Chapter 8 - Human After All

"What happened to your arm, Timmy?" Tootie asked in a quiet voice. Chester shot her a look that told her she shouldn't have asked. Timmy looked down to the ground and mumbled something under his breath.

"Oh," Tootie said, as though she had heard him perfectly.

-

It had been two days since the incident with Vicky. It was still weighing heavily on Timmy's mind as he walked home through the darkened streets of Dimsdale. Timmy felt uncomfortable that he was spending so much time worrying about Vicky and how she was feeling. As far as he was concerned she was nothing to do with him anymore. He could have severed all ties with the girl the second his parents cancelled her services, but he hadn't. He had seen that she was hurting and he had tried to reach out to her. Despite everything she had done to him, all the pain she had put him through, he was trying to cure hers. And she had turned him away. She had shouted in the face of his charity, and as far as Timmy cared, that was it. He no longer needed to think about her, to remember her, to let her have any impact on his mind whatsoever.

So why couldn't he stop thinking about her?

He walked slowly up his garden path, rooting around in the pocket of his jeans for his door keys. He pulled them out, and with them came a small piece of paper.

One twelve inch pepperoni, $14.95.

It was the receipt from the other night. Feelings stirred in Timmy's chest, feelings that he wasn't used to. He was used to being angry at Vicky, but it was usually because of all the things she did to him. He wasn't used to being angry at Vicky for being sad. She had no right to be sad! Who did she think she was, feeling down and cracking up, and showing the whole world that she was human too? At least she had had the decency to try to cover it up, but that just made it more apparent to Timmy that he was looking at her harder than most people. He had noticed that she wasn't fine when the rest of the world just passed her by.

Just like it always did. Because girls like Vicky don't deserve to be noticed. They don't deserve anything.

And then Timmy thought; Vicky definitely didn't deserve this.

Despite everything she had done, all the torment and the teasing and, yes, the heartache he was feeling now, Vicky didn't deserve to be miserable. And Timmy knew why. She wasn't a bad person. She was mean spirited and superficial and even though these traits of hers went a fair way down, Timmy knew that Vicky would always come through at the end. Somewhere in the not to distant future Timmy had felt that one day Vicky would realise the error of her ways and try to atone for everything she had done. Because that was what good people did. And Vicky was a good person.

He slid his key into the door and walked up to his room without even stopping to check if his parents were home. He was almost certain they wouldn't be. Timmy spent a lot of his evenings alone now, and every so often he would find himself missing Vicky's company. The times, especially in recent years, when she was there, in house. Often in a different room but it was her reassuring presence that made Timmy feel safe. It felt silly to him really, a seventeen year old boy still being afraid of the sounds that his house made as it settled, but he was. It was so vast, and so big and even though Cosmo and Wanda were around during the day, they now spent the evenings back at Fairy World, reporting to Jorgen and always trying to buy just a little more time.

Even though he had seen her since, Timmy couldn't shake the image of Vicky crying in the mall from his mind. He had never seen the girl looking so vulnerable and so lost. When she had turned up at his house, the same haunted look still filled her eyes, but there was also the attitude of defiance that used to go hand in hand with Vicky. It was as though she had pulled it up from the depths of her soul when she went to his house because now she knew that the world was watching.

Timmy wanted not to care. He wanted to not have these feelings for Vicky.

It wasn't love, or lust, or desire, or anything warm and fuzzy like what was in the books his mother kept on the top shelf of her bookcase. It was pity, and sadness, and helplessness and, most of all, understanding. Timmy understood not why Vicky was hurting, but that she did. That she could. Timmy understood just how fragile Vicky really was.

Deep down he had always known that she was. He'd always known that she would be the quickest to break down out of everyone. Because, when push came to shove and real emotions turned up on Vicky's doorstep, she couldn't cope. Timmy knew that Vicky was feeling something, be it guilt or regret or whatever it was, and it was killing her. Because she had never felt it before. Most people grow up full of negative emotions towards things they had done, but Vicky had never let hers in. She'd ignored them until they went away, but now Timmy thought that perhaps they were catching her up.

Timmy flung himself onto his bed and closed his eyes. He wondered how long it was going to take for this feeling to go away. Never, perhaps, until Vicky was feeling better. Timmy let out a small, mirthless laugh. Once upon a time Vicky's happiness had depended on Timmy feeling sad, and now his depended on her feeling better. It was funny, really, the way things turned out.

There was a small green 'poof' beside him, and Cosmo appeared, wearing a grin that was not as wide as usual.

"Hey Timmy," he said in a not-so-cheerful voice.

"Hey Cosmo, where's Wanda?" Timmy asked.

"She's still in Fairy World. Jorgen said he'll give us more time if she gives him a pedicure." Both of them wrinkled their noses. "I know it's not nice, but he's willing to do it. I don't think it's just because of the pedicure either."

"You think he wants you to stay here with me?" Timmy asked hopefully.

"No," Cosmo admitted, trying not to look at Timmy as his heart sank. "I think he just wants you to feel better." In the darkest part of his soul, something evil raised it's head. If Vicky felt the way she did forever, then Cosmo and Wanda would never have to leave.

