Is ‘disappointment’ the theme of my life or something?...

In one of the inconspicuous suburbs around London, on the first floor of a normal-looking red-bricked building, inside a room, atop one of the four beds, a pair of dark eyes snapped open.

The possessor of the said eyes, Alex, slowly and silently slipped out of the bed he'd been sleeping on just a few moments ago, and similarly made his way to the door at the opposite corner of the room.

Sneaking past the other rooms along the corridor, he slinked towards the staircase at its end, and while being mindful of some creaky steps of the staircase, he climbed down to the ground floor, just beside the exit to the building he called home. He unlocked the door and slipped out being as quiet as possible. After all, he wouldn't want anyone else to wake up, right?

It was still dark outside, the only light source being the bulb fixed just above the door he'd exited from, and no one in sight…

"Hoot-hoot"

…except that owl perching on a branch of the English Oak tree, growing at one corner of the lawn that is.

*buzz* *buzz*

And some insects buzzing around too.

*bark**bark*

…Okay, there was no human in sight. It being the month of September, autumn had already begun on the British Isles, as could be witnessed by the dry brown leaves covering the grass lawn in front of the orphanage. The pleasantly cold early morning wind was blowing, taking a few dried fallen leaves with it and then dropping them a little distance away.

Taking in the dreary sight for a few moments, while simultaneously making sure of his solitude, Alex moved towards a secluded spot in the lawn he'd found earlier to prevent anyone from accidentally noticing his nightly activities from the windows of the orphanage building.

'…Or is it early morning activities? Technically, two hours after midnight should be called early morning and not night, right? After all, the day ends at midnight.'

Getting somewhat used to the oddly logical thoughts of his whimsical subconscious mind, he ignored them and focused on the task at hand instead. The ground covered with dried leaves was not suitable for any physical activity, especially when it had to be done in secret. So, he'd to clean it before doing anything else.

Without even thinking of using a tool to clear the ground, he just raised his hand and closed his eyes. A few moments later, he opened his eyes while making a sweeping gesture with the raised hand. Reveling once again in the intoxicating feeling of magic flowing through his body, which he wasn't sure if he would ever get used to, he watched as the leaves covering the secluded patch of land began receding slowly as if they were blown away by a burst of focused wind, leaving behind the grass-covered ground that was hidden under the leaves.

He then stood in the middle of the cleared patch and stared doing some light stretching to warm up his body. For the next half hour, he performed various asana of Yoga, pushing his body to its absolute limit, and breaking past some of them.

Each asana was done while keeping in mind the posture of the body and maintaining a steady rhythm of breath to maximize their effects. He was no master in the art of Yoga, but when attending a school where Yoga was mandatory for students up to the middle school level, he'd obviously picked up some things.

After going through the previously determined set of asanas, he took a break of about 10 minutes to somewhat relax his body in preparation for the next activity on his list.

Acrobatics.

He started with the simplest, forward rolls, which were then followed by backward rolls, sideward rolls, cartwheels, handstands, and handsprings sequentially. He was not very proficient even in these basic acrobatic skills; he was just trying to copy whatever he remembered watching in his last life. The result of his ignorance on the matter was evident in the way he failed in performing even the simplest forward roll continuously. Cartwheels, handstands, and handsprings were another matter altogether.

Still, he didn't give up and practiced each one for at least twenty minutes. After about two and a half hours of hardship, breaks included, he'd completed his quota of acrobatics, more like gymnastics, for the day and was left with a body that ached all over.

Failure in performing continuous handsprings and cartwheels did have its consequences.

Lying on his back, breathing heavily, he observed the slowly brightening sky. He'd a little time left. Steeling his determination, he forced his tired body up and started to jog at the same spot. Each time he brought his leg upwards, he made sure to pull his knee as close to his chest as possible to make it as exhausting as possible.

He couldn't go outside to jog. After all, he could guess the sleeping pattern of the residents of the orphanage, most of them being children, but didn't have much interaction with the people in the neighborhood to make an assumption about them.

His jogging session with varying intensity continued for a half-hour, slowing down at times to regain some energy before quickening up once again.

Having finished his pre-decided physical training, he magically reversed the secluded patch of land to its previous state and dragged his exhausted-to-the-limit body back to his room, similar to the way he came down, and took a nap of about an hour.

Awakening from his hour-long nap to the loud complaints of the children against waking up, which his body wholeheartedly agreed with, he took a quick shower and made his way downstairs for breakfast.

Sitting on the breakfast table, waiting for some of the tardy residents to arrive, he greeted all the present people, children, and caretakers, with all enthusiasm he could muster. Some children returned the greeting with even more enthusiasm while others responded sleepily, still lost in their dreams from the previous night.

Adults, too, returned his greeting with a smile. Unknown to him, however, they exchanged concerned glances when he wasn't looking and then collectively sent a questioning look towards Sarah who shrugged her shoulders with a wry and somewhat pained smile etched onto her face.

Alex quickly ate his breakfast and made his way to his spot at the library, unaware of multiple worried looks directed at his back.

