Work Text:
[Peter Spankoffski was born laughing.
If you ask anyone with a medical degree they’d tell you no he fucking wasn’t. Newborns don’t laugh, they can’t. They don’t even smile until a couple weeks out, and laughing is a multi-month project. It’s a developmental stage, you start with socialization, and eventually they start cooing, and then, only then, do you get laughter.
And yet, Peter Spankoffski was born laughing.
(Like there’d been someone inside with him teaching him exactly how to do it, the smiles the cooing the laughter. Or maybe just the laughter part. Because that was the most important bit, really.)
Not that he’d had much to laugh about.
Peter Spankoffski was what his parents would call a ‘miracle child’, which means Peter Spankoffski was what any psychologist on the planet would call an attempted ‘fix it child’ and a ‘huge mistake’.
The Spankoffskis just weren’t a good couple. Plain and simple. They hadn’t been in 1984 when they’d had their first child, and it’s not like that had made them any better, so it’s anyone’s fucking guess to why they’d thought another kid would solve anything. (It was almost funny. It was funny. At least someone out there thought so. But, in fairness, that someone also thought the Spankoffskis were always funny, no matter what they did. So so so so so so funny.)
It hadn’t fixed jack shit, in case you were curious. Whatever new-baby-magic they’d been expecting failed to show up, just one giggly, tiny kid with the worst case of jaundice St. Damien's Hospital had ever seen.]
[And it’s not 2005 yet, so nothing drastic changes. No time lines split. No white spiders.
But the Spankoffski bloodline is never quite the same, after that, is it?]
Pete’s got a Bad Feeling about the old Waylon Place.
A proper noun style Bad Feeling.
(He’s got plenty of lower-cased, improper noun bad feelings about it too, though. He does not trust Grace Chastity as far as he can throw her, and is still like forty-five percent convinced he’s going to turn a corner and realize he’s been tricked into the most structurally unsafe prayer meeting in the world.)
It’s the kind of bad feeling that sticks behind his eyes and turns his stomach, a familiar Bad Feeling that he knows almost as well as he knows breathing. And he’s really, really unsettled by how the Bad Feeling only started once he’d stepped through the front door.
‘Hey, Kiddo!’
Pete flinches, shoulders shooting up to his ears without his permission (he’d known that was coming, he’d fucking known it) and Tinky cackles. He’s always doing that, cackling, but it echoes here in a way it usually doesn’t. Amplified in a way it should not be, considering how little the architecture of the old Waylon place seems to have been planned around acoustics. All hard, flat surfaces and low, dusty, sound swallowing ceilings.
Shit, shit, shit.
He doesn’t like it when things with Tinky change in any capacity. He’s already bad enough, but at least he’s a consistent sort of bad enough. It’s when things go even wonkier that he gets nervous. (Or, okay, fine, nervous-er). He scrambles for his backpack, he’s got a bag of gummy bears in there: fifteen or so and he’s fine after a second. He knows how this works, he’s got it down to a science. (Which is why he doesn’t like it when things change.)
‘Uh-uh, Petey, not this time.’ Tinky grins, suddenly very much directly in front of him and yanking back the top strap of his bag hard before Pete can grab for it.
To his, probably woozy (because Tinky always, just barely, precedes woozy), horror, it slumps off his shoulders and slams against the floor.
(He’s never been able to do that before. Figments of your imagination are not supposed to be able to do that. This is not how this usually goes at all.)
Logically (and that’s how Pete operates, logically) he knows this is fine. That it’s a much smaller deal than he’s making it. Tinky is here, ugh, whatever, fine, that just means that his blood sugar is out of whack, and his blood sugar being out of whack always makes him clumsier. That’s what probably happened. That’s definitely what happened.
He’s dizzy and dropped his bag without realizing.
(He doesn’t feel dizzy though. He feels perfectly and entirely fine.)
(Well, fine blood sugar wise, at least. His face still fucking hurts. And his ribs. And his whole punching-bag-body. But his brain is fine, and his blood sugar levels should be too. But that’s what this has to be. This only happens when his blood sugar is fucked.)
“You good, Pete?”
Steph had stopped when he dropped his bag, he realizes, something warm bubbling up in his chest. She cocks an eyebrow, glancing down at his backpack and he lurches to grab it.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine!”
“Okay?” She smiles, and keeps following Grace’s lead. He watches her walk away, wishing he felt less like a liar. He feels fine, but, is he actually? Tinky isn’t supposed to be here when he’s fine, and it’s freaking him out that he is. Something about the old Waylon place is wrong. Down-to-his-bones-wrong. Tinky wrong. Bad Feeling.
But that’s certainly not something he’s going to tell Stephanie Lauter.
(God, fucking imagine?
‘No, Steph, don’t worry, the invisible goat man I’ve been hallucinating since I was a kid just showed up and freaked me out. Oh, yeah, I did say invisible goat man! Remember the weirdo in elementary school who got bullied for talking to himself all the time? That was me! Don’t worry I’m not crazy I swear.’
Yeah, that’d go so well.)
He locates the gummy bears, finally, and shoves a handful straight into his mouth all at once, a tried and true Go-Away-Tinky assurance. He’s fine. It’s fine, and it’ll be even more fine in a couple minutes.
‘I told you it’s not gonna work this time!’ Tinky sing-songs, floating upside down next to him and beaming in the manic kind of way that’s never read anything good. It’s the kind of wide, yellow-drooly grin that historically has preceded him telling Pete step by step how to brutally slit someone’s throat or explaining in detail what it looks like when someone’s flesh melts off their bones.
“Shut up.”
“You say something?” Steph pauses again, and Pete mentally kicks himself. He’s been training himself not to respond out loud to Tinky for years, but something about this stupid old house is messing with him.
“No! Sorry, I was- um, talking to myself.”
“Ah,” She huffs a laugh, sidling up next to him and right into where Tinky’s been floating. And that, that, is where he’s supposed to disappear. Where he’s supposed to blink very unhappily slightly to the left so Pete can still see him clearly, whining until the sugar of the gummy bears hit and he goes away entirely. That’s the way it is supposed to go.
But he doesn’t, he just keeps floating, happy as a pig in shit (goat in shit? do goats like shit?) as he bisects into two bloody halves, bobbing in time with Steph’s steps as he frames her front and back.
Pete thinks he might throw up. Just a little, in his mouth, because, sure, whatever, this is all generally unsettling, but Tinky does shit like this all the time. It’s just something about him doing it at all to Steph that makes it feel so much worse.
Or maybe it’s just the house.
It’s at least fucking somewhat the house.
“This place creeps me out.” He admits, carefully, not making any eye-contact.
