement - save one.

Wedged between an overgrown bush and the inoperable, stone fountain sat a dark-haired boy with a long, wet stick resting in his lap. Exposed nails and knots of hanging ivy poked out from the surrounding fence. It wasn't exactly prime real estate, but still, somehow the wiry-looking boy had managed to claim this corner of courtyard all for himself. Angled away from the door, he hunched protectively over something in the grass, his eyes flitting about whenever he glanced suspiciously over one shoulder.

Domino ignored the shrill hoots and hollers of the children across the square and marched right over to the shifty, little boy. He was eagerly hissing at the ground but fell silent as soon as her slight shadow draped over his play area. She leaned around to peek at whatever it was he was playing with and promptly received a most-impressive glare.

Domino's eyes, however, grew big and round as they fell upon a small, coiled snake.

"Are you talking to that snake?" she gasped, her muddy-brown eyes meeting his grassy-green grey.

"Yes," hissed the boy as he appraised her warily.

And, without further ado, she plopped down next to him, adjusting her body to shield the snake from anymore prying eyes.

Domino simply loved animals of all shapes and sizes. She had always wished for the ability to speak with one of the fascinating beasts, though all of her attempts had been woefully unsuccessful.

Thus, while staring reverently at the coiled creature, she clasped her hands in front of her chest and squealed inelegantly, "It's so cute! What's it saying?"

The boy raised his dark eyebrows in surprise, before carefully schooling his expression back into a cool, unaffected glare.

"Why should I tell you?" he demanded.

She gave a small shrug and stated plainly, "I don't know? Because it's cool."

The odd, little boy stared quietly for a moment, before narrowing his eyes once more and whispering, "She says she's traveled a great distance."

After a brief moment of consideration, Domino inquired earnestly, "Is she hungry?"

She hoped to earn the friendship of both the snake and the snake-boy by being helpful. The young boy didn't seem to be particularly friendly, but Domino was used to these emotionally-distant sorts.

See, the greater Dewey family was practical, logical, and no-nonsense as a rule. Her father had been the sole exception, as even Domino herself tended towards polite seriousness. She supposed it was exactly that sort of practical mindset that led to her uncle's decision to drop her off here.

When the boy finally quit his staring, he hissed something unintelligible at the snake. The little snake's pink tongue poked at the air as it responded with a low, quiet hiss of its own.

"Yes," the boy then translated disinterestedly, "She says she swam here to look for food and a place to lay her eggs."

"She's laying eggs?" Domino crooned, bouncing up and down on her crossed legs.

"It would seem so," the boy answered flatly, apparently unimpressed.

Domino wasn't the least bit surprised by his scorn for her childish, emotional displays - boys were always like that. What did surprise her was that he was even bothering to hide his obvious interest. Because, yes, despite his practiced, bored expression, Domino could clearly see that his sharp, intelligent eyes were glinting wildly.

"Say, we should go find some food for her!" exclaimed Domino, jumping to her knees and then posing mid-squat, as if a race were to begin any second, "And then maybe we can build a nest for her babies!"

"We?" sneered the boy, an expression of pure incredulity on his face.

"Yeah! Me and you, silly!" she replied, rolling her eyes.

Apparently that was not the proper thing to say to this boy, however. He tensed immediately, raising the long, wet stick from his lap and gripping the wood so hard his knuckles blanched white.

He stabbed the stick emphatically at Domino's face, while growling dangerously, "I am not silly."

Domino's face scrunched into an uncomfortable position as she strained her eyes, attempting to focus them on the tip of the stick, which was currently hovering an inch in front of her miniature nose. However, she was not afraid of this boy, his stick, or his silly temper-tantrum. No, she was much too interested in this power of his to let him scare her away. She would simply ignore his moodiness, so that they could move along already to the more important stuff.

"Okay, fine. We can be serious if you want," she sighed, shuffling away from the stick, before continuing enthusiastically, "So… How do you say Hello in snake?"

The boy merely scoffed, "What makes you think you can speak snake?"

Domino was becoming quite exasperated with this boy's difficult attitude. Good grief, there were magical forces of nature to be studied and harnessed! Who had time to get territorial or speculate?

Summoning her patience, she explained matter-of-factly, "I don't know - but, we should find out! You need to train."

The boy's cool demeanor broke, and he blurted out in surprise, "Train?"

