The Ride Home

An Over the Garden Wall Oneshot

The ride home was never a thing to look up for. In addition of almost getting hit by a train, drowning, and spending nearly two days in the hospital bed, Wirt must now face whatever that would happen once he laid a foot in his house. His mother and stepfather didn't really talk much during his and his brother time at the hospital, and certainly being almost silent the entire way back. That would later mean hours and hours of talking and scolding and not 'taking a good care of Greg' talk and so on. But his true fear was on how he should explain all that happened in the realm of the unknown, the Beast, Beatrice, the Woodsman. His mother was certainly not a believer type of woman, and who knew what was on his step father's head. With all those thoughts filling his head bumping and crashing to each other, the boy decided that it was best to stop thinking and start to look into the real world—like what he usually did when the subject had gone too rough during math class.

"Mom, could we stop somewhere? I'm hungry…" Gregory piped in. Thought that the boy sitting next to Wirt was not being quiet during the entire ride, it was his first action to start a conversation. That was because all that he said before was some kind of music-humming and imaginative trip narration as what a seven-and-a-half-year old would do.

"It was already nine dear, I think that most diners already stop serving…" the mother replied from the passenger seat. "Besides, I could heat up some casserole when we get home…"

"Then again, your frog… what was its name again… Jason Burger-something, was waiting for you back at home." the father added without looking away from the road. Greg once insisted on having a terrarium set next to his hospital bed for Jason but no sane doctor in the world would keep a frog inside a medical facility. And after some reasoning with the young boy, followed by some whining, the frog was sent home earlier.

"Yeah, we set up some rocks next to our pond, I think that your frog really likes sunbathing in there," the woman then responded with a slight snigger, noticing a grin from her younger son viewed through the rear-view mirror, but not the silent groan from her eldest.

Wirt just looked away without giving any expression, but on his mind, a spark of anger blow. Both of their parents were certainly loved Greg way more than him. They certainly looked up to his interest and were being really supportive. On the contrary, it was possible that his step-father didn't even know that the teen liked to write poems, or play the clarinet. If the teenage boy was the one who brought the frog, his dad would definitely tell him to throw the frog that instance, let alone building the frog a five star hibernating hotel. Not only that, both of the parents actually came to Greg's elementary school play, his PTA, his little league, and other thing Greg-related. Something that Wirt never had growing up as a child.

No, not that he hated Greg. He loved Greg just fine, especially after the events in the woods. Prior to that, yes, Wirt was sometimes being ignorant to him and didn't really want to take care of him. All in all, he might treat Greg that way because of the imbalanced fondness of his parents to him. But after the events in the woods, the trip that made him think everything that was happening in his life; he finally realized that Greg was too innocent to be blamed on something that should be aimed to his parents, all three of them.

The car pulled over before the teen grasped on what was happening. They finally reached the house. Though that there was nothing to be excited about, Greg immediately jumped out of the car and ran to the front door, humming his trademarked 'run run run run run' voice. For Wirt, it was the exact opposite. Dread and fear crept to his body, eating his feet slowly and making their way to the head. He knew that the parents would blame everything on him—which he was already okay with that since after all since he was the one who plunged him and his brother to the mess, not Greg, as he once selfishly believed.

How should he explain what happened back then? He certainly didn't find any answer during the five minutes of the way back home, or during the two days of his stay in the hospital. If he told all of what they had been through, the mother would laugh and the father would mark him crazy his entire life. He even might be sent to a physiologist for troubled teen, or a mental asylum. Nobody would ever believe a fight between two kids and a shadowy figure that had been turning people into trees. He—

"Wirt! You're coming or what?" The mother yelled from the front door, calling the boy. Wirt only responded with a slight nod and followed the family inside.

The dinner was really silent, save for some clacking of the utensils, and Greg's voices of chewing. As promised, the mother heated up the food along with some other leftover side dishes and poured some refrigerated orange juice for the family. This was really bad for Wirt. Dinner should never be anywhere near this noiseless. Usually the parents asked what were their kids doing at school, even if when Wirt preferred not to answer any of that. But for today, no one even made a sound. Every nerve in the teen's body could virtually see the tangible air inside the living room, and he didn't like it a bit. The only thing that stood between him and his parents screaming their throats off was Greg; obviously he was too young to be near any family argument of any kind.

Greg ate almost all of his food before he was allowed to go upstairs, much to his delight. But sure much to what Wirt feared. This was it; his parents were going to blow an all-out attack on his face and ears. Then it was silent, which was really suffocating. He knew that he was expecting something that could happen, in any moment—

"Wirt, you know what was exactly going on right," his mom was the first to talk, making the teen flinched in surprise and then lowered his head. "You certainly realized that your action made yourself and Greg in danger…" It was really hurting the boy's heart to hear his mother on her devastating exasperated voice. "I'm really disappointed in you…" There was the word that really struck him like an arrow and the boy could only hold back the tears forming by staring at his untied shoes.

