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My eyes lingered on her perfect face, knowing it might be my last chance to admire it. She was the embodiment of the perfect woman described so many times by Poe: skin as white as the moon, lips as red as blood, hair as black as night, and eyes as penetrating as death. Part of me admired her with envy, while the other desired her with jealousy.

Seated like a queen in her elegant wicker chair, she turned it into a throne just with her presence. I had learned to look at her, observe her... love her. And she, she had managed to become a part of my weak heart, which I had promised not to let anyone enter. Anyone. Until I met her.

The fireplace sparkled, illuminating her face with ancient features that held the secret of the most mythical beauty. Her hands danced like spiders in their arduous task of knitting a sweater. A sweater that would never be mine. All I could do was enjoy my last moments with her in that room, in that corner, like a spy... by her side... almost able to touch her, but never as I wished. My thoughts were forbidden, absurd, wrong. I had betrayed her trust. She had opened the arms of her home to me, and I would have given my life for her to let me into her bed. I was unforgivable, I had failed her, I didn't deserve to be by her side, yet I couldn't deny myself that privilege. Not when she was my greatest addiction and soon I would suffer the deepest of astinences. I couldn't tear myself away from such a being, a masterpiece of nature. She was magnificent in every movement of her eyelashes, her lips, her chest, and hands. When she settled into her seat, it was like watching a statue come to life, gracefully changing from one pose to another. She was beautiful, and I had the pleasure, the greatest pleasure, of knowing her. I had delighted day and night in her voice, her conversations, her laughter, in every one of her sounds. But every paradise has its end, and as in all Poe's tales, such beauty comes with agonizing endings.

The gong at the front door snapped me out of my daydream, but I refused to look away from her, especially when such a libidinouse smile appeared on her face. There was desire in every one of her features. A sincere and faithful desire, a desire that would never be for me, but for the owner of her heart.

There was a series of sounds and voices until he appeared at the doorway. He was wearing a dark blue pinstripe suit, his smile shining brighter than his freshly polished shoes, and his tie lustfully matching her lips. His olive skin barely contrasted with hers. From the deep of dark circles under his eyes protruded two histrionic brown pupils. I still remember the first day I saw him. His presence dazzled me, and I could recognize in her face my own first expression when I met him, amplified by the years of love she had dedicated to him.

I felt out of place the moment the room faded and melted before my eyes, leaving only the two of them to exist. I had become the humblest frame of the most pathetic painting in that room. I was nothing more to her. My time had come, the contract had expired.

Their meeting was like two magnets destined to fit. He wrapped her in his arms, admired her deeply, caressed her cheek, and waited for her to kiss him. It was a kiss so gently passionate that I wondered if that wasn't truly making love.

"Mon Cher, Clow is here," hearing my ridiculous name after the French nickname she used for him definitely made me the unhappiest person in the world. He noticed my presence and greeted me with his innate cheerfulness as if I had just entered the room. Then he pulled out a large wad of bills from one of the inner pockets of his jacket, approached me, and with both hands handed it to me, enclosing my hand between his palm and the papers.

"Thank you very much for all the trouble caused. This is the total of your payment, the amount is a bit more than we agreed at the beginning," he winked at me in camaraderie and I felt like vomiting. How could I have betrayed such a kind and trusting man? "You have taken care of the love of my life." I felt like Judas. I felt like the vilest scum in this world. I took the money and didn't bother to count it; whether it was less or more than we agreed, didn't interest me. Even if he had forgotten to pay me, he should never owe me anything.

I pretended an attempt of a smile that he took as sincere and put the payment into my bag. He pulled out a cigarette and once again took his wife by the waist. In front of me stood the woman I should have always desired by my side and had always wanted to be. And beside her stood her husband, Gomez Addams, the person I was most ashamed to envy.

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When I saw the huge mansion on the hill, I realized why the agency had sent me. And when I saw the character who opened the door, I understood that the agency wouldn't have sent anyone if it weren't for me. I didn't dare to move; the man was so tall that he bent like a crescent moon just to look me in the face. His pale bluish skin made me think he was my patient. He murmured things so quietly that even with my greatest efforts, I wouldn't have understood. And watching how he moved, I assumed he had difficulty walking due to some operation that required care. I stepped forward, cautiously circling him, to find someone who could tell me something I could understand. But before I could climb the stairs, a man with a Latino demeanor and features appeared. His thin mustache caught my attention, which would have made me laugh on any other face, but together with his impeccable violet suit and hair slicked back with pomade, he exuded an air of respectable madness.

"Good day, miss, a pleasure to meet you. My name is Gomez Addams," he extended his hand and kissed mine courteously. That gesture caught me off guard; it had been a long time since a man treated me like this.

"Good day, Mr. Addams. My name is Clarisa Ow. I was sent by the companion agency. I was informed that my patient would be a woman... but I believe they were mistaken," I pointed to the tall man following me as if he had a magnet. "It would be better if you called the company. Male companions are recommended for such tall patients, especially because of the strength that may be needed... although he seems able to walk, if he were to fall, I wouldn't be able to handle... him..."

Mr. Addams had to hold himself back from laughing. When he calmed down, he asked young Frankenstein to take his luggage to the car.

"Miss Ow, allow me to correct you, but I believe you are mistaken. The patient is my wife."

My face denoted a lack of information, which my interlocutor took it upon himself to provide as we climbed the stairs that split the baroque mansion down the middle.

As Mr. Addams explained, his wife, the love of his life, had had a fatal accident in their garden, resulting in an ankle fracture. Because he had to represent a family friend outside the country, he had to leave urgently. His clear devotion to his wife compelled him to ensure she was provided with all necessary assistance while he was away. I was amazed by the affection with which he spoke of his wife, but at the same time, I was daunted by the dimensions of the house and the number of corridors. I hoped to encounter a kind patient who would have the kindness to guide me during my stay there.

