The Parent's Weekend is amongst the numerous annual events that Nevermore celebrates. It's an event meant for parents and children to catch up, talk with one another without the hindrance of distance to limit their words.
Distance could do much to strain a relationship, no matter how close, you see. Regardless of whether they are friends, family, or a lover—distance becomes insurmountable when coupled with personal problems. It could rot, tug at the string of connection people possess.
Humans are social creatures, that much he knows. No man nor woman could live alone in their own volition, isolated in their own world. No one is ever truly alone, no one is an island.
Connection is one of the most fundamental parts of life. Love, joy, hope—we source all these virtues in the connection we have with others, regardless of relevance. To wake up for another day to see your friends, to wake up for another day to see your family. How happy must that sound? How joyful must that be to experience?
Envy flickered slightly, but nevertheless faded to oblivion in Adam's heart for but a moment. From the balcony of his room, he could see his fellow students in uniform waiting by the school's front yard. He could hear their excitement, the giddiness while they waited for their mothers and fathers to arrive.
The concept of a parent is something he once longed for, but ultimately relinquished in fate's cruel plan. He has none, so why must he hope? Perhaps these hands have once felt the touch of love, cradled kindly by their lovely mother and disciplined gently by their stern father—but not him.
Familiarity may surge, yes, but it is not real. A life once lived, dishonored by his existence, is not something to punish himself for because he could not control the manner of his creation. Forgive, forget, live—such is the path to acceptance. One he must tread, no matter how rigorous.
Adam took a deep breath and exhaled an icy fog. Day by day, the climate proves itself impossible to ignore. The cold, God's way of silencing the world, creeps ever so slowly by the passing minutes.
One day, all that he could see, from the grays of the fortress' wall to the greens of Jericho's woods, would be covered in a layer of snow. That is, at least, what Larissa told him.
Adam imagines in his head a field of white, gentle bed of ice, or would it look rather like a field of white lilies instead? He imagines white spores of purity falling from the sky, enveloping the whole of the world, like that of an angel's wings covering all that he could see.
He imagines his friend fawn, catching the cold white berries that continue to fall from the heavens, asking their mother why it does not taste sweet like the red ones they usually eat. It will ask its mother over and over again, 'till it realizes that it is not berries after all.
Adam mused at his conjured image, the purest chuckle leaving his once constrained mouth.
He imagines again, Tyler and the demoness of fire, roaming the woods. In their movement, they taint the white snow in the crimson red of malice. They leave a trail of darkness behind their shadow, extending to the trees, the ground, the ice ravine. They pollute the very soil they step on, and all of a sudden, the chuckle refused to come out.
He has grown rather restless for the past days, a foreboding sense of danger crawling in the back of his neck. He could feel an eye watching him, that same pair that conjured the hell on Earth he endured. He could feel the walls closing in, hands of darkness reaching from behind the walls of Nevermore.
He has told Wednesday, and by extension, Thing. The girl gave a quiet response befitting of her usual behavior, but did not dismiss his anxiety. After that night, her eyes lingered for moments longer when they met. Something he could not understand brews once more behind the abyss of her eyes.
That said, the time for thought is finished. Matters he must attend wait behind the door of his room.
Adam put on his uniform, the Nevermore blazer layered over a shirt and a vest. Weeks have gone by, yet the aesthetics of these clothes refuse to grow on him. Never mind that. He opened a drawer in his closet, revealing another set of masks and gloves. The melted, bloodied one stared from the very corner, a reminder of pain, of their enemy.
Adam looked in the mirror with satisfaction, finding himself presentable enough. Without wasting another second, he opened the door to go out, leaving his room on its own.
It did not take long for Adam to arrive at his destination. Perhaps it is the familiarity of Nevermore, subconsciously guiding his feet like strings of a puppet. An easier explanation, however, is that Larissa's office is merely at the very end of the hall.
He stood still for a second before the door, looking at the metal nameplate. With a breath, the gloved tips of his knuckles gently met the familiar wooden surface, performing the rhythmic dance it usually does.
Adam counted the silent seconds—1…2…3– finally, "Come in." A female voice inside gracefully said. She did not shout, her voice did not assault the air like a shopkeeper's yell. She simply spoke normally and by her charismatic prowess, bent space itself to deliver her words.
Adam opened the tall door, and what greeted his senses inside is everything comfortable.
The medusa pyre burns as strong as ever, making him wonder if it ever does not. The giant curtains were closed behind Larissa's figure, with sunlight peeking slightly between the cracks. She sat there, patiently working on, he mused, whatever principals worked on.
Larissa glanced briefly at him as her crimson lips curved to a maternal smile at his sight. "You're early." She said kindly, eyes turning back to her laptop.
