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The funeral is not what Wednesday expects and that alone unsettles her more than the fact of the funeral itself. She has attended more than her fair share (family acquaintances who met unfortunate ends, distant relatives whose deaths were celebrated like carnivals, and the occasional stranger’s service she wandered into simply because she liked the floral arrangements).
Funerals are, in her experience, an excellent opportunity to admire mortality up close, to study grief in its rawest form, and occasionally to play a sonata on the church organ if no one is paying enough attention to stop her… but this one is different. The air inside the chapel is stifling, thick with incense, perfumed with lilies that choke more than they soothe, and crowded with people who look uncomfortable in black (as if they are children playing dress-up).
Wednesday sits rigid in her pew, the glossy varnish of the wood sticky beneath her palm, her spine locked in the kind of posture that would make her mother proud. Her hands are folded neatly, but her eyes, sharp and dark, drift with irritation across the faces of the mourners (none of them deserve to be here).
They whisper in delicate tones, voices trembling with false emotion, speaking of how noble, how brilliant, how beloved Larissa Weems was. They mutter of tragedy and cruelty, of how senseless it was for her to be taken. They clutch their tissues and dab their eyes as though it were all some great performance… Wednesday despises them.
It isn’t just that they are vultures feeding on the memory of a woman they did not truly know. It’s that not a single one of them has earned the right to mourn. Not the parents of long-graduated students, not the bureaucrats with their oily smiles, not the colleagues who now preen as though proximity to her death grants them significance (and certainly not Wednesday herself).
Her lips press together, the corners tugging down with unusual heaviness. She tells herself it is not grief, because grief implies weakness, an inability to confront what is inevitable (she is not weak). She tells herself it is not regret, because regret implies a choice she might have changed, and she does not believe in revision. She tells herself it is simply irritation, that Larissa Weems, even in death, insists on making her feel something she has no interest in feeling.
It is only when the pastor begins to speak, voice droning like a mosquito near her ear, that Wednesday allows herself to look toward the coffin. She expects the sight of polished wood, of brass fittings gleaming dully beneath the dim lights, she expects flowers laid reverently across the lid, she expects, perhaps, to picture the body inside, cold and still and pale… she does not expect Larissa Weems to be standing beside it.
The realization hits her with the same sensation as a sudden fall. Her stomach dips, her pulse quickens, but her face remains carved in its usual marble stillness. Only her eyes, narrowing, betray the flicker of shock.
Larissa stands there, tall and colourful even in death, her blonde hair catching the candlelight in a way that makes her look almost too solid, too alive. Her hands are clasped loosely before her waist, her posture perfect as always, her mouth curved in the faintest, most infuriating trace of a smile (and no one else reacts).
The mourners continue their charade, heads bowed, shoulders shaking, eyes glistening. The pastor drones on about eternal rest and the kingdom beyond… not a single person glances toward the coffin as though they see what Wednesday does and that cannot be right.
Wednesday blinks once, slowly, convinced that her mind is playing tricks. She tells herself that it is fatigue, or perhaps her guilty conscience creating visions. After all, it was her eyes that watched Larissa choke and collapse on the floor of Nevermore. Her eyes that lingered too long, too hungrily, on the older woman in life. Perhaps they are only punishing her now, but when her lashes lift again, Larissa is still there (and worse, Larissa is looking directly at her).
The ghost’s eyes (blue, sharp, far too knowing) lock with Wednesday’s from across the chapel. There is no mistaking it, not a chance that this is a trick of the light or a figment of imagination. The intensity of that gaze is as real as anything Wednesday has ever endured, and it settles like a weight against her ribs… she tears her eyes away.
She refuses to play along. If her mind is unraveling, she will let it do so with dignity. She will not sit in the pews of this mockery of a funeral and stare at hallucinations like some trembling fool. But when she dares to glance back, Larissa is still there, her head tilted now, curious, like a predator amused by its prey. The faint smile has grown, almost imperceptibly, but enough to stoke Wednesday’s annoyance into something far more dangerous.
