Summary:"Mother!" Wednesday said, so sharply it was almost shrill, "You need to tell me how to turn it off this instant."
"Turn what off, dear?"
"The—you know—" Her expression twisted.
"Oh, my little terror, it's feelings, isn't it?"
Morticia might think it can't be done, but Wednesday is good at everything she sets her mind to, so she's sure she can manage it. Meanwhile, Enid doesn't know why Wednesday is acting so weird, but it's ruining her week.
Notes:I swear, I started this with no intention of being cliche, but then I had this vision of Wednesday playing Haunted by Taylor Swift, and inspiration comes too fleetingly for me to refuse it. Hell if it doesn't fit pretty damn well.
(See the end of the work for more notes.)
Work Text:"Mother!" Wednesday said, so sharply it was almost shrill, "You need to tell me how to turn it off this instant."
"Turn what off, dear?"
Wednesday glared, as if Morticia should be apologizing for failing to keep up. So, a typical conversation with Wednesday.
"The—you know—" Her small, slender hands flailed in and out of view of the crystal ball. And then her expression twisted into something so nauseated, so panicked, that Morticia knew there was only one thing that could agitate her misanthropic daughter to such an extent.
"Oh, my little terror, it's feelings, isn't it?"
At that, Wednesday went stock still. "No," she said stiffly, "it's whatever makes you and father act ridiculous."
"They're one and the same, Wednesday."
"Impossible. I would never debase myself in such a way."
"Of course. But love is not a debasement, darling."
"No. No, no, no," said Wednesday very firmly, almost—almost—frantic. "I'll concede to perhaps having some sort of feelings, but, absolutely not that one."
"Very well," Morticia said. "Whatever emotions it is you're struggling with, I regret to inform you they cannot be "turned off.""
Wednesday looked murderous. "Fine. If my own mother won't help me, I'll find someone who will."
"My batling, you know I would help if I could."
"Do I?"
"I'm not trying to torture you."
"Then what kind of mother are you?"
Morticia knew her daughter too well to fall for the redirection. "Regardless," she said, "emotions are beneficial. I assure you, you needn't be concerned."
"I am not concerned."
Morticia raised an eyebrow.
"Alright. I may be ever so slightly…unnerved, but only because this is quite distracting."
"If you allow yourself to feel your emotions, you won't have to exercise so much energy fighting them."
"If I allow myself to feel, I will act like you and father."
Instead of asking if that would really be so horrid, Morticia tried a different tack. "Think about how you feel when you successfully exact revenge on bullies, or finish one of your novels, or have a deliciously violent nightmare. Those are emotions, too, Wednesday. Would it really be so awful to feel like that more often?"
"Perhaps not," Wednesday said, reluctantly. "I will consider it."
"I'm glad, my darling."
"That is all. Thank you, mother."
And, with that, Wednesday ended the call.
Thing tapped on her desk.
Busying herself with a stack of manuscript pages, Wednesday said, "No, I don't think I have. She may be right that emotions have some value, but I am too busy at present to conduct the necessary experimentation."
Again, Thing tapped and signed.
"Yes, I do believe her that they can't be turned off. She is an expert in the grotesque."
What now? Thing signed.
It wouldn't do. It wouldn't do at all. No, if the urges to act a fool weren't going away, Wednesday would just have to become an expert at ignoring them. Becoming an expert was one of her many areas of expertise.
"How hard can it be?" she said to Thing. "Every time I want to do something horribly embarrassing, I'll simply not do it."
Enid was concerned.
She'd been so for the last forty-three minutes. Near the start of class, Wednesday had looked back at her. She'd waved, since they'd been getting along better lately, but, in response, Wednesday's head had snapped forward so aggressively she was sure she'd heard a crack. And, since then, Wednesday had been sitting with her elbows propped up on the desk and her head between her hands. It was a morning class, full of bored, tired teenagers. Lots of their classmates were in variations of that same pose. The concerning part was that Wednesday didn't look like a bored teenager. She looked like she had her own head in a vice. The tendons in the hand Enid could see were so taut that Enid was starting to wonder if Addamses had trouble keeping their extremities attached to their bodies. That would explain Thing.
Are heads extremities?
"It usually means just hands and feet," said Yoko next to her. "Why?"
"It's just, why does Wednesday look like she's literally trying to hold her head in place?"
"I dunno? Maybe 'cause she's weird?"
"Yeah," Enid said, "maybe."
—
Up at the front of the classroom, Xavier looked at his seatmate. "Not that I'm sure I want to know, but what are you doing?" he asked.
"Learning," said Wednesday.
"We both know that's not true and not what I meant."
"If I hold my head still, I can't turn it."
