𝐊𝐀𝐋𝐎𝐏𝐒𝐈𝐀 ━ wybie x reader.

Nineteen: The Tender Trifles of Love.

[Ashland, Oregon. Tuesday,
November 21, 2015.]

Y/n gets up and starts to pound on the mirror door, kicking it with her new shoes before a sob wells up in her throat. She cannot be left in here to rot. Before she could think of bursting into tears, she instead lets out a small gasp when she overheard a soft ghostly moan.

She turns. She can just make out a sagging iron bed. When the voice speaks, there is a faint glow from beneath its stained cover.

"Who's there?" Y/n asks, frightened yet apprehensive.

"Hush! And shush! For the Beldam might be listening!" A young whispery voice muttered. The teenager steps towards the grimy bed, the faint glow from under the covers in sync with the words she hears.

"Are you talking about the Other Mother?..." begrudgingly, Y/n gently pulls back the sheets. The dimly glowing ghosts of four children, button eyes, sit up. A sweet girl with pigtails, a tall and emotional ghost girl, a very sad ghost boy, and — as for the fourth one — she hugged her knees close to her body and kept her head turned away from Y/n.

She decides not to question it. She didn't want to risk pissing off a ghost or accidentally causing them to vanish into thin air. Y/n needed their help if they can provide it. "Who are you?" She interrogated.

"Don't remember our names... but I 'member my true mommy..." the boy, dressed like Huck Finn, conjures up flowers. The strange-looking flowers wither and fade. He's so upset that Y/n takes it upon herself to take his cold hand and squeeze it reassuringly.

"Why are you all here?"

"The Beldam!" They all shout in unison and the three standing ghosts move about in a dance macabre, like ghostly fish in water.

"She spied on our lives, through the little doll's eyes..." the sweet ghost girl started and, at this newfound information, Y/n felt her heart sink deep within her chest. That blasted doll was still in her world. Inside the Pink Palace. Since she rejected the Other Mother about the button eyes, is her adoptive family now at risk?

"And saw that we weren't happy." The ghost boy continued.

"So, she lured us away with treasures and treats."

"— and games to play!"

"Gave all that we asked—"

"— yet, we still wanted more—"

"So, we let her sew the buttons..."

"She said that she loved us."

"But she locked us here."

"And ate up our lives." The ghosts fall back into their bed — rejoining the silent fourth ghost — and sink. Y/n is stunned.

She thinks a little and then speaks, trying to steady her voice, "Well, she can't keep me in the dark forever; not if she wants to win my life. I'll have to kill her."

After a moment of silence, the sweet ghost girl speaks up in a sing-song voice: "Perhaps, if you do win your escape, you could find our eyes?" She suggests.

"Has she taken those, too?" Y/n bit the inside of this cheek. Will this madness never end? The Other Mother, or rather 'Beldam' is a cruel being. She didn't deserve to live. Y/n wouldn't be killing a person but rather a monster.

"Yes, miss, and hidden them."

"Find our eyes, mistress, and our souls will be freed."

"Of course..." Y/n nodded her head, considering it. It's the least she could do for the ghost children after they have shared their dark stories with her. The trio pulse with hope. The new tenant then sits down against the mirror door and bounces her head against it. She's not hopeless. "I'll find them for you," Y/n repeats before her gaze settles on the fourth ghost. The one who has not spoken a word. "And what about you?"

Just then, a draft picked up in the secluded room. Y/n didn't think it was possible but — as the Other Family stated — anything is possible in this world. Locks of Y/n's h/c hair smacked her in the face which caused her to seethe in pain.

"Get out!" The final ghost child turned to face the teenager. The sight of the previous victim left Y/n in complete shock. Her jaw seemed to have been broken. Y/n speculates this because the ghost girl — who possessed chin-length, bobbed hair which is parted to the side, with more hair covering the right — yelled at her, and her jaw become unhinged.

And, in complete disarray, the three other ghost children retreated to their shared bed and hid under the dirty blanket.

"I-I'm sorry?" Y/n stood to her feet and tried to back up but she had nowhere else to go. Her back was already up against the wall.

"Get out! Get out! Get out!" She continued to scream just as a pair of hands reach through the mirror and pull Y/n out.

Y/n, eyes wild, tears at the hands that hold her. She grabs one and, flips her masked attacker onto the ground. She pulls off his mask: it's the Other Wybie, his mouth stitched into a painful, ear-to-ear smile. "Wybie?..." she panted.

Y/n helps sit him up.

"Did she do this to you?" She carefully unstitches his painfully-huge grin. "Are you okay?" Y/n's eyebrows knitted together in subtle confusion, awaiting an answer that never came. "Wybie?" She repeated his name.

The Other Wybie slowly met her gaze and gestured towards his throat. "I... c-can't." He could no longer talk or, at the very least, it hurt to do so.

"What did she do to y—" before Y/n could continue her inquiry, the Other Wybie stops her with a finger to her lips and pointed to the living room, its door unlocked and open. He grabs her hand and pulls her there.

It's dark, and the bug furniture is asleep. They run to the big armoire bug that guards the little door and shove it out of the way. It crashes to the floor. And from upstairs, a voice calls out, "Y/n! Is that you?!" It's the Other Mother.

"Let's get out of here," Y/n says as she opens the large door. A cold wind blows from the dark passageway, now filled with spiderwebs and the shoes, coats, and hats of other kids who tried to escape.

"Y/n..." the Other Mother continued whole the tunnel moves at the sound of her voice.

Y/n takes Other Wybie's arm. He doesn't budge. "Wybie, come on, let's go," she repeated. "She'll hurt you if you stay."

He shakes his head no, then pulls off his glove to reveal a hand made of sawdust. He blows his fingers away. The Other Wybie looks up and notices Y/n hurt expression. "Why... do you weep? Did you think I was immortal?" He rasps out.

"Wybie..."

Y/n's voice was so soft and desperately grasped onto the hot air between them. She leaned forward and kissed him. Just softly. Something in the Other Wybie's stomach fluttered, and his body tensed. It was just a simple kiss. A whisper of sensation against his lips, warm and real... and then he leaned away.

He'd never felt that before. He'd never felt the such desire to touch and be touched. However, the high heels clocking as they made contact with the ground below them broke the young adults out of their thoughts. The Beldam was almost there.

"Y/n, how dare you disobey your mother?!" Her muffled voice screamed and, before Y/n could plead once more to the Other Wybie, he pushes her into the tunnel and shuts the door behind her.

Hunched down, she moves as quickly as she can, tearing through the sticky cobwebs. "You!" The Other Mother hollered which caused Y/n to pause and look over her shoulder. Wybie is in trouble. The teenager then flinched when she overheard a loud smack from the other side of the door.

She had slapped him...

"Y/n!" The Other Mother calls out for the h/c-haired girl. Y/n snapped out of her daze and continued her way down the hallway, stands of web brush her face, stick to her hair; she closes her eyes, hands out until she finally gets to the door at the other end.

She dives, tucks, and rolls out onto the her world's living room floor. Y/n immediately gets up and slams the door shut and turns the sharp little key, still secured in its respective hole, to lock it.

Y/n stands, covered in dust and cobwebs, and lets out a shaky sigh of relief.

She's home.