#THE WAY FRANK WENT FROM MR DEAR TO EDDIE

[bunnyspine]

‼️Potential spoiler warning‼️

☆

▪︎

☆

▪︎

I'm waaay too emotionally attached to these puppets

I'm not crying over puppets ☹️ you are!!!!!

Also I made this

#husbands :( #this update left me emotionally scarred #THE WAY FRANK WENT FROM MR DEAR TO EDDIE #MY HEART #ARRRG #crying screaming sobbing #clown pls give us an eddie plush so i can hug him really really tightly :(( #welcome home #wally darling #welcome home arg #welcome home fanart #welcome home puppet show #eddie dear #frank frankly #welcome home eddie #welcome home frank

[ttttobistuff]

Another Believer…

A freezing, yet lovely night was ahead of everyone in the enchanting city of Welcome Home. It had finally arrived, homecoming day! With the preparations being finished, Sally observed from her spot in the clouds. Sitting at the top of the tree, just like a dazzling star, she cordially greeted her friends as they stepped through the door of Home. For what seemed to be an eternity, Sally kicked her feet around, in exasperation.

Hello there—she cheered as Eddie, whom she had been waiting for, turned the handle—Oh, Eddie, we can officially start!

Sally! How on earth did you get up there?—Cracking a grin, Eddie said—I was worried, I couldn’t seem to find you all anywhere…

As the good mailman approached the living room, he could feel a friendly ambiance hugging him. Just as he crossed the line between the entrance and the main room, a familiar face emerged, just as the sun peaks upon the tall hills.

Mr. Dear, you took your time to arrive!—Spoke, as gracefully as always, Frank—We all hoped for your safe arrival, no celebration is a proper one without every guest

While his mouth moved, Eddie could not help it but stare into his tremendously soft cheeks. Have they always been so reddish and…delightful? The poor red-haired man was driven mad when a soft hand caressed his cheek. Mr. Dear melted away into Frank’s touch, being a lovely mess. All until a voice dragged him out of such a heavenly place…

Pack it up, lovebirds—yelled Barnaby, from the other side of the room—Let’s start this, I cannot wait to taste my mama’s eggnog

Nervously chuckling, Eddie apologised and the party went on. This mailman was for sure exhausted from so much worrying…he needed a quick rest on the couch! As he sat down, he felt his tensed body start slipping away. Not much, but enough for him to let a sigh slip away from his lips. What else could he ever wish for? It was homecoming, everyone he cherished was celebrating, and he had one of the most traditional meals: a single pea on a plate.

A single green dot, in such a big white space.

…

His guts began wrenching, twisting and turning. Ice cold sweat rolled its way down his throat. Lungs almost bursting, it felt as if they were getting pulped into nothing but gubbins. Drenched in red, the world seemed too suffocating. Everything was submerged in a certain gloom, only a pair of eyes could light up. His chest went up and down aggressively, without a rest in between.

Oh, Eddie! What would we do without you, sweetheart…—Spoke, softly and gently, Poppy—Dear? Do you hear me?

With no apparent response, Eddie could only help but pant and whine softly. His nails, barely holding within their blood, grasping hardly the couch’s edge. At this, Frank knew he required some space. He acted rapidly, and told Poppy he was just a bit…tired. As they were left alone, he placed himself in front of his dearest and held his shoulders.

Mr. Dear? What’s wrong?—Mr. Frankly seemed genuinely worried, noticing all symptoms of sickness—Please, speak to me…

Softly speaking made Eddie snap out of it. Taking a big breath, he looked up and blinked a few times. As he looked around, he took a hand to his face and dried his own sweat. Ultimately, he looked upon Frank.

I…—Eddie spoke, almost in whispers—saw it.

Mr. Dear, I think it’s appropriate to go home now—Mr. Frankly told the man who was facing him—You are definitely not in conditions to be here!

Frank made sure to let someone know about them leaving, only in case they asked. Then, they left silently without people noticing, except Barnaby who they had told. Eddie could hardly walk properly, stumbling at every step or so, his lover was tremendously worried.

After analysing the situation, Frank was forced to take Eddie to his home since it was the closest. As expected, they arrived in a matter of minutes. Thankfully, the house was warm and Eddie felt a little bit better than before. Yet, he still was containing himself…

Mr. Dear, what happened back in Home?—Frank spoke softly, while hanging his coat and taking Eddie’s too—Is it stress? Working seven days must be affecting your immune system! That’s right…high levels of constant stress could-

Frank—Said Eddie, roughly—something’s very wrong inside that house. Well, not inside but beneath it…

No stutters, no doubts. Frank knew Eddie was not joking around with him, and it went shivers down his spine.

W-what do you mean?—Shaking voice came out of Frank’s throat, unable to stay calm

His eyes, he was slowly drowning me–Eddie said, in a quite paranoid voice–You’ve got to believe me, please

As tension built up between them, Frank knew this was going to end up wrong…they should not be talking about this. Not so close to him.

Stop, I beg you—A grey hand covered Eddie’s lips? Preventing him to speak any further about the situation.—You…I cannot do this without you.

Confusion striked Eddie, the numbness from the homecoming incident had completely vanished by now. All that was left were some terrorising memories, almost as vivid nightmares. He was too stressed to even stop and think, for him, it was too late. Frank’s hand slipped off, Eddie’s tongue too.

For the love of God, Mr. Dear—Started, Frank—quit this!

I refuse, please hear me!—Loudly said, by Eddie in distress—What I saw…

…What was it?—asked, perhaps unfortunately, Frank—What did you see?

The bellow.—Eddie said it with confidence, believing in what he saw.

I beg you, Mr. Dear, sit down and calm yourself.—Frank caressed once again his face, his thumb going in circles—Stay with me.

Few moments of silence, a hoaxed peace.

No! Give me just one more chance, one more glance…—The mailman approached Mr. Frankly’s chest—And I will make of you another believer.

Frank’s silence was the last drop needed for the water to spill. Eddie’s hands stopped holding onto him, and his legs began moving towards the door. Without a second thought, he ran away, leaving Frank all alone.

Eddie ran, as fast as he could. His legs failed around fifteen minutes later, making him trip and fall to the ground. It was then when he realised…he had never seen this side of the neighbourhood. Was this forest always here?

Before his question could be answered, a strange object seemed to impact his head from a blind spot. Before passing out, he observed a rather familiar silhouette looming over his barely conscious body.

Such eyes, shining bright in the night, could only belong to one person.

…

What are we gonna do now?—Frank spoke, feeling guilt twist his guts.

(Based upon newest hidden video-03/24)

#welcome home #eddie dear #frank frankly #wally darling #horror #one shot #Spotify

[icdrawings]

Corpse puppet au

By @sketchquill

Chapter 5

----------------------------------------------------------

The living world

----------------------------------------------------------

💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍

Wally's pov

I felt the wind against my face as I opened my eyes when I looked to see Gold starting up at the moon as their dress reflected the moonlight as the snow surrounded us 'they look magnificent' I thought before I started to talk "I spent so long in the darkness ,I almost forgotten what the moonlight looks like" I started to dance around feeling enjoyment in a while before turning to my beloved "join me dear" I said as I reach my hand out for them. It took them without hesitation to accept it giving me a soft smile as we started to slow dance, our first dance was a bit... well it was rushed so I wanted to finally have a slow dance with them in the moonlight, I couldn't be more happier, not once have we broken eye contact as we got closer and closer and closer as our heads were touching as Gold placed their hand on my face as we kept getting closer before...

"GOLD!!!"

'DAMN IT' I internally screamed as we pulled back "papa?" Gold said letting go 'nooooooo' I had to let them go "I'm sorry Wally I forgot, I should let papa know about you, hopefully he'll like you" they said letting go of my hand "perfect" I said trying to hide my bitterness "please wait here I won't be long" they said with a smile that made me melt "okay" I said as Gold walked away.

Once they were out of my site I fell to the gound and started having a tantrum about not getting my kiss

🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀

Gold's pov

I speed walk out of the forest to see the Eddie was about to walk in "GOLD!!!" Eddie saw me, rushed towards me as he gave me a huge hug "oh my gosh peaches! Thank God your safe! What happened?!" He said checking my face to see if I was hurt "oh, no, no I'm alright, actually I need you to meet someone" I said grabbing his hands gently "wha-what! So that rumor, the other man, that was true?!" He said shocked "well... yes it was sudden but I would like for you to meet him" I said "gosh Gold really? me but I ain't your real father and I don't even know this man" Eddie said sadden so I gave him I hug "you may not be my real father but you are my papa and that means you're my family so I would like for you to meet him" I said "gosh, really? kid you're gonna make me cry, you're too sweet, am I even gonna like this man" he said wiping a tear from his eye "you would love him" I said with a smile "okay, okay! when do I meet him?" He asked a bit excited "I'll introduce him but I need to talk to Howdy first" I said stern "the last thing I know is that he is at his home" Eddie said "thank you Eddie now please go home, get some rest" I said as we both walked the bridge "okay, okay your right peaches, your right" he said as we got to the edge of the bridge "goodnight peaches" Eddie said "goodnight papa" I said as we went out separate ways "wait!" I shouted at Eddie making him stop and he looked at me "Frank says he loves you too" I said before rushing off to the Pillar estate unknown that Eddie was crying tears of happiness

I got to the Pillars estate and was about to knock but stopped when I heard the Pillar's talking "if ever I see that Treasure kid, ill strangle them with my bare hands" I heard Mr. Pillars say "your hands are too fat and their neck is too thin, you'll have to use a rope" Ms. Pillar said making me terrified as I backed away from the door looking for another way to see a brick wall, I knew what I had to do and started to climb up

💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍💍

Wally's pov

"This is the voice of your consciousness, listen to what I say, I have a bad feeling about that person you know that Gold is no-" I smacked out Home out of my head as he fell into the snow "go chew someone else's ear for a while" I said with anger before continuing "Gold has gone to visit their papa, just like they said" I continued "if I hadn't been sitting in it, I would have said that you have lost your mind!" Home said insulting me 'how dare this little' I calmed myself down "I'm sure they have a perfectly good reason... for taking so long" I said sounding unsure "oh, I am sure they do, why don't you go asked them" Home snapped back "alright I will" I said ready to prove home wrong "after all, they couldn't have gotten that far with those cold feet" Home said as I let Home back inside my head and started to follow Gold's footsteps

🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀🥀

Gold's pov

I finally got to Howdy's balcony and knocked on his glass door see Howdy turn and gasp before rushing to open it "hello Howdy" I said "Gold!? I'm so happy to see you, come by the fire" he said letting me inside to sit down "where have you been? A-are you alright?" He asked franticly before grabbing my hand "you're cold as death, what's happened to you" he said before looking down at my dress "your dress!" He looked up "your hair!" He said as one of his hands went through it but I backed away from it "H-Howdy... I need to confess something" I said as he finally let removed his hand from my hair, I looked down not wanting to look at him at all just as I have been doing from the start only to look up when he held my hands more tightly "no let me confess, this morning I was terrified of marriage, but then, on meeting you, I felt... I should be by your side and that our wedding could not come soon enough" he confessed taking me by surprise but guilt as I pulled my hands away still refusing to look at him "H-Howdy I... I don't-" I tried to figure out what to say as I finally looked up to see Wally at the balcony as we made eye contact before me came in "my darling, just wanted to meet..." Wally finally noticed Howdy as he reached his hands out as I grabbed it making me closer to him "who is he?" Howdy said terrified to see the corpse husband "I'm their husband" Wally said with anger as he showed off his ring "Gold!?" Howdy question not understanding

I hugged Wally, burying my head in his chest in the opposite direction from Howdy as Wally held me tight "I'm sorry" I whispered trying not to cry due to the guilt I felt as Wally stared Howdy down with hatred "hopscotch" he muttered darkly as I held Wally tighter pulling us towards the balcony as crows surrounded us "NO! NO! GOLD!" I heard Howdy shout yet I couldn't look back only shutting my eyes waiting for it to be over

I felt my feet on the ground, reopening my eye to see that we where indeed back in the library in the land of the dead being harshly pulled off by Wally "you lied to me" he said angerily "I-I..." I stuttered "go back to that other man" his voice trembled as he pointed up " the-the m... m-marrige was... originally b-between me and h-him so... that-that does m-mean you are t-the other m-man" I was never good with confrontation, I would either submit or cry but I was trying not to cry in front of Wally, didn't want to look like the victim with Wally's misundstanding "NO! you're married to me! He's the other man!" Wally said crying 'i didn't it again another mistake, you hurt someone again, useless, heartless, NOBODY' my mind kept screaming at me as I started to shake a bit as Frank took notice but did nothing knowing that this is between me and Wally

"And I thought... I thought it was going so well" his tear gushed out causing his right eye to fall out, it right led towards me as I picked it up and cleaned it off staring into it "I-I am sorry, so s-sorry... cou-could... this marriage e... even w-work" I started to question "why not!?" Wally said as he looked at his eye in my hand "it's my eye isn't it" he said insecurely make my heart twist in pain "no, not at all, your eye is lovely" I said before walking over to him and carefully placed it back in making sure not to cause any further damage

Once in he looked away "in d-different circumstances...maybe... b-but we are d-different I am l-living and y-you are d-dead" my stutter got worse as I tried to explain but couldn't due to panic, stress, and pain, pain for hurting him, I tried to calm down my breathing to focus "you should've of that before you asked me to marry you" Wally said yelling and crying "I was p-practicing my v-vows... I-I didn't e-even know you w-were there s... so" I tried not to cry "so I was... a mistake?" he said sounding empty as I look to see his eyes full of hurt and rushed out of the library

I could only stare at the doors, the doors he walked out of, unaware that I was crying, unaware that I had stopped breath, unaware that my hand was clasped on my mouth, unaware that Frank was next to me after seeing me in distress, unaware that he tried to talk to me

I felt warmth, the good warmth, warmth that only be given by love, giving me comfort I finally gasp "oh thank the gods, you terrified me little one" I look to see Frank hugging me "... I'm... sorry" I said as he started to let go before he grabbed my hands "look, I may not know what exactly happened but something tells me that you wouldn't hurt him, at least not on purpose" he said gently rubbing my hands with his thumbs "right now you both need to calm down before talking again" he said "oh, okay... thank you" I said "how about you go on a walk, recollect yourself" he said letting go of my hands "I... I think I will thank you Frank" I said before walking out the library and started walking unknown that a certain bird was near by

🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡🪡

Jewel's pov

I was working on one the costumes for Sally when Poppy rushed in "oh hello Poppy" I said looking up from the skirt "Jewel dear your siblings is back" she said "really how are they?" I asked excited to know how they where doing "oh dear I don't think they're doing well, I saw them crying" Poppy said concern "oh gosh did you see where they were heading" I asked "down the street in think" she said as I rushed to the door "Poppy could you watch the shop please" I quickly asked "of course now hurry they need you" she said nugding her feather for me to leave and I did running full speed to comfort my baby sibling

----------------------------------------------------------

Chapter 6

#welcome home #o/c #wally darling #welcome home oc #wally darling x o/c #wally darling x reader #wally x reader #corpse puppet au #@sketchquill

[thebestestofbees]

Merry Xmas/ Happy Hanukkah/ whatever you do on the Holidays (I think I saw sumthing called Yule too) JUST HAPPY HOLIDAYS YOU GUYS!!!

You marked the week on your calendar. Christmas is coming up. Oh goodie.

You liked all the holiday's equally (aside from Halloween, if you're a fan of Halloween like me), so you decorated for each one.

You placed a Christmas decorated reef on your door. Adding some lights to your exterior house, just mostly to the roof and around the pillars, with Home's permission (Because you didn't really want to piss of your sentient house).

You changed your candles to something more festive. Mostly tame scents like gingerbread and candy cane. You though about sitting by your fire place with a cup of hot chocolate, but you decided against it, saving your hot chocolate for the Christmas marathon on Christmas Eve.

After a little incident after this Thanksgiving you never hosted anything at your house, or went to your parents house because they were usually full with your nieces and nephews.

"What are you doing, Neighbor?" A voice knocked you out of your thoughts and you looked behind you.

It was Frank, peering through their reading glasses on the couch with a book in their hands.

You surprisingly didn't notice the puppet on the couch before as you replaced the candle.

"Handling the mistletoe." You say simply as you fasten the particular piece of nature to your ceiling.

Frank closed the book they were reading, placing a bookmark in the page they left off.

"Do you mind delving into this topic?"

It was Franks way of saying that you had gained their attention.

"It's a human custom."

Frank gave you a blank stare as if to say 'no duh.'

"If you stand under it with someone else, you have to kiss that person, basically."

You explain crisply as you step down from the step stool, patting the mistletoe that was hanging innocently in the kitchen doorway.

Frank raised half of their unibrow and they got up, walking over to the mistletoe, making you take a few steps back, so you wouldnt get caught under the Mistletoe with them.

"Who'd be dumb enough to fall for this?" Frank remarked as Eddie walked up to Frank, tipping his hat as he stopped right under the mistletoe with Frank.

"Mornin' Mr. Frankly." Eddie chirped and Frank flushed, you just quirked an eyebrow.

"You apparently." You say as Eddie seemed a bit confused.

"I'm sorry? Mornin' neighbor." Eddie greeted you with a slightly confused smile.

"good morning to you too Eddie." You greeted Eddie politely.

"this has to have been set up! I've been set up!" Frank yelled, their cheeks even more flushed before realization hit their face. "it's supposed to be."

You snapped your fingers at Frank. "there you go, now kiss." Eddie was even more confused, his cheeks seeming to get red.

"P-pardon, I still seem a bit confused..?" you had already moved on to the next corridor.

"Frank'll tell you!" you yelled back to Eddie, moving your step stool and stepping up to reach the top of the doorway.

Frank, now completely flushed and embarrassed, kissed Eddie on the cheek and turned away from the increasing in color mailman.

"Good morning to you too, Mr. Dear." Frank grumbled, now regretting their decision to get up from the couch.

Frank turned and went back to the couch, a flustered Eddie following quick on their heels. "now, hold on a minute Mr. Frankly, I still havent gotten an explanation!"

Those two. you let out a chuckle and hung up the mistletoe carefully, so it wouldn't fall throughout the day.

"Hiya Neighbor!!"

"Hi neighbor." The monotoned voice, paired with an ecentric one greeted you as you stepped down from the step stool. You picked up the step stool and moved it out of the way of Wally and Julie's way.

"Whatcha doing?" Julie asked as you stepped back, out of the way of the hallway, Julie and Wally moving into the kitchen. "Hanging the mistletoe." You say. "It's a human tradition."

Julie ooo'd as she looked up at the mistletoe in the doorway of the kitchen and hallway. "What's it do?" Julie asked.

"The two people who stand under it has to kiss." You explain simply. Before giving a few more looks around. "Where's the rest?" You ask, Julie looks around.

"Barnaby might still be sleeping, Howdy And Poppy are talking and Sally-"

"You called?"

Julie was cut off by Sally Starlet herself, who left the room and appeared behind Julie.

"Oh, hi Sally!" Julie greeted happily.

"hi Sally." Wally monotonly greeted as he waved.

"Yes, yes, hello, Julie, Wally, Neighbor." Sally greeted with her usual sense of confidence. "I just wanted to know, Neighbor-" Sally cut herself off, her eyes trailing up to the mistletoe. "-What's that?" Sally pointed up at the leafy green fake plant that dangled above her head.

"It's called a mistletoe, it's a human tradition where if two people are under the mistletoe at the same time, they have to kiss."

As much as you hated to reiterate explanations, you knew you had to be patient with these puppets, and that Sally would most likely get the point across to the others, if not exaggerate it a bit.

First part of the special DONE

#welcome home television au #welcome home x you #wally darling #julie joyful #sally starlet

[strawberryaziraphale]

reddie but eddie is raised by the toziers

Eddie was eight when it happened. His mom had been doing her usual job of suffocating him, telling him to get his hair cut, that he was too old to wear his Spiderman shorts, that he couldn’t play outside because the dust aggravated his asthma. Something in Eddie snapped and he screamed at her to leave him alone. He could do what he wanted with his own body, he knew his limits. Besides, he hasn’t had an asthma attack in a long time!

Sonia glared at him, her expression furious. She stood to her fullest height and berated her son for speaking to her in such a way, bringing up his father Frank and how disappointed he’d be if he could see the way Eddie was treating her. Although the Frank card hurt, he refused to fall for his mother’s crocodile tears and stood his ground, refusing to apologise. So Sonia threw him out into the street, refusing to let him back in until he learned some manners.

Eddie’s first thought was to go to Bill’s house but he lived quite far and he didn’t feel up to the walk. Richie though lived just one street over. Eddie didn’t let himself cry until he reached the Toziers front door, wiping his eyes with his arm as he rang their bell. As soon as the door opened, he was swept into a warm hug by Richie’s mom. She smelled sweet, like apples and honey. When she pulled away, Eddie noticed flecks of flour in her hair and on her floral apron. She’s clearly been baking.

