"…Thanks for the ride home, Kath! G'night!" Frances "Frankie" Foster bade a cheerful farewell to her companion before she entered the expansive Victorian mansion.
Strolling across the foyer in a beeline towards the staircase, the caretaker couldn't help but add a little exuberant skip to her gait and giggled like a schoolgirl. There was probably nothing else in the world like a night out with a few close friends that could put her in such high spirits. Indeed, she couldn't think of any equivalent to the extraordinary revitalization it gave her; even returning home after midnight, she almost felt as if she could take on the world-
An odd racket suddenly interrupted her thoughts, revealing that she was not the only one -awake at such an hour. Pausing at the foot of the staircase, Frankie waited in dead silence for a few moments until she quickly heard peculiar clatter, which she easily recognized as the sounds of someone fetching themselves a midnight snack.
Knowing that it was hardly anything to fuss about, nevertheless her curiosity was aroused as she silently contemplated who had the need for a quick meal at so late an hour. Moving like a red-haired shadow, Frankie quietly snuck her way into the kitchen, and much to her extreme amusement, instantly recognized the familiar mop of chestnut brown poking out from behind the open fridge door.
Grinning fiendishly to herself, Frankie playfully darted forward and peeked over the refrigerator door with a cry of, "BOO!"
However, within an instant her jubilant smirk was wiped clean off her face as she was quickly beset by confusion. She could've sworn her cry had been loud enough to wake up half the household, and thus should've at least startled the child at least a little.
Nevertheless, Mac hadn't emitted so much as a squeak of surprise. Much to Frankie's dumb shock, all he did was continue to stand motionlessly in front of the fully stocked refrigerator while carrying an oddly vacant gaze as he quietly clutched his "midnight snack", which to her bafflement, consisted of a half-empty jar of relish, an old leftover pork chop, and some cauliflower.
"…….Mac?" Frankie asked as she uneasily eyed the oddly behaving little one.
"…Huh?" the child just grunted softly, unblinkingly staring dead ahead into the depths of the refrigerator. For a few seconds, Frankie just gnawed on her lip worriedly as she wracked her brain to try and figure exactly what devilry was this, but as soon as she noticed the peculiar glazed look in his eye-shut eyes, common sense nearly shrieked the obvious to her.
"…Sleepwalking." She murmured in astonishment, and hastily scooted to the child's side.
"C'mon pal, you really don't wanna eat any of this, do you?" she cooed, taking the utmost care not to wake him from his stupor, for as far as she knew, few things were worse than waking a sleepwalker.
"…Huh?" Mac just murmured drowsily, swaying back and forth a little and clearly not in a right state of mind while she quickly plucked the various items from his limp grip and deposited them back into the fridge.
"Yeah, that stuff's pretty yucky, isn't it?" she continued as she placed the relish back into the refrigerator. "That would make a pretty gross midnight snack, wouldn't it-"
The words died upon her lips the second she peered back behind her. To her utter amazement, the eight-year-old had vanished clean from sight, as if he been nothing more than a mind trick. Utterly flummoxed beyond description, at first she could do nothing but stare blankly at where the child was just moments before.
"….Mac?" Frankie whispered nervously as she began to glance about. "Mac? Where are y- MAC!"
She couldn't quite explain how the eight-year-old sleepwalker had managed to clamber to the top of the cabinet so quickly, but that didn't nearly scare her halfway to death as much as the fact that the boy was striking a pose that was unnervingly reminiscent of an Olympic diver.
"Whoa! What do you think you're – AUGH!"
Without even thinking, Frankie hurled herself halfway across the kitchen and just barely managed to catch the swan-diving child in mid-air before he crashed face first upon the linoleum.
THUD!
"OOF!" Frankie grunted as she flopped rather ungracefully unto the floor and skidded a few feet before slamming to a painful halt against the counter.
