Advent - part 2
Title: Advent
Author:subtilior
Medium: Fanfic
Rating: M [cumulative] for: angst, childhood injury, bad language, sexuality, violence & gore. (Please note that most of these appear later on in the fic. Reader discretion is advised.
Thanks so very much to knifeedgefic for the super-speedy beta, and, as well, to lightup_tea and for their feedback.
Cross-posted at Labyfic. [nb: Labyfic mods - if this ain't permissible, shoot me an message pls.)
Advent
Part 2
I couldn’t get over it - he was real and right here in my room.
“Um. Hi,” I said, peering up at him. I was a little nervous.
He smiled at me, and swept down his outstretched arms as he bowed. The cape of light did this really cool flash, and I knew my mouth had dropped open, but I couldn’t help it.
“My greetings to you, Tobias Williams,” he said. He sounded just like I remembered.
“Yeah - hi. So …” and I wobbled to my feet, from the floor, grabbing my Advent calendar as I did. “I guess you need one of these to get here?”
“This?” He took the calendar and smiled down at it. “Well this is quite nicely done. But to answer your question: no. All I need is a wish, occasionally - but more importantly, a door.”
“That door was really cool,” I stuttered.
His eyes crinkled up at the corners. “I do try. But what I mean is that I know I have another door, now.” He reached out one hand, and tapped a finger in the middle of my forehead. He was wearing gloves. “Right here.”
I didn’t really get it, but I wanted to show him I was smart, so I nodded.
“Well then!” He rocked back on one heel, and tossed his head, and man, I had forgotten about that hair. It was seriously epic. “Here I am, young Toby - you wished for me, and I have come. What may I do for you?”
It hit me, then: I had so many questions. So much to ask, that I didn’t know. I blurted the first thing that came to my mind.
“When I went to see all the goblins - was that real?”
“Of course.”
I gulped. “So I didn’t imagine it all? It’s another world, like in Lord of the Rings or something?”
“Hm. Slightly different, in a few key ways.” He scooped up some of the light from his cloak - seriously, it was awesome - and began pouring it from hand to gloved hand. “But the principle is the same.”
“And … it’s real?”
He dropped the light - it flickered all around the room and fizzled in the corners. “Yes. It is as real as I am!”
“But - who are you?”
The light grew in brightness, until I had to squint.
“I?” he said. “I am the Goblin King, Lord of the Labyrinth, and King of Dreams.”
“Oh.” I knew my voice sounded small.
The light dimmed, and I saw him smiling, kindly. “You, Toby, may call me Jareth.”
That name - I knew I remembered it from somewhere. But then the memory slipped away, like an echo, and it was gone.
That light trick had been pretty freaky, though, so I wanted to show him I wasn’t afraid. “Can I call you Jerry?”
“Absolutely not,” he said. “I spent two hundred years stuffed in a lamp to obtain my illustrious name, and I rather insist upon your using it.”
“Wow. That sounds serious.”
“It was.” He - Jareth, I guess - smiled again. “But enough of this. What may I do for you, Toby?”
There were so many things I wanted to ask. So many things I wanted to do … So I fixed upon one thing that I knew would make me happy. Or, at least, I hoped it would.
“I’d like to see it again,” I said, quietly. “Please. Wherever you come from -”
“The Labyrinth.”
“Yeah. That. I remember going there, and even though it was such a long time ago, and only once …” I gulped. “I had a lot of fun. It - it made me happy.”
“Hm.” Jareth tipped his head to look at me, considering. “And I think, venturing a guess, that you have not been happy for some time, now. Is it so?”
I couldn’t reply. Instead, I nodded, looking at my shoes.
“Well. Come along, and you can tell me all about it.”
I looked back up. He was holding out his hand.
And that memory was there, like it had been yesterday. He had stood in front of a door of light, holding out his hand. I had taken it, and had traveled to see - the Labyrinth, I guess it was, even then.
He had his head to one side, and he was staring at me, serious. Somehow, there was wind blowing through the door - it was hot, and smelled like sand.
All of a sudden, I thought of Sarah.
