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Damian pulled himself up the ledge of the bay window, eyes clashing blue as he stole a glimpse into the rainy garden. Mid-April and it was raining hard. Harder than it had all winter. Spring had shown its beauty the day before, allowing for sun beams to tickle Damian’s knees as he ran out into the green grass and among the blooming sprouts along tamed paths of stone and brick. He had spent the entire day away from the click of keyboards and the scooching of coffee cups. Damian had been transported into a wonderous land of fairies and mystic creatures, big and small, as he had ventured far past the garden gate and into the wood areas of the property.
Now he sat in the library, a book placed on his knees as he leant into the window for support. The rains were soothing as he took to reading, reminding him of each bloomed flower and each crisp leaf he found of the day’s journey. He smiled as thunder rumbled through the hollow walls of the manor, the vibrations bringing a calm sense of home to his bones.
But a second sound followed the thunder.
The slamming of a door, an impeccable copy of the sound, and then a short and nervous cringe following the mimicry. Heavy footsteps, none of them bellowing to his light footed family, came down the hall. They came closer to the library, forcing Damian to push back against the glass till he was hidden by the thin veil of curtain framing its edge. He pulled his breathing to a stop, eye trained on the only entrance to the library. The front door.
He was readying himself for an intruder. Some vagabond who had wandered onto the property to seek revenge of his family, or an assassin sent by his grandfather to collect him. Both had been warned about earlier on his stay and, even if no such event had yet to occur, Damian would be foolish to dismiss the thought.
Though, he felt quite foolish when it was simply Richard at the door.
Stumbling in, Richard’s hands were wilding grabbing in front of him as he gravitated towards the couch, pulling the blanket Damian had been using early up and over his shoulders. The teenager had his eyes shut tight, Damian realized, as he twisted himself away from the couches and towards one of the walls. Manual training was the only explanation for what happened next. Damian watched in aw as the blinded Richard pushed a book into the case and revealed a pocket door within the bookcases. The entire piece moved aside and, before Damian could even roust himself from his hiding place, Richard was gone and the case was back to its normal stature.
Damian, fumbling himself to get out of the window, trotted over towards the case to examine it. Up close you could see the fine lines. See the shadows little beads of light from the chandelier above that hid the door’s seals. The balcony surrounding the library’s rim allowed for those shadows and tricks of light to be minimized, but not totally unnoticeable. He saw the book he needed to push. It was a good foot and a half above his reach, meaning Damian had to drag one of the armchairs away from the circled meeting area to the shelf, and clamber atop of it to access the book.
“What?” He mumbled, pushing at the book once, twice, and third time to make sure the door was not budging. The book moved inward, just as Damian had seen, but the shelf was lifeless and still.
The door was firmly shut, and Damian was firmly pissed off that he could not follow. On one hand, his brother had looked upset and frightened. He needed to get to Richard and make sure he was safe and uninjured. On the other hand, Father had not disclosed that they had a SECRET ROOM IN THE LIBRARY! Damian was more than upset, he felt betrayed.
Secret rooms? Damian loved secret rooms! Why had no one told him there was a secret room in his favorite room in the manor? Why had no one told him the manor had secret rooms!?
Putting those question aside for the moment, Damian began to investigate the shelving. The book Damian had to press was a read book, though it was glued in place. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, by Robert Louis Stevenson. It was a classic. There weren’t any other books in the area from 1886, nor any by the same author. Classics were also out of the question. Everything on the shelf was a script on war and combat techniques. The shelf below it was naval battle of the British empire. And the bottom row had-
Damian saw it. Among a collection of Dated Air Strikes post WWI, there was a light brown book with no title on the spine. He climbed off the chair, facing the book up close. It wasn’t very noticeable. Blended with the other brown booked around it. But its spine was bare. There were little bumps along it, ones Damian quickly assessed as braille.
Running back across the room, up the stairs to the balcony, and towards the section of languages, Damian thumbed over volumes till he found the right book. A textured script on the braille alphabet. Damian lugged it back down, flipping around the book till he found the right pages, letter, and what he came to realize were numbers on the spine. With a pad of paper he swiped from the table, Damian wrote it all down.
H G W 1897
He chuckled, closing both books.
The Invisible Man, by H.G. Wells. 1897. He had to ask Richard who made the secret passageway and congratulate them on the use of a pun. It was most adequate.
Damian replaced the book on braille, moving the paper ripped from the pad into his pants pocket before going about fixing The Invisible Man into position before climbing back up the chair to push in Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. This time, the door pushed back along with the books, leaving Damian with an opening into a soft padded room.
A room holding his big brother within it.
Richard was curled up in the corner, eyes squeezed shut, arms round his head, and body rocking as his body shook atypically with fear. Damian jumped down from the chair, allowing his weight to shift and make noise as he did so to warn his frightened brother. Frightened had not been an emotion that Damian had seen lately. Not in the manor and especially not on Richard’s face. He had seen plenty of caution, even Father showed that emotion, but not fear. This was… darn Damian say, frightening?
He slowly approached Richard’s fetal taken body, waiting for him to lash out or react to Damian’s closeness. Instead he stayed hidden, face shadowing itself as the door to the small hidey hole closed and darkness overtook them. Damian got close enough to touch his brother and he did. Set a gentle hand on to Richard’s back, eyes filled with worry as he continued to step closer.
“Richard, you’re scaring me.” He whispered. The thought of talking at a normal volume inside this protected space felt inappropriate. This was not a space to hear echoes.
The words seemed to be heard, because the rocking stopped. Trembling, Damian noted, was the correct word. Shaking was known, trembling was a more unconscious effort made by the body, not the mind. Richard’s right arm unlatched itself from the tight hold around his knees, slowly moving to pull Damian in.
Damian allowed it, moving himself to the floor and leaning against Richard as the arm settled at his shoulders. He burrowed himself into his brother’s side, smiling when he finally saw the bright face that he was used to. It was different. Tear stricken, dehydrated, and a bit pale. But it was the face Damian had come most accustomed to seeing over the past few months. It was his big brother’s face.
“Hey, bud,” Richard also whispered, making Damian happier at the thought that he read the room’s social requirements correctly. “I’m just riding out the storm in here, alright? Nothing to be afraid of.”
“But you are frightened.” Damian said, feeling the hand at his shoulder begin the run smoothly through his curls.
Dick chuckled, nodding. “I am frightened by the storm. But I’m gonna be okay here. Why don’t you go back to reading your book and I’ll keep riding it out alone.”
Damian thought about that option. Leave and finish the book, one he had not put down since breakfast about a common girl meeting a mysterious monster in the woods who has been cursed by a witch and- Or stay right where he was? It was a hard decision. But Damian had a third option in mind.
He pulled out of Richard’s grip, finding his way back to the door where a handle was apparent. Damian escaped from the hidey hole, scampered back towards and window. He grabbed his book, ran back, pushed in The Invisible Man and popped Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde into place to get back inside. As the door closed behind him, Damian slid himself back into Richard’s side, opening up his book and flipping all the way to the beginning.
“When I was sad after Omma left, you told me that we shouldn’t be alone when we’re sad or scared or angry, because those emotions will only get worse if we isolate ourselves. So, I’m going to read my book here if that’s okay?” Damian looked up to Richard, waiting for his cue.
With another chuckle, a sniffle, and a quick wipe of his nose, Richard nodded. “Alright,” He let his head lean back till it tapped the padding of the wall, his eye shutting a bit softer now. “go ahead and read.”
Damian smiled, pulling a bit of the blanket off of Richard and onto himself as he began the story back at the beginning. “Once upon a time, in a poor provincial town in the French countryside-”