“God. Same.” Steph groans, rolling her neck with a click. He steals a glance, very carefully, super cool-like, and she’s tilted her head against her shoulder so she’s looking at him. She’s smiling and despite himself he smiles back.
Tinky just giggles.
And giggles.
And giggles.
Pete swallows another fistful of candy.
“So, like, what are we even doing here?”
‘Ooh, Kid, listen! This story is really fun,’ Tinky beams, butting his head hard against Pete’s shoulder, and it hurts more than it usually does. A real, sharp, bruise type of pain as opposed to the dull, phantom ache of something not-real.
God, Pete fucking hates this house.
[Today is a Good Day.
A big, capital letters, proper noun kind of Good Day.
It’s a Good Day because today is a Ted-Babysitting-Him-Saturday, and, to put it into simple words, Pete loves Ted-Babysitting-Him-Saturdays. Not nearly as much as Tinky does, but how much Tinky loves it is part of what makes it so fun, anyways, so Pete doesn’t mind. It’s not like it’s a competition.
His mom doesn’t bother to make him ‘look presentable’ on Ted-Babysitting-Him-Saturday, Pete thinks it’s because she doesn’t trust Ted enough to not let him ruin his nice things, which is fair, and Pete is not complaining. He’s more than happy sprawled out on a blanket on Ted’s, honestly, kind of gross, floor (the blanket is clean though, he knows because he brought it from home), kicking his mismatched-socked-feet against the bottom of the coffee table and tugging the too-long sleeves of his Ted-old hand-me-down sweatshirt over his hands.
Ted’s in a Mood today (less of a proper noun, but still, capital letters), which is fine. Sometimes on these Saturdays he’ll sit and play with Pete, or take him to see a movie, or even, sometimes, take him to Toy Zone and let him stare at the science kits or play with all the tiny, too-expensive sensory toys his parents never let him buy. (Well, Ted doesn’t really buy them either, but he lets Pete play with them while they're there, and sometimes he’ll get him one later, for Christmas or a birthday, so that’s okay too.)
But Ted’s in a Mood, which means Pete has to entertain himself. Which, as established, is also fine, because Pete never has to entertain himself. That’s what Tinky is for.
He lines up the blocks that Ted’s had in his apartment for as long as he can remember in color order, a familiar and easy rhythm while listening to Tinky wheeze and giggle his way through a hundred different ways to say his big brother’s name.
Teddy-Bear, Ted, Theodore.
Tinky plops down on the blanket next to him, tap tap tapping Pete on his shoulder. He looks up from his blocks, ‘Ask him what his favorite color is!’
He nods, “Teddy? What's your favorite color?”
This is an important part of Ted-Babysitting-Him-Saturday, the careful ritual of Tinky asking him a million questions about his big brother, and him, in turn, asking them to Ted. He doesn’t mind it, it’s not Tinky’s fault that Ted can’t see him, and it’s, like, super unfair, so as his best friend the least Pete can do is pass along the message.
Ted glances over at him from the couch, pausing the TV and taking a long, slow sip from his beer bottle before answering, “I dunno, red?”
Uh oh.
‘Fuck that.’ Tinky hisses, angry, in the sharp, quick way that Pete knows will go away if he does something fast, but, if he doesn’t, will just grow and grow and grow until a Good Day becomes a Very Bad Day.
“Teddy?” He whispers, quickly, “Can you say it’s yellow, actually?”
Ted raises an eyebrow, scoffs, and Pete feels nerves start to crawl up his throat, acidic and tasting like blood, but, then, “Sure. Whatever. Yeah, my favorite color’s yellow.”
His shoulders slump in relief. Tinky beams, wider than ear to ear.
‘Yes!’ He cackles, ‘Yes, yes, yes, I knew it!’
“Thank you!”
“Whatever, kid.”
Ted goes back to his show. Pete goes back to lining up his blocks. Tinky goes back to sing-song-ing Ted’s name.
Bad-dog-Teddy, Teddy-weddy, Bastard, Bastard, Bastard.
‘Ask what’s his favorite food is!’
“I think it’s pizza.”
“Hm?”
“No, not you.”
“Alright.”
‘Just fucking ask, Kiddo.’
“Okay.” Nod, “Teddy?”
TV pause.
“Yeah?”
“What's your favorite food?”
“...Pizza. I guess?”
“Told you!”
TV plays.
Teddy, Spank-bank-offski, Theo, Konk, Teddddddddddddddddddyyyyyyyyyyy.
‘Ask if he likes his job!’
Nod.
“Teddy?”
TV pause.
“What?”
“Do you like your job?”
“What?”
“Do you like your job?”
“I mean… it’s a job.”
‘Not an answer! Ask again! That’s not a fucking answer!’
Second nod, “Tinky says that's not an answer.”
“Jesus, okay. I mean… it's fine. I like it fine.”
‘... I guess that’s an answer. Tell him it’s a bad answer.’
“Tinky says that's a bad answer, but that’s okay!”
“Whatever you say.”
TV plays.
Ted, Ted, Teddy, Theo-doring-boring, Time Bastard, Ted Spankoffski.
Pete finishes the even steps of lining up the blocks and slowly begins to stack them one by one. This is almost Tinky’s favorite part, and so it’s almost Pete’s favorite part too.
‘Oh! Oh, oh, oh, Bucky! I just thought of a good one!’ Tinky laughs, bulldozing his head through the beginnings of the block tower. Nothing happens. It never does, but he always tries. Pete’s offered to swipe it down for him in the past, but he doesn’t like that, ‘Ask him if he’d rather be trapped in a time loop forever and ever and ever or… or or or… punch a baby.”
Pete giggles, sometimes Tinky asks questions that don’t make much sense at all, but he complies, “Teddy?”
“Yeah?” Ted sighs hard, rubbing a hand up his face and pausing the TV.
“Would you rather be trapped in a time loop or punch a baby?”
“What?” It cracks out of him like a laugh, but his eyebrows are scrunched together unhappily, “Where the fuuu– where’d you come up with that one?”
“Tinky wanted to know.” He shrugs.
“Ah.”
He leans back on the couch, pressing play on the remote, and Tinky starts to shake. Uh oh.
“No, no, Teddy, you gotta answer.”
“I have to answer whether or not I want to punch a baby?”
“No. You have to answer whether or not you’d rather punch a baby or be trapped in a time loop.”
“Oh, of course.”
He’s not getting it. Pete scrambles up, leaning on his knees closer to the couch, hoping his closeness emphasizes how important this is, “Teddy, you gotta answer!”
“I dunno!” He slumps deeper against the cushions, and Pete’s mouth starts to taste like blood and live wires again, “Is it, like… a bad time loop?”
