A Crossbow Aimed At the Heart

Jeremy grumbled awake the following morning, to the smell of burnt candle wax. Sitting up and stretching for a moment, he wasn't even entirely sure it was morning but for the sliver of light peeking in from behind the set of blackouts covering the bedroom window. He checked his watch and it was 6am. He shrugged — it had been about as good a night's rest as he'd been getting lately.

He sauntered over to where he could make out the outline of the window and inched the blind away from the glass, in an effort to wake his eyes up. His room had a view over a small, cobbled courtyard and a garden, where it looked like Wednesday or Lurch must have been attempting to grow red roses. They looked a little worse for wear. He let go of the blind again, preserving the sacrosanct darkness of the house.

Taking a peek out his door, he couldn't hear a thing besides Lurch snoring away in the adjacent room. He ventured a step out, noticing that the study opposite him was shut. He figured Wednesday must have been using the room to read.

He rocked back and forth indecisively.

'Well it's not like I'm planning to stay for breakfast — I'd better just let her know I'm leaving,' he decided.

He tiptoed across the landing to the door, giving it a couple of quiet knocks.

He figured he'd mention that he wanted to make sure his car wasn't on the street for when the no-parking period came into effect in a few hours, or something like that. He couldn't really imagine there being any kind of awkward, long goodbye. He anticipated opening the door to find her sitting there mysteriously, in her leather armchair, reading one of her crime books, or whatever it was she'd mentioned to him the previous night. Perhaps she'd be wearing the same dark dress she did the previous night. He briefly pictured her with one leg crossed over the other, laying back comfortably into the back of the chair, her dark braids resting delicately on her chest, heaving slowly, up and down as she softly breathed...

Shaking his head, he dispelled the thought.

He realized he hadn't heard a reply. He inched the door open.

"...Wednesday?" he whispered. There was nobody in the room.

'Oh...' he thought.

Jeremy closed the door again, and looked around. He decided that he needed to use the bathroom before anything else. As he went to enter, Wednesday popped her head out from the next room over.

"Jeremy," she said.

She briefly fiddled with one of her braids as she stepped out to meet him.

"Oh— hey," he answered, "what, uh, what's up?"

"...I heard you say my name?" she said.

"Y— yeah, I thought you might've been in there reading," he replied.

"Oh," she said, "yeah... I finished it after you went to sleep. I was just in my bedroom."

"Ah," he nodded.

"Did... you sleep okay?" she asked shyly.

"Yeah, slept fine, yeah, just an early riser is all," he reassured her.

Her attention drifted above his eye-line.

"Did you already style your hair…?" she asked snidely.

"Huh? Oh—" he ran a hand through it bashfully, "I don't know, it just kind of sits like that, I guess."

"Uh-huh," she shot back, in amusement.

He thought he noticed her bite her lip, though he might have imagined it.

She glanced at the bathroom door. "Oh, I didn't mean to keep you—"

"Yeah, no, that's okay," he quietly chuckled, "and thanks, again, for letting me crash. After I'm out I might actually—"

He caught her eye for a moment. Her gaze this time was soft, almost tender, behind her dark and broody eyes.

"...Are you hungry, by chance?" he asked instead.

She looked down. "Oh, um..."

"I mean, I was probably gonna go out for some breakfast, I could, I don't know, I could grab you something, if— you know, if you wanted."

She thought for a moment.

"You'll... bring something back here?" she asked dubiously.

"Yeah, I don't mind," he said, "I remember spotting a Micky D's just down the road. You like hash browns?"

"McDonald's…?" she confirmed, "you want to buy me fast food…?"

"I— I don't know," he laughed uneasily, "I could try finding another breakfast takeout spot, there just usually aren't any open this early is all—"

"No, that's okay," she smirked, "you can bring me some McDonald's, Jeremy…" She annunciated the word in a deliberate way, as if to tease him.

"Okay," he smiled and shook his head, "Well, I'll be out in a sec, I guess." he turned and went into the bathroom, closing the door behind him.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It was only the beginning of spring, but Jeremy was ready for it to be summer, he thought to himself as he stepped out into the nippy, early morning air. He rubbed his hands together as he began down the street, whistling to himself.

He was surprised by his own good mood, given the cold, and that he rarely enjoyed being in the city. In fact, what was he currently doing? He'd again effectively relegated himself to running errands for a client.