"Right. Whatever. Forget I asked."
At lunch, Enid was sitting with her friends, about to bite into her first sandwich, when she looked up and saw Wednesday walking towards their table. It wasn't all that out of the ordinary, lately; she'd started sitting with them periodically since Poe's Cup. When she arrived at the table, however, Wednesday seemed surprised to find herself there.
"Hi!" said Enid, trying not to be too overzealous.
"Hello," Wednesday replied, looking from the spot beside Enid, to Enid herself, and back.
She sidestepped stiffly over to an open seat that was across from Enid rather than beside her. Her gaze flashed to Enid and away again. The corner of her mouth twitched, then she grumbled something inaudible and marched all the way around to sit on Yoko's other side.
Yoko looked at Wednesday like she'd grown three extra heads.
Enid leaned around Yoko to stare quizzically, too.
Wednesday ignored them both, seeming not the least bit perturbed. That, at least, was the most characteristically Wednesday thing they'd seen all day, so, eventually, both girls went back to the normal lunch conversation.
Said conversation drifted to boys—the ones they liked and the ones they didn't.
"…and then he said my hair is stupid and makes me look like a wannabe Harley Quinn."
"He's an imbecile," said Wednesday. "You're far more deadly than an unhinged clown."
Enid looked at her and grinned. "Are you saying you like my hair?" she asked teasingly.
Rolling her eyes, Wednesday scoffed and opened her mouth. Nothing came out. Looking a little put-out, she closed her mouth and opened it again. And again.
"Go on, say something nice for once," Yoko said.
Wednesday stood up, spun on her heel, and walked away.
"Yoko!" Enid whined.
"What? I didn't think she'd full on leave."
Things with Wednesday kept getting weirder and weirder. One night, Enid went to pat her on the shoulder, and Wednesday nearly threw herself off their balcony. They sat next to each other in class one afternoon, and everything seemed fine until Enid looked down and noticed that Wednesday had somehow tied up her own wrists in rope handcuffs.
It was maddening.
Her friends were starting to get annoyed by how much she brought it up. "She's always been weird,"they said. "What's the difference?" But Enid couldn't let it go. It was so frustrating and confusing that she kept getting distracted by it even while she was trying to get hot and heavy with Ajax.
In a fit of desperation, she untucked her own shirt. Ajax took the hint and slipped his hand under it, and she thought maybe, maybe she'd be able to focus on something other than her weird roommate's weird behavior.
And then a flashlight nearly blinded them.
Ms Thornhill stayed pretty quiet all the way back to the dorm. It wasn't until her hand was on the door that she said, "I'm disappointed in you, Enid. You know better."
She opened the door, and there was Wednesday, sitting at her desk, reading some big old book that she probably stole from somewhere she shouldn't have been. And Enid was just so frustrated.
"She sneaks out to see boys all the time," she said petulantly, gesturing at Wednesday. "How come she doesn't get in trouble?"
"I've never caught Wednesday out after curfew with a boy's hand up her shirt."
Wednesday set her book down and turned around, expression stormy.
Evidently, Ms Thornhill didn't have the patience for whatever feud was brewing between two teenage girls at that time of night. She gently shoved Enid over the threshold and closed the door on her way out.
"Sounds like things are going well with snake-brains," said Wednesday. "Congratulations."
"Yeah, well why do you care?" Enid snapped.
"I very much do not."
"Right. Forgot who I was talking to. You don't care about anything."
"No, I don't. And, if I did, it would certainly not relate to you."
Enid wanted to scream. "I know," she said. "You hate me."
The muscles in Wednesday's jaw jumped. "You make my skin crawl."
"And not in the good way," Enid mimicked bitterly.
Wednesday said nothing.
At that point, Enid was no longer sure if what she wanted was answers or a fight. "Why do you have to be so awful?" she asked.
"Because I can't handle the alternative."
"What the hell is that supposed to mean?"
"You're smart," Wednesday snapped. "Figure it out."
"Oh, sure! You insult my intelligence all the time, but as soon as you're too up your own ass to explain something, I'm suddenly a genius."
"You are smart," she said sharply. "You just frequently don't act it."
Enid snarled. "I'd rather act dumb if it means people want to be around me."
Wednesday stomped away in a flurry of melodramatic movement. Just to have something equally petulant to do, Enid stomped over to her own desk. She didn't even realize how long she'd been glaring impotently at her cluttered desktop until she heard a few shaky passes of a bow over strings.
She should go. She should go now, because, when her insufferable roommate played her cello, it felt like colorless, unfeeling Wednesday Addams had more color and emotion within her than any person could handle. When Wednesday played her cello, it felt like she siphoned off all emotions within a hundred foot radius and channeled them through her bow. Allemotions, especially anger. And Enid didn't want that—she wanted to keep her anger at Wednesday. So she should go.