"OW!" she yelped, as she instantly went flush with frustration. "Mac Foster, what do you think you're-"
For the second time in less than two minutes, the redhead found herself completely dumbstruck with surprise. In just the second or so she had him safely back in her arms, Mac had abruptly drifted off back into a deep sleep, and was now no more dangerous than a slumbering infant.
For a moment or so, Frankie just gawked stupidly, torn whether between letting it all go as a peculiar mishap and putting him to bed or actually waking him up just to scold him for a dangerous stunt he didn't intentionally mean to perform. Fortunately, as soon as the dozing eight-year-old tried to snuggle into the crook of her neck, the caretaker's maternal instinct quickly overwhelmed any irrational urge to reprimand, and she finally relented with a weak smile.
"No fair…" she laughed softly, cradling the slumbering lump of a little boy while she clambered to her feet and made a beeline for the staircase.
"…Mac?" The nightgown-garbed young woman inquired gently. She knew perfectly well of course that he had long been dead asleep when she had deposited him safely back in his own bed, but now that she herself was prepared for a good night's rest, she decided that it couldn't hurt to make sure he was all right. After all, she had never known him to exhibit such strange nocturnal behaviors before; the little earlier episode was definitely a first, and she figured she'd better be safe than sorry.
Tapping softly on the door, she called out his name once more as she took a quick peek into the room.
"Pal?" she whispered before tiptoeing over to the bed. "Mac? Are you…"
As soon as started feeling around, only to find nothing but pillows and sheets, for a few moments she just stood there, frozen as a statue as the unthinkably horrific realization slowly sank in. "Oh…no…"
As her heart rate instantly tripled, she immediately began searching around frantically.
"Mac? Mac? Here, pal! Here!" she yelped, actually whistling sharply a few times as if searching for a lost puppy. Unfortunately, much to her skyrocketing dread, it soon became plain that she was most definitely short her charge.
Despite this, the tremendously frantic young woman wasn't quite ready yet to face her worst fears. In the next few minutes that followed, Frankie practically turned the child's bedroom upside down in her desperate search, nearly tearing it apart to shreds in the midst of the gut-wrenching panic that possessed her. The very moment her horrific suspicions were confirmed that a mere child was possibly wandering aimlessly about the house without so much as a vague clue of what he was doing, Frankie shot out of the room like a lanky redheaded rocket.
To say that she was worried out of her wits and frightened half to death would unfortunately have been the understatement of the decade. As panic overwhelmed her, a heap of ugly possible scenarios began to enter her mind at an alarming rate, ranging from the child in question tumbling head over heels down the staircase to Mac blindly wandering outside to the extreme-o-saur cages and...
A violent shudder wracked her body as she hastily blocked out the outrageous image. With any luck, he was just wandering about downstairs, but in a house as colossal and bizarrely unique as Foster's, the risk of him blindly stumbling into some sort of danger was still chillingly high.
"Mac? Mac? Mac! Maaa-aaaac!" she yelled hoarsely as she scampered about at a pace that would've left an Olympic sprinter gasping for breath and begging for a quick rest. As she dashed down the hallway like a chicken with its head cut off, Frankie's head never seemed to be still for a second from where it rested atop her neck, nearly transforming into a veritable scarlet blur as she glanced about everywhere conceivable.
"Mac? Pal? Mac, are you – MAC!"
Just as she felt like she was on the threshold of a heart attack, she spotted a little silhouette emerge from a nearby bathroom. As a massive sense of utter relief began to surge unabated through every ounce of her being, Frankie couldn't help but let loose with a squeal of glee as she instinctively darted forward and scooped up the little figure into her arms.
"Pal!" she laughed, coddling her catch close in a tenaciously loving hold. "There you are! I was so worried about you!" she trilled in her unfathomable joy, tittering uncontrollably in her intense jubilation. "You have no idea what you just put me through, kiddo! I actually thought that you had-"
"Um…sorry?" the clearly bemused lump in her arms muttered, sounding sorely bewildered by the outrageously tender manner he was suddenly being handled. Nearly on the verge of tears in her colossal elation, Frankie only elicited another carefree giggle as she planted a quick, affectionate kiss upon his forehead.