But Timmy was a good person. He shook his head.

"How are you feeling," Cosmo asked nervously.

"Really... bad, I guess," Timmy said. Cosmo was his godfather, and one of his best friends, and yet he felt that he couldn't tell him anything. He knew Cosmo, and how Cosmo would react if he told him that his head was full of thoughts of Vicky. He would laugh, and tease, and Timmy really didn't need that. But he couldn't help but feeling that he needed someone like a father figure to talk to, to help him figure everything out, and Cosmo was as close to that as Timmy could get.

"Why bad?" Cosmo asked in a worried voice. He sat down next to Timmy on his bed.

"If you must know," Timmy said with a small sigh. "It's about a girl."

"Trixie?" Cosmo said automatically.

"Um... no," Timmy replied nervously. Cosmo shut his eyes and Timmy watched him. The small green fairy seemed to be gearing himself up for something.

"Is it Vicky?" he asked in a quiet voice. Timmy stared at Cosmo in wide-eyed shock. It had never occurred to him that Cosmo could be insightful about things of such a sensitive nature. And then it hit him.

Wanda.

Cosmo had struggled through so much to be with her. He loved her with all his heart, a heart which had been tugged and pulled and broken so many times before he got his girl. He had seen her hate him, seen her need him, seen her love him and seen her leave him. He knew about the constant war with Wandissamo for Wanda's heart, a war that he had only won after sustaining some heavy injuries. Cosmo might not know much about logic or life, but when it came to feelings he was pretty much an expert.

"Yeah," Timmy said meekly. "Vicky."

"I heard you two rowing the other night," Cosmo confessed. "I couldn't help it."

"What should I do, Cosmo? Why does it matter to me how she feels?"

"Maybe you care about her," Cosmo suggested. Timmy forced out a laugh, but at the same time he couldn't help but feel that his godfather was on to something. The something which Timmy had been avoiding admitting to himself for so long. He did care about Vicky, more than he ever thought he could. He wouldn't call her friend, not by a long shot, but he wouldn't call her an enemy either. He would call her someone he just needed to know was alright.

"I saw her crying, the other day at the mall," Timmy said. "She looked so different, so -"

"Human?" Timmy stared at Cosmo.

"Yeah. Underneath all that meanness it turns out there's a girl! Who would have thought it? One who eats and sleeps and cries when she's hurting."

"Sometimes people surprise you," Cosmo said simply.

"I never thought Vicky would," Timmy said.

"That's why they call it a surprise," Cosmo said with a grin. Timmy grinned back and shut his eyes again. Thoughts flooded into Timmy's brain. If he could just make sure that she was alright, just for now, then maybe he could get some sleep. If he could just see that she was going to survive until morning, then maybe he wouldn't have to spend all night worrying that she wouldn't. He got to his feet.

"Where are you going?" Cosmo asked.

"Just out," Timmy said, striding out of his room.

"Me too," Cosmo whispered when he was certain Timmy was gone.

-

Timmy walked quickly to Vicky's house, checking his watch as he went. It had just gone past midnight. He thought of knocking on the door, but he stopped himself in time. He didn't want Vicky to know he was there, that might just lead to another shouting match. He just wanted to see if she was ok.

He crept round the back of her house to her garden and leapt over the fence. The damp grass squelched under his feet as he strode up to the back of Vicky's house. Her garden was so plain, just an expanse of lawn with nothing in it. Timmy sighed at it, paying no mind to the small green bird that watched him with interest from atop the fence.

A trellis climbed up the back of Vicky's house, stopping just underneath her bedroom window. Faint lamplight shone out from the gap in Vicky's curtains. With a determined expression on his face, Timmy began to climb up the latticed wood.

Timmy wasn't really afraid of heights, but he was worried about how well the trellis could hold his weight. He reached to top, heaving himself up just a little higher by hanging onto Vicky's window ledge. He peered through the gap and into a room he hadn't seen for almost seven years.

Vicky sat hunched on her bed, with her back to the window. She was wearing a very dainty and, Timmy noticed, quite revealing nightdress. It didn't look as though the skimpiness had been intentional though. The nightdress was simply to small for her. Timmy wished that he could see her face.

Her hair had been brushed, and much to Timmy's happiness it had also been tied back into it's usual ponytail. Timmy smiled, but stopped quickly when he noticed that the girl's shoulders were shaking.

"Vicky?" he whispered to the glass, even though he knew she wouldn't hear him.

Vicky got to her feet and headed to the window. Timmy tried to duck down, but Vicky had only come over to open the window. She didn't notice him at all.

Timmy gasped as he saw the tears rolling down her face. They weren't coming fast, by any means, but they were constant. Always there. Timmy sighed as he looked up at Vicky, who ran her hand over her hair and sat down on her bed. She stayed facing the window this time, with her hands placed gently in her lap. Timmy watched as she picked up something from her nightstand, and he stood on his tiptoes to see what it was. It was a small teddy bear.

Something creaked under Timmy's foot, and just before he fell he could have sworn that he saw Vicky look up and mouth the words 'I love you' to the empty air.