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Another Coraline: Chapter 3

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Chapter 3

It was hard to keep a bright face on before breakfast, especially on a day like this.  Dawn light was streaking the sky with vibrant color, but as far as Wybie's mood was concerned, it might as well have been raining.  Still, when Mr. Jones opened the front door, Wybie was relieved that he'd made the effort. Shadows like bruises darkened the bags under Coraline's father's eyes-he looked like he hadn't slept at all.

"Oh," he mumbled, rubbing at his stubbly chin with one hand. "Morning, Wybie."

"Morning, Mr. Jones," Wybie said, and because it seemed like the only thing to ask, "Any sign of her?"

Mr. Jones' drooping mouth firmed up a bit. "Not yet, but we're hoping. Did you spot anything in the woods?"

Wybie started to answer, then hesitated. "Uh…nothing yet, no," he said. "Sorry. I'm going to look again today, though!"

Mr. Jones sighed. "You know, from what the police are saying, you're as close to the right track as anybody. We had a look at her things, and all we could find missing were her pajamas and her rubber boots, so she might have gone out for a walk and got…sidetracked."

Wybie gulped. "Sidetracked?" he said, a little helplessly.  The word had never sounded quite so alarming.

"Something like that," Mr. Jones said, rubbing his temples absently with the fingertips of one hand.  Wybie's head was starting to ache in sympathy. "Coffee?"

Wybie gulped. "Uh…no, thanks, I…just had breakfast? Anyway, Grandma says that caffeine early in the morning can build a dependency…"

"It's all right, kiddo," Mr. Jones said, with a wan chuckle. "I know it's awful stuff, but it's…familiar."

He glanced over at the coat rack, and Wybie realized with a dull, sore turn of his stomach that Coraline's father was probably staring at the yellow rain slicker hanging at one end. It drew at his gaze, too, with its sunny color and the quiet emptiness of its dangling sleeves.

Wybie cleared his throat. "I…should probably get searching again." He wondered briefly if he could get away with asking to have a look in their living room, but…if that was where she'd gone, the other-her would have known, wouldn't she?

"And I have phone calls to make," Mr. Jones agreed, with another sigh. "Be careful out there, all right? The last thing we need here is a vanishing epidemic."  He managed a rueful smile. "Anyway, if our wayward girl hasn't turned up by tomorrow, the police are putting on a full search-and that'll include the woods. Don't be a hero, okay?"

He gave Wybie a friendly pat on the back. Wybie gulped, and laughed nervously.

"Y-yeah, I'll…try, uh, that," he said. "Good luck today, Mr. Jones!"

He turned and hurried down the steps.

Leaning on the doorframe, Mr. Jones watched him go, and shook his head. Was that really the little boy who'd wolfed his batches of organic lemon bars all through middle school? College was looming in his future, too; at least, Mr. Jones hoped so. That boy was too gifted to spend his life tinkering around on other people's vehicles.  Still, there was no sense pushing him about it, and risking scaring him off. That was his grandmother's job.

And ours, Mr. Jones thought wistfully, is to remember not to do the same thing to our own little girl. When she comes back to us.

"Good luck," he murmured, and wondered who exactly he meant it for.  All of us, he decided after a moment, and headed for the phone, letting the door swing shut behind him.



The grass swished softly as Wybie walked through the forest.

"She took her swampers, but nothing else," he muttered, twisting at a stick to keep his hands busy. He always thought better when he was doing something. "That means she expected bad terrain, not a ride in somebody's car."

He snapped the stick in half, looking at the two halves. "So either I'm right, and she's here in the woods…or maybe she was planning to walk into town," he added, remembering seeing her muddy boots approaching from under that car at Bard's. His eyes flicked from one stick to the other, wondering whether he was wasting his time…and hers…on this hunch.

"Hello, Wybie."

Wybie let out an unmanly shriek, whirling around and raising the broken halves of the stick high…

And the other Coraline started to giggle, linking her hands shyly behind her back.