By the time the service ends, Wednesday’s nerves are stretched tight. She remains seated longer than necessary, waiting until the chapel begins to empty, the clamor of footsteps and hushed condolences echoing down the aisles. She refuses to be the first to leave. She will not be seen rushing out as though fleeing a specter.
When at last she rises, smoothing her skirt with precise fingers, she dares to glance again at the coffin. Larissa has not moved (still standing, still watching and as Wednesday steps into the aisle, the ghost follows). Wednesday steps forward with measured precision, her heels striking the stone floor in a rhythm too steady, too deliberate, to be mistaken for anything other than defiance. She can feel it, the weight of that gaze pressing into her back like a physical touch.
Her hand hovers at the polished wood of the pews as she passes, her fingers grazing briefly against them to anchor herself in reality. That reality feels slippery now, thin at the edges, a veil that could tear at any moment. The last thing she intends to do is let herself stumble into open delusion, not here, not in front of people who would whisper gleefully that Wednesday Addams had finally cracked.
The murmur of the mourners swells behind her as they begin to file out, a tide of black-clad bodies moving toward the doors. She does not look at them. She keeps her chin high, her expression blank, her stride impeccable. She is not running and she is not hurrying, she is walking as though she owns the floor beneath her feet (still the presence lingers).
It takes only a single breath, one infinitesimal pause in her rhythm, for it to happen. The voice comes low and velvet, cutting through the dull roar of the crowd like a blade through silk. “I don’t suppose you’re going to say hello?”
Wednesday’s entire body goes taut, but her face betrays nothing (not even the faintest flicker). Her stride does not falter and she does not blink, it is not real. Her mind is simply recreating the voice she heard so often in life (calm, cool and cultured, with a lilt of amusement that always seemed to rest at the edges). A voice she catalogued without consent, replayed too often in the silence of her dormitory nights… it is not real.
The voice follows anyway. “Really, Miss Addams, it’s rather rude to pretend you can’t hear me. Particularly when you keep looking at me.” Wednesday’s eyes cut sharply to the right, toward the stained-glass window. She traces the lines of crimson and cobalt, the pale face of some sanctified saint gazing beatifically outward. She wills her focus there, clings to the color and form as though it might tether her sanity.
“I must say,” the voice goes on, lilting now with faint humor, “it’s refreshing to see you speechless for once. Though I can’t imagine it will last long.” Her jaw tightens, but she remains silent. If she acknowledges the sound, it will root itself deeper and if she keeps her composure, perhaps her mind will let go of its cruel trick.
The mourners spill out ahead of her, some pausing to glance at her stiff figure, others whispering in their contrived grief. She ignores them all, just as she will ignore this as well. “You’ve always been a stubborn girl,” the voice murmurs at her shoulder, closer now. “But you cannot keep ignoring me forever.”
Wednesday steps into the courtyard, the air biting against her skin, damp earth beneath her feet. The sky is swollen with low gray clouds, threatening rain. Her boots crunch on gravel as she takes the narrow path away from the crowd, toward the shaded line of trees that borders the cemetery. She prefers solitude (she needs it now more than ever).
When she risks the briefest glance to the side, she sees her again… Larissa Weems, tall and radiant, her form faintly translucent against the gloom of the trees. The ghost’s expression is one of polite curiosity, her head tilted slightly, as though she is amused by the performance of Wednesday’s denial and Wednesday jerks her gaze forward again.
“You’ll ruin your neck if you keep snapping it away from me like that,” Larissa observes smoothly, her voice threading through the air as though she stands no more than a step away. “Though I admit, it’s rather entertaining.”
The gravel crunches louder beneath Wednesday’s pace, her strides clipped, her coat pulling tight across her shoulders as she increases her speed. She tells herself she is not fleeing and she is not chased, she is merely walking briskly, as she often does (as she prefers to do). “You must know by now that I’m not a trick of your imagination,” the ghost continues, her tone deceptively gentle, laced with an edge of playfulness. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t be trying so hard not to respond.”
