Whumpee has wanted nothing more than the bare minimum for years. Their desires ranged from a cold glass of water to a soft blanket to just 15 minutes alone and unharmed. Things like that.
Now, with Caretaker, they have that. Cold water on tap, a bed filled with soft blankets and pillow, every day is filled with peaceful minutes. They haven’t wanted anything for months. They’d almost forgotten what it felt like, to want for something out of reach.
That is, until during some random quiet afternoon, an ad on the TV scrolled by.
It was something silly, cheesy and gimmicky and 19.99 plus shipping and handling. But they wanted it. And almost immediately they resigned themselves to not getting it, ever.
It wasn’t a big deal, it was stupid, they didn’t need it, but every time the commercial was on, they watched.
Caretaker notices, of course they do. They’d been worried honestly, Whumpee didn’t seem sad, or scared, or upset, and that was exactly what they’d been working towards this whole time, but they seemed a little…hollow. Kind of listless sometimes, and though Caretaker didn’t want to push, Whumpee had to have more aspirations than just, sleeping and wandering all day.
But they chalked it up to needing more time to recover, relearn what they liked, and what interested them. So when they see how they perked up at the commercial, how their eyes followed the demos, Caretaker happily sent off 19.99 plus shipping and handling, and waited.
The box arrived on a grey Tuesday, and the knock at the door made both of them jump. Whumpee lingered in the living room while Caretaker answered the door, accepting a brown box with a familiar looking logo across the side.
When Caretaker turned around, Whumpee looked away, pretending like they hadn’t been watching like a hawk from down the hall.
They set the box down, and call Whumpee over with a grin, saying it was for them, come do the honors. When Whumpee opened the box, it was like a kid on Christmas. They looked from it to Caretaker, confused but unable to hide their excitement.
Caretaker says they seemed to like the commercials. Whumpee looked back down into the box. Inside was a gigantic art kit, oil pastels, water colors, markers, pencils, erasers, brushes, everything. They didn’t know what they were going to make with it, but just the thought of it made them light up.
They thanked Caretaker over and over the following days, which they waved off, it was an absolutely minuscule price to pay to see Whumpee as excited as they were.
It takes a while for them to actually use it, instead of just running their fingers over the rows of pastels and brushes, but soon their entire room is littered with sketches, paintings, doodles and drawings.
Caretaker hangs up a bulletin board, restocks the paper, and finds a series of paint along videos for Whumpee to follow, and beams with pride.
There they are. That’s the person they’d seen glimpses of, that’s who Whumpee was. Is. Will be.
