Disclaimer: I don’t own Harry Potter, the characters, the plot, or anything at all: I live in a cardboard box. Please read and review.

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Where did it all go wrong?

That question seems to be at the forefront of my mind these days, distracting my attention from what I should be doing, what I ought to be doing.

It chooses the most inopportune moments to crop up, when I’m talking to the Dark Lord, when I’m in the bath.

And now, when I’m making a cup of tea.

It startles me so abruptly that my hand shakes, spilling searing hot water on my hand, my new silver hand that I was granted after cutting my own hand off.

Where did it all go wrong?

I close my eyes momentarily, looking down at the sheaf of parchment in front of me, the prospect daunting. But I’ve put it off for far too long as it is.

‘Dear Harry,’ I write, the ink glistening on the page as I feel my heart sink. I don’t know what to write. I was writing to the son of my best friend who hated me and blamed me for the death of his parents.

And really, he has every right to. I made an orphan of my best friend’s son.

I swallow, trying to get rid of the dryness in my mouth, the sickness that makes me feel like screwing the parchment up in disgust with myself already. Because I don’t know what to say. It’s only the thought of what James would say, and the expression on Sirius’ face that night in the shrieking shack that spurs me onwards.

‘I know we’ve never been formally introduced but’ I scrawl it out, frustrated with myself and screw it into a ball, pulling out a fresh sheet of parchment.

‘Dear Harry,’ I write again, chewing the end of the quill.

I’ve never been good at writing letters, or writing in general. I remember opening my letter with my OWL results in it and seeing that I had only passed two subjects. I hadn’t minded too much because it wasn’t as if I had failed to notice that I wasn’t what you could call the…academic sort.

I grew up in a respectable pureblood family. My parents were both Hufflepuffs when they were at school, and I gather that they met there. My mum worked in the ministry in the department of International Magical Co-operation, and traveled a lot, so I lived with my dad, and my mum came home in the holidays.

When I was eight, my dad died from dragonpox. I remember going to his funeral, and getting so upset that I didn’t cry that I made myself cry from being upset at not crying.

My mam didn’t really know what to do with me, since he was working abroad and had to stay there for a couple of years. Besides which, I don’t think she was proud of me, because I’d never shown an ounce of magic, and I always managed to be twice as clumsy around her, from nerves.

I was sent to live with my Aunt Gladys, as it was only three years until I went to Hogwarts anyway. I didn’t mind too much at the time, still numb from shock at my father’s death, I guess.

‘i know no words could ever make you forgive me for what i did, but i'd like to explein so at leest you understand why i did what i did.’

My third day of school, I had my first ever potions class. I remember it as vividly as if it had been merely a couple of weeks ago.

I had fallen into a Slytherin in my rush to get to class on time, and Remus had stood up for me. I became his potions partner, and we suffered our bad marks together, blowing up cauldrons more often than not.

There were only four of us boys in Gryffindor in our year, Padfoot, Moony, Prongs and I, so we were bound to at least be on speaking terms, being in such close proximity for extended lengths of time.

At the beginning of that year, Sirius and James were competitive, you’d never have believed it if you’d met them when we were ‘the marauders.’ They were constantly trying to better each other, but they ended up siding with each other for the first ever time because of me.

I say because of me, but I didn’t really mean to do anything. I got cupcake crumbs all over Sirius’ bed, and became rather offended when Sirius said they were cake crumbs. Cupcakes and cakes are obviously different, but James seemed to agree with Sirius.

For a while it was Sirius and James and Remus and myself, and then Sirius and James sort of fell in with us. They joined the school choir, making up their own lyrics to the festive songs and I knocked the giant Christmas tree in the great hall over.

Then, in our second year, Sirius and James deduced that Remus was a werewolf. He seemed scared to death when we confronted him (I say we, it was mainly Sirius and James whilst I was working out anagrams of our names.) But of course we didn’t mind. I didn’t care that he was a werewolf, he was still the same Remus who had stood up for me all the time ago, and had continued to do.

We became animagi, and those were the best years of my life. I had friends, had more fun than I could ever have imagined, and they helped me scrape my pass grades.

If you had told me all that time ago that I would have ended up working for Voldemort, working with the Slytherins that had bullied me all that time ago, I would have laughed.

‘Your father was one of my three best friends. you think I can sleep at nite, nowing what i did?’

The words sound hollow and meaningless, even as I write them and read the glistening ink.

And that question again - - where did it all go wrong?

All my friends left school and did well, but I fell into making robes, and even then, my stitching was shabby and sub-standard.

