A/n: Well...this is my first attempt at a Lenore fanfiction. To be honest, I was debating with myself which archive to put it in: Lenore the Cute Little Dead Girl, or the Roman Dirge one. I decided Roman Dirge, since it had more stories. Anyway, this was a story idea I had a while ago and decided to write a story for it. I had another one too but I want to write this one first. Now I only have the first four Lenore books (the comic collections in hardback covers), so forgive me if I'm not including anything recent from the comics. And this is my first try at a Lenore fanfiction, so bear with me please~
Disclaimer: Roman Dirge owns Lenore and I don't. If I did own Lenore, Ragamuffin and Lenore would have gotten together long ago.
It seemed to be an uncharacteristically quiet day in the town of Nevermore this morning. Well, all was quiet until the melancholy tune of funeral bells rang and echoed through the town. Local people all came to the cemetery to pay their final respects upon whomever it was being buried. When the preacher wasn't even halfway through the final blessing, everyone's attention was directed to the small girl of about ten, frollicking in a tutu through the graveyard. She seemed oblivious to the angry glares from the mourners. She had straw-like blonde hair, she was deathly pale and had dark rings under her eyes, and her eyes were black, but one eye seemed bigger than the other eye, which was a tiny dot of black with a ring around it. She hopped onto one of the gravemarkers with a giant cross shape, and she twirled on one foot on the small surface, a dead cat clutched by its tail in her tiny hand.
"Won't you do anything to stop that stupid child?" one mourner demanded, wiping tears out of his eyes but still holding enraged features. The priest sighed and shook his head.
"It's no use. Every time, she never stops. Just let kids be kids. Let's ignore her and get back to the ceremony," he grumbled, and everyone tried to keep their mind on the casket in front of them.
The girl that looked dead, ah, her name was Lenore, suddenly stopped twirling then hopped from the very tall cross gravestone, still clutching the dead cat by the tail. She came over to the funeral where everyone was at and debated internally for a half a second before her usual innocence made her hop up onto the casket and tapdance, grinning widely. She got very angry glares.
"Hey kid! Get off the fucking casket!" one woman yelled. Lenore blinked her eyes open and looked around, not stopping.
"Yeah! What are you, stupid!?" a man demanded.
"Show respect for the dead!" an old...man or woman? yelled.
Lenore stopped and stared at everyone blankly. The priest reached for her to get her down. "Come on, sweetie, get off of the casket-"
In a brief second, Lenore grabbed her giant knife she always seemed to have on her person, and stabbed the preacher probably a dozen times. "I don't wanna, poopyhead!" she exclaimed, pouting. She didn't realize she killed him until after he fell into a pool of his own blood. Her eyes widened slightly. "Oopsie..."
Screams erupted from the mourners. Lenore hopped off the casket and tore off from the scene, throwing stray rocks at those who were brave-and stupid-enough to follow her. She tripped a couple of times over a branch or two. She caught sight of her mansion on the top of the hill and made a mad dash up to it. She jerked the door open and quickly slammed it shut, panting hard after having just run very fast and overexerting herself. Her kitty fell face down on the wood floor after she unknowingly let it go.
Ragamuffin came into the room with a soda and raised a plushie eyebrow. He sighed. "What did you do now, Lenore?"
Lenore swallowed and regained her childish demeanor. She tucked her hands behind her back and shuffled one foot in front of the other. "Oh, nuffin'..." she said, a little too innocently.
Ragamuffin sighed again and took a swig of his soda. "You killed somebody again, didn't you?" Lenore blushed slightly in embarrassment, giving Ragamuffin his answer right away. He smacked his forehead. "Lenore..."
"It was a accident! I swear!" she said quickly, fidgetting. "I was having fun dancing in the cemetery and then on a deadbox and the man in black with the book tried to take me off of the casket and I panicked and my knife may have accidentally stabbed him a bajillion times...in the same place..."
Ragamuffin facepalmed again. "Lenore, I told you to stop doing your made up ballet recitals in the cemetery on days when funerals are taking place! Didn't you learn the last time you did and you got a cross stuck in your throat?"
Lenore shrugged. "It tasted yummy!"
