/I'm so sorry for the late update! Here you go everyone! I...For those who reviewed I'd just like to say that I have no intention of giving up on this story, now, or ever, until it's finished! My updates, however... Expect them to be slow. Sorry, I'm pretty busy having my finals. But nonetheless, please, read on./

YEAR: 2009

Right now, 8:32 PM, Friday

"You know mom, you should stop patronizing me." That's her, Wednesday, trying to convince her mom to stop making her own decisions. At certain times, these situations seem to annoy the hell out of her, and on infrequent occasion, benefit her well being. But as of current, this is seriously crossing the line. To prove just how serious she is, she's putting her foot. Down. On. The. Floor. When you see Wednesday, a 23-year old girl who looks like a teenage hormonal-driven 17-year old, putting her left foot down on the ground quite ambitiously, just like what she's doing right now, you just know that some major shit is about to go down.

"Wednesday honey, I told you to take an aspiring path, but the path your taking is steeper than you think!" she tries to persuade her otherwise. It's not going to work. It just won't. It may have worked when she was seven, oblivious to the world as any, but now she's a fully-grown freeloading adult, and she has the right and free will to do anything she wants, whenever she wants.

As predicted, the raged out girl practically flew right past her mother, faint puffs of clouds being left in her tracks at the great velocity she's put into running from her parent. A faint, malicious cackle could be heard into the distance. She's being a rebel.

She has never even once stopped following her mother's words.

To her, whatever came out of her mom's mouth was considered law, law that one must follow, with severe penalty to whoever disobeys whatever the law firmly states. It was the absolute, the ultimate.

Then again, laws were always meant to be broken, weren't they?

Yesterday, 7:45 AM, Thursday.

Wednesday grimaced at her breakfast meal.

This is what it was composed of: two fattening strips of fresh sizzling bacon, one sunny side up white and yellow egg, and three small slices of toasted bread with crisp burns on the side, along with a portion of butter in a separate and smaller plate.

Oh joy.

She looked up at the person sitting adjacent to her on the dining table, then back at her meal. Wisps of smoke were still rising from the bacon. The scent was intoxicating, but nevertheless, she tried in her best efforts to keep a practiced poker face and a disinterested glare. Judging from the panicked expression of the other person, it seemed her plan to intimidate was a success. She would not succumb to a woman of such low class, even if this woman was her elder sister.

Clearing her throat, she addressed the only other person in the room. "Tuesday. The only reason such a maliciously intended person such as you would ever make me breakfast is if she wanted something from me. Now what do you want?"

Tuesday fails to keep up her plastered smile. "Oh, come on, silly Wendy! What's wrong with your darling sister making an effort to create a delicious morning meal for her precious sibling? Your bacon's already going cold!" her mind prattles along the lines of I'm such a liar before saying what she can.

That's definitely Tuesday alright. A charismatic 29-year old who can get anyone to follow her like she's a goddess. Wrapped around her perfectly manicured fingers, she can control people like puppets on strings, marionettes, that is, people aside from Wednesday. Wednesday hates her like hell, and Tuesday knows that. They've had a long history sibling rivalry, being the two eldest out of the children bunch.

"It's obvious you're lying. You never do this. And besides, your posture is stiff, you're breaking into a cold sweat, your throat is getting dry, your voice is breaking into a higher octave—need I say more?" while saying this, she pokes the yolk of her egg, watching the yellow ooze dripping slowly off the circumference of the white outsides before piercing a side of the egg and munching it off her fork. After taking her sweet time swallowing her food, she continues, giving a cold facade to Tuesday. "You're an emotionally wrecked up pile of cold nerves. You, of all people, should know it's pointless to lie to me."

After she said that, Tuesday dropped the sweet sister act and returned to her normal self, relaxing her position, rolling her eyes, and giving a disapproving sigh.

"Okay, fine!" she raised her hands in insincere apology, "Mom wanted me to convince you to quit your job and go career searching again." She murmured in no positivity, tilting her head to the side.

"As expected." Huff.

"Well duh, Wendy. You have no motivation at all. Either that or your just trying to make mom get as desperate as she can!" a heartless laugh ringed Wednesdays ears and filled her mind like poison. She hated that laugh so much; she almost felt the urge to put her foot down. But before taking her chances, she paused for a moment to reconsider. A low class like her wasn't even worth one of her infamous tantrums. So instead, Wednesday stood up abruptly from her chair, slamming her bare hands on the desk a little more painfully than intended, and made haste to exit the room.

Midway, she paused in her action, hand hovering over the doorknob before she turned around to face her pompous sister.

"Fuck you." She says, after Tuesday stopped her mocking laughter. A devil's grin spreading across her sister's lips were the last thing she looked at before barging back upstairs and into her room, otherwise known as her sanctuary.