Among countless details, one that the mansion's owner boasted about was having set up, with the help of the butler, a bed adjacent to his wife's where I would sleep, to be close to his magnificent treasure and take care of it 24 hours a day.

In today's new, I feel a little sorry for him. He exposed me to the most precious thing he had, without knowing that I could see that wealth and envy it.

"My mother and brother also live in the house, but I don't have time to introduce them before I leave. And probably my children will come to visit their mother on weekends," he said, then opened a grandiose door.

That's when I saw her for the first time. I can still bring her image to my mind, as if posing for a tenebrous painting. It was like seeing a panther resting in a nest of silk sheets. She lay on the bed,  imposing, fierce, smart, capable of breaking any bone with just the opening and closing of her mouth.

But still, she looked uncomfortable, trapped in a position that didn't feel natural to her. As I approached, it became clear that she would have preferred to come closer and introduce herself, even if her body prevented it, rather than having me approaching and her husband introducing her.

"My dear, this is Clarisa Ow. She'll be your companion while I'm away," Mr. Addams turned towards me out of courtesy, as he seemed to be mesmerized by his wife. "Miss Ow, this is my wife, Morticia Addams."

It was more the pressure of the moment than a natural gesture; I moved like a robot towards her to extend my hand, intending to be as professional as possible. Manners within the mansion seemed to be of utmost importance.

"You can call me Clow," my voice sounded hoarser than I would have liked; the touch of her skin had electrified my spine and numbed my tongue.

Her voice in response was almost like a purr that sent shivers down my back.

Mr. Addams, somewhat reluctant to tear himself away from his wife, approached her with an air of chivalry. He knelt before the bed and gazed at her lovingly. Automatically, I stepped aside to give them space as she caressed his hair and he kissed the tips of her fingers. "I'll miss you," "I love you, I can't live without you," "I'll stay," "I love you," "I'd give my life for you," and a series of foreign nicknames paved the way for their mouths to passionately kiss. On my part, I would have preferred to be attending Frankenstein or throwing myself off the highest tower of the mansion.

Time seemed to stand still; it was almost embarrassing to watch them. It was the purest and most real demonstration of affection and lust I had seen in years. And within me, the first roots of jealousy towards him began to grow.

"Your luggage is ready, sir," the towering butler had appeared by magic at the bedroom door to take the master of the house to the airport. It was as if a weight had been lifted off my shoulders only to be replaced by a heavier one. They were no longer kissing, but now I was alone with her. I cursed inwardly.

"As you can see, I'm not in such bad condition, but my husband tends to exaggerate. I hope I won't be a bother to you."

"I don't think you will be, Mrs. Addams."

"Call me Morticia, Clow."

I couldn't maintain eye contact when she said my nickname; it sounded exquisite and foreign.

"Can I ask you something, M...?" I tried to say her name to return the courtesy, but it got stuck on my tongue. "What's the butler's name?"

"His name is Lurch."

"How unstable* can a name be?"

Morticia let out the most harmonious and feminine laugh I've ever heard. And I wanted to come up with a joke

"Our butler's name is Lurch."

"That name suits him perfectly," I said, hoping and succeeding in hearing her laughter again.

"We adore him, and he adores us. His heart has been with the family for years."

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I still remember how naive I was on my first day of work in the mansion, thinking I would be able to resist her charms. In the afternoon, we didn't talk much; she barely spoke to tell me she was a night owl but that painkillers made her drowsy, and that I should sleep peacefully because if anything happened, she wouldn't hesitate to wake me up. Shortly after, she surrendered to the arms of Morpheus. I watched her more than I had imagined before Lurch arrived with dinner, which I devoured without even asking what it was. She continued sleeping, unaware that dinner was over. Before falling back under her spell, I searched my luggage for something to distract myself. As night fell, the immense mansion had become a gaping black hole that interrupted my attempts to stay awake reading. By dawn, I must admit I panicked at the nighttime noises and surrendered like a child fleeing into sleep to escape from the darkness.

Waking up to an explosion is not the most relaxing thing. As I opened my eyes, I didn't remember what I was doing there or why I wasn't in my apartment, but in a few seconds, I recognized my patient resting under the dim light of dawn. She seemed so peaceful that if it weren't for the movement of her chest, I would have thought she was dead. And she was so pale that if I hadn't seen with my own eyes how the sun rays touched her without burning her, I would have sworn all my life that she was a vampire. The gigantic bed with black curtains and red sheets played cruelly with her hair and lips, awekening something deep in my lower belly, so I decided to go to the bathroom to freshen up and leave the room as soon as possible without waking her. A strange halo of lust and fear surrounded her, inviting me to flee before losing my sanity.

I walked through the mansion's corridors, which had regained their friendly face with the morning light but had transformed into a gigantic maze. Bored after seeing the decapitated polo player painting five times, I resigned myself and called Lurch, who almost gave me a heart attack by appearing behind me before I finished saying his name. He escorted me to the kitchen, or what I would have called a witch's potion room.

Hanging all over the place were spiderwebs, strange artifacts, pieces of animals I had never seen, books that would have been better off in an alchemist's library, and in the middle, a cauldron where they could have cooked me, and indeed the witch I was expecting to see. I wanted to run after Lurch, but by the time the woman saw me, he was already gone, and I didn't know how to get back. To my surprise, the witch was very pleasant and kindly served me fried frog legs she had just prepared for a spell. Behind her hostile appearance covered in dark scarves, deep wrinkles, and swirling gray hair, there was a charming old lady. I found it amusing how quickly I had become accustomed to the oddities of the house that when a disembodied hand appeared to offer me a glass of water, I had already resigned myself to the idea that nothing in that room would be normal.