"Aren't I always?" Adam replied lightly as he sat down in front of her. He made himself comfortable on the soft cushion of the chair, resting himself as the cozy warmth of the room hugged the whole of his body.
"You are." Larissa closed her laptop with a thud, done with her work as she faced Adam with those bright blue eyes of hers that seemed to encapsulate the very sky itself. "Always on time, a punctuality hard to find these days. You'd be surprised how even some of your professors fail to respect time."
The tone of her voice contrasted the sharp remarks that left her mouth, the criticism holding no weight under the lightness of which she spoke.
"Maybe you should change some policies regarding tardiness." Adam mused, a flicker of mischievousness glinting in his eyes. "Well, what do you suggest?" Larissa smiled, deciding to entertain his banter.
"Make them write a hundred statements of pledges," he said as he leaned back. "Something along the lines of, "I shall not be late again," or maybe, "I will value time and punctuality." Something they'd remember."
Larissa could sense the teasing grin behind that white mask. From the way Adam squinted his eyes as he smiled, from the way he tilted his head when he joked. She knew him well, as well as a mother knows the creases on her son's palm.
She chuckled, resting her chin on her fingers, pausing her work. "You believe the faculty would accept a policy like that?"
"Equality consists in the same treatment of similar persons." Adam replied simply, quoting from Aristotle. "No one should be above the rules, right?"
Larissa regarded him for a moment, the warmth in her eyes never dwindling despite his cheeky remark. "You would make an interesting headmaster," she said humorously, her tone carrying that familiar mix of amusement and fondness. "For a year or two, before the school collapses on its own."
"I'd like to think otherwise!" He replied cheekily. "I'll have you know, I've read about Alexander, Julius Caesar, and more rulers than you could count with your fingers."
"Reading about conquerors and war won't make you a good school headmaster. A general, maybe?" Larissa playfully raised a brow. "And also, you have me to thank for that."
Adam flinched before scooping his hair back. "You've got me." he replied with a defeated sigh. He paused for a moment, head low, eyes tracing the pattern golden pattern on her table. "Thank you…" he said suddenly, quiet and grateful.
Larissa's mouth opened and closed, unsure of what to say from the sudden change of the atmosphere. Her mind, however, trained in words, was lost only for a few moments. "I meant that as a joke, you know? I did not really mean for you to thank me, I taught you out of my own will."
"We often do things for the sake of simply doing," Adam said, eyes once again landing in those vast ocean of blue. "But, must I not appreciate you for the gifts that you gave?"
Larissa's lips curved into a softer smile, one that lacked her usual composure. For a fleeting second, her eyes mirrored a quiet pride, a warmth that Adam had always sensed but never dared to name.
"You're a curious one," she murmured, fingers drumming lightly against the polished wood of the desk. "Most children your age barely think of gratitude in the way you do."
"Maybe that's why I'm not like most children," Adam said with a light shrug, though his voice carried a melancholic note beneath its airy tone.
Larissa hummed, reaching for his masked face. Adam could feel the warmth of her fingers beneath the mask, as if her caress transcends the concept of boundaries.
The medusa pyre flickered, the flames casting golden halos along the edges of Larissa's hair and the curves of her face. The room smelled faintly of parchment and warm cedar, a sanctuary in the ever-chilling halls of Nevermore. Adam felt, as he always did here, that the world outside—its bitterness, its cold, its shadows—could not touch him for as long as he stayed.
"You are a child, nonetheless. A child different from others remains still a child." Larissa moved a strand of hair covering one of his eye, "However learned, however well-read, however tall and big and strong— that simple fact is true. You are a child of Nevermore as you are a child of mine, perhaps even more."
To Adam's eyes, Larissa has never felt no less golden than the sun. All the warmness of the unforgiving universe seems to coalesce in this very room, in this very moment.
Then, perhaps to wake him, Larissa flicked his forehead. Adam, confused and dazed, looked at her questioningly. "A child, despite your… nightly vigilantism."
His gaze faltered for a moment, a moment caught by Larissa's keen eyes. "How di—" he stopped, the words were caught in his throat, he has just sentenced himself guilty.
"How would I not know, is what you should be asking." She replied, "Being the principal grants me certain privileges when inside the school, you see."
Larissa leaned back on her chair, watching Adam's guilty figure downcast. She sighed, "I will not punish you, nor will I Ms. Addams."Adam remained quiet, fingers interlaced together as he sat listening. "I just want to ask you a question. I want you to answer it honestly, truthfully, and whatever you say I will believe wholeheartedly because it is you that said it."
Larissa continued. "I know, in my heart without doubt, that it was not you that caused Sheriff Galpin's current status or his son missing. I also believe that, in your good conscience, you would not let Wednesday nor anyone for that matter, enact such a malicious crime to that degree."
