Parents & Police
Harry stood in the courtyard between Wednesday and Enid, his eyes never resting while he searched every face crowding the lawn. Principal Weems was talking, giving a speech about how parental support is important to students, but Harry could barely make out her words over the hammering of his heart.
There was no way that his dad wasn’t there. He had to be.
He had to be.
There was a tall man with black hair that made Harry gasp, but, no… he had his arm around Yoko’s shoulders and Harry could see his fangs when he spoke.
Another man, tall with wavy black hair and thin shoulders, caught Harry’s attention, but when he turned, Harry saw that he was one of the faceless.
And James Potter definitely had a face.
“Harry, do you want to come meet my family?” Enid asked, interrupting Harry’s search. Harry spared a second to glance where Enid gestured and saw an older woman with brown hair streaked with grey alongside a gruff looking man with a beard and three boys who were rough housing and sporting identical manes of wild blonde curls.
“No,” Harry told her before tacking on a polite, “thank you.”
Wednesday pushed Harry down when he’d stood on his toes to look for his dad more easily.
“Come meet our family,” Wednesday said shortly, a demand Harry had no intention of following. “I saw my parents and brother arrive this morning, they’ll be pleased to meet you.”
“I can’t right now,” Harry said distractedly. “I’ve got to wait for my dad.”
Harry continued to search the crowd, missing the look that passed between Wednesday and Enid. His dad would show up, he just knew it.
A tap on Harry’s shoulder had him turning around quickly, but it was only Xavier.
“Looking for someone?” Xavier asked, ignoring Wednesday completely.
Which was fair, because if someone accused Harry of being a monster stealing organs from normies, he’d probably ignore them too.
“Yeah, my dad,” Harry told him.
“His father who is reported to be dead yet possibly seen by two people recently,” Wednesday told Xavier. “Perhaps you’ve seen him during your trips to the forest?”
Xavier’s lips curled up on one side when he looked at Harry. “I don’t go in the forest much, despite what Wednesday thinks, but you can come wait up on the balcony with me, if you want. My dad isn’t coming, but you can look for yours with a better view.”
“Brilliant,” Harry said eagerly. He patted his hair down nervously and tested out a smile for Wednesday who merely rolled her eyes at him.
“When we reconvene for lunch, I expect you to sit with us,” Wednesday told Harry firmly. “Understood?”
“Sure,” Harry nodded quickly. “See you later.”
When everyone gathered for lunch later, Harry would sit with Wednesday and her family and he could meet her parents and she could meet his dad.
Harry followed Xavier up the stairs and saw that his hands were shaking with excitement so he quickly stuffed them in his trouser pockets. Some of the students, like Xavier, had foregone their uniform for the day. Harry didn’t though, he had on his black school slacks, his blazer, and the green tie his dad bought.
It was a ‘just in case’ measure, just in case James didn’t recognize Harry in the sea of students.
At the top of the stairs was a large balcony that looked out over the courtyard and Harry leaned on it beside Xavier while he watched other parents reunite with their kids.
“What’s your dad look like?” Xavier asked Harry.
Harry grabbed the photo of James and Lily Potter from their wedding day out of the inner pocket of his blazer and showed it to him. Xavier smiled at it and nodded.
“Just like you then,” Xavier laughed. “Got it.”
Harry didn’t think they were completely identical, his dad had a straighter nose, a more square jaw, and different shaped and colored eyes, but he was pleased to be compared to him all the same.
“Enid said he has long hair,” Harry told Xavier. “Messy though, not neat like yours.”
Xavier shook his head, sending his hair to settle in waves around his shoulders. Both of them looked out in the crowd and there was a band around Harry’s heart when the crowds thinned and he still didn’t see his dad anywhere.
Harry did see a tall woman, thin and elegant looking, with a long curtain of silky black hair sweep over to where Wednesday stood. There was a man too with a neatly combed black mustache and a black suit on followed by a boy a couple years younger than Harry with black hair just like his parents and sister.
It wasn’t that Harry wasn’t pleased that Wednesday’s family came to see her, and he was interested in meeting them, but they weren’t the people he was so desperate to see.
“So… not that I take Enid’s blog as gospel or anything, but I thought your parents died a long time ago?” Xavier said after a quiet minute.
Harry nodded, “Yeah, but I think my dad’s alive.”
“Why?”