Maybe it was a memory of the wind; maybe it was the way it gusted through his hair. Maybe it was how the light was like diamonds and his cloak was like gold, and how he looked like a hero or a god from my mythology book.
Whatever it was, it made me think of Sarah. I didn’t know why. But maybe I could ask him - Jareth - I corrected myself - for advice. On how to make us all a family again.
“Well?” Jareth said. “Will you come?”
“Sure,” I said, and took his hand.
*******************
After that visit, things got a lot better. It was the memories that made it better, you know?
If it was dark and raining outside, I remembered the sun in the Labyrinth. If I fell off the balance beam in gym, I remembered that I could balance just fine on a lot of the Labyrinth’s walls.
And if people at school were mean, I made them look like goblins, in my mind. I didn’t turn them into goblins or anything - Jareth had said he sometimes did, but then he laughed a lot, so I assumed it was a joke.
It wasn’t as funny as it might have been, though - because those goblins had been a bit freaky. I mean, they were a lot bigger than I remembered -especially when they danced. When we left, I had asked Jareth, “Could we see more animals, next time?” He said we could.
We had talked about a lot of things. It was great. Jareth was glad that I liked fairy tales and myths, and he made a crystal turn into an awesome book he said was from his library. He was interested in all of the stuff at school, and gave me advice. “They are beneath you,” he said. “You are now a Prince of the Labyrinth, and you must ignore all the plebians. If you can’t feed them to the wolves, that is.”
I had to look up plebians when I got home, and I knew he was joking about the wolves - but the principle was the same, I guess. So I came up with the idea to make the jerks look like goblins.
He even gave me advice about Mom and Dad, and Sarah. “You should always try to tell the truth, Toby,” and I could tell he liked the way it sounded. “Try to tell the truth,” he said, spitting out the T’s. “You think your father works too much - tell him so. You want your mother to frown less - ask her what makes her frown. And you say this Sarah - the name is Sarah, is it not? - she is not allowed back in your home?” I nodded; he shook his head, regretful. “If your own untruth-telling has made it so, then you must tell the truth again. To both your parents.”
“Well,” I said, “I haven’t really seen her in a while.”
“Nor had you seen me in a while,” he laughed. “And haven’t we had a time of it?”
We really did have a good time. I felt like crying when he said that the morning was coming, and we had to go back. “Take heart, Toby,” Jareth said to me, back in my room, stooping so he could look me in the eyes, “Remember, next year: I will come back to you.” He raised one eyebrow. “Calendar or no calendar.”
“About that -” I began. Then I stopped. It sounded like such a dumb thing to ask.
“Yes?”
“Could-I-have-that-kind-of-calendar-as-a-present-again?” I said it all in a rush. “I just really liked it. The drawings and all. You know.”
Jareth smiled, and squeezed my shoulders with his hands. “Of course you may. I will create it myself.”
“Except -” I remembered something. “Sarah can’t know about it. I remember - she said I would never get one again.”
“Did she?”
“Yeah, well - I think so.” I frowned. “It’s all a bit fuzzy.”
“Hmm.” Jareth’s smile had gone.
I really didn’t want to lose the calendar, so I hurried on: “It was a long time ago. Maybe she won’t mind, now. We don’t have to tell her, or anything.”
Then I was relieved, because he laughed. “Well said!” Jareth drummed his fingers on my shoulders, and straightened back up. He lifted one hand in farewell, smiling. “We’ll keep it a secret, just for us. Promise me that.”
“O.K.,” I said - but the light was shimmering, sparkling, and then the door closed in a flash, and he was gone.
“I promise,” I said, to an empty room.
That helped make the rest of sixth grade better, and the start of seventh, too. I kept my promises. I asked Mom if I could help her be less stressed. I wrote Dad a card for Father’s Day, and asked him if we could do more things together.
I even did something really hard, one day. I asked Mom and Dad if we could all sit down, and I told them that I had heard Mom yelling at Sarah on the phone, two years ago. I said that I knew they thought Sarah had pushed me, that one winter’s night … and that that wasn’t what had happened. Then I tried to tell as much of the truth as I could, without bringing Jareth into it. I told them that I had heard something and had been scared, and that Sarah had gone to see what was outside. Then I had run after her, and had fallen down the stairs.
