The photo refused to make sense. She remembered the estate. She remembered the fire. But she did not remember being at that masquerade. Not at that age. Not with them.
And Wednesday Addams did not misplace memories.
She lit a single candle before retrieving the journals.
The vault behind the study wall released its lock with a mechanical sigh -- more creature than structure. Inside, her personal volumes sat waiting. Black leather. Thin. Unlabeled but numbered in Latin.
She pulled down Volume XXIII.
Inside, her handwriting was crisp, detached, devoid of excess. Each week catalogued like a crime scene. Precise. Inarguable.
-- "Taught myself to solder glass. Dreamed of drowning. Burned the roses on purpose. Wrote a letter to Mother -- did not send. Studied the dreamless dead. Do not trust piano teachers."
Then...nothing.
Two weeks: blank. Crossed out with thick lines of black ink. Beneath the second week, one word:
"Absentia."
She would never use that word. It was too...theatrical. She replaced the journal and turned to the filing cabinet -- second drawer, alphabetical.
Addams, W. - Memory/Dissociation (Voluntary)
She had consented to neurochemical trials in her twenties -- clinical, detached, deeply unsatisfying. She remembered those. She chose them. As any good Addams would choose forms of torture.
But there it was:
-A prescription with a name she didn't recognize: Dr. G. L. Reyna
-Another, older note, on hosptial stationery: Dr. D. Thornhart / Short-term chemical sedation. "Observation ordered. Memory dissaociation recommended. Requested by guardian."
Wednesday stared at the date. Masquerade week. She was twenty-four. Who, exactly, had been her "guardian"?
A knock startled her. Twice. Firm. Not tentative. She didn't move. Another knock. She opened the door slowly, prepared to end the conversation before it began.
The man standing on her front step wore a black wool coat, rain on his shoulders, and the expression of someone who had long ago stopped expecting warm welcomes.
"Ms. Addams?"
"Depends," she said, "Are you selling anything?"
"I'm here about the Thornhart case," he said. "I was told you might be the only person who cared that Delia's death wasn't an accident."
She studied him. Sharp eye. Stubble. Age resting unevenly across his face. He was tall, solid, tired with the smell of clove cigarettes and quiet regret.
"And you are?" she asked. "Felix Marron. Private Investigator." She opened the door wider. "Then come in," she said. "But wipe your feet. This house doesn't tolerate dragging."
He followed her into the study without speaking. His gaze flicked briefly to the candle, the cello, the file still open on the desk.
"You keep unusual hours." he said.
"I keep honest ones."
He stepped closer, glancing at the photo lying beside the medical papers. "That's...Genevieve?"
"Yes."
"She was younger than I remember." "And Delia," he said frowning. "She looks like she's preparing someone's execution."
"She usually was."
Then silence. He squinted at the corner of the photo. "That looks like you." She didn't reply.
"You don't remember," he said, more a statement than a question. She closed the file. "No." She said.
"Do you think they made you forget?"
"I think someone wanted to make sure I couldn't remember." He paused. Something in his face shifted -- less detective, more human.
"Do you want help?"
She studied him. There was something there. A wound buried beneath order. Grief tucked into his collar like a forgotten letter. "...Yes." She said. He nodded. Not smiling, not stepping back, just staying. The fire in the study crackled.
And for the first time in years, Wednesday felt the quiet slide of something in her mind beginning to move. Not fall apart. Just....loosen.