Xavier didn’t sound like he didn’t believe Harry, just that he was curious, so Harry figured there wasn’t any harm in explaining. He watched the courtyard - maybe he’s just late… - while he told Xavier about finding the photo album and someone buying him his suit that matched his dad’s description. He didn’t include Wednesday’s lack of research results about a car crash killing his parents -
“Your mother begged before she died too…”
- because he wasn’t entirely sure a car crash killed them in the first place. But he did tell Xavier about what Enid said about a man with long black hair, pale skin, and a British accent rescuing her from the burning cave.
“Yeah, that’s weird,” Xavier agreed when Harry finished telling him all the different reasons that placed the hope in his heart. “But… I mean, I dunno. Even if he is alive, isn’t it kind of crappy that he never reached out before now?”
“No,” Harry said, snapping it a bit more harshly than he intended. He looked away from Xavier’s surprised face back out to the courtyard.
“I’m sure he had a reason,” Harry added more calmly. “And- and I’m sure he wants to see me.”
“Alright, Harry,” Xavier said lightly. He propped his elbows on the balcony rail and put his chin in one of his hands. “I’ll wait with you.”
Harry was thankful for his presence beside him as he watched the courtyard for any sign of his dad. The longer they waited though, the more that the hope that warmed Harry’s heart began to cool to something cold and icy.
The gates to the courtyard were closed and the families were leaving with their students to see their dorms, see their classrooms, meet their teachers. Harry saw Wednesday leave with her family and Principal Weems. Harry watched Enid lead her family to the greenhouses. Even Ajax and his sister and parents all entered the school with the caps covering the snake tendrils that they must all share.
The sun slowly rose higher in the sky and Harry’s heart sunk lower in his chest.
“You said your dad isn’t coming?” Harry asked Xavier when the courtyard was clear of all except the families filling the picnic tables set up for them.
“Nope. He’s at a book signing in Boston,” Xavier said, sounding bitter about it.
Harry swallowed and nodded. “I don’t think mine’s coming either.”
Xavier gave Harry a look like he’d been thinking the same thing for a while, but he just nodded.
“In that case, let’s bail,” Xavier suggested. “Come on, Harry, I’ll buy you a coffee and we can share crappy family histories.”
That didn’t sound like much fun to Harry, but he figured he didn’t have anything to lose. Since Harry didn’t have a parent to come see him - why didn’t he show up? - then all Harry could do at school was watch the other students flaunt their families around. Instead, the two of them, the two boys with dad‘s too busy or too uncaring to show up, signed out for the morning and headed to town.
Harry tried to muster up a smile when his dog came running to him the moment he walked out the gates and started licking his hand, but even the sight of his loyal and protective pet couldn’t remove the disappointment of his dad not showing up.
*****
Wednesday sat in Weems’ office and listened as the woman outlined her ‘behavior’ since beginning Nevermore.
“Wednesday has a habit of being places she shouldn’t be,” Weems told her parents with a fake smile on her red lips. “She’s been in the forest multiple times, both times dragging other students in danger with her.”
“We’ve always encouraged Wednesday to explore her surroundings, be at one with the environment,” her father said brightly, a wide smile on his face. “I am pleased that she’s been branching out and creating connections.”
“It’s always been difficult for Wednesday to make friends,” Wednesday’s mother said with a smile as fake as Weems’. “It’s wonderful to hear that she’s found some here.”
“I’m afraid that Wednesday’s… strong personality is a magnet for some of our… less outgoing students,” Weems said slowly. “‘Friends’ might not be the proper term.”
“You mean Harry?” Wednesday scoffed. “Harry and I are not friends, we are cousins.”
“Cousins?” Father perked up and his smile somehow grew. “How wonderful! We’ve not found a new relative in years!”
“Regardless,” Weems cleared her throat, bringing the attention back to herself, “Wednesday is not adjusting as well as we had hoped. Her therapist said that she is less than participatory during her sessions and she believes that a family session this weekend may be useful.”
“I don’t know,” Mother said slowly, her fake smile dripping away. “I can’t imagine what good that would do. We are only here for the weekend.”
“Doctor Kinbott believes that even a single session would do Wednesday a world of good,” Weems said with something like a challenge in her cold eyes.
An undercurrent of something tense flowed between Weems and Mother as they stared at each other with their own false masks on their face.
“Fine,” Mother finally said. She smiled at Wednesday and Wednesday could see the tense lines around her dark eyes. “One session.”
“Will it hurt?” Pugsley asked Wednesday anxiously.
“Excruciatingly,” Wednesday said drily, dreading the day more than usual.
Pugsley grinned, a smile as similar to their father’s as Wednesday’s cold mask was to their mother’s.
