Daughters are Forgotten

There were two things in Vlad’s life that he cherished, first was Maddie, sweet, lovely, and intelligent Maddie, and then there was power. He was a man of many things, but those two ruled his life; fueled his ideas of revenge and pressed him towards the ambitions of mayor and even world domination. 

Sometimes this blinded him. He spent day after day walking circles in his office, plotting his very next scheme. When he wasn’t plotting, he was spying and scheming. Those were the only things he did outside of his “business efforts”. But, anytime he would fly over to the Fenton household to spy on Maddie and Jack, he would feel a stab in his core.

The Fentons were a family . 

Maddie had given birth to a beautiful young girl who looked like a mixture between her and Jack and a boy with a lithe frame but with Jack’s coloring. He found it strange the way genetics worked in the Fenton family. Vlad would fantasize while twisting a pen, what would a little girl between him and Maddie look like?

Could a halfa even have children, or would they be like him — a mixture of a ghost and a human?

His brows furrowed in thought as he swore he heard the echoing laughter of a little girl. Dreams were invasive and he couldn’t help but imagine the possibilities.

Questions milled in his mind as he crumpled the report in his hand into a ball before throwing it across the room into the bin. He had no time for daydreaming, but his mind still lingered on the idea of what his child would look like.

Would they have natural colored hair or would their hair be white like his — white like bone, white like death. When he got Maddie back, would their new children have her eyes, violet like soothing lavender?

He could only speculate.

—

It was a warm winter in Wisconsin when he got the letter. His hands trembled in a mixture of shock, glee, and absolute fear. In his hands was a letter from an attorney as well as a death certificate and birth certificate. 

The death certificate belonged to a woman that he had long ago forgotten, a simple nurse who looked after him while he was hospitalized. The last time he saw her he had taken her out for a drink — a thanks of sorts for all she did for him while he was hospitalized. She was a sickly thin woman, with hair resembling fall and eyes a touch too blue to be lilac.

He might have liked her more than the other nurses at the hospital because she looked like Maddie. She wasn’t Maddie, but at the time, she was enough.

Vlad couldn’t tell if he regretted the affections he transferred to her; he didn’t know if he could regret something that he didn’t even remember. He certainly didn’t remember that her name was. He only remembered that she grew up in the same town that Maddie had, he remembered that she was originally from Arkansas, that she wanted to go back there to marry and have kids of her own.

He figured she did, just that she never married.

He stared at the three papers in his hand; one explaining the will and testament of a woman named Madison Keys — even her name was similar. What had he been thinking?

The second paper was the death certificate of the nurse. It was simple and bland, but the cause of death was what was most startling…

Frostbite?

How had a woman in modern day Arkansas contract frostbite in the summer? Surely there had to be a mistake—

That was his thought process until he saw the birth certificate attached to the will and death certificate.

It belonged to one Wisconsin Masters, a little girl, now aged 13 with “blonde” hair and “blue” eyes. But Vlad knew that there was more to little Wisconsin than what the papers said, because in the little spot for the father’s name was written in the curly cursive of Madison keys:

Vlad Masters

He had gotten the nurse pregnant.

His nurse gave birth to a little girl.

He was a father.

He had a family.

—

He arranged a meeting with the case manager and attorney as soon as possible to discuss the affairs of Miss Keys.

Calling her Maddie hurt .

It was a long and tedious effort just to get the meeting arranged. At first they told him it would take two months to get the paperwork resolved and settled, apparently a sister or cousin (maybe both, who really know down that far South) of Miss Keys was fighting for custody. But, with a flash of his gold card and some flashy lawyers, the resistance to meeting little Wisconsin ended quickly. 

He was admittedly frantic. 

There were many steps in the process of just meeting the little thing, what if she didn’t like him, what if she despised him? So he paced and paced in his office, waiting for the grandfather clock in the corner to strike twelve.

He had five minutes left to wait.

Five minutes to contemplate his first words to a little girl with light hair and blueish eyes. 

—

He was alerted of their presence not by a squeal of the door, or the loud banging of knuckles on wood, rather he was startled by an unfamiliar presence in the world of the living. He couldn’t sense it clearly, he never was able to even in the ghost zone. But there was a familiar taste of metal and the air cooled by a few degrees.

She was here.

Then came the rapping at the door, a slow and steady beat in threes.

“Come in.”

Three figures emerged into the room, a tall woman with a rather pinched face — possibly from the cold, possibly from their current circumstances — and a short stacked man who looked rather cold judging from the scarf and gloves entered with a smaller figure, one shrouded in a large black jacket if you could call the rag that.

“Hello Mr. Masters, is it? I’m Amelia Tay, the social worker. We talked on the phone?” The pinched face spoke to him, and at that point Vlad stuck on a charming smile and replied.

“Of course, it’s wonderful to put a face to a voice, nice to meet you. And I presume that the man next to you is Attorney Leigh? We also spoke on the phone about Miss Keys’ will and testament.”

The stout man puffed in pride from the recognition, not that it was anything really to be proud of, but nonetheless, “Yes, yes! Very nice to see you instead of hearing you, Mr. Masters. As I last said on the phone, Miss Keys wrote that you would be granted custody of her daughter, Miss Wisconsin, should you want it .”

The phrasing was off, but Vlad was not surprised. Certainly, a man who specialized in the words of the dead, would prefer to spend time away from the living, especially from those with so much to live for, like children.

It seemed like Vlad had a firm to conquer in the future, judging from the hesitance the small cloaked figure had, stepping closer to the woman than the man.

“Please, do come in and sit, wouldn’t want the little one to tire herself out from the long trip, now would we?” he placated, bending down slightly to meet the girl’s gaze.

He had read it in a book, how to connect with children and approach them; he had reminded himself to stay calm and collected, to seem open and wear a smile. But the minute he met her eyes, the smile slipped into a mad grin.

“My, my, and who may this little princess be?”

The girl flinched, and so did Vlad’s heart at her movement. But she didn’t withdraw eye contact, rather her eyes lit up at his appearance.

“Sinny.”

“Hmmm? I’m sorry, could you repeat that?” He had heard her just fine, but the girl’s voice was sweet yet tart, that of a child, and never before did his heart clench at the tone.

She seemed tired and lonely, her voice was flatter than the screams he usually heard when nearing the schools in town or passing by children in general.

“Sinny, my name’s Sinny.”

“Now, Wisconsin, you know that Mr. Masters doesn’t know that. Why don’t you introduce yourself properly?” the woman gently chided, leading the girl towards the couch where she slowly sat down next to her.

Sinny — Wisconsin — lifted the hood with wobbly fingers. They weren’t shaking in nervousness, but tilted every so often out of awkwardness. Vlad could sympathize, after all he was a tall looming boogie-man with hair so stark white…

But when she lowered the jacket away from her, he saw that there would be no reason to worry about his appearance.

What he could only describe as a miniature Maddie with snow-white hair stared back at him. Large circular lilac eyes that were a tad too pale to be called purple or lavender watched him with interest. A light dash of freckles decorated her cheeks and nose like the constellations of stars in the night sky. She watched him intently and he only returned her gaze.

“My name is Wisconsin, but you call me Sinny. My Mommy said that family and friends call me Sinny. Wisconsin is a place, but I am Sinny.”

Her gaze never left hers and he felt the smile on his face become less stiff and become entirely genuine.

“It’s very nice to meet you, Sinny. My name is Vlad Masters, and I’m your—”

The child beat him to it, a cold and knowing fire in her eyes.

“You’re daddy.”