"Oh," Wybie said, and relaxed. He dropped the scrawny sticks. "Geez, you scared me! You can't just sneak up on people and…hey!" A grin spread across his face as realization dawned. "You said two words! That's great!"

The other Coraline tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "I'm growing," she said.

"Oh." He blinked. "Oh, yeah, that reminds me!" Wybie reached into his hoodie pocket and pulled out a crumpled silver packet. "I brought you this," he said, offering it to her. "I thought maybe you might have trouble finding food out here…"

She pushed the packet away, shaking her head. "No, thanks."

"Okay, so it's not really food, exactly," he admitted. "I dunno if toaster tarts qualify, but it's, uh…it's got all kinds of vitamins and stuff, and…you can eat it, I swear."

He held it out again, and she smiled. "You're funny," she said, but didn't take it.

"What, don't you eat?" Wybie said. "You can starve to death in ten days, you know, I read it somewhere…"

"It's okay," she said, taking the packet out of his hands, and gently tucking it back into the front pocket of his hoodie. "You're sweet," she added, and gave the pocket a little pat, smiling up at him. Wybie gulped, and went very still.

"Uh…" he managed.

She held out her hand. "Come on!"

"Oh, uh…right," Wybie said. He gave his head a little shake and put his hand in hers. He'd only taken a few steps, though, when something wove between his ankles and he stumbled. "Ah-!"

The something extricated itself from his boots with a squalling noise, then settled itself on its skinny haunches and began disdainfully setting its fur back in order with tongue and paws. Wybie's face lit up, and he let go of the other Coraline's hand to crouch next to his not-quite-pet.

"Hey! I haven't seen you around here in ages…well, days," he corrected himself, and gave the cat a scratch between the ears. It gave him a wearily indulgent look and stopped washing to allow for better scratching. "Where've you been, anyway?"

It blinked calmly at him, looking for all the world as if it were about to explain. Then it spotted something behind him and leapt to its feet with its ears laid flat, making a high furious sound like a punctured tire.

Wybie started, then realized the problem and started to laugh. The other Coraline was kneeling next to him, looking perplexed.

"Whoa, calm down, already," he said to the cat. Its mangy black fur was completely on end, giving its body the look of a spiky pine cone with legs. "Stay there for a second, okay?" he told his companion. "He's never bitten me, but I can't vouch for anybody else."

That said, he waddled a little closer, still crouching, and tried to smooth down the cat's hackles; the fur crackled electrically under his fingers. Its eyes were pinned accusingly to the other Coraline's face, and it opened its mouth and hissed.

"Stop that," he chided. "I know the buttons are a little weird, but she's just the other Coraline. She's here to help." Turning back to her, he added ruefully, "Other Coraline, this…is the cat."

"Your cat?" she asked.

"Nah," he admitted. "Just a cat. He kind of adopted me when I was eight or so. I don't really know how old he is, but he's gotta be over a hundred in cat years by now…"

She nodded, then reached out a hand towards it. The cat backed away, gargling low in its throat with its teeth bared.

"I'm really sorry," Wybie said, and gave the cat a frown. "Relax, would you? She's nice, I promise."

It gave him a withering look, and then turned and trotted off back towards the Palace. Wybie shrugged.

"I don't know what's wrong with him," he said. "He loves Coraline."

"It's okay," she said, and took his hand again. "Let's go?"

Wybie nodded, and followed her into the woods.

  

The cold was bearable. The fear of something waiting in the dark was fading with every hour she spent so obviously alone. But what was driving her batty, Coraline realized as she drifted awake after another brief, fitful spell of sleep, was the darkness itself.

There was no time here. No daylight, no moonlight. No clues to what had become of the hand. No way to tell how long she'd been trapped in this place, except the increasing gnawing in her stomach…

Coraline shivered, wrapping her arms more tightly around her good knee.

"Hello?" she called up, fruitlessly. Sooner or later, somebody had to be listening, right? That, or her voice would give out.

