My Lost Starshine (Willy Wonka x Reader)(2005)

4

✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦ . 　⁺ 　 . ✦

Two days had passed since the break-in—two days since the alarms had shrieked and you'd thrown a tray of Gobstoppers like it was the most natural thing in the world. 

Two days since Willy had looked at you like you'd handed him something far more precious than a stolen recipe.

And in those two days, something had shifted.

He still smiled at the workers, still twirled through the Inventing Room with his coat flaring dramatically, still tasted new confections with that childlike wonder that made everyone around him feel lighter. But you noticed the cracks.

His laughter came a beat too late. His eyes darted to corners and shadows when he thought no one was watching. 

He checked the locks on the recipe vault three times in a single morning—once with you standing right there beside him. 

He wore his gloves again, even indoors. The violet silk ones that reached his wrists like armor.

You understood why. The factory was his heart laid bare: every bubbling vat, every shimmering candy meadow, every secret scribbled on edible parchment. 

To have someone try to steal even a corner of it must have felt like a knife.

You hadn't told him yet, but you'd begun to suspect one of the newer hires—a quiet man in the packaging department who always lingered too long near the restricted corridors, who asked casual questions about security rotations that weren't casual at all. 

You'd seen him once slip a folded paper into his sleeve when he thought no one noticed. You weren't certain. 

But you were certain enough that it kept you awake at night, staring at the lavender ceiling of your guest room.

You were fond of Willy Wonka. More than fond.

It had crept up on you slowly, the way caramel hardens around a soft center. The way he tilted his head when he listened to you speak, as though every word you said was a new flavor he wanted to memorize. 

The shy blush that appeared whenever you smiled at him first. The way he said your name—Miss L/n—like it was something delicate and rare.

He reminded you painfully of a boy you'd once known.

A boy with messy brown hair and wide, uncertain eyes who'd followed you under a cherry tree one Halloween night, clutching stolen candy like it was treasure. 

A boy named Willy who'd hugged you so tightly you could feel his heartbeat against your ribs. You'd never learned his last name. 

When your family moved—your father's new job, the sudden uprooting—you'd cried for weeks, wondering what had become of him. You still wondered, sometimes.

But that was years ago. A different life.

Now, late in the afternoon, you sat on a bench in one of the quieter hallways, the one lined with windows that looked out over the chocolate river at golden hour. 

The light turned everything amber and warm. 

You were trying to decide how to tell him about your suspicions without sounding paranoid—when you saw movement.

A man in a worker's jumpsuit walked past the far end of the corridor. You didn't recognize him. 

The jumpsuit was the right color, the right cut, but something about the way he moved—too stiff, too careful—set your nerves alight.