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Brisk autumn winds whistled through the trees around the former Dreemurr house, and its sole resident hummed along to them.
The sound, which was the only one she could catch save for the plodding of her feet, carried memories of days gone by.
The wind's call rang out back in her home's heydey, when it had to struggle against the tip-tapping of little feet and the buzzing tunes of video games and the apologies of a sorry oaf.
Now she could hear the dull howl clear as day.
Toriel opened her work bag, and slid a freshly graded stack of drawings into the “Done” compartment. Just to be safe, she checked the “To Do” section, and shut the bag when she found nothing.
The clock on the wall said 5:35 PM. It was two and a half hours before her remaining son's curfew, which meant she had about three hours before he was home.
She hoped he took his jacket. As comforting as the winds sounded to her, she knew they were no friend to her poor, furless son. She distinctly remembered telling him to bundle up, but the boy had a mind of his own.
She considered calling to ask him, but decided against it. He was with his friends, after all, and she didn't want to jinx anything.
The goat mulled over going upstairs to see if a certain garment was there, but she rejected that thought too. It was a waste of time.
Even in the stillness of her home's new normal, three hours with no work to do and no chance of being walked in on was a rare boon.
The former housewife clicked her tongue inconspicuously as she glanced around the room. She knew no one was there, but it was always good to double check.
When she had confirmed that no one lurked behind the television, or her chair, or in the kitchen, or the bathroom, Toriel felt confident enough to draw the curtains shut.
Ever so carefully, the goat woman took her work materials and set them aside. Then, with all the grace she could muster, she slid down onto Chairiel, and reached into her secret hiding place.
Her claws fumbled around in the chair's crevice for only a moment before finding their treasure.
Toriel felt scandalous already, clutching the thick softback book that was quickly becoming her favorite.
The goat pinched herself and apologized to the powers above. Quickly becoming her second favorite.
With the single caveat that it was no bible, though, Toriel had nothing but praise for “Hearts of Suburban Fire.”
Its front cover was simple, adorned only with the title, a fake sounding author name, and a set of rippling abs flanked by roses, serene two story houses, and strangely, bungee cords. Its back cover was even more conservative, offering only a spartan description. In between those two covers, though, lay the most exhilarating love story Toriel had ever heard.
It followed two star crossed lovers on their way from being strangers to, Toriel hoped, spouses. Of course, like any great story, there were bumps along the way. Many, many bumps, in all sorts of exciting varieties.
Toriel loved both of the leads. The male protagonist in particular, one Beef Well-to-Do, fired the goat's imagination. He was a strapping gray bull monster with a mysterious and checkered past. He was the CEO of a major corporation, which he became part of after his stint in the army, where he ended up after ending his career as a mob boss. He was also a notoriously hard-hearted playboy, but Toriel thought that he had met his match in the form of the novel's heroine.
Plaina, a humble suburban mother, seemed like she would be the one to finally get the wily bull to settle down. Plaina was a middle aged woman with two children from a previous marriage, and she worked a vaguely-described service job that seemed like teaching. Her exact appearance and even her species were never explored in great detail, but Toriel strongly suspected she was some kind of caprine.
The goat had been following the lovers' escapades in bits and pieces for the past few weeks, and they now approached an interesting crossroads. They were embarking on their third date, in the middle of an exotic rainforest. This was a crucial time in any relationship, the goat knew, and she wondered if their romance would continue to blossom.
She knew there were several hundreds of pages of story left, which strongly implied they would continue courting, but as she opened the book she was still filled with dreadful tension.
The kindergarten teacher spared one last look around, and then dug into her guilty pleasure.
Helicopter blades chopped the air, viciously. “Beef,” cried Plaina, pragmatically, “are you sure about this? It seems awfully dangerous!”
Beef quirked a mysterious smirk at her words. “My dear,” he said, shooting her a smoldering look, “you know I live for danger.” Much in the same fashion as the way he was looking at her, his voice was also smoldering.
Plaina's heart fluttered, yet she was still also concerned about the safety of the stunt she was expected to pull. “I don't know, Beef. I have two kids to think about! I can't die in a bungee accident out in some forest!”
Once again the bull smirked. With the utmost confidence, he smirkingly said “Sweetheart, with me at your side, no force on Earth could harm you. Not even gravity.” With that, he flexed his rippling muscles, and despite her previous reservations Plaina felt confident enough to go through with this.
