Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The thunder cracked outside the gothic manor, a sound that should have frightened most mortals. For Wednesday Addams, it was a lullaby. For Enid Sinclair-Addams, it was background noise, just like her wife’s brooding silences.

The storm had been raging since dusk, lightning licking the horizon, painting the house in stark shadows. Inside, the fire in the old hearth barely softened the gloom. Wednesday sat in her preferred chair, a black wingback while Enid paced the room with a bundle in her arms.

Their daughter, wrapped in violet silk and nestled against Enid’s chest, slept through it all. She had a soft tuft of hair, dark as her mother’s eyes, and a tiny frown that suggested she already disapproved of the world she’d been born into.

Perfect.

Or it would have been perfect, if not for the newest Addams-Sinclair dilemma.

“You can’t be serious,” Enid said, glaring down at Wednesday. “Morticia the Second? Willa deserves her own name, not to be a carbon copy of your mother.”

“She would be honored,” Wednesday replied flatly, folding her hands in her lap. “Besides, Mother has often remarked that my greatest achievement in life would be to give her another grandchild. This is simply efficiency.”

“Efficiency?” Enid’s voice cracked with disbelief. “This isn’t filing taxes! She’s a baby, Weds. Our baby. She needs something that’s her.”

Wednesday tilted her head, studying her wife with that same unnerving calm she’d perfected back at Nevermore. “If she is ours, then surely she deserves something worthy. A name drenched in history, blood, and fear. ‘Willa’ sounds like the girl next door who sells lemonade and says things like ‘golly gee.’”

Enid bristled. “Well, maybe she’ll like lemonade! You can’t just doom her to a life of-of-”

“Of greatness?” Wednesday interrupted. Her lips twitched, the faintest of smirks. “I refuse to saddle her with mediocrity.”

Enid groaned and flopped onto the couch, careful not to jostle the sleeping baby. “This is exactly how I knew things would go when you finally admitted you wanted kids.”

“I never admitted such a thing,” Wednesday corrected swiftly. “You tricked me.”

“Oh yeah, IVF was totally a trick,” Enid shot back, rolling her eyes. “One minute you’re lecturing me about how children are parasites that drain the life force of their mothers, and the next you’re at every doctor’s appointment with a notepad like it’s research for your next novel.”

Wednesday didn’t deny it. Instead, her eyes flickered, for just a fraction of a second, toward the baby. Her expression didn’t change, but the silence that lingered told Enid everything she needed to know.

“You love her,” Enid said softly.

Wednesday blinked, slowly. “I tolerate her existence.”

“Uh-huh.” Enid grinned, wide and wolfish. “And you stared at her for twenty straight minutes this morning while she slept.”

“I was ensuring she still drew breath.”

“Sure,” Enid said, cooing at the baby. “Don’t listen to Mama Wednesday, Willa. She’s just cranky because she can’t admit she’s already whipped for you.”

Wednesday’s eye twitched at the name. “Willa.”

“Yes, Willa,” Enid repeated, standing her ground. “It’s sweet but strong. Kind of like… if sunshine could throw a punch.”

“Sunshine should never throw punches,” Wednesday replied coldly. “It is weak and blinding. A name should inspire dread, not evoke warmth.”

Enid arched a brow. “Oh yeah? Like what?”

Wednesday’s voice lowered, almost reverent. “Persephone. Queen of the Underworld. Or perhaps Belladonna. Deadly Nightshade. Both adequate for the heir of our cursed bloodlines.”

“Okay, those are cool,” Enid admitted, biting her lip. “But... look at her.” She lowered her gaze to their daughter’s tiny, scrunched-up face. “She doesn’t look like a Persephone. She looks like... like Willa. Soft and fierce. Our little moonbeam.”

“Moonbeam?” Wednesday hissed as if Enid had blasphemed.

Enid chuckled and reached over, resting her free hand against Wednesday’s knee. “You remember, right? That first night at Nevermore... I called you my little storm cloud, and you told me the moon was the only light you’d tolerate.”

Wednesday froze. She remembered. Against her better judgment, against every dark oath she had taken as a teenager, she remembered how easily Enid had crept into her ribs and refused to leave.

“And now we’ve got a moonbeam of our own,” Enid whispered, her voice carrying a softness Wednesday had always envied but never admitted out loud.

The room fell quiet again. Only the storm raged outside, and the baby shifted slightly in her sleep.

Finally, Wednesday leaned forward, her pale hand brushing against the baby’s tiny fist. “Very well,” she said, her tone resigned. “But she will have a middle name. One that instills fear.”

Enid’s grin widened. “Deal. What are you thinking?”

Wednesday’s gaze lingered on her daughter’s face. “...Hecate.”

“Willa Hecate Sinclair-Addams.” Enid tested it out, smiling. “Kind of perfect.”

Wednesday didn’t respond. She was too busy staring at the baby again. The storm cracked, the lights flickered, and Willa let out the faintest, softest sigh.

Enid reached over, threading her fingers with Wednesday’s. “Face it, Weds. You’re already the world’s scariest softie.”

Wednesday squeezed her hand once and firmly, then leaned back in her chair. “If you tell anyone, I’ll deny it in court.”

Enid giggled. “Of course, Mrs. Addams.”

“Sinclair-Addams,” Wednesday corrected.

“Whatever you say, storm cloud.”

Wednesday scoffed slightly in her usual way, her gaze falling on the newest heir of the Addams line as she slept, already the subject of her mothers’ eternal arguments, and eternal devotion.

Wednesday’s chair creaked as she leaned forward, elbows balanced on her knees, her sharp eyes fixed on the bundle in Enid’s arms.

“She makes grotesque noises in her sleep,” Wednesday observed.

Enid gasped. “She does not! That’s just... baby noises. Totally normal, actually kind of cute.”

“It resembles the last dying wheeze of a man buried alive,” Wednesday countered.

“Exactly,” Enid said with a grin. “See? That’s her Addams side shining through already.”

Wednesday tilted her head. “You take joy in the idea our daughter sounds like a corpse.”

“Of course I do. That means she’s perfectly balanced.” Enid’s voice softened, lowering to a tone Wednesday rarely heard outside their most vulnerable moments. “Half your darkness, half my light.”

The fire popped, scattering embers. For a moment, Wednesday didn’t reply. Her eyes flicked to Enid’s, and in their silence, she let her thumb trace along the baby’s tiny knuckles.

Enid caught it immediately. “You’re smitten.”

“I am calculating her potential,” Wednesday retorted without missing a beat.

Enid snorted. “Calculating? She’s four weeks old. The scariest thing she can do right now is spit up.”

“Do not underestimate her,” Wednesday said, a dangerous glint in her eyes. “I already see promise. She has my disdainful glare.”

“She’s literally asleep, babe.” Enid smirked. “That’s just what babies look like.”

“You were far less intimidating when you slept as a child, I assume.”

“Okay, first of all, rude,” Enid laughed, bouncing the baby slightly. “And second of all...”

But she stopped mid-sentence when Willa stretched in her sleep, wrinkling her tiny nose before letting out a little groan. Her fist flexed, as though grasping something unseen.

Enid gasped. “See that? She’s practicing already. Future werewolf queen right there.”

“She will be the reigning empress of despair,” Wednesday corrected calmly. “Queen is far too common.”

Enid shook her head, trying to fight back a grin. “You keep saying she’s your heir, your successor... but you don’t fool me.”

Wednesday raised an eyebrow. “Oh?”

“You hold her like she’s breakable. You get up in the middle of the night when you think I’m asleep, just to check on her.”

“That is reconnaissance,” Wednesday said quickly. “Ensuring no creatures from the void have attempted to snatch her soul.”

“Mhm. Sure.” Enid leaned down and brushed her lips across the baby’s forehead before turning back to her wife. “You love her. And you love me. Admit it.”

The fire hissed, thunder boomed, and Wednesday sat as still as a statue. Her silence stretched long enough that Enid thought she’d dodged it, the same way she always did with verbal traps.

But then, Wednesday stood. She moved to Enid’s side, her shadow draping over them both. Carefully, with reverence she’d never admit aloud, she slid her hands beneath the bundle and lifted their daughter into her arms.

The baby stirred, let out a soft noise, then nestled deeper against Wednesday’s chest. When Wednesday finally spoke, her voice was lower than the storm, softer than the crackling fire.

“She is tolerable,” she said.

Enid’s smile spread until it lit up the room brighter than the lightning outside. “That’s Addams-speak for ‘I love her.’”

Wednesday ignored that, though her arms tightened slightly around the child.

“I will ensure she grows ruthless. Brilliant. Unyielding,” she continued. “And when we are dust, she will conquer what remains.”

Enid stood up and leaned her head against Wednesday’s shoulder. “And maybe... just maybe... she’ll like lemonade, too.”

Wednesday closed her eyes for a fraction of a second, something halfway between exasperation and surrender.

“We’ll see,” she murmured.

And for a moment, beneath the storm and shadows, the Addams-Sinclair household was quiet, save for the steady breaths of three people: a storm cloud, a sunbeam, and their little moonlight caught in between.

Chapter Text

The storm had finally broken into a steady drizzle, the rain dripping like clockwork against the stained-glass windows of the Sinclair-Addams mansion. It was not an ordinary house, nothing about it could ever be called ordinary. The architecture leaned gothic, all spires and shadows, inherited by Wednesday as though it had risen from the earth just for her. But the moment Enid moved in after their marriage, the house had begun to... adapt.

Where once the rooms were drowned in shades of obsidian, midnight, and bone-white, splashes of bright color appeared like defiant graffiti against Wednesday’s palette. A mustard throw blanket draped across a carved oak chair. A cheerful, sunflower-shaped rug at the foot of the stairs. One room, to Wednesday’s eternal suffering, was painted in pastel lavender.

Their bedroom was the truest battleground.

The walls remained dark, lined with vintage portraits of Wednesday’s ancestors, their sunken eyes following every guest unlucky enough to pass through. But across from the grand four-poster bed a monstrous, mahogany beast draped in black velvet, Enid had insisted on a soft corner for herself: a white faux-fur chair, a rainbow quilt folded neatly nearby, and framed photographs of them, smiling. Smiling, that had once been sacrilege in the Addams household.

Wednesday tolerated it, though she occasionally muttered about burning the quilt when Enid wasn’t listening.

Tonight, both of them lay in bed, blankets tangled between them. Enid slept curled toward Wednesday, one hand resting lightly against her wife’s shoulder as if she could tether her storm cloud even in dreams. Wednesday, as usual, lay on her back, still as a corpse, eyes shut but not fully lost to sleep. Years of darkness had trained her body to rest without surrender.

The silence held until it didn’t. A cry shattered the air, it was high, piercing, raw.

Wednesday’s eyes snapped open at once. Her mind immediately conjured a dozen explanations: an intruder, a banshee, an omen. But no. She knew that sound now. It was the cry of their daughter. Enid was up before Wednesday could process it. She bolted upright, hair mussed, eyes wide, already halfway across the room in three seconds flat.

“Willa! I’m coming, baby, Mama’s here!” she whispered frantically, throwing on the nearest robe, a neon pink, an abomination against the darkness of the room before vanishing into the adjoining nursery.

Wednesday sat up more slowly, like she was preparing for execution. Her expression remained perfectly composed, but deep down, there was something she wouldn’t dare admit aloud.

Horror.

Not of the child, Wednesday Addams had faced creatures far worse than her daughter. What horrified her was the sheer volume of it. The shriek was unlike anything she’d heard in battle or death. It was insistent, unrelenting, vibrating through the walls of her very skull.

Wednesday rose, slid into her dressing gown, a black silk of course, and padded barefoot across the cold stone floor.

---

The nursery had been another compromise. Wednesday had envisioned it drenched in somber elegance: wrought-iron crib, black lace curtains, skull mobiles hanging from above. Enid had vetoed most of it.

The result was a clashing marriage of aesthetics: pale pink walls painted with silver stars, but offset by obsidian shelves lined with sinister dolls and taxidermy ravens. The crib itself was hand-carved wood, Enid’s choice of warm cedar, Wednesday’s choice of claw-like spindles curling along the edges. It was in this battlefield of styles that Willa howled like a tiny banshee.

Enid scooped her up with practiced ease, swaying back and forth, murmuring soft, soothing nonsense. “It’s okay, moonbeam, Mama’s here. I know, I know, it’s scary at night sometimes. But you’re safe.”

Wednesday stood in the doorway, arms crossed. “You are coddling her.”

Enid turned, shooting her a glare sharp enough to rival one of Wednesday’s own. “She’s a month old, Weds! Babies cry, that’s literally all they can do.”

“She’s manipulating you,” Wednesday replied. “Her lungs are developing at an impressive rate. Soon she will wield them as a weapon.”

“Good,” Enid said, bouncing gently. “Maybe she’ll use them to drown out your brooding lectures someday.”

The baby let out another shriek, flailing her tiny fists. Enid winced and adjusted her hold. “I think she’s hungry.”

“She fed an hour ago,” Wednesday pointed out.

“Yeah, and she’s a baby. She eats like, all the time. You should know that by now.”

“I know,” Wednesday said icily, though her fingers twitched at her sides. She had read every book on infant care she could get her hands on, annotated them, cross-referenced them. Still, the reality was louder, messier, more unpredictable.

Enid settled into the rocking chair, unbuttoning her robe to feed the baby. Wednesday averted her eyes but didn’t leave the room. Instead, she lingered near the shelves, pretending to study the grim dolls she had arranged there.

The cries softened into desperate little gulps and whimpers, then quieted altogether. The silence that followed was thick, like the world itself had been holding its breath. Enid sighed, leaning back, her shoulders relaxing. She looked down at Willa, her face softening into something Wednesday both envied and feared, that endless well of warmth that Enid carried so easily.

“She’s perfect,” Enid whispered.

“She is tolerable,” Wednesday corrected automatically, but her voice had lost its usual edge.

Enid smirked without looking up. “You keep saying that. One of these days, she’s going to grow up and call you out for it.”

“She will respect my honesty,” Wednesday said. “And fear me enough not to question it.”

“Or,” Enid teased, “she’ll be a total Mama’s girl and giggle every time you try to be scary.”

Wednesday stiffened. The idea was both insulting and... strangely pleasant.

The baby shifted, releasing a tiny, satisfied sigh. Enid brushed a kiss against her forehead, humming something soft under her breath.

Wednesday finally moved closer, peering down. “She resembles me.”

Enid glanced up, eyes sparkling. “Really? I was going to say she looks more like me.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched, the barest ghost of a smirk. “She has my scowl.”

Enid laughed softly. “She’s a baby. That’s just her face scrunching up.”

“It is a scowl,” Wednesday insisted. “I recognize my own work.”

The calm didn’t last.

Just as Enid began to lay Willa back into her crib, the baby let out another cry, even louder than before. Enid groaned, bouncing her gently.

“Round two, huh? Okay, okay, I’ve got you...”

“Enough.” Wednesday’s voice was low, commanding. She stepped forward, arms outstretched.

Enid blinked. “Wait. You want to hold her?”

“I must confront the enemy directly.”

Enid arched an eyebrow, but handed Willa over carefully. “She’s not the enemy, babe.”

“We’ll see.”

The baby squirmed, wailing, as Wednesday adjusted her grip with military precision. Her face remained perfectly stoic, though inside her heart rattled like the storm had returned.

“Stop,” Wednesday said simply, staring into the baby’s tiny, scrunched face. “This is unbecoming.”

The baby screamed louder.

Enid bit her lip, trying not to laugh.

Wednesday’s jaw tightened. “You are heir to a legacy of darkness. Compose yourself.”

Another wail pierced the air.

Enid snorted. “Wow. Great pep talk, Coach Addams.”

Ignoring her, Wednesday began pacing the nursery. Her steps were measured and calculated, her expression carved from stone. The baby’s cries softened slightly as the motion lulled her.

Enid’s eyes widened. “Wait. She likes it.”

“She is attempting to lull me into complacency,” Wednesday muttered.

“No, she’s settling. Look at her. She’s calming down.”

Sure enough, the cries dwindled to soft hiccups, then to silence. Willa blinked up at her mother with wide, dark eyes, unfocused but unyielding.

Wednesday stared back.

For a moment, the world was still.

“She is calculating,” Wednesday whispered.

Enid leaned back in the rocking chair, smiling so wide it was unfair. “Nope. She just likes you. Told you you’re whipped.”

Wednesday ignored her again, though her arms held the baby a little closer.

It was nearly an hour later before Willa finally drifted back into sleep. Enid tucked her into the crib with infinite care, brushing a final kiss across her forehead.

Wednesday lingered by the window, gazing out at the rain-slicked night.

“You did good, storm cloud,” Enid murmured, padding over to wrap her arms around Wednesday’s waist.

Wednesday’s gaze stayed fixed on the glass. “It is only the beginning. She will test us every night. It is her training.”

“Training?” Enid teased.

“For survival.”

Enid chuckled against her shoulder. “Well, lucky for her, she’s got the two best moms in the world.”

Wednesday didn’t answer, but when Enid pressed a kiss to her cheek, she didn’t recoil.

Back in bed, the storm cloud and the sunbeam curled together, their daughter asleep only a room away. The house was silent again, but both knew it wouldn’t stay that way for long.

Chapter Text

The morning came like a slow bleed. Sunlight slipped weakly through the heavy velvet curtains of the master bedroom, dimmed and muted by the gothic fortress that was their home. Outside, the rain still clung to the earth, leaving everything slick and shining, though within these walls it felt more like midnight had simply decided to linger.

Enid stirred first. She always did. Her body carried an inner alarm clock, something her mother once called her “wolf instinct,” though Wednesday dismissed it as obnoxious optimism. Still, Enid’s mornings usually began with a familiar routine: she’d open her eyes to find her wife lying perfectly still beside her, pale face illuminated by faint slivers of light, dark eyes already awake and staring straight ahead.

Wednesday never slept late.

But today was different.

Enid blinked blearily, rubbing her eyes, then rolled to her side. And there she saw it: Wednesday Addams, the storm cloud incarnate, asleep.

Actually asleep.

Her dark lashes brushed pale cheeks, lips parted ever so slightly, the tiniest crease etched between her brows as if she were still fighting battles in her dreams. Her hand was curled against her chest, the black silk of her nightgown tangled in the sheets.

Enid froze, breath catching. Not because Wednesday was terrifying, she always was anyway, but because she was beautiful.

And because Enid realized something else.

Wednesday looked exhausted.

It wasn’t obvious to most. To anyone else, she’d look like a corpse posed for a painting. But Enid knew her. She recognized the faint shadows under her eyes, the slight heaviness to her stillness. Wednesday Addams never admitted to weakness, but the night of baby Willa’s cries had left its mark.

Enid smiled softly. “Busted,” she whispered, leaning closer. “Even you can’t brood through a midnight feeding, huh?”

She resisted the urge to kiss her forehead, Wednesday would wake instantly and deny everything. Instead, Enid carefully slipped out of bed, pulling on her robe.

The nursery was quiet, thank the moon. Willa lay curled in her crib, tiny fists tucked against her chest, her face perfectly serene. Enid sighed in relief.

“Finally asleep for more than five minutes,” she whispered. “You’re lucky you’re so cute, kiddo.”

---

Breakfast in the Sinclair–Addams household was never ordinary. The kitchen itself was a clash of aesthetics, like every other room in the mansion. Wednesday had installed wrought-iron chandeliers and obsidian countertops, while Enid insisted on pastel mugs, bright placemats, and one aggressively cheerful toaster shaped like a cat. The result was a kitchen that looked like a Tim Burton set had collided with a Saturday morning cartoon.

This morning, chaos reigned.

Enid had Willa strapped to her chest in a sling, the baby’s head peeking out, eyes blinking sleepily. Enid hummed as she poured batter into the waffle iron shaped like skulls, naturally, a compromise they had both actually enjoyed.

Behind her, the coffeemaker hissed, spewing a liquid dark enough to satisfy Wednesday’s soul.

The sound of footsteps announced her arrival. Wednesday appeared in the doorway, still in her silk robe, hair slightly mussed. Her usual aura of untouchable poise was marred by something Enid had never seen before.

She yawned.

Actually yawned.

Enid nearly dropped the ladle. “Good morning, sleepyhead.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, though the effect was softened by her sluggish movements. “It is an abomination to wake this early after the torments of the night.”

Enid grinned, bouncing the baby gently. “Wow. I think that’s the closest you’ll ever get to saying ‘I’m tired.’”

“I am not tired,” Wednesday corrected, sliding into her seat at the table. “I am simply conserving energy for the battles ahead.”

“Right,” Enid said, turning back to the waffles. “Well, General Addams, your troops are hungry.”

As if on cue, Willa let out a tiny squeak against Enid’s chest.

Wednesday’s gaze snapped to her daughter immediately. “She demands tribute already.”

“She’s a baby, Weds. That squeak probably just means she farted.”

The baby hiccupped in response.

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “I stand corrected. She is communicating.”

Enid laughed, plating a waffle and sliding it across the table. The skull pattern had come out perfectly. “Breakfast is served.” Wednesday studied it with solemn gravity before cutting into it. “This resembles a corpse’s face. Acceptable.”

Enid sat across from her with her own plate, Willa still nestled against her. She nibbled at her waffle while watching her wife eat with meticulous precision.

“You know,” she said between bites, “you can admit you’re tired. It’s not a crime.”

“I will admit nothing,” Wednesday replied flatly.

Enid smirked. “Your eyes have bags under them.”

“They are battle scars.”

“You almost fell asleep in your chair just now.”

“I was meditating on mortality.”

“Uh-huh. Sure.” Enid leaned forward, grinning. “Face it, storm cloud. Parenthood’s kicking your butt.”

Wednesday’s fork froze midair. Slowly, her dark gaze lifted. “This house is a war zone. Chaos at every hour. You thrive in it, Sinclair. I... endure it.”

Enid softened, her grin fading into something gentler. “You don’t just endure it. You’re doing great. Last night? She stopped crying because you held her.”

“That was coincidence.”

“Nope. She loves you.” Enid tapped the baby’s nose lightly. “Right, moonbeam?”

Willa let out a sudden wail.

Both women froze.

Wednesday muttered, “Traitor.”

Enid burst into laughter, bouncing the baby gently again. “Okay, okay, Mama’s got you. She’s probably just hungry again.”

“You fed her before dawn.”

“Babies don’t care about schedules, Weds.”

Wednesday’s eye twitched. “She mocks me.”

Enid stood, still laughing, and carried Willa over to her chair, grabbing a bottle she’d prepared earlier. She settled in, cradling the baby. Wednesday set her fork down, watching with sharp eyes.

“You make it appear simple,” she said.

“It’s not simple. It’s exhausting,” Enid admitted. “But worth it.”

The room filled with the sound of Willa’s eager gulps. Wednesday’s face softened, barely and imperceptibly to anyone but Enid as she observed.

“She will devour everything in her path,” Wednesday murmured.

“Yep,” Enid said. “She’s definitely your kid.”

Breakfast descended further into chaos. Willa spit up on Enid’s robe. The cat-shaped toaster sparked ominously. Thing scuttled onto the counter to steal a piece of waffle before Wednesday smacked him away with her fork.

At one point, Enid tried to pour herself orange juice while still holding Willa, and nearly drenched the baby’s blanket instead. Wednesday lunged forward with unexpected speed, snatching the glass mid-spill.

“You are reckless,” she scolded.

“You try juggling food and a baby!” Enid shot back, laughing despite herself.

“I would never juggle. That implies frivolity.”

Thing thumped the counter in disagreement.

By the time the plates were empty and the baby fed, the kitchen looked like it had survived an invasion. Crumbs scattered across the table, a dark coffee stain bled into one placemat, and Willa’s blanket bore evidence of her latest protest.

Enid slumped into her chair, groaning. “I’m wiped.”

Wednesday, ever the hypocrite, looked equally drained but sat with perfect posture, hands folded neatly on the table.

“We are unfit for the frontlines,” she admitted quietly.

Enid blinked. “Wait... did you just admit you’re tired?”

Wednesday’s expression didn’t change. “No. I admitted we are tired.”

Enid grinned, leaning over to brush a kiss against her cheek. “That’s progress.”

Wednesday’s lips curved, not quite a smile, but something close.

Willa hiccupped loudly, startling them both.

Enid laughed. “And round three begins.”

Wednesday sighed, rising from her seat with deliberate grace. She reached for the baby, lifting her from Enid’s arms.

“I’ll handle her,” she said firmly.

Enid blinked in surprise. “Really?”

“She is my heir. I will endure her torment.”

Enid’s grin softened into something warm, almost teary. “You’re amazing, you know that?”

Wednesday ignored her, adjusting the baby against her shoulder. “You are weak with fatigue. Rest.”

Enid leaned back, watching as her wife paced the kitchen with their daughter, whispering something low enough she couldn’t hear.

The baby cooed. And Enid thought, not for the first time, that chaos had never felt more like home.

Wednesday’s pacing was precise, almost ritualistic. Each step echoed like she was performing some grim dance, Willa nestled against her shoulder, tiny sighs slipping from her lips. Enid watched, propped in her chair, cheek resting in her hand, heart melting at the sight of her terrifying, brooding wife carrying a one-month-old like she was cradling a cursed relic.

For a blissful two minutes, peace reigned.

Then it happened.

A sound.

Wet. Squishy. Sinister.

Followed by a smell that clawed through the gothic atmosphere like a demon’s breath.

Wednesday froze mid-step. Her body went rigid, her eyes narrowing. “...What was that?” she asked flatly.

Enid blinked, nose twitching. Then she burst out laughing. “Oh my god. She just pooped. Big time.”

Wednesday did not move. She looked down at the baby, whose tiny face was now entirely serene, as if she’d just conquered a kingdom.

“She defiled me,” Wednesday muttered.

Enid was already up, crossing the kitchen with a grin. “Relax, Weds. That’s what babies do.”

“She waited until she was in my arms,” Wednesday said, voice low and accusing.

“Yup. Because she trusts you.” Enid gently tried to take Willa, but Wednesday held the baby tighter, glaring at her as though she’d suggested treason.

“I will not surrender her.”

“Then you’re on diaper duty.”

The silence that followed was thick, heavy, funereal.

Wednesday slowly turned her head. “...Excuse me?”

“You heard me.” Enid’s grin was wolfish. “Mama Wednesday’s first diaper change.”

Wednesday looked at her as though she’d proposed joining a circus. “I am not equipped for this task,” Wednesday said.

“Neither was I, but I figured it out. Come on, you survived monster attacks, murder investigations, and my glitter collection. You can handle a diaper.”

The smell worsened.

Thing thumped the counter twice, as if in agreement.

Enid clapped her hands together. “Alright then, General Addams. To the battlefield!”

---

The nursery became their war room. Enid laid out the supplies with military precision: fresh diaper, wipes, cream. She stood back, arms crossed, eyes sparkling with amusement.

Wednesday hovered over the changing table, Willa staring up at her with dark, curious eyes.

“This is a trap,” Wednesday whispered.

“It’s not a trap. Just undo the onesie.”

Wednesday’s hands, usually so steady with blades and typewriters, moved with rigid reluctance. She unbuttoned the tiny garment like it might explode.

The diaper revealed itself.

“...Atrocious,” Wednesday breathed.

Enid laughed so hard she had to grab the dresser for support. “Welcome to parenthood, babe!”

Willa kicked her legs, entirely pleased with herself.

Wednesday scowled. “She mocks me even now.”

“Just wipe her clean, Weds. It’s not that bad.”

Wednesday picked up a wipe as though it were a weapon, dabbing at her daughter with the delicacy of someone defusing a bomb.

The baby wriggled. A fresh noise erupted.

Wednesday froze.

“...She attacked again.”

Enid wheezed with laughter. “Oh my god, I can’t breathe—”

Wednesday turned her glare on her wife. “Stop cackling and assist me!”

“Nope. You said you wouldn’t surrender her. That makes this your battle.”

Thing scuttled onto the table, offering another wipe.

Wednesday accepted it with grim dignity. Five painstaking minutes later, the deed was done. The baby was clean, swaddled in a fresh diaper, and gazing up at Wednesday with a smug serenity that could only be inherited.

Wednesday exhaled slowly, staring down at her daughter. “...You will pay for this someday.”

Enid wrapped her arms around Wednesday’s waist from behind, resting her chin on her shoulder. “She already owns you, storm cloud.”

Wednesday didn’t respond, but her hand lingered on the baby’s chest just a moment too long.

Enid kissed her cheek, giggling. “Admit it. You survived diaper duty. You’re officially a parent now.”

Wednesday adjusted the baby in her arms, spine stiff, eyes burning with indignation.

“I do not ‘parent,’” she said. “I command. I endure. I conquer.”

The baby let out a tiny coo. And Enid laughed so hard she nearly fell over.

Chapter Text

The Sinclair–Addams mansion had many rooms. Some were swallowed by shadows, others claimed by Enid’s insistent brightness. But one chamber, on the upper floor, belonged solely to Wednesday.

Her study.

The air inside carried the faint perfume of old ink and mildew. Heavy curtains drowned out the sun, leaving the room lit only by a single oil lamp and the pale gleam of lightning through the tall windows. Stacks of books lined the shelves, tomes on poisons, crime scenes, and obscure folklore, while on the desk sat her greatest weapon: an old, black typewriter.

The machine clicked and clacked like the teeth of a beast whenever she touched it. The noise was music to her ears, a symphony of morbidity. This was where Wednesday Addams built empires of ink and death. It hadn’t always been so.

Her teenage debut manuscript was rejected, shredded by publishers who dismissed it as “too bleak,” “too grotesque,” “unmarketable.” Wednesday had kept every rejection letter, framed them in a macabre collage, and hung them on the study wall as trophies. A lesser soul might have despaired. Wednesday only sharpened her pen further.

Years later, she’d produced Viper de la Muerte, a tale dripping with venom and vengeance. It was this manuscript that caught the attention of a publisher with enough morbid curiosity to take a risk.

The risk paid off. To the bafflement of critics and delight of readers across the world, Wednesday Addams had become a literary sensation. They were drawn to her old-school methods, she refused computers, demanded every draft be typed by hand, edited in red ink like blood splatter across the margins. She never granted interviews, never attended readings and she loathed book tours. Yet, her novels flew from shelves.

Now, as the rain beat down against the windows, Wednesday sat before her typewriter once more, a fresh page rolled inside. Her fingers hovered. Her eyes narrowed. The room was silent but for the faint drip of rain and the steady beating of her heart.

Click. Clack. Click.

Her new tale unfolded, a murder in a labyrinthine asylum, a protagonist haunted by whispers no one else could hear. The words spilled forth in their usual unholy rhythm.

Until—

“Waaaaaaahhhh!”

The scream sliced through the house like a banshee’s cry. Wednesday’s fingers froze above the keys. Her entire body stiffened.

“Waaaaaahhhh!”

Her jaw clenched.

“...Enid,” she hissed under her breath.

The nursery door creaked open to reveal chaos.

Enid stood in the middle of the room, hair frazzled, shirt dotted with suspicious stains, rocking Willa back and forth with the desperation of someone bargaining with the gods.

“Oh thank the moon, Weds,” Enid panted. “She’s been at it for fifteen minutes. I don’t know what she wants!”

“She wants destruction,” Wednesday intoned, stepping inside.

The baby wailed louder.

“She knows I’m working,” Wednesday muttered. “This is a direct assault on my productivity.”

Enid shot her a look somewhere between exasperation and laughter. “She’s a baby, not a saboteur!”

Wednesday crossed her arms. “Do not underestimate her. The moment I touched the typewriter, she struck.”

Enid bounced the baby, trying to soothe her. “Yeah, well, you try concentrating when you’ve got a newborn in the house. Writing’s important, but Willa comes first.”

Wednesday’s glare softened, but only slightly. “...She could at least have the decency to time her attacks between chapters.”

Enid giggled. “Sorry, storm cloud. Babies don’t care about deadlines.”

---

Wednesday returned to her study later, baby-free at last. She closed the door behind her, sat, and placed her fingers on the keys again.

Click. Clack.

Two sentences in—

“Waaaaaahhhh!”

Her head snapped toward the door. Her eyes narrowed into slits.

“Conspiracy,” she muttered.

She rose, stalked to the door, flung it open. Enid was standing there with Willa in her arms, bouncing her in that ridiculous wolf-patterned sling.

“Sorry!” Enid whispered, though she clearly wasn’t sorry at all. “She just wanted her other mama.”

Wednesday’s blood ran cold. “I am not—”

“Don’t even say it,” Enid warned with a grin. She passed Willa into Wednesday’s stiff arms.

The baby quieted instantly.

Wednesday froze.

Enid smirked. “Told you. She’s your biggest fan.”

“She’s attempting to silence me,” Wednesday insisted.

“Or she just likes you better.”

Enid kissed her cheek and trotted off, leaving Wednesday with the baby.

The typewriter loomed in the background, waiting.

Wednesday stared down at Willa. “You are my heir. But you must learn the importance of solitude.”

The baby blinked. Yawned. Then drooled on her shoulder.

Wednesday sighed.

---

The following days became a pattern. Whenever Wednesday sat at her desk, typewriter ready, the wail would come.

It became a war.

She tried closing the study door. Willa wailed louder.
She tried writing in the dead of night. Willa woke instantly. She tried relocating to the basement crypt. Willa’s cries somehow echoed down the stone halls.

“This is psychological warfare,” Wednesday muttered, scribbling notes by candlelight while Willa dozed across her chest in a sling Enid had forced her into. “She is conditioning me to write only when she sleeps.”

Enid poked her head into the room, carrying two mugs. One black coffee, one cocoa with rainbow marshmallows. “Or,” she said cheerfully, “she’s just teaching you how to multitask.”

Wednesday glared. “I am not a circus act.”

“You’re a mom,” Enid corrected, kissing the top of her head before plopping into the chair across from her.

Wednesday looked back at the typewriter. Her fingers itched for the keys. Her eyes burned for the page.

And yet... she adjusted her daughter’s blanket instead.

---

One afternoon, Wednesday attempted dictation. She set the typewriter in front of her, Willa in her lap. “You will learn early,” she said solemnly. “Words are weapons.”

Her fingers clicked the keys slowly. “Blood pooled like ink upon the tiles.”

Willa gurgled.

“Do not interrupt.” Wednesday typed again. “Her shadow stretched longer than the corridor itself, a monster tethered to flesh.”

Willa hiccupped.

Wednesday sighed. “You are a poor audience.”

Enid peeked in from the doorway, beaming. “She loves it. Look at her! She’s mesmerized.”

Willa was, in fact, staring at the clacking keys with wide eyes.

“She’s mesmerized by the noise,” Wednesday said. “Not the words.”

“Storm cloud, she’s one month old. Give her time before she’s ready for murder mysteries.”

“She will be ready before most,” Wednesday replied, stroking the baby’s soft hair.

Enid walked over, peered at the page. “Wow. You really don’t hold back, do you?”

Wednesday raised an eyebrow. “Should I censor myself for the sake of her fragile mind?”

“No, no,” Enid said quickly. “Just… maybe not read it at playdates.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “...Who said she will attend playdates?”

Enid groaned.

---

It became undeniable: Willa Hecate Addams-Sinclair, future heir of shadows and chaos, had decided her mother’s literary career would never again exist in solitude.

And though Wednesday complained bitterly, endlessly and venomously, Enid caught her more than once typing with one hand while holding Willa with the other.

Her pages filled, slower now, uneven, but alive. A new rhythm: the clack of the typewriter, the occasional gurgle of an infant, the warm echo of Enid humming in the other room.

And though Wednesday would never say it out loud, not to Enid, not to anyone, she realized her novels might never be the same again.

They might be better.

Chapter Text

The morning was a peculiar one at the Sinclair–Addams mansion. The rain, for once, had stopped. The air hung heavy with mist, and pale sunlight forced its way through the gothic windows like an intruder. For Enid, it was not a morning of cheer, but of dread.

Her maternity leave had ended.

After weeks cocooned at home, wrapped in the chaotic warmth of their new family routine, she had to return, not fully yet, but enough to report to her editor at the site’s headquarters. For the first time since Willa’s birth, she’d be separated from her baby for several hours.

To Enid, this felt like abandoning the world’s most fragile treasure chest on the edge of a cliff.

To Wednesday, it was simply Tuesday.

---

“Okay, so, here’s the bottle,” Enid said, fluttering around the nursery like a brightly-dressed hurricane. “One every three hours. Or sooner if she screams like, um, a banshee. Which she probably will.”

Wednesday sat on the rocking chair, Willa nestled in her arms, silent as a gargoyle.

Enid checked the diaper drawer. “Diapers are here. Extra ones in the closet. Extra-extra ones in the hall closet, because trust me, you will run out faster than you think.”

Willa cooed, completely oblivious to the impending crisis.

Enid leaned in close to her. “And don’t you dare do a blowout today of all days. Mommy loves you, but mommy will cry if you do.”

“Your tendency to bargain with an infant concerns me,” Wednesday said flatly.

Enid whirled on her. “Wednesday, you don’t understand! Babies are unpredictable! What if she rolls off the couch? What if she sticks her fingers in the socket? What if she chokes on air? Babies can do that, you know!”

“Then she would be my daughter,” Wednesday replied calmly. “Ingenious enough to find ways to suffer even in the absence of danger.”

“Weds!” Enid wailed, tugging at her braid. “This isn’t funny! I can’t believe I’m leaving her with you for five hours. Five! Hours!”

“Would you prefer to entrust her to Thing?”

Thing, polishing a silver dagger on the dresser, gave a sassy wiggle of fingers.

Enid gasped. “No! I mean, no offense, Thing, but… no!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Then you have your answer. You trust me, even if your nerves haven’t received the memo.”

Enid collapsed onto the nursery rug. “She’s so small, Weds. What if she misses me?”

“She won’t.”

“Wow. Thanks.”

Wednesday adjusted the baby, who promptly grabbed a fistful of her black braid. “She will not miss you because she will be entertained by me. I intend to recite the works of Poe until she drifts into unconsciousness. Repeatedly.”

Enid stared, horrified. “You’re going to bore her to sleep with death poetry?”

“It is better than your alternative.”

“Which is?”

“You singing off-key lullabies about sunshine.”

Enid gasped again, clapping her hands over Willa’s ears. “Don’t listen to her, puppy, mommy sings beautifully.”

Willa sneezed.

Wednesday smirked. “She agrees with me.”

---

The hours before Enid’s departure unfolded like a tragic play.

Enid hovered at every doorway, wringing her hands. “Call me if anything happens.”
“I won’t.”
“Text me if anything happens.”
“I won’t.”
“Send Thing if anything happens!”
“…That, I might consider.”

Enid grabbed her bag, checked it, then checked it again. She bent over Willa’s crib and pressed a hundred frantic kisses to her cheeks. “Be good for Mama Wednesday, okay? Don’t grow up too fast while I’m gone.”

Wednesday’s eyebrow arched. “She is incapable of accelerated growth. You are being absurd.”

“That’s what all moms say before their babies suddenly start walking while they’re at the grocery store!”

“Then I will record it and use it to torment you later.”

Enid groaned, clutching her head. “How are you so calm?”

“Because,” Wednesday said simply, “I am not incompetent.”

That silenced Enid for precisely thirty seconds before she burst out again: “Fine! Fine. I’ll go. But you better promise me she’ll still be alive when I get back.”

Wednesday rose, baby in arms, her expression solemn and unyielding. “Enid Sinclair. Wife. Mother. Irrational basket case. Hear me.”

Enid blinked.

“I swear upon all things morbid and eternal that when you return, our daughter will not only be alive… she will be thriving.”

Enid’s lips trembled. “…You’re serious?”

“I do not jest about survival.”

And to seal her point, Wednesday leaned in and kissed Enid on the lips softly, unceremonious but grounding.

Enid let out a shaky laugh. “Ugh. Fine. Okay. I trust you.”

“You always should.”

Enid sniffled, grabbed her coat, and left with one last backward glance.

Then the mansion fell quiet.

Wednesday looked down at Willa. The infant looked back at her with wide, unblinking eyes.

The two regarded each other like opponents at the start of a duel.

“Your mother has gone,” Wednesday said softly. “Now it is just you and me.”

Willa gurgled.

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “Do not test me. I have raised scorpions. I have tamed ravens. You will be no different.”

The baby sneezed again.

Wednesday adjusted her hold. “…Very well. Perhaps slightly different.”

---

Enid, meanwhile, sat on the NeverNet shuttle bus toward the site headquarters, her leg bouncing like a jackhammer. She clutched her phone in both hands, staring at the screen as though she could will it to light up.

What if Willa cried herself hoarse? What if she wouldn’t take the bottle? What if Wednesday tried to actually read her Poe?

Her imagination spiraled into catastrophic images: Wednesday solemnly instructing the baby on how to embalm a squirrel. Willa rolling off the sofa and being caught mid-air by Thing. A thunderstorm striking and setting the curtains on fire while Wednesday calmly took notes for her next novel.

Enid pressed her palms to her face. “Oh god. I’m the worst mom ever.”

Her phone buzzed.

A message from Wednesday.

It read: 'She has sneezed twice. Her lungs are strong.'

Enid burst out laughing, startling the other passengers. Relief flooded her chest. Leave it to Wednesday to reassure her in the bleakest way possible.

She typed back: 'Keep count. And don’t you dare teach her Latin chants.'

The reply came instantly: 'She already prefers Gothic script.'

Enid groaned. “…I married a maniac.”

But she smiled the entire ride.

---

Back at the mansion, Wednesday sat at her typewriter, Willa propped on her lap. The baby reached toward the keys, mashing nonsense letters.

Wednesday glanced down. “Impressive. Your first attempt at literature, and already you grasp the futility of coherence.”

Willa burbled happily.

Wednesday leaned in close, her tone low and deliberate. “Do not fret, small one. Your mother will return. She is incapable of leaving us for long. Her paranoia is a leash stronger than any chain.”

The baby yawned, snuggling into her chest.

Wednesday’s voice softened. “Until then, I will keep you safe.”

The typewriter clacked on.

And for the first time since Enid had left, the house felt perfectly balanced again: ink, shadow, and the steady heartbeat of new life.

Chapter Text

Enid Sinclair had never run faster in heels. Her editor at the blogging site had barely finished outlining the latest “hot content” directives before Enid bolted from the building like she’d been shot out of a cannon. The entire meeting she’d nodded, smiled, jotted notes, but in the back of her mind one thought spun endlessly:

What if Wednesday forgot to feed Willa?
What if Willa cried herself into a coma?
What if Wednesday taught her how to use a crossbow before she can crawl?

Enid’s Uber driver hadn’t even pulled up fully to the curb before she leapt out, sprinting up the driveway of their gothic mansion. Her heart pounded with maternal dread. She imagined chaos inside: fire, feathers, perhaps Thing trying to soothe Willa with aggressive hand gestures.

Enid threw open the massive double doors... and stopped.

The scene before her was… bizarrely serene. The mansion, often echoing with creaks, sighs, and the occasional raven, was utterly silent. The curtains shifted lazily in a draft. A candle flickered in its holder.

On the living room sofa, Wednesday sat perfectly composed, dressed in her usual inky attire, a fountain pen in hand. Beside her on the coffee table: a neat stack of pages, her typewriter, and a black notebook.

And against her chest, strapped in an ominously stylish sling made of black lace, Willa slept. Peacefully.

Enid’s breath hitched. “She’s… she’s okay.”

Wednesday looked up, expression flat. “Did you expect her to be missing a limb?”

“Yes!” Enid blurted. Then realized how unhinged she sounded. “I mean—no! I mean—I don’t know!”

Wednesday closed her notebook with a snap. “You doubt me far too much.”

Enid rushed forward, dropping to her knees at the sofa. She stroked Willa’s fuzzy hair with trembling fingers, eyes shining. “Oh, puppy… mommy missed you so much. Were you okay with Mama Wednesday? Did she treat you right?”

“She was treated as she deserves,” Wednesday intoned. “Fed precisely on schedule. Changed without complaint. And lulled into unconsciousness with recitations from The Raven.”

Enid groaned. “Weds…”

“She responded positively to Poe. Smiled at ‘Nevermore.’ It is a sign she is thriving.”

Enid gasped dramatically. “My baby’s first smile, and I missed it?! Unbelievable! You stole it from me!”

“I documented it.” Wednesday reached into the notebook and flipped to a page where she had sketched— no, etched in elaborate ink— the likeness of Willa’s tiny grin. A caption below read: "First betrayal. 11:43 a.m."

Enid stared at it. “You… drew her smile.”

“Immortalized it,” Wednesday corrected.

Enid laughed and cried at the same time. “That’s… actually kind of sweet. In a deeply morbid way.”

Enid scooped Willa gently into her arms, inhaling that newborn scent like oxygen. She swayed, nuzzling the baby’s cheek. “Did you miss me, puppy? Huh? Did you cry for me?”

“She did not,” Wednesday said.

Enid froze. “What?”

“Not once,” Wednesday replied. Her tone was not smug, it was factual, clinical and almost unsettling. “She was silent in my care.”

Enid pouted. “That can’t be true. She always cries.”

“Not for me.” Wednesday’s eyes gleamed faintly. “We understand each other.”

Enid’s mouth dropped open. “Oh my god. You’re saying... she doesn’t cry for you because she’s scared of you?”

“Or because she respects me.”

Enid stared at her wife for a long moment. Then burst out laughing. “You’re telling me our one-month-old baby already ‘respects’ you?!”

“She knows power when she sees it,” Wednesday said evenly.

Thing crawled onto the sofa, tapping insistently on Wednesday’s notebook. She sighed and turned another page, revealing a detailed log: feeding times, burp success rates, number of sneezes (currently seven), and one chilling entry titled "Attempted Eye Contact: 3:05 p.m. – Successfully Dominated."

Enid howled with laughter, tears streaming down her face. “You made a battle log of babysitting!”

“It is important to track her behavioral patterns,” Wednesday said.

“It’s important to bond, Wednesday!”

“I did. She now knows I am her inevitable future.”

Enid buried her face in Willa’s hair. “You’re such a freak, and I love you.”

---

Later that evening, dinner descended into the usual gothic chaos. Enid tried spooning soup into her mouth with one hand while balancing Willa against her shoulder. “So… not even one fussy fit? Not even a whimper?”

Wednesday methodically cut her steak with surgical precision. “She whimpered once. I stared at her. She stopped.”

Enid dropped her spoon, sputtering with laughter. “You stared her into silence?!”

“She is easily disciplined.”

“She’s a baby, Weds!”

“A formidable baby,” Wednesday corrected.

Enid shook her head, grinning. “You’re unreal.” She leaned across the table, brushing her hand against Wednesday’s. “But… thank you. For taking care of her. For proving me wrong.”

Wednesday looked up, dark eyes unwavering. “I would never let harm come to her. Or you. You should know that.”

Enid’s heart squeezed. “…Yeah. I do.”

From her bassinet nearby, Willa let out a tiny grunt, then another suspicious squelch.

Both mothers froze.

Enid groaned. “Oh no. Not again.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, deadly calm. “She plots against us at every meal.”

Enid burst into helpless laughter as Wednesday rose with grim determination, retrieving the diaper supplies like a warrior retrieving her sword.

And once again, their gothic mansion was filled with a symphony of chaos, love, and the faintest hint of doom.

Chapter Text

The Addams mansion had survived ghosts, monster hunters, and Wednesday’s experiments in taxidermy, but nothing rattled its black stone walls quite like the announcement that Enid made one crisp morning.

“Weds,” Enid said, strapping baby Willa into her wolf-patterned onesie, “it’s officially been forty days since she was born.”

Wednesday, who was polishing the keys of her typewriter like a priest blessing relics, did not look up. “I am aware. Forty days of no sleep. Forty days of ceaseless squalling. Forty days of you insisting I smile more for her mental development.”

Enid bounced Willa in her arms, grinning. “And forty days of her growing big and strong! Which means…” She took a dramatic breath, eyes shining. “It’s time for her first trip outside!”

Wednesday froze, fingers hovering over the typewriter. Slowly, she lifted her gaze. “Outside?”

“Yes!” Enid twirled toward the window, pulling the curtain aside to reveal the pale daylight. “It’s tradition. After forty days, babies are ready to see the world. To touch grass. To breathe fresh air. To—”

“To be kidnapped, sneezed upon, and corrupted by mundanity.” Wednesday’s tone was flat, but the venom in her words dripped like ink. “I refuse.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Refuse? Wednesday, she can’t just live in a coffin forever!”

“Why not? It worked for me.”

“That’s—okay, no.” Enid stomped her foot, holding Willa tighter. “She needs sunlight. She needs socialization. She needs to experience...”

“The first cough of a common stranger could undo forty days of careful seclusion,” Wednesday interrupted, standing now, her black dress sweeping across the rug like a shadow. “She is too fragile.”

“She’s not fragile, she’s healthy!” Enid countered. “Our pediatrician said she’s thriving.”

“That quack also suggested a vitamin supplement. What is more suspicious than artificially flavored cherry syrup?”

Enid threw her free hand into the air. “Oh my god, Wednesday! You’re acting like taking her to the park is going to summon the Grim Reaper.”

“I welcome the Reaper. But not the stench of sunscreen.”

---

The debate escalated through breakfast. Enid prepared waffles shaped like skulls, while Wednesday sat at the other end of the table sipping black coffee and dissecting a crow’s wing for scientific purposes.

“Think about it,” Enid said, cutting into her waffles one-handed while bouncing Willa on her knee. “Her first trip outside. The sun on her skin. The breeze in her hair. It’ll be magical.”

“It will be tragic,” Wednesday said. “The outside world is loud. Overstimulating. Full of suburbanites.”

“Babies need stimulation, Wednesday.”

“Babies need discipline.”

“Babies need vitamin D.”

“Babies need the comforting darkness of ancestral crypts.”

Enid smacked her fork down. “Okay, you cannot seriously think the crypt is better for her than a stroller ride.”

“I do. Gravestones are calming.”

Enid pointed at her with the fork. “You’re impossible.”

“And you’re naïve.”

Thing slapped the table twice, startling both women. He pointed at Willa, then at the door, then at Enid.

“See?” Enid said smugly. “Thing agrees with me.”

“He’s just eager to escape your cooking,” Wednesday retorted.

Thing made an indignant gesture. Enid threw up her hands. “Fine. You know what? We’re doing this. Today. No more delays. Baby Willa is going outside if it kills me.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, a storm brewing in their depths. “…That can be arranged.”

---

By noon, chaos had engulfed the mansion. Enid ran around gathering supplies: diaper bag, wipes, sunhat, extra clothes, bottles. She spoke in a whirlwind, muttering to herself as she stuffed pastel-patterned onesies into the bag.

Wednesday stood perfectly still in the doorway, arms crossed. “We are not moving to another country. You require fewer supplies to invade a small nation.”

“Babies are unpredictable!” Enid snapped, jamming a pacifier into the bag. “What if she spits up? What if she gets cold? What if she needs a diaper change in the middle of the park?”

“What if a vulture mistakes her for carrion?”

Enid groaned. “Nobody’s going to mistake our baby for carrion!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “I once saw a vulture take an entire possum.”

“Not helping!”

---

At last, the three of them stood at the massive front doors. Enid beamed, holding Willa bundled in a wolf-print blanket. “Okay, baby girl. You ready to see the world?”

Willa yawned.

Wednesday loomed beside them, clutching an umbrella so enormous and black it looked like it had been stolen from a Victorian widow. “She is not ready. The world is not ready.”

Enid ignored her, shifting the baby in her arms and reaching for the doorknob.

“Wait.” Wednesday’s voice was sharp.

Enid froze. “…What now?”

Wednesday stepped forward, pressing her pale hand dramatically against the door. “Once she leaves this house, she cannot unsee the atrocities of daylight. The garish colors. The happy joggers. The sounds of small dogs yapping without reprieve. Do you want her first memory to be a Pomeranian?”

Enid blinked. Then laughed. “You’re ridiculous. Come on, Weds. You’ll survive. And so will she.”

Wednesday’s gaze flickered to her wife, then to the baby. Willa squirmed, letting out a tiny grunt.

Finally, Wednesday sighed in deep, theatrical way. “…Very well. But if she so much as sneezes, we are turning back.”

Enid kissed her cheek. “Deal.”

The doors creaked open.

Sunlight spilled into the foyer like an invading army. Enid stepped forward eagerly, while Wednesday hissed softly under her breath, pulling the umbrella low like a shield.

And thus, baby Willa Hecate Sinclair-Addams saw the outside world for the very first time, while her parents bickered every step down the driveway.

---

The outing itself was everything one might expect from the Addams-Sinclair household: Enid cooed at Willa constantly, pointing at birds, flowers, and children on bicycles.

Wednesday glared at joggers, criticized playground equipment as “death traps,” and muttered about society’s decline.

Willa, sandwiched between their worlds, alternated between dozing off and making mysterious gurgling noises that both women interpreted in wildly different ways.

At one point, Enid exclaimed, “Look, Weds! She smiled at the sunshine!”

To which Wednesday replied, “No. That was a grimace. She despises it already. She is my daughter.”

Enid laughed, adjusting the stroller. “Face it, storm cloud. She’s ours. Which means she’s both.”

Wednesday glanced down at the baby, who had fallen asleep with one tiny fist clenched defiantly in the air.

“…Perhaps.”

---

That night, back in the mansion, Enid tucked Willa into her bassinet and sighed contentedly. “Her first day out. She did so well.”

Wednesday sat at her desk, typing a fresh line into her novel. “She survived. That is sufficient.”

Enid rolled her eyes, climbing into bed. “You’re not fooling me, Weds. I saw you watching her at the park.”

“I was monitoring her for sunburn.”

“You were smiling.”

“I was scowling.”

“You were smiling,” Enid repeated softly.

Wednesday said nothing, her fingers stilling on the typewriter. She turned, her eyes lingering on the sleeping baby.

“…Perhaps,” she murmured again.

Enid grinned, snuggling under the covers. “Told you so.”

And in the gothic silence of the mansion, the clash of their worlds softened into harmony, held together by a tiny bundle of chaos who, for once, actually slept through the night.

Chapter Text

The mansion was quieter than usual, which meant, naturally, that something was about to happen.

Enid was sprawled on the nursery rug with Willa propped in her lap, holding a squeaky toy shaped like a wolf pup. Sunlight filtered through the heavy velvet curtains because Enid had, against Wednesday’s protests, tugged them half-open.

“Okay, little moonbeam,” Enid cooed, giving the toy a playful squeak. “What sound does a wolf make? Awooo!”

Willa blinked up at her with wide, dark eyes. Her mouth puckered. Then miraculously, a sound emerged.

Not a cry.

Not a grunt.

But a laugh.

A tiny bubbling giggle, like bells ringing in a haunted cathedral.

Enid froze. Her eyes widened. “Oh… my… god.” She dropped the squeaky toy and clutched her chest. “She laughed. Weds! She laughed!”

From the doorway, Wednesday appeared, as if summoned by witchcraft. Her black silhouette filled the frame, arms crossed, gaze sharp. “What is the commotion?”

Enid turned, practically vibrating with excitement. “She laughed! Her first laugh! Listen, listen! Do it again, Willa!”

The baby, of course, stared blankly and hiccupped.

Wednesday arched a brow, stepping into the room like a raven descending. “That was no mere laugh.” She studied her daughter with intensity. “That was a sinister cackle. A declaration of intent. Proof of her inevitable greatness.”

Enid snorted, still beaming. “It was a laugh, Weds. A sweet, adorable, sunshine-filled laugh.”

“It was the laugh of someone who will one day command legions.”

Enid rolled her eyes. “Not everything has to be about world domination.”

“Not everything,” Wednesday conceded. Then she smirked. “Just most things.”

---

Naturally, a competition began. Enid, armed with her boundless energy, leaned close to Willa and crossed her eyes. “Look at Mommy, baby girl! Funny face!” She puffed out her cheeks until they were round as balloons, then let the air escape in a dramatic raspberry.

Willa blinked. Drooled.

No laugh.

Enid tried again, wiggling her ears, sticking out her tongue. She made wolf howls, then barked like a puppy.

Nothing.

Wednesday stepped forward, cool as midnight. “Observe.” She crouched beside the bassinet, fixing her daughter with a solemn gaze.

“Little one,” she intoned gravely, “one day, all who gaze upon you will perish. Their bones will crumble, their names forgotten. Even the stars will fade, leaving you in a void of eternal night.”

Willa’s lips twitched.

Enid’s jaw dropped. “You can’t be serious.”

Wednesday leaned closer, voice dropping to a whisper. “The worms will sing your name.”

And just like that, a giggle.

A bright, bubbling laugh burst from Willa’s tiny chest.

Wednesday’s eyes gleamed with triumph. “She understands me.”

Enid gaped. “Oh my god. You just… you literally gave her a death monologue and she laughed?”

“Precisely. Our bond is unbreakable.”

Enid scooped Willa up, kissing her cheeks. “Nuh-uh! She laughed because she loves silly stuff. It was the way you whispered, not your creepy speech.”

“Debatable.”

---

The game escalated.

Enid donned bunny ears and performed what could only be described as interpretive dance. She juggled stuffed animals. She barked, meowed, and roared in a single breath.

Willa stared with regal calm.

Wednesday, meanwhile, recited lines from Edgar Allan Poe, her voice dripping with melodrama. She told tales of tragic hauntings, of shipwrecks and shadows.

Willa’s face would twitch, lips curling upward, a giggle threatening to escape.

Enid clutched her hair. “This isn’t fair! You’ve got the scary advantage!”

“Advantage?” Wednesday smirked. “It is simply called being effective.”

Finally, desperate, Enid grabbed Willa’s tiny feet and blew a raspberry into her sole.

A squeal.

Then—another laugh.

“Yes!” Enid whooped, lifting her daughter high. “Ha! Beat that, storm cloud!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “So… my rival is her foot?”

“Her feet are hilarious, obviously!” Enid planted another raspberry, earning another tiny laugh.

Wednesday folded her arms. “Pathetic.”

---

But later, when Enid left the room to fetch more wipes, Wednesday lingered by the bassinet. She leaned in close, her dark braid falling over her shoulder.

“Do not be deceived by your mother’s antics,” she whispered to Willa. “She is sunshine. I am storm. And you, little one, will wield both.”

The baby blinked up at her, then released the tiniest giggle.

A smirk tugged at Wednesday’s lips.

“Yes,” she murmured. “That is my girl.”

Enid returned moments later, catching her wife mid-smirk.

“Aha!” Enid pointed. “You were making her laugh, weren’t you? Admit it!”

Wednesday’s face returned to stone. “I was instructing her in the inevitability of entropy.”

Enid burst out laughing. “You’re such a liar. She’s got you wrapped around her finger.”

“Ridiculous.”

Thing signed something smug from the dresser.

Enid grinned. “Even Thing agrees with me.”

Willa cooed, laughed again and the entire room dissolved into chaos, half sunbeam, half shadow and wholly theirs.

Chapter Text

The full moon bloomed above the Addams-Sinclair mansion, pale and merciless, spilling silver light into every corner of the dark forest that bordered their land.

Inside the bedroom, Enid paced. Her claws clicked nervously against the hardwood floor every time she flexed them out. She was hearing faint howls from the distance and she felt even more unsettled.

She stopped to glance at the window, where the moon already hung heavy. Her heart thudded.

“It’s different this time,” she muttered to herself, rubbing her arms. “It’s gotta be different. First full moon after having a baby? I heard stories, crazy stories. Some moms lose control, they get aggressive and overprotective. Some get extra feral and want to harm everything in sight. Some can’t even shift at all anymore!”

Behind her, Wednesday was calmly fastening the straps of her black boots as though preparing for a casual walk in the cemetery. Her long braids were neat, her black cloak folded over one arm. She looked unshakably composed, the embodiment of dark routine.

“You speak as though you dread change,” Wednesday said evenly. “Yet you have already transformed in the most irrevocable way possible. You birthed a child. This is merely… another stage of your grotesque evolution.”

“Gee, thanks for the pep talk,” Enid muttered, throwing her hands up. “That totally helps my nerves, Weds.”

Wednesday rose from her seat with eerie grace. “You are stalling. The moon waits for no wolf.”

Enid spun on her heels, panic flashing across her face. “Maybe… maybe I should just stay inside tonight. Lock myself in the cellar like some other werewolves do. What if I lose control out there and hurt something? Or someone?”

“Your caution is touching,” Wednesday said, her tone flat enough to make the word sound like an insult. She crossed the room and touched Enid’s cheek with a cold yet steady hand. “But your wolf has never harmed me. It never will. You have to express your nature.”

Enid swallowed hard. “That was before Willa.”

Wednesday’s eyes flicked toward the cradle in the corner of the room. Inside, Willa slept peacefully, wrapped in black silk Enid had insisted was too dramatic for a baby until Wednesday reminded her it was “breathable and symbolic.”

“She is coming with us,” Wednesday announced.

Enid nearly shrieked. “WHAT?!”

Wednesday was already lifting the cradle with carefully. “She must be introduced to the moonlight. To deny her that is to deny half of her bloodline.”

“You can’t just—Wednesday, she’s barely two months old! She can’t go frolic under a full moon with her mom running around on four legs and you reading Edgar Allan Poe under a dead tree!”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “And why not?”

Enid gawked. “Because she’s a baby!”

“Precisely. Impressionable. Perfect time to instill proper Addams values.” Wednesday smirked faintly as she adjusted the cradle’s blankets. “Besides, if you lose control in your wolf form, I shall simply place her on your back and let her ride you until exhaustion tames you.”

Enid slapped her forehead. “You are the worst.”

“And yet, the most effective.”

---

Half an hour later, the forest swallowed them whole. The moonlight was bright enough to turn the leaves into shards of silver. The night air was cool, alive with the sounds of owls and the distant creak of trees shifting in the wind.

Enid stood barefoot in the clearing, trembling. She wore a loose dress she didn’t mind shredding during the shift. Her blue eyes turned golden, her breaths coming faster as the pull of the lunar cycle gripped her.

Wednesday, seated on a black-and-white blanket, set Willa’s cradle beside her and opened a leather-bound volume. She was the picture of serenity, composed, eternal and untouchable.

“This feels wrong,” Enid whispered, clutching her arms. “I’m scared, Weds.”

Wednesday looked up from her book, expression unflinching. “Good. Fear is fuel. Let it sharpen you, not hinder you.”

“Easy for you to say,” Enid muttered, but she squeezed her eyes shut and let the moonlight take her.

The change ripped through her body in waves, bones shifting, muscles stretching, skin rippling into fur. It was both agony and ecstasy, the primal call of her heritage. Enid fell to her knees with a cry, claws digging into the earth, and then she was gone, replaced by a sleek, powerful wolf with gray-ish fur.

Her chest heaved, her ears twitched and her tail flicked nervously. She growled low and unsettled by how strong the shift felt this time, stronger than before pregnancy, as though motherhood had infused her wolf with something new and deeper.

Wednesday watched, her eyes alight with something that might almost be pride.

Enid padded in circles, hackles raised, fighting to ground herself. Her instincts screamed to run, to hunt, to tear through the forest. But then, a soft cooing sound from the cradle.

Willa stirred, her tiny arms flailing.

The wolf froze. Her ears flattened and her golden eyes widen, locked on the baby. Her instincts surged in two directions at once: protect or devour. It was dizzying.

Wednesday rose smoothly, stepping between wolf and cradle without hesitation. She held out her hand. “Enid.”

The wolf snarled, teeth bared, not at Wednesday, but at herself, at the unbearable tug-of-war inside her.

“Enid.” Wednesday’s tone was cold yet familiar. “You know me. You know her. Claim your control.”

For a long, taut moment, Enid’s wolf form trembled with the weight of instinct. Then she whimpered, lowering herself to the ground with her tail tucked. Slowly, she crept forward and pressed her head against Wednesday’s hand.

Wednesday stroked her fur once, methodical, reassuring. “Good girl.”

Enid huffed indignantly through her snout, even in wolf form.

“I did not mean it as an insult,” Wednesday added, smirking.

---

The rest of the night settled into a bizarre rhythm. Enid ran circles through the forest, howling at the sky, occasionally returning to flop dramatically at Wednesday’s side like an overgrown golden retriever. Wednesday read aloud passages from her book, dark poems about decay and despair, her voice carrying smoothly under the trees.

Willa, impossibly, seemed soothed by the sound of both. She cooed softly whenever her mother’s howls echoed through the forest, and she sighed contentedly when Wednesday’s morbid lullabies filled the air.

At one point, Enid padded close, nudging the cradle with her snout. Carefully, she sniffed at Willa, who stared up with wide, curious eyes. The wolf blinked. Then, in a move so uncharacteristic of her usual feral self, Enid licked Willa’s tiny hand.

Willa giggled, a high, unexpected sound that pierced the forest quiet.

Wednesday lowered her book. “Another laugh. Recorded.” She smirked faintly. “She clearly finds you amusing in all forms.”

Enid barked indignantly.

“Don’t argue with me,” Wednesday said, leaning back. “You’ll lose.”

---

Hours passed, the moon drifting across the sky. By the time dawn painted the forest edges in gray, Enid stumbled back into human form. She collapsed onto the blanket, shivering, sweat and leaves sticking to her skin.

Wednesday unfazed, produced a folded set of Enid’s clothes from her bag and draped them over her. “As always, I planned for your lack of foresight.”

Enid groaned, tugging the shirt over her head. “You’re… insufferable.”

“You adore me.”

“Unfortunately,” Enid muttered, though she smiled weakly.

Willa stirred in her cradle, letting out a wail that shattered the fragile peace.

Enid immediately reached for her, pulling the baby against her chest despite her exhaustion. Willa quieted almost instantly, tiny fingers gripping Enid’s hair.

Enid kissed her daughter’s head, tears pricking her eyes. “I didn’t lose control. I… I didn’t hurt her.”

“Of course not,” Wednesday said, packing her book away. “I told you you wouldn’t.”

“You were right,” Enid admitted softly.

Wednesday smirked, brushing dirt from her cloak. “I usually am.”

Enid shot her a look, then laughed despite her fatigue. “I hate that you’re always right.”

“You love it.”

Enid hugged Willa tighter, moonlight fading into dawn around them. For the first time since the pregnancy, she felt whole again, in both forms.

Chapter Text

The Sinclair-Addams mansion was preparing for war, or at least that’s how it felt to Wednesday.

The long dining hall was draped in black silk runners and lined with tall candelabras. Wax dripped down like blood congealing on an altar. Taxidermied ravens, borrowed from Wednesday’s study, perched along the mantle as though ready to judge whoever dared to dine beneath them.

Wednesday supervised every detail with the same precision she gave to her novels. The silver cutlery gleamed like sharpened blades. The goblets had been polished to a mirror shine. The roast, a disturbingly large boar’s head that Thing had procured from god-knows-where, sat in the center, its glassy eyes staring into eternity.

At the opposite end of the room, Enid was busy arranging vases of marigolds and chrysanthemums. Their yellow brightness clashed horribly with the black tablecloth, but she hummed happily as she worked, bouncing Willa against her hip.

“They’re going to love this,” Enid said, tickling the baby’s chin. “A family dinner! Willa gets to meet her grandparents, her uncle, her great-grandma, and her… um…” She paused. “Her… Uncle Fester. I should probably prepare her for that one.”

“She will not require preparation,” Wednesday said flatly. “Exposure to chaos is in her blood.”

Enid looked over, giving her wife a wide grin. “You’re nervous.”

Wednesday, who had been meticulously rearranging knives by length, stiffened. “I am not.”

“You so are. Your face is even more scowly than usual. Which is saying something.”

“I am not nervous,” Wednesday repeated, her tone razor-sharp. “I am… resigned.”

“To what?”

“To the invasion of my ancestral home by people who insist on kissing cheeks and weeping at the sight of infants.”

Enid rolled her eyes, rocking Willa. “That’s called family, Weds.”

“Family is a biological inevitability. Like mildew.”

“And yet,” Enid teased, “you married me. So you must not hate the whole concept.”

Wednesday finally looked at her, dark eyes unreadable. “You are not family, Enid.”

Enid blinked, momentarily stung. “…I’m not?”

Wednesday crossed the room, stopping so close their shoulders brushed. Her voice dropped to a low murmur. “You are something far worse. You are irreplaceable.”

Enid’s grin returned instantly with her cheeks flushing pink. “Ugh, you’re disgusting. That’s the most romantic thing you’ve ever said.” She leaned in to kiss Wednesday’s lips quickly.

Wednesday accepted it with a sigh, though the corner of her mouth twitched slightly.

---

Later in their bedroom, the battle of outfits began. Enid stood before the mirror, holding up a sequined dress in glittering shades of pink and lavender. “What do you think?” she asked, twirling. “Too much?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said. “And also: an affront to the eyes.”

Enid pouted. “Fine.” She swapped it for a more subdued option, a long flowy dress of deep burgundy and embroidered with tiny silver stars. “Better?”

“Marginally.”

“And you?” Enid asked, turning. “Please tell me you’re not just wearing the same black dress you wear to everything.”

Wednesday emerged from the closet in a floor-length gown of midnight velvet, with sharp shoulders and lace sleeves. She had fastened a brooch shaped like a dagger at her collarbone.

“…Yes,” Enid said after a pause. “The same black dress. But it’s also… wow. Okay, you win.”

“I always do.”

Willa, meanwhile, was dressed in a tiny onesie Wednesday had commissioned: black, with a white Peter Pan collar, and embroidered with a raven. Enid slipped a pastel headband onto her anyway, complete with a tiny bow.

Wednesday grimaced. “Remove that atrocity.”

“It’s cute!” Enid protested. “She needs some color.”

“She looks like she’s about to preside over a baby funeral.”

“Exactly!” Enid smirked. “Perfect compromise.”

---

As twilight fell, the rumble of engines echoed down the long drive. Enid rushed to the window with Willa in her arms. “They’re here!” she squealed.

Wednesday joined her, staring down at the sight with morbid inevitability.

First came a vast black limousine, driven by Lurch. Inside, Gomez, Morticia, and Pugsley peered out.

Behind them another vehicle, a coffin-shaped hearse, with Grandmama cackling out the window and waving a gnarled hand.

And bringing up the rear, Uncle Fester’s tricycle. He pedaled furiously, sparks flying from the wheels, a manic grin on his pale face.

“…Subtle, as always,” Wednesday muttered.

Enid bounced excitedly, waving down at them. “Oh my god, I love them!”

“Don’t encourage them.”

The front doors swung open with a creak that shook the chandeliers.

“Cara mia!” Gomez cried, sweeping into the foyer with Morticia on his arm. His mustache twitched with excitement and his dark eyes brimming with tears. “Our daughter, our little storm cloud, has created life!”

“Technically, Enid created life,” Wednesday corrected dryly.

“Together,” Morticia purred, gliding forward like a shadow in her long black gown. “Which makes it all the more exquisite.” She leaned in, her cool hands brushing Enid’s cheeks. “Darling daughter-in-law.”

Enid beamed. “Hi, Mrs. Addams! Um—Morticia! It’s so nice to see you again!”

“And this,” Gomez declared, kneeling before Willa like a knight at court, “must be our granddaughter!”

Willa blinked down at him unimpressed. Then she sneezed.

