#artsy reader

“Y/N?” He called out again as his feet landed lightly on the floor. That’s when he heard the shower water running and your soft humming coming from inside. He smiled to himself as he listened to your angelic voice, even when there was a door between the two of you, you still managed to make him smile. He decided to just wait for you to finish instead of letting you know he was here since he knew it would make you rush out. It had been a stressful week at school for you, and he wanted you to relax.

Instead he opted to just wander around your room for a bit. He picked up a framed picture of the two of you. you were at the park on a sunny day with an Ice-Cream that you were sharing. It was the most cliché thing ever, but he loved it. That was one of his happiest memories. He put the frame down and looked at the polaroid's that covered your wall. Pictures of you, your friends, your family, and your pets. You look so happy. Peter let out a small chuckle when he saw the photo of you two in face masks with his hair tied up on the top of his head like a toddler.

He started to stroll around, letting his fingertips glide on the smooth wood of your table, he picked up a snow globe and examined the trees inside of it. He had a mental debate as to whether or not he should put on your cherry lipstick but decided against it since being killed for breaking your makeup wasn’t on his bucket list. But that’s when his eyes landed on the leather sketch book sitting in a pile of pencils and eraser shavings. He slowly walked over to it looking around like he was committing a crime. With careful hands, he picked it up and out lined the golden tree in the front cover with his finger. The edges were warn from being carried almost everywhere you went. You were an amazing artist, Peter knew that much, you had won many awards from some of your pieces. Peter absolutely adored how artsy you were. Sitting with you, and watching you draw was one of his favorite things to do. You always worried that he would get bored, but he loved seeing you in your element. There have been a few times where you’ve tried to teach Peter, but it ended up looking like a preschoolers handy-work. Nun the less you still loved them and made him sign each and every one of them saying that ‘everything is art.’

The thing was, you were always really secretive about your drawings in your sketchbook, insisting that they were just ideas that flowed into your mind and were so terrible you didn’t want anyone to see. Peter knew for a fact that wasn’t true, but he also knew that you were a perfectionist so you both saw perfection differently. Peter respected your privacy, he really did. But it was like his fingers had a mind of their own as they started to untie the leather string. He flicked through the delicate pages, his eyes growing wide at all of the breathtaking things you’ve drawn. Every single detail was exact. With each page he turned he became more and more stunned. There was a drawing of the forest where you had your first kiss, and the view from the rooftop he showed you, there was a sketch of your school and he even found a random one of an apple you were eating, every pencil stroke precise. There was a beautiful lake, and a few super detailed drawings of up-close eyes. These were all memories.

That’s when he flicked to the next page and saw a title called ‘Peter’ with hearts around it. His breath caught in his throat and his heart felt like it was about to burst. You have a section in your beloved sketch book for him? Granted you did have like three for your dog but still, it made Peter ecstatic. Taking a breath he flipped the page and saw a drawing of him in science class writing notes with his tongue caught between his teeth as he tried to figure out the formula. He didn’t know whether to be astounded or roll his eyes at the fact that you were doing that instead of the work. Turning to the next page he saw one of him half in his spidie suit, sitting by your window. It looked printed it was so precise. The next one was of him and Ned when they finally finished building the LEGO Death Star. He remembered that day like it was yesterday. He was begging you to help them build it and kept of hassling you about sketching all day but now he couldn’t be happier that you stuck to that. The next was a close up of your hands intertwined, you were both wearing the promise rings he got. Absentmindedly Peter sat down on your bed, his cheeks were starting to get sore from how much he was smiling. Flipping the page again, he revealed one of your favorites, it was Peter sitting by a tree, laughing at something you said while rays of golden sunlight streamed down on him lighting up his hair and eyes. He didn’t even realize he was crying until he felt a hot tear land on his hand, he quickly wiped it away, not wanting to get your art wet. You are so precious Peter thought to himself.

“What are you doing?” You snapped; voice filled with panic. Peter turned around and that’s when you saw the tears in his eyes. Ok now you were really panicked, were your drawings that bad? Before you could say another word he ran up to your and hugged you lifting you off the ground and spinning you around.

“Woah!” You laughed as he put you down,

“What was all that about?” You questioned, tilting your head.

“I love you!” Peter exclaimed

“I love you, I love you, I love you!” He gently grabbed your face and places chaste kisses all over it, literally showering you in love.