“Oh Eddie, dear, whatever happened?”

Before Eddie could explain, Richie was elbowing his way past his mother to get his own Eddie hug. He looked in a worse state than Maggie; his glasses were covered in flour, his hands were sticky and his hair was splattered with all sorts of ingredients. Eddie’s first instinct was to squirm away, cringing at the state of Richie but he was too upset to move so he clung onto his friend. Eddie had never made so much as a sandwich with his own mother.

“Eds, what’s wrong?”

“Mom kicked me out,” he sniffled almost inaudibly into Richie’s shoulder whilst his friend routinely rubbed his back soothingly, “I told her off about everything so she told me not to come back. She mentioned my dad.”

Eddie was overcome by sobs again and he buried himself further into Richie’s neck. He expected Maggie take his Mom’s side with a roll of her eyes and ‘oh, kids today.’ Instead, she led Eddie into the house and sat him on the couch, handing him a plate of freshly baked apple pie and a glass of milk. Whilst Maggie and Went chatted in the kitchen, Richie entertained his friend by making a face out of his own food. Eddie had just finished his plate when Richie’s parents returned.

“Eddie...” Maggie began but her energetic son interrupted her.

“Can we keep him, Mom, pleeeeease, can we keep him?”

Maggie rolled her eyes affectionately, a small smile on her face, “honestly Richie, he’s not a dog,” she shook her head, looking down at Eddie. He was peering up at her with shining doe-eyes, silently pleading to stay. As if she was going to say no, “I’ll go and collect a few things from your house. You can stay here.”

"Thanks, Mrs. Tozier,” he managed to hiccup before Richie was dragging him upstairs, eager to show him where he could sleep.

Maggie immediately crossed to the street to the Kaspbrak residence. She wasn’t surprised to find Sonia unapologetic, her arms crossed as she listed off every quality she disliked about her son. Maggie ignored her, packing a bag of clothes and necessary items.

“You don’t have to worry about Eddie ‘disappointing’ you anymore, Sonia,” Maggie said defiantly, clutching Eddie’s bag of clothes. She made her way to the front door, “Eddie is living with us now.”

"You?” Sonia appeared in front of the door in an instant. She looked completely insulted and glared at Maggie in disgust, “I have done everything for that boy and now he’s abandoning me for you? You don’t know the first thing about parenting! You only have to look at your boy to see that.” Ever dignified, Maggie just stepped around the overbearing woman and left the house. Before she could cross the street, Sonia was calling her, “he needs these. All of them. I’ll be here when it all gets to much for you.”

She tossed a clear bag full of various pills in Maggie’s direction, slamming the door behind her. She briefly examined the large bag and concluded that she was not giving Eddie any of the pills in the bag until she’d determined if he actually needed them. When she arrived back at her house, Richie had found a spare pair of pyjamas for Eddie; the poor boy was almost drowning in hte large clothes but at least he looked happier.

"How did it go?” He asked anxiously, ringing his hands. Maggie glanced between Eddie and her son, who was biting his nails and fidgeting nervously. She smiled softly.

“I guess I have two children now.”

All at once, Maggie was leapt upon by the two boys and she chuckled, ruffling their hair. Went grinned in the background, delighted that everything had worked out for the better.

-

Eddie was nearly ten when the Toziers took him on his first ever vacation. He’d heard horror stories about the sea from mother but it didn’t look that scary. He still held Maggie’s hand fiercely tight, though, as the waves rushed onto the sand, brushing over his feet. Maggie smiled at the look of boyish amazement on Eddie’s face. He built sandcastles, played volleyball with Went and Richie and swam with his floaties in shallow water with fearless abandon, although he did pause every now and then to slather on sunscreen or drink plenty of water. Maggie and Went bought him ice cream which was nice without the added warnings that his mother would’ve provided.

"BRAINFREEZE,” Richie cried after he’d wolfed down his ice cream in one bite, one hand clutching his head dramatically.

"I thought you needed a brain for that,” both Went and Eddie said almost at the same time. That was when Eddie received his very first high five. It was the best holiday he’d ever had.

Eddie had just turned fourteen when he realised he loved Richie as more than just a friend or adopted brother. He had no idea if Richie felt the same and he was terrified of either possibility, to be honest, so he kept his mouth shut. Their school was hosting a summer dance for students to blow off steam and Eddie desperately wanted to ask Richie yet some other part of him wanted to hide and forget about the whole thing. He’d talked to Maggie and Went about his feelings; he’d told them he had a crush on a boy in his year but didn’t go into details. He suspected they knew anyway, judging by the way they smirked conspiratorially at each other.

He spent weeks agonising over his predicament and nearly all of the Losers were paired off. Bill, Mike and Stan were going as a threesome, Ben and Bev were going together. Richie, however, hadn’t said a word about his date which gave Eddie hope. He vowed by the end of the day, he’d ask Richie to the dance. He arrived at the Toziers after school to find the living room filled with flowers and candles, a homemade sign reading WILL YOU GO TO THE DANCE WITH ME EDS? hanging above the fireplace. Eddie wanted to cry.

“It’s cool of you want to go as bros,” Richie said awkwardly, rubbing the back of his neck, “but I like you. Not as a bro, you know?”

“I like you, too,” Eddie mumbled, blushing as he noticed Maggie and Went standing off to the side, the red light of the camera recording blinking away, “I can’t wait to go to the dance with you.”

Richie was so happy he surged forward and lifted Eddie off of his feet, swinging him around. Eddie laughed delightfully, sharing in Richie’s happiness. Moving in with the Toziers was the best decision he’d ever made.

#it's what he deserves #richie x eddie #reddie #eddie x richie #reddie fanfic #my writing

[kaijuguy19]

Scooby Doo,and the Ink Machine. Chapter 1

New York City, 1946

Car noises blared across the city sky as they drive off to their specific destination. Either they be towards home,work, shopping or really anything that warrants fast travel,it was hard to hear them unless you're hard of hearing. For a guy like Edward Blake it was the city version of hearing cicadas in the countryside which soothed him during his time,slumping over the drawing board as he made sure the lines on the cartoon characters he was doing are smooth as possible. To say that working for the famous Joey Drew owner of Joey Drew Studios and home of renowned cartoon icon Bendy the Dancing Demon demanded blood and sweat along with talent would be the understatement of the century. He lost count on how many social events,and free time he missed out on all because of how his boss demanded overtime from him and his fellow cartoonists. He sighed in annoyance at that,as he placed the finishing touches on the picture of Bendy about to give Alice Angel flowers. Thankful that this was the last cell he had to work on for the night,Eddy started to put everything on his desk away at the folder,and pack his own stuff to carry home.He then heard someone come next to him ,hearing then a mop plop down behind him. Eddy didn't need to ask who was it behind him.

"Anyone else gone home for the night Wally?" Eddy asked without looking at the studio's janitor Wally Franks.

"Well by that you mean the ones that don't have to make sure them ink pipes don't go dynamite on this joint then sure." Wally replied as he moped. "Afraid I can't say the same for myself you know?"

"Connor on your case again?" Eddy asked as he picks up his suitcase.

"Right on the money." Wally said with an annoyed tone. "One little slip up with the monkey wrench apparently lands me doing night shifts as a way to make me more attentive." Wally mops around the middle of the room. "Would it kill Connor to lighten up once in a while? You'd think working in a cartoon studio would make a fella chuckle a bit more."

"He's just a little on edge with what rumors are saying about the studio facing money problems despite what Mr Drew says." Eddy said. "That and the growing number of missing people here isn't helping him I'm sure." Eddy looked around nervously as he said that.

"Yeah well rumors, or not I ain't got time to do some overtime. Getting enough flak from my gal about not spending some more time together." Wally finished the last space in the room then starts to go out. "If I get slammed with doing oil changing the ink equipment next I'm outta here!" 

After seeing Wally leave,Eddy followed out,then making a right turn. He pondered more about the rumors he mentioned Wally about the studio possibly going under. He felt that it might've been the reason why Drew had been making hem do more overtime as a way to pay off whatever dept he owed. Granted Drew talked about many times that the studio was doing fine and normally with a man that's able to make inspiring speeches he'd feel more at ease. However a man like Napoleon Bonaparte likely had said the same thing to his troops during the invasion of Russia,and he knew how they worked out for him at the end. But what worried him more was how people around the studios kept vanishing like ghosts. One especially was Susie Campbell who he remembered last time seeing was distraught about being replaced as Alice angel's voice actress. He was keeping on his toes since they started to begin. He also notice that the newest intern Drew hired named Buddy went missing too. He did like the kid from the few interactions he'd had with him. What didn't help was the strange noises he's been hearing near the medical rooms. Coming from the door that no one's meant to go inside in. Animal like noises he could've sworn were being uttered around that side of the studio. He prayed that nothing will happen to him long enough to see his brother Denny Blake being married to his long time lover. He's glad that Denny from his end was really making enough dough to last his luck for a lifetime along with his children's children when they come. At the very least one of the Blake brothers was getting fortunate at life.

As he reached to the exit,he stopped in dismay on what he almost forgot.

"Dang it!" Eddy muttered under his breath. "Of all the times to forget about my coat." Sighing he turned around and went to the direction to where he hung his coat in the recreation room. He went down the steps leading down to the recreation room,filled with tables, and darting boards on walls. He was about to grab his coat until he heard a clanging sound. He topped still and turned his eyes around.   "Wally is that you?" Eddy called out in a quiet tone. "If this is a joke it's not funny..." Hoping as it was Wally,he was getting the feeling that it wasn't him. 

Eddy backed away slowly,being extra attentive to his surroundings so he can catch who ever was making the noise,and chew out for making a distasteful gag. He kept hearing more clanking,making him want to just dash it out of there,but daring not too. He almost reached the staircase when he notice an odd yet familiar smell.

<i>"Is that ink?" </i> Eddy thought as he noticed more of the inky smell coming to his senses. He suddenly felt something wet,and sticky hitting his back. Heart pounding,and mind, racing in fear, Eddy began to look up to what he hit against.