"Don't be, pal, don't be." She chuckled weakly. "Haha! Just tell me why you had to go to the bathroom all the way over here when there's one right….right near….our….bedrooms and…a-and…"
So helplessly caught up in her triumph, it unfortunately took her no less than a full ten seconds to comprehend the blaring fact that something was terribly amiss; namely the fact that not only had "Mac" seemed to had suddenly gone totally bald since she had last laid eyes upon him, but his skin now possessed a texture akin to a scoop of gelatin. As she began to feel a sense of utmost dread welling up deep within her, Frankie hurriedly held out her catch in the moonlight of a nearby window and almost immediately her jaw nearly hit the floor.
Despite her rather unsound state of mind at the moment, she could at least deduce one undeniable truth; a terribly confused blob that had been accidentally nabbed in her hysterical panic and her missing sleepwalker were far from the same person.
"Ewwww…" Bloo whined, grimacing in complete disgust as he frantically wiped at the blotch of the redhead's slobber now adorning the top of his head. "Oh, gross, Frankie…seriously, that's not cool..."
"Son of a b-" The caretaker immediately began to curse in gut-reaction, although she hastily bit her lip just in time to avoid cursing a blue streak right in front of the baffled little imaginary friend in her grasp.
"Frankie….do you always kiss anyone you can find at one in the morning?" The perplexed figment muttered incredulously to the frazzled young woman. However, his display of tremendous mystification lasted for but a moment before Frankie abruptly loosened her hold and sprinted back off down the hallway before the startled little imaginary friend could hit the floor with a wretched yelp of surprise.
"Why me?" she bewailed as she began her wild search anew. However, Bloo's acute sense of curiosity was already roused by her inexplicable behavior, and once he hoisted himself out of his sprawl he immediately took off after her, shooting off questions as fast as he could conjure them up.
"Frankie? Wait, Frankie, what's wrong?" he shouted as he scuttled along hot on the frantic woman's heels.
"Now not, not now, not now, I swear to God, not now!" she snarled while racing down the main staircase.
"Wait, Frankie, hold on! I don't get it! What's with all the midnight smooching? I mean, seriously, that's pretty weird-"
"I didn't mean to kiss-" she protested distractedly.
"Wait, so who were you trying to give a big sloppy peck at-"
"Shut up! Now is not the time to-"
"It's okay, I mean, I'm not gonna judge you if-"
"Shut up, shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!" she involuntarily screamed. "For the last time, I didn't mean to!"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa, calm down! You don't need to get huffy with me, Miss Smoocherella!" he snapped. Once she reluctantly accepted he wasn't clamping up anytime soon, the exasperated young woman hastily attempted to try and turn this new annoyance into her advantage.
"Bloo, has he ever had any problems with sleepwalking before?" she suddenly demanded while pausing to take a quick precautionary scan of the foyer.
"Huh?" Bloo mumbled perplexedly. "Wait, has who ever had-"
"Mac! Has Mac ever had any problems with sleepwalking before-"
"Wait, wait, wait, sleepwalking?" he answered skeptically, crushing her hopes. "Wait, why are you wandering about asking me about…aw c'mon, how should I know? I-"
"You're his imaginary friend!" she snapped while checking underneath a nearby sofa. "He created you!"
"Yeah, but that doesn't mean I stick around him twenty-four hours a day! I mean, really! And just why do you wanna know that at one in the morning? It's not like it's your business, is it? Who put you in charge of Mac and told him that you had to look after him like a-"
The words died upon his lips as soon as she whirled about bearing an expression that seemed to say that she was only five seconds away from throttling him. Quickly, Bloo remembered the obvious answer to his foolish inquiry.
"Oh, riiiight….the adoption thingy...n-never mind…" he murmured, flashing a weak apologetic grin and a woefully forced chuckle in an attempt to calm the aggravated caretaker.