“I love you too baby,” You smiled, pecking his nose,

“These drawings, I’m- I mean you’re- they’re” he was getting all tongue tied and flustered and you found it adorable. Laughing you held his hand and gave it a loving squeeze.

“Breath baby, breath,” you laughed

“Right sorry,” He took a deep breath and tried again.

“Y/N these drawings, they are amazing. Seriously, I mean I knew you could draw but this…” he trailed off pointing to the sketch book.

“This is a whole new level of amazing, I mean, I understand why that book means so much to you now. I seriously have the most talented girl.” he laughed carding a hand through his hair.

“And the ones you had of me? That’s- I think that’s the sweetest thing anyone’s ever done to me. I didn’t even realize you payed that much attention. There stunning. Each and every one of them. Just like you.” He added, putting a hand on your cheek. You were as red as a cherry by this point, unable to look him in the eye since taking complements, wasn’t really your strong suit.

“Now how am I supposed to be mad at you for prying when you say stuff like that?” You huffed feigning annoyance. He laughed at that, picking you up and carrying you over to your bed.

“M’ sorry I pried, but I’m glad I did,” he smiled.

“Well, I guess since you were so sweet about it I can forgive you this once.” You joked. Peter picked up your hands and balled them into his own, giving them a loving kiss.

“Who knew these hands could create such beautiful art.”

“Aww Pete” You buried your head in his chest blushing again. Suddenly, he got up. You watched him, dumbfounded as he collected things throughout your room. He came back and plopped himself opposite you laying out your sketchbook and a variety of pencils. He looked at you expectantly and you just tilted your head in question.

“Draw something?” He said hopefully, giving you puppy dog eyes. You scoffed.

“I can’t just draw something out of thin air Pety,” You stated matter of factly.

“Isnt that how it works?”

“I need to have inspiration, to be in the mood, I can’t just wave a paintbrush and boom! Artwork.”

“Inspiration huh?” He smirked leaning forward and tilting his head, you reciprocated his movements expecting to be met with his soft lips but instead he grabbed you and flipped you over. Attacking you with tickles.

“Ahhh!” You yelped trying to get away from him, but he cadged you in, his fingers lightly tugging against your sides making you gasp in laughter.

“P- P-heterrr” You laughed squirming around as he started to attack your rib cage.

“Feeling inspired yet baby?” He asked. You nodded furiously, one, because you wanted to breath properly, and two, he actually had giving you inspiration; it was him sitting above you, laughing while his soft curls framed his dusted pink face. He beamed and got off you.

“Yay!” He chimed like a child.

“You cheated,” you giggled as he once again pushed the art supplies toward you.

(And by affection, you clearly meant everlasting devotion bordering on obsession).

Regardless, whenever you seemed disturbed or uncomfortable by his staring, Brian’s eyes would furrow a little, which only heightened your embarrassment. However, your fear would be assuaged by what happened next.

He would always offer you a kind, but muted smile before pointing at your sketchbook once again. It was a calm, but almost childish gesture. Draw for him, it seemed to say. Relax and don’t worry, I won’t hurt you.

And well, when you’re stuck with a man who you know has been affiliated with circumstances not appropriate for polite company, you couldn’t help but acquiesce to his requests.

Sometimes, you would draw people. Other times, fancy landscapes and vistas would pique your interest and you would hasten your fingers and search the recesses for your imagination to better align your perceived vision and what you eventually drew on paper. Sometimes, a bout of madness would take over and you would draw abstract, almost nonsensical figures and shapes to bide your time.

Brian loved all of them.

In particular, he happened to like it whenever you drew your nonsensical shapes and fever dreams. There was meaning there, he had said. A meaning that you couldn’t quite grasp. You tried questioning him, but he would wave you off and putter around his editing software on his aged laptop.

(You tried asking a couple times what he was doing, but you never did get a straight answer out of him).

Whatever the case, you kept drawing because you had nothing else to do.

(There was nothing that you could do… especially after he had taken you away).

But there were times… times when night would come and you would find yourself itching for your colored pencils, your charcoal, or your paints. You had to draw…

You had to draw him.

Him. The man who had taken you away from your previous life, had forced you to remain submissive and docile, and was still encouraging the one thing that challenged you and kept you alive.

You wanted to draw Brian.

But how should you draw him?

Would you prefer to draw a mere caricature? Or would a realistic depiction do him justice?