"Or I could starve to death," she muttered, thinking longingly of Mrs. Lovat's steaming baked oatmeal with raisins, right out of the oven…or even her dad's standard bowl of granola with soy milk and those awful bits of dried fruit that stuck in your molars.

She leaned back on her hands and stared up into nothing. "Hello?" she tried again. "If anybody's up there, I'd really appreciate it if-"

A spatter of falling dirt struck her cheek.

"Ow! Hey!" Coraline flinched, and sat up straight. Her half-numb leg twinged again, but she ignored it, staring intently overhead.

A soft scuffling sound echoed down the long shaft of the well, and more fragments of earth dropped into the water with tiny splashes. Coraline caught her breath. Someone was digging!

"Hello?" she shouted, gleeful. "Hey, it's me! It's Coraline!"

High above, in the darkness, a tiny golden star came to light. Coraline breathed a sign of relief. That had to be the knothole. It was daytime-the thought was comforting.

"Hey!" she cried.

Something meowed.

Coraline's face fell. "Oh, god," she whispered. "Please be with Wybie, please…"

Another little rain of pebbles fell, and the light vanished as if something was poking its nose inside. The meow came again, louder this time, and Coraline groaned.

"No-o-! Not the cat, come on!"

The nose withdrew, and the little ray of light returned. Coraline listened hard, but it was impossible to hear the sound of the cat's footfalls from where she sat.

"Wait!" she cried, dread congealing in her stomach. "Don't leave me alone down here! I'm sorry, I was just…hoping you were somebody who could get me out of here!"

There was a pause. Coraline held her breath.

Then, reluctantly, there came another soft mew.

"Oh, thank god," Coraline breathed, rubbing a hand across her brow. "Okay, cat. I don't suppose you could go and get Wybie for me?"

Something blocked a bit of the light from the hole. Coraline couldn't tell if it was an ear or a tail or what, but it was wagging from side to side, making the sunlight flash and flicker.

"Is that a yes or a no?" she called, then groaned in frustration. "What am I saying? How are you supposed to tell me?"

She let her head fall forward onto her folded arms. After a moment, the cat meowed again, and something in the sound seemed sympathetic. That, or she was just clutching at straws. Coraline sighed, and nestled her cheek against the wet sweater sleeve to warm it up a little.

"Well, I'm glad somebody's here, anyway," she mumbled. "It's better than being down here alone."

The cat made a companionable noise, somewhere between a mew and a purr. A few grains of dust floated down, as bright as sparks in the little column of light.

"Are you getting settled up there or what?" she asked.

He mewed once more, this time sounding almost like a terse scolding-what else did she expect?-and fell silent.

For the first time in long, trackless hours, Coraline Jones smiled.



"Wybie, look!"

Straightening up from his crouch, Wybie abandoned the dead grass he'd been searching for tracks and shaded his eyes with his hand. The weather today was beautiful, more like summer than spring, and his searching partner had been wandering off to chase every bright and shiny thing they found along their way.

At the moment, she was following after a dipping, dodging white butterfly, snatching at it with both hands. As he watched, laughing, she jumped and caught it in her cupped fingers.

"Nice catch!" he couldn't help exclaiming. She smiled and held out her hands. He could see the snowy wings of the trapped butterfly beating wildly against her fingers.

"It's beautiful," she murmured, sidling up next to him to show it off.

Well. Maybe she wasn't that different from the Coraline he knew. Wybie had no trouble imagining this girl spinning out into the rain in a yellow slicker, laughing.

She sighed, still looking at her catch, and leaned her head on his shoulder.

Wybie froze. Her hair was soft, and it tickled his neck.

"Uh…yeah!" he exclaimed, taking a step left so that she had to straighten up quickly or lose her balance. "It's a...it's a great butterfly. Um…we really should be searching for Coraline, though."

The other Coraline pouted. Her hands started to close into unhappy fists as she lowered them, and Wybie grabbed her wrists.