Tinky freezes, angry-angry-angry face lifting into a wide smile. Pete looks at him expectantly and the copper-electricity-taste dissolves in on itself, ‘Oh yeah, kiddo, it’s a bad time loop.’
Pete squints at him, confused and hoping for a little more clarification he doesn’t think he’ll be getting. Why would Tinky want to put Ted into a bad time loop? Tinky likes Ted.
“Tinky says it’s a bad time loop.”
“Ah. Shit– shoot. I mean.” He snorts, “I guess I’m punchin’ that baby, then.”
And Tinky really likes that answer.
“Tinky likes you.” Pete says, softly, as he goes back to stacking up his blocks, grinning a little at the way Tinky’s delight has spotlighted the whole room yellow.
“Yippee.” Ted rolls his eyes, and starts his show again. Which is frustrating, even if Tinky doesn’t seem abruptly upset by it the way Pete had sort of been expecting. He doesn’t seem to realize what a big deal that is. Tinky doesn’t like anyone. Especially not his mom and dad. He gets pouty when someone else, someone other people can see, take Pete’s time and attention away from him.
But he doesn’t even mind it when Ted does it. He loves Ted.
“No. Teddy, you aren’t listening! He likes you! A lot!”
“That’s great, kid. Really. Glad to hear it.” But he doesn’t sound like he means it.
Tinky cackles taper off to giggles, and he settles down to slam at the floor around Pete’s block tower, trying to get it to topple topple topple. It doesn’t. Because it can’t.
He finishes the tower and leans back on his heels, waiting for what he knows is coming. The blocks have been lined up and sorted and stacked, the questions have been asked, and now, it’s time for Tinky to bring out The Box.
He watches, stomach twisting the way it always does at this part. The Box is important, he knows, and so very pretty. All golden and impossible to look at straight and sparkly. Too many corners and sides and edges and somehow still a box. The Box. It’s Tinky’s very favorite thing in the whole entire world, and so Pete’s long since decided it’s got to be his favorite thing too. Even if it makes him sort of uncomfortable.
He holds it up, and Pete watches close as he shrinks it down to a compact, matching-sized cube to fit with the rest of the blocks. Sometimes he throws it, or the whole thing explodes and reappears, or something else equally sort of loud and sort of scary, but today he just oh-so-carefully walks over and balances it on the top of the tower.
Tinky giggles, and Pete giggles back, and then Tinky lifts his leg and slams it into the block stack. The rest of the blocks stay neatly piled, but The Box goes flying, clanging like he’s packed every pot and pan in Hatchetfield inside. (But it always does that, so Pete shoves his hands over his ears just in time.)
‘Ask him about Jenny!’ Tinky’s voice cuts easily through the muted silence of Pete’s palms.
He lifts his head, keeping his hands up, just in case, feeling entirely too thrown off his footing. This… this isn’t how this goes. The Box came out, questions are supposed to be over.
“Who?” He asks, slowly. Maybe this isn’t a Ted question. Maybe it’s just a normal question.
Ted glances over, eyebrows furrowed in a way Pete is pretty sure is annoyance, he can never really tell, “Who what?”
(Ted’s voice stays muffled, so he lets his hands fall back down so he can hear him better.)
“No. No, not you. Tinky.”
He rolls his eyes and goes back to his show, “‘Course.”
‘Jenny, Kiddo!’ Tinky barrels on, bouncing up on his knees so he’s too close too close too close into Pete’s personal space. The Box jangles from where he’s left it on the floor, abandoned, like the routine, ‘Jenny Benny Bloody Bunny! Ask Teddy-bear about Jenny!’
“But who is she?”
He giggles, but his eyes are wide and insistent. Oh. Angry. Again. This is supposed to be a Good Day, ‘Ask Teddy-bear!’
“Hm.” He doesn’t like when Tinky gets really angry, and he’s got the uncomfortable feeling swallowing up his chest that they’re getting way too close to really angry. When Tinky gets really angry he gets loud and gross and says things that don’t make any sense at all over and over and over until it’s time for Pete to go to bed. (And then, if Tinky’s still mad enough, it’s Nightmare Time. Pete doesn’t like Nightmare Time. He doesn’t he doesn’t he doesn’t.)
It’s easier, sometimes, just to go along with what he’s asking. Even if it’s not in the right order. He probably just forgot to ask earlier, he decides, and doesn’t feel any better about it at all, “...Teddy?”
Ted tilts his head in his direction just a little, with a tight-corners-kind-of-smile, which is almost nice, “What?”
“Whose Jenny?”
All at once the almost nice smile is gone and nothing shows up to replace it, “What?”
Tinky giggles.
Pete has a really bad feeling about this. This is why you do things in order, “Jenny?”
Ted doesn’t even bother to pause his show, which is how Pete knows whatever Tinky’s accidentally stumbled him into is really serious. He doesn’t know what do with really angry Ted, he’s never seen that before. He doesn’t want to see it now. But, regardless of how much Pete doesn’t want this to be happening, Ted slams down his beer on the coffee table with a loud loud too loud clank, pushing off the couch so he’s right in front of where Pete’s crouching.
And, usually, it’s kind of nice when Ted sits on the floor with him, but this isn’t a nice kneel-on-the-floor. Tinky’s laughing way too hard for that. This is something entirely different.
“Buddy.” He says, slowly, words coming out all broken-pieced and too high pitched, with something that isn’t a smile but Pete thinks it’s maybe trying to be, “Where… did you… hear that?”
Pete blinks. That doesn’t make any sense. He hadn’t asked about a that he’d asked about a who.
He looks back at Tinky. Tinky’s looking at Ted. Grinning like he’s won something.
“Who the fuck told you about that?”
Loud. He’s being loud. He’s angry, why is he so angry? Pete shrinks into himself and Ted freezes. Slowing again in the wrong wrong wrong forced way that makes his face look weird and his shoulders tense big big bigger, “Look. I’m not… mad,” (Liar.) “I just,” he takes a rattly-sounding deep breath, “I just… I wanna know how you know that name.”
“Tinky.” He manages to force out, squeaky and uncertain, over the overwhelming sense of wrong crashing over him and drowning him up to his ears. Ted’s lying. He is angry, and he was being so loud, and it’s confusing. That’s exactly what Pete had been trying to avoid.
“Oh!” Ted laughs, but it’s not a nice laugh, burying his face into one of his hands, “Oh, of fucking course! Yeah, sure, that makes sense. The imaginary goat told you about Jenny.”
