Sarah Williams was not in a very good mood. For a simple reason, she had an otherworldly Goblin King chasing her everywhere, who refused to simply 'bugger off' and leave her to get on with the life. She had to admire his persistence to be honest with herself. She had tried everything, screaming at him, whacking him over the head with a broom, attacking him with her piping hot cup of morning tea. But he remained exactly the same, he just seemed totally unperturbed by everything she would throw at him, literally, she'd thrown cushions at him, small, marginally insane clocks, a highly prized china ornament from the Ming dynasty. Nothing worked.
She was twenty-four now, and had had a string of jobs that had been practically impossible to maintain through having to explain a series of awkward situations wherein a man in questionable leather attire had been proposing to her through means of Shakespearean poetry on bended knee. It had taken her about four years after the events of '1986' to understand what he had actually been doing. She thought he'd been practising being 'pissed off,' utilising radically archaic lexis, until she had to perform the role of Olivia in Twelfth Night and was able to decipher what on earth he was saying. It came as something of a shock, though even holding a comprehension of the impossibly complicated speeches he would launch at her didn't stop her wishing he could express it in a method she could at least vaguely understand without referring to the Olde English Dictionary.
And boyfriends, there was another problem, after the Labyrinth, she'd tried and succeeded in getting a boyfriend, as an integral part of her newly-established 'must move on' policy. He was a nice boy, was called Stanley and had a lisp, he was however very sweet, gave her flowers and the like. Jareth however, threw what Sarah referred to as a 'strop' and took after Stanley with an air rifle he had just taken, with no explanation from the window display of the local heavy artillery store, it took Sarah about an hour to persuade him to draw the barrel away from Stanley's rapidly paling throat, and it was only when she promised him she wouldn't throw anything at him and would listen that he left the poor boy alone. He had somehow managed to communicate to her that her partners would have a radically reduced life span should he come to know of them, and as Sarah was of an extremely obstinate and defiant character, she promised him she would see no one, a promise that she spoke with her fingers twisted firmly behind her back, a promise she had every intention to break. It was only after the next one had ended up in intensive care that she began to take his warning more seriously. After using a surplus of cushions during her persistent suitor's next visit, she had needed to pay a visit to the local home furnishings store. The attendant, a gawky teenage boy of Sarah's age had been surprised when with a stony face, she asked if they possessed any cushion covers that could be fitted deceptively around a slab of concrete.
Her relationship with her family, was one of the few factors that had seen a marginal improvement in her severely constrained life, she had grown extremely close to Toby, and sat with him almost every weekend seeing that romantic liaisons possessed a high probability of reaching their climax in the local hospital. She was not as vehemently 'I hate you' with her father, and coped with the 'Karen situation' by avoiding her at every available opportunity, which involved a great deal of fast thinking at dinner. Toby had grown up with the annual, consistently intense visits from the Goblin King (who sometimes brought him gifts, a toy cannon for example, complete with loaded Goblin ammunition, predictably, Sarah had not been too happy about the 'gift,' and had to badger him into taking it back with him) and so by the age of nine, saw Jareth's visits as perfectly normal and routine, and at the commencement of the events this passage will be dealing with, Toby simply said:
'Hi Jareth. Sarah? She's in the hall, think she's speaking lovey dovey to her boyfriend.' At this word Toby pulled a face at the thought of Sarah whispering sweet nothings to yet another hapless soul. Jareth proceeded to stalk menacingly down the stairs. Toby promptly returned to the indescribable pleasures of the 'Power Rangers: Xtreme generation super high powered pow.'
Sarah upon seeing Jareth, who looked like he had practised his 'intense/melancholy' gaze very hard in the time in between the present and their last encounter, began rattling off a list of profanities to the ear on the other side of the phone. Before her latest love interest could ask what in the world was going on, Jareth had snatched the phone from her and rapidly delivered a curse to the attentive lover's ears that resulted in him becoming stone deaf for several months.
"Why do you have to do that!" Any terror or awe his presence had previously induced had been vanquished by the knowledge that if she asked him to dance the salsa for her in a pleated mini skirt, he would, she hadn't tried it, yet, but was safe in the knowledge of his compliance. This resulted in her tone merely coming across as being mildly frustrated. She began tapping her foot, as if a mother to a naughty child.
"Because I know with a perfect clarity you would not comply to my orders to abandon such nonsensical devices." Oh great, here we go again...
"Look will you stop spouting that crap! You know perfectly well I don't have a clue what your on about!" Jareth looked slightly put out, as a form of come back, he retrieved a large volume of romantic poetry, as if by magic, from his cloak, and eagerly thrust it into Sarah's hands. It was about the same volume and density as the first edition hardback of War and Peace, a book that has it's own section in libraries, a section titled, 'books as offensive weapons.' "Oh God! Not again, look, why do you bother? You know I don't read them, as it makes as much sense to me as the original Greek transcript of The Odyssey, it will just end up being used as a door stop, it's too big to be a paper weight, y' know?" She sighed and looked at him, his lengthy, wrist straining volume of poetry had done little more than irritate her, "I can't understand you in the slightest, you know that don't you?"