Wednesday presses her lips thin, the muscle in her jaw flexing once… she does not respond. “Oh, fine,” Larissa sighs, the sound so achingly familiar it slices straight through Wednesday’s ribs. “Have it your way. I’ll simply keep talking and you can ignore me for as long as you like. But you always did prefer a battle of wills, didn’t you?” Wednesday walks faster.
The gravel path narrows, Wednesday chooses the narrowest path deliberately, hoping the hush of the woods will drown out the sound (it does not). The voice is persistent, weaving through the air no matter how many steps she puts between herself and the world. “I must say,” Larissa remarks, her words accompanied by the faint click of phantom heels against the gravel, an illusion so perfect Wednesday almost wants to look, “this funeral has been terribly dull. All that crying, all those sad little speeches. Not a single dramatic fainting fit, it’s tragic really.”
Wednesday’s fingers tighten around the handle of her umbrella, though she has not yet bothered to open it against the mist. She does not answer and she does not turn her head. The ghost hums softly, as if considering. “I expected something far more extravagant. Black velvet draperies, perhaps. Thunder rumbling at key moments, your family usually has a flare for the theatrical. Disappointing that you didn’t insist.” Wednesday quickens her pace.
“Oh, don’t pretend you weren’t disappointed too,” Larissa’s voice lilts closer, teasing now. “I saw the way you glared at the floral arrangements. Too many lilies? Or not enough decay?” The umbrella’s tip drags along the gravel as Wednesday clenches it, the scrape a harsh counterpoint to the even cadence of her steps. Her jaw aches with the effort of keeping it locked shut.
“You know,” the ghost continues, a sigh curling beneath her words, “when I pictured my funeral, I always assumed I’d be in attendance. But I thought it would be a closed casket, not… well this.” Wednesday breathes evenly through her nose, her face impassive, though a muscle jumps faintly in her cheek.
“I should thank you, I suppose,” Larissa adds after a beat, her tone dipping into something silkier. “It’s terribly flattering to be haunting your imagination. One does wonder, though, why you.” Wednesday halts and the gravel crunches to silence beneath her boots. The mist drapes itself like a veil around the trees, soft and gray. The silence is nearly absolute, broken only by the thud of her heart in her own ears.
When she speaks, her voice is flat, measured, as though reciting a fact for a courtroom. “You are not real.” There is the faintest sound (low and amused, a chuckle that seems to curl inside her chest more than through her ears). “Of course I’m not,” Larissa purrs. “That’s what makes this so delicious.”
Wednesday grips her umbrella until her knuckles pale. She resumes walking, her boots landing hard against the gravel. The ghost follows, unbothered, still faintly shimmering in the corner of her eye.
“You always did pride yourself on composure,” Larissa muses, her voice closer again, as though she were gliding just beside her. “But I can hear the crack forming. You can ignore me all you like, Wednesday, but you won’t hold out forever.” Wednesday keeps her gaze fixed ahead, refusing to even glance. Her breathing is steady, but the set of her shoulders is rigid steel.
“Perhaps I should sing,” Larissa murmurs, almost to herself. “Would that make you acknowledge me? No. You’d endure that too. Very well. I’ll simply continue like this. A ghost is, after all, a rather persistent companion.” Wednesday’s lip curls, almost imperceptibly, though her voice does not rise. “I am not accompanied, I am being tormented.”
“Semantics,” Larissa replies, her amusement practically humming through the mist. The umbrella tip digs into the soil as Wednesday stabs it against the earth, her pace clipped, her restraint unraveling in the silence of the woods. And Larissa, insufferable even in death, only laughs softly, the sound warm and taunting all at once.
The woods empty into the courtyard behind the chapel, where slick stone paths snake between rows of marble headstones. Rain has begun to fall in earnest, thin sheets spattering against Wednesday’s coat and plastering strands of dark hair to her forehead. She does not bother with the umbrella, she prefers the cold sting against her scalp… unfortunately, ghosts appear to be unaffected by weather.
Larissa glides beside her, utterly dry, her pale hair shining as though the rain itself refuses to touch her. Her expression is infuriatingly serene. She doesn’t so much walk as exist in step with Wednesday, her movements too smooth to be human.