She hopped into Beef's massive arms, and then the bull jumped, jumpingly. Soon they were outside the helicopter, dipping down below the lush treeline, passing monkeys and tigers and the ruins of ancient civilizations on the way down. All too soon they were jolted all the way back up, landing safely in their helicopter they had just left.
Plaina panted at how out of breath she was. “That was amazing,” she told Beef, breathlessly. “Probably the most amazing thing I've ever experienced. I can't believe how strong and stretchy those cords are!”
Beef smoldered a smoldering glance at her, and flicked the bungee cord in question. “My dear, just wait until you see what else we can use these for.” Plaina gave him a confused look.
Toriel also felt confused. Every once in a while the story would have lines like that, which made references that flew over her head. She pressed on, though.
After another twenty pages of tropical danger and intrigue the teacher learned exactly what the bungee cords were for.
In excruciating detail.
She could never look at hiking equipment the same way ever again.
The poor woman felt like her face was on fire, and steam may as well have been coming from her ears.
She could hardly bear the scandal of it all, but she couldn't look away. Date after date and encounter after encounter she absorbed, growing redder all the while. Before the goat knew it, she was a hundred pages past where she'd begun, and likely a hundred degrees hotter.
As she approached another key milestone for Beef and Plaina's love, though, something broke the spell on her.
The doorknob rattled. With a yelp, the goat scrambled to hide her sinful book. Chairiel wasn't cooperating, though. She couldn't get the book to fit into the crevice of the traitorous furniture. As the door opened, she snatched a snail encyclopedia from the floor, and hid “Hearts of Suburban Fire” behind it.
As calmly as a woman who was practically melting could, Toriel looked up to greet her son.
“Welcome home, my child.” she called. “You are-” she looked over at the clock, which read 7:04, “early?”
That was certainly a welcome new trick from Kris, even if he'd picked a terrible night to spring it on her. She smiled a little when she noticed he wore his jacket, too.
“Hi, Ms. Toriel!” chimed a familiar voice from behind the threshold. “May I come in?”
The old goat nearly jumped again at the sound, but she managed to stop herself.
“Hello, sweetheart,” Toriel called, as coolly as she could manage, “of course you may come in.”
With no fanfare, Toriel's favorite little neighbor girl strode into her living room, shutting the door behind her.
“Are you and Kris still playing, or did you just stop in to say hello?”
The doe chuckled, and scratched her cheek. “Well actually, we were studying.” As if to demonstrate, the girl shrugged a shoulder which held a red and green backpack. “And we decided it would be more productive if we changed venues to Kris' room. If that's alright.”
The girl offered up a smile, which Toriel had never been able to resist returning.
“Of course, dear,” the goat told her, “just be mindful of making noise. And, um, keep the door open.”
“Oh, we will,” Noelle assured her, as the two teens set off for the stairs.
Before they began climbing, though, Toriel had the presence of mind to ask “Do you two need anything to eat?”
“No,” the girl called back to her “but thank you anyway!”
Toriel smiled as two distinct sets of feet tapped up the stairs. That girl was more polite than her own children, most of the time.
And she was true to her word. Toriel could hear a door open, but not close. After a few moments of one-sided chatter, all she heard was silence.
The goat took several deep breaths, and thanked providence she had that snail book handy.
If her son or, heavens forbid, innocent little Noelle Holiday had caught her with that... romance novel in her hand she might have died.
She was only interested in the romance, of course, she assured herself. She merely enjoyed wholesome relationship building between two fascinating adults who loved each other very... often and... explicitly.
Yes, that was all it was. Nothing she would have to confess that coming Sunday.
When her mind was at ease, Toriel began to ponder. Her son could be stealthy when he wanted, but there was no way for a reindeer's hooves to go up and down her stairs unnoticed. Really, even though she wasn't alone in the house, she would have more than enough time to react if the children attempted to come down again.
She might as well enjoy a little more wholesome romance. Toriel propped up her snail book, with its steamy payload inside, and continued reading.
Plaina paced around her kitchen, waiting eagerly. Her children, who understood that their mother sometimes needed to do things for herself, had put themselves to bed early to allow her extra free time. She was alone. For now.
Toriel chuckled. Sometimes this book was a little unrealistic.
Soon, though, a smoldering knock rang out into the night. And also a splintering noise. Plaina walked up to her ailing door to look through the peephole. All she saw was gray and black. She turned the doorknob and pulled on it to open the door.
