There was something about that sound of mania that pulled at Abigail, tugging at her to discover whatever it is. She could almost laugh at her own situation but she didn’t dare make a sound. Stray cave monsters grew hostile at noises and it was best to keep being silent as she went.

Exactly like my games, she thought to herself. Her strange situation matched to one of those hidden object games she liked to play wherein a detective follows a mysterious path to a circus, guided by the sound of merry laughter.

Excitement coursed through her veins the more she descended down the cave ladder. What was she doing? This was dangerous. She defeated slimes levels earlier and their blob splatters on her were giving her a slight singe. There was literal poison burning on her skin. It wasn’t that dangerous. But still. She should go back.

Although, she was really really close to finding out what sort of cave monster was making that odious laugh.

She released the rung of ladder she was holding onto, and made a 3-point landing on ground dirt, inspiring a flurry of black specks flying in the air. Her own flashlight that she belted to loop around her pant leg had only extended light to little much of her surroundings so she would have to walk to every nook and corner of this place to find that source of laughter. She was sure that this was the level where she had heard of it. She was sure as day.

“Well, well.” said a man who just stepped out of the shadows. It was her father, Pierre, wearing his usual cream-colored sweatshirt and brown loafers. “Abigail.” He growled her name in disgust, a disapproving frown curling at the sides of his mouth.

She flinched at his voice. There was something about his father. Every time she came into a room where he was, he would immediately voice his demands. Give out chores, hand out trivial labors and effectively keeping her out. Each time she would answer to his calls and fulfill those demands which are largely about house chores and store labor then after all that, he would go about treating her as if she was invisible again. As though her only value to him was her usefulness. Discarded the moment she fulfilled her duties. It’s the reason why she avoided him. The man who was supposed to be her father treated Abigail as a pair of hands like it was all she was good for. Anything else she did he would outright ignore. Her mom would try to compensate by giving her extra attention but honestly, Abigail can’t bring herself to admire a mother who chooses every day to be with Pierre whose attitude bore anything but respect to both of them.

The man simply terrified her mother. No more so to Abigail. All the color she wore on her outfit at a daily basis was an armor that reminded her she was her own person and that nobody can make her feel weak without her consent. But the hard look of her father was straight-up terrifying especially when it was directed at Abigail. It was the same look he would get whenever he starts counting the cash register at the end of a work day, a grim aura shutters over him and it seemed like he could just about snap at any moment. And that was the last thing her mother and Abigail wanted.

“D-dad?” The word left her in soundless breath, fear was a ball of emotion stuck in her throat.

Then he chuckled, a red menacing glint sparkling in his glasses. That was when she looked up to him, and up and up and up. She realized her butt was sitting on the dirt, her hands gripping on the ground for support. She felt weak and terrified. The claustrophobic intimacy of the darkened mines only adding to her panic.

The whistle! That’s right Alex gave her a whistle. The ex-quarterback can for sure make her dad think twice about hurting her. Because what Pierre valued above all else was reputation. That’s how he kept their shop above ground for so many years while in stiff competition against Joja mart. He would always whinge and complain about it to anyone with ears. The unfortunate situation was that he had a daughter, an entire family to keep providing food for at their table.

Playing the victim. Playing the underdog to pull at the heartstrings of simple townspeople. It was all an illusion, of course. When the front doors are closed, he becomes an overbearing commander who gets to decide what they can or can’t eat. And it was always the produce that was already past its expiry date. To him, she wasn’t a daughter or even a person for that matter. She was just a mouth to feed and an extra set of hands when necessary. To him, Abigail’s jilted feelings and destructive thoughts never mattered. To him, her only value was what she cost in relation to his business.

“What do we have here?” Rather forcefully, he stooped down and tugged her backpack free off her shoulders, leaving a painful abrasion on her arm. He towered over her, the measly flashlight hanging limply from her belt was illuminating his features in a harsh fluorescent light. Then he zipped down her pack, pushing it wide open with both hands.

Then came the change.

It came instantaneous.

Abigail had a hard habit of putting in dried fragrant wisteria in her pack’s pockets. She can’t get enough of it. The smell reminded her of wide open spaces in autumn. It reminded her of the lakes, of the sea, of the special Stardew sky and just about everything wonderful in life that made her feel good. Like a mythical talisman, the powerful wave of scent broke through her emotions, cutting through her fear. It gave her enough strength and sense to pull out the whistle in her pockets.

And to blow on it. Three times.

She needed a witness. A civilian presence that correlated to Pierre’s high social reputation. Because she wasn’t too keen to find out what will happen if he didn’t get hyperconscious about what his image would look like to his precious townspeople. She didn’t want to relive again in what Pierre will do if he wasn’t caught in the trappings of his social and public image.

Because behind closed doors, his dad becomes someone else entirely. And it was more terrifying than the cave monsters at night.