"Thing is part of the family, or at least was part of some family... I can't even remember. Gomez and Thing have been friends for years. So when they got married, Thing was the first to accept Morticia," Eudora, Gomez's mother and the house witch, amused herself by telling me family secrets. It was clear she hadn't talked to someone outside her family for a long time. She walked me through the lives of cousins, uncles, and grandparents whose names I would never remember before she mentioned something that really interested me. "Morticia is charming; I don't know how I ever thought her sister would be a better match for my Gomez."

"Morticia has a sister?" Knowing as much as possible about my patients was always part of the job. I had learned the hard way that the more you know, the more you can communicate with your patient and make their stay enjoyable.

"Yes, a twin sister, Ophelia, but since Morticia married my son, they haven't seen each other much. Gomez had promised to marry Ophelia out of honor, and then he married Morticia for love," the old woman handed me a tray with Morticia's breakfast, and the severed hand guided me to my destination.

"I thought some book had swallowed you in the middle of the night," Morticia didn't seem very keen on eating with my help, so I left the tray to her mercy and waited for her to finish to remove it and adjust her pillows. "Have you had breakfast?"

"Yes, your mother... I mean, your mother-in-law... Eudora made me an improvised breakfast."

"How charming."

"Do you get along with her?"

"She's a nightmare... I adore her. From the beginning, she adopted me as her daughter."

"From the beginning?"

"Where does that question come from?" Morticia raised an eyebrow, forming a perfect curve that invited me, challengingly, to decide whether or not to get involved in a matter that seemed tricky

"Eudora mentioned that Gomez was engaged to your sister." After my words, I expected a frown or a comment that would diminish the importance of the matter and would lead her to start a conversation of her liking, but to my surprise, the most beautiful and melancholic smile settled on Morticia's lips, while memories roamed in her eyes.

Even with her raised eyebrow, she looked at me and asked if I wanted to hear the story. I nodded with a little fear, and she invited me to sit next to her on the bed. That niche was the most comfortable and soft rest I had ever had. I would have fallen asleep if she weren't next to me, with her elegant face and immense size. I couldn't help but feel the weight of her body next to mine, reminding me that she wasn't a ghost. I must have looked microscopic next to such an imposing woman.

Her narrative was the most eloquent, and as she elaborated on the tiniest details, I could see for the first time since her husband had left, a hint of feeling on his marble face.

She told me how her mother and her husband's mother had made premarital arrangements that forced Gomez to join in holy matrimony with her twin sister, who, although very pretty, had a temper similar to that of a raging dragon. Even before meeting who would be her fiancé, she already felt sorry for the unfortunate soul who would be tied to her sister's.

"My mother believes that I met Gomez on the day she introduced him to my sister. But I already knew him, and he had already stolen my heart."

"Where did you meet?"

"A month before the engagement, at the funeral of his cousin Baltasar, a great friend of mine. I envy that he died so romantically; they said Gomez killed him. Of course, that was what I loved about him. Everyone was talking about the young man with mustaches and a black suit. That same night, behind Aunt Lavorgia's tomb, he declared his love for me."

"How did he went from loving you to being engaged to your sister?"

"We were young and impulsive. That night, we were so eager to love each other that we forgot to introduce ourselves. After the funeral, I thought I would never see him again and that I would die of sadness. It was a good ending, very tragic. I never thought they would introduce him to me as my sister's future husband and that he had promised to marry to honor his father's dying words. He wasn't the only one engaged; I was also linked to his cousin Vlad, a charming man but not a patch on my Gomez." The conversation had become so intimate and exciting that I felt Morticia was telling me a secret, or at least a version of events that not everyone knew "We were so distressed that we almost met the same fate of Romeo and Juliet."

"And how did you escape from those engagements?" Morticia let out a laugh so tremulous that it chilled me to the bone.

"That's an excellent question... perhaps if you play chess with me, I'll finish telling you the story. I've grown tired of beating Thing."

"I'll also need you to tell me the story of Thing someday."

"That story has many parts" she finished her last sip of mandrake tea and pulled a rope that, with a "gong," summoned Lurch. Shortly after, the butler had brought the chess set, and between pawns and anecdotes, I was already playing her for a rematch so she could finish telling me the story. "My mother, Hester Frump, was a very stubborn tempered woman; I could never be as sublime a woman as she. Everything she said, happened, and if it couldn't, neither could anything else. So she would never allow me to marry Gomez, even if Vlad had died and Ophelia had run away with Uncle Thing. At the end of the day, I believe it was Eudora who recognized me from the funeral, since she found us entangled in the cemetery when everyone else had left. I always suspected she was the one who convinced my mother to let me marry Gomez. I eat your queen and "checkmate."

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Her deep eyes kept me frozen. It was like peering into the depths of a lagoon at night, the intensity drawing you in, making everything else vanish. I had lost track of how long I had been there... just gazing at her. She remained still as I coveted her from afar.

Suddenly, something changed in her expression, a flash of determination caused the space to shift, and she began to approach, like a ghost. The curve of her smile mocked the speed of my heartbeat as she closed the distance between us. Determined, sensual, powerful, as if death itself were approaching knowing I feared it. Her challenging smile reminded me of reality and made me fear the consequences of this situation. My breath began to fail me as I realized she was heading towards me with unethical intentions. Her eyes spoke it while her lips showed it. Her black hair blended with her dress as if she were wearing a shroud. Seeing her for the second time, she indeed wore nothing but a shroud that left little to the imagination. I wanted to run, run as far as possible. This was a mistake. But I couldn't move, I was paralyzed in that place as she approached with total impunity.