"Careful, you'll kill it!" he cried. Slugs and beetles could take plenty of abuse, but butterflies were like fancy living Kleenex, and his grandma had given him holy hell the one time she caught him trying to pin one to a card. "Here."

He cupped the girl's hands in his own and pried them open. The butterfly sat peaceably on their linked fingers for a moment, shaking its wings back into place, then darted into the air and disappeared up over the treetops.

Wybie tilted his face up to the sun and watched until the little bug had fluttered out of sight. When he lowered his chin again, the other Coraline was nose to nose with him, her blank button eyes close to his.

"Ahh!" He let go of her hands and took a hasty step back, then gulped. "Uh…look, today was fun and everything, but we're wasting time," he pointed out. "We haven't got much daylight left, and if we don't find her tonight, they're going to search the woods with dogs and cops and flashlights and all kinds of-"

"Wybie, shh." She pressed a finger to her smiling lips. "I'll hide."

He sighed. "I know you'll be fine. I just…I'm scared for her. Either she's going to be in a lot of trouble when they find her…or she's in a lot of trouble right now."

He clenched his gloved hands into fists. "What if she's hurt? What if she had an accident, or something, and she's…lying under a bush somewhere and we walked right past her? I mean, just look at you! Her hair would blend right in!" He tugged at his own in frustration, making two frizzy handfuls stand up. "She could be right under my nose and I'd never…"

The other Coraline tugged at a lock of her own hair, and suddenly it wasn't green anymore. It was a brilliant shade of orange.

Wybie yelped, startled clean off his train of thought. "Wha-! How did you…?"

He craned his neck this way and that, peering at the sides and back of her head. Every hair seemed to have changed color. "That's…that's crazy!"

She giggled, and tugged the same strand again. Her hair flashed brilliant blue, then pale green like a leaf in the sun.

Wybie whistled. "You have got to teach Jonesy that trick. She keeps frying hers at home in the sink and-augh!"

He flinched away in instinctive horror. Of the many colors Coraline's head had phased through over seven years of abusing the dye bottle, shocking pink was one of the few he couldn't remember.

"Geez! Change it back, quick, she'd kill me if…wow."

The other Coraline brushed a strand of perfectly ordinary brown hair out of her button eyes.

Wybie stared. "Okay, that's just weird."

A faint call echoed through the air, and they both turned to look up the hill. The words were impossible to make out, but the clanging cowbell was deeply familiar. Wybie groaned. "Grandma."

The other Coraline sighed, and suddenly her hair was green again, as if it had never changed. "Don't go?" she said.

"I have to," Wybie admitted. "She probably needs help with something. Can you keep out of sight, if they show up tomorrow for a real search? I…don't think it'd be good if they found you."

She nodded, solemnly. "Totally invisible."

"Good," Wybie said, and patted her shoulder. She beamed at him, and he felt his cheeks flush.

"Uh…bye," he said, flustered, and quickly turned and headed up the hill.  A twig snapped behind him.  He glanced over his shoulder.

The other Coraline was following close behind him, calmly picking her way through the long grass.

He stopped, and she stopped, too.

"Um," he said.  "You…do know you can't go to the top of the hill, right?  They'll see you."

For a moment, he could have sworn a look like frustration flickered across her blank-eyed face.  Then it was gone, replaced with another sweet smile.  "Your bike," she said.

"Oh," Wybie said.  "You want to see me off?"

She nodded, eagerly.  Wybie sighed and went back to tramping along.

Halfway up the hill, he felt her hand slip into his. Her fingers felt cool and dry, even through his gloves. Wybie blushed, but kept his gaze straight ahead, stubbornly pushing his way through the dry branches. Their linked hands swung between them as they walked; the sun beat down on their heads, warm and golden.

They reached the top of the hill and he spotted his bike, parked against the prickly bark of a fir. The red paint glistened in the sun.