"I swear, Bloo, I will-"
Before she could issue any threats, she paused, and took a long deep breath as she strove to calm down. No, now was not the time to lose control.
"What did you guys do after I left this evening?" she demanded, hoping she could have some clue as to what started this whole nightmare.
The little blob just stared back blankly before grunting, "Huh?"
"What'd you do? What'd you do?" she snapped and gestured impatiently. "Watch a movie? Play in the arcade? What?"
"Oh! Well…we watched TV, and…then watched some more TV, I guess…" the little blob answered as he thought hard. "Oooh! Then we watched a movie! A made-for-TV movie, see, and…"
As he prattled on, being absolutely no help whatsoever, Frankie rubbed her temples and started shaking her head wildly.
"No, no, no, no!" she moaned to herself in despair. "Why! Why him? Why now? Mac's never, ever-"
"…And then we had some of those brownies you made this afternoon…tasted pretty good, but they were kinda weird, to be honest…" Bloo prattled on.
"Yeah, yeah." She muttered distractedly as she wracked her mind. "Well you know Mac can't have sugar, so I had to…use…the…"
The young woman trailed off as the terrible realization slowly dawned upon her, or at least she thought so. No, it couldn't be…
She couldn't deny it though, she had never used that particular brand of artificial sweetener she had put in the brownies before. Plus, it didn't seem that far-fetched, for after all, when it came to sugar, Mac tended to react a bit…'differently 'from others, to say the very least. Well, if that was the case, then why wasn't it possible for him to have an adverse reaction to…
"No…no….no!" she started murmuring frantically to herself, unwilling to believe she was the cause of this mess. "No, I…maybe it's just a…just…well, maybe, he doesn't really…but…"
"Uh…." Bloo just grunted as he shot her a wary glance. "You okay?"
"I didn't mean to!" she bemoaned. "It was on sale, that's why I bought it! How was I supposed to know that-"
Before the mortified young woman could rant on, shrill ring suddenly reverberated loudly throughout the foyer. Although Bloo leaped a little with a squeal of surprise, Frankie didn't even bat as eyelid as she elicited a venomous hiss while she just instinctively reached over and answered the nearby phone.
"What?" she snapped condition to put up with a prank call or wrong number. "I don't care who this is, now is not the time to-"
"Frankie?" a familiar high-pitched squeak inquired gently over the receiver, baffling Frankie to no end upon instant recognition.
"…G-Goo?" the young woman just asked dumbly, her previous fury instantly draining away to be replaced by a degree of perplexity she had never endured before in her entire life. "Goo, what are you doing calling here at-"
"Frankie, make him go home!" the impatient squeal suddenly rang out, forcing the redhead to nearly drop the phone in her shock.
"…What?" she whispered hoarsely.
"What, am I speaking Norwegian here? Tell Mac to go home!" The obviously cranky little girl reiterated fiercely. "I keep telling him over an' over an' over an' over an' over an' over that I can't play right now, I gotta sleep, but he still won't go! It's nothing but 'Mac, go home! Mac, go home! Mac, Mac I'm tired! Why won't you….' and he still won't go! Frankie, please, I just wanna go back to bed! Why won't he-"
"MAC'S AT YOUR HOUSE?" Frankie suddenly nearly shrieked, losing all semblance of control over her vocal cords in colossal shock.
"Yes!" Goo immediately replied, sounding just as puzzled over the manner. "And I don't know what's wrong with him, he's just not getting' that it's waaaaay too late to play or anything, and…well, I think that's what he wants to do right now, I dunno! He's kinda just standin' there on my front lawn, I saw him when I went to get a drink of water and…hold on, lemme see if…yeah, he's still there, and I really really really think that he shouldn't be out there and…and…wait, lemme check…yup, still out there, like a zombie or something…but I don't wanna play 'Zombie'! I just wanna sleep! I keep on yelling and yelling at him, but he just…hold on, I'm gonna try and yell at him again for a few more minutes, 'kay? If that doesn't work, I'll call you back quick as I can, all right?"
