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Part Three: Dark Confessions
He waited in silence, bathed in moonlight. He marveled at the beauty of the evening, stars bright, the moon a beacon in the sky, and the soft rustling of nocturnal animals moving about in the trees. The shadows of the tombstones in the Addams' cemetery cast ghastly shadows in the moonlight and he felt for a moment a kinship with them, as his own shadow laid alongside theirs in the dying grass.
He didn't know if she'd come. He didn't know if he wanted her to. But he'd given up on being a coward years ago and he refused to give up the one thing he wanted in the world because of fear or pride. He waited.
She'd sat silently through dinner that evening, only vaguely noticing the concerned stares of her brothers. Their pathetic attempts at stealth should have made her laugh, but she found her mind too full of other thoughts. Her parents were oblivious, too busy staring deeply into each other's eyes to notice her absorption. She hadn't made up her mind.
She didn't know she was going to meet him until she found herself walking in the glow of the moonlight a little after 1 am. She'd laid down in bed at 11, determined to forget about Joel and his ridiculous power over her, but by 1 she found she could not keep her tossing and turning body in bed a moment longer.
So it was with irritation, intrigue, and awe that she wandered through the cemetery. She loved that cemetery. It warmed her heart in the way that some people feel when wandering through their childhood bedroom. It was a safe feeling. The glow of the moon gave everything a magical appearance. The light on her skin was so bright it almost felt like a physical presence – like she was dripping with moonlight. She stopped to look at the glittering glow off her pale skin.
A rustle somewhere nearby reminded her of her purpose and froze her in her tracks. She raised her eyes, searching for him. All she could make out was the glistening white of the tombstones and the foggy dark of their shadows on the ground.
Finally, slowly, one of the shadows moved, and Joel stepped out from behind Uncle Imar's tombstone. He was beautiful, she thought. He took her breath away. He was staring intently at her now, so she tried to appear cool, detached.
After a long moment, he moved slowly toward her, in measured steps as if to keep from scaring her. She registered that, but couldn't decide if she appreciated the gesture or not. Keeping her eyes on him, she moved over to a stone bench, sat, and motioned with her eyes that he should do the same.
He sat next to her, but not particularly close to her. She turned to face him, needing to see his expression as she asked her questions.
She stared deep into his eyes before speaking. "There was a fire," she said, simply. She caught a slight change in his focus – she'd caught him off guard – before he controlled his expression.
He looked down at his feet for a long moment before sighing and returning to her gaze. There was something new in his eyes – Shame? Resignation? She wasn't sure.
"Yes." He said finally. "I set it." He said this evenly, coolly, with no hint of regret or anger. He put her to mind of the face of an assassin, cold and deadly.
His answer should have surprised her, but she somehow felt that this new Joel might be capable of anything. She couldn't believe how much he'd changed. She felt a tiny pang of nostalgia for innocent, naïve boy she once knew.
"The kids who died?" She asked.
"Yea," he said, his head bowed, looking at his hands.
She'd asked just the questions he'd hoped she wouldn't. He was suddenly remembering that night.
Joel had stormed into the common room, ready for the fight of his life. They'd gone too far this time, and he was going to make them pay for what they did to her – his friend, his first and best friend since being left to rot at that horrible school.
He saw them there, the other six, already assembled. They turned their heads abruptly as he slammed the door behind him.
"HOW DARE YOU!" he screamed at them. "HOW COULD YOU! I TOLD YOU TO LEAVE HER OUT OF THIS! SHE HAS NOTHING TO DO THIS!" He began throwing chairs against the wall as he paced the room, drowning in his rage.
Before the others could speak, she entered from a side door. The door opened with a creak, so quiet compared to Joel's shouts, but it silenced him and turned everyone's attention to her.
She was tall, young for a teacher, or so she appeared, with long flowing golden locks, pouty lips, and piercing blue eyes. Their moderator. Hah. When Joel had joined this 'club' he'd had no idea what he was getting into. Now that he thought back, he couldn't remember what reason she had given him in the first place to entice him to join - just that she had sought him out one day, leaned in close, whispered something in his ear, and that he'd shown up.
He'd thought her beautiful once, but now he gazed upon her with disgust.
"How could you?" he repeated, softer.
Her laugh was musical. She entered the room with slow, languid movements, her piercing blue eyes seeming to melt into crystal pools as she held Joel's fierce stare. "Don't be foolish, Joel," she chimed, "she could not be allowed to live, not with what she knew."
Joel's face betrayed his confusion, "What are you talking about? What did she know? She didn't know anything! I never told her about anything!" His voice grew louder with each word.
Her liquid eyes solidified now and she stared him down, her beautiful face becoming fierce and deadly. "She followed you here," she said, each word a dagger aimed at his heart. "She watched us through the window. I caught her at the end of last meeting." She twirled a strand of hair around her fingers, "And the other two, well, they were just in the way. I couldn't let them live carrying tales, you know." She smiled, remembering their feeble struggles, their delicious screams, and the intoxicating feeling she got in her stomach when they finally stopped kicking.
Joel's mouth dropped. He thought he'd known what these people were capable of. He'd known of their cruelty since they'd ruined his life and trapped him in this 'club,' but he'd naïvely thought that at least she was safe from it as long as he could keep her away.
And, for that reason alone, he knew that her death would always be on his hands.
He dropped his head, and turned away from the group, trying to think through the pain in his heart. Suddenly, it became clear. They may have taken away his past, but he'd be damned if he let them manipulate him and take away whatever future he could have. He stormed out.
In his memory he saw the blaze again. He'd waited until all of the other students had gone home for break, knowing that the 'club' would meet one more time, more than likely to plan how to punish him for his latest outburst. He saw them through the window before igniting the blaze and watching the how the whole building became enveloped in reds and oranges, flashes of yellow and white.
He didn't know if they survived or not. He figured it was more than likely at least some did, but the fire was the distraction he needed, and his ticket out of boarding school hell and out of conscription into a 'club' he never intended to join.
Joel's eyes cleared as he emerged from his memory, and he realized he'd never answered Wednesday's question about the kids that had died.
He looked her square in the face before answering, "Yea, but that came earlier." Much earlier, he thought to himself.
Wednesday's face became pensive now. Joel marveled at how she sat calmly beside him, hearing his dark confessions, but not pressing him for more information or running and screaming away, as he imagined she should. He knew she was frightened of him, at least a little bit. He knew she'd never admit it, but he was glad that she was, it proved she was human.
Joel looked down at his hands in his lap, unable to hold Wednesday's gaze any longer. He wanted to tell her how much she'd meant to him over the years, and how much it meant to him now, to have her sitting with him here on this moonlit bench, listening to his confessions. But, it wasn't that simple anymore. He wasn't just a boy, sitting with a girl in the shadow of a tombstone overlooking an empty grave. He could never be that, never again.
He looked up at her once more, sensing that she was waiting for his gaze before asking her next question. He was right. Wednesday had one final question for the evening. She wasn't sure how to word it, and she wasn't 100 percent sure she wanted to know the answer – it could open a whole can of worms she wasn't sure she was prepared for yet. But curiosity burned. She spoke, "So you faked your death." Her question came out more as a statement than a question.
Joel winced subtly and his eyes immediately dropped. After a moment, he took a deep breath, mustering his courage, it seemed, and brought his eyes back to Wednesday's. She nearly gasped. No longer cool and detached, they were open and vulnerable. He held her gaze for one long moment before whispering, "No. I died."