“Cool,” Pugsley said.
Not cool.
Not cool at all.
*****
Harry followed Xavier into the Weathervane with his head held low and his spirits even lower.
Xavier had tried to make small talk during their walk, but Harry hadn’t been interested. It was nothing against Xavier, but it was all Harry could do to swallow his disappointment and not cry like a baby while they walked.
Why didn’t he come? Why save Enid and leave the book of photos but not show up? Why buy Harry a suit and not say hello?
It was Harry’s fault, he was sure of it.
“Harry?”
Harry blinked when someone’s hand waved directly in front of his face and realized that he’d been standing just inside of the coffee shop while Xavier had clearly been trying to talk to him.
“Sorry,” Harry murmured, “what?”
Xavier smiled and shook his head. “Never mind. Hey, why don’t you go sit down and I’ll grab us drinks?”
Harry nodded absently, his mind still on his dad, and let his feet take him automatically to a booth by the windows. He stared out on the street and watched his dog chase birds in the town square across the road and watched when a car drove up to Dr. Kinbott’s office.
Interestingly, Wednesday, her parents, and her brother all unloaded from the sleek and posh looking black stretch car.
Harry would have brushed it off and let his mind and eyes continue to wander, but a swear from the booth behind him caught his attention.
“Son of a bitch…” Harry wasn’t sure without turning around, but he thought it sounded like Tyler’s dad. Harry lowered his head to the table, not keen on being spotted by the man, but he was out of luck when Xavier came walking back to the booth with two cups of something steaming and rich smelling and Tyler beside him with a smile and plate of cookies.
“Harry, hey!”
Harry closed his eyes in momentary horror when he heard the man in the booth shifting around and knew he’d been spotted. He didn’t exactly think Tyler’s dad was a big fan of him, considering he wanted to arrest Harry, and he wasn’t really having a great day to begin with.
“Oh, Dad,” Tyler drew up short in front of Harry’s booth while his eyes looked over at the booth beside him, “hey.”
Xavier slid in across from Harry and handed him a cup and raised his brows. ‘What’s up?’ he mouthed silently, but Harry shook his head subtly.
“What are you doing here?” Tyler asked his dad as he nudged Harry with his knee, probably wanting Harry to scoot over so he could sit.
“Working,” his dad said. As soon as Tyler sat down beside Harry with a scoff, his dad stood up. Harry didn’t have to look up to know the man was staring at him, and he’d rather not see whatever look he had on his face.
Just because Principal Weems and Dr. Kinbott thought it wasn’t disrespectful to stare at someone didn’t mean that Harry thought the officer followed the same rules.
“What are you boys doing out of school?” Tyler’s dad asked shortly. “I thought there was some parent event happening.”
“Dad, Jesus,” Tyler sighed. “Rude much?”
Harry grinned slightly out the window, firmly ignoring the conversation happening.
“No parents to show up for us, sir,” Xavier said, adding the polite title despite his sullen tone.
Harry pinched his leg beneath the table as hard as he could, focusing on the twinge of physical pain to ignore the overwhelming internal pain he felt at Xavier’s words.
“Is that right?” Tyler’s dad said. “Something interesting out there, Harry?”
As much as Harry would rather not participate in the conversation, he couldn’t exactly ignore a direct question either.
“No, sir,” Harry said, an embarrassing quiver in his tone that betrayed his fear of being arrested and his overall misery. Tyler reached under the table and put his hand on Harry’s thigh, so Harry moved his hands to the table. He wrapped them around the warm drink that smelled like the vanilla latte he liked and stared hard down at the white foam smiley face on top of the drink.
How come Xavier knew Harry’s favorite drink and Tyler drew him a smiley face in foam and Harry’s own dad was avoiding him?
Tyler’s dad made a sound of disbelief, something rude that Harry didn’t need to comment on, and Tyler sighed again.
“Dad, do you need something?” he asked. Harry thought that even though Tyler said they don’t get along much, clearly Tyler wasn’t really scared of the man because otherwise he’d probably not speak so rudely to him.
“I’m headed uptown, I just got a call about possible gunshots heard in the morgue,” his dad said. “You boys stay out of trouble. Tyler, I might be late tonight.”
“Shocker,” Tyler muttered.
“Gunshots in a morgue? Isn’t that an oxymoron?” Xavier said quietly, causing Tyler to snort with laughter.
Harry waited until he heard the sheriff’s heavy footsteps walking away and the doorbell ringing that he left before glancing up. He felt some tension from his shoulder leave when he saw it was only Tyler and Xavier in the booth with him.