‘Oh, fuck you!’ Tinky wails, not laughing anymore, not happy, oh no oh no oh no now they’re both angry, and and and too many people are yelling. It’s too loud loud loud too loud, ‘You should just fucking kill yourself you fucking bastard!’
“He did tell me!” Pete insists, also probably too loud, hoping it’ll make it better but everything just feels worse. Because Tinky’s not imaginary, he’s right there, and he actually likes Ted and Ted’s being so mean, “And he’s real!”
“Was it dad?” Ted asks, not taking his face out of his hand, but still so loud, “Is he the one who told you?”
“No.” He’s so confused, he’s so so so confused, “I told you! It was Tinky!”
Ted stares at him. For a long moment. Just stares.
And then he slams his hand loud loud too loud against the floor. Pete’s block tower finally falls loud loud too loud across the hardwood. No no no no no no! This is all wrong.
“Tinky’s not fucking real!”
“Yes, he is!” Pete yells back, before promptly bursting into tears.
Ted lets out an extended, wordless groan into his hands, before snapping his head up. Face red and eyes hard and, to Pete’s confusion and deep, deep scared-sort-of-discomfort, he might be crying too. He opens his mouth, and Pete auto-pilot sets himself up to yell again, because it’s not helping but his head is so hot hot hot and he thinks it’s all he knows how to do anymore.
Tinky’s wheezing out livid, hissy, little giggles from behind him, clearly expecting to yell too.
But all at once Ted snaps his mouth shut, stands, and leaves the room. The door to his bedroom slams.
Pete feels nauseous.
Tinky kicks The Box, and the crash of metal rattles over itself until it sounds a lot less like kitchen cabinets and more like screams, ‘Bastard.’
Pete swallows. His throat feels dry. Ted’s never yelled at him before. He’s yelled, yeah, but it’s always in front of Pete, never at Pete. He doesn’t like it.
“Why did you make me do that?” He rounds on Tinky, suddenly upset, really upset. This isn’t his fault, it's Tinky’s. He did the steps all out of order and now everything is wrong.
It was supposed to be a Good Day.
‘Oh, hey, wait,” Tinky’s anger drops slack, voice so soft and hooves raised, ‘Bucky! This isn’t my fault.’
“Yes, it is!” He must have known Ted was gonna be mad when Pete said Jenny (and Pete still doesn’t know who that is) but he made him do it anyway.
‘No! No, no.’ He reaches out, hoof extended so Pete can take it. He doesn’t… want to, ‘It’s Teddy-bear’s.’
“What?” He doesn’t think that’s right. That doesn’t seem right.
‘Think about it, come on, you were just asking him a question! And he freaked out!’
That's true. Sort of. His brain still feels too warm and buzzy to try and wrap it fully around the concept. But Tinky’s his best friend, he’s always been, the kind of so-super-special bestest best friend that’s so so-super-special that only Pete can see him.
And… Ted had yelled at him just for asking a question.
‘Come on, don’t look so sad, Buckling! I’ve got a fun idea.’ He grins, waving his still pushed-out arm, tempting him to grab his hoof, just take it, come on come on come on.
And so he does. Slowly, because, at least today, Tinky’s fun idea’s haven’t been going all too well for Pete, “What’s your idea?”
‘You’ll see!’ He skips him over to the front door. It’s a weird feeling, Pete thinks, walking hand in hand with someone whose skipping when you’re just dragging your feet. He doesn’t much feel like skipping to fix it, though. It’s distracting enough, elbow rattling and lurching up and down as Tinky rockets himself too high off the hardwood, that he doesn’t notice for a second just what his friend wants him to do.
‘Just turn it!’ He beams, pointing to the door handle.
“I’m not s’pposed go outside without Teddy, though.”
‘Teddy’s too busy being a little bitch, though. Right? Remember what we talked about?’
“Yeah, but-”
‘Hey, you can trust me, right? I’m your bestest friendy-wend!’
“I-”
‘Come on, I’m not gonna getcha hurt! It’ll be fun!’
“But-”
‘Come on!’ He yanks their attached hands, so hard his own fur covered arm pops out of its socket and hangs there with a nauseating squelch. He bares his teeth into a too wide smile.
There will be no taking no for an answer, then. Pete squeezes his eyes shut and reaches up for the handle, “Okay.”
Ted’s apartment is on the third floor, which means they have to take the elevator. And as the floors count down down down Pete feels his nerves grow. He’s not supposed to be doing this. Ted’s gonna get mad again.
‘Hey, Buckling, calm down.’ Tinky smiles, not letting go of his hand, but digging The Box out of thin air, ‘Here, just listen to my Toy Box. This’ll be fun fun fun!’
The Box, on it’s own, not as part of a routine or a block stack, always makes things feel… well… better isn’t the right word but… different. Fuzzy around the edges. Too loud for anything else to break through. He feels his shoulders drop, just a little, Tinky’s right. It’s gonna be fun. Even if Ted will be… Teddy will be… why was he worried about Teddy again?
Tinky giggles, and The Box jangles and yells and cackles and glows, and he processes, in a blurry sort of way, like a fuzzy-edged dream, that they’re outside of the apartment complex. He hesitates, bouncing on his toes, right on the edge of the sidewalk. He never put his shoes back on.
It makes everything feel suddenly off kilter that he’s outside of the house in only his socks.
“Tinky, I dunno about this-”
‘Trust me, Kiddo, I’ve got brothers too, and this is gonna get Teddy-Bear back.’
He can’t remember why he wants to get Teddy back, all of sudden, “You’ve got brothers?”
Tinky frantic-giggles, and pulls him off the sidewalk edge, right into the street, ‘Shut the fuck up.’
He watches, wide eyed, as a car comes barrelling closer. Closer. Closer. The Box is too loud he can’t move and the car has been coming for so so so long why isn’t it stopping The Box is so loud–
And then, bright lights.
Crash, Bang–
Ted.
He skids across the sidewalk, face pressed dark and warm against the front of Ted’s hoodie, sharp metal of the zipper digging against his nose in a way that should be more unpleasant than it is. All his senses rocket back to him, nauseating and terrifying.
“██████, oh my god, oh my fucking god–” Ted frantically pushes Pete off his chest, hands cupping his face and eyes wider than Pete’s ever seen them. He looks scared.
Pete’s never seen a grown up look scared before.
He wants to stop seeing it. He can’t see Tinky. He doesn’t know if he wants to. Unceremoniously, and more overwhelmed than he thinks he’s ever been, Pete shoves his face back into Ted’s chest and bursts into tears.
Ted just cups the back of his head close, safe safe safe, “Oh my fucking god, buddy, holy shit, I’m so sorry. Oh my god, oh my god–”]
The plan is stupid.