Mom looked pale and her lips trembled. “But what about the calendar?”
“Sarah dropped it in the snow, and I couldn’t find it afterwards.” I chose my next words carefully. “I guess the physical hurt and my, um, emotional hurt got all mixed up in my head.”
“Well,” Dad said, gruffly, “You were only six.”
“Yeah.” Then I took a deep breath. “So can Sarah come home for Christmas? I miss her.”
“Of course she can,” Mom said. She started to cry and Dad hugged her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry,” Dad said; and then, “No, I’m so sorry,” I said - and we all had to laugh a bit, because it was a total sorry party, or something. Dad said that he would call Sarah, and he did, that same night. They all made plans for Christmas. I knew it would be the best Christmas we’d had for a long time.
*
And it was an awesome Christmas. Except there was one really weird thing that happened. Mom said it was part of growing up, but I wasn’t quite sure.
My Advent calendar came on the last day of November. It appeared on my dresser, and I hid it deep in my underwear drawer before anyone could see it. The three doors I knew were there! One that was made of mother-of-pearl (I knew what it was, now), one of red and gold, and one of a starry blue sky. Opening them made me smile each time.
Sarah came home for Christmas and it was great. We talked a lot and she taught me how to cross-country ski. If she noticed that I was a bit of a blimp, she didn’t say anything. Skiing left me out of breath, but she said that if I practiced, I’d keep up with her next year.
It was getting closer and closer to Christmas - I was getting really nervous, because there were only a few doors left on the calendar. On the twenty-second, though, after we had come home from my choir concert and all gone to bed, Jareth came back.
This door was all different sorts of green leaves and branches, twining together, rippling up and down and then parting in the middle so he could step through. It was really cool - but it was always cool, and I told him so. We jumped right into the Labyrinth; the whole time I was telling him all about seventh grade being better, and how I had kept my promises to everybody. Mom and Dad were feeling happy, Sarah was at home visiting, and they had even hinted that I might get a dog or cat.
Jareth listened to it all, smiling. “Well done,” he said. “I would expect nothing less from a Prince of the Labyrinth.”
“You keep saying that,” I said. “I’m not a prince of anything.”
“Toby,” he replied, serious, “I am a king - and if I say you are a prince … then you are a prince!” He flourished his cloak, bowing.
“But have you ever seen a prince who looks like me?” I felt myself flushing. “I mean, like all fat and stuff?”
“I’d say ‘powerful,’ rather.” Jareth shrugged. “And who cares how you look? True princes, and true kings, emanate true virtue from within themselves.” He drummed his fingers on the medallion that always hung around his neck, and rolled his eyes skyward. I had to laugh.
“But you don’t sound as though you believe me.” Jareth looked at me, thoughtful. “Why is that?”
“I don’t know. Girls, maybe, and what they say.” And man, I must have been as red as a tomato.
His laughter pealed around the Labyrinth’s walls. “The age-old trouble! Ah, Toby, Toby - who cares for what women want, or think, or say? Become a King, and you don’t have to consult them on anything!”
“You don’t?” I frowned.
Jareth grinned at me. “No. You just take what you want to take.”
“Um.” I felt kind of weird, in my stomach. “Uh, Jareth, we learned about No Means No, in health class, and - well, that doesn’t sound right.”
“Ah, perhaps not. I have lived so long, you understand, that occasionally I forget to change with the times.”
I didn’t understand, but I just kept walking by his side. I didn’t want to talk about girls any more, so I changed the subject.
“I just hate that I can’t run, in gym class.”
“You cannot run?” Jareth’s voice flew up, just like his eyebrows. “Surely you can run.”
“Well, I mean I can - I just never get very far.”
“That’s different altogether, young man. I find that running far, and running fast, is just a matter of … practice.”
“Practice?”
“Like this.” He grinned at me, and curled his gloved fingers into claws. “Run!”
