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He was looking at her, completely terrified. He couldn´t believe what did his father just said to him. He was expecting a joke, but neither his father nor Wednesday belonged to the particularly funny people.
"Come, let´s not make a show of it," said Wednesday, took his hand and led him out of the restaurant.
Going home was spent in silence. Tyler tried to focus on the ride, even though myriads of thoughts were swirling in his head. Luckily, he was an experienced driver ever since his 16th birthday.
Absent-mindedly, he pulled over in front of his house and then walked inside. In the living room, he turned to his girlfriend.
"What is going on?"
"What do you think?"
"You know very well what I´m talking about." He tried hard to suppress tears pushing out of his eyes. He didn´t want her to see him that humiliated.
"I´ve found a ring."
This simple sentence turned Tyler´s world upside down. She knew it. She knew he was going to propose to her.
"And that was why you arranged this theatre with my father?"
She nodded.
"It seemed to me less painful than to refuse you, kneeling, in front of the whole restaurant."
"And you didn´t even think to talk to me about it?" shouted Tyler. "If you didn´t want to marry me, you could tell me directly in my eyes!"
He brushed through his light-brown locks absent-mindedly.
"We didn´t have to marry, we could live together just like that."
Wednesday shook her head.
"No, I think I´m done with this game. I decided to quit."
Tyler´s world fell apart for the second time that evening.
"Game?! This is what you call a relationship that lasted for six years?!"
She nodded.
"Yes, it was an experiment. Your father knew about it, that´s why he tried to warn you not to get involved with me. You should have listened to him."
He turned her back to her, unable to stop tears from flowing now.
"I can´t believe my father knew about all of this."
Wednesday just nodded, silently. Tyler felt a sudden turmoil in his insides. Just with whom he had been living these last years?
"Just go away! Go! I don´t want to see you ever again!" He gestured to the front door, but instead run away into the rain by himself. He had no idea for how long he was walking. When Tyler looked around, he was already in the middle of the forest, god-knows-where. Not that it was important, anyway. He sat under the nearest tree and let the tears fall, mixing with the rain. To hide red eyes would be tougher, but that wasn´t the point right now. This was supposed to be one of the happiest days of his life. He was going to propose to the love of his life to become his wife. So, when did it go wrong? Six years of their mutual life was an experiment. Tyler hoped we would wake up soon, finding out this was all just a terrible dream. A nightmare! Wednesday loved these. This was too awful even for her, however. It didn´t matter to him that if this was a reality, Wednesday had been the one to cause all of it. He hoped to wake up. To see her lying next to him with a ring on her delicate hand. The ring! Just now he remember that cursed piece of metal still in his trousers pocket. He took the box in his hands and opened it. Yellow gold with a small ruby. It belonged to his mother who got it from his father for their engagement. Tyler believed she would be satisfied with the idea of her future daughter-in-law wearing it. He watched the ring as if it could laugh at him for having feelings for someone.
He had no idea how long he was sitting there. A whole night, apparently, because the dim light suddenly started shining directly at him from behind the trees. Dawn!
"How cheesy!" Wednesday would say.
The tears started flowing down his cheeks again, but droplets of morning rain washed them off. Not that he cared about his looks, anyway. He was 22 years old, with the last six years spent completely worthless. At least when we talk about emotions, that is. Two years of high school in Jericho and four years at the university, with Wednesday by his side. He hoped they would marry after graduation and start a family together. Although she never suggested having children, Tyler still hoped that one day he would become a father of a small girl with two black braids. A perfect little copy of her mother.
Crap! It was just an experiment for her! A goddamn experiment. He didn´t know what was that Wednesday wanted to gain from it, but he didn´t yearn to find out anymore. His heart was too broken just to think about it.
When sheriff Galpin was opening his mailbox the next day, he found an envelope with a ring he gave his wife years ago. In the letter, it stood written:
Father,
this is the last time of me calling you like that. You disappointed me greatly when you plotted it together with Wednesday and made that embarrassing scene in the restaurant. I would never guess you will fall that low and fooled your own son by this terrible means. Why didn´t you take it as a man and didn´t tell me anything about Wednesday's intentions?
I will no longer contact you and you, sheriff, can forget you have a son.
Farewell.
Tyler.
Donovan closed his eyes, a lonely tear running down his cheek. He had no idea how he could lose his child just like that. He couldn´t explain to Tyler that he chose "the lesser evil", because that Addams girl was threatening him by refusing his son in the middle of a full restaurant and he wanted to spare him both a broken heart and a public shame. He knew Tyler would never believe him if he told him that Wednesday planned all of this out. He was too in love, too deaf to all warnings. For six years, Donovan tried to persuade him that Wednesday was just playing with him. All for nothing. Tyler´s eyes were blinded by love and his whole world was turning around the black-haired, dark-eyed goddess named after a day in a week.
After four years
Even though Tyler managed to finish his university studies, he quit as a waiter so he didn´t have to fear meeting Wednesday or sheriff somewhere in the restaurant. He decided to work as a stock-keeper in a clothing store located in a small town at the opposite end of USA. From his salary, he could afford to buy a small house at the end of the city where he lived alone. He didn´t have to rush home, he only used it as a sleeping place.
