First few weeks after Ramsey disappeared with Ransley were tough for Ronald. He kept seeing weird dreams and he missed Lucas, feeling like he had betrayed him by letting Ransley get away. He knew Lucas had… loved Ransley but that didn’t change the fact that Ransley was a mess to say at least. And there was something else that bothered his mind.
He didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to Lucas. He wasn’t even sure where he and Lucas had stood before the accident. Were they in good terms? Was Lucas angry with him? Ronald didn’t know. He hated the feeling of not knowing. Speaking of not knowing, what bothered Ronald the most was the thing that Ramsey had said but what Ronald hadn’t had time to think about until now.
He had implied that Ronald was just as big of a reason of Lucas’s death than what Ransley was. Ramsey had said that Ronald had threatened Lucas and Ransley had come in between them and because of that they had started fighting and the worst that could’ve possibly happen, happened.
Had it been really Ronald’s fault? Had he pushed the dominos and caused the accident?
One evening when he and Farrah were studying together at Farrah’s own little apartment, he shared his stress with her.
“I have to ask you something”, Ronald said and dropped his pencil down. He felt like the school was pointless. It was pointless without Lucas and he didn’t have motivation to study.
“Yeah?”
“Do you… do you think it’s my fault that Lucas fell off that cliff?” Ronald asked, fidgeting uncomfortably and avoiding eye contact with Farrah. He was scared what he’d see on her face, but it was pointless because Farrah’s face was blank as she was silent for a long moment before speaking.
“No”, she finally said. “I don’t think it’s your fault.”
“Then whose fault is it?”
“Probably no one’s, to be completely honest”, Farrah said. She had thought about it a lot and she couldn’t find it from herself to blame Ransley or Ramsey. She was great at reading people and she was sure that Ransley’s distress at the cemetery had been completely genuine. “It just happened. It was bad luck, a series of unfortunate events, if you will.”
Ronald stayed quiet, thinking about what Farrah had said. A series of unfortunate events. Perhaps Farrah was right. He sighed.
“Remember when a series of unfortunate events was a book and not our life?” Ronald asked.
Farrah grinned. “You stole that from that meme.”
“Yeah, well...”, Ronald shrugged. “It’s true, though.”
“Speaking of unfortunate events”, Farrah said. “Are you ready for the next full moon?”
“When is it again?” Ronald asked. He thought he should be following the moon’s phases better but he had forgot yet again.
“Two days from now.”
“Ah.” Ronald looked out of the window. “There’s snow now...”
Farrah patted his hand and smiled at him encouragingly.
“You will be fine”, she said. “I will take care of you.”
“Are we going to the cave again?”
“I think it’s the best choice. I can carry you to a warm place if you’re unconscious again.”
“You sure you can carry me that long?” Ronald asked doubtfully. He had proof that Farrah was strong but he still had his doubts.
“Please”, Farrah said and flipped her hair as Ronald had thought she would.
He smiled at her and sighed. “I feel bad that you have to babysit me.”
“It’s fine, Ron”, she assured. “You will learn to control your anger sooner or later. And I don’t mind following you around when you’re a werewolf. At least I got something interesting to do. It’s actually quite entertaining.”
“Only you can see the bright side of me being a werewolf”, Ronald said, shaking his head.
“You will see too, eventually.” She offered Ronald his pencil back. “Back to studying?”
Ronald sighed. “Fine.”
When the next full moon came Ronald and Farrah backed warm clothes on a bag and then headed to the woods. They walked through the woods slowly since Ronald couldn’t move in the snow as fast as Farrah. He was all sweaty and out of breath while Farrah was breathing normally and looked like she hadn’t done any exercise at all.
“So I’m going to dress you up after you turn back to human and carry you to a warm place, maybe that coffee shop we drove past in the bus”, Farrah said as she entered the cave. “That being of course if you’re unconscious. Who knows, maybe you won’t be this time.”
“This is so embarrassing”, Ronald groaned and sat down on the icy ground of the cave. “Me being completely naked and you dressing me up, I mean.”
“Ah, stop it”, she said. “You think I haven’t seen you naked already? Remember that I have been with you before when you turned back to human and we went to the hospital.”
“Oh, right”, Ronald muttered. “But still!”
“Stop being a pussy”, Farrah said. “We have more important things to worry about than whether or not I see you naked.”
Ronald hummed and smiled a little.
“You sound like Lucas”, he said and looked down on his hands. “I miss him.”
“I know, babe”, Farrah whispered and kissed Ronald’s head. “But like the great Sirius Black said, the ones that love us never really leave us. We can always find them–“, she poked Ronald’s chest, “–in here.”