“You always were fond of storms,” Larissa says, voice pitched low and intimate, as if confiding in her alone. “I remember watching you once, through my office window. You stood in the courtyard, drenched to the bone, glaring at the thunder like you were daring it to strike you.” Wednesday exhales slowly, her breath visible in the cold air. “My imagination grows tiresome.”
Larissa tilts her head, her ghostly smile faint but sharp. “Your imagination has excellent taste.” Wednesday’s boots splash through a shallow puddle. Her shoulders are taut as bowstrings, her hands aching with the grip she maintains on the umbrella handle. She tells herself not to answer, not to feed the delusion.
And yet the words slip out like poison from a cracked vial. “You were far less verbose alive.” Larissa laughs softly, her voice carrying on the rain. “I doubt that very much.” Wednesday’s lips press thin and she focuses on the ground, on the rivulets of water streaming between the stones.
The ghost drifts closer, close enough that Wednesday can almost feel the phantom brush of air near her sleeve. “There now,” Larissa murmurs, amused. “That wasn’t so difficult, was it? You admit you hear me.” Wednesday’s eyes snap forward, sharp as knives. “I admitted nothing, I chastised a hallucination… that is not the same thing.”
“Of course,” Larissa says smoothly, not the least bit convinced. They pass a pair of mourners huddled beneath a shared umbrella, their voices hushed, their glances mournful. Neither so much as flickers an eye toward the blonde figure beside Wednesday. She feels the weight of that absence keenly, though she keeps her gaze fixed ahead.
“You’re going to exhaust yourself pretending I’m not here,” Larissa remarks after a moment, her tone light. “You could simply acknowledge me.” Wednesday’s throat feels tight, but her reply is clipped, dry. “And what would I gain by speaking to the figment of a woman already buried?”
“Entertainment, at the very least.” Larissa’s eyes glint with mischief, her form shimmering faintly in the gray rain. “And perhaps answers, if you cared to ask them.” Wednesday’s pace falters, just for half a step, before she resumes. She despises herself for the slip. “If you had answers, you wouldn’t be haunting me. You’d be rotting quietly, as is natural.”
“Oh, Wednesday,” Larissa says, and the ghost’s voice wraps around her name with such warmth that for a moment, it feels like a hand against her cheek. “I can’t tell if you’re more disturbed by the fact that I’ve returned… or by the fact that I’ve returned to you.”
The umbrella slips slightly in her grip as her fingers tighten. Her pulse thrums hard beneath her skin, her expression carved in iron, though the smallest tremor betrays her (she tells herself she does not respond but the truth is already seeping in, like rain through fabric, impossible to keep out).
By the time Wednesday returns to the Addams house, the rain has soaked her coat straight through. She sheds it in the hallway with mechanical precision, hanging it neatly beside her mother’s collection of cloaks, her fingers steady though her jaw is clenched. She does not look behind her, she does not need to… the presence follows.
The house is unusually subdued. Even Pugsley, who normally delights in rummaging through Morticia’s vials of poison or Gomez’s fencing blades, is tucked away somewhere quiet. Wednesday stalks through the corridor, her boots leaving faint wet prints on the black-and-white tiles, the silence pressing close around her.
“Home sweet mausoleum,” Larissa observes lightly, her voice echoing faintly against the vaulted ceiling. “I always liked it here. Such a sense of tradition, it is so very you.” Wednesday ignores her, ascending the stairs. The banister creaks beneath her hand, the air scented with candle wax and faint smoke.
She reaches her room, closes the door with deliberate force, and moves to her desk. Her typewriter sits ready, a sheet already fed, blank and expectant. She lowers herself into the chair, sets her hands to the keys (the ghost waits).
“You can’t possibly intend to write me away,” Larissa murmurs, amusement curling through her words. “Though I’d love to read what you’d come up with. A gothic tale? A tragedy? Something romantic?” The keys clack, sharp and precise. Wednesday types with violence, her words striking against the page as though she might hammer Larissa out of her reality.