The face of Bendy that is he assumed to be Bendy's from what face he can clearly see,smiled down at Eddy,as Eddy gasped a silent scream at the shock. The Bendy creature's face was almost covered down with ink but the smile clearly wasn't. Regaining what common sense he had,Eddy backed straight away to move from the creature's arms as it tried to grab him. Eddy ran to the other side of the room as the creature limped after him. Eddy threw tables at it,taking the chance to race down back to the stair case. As he ran up,he heard the creature racing after him. He slammed the door,and locked it after going up,praying it'll hold long enough for him to escape. He charged to the left,as he heard the door breaking open. Dashing some more,he eventually reached the exit,but before he can around the corner,he felt his right foot being grabbed,falling down face flat,eddy scream in terror as he being dragged more and more away from the exit. 

Afterwards no other noise let alone screams of the terrified animator was heard other then wheezing animal noises in Joey Drew Studios.

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Present Day:

New Jersey Pine Barrens. Nighttime 

Owls hoot in the night sky as the trees of the infamous Pine Barrens rustles in the night. It was a peaceful sight to behold for sure that is until a giant shape burst out from the trees. The shape was a giant monster that had a demonic hose head,body of a bear,claws of an eagle with hood legs,bat wings,and snake tail that roared in fury as it tried to shake off a rope that was tied around it's tail. 

At the end of the rope a tall skinny young man wearing a green shirt with his dog a Great Dane both clearly hanging on for dear life.

"Like this is the last time I try to play cowboy with a dragon thingy Scoob!" The skinny man cried out to his dog.

"Rikewise here Rhaggy!" Scooby Doo yelled to Shaggy Rogers in turn as they swing around the air like a couple of monkeys hanging for dear life.

The beast roared in fury at the two poor souls then it dove back down to the forest ramming into trees in an effort to shake them off.

"Like-OW-OOF! OWY HEY NOT IN THE MOUTH MAN!" Shaggy yelled in pain,coughing up leaves.

Coming in front of them was a van that was blue and green with the words Mystery Machine written on both sides. A gun came out of top of the van then it fired a net at the creature at full face. The beast roared as it crshed to the ground,knocked out. 

Another young man dressed in a white sweater with an orange ascot came out of the driving side of the van,and rushed quickly to the van. Two other people a beautiful young woman dressed in a purple dress,green scarf,and purple tights,and a nerdy girl with an orange sweater with glasses followed after him.

"I can't believe this worked on the first try!" The man with the ascot said with excitiment. "I mean usually they tend to backfire at first but this is the first time it didn't happen!"

"Like that's great Fred but can ya please get me and Scooby down?!" Shaggy said as he and Scooby hung from branches in a comical fashion.

"Here let me help!" The girl with the purple dress said as he started to climb up. She soon reached them and got out some knives as she cut the branches down. both Shaggy and Scooby fell down softly.

"Like thanks Daphne!" Shaggy said as he rubbed his butt. 

"No problem." Daphne Blake said coming down. "Pays to have outdoor training years ago."

Fred Jones saw upcoming police vehicles drive up. "Right on time. Care to do the honors Velma?" He asked the nerdy girl.

"Like I need to ask Fred?" Velma Dinkley replied in his usual know it all self. She turned to see the chief come up to them with a rightfully concerned look.

"Care to explain me kids on how the flipping heck did you capture the Jersey Devil?!" The chief demanded. "That monstrosity put many of my men and women to hospitals faster then you can say Clockman Diamond!"

"Funny you should mention that Chief." Velma replied going up to the Jersey Devil. "Had this been the actual Jersey Devil it would've done more then put people into hospitals but seeing as on how we've figured out on this is otherwise allow us to show you who's been really behind the Jersey Devil attacks."

She pressed into the monster's neck,making clicking noises as the head falls off revealing itself to be just a high tech suit,worn by a disgruntled man with balding hair,and a glare in his eyes.

"Glen Richards?!" The Chief cried in surprise "But how? Why? He was doing well as the city's electrician!"

"He was. However he didn't always want to be known as such. He had ambitions of being the owner of his own movie studio and was able to get enough funds from his time as an electrician however the problem was that he wanted to set it up at the Pine Barrens but the county council didn't allow it for obvious reason." Velma said.

"So in order to scare people away from the Pine Barrens for good,Richards used his suit making skills he learned from film school to construct the Jersey Devil suit using advance enough tech to make a convincing method to bringing the Jersey Devil legend alive!" Fred joined in.

"It took a little eye for detail to figure out on how the fur on the creature was made from leftover fun used from taxidermy operations." Daphne said plucking out clumps of fur then showing it to the police chief. "This was made from deer fur, so once we were able to figure where the fur came from and where bits of oil were flown about from the hydrolics all we had to do was to set him up and nab him!"

"And I would've gotten away with it too! If it weren't from you snooping goody two shoes suck ups to the law and your flea ridden sorry excuse for a canine!" glen Richards growled as he was led away."

"Hey!" Scooby said with offense.

"Like you could've just said Meddling kids and your dog too man!" Shaggy said.

"THEY MEAN THE SAME THING MORON!" Richards yelled as he was driven off.

"Sheesh! Like someone didn't give him enough hugs." Shaggy said with annoyance.

"Well thanks kids." The chief said shaking Fred's hand. "A lot of folks are gonna rest easy tonight."

"It's our thing chief! Always happy to help!" Fred said with his usual friendliness. The chief then went to his own car and drove off. He then turned around and faced his friends. "Another mystery solved gang!"

"About time too! Scooby Doo!" Scooby said giggling.

Daphne smiled then she heard her phone ring from her purse. She got it out and looked at her friends "Hang on guys! I have to take this." She answered the phone. "Yes?...Oh Mimi it's great to hear from you!...Yes I know I loved your last fashion show!....Huh?....Wait really?!" She said looking surprised then serious. "....You're not pulling my leg right?.....Where?!.....You have it?!....Thank you so much Mimi! I'll tell them about this!..alk to you later!" She hung up the phone and sees her friends looking a little worried.

"You ok Daph?" Fred asked in a concerned tone. "Something happen?"

"Yes Fred but it's the good kind!" Daphne said "It has to do with my great uncle Edward Blake!"

"Edward Blake?" Shaggy asked. "Wait wasn't he one of the animators of-"

"Of the Bendy cartoons? Well sure!" Daphne said with a surprised tone. "You watch them too Shaggy?"

"Like sure Daphne!" Shaggy said with a grin. "It's one of Scoob and mine's top cartoons to watch as kids."

"Surprised you didn't ask us before Rahpne!" Scooby said.

"Ok going fanboy or fangirl in your case Daphne aside what about Edward Blake?" Velma asked now curious.

"Oh right!" Daphne said remembering what she was about to say. "My old friend Mimi works as a fashion designer in New York City,and she said that during one of the renovations near where Joey Drew Studios was at,hey found a couple of items there. Most of which belonged to My great uncle who vanished those years ago."

"So this was a family mystery for a long while now?" Fred asked,looking equally as curious. 

"Yeah." Daphne sighed. "I remember my grandmother talking about on how her father was devastated at his brother's going missing like that. He wasn't totally the same afterwards." She looked up,looking pretty glad. "Mimi said she has his suitcase in hand,and wanted to show it to me to finally get more of an idea of where he went." 

"Wasn't the studio also the subject of urban legends of ink oozing out from the studio's cracks and odd animal noises coming from it?" Velma then inquired. "I remember reading upon New York's urban legends and that was among the more infamous ones."

"Like what now?" Shaggy asked now with a look of horror in his face. Same goes for Scooby.

"Yep." Daphne replied. "If that isn't adding icing on the cake for us I don't know what is."

"Well then." Fred said with a look of great interest coming upon him. "I think we've just found ourselves a new mystery!"

Both Shaggy and Scooby look dejected.

"Well so much for a relaxing weekend right Scoob?" Shaggy said to Scooby.

"Rep." Scooby said nodding his head. "Phooey."

#scooby doo #bendy and the ink machine #scooby doo and the ink machine #daphne blake #fred jones #shaggy rogers #velma dinkley #wally franks #thomas connor #themeatly #kindly beast #warner bros animation #hanna barbera #bendy the ink machine #ink demon #jersey devil #crossover

[nicktremblaywayfu]

To @artofalonistrubel

From @charsawdeath

Holiday gift

EddiexFem!Reader

(Umm...name of the lady… ??? I wasn't told so I came up with Osa)

Wanted a hide and seekish like fic, I hope you enjoy ❤️

And Happy Holidays~

***

Was it appropriate in this setting to call herself crazy?

She WAS going into an insane asylum after all-Did it matter?

For now, as she walked through a gap in the ringed fence, she didn't think it mattered. This was tame looking~

She even saw lights in more than half the building so who knows, maybe just some homeless guys lived here now and once she found out, snapped a few inside shots, she could leave, easy peasy~

Crazy would be nowhere in this 'insane asylum' sneak in~

With an aced gymnastics score to her name, the women shimmied up the scaffolding that also made her to believe this building wasn't as 'spooky' and 'crazy' as so many in her class said it was.

Someone must be fixing up the old thing!

She stopped at that thought though and stood off to the side of a window ledge. IF someone was fixing up such a massive building, cameras on overnight MIGHT see her and her snooping camera shots-

She squatted upon the scaffolding a moment and went through the outside image she had of the asylum on her phone, looking for a safer passage as to not get caught.

Female Ward! She tapped the screen twice to enlarge the image and scanned the area before nodding with silent agreement that that's where she'd go.

This was the first place shut down and also most rundown, she knew if the new owner wanted this place saved, the front was the first major bet to tend to, they'd not have gotten THERE yet!

She set her phone back into her jacket pocket and easily, softly, slipped back down the scaffolding and headed back deeper into the brush of the unkempt asylum, back towards the Female Ward.

Blood pumping, body shaking not with fear but excitement, the women found a final obstacle in her way and scaled the brick wall with ease, sitting upon the top a moment to see all she could before committing to her task.

She had a thrill seeking streak within her which fit her namesake well in Osa, Godlike, God himself a man of many amazing streaks and wonders about him.

'God', as some we're quoted to have said in the asylums haydays said how, 'did not care about a few forgotten lunatics', so Godlike in her name, would Osa ever forget this choice, or become part of the forgotten because of it?

---

It was musty outside, but inside, Osa put a sleeve to her noise and tried not to cough.

It held such 'beautiful' smells such likes as, blood, urine, vomit, death, sprinkled with manly sweat.

It was worse than the large dumpsite downtown that her bus had to drive past every day to get to her school!

Still, she pressed on, this wasn't going to stop her, it was nothing after an hour really, and soon, all together, in her amazement over the structures details, she nearly forgot all about it.

Ornate wood cuttings in the stairs and wall frames, old-in-day pictures hung lifeless upon the walls!

Documents everywhere told Osa those who worked here had literally packed up everything they could and left without a second glance.