I knew he was joking, and I laughed as I ran away from him. He was really fast, though; I mean like ultra-fast, and he caught me almost before I knew it. I told him there was no hope of me catching him, so he said he would chase me again. We did that a few times, until I couldn’t breathe at all. Then we stopped to rest.
Sometimes life isn’t fair, you know? I was gasping and wheezing, and he hadn’t even broken a sweat. I told him so; he laughed and tossed his hair away from his face. “Practice, Prince Toby, that’s all it takes.”
“Yeah, O.K.” I leaned back against a wall. “I’ll practice. Nobody needs to watch - there’s a park right by my house.”
“That doesn’t sound like a place many go,” he agreed.
Before I knew it, Jareth said our time was up. We went back to my room - and it was weird, because I was so tired from running that I almost fell asleep before he left.
“Farewell, Toby,” he said. I saw his silhouette against the glowing green of the Advent door. “We’ll meet again next year. And perhaps we’ll run.”
I fell asleep.
*
But that’s not the end of it - though I figure that the weird thing that happened must have been a dream, because Jareth had gone.
I dreamt that I really had to pee, so I got up. I was walking to the bathroom, kind of slow like you do in a dream - and I heard a whisper.
It was the kind of whisper that snaked around your ears, and licked at them, like with Melampus in my mythology book.
It must have been the same kind, because I understood what was being whispered. I don’t remember all the words, though. I just remember them all being - wanting. Like no sort of wanting I had ever felt before, not even when I was really hungry or thirsty. Want, want, want. I want, I want -
I want you - I want you -
I tried to cover my ears. My arms were heavy in my dream, though. I turned round and round, looking for the whisper. There was nothing - I turned - nothing again - I turned a third time -
And I saw a dark shadow, a big one, right outside Sarah’s door.
This made me feel kind of weird, in my stomach. I tried to look away, but I couldn’t. I dreamt that I saw the shadow ripple, and unfold, and that it was Jareth. Jareth, with his arms stretched above his head, two long and skinny shadows, as he whispered against the panels of the door. He was moving against the door, all slithery. The whispery want said something more:
Come here - come out - I promise I won’t hurt you -
Then I dreamt that he slithered down to whisper into the keyhole - and then he started sliding up the door again, and took off his gloves and smoothed his hands against the wood, and he licked the doorknob - which was just really weird and gross. And he kept whispering, whispering.
I want you - I want you - Come to me - I want you -
I tried to say something; I felt all hot and cold, at the same time. Jareth pressed his bare hands against the door, and then he scratched at the wood a bit, and the scritch-crrrk of it made me gasp - and his eyes flashed as he looked at me.
He was still whispering. I saw his mouth, all curled back from his teeth.
And the whisper said, “You’re dreaming, Toby. It’s time to wake up.”
And Jareth’s fingers scrrrrrrritch-ed into fists, and then flew out, and a light flashed in front of my eyes, and I heard Sarah screaming.
*
I woke up; my heart was hammering, and the sheets of my bed were all tangled.
I don’t want to talk about the rest. I’ll just say that Mom said it was part of growing up, and it was seriously embarrassing.
I didn’t tell anyone about the dream.
It was weird, though. At breakfast, Mom teased Sarah about all the coffee she drank - “Some things never change!” Sarah looked really pale, and had dark circles under her eyes.
On Christmas Eve day, Sarah took me with her to run errands for Mom. We stopped at the hobby shop on the way home. It would have been seriously lame, except they had a bunch of books about how to draw animals. I bought one of those, and Sarah bought some paints.
And then, on Christmas day, she painted something really pretty - like ribbons all scrolling together in silver and in blue - all around her doorframe. She said it was a kind of treat for herself, for Christmas. Mom sighed but had to admit that it “was gorgeous,” and “Where did you learn to do that, Sarah?” Sarah said art class.
I thought back to the drawings for my dorky little Advent calendar, which Jareth had kept, and I was a bit jealous - until Sarah said she’d do my doorframe, too. So it all turned out totally cool.