But Larissa does not fade. She perches on the edge of the desk… or at least, her ghostly likeness does, her pale form shimmering faintly against the lamplight. She crosses one elegant leg over the other, skirts falling into neat folds. “I must say, this is flattering. To be the subject of your breakdown? Quite the honor.” Wednesday’s fingers falter on the keys. She exhales through her nose, sharp, before resuming with renewed aggression.
Larissa leans forward, her hair spilling like liquid light over her shoulder. “Do you know what it means, Wednesday? To see a ghost? It means unfinished business, a tether.”
“You mean guilt,” Wednesday mutters without looking up, her tone clipped, as though each word is carved into stone. “Do I?” Larissa’s smile widens. “Or perhaps desire. After all, guilt fades… desire lingers.” The typewriter halts, the keys still beneath Wednesday’s fingers.
Wednesday stares at the half-finished sentence on the page, her throat taut, her heart pounding with quiet violence. She forces her hands to move again, but the rhythm is ruined and her words tangle.
When she dares to glance up, Larissa is still there (closer, leaning in, her ghostly face inches from her own). Wednesday jerks back in her chair. “You are a figment,” she hisses, her voice razor-sharp. “An echo of my fractured mind. Nothing more.” “And yet,” Larissa says, her voice silken, “you keep answering me.”
The days unravel into a series of ambushes. At dinner, Larissa drifts behind her mother’s chair, offering wry commentary on the menu. “Chicken hearts? Delightful, but surely bat wings would have been more festive.” Wednesday glares at her plate, stabbing her fork into a slice of rare meat as though it were Larissa’s smirk. Morticia tilts her head at the display, her eyes glinting, but she says nothing.
At night, when the candles are extinguished and the moonlight stripes her floorboards, Larissa appears at the foot of her bed. “You should really try sleeping, Wednesday. Brooding only gets you so far.” Wednesday throws a knife across the room in response, it passes straight through the figure and buries itself in the wardrobe… Larissa laughs softly, delighted.
In the garden, when Wednesday kneels to inspect the carnivorous plants, Larissa hovers just behind her shoulder, her tone low and amused. “You always did prefer things that bite.” Wednesday snaps that she prefers silence and Larissa only chuckles. Everywhere she turns, she finds the same tall, ghostly figure (unshakable, persistent… infuriating). And with every encounter, Wednesday’s resistance frays thinner. Her responses grow sharper, quicker, less controlled.
One night, in the library, she finally breaks. The room is cavernous, shadows stretching long between the shelves. A single candle burns at her side as she reads, the wax dripping slow rivers onto the black tablecloth. Her eyes trace the words of an old tome on necromancy, her mind rigidly fixed on anything but the presence across from her… but Larissa is there, leaning gracefully against a shelf, her arms folded, her smile maddening.
“You’ve been reading about ghosts,” Larissa observes lightly, her voice cutting through the hush. “How very flattering. Researching me, are you?” Wednesday slams the book shut, the sound echoing through the chamber. She lifts her eyes at last, meeting the ghost’s with feral intensity. “Why me?” she demands, her voice low, shaking only with restrained fury. “Why am I cursed to see you when no one else does?”
For the first time, Larissa does not smile. Her expression softens, tilting toward something unreadable. She steps closer, her figure glimmering faintly in the candlelight. “Because, Wednesday,” she murmurs, her voice wrapping the words in velvet, “you wanted me to stay.” (the candle flame gutters as the silence thickens).
Wednesday’s breath catches, betraying her. She rises slowly from the chair, her fingers curling against the edge of the table for balance. Her eyes are sharp, unblinking, but her pulse is frantic beneath the surface. “You presume too much,” she whispers, though the words sound hollow even to her own ears.
Larissa steps closer still, so close now that her ghostly presence seems to seep into the air between them, cool and tingling against Wednesday’s skin. “Do I?” Wednesday does not move back.
For the first time since the funeral, she does not look away and when Larissa’s hand lifts, translucent and trembling at the edges, hovering just shy of her cheek, Wednesday leans forward instead of flinching. The touch is not quite real, not quite solid (it sears all the same).
The first brush of Larissa’s mouth is like cool air against Wednesday’s lips, weightless and fleeting, a whisper rather than a touch. It should feel insubstantial, a trick of her own fevered mind but instead it rattles through her bones with startling clarity, a tremor that lodges in her chest and steals the air from her lungs.
