UNDEAD BECOMES HER, wednesday addams

xiii. bought the farm

Wednesday got in trouble for leaving campus during a lockdown, surprising no one. Enid ditched the Addams girl as a roommate, which was only a little surprising. She had it coming (Wednesday, not Enid.)

Ollie brought a K-Pop CD and a bar of chocolate to Yoko's room, since that's where Enid was crashing for the foreseeable future. She left pretty quickly after she realized Enid was crying.

Word spread quickly that Mayor Walker had died in the hospital, and Ollie had to physically stop herself from asking Principal Weems if Eugene was okay.

Everyone attended the funeral, and Ollie borrowed a non-plant-infested umbrella to use. She had mourning clothes from when a slew of cousins had been murdered by big game hunters, but she never thought she would have to use them during her time at Nevermore.

There were so many people there, normies and outcasts alike, all gathered to mourn someone taken too soon. Ollie was never one to mourn the traditional way. She didn't feel grief, only a sense of profound gratitude that the one lost had been a part of her life at all. 

Right now, she felt sorry for the mayor, sorry that he'd never know the life he'd bring into the world after death. He would make the prettiest flowers while he was rotting in the ground.

It was raining heavily through the whole ordeal, and Principal Weems allowed her a moment by herself to look down at the coffin. She pulled out a fistful of sunflower seeds and dropped them over his coffin. She'd return to actually plant some, but there was no time now.

"I'm sorry," she said softly, hoping the vengeful dead wouldn't hear her and consider her apology an admission of guilt for their passing. "You didn't deserve this."

That was all she had to say, considering she had a raging fever and felt like she would die at any moment. The rain was helping, though, and she closed the umbrella.

She needed to check on Eugene's bees later. 

All of the bees were still hibernating, except for a couple that seemed exceptionally dazed. Ollie wondered what had woken them up from what was supposed to be a months-long sleep, and took them out of the box. 

With her free hand, she undid the buttons on her jacket and shirt, slipping the insects into an emerging crop of white wild indigo and evening primrose. If they got hungry, there was something to eat, and it would be an adequate resting place until they started hibernating again. 

There was a bit of disturbance in the items in the shed, as if someone unused to the space had been knocking around in there. She brushed it off as Wednesday losing it. Served her right.

The day was long, and painful to suffer through. Her teachers treated her like a time bomb, asking her if she was okay and if she needed to talk to anyone, or if she needed to get some rest in her room. Funnily enough, that was the first day in several months that she was actually able to make it through the whole school day without a break. 

Ollie made it almost a full day without having to suffer through a conversation with Wednesday Addams, right up until Wednesday came marching into her room that night without so much as knocking first. 

"Oh, God, not you," she groaned.

"I need a favor," Wednesday said. 

"I need you to think about how your actions affect other people."

"I don't follow."

"For the love of all that is holy, Addams," Ollie snapped. "I watched a man get hit by a car yesterday, and I went to his funeral this morning. I've never been in this much trouble with the school before. I'm sicker than I've ever been before since you showed up. You've already driven off all your friends and you're getting pretty damn close to losing me, too. What the hell do you want from me this time? A toxic plant? A guard to stop people from entering a room?"

Wednesday stared at her with an even expression. "I want you to guard this." She held up a large brown book. "It's Nathaniel Falkner's diary. The man who founded Nevermore. I'll be leaving Thing with you, too."

Ollie took the book and almost dropped it. Either it was heavier than it looked, or she was just that weak. Likely the second one. "Where are you going?"

The Addams girl looked extremely uncomfortable. "I agreed to a date with Tyler at Crackstone's crypt."

Ollie narrowed her eyes. "Galpin? Like, the sheriff's son? The barista? The normie? That Tyler?"

"Yes, him. Are you going to watch the book or not?"

"Fine. But I'm only doing this because I like hanging out with Thing. Just go."

Wednesday nodded, suddenly looking very tired and young, and left the room, not closing the door behind her. Ollie got off her bed to shut the door before looking over at Thing, who was crawling around on her desk. 

"I have a new bottle of black nail polish," she said. "Do you want me to paint your nails?"

Judging by the enthusiastic thumbs-up he gave her, that meant yes.

"This sucks," Ollie mumbled, staring at Thing as he wriggled, pinned to the wall by a knife blade. "I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry, buddy. I'm so-" Her throat closed up as yarrow sprouted from the blood running down her neck. "I'm-" 

She began to choke. There was a tremendous pressure behind her eyes. Already, more yarrow was sprouting from the knife wounds in her back and chest. She'd never even seen it coming. Neither of them did. 

With a wildly shaking hand, she ripped out a fistful of the plant from her mouth, tearing up the lining of her throat where it had laid roots. "Francis!" she sputtered, blood flecking her lips. "Get help, Francis, get help-"

More yarrow pushed its way up and out. The column of her throat was so tight the skin felt like it was about to split. Blood began to leak from her eyes and ears, making her face burn something awful.

"Wednesday," she whispered, and passed out.