Pete is well aware of this simple fact from the second it comes out of Grace’s mouth. It’s a bad plan. Tinky seems to disagree, Tinky seems thrilled that this is what they’re going with, which is only making him more convinced that this plan sucks ass.
Unfortunately, he doesn’t really have a better one.
‘I dunno why you're being such a sourpuss, Kiddo, it sounds fun!’ Tinky wheels around, kicking at a broken light fixture and giggling over the shower of dust that subsequently rains down to the floor.
Pete tugs sharply on the front of his costume jacket, “No, see you saying that is making me really fucking sure that this is a bad idea!”
Richie lifts his head up from his video camera screen, eyebrows pinched together, “What?”
“Nothing.” He huffs. He hates this. He hates this.
“Are you alright, Peter? You’ve been acting strangely since we’ve gotten here.”
“I’m fucking fine.” He insists, probably harsher than he needs to.
Richie just nods in response, which he appreciates. Richie has never been great at social cues, in general, (not like Pete’s one to fucking talk about that shit though), but one thing he’s always been okay-ish at is knowing when to fucking drop it.
(Ruth, however, sucks at dropping it, which is why it’s lucky that Ruth isn’t over here right now.)
“Be honest, am I reading as ghost, or Lin Manuel Miranda?” He asks, for multiple reasons; as a peace offering (for Richie, whose messing with his camera, face twisted still-kind-of-uncomfortably) and a ‘fuck off’ (for Tinky, who gets horribly, loudly upset when Pete ignores him for someone else whose actually real), and as a genuine goddamn question. Ted’s been watching the Hamilton pro-shot a lot recently, and he can’t help but notice way more similarities than he’d like to. He doesn’t know how scary he can be with ‘Cabinet Battle #1’ fucking looping in the back of his head the whole time.
Richie tilts his head, “You kind of look like that homeless guy from downtown.”
Mmm. Fuck.
Tinky’s laughter slithers down his spine. Shattered-glass-sounding delight sharp in the base of Pete’s skull. Entirely expected and even more entirely unwanted. Because, here's the thing, Tinky loves the homeless guy from downtown. He loves him so much that it’s, on several occasions, sent Pete down a frantic, Google-search rabbit hole trying to figure out what the fuck that said about his psyche.
Richie keeps talking, something teasing and flat, but Pete can’t hear him over Tinky’s heaving cackles.
With all of the restraint left in his tense, probably-having-a-low-blood-sugar-episode-against-all-odds-and-what-his-level-moniter-says, body he doesn’t shove his hands over his ears. He wants to, though. God, he wants to.
(Because when Tinky sees the homeless guy, when Tinky hears about him, when Tinky laughs, it’s not just laughter. It’s screaming. It’s a phantom burn in his throat as a thousand voices beg him for help he can’t give. It’s voices that sound a hell of a lot more like his older brother’s than he’d like them too.)
‘YES YES YES YES!’ Tinky wheezes, ‘Oh man, I like this one, Kid!’
(That’s objectively false. Tinky fucking hates Pete’s friends, and always has. He finds them funny sometimes, sure, but most of the time he’ll lean against Pete’s shoulder and mumble all the horrible, disgusting, brutal ways he’d murder them, walking him step by step on how to do it until Pete throws up or eats some M&M-heavy trail mix.)
The broken body of the homeless man sprawls out of one of the glowing, shifting sides of The Box, illusion slamming against the floor with a splat, ‘Y’know, the resemblance is uncanny!’
Pete hates the Old Waylon place, oh man, Pete hates the fucking Old Waylon place.
He squeezes his eyes closed as hard as he can. It’s not like it’s gonna help anything, but a childish part of his brain clings to if I can’t see it it’s not happening. Like maybe if he keeps his eyes shut then Tinky will just disappear–
‘Ohohoho, here comes Maxy!’ Tinky squawks with fresh giggles. It overlaps with his previous cackling like the worst orchestra in history. Pete can hear the echoey clack clack clack of his hooves clapping together. Not looking is, unsurprisingly, making it fucking worse. And well, it’s not like he’s surprised, Tinky’s always been really fucking good at that; making shit worse.
Pete’s stomach twists. This plan is so fucking bad. So bad. There is no way this is going to go well.
His Walkie-Talkie crackles to life, Grace’s too-loud-mouth-practically-on-the-microphone voice slamming through his earpiece, “Max is coming!”
Fuck.
God, this plan blows.
[Ted’s on the phone in the living room with their mom.
He’s talking louder than Pete thinks he’s meaning too because he can hear him clearly from Ted’s attached kitchen, where he’s been sat very pointedly at the table and told to not move.
It’s maybe a time out, Pete thinks, so he’s not gonna go anywhere.
(He watched Ted shove his shoe rack over to barricade the front door anyway. It makes him feel weird in a way he doesn’t have words for.)
“Ma,” Ted always calls their mom ‘Ma’. Pete had tried to once, but the word fit awkward in his mouth and all it’d gotten him was a swift spanking and twenty whole minutes of time out, so, apparently it’s just one of those things only Ted’s allowed to do. Like having a mustache and saying fuck, “This imaginary fucking friend is telling her to walk into traffic. That’s not fucking normal.”
He likes getting punished at Ted’s a lot more than he likes getting punished at home, he thinks, sipping on his chocolate milk.
It tastes kind of weird, because Ted buys whole milk instead of skim and the chocolate sauce was warm. (He kept it in his bedroom instead of the fridge, apparently, which Pete thinks is weird, but Ted had dodged the question when he tried to ask about it. Tinky thinks it’s very, very funny, but Pete thinks he’s a little mad at Tinky so he doesn’t ask him for clarification.) But, still, it’s way, way better than getting spanked or the timeout corner.
If he’s being honest, he’s not even sure it’s a punishment at all. He’s pretty sure Ted forgot. He’s not planning on reminding him.
“No. No, I don’t care,” Ted hisses, “I’m serious, you need to take her to a psychiatrist or something.”
‘Nu-uh!’ Tinky pouts. He’s been upset ever since Ted grabbed Pete out of the road. Or, at least, he’s been upset since it’s become clear Pete’s giving him the silent treatment.
It’s not exactly an intentional silent treatment, but Pete’s really confused, and asking Tinky why he’d done something bad last time had gotten him into this mess in the first place. (But, okay, it’s a little bit intentional. Because Pete’s mad and there's nothing Tinky hates more than being ignored. It just makes him feel weird to think about it that way, so he doesn’t.)
Even if he’s upset with Tinky he doesn’t get why everyone is so convinced Tinky’s bad or something he’s gonna grow out of. Sure, he’d been kind of a jerk today, but still, he’s Pete’s best friend.