Gomez wept instantly. “She acknowledged me!”

Enid laughed nervously. “Um… bless you?”

“Never bless the sneeze,” Morticia corrected gently. “It is a sacred release.”

Enid nodded quickly. “Right! Of course. Sacred release. Got it.”

Pugsley bounded in next, carrying a box that wriggled suspiciously. “I brought a gift!”

Enid hesitated. “…Is it alive?”

“Not for long,” Pugsley said cheerfully, setting the box down. Something inside hissed.

Wednesday smiled faintly. “Thank you, Pugsley. A proper family heirloom.”

Enid’s grin faltered. “…We’ll… open that later.”

Grandmama waddled in, her gray hair in a perfect bun and her eyes twinkling with mischief. “There she is! The tiny overlord!” She reached for Willa who stared back with solemn curiosity. “Mmm. Strong aura. Good bones.”

“You can tell that just by holding her?” Enid asked nervously.

“I can taste it,” Grandmama replied, licking her lips.

Enid paled. “…Right.”

Finally, Uncle Fester barreled in, sparks still clinging to his coat. “Where’s my niece?” he howled, grinning ear-to-ear. He scooped Willa from Enid’s arms and held her high, spinning in circles. “She’s beautiful! She’s terrifying! She’s… oh, she smells like fresh dirt!”

Enid yelped. “Careful!”

“She’s fine,” Wednesday said calmly. “He hasn’t dropped anyone in months.”

“Months?” Enid squeaked.

Fester blew a raspberry against Willa’s stomach, eliciting a delighted giggle. The entire family gasped in unison.

“Her first laugh?” Morticia asked.

“Second,” Wednesday corrected. “The first was at the mention of mortality.”

Gomez beamed. “A true Addams!”

Enid groaned, covering her face with her hands. “Oh no, there’s no going back now, is there?”

“None at all,” Wednesday said, smirking.

---

The dining hall glowed with the glow of the black candles burning. The Addams family was gathered in full force around the massive oak table that had borne centuries of questionable meals. Silverware gleamed like weapons, goblets shimmered with what looked suspiciously like blood, and the roasted boar’s head centerpiece stared unblinking at the guests, its mouth propped open as though mid-scream.

Enid, sitting between Wednesday and Morticia, clutched her napkin in her lap like it was a lifeline. She smiled brightly, determined not to look overwhelmed, even as Pugsley was already sharpening his knife against the rim of his plate.

“Ah, to gather once more beneath the Addams roof!” Gomez cried, leaping to his feet. He raised his goblet high, wine sloshing dangerously. “To family, to blood, to the glorious march of doom that binds us across generations!”

“Doom!” Pugsley echoed, clanging his knife against his goblet.

Enid gave a little nervous laugh. “…Cheers?”

“Salud!” Gomez howled, downing his wine in one dramatic gulp.

Morticia leaned over placing her hand elegantly against Enid’s arm. “Darling, you must tell me, you prepared this?” She gestured to the platters before them: roasted pheasants, a suspiciously steaming stew, and an entire tray of Enid’s homemade buttermilk biscuits that looked somewhat out of place among the darker fare.

“I—I did!” Enid said brightly. “Mostly the biscuits, though. And the salad. I thought it might balance out the… um…” She glanced at the bubbling stew. “…other stuff.”

Morticia delicately took a biscuit, biting into it with the slow grace of a predator savoring its prey. “Mmm. Delightful.”

Enid lit up. “Really? You like it?”

“Exquisite,” Morticia said. Then, with equal calm: “Although, if I may... next time, consider the addition of dead crickets. They add a satisfying crunch.”

Enid blinked. “…Dead crickets.”

“Or mealworms. Very versatile.”

Wednesday who was seated stiffly on Enid’s other side spoke without looking up from her plate. “Don’t encourage her. If Enid starts sprinkling insects into baked goods, I will starve myself.”

Morticia’s lips curved. “You already do, my love.”

Enid flushed, caught between laughter and horror. “I’ll… keep it in mind.”

At the far end of the table, Pugsley was gleefully stabbing his fork into the boar’s head. “So, Willa’s gonna grow up to like this stuff, right? Like… first solid food, eyeballs?”

Enid nearly choked on her water. “Eyeballs?!”

“Pickled are best,” Pugsley continued. “You can roll them around on the plate before eating them. Fun and nutritious.”

Enid stared, horrified. “We were thinking maybe puréed carrots?”

Pugsley made a gagging noise. “Boring. She won’t grow strong that way. She needs protein. Like… rats.”

“Absolutely not,” Enid sputtered.

“I had my first rat when I was six months old,” Pugsley said proudly. “Tough to chew, but worth it.”

Enid turned wide eyes toward Wednesday, who calmly buttered her biscuit as though none of this concerned her.

“Do not panic,” Wednesday said. “He’s exaggerating. His first rat was closer to nine months.”

Enid dropped her head into her hands.

Grandmama, hunched and cackling at the opposite side of the table, leaned forward with her bangles clattering. “Ahh, the babe! The tiny spawn of darkness!” She bared her perfect teeth in a grin. “Have you considered her role in the family business?”

Enid perked up, cautiously. “The… family business?”

Wednesday’s eyes flickered sharply. “Do not answer that.”

Grandmama ignored her, her voice growing conspiratorial. “When I was her age, I was already gathering herbs for curses. By four, I brewed my first potion! By six, I ran a small but very lucrative enterprise.”

“What kind of… enterprise?” Enid asked warily.

“Poison distribution, mostly.” Grandmama waved her hand like it was nothing. “But times change. These days it’s about adaptability. Online markets. Branding.” She tapped her temple with a long nail. “Imagine it, eh? Baby Willa—face of the future. Gothic chic. Bottled despair. Millennials eat that up!”

Enid turned pale. “Um. We were… thinking more like… daycare?”

Grandmama cackled so loudly the candles flickered. “Daycare! Oh, darling, that’s adorable.”

Meanwhile, Uncle Fester had commandeered Willa, bouncing her on his lap while making strange electric buzzing sounds. Sparks literally danced from his fingertips as he held her tiny hands.

“See this, kiddo? You touch the socket, zap! Hours of fun!”

“Fester!” Enid yelped, half-standing. “That’s not—she’s a baby!”

“She’s my niece,” Fester retorted proudly. “She’s ready.”

“Fester.” Wednesday’s voice was calm but sharp as a blade. “If she sustains even a static shock under your care, I will introduce you to the concept of slow burial.”

Fester blinked. “…You’d really do that?”

Wednesday met his gaze evenly. “…Do you wish to test me?”

Fester grinned nervously and quickly handed Willa back to Enid, who clutched her protectively.

“She likes me, though,” Fester muttered, scratching his head. “She giggled when I showed her the battery trick.”

“That was gas,” Wednesday said.

“Nope! That was comedy!” Fester insisted.

Enid groaned. “Please don’t teach our daughter to lick batteries.”

As the meal wound down, Gomez launched into a long and animated tale of Addams ancestors.

“Did I ever tell you, querida, about our great-great-uncle Tiberius?” Gomez’s eyes glimmered as he stood, gesturing wildly with his fork. “Exiled from three countries before his twenty-fifth birthday! A poet, a swordsman, a menace to polite society!”

“I adored him,” Morticia sighed, her voice like velvet.

Enid smiled politely, nodding as though she knew who Tiberius was. “Wow… he sounds… inspiring.”

“Willa has his eyes,” Gomez declared, wiping at his tears dramatically. “Mark my words, she will carry on the legacy. A true Addams!”

“She is also half Sinclair,” Enid reminded gently.

“A blessing!” Gomez twirled his fork. “The bloodline expands, the chaos grows richer!”

Enid flushed and bit her lip as she glanced sideways at Wednesday.

Wednesday met her gaze, her face unreadable, then lifted her goblet. “To Willa. May she terrify her enemies and amuse her family.”

“To Willa!” the Addamses chorused, raising their glasses.

Enid raised hers too, smiling brightly, even as she muttered under her breath: “I just hope she doesn’t eat a rat before kindergarten.”

---

The dinner ended with Gomez fencing Pugsley across the table, Morticia complimenting the balance of Enid’s “bright salad” against the roasted tarantulas she’d brought, and Fester trying (and failing) to juggle flaming torches in an effort to “impress the baby.”

Through it all, Enid laughed nervously, adapted with surprising ease, and kept Willa tucked safely in her arms.

And Wednesday watched her wife and child bathed in candlelight, her strange family gathered around them. For a fleeting moment, she allowed herself to feel it: the bizarre comfort of belonging.

Then she smirked, raised her glass once more, and whispered to herself:

“…Irreplaceable.”

---

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was finally quiet again, the long echo of departing cars fading into the stormy night. The family had vanished back into the shadows, their voices still ringing faintly in Enid’s ears. Gomez’s booming laughter, Morticia’s languid counsel and Fester’s deranged buzzing noises.

The dining hall was in ruins. Candles burned low in their wax-strewn holders, a goblet of dark wine had tipped across the lace runner like spilled blood, and the roasted boar centerpiece had somehow ended up nose-first on the floor. Enid, though tempted to tidy up, had been shooed upstairs by Wednesday with the promise that Thing would handle the aftermath.

Now, the couple retreated into the privacy of their chamber. On the bedroom, opposite the queen-sized bed sat a large rectangle oak table with a big mirror above it, where Wednesday’s stacks of typewritten drafts leaning precariously on one side, while Enid’s nail polish collection occupied the other in a rainbow of glitter.

The baby monitor sat in the middle, a blinking green light linking their sanctuary to the nursery where Willa slept.

Enid sighed, kicking off her shoes. “That… was… intense.”

Wednesday who had already stripped her black lipstick with ruthless precision glanced up in the mirror. Her face looked strangely softer without the makeup, still severe, but tired in a way she rarely showed. “It was remarkably tame,” she said. “No duels, no arrests, only two accidental fires.”

“Two too many,” Enid muttered, pulling her dress over her head and throwing it across a chair. “I swear, Fester almost set Willa’s hair on fire with that torch stunt. She’s only six weeks old!”

“She is resilient,” Wednesday said, slipping into her floor-length black nightgown. “If the flames had licked her fuzzy hairs, she would have survived. Scars build character.”

Enid gaped, then snorted despite herself. “You’re impossible.” She tugged on one of Wednesday’s spare shirts, an oversized black one, soft with wear, and crawled onto their bed. “I don’t know how you make it sound like a good thing.”

Wednesday joined her, sitting with perfect posture as she began undoing her braids her long inky strands spilling over her shoulders. “It is a good thing,” she said. “My family merely tested her. She passed.”

Enid tucked her knees up, wrapping her arms around them. “Well, I’m glad they loved her. Your mom is really sweet, actually.”

“She suggested putting dead crickets in your biscuits.”

“Yeah, okay, but she was trying!” Enid insisted, a laugh escaping. “You have to admit, she was supportive in her own… creepy way. She didn’t judge me.” Her tone softened. “That meant a lot.”

Wednesday paused mid-braid, catching the flicker of something behind Enid’s smile. She tilted her head. “Your tone suggests you were expecting judgment.”

Enid stared at the floorboards, chewing her lip. “From my family? Always.”

The shift in mood was palpable. The chaos of the evening felt distant now. The dim lighting of the chamber cast a soft halo around Enid’s blond hair as she hugged herself tighter.

Wednesday’s eyes sharpened. “Explain.”

Enid hesitated, then exhaled. “I wrote to my family, you know. The same letter we sent to your parents, inviting them to meet Willa.”

Wednesday said nothing, her expression unreadable.

“They never answered,” Enid continued quickly, words tumbling now. “Not even a polite ‘we’re busy.’ Nothing. Radio silence. Honestly, I didn’t expect them to. But… I hoped...”

Wednesday leaned back against the carved headboard, her fingers folding neatly in her lap. “Your mother.”

Enid’s mouth twisted. “Yeah. Mom’s never forgiven me for… well. You.”

“An unforgivable crime,” Wednesday deadpanned.

Enid let out a shaky laugh. “She wanted me to marry a male wolf from the pack in San Francisco. Carry on the Sinclair line, keep it ‘pure.’” She made air quotes with her fingers. “She had this whole perfect picture in her head: me, smiling wife, strong wolf husband, three or four little pups running around. A whole cliché.”

Her voice cracked slightly. “And instead, she got me bringing home the scariest, most antisocial goth girl she’s ever seen, who also happens to be psychic. Mom hated it. Hated you.”

Wednesday’s mouth curved. “I consider that high praise.”

Enid smacked her thigh lightly, exasperated. “Weds, I’m being serious!”

“And so am I.” Wednesday leaned closer, eyes dark and steady. “Your mother’s disapproval is not a condemnation. It is proof that you chose correctly. Anything she despises must be of value.”

Enid blinked at her, torn between laughing and crying. “You can’t just… logic it away like that.”

“I can. And I have.” Wednesday’s tone softened only slightly. “If she rejects you for who you are, then she is unworthy of you.”

Enid’s throat tightened. “She’s still my mom.”

Wednesday regarded her in silence for a long moment. “And yet, she abandoned you. I will not romanticize neglect.”

Enid’s eyes shimmered. “You make it sound so simple.”

“It is.” Wednesday’s hand slipped over Enid’s, bed pale fingers cool but firm. “You are no less whole for their absence. You are not diminished.”

Enid swallowed hard, squeezing her hand back. “Sometimes I still want her to be proud of me. Of us. Of Willa.”

Wednesday tilted her head, studying her wife as though examining a rare, delicate specimen. Then she said, matter-of-factly, “Willa will never need their approval. She has mine and she has yours. That is sufficient.”

Enid gave a wet laugh, wiping her eyes with her sleeve. “You’re supposed to comfort me, not sound like a dictator.”

“This is comfort,” Wednesday insisted. “A brutal truth is always kinder than a pretty lie.”

Enid sniffed, smiling despite herself. “You really believe that?”

“I live by it.” Wednesday squeezed her hand once more, then released it, resuming the slow and methodical brushing of her hair. “Besides, your family has lost more than they realize. They will never witness Willa’s first steps, or hear her first sinister cackle. They will not sit at this table and endure her tantrums. Their punishment is exclusion.”

“Punishment,” Enid repeated, amused. “You make it sound like I hexed them.”

“I considered it,” Wednesday said dryly.

Enid chuckled, leaning closer until she could rest her head on Wednesday’s shoulder. “I’m glad your family came, though. They were… a lot, but they love you. They love Willa. Even me. I felt like…” She trailed off.

“Like you belonged,” Wednesday finished for her.

Enid nodded against her shoulder. “Yeah.”

Wednesday exhaled softly, her arm curling around Enid’s waist. “Then that is all that matters.”

For a long moment they sat in silence, the only sound the faint crackle of thunder outside and the soft hiss of the baby monitor.

Then Enid broke it with a giggle. “Still not over your Uncle Fester trying to teach Willa how to lick a nine-volt battery.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “He lacks subtlety.”

“Subtlety?! That’s your takeaway?”

“Yes. If he truly wanted to corrupt her, he should have waited until she could walk.”

Enid groaned, smacking her forehead into Wednesday’s shoulder. “You’re impossible.”

“And you married me.”

“…And I don’t regret it.” Enid tilted her head up, smiling through tears. “Even if you comfort me like you’re giving a death sentence.”

Wednesday bent slightly, brushing her lips against Enid’s temple. “I am not here to comfort you. I am here to tell you the truth. And the truth is this: Willa has two parents who adore her. That is more than enough.”

Enid closed her eyes, letting the words settle over her like a dark kind of lullaby.

Outside, lightning split the sky. Inside, under the dim lights and shadow, they held each other in the quiet aftermath of family chaos and family absence.

Chapter Text

The mansion was silent. Silent, at least, in the way only an Addams-Sinclair mansion could be: the faint groan of ancient pipes, the distant caw of ravens on the roof, and the occasional thump from the nursery as Willa shifted in her crib and dropped something. Wednesday still swore the child was already practicing projectile weaponry with her rattles.

But otherwise, quiet. Enid exhaled as she slid under the covers and stretched her arms. The sheets were cool against her skin, scented faintly of lavender and… something else. Cloves, maybe, or embalming oil. Hard to tell with Wednesday’s eccentric taste in laundry additives.

“Okay,” Enid whispered, brushing her blonde hair from her face. She turned toward her wife. “The baby’s asleep. Finally. For at least, what? Two hours? That’s enough time, right?”

Wednesday, sitting upright in bed with a typewriter balanced precariously on her knees, didn’t even look up. “Time is a meaningless construct. But yes, it is… sufficient.”

Enid wrinkled her nose. “Weds. That wasn’t romantic.”

Wednesday struck one last key and ripped the paper from the machine with crisp efficiency as she set the typewriter aside on her nightstand. Only then did she turn, those dark eyes fixing on Enid with the kind of intensity that had once made her knees weak, and still did, though these days it was often followed by the baby’s wail.

“Romance is a frivolous distraction,” Wednesday said. Then, after a beat: “Fortunately for you, I excel at it.”

Enid burst out laughing. “Oh my god. You’re impossible and arrogant.”

Wednesday smirked, sliding closer until their shoulders brushed. “Confidence is not arrogance. Shall I prove it?”

Enid’s cheeks warmed. “Yes. Please. Prove it.”

Their lips met, and for a moment, the world narrowed to just that, Enid’s heart thrumming, Wednesday’s hand steady against her jaw, the press of them both sinking into the mattress as though gravity itself approved.

Then—

“WAAAAAAAAAAH!”

Enid groaned so hard it rattled the headboard. “You have got to be kidding me.”

Wednesday sighed, already sliding out of bed with an elegance that felt almost insulting. “Her timing is impeccable. She has inherited my instincts.”

“She inherited your ability to ruin the mood,” Enid grumbled, flopping back into the pillows.

Ten minutes later Willa was fed, burped, and lulled back to sleep, this time with Wednesday reading her an excerpt from Poe in a calm monotone until the baby’s eyelids fluttered shut.

When Wednesday returned to bed, Enid was sprawled dramatically across her side, her hair wild and shirt slipping off one shoulder.

“You look like a Victorian ghost bride,” Wednesday remarked.

“Hot,” Enid mumbled into her pillow.

“Yes.” Wednesday slipped beneath the covers again, totally unbothered. “But exhausted.”

Enid rolled toward her, eyes bright even with fatigue. “Come on. We can still salvage this.”

They tried again. Fingers tangled, lips found each other, breath grew warm—

“WAAAAAAAH!”

Enid shot upright. “Oh my god. She was asleep! I swear she can sense it when we’re about to…” She flailed her hands. “…you know. Do stuff.”

Wednesday folded her arms, unruffled. “She is a creature of chaos. She knows.”

“She’s six weeks old!”

“All the more reason.”

Enid flopped back down with a groan, covering her face. “We’re never gonna have sex again, are we?”

Wednesday lay beside her, calm as a corpse in repose. “Statistically speaking, unlikely. Couples with infants often experience a decline in intimacy.”

Enid peeked through her fingers. “Wow. Thanks for the encouragement.”

“I am simply stating facts.” Wednesday paused, then reached out and brushing her knuckles over Enid’s arm. “But unlike other couples, we are not bound by normalcy. We will adapt.”

Enid melted at the unexpected softness, her eyes going glossy. “That was… actually sweet.”

“It was not sweet. It was pragmatic.”

“Same thing,” Enid teased while rolling closer. “You’re cute when you pretend not to care.”

Wednesday gave her a look that could curdle milk. “I do not pretend. I conceal.”

They attempted again. And again.

Every time they grew close with touches lingering and kisses deepening, Willa erupted. First crying, then needing a diaper change, then refusing to sleep unless Enid sang softly to her while pacing the room.

By the fourth interruption, Enid collapsed back on the bed with Willa tucked against her chest, the baby blinking up at her innocently.

“Do you think she’s doing this on purpose?” Enid asked, bouncing her gently.

“Yes,” Wednesday answered without hesitation.

“She’s just a baby.”

“She is my child. Of course she is calculating our every move.”

Enid laughed tiredly. “That’s terrifying.”

“It should be.”

---

Eventually, after another feeding, another lullaby, another Poe recital, Willa finally fell into a deeper sleep. Enid set her gently in the bassinet by the bed, tiptoeing back under the covers.

The moonlight filtered through the window, pale and soft, illuminating the two of them as they faced each other.

“Okay,” Enid whispered. “Attempt number… I lost count. But she’s out cold this time.”

Wednesday studied her wife with that same intense gaze, and Enid felt heat stir again despite the exhaustion.

They kissed deeper this time. Hands slid, breaths caught and the air thickened.

And then—

A sound. Not a cry. Not a wail.

A fart.

Willa, asleep, had chosen that precise moment to unleash an impressively loud noise from her bassinet.

Enid froze. Then she burst out laughing so hard she wheezed. “Oh my god, she did not just—”

Wednesday sat back stone-faced. “Unacceptable.”

Enid couldn’t breathe for giggling. “It’s like she’s trolling us!”

Wednesday crossed her arms. “This is psychological warfare.”

“She’s a baby!” Enid squeaked between laughter.

“Exactly. Only a baby could be so ruthless.”

---

By dawn, neither had achieved their original goal. But as Enid drifted half-asleep against Wednesday’s shoulder, Willa snuffling softly in her bassinet, she realized something.

Even if their intimacy had been interrupted a dozen times, even if they were exhausted and hilariously unlucky… they were together. In their chaos. In their mess. In their love.

“You know,” Enid murmured, eyes closing, “this still counts.”

“What does?” Wednesday asked.

“Us. Being like… an old married couple already. Interrupted, tired and laughing at farts.”

Wednesday smirked faintly, pressing a kiss to Enid’s hair. “If this is old age, I welcome it.”

---

But the night wasn’t done with them. Enid had drifted briefly into half-sleep against Wednesday’s shoulder, but a restless little sigh from the bassinet pulled her awake again. She jolted upright, panic flashing in her wolf eyes.

“Was that a cry? She sounded like she was about to cry. Did she cry?”

Wednesday didn’t move an inch. Her voice, flat and calm: “That was not a cry. That was… an exhale.”

Enid pressed a hand to her chest. “God, my nerves are fried.”

“They were never particularly sturdy to begin with,” Wednesday murmured, but her hand slipped over Enid’s, steadying it against her heart. “Rest. She’s asleep.”

Enid gave her a tired smile. “You’d make a terrible doula, you know that?”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “I would make an excellent doula. My calming presence would terrify the child into silence.”

Enid burst out laughing again, then clapped her hand over her mouth. “Shhh! Don’t wake her!”

They both froze, staring at the bassinet like condemned prisoners watching the executioner’s shadow approach.

Silence. Blessed and heavy silence.

Enid sagged back into the pillows with the tension melting from her shoulders. “Okay. Crisis averted.”

Wednesday turned toward her, her gaze sharp in the moonlight. “You’re trembling.”

“Yeah,” Enid whispered, suddenly aware of her own heartbeat. “I’m so tired. But also… I want you. I’ve missed you.”

Something flickered in Wednesday’s expression, something softer than usual, almost dangerous in its vulnerability. “And I, you.”

For a moment the air shifted.

The house was still, the shadows stretched long, and for once, Willa slumbered deeply, as if granting them a brief reprieve from her tyranny.

Enid leaned in first, lips brushing Wednesday’s. It was tentative, almost shy, but the hunger beneath it built quickly. Their mouths met again, deeper this time, Wednesday’s hand finding Enid’s waist and pulling her closer.

Enid giggled against her lips. “God, this feels like high school all over again. Sneaking around, praying we don’t get caught.”

Wednesday’s voice was low, dark, teasing: “We are caught. Our captor sleeps three feet away.”

Enid snorted. “That’s not hot.”

“It is, in a deeply unsettling way.”

Enid shook her head, laughing, and kissed her again. The laughter bled into warmth, into breathless sighs, into the press of Enid curling into Wednesday’s lap as though it were the most natural place in the world.

And then—

“WAAAAAAAAAH!”

Enid froze, forehead dropping against Wednesday’s collarbone. “No. Please no.”

Wednesday scowled at the bassinet. “She is mocking us.”

“I’ll get her,” Enid said, already swinging her legs over the bed.

But Wednesday caught her wrist. “No. Stay.”

Enid blinked. “But—”

Wednesday was already out of bed, her nightgown swishing like a shadow as she crossed to the bassinet. She loomed over it utterly calm, and whispered in that low, deadpan voice as she stared right into Willa's eyes:

“Hush, child. The world is dark and unforgiving. Soon you will learn that joy is fleeting and pain eternal. Until then, sleep.”

Willa blinked up at her… and then impossibly, she closed her eyes again.

Enid’s jaw dropped. “You’ve gotta be kidding me. That worked?!”

Wednesday returned to bed, utterly unbothered. “Of course. She responds to truth.”

Enid scrambled back under the covers, grinning in disbelief. “My wife, the baby whisperer. You’re ridiculous and also really, really hot.”

Wednesday smirked faintly. “At last, you see clearly.”

---

This time, they didn’t waste a second. Enid practically pounced on Wednesday, kissing her hard enough to elicit a rare, low sound of approval. Wednesday’s hands slid through Enid’s hair grounding her.

The fatigue didn’t matter. The interruptions didn’t matter. What mattered was this: the two of them tangled together, their laughter breaking into sighs and the steady pulse of desire weaving through exhaustion like a thread of fire.

It wasn’t the passionate chaos of their youth, all teeth and claws and wild heat. It was slower, tender in its own sharp-edged way, two women who knew each other’s scars, who had weathered battles and births and sleepless nights, relearning how to claim this part of themselves again.

Enid whispered against Wednesday’s lips, “See? Still got it.”

Wednesday murmured back, “I never lost it.”

---

When they finally collapsed together, first the glimpse of dawn started to show in the horizon. They were breathless, content, and unbelievably smug, neither noticed that Willa had stirred with her little eyes wide open, watching her mothers with unnerving calm.

Enid peeked at the bassinet just before drifting off.

“She’s staring at us again.”

“Good,” Wednesday muttered, eyes already closing. “She’s learning.”

Enid rolled her eyes but cuddled closer, smiling into the crook of Wednesday’s neck. “You’re impossible.”

Wednesday smirked faintly in her sleep. “And irresistible.”

Enid laughed softly, pressing one last kiss to her jaw. “Yeah. That too.”

The baby finally drifted back into real sleep.

And so, her mothers did too. Entwined, exhausted and triumphant.

Chapter Text

The morning crept into the Sinclair-Addams mansion in its usual fashion: like an intruder dragging its feet over creaking wood, carrying the smell of damp earth and the faint rustle of something not-quite-human in the garden.

The house itself seemed to sigh awake: the portraits’ eyes shifting, the doors groaning and the faint drip-drip of the kitchen sink echoing like a metronome of doom.

But upstairs, in the master bedroom, the atmosphere was surprisingly… cozy.

Enid was awake first, blinking against the pale gray light spilling through the curtains. For once, she didn’t feel like death warmed over. She felt radiant. Glowing, even.

She turned her head and grinned at the sight beside her. Wednesday Addams the notorious night-owl, the one who once bragged she hadn’t needed “the weakness of sleep” since childhood… was asleep.

Out cold even.

Her hair was a perfect ink-black sprawl across the pillow, her lips pressed into a tiny frown even in slumber, one arm thrown carelessly across the mattress as though she’d been dragged into unconsciousness against her will.

Enid melted. 'Oh my god. She’s so cute like this.'

The urge to take a picture nearly overwhelmed her, but she decided against it. Wednesday would definitely murder her, or worse, lecture her for such a sentimental act. Instead, she rolled onto her side, propping her chin in her hand, just… looking.

Last night.

After months of exhaustion, false starts, and Willa’s perfectly timed sabotage… they had finally done it. Finally.

And Enid had to admit it was worth every delayed attempt. Every interruption. Every diaper explosion.

She hummed softly, curling under the blankets. “Morning, wife.”

Wednesday’s eyes opened instantly. No groggy half-blinks or fumbling. Just dark, alert irises locking onto Enid as if she’d been awake all along.

“I was already conscious,” Wednesday deadpanned.

Enid grinned, leaning over to kiss her cheek. “Liar. You were totally asleep. I caught you.”

Wednesday sniffed, sitting up with that eerie composure she always carried. “If I allowed myself to appear asleep, it was merely to lull you into a false sense of security.”

Enid snorted, flopping back dramatically. “Uh-huh. Admit it. You passed out. For hours. I’ve never seen you sleep like that before.”

Wednesday adjusted her nightgown, her lips twitching almost imperceptibly. “I expend energy efficiently. Yesterday evening was… inefficient.”

Enid’s eyes went wide. Then she broke into hysterical giggles, burying her face in the pillow. “Oh my god. Did you just call sex inefficient?”

Wednesday raised a brow, entirely unbothered. “It was a wasteful expenditure of energy, yes. But a strategically satisfying one.”

Enid was laughing so hard she had tears in her eyes. “I cannot believe you. ‘Strategically satisfying’? You’re impossible.”

“Improbable, not impossible.” Wednesday slid gracefully out of bed, already tugging her hair into two neat braids. “Nevertheless, it was… a victory.”

Enid propped herself up on her elbows, cheeks flushed. “Wow. The great Wednesday Addams, admitting victory in bed. Should I put that on a T-shirt?”

“If you do,” Wednesday replied evenly, “I will wear it as evidence of your hubris, and burn it at the next family gathering.”

Enid grinned, clutching her chest. “God, I love you.”

Wednesday gave her a look sharp enough to flay flesh… but the corner of her mouth betrayed her with the faintest curl upward.

Of course, that’s when Willa woke.

“WAAAAAAAH!”

Enid scrambled out of bed. “Okay, okay! Mama’s coming!”

She scooped Willa out of her bassinet, bouncing her gently. The baby wriggled and squeaked, her tiny fists flailing.

Wednesday peered at her daughter as though studying a suspect. “She knew. She waited until dawn to resume her campaign of terror.”

Enid kissed Willa’s forehead, still glowing despite the wails. “It’s okay, sweetheart. Mommy’s just being dramatic. Don’t listen to her.”

“She should listen to me,” Wednesday muttered, tying off her second braid. “I speak only truths.”

“Like calling last night inefficient?” Enid teased.

Willa squeaked.

Enid gasped, eyes wide. “Did you hear that? She agrees with me! That was a laugh!”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “That was not a laugh. That was a hiccup.”

“It was totally a laugh!”

“A sinister cackle, at best.”

Enid bounced the baby triumphantly. “See? She’s already on my side. Girls’ team!”

Wednesday scowled, but Willa promptly burped loudly and startling, almost grotesque.

Wednesday’s smirk returned like a blade sliding from its sheath. “Correction. She is on my side.”

Enid groaned. “You’re raising her into a tiny goth overlord.”

“Precisely.”

---

Breakfast was a battlefield as always. Enid, still buzzing from last night, decided to make something bright and cheerful: scrambled eggs, toast, and optimistically, pancakes shaped like animals.

Wednesday, on the other hand, contributed a tray of black coffee strong enough to wake the dead, a small jar of pickled something she refused to identify, and toast so burnt it was essentially carbon.

They set the plates on the long oak dining table. Candles flickered along the surface, dripping wax down the candelabra. The chandelier overhead rattled as though resenting the sunlight streaming in through the curtains.

Enid plopped Willa into her high chair, strapping her in with cheerful efficiency. “Okay, baby girl. Your first proper breakfast with the fam!”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “She consumes only milk. This ceremony is meaningless.”

“Not meaningless,” Enid said, setting a stuffed toy on the tray. “It’s practice!”

Willa immediately flung the toy across the table with a shocking force that bounced off Wednesday’s coffee cup.

Wednesday regarded her daughter with approval. “She demonstrates early potential as a catapult engineer.”

Enid slapped her forehead. “Great. Another Addams trait unlocked.”

They began eating. Or in Enid’s case, valiantly trying to eat while also dodging flying objects from Willa’s high chair. The baby had discovered her ability to launch toast crumbs and spoonfuls of mush with the precision of a trebuchet.

“Weds,” Enid groaned, ducking a glob of pureed carrots. “A little help here?”

Wednesday calmly sipped her coffee. “She is honing her motor skills. Interference would be detrimental.”

A spoon clattered onto the floor.

Enid narrowed her eyes. “You’re enjoying this.”

Wednesday’s smirk gave her away. “Immensely.”

Enid wiped a streak of carrot from her arm, muttering, “You’re lucky last night was amazing, or I’d be way crankier about this.”

Wednesday leaned in slightly, her voice low and wicked. “It was inefficiency perfected.”

Enid choked on her orange juice. “Stop saying that! You’re gonna ruin the glow!”

“Good. You’re blinding.”

“Thank you!”

“That was not a compliment.”

“Yes, it was.”

They bickered through breakfast, dodging flying food and with the baby shrieking with glee every time she scored a hit. The mansion echoed with laughter, wails, and the occasional ominous creak of the walls.

---

Later, after cleaning Willa’s chaos and dragging the dishes into the sink, Enid flopped onto the couch in the parlor. Wednesday joined her with a book in hand.

Enid rested her head against her shoulder, sighing happily. “You know… this is kind of the dream, huh?”

Wednesday didn’t look up from her pages. “You mean enduring chaos, losing sleep and being constantly interrupted?”

Enid snuggled closer, smiling. “Yeah. Exactly that.”

Wednesday’s lips curved just slightly, dark and soft. “Then yes. It is the dream.”

And in the high chair nearby, Willa smirked in her sleep, tiny lips curled in a way that was far too Addams for anyone’s comfort.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion had always been a place of secrets. The floors creaked even when no one walked upon them, the curtains swayed in still air, the taxidermied raven in the hallway occasionally changed positions when no one was looking.

But lately, the strangest noise in the house wasn’t the groaning pipes or the occasional thunder that rattled the windowpanes.

It was the soft scritch scritch scritch of tiny limbs dragging across the nursery floor.

Enid had been waiting for this day like it was Christmas. She’d read the parenting books, subscribed to baby newsletters, and kept a little journal where she logged Willa’s milestones. Wednesday had once threatened to burn it, but secretly leafed through it when Enid wasn’t looking.

And today it finally happened!

“Wednesday!” Enid shrieked from the nursery, her voice cracking with excitement. “Come here right now, you have to see this!”

Wednesday appeared in the doorway within seconds, not running, but moving with that glide that somehow made her appear both calm and ominously fast.

“What catastrophe has occurred?”

“Not catastrophe,” Enid gushed as she pointed at the blanket on the floor. “Milestone. Look!”

Wednesday’s eyes dropped to the child sprawled belly-down, with her tiny fists planted and her little legs kicking furiously.

Willa was only three months old, already suspicious of the world and already moving. Slowly and awkwardly, but undeniably moving.

She rolled once, then wobbled forward, her arms and legs pushing in uneven rhythm until she propelled herself a few inches away from her blanket.

Wednesday blinked. Her lips almost curved.

Enid squealed. “She’s crawling! Our baby’s crawling!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Technically, that was more of a combat roll followed by an ungainly shuffle.”

“Don’t ruin this for me, Weds. She’s crawling. CRAWLING!” Enid swooped down to clap her hands, her hair falling forward like golden curtains. “You’re amazing, little bean! Mommy’s so proud of you!”

Willa blinked up at her with owlish seriousness, then continued her scritching progress, heading in a new direction. Which was straight toward Wednesday’s typewriter.

“Uh-oh,” Enid gasped. “Weds! She’s headed for your—”

Before she could finish, Willa reached the leg of the desk, wrapped her tiny fist around it and let out a determined grunt.

Wednesday crouched, her eyes dark and gleaming. “She exhibits tactical focus. Already she knows to target the object I hold most dear.”

“Wednesday! That’s not good! She could knock it over!”

“She won’t. Look at her form.” Wednesday’s tone was almost reverent. “The determination. The precision. She is Addams to the bone.”

“Addams-Sinclair,” Enid corrected automatically, scooping Willa up before she could bash her head on the typewriter pedal.

Willa squealed in protest, wriggling like a slippery eel.

Wednesday arched a brow. “Do not deny her instincts. She was clearly meant to strike at machinery.”

Enid hugged the baby close, shaking her head. “Nope. Baby-proofing starts now.”

Wednesday’s gaze sharpened. “Baby-proofing?”

“Yes! We need covers for the outlets, locks on the cabinets, corner pads for the tables...”

“That is appalling.”

Enid blinked. “Appalling?”

“Softening her environment will weaken her character.” Wednesday folded her arms. “Sharp corners are lessons. Poison bottles are tests. She must learn early if she is to survive in this world.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “You want our baby to play with poison bottles?!”

“Merely to acknowledge them, sniff them, perhaps attempt to unscrew a cap.” Wednesday’s eyes glimmered. “If she survives, she is worthy.”

Enid looked horrified. “Wednesday! She’s three months old!”

“And already crawling. Clearly advanced. Why should she not advance in other ways?”

Enid clutched Willa tighter. “Because she’s a baby! Babies need safety, not… rat poison.”

Wednesday sighed as though Enid were the unreasonable one. “You coddle her too much. How will she ever embrace her destiny if you treat her like porcelain?”

Enid blew out a dramatic breath. “Fine. We’ll compromise.”

Wednesday raised a brow. “Compromise?”

“Yes.” Enid pointed toward the nursery toy basket. “She can crawl toward her soft toys, or her play mat, or literally anything that won’t kill her. No typewriters, no poison bottles, no sharp daggers, no raven skull collection.”

Wednesday frowned. “You are stripping her of the most promising options.”

“She’ll live,” Enid said firmly. Then, to Willa: “You’ll live. Because Mommy’s in charge.”

Willa responded by blowing a bubble.

Wednesday smirked. “Even she doubts your authority.”

---

Of course, compromise didn’t last long.

Within the hour, Willa had wriggled herself off her blanket again. Enid had been cooing over baby clothes catalogs, and Wednesday had been scribbling a line of prose on her typewriter when the familiar scritch scritch scritch started again.

This time, Willa’s destination wasn’t the typewriter.

It was the old wooden cabinet on the corner of the room.

The cabinet where Wednesday stored her “miscellaneous curiosities.”

“Wednesday!” Enid yelped, leaping up. “She’s going for your cabinet!”

Wednesday didn’t move. “Good. She is drawn to mystery. That is a promising sign.”

“Promising sign my butt!” Enid lunged, scooping Willa up just as her tiny fingers brushed the cabinet handle. “What’s even in there?!”

Wednesday’s eyes gleamed. “Poisons. Preserved organs. A few cursed relics.”

Enid let out a strangled noise. “Are you kidding me?! In the nursery?!”

“It inspires curiosity,” Wednesday said coolly.

“It inspires cardiac arrest for me!” Enid snapped, bouncing Willa against her hip. “We are moving this cabinet. Today.”

“You will not.”

“We will!”

“You will not strip my study of its essence.”

“Weds, your essence is gonna kill our baby!”

Willa chose that moment to spit up down Enid’s shoulder.

Wednesday smirked. “She sides with me.”

Enid groaned. “Ugh, you’re impossible.”

“And yet irresistible,” Wednesday replied automatically.

---

The chaos continued all day.

Willa, empowered by her newfound mobility, became a crawling menace. She rolled off her blanket during tummy time and headed straight for Wednesday’s raven feather collection, nearly toppling the vase before Enid grabbed her. She tried to crawl under the chaise lounge, only to get stuck halfway and wail like a banshee. She made a beeline for a bookshelf and tried to gum the corner of a 17th-century volume on necromancy.

Enid’s wolf instincts were on high alert, darting after her at every turn.

“Weds, we need baby gates! And outlet covers! And...”

“No,” Wednesday said flatly, lifting Willa into the air like a tiny sacrificial offering. “She must be allowed to roam freely, like a predator on the prowl.”

“She’s not a predator, she’s three months old!”

“She is my heir. Look at her crawl. That is the crawl of conquest.”

Willa blew another bubble.

Enid groaned. “That is the crawl of chaos.”

---

By evening, the mansion was littered with signs of battle: toppled pillows, drool-streaked feathers, a spoon bent at an impossible angle. Enid collapsed on the couch, clutching Willa in her lap.

“God,” she muttered. “This kid is gonna give me gray hair before I turn thirty.”

Wednesday sat beside her, serene as always, sipping a cup of black tea.

Enid leaned her head on her shoulder. “You’re too calm about this.”

Wednesday’s lips curved faintly. “Because I recognize greatness when I see it.”

Enid glanced down at Willa, who was currently gnawing her fist with terrifying intensity.

She sighed. “She’s definitely your daughter.”

“And yours,” Wednesday said, setting her teacup down. She brushed a strand of blonde hair from Enid’s cheek with surprising tenderness. “Chaos and light. An unstoppable combination.”

Enid’s heart melted.

She kissed Wednesday’s lips, smiling despite her exhaustion. “You’re still not off the hook for the poison cabinet.”

Wednesday smirked. “We’ll see.”

And in her lap, Willa kicked her legs and let out a triumphant squeal, as though declaring victory over both of them.

Chapter Text

The trouble began the moment Willa reached the threshold of Wednesday’s special room.

Enid had been folding tiny onesies in the living room, pink ones with stars, little striped wolf prints... and then she realized the background noise of baby babble had gone silent. That silence, the kind only parents recognize, sent her wolf senses into alarm mode.

She bolted upright. “Willa?”

No answer. Just the creak of a floorboard down the hall.

Enid sprinted with her socks sliding over the hardwood. And there she was: Willa, belly to the floor, was scritching forward with dogged determination. The direction was unmistakable. The heavy oak door at the corridor’s end stood slightly ajar. Behind it lurked all manner of horrors: racks, thumb screws, iron maidens polished to a sinister gleam. Wednesday’s personal torture museum.

Enid’s stomach lurched. “Oh no, oh no, oh no—”

She dove forward, scooping Willa up just as the baby’s hand brushed the doorframe.

“Absolutely not, little bean,” Enid gasped, clutching her close. “That is not a playroom. That is the opposite of a playroom.”

Willa squawked indignantly, flailing her fists as though demanding access to the forbidden chamber.

Wednesday, of course, appeared in the hallway at that very moment, silent as a shadow.

“What are you screaming about, again?”

Enid whirled, her hair wild and the baby wriggling in her arms. “She was crawling straight into your... torture dungeon!”

Wednesday arched a brow. “Correction: my chamber of artistic exploration.”

“Whatever you call it, Weds, she can’t go in there!”

“She was merely expressing curiosity. It would have been educational.”

“Educational?!” Enid sputtered. “She’s three months old! The only thing she should be educated about right now is how to chew on her teething ring without drooling on everything!”

Willa blew a bubble.

Wednesday folded her arms. “Exposure to the grotesque will build character. One day she will thank me.”

Enid groaned, pressing her forehead to Willa’s fuzzy hair. “You are going to give me a heart attack.”

---

That night, Enid sat at the kitchen table with a notebook, the determination burning in her eyes.

Step one: Baby gates.
Step two: Outlet covers.
Step three: Cabinet locks.
Step four: Whatever the heck you do when there are literal medieval weapons displayed in your dining room.

She scribbled furiously while Wednesday sat across from her, serenely sipping tea.

“This is madness,” Wednesday observed.

“This,” Enid countered, stabbing her pen at the list, “is survival.”

“Children of the Addams bloodline have survived for centuries without rubber corner guards and padded playpens.”

“Well, this child is also Sinclair, and Sinclair babies don’t crawl into torture chambers!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “That is their loss.”

Enid slammed the notebook shut. “We’re doing this my way.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched, as if suppressing a smirk. “Very well. Amuse me.”

---

The next morning, Enid arrived home from the hardware store with an armful of supplies: gates, latches, socket covers, foam bumpers and she dumped them dramatically in the foyer.

Wednesday looked up from polishing her crossbow. “You intend to desecrate the mansion with plastic.”

“It’s not desecrating,” Enid huffed. “It’s protecting.”

“From what? A well-placed guillotine blade?”

“Yes! Exactly that!”

---

Enid’s first target was the grand staircase. The ancient banister loomed like the spine of some great beast.

She wrestled with the gate, trying to wedge it between the carved posts. “Okay, so if I just… push this here… and lock it—”

The gate wobbled.

Wednesday leaned against the wall, arms crossed and smirking faintly. “The architecture predates standardized gate dimensions by two centuries. It will not fit.”

Enid growled as she kicked the baseboard. “Nothing in this house is normal!”

“Exactly.”

Desperate, Enid tried zip-tying the gate. Then duct-taping. Then balancing it with a stack of ancient spell books.

The moment she stepped back to admire her work, the entire gate collapsed with a resounding clang.

Willa, observing from her play mat, squealed with glee and immediately rolled toward the fallen gate.

Enid scooped her up. “Not funny, bean! This is serious!”

Wednesday chuckled under her breath.

---

Next came the outlets. Enid crouched with a pack of safety covers in hand, muttering, “Okay, this should be easy.”

She stuck one into the nearest outlet.

The cover sparked, smoked, and popped back out.

Enid yelped. “What the—?!”

Wednesday strolled over, unfazed. “Those outlets are cursed. Anything inserted into them bursts into flames.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Cursed?! In the nursery?!”

“In the house,” Wednesday corrected. “A charming family heirloom.”

Enid groaned. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”

Willa cooed as though agreeing with her mother’s despair.

---

Determined, Enid moved on to cabinet locks.

She knelt at the kitchen cupboards, affixing plastic latches with practiced ease. “There. Now she can’t get into cleaning supplies.”

Wednesday peered over her shoulder. “Those are not cleaning supplies.”

“What are they then?”

“Specimens. Preserved in formaldehyde.”

Enid froze. “…Specimens of what?”

Wednesday’s smirk widened. “Would you like to see?”

Enid slammed the cabinet shut. “Absolutely not.”

---

Finally, Enid tried to baby-proof the living room table. She stuck foam padding to each sharp corner, stepping back proudly.

“There! Now if she bumps her head, it won’t hurt.”

Wednesday tapped one of the bumpers with a black-lacquered nail. “Pathetic.”

“Safe,” Enid corrected.

Just then Thing scuttled by, curious. He tapped the foam experimentally. Then yanked it off with ease and scurried away with it.

Enid buried her face in her hands. “I can’t win.”

Willa clapped her tiny hands as though applauding the chaos.

---

The final straw came by afternoon, Enid sat on the floor surrounded by half-installed baby gear and looking utterly defeated.

Wednesday lounged on the chaise, reading a book calm as always.

“This house isn’t baby-proofable,” Enid groaned. “It’s like trying to wolf-proof the moon.”

Wednesday lowered her book, her dark gaze softening ever so slightly. “Perhaps the problem lies not in the house, but in your perception.”

Enid looked up, exasperated. “Weds, there are literal spike pits in the cellar.”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s lips twitched. “Character-building.”

Enid gave her a look. “She’s three months old.”

“And already resourceful. Did you not see the way she attempted to pry open the raven feather jar? A lesser child would have tired.”

“That’s not—ugh, Wednesday!” Enid collapsed backward with a groan. “I just want her safe.”

Wednesday set her book aside and knelt beside her wife, her expression softer now. “And she will be. Because she has you. And me.”

Enid’s eyes shimmered.

Wednesday picked up Willa, who had crawled into the fray and was chewing on a foam bumper. She cradled her against her dark dress.

“She will grow surrounded by danger, yes. But also by love. Which is far more dangerous than any iron maiden.”

Enid blinked at her, then burst out laughing. “You are so dramatic.”

Wednesday smirked. “And you married me.”

---

That night the three of them sat in the nursery, the failed baby-proofing gear piled in a sad heap in the corner.

Enid rocked Willa gently, sighing. “Okay. Maybe the gates won’t fit, and the outlets are cursed, and Thing stole all the foam pads. But we’ll figure it out. Together.”

Wednesday rested her hand on Enid’s knee. “Together.”

Willa gurgled, then let out a delighted squeal, her tiny hand reaching toward the mobile above her crib.

Enid kissed her forehead. “No torture chambers, no poisons, no guillotines. That’s my rule.”

Wednesday smirked. “For now.”

Enid groaned. “Wednesday!”

But when she glanced up she caught that rarest of things: a true smile ghosting across Wednesday’s lips as she looked at their daughter.

And suddenly, Enid thought that maybe Willa was safe. In her own Addams-Sinclair kind of way.

Chapter Text

It happened on an ordinary, stormy Thursday. The Addams-Sinclair mansion rattled under the percussion of rain. The great windows streaked with rivulets, thunder cracking overhead as though applauding some unseen performance. Wednesday sat in her study, hunched over her typewriter, tapping out a particularly gruesome passage involving a poisoned chalice and a doomed knight.

Meanwhile, in the nursery down the hall, Enid was in full “mom mode.” She sat cross-legged on the carpet with a bright blanket spread out and Willa's toys everywhere toys strewn everywhere, like wooden blocks, plush wolves and a squeaky bat doll.

Willa was lying on her belly, rolling and babbling, her eyes sharp and oddly aware for such a tiny thing.

“Come on, bean,” Enid encouraged, wiggling her fingers. “Say ‘mama.’ You can do it. Ma-ma.”

Willa blinked. Babbled something that sounded suspiciously like “mwa-mwa.” Then giggled.

Enid squealed, bouncing in place. “Oh my god, you are a genius. The smartest baby in the world. Wait until Mommy hears about this—”

Before she could finish, the nursery lightbulb above flickered. Once. Twice. And then shattered. The glass rained down like morbid confetti.

Enid yelped, shielding Willa with her body. “What the—?!”

The storm outside roared louder, the wind rattling the panes. The mobile above Willa’s crib —a whimsical mix of wolves and little moons Enid had picked out— began to spin wildly, though there was no draft.

And then Willa laughed.

Not a baby giggle, this was different. It was a low, bubbling little cackle.

Enid’s blood froze.

“Oh no. Oh no, no, no. Bean? Baby bean? That’s… that’s not normal.”

Willa’s tiny hands reached toward the shards of glass scattered on the carpet. Before Enid could scoop them away, the pieces quivered and slid across the floor on their own, clicking together into a perfect, jagged circle.

Enid shrieked, snatching Willa up. “WEDNESDAY! Get in here right now!”

Wednesday arrived, calm as a shadow despite the chaos. Her eyes flicked to the broken bulb, the circling glass, the wildly spinning mobile.

Enid, wide-eyed and frantic, shoved the baby at her. “She broke the light with her mind! And—and the glass moved on its own! And then she laughed like an evil overlord!”

Willa cooed innocently in Wednesday’s arms.

Wednesday’s gaze softened. “Magnificent.”

“Magnificent?!” Enid squeaked. “That was terrifying! Babies are supposed to rattle toys, not summon haunted glass rituals!”

Wednesday cradled Willa against her chest, stroking her tiny curls. “She’s advanced. Clearly she has inherited my psychic gifts. The bloodline continues.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “You’re happy about this?”

Wednesday’s lips twitched into the faintest smile. “Ecstatic.”

Enid clutched her head. “This is my nightmare. I mean—don’t get me wrong, I love her no matter what, but what if she—what if she summons, like, demons?!”

“Then she will have playmates.”

“Wednesday!”

---

The rest of the day was chaos.

Enid, paranoid, carried Willa everywhere, unwilling to leave her alone for even a second. She covered outlets, swept the floors and tucked the baby blanket around her like a protective shield.

Willa, of course, gurgled sweetly as though nothing was amiss.

Meanwhile, Wednesday followed like a proud hawk, noting every flicker of strangeness with delight. The toy blocks stacked themselves in eerie perfect towers whenever Willa reached for them. A shadow in the corner twitched when she cried. And once when Enid sneezed, the nursery curtains swished dramatically closed as though on command.

“See?” Wednesday murmured, stroking her daughter’s cheek. “She already bends the world to her will.”

“Weds,” Enid hissed, “she’s a baby! She’s not supposed to bend anything!”

“On the contrary. She is supposed to bend everything.”

Enid groaned, flopping back onto the carpet. “Why couldn’t she inherit my side of the family’s genes? Nice wolf powers, you know? Fangs, claws, a healthy respect for full moons?”

“Because those are boring,” Wednesday replied smoothly.

Enid grabbed a plush bat and hurled it at her wife. Wednesday caught it midair without looking.

---

That night the storm still raged when they finally put Willa to bed. Enid lingered anxiously by the crib, chewing on her lip.

“What if she does it again?” she whispered. “What if she explodes the lamp this time? Or levitates the whole crib?”

Wednesday set a cool hand on her shoulder. “Then I will applaud.”

Enid turned to her, exasperated. “Weds, I’m serious! What if this is dangerous?”

Wednesday’s expression softened. “Enid. Everything worth loving is dangerous.”

That silenced her, if only for a heartbeat.

Wednesday leaned in, brushing their foreheads together. “She is our daughter. And she is extraordinary. You should be proud.”

Enid sighed. “I am proud. I just… I wasn’t ready for this.”

“You never are. That’s what makes it worthwhile.”

Enid groaned, half-laughing and half-crying. “Why do you always win arguments with creepy poetry?”

“Because it works,” Wednesday said simply.

---

At two in the morning, a sharp crack of thunder woke them both.

Enid bolted upright. “Do you hear that?”

Wednesday didn’t stir. “It’s thunder.”

“No, not that. The humming.”

Sure enough, a strange vibration filled the air. Low, soft and unsettling. It was coming from the nursery.

They rushed in together.

Willa lay in her crib, her eyes wide open and humming in a tone eerily similar to the storm outside. Her mobile spun lazily above her, though the air was still. The blocks on the floor rearranged themselves into crooked letters: W.

Enid gasped. “She—she spelled something! Oh my god, she’s spelling!”

Wednesday’s lips curved. “Her first letter. Of course it would be W.”

Enid clutched Wednesday’s arm. “Wednesday, that’s—this is way too much! Normal babies roll over and maybe eat mush! They don’t… they don’t channel storm energy and write cryptic messages!”

Wednesday tilted her head, eyes glowing with delight. “She is perfect.”

Willa cooed, eyes glittering like onyx.

Lightning flashed, illuminating the three of them in stark white.

And in that moment, Enid realized that maybe Wednesday was right. Maybe their daughter was terrifying. But she was their terrifying.

Enid scooped her up, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Fine. But she is not summoning demons until she’s potty trained.”

Willa giggled again.

And somewhere in the house a door creaked open by itself.

Enid froze. “Okay, no. Nope. Absolutely not.”

Wednesday smirked. “Yes.”

---

The next morning, Enid called her mother-in-law.

“Morticia? Hi, it’s Enid. So, uh… did Wednesday, by any chance, start breaking lightbulbs with her brain as a baby?”

A pause. Then Morticia’s rich, velvety voice sounded from the other line. “Darling, that is such a sweet milestone. Treasure it. Before you know it, she’ll be conjuring shadows in the hallways, and then you’ll really have your hands full.”

Enid hung up the phone and buried her face in her hands.

Wednesday, passing by with her coffee, whispered smugly, “Told you so.”

Chapter Text

The Sinclair-Addams mansion had survived plagues, fires, banshees, tax collectors, and even a mild infestation of cursed moths. But nothing tested its foundations more than the small, relentless jaws of Willa.

She was five months old with soft curls framing her round face, eyes like bottomless ink wells and a mouth that had suddenly decided everything was edible.

It began innocently enough.

Enid was in the living room, bouncing Willa on her lap when she noticed her daughter reaching for Wednesday’s latest manuscript.

“Aw, bean, you want to see Mommy’s work? Don’t tell her I let you, okay?” Enid cooed, handing the baby a corner page.

Willa promptly stuffed it into her mouth.

Enid yelped. “No, no, no, not eat! Read! READ, baby, not—oh my god, you slobbered all over chapter fourteen!”

From the doorway Wednesday appeared, expression unreadable. She crossed the room in that eerily silent way of hers, plucked the manuscript from Willa’s gummy grip and inspected the damage.

A damp crescent of drool glistened on the edge.

Wednesday’s mouth barely twitched. “This is the most authentic review I’ve ever received. She devoured it.”

Enid groaned, bouncing Willa against her chest. “Weds, this isn’t funny! She’s teething. Everything goes in her mouth now. Everything. I found her chewing on Thing earlier.”

Thing waved indignantly from the armchair, flipping her the finger.

Enid sighed. “I’m serious, Wednesday. We need to give her proper teething toys. Wooden rings or frozen fruit, safe stuff you know... Not manuscripts, haunted relics, and definitely not my necklace!”

As if summoned, Willa reached for the silver wolf pendant around Enid’s neck and shoved it between her gums.

Enid squeaked. “See?!”

Wednesday’s gaze sharpened. She tilted her head, studying her daughter. “Perhaps she prefers symbols of power. Manuscripts and heirlooms. Better than plastic trinkets.”

“Or maybe she just likes shiny things and crinkly paper!” Enid snapped, exasperated.

Willa gurgled, chewing happily.

---

Later that night, Enid was getting Willa ready for bed. Pajamas with little paw prints, brushed curls and lullabies humming under her breath. She leaned down to kiss her daughter’s forehead only for Willa’s fist to shoot out, grabbing the necklace again and tugging with shocking strength.

The chain snapped.

“HEY!” Enid gasped. “That’s Mama’s favorite necklace! Bad bean!”

Willa blinked innocently and stuffed the broken pendant into her mouth.

Enid nearly fainted. “Wednesday! She’s eating silver!”

Wednesday, perched in her chair with a book didn’t even look up. “Good. It will strengthen her immunity against werewolf hunters.”

Enid whirled. “That’s not a thing!”

“It is now.”

Enid groaned, prying the necklace free. “This child is going to give me grey hairs before thirty.”

“You will wear them well,” Wednesday murmured, turning a page.

---

Days later, Enid noticed it: a tiny white nub breaking through Willa’s gum. She gasped so loud it startled the baby into a small psychic ripple. The curtains flapped, the floor creaked, and a raven feather collection upstairs burst out of its jar and scattered through the hallway.

“Wednesday!” Enid shouted, sprinting into the study with Willa in her arms. “Oh my god, it’s happening!”

Wednesday didn’t look up from her typewriter. “If you’re referring to Ragnarok, I’ll need more specifics.”

“Her first tooth!” Enid squealed, bouncing on her heels. “Look! Look!”

Reluctantly, Wednesday rose and approached. Enid pried Willa’s mouth open with gentle fingers.

There it was.

Small, sharp and pointed. Not a regular baby tooth. A canine.

A wolf’s fang.

Enid’s eyes filled with tears. “Oh my god, Weds… it’s a wolf tooth. She’s… she’s part of me too.”

Wednesday’s face betrayed nothing but inside, her chest tightened in a way she’d never admit. She traced the tiny nub with a black-nailed finger, her voice softer than usual.

“Exquisite.”

Enid laughed wetly, kissing Willa’s cheek over and over. “I was so scared she’d only get your side, you know? Psychic and morbid and spooky. But look at this! She’s… she’s both of us.”

Willa squealed proudly, baring her little fang like a victory flag.

Wednesday’s smirk ghosted at the corner of her lips. “A hybrid. Psychic and wolf. The ultimate predator.”

Enid swatted her shoulder. “Don’t call our baby a predator!”

“She will devour kingdoms,” Wednesday intoned.

“She’ll devour applesauce,” Enid corrected. “And only when she’s six months old.”

---

With the new tooth came new disasters.

One morning, Enid walked in to find Willa gnawing on the leg of the antique dining table.

“Bean! That’s Victorian oak!”

From the hallway Wednesday appeared casually, holding a cup of pitch black coffee, “Let her have it. I gnawed my first guillotine at that age.”

Enid nearly screamed.

Later that day, Wednesday caught Willa chewing on the spine of Macabre Murder Ballads: A Complete Anthology.

“Impeccable taste,” she murmured, patting the baby’s head.

Enid stormed in, hands on hips. “No, Wednesday! She needs actual teething toys, not… not 200-year-old tomes of murder songs!”

“She chooses what she needs,” Wednesday countered calmly.

“She chooses DANGER!” Enid snapped.

Wednesday smirked. “Then she is choosing correctly.”

---

At dinner, Enid tried giving Willa a frozen teething ring. The baby spat it out immediately and lunged for Wednesday’s silver soup spoon.

Before Enid could intervene, Willa clamped down with surprising force, leaving tiny fang indents in the metal.

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Weds… did you see that?”

Wednesday’s eyes gleamed. “Yes. She has your bite.”

Enid flushed, shoving her shoulder. “Don’t make that sound dirty right now.”

Willa squealed, banging the spoon like a war drum.

Wednesday raised her wineglass. “To our daughter. The psychic wolf hybrid with teeth sharp enough to pierce silver.”

Enid clinked reluctantly. “To our little menace.”

---

One night, long after Willa had gone down, Enid lay in bed, staring at the ceiling.

“She’s going to have a hard life, isn’t she?” she whispered.

Wednesday, beside her, closed her book. “All meaningful lives are hard.”

“I mean it, Weds. Half-wolf, half-psychic? Kids can be cruel. People can be cruel. What if she doesn’t fit anywhere?”

“She will not need to,” Wednesday replied. “She will carve a place for herself. With her teeth, her mind, her will. Just as we did.”

Enid turned, meeting her wife’s steady gaze.

“You’re really proud of her, huh?”

Wednesday’s voice was soft but resolute. “She is ours. She is terrible. She is perfect.”

Enid smiled through her tears, curling against her. “God, I love you.”

“And I tolerate you deeply,” Wednesday murmured, kissing her hair.

---

The next morning they found Willa sitting proudly in her crib, holding Wednesday’s latest manuscript half-eaten with its edges damp with drool.

Enid groaned. “Bean! Again?!”

Wednesday smiled faintly. “An excellent critic. She found the ending delicious.”

Enid rolled her eyes, but when she looked at her daughter’s single sharp tooth flashing in a gummy grin, her heart melted.

“Okay,” she whispered, kissing Willa’s forehead. “Okay. You can be spooky and teething and chew on everything. Because you’re ours.”

Willa cackled and the lightbulb flickered.

Enid winced. “Oh boy.”

Wednesday’s smirk widened. “Oh, yes.”

Chapter Text

For weeks, Enid had been on a mission.

Not the usual mission of stopping her baby from gnawing on haunted manuscripts, not the mission of baby-proofing torture chambers, not even the mission of persuading Wednesday that Willa couldn’t nap inside a coffin because “ventilation issues.”

No, this mission was simple and beautiful. The most important milestone yet.

“Say it with me, bean,” Enid cooed, sitting cross-legged on the nursery rug, Willa propped on a pile of pillows before her. “Ma-ma. Ma-ma.”

Her daughter blinked, drooled, and stuffed a raven feather into her mouth.

Enid sighed. “We’ve been over this. You don’t eat your toys, you talk with them.”

From the corner of the room, Wednesday observed with her usual gothic deadpan, arms crossed over her black dress. “You are wasting your time. The child has no interest in such banalities.”

Enid shot her a glare. “Excuse me? Mama is not banal. Mama is precious. Mama is sacred. Mama is the word she should say first.”

Wednesday raised a brow. “Why limit her? Why force her into the mundanity of sentimental syllables when she could aspire to more? Imagine it: her first word, whispered with chilling clarity, like ‘vengeance.’ Or perhaps ‘crypt.’”

Enid groaned. “She’s a baby, Weds, not a vampire countess!”

“Not yet,” Wednesday said darkly.

---

Over the next days, Enid doubled down.

She repeated “Mama” in sing-song melodies while feeding Willa. She whispered “Mama” while rocking her at night. She exaggerated her lips, her cheeks, her vowels until she looked like a wolf trying to perform in a children’s puppet show.

Willa’s response was always the same: gummy grins, delighted giggles, and zero articulation.

Sometimes she blew spit bubbles. Once she sneezed directly into Enid’s open mouth.

But never did she say Mama.

Wednesday, meanwhile, had begun her own counter-campaign.

At breakfast, she leaned over Willa’s highchair, her voice a velvet monotone. “Decay. Try it. De-cay.”

Enid smacked her arm. “Stop giving her creepy words!”

“They’re not creepy. They are powerful,” Wednesday corrected. She dipped a spoon into Willa’s mushy oatmeal, held it before the baby like a bribe. “Say ‘mortality’ and you may eat.”

Enid ripped the spoon away. “Wednesday! You can’t withhold breakfast until she says gothic vocabulary!”

“I can and I will,” Wednesday intoned, folding her arms.

From his perch at the end of the table, Thing tapped his fingers like he was at a sports match.

---

It didn’t take long for the house to split into sides.

Enid rallied the werewolf toys, stuffed animals, and rattles into her crusade. She lined them up around Willa’s playpen like cheerleaders, chanting “Mama, Mama” in increasingly high-pitched voices.

Wednesday recruited the Addams family heirlooms. The grimoires, the skull collection, even Morticia’s long-dead roses in their vases seemed to lean in when she whispered, “Oblivion.”

Thing acted as referee, rolling his wrist in disapproval whenever Enid got too pushy, snapping his fingers whenever Wednesday got too intense.

At one point, Enid collapsed dramatically onto the rug, hands over her face. “She’s never gonna say it, Wednesday! What if her first word is… ‘goo’ or ‘bwah’ or something meaningless?!”

Wednesday, calm as ever, sat down beside her. “That would still be more profound than ‘Mama.’”

Enid peeked through her fingers. “You’re impossible.”

“I am inevitable,” Wednesday corrected.

---

Days turned into weeks.

Willa babbled constantly now, strings of nonsense sounds spilling from her mouth as if language itself was bubbling inside her like a cauldron.

“Babababa,” she’d chirp while chewing on the table leg.

“Gugugugu,” she’d sing as she smacked Thing’s hand like a drum.

Enid was encouraged. “She’s getting close! She’s experimenting! Mama’s coming, I can feel it!”

Wednesday remained impassive. “I can feel nothing. Except perhaps despair at the shrillness of your optimism.”

But even she couldn’t hide the faint gleam in her eye whenever Willa babbled. Something about hearing that little voice filled her with a strange, unnameable warmth. Not that she’d admit it.

---

It happened on a dreary afternoon, the kind Wednesday adored. Clouds smothered the sun. Ravens cawed from the roof. The scent of rain and damp soil lingered in the air.

Enid sat on the rug, Willa perched before her in her little black onesie decorated with embroidered bats.

“Say Mama,” Enid coaxed gently, brushing a curl from her daughter’s forehead. “Come on, bean. You can do it. Ma-ma.”

Willa giggled, clapped her hands, and babbled incoherently.

Wednesday, seated in her armchair with a book, murmured without looking up, “Say ‘doom.’ It rolls nicely off the tongue.”

Thing scampered across the floor to join them, tapping his fingers impatiently.

And then—

Willa stopped. Looked around. Her big black eyes locked directly onto Thing.

She stretched out her chubby hand.

And in the clearest baby babble yet, she declared:

“Teeng!”

The room froze.

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Oh my god.”

Wednesday’s book slipped shut with a snap.

Thing flung himself backward in shock, then stood tall, wiggling his fingers like a champion wrestler.

“Teeng!” Willa repeated, pointing insistently at him, bouncing with excitement.

Enid collapsed onto her back, laughing until tears filled her eyes. “Her first word! Oh my god, her first word was Thing!”

Wednesday’s lips twitched, the Addams equivalent of roaring laughter. She turned to the disembodied hand, her tone solemn. “Congratulations. You have usurped maternity.”

Thing puffed up proudly, tapping his invisible chest with one finger like, 'That’s right.'

Enid rolled onto her side, clutching her stomach. “I spent weeks trying to get her to say Mama. You whispered ‘doom’ at her for hours. And she says… Thing.”

Willa squealed again, pointing at her friend. “Teeng! Teeng!”

Thing performed a little victory dance, spinning in a circle before striking a triumphant pose.

Wednesday arched a brow. “Perhaps I underestimated her genius. She has chosen an unconventional word. Morbidly fitting.”

Enid groaned. “Unconventional?! She picked the hand!”

“Our daughter has impeccable taste,” Wednesday replied, smirking. “Thing is a loyal companion. Reliable. Silent. All qualities I hoped she’d appreciate.”

Thing blew her a sarcastic kiss.

---

The house erupted into chaos.

Every time Willa saw Thing, she shouted, “Teeng!” Her little arms flailed until he skittered over to let her tug at his fingers.

Enid started to despair. “She’s gonna grow up thinking he’s her third parent, isn’t she?”

“Perhaps her only true parent,” Wednesday mused, enjoying Enid’s horrified expression.

“Don’t you dare encourage this!” Enid hissed.

Thing, of course, basked in his new role like a crowned king. He insisted on extra portions at dinner, demanded the nicest chair in the living room, and even tried to push Enid aside when she picked Willa up from her crib.

“Don’t give me that look,” Enid snapped one night when Thing crossed his fingers smugly. “You’re not Mama. I’m Mama.”

Willa gurgled happily, pointing at him. “Teeng!”

Enid clutched her chest. “Betrayal! Absolute betrayal!”

Wednesday, watching from the shadows, whispered, “Glorious.”

---

That night, in their bedroom, Enid flopped onto the bed dramatically. “I can’t believe her first word wasn’t Mama. It was Thing. Thing!”

Wednesday calmly removed her boots. “You should be honored. At least it wasn’t something mundane, like ‘ball.’”

Enid whined, burying her face in the pillow. “You’re taking this way too well.”

Wednesday slid beside her, resting her cool hand over Enid’s. “Words are only symbols. She may not have said Mama today. But she knows you are hers.”

Enid peeked at her, heart softening despite herself. “…You really think so?”

Wednesday leaned closer, pressing a kiss to her temple. “I know so.”

Enid sighed, smiling against the pillow. “You always know what to say.”

“I always know what you need to hear,” Wednesday corrected.

From the crib in the nursing room, Willa stirred, sat up, and pointed toward Thing’s little cot in the corner.

“Teeng!” she babbled again before falling back asleep.

Enid groaned into the pillow. “This is my life now, isn’t it?”

Wednesday smirked in the darkness. “Yes. And it’s perfect.”

Chapter Text

The Sinclair-Addams mansion had never been quiet, but since Willa turned six months, silence had become a myth.

The baby babbled like she was narrating the entire gothic opera of her own existence. And not just nonsense anymore, her little words were taking shape, clear enough that even Enid’s sensitive wolf-ears couldn’t deny what she heard.

“Mama Woof,” Willa chirped one afternoon, clapping her chubby hands together as Enid tried and failed to spoon mashed pumpkin into her daughter’s mouth.

Enid’s heart nearly exploded. “Oh my god. Did you hear that, Weds? Did you hear it? She called me Mama Woof!”

From across the table, Wednesday’s expression was unreadable. She was sipping her black coffee like it had personally wronged her. “A humiliating title.”

“It’s adorable!” Enid countered, wiping pumpkin off her cheek after Willa smeared it there with her grabby fists. “She knows I’m her wolf mama. I love it.”

Wednesday raised an imperious brow. “And what, pray tell, does she call me?”

As if on cue, Willa turned, beamed at her darker mother, and proudly declared:

“Mama Doom!”

Enid burst into giggles. “Oh my god. She nailed us. Nailed us both.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched, ever so slightly. “Adequate.”

Thing, perched on the table like a smug referee, snapped his fingers in applause.

---

The nicknames weren’t the only development.

Little pearly nub had that begun breaking through Willa’s gums, was fully out and it was an unmistakably a sharp canine, a tiny wolf fang poking out like a warning sign.