Author:subtilior
Medium: Fanfic
Rating: M [cumulative] for: angst, childhood injury, bad language, sexuality, violence & gore. (Please note that most of these appear later on in the fic. Reader discretion is advised.
Thanks so very much to knifeedgefic for the super-speedy beta, and, as well, to lightup_tea and for their feedback.
Cross-posted at Labyfic. [nb: Labyfic mods - if this ain't permissible, shoot me an message pls.)
Advent
Part 2
I couldn’t get over it - he was real and right here in my room.
“Um. Hi,” I said, peering up at him. I was a little nervous.
He smiled at me, and swept down his outstretched arms as he bowed. The cape of light did this really cool flash, and I knew my mouth had dropped open, but I couldn’t help it.
“My greetings to you, Tobias Williams,” he said. He sounded just like I remembered.
“Yeah - hi. So …” and I wobbled to my feet, from the floor, grabbing my Advent calendar as I did. “I guess you need one of these to get here?”
“This?” He took the calendar and smiled down at it. “Well this is quite nicely done. But to answer your question: no. All I need is a wish, occasionally - but more importantly, a door.”
“That door was really cool,” I stuttered.
His eyes crinkled up at the corners. “I do try. But what I mean is that I know I have another door, now.” He reached out one hand, and tapped a finger in the middle of my forehead. He was wearing gloves. “Right here.”
I didn’t really get it, but I wanted to show him I was smart, so I nodded.
“Well then!” He rocked back on one heel, and tossed his head, and man, I had forgotten about that hair. It was seriously epic. “Here I am, young Toby - you wished for me, and I have come. What may I do for you?”
It hit me, then: I had so many questions. So much to ask, that I didn’t know. I blurted the first thing that came to my mind.
“When I went to see all the goblins - was that real?”
“Of course.”
I gulped. “So I didn’t imagine it all? It’s another world, like in Lord of the Rings or something?”
“Hm. Slightly different, in a few key ways.” He scooped up some of the light from his cloak - seriously, it was awesome - and began pouring it from hand to gloved hand. “But the principle is the same.”
“And … it’s real?”
He dropped the light - it flickered all around the room and fizzled in the corners. “Yes. It is as real as I am!”
“But - who are you?”
The light grew in brightness, until I had to squint.
“I?” he said. “I am the Goblin King, Lord of the Labyrinth, and King of Dreams.”
“Oh.” I knew my voice sounded small.
The light dimmed, and I saw him smiling, kindly. “You, Toby, may call me Jareth.”
That name - I knew I remembered it from somewhere. But then the memory slipped away, like an echo, and it was gone.
That light trick had been pretty freaky, though, so I wanted to show him I wasn’t afraid. “Can I call you Jerry?”
“Absolutely not,” he said. “I spent two hundred years stuffed in a lamp to obtain my illustrious name, and I rather insist upon your using it.”
“Wow. That sounds serious.”
“It was.” He - Jareth, I guess - smiled again. “But enough of this. What may I do for you, Toby?”
There were so many things I wanted to ask. So many things I wanted to do … So I fixed upon one thing that I knew would make me happy. Or, at least, I hoped it would.
“I’d like to see it again,” I said, quietly. “Please. Wherever you come from -”
“The Labyrinth.”
“Yeah. That. I remember going there, and even though it was such a long time ago, and only once …” I gulped. “I had a lot of fun. It - it made me happy.”
“Hm.” Jareth tipped his head to look at me, considering. “And I think, venturing a guess, that you have not been happy for some time, now. Is it so?”
I couldn’t reply. Instead, I nodded, looking at my shoes.
“Well. Come along, and you can tell me all about it.”
I looked back up. He was holding out his hand.
And that memory was there, like it had been yesterday. He had stood in front of a door of light, holding out his hand. I had taken it, and had traveled to see - the Labyrinth, I guess it was, even then.
He had his head to one side, and he was staring at me, serious. Somehow, there was wind blowing through the door - it was hot, and smelled like sand.
All of a sudden, I thought of Sarah.
