The Hundred Acre Wood
Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter, Winnie-the-Pooh, or anything else that may seem familiar. In fact, I own very little.
Author: DracaDelirus
Warnings: Mention of extreme child abuse, mental, physical, and sexual. Please take this warning very seriously. Feel free to not read and hit the back key now. If you decide to go ahead and read this tale before it's complete, and you get worried and want the happy ending to know that it really does end okay - just let me know and I'll send it to you. It's already written and I'd much rather share it early than to distress anyone.
Timeline: Wednesday, July 31st, 1991, morning
Chapter 1 – Boy
Boy wrapped his thin arms around his knees and curled up in a ball on his raggedy blanket, trying to become so small that he'd disappear. Disappearing was Boy's fondest wish, but like everything else in his short life, he'd never been gifted with the talent. However, that didn't mean he wouldn't keep trying to do it, especially as he felt compelled to do so, if for no other reason than to try to please 'The Family'. After all, it was what The Family kept telling him to do - to disappear as if he never existed. To his credit, he really did try to the best of his abilities to please them and make them happy, even though his best never seemed quite good enough. It didn't help a whit that they weren't a particularly jolly bunch to begin with.
Scrunching up his eyes, he wished again with all his might. Was it his imagination, or did the air around him feel differently this time - warmer and almost… alive?
BANG!
The sound broke Boy's concentration and his head snapped up immediately, his wide, startled eyes drawn to the illuminated crack that marked where his little door met the floor.
"BOY! YOU'D BETTER NOT BE GETTING ANY BAD IDEAS IN THERE! I WON'T STAND FOR IT I TELL YOU!" Ma'am's voice screeched from the other side of the door.
Ma'am hadn't actually asked Boy a direct question so he remained silent. He knew it was against the rules for him to talk, unless specifically ordered to do so - an event that rarely happened, as The Family seldom wanted to hear anything he had to say unless it was an apology. However, her accusation did make Boy start to think.
She'd accused him of having ideas on several occasions in the past, and as of yet Boy still wasn't sure exactly what an idea was. As The Family didn't allow him to ask questions - finding out what they were talking about sometimes was a tad difficult at best. However, using the process of elimination he could usually come close, and right now, he was fairly certain he didn't have any of the ideas in his little cupboard that Ma'am claimed he did - good, bad, or otherwise.
Nevertheless, to be absolutely sure he felt around in every nook and cranny.
No, nothing there that wasn't there the last time he checked. Besides the blanket he was laying on, there were few other things in his space. There was a plastic bucket with a handle for carrying. He knew that wasn't an idea so he pushed it carefully back into the corner so it wouldn't slop out, and felt further. There was his tattered story book, the empty water pitcher, an old sock with a hole in the toe, a bent coat hanger, a paper clip, a used tissue, a couple of spiders that skittered out of the way as his hand brushed them, and lastly Boy himself.
That was all.
No ideas.
Not a one.
"BOY! DID YOU HEAR ME? WHY DIDN'T YOU ANSWER? AREN'T YOU PAYING ATTENTION?" Her voice was an octave higher than before.
'The rules must've changed again! Ma'am wanted me to reply after all!'
Boy cringed at his mistake. The number one rule was he was to obey all the other rules all of the time, no exceptions. Breaking any rule always meant swift punishment, and ignorance of them wasn't an acceptable excuse. The Family felt if he were good, he'd know what the rules were and abide by them automatically. In their opinion, it was only because he was bad, that he didn't have a clue and kept breaking them. In his opinion, it was because they kept changing them on him.
He scooted over to the door, and with his mouth pressed, as close to the crack by the floor as possible, to ensure Ma'am heard his reply, he answered respectfully, "Yes Ma'am, I mean, no Ma'am. I checked. There aren't any ideas in here. Sorry Ma'am."
"YOU'D BETTER BE SORRY! I KNOW YOU'RE UP TO NO GOOD. YOU'RE PLOTTING SOMETHING AREN'T YOU? WE'LL JUST SEE WHAT YOUR MASTER HAS TO SAY ABOUT IT WHEN HE GETS HOME."
The wrath emanating from Ma'am was so tangible in the air that Boy could feel its sharp tendrils slithering under the door and stabbing into his heart. He'd tried so hard to please, and once again, all he'd managed to do was to be a disappointment and a burden.
When the fates had first rudely thrust the unwanted baby into their home, The Family had pondered what to do with him, preferably something that wouldn't impose on their own space. However, wherever they put him, they could still see him, and even worse - he could see them. He wouldn't fuss, he wouldn't cry, he'd just stare at them with his unusually vivid emerald green eyes as if he knew what they were thinking.
It was unsettling.
Anything unusual and unsettling was deemed 'abnormal', and being abnormal was most unacceptable in their very normal household. To remedy the situation, Sir and Ma'am finally hit on the idea of partitioning off the unused area under the staircase in the main hallway. This created a very useful cupboard for storing cleaning supplies under the roomy upper half of the steps, leaving the area under the lower half of the steps (where they couldn't conveniently reach anyway) unoccupied. This small, cramped awkward space they allowed the child for his personal use.