He’s the reason Pete already knows how many hours are in a day and how many minutes are in an hour and what the difference between the little hand and big hand on clocks are. And adults always think that's impressive.
He doesn’t get why they don’t think Tinky is impressive then too.
So, even if he’s mad at Tinky, he decides he’s gonna tell Ted that there's nothing to be worried about once he’s off the phone.
(Fun fact: that’s not going to help his case.
Not even a little bit.)]
Pete tugs nervously on one of the loose rags sewn on the front of his costume jacket, running his lines quickly over in his head.
Max-Maxwell-Jägerman-You-Have-Disturbed-The-Spirits-Of-Waylon-Hall-Now-Your-Soul-Shall-Be-Ours-blah-blah-blah–
This is scripted, easy, he can do this. He just has to say the Grace-approved horror-movie-for-little-kids-style (that are also Richie approved anime-ghost-story-style) lines and make his voice kind of echoey and boom! That's his part all finished.
(And then, probably, Max Jägerman is gonna kick his ass. But whatever. Sure. Fucking fine. Fantastic plan, Grace.)
He watches as the blurry shape (he really should have kept his glasses on) of Max stumbles, already clearly drunk, into the middle of the room, “If you guys are gonna surprise me do it al-fucking-ready! I gotta take a piss!”
Blankly, he thinks that's kind of perfect. Maybe they’ll manage to get the shot Grace was hoping for because he’ll be too preoccupied beating the shit out of Pete to hold it.
“Peter! Go time!” Richie hisses into his Walkie.
He swallows hard, stepping hopefully-more-grandly-than-stupidly out into the light. Now or never. His mouth opens, shaped readily for Max-Maxwell-Jägerman-You-Have-Disturbed-The-blah-blah-blah, but–
But.
But no words come out.
They’re caught on something, boxed in and clogged up, at the base of his throat, and it becomes clear very, very quickly that no matter how hard he swallows or tries to push they aren’t going anywhere. Fuck.
The back of his throat burns like he’d sunk his molars into copper wiring.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck. Before he can move (he gets the stomach churning feeling he wouldn’t have been able to move even if he’d had the time) Tinky’s arm wraps tightly around his throat, sharp edges of his hoof pressing hard into Pete’s chin.
This no longer feels like a Grace approved horror movie for little kids.
Cackling, always cackling, he forcefully puppets Pete’s mouth open and shut out of time with his own voice, ‘Heya, Maxy!’
“Woah, nice ghost voice!” Someone whispers through Pete’s earpiece, at the same time Max says something in response, but suddenly Peter’s too terrified to register any of it. This isn’t how this goes. This isn’t supposed to happen. No one else should be able to hear him.
‘It’s me! Up here! The stupid looking ghost in the toppy-top-hat!’
Max says something to that too, and in his panic Pete, at least, grasps onto the fact that he sounds kind of scared.
‘Do you know what happens to the people who trespass on sacred ground, Maxy-poo?’
“Wh-what?” Oh. Yeah. Max is definitely scared. It feels like that should make him feel better but it doesn’t. Pete’s fucking scared too. Pete’s more scared than he’s maybe ever been.
‘My little brother swallows their dirty goddamn souls!’ Tinky hollers, throwing Pete’s head back and forth to mimic it. It aches into the bruised corners of his neck, too real for something that isn’t real, this can’t be real. It’s not real. When he gets home, he’s sure, he’ll comfortably curl up with a digital medical journal that will answer all his questions about how this is all some waking sleep paralysis nightmare (time) brought on by stress and a sudden, shock overproduction of insulin.
“Peter Spankoffski! These aren’t the lines!” Grace (that was Grace’s voice, that was so definitely Grace’s voice, he clings to the awareness like a lifeline) lectures through her own Walkie-Talkie, and Pete realizes, blurrily, that Ruth is probably going to tear him a new one about going off book. He hones in on that. The memory of Ruth’s endless text-vent-chains and rant sessions waxing poetic about how actors who don’t stick to the script should be lined up and shot.
He almost wishes someone would shoot him. He needs this to stop.
“Nu-uh!” Max whines.
‘Uh-huh!’ Tinky (who isn’t real, who Pete is intensely hallucinating) whines right back. He thinks he’s mocking him. But he can’t be mocking him. Tinky’s not real.
‘Y’know something, Maxwell-a-well-a-well? I bet this is why your daddy doesn’t love you! Because you’re a fucking COWARD!’
Oh. Shit.
“Woah, Pete, that’s not-” Oh, fuck, that’s Steph, now Steph’s gonna think he’s an asshole, and, fuck, maybe he is. Is he? If Tinky isn’t real, which he cannot be, then Pete’s the one saying this. Right?
Before he can really fall down that rabbit hole he sluggishly catches that Max is in a new place. He’s not standing in the center of the room anymore, cowering in his letterman jacket. No. He’s fucking charging Pete.
Oh fuck.
He literally cannot conceive in that moment the fact that he is having to sit through the most invasive, disturbing bullshit Tinky’s ever done and it’s not even working. His brain won’t allow it.
So, instead, he forcefully throws himself out of harm's way.
Tinky clings to his shoulders like Pete’s giving him a fucking piggy back ride, and, under the frantic thrum of he’s gonna kill me he’s gonna kill me he’s gonna kill me Max is gonna kill me in this stupid horrible god forsaken house he lets himself relax. (Marginally. So marginally it’s insane.)
Adrenaline broke him out of it. So obviously he was the one doing that to himself. Somehow.
Not Tinky. Tinky isn’t real.
He tumbles over his own ankles, skidding to his knees on the floor in a way that has his still-bruised ribs burning and sends Tinky flying over his head. He pinwheels into the wall, and the second he makes impact, any hold he still had iron-gripped over Pete’s vocal chords snaps.
His swallowed back lines tumble through his lips, MaxMaxwellJägermanYouHaveDisturbedTheohmygodwhatshappeningstopitstopitstopitthisisn’trealitcan’tberealstoptinkypleasestopstopstop, tongue smashing against his teeth as it tries to manuver it’s way over too many consonants. Pete hacks it out, coughing into the dusty sleeve of his costume as a blurry Max storms over toward Ruth in his periphery.
He waits, shoulder tensed automatically by his ears, to see if Tinky winds his way around her throat too, but he doesn’t.
He stays stationed right in front of Pete, sprawled against the wall and pouting, ‘You never let me have any fun, Bucky.’
Pete begs to fucking differ. He seemed to be having more than his fair share of fucking fun two minutes ago. But he just wheezes around another painful cough instead of saying all that.
“Max, stop!”