Ronald started laughing. “You’re worse than my mother.”
“What an amazing woman, I take that as a compliment.”
Hours passed and they walked around in the cave to keep themselves warm. Or Ronald walked, Farrah didn’t get cold. But when the pain finally came, Ronald wasn’t cold anymore. He was sweating and yelling in pain as his body turned into a werewolf and Farrah stood nearby, eyeing him carefully and ready to show it who is the boss if it tries anything.
But for a long moment werewolf-Ronald just stooped there, looking around and then it howled and ran away.
“Why do you always have to run?” Farrah sighed and ran after it.
She followed the werewolf for a while while it ran around in the woods aimlessly and then it suddenly stopped and turned its head to Farrah.
“Hi, big boy”, Farrah muttered. “Tired of running?”
Werewolf-Ronald growled but not angrily, it sounded almost like as if it was answering to Farrah. She smiled and crossed her arms.
“Would you look at that”, she said. “You’re managing your anger.”
The werewolf howled loudly and then instead of running, it started to walk forward with its hind legs, ignoring Farrah.
Farrah eyed it. It looked so much like Ransley, only it was smaller. But just as bony and frankly, pretty as a bag of shit. But Farrah didn’t mind. He loved every side of Ronald, in both human and werewolf form.
She walked behind it in a safe distance away, ready to put it back in its place if it would try anything stupid. Suddenly Farrah realised that they were close to the road that passed the woods. She speeded in front of the werewolf-Ronald and stood there, spreading her arms.
“Go other way”, Farrah said. “You can’t go there.” She took snow from the ground, forged it to a ball shape and threw it at the werewolf who was eyeing behind her. “Look at me!” It turned its red eyes on Farrah. “Turn around.”
The werewolf-Ronald started growling and lowered itself on all fours. Farrah revealed her fangs and hissed. Ronald growled back and Farrah took a good posture, ready to stop Ronald if it came to it.
But Ronald gave up. A loud growling could be heard as the werewolf turned around and started running away in the other direction. Farrah sighed in relief, glad that she didn’t have to hurt Ronald, and went after him.
Ronald woke up. He realised he was in a booth, leaning against a table. He straightened up and realised his body wasn’t as sore as it had been every time before after turning. He looked around. He saw Farrah sitting next to him, smiling and when he looked around he saw that they were the only costumers.
“I controlled everyone to leave and the staff to not call anyone when I carried you in”, Farrah explained. “How are you?”
“I’m okay”, Ronald said and looked down on his clothes, glad that he wasn’t naked and then he looked back at Farrah. “I remember your voice.”
“I talked to you during the night”, she said. “You remember it?”
“I don’t remember what you said”, he said, “but I remember your voice.”
“That is good”, Farrah said and smiled happily.
They left the coffee shop and Farrah went to the city, she needed to feed herself, and Ronald went to home.
Weeks passed and to his surprise Ronald realised that without Farrah he wouldn’t have been able to keep his secret from his parents. Farrah was an expert of hiding her true self, she had done it for centuries. All the secrets were too much for Ronald from time to time but Farrah helped him to get through that.
He didn’t see or hear from the Barlow brothers at all. It was like as if they had disappeared from the Earth. For all Ronald knew, they could be in Bahamas. But as the time passed, Ronald realised that his angry feelings towards the Barlow brothers had faded away and instead he felt weirdly passive about them.
He had moved on.
Christmas came and Farrah spent it at Ronald’s home. Mrs. Quinn loved Farrah and Mr. Quinn tolerated her. Farrah had offered to mind control Mr. Quinn to not be such an asshole but Ronald had said that she shouldn’t do that; it wouldn’t be his father then.
Also Mr. and Mrs. Boyd and Emily dropped by during Christmas. They hugged Ronald and then proceed to talk with his mother. It was weird seeing them without Lucas but instead of getting sad, Ronald felt thankful for the time he had got to spend with Lucas.
The pain of losing his best friend never really went away, but got easier to handle by time.
“Merry Christmas!” everyone in the house yelled and then it was time to share the gifts. It was a lovely day, full of good food, laughter and smiling. Ronald felt surprisingly good.
During the New Year Farrah and Ronald had a fight about which movie they should watch. It was a stupid ass fight and after they both realised it, they kissed and made up and afterwards laughed at their stupidity.
On the first of January Ronald stayed at home alone. Farrah was in the city and his parents were visiting their mutual friends. Ronald was sitting in the living room lazily, staring at The Simpsons marathon that was coming from the TV.