As Boy was barely fifteen months old at the time, and quite small, the space was more than generous. Very fitting, they laughed as they shut him inside and thus made the green staring eyes go away - 'wasted space' for the 'waste of space'.
As he was so young when the door of the cupboard first closed him in, Boy could barely remember any other way of life. Any thoughts, feelings, or memories of the time before the darkness enveloped him, were just lovely bright scraps of dreams. So lovely that Boy knew they couldn't possibly belong to him. For as far back as Boy could remember his life hadn't been lovely at all. It had always been very dark and about a metre and a half square. That was as far as he could reach in any direction, including up, before he touched a wall.
If he lay in the centre catty-corner and stretched out his legs and arms, he could touch all four walls at the same time. He knew this because he did it quite often, as there was no other entertainment to be had in the small space. If he lay straight-wise, the top of his head touched the back of the partitioned wall, but he couldn't stretch out fully anymore without curling up his knees - his feet barely finding room in the space created by the bottom stair.
The cupboard under the stairs may have been spacious enough when The Family first put him there, but if he grew any more he wouldn't be able to do anything but curl up no matter which way he turned. He laughed at this thought. The only way he was going to outgrow the space would be if he got enough to eat. That was unlikely to happen the way he kept breaking rules left and right.
On second thought, it was good they kept forgetting to feed him, so he didn't grow and could still fit into the space. Hee was only allowed out to be punished or to do chores, so he supposed he really didn't want to grow much bigger. For as much as he was afraid of the dark, he'd rather just stay in his cupboard, because at least in here he wasn't hurt or overworked. However, he didn't have any choice in that either.
As Ma'am stormed away, her angry vibrations caused the floor to shudder and the spiders to scurry to the safety of their webs. Although Boy knew he deserved to be yelled at, and his mistakes pointed out, so that he could learn from them, he was still relieved when the shrill voice stopped and Ma'am left him alone. He also knew that this momentary respite would be short lived when Sir came home as promised. He knew without being told that Sir wouldn't be any happier with him than Ma'am was. Boy shuddered at the thought.
He was still hurting all over and limping from the lesson, against wanton gluttony, that Sir had taught him before leaving for work that very morning. Normally Sir's impromptu lessons just left him with a few welts and bruises, but this time he'd made the mistake of accidentally jerking in pain and kicking Sir instead of staying perfectly still while taking his deserved beating. Sir reminded him never to do that again by twisting the offending foot until Boy begged him to stop.
Boy wasn't sure if he could take another lesson of that type so soon and still be able to do his chores effectively, but he knew it was useless to beg for compassion, just as it'd been useless that morning to beg water to fill his empty pitcher. He shouldn't have been greedy then, and he shouldn't expect forgiveness now. Besides, his just punishment would happen whether he was ready for it or not, because he had no rights. He was a nothing.
'All I was trying to do is disappear as they keep telling me to do, and now Ma'am's angry again. I wasn't making any noise. I wasn't even moving! I was just pretending I didn't exist. Isn't that what they want? It seems as if even when I'm being good, I'm being bad,' Boy thought in frustration.
He wiped at his eyes with the back of his grubby hand, wrapped the blanket around his trembling shoulders, and cradled the tattered book carefully in his arms. Opening the pages in the dim light from the crack under the door, he tenderly traced his finger around the charming characters on the pages.
He'd wondered many times what the real story was that went with them. He'd heard Ma'am read storybooks like this to Cousin but she'd never read this one to him. Since he didn't know what the words said, he'd made up stories in his own head to go with the pictures, but he was sure that the pitiful fantasies he could think up were not nearly as exciting as the real one.
To him the characters were very exciting. They could do all sorts of things, many more than Boy himself could. But then Boy had had very few happy experiences, so it was hard to think up adventures worthy of the colourful happy characters he considered his only friends. That meant the characters had to make up their own for him, and they did – they were all so terribly creative! The thought brought a small smile to Boy's face even though he was quite envious of their talents.
Boy then touched the black squiggles on the page, his index finger mimicking the shape of the loops and lines. Ma'am said things that looked like this were something called 'letters' and the letters made 'words' and the words made up the story. So many words he didn't know… If only he could learn to read, but Sir said he was too stupid. If only he could, he thought, then maybe he'd also know how to disappear just as his friends did whenever The Family pounded on his door. Then again, if he knew how to read, he might also get 'ideas' and possessing even one idea was strictly forbidden.
Boy sighed. There were just too many ways to break the rules. No wonder he was always in trouble. The disheartening thought finally made Boy's head droop onto the open pages and he drifted off to sleep while he awaited Sir's arrival and the promised punishment.
'I wish I could live with my friends in The Hundred Acre Wood…'
In the darkness of the little cupboard, the pages of the tattered storybook gave off a momentary soft blue glow at his words.
'I wish…'