Kind of sad to think, as she pulled out a photograph of a young man with striking blue eyes and old-in-day under cut.

"Eddie Gluskin," Ora whispered then found another.

"Frank.. Mar.." The letters were splattered like wet ink thus this man's last name was unknown yet still, he too, she felt bad for..

He looked homeless!

That was a case for some hospitals… People without homes acted out and gained meals and shelter-Was Frank one such man?

She put the photos back inside their Manilla folders and started walking through the hell that was the busted tables and hastily thrown around chairs.

A light lead her this way, one she hadn't noticed was on before and with caution, she moved forward until she found the passage she walked through ended and thus left her without cover and so she stayed put, studied where she was.

She wasn't stupid!

Those women in horror movies deserved their deaths, fucking dimwits-

No, Osa sat on her knees quietly and listened.

No footsteps.

No different smells either, not from those 'wonders' of before anyway.

'Faulty wiring, it's old-' She began but stayed put a bit longer.

As if to signal she was right on the faulty wires, the light flickered then died and after five minutes of watching it, flicked back on before her eyes.

She sighed and got up very slowly and not without finding something from a desk before she left her safe hole to start forward again.

It was just a closet, the wire indeed flickered many times after she moved on, so she paid it no more mind.

She didn't count on those who may call the asylum home knowing where quiet places to step were or where the best places to hide could be.

No, out of all her grand judgements thus far, as a shadow slunk past the flickers of light on silent feet, she did not assume and kept walking, snapping a shot here or there or marveling at the structures amazing points of details!

---

"Vocational Block, Hu." She pushed open the door carefully and looked around before stepping inside.

She had barely missed some bodies behind a door or two and chalked up the blood she'd seen as an animals and once a humans but maybe because they had lost a fight.

She'd seen nothing strange about the asylum, nothing that pegged it for being 'spooky' or 'creepy' like those of her grade said it was said to be.

She gave a tired roll of her eyes when she recalled Phil offering her a heroic man's hand as her 'guide' through the place even then pushed the thought aside. The Block had caught her attention quickly.

Phil's words died in her head as she saw in every direction, wedding dresses, of various sizes and styles!

She dared herself to touch just one to see if by chance it was just webs caught on things and made to look as such via the light filtered in by the boarded windows but no… No they weren't!

Satin like fabric, elegantly designed!

"There's roses embroiled in this one, holy shit!" She whispered and used her phone light to better catch the details she felt.

"Done in red thread too!" She was impressed. Whether by patients or a homeless person, THIS was worth some cash!

She pulled out a notepad from her arm bag and ripped off a piece and wrote,

'These could sell for money! There's a place for free haircuts and the YMCA allows free showers.'

She sighed it then wrote the directions before drawing some to be sure and simplified her note with pictures as an added bonus.

Even if they weren't all on upstairs, help was nice, even in this day and age, and this guy's work was so worth it!

Cliink

Osa's head turned so fast, her brown locks smacked her in the face after the sound of a cane being kicked broke her from her thoughts.

Stupidly, she knew so as she opened her mouth, she called out, "Hello?"

Quietly, right after, she scurried under the dress she'd been admiring and tried backing up further to get away from where she'd called.

No answer.

'What do you expect?' She barbed to herself as she carefully turned onto her hands and knees and gingerly began to walk away from the dress.

"Leaving me a note, Darling? That's very kind of you." A man's voice spoke out of nowhere, making Osa smash her head in shocked surprise by the noise, a curse escaping her lips as she fell back down to the floor after doing so.

"Oh dear, Darling! I'm so sorry, I hadn't meant to scare you!" The man's voice spoke with true concern and to Osa's surprise, a fingerless gloved hand reached downwards toward her hiding place and the voice spoke up with, "Let me help you."

"Your the man in the folder!" Osa said calmly, not ready to rattle this behemoth of a man who indeed helped her up and made sure she was standing okay before grabbing for an aid kit by a table.

"Ahh yes, so you've seen me, Darling?" The man asked in such a dashing way, Osa smiled and nodded. "Eddie Gluskin, right?"

With his nod of 'yes', Osa held out her hand in a polite way, as human and friendly as she could to this man and offered, "Well I'm Osa, Mr. Gluskin!"

"Oooh, Eddie is just fine by me, Darling~" He purred before taking her hand and granting it a kiss to the knuckle.

Did he WORK for the asylum? Was he a homeless man? Was he a PATIENT?

Best to keep his charm and not find out in the wrong way if her wonders needed answers.

"Eeeeddie, well, you do have amazing work!" Osa said truthfully, laughing sweetly, something she saw he liked by his half closed eyes and warming smile.

"Really?"

"One of those dresses has red roses stitched into its work! That's amazing and beautiful!"

Eddie seemed thrilled and offered, stepping away from Osa as he spoke, "Try it on then, Darling~ If it fits, you may keep it, for being so kind and honest to a man such as myself!"

This, disturbed Osa a bit.

Try it on..

"Oh I don't want to ruin it, Mr. Gluskin, Sir. But I'm very very honored." Osa said as he came back with the dress being spoken of.

"Nonsense, here, I have a room here so you can try it on in private~" And to his word...He did… Kind'of.

It was a room alright, a room FILLED with lockers…

It smelled so… BAD in this room!

"Is there..there a..anywhere else..see to change? It s..smells very VERY badly I...in here.." Osa asked, trying to back out of the room she was being offered to change in.

"Oooh now Darling," Eddie said warmly and tipped her chin upwards and smiled into her face, "A Bride must dress away from the Groom, you should know that!"

"Bride? Wait a moment… Bride?" Osa asked in pure disbelief, all excitement from her first steps inside gone like the last breath of life from her lungs.

"Indeed~ Osa Gluskin~ Very fitting, isn't it Darling?" Eddie asked happily and nudged her easily into the locker based room and closed the door with a lock after, his voice upbeat and loving, "I'll be back shortly, I have to be sure the wedding room is ready~" Then to signal he was leaving, he began to whistle an oldie kind of song, the sound fading the further he got from where she was locked.

Out of her mind that this was just a nightmare or some kind of joke, she opened a locker, one that smelt like death worn over and held her jacket sleeve within her mouth to muffle the screams as a decomposing body sloshed out of its metal coffin.

She opened the rest and bodies of various forms of decay either slid out, plopped out, or just slumped forward.

Each had a dress on, every single one-

She held the dress Eddie had given her and began to let panic win over and felt trapped like a rabbit in a snare, the walls closing in upon her as too, the room itself seemed to be growing darker around her.

She shut her eyes up tight, buried her head within the dress and screamed as loudly as she could until tears followed suit, then, then she slid upon the locked door and let herself fall further into despair.

This wasn't a dream, nor a movie, no, this was what curiosity got someone, someone so assured of herself and bold like Osa…

They wound up a dead dress up doll for a crazy man in an abandoned nuthouse!

Best part of this?

No one knew where it was she had gone, it was going to be a shocking reveal to her friends on what she'd done!

And now-

She sobbed softly, head upon the locked door, no one would know where to look.

---

A half hour past Osa by.

A half hour of feeling sorry for herself.

A half hour she could have gotten her ass in gear-She broke out of her self made pit and tried hard to go through everything she'd seen in movies.

Hell to phones, she checked never the less but knew no signal, she WAS in the middle of nowhere and still shots only got her so far-

Still shots!

Before she took inventory of her phones still shots of the outside of the asylum, Osa looked around like she was looking for a needle in a haystack for a possible way out.

THERE!

An old fashion top window to the locked door!

The bodies were already dead, so what she did to them next wouldn't make or break them any more than they were already and began using the more solid bodied ones to mold the softer ones into a pile then placed the body parts she could upon the mound and then, as quietly as she could, leapt for the upper window.

Slowly, carefully, she moved herself from the window, undoing her bag before getting back to the floor then stayed put, listening.

Forty minutes now added to that half hour of being gone.

She needed to MOVE but quietly.

She hadn't heard him, somehow for someone so damn built and upon such old wood-What had she missed?

She slipped slowly under a table, either a woodworking table for sewing table then pulled up her phone, curling up as tightly as she could to hide it's light before working on a way back outside.

When had Eddie found her?

She knew by an inner feeling he wasn't going to be tickled pink she had gotten out of his locker room so running into him was a NOT, so, slowly, carefully, she planned.

Something caught her off guard once more, this time to her advantage as Eddie was coming back where she was. His boots, she now heard them since she wasn't lost in the beauty of the building!

Clop, clop, clop!

Then, then she SAW them!

The heels pointed her way and she held her mouth shut as she heard him knock upon the door sweetly and his voice sing out, "All is ready, Darling~"

"Daaarling~" He sang before unlocking the door only to be greeted by the bodies falling out instead.

"Osa? Darling, where have you gone?" He asked at first not as angry as she'd thought he'd have been.

No, opposite!

"Playing are we~ You minx~ Hmhm, alright, I'll play my Darling, and when I find you-" Osa's eyes grew in horror as his voice dropped from charming to chilling in a second, "I'll make certain you won't run away again~"

Like an on and off switch, back came his sweet charming, "Okay now Darling, give your Groom a hint? Hot or cold?"

A very small sound caught Osa's ears as he walked the other way, the sound...of a blade…running along a wooden surface…

She calmed her breathing as softly as she could.

No, he was NOT going to be that kind of guy to just let someone go unhurt! No matter how charming and nice he acted!

And she had made directions to a few places that could help him out if he chose to sell his work….

Would he go through with those plans…

Should she brave it and take them back?

Where would they be if she did try?

No, no, she'd leave it be… She'd BEG her mother to leave… Tell her someone had tried to hurt her but BEG to just leave town instead!

That's all she could think up before the charming voice of Eddie came back, ABOVE HER upon the table she hid under, "No need to hide, Darling, hmhm~ I don't bite~"

She dare not breathe.

The heavy sound of him jumping off the table shook her fully.

Pounds and pounds of muscle!

She wouldn't be able to escape him if she tried… She'd seen videos on YouTube and guides on how-to fight off this or fight-off that.

The guides never prepared you for it when it was right there, a big wall of violent muscle!

His footsteps moved off again and this time, Osa moved off herself, in his direction, a table close by.

'Mimic him best you can, move when he does, hide in ANYTHING when he stops,' She told herself and gave a laugh at such a time because, 'A perverted game of hide-and-seek,' came to her mind.

What the hell?

If it kept her alive and kept her from making noises as Eddie moved around looking for her and slowly growing less and less charming doing so, she'd be the best damn player when she was done!