He almost peed himself when Ramsey Barlow materialised in front of the TV. Ronald jumped on his feet and stared at Ramsey, not really believing his eyes. He had so many things he wanted to say but nothing came out of his mouth.
“Hi”, Ramsey said.
“Hi?” Ronald said. “Hi? After all this time you come here and say ‘hi’?”
“What else am I supposed to say?”
“You shouldn’t be here at all.”
“I came to–“
“Why didn’t you kill him?” Ronald interrupted, surprised that he had asked it. Maybe it was still bugging him. “You seemed so ready to do it.”
“I couldn’t do it because I saw in him the same thing Lucas had seen”, Ramsey said.
“And what was that?”
“Hope.”
Ronald bit his lip and shrugged. “Where have you been all this time?”
“Far away from civilisation”, Ramsey replied. “Ransley hates it. He hates that I’m babysitting him all the time, teaching him how to control his anger. Because that was the problem all the time; he wasn’t in control of himself as well as he liked to believe.”
“So you’re supervising him now?”
“Yes. We work day by day and minute by minute for the better future.”
“And he hates it?” Ronald asked.
“Every second of it”, Ramsey confirmed.
“Good.”
“He has begged me to kill him several times”, Ramsey said. “He really hates it.”
“Does he… talk about Lucas?” Ronald asked hesitantly.
Ramsey shook his head.
“He shuts down every time I bring him up”, he said.
Ronald didn’t know how to feel about that. He didn’t know what to think about Ransley, he seemed like a distant memory, not like the guy who had turned him and changed his whole life.
“How are you?” Ramsey asked.
“Do you really care?” Ronald asked.
“I do.”
“I’m fine. Slowly remembering things.”
“I’m glad”, Ramsey said, his facial expression staying completely blank.
“You don’t look like it”, Ronald said, not feeling surprised at all. He knew Ramsey well enough to know that showing emotions was rare for him.
“I should get going”, Ramsey said and glanced at the door.
Ronald eyed him and realised something. He didn’t feel angry. He didn’t blame Ramsey for what had happened. He felt calm and collected.
“Yeah”, Ronald agreed.
Ramsey stared at Ronald and then he actually attempted to smile.
“Happy New Year, Ronald”, he said.
“Happy New Year, Ramsey.”
Then Ramsey left, actually using the front door. Ronald sat back down in front of the television and focused his eyes on The Simpsons marathon.
He felt calm, his mind wasn’t a mess. It was fully blank, in a good way.
He was okay.
He didn’t get a chance to say goodbye to Lucas. He wasn’t even sure where he and Lucas had stood before the accident. Were they in good terms? Was Lucas angry with him? Ronald didn’t know. He hated the feeling of not knowing. Speaking of not knowing, what bothered Ronald the most was the thing that Ramsey had said but what Ronald hadn’t had time to think about until now.
He had implied that Ronald was just as big of a reason of Lucas’s death than what Ransley was. Ramsey had said that Ronald had threatened Lucas and Ransley had come in between them and because of that they had started fighting and the worst that could’ve possibly happen, happened.
Had it been really Ronald’s fault? Had he pushed the dominos and caused the accident?
One evening when he and Farrah were studying together at Farrah’s own little apartment, he shared his stress with her.
“I have to ask you something”, Ronald said and dropped his pencil down. He felt like the school was pointless. It was pointless without Lucas and he didn’t have motivation to study.
“Yeah?”
“Do you… do you think it’s my fault that Lucas fell off that cliff?” Ronald asked, fidgeting uncomfortably and avoiding eye contact with Farrah. He was scared what he’d see on her face, but it was pointless because Farrah’s face was blank as she was silent for a long moment before speaking.
“No”, she finally said. “I don’t think it’s your fault.”
“Then whose fault is it?”
“Probably no one’s, to be completely honest”, Farrah said. She had thought about it a lot and she couldn’t find it from herself to blame Ransley or Ramsey. She was great at reading people and she was sure that Ransley’s distress at the cemetery had been completely genuine. “It just happened. It was bad luck, a series of unfortunate events, if you will.”
Ronald stayed quiet, thinking about what Farrah had said. A series of unfortunate events. Perhaps Farrah was right. He sighed.
“Remember when a series of unfortunate events was a book and not our life?” Ronald asked.
Farrah grinned. “You stole that from that meme.”
“Yeah, well...”, Ronald shrugged. “It’s true, though.”
“Speaking of unfortunate events”, Farrah said. “Are you ready for the next full moon?”
“When is it again?” Ronald asked. He thought he should be following the moon’s phases better but he had forgot yet again.
“Two days from now.”