Slamming the door as forcefully as her little body could, almost worried that she might have broken the hinge, she left a loud sound that could be heard throughout the house. After confirming that no one had been bothered, she leaned against one of her walls, and curled into a ball.

After a few moments of sulking, she heard the front door of her house slowly shutting closed, which meant that Tuesday had left her unit. Finally.

At the same time, she listened closely to the sounds against the wall next to her. The sound was faint and distorted when a thick concrete surface was blocking the pathway of noise. She pressed her ear closely and listened to it closer.

A faint jag-ish caused sound could be heard. It was her next door neighbour's doing. The strange one who she never sees. Then again, her entire floor was strange. All the other units were unoccupied by anyone except for her and her mysterious neighbour—which was probably caused due to the several noise complaints the management had received before.

They did try and accommodate Wednesday into moving to another floor, but Wednesday declined the offer, saying that, 'The view from my window is more than important compared to whatever my neighbour does.'

Yeah,later on, she kind of regretted her decision at least two weeks after.

Ugh, sometimes she guesses, even makes it into a sort of game, what exactly causes that indistinguishable sound that she's witnessing as of moment. The sound brings unpleasant, queasy feelings to her stomach every time she hears it, the somewhat same feeling she gets whenever a fellow sharp-nailed student of hers, when she still attended school, scratched their fingers against the chalkboard quite audibly to catch the attention of rest of the class.

Her ears were always sensitive, now that she thinks about it. In fact, her entire five senses could be considered a rank higher than standard. It doesn't really bother her though, because it isn't really something to gloat about, nor be ashamed of. Though, the peculiar talent did prominently contribute to her rise in the ranks of popularity during the early years of middle school.

Removing herself from her tangled web of school memoirs, she took a swift glance to the left and checked the time on her digital alarm clock.

8:12

She momentarily processed the time in her cerebral calendar to-do list. Cataloguing the information into her well-organized metaphorical syllabus, she stands up to get ready for work, realizing that she's late for it by exactly twelve minutes, and counting.

She does not panic at this fact, however, she does speed up her pace and proceed to run to the bathroom and brush her teeth. While she scrubs the inside of her mouth with the toothbrush, minty bubbles invading the outside of her jaws, she examines her reflection on the mirror.

Her bed head auburn hair is tangled in distraught confusion over her freckled, sleep-depraved face. The dreary eyebags under her dark blue eyes give her a look that can match that of a pissed off Sadako, except with different hair and eye pigments. She held back a groan of displeasure after brushing through her waist length savannah on her scalp and grabbing a random fresh set of clothes from her nearby closet, putting on the unidentified top while looking around for her duffel bag.

While grabbing her bag and effortlessly swinging it on top of her left shoulder, she snatched a small cylinder jar-looking container at her side desk, next to her bed. She read the label of her container, despite knowing what it says. They were medication pills for her recurring family disease—a disease of osteoporosis that seems to insert itself into the family tree once in a while. The symptoms have never occurred on her, but since her youngest, 7-year old sister, Sunday, wasn't as lucky not to get it, the rest of her siblings had to prescribe in suite as well. Just in case. Oh Sunday, sweet Sunday who can't even get out of bed without proper, delicate assistance.

She had been scolded by the doctor for more than one occasion to stop forgetting to take these pills twice a day, stating that the consequences are later on to be fatally regretted.

To her, she still thinks it's quite a nuisance and a real pain in her side to keep track of. But just to keep the old doc happy, she swallows one pill in to her mouth and puts the container inside the side pocket of her duffel bag. The bitter taste sickens her.

Putting a hand over her abdomen, she felt a growl of cramped hollowness coming from the deep pit that was her stomach. Remembering that she didn't finish the breakfast Tuesday made her, she hung her head in nausea at the idea of growing hunger developing in her brain.

She checked if she forgot anything behind. She hated the feeling that you get whenever you finish packing your stuff and you're ready to leave, but there's this troublesome feeling in the middle of your gut that makes you feel like you've forgotten something. She takes a quick scan around her room before bolting for the stairs, and leaving the room, taking another glance at her wrist watch.

8:24, it read.

She made her way to the basement, effectively starting up the nearest car's engine, slamming the door shut, and driving off to the office for another stressful day at work—a little gibberish with her quick course of action. At times like these, Wednesday is grateful that she lives in a less than urban area rather than an infrastructural, middle-of-town apartment. The traffic was never horrible on the way to work, which was a good thing. At the same time, she was also thankful for living in the first floor of her condominium. Running down the emergency staircase was never a chore when it rivalled for waiting several seconds for a vacant elevator.

