A GAME - Staring and Unmarked Gifts - Part 1/5
part 1 (here) | part 2 | part 3 | part 4 | part 5
synopsis: an immortal outcast and a mad scientist fall in love. what will happen when their fates realign with the revival of the latter? who knows, but wednesday addams is going to find out.
trigger warnings: none besides talks of dying and an emotional immature issac not knowing how normal people flirt
a/n: …i gave in. he’s too hot not to write for. enjoy <3
Immortality is a fickle thing. The first time you died had been an accident. At the age of seventeen, you had been hanging out with your friends at the local neighborhood pool. Your friends had been a little rambunctious and while play fighting by the edge of the pool, you had hit your head and slumped down the waters edge. With all the chaos of children running away and your friends laughing and splashing each other, by the time anybody noticed your face underwater and blood staining the pool’s surface, it was too late. Bless them, they had tried to resuscitate you but the damage was already done.
It was three days later when you woke up, naked and laying on a coroners table, giving the old man working that night a heart attack when his ‘dead body’ sat up and stared back at him. It was then that your normie parents realized that they had given birth to an Outcast. To a kind that was so incredibly rare that there were only 6 in documented history. From then on, you would never age forward and never age backward, time stopped its touch on your body. Every time you died, your body would just click back to your first death. Forever seventeen with the mind of a woman who would eventually meet everyone and see them die.
It was on your third life that you met Isaac Night. Your parents were getting old and not knowing what would happen to you once they passed, they packed up and moved your family to Jericho so you could attend a school for Outcasts, Nevermore. They had made a deal with the principal that you could stay at the school for as long as you needed until you could live on your own. You didn’t feel a need to go around telling anyone what kind of Outcast you were, which only added to the air of mystery you had when you walked through the halls halfway through the semester. The whispers were hard to not hear so you ignored them, kept to yourself and did your schoolwork.
Then you saw him. Isaac Night, sat across the chemistry classroom, staring at you. His curly dark hair was pushed back and his eyes were so incredibly dark, you couldn’t see his pupils. You stared back, wanting to see if you could tell why he was looking but the eye contact broke when Professor Orloff shouted that class was beginning and for everyone to take their seats. You had heard about him, the genius inventor and prodigy engineer that had saved himself somehow from an imminent death. He was infamous, thought nobody seemed to really know him, all information on Issac was bits of gossip and speculation. He didn’t have friends or really talk to anyone beyond his younger sister. You didn’t even build an interest in knowing him before now, having more of the mindset of viewing from afar as to not become attached. (This was thrown out the window quickly).
This habit continued for weeks, him staring at you whenever you two were in the same vicinity, you staring back until one of you moved or looked away. It was like a game that neither of you knew all the rules too. Neither of you talked to the other, you mainly out of principle in your own mind as you hadn’t started this little game so why be the one to end it? His face was a curious thing, handsome obviously, but you couldn’t read his face in the slightest. Why was he staring at you constantly? Was there a spark? Or had that been something that you fabricated to make sense of his lingering look?
He broke the silent staring between the two of you by not even speaking to you through words but in unmarked gifts. Things had started to pop up, book of poetry found on the seat of your chair in chemistry with a withered rose rested on top, a metal flower wielded together made of scarps and bolts, even a small mechanical butterfly that would flutter its wings when the head was pressed. It was so odd. His behavior was so hot and cold, the constant staring but going out of his way to avoid you in public, refusing to work with you in class, turning the opposite direction when he saw you coming. There was a time where you had tried, deciding that he had made the first move so you would make the next, like an odd dance. It was after the poetry book had been found by you and once class had ended and people started filling out, you gathered quickly and made your way towards the end of the rows. He sat on the outskirts of class so he would have to walk around the tables to get to the door.
You smiled a bit as you called his name as he approached, “Isaac! I just wanted to say that-“
You couldn’t even get the whole sentence out before he brushed past you without any recognition and made it a point to disappear amongst the crowd of bustling students eager to leave the classroom. You stood there, feeling embarrassed and a little defeated, wondering if you had read everything wrong. Maybe the book hadn’t even been for you, a misplaced affection meant for someone else, same with the staring. You’d think after being a teenage girl for so many years at this point that you might get the hang of reading boys and crushes but currently, no luck. But then the next week, the welded flower had made its way in front of your dorm room door and the game started all over again. His sister on the other hand was not so successful at hiding her intentions, always finding her lurking, hiding in corners and glancing from behind walls. It was like she was a bird watcher and you are her bird of prey. Maybe he had sent her. Or she was just another fanatic of the mysterious new student.
Professor Orloff had called you and Issac one day, after weeks of back and forth between you and Issac with the closest you’d gotten being when he sat next to you in the library for fifteen minutes of complete silence, to stay behind after class as something needed to be discussed.
“Due to the fact that you entered the semester half way and how you have a slight time gap in your educational background, I thought maybe you could benefit with some extra tutoring and there’s no better man in chemistry than our very own Isaac Night.” The head said, his voice brimming with pride as he spoke of the male student.
Isaac sighed loudly, looking away from the both of you. The nerve…
You turned to him with your eyebrows pulled together and your lips pressed, “Because this is such a huge inconvenience for only you?”
He whipped back and went to say something but you put your hand in front of his face and turned to Professor Orloff.