The shroud billowed around her sides like a cloud of vapor, and her hair floated against the law of gravity. It was torture in slow motion. I tried to run again, but my feet were rooted to the ground. She seemed unfazed by my desperation and continued to advance. She was so close that I could smell her intoxicating perfume. Her closeness was imminent. She was inches away from me. My lungs could no longer take it, I was hyperventilating. I thought I was dying.

Her long, sharp nails touched my cheek, while her other hand released the tie that kept the shroud closed... I felt my heart stop. The impulse to run ceased. I was doomed. All I could do was close my eyes, but I couldn't even do that. She was the pale perfection. I couldn't escape. I tried to turn my face to the side and ended up sinking into the palm of her hand. There was so little space between us that the wall behind me began to weigh on me. I didn't know where to escape, and she seemed to know it. She brushed her lips against my neck and up my aorta until she reached my ear. Shivers ran down my spine as she prepared to speak. She parted her lips and... "Boom!"

My eyes opened so forcefully that I didn't know if I would be able to close them again. My heart was beating so fast that I could feel the pulses in every fiber of my body. I was covered in an unpleasant layer of sweat. The light blinded me, so it took me a moment to recognize reality. I was sitting in a rocking chair next to Morticia's bed, who was reading "Five Recipes for Homicide." It had been a dream, I repeated to myself. A dream, a dream, a dream, with her, a dream, a dream, a wet dream, a dream, a dream, a wet dream with her.

"You've had a beautiful nightmare" Morticia lowered the book and looked at me with one of her soothing smiles. "I've been wishing for years to have such an exquisite nightmare again, one that makes me tremble while I sleep."

Her comment only plunged me deeper into guilt. I felt uncomfortable, not only because of the sweat but also because I was next to her. I needed to get out of that room urgently.

"I think it would be best for me to take a shower."

"After a nightmare like that, I would bathe too."

My agile mind quickly brought up images. Guilt. Fear. Desperation. I ran to the bedroom door with the idea that Morticia knew the truth of my subconscious.

"I wouldn't go that way. Uncle Fester blew up the guest bathroom that's closest" That was the explosion that woke me up.

"Don't worry, I'll ask Lurch where there is another bathroom in the house.

"No, bathe in the one here" she said, pointing to the door leading to the en suite bathroom.

The warm water only brought memories of my subconscious that mixed with the scene of her taking a shower. Soon, my mind became so perverse that I could confuse water droplets with nail caresses. Cold water, freezing water. I could never stay in low temperatures for so long, but my body and imagination needed it to be able to leave in a condition to work. Once bathed, changed, and out of the bathroom, I could return to my usual behavior as a companion.

"Today I would like to be able to see my plants" as soon as I heard her voice, all my intellect went out the window.

"But with that ankle, we won't be able to go very far unless Lurch carries you in his arms."

The smile that formed on Morticia's face, a sign that she was holding back a laugh, made my stomach flip 180 degrees. She had felt tenderness from my comment; I noticed it by the way she explained the existence of a wheelchair, which she had avoided mentioning for days, thinking that she could endure all those days in bed without giving a humiliating mobile spectacle.

In order to calm her melancholy about her plants, I had to venture into her brother-in-law's premises to rescue the wheelchair that would allow her to move around the mansion. Escaping from her room seemed like the most relaxing idea until I ended up inside what looked like a junkyard with a bed and a pharmacy. The door was open when Lurch left me, so I entered, thinking it would be empty and I would quickly find the damn chair. But to my unfortunate heart, as soon as I entered, a creepy face emerged from under the bed, making me jump almost to the ceiling. Bald and pale, it looked like a huge golf ball with two black holes as eyes. The yellow smile mixed with uncomfortable friendliness and unfortunate madness. I didn't immediately know if it was a ghost or if i had completely lost my mind. He greeted me with a sharp voice and then emerged from his hiding place with three wet dynamite cartridges, which I appreciated they were wet despite his grumbling.

He seemed to know nothing about the wheelchair that I could clearly see resting behind a crossbow in one of the corners of the room. If until that moment I doubted my sanity, that man convinced me that I had lost every gram of it with his comments, which I didn't know whether they made me laugh or cry. He walked past the wheelchair without seeing it, went back and forth, and seemed about to grab it when he changed his mind and looked away as if his nose had sniffed something that would guide him on a better path. I wasn't sure if I wanted to talk to this character who seemed mentally unhinged, but between one remark and another, he ended up explaining that he was glad I was taking care of his brother's wife so that she would be fine. A certain part of my brain felt tenderness for that misunderstood man who was clearly obsessed with explosives.

At one point, he stopped, looked at me, and said, "It's good that you're in the house, ever since the kids grew up, I've missed having young people wandering around here. One day, you should ask Morticia to come and blow up some old junk." Before I could respond to his kind offer, he exclaimed, and the truth appeared before his eyes so he could see the wheelchair. He kindly handed it to me and waved cheerfully as I left with my prize for patience. That day, for the first time, I reached Morticia's room without assistance.

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I had been waking up to explosions for almost a week, and not just the ones Lucas caused; my lower abdomen felt blasted by cartridges of libido and lust. Vertigo, tingling, and dreams were increasingly waking me up with greater intensity, causing me to rush to shower with cold water before Morticia woke up.

