Cover for the ebook and paperback version of the first book
Tommy Taffy is a series of stories originally posted on the nosleep subreddit by author Elias Witherow. The series follows the title character, a strange doll-like being as he shows up to family homes and declares himself a part of the family. Claiming to be there to teach people to be better, Tommy is a very strict disciplinarian. You better follow his rules. Or else.
The first installment, Third Parent
, was posted to Reddit in 2016. Two prequels followed, as well as a sequel. Witherow has also released a novel featuring the character, also entitled The Third Parent, which is available in both paperback and ebook editions.
The series contains examples of these tropes:
- The Ageless: From 1969 to the present day, Tommy always looks exactly the same.
- Allegorical Character: Tommy can be seen as a metaphor for generational trauma and how children see their abusive parents. An abusive parent can appear sweet and kind to their child at moments, before suddenly changing their behavior to the point of being unrecognizable.
- Alien Blood: When Tommy is finally on the receiving end of a beatdown, he bleeds yellow.
- Berserk Button: Tommy has a few. Not listening to him will cause him to deliver a savage beating. Trying to get rid of him, either by involving the police or killing him, results in him murdering people, often in extremely gruesome ways.
- Bittersweet Ending: Tommy is dead, possibly for good, but so are Stephanie's husband and two children. Matt has to live forever with the knowledge that he killed the children, and the entire family (and countless other families) are scarred mentally and physically because of Tommy.
- Creepy Blue Eyes: Tommy's eyes are an unnaturally bright blue. Special attention is often drawn to them in the story.
- Depraved Bisexual: Not only does Tommy rape women and little girls, but he also gets a kick out of acting sexually