"Lenore, you don't get the point. I told you on days where funerals weren't planned, I would take you at night in the cemetery and you can dance all you want!" Ragamuffin continued.
Lenore stuck out her tongue. "Shut up, poopy-brain!" she snapped (quite cutely at that), pointing at Ragamuffin. There was awkward silence for a few minutes and then she perked up again as usual. "I want pizza!"
"Lenore, it's nine o'clock in the morning..."
"PIZZA!"
"No, Lenore. We can have pizza some other time."
"YOU SUCK!" She death-glared at Ragamuffin and stormed off to the back yard to play with her toys.
Ragamuffin groaned. Lenore was such a handfull. How did her parents deal with her a century ago? Well, he was positive she never killed when she was alive alive, but still, she was just so childish. She could insult him and make him question his badassery constantly, she could drive anyone crazy with her yelling all hours of the day of the most random of things, and she could play rough and break anything she touched. She was a walking piece of bad luck! But hey, she was his best friend! And he was her guardian, so he had to stick by her no matter what. Well, he didn't have to, but he certainly wanted to.
At that moment, he heard a familiar scream coming from the back yard. "Lenore!?" he called, rushing out the back door to save her from Lord knows what now. He thought for a brief second as he ran, Wait, why do all the weird things always happen to US? He shook his head as he stopped in the yard, looking around for his Lenore. He finally found her cowering against a tree, knife in hand, trying to get away from...Ragamuffin ground his plushie teeth...Mr. Gosh. Of course.
"Lenore, my love! I have glued your feet to the ground so you will just hear me out!" Mr. Gosh proclaimed, stepping closer. Lenore screamed and flailed her knife. Mr. Gosh stayed a safe amount of distance away as he talked. "Lenore, I LOVE YOU! What can I do to have you return the feelings?"
"GET THE HELL AWAY FROM ME YA FREAK!" Lenore yelled, still trying to stab him. She was so scared that she was glued to the ground, she couldn't even aim her knife at Mr. Gosh well enough to throw it at him.
"I love you, Lenore!" he tried again, stepping closer and throwing her knife to the side. He presented her with dead flowers and a big box of chocolates. "I even got you your favourite chocolate brand and dead flowers-you love dead flowers!"
"I. HATE. YOU!" Lenore yelled, trying to strangle him but failing to grab his neck. Mr. Gosh held her hands and was about to kiss her when-
"GET OFF OF HER YOU SICKO!"
"Huh?" Mr. Gosh turned around and was greeted with Ragamuffin's plushie foot. Even though he was a doll, he was still pretty strong in muscle. Mr. Gosh screamed as he faceplanted into the grass. Lenore panted hard, looking at Ragamuffin. He didn't notice and went over to Mr. Gosh, keeping his foot on the burlap-covered head. He glared down at him.
"Don't you ever learn you bastard?" Ragamuffin frowned. "She's a fucking ten-year-old girl!"
"Yes, but I keep telling you, man, she's been 10 for a loooooooooooooooooooong time!" came Mr. Gosh's muffled reply. Ragamuffin rolled his eyes.
"That doesn't count! You just like her like that one skunk likes the cat in those old cartoons from the 1940s! Pepe LePew! Yeah, that's what you are, you're a skunk!"
"..." Mr. Gosh didn't know how to reply to that.
"You can't take the hint that she wants nothing to do with you!" Ragamuffin continued, kicking him again. "Just leave her alone! You're a freakin' pedo, you know?"
"You're just a doll!" Mr. Gosh muffle-retorted. Ragamuffin rolled his eyes.
"Yeah, but I'm a doll who's her guardian. And as her guardian, I protect her. But there's you who keeps bugging her. Just let it go, man!" Ragamuffin growled.
Mr. Gosh thought for a minute then he turned his head as best as he could. "Why? Do I have competition?"
"Huh...? I sure hope not!" Ragamuffin retorted.
"It sounds to me like you want Lenore all to yourself," Mr. Gosh said thoughtfully. "So I guess you're my rival for Lenore's affections?"
Ragamuffin blushed slightly. "Wha-? NO!" he blushed more. "NO! I'm just keeping an eye on her and I don't want her to be afraid to so much as step outside! But you can't seem to get the hint that she hates you!"