Like he’s operating on pathetic, Ted-would-call-simp-esque autopilot, his head snaps up at the sound of Steph’s frantic voice. He fishes his glasses out of his pocket clumsily, shoving the world into too much way too much holy shit clarity just in time to see Max push Steph behind him protectively. (It twists something in his chest unhappily that he immediately suppresses, thanks so much.)
To his baffled surprise, that probably would have been more baffled before Tinky apparently dug through Max’s childhood trauma when the fuck did Pete learn and internalize that, he realizes whats going on. Max bought it. Hook, line, and fucking sinker.
(If it was anyone other than Grace’s plan he would have felt kind of bad for doubting it so hard. But it was Grace's plan. And also it objectively sucked, so he’s not gonna beat himself up too badly for being a he of little faith, or whatever the singular of that phrase is.)
“It’s not real, stupid!” Steph yells at Max, and he tries to blink himself back into reality, “It’s not a ghost.”
‘That's your cue!’ Tinky cackles, shoving him by the ankles out of the corner, stumbling directly in the sightline of Maxwell goddamn Jägerman.
“It’s Peter Spankoffski.”
Oh man, Pete’s going to die tonight, isn’t he?
He gestures a little helplessly in agreement as Steph starts to explain that it was a prank, waiting with tense-edges for Max to snap, to grab him by the throat and finish the job he’d left in the Pasqualli’s parking lot… but Max… doesn’t. He just looks, expression unreadable, at all of them one by one as Ruth and Richie and Grace shuffle out of the shadows.
“You’re telling me you nerds put this whole thing together just for me?”
Max does this a lot, talks through the situation slow and clunky like some movie supervillain monologuing their master plan before shoving your head in a toilet. It should be recognizably nerve-wracking, but it isn’t. Something about his tone is off.
“Wow.” He blinks, softly, and Pete’s stomach slopes confused. Oh god, is he… hurt? Did we emotionally devastate Max fucking Jägerman with some goat bullying and a skeleton costume from Spirit Halloween? Oh man, oh man, oh man-
“I, uh, I thought you guys hated me.” Max swallows, and then his face cracks into a small, unfamiliar smile, “But, um, thanks.”
What.
“This was really great!”
What?
[Today is a Bad Day.
Today is a Bad Day because today is the day that Pete gets a diagnosis: Type one diabetes. More relevantly to the conversation at hand against his will, low blood sugar, which is scientifically proven to potentially cause hallucinations. (That's what Tinky is, according to the doctor, just a hallucination. Tinky doesn’t like that.)
It also causes confusion and loss of balance, a kid could stumble into traffic without realizing he was doing anything wrong, especially if he was overwhelmed after a fight with his big brother.
He’s lucky they ‘caught it before anything really bad happened.’
“It’s not entirely common, but since ██████ has shown signs of both poor judgment and… delusion surrounding this… imaginary friend I don’t believe it’s something we should take off the table. It’s entirely possible these hallucinations are all just a result of low blood sugar episodes.”
‘He’s lying.’ Tinky seethes, dripping with liquid gold anger and making a big mess on the doctor’s-office-tile floors, ‘Bucky, he’s lying to you. You should fucking kill him.’
He ignores him, opting instead to stare at his own swinging legs. Back and forth and back and forth.
(He won the battle this morning with his mom to get to wear pants under his dress, both through an absolutely stellar closing argument counter-referencing the episode of Hannah Montana he’d been watching where Hannah herself had jeans on under her skirt and a lot of screaming. It makes things feel less uncomfortable. Less exposed.
He wishes Ted had taken him, Ted never cares what he wears, just that he gets out the door without crying. He wouldn’t have to be in a skirt at all.)
It’s confusing, not the words, really, those make more sense than Pete thinks the doctor realizes, because he’s talking in that barely-hushed voice adults like to use around him when they’re talking about things they don’t think he understands. But what he’s saying with those words is confusing.
Tinky is real. Obviously. He’s always been real.
Right?
“Tinky says you're lying.” He admits, quietly to the doctor, hoping maybe he’ll be able to clarify. To make the words make sense where they don’t, and both the doctor and his mom look at him with squinty, confusing-shaped expressions.
“Honey, didn’t you hear what Dr. Lazlo was saying? You’re just sick.” His mom’s talking in Pete’s least favorite voice, all sticky sweet and con-de-scending (Ted taught him that word last time he came over, his parents seemed even more annoyed then the time he taught Pete how to say ‘ bullshit’), “It’s not real.”
‘Of course I’m real! They’re just lying to you!’ Tinky gnashes his teeth, so loud that he almost can’t hear what he’s saying under the clack of big, square incisors goats aren’t supposed to have, ‘Kill her! Buckling, c’mon, c’mon just grab the trash can and bash her fucking skull in.’
He just shakes his head. It’s supposed to be at Tinky, but his mom sighs like it’s for her. He considers that, carefully. All the times someone had sighed or yelled at him or gotten mad when he did something meant for Tinky.
Like, maybe the doctor has a point.
That’s impossible, though, isn’t it? Tinky’s his best friend.
He’s always been his best friend.
… The best friends that he sees on TV never make their best friends walk into traffic though, do they?]
Pete’s never been positively disoriented before. But that’s absolutely what this is. He is, no questions asked, fully, entirely disoriented. And it’s weird.
He’s just standing there, stupid, as Max beams at all of them as though they’ve given him the birthday present that he’s been waiting his entire life for. He doesn’t know what to do with himself, so he just keeps standing. Waits for the other shoe to drop.
Even Tinky’s disappeared. Not with a blood curdling scream or horrible, vomit-inducing show of personal violence like ripping himself in half so each side falls out of existence. He’s just… gone.
He doesn’t do that, especially after the horror show that's been this whole night. He doesn’t just go. But Pete’s very tentatively not looking a gift goat in the mouth about it.
Stress fucks with his blood sugar, it’s both scientifically proven and more than supported by Pete’s personal hell of trial experiments through every finals week and social interaction he’s ever had, so, maybe that's what this was. He was just so stressed by his pre-existing injuries and the bullshit plan that Tinky, who was not real, manifested a lot more intensely than usual.
“Y’know, maybe, I had you guys figured all wrong!” Max grins, pointing at him in the specific, cool-guy way Pete’s never been able to pull off. Not that he’s really tried much. He glances wide-eyed over to Steph, and she shrugs, huffing out an equally confused, wide-eyed laugh of her own.
In no world did he even think the plan was going to work as intended, this is beyond his wildest dreams. (Or, at least, his wildest dreams of how tonight was going to go. With Tinky his dreams get fucky and pear-shaped as shit.)