But no, while her parents were clients, Wednesday herself wasn't, he thought to himself. And after the initial prickliness of the previous night, he'd actually rather enjoyed her company. And he was out fetching breakfast for her because he'd offered it.

He hurriedly crossed the street.

It was pretty nice of her to have given him a bed for the night, too, he continued his thought. He figured it was the least he could do in return, to get her some food.

He arrived, and ordered the full breakfast meal. It warmed his hands as he ventured back the way he came.

Jeremy thought back to the previous night again. He thought about the odd, but palpable tension between the two of them when they'd spoken, which had continued through to their conversation this morning. He wondered whether other people would have a similar experience when interacting with her, or if it was something which existed exclusively between the two of them.

Indeed, he found it somewhat difficult to get a read on her — had she been enjoying their conversation also? Was it possible that she, in fact, simply found him insufferable?

As he drew closer to the house, he realized his heart rate had been steadily increasing.

'Geez, you're working yourself up over nothing,' he attempted to reassure himself. Even worse, he'd begun to fear that he'd succumbed to some form of long-term manipulation on the part of her parents, as it did almost seem as though he was already right where they wanted him — at her house, fretting and overthinking their interactions, even staying the night…

He let himself back in and headed to the dining room, where Wednesday was already sitting and cradling a glass of red wine.

"You made it back," she teased.

"You mean despite all of the excitement out there at this time of day," he retorted.

She gave a small smile. "Well, speaking of, don't let me pressure you into joining me," she mentioned of her drink, "we are on two different time zones in a way, I suppose."

"Sure," he chuckled, setting the food down. "What is it?"

"Oh, it's been in the family cellar for generations I'm sure, I don't read the labels, I just drink it," she quipped.

He nodded, amused. "Taste alright at least?"

She leaned forward. "Oh, it's magnificent," she said passionately, "you're welcome to try." She playfully offered it to him.

"I don't know, you told me not to let you," he half-smiled.

She cracked a smile, and watched him distribute the take-out. The fact that she was drinking put Jeremy back in his head a little — he was unsure whether her pleasant demeanor was occurring organically, or could be attributed to the half a glass she'd appeared to have had so far. He supposed that it would be difficult for him to judge, seeing as how he rarely ever drank alcohol.

"I've never eaten this type of food before," Wednesday said as she waited.

He slid her a hash brown and a McMuffin. "Well, I'd be careful with it, to be honest — I'm pretty sure they lace it with weird, hidden ingredients that keep you coming back for more," he explained, "that must be how they do it, 'cause god, it tastes too good."

She raised an eyebrow. "How conniving."

They dug in. Wednesday took slow, deliberate bites, seemingly due to Jeremy's warning. It struck him as rather endearing.

"They let me order your McMuffin without the bacon by the way, they were nice," said Jeremy.

"Oh..." She examined it, a little startled. "...How did you know I'm vegetarian?"

"Lurch mentioned it," he replied.

The kindness almost appeared to make her uncomfortable. They ate in silence for a few moments.

"You know," he began, "I've gotta ask: Wednesday— I've never, like, in my life heard of that as a name, do you have any idea how your parents came up with it?"

Her eyes danced around a little, as she seemingly deliberated on whether to entertain his question.

"Um… Well," she finally replied, "I hadn't exactly thought to ask, but I'm fairly sure it's just because of the nursery rhyme."

He looked at her, unfamiliar.

"You know," she continued begrudgingly, "Monday's child is fair of face, Tuesday's child is full of grace... Wednesday's child is full of woe, Thursday's child has far to go," she waved her hand, "and so on..."

"Right…" he said. He clearly hadn't heard it. "So that's you, huh? Full of woe?"

She rolled her eyes. "More like indifference."

He smiled.

"At least I'm not stuck with yet another painfully commonplace biblical name," she added.

"Biblical?" he puzzled.

"Yeah," she replied, "Jeremy comes from Jeremiah... you know, one of those characters in the Christian bible they call prophets, or some such nonsense…"

"Oh, I see," he said. "…Nonsense, huh?"

She paused and seemed to shoot him the type of look that a predator might, before capturing and devouring its prey.

"I'm just kidding," he teased, "my family's pretty secular."