“Ah.” Ronald looked out of the window. “There’s snow now...”
Farrah patted his hand and smiled at him encouragingly.
“You will be fine”, she said. “I will take care of you.”
“Are we going to the cave again?”
“I think it’s the best choice. I can carry you to a warm place if you’re unconscious again.”
“You sure you can carry me that long?” Ronald asked doubtfully. He had proof that Farrah was strong but he still had his doubts.
“Please”, Farrah said and flipped her hair as Ronald had thought she would.
He smiled at her and sighed. “I feel bad that you have to babysit me.”
“It’s fine, Ron”, she assured. “You will learn to control your anger sooner or later. And I don’t mind following you around when you’re a werewolf. At least I got something interesting to do. It’s actually quite entertaining.”
“Only you can see the bright side of me being a werewolf”, Ronald said, shaking his head.
“You will see too, eventually.” She offered Ronald his pencil back. “Back to studying?”
Ronald sighed. “Fine.”
When the next full moon came Ronald and Farrah backed warm clothes on a bag and then headed to the woods. They walked through the woods slowly since Ronald couldn’t move in the snow as fast as Farrah. He was all sweaty and out of breath while Farrah was breathing normally and looked like she hadn’t done any exercise at all.
“So I’m going to dress you up after you turn back to human and carry you to a warm place, maybe that coffee shop we drove past in the bus”, Farrah said as she entered the cave. “That being of course if you’re unconscious. Who knows, maybe you won’t be this time.”
“This is so embarrassing”, Ronald groaned and sat down on the icy ground of the cave. “Me being completely naked and you dressing me up, I mean.”
“Ah, stop it”, she said. “You think I haven’t seen you naked already? Remember that I have been with you before when you turned back to human and we went to the hospital.”
“Oh, right”, Ronald muttered. “But still!”
“Stop being a pussy”, Farrah said. “We have more important things to worry about than whether or not I see you naked.”
Ronald hummed and smiled a little.
“You sound like Lucas”, he said and looked down on his hands. “I miss him.”
“I know, babe”, Farrah whispered and kissed Ronald’s head. “But like the great Sirius Black said, the ones that love us never really leave us. We can always find them–“, she poked Ronald’s chest, “–in here.”
Ronald started laughing. “You’re worse than my mother.”
“What an amazing woman, I take that as a compliment.”
Hours passed and they walked around in the cave to keep themselves warm. Or Ronald walked, Farrah didn’t get cold. But when the pain finally came, Ronald wasn’t cold anymore. He was sweating and yelling in pain as his body turned into a werewolf and Farrah stood nearby, eyeing him carefully and ready to show it who is the boss if it tries anything.
But for a long moment werewolf-Ronald just stooped there, looking around and then it howled and ran away.
“Why do you always have to run?” Farrah sighed and ran after it.
She followed the werewolf for a while while it ran around in the woods aimlessly and then it suddenly stopped and turned its head to Farrah.
“Hi, big boy”, Farrah muttered. “Tired of running?”
Werewolf-Ronald growled but not angrily, it sounded almost like as if it was answering to Farrah. She smiled and crossed her arms.
“Would you look at that”, she said. “You’re managing your anger.”
The werewolf howled loudly and then instead of running, it started to walk forward with its hind legs, ignoring Farrah.
Farrah eyed it. It looked so much like Ransley, only it was smaller. But just as bony and frankly, pretty as a bag of shit. But Farrah didn’t mind. He loved every side of Ronald, in both human and werewolf form.
She walked behind it in a safe distance away, ready to put it back in its place if it would try anything stupid. Suddenly Farrah realised that they were close to the road that passed the woods. She speeded in front of the werewolf-Ronald and stood there, spreading her arms.
“Go other way”, Farrah said. “You can’t go there.” She took snow from the ground, forged it to a ball shape and threw it at the werewolf who was eyeing behind her. “Look at me!” It turned its red eyes on Farrah. “Turn around.”
The werewolf-Ronald started growling and lowered itself on all fours. Farrah revealed her fangs and hissed. Ronald growled back and Farrah took a good posture, ready to stop Ronald if it came to it.
But Ronald gave up. A loud growling could be heard as the werewolf turned around and started running away in the other direction. Farrah sighed in relief, glad that she didn’t have to hurt Ronald, and went after him.
Ronald woke up. He realised he was in a booth, leaning against a table. He straightened up and realised his body wasn’t as sore as it had been every time before after turning. He looked around. He saw Farrah sitting next to him, smiling and when he looked around he saw that they were the only costumers.
“I controlled everyone to leave and the staff to not call anyone when I carried you in”, Farrah explained. “How are you?”
