Chapter Text
The first thing Tom saw when he opened his apartment door to an unexpected knock was a large tray of burnt cookies; terribly deformed, black-crusted monsters.
His stomach immediately flipped at the smell, and Tom heaved, clutching at his door-frame as he doubled over. Stumbling back through tear-blurry vision, he slammed the door in the face of whoever it was. Then, he collapsed.
Five minutes later found Tom fanning himself and passing a eucalyptus essential oil under his nose. A close encounter with cookie poisoning did not dwell well with him. In fact, he could hardly stand it. He’d have to investigate who would dare—
A knock on the door snapped him out of his scheming reverie. Like magic, Tom straightened himself up: smoothing back his hair, his shirt, and his former frown into a charmingly impassive disposition (a favourite personal skill of his). No trace of his previous distress was to be found. He was perfect.
Of course, this was all to be ruined again when he whipped open the door only to see The Killer Cookies. The smile melted off of Tom's face in an instant. So this is the culprit, he thought to himself as he sized up the man. A man who didn't look like much of a murderer but Tom could be wrong.
Not that he was wrong often.
“Hi, it’s me again. Your neighbour; Harry,” the owner of the indescribable beasts told him in a chipper voice. “Just checking in on you!”
With morbid fascination, Tom watched as a fly nibbled at one of the cookies and began spasming within seconds. Disbelief—and dread—filled him as he watched its corpse fall to the ground. He tore his gaze from the dead insect to glare at his neighbour, façade be damned. “You just tried to kill me,” he accused, voice cracking.
“Er, well, my first try with these snickerdoodles, you see,” his neighbour said. He jabbed a painted nail at the burnt hulks of batter.
Tom stared the short man down. “I nearly died.”
Harry stared back, head cocking. “But did you die?”
“No.” Tom’s mouth twitched its way into a strained smile. His eyes screamed MURDER. “But I could have.”
His neighbour promptly ignored this and chose instead to shove the platter into Tom’s unwilling hands. He pointed to different sections of black mess, telling him what kind each was, but all Tom could focus on was how green Harry’s eyes were.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Harry’s voice suddenly registered, “But I’ve forgotten your name.” Ah, the cookie speech was over.
The tension leaking from his shoulders, Tom held out his hand for a shake with a practiced Riddle, Tom Riddle rolling off his tongue easily. But as Harry gripped his hand, he suddenly couldn’t help but wonder how his neighbour didn’t know his name if they had been living wall-to-wall for so long?
With Harry’s pretty boy physique and looks—just Tom’s type—it seemed odd that Tom had no past experiences of realising this. He knew Harry was his neighbour and had been for a while now but Tom had no actual memories of Harry. In fact… the more he thought on it, he realised he’d never heard of Harry until the cookies.
“I don’t trust you,” he told Harry aloud after another sceptical once-over. “I don’t think you’re my neighbour. I’d have bedded you by now.”
And that was truth. He eyed Harry’s flustered splutter with apprehension. “It was a pleasure meeting you, Harry, but I will be disposing of these cookies before more innocent flies are killed,” Tom said. “Goodbye.”
With that, the door was swung shut.