Author's note: Thank you, thank you, to those who have reviewed. To those who sign in as a 'Guest', I can't thank you through a message, so I'll reiterate it here.
I am glad you're enjoying this story.
"Mmmmm," she cooed as the plant wrapped itself tightly, prickling and affectionate, around her ankle, "Mmmm, mama missed you too."
The plant slithered towards her hand, where she held a freshly caught mouse, which swung, terrified, from side to side, within her fingers. The thrill of its trembling, of its fear, was somehow more intense when it was at her own hand.
"Dinner for Cleo," she dangled the squealing little rodent over the clicking jaws, "That's right baby…good girl."
"The way you talk to that plant…." Her sister said behind her, "It makes me shudder. I can't decide if you want to seduce it or mother it."
Morticia smiled as she watched the plant masticating, "Nor can I. How was your night?"
"Boring," her sister answered listlessly, "Apart from…."
Morticia turned to her and Cleo snaked up her spine and onto her shoulder, where she wound herself around her neck. She had the distinct feeling her sister wanted her to encourage her, to coerce the story of her night from her, so she remained silent.
"How you will ever find a man who'll take that into his house," her sister smirked at her own tangential thoughts, "Or let you whip him senseless, I don't know. If only mama and papa knew how truly twisted their little girl was. Oh if they knew about the blood….so much blood."
"I am simply more subtle than you," she said quietly, seriously, "What were you going to say?"
"Oh, yes," Ophelia perched on the dusty glass table, "I was going to say I ran into my fiancé."
At this Morticia's skin prickled with tension and the plant, reacting, shrunk from her. She cooed softly, ran a comforting finger across her tendrils.
Ophelia didn't notice, or at least, she pretended not to. Morticia would bet it was the former. For all she was clever, Ophelia, her conceit made her concentrate solely on herself and fail to see the wider, more dangerous picture.
"Oh?"
"Yes," Ophelia fluttered a dramatic hand, "But to say I ran into him wouldn't convey quite the situation. No, I spotted him, glued at the mouth with a little slut. He was quite taken aback."
Morticia felt the shudder of jealousy again, of something humiliating and enticing all at once. And she knew the other woman in the room was feeling it too but it had a different make-up to Morticia's.
"Ophelia, you knew he-"
Her sister laughed, "Of course I did. I don't care if he does it first. If anything, it gave me leverage. The thing is, darling, I shan't be one to take any sort of humiliation. If he cheats on me, he'll have to face the prospect that I will humiliate him as equally. Tish, you can't seem to understand how this will, how this must work. And he must see it too."
Morticia couldn't help but feel the monologue was contrived, a front for her hurt pride that he hadn't fallen prostrate in worship at Ophelia's feet as soon as he'd clapped eyes on her.
"I do," Morticia concentrated on the sharp, sticky, gaping mouth of Cleo as the plant slithered over the arm of the chair, "I do. It is simply…"
Her sister came towards her and kneeled on the stone flagons at the foot of her chair, "Oh Morticia, you don't see at all. I never, ever lose out, and certainly not to a man. You'll understand, little Tish, when you find yourself in love or, at least, bound to someone you are supposed to love."
She watched her sister go, the poisonous declaration that she already was, on her tongue.
She felt tears prickle behind her eyes and pushed them away. The plant curled around her neck and tightened.
"I am perfectly alright," she whispered, her nails digging gently in to her palms, "I swear my darling."
Content, the plant loosened and curled down towards her ankles.
She sat back, breathed in the damp and cold around her, and knew precisely then that there was nothing, simply nothing, that could break her resolve in this matter. She wanted, desperately, to test the borders of this new, unexplored desire but to break the bonds of sorority was something she could not, would not, do. Her sister, despite the frivolity and lightness of her step and actions, was never to be beaten or trifled with. An innocent, large-eyed Morticia had learned that, dangling from crudely strung ropes, at the tender age of eleven. But there was something else too, an edge to Ophelia's words, which suggested a determination to see this through for all of the other benefits of the marriage; the money and home, the cars and the children and the servants.
The prospect of something to control, to order around for fear of the exposition of his shame.
Her mind flittered to devious thoughts, ones she explored only in the confines of the coldness of her own bed. She thought of his broad body, his dark half-lidded eyes that had sparked with a deliciousness she'd yet to know, yet to taste. She wondered at what his skin would smell of, taste of. Cigars, bitter oranges, earthy.
Her skin flushed with blood, rising to the milky surface till she felt it in her cheeks. It grew more, though she thought it could not, when she heard that rich, expectant voice echoing through the house.