His lonely life was filled with thoughts about Wednesday. Even after all those years, he didn´t forget about the woman he wanted to spend the rest of his life with. The one who broke his heart and turned him into a hermit, whose sole purpose in life was work that he hated. Tyler started to resemble his father, but he was not awaited home by a small son. Not even by a dog that would remind his unhappy childhood with the sheriff. Right now, even in his thoughts, he didn´t think of Donovan as his father. For Tyler, his father "died" in that restaurant.
The snow was crunching under his feet, it was the end of October, a few days before Halloween. The stores were packed with orange decorations, skeletons, ghosts and similar absurdities.
Lost in his thoughts, Tyler almost overheard someone calling his name.
"Tyler! Tyler Galpin!"
He noticed someone running in his direction and waving. The person was swaddled from head to toe, but a bright-pink jacket and flowery-patterned trousers easily helped to identify her.
"Tyler, what are you doing here? I haven´t seen you in ages!" said a young werewolf after hugging him tightly.
"I should ask you the same. I live here since I finished college."
"Me and Ajax are just passing by. Filled our car and decided to take a break and have a coffee."
"Since when do you drink coffee? You always drank only caramel latte with extra cream," said Tyler remembering Jericho times.
"Well, it´s been some time," she said shyly. "Anyway, coffee will be only for Ajax. I rather shouldn´t drink that," she said and gently stroked his oversized belly, almost not visible under the thick coat.
Tyler just smiled sadly. Oh, how he envied Ajax. The woman he loved was expecting his child. Before, he also hoped to create a family with Wednesday and one day holding her little copy with black hair and a grumpy face in his arms.
Enid looked at him sympathetically.
"I heard you broke up. I´m sorry!"
"Yes, Wednesday broke up with me the same day I wanted to propose to her," Tyler said, painfully.
"Oh, God! I didn´t know about that! Wednesday just told me you are apart from each other now. I wasn´t asking for details."
"Maybe she just didn´t want the whole Jericho to know about it. Even though, one can´t hide anything in there."
Enid nodded.
"I´m also sorry about what happened to your father," she said and took his hand tenderly.
Tyler looked at her with surprise. What was she talking about?
"You don´t know? The sheriff was hit by a stroke last year. He was found by a neighbour only the day after that. Since then he is in Burlington hospital, comatose."
Tyler was visibly shaken by this news. Even though his relationship with sheriff was bad, he was still his father, after all.
He quickly said Enid goodbye and after coming home calls his boss and asks for a week of vacation. Tyler had always been a good employee, so the manager agrees without hesitation.
After arriving at Jericho, he is overflowed with memories. Different people are living in his childhood home, but the garden seems kept and they even got a dog similar to Elvis. He also visits his mother´s grave at the cemetery. He is surprised to see it clean and thanks in his mind to whoever had removed the leaves and put fresh flowers in the vase.
At the end of the day, Tyler visits the café where he met Wednesday. As if the last ten days never happened – inside Weathervane everything looks the same as at the day he left for college. Even the coffeemaker that Wednesday repaired still stands here, similar to wall decorations. He almost feels as if the manager appears from behind the door and says: „Hi Tyler, you´re coming too soon!“, and that idea makes him smile slightly. He orders quad over ice and starts remembering.
His first meeting with Wednesday. Ravens dance and her beautiful black dress, the beginnings of their relationships, first love-making, departure to university… Everything of that was connected with Jericho and this café.
The next day, he visits his father at the hospital.
The nurse takes him directly to the room and Tyler is devastated by a sight of a skinny figure lying in front of him. Without those grey eyes, Tyler wouldn´t even recognize his father. Only a shadow remained of the former sheriff Galpin.
„He was found in the last moment, but the brain damage is too large.“
„Does he know I´m here?“
„He can perceive reality, but to what extent… nobody knows.“
Tyler just nodded silently.
„Luckily, thanks to his generous patron we can try the most current medical procedures on him.“
Tyler didn´t like the sound of it – it seemed to him as if his father should be used as a lab rat, but then his attention switched to the first part of the sentence.
„Who are talking about?“
„Miss Addams. She is the one playing for his treatment. Otherwise, your father would have to be relocated to a different institute because his rent doesn´t cover the whole costs,“ said the nurse and left.
Tyler stood still for a couple of minutes, reminiscing of the last meeting with his father that happened to be at that local restaurant. Tears welled up in his eyes. Suddenly he regretted that he didn´t have a chance to make up with him. All those years of neglected care, years full of arguments, shouting, hate...
All for nothing. Old wounds will stay open and heal only slowly.
Tyler wiped away the tear that rolled down his cheek. He leaned to a bony figure lying under the sheets and held his hand.
„I forgive you, father,“ he whispered in the man´s ear and kissed his forehead.
Tyler left without turning back, suddenly aware that he would never see sheriff Galpin again.
the end