The thing about drawing specific things—like people, in this instance—you needed a reference. You’ve heard of people posing for others, but you weren’t quite sure if Brian would be willing to stay still for you. He was the quiet sort of man, observant too, but the way he would stare.

It was unsettling.

And so, for a few anxiety inducing moments, you merely wondered if you should just picture him in your mind’s eye. Memory would serve as your muse.

You put your pencil to paper and—

Nothing.

For some odd reason, you somehow lost all memory of what Brian looked like. Were you suffering from artist’s block? Has your memory become faulty somehow?

You struggled for a few moments before settling on drawing something else.

Unfortunately, Brian, ever the watchful observer, picked up on your distress and walked towards you, a concerned look in his dark eyes. Apprehensive now, you practically drop your pencil atop your notebook, your breathing hitching in confusion as Brian sits in front of you.

“You know, you can draw me anytime you want,” he offered nonchalantly. “All you have to do is ask.”

You swallowed hard and nodded before picking up your pencil once more.

“Is… is it okay if I draw you?”

Brian smiled and said, “Of course.”

And then you drew him—him, the figure in your nightmares and dreams, the hooded figure in the woods, and the one who held your heart.

The drawing came out better than you expected.

.

.

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DISCLAIMER: I do not condone yandere behavior outside of fictional settings. Please don’t mistake the actions of fictional characters displayed in works of fiction to be considered harmless in real life.

If you want to donate a Ko-Fi, feel free https://ko-fi.com/devintrinidad.

It started (or at least, as far as you can tell) an entire week earlier when you’d walked in on Ophelia Greengrass sobbing in the fourth-floor girl’s bathroom during second period. Up until then you’d not spoken more than half a dozen words to Ophelia across your entire time at Hogwarts, but it had felt wrong not to say anything – and as it turned out, Ophelia had been in dire need of someone saying something to her. She’d been dating Lestrange for a little over three months and by the sounds of it things were not going well.

So of course you’d comforted her as best you could but it was hardly surprising when she tentatively approached again you the next day, and the next, and the next, and then every single day for an entire week there had been a new horror story until yesterday you’d finally had enough and told her that she should break up with him.

That, of course, was why he’d confronted you in the corridor that morning on the way to Charms, angrily accusing you of losing him his girlfriend. And that was why you and Lestrange had been caught by Peeves with a watering can full of Bulbadox juice brandished gleefully in his spindly hands.

Which was how you both ended up in the hospital wing for the entirety of first period, Lestrange with boils all over his face and down his back, and you with them on your hands from where you’d managed to shield yourself.

You’d left Lestrange behind complaining loudly as the matron peeled back his school shirt, sprinting all the way up to the Divination tower at breakneck speed, throwing the trapdoor to the classroom open and scrambling inside, the trapdoor falling shut behind you, the very final domino.

“Sorry I’m late, Professor,” you gasp as you spin around to face her. “Peeves caught me and Lestrange!”

The class snickers.

“That’s quite alright, quite alright…” Cassandra Trelawney says, deep and ringing, “we have not yet started, take a seat with Mr Riddle and we shall begin…”

You freeze. Riddle…?

That’s when it hits you.

Lestrange always sat with Riddle in Divination.

And you’re so late that everyone else already has partners.

You turn to see Tom Riddle sitting at the back of the room looking at you with a polite but blank expression on his face. The class giggles again. The vast majority of Hogwarts students are at least somewhat in love with Riddle – beautiful, intelligent, polite Riddle, orphaned and poor but refined and successful. Better yet he barely speaks to anyone, leaving a lot of empty space of endless possibility for people to fill in with their personal daydreams.

He scares you.

Those horrible boys that hang around him remind you of flies hanging around rotting meat. And if they’re the flies, that makes Riddle…

You grit your teeth and step forward, weaving between the other tables and snickering students to take your seat, dropping your bag to the floor and eyeing the tea set on the small table apprehensively.

“Begin your readings!” Trelawney calls.

You frown and turn to Riddle questioningly. “We’re doing tea leaves?”

“Tasseography,” he corrects smoothly, leaning forward and picking up the burnished copper pot with one hand and pouring steaming tea into the little china cup in front of him.

You blink at him silently. There’s something manufactured about his face that you can’t put your finger on.

“Shall I go first or would you like to?” Riddle asks casually, pouring you a cup, too.

“I don’t mind,” you mumble, looking away.