"You both could have been killed…" the father added and it really irritated the boy. He really hated his stupid voice. From the beginning when his mother started dating him, he knew that it would never work out for him, no matter how much your mother convinced the boy. And until today, Wirt still treated him like a stranger, a stranger that scold him and make him do things around the house. There should be a set of rule existed that mentioned stepfathers should not be allowed to scold their stepsons. But of course, nothing ever worked out in the world for the teenage boy.

"Care to tell us exactly what happened?" The step-father inquired.

Wirt threw up a silenced groan like he used to and start to control his pace of breath before telling both of his parents the story. Of course he snipped some details about the motives of giving a mixtape of poems to Sara so the censored and icing-frosted version of the story would be more like Wirt joined Greg trick or treating like what an ideal big brother would do, and then they were invited to a party, which lead to a more secluded party in the graveyard…

"The graveyard?" The father was giving him another puzzled look, as what he actually did during the entire session of recounting. "Why on earth did you go to the graveyard boy?"

Again, Wirt groaned, but decided to keep his anger at bay. "Well, it is Halloween it is scary, and people want to make it less scary as possible…" the boy responded rather sarcastically.

"Then why did you bring Greg around?" The mother now asked, also with the same level of curiosity as his father's.

"You know him, always wants to sit quietly inside the house and not bothering any other people's business…" another comment but this one made the mother chuckle. "Continue? Well, then this, I don't know, some pranking police officer came. Surprised and frightened, we all ran to all places which forced me and Greg to climb a certain wall then we jump across… I thought that we probably land in someone else's backyard, but surprisingly we landed on a slope, then—"

The boy finally reached to the events in the woods, then the thought he had been thinking since the moment he woke up from the unknown kicked in. He still didn't know how to tell his parents. Should he extended the story of the mill, then meeting a pumpkin kin, a talking bluebird, Lorna and her aunt… the Beast. Nobody on the same mind would ever believe any of that nonsense. Maybe it was a kind of dream, or some wild imagination that jerked in when his minds decided to resurface some random memories of old cartoons or storybooks. Yeah he was pretty sure that he watched something about frogs and steamboats, or was it a mouse and a steamboat. No, it was too real to be a dream, and he could remember every detail of their trip to the unknown, something that he certainly couldn't do for regular nightmares. It was not a dream, nor was it an imaginative visualization. He couldn't lie to himself, but he certainly could lie to his parents…

"Then I didn't remember anything until I woke up…" The words came out from his mouth just like that. He didn't think it through but it certainly did the job for him. Nobody would ever asked what dream did you have when you were knocked out unconscious, and when Greg told their parents, they could simply deduce that it was from the fantastic head of his. No one would ever judge a seven-year-old wild imagination.

The story just ended and the parents seemed displeased. Not because of the lousy anti-climactic ending, it was probably the nature of the problem itself. Wirt had failed to take care of Greg, to the point of mortal danger, and no parents would ever be okay with that…

Especially when both of the parents prefer the other kid…

"Wirt…" the mother then spoke after a well-timed silence. The teen couldn't hold back the tears and just sobbed silently without even looking at the parents seemingly furious sad of eyes, which really surprised the mom. "No… no… don't cry dear, we are not mad… we just want you to know that you have to take care of yourself and Greg better that's all…"

"If you can keep your head when all about you are losing theirs and blaming it on you," Wirt uttered quietly. As much as he wanted to talk back, he certainly didn't want him to get into an even deeper trouble. So he normally did the things that would keep him calm, like silently voiced some poems that popped into his mind.

"Well, don't you realize that drowning your brother in a lake certainly was not the idea of—"

"I didn't drown him!" The teenage boy didn't know what he did as he lost all his willpower to control himself. The poems seemed to be not working. He just stood up and slammed his hands to the table which really surprised his company. Yes he was a pushover most of the times but at some point he needed to stand up for himself if somebody crossed the line. "Why would I want to drown Greg? I already told you that we accidentally fell!"

"Well, you won't fall if you hadn't climbed the wall in the first place, and if you hadn't gone to that stupid graveyard!" The father raised his voice to match Wirt's. "For heaven's sake, Greg is with you, he copies what you did! You know better than to pull off stupid stunts in front of your brother!"

"Greg, Greg, GREG! It's all about Greg!" Wirt groaned heavily. "Don't you know that I also need to be taken care too? Ever since he was born and I have to play the big brother all you did was putting his weight on me. When he fell from his bike, you blamed for not looking out for him. When he got a toothache, you blamed me for giving him too much candy. When Greg was lost at the fair, you both—"

"Stop! That's enough!" His mother yelled and stood up to control the two. "Wirt, you don't talk that kind a way to your dad!"