“Sorry about the door,” said Beef, who was the person behind the door. He was gray and black because he was wearing a tuxedo. “I guess I just don't know my own strength.” He flexed his giant muscles, which strained against his giant suit.
“It's fine,” said Plaina, who had insurance.
She led him to the kitchen table. He chose a chair and sat, sittingly. The chair cruched, dyingly. “Sorry about the chair,” Beef smoldered. But it was alright. Clearly the sensible and modern chair from the DIY store was not designed to handle that much man.
Plaina passed him a bowl of her special dinner, while he simply squatted in place, still acting as if he had a chair under him. “Now, tell me about work,” he asked, less of a question and more of a command, “is that awful woman Becky still downplaying your contributions?”
Once again the old goat felt herself growing warm, as she pressed on. What a man that Beef was. If only they came like that in real life.
Before Toriel could bake herself alive, though, a knock at the door caught her attention.
She sat and blinked for a few moments, as her mind tried to guess who could possibly be here at this hour.
Something thudded against the door again, though, and that was enough to get her moving.
She sat down her just-for-the-romance novel underneath its snaily shell, and stood on surprisingly wobbly legs.
By the time the third rap was heard, her imagination was firing wildly.
When she made it to the peephole, though, her fantasies went out the window. All she saw was purple.
“Good evening,” she said, to the girl behind the door.
“Uh, hi Mrs. Dreemurr,” said the plum delinquent, scratching at the back of her thick mane, “is uh... wait, ah shit...”
To her credit, Toriel didn't even wince. That name was losing its power.
“Do you need something?”
After a moment, the girl blurted “Yeah, actually. Uh, are Kris and Noelle here?”
Toriel nodded.
“Well, they said I should come, uh, study, you know?”
Toriel took a deep breath. She actually didn't know. She would have appreciated knowing that Kris was planning to have another friend over. Especially if it was the friend who required the most supervision.
“Can I come in?” she asked, sheepishly.
Toriel remembered to smile. “Yes, dear.”
The great goat stepped back and allowed the awkward teen to pass through.
“Children,” she called up at the ceiling, with just a hint of a spur in her voice, “your friend is here.”
The two of them received no response.
“They are probably just enthralled in their studies,” Toriel reasoned. And Noelle was there to keep this one out of trouble. “You may go and join them.”
Susie didn't need a second invitation to get out of there. She nodded a few times in quick succession and said “Thanks uh, Ms. Toriel.”
Toriel watched her thump her huge purple feet all the way to the staircase before she sighed.
At least the dragon had caught it, that time. She was trying.
Toriel had to remind herself that the girl was just a child. A gigantic child with the mouth of a salty adult, but still a child.
She followed the sound of heavy feet tromping up the stairs, and then she heard a door creak. Then nothing, once again.
As she gathered her books and sat down, she wondered how her son had become so popular.
Months ago she had had to prod the boy to leave his room, and now he went out of his own volition at least a few times a week.
And he had friends. Two friends, at the absolute minimum. And female friends, at that.
If he kept up at this rate, then a few years and a wedding from now she may even dare to hope for grandchildren. Jolly, blonde, little antlered grandchildren, if the Angel was merciful, and not ravenous daggermouthed purple ones.
Though, even those sorts of babies she would come to love, she knew.
The old goat sighed. It did her no good to think about this now.
Once again, the only sound Toriel could make out was the wind. There were now two sets of loud, noticeable feet parked upstairs to give her early warning.
Toriel was about as far from a gambling woman as she could be, but she bet a fourth teenager wasn't going to come banging on her door tonight.
With a glint in her eye, she resumed her place in the novel.
“This food is divine, my dumpling,” crooned Beef, savoring Plaina's special meal. “How did you ever come up with a dish like this?”
Plaina blushed which may or may not have been visible, and said “Well gee, I make this all the time for my kids. It's just boxed macaroni and cheese with cut up hotdogs.”
Beef did the gesture that people who appreciate art make when they're appreciating art.
“It's wonderful,” he said, as he gazed at her, gazingly. As he spoke, Plaina noticed that his breath smelled not like macaroni and hotdogs, but like the most intoxicating mouthwash she had ever smelled.
“Now tell me, dear,” he said, beckoning her chin up with one of his massive fingers, “How did your son's soccer practice go? I'm very interested in being a part of your kids' lives.”
Suddenly a door slammed.
“Nothing!” Toriel shrieked, out of instinct more than anything, as she flailed to hide her special stories.
To her partial relief, nobody approached the living room. Instead, she heard three sets of footsteps and two voices whispering. Whispering, as if there were anything subtle about the noise they had just made.
Toriel frowned when it was clear she was in no danger. Dainty hooves and big thudding feet and her son's dress shoes tapped up the stairs amidst useless whispers.
Up the stairs.
Her brow furrowed, as she replayed what she had just heard in her mind. It wasn't an upstairs door that had opened, it was-
The goat shot up and saw that, sure enough, the bathroom door hung open. She strode across her kitchen and into the offending room.
She knew for certain that its door was closed, its lights were off, and it contained zero teenagers when Susie had gone up the stairs.
But that had clearly changed, somehow. The lights were on and the door hung open and she was positive three teenagers had just clobbered out of it.
Somehow.
She began to look around, but quickly found nothing out of the ordinary. The cabinets contained the same things they ever had. The toilet and the shower looked like they hadn't been touched since the last time she had seen them.
Out of morbid curiosity she even investigated the waste basket, and found nothing there.
Questions zoomed through the mother goat's mind, and she wanted answers to all of them.
With all the grace of a bowling ball, the confused woman thumped up her own stairs.
“Children!” she called after them, failing to smooth an edge out of her voice for Noelle's sake, “What on Earth are you doing up there?”
She found the door to her son's room cracked, and didn't bother knocking.
She blew in like a storm of motherly concern, but fizzled out in an instant.
There were no children. On Kris' half of the room there were various textbooks opened to various pages strewn about, but not one single living thing besides herself.
By memory more than instinct the goat dropped to her knees and looked under Kris' bed. She found no snickering little human, just inky black. She found nothing under Asriel's bed either. Or his desk. Or in the cage Kris used to keep his imaginary bird.
She rushed to the window and looked out, but all she saw was an autumn night.
She wished the wind would quiet down, now.
Toriel thundered out of the room, yelling “Children?” all the way.
Out of desperation she produced a key and barged into her own room, but still no luck. She thought about grabbing a coat, but there was no time.
Every footfall was heavier than the last as a very panicked goat made her way down the stairs.
This was not happening. Whatever was happening was not happening and the children were fine and-
Toriel skidded to a halt and nearly tripped over her own feet when she reached the kitchen.
In her living room stood three very familiar statues of teens. They wore strange accouterments she had never seen them in, and they were half-crouched in a failed attempt at stealth, but she would know them anywhere.
She was just thinking about how she'd describe them to the police.
All of Toriel's panic and worry and dread congealed in the course of ten seconds, and became something smooth and cool.
“Where were you?” she asked the statues, flatly, and that was enough to get them to move.
Two guilty sets of eyes, and probably a third if her son would allow the world to see his pretty face, all conferred with each other in silence.
After a moment, it seemed Noelle was elected their speaker.
“We were, um, outside,” she squeaked.
“Why?”
“Um...” she looked back at her cohorts, who had nothing. “I uh, dropped a pencil out there, and we went to look for it.”
Realization smacked Kris in the face, and he held up a festive green and red pencil.
“See,” Noelle said, gesturing towards him, “we found it.”
“Why did I not see you come out the front door?”
Noelle shifted in place for a moment before she managed “We didn't want to disturb your reading, so we didn't use the door.”
Toriel could feel a blushforming beneath her fur.
“Well, how did you get outside?”
“Uh... we climbed out the window.”
“The window was closed.”
Noelle winced at that one, but finally offered “Well these two just wanted to rush outside, but um, I made sure to close the window. Uh, to keep the hot air in.”
Toriel massaged the bridge of her snout, but she didn't break her gaze. That sure sounded like her son, and his careless giant friend. And it sure sounded like Noelle.
The reindeer looked like she was about to wither, and Toriel didn't want that. Still, she had burning questions.
“What were you doing in the bathroom? How did you get there?”
Noelle blinked a few times, and thought. And then Toriel saw a revelation hit her. “Well you see... Susie here was really curious about toilets...”
“Yeah!” the dragon piped up, happy to finally help “I really wanted to see a toilet!”
“Exactly,” Noelle went on. “And I remembered what you said about being quiet, so we went down to go see it, really quietly.”