She leaned forward, facing Adam to look at her straight. "So tell me, Adam. Who was it?"
The pressure was tantamount to carrying the sky itself. Adam could feel her eyes, waiting, perhaps pleading. The medusa pyre's crackle is louder than ever, it felt to him screaming like a crowd of people yelling for him to answer, "Speak! Speak! Speak and be done!"
He took a deep breath, gathering himself under the palm of his own conscience grinding him like he's in a mortar. "It was… Tyler, he was the monster."
Larissa's eyes widened, and for a moment, her long trained posture faltered. "Oh…" she said, seemingly unable to muster any other word. She nodded, more to herself than Adam.
"…"
A long silence followed, Adam keeping to himself and Larissa lost to her thoughts. Finally, after a few minutes, she stood up, looked at her silver watch and produced a hum. "Would you look at that? It's assembly time already."
Her face, once again serene and composed, looked at Adam with unexplainable emotions. "Since you're already here, we might as well go together."
Adam nodded and watched as Larissa walked towards the coat rack. She picked a white one, elegant as usual. She turned back to him with a small smile. "Let's?"
The two of them exited out of the office, followed by the soft click of the door as it fully closed. The silence as they walked the halls of the faculty building was accentuated even more by their steps.
"—in your good conscience, you would not let Wednesday nor anyone for that matter, enact such a malicious crime to that degree."
Those words left a deep crater in his mind. Larissa's faith in his goodness formed an imaginary guillotine above his neck. A barbed wire that tightens closer to his heart. Adam clenched his fist. How could he admit? How could he confess?
How could he say that, that night, he wanted nothing more than to take another person's life?
What would her face look like? What would her reaction be? To where could she measure her disappointment at the monster he could become?
—-
The Addams family is one that many would describe as… unique. A family that seems to appear in a different filter from others. An uncaring, genuine, and honest family true to their nature. With a deep love for the macabre, the gothic, and the morbid— they are often at the spotlight when talks of weirdness and which people to avoid is in the conversation.
That said, Wednesday watched as the familiar vintage Pontiac entered the school premises. On the driver's seat was, of course, the ghastly butler Lurch. The car stopped by the end of the driveway.
Lurch went out, walking towards one side of the passenger section. Out comes her detestable, utterly incompetent little brother, Pugsley, wearing once again that black and white sweater. He looked around lost, as if he's never been at Nevermore before.
The other side opened and the padre de familia of the Addams family comes out. Wednesday's father, Gomez, in a 3-piece suit. His hair is curled, caressing his mustache as his eyes shines bright with over the top nostalgia.
Wednesday could read his lips, praising Nevermore's air and whatnots.
Gomez reach gently inside the car, his hand, plump and tanned, met the last passenger's slender and pale. Wednesday, as brave as she is, has many things in the world she avoids: party clowns, for example, the ones that don't kill.
If she has to rank them all from 100 to 1, the first 99 would be taken by her mother with the last one saved empty just in case. Or maybe the last is for her roommate's colorful plushies scattered like landmines, who knows?
With one final look, Wednesday folded her telescope. Another case, one she's put at the back of her head arose to the surface. With no further progression with Tyler and his accomplice, she might as well entertain herself with this.
The jovial, melodramatic Gomez Addams, her father— murdered someone at this very school she attends. The crime seems impossible, an improbable act that even she could not imagine her father could do. Yet, here it is. With a young picture of him, grinning like a cocky stuck-up millionaire heir.
"Now, father," Wednesday whispered, "You'll either tell me… or I'll make you spit it out."
—-
A crowd of parents and children filled the inner courtyard. The air was alive with laughter, with greetings both loud and soft, the clinking sound of thermoses and picnic baskets being set down, and the chorus of footsteps over the stone floor.
In the middle benches sat the the werewolves, disheveled and wild both adults and students. They greeted each other in growls and howls like adrenaline junkies high ecstasy. A few kept to themselves, none were students. Wednesday if they also ate their shame.
Another group were among them, chatting and laughing in a carefree manner, like they can't stone everyone here with but a slip of their headwear. Enid's boyfriend sat among them, the gorgons.
To the side were the sirens and vampires. Majority of the former looked arrogant and haughty, noble want-to-be's with not a sliver of humility in them. The latter, on the other hand, just looked to be avoiding any ounce of sunlight touching their pale, fragile skins.
Wednesday wonders which of the two is harder to flay: the fish or the bat? 'Food for thought.' She brushed it off with a quiet hum as she surveyed the scene, distracted only by the subtle trembling of one werewolf beside her.
The two's figure contrasted the rest of the world around them. Wednesday's dark, brooding aura separated her from everyone else. A black silhouette in the painting that swallows every color, with the sole exception of one person— Enid Sinclair.