A CRASH made her start fast as Eddie broke a table in half with a single fist punch downward, his voice just as alarmingly hard, "VITCH, come now, stop this and come vack to me!"

She heard a lisp she hadn't before. Maybe to seem perfect like his picture? She could see that as she watched Eddie now whimper and call out, broken, "I'm sorry, please forgive me, Darling… I can't live without you!"

'Did well before I got here, ganna do so when I'm gone!' Osa said and as Eddie threw a piece of the table further into the Vocational Block, Osa moved from hands and knees to feet and swiftly got towards a stack of old clothes dumped damp and forgotten for years it smelt.

She removed her shoes next, better not make to much noise, pain was worth being silent.

In an effort to get the man away from where he was already, a door just an inch away shining light that would give her away at once, she flung a shoe one way, watched Eddie's head snapped toward it, then flung the other and bolted as he chuckled and followed that one.

"You sure move fast, don't you, my Darling~"

Outside and into the hallway light, Osa carefully moved, not outright running yet, energy saved if needbe.

She needed to find the place the Female patients were brought through the main hallway, if she found that all she'd have to do to make it was a good sprint along the connecting hallways.

Both buildings shared a single long hallway, separated by a door.

There were stairs up or down if the door wasn't open so she had a few routes-

"Darling, there you are!" Eddie's voice called out as Osa stayed put too long as she planned out how she was going to get out.

She swore to herself before smiling, backing up slowly, "Surprise…"

Eddie looked slightly more ragged, but calmed as he neared her and even began to smile warmly again as he spoke, "I thought you left me my love!"

"No, no, no! I was..was just getting.. getting antsy…"

"I should have known you'd be ready to consummate our love like I was, Darling~" Eddie choked back and took Osa's hand within his large, table breaking one and began walking her along through the hallway.

"Once we get this vit over with, and once we make one another whole, we can work on making dresses~ You said so yourself they'd like them, I'm sure they will, you'd never tell me lies would you, Darling?" Eddie rambled on as he and Osa past room after room, hallway after hallway.

"H..have those… instructions I...I made you..then, l...love?" Osa asked as calmly as she could and to her surprise, the man pulled said paper out of his jacket pocket and handed it to her, beaming, "Of course!"

"Can I ho..old on to it for..or a b...it?" She asked and pressed on before he wondered why, "I'll need to make...make out where homes a..are.. Close t..to work is good r.. right?" To which Eddie kissed the hand he held.

"Indeed, a brilliant idea~" Then added into her ear before they went through the last door, "Make sure there's a school nearby, for our children my Darling~"

And just as shocked and disturbed as she had been before, to now, it grew a million times worse as they stepped out and into a makeshift wedding aisle, complete with a Father with his Book, ring bearer, and dead bodies in the chairs as witnesses to this 'wonderful' event.

---

"Alright, now, I'll be up ahead, the music will begin, and then you'll come down to me, understand my love?" Eddie asked Osa who had yet to move when she saw the display before her eyes.

This man wasn't a member like that of the asylum, nor just a random homeless man, no, he BELONGED here for some reason, and as Eddie kissed the tip of his finger then poked her nose, leaving, she was painting a vivid picture about what had happened to end him up here and she wasn't at all excited to be piecing it together with her own body added to the count and display.

Ahead, Eddie tapped a cassette player on and soon the titular wedding theme began to play, Eddie himself puffing up proudly, waiting.

Her mind raced now. He was waiting!

His anger flared violently when something wasn't going right…

She had to think…

'Frank-' She recalled before chiming out, Eddie's head turned her way, all attention upon her now, "Eddie, where is Frank?"

"Frank? Monera, why?" He asked completely baffled now.

Osa bit her lip and said, still standing put, "I...I saw h...him before…"

"What do you mean, Darling?" Was that pain in his voice? Why?

"Well.. I saw him before meeting y..ou-"

"Was he vetter then me?" He asked and this threw Osa backwards.

'He thinks I'm meaning BEEN WITH HIM!'

The pain now was more so hiding rage as Osa played through it with, "He was n...ice, yes!"

"When were you going to tell me, Darling?" Eddie asked, hand upon his chest, almost betrayed like.

"I didn't know I had to, how do you know Frank, Eddie?"

"It's proper of a man and wife to share such things, Darling! Have I not be open with you?" Eddie asked, turning around fully, Osa feeling the need to flee.

She stayed put and said slowly, "Not really, Eddie I mean, you know Frank and yet he's not here for our wedding, I… mean.. So he can see what he's missed out on?"

The look in Eddie's eyes scared Osa as the man before her straightened up and grinned darkly, "Your right, I SHOULD show that corpse muncher what he's lost and I've gained!"

Before he could take her hand, Osa gave the best 'girly' cry she could and whimpered, face hidden, "Please don't have me go see him myself! I only have eyes for you! What he's done to me I dare not look back upon again! Please, my love? Don't have me see him again?"

"Understood, Darling, wait here~" Eddie whispered before kissing her head and got back up, knuckles cracking as he flexed his fingers, "Your Groom shall not be long!" And with the steady clop, clop, clop of his feet, Osa waited till they were well and gone out of earshot before making a mad dash for the door behind the altar.

---

Forgoing the images on her phone, throwing being quiet to the wind, Osa just ran.

Down hallways, through doors, and the first window she found that wasn't like a million stories up, she jumped out of.

She tucked into a bush nevertheless, rolling deeper to be extra safe in the event Eddie had followed her and in her flight from fright hadn't noticed, and waited.

Pain throbbed dully in the back of her mind but still she stayed alert.

Listen for Eddie…

Listen..

Carefully, slowly, Osa shifted further and further into the bushes and tumbled outside the asylum by a hole dug a while ago by something pretty human sized.

Climbing out of the hole that separated asylum from real life outside, Osa panted, shivered, and waited again.

Just nature noises around her-

Unless he had powers, he wouldn't be able to sneak up on her out here!

But-

Until she was back amongst homes again, streetlights, and cars, Osa moved an inch at a time, hide behind trees, and listened like a deer in the open fields.

Ever snap of a twig, rustle of leaves around her, she was alert and went still.

Until she got to someone she felt she could trust, Osa remained wild eyed, shivered as if she'd never be warm again, and looked ready to sprint at any given motion.

Finally, at the station in the lower town, Osa grabbed for a cop and recalled her events, showed the shots from her phone, and then handed one of the officers the directions she had made just to be sure those there would be safe, and with all shared and spoken, Osa was lead to a calm room, assured she'd be let out shortly and left to breathe and collect her thoughts.

They'd take her case!

She felt more at ease with every second.

They looked so concerned and bothered about what she'd gone through!

When her door opened up a few minutes later, she expected the officers but instead was ready to beg forgiveness to the buildings owner since that seemed to be who came into her room.

"Was all you said all that happened, Ma'am?" The man asked, brown eyes calm, voice very businessman like.

"Yes, I didn't even tell my friends or parents, I wanted to surprise them with finding nothing but an old building is all, honest!"

"No one knows you went?" The man asked with a strange look to his eyes and Osa nodded slowly, 'yes'.

"I have an offer for you, Osa~" The man said warmly, hand out, "We don't get you in trouble for trespassing, in exchange for some minor help with our work~"

"Minor work?" Osa asked slowly and the man nodded, taking his hand back, not having been shaken as he wished.

"It's a program really."

"A..program?" Osa asked with confusion and the man beamed and placed a hand upon her shoulder, "It's called Project Walrider! Sounds pretty cool right?"

"I...I don't...know.." Osa said, feeling unsafe all of a sudden, even in a police men's office.

"So you'd rather go through the hell that's to be paid for trespassing when a simple program assist is all I ask of you?" This man asked with a strange truth to his words.

He...was right…

Names weren't always as they sounded…

"This won't be on any records?"

"Your name will be clear of everything and everything my dear, Blaire's promise!" The man said and crossed his heart then winked.

"When do I tell my parents?" Osa asked slowly, watching the man named Blaire before her.

"Tell them? Tell who?" She was asked and yet, before being able to repeat herself, a needle was injected into her neck and as she blacked out, the last thing she recalled being spared by Blaire was, "Welcome to Project Walrider, number 369~"

#Outlast #outlast secret Santa #Eddie Gluskin #Eddie x Fem!reader

[mikeo56]

Dorothy Parker’s reputation as one of the premier wits of the 20th century rests firmly on the brilliance of her writing, but the image of her as a plucky, fast-talking, independent woman of her times owes more than a little to her seat at the legendary Algonquin Round Table. Jonathan Goldman explores the beginnings of the famed New York group and how Parker's determination to speak her mind — even when it angered men in positions of power — gave her pride of place within it.

Dorothy Parker lost her job as Vanity Fair theater critic on January 11, 1920, in the tea room of the Plaza Hotel. Parker must have known there was trouble brewing as she sat down across from editor Frank Crowninshield. She had been in hot water for months. Her latest column had been a particularly biting one. Reviewing The Son-Daughter, Parker contended that David Belasco's new play followed his old one, East Is West, "almost exactly," which Belasco made known he considered grounds for a libel suit.1 A couple paragraphs later, writing about the new Somerset Maugham play Caesar’s Wife, Parker had zinged actress Billie Burke for performing "as if she were giving an impersonation of Eva Tanguay".2 The comparison to a risqué vaudevillian enraged Florenz Ziegfeld, one of Vanity Fair’s most reliable advertisers, who happened to be Burke’s producer — and husband. Ziegfeld and Belasco both took their umbrage to publisher Condé Nast. It is in dispute which complaint held more weight, but either way, Nast passed the buck to Crowninshield, who met Parker at the Plaza and fired her from the job she had held for two years. Parker promptly ordered the most expensive dessert on the menu and left.

In the days that followed, Parker’s cronies who hung out in the Rose Room of the Algonquin Hotel made the firing and its fallout at Vanity Fair into a media scandal Parker herself would never again hold a desk job or draw a regular salary, finding success instead as a freelance critic, author of brilliant and acclaimed verse, short fiction, essays, plays, and film scripts. The incident changed her career and stature, and its response helped forge the legend of what would eventually be called the Algonquin Round Table.