She shook her head, smirking a little. "Whatever, Jeremiah."

"For the record," he chuckled, "I wasn't making fun of your name, or anything… you know, I think it's neat."

She playfully grimaced at his compliment.

Jeremy suddenly felt his cell phone buzzing in his pocket. He pulled it out to check it.

"Sorry, I'll just be a sec," he said to Wednesday as he stood and removed himself from the room. She had seemed puzzled by what exactly was going on.

"Mom, hey— yeah, I'm still alive," he spoke into the receiver, "no, I just stayed out with a friend… Okay, yeah, sure… Like, a couple of hours, maybe… Sure, love you too." He pushed the red button to end the call.

"That was cute," Wednesday remarked as he rejoined the table, perhaps somewhat facetiously.

"I— yeah, I don't know, I suppose I could've flicked through an SMS last night to them, maybe," he replied, a little flustered.

He noticed she had her puzzled look back.

"Oh, yeah, I forgot you don't have one of these," he said, holding his Nokia.

"A little noise-making machine, you mean?" she raised an eyebrow condescendingly.

"Hey, I mean, they've managed to make them so small and inexpensive recently, like, virtually everybody in the world is gonna have one pretty soon," he explained, "I don't know, I think it's pretty cool."

She smiled at him. "You sound as though you sell the things," she remarked playfully.

"Hey, I— I don't know, whatever," he chuckled.

They returned to their breakfast for a bit.

"Do you…" she broke the silence, "I don't know, get up to much when you aren't bean counting for my parents?"

He swallowed the last bite of his meal. "Well," he began timidly, "yeah, uh— I mean, all of my buddies from school, we all pretty much still live on the same street, like, no one ever really moved away, so… Yeah, we hang out a bunch, you know, weekends... we're all total nerds — we all bought the Xbox when it came out, so we, like, bring them over to each other's places, set up Halo LAN parties—"

He noticed her tilting her head in slight confusion at the terms he was using.

He paused, "Oh, as in like, video-games," he attempted to explain.

"Oh," she replied, slightly raising an eyebrow.

"It's… like, you get to control an avatar of yourself in an imaginary world," he continued, "with like, crazy, sci-fi guns, and you can blow stuff up, and—"

"I've seen… arcade machines, and things like that…" she replied.

He nodded, satisfied enough.

She stared into space for a moment. "Do you... wanna see some real weapons?" she asked tentatively.

He paused. "You... what, you've got guns here?"

"No..." she replied reticently. "Do you... wanna see, though?"

He wasn't sure where this was going, but he agreed. "Sure..."

"Very well," she said as she left the table, with a pep in her step. "Come."

He mused over how mysterious she often acted, while she led him to a door leading behind the staircase.

She brought him inside to reveal a small workshop, with various workbenches and woodworking tools scattered about. Wednesday picked up the latest creation — a medieval-style crossbow, and pointed it at him. It wasn't loaded, but he recoiled slightly anyway.

"Hey!…" he exclaimed.

She silently giggled, placing it back down.

The far wall of the room was lined with similar spring-loaded, pain inflicting contraptions.

"You make these?" he asked in disbelief.

"Yeah," she replied, "half of them I made before I turned 12."

He simply stared.

"What do you think?" she asked.

"I think..." he began, "that I wouldn't wanna be locked in here alone with you if you were ever mad at me," he joked.

She slightly blushed, and looked away.

He observed the rest of the room, and noticed against the near wall what looked to be a set of wooden torture racks. He raised an eyebrow, glancing back at her.

She noticed, and rolled her eyes. "I don't use them for anything weird, idiot," she chided.

"No, I— I wasn't," he babbled, "you know, I respect the theme."

She looked at him, smiling a little.

"...You wanna shoot something?" she asked ghoulishly.

He pressed his tongue against his teeth. "Uh... okay?"

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Out in the courtyard, Wednesday had a few hay bales stacked up against the exterior wall, looking a little mangled from past target practice, no doubt.

She handed Jeremy a bolt. "Want me to show you how to load it?" she asked.

"Uh, please." He passed it back to her.

The end of the crossbow had a foot-hole sized loop attached to it. She lowered it and hooked it over her shoe, then craned over and pulled the string back over a metal catch, with a definitive click. She then inserted the bolt into the mechanism, and without hesitation, raised and nailed the center of the tallest hay bale.