While she rode off into the street, she kept a note at the back of her head to stop leaving her spare key above the doorframe of her unit. Tuesday managing to break in her house as an intruder was reminder enough to stop being so careless about her personal security. It made her wonder why she wasn't at all surprised when she saw her blonde-haired sister in the morning, waking her up with fake happy eyes. Then again, her mind wasn't functioning properly since she hadn't received her early dose of coffee.

Making a sharp turn to the left, Wednesday parallel parks her car in with practiced precision that took weeks for her to master. After getting out of the car and locking it shut, without thinking any second thoughts, she ran to the elevator which was about to be closed, its contents containing a cramp full of office co-workers.

Barely making it in, the satisfying ding signifying the elevator door's closing made her proud at her speed, and at the same time, tired as hell. She tried catching her breath in the stuffy compartment filled with other people while reaching for her floor number, the highest floor aside from the rooftop, floor 64.

For some reason, the elevator was making its stop on every single floor. And every single time it made it stop, it made Wednesday lose half her patience, and get twice as furious. In her perspective, this was clearly the doing of some cruel, heartless prankster. A prankster that seriously needed to get some major foot-stomping action from her. Right. Now.

Luckily, the last stop had finally been reached. She stepped out of the elevator with a huge gasp of not-exactly-fresh-but-still-better-than-the-stuffy-air-in-that-elevator oxygen.

She turned her head a little to her left to see the visible time on one of the nearby company clocks.

9:19

...Why do clocks hate me so much?

"FERNSBY!" a voice boomed out from the intercom. A few of the people working away at their computers in separate cubicles slightly winced at the sound, some going to the extent of covering their ears. A following dictation came after, the voice, now much softer than the last. "Please report to the head office." Venom could be tasted in each syllable he, yes he, spoke, a particularly sour note hitting the last slur before the intercom turned off.

Her boss, personally calling her in for a discussion only meant one thing.

I'm so fired.

Upon opening the door, Wednesday finds her boss, a middle-aged man who looked like he was tipping to the older ages, tapping his desk with a pen and holding a folder with a few short bond papers—most likely her performance review for this month—and judging by the disappointed frown on his face, he's clearly not here to give anyone a promotion.

He ceased to create noise with his pen, and motioned her to sit down, not giving a glance away to meet her eyes, but instead, intently focusing on the papers. In Wednesday's perspective, the man isn't even giving a damn at what he's looking at, and she's right. The boss is just plainly looking at black scrawls on a white canvas, nothing more, and nothing less. This is simply done to provoke her—to get her worried, or even furious. To him, this was just phase one in his plan to set her only career burning in ashes. The guy was a total sadist.

Initiate phase 2.

"Tell me, I seem to have short-term memory loss," he inquired, "What was your name again?"

The son of a bitch did not have the right to ask that. Wednesday's leg twitched. Self-control was never her strong suit. She managed to extinguish her fumes for the first wave, at least. Her stamina wasn't improving at a hopeless pace.

"Wednesday. Fernsby." She recited her lines with slowness, the intent—malice, the gesture—fake sincerity. A smile had been plastered on her face, a little too toothy, as if she were bearing fangs, ready to eat and sever the flesh and bone of her prey in front of her.

It was just a coincidence that her boss just happened to be the only one facing right in front of her.

"Ah, yes, Fernsby." He muttered incoherently in that annoying way—mumbling things even though they seemed important. If it weren't the fact that he was her superior, she would have smited him a long time ago.

"It seems you aren't exactly a right person to have such a career here. Why not try something new? Like... Being a musician again?" he was hitting all her pressure points. It made her want to snatch the damn folder from under his nose. Yes, for her entire life, her dream job was to be a musician—it didn't matter what kind of instrument, what mattered was that she was able to perform live. She loved the feeling of adoration.

It didn't go over so well when she brought the topic up to her parents after graduation.

"Well then, Fernsby," the emphasis proved a reaction that she meant to disclose, rage. She accidentally fisted her palms into white-colored balls of vengeance that wanted to get a fistful of I'm your superior.

Which meant phase 2 was a success, and it was time to initiate the final part.

"Twenty-three years old. Average school records. Oh, and what's this? A history of family diseases that have deteriorated your family tree for centuries."

You're not playing this game. You aren't.

"Aha! No wonder you had such a poor lifestyle. I can see why." He inclined his voice in an interrogative notation, one meant to mock. "And you, a family of one mother, and 6 siblings?" it burns her whenever someone talks about that—since Father left the family just a few weeks ago.

Don't you dare talk about my family issues.

"And a young girl named Sunday, huh. The poor girl who can't even stand on her own two legs. The girl who can't even get out of her wheelchair without breaking her b-"

"DON'T YOU DARE TALK ABOUT SUNDAY."