Sometimes I stayed contemplating her, hoping to satisfy my eyes with her image, but it was a salty fountain. Her body mesmerized me, waiting to catch her gesturing in her sleep. It was magical, as if I were seeing a painting come to life. And at the same time, it was torturous. I had to keep my thoughts in a professional place and keep my feelings in check. Especially when I began to earn her trust. My life outside the mansion had become the subject of her interest, so I couldn't escape her constant inquiries during the daily routine. Mornings began in her room with some indiscreet question about breakfast, dreams, or the bed. We had lunch in the kitchen with Eudora, which meant an alliance between them to investigate without getting results. But it was in the afternoon when my barriers fell. In her botanical garden, drinking rose tea and playing chess or cards, the never-ending series of questions and answers began. Her technique was to ask me questions while I was focused on the game or her beauty; my technique was to try to respond telegraphically, not wanting any information about me to reveal my feelings. Still, she had already managed to find out my aspiration as an artist, how many years I had been working as a companion, whether the tattoo on my right arm had hurt, what strength my reading glasses had, how many partners I had had, how many were men and how many were women, the name of my best friend, and whether it had hurt to break up with my last girlfriend. Sometimes when she got bored of getting little information, she would suggest feeding her carnivorous plant, Cleopatra. That really amused her; she couldn't hold back her laughter when she saw my terrified face as her pet wrapped me with its whips or made me fall. At midnight, dinner remained in her room along with questions like, "What would you like to dream about?" And to end the day, rest with my pillow whispering fantasies. Perhaps so much questioning was the consequence of my first question about her sister, and now she was collecting on it, or she had simply found something in my person that aroused her curiosity in times of boredom. Whether one or the other, each day became more difficult to answer without exposing my feelings.

It's hard to clearly explain what, even today, drives me crazy about that woman. The way her eyes look, the power of her gestures, the softness of her voice, and the exquisite beauty of her face are some of the predominant characteristics of her essence. But what broke my walls were the moments when her sober personality changed for a few seconds to give me a smile or adjust some hair behind my ear. Anyone would say that it was a gesture of kindness or even maternal, and I thought so too, until the day I met her children. Their arrival at the mansion interrupted our card game, and even though Eudora had told me about them, seeing all three of them standing at the door with a certain look of displeasure left me in a catatonic state.

The eldest was the spitting image of her mother, twenty years younger, no makeup, and two braids she wore proudly even though she was almost in her thirties. Her reaction upon seeing me was so austere and quick that it froze me. She passed by me as if I were nothing more than a garden pot and went straight to her mother, whom she allowed to hug and kiss her.

The middle one was the spitting image of her uncle, with a blonde mane that ended in a pointed fringe, a biker look, and almost twice the height. Upon entering, he had the sweetest smile of a mischievous child that turned into disappointment upon noticing my presence. Still, he imitated his sister to throw himself into the arms of the one who had given him life. I had never seen an adult man hug and kiss his mother so tenderly and uninhibitedly.

It was the youngest who definitively broke the structures, the faded image of his father, stretched by his mother's genes and dressed as if he were the waiter at the most elegant restaurant in France. He seemed lost from the moment he arrived until he noticed me; his gesture was dignified and assertive, he approached and extended his hand to me. With his deep teenage voice, he introduced himself as "Pubert Addams," then dropped that gesture and turned to his mother as the lucky child he was. Seeing those three specimens of young people should not have surprised me at all after seeing Lurch and Thing; however, the balance in their identities, so different from those of their family members and yet so peculiar, made them perfectly belong to that clan. Although I struggled to imagine Morticia telling a story to little Pubert, the affection he and his siblings showed the infinite love with which she had raised them.

It was there, in a split second, when Morticia combed her youngest son's slicked-back hair, that I met her maternal face. A face that I definitely had not seen before.

"Darling Clow, they are my children: Wednesday, Pugsley, and Pubert" there was pride, happiness, and nobility in Morticia's words, but not a single hint of that woman who adjusted my hair. Something ignited in me. A certain hope or awareness that even though I was the same age as her oldest daughter, Morticia definitely didn't see me as one of them. There was something darker on her lips when she smiled at me, and I began to wish to know that darkness.

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During the following nights, reading became an impossible mission. Her figure would snatch the book from my hands barely reaching the first full stop. I couldn't concentrate on reading while that bellicose and nocturnal being rested meters away from me. I tried to suspend reading with the excuse of getting the hours of sleep I needed. Another lie to add to the list.

Under the moon, she was more idyllic and beastly; perhaps due to the lack of sunlight, which fueled her boredom and disenchantment. I was allowed to look at her. I developed a meditation technique around this action to avoid waking her up. However, some nights she would change position and notice her eyes, unrecognizable even to myself, who saw her even in my dreams. A second was enough for me to know that she didn't need teeth or claws to kill me, that i saw her, to murder my inside; and a second to know that, without her, the sky couldn't be beautiful. I saw her as a panther, as if my desire had given her gigantic proportions and had gone beyond what was dreamt. Still, I couldn't prevent my inner voice from calling her, like in a one-sided conversation, confidant and compassionate. That's how it started, calling her with looks, as a simple fondness. When I saw her lurking in her bed, waiting, I suppose, for my touch. Looking at her was all I could give her without going mad.

It became a customary communication. It was impossible to forget my longing and I couldn't, or shouldn't, commit excessive wrongdoing in my mind. I had to relegate desire to the condition of extending my time in the mansion, futile hopes due to my human condition.

So, I limited myself to stopping at a certain distance from the bed and looking, nothing more, just looking. Soon I would hear my inner screams. Because there, I saw, in the reflection of her eyes, my own face and in the posture of my hands, the burden of desire and waiting. That look would walk through my mind until I died. But in the following nights, she walked through my unconscious with the force and clumsiness, with which she opened my heart.

My situation was to subject myself to her eyes and to me it gave the impression i was imagining her. Everything slowed down. That's how my usual habit of drawing her on the first piece of paper I found occurred. Her smile, her collarbone, her nails, her chest. The howls accumulated in my throat. In her sharp pupils, I saw the self-imposed silence. It approached and extinguished. As if she wanted to tell me a secret and then remembered that I already knew it; while the graphite on the paper whispered poems in a language that only her modesty knew.

Drawing her was the consolation for not being able to touch her. Finding complicity in the abstraction of the technique. And in the representation, the product of that long process, my hands could touch her.