Wirt then frowned and knitted his eyebrow, "again, you take his side! Aggh! I give up" Wirt threw the fork that was on his right hand to the floor and quickly dashed to his room upstairs, leaving the angered parents at the dining room.

…

"He's been really difficult these days," the mom commented while she let off a bit of steam from his head. "I don't know that I was that kind of teenager back then…"

"He's always been that difficult," the father added while chewing at the food in front of him.

"Maybe I should check up on him…" the mother then stood up before the father gently stopped her.

"Later dear, let him cool off first…" he responded. "I've been through that stage and if I were him, I really don't want to be bothered right now…"

Again, Wirt tried to shut down any thinking from his head. He curled to his blanket and the pillows were made into a makeshift fort covering his head. All the tunes he normally used to calm himself down were surprisingly ineffective as now it was stuck at the end of side A. Maybe he should just let the player stay like that, creating seemingly unheard static sounds, until the batteries were dead.

The teenage didn't really know what kind of jealousy and angst he was facing. The teachers back at middle school called it a normal thing and nobody should be worrying any of that. Not even him, Greg, or his parents.

Speaking of the devil, a knock was heard from the door. And as much as he needed some kind of a talking, he refused to let anyone look at him drenched in tears and insecurity like this. At first he ignored it, but the knockings kept on coming.

"Don't come in…" Was the only sentence that could be mumbled from his mouth, and muffled through a series of blanket and pillows layer, he was sure that nobody could even heard that one.

As expected, the door creaked open. He never locked his room door, never. A closed door should always be enough sign that a certain person didn't want to be bothered. But, the person he deduced as his mom seemed to be clueless or didn't care about the idea. The sound of her closing down the door behind her followed by a series of silenced footsteps was clearly a sign that his mother was walking to him.

Feeling a large shift on his mattress weight center, Wirt winced a little, and decided to ignore the figure. Maybe, if he was being silent, his mother could think that he was fast asleep and wouldn't be bothering him for the night. But time passed and passed, the being hadn't yet moved at all, and Wirt was getting uncomfortable pulling this stunt. She definitely knew that he was wide awake.

"Mom, I told you…" He stood up and stopped his mumbling when realizing that the person sitting next to him was in fact his stepfather—which really confused him. He never ever had the guts to enter the room, mainly because of the strained relationship between the two. "What are you doing here…?" the teenage boy's voice was cold and harsh. He didn't even want to look at his father in the eyes.

The father gulped to break the silence and decided to just directly tell his motive of coming here. "Listen son…"

"Don't call me that…" Wirt interrupt his step dad, only his mother had the rights to call him that.

The father sighed in irritation. All these years, Wirt had never respected him as a father. He knew that the boy never referred to him as a dad—usually he was referred as Greg's dad and nothing more—and he also knew that the boy was calling him with adjectives like stupid and idiot behind his back. Not that he expected Wirt to treat him like he treat his mother, but it almost had been ten years. Why nothing had improved since they both first met? But that problem aside, he needed to get something out of his mind and into his stepson's.

"Okay, listen Wirt. I didn't really know who your father is, and how he treated you back when you were young. In fact, I might need some pointers." He started, rather awkwardly. Still, no one was giving any eye contact, which would have made the conversation go nowhere if it was kept like that.

"No need. You are exactly like him… You are both cold to me, and didn't really care about me. You both didn't know anything about me…" After some dead silence, he finally answered, along with feeling a little bit of tears running from his left eye.

"What makes you say that…?"

"Well, isn't it obvious...? You clearly loved Greg way more than me... Obviously that he was in fact, your son! And me? I'm only an unwanted extra that came with mom when you marry her… And I hate it when she seemingly tries to take your side from times to times. I think now she also loved Greg more than me… She's the only person I have and you also take her away from me! Same as him, he only liked mom and couldn't care less for me. Heck, why should I care about him? He didn't even have the will to actually pick up his phone and answer my texts!" Wirt finally let all of his hearts out and now was breaking into sobs that were muffled with the pillow that was pulled to his face.

"So you don't like having Gregory as your brother?"

"No, I loved him... but I hate it when you both picked him over me... all the times…"

The father put his hands on Wirt's back, surprisingly, Wirt didn't even cringe at this kind of physical contact which he would normally do. "So you are jealous of him? What makes you think that we prefer Greg more…?" The father finally found the kind of voice he was looking for when he talked to the boy. It was a rather calm and toned one.

"Well…, first, you all suddenly blame all things on me for this… incident. It could have been Greg's fault…" The boy replied between sobs.