"So...I can have Lenore since you're not a rival?" Mr. Gosh replied.
"NO. SHE HATES YOU!" Ragamuffin growled again, still red in the face. He grabbed Lenore's thrown away knife. "Get over yourself! You and Lenore have a...surprisingly a worse love story than Twilight! Now get the hint this time and just stay dead!" He quickly stabbed Mr. Gosh in annoyance until he heard a life-ending bloody gurgle. Ragamuffin pulled out the knife and looked at Lenore.
"You should be safe, Lenore," he panted. "...for now." He glared at Mr. Gosh's body then went over to help Lenore get unstuck from the ground. When she was free, they took Mr. Gosh's body and burned it and spread the ashes in the Nevermore pond.
Once they disposed of the ashes, they went back home and locked the doors-just in case. Then Ragamuffin joined Lenore in watching some TV. Lenore settled for some Courage the Cowardly Dog while Ragamuffin half-watched the show, more interested in the fuzzballs on the wood floor. Several hours passed by and Lenore fell asleep on the couch, after having eaten a bunch of Combos, popcorn, and drinking a lot of soda. Ragamuffin smiled a little at her sleeping form. She was very cute when she was asleep.
At that moment, the door unlocked and opened then closed. "Hey," came the voice that was Pooty. He scratched his bucket head and looked at Ragamuffin and Lenore. "Sorry I came home late. My girlfriend wouldn't let me go so easily."
Ragamuffin pulled his eyes away from Lenore, lightly pink in the cheeks, then looked at Pooty. "Hey Pooty."
"So did I miss anything exciting while I was gone?" the bucket-headed demon asked, going to the kitchen to get himself some soda.
"Oh, just the usual. Lenore killed the preacher at a funeral this morning, Mr. Gosh tried to get her to love him again, and then we watched TV for the past few hours." Ragamuffin shrugged. "I'm kinda hungry. Lenore wanted pizza for breakfast. Maybe we can have it for dinner?"
Pooty shrugged. "Sure. Let's hope Lenore is still asleep when the delivery guy comes," he replied, getting out his cell phone. "We don't want another mess to clean up again."
A half an hour later after the pizza guy left, Ragamuffin woke up Lenore. She gurgled a bit and yawned, then looked at Ragamuffin sleepily. "Yeah?"
"Pizza's here," he replied, motioning for her to wake up some more. "Here's your plate." He handed her a paper plate with a couple of slices of pizza already on it. Lenore grinned and began to eat.
"Yummeh!" she exclaimed loudly, some pieces of the slice of pizza flying out of her mouth. Ragamuffin winced. Thank goodness it was just a myth about vampires and garlic.
"Lenore, slow down when you eat," he scolded gently, not wanting to annoy her too much. Lenore pouted and then nodded, slowing down.
The cartoons Lenore was watching earlier were no longer on and now some movie was playing. It was Twilight. "Oh god, can I change the channel!?" Ragamuffin groaned, looking for the remote.
"No!" Lenore frowned, remote in her hand. "I like dis movie!"
"WHAT?" Ragamuffin gaped. "Lenore! That movie and story is terrible! It's horribly unrealistic! Us vampires don't sparkle! We're not like that gay Edward guy!"
"ILIKETHISMOVIE," Lenore growled, giving Ragamuffin a "shut up or you die" glare. Ragamuffin groaned, biting his pizza.
"I'm a freakin' vampire, Lenore! How can you buy into this crap?" he asked.
"It's romantic!" Lenore protested. "The pretty girl gets the vampire she loves!" She pouted again.
"Lenore," Pooty intervened, "how about we watch another movie instead?" Lenore thought.
"Okay!" she said loudly. Ragamuffin facepalmed. Oh sure. She listens to Pooty.
Pooty grabbed the remote and flipped through channels until he caught the very beginning of the movie Orphan. "I like this movie," he said simply after he hid the remote so Lenore couldn't grab it in case she got bored.
Lenore watched the whole movie with interest. She really loved this Esther character. Ragamuffin made a mental note to keep an eye on her even more after seeing how she reacted to this movie. She may try some things. During the scene where Esther tried seducing the father, Ragamuffin felt uncomfortable. "Now that's just weird," he muttered to Pooty who simply shrugged.