“Rough day?” Tyler asked Harry with a soft smile. His eyes were more grey that day, a match to Harry’s mood.
“A bit,” Harry said. He took a sip of the drink and felt the warm sugar filter in his stomach and give some life to his frozen limbs.
“You’re lucky you go to school here in town,” Xavier told Tyler while Harry focused on adding life to his body and Tyler’s thumb made a slow circle where it rested on Harry’s leg. “No parents weekend when you go to public school.”
Tyler huffed and grabbed one of the iced cookies, a pumpkin for the month of October it seemed like.
“We have lame parent things all the time. Open houses, recitals, plays, shit like that. Do you think my dad ever came to a single one?” Tyler let out a short laugh. “No.”
“Recital?” Harry looked over at Tyler. “Do you play an instrument?”
Tyler’s tanned face turned a light shade of pink and he reached up with his free hand to ruffle his curls.
“Uh… not anymore,” he said, sounding sheepish for some reason. “I used to play guitar.”
“Harry plays piano, did you hear him during the Founders Day event?” Xavier smirked at Harry and kicked his foot beneath the table. “He’s good.”
“Really?” Tyler smiled more easily at Harry. “You’ll have to play sometime, so I can hear.”
“I don’t really play much,” Harry admitted. “Er… not- not in public anyway.”
“He’s being modest,” Xavier told Tyler. “I’ve heard him play in class and with Wednesday before. You’ve never heard piano like it before. It’s like he puts his whole soul in it.”
Harry did; he put his soul, his heart, his mind, his whole being in playing the piano.
Every time his fingers touched the keys, he tried to escape. Just like the custodian from St Brutus’ told him to do. Sometimes it worked, sometimes Harry banged the keys in an intense and furious anger when he was stuck in his own body and not drifting away with the music.
“Well I’d like to hear it sometime,” Tyler told Harry. “Maybe I’ll bring my guitar to your school next time I’m off, we could play together.”
“Maybe,” Harry said noncommittally. He looked around the coffee shop and felt a sharp stab in his chest when his eyes landed on his classmate Bianca and a woman that had to be her mother having an intense conversation on the opposite side of the shop.
Not that Harry wanted other people to not have their parents, but it seemed like a slap in the face to know that even someone as rude as Bianca had a mum show up to see her.
“Oh, hey, what are you guys doing today?” Tyler asked them, regaining Harry’s attention. “I get off at one, and it seems like my dad isn’t going to be home anytime soon. If you guys are avoiding your school, you could come over and hang out? Watch a movie? Something?”
Harry slowly reached over and grabbed one of the iced cookies while Xavier and Tyler made plans. He nibbled on the cookie and looked out the window, focusing on all the things that ground him to the moment and not in his own head.
He saw his dog still running around the square, barking at a cat that was up in a tree. He tasted the orange icing on the cookie- it tasted just like the green icing from the leaf shaped cookies they sold last month. He could feel Tyler’s hand on his leg, his thumb rubbing circles on his leg still. And he could hear Tyler and Xavier talk about movies and games that Harry had never heard of.
And none of it mattered at all.
Harry stood up abruptly, suddenly feeling suffocated in the shop. He needed air that wasn’t warm and strongly scented so he could breathe properly.
“I’m gonna go,” Harry murmured, pushing past Tyler roughly to get out of the booth. “Bye.”
Tyler and Xavier called out to Harry, but Harry ran from the shop, not even noticing he still held the partially eaten cookie in his hand.
*****
Wednesday stood by the doors to the school with her arms crossed and her eyes roaming the crowd.
After the horrifying appointment with Kinbott, Wednesday and her family returned to Nevermore to have lunch with Harry. Except Harry was nowhere to be found.
“Ajax, where is Harry?” Wednesday demanded when she saw Harry’s roommate walk past her with his family in tow.
“Harry?” Ajax looked around and shrugged, an overloaded plate in his hand tilting precariously in his oafish hands. “No idea, I thought I saw him earlier with Xavier though.”
Wednesday seethed over that. How many times did she have to warn Harry over the danger of associating with Xavier before he understood that there was an excellent possibility that Xavier was the very monster killing the normies in town?
“Wednesday, come sit with us,” Mother called. She sat at the head of a table in the shade with Father and Pugsley on one side of her and an open seat for Wednesday on her other side.
Wednesday had no desire to partake in a cozy lunch with her family - not while her cousin was off with a possibly murderous monster while undoubtedly bemoaning the lack of his own father appearing - but she could hardly stand glaring at the gates and force Harry to appear.