"Mr. and Mrs. Nightshade," she heard, then a pause, "No, no nonsense. No need for tea, I should like to take my fiancé on a walk. That is all."
She stood up then, shrugging the plant from her with a promise of 'tomorrow' and floated quietly, invisibly up the stairs.
She pulled aside the heavy drapes and was able to see in to the beautifully tended gardens below, once she'd barricaded herself in her bedroom. The gardens were not to her taste, but rather her parents. She would have let it grow wild, untameable, dangerous, if ever she had the opportunity. But like everything she didn't control it, she merely speculated over the odds that one day she would. The garden fitted, she did not.
And she was tired of trying, quietly and wilfully, to fit.
They were not holding hands, her sister and Mr. Addams, and they walked a pace apart and formally. She wondered, for a second, what the conversation would be.
Then she realised she didn't want to know.
She sighed and let the heavy material fall into place at the window. She slid her hand around her back and plucked at the tiny buttons of her dress until it loosened and fell from her shoulder to her hips, her hips to the floor.
She pushed back the satin sheets, and slid in amongst the cold and quiet.
There she wept, fully and openly, at the unfairness of it all.
-0-
"To whom do these belong?"
He asked to the room at large.
The tea he'd refused had been served anyway, in the quaint little library, and he had dutifully remained despite not wanting to.
"Oh, those," Mrs. Nightshade answered, "Those are Morticia's. We try to let the girls be…liberal. If they should wish. We don't stop them from reading," she seemed to blush, "Even if the books are…."
"Good, interesting, well written?"
He asked, despite knowing it seemed rude.
The woman laughed, achingly forced, and grinned.
"Well, they are to some tastes."
He ran his finger over the spine of 'In Cold Blood', nestled between 'The Divine Comedy' and 'Tropic of Cancer', and felt a smile at the kindred link being forged.
"Where is your youngest daughter?"
He inquired lightly.
"Oh," Ophelia set her tea cup down with exaggeration, "Tish doesn't like company. She's a strange little thing, really."
Her parents nodded enthusiastically at this and he retook his seat.
"Gomez, darling," Ophelia reached out to his hand and her sharp nails dug in, "Mama and papa thought an engagement party, to formally seal the deal."
He felt a ball of misery clog his throat and prevent his words.
"You see it'd make it official," her father said briskly, "We shall, of course, foot the bill. We'll do it simultaneously with the page six announcement."
He swallowed, "A splendid idea."
After their mutual agreement to attempt some kindness towards each other that had, just minutes ago, taken place in the gardens, he felt he could hardly refuse. He'd not sworn his fidelity and nor had she, but he'd sworn his allegiance to the agreement to make this bearable for either party. She'd seemed content, and that had been enough to assuage his panic at that moment.
Ophelia, beside him, sounded bored, "Isn't it just?"
"Your home, is of course, the bigger of the two," her father continued.
He wanted to say that it was, by quite a difference, but he deferred from sounding rude. Instead he smiled blandly again.
"Yes, yes of course."
"Of course."
"And dinner, just with family you mind, just to seal the deal?"
Mr. Nightshade was anxious to have tangible proof of the agreement, and it angered Gomez.
He nodded obligingly again, "My aunt did say," he said, "I wonder if my friend, Williamson, might join us. He will, after all, be my best man."
They all nodded happily, slurping at tea as they did.
"We should set-"
He stood briskly at those very words he'd been dreading, "But I must go. I really must."
He bent over Ophelia's hand, "Until Saturday my dear."
She smiled and, for a moment, he could have sworn he saw tenderness in her eyes. Maybe she'd just decided to change tact in order to win him over.
Terrified because of it, he went swiftly from the room.
He stalled though, just at the door, feeling other eyes on him. He turned on his heels and his eyes found hers, just at the top of the stairs.
She was half in shadow, half in light. Like the goddesses of film-noir or of dark paintings. Eyes unblinking, glistening, deep. She didn't say anything and he said nothing either. His eyes though, his eyes scanned every delicious silk-draped inch of her, from top to toe.
And when his eyes had drank all they could of the poison, they returned to her mouth to find a deadly smile there.
He flung the door open and ran, his feet carrying him faster than he'd ever thought possible.
His dreams that night, tossing between roasting sheets, were as boldly erotic as they were petrifying. He awoke in a puddle of sweat and terribly uncomfortable with shame. He tried, under a scolding spray, to shower it away but it had to be dealt with. Guilt, unseemly and full, filled his legs and his belly and his chest and exploded forth.
