COMPLETED // i don't want to hurt anymore - enoch o'connor x reader

Chapter 3 - The Peculiars

(Y/N)'s P.O.V

"So... What's your, um, peculiarity?" She smiled again, proudly this time, and gestured​ to a huge statue that was sitting in the hallway. "Watch this." Bronwyn walked up to it and held the arm of the statue between her thumb and forefinger, before lifting it up right over her head. I applauded. "How did you do that? That statue must be... Well, extremely heavy..." Bronwyn nodded.
"It is. But my peculiarity means I can lift rather heavy things... I'm very strong."
"That's... That's awesome!" She bowed, and waved her hand towards me, beckoning me to follow her up a grand flight of stairs.

We emerged in a long corridor with multiple doors on each side. "So this room," Bronwyn started to open the door of the first room on the left, "Is mine and Fiona's. You'll meet her soon enough, but at the moment, she's outside, tending to the plants, as usual." She closed the door and walked to the room opposite. "This one is Claire's and Olive's, but we won't go in... They get up to weird stuff in there." I heard maniacal laughter from inside, and I raised my eyebrow at Bronwyn. "See what I mean, love?" She laughed.
We carried on up the corridor, and stopped outside the second door on the left. "This room here is Millard's and Hugh's." I frowned, remembering the latter name. "I think I've met Hugh... Ah, is he the boy with the insects coming out of his mouth?" Bronwyn nodded. "Bees, yes, but they're actually in his stomach." My eyes widened.
"How on earth does that work?"
"Don't ask me! Anyway, this room," Bronwyn gestured to the room facing Hugh's, "Is Emma's room, and I think you'll be sharing it with her. Here, have a look inside." She pushed the door open, revealing a simple but tastefully furnished room painted light blue, with two single beds, a wardrobe, two bedside tables, a long dressing table at the back and a large window overlooking a beautiful lake. "This is - this is lovely!" Bronwyn sighed.
"Well, Emma always did have the nicest room out of all of us. I don't envy you much, though; she makes a terrible snoring noise when she's sleeping." I groaned, laughing.
"Oh, no. Next time I'll bring some earplugs."

We carried on up the hallway, stopping outside a room with a wooden sign saying: 'No entry: Alma LeFay Peregrine'.
"Is that Miss Peregrine's room?" Bronwyn nodded. "The Bird's quite tight on her privacy here, as you can tell. And order and routine. Those are her main rules."
"The Bird?"
"Some of us call the Headmistress that, because she can turn into a peregrine, as you probably already knew." This was news for me.
"She can do what?" The strong girl frowned.
"Didn't she tell you? She can turn into a bird because she's an ymbryne. They're women who look after loops."
"Don't you ever get any men doing it?"
"Oh no. Apparently, they're not cut out for it. Shall we continue?" We walked across the hall to the second to last room on the corridor. Bronwyn knocked on the door, before whispering to me: "This is Horace's and Enoch's room, but you won't find Enoch up here much. He's usually down in the basement doing his weird work, and he sometimes even sleeps down there." A refined voice answered Bronwyn's knock. "Come in." We entered the small room to find a boy, perhaps a couple of years younger than me, standing by a cloth dummy, measuring a long strip of light blue silk against it's waist. He had blonde hair, combed carefully to the side, and was wearing a full-on black suit, and a rather tall top hat, not to mention the monocle that was sitting over his left eye. "Can I help you?" he said, eyeing my 21st century clothes. Bronwyn raised his eyebrows at him. "This is (Y/N) (Y/L/N), the new peculiar. She's from 2014! (Y/N), this is Horace." Horace approached me, one hand outstretched. I shook it, and he continued to stare at my clothes. There was a short silence for a moment, before Horace burst out: "Why do your tight trousers have hundreds of rips in them? I can sew them up if you'd like." I laughed nervously. "Oh, no, thank you. This is the fashion where - when I live." He raised an eyebrow. "Dear me. Wyn, dear, do you think you'd be able to get Emma to lend some of her clothes to (Y/N)? She'll stick out like a sore thumb if she goes out into the town like that." I couldn't help but feel a bit offended, but I wanted to make a good impression on these people, so I just smiled. "Yes, I suppose I could, Horace. After the tour, of course." Horace turned back to his mannequin, after saying, "Have fun with the rest of your tour! Don't mind Enoch, he's always grumpy." Bronwyn and I turned to leave, Horace having given us what I can only describe as a 'royal' wave. 

There was only one door left on the top floor of the house. I walked towards it, expecting Bronwyn to explain whose room it was, but instead she caught my arm and pulled me back. Her eyes were sad. "We don't go in there very often. C'mon, let's continue with the rest of the house." I was puzzled, but didn't press it, and let her lead me back down the stairs and where we began. 

"You've already been in the Bird's office, and you'll see the kitchen at dinner, so I'll show you the basement..." Bronwyn turned to me, smiling nervously. "Look, Enoch's always grumpy, okay? Don't take it personally." I frowned, wondering how one boy could be so renowned for his slightly grumpy attitude.
"Okay... I won't be offended. I've met a lot of surly people."
"Well... You should be alright then."
We descended down some rickety steps, hardly able to see anything in the inky darkness, before stopping outside a door. Bronwyn breathed in heavily, then pushed it open.
We were in a dimly lit room, with one single worktop and a workbench in the middle, and jars of... Were they organs? lining the walls. At the bench, sat a teenage boy, around my age, with dark, curly hair and a brooding face. He was sewing up a doll.
Bronwyn cleared her throat. "Enoch! So nice to see you..."
Enoch answered bluntly, in a cockney accent: "What do you want?" It sounded more like an order than a statement. Bronwyn pushed me forward, saying, "Enoch, this is the new peculiar, (Y/N) (Y/L/N). Please be nice..." The surly boy looked up from his workbench, looked me up and down for a couple of moments, then returned to whatever he had been doing. I tried a question. "So, um, Enoch... What's your peculiarity?"
"I'm a dead-riser."
"Cool... What's that, exactly?"
"It means I can take the life of one thing and put it into another. It's very taxing and complex work, and I appreciate being left alone while I'm doing it." That was our cue to leave.

Bronwyn and I reached the top of the stairs, looked at each other, and unexplainably started giggling.
"That went... Well." Bronwyn said, in-between breaths.
"Yeah, I really think we have a spark..." I said, which set us both off again. For a couple of moments, we sat there, laughing, until a bell rang, and Bronwyn jumped up. "That's dinner! Come on, you can meet everyone, now."