The paint job had taken three weekends. Coraline had passed him the brushes and the cans, while they went through boxes of moon pies and quarts of orange drink. She'd told him he was a goober for putting tiger stripes on a dirt bike and then helped outline the pattern with magic marker…

Wybie flinched, and dropped the other Coraline's hand as if her fingers were made of hot glass. She gave him a look that managed to be startled and wounded at the same time.

"Look, I'm sorry, but…" What was he playing at, anyway? He gulped, taking a step back. "I really gotta…"

"Wybie," she whispered, her button eyes intent on his, "shh."

He took another step back, but she stepped forward, following him as he edged away, foot for foot and nose to nose. Wybie realized what she was about to do, just in time to stop short in dismay.

And then she leaned across the gap between them, and kissed him.  Her lips against his were just as cold as her fingers.

"W-whoaa!" Wybie struggled loose, grabbing her arms and shoving her away. "Whoa, whoa! Hang on-"

She looked puzzled. He realized he was still gripping her wrists and quickly let go.

"What's wrong?" she said, and reached for him again. Wybie nearly tripped over his bike in his haste to back away.

"Look," he said, holding up his hands. "I'm sure you're a very nice, uh…button girl, and…but…you can't just go around kissing random guys out of nowhere! Okay? It's...it's kind of creepy."

"I'm creepy?" If buttons could cry, hers would be filling with tears. Wybie felt a stab of guilt.

"Well, no, not really, but…I mean, you, uh, you have…" He gestured to his face, lamely.

She touched a fingertip to each of his cheeks, just under his eyes, and smiled.

"My buttons?"

Wybie shoved her hands away, frustrated. Her moods were swinging like someone flipping a switch. "Look, would you just…stop touching me for five seconds? We've got more important things to worry about right now. We have to find Jonesy, and then we-"

"Who's Jonesy?" she said, sweetly.

"Coraline!" Wybie was rapidly running to the end of his patience. "You know, my best friend! The other you! The girl we've been combing the woods for all…all weekend…"

His anger faltered suddenly. Come to think of it, they'd done a lot of poking absently around under bushes, finding frogs and bugs and searching the stream beds for footprints, but very little actual searching. Every other minute, his so-called searching partner had come up with another frog or a game or a shiny stone…

The other Coraline was playfully walking her fingertips up his sleeve. Wybie squawked and grabbed her by the shoulders, holding her at arm's length.

"God! Okay! Okay." He took a deep breath, and gave her shoulders a squeeze. "You, stay right there and…and think about respecting other people's personal bubbles. I," he declared, throwing one leg over his bike, "am going home."

She caught at his sleeve, stopping him.

"But…tomorrow?"

Wybie made a face. This was getting too weird. "If I come back, no more touchy stuff, got it?"

She nodded. "No more."

"Fine." He was in too much of a hurry to make nice-instead, he kicked his bike into gear, and it rumbled to life under him. "Stay out of sight!" he shouted over the sputtering roar, and shot off towards the main road, swerving wildly around trees and bushes.

It was too dangerous to look over his shoulder with so many branches waiting to sweep him off his bike. But when he reached the road, he braked for a second and looked back. She was still standing exactly where he'd left her, a tiny figure far away among the trees. He could just see the pale dot of her face, uplifted, watching him go.

A shiver ran up Wybie's spine. He shut his eyes for a second, then gunned the motor and sped off down the road and away.

"See you soon," the other Coraline whispered to the waiting woods.
: prologue : [link]
: chapter 1 : [link]
: chapter 2 : [link]
: chapter 3 : ----
: chapter 4 : [link]
: chapter 5 : [link]
: epilogue : [link]


Keep your buttons peeled for the next chapter of Another Coraline on February 25th!
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LarioLario54321's avatar
OH NO!!!! I KNEW IT; I Knew Other Coraline was really HER!!

P.S. Those of you who Watched the Movie AND/OR Read the Original Novel by Neil Gaiman would know e-x-a-c-t-l-y who SHE is!!