Her presence left her when the light illuminated her charm. She slept at dawn.

No matter how much desire there was, deep down I knew it was just a whim. And when I returned to my bed, wrapped in myself, I felt the usual lack of protection and love. Before falling into dreams, a voice, her son's, reminded me, with a gesture, that my life was at risk if I touched her. For he knew well of the gazes I shared with her when he recognized desire in mine. It was better that I didn't risk facing Pugsley Addams, who after finding one of my drawings, promised to tattoo it on my arm with a knife.

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

If you've ever held ice for a long time, you'll know that your hands start to go numb and burn. From the moment my left hand held a bag of ice over my head, I don't remember feeling that at any point. Mainly because I was completely focused on the fact that the woman I had dreamed of and drawn so many nights was standing inches away from me, standing between my legs while I rested seated on the edge of her bathroom counter.

And as if the irony wasn't enough, given that my job was to take care of her, it was she who was washing and disinfecting my wounds. An action she performed with the solemnity of someone carrying out a ritual, taking the cotton balls and bottles with the tips of her fingers, executing each movement with thoughtful slowness, allowing me to see the details of her ivory face delighted in front of the blood. Every so often, she increased the pressure on my skin and peeked through the side of her long lashes at the expression of pain on my face. The chills up and down my spine were cruel when I felt her breath brushing against my body.

The complicity of those nights of drawing had developed a silent language over which I no longer had control; it was she who now performed actions on my body. Feeling her hands on my abdominal area blurred my vision and accelerated my heartbeat. Symptoms that she wasn't going to let pass without commenting that I should calm down before continuing with the treatments, as she wouldn't want to have to call a doctor and end up unable to heal those wounds.

"It's been years since I've seen whip marks so deep," her breath brushed against my chest as she spoke, and her hands traced the cross engraved just above my sports top. "It's better if Wednesday starts to control the force she uses with her lovers, or they won't last long."

"That's not..." I let go of the bag of ice, which had already turned into water, into the sink, and started to get off the bathroom counter where I was sitting, but Morticia stopped me by putting her hands on my waist.

"I know," she whispered against my clavicle, which was too close to her mouth.

As soon as I stopped my actions, she continued with the healing, a task that had ignited a spark in her only visible at night. I noticed how she stared at my injured body and its reflection in the mirror behind me.

In that bathroom, where I had often gone to shower in search of peace and coolness, the flames of consummation rose to the ceiling with the deliberately accidental brush of her nails against my sensitivity.

Slowly her hands rose to the wound at the corner of my lips, and there all the remaining structure that kept me tied to what should be was lost. The tip of her fingers on my mouth, tracing my lower lip until forcing me to release the tension in my jaw. I submerged for a few seconds in the black lagoon of her eyes before we both closed them. As if it were a vision of the past, her hair fell over my face, filling my lungs with her rose tea perfume. Without fear, without expecting it, like when an undecided drop finally falls from a closed faucet, that's how her lips landed on mine. We distanced ourselves to exchange one of those looks between lashes and half-closed eyelids. The closeness with her cleavage, her eyes clouded with satisfaction, her left fang peeking out in a half-smile when sighing, and her hands drawing me closer to her gave me courage. In the second encounter, subtlety began to break down. She was made entirely of velvety marble, and there could have been nothing better than burying my face in her skin if her kisses hadn't been a Dionysian feast from which I couldn't, and didn't want to, escape. I traced every curve drawn to test the memory of my touch. Our bodies came together in that embrace as if we were about to melt into one. I felt her caresses on my face, her scratches on my back, her hands trying to break every distance that made us two separate bodies.

Two movements were enough for the curtain to fall. Her hands taking my legs to open them wider until our lower abdomens collided, and my hand on the skin of her back after removing her corset and lowering the zipper of her dress. That paralyzed her, as if at that moment she had been aware of which way the wind was blowing.

With a gesture like a stab, she moved her face away from mine and hid it behind her hair. I stepped back, pressing my back against the bathroom wall. The contact of that icy surface made my heart skip a beat. Seeing her tears rolling down her cheeks, I understood that I had dream too far. She removed the hand from my chest with which she had unconsciously pushed me away, and wiped away the tears with the side of her index finger. I sighed.

"I'm going to ask you to give me all the drawings," she stepped away from the counter, and I didn't need her to say anything else for me to retreat to the door as she headed for the shower. Before leaving the room, I allowed myself to watch her as she freed her shoulders and back from her dress. Seeing that portion of skin in contrast to her long black hair, the side of her chest... Before her nudity was revealed to me, I closed the door.

Inside the room, I struggled to recognize the space; I felt naked and quickly searched for a shirt to cover myself from the vastness. While Morticia showered, I searched for all the drawings I had made during my stay. I found sketches under the beds and the carpet, in the space between the nightstand and the wall, and even one folded inside my book. By the time I had calmed down and piled the sketches on the king-sized bed, Morticia had finished bathing. She came out of the bathroom wearing a long black robe with a pompous fur collar and a cloud of French perfume.

With the help of her cane, which she had resisted using so much, she went out to her balcony overlooking the cemetery. I followed her and saw her sit on an old iron bench next to a vase full of thorns and surrounded by rose heads. The sunset light gave her a halo of darkness around her slender figure. The sculptures of the mausoleums were the spectators, and she was their Madonna. With a look, she indicated that I should sit next to her, and so I did; despite everything that had happened, her spell still had an effect on me.

"This morning, before I found you, I spoke on the phone with Gomez," after her words, I began to notice the cold wind that brought the night.

Slowly and in the distance, the sun began to set.

"I am the mother of a family and the wife of a man whom I love and cannot betray."

I still couldn't tell if the blow of the bat on my head hurt more than those words.

