Chapter Text
It’s been three days since they visited Caine’s office.
Pomni has seen the others a few times, but she’s mostly stayed in her room. Going out and facing everyone seems terrifying. She knows seeing Ragatha and Gangle and everyone trying to act normal will only bring her down more.
So she’s stayed put. She’s locked the door. She’s all alone once again.
After exploring every inch of her room, she’s grown increasingly bored. She found a little mouse hole behind her dresser, which made her wonder if there were any mice to use it. She’s found crayons and paper, but she has no drive to draw.
She was never a good artist anyways. Outside she can hear the others talking to themselves. She waits until she can’t hear them anymore.
Eventually it’s night time again. For the fifth time since she’s locked herself in.
As she’s recounting her crayons, she hears something. A door creaks open quietly, before shutting with a squeak. She hears footsteps padding quietly down the hall. Curious, she cracks her door open and sees a familiar purple bunny walking down the hallway.
After debating a moment she follows. He walks slowly through the main area then out front to the lake. Pomni continues behind him, staying far enough away so he doesn’t notice her
Jax slumps down on the bank, inches away from the shore. The water licks close to his feet but never touches. Pomni hasn’t been out here in the dark. It’s peaceful but also lonely.
The bunny sits with his chin on his knees, just staring into the water. The fake stars sparkle against the water's surface and Pomni almost thinks she can hear crickets chirping. She almost forgets she’s not home.
“I know you’re back there. Stop creeping on me.” Jax calls out, not even bothering to look back.
Pomni blinks rapidly, unsure of what to do. They haven’t even had an actual conversation since their fight. She’d never seen him react that way. She knows there’s more to him than he lets on, but she doesn’t know how to get to him. It feels like she’s on another island and Jax is on his own, by himself with his worries.
She takes a deep breath and makes a brave decision to step forward. Her little feet sink into the sand as she walks over to him, the ground still warm from the sun. She opens her mouth to say something before just sitting down beside him.
“What are you doing, Pomni?” Jax sighs loudly, averting his gaze.
“I was worried about you.” Pomni confesses, digging her feet in the sand.
“I told you I’m not your friend. Just leave me alone.”
“I just don’t want to be alone right now. Not anymore.”
Jax’s eyes move over to Pomni, as if trying to gauge whether or not she was serious.
He grunts and turns back away, leaving it at that. They both sit there just staring at the water. There’s an immense grief they can feel coming off of one another. Pomni chews on the inside of her cheek, she’s immensely uncomfortable not addressing it. She’d always been the one to fill the silence as it made her uneasy.
Eventually Jax huffs and lays back on the sand, Pomni joins him. She twiddles her fingers while still chewing.
Above them the stars twinkle in a repeating pattern. It’s a subtle reminder to the both of them that it isn’t real. It’s not really the sky, although it looks like it. There is no way out.
Without even realizing it she begins to cry. Tears pour down her rosy cheeks, leaving marks in their wake. Pomni tries not to make it obvious as she brings a hand up to wipe them away.
For a split second she catches Jax’s eyes on her before they snap back to the sky. She might as well just curl up and die.
“Listen.” Jax pauses, struggling with his words. “Sometimes, it’s easier to get angry. That doesn’t make it right. But for what it’s worth…”
Pomni’s mouth hangs open in shock, afraid of ruining the moment. She feels she’s witnessing something she shouldn’t be.
“I’m…” He stumbles over the next word, mouthing it over and over again trying to will it into existence. “I’m sorry.”
With that he stands up, tripping over the sand as he stomps back to his room. Pomni watches him go, a slow feeling of relief washing over her. He doesn’t hate her.
Though the sky above her and the water lapping at her feet aren’t real and never will be, they are real. No matter how much Jax pretends he’s not human anymore, like the circus has made him into this evil cartoon villain, he’s the most human out of all of them.
The next morning Pomni wakes up alone, still in the sand. Jax is gone, but the lake still remains. She stares into the water, watching it sit still.
Finally after a few minutes she leaves the lake, and ventures back into the tent. Inside she spots Gangle and Zooble on the couch. Gangle has open her sketchbook, leaning against Zooble as she doodles. Further on she can see Ragatha and Kinger adding pillows to Kinger’s fort.
She lets out a sigh she didn’t realize she had been holding in. Everyone was fine. Things weren’t ever going to be normal, but this was as good as she could hope for.
“Hey Pomni, Ragatha stopped by your room this morning but you weren’t there. What were you up to?” Zooble turns their head to face Pomni, Gangle gives her a little wave in acknowledgement.
“Oh, I was just up early exploring,” She takes a moment to survey the room again, “where’s Jax?”
“Umm, we checked his room but he wasn’t there. I kind of assumed he was with you.” Zooble admits, leaving Pomni confused.
He WAS with her, but that was last night. She wasn’t going to say that though, that sounds weird.
She excused herself and made her way down their bedroom hallway. It’s so very quiet, but not in a comfortable way. It made Pomni’s heart sink, like there was something missing. She was terrified that maybe she wouldn’t find him. The one person she felt like she could have an honest conversation with, at least that’s what she used to think.
Through the halls she thinks she can hear something. It seems like muffled TV sounds. Somewhere far back, somewhere she hasn’t been yet. With an urge she hasn’t felt in days, she ventures down the hallway. She passes empty and not empty rooms along her way. As much as she wants to explore each one, she knows she’s on a mission. It’s like her own adventure, just hers.