Maybe it was a memory of the wind; maybe it was the way it gusted through his hair. Maybe it was how the light was like diamonds and his cloak was like gold, and how he looked like a hero or a god from my mythology book.
Whatever it was, it made me think of Sarah. I didn’t know why. But maybe I could ask him - Jareth - I corrected myself - for advice. On how to make us all a family again.
“Well?” Jareth said. “Will you come?”
“Sure,” I said, and took his hand.
*******************
After that visit, things got a lot better. It was the memories that made it better, you know?
If it was dark and raining outside, I remembered the sun in the Labyrinth. If I fell off the balance beam in gym, I remembered that I could balance just fine on a lot of the Labyrinth’s walls.
And if people at school were mean, I made them look like goblins, in my mind. I didn’t turn them into goblins or anything - Jareth had said he sometimes did, but then he laughed a lot, so I assumed it was a joke.
It wasn’t as funny as it might have been, though - because those goblins had been a bit freaky. I mean, they were a lot bigger than I remembered -especially when they danced. When we left, I had asked Jareth, “Could we see more animals, next time?” He said we could.
We had talked about a lot of things. It was great. Jareth was glad that I liked fairy tales and myths, and he made a crystal turn into an awesome book he said was from his library. He was interested in all of the stuff at school, and gave me advice. “They are beneath you,” he said. “You are now a Prince of the Labyrinth, and you must ignore all the plebians. If you can’t feed them to the wolves, that is.”
I had to look up plebians when I got home, and I knew he was joking about the wolves - but the principle was the same, I guess. So I came up with the idea to make the jerks look like goblins.
He even gave me advice about Mom and Dad, and Sarah. “You should always try to tell the truth, Toby,” and I could tell he liked the way it sounded. “Try to tell the truth,” he said, spitting out the T’s. “You think your father works too much - tell him so. You want your mother to frown less - ask her what makes her frown. And you say this Sarah - the name is Sarah, is it not? - she is not allowed back in your home?” I nodded; he shook his head, regretful. “If your own untruth-telling has made it so, then you must tell the truth again. To both your parents.”
“Well,” I said, “I haven’t really seen her in a while.”
“Nor had you seen me in a while,” he laughed. “And haven’t we had a time of it?”
We really did have a good time. I felt like crying when he said that the morning was coming, and we had to go back. “Take heart, Toby,” Jareth said to me, back in my room, stooping so he could look me in the eyes, “Remember, next year: I will come back to you.” He raised one eyebrow. “Calendar or no calendar.”
“About that -” I began. Then I stopped. It sounded like such a dumb thing to ask.
“Yes?”
“Could-I-have-that-kind-of-calendar-as-a-present-again?” I said it all in a rush. “I just really liked it. The drawings and all. You know.”
Jareth smiled, and squeezed my shoulders with his hands. “Of course you may. I will create it myself.”
“Except -” I remembered something. “Sarah can’t know about it. I remember - she said I would never get one again.”
“Did she?”
“Yeah, well - I think so.” I frowned. “It’s all a bit fuzzy.”
“Hmm.” Jareth’s smile had gone.
I really didn’t want to lose the calendar, so I hurried on: “It was a long time ago. Maybe she won’t mind, now. We don’t have to tell her, or anything.”
Then I was relieved, because he laughed. “Well said!” Jareth drummed his fingers on my shoulders, and straightened back up. He lifted one hand in farewell, smiling. “We’ll keep it a secret, just for us. Promise me that.”
“O.K.,” I said - but the light was shimmering, sparkling, and then the door closed in a flash, and he was gone.
“I promise,” I said, to an empty room.
That helped make the rest of sixth grade better, and the start of seventh, too. I kept my promises. I asked Mom if I could help her be less stressed. I wrote Dad a card for Father’s Day, and asked him if we could do more things together.
I even did something really hard, one day. I asked Mom and Dad if we could all sit down, and I told them that I had heard Mom yelling at Sarah on the phone, two years ago. I said that I knew they thought Sarah had pushed me, that one winter’s night … and that that wasn’t what had happened. Then I tried to tell as much of the truth as I could, without bringing Jareth into it. I told them that I had heard something and had been scared, and that Sarah had gone to see what was outside. Then I had run after her, and had fallen down the stairs.