"Yeah! You obviously have superpowers. Not like The Shadow's powers, but the idea is the same…. You're just like… Doctor Dolittle and Mary Poppins! Ah, those books are my favorite…" swooned the little bibliophile as she trailed off, before quickly resuming her gleeful explanation, "Maybe you have even more special powers, and you don't even know it!"

Once more, the boy replaced his face with a neutral mask. He was quite good at that, actually. And, indeed, as he pondered silently for a long moment, the only indication of change to his fine facial features was a slight narrowing and widening of the eyes.

"So? Maybe I do have more powers…" he started to say slowly, finishing in a challenging tone, "What do I need you for?"

Domino supposed it was a fair question, although she thought it was quite plain-as-day that this boy needed her assistance. So far, he seemed rather rude and rather lonely and rather unmotivated to make some sense of this power of his. Good grief… He had mystical powers to develop, and all he was doing was sitting here brooding!

"I can help! I can be your sidekick! Like Tonto and the Lone Ranger…" she tried to explain.

However, Domino swiftly gathered from the boy's blanker-than-usual expression that orphans didn't get the chance to listen to too many radio shows. Ugh, her new life at the orphanage was going to be difficult indeed…

"The point is, I can help you," she huffed, "and, maybe I can learn some magic too."

"Magic?" he inquired with amusement, "I thought you said superpowers…"

"Magic is a superpower! Haven't you read Mary Poppins yet?" she scoffed, "It says everyone is born with magic, but only exceptions like Mary Poppins get to keep it. And, she can speak to animals - just like you!"

The boy puzzled over this newest information, before admitting indifferently, "No, I haven't read that book. All the new books at the library are always checked out…"

"Oh," Domino gasped in horrified fascination as she considered the unprecedented horror of having to fight other people for books, "That sounds terrible! You can borrow my copy if you like. My uncle only let me bring the one, though…"

The boy seemed a bit surprised by her offer, and Domino couldn't help but wonder if he'd ever been offered a book before. All of the other children seemed to avoid him, and she couldn't imagine them sharing with him anything more than the time of day - and then again, maybe not even that, if he was always this caustic in conversations.

"Also… This Mary Poppins…" he began musing aloud, while casually glancing around the visible courtyard, as if their magical conversation was only slightly more interesting than the cement, "I can't really speak to all animals. So far, it's just snakes."

His emotional expressions were so minute, some miniscule flicker of movement here or there on his otherwise-neutral face. However, Domino believed she was starting to get the hang of it - he really would've made an excellent Dewey. Yes, buried just beneath his bored expression there was a hint of painful discomfort. For some unfathomable reason, it was as if he thought admitting he could only speak one secret magical language instead of all of them was some extreme mark of shame.

"Hmm… Well, see! That's why we need to investigate this, like good detectives…" she replied encouragingly, quite eager to begin their secret training, "I know! We should make a list."

Before the strange boy could protest, Domino jumped to her feet and dashed all the way to the front door. The doors were quite heavy and she struggled against the rightmost one with all of her weight, pushing hard as a few older children snickered from their lounging spot near one of the tall windows. Finally, Domino was able to prop the door open just enough to squeeze through, and she carefully made her way up to her room.

The orphanage was organized rather practically, but, really, so was a prison. Hallways filled with monotonous rows of doors, each leading to nearly indistinguishable rooms, did little to banish the impression that this was a place for the unremarkable, the common, the rejected. Everything here was quite clean but worn-down, as if the entire building's existence were but an afterthought of the world.

Domino padded up three flights of dimly-lit, chipped, stone stairs to the floor reserved for all children ages eight to ten. She then turned left for the eastern half of the building, which was reserved for females only. She next proceeded towards the third door from the second window on the left. As she passed nondescript door after nondescript door, she tried to imagine that she was just a unique, beautiful, beloved book being reshelved at at an orderly library, rather than an unwanted child being stuffed away and stored behind some blank, anonymous door.

Finally, she reached her new bedroom. It appeared that Mr. Cole had finished assembling the upper bunk for Domino's bed, though no one had bothered inviting the orphans back inside and out of the drizzling rain. Her small suitcase was exactly where she'd left it, resting next to the girls' shared wardrobe. Thus, Domino very quickly rifled through her things, retrieved a notepad and her favorite pen, and then raced back down the stairs.

Yanking on the doorknob, she had just about opened the heavy front door wide enough to escape outside, when a cold, bony hand slapped down firmly on her right shoulder. Domino released the door handle with a yelp, her gaze snapping up to greet her stern captor.

