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It was a morning just like any other in the Manor – well, with one exception: the gentleman of the Hunters, Jack, was yet to emerge from his room.
None of the Hunters wanted to meddle with his affairs out of respect and so they had simply gone on with their daily routines. All of them knew that he might get a stroke of inspiration at any given moment and on those times, he mustn’t be disturbed without a good reason.
This time, however, that wasn’t the case. The man had just been sleeping for longer than usual.
When Jack finally woke up, one glance at a clock made him rise with haste. It was already a quarter past nine in the morning, whereas he normally rose at seven. Such delay disoriented him and left a bad taste to his mouth in its wake; routines and punctuality were something he treasured, especially in the Manor where one can easily lose their sense of time if they have nothing to hold on to.
But today, all he could do was to try to make up for his mishap and finish the day on a good note.
Only five minutes later, Jack left his room to get some late breakfast.
One staircase and a short walk later, Jack arrived at the kitchen and made himself something to eat. To his mild surprise, there was someone still sitting at the table despite his lateness.
Antonio, the Violinist, greeted Jack when he took a seat across from him. He was shuffling a deck of cards skilfully, humming once he noted the meagre slices of bread on Jack’s plate.
“Not having much appetite today, hm? Do yourself a favour and eat some more after that painting session, you like nagging me for the same reason anyway,” he said, laying the cards in rows of different lengths; it seemed like he was going to play Solitaire.
“Painting session? Oh, no, you are mistaken… I was sleeping,” the painter confessed and took a bite of the sandwich.
That made Antonio raise his gaze from the cards and stare at his friend with furrowed brows.
“Sleeping? Really?”
“Yes, though I would have much rather been painting like you assumed.”
“Hm. Maybe you’re starting to relax.”
“I do not like starting my day this late, but maybe you are right. I just hope this will not become a common occurrence.”
For some time, the only sounds at the table were the soft gliding of the cards and then the quiet flap they made when the musician turned them over one by one.
He got stuck in his game quite early on, though, and had to resort to flipping through the remaining deck.
“What’s with the rotten luck… King of Hearts… King of Spades… I need something useful,” he mumbled as he had to reveal yet more cards, “Ace of Spades, that’s fine… And Queen of Clubs. Jack, tell me, where has all my luck gone?” Antonio complained and looked up.
Instead of replying, however, the man in question had paused altogether and was intently staring at the cards before rising from the table abruptly.
“Excuse me, I feel ill all of a sudden… I hope you’ll complete the game successfully,” Jack said with a sliver of a smile and left, supposedly to his room.
And so, Antonio was alone again, but now there was a halfway finished sandwich sitting on the table as well.
He wondered briefly what had caused his friend to react in such a way, but he knew better than to push. Jack was the type to insist that everything was well even if he was lying on his deathbed… But whatever it was, he would be able to work it out. Hopefully.
Not long after the Violinist was done with his third game of cards, he heard the click of heels and the Queen herself appeared, carrying a used tea set towards the kitchen.
“Now, what is this, mon ami? If you won’t finish that sandwich of yours, at least have the decency to throw it away instead of letting it attract flies,” she tutted as she passed by.
“Hm? Oh, that’s Jack’s.”
“He has left his room today but did not join me for forenoon tea?”
Mary was surprised, rightfully so, as it was very rare for the gentleman to not have tea together in the gardens with her. He must’ve been quite busy indeed… Well, as there was nothing else left to do, she disposed of the sandwich, left the dirty fine china in the sink at the kitchen and was about to leave until Antonio spoke again.
“To be fair, he was out and about for a whole fifteen minutes at most before leaving in a hurry. Claimed that he felt sick, but that was clearly a lie,” he said, shuffling the cards and preparing for the next round.
“Maybe he’d open up to you. Your choice,” he added, letting the other Hunter understand that the conversation was over, and turned his full attention to creating yet another Solitaire formation.
Either he will or won’t talk to me, but if nothing else, I must try, Mary thought to herself as she set off towards the Englishman’s room with determination in her step.
Upon arriving on Jack’s door, the Queen knocked on it, cleared her throat, and spoke:
“Are you there, Jack? I would like to see you.”
She waited patiently but no answer came. The man never took this long to reply.
“Jack, I’m coming in,” she warned and tried the handle, but the door was locked.
Well, then.
“Please open the door, mon chéri, or I’ll have to use my mirror.”
A few beats passed after which Mary heard soft footsteps and the click of the door unlocking. Good… That meant the man wasn’t completely lost in his thoughts, not yet at least.
However, Jack didn’t open the door for her as would have been polite, and he was a man of manners. Something was clearly off.
