Title: Home Once More
Author: caz251
Fandom: Labyrinth
Characters: Sarah Williams, Toby Williams, Karen Williams, King Jareth
Pairing: Sarah/Jareth
Genre: some angst
Rating: PG-15
Prompt: 29 story_lottery Home Sweet Home
Summary: Sarah and Toby are finally home after a long and trying experience.
Spoilers: General spoilers for the film
Warning(s): Mentions of character death
Word Count: 1400
Disclaimer: I do not own the Labyrinth, no matter how much I wish it were so.
It was over, she was home, Toby was home, and her torturous experience was now over. She couldn't believe all that she had gone through to get back home. In a way she wished she could forget the trials and tribulations that she had endured to get back home. She knew however that she couldn't, she had learnt valuable lessons through her experience, and she knew that to forget them would be a great injustice to herself. It also wouldn't be fair to Toby, she had learnt not to take things for granted and had grown up a lot in the last while. The lessons she had learnt had brought her closer to her little brother, to forget them may put their relationship in jeopardy, something she never wanted to happen.
Before she had been a spoiled brat and it was only through her time in the Labyrinth and her interaction with the Goblin King that she had come to see that. Her relationship with her brother had flourished as a result of that experience. No longer was she a complete brat, the brat was still in her of course but she kept it leashed most of the time, only ever bringing it out if absolutely necessary. Over the years she had grown as a person, spending more time with her baby brother and helping him grow into a person that his parents could be proud of. While she had come to understand and love her baby brother, things with her parents weren't exactly perfect. Her father was the same as always, he loved both his children and his wife, but her relationship with her stepmother was still stilted. She had resented Karen for taking her mother's place, when really it had been her mother who had left, but after her time in the Underground she had put that aside. The barrier between her and Karen was Toby believe it or not, the closer Sarah became to Toby the worse her relationship with Karen became.
It baffled Sarah in a way; Karen had always wanted Sarah to look after Toby so that she could spend time with their father, but now that she did so without having to be asked Karen was unhappy about it. She knew on some level that it was jealousy, Karen although a wonderful housewife and hostess was not cut out to be the perfect mother. Or she wasn't when Toby had the perfect sister. There was only so much space in a young child's affections for one of them to take the main role, and Karen had been relegated to the backseat. It wasn't that she was a bad mother; it was more to do with the fact that Sarah catered to her brothers desires as much as she could without helping to turn him into a brat.
Sarah and Toby would spend plenty of time together, a large part of it being when Sarah would read to him or tell him stories, when he was young, and as he grew older involving him more in the stories through role play. Each story she told had an individual lesson to teach about growing into a good person, but the games and stories were something that Karen was definitely unhappy about. The way that Sarah presented the stories and games were like how she had played when she was younger as taught by her mother. Karen felt that Linda Williams was butting in on the raising of her child, even without being anywhere near, just through Sarah's actions. Toby was becoming more and more like his sister everyday, his head in the clouds, concerned with things like goblins and playacting rather than soccer or baseball, or even playing in the mud.
In a way Karen was grateful that her son didn't take an inordinate amount of pleasure in getting dirty, but in others she just wished he would be a little boy. She tried everything, she had even sent him to a afterschool club when he started school in the hopes that he would make a friend that would usurp Sarah in his affections, and he would find new interests. She didn't have any real problem with the idea of Toby liking to act, if that's what he wanted to do as a future career she would have supported him, no what she didn't like were the parallels between his and Sarah's childhoods. Sarah had been interested in the exact same things and was now encouraging Toby to follow in her footsteps, something that unsettled Karen. Sarah had been such a brat, she had grown out of it eventually but Karen couldn't help but think that she was intending to teach Toby her old tricks.
Everything had changed when their father died, he was killed in a car accident by a drunk driver on his way home from work, and life became a lot harder for both Sarah and Toby when that happened. Karen had taken their father's death hard and had started drinking, taking her anger out on Sarah when she came to visit. She had even gone so far as to ban Sarah from seeing Toby now that Robert wasn't around to protest her actions. Sarah and Toby had made sure therefore to meet nowhere near the house so as not to be noticed by Karen. Sarah wouldn't have her little brother getting into trouble for seeing her; she'd rather remove herself from his life entirely than that.
They had been discrete, meeting up only once a week in the park where Sarah used to play as a child, knowing that it was a place that Karen never visited, thinking they were safe. They had been, up until yesterday, things had been going well; Karen was even appearing to be better, having stopped drinking. Sarah had met Toby at the park as usual, but neither of them had expected Karen to have followed Toby. She wasn't impressed that Toby had been going behind her back and lying to her, and had grounded him, forbidding him to see Sarah again, explaining that she had put the house on the market and that they were moving.
Toby had protested, exclaiming that he couldn't leave Sarah; she was his sister, before muttering something about goblins. Karen had laughed at him, telling him that he had no choice; that she was his mother and it was her decision. Her sons mention of goblins reminded her however of the book that both he and Sarah had read many times, and she decided to take a chance, knowing it wouldn't work, but hoping that it would shock both her son and her stepdaughter into silence. "I wish the goblins would take you away, right now."
She hadn't expected her words to work, and she certainly hadn't expected to find the Goblin King in front of her, but he was and Sarah was gone. She had always thought Sarah's favourite book to be nothing more than a fairytale, but now she was convinced it was true. The majestic figure in front of her had offered her dreams or a chance to get Sarah back. Karen had taken her dreams over the chance of reclaiming her stepdaughter, not noticing the looks passed between her son and the King.
Karen had then taken Toby home, there was no need to sell the house now that Sarah wasn't around to intrude upon their lives. She sent her son to bathe while she cooked dinner, only to call out and find that he was ignoring her. Entering his room, she found him standing packing a bag with what appeared to be his and Sarah's prized possessions. He looked at her before turning away, "I wish the goblins would come and take me away, right now."
Sarah sighed as she came out of her memories, it was over, there was no need to dwell on it, both she and Toby were back where they belonged. She looked around the room she shared with Jareth with a smile, before touching the wall and allowing the Labyrinth to speak into her mind. Both her husband and her brother were in the library, Jareth teaching Toby more about Fae politics, something he would need to know for when he took the throne. Standing she made her way to the window, looking down at the labyrinth below, she was home.