"Miss Dewey, what on Earth are you doing inside?" snapped a rather weary-looking Mrs. Cole, "Do you not realize that you have very limited time outside to play?"

"Yes, ma'am - I mean, no! No, ma'am, I do not not realize…" Domino stammered as she wrestled with the logic of her own words, "I was just retrieving some of my things from upstairs."

"Retrieving," slurred the matron, cocking a thin eyebrow as she thoughtfully rolled the word over her tongue, "That is a very nice word for someone your age. Do you do well in school, Miss Dewey?"

"Yes, ma'am," Domino answered without hesitation.

"And so polite too. Good, good. I suspect you won't be with us for too much longer, Miss Dewey," said the matron, looking quite relieved.

Domino didn't know what Mrs. Cole had to be so relieved about. Domino hadn't been the slightest bit troublesome or noisy. In fact, she thought Mr. and Mrs. Cole were far more likely to disturb her peace than the other way around. Whether it was arguing over the bed assembly or screaming at each other about adult drinks in the kitchen, it seemed like those two were always fighting.

Still, guilt nagged at her delicate heart for being such a bother. Domino crossed her arms and scuffed at a stone floor tile with her dirty shoes.

Her expression was rather downcast as she replied, "I suppose not. My daddy said he didn't want to be gone too long."

"I see. Well," Mrs. Cole said sharply, glaring at the crusty streaks of mud that Domino had rubbed into the floor, "Miss Dewey, in time you'll learn to accept that your father is not coming back."

Domino abruptly ceased her guilt-ridden ritual. With the inner sole of one shoe, she swept the crumbling mess she'd made into a neat, little pile, while she stubbornly prepared to argue against this foolish notion until she was blue in the face. Her father was a good man, and he loved her!

Voice raising to a tender whine, she stammered once more, "But, Mrs. Cole, he is! He's just on a trip - he doesn't know I'm -"

"Please, calm down, Miss Dewey. There's no need to make a scene," the matron interrupted curtly, her tone clipped but her expression surprisingly gentle, "Leave that mess - the others will only track more in later. Now, run along! I think that's quite enough of this for today."

Thankfully, Mrs. Cole pried open the obnoxiously-heavy door, before shooing the girl away. Finally, Domino was free once more, free to rejoin her hissing playmate and get down to the bottom of this superpower business.

The pale, British boy was still seated cross-legged beside his scaly companion. However, he sat up straighter as he saw Domino approach, clearing his throat and fixing her with a condescending glare. No sooner had Domino reclaimed her grassy seat than the boy launched into what seemed to be a meticulously prepared and rehearsed speech.

"It's about time! Now, you clearly are ignorant of the way this place, Wool's Orphanage, works. Firstly, no one is going to just share pencils and paper with -"

"That's okay, I brought my own!" interrupted Domino, which of course left the little boy fuming mid-speech, "I also have some crayons and a coloring book. If you want, I can show you those later?"

The boy ground his teeth in irritation, clenching and unclenching his fists and violently pulling at the grass. It was such a shame to see perfectly-good grass cut down in its prime, but Domino supposed an orphaned loner like him didn't exactly have an abundance of emotional outlets.

"As I was saying, you are ignorant," spat the boy, before he finally smoothed his furious scowl back into his favorite neutral expression and continued, "Don't expect people to share. Secondly, you don't just parade your stuff around or it's liable to get stolen. Thirdly, and most importantly, I do not play with someone like you."

"Why not?" she cried in protest, interrupting the wannabe-orator yet again.

He deadpanned, "I don't associate with people too ignorant to know the meaning of the word 'ignorant."

Ugh! His ignorance of her lack of ignorance of the word ignorant was most insulting. Domino had never won any spelling bees per se, but she was an advanced, avid reader - and that meant vast, voracious, voluminous vocabulary!

"I know what ignorant means!" she scoffed, raising her chin in defiance, "It means 'lacking knowledge.'"

At this point the patch of Earth on which they sat had been reduced to a grass-littered graveyard, and Domino feared the boy might start pulling out his own hair next. However, more casualties were mercifully spared, when the odd child finally folded his hands in his lap and grasped onto the long stick instead.

"Well, perhaps you're capable of basic reading vocabulary after all, but you're still not as smart as me," the boy said pleasantly, while his haughty smirk said something else entirely, "Do you know the definition for the term 'liable'?"

"Hmm… no, but I know the definition for the term pompous," she retorted, before giggling wildly at her own joke.

SNAP!

