1Looking back, it was fairly obvious that something was strange about that diary.
It would flutter open at random intervals and she could swear she heard it moaning during the night. Ever since she found the damn thing she'd been having strange dreams; one could call her a Seer, but the technicalities of such a claim would not allow for that term to be applied to her. You see, she could only play witness to the past.
Several times she had tried to change the things she saw, but found she couldn't. When she reached out to touch someone, her hand would go right through them. She would scream and shout warnings until her voice became hoarse and her throat raw, but still they didn't hear.
So, she watched the scenes play over and over again; she no longer flinched when she saw the green light of the Killing Curse hit Marlene McKinnon as she shielded her brother. Nor did she cry when she heard the screams of agony from the Longbottoms.
It's not that she didn't care -Merlin knows it keeps her up at night more often than not-, she just couldn't find it in her to do anything other than observe the scene, looking for a new detail.
Day by Day she seemed to become more drained; she found herself falling asleep in class and skipping Dinner to go take naps in the Gryffindor Tower.
When she wrote in the Diary, visions of the past would not haunt her sleep at night. She was beginning to suspect that she was sleep walking; at least twice a week she woke up with a new scratch or dirt-covered feet.
Yes, this is most strange, indeed.
He calls himself Tom.
He seems charming enough, and he is a great listener. He's also a genius: she can tell by the words he uses and the way he easily hides his natural inflection- instead favouring the sophisticated drawl of a Noble Pureblood. She tells him her secrets, her dreams, and her ambitions. She even tells him about how the Hat briefly considered placing her in Slytherin.
And though he was charming, and a great listener, and smart, he just wasn't there. He answered dutifully enough, and his answers were the ones she needed to hear, but they were too perfect, almost superficial.
She starts to suspect that there is something he isn't telling her.
Whenever she asks about his childhood he refuses to answer. He says it's because it is too painful for him to discuss, but she knows differently.
Tom Riddle is, after all, human, which means he makes mistakes, too. One time he had let slip that he felt Dumbledore was a 'crackpot old fool who is too naïve to be considered a threat'.
She asked what he had meant, but he never responded.
She had a bad feeling.
Tom said he wanted to meet her- that he was 'positively enchanted by the young lady she was becoming'. Though she knew there was no sincerity in that statement, she agreed.
He had led her down to the Girl's Bathroom, instructing her to run her fingers over the tap with a snake engraved in it. When she did, she fell to the ground, paralyzed.
She could feel Tom taking away her life. It wasn't painful -dying was almost peaceful, in its own way-, yet she still wanted to scream in agony.
He whispered to her that he had been making her set free the Basilisk, and that she was responsible for the near-deaths of a score of Mudbloods. He told her that she had been all-too-easy to control; it was almost pathetic, in fact.
And though she somehow knew that this wasn't the end, she still suffered a partial death; a crack in her soul that could never be repaired. She was no longer innocent, and she never would be again.
She always knew there was something strange about that diary.