Mom looked pale and her lips trembled. “But what about the calendar?”
“Sarah dropped it in the snow, and I couldn’t find it afterwards.” I chose my next words carefully. “I guess the physical hurt and my, um, emotional hurt got all mixed up in my head.”
“Well,” Dad said, gruffly, “You were only six.”
“Yeah.” Then I took a deep breath. “So can Sarah come home for Christmas? I miss her.”
“Of course she can,” Mom said. She started to cry and Dad hugged her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I’m so sorry.”
“No, I’m sorry,” Dad said; and then, “No, I’m so sorry,” I said - and we all had to laugh a bit, because it was a total sorry party, or something. Dad said that he would call Sarah, and he did, that same night. They all made plans for Christmas. I knew it would be the best Christmas we’d had for a long time.
*
And it was an awesome Christmas. Except there was one really weird thing that happened. Mom said it was part of growing up, but I wasn’t quite sure.
My Advent calendar came on the last day of November. It appeared on my dresser, and I hid it deep in my underwear drawer before anyone could see it. The three doors I knew were there! One that was made of mother-of-pearl (I knew what it was, now), one of red and gold, and one of a starry blue sky. Opening them made me smile each time.
Sarah came home for Christmas and it was great. We talked a lot and she taught me how to cross-country ski. If she noticed that I was a bit of a blimp, she didn’t say anything. Skiing left me out of breath, but she said that if I practiced, I’d keep up with her next year.
It was getting closer and closer to Christmas - I was getting really nervous, because there were only a few doors left on the calendar. On the twenty-second, though, after we had come home from my choir concert and all gone to bed, Jareth came back.
This door was all different sorts of green leaves and branches, twining together, rippling up and down and then parting in the middle so he could step through. It was really cool - but it was always cool, and I told him so. We jumped right into the Labyrinth; the whole time I was telling him all about seventh grade being better, and how I had kept my promises to everybody. Mom and Dad were feeling happy, Sarah was at home visiting, and they had even hinted that I might get a dog or cat.
Jareth listened to it all, smiling. “Well done,” he said. “I would expect nothing less from a Prince of the Labyrinth.”
“You keep saying that,” I said. “I’m not a prince of anything.”
“Toby,” he replied, serious, “I am a king - and if I say you are a prince … then you are a prince!” He flourished his cloak, bowing.
“But have you ever seen a prince who looks like me?” I felt myself flushing. “I mean, like all fat and stuff?”
“I’d say ‘powerful,’ rather.” Jareth shrugged. “And who cares how you look? True princes, and true kings, emanate true virtue from within themselves.” He drummed his fingers on the medallion that always hung around his neck, and rolled his eyes skyward. I had to laugh.
“But you don’t sound as though you believe me.” Jareth looked at me, thoughtful. “Why is that?”
“I don’t know. Girls, maybe, and what they say.” And man, I must have been as red as a tomato.
His laughter pealed around the Labyrinth’s walls. “The age-old trouble! Ah, Toby, Toby - who cares for what women want, or think, or say? Become a King, and you don’t have to consult them on anything!”
“You don’t?” I frowned.
Jareth grinned at me. “No. You just take what you want to take.”
“Um.” I felt kind of weird, in my stomach. “Uh, Jareth, we learned about No Means No, in health class, and - well, that doesn’t sound right.”
“Ah, perhaps not. I have lived so long, you understand, that occasionally I forget to change with the times.”
I didn’t understand, but I just kept walking by his side. I didn’t want to talk about girls any more, so I changed the subject.
“I just hate that I can’t run, in gym class.”
“You cannot run?” Jareth’s voice flew up, just like his eyebrows. “Surely you can run.”
“Well, I mean I can - I just never get very far.”
“That’s different altogether, young man. I find that running far, and running fast, is just a matter of … practice.”
“Practice?”
“Like this.” He grinned at me, and curled his gloved fingers into claws. “Run!”
