Disclaimer: I don't own any rights to Sandman; those belong to Neil Gaiman and DC.
Beta: Moviemom44
Meds legend: Risperdal is a drug used in schizophrenia treatment. Prozac is prescribed to the suffering from depression, the Pfizer blue pill is known under its trade name of Viagra. Melatonin is the hormone on which good sleep depends and when one have insomnia issues, they must take supplemental melatonin. Nitroglycerin is obviously an explosive – fitting Destruction a lot – but it's also used to treat heart conditions.
I thought Despair is a relatively rare character of fanfics and even if it is so, she never appears in any humorous context. It's the highest time to change it.
The idea of Despair and Delirium sharing the souls of mortals belongs to evie vie who used it for the first time in her fanfic entitled Mood Swing.
Day first
I was just playing dice with my baby sister Delirium when Death, my other sister, proposed that I should get rid of my pet rats. She claims replacing them with some other pets would be quite a good idea – just for a change. I must only wonder what new animals I could have. My sisters started to come up with some ideas, which made me lose my concentration and as a result I lost the dice game. But I will win it all back next week, when we are playing for the soul of this mortal one more time. Delirium and me share many souls of mortals. Death often assists us at our games. Her presence often gets indispensable when it's me, Despair, who wins. Because bipolar disorder is a curious thing indeed. And especially in its depressive phase.
Day second
I spent the day with my older sister, Death, in her realm of sunless lands. I met some old acquaintances of mine there. Like Yasir from the Unforgiven. This sect once declared me their goddess. Imagine that! The sect dissolved two years later, with the death of Yasir, the last of them. All of them committed suicide – one by one. It was a touching thing – such devotion on their side. I felt really flattered thinking of it. Until I recalled the reason – it all started when I decided to award them by giving them some pleasure. Those people really should rename themselves as the Ungrateful – they renounced my gift, killing themselves. None of them seemed to be particularly happy at the prospect of going to bed with me.
Day third
The choice of chimpanzees as the pets to replace my rats wasn't as good an idea as it initially seemed to be. When I let them in my realm, I was already sure I'd made a mistake. Those animals demolished all of it! I lost more than three dozens of my mirrors that got broken! Among them, those belonging to the people who used to deliver me the biggest entertainment. I do wish I had decided on rainbow fish as pets instead, as Delirium advised me! After I tidied up my realm – I was never more grateful that the only thing in there besides the mirrors is just fog – I returned my chimps to their previous owners. One of them is a nice lady named Charla Nash. Destiny, my oldest brother, made an allusion to me seeing Mrs. Nash in one of my mirrors very soon but when I asked him, intrigued, what he meant, he fell silent, refusing to answer. Maybe she too is going to have her whole house demolished by this naughty animal.
Day fourth
For a lack of better entertainment after the loss of my mirrors, I decided to go out this evening with my siblings. We decided to go as a foursome – me, Delirium, Death and Desire who chose the club it likes to go to. It was a nice place. And it looked so familiar - those heavy clouds of smoke from the cigarettes made me think of my fog realm. I was soon left on my own but my solitude didn't last long. All of a sudden, I heard behind me a male voice, saying to his companion: "Desire, this hottie we talked with, said this gal who is sitting here is her twin. I'm going to ask this chick out." With those words, he stood before me. You should have seen his eyes when he saw me! And you should have heard the tone of his voice when he uttered: "Oh, I'm sorry… I thought you were someone else… you look like my great aunt Henrietta, sorry…" I didn't even have time to wonder what he meant because then Delirium came over, very agitated, saying some man was trying to kiss her but she didn't like to be touched so she did some stuff to him, making him see only colors. Really pretty colors. So I used this occasion to go out, returning to my realm with a feeling of relief. Great Aunt Henrietta?
Day fifth
Destiny called a family gathering. Devoid of my mirrors, I went along. However, as it turned out, that idea wasn't the best one I ever had. The first thing I did, having arrived in my big brother's realm was get lost in his maze. And when I finally managed to get out and went to Destiny's house, I saw the gathering was attended by Bastet, the newest girlfriend of my brother Dream aka Sandman (an affectionate pet name for him, used in the family), which instantly destroyed my mood. I don't like Bastet, I have an aversion to her since once I caught her eating my rats. She mistook them for mice. Later, Delirium proposed that we change our sigils for something new. She claims we need to keep abreast of the times. I asked her what exactly she meant by new sigils, and she proceeded to pull out of her pocket a handful of some strange pills, explaining their names and which one stands for whom. Like Risperdal for herself and Prozac for me. For Dream it was melatonin, for Destruction nitroglycerin. Or some other pill for Desire, the name of which I don't remember now. I remember only it was blue and produced by the Pfizer firm. But before Del finished, for some reasons unknown to me, Desire got offended and left the meeting, mumbling something about that it never needed anything like that. Although at this moment Destiny looked into his book and whispered something that sounded like "defence mechanism."
Day sixth
I remembered what that young man told me at the club the other day. I came to the conclusion I just didn't suit his taste. Well, I shouldn't worry; there were many mortal men who at this or that point of history had a weakness for me. Like Pablo Neruda who wrote his "A Song of Despair" in honor of me. Yes, I'm sure he entitled it so to give me honors. Or the "Shape of Despair" band, started by those two Finnish men. Yes, they must have fancied me and that's all. Many mortals did, which means that though I don't know human tastes, I must be quite attractive. Otherwise the mortals I used to date wouldn't have wanted to do this. I still remember the names of them. For example Homer, Louis Braille, Andrea Bocelli…
Day seventh
I can't stop thinking about what this boy told me. My sister Delirium says I should start wearing some make up and dressing pretty to look more feminine. I decided to follow her advice. I went to a store and bought everything I needed. Cosmetics and clothes. Wearing clothes is a strange experience indeed. I dyed my hair blonde. When I was walking the street, not being in a hurry to go home (I lost my mirrors, after all so what was there to return to?), in my new pink dress and a new hat, with make-up and my new blonde hair left loose, people were turning their heads back just to look at me. I must have been looking really fabulous. I was so proud of myself. Everybody was craning their necks to take a look at me and they weren't even trying to do it discretely. Some of those humans, especially the females, were very excited about seeing me; they asked me for an autograph. They mistook me for someone else, thinking me to be someone they called Barbara Cartland.
Day eight
Still bored without my mirrors. I think I'm in withdrawal. I decided to take a peek into those mirrors which are left after the chimp attack, hoping to find something interesting. I often see even famous people in my mirrors, though not many mortals would believe this. Like Sarah Winchester. I liked her Mystery House. Empty rooms are my sacred places, as the Unforgiven believed, so Sarah's house was my temple. I gave her my blessing, making her feel the taste of this best feeling in the world to show her how pleased I was with her about this but she didn't seem to be grateful for this either. Strange. I don't know how anyone may not like a good deep depression. Old good major depressive disorder isn't bad. Or Harold Holt. He had to run away, faking the drowning, just like Bernie Capax, Dream's friend who had to leave the places he lived in from time to time. Because Holt, similar to Capax was one of the truly old. Or… this writer whom I can see now in his mirror. His name is Neil Gaiman. He has no idea for a good story now, completely devoid of any good story ideas in fact.
Day ninth
Wildly bored without my mirrors, I decided I would put some ideas into the head of Mr. Gaiman. Something tells me that he's really talented and can make a great story which may keep me entertained for a long time while I am without my mirrors. Only what story can it be? Aaah, I think I know. What if I gave him an idea for a story about my family? I'm sure he would be able to do something great with it. Only what title for it would fit? I thought a nice idea would be naming the story after someone of my siblings. So maybe Sandman?