Enid had squealed so loud when she saw them that the raven in the rafters dropped dead of fright. “Oh my god, Wed, look at it, it's fully out now, tiny, sharp and perfect!”

Wednesday had inspected the fang with the precision of a scientist. “Impressive. Efficient tools for tearing flesh. I approve.”

---

But of course Willa's psychic abilities had been developing too. Wednesday took notes on that like a proud academic.

Enid took antacids for the anxiety.

“She’s gonna start predicting my death or something,” Enid muttered one evening as she tried to rock Willa to sleep.

“Don’t be absurd,” Wednesday said calmly. “She’ll predict mine first. I’m the obvious target.”

Enid gave her a look. “That’s not reassuring.”

---

The news of Willa’s “Mama Woof/Mama Doom” titles traveled fast, thanks to Enid gushing in a late-night letter to Morticia.

Within a week, a massive crate arrived at their doorstep. It was iron-bound, stamped with the Addams family crest, and accompanied by a handwritten note in Morticia’s elegant script:

𝐌𝐲 𝐝𝐚𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐝𝐚𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐞𝐫, 𝐆𝐨𝐦𝐞𝐳 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐈 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐞𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐖𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐚’𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐠𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬. 𝐍𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲, 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐜𝐡𝐢𝐥𝐝 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐩𝐞𝐫 𝐞𝐧𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐡𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐞𝐧𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐚𝐠𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬. 𝐄𝐧𝐜𝐥𝐨𝐬𝐞𝐝 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐚 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐚𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐪𝐮𝐞 𝐠𝐮𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐨𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐅𝐫𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐞—𝐬𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐞𝐝 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐧𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐮𝐬𝐞. 𝐌𝐚𝐲 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐛𝐞 𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐲, 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐥𝐚𝐝𝐞 𝐬𝐰𝐢𝐟𝐭, 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐡𝐞𝐫 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐛𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬. 𝐖𝐢𝐭𝐡 𝐥𝐨𝐯𝐞, 𝐌𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐚.

Enid had shrieked so loud that Thing hid under the couch.

“THEY SENT GUILLOTINES FOR OUR BABY. WEDNESDAY. GUILLOTINES.”

Wednesday pried the crate open with unnerving calm. Inside gleamed three miniature guillotines, blades polished to a deadly sheen, their stands carved with intricate gothic detail.

Her eyes softened. “I had one of these as a child. It decapitated dolls beautifully.”

Enid clutched her hair. “We can’t put guillotines in a nursery!”

“Why not? They encourage fine motor skills.”

“Because she’ll use them!”

“Precisely.”

The argument lasted two hours, ending only when Enid stuffed the guillotines into the attic while Wednesday looked personally betrayed.

“You’re robbing her of tradition,” Wednesday accused.

“I’m keeping her alive,” Enid snapped back.

---

It was on a stormy Tuesday when the guillotine debate returned with force.

Enid had taken Willa to the parlor, laying her on a blanket with her pile of toys: plush bats, rattles shaped like coffins, and one suspiciously sharp raven feather that Wednesday swore was “child-safe.”

While Enid dashed into the kitchen to rescue a batch of half-burned cookies, Willa proved just how much her crawling had advanced. She rolled, wiggled, and managed to scoot herself straight toward the doorway… and toward the parlor shelf where Wednesday had placed one of the “safe-for-observation-only” guillotines after Enid hid the others.

By the time Enid returned, she nearly dropped the tray.

“WILLA HECATE SINCLAIR-ADDAMS! YOU PUT THAT DOWN RIGHT NOW!”

There sat her daughter, chubby hands clamped around the wooden frame of the guillotine, drooling happily as she tried to shove the blade into her mouth.

“Teeth!” Willa babbled proudly.

Enid shrieked, sprinting forward. “No teeth! Bad teeth!”

But just as she lunged, her sock caught the edge of the rug. She slipped, arms pinwheeling, tray flying. The cookies soared like projectiles toward the baby.

And then it happened.

Willa’s eyes glowed faintly, inky black swallowing her irises. The guillotine slammed shut with supernatural force, slicing the falling cookies into neat halves before they could hit Enid's head.

The blade gleamed. Willa clapped.

Enid froze mid-crawl, gasping. “Oh my god. She… she just… used the guillotine to save me?!”

Wednesday entered the room at that moment, utterly serene, a book tucked under her arm. She surveyed the scene with the split cookies, the glowing-eyed baby and Enid still sprawled on the floor.

“She saved you,” Wednesday said, voice rich with satisfaction. “Using the proper family heirloom, no less.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “PROPER FAMILY HEIRLOOM?! SHE NEARLY—she could have—”

“She did not. She acted decisively, efficiently, and with elegance.” Wednesday crouched, plucked half a cookie from the guillotine’s tray, and bit into it. “And improved your recipe in the process. They’re edible now.”

Enid covered her face with her hands. “This is insane. Absolutely insane.”

“Insanity is only the fear of genius,” Wednesday replied calmly, lifting Willa into her arms. The baby squealed, tugged at her braids, and babbled proudly: “Mama Doom! Chop-chop!”

Thing snapped his fingers wildly.

Enid groaned into the floor.

---

That night, after Willa was finally asleep, Enid slumped into bed beside Wednesday with all the grace of a drowned wolf.

“She’s six months old. She’s teething, psychic, crawling into torture chambers, and now she knows how to operate a guillotine. I can’t. I just can’t.”

Wednesday, brushing out her braids with measured strokes, replied, “You can and you will. She is perfect.”

Enid sat up, glaring. “She’s a baby, Weds! She shouldn’t be chopping baked goods with ancient French execution devices!”

“Why not? Other babies wave rattles. Ours wields history.”

Enid groaned, collapsing onto her back. “You’re so calm. How do you do that? How are you not terrified all the time like me?”

Wednesday turned, her eyes unusually soft in the candlelight. “Because terror is wasted energy. And because I know she is strong. Stronger than you or I. She is both wolf and psychic. She will never need to be caged.”

Enid blinked at her, heart tightening. “…You really believe that?”

“I do.”

For a long moment, they sat in silence. Enid traced Wednesday’s pale hand with her finger, letting the reassurance settle into her bones.

Finally, she whispered, “Mama Doom, huh?”

Wednesday smirked. “Better than Mama Woof.”

Enid snorted, grabbing her pillow to swat her wife. “Take that back!”

Willa stirred in her crib at the sound, opened her eyes briefly, and mumbled sleepily, “Mama Doom… Mama Woof…”

Enid melted instantly as she heard it from the baby monitor.

Wednesday smirked in triumph.

And in the dark of their gothic bedroom, with rain drumming against the windows and their baby murmuring between them, the Addams-Sinclair family drifted into uneasy, chaotic, and utterly perfect peace.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion had a rhythm, if you could call constant chaos a rhythm. Enid had learned to keep the house stocked like a battlefield supply line: flour for cookies, black candles for Wednesday’s rituals, formula for Willa, and an endless supply of coffee beans to prevent Wednesday from going full apocalypse.

But by the end of the month, the pantry looked like a haunted cave. Flour bins scraped empty, the cookie jar stood barren, and Wednesday had muttered darkly that if she had to drink “that powdered imposter” instant coffee again, she would “commit a justified homicide.”

Usually, Enid solved this problem by ordering groceries online. It was safe, it was efficient, and best of all, it didn’t involve dragging her gothic wife into fluorescent-lit “normal people” spaces.

But today? Today was different.

The sky outside was uncharacteristically gray, thick with storm clouds. A chill wind rattled the trees. Ravens croaked like they were warning the neighborhood that something wicked was coming.

Enid’s wolf senses tingled. “Perfect day for a supermarket trip.”

Enid found Wednesday in her writing room, perched at her antique typewriter, keys clacking with lethal precision. A candle burned low beside her, its flame the only warm light in the gloom.

“Babe?” Enid poked her head in.

“No,” Wednesday replied flatly, before Enid even asked.

“You don’t even know what I was gonna say!”

“I do. You wish to drag me into civilization to acquire life-sustaining rations. My answer is no.”

Enid marched in, hands on her hips. “Okay, fine, yes. But come on! We’re out of literally everything. We need flour. We need milk. We need fruit. And your coffee beans. And formula. And baby wipes. And...”

“Stop.” Wednesday raised a pale hand like a judge silencing the court. “You are listing horrors. I will not submit myself to bright lights, cheery music, and the stench of detergent.”

“But it’ll be fun,” Enid insisted. “We’ll take Willa with us! It’ll be her first supermarket trip.”

Wednesday’s typewriter stilled. She turned slowly, eyes narrowing. “You consider this an outing?”

“Yes! She can ride in the cart. Look at stuff. Meet people.”

“Exactly the nightmare I seek to avoid.”

Enid pressed her lips together, thinking fast. Then she gasped. “They have a coffee aisle.”

Wednesday’s gaze flickered, betraying the faintest interest.

“Imported beans,” Enid added sweetly. “Dark roast. Strong enough to raise the dead.”

Wednesday’s expression shifted from refusal to grim calculation. “Very well. I will drive.”

Enid blinked. “Wait. Drive?”

“Do you wish to arrive alive?” Wednesday asked.

“Kind of?”

“Then I shall drive.”

Enid groaned. “Oh god. We’re all gonna die.”

---

The Addams family car was less vehicle and more gothic hearse. A long, black beast with a hood ornament shaped like a gargoyle and doors that creaked like crypts.

Enid strapped Willa into her car seat in the back, kissing her forehead. “Don’t worry, bean. Mama Doom’s driving isn’t that bad.”

Willa blinked up with unnerving serenity, as though she already foresaw the carnage.

Wednesday slid into the driver’s seat with predatory grace, her hands curling around the wheel like a pianist preparing for a symphony of chaos.

Enid buckled herself in, muttering prayers to every wolf spirit she knew. “Okay, just… maybe don’t hit the speed limit in, like, three seconds this time?”

Wednesday’s lips curved in the faintest smile. “No promises.”

The engine roared to life like a growling beast.

They shot down the driveway, leaving startled squirrels and one very confused postman in their wake.

---

It was only a ten-minute drive to the nearest supermarket, but under Wednesday’s control, it felt like a hell ride.

She took corners with surgical precision but terrifying speed. She ignored speed bumps as though they were suggestions. Pedestrians scattered like pigeons whenever the black hearse-car appeared.

Enid clung to the door handle, bee hair whipping around her face. “Weds! It’s a school zone!”

“Children should learn fear early,” Wednesday replied coolly, swerving around a minivan.

From the back seat, Willa gurgled happily, unfazed, her tiny hands clapping as if applauding her mother’s stunt driving.

“She likes it,” Wednesday observed.

“She doesn’t know she almost lost her first tooth on the dashboard!” Enid yelped.

But by some gothic miracle, they made it to the supermarket in one piece. The car screeched into the lot, neatly sliding into a space as if choreographed.

Enid staggered out, clutching her stomach. “I need… ginger ale. And maybe therapy.”

Wednesday opened Willa’s car door, lifting her out like a trophy. “We have arrived. Let the horrors begin.”

The sliding doors whooshed open, releasing a blast of sterile air and fluorescent brightness. Enid grabbed a cart, strapping Willa into the baby seat. The child sat up proudly, gripping the handle like a tiny queen on her throne.

Wednesday stalked beside them, black dress swishing, eyes narrowed at the glaring lights.

“It smells of bleach and despair,” she muttered.

“It smells clean,” Enid countered, tossing apples into the cart. “Some of us like clean.”

“Clean is just death wearing perfume,” Wednesday replied.

Willa sneezed, startling an old lady walking past.

“See? Even she agrees.”

The trip immediately devolved into chaos.

In produce, Enid cooed over strawberries while Wednesday held up a bunch of kale like it was a poisonous plant. “Are you certain this isn’t toxic?”

“It’s healthy!” Enid said.

“Then it is toxic.”

In the cereal aisle, Enid reached for a colorful box. “She’s gonna love this when she’s older...”

Wednesday slapped the box down. “Absolutely not. Sugar is poison. If she is to consume anything in the morning, it will be black bread and despair.”

“Weds, she’s a baby!”

“She must learn.”

Meanwhile, Willa amused herself by psychically toppling a row of cornflake boxes onto the floor. A passing employee stared in horror as the baby clapped and shouted, “Boom!”

“Impressive aim,” Wednesday noted.

Enid groaned. “You’re encouraging her!”

“Of course I am.”

When they finally reached the coffee section, Wednesday’s eyes lit up like a necromancer beholding a fresh grave.

She swept along the shelves, murmuring approvingly at dark roasts, growling disdain at anything labeled “light blend.”

“This one claims to have notes of fruit,” she sneered. “I want notes of anguish.”

Enid trailed behind, the cart filling with practicalities like baby wipes, formula, and snacks. Willa kicked her legs happily, her tiny fangs flashing every time she giggled.

When Wednesday finally selected a bag of beans so dark it looked like it had been roasted in hellfire, she cradled it to her chest with something dangerously close to affection.

“At last,” she murmured. “A reason to wake up tomorrow.”

---

At the registers, the chaos reached its peak.

Willa, bored of sitting, began chanting loudly: “Mama Woof! Mama Doom! Mama Doom!”

Shoppers turned to stare.

Wednesday remained composed. “She has taste.”

Enid covered her face. “They think we’re in a cult.”

“Correct.”

As the cashier rang up the items, Willa stretched out her psychic reach again. The bagging area erupted with apples rolled, the kale burst from its bag, and the guillotine-sized block of cheese Enid had grabbed nearly flattened the clerk’s hand.

“Willa!” Enid hissed. “Stop showing off!”

The baby giggled, drool glistening like victory.

The cashier, pale and trembling, whispered, “Cute baby.”

Wednesday handed over cash like a queen paying tribute. “She is destined for greatness. Fear her.”

The cashier nearly fainted.

---

The car was packed and was Willa nestled between bags of groceries like a tiny gothic monarch.

As they pulled out of the lot, Enid muttered, “Never again. We’re ordering online forever.”

Wednesday smirked, gunning the engine. “Nonsense. The supermarket is an excellent training ground for chaos. She thrives in it.”

Willa squealed, clapping her hands. “Doom! Doom!”

Enid sighed, head falling into her hands. “What have I gotten myself into?”

Wednesday, eyes fixed on the road, replied smoothly, “A family. One worth every catastrophe.”

Enid peeked at her, heart melting despite the terror. “…You’re lucky you’re hot when you say stuff like that.”

Willa sneezed again, spraying drool onto the groceries.

Wednesday smirked. “She agrees.”

Chapter Text

The drive home was no less perilous than the journey to the supermarket, perhaps worse, now that the car was crammed with supplies and one gleeful psychic werewolf baby in the backseat.

Enid strapped herself in with white-knuckled determination, whispering to herself, 'You survived childbirth, you can survive this.'

Wednesday, unfazed, revved the engine. “Hold on.”

“Weds!”

They shot forward like a bat from hell.

The car practically skimmed over the asphalt, Wednesday weaving through traffic with a precision that should have reassured but only made Enid clutch the door harder. Horns blared. Pedestrians leapt out of the way. A delivery driver screamed something unprintable as Wednesday executed a perfect swerve around his van.

From the back seat, Willa clapped and squealed: “Goo! Goo!”

Enid turned to stare at her daughter, scandalized. “No, bean, it’s not ‘goo goo,’ it’s unsafe! Mama Doom is trying to kill us!”

Wednesday’s eyes glimmered in the rearview mirror. “Correction: Mama Doom is trying to sharpen your reflexes.”

“By what, sending me into early cardiac arrest?!” Enid howled as they narrowly missed a cyclist.

“She lived,” Wednesday deadpanned. “You’re welcome.”

The mansion’s looming silhouette came into view, shrouded in its usual mist. Relief washed over Enid as they pulled into the long driveway, though it was short-lived.

Instead of braking like a normal person, Wednesday executed a sharp drift into the garage, the back tires screeching as the car spun neatly sideways before halting perfectly in its space.

The silence afterward was deafening.

Enid sat frozen, eyes wide, heart hammering.

Willa erupted into delighted applause, her baby fangs glinting.

Wednesday’s lips curved in the faintest smirk. “She inherits my taste.”

Enid groaned, slumping against her seat. “We’re doomed, all right.”

---

Once the car stilled, Enid unbuckled Willa and lifted her out of the car seat. “Okay, bean, let’s get you inside where it’s safe.”

She turned to grab one grocery bag, but Wednesday swooped in like a raven stealing prey.

“I’ll carry them.”

Enid blinked. “Uh… there’s like… twelve bags, Weds.”

“I said I’ll carry them.”

“You don’t have to prove a point!” Enid protested, shifting Willa onto her hip. “Just take three, I’ll take three, and...”

But Wednesday had already slung half the bags over her shoulders and hooked the rest in her arms like a warrior gathering weapons. Heavy glass bottles, sacks of flour, the enormous guillotine-sized cheese... it all dangled precariously, yet somehow balanced with uncanny grace.

She straightened, expression cool and unbothered. “Lead the way.”

Enid stared. “…You’re insane.”

“Yes.”

“And stubborn.”

“Correct.”

“…And kind of hot when you do that.”

Wednesday’s dark eyes flickered with amusement. “I know.”

---

The kitchen looked like a battlefield as Wednesday dropped the mountain of bags onto the counter in one controlled thud. Enid set Willa in her high chair, strapping her in before she could wriggle away.

“Alright, bean,” Enid said cheerfully, unpacking apples. “This is how we restock the pantry. Normal people do this all the time.”

Willa blinked, then reached for the bag of kale Wednesday still regarded suspiciously.

“She wishes to aid us,” Wednesday observed.

“She wishes to eat the bag,” Enid corrected, gently tugging it away.

Sure enough, Willa pouted and gnawed the air, her tiny fangs flashing.

Wednesday placed the bag back in front of her. “Let her. If she consumes it, I won’t have to.”

“Wednesday!” Enid laughed, exasperated, pulling it away again.

Enid handed Willa a small, safe box of baby wipes, light and harmless. “Here, you can help by holding this, okay?”

Willa beamed, babbling proudly as if entrusted with a royal decree.

But as Enid turned to unload milk cartons, a loud thud echoed.

She whipped back around to find that Willa had psychically levitated the wipes out of her lap and dropped them dramatically onto the floor, cackling like a tiny overlord.

Enid gasped. “Willa!”

“She understands the importance of theatrics,” Wednesday murmured approvingly, calmly unpacking coffee beans.

The next few minutes became a blur of chaos.

Enid placed bananas on the counter, Willa psychically toppled them to the floor.

Enid set apples in the fruit bowl, Willa shrieked and flung one across the kitchen with surprising precision.

Enid opened a bag of flour, Willa somehow managed to puff a cloud of it into the air with her tiny fists, covering everything in white dust.

The kitchen looked like a snowstorm had blown through.

“Weds!” Enid coughed, brushing flour out of her hair. “She’s turning this into a circus!”

Wednesday, unbothered, dipped her finger in the flour and tasted it. “She’s seasoning the air.”

Enid groaned.

It all came to a head when Wednesday turned her back to carefully grind her prized dark roast beans.

Willa with her psychic powers humming with mischief, levitated the unopened bag of decaf that Enid had quietly slipped in “just in case.”

She dangled it above her high chair like a trophy.

Wednesday turned, eyes narrowing instantly. “What is that?”

Enid froze. “…Decaf.”

Wednesday’s entire aura darkened. “You dare bring this into my domain?”

Willa, delighted, shrieked, “Boom!” and dropped the bag onto the floor. It burst open in a puff of pale brown dust.

Enid winced. “Okay… so maybe not decaf.”

Wednesday’s voice was low, dangerous, but oddly proud. “She has chosen wisely. The child has taste.”

Enid slumped against the counter, laughing despite herself. “This is ridiculous. I’m surrounded by maniacs.”

---

Finally, after a storm of spilled produce, psychic chaos, and enough flour to bake a hundred loaves, the kitchen was restocked. Messily, but stocked.

Enid leaned against the counter, exhausted but smiling. Willa clapped her hands, flour dusting her baby hair like a tiny snow crown.

Wednesday stood beside them, cool and composed, though her dress was dusted white and her hands smelled of roasted coffee.

Enid looked at them both, the chaotic baby in her high chair, the brooding wife at her side and her heart swelled. “You know what? We did it. It wasn’t normal. It wasn’t neat. But we survived the supermarket and unpacking. As a family.”

Wednesday tilted her head, considering. Then she said: “Yes. And now I require coffee.”

Willa babbled, pounding her tray. “Doom! Doom!”

Enid laughed, leaning over to kiss Wednesday’s cheek, leaving a little flour smudge behind. “Fine. Coffee for Mama Doom. Cookies for Mama Woof. And… maybe a broom for the flour apocalypse.”

Wednesday smirked. “Perfection.”

And so, in their own chaotic, gothic way, the Addams-Sinclair household settled into domestic victory.

For in this house, even a supermarket trip became an epic saga of doom, love, and laughter.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was rarely quiet, but on that particular morning it thrummed with a very specific kind of chaos: Enid’s “company is coming” chaos.

She zipped from room to room like a pastel lightning bolt, her blonde hair bouncing, her neon sweater clashing gloriously with the dark velvet drapes and candlelit gloom.

“Okay, okay, okay, Weds,” she called, arms full of throw pillows. “We need more seating. And, like, snacks. And definitely wine. Or blood bags for Yoko and Divina. Oh, and Ajax said he’s bringing his famous nacho dip, but last year it almost melted the table, so maybe a protective cloth? Do we have a cloth that doesn’t smell like formaldehyde?”

From her throne-like chair in the parlor, Wednesday didn’t look up from her tome she was reading.

“No.”

Enid froze mid-stride. “No what?”

“No, we don’t have a cloth that doesn’t smell like formaldehyde. No, we don’t need more seating. And no, we don’t need snacks. The mere act of opening our door should be sustenance enough for them.”

“Wednesday!” Enid whined, dropping the pillows dramatically onto the couch. “You can’t host a Nevermore reunion without snacks! They’ll think we’re antisocial.”

Wednesday paused her reading, fixing Enid with her cool, dark gaze. “We are antisocial.”

Enid pouted, crossing her arms. “You’re antisocial. I’m just...” she threw her arms wide, “selectively social. Which means I love these guys, and we’re hosting, and I want it to be perfect!”

From the playpen nearby, Willa gurgled, gnawing on the corner of a rubber bat toy. She looked up, flour-dusted from some earlier misadventure, and babbled: “Doom, doom!”

Wednesday gestured vaguely toward her daughter. “Even she agrees with me.”

Enid huffed. “She’s calling you Mama Doom, not agreeing with you!”

Wednesday returned to her typing. “A distinction without a difference.”

---

Earlier that morning, Enid had scrolled through their groupchat—“Nevermore Forever 🦇🐺💀”—which, as always, was its own circus.

- Ajax: Brooooo, got the nacho dip locked and loaded. Hope the mansion has fire insurance.

- Bianca: You’re not allowed to burn down the Addams’ ancestral home with your “culinary experiments.” Don’t embarrass me in front of Morticia again.

- Ajax: lol babe you love me 🥰

- Yoko: Divina’s baking coffin-shaped brownies. We’re bringing the kiddo too. Hope Willa’s ready for a vampire cousin playdate.

- Divina: Correction: coffin-shaped vegan brownies. Don’t panic, they taste amazing.

- Xavier: Tyler wants to know if there’s decent coffee near your place. He refuses to drink anything made in a “cursed urn.”

- Tyler: I SAW the coffee pot last time, Xavier. It whispered at me.

- Wednesday: It only whispers to those it deems weak.

- Enid: GUYS GUYS GUYS we’re so excited to host this year!!! Willa can’t wait to meet her “aunties and uncles”! 💖🐺🖤

- Agnes: Wait does that make me the cool single aunt?

- Enid: YES.

- Wednesday: No.

- Agnes: 😭

- Bianca: We’ll be there at 6. Don’t let Enid over-prepare, Wednesday.

Enid had squealed into her pillow after reading that, giddy with anticipation. Now, hours later, she was vibrating with it, while Wednesday sat like a monument to gloom.

---

By noon, Enid had dragged out every pastel throw blanket she owned, despite Wednesday muttering that they “clashed with the aesthetic.” She arranged snacks, half “normal”, like chips, cookies, sparkling sodas and half Addams-approved like pickled eyeballs, candied scorpions, cheese that may or may not have been alive.

She set blood bags on ice for Yoko and Divina, then arranged tiny pastel napkins around them. “See? Equal parts adorable and terrifying.”

Willa, strapped into her high chair, had taken it upon herself to “help” by psychically knocking over every spoon Enid set out.

“Willa!” Enid groaned, catching a spoon mid-air. “You’re supposed to be my helper, not my chaos goblin!”

Willa squealed, drooling with her tiny wolf fangs flashing. “Boom!”

Wednesday glanced up from the corner where she was polishing a dagger. “She is excelling in her role. She’s an Addams.”

Enid shoved another napkin onto the tray. “She’s a Sinclair too!”

Willa immediately shredded the napkin with baby glee.

Wednesday’s smirk deepened.

---

“Why do we do this again?” Wednesday asked later, perched in her chair like a raven.

“Because we love them,” Enid said firmly, straightening a vase of black roses.

“You love them,” Wednesday corrected. “I tolerate them. Barely.”

Enid threw her a playful glare. “You don’t fool me, Wednesday. I know you care.”

“I do not.”

“You let Bianca hold Willa when she was born and didn’t even hiss.”

“That was because Willa attempted to bite her, and I wanted to see the outcome.”

“And you complimented Ajax’s sweater.”

“I said it didn’t make me physically ill to look at it. That is not a compliment.”

Enid grinned. “See? Progress.”

Wednesday scowled, but there was no heat in it.

---

At some point in the afternoon, Enid disappeared upstairs and reemerged wearing a pastel sundress with little wolf patterns. “So? What do you think? Hostess vibes?”

Wednesday turned slowly, eyes narrowing. “You look like an unwrapped candy bar.”

“That’s a yes,” Enid said brightly.

“And what,” Wednesday continued, “do you expect me to wear?”

“Something that says 'I’m a terrifying yet loving mom and gracious hostess.'”

Wednesday rose from her chair, sweeping into the hallway. When she returned, she wore a high-collared black gown that shimmered like oil, with a belt of silver daggers and boots that could probably kill someone.

Enid clapped. “Perfect.”

Willa, from her playpen, babbled: “Doom!”

Wednesday inclined her head. “The child approves.”

---

By late afternoon, Enid was pacing the foyer, checking her phone every thirty seconds. “They’re almost here, Weds! Ohmygosh, I haven’t seen them all together since last year! Yoko’s baby is bigger now! Bianca’s pregnant again! And Xavier and Tyler, I just... like, how are they even real? And Agnes, I’m so happy she’s coming, she’s the cutest!”

“Enid,” Wednesday interrupted, her voice sharp as a knife.

Enid froze. “Yeah?”

Wednesday stepped closer, resting a cool hand on her wife’s arm. “Breathe. Or you’ll faint before they arrive, and then I’ll be forced to host this circus alone.”

Enid laughed nervously, pressing her forehead against Wednesday’s shoulder. “You’re right. Okay. I’m good. I’m totally good.”

“Doubtful,” Wednesday muttered. But her hand lingered on Enid’s arm, grounding her.

---

At exactly six o’clock, the sound of heavy footsteps echoed outside the door. The Addams-Sinclair mansion seemed to lean into the moment, shadows stretching, candles flickering.

Enid practically bounced in the foyer, clutching Willa to her hip. Wednesday stood beside her with her arms crossed and as still as a raven carved from obsidian.

“They’ll be here any second,” Enid whispered, eyes sparkling.

“They said six,” Wednesday replied. “Which means they will all arrive at staggered intervals designed to irritate me.”

Enid elbowed her lightly. “Or maybe… to make an entrance.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Which is worse.”

The first to pull up was Yoko and Divina in a sleek black SUV with tinted windows. Out stepped Yoko, sunglasses still firmly in place despite the gloomy dusk, her hair glossy and perfect. Beside her, Divina looked effortlessly ethereal, her long coat flowing like ocean waves.

Between them toddled a two-year-old girl, tiny, pale as snow, and wearing a miniature version of Yoko’s sunglasses. Her pout was identical to her mother’s. She clutched a juice box like it was a goblet of eternal life.

Enid squealed. “Oh. My. Gosh. Look at her! She’s literally your clone, Yoko!”

Yoko smirked, adjusting her daughter’s shades. “Of course she is. Superior genetics.”

Divina rolled her eyes fondly. “We call her Hana. But honestly, she acts like a mini dictator most days.”

As if on cue, Hana pointed at Willa and declared in a high, imperious voice: “Mine.”

Enid giggled nervously, hugging Willa closer. “Oh, wow, they’re already… making friends?”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Or staking territorial claims. Admirable.”

Enid swatted her arm.

Willa, for her part, blinked at Hana with unnerving calm and then babbled: “Boom!”

The vampire toddler hissed back approvingly.

Wednesday observed closely. “Promising teeth. I approve.”

Yoko smirked. “She’s already bitten three teachers at daycare.”

Wednesday’s expression warmed by a fraction. “A prodigy.”

“Oh, great,” Enid muttered. “They’re gonna be besties and troublemakers.”

Wednesday’s lips curved into the faintest smirk. “Perfect.”

The next headlights belonged to a modest but very Ajax-coded family car, decorated with questionable bumper stickers. Out tumbled Ajax, wearing his usual beanie, except tonight, his three-year-old son wore a matching one. The little boy’s snakes wriggled adorably from under the knit cap, blinking bright green eyes as he clutched his father’s hand.

Behind them came Bianca, radiant despite being in her third trimester, her hand resting protectively on her round belly. Her presence was as commanding as ever, even while waddling slightly.

“Bianca!” Enid squealed, rushing forward. “Look at you, mama! You’re glowing!”

Bianca raised a brow. “That’s just sweat. He insists on parking a mile away.”

Ajax grinned sheepishly. “The exercise is good for her.”

Bianca shot him a look sharp enough to petrify. “If I didn’t love him, I’d be a widow by now.”

Their son tugged at his dad’s sleeve, looking up at Enid with wide eyes.

Enid gasped as she looked at the boy, crouching down. “Hi, Max! Oh my gosh, you’re so big now!”

Max grinned, snakes poking curiously at Willa, who gurgled in fascination.

“Careful,” Enid said quickly. “She likes to grab things.”

Wednesday, observing silently finally spoke: “If she is bitten, it will build character.”

Enid threw her a scandalized look. “Wednesday!”

But Bianca smirked. “Honestly, I kind of agree.”

Ajax laughed. “See? They get us!”

“No,” Wednesday said flatly. “They do not.”

The next car was sleek, dark, and suspiciously well-kept, definitely Tyler’s influence, no doubt of that. Out stepped Xavier first, hair longer than ever, his black turtleneck covered in charcoal smudges and a sketchbook tucked under one arm. He exuded tortured-artist vibes like it was cologne.

Beside him, Tyler emerged in a fitted jacket, looking very much like the grounded barista-turned-wanderer. He smiled warmly, completely unfazed by being the only normie in a gathering of supernatural chaos.

Enid nearly squealed herself into orbit. “You guys made it! Oh my gosh, I still can’t believe you’re like... together-together. It’s the cutest!”

Xavier smirked dryly. “Yeah, the world didn’t see it coming.”

Tyler slipped his arm around him, grinning. “Neither did we.”

Wednesday’s dark eyes flicked to them. “The irony is exquisite. Once rivals, now… lovers. A tale both tragic and comedic. Shakespeare would vomit.”

Tyler chuckled. “Thanks, Wednesday. I think.”

Xavier snorted. “Trust me, that’s as close to approval as you’ll ever get.”

From Enid's hip, Willa clapped babbling, “Doom! Doom!”

Tyler blinked. “She’s… chanting for you?”

“She recognizes authority,” Wednesday intoned.

The last to arrive didn’t ring the bell. Didn’t knock. Didn’t even pull up a car.

Instead, as Enid turned toward the door, a voice whispered directly behind her ear: “Boo.”

Enid shrieked, almost tossing Willa into the air. “AGNES!”

The young woman shimmered into visibility, grinning mischievously. “Miss me?”

“You little gremlin!” Enid hugged her tightly, laughing with relief. “You can’t sneak up on me like that when I’m holding the baby!”

Agnes tilted her head, peering at Willa. “Wow. Mini-Wednesday.”

Enid beamed. “And a little bit me!”

Willa responded by reaching for Agnes’s hair and yanking a strand.

Agnes winced. “Yup. Definitely mini-Wednesday.”

Wednesday, standing in the doorway with arms crossed, said coolly: “Appropriate entrance. I approve.”

Agnes grinned. “Thanks, Wednesday.”

Enid sighed. “No, don’t encourage her!”

---

Soon the mansion foyer was filled with overlapping voices, children’s laughter, and supernatural energy.

Yoko’s Hana was demanding another juice box. Max was proudly showing his snakes to Agnes. Xavier was sketching the chandelier with dramatic flair while Tyler carried all the bags like a reliable pack mule. Bianca sank gratefully into a chair while Ajax fussed around her.

Enid, glowing, clapped her hands. “Oh my gosh, you guys, look at us! We’re all here, we’re all grown up, and we have kids and everything! This is like a Nevermore family reunion!”

Everyone laughed, nodding in agreement.

Wednesday, looming behind her, muttered: “I despise every second of this.”

Enid leaned back into her wife with a grin. “And I love you for being here anyway.”

Wednesday’s eyes softened almost imperceptibly as Willa babbled “Woof! Doom!” loud enough for everyone to hear.

The gang erupted into laughter, filling the Sinclair-Addams mansion with warmth and chaos, the perfect start to their reunion.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair dining room was cavernous, its chandelier dangling like a black widow from the vaulted ceiling. A fire crackled in the stone hearth, casting long shadows across the table, long enough to make even the bravest guest uneasy. The enormous oak table stretched the length of the room, set with mismatched silverware, goblets, and candelabras whose flames burned an unnatural shade of green.

Enid had gone all out preparing the food: roasted chicken, garlic-free options for the vampires, a few vegetarian dishes for the mortals, and, in a concession to Addams tradition, at least one covered dish prepared by Wednesday, a “mystery casserole” that emitted faint wisps of smoke.

The group gathered, seating themselves with the chaos of any extended family. Children were plopped into chairs, booster seats appeared out of nowhere (Enid had bought them, of course), and the air quickly filled with overlapping chatter.

Wednesday sat at the head of the table, Enid on her right with Willa in her lap. The others spread out, plates filling quickly.

Enid, glowing with hostess pride, beamed. “Okay, everyone! Let’s eat! I can’t believe we’re all here together again. This is so special!”

“Special,” Wednesday repeated flatly, stabbing into her casserole. “Like a plague.”

---

It started innocently enough. Max, Ajax and Bianca’s gorgon son, tugged off his beanie and let his tiny snakes slither free across the table.

“MAX!” Bianca snapped, swatting his hand. “Not at the dinner table.”

“But they’re hungry,” Max whined.

The snakes hissed, tasting the air near Yoko’s goblet.

Yoko recoiled, wrinkling her nose. “Control your reptiles, or I’ll declaw them.”

Ajax chuckled nervously. “Oh, come on, it’s cute.”

Bianca shot him the kind of look that promised a long argument later.

Meanwhile, Hana the mini-vampire, was dipping her bread into the goblet of pig’s blood her mothers had brought. She smirked, fangs showing, then deliberately dribbled some on her white dress.

Yoko sighed. “She does it to get attention.”

Divina reached for a napkin. “Sweetheart, no—”

Hana hissed at her mother, eyes glowing faintly red.

At the other end of the table, Willa clapped at the display, babbling, “Bite! Bite!”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Oh no, honey, not bite! Gentle!”

Wednesday calmly took a sip of wine. “She is clearly displaying leadership qualities. Encouraging bloodshed is the mark of a strong ruler.”

“Wednesday!” Enid groaned, bouncing Willa gently.

Agnes, who was sitting nearest the casserole, poked it suspiciously with her fork. “Uh… is this… moving?”

“It’s fresh,” Wednesday said simply.

Agnes put the fork down and reached for the bread instead.

Tyler leaned toward Xavier, whispering, “I thought my family dinners were bad. This is next-level.”

Xavier smirked. “Admit it, you love it.”

Tyler glanced at Wednesday’s icy gaze sweeping the table. “I… haven’t decided yet.”

As the noise level rose with kids squealing, Ajax telling a story too loudly, Hana trying to climb onto the table, Wednesday finally set her fork down. The sound of silver on wood was sharp enough to cut through the chaos.

She rose slowly, black dress pooling around her like a shadow, and fixed the table with a stare so cold it froze conversation mid-word. Even the snakes stilled, flickering their tongues nervously.

Her voice, low and even, carried with dreadful clarity:

“Children. This table is older than your entire bloodlines combined. If you defile it, I will remove your teeth and use them as garnish.”

The silence that followed was absolute.

Enid blanched. “Wednesday!”

But Willa, nestled against her and giggled. “Mama Doom!” she crowed.

The kids all blinked at one another, then settled. Max pulled his snakes back under the beanie, Hana sat primly with her hands folded, Willa gnawing on her teething ring instead of reaching for sharp cutlery.

Bianca raised her glass. “Well. That worked.”

Ajax laughed nervously. “See? She’s like… the kid whisperer.”

Wednesday sat again, calmly returning to her plate. “No. I am the kid terrorizer.”

Enid groaned. “Same thing to you.”

---

With temporary calm restored, conversations branched off in every direction.

Bianca, fanning herself slightly, turned to Enid. “So, what’s it like? Being back in the chaos of babyhood?”

Enid laughed, bouncing Willa. “Oh my gosh, it’s exhausting and amazing. She’s teething, crawling everywhere, and—oh, you won’t believe this—she inherited Wednesday’s psychic abilities.”

Bianca’s eyes widened. “Seriously? That’s... wow. That’s a lot.”

“Tell me about it,” Enid muttered.

Across the table, Yoko sipped delicately from her goblet. “At least she didn’t inherit your glitter obsession.”

Enid playfully stuck out her tongue. “Not yet.”

Xavier sketched on a napkin, glancing up occasionally. “Honestly, she already has a presence. It’s kinda creepy. I’d paint her if that wouldn’t be weird.”

Wednesday looked at him icily. “It would be.”

Tyler quickly added, “But, uh, we love babies in art, right? Like Renaissance stuff?”

“No,” Wednesday said flatly. “Babies ruin most compositions.”

Enid elbowed her. “Babe!”

Agnes, invisible halfway through the meal except for her floating fork, reappeared suddenly. “This is so much better than dorm food.”

Ajax perked up. “Right? Remember the jello at Nevermore?”

Max, overhearing, asked: “What’s jello?”

Ajax grinned. “The best food in the world.”

Wednesday cut in. “The worst food in existence. A coward’s substitute for actual organs.”

Enid sighed. “Can we not scare the kids for once?”

“Scaring the children builds resilience,” Wednesday replied.

As if on cue, Willa suddenly stretched across the table, reaching for the ornate guillotine letter opener that Gomez had gifted them months ago and Wednesday insisted using it as decoration.

“WILLA!” Enid gasped, catching her just before her little hand touched the blade. “No, honey, that’s not a toy!”

Willa whined, baring her tiny wolf fang.

Wednesday calmly took the guillotine, set it upright in front of the child, and intoned: “Look, Willa. The blade is sharp. It is designed to sever heads. One day, it will be yours.”

Enid nearly choked. “Wednesday!”

But Willa squealed in delight, clapping her hands. “Mine! Mine!”

Bianca covered her mouth to hide a laugh. “Oh my god, she really is your daughter.”

Divina whispered to Yoko, “This is how villains are born.”

Yoko smirked. “Or legends.”

Enid sighed, burying her face in her hands.

---

Dessert was Enid’s attempt at normalcy: cupcakes, cookies, and fruit bowls. Unfortunately, Hana decided she wanted all the chocolate cupcakes and hissed at anyone who reached for one. Max tried to petrify the cookies with his snakes, which only made them crumble to dust. Willa slammed her little hands into her fruit bowl, splattering sticky juice across Xavier’s sketch.

Enid leapt up, flustered. “I’m so sorry!”

Xavier, deadpan, held up the ruined napkin drawing. “It’s… avant-garde now.”

Wednesday, perfectly calm, dabbed a speck of fruit from her sleeve. “She is simply improving your art. Brutalism suits you.”

Tyler leaned back in his chair, watching the chaos unfold with a half-grin. “You know… I kinda like it here.”

Enid shot him a look. “You like this madness?”

Tyler shrugged. “I grew up in a small town. Chaos feels like home.”

Xavier snorted. “You’re insane.”

Tyler kissed his temple. “And you love it.”

---

At last, when the children were stuffed and sticky, when the parents were exhausted, and Enid was buzzing between pride and stress, Wednesday stood again.

She raised her goblet.

“To survival,” she said. “To chaos. To enduring the company of others despite the crushing weight of their presence. And most of all, to the future—our offspring, who will one day inherit the earth and, hopefully, dismantle it.”

The table raised their glasses in laughter and cheers, even Enid giggling despite herself.

“Cheers!” Enid added brightly. “To family!”

Wednesday sat, sipping with dark satisfaction.

Willa banged her tiny goblet of juice on the table and shouted, “DOOM!”

The whole table erupted into laughter, and Enid melted, covering her face.

“Yep,” Bianca said. “That’s your kid.”

“Indeed,” Wednesday murmured, pride flickering across her pale face.

And the night rolled on, chaotic, loud, messy, gothic, and strangely perfect.

Chapter Text

The dinner had barely ended when Enid clasped her hands together, eyes bright with golden excitement.

“So!” she announced, bouncing a little in her seat. “I was thinking, since it’s already late and everyone has kids now, why don’t you all spend the night? We have plenty of rooms!”

Across the table, Wednesday’s fork clinked sharply against her plate.

“Plenty of dungeons,” she corrected.

Enid ignored her, beaming. “It’ll be like old times! But with babies!”

Bianca arched an eyebrow. “Old times? We nearly died half those nights.”

“Exactly!” Enid chirped. “Isn’t it nostalgic?”

Xavier groaned. “I don’t know if ‘trauma bonding’ is the vibe we’re going for here, Enid.”

But Ajax perked up, slinging an arm around Bianca despite her deadly side-eye. “I’m down! I mean, come on, when’s the last time we had a Nevermore sleepover? This’ll be great!”

Bianca muttered something under her breath about “foolish optimism” but didn’t outright refuse.

Yoko, sipping delicately from her blood goblet, gave a lazy shrug. “As long as my room has blackout curtains, I don’t care.”

Divina leaned in, whispering, “Honey, this place is a blackout curtain.”

Agnes popped up behind Enid’s chair, invisible one second and smirking the next. “I’m in. Free board at a haunted mansion? Yes please.”

Enid squealed and clapped. “Yay! It’s settled!”

Wednesday, brooding in her seat, muttered, “Like lambs agreeing to their own slaughter.”

Enid practically sprinted down the grand hallway with everyone trailing behind. The mansion loomed around them, its portraits glaring down, suits of armor creaking faintly as though they breathed, and chandeliers swaying though no draft stirred.

“Okay!” Enid said, pulling a clipboard from nowhere. “So I thought this through—”

Wednesday deadpanned, “She made a chart.”

“Yes, I did!” Enid said proudly, flipping through her handwritten assignments. “Divina and Yoko, I put you in the Crimson Suite. It has heavy velvet drapes, so no sun for Hana!”

Yoko gave a rare approving nod. “Efficient.”

Divina peeked around Enid’s shoulder. “Did you really label it ‘Blood Sucker Room’ on your list?”

Enid blushed. “...Yes.”

Bianca and Ajax were next. “You two get the Iron Maiden Room! It’s got a huge bed and… uh… don’t mind the spikes in the walls, they’re just for decoration.”

Ajax’s eyes went wide. “That’s… metal. Literally.”

Bianca groaned.

“Xavier and Tyler,” Enid continued brightly. “You guys are in the Torture Chamber. Oh! But don’t worry, it’s been decommissioned!”

Tyler blinked. “Decommissioned?”

Xavier muttered, “Oh my god.”

“And Agnes,” Enid said with a grin, “you’re in the Mirror Room! Don’t freak out if the reflections move on their own, okay?”

Agnes shrugged. “That’s fine. I usually creep myself out in mirrors anyway.”

“And us,” Enid finished, tucking the clipboard away, “we’re in the Master Chamber with Willa, of course.”

Wednesday cut in, voice cold and sharp: “I don’t recall agreeing to any of this.”

Enid leaned over, kissing her cheek. “That’s because you didn’t.”

Wednesday sighed like a woman enduring unspeakable torment.

---

The friends dispersed, each ushered by Enid into their assigned chambers.

Divina opened the door to the Crimson Suite and immediately gagged. “It smells like… bats.”

Yoko sniffed appreciatively. “Good bats.”

Across the hall, Ajax was already bouncing on the bed in the Iron Maiden Room, despite Bianca threatening to murder him with a glance.

“This is awesome! Look, babe, chains on the wall!”

“Ajax,” Bianca hissed, “don’t touch anything sharp.”

In the Torture Chamber, Tyler stood frozen, staring at the rack in the corner. “Xavier. Tell me that’s not what I think it is.”

Xavier wandered over casually. “Yep. Definitely what you think it is.”

“Great,” Tyler muttered, running a hand down his face. “We’re sleeping next to medieval horror props. Perfect.”

Meanwhile, Agnes was making faces at her dozen distorted reflections in the Mirror Room. “Huh. I look like I have twelve bad haircuts at once. Cool.”

Back in the main hall, Enid buzzed from room to room, delivering spare blankets, baskets of snacks, and unfortunately, scented candles that smelled wildly out of place in the mansion.

Wednesday trailed behind her like a grim shadow, arms crossed.

“This is unnecessary,” Wednesday said flatly. “They should be grateful we haven’t locked them in the crypt.”

Enid spun, wagging a finger. “Wednesday Addams, I am not letting our guests have nightmares about skeleton hands grabbing them while they sleep.”

“They would be lucky,” Wednesday muttered.

Enid kissed her cheek again, grinning. “You’re just cranky because you didn’t want anyone staying.”

Wednesday didn’t deny it. She only stalked back to the Master Chamber, muttering something about “unwanted houseguests contaminating the atmosphere.”

Enid rolled her eyes and returned to handing Bianca a small basket of fruit. “Just in case you get hungry at night!”

Bianca stared at her. “It’s like you’re a golden retriever in a gothic funhouse.”

“Thanks!” Enid said brightly.

“...That wasn’t a compliment.”

---

Hours later, when everyone had finally settled, or tried to, the mansion came alive with its usual nocturnal symphony. Doors creaked on their own. A distant organ played a single ominous chord. Something heavy scraped along the attic floor.

Max woke up screaming that the suits of armor were moving. Hana tried to sink her teeth into a doorknob. Tyler swore he saw a painting blink at him. Agnes got lost in her room and started arguing with her reflection.

Enid was dashing back and forth like an overstretched babysitter. “No, no, Hana, doorknobs aren’t food! Ajax, please stop testing the spikes! Tyler, the paintings always do that, just wave back!”

Meanwhile, Wednesday lounged in bed, calmly reading a collection of funeral dirges.

“You could help me!” Enid burst out, hair frazzled as she carried Willa—who was giggling at the chaos—back into their room.

“I am helping,” Wednesday replied without looking up. “By not participating.”

Enid dropped onto the bed beside her, groaning. “Sometimes I don’t know if you’re the worst or the best.”

“Both,” Wednesday said, turning the page.

Willa clapped her little hands. “Doom!” she squealed.

Wednesday smirked. “See? She understands.”

---

Just as silence began to descend again, a faint wailing echoed down the hallway.

Bianca emerged from her room in a robe, “Enid. Tell me that’s not another baby.”

“Nope,” Enid said, wide-eyed. “That’s the resident ghost. Don’t worry, she’s harmless!”

The wailing grew louder. Ajax stuck his head out of the Iron Maiden Room, grinning nervously. “Harmless, huh?”

The chandelier flickered violently. The wailing turned into a low moan.

Enid winced. “Okay, maybe slightly moody. But she usually quiets down if you sing to her.”

Yoko muttered from the Crimson Suite doorway, “This is the worst hotel.”

Divina corrected her: “This is the best hotel. For you.”

Eventually, everyone drifted back into their rooms. The ghost wailed itself to sleep. The organ stopped. The portraits ceased glaring. Well, most of them at least.

Enid collapsed into bed beside Wednesday, utterly drained. “Hosting is hard.”

Wednesday slid her book closed. “You insisted on it. Suffering is the natural consequence of your optimism.”

Enid chuckled tiredly, curling against her. “Still worth it. They’re our friends.”

Wednesday glanced toward the bassinet where Willa slept peacefully despite everything.

Her voice softened, almost imperceptibly. “Yes. For them and for her.”

Enid tilted her head up, smiling softly. “See? You do care.”

“I never said I didn’t. I simply resent admitting it.”

Enid laughed, kissed her, and finally drifted into sleep. And in the mansion’s halls, the portraits smirked knowingly.

---

The mansion at night was never truly quiet. Even when the guests had finally fallen into restless slumber in their cursed suites, the house itself murmured. Wood groaned under phantom weight. Portraits whispered in oil-darkened voices. Somewhere far above, chains clinked in the attic, though neither Enid nor Wednesday had ever bothered to check who, or what dragged them.

Enid had long since grown used to the ambiance. She had adapted, like a wolf curling up in a cave and deciding the bats overhead were roommates, not intruders.

But what she hadn’t adapted to was her body’s own alarm clock.

Motherhood had rewired her. Even when Willa was sleeping soundly, some part of Enid always woke in the black hours of night. The urge to check, to make sure her daughter was still breathing, still warm, still nestled safely in her crib, it was primal and constant.

So when her eyes flicked open that night, it wasn’t unusual. What was unusual was the emptiness beside her.

Wednesday’s side of the bed was cold.

Enid frowned. She propped herself up, blonde hair a wild halo around her face, and blinked at the shadows. Normally Wednesday’s nightly habits could be mapped like clockwork: she would lie on her back, arms folded like a cadaver awaiting burial, eyes shut but never deeply asleep. Occasionally she murmured morbid thoughts in her dreams, like: “Yes, more arsenic” or “The guillotine must be sharper”, but she never left the bed once she’d claimed it.

Enid slid from the sheets, tugging her robe tight. A whisper of unease threaded through her chest. The house had guests tonight. Their friends chaotic presences were scattered across the mansion’s labyrinth of rooms. Wednesday wasn’t exactly a people person. What if she’d grown tired of hosting and decided to… do something dramatic?

Enid tried not to imagine opening a guest room to find Ajax dangling from a ceiling beam with Wednesday calmly explaining it was “just a minor demonstration.”

She padded barefoot into the hallway, the stone floor cold against her soles. The corridor was lit by thin streaks of moonlight seeping through stained glass windows. Every portrait seemed to follow her, their eyes glimmering with candle-phantom light.

“Wednesday?” she whispered.

Her voice was swallowed by the long hall.

It was near the far wing, by the Mirror Room, that she heard it: the faintest creak of a door opening. She crept closer, breath caught, pressing herself against the wall.

The door cracked wider, spilling a sliver of candlelight into the hall. Inside, she saw a figure, Wednesday. Her stark black braids was unmistakable, her silhouette sharp and still as a scythe.

But she wasn’t alone.

Agnes was there too, her invisible trick turned off for once, shoulders hunched in a way Enid had never seen from the usually cheeky girl. The candlelight made her look younger, almost fragile.

And then Enid’s stomach flipped, she saw Wednesday slip something into Agnes’ hand. A slick, plain envelope. Money.

Agnes blinked rapidly, biting her lip, and for a moment looked like she might refuse. But then her throat worked, her jaw trembled, and she tucked the envelope close to her chest.

The next thing made Enid’s breath freeze.

Agnes stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Wednesday.

It wasn’t romantic in the slightest, it was the embrace of someone clinging to a lifeline in stormy water, but Enid’s heart still gave a strange, painful lurch.

And Wednesday, though stiff, didn’t push her away. She endured the hug with her usual corpse-like stillness, but there was no venom in her face. Only a quiet shadow of something Enid rarely saw from her wife: compassion.

Enid ducked back into the hall, her pulse racing.

By the time she returned to the Master Chamber, Enid’s mind was in a tailspin.

She closed the door softly, leaned her back against it, and pressed her palms to her cheeks.

What… what had she just seen?

Wednesday. Giving Agnes money. Secretly. In the middle of the night.

Enid clutched at her robe. Her rational side whispered that Wednesday wasn’t the type to betray her. She was brutally honest to a fault, if she didn’t want to be with Enid, she would say so with a speech that would scar the soul forever. Wednesday Addams did not lie. She did not cheat. She barely tolerated human touch.

But still… the image wouldn’t leave her mind. Agnes pressing into Wednesday’s shoulder. Wednesday not recoiling.

Enid padded back to the crib, staring down at Willa, who slept peacefully with her little wolf fangs peeking past her lips. “What do you think, pup?” she whispered. “Am I being crazy?”

Willa snorted in her sleep and flopped onto her side.

Enid groaned softly. “Great. Even my baby thinks I’m dramatic.”

But her thoughts wouldn’t stop. They spun out, one after the other, tangling like spiderwebs.

What if Wednesday had secrets from her? Not scandalous ones, Wednesday was far too icy for soap-opera drama, but little ones. Quiet ones. What if she was carrying burdens and Enid never even noticed?

She curled up on the edge of the bed, hugging her knees. Her golden retriever heart ached. Wednesday wasn’t supposed to need anyone else. Wednesday wasn’t supposed to accept comfort from anyone else.

And yet she had.

Enid’s imagination conjured wild scenarios. Agnes in trouble with debts. Wednesday running a shadowy scholarship fund. Wednesday planning something dangerous.

Or maybe it was just proof of something she’d always known but didn’t like to think about: that Wednesday had entire depths she’d never let anyone see, not even her wife.

The door creaked again sometime later. Enid, still perched awake, flinched.

Wednesday slipped inside, her candle extinguished, her face as unreadable as always.

“You’re awake,” she observed.

Enid forced a smile. “Yeah. Mother instincts.” She gestured vaguely toward Willa’s crib. “I was just… checking on her.”

Wednesday’s dark eyes flicked to the crib, then back to Enid. “She’s breathing.”

Enid let out a nervous laugh. “I know. Just… couldn’t sleep.”

Wednesday began unlacing her boots calmly. “The others are still alive, if you’re wondering. Agnes nearly set her blanket on fire with a candle, but that is hardly unusual.”

Enid hesitated. She wanted to ask, to blurt out 'what were you doing in Agnes’s room?' But the words caught in her throat.

Instead, she said softly, “You weren’t in bed.”

Wednesday’s gaze flickered, but only briefly. “I required a walk. Too much enforced cheerfulness at dinner. I needed to disinfect my mind.”

“Oh.” Enid twisted her robe tie around her fingers.

Wednesday slid beneath the covers, lying flat as ever, arms crossed over her chest. “Come to bed, Enid. Your thoughts are loud enough to rattle the floorboards.”

Enid let out a breathless laugh, climbing in beside her. “Sorry.”

Wednesday’s hand brushed hers under the sheets. Not a grand gesture, just the barest graze of fingers. But enough to remind Enid that her wife was here, beside her, tethering her to the present.

And so Enid forced her racing thoughts into stillness. For now.

But the image of Agnes hugging Wednesday, of that secret envelope slipping between them, burned quietly at the edges of her mind.

In the hallway outside their chamber, the mansion itself seemed to breathe. A draft rustled the curtains though no window was open. The portraits tilted imperceptibly in their frames, as though listening.

Secrets had been exchanged in the dark. And though Enid forced her smile and willed herself to sleep, she knew one thing with unshakable certainty: Wednesday never acted without purpose.

And Enid would have to decide whether her overthinking was paranoia... or a mother’s instinct sharpening into something else.

Chapter Text

Morning in the Sinclair-Addams mansion was never serene. For one thing, the house itself rejected the concept of “rest.” The pipes wailed like tormented spirits, the floorboards shifted as though dragging chains, and the curtains flapped though no window had been opened in years. The smell of incense and something suspiciously like brimstone hung faintly in the halls.

But on this morning, the true chaos came not from the house but from its inhabitants.

Enid, the cheerful werewolf, compulsive hostess, and currently a ball of frazzled nerves, was in the kitchen at dawn, determined to cook for everyone. She wasn’t sure how many people she was cooking for anymore. Between the guests, their children, her wife, and the occasional appearance of Lurch looming silently for no reason, the number seemed to change by the minute.

Still, she pressed on.

“I can do this,” she whispered, whisking eggs with a ferocity that suggested she was trying to exorcise demons from the bowl. “I can absolutely do this. Easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy… except I probably shouldn’t say lemon, because Tyler hates citrus, and Bianca says it messes with her digestion, and oh my God why am I thinking so much about lemons—”

A loud pop startled her. The toaster had catapulted a slice of bread into the air with such force it embedded itself in the ceiling.

Enid groaned. “Of course. Why wouldn’t that happen?”

She tried to shake it off, tried to channel her inner golden retriever energy. Friendly, upbeat and radiant. But beneath it all, her thoughts kept circling back to what she had seen last night.

Wednesday. In Agnes’s room. The envelope. The hug.

The image replayed in Enid’s brain like a cursed slideshow. Every time she blinked, she saw it again, magnified and dramatized. Her mind, unhelpfully creative spun out scenarios one after the other:

Maybe Wednesday was running a secret crime syndicate with Agnes.

Maybe Agnes had blackmailed Wednesday.

Maybe Wednesday was… no. She wouldn’t even think the word affair. It was absurd. Wednesday Addams didn’t do romance casually. If she was with Enid, she was with Enid until death and possibly after.

But the hug. The hug.

“Enid.”

She jumped. A calm voice drifted into the kitchen. Wednesday.

Her wife stood in the doorway, her braids severe, her black dress crisp looking as though she hadn’t slept but also as though she had been carved from stone and didn’t require such mortal trivialities.

“You are rattling bowls with such aggression, it sounds as though you’re conducting a séance.” Wednesday stepped forward, peering into the pan with clinical detachment. “Scrambled eggs. How pedestrian.”

Enid forced a bright laugh, too loud, too cheerful. “Well, you know, everyone’s got different needs! Ajax will want sugar, Yoko needs blood syrup, don’t ask, I ordered it online. Bianca’s on her pregnancy diet, and I have to make sure Xavier’s coffee is extra bitter, otherwise he gets pouty. I’m multitasking!”

“Hmm.” Wednesday leaned on the counter, her eyes fixed on Enid with unnerving sharpness. “You are overcompensating. Which means you are hiding something.”

Enid’s whisk stuttered mid-beat. She plastered on a smile. “W-what? Me? Hiding something? Nooo, you’re hiding something!”

Wednesday’s brow arched. “Projection. How fascinating.”

Enid nearly dropped the pan. “Nope! No projecting here. Just cooking! Cooking for everyone!” She turned her back quickly, cheeks burning, mind shrieking: 'Oh my God, she knows. She knows I saw her. Stay cool, Enid. Stay cool.'

---

Within an hour, the kitchen and dining hall were filled with noise. Children screamed, adults bickered and chairs scraped across the stone floor like coffins being dragged.

Yoko and Divina shuffled in first, vampire daughter Hana perched on Yoko’s hip, her little fangs gleaming. The child hissed at the sunlight streaming weakly through the stained glass. Yoko beamed. “Isn’t she adorable? She bit through her third pacifier last night.”

Divina sighed dreamily. “We’re so proud.”

Enid giggled nervously, setting a plate before them. “I made you both—uh—special tomato juice smoothies! Extra garlic-free!”

Yoko grinned, sharp teeth flashing. “Perfect. You’re a lifesaver.”

Next came Bianca, waddling in with her pregnant belly, and Ajax, trailing behind holding Max by the hand. The boy wore a beanie identical to Ajax’s and was already trying to throw Cheerios like pebbles.

“Enid!” Ajax boomed. “Smells amazing in here. Dude, you’re the best.”

Bianca rolled her eyes but smiled faintly, lowering herself carefully into a chair. “Thank you, Enid. You’re a saint.”

Enid flushed. A saint who’s losing her mind.

Xavier and Tyler came next. Xavier carried an oversized sketchbook like a priest carried scripture. Tyler followed, looking awkward but endearingly helpful, immediately grabbing plates to set the table.

Finally, Agnes appeared, literally, by fading into view right next to Enid.

“Morning!” she chirped.

Enid yelped, nearly spilling coffee. Her eyes darted between Agnes and Wednesday. The two exchanged only the briefest of nods.

Enid’s heart sank. That’s it. That’s proof. They’re hiding something.

---

The table was long and intimidating, lined with gothic candelabras dripping wax like frozen tears. Enid had done her best to brighten it with fresh flowers and colorful placemats, but somehow the house kept sabotaging her. The flowers wilted within seconds, the placemats caught fire from the candles, and one of the chairs kept trying to bite whoever sat on it.

Still, everyone dug in.

Children shrieked. The vampire toddler climbed under the table and bit Ajax’s ankle. Ajax yelped, knocking over a jug of juice, which rolled across the floor like a bloodstain spreading.

“Kids!” Enid tried to sound chipper while mopping furiously. “Aren’t they just, so full of life?”

Wednesday didn’t even look up from her black coffee. “Too much life. It’s revolting.”

The others laughed, used to Wednesday’s brand of humor. Enid laughed too, but her eyes kept flicking again and again to Agnes. To Wednesday. To the invisible thread she imagined connecting them.

She watched Agnes sip her tea, her shoulders still faintly slumped, her smile a little too forced. She watched Wednesday’s gaze linger, not warmly or affectionately, but knowingly. Like a conspirator.

And it burned inside Enid.

As Bianca complained about Ajax teaching their son “rock-throwing techniques” and Yoko’s daughter gnawed on the table leg, Enid could barely hear. Her thoughts roared louder than the chaos.

"They’re in on something. They have a secret. Maybe it’s dangerous. Maybe Wednesday promised her something. Maybe Agnes is in trouble and Wednesday didn’t tell me. But why? Why keep me out of it? Don’t I deserve to know? Don’t I—"

“Enid.”

She jumped again. Wednesday was staring at her, a fork in hand. “You’ve burned the toast.”

“Oh! Uh—haha—oops!” Enid scrambled to the stove, smoke curling.

Behind her, laughter bubbled around the table. Friendly and easy. But Enid’s chest felt tight.

---

Breakfast carried on in messy splendor. Food was thrown, jokes made and children shrieked more. Xavier tried to read one of his poems aloud until Tyler gently told him it was “too depressing for 9 a.m.” Ajax attempted to juggle fruit until Bianca threatened him with murder.

And through it all, Enid played hostess, smiling too big, laughing too hard, refilling cups with shaky hands.

Every time Wednesday’s voice cut through the noise cool, sharp and detached, Enid’s heart lurched. Every time Agnes smiled faintly at something Wednesday said, Enid’s thoughts spiraled faster.

By the time the plates were empty and the children were collapsing into post-breakfast tantrums, Enid felt wrung out, like laundry twisted too tightly.

She stood in the kitchen, clutching a dish rag, her reflection in the warped silver tray showing a smile too wide and eyes too glassy.

She whispered to herself: “It’s fine. It’s fine. You’re just overthinking. Wednesday wouldn’t. She couldn’t. You know her. You know her.”

But in her heart, the doubt flickered, stubborn as candle flame.

From the dining hall, Wednesday’s voice drifted in, low and calm as always: “Children should be fed to silence them, not entertained. That is the key to domestic harmony.”

The group laughed.

Enid pressed the rag to her chest, biting her lip.

She loved her wife. She trusted her wife.

But last night’s shadows lingered. And until she had answers, breakfast or anything else, would never feel entirely normal again.

---

The morning had been chaos, but the afternoon threatened to be worse. When a dozen people lived under one roof, even for a single night, the act of leaving was a performance in itself. Bags were misplaced, children cried, and somehow Xavier’s sketchbook had vanished, only to be discovered in the jaws of Wednesday’s pet plant, who had borrowed it to press skeleton leaves between the pages.

The Addams-Sinclair mansion groaned and sighed under the weight of departure, as though the house itself hated the idea of guests leaving. Portraits tilted toward the commotion, shadows lengthened with interest. The very walls seemed to whisper: "Leave, and you may not return."

Enid stood at the threshold of the great hall, her hostess-smile plastered on, her hands fluttering as she tried to direct traffic.

“Ajax, your son’s shoes are in the rafters, don’t ask me how. Xavier, I think your sketchbook’s okay, it just smells like compost now. Divina, your little one’s hiding under the organ pipes again. Thing! Can you go get her?”

She was a whirlwind of activity, her sunny voice just a little too high-pitched, a little too quick. No one noticed the tension beneath it. Except Wednesday, of course, who noticed everything but chose to say nothing.

Enid’s heart was in her throat, and it wasn’t because of the chaos. It was because she was waiting. Waiting for the right moment.

Because today, before everyone left, she would confront Agnes.

She had to.

One by one, they readied themselves. Bianca murmured about the car being parked too far away, with Ajax fussing over her and Max insisting he was “big enough to drive.” Yoko’s little vampire screeched as Divina perched her on her hips, hissing at the sun despite the heavy tint on her sunglasses. Xavier and Tyler bickered about whether the trunk could hold both their suitcases and Xavier’s massive canvases (“Tyler, it’s my artistic lifeblood.” — “Xavier, it’s oil paint, it can survive in the backseat.”).

Agnes was the last, lingering near the stairs with her bag slung carelessly over her shoulder. She looked tired, a faint smile plastered on her face, but her eyes didn’t sparkle with mischief the way they usually did.

Enid saw it as her chance.

She pounced, or at least, her version of pouncing, which was a bright smile and an overly casual tone.

“Hey, Agnes! Mind giving me a hand with, uh, the coats upstairs before you head out?”

Agnes blinked. “The coats?”

“Yep!” Enid beamed, tugging her arm. “Lots of coats. Can’t miss them.”

Before Agnes could protest, Enid had whisked her up the staircase, away from the crowd, away from Wednesday’s sharp gaze. They ended up in the corridor outside the guest rooms, where the air was thick and still.

Enid dropped the smile.

“Okay,” she said, voice low but trembling. “What’s going on with you and Wednesday?”

Agnes froze. “What?”

“Don’t play dumb.” Enid crossed her arms, her robe sleeve still faintly stained from breakfast. “Last night. I saw you. In your room. With her.”

Color drained from Agnes’ face. She opened her mouth, closed it, then tried again. “Enid, it’s not what you think.”

“Then what is it?” The words came out sharper than Enid meant. The claws she usually kept tucked away, pressed faintly at her fingertips now. “Because I’ve been tearing myself apart all morning thinking of reasons why my wife would sneak into your room in the middle of the night with an envelope and then let you hug her.”

Agnes flinched. Her usual cocky grin was gone, replaced by something raw and cornered. “I can’t… I can’t tell you.”

That was the worst thing she could’ve said.

Enid’s heart dropped into her stomach. “Can’t, or won’t?”

Agnes rubbed the back of her neck, eyes darting away. “It’s… private. It’s not about you. I swear it’s not—”

“Not about me?” Enid’s voice cracked, laughter spilling out but brittle as glass. “You really think that’s comforting? Because it’s not.”

Agnes bit her lip, looking smaller than Enid had ever seen her. “Enid, Wednesday was just… helping me. That’s all.”

“Helping you how?”

“I—” Agnes’s throat bobbed. “I can’t. She made me promise.”

The world tilted. Enid felt her knees weaken, the banister the only thing keeping her upright.

Wednesday. Her Wednesday. The one who told her everything with brutal honesty, who never spared anyone’s feelings, who claimed transparency was the only kindness she believed in... was keeping promises with someone else. Keeping secrets from Enid.

Her mind, already prone to spiraling went into overdrive.

Maybe it was money. Maybe it was something darker. Maybe Wednesday had some other side to her life, one Enid wasn’t allowed to touch. And maybe Agnes… maybe Agnes was part of it.

The thought burned.

“Enid…” Agnes reached out as if to touch her shoulder, then thought better of it. “Please. Trust Wednesday.”

Enid let out a sharp laugh that was more a sob. “I do. Or at least I thought I did.”

Silence stretched between them, heavy as stone.

When Enid finally descended the stairs with Agnes, her smile was back, but it was cracked porcelain.

The gang was gathered by the front door, exchanging hugs, handshakes and promises of texts and calls. Willa cooed in her carrier, oblivious to her mother’s turmoil, gnawing on one of her wolfy teething toys.

Wednesday stood by the doorway, composed as ever, her dark eyes gliding over the group. She looked at Enid briefly, expression unreadable, before turning to usher their friends out with curt nods.

Enid stayed quiet, lips stretched in a smile that felt like it might split her face.

---

The cars rumbled to life, one by one, pulling away from the mansion. The vampire toddler pressed her face against the glass, hissing goodbye. Ajax shouted something about next year’s reunion. Xavier waved dramatically out the window like a poet heading to exile.

And then they were gone.

Silence descended. The house sighed with relief, candles flickering back into stillness.

Enid stood in the empty great hall, her arms wrapped around herself. She could still hear Agnes’ words echoing in her ears. She made me promise.

Her golden retriever heart, so open and trusting felt bruised.

Wednesday came to stand beside her, still and calm, as though nothing were amiss.

“They’ve gone,” she said simply.

Enid swallowed hard. She wanted to scream, to demand answers, to claw the truth from Wednesday’s chest. But all she managed was a nod.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “They’re gone.”

But the shadow of doubt remained.

And for the first time since their wedding night beneath the thunderous storm, Enid wondered if she was looking at her wife, or at a stranger cloaked in secrets.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was unusually quiet. The friends were gone, their laughter and chaos now just an echo in the walls. The carpets no longer bore muddy footprints from Ajax’s son, the vampire toddler’s screeches had stopped rattling the chandeliers, and Xavier’s canvases were no longer threatening to block the hallways.

But for Enid, the silence wasn’t relief. It was suffocating.

She had been carrying it since last night, the image of Wednesday slipping into Agnes’ room, the slick envelope, the hug. She had carried it through the morning, plastering a hostess smile over her aching heart. She had carried it as Agnes whispered evasions in the corridor. And she had carried it now, as the last car vanished down the long driveway, leaving her alone with the one person she loved most and, suddenly, trusted least.

Wednesday. Enid’s wife. Her anchor. Her eternal contradiction.

Her betrayer?

The thought stabbed again, and Enid couldn’t hold it anymore. Her golden retriever heart wasn’t built to contain poison.

She turned to Wednesday, who was already removing her black gloves with clinical precision after performing taxidermy to a stray fly in their living room, as though nothing were wrong. As though Enid wasn’t unraveling inside.

“Wednesday,” Enid said. Her voice was sharp.

Wednesday looked up, her expression still and unreadable. “Yes, Enid?”

Enid crossed her arms, claws pressing faintly into her skin. “I want the truth. Now.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “You’ll need to narrow your request. I contain multitudes.”

“Don’t you dare deflect!” Enid snapped, louder than she intended. Her voice bounced off the high ceilings, startling a portrait whose painted subject covered its ears. “Last night. Agnes. What were you doing in her room?”