I knew he was joking, and I laughed as I ran away from him. He was really fast, though; I mean like ultra-fast, and he caught me almost before I knew it. I told him there was no hope of me catching him, so he said he would chase me again. We did that a few times, until I couldn’t breathe at all. Then we stopped to rest.
Sometimes life isn’t fair, you know? I was gasping and wheezing, and he hadn’t even broken a sweat. I told him so; he laughed and tossed his hair away from his face. “Practice, Prince Toby, that’s all it takes.”
“Yeah, O.K.” I leaned back against a wall. “I’ll practice. Nobody needs to watch - there’s a park right by my house.”
“That doesn’t sound like a place many go,” he agreed.
Before I knew it, Jareth said our time was up. We went back to my room - and it was weird, because I was so tired from running that I almost fell asleep before he left.
“Farewell, Toby,” he said. I saw his silhouette against the glowing green of the Advent door. “We’ll meet again next year. And perhaps we’ll run.”
I fell asleep.
*
But that’s not the end of it - though I figure that the weird thing that happened must have been a dream, because Jareth had gone.
I dreamt that I really had to pee, so I got up. I was walking to the bathroom, kind of slow like you do in a dream - and I heard a whisper.
It was the kind of whisper that snaked around your ears, and licked at them, like with Melampus in my mythology book.
It must have been the same kind, because I understood what was being whispered. I don’t remember all the words, though. I just remember them all being - wanting. Like no sort of wanting I had ever felt before, not even when I was really hungry or thirsty. Want, want, want. I want, I want -
I want you - I want you -
I tried to cover my ears. My arms were heavy in my dream, though. I turned round and round, looking for the whisper. There was nothing - I turned - nothing again - I turned a third time -
And I saw a dark shadow, a big one, right outside Sarah’s door.
This made me feel kind of weird, in my stomach. I tried to look away, but I couldn’t. I dreamt that I saw the shadow ripple, and unfold, and that it was Jareth. Jareth, with his arms stretched above his head, two long and skinny shadows, as he whispered against the panels of the door. He was moving against the door, all slithery. The whispery want said something more:
Come here - come out - I promise I won’t hurt you -
Then I dreamt that he slithered down to whisper into the keyhole - and then he started sliding up the door again, and took off his gloves and smoothed his hands against the wood, and he licked the doorknob - which was just really weird and gross. And he kept whispering, whispering.
I want you - I want you - Come to me - I want you -
I tried to say something; I felt all hot and cold, at the same time. Jareth pressed his bare hands against the door, and then he scratched at the wood a bit, and the scritch-crrrk of it made me gasp - and his eyes flashed as he looked at me.
He was still whispering. I saw his mouth, all curled back from his teeth.
And the whisper said, “You’re dreaming, Toby. It’s time to wake up.”
And Jareth’s fingers scrrrrrrritch-ed into fists, and then flew out, and a light flashed in front of my eyes, and I heard Sarah screaming.
*
I woke up; my heart was hammering, and the sheets of my bed were all tangled.
I don’t want to talk about the rest. I’ll just say that Mom said it was part of growing up, and it was seriously embarrassing.
I didn’t tell anyone about the dream.
It was weird, though. At breakfast, Mom teased Sarah about all the coffee she drank - “Some things never change!” Sarah looked really pale, and had dark circles under her eyes.
On Christmas Eve day, Sarah took me with her to run errands for Mom. We stopped at the hobby shop on the way home. It would have been seriously lame, except they had a bunch of books about how to draw animals. I bought one of those, and Sarah bought some paints.
And then, on Christmas day, she painted something really pretty - like ribbons all scrolling together in silver and in blue - all around her doorframe. She said it was a kind of treat for herself, for Christmas. Mom sighed but had to admit that it “was gorgeous,” and “Where did you learn to do that, Sarah?” Sarah said art class.
I thought back to the drawings for my dorky little Advent calendar, which Jareth had kept, and I was a bit jealous - until Sarah said she’d do my doorframe, too. So it all turned out totally cool.