When the movie was off, Lenore was jumping around and reciting some lines from the movie. "Lenore, knock it off!" Ragamuffin called after her. He looked at the time. Midnight. He sighed and went after Lenore. "Hey Lenore, it's way past your bedtime!" he called. Lenore turned at him and pouted.
"But-"
"No 'buts', now get in bed, Lenore," he sighed, pointing to her room. Lenore groaned and nodded, but looked at him again. "What?"
"Can you sleep with me? I don't wanna get nightmares no more," she said quietly, looking slightly scared. Ragamuffin sighed. How could he say no to Lenore? She was too adorable. He nodded and Lenore squealed in delight. She picked him up and ran to her bedroom. Once Ragamuffin was on the bed, she stared at him.
"Close your eyes. Imma get changed now," she said, getting her nightgown out of her closet. Ragamuffin blushed.
"Why would I watch anyway?" he asked, rolling his eyes but obliging. He heard Lenore change and then she turned off her light and crawled into bed, cradling Ragamuffin to her chest tightly.
"Goodnight, Ragamuffin."
"Goodnight, Lenore."
"Ragamuffin?"
"What Lenore?"
"Nevermind, sheesh!"
"*sigh* Tell me."
"I love you," she whispered, clutching him tighter. Ragamuffin blushed again for the millionth time that day. "Thanks for sleeping with me tonight."
"Uhh...yeah. Goodnight," he replied, confused. Love? Romantically or in the way a child loved a parent? He wanted to ask her but he heard her light snoring. He could just ask her in the morning.
Ragamuffin woke up in a cold sweat in the middle of the night. He had just had a horrible dream. He dreamed he and Lenore were being happy together as usual, but the Nazi zombies returned and took Lenore away from him forever. He breathed a sigh of relief when he realized Lenore was still there, holding onto him when he was awake. He smiled at her.
"Geez, Lenore, I had such a bad dream that I lost you..." he muttered. Normally Lenore would wake up to his voice, but she didn't this time. That was...strange. He lightly tapped her face. "Lenore? Are you okay?"
Lenore's eyes were still closed with her smile she wore last night. Ragamuffin began to panic. "Lenore!" he tried again, nudging her worriedly. "Lenore, this isn't fucking funny anymore! Dammit, wake up!" He slapped her face. He groaned and broke free from her grasp. He held his head against her chest to try to hear her breathing, but he heard...nothing. He panicked again. "P-Pooty! Pooty!" he yelled. "Come here!"
The bucket demon opened the door angrily, yawning. "What do you want, dude? It better be important!" He looked at Ragamuffin's worried face and then at Lenore, then back to Ragamuffin. He understood quickly. "Whoa, is Lenore okay?" he asked, walking over to the bed.
"I-I don't think so! She's not breathing!" Ragamuffin said.
"Well, she's already a zombie..."
"You know what I fucking mean!" Ragamuffin shouted. "See if she's okay yourself!"
"What should I look for? Dude, she's been dead for over a hundred years..."
"SHE STILL HAS VITALS YOU DUMBASS!"
"Fine, fine. Let me check."
Ragamuffin paced the floor worriedly while Pooty checked out Lenore for any sign of undead life. After ten minutes, Pooty sighed and got off the bed. Ragamuffin glared anxiously at Pooty.
"Well? Is she okay?!" he demanded.
"...I'm afraid Lenore's dead. AGAIN." Pooty lowered his head. "I'm sorry, Ragamuffin."
Ragamuffin shook his head quickly. "No. No! She's Lenore! Sh-she'll come back! I know she will..."
"I don't know, dude. Maybe she's gone for good this time..." Pooty sighed. "I'm sorry."
Ragamuffin bit his lip. "I...I've got to go..." he muttered, turning and quickly running out of the room as quickly as his stubby legs would take him.
'No. Lenore can't be dead again. It has to be a cruel joke she and Pooty decided to pull. It has to be!' he thought as he made his way downstairs and onto the porch. 'It has to be!'
A/n: OH NO! Cliffhanger! I'm evil~ Worry not, Lenore will show up again next chapter~