Wednesday Addams's Arc

Chapter 2 of 2

Enid folded the letter along the same creases Wednesday had pressed into it nine days ago. She did not give it back. She held it against her chest like something that might try to leave. "I felt the same," Enid said. "The day I wrote mine. The day you walked away. Every day since." Her voice did not rise. "I thought you read it and decided no. So I decided no too. I got good at it." Wednesday made herself stand still. The gazebo lattice pressed cold against her shoulder. Outside, past the ivy, she could see a patch of bright wildflowers someone had planted in the dark moss. Painted stones sat between the stems in reds and yellows. The patch had not been there last week. It looked like something Enid would do, and Wednesday understood, with a small shock, that Enid had done it. Enid had been coming here. Enid had been waiting for her to catch up. "I did not decide no," Wednesday said. "I did not know how to decide anything. I walked away because the alternative was to stay and be seen." She paused. The next sentence was the one she had practiced and crossed out and practiced again. "I am asking you to be my girlfriend. I would like an answer here. Not later." Enid laughed once, short, almost a cough. "You're using my line on me." Then her face went serious. "Yes. Obviously yes. I have been yes for a year." She stepped forward and took Wednesday's hand. Her fingers were warm. Wednesday did not pull back. She had prepared for that impulse and overruled it in advance. They walked together past the old stone well and farther into the trees, because neither of them wanted to go back to the dormitory yet. The path opened on a small stone chapel Wednesday had seen once and never entered. Inside stood two narrow pedestals beneath a window of stained glass branches. On one pedestal sat a wooden chest with a brass lock, its lid propped open. Old letters lay inside, edges yellowed. Enid drew a slow breath. "My grandmother's," she said. "She told me about this place. People leave answers here." She tucked Wednesday's letter into the chest and laid her own old confession beside it. She closed the lid. The lock clicked. Wednesday felt the sound in her teeth. They walked back as the light thinned. Near the tree line, something moved in the brush, low and heavy, with eyes that caught what little sun was left. Wednesday counted three sets. Enid's hand tightened around hers and did not let go. The shape watched them a moment longer, then turned and vanished into the dark between the trunks. Wednesday did not know what it was. She knew only that she had said the word girlfriend out loud, and Enid had said yes, and something in the woods had seen them together and let them pass.