Parker may have learned from her parents the tendency to not quite accept the rules. She was born Dorothy Rothschild (a surname whose mention always caused her to protest any relation to the Rothschild lineage) in 1893, a child of once-forbidden love between Eliza Annie Marston, daughter of British burghers, and Jacob Henry Rothschild, child of Jewish immigrants, who married over the opposition of Marston's parents. Dorothy grew up in New York City, in her family’s 214 West 72nd Street townhouse. It was a newly fashionable neighborhood; Broadway, a few steps away, was then called "the Boulevard" along this stretch, in homage to the Parisian boulevards designed by Georges-Eugène Haussmann that it very slightly resembled. Dorothy’s was not an idyllic childhood. Her mother died when she was five. When she was eighteen, the Titanic sank, taking with it a favored uncle, Martin Rothschild; Parker may have accompanied her distraught father to the docks to greet the shipwreck’s survivors and learn that her uncle was not among them. Henry Rothschild, devastated, fell ill and died less than a year later.

Needing income beyond her father’s legacy, Parker found a job playing piano at one of many dance schools, which were faddish in the mid-1910s. But she wanted to earn money by writing. She went about it the old, hard way, sending in cold submissions of poetry until her number was called. In 1914 Vanity Fair accepted her poem "Any Porch", which satirized chitchat of society women in meticulously metered and rhymed stanzas such as:

I don’t want the vote for myself, But women with property, dear –– I think the poor girl's on the shelf, She's talking about her "career."3

The piece earned her $12, comparable to about $300 today. Parker used the poem as justification to force her way into the Vanity Fair’s offices at 19–25 West 44th Street and ask for a steady job. The editor, Crowninshield, was sufficiently impressed. In 1915 he hired her for Vogue, another magazine owned by Nast, to do editorial work and write captions for illustrations of women’s garments. Soon her personal life also took a dramatic turn, and then another, when she met Edwin Parker II in 1916, married him in 1917, and a week later watched in surprise and dismay while "Eddie" enlisted in the US Army and went off to World War I.

During her two years at Vogue, Parker worked under Edna Woolman Chase, a legend. Chase, following a course normally reserved for men, had worked her way up from the mailroom to the top of the editorial ladder, becoming the managing editor in 1911 and editor-in-chief in 1914; she would stay in that position until 1952. Chase’s dedication was matched by her strictness. She insisted on formal workplace demeanor, and she and her young employee, demure in appearance but iconoclastic in attitude, grated on one another. Though thrilled when she landed the job, Parker could only follow the leader for so long, and was soon plaguing Chase with unprintable captions, meant to challenge the Vogue sensibility. One nightgown, she suggested, could be worn as a sexual enticement: "When she was good she was very very good, and when she was bad she wore this divine nightdress…" Such insinuation was a no-no for Vogue readers of 1916. The caption made it through several editorial stages before its twist on the "girl with the curl" nursery rhyme was recognized.

Crowninshield relieved Chase of her problem employee in 1918, bringing Parker over to the editorial staff at Vanity Fair and offering her the theater critic job that would change her career. It was a wonderful time to have a front-row seat to New York’s theater scene. Over eighty venues were active in the Broadway district, opening over 150 shows a year; a reviewer could write about new shows every week. Parker’s monthly columns demonstrated early her propensity for dropping, and sometimes deflating, the big names — regardless of whether they belonged to someone on stage. In April 1918, while touting Wodehouse’s musical Oh, Lady! Lady!!, she digressed to say that "not even the presence in the first-night audience of Mr. William Randolph Hearst…could spoil my evening".

Parker loved being a theater critic, but she loved less and less Nast and Crowninshield’s attitudes toward the staff. In this, as in many things, she was supported (and egged on) by her two new colleagues at Vanity Fair, Robert Benchley and Robert Sherwood. Benchley was hired as managing editor in the winter of 1919 and became Parker’s office mate in May. His straitlaced demeanor and traditional domestic life — wife, children, and house in the suburbs — belied an anarchic sense of humor that made him one of the US’s leading humorists for decades. Soon after Benchley’s arrival, Sherwood, recently returned from the war, came aboard as writer. Both Sherwood and Benchley had trained, so to speak, at Harvard, writing satire for the Harvard Lampoon; both, like Parker, would flourish as authors after Vanity Fair. It is clear that Crowninshield had a brilliant eye for literary talent.

In 1919, however, the three writers soured on the management and particularly on the ownership of the magazine they worked for. They disdained Nast’s combination of crass libertinism and schoolmarmish insistence on office conformity, and they resented their uncompetitive salaries. They were "treated like serfs", said Sherwood, and "paid that way, too".4 They acted out: decorating Nast’s office with streamers for a mock bon-voyage party, and at one point, when Crowninshield was on a trip and left them minding the store, publishing a satirical fashion article by Sherwood in which he predicted that men’s attire would soon include waistcoats trimmed with jewels.

Caesar’s Wife had its opening night in November 1919 and ran until the following February at the Liberty Theater at 236 West 42nd Street (whose facade is still there, now part of Ripley’s Museum, believe it or not). The play depicts the marriage between an English diplomat and a woman many years his junior. Parker’s review is not completely unkind until its conclusion: "Miss Burke, in her role of the young wife, looks charmingly youthful. She is at her best in her more serious moments; in her desire to convey the youthfulness of the character she plays her lighter scenes as if giving an impersonation of Eva Tanguay".5 This was in fact a toned-down revision; in her first draft, Parker had written that Burke "threw herself around the stage as if giving an impersonation of exotic dancer Eva Tanguay". After Crowninshield objected, Parker offered the slightly less inflammatory phrase.

The published version was insulting enough. Caesar’s Wife, by the acclaimed Maugham, was meant to burnish the credentials of Burke, returning to the stage after three years in cinema, and her husband Ziegfeld, best known for his annual variety shows. Parker’s reference to Tanguay undermined these aspirations. Eva Tanguay’s name was a byword for indecorum, eroticism, and unbridled physicality. She was, by all accounts, not particularly skilled as a singer, dancer, or actress, yet she became an international star, famous partly for her salary, which eventually climbed to an astonishing $2,500 per week when she headlined at the Metropolitan Theater in Brooklyn in 1921. As Printer’s Ink had hailed her ten years earlier: "She can neither sing, nor dance, nor recite…. Just the same, Eva commands the money. The audience wants her".6 Tanguay was also known for transgressions against traditional female comportment on stage and off, and for acting as her own business manager, hiring male business agents but insisting on controlling her own career.

Parker's allusion to Tanguay conjured up associations that show her remark to be more than a dig at an imperfect performance. It also subtly invoked the dynamics of the Burke-Ziegfeld marriage and served as a swipe at patriarchal control. When Parker refers to the "young wife", and twice reiterates the "youthful" qualities of the role, she loops in the public history of Ziegfeld’s relationships with younger women, and of those women getting replaced by even younger women. Burke, for example, seventeen years Ziegfeld’s junior, had married him in 1914 following his divorce from Lillian Held and endured his unrepentant philandering ever since. Parker’s review implies that Burke is overacting because she is too old for the part of the "young wife" — and that her status as Ziegfeld’s "young wife" was expiring as well. Parker had thought Burke both inept and (her opinion unsympathetic to the plight of women actors in an inegalitarian theater industry) miscast, and had turned the critique personal. Less overtly, the reference to Tanguay, a woman who resisted having her career guided by men, sets in relief the professional arrangement between Burke and Ziegfeld.

Nine years earlier, Ziegfeld had employed Tanguay in his Follies of 1911 and knew well what Tanguay represented: excess, vulgarity, spectacle — all the associations he was trying to avoid. He had already complained about Parker’s writing to his friend Nast, but this time he was either more persuasive or had the weight of Belasco's threats to add to his own. Nast was not in a position to lose a prominent source of ad revenue and weather Belasco’s libel suit, so he called Crowninshield, his trusted chief editor at Vanity Fair since 1912.

Crowninshield rose to the occasion. The Plaza Hotel was, in 1920, already a symbol of luxury, excess, and pretension. (It has since been owned by, among others, Conrad Hilton and Donald Trump.) In this setting, Crowninshield, after commanding the staff to bring a huge bouquet of roses for the table, explained to Parker that her predecessor, P. G. Wodehouse, wished to resume the job of theater critic. He complimented Parker’s writing and invited her to freelance for the magazine. She left.

Returning to her West 71st Street apartment, Parker may have been greeted by her husband. Eddie had returned to New York the previous summer, struggling with drug use as did many GIs returning from the Great War. For commiseration, Parker telephoned her friend and confederate Benchley, who immediately caught a seven p.m. train to Manhattan from his home in Crestwood, arrived at the Parker apartment, and offered support. The next morning he walked into Crowninshield’s office and, in protest against Parker’s dismissal, tendered his letter of resignation. That afternoon, Parker and Benchley went to the Algonquin to tell their stories, staying for hours of gossip and rounds of drinks. After repeated recountings, the Round Table wits, who had long heard the complaints about Nast and Crowninshield, sprang into action. Alexander Woollcott persuaded his editors at the New York Times that the paper should cover the story. His article, "Vanity Fair Editors Out: Robert Benchley Follows Mrs. Parker–Criticisms Under Fire", appeared the next day — good publicity for the trio, tantamount to a free "for hire" listing.7 A few days later, another writer from the table, Frank Adams, publicly shamed Vanity Fair: he described the kerfuffle in his column "The Conning Tower" running in the New-York Tribune. The incident helped make the Algonquin Round Table a thing.

This informal group of colleagues, friends, adversaries and contestants had started taking shape over the previous summer, starting at a roast for theater columnist and Broadway personality Woollcott upon his return to New York from military duty. The group met at 59 West 44th Street, in the dining room of a hotel that had opened in 1902 under the name The Puritan. It was Frank Case, who managed the establishment for over two decades and then bought it in 1927, who, perhaps hoping to entice a less puritan clientele, rechristened it The Algonquin, giving it the name used for a group of indigenous tribes. One can assume that Case did not intend the irony of using a name for people who had been forcibly exiled from New York City three centuries earlier.

From 1920 on, the Algonquin became a regular meeting place for a group eventually to include a host of literary and cultural figures, including New Yorker founder Harold Ross, fiction writer Edna Ferber, sportswriter Heywood Broun, and Harpo Marx. It was Case, again, who made the decision to arrange a large round table for this garrulous group, set right in the middle of the Algonquin’s "Rose Room" where they could be on display for other customers, especially the tourists. "The Gonk", as its regulars took to calling it, was where Parker was to encounter Will Rogers, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Zelda Sayre, Ernest Hemingway, and the artist Neysa McMein, who would become her close friend.