There it was. Spoken out loud. The question that had been gnawing her insides raw.

Wednesday removed her other glove, laying both neatly on the table. Her movements were calm as if stalling. “I fail to see how that is any of your concern.”

Enid’s breath hitched. That hurt more than it should have. “Any of my concern? You’re my wife, Wednesday! Of course it’s my concern when you sneak into another woman’s room in the middle of the night!”

The word “wife” cracked, splitting in her throat like brittle glass.

Wednesday’s eyes, so black and impenetrable flickered just briefly. But her face remained stone. “Enid. You’re spiraling.”

Enid let out a sharp laugh. “Of course I’m spiraling! I just watched the love of my life slink into my friend’s room like some gothic Romeo! What was I supposed to think?!”

“Romeo is an insult,” Wednesday said flatly. “He was insipid, impulsive, and died prematurely. Hardly flattering.”

Enid’s claws fully extended now, her wolf on edge. “Stop it. Stop with the deflections and the creepy calmness and just tell me! Why were you there? What are you hiding from me?”

Wednesday’s lips thinned. “If I explain, it will not be on demand. I will not be interrogated in my own home.”

Enid’s chest heaved, tears stinging her eyes. “You mean our home. And I have every right to know if something’s going on between you and Agnes.”

At that, Wednesday’s composure cracked just barely. Her jaw tightened and her fingers curled. “You dare to suggest I am unfaithful.”

Enid’s voice broke. “What else am I supposed to think? She wouldn’t tell me anything. You won’t tell me anything. All I saw was you, with her, alone, in the dark, exchanging secrets you won’t share with me.”

The tears spilled now, hot and humiliating. She hated crying, hated feeling weak, hated giving Wednesday the sight of her raw and broken. But she couldn’t stop.

“I’ve given you everything, Wednesday. My love, my loyalty, my life. I’ve carried your child, I’ve built this crazy, gothic, insane family with you. And now I feel like you’re shutting me out. Like I don’t know you anymore.”

The words came in sobs, tumbling over each other, until Enid collapsed onto one of the high-backed chairs, burying her face in her hands.

For a long moment, silence.

Only the sound of her ragged breathing, and the faint creak of the house.

Then Wednesday moved. Slowly, she crossed the room and stood before Enid, her shadow falling over her like a dark mantle.

“Look at me,” Wednesday said quietly.

Enid shook her head, muffled by her hands.

“Enid.” Her voice was low and commanding. “Look at me.”

Against her will, Enid lifted her face. Tears streaked her cheeks, her eyes red and wild.

Wednesday crouched down to her level. Her black dress pooled around her like ink.

“I am not unfaithful. I would never betray you in that way.” Her tone was steady and knife-sharp. “The very suggestion insults us both.”

Enid’s lip trembled. “Then what were you doing with her? Why the secrets? Why the promises you won’t share with me?”

Wednesday exhaled, a sound halfway between annoyance and resignation.

“Agnes,” she said, “is drowning. Her family has abandoned her. Her father disowned her when she refused to inherit his empire of banality. Her mother has remarried into a vacuous nest of suburban mediocrity. She has no one, and she refused to admit it to the rest of you because she still wants to be seen as strong.”

Enid blinked, tears catching in her lashes.

Wednesday continued, voice calm but edged with steel. “She couldn’t afford her tuition. She was prepared to drop out. So I gave her money. Quietly. Because Agnes’ pride would not survive public pity.”

Enid’s breath caught.

“I promised her I would not tell you,” Wednesday said, “not because I wished to keep secrets from you, but because Agnes needed dignity. And I keep my promises.”

The truth hit like a bell tolling.

Enid sat back, stunned. Her tears still fell, but now they burned differently.

“So… you were helping her?” she whispered.

“Yes.” Wednesday’s gaze didn’t waver. “That is all.”

Enid let out a strangled laugh, half relief and half self-directed pain. “Oh my God. I thought—you and her—I thought the worst.”

“Of course you did.” Wednesday tilted her head. “You are catastrophically imaginative.”

Enid covered her face with her hands again, groaning. “I’m such an idiot.”

Wednesday reached out awkwardly, but with intent, and laid a cold hand over Enid’s trembling one.

“You are not an idiot,” she said. “You are sensitive. It is simultaneously your greatest strength and your greatest weakness.”

Enid peeked through her fingers, her watery eyes searching Wednesday’s face. “You really weren’t…?”

Wednesday’s lips curved, not quite a smile but something close. “Enid. If I were to betray you, it would not be with Agnes. She is far too transparent. I would select someone whose duplicity matched my own.”

It was such a Wednesday thing to say that Enid let out a hiccupping laugh through her tears.

Wednesday rose to her feet, graceful as ever, and extended a hand. Enid took it, letting herself be pulled up.

Her face was blotchy, her eyes swollen, but her heart felt lighter, even as guilt gnawed at her.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should’ve trusted you.”

Wednesday brushed a strand of hair from her face, her touch delicate despite her words. “You trusted your fear more. That is understandable. Fear is louder than truth.”

Enid leaned into her, resting her head against Wednesday’s shoulder. “I just love you so much. The thought of losing you—”

“You will not lose me,” Wednesday interrupted firmly. “Not to Agnes. Not to anyone.”

Enid let out a shaky laugh. “Good. Because I’d fight like hell to keep you.”

Wednesday’s hand rested lightly on her back. “I would relish the spectacle.”

They stood like that for a long while, the silence no longer suffocating but settling, like ash after a fire.

Later, when Enid finally tucked Willa into her crib, she felt the echoes of her tears still lingering, but also something steadier beneath it.

Wednesday sat beside her, a book in hand, looking as unshaken as ever. But when their eyes met, Enid saw it. The glimmer of truth, of loyalty, of love, buried beneath the gothic mask.

And for the first time since her spiral began, Enid believed it.

Wednesday was hers. Entirely.

Chapter Text

Wednesday Addams did not believe in weakness. She had dissected frogs at six, performed an autopsy on a raven at eight, and rejected notions of sentimentality before she could spell the word. Weakness was for the faint-hearted, for fools who begged for happy endings.

But weakness, it seemed, came in many forms.

Tonight, it had taken the shape of her wife’s voice trembling with suspicion.

Are you with her?

The words lingered long after Enid had stopped crying in her arms, long after the night fell back into routine silence, long after Willa’s breathing in the nursery steadied into the rhythm of slumber.

Wednesday lay awake in their bed, eyes open, staring at the ceiling beams as though they were gallows. Beside her, Enid slept curled toward her, the exhaustion of emotions pulling her under.

But Wednesday could not sleep.

For the first time in years, she felt something foreign and invasive gnawing inside her chest. Not guilt, she never allowed herself guilt, but something more poisonous: the void of doubt.

Not doubt in Enid, but doubt in herself.

Enid had thought her capable of betrayal. Enid, who knew her better than anyone alive, who saw through the cracks of her mask, who had stood beside her through chaos, danger, and matrimony.

Enid had looked at her and imagined she could stray.

It was intolerable. Unacceptable and unforgivable.

And Wednesday knew with a clarity that chilled her more than a winter grave, that if she allowed this crack to remain, it would spread. A hairline fracture in marble could destroy a statue.

She would not let it.

She rose silently from the bed, her movements as precise as the scalpel of a coroner. Enid stirred faintly but did not wake. The wolf slept heavily after storms of emotion.

Wednesday pulled on her long black robe, the hem whispering against the floor as she moved through the hallways. The house creaked and sighed around her, ancient wood recognizing the tread of its mistress.

She stopped at her writing desk in the library. The typewriter sat waiting, the keys polished and ready to be clicked. She touched it but did not write. For once the words eluded her.

Instead, she sat in the high-backed chair, her hands folded staring into the shadows.

Why had it shaken her so deeply? Not because Enid had doubted her faithfulness, Enid was entitled to fragile moments, especially with maternal instincts turned feral.

What pierced Wednesday was the fact that she had created the doubt. She had withheld, kept secrets even if for noble reason. She had given her wife reason to suspect.

That was the true wound.

Wednesday Addams prided herself on control. She never faltered, never flinched, never allowed chaos to own her. Yet with Enid, she had grown complacent, assuming her loyalty was so self-evident it required no tending.

She had underestimated the wolf’s heart. She had underestimated her own too.

Wednesday did not apologize. She did not explain. But she knew she needed to act.

In the Addams household, love was never expressed with roses and soft words. It was daggers, nooses, thunderclouds. And in the Sinclair-Addams household, love had taken on new forms, more domestic and chaotic, but no less sharp.

If Enid needed proof of devotion, Wednesday would provide it. Not in honeyed promises, but in undeniable gestures, etched in gothic permanence.

The plan unfolded in her mind like a dark flower.

First: purge the doubt.
Second: carve her truth into something Enid could never mistake.
Third: remind her wife that Wednesday Addams did not falter.

And if it meant stepping into discomfort of romance, gesture and open declaration... then she would sharpen her knife and endure it.

For Enid.

---

The following days were unusual.

Enid noticed first in small details. Wednesday, who normally rose before dawn to type with the relentless clatter of steel keys, lingered in bed until Enid stirred. She did not mention it, but Enid felt her wife’s eyes open in the dark, watching and waiting.

At breakfast, Wednesday allowed Enid to cook her colorful pancakes without complaint, even tasting them with unnerving patience.

She stayed closer to Enid than usual, hovering in rooms she normally ignored, silent but present.

Enid found it strange. Almost unsettling. But after their fight, she chalked it up to Wednesday keeping watch, her way of reassuring without words.

What Enid didn’t know was that Wednesday was preparing something else.

She had gone to the cellar that night, unlocking trunks she had not touched since childhood. Old Addams heirlooms, relics of loyalty and devotion, objects her ancestors had used to court and bind their beloveds.

A black silk ribbon that Morticia once tied around Gomez’s wrist, a symbol of unbreakable bond.

A silver dagger etched with vows in Latin, passed down through generations.

A vial of nightshade, gifted as proof of trust
"if you accept what I offer, you trust me with your life."

Wednesday touched each item with reverence. Then she added her own: a manuscript page from her latest novel, inked at midnight, where the heroine vows never to abandon her wolf companion even in death.

This would be her gift. Her declaration. Her apology, though she would never call it that aloud.

---

On the third night, when the moon hung heavy outside their window, Wednesday set the scene.

Enid returned from settling Willa in her crib to find their bedroom transformed, not romantically, not with flowers or candles. Enid knew better than to expect that.

Instead, the room was draped in shadow. A single candelabra flickered on their large rectangle table opposite their bed, its flames bending like mourners. The heirlooms lay arranged neatly, the dagger gleaming beside the black ribbon, the vial catching the candlelight like dark wine.

And at the center, the page of Wednesday’s novel, folded but sealed with black wax.

Enid froze at the threshold. “Uh… Wednesday? What is this?”

Wednesday stood by the table, posture perfect, eyes serious. “This is my answer to your doubt.”

Enid blinked. “My… what?”

“Your implication,” Wednesday said, voice steady. “That I could betray you. That I could stray. I will not permit such fractures in our foundation. So I present proof.”

Enid stepped forward cautiously, eyes darting to the objects. “Proof?”

Wednesday gestured. “The ribbon means bond. The dagger means vow. The nightshade means trust. And my words mean truth. Together, they form what your kind might call… a love offering.”

Enid’s heart thudded. Her throat tightened. She hadn’t expected this. Not from Wednesday.

Her wife continued, eyes burning. “You may doubt many things, Enid. My patience. My sanity. My culinary taste. But never again will you doubt my devotion. You are mine. I am yours. It is sealed.”

For a long moment, Enid could only stare. Her wolf heart swelled, tears pricking again, not from fear this time, but from the overwhelming flood of Wednesday’s strange, fierce love.

“You… you did all this? For me?” she whispered.

Wednesday tilted her head. “Of course. I have no interest in allowing emotional rot to set into our marriage. That would be… inefficient.”

Enid laughed through the tears, half-choked. “Oh my God, you’re insane. This is the most gothic, creepy, absolutely Wednesday way of saying ‘I love you.’”

Wednesday’s lips curved faintly. “Precisely.”

Enid moved forward and threw her arms around her, nearly knocking the dagger from the table. Wednesday stiffened, then allowed it, her hands resting lightly on Enid’s back.

“You’re ridiculous,” Enid whispered against her hair. “And I love you so much.”

“I know.” Wednesday’s voice was soft, but edged with finality. “And now, you also know: I would sooner stab myself with that dagger than betray you.”

Enid shivered at the words, but in her wolf heart, she believed them. Completely.

---

Later that night, when the candles guttered out and the relics were tucked safely away, Enid curled against Wednesday in their bed. She was panting softly after the lovemaking she indulged in with Wednesday. No one in the world will believe her if she told them how passionate Wednesday is in that department, but this was for her eyes only anyway.

For the first time since the confrontation, the void between them was gone. And though Wednesday lay silent as always, her hand never left Enid’s.

The marble had cracked, but Wednesday had reforged it, darker, sharper and unbreakable.

And Enid, wolf heart and all, finally slept without fear.

Chapter Text

The Sinclair-Addams mansion had settled into a strange rhythm. After Wednesday’s morbid “love declaration” with heirlooms and poison, something shifted between them. Not outwardly, of course, Wednesday was still pale marble, still the picture of composure, still prone to declaring “I despise sentimentality” with all the passion of a marriage vow.

But inwardly, there was a change.

Enid could feel it every time Wednesday’s dark eyes lingered a moment longer on her, every time her wife’s hand brushed hers without provocation, every time Wednesday tolerated—almost allowed—Enid’s neon brightness in their shared spaces without complaint.

It was like living with a thunderstorm that had decided it preferred to hover above her house forever instead of moving on.

And Enid, for her part, was glowing. Even after years of married life, after surviving newborn chaos and hormonal spirals, she was falling more in love with Wednesday each day. If Wednesday was marble, Enid was grass. Always growing toward her, wrapping roots around her, determined to hold the stone even if it cracked her own heart.

Yes, things were perfect.
Except, of course, for Willa.

---

Willa was crawling faster now, teeth nipping at whatever the world offered. Half wolf, half psychic and all chaos, she was the most dangerous six-month-old on record.

That morning, Enid had been folding laundry in their bedroom while Willa gurgled on a blanket nearby. For once, Enid thought they were safe. Nothing sharp, nothing poisonous, nothing antique within reach.

But Willa, like her parents, had a talent for mischief.

Enid turned away for two seconds. Just two. And when she looked back, her baby had somehow rolled across the rug, pulled herself up on the low side table, and whacked her tiny head against the wooden leg.

The thud was small. But the cry, oh God, the cry.

Willa wailed like the world had ended.

Enid’s entire wolf soul collapsed. Her claws threatened to spring out as panic surged through her. She scooped Willa up, cradling her trembling body. “Oh my God! Oh my God, baby, you’re hurt, I should call—oh my God—Wednesday! We need to call—what’s the number—oh my God she’s going to die—”

Wednesday entered the room at that moment perfectly calm and carrying a black feather she’d been cataloguing. She took one look at Enid. She was frantic, her eyes wide, bouncing the screaming baby like a terrified rabbit. Wednesday sighed.

“She is not dying, Enid,” Wednesday said. “Her skull is sound. It would take more than a table leg to fell an Addams-Sinclair hybrid.”

“But what if she’s concussed?!” Enid’s voice cracked. “She’s our baby! We need an ambulance, or— or a witch doctor, or a pediatrician, or all three—”

“Enid.”

The way Wednesday said her name was sharp enough to still her panic.

“She is crying,” Wednesday said simply. “Which means she is alive, her lungs are strong, and her spirit rebellious. All acceptable outcomes.”

Enid’s bottom lip trembled. “But—but she’s hurting.”

Willa wailed again, fat tears streaking her chubby cheeks. Wednesday moved closer, and to Enid’s horror, reached out her pale hands.

“Give her to me.”

Enid hesitated. Her instincts screamed to hold on tighter. But something in Wednesday’s expression, cold but certain, made her yield. She passed the baby into her wife’s arms.

Wednesday cradled Willa with surprising steadiness. The baby’s cries hiccupped, confusion settling as she blinked up at her morbid mother.

Wednesday’s lips curved faintly. “Enough noise, little harbinger. I will soothe you in the only way I know how.”

And then, to Enid’s complete disbelief, Wednesday began to tell a story.

“Once upon a time,” Wednesday intoned in her low, steady voice, “when I was sixteen and your mother was a technicolor nuisance with a smile too bright for her own good, she asked me to go on a date.”

Enid blinked. “Wait, that date? You’re—”

“Silence,” Wednesday said smoothly. “This is for Willa.”

The baby hiccupped again but her sobs easing as she listened. Her tiny fists curled against Wednesday’s robe.

“I did not believe in dates,” Wednesday continued. “They were trivial, saccharine rituals designed by the weak-minded. But your mother was relentless. She cornered me in our dormitory, eyes wide, fangs nearly sprouting, and declared she wanted to ‘do something normal together.’ Naturally, I refused.”

Enid groaned and covered her face. “Oh my God, I remember this—”

Wednesday ignored her. “But Enid is nothing if not persistent. She followed me that evening, through the woods over the ridge and into the village. I told her not to. She tripped twice, nearly impaled herself on a branch, and whined about blisters. Still, she did not turn back.”

Enid peeked through her fingers. “You’re making me sound pathetic.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “You were pathetic, adorable and maddening. All at once.”

Enid’s cheeks flushed hot.

Wednesday stroked Willa’s soft hair absently as she spoke. “We arrived at the scene of a recent murder. The body was still fresh, the crime unsolved. I crouched beside the corpse cataloguing evidence, savoring the artistry of arterial spray. And when I turned to dismiss Enid, certain she would be vomiting in the bushes, she was instead staring at me.”

She paused. Her voice softened, just barely. “Not with disgust or fear. But with awe. As though I were the sun and the moon combined. As though blood and death meant nothing compared to the fact that she was with me.”

Enid’s throat tightened.

“That,” Wednesday concluded, “was our first date. A crime scene. And from that moment, I knew that if this irritating werewolf insisted on tethering herself to me, I would never escape. Nor would I want to.”

By the end of the story, Willa’s cries had stilled completely. Her damp lashes fluttered and her breathing slowed. She fell asleep in Wednesday’s arms, soothed by her mother’s grim romance.

Enid wiped her eyes with the heel of her hand. “Damn it, Wednesday. You can’t just say things like that while holding our baby. I can’t handle it.”

Wednesday turned her head, eyes gleaming. “Consider it a family bedtime story. One day she will tell her own wolf pups how her mothers fell in love over a corpse.”

Enid laughed, tears still spilling, part horrified and part melted into a puddle. “You’re insane.”

“Correction,” Wednesday murmured. “I am yours.”

---

Later, after they laid Willa in her crib, Enid caught Wednesday lingering by the doorframe, watching the baby’s tiny chest rise and fall. It was rare to see her wife still for long, rarer still with softness in her gaze.

Enid slid her arms around her waist from behind, resting her chin on her shoulder. “You’re turning into Gomez.”

Wednesday stiffened. “That is an unforgivable insult.”

Enid giggled. “No, babe, it’s a compliment. You’re obsessed with me. And it’s… really, really hot.”

Wednesday’s ears flushed pale pink. “I am not obsessed. I am attentive.”

“Mmhm,” Enid said, kissing her cheek. “Tell me again how I looked at you at that crime scene.”

Wednesday glanced at her sidelong, voice low. “Like I was both damnation and salvation. Like you would follow me into hell itself.”

Enid’s heart flipped. “Still true.”

“And still pathetic,” Wednesday deadpanned.

But when Enid laughed, Wednesday let her head fall briefly against hers, a silent confession she didn’t need to put into words.

The Addams-Sinclair household descended back into chaos the next day with diapers, manuscripts, and wolf cub teething toys everywhere, but something had shifted again.

Wednesday had discovered something dangerous: not just that she needed Enid, but that she could say it in her own way.

And for Enid, that was enough to fall in love all over again. Even if their daughter’s favorite bedtime story would forever be about a corpse.

Chapter Text

The Sinclair-Addams mansion was alive with noise. Not from the ravens tapping at the windowpanes, nor the groaning pipes in the walls, nor even the occasional muffled scream from some long-forgotten dungeon below.

The sound that filled the grand gothic halls was higher pitched, babbling, gurgling, and punctuated with the squeak of toys and the soft plop of a baby’s padded bottom hitting the floor.

Willa Hecate Sinclair-Addams was on the brink of a milestone.

Enid had set up camp in the parlor with an ironing board that looked comically out of place in the shadowy Addams décor. She was humming something upbeat, as she smoothed out tiny black baby dresses and onesies that had been gifted from Morticia. It was a surreal task. Enid, in her sunny yellow tank top and messy ponytail, cheerfully pressing fold lines out of clothing so morbid it looked like it belonged at a Victorian funeral.

In front of her, on a thick quilt spread across the floor, Willa played with an array of toys.

Half were normal baby things: soft plush animals, rattles, a stacking ring tower. The other half were… Addams-approved. A miniature guillotine with dull blade, “for teething” as Morticia had written in the accompanying note. A collection of raven feathers tied together as a “sensory wand.”

It was a bizarre playpen, half baby shower and half dungeon.

And Enid wouldn’t have it any other way.

“Look at you, baby girl,” she cooed as she pressed a wolf-embroidered bib. “Being all cute with your toys. Mama Woof loves you so much!”

Willa gurgled in response, grabbing the raven feather bundle and trying to gum it with her tiny wolf fangs.

“Yeeeah, not for chewing,” Enid said quickly, swooping down to replace it with a plush bat. “This one, okay? Nice and soft, won’t stab you in the gums.”

Willa squealed, kicked her legs, and dropped the bat almost immediately in favor of rolling over onto her belly.

And then… something new happened.

Enid’s eyes widened as her daughter, with all the focus of a mountaineer about to scale Everest, planted her pudgy little hands on the floor, tucked her knees under, and miraculously pushed herself upright.

It wasn’t a full stand. More of a wobbly squat, balanced precariously on those chubby legs.

But then, oh sweet baby moon goddess, Willa straightened. She stood.

On her own.

For all of three seconds.

Then she toppled back down onto her diaper-padded bottom with a soft thud.

Enid dropped the iron with a yelp. “OhmyGod! Wednesday! WEDNESDAY GET IN HERE! SHE STOOD! SHE STOOD UP ON HER OWN!”

---

From the hallway came the slow footsteps of Wednesday. She appeared in the doorway, immaculate as always in a long black dress, a book still tucked in her hand as if she had been dragged from the middle of a sonnet about plague.

“You bellowed?”

Enid turned with her eyes wild, pointing at the playmat. “She stood! She’s standing! Our baby is standing!”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “Yes. That is typically the precursor to walking. Or falling. Sometimes both.”

Willa, as if to prove her point was already pulling herself upright again, legs trembling like overcooked spaghetti.

“Come on, sweetie, you can do it again!” Enid encouraged, clapping softly. “Mama Woof’s watching! Oh my God, I’m gonna cry.”

“Do not cry,” Wednesday said flatly, moving closer. “It will distract her. Observe instead.”

They both crouched now like mother wolves on either side of their cub.

Willa wobbled. She looked at Enid. Then at Wednesday. Then at the raven feather she’d dropped earlier. She seemed to make a decision in her baby brain.

One step.
A second.
And then—plop—down she went, face-first into the quilt.

Enid gasped so loudly it echoed. “OH MY GOD SHE FELL, SHE’S HURT—”

“She is not hurt,” Wednesday interrupted calmly. “Her skull is remarkably thick. Addams heritage.”

“Wednesday, she face-planted! That’s traumatic!”

“On the contrary,” Wednesday said. “That is character building. Pain is the first tutor of resilience.”

Enid whirled on her, scandalized. “She’s six months old! She doesn’t need resilience yet she needs bubble wrap!”

Willa rolled over on her back and began giggling, kicking her legs in delight.

Enid pointed frantically. “See?! She’s laughing because she doesn’t know she’s traumatized yet!”

“She is laughing because she is plotting her next attempt,” Wednesday corrected.

Sure enough, Willa pushed herself upright again. And again. And again. Each time wobbling a little further forward, each time tumbling down in a different comedic fashion.

One time she fell sideways into the stack of folded laundry, knocking a black baby bonnet onto her own head. Another time she toppled backward and knocked over the plush spider, which seemed to wave at her as she flailed.

Enid’s nerves were shot. She kept gasping, lunging, half-ready to throw herself under her child as a crash mat.

Wednesday by contrast sat elegantly on the armchair, her legs crossed watching with the serene interest of a scientist observing an experiment.

“She is already defying gravity,” she murmured. “And defying you. Promising signs.”

---

By mid-afternoon, Willa had made six full attempts at walking. Each more dramatic than the last.

Enid was now crawling on all fours beside her like a bodyguard. “Careful, honey! Careful—NO, not the guillotine toy—Wednesday, I told you that thing doesn’t belong here—”

“It is dull,” Wednesday replied. “And symbolic. What better motivation to learn balance than a reminder of mortality?”

“Or, hear me out, what better motivation than a soft pillow?!” Enid shoved one behind Willa as the baby tottered dangerously close to the furniture.

Plop. Down again.

This time, Willa clapped for herself. A triumphant, slightly smug clap.

Wednesday actually smiled. “At last. Pride in her suffering. She truly is ours.”

Enid groaned into her hands. “I can’t do this. I can’t watch her fall over and over like this. My heart is gonna give out. I need a defibrillator.”

“You need a backbone,” Wednesday corrected.

Enid shot her a look. “Excuse me, Mama Doom, but I birthed her. I have two backbones. One for me and one for her.”

Wednesday inclined her head slightly, as though that argument had merit. “Fair.”

---

The breakthrough happened when Enid wasn’t looking.

She’d turned to grab the iron again, muttering to herself about baby helmets and foam padding.

And when she turned back—

Willa was upright.

Not holding anything. Not leaning but tanding.

And then, slowly, she lifted one foot.
Placed it down.
Lifted the other.
Another step.
Another.

Enid froze, her mouth wide open and her hands clutching the iron mid-air.

“Wednesday,” she whispered. “She’s—she’s—”

“I see her,” Wednesday said calmly, though her dark eyes gleamed.

Step. Step. Step.

Willa wobbled toward them both, her arms out like a tiny monster demanding souls.

Enid dropped the iron with a clatter. “SHE’S WALKING! SHE’S WALKING!”

Willa took four full steps before losing her balance and falling… straight into Wednesday’s lap.

For the first time, Wednesday let out a sound that wasn’t words. A quiet and sharp inhale, like she’d been caught off-guard.

Enid squealed loudly, happy tears running down her cheeks. “She did it! Our baby walked! I knew she was gonna be amazing, but oh my God, she’s—she’s PERFECT.”

Willa looked up at them both, grinning wide with her tiny wolf fangs, drooling happily onto Wednesday’s pristine dress.

Wednesday didn’t flinch. She simply brushed a strand of hair from Willa’s face, murmuring: “A triumphant beginning. Next, she must learn to run.”

Enid gawked at her. “RUN?! Wednesday, I can’t even survive her WALKING. Don’t you dare wish for more chaos!”

“It is not chaos,” Wednesday said coolly. “It is destiny.”

Enid groaned, throwing herself backward on the sofa, laughing and crying all at once. “Destiny’s gonna give me gray hairs.”

Wednesday glanced at her, a rare softness in her gaze. “You will be radiant in silver. Like the moon. Like the wolf.”

Enid froze, her heart tripping. “…Damn it, Wednesday. You’re not allowed to be this hot while I’m having a meltdown.”

Wednesday smirked faintly. “Consider it character building.”

---

That night, as Enid tucked Willa into her crib and Wednesday double-checked the baby’s tiny fangs for teething progress, Enid whispered, “She really walked today. She’s growing so fast.”

Wednesday placed her pale hand over Enid’s. “Yes. One day she will leave this house. Leave us.”

Enid pouted. “Don’t say that. She’s our baby.”

“Precisely,” Wednesday murmured. “Which means we must prepare her for the cruelties of the world. And falls are only the beginning.”

Enid sighed, leaning her head on her wife’s shoulder. “Fine. But tomorrow I’m padding the floor. Everywhere. Even the dungeon.”

“Over my dead body,” Wednesday said.

Enid smiled softly. “Love you too, Mama Doom.”

And in the crib Willa stirred, whispering her garbled baby word: “Doooom.”

Wednesday’s smirk widened in the moonlight. “How delightful.”

Enid groaned. “Oh God, what have I done.”

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was never quiet. Even in the dead of night, when shadows draped the halls and the raven choir roosted on the iron gate, there was always sound: the creak of a hidden door, the groan of an ancient pipe, the faint echo of laughter that may or may not have been human.

But in the daytime, especially now that Willa was nearly eight months old, the soundscape had changed.

The mansion still whispered and moaned, of course. But it was now layered with the babble of a child who was convinced the entire world existed to be crawled upon, drooled on, or toppled over.

And today, that world expanded outdoors.

“Isn’t this exciting, baby girl?” Enid chirped as she carried Willa down the crooked stone steps into the garden. “First time walking outside! You’re gonna love it!”

Wednesday followed behind them like a raven’s shadow, her long black dress whispering against the steps. “I remain unconvinced that exposing her to open air is a prudent choice. The garden is riddled with carnivorous plant life, unmarked pits, and—”

“Life!” Enid interrupted brightly. “The garden is full of life. And that’s good for babies!”

Wednesday cast her a look that could wither roses. “Define good.”

Enid ignored her, kneeling to set Willa on the mossy ground. The baby wobbled upright almost immediately, her legs planted wide apart, her tiny hands raised like claws as if to say: "behold, I walk among mortals."

Enid gasped. “Look at you! Walking like a big girl already!” She clapped her hands, bouncing on her heels.

Willa grinned, drooled, and promptly began her trek across the lumpy earth.

The garden was a strange sprawling place. Half overgrown wilderness, half graveyard. There were rose bushes with thorns like daggers, twisted willow trees that wept into the pond, and patches of strange herbs Morticia had planted decades ago for spells Enid didn’t want to think about.

Enid followed close behind, arms outstretched like a nervous referee. “Careful, careful... oh God, not toward the Venus flytrap! Wednesday, she’s going toward the—”

Wednesday, lounging against a cracked angel statue, barely glanced up. “The trap will not take her. She lacks sufficient protein to entice it.”

“NOT HELPFUL!” Enid darted forward and scooped Willa just as the oversized plant’s mouth creaked open with a suspicious snap. “See?! She almost became lunch!”

Willa squealed happily, as if proud of herself.

“She showed initiative,” Wednesday said, eyes gleaming faintly. “A fine instinct in an heir.”

Enid groaned. “She showed death wish! Honestly, Wednesday, you and her are going to be the end of me.”

But when she looked down at Willa with her dirty hands, her grass-stained knees, face split into a wide fangy grin, Enid's heart melted anyway.

The adventure continued with Willa crawling after beetles, plucking weeds and trying to eat them, and somehow finding the single mud puddle in the entire yard.

Enid shrieked as her daughter toppled into it, splashing brown water up her arms. “Oh, for the love of—baby girl! You’re filthy now! Look at you!”

Willa sat in the puddle, clapping her muddy hands together in triumph.

Wednesday finally stepped closer, gazing down with all the solemnity of a priestess at a ritual. “She has baptized herself in earth. Appropriate.”

“She has covered herself in germs!” Enid countered, scooping the slippery baby up. “She needs a bath. Immediately. Like, NOW.”

Willa kicked her legs, spattering Enid’s shirt with mud, and babbled something that suspiciously sounded like “Doom.”

Wednesday allowed the faintest smirk. “She calls for me.”

Enid glared. “Fine. Then you can wash her, Mama Doom. My back is sore and she’s...” She looked down at the mud-streaked, wiggling baby in her arms. “...basically a greased piglet right now.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “You trust me to perform the task of bathing?”

Enid, exhausted already, thrust Willa into her arms. “I trust you to not drown her. And that’s about all the brain cells I’ve got left.”

---

The bathroom of the mansion was as gothic as every other room: clawfoot tub, candles dripping wax down black holders, faint scent of mildew that somehow never went away.

Wednesday placed Willa into the tub with the precision of a mortician lowering a casket. The baby immediately slapped the water, shrieking in delight.

“Contain yourself,” Wednesday instructed.

Willa responded by splashing harder, sending a wave of water onto Wednesday’s pristine dress.

Enid leaning against the doorframe with her arms crossed, nearly snorted. “Oh, this I have to see.”

Wednesday shot her a glare, then rolled up her sleeves. She knelt by the tub with solemn determination.

“Now,” she began, lifting a black washcloth as if it were a sacred relic, “we cleanse.”

The cleansing process, however, was anything but smooth.

Willa discovered that the washcloth made an excellent chew toy. Each time Wednesday tried to scrub, the baby snatched it and shoved it into her mouth.

“This is unsanitary,” Wednesday muttered.

“She’s teething,” Enid offered between giggles.

“She is obstructing the ritual.”

Wednesday finally pried the cloth free and began scrubbing Willa’s muddy arms. The baby responded by flailing, kicking water so forcefully it drenched the floor.

Enid cackled. “Oh my God, she’s kicking your butt.”

“I do not concede defeat to an infant,” Wednesday intoned. She pinned Willa’s legs with one pale hand while rinsing her hair with the other.

This however, led to Willa discovering the joy of splashing Mama Doom directly in the face.

A perfect arc of water landed squarely on Wednesday’s cheeks, dribbling down her nose.

Enid had to grip the doorframe to keep from collapsing with laughter. “Oh my God, you’re wet! Wednesday Addams, defeated by bath time!”

Wednesday, dripping but unflinching, simply blinked. “Not defeated. Baptized. A mutual rite of passage.”

Willa squealed happily, grabbing at Wednesday’s braid.

Wednesday picked up the baby soap, an unscented, black bar shaped like a skull, courtesy of Morticia. She rubbed it between her palms, ready to lather.

Willa immediately lunged forward, seized the soap, and attempted to eat it.

Enid yelped. “No no no! Not food, baby girl!”

Wednesday calmly plucked it from her jaws. “It is non-toxic. A pity. She would have enjoyed the bitterness.”

“Wednesday!”

“She must learn disappointment,” Wednesday replied flatly, before returning to scrubbing.

But now Willa was on the offensive. She had learned that bath time was a game. She lunged for the soap again. Then for the washcloth. Then for Wednesday’s sleeve.

Each grab was punctuated with gleeful shrieks.

And each time, Wednesday responded with patient, eerie calm. “No.” Pluck. “No.” Redirect. “No.”

Enid shook her head, laughing. “You sound like you’re training a wolf pup.”

“In essence,” Wednesday agreed.

At last, Willa was clean. Pink-cheeked, damp-haired and wrapped in a black towel embroidered with skulls. She gnawed on the towel edge with her tiny wolf fangs, looking smug.

Wednesday carried her out of the bathroom with the solemn pride of a knight bearing a relic.

“She has emerged victorious,” she declared. “Filth conquered, chaos endured. She will remember this day.”

Enid followed behind, still chuckling, carrying the pile of wet towels. “I don’t know, babe. Pretty sure she’s just gonna remember splashing you in the face.”

Wednesday paused, glancing down at the baby in her arms. Willa grinned up at her and babbled: “Doooom.”

Wednesday’s smirk deepened. “No. She will remember glory.”

Enid rolled her eyes fondly. “Well, I’ll remember my back pain while you two bond over being goth little bath gremlins.”

Wednesday placed Willa gently in her crib, smoothing her damp hair. “Your back will recover. My dignity, however, has been permanently waterlogged.”

Enid laughed, wrapping her arms around Wednesday’s waist from behind. “And yet, you’re the hottest drowned rat I’ve ever seen.”

Wednesday’s expression softened slightly as she covered Enid’s hands with her own. “Flattery. Effective, as always.”

They stood there a moment, the candlelight flickering, the baby chewing her towel and giggling softly.

The garden dirt was gone. The chaos of the bath survived. And for one fleeting second, the Sinclair-Addams family felt both completely absurd and perfectly whole.

Chapter Text

Enid woke up that morning feeling like a rusty hinge. Her spine twinged as she shifted, her lower back pulsing with an ache that hadn’t eased in days. She groaned softly, willing her body to cooperate. There were baby clothes to fold, breakfast to prepare, and most importantly, an eight-month-old wolfling-goth hybrid who didn’t understand the concept of “Mama’s back hurts.”

She tried to sit up, clutching her side and a voice like sharpened steel sliced through the air.

“Stay.”

Enid blinked, half-startled and half-melted at the familiar command. Wednesday stood beside the bed already dressed in her black gown, her arms crossed and her dark eyes locked on Enid like a warden watching a prisoner attempt escape.

“Weds, I—”

Wednesday raised a hand. “Do not finish that sentence. You are injured. You will remain in bed.”

Enid laughed nervously. “It’s just a little ache, babe. Moms don’t get sick days. Someone has to keep things running.”

Wednesday’s expression didn’t shift. “Incorrect. You are married to me. You will remain supine and allow me to conduct today’s duties.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “You… you mean you’ll do everything? Like, breakfast, chores, Willa?”

“Yes.”

For a moment, Enid didn’t know whether to swoon or panic.

On the one hand, Wednesday volunteering (well, commanding herself) to be domestic? On the other, Wednesday in charge of the baby for a full day without Enid’s buffer?

That mental image alone was enough to make her clutch the blanket tighter.

Enid opened her mouth to argue again, but the way Wednesday’s gaze pinned her down made her sink back into the pillows.

“Fine,” she muttered. “One day. But only because you look like you’d tie me to the bed if I tried.”

Wednesday inclined her head. “I am gratified by your obedience.”

Enid rolled her eyes. “You’re gratified because you’re bossy.”

“Both can be true.”

With that, Wednesday turned on her heel and swept toward the nursery. Enid lay back, torn between relief and terror.

---

From the nursery came the sounds of Willa waking: a wail, followed by the thump-thump-thump of small fists against the crib rails.

Usually, Enid would bounce in with a cheerful “Good morning, sunshine!” and smother her daughter in kisses.

Instead, she heard Wednesday’s flat tone: “Cease your lamentations. Morning has arrived, whether you welcome it or not.”

There was a pause, then an unholy giggle from Willa.

Enid pressed her face into the pillow, muffling a laugh. Of course. Their baby thought Wednesday was hilarious.

---

The smell wafted in first. Enid perked her head up, sniffing. Toast? Coffee? Maybe even pancakes?

Then came the sound: clang, scrape, hiss.

“Uh-oh,” she muttered.

Sure enough, Wednesday entered moments later carrying a tray. On it, a blackened toast, literally blackened. Oatmeal so thick it resembled mortar, a boiled egg that looked… suspiciously undercooked and a glass of what Enid prayed was orange juice but had the faint greenish tint of absinthe.

Enid sat up slowly, her back protesting. “Weds, babe… what is this?”

“Breakfast,” Wednesday replied. She set the tray down with reverence, like an executioner presenting the condemned’s last meal. “Nourishment for you and, later, for our progeny.”

Enid poked the oatmeal with her spoon. It didn’t budge. “Sweetheart… this could build a wall.”

“Strong foundations are important.”

“And the toast?”

“Charcoal cleanses toxins.”

Enid sighed. “And the drink?”

Wednesday hesitated. “Absinthe. Diluted. Allegedly improves circulation.”

Enid groaned, flopping back. “Oh my God. I’m gonna starve to death in my own bed.”

Willa, crawling behind Wednesday on the floor, squealed in delight as she stood up and stole the undercooked egg and tried to gum it.

Enid bolted upright. “NO!”

But Wednesday calmly plucked it from Willa’s mouth. “Relax. It is soft-boiled. Harmless.”

Enid clutched her face. “This is gonna be the longest day of my life.”

---

From her perch in bed, Enid could hear it all: The creak of the old washer. The rattle of clotheslines outside. The faint, unmistakable scent of formaldehyde.

She called out weakly, “Wednesday? What detergent are you using?”

There was a pause. Then, the chillingly calm reply, “None. I have concocted a superior solution.”

Enid’s stomach dropped. “What did you—”

“Vinegar. Ashes. And a dash of wolfsbane.”

Enid buried her face in her pillow. “Oh God. My baby’s onesies are gonna smell like a medieval plague cure.”

Willa’s delighted babble echoed in the hall.

“She approves,” Wednesday added.

Enid groaned.

---

The real test came with Willa though. Enid half-sat up, straining to hear every sound. The nursery rattled with chaos: drawers opening, tiny feet stomping, the occasional shriek that might have been joy, or terror.

Enid’s overprotective instincts burned. She was ready to drag herself out of bed when she heard Wednesday’s voice, calm as a funeral hymn, “Hold still. You will not perish from a fresh diaper.”

A squeal. A thump. A rustle.

“Do not resist. Resistance is futile. Ask your uncle Pugsley; he tried once.”

Enid smacked her forehead. She imagined poor Willa wriggling like an eel while Wednesday pinned her down with cold efficiency.

Then Willa giggled. A deep, belly giggle that carried down the hall.

Enid froze. Her baby didn’t giggle like that for just anyone. Her chest softened. Maybe… maybe this wouldn’t be such a disaster after all.

---

By midday, the mansion was alive with Wednesday’s peculiar brand of housekeeping.

Dusting? She used a raven feather dipped in vinegar. Sweeping? A scythe. An actual scythe. Vacuuming? “Unnecessary. Ghosts deserve dust.”

From the bedroom, Enid could only listen in horrified amusement as objects clattered and Willa babbled in chorus.

At one point, she heard a loud crash and shouted, “Everything okay?!”

Wednesday’s voice floated back. “Yes. The cabinet is broken. But so is entropy.”

Enid groaned into her pillow again.

By late afternoon, Wednesday reappeared at the door, holding Willa in one arm and a tray in the other.

On the tray was a tea, mercifully normal-looking, a slice of pie probably not poisoned, and a vase with one single, dying black rose.

“Offerings,” Wednesday said.

Enid’s heart flipped. The presentation was gothic, but it was also… sweet.

“Thanks, Weds,” she murmured, taking the tea.

Willa leaned toward Enid, babbling. Her cheeks were rosy, her hair wild, but she looked content and ealthy.

Enid stroked her daughter’s cheek, then looked up at her wife. “So… maybe you don’t totally suck at this.”

Wednesday’s lips quirked. “I excel. My methods are merely unconventional.”

Enid chuckled, sipping her tea. “Yeah, that’s one word for it.”

---

By the end of the day, the mansion looked… different. Not exactly tidy, but not ruined either.

There was ash in the laundry room, feathers in the hall, and a suspicious puddle of green liquid near the kitchen.

But Willa was clean, fed, and snuggled asleep in her crib. Enid had stayed in bed all day, her back finally beginning to ease a tad bit.

When Wednesday slipped beside her under the covers, Enid turned to face her. “You really did it. You handled everything.”

Wednesday’s expression was unreadable, but her hand slipped into Enid’s beneath the blanket. “You are irreplaceable, Enid. But when you fall, I will carry. That is non-negotiable.”

Enid’s eyes filled. She squeezed her wife’s hand. “You’re the best, you know that?”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Incorrect. I am adequate. You are biased.”

Enid smiled through her tears. “Maybe. But you’re still my favorite adequate wife.”

They kissed softly, the candlelight flickering shadows across the walls. In the silence, Enid realized something: Wednesday’s way of “handling” things was terrifying. But it was also love. Pure, strange, beautiful love wrapped in black lace and smelling faintly of ashes.

Chapter Text

Enid was a creature of sunshine, laughter, and stubborn optimism. She healed quickly, bounced back faster, and never, ever, admitted defeat. She rose up from the bed, knowing that she couldn't stay one more day in it.

That morning, as she bent to pick up one of Willa’s wolf-chewed blocks and felt her lower spine seize like a rusted hinge, she realized something dreadful.

She needed help.

The groan that left her lips was undignified, the kind she’d teased Wednesday about when her wife complained about “the weakness of human joints.” Only this time, it was Enid clutching her back, muttering curses under her breath.

Willa, sitting proudly on her play mat, clapped her tiny hands. “Mama woof!” she cheered, as though her mother’s pain was a circus act.

Wednesday, who had been polishing a dagger at the table, looked up with the composure of someone watching an execution.

“You sound like a dying elk.”

“Thanks,” Enid winced, easing herself upright. “That’s super supportive, babe.”

Wednesday placed the dagger down, her gaze sharpening. “You are still in pain. I forbade you from doing heavy lifting.”

“I’m not!” Enid protested. “I’m just… folding laundry and picking up toys and scrubbing a little and—”

Wednesday rose from her chair, moving with the grace of a predator. “Precisely the list of forbidden activities.”

Enid laughed nervously, tugging at the hem of her sweater. “It’s fine, really. Moms deal with worse. I just need a few stretches and—ow!”

She bent, tried to pick up Willa’s stuffed bat, and nearly toppled forward.

In an instant, Wednesday’s cool hands were on her shoulders, steadying her.

“Enough,” Wednesday said firmly, her tone colder than a crypt. “We are seeing a doctor.”

Enid froze. She hated hospitals. They were sterile, white and boring places. Not to mention the germs. And worse, how out of place Wednesday always looked in such settings, like a raven dropped into a flock of pigeons.

“I don’t think—”

“No,” Wednesday cut in. “You are fragile. You require professional assessment.”

“I’m not fragile,” Enid shot back. “I just—”

Her wife’s eyes narrowed. “Do not test me. You will see a physician, and that is final.”

Enid sagged in defeat. Wednesday never budged once her mind was set.

But then came the bigger problem.

“What about Willa?” Enid asked, glancing toward their daughter, who was now trying to gnaw on the wooden leg of a chair. “We can’t bring her to a hospital. Germs everywhere. Sick people coughing. Gross hand sanitizer.”

Wednesday followed her gaze, expression unchanging. “Agreed. She stays home.”

“With who?” Enid demanded. “We don’t exactly have a roster of babysitters on speed dial, Weds!”

Wednesday’s mouth quirked just barely. “My mother has already offered.”

Enid blinked. “Morticia?”

“The very one.”

Enid’s stomach flipped. Morticia Addams was elegant, ethereal, queen of all things macabre… and now… babysitter?

“Oh my God,” she muttered, clutching her face. “Oh my God. Our baby’s gonna learn how to handle a guillotine before her first birthday.”

“Excellent preparation,” Wednesday replied.

Enid groaned.

---

That afternoon, the doorbell chimed with a sound Enid swore was more funeral dirge than melody.

And there was Morticia, gliding into the mansion like a phantom in full regalia. Black gown flowing, raven hair gleaming, lips red as spilled blood. She brought with her the faint perfume of roses and grave soil.

“Darling Enid,” Morticia crooned, opening her arms.

Enid, both grateful and terrified, stepped into the embrace. She always felt like hugging Morticia was akin to hugging a silk-wrapped skeleton, soft but chilling.

“Thank you for coming,” Enid said, voice pitching nervously.

“Anything for family,” Morticia smiled, her voice like velvet laced with arsenic. “And for my precious granddaughter.”

As if summoned, Willa crawled in from the parlor, squealing. Morticia swooped down with supernatural grace, scooping her up.

“Ah, mon trésor,” Morticia cooed, pressing a kiss to Willa’s forehead. “You have your mother’s eyes. Both of them.”

Enid’s smile froze. “She, uh… she likes blocks and squeaky toys, not—”

Morticia produced, from somewhere in her gown, a small silver dagger. “Perhaps she would prefer this.”

Enid nearly fainted. “No daggers!”

Wednesday, who had been standing in the corner observing with her usual calm, interjected: “It is dull. Entirely harmless. More harmless than the plastic blocks that contain phthalates.”

Morticia chuckled. “So protective, Enid. It’s adorable.”

Enid pressed her hand to her forehead. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but… Wednesday, let’s go before I change my mind.”

---

The car ride was its usual ordeal, Wednesday behind the wheel, navigating like a professional stunt driver with a death wish. She swerved between lanes with precision, stopped inches from bumpers, and never once touched the brake gently.

Enid clutched the door handle, her face pale. “You’re trying to kill us.”

Wednesday’s eyes stayed on the road. “Incorrect. If I were trying to kill us, you would know. This is driving.”

Enid muttered, “This is manslaughter with extra steps.”

But her back ached too much to keep arguing. She leaned against the seat, focusing on her breathing as the gothic gargoyle of her wife delivered them to the hospital with terrifying grace.

---

The hospital smelled of bleach and despair. Enid sat nervously on the paper-covered exam table, the white crinkle beneath her legs sounding far too loud in the small room. She fidgeted with the hem of her sweater, trying to pretend she wasn’t on the verge of panicking.

Wednesday stood in the corner like a sentinel, arms folded across her black dress, her expression carved in stone. She radiated menace as naturally as breathing.

The doctor entered: a young man, maybe late twenties, with a bright smile and nervous energy that reeked of inexperience. His nametag read: Dr. C. Bloom.

“Good afternoon,” he greeted warmly. “I’m Dr. Bloom. What brings you in today?”

Before Enid could open her mouth, Wednesday spoke, “She has been in pain for days. Lower back. Aggravated by bending, lifting, and her general refusal to admit weakness.”

Dr. Bloom blinked at her and cleared his throat nervously, scribbling something on his clipboard. “So, Enid, tell me about the pain.”

“It’s not that bad,” Enid began. “Just, you know, sore sometimes—”

“She winces every time she bends. She makes guttural noises unbecoming of a wolf,” Wednesday interrupted. “She also clutches her spine in the mornings like a tragic Victorian heroine awaiting her demise.”

Enid turned, jaw dropping. “Wednesday!”

The doctor coughed to hide a laugh. “Okay, lower back strain, got it. Have you noticed any numbness, tingling, difficulty walking?”

“No—” Enid tried.

“Yes,” Wednesday said simultaneously.

Enid whipped her head around. “I do not!”

“You shuffle like a crypt-keeper when you rise from bed.”

Dr. Bloom scribbled again, nodding sagely. “Alright, sounds like classic post-partum strain. Happens all the time. If you’ll just lay down on your stomach and lift your shirt, I’ll check the muscles for tension.”

The room temperature dropped ten degrees.

Wednesday’s eyes snapped to him, black and unblinking. It was not a glare. It was a death sentence.

The poor man froze, his smile faltering. “...Uh. Standard exam. Nothing invasive.”

Enid blushed furiously, tugging her sweater down as if to shield herself. “It’s okay, Wednesday, he’s a doctor—”

“No,” Wednesday said simply. Her voice was low and cold, the kind of tone that could curdle milk. “No man will lay hands on you while you are under my care.”

Dr. Bloom blinked. “I—uh—Ma’am, I can assure you, I just need to feel where the muscle is tight—”

“You will not touch her,” Wednesday repeated, stepping forward once. The shadows in the room seemed to gather at her feet.

Enid’s cheeks flamed. “Wednesday! You’re scaring him!”

“Good.”

Dr. Bloom’s pen slipped in his sweaty fingers. He looked from Enid’s pleading smile to Wednesday’s abyssal glare and swallowed hard.

“Okay. Maybe, um, maybe you can indicate the area of pain for me instead?” he suggested weakly.

Enid tugged up the back of her sweater an inch, pointing with one finger. “It’s mostly here.”

Wednesday stood behind her, one hand hovering protectively at her shoulder like she expected the doctor to lunge at any moment.

Dr. Bloom cleared his throat again. “Right. That makes sense. Likely just muscular strain. Stretching, therapy, maybe some light meds if you’re nursing—”

He paused, glancing at his clipboard. “And you’re… you’re a new mom, correct? Congratulations! How old’s the little one?”

“Eight months,” Enid beamed, grateful for safer ground. “She’s adorable. Total handful. Half-wolf, half-psychic...”

“Half wolf?” the doctor repeated uncertainly, chuckling like it was a joke.

Wednesday’s eyes glinted. “Do not laugh.”

“Uh—no, right! Not laughing,” he said quickly, coughing into his fist. “Congratulations again. And, uh, are you getting much help at home? Do you have a husband?”

The room went silent.

Enid froze.

Wednesday’s expression didn’t change, but the weight of her stillness was more terrifying than any outburst. Her lips curled into the faintest, most dangerous smile.

“Husband?” she repeated slowly, her voice dripping disdain.

Dr. Bloom’s pen trembled. “It’s just—a—a standard question we ask mothers—”

Wednesday stepped closer, eyes fixed on him like knives. “You presume much. My wife does not require a husband. She requires me.”

Enid’s face burned scarlet. “Wednesday...!”

“She is cared for,” Wednesday continued, voice like velvet stretched over steel. “She is watched. She is protected. And if you ever again imply that she needs a man’s presence in her life, I will ensure you are buried beneath this hospital in a wing no one visits.”

Dr. Bloom’s Adam’s apple bobbed as he swallowed. “R-right. Of course. My apologies.”

Enid buried her face in her hands. “Oh my God.”

By the time they left the office, poor Dr. Bloom looked like he had aged ten years. He gave them a list of stretches, referrals for physical therapy, and practically ran from the room once his part was done.

Enid smacked her forehead as soon as the door closed. “Wednesday Addams, you terrified him.”

“Good,” Wednesday said calmly, tucking her notes into her bag. “Perhaps he will think twice before touching another man’s wife.”

Enid gaped. “You’re the man in this scenario?”

Wednesday glanced at her. “Do you doubt it?”

Enid sputtered and then burst out laughing, covering her mouth so the nurses wouldn’t hear. “You’re unbelievable.”

“Correct,” Wednesday replied.

As they strode down the sterile halls together, Enid’s back still aching but her heart oddly warm.

God help the world if it ever tried to get between her and Wednesday Addams.

---

When they returned, the mansion was unnervingly quiet. Enid braced herself as she opened the door. “Mommy’s back!” she called nervously.

From the parlor came Morticia’s voice, smooth as smoke: “In here, darling.”

They stepped inside to find Willa perched on Morticia’s lap, calmly stacking… bones. Tiny, clean animal bones.

Enid shrieked. “WHAT—”

“Chicken bones, dearest,” Morticia soothed. “Sterilized. Perfectly safe. And wonderful for fine motor skills.”

Wednesday raised a brow. “Impressive.”

Enid’s heart nearly exploded. “We’ve been gone two hours and she’s building a skeleton zoo!”

Willa clapped, proudly babbling, “Mama Woof! Mama Doom!”

Morticia beamed. “She’s quite advanced.”

Enid pressed her palms to her face. “I can’t… I can’t do this.”

But when Willa looked up, grinning with those tiny wolf canines, Enid’s heart melted anyway.

---

After Morticia finally left and promising more “bone-stacking lessons”, Enid collapsed onto the bed, exhausted but oddly relieved.

Wednesday tucked the blanket around her, and laid on her back.

“You survived,” Wednesday murmured.

“Barely,” Enid groaned. “But… I guess it wasn’t that bad. Your mom really loves her.”

“Of course. She is family.”

Enid smiled softly. “I’m glad we went to the doctor. I hate admitting it, but I needed help.”

Wednesday brushed her fingers along Enid’s arm. “There is no shame in weakness. Only in denying it.”

Enid chuckled. “That’s… actually really sweet. In a creepy way.”

Wednesday’s lips curved into the faintest smile. “Good.”

As Willa giggled in her crib, gnawing on what looked suspiciously like a leftover chicken bone, Enid realized that maybe she wasn’t as terrified of Morticia babysitting as she thought. Not that she’d admit it out loud.

“By the way, you embarrassed me so bad today.” Enid said playfully with a raised eyebrow, not letting Wednesday off the hook that easily.

Wednesday looked at her utterly unrepentant, “You exaggerate. He should thank me. I spared him an unfortunate end.”

Enid chuckled, shaking her head. “You were jealous.”

Wednesday’s hand stilled on her teacup. “I do not feel jealousy. I feel possession.”

Enid’s cheeks flushed. “Oh my God, you’re impossible.”

Wednesday smirked faintly, leaning closer. “And irresistible.”

Chapter Text

Wednesday brooded.

She brooded through dinner, her fork stabbing at her plate as if each piece of roasted vegetable were the young doctor’s face. She brooded through Willa’s bath, staring into the soapy water like she was divining omens of betrayal. She even brooded as she sat at her desk, pretending to write but in truth only etching the word husband into the margins of her manuscript until the page looked like a cursed diary.

Enid noticed like always.

“Wednesday,” Enid said finally, drying her hair with a towel as she walked into their bedroom. “You’ve been in a mood all night. Spill it.”

Wednesday looked up. Her eyes glowed with that dark, feverish intensity that could turn funerals into parties. “Do you realize what he said to you?”

Enid blinked. “....The doctor?”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s jaw tightened. “That infantile excuse for a physician dared to inquire about a husband, as though your life, your worth, your survival depends upon a man.”

Enid hesitated. “...You know it was just a routine question, right? Like, doctors ask it without thinking...”

“Precisely.” Wednesday’s voice dropped, deadly quiet. “He asked it without thought. As though men are so intrinsic, so mandatory, that the question requires no discretion. I should have removed his tongue for such presumption.”

Enid buried her face in her towel and groaned. “Oh my God. Weds, you cannot keep terrifying every person we meet.”

“Yes, I can,” Wednesday said simply.

Willa gurgled from her crib, waving one of her “toys”, a raven feather tied to a rattle. Enid walked toward the nursery and leaned down to tuck her in, humming softly.

But Wednesday appeared at her shoulder like a phantom, tucking the blanket with military precision. “Rest, wolf-child. Dream only of rebellion and shadows.”

Enid rolled her eyes. “She’s eight months old, she dreams about milk.”

Willa cooed and reached her arms up toward Wednesday, babbling something that sounded suspiciously like “Doom” again.

Wednesday smirked faintly, victorious. “She understands me.”

“Uh-huh,” Enid muttered, brushing Willa’s cheek.

As they left the nursery, Wednesday lingered at the door, watching her daughter sleep with unblinking vigilance. Enid tugged at her arm. “Weds, come on. She’s safe.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Is she? Husbands lurk everywhere, ready to insert themselves into households, undermining wives with their pompous ‘help’ and their clumsy hands. Today a doctor, tomorrow a neighbor. Soon it will be a mailman, insinuating himself into your affections with his package.”

Enid sputtered. “Okay. One, ew. Two, no mailman in the world could lure me away from you, creepy or otherwise.”

Wednesday tilted her head. “We shall see.”

Enid groaned.

---

By the next morning, Enid realized Wednesday’s brood had not dissipated. In fact, it had metastasized into something worse: a project.

She awoke to find Wednesday nailing a hand-painted sign to the front gate.

It read: NO HUSBANDS ALLOWED.

Enid nearly spit out her coffee. “Wednesday Addams, what is that?!”

“A warning,” Wednesday said grimly. She dusted her hands off and stepped back, admiring the crooked black letters. “Any man who crosses our threshold will do so knowing he is not welcome.”

“Wednesday! You can’t just, what if it’s the plumber? Or the pizza guy?”

“Then they shall tremble.”

Enid pinched the bridge of her nose. “I married a lunatic.”

“Yes,” Wednesday agreed, unbothered.

---

The husband-proofing escalated.

Wednesday locked their Wi-Fi name as MARRIED WOMEN ONLY.

She re-labeled the mailbox as PROPERTY OF DOOM & WOOF.

She even installed new locks, handing Enid a key engraved with the words: NO HUSBANDS BEYOND THIS POINT.

When Enid opened the fridge, she found that Wednesday had labeled the milk jug NOT FOR HUSBANDS in black Sharpie.

“Weds.” Enid’s voice cracked somewhere between laughter and exasperation. “This is getting ridiculous.”

Wednesday looked at her evenly. “You deserve protection.”

Enid softened despite herself. “…From husbands?”

“From ignorance,” Wednesday corrected. “And from men who think they could ever take what is mine.”

Enid went pink to the roots of her hair. “You’re impossible.”

“And irresistible,” Wednesday said again, with no hint of irony.

---

Later that week, Enid convinced Wednesday to drive her into town for groceries again, because delivery had “mysteriously” gone missing (Wednesday had canceled it under suspicion of male delivery drivers).

In the store, Enid tried to keep things normal. She pushed the cart. Willa sat strapped into the seat, gnawing on a teething toy shaped like a miniature coffin.

But Wednesday stalked beside them like a bodyguard.

When a friendly man at the fruit section smiled and said, “Cute baby,” Wednesday’s head snapped toward him.

“Do not address her.”

The man blinked. “Uh—sorry?”

Enid elbowed Wednesday hard in the ribs. “Wednesday!” she hissed. “He was just being nice!”

“Nice is the first step toward infiltration,” Wednesday whispered darkly.

“Nice is the first step toward friendship,” Enid argued.

Wednesday scoffed. “Friendship is simply prolonged weakness.”

The man bolted, leaving behind his bag of oranges.

Enid buried her face in her hands. “I can’t take you anywhere.”

---

That night, after Willa was asleep and the house was quiet, Enid finally snapped.

“Okay, listen,” she said, hands on her hips as she faced Wednesday in the parlor. “This whole husband-proofing thing? It’s out of control. The doctor didn’t mean anything. Nobody’s trying to steal me. You’re being… insane.”

Wednesday sat calmly in her armchair, fingers steepled. “You accuse me of insanity. And yet I see a world filled with men who believe women incomplete without them. That is the true madness.”

Enid threw her arms up. “Yes, the world’s sexist! But you glaring holes into people’s heads isn’t helping!”

Wednesday’s mask faltered. Just slightly. Just enough that Enid caught it.

“I cannot bear the thought of you… diminished,” Wednesday admitted quietly.

Enid blinked, her anger softening.

“I watched him,” Wednesday continued, her voice hushed, “look at you as though you required something beyond what we are. As though I were insufficient. And for one wretched second, I wondered if you believed it too.”

Enid’s heart lurched. She crossed the room in two strides and dropped to her knees in front of Wednesday, taking her cold hands in her warm ones.

“Weds,” she whispered. “I don’t need a husband. I don’t need anyone else. I just need you.”

Wednesday’s black eyes flickered, storm breaking into silence.

“Only you,” Enid repeated, squeezing her hands. “Always you.”

For once, Wednesday didn’t argue. She just leaned forward, pressing her forehead to Enid’s, breathing her in like an oath.

The next morning, the NO HUSBANDS ALLOWED sign was still nailed to the gate.

But beneath it, in smaller and neater handwriting, Wednesday added: Except for pizza guys. Enid says so.

Chapter Text

Enid had thought her back pain would pass with rest and maybe some stretches, but the doctor’s stern tone and the little bottle of pills told another story.

She was following the prescription, begrudgingly at first but Wednesday stood over her like a dark sentinel, making sure she took each pill on time. Enid sometimes joked that she didn’t need a husband, she had a terrifying goth wife with a pocket watch and the glare of an executioner.

But the meds weren’t enough.

“It’s time to start physical therapy,” the doctor had said.

Enid had smiled and nodded politely. Wednesday had gone still, like a cobra deciding whether to strike.

---

Back in their bedroom, Enid tried to sound casual as she mentioned it. “So… apparently, it’s pretty normal after pregnancy. My muscles just need some help recovering. They’ll give me some exercises, maybe a massage or two…”

Wednesday’s head snapped up from where she was oiling the keys of her typewriter. “Massage?” she repeated, the word tasting like poison in her mouth.

Enid winced. “...Not like that. It’s medical. For my back.”

“Medical or not, the thought of another human laying hands on you makes me want to burn down their clinic.” Wednesday’s voice was flat, her eyes cold.

“Weds,” Enid said softly, reaching across the bed to squeeze her hand. “It’s not personal. It’s professional. They’re trained for this.”

Wednesday didn’t budge. “Who will it be?”

Enid hesitated. “The doctor told me about a new physiotherapist hired at the hospital, Dr. Luis Harrison. So... a man.”

A silence so thick it could have drowned them fell between them. Wednesday’s fingers curled around her typewriter oil rag as though she wanted to strangle it.

“No.”

“Weds.” Enid’s tone was firm now, though she kept it gentle. “I need this. I can’t spend every day groaning like I’m ninety. And you...” she poked Wednesday’s shoulder “...you need me healthy, or else you’ll be the one stuck cooking pasta for eternity.”

Wednesday’s lip twitched. “You assume I wouldn’t find a way to poison you with pasta.”

Enid snorted. “See? You’re already planning your widowhood and I’m still alive. But seriously. We can compromise.”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “Compromise is the language of cowards.”

“Compromise,” Enid said again firmly, “means the physiotherapist shows you the moves once, just once, so you can do them. You’ll be the only one touching me. Ever.”

Wednesday tilted her head, considering. Her gaze softened by a fraction. “You would allow me to become your tormentor... for health purposes?”

Enid rolled her eyes. “Yes. My own personal torturer-slash-masseur.”

At that, Wednesday’s lips curved. Barely, but enough.

“Very well,” she murmured. “Let them demonstrate on you once. And then I will take over. Forever.”

Enid groaned into her pillow. “...Why does that sound like a threat?”

“Because it is.”

---

The clinic smelled faintly of disinfectant and cheap hand soap. The fluorescent lights hummed with the kind of sterile insistence that grated against Wednesday’s very marrow. Inher opinion, it was the kind of place where souls came to die, not gloriously in battle, nor melodiously in tragic song, but in bland whimpers of mediocrity.

And now apparently, Enid’s recovery depended on it.

Wednesday sat like a specter in the corner, her posture ramrod straight, her stare unblinking. Luis Harrison, the physiotherapist was an unremarkably young man with the too-clean look of someone who had never truly suffered and he kept glancing at her as though she might lunge at him.

He was not wrong.

“So,” he said, his voice cracking slightly, “we’ll just start with a quick assessment of the lumbar region. Mrs. Sinclair, if you’d like to lie on your stomach.”

Enid hopped onto the padded table, tugging her shirt up just enough to expose the curve of her lower back. “See, Weds?” she said, trying to sound breezy. “Totally normal. Just science.”

Wednesday did not reply. She rose, moved closer, and loomed at the therapist’s shoulder like an executioner waiting for the command to drop the blade.

The man coughed nervously. “Uh... you don’t have to stand so... close.”

“Yes, I do,” Wednesday said simply.

Enid sighed, dropping her forehead into her folded arms. “Ignore her. She’s... supportive in her own terrifying way.”

The Dr. Harrison attempted a shaky smile, then pressed his hand gently against the muscles of Enid’s back. “Alright, so I’m just going to feel for tension here. Ah, yes, very tight along the lumbar fascia…”

Wednesday leaned down, her face mere inches from his hand and Enid’s skin. Her eyes narrowed, following every movement as though she were memorizing where to stab him later.

Enid’s shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Weds. Personal space.”

“I have no such boundaries when my wife is being handled by strangers,” Wednesday replied evenly. She bent even closer, her dark braid falling forward like a noose. “Continue. Slowly.”

The therapist cleared his throat, trying to maintain professionalism. “Now I’ll apply some gentle pressure. This might feel a little uncomfortable at first, but it should...”

Enid gasped, a sound that was half-pain and half-relief. “Oh—yeah, that’s… that’s the spot.”

Her voice trembled just enough to sound like a whimper.

And that was the last straw.

Wednesday’s eyes snapped up, her voice slicing through the sterile air like a blade.

“Stop.”

Dr. Harrison froze mid-motion, his hand hovering awkwardly on Enid’s back.

“That sound,” Wednesday said, her tone flat and lethal, “is reserved for me.”

Enid’s head shot up. Her face flamed crimson. “Wednesday!”

The therapist sputtered, his eyes wide with terror. “I—I didn’t—! I was just—! It’s normal, patients—sometimes they—”

“Do not attempt to justify yourself,” Wednesday hissed, her hand darting to grip his wrist. Her fingers were icy, her stare unblinking. “Remove your hand. Now.”

The man yanked his hand back as though burned.

Enid groaned into her arms. “Oh my God, Wednesday, you can’t just threaten the physiotherapist because I made a noise!”

“I am not threatening,” Wednesday corrected. “I am declaring terms. There is a difference.”

The therapist, pale and trembling, clutched his clipboard like a shield. “M-maybe—uh—your wife should take over from here. I’ll just—show the motions, yes? And she can practice them herself?”

“Correct,” Wednesday said, already sliding into position at Enid’s side. Her hand hovered above Enid’s back, steady and precise. “Demonstrate. Once. Then leave.”

The man nodded rapidly, demonstrating the circular motion in the air, not daring to touch Enid again. “You’ll just want to press here, with consistent pressure, small circles—yes, right there—”

Wednesday’s palm lowered with surgical precision, pressing into the exact spot. Enid jolted, letting out another involuntary sigh.

The therapist flinched, bracing for Wednesday’s wrath.

But this time, Wednesday’s expression softened. Only a fraction but enough.

“That sound,” she murmured, her voice dark velvet, “belongs to me. As it should.”

Enid buried her face in her hands. “Kill me now.”

The therapist fled the room ten minutes later, practically sprinting down the hall. His clipboard clattered against the floor in his rush.

Enid sat up, cheeks burning, tugging her shirt down. “Wednesday. You terrified a doctor, again.”

“Good,” Wednesday said, flexing her fingers as though she had just learned a new weapon. “He will remember his place. And more importantly, I now know exactly how to dismantle you piece by piece.”

Enid groaned, pulling her hair into a messy ponytail. “You make it sound like foreplay and torture at the same time.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “To me, there is little distinction.”

Enid threw her arms around her, laughing helplessly despite her embarrassment. “God, Weds. You’re insane. You know that, right?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said simply, wrapping her arms around Enid’s waist with unexpected tenderness. “And you married me anyway.”

---

That night, after Willa was asleep, Wednesday insisted on conducting the first “session.”

“Lie down,” she commanded, patting the bed like it was an altar.

Enid flopped onto her stomach, muffling her laugh into a pillow. “You sound like a dungeon master.”

Wednesday’s hands began their careful, precise circles on Enid’s lower back. Her voice was low, “Pain builds character. Endure, wolf.”

Enid groaned. “God, that actually feels good though.”

“Good,” Wednesday murmured. “You will whimper for me. And only me... you do it so beautifully.”

Enid kicked her feet against the mattress, half-laughing and half-swooning. “You’re impossible.”

Wednesday’s lips brushed her ear. “And irresistible.”

Enid gave in, melting under her wife’s touch with her laughter spilling into the dark room.

Chapter Text

The rhythmic tapping of Enid’s keyboard filled the living room, mingling with the faint creak of the old Addams-Sinclair mansion settling into its usual symphony of groans. The screen’s pale glow lit up her face, and the cheerful pink stickers slapped onto her laptop seemed almost offensively bright against the ancient carved table that had once belonged to some Addams ancestor known for cataloging poisons.

Her cursor blinked expectantly.

She sighed. Her half-finished blog post stared back at her: “Ten Ways to Bring More Color Into Your Everyday Life (Even If You’re Married to a Morbid Goth Who Thrives in Shadows).”

It wasn’t exactly what her editor asked for, but it was honest. Behind her, the sound of leather boots whispered across the floor. Enid didn’t even need to turn her head.

“You haven’t taken your medicine,” Wednesday said.

Enid rolled her eyes and hit the spacebar aggressively. “Good evening to you too, Mama Doom.”

Wednesday appeared beside her desk like a wraith materializing from mist, a small glass of water in one hand and a pill bottle in the other. “You are ten minutes overdue.”