All rainbows and unicorns, her presence felt like an antithesis to the human black hole. A supernova that lights up space, halting darkness to a still.
"Hooh…" Enid exhaled, calming her nerves by shaking her hands. Wednesday eyed her up and down, wondering how one could exhibit all symptoms of nervousness at the same time.
"If you start having a seizure, don't expect me to help." Wednesday said flatly. Enid turned to her, the expression of a terrified child adorning her face. "This is the WOST day ever. Period. Ever!"
"It's like, you know, you're having the best days of your life then all of a sudden, you get sacrifice to a humiliation ritual! I could already hear mom's voice asking why I haven't turned yet, or why I'm not with other werewolves, or why my boyfriend is a gorgon and that I should break up with him. She'll start comparing me to my cousins, my brothers and then…— worst than that, she'd…— and….—"
Wednesday can't quite remember when she lost focus during the conversation. In fact, she can't quite remember when she'd last lost focus before. Maybe Enid is half-siren? But then again, a werewolf and a siren? She listened faintly, noting what she said here and there with little attention.
A mother who constantly berates her daughter, a father who dances at the palm of his spouse's hand, and brothers who exist only in the background. A strangely familiar family dynamic, she noted.
The world, it seems, has a way for answering mental SOS calls. A high-pitch ringing rang in the air. At the very front of the inner courtyard stood a familiar woman, platinum hair and crimson lipstick, and that awfully political smile.
Principal Weems tapped the mic twice, catching the attention of everyone present. Hate her as she may, Wednesday admits the woman's charisma is undeniable.
"First of all," Principal Weems said with a smile, her voice reaching every corner of this pentagon-shaped quad, "I would like to thank all of the parents that attended. Welcome, once again, to Nevermore Academy. Alumni or not, your presence here is one we much appreciate."
The quad was quiet, all eyes on her. It seems, to Wednesday, that many students and parents are fond of the woman. Enamored by her charm, perhaps. "Nevermore was created as a safe haven for our children to learn and to grow, no matter who or what they are." A light applause followed and Principal Weems continued.
On the far side of the quad, at the very back near a pillar of stone stood a lonesome figure of undeniable eye-catching mask— Adam. He stood quietly, an almost statue of sorts. Wednesday isn't quite sure, unsure like she is most of the time these days, she found herself surfing between crowd closer to him.
Soon, the raven landed. The ocean stilled. Wednesday crept beside him, unlike others though, the boy noticed her and showed no sign of surprise.
Without turning, Adam spoke. "Did your parents not come?" He asked, Principal Weems voice did not come between his and her ears.
"They did," Wednesday replied, "They're bidding their time, waiting. The Addams are not so fond of jovial ceremonies, unless it's blood rituals."
"And you are?" Adam chuckled, Wednesday, however, gave no reaction. "I like coming prepared. Puts me above my adversaries."
"Here I thought you were the black sheep," Adam leaned towards the pillar, his shoulder anchored for support. "But, I must say, I have not heard anyone else refer to their family as "adversaries.""
"There's a first for everything." Wednesday said coolly. Adam chuckled again, finally turning towards her slightly. Their eyes met briefly, a fleeting collision that ended sooner than usual. "Indeed. I have not seen much at all."
Before she could reply, a stronger applause rang loud. Principal Weems stepped out of the makeshift podium and the people started scattering once more to their own groups. 'It's finished.' Wednesday thought.
She looked back at Adam again to find his eyes darting towards the families. "It is as I imagined," he said. Wednesday could feel the smile he's wearing, and the strain it puts in his striated muscles, "Warmth, connection, and the walls being lighter for once."
Wednesday wanted to interject, to say that the warmth is a facade, that connection is unneeded, and that behind those walls are the evil they are fighting. Those stinging, painful words refused to come out, for even her cruel and dark heart refuses to be cruel for once. So she did not speak.
There are times when speech is irrelevant, and times when silence weighs heavier than inessential words. There is heaviness in the air between the two of them that only now she is acknowledging.
Then, a hush began spreading from the crowd. It crawled and crawled, leading to the entrance of the crowd where a family of three stood. Wednesday wanted to cover her face in annoyance, to bury herself six-feet under to be with herself.
Gomez's booming laughter carried first, followed by Morticia gliding with the gravitas of a queen in mourning. Pugsley trailed behind. The Addamses were a spectacle, a spectacle she found herself a part of.
Eyes similar to hers found her. "Wednesday!" Her father's voice rang out, heartfelt and unrestrained as he broke through the crowd, arms wide. "There she is, Mi querida! Oh, how we missed those accusing eyes and youthful sneer."
Wednesday's face barely twitched. "Father."
—-