"Well thou shalt have to learn to understand, for when thou art my bride I -"
"Oh will you stop going on about that! For the love of God, what do I have to do to make you understand. I DON'T WANNA MARRY YOU YOU PRATT!" She sighed and kicked the skirting board to show her frustration. Poor skirting board, it had taken a good beating from Sarah's Jareth directed frustration, a whole nine years of it. He's so, so - stubborn! She turned her back from him sighing with a theatrical skillher acting lessons were coming in some vague use, her father would be pleased, considering the voluminous sums of cash he had invested in her 'career.'
"Will thou not grace me with the knowledge as to why."
"Re-phrase that, who knows? You might get an answer."
"Tell me why you persist in your rejection of me I have offered you the stars, to share my throne, I am offering to give myself to you."
"See, you can do it, if you speak proper English we might get along better. And as for the offer, I'll pass, I've passed for the last nine years, this one ain't any different. I may be strange, but I don't find the prospect of being queen to a bunch of wart infested freaks appealing."
"You have no idea of the torment you are putting me through, Sarah. You are only evading the inevitability of your union with me."
"Oh please."
"Consider it, you have no life, I have ensured that." He smiled, a terribly evil smile, but more a little boy wannabe evil than hardcore absolute-rotten-to-the-bone evil. She saw him now as something like a preposterously spoilt, egotistical eight year old possessing a man's body, a man who had extremely questionable fashion sense. Though despite the air-tight breeches and the shirts that looked like they'd be bloody cold in the winter, she had to admit to herself, he looked kinda good in them, in a vaguely Bronte esque sense. She felt like slapping him, but knew that Jareth eagerly interpreted any form of physical contact from her as an 'amorous advance' and restrained herself. He wasn't lying though, she had no life, no job, no friends, and love in the form of an ever-increasingly annoying nine year old brother. All because of him, the bastard. The prospect of Jareth was steadily growing more appealing. Heck, a few Venetian gowns, and a brace of opulent jewellery wouldn't go unwelcome. She restrained herself however, shaking her head back to the cold reality of the situation, she reminded herself, that essentially Jareth was not a very nice person. He was dangerously possessive, malevolent, and to top it all he stole babies. If she was ever to touch him with a lengthy, highly pointed barge pole he'd need to cut that out of his routine pronto. So she gave him her answer, for yet another year:
"No, sorry. Try your chances next time." She gave him a slight, vaguely tired smile, an understated reward for his years of doggedly pursuing her you could say. Jareth looked ecstatic and gripped hold of her tightly in his enthusiasm.
"You mean to say you may consider my proposal next year? Oh happy year! Thou shalt not regret your choice of path, my Queen." He brought her hand to his lips like an over-eager puppy dog, she stuck her tongue out at him and put her free hand on her hip, sighing once more. Resistance to Jareth had as much purpose as holding ones hand up to stop the impact of a forty tonne boulder.
"Get a hobby, have you considered hang-gliding? Who knows? You might get blown away to the wilds and I may never have to set eyes on you again!" She yelled after him as he disappeared, him utilising his trademark excess of glitter usage. Totally useless, she might as well of been speaking to a moss infested brick wall drawing it's pension for all the attention he payed to her words.
She went upstairs to check on Toby, and found him hopping up and down excitedly on his bed, chanting, "go, go power rangers!" with a terrifying enthusiasm. "How did it go with Jareth sis?" His eyes were transfixed to the flickering pastel-toned screen as he spoke, he was currently watching the Mauve ranger use her super-high-mega-chant-power kick to destroy some vast lumbering monster who exploded into a dazzling display of vibrant glitter. Sarah couldn't help but wish Jareth would do that more often.
"Don't call me 'sis', what happened is none of your beeswax and remember, Jareth, only exists between you and me, got that?"
"You don't think the others don't know bout him do you? Mom and Dad think he's one of your old actor friends, y' know the ones who dress funny. They asked me about him, last time, y' know when you threw the Tiffany glass lamp at him. That was funny." He giggled and Sarah quickly seized the remote from him and held it aloft from his grasping reach.
"Bed." He protested, as usual, whining and persistently telling her 'you're so mean,' and tried the routine of tricks he had learnt from his idol, Bart Simpson, for evading 'bedtime.' One such trick involved complaining of illness, and when he complained of 'tummy pain' she just muttered, "if you were a girl, every month, you'd learn what the meaning of pain is, and each time, have it intensified to new heights. Now get yourself to bed before I tell Karen and Dad all about your irrational fear of socks." That got him, and the speed at which he changed and took to bed was impressive. He could of entered a world class bed time contest, he'd of probably won Bronze, if it had been a good day.
She really needed to do something about the whole 'Jareth' situation, she spent the night considering the possibilities. These possibilities involved a flame-thrower, a machete and a large sizzling vat of sulphuric acid. She settled to sleep with a smile.
Let me put it this way, I felt like writing something insane and random, despute saying I's going on hiatus, I've been doing a lot of one shots recently, and this is another one. I hope it's actually funny, and it would be great if you could let me know by reviewing!
I hope you enjoy it!