Slenderman Love Story: Damned Romance

~Chapter Eight: Home Movies~

I stumble into the Mansion, trembling slightly but trying to keep my breathing steady. I slump onto the couch, and Jeff looms over at me, turning down the volume on the TV. Slenderman passes me into the kitchen, and I hear him start rummaging through the cupboards.
Jeff looks over at me, shocked.
"Hey kiddo. Are you alright?" He rasps.

Shaking my head no, I hide my face in my hands and let out a jittery sigh. I feel Jeff shift closer, but still jump slightly when I feel his hand rubbing my back.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

I look up. "Laughing Jack says he loves me, yet he stood by all these years watching me..." My voice chokes off, then returns louder and angrier then before. "Watching me writhe with pain in that everlasting hell hole of an Orphanage! "
Jeff sighs, shaking his head slowly.
"Wow Laughing Jack..." He trails off his mutter under his breath. Then he slides to the floor to look up into my face, pulling down my hands.
"Can I...uh, do anything for you?" He asks.
I smile sadly, eyes tearing. "Could...could we watch some home movies?" I ask hopefully.
Jeff gives a sharp bark of laughter, then gets to his feet and walks to one side of the television stand. He opens one of the cupboards, revealing stacks upon stacks and rows upon rows of VCRs. He scans the taped-on titles.
"Which one?" He asks.
"Grab any one." I reply, pulling a folded blanket off the back of the faded blue couch and wrapping up in it.
Jeff chuckles, pulls one off the shelf. Crouching, he pushed it into the VCR player and comes back on the couch just as Sam walks in, holding a tray of slice-and-bake Pillsbury cookies, with a few peeled oranges and a tall glass of milk. He taps my leg with a tentacles, and both Jeff and I move over so Slenderman can sit too. He sinks onto the couch and I straighten my legs just in time as he places the tray on my lap.
"Eat up." He says softly. Then wrapping one arm around my shoulders, he crosses an ankle on his knee, leans back and I lean into him as the movie starts.
"Are you getting it? " My younger voice calls.
All we can see is blackness but we can hear.
"Uh...no." Says Eyeless Jack behind the camera. "I-I think the camera's broken, I can't see through the view thingy!"
"I think your brain is broken," BEN sniggers. There's some footsteps, then we see the pattern of air moving under a twisting cap.
"Hey, what are you doing to my cam--?!"
"The lenes cap is still on, dumbass!" BEN laughs as light begins to seep in through the cracks, blinding the camera.
"Oh..." Jack mutters. "I knew that." The camera adjusts, and you see me hanging down from a tree branch with my legs kinked over the branch. My long hair rippled in the breeze my arms swaying as I rocked softly back and forth. My light laughter dances through the air. "You're such a dork, Dad!" I giggled.
"Hey, no one uses these dinosaur cameras anymore! Why does Slenderman want it on VCR anyway??" Eyeless Jack cries out, fiddling with the lense and zoom and other camera thing. For a moment, he switches it into infrared.
"The fuck?" Eyeless Jack gasps. "I think I broke it!"
"Oh for fuck sakes!" Jeff snarls off camera, and suddenly the camera is jerked to the side and brought up again. "Let me do it!" The infrared is switched off, then Jeff walks across the clearing to look up into the tree I hang from.
I notice that wrapped around my body and bunched in my arms, are strips of black and white materials. I cock an eyebrow and sip my milk before redirecting my attention to the TV.
"Okay, we're ready. We can't do this twice, so make it count." I hear Masky call up as he walks closer to the camera.
Taking a deep breath, I begin swinging. Back and forth, back and forth, gaining more and more momentum until I swing myself back up onto the thick branch right-side up. I crouch and focus on a branch in the neighboring tree. Then without warning, I spring from the tree and fly across the gap, trailing the material behind me. I bounce off that branch, swing up to a higher one, loop it twice and send my self jetting up. I slip through two there, spin around another, jump from that one or roll in between those two until in giant, black and whites letters, spell the words "HAPPY BIRTHDAY LAUGHING JACK" strung between two trees.

Watching this while eating, I realize I suddenly have a salty taste on my lips. I touch my cheek, and I'm shocked to pull my hand away moist. I'm crying.

Jeff wheels back so we can see it better, than he asks "Can somebody get the-?"
"Got it!" Hoodie interrupts. Suddenly there's a soft metal creaking, and the camera sinks. Jeff walks around in front of it and we see his face at large as he cleans the lenses, grins into the camera, then walk to where I've jumped onto the ground. Masky, Hoodie, BEN, EJ, Clockwork, Jane, Trenderman and Slenderman, Ticci Toby, Sally and even the Bloody Painter are gathered underneath my glorious art. Some spiderweb trails of material still cling to me.
Slenderman counts down on his fingers, then everyone simultaneously screams "HAPPY BIRTHDAY LAUGHING JACK"
"Alright, that's a wrap. You can take it down now!"
"Alright!" I call back. I start running across the clearing, and the whole production pulls with me, tugging the letters until they're just a mass of material piled on the ground.
"You got it?" Eyeless Jack calls to Jeff.
"Of course I got it!" He snaps as he takes the camera off the tripod. "Now how do you turn it--? Hey, BEN, the fuck you doing to the--?!" The camera clicks off.

Jeff looks over at me, and I flip the hood up on my sweater. "That was fun." I reply, keeping the tears out of my voice.
I hear Sam murmur something to Jeff, who snorts, gets up, and heads upstairs to his room. Slenderman pulls the empty tray from my hands. I fold my hands in my lap, and one of my tears fall and splash on them.
Slenderman pulls me into a hug, and I silently weep again.
"Not the best reunion so far, eh?" He chuckles.
I laugh softly through my tears, and sit up, wiping my face. Slenderman suddenly reaches forward and rips down the hood.
"Don't hide the awesomeness that is you."
I look up at him and smile. And he nods slowly.
So we get up and head out for a walk.