“I’m okay”, Ronald said and looked down on his clothes, glad that he wasn’t naked and then he looked back at Farrah. “I remember your voice.”
“I talked to you during the night”, she said. “You remember it?”
“I don’t remember what you said”, he said, “but I remember your voice.”
“That is good”, Farrah said and smiled happily.
They left the coffee shop and Farrah went to the city, she needed to feed herself, and Ronald went to home.
Weeks passed and to his surprise Ronald realised that without Farrah he wouldn’t have been able to keep his secret from his parents. Farrah was an expert of hiding her true self, she had done it for centuries. All the secrets were too much for Ronald from time to time but Farrah helped him to get through that.
He didn’t see or hear from the Barlow brothers at all. It was like as if they had disappeared from the Earth. For all Ronald knew, they could be in Bahamas. But as the time passed, Ronald realised that his angry feelings towards the Barlow brothers had faded away and instead he felt weirdly passive about them.
He had moved on.
Christmas came and Farrah spent it at Ronald’s home. Mrs. Quinn loved Farrah and Mr. Quinn tolerated her. Farrah had offered to mind control Mr. Quinn to not be such an asshole but Ronald had said that she shouldn’t do that; it wouldn’t be his father then.
Also Mr. and Mrs. Boyd and Emily dropped by during Christmas. They hugged Ronald and then proceed to talk with his mother. It was weird seeing them without Lucas but instead of getting sad, Ronald felt thankful for the time he had got to spend with Lucas.
The pain of losing his best friend never really went away, but got easier to handle by time.
“Merry Christmas!” everyone in the house yelled and then it was time to share the gifts. It was a lovely day, full of good food, laughter and smiling. Ronald felt surprisingly good.
During the New Year Farrah and Ronald had a fight about which movie they should watch. It was a stupid ass fight and after they both realised it, they kissed and made up and afterwards laughed at their stupidity.
On the first of January Ronald stayed at home alone. Farrah was in the city and his parents were visiting their mutual friends. Ronald was sitting in the living room lazily, staring at The Simpsons marathon that was coming from the TV.
He almost peed himself when Ramsey Barlow materialised in front of the TV. Ronald jumped on his feet and stared at Ramsey, not really believing his eyes. He had so many things he wanted to say but nothing came out of his mouth.
“Hi”, Ramsey said.
“Hi?” Ronald said. “Hi? After all this time you come here and say ‘hi’?”
“What else am I supposed to say?”
“You shouldn’t be here at all.”
“I came to–“
“Why didn’t you kill him?” Ronald interrupted, surprised that he had asked it. Maybe it was still bugging him. “You seemed so ready to do it.”
“I couldn’t do it because I saw in him the same thing Lucas had seen”, Ramsey said.
“And what was that?”
“Hope.”
Ronald bit his lip and shrugged. “Where have you been all this time?”
“Far away from civilisation”, Ramsey replied. “Ransley hates it. He hates that I’m babysitting him all the time, teaching him how to control his anger. Because that was the problem all the time; he wasn’t in control of himself as well as he liked to believe.”
“So you’re supervising him now?”
“Yes. We work day by day and minute by minute for the better future.”
“And he hates it?” Ronald asked.
“Every second of it”, Ramsey confirmed.
“Good.”
“He has begged me to kill him several times”, Ramsey said. “He really hates it.”
“Does he… talk about Lucas?” Ronald asked hesitantly.
Ramsey shook his head.
“He shuts down every time I bring him up”, he said.
Ronald didn’t know how to feel about that. He didn’t know what to think about Ransley, he seemed like a distant memory, not like the guy who had turned him and changed his whole life.
“How are you?” Ramsey asked.
“Do you really care?” Ronald asked.
“I do.”
“I’m fine. Slowly remembering things.”
“I’m glad”, Ramsey said, his facial expression staying completely blank.
“You don’t look like it”, Ronald said, not feeling surprised at all. He knew Ramsey well enough to know that showing emotions was rare for him.
“I should get going”, Ramsey said and glanced at the door.
Ronald eyed him and realised something. He didn’t feel angry. He didn’t blame Ramsey for what had happened. He felt calm and collected.
“Yeah”, Ronald agreed.
Ramsey stared at Ronald and then he actually attempted to smile.
“Happy New Year, Ronald”, he said.
“Happy New Year, Ramsey.”
Then Ramsey left, actually using the front door. Ronald sat back down in front of the television and focused his eyes on The Simpsons marathon.
He felt calm, his mind wasn’t a mess. It was fully blank, in a good way.
He was okay.