Slowly, he allows himself a tentative smile in Max’s direction.
(Optimism has never, not once, served Peter Spankoffski well, though, has it? He really should know better by now.)
A flash of yellow in his periphery.
And there he is. Floating right above Max Jägerman’s fucking head, kicking his stupid little hooves, “Hey, Buckling!”
Shit.
[Today is a Bad Day.
At least to Tinky’s standards.
Pete’s not sure if those are something he can trust anymore, though.
He sits criss-cross-applesauce on top of his comforter, rubbing his thumb over one of the fabric covered buttons stitched into the quilting. They’re the worst when he’s trying to sleep, heavy and too solid and kind of scratchy, but right now, fully awake and nervous he appreciates having something to fiddle with.
‘Who the fuck do they think they are?’ Tinky hisses, pacing through the whole of Pete’s room, kicking at chair legs and dresser drawers. He’s twisting the sides of The Box like it’s a Rubix Cube, making the room pulse and bubble out of reality, blood splattered to angry-gold to dead bodies dead bodies dead bodies– The Box isn’t jangling today, just letting out a low, ear-burning hum.
An angry sound.
“Is it true?”
‘What?’ He rounds on Pete, words gentle but eyes blown wide and livid and anything but, ‘Bucky! No!’
“Okay.” He nods, but he’s not as convinced as he wants to be.
‘How could you say that? After everything we’ve been through? Kiddo, I’m your best fucking friend!’
For the first time ‘best friend’ doesn’t fill Pete with the warm comfort that having a most-important-person always has. A best friend– a best friend is someone you’re supposed to trust, aren’t they?
‘It’s them! They’re lying to you! Trying to trick you!’ Tinky seethes, and the room saturates from angry-gold all the way to a rancid-highlighter-yellow. And, well, Pete’s confused but he still knows how Tinky gets. Best friend or not, real or not, he doesn’t want to make him angry.
“...Okay. I believe you.”
The harsh, day-glo light eases, not all the way, but it waters down to something sated and pastel.
‘Do you promise, Buckling?’
Pete blinks the spots out of his vision and attempts a smile, “I promise.”
The lie feels dirty in his mouth.]
“Max,” He says, quickly, trying not to sound as panicked as he feels, “Get- hey, Max, get down.”
Tinky’s a hallucination from low blood sugar. He knows this, he’s got a fucking medical diagnosis and all that shit. Except, this house is weird and bad and wrong and he knows it wasn’t his voice echoing ghost-like and mean over the room before. This place is not as it should be and Pete’s got a very, very bad feeling.
“What? No, come on up here with me, man!” Max crows, with another cool-guy point, “It’s fuckin’ party time!”
“No, I’m serious-”
Ruth elbows him hard in the ribs, an unspoken ‘stop trying to fuck this up’ and Pete gets it, sure, he does, but he never felt good about this and something about the way Tinky’s grinning like a kid on fucking Christmas is freaking him out.
(Tinky can’t do anything real. He can’t. But also, how did he pull off his backpack before? Pete’s starting to get the creeping feeling he hadn’t actually dropped it.)
[Today is a bad day. He thinks.
He watches Tinky out of the corner of his eye as his mom explains that the ziploc baggie full of candy in his backpack is for emergencies only.
For when he sees his ‘imaginary friend’.
Tinky throws The Box through her head. Over and Over and Over. The whole house has been neon bright for days now.
He wonders, uncomfortably, if this counts as an emergency.]
“Just get down. Please.” If this is a hallucination nothing will happen, maybe Max will go back to making fun of him, because he’s being weird, but it’s better than the alternative. Not that Pete even knows what that alternative is.
He sincerely does not want to find out.
‘Oh, come on . It’s not like I'm real!’ Tinky cackles, with a grin that stretches all the way back to his horns, like he’s read his mind. He does that sometimes, responds to things he has no business knowing, and Pete fucking hates it, ‘Isn’t that right, Peter?’
[Today is just a day.
He stares at the glass of grape juice he’d poured for himself. It feels better to think of this as a science experiment. That way it feels less like a loss.
Tinky towers over him on the counter, glowering down at the glass, looking for all the world like he wants to make it shatter, splattering purple blood stains all over the kitchen walls. But he can’t. He’s never been able to.
‘I don’t know what you’re trying to do here, Kiddo.’
His voice is heavy. Old and worse-than-angry in a way Pete’s never heard before.
“Everyone says you’re not real. I saw the blood test results.”
The kids at school have started to be mean about Tinky when he mentions him or talks to someone they can’t see. His parents are mad at him everytime he pushes away the spoonfuls of honey and glucose tablets at Tinky’s command. Ted’s worried. He knows so because he’s heard him say so, last night after a didn’t-go-so-well family dinner. Which, in fairness, seems to be most Spankoffski family dinners.
(“Ma, I’m getting really worried about her.”)
“I’m just gonna try it. For science.”
‘Why?’
His mouth tastes like blood. It clings to the edges of his lips and won't go away.
‘Don’t you trust me?’]
Pete’s stomach drops somewhere around his ankles.
Tinky has never called him by his name. Never. For the past seventeen years Pete has always been Kid, or Kiddo, or Buckling, or Bucky. He had honestly been pretty sure it was just something deep in his little trans-kid-subconcious not wanting to be dead named by his hypoglycemic hallucination monster that had stuck.
But Peter is new. Peter is wrong. Peter is real.
He hates this fucking house.
Slowly, so slow the world around him goes blurry and sluggish, Tinky pulls out The Box again.
[“I… I don’t think you’re real.”
The copper coating his gums sours to something bitter and livid and not-supposed-to-be-there, ‘Of fucking course I’m real.’
He squeezes his eyes shut and grabs for the glass. It’s just a science experiment.
It’s just a science experiment.]
“Tinky, stop!”
Max’s face screws up in slow motion confusion, and he knows, he knows, he knows he’s just opened the door up for hundreds of questions, for reminders that he’s not only Micropeter, but he’s Micropeter the weird freak who talks to things that aren’t there.
But he doesn’t have time to consider it too long, time to care, because it's just then that Tinky slams a cloven, golden hoof through the rotten, creaky, structurally-unsound floor boards.
[“I’ve just got low blood sugar,” He whispers, eyes still clamped shut so hard it hurts, “You’re not real.”
‘Okay, Buckling. Sure. I’m not real.’ Tinky’s voice crackles loud enough he feels like his ear drums burst. Flat, and serious. He’s never heard him so serious.
‘Let’s see how that goes for you. ’]
The other shoe drops.
[He swallows a mouthful of juice and finally finally finally opens his eyes. Tinky is gone.]
And so does Max.
[At least for now.]