And one night, I was approached by someone I didn’t know, who asked me to do such a small task for him for a large amount of money that I thought I was dreaming.

He kept coming back, and the tasks increased in time. I let myself get sloppy at work and was fired, and I depended on his tasks more and more.

And then they suddenly stopped.

James and Lily got married, and I was at their wedding. Truth be told…I had mixed emotions. You see…I loved Lily Evans so much that every time I saw James with her I felt that now common twinge of resentment.

But I buried it, and smiled, trying to be happy for them, because they were obviously so much in love. Besides - - I knew I had never had a chance with her. She was pretty and vivacious, and I was at the bottom of the heap.

Soon after they got married, I was evicted from my house for not paying the rent. I didn’t want to ask any of my friends for help - - Sirius and Remus could ill afford it, and James and Lily were newly married, and needed every penny they had.

I went to Hogsmede and drank so much firewhiskey that I can barely remember anything. But when I awoke, I remembered that the person who had asked me to do small errands for large amounts of money had approached me and had given me a slip of parchment with an address on it. I was desperate; I had no job, no home and no money. So I went.

I had an inkling that the people I was working for weren’t exactly respectable, but to be honest, I pretended not to notice and lied to myself. I didn’t want to admit that my only source of income was derived from a less than reputable source. I needed that money, and so I lied to myself, rather than ask my friends for help.

And then, one night when they had bought me drinks, and I was on my third round, I was approached by Voldemort. Even though I was pretty tipsy, I remember exactly what he had told me.
That if I became a death eater, had a simple mark etched onto my arm, he would ensure that I never needed to worry about money ever again.

I protested, I had never wanted to become a death eater, never in a million years wanted to turn to their side, but he threatened me, turned his wand on me.

If you’ve never come that close to death, you’ll not be able to empathise how frightened I was. Staring at that wand; I knew that in an instant I could be dead. Unmarked, completely well, in every sense apart from the fact that I was dead.

I said yes, without knowing what I was saying. Looking back, it makes me wonder why I was put in Gryffindor. Going against everything I believed in just to save my own life. I was disgusted with myself. And the worst was yet to come.

I assured myself that just because I was now a death eater, had the tattoo upon my arm, that it didn’t mean that I would work with them, that I would become one of them.

But in that environment…I had death eaters on all sides, every night I worried about whether I would wake up in the morning. I was too scared to stand up for myself; too scared to say no to the tasks they made me do.

Voldemort left me alone for a period that stretched every longer, and yet still supplied me with money to buy food, to have an apartment, so I knew that he hadn’t forgotten about me.

And then Voldemort had heard of a prophecy. That the one with the powers to vanquish him would be born at a certain time, I can’t remember it all, but Severus Snape told him about it.

And James had a son. I laughed when I discovered his name.

Harry James Potter.

That was just like James, to give his son his own name as his middle name. It made my heart ache to think how far I had drifted away from them. How deep I was sinking into everything we had all hated.

And Voldemort realised that the prophecy meant Harry.

My best friend’s son.

Dumbledore told James and Lily of the danger, and they went into hiding in Godric’s hollow. Sirius was made secret keeper and he decided to use it as a bluff -- I would become secret keeper.

Once I told Voldemort this, I knew I had made a mistake.

With his wand pointed at me, I was shaking so much I thought I was going to be sick.

‘Wormtail. Tell me where they are. Remember, I only want their son. The mudblood and her husband won’t be touched.’

I don’t know why I trusted him. I think I wanted to believe what he was saying so much that I lied to myself and told myself that it was the truth.

When I found out that Lily and James had been killed, I was inconsolable. I loved Lily so much, and no matter what I had done, James had always been my best friend. It would be easy to label my actions as a ‘If I can’t have her, no one can’ thing, but that wasn’t the truth.

I never wanted Lily or James to die. Never.

Two days later, Sirius confronted me. I could see he was going to curse me, the anger in his eyes was enough for me to fear for my life.

I panicked.

I’m more ashamed of what I did now than of anything else - - even betraying Lily and James.

I yelled out, asking how Sirius could betray Lily and James like that, making sure I had enough muggle witnesses to pull it off. I cut off my finger, cursed behind me and transformed into a rat.

I didn’t realise I would kill anyone. I didn’t mean to kill anyone.

I should have taken the blame.

‘I never ment to kill your parents,’

I look at the words I have just written and finish the sentence in my head.

I only meant to kill you, Harry.

Reaching forward, I crumple the letter up in my fist and throw it on the fire, watching it smoulder.

Everything had gone so horribly, terribly wrong.