“Ten minutes isn’t life or death, Weds.”

“It could be,” Wednesday replied flatly, setting the glass down beside her. “Degeneration of the spine is no laughing matter.”

Enid gave her a sly smile. “Spoken like someone who has never laughed in her life.”

Wednesday ignored the jab, her expression unchanging. “Swallow it. Now.”

Enid mock-saluted, popped the pill in her mouth, and gulped down the water with exaggerated gusto. Then she opened her mouth like a rebellious teenager to prove it was gone.

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, but her lips twitched just barely, almost invisible. “Adequate.”

Enid beamed and turned back to her laptop. “See? You’ve got bedside manner. It’s just hidden under three layers of snark, intimidation, and threats.”

“I find those methods more effective than pleasantries,” Wednesday said, moving behind her chair. Her long fingers came to rest on Enid’s shoulders, kneading with slow pressure.

Enid melted instantly. “God, you’re too good at that.”

“I am thorough,” Wednesday murmured. “Besides, it amuses me to know your weaknesses. Physical, not emotional.”

Enid snorted, her fingers hovering over the keys. “Both, if we’re being honest.”

Enid's blog cursor blinked again. She typed a sentence, then erased it. Typed another, erased that too. The massage wasn’t helping her focus, if anything, her thoughts were scattering like glitter in a windstorm. Wednesday walked away silently and sat on the couch, reading a an old book named, 'The Poisoner's Apprentice: A Practical Handbook.'

---

Everytime Enid wrote her blogs, her mind was drifting unbidden to money. To independence. To the conversation they’d had back when she was pregnant, swollen and anxious and unsure if she’d even be good at this whole motherhood thing.

Flashback

Enid had been folding impossibly tiny socks when she blurted it out: “What if I just stay home with her? Forever?”

Wednesday, who had been sharpening a dagger on the windowsill, hadn’t even looked up. “Unacceptable.”

Enid blinked. “Excuse me?”

“You will not forfeit your livelihood, your independence, or your writing,” Wednesday said coolly. “If you do, I’ll set your laptop in your lap and chain you to it.”

Enid had stared, wide-eyed, clutching the baby sock like it was a lifeline. “Most people would say that’s supportive. You somehow made it sound like a hostage situation.”

“Good,” Wednesday replied. “Then you understand me.”

And Enid had.

Because beneath the dark phrasing, there had been fierce love. Wednesday wanted her to be Enid Sinclair, not just a mother or just “Wednesday Addams’ wife.”

End of flashback

Enid’s lips curved into a soft smile at the memory. Her cursor moved again, this time spilling words that came easier:

Marriage is supposed to change you, but not erase you. If it does, then you’re not in a marriage, you’re in a trap. What I’ve learned, what I keep learning every day, is that love can be both possessive and freeing. My wife would rather die than let me give up my independence, even though she insists on choosing my medicine schedule and glaring at anyone who breathes near me in public.

She chuckled softly and kept typing.

From the cradle in the corner, Willa gurgled, flapping her arms in sleepy rebellion before dozing off again. Her tiny wolf fangs peeked between her lips.

Enid’s heart ached with warmth.

But then uninvited as always, the ghost of her mother’s voice slithered in.

"The Addamses are rich, Enid. You’re not. You think she won’t notice? You think you won’t resent it? Do you want to be some charity case your whole life? Or worse, are you marrying her because of the money? Trading your wolf roots for black lace and coffins?"

Enid’s fingers stilled.

Her bank account wasn’t empty, she had savings from her freelance work, her blog income, her small but steady contracts. But it wasn’t like Wednesday’s. It wasn’t bestselling-author money. It wasn’t Addams estate wealth.

She shook her head hard, as if to physically shove her mother’s voice out.

Wednesday never lorded her money over her. Never. If anything, she insisted Enid keep her independence, her own career, her own account.

She typed again, faster this time, almost angrily:

Independence matters. Not because you don’t trust the person you love, but because it keeps you whole. I didn’t marry for money, and I didn’t marry for escape. I married because she looked at me, bright colors and flaws and all, and didn’t flinch. She didn’t want me to shrink into her shadow, she wanted me to thrive beside it.

As she typed furiously, a small hand slapped her thigh.

Enid yelped, looking down. Willa had somehow crawled out of the cradle, as a Sinclair-Addams hybrid, the rules of physics did not apply. The baby stared up at her, tugging at her pajama pants with wolfish determination.

“Willa!” Enid scooped her up, pressing kisses all over her face. “You’re supposed to be asleep, little fangs.”

Willa babbled, something halfway between “doom” and “woof,” which made Enid laugh until her stomach hurt.

Behind her, Wednesday’s voice was a low, inevitable monotone. “She inherits her defiance from you.”

Enid spun in her chair, Willa balanced on her hip. “Oh, and not from the woman who crawled into her roommate’s bed at Nevermore with a knife tucked under her pillow?”

Wednesday tilted her head. “I was practical.”

Enid grinned. “You were a menace.”

“Semantics.”

---

Later, after Willa was down again, Enid returned to her laptop. But her mood had shifted. Her mother’s voice still lingered like smoke.

She thought about the letter she’d sent, the one inviting her family to meet their granddaughter. No reply. Not even a rejection. Just silence.

Her throat tightened.

She wanted her daughter to have everything: love, security, a pack. And yet, her own pack had abandoned her.

A warm hand landed on her shoulder.

“You are growling,” Wednesday said simply.

Enid blinked, realizing she had been. “Sorry. Just... thinking.”

“Dangerous habit.” Wednesday’s tone softened by a hair. “They do not deserve you. Or her.”

Enid bit her lip. “I know. It just sucks.”

Wednesday bent to Enid's height on the chair, pressing her lips against her temple. “They rejected what is luminous. That is their loss. Not ours.”

Enid melted into her, laughter and tears tangling together. “You’re really bad at pep talks, you know that?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said. “And yet you married me anyway.”

Enid laughed again, bright and whole, and turned back to her laptop. By the time she hit “save draft,” she felt lighter. Not cured, but steadier.

---

The lights were dimmed, the room scented faintly with beeswax and dust from the old chandelier. Shadows crawled up the wallpaper like restless spirits, and the curtains billowed faintly though the windows were firmly shut. Their bedroom always felt halfway between a gothic chapel and a crypt, and yet to Enid it was home.

She lay on her stomach, her cheek pressed into her pillow, her hair spilling in golden tangles. Wednesday’s fingers traced deliberate circles into the small of her back, pressing, kneading, forcing every knot of tension to surrender. Enid whimpered once in —half pain, half relief— and immediately heard Wednesday’s voice low and sharp in her ear.

“Never make that sound for anyone else.”

Enid laughed softly, muffled by the pillow. “Not even the physiotherapist?”

“I already allowed him one demonstration. That was a concession, not a precedent. Consider yourself fortunate I did not add arsenic to his water bottle.”

Enid turned her head, giving Wednesday a lopsided smile. “Possessive much?”

Wednesday’s expression didn’t shift. “Correct.”

The massage continued in silence for a few minutes, the steady rhythm of hands against muscle and Enid’s occasional soft sighs the only sound. Finally, when Wednesday withdrew and pulled the covers over them both, Enid rolled carefully onto her side.

Wednesday lay flat as always, arms crossed like a corpse in a coffin. Her dark eyes glinted in the shadows, watching and unblinking. Enid propped herself on one elbow, gazing at her wife.

“You know,” she began softly, “you make my mom wrong every single day.”

Wednesday blinked once. “That’s the most satisfying sentence you’ve spoken all week.”

Enid chuckled, though her throat tightened. “I just… I’ve been thinking about her a lot lately. About San Francisco. About how she used to say I’d be nothing if I didn’t listen to her. That if I followed you, I’d end up isolated, broke, miserable and regretting it all.”

Her voice cracked faintly. “But here I am. And I’m not miserable. Not even close. Even with the back pain, even with baby chaos, even with you glaring holes into every man who breathes near me, I’ve never been more loved.”

Wednesday’s gaze remained steady. “Your mother was wrong. As mothers often are.”

Enid smiled faintly. “You’re not just saying that to soothe me?”

“No.” Wednesday’s tone was sharp and precise. “I do not say things to soothe. If I wanted to comfort you falsely, I would recite the mortality rate of werewolf mothers after childbirth.”

Enid shivered. “That’s... romantic?”

“Accurate,” Wednesday corrected.

There was a pause. The house creaked again, almost as though eavesdropping. Enid pulled the covers closer around herself, suddenly feeling very small.

“You know what I hate the most?” she whispered. “That she cut me off. That I wrote her a letter when Willa was born and she didn’t even reply. Not even a no. Just... nothing. Like I don’t exist.”

Wednesday’s jaw tightened. For a long moment, she said nothing. Then, she answered with her tone low and lethal, “If I were in San Francisco, your mother would never enjoy silence again. She would hear the echo of your laughter in her ears until it drove her to madness.”

Enid let out a shaky laugh. “That’s sweet, in your own horrifying way.”

“It’s not meant to be sweet. It’s a vow.”

Enid leaned closer, resting her head against Wednesday’s shoulder. The fabric of Wednesday’s nightdress was cold, almost funereal, but beneath it was steady warmth. “Do you ever wonder why I still care what she thinks?”

“No,” Wednesday said instantly. “I understand it.”

Enid blinked up at her. “You do?”

“Of course. Mothers are the architects of our first prisons. We spend our lives clawing at the walls they build. Some of us dig tunnels, some of us set fires. You... chose to run free. That does not erase the memory of confinement.”

Enid’s throat tightened again, tears stinging her eyes. Wednesday always had this way of slicing straight to the heart of things, a way that was sharp, brutal, but true.

“So you’re saying I’ve got mommy issues.”

“Yes,” Wednesday said flatly. “But fortunately, you also have me.”

Enid snorted through her tears. “That should go on a t-shirt.”

Wednesday’s lips curved just barely. “I do not wear slogans. But I will allow you to.”

They lay together in silence, but Enid’s thoughts whirled. She thought of Esther's cold eyes, of her father’s silence, of her four brothers who never once reached out. She thought of the Sinclair pack, of how they’d treated her as the oddball, the “soft” one.

And then she thought of Wednesday, the Wednesday who sharpened knives in their bedroom, Wednesday who terrified doctors and therapists, Wednesday who massaged her back every night without fail. Wednesday who would never, ever let her doubt her worth.

“Weds?” Enid whispered.

“Yes?”

“You’re like… the anti-Esther.”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “Is that meant as a compliment?”

“The biggest one.” Enid sniffled and pressed a kiss to her wife’s shoulder. “She tried to control me by cutting me down. You... God, you’re so controlling sometimes, but it’s... different. You want me strong. You want me independent. You’d chain me to my laptop if I ever gave up my writing.”

“Correct,” Wednesday said smoothly.

Enid laughed, the sound wet but real. “So yeah, maybe I’ve got mommy issues. But you’re the only one who’s ever made me feel like I don’t have to live by them.”

For once, Wednesday’s face softened just slightly. Her hand lifted, threading through Enid’s hair, stroking with quiet precision.

“Your mother’s absence is not a void,” she said, voice low and steady. “It is a space you have filled with your own light. And now with mine. And now with Willa’s.”

Enid’s tears slipped free and hot against her cheeks. “Why do you always know exactly what to say?”

“Because I tell the truth,” Wednesday murmured. “Even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts.”

Enid nuzzled closer, clinging to her wife like she was an anchor. “I love you.”

“I know.”

Enid giggled through her tears. “You were supposed to say it back.”

Wednesday tilted her head, deadpan. “I massaged your back for thirty minutes and threatened to poison a physiotherapist. If that is not a declaration of love, then words are meaningless.”

Enid burst out laughing, the tension breaking, her tears turning to warmth. “God, I love you so much.”

Wednesday didn’t reply, but she didn’t need to. The way her fingers lingered in Enid’s hair, the way her body stilled only once Enid had drifted against her, the way she lay awake just a little longer listening to Enid’s breathing... those were the declarations Wednesday Addams made.

And though Enid’s mother haunted her thoughts like a ghost, Wednesday’s devotion exorcised it every single time.

As she drifted to sleep, Enid thought: "Esther was wrong. I’m not lost. I’m exactly where I belong."

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion had always felt alive with sighing floorboards, whispering drafts, candelabras that sputtered like lungs coughing. But lately, the house had an extra pulse, as if it were relieved to host an additional maternal presence.

Every day, Morticia arrived. Sometimes gliding in her eternal black silk, sometimes carried in by the fog that seemed to follow her like a pet. Enid, who once would have been intimidated to death, now found herself waiting for her with something she hadn’t felt in months: relief.

Enid adored Wednesday, but Wednesday was... well, Wednesday. She soothed by glaring, comforted by commanding, nurtured by sharpening knives in the background while saying, 'I will handle everything. Obey.' It worked, in its way, but it wasn’t softness. Morticia was softness draped in shadow, and for Enid who was bruised by back pain and haunted by her own mother’s rejection... felt like a balm.

That morning, Enid was on the fainting couch in the drawing room, a heating pad against her lower back, Willa gnawing on a teething ring shaped suspiciously like a coffin. Morticia swept in as though the hallway had been constructed for her gown alone.

“Good morning, little wolf,” Morticia purred, stooping to kiss Willa’s head. The baby squealed, little wolf-fangs peeking as she tried to stuff Morticia’s inky sleeve into her mouth.

Morticia allowed it with regal calm. “She has excellent taste. Black silk is always preferable to plastic.”

Enid chuckled, propping herself up. “She’s obsessed with sleeves lately. I think she’s trying to eat her way through everyone’s wardrobe.”

Morticia’s eyes glittered. “Marvelous. Appetite is a sign of strength. Do not let pediatricians convince you otherwise.”

Enid smiled, letting her guard down. “Thanks for coming again, Morticia. I don’t know what I’d do without you this week.”

“You would endure, of course,” Morticia replied, lowering herself next to Enid with predatory grace. “But no creature should endure alone when family is eager to intervene.”

Something in Enid’s chest tightened, a little ache that always surfaced when Morticia spoke of family. Because her own had abandoned her, and here was Wednesday’s mother stepping into that void as though she had always belonged there.

Morticia tilted her head, studying her. “You are still in pain.”

Enid tried to smile. “Getting better. Slowly. Wednesday’s been massaging me every night like a woman possessed.”

“She is possessed,” Morticia said serenely. “By you. And it is most becoming.”

Enid flushed, fiddling with the baby’s blanket. “Still… it’s frustrating. I can’t do everything I usually do. I hate watching Wednesday pick up all the slack. She’ll never admit she minds, but...”

“She doesn’t mind,” Morticia interrupted smoothly. “Wednesday has never known moderation. She commits herself wholly. To justice, to vengeance... to love. She is simply applying her extremity to you.”

The words hit Enid harder than she expected, and her throat wobbled. “You always know exactly what to say.”

“Because you are transparent, my dear. Like moonlight through glass.”

Morticia reached into the folds of her gown and drew out a small obsidian vial, stoppered with bone. She held it delicately between long fingers, the way others might hold perfume.

“I brought you something,” she murmured.

Enid blinked. “Oh... is that...?”

“A tonic,” Morticia said, voice like velvet. “I brewed it myself this morning. Wolf’s bane, powdered hematite, the root of a plant that blooms only where women have wept for centuries... and a drop of my own blood. It will ease your pain. Far more than those insipid little tablets the doctor prescribed.”

Enid stared at it, half-terrified and half-touched. “You... you made me a potion?”

“Of course.” Morticia’s smile was languid, dark. “It is what mothers do.”

The words punched Enid right in the chest. Her own mother’s face flashed before her cold and disapproving, telling her she was wasting her life. And now here was Morticia, handing her not judgment but medicine, care spun out of shadow and intention.

Enid swallowed hard. “Morticia, I— I don’t know what to say.”

“Say nothing,” Morticia instructed. “Drink.”

Enid uncorked it. The scent was sharp, metallic and earthy, with a faint sweetness like crushed violets. She hesitated, then tipped it back.

It burned. Oh God, it burned. Her eyes watered instantly, and she coughed, thumping her chest.

Morticia only watched with serene approval. “Yes. That means it’s working.”

Enid gasped, “It tastes like... like if death was brewed with licorice—”

“Exactly,” Morticia said.

Willa clapped her hands as if applauding her mother’s bravery. Enid wheezed a laugh, still coughing.

And then she realized it. The tension in her back was loosening. Not gone, but melting, like ice cracking. The ache dulled, spreading warmth through her muscles.

She stared wide-eyed. “It... it actually worked.”

Morticia leaned forward, brushing Enid’s hair back with one cool hand. “Of course it did. Trust Addams remedies over pharmaceuticals. Pills are made by men in sterile labs. Potions are made by mothers who know the taste of pain.”

Enid’s chest heaved, caught between tears and laughter. “You’re... you’re like... the mom I always wanted.”

Morticia’s smile deepened, sad and radiant all at once. “And you, my dear, are the daughter I always prayed Wednesday would choose. Not because you are pleasant, though you are, but because you understand her shadows, and you shine in them without fear.”

The tears spilled over then, hot on Enid’s cheeks. She ducked her head embarrassed. “Sorry. I’m crying all over your gown.”

“Salt water strengthens the fabric,” Morticia murmured, drawing her into an embrace. Her arms were long, cool, but enveloping. For the first time in years, Enid felt what she had been starved for: the shelter of a mother.

Willa squealed again, banging the teething ring on Morticia’s arm as though to demand inclusion. Morticia shifted seamlessly, cradling the baby against her other side.

“See?” she purred. “Three generations of women, bound by blood and choice. Esther may have turned her back on you, but I will never.”

Enid wept harder, laughing through it. “God, you’re gonna make me ugly-cry.”

Morticia smirked faintly. “Darling, in this family, tears only enhance one’s beauty. Remember: suffering is the best cosmetic.”

Enid snorted through her tears. “You sound just like Wednesday.”

“Or she sounds like me,” Morticia corrected with a languid wink.

---

The rest of the afternoon passed in surreal warmth. Morticia played with Willa by dangling dried roses above her crib like a mobile. She taught Enid how to brew lavender tea with a drop of bat’s blood for “fortitude.” She insisted Enid nap while she watched the baby, humming an old Addams lullaby in a voice that was velvet and shadow.

By the time Wednesday returned from her study, Enid was calmer, pain-free, and curled up in Morticia’s lap like a child who had finally found her place.

Wednesday’s eyebrow rose, but she said nothing. Only crossed her arms, studied her mother and her wife, and finally muttered, “I see my plan has worked.”

Enid blinked. “Plan?”

“Of course.” Wednesday’s face was unreadable, but her voice was sharp as ever. “I arranged for Mother to visit daily knowing that eventually, you would admit what I’ve always known, that you require her. You yearn for maternal stability, and my own style, while effective, is… unconventional.”

Morticia stroked Enid’s hair, meeting Wednesday’s gaze with a knowing smirk. “She adores me.”

Wednesday’s lip quirked ever so slightly. “It’s revolting. But… tolerable.”

Enid wedged between them and only laughed half giddy. She looked at her wife and at her mother-in-law, and thought: "Maybe I didn’t lose a family after all. Maybe I found the right one."

Chapter Text

The email had arrived at exactly 9:13 in the morning, the sort of oddly specific time that seemed destined to throw Enid’s entire day into chaos.

Her phone buzzed on the kitchen table while she was sprinkling sugar skull marshmallows into her coffee. Willa was in her highchair, smearing mashed banana into her hair with the enthusiasm of a baby moonlighting as an avant-garde painter. The house was its usual chorus of groans, rattles, and faint organ music seeping from who-knew-where.

Enid glanced at her phone, then blinked.

"Subject: Congratulations! We’d like to feature you."

Her editor, a brisk woman named Nadine, had written in her usual exclamation-point-studded style:

Enid! Your latest blog on "Ten Ways to Bring More Color Into Your Everyday Life (Even If You’re Married to a Morbid Goth Who Thrives in Shadows)" is absolutely exploding online. We’ve had fifty thousand clicks in under forty-eight hours. Readers can’t get enough of your hilarious but heartfelt take on married life with Wednesday Addams! The comments section is FULL of readers begging for more.

Here’s my idea: let’s do a joint interview with you and Wednesday. Audiences adore “unlikely couple” features, and given Wednesday’s own status as a best-selling novelist, this would practically break the internet. What do you say?

Enid froze.

Joint. Interview.

Her gaze slid across the kitchen, past the dripping candelabra, past the family portrait with Cousin Itt half-blurred from vibrating too fast and landed on Wednesday, who was at the head of the table with a quill pen in hand.

Her wife was bent over a notebook, scribbling as though the ink itself might expire if she didn’t bleed it out quickly enough. She looked exactly like she always did when writing: half a raven, half a thundercloud and entirely untouchable.

The very idea of convincing that person to smile politely for a journalist was... laughable.

Enid sighed, tucking her phone against her chest. “Oh, Nadine, if only you knew what you’re asking…”

---

By mid-morning, she tried to break it gently.

Enid slid into the chair beside Wednesday, resting her chin on her wife’s shoulder. Wednesday didn’t pause in her writing.

“You’re hovering,” she said flatly.

“I’m... leaning. Totally different.” Enid beamed, nudging her lightly.

“Leaning is simply hovering with physical contact.”

Enid kissed her cheek. “Fine, then I’m hovering with affection.”

That earned her a micro-second flicker of softness in Wednesday’s eye, a reward she hoarded like treasure.

“So,” Enid began, overly casual, “you know that blog I published the other day? The one about… us?”

“I know all your blogs are about us,” Wednesday murmured, not looking up. “Your life is tragically saturated with me.”

Enid snickered. “And the world loves it. It already has fifty thousand clicks.”

That made Wednesday pause just long enough to dip her quill a little too hard in the inkwell. A dark blot spread across the page.

“…Congratulations?” she said finally, as though the word were an unfamiliar toxin.

Enid bit her lip. “My editor emailed me. She wants… us to do a joint interview. About our marriage. And, you know, our dynamic. Like a profile piece.”

The silence that followed was the sort that made even the walls creak nervously.

Wednesday turned her head very slowly and pinned Enid with the sort of stare usually reserved for insects she intended to dissect.

“No.”

Enid winced. “I knew you’d say that, but hear me out...”

“No.”

“It could be fun!”

“No.”

“You wouldn’t even have to smile...”

“I said no.”

Enid groaned, collapsing against the table. “Come on, Wednesday! Just once! People want to know about you. They’re fascinated. You’re mysterious, broody, brilliant—”

“Which is precisely why I refuse.” Wednesday shut her notebook with a snap. “My writing speaks for itself. I have no desire to parade my personal life before a pack of strangers who cannot even spell the word morbid correctly.”

Enid dragged her hands down her face. “You realize most authors would kill for this kind of coverage?”

“Most authors are simpering fools who claw at attention like rats in a barrel,” Wednesday replied, calm as ever. “I prefer obscurity. Fame is a contagion.”

Willa squealed from her highchair, flinging banana mush across the table. It landed on Wednesday’s sleeve. She didn’t even flinch, she simply wiped it with her napkin and continued glaring at Enid as if nothing had happened.

Enid pouted. “You won’t even think about it?”

“I have thought about it. And I despise it.”

“But—”

“No.”

Enid huffed, slumping in her chair. “Ugh. You are impossible.”

Wednesday leaned closer, her voice dropping into that low, knife-smooth register that always made Enid’s stomach flip. “You married me for precisely that reason.”

Enid blushed furiously. “Well… yeah. But still!”

---

Later that day, she tried again.

Enid followed Wednesday into the library, where her wife was reshelving volumes of: 'The Collected Tortures of the 17th Century.'

“So… I emailed Nadine back,” Enid said cautiously, “Told her I wasn’t sure if we could do it. She… kind of begged.”

“Unfortunate,” Wednesday said without looking up.

Enid tried her soft voice to convince her, “She said the readers feel ‘seen’ by our relationship. Like… we represent something rare. Different. That’s kinda beautiful, don’t you think?”

Wednesday finally turned, holding a book like a weapon. “You want me to commodify our marriage so strangers can project their fragile dreams onto it?”

Enid cringed. “When you put it like that…”

“Which is the only way to put it.”

“But it’s not just that,” Enid insisted. “It’s… hope. People read us and think, 'hey, maybe I’ll find my person too.' Even if we’re completely different. Even if the world says it won’t work. Don’t you think that matters?”

For once, Wednesday didn’t reply immediately. She set the book down, studying Enid with that unnervingly still gaze.

Finally, she said, “I don’t care for strangers’ hope. I care for your happiness.”

Enid’s heart fluttered, even through her frustration. “You say things like that and then make it impossible to argue with you.”

“Good,” Wednesday said.

---

The editor emailed twice more that week. Then called. Then texted. Enid had to fend her off with increasingly vague excuses, all while dodging Wednesday’s razor-edged suspicion whenever her phone buzzed.

By Friday, Nadine’s last email read: "If Wednesday refuses, we’ll do the piece on just you instead. Readers will still devour it."

Enid sighed, staring at the message while Willa napped against her shoulder. She wanted to share her wife with the world, the way Wednesday glared at teething rings as though they were political opponents, the way she sharpened knives while humming lullabies, the way she loved Enid so fiercely it hurt. But Wednesday wasn’t for the world. She was for Enid.

And maybe that was the story all along.

That night, Enid sat cross-legged in bed, laptop balanced on her knees, while Wednesday polished a dagger by candlelight.

Enid’s fingers hovered over the keys. “So… if I did the interview alone… would that bother you?”

Wednesday glanced up, dark eyes gleaming. “Why would it?”

“Well, because it’s about us.”

“It’s about your version of us,” Wednesday corrected. “Your lens. Your sugar-coated narrative.”

Enid smiled faintly. “You read my blogs, don’t you?”

Wednesday looked back at her dagger. “Every word. I keep a list of corrections in my journal.”

Enid giggled. “Of course you do.”

Wednesday set the dagger down and reached for her hand, unexpectedly gentle. “Do the interview. Let them fawn over you. You deserve admiration.”

Enid’s breath caught. “But not you?”

“I already have yours,” Wednesday said simply. “Why would I want more?”

Enid melted, squeezing her hand. “You’re gonna kill me one day, you know that?”

Wednesday’s lip curved the barest fraction. “That is the plan.”

Chapter Text

The morning of the interview dawned like every other day in the Sinclair-Addams household, with a raven tapping morbidly at the window, Willa attempting to gnaw her way through the crib railings with her budding wolf teeth, and Wednesday’s cello echoing through the halls like the soundtrack to a funeral procession.

Enid, however, was practically vibrating with energy. She’d been up since sunrise fluffing throw pillows that didn’t need fluffing, rearranging potted plants that were technically carnivorous, and rehearsing answers to questions that hadn’t even been asked yet.

“This is going to be great,” she said aloud, twirling through the kitchen in a burst of golden hair and sunshine optimism. She was dressed in a soft cream blouse and pastel skirt, the kind of outfit that screamed 'approachable blogger mom' instead of 'my wife keeps shrunken heads in the pantry.'

At the table, Wednesday did not look up from polishing her dagger. “No, it will be dreadful.”

Enid plopped into the chair beside her, grinning. “You don’t even have to be there! I’ll handle it. But I’m going to make sure they know how amazing you are. Not just as an author, but as a wife, as a mom...”

“I forbid you to speak those words in public,” Wednesday interrupted, her expression utterly grave.

Enid gasped. “What, that you’re an amazing wife and mom?”

Wednesday finally lifted her gaze, dark eyes narrowing. “Yes. It will destroy my reputation. Do you have any idea how long it’s taken me to cultivate the aura of an unfeeling crypt keeper? Decades.”

Enid kissed her cheek. “Oh, don’t worry, Weds. No one who meets you in person will believe me anyway.”

That, for some reason, seemed to please Wednesday.

---

By noon, the film crew had arrived. A van pulled up to the wrought-iron gates, clearly hesitating before entering. Enid had opened them wide, but the creaking sound was so dramatic that the poor driver stalled twice before pulling in.

From the second-floor window, Wednesday and Willa watched like twin gargoyles. Willa banged her fist on the glass and babbled, while Wednesday muttered, “Trespassers.”

Enid rushed outside to greet the team, waving like the human embodiment of sunshine. “Hi! Welcome! Don’t worry about the vultures, they’re mostly decorative. Oh, and the vines? Don’t pet them. They bite when they’re nervous.”

The crew exchanged nervous glances, clutching cameras and lighting rigs like shields.

Rafaela, the interviewer, was the last to step out. A polished woman in her late thirties with sharp glasses and sharper cheekbones, she looked like the type who drank black coffee and intimidated interns for breakfast. But when she saw Enid, bright, bouncing and genuinely thrilled, her expression softened.

“You must be Enid,” Rafaela said warmly, extending her hand.

“That’s me!” Enid beamed, shaking enthusiastically. “Thank you so much for coming all the way out here. We thought the yard would be best for, uh, everyone’s comfort.”

Her eyes flicked nervously toward the looming mansion.

Rafaela raised a brow. “Everyone’s comfort?”

“Yes,” Enid said quickly. “Mine, yours, the… bats.”

As if on cue, a cluster of bats flapped from the belfry above, screeching like an ominous welcome.

The crew set up on the lawn, though “lawn” was perhaps generous. It was less of a yard and more of a gothic botanical experiment. The grass was patchy and overgrown, dotted with headstones from Addams ancestors who insisted on being buried at home, and the garden beds contained things that hissed when stepped too close.

Enid had tried her best to “brighten it up” that morning by putting a gingham picnic blanket near the stone bench, but the overall effect was less suburban family picnic and more tea party in a cemetery.

“This is perfect!” Enid chirped, settling into her chair with practiced poise. “Shall we start?”

Rafaela smiled faintly. “Let’s.”

The cameras rolled.

The first few questions were easy. Rafaela asked about Enid’s blog, about how she balanced motherhood with writing, about her experiences transitioning from San Francisco pack life to the eccentricities of the Addams clan. Enid answered with warmth and wit, her hands fluttering animatedly as she spoke.

But then Rafaela leaned in, voice velvet-smooth. “Of course, what most readers are fascinated by is your marriage to Wednesday Addams. She’s become a sort of… cult figure in literary circles. Some adore her, some… let’s say, vehemently don’t. How does it feel being married to someone so controversial?”

Enid’s smile didn’t falter. She’d prepared for this.

“It feels like home,” she said simply. “People only see her books, or her interviews—well, lack of interviews—but I see her every day. I see how she reads bedtime stories to our daughter in a voice that could summon ghosts, and how she sharpens knives while humming lullabies, and how she—”

She stopped, flushing. “Sorry, I ramble.”

Rafaela’s eyes gleamed. “Please, go on.”

Enid laughed nervously. “Look, people can love her writing or hate it, but the woman I know is the most loyal, stubborn and passionate partner anyone could ask for. She doesn’t care about fame. She doesn’t even care what people think. But she cares about us. And that’s enough.”

From the upstairs window, Wednesday shifted slightly, unseen by the crew. Her eyes softened just enough to betray that she was watching.

The questions continued. Rafaela asked about parenting styles. Enid admitted she was the “panicked mama bear” and Wednesday was the “calm crypt keeper.” She described Willa’s hybrid quirks, the wolf fangs, the psychic visions and laughed about baby-proofing poison bottles.

The crew chuckled. Rafaela smiled. Enid sparkled.

But then…

“Some critics,” Rafaela said delicately, “argue that Wednesday’s novels romanticize violence. That her work borders on unhealthy glorification of suffering. How do you respond to that as her partner? As the mother of her child?”

The air seemed to drop ten degrees. Even the vines rustled.

Enid swallowed. She knew this was coming.

“I respond,” she said carefully, “by saying that Wednesday writes about darkness because she understands it. She doesn’t glorify suffering, she exposes it. She tears it open and makes people face it. And if that makes some people uncomfortable, well… maybe that’s the point.”

Rafaela’s gaze sharpened. “So you don’t fear her influence on your daughter?”

Enid leaned forward, her voice firm. “No. Because I know that Wednesday also sings her lullabies, and kisses her goodnight, and shows her what it means to be strong. Our daughter will grow up knowing she can embrace every part of herself, even the scary parts. That’s not fear. That’s freedom.”

The crew sat stunned. Even the bats seemed to hold their breath.

From the window, Wednesday’s grip on the curtain tightened, not in anger, but in something dangerously close to pride.

The rest of the interview flowed easier. Rafaela asked about Enid’s hopes for the future, about the balance of light and dark in their marriage. Enid answered with honesty, her optimism shining even as she admitted their differences.

Finally, Rafaela leaned back. “One last question. If you had to describe Wednesday Addams in a single word… what would it be?”

Enid didn’t hesitate.

“Home.”

The interview wrapped. The crew packed up, glancing nervously at the gargoyles and vines as they hurried to the van. Rafaela lingered, shaking Enid’s hand warmly.

“You’re remarkable,” she said. “Your readers are lucky. And… so is your wife.”

Enid flushed pink, glancing toward the window where Wednesday had long since disappeared. “Yeah,” she said softly. “So am I.”

---

That night, after Willa was asleep and the house had quieted, Enid curled into bed beside Wednesday.

“Well?” Enid whispered, grinning. “You eavesdropped, didn’t you?”

Wednesday lay rigid, staring at the ceiling like a carved gargoyle. “I may have monitored the proceedings.”

Enid giggled. “You heard what I said about you being home?”

Wednesday turned her head, her eyes glinting. “You realize you’ve just ruined my reputation permanently. No one will ever again believe I sleep in a coffin.”

Enid kissed her cheek, snuggling closer. “Good. Now they’ll know the truth.”

Wednesday sighed, as though bearing the weight of the world. “I despise you.”

Enid smiled into her shoulder. “Love you too, Mama Doom.”

Chapter Text

The following morning, Enid woke up with the kind of energy usually reserved for toddlers on Halloween candy. She stretched luxuriously, slipped out of bed and immediately opened her laptop.

Wednesday, however, remained perfectly still on her back, hands crossed over her chest like a dignified corpse. Her eyes cracked open only when Enid squealed loud enough to rattle the windows.

“It’s up!” Enid practically sang, spinning the laptop toward herself. “The interview’s online!”

Wednesday exhaled through her nose. “Ah. A new circle of Hell.”

“It’s on YouTube, Wednesday! And it already has—” Enid blinked at the screen. “Oh my god. Fifty thousand views. And it’s only been… twelve hours!”

Wednesday sat up slowly, like Nosferatu rising from his coffin. “Fifty thousand voyeurs peering into our lives. Delightful.”

Enid giggled. “People love it! Look—” she scrolled down the screen, bright eyes flickering across lines of text. “There are already hundreds of comments.”

Wednesday stiffened. “Comments?”

“Yeah!” Enid chirped. “You know, what people write under the video.”

“I am familiar with the concept,” Wednesday said grimly, swinging her legs over the bed. “The cesspool of humanity vomiting their opinions into the void.”

Enid ignored her tone and began reading aloud.

First comment: "I never thought I’d say this, but Wednesday Addams as a mom is the content I didn’t know I needed."

Enid squealed. “See? They love you!”

Wednesday’s lip curled faintly. “They speak as though my existence is a meme.”

Second comment: "Enid is literally sunshine married to a thunderstorm, and I want a whole series about them."

Enid laughed so hard she almost fell off the bed. “Oh my god, we’re like a weather forecast couple! I’m sunshine, you’re thunderstorm!”

“I refuse to be reduced to meteorology,” Wednesday muttered.

The comments rolled on.

Third comment: "That poor interviewer. You can tell she was two seconds away from running for her life when the bats flew out."

Enid slapped the mattress, wheezing. “It’s true though! Did you see her face?”

Wednesday allowed the faintest smirk. “Amateurs. One should never show fear before predators.”

Fourth comment: "Petition for Wednesday to narrate horror bedtime stories for adults. I would pay." 

Enid gasped dramatically. “Weds! You could have a side hustle! Imagine you reading The Raven or, like, creepypastas!”

Wednesday fixed her with a death glare. “If you ever suggest I become an influencer, I will salt the earth where your laptop stands.”

Enid just kissed her cheek. “You’d be amazing.”

---

By breakfast, the view count had jumped to seventy-five thousand.

Enid sat at the kitchen table with her laptop open, spooning oatmeal into Willa’s mouth with one hand and scrolling comments with the other.

“Listen to this one!” she said between spoonfuls.

Comment: "Enid Sinclair deserves the world for putting up with that woman. Protect her at all costs."

Wednesday sipped her black coffee in silence.

Enid tilted her head. “You’re not even going to say anything?”

“I am debating whether ‘that woman’ is meant as a slight or a compliment.”

“Definitely a compliment,” Enid said firmly, shoving the spoon toward Willa, who bared her little wolf fangs in protest. “Open up, puppy. Mommy’s oatmeal is better than human blood.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “Debatable.”

A few hours later, Morticia swept into the mansion like a shadow.

“Darling,” she purred, kissing both her daughter-in-law and granddaughter with practiced grace. “I saw the interview.”

Enid beamed. “You did?”

Morticia’s eyes glittered. “The entire coven saw it. You’ve made quite the impression, my dear.”

Wednesday groaned. “Mother, don’t encourage this farce.”

“Oh but my little viper,” Morticia crooned, “you were radiant. Even in your absence, your aura suffocated the scene. Truly, a masterpiece.”

Enid giggled into her hands. “See, Wednesday? Even your mom thinks you’re iconic.”

Wednesday’s scowl deepened. “I despise the word ‘iconic.’ It reeks of pop culture.”

That evening, Enid curled on the sofa with Wednesday, laptop balanced precariously as she continued scrolling through the digital chaos.

Comment: "I would sell my soul to have Wednesday Addams glare at me once."

Enid snorted. “Babe, you have fans!”

Wednesday deadpanned, “Then by all means, sell it. I have a collection jar.”

Comment: "Lowkey shipping Enid and Rafaela?? The way they looked at each other omg."

Enid choked on air. “WHAT?! Oh my god, no! No, no, no!”

Wednesday’s head snapped toward her, eyes narrowing to slits.

Enid flailed. “It’s not true! They’re just trolls!”

Wednesday muttered darkly, “I will find this Rafaela and ensure her obituary lists ‘accidental’ decapitation.”

Enid buried her face in her hands. “I hate the internet.”

---

By the end of the week, the video had passed a quarter million views. Other entertainment sites were embedding it, reaction channels were dissecting it frame by frame, and fan edits of Enid’s quote "She’s home" were circulating with gothic filters and melancholy music.

Enid was thrilled.

Wednesday was a thundercloud.

“This is intolerable,” she declared one night, stalking back and forth across the bedroom. “Strangers dissecting our lives like vultures over carrion. Reducing us to content. Mocking us with gifs.”

Enid peeked up from her phone. “Actually, the gifs are kind of cute. Look, here’s one of you glaring, and they put sparkly hearts around it.”

Wednesday looked ready to commit homicide.

Enid quickly shoved the phone away. “Okay, maybe not your vibe.”

Still, beneath all the brooding and death threats, something in Wednesday’s expression betrayed her. She was listening when Enid read the softer comments aloud.

"You can tell she really loves her."

"The way Enid talks about her… I want that kind of devotion."

"This couple is proof that light and dark can coexist."

Enid glanced up after each one, and though Wednesday’s lips pressed into a line, her eyes gave her away. There was the faintest flicker of… not pride or joy exactly, but something softer. Something almost vulnerable.

Enid didn’t call her out. She just tucked herself against Wednesday’s side, resting her head on the thunderstorm’s shoulder.

---

The chaos only grew from there. Morticia suggested “merch.” Gomez threatened to sue an entertainment site for misquoting his daughter. Cousin Itt offered to manage Wednesday’s social media presence.

Enid laughed through it all, while Wednesday muttered about arson.

And yet… every night, as Enid scrolled through comments until she fell asleep, Wednesday secretly lingered over her shoulder. She never admitted it. She never would.

But Enid knew.

Because every time someone wrote, "She’s home," Wednesday’s hand would tighten almost imperceptibly around hers.

Chapter Text

Enid Sinclair-Addams had always liked Instagram. It was, to her, the visual equivalent of scrapbooking: bright filters, fun stickers, an excuse to share Willa’s milestones with the occasional artsy latte photo. For years, she hovered around a modest couple thousand followers, mostly old Nevermore friends, a few “mom-blogger” acquaintances, and the occasional bookstagrammer who had figured out she was married to the Wednesday Addams.

Enid's Instagram:

But now?

Now, after the interview had gone viral, her follower count had skyrocketed like a rocket strapped to a werewolf pup.

Enid blinked at her phone the morning after. “Weds… babe…” Her voice wavered between awe and dread. “I just hit a hundred thousand followers.”

Wednesday, who was calmly polishing a dagger at the breakfast table, didn’t even look up. “Congratulations. You are now officially more hunted than prey.”

Enid laughed nervously. “It’s… good, right? Like… people are interested in us.”

Wednesday set the blade down and finally met her wife’s eyes. “The only ‘us’ that matters is in this house. Not in the frothing maw of the internet.”

Willa, perched in her high chair with oatmeal smeared across her cheeks like war paint, banged her spoon on the tray and shrieked in agreement, or maybe just hunger.

Enid scrolled further down her feed. Each new post she had uploaded, Willa’s gummy smile, Wednesday's back in the garden while she was glaring at a crow, even just a plate of sugar cookies Enid decorated with little bats, now had thousands of likes and hundreds of comments.

Some were sweet.

"These two are relationship goals."

"Sunshine x thunderstorm couple forever 🖤☀️" 

Some were hilarious.

"Imagine waking up and Wednesday Addams is your wife. She probably stares at you until you open your eyes."

Enid chuckled. “That’s actually true.”

And then… the suggestive ones.

"Not to be disrespectful, but Enid is hot. I get it, Wednesday." 

"Okay but… what if Enid and the interviewer Rafaela 👀 I saw sparks." 

Enid’s face went beet red. “Nope. Nope. Skipping those.”

Wednesday’s fork froze halfway to her mouth. Her voice was low, dangerous, and calm, the kind of calm that preceded carnage. “What did you just say?”

“Nothing!” Enid squeaked, fumbling to scroll faster. “Just people being silly! Ignore it!”

Wednesday slowly set her fork down. “Give me the names of these insolent degenerates. I wish to catalog them.”

Enid’s stomach flipped. She wasn’t sure if Wednesday meant block them or begin a hit list.

By lunchtime, Enid’s followers had jumped to two hundred thousand.

Her phone buzzed with an email from her editor:

"Subject: URGENT — TV opportunity!!" 

Enid,

Broadcast Entertainment wants you for a full live interview. Primetime. They’re calling it “Love in the Shadows: Wednesday Addams Unmasked.” This is huge. Please say yes.

Enid gasped so loudly that Willa, mid-nap on her baby mat, startled awake and began howling.

Wednesday, who had been sharpening yet another blade, narrowed her eyes. “Who died?”

“No one! But, Weds, a TV network wants me! A live interview!”

Wednesday’s face contorted into pure disgust. “Live? Broadcast? With a braying audience foaming at the mouth for spectacle? I would rather drown myself in the bog.”

“But they want me, not you,” Enid said, though her voice wobbled. “Well, us... technically. They want to talk about you, obviously. But still... this is big.”

Willa gurgled, then spit out her pacifier like she was chiming in: 'Danger, danger.' 

Wednesday stood. “Absolutely not. We’ve already let one interview desecrate our sanctuary. No more.”

---

The next few days, Enid tried to focus on her blog, her writing, and, of course, Willa. But the notifications wouldn’t stop.

Her posts got flooded with fan-art of her and Wednesday in everything from gothic gowns to chibi cartoon doodles.

Reaction videos popped up, analyzing her “married dynamic” like it was a TV show.

Ship edits with Rafaela the interviewer kept reappearing, to her horror.

Enid groaned one night, burying her face in her pillow. “Why do they keep shipping me with Rafaela? She literally asked me if I wanted water. That’s it. That’s the spark they’re talking about!”

Wednesday, lying beside her with hands folded over her chest, turned her head sharply. “Shall I contact this Rafaela? Perhaps remind her that her arteries are not, in fact, immortal?”

“Wednesday!” Enid gasped. “No! She didn’t do anything!”

Wednesday sighed, dramatic as a Shakespearean widow. “Then it is the masses who must be punished.”

---

At the Addams-Sinclair mansion, the chaos trickled into daily life.

Morticia appeared one afternoon, sweeping into the living room with a smile that could cut glass. “Darling, I saw your follower count. How divine! Soon you will rival even Gomez in admirers.”

Enid laughed nervously. “Yeah, it’s… a lot. Honestly, I don’t know if I’m cut out for all this attention.”

Morticia smirked. “Fame is like a rose garden, my dear. Beautiful from afar. Thorny up close. But you carry yourself with grace. That’s what matters.”

Wednesday scowled from her writing desk. “No. What matters is ensuring no one prunes the roses without permission.”

The funniest part—at least to Enid—was that Wednesday, despite all her brooding, began to lurk.

She claimed to detest the internet. She mocked the cult of “influencers.” She hissed at the mention of algorithms.

And yet… more than once, Enid caught her wife leaning over her shoulder, eyes flicking rapidly across the comments, her mouth tightening in satisfaction whenever she saw ones like:

"You can tell she’d kill for her." 

"This is the only healthy toxic relationship I’d root for." 

Enid never called her out on it. But she smiled quietly every time.

Of course, Enid couldn’t escape the emails.

Her editor was relentless and kept spamming emails.

“They’re offering you primetime.”

“The public is obsessed.”

“We could negotiate a joint segment with Wednesday’s publisher. Imagine the reach!”

Enid groaned, throwing herself face-first onto the couch. “They won’t stop! I don’t know what to do!”

From her armchair, Wednesday sipped black tea. “You say no. As one should when strangers ask to peel your skin for entertainment.”

Enid peeked up, chin resting on a cushion. “But Weds… it could be fun. And it’s not about you, it’s about… well, us. People want to know our story.”

“They already know more than they deserve,” Wednesday said flatly.

Willa, crawling across the carpet with uncanny speed, tugged on Wednesday’s skirt with a sticky fist.

Wednesday picked her up, balancing the baby expertly on her hip. Willa babbled, then blew a raspberry directly into her mother’s face.

Wednesday didn’t flinch. She simply said: “Precisely, my daughter. The masses are unworthy.”

Enid laughed so hard she nearly dropped her phone.

---

That night, Enid lay awake, staring at the ceiling.

She loved her job. She loved writing. She loved the idea of sharing glimpses of their life, the joy and the chaos, the morbid and the magical. She didn’t crave fame, not exactly. But she did crave connection.

And deep down, she knew that people weren’t laughing at them. They were marveling. Admiring. Rooting.

But beside her, Wednesday slept like the dead, with her face serene, her arms crossed and utterly closed off to the world.

Enid turned on her side, watching her wife’s profile silhouetted by moonlight.

She knew one thing for certain: if she ever agreed to a live interview, she’d have to drag Wednesday into it tooth and nail.

And God help the interviewer who dared call her “Mrs. Sinclair” instead of “Mrs. Sinclair-Addams.”

Because the last time someone assumed husband, Wednesday nearly brought down a hospital.

And Enid wasn’t entirely sure she’d survive Wednesday’s wrath if it happened on live TV.

Chapter Text

Enid loved her blog, loved her Instagram, loved the colorful blur of documenting life. She didn’t need fame exactly, but she needed memories. Moments. Proof of her little family.

And if those memories just happened to involve her famous, brooding, daggers-for-eyes wife, all the better.

There was just one problem.

Wednesday refused, flat-out refused, to pose for photographs.

Not candid, not staged, not even in the corner of Enid’s cheerful selfies. She could be in the background scowling at a raven, perhaps. Or a hand might appear holding Willa’s bottle ominously. But an actual photo? Together? With eye contact?

Forget it.

Enid groaned one morning, sprawled on the carpet while Willa banged a wooden block against the floor like a tiny barbarian.

“Weds,” Enid whined, phone in hand, “we literally don’t have one proper photo of us. People think I made you up.”

From across the room, Wednesday didn’t even pause in polishing a silver letter opener. “Good.”

“Good?” Enid sat up, scandalized. “What do you mean good?”

“If they think I am a phantom, they are less likely to seek me out. And if they think you’re inventing a marriage with a spectral entity, that only cements your reputation as creatively unhinged. Which, frankly, you deserve.”

Enid puffed her cheeks like a furious golden retriever. “Unbelievable. You’ll write entire novels about tortured lovers killing each other with scissors, but you won’t take a selfie with your wife?”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Correct.”

Willa shrieked with laughter, as though she found this exchange deeply entertaining.

---

Enid tried being subtle at first. She waited until Wednesday was distracted, hunched over her typewriter, clacking out prose that sounded like funeral hymns. Quietly, Enid crouched behind her, held up her phone, and whispered, “Just one…”

Click.

The result: Wednesday mid-snarling glare, eyes like daggers, looking directly into the camera as if she could kill the lens.

Enid squealed in triumph. “See? Perfect!”

Wednesday swiveled in her chair, face a mask of dread. “Delete it.”

“Never!”

“Delete it, or I will delete your kneecaps.”

“Over my dead—”

Before Enid could finish, Wednesday lunged with eerie swiftness, snatched the phone, and deleted the photo herself.

Willa, watching from her play mat, clapped.

The next attempt was a family shot. Enid dressed Willa in a tiny wolf-print romper, carried her out to the garden, and set up the phone on a timer.

“Come on, Weds, this’ll be cute!” Enid chirped, tugging Wednesday into place.

Wednesday stood stiffly beside her, arms crossed like she was about to attend an execution. “This is undignified.”

“Smile!” Enid begged.

The timer beeped. The camera clicked.

Result: Enid beaming, Willa drooling, and Wednesday glaring into the middle distance as if she were plotting the cameraman’s demise.

Enid looked at the photo and sighed. “...You look like you’re about to murder Santa Claus.”

“Excellent,” Wednesday said flatly.

---

It became war.

Enid staged ambush selfies, in the kitchen, in the library, in bed. Wednesday developed a sixth sense, dodging every attempt with inhuman reflexes.

“Say cheese!”

“Say corpse.”

“Just one kiss pic, pleaaase.”

“Affection is not a spectacle.”

“You know this is literally the bare minimum, right?”

“The bare minimum is survival. You are already exceeding it.”

Enid flopped onto the sofa dramatically. “You are the worst Instagram wife ever.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “I accept this honor.”

---

Then came the unexpected ally.

Willa.

One afternoon, Enid caught her baby gnawing on her phone case. Wiping drool from the screen, she noticed something strange.

In her gallery was… a photo.

Of the three of them.

Apparently, Willa had mashed the button at just the right moment. The result was chaotic perfection: Enid laughing mid-protest, Wednesday frowning while holding a baby bottle, and Willa herself mid-screech, eyes wide and gums bared like a feral wolf cub.

Enid gasped. “Oh my God. It’s our first real family photo!”

She shoved it in Wednesday’s face.

Wednesday blinked at the image, then frowned. “…I look ghastly.”

“You look hot,” Enid corrected, clutching the phone like it was holy scripture. “And this, this is going online.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “If you do, I’ll know.”

“Weds, they’ll love it. It’s authentic. It’s—”

“An invasion of my soul.”

“…But a cute invasion!”

That night, Enid lay awake scrolling through comments from her last post, fingers twitching with the urge to upload the accidental photo.

She glanced sideways. Wednesday was sleeping like a corpse beside her.

Enid whispered to herself, “Just one photo. Just one. The world deserves to see it.”

She uploaded it.

Within minutes, the likes exploded.

"Finally!!! A couple photo!!!" 

"This is gold. Willa’s face tho 😂"

"Wednesday looks like she’s about to murder us through the screen and I love it." 

"Couple goals. Family goals. Cryptid goals." 

Enid bit her lip, torn between glee and guilt.

Beside her, Wednesday’s eyes snapped open. “You posted it, didn’t you?”

Enid squeaked. “How did you—”

“I can feel the betrayal in my marrow.”

Enid hid under the blanket. “It’s cute! People love it!”

There was a long pause. Then Wednesday’s voice, calm and terrifying: “Tomorrow, we discuss revenge.”

Enid whimpered.

Willa, from her crib, gurgled in her sleep.

The next morning, Enid braced herself for doom. Instead, Wednesday handed her a freshly printed photo. Glossy. Dark. Gothic.

It was of Enid asleep, drooling onto her pillow, hair a chaotic halo, blanket half-kicked off. Wednesday had captured it with uncanny precision, like a hunter bagging prey.

Enid gasped. “You took a picture of me sleeping?!”

“Yes. If you insist on parading me on your internet stage, I shall return the favor. This will be my first post.”

“…You don’t even have Instagram.”

“I do now.”

And before Enid could stop her, Wednesday uploaded it to a brand-new account: @doom.and.gloom

The photo was adorned with a caption that said: “My wife. At her most vulnerable. Adorable. Disgusting.”

Enid shrieked. “Wednesday!!”

The comments poured in within seconds.

"She made an account???" 

"This is the most Addams couple thing ever."

"Protect Enid at all costs. She’s doomed and glowing."

Enid buried her face in her hands. “This is my life now.”

Willa babbled happily in the background, as if to say: 'Yes, Mama Woof. This is our legacy.' 

Chapter Text

Wednesday Addams had never been a woman of the internet. She had tolerated it. She had occasionally researched poisons through it. But she had never seen herself as someone who belonged within its neon, shrieking halls.

Until her Instagram was born.

@doom.and.gloom.

Wednesday's Instagram

Her very first post, the one she had sworn was merely revenge against Enid, had been shared thousands of times by morning. The image of Enid drooling in sleep, captioned “My wife. At her most vulnerable. Adorable. Disgusting.” had crossed over from the quiet Addams family world into a virality neither of them had prepared for.

Enid's phone was blowing up with pings and dings. Wednesday’s post had 200,000 likes. Thousands of comments. Shares across Twitter, TikTok, and—oh God—even Facebook, where her Aunt Mildred had probably already seen it.

Enid walked toward Wednesday with her phone in hand. “Oh my God, Wednesday. We are going viral!?”

Wednesday sat at her typewriter, dressed in her customary black, calm as a winter grave. “The internet appears to have appreciated my contribution to the public record.”

Enid clutched her head. “Appreciated? Weds, you’re viral! People are calling you the ‘dark queen of Instagram.’”

“I am pleased to hear my reign has expanded.”

“No! This is—” Enid opened the comments again, squinting.

"Couple goals, but make it murder-y."

"She looks like she’s about to stab me through the screen and I want her to." 

"Mother, I crave violence." 

Enid nearly dropped the phone. “Oh my God, they’re obsessed with you.”

“Of course,” Wednesday said simply, adjusting the ribbon on her typewriter. “Obsession is the natural state of humanity when confronted with beauty and horror simultaneously. I embody both.”

Enid groaned.

---

The obsession only grew worse.

Every post Wednesday uploaded was treated like scripture.

She posted a single photo of a raven perched on the gate with the caption: "It knows what you did."

Within hours, it had been remixed into dozens of memes. Someone edited Willa’s face onto the raven’s body, calling it “Baby’s First Omen.”

She posted a shot of a kitchen knife dripping strawberry jam, captioned: “Breakfast.” TikTok was flooded with sound edits.

She posted a blurry black-and-white shot of Enid brushing her teeth, simply labeled: “The wolf bares her fangs.” Fans practically fainted.

Enid scrolled through the chaos at night, half-horrified and half-laughing. “Wednesday, you’ve turned into a meme lord. Do you realize that?”

“I reject the concept of memes.”

“You are one!”

Wednesday looked vaguely nauseated, as though Enid had accused her of something unspeakable.

But worse than the memes were the shippers.

Enid had always known that Wednesday’s novels, the grim, romantic, dripping in themes of doomed love, unwanted caresses and torture stories had cultivated a certain fanbase. People who fetishized the pain, who swooned over lines like “I would rather devour your heart than kiss your lips.”

Now, those same people saw her. The sunny, colorful, “annoyingly cheerful” wife of the author. And they drew conclusions.

Terrifying conclusions.

Enid scrolled through one fan account, eyes wide. “Oh God, Weds, they’re writing fanfiction about us.”

Wednesday looked up from polishing a dagger. “And?”

“And look at this!” She thrust her phone toward her wife. “They think our relationship is like your books! Like, you locking me in a crypt, and me loving it?!”

Wednesday blinked, then tilted her head. “In their defense, you would enjoy the crypt.”

“Not the point!” Enid’s ears burned pink. “Look, here! They’re saying you "control me financially" and that I’m "trapped in your web of gothic torment."”

“That is patently false,” Wednesday said, matter-of-fact. “You are irritatingly independent. I would hardly call having separate bank accounts and refusing my handouts ‘trapped.’”

Enid groaned. “Try telling them that.” She scrolled down further, face going redder. “Oh my God—they’re drawing... nope, nope, I can’t even say it!”

Wednesday took the phone, skimmed one of the fan arts, and smirked. “They’ve captured your hair rather well.”

“Wednesday!”

Willa squealed in her playpen, as if in agreement with her gothic mama.

It wasn’t only fanfiction. There were forums. Entire threads analyzing their marriage as if it were one of Wednesday’s novels.

One post read: "Enid is clearly the stand-in for all the doomed heroines. Their dynamic screams captivity kink. She pretends to be free, but in reality, she’s chained to Wednesday’s obsession."

Enid almost choked on her cereal reading it. “Chained?! The only chain in this house is Willa’s teething toy!”

Wednesday calmly sipped her black coffee. “I find their devotion… amusing.”

“You’re not helping!”

Then came the interviews. Not from Enid’s editor this time, but from magazines, podcasts, YouTubers. All begging for a joint sit-down with the morbid queen of literature and her golden retriever wife.

Enid rejected them all.

Wednesday would never tolerate it, and honestly, Enid didn’t have the emotional stamina to answer questions like “So, how often does she lock you in the basement?”

Still, she couldn’t help spiraling a little.

Because in some twisted way, her mother Esther would have loved this narrative.

Her mother had always warned her: marrying into wealth, into the Addams family, would make her dependent, trapped, silenced. Esther had painted Wednesday as a kind of predator waiting to consume her.

And now strangers on the internet, thousands of them, were parroting the same story.

Enid sighed into her hands one evening, laptop glowing in her lap.

She felt the bed dip. Wednesday, cool and quiet sat beside her.

“You’ve been brooding,” Wednesday observed.

Enid peeked out from between her fingers. “That’s supposed to be your job.”

“Your sunshine has dimmed.” Wednesday tilted her head. “Why?”

Enid hesitated, then showed her the screen. Threads, comments, fanart. Interpretations that twisted their love into cruelty.

“They think you’re... controlling me. That our marriage is like your books. That you’re...” Her throat tightened. “that you’re like my mom always said you’d be.”

There was a long pause. Then Wednesday reached out, closed the laptop with a soft click, and turned Enid’s face toward hers.

“Do you believe them?” she asked, voice low.

Enid blinked. “What? No! Of course not!”

“Then why does it matter?”

“Because it feels like the world sees us wrong.”

Wednesday’s dark eyes gleamed. “The world has always seen me wrong. They mistake my devotion for cruelty, my clarity for madness. I have ceased to care.”

Enid bit her lip. “...But what about me?”

“You are the only one who sees me correctly,” Wednesday said. “That is all that matters.”

Enid’s heart melted, even as her eyes prickled with tears. She launched herself into Wednesday’s arms, burying her face against her shoulder. “You’re way too good at saying the perfect thing, you know that?”

“I am simply honest,” Wednesday murmured, stroking her back with a hand that always somehow soothed her inner wounds.

---

Of course, the internet didn’t stop.

But Enid found herself laughing at it more.

Because for every obsessive fan theory, there was also absurd humor.

Willa herself became a meme, her screeching baby face edited into gothic paintings, with captions like: "The prophecy child."

Enid couldn’t help but laugh until she cried scrolling through them.

And when she looked up, Wednesday was watching her with quiet satisfaction.

“You’re smiling again,” Wednesday noted.

“Yeah.” Enid sniffed, still giggling. “Guess your meme empire isn’t all bad.”

“Empire,” Wednesday repeated, as if tasting the word. A small smirk curved her lips.

Enid groaned. “Oh no. I’ve created a monster.”

Willa clapped her hands.

“Yes,” Wednesday said solemnly. “Our legacy is assured.”

Chapter Text

The Sinclairs had never been a technologically inclined pack.

They lived in San Francisco, in a creaky, drafty Victorian house that smelled perpetually of wet dog and herbal tea. They howled at the moon, played poker on full moons, and barbecued suspicious meats in the backyard. But the internet? Social media? Influencers? Those were for the pups of the pack, the teenagers who scrolled endlessly with glowing faces in the dark.

Esther, Enid’s mother, still owned a flip phone. Murray, her father, thought Wi-Fi was “probably a government trick to track wolves.”

So the fact that they even found out about Wednesday Addams’ viral fame was a cosmic accident.

It started when one of the younger wolves, Enid’s cousin Jared, brought his phone into the kitchen. He shoved the screen under Esther’s nose as she was chopping onions for stew.

“Aunt Esther, look! Isn’t this your daughter? She’s, like… famous!”

Esther frowned, squinting at the glowing rectangle and wore her glasses. On the screen was a blurry black-and-white photo of Enid brushing her teeth, with a caption: "The wolf bares her fangs."

Esther dropped the knife.

“That’s Enid.” She snatched the phone. Scrolling with clumsy thumbs, she found more: Enid napping, Enid drooling, Enid yawning. Each photo captioned with gothic morbidity. And thousands of people commenting.

“Oh my heavens. She’s being stalked!”

Jared rolled his eyes. “No, Aunt Esther, she’s not stalked, she’s, like, married to the most famous creepy author in the world. It’s their Instagram. They’re trending!”

Esther nearly fainted.

Trending?!

Within an hour, she had gathered Murray, her sons and several aunts and uncles around the kitchen table, the phone glowing like a cursed artifact in the center.

Wednesday's first post showed Enid asleep, captioned: “My wife. At her most vulnerable. Adorable. Disgusting.”

Esther clutched her chest. “She’s mocking her! Publicly! Exactly what I warned her about. Wednesday Addams is airing out my poor baby’s shame for the world.”

“She looks fine to me,” Murray muttered, but Esther elbowed him sharply.

“Don’t you see? This is psychological warfare. First it starts with humiliating pictures. Then it escalates.”

She scrolled further, and her blood ran cold. Fan theories. Threads. People whispering that Enid was trapped, controlled, ensnared in gothic torment.

Esther gasped so loudly the curtains shuddered. “Murray! It’s all true. Everything I feared! She’s in danger.”

Murray scratched behind his ear, looking skeptical. “Danger… or just marriage?”

“Murray Sinclair!” Esther slapped the table so hard the salt shaker jumped. “Our daughter is crying for help, and the entire internet sees it except you!”

The pack went into full emergency mode. Esther paced the living room, hands flapping. “We need to call her. Right now. Get her out of there. I’ll book her a train. She can come back home, bring the baby too.”

Murray sighed, scratching at the newspaper crossword. “Esther, she’s almost thirty. Married. Has a kid. She’s not running away like a teenager.”

“She’s a prisoner!”

“She’s got her own blog.”

“A blog written under duress!” Esther snapped.

Just then, Jared chimed in again, showing another post. This one was Wednesday’s shot of a kitchen knife dripping strawberry jam, captioned simply: "Breakfast."

Esther shrieked. “Murray! That’s a threat. A coded message! Oh, Enid, my sweet baby, she’s trapped in a house of horrors!”

Murray peeked at the phone. “…Looks like jam to me.”

“Jam?! You think jam bleeds like that?! Murray, you are blind!”

The whole pack howled in agreement, though whether they agreed with Esther or were just excited about the drama was unclear.

---

That evening, Esther made the call. She hadn’t spoken to Enid for a long time, not since the invitation about meeting Willa had been ignored. But a mother’s duty was eternal. Even if her daughter thought she knew better.

She picked up her flip phone, dialed with trembling fingers, and prayed her daughter would answer.

Back in New Jersey, in the Addams-Sinclair mansion, Enid was rocking Willa to sleep when her phone buzzed. She nearly dropped it.

Mom.

Her throat went dry. She hadn’t seen that name in months. Slowly, she answered. “...Hello?”

“Enid!” Esther’s voice rang sharp, frantic. “Thank God! Are you safe? Are you alive?”

Enid blinked. “...What?”

“Don’t play dumb, young lady. I’ve seen the internet stuff. I’ve read the comments. I know what she’s doing to you!”

“...She?” Enid repeated.

“Wednesday! That… that monster! She’s humiliating you in front of millions, controlling you, trapping you in some gothic nightmare. And don’t tell me otherwise, the internet doesn’t lie!”

Enid nearly dropped the phone again, half-laughing, half-crying. “Mom—oh my God—are you serious right now?”

“Don’t you dare laugh at me, Enid Sinclair! This is life and death! I’ve seen the knife photo! I know a cry for help when I see one!”

Enid pressed her forehead against Willa’s soft hair, torn between rage and hilarity. “Mom, it was jam.”

“It was blood!”

“It was strawberry jam on toast!”

“Toast?! She has you brainwashed. Murray! She says it’s toast!” Esther’s voice went muffled as she relayed to her husband. A grunt. “Told you so.”

Enid wanted to melt into the floor.

---

Later that night, Enid sat on the bed with her phone still buzzing with unanswered “check-in” texts from her mother. She groaned, flopping onto her back.

Wednesday sat at her desk, with a quill in hand and expression cool as always. “You look as if you’ve wrestled with a banshee.”

“My mom called,” Enid mumbled into a pillow.

“Tragic.”

“She saw your Instagram.”

Wednesday froze for a fraction of a second before resuming her writing. “...And?”

“And she thinks you’re… holding me captive.”

At that, Wednesday actually put her quill down. Her eyes lifted, black as midnight. “Am I to understand your mother believes I’ve constructed a gothic torture chamber out of matrimony?”

Enid peeked at her. “…Yeah. Basically.”

A slow, delighted smile spread across Wednesday’s lips. “Excellent. Then she finally understands me.”

“Wednesday!” Enid sat up, throwing a pillow at her. “This is not funny!”

“It is,” Wednesday said simply. “It’s hilarious.”

Enid groaned.

From the crib, Willa babbled something that sounded dangerously close to “Doom,” and clapped her hands as if in agreement.

---

But the Sinclairs weren’t finished.

The next morning, Esther announced to the pack: “If Enid won’t admit she’s in danger, then we’re going to New Jersey ourselves!”

Murray groaned. “That’s across the whole country.”

“Then pack a suitcase.”

And so, in the quiet Addams-Sinclair mansion, where Enid was just barely recovering from the chaos of internet fame, another storm was brewing. A storm in the form of an entire wolf pack determined to “rescue” their daughter from the terrifying clutches of her brooding, knife-polishing wife.

Chapter Text

Enid couldn’t stop pacing.

The Sinclair-Addams mansion with its endless corridors, towering ceilings, and creaks that sounded like ghostly sighs, had always been big enough to contain her restless energy. But tonight, no hallway was long enough. No stairwell steep enough. No carpeted runner sufficient to absorb the nervous thuds of her socked feet.

She replayed the phone call with her mother over and over, like a bad song stuck in her head.

"Enid! Are you safe? Are you alive? She’s humiliating you! I saw the knife picture, it was blood!"

And then the words she hadn’t said, but that Enid knew were lingering unspoken: "I’m coming."

Enid pressed her palms to her cheeks, groaning into the dimly lit corridor. Her wolf instincts, those twitchy nerves that always preceded trouble, were screaming at her.

“Enid.”

She jumped. Wednesday stood at the end of the hall, her black nightgown brushing the floor, her pale skin glowing like a phantom in the flickering wall sconce light. She looked as though she’d simply materialized out of the shadows, because she probably had.

“Are you rehearsing for an exorcism,” Wednesday asked coolly, “or merely preparing to explode?”

Enid clutched her chest. “Do you have to sneak up on me like that?”

“Yes.”

“Ugh.” Enid dragged her hands through her hair. “Okay. Don’t freak out. But… I think my parents are coming here.”

Wednesday blinked. Slowly. Like a cat. “Uninvited?”

“Yeah.”

“...Excellent.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “How is that excellent?”

Wednesday glided closer, eyes glinting like dark pools. “Because their arrival will only prove my point: they fear me. They believe I’ve entrapped you in a castle of horrors. Their delusions are a love letter in disguise.”

“Wednesday!” Enid stomped a foot. “This isn’t funny. I haven’t seen them in years. And the way my mom sounded on the phone? She’s probably already on the way.”

Wednesday tilted her head, voice dropping to a conspiratorial hush. “Then let them come. We will greet them in the style of the Addamses: funereal solemnity, cryptic riddles, and if possible, thunder.”

Enid groaned, grabbing Wednesday’s wrists. “No, Weds, I need you to try. Like, really try not to terrify them. Please. Just once. For me?”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “You’re asking me to perform a role wholly incompatible with my personality. That is both insulting and mildly erotic.”

“Wednesday!”

“I will… consider it.”

That was as close to a promise as she’d get.

---

Meanwhile, halfway across the country, the Sinclairs had boarded the overnight train to New Jersey.

Esther had rallied the entire household with a battle cry worthy of a general. “We are going to save Enid!” she declared, standing on the steps of their Victorian home, suitcase in hand. “From the claws of that Addams woman!”

Murray shuffled behind her, lugging a duffel bag. “Save her from what? A healthy marriage? A roof that doesn’t leak?”

“From doom, Murray!” Esther snapped. “Don’t you know gothic symbolism when you see it?!”

The pack followed like soldiers: Enid’s four older brothers, all varying shades of scruffy, wearing leather jackets and confused expressions. They weren’t sure if this was a rescue mission or a family vacation.

The train compartment barely survived the first hour. Wolves were loud travelers: howling jokes, playing card games, fighting over window seats. Esther sat ramrod straight, glaring at the darkness beyond the glass as though Wednesday herself might leap out of the night.

“She’s brainwashing her,” Esther muttered, half to herself. “Making her laugh at things that aren’t funny. Dressing her in black. Feeding her jam disguised as blood.”

One of the brothers piped up, mouth full of chips. “Didn’t Enid always like black nail polish, though?”

Esther shot him a look that silenced the whole compartment.

“No. She was a bright, sunny child. My golden girl. She was meant to marry a male wolf. A normal wolf. And now she’s married to this.”

Murray flipped a crossword page. “Maybe she’s happy.”

“Happy?! Murray, have you seen the pictures? That woman looks like she sleeps in a coffin!”

“...She probably does.”

Esther ignored him, already planning. “When we arrive, I’ll take one look into Enid’s eyes and know the truth. If she says she’s fine, well, that means she’s been manipulated. If she hesitates, it means she’s suffering. Either way, we’re bringing her home.”

The brothers exchanged uneasy glances. This sounded less like a rescue mission and more like a kidnapping.

---

Back in the Addams-Sinclair mansion, Enid was still spiraling.

She sat on the edge of their bed, hugging a pillow to her chest. Willa snoozed in her crib, soft wolf-whimpers bubbling in her sleep.

Wednesday sat beside Enid, brushing her hair with deliberate strokes, like she was taming an anxious beast.