“Professor, I appreciate the offer but I’m sure I will do fine without it. While, there is a gap in my educational timeline, that’s in traditional schooling, it didn’t stop my learning, especially in the sciences. I will reach out if I have any terrible and I most likely will not go to your star student as I’m sure he has his own studies to focus on.”
You turned on your heel and walked out of the classroom with your hands behind your back, feeling incredibly confused and frustrated. You were done! This wishy-washy bullshit were he just played with your feelings and seemed to want nothing to do with you was over. You had all the time in the world, literally, to have an odd dynamic with a hot guy. No reason to do it all your first semester!
“Wait-“ Footsteps chased you out into the hall along with his voice.
“Be confusing on your own time, Night!” You yelled over your shoulder, cheeks feeling hot along with the tips of your ears.
“Did you like my gift?” He asked, the hallway echoing his question to you at the other end of the hall, causing you to stop in your tracks and turn halfway in his direction. Obviously the gifts were from him but he never took ownership of them until now, addressed that they were actually for you.
Maybe you were too easy. The flip of your emotions had happened so quickly that the actually frustration had almost completely dissolved when he finally acknowledged you. Acknowledged that the game had really been two sided and not you playing alone.
A small smile was suppressed as you answered, almost as though it was against your will to give up the information, “Yes, very much so. It sits on my desk.”
He smiled, a soft one you hadn’t seen before besides maybe with his sister, and dipped his head.
He turned to leave when your voice stopped him this time.
“I would have preferred being given it by you. So I could have thanked you then, in person.”
Isaac looked at you, those dark eyes trying to tell you something you couldn’t make out, while he smirked a bit, “You could thank me now.”
“Hmm, I think I’ll thank you for the next one. If you’re there when I get it.”
You watched as he pushed his hair back, taking very slow steps backward, “I’ll have to come up with some ideas then.”
“I’m looking forward to it.”
Spinning on your heel, you practically skipped away. The game was back on, with a few more moves to play now.
It was only a few days before he approached you in the courtyard. Everyone around stopped to watch what was happening, to see why Isaac Night was talking to you with such a gleam in his eyes. His hands behind his back, holding something out of sight. A shadow cast over you from where you were sat on the fountain, reading the same book for the third time like it would uncover a new secret this time. Closing the book, you glanced up to look at him, a cocky little grin on his face when he realized you were reading the book of poetry he had given you.
“Hello Isaac.” You said, covering any outward emotion to see what he’d do.
“Hello dove.” He was slightly bent over due to his height, his hair falling forward out of their usual fashion.
“Dove? Where’s that come from?”
“You once said morning doves were your favorite bird. It stuck in my brain, now they remind me of you when I see them.” It was hard to continue your game of emotional cat and mouse when his voice became almost shy at that. You tilted your head at him, just admiring for a moment as he pulled out a small box from behind his back.
“What’s this?” You played coy, holding your hands out for it.
Gently pulling the top off the box, you gasped softly as you pulled out a silver necklace. The pendant seemed to have been made by the man before you, the shape of a heart with little gears inside clicking against each other.
At the time, you didn’t know what he meant by that nor were you paying much attention to what he said because you were looking at the tag on the chain of the necklace.
‘Will you go out with me?’ written in his scribbled handwriting.
You looked back at him, eyes squinting at him with a little smile etched across your lips, “Couldn’t even ask me yourself?”
“I did give it to you in person, at your request. Isn’t that enough?”
Your hands grazed the black tie hanging from around his neck as you shrugged.
“Hmm. Maybe this time but I’d prefer it from your lips instead next time.”
Th tension was palpable. The way he looked at you, how his eyes drifted to analyze the rest of your face from the tip of your nose to the shape of your lips.
“There’s always next time.” He whispered, dipping forward just slightly so his hair brushed against your forehead, “But for now, what’s your answer?”
It was so hard not to tease him, to drag this out as long as you wanted, to keep him on the edge. You wanted to see how far he could be pushed, a little experiment of your own.
“Yes. I will go out with you, Isaac Night.”
The boy smiled, leaning closer again, this time going for your lips but you stopped him.
“Once you answer my question.”
“Anything.” It was breathless. Due to how close he was, you could hear the faint muffled sounds of ticking. Where was that coming from? Maybe a figment of your imagination, the audible sound of your heart pounding in your chest.
“Why were you upset by the idea of tutoring me? You’d think you’d want to spend alone time with me, especially leading up to us getting here.”
He sighed, leaning back a little to run his fingers through his curls, “It wasn’t you, it was the incessant praise from Professor Orloff to other students that got me. It’s like he’s buttering me up for something.”
“Aww,” You faked pouted, patting his cheek gently, “It’s so hard being the celebrity genius.”
“It really is.” He nodded along with you getting closer and closer to your lips until they finally met. Her long, thin hands wrapping around your waist to meet pressed against your lower back, almost dipping you in your guys moment of passion.
That was the beginning of the one and only love affair in all your lives that ended in tragedy because of Issac’s obsession with curing the incurable.
It was hard for you to look back on that night specifically, it was so much nicer to think about the year leading up to it. So on your seventh life and now back to your old haunting grounds but now as a teacher, when Wednesday Addams showed up at your classroom doorway after hours and asked, “What was your relationship with Isaac Night?” You couldn’t help but pale at the memories.
a/n: im very excited for this mini series guys, its been years since ive written any fanfics so this is really nerve racking for me so please leave some comments if you enjoyed and like so i know people are actually reading this! love you guys <3