For one precious moment, Wednesday allows it. Her eyes fall half-lidded, her hand tightening against the table’s edge, grounding herself against the impossible. The ghost leans closer, her presence glimmering faintly like heat-haze, the faint outline of her pale hair glowing against the candlelight. “You see,” Larissa murmurs against her mouth, her voice low and reverent, “you don’t want me gone at all.”
Wednesday stiffens, her eyes snapping open again. “I want peace.” The words are ragged, uneven, nothing like her usual control. Larissa laughs softly, the sound brushing over her skin like silk dragged through fire. “Liar.”
The ghost presses forward, and though she has no solid form, the sensation grows sharper. A chill tingles against Wednesday’s jaw as Larissa’s lips find it, the curve of her throat grazed by phantom kisses that feel almost too real. Wednesday’s breath hitches despite herself, her body taut as a bow, torn between recoiling and devouring.
“This is absurd,” Wednesday manages, though her voice falters when Larissa’s hand (translucent and shimmering) ghosts along her collarbone. It should be intangible, and yet Wednesday feels the faintest drag, like static electricity prickling her skin. Her chest rises sharply, betraying her stillness.
“Absurd,” Larissa agrees smoothly, her tone languid with amusement. “And yet you let me touch you.” Wednesday’s nails dig crescents into the wood of the table. “Because I wish to study the limits of my delusion.”
“Oh?” Larissa’s lips trace upward, brushing the corner of her mouth again, her form rippling faintly with the effort of existing so close. “And what do you conclude?” “That I am unwell,” Wednesday hisses, though her breath is shallow, her voice unsteady.
The ghost laughs, low and warm, her mouth slanting against Wednesday’s once more. The pressure is feather-light, maddeningly fleeting, but Wednesday finds herself leaning into it, her own lips parting before she realizes what she’s done. The kiss deepens with the raw ache of hunger denied substance… it is unbearable.
Her hand jerks upward as though to grip Larissa’s shoulder, but her fingers meet nothing. They pass straight through, leaving only a crackling chill that races up her arm. The absence is so sharp it makes her teeth clench, her frustration boiling. She drags her hand back down, curling it instead against her own ribs, as though to cage herself from shattering.
When they finally part, Larissa lingers so close that her breathless laugh seems to vibrate in the marrow of Wednesday’s bones. “Tell me again, darling,” she whispers, her eyes glinting like polished glass, “how you don’t want me.”
Wednesday’s lips are swollen, her chest tight, her control frayed to threads. She forces her voice low, measured, but the edges tremble like glass under strain. “You are dead and I am imagining this.”
“And yet,” Larissa murmurs, tilting her head with a smile sharp as a blade, “you feel my touch as if I was alive.” The candle gutters, plunging the library into near-darkness. Wednesday stands rigid in its shadows, her breath unsteady, her lips tingling with the touch of something that should not exist (when she blinks, Larissa is gone).
The next morning, Wednesday wakes with the sour taste of ash on her tongue. She hadn’t slept, not really. She’d lain rigid in her bed, staring at the ceiling, willing her thoughts into order while every nerve in her body still thrummed from the echo of phantom lips.
She dresses with brisk, mechanical precision. The bodice of her dress is pulled tighter than usual, the buttons fastened with unnecessary force, her braids drawn taut enough to sting her scalp. Her reflection in the mirror is immaculate, her expression carved from marble. No trace of the unraveling she endured in the library lingers. And yet…
“You missed a button,” Larissa remarks from the corner, perched at her vanity like a queen awaiting court. Wednesday’s eyes snap to the mirror, her gaze cutting over the ghostly figure shimmering faintly in the morning light. Of course she looks flawless: not a hair out of place, lips curved in that infuriating smile.
Wednesday lowers her hands from her collar, the button perfectly aligned. “Hallucinations rarely bother with detail.” Larissa chuckles, the sound warm and low. “Then perhaps I’m not a hallucination.”