"You have been a beautiful odyssey, Clow, for years... since Lily," a smile escaped her when she said that name, "... but I can't anymore. You are a young woman, I am not anymore. And Gomez returns tomorrow."

With that, she got up, while the last rays of light revealed her naked body under the transparency of her robe. Like the eternal feeling of distance, so was her farewell. With a kiss on my cheek.

For the first time since her recovery, she didn't wait to see all the stars in the sky before sleeping. And for the first time since my stay in the mansion, I went to sleep without looking at her. Just pronouncing her name would become a curse for me.

Morticia Addams.

Chapter Text

Having afternoon tea at the corner café every day wasn't exactly friendly to my finances since I had quit my job as a companion, but since my drawings were selling well at the gallery and the classes at the workshop had their loyal audience, I could afford to be a regular customer. Especially when the waitress gave me discounts and flirty looks to encourage me to ask her out.

The little café had become my inspiration space with its warm atmosphere and perpetual Christmas vibe. I could stay until dinnertime and have two coffees just to have a moment of tranquility to work on my drawings for the next exhibition. In the past year, my home had turned into a constant mess, which I tried to keep up for my health and that of my cat, Mortimer. That, and because some weekends, after a night of parties, I preferred to bring my new friends home rather than pay for a room.

Just that day, being Friday, I had left the apartment tidy and little Morti fed and asleep. I had sat at the round table by the window, as usual, and ordered my coffe and two croissants from Marilyn. Everything had been the same for a year. Everything, except seeing her.

I thought my mind was playing tricks on me. My heart started pounding as if it was going to run out of my throat. My hands turned into cement paperweights on my drawings. And my breath stopped as she walked into the café as if floating.

She entered with a woman of supernatural beauty, with whom she clearly shared a friendship and a taste for gothic makeup. Or maybe more. My mind refused to dwell on it as I glanced fleetingly at the eccentric woman with long black hair parted by two strands of gray at each side. Her short stature and her white dress with wide sleeves and baroque ruffles reinforced her companion's stoicism. She wore one of her classic black dresses with pointed shoulder pads that highlighted the hourglass figure embedded in her silhouette. When our eyes briefly met, I clenched the jaw I didn't remember opening. Graceful and elegant as I had never seen her before. Her hands no longer held a cane but were linked at her belly as the axis of her swaying walk.

They sat at a table on the other side of the café, ignoring all the looks and whispers they had caused. They ordered tea each and chatted while my body seemed to root itself to my chair. My ear strained to try to hear what they were saying but I only perceived their conspiratorial and seductive laughter. My stomach twisted when I realized they had finished and were heading to the door. For a moment, I thought I would never see her again and that it was a cruel joke of fate reminding me of how unattainable she was. They said goodbye with a kiss dangerously close to the corner of the lips.

Her "friend" left, and she stayed inside the café. She had noticed my presence. It was happening again. This time I was sitting while she approached. She captivated me with her sidelong smile, her lips painted ruby red, and her long-nailed fingers joined in a ceremonial gesture like ornaments in the middle of her chest. Her tight black dress inches from my nose was the signal for me to clumsily get up from my seat. She extended her hand, and I kissed the back of it.

"I didn't expect to see you here, Clow," her voice was torturous like in my dreams.

"I could say the same," with my abrupt movements, I cleared the table of my drawings so that she could sit across from me. Having her there, at a table's distance, made me feel as if that whole year of quitting my job to get away from her memory had been for nothing. "What are you doing on this side of the city?" My question wasn't innocent; after so many conversations with Morticia, I had learned her routes to avoid crossing paths with her.

"I've come to see my friend Lily, who lives around here," the only friend Morticia had ever talked to me about was Lily, whom she hadn't seen in decades and who had been more than just a friend. More reasons for my mind to fear the worst.

"And how is Lily?" My question was only out of courtesy, and her response didn't extend much into the comings and goings of the vampire who was now following a new diet of only consuming animal blood.

"I tried to convince her to become her donor again, but I haven't succeeded," she enjoyed the emotional consequences that her comment provoked in me as she slowly dismantled my croissants, which I hadn't touched. "Maybe it's for the best; in these times, I can't afford to faint indiscriminately," the conversation continued from one uncomfortable comment to another, increasing the tension around us, and almost without realizing it, we were back to playing chess without pieces or a board. Listening to her talk was a spell that spun threads from her lips to my body, enveloping it completely. The tables around us changed diners, and the light outside changed from natural to artificial. Morticia managed to extract almost every new anecdote that had happened in that year without seeing each other, including adopting a black cat and naming it something remarkably similar to hers. "I would love to meet Mortimer."

"We're less than a block from home," I didn't recognize my voice until I had finished saying that sentence. And almost without speaking, I paid my debts to Marilyn and we left.

It was surreal to walk with her in a public space. The fear that the wrong people would see us brought back memories of pain and physical torture.

The jingling of the keys betrayed my nervousness as we rode the elevator. Having her so close made me blush and forced me to avert my gaze. I hoped to wake up from that dream when I opened the apartment door. But that didn't happen.

It was like an apparition to see her standing in the middle of my minimalist kitchen-dining room, subtly inspecting every detail around her. It was like a black line that split my vision and understanding of reality. Her movements were even sharper and more precise than I remembered, as if her recovery had turned her spine into that of a snake.

"Mortimer must be in my workshop," I said, guiding her there.

As soon as we crossed the threshold, she mentioned the fact that the workshop was also my bedroom with one of her subtle comments.

"It must have been a profound change for you to pass through the mansion," she said as she sat on my bed to look at the last drawing I was working on, a tangle of black graphite curves on a paper that covered an entire wall.

"I don't know, was it for you?"

