Author's note: none of this belongs to me and I make no monetary gain from this. Characters within are the property of the Addams' Estate and Paramount Pictures.
This story is a study of Morticia's attitude after the auction scene in the film, when Gomez starts to suspect that Fester is not his brother.
The roaring sound of diesel model trains shook the very eaves that held up their home, vibrating down the columns and shaking across the floors. She placed the book down on the bedside table and kissed her son on the forehead. He frowned as she pulled the blanket up towards his chin and a flash of brown again sped through the floor to ceiling fish tank within his room.
"Will father's trains stop soon?"
She touched her fingers to his cheek and smiled lightly, attempting to feign genuine carelessness in the face of what she'd just witnessed.
"Hopefully," she bent at the middle to kiss his forehead, "You know how your dear father likes his trains."
Wednesday tugged on her hand. For the last few moment, she had stood beside her mother as Puglsey settled himself in bed. This had been their bedtime routine for as long as Morticia could remember. Gomez had opted out of the reading tonight and he had opted out of dinner and wine after the auction too in favour of that room into which she never ventured – the train room. It was the one place she was not welcome, and she was very content with that. She hated the noise and the rumble and more than that, she hated what it represented. The symbolic nature of the noise was far more worrying than the noise itself – it meant Gomez was upset and when Gomez's world was out of kilter, so was hers and by virtue of that, everyone else that lived in the Addams' mansion.
They walked down the hall in silence, too deafened by the noise and riot brought about by the trains to speak. She watched as her daughter climbed into the bed and settled Marie Antoinette on the pillow beside her, the doll's head a few inches from its body.
"Do you know," Wednesday said quietly, "That the court of Louis the 16th had many traitors, long before the storming of the Bastille. It took years to bubble over…if only they had dealt with it."
"But it was always a potent threat," Morticia was always impressed with Wednsday's ability to infer. She ran her fingers over the plait that lay beside Wednesday's ear as she perched on the edge of the bed. It was thick like rope, but shiny and vital looking. She could see so much of herself in Wednesday that it was startling at times. There was no doubt that she was very much Morticia's offspring; the only thing she shared with Gomez was that rounder face.
"Stop father playing with those trains," she whispered slowly, "I can't hear the screams if the trains keep going."
"Have sweet dreams of your new electric chair," Morticia kissed one cheek then the other, "You did an excellent job of warming it this morning."
"Thank you, mother."
Outside Wednesday's room, her fingers still on the handle, she could feel from the vibrations and tell from the noise that he had moved onto his older set of trains. She let out a little puff of frustration as she rested back against the dresser at the bottom of the stairs. She was very grateful for the fact she was isolated, at least she could be frustrated by the noise in peace.
She was glad of the isolation because it meant she could shed her skin – snake like. Since the auction (which in a less fatal situation, she may have focussed on the fact that she was carnally frustrated after such a lusty battle with her husband over that rather charming finger trap) she had been pretending not to feel what she was feeling. How different it could have been if Fester had not uttered those fateful words; "How do you take it off?" It would have been an afternoon of finding inventive new ways of making the finger trap useful. And laughing over the fact they spent $50,000 in the heat of a rather lascivious moment.
When they had exited the car, and with a slam of the heavy door of the playroom Gomez had disappeared into the bowels of the home, she had been simmering with fury. She had pretended, while entertaining the children that evening and eating dinner with an empty chair beside her, that she had not at all shared a pointed look with him over the comment that had so fatefully ended his happiness.
His happiness that had been so full and overflowing on the night of his brother's return had been shattered with that final, simple comment. Of course, Morticia knew that her darling husband had been noticing these things for the last few weeks. He had, casually, confided in her the fact that his brother hadn't known about his first cigar but his flippant manner told her he was looking for reassurance and in the circumstances, she gave it. She had not known what else to do.
Like a serpent she only shed her skin, and her manners, at the right time.
Worse than the damaged pride though, and the embarrassment that Gomez would conquer eventually, was the fact that there was an unknown danger for her family. That within their midst, was something that had previously been unmeasured by her. She didn't think this was Fester – it was as simple as that. And whoever Dr Pinderschloss was, it didn't feel right either.
She stretched out her fingers against the surface of the dresser and closed her eyes. Inside her there was an inherent urge to protect them – all of them. She tipped her head back and then made a decision.
The deeper you went into their home, the warmer it became. By the time she reached the playroom, the walls were sweating. The nearer you are to hell, she thought delightfully, the more it burns. She rapped on the door with her knuckles when she realised it was bolted firmly from his end.
She leaned against it, "Gomez, let me in my darling."
There was no immediate response, then a faint; "Not right now Tish."
She was poised to disagree and she placed her fingers against the door once more when she decided there was no point in attempting to bring him round. It never worked that way with her husband.
