Snapshots

One of Boy’s earliest memories was sitting under the giant kitchen table and finger-painting on the floor. Blood kept dripping over the edge of the table and it was such a nice, pretty color that Boy couldn’t help himself. It was just a bunch of childish doodles, stick figures and misshapen dogs and flowers but he was having fun.

Toby, cackling each time, kept passing him severed fingers from the corpse to use.

“All I’m saying is that kids, especially the little ones, need a schedule. If you would read the books I brought back for you, you’d know this!”

“I’m not going to read any fucking parenting books!”

Boy hummed quietly to himself as he named each figure with a little sign above their head. He couldn’t read yet, but he could make up his own marks for now. Slender was in the middle of the group of course, a really tall and skinny figure with long lines floating off of him. His mark was the best, it was an X and a O and was everywhere in the castle.

“He needs to feel secure! You can't just ignore his social and psychological needs!”

Boy practiced the sigil a few more times, trying to get it perfect. He soon noticed that the shadows around him were getting wiggly, and as he went to draw the sign one more time a piece of shadow actually reached out and grasped his wrist in a cold tendril.

“He’s plenty socialized! Even fucking Liu plays with him!”

“That’s not.. It’s like talking to a wall. A burnt brick wall.”

Boy giggled at the shadow, and grasped it back to do an awkward ‘hand’ shake.

Later, he’d come to understand that what he’d been doing was the equivalent of pestering Slender with “hey look here hey come see hey HEY HEY HEY.” Since, you know, the sigil was meant to get his attention and all.

At the moment though Boy was just happy to know the tall monster man was nearby.

“I’m putting my foot down. You can't just feed a baby cookies and hot dogs all day and expect him to stay healthy. He needs vegetables and vitamins unless you want to stunt his growth or give him rickets.”

“I don't fucking care what you want to do, just don't expect me to sit down with you fuckers for every damn meal!”

There was a thud and a grunt and when Boy turned his head he could see Jeff’s sneakers had left the floor by a few inches. Boy looked up at the underside of the table curiously.

In a much lower tone- “so help me, if you teach him to be as much as an asshole as you are, I’ll gut you. Understand?”

“...yeah.”

Toby ducked under the table now. “Hey ducky Duck. Whatcha doing? Let’s go play with Benny while these two talk it out.”

“Bye-bye,” the toddler told the shadowy tendrils as Toby pulled him out from under the table and carried him off. He could see Jeff and Eyeless over Toby’s shoulder, Eyeless had Jeff by the collar of his hoody and had pulled him partly over the table so they could talk nose to nose.

“Bye-bye?”

Jeff waved absently with his bloody knife. Eyeless turned and pointed a clawed finger at Toby. “No more sweets!”

“Yup yup, no sweets. Just gunna go see what BEN’s doing.” He patted the baby on the back as he scuttled down the hallway. “No one needs to hear Mommy and Daddy fighting, eh midget? Don’t worry, I got your back.”

Boy looked at him thoughtfully before leaning in close to plant a kiss on Toby’s cheek.

“Awwww-HEY! Did you just bite me?! No biting! Bad baby! Bad!”

“You’re seriously telling him that?” Liu shook his head and took the toddler out of Toby’s arms.

Toby rubbed at his cheek and the tiny red tooth marks. “Not even four and he’s already trying to eat people! And Eyeless says Jeff is the bad influence.”

Liu rolled his eyes. “There isn't a single person in this castle who can say they’re a good influence.”

“Bah. Take your evil logic and leave!”

“Fine.” Liu took the baby with him.

Toby raised a finger to argue then realized he didn’t want to get bit again. By the mini-Jeff. “Yeah that’s right, walk away! Curse you and your sensible ideas!”

In the next round of Pass the Baby, Liu left the boy with BEN in the game room. BEN had him for a bit, and even tried to teach him how to use a game controller, but Jeff claimed him before long.

“Oi, naptime brat.”

“Since when do we do a naptime?” BEN wondered, even as he passed the baby over the back of the couch.

“Since Eyeless fucking said so.”

“Ah..”

“Shut the fuck up BEN.”