Chapter Text
So of course, in the most insane days and months I have ever experienced in my life, I turn to fanfiction. What am I writing? A chapter re-write of 'Addams Family Values' from a multi-perspective, feminist slant. Duh.
I love comments, I love kudos, I love follows and favourites. But most of all I just love writing. So thanks for reading.
"I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will."
― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre
Wednesday
Something is troubling you," her mother said, and Wednesday was not entirely shocked that her mother had said it. In the first instance it was true and in the second instance she was expecting this conversation, so surprise was not her first instinct.
However she was somewhat alarmed; she did not expect her mother to broach the subject so quickly, and that caught her on the backfoot.
She turned to look at her mother, the sharp lines of her face, the concern which ghosted across it for a mere moment before it vanished again, and wondered what she should say.
Myriad responses sprang to mind. Some of them pitifully childish, the theme of which was ripe envy at the amount of time her mother had been spending on her helpless infant brother.
And the other, more honest response that danced on the tip of her tongue - before she quelled it - was around the latest help in their home.
They were not unaccustomed to servants around their house; Lurch had been there from the moment she had been born (and would be eternally, she suspected), and they had drivers and maids and other staff on retainer.
It was not her communist leanings rearing their ugly head around Debbie's sudden ingratiation into the family, but rather every never standing on end every time she interacted with her.
There was something decidedly off about their white-wearing, zealously smiling, new nanny.
Wednesday would, under any other circumstances, have been immediately frank with her mother. But her mother was tired, and Wednesday was of an age where she understood it in a way she wouldn't have as a child. Under her mother's perfect make-up, her immaculate clothing, her calm composure, was a woman who was trying to balance all of the scales of her life.
"I am your mother, and you can share anything with me."
Wednesday set her book down and regarded her mother properly. She held her teacup between her pale fingers, perched delicately on the edge of the couch, her book resting in her lap, her eyes holding Wednesday's own.
There was something powerful in the way all of her interest was focussed on Wednesday.
Wednesday found it disconcerting and comforting all at once. It felt like a familiar piece of music she hadn't heard in a while but knew every note of.
She wondered, briefly, if father had volunteered to take the baby a walk and asked Pugsley for help just so that her mother could speak with her. Even the concept that it was premeditated filled Wednesday with an innocent warmth that wasn't entirely welcome in her skin.
She set her book aside and looked at her mother.
"You're an astute woman, mother," she said softly.
Her mother smiled her close-lipped smile and nodded almost imperceptibly.
"Surely you can see it?" Wednesday said, the words rushing out with a desperation she didn't entirely want to show. She sounded like a child, emphatic and desperate for approval.
Her mother motioned with a hand, beckoning her to sit on the seat beside her own. Wednesday climbed up from the floor beside the fire and took the seat she'd been directed to.
"You mean Miss Jelinksy?"
Her mother was not one to prevaricate in the face of any subject and it was – it occurred to Wednesday – a trait she was beginning to display herself. Her mother was watching her closely for her response, and Wednesday felt her next words must be chosen carefully in order to assert her argument.
"She is very-"
"Untrustworthy, calculating, too sweet to be wholesome?"
"Yes," Wednesday answered, then realising her mother truly understood, her voice coloured with passion. "Yes mother."
"Well," her mother took up her book again, as if acknowledging a traitor in their midst was a mere formality, "we're agreed."
Wednesday, still inflamed by the revelation, waited patiently for a plan, for a statement of intent. But it was not forthcoming.
"What will we do?" She felt close to bursting with anticipation and had to work very hard to keep her tone emotionless.
Her mother looked up, thoughtful, then shook her head softly.
"Nothing my darling."
If she had been taken aback by her mother's bland response, she was horrified by her willingness to simply let matters unfold.
"But she's going to kill my uncle, and possibly us…" Wednesday burst, her voice rising an octave as she laced her fingers together nervously.
Her mother smiled – small and just on the border of patronising – and then set her book to the side calmly, as if they were not in imminent danger.
"No, she won't," her mother said softly, as if it was entirely obvious and Wednesday was being woefully dense in having not understood that.
"How can you be sure?"
Her mother raised her brow, "I won't let her."
Wednesday was silent for a moment and mulled the threat over as her mother simply examined her with her unique brand of unsettling, yet maternal, scrutiny.
"What will you do?"
Her mother smiled again and for a moment a rare mischief almost curled the sides of her mouth and it both delighted and shocked Wednesday, for it seemed, to her, to be entirely new.