The pattern on the carpet below her starts to shift and distort as she continues on. Fuzzy geometric shapes appear below her, as if they changed only for her.
Pomni knows she’s getting closer by the way the audio gets clearer. No longer were they dissembodied voices, she now recognized them as her friends' voices. They’re staticky, like they were being played through a VHS. Finally she reaches the door. Before she enters she presses against the door, trying to make more out.
She opens the door with a prominent creak. It swings open slowly to reveal an almost empty room. Against one of the walls is an old box TV. Pomni can see VHS tapes spread around the TV, with various labels. Jax is messing with one of the tapes, frustrated.
“Jeez, Pom, can’t a man get some alone time?” Jax scoffs, not even bothering to look at her. His hands grip harder on the plastic within his grasp.
“Everyone was looking for you.”
“Well I obviously didn’t want to be found.” Jax bites back, sliding a new VHS in. The TV remains blank. Jax angrily beats against the side of it before giving up. He ejects the tape and moves on to the next one.
Pomni catches a glimpse of the tape he had been messing with. In what looks like faded marker “Ribbit’s first day” is written. The tape is covered in dents and bite marks, clearly not in working condition.
Jax flips the new tape around in his hands, inspecting it. It also has a label but this one is smudged. They hadn’t let the marker dry enough and now it was unreadable. Jax didn’t seem to mind though, he slides it into the slot and waits.
The screen glitches for a moment before showing a scene from a couple of adventures ago. Pomni and Jax lay on the grass, fireflies buzzing around them. This was one of her favorite memories from the circus, one of the only times she actually felt normal.
Pomni hesitantly makes her way over to Jax, walking very slowly. She approaches him as if he’s a timid deer, capable of being spooked off in a second. She sits down beside him and glances his way. He’s staring intently at the screen, his face showing no emotion. His brows seem to furrow as he watches, as if confused.
“Y’know, you’re not as insufferable to be around when you’re genuine.” Pomni quips.
He just eyes her and scoffs, but she catches the slightest hint of a smile on his face. Pomni rolls her eyes as well and they both turn their attention back to the TV. The tape ends and Jax moves to put another one in. He doesn’t bother reading the label this time, opting to just shove it in and see what happens.
The TV flickers to life again and the next scene is like something from a movie. It looks like it actually shot on camera, and not just an overview of the scene. It’s their fight, or right before they started fighting.
She watches herself hug Jax on the screen and inwardly cringes at herself. Maybe this wouldn’t have happened if she hadn’t touched him. Did she cross a boundary? It wasn’t like he told her not to.
Jax doesn’t speak and shuts the TV off. Pomni can see his knuckles clench in anger. They pull at his overalls as he tries to calm himself down. He grumbles and pulls his knees up to his chin.
Pomni flicks the TV back on and ejects the previous tape. She rummages through the pile and picks one at random.
On the TV there's a scene between Pomni and Ragatha. It takes her a second to remember this instance. She knows it was a little while back but she can’t remember what exactly they talked about.
“So, what's going on with you and Jax?” Ragatha asks Pomni.
“Umm… What’s that supposed to mean?” Pomni counters.
“Well you guys have gotten really close as of recently, I was just curious is all. Why so defensive?” The rag doll asks, nudging the other girl's arm.
“I’m not being defensive! BUT! We are friends.”
“Just friends?” Ragatha asks, putting emphasis on the first word.
Pomni hurriedly flicks the TV off again, her face bright red. Jax eyes her and notices, before laughing like a maniac.
“What’s so funny?” Pomni asks. She crosses her arms and looks toward Jax.
He just waves it off and continues giggling quietly. For a second the embarrassment leaves her and all she can think about is his smile. He’s staring down at her, looking over his knees. It’s cute.
Pomni looks away, too scared to look. He cocks his head as he watches her avert her eyes. He knows it’s awkward now because of him. But he can’t bring himself to address it. Maybe she’d just give up and leave.
“Y’know what I was just thinking about?” The girl asks. She’s looking at him again.
“What?” Jax answers, he looks at her too.
“I miss taking baths. That’s what I’d do once I got off work. I’d run a hot bath and wash away all my worries. Man do I miss that.” She reminisces, picking at her nails.
Suddenly a memory runs through him he hadn’t thought about in years. He’s only five, laying down in his bathtub. His toys float around him atop the bubbly water. His mother is running the water over his hair, scrubbing the soap into it. She’s singing to him, but all he can remember is the melody. She’d only sing it to him when they were alone together, like she was embarrassed. He thought his mother had a beautiful singing voice, but she’d always laugh when he’d say that.
“Yeah… I miss that too.” He finally mumbles, looking out of it. “The last time I had a bath I was a little kid.”
“What!?” Pomni shouts dramatically, sitting back up. “That's like… the best part of your day. You relax in the bath.”
“I was usually too tired to do anything once I was off work.” He said, shrugging.
She sat there thinking for a moment before turning back to him.
“Is there a pool here? That’s the closest thing I can think of to a bath. Plus I don’t think we’d fit very well.” She giggles, bringing her hand up to cover her smile.
He almost says no, that would be way too awkward. He’s already ruined everything else, why ruin this. But then he looks at her and her little smile. Her eyes sparkle artificially in the windowlight, making them look real.
“Yeah. I know a spot.” Jax tells her, catching himself smiling as well. He can’t help it, no matter how hard he tells himself to stop he just can’t. Maybe he could be happy just for a little. Then he’ll go back to sulking.