No Rest for the Wicked
Written By and in Collaboration with: Poor Little Match Girl and A Clever Ruse
Disclaimer: I don't own or associate with Labyrinth or the Jim Henson Company in any way form or fashion. ;-;
Chapter 1: A Window, Again
Oh, the sweet sound of a slamming door. That was what Toby loved to hear. The slamming of a door meant a number of things, though the favorite of the fair-haired boy, ripe with age at sixteen since the last November, was the stoppage of unwelcome noises - the kind that intruded on his personal revelry, such as the harpy-like shrieking and carrying on of his mother. Though it hadn't always been so, he drew satisfaction from her distress weekly, if not daily, at whatever it was he'd purposefully done to release the furies, until his ears began to ring and Toby determined it to be the opportune moment to slam a door or two.
However, tonight it was different. Tonight she had struck a nerve.
Age, that dreaded thief in the night who steals the gold from maiden's hair, had apparently also robbed Toby's mother of her patience for fairy tales, especially when said stories are delivered from the lips of an almost-grown girl. Ever since his older step-sister, Sarah, had her…episode when he was just a baby, Toby's mother had become an avid armchair psychologist, filling the precious space of their bookshelves with thick textbooks mapping the psyche. Sarah and her stepmother had a very Cinderella-esque relationship, but with fewer fairy godmothers and quite a bit more volatile confrontation. When Sarah came of legal age, she moved out by both her own choice and Toby's mother's influence. As he grew older, Toby gained his mother's intolerance early, resenting her for the loss of the sister he'd become so close to in recent years following a myriad of letters and phone calls. Along with this shift of favor and behavior, Toby had the pleasure of becoming the sole subject of Karen's amateur analyses. The number of chances open for said analyses per week were roughly equivalent to the number of times Toby slammed a door in the span of that week, which was unsettlingly often.
As the banshee-like cry faded into the distance and its stinging echo retreated down the stairs, the conquering silence was finalized with the slam of Toby's bedroom door. He disregarded what little he carried to school onto the floor of his room, then plopping down on his bed, the old frame of which shook with a defiant creak even under the boy's lean form. Laying back, he intertwined his fingers and stretched his arms, then settling them on the back of his head as he reclined.
"Not as if this is the worst I've done, you old goblin," the disgruntled teenager muttered to himself, though this be redundant description. To say that Toby Williams was somewhat of a goblin himself would be a gross understatement. With a school criminality document the length of The Art of War, young Toby was the type of guy that teenage girls deem "bad boy" and other boys fantasized about murdering in a variety of creative ways. After all, when Toby wasn't getting into some sort of fight, he was 'unintentionally' gaining the attentions of every teenage girl within a ten mile radius of the pristine private campus to which he was enrolled (temporarily, at this rate). Truth be told, Toby had a horrible time with normal dating and rarely even showed interest - a fact that was beginning to catch up with him as his social life teetered on the edge of abandonment.
His olive green gaze traveled lazily from poster to desk to scattered drawings in the messy room. Toby's eyes fell finally upon the window seat which he never used for anything more than storage, due in large part to his belief that every flat surface, including the floor, collects to comprise the largest shelf in the house. Short, fat, tall, and long books of every kind, though all bound in leather, littered the cushions and surrounding floor. A small hand-mirror his sister had left caught the infant moonlight that filtered through the wide, curving window. The mirror cast a bright reflection across Toby's narrow features, contorted slightly with frustration and graced by a light blush. For a moment, it might have seemed that his eyes had taken on an impossible golden hue, but the shimmer was fleeting. Toby barely blinked at the sudden glare. If anyone was used to light - it was Toby.
Come to think of it, Toby had always seen lights. He couldn't recall ever being without the lights that followed him around in shapes. They seemed to float in the air - he could even touch them, move them around and fit them together in glowing mosaics. At times they would pulse lightly for a moment before fading and being replaced by another, differently colored and unique. He wasn't sure of their true function or origin, and had spent long hours wondering about the lights but never speaking of them. He was sure that his mother would think he'd gone insane, the same accusation she'd pushed his sister away with, and probably attribute said spiral into madness to the music he listened to and video games he played. Toby didn't dare to mention them, even in passing. What seemed like an eternity ago, when he hadn't grown tall enough to hit his head on open kitchen cabinet doors yet, he had referred to them once or twice, no more than one might mention something as natural as breathing. Met with a stale silence or an odd expression, he had learned to keep the lights to himself. Still, they remained with him, almost like guardians.
Now, they acted not as guardians. Now they were tools used to fight his mother's incessant probing. Toby's breathing was heavy and shakily, consciously controlled. His fingers acted first, flying into the air and grasping greedily at the lights. Thoughts flooded his mind - wishes echoing the same desperate sentiment. He wished and wished that he were anywhere - anywhere but here, stewing in his own personal hell, as Karen's words repeated like a broken record in his head. Only want attention. Useless. Malicious. Irrational. Just. Just. Just. Just. Only. Nothing. Toby furiously arranged the lights, moving them in every direction as they glided effortlessly toward him, placing themselves within arm's reach, ready to receive their canvas. They began to pulse. If Toby were not caught up in his own wish and mental flight, he might have noticed that the lights were pulsing stronger than they ever had before. The vibrations seemed to affect the surrounding air in minute fractions, almost creating waves of sound confused with the vibrant colors. He pieced them together, gathering the shapes and melding them into groups until they came into one. The light grew, and grew until it consumed all sight and mind, flooding the world with Toby's desperation.
I wish...anywhere but here.