In the library, sitting at his place, he took out a pebble and started trying to cast spells, or rather, willfully enforce various changes onto it. Evident by his small feat of magic that morning, he was able to focus much better than his first tries at magic. Partly, it was due to his memory, his experience, of the second time he'd performed accidental magic.

He practiced until it was time for the afternoon meal. After that, he once again returned to the library and continued to practice magic.

His second session of the practice continued until the evening when some children forcefully, some even tearfully dragged him to play. Somehow coaxing them into playing a game with a lot of physical activity, he fully utilized the time he spent playing with them.

Dinner was quite a quiet affair, what with every child getting tired due to the exhausting evening playing session he had with them. Leading the younger ones to their rooms, while adults did the dishes, he tucked them into their bed, pecked them on their forehead, and wished them sweet dreams, to which they sleepily replied before falling to the embrace of sleep.

Honestly, that was such a heartwarming sight that he would, rather, could never get tired of seeing it.

Upon returning to his room, still warmed by the experience a few moments ago, he wished his roommates goodnight, and lay on his bed, waiting for others to fall asleep.

He didn't have to wait long as; them being children, both physically and mentally, they quickly fell asleep which was made obvious by their cute snoring sound.

Sure that the others were asleep, he sat on his bed, crossed his leg, and started his meditative session. For the next quarter-hour, he sat in the same position, trying to clear his mind.

The keyword here was 'trying'.

He still couldn't clear his mind of stray thoughts. Along with the passage of time, the frustration showing on his face began to grow, and eventually, he stopped trying. He leaned against the wall behind his back and thought back to the day that was about to end.

He noticed that it was almost as identical as the last seven days.

Seven days had passed since that uneventfully eventful trip to London. The day was uneventful because he'd been unconscious for most of that day. It was eventful too; after all, his world view crumbled that day, and it marked the start of his current monotonous life.

The day after his shamefully humorous attempt at magic, on which he'd performed accidental magic for the second time, he'd begun his training. He planned everything, from the intensity of the training to the time at which he would undergo it, and had followed that routine almost obsessively.

He couldn't claim that he'd become strong, or even average, but there had been a considerable growth in both, physical and magical aspect, especially for a five-year-old child.

He'd developed pretty well physically in the past week, and no small amount of credit belonged to the passive healing effect magic had on his body. Every day, he had stretched his muscles to the limit, his body had fallen on the ground enough times to form mild bruises, but over the day, all he'd been left with was slight soreness, and even that went away by his next training session.

His pseudo-masochism had paid off; he'd gone from getting tired to the point of fainting in just one and a half hours on the first day to grinding his body for over two hours with just needing a nap afterward. He had to practice more to even consider using acrobats in a fight. After all, he couldn't just pause in the middle of a battle to get in the starting pose. He wished that his fluidity in performing acrobatics could be magically enforced too.

Magical training, on the other hand, even with the obvious success, had left him disappointed. He'd been able to cast magic, or in his case, levitate the pebble on demand by the end of the second day. By the end of the third day, he'd become able to maintain that state of levitation for as long as he wished.

That had been a happy day for him, after all, with him being able to maintain a spell, or rather focus, for a long duration meant he was ready to cast spells wandlessly. But, he was once again hit with the cold truth that was the reality that day. Apparently, doing magic was not as easy as he'd thought, and shouting the name of spells out loud would do nothing other than making a fool out of the one trying to cast.

That's right; he'd learned that shouting out the names of the spells he'd known wasn't enough to cast them. He had to imagine the effect, to focus on the intent of the spell he was trying to cast. He couldn't test the more destructive spells, so, he'd experimented with a simple Lumos, the light spell, after the early morning training session the next day.

The result had left him disappointed, as he could not produce light with simply saying the spell, he had to imagine a small ball of light in his hand first, and then intend it, focus on that image to make magic cast the spell. And focusing takes time.

Time, now that was a commodity that goes scarce in situations that need it the most. It was true in his past life when he had to submit an assignment, and it was even truer in life-and-death-or-escape fights he was preparing for. After all, he couldn't negotiate with the possible assailants for some time in exchange for listening to them spout their drivel about their over-inflated sense of superiority. No one was insane enough to even consider his offer, let alone accept it…

…Maybe Bellatrix would consider it; one could never say about insane people. Or maybe, she would just cast a Crucio on him even as she gushed about her Lord.

Maybe even the snake-face…

'Has he even lost his nose yet?'

He was honestly curious about it. Had Voldemort lost his nose due to him using a snake-venom-made homunculus for his ritual, or was it due to him making Horcruxes?

Returning on topic, as he was too tired to get frustrated over his stray thoughts, he had to make his casting faster, to make up for lack of wand, the focus most wizards use. He could only think of occlumency that could hopefully fasten his casting speed.

But, he was still failing at completely clearing his mind. Always, a stray thought would somehow cross his mind, be it what he was supposed to do next day, the result of his training, or his worry for the future, and even his imagination of what the worst-case scenario would look like. He didn't know how to move past his worries to clear his mind.

'Perhaps, I should increase the time for meditation once more…'

He thought. Before he could further plan, to make time in his already tight schedule, he heard footsteps echoing out in the corridor. Thus, he quickly pretended to sleep.

Unknown to him, however, all of his plans would fall apart the next day…