Drugged with boiled frustration, frustration that had been covered with a lid, heating the liquid inside, she released all her anger, only to find herself chocking her boss's neck. The man was gasping for relief. After steaming the heat out of her system, she managed to find the inner peace in her to calm down.

Dropping her grip, she solemnly looked away and walked out the door, head hung low.

"I...I quit." She seethed in slight moral redemption.

Phase 3, success.

Yesterday, 11:06 AM, Thursday

Walking out of the elevator once again, she preoccupied her mind with lousy things that haven't been reminiscenced until now. It was illogical to be thinking of silly things like these, when most people would have been looking through the Classified Ads section from a nearby newspaper stand. Just in case she felt like going back to earth, she snagged a copy of a fresh newspaper from the corner of a shop vendor's eye, rolled the thin sheets into a cylinder, and held onto it until she snapped out of her trance.

If her mind was one huge filing cabinet, by now, she would have removed the entire dusty contents of folders under the letter M section for "Memories" and a few other particularly worn out papers from the R section, for "Recollections".

And maybe a scrap of paper from the "Penance" cabinet.

Starting with Sunday, a topic that had been brought up quite insensitively just a few minutes ago. Sunday was a sweet girl—was. It was stupid. She's history, and Wednesday needed to accept that and let her anguish go.

If only-these were the two words that she constantly ruminated. If only she could have noticed the symptoms sooner. If only she could exchange her health for Sunday's.

If only you were still fucking alive.

A few dabs could be felt on her eyelids. She blinked them away before they reddened. It was time to change the topic into something less emotional. Like...Like-

Like finding another job.

The opportunities were endless, and she didn't know where to st—how about being a musician?

Here we go, living out her fantasies again. If she still had an occupation, she'd be probably be snickering at how reckless her action was. But then again, even mother wanted her to find a different job, so might as well take the chance while you can.

Remembering she had a newspaper at the side of her hand, she flipped through the several small ads that dominated the paper, searching through each one—specifically the ones that were related to musically-inclined career paths that seemed credible enough.

The amount of job applications however, were just too much for her mind to store, so she decided to grab a spare pen from her duffel bag's inner pockets, making her way to a nearby bench to look through her stuff properly.

Rummaging through several objects, she finally found her pen, along with her phone that seemed to be vibrating next to it. Grabbing both items, she checked who was calling her—only to be a few seconds late when the callers ID had been filed under missed calls.

Mother

14 missed calls

She was not in the mood to talk to her mother. Especially when she knew that her mom would just try to convince her to quit her job—which she already did, and become a more financially stable worker—which is what she was kind of working on right now.

Wednesday set aside her phone, placing it back in the bag after turning off the vibration function. She grabbed her pen again and began to encircle particular jobs that she would like to join. Most of them were some amateur bands that performed in decent coffee shops and small concerts.

It was credible enough. The pay was pretty decent, plus most of them free food.

In the end, she narrowed down her search to one job. The ad had the band leader's phone number, which she was grateful for, and the address for where the auditions were going to take place, which was reliable, and didn't seem like a scam.

The thing that appealed to her most was that they weren't looking for any specific musician, but that they simply wanted more people. Wednesday made an inference that they were probably a free-lance group that improvised.

Deal.

She dialled in the number, just in case she was wrong.

"Um...Hello?" a throaty male's voice had been whispered in her ears. She was quite surprised at the uncertainty of the guy's tone.

"I-I'd just like to confirm with your ad if I got the right number, the..." she looked at the newspaper again to see the title of the band, "Outside Subject... Right? That's your band name?"

"W-why...Yes it is. Are you..."

"Yes, I'd like to try out. What's the schedu-?"

The man's voice kind of sounded off. It appeared that wherever he was, he was calling out some other people in the distance. She didn't really understand it, but it faintly heard like:

"Oh my god dudes, we've finally got one!"

She mentally slumped in disappointment, was she really their only applicant? Judging by the cheering from the other end, she probably was.

"Okay," his voice was filled with euphoria, and it was a little closer to the speaker than the last, so Wednesday kind of had to extract her phone away from her ear a bit, "Ump... So, you know the address right? Go there tomorrow, Friday, at 9 PM, sharp. I...I mean, is, is that okay with y-you?" the dude sounded bipolar, his two split personalities differentiating in confidence.

"Y...Yeah I'm okay with that." She said unsettlingly.

"Okaythankyousosososososososo much! Byenowanddon'tforgetkk?"

-click-

/Comments, Suggestions, Reactions? Feel inclined to voice out your opinions, good or otherwise. Much appreciated.

Stay tuned, folks. Undertaker will come, just remember, patience is a virtue.

*snicker* I'm full of corn, aren't I?/