But she had other business to attend to first. On January 13 — the morning Woollcott’s article appeared — Benchley, Parker and Sherwood arrived at the Vanity Fair offices, apparently out of contractual obligation. Freed of any need for decorum, they pinned chevrons, insignias of military discharge, on themselves, and created a mock contribution box labeled "for Billie Burke". Parker kept up these embittered jokes even after January 25th, when she cleaned out her Vanity Fair desk for good. That September, she sent Benchley a series of postcards signed "Flo and Billie", and "Conde and Clarisse" (Nast’s wife, by this point estranged).8

In February, she and Benchley rented an office together in the Metropolitan Opera House Studios at 39th Street and Broadway, a quick trip on the IRT or 9th Avenue elevated train from Parker’s home. The space was so tiny, she later quipped, that "an inch smaller and it would have been adultery".9 Parker’s first gig of her new life was writing intertitles for Remodeling Her Husband, a film Lillian Gish was directing, produced by D. W. Griffiths. The work dissatisfied her, and she soon resumed work as theater critic, this time for Ainslee’s, whose circulation was larger than that of Vanity Fair; it was a position allowing Parker to schedule her own work hours and write for other publications. She proceeded to have a productive winter, publishing in Ladies Home Journal and The Saturday Evening Post. Her finances survived, and that spring she had enough to lend Benchley $200. She surely appreciated being liberated from daily editorial responsibilities, and especially being free of Nast. Indeed, she would never again work a nine-to-five job, maintaining as much control as possible over how to pursue her profession and calling as writer.

Ziegfeld and his women stayed in her sights. In her June 1920 column for Ainslee’s, Parker wrote warmly of Ziegfeld’s Frolics — variety shows distinct from the Follies. She complimented the comedic performances of W. C. Fields, Mary Hay, and Fanny Brice, but skewered the singing of Lillian Lorraine — the longtime Ziegfeld paramour who had been instrumental to Ziegfeld’s divorce from Held. Commenting sardonically on the show’s female chorus, she wrote: "Where the Ziegfeld girls come from will always be one of the world’s great mysteries".10 Her next column reviewed the Follies, giving the thumbs down to even the music of Irving Berlin and Eddie Cantor while pointing out that "the real point of the production, as it is of every Follies, is the girls".

When Parker likened Billie Burke to Eva Tanguay, she was gesturing past the actor to the patriarchal structures, personal and professional, represented by Ziegfeld and Nast. She surely knew that she was risking her position, and just as surely decided that to defer to those structures would be worse than the consequences of defying them.

#dorothy parker

[chiseler]

YOU’RE A SAP, MISTER JAP

When Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7 1941, Tin Pan Alley’s songwriters reacted with instant fury and patriotic zeal, churning out hundreds of war songs at a ferocious clip. Amateurs jumped into the fray as well. By December 20, just two weeks later, The Billboard was already reporting that music publishers had received more than one thousand war song submissions. Only a fraction were ever published and recorded, but even that amounted to a lot of records, and a few would have big impacts on American morale early in the war.

The hive of most of that activity was the Brill Building on the west side of Broadway between 49th and 50th Streets. At the start of the century, when the term “Tin Pan Alley” was coined, the music business was concentrated on West 28th Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues, with Broadway cutting diagonally through. Its nickname referred to the constant racket of cheap upright pianos where guys stacked five stories high toiled long into the night banging out a cacophony of competing tunes. By 1941 most of the publishers had migrated uptown to the eleven-story Brill Building, opened in 1931. Lindy’s, immortalized by Damon Runyon as Mindy’s, was across Broadway.

The first two Tin Pan Alley songs reacting to Pearl Harbor — “We’ll Knock the Japs Right into the Laps of the Nazis” and “We Did It Before (and We Can Do It Again)” — were allegedly written that very day, December 7. Hearing the news from Hawaii, composer Lew Pollack and lyricist Ned Washington whipped out “We’ll Knock the Japs” on Sunday afternoon and rushed it to Bert Wheeler, of the vaudeville and Broadway comedy duo Wheeler & Woolsey. (Woolsey had died in 1938.) Wheeler apparently introduced the song that night as part of his club act in Los Angeles. In part it went:

Oh, we didn't want to do it but they're asking for it now

So we'll knock the Japs right into the laps of the Nazis,

When they hop on Honolulu that's a thing we won't allow

So we'll knock the Japs right into the laps of the Nazis!

Chins up, Yankees, let's see it through,

And show them there's no yellow in the red, white and blue

I'd hate to be in Yokohama when our bombers make their bow,

For we'll knock the Japs right into the laps of the Nazis!

Also on Sunday, another pair of Tin Pan Alley stalwarts, Charles Tobias and Cliff Friend, knocked out “We Did It Before,” a rousing George M. Cohan–style march. Friend is best known now for having written the theme song for Looney Tunes (“The Merry-Go-Round Broke Down”) in 1937. Tobias’s long list of credits includes “Those Lazy-Hazy-Crazy Days of Summer,” “Merrily We Roll Along” — which he cowrote with his brother-in-law Eddie Cantor, and which Warner Bros. adapted for its Merrie Melodies theme song — as well as one that became a huge hit during the war, “Don’t Sit Under the Apple Tree (With Anyone Else but Me).”

Cantor introduced “We Did It Before” on his popular weekly radio show that Wednesday, December 10. Dinah Shore sang it on her radio show the following Sunday, and Cantor went on to interpolate it into his stage revue Banjo Eyes, which opened on Broadway on Christmas Day and ran into April 1942. The sheet music was a top ten seller for a couple of months. Bringing things full circle, in 1943 Warner Bros. would use the song in a Merrie Melodies cartoon, Fifth Column Mouse, in which the mice mobilize for war against a dictatorial cat.

By Monday morning, December 8, the Tin Pan Alley trio of lyricist James Cavanaugh (best known for “You’re Nobody till Somebody Loves You”), John Redmond, and Nat Simon had written the upbeat “You’re a Sap, Mr. Jap”:

You’re a sap, Mr. Jap, you make a Yankee cranky,

You’re a sap, Mr. Jap, Uncle Sam is gonna spanky

It was released as a single before the month was out. In 1942 it also found its way into a cartoon, the first Popeye cartoon of the war, with caricatures of Japanese that were so extreme it was removed from circulation after the war — along with a number of other patriotically racist cartoons — and rarely seen again until the birth of the Internet.

By the week of January 11 Billboard counted twenty-four war singles released since December 7. There was the catchy “Goodbye Mama, I’m Off to Yokohama,” written by Brooklyn-born J. Fred Coots, better known for writing “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town” in 1934. The singer of this song was going to “teach all those Japs / The Yanks are no saps.”

Kate Smith weighed in with the spritely “They Started Somethin’ (But We’re Gonna End It)” and the sentimental ballad “Dear Mom,” a soldier’s letter home. She would follow them in February with “This Time,” a not particularly memorable Irving Berlin number. (“We’ll fight to the finish this time / Then we’ll never have to do it again.”) Billboard listed three different recordings of the inevitable “Remember Pearl Harbor,” plus the clever “Let’s Put the Axe to the Axis” and the swinging “The Sun Will Soon Be Setting (For the Land of the Rising Sun).”

The list also included two interesting “hillbilly” songs, as country music was then called. They emanated not from Nashville but the Brill Building. Tin Pan Alley had been exploring the relatively small markets for hillbilly and folk music since the 1920s. Then the genres got a boost in popularity in 1941 from an unlikely source. In January, ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers), the professional organization that licensed music to the radio broadcasters, demanded a doubling in fees. Broadcasters responded by pulling all ASCAP music from the airwaves and plugged the gap with music by non-ASCAP members, especially hillbilly and folk. By October, when ASCAP and the broadcasters came to new terms, hillbilly and folk had expanded their niche in the market, and the Tin Pan Alley pros cashed in.

One of those pros was Fred Rose, whose “Cowards Over Pearl Harbor” was a mournful, guitar-strumming folk ballad recorded by Denver Darling. Two of the most prolific were Memphis-born Bob Miller and Kansas-born Carson Robison, who both came to Tin Pan Alley in the 1920s. Miller worked for a while as Irving Berlin’s arranger, while Robison specialized in country and cowboy songs that humorously treated topical themes. Their response to Pearl Harbor was the outrageous “We’re Gonna Have to Slap the Dirty Little Jap,” sung to a silly, quick-time oompah melody:

We're gonna have to slap the dirty little Jap

And Uncle Sam's the guy who can do it

We'll skin the streak of yellow from this sneaky little fellow

And he'll think a cyclone hit him when he's through it

We'll take the double crosser to the old woodshed

We'll start on his bottom and go to his head

When we get through with him he'll wish that he was dead

We gotta slap the dirty little Jap

We're gonna have to slap the dirty little Jap

And Uncle Sam's the guy who can do it

The Japs and all their hooey will be changed into chop suey And the rising sun will set when we get through it

Their alibi for fighting is to save their face

For ancestors waiting in celestial space

We'll kick their precious face down to the other place

We gotta slap the dirty little Jap

Robison went on to record several more humorous war songs, including “Mussolini’s Letter to Hitler” and its flip side “Hitler’s Reply to Mussolini,” “Get Your Gun and Come Along (We’re Fixin to Kill a Skunk),” and “Who’s Gonna Bury Hitler (When the Ornery Cuss Is Dead)?”

Far and away the most successful song responding to Pearl Harbor was Frank Loesser’s “Praise the Lord and Pass the Ammunition,” one of the biggest hits of 1942. Born into a wealthy Upper West Side Jewish household, Loesser had dismayed his family when he went first to Tin Pan Alley and then to Hollywood, where he wrote the lyrics for such standards as “Heart and Soul,” “Baby, It’s Cold Outside,” and “Two Sleepy People.” “Praise the Lord” was inspired by a Pearl Harbor legend concerning the fleet chaplain (“sky pilot” in the song) Father William A. Maguire, who helped carry ammo to the guns firing at the attacking planes and supposedly cried out the song’s title. Father Maguire told Life he didn’t remember saying the line and it would not have been heard in all the uproar even if he did, but you can’t stop a legend. In some versions — including Loesser’s — Maguire actually manned a gun himself.

First recorded by the vocal quartet the Merry Macs, then by Kay Kyser and others, “Praise the Lord” sold huge numbers in both disc and sheet music, nearly matching Irving Berlin’s giant “White Christmas” in sales and jukebox plays for a time. No doubt much of its popularity stemmed from its easy-to-sing simplicity, with lyrics that weren’t much more than the title repeated over and over to a strolling melody that sounded like an old-time spiritual.

Loesser donated his proceeds from the song to the U.S. Navy Relief Fund. After the war he would have a big Broadway hit with Guys and Dolls.

by John Strausbaugh

Excerpted from John's new book Victory City: A History of New York and New Yorkers During World War II.