Wednesday lifts her chin and steps away from the mirror. “Or perhaps my subconscious is simply thorough.” She strides down the hall, her boots clicking sharply, but Larissa drifts after her, utterly unbothered.
At breakfast, the ghost sits elegantly at the end of the table, unseen by anyone else. Morticia converses idly with Gomez, her long pale fingers wrapped around a goblet of something dark and viscous, while Pugsley gnaws happily at a plate of charred sausages. “You haven’t touched your food,” Larissa observes lightly, resting her chin on one translucent hand. “You’ll waste away if you keep brooding.”
Wednesday stabs her fork viciously into her eggs. “I am not brooding, I am enduring.” Morticia glances up, eyes sharp and curious, though her smile never wavers. “Enduring what, my little viper?” Wednesday does not flinch. “Existence.” Her mother hums approvingly, as though that answer pleases her immensely (across the table, Larissa laughs softly, unseen, and mouths something that makes Wednesday’s jaw clench: liar).
The days coil into weeks. Larissa lingers at her shoulder while she plays the cello, tilting her head with a smile as the low, mournful notes pour through the strings. “You’re playing for me,” she teases, and Wednesday only presses harder against the bow, as if trying to drown her out.
She drifts beside her while she writes, leaning over the desk to read her drafts. “You’re making me the villain,” Larissa notes once, her lips curving as Wednesday scratches furiously at the page. “How flattering.”
She appears in the bathroom mirror when Wednesday brushes her teeth, pale and luminous. “You glare at me every morning,” she remarks, amused. “It’s practically affection.”
And every night, when the house quiets and shadows swell, Larissa is there (at the foot of her bed, beside her desk, leaning casually against the wall as though she belongs). Wednesday tells herself she does not wait for her presence, she tells herself she is not relieved each time she appears… the lie grows thinner with every passing hour.
It ends the night Larissa doesn’t come. Wednesday sits at her desk, typewriter silent, candle burned low to a stub. The house is hushed, the windows rattling faintly with wind. She waits (though she would never call it waiting) for the inevitable sound of that silken voice, for the shimmer of pale light in the corner.
But nothing comes and the silence grows heavy… too heavy. She rises at last, moving through the halls with restless precision. Her boots strike against the tiles, her braid swings against her back, her throat tight with a pressure she will not name. She checks the library, the parlor, the garden, each empty of the figure that has haunted her.
When at last she returns to her room, Larissa is there (but she is fainter now). Her form flickers at the edges, her glow dimmer, her features softer, blurred. Wednesday freezes in the doorway, her breath catching against her will. “You’re fading,” she says, her voice low, even, but the words scrape raw.
Larissa’s smile is gentle this time, tinged with sorrow. “All things must end, Wednesday. Even hauntings.” Wednesday steps closer, her boots slow, deliberate. Her hands are clenched tight at her sides. “You came because I wanted you to stay.”
“Yes,” Larissa admits softly, her translucent figure shimmering faintly as though threaded with starlight. “But unfinished business can’t last forever. You wanted me, so I lingered. And now…” Her voice catches, uncharacteristically, before smoothing again. “Now it’s time I go.”
Wednesday’s throat burns. “You’re leaving exactly when I no longer wish you to.” A flicker of amusement returns to Larissa’s lips, faint but familiar. “That’s how it always is, isn’t it?”
Wednesday stands before her now, close enough that if Larissa were solid, she could touch her. Her hands hover uselessly in the air, trembling though she wills them still. Her voice fractures when she speaks again, low and raw. “Stay.”
The ghost lifts her hand, translucent fingers brushing faintly against her cheek, the sensation cool and fleeting but unbearably intimate. “You’ll be fine without me,” Larissa whispers. “You always were stronger than you believed.” Wednesday’s eyes glisten, though no tears fall. Her lips part, her words dragged from her chest like thorns. “You are wrong… I am not fine.”
Larissa leans closer, her form flickering, her mouth ghosting against hers one final time, as soft as breath, as fleeting as memory. “Then remember me,” she murmurs… and with that, she vanishes. The room is empty, the candle gutters out… and Wednesday, once again, is left alone.