"Just hold it firmly and don't get your fingers caught," she explained, handing it over to him.

As he replicated her technique, he realized she must have been a lot stronger than she looked, as it took a concerted effort to pull the bow tight. He raised it up to rest the stock against his shoulder, and laid the bolt onto the shaft, taking a breath. As he aimed at his target, he figured there was going to be a lot more guesswork involved in hitting the shot than in Halo.

He squeezed the trigger, and felt the snap of the bow vibrate through him. It actually was rather exhilarating, he thought.

"Well done," Wednesday complimented.

He checked and saw his bolt had struck only a few inches from hers.

"Wow," he caught his breath, "that felt great."

She smiled coyly, and handed him another bolt.

They took turns for a few more rounds of shooting.

"Okay," she beamed, "we should stop before the neighbors become nosy."

They collected the bolts they'd fired, and she opened a wooden case and began packing them back into it. As he helped her, Wednesday noticed a long scar running down his palm.

Curious, she slowly reached out and took his hand, examining it. "That must've hurt," she said, "how'd you get it?"

"Oh, when I was a kid we liked to explore this one creepy abandoned house the next neighborhood over," he reminisced, "I— there was a broken window. Had to get a piece of glass taken out in hospital, and yeah, stitches."

"That's fun," she smiled, tracing her finger over his scar.

"I guess," he grimaced, amused.

She held his hand in hers a little longer than he imagined was necessary to simply admire a scar. They shared a brief moment of awkward eye contact before she suddenly let go and took a step away from him. His heart raced a little.

"It's okay," he shrugged, playfully, "I know my hands are warm."

She slightly narrowed her eyes at him, while she twirled a strand of hair that had fallen in front of her face with her finger.

"Well… We should go back inside, then…" she murmured.

He nodded in return. "You want me to—?" he gestured to the crossbow.

"Um, sure, just don't damage it," she replied. "Thank you," she quickly added.

She held on him for a moment, then spun and went back into the house.

Jeremy paused to contemplate the interaction they'd just had, then shrugged it off and followed suit.

He lugged the thing back to her workshop, and hung it on an empty slot on the wall. He turned to find her leaning against the doorframe.

She opened her mouth to speak, but didn't, as though she were struggling to find the words. It struck Jeremy as somewhat uncharacteristic of her, even after only the short amount of time of time he'd known her.

She glanced at him, her eyes as piercing as ever, almost as though she were hoping he'd say something, instead.

He missed his opportunity.

"I'm... probably gonna turn in soon..." she began.

"Oh, sure," he replied, "yeah, I— I'll get out of your hair, for real this time."

"Okay..." she said, traipsing over to him, "but... you should... you know, you should come back sometime." She looked into his eyes. "We can shoot stuff again, or..."

"Yeah, I can do that," he smiled. "Do you... want me to send a message by pigeon or something, to let you know when I'll be by?" he joked.

She smiled and rolled her eyes. "No, that's fine... I'll just expect you."

She looked down for a moment. Then, to his surprise, she reluctantly hugged him.

Her embrace was cold, as though she'd never done it before. He held her more tightly, feeling her drop her shoulders a little, and sink into his chest.

After a moment, she broke it off. "Okay, now get the hell out, let me sleep," she said lazily.

He smiled and walked by her, to the front door.

Lurch startled him by emerging from the corridor, a feather duster in hand.

"Oh, hey, morning big guy!" said Jeremy, as nonchalantly as he could.

Lurch sounded in puzzlement over Jeremy still being here. He turned to Wednesday. Her glare seemed to satisfy his curiosity, and he moved on.

Jeremy hadn't expected to have felt self-conscious in front of Lurch, but the last day and a half had turned out to be a somewhat unusual series of events.

Opening the door, he turned to Wednesday one last time.

"Well, I'll see ya," he said warmly.

Her typical wry, half-smirk came across as rather adorable this time.

"Goodbye, Jeremiah," she returned.

He grinned and closed the door behind him, setting off down toward his car.

He hopped in, rubbing his shoulders for warmth.

As he went to turn the key, he realized he'd forgotten his bag. He hesitated for a moment, but then started the ignition anyway.

Perhaps it'd make for an excuse to return sooner rather than later, he thought.