Mary let herself in and saw him standing at his desk, looking out of the window with his back turned to her. She closed the door behind her and took a few steps further into the room, waiting for him to say something, but as the other didn’t even move, she took the initiative.
“Mister Paganini told me you had left his company in a hurry… What’s wrong, dear?”
No answer.
“Jack, we have talked about this before. You cannot isolate yourself when there is something bothering you… Tell me, I will listen. You know I will.”
Moments passed, and just when Mary was thinking that the man would stay silent, he finally spoke.
“Thirty-nine.”
“Pardon?”
“Thirty-nine,” Jack repeated and turned around, a pained look on his face, “That’s today.”
“I’m afraid I don’t understand… It’s the first week of August. There is neither thirty nor nine on today’s date, so what is that number?”
There was such a sombre air around the man, it pained her to see him that way. She took a few steps closer, attempting to grasp Jack’s hands, but he moved them out of her reach.
He looked to the side, then at his hands. He breathed in and out before facing Mary with sorrowful eyes, words spilling from his mouth like heavy drops of rain.
“The number of stabs. The ones by my hand, of the first crime… Today is the anniversary and the Manor is reminding me of it, mocking me, laughing maniacally as it watches how I suffer… Reminding me of how I will never truly be free.”
The man’s distress was clear as a day, his jaw set and shoulders squared, but all the fight left him when he slumped to sit atop the foot of his bed and covered his face with his hand.
“This place never ceases to spite me at every given moment it gets… Is it not enough that I recall the horrors in my sleep, see the shadows of my memories while awake? Would our death and sentence in Hell have not been enough of a retribution for all the poor souls who had their lives taken from them?”
His heart bleeding bitter tears, the man choked back a sob.
“I hate it. I truly hate it, Mary, though I’ve said that I do not hate anything… That was a lie. I’m a liar, a monster, a wretched fiend, and I deserve none of your empathy. You should leave me to rot with my kind.”
Tears flowed silently from Jack’s closed eyes, but he did nothing to wipe them. He wasn’t crying for himself; he was crying for the world that had the misfortune of carrying a beast like him on its surface.
“All those women, Mary, none of them deserved a horrid death. They were innocent, doing the only thing they could do to survive on those dark and winding alleys, and I… My hands held the blade that ended their lives in such a cruel way, and as if that wasn’t enough –!”
He couldn’t bring himself to complete the sentence.
“I am sorry. So, so sorry…”
This was enough self-guilting for Mary, however, and she sat down next to the man, setting a hand to rest on his back. Time after time again, he beat himself up for the events of the past, and on the worst days he holed himself up in his room, crying until there were no tears left and kept sobbing even then. There had been a time before Mary had arrived at the Manor, Michiko had told her, when the Geisha had gone to fetch Jack for his match and found him sitting on the floor at the foot of his bed, passed out from the exhaustion with tear streaks on his face. Such wouldn’t happen again.
“Cry it out, my dear, it will lift some of that weight from your chest,” Mary said softly, petting Jack’s trembling back as he cried silently.
The way he cried broke her heart, how he didn’t allow himself to make a sound as if he didn’t deserve to grieve. He carried an endless sadness within him but still acted like he wasn’t repenting enough… The man was always too hard on himself.
“I cannot even begin to imagine how it is that you feel, exactly, or what it is like to have experienced such things, but I do know how the memories come back and how the guilt never seems to leave,” the former queen spoke, not once stopping her comforting gestures.
“But it will be alright, for those wounds will not ache forever. However, you should not force yourself to act like everything is fine when it isn’t. Me, Antonio, Michiko, and everyone else, we want to take care of you, just like you take care of us. You are not alone, mon chéri, and never will be. Please know this.”
Mary pried Jack’s hand gently from his face and wiped his damp cheeks by the back of her hand, relieved to see that he seemed a touch calmer now.
“Now, look at me, dear,” she said and turned the man’s face by his cheek to face her. Although he was first unwilling to meet her gaze, he complied eventually.
“You are not a monster, Jack, it is only you who has painted that picture of yourself in your mind. You must’ve long redeemed yourself from the sins of the past with your ever-helping, always friendly and truly caring persona.”
“I’m not as good of a person as you think I am… All that has stemmed from selfishness, of the yearning for salvation,” he protested, but Mary wasn’t having it.
“I do not think that is true and even if your actions had truly been inspired by your own best interests, they have turned genuine on the way. Would you help only for the praise, you would not be so humble and so willing to go an extra mile for the requests asked of you,” she countered.