With a vicious snap, the long stick cracked into two halves. The boy now held a jagged half-stick in either hand, brandishing one on either side of his menacing glare.

Between sharp, shallow breaths, he hissed, "Go. Away. If you know what's good for you, you'll stay away from me, new girl!"

"Domino," she immediately replied.

Slowing his angry panting, the boy lowered each stick to the ground and frowned in confusion as he asked, "Pardon?"

Correcting the boy had been a reflex as involuntary as blinking. She had been introducing herself to other children all day, and it had simply slipped out.

"My name is Domino, not new girl," she explained.

Each jagged half of the now-mutilated stick clattered to ground, adding yet another set of plant remains to the boy's already-crowded, grass-strewn graveyard. Either corner of his lips rose gracefully up the gentle contours of his face as his frown resurrected into a wicked, jeering smile.

"Well! And here I thought I had a poor given name," he laughed bitterly, "At least I'm not named after a tabletop game."

Domino knew he probably expected her to cry or to run off in a huff. But, she'd been weathering the inevitable storm of insults that accompanied her name for quite some time - and she was proud to say that she'd grown a rather-thick skin. Domino also knew he probably wasn't expecting her to be pleased.

Yet, contrary to expectation, her eyes grew wide as saucers, and her delicate eyebrows jolted upwards to hide behind her bangs. The boy looked quite perturbed as she eagerly leaned over her crossed legs and drew nearly nose-to-nose with him.

She gasped, "You don't know what 'domino' means!"

The boy's eyes narrowed intently, his gaze flitting about her face as he seemed to be desperately recalculating something.

"What? Of course, I know what a domino is…" he muttered.

"Nope!" she tutted, while touting a playful grin, "They didn't just make the word up for the game! There are two other definitions. Historical facts, really… Well! Guess you're not as smart as me."

Though he'd already exhausted all available vegetation targets, the boy promptly resumed his fuming. Really, he was quite good at that as well. Domino was even starting to consider adding masks, glares, and angry outbursts to his superpowers list.

"You do not want to make an enemy of me, Domino," growled the boy, delivering each syllable of her unfortunate name with disdain.

Yes, yes, he really was quite good at this fuming thing. Of course, she had her own sort of superpower as well - she was rather good at getting along with people when she wanted to.

Arming herself with her friendliest smile, she replied genuinely, "Of course not! I want to make you a friend!"

"You want to be my friend?" sneered the boy, his tone tragic in its disbelief.

Domino slapped a muddy palm to her face and sighed. This was going to be much harder than she'd thought…

"Duh! That's why I'm over here?" she said, rolling her eyes at the obviousness of it all, before returning to this befriending business, "So. We should start by listing our powers…"

At last, she propped her small notepad against her knee and prepared her pen with a satisfying click.

"I don't need friends," the boy muttered quietly.

"Okay…" Domino mused aloud, staring thoughtfully at the blank first page of her notepad, "I don't think that sounds very powerful though."

"No, you idiot!" he snapped, "I'm telling you to go away and leave me alone."

Domino couldn't recall ever meeting a boy more difficult than this one - more 'obstinate,' if she were to use her considerable reader's vocabulary. After a long morning filled with parental abandonment, she was far too tired to indulge his pettiness any longer. Why was he so dead-set on wasting time? They could be well on their way to being friends with magical superpowers by now.

"No way! There's way too much work to do," she insisted, heaving out a dramatic sigh, while she counted the tasks on her fingers, "We still have to figure out magic and write down the snake language and feed the pregnant snake…"

"Fine," agreed the boy quite unexpectedly, "I will allow you to work with me… for now."

"Yay!" Domino shouted triumphantly, hovering her pen tip over the empty notepad page, before she gasped, "Oh, wait - what's your name anyway?"

"Tom," he answered shortly, a strange, bitter edge to his voice.

"Tommm…" she hummed as she penned his name on one of the faint, blue lines, "Nice name."

OUR SECRET POWERS / MAGICK

TOM: (1) SPEAK TO SNAKES* (2) MIND CONTROL (3) HURT BAD PEOPLE / TELEKINESIS

DOMINO: (1) MAKE PEOPLE LIKE ME / PSYCHIC? (2) SPEAK TO SNAKES**

*MAYBE OTHER ANIMALS

**HAVE TO LEARN FROM TOM THE HARD WAY

THE SECRET LANGUAGE OF SNAKES

hello - ha dis ha

grass - kiss da sas

Tom - hiss dak sss

Domino - das ki ka sss