Except then the shaky notes died and Wednesday settled on a song that Enid recognized immediately. Haunted made for an epic string instrumental.
She stayed.
No one was singing, but the lyrics were loud in her head, anyway. You and I walk a fragile line. It was so much. Too much. It couldn't mean what it sounded like it meant. This song choice had to be so far from what they'd been arguing about—so thoroughly unrelated—that Wednesday would eviscerate her for thinking they were connected. It had to be. There was no way Wednesday Addams would be so transparent with her feelings.
Because this was a breakup song. A really, really emo breakup song.
Enid looked at the line that divided their room. It didn't seem fragile at all. In fact, the line between them seemed starker and stronger than ever. She did, however, feel like something was breaking. Hands shaking, she forsook her bed and chair and simply sat on the floor.
Wednesday got to the bridge, and Enid felt the pull to howl more strongly than she ever had looking at the moon.
The song ended, and Enid realized she should've been thinking about what to say—how to fix everything.
Wednesday reappeared from the balcony with Thing and her cello, no music stand in sight.
"That's an impressive song to have memorized," said Enid weakly.
"I'm an impressive person."
"You are."
They locked eyes.
"I didn't know," Enid said quietly.
"I know," replied Wednesday.
For a very long moment, they both stayed quiet. Then, Enid stood slowly and said, "It's okay. We can still be friends. Nothing has to change."
"Of course," said Wednesday, too flatly, even for her. She turned away, grabbed her pajamas, and marched into the bathroom.
The line on their floor had widened. Enid was sure of it.
Things did not go back to normal.
Wednesday avoided her like the plague…or like whatever Addamses were loathe to catch. Feelings, apparently. Wednesday avoided Enid like she avoided feelings. If she'd thought the bizarre behavior of the previous week was bad, then Wednesday giving her the cold shoulder was a hundred times worse.
Her roommate already snuck out a lot, but, after their fight, it became a nightly ritual. If Enid came back to the room after dinner instead of hanging out with her friends, Wednesday left and didn't return until after Enid had fallen asleep. By the time Enid woke up in the morning, she'd already be gone. The only reason Enid knew Wednesday slept in the room at all was because her scent didn't fade.
—
After putting it off for almost a week, she rescheduled her date with Ajax. Feeling guilty about Wednesday didn't mean she had to put the breaks on her own dating life. Hopefully, he'd be a better distraction this time than last.
The moment that thought crossed her mind, she felt bad about it. She wanted to see Ajax because she liked him, not because she missed Wednesday. She did. She was sure of it. She wanted him, and she certainly wasn't wishing he was anyone else.
It made her think of the song. Of he will try to take away my pain. She couldn't help it; she'd been measuring every facet of her existence against that song for the last five days.
Except Wednesday had been the one playing the song. Wednesday was probably the one in more pain, though that felt impossible. And that made Enid think of something else—of those lyrics being real and not about Ajax and herself but about Wednesday and…and…
The worst part, she thought, without realizing "worst" implied it was bad all around, was not knowing how to follow that and. Not because Wednesday was so insufferable that she wouldn't have options. No, the utterly nauseating truth was that too many faces came to mind: boys who would leap at the opportunity if Wednesday Addams gave them the time of day.
Enid texted Ajax an apology and sprinted towards Ophelia Hall like something was chasing her.
She slowed at the top of the last staircase and crept as quietly as she could to their room. On the other side of the door, she heard the clacking of Wednesday's typewriter. No voices. She sagged in relief. And, then, she crumbled in realization when the thing that had been chasing her caught up.
The idea of Wednesday with someone else made her want to bathe in silver.
Enid had crept away from their door and crashed in Yoko's room that night. Wednesday would've simply left if she'd gone in, and Enid hadn't had enough time yet to think of ways to make her stay.
What she did do was find Thing the next morning. After a lot of groveling and promises and explaining herself, she convinced Thing to help her.
The next night, Enid left dinner in the wrong direction and did a few laps around the quad before heading to the dorms. When she finally made her way to their room, Wednesday was there, pulling a sweatshirt over her head.
Wednesday froze, blinked, and went for her shoes.
"Wait!" said Enid desperately. "Please, just hear me out."
It worked. She let go of the shoes and glared viciously at her bed. On it, Thing signed something and scuttled away.
"Sorry for the subterfuge. I need to talk to you, and you keep avoiding me."
"Need is not the appropriate word in this context."
"Need is definitely the appropriate word."
Enid took a few steps further into the room.