Instead, after hearing faintly the rattling sounds of the chains that took them to the lake below the house, she decided to make her way outside.
Throughout her entire conversation with the man who was claiming to be her brother-in-law, she twisted her hands into her chest and held them there. She was not afraid, because for all she knew this was not Fester, she could see that something went much deeper than that. She knew that he was conflicted somehow. He listened to everything she said and everything she didn't say. She had done what she had to do, she was explicit – I will feast on anyone that subdues me, or my family.
She didn't eat often, like a snake, but when she did she feasted.
She may not be an Addams by blood, but that was where the only discrepancy lay. She was an Addams by attitude and by choice, and most essentially, by love. She really meant it; she wished that mother and father Addams had met the children because they would have loved them…and they would have simply adored their son's choice of wife. Of that she had no doubt.
And she really meant it – she would feast, both literally and metaphorically, on anyone who deemed to challenge their concept of happiness because it was her happiness.
She glided back the way she had come, her cloak rustling along the dry leaves and damp ground of the cemetery. She noted the sopping patch of earth below the various chutes, and realised that he had been trying for the majority of the evening. She had an inkling about why he was here but not one she would share with Gomez. Gomez could not have cared less about money and if she were to share this suspicion with him, she was inclined to believe that it would upset him even further because he found monetary need so insignificant.
She went through the conservatory door to avoid having Lurch re-open the front doors he had locked. She trailed her hand across the carefully cultivated vines, the ones she had taken so long over, and felt them shiver underneath her hand. They were probably relaxing and grateful for the sudden, intense quiet that had fallen over the house.
Perhaps, she thought with a slight smirk, he had run out of diesel.
She made her way, again, to the depths of her home – this time taking the short cut through the library – and came to the door again.
She rapped gently then said; "It's me, Gomez."
She waited for a moment, and then the door fell slowly open.
"Come to bed," she merely said, then turned away from the door as he nodded.
In this house there were things that were done without anyone being asked. Before bed every night, their fire was lit and their covers were turned down. Gomez was in the habit of sleeping without an unguarded fire and she had fallen into this habit too.
She went into her closet, reaching round to her back and plucking each and every button on her dress open. She let it fall onto a pile on her floor and reached for her night gown that was hung upon the armoire. She felt a very sudden and real fatigue.
She padded across the cold, rough wooden floor of their bedroom but stopped as she saw him sitting morosely on the bed. There was a cigar hanging limply from his mouth, his forehead was creased with exhaustion, and the line of his jaw was tense. His shirt lay open crudely and his bow tie was discarded in front of the fire, into which he was staring intently.
"I thought that was it," he said despondently, "I thought my life was complete."
"It is," she responded, coming towards him. She knelt down in front of him gracefully and began untying his Oxfords, letting them fall, one after the other, with a thump to the floor. She looked up at him, and he was staring at her without really looking.
He fell back onto the bed with a flop as she lined the shoes up neatly beside the fireplace. He ran his hands across his eyes and let out a very loud groan.
"Mon cher," she whispered calmly, "Would you like to discuss your upset?"
"No, thank you."
She lifted the shirt he had discarded onto the bed and then waited for him to hand her his trousers. She laid them both over the armchair in the corner.
"Would you like your pyjamas?"
"Yes," he grumbled.
She disappeared into his dressing room, and emerged a moment later with a pair of folded, navy blue satin pyjamas. They had definitely seen better days – in places the satin had faded and was snagged. It was unusual for Gomez's clothes to be remotely worn. Out of both of them, he was by far the vainest with clothing. His closet was bigger than hers, and between smoking jackets in the morning and lounge wear in the evening, she had known him to change up to 5 times a day.
She handed him the bundle, which he began to unfurl. He stopped for a moment looking at the hand-sewn, intricate monogram on the pocket.
He looked up at her, a sweet, almost child-like smile on his face, "My favourite. You always know what I need."
"Not always," she said, watching as he climbed into their bed.
He lay on his side, watching then as she extinguished the lamp and climbed in too. In the dim light from the fire, which cast his face in monstrous shadows, she reached forward and kissed him.
He pulled her closer, so their foreheads were touching.
"I can shed my skin," she whispered into the darkness, "I can deal with it."
"No," he whispered, "I only need you."
"What if I am not enough?"
"You are always enough," he buried his face in her neck, "Let's just sleep."
Despite herself she asked again, "Are you sure you do not want to talk about it?"
"I can't," he said quietly, "I simply can't just now."
They fell into silence then and she listened as his breathing evened out and he gave in to the lulling embrace of sleep. There was an inherent danger under her roof and her husband had fallen victim to it already – she would be damned if she'd let it go any further.
She would feast and leave nothing behind. Inherited her attitude might be, but it had grown to be everything she was.
Please R and R.