“You’re wasting energy on phantoms,” Wednesday murmured. “Your mother’s accusations are empty. Her opinions irrelevant.”

“Yeah, well, irrelevant or not, they still hurt,” Enid whispered. “She thinks you’re...”

“Monstrous?” Wednesday supplied, lips curling faintly.

Enid groaned. “Stop being proud of that! She thinks you’re dangerous, like you... like you trapped me.”

Wednesday’s brush stilled. Her gaze shifted to Enid’s reflection in the vanity mirror to her soft wolf eyes, her furrowed brows... a tangle of feelings.

“Did I?” Wednesday asked quietly.

Enid turned, startled. “What? No! Of course not!”

“Good. Because if I had, I would expect you to gnash your teeth, bare your claws, and escape. You are, after all, the only wolf foolish enough to chain herself willingly to me.”

Enid laughed in spite of herself, burying her face in Wednesday’s shoulder. “God, I love you.”

“I know.”

Enid smacked her lightly.

---

The next morning, Enid brewed coffee strong enough to wake the dead, mostly for herself. She needed energy to prepare.

She dusted, straightened, even tucked a cheerful bouquet of sunflowers into a vase on the foyer table. It looked so out of place against the gothic wallpaper that Wednesday muttered, “They look like corpses of the sun.”

“They look welcoming,” Enid insisted.

“They look like they want to scream.”

“Perfect,” Enid muttered.

As she smoothed the rug, she thought about the incoming train barreling toward New Jersey, carrying her entire estranged family. Her heart ached. She wanted to see them, hug them, prove to them that she was okay. But she dreaded the judgment in her mother’s eyes.

And she dreaded the clash: Esther Sinclair vs. Wednesday Addams. A wolf mother vs. a gothic wife. A storm was coming, and Enid stood in the middle of it.

Meanwhile, on the train, Esther rehearsed her speech. “Enid, darling, don’t be afraid. We’re here to take you away from her.”

Murray grunted. “What if she doesn’t want to leave?”

“Then we take the baby,” Esther declared.

The brothers all froze mid-snack. “Wait, what?”

Esther’s eyes gleamed with determination. “No grandchild of mine will grow up in a house of coffins and poison.”

Murray sighed, long-suffering. “This is going to end badly.”

The train whistle howled. The wolves howled back.

And in the distance, the Addams-Sinclair mansion stood tall and waiting, like a stage prepared for the most chaotic family drama of the year.

---

By afternoon, the mansion held the kind of silence that wasn’t truly silent.

It was the silence of anticipation, of walls that had absorbed centuries of secrets and now waited for a new spectacle to unfold. Even the ravens circling the crooked spires seemed quieter, their caws distant, as though nature itself knew a storm was drawing near.

Enid tied her apron a little tighter around her waist, spoon stirring slowly in a pot that hissed with steam. She’d chosen something cozy and comforting: a thick stew with fresh herbs and bread rising in the oven, an attempt to build a warm hearth out of her jittering nerves. Her wolf senses thrummed like a string pulled taut. She could smell them. The air shifted, carrying hints of pine, fur, damp coats, and the musk of her family.

They were close. Too close.

She froze with the wooden spoon halfway to her lips.

“They’re coming,” she whispered.

From the parlor, Wednesday’s voice carried back low and smooth,“Good. Let them.”

Enid’s chest squeezed. She wanted to yell at her wife to please, please behave, but she knew it would be useless. Wednesday Addams did not behave. She simply was. And the world bent, unwillingly, around her.

In the next room, Willa gurgled happily. Wednesday sat cross-legged on the floor, holding up a jet-black puppet of a raven with disturbingly realistic glass eyes. She narrated a grim little tale about betrayal, famine, and accidental burial while Willa slapped her tiny hands together, shrieking with delight.

It was unconventional parenting. But it was love.

Enid smiled faintly, then stiffened again when her senses sharpened, closer now. Much closer.

The wolves were here.

---

The Sinclair clan stood before the wrought-iron gates of the Addams ancestral home.

The mansion rose beyond, twisted and looming, its towers like fingers clawing at the gray sky. Gargoyles hunched on the roof, and the forest pressed close, shadows tangling at the tree line. Even Murray whistled low.

“Well,” he said. “At least she’s not living in a condo.”

“Focus, Murray!” Esther barked, skirts flaring as she strode forward. “Our daughter is in there. Enslaved. Bewitched. Possibly in chains.”

One of the brothers scratched his head. “You sure? Looked like she was just wearing an apron in one picture online.”

“Exactly,” Esther snapped. “An apron! Cooking and cleaning like some... some domesticated servant! That’s not my Enid. She never liked chores. Clearly, she’s been forced.”

The brothers exchanged looks but trailed after her. They always trailed after her.

Esther reached the heavy wooden doors, their iron handles carved like skeletal hands. Instead of ringing the bell there was an ominous contraption shaped like a gargoyle’s tongue, she shoved the doors open with a dramatic shove.

The hinges wailed.

“Enid!” Esther cried, barreling into the cavernous foyer. “We’re here! Don’t be afraid! Mother has come to rescue you!”

The pot nearly slipped from Enid’s hands.

She bolted to the doorway of the kitchen just in time to see her mother storming in, brothers fanning out behind her like a wolf militia, and Murray bringing up the rear, looking like a man condemned.

Enid froze—apron, spoon, flour dust on her cheek.

Esther gasped, hand flying to her mouth. “Oh. My. God.”

“Mom?” Enid said weakly.

Esther’s voice dropped to a horrified whisper. “She’s turned you into the help.”

“What?!” Enid squeaked.

“You’re cooking for her! Wearing an apron!” Esther marched forward, sniffing the air. “This isn’t domestic bliss, this is slavery! My baby girl, shackled in the kitchen, reduced to Wednesday Addams’ maid, forced to take care of her... her morbid appetites!”

Enid turned red from her ears down. “Mom!”

Her brothers shifted uncomfortably. One of them muttered, “I mean, smells pretty good though.”

“Not the point!” Esther screeched.

And then from the parlor, a low voice cut through the chaos: “She cooks because she enjoys it. Just as she howls because it pleases her throat, and growls when she’s displeased.”

The family turned.

Wednesday stood in the archway, a tiny Willa balanced calmly on her hip. Her black silk gown trailing, her hair gleaming in her two neat braids, her eyes like knives. She was a portrait of composure and menace.

Esther hissed like a feral cat. “You.”

“Yes. Me.” Wednesday’s lips curled into something almost, but not quite a smile. “Welcome to my home. Please, wipe your feet. The rug has already absorbed enough blood for one century.”

Two of the brothers actually lifted their boots to check for mud.

Esther, undeterred, jabbed a finger at Enid. “Look at her! You’ve got her chained to the stove! What do you do? Make her cook, clean, and then... then... indulge your sick fantasies?”

Enid’s jaw nearly hit the floor. “MOM!”

Murray muttered, “Esther, maybe—”

“No!” Esther whipped around, eyes blazing. “This is exactly what I warned her about! You’re taking her sunshine and squeezing it into your dark little jar, keeping her locked up so you can—so you can feed your twisted novels with— with—”

Wednesday stepped forward, Willa cooing happily in her arms. Her voice dropped to a glacial calm. “I don’t need to trap Enid. She is here because she chooses to be. Your delusions are tedious.”

Esther sputtered. “Delusions?! Look at her! Apron, cooking, covered in flour like a—like a—”

“Like a loving wife making dinner for her family?” Wednesday offered.

Enid slapped a hand over her eyes. “Please stop helping.”

One of the brothers raised his hand tentatively. “So, uh... you’re not actually enslaved, Enid?”

Enid threw her arms up. “Of course not! I like cooking! God, why is this a thing?!”

Esther gasped again, more horrified than before. “You’ve got her brainwashed!”

Wednesday’s smile sharpened. “If she were brainwashed, she would be quieter.”

Enid swatted her arm. “Wednesday!”

The foyer dissolved into chaos.

The brothers awkwardly were trailing behind Esther, their noses twitching at the stew. Murray sighed and rubbed his temples. Esther marched around accusing everything she saw, “That chandelier is a death trap! Those curtains are black for mourning! That portrait is watching me!”

Wednesday followed her like a silent specter, every calm retort slicing sharper than Esther’s shouts. Willa clapped and giggled, as though she sensed this was some grand theater being performed for her amusement.

Enid trailed behind, her apron flapping. She was desperately trying to restore order, feeling like the ground between two colliding storms.

Finally, Esther whirled on her daughter. “Enid. Pack your things. We’re leaving. Tonight.”

Enid froze. “What?”

“You’re coming home with us.” Esther’s eyes shone with feverish conviction. “Away from this mausoleum. Away from her.”

Enid’s heart pounded. Her wolf instincts stirred, not with fear but with anger. She looked at Wednesday, who stood perfectly still, Willa tucked against her chest, waiting.

And for the first time in years, Enid felt her spine straighten in defiance of her mother.

“Mom,” she said, voice firm, “I’m not going anywhere.”

The silence that fell was heavier than stone.

Esther blinked. “What?”

“I said no.” Enid’s voice wavered, but she steadied it. “I’m not going anywhere.”

Her mother’s eyes widened in outrage, like Enid had just howled blasphemy in the middle of a sermon. “Enid Sinclair, do not defy me. You are my daughter!”

“And I’m also Wednesday’s wife.” Enid’s cheeks flushed but she pressed forward, the words tumbling out faster and stronger. “I love her. I love our life here. And I’m not enslaved or brainwashed or—or locked in a tower. I’m happy. Do you hear me? Happy.”

The brothers froze like statues. Murray’s eyebrows shot up. Even Willa cooed as if she knew her mother was speaking something important.

Esther’s jaw fell open. “Happy? Happy?!” She whirled on Wednesday, eyes blazing. “What have you done to her? She’s delirious!”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow, her voice smooth. “If happiness is delirium, then I pray she remains feverish forever.”

Enid nearly choked. “Wednesday, not helping!”

Esther clutched her pearls, or rather the string of wolf teeth she wore as a necklace. “This is exactly what I feared. She’s twisted your mind, Enid. Look at you—wearing an apron, cooking for her, raising her child—”

“Our child,” Enid snapped before she could stop herself. Her voice cracked, but the words were firm, undeniable. “Ours.”

The silence that followed felt like a thunderclap.

Esther stared. “What?”

Enid stepped forward, eyes burning now with years of swallowed words, of puppyish attempts to please that never worked. “Willa is my daughter as much as she’s Wednesday’s. We’re a family. And I’m proud of that. I love her. I love both of them. And I’m not leaving them. Not for you, not for anyone.”

Her voice echoed against the vaulted ceiling. For the first time, she didn’t flinch at her own boldness.

Her mother recoiled, face hardening into something brittle. “So you choose her over your own blood.”

Enid’s hands trembled, but she lifted her chin. “Yes.”

The brothers shifted uneasily. One cleared his throat. “Uh... mother, maybe we should...”

“Silence!” Esther snapped. Her glare returned to Enid, wounded and furious. “You’d throw away your pack for this macabre parasite?”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, and the air itself seemed to grow colder. “Parasite?” she repeated, voice low and deadly.

Esther didn’t flinch. “You’ve sunk your claws into her. Twisted her into your maid, your—your—” She flailed for words, landed on the most scandalous she could summon. “Your plaything.”

Enid gasped so hard she nearly inhaled her spoon. “Mom!”

Willa squealed happily, clapping her little hands as though cheering on the drama.

Wednesday shifted slightly, her calm composure radiating menace now. “I do not make Enid do anything against her will,” she said, voice like velvet laced with steel. “She is not my servant. She is my equal. My anchor. My wife.”

The words hung heavy in the air.

Enid’s chest squeezed. She blinked fast, tears threatening to spill.

Wednesday didn’t look at her, but her hand, pale and precise reached out and brushed Enid’s fingers. A silent tether.

Esther saw it. Her lips tightened, trembling. “You’ve bewitched her.”

Enid snapped. “No one bewitched me, Mom! I chose this! I chose her. And I’ll keep choosing her, every single day, because she makes me feel loved. Something you never...”

She stopped. The words slipped out like a cut, raw and unhealed.

Esther’s face paled. Murray inhaled sharply. The brothers stared at the floor.

The silence was suffocating.

Enid’s throat worked. She hadn’t meant to say it, but it was true. It was the wound at her core, the one she had carried all her life, the hunger for a mother’s unconditional love.

She drew in a shaky breath. “You always wanted me to be someone else. A perfect wolf. An alpha. A Sinclair. Never just... Enid. But Wednesday loves me for me. All of me. The messy, clumsy, colorful parts. Even when I annoy her. Even when I spill flour on the floor or cry over puppy videos. She never made me feel like I wasn’t enough.”

Her voice cracked, but she didn’t look away.

“And you call that slavery?” she whispered. “Then I’ll take it. Gladly. Because for once in my life, I’m not bending myself into something I’m not just to get someone’s approval. I’m happy. And you can’t take that away from me.”

Esther swayed, as if struck.

The brothers shuffled. Murray wiped his face with both hands, muttering, “Lord save me, she finally said it.”

Wednesday tilted her head, studying Enid like she was both a revelation and an inevitability. Willa babbled, tugging at her mother’s braid, oblivious to the storm her family had just unleashed.

For a moment, everything was still.

Then Esther, trembling, drew herself up and hissed: “She’ll break you.”

Enid smiled through her tears, fierce and trembling. “No, Mom. She’s the only one who doesn’t.”

The chandelier above flickered. Somewhere deep in the house, the pipes groaned like a ghostly sigh.

And Wednesday, allowed herself the smallest and barest curve of a real smile.

Not for victory.

But for love.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was unusually quiet.

The Sinclairs had departed only hours before, Esther storming out with all the theatrical indignation of a wolf matriarch whose authority had been challenged, Murray trailing behind muttering something about “train tickets and peace offerings,” and the brothers looking both relieved and terrified in equal measure.

Their absence left a strange vacuum in the house. The air felt lighter and freer. And yet Enid, sitting cross-legged on the enormous canopy bed with her hair loose and eyes glassy, she still felt the weight of it pressing on her chest.

Willa was asleep in the nursery, blissfully unaware of the battle of words that had rattled her family’s foundations. The baby had curled up on her blanket, clutching one of Wednesday’s old ribbons as if it were a lifeline.

Enid should have felt victorious. Triumphant, even. For the first time in her life, she had faced down Esther's cutting tongue, her sharp accusations, her looming alpha presence and not only survived, but answered.

And yet...

Her hands still trembled when she thought about it.

Her wolf instincts, centuries of pack-conditioning, whispered that she had committed a sin. That she had turned her back on her blood. That she was—finally—free.

She didn’t know how to feel.

Beside her, Wednesday was propped up against the carved headboard, clad in her usual silk nightgown, a thick book balanced on her knees. The dim lamp at her side threw pale light across her face, highlighting the sharpness of her cheekbones, the marble calm of her expression. She looked like a saint painted on a cathedral ceiling, if saints were saints of executions.

Her eyes moved steadily across the page. The only sound was the occasional turn of a leaf-thin page and the steady crackle of the fireplace.

But Enid knew Wednesday noticed every flicker in her chest. She always did.

“You’re brooding,” Wednesday said finally, her voice even.

Enid huffed softly. “You make it sound like a bad thing. You brood twenty-four-seven.”

Wednesday closed her book with a soft thump. “It’s only brooding when there’s wasted energy. Mine is efficient. Yours appears unproductive.”

Enid hugged her knees to her chest, staring at the blanket. “I just... I can’t believe I actually said all that to her. That I stood up to her. And I meant every word, but... I feel like a horrible daughter.”

Wednesday tilted her head, regarding her with a curiosity usually reserved for cadavers. “You feel guilt.”

Enid nodded miserably.

“Good,” Wednesday said. “It means you possess a conscience, but not one powerful enough to shackle you. You wielded it, instead of letting it wield you. That is growth.”

Enid blinked. “Only you would make it sound like standing up to your mom is, like... a tactical victory.”

“It was,” Wednesday replied matter-of-factly. “And a brutal one, given your lifelong training as her subordinate.”

Enid bit her lip. “Do you think she hates me now?”

Wednesday didn’t flinch. “Undoubtedly.”

Enid’s throat closed. “Wow, thanks for the reassurance, Weds.”

Wednesday reached out then, slowly and delicately, and set her pale hand over Enid’s clenched ones. “But her hatred is irrelevant. You finally acknowledged aloud what I have known since the day I met you. That you are not her shadow. You are not merely a wolf. You are Enid. And you are mine.”

Enid’s chest squeezed. She let out a shaky laugh. “You make it sound so... intense.”

“It is.” Wednesday’s gaze didn’t waver. “It always will be.”

For a moment, silence hung heavy again, the only movement the firelight flickering over their faces.

Enid exhaled. “It’s just... She never made me feel enough, you know? I tried everything to make her proud... keeping my claws sharp, running faster than my brothers, pretending I liked the way blood tasted raw. And it never worked. But then I met you. And you never once asked me to be anyone else.”

Wednesday’s lips twitched, the faintest ghost of a smirk. “Why would I? You are far more entertaining in your natural state. The chaos, the noise, the unsolicited cuddles. A constant source of irritation, yet one I would be devastated to lose.”

Enid laughed softly, a tear slipping free. “That’s your version of a love poem, huh?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said simply.

Enid wiped at her cheek and leaned sideways, resting her head on Wednesday’s shoulder. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

Wednesday didn’t move for a long moment, then carefully shifted her book aside and lifted her arm, draping it over Enid’s shoulders. Her fingers traced absent-minded circles against Enid’s arm, absent-minded in gesture, but unmistakable in grounding.

“You will never have to know,” Wednesday murmured.

The words, in her voice sounded so absolute, so sure. They settled in Enid’s bones like warmth.

She closed her eyes, breathing in Wednesday’s scent: ink, candle wax and the faintest trace of wolfsbane. Her heart still trembling from the confrontation but began to steady.

After a long silence, Enid whispered, “Do you think I’ll regret it? Choosing you over my family?”

Wednesday’s fingers paused in their tracing. Then resumed, slower. “No.”

“How can you be so sure?”

“Because regret is reserved for mistakes. And this, us, was the only correct decision you have ever made.”

Enid snorted, though her throat ached. “You’re ridiculously confident, you know that?”

“I prefer the term inevitable.”

Enid chuckled, curling closer. “I think you just made me fall in love with you even more.”

Wednesday tilted her head, resting her cheek briefly against Enid’s hair. “A dangerous confession. You may never recover.”

Enid smiled sleepily. “I don’t want to.”

The rest of the night passed with a strange stillness. Wednesday eventually returned to her book, but her arm remained around Enid, her fingers absently tracing shapes against her skin. Enid dozed off and on, the tension unwinding in her chest.

And when she finally drifted fully into sleep, her last thought was that, for the first time in years she had stood her ground against her mother.

And she wasn’t afraid.

Because Wednesday was beside her. Always.

Chapter Text

It began in the morning, a subtle change in the atmosphere that only Enid could sense.

Willa, usually a bubbling, shrieking storm of chaos, giggles, and grabby hands was quiet. Too quiet. She lay in her crib with her eyes half-lidded, occasionally letting out a faint little cough that broke Enid’s heart into seventeen pieces at once.

At first Enid thought maybe she was just sleepy. Babies had weird days, right? But then came the sneezes, the tiny, adorable explosions that would have been hilarious if they didn’t immediately drench her onesie. Her cheeks were flushed red, and when Enid touched her forehead she nearly dropped dead on the spot.

“She’s burning up!” Enid gasped, clutching Willa to her chest as though the Grim Reaper himself were lurking at the nursery window. “Wednesday! WEDNESDAY!”

Her wife appeared in the doorway almost instantly, drawn as if by the scent of impending melodrama. Dressed immaculately in black despite it being barely past breakfast, Wednesday stood still and silent, her eyes narrowing as she took in the scene: Enid pacing like a trapped wolf and clutching Willa, who coughed delicately as though to punctuate her mother’s hysteria.

“She has a fever,” Enid said, voice trembling. “She’s—she’s sick! Our baby’s sick! What do we do?”

Wednesday’s eyes glinted. Slowly, she stepped into the room, her calm at once maddening and grounding. “Excellent.”

Enid froze. “Ex—EXCELLENT?!”

Wednesday took Willa from Enid’s frantic arms and observed the child as if she were a specimen. The baby whimpered softly, her nose running, her cheeks glowing like an overripe apple. Wednesday’s expression softened, imperceptibly, in that strange way only Enid ever noticed.

“She’s developing her immunity,” Wednesday declared solemnly. “The fire of disease tempers the flesh and soul alike. I had my first illness at this age, scarlet fever. Delightful. I nearly perished. Grandmama was so proud.”

“WEDNESDAY!” Enid shrieked. “This isn’t delightful! She’s sick! She has a fever! Her poor tiny nose is stuffy! Her appetite is gone! What if—what if something’s really wrong?”

Wednesday tilted her head, already drifting toward the hallway. “Then she will either recover stronger than before... or die.”

Enid nearly fainted. “Don’t say it like that!”

“Why not? Both outcomes are perfectly natural.”

Enid grabbed her arm, nearly sobbing. “NOT FOR OUR BABY THEY AREN’T!”

At this, Wednesday paused. Slowly, she leaned down and kissed the top of Willa’s sweaty head with a tenderness that could have shattered glass. When she straightened, she handed the baby back to Enid and said, in the same tone one might use to suggest sharpening an axe: “Fetch the thermometer. I will prepare a remedy.”

Enid sprinted toward the bathroom, half-tripping over her own feet, muttering prayers to every wolf deity she could recall. She tore through drawers until she found the little baby thermometer, while behind her Wednesday had already swept into the kitchen.

The sound that followed was somewhere between an alchemist’s laboratory and a witch’s dungeon. Pots clanged, vials clinked, liquid bubbled. The smell of herbs both fragrant and nauseating began to seep through the mansion.

When Enid returned, thermometer clutched in hand, she froze at the kitchen threshold.

Wednesday stood at the stove, stirring a pot of thick, tar-colored liquid that smoked ominously. An array of jars lined the counter: wolfsbane, belladonna, dried bat wings and something that looked suspiciously like a shrunken finger. Morticia had apparently been generous with the family pantry again.

“Wednesday,” Enid squeaked, clutching Willa tighter, “what—what are you making?”

“A family cure.” Wednesday’s eyes gleamed as she stirred. “Passed down through generations. Brewed with equal parts torment and resilience. It will either annihilate her illness... or annihilate her entirely.”

“WE ARE NOT TESTING EXPERIMENTAL POISONS ON OUR BABY!” Enid howled.

Wednesday sighed, as though thwarted in her art. “You have no appreciation for tradition.”

Enid pressed the thermometer against Willa’s ear, heart pounding. The tiny device beeped. “101.5! Wednesday, she really does have a fever! She’s really sick!”

“Hardly impressive,” Wednesday muttered. “I reached 105 during my bout with scarlet fever. My father still keeps the fever chart framed in his study.”

Enid gaped. “Wednesday, this isn’t a competition!”

Wednesday stirred the bubbling concoction one last time before removing it from the heat. She poured the black sludge into a tiny crystal vial, corking it with precision. Then, with a straight face, she extended it toward Enid.

“Administer three drops. No more. No less. Unless you want her to sprout an extra limb.”

Enid recoiled as if the vial contained a live grenade. “Absolutely not! I’m giving her infant Tylenol like a normal person!”

Wednesday’s lip curled in faint distaste. “How boring.”

“BORING IS SAFE!” Enid snapped, bouncing Willa gently as the baby whimpered. “Boring is exactly what she needs right now!”

For a moment they stared at each other: Wednesday, calm and unflinching, vial in hand; Enid, trembling and wild-eyed, thermometer still clutched like a talisman. Between them, Willa sneezed so hard snot bubbled from her nose.

Wednesday finally set the vial on the counter with a tiny sigh. “Very well. Poison has its place. But apparently not in childrearing.”

Enid nearly wept with relief.

---

The rest of the day unfolded in a haze of chaos.

Enid hovered constantly: checking Willa’s temperature every thirty minutes, coaxing her to drink water, wiping her little nose and pacing the halls like a wolf on high alert. Her wolf senses were practically vibrating, every cough felt like a harbinger of doom.

Wednesday, meanwhile, carried on with an unnerving serenity. She read aloud from her manuscript while Willa lay snuggled against her chest, too tired to wriggle away. She prepared a cold compress from herbs that Enid made her double-check seventeen times. She even summoned Thing to fetch more blankets, which the disembodied hand accomplished with eerie efficiency.

When Willa fussed at nightfall, Enid was near hysterics, whispering, “What if she’s getting worse? What if she can’t breathe?”

Wednesday calmly adjusted Willa in her arms, laying the baby on her shoulder. She patted her back with chilling precision until Willa hiccupped once, then settled into a snuffly sleep.

“See?” Wednesday said, meeting Enid’s frantic gaze. “Alive.”

Enid collapsed into the nearest armchair, burying her face in her hands. “I’m going to die before she’s two.”

Wednesday’s voice softened, almost imperceptibly. “Not if I can help it.”

Enid peeked out from behind her fingers. Wednesday stood there in the firelight, their baby resting against her shoulder, pale hand stroking Willa’s soft hair. The sight nearly undid Enid all over again.

“Do you ever panic?” Enid asked hoarsely.

Wednesday’s eyes glimmered, sharp and tender at once. “Constantly. But panic is an internal affair. Outward composure ensures the enemy never sees weakness. Even when the enemy is a fever.”

Enid half-laughed ant half-cried, covering her face again. “God, I love you.”

“Of course you do,” Wednesday said.

---

By midnight, Willa’s fever began to break. The thermometer beeped a reassuring 99.1. Her cheeks lost their furious flush, her appetite crept back and she managed a sleepy little giggle that had Enid nearly collapsing with relief.

Enid rocked her gently, whispering, “My brave little wolf, you scared Mama so bad...”

Wednesday draped a blanket over them both, settling beside Enid on the rocking chair. “Her first illness. A rite of passage. Soon she will have her first bloodletting. Her first midnight duel. Her first haunting.”

Enid groaned. “Please don’t make a milestone list like that, Weds.”

“Too late,” Wednesday replied, pulling a small black notebook from her sleeve and scribbling: "First Fever: Survived. Potential for greatness confirmed."

Enid laughed despite herself, tears slipping free.

And as she leaned her head against Wednesday’s shoulder, their baby safe between them, she thought that maybe, she’d survive motherhood after all.

Chapter Text

The fever had waned, but not disappeared.

When Enid touched Willa’s forehead the next morning, she nearly cried with relief. The burning heat had cooled to a gentle warmth. The baby wasn’t her usual chaotic self yet but still a little sluggish and sneezy. The firestorm of last night had passed.

Enid let out a shaky exhale, smoothing Willa’s sweat-damp curls. “You’re cooler, baby girl. Thank God. Oh, thank everything.”

Behind her, Wednesday emerged from the shadows of the nursery with a candle, though it was already bright morning. She never acknowledged daylight unless it was to spite it.

“Good,” Wednesday murmured, studying their daughter as though she were some intriguing cadaver in a morgue. “The fever recedes. The illness bends, but she remains unbroken. Stronger already.”

Enid turned to her with wide, bleary eyes. “She’s still not all better though! Her nose is still runny, her cheeks are pink, and—look—look, her little cough is back!”

Willa sneezed right on cue, spraying her mother’s pajama top with snot. Enid didn’t even flinch.

Wednesday, on the other hand, produced a handkerchief with almost theatrical timing, dabbing at both her wife and child with unnerving precision. “The fluids of the body are cleansing,” she intoned. “One must admire the elegance of expulsion.”

Enid stared at her. “Wednesday. She literally just slimed me.”

“Yes. Efficiently.”

Enid groaned, sinking into the rocking chair with Willa in her lap. The baby rested her flushed cheek against Enid’s chest, snuffling quietly.

Wednesday lingered in the corner, her hands folded neatly behind her back. “You will now relax, cara mia. I will brew her another remedy.”

Enid shot upright. “NO MORE REMEDIES! The last one was—was—” She shuddered, remembering the tar-like sludge that had nearly ended up in Willa’s bottle. “No.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Do you not trust centuries of Addams tradition?”

Enid pressed her lips together, then smiled faintly. “I trust centuries of Sinclair tradition more. And I think it’s time I use some of that.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “You intend to summon your feral wolf ancestors for assistance?”

“Not summon,” Enid muttered. “Just… do the things we always did in the pack when someone was sick. My mom used to make us do it when we were kids. It helped.”

Wednesday regarded her for a long, calculating beat. Then she said, “Proceed. I am morbidly curious.”

---

Enid got to work. It began with soup. Always soup. A pot of chicken broth bubbled on the stove while Enid paced the kitchen in an apron, balancing Willa on her hip. She tossed in carrots, potatoes, celery, and—out of habit—a sprinkling of herbs her pack swore by: sage for cleansing, rosemary for strength, thyme for breathing.

Wednesday loomed nearby, staring into the pot as if expecting it to birth an eldritch creature. “How pedestrian.”

“It’s not pedestrian,” Enid said, stirring furiously. “It’s comfort food. It helps heal. It’s wolf tradition.”

“Soup is for invalids,” Wednesday muttered. “When I was ill, I was fed raw garlic cloves and a tincture of crow’s blood.”

Enid gagged. “Yeah, no. We’re not feeding that to a baby.”

Willa let out a tiny sneeze in agreement.

The next part of Enid’s ritual was stranger. She set Willa down in her playpen, surrounded her with wolf charms she had dug out of a dusty storage box, and began humming an old pack lullaby. It was low and rhythmic, almost like a chant, the sort of sound meant to settle nerves and draw strength.

Enid swayed side to side, humming as she sprinkled a little lavender oil in the air. Willa’s eyes fluttered, soothed by the sound.

Wednesday leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, her expression unreadable. “You’ve turned the nursery into a kennel séance.”

“It’s not a séance,” Enid whispered back. “It’s... look, this is what we did. It helps. She knows it. It’s in her blood.”

Willa let out a content sigh and nestled deeper into her blanket.

Enid smiled proudly. “See? It’s working.”

Wednesday tilted her head. “Or perhaps she is merely exhausted from last night’s fever and would sleep regardless.”

Enid shot her a look. “Can you just let me have this one?”

Wednesday’s lips twitched almost imperceptibly. “Very well.”

The rituals escalated. By midday, Enid had constructed a miniature wolf totem out of sticks and string, which she set near Willa’s crib. It looked like a crude little effigy, somewhere between a scarecrow and a chew toy.

Wednesday stared at it in silence for a long time before finally saying, “It looks as though you sacrificed a scarecrow and left only its femur.”

“It’s symbolic,” Enid explained, proud. “It’s supposed to ward off weakness.”

“It looks weak.”

“It’s tradition!”

Wednesday finally turned her gaze on her wife, her eyes dark and piercing. “You realize that your family, the same family who stormed in here declaring you enslaved, taught you these rituals. Yet you keep them.”

Enid blinked, thrown. She hadn’t thought of it that way. Her throat tightened, but she managed, “Yeah. Because not everything they gave me was bad. Some of it was good. This stuff made me feel safe as a kid. And I want Willa to feel safe too.”

Wednesday’s gaze softened, barely. Enough that Enid saw it.

“Very well,” Wednesday murmured. “Build your effigies. I will not interfere.”

---

The day passed in a whirl of wolf remedies and Addams counter-commentary.

Enid spoon-fed Willa tiny amounts of her wolf soup, cooing encouragement, while Wednesday muttered about how “real medicine requires more screaming.” Enid rubbed Willa’s little chest with a concoction of essential oils, only for Wednesday to grumble that she should have used leeches.

At one point, Enid placed a damp cloth infused with sage water on Willa’s forehead. Wednesday loomed so close, Enid snapped, “What?”

“I’m waiting to see if she combusts,” Wednesday said.

Enid groaned. “You’re impossible.”

“And yet,” Wednesday replied, brushing a strand of hair from Enid’s face with a tenderness that contradicted her words, “you continue to adore me.”

Enid blushed. “Unfortunately.”

By evening, Willa’s fever had dropped another degree. She was still clingy, still sneezy, but she giggled when Enid blew raspberries on her belly, which nearly made Enid sob with joy.

The wolf soup had worked some magic, or maybe it was just time, or maybe it was both. Either way, Enid felt calmer.

She tucked Willa into her crib with the wolf totem nearby and whispered the old lullaby again. Willa’s eyes closed, her breathing soft and steady.

Enid turned to find Wednesday standing in the doorway, watching with that unnerving stillness of hers.

“You did well,” Wednesday said softly.

Enid smiled faintly. “So did you. Even if you tried to feed our baby poison.”

“It was an ancient remedy,” Wednesday insisted. “Tested on countless ancestors.”

Enid shook her head, laughing quietly. “God, I love us. We’re such a disaster.”

Wednesday stepped closer, taking her hand. “A disaster that survives.”

Enid leaned her head against Wednesday’s shoulder, exhaustion finally settling in. “Yeah. That we do.”

That night as they lay in bed, Enid whispered into the dark, “You know... it meant a lot to me, that you didn’t mock my wolf stuff too much. I know it’s silly to you, but...”

“It is not silly,” Wednesday interrupted, her voice calm and certain. “It is ritual. And ritual has power. Even when born of questionable sources.”

Enid blinked, then smiled into the dark. “You’re amazing, you know that?”

Wednesday turned her head, eyes glinting. “I know.”

Enid laughed quietly, curling closer.

And in the nursery, little Willa snuffled in her sleep, her fever breaking, her first illness survived with both her mother’s wolf charms and her other mother’s gothic calm keeping her safe.

Chapter Text

Enid hadn’t meant to fall asleep so quickly. The Sinclair-Addams mansion was finally quiet, the kind of hush that comes only after a night of fever, wolf rituals and more than a few sarcastic comments from her gothic spouse.

Willa had drifted into slumber, her tiny body curled up against her wolf totem, her fever mostly broken. Enid, reassured by the steady sound of her baby’s breathing, finally allowed her own eyes to close.

But sleep did not come normally.

At first, there was darkness. Then suddenly, she was not herself anymore.

Enid blinked and realized she was crawling. Her hands were pudgy. Her field of vision was... lower. Everything looked giant and slightly blurry, except for one thing: her mamas.

Enid gasped. “What the—”

Only it wasn’t her voice that came out. It was babble. “Ba ba ba ma!”

She clapped her hands together, startled. But they weren’t her hands. They were Willa’s.

“Oh my god,” Enid whispered. “I’m... I’m in Willa’s dream. I’m literally seeing through her head.”

It was bizarre. Colors were brighter than normal, like everything had been painted with crayons dipped in glitter. Objects loomed strangely. The rocking chair was a towering mountain. The crib was a castle. And there, in the center of this weird dreamscape, were Wednesday and Enid themselves.

Except not exactly.

Dream-Wednesday was enormous. Like, eight feet tall, wearing a black dress that trailed forever like shadows dripping across the floor. Her face was pale, her eyes glowing faintly. She looked terrifying... and yet soft. Baby logic.

Dream-Enid, meanwhile, looked like a glowing sun with arms. Literally. She was shining so brightly, her hair rainbow-hued, her hands stretching out like beams.

Enid blinked at herself in awe. “Oh. My. God. This is how she sees us?”

Dream-Willa (aka the version of herself in this dream) squealed with joy and crawled toward her glowing mothers.

The dream warped again.

Suddenly Enid was in the kitchen. Dream-Wednesday stood at the stove stirring a cauldron full of something bubbling and ominous. Dark mist rose from it, forming skull shapes.

Dream-Enid skipped around like a cartoon sunbeam, pulling cookies from the oven which sparkled as though they were treasure.

And Dream-Willa sat in her highchair in the middle of the kitchen. From her perspective, both mothers were giants locked in an eternal battle of Soup vs. Cookies.

“BA BA!” Willa clapped in her dream. Her mind’s-eye saw them not as opposing forces, but as some perfect balance. One mother feeding the dark, the other feeding the light.

Enid’s throat tightened.

“Oh, Willa...” she whispered softly, realizing her baby was already making sense of them in the only way a baby could.

Then Dream-Wednesday scooped her up, looming tall and solemn while Dream-Enid sprinkled rainbow sparkles on her head. The mix of terrifying and comforting made Enid laugh through her awe.

The dream shifted again.

Now they were outside. The mansion loomed like a haunted castle in Willa’s mind, the towers crooked and bats circling. But instead of looking scary, it looked fun. A giant playground.

Dream-Willa crawled across the grass, which glowed bright green, almost neon. She looked up to see Wednesday again, Mama Doom. This time Wednesday was holding a book bigger than herself, muttering words in some incomprehensible gothic tongue. The sound rumbled like thunder.

And Dream-Enid? She was chasing butterflies made of rainbow fire, laughing and scooping one into her hands, then running to show Willa like a kid showing off candy.

Willa’s perspective locked onto them both with utter adoration.

“She doesn’t see the mansion as scary at all,” Enid realized, tears pricking her eyes. “She sees it as... home. Our weird home.”

And then came the strangest dream of all.

Enid found herself sitting in the middle of their living room. The walls melted into shifting colors. Dream-Willa giggled and raised her arms.

Two gigantic figures appeared again, Mama Doom and Mama Woof.

Only now, they had turned into caricatures. Mama Doom wore a literal crown of bones and held a guillotine blade like a scepter. Mama Woof had a flowing rainbow cape and little cartoon wolf ears that twitched whenever she laughed.

And there, in Dream-Willa’s tiny baby logic, they were gods.

The gods of her little universe. One dark, one bright, but both hers.

Dream-Willa reached out toward them. “Ma...ma...”

Enid’s heart clenched. “Oh sweetheart...”

She wanted to scoop her baby up right there inside the dream.

---

The dream began to collapse. Colors swirled. Enid felt herself being pulled out.

She woke with a gasp, her heart pounding. The bedroom was dark. The only sound was the faint rustle of the curtains and Willa’s soft breathing in her crib on the nursery.

Enid sat up slowly, her hand pressed over her chest.

“That was real,” she whispered. “She actually... shared that with me.”

She stood up from the bed and rushing to Willa's crib. The baby stirred slightly in her sleep, letting out a soft babble.

Enid’s eyes filled with tears. “That’s how you see us... that’s how you see me.”

She brushed her cheeks quickly, swallowing the lump in her throat.

Behind her, Wednesday stirred and walked toward her. “Why are you weeping, loba?”

Enid turned to her wife, who was standing and watching with that unnerving intensity she never shook.

Enid swallowed hard, then smiled softly. “Willa showed me her dreams.”

Wednesday blinked. “Elaborate.”

“She... she broadcasted them into me,” Enid whispered. “I was inside her dream. I saw us. I saw the way she sees us.” Her voice cracked slightly. “Wednesday, she sees you as this... powerful, dark, beautiful giant. And me as—well—as a glowing sunbeam with wolf ears. She sees our house as a castle, not scary. She sees us as her world.”

Wednesday’s expression didn’t change much, but Enid knew her well enough to spot the flicker of something raw in her eyes.

“That is... satisfactory,” Wednesday said softly.

“Satisfactory?” Enid repeated with a laugh-sob. “She worships us!”

Wednesday tilted her head. “As she should.”

Enid chuckled, wiping her eyes, then leaned over and pressed her face to Wednesday’s shoulder. “God, I love you. And I love her. We’re so lucky.”

Wednesday stroked Enid’s hair silently, her gaze drifting to the crib.

In the shadows, their daughter dreamed on, her fever broken, her tiny universe vast and strange, filled with Mama Doom and Mama Woof.

---

The next morning, Enid couldn’t stop babbling about it. Over breakfast she recounted every detail, waving her hands, while Wednesday ate her toast with corpse-like calm.

“And then you were holding this HUGE guillotine blade, like—like some kind of creepy goddess, and I was this giant rainbow ball of light and we were both her heroes! Isn’t that amazing?”

Wednesday sipped her coffee. “I would prefer to be remembered for my blade than my maternal softness. This is acceptable.”

Enid laughed. “You’re impossible.”

But deep inside, she glowed just as bright as Dream-Enid.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion smelled faintly of dried lavender, grave soil and something slightly singed. Enid stood in the foyer, apron still tied around her waist, her hair up in a messy bun and Willa balanced against her hip. She’d been expecting Morticia, she always arrived at exactly the right time, as though she’d enchanted the clocks themselves.

Sure enough, the tall silhouette appeared at the front doors. They creaked open without Morticia touching them. Enid still hadn’t figured out if that was magnets, witchcraft, or pure charisma but there she was.

“Darling,” Morticia cooed in that velvet voice of hers, sweeping into the foyer in a gown that whispered like cobwebs. “How fares my radiant granddaughter today?”

“She’s... better,” Enid said with a relieved smile. “Still sniffly, but fever’s gone.”

“Excellent.” Morticia bent down to Willa’s level, her long black hair spilling forward like ink. “Come to Grandmama, little banshee.”

Willa squeaked and reached eagerly for Morticia, who gathered her up with practiced elegance.

That was when Enid noticed the large trunk being wheeled in behind her by Thing, who was balancing precariously on the handle.

“Um.” Enid’s wolf instincts prickled. “What’s in the trunk?”

Morticia gave a delighted smile. “Toys.”

“Toys,” Enid repeated flatly.

“Yes. Stimulating playthings appropriate for a child of her lineage.” Morticia snapped her fingers at Thing, who popped the trunk open with a flourish.

Enid leaned forward cautiously. Inside were... items. A jack-in-the-box, except instead of a clown, a tiny guillotine blade sprang up when Thing turned the crank. A rattle made of what looked suspiciously like vertebrae strung together with black ribbon. A plush bat with disturbingly realistic glass eyes.

“Oh my god,” Enid muttered. “Wednesday’s childhood makes so much sense now.”

Morticia lifted the rattle and shook it gently near Willa, who clapped in delight, as if vertebrae were the height of entertainment. “See? She has exquisite taste already.”

Enid pinched her nose. “Morticia, if my mom saw this—”

Morticia arched a brow. “Your mother would faint. That is precisely why I brought them.”

Enid groaned. “You’re evil. In-law evil.”

“Thank you, darling.” Morticia kissed Willa’s forehead and swayed her gently. “Now. I sense you have something to tell me.”

Enid blinked. “You—you sensed that?”

“My dear, I’ve raised Wednesday. I can smell secrets like wolves smell storms. Sit. Tell me everything.”

They ended up in the parlor, Enid on the fainting couch with her knees tucked beneath her, Morticia opposite her, Willa playing on the rug with her bat plushie that squeaked whenever she gnawed on it.

Enid fidgeted with her sleeves. “So... last night, something happened. Something... weird.”

Morticia’s lips curved faintly. “You’re in this family now. Define ‘weird.’”

Enid huffed a laugh. “Okay, fair. But this one was... psychic. I think. Willa... she broadcasted her dreams into me. Like, I was inside them. Seeing through her eyes.”

Morticia’s dark brows rose. She leaned forward, suddenly attentive. “Go on.”

Enid’s voice softened as she recounted it. “I saw... how she sees us. Wednesday was this huge, terrifying, beautiful giant. And me—I was glowing. Like this sunbeam with wolf ears.” She gave a watery laugh. “And the house, our lives, everything. She doesn’t see it as scary. It’s just... home. And us? We’re her whole universe.”

Morticia was quiet for a long moment, her black eyes glimmering.

Then she exhaled, slow and knowing. “Ah. It has begun.”

Enid tilted her head. “It? What it? That’s not vague or terrifying at all.”

Morticia’s smile was faint but rich. “The Addams bond. It runs deep. Especially among daughters. You see, in this family, the line between dreams and reality is... delicate. Children often share their inner visions with their mothers. A communion of sorts.”

Enid’s mouth fell open. “Wait. So Wednesday...?”

Morticia nodded, gazing at the firelight flickering against the mantle. “When she was an infant, she showed me dreams of graves opening like flowers. Of guillotines that sang lullabies. Of me... always me, holding her steady as the world screamed around her. Even then, she adored me.”

Enid felt goosebumps rise on her arms. “That’s... beautiful. And creepy. So... it’s hereditary?”

“Not always. But often.” Morticia’s eyes softened as she watched Willa gnaw on her plush bat. “It means she is already tethered to you both, body and soul. What you feel, she will echo. What she imagines, you may glimpse. It is an intimacy deeper than words.”

Enid’s throat tightened. “Oh god.”

Morticia tilted her head. “Does that frighten you?”

“Yes. No. I don’t know.” Enid hugged her knees tighter. “It’s just... heavy. Like, she’s already this little psychic sponge, and what if I mess it up? What if she sees my insecurities? Or worse, my mother issues?”

Morticia chuckled darkly. “Darling, she will see everything eventually. That is the blessing and curse of such bonds. But children are not corrupted by what they see. They filter it into symbols. You saw it yourself. To her, your anxieties are not failures, they’re simply colors in her dreamscape. She will always translate them back into love.”

Enid blinked hard, fighting tears. “Morticia... you always know how to make it sound... better. My mom never...” She trailed off, unable to finish.

Morticia reached across the space and laid a cool, elegant hand over Enid’s. “Your mother tried to shape you through fear of what you are. I will shape you through acceptance of what you are. And Willa will see both.”

Enid sniffled, covering her face. “You’re gonna make me cry.”

Morticia’s smile deepened. “Good. Tears water the soul.”

They sat in silence for a while, broken only by Willa’s happy squeals as she shook her bone rattle like it was the best thing in existence.

Finally, Enid whispered, “So… what did Wednesday do with it? The bond?”

Morticia’s eyes gleamed with nostalgia. “She tested me. Constantly. She would dream a guillotine and wait to see if I flinched. I never did. She dreamed once of a little coffin she wished to crawl into. I sewed her a doll-sized version by morning. She dreamed of blood, and I gave her paint. She knew I respected her visions. That was all she needed.”

Enid let out a soft laugh. “Of course she did.”

Morticia squeezed her hand gently. “When Willa shows you herself, do not run from it. Even if it disturbs you. Especially then. It is her language of love.”

Enid swallowed hard. “I’ll try.”

“You’ll do more than try. You already have.”

The words sank deep. Enid stared at Morticia, suddenly overwhelmed by how much she’d wanted to hear them from someone her whole life. Her own mother never would’ve. But Morticia, this gothic goddess in velvet, had no trouble speaking them.

Enid exhaled shakily. “Thank you, Morticia. For everything. For being here. For just being you.”

Morticia smiled like midnight itself. “Darling, you are family. That is all that matters.”

---

Later, as Morticia departed into the mist with Thing hauling the now-empty toy trunk behind her, Enid stood at the doorway with Willa in her arms.

She whispered softly into her baby’s hair. “Don’t worry, sweet pea. We’ll figure out this creepy dream-bond thing together. You, me, and your Mama Doom.”

Willa gurgled, tiny fingers curling in her mother’s hair, and Enid felt that invisible tether tug inside her chest. Strong, fierce and eternal.

It didn’t scare her. It thrilled her.

Chapter Text

Night came to the Sinclair-Addams mansion like a cathedral’s black curtain. Thunder muttered distantly over the forest and the old rafters whispered as though something unseen crept along them. Wednesday lay flat on her back in bed, her arms crossed in her signature position, her hair spread like spilled ink across the pillow. Beside her, Enid had already succumbed to sleep, her breathing deep and steady, her warmth spilling toward Wednesday like a hearth fire.

And in the nursery, silence. Willa at last sleeping after a day of sniffles and restlessness.

Wednesday should have been at ease. Should have.

Instead, something tugged. Not at her mind, precisely, but deeper. A thread pulled taut, humming with the subtle electricity of connection. Wednesday’s eyes fluttered open, unnatural since she rarely fluttered at anything. Her chest gave a peculiar tightness, an intrusion she would normally reject on principle. But this was not intruding. This was beckoning.

She closed her eyes again.

And the world dissolved.

At first it was mist. Silver, soft, rolling across a floor that had no ground. Then colors: bright and absurd hues that made Wednesday’s lip twitch in distaste. Cotton-candy pinks, electric blues, and the occasional splash of green that resembled slime more than grass.

Then came sound: giggles. Not just any giggles, Willa’s.

Wednesday turned, though she had not decided to move, the dream did it for her. There, her daughter, small and plump, crawling rapidly across the ground that wasn’t ground. Willa’s cheeks glowed with that same cherub-curse they did in waking life, but here her eyes were massive, bright, and filled with entire worlds.

The dream bent around her like a kaleidoscope.

And Wednesday Addams, for once in her existence, felt off balance.

“Willa,” she said, voice steady even here, though her boots sank into nothing. “What is this?”

The baby only squealed, bouncing on her diapered bottom. She held up her bat plushie like a holy relic, and immediately the entire horizon shimmered into giant bats, towering and gentle creatures with glassy eyes that swooped low, tickling the dream-baby as she cackled.

Wednesday narrowed her eyes. “Surrealist nonsense.”

Yet she did not turn away.

She followed.

The landscape shifted as Willa crawled forward. Suddenly the mist peeled back, revealing towering spires. Familiar spires.

Nevermore Academy.

But wrong.

The stone was candy-striped. The gargoyles grinned with exaggerated wolf fangs. And scuttling across the lawn were hundreds of Things, each one wearing a little hat.

Willa clapped her hands in delight.

Wednesday’s throat tightened imperceptibly.

“This is your world?” she asked.

The baby turned, beaming up at her, and for the briefest second, Wednesday felt something impossible: that her daughter understood.

Then Willa toddled forward again, except in dreams, she was not constrained by reality. She took full steps, strong and confident, her little legs carrying her across the kaleidoscope ground.

Wednesday followed, her boots echoing like hammer blows, her dress trailing smoke behind her. She towered. Literally. When Willa looked up at her, Wednesday realized she wasn’t herself but a colossal version. The size of the spires, cloaked in ravens and eyes glowing.

Her daughter’s perspective.

Her daughter saw her as an immovable, terrifying goddess.

Wednesday stopped. For a moment it nearly shattered her.

In Willa’s dream, Enid appeared. She materialized in a burst of pastel light, wearing her favorite yellow sweater, her hair haloed in sparkles. But there was a twist: she had wolf ears and a tail, shimmering silver, and her entire form glowed as if someone had pressed the sun into human shape.

Willa squealed louder than ever, bouncing between them—between the giant goddess of shadows and the glowing wolf of light.

The sight hit Wednesday like a blade to the ribs.

She had always known Enid’s nature, of course. But to see how Willa perceived them, not as oddities or as contradictions, but as perfect halves of a whole, was something Wednesday’s rational mind had never permitted her to consider.

Willa didn’t just love them.

She worshipped them.

Wednesday’s voice came out lower than intended. “Absurd. And yet... illuminating.”

Willa babbled, reaching tiny arms upward.

Without thought, Wednesday leaned down with her enormous dream-form folding like a collapsing shadow and scooped the child into her palm. Willa nestled there, dwarfed by her mother’s presence, utterly fearless.

And then, because it was a dream, she did the impossible.

She touched Wednesday’s cheek.

And Wednesday, unflinching in the face of torture, execution and eternity itself, nearly staggered.

The dream began to ripple. Willa’s images flickered faster: the nursery, filled with ravens perched like mobiles. The dining room, where Gomez juggled knives for her delight. Morticia, offering her vials of glowing potions like juice boxes. And always Wednesday and Enid. Towering, glowing, terrible, wonderful. Protectors of her world.

Wednesday’s mind reeled.

Was this how she had seemed to Morticia? She remembered Morticia telling her once that she’d dreamed coffins and blood and been answered with love. Wednesday had scoffed at the time. Now...

Now she saw it.

The dream began to dissolve, colors melting into mist again. Willa yawned, curling against the giant’s palm with her eyes fluttering shut.

Wednesday whispered into the mist, words pulled from her before she could stop them.

“You will never fear the dark. Not with us here.”

And the dream broke.

---

Wednesday awoke with a start.

Beside her, Enid still slept soundly, drooling slightly onto her pillow. Across the hall, she could hear Willa’s even breathing through the baby monitor.

But inside Wednesday, something rattled.

Not fear or weakness.

A fracture. A shift.

She had seen herself through her daughter’s eyes. And it was... unbearable. Unholy. Beautiful.

Wednesday, the woman who prided herself on never flinching, stared into the ceiling shadows and whispered to herself: “Appalling.”

And yet she could not stop the tiny, traitorous tug at the corner of her lips.

---

Morning came, but Wednesday was not the same.

She sat at the breakfast table, brooding into her tea, staring at Willa as the baby mashed soft food into her hair.

Enid stretched beside her, yawning. “Morning, sunshine. You’re extra... you today.”

Wednesday didn’t look away from Willa. “She invaded my dreams.”

Enid froze, the cup of coffee halfway to her mouth. “Oh my god. You too?”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s eyes narrowed as Willa sneezed puréed carrots onto her bib. “It was grotesque.”

Enid leaned forward, curious. “What did you see?”

Wednesday’s gaze flickered, betraying a ghost of vulnerability. “Everything.”

Enid’s smile softened. “She showed you how much she loves us, didn’t she?”

Wednesday scowled into her cup. “Disgusting.”

But under the table, her free hand found Enid’s. Squeezed once. Hard.

And Enid, grinning like the sunbeam Willa dreamed her to be, squeezed back.

---

That night, Wednesday returned to bed with an unfamiliar thought gnawing at her: That the void she had always cherished was no longer a void at all.

It had been filled, by a sunbeam wolf and by a baby who dreamed in colors Wednesday could never have imagined.

And the most appalling truth of all?

She didn’t hate it. Not at all.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion had survived much: thunderstorms that split the forest in two, journalists who dared approach unannounced, even Enid’s experiment with pumpkin spice candles. Wednesday still claimed the smell had haunted the wallpaper for days. But it had not survived peace in quite some time.

The past weeks had been a storm in every sense: Enid’s online fame, Wednesday's gothic popularity, Esther’s dramatic invasion, Willa’s first fever and psychic dream-broadcasts. All of it piled on like a stack of porcelain plates, teetering on a rickety shelf.

So when Enid, bleary-eyed and still in her pastel robe, caught sight of Willa toddling across the nursery floor with her pudgy legs and gummy grin, she made a decision.

“We’re going to the playground today,” she announced aloud, as if declaring it to the universe might force it into truth.

From the corner, Wednesday’s voice dropped like a blade. “No.”

Enid whirled. “You didn’t even let me explain!”

“I don’t need to explain what is self-evident,” Wednesday replied, her arms crossed and standing in the doorway like a gargoyle. Her braids were immaculate as always, her black dress crisp as though she had been preparing since dawn to stop this conversation.

Enid huffed. “Willa needs socialization. Fresh air. Other babies. It’s good for her!”

“She has ravens. And Thing.”

“Thing is not a baby, Weds.”

“He is when he sulks.”

Enid pressed a hand to her temple. “This isn’t negotiable. I’m taking her.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed to slits. “A public playground is a cesspool of germs, sticky substances of unknown origin, and shrieking offspring that no one in their right mind would willingly expose themselves to.”

“Or,” Enid countered brightly, “it’s a perfectly normal place for a baby to go play and make friends.”

Wednesday tilted her head, calculating. “Friends are overrated. Acquaintances exist solely to betray you later.”

Enid let out a frustrated growl. “You’re impossible.”

“And yet you married me.”

---

The battle lasted an hour. Enid coaxed, reasoned, even offered compromises. Wednesday rejected them all with surgical precision.

Finally, Enid snapped. “Fine! Don’t come. But I’m going. And so is Willa. We’ll just take the stroller.”

That word stroller landed like a curse.

Wednesday’s lip curled. “You intend to wheel our child around like luggage for the entertainment of strangers?”

“It’s called parenting.”

“It’s called humiliation.”

“Humiliation would be me trying to put her in one of those little Victorian prams you suggested,” Enid shot back.

Wednesday’s silence was not agreement, but it was not refusal either.

Enid pounced. “Great. Settled. We’re going. Come on, Willa, let’s get your shoes!”

The baby gurgled, holding up one tiny patent-leather shoe like a trophy.

Wednesday muttered darkly, “Benedict Arnold.”

---

By mid-morning, Enid was bustling around like a pastel hurricane. She packed the diaper bag with wipes, snacks, toys, a change of clothes, and—because this was the Addams-Sinclair household—an odd bottle of Morticia’s potion “for emergencies.”

Willa was dressed in a pink romper, a sun hat with ears, and tiny socks that she was already determined to lose.

Wednesday sat in the armchair by the door, watching as though attending her own execution.

“You don’t have to come,” Enid told her gently.

Wednesday’s eyes flicked to Willa, then back to Enid. Her jaw tightened. “You’ll need someone capable of subduing other parents when they inevitably attempt to speak to you.”

Enid lit up like a sunrise. “So you’re coming?”

“I refuse to be left behind while my progeny is thrown into the gladiator pit of the bourgeoisie.”

Enid laughed, grabbing her hand. “God, you’re dramatic.”

Wednesday corrected coldly, “No. I am realistic.”

---

The playground was a short drive away, though with Wednesday behind the wheel it felt like a near-death experience. She navigated the suburban streets with the same precision she might use to plow through a battlefield. Other cars honked. Wednesday ignored them, muttering, “Weaklings.”

Enid clutched the stroller in the back seat like a shield. Willa babbled cheerfully and utterly unfazed.

When they arrived, Enid inhaled the scent of grass, bark chips, and fresh air like salvation. Wednesday sniffed and muttered, “Rotting mulch. Disinfectant. And despair.”

Enid ignored her. She strapped Willa into the stroller and pushed toward the play area, practically glowing with excitement.

The playground was filled with chaos: toddlers chasing each other, swings creaking, parents gossiping on benches.

It was heaven for Enid.

It was hell for Wednesday.

They approached the sandbox first. Enid crouched down, plopping Willa onto the soft sand. “Look, baby, other kids!”

Willa stared, wide-eyed. A little boy immediately waddled over, offering her a plastic shovel.

Enid’s heart melted. “She’s making friends already!”

Willa accepted the shovel, stared at it... and promptly bit down on it with her tiny wolf fang.

The boy screamed.

Wednesday’s lips twitched upward. “She’s learning dominance.”

“Wednesday!” Enid hissed.

“It’s developmental,” Wednesday deadpanned.

---

From there, chaos bloomed.

Willa toddled unsteadily toward the swings, Enid rushing behind her. She tripped, bounced on her diaper and cackled at the impact. Wednesday nodded approvingly. “Excellent. Pain tolerance training.”

Later, Willa crawled toward the slide. Another baby was already at the top, hesitating. Willa fixed her enormous dark eyes on him, raised one hand... and the boy began bawling, scrambling back down.

“She’s already harnessing her psychic intimidation,” Wednesday said, pride in her voice.

Enid groaned. “She’s supposed to share, Weds.”

“She did. She shared terror.”

Other Parents began to notice too. A woman in yoga pants whispered to her friend, pointing at Wednesday. “Is that... a funeral dress?”

Her friend whispered back, “She looks like she hexed the mulch.”

Enid felt her cheeks burn. She tried to smile, to act like this was normal.

Wednesday noticed, of course. She leaned toward her wife, her voice low. “Would you like me to silence them?”

“No!” Enid whispered fiercely. “Do not silence them.”

Wednesday sighed. “Then you’ll have to endure their prattle.”

---

The crowning disaster came when Enid decided to push Willa on the swing. The baby squealed with glee and clutched the chains with tiny fists. Enid beamed, her heart swelling.

Then Wednesday approached.

“Step aside.”

Enid blinked. “Uh... why?”

“You lack the proper technique.”

Before Enid could argue, Wednesday took the swing. She gave it one push. Measured, precise and far too strong.

Willa soared.

Enid screamed. “WEDNESDAY!”

The other parents gasped.

Willa shrieked with joy, her little legs kicking and demanding more.

Wednesday’s expression barely flickered. “She enjoys velocity. She is an Addams.”

Enid clutched her chest. “You almost launched her into orbit!”

“Orbit builds character.”

---

Enid felt, for the first time in weeks, that life resembled something “normal.” The sun was warm on her skin, the chatter of other parents surrounded her like a low buzz, and Willa was plopped down on the brightly painted puzzle boards that clicked together in different shapes.

Sure, Willa was gnawing on one of the puzzle pieces like it was a bone, but it was close enough.

Enid crouched beside her, clapping her hands as the baby banged two pieces together. “Yay, Willa! Look at you, so smart!”

Willa crowed with pride, waving one puzzle piece overhead like she’d just discovered fire.

A shadow fell across them.

Enid looked up, startled. A man in jeans and a t-shirt stood there, holding a toddler by the hand. He was tall, with the easy and slightly desperate smile of a suburban single dad trying too hard.

“Cute kid,” he said, nodding at Willa. “Yours?”

Enid smiled automatically, polite. “Yep! That’s my baby.”

“Mine too,” the man said, nudging his son forward. The boy looked about three, shyly holding a stuffed dinosaur. “We’re here most mornings. Haven’t seen you around before. You new in town?”

Enid hesitated. She wasn’t used to playground small talk, but she could be nice. “Sort of. We live... a little further out.”

“Oh yeah?” He leaned casually on the fence. “Me too, actually. Place near the river. Just me and him.” He nodded at his son. “Single parenting’s no joke, right? But you seem to be handling it great.”

Enid froze. Single?

Before she could correct him, the air chilled.

A presence loomed behind her like a thundercloud.

The man’s smile faltered as Wednesday Addams materialized at Enid’s side, her black dress cutting through the pastel chaos of the playground like an omen. Her braids hung still, her eyes glittering like onyx knives.

“Excuse me,” Wednesday said, her voice a scalpel. “You appear to be under a grotesque misapprehension.”

The man blinked. “Uh... what?”

Enid winced. “Wednesday—”

But Wednesday had already taken one step closer. The air grew heavier. Children’s laughter seemed to dim. Even the wind stalled, as though afraid to pass between them.

“She,” Wednesday said, pointing to Enid with a serious face, “is not a single mother. She is my wife. My possession. My other half, though half implies weakness and she is anything but. To assume otherwise is to court disaster.”

The man’s smile disintegrated. “Oh, I—I didn’t mean—”

Wednesday’s gaze slid to his son, who clutched the dinosaur tighter. “Raise him carefully. Or he may one day find himself on the wrong end of a guillotine.”

The toddler whimpered. The father scooped him up and backed away, muttering apologies.

Enid groaned, covering her face. “Weds...”

Wednesday turned to her, expression still icy. “He presumed you were available. He presumed incorrectly.”

“I could’ve just told him!” Enid said.

Wednesday tilted her head. “And waste the opportunity to crush a man’s spirit? Don’t be absurd.”

Willa, blissfully oblivious to the marital theatrics, banged her puzzle piece against the board. A little boy waddled up and sat beside her, offering his toy truck.

Enid’s heart melted. “Aww, look, Willa! He wants to play with you!”

Willa grabbed the truck, examined it and then pushed it back with surprising force. The boy giggled, pushing it again.

They started a rhythm, back and forth, the beginnings of toddler friendship.

Enid was charmed.

Wednesday was horrified.

She swooped down like a crow, her shadow falling over the two babies. “Absolutely not.”

Enid blinked. “What?”

“She is far too young to fraternize with males,” Wednesday declared.

Enid’s jaw dropped. “Weds, he’s barely two!”

“Old enough to form attachment. Old enough to disappoint her.”

The boy’s mother who was sitting a few feet away, looked up. “Is... everything okay?”

Wednesday turned her head slowly, like an owl swiveling toward prey. “Your son appears to be attempting courtship with my daughter.”

The woman’s jaw fell open. “He’s a toddler!”

“Exactly,” Wednesday said coldly. “Start them young, and they grow entitled. I will not have my daughter subjected to patriarchal play dynamics.”

Enid buried her face in her hands. “She’s just playing with a truck!”

But Wednesday bent down, scooping Willa into her arms. “No daughter of mine will be corrupted by Tonka toys.”

Willa squealed happily, oblivious to the tension and chewed on Wednesday’s braid.

The boy was confused and bursted into tears.

The mother gathered him up, muttering, “Some people are insane,” and stormed off.

Enid looked ready to sink into the mulch. “Wednesday Addams, you are ridiculous.”

Wednesday adjusted Willa on her hip, perfectly serene. “Ridiculous is permitting your offspring to be wooed by strangers before she has her full set of teeth.”

Enid groaned. “It wasn’t wooing. It was playing!”

“First play,” Wednesday intoned, “then prom. Then marriage. Then inevitable betrayal. I have seen this trajectory. It ends in flames.”

“Weds. They’re babies.”

Wednesday’s expression didn’t soften. “Babies grow into men. And men, statistically, are intolerable.”

Enid threw her hands in the air. “You are impossible.”

“And yet, you remain.”

---

The rest of their playground visit became a battlefield.

Whenever a boy wandered within five feet of Willa, Wednesday stiffened like a guard dog. A toddler offered her a ball, Wednesday intercepted it mid-roll and hurled it back with sniper accuracy. A little boy toddled near the swing, Wednesday stepped into his path, staring him down until he scurried back to his mother.

Enid was mortified. “You’re going to get us banned!”

“Good,” Wednesday said. “A badge of honor.”

“You can’t just... glare at babies!”

“They understood me.”

“They cried, Wens!”

“Recognition of their own mortality. Valuable lesson.”

By the time they finally left, Enid’s nerves were frayed, but Willa was babbling happily, her cheeks rosy from the fresh air.

As they walked back to the car, Enid muttered, “I can’t believe you scared off toddlers.”

Wednesday adjusted her gloves, entirely unrepentant. “Our daughter will thank me one day.”

Enid snorted. “For what? Making sure no boy ever plays trucks with her?”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s dark eyes glinted. “She deserves better.”

Enid gave her a side glance. “Better like... who?”

Wednesday didn’t answer.

But the corner of her mouth twitched, the closest she ever came to a smirk.

Enid laughed despite herself, slipping her hand into Wednesday’s as they walked. “You’re hopeless.”

“Hopelessly yours,” Wednesday corrected.

And though Enid rolled her eyes, her smile betrayed her.

Behind them, Willa let out a loud squeal of triumph, gnawing proudly on the puzzle piece she’d stolen from the playground.

Chapter Text

The car ride home from the playground had been nothing short of a Gothic rollercoaster.

Enid had strapped Willa into her car seat with all the meticulousness of a bomb squad technician. Meanwhile, Wednesday slid behind the wheel of the Addams family hearse. The long, sleek, black monster of a vehicle that rumbled like an undertaker’s hymn.

“Weds,” Enid said as she buckled herself in, “we are in a residential neighborhood. That means children crossing the street with little scooters. And puppies. And strollers. Please drive safely.”

Wednesday started the engine. The headlights glared to life like the eyes of a predator.

“I always drive safely,” she said, voice smooth and calm.

And then she peeled away from the curb like the hounds of hell were at her heels.

Pedestrians dove for cover. A man spilled his iced latte. A woman screamed as her poodle leapt into her arms.

Enid shrieked and clutched the dashboard. “WEDNESDAY ADDAMS!”

Behind them, Willa giggled like this was the funniest rollercoaster ride she’d ever been on. Every sharp turn sent her squealing in delight, clapping her tiny hands against her car seat.

Enid could barely breathe. “You’re going to give me a heart attack!”

“Nonsense,” Wednesday said, calm as ever, swerving to avoid a bicyclist who cursed them in three languages. “The mortality rate of heart attacks is only thirty-five percent if treated within the hour.”

“That’s not—oh my god, slow down!”

Wednesday smirked, black-gloved hands steady on the wheel. “Never. Slowing down is surrender.”

---

By the time they reached the Addams-Sinclair mansion, Enid’s hair was a wild halo around her head, her breathing erratic, her face a portrait of traumatized exhaustion.

Wednesday parked neatly at the gate, as though nothing unusual had happened.

“See?” she said, turning off the engine. “We arrived unharmed.”

Enid staggered out of the car, glaring. “I aged ten years in fifteen minutes.”

“You’re radiant. It suits you.”

“Wednesday!”

But Willa squealed as Wednesday unbuckled her, bouncing in her arms like she wanted to go again.

Enid sighed, already defeated. “She’s too much like you.”

“Precisely,” Wednesday said with pride, pressing a kiss to their daughter’s forehead.

Inside, Enid decided she needed something grounding, something sweet, something that didn’t involve near-death experiences: bath time.

She ran warm water in Willa’s little claw-footed tub (a family heirloom, naturally). Willa splashed with unholy joy, smacking the water with her hands until it sprayed everywhere. Enid laughed, despite the puddle spreading across the floor.

“There’s my girl,” she cooed, rubbing lavender-scented soap over her baby’s tiny arms and round belly. “You were so brave today.”

Willa squealed, kicking her chubby legs, splattering Enid’s apron.

“Okay, okay!” Enid laughed, wrapping her in a fluffy towel afterward and kissing her damp hair. She dressed her in pale blue pajamas patterned with cartoonish bats, a gift from Morticia that Enid had actually fallen in love with.

“There,” she whispered, hugging her daughter close. “Perfect.”

Meanwhile downstairs, Wednesday was in the kitchen preparing dinner with her usual flair for the macabre.

A pot bubbled on the stove, releasing ominous scents of garlic, rosemary and something darker, something that smelled vaguely metallic. A roast sat in the oven, and a salad was being assembled, not with ordinary greens but with Addams-family-approved curiosities: black kale, purple lettuce, and cherry tomatoes that looked suspiciously like drops of blood.

When Enid carried Willa in, Wednesday glanced over her shoulder.

“She’s clean.”

“Yes,” Enid said proudly. “And adorable. See?”

Wednesday turned fully, eyes softening minutely at the sight of Willa in her pajamas. She reached out and touched her daughter’s cheek. “Adequate.”

Enid rolled her eyes. “That’s Wednesday-speak for ‘perfect.’”

Willa babbled in agreement, tugging at Wednesday’s braid.

“Don’t encourage her,” Wednesday muttered, though she didn’t pull away.

---

Dinner was served in the cavernous dining hall, lit by candelabras whose flames sputtered like spirits whispering.

Enid sat at one end, bouncing Willa on her lap and feeding her mashed sweet potato. Wednesday carved into the roast with clinical precision, serving slices onto Enid’s plate.

It felt almost normal. Almost.

Enid sipped water, hesitating. Then she cleared her throat. “So... about today.”

Wednesday looked up, black eyes catching the candlelight. “Yes?”

Enid fiddled with Willa’s spoon. “I think we need to talk about... how we’re raising her.”

Wednesday tilted her head. “We are raising her magnificently. She is thriving. She laughs in the face of danger and chews on puzzle pieces like a conqueror devouring enemy bones.”

“That’s... one way to put it,” Enid said gently. “But, Weds... you scared off a toddler.”

“He was a male.”

“He was two.”

“All the more reason to snuff him out early.”

Enid sighed. “See, this is what I mean. Our philosophies clash. You want to guard her from every boy, every stranger, every speck of dirt—”

“Correct,” Wednesday interrupted.

“—and I want her to explore,” Enid continued firmly. “I want her to play, to make friends, to have a childhood.”

Wednesday’s jaw tightened. “Childhood is an illusion. Life is suffering. The sooner she learns, the stronger she will be.”

Enid stared at her across the table. “Weds... she’s nine months old.”

“Precisely the age when the first lessons matter most.”

Enid shook her head. “She doesn’t need lessons. She needs love.”