Wednesday took several steps back.
While that stung, it didn't matter in the moment, because Wednesday wasn't Enid's target. Her target was the line, and she needed—yes, needed—to plant herself firmly on Wednesday's side of it. She needed to say this without a line between them.
"I'm really, really sorry about how I handled things the other night," she said. "For being a brat in the first place, and for how I responded to…well, after."
"Great. Can I go now?"
"I'm not finished," Enid said. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you. I—"
"You didn't."
"Wednesday," said Enid, firmly enough to illicit a sliver of visible surprise. "Listen to me." She took another step forward.
This time, Wednesday didn't back away.
"The last thing I wanted to do was hurt you. All I knew then was that I didn't want to lose you. I needed time to figure out what that meant."
"And?"
"I ended it with Ajax."
"And?"
When Enid started moving, so did Wednesday. They were toe-to-toe in half a heartbeat. She studied Wednesday's face. "Can I kiss you?" she asked.
"If you don't, I'll—"
That sufficed. Enid didn't need threats to convince her.
As far as kissing went, Wednesday didn't seem to know exactly what she was doing, but she had good instincts. Like, really good instincts. Before Enid even processed what was happening, they were sitting on her bed. Wednesday settled onto her lap and held her face with both hands like she might actually follow through on one of her threats if Enid stopped kissing her. It took a moment to process everything—Wednesday, in her arms, in her lap—and, once she did, Enid's brain short-circuited.
Wednesday made a sharp, startled sound against Enid's lips and pitched forward a bit. At which point Enid realized she'd extended her claws and retracted them quickly, pulling away to frantically search Wednesday's lower back for damage.
"I'm so sorry," she said more than once. "That's never happened before. Are you okay?"
Wednesday grabbed her by the chin and looked her in the eye. "Don't apologize for being dangerous," she said. "I like it."
Enid whined, more than a little wolfishly.
The next morning, they got distracted making out and were almost late to class, so they didn't have a chance to talk about what they were or if they were going to tell anyone yet. So, Enid was pleasantly surprised at lunch when Wednesday caught her eye across the courtyard and headed straight for her table.
"Oh, thank god," said Yoko, noticing Wednesday's approach. "You two kiss and make up?"
Enid ignored her. "Hi!" she said brightly, as Wednesday set her own lunch down next to Enid's. "How's your day going?"
Still standing, Wednesday brushed her knuckles along Enid's jaw, cupped her face, and bent down to kiss her sweetly. "Better now, mio sole," she said, once they parted, and sat so close Enid could distinguish every individual scent she'd picked up since they'd gone their separate ways that morning.
Yoko was battling a coughing fit. The rest of the courtyard had gotten much, much quieter. Enid could feel the heat blooming across her cheeks, but she couldn't stop beaming at Wednesday.
"And yours?" Wednesday asked.
"Same," said Enid a little breathlessly. "Better now."
"Being apart from you is like reading Machiavelli in English."
"Bad?" Enid guessed playfully.
"A travesty," said Wednesday, very seriously.
"Looks like the un-wolf declawed the freak," someone said loudly.
Enid frowned and looked over Wednesday's shoulder to glare at the boy. Before she could open her mouth, however, a small knife went flying across the courtyard and embedded itself in his soda can. The hand that had thrown the knife fell to Enid's thigh, bringing her attention back to Wednesday, who hadn't even turned.
"Call me soft again," she said, still not even looking at the boy she'd nearly given a free appendectomy. "I dare you."
As it turned out, Wednesday's open-ended threats were even scarier than her hyper-specific ones.
"You're terrifying," Enid said with a wide grin.
"And you like it."
"Oh, yeah."
Wednesday leaned in.
"You aren't going to do anything?" asked Ms Thornhill.
"Do anything?" echoed Principal Weems dubiously. "Like what?"
"We're supposed to separate students when they get too…affectionate."
Weems rolled her eyes. "Other students, yes. An Addams? Don't bother."
"What? Why?"
"Trust me. Don't waste your breath."
Thornhill looked from Weems to Wednesday and Enid. She wrinkled her nose and looked away again. "But shouldn't we at least change their room assignments?" she asked.
"Certainly not. We should consider ourselves lucky this worked out so nicely."
"Nicely?"
"Marilyn. I roomed with Wednesday's mother when I was a girl. I will gladly spare any of these students that same trauma."
Notes:This is far from my favorite thing I've written, and it's not what I intended to write at all, but I finished it in a day after having writers block for nearly two years, so…there's an actually good Wenclair fic somewhere inside me. Maybe getting the wheels turning will help me find it.
As usual, comments make this feel less like screaming into the void.
Thanks!