"But-"
And just like that, Frankie was left listening dumbly to the dial tone. For what felt like the longest time, she just stood there in the middle of the foyer, absolutely slack-jawed as she struggled to comprehend whether this was all reality or not. Finally, moving ever so gently, she calmly hung up the phone-
"OUCH!"
…And promptly pinched her arm so fiercely she nearly drew blood, all the while praying desperately that she'd wake herself up and end this living nightmare. Alas, when all was said and done, she was still right where she started, accompanied by one very confused little blob.
"Um…what was-" Bloo tried to inquire bemusedly. No sooner had he begun to speak however, without a word of warning Frankie quietly made a hasty beeline towards the front door, scooping up the atrociously bemused imaginary friend and simultaneously grabbing the bus keys in one deft movement.
"Hey! Hey wait! Frankie, what's going on?" he whimpered, baffled out of his mind by everything he had witnessed for the last few minutes.
The irked redhead groaned exasperatedly as she wearily plodded outside onto the front walk. "I don't know why, but for some reason, I think I'm getting punished for bargain hunting…"
"…Frankie?"
"Hmmm?"
"I-I was just thinking... could you just let me-"
"You know the answer; no."
"But I-"
"Nuh-uh."
"C'mon, I don't think I-"
"Try again, pal."
"But it probably won't even ever happen again! It's been a full day, it has to be out of my system by now-"
"Nice try…no way."
"But I-"
"Nope."
"I just-"
"No."
Having been denied yet again, the dumbfounded child crossed his arms and sighed heavily, making absolutely no secret of his intense displeasure.
"Where did you even find this?" Mac demanded incredulously glared daggers at his unresponsive guardian. Despite his blatant display of discontentment, however, Frankie didn't even pass him a momentary glance as she lay propped up against her pillows, immersed in a book.
"A store downtown." She answered calmly, never peeling her eyes away from her novel for a second. Mac countered with an audible growl, but even then Frankie found absolutely no need to fret. After all, at least tonight she'd now exactly where he'd be the entire time; safely inside an extra, extra large infant sling strapped across her front. Even though Frankie seemed to resemble a redheaded mother kangaroo with the ludicrous maternal attire she wore, as long as she was assured he wouldn't wind up a few miles away from home, she was honestly quite content.
She casually continued on with her reading, blatantly ignoring her squirmy charge and the myriad of irked grunts and squeaks he emitted as he struggled to liberate himself from the humiliating contraption.
"Hey, calm down, kiddo." she murmured, tousling his hair absentmindedly. "It's well past ten o'clock, shouldn't you be asleep by now?"
"Well, shouldn't you just let me sleep in my own bed?" Mac countered fiercely, shooting the unresponsive young woman another harsh glare. "Just look at us-"
"Remind me again, where was it that I had to go pick you up at two AM last night? Hmm? Could you tell me that, pal?" she mused sarcastically, to which the indignant little boy sighed wearily.
"Seriously, Frankie!" he protested. "You're totally going overboard here with-"
"Oh, so I should just forget about the whole 'sleepwalking a full mile in the middle of the night to your little friend's house,' thing? Hmm?" Frankie shot back. "I'm not taking any chances."
With that, she immediately went silent once again, solidifying her firm stance upon their predicament as a long, awkward silence descended upon the incredibly ridiculous-looking pair.
"…How long exactly are we gonna have to do this?" he finally relented with a whimper.
"Let's wait until tomorrow…if you don't wake me up while trying to do another late-night trek, then we'll see." His guardian explained with a heavy yawn. With this steadfast declaration, silence yet again fell upon the room, and for a few minutes all that could be heard was the rustle of a flipped page now and then.
"You better not snore." Mac finally grumbled softly as he shut his eyes tightly, hoping for the sweet embrace of slumber to temporarily free him of this embarrassing predicament.
The redhead merely commented dryly. "If you're just gonna keep up with that attitude all night, then frankly I hope I sound like a foghorn…"
The End