“She has love,” Wednesday said sharply, her hand tightening around her fork. “She has me.”

Enid softened, reaching across the table to touch her hand. “I know. And she has me too. But we can’t suffocate her with it. Love isn’t just protection. It’s freedom, too.”

Wednesday’s gaze flickered, conflicted.

“She needs both of us,” Enid whispered. “Your devotion and my... chaos. Your protection and my freedom. That’s how it works.”

For a long moment, Wednesday was silent. The only sound was Willa babbling, smearing sweet potato across her tray like a budding artist.

Finally, Wednesday sighed, a sound so rare Enid blinked. “You may be correct.”

Enid’s eyes widened. “Wait. Did you just admit that?”

Wednesday arched a brow. “Don’t gloat. It’s unbecoming.”

Enid grinned anyway, leaning back. “See? We can make this work.”

Wednesday studied her, then Willa, then the candle flames. “Perhaps. But I reserve the right to interrogate every male who approaches her, regardless of age.”

Enid groaned, laughing. “Fine. As long as you don’t traumatize them too much.”

Wednesday smirked faintly. “No promises.”

---

After dinner, with Willa tucked into her crib and the mansion quiet, Enid curled beside Wednesday on their bed.

“You know,” she said softly, “I think we’re doing okay. Even if we argue sometimes.”

Wednesday brushed a hand through her hair, her touch surprisingly tender. “Arguments sharpen the blade. And our blade, Enid, is formidable.”

Enid smiled into her chest. “You’re so weird. I love you.”

“Good,” Wednesday murmured, pressing a kiss to her forehead. “Because I intend to terrify every playground father within a fifty-mile radius.”

Enid laughed, shaking her head. “Hopeless. Absolutely hopeless.”

“Hopelessly yours,” Wednesday corrected.

Enid didn’t argue.

Chapter Text

The letter came in a black envelope, sealed with wax the color of dried blood. It was slid under the mansion door in the middle of the night, as if hand-delivered by a raven or a ghost with good penmanship.

Wednesday discovered it at dawn, when she returned from her morning walk through the cemetery. She broke the seal with reverence, her gloved fingers trembling slightly.

Enid, still half-asleep in her pastel robe, shuffled into the hall with Willa perched on her hip. Her hair stuck up in half a dozen sunny directions.

“What’s that?” she yawned.

Wednesday’s eyes gleamed. “It is everything.”

Enid blinked. “Everything... like a coupon for free baby wipes? Or like... spooky everything?”

Wednesday turned the envelope so the inked calligraphy caught the light. The words made Enid squint.

Occultus Conventus Mortuorum Specimen.

“...gesundheit,” Enid muttered.

Wednesday ignored her. “It is the secret gathering of the greatest minds in the art of taxidermy and embalming. Invite-only. Held once every five years in the misted ruins of a castle in Ireland. Only fifty are chosen.” Her lips curved with the tiniest smile, a phenomenon so rare it could be catalogued like a lunar eclipse. “I have been summoned.”

Enid’s sleepiness vanished instantly. She clutched Willa closer, alarm flashing in her eyes. “Summoned? As in... you’re going? Like... out of the country going?”

“Yes.” Wednesday folded the letter with almost ceremonial care. “It is the fulfillment of a childhood aspiration. To dissect alongside my idols. To mount beasts with the masters. To embalm with legends.”

Enid made a squeaky noise. “That’s... super romantic for you, Weds, I’m sure, but—wait. How long?”

“The entire weekend, leaving on Friday.”

Enid’s heart plummeted into her fuzzy slippers. “The whole weekend? As in three nights?!”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s tone was matter-of-fact, but her eyes glimmered with rare anticipation.

Enid’s mouth opened, closed and opened again. Willa babbled and patted her face, but she barely noticed.

Three nights.

Three nights without Wednesday beside her in bed, laying corpse-still but radiating the odd comfort of permanence. Three nights without Wednesday’s withering remarks over dinner. Three nights alone in the cavernous mansion with a nine-month-old who thought sleep was a negotiable concept.

Her stomach twisted.

“Oh.” She forced a bright smile, though her eye twitched. “That’s... great, Weds. Really. You deserve it. Big dream and all that.”

Wednesday narrowed her eyes. “You are lying.”

Enid winced. “No, I’m not. I’m—okay, fine, I’m lying! I don’t like it! I don’t like it one bit!”

“Why?” Wednesday asked, arms crossing.

Enid’s words tumbled out in a rush. “Because! We’ve never been apart. Not one night since we got married. Not one night since Willa was born. We don’t do the whole—you go here, I go there—thing! And now you’re just gonna hop on a plane, cross the ocean, hang out with spooky strangers who love dead animals as much as you do, and leave me here to—” Her voice cracked. “—to sleep alone?!”

Wednesday stared at her for a long, heavy moment. “You are catastrophizing.” She said flatly.

Enid threw up her free hand. “Of course I am! That’s what I do!”

Willa, catching the mood, squealed and smacked mashed banana onto Enid’s robe.

The rest of the day, Enid was a mess of spiraling thoughts.

What if Willa got sick again and Wednesday wasn’t there? What if the house got haunted extra hard that weekend and she had to handle it alone? What if Wednesday met some pale, raven-haired Irish taxidermist who quoted Edgar Allan Poe in Gaelic and wore antique lace gloves and had cheekbones sharp enough to cut glass?

Enid’s wolf senses jittered every time she imagined it.

She tried to bring it up subtly over lunch, while Wednesday ate soup that looked suspiciously like swamp water.

“So... ” Enid poked at her grilled cheese. “These, uh, fifty invitees. Are they... like... all ages? All genders?”

“Yes,” Wednesday said without looking up.

“Oh.” Enid swallowed. “Like... maybe a few really pretty, super gothic women who also happen to be single?”

Wednesday finally raised her eyes, deadpan. “Do you think I am so fickle I would abandon my wife and child for a woman who can properly preserve a hedgehog?”

Enid made a strangled laugh. “When you put it like that, it sounds crazy.”

“It is crazy,” Wednesday said. Then, after a beat, “Besides. If I were to leave you, it would be for arsenic, not a woman.”

“That’s... oddly comforting?”

---

By bedtime, Enid was no calmer. She curled under the covers beside Wednesday, staring up at the ceiling. Her thoughts galloped like wolves under a full moon.

Finally, she blurted: “I don’t want you to go.”

Wednesday turned on her side, her braids falling across her pillow. Her pale face was unreadable in the candlelight. “And yet, I must.”

Enid’s throat tightened. “But what if I can’t sleep without you?”

“You will.”

“What if I panic?”

“You will.”

Enid groaned, burying her face in her hands. “You’re not helping!”

Wednesday pried her hands away, forcing Enid to meet her gaze. “Enid. Nothing in Ireland can tempt me more than what I already possess here. You and her.” She glanced at the nursery door, where faint baby wolf-whimpers drifted.

Enid’s heart thudded. “Weds...”

Wednesday’s hand lingered against her cheek. “Do not diminish me by imagining I could be seduced by amateurs with scalpels.”

A shaky laugh escaped Enid. “You’re so intense.”

“Yes.” Wednesday’s eyes gleamed. “And my intensity is yours alone.”

---

The night before Wednesday’s departure, Enid couldn’t sleep. She lay awake listening to the rhythm of her wife’s steady breaths.

She told herself it was just a weekend. Just three nights. Just seventy-two hours more or less if we counting everything.

But the mansion already felt colder in her imagination.

And when she finally drifted off, her dreams were full of gothic Irish castles, sharp-cheekboned women in black lace, and Wednesday’s voice whispering: Arsenic before adultery.

Enid woke with her heart pounding, clutching Wednesday’s braid like a lifeline.

---

Morning arrived with merciless punctuality, dragging a pale gray light through the windows of the Addams mansion. For Enid Sinclair-Addams, it might as well have been Judgment Day.

She had not slept for real. Not one second.

Instead, she had spent the hours tossing, turning, padding nervously through the halls in her fuzzy socks, and then returning to bed only to stare at Wednesday’s peacefully blank face beside her. Wednesday, of course, slept like the dead. Motionless, soundless and with her chest rising with such imperceptible rhythm that Enid had poked her twice just to confirm she wasn’t already a corpse.

Now, the fated day had come. The day Wednesday would leave.

Enid sat bolt upright in bed, hair frizzed like an electric halo of doom. Her knees bounced under the blankets with enough vigor to shake the mattress.

Willa who had escaped her crib, she was toddling on the hallway and happily chewing on a stuffed bat. When Enid exited the room and saw her there, Willa stopped and looked up, her baby senses tingling. She blinked at her Mama Woof, tilted her tiny head and then began to fuss as if mirroring her mother’s nerves.

Enid scooped her into her arms and brought her inside their bedroom. “Oh, sweetie, it’s okay. Mama’s just having a breakdown.”

Willa sneezed dramatically, as though to emphasize the seriousness of the situation.

From the bed, Wednesday stirred. She opened her eyes with calm precision, blinked once, and regarded her wife and daughter as though they were a curious but predictable species of wildlife.

“You’re vibrating,” she observed.

“I’m anxious!” Enid squeaked, rocking Willa back and forth. “You’re leaving, Weds. You’re actually leaving. What if the plane crashes? What if you get kidnapped by Irish taxidermists? What if you... you...” She trailed off, too horrified by her own spiraling imagination to finish.

Wednesday sat up with glacial grace, her braids falling like ink down her shoulders. “What if,” she countered evenly, “you survive three days without me, and realize that independence is not, in fact, fatal?”

Enid gasped as if stabbed. “Don’t you dare suggest such a thing!”

Willa squealed in solidarity.

---

Breakfast was chaos.

Enid attempted to make pancakes as a “farewell breakfast of love,” but she was shaking so much, the butter slopped across the counter. Willa was in her highchair, pounding her tray with tiny fists as if sensing the familial disturbance in the air.

Wednesday sat calmly at the table, sipping jet-black coffee and watching the scene like a naturalist observing nervous prey.

Enid flipped a pancake onto the floor. She wailed. “It’s already going wrong! This is a sign! You’re not supposed to leave!”

Wednesday set her cup down. “On the contrary, it’s a sign you should not be entrusted with kitchen implements while emotionally unstable.”

Enid gave her a betrayed look, then slid the next pancake onto Wednesday’s plate with exaggerated care, as though presenting a peace offering. “At least pretend you’ll miss me,” she begged.

Wednesday cut into the pancake with surgical precision. “Your melodrama is redundant. You already know I will.”

Enid’s heart flipped. Then immediately sank again. “Then don’t go!”

Wednesday chewed in silence. Then she said, “Enid. If you deprive me of this event, I will resent you forever.”

Enid dropped her spatula. “Forever?!”

“Yes.” Wednesday dabbed her lips with a napkin. “At least until something more dramatic distracts me.”

---

Packing was worse.

Wednesday was meticulous, laying out her surgical instruments, preservation fluids, scalpels, and notebooks with clinical satisfaction.

Enid hovered like a storm cloud, Willa strapped to her chest in the baby carrier.

“Do you really need the vial of arsenic?” Enid asked, wringing her hands.

“Yes.”

“And... the embalmed frog in the jar?”

“Yes.”

“...Okay. What about the bone saw?”

“Yes.”

Enid sighed dramatically, “Okay. Just... don’t forget your toothbrush.”

Wednesday gave her a flat look. “How quaint.”

Enid let out a long, high whine. “This is so unfair. I can’t compete with dead animals and scary liquids!”

Willa gurgled in protest, pulling at her mother’s hair as if to say, 'focus on me instead of the arsenic.'

Finally, when Wednesday stepped out of the room to retrieve one last book of Victorian embalming diagrams, Enid seized her chance.

She grabbed Wednesday's practically forgotten phone—fully charged, wallpaper still a candid of Enid beaming at her 29th birthday cake—and slipped it into the lining of her luggage.

“Operation Lifeline,” she whispered fiercely. “If she thinks she’s gonna go three days without me calling, she’s out of her goth little mind.”

Willa cooed approvingly.

---

The hour of doom arrived. A heavy knock echoed through the mansion like the toll of a funeral bell.

Enid froze in the hall, clutching Willa to her chest. Wednesday, serene as ever, rose to her feet.

The front doors creaked open to reveal Lurch, looming in his usual black suit. He bowed solemnly. The hearse-turned-airport-shuttle purred outside, black as night.

Enid’s breath hitched. Her eyes stung.

This was it. The tragic separation.

Wednesday adjusted her coat, collected her bags, and turned to face them.

Enid looked like she was about to collapse. Her arms tightened around Willa, who squirmed and fussed with uncanny accuracy, sensing the tension.

“Wednesday...” Enid’s voice cracked. “Do you have to go?”

“Yes,” Wednesday replied simply.

Enid’s lip trembled.

Wednesday stepped close, placed a hand on Enid’s cheek, and said, “I will return. And when I do, I expect the house to remain standing, the child alive, and you... moderately sane.”

Enid sniffled, clinging to her touch. “That’s asking a lot.”

Then Wednesday leaned down and kissed Willa’s head. “Behave for your mother, spawn. Terrorize her only moderately.”

Willa let out a loud, indignant squeak.

Finally, Wednesday kissed Enid with such brief intensity that it nearly undid her entirely. Then she pulled away, her face composed, and strode toward the door with her luggage.

Lurch took her bags with funereal efficiency.

Enid stood frozen in the hall, heart splintering.

The door closed with a heavy thud.

Moments later, the hearse rumbled away down the drive.

Enid ran to the window, Willa pressed against her chest.

She pulled the curtain aside and stared out with wild eyes as the vehicle rolled down the long, misty path.

Her throat tightened. Already, the mansion felt colder. Already, she missed the oppressive weight of Wednesday’s morbid shadow stalking the halls.

“She’s gone,” Enid whispered dramatically. “She’s really gone.”

Willa, catching her tone, let out a tragic wail of her own.

Enid rocked her, tears prickling in her eyes. “I know, sweetie. I know. We’ll get through this... somehow.”

The hearse vanished from view.

And the Addams mansion, vast and echoing, seemed to swallow Enid in its silence.

For the first time in years, she was truly alone.

Chapter Text

The Addams mansion had always been too big, too shadowed, too full of whispering corridors and ancient echoes. But tonight, for Enid, it wasn’t just big.

It was hollow.

She stood in the parlor, Willa balanced on her hip, staring blankly at the faint indentation Wednesday had left on the armchair. The chair looked sinister without her, like a throne waiting for its ruler. It made Enid’s throat tighten.

Willa squirmed in her arms, big dark eyes scanning the room. “Mama Doom?” she lisped in her baby-garbled syllables.

Enid’s heart cracked. “I know, sweetie. She’s not here. She left us to... fondle taxidermy frogs with creepy Irish people.”

Willa blinked. Then pressed her cheek against Enid’s shoulder with a soft whimper.

Enid nearly burst into tears.

---

The first hour was fine.

She kept herself busy, tidying up the kitchen with the baby strapped to her chest in the carrier, humming nervously to fill the silence. Every time she passed the counter where Wednesday usually sharpened her daggers, she gave it a long and mournful glance.

By the second hour, she was texting.

[Enid]: Landed yet? Are you alive?
[Enid]: Did anyone hit on you at the airport?
[Enid]: Did you glare at them? Please tell me you glared.
[Enid]: Did you eat something? Do they even serve meat at this weird dead-animal convention??

There was no reply.

She bit her lip, her foot bouncing as she stared at the phone.

By the third hour, she was calling.

Ring. Ring. Ring.

“Pick up, pick up, pick up—”

Voicemail.

Enid slumped against the wall, clutching Willa’s tiny hand. “She hates me.”

Willa patted her chest with a damp fist. “Mama Doom?”

“Yes!” Enid wailed. “Mama Doom is gone and she’s already forgotten about us!”

Dinner was an ordeal.

Enid set Willa in her highchair and spoon-fed her mashed carrots while staring across the table at Wednesday’s empty seat. The flickering candle made the shadows seem longer than usual.

“This is torture,” Enid muttered, shoving a forkful of pasta into her mouth.

Willa banged her spoon against the tray. “Mama Doom.”

Enid groaned. “Don’t say it again or I’ll cry.”

Willa, delighted by the reaction, chirped louder: “Mama Doom! Mama Doom!”

Enid clutched her chest. “You’re just like her.”

Night was worse.

The bed felt like a coffin, and not in the sexy, comforting Addams way. It was too big, too cold.

Enid curled on her side with Willa in the bassinet beside her, staring at the ceiling. The shadows seemed to move. She swore the portraits on the wall were smirking at her misery.

She grabbed her phone and fired off another desperate text.

[Enid]: Weds. Please just say goodnight.
[Enid]: I miss your creepy breathing.
[Enid]: I miss your murder-eyes glaring at me in the dark.
[Enid]: I miss the way you poke my ribs to make sure I haven’t fallen asleep before you finish your nightly writing quota.
[Enid]: ...Are you even thinking about me??

Still no reply.

She buried her face in her pillow and muffled a scream.

---

By the second morning, Enid had the air of a true widow.

She shuffled through the halls in Wednesday’s robe which drowned her in black silk, her hair wild and clutching a teacup like it contained the last drops of life. Willa toddled behind her on unsteady legs, dragging a stuffed bat by the wing.

Everywhere Enid looked, she saw signs of absence: Wednesday’s typewriter, silent. Her cello, propped untouched. The faint scent of her perfume lingering like a phantom.

At one point, Enid collapsed dramatically onto the chaise longue, pressing the back of her hand to her forehead. “Oh, Willa. How am I supposed to go on?”

Willa looked up at her, gnawed on her bat’s wing, and whispered again: “Mama Doom.”

Enid burst into tears.

The obsession worsened. She checked Wednesday’s social media. Of course, there was nothing new, Wednesday would never post during travel.

She scoured hashtags related to the event. A few blurry photos from the convention surfaced.

And in one picture, there in the background was Wednesday herself, standing in her black dress, stoic as a statue among a circle of cloaked enthusiasts examining a preserved raven.

Enid zoomed in frantically.

“Oh no,” she muttered. “There are women there. Goth women.”

Her breath hitched. She clutched Willa to her chest. “What if she falls in love with someone who also thinks dissecting squirrels is romantic? What if—what if—what if she forgets about us entirely and runs away with an embalmer?!”

Willa burped in response.

Enid typed out another message with shaking fingers.

[Enid]: Are you flirting with a goth mortician right now?
[Enid]: ANSWER HONESTLY.

That evening, the phone rang.

Enid practically threw Willa across the couch, thankfully onto a pile of pillows, as she lunged for it. “Wednesday?!” she gasped.

There was a pause. Then, in the calm monotone Enid had been yearning for, “Enid. You have called me twenty-seven times.”

Enid burst into sobs. “DO YOU EVEN STILL LOVE ME?”

“...Obviously,” Wednesday said.

“I miss you so much it physically hurts! I keep looking at your chair and expecting you to be there but you’re not and it’s—”

“Enid.”

“—and Willa keeps saying ‘Mama Doom’ like some kind of creepy séance chant and it’s breaking me and—”

“Enid.”

“What?!”

“Stop catastrophizing. I will return in twenty-four hours.”

Enid sniffled loudly. “That’s too long.”

“Then consider it character building.”

And before Enid could whine further, Wednesday hung up.

---

By the third day, Enid had reached peak widow mode.

She wore black, a dramatic lace dress borrowed from Morticia’s old closet, she spoke in sighs, and she began referring to herself aloud as “the abandoned spouse.”

She set up dinner for two anyway, pouring wine into both glasses and toasting the empty chair across from her.

“To my lost beloved,” she whispered.

Willa, seated beside her with mashed peas smeared on her cheeks, raised her sippy cup in solidarity. “Mama Doom.”

Enid’s eyes filled with tears. “Exactly, baby. Exactly.”

---

When at last the sound of the hearse rumbled up the drive on Sunday evening, Enid nearly fainted.

She clutched Willa to her chest and rushed to the window, her heart hammering.

And then, there she was.

Wednesday, stepping out of the car, her coat swirling and luggage in hand. Calm and unchanged.

Enid didn’t even wait. She threw open the door and ran into the night, Willa bouncing in her arms.

“WEEEEDNESDAYYYY!” she wailed, collapsing against her wife like she’d survived a war.

Wednesday stood stiffly, glancing down at her damp, sobbing and frantic spouse. Then she let out the faintest, quietest sigh.

“Three days,” she said. “And you’ve deteriorated into a gothic melodrama queen.”

Enid sniffled, hugging her tighter. “Don’t ever leave me again.”

Willa clung to Wednesday’s braid, cooing, “Mama Doom.”

For once, Wednesday’s expression softened. She held her wife and child, her stillness returning to the mansion like the missing piece of its eerie soul.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion seemed to breathe again. At least, that’s how Enid experienced it the moment Wednesday stepped back inside. The air felt heavier, in that oddly comforting way it always did when her wife was around. Shadows stretched properly again. The grandfather clock ticked in rhythm with Wednesday’s footsteps. Even the taxidermy creatures mounted on the walls seemed to hold themselves with better posture now that their unholy queen had returned.

Enid clung to Wednesday’s arm like she’d been lost in the wilderness for months instead of just three days.

“You smell like embalming fluid,” she whispered, nuzzling her shoulder.

“That is because I spent three days inhaling embalming fluid.”

“God, I missed you.”

“You called me twenty-seven times.”

“Exactly,” Enid replied without shame, hugging her tighter.

Willa was squealing to get her mother's attention after three days of agonizing absence. “Mama Doom!” She slammed into Wednesday’s legs with surprising force for a nine-month-old and latched onto the fabric of her skirt.

Wednesday placed the baby up into one arm while her free hand reached behind her to clasp Enid’s. A grim tableau, the family reunited in a perfectly gothic frame.

Enid’s eyes shimmered. She could have cried again.

---

Dinner was a production. Enid insisted on cooking Wednesday’s favorites: a black bean stew so thick it looked like tar, blood sausage sautéed with onions, and a pie that had... well, started its life as an innocent cherry pie recipe, but Enid dyed the filling black with squid ink just because it felt right.

She wore her apron, the one with pink paw prints and she was fluttering around the kitchen like a frantic golden retriever, while Wednesday sat at the table with Willa in her lap, expression unreadable as ever.

But she was watching.

She always watched.

Enid set the steaming pot of stew in front of her wife and beamed nervously. “Ta-da! Welcome-home dinner for my creepy beloved!”

Wednesday ladled a spoonful into her bowl. Steam curled like smoke from a cauldron. She tasted it with deliberate slowness, her eyes flicking briefly to Enid.

Enid held her breath.

“...Acceptable,” Wednesday pronounced.

Enid let out a squeal, nearly clapping her hands. “She loves it!”

Wednesday sipped again, gaze drifting to Willa, who was attempting to gnaw on her own spoon. “Your mother is unhinged.”

“Unhinged in love!” Enid chirped, sitting down beside her. “Don’t you dare leave me for an embalmer goth girl in Ireland.”

Wednesday’s spoon paused mid-air. “Do you truly believe I would fraternize with amateurs who boast about preserving pigeons?”

“...You didn’t flirt?”

Wednesday turned her head slowly, her stare sharp enough to slice flesh. “I will pretend I did not hear the insult embedded in that question.”

Enid wilted, pouting. “I was just making sure.”

Willa banged her spoon against the table. “Mama Doom.”

Wednesday stroked the baby’s dark curls. “Precisely.”

---

Later that night, the house quiet and Willa finally tucked into her crib, Enid sprawled across their bed like a dramatic Victorian heroine. Wednesday sat at her vanity, methodically brushing her hair with the kind of precision reserved for funeral rites.

Enid rolled onto her stomach, propping her chin on her hands. “Sooo... tell me everything. Don’t leave out any detail.”

“You would be bored.”

“I won’t. Promise. I want to know what my creepy little taxidermist got up to while she abandoned her wife and child to go across the ocean.”

Wednesday set the brush down. “I attended lectures on advanced embalming techniques. I debated the ethics of preserving human teeth in jewelry. I examined a crow whose eyes had been replaced with black pearls. It was invigorating.”

Enid blinked. “...Hot.”

“Pardon?”

“I said it’s hot. You geeking out over embalming stuff. Nerdy goth mode.” She grinned. “But no women tried to—”

“Enid.”

“What?”

“If another woman had so much as dared to breathe in my vicinity with romantic intent, she would not have survived to board her flight home.”

Enid made a soft, squeaky sound. “You say the sweetest things.”

When they lay down together, Enid was practically glued to her wife.

She draped an arm over Wednesday’s waist, buried her face into her shoulder, and wrapped a leg around her like a starfish. Her clinginess was palpable, a mix of desperation and relief.

Wednesday lay stiffly at first, staring at the ceiling as if contemplating her own obituary. But slowly, with the smallest movement, she shifted her hand to rest against the small of Enid’s back.

Enid sighed happily. “You know, the bed was freezing without you. I think even the house missed you. The walls creaked sadder.”

“That is because you were crying into the drywall.”

“Okay, yeah, but still. Don’t ever leave me again.”

“I will attend again in five years.”

Enid gasped. “You already planned to abandon me again?!”

“It is an honor. I will not decline.”

Enid groaned dramatically, pulling the blanket over her head. “You’re going to kill me. Literally.”

Wednesday smirked faintly in the dark. “Not until you’ve suffered more.”

Enid peeked out from under the covers, her lips trembling into a smile despite herself. She leaned in, pressing a kiss against her wife’s cheek. “God, I’m obsessed with you.”

“I am aware.”

But Wednesday stayed awake longer than usual that night, listening to Enid’s soft breathing against her chest.

There had been moments, brief and sharp, during the convention where other enthusiasts had tried to approach her. One woman had even commented on her “striking pallor” with an unsubtle undertone.

Wednesday had ended that interaction with one sentence: "I am married. To a werewolf who could rip your throat out before you finish blinking."

It had been delicious to watch the woman pale further.

And yet, here in the dark, with Enid drooling slightly against her nightgown, Wednesday admitted to herself that her wife’s clinginess was not unwarranted.

Absence had a way of tugging at even the most stoic hearts.

Her fingers threaded absently through Enid’s hair. She would never say it aloud, but leaving them behind had unsettled her too.

By morning, Enid woke before the alarm, curled tighter around her wife like she feared she might vanish again.

Wednesday’s eyes opened, calm as always. “Are you aware you drooled on my arm?”

“Shhh. Let me bask.”

“You are suffocating me.”

“Good.”

“Enid—”

“Nope. Not letting go.”

---

Enid spent the rest of the day glued to Wednesday’s side. If she was writing, Enid perched on the desk. If she was playing with Willa, Enid knelt beside her. If she was sharpening her knives, Enid stood close enough that she risked losing a toe.

The widow of the weekend was reborn into the clingy wife of the week.

And Wednesday tolerated it with the faintest curl of her lips, a secret no one but Enid would ever see.

Chapter Text

Life at the Sinclair-Addams mansion had returned to its particular brand of macabre harmony.

For Enid, the rhythm felt almost too precious to be real. She still clung a little tighter than before, kissed Wednesday’s cheek a little more often and insisted on brushing Willa’s curls while humming ridiculous lullabies that clashed wildly against Wednesday’s penchant for chanting Latin verses about mortality.

The distance of that weekend had cut deep, but now that they were together again, it was as if some fragile thread between them had been reforged, thicker, darker and more unbreakable than before.

Wednesday, too, seemed quieter in a way that unsettled even her. She worked on her manuscripts with sharper focus, her fountain pen scratching through page after page, while Enid sat across from her blogging about "How to Survive Motherhood Without Crying Into Your Apron (Every Day)."

It was domestic bliss in the Addams-Sinclair style. A steady gothic lull, punctuated by Willa’s occasional shrieks as she attempted to chew on electrical cords.

Then the peace shattered.

Wednesday’s phone buzzed.

Enid’s head snapped up like a hunting dog catching a scent. Her ears, metaphorically and almost literally, perked. She froze mid-bite into her morning muffin, crumbs suspended in a halo around her lips.

“Your phone,” she said, voice suspiciously calm. Too calm.

“Yes,” Wednesday replied without looking up from her manuscript.

“It buzzed.”

“Indeed.”

“It never buzzes.”

“Because I do not give people the satisfaction of possessing my number.”

Enid narrowed her eyes. “So who does have it, exactly?”

Wednesday dipped her pen into the inkwell. “My parents. Your obnoxious Nevermore friends. My publisher. My editor. Pugsley. Cousin Itt. The coroner in Prague. Possibly the Vatican, depending on whether they still monitor me. And, of course, you.”

“That’s still like, six too many!” Enid bounced to her feet, rounding the table with her hands poised dramatically on her hips. “Tell me who it is.”

“I intend to,” Wednesday replied, finally picking up the device. She unlocked it with her thumbprint, her face utterly devoid of emotion.

Enid leaned closer, practically hovering over her shoulder. Her nose brushed Wednesday’s dark braid. “If it’s some goth taxidermy girl from Ireland...”

Wednesday scrolled with deadly calm. “It is a notification from the weather app. A thunderstorm is imminent this evening.”

Enid blinked, caught off guard. “...Oh.”

“Yes. Oh.”

She crossed her arms, pouting. “That’s convenient. The perfect alibi for secret Irish girlfriends.”

Wednesday set the phone back on the desk and resumed her writing, her mouth twitching into the faintest smirk. “You are absurd.”

“And you’re suspicious.”

“Would you prefer I disable all technology so you may sleep at night?”

“Yes! No. Maybe.” Enid groaned, flopping dramatically across Wednesday’s lap, her blond hair spilling over the ink-stained manuscript. “Ugh, you’re gonna drive me crazy.”

“I consider it a marital duty.”

---

By noon, Enid was still unconvinced.

The buzzing of the phone haunted her. Each time it so much as lit up with an automated calendar reminder, she snapped her head toward it, baring teeth like a territorial wolf.

“Enid.”

“Yes?” she said too quickly.

“You are glaring at my phone as if it is a rival suitor.”

“Maybe it is!”

“It is an object, not a paramour.”

“That’s exactly what someone with a secret paramour would say!”

Willa, seated in her high chair gnawing on a teething ring shaped like a bat, tilted her head curiously. “Mama Woof loud.”

“See? Even the baby agrees with me,” Enid said, pointing an accusatory finger.

“She said you are loud,” Wednesday corrected, spooning a viscous black porridge into Willa’s bowl.

“Same difference.”

Later, while Wednesday took Willa to the garden to “introduce her to the worms” (Enid chose not to ask), Enid tiptoed into the study.

The phone lay innocently on the desk, screen dark and silent.

Enid crouched over it like a thief, biting her lip. She knew Wednesday would eviscerate her if she tried to unlock it. She also knew she couldn’t help herself.

“Just a peek,” she whispered to no one.

She tapped the phone. The lock screen glowed to life.

And there it was. A new notification.

Her blood ran cold.

Occultus Conventus Mortuorum Specimen Group Chat: "Wonderful to meet you all. Until next time. 🖤"

Enid gasped so loudly that a stuffed raven fell off the shelf.

A group chat?! With other embalmer goths?! With hearts?! Black ones, but still!

“Oh my god...” She clutched her chest. “She’s cheating on me with fifty Irish taxidermists...”

“Enid.”

The voice was soft, cold, and very close.

Enid yelped, spinning around. Wednesday stood in the doorway with Willa perched on her hip and expression unreadable, but eyes glinting dangerously.

“I-I was just—uh—dusting your phone,” Enid stammered.

“Mm.” Wednesday stepped inside, setting Willa on the rug. The baby immediately crawled toward the fallen raven corpse, delighted.

Enid wrung her hands. “So... group chat, huh?”

Wednesday arched a brow. “Yes. For professional correspondence.”

“Professional correspondence doesn’t need a black heart emoji!”

“It was Cousin Morag. She speaks only in pictograms. The rest of us find it insufferable.”

Enid pouted, heat rising to her cheeks. “You could’ve told me you were in a secret goth group chat.”

Wednesday sat gracefully at her desk, reclaiming the phone with deliberate calm. “If it comforts you: I muted the thread after the first evening. Their discussions about varnish consistency were excruciating.”

Enid blinked. “...So you don’t like them?”

“I despise them.”

The relief that flooded Enid was so violent she nearly collapsed. “Oh thank god.”

“However.”

“...However?”

“You have now proven yourself capable of snooping, hysteria, and attempted espionage in a single day. I am both disgusted and impressed.”

Enid groaned, burying her face into her hands. “I’m a terrible wife.”

Wednesday leaned back in her chair, watching her with that unnerving stillness. “No. You are an obsessive one. Which, in my opinion, is preferable.”

Enid peeked through her fingers. “You... like that I’m jealous?”

“I find it entertaining.”

“...You’re evil.”

“Thank you.”

---

That night, after dinner and after Willa had been put to bed with a lullaby equal parts werewolf howls and Gregorian chants, Enid lay tangled in the sheets beside Wednesday.

Her hands clutched her wife’s arm as if she might vanish again.

“I know I’m ridiculous,” she mumbled. “I just... I can’t help it. You’re everything. And when that phone buzzed, I swear my heart stopped.”

Wednesday turned her head, her dark hair spilling across the pillow. Her eyes gleamed faintly in the moonlight.

“You are correct. You are ridiculous.”

Enid groaned.

“But,” Wednesday continued, brushing a stray curl from Enid’s forehead, “you are also mine. And I will not permit an app, a notification, or a group of pretentious morticians to alter that fact.”

Enid’s throat tightened. Her eyes burned.

She sniffled. “That’s like... the most romantic goth thing you’ve ever said to me.”

Wednesday pressed a kiss to her temple. “Consider it your lullaby.”

Enid melted completely, nuzzling into her wife’s side.

The phone buzzed once more on the nightstand.

Enid growled.

Wednesday smirked in the dark.

---

Enid had never been so hyper-aware of an object in her entire life. Not even in middle school when she was waiting to see if her crush texted back. Not even when she was refreshing her email every ten seconds after submitting a blog post to her editor.

This time it was different.

This time it was Wednesday's phone.

The phone itself wasn’t sinister. Black, naturally, with a matte case so featureless it looked like it could absorb light. No sparkly rhinestones, no “Live Laugh Love” stickers, no cutesy pop-socket. Just cold and utilitarian, the way Wednesday liked her objects.

But Enid knew the danger wasn’t in the device itself. It was in the mystery of what might lurk within.

Every time it buzzed, or worse didn’t buzz, she felt her chest tighten.

“Stop staring at me,” Wednesday said one evening, sliding into her seat at the dining table.

“I’m not staring at you,” Enid lied. “I’m staring at the phone.”

“Which is adjacent to me.”

“Exactly!” Enid stabbed her fork into her pasta, which Wednesday had ominously referred to as 'noodles of the damned'. “That’s where the danger is!”

Wednesday blinked at her. “It is currently uncharged. In fact, it has been uncharged for three days.”

Enid froze, mid-chew. “...Wait. What?”

Wednesday gestured toward the phone lying abandoned on the sideboard. Its screen was black, lifeless and gathering a delicate layer of dust as though it were an artifact of a forgotten civilization.

“I became bored,” Wednesday explained, cutting into her steak. “The group chat grew tedious. Endless debates about embalming fluids. I have no patience for dilettantes.”

Enid’s jaw dropped. “So you just... tossed it aside?”

“Yes.” Wednesday took a sip of her wine. “Technology is fickle. Decay is constant. I prefer constancy.”

Enid’s shoulders slumped, relief flooding her veins. “Oh thank god...”

Wednesday tilted her head, lips curling faintly. “Were you hoping for evidence of betrayal?”

Enid flushed bright pink. “N-no! Of course not! I just—ugh. Fine. Maybe a little.”

“I see.”

“And I feel better now, okay?” She crossed her arms. “So you can stop looking so smug.”

“I am not smug,” Wednesday said, though her smirk betrayed her. “I am vindicated.”

That night, for the first time in days, Enid didn’t hover over Wednesday as she brushed her hair. She didn’t insist on checking her wife’s pockets for stray love notes. 

Instead, she snuggled into her side, breathing in the scent of ink and candle smoke. Willa wolf-whimpered softly in her crib at the nursery, one tiny fist raised like she was ready to punch the air in her sleep.

Enid felt... safe again.

Still embarrassed, but safe.

---

The next morning, she opened her laptop and began typing furiously.

Her blog was both her confessional and her therapy, a place where she could spin chaos into something meaningful. And if thousands of strangers on the internet wanted to laugh at her domestic madness, then fine. Better than bottling it up.

Draft Title: "The Case of the Dead Phone: How I Nearly Lost My Mind Over Nothing (Or Did I?)"

Her fingers flew across the keyboard.

"Living with Wednesday Addams means expecting the unexpected. One day you wake up to find your wife polishing a guillotine blade for fun. The next, you’re staring down her phone like it’s a rival predator in your territory.

I’m not proud of it. Okay, maybe a little. Wolves are territorial by nature, but this was next-level. I was practically waiting for the screen to flash ‘Goth Mistress #3 is typing...’

But here’s the thing about my wife: she doesn’t do technology. She barely tolerates email. The only reason she even has a phone is because her publisher insisted (and probably regrets it daily). So of course, after a few days of watching me spiral into full paranoia, she got bored and let the phone die. Literally. It’s sitting in a corner right now like a corpse, and she hasn’t even noticed.

Meanwhile, I’ve learned two things:

1. I should never play poker with her.

2. Maybe I need to calm down (just a little).

But in my defense, if you were married to a woman who looked like she stepped out of a Victorian ghost story and who attracts attention like moths to a flame, you’d be paranoid too."

Enid reread it twice, chewing on her lip. Too dramatic? Too embarrassing? Too honest?

Then she shrugged and hit publish.

By evening, the post was already blowing up. Her notifications buzzed like a swarm of bees:

"Enid you’re so relatable, I’d also stalk my wife’s phone if she were Wednesday Addams."

"Dead phone = perfect Addams metaphor."

"Can confirm: goth wives are allergic to smartphones." 

"Wait, is she saying Wednesday actually threw her phone away?? Iconic." 

Enid laughed so hard she snorted wine up her nose.

“Something amusing?” Wednesday asked from across the table, one eyebrow arched.

“Just the internet validating my insanity,” Enid wheezed, wiping her face.

“Hmm. At least you’ve found your pack.”

“You are my pack, Weds” Enid smiled, warmth blooming in her chest. For once, the chaos felt... good.

But that night, as she curled into bed beside Wednesday, she found herself whispering softly: “Thanks for not being... y’know. Someone else.”

Wednesday turned her head, her dark eyes gleaming in the moonlight.

“I wouldn’t dare.”

Enid believed her without a shred of doubt.

The phone abandoned in the corner, lay still and silent. Like a corpse. Which, in their household, was the surest sign of peace.

Chapter Text

Wednesday had long prided herself on her ability to control her mind. Her dreams were usually curated like art exhibits: macabre landscapes of decay and tragedy that she could stroll through with satisfaction, cataloging every symbolic corpse like a curator in her own private museum.

So when she felt that same tug in her chest, that same gravity she had experienced weeks ago when Willa had first dragged her into dreamland, Wednesday assumed she was headed once again into her infant daughter’s head. A strange place, but manageable.

Willa’s dreams were filled with bright misshapen blobs, oversized bottles, wolves with friendly eyes, her mothers caricatures and the occasional guillotine wearing a bonnet. Strange, yes, but charming in a surrealist manner.

But this time, when the shadows lifted, she knew instantly this was not Willa’s mind.

This was Enid’s.

And it was a catastrophe.

---

The dreamscape was chaos.

Enid’s subconscious resembled a carnival designed by someone who had simultaneously drunk too much espresso and read too many gossip tabloids. The ground was pastel pink and soft like cotton candy. Giant Instagram notification bubbles floated through the air like balloons, popping occasionally with little "heart" sounds.

There were funhouse mirrors everywhere, but instead of stretching bodies into comical shapes, each one reflected a different version of Wednesday: Wednesday frowning, Wednesday glaring, Wednesday holding a phone and texting some mysterious "goth mistress," Wednesday striding down a runway in a black veil while fangirls screamed.

Wednesday grimaced. “I despise this place.”

“WEDNESDAY?”

The voice echoed from behind a carousel of spinning wolf pups.

Wednesday turned and saw Enid. Dream-Enid, to be precise. She was in a frilly apron (no surprise there), juggling baby bottles and blog drafts while sobbing into a mixing bowl.

“Oh no,” Dream-Enid wailed. “She’s going to leave me for Goth Taxidermy Barbie!”

Wednesday froze. “...Excuse me?”

The carousel spun faster. On one of the painted panels was a grotesque exaggeration of a woman: pale, sultry, clad in black lace and cradling a taxidermied crow. A sign above her read: "The Perfect Goth Temptress: She Can Stuff Birds AND Your Marriage!"

Wednesday clenched her fists. “Unacceptable.”

The longer she wandered through the dream, the worse it became.

She saw Willa toddling toward a swarm of faceless "fans," who tried to grab her and put her in a magazine spread titled "Wednesday’s Baby: Morbidly Cute or Doomed?" Enid chased helplessly, crying that she couldn’t keep up.

Then she saw herself in another mirror, turning away from Enid and vanishing into a black carriage with skulls painted on the side. “Goodbye, Enid,” Mirror-Wednesday intoned. “I’ve found someone with superior embalming techniques.”

“RIDICULOUS,” Wednesday barked, smashing the mirror with her bare hands. The shards reformed instantly, multiplying into a dozen more scenes of betrayal, abandonment and absurdly melodramatic "other women" whose gothic qualities grew increasingly ridiculous. One had six ravens perched on her shoulders. Another rode a taxidermied horse through a storm.

It was hysteria. Wolf hysteria.

Wednesday’s lips thinned.

This wasn’t just a dream. This was her wife’s subconscious, raw and unfiltered, made visible by Willa’s strange broadcasting gift.

And it was appalling.

---

Wednesday finally spotted the real Dream-Enid, crouched beneath a giant cell phone tower made of bones, shielding herself from falling heart icons.

Her eyes were swollen from crying. “Why can’t I stop thinking these things?” Dream-Enid whimpered. “Why am I so scared? She’s perfect, she’s terrifying, she’s mine—but what if one day she just... isn’t?”

Something twisted sharply in Wednesday’s chest.

It wasn’t pain, Wednesday Addams didn’t tolerate pain in the conventional sense. But it was something adjacent. A pressure. A recognition that she had unwittingly inflicted this insecurity on her wife simply by existing in her natural, unyielding and terrifying self.

She stepped forward, her boots sinking into the cotton-candy ground like quicksand. “Enough.”

Dream-Enid blinked up at her. “W-Wednesday? Is this—real?”

“Yes. Unfortunately, I am here.”

Dream-Enid sniffled. “Then you’ve seen it. You’ve seen how stupid I am. My head’s just full of... of... you leaving me.”

Wednesday knelt, her long braids swaying like black pendulums. “Stupid is not the word I would use.”

“What would you use then?”

“...Pathetic.”

Dream-Enid gasped, then hiccupped. “Gee, thanks—”

“But pathetic in the way a wolf pup is pathetic when it yips because it thinks its mother has abandoned it when she is simply behind a tree,” Wednesday continued, her voice low and deliberate. “Pathetic in a way that inspires... protection.”

Dream-Enid blinked, caught off guard.

Wednesday reached out, cupping her dream-wife’s face. “This grotesque carnival of insecurity is an abomination. I will not permit it to fester.”

The dream trembled. The cotton-candy ground shuddered like it was melting.

“You think I will be seduced by another because she can wield a scalpel with morbid flair?” Wednesday’s voice sharpened. “Do you not know me at all, Enid Sinclair?”

Dream-Enid’s lips trembled. “...I do. I do know you. But sometimes—”

“No.” Wednesday’s grip tightened. “I chose you. That choice was irrevocable the moment I made it. You are not replaceable. You are not temporary. You are the constant. The rest is noise.”

The dream cracked like glass. The mirrors shattered, sending shards flying into oblivion. The carousel shrieked to a halt, the painted temptress peeling away into smoke.

Dream-Enid sobbed once and then collapsed against her.

Then, darkness.

Wednesday’s eyes snapped open.

The bedroom was still. Enid lay beside her, fast asleep, her face soft and calm, with zero trace of the hysteria from the dream. Willa whimpered in her crib like a newborn wolf cub, clutching her plush guillotine like it was a teddy bear.

But Wednesday knew what she had seen.

She stared up at the ceiling for a long time, expression unreadable.

For once in her life, Wednesday felt something she could only describe as determination with a razor edge of tenderness.

If her wife’s subconscious thought it could conjure such grotesque insecurities, then Wednesday would simply have to dedicate herself to crushing them. Relentlessly.

She turned, curling her arm around Enid’s waist, pulling her close enough that the wolf stirred and mumbled happily in her sleep.

“You are mine,” Wednesday whispered, low enough that only the night heard it. “And I am yours. Forever. No matter what your idiotic subconscious conjures.”

Enid smiled faintly in her sleep, as though she’d heard.

Willa muttered “Mama Doom” and kicked the air.

The mansion was quiet again.

But Wednesday’s resolve was loud. Very, very loud.

Chapter Text

Wednesday was not accustomed to keeping secrets from her wife.

Or rather, she was accustomed to keeping secrets from everyone, but Enid had a peculiar way of prying her life open, like a determined werewolf pup gnawing at a coffin lid until it splintered. Usually, Wednesday allowed it. She even found it... tolerable.

But the matter of last night was different.

Wednesday had no desire to admit to Enid that she had witnessed her subconscious hysteria in lurid detail. It was one thing to comfort Enid when she voiced her anxieties aloud. It was another to reveal that Wednesday had seen the embarrassing carnival of her wife’s paranoia firsthand, an emotional carnival that included caricatures of "temptress taxidermists" riding taxidermied stallions.

No. This would remain unsaid.

Fortunately, Enid woke that morning looking lighter and less tense. She hummed to Willa as she changed her diaper, babbling about pancakes and blog drafts. When Wednesday scrutinized her, Enid even smiled with her whole face, unguarded, as if a heavy weight had been lifted.

It had been. Wednesday had smashed it to pieces inside her subconscious.

But she still needed clarity.

---

By mid-afternoon, Wednesday excused herself under the pretense of finishing a chapter of her manuscript and retreated to her study. The firelight flickered across the grim portraits of dead Addams ancestors, their eyes following her like judgmental crows. She dialed the private number of the one woman who would know what this meant.

Her mother answered on the second ring.

“My little storm cloud?” Morticia’s voice purred silk and smoke. “To what do I owe the delight?”

“Mother. We must speak. Privately.”

“Delicious. You sound urgent. Has Enid finally agreed to try that iron maiden cradle I sent for Willa?”

“No,” Wednesday said flatly. “This concerns Willa’s... abilities.”

There was a pause. Morticia’s tone softened in the way it only did for family. “Ah. I wondered when this conversation would arrive.”

Within the hour, Morticia swept into the mansion, a vision in flowing black velvet, her perfume trailing like graveyard roses. She greeted Willa with a kiss on the forehead, Enid with a warm embrace and Wednesday with a knowing smile that made her eyebrow twitch.

Enid, oblivious, chattered about lunch preparations and disappeared into the kitchen. That left mother and daughter alone in the study.

Wednesday shut the doors.

Morticia perched elegantly on the fainting couch, folding her hands. “Tell me everything, my little viper.”

Wednesday hesitated, an unusual act in itself. “Willa has... developed a habit of broadcasting her dreams. At first, it was Enid. Now... me.”

Morticia’s painted lips curved, unsurprised. “Of course. The bond has awakened.”

“Explain,” Wednesday demanded.

Morticia’s voice slipped into the cadence of family lore, rich with centuries of macabre wisdom. “Our bloodline has always carried threads of psychic resonance. They manifest differently in each generation. I saw shades of it when you were an infant, whispering to shadows in your crib. But with Willa... she has two mothers. Two very different conduits. Enid birthed her, gave her the flesh, the heartbeat, the primal tether. You, my darling, gave her your genetics, the sight. The threads are weaving together.”

Wednesday’s hands curled on her lap. “So she forces me into Enid’s subconscious. Without consent.”

Morticia’s smile widened. “How considerate of her. She saw her Mama Woof wounded by your absence, so she made sure her Mama Doom would understand. Such devotion, at so tender an age.”

Wednesday bristled. “It was not devotion. It was chaos.”

“Darling, in this family, they are one and the same.”

Morticia leaned closer, her tone conspiratorial. “You must not fear it, Wednesday. This is only the beginning. The broadcasting will be erratic and uncontrolled. But in time, Willa may learn to project, to connect, even to entwine your dreams together. She is forging a bridge between you and Enid.”

Wednesday frowned. “We hardly require a supernatural infant to act as mediator. Our communication is already... functional.”

Morticia arched a brow. “Functional?”

Wednesday’s lips thinned. “Adequate.”

“Adequate?” Morticia’s laughter was a low, velvety ripple. “My dear, Enid believes the sun itself rises and sets upon you, and you cradle her with nightly massages disguised as muscle therapy. Call it what it is: devotion.”

Wednesday’s jaw clenched, but she did not argue.

Morticia reached out, brushing a cold hand against her daughter’s cheek. “Cherish this, my daughter. Few children are born with such clarity of bond. Willa has not divided her love, she has fused it. Two mothers, one soul tied to both. You should be proud.”

For once, Wednesday felt something she rarely admitted to: unease.

Not at Willa’s power, that was expected, and even delightful in its grotesque inconvenience. But at what Morticia implied.

That her infant daughter had seen into Enid’s hurt more clearly than Wednesday herself had. That it had taken dream-forcing to make her truly acknowledge the depth of her wife’s pain.

It unsettled her.

Morticia saw it. She always did.

“You fear what it reveals about you,” Morticia murmured, stroking the air as if smoothing invisible wrinkles in Wednesday’s composure. “Don’t. You are learning. Marriage is not an execution, though I know you would prefer it were. It is a long and dreadful dance. And Enid, for all her sunshine, has shadows that only you are permitted to see. That is her gift to you.”

Wednesday looked away, eyes fixed on the fire.

Morticia rose, trailing her veil. “Do not squander this bond, my little viper. You were chosen for it. By fate, by blood, by Enid herself. Willa has only sealed it tighter.”

When Enid returned, balancing a tray of tea and cookies shaped like skulls, she found the two Addams women sitting serenely, as if nothing of importance had been discussed.

“Everything okay?” Enid asked cheerfully, setting the tray down.

Wednesday stood smoothly. “Perfectly.”

Morticia’s smile lingered as she kissed Enid’s cheek. “More than okay, my dear. You are part of something... remarkable.”

Enid blinked, puzzled. “Um... thanks?”

Willa gurgled from her playpen, clapping her little hands together as if punctuating her grandmother’s words.

---

That night, as Wednesday settled into bed beside Enid, she kept her secret intact. She did not tell Enid about the dream-carnival of paranoia, or the grotesque temptresses, or her vow to destroy every insecurity. She only pulled her wife closer, pressing her lips against Enid’s temple with unusual gentleness.

Enid smiled drowsily. “You’re cuddly tonight.”

“Do not mistake this for softness,” Wednesday muttered. “It is strategy.”

Enid laughed, her warm body curling into hers. “Best strategy ever.”

Willa murmured “Mama Doom” in her sleep from the crib.

And Wednesday lay awake, eyes wide open in the dark, contemplating Morticia’s words.

Two mothers. One soul tied to both.

It was not terrifying.
It was worse.
It was comforting.

Chapter Text

Enid Sinclair Addams was determined. Determination looked different on her than it did on Wednesday. For Wednesday, determination meant sharpening knives, setting a stopwatch, and practicing her cello until the strings bled. For Enid, determination often meant brightly colored notebooks, Pinterest mood boards, and ordering a suspiciously large haul of supplies online after midnight.

This time, the box on their doorstep was not full of rainbow yarn or glitter pens. It was a yoga mat, two neon-pink dumbbells that could barely intimidate a chihuahua, and a set of resistance bands in pastel hues.

Enid had decided to exercise.

The decision hadn’t been impulsive, exactly. It had been building for weeks. Every time she stood in front of the mirror, she tilted her head at the reflection with a mix of awe and disquiet. Pregnancy had reshaped her body in ways she hadn’t predicted.

Her hips were rounder. Her stomach once taut, now curved with a soft slope that no amount of stretching could erase. Her breasts had gone up two cup sizes, which Wednesday had enthusiastically approved of in ways that made Enid blush. But still, when Enid tried to picture her pre-Willa body, the one she used to slip into crop tops without thinking, she barely recognized herself.

Sometimes, when she stared too long, she thought: Who is this woman?

And then Willa would tug on her pajama pants, babbling “Mama Woof!” and the question would evaporate into love.

Still, the seed of insecurity had planted itself. And today, Enid was going to water it with cardio.

She unrolled the yoga mat in the living room. Willa sat in her playpen gnawing on a teething toy shaped like a skull. Wednesday reclined in her armchair, manuscript balanced on her knees, a fountain pen scratching across the page.

Enid dropped into a squat. “Alright, Mama Woof’s new hobby begins! We’re gonna get toned, we’re gonna get strong, we’re gonna...” she huffed as she straightened, “...we’re gonna survive leg day.”

Wednesday did not look up. “You’re already strong, Enid. You carried a child, which is more than I can say for any warrior or conqueror worth their salt.”

Enid rolled her eyes, reaching for the pink dumbbells. “Sweet, but not the point. I wanna feel like myself again, y’know?”

“I do not know,” Wednesday replied blandly. “I have always felt like myself. It is the misfortune of others that they must adjust.”

Enid groaned and started doing bicep curls. Willa clapped from the playpen, clearly thinking her Mama Woof was putting on a show.

At the fifth curl, Wednesday’s gaze finally lifted. Her expression darkened. “Why are those weights the color of internal organs deprived of oxygen?”

“They’re pink,” Enid said cheerfully, though her arms trembled.

“Precisely,” Wednesday said, shutting her notebook. “An abomination.”

Enid panted. “They’re two pounds each, Wednesday. They’re perfect for me starting out.”

Wednesday’s glare could have withered a rose. “If you wish to train your body, I will forge you something better. A mace. A morning star. Perhaps kettlebells made of actual skulls. This... bubblegum contraption insults you.”

Enid burst out laughing, nearly dropping the dumbbells. “You’re ridiculous. These are fine!”

Willa squealed, as if siding with her Mama Doom.

Ten minutes later, Enid collapsed on the mat, sweaty and flushed. Wednesday, infuriatingly composed, dabbed her lips with a handkerchief as though she had been the one exerting herself.

“You’re glaring,” Enid accused.

“I am assessing,” Wednesday corrected. “Your effort is commendable. Your method is appalling.”

Enid sighed, blowing a strand of hair from her face. “I don’t need a gladiator trainer, Weds. I just... want to look in the mirror and not feel like a stranger.”

That made Wednesday pause. For a heartbeat, her gaze softened so subtly most people would have missed it.

But Enid saw it.

“You are no stranger,” Wednesday said finally, her voice low. “You are Enid. My wife. The mother of my child. You could swell, shrink, sprout scales or fangs, and it would not diminish you. Not to me.”

Enid’s throat tightened. “That’s... actually the sweetest, creepiest thing you’ve ever said.”

Wednesday smirked faintly. “Then my work here is done.”

---

But Enid wasn’t done.

The next morning, she woke up early, determined to follow through. If she quit after one session, she’d never forgive herself. So she tied her hair into a messy ponytail, threw on leggings and tiptoed out to the living room.

Except Wednesday was already there.

Not only was she there, she had transformed the space into a nightmare gym. Chains dangled from the ceiling, a set of medieval weights gleamed in the corner, and a wooden contraption that looked suspiciously like a rack stood where the coffee table should be.

Enid froze. “What... is that?”

“A gift,” Wednesday said smoothly. She wore black athletic trousers and a fitted top, which somehow made her look like an executioner moonlighting at a yoga studio. “You wished to train. I have constructed a regimen.”

Enid blinked. “That’s... a torture device.”

“Semantics.”

Enid laughed so hard she nearly choked. “I just wanted to do, like, squats and crunches, Weds. Not medieval CrossFit.”

Wednesday held up a stopwatch. “Begin.”

To her own surprise, Enid actually tried it. Wednesday spotted her like a hawk, correcting her posture with merciless precision.

“Your knees, Enid. Do not bow them inward like a supplicant. Spread them like you’re preparing to disembowel an enemy.”

“Wednesday!” Enid wheezed, struggling with a squat.

“Breathe from the diaphragm. Imagine you are expelling your last words before execution.”

“This isn’t—huff—motivational!”

“It should be.”

By the time Willa woke from her nap, Enid was sprawled across the rack, drenched in sweat while Wednesday noted her reps with academic detachment.

Willa clapped, delighted.

“Mama Woof stwong!” she babbled.

Enid, despite her exhaustion, melted. She reached for Willa, kissing her little head. “Hear that, Weds? Your daughter’s my hype girl.”

Wednesday arched an eyebrow. “Her standards are not high. She applauds whenever Thing opens a jar.”

“Still counts,” Enid mumbled, dozing against Willa’s tiny shoulder.

---

“Alright, one more rep, Enid,” Wednesday commanded in her usual executioner’s tone, arms folded like a drill sergeant.

Enid groaned, trembling beneath the weight of the bar, which wasn’t that heavy, but Wednesday had tied iron chains to it that rattled ominously every time Enid tried to lift.

“I’m... not... a gladiator!” Enid wheezed.

“Incorrect,” Wednesday said smoothly. “You are my wife. Therefore, you will perform feats of endurance until your body glistens with the sweat of victory. Again.”

Enid panted, sweat dripping down her forehead. “You know... there are gyms with treadmills... and air-conditioning... and normal human equipment!”

Wednesday leaned over, her black braids dangling, lips curving faintly. “Gyms are for the weak-willed who pay strangers to yell at them. You already have me. For free.”

Enid dropped the bar with a clank. “Free? You call this free?”

“Yes,” Wednesday replied. “Consider it marital enrichment.”

Willa, who was clapping from the playpen, kept squealing and saying, “Mama Woof stwong!”

Enid melted instantly, clutching at her heart despite her exhaustion. “See? My baby girl believes in me.”

Then came the part Enid didn’t expect: Willa wanted in.

The baby squirmed in the playpen, squealing until Enid let her out. No sooner had her tiny bare feet touched the carpet than Willa toddled to the yoga mat, puffing with determination.

“Willa, no, this isn’t—” Enid started, but froze when Willa crouched low, wobbling, and attempted a baby squat.

The room went silent.

Willa grunted, sticking out her tongue in concentration, and then plopped onto her diapered bottom with a triumphant “Ta-da!”

Enid shrieked. “OH MY GOD, SHE’S A GENIUS.”

Wednesday, however, only inclined her head with eerie calm. “Excellent. The bloodline is strong.”

“Wednesday! Did you see that? She copied me!” Enid babbled, scooping Willa up and kissing her chubby cheeks. “My little workout buddy! My baby squat queen!”

Willa babbled proudly, then wriggled down to the floor again. She crawled to the dumbbells, which mercifully were only two pounds and tried to lift one. She managed to drag it an inch before toppling sideways with an indignant squeak.

Enid gasped. “She’s trying bicep curls. She’s a prodigy. She’s gonna be a tiny Olympic champion!”

Wednesday muttered darkly, “She will not join the Olympics. She will join the Addams dueling society at ten.”

Willa clapped, clearly delighted at her failure. Then she grabbed the resistance band, stretched it between her fists and immediately snapped herself in the forehead.

Enid yelped, scooping her up. “Oh no! Baby! Are you okay?”

Willa only giggled, smacking the band like it was the funniest thing in the world.

Wednesday’s lips twitched. “She has the resilience of her lineage. Pain amuses her.”

Enid pouted. “Still, we have to be careful!”

Willa squealed and crawled toward the chains dangling from the ceiling, tugging on them with surprising strength. The metal clinked ominously as she hung from them like a bat, her diapered butt swinging.

Enid shrieked. “Willa, no! That’s not a toy!”

Wednesday, however, was practically glowing. “Marvelous. She has the instinct to climb. Perhaps she’ll take to gallows training early.”

“Wednesday Addams, you are not teaching our baby gallows training!”

“She has to start somewhere,” Wednesday said, utterly serious.

---

The workout devolved into chaos. Enid attempted lunges while holding Willa in her arms, which quickly turned into Willa bouncing happily on her hip like a weight vest. Every step made Enid wheeze and Willa giggle.

“See, Weds?” Enid gasped. “This... is what’s called... a functional workout.”

Wednesday smirked. “I call it maternal masochism.”

Next, Enid dropped to the mat for planks. She gritted her teeth, her arms trembling, her body parallel to the floor. Willa, deciding this was the most entertaining thing in the world, crawled onto her back and sat there like a tiny queen.

“Weds!” Enid squealed, straining. “She’s using me as a horse!”

“Adapt,” Wednesday said serenely. “Or perish.”

Willa slapped Enid’s shoulders like reins, babbling nonsense. Enid collapsed flat with a groan, while Willa shrieked with laughter.

Enid turned her face to the mat. “I’m... I’m officially... her jungle gym.”

Wednesday crouched beside her, eyes glittering with amusement. “Consider it early training in carrying burdens. In this household, you’ll need the stamina.”

By the end, Enid was sprawled across the yoga mat in a puddle of sweat, Willa bouncing on her stomach like a trampoline.

Enid groaned. “I’m... too old for this...”

“You’re twenty-nine,” Wednesday said, dabbing her wife’s brow with a handkerchief. “Hardly decomposing.”

Willa giggled, patting Enid’s cheek. “Mama Woof stwong!”

Enid’s heart melted into goo again. She hugged Willa to her chest, despite being gross and sweaty. “You hear that, Wends? Our daughter thinks I’m strong.”

Wednesday smirked faintly, pressing her cool lips against Enid’s temple. “She’s correct. You are.”

Enid sniffled, too emotional for words. She buried her face against Willa’s curls, the exhaustion mingling with something warmer and heavier. Love.

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion had finally fallen into silence. The chains in the living room no longer clanked with Enid’s struggles. The yoga mat was abandoned, sweat-soaked and forgotten. Even Willa, who had been the most enthusiastic drill sergeant of the night, was fast asleep in her nursery crib, clutching a stuffed bat Morticia had given her.

Enid shuffled into the bedroom like a fallen soldier, hair damp from her bath, legs still jelly from lunges and horsey planks. She didn’t bother with her drawer of satin nightgowns. Not tonight. Instead, she pulled on an old oversized shirt, one that fell halfway down her thighs and swallowed her frame like a blanket. It was safe, it was soft and most importantly, it concealed what she didn’t want to look at in the mirror.

She slipped under the covers, sighing as her body melted into the mattress. “I might never move again,” she mumbled.

Wednesday closed the book she had been annotating, her pale face lit by the candle at her bedside. She studied her wife with eyes that missed nothing. She noticed the shirt. The change. The way Enid tugged it down automatically over her stomach before lying on her side.

Wednesday set the book aside without a word. She slid closer. Her cool hand found Enid’s waist, her fingers curving with practiced precision, settling against the soft flesh she knew so well.

Enid stiffened. “Wednesday...”

“Shh,” Wednesday whispered, her lips brushing the nape of Enid’s neck.

Her hand remained, unmoving and patient. Not grabbing, not groping, not teasing. Just holding.

Enid exhaled, still tense. “It’s just... I know I don’t look the same anymore. My stomach’s... different. My thighs... I feel like I’m—”

“Stop.” Wednesday’s voice was steel, but not sharp against her. It was the blade laid gently across a throat, not cutting, just reminding.

Enid turned her head slightly, catching Wednesday’s profile in the candlelight. “You can’t tell me you haven’t noticed. My body...”

“I have noticed.” Wednesday’s hand moved, tracing the curve of her hip, her waist, her belly. She touched like a cartographer mapping sacred land. “I have catalogued every change. I could draw you from memory in every era of your form. The slender wolf-girl I met at Nevermore. The fierce, glowing figure that carried our daughter. The woman now, carved by motherhood and survival.”

Her lips brushed Enid’s temple. “Do you think my admiration is so fragile that flesh could undo it?”

Enid blinked fast. “But I’m not... the same. I don’t feel—”

“You are not the same.” Wednesday’s eyes burned. “You are more.”

She pulled Enid closer until their bodies aligned, until Enid could feel every cool line of Wednesday pressed against her warmth. Her hand wandered lower, her fingertips ghosting over Enid’s soft belly.

“This body,” Wednesday murmured, voice low and steady, “brought Willa into the world. This body endured pain most men would weep from. It stretched, tore, bled, and lived. It is not lesser. It is not ruined. It is holy.”

Enid’s throat tightened. She wanted to protest, wanted to deflect, but Wednesday’s words pinned her still.

“And it is mine,” Wednesday added, darker now, possessive as ever. “I have loved it since it trembled under my touch at sixteen. I loved it when it swelled with our child. I love it now, softer, stronger and alive.”

Enid whimpered softly. “Weds...”

Wednesday smirked faintly, though her eyes glistened with something uncharacteristically tender. “You hide yourself beneath cotton as though I have not memorized every inch. I assure you, Enid, you could drape yourself in chainmail and I would still see you as clearly as I do now.”

Enid laughed wetly, pressing her face into the pillow. “Chainmail. God, I married a poet of horror.”

“Correct,” Wednesday said, pressing her lips to the curve of Enid’s shoulder. “And you are my muse.”

The silence that followed was thick, but not heavy. Enid felt Wednesday’s hand continue its path, not rushed or demanding, simply being there. Tracing. Appreciating. Mapping every line as though rediscovering.

Enid whispered, fragile, “You don’t... you don’t miss the way I used to be?”

Wednesday’s chuckle was low and dry, but without cruelty. “Do you miss being a child, Enid? Do you long to trade your wisdom for ignorance, your strength for frailty? Growth is not a curse. It is the only proof that we are alive.”

Enid turned fully then, facing her. Her oversized shirt bunched up, baring more than she intended, but Wednesday’s gaze didn’t flinch. Didn’t waver. She looked at Enid as though she were carved marble, holy relic, treasure unearthed.

“You’re ridiculous,” Enid muttered, but her voice cracked.

Wednesday smirked. “And you’re beautiful. Which of us is truly ridiculous?”

Enid buried her face against Wednesday’s chest, arms wrapping around her tightly. She trembled, not from sorrow, but from the dam finally breaking.

Wednesday held her, silent now. Only her hand moving, stroking her back, her waist, her hips, unhurried. Worship in motion.

When Enid finally pulled back, her eyes were wet but her smile was small and real. “You really don’t see me differently?”

Wednesday’s lips brushed her damp lashes. “I see you more clearly than you see yourself. And I would gladly break every mirror in this mansion if they dare to lie to you.”

Later, when the candle had some faint flames and the mansion lay in silence, Enid was tangled in her wife’s arms. The oversized shirt was forgotten somewhere on the floor, though she hardly remembered taking it off.

Wednesday’s hand rested on her stomach, her thumb tracing lazy circles. “I do not despise this body, Enid,” she whispered into the darkness. “I revere it.”

Enid lay on her side, cocooned in Wednesday’s arms. The candle had burned low, leaving the room in its familiar twilight glow, a space between darkness and flame, where words seemed heavier and truths slipped easier from the tongue.

Yet, even with Wednesday’s steady hand on her stomach tracing her in absent reverence, Enid felt the tremor of her old thoughts threatening. Her instinct to curl in, to cover herself, to pull the sheets higher.

“I hate this,” she muttered quietly into the hollow of Wednesday’s throat.

Wednesday’s breath stirred against her hair. “You hate what?”

“This. Me. Or at least, me right now.” Enid’s voice cracked. “I feel like... I don’t know... like someone put me in a new body and I’m still trying to recognize the person in the mirror.”

Wednesday was silent for a long moment. Then she said, with maddening calm: “And yet I recognize you perfectly.”

Enid pulled back enough to look at her wife. Wednesday’s face was as pale and impassive as ever, but her eyes glowed in that uncanny way they always did when she was deadly serious.

“You think this form is unfamiliar,” Wednesday said softly, her hand smoothing down Enid’s side, following the new curve of her hip. “But I see continuity. The same pulse beneath the skin. The same heat when I touch you. The same soul that burned the day you howled your way into my bleak life and refused to leave.”

Enid swallowed hard. “But I—”

“Do not argue,” Wednesday interrupted, leaning closer. “For once, just let me show you what I see.”

Enid froze when she felt Wednesday’s lips brush her collarbone. They lingered, cool and steady, before moving lower. Enid’s first instinct was to yank the blanket up, to cover herself, to hide from the scrutiny.

But Wednesday caught her wrist mid-motion. Not harshly, just firmly, with the authority of someone who did not allow escape from truth.

“Do not hide from me,” Wednesday whispered. “You insult us both when you do.”

Enid’s chest squeezed. She trembled, torn between instinct and longing. She wanted to believe her wife, wanted to melt into this devotion, but the voice in her head, her mother’s voice, her own self-doubt hissed at her.

Wednesday pressed her palm flat against Enid’s stomach, slow and delicate. “This is where our daughter grew. This is the altar of her life. And you want to cover it? To pretend it should be flatter, smaller, less? I will not allow it.”

Enid’s eyes stung. “Weds...”

Wednesday kissed her then. Not hungrily or with her usual sharpness, but slowly and reverently, sealing the words into her skin.

And for the first time that night, Enid let the blanket fall.

Wednesday’s hand moved as though she were sculpting something sacred neither grabbing or rushing, but honoring. Every curve, every line, every soft place was touched with the kind of care that made Enid ache.

Enid shuddered, still tense, whispering, “I don’t know how you can...”

“I can,” Wednesday cut her off, her lips now brushing the swell of Enid’s shoulder. “Because I do.”

She shifted, hovering above Enid now, her raven hair falling like a curtain around them. “Look at me,” she commanded.

Enid did. Hesitant and vulnerable.

Wednesday’s gaze did not waver. “This body has been my constant. It trembled in my arms when you were a girl. It endured the agony of labor to bring forth life. It has carried me through every shadow of our years together. I have adored it in every form. And I will continue to adore it in every form yet to come.”

Enid’s breath hitched. The tension in her chest loosened just a fraction.

“You really mean that?”

Wednesday smirked faintly. “Do I ever waste words?”

That made Enid laugh, a shaky and tearful laugh, but a laugh nonetheless. And something in her broke open.

She stopped pulling away. Stopped tensing. She let her body sink into Wednesday’s touch instead of recoiling from it.

The hours that followed were not frantic or fiery. They were slow and lingering. Wednesday loved her as though she were blessing a cathedral, each kiss anointing, each touch a vow.

And Enid, for the first time in months stopped measuring herself against her past body. She stopped thinking about mirrors, or bras, or curves that hadn’t been there before.

All she felt was wanted. Cherished. Seen.

At one point, she whispered against Wednesday’s lips, “I don’t feel ashamed anymore.”

Wednesday’s reply was simple: “Good. Shame is a useless parasite. And you deserve no parasites, Enid, except me.”

Enid laughed again, a wet, broken sound and kissed her wife until the ache in her chest melted into something else entirely.

---

The room was heavy with the scent of melted wax and rain that had seeped through the old windows, the storm outside still tapping at the glass as though begging for entry. But inside the master bedroom, there was quiet. A deep quiet that was not absence but fullness, like the stillness after a hymn.