Riddle sets the pot down and picks up his cup in long, elegant fingers, lifting it to his lips. “The instructions are on page seventy-nine,” he says after taking a sip, looking around the room disinterestedly.

You pull out your book and find the right chapter and scan the first few paragraphs as Riddle finishes his tea, sipping absently at your own, and by the time he finally hands you his cup your heart rate has finally returned to normal from running up eight flights of stairs.

“You have a scattered-type formation,” you say, checking it against the diagram on your page, “and it’s north-west oriented.”

“Mhmm,” Riddle says noncommittedly, his dark eyes level on the parchment before him as he takes notes.

You lean forward over Riddle’s cup and frown as you compare it to the pictures in the book. “That looks like shepherd’s crook,” you say, pointing to a cluster shaped like a pinched hook, “which means… either the responsibility to protect, or the exertion of power and authority over a group of people.”

Riddle scoffs very lightly, his lips curling into a slight smirk as he continues to write.

Something about it had clearly struck a chord with him, but you pointedly train your eyes back on your book. “Oh,” you frown, checking his cup again. “Or it’s the old glyph for seven.”

Riddle stops writing. You look up curiously at the sudden lack of his quill scratching evenly on his parchment to find him perfectly still, his eyes on your face. “Seven?” he repeats, tone distinct.

You nod and push your book around to show him. “The number seven used to be drawn like that, too.”

Riddle’s eyes drop to the page and linger there for a moment before he resumes taking his notes – though his expression is much more preoccupied than before.

But something in Riddle’s cup has caught your eye. Beside the shepherd’s crook/number seven is a lump of tea leaves so distinct in form that it’s almost comical – the round of the cranium, the square of a mandible, and gaps in the leaves to indicate two eye sockets.

“Oh,” you say in surprise, pulling your book back around. “Wow, that’s pretty clearly a…”

You trail off, frowning. You’ve noticed the tea leaves below it, the long twisting trail that leads directly into the skull’s mouth. A cold, creeping feeling is curling in your stomach as something about the image before you seems to move, you can almost see the thing writhing, it almost looks like a…

“How are we going?” Trelawney asks, suddenly right beside you.

You jump, looking up at her in panic. “Fine,” you say quickly.

She lifts her brows, assessing you thoughtfully. “Hmm,” she says, before glancing at Riddle. “And you?”

“Fine,” Riddle echoes smoothly. But he’s not looking at Trelawney.

He’s looking at you.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

The image worms into your thoughts like a deep root, twisting into places you don’t expect to find it and spreading itself out more and more. The dreams are first, and then the nightmares, and finally the night terrors. The skull hovers before you, its pitch, hollow eyes bore into you, the snake coiling endlessly with its fangs yawning wide.

Something about it is cold and evil, some sort of strange perversion of an ouroboros, the eternal snake broken by the skull’s mouth.

Consuming it.

“What is that?”

Your head snaps up from your parchment feeling like you’ve just been jolted awake from a deep sleep, and it takes you a second to process the sight of Tom Riddle before you, his eyes fixed attentively on the parchment strewn on top of the essay you’re supposed to be writing.

He’d caught you drawing it for the hundredth time.

“Nothing,” you say hastily, sliding it away under a book. “Just a doodle.”

Riddle’s eyes flick to yours. There’s a cold rigidity to his expression that you don’t like. It’s a coldness that feels horribly familiar.

For a moment you almost think he’s going to force you to show him, but after a long moment Riddle looks away and he’s gone, disappearing off further into the library. You exhale in relief and pull out the parchment again.

Drawing it made the thoughts go away for a bit, like manifesting the horrible thing distracted it from its need to live in your head. You lift your quill and carefully write a single word next to the skull.

Consume.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

The parchment goes missing the next day.

You never prove that he took it, never even mention it to him, but Riddle’s eyes have a cold glimmer to them when he catches your eye in Divination next, the smallest curl to his lips like he’s daring you to bring it up.

The dreams abruptly stop.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

When you see it next, it’s in a photo on the front page of the Daily Prophet beneath a terrified headline, a spectre hovering just like it had in your nightmares at school years prior. Except this time it’s real. This time it’s above the burning remains of the family home of a prominent Muggle-born politician and Voldemort’s name is a shadow on everyone’s lips.

You stare at it on the page, the snake writhing in ink, the black, hollow eyes of the skull, and you think about Tom Riddle’s cold smile watching you from across the classroom, his manufactured beauty, the boys that hung around him like flies around rotten meat.