Chapter Text
"Am I mad?”
Is the question that has been repeating in my mind, over and over again. Ever since the moment I coughed up that petal.
I can figure out the answer to this once Enid falls asleep; it’ll be easy since she snores and grinds her canines all the time while she sleeps…
Annoying.
But perhaps it's rather..
-Ahem-
Anyways..
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By the time Enid fell asleep, it was 11 P.M. I had to pretend to sleep for two hours due to my routine, so she wouldn’t be suspicious of my unusual behavior, or even more due to my sudden outbursts of coughing.
Once I had confirmation of Enid being asleep, I sat up on my bed and quietly took the black covers off my body and legs, which signaled for Thing to sneak into my black leather bag that I always carry over my shoulders. I quietly changed into my boots and grabbed a flashlight to roam the halls of Nevermore and its hidden library, which was recently overruled by pubescent teens who treat intelligence like an optional elective.
I sneak out using the window that makes the moonlight shine vibrantly on our dorm floor. It's all dark on my side, while it looks like a rainbow is entering our room on Enid’s side. I don’t care to touch her side of the room during the night; it's not like I go to her side in the morning anyway.
Suddenly, a strong gust of wind pushes me a bit and makes me stumble, but I make sure I close the window. I push through the wind to go down the balcony stairs to the second floor below our dorm when I hear a clicking sound. I turn on my flashlight and look around back at the balcony, but no one's there. Must've been the wind. I continue to go down the stairs and attempt not to make too much sound. After I situate myself and look around again, Thing decides to climb out of my bag and join me on my shoulder.
I walk down the hallway and stairs that connect Ophelia Hall to the Quad, glancing and using my flashlight every once in a while to make sure no one is following me. Eventually, I reach and stand in front of the statue of Edgar Allan Poe.
-Snap-
-Snap-
The statue’s arm with the raven on it bends down and opens the door to the concealed Nightshade’s library. Once observing that the coast is clear, I go down the stairs and look at my surroundings. There's something about today that’s making me wary… in a good way.
Thing jumps off my shoulder and onto the floor and asks if there’s anything specific that I’m looking for, such as a symbol that could help limit our search.
“I couldn’t find any symbols for this disease… just look for anything that mentions a flower or petal; start at the top of the bookshelf.”
Thing started looking through the farthest left bookshelf, while I moved toward the one on the right. After a while, the search was starting to seem meaningless, and my patience began to wear thin. I skim through the pages of a book and find a drawing of a flower coming out of someone's mouth, the petals falling to the ground, they were covered in blood, filling the background of the page, every inch of the page had blood drawn all over it, seemingly due to the sharp thorns on the flower’s stem scratching and poking at the person's throat.
Fascinating.
The flowers also seem to have started in the person's heart or lungs, and have continuously grown all the way up to the trachea and throat, escaping the person's body by their mouth, leaving their access to oxygen unusable and possibly suffocation.
I trace the flower's path along the page with my fingers when suddenly my head shoots up and my eyes widen as it makes me lose my balance.
-Thud-
My body hits the floor as I get transported into a vision, pictures of flowers blooming, blood, flash in a repeating cycle. The word “Hanahaki” flashes into my vision after a while of the same black rose blooming through someone’s body. The more the flower grew, and my vision went on, it became more clear to me that this someone was me. First, the rose had sprouted in my heart and lungs and had been growing at a linear pace around my trachea. The more thorns it had as it grew made more blood come out of my mouth as I coughed and tried to breathe. Ultimately, this made me have trouble breathing and lose consciousness.
‘Wednesday..”
I get transported to a dark and eerie path in the forest of Jericho, which seems to be calling out my name, both figuratively and literally.
“Wednesday~”
I walk down the path, leaving me stranded in front of the lupin cages. Why am I here? This seems pointless for this type of vision. Does this even correlate to the roses from earlier?
My legs begin to wobble and make me sway as I continue down the path. Eventually, my legs fully give out and make me plaster myself onto the dirt and gravel covered ground. As soon as I tried to get up from the ground, I saw that it was covered in blood, blood that was dripping from my mouth. At the same time, my breath supply had seemed to be thinning with the force I used to try to lift myself back up. When I felt my throat closing up and raised my head, I saw an unknown animal's paw and claws.
“Wednesday”
Is this the same voice that was calling me earlier? The paws' movement didn’t seem to have any malicious intent; even if its claws were protracted, it seemed like it wanted to help me instead of harm me.
“Wednesday!”
I snapped out of the vision and gasped for air as I sat up.
“Are you okay, Wednesday?”
At first, I didn't notice this voice talking to me; my consciousness believed it was still a part of the vision I was having. When I stabilize my breath, I realize someone was holding me, and I back away from the person holding me, defensively.
I examined the person's intent and identity. It's Agnes. Was she stalking me again?
“What are you doing here, Agnes?”
She hesitates a bit before she responds, “I- uhm.. I was stalking.. Again.”
I roll my eyes, “We’ve talked about this, Agnes.”
She reclaimed, “But it looked like you were having a seizure! You were gasping for air and were shaking for a while, till you randomly stopped… I thought you died!”
“I’m fine now, that was just a vision error..”
“Uhm, also you have some… tears?”, she says, slightly confused.
I wipe my face and notice black tears coming out of my eyes, “..That’s nothing.”, I say as I stand up, back onto my feet.
“That doesn’t seem like nothing..”, she says as she quickly gets on her feet also.
“Drop it. If you utter a word about this to Enid, I’ll- ”
“Skin me? Or some other morbid torture..”, she adds in.
I stare at her blankly and look for Thing; he’s near my feet, where I was previously lying.
“Let’s go, Thing.”
Thing grabs the book I was holding earlier and gives it to me before he climbs up my leg and goes onto my shoulder. I place the book into my bag and throw the bag over my shoulder.
Agnes butts in, “I could help you know.. With whatever you're doing with that book..”
I stay quiet for a moment.
“Look for any books that have the term ‘Hanahaki’ in them, if they show any flowers coming out of a person's body, it's the right one.”
Agnes smiles slightly, “Got it! You won't be disappointed..”
I walk away as Agnes immediately goes to the bookshelves and starts looking. Thing takes out my flashlight for me as I walk up the dusty gray stairs that lead back to the hidden entrance behind Edgar Allen Poe’s Statue.
The wind is even rougher than it was earlier, it seems like a storm is brewing. I go back up the stairs to the second floor of the Quad as it starts to drizzle; the rain progressively pours harder as I make it to the balcony.
The bottom part of the window I left the dorm by was slightly cracked, I could have sworn I closed it. The moment I step in and close the window behind me, I see a light turn on behind me. I quickly turn around to look at the perpetrator.
“Where were you?” says a stern voice behind me
My jaw tightens as I turn around to see who it was, the voice belonged to Enid..