She would simply have to hunt him down after lunch and drag him back to Nevermore with bodily force and introduce him to his true family. The Addams may be peculiar to others, but they would never abandon one of their own.
And Wednesday would certainly never leave Harry to flounder for years as his father did.
It would be for the best that James Potter truly was dead, otherwise he would find himself on the wrong side of Wednesday’s most creative inquisition on where he had been the last fourteen years.
Wednesday sat beside her mother and felt her anger at Harry’s father grow the more she heard other families chattering and putting on their airs of joyous reunions.
“It is absolute madness,” Wednesday hissed, slamming the table and causing Pugsley’s plate of desserts to jump and clatter.
Father smiled at her, always so perfectly genial and unflappably cheerful.
“What is madness, my black dahlia?” Father asked her, truly sounding as if he cared. Father was the heart in his and Mother’s relationship.
Mother was obviously the brain.
“Harry isn’t here. I cannot sit here and partake in this charade while he isn’t with us,” Wednesday told them all with a steely glare. “Until I find him, consider our heartwarming reunification to be over.”
“Go fetch me something of his,” Mother said. She smiled condescendingly at Wednesday’s quick look. “I may be able to divine his location much quicker than you will on foot.”
“Thank you, Mother, I’ll do that,” Wednesday said, privately grateful for the offer. It was a balm to the festering wound inside of her to share her gift with her mother to know that Mother had much more control over her gift and may find Harry more easily.
When Wednesday rose to go steal something from Harry’s dorm room though, the gates opened and the students and their families fell silent as Sheriff Galpin entered the grounds with his eyes locked on the table where the Addams family sat.
“Sheriff Galpin, what is the meaning of this?” Weems asked, rising from the table of teachers to intercept the sheriff.
“Stand aside, Weems, this is official business,” the sheriff snapped. He stepped directly toward Wednesday’s table and Wednesday wondered what crime she was being arrest for.
Then he stopped behind Father’s chair.
“Gomez Addams, you are under arrest for the murder of Garret Gates. You have the right to remain silent, anything you say can and will be held against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney, if you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed to you…”
Wednesday saw the look Father sent Mother, a doe eyed look of fear. She saw the look Mother had, not nearly enough surprise.
And as Father was led away in handcuffs before all of Nevermore, Wednesday knew that there was no scenario in any world that would cause her overly gentle and kind father to commit murder.
*****
Harry sat just past the entrance of the forest, curled up on the ground with his back against a fallen tree trunk.
The cold air of the forest felt just as suffocating as the the warm air inside the shop and Harry scratched at his neck, desperate to breathe. His fingers slid in the wetness that dripped down his cheek, soaking his neck and shirt collar, but Harry’s fingers caught in the silk of his tie and he ripped it off, flinging it as far as he could from himself.
“I HATE YOU!” Harry screamed at the tie that lay in the muddy ground. “WHY AM I NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR YOU? WHY?!”
Harry’s dog - he should probably name him at some point - whined and came running in the forest, his nose bumping against Harry’s arm pathetically, but all Harry could see was the tie that meant so much to him.
“Why?” Harry asked the tie, pushing through his discomfort with questions to ask all the ones he needed answers to. “Why am I not good enough? Why are you hiding? WHY CAN’T YOU LOVE ME?!”
Harry always thought he couldn’t hurt anymore than he did, then something inside of him cracked and shattered and he was eight years old at Primary School wondering why his parents had to die and leave him alone. Harry was ten and crying every day, wondering when he’d go to jail for killing Piers. Harry was twelve and sick of being a target and took matters in his own hands.
Harry was fourteen and in the closet with Guard Hamilton and knew only one of them would leave the closet alive.
Harry always survived, but he always did it alone.
“Please, Dad, I’m sorry,” Harry whimpered, curling his head between his knees with no more energy to even cry. “I’ll do better, I swear. I can. Please.”
He could change.
He could be a better person.
He would do anything to have his dad want him.
He just wanted to be wanted.
One moment, Harry felt the paws of his dog on his arm, reassuring him in the only way a pet could. The next moment, when Harry was struggling to breathe through his own snot clogged nose, the paw flexed and Harry flinched to feel fingers flexing on his arm.
Harry snapped his head up quickly and his heart stuttered in shock when he saw a man beside him.
Tall, black hair, pale, and Harry would bet when he opened his mouth that he’d have a British accent.
And it was not James Potter.