"For the love of… he's seven Wirt! You are the older brother, of course we both asked you to take care of him!" The father reasoned. "He is still young; he didn't even know how to tie his own shoes. He still didn't know what he's doing from every now and then… and we couldn't look after him all the times…" His father suddenly sounded like the Woodsman. He too thought that the eldest brother should take responsibility for his younger brother's action. "Well, we will also teach your brother responsibility and good judgment when the time comes, little by little."

"Then you come to his play last spring… you didn't even know that I played the clarinet." Wirt argued with another rebuttal, but of course, not as strong as the last one. And Wirt seemed to smile a little more than before.

The father laughed a little. "We've been living together for what? Nine years? Do you seriously believe that I have no idea that you played the instrument? I usually listened to your playing from the next room…" He smiled and his boy smiled, and they finally faced each other. Though that the air was still cold, but both of them could feel that the atmosphere had changed.

"Then… do you like it?" Wirt inquired wryly.

"It's a little bit off every once in a while, I mean, why would I suggest you to join the marching band? To fix that awful transition between lower G and high B of yours… And I also know that you have been recording some sappy poems for a certain girl. Who was she?" The comment made Wirt face reddened and he playfully punched his step-father on the shoulders, which made both of them laughed.

"Okay, what else?"

"Well, you are still being easy on him. All I get is responsibility and chores and doodad, and groceries…"

"Again he's seven, let him play a little bit, as for you, you're sixteen. We were being rather hard for you because, well, we want to make sure that you are prepared for the world… as for Greg, well, he still had at least a good three years before we introduce him to the cold reality…" the transition is uncanny to let Wirt comment, but the father decided to continue. "Trust me, there are a lot of people out there that want to take you for the advantage… and when the time comes, I want you to take the stood up for yourself and also for your brother… Someday, you both might face a problem so huge and dangerous, even your mother and I couldn't protect both of you. I want you to be prepared for that, and personally I believe… that you already did."

Another silent came to the atmosphere, but this one was unlike the rest. It was warm and forgiving.

"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch." Wirt flinched as hearing his father said that, and was sitting there in disbelieve—though he shouldn't due to the fact that this poem was really popular. Still, it was really surprising to know that he and his step-father shared some common interest.

The father continued, "if neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you. If all men count with you, but none too much. If you can fill the unforgiving minute. With sixty seconds' worth of distance run…"

"Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it." Wirt picked up where he had left, and his father smiled with him doing so.

"And—which is more—you'll be a Man…"

"…my son." The last two words made Wirt mixture of emotion blew up into tiny pieces as he hugged his step-father for the first time since he could remember. His father was never the bad person he thought he was, he was too snuck up with fairytales that stepparents were evil and wicked people without realizing that the teenage boy was actually the one who was cold to his father. The memory flashed in front of his closed eyes. The time when he introduced himself to the boy, the marriage, the lousy dad jokes, the time his dad picked the boy from school late after detentions, the angers, and his efforts to say I love you… All the attempts he tried to give affection to the teen, and the teen just pretend to ignore all of it.

"Well, dad," the father both flinched and smiled as the teen uttered that for the first time. "I'm sorry about my outburst today… and from all these years," he sobbed to the father's sweaters. "I don't know, I just felt that my dad never loved me and seeing Greg has a biological father that actually loves him, well, I wish I have a kind of that…"

"I think you already did…"

Without both of them knowing, Greg was actually watching them from the crack of the door that was failed to be shut. And the little brother finally burst in after that scene, which made them jumped a little and released a hug…

"Dad, I want a hug too!" He pouted playfully, which made Wirt and the father chuckled rather loudly. The father picked him up and rested him between the two and gave him a side hug.

"Wirt? Why are you crying? Big boys don't cry…" Greg commented when he saw the puffy and red eyes of Wirt.

"They do Greg…" He replied with a small sigh when realizing that wiping the crying evidence would not be much of an avail.

"Hey Greg," the oldest of the three uttered. "Your big brother was jealous because I love you more." He commented with a laugh, and Wirt responded with a slightly annoyed smile.

Greg turned his face from the father to his brother, "don't worry Wirt, I'll share some of the love to you too… though not all of it… and also to Jason Funderburker too!" The smile was sincere and playful, one of the things that made Greg a really nice company at times like this. Wirt then patted the boy as a respond.

"Say, why don't we microwave a pizza and stay late for the midnight movies…" the father suggested. "Though that we should be as quiet as possible so that your mother won't blow a fuse." Of course, though that tomorrow's Sunday, their mother still gave the kids strict curfew every day. Only heaven knew what would happen if the mother found out. Greg responded with a smile as big as he could give. He never stayed past his bedtime.

"That's my dad!" Greg commented happily.

"Our dad…" Wirt added.

[]

I never found a suitable name for the parents' name hehe

Reviews are appreciated!