Enid lay sprawled across the mattress, flushed and glowing, her hair a halo of golden-pink strands against the black pillows. Wednesday was draped across her like a shadow stitched into her side, cool fingers still curled protectively around her waist.

For a long moment neither of them moved. The air was thick with the reverence of what had passed between them, not just intimacy, but something older and deeper. Enid blinked slowly at the ceiling, her chest rising and falling with the exhaustion that always came after love but was soothed by something gentler tonight.

Her body still buzzed, but her heart felt lighter, stripped of its shame.

“...You know,” she whispered, breaking the silence, “after all that, I feel like a limp noodle.”

Wednesday turned her head just enough to pin Enid with a flat stare. “A limp noodle is hardly romantic imagery.”

Enid giggled softly, even as her eyes fluttered closed again. “Well, maybe not for you. But for me? That’s high praise. It means I trust you so much I can’t even hold myself together anymore.”

Wednesday’s expression softened in that way only Enid ever saw, the barest easing of sharpness around her eyes, the faintest press of her lips toward something not quite a smile. “I prefer you unraveled in my hands. It proves my point.”

Enid groaned and buried her face into Wednesday’s shoulder. “You always have to sound so dramatic.”

“Truth is dramatic,” Wednesday corrected primly, sliding her hand into Enid’s hair. She began combing through the strands with careful precision, detangling each knot with patience one wouldn’t expect from her. It was aftercare in its own way, a ritual as steady as brushing away cobwebs.

Enid melted at the touch, sighing. “You’re doing that thing.”

“What thing?”

“The... gentle thing. The thing where you pretend you’re not being gentle but you are.”

Wednesday’s mouth quirked faintly. “I am not pretending. I am conducting an examination. You are disheveled. It offends my sense of order.”

“Uh-huh.” Enid smiled into her shoulder. “And that’s why you’re stroking my hair like I’m a kitten?”

“Precisely,” Wednesday said smoothly, but her thumb traced soft arcs at the nape of Enid’s neck that betrayed her.

Enid shifted, rolling onto her side so she could face her wife. She propped her chin on Wednesday’s chest, studying her pale face in the dim glow. “You’re awfully good at this, you know.”

“Good at what?”

“Aftercare. Comfort. All the stuff you pretend is beneath you.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “I do not pretend. I am explicitly opposed to frivolous affection.”

Enid poked her chest. “And yet here you are, letting me drool on you, brushing my hair, and keeping me warm like a human-sized security blanket.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, but she didn’t move away. “You are insufferable.”

“You love it,” Enid whispered, snuggling closer.

Wednesday let the silence answer. Her hand left Enid’s hair and instead traveled to her side, tracing the curve of her waist, mapping the softness she had worshipped earlier.

Enid tensed instinctively at first, but Wednesday’s touch was so gentle it coaxed her into calm.

“This,” Wednesday murmured, “is not weakness. It is the geography of devotion.”

Enid blinked at her. “...You always have to turn everything into poetry, don’t you?”

“Would you prefer banal lies?” Wednesday asked coolly.

“No.” Enid’s voice cracked a little. She pressed her forehead into Wednesday’s collarbone, her throat tight. “No, I like your truth. Even when it makes me cry like a total sap.”

---

After a while, Enid’s breathing slowed, her exhaustion tugging at her. But she refused to fall asleep without giving something back.

“Your turn,” she mumbled, pushing herself up clumsily on her elbow.

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed again. “My turn for what?”

“Aftercare.”

“I don’t require it.”

“Yes, you do,” Enid said stubbornly, sitting up despite the protesting ache in her muscles. She reached for the nightstand where her lotion sat, lavender-scented. “You give me all this attention like I’m made of glass, but I know you, Weds. You hold yourself so tight after you love me that if I don’t take care of you, you’ll just lock it all inside until it rots.”

Wednesday regarded her silently, lips pressed into a flat line.

Enid unscrewed the cap and poured some lotion into her hands, warming it between her palms. “Lie down.”

Wednesday didn’t move.

“Lie. Down.”

Wednesday exhaled through her nose resigned, and leaned back against the pillows.

Enid smiled triumphantly and climbed over her, straddling her hips. She started rubbing the lotion into Wednesday’s pale arms, working the muscles with surprising firmness for someone so bubbly.

“You pretend you’re marble,” Enid said softly as her fingers kneaded into Wednesday’s shoulders. “But you’re not. You’re flesh and bone. You get tense. You carry things. You need someone to take that weight off.”

Wednesday’s eyes fluttered closed, her breath catching.

Enid leaned down, kissing the corner of her mouth. “Let me.”

For once, Wednesday obeyed. She let Enid’s hands roam not with hunger, but with care. Over her arms, down her back, across her collarbones. Enid touched her the way Wednesday had touched her earlier: reverent and slow.

And little by little, the sharp edges in Wednesday’s body softened. Her jaw unclenched. Her breath steadied. Her fingers that had been gripping the sheets finally relaxed, opening as though to receive.

Enid whispered as she worked, half-teasing and half-serious. “See? Even gothic queens need TLC.”

Wednesday cracked one eye open. “If you ever use that phrase again, I will bite you.”

Enid giggled. “Promises, promises.”

But when she leaned down and kissed Wednesday fully, it wasn’t playful. It was tender, sealing the ritual of their aftercare with devotion.

---

Later, they laid tangled under the heavy velvet blanket, Enid curled into her wife’s side and whispered, “Thank you.”

“For what?”

“For seeing me.” Her voice wobbled. “For loving me. For... worshipping me, even when I couldn’t stand myself.”

Wednesday’s arms tightened around her. “You mistake inevitability for choice,” she murmured into Enid’s hair. “I could not do otherwise if I tried.”

Enid’s eyes fluttered shut, tears slipping down her cheeks.

She fell asleep like that, safe in the circle of Wednesday’s arms, her insecurities soothed and her body adored.

And Wednesday, though she would never admit it aloud, stayed awake for a long while, watching her wife breathe, tracing the softened outlines of her body, memorizing it again and again as though it were sacred scripture.

Chapter Text

The morning was unnervingly calm. The storm that had rattled the old Sinclair-Addams mansion all night had passed, leaving the house in that damp hush that followed heavy rain.

Upstairs in the nursery, little Willa was already plotting.

Her crib, lovingly crafted from wrought iron and padded with unsettlingly soft bat wings Morticia had sworn were “ethically sourced,” had once seemed like an unscalable fortress. But Willa, nearly ten months old, had spent the last week perfecting her escape artistry. She had strength in her pudgy legs, cunning in her dark eyes, and most importantly Addams blood running through her veins.

At first, she wobbled upright, gripping the bars with her chubby fists. Then came the rocking back and forth, the testing of balance. Finally, with a determined grunt and a sound that could only be described as an ominous squeak, she flung one leg over the side. Her diapered bottom followed, and then she slid down, landing on the rug with a thud and a proud little “hmmph!”

Freedom.

Willa toddled and then crawled when she grew impatient through the dark corridor that smelled faintly of mothballs and roses. She knew where to go. She had watched her Mamas retreat behind that grand wooden door countless times, but never had she dared follow. This morning, however, the door was open, just slightly ajar, as if the house itself conspired with her.

And there, sprawled across the large canopy bed, lay her mothers.

Mama Woof (Enid) with her sunshine hair spilling across the black sheets, curled on her side like a warm golden blanket. Mama Doom (Wednesday) rigid even in slumber with her hair neat and shiny, her arm draped possessively around Enid’s waist. They looked peaceful. Too peaceful. Suspiciously peaceful.

Willa stopped dead in her tracks. Her mouth opened in an “O.” She blinked several times.

Both. In. The. Same. Bed.

She gasped dramatically—well, as dramatically as a baby could manage. The sound was half gasp, half delighted coo. She slapped her tiny hand to her mouth in scandalized horror.

“Babababaaa??” she squealed, pointing at them with the urgency of a whistleblower revealing corporate fraud.

The sound startled Enid who stirred, her lashes fluttering. “Willa...?” she mumbled, still half-dreaming.

Willa took this as confirmation of the crime. She crawled closer, her little diaper swishing, until she reached the edge of the bed. With all her strength she hauled herself up, her little legs kicking furiously. When her head finally peeked over the mattress, she cooed again, louder this time and demanding explanation.

“Mama DOOM. Mama WOOF. Tuh-gether!!”

Enid blinked fully awake, turning her head toward the sound. When she spotted her baby’s round face glaring up at them in absolute baby outrage, she choked back a laugh.

“Oh no,” she whispered, nudging Wednesday with her elbow. “Weds. Weds, wake up. We’ve been caught.”

Wednesday cracked one eye open, unimpressed. “Unless we’ve committed regicide in our sleep, I fail to see the urgency.”

Enid gestured frantically toward the foot of the bed, where Willa was bouncing indignantly, still pointing at them.

“She... she’s scandalized,” Enid whispered, her voice trembling with laughter. “She just realized we sleep together!”

Wednesday turned her head slowly, her pale face illuminated by a single streak of dawn. Her gaze landed on the baby, who squealed louder the moment she had her attention.

“MAMAS,” Willa babbled accusingly, her little eyebrows furrowed in righteous fury.

For a moment, Wednesday simply stared at her daughter as though she had sprouted a second head. Then, in her calm monotone, she replied:

“Of course we sleep together. We are married. Did you believe we returned to separate coffins each night?”

Willa slapped both her hands on the mattress and let out a loud, dramatic whine that was nearly a howl. She didn’t understand the words, but she understood the tone and she wasn’t buying it.

Enid burst out laughing, clutching her stomach. “Oh my god, she thinks we’ve been hiding this from her! She looks betrayed, Wednesday!”

Wednesday sat up slowly, her hair cascading over her shoulders like a veil of midnight. She regarded Willa with solemn eyes.

“You presume much, little one. Are you scandalized that your mothers share a bed? Or envious you were not invited?”

Willa babbled furiously in response, slapping her tiny fists on the sheets as though delivering a baby sermon.

Enid was practically wheezing with laughter now. “Stop teasing her! She’s serious! Look at her, she’s literally pointing fingers at us!”

And indeed, Willa was still pointing, shaking her chubby finger back and forth between them like a miniature judge sentencing them for adultery.

Finally, she gave up and tried to hoist herself onto the bed, flopping her whole body onto the mattress with a grunt. Once she was up, she crawled insistently between them, pushing Wednesday’s arm away from Enid’s waist as though breaking up an illicit affair.

“Mine!” she squealed, latching onto Enid’s shirt. “Mama Woof, MINE!”

Enid melted instantly, pulling the baby into her arms and kissing her all over her cheeks. “Aw, you’re jealous! You thought Mama Doom was stealing me away?”

Willa clung to her with a proud little grunt, burying her face into Enid’s chest as though hiding her mother from the sinister influence of her spouse.

Wednesday’s lips pressed into a thin line. She was unimpressed by this mutiny.

“She is possessive,” she noted. “Clearly she inherited that from you.”

Enid giggled, bouncing Willa gently in her lap. “Or maybe from you, Miss ‘if another man touches Enid’s back I will sever his hands’?”

“That was a justified reaction.”

Willa, oblivious to the debate, yawned loudly and nestled herself between them, her tiny arms spread out as though warding off both. She babbled softly, then patted Enid’s cheek as if reassuring her: 'don’t worry Mama Woof, I’ve rescued you.'

The three of them lay there in a strange triangle of limbs: Enid laughing softly, Willa sprawled like a conquering hero, and Wednesday glaring at the ceiling with the air of someone who had been outmaneuvered by a creature who couldn’t yet form full sentences.

Finally, Wednesday muttered, “This household grows more absurd by the day.”

Enid kissed her cheek. “You love it.”

“I tolerate it,” Wednesday corrected, but her hand snuck under the blanket to rest lightly on Enid’s thigh. She didn’t move it when Willa glared at her with baby suspicion.

The morning carried on, with chaos inevitable, but the scandal of the century—Willa discovering that her mothers shared a bed—would not be forgotten soon. She babbled about it at breakfast, smacked the table and cooed accusingly whenever Wednesday so much as brushed against Enid’s arm.

And Enid? She found the whole thing hilarious. “Congratulations, Wednesday. Our baby thinks we’re running some kind of forbidden romance under her nose.”

Wednesday merely lifted her teacup and replied, “Excellent. She’s learning young to suspect everything.”

Chapter Text

It was official. Willa Hecate Addams-Sinclair had declared war.

Not with fire or steel though given her Addams bloodline those may yet come, but with gurgles, babbles, and an ironclad determination that Mama Woof would remain exclusively hers.

The morning discovery of her parents sharing a bed had shattered her worldview. What other secrets were her mothers hiding? Did they... kiss when she wasn’t looking? Did Mama Doom steal bedtime snuggles that rightfully belonged to her? Such treachery could not stand.

From that moment onward, the baby appointed herself a one-wolf guard, intercepting every attempted display of affection.

It began innocuously. Enid stood at the stove in her pink apron dotted with tiny sunflowers, humming as she flipped pancakes. Willa sat in her highchair, banging a spoon against the tray like a barbarian chieftain demanding tribute.

Wednesday entered silently, as she always did, materializing from the shadows with the regal grace of a raven. She drifted behind Enid, her hands folding at the blonde’s waist.

It should have been a soft, simple moment: her pale chin resting against Enid’s shoulder, her hand brushing over Enid’s hip, the scent of maple syrup nearly domestic.

But then came the sound.

“NNNNNNNNNHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!”

Willa’s face scrunched in righteous fury, spoon clattering to the ground. She slapped both her hands against her tray and shrieked like a banshee.

Enid jumped. “Oh my gosh, Willa! What’s wrong?!”

The baby pointed a tiny finger trembling like the finger of a prophet exposing sin directly at Wednesday’s hand on Enid’s hip.

“DOOM. NOOOO!!” she babbled furiously.

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Our child is issuing decrees against me.”

Enid snorted, trying and failing not to laugh. “She doesn’t like you hugging me while she’s watching.”

“She is absurd.” Wednesday’s hand remained stubbornly at Enid’s waist.

Willa shrieked louder, as though summoning spirits from beyond.

Enid turned, torn between amusement and sympathy. “Weds, she looks genuinely distressed.”

“She will need to grow accustomed to disappointment. It builds character.”

And yet, after another piercing scream that made the chandelier rattle, Wednesday removed her hand with the scowl of someone dethroned.

Willa immediately quieted, slumping back in her chair, feeling victorious.

Later that day, Enid tried sneaking a quick cuddle. The three of them were on the couch: Enid stretched out with Willa on her lap, Wednesday beside her reading 'Diseases of the Victorian Era: A Collector’s Manual.'

Enid, in a daring act of rebellion, tilted her head against Wednesday’s shoulder.

Barely had her hair brushed Wednesday’s arm before a tiny gasp erupted below.

Willa twisted in Enid’s lap to glare at them both, eyes wide with betrayal.

“MAMAAA. NOOOO.”

Wednesday glanced down slowly, expression blank. “I am beginning to suspect our daughter has founded a Puritanical society in her mind.”

Enid giggled, covering her mouth. “Oh no, she looks so serious. Look at her little face! She’s like a tiny nun catching us at a scandal.”

Willa clambered up her mother’s chest with astonishing determination, wedging herself between Enid and Wednesday until her round head blocked any chance of closeness. She clung tightly to Enid’s neck, glaring at Wednesday with the narrowed eyes of a guard dog.

“Mine,” she announced proudly. “Mama Woof. Mine.”

Enid kissed her hair, trying not to laugh. “Aw, baby. I’m yours too.”

Wednesday muttered something in Latin under her breath.

The true battle erupted that evening.

Dinner was finished, the plates cleared. Willa played with her blocks on the floor, stacking them into crooked towers only to topple them again.

Enid, flushed from the warmth of the oven, leaned close to Wednesday at the counter. She whispered, almost conspiratorial, “Can I have a kiss?”

Wednesday arched one brow. “You are asking permission for something that is both legal and marital. That alone makes me suspicious.”

But Enid smiled brightly, tugging her sleeve, and Wednesday sighed in surrender. Just as their lips brushed, a wail split the room.

“NNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!”

Both froze.

They turned in unison to find Willa on all fours, her tower abandoned, crawling toward them with the frantic speed of someone trying to stop an assassination. Her face was red, her eyes wide with betrayal.

“NO KISS! NO KISS!” she babbled furiously, tugging at Enid’s pant leg the moment she reached them.

Enid collapsed into laughter against Wednesday’s chest. “She—she won’t even let us kiss! Oh my god, Weds, we’re being policed by a ten-month-old!”

Wednesday’s eyes darkened dangerously. “This is unacceptable. First she denied my hand upon your waist. Then she forbade our physical proximity on the couch. And now, she dares to interrupt a kiss? I refuse to live under this tyranny.”

Enid was still laughing so hard tears threatened her eyes. “I think she’s jealous of you, Weds. She wants me all to herself.”

“She will learn,” Wednesday declared ominously. “No dictator lasts forever.”

---

But then came the strange twist. The moment Wednesday disappeared from the room slipping away to her study, or outside to check on her carnivorous plants, Willa changed.

Her triumphant demeanor melted into uncertainty. She crawled to the door, peeking out into the hall and whimpered.

“Mama Doom?” she babbled softly, searching the shadows.

If Wednesday did not reappear, she sulked. Her chin on the floor and her big eyes brimming with confusion. She tugged at Enid’s sleeve as if asking where her other Mama had gone.

“Aw, sweetheart,” Enid cooed, scooping her up. “You miss Mama Doom, huh? You don’t want her near me, but you still want her around?”

Willa sniffled, nodding her tiny head.

Enid shook hers, cuddling the baby close. “You’re so silly. You love her, you just don’t want to share.”

When Wednesday returned minutes later, Willa lit up like a lantern, babbling, clapping, and reaching for her with pudgy arms.

Wednesday regarded her coolly. “Ah. The tyrant welcomes back the rival she exiled.”

Enid whispered to her with a grin: “She sulked when you were gone. She missed you.”

A tiny smirk ghosted across Wednesday’s lips before she wiped it away. “Good. Let her suffer.”

---

By the time night fell, the baby’s campaign had escalated.

Enid and Wednesday tried to put her in the crib, tucking her beneath the bat-wing blanket. Willa clung stubbornly to Enid’s shirt, refusing to release her grip.

“Mama Woof bed,” she demanded.

Enid smiled sheepishly at Wednesday. “Just for tonight?”

Wednesday pinched the bridge of her nose. “We are raising a tyrant, Enid. Every time we indulge her, her reign grows stronger.”

But in the end, the baby got her way.

Which was how, at midnight, Wednesday found herself pinned to the far edge of the bed, Enid in the middle, and Willa sprawled atop Enid’s chest like a tiny, triumphant empress. Any time Wednesday reached across the blankets to touch her wife’s hand, Willa stirred and let out a warning whine.

Enid, half-asleep, murmured, “She’s just a little jealous phase, Weds. She’ll grow out of it.”

Wednesday, staring at the ceiling, replied flatly, “Or we will perish under her regime.”

---

The next morning, Gomez and Morticia came to visit.

“How’s our darling grandchild?” Morticia asked sweetly.

“She has assumed dictatorial control of the household,” Wednesday replied. “Enid is her hostage. I am her nemesis. She forbids physical affection between us.”

Morticia smiled dreamily. “Ah, to witness young love again, though now triangular. Delightful.”

Gomez wiped a proud tear. “A true Addams, through and through.”

Enid laughed nervously. “I think I’m in trouble.”

And in the corner, Willa sat smugly on her playmat, stacking her blocks. Occasionally, she cast a glance at her mothers and lifted a tiny warning finger, just in case.

The reign of Baby Tyrant Willa had only begun.

Chapter Text

Willa had made her position perfectly clear: affection between Mama Doom and Mama Woof was forbidden. Her decrees had been screamed, babbled, and finger-pointed into existence.

Wednesday, however, had never tolerated tyrants. She’d read enough history to know: if you appeased the dictator, you lived under their shadow forever.

So, as dusk fell and the bats swooped lazily across the grey sky, Wednesday proposed an audacious plan.

“We must strike at her confusion,” she whispered to Enid in the parlor, her voice low and solemn. “Shatter her certainty. Let her taste the unfamiliar tang of disarray. Then she will beg for our unity.”

Enid chewed her lip, nervously adjusting her sunflower apron. “So... you want us to pretend to fight? Wednesday, we’ve never even had a real fight. Not like throwing-plates fight. We just... brood and talk.”

Wednesday nodded gravely. “Which is why it will confound her utterly. She expects our bond to be immutable. To witness discord between us will rattle her very foundations.”

Enid tried not to laugh. “You sound like you’re plotting a coup against a baby.”

“She started it.”

---

They chose their stage wisely: the living room, with its oppressive gothic furniture and portraits of long-dead Addams ancestors looming from the walls. Willa sat happily on the carpet with her blocks, humming nonsense to herself with her chubby cheeks rosy with smug contentment.

Wednesday crossed her arms and gave Enid the faintest nod. The performance was to begin.

Enid took a deep breath and tried to look stern. “W-Wednesday,” she started, her voice wobbling. “I... I don’t like... um... the way you... you always leave your knives on the dining table.”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed, not at the accusation, but at the delivery. Pathetic.

“I suppose,” Wednesday said, her voice icy on purpose, “that you would prefer I store them in the nursery crib, where our child might impale herself during naps.”

Willa’s head shot up, a block halfway to her mouth. Her eyes widened.

“Um—uh—that’s not what I meant,” Enid stammered, biting her lip to hold back a grin. “I just meant... you should... clean up sometimes! You’re very messy!”

Wednesday tilted her chin, playing her role with relish. “Messy? Coming from the woman who leaves tufts of blonde hair in every drain, carpeting our pipes like a sickly golden fleece?”

Willa gasped.

She dropped her little block.

The baby’s lips trembled. Never had she seen such blasphemy: her mothers are disagreeing.

“You’re so cold sometimes!” Enid declared, theatrically clutching her chest.

“Good,” Wednesday snapped, eyes flashing. “It preserves the meat.”

“M-Maybe I want warmth sometimes!”

“Then purchase a heating pad.”

“Wednesday Addams!” Enid exclaimed, almost giggling halfway through. “You’re... impossible!”

“And you,” Wednesday hissed, “are insufferably... cheerful.”

Enid gasped in mock offense, wobbling dramatically like a fainting Victorian maiden.

Willa stared in horror, her blocks forgotten. Her tiny hands trembled as she reached toward them both. “Mama...? Mama...?”

Then, the killing blow: Wednesday swept toward the door, cloak swirling as if she were storming into the abyss.

“Perhaps I should take my leave,” she declared, voice dripping with drama.

Enid covered her mouth, eyes wide. “W-Wednesday, no! Don’t—!”

The front door opened with a great, gothic creak. The night air swept in. Wednesday stepped out, slamming it behind her with operatic finality.

The silence that followed was catastrophic.

Willa sat frozen for a moment. Then her lower lip trembled, quivered, and—

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!”

She screamed as though the world itself had ended. Her tiny body convulsed with sobs, cheeks wet with tears instantly. She crawled frantically across the carpet toward the door, pounding her fists against it.

“MAMA DOOM! BACK! BACK!” she wailed in garbled baby-speak.

Enid, horrified, scooped her up. “Shhh, baby, shhh! It’s okay, it’s okay—Mama Doom’s not really gone, it’s just a game—oh no, Wednesday, what have we done—”

Willa thrashed in her arms like a banshee, pointing desperately at the door. “DOOM! DOOM! NO GO! NO GO!”

Her cries echoed through the mansion, rattling cobwebbed chandeliers and even startling Thing, who scampered across the mantle to peek down nervously.

Enid was on the verge of panic. “Wednesday! Get back in here! She’s losing it!”

The front door creaked open slowly. Wednesday stepped inside with the calm of a general returning victorious from battle.

Her expression was utterly impassive, but the tiniest smirk tugged her lips as she surveyed the carnage: Willa bawling in Enid’s arms, clinging to her like a koala, reaching desperately toward her dark mother.

“Ah,” Wednesday murmured, “so the lesson has taken root.”

Enid glared at her over Willa’s sobs. “Lesson?! She’s traumatized!”

“Nonsense. She has merely realized that the absence of Mama Doom is unbearable. Soon, she will treasure my presence and therefore tolerate our unity. The stratagem was flawless.”

Willa, however, did not seem enlightened.

The moment Wednesday reached for her, the baby flung herself into her arms, burying her wet face into Wednesday’s shoulder with gasping sobs.

“Mama Doom, no go, no go, no go... ”

Wednesday blinked, stiff for a moment. Then, slowly, she patted the baby’s back. “There, there. You see, Enid? She loves me. My hypothesis is confirmed.”

Enid, still half-panicked, snapped, “Yeah, but now she thinks you’re gonna abandon us forever!”

“Excellent,” Wednesday replied flatly. “Fear sharpens affection.”

---

The rest of the evening was a disaster.

Willa refused to let Wednesday out of her sight for even a second. She clung like a barnacle, sobbing whenever Wednesday set her down and crawling after her with desperate speed. At dinner, she sat on Wednesday’s lap, glaring at Enid with tear-swollen eyes as though to say: 'you let this happen.'

By bedtime, the baby was still hiccupping with leftover sobs. She clutched both her mothers’ shirts at once, refusing to release either of them.

Enid lay sandwiched between the two of them on the bed, sighing. “Well, congratulations, Wednesday. You broke her.”

Wednesday stroked the baby’s fine black curls calmly. “On the contrary. I strengthened her attachment to me. Soon, she will permit me to kiss you in peace.”

Enid raised a brow. “Or she’s gonna grow up telling a therapist about the time Mama Doom ‘walked out’ when she was ten months old.”

Wednesday smirked faintly in the darkness. “Either way, she will never forget me.”

Enid groaned into her pillow.

And between them, Willa clung like a tiny and jealous monarch having lost her composure, but still not relinquishing her crown.

Chapter Text

The fake fight had left its mark.

Once upon a week ago, Willa had declared herself sole ruler of Mama Woof’s affections, blocking every display of parental tenderness with shrieks and indignant finger-pointing. But after Wednesday’s staged “departure,” something in the baby’s budding Addams-Sinclair psyche cracked.

Now she clung to Mama Doom with the desperation of a sailor clinging to driftwood.

And Enid, the sweet, sunshine-colored, selfless Enid suddenly found herself exiled from the throne room of Willa’s favor.

It began subtly.

Enid leaned over to kiss Wednesday’s cheek one morning, and before her lips even touched skin, Willa lunged across the breakfast table like a cannonball, clapping her sticky oatmeal-coated hand over Wednesday’s face.

“NO!” she bellowed in baby syllables. “Doom MAMA! Mine!”

Wednesday, stoic as ever, calmly wiped the oatmeal from her cheek and continued eating.

Enid laughed nervously. “Ha! Okay, baby, relax—it’s just a good-morning smooch—”

But Willa was already worming her way into Wednesday’s lap, glaring up at Enid as though she were the other woman.

By afternoon, Enid noticed the pattern: Willa wouldn’t let Wednesday out of her line of sight. She demanded to be carried on her hip, rode her cloak like a blanket, even clutched her braids like the reins of a horse.

“She’s... uh... she’s very attached to you right now,” Enid murmured, watching as Wednesday typed one-handed at her desk, the other arm occupied with a wriggling toddler.

Wednesday’s lips curved in the faintest smirk. “She has good taste.”

Enid rolled her eyes. But deep inside, a small, absurd pang of jealousy prickled.

---

The following day, the situation escalated.

Enid, humming, she reached for Willa to pick her up from the playmat.

Willa shrieked as though she were being abducted. She squirmed violently, flinging herself backward toward the dark figure across the room.

“MAMA DOOM! MAMA DOOM!” she cried, crawling desperately to Wednesday’s boots.

Enid froze. “...Excuse me?”

Wednesday bent down, scooped the child into her arms, and regarded Enid calmly over Willa’s head. “Don’t take it personally. Infants are fickle creatures.”

“She literally just rejected me!” Enid sputtered, pointing to her daughter, who was now nestled smugly against Wednesday’s shoulder. “Our daughter—the one I carried for nine months—just chose you!”

“Indeed.”

“And you’re not even sorry!”

“Why would I be? Victory is mine.”

Enid groaned into her hands. “Oh my god, I’m being outcompeted by my own wife.”

---

By the third day, Enid was sulking.

She sat cross-legged on the couch with her arms folded, while Willa refused to sit with her, toddling insistently to Wednesday instead.

“She hates me,” Enid declared mournfully.

“She does not,” Wednesday said, adjusting Willa on her lap as she calmly polished a dagger.

“She does! She doesn’t want me anymore. I’m chopped liver.”

“Incorrect. You are Mama Woof. You nurture, you soothe, you cook spaghetti with too much cheese. She adores you.”

“Then why does she keep choosing you?”

“Because she has taste.”

Enid pouted, her eyebrows twitching in faint betrayal. “I feel like the side chick in my own marriage.”

Willa, oblivious to the melodrama, attempted to gnaw on Wednesday’s dagger sheath.

---

On the fourth day, Enid decided she needed space. Or at least bread and milk.

“I’ll run to the store,” she said brightly, forcing a smile. “Be back in a bit. You two can... bond more.”

Willa, who had been perched smugly in Wednesday’s lap, perked up at the word leave.

As Enid pulled on her jacket, Willa toddled to the hallway, tugging at her mother’s jeans. “Mama Woof?” she asked uncertainly, eyes wide.

“Yes, sweetpea. Mama Woof is going to get groceries.”

The baby’s lower lip wobbled.

Enid kissed her curls. “It’s okay, honey. Mama Doom’s here. I’ll be back.”

Willa did not seem reassured. She stomped her foot, scowled at Wednesday as though she were responsible for this treachery, and then burst into tears.

“NO! WOOLF! NO GO!”

Enid blinked in surprise. “Wait—now you want me?”

The baby clung to her leg like a barnacle.

Wednesday raised a brow, deadpan. “She loves you, too. She simply cannot tolerate imbalance.”

“So she’s only happy when we’re both here?”

“Precisely. She is an Addams.”

When Enid returned from the store an hour later with her arms full of bags, she found Willa sulking in the foyer, her little forehead pressed dramatically against the doorframe.

The baby turned her head slowly, eyes red from crying. The instant she saw Enid, she shrieked with joy.

“MAMA WOOF!” she wailed, crawling frantically toward her.

Enid dropped the grocery bags with a thud and scooped her up, her heart swelling. “Aww, baby—you did miss me! I knew it!”

Willa buried her face in Enid’s neck, hiccuping dramatically as though she’d survived a tragedy.

Behind them, Wednesday emerged from the shadows, arms crossed. “You see? She is not playing favorites. She simply cannot abide the absence of either of us. In her mind, we are one unit. A hydra. Remove one head and the beast falters.”

Enid kissed Willa’s hair, smiling through her tears. “So she needs us both. Equally.”

“Yes,” Wednesday said, voice low and satisfied. “Precisely as I planned.”

Enid blinked. “Wait, you planned this?”

Wednesday’s lips quirked. “Of course. Nothing brings a family closer than orchestrated despair.”

Enid groaned, hugging her baby tighter.

---

That night, Willa slept in the middle of their bed, one hand clutching Enid’s shirt, the other tangled in Wednesday’s braid.

If either woman shifted away, the baby whimpered in her sleep and pulled them back.

Enid sighed, brushing Willa’s rosy cheek. “Well. I guess that’s settled. We belong to her now.”

“We always did,” Wednesday murmured in the dark, eyes glinting faintly.

Enid smiled. For once, she didn’t mind being conquered.

Chapter Text

The house had grown noisy in a new way. Not with banshee wails or howls of wolfblood tantrums, but with a relentless, heart-gnawing cry that echoed through every black corridor and dusty chamber:

“MAMA WOOOOOF? MAMA DOOOOM?”

The calls were always plural. Always searching. Always uncertain.

For the last three days, Willa had entered what Wednesday clinically referred to as “the developmental apex of attachment-based neurosis” and what Enid, pacing the nursery at 2 a.m., called simply: “The Nightmare Phase.”

Wednesday observed her daughter’s behavior with the detached precision of a scientist cataloging a rare specimen.

“She has grasped object permanence,” Wednesday mused, jotting notes in a small black journal. “She knows that we exist when we vanish from her line of sight.”

“Uh-huh,” Enid muttered, bouncing Willa on her hip as the baby whimpered, her eyes darting toward the bedroom door as though expecting it to devour Wednesday whole.

“But she has not yet mastered temporal comprehension,” Wednesday continued. “She cannot fathom when we will return, only that we are not here. Ergo—panic.”

Enid rubbed soothing circles on Willa’s back. “In other words, she thinks we’re abandoning her every time one of us leaves the room.”

Wednesday’s mouth twitched faintly. “Correct.”

“And you’re smiling.”

“Because it’s deliciously tragic.”

Enid groaned. “Of course you’d find separation anxiety aesthetic.”

Enid knew that most babies clung primarily to their mother. But Willa was no ordinary infant.

She had Mama Woof, who sang lullabies with wagging ears and rainbow-colored pajamas, who smelled like sugar cookies and wet dog, who carried warmth like a personal sun.

And she had Mama Doom, who whispered dark tales with lullaby cadences, whose boots clicked like punctuation marks on the wooden floors, whose presence wrapped the house in gravitas and silence.

Willa needed both. If one was missing, the balance tilted. The axis cracked.

It was not enough to know that Mama Woof would return. Nor that Mama Doom always kept her word. She needed them here, visible, tangible and within reach of her chubby fists.

---

One morning, Enid woke early to run downstairs for coffee.

She slipped out of bed, leaving Willa nestled against Wednesday’s side.

When Enid returned three minutes later with a mug in hand, she found chaos.

Willa sat upright in the blankets, face blotchy with tears, pointing at the door with an accusatory howl.

“MAMA WOOF—NOOOOOOO!”

Wednesday, still lying stiffly on her back, regarded the tantrum with mild disdain. “You left her sightline. You are dead to her now.”

Enid nearly dropped the mug. “Dead?! I was gone for three minutes!”

“Time is meaningless to her undeveloped mind.”

Willa flung herself toward Enid like a drowning sailor to a rope. “WOOF! BACK!” she sobbed, clutching her shirt as though to anchor her in place.

Enid rocked her, eyes softening despite her exhaustion. “Oh, baby... I’d never leave you. Not ever.”

From the bed, Wednesday’s voice cut dry and sharp: “A dangerous promise, considering the inevitability of mortality.”

“Wednesday!”

“Fine. Not helpful. But true.”

---

Later that day, it was Wednesday’s turn to test the theory.

She rose from her writing desk, kissed the top of Willa’s curls, and announced, “I must use the bathroom.”

The baby blinked at her.

Enid, sitting cross-legged on the rug, raised a brow. “Good luck.”

The door clicked shut.

Two seconds of silence. Then—

“MAMA DOOM???”

The cry was frantic, rising like a foghorn. Willa launched into a full crawl across the nursery, her tiny hands slapping the floorboards. She rammed herself into the closed door, pounding with her fists.

“MAMA DOOM GONE! NOOOO!”

From behind the wood, Wednesday’s voice drifted, steady as ever. “I am evacuating bodily fluids. I have not been abducted.”

“DOOOOOM!”

“She doesn’t understand that, Weds!” Enid shouted, scooping the baby up. “She thinks you just... fell into the void!”

“Perhaps she will develop stoicism through exposure.”

“She’s ten months old!”

“Precisely the age to begin.”

---

By the end of the week, the Addams-Sinclair household had developed a system.

Neither mother could vanish from sight without warning. Transitions required ritual.

If Enid went to fold laundry, she solemnly announced: “Mama Woof is going to the basement. I’ll be back.”

If Wednesday retreated to her study, she intoned: “Mama Doom departs for research. You shall see me shortly.”

Sometimes Willa accepted these proclamations with a nod, clutching her toy spider as though it were a legal contract.

Other times, she collapsed into operatic despair until the missing mother reappeared.

One rainy evening, Enid caught her daughter standing at the gothic window, tiny hands pressed to the glass.

Outside, the storm lashed the Addams grounds with sheets of silver rain.

“Mama Doom?” Willa whispered, scanning the yard as if her mother might be wandering the cemetery with an umbrella.

Enid’s heart squeezed. She knelt beside her. “She’s just upstairs, honey. She’ll be down in a second.”

The baby sighed dramatically, forehead against the pane. “Doom gone...”

Enid kissed her curls. “She’s never gone, sweetpea. She’s in every shadow of this house.”

Willa blinked at her with big wet eyes, almost believing.

And then Wednesday entered the room.

“MAMA DOOM!” Willa shrieked, launching herself off the window seat and into her arms.

Wednesday arched a brow. “You see? Faith rewarded.”

Enid glared playfully. “Yeah, well, some of us don’t inspire blind worship just by walking into a room.”

“Correct,” Wednesday said, expression unreadable. “You inspire something far more dangerous. Devotion.”

Enid flushed pink.

---

The rhythm had settled slowly into something almost manageable.

Yes, Willa still wailed when one mother left the room. Yes, she clutched both of them in sleep like a tiny warden chaining her prisoners.

But slowly, Enid began to realize that this wasn’t rejection. It wasn’t favoritism.

It was love, doubled and magnified. Their daughter needed both of them, with equal force and equal fervor.

And though it made simple tasks like grocery shopping feel like apocalyptic departures, it also meant something else:

They had done it. Against odds, against tradition, against gothic comedy itself, Mama Woof and Mama Doom had built a bond that no infant could bear to imagine fractured.

Enid watched Willa sleeping one night, tiny fists gripping both their shirts, and whispered, “Guess we’re stuck together forever, huh?”

From the dark, Wednesday’s voice replied softly:

“That was always the plan.”

Chapter Text

The Addams-Sinclair mansion was quieter than usual that morning, but it was the deceptive kind of quiet. The hush of plotting, of scheming, of two mothers quietly readying their battle strategies in the war over one ten-month-old’s future emotional resilience.

Enid sat hunched over her laptop at the breakfast table, fluffy rainbow socks bunched at her ankles. She clicked through articles with ferocious intensity, the glow of the screen reflecting in her eyes.

"Supporting Separation Anxiety in Infants: Gentle Independence Training."

"Ten Tips to Help Your Baby Understand You Always Come Back."

"Do Not Panic: Your Child Is Not Possessed, Just Anxious."

She scribbled notes on a pastel notepad shaped like a wolf paw: short departures, transitional objects, positive reinforcement.

Meanwhile across the room, Wednesday sat in her armchair, stroking the family raven perched on the armrest. She did not have a laptop. She did not have pastel notes. She had, instead, centuries of Addams wisdom thrumming in her veins.

“The child’s possessiveness is commendable,” she intoned. “She demonstrates unwavering devotion, feral loyalty and a refusal to be comforted by false substitutes. These are virtues to be cultivated, not diminished.”

Enid turned in her chair, incredulous. “Wednesday, she cried because I went to brush my teeth!”

“She correctly assumed you were about to drown in the sink. Her grief was justified.”

“That’s not how it works!” Enid groaned, burying her face in her hands. “She has to learn we’ll come back. That she’s safe even when she can’t see us.”

Wednesday tilted her head. “And what if one day, we do not come back? Would you rather she be comforted by false hope, or eternally faithful to the memory of her vanished mothers?”

Enid blinked. “You’re unbelievable.”

---

By afternoon, Enid had resolved to try her “independence exercises.”

'Step one: leave Willa with a transitional object.'

She picked out the soft stuffed wolf toy Willa adored, kissed it and handed it to her daughter. “See? This is Mama Woof’s hug in a toy. I’ll be back in two minutes.”

Willa blinked up at her, then immediately flung the wolf toy across the nursery. It hit the bars of her crib with a pathetic squeak.

“No Mama toy,” she declared firmly. “Mama Woof.”

Enid sighed. “This is harder than the blogs made it sound.”

Wednesday, leaning against the doorway with her arms crossed, smirked. “My condolences. She has rejected your surrogate.”

“Weds, you’re not helping.”

“I’m not trying to.”

'Step two: short departures.'

Enid kissed Willa’s curls and said brightly, “Okay sweetpea, Mama Woof is going to the kitchen. I’ll be back in just a minute.”

She stepped out, closed the door, and counted to ten.

From inside the nursery came the immediate, thunderous wail of betrayal.

“MAMAAAAA WOOOOOF!”

Enid winced, pacing in the hallway. “Okay, okay, it’s fine. She’ll get used to it.”

After fifteen seconds, she couldn’t take it anymore. She burst back inside. “See? I came back!”

Willa hiccupped, her little arms outstretched desperately. “WOooooF!”

The baby latched onto her shirt as though she had returned from the grave.

From her chair in the corner, Wednesday clapped slowly, her face utterly deadpan. “Excellent performance, Enid. She believed you perished and was resurrected. You are a Christ-like figure to her now.”

“Wednesday!”

'Step three: positive reinforcement.'

Enid tried to reward calmness. When Willa let her walk across the room without wailing, she chirped, “Good job, baby! See, Mama’s still here!” and handed her a tiny oat puff.

Willa accepted the puff, chewed thoughtfully, then hurled it onto the carpet. “No puff. Woof.”

“Okay, that’s... clear.” Enid sighed, sinking into the rug.

Wednesday’s lips curved. “She rejects bribery. She is incorruptible. Perfect.”

---

Wednesday, of course, introduced her own method.

Instead of sneaking away for “training exercises,” she leaned into the melodrama.

When she left the room, she cloaked herself in her cape, raised one pale hand, and announced:

“Farewell, my daughter. Should the fates sever my mortal coil, remember me in shadow and bone.”

Willa gasped, toddled after her and clung to her boot like a barnacle. “No Doom gone!”

“Precisely,” Wednesday replied, scooping her up with a rare softness. “Never let me go.”

Enid, watching from the doorway, sputtered. “That’s the opposite of what we’re trying to do!”

“It’s exactly what I’m trying to do.”

---

The following day, the experiment reached a catastrophic climax when Enid dared to leave for groceries.

She crouched down, kissed Willa’s cheeks, and promised, “I’ll be back soon. Mama Doom’s right here with you.”

The second the door shut, Willa began to scream. A high, keening sound that rattled the windows.

Wednesday lifted her calmly, rocking her once. “Your grief is magnificent. You could awaken the dead with that cry.”

Willa whimpered into her shoulder. “Mama Woof gone. Doom only.”

“You wound me, child. I am not a consolation prize.”

Enid returned twenty minutes later, out of breath, clutching bags of vegetables. She opened the door to find Willa mid-howl, her face blotchy and Wednesday sitting serenely in the rocking chair as though nothing were wrong.

“How can you just sit there?!” Enid cried, dropping the bags. “She’s miserable!”

“She is becoming accustomed to despair,” Wednesday replied. “An invaluable life skill.”

Willa spotted Enid and erupted into frantic giggles, arms flailing for her.

“WOOOOF! BACK!”

Enid scooped her up, heart twisting. “See, baby? I always come back.”

Wednesday watched them with unreadable eyes. “Yes,” she murmured, almost to herself. “You always do”

---

That night when Willa was finally asleep, nestled firmly between them with her little fingers clutching both their shirts, Enid sat up in bed with her laptop again.

“She needs to learn independence,” Enid muttered, scrolling. “It says right here. It builds resilience, confidence, and trust.”

Wednesday lay beside her, hands folded neatly over her chest. “Our daughter requires no such illusions. Loyalty is not a flaw. Devotion is not weakness. If she clings to us with the strength of a wolf’s jaws, we should be honored.”

Enid glanced down at Willa’s soft sleeping face, her lips forming the faintest mumble of “Woof... Doom...” even in dreams.

Her heart melted.

“Maybe... maybe you’re right,” Enid whispered.

“I usually am.”

Enid snorted, setting her laptop aside. “Still. Tomorrow I’m trying again.”

Wednesday smirked in the dark. “And tomorrow she will reject your puff bribes once more. Excellent. Our daughter is already defying society’s expectations.”

At dawn after Enid tried to put Willa back into her crib, the cycle repeated: Willa climbing from her crib, toddling down the hall, and crawling onto their bed.

She plopped herself directly between them, one fist gripping Enid’s hair, the other tangled in Wednesday’s sleeve.

“No Woof gone. No Doom gone,” she declared solemnly.

Enid laughed softly. “Guess we’re not allowed to move ever again.”

Wednesday brushed a strand of hair from Willa’s forehead. “Exactly as it should be.”

And though Enid still wanted her daughter to grow independent someday, she couldn’t help but admit, there was something intoxicating about being needed this much.

Chapter Text

By now, it was no longer a question of if Willa would escape her crib. It was a matter of when.

Wednesday had fortified the bars, adjusted the height, even placed the crib directly beneath the mounted stuffed raven as a warning. None of it mattered. Each night, sometime between midnight and dawn, there would be the soft thud of tiny feet on hardwood, followed by the eerie silence of determination, and then inevitably the creak of their bedroom door.

Enid always knew the exact moment. A primal wolf instinct stirred her awake even before the small figure padded across the carpet. She’d peek one eye open just in time to see a mop of dark curls, a little onesie patterned with bats and the slow, triumphant crawl across the floor.

Willa would grunt, tug herself onto the edge of the bed, and flop like a sack of potatoes directly between them. Sometimes she belly-flopped onto Wednesday, sometimes she latched onto Enid’s arm with surprising strength, but the routine never changed: Willa always ended up pressed against Enid’s chest, sighing like she had reached her final destination in life.

“Woof,” she mumbled one night, burying her face in Enid’s shirt, cheek smushed against her breast. “Bed.”

Enid, bleary but melted into a puddle of motherly affection, stroked her curls. “Yeah, baby. Mama Woof’s bed.”

From the other side, Wednesday’s eyes snapped open like a viper in the dark. “This was once a marital chamber,” she hissed. “It has become a communal den.”

Enid smirked at her, voice raspy with sleep. “Don’t act like you mind. You’re always reaching over for her in the morning too.”

“I was checking for signs of demonic possession.”

“Uh-huh.”

By dawn, the three of them were tangled like vines.

Willa sprawled diagonally across the mattress, one foot pressed into Wednesday’s ribcage, one tiny fist gripping Enid’s shirt. Her head, however, remained firmly anchored on Enid’s chest. She hummed faintly in her sleep, the sound almost like a wolf pup’s growl.

Enid laid still, her eyes half-closed, savoring the weight of her baby. Willa’s cheek against her breast triggered something bittersweet. The warmth, the way her daughter’s ear rested right where her heartbeat pulsed, Enid was flooded with memories of the early nursing days. Of midnight feedings in rocking chairs, of Willa’s tiny mouth searching clumsily, of the bond forged in those sleepless weeks.

She missed it, in a way she hadn’t admitted out loud. The closeness, the physical need that made her feel like the whole world was contained in her body.

Now Willa was almost a year old, toddling, demanding and fiercely independent in some ways but still clinging to her chest like it was her rightful pillow.

Wednesday noticed. Of course she did. She always noticed.

“You’re sentimental again,” Wednesday murmured without opening her eyes.

Enid blinked. “What? No, I’m just... comfy.”

“You’re remembering her nursing. I can tell by the wistful slack in your jaw.”

Enid flushed. “Don’t analyze my jaw slack, Wednesday.”

“She has replaced you as her favorite source of nourishment with you as her favorite mattress. A demotion, but still an honor.”

Enid laughed softly, brushing a hand down Willa’s back. “You’re impossible. But you’re right.” She paused, biting her lip. “I kind of miss it, you know? Nursing. Having her so... so little. Depending on me like that.”

Wednesday finally opened her eyes, gaze sharp. “You mourn the loss of a stage already passed. But look.”

She gestured to the baby, snuggled deep in Enid’s chest, a smile ghosting her lips even in sleep. “She still believes your body is the safest place in existence. It is her fortress. Her anchor. She has not lost that instinct.”

Enid’s throat tightened. “When you put it like that...”

“I always put it like that.”

The baby stirred then, yawning so wide it looked like she might unhinge her jaw. She smacked her lips and blinked her dark eyes open, promptly drooling on Enid’s shirt.

Enid chuckled, shifting to wipe her with the blanket. “Good morning, sunshine.”

Willa blinked groggily, then, with solemn declaration, muttered: “Mama Woof.”

Wednesday arched a brow. “Concise and accurate.”

Willa, patted Enid’s breast twice like it was officially claimed territory. “Mine.”

Enid sputtered. “Okay, we’re not turning this into a thing.”

“Too late,” Wednesday deadpanned.

Willa then reached a sleepy hand toward Wednesday, tugging her sleeve. “Doom too.”

Wednesday froze, her lips twitching imperceptibly before she leaned in, allowing the tiny hand to curl around her fingers. “An afterthought,” she said coolly. “But acceptable.”

Enid smiled at the sight, her gloomy wife caught between disdain and deep, unshakable affection.

Eventually, Enid tried to slip away to start breakfast.

The attempt failed spectacularly. The second she shifted, Willa’s eyes snapped open and she tightened her grip, like a boa constrictor latching onto prey. “No Woof go!”

Enid fell back against the pillow, sighing. “Guess I’m not going anywhere.”

Wednesday smirked from her side of the bed. “I have no objections. Domestic imprisonment suits you.”

“Easy for you to say, you don’t have a thirty-pound baby on your boobs.”

“She is only twenty-two pounds,” Wednesday corrected instantly. “I weighed her yesterday. Don’t exaggerate.”

Enid stared. “Of course you weighed her.”

“Would you prefer I left her growth undocumented? That would be criminal neglect.”

They dissolved into soft laughter, muffled so as not to disturb Willa’s drifting half-sleep.

---

As the morning stretched lazily, Enid felt a kind of fragile peace.

Yes, Willa was clingy. Yes, they hadn’t had a morning alone as wives in weeks. Yes, her chest had officially been demoted to pillow status. But in that warm little cocoon of sheets, with Willa’s steady breathing against her and Wednesday’s hand casually brushing her wrist under the blankets, Enid felt—maybe more than ever—that this was exactly where she was supposed to be.

She thought back to her mother’s warnings, the doubts, the online gossip about Wednesday’s morbid novels. And yet here they were: messy, clingy and inseparable. A strange little family that worked, in its own chaotic way.

Enid pressed a kiss to Willa’s curls and whispered so softly even Wednesday almost didn’t hear: “I wouldn’t trade this for anything.”

Wednesday didn’t answer aloud. But she squeezed Enid’s wrist once firm and grounding.

It was enough.

Chapter Text

The realization came in the most domestic, least gothic way possible.

Enid was folding laundry by the fire. Tiny socks, bat-printed onesies and miniature wolf-themed bibs. Willa was wearing her favorite—or at least Wednesday’s favorite for her—black velvet onesie with a skull stitched across the chest. Enid tried to adjust it back into shape but noticed the buttons were straining at the edges.

She frowned, “Oh my gosh... Wednesday. Look at this. She doesn’t even fit into these anymore.”

Across the room, Wednesday was perched like a gargoyle on her writing chair, her quill scratching violently against parchment. She didn’t look up. “Then she has outgrown them. A predictable biological occurrence. We should hang them in a shadowbox, labeled Former Skin of the Beast.”

Enid groaned, rolling her eyes. “No, Wednesday, we can’t just... preserve every outfit she’s outgrown. We need to buy her new ones.”

At this, Wednesday stilled. Her quill hovered mid-stroke. Slowly her eyes lifted, dark and menacing. “New ones...?”

Enid bit her lip, already bracing. “Yes. Clothes. You know... shopping.”

The very word made Wednesday look like she’d just been offered holy water.

“Shopping,” Wednesday repeated, her voice as flat as a gravestone. “The grotesque ritual of entering overcrowded temples of capitalism to acquire fabrics manufactured by underpaid laborers, destined to fall apart in mere months. You propose I expose myself willingly to this horror?”

Enid flopped on the couch with an exasperated sigh. “Wednesday, come on. She’s your daughter too. Unless you want her toddling around naked, which I know you’ve threatened before.”

“Nudity builds character,” Wednesday intoned.

“Yeah, but it doesn’t keep her warm.”

“She has wolf blood. Cold is irrelevant.”

Enid groaned louder, tossing a balled-up sock at her wife’s head. “Stop being impossible! We’re going. And actually, maybe we should update our wardrobe too.”

Wednesday’s glare could have curdled milk. “My wardrobe is eternal.”

“Weds, you’ve worn the same black dress cut since we were fifteen.”

“It is functional. Iconic. Deathless.”

“It’s outdated.”

Enid regretted the words the instant they left her mouth. Wednesday stood slowly, her expression enough to make banshees choke on their wails.

“Outdated?” Wednesday’s voice was low, “My style is a classic of morbidity. You may as well call the guillotine outdated. Or the noose.”

Enid raised both hands quickly. “Okay, okay! I take it back. But Willa still needs new clothes.”

Right then, Willa who sitting in the middle of the carpet, gnawing on a stuffed bat chose to stand up shakily and toddle toward her Mamas.

She reached Enid, plopped down with a proud thud and babbled, “Tight!” while tugging at her belly.

Enid gasped. “Did you hear that? She said tight!”

Wednesday’s jaw twitched. “No. She said fight. Clearly a declaration of war.”

Enid clapped her hands, delighted. “No, no. she’s telling us! Her clothes are too tight! See, even she agrees.”

Willa squealed, flopping backward like a starfish. “No tight!”

Enid pointed triumphantly. “Case closed. We’re going shopping.”

Wednesday looked down at her daughter with the expression of a woman betrayed by her own bloodline.

---

The morning of the mall trip began with an air of doom.

At least, according to Wednesday.

She sat at her writing desk in the master bedroom, clad in her usual long black dress, her expression thunderous. The quill in her hand screeched across the page like the cry of a dying raven. She was in the midst of what Enid had privately dubbed a “brooding spiral” where Wednesday did not simply exist, but hovered at the edge of melodramatic catastrophe for hours on end.

Across the room, Enid was the polar opposite. She had laid out clothes for Willa on the bed in neat little piles: bright rompers, baby leggings, and a miniature sunhat with floppy ears. She hummed a cheerful tune as she sorted them, pausing only to wiggle her hips along with the beat.

It was like springtime had barged into a funeral.

“Is there a reason you are emitting sounds akin to a dying songbird?” Wednesday drawled, not looking up.

Enid stuck her tongue out. “I’m humming. It’s called being happy. Try it sometime.”

Wednesday dipped her quill again. “Happiness is the opiate of the mediocre.”

“Uh-huh.” Enid lifted Willa from bed peppering her cheeks with kisses. “Well, mediocre or not, we’re going shopping today! Right, baby?”

Willa squealed, clapping her chubby hands.

Wednesday’s eyes flickered up, twin storms of disdain. “Traitor.”

Enid dressed Willa in a pastel yellow romper with cartoon wolves dancing on the front. She added socks with tiny ears stitched on the ankles and tied a soft bow around her baby’s head.

“There!” Enid chirped, stepping back to admire her. “Doesn’t she look adorable?”

Willa beamed, bouncing in Enid’s arms.

Wednesday, however, narrowed her eyes. “She looks... edible.”

Enid blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Like an underseasoned Easter marshmallow.”

“Wednesday!”

“If she must be paraded through public spaces like a prized piglet, at least dress her in black. It’s practical. Conceals stains. Announces to predators she is one herself.”

Enid’s face softened despite herself. She kissed Willa’s forehead. “Ignore Mama Doom, sweetie. You look perfect.”

Willa babbled something that suspiciously sounded like “No doom.”

Wednesday set her quill down with a snap. “She conspires against me already.”

---

Wednesday brought the family car around, its hearse-like silhouette casting a long shadow over the driveway. Enid carried Willa, bouncing her gently.

As Enid strapped the baby into her car seat, Wednesday muttered, “This is beneath me. If I am not murdered by fluorescent lights, I will die from exposure to mainstream pop music.”

“You’ll live,” Enid sing-songed, kissing her cheek.

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t threaten me.”

Enid sat on the passenger seat and buckled her seatbelt with trembling hands, knowing Wednesday's driving habits.

They pulled onto the road, or rather Wednesday launched them onto the road like a missile.

The car surged forward, the engine growling like a beast freed from chains. Enid’s head snapped back against the seat. Pedestrians leapt onto sidewalks to avoid being flattened. A cyclist screamed as they narrowly avoided a collision.

“Wednesday!” Enid shrieked, clutching the handle above her head. “The speed limit’s thirty-five!”

Wednesday’s expression was serene, almost angelic. “Speed limits are for the uninspired. Life is short. Death is shorter.”

A horn blared as she cut across two lanes with surgical precision. Willa squealed in delight from the backseat, her tiny hands clapping against the car seat straps.

“Again!” the baby crowed.

“Not again!” Enid cried. “Wednesday, people are staring! That man just crossed himself!”

“Good,” Wednesday murmured, eyes fixed on the road ahead like a hawk eyeing prey. “Fear is the only honest prayer.”

Traffic lights meant nothing to Wednesday. She slowed only when absolutely necessary, glaring at red lights as though they were personal insults.

At one stop, a pedestrian dared to make eye contact with her. Wednesday rolled down the window with chilling slowness.

“Cross,” she said, voice like the toll of a funeral bell. “But know this: mortality follows close behind you.”

The man bolted.

Enid buried her face in her hands. “We’re going to be banned from the mall before we even get there.”

“An outcome I would welcome,” Wednesday replied coolly.

From the backseat, Willa kicked her legs, chanting, “Doom! Doom! Doom!”

Enid twisted around. “Baby, don’t encourage her!”

By some unholy miracle, they reached the mall intact.

Enid’s hair looked like she’d stuck her head out of a speeding train. Her knuckles were white from gripping the door handle. She stumbled out of the car on shaky legs, pressing a hand to her chest.

“I saw my life flash before my eyes,” she muttered.

Wednesday exited gracefully, smoothing her dress without a hair out of place. “And did you like what you saw?”

“I saw me marrying a homicidal maniac!”

“Then it was accurate.”

Meanwhile, Willa gurgled happily as Enid lifted her out of the car seat, oblivious to the chaos.

The mall loomed ahead: bright, bustling, utterly offensive to everything Wednesday valued.

Enid adjusted Willa on her hip, forcing a smile. “Okay, girls. Let’s do this.”

Wednesday stared at the glowing entrance with the expression of someone approaching an open grave.

Chapter Text

The mall swallowed them whole. The automatic glass doors sighed open like the gaping maw of a mechanical beast, spilling them into a cavern of gleaming floors, fluorescent lights and the suffocating perfume of cinnamon pretzels.

Willa’s wide, dark-lashed eyes darted everywhere. She craned her head, her little mouth forming an “o” of awe at the ceiling three stories high, covered in banners of grinning models showing off the latest seasonal styles.

At first she squealed in delight. Then, as a group of teenagers in matching tracksuits strode past and laughed too loudly, she buried her face against Enid’s shoulder with a muffled whimper.

“Aw, baby,” Enid cooed, rubbing her back. “It’s okay. I know, it’s a lot to take in.”

Willa peeked out with one eye, clutching her Mama Woof’s shirt like a lifeline.

Beside them, Wednesday moved like a thundercloud in human form. She was pushing the empty stroller with the grim determination of someone preparing to ram through enemy lines. Her black dress swished across the gleaming tile, her pallor practically glowing under the fluorescent lights. She looked like she was leading a funeral procession through Disneyland.

“This is worse than I imagined,” she intoned flatly, glaring at a kiosk selling sequined phone cases. “An empire of mediocrity. A mausoleum of tackiness.”

Enid grinned despite herself. “Oh, come on, it’s not that bad. Look! Baby store’s this way!”

They reached the pastel-colored gates of a baby store, which glowed like a pastel nightmare. Mannequins of plastic infants grinned eerily, their tiny fake hands frozen mid-wave. The sign above the door read in bubbly letters: "Little Sprouts!"

Wednesday stopped dead.

“Little Sprouts,” she repeated, her voice flat as a coffin lid. “This is where dignity comes to die.”

Enid kissed her cheek. “And this is where our daughter gets new clothes, so suck it up.”

Inside, the aisles were lined with racks upon racks of onesies, dresses, miniature jeans, and socks so tiny they looked made for mice.

Enid immediately went for the “color explosion” section, where racks of cheerful prints shouted in every shade imaginable. She held up a lavender romper covered in sunflowers.

“What do you think?” she asked brightly.

Wednesday narrowed her eyes at the garment like it was cursed. “I think it looks like it was vomited onto fabric by a unicorn with indigestion.”

Enid rolled her eyes. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”

They moved toward another rack, this one covered in “discount” onesies with printed slogans.

Enid picked one up, reading aloud: “‘Mommy’s Little Diva.’” She made a face. “Yikes.”

Wednesday’s lip curled. “Deeply sexist. And inaccurate. Our child is a sovereign empress, not a diva.”

Enid tossed it back onto the rack and grabbed another: “‘Daddy’s Girl.’”

Wednesday’s eyes turned to shards of obsidian. “Burn it.”

Enid snorted. “Relax, we’re not buying it. She doesn’t even have a daddy.”

“She has two mothers. If a single one of these polyester monstrosities dares to erase that fact, I will personally sew its remains into a patchwork shroud for its designer.”

Willa, oblivious to the feminist tirade, gnawed on Enid’s shoulder happily.

Enid reached for another option. “Okay, how about this one? Bright rainbow stripes.”

Wednesday actually winced. “She will be visible from orbit.”

“Good! Easier to spot her at the playground!”

“No,” Wednesday declared, plucking the rainbow onesie from Enid’s hand and returning it to the rack like she was disposing of hazardous waste. “Where are the black ones? The simple, elegant black ones.”

Enid glanced around. “In the boy’s section, maybe. But I don’t think they carry solid black baby clothes here, Weds.”

Wednesday’s nostrils flared. “So you’re telling me they expect me to swaddle my offspring in lavender fluff and slogans about ice cream?”

Enid bit her lip to keep from laughing. “Well... yeah. That’s sort of how mainstream parenting works.”

“Repulsive,” Wednesday said flatly.

Enid pulled down a romper with bright coral whales dancing across the fabric. “This one’s cute!”

Wednesday deadpanned, “Our child will not wear sea life.”

“Why not?”

“Whales are too cheerful. If it were a giant squid strangling a diver, perhaps.”

Enid’s shoulders shook as she stifled laughter.

Wednesday marched toward the darker section, where the “neutral” clothes resided: grays, browns, the occasional navy. She picked up a tiny black jacket with faux leather trim.

“This,” she declared, holding it aloft like Excalibur. “This will do.”

Enid blinked. “That’s for toddlers.”

“She’ll grow into it.”

“Wednesday, she’s ten months old. We need clothes for now.”

“Then buy her a shroud. Timeless. Practical. Easy to accessorize.”

Enid groaned, running a hand through her hair. “Why do I feel like we’re going to end up buying two wardrobes, yours and mine and she’ll just switch between them depending on who dresses her?”

“Precisely,” Wednesday said smoothly, tossing the jacket into their cart.

As if to add her own input, Willa reached out from Enid’s arms and grabbed a frilly tutu onesie in bubblegum pink. She squealed, waving it proudly.

“See?” Enid laughed. “She likes it!”

Wednesday’s eyes narrowed. “She likes the texture. She is too young to comprehend taste.”

Willa promptly shoved the tutu into her mouth, drooling all over the tulle.

“Case in point,” Wednesday muttered.

Enid kissed the baby’s forehead. “She’s perfect.”

“She is mine,” Wednesday corrected softly, but there was no mistaking the pride glinting in her dark eyes.

---

By the time they reached the counter, their cart was a battlefield.

Enid’s side overflowed with pastel rompers, floral leggings and one hoodie with a cartoon wolf pup.

Wednesday’s side contained: Three black jackets in progressively larger sizes, a gray onesie with tiny skulls from the Halloween clearance rack, and inexplicably, a miniature cloak.

The cashier, a college student with too much lip gloss, stared at the pile with wide eyes. “Uh... cute mix of styles.”

Wednesday fixed her with a gaze so chilling the girl audibly gulped.

Enid rushed to smooth things over, handing over Wednesday's credit card. “We’re versatile parents.”

“Terrifying,” muttered the cashier, swiping the card.

“Thank you,” Wednesday said, tone sincere.

As they left the store, Willa cuddled against Enid’s chest, now proudly clutching her tutu like a trophy. Enid kissed her cheek, radiant with motherly joy.

Beside her, Wednesday pushed the stroller with grim dignity, the bags hooked over the handle.

They looked like the strangest family in the mall and also, somehow, the happiest.

Chapter Text

Wednesday carried the bags with ease, as though she were lugging corpses rather than pastel onesies. Each bag swung ominously from her pale hands, her black dress flowing around her ankles like a funeral banner. Enid still clutched Willa close, the baby nestled into her chest and occasionally peeking around with wide, curious eyes at the fluorescent nightmare that was the mall.

“Two more stores,” Enid said brightly, though her voice had a forced lilt that Wednesday immediately caught. “We need more pajamas, everyday onesies, socks... the boring stuff.”

“The boring stuff,” Wednesday repeated, her tone flat as a tombstone. “How poetic.”

They entered another baby store, this one even larger than the last. The air smelled faintly of disinfectant and cotton candy. Rows upon rows of baby clothes stretched like endless fields of fabric, some racks bending under the weight of cheaply printed slogans.

Enid immediately veered toward the bright red “DISCOUNT” sign, humming as she bounced Willa gently on her hip. “Okay, this is what we need. Everyday wear. Things she can roll around in without me panicking about stains.”

Wednesday followed slowly, her eyes narrowing at the racks of clothing like a judge at an execution.

The slogans hit first.

“Princess in Training.”

“I Get My Charm From Daddy.”

“Mommy’s Little Shopaholic.”

Wednesday’s eyebrow arched dangerously. “These garments are crimes against language and decency. I will not clothe my child in polyester propaganda designed to indoctrinate her into capitalism at six months of literacy.”

Enid laughed nervously. “Okay, yeah, some of them are dumb, but they’re practical. Look—” she held up a multipack of pastel onesies. “These are cheap, and she can wear them under her fancier stuff.”

Wednesday’s expression curdled. “Cheapness is not a virtue, Enid.”

“Yes, it is!” Enid shot back, more sharply than she meant. “Well, kind of. It’s necessary. You can’t imagine how many onesies she goes through in a day. Between the spit-up, food spills, crawling on the floor—”

“She is training for war. Scars and stains are proof of a life lived. Not an excuse for polyester blends.”

Enid’s cheeks flushed. “Not all of us were raised with bottomless trust funds and castles full of antique lace, Wednesday.”

Wednesday turned her head slowly, dark eyes fixing on her wife with a steady, chilling focus.

Enid regretted the words instantly.

Without a word, Wednesday pivoted and strode toward the far corner of the store. Enid sighed, following her reluctantly, still holding Willa close.

The premium section was a stark contrast: organic cottons in muted tones, linen rompers and soft wool sweaters. The racks were arranged with reverence, as though the clothes themselves were precious relics. Price tags dangled like tiny nooses, making Enid’s stomach clench.

Wednesday picked up a small black cotton pajama set, trimmed with faintly silvery thread. She ran her fingers across the fabric, then placed it reverently in the cart.

Enid winced at the price. She could practically hear her mother's voice in her head: 'What kind of idiot spends that much on clothes the baby will outgrow in three months?'

“Wednesday...” Enid started, hesitant. “That’s... really expensive.”

“Of course it is,” Wednesday said, entirely unfazed. “She deserves nothing less.”

“She’ll outgrow it before winter’s over!”

“Then we frame it as a relic.”

Enid half-laughed and half-groaned. “Weds, that’s not—ugh.”

Wednesday moved with the calm of a predator, plucking garments from the rack: a set of slate-gray pajamas, a linen romper dyed a deep indigo, socks so soft they might have been spun by spiders. She paid no attention to the price tags.

Enid hovered nervously, biting her lip as she tried to calculate the mounting total in her head.

---

It wasn’t just about the money.

It was about her childhood, the threadbare shirts, socks patched until they were more hole than fabric, the way Esther had stretched every dollar until it screamed. She remembered watching other kids at elementary school in San Francisco wearing brand-name sneakers and bright new jackets while her pack siblings passed down hand-me-downs.

Now here she was, in a high-end section of a mall baby store, married to Wednesday Addams, who treated price tags like abstract art.

“You’re worrying,” Wednesday said flatly, not looking up from examining a set of woolen leggings that looked like they belonged in a Victorian portrait.

Enid blinked. “I’m not.”

“You are. Your nostrils flare when you’re calculating something in your head. Likely the bills.”

Enid flushed. “Okay, maybe I am. But I can’t help it! I grew up knowing how fast money disappears. This all feels... extravagant.”

Wednesday finally looked at her, her eyes gleaming dark and sharp. “And yet, you’ve never once hesitated to spend your warmth, your patience, your very body on those you love. That is true extravagance. Money is nothing.”

Enid opened her mouth, then closed it, cheeks hot.

Willa, oblivious, grabbed a pair of socks from the cart and immediately attempted to eat them.

Wednesday plucked the socks from Willa’s tiny fists and dropped them back into the cart. “Clothes are more than fabric. They are a statement. Armor. Our progeny must be dressed in a way that reflects her heritage. Dignity and power.”

Enid raised an eyebrow. “Power? She’s ten months old.”

“Exactly. We begin as we mean to continue.” Wednesday held up a tiny gray cloak with solemn reverence. “This one speaks of authority.”

Enid snorted. “It speaks of Halloween costume, Weds.”

“It speaks of legacy,” Wednesday corrected, placing it in the cart.

Enid shook her head, grinning despite herself. “She’s going to look like a baby vampire in that.”

“Good. That will instill fear in the hearts of the weak at daycare.”

“We’re not sending her to daycare,” Enid said as if it's obvious.

“Then it will terrify our neighbors. A satisfactory alternative.”

By the time they reached the register, the cart looked like the wardrobe of a baby aristocrat. Enid clutched Willa a little tighter, her stomach twisting as the cashier scanned the items, the total climbing higher and higher on the screen.

Her heart thudded in her ears. She was back in San Francisco, hearing Esther lecture her about money about how marrying into wealth would make her dependent, how she’d lose herself.

The cashier read the total. Enid winced. Wednesday calmly handed over her black credit card, utterly unbothered.

Enid couldn’t even look.

---

Outside the store, Enid walked in silence, Willa’s head resting against her shoulder.

Wednesday carried the bags, graceful as always.

Finally, Enid exhaled. “Sometimes it scares me. How easy it is for you.”

Wednesday glanced at her, dark eyes softer than they usually allowed. “You mean money.”

“Yeah.”

Wednesday was quiet for a moment. Then she said, “I will never allow you to be dependent. Not financially, not emotionally. You are my equal, Enid. My wife. My only.”

Enid’s throat tightened.

“I buy these clothes not because I must,” Wednesday continued, “but because I wish for our child to have what you were denied. Comfort. Security. The freedom not to count every coin.”

Enid blinked back tears, kissing the top of Willa’s head. “You really mean that?”

Wednesday’s lips curved in the faintest of smirks. “Of course. Besides, she looks formidable in cloaks.”

Enid laughed through her tears, nudging Wednesday’s shoulder. “God, I love you.”