H&S: Story Of Dorothy Oneshots

This Fear of Mine

No one knows this fear of mine. Only Dorothy tried to understand me. I heard a voice from somewhere all day...

        Servant A was a man with sleek black hair and a medium build usually dressed in his work uniform, his skin pale like white beach sand and his eyes a bright blue like a cloudless summer sky. His real name was Adam Lovinskey, he would play the piano in the parlor for Dorothy's family, back when times were happier and there weren't rumors of a curse and people weren't dying in the house. Now, he couldn't start pushing the piano keys to play a beautiful melody without messing up because his fingers were shaking too much.

          Adam was terrified of what was happening, same as everyone else. Servants were dying very strangely not long after they moved into the mansion. A few male servants were stung to death by bees, during winter for Christ's sakes. Two maids were found hanging from vines entangled around a tree in the garden, their necks bleeding from the plants tightened around them and their eyes bulging out their sockets. Maria and Georg were worried, Dorothy started acting distant so everyone thought she was in shock. But when her parents took her to a doctor, he said there was nothing the matter.

         That's when the rumors arose among the house staff, started by one of the servants who accompanied the family on their trip to the town doctor. A peasant in the village nearby had questioned the servant on whether or not the family came from that 'fancy ol' house up on the hill,' and he'd curtly confirmed this. The peasant told him they should be wary, for the Devil was rumored to reside within the sewers of the house. Then when they returned, that servant told everyone else. It's a curse, they said. But being faithful to the family and all of them needing this job, for it fed them and gave them a home, they didn't leave.

          Adam was more of a nervous wreck than everyone else, a servant's baby had suddenly died without reason. The servant was a very young girl, a child who shouldn't have to look after another child, and she suffered a terrible temper for a while before eventually offing herself with poison of all things. Why poison? Why endure the prolonged pain it brought as it slowly killed her? Everyone grieved for her, and yet another body was buried in the backyard with flowers decorating their headstones. Rainbows of petals brightening the gray material. 

              Dorothy would mutter things that didn't make any sense whenever someone asked if she was okay. She wore this dark look on her face a lot, a grim expression unfit for a twelve year old. She'd run off often as if she had an urgent meeting somewhere. Adam soon started hearing the voice. It was a young boy's, haunting and lilting, speaking to him in his worst moments when he was constantly glancing over his shoulder and wondering of the hidden secrets down in the darkness of the sewers.
          
          One day, Dorothy found Adam sobbing to himself in the grand music room on the second floor. He had been trying to recreate the piece his father played to him as a child with the golden gleaming harp, shortly after polishing all the expensive instruments. She stood there in the doorway, staring with a sense of guilt, and he silently avoided her gaze from his position on a mahogany stool. The man was ashamed to have the redhead see him in this state.

        "My father loved music." Servant A said after a while of nothing spoken between the two. He sniffled a bit, using a handkerchief from his breast pocket to wipe his nose. "Played all sorts of different instruments, he did. Whenever I was feeling glum, he'd play me my favorite pieces of his to make me chin up. I still aspire to be a musician to this day, I just need enough money to attend a proper school so that I may become a household name."

        He couldn't help what tumbled out his mouth next. "...I just might, if I ever finish my work here in this house..." Both of them knew what this implied. He wasn't sure if he'd live to see the day he didn't have to be a servant working day and night for a rich family.