He stood for what felt like hours under the blast of the water and emerged only when his skin was numb with a more permanent shame and burning questions.
The parlour was quiet and at the far end his aunt was practising at her bridge table. Thing, forced to partner her, drummed irritated fingers against the felt.
"Aunt Lillith," he came to a halt before the table, "I need to talk with you."
Thing gave a relieved thumbs up and, bouncing from the table, scurried away.
Her eyes stayed on the cards for a minute more, to punish him no doubt, and then they flittered up. She looked irritated already.
"You seem flustered dear nephew," she motioned to the empty seat across the table.
Sitting, as he was bid, he was about to pour forth his agonies when she said:
"I truly hope this is not about your forthcoming marriage."
He faltered, then was resolute again, "I can't do it. I –"
She lifted her large, doleful eyes from her hand of cards. They were disturbingly moving.
"Before your broken-hearted mother died," she paused for impact and he felt it like a dagger, "She begged me, begged me, that I make sure you were settled."
He fiddled uncomfortably, "Maybe she didn't mean mar-"
"Of course she meant married," his aunt hissed, "What else would she mean? She knew what you were capable of. Maybe she needed to know you wouldn't be left to break every member of this family's heart."
Despite the tinge, the faint rustle of pride that flared in his chest, her words stung as paradoxically as they flattered. He had to acknowledge the truth in it; his pursuit of pleasure had already broken his family apart and yet here he was, considering it again.
He pushed his cry of outrage into his stomach where it grew poisonous and thick and putrid. His aunt set her cards aside and looked him squarely in the face. There was pity there, as well as frustration.
"My dear nephew," she shook her head, "It is, I promise, for the best. You need some sort of…stability. All you do is drink and gamble and womanise. Your businesses are-"
"Flourishing," he drummed his fingers on the table, "And you know it. Don't pretend this is about business. I've never done anything to compromise my business."
She nodded her head in concession but was nonetheless resolute.
"Marrying Miss Nightshade will be good for you," she returned to her cards, lifting her hand in front of her face so she could study it more closely, "And it was your mother's dearest wish."
He knew there was no fight to be had, no protest to be brooked, so he stood and went from the room.
The train room was familiar and welcoming, damp with mustiness and diesel and the tangy bitterness of twisted metal. Thing had scampered behind him, quiet and watching, and a presence who was offering comfort.
"Fester doesn't know what he's done," he ripped the chair out from the console and reached for the scarlet diesel engine at his side.
Thing made no motion in affirmation and Gomez knew it was a petulant statement to say the least. His brother had fled because of what Gomez himself had done, not because he'd been selfish. He had been hurt at Gomez's perfidy – and quite rightly so.
He set the train clumsily on the track and sparked up the switch.
"Always thinking with my-"
Thing shook his fingers warningly and, had he had ears, he would have blocked them up. Gomez considered it decent to spare him and didn't finish his own musings.
Thing gave a thumbs up of thanks. It was difficult for his childhood pet to acknowledge his master's determination to lead the life of a rouè. At any rate, he didn't have to acknowledge it as long as Gomez didn't force the issue.
The trains, started up, began whizzing around the track, the sound of metal on metal sharp and soothing all at once. The noise was a welcome one, filling up his head so he needn't think.
Or at least, that was what he had hoped for. It didn't work though. Instead the noise was the soundtrack for a tableu, in which she was a sirene. Ebony hair whispering out against a grey, stormy sky. Pale skin off-set by lightening. And the noise her call, whispering and deafening all at once.
It was no use.
His finger darted out, the trains ground to a halt and he slammed his head onto the surface of false terrain before him.
"Oh Thing! How my heart aches."
Thing flicked his earlobe in gentle questioning.
"Oh old man," he opened his eyes and squinted at the hand, "You wouldn't understand."
Thing's finger drummed a 'try me' gesture inches away from his face.
"Her sister."
Thing scurried back and began to shake profusely.
"See, that's why I didn't tell you."
Thing shook his finger warningly.
"I won't do anything," he cried, "I swear it!"
But he could tell, from the little shudder, that Thing didn't believe him.
He was firm though, in his decision. He couldn't break any more than he already had. Even for a delicious goddess who's eyes sang to him.
"No no," he said to Thing, "No I won't. I mean it old chum, I mean it."
Thing scuttled nearer.
"You do believe me, don't you?"
Thing gave a thumbs up but it simply wasn't as true as either of them wanted it to be.
So I like things to go very slowly, I hope you do too! Please review if you can.