“Look, dear… We have all done things we wish we hadn’t and will continue to do so, such is the human nature. The best we can do in exchange is to try and make more good things to happen than bad. But right now, you are trying to drive me away so you could keep being in denial and drowning in self-pity, which I will not allow,” she stated, looking into his eyes.
“I made a promise which I will never break, remember? I am to stay by your side, whatever may happen,” she said.
After a moment, a slight smile appeared to Jack’s lips.
“I do, and I will keep mine as well,” he said and chuckled weakly, “You are the most stubborn woman I have ever met, but it seems to work in my favour.”
“You are just as stubborn, my good sir. Now, I believe it is soon time for lunch, but before that, we have time for a dance or two,” Mary said and got up from the bed, offering her hand for Jack to take.
He took it and rose to his feet as well, pressed a chaste kiss to the backside of her hand and bowed courteously.
“May I have the honour of dancing with you, milady?”
A soft giggle later, an answer was heard:
“Why, of course.”
Several dances and a breather later, the two of them made their way to the dining room where most of the other Hunters had already gathered. No one paid them any special attention save for Antonio who gave a small wave with his hair.
Once they were seated and everyone was chatting amongst themselves comfortably, Jack dared to call for the Photographer’s attention.
“Excuse me, Joseph… Do I remember correctly if I say that your camera works just like any other outside of the Game?”
“Yes, you’re correct. Why do you ask? You want me to take your picture?” the Frenchman asked, taking a sip from his wine.
“Actually, I was thinking of having a group photo of all of us taken.”
Those words quieted the conversations and several heads turned Jack’s way in curiosity.
“Ah yes, I should explain… You see, we are all here together, yes? Even if most of us prefer our own company, we still live in the same wing as a faction and are not alone, though it may feel like the opposite in the context of a usual Game… In any case, I feel like a picture on the dining room wall could help us remember that and possibly make the place more like a home, if you will.”
Some time passed in utter silence. It left the Englishman to wonder if his proposal was too ridiculous to even consider but then Burke, the Mad Eyes, spoke.
“Would you hear that… What a sentimental suggestion. A mechanic like me trusts in his machines more than memories, but it has been quite a long time since an image has been hung up and there is a blank space on the wall… I suppose it wouldn’t hurt that the Manor had a photograph of its residents on display.”
One after another, all the Hunters accepted the idea, some with more enthusiasm than others, but nevertheless, all of them were in agreement. Now the eyes were on Joseph, who sighed and set his wine glass down.
“Fine, I suppose we will take one, but who will man the camera? If we are really doing this, I am not going to be the one left out.”
“There are a few dozen Survivors, why not ask one of them?” Luchino, the Evil Reptilian, piped up before stuffing his face with food.
“Because I don’t trust them with it! The two of them who might just barely have enough understanding on its workings would break it apart and I am not letting my prized camera be handled by amateurs!”
“How about miss Dyer or mister Riley? They are both sensible people, surely either of them would be able to learn how the camera works and handle it with care,” Jack suggested.
“If they want to do it,” the Photographer scoffed.
“Indeed, but it costs nothing to try, yes?”
“You do the asking, then. It was your idea anyway.”
“Very well.”
And so, the lunch continued in good spirits, the conversations picking up from where they had been left.
“Alright, let’s get this over with! First of all, you all need to move closer to each other, half of you doesn’t even fit into the frame right now! That’s it! Then, arrange yourselves into three rows, tallest ones to the back row and the shortest ones to the front!” a voice barked commands.
“Photographer, if you want more than the top of your head to be seen, you do not try to group up with the tall people! You are average height at best!”
“Watch your words, lawyer, or I’ll make sure to make you my primary target in the next match we meet. Unlike Jack, I haven’t promised to have mercy on you.”
“Agh– Fine, fine! I’m just trying to tell you that you will stand out better in the middle row,” Freddy Riley mumbled and glanced at Joseph to make sure no unwelcome pointy surprises were moving his way. Then he peered through the lens of the camera but didn’t take a picture. Instead, he stood up again, furrowing his brows.
“Do you lot really want to stand still like in a graduation photo? Why don’t you all, I don’t know, take a pose or something?” he asked, throwing his hands up.
“I’m here to take a picture of the Hunter family, as Jack put it, not of a class of students. Brighten up, do your thing! I don’t half-ass any of my work and this won’t be an exception, so you all better think of a pose quickly because I’m going to take the photo in five,” Freddy warned, bowing to peer through the lens again.
“Four, three, two, one– Cheese!”
And so, by the end of the day, there was a newly framed photograph on the wall of the Hunters’ dining room where they truly looked like the one big dysfunctional family they were.