She didn't answer me; instead, she asked me again the name of the cat that had suddenly settled in her lap, purring from her caresses. I envied him for a few seconds before responding. It was the third time that name brought a smile to her face. Her perfect face plunged me into pain. Her cheekbones that could cut glass; her jawline drawn by the sharpest line; her nose, the axis of symmetrical balance; her almond-shaped eyes framed with long lashes that seemed to caress the air with every blink; her lips perfectly painted in the same red that covered the forbidden apple.

Unable to fight against my self-control, I sat next to her, afraid to look at her. The cat moved from her lap to mine as she continued to stroke it. I could see from the corner of my eye her face almost resting on my shoulder. When the animal got down to drink water, her hand gently fell on my legs. My eyes remained fixed on my shoes, unable to understand that this was happening and fearing the possible consequences of it being real.

"Sorry," that was all she needed to say for the tension on my body to break. I turned to look at her. No, not to look at her. To kiss her.

We kissed slowly, enjoying the encounter, our lips recognizing each other. When my back touched the bed, the speed and strength increased. Remembering the sweet taste of her tongue took me to the most primitive part of my desire. It was an urgency that I was willing to release with every heartbeat of my body. The kisses turned into contained bites and the hands stopped subtly covering the borders to begin to get rid of the clothes. Touching ourselves on the fabric had erogenized every inch of our skin that screamed to feel the friction. We take off our clothes as if in a ritual. Opening her dress felt like a greater sin than fornication. She took off my shirt as if taking a glove off her own hand. The monster in my gut wriggled heroically as I released her from the pressure of her corset, as if trying to disengage pieces of armor. I ended up taking off my jeans myself so she wouldn't break her nails. Modesty overwhelmed me but that didn't stop her and soon our underwear was on the floor.

Seeing her naked was saying goodbye to my sanity. The subtle difference between one aureole and the other, the darkness of her pubic hair and the stretch marks on her skin made her so human that just caressing her body with my fingers, made me vibrate.

I kissed her and her hands ran over me and caressed me. Disbelief, fear and shame pooled at the back of my neck where her nails entangled to electrify my spine. Every pore of my skin bristled with its rose. Her face on my neck, her hands on my waist, her legs braided with mine. I could barely feel the difference between what I wanted her to do to me and what she did to me. I could feel her preparing me, like someone starting the engine of an old car before starting it. And it worked, it totally worked. The tickling accumulated at the tips of my fingers and when I couldn't hold it any longer I let it go so it could run through me. When her kisses turned into licks on my nipples I couldn't stop my hips. I began to rub against the softness of her leg, slowly and embarrassedly at first, not wanting her to notice; until the dry was inevitably lubricated. At that point I could barely maintain control over my body, yet it was she who separated us. The reflex of continuing to move against the air when she touched me gave me away. "Stay still," she ordered me, staring at me and caressing me between my legs. She tortured me patiently and with just the tips of her fingers. I felt paralyzed by the pleasure of her fingertips between my lips, caressing my clitoris. She took pleasure when I moaned. She had experience, I knew it as soon as I felt her long nails on me. I didn't have time to feel afraid of the pain or shame of begging for more. The waves of pleasure didn't take long to arrive as she left her lipstick marks on my chest.

It wasn't the first time I had sighed her name and she knew it, I could tell by her sly smile when she made me arrive.

I kissed her to erase that self-satisfied gesture and quickly positioned myself on top of her. Her breath was so sweet and soft that it was difficult for me to leave her lips and go down her neck. Her perfume intoxicated me, filling my mind with her. Reaching her breasts and hearing her sigh lit a flame of complacency in me. Her body was a lake from which I wanted to drink until I drowned. I dedicated myself to ensuring that each caress with my tongue on her nipples elicited a hungry moan from her, while my hands caressed her thighs. Her skin was melting in my hands, nothing was enough for me. Pure adrenaline was watching her lose control slightly, never enough to leave her place of power. Her legs stiffened so that her pelvis touched my entire body as I slowly lowered myself, leaving a kiss on every inch. I let my hands delight in her chest for a while longer while I kissed her belly. Once she let out her first loud moan and I was able to delight in the harmony of her voice, my mouth went down to her thighs and my hands adjusted her hips to slowly bury my face in her. I could feel her lose her mind as French words escaped her. I returned the favor by slowly torturing her with my tongue before kissing her. Its flavor was addictive and so exciting that soon a new thread of moisture ran through my legs. I adored her intimacy with my mouth and penetrated her with my fingers until her nails stopped digging into my skull and her moans reached their peak.

I lay down next to her and we rested until she noticed that I was still excited. Soon we were kissing again. She lay on top of me and brought our sexes and mouths together so that the kisses respected the rhythm of the hips. Our nipples eventually rubbed against each other until our hands couldn't resist caressing and squeezing them. I felt that all our parts would meet, press, rub and eroticize each other without still being able to believe that it was real. We moaned into each other's mouths, swallowing the pleasure we caused each other. We hardened and deflated in the search for pleasure, until she bit my lower lip and pulled on one of my nipples while dragging my clitoris upwards with the force of her vagina. I ended up giving her name. This was enough for her to increase her speed and strength against me, arching her back backwards. Her erect nipples called to my lips so I could continue pleasing her. She moaned like the panther she was, dragging me into madness. I held my hands on her waist to accompany the movement of her body as she finished.

With her face on my chest, I fell asleep. When I woke up, she was gone. In her place, there was an envelope with my name written in elegant cursive handwriting.

"Clarisa Ow," I repeated over and over with Mortimer by my side. The cat looked at the letter with as little understanding of what it was as I did, and with as little wisdom about whether to open the letter or not, as I did.

Chapter Text

Kusubana_Yoru realizó un fanfiction que continúa con la historia y quería compartir el link para que más gente lo lea. 

Fleur de saison

Summary: Keeping sanity in the family was a difficult job, but someone had to do it.