As quickly as it was there, it was gone.
"I haven't though that far ahead, if I am to be entirely honest with you my darling," her mother answered. "I have been somewhat occupied with the-"
"Birth of my brother," she interrupted, lambasting herself with silent scorn even as the words streamed out of her mouth.
Her mother reached out and brushed the hair which curved into the braid below her ear, tucking it neatly back in place as she'd always done for as long as Wednesday could remember. Wednesday felt powerless under her touch; safe, and longing, and loved and irritated all at once.
She was fourteen, she did not need babying (she could not remember a time she had) and yet here she was, craving it.
Perhaps that was why she was so unbearably – and uncharacteristically - furious all the time.
"It must be difficult," her mother said softly, toying with the tight weave of her braid. "I am sorry I haven't given time to that."
Her mother touched her face softly.
"I am not jealous-"
"You can confide in me, you know, and I will never be anything but supportive," her mother cut through her lies, like she cut through everything; gently, and with blistering precision. "And I expect you to be jealous, I suspect you should be. I think I would be."
Wednesday doubted that. Her mother, until this evening, have never seemed anything but completely level, and even then, she hadn't exactly been irrational tonight, just inexplicably calm.
"I just…I don't particularly enjoy change," she answered, trying to sound as sensible as possible. "I can't imagine you being jealous mother, you're not the jealous type."
Her mother looked serious for a moment, and a gentle smile chased the shadow from her face.
"I always find this part of being a mother the most challenging; that one must be a version of oneself, rather than the whole and – sometimes ugly - truth. Of course I have felt jealousy, and anger, and disappointment, and fear, and all the things you are feeling. Particular situations still excite them in me. But as a mother – as your mother – my job is to show you how to handle those things Wednesday, to be resilient in the face of them. And you have mistaken that for their absence."
"Maybe," Wednesday said, feeling braver in the face of her mother's candidness, "maybe you don't want me to see them."
Her trust in her mother was absolute, even if she didn't always understand her, and it was easy to offer something which could be interpreted as a criticism when she knew it wouldn't be read that way.
"You may have a point," her mother said. "Emotional intimacy is not my strength."
Wednesday knew, of course, that wasn't strictly true.
There was one person who knew her mother as well as person could be known.
"I don't want more of your time," Wednesday said, suddenly feeling guilty as she realised she was adding another burden to her mother.
"I think it's what you need...and what I need, all things considered," her mother smiled, with an air of reassurance so absolute that any other argument Wednesday may have made for the sake of saving face seemed pointless. She merely nodded, and allowed her mother to pull her into her embrace.
"Don't worry about Miss Jelinsky," her mother murmured softly, "leave that to me. Heaven knows you've enough to worry-"
The door of the parlour opened, heralding an intruder, and they broke from their embrace to examine who it was.
It was her father, with the baby, who was wriggling impatiently, and from the apologetic look on her father's face she suspected that he had been unsettled for quite a while.
"He is hungry Tish," her father said softly, tucking the baby into one arm while he shrugged off his coat onto the chair with the other.
Her mother had already begun untying her robe even before her father had spoken. He brought the baby forward, and as soon as he was latched his wriggling frenzy stopped and he settled into her mother's arms peacefully.
"Was your walk lovely?" Her mother asked the baby, as she gently stoked his cheek. "Your father is a fine tour guide for the cemetery."
"A pale imitation of you Tish."
Her father turned and smiled at her after his eyes lingered on his wife a moment longer. His mouth was a grin of satisfaction, decorated with tiredness, and was soon the owner of a glowing cigar.
"How is my little hellion, my Wednesday?"
"Fine, thank you," she stood. "Excuse me. I have studying."
"We could finish our conversation," her mother said. "You don't have to leave."
Wednesday was genuinely happy to go; she wasn't making a show of her own exit in order to imply she was intruding. So, she shook her head.
"I really do have to study," she said softly, making a poor attempt at a reassuring smile. "I promise."
"Alright," her mother said, but Wednesday could see her incredulity for a second before her face was a mask of regal composure.
Wednesday bent to look at the baby, resisting various urges to show it who was boss. And instead she smiled and just as the baby caught her eye, he began to sob.
A gentle heat filled her chest and she was forced to reconsider the entire concept of ridding their home of the baby.
And when she made eye contact with her mother, there was something that looked like pride in her mother's black eyes.