Toriel was beginning to think the wrong Holiday was mayor. The little one had ten times the diplomacy her mother did.
She wasn't sure she believed Noelle's little hooves or Susie's giant clumsy feet could ever sneak past the notice of her ears. But she also wasn't sure she believed teenagers could just teleport, and that was the only other explanation.
Toriel exhaled as much tension as she could, before she thought of one final question. This one wasn't as burning as the others, and in fact only recently came to her.
“What on Earth are you wearing?”
At that the three kids looked at each other again.
Her son was adorned with various bits of cloth tied around his fingers and across his arms. He brandished what must be Noelle's lost pencil, and various bits and bobs stuck out of his pockets.
Strangely, Noelle held a pencil too. She had a few plastic rings on her fingers and few pieces of wrapped candy poking out of her sweater.
The dragon didn't have as much as the others. Toriel only spotted a playing card sticking out of her hair. After another moment of scanning the matted nest, though, the goat also noticed a small white bow.
“Well,” Noelle started, after giving herself a minute “They say that uh, putting things on you when you're learning helps you remember them better.”
Toriel nodded. She remembered that from college, actually. She had even tried it once with her little ones, tying strings to their fingers to help them remember the names of plants. As she recalled, most of the children had just eaten them.
Maybe it worked better on children less likely to just eat the reminder items.
“Alright,” said Toriel. Maybe her imagination had simply gotten ahead of her, as it sometimes did. Yes, that must have been it. “I would appreciate more communication the next time a situation like this arises. You do not need to climb out a window just to avoid d-”
Another question lodged itself in her mind as she spoke.
“Just how did you climb out of that window? It is on the second floor, after all.”
Kris made an excited little noise, and the other two happily gave him the floor. Instead of offering an explanation, though, the boy simply reached into his overstuffed pockets and produced a few bungee cords.
“Oh sweet lord in heaven!” Toriel squawked, as she fell onto her bottom. He may as well have pulled out live snakes.
“Ms. Toriel,” said a worried little reindeer, “are you alright?”
Toriel was not alright. Visions of just exactly what those three might have been doing with those cords were flooding into her mind unbidden.
But she was letting her imagination get ahead of her, again. And she really, truly, very much did not want to explain what she was thinking to the children.
After a moment, she gathered herself up off the floor. “I am fine, dear. It has simply been a long night, for me. I think I should lay down.”
She looked between Noelle and Susie for a moment.
“Should I...” she began, before she thought better of it. She really was in a poor state of mind. “No, I do not think I should drive you two home.”
That seemed to placate the dragon more than the deer.
“Can I trust you two to see yourselves out when you have finished studying? And to not sneak out any windows in the meantime?”
The girls nodded vigorously. Toriel went over and gathered up her trusty book of snail facts, trying to shield it from prying little eyes.
Her son had the good sense to try and suck up by helping her to her room without even being asked.
What a nice son he was.
“Please do not do things that can break your bones over a pencil, Kris,” the tired goat bid him, when they reached her door.
He nodded as his mother found her key again. She kissed the top of his messy little head, and wandered over to her bed.
Before she could settle in, though, a heavy knock caught her attention.
She opened the door, and found a sheepish dragon waiting for her, for the second time that night.
“Uh, Mrs.-”
The girl was interrupted by hissing noises down the hall.
“Ms. Toriel,” she started over, “You uh, I think you dropped this.”
To the goat's distant horror, the girl held up a very familiar, very musclebound book.
She allowed the dragon to place it into her paw.
“It um... looks fun?” she offered, giving the best smile she could give someone who probably didn't like her. Heaven help her, she was trying.
Toriel remembered to smile back a little easier, this time.
“Thank you, sweetheart.”
With that, her door closed once again.
Toriel thumped over to her bed and collapsed, collapsingly. She draped her smut over her tired eyes and willed the memory of this evening to smolder.
-
On the other side of the door, a frazzled dragon was still smiling. That had gone far better than she had hoped. With a little pep in her giant step, she walked over to her co-conspirators waiting by the stairs. "You know, that might have been the coolest thing you've ever done," she said, clapping the reindeer on the shoulder. Before their savior could become a spluttering wreck, though, Kris sproinged his set of bungee cords as loud as he dared. At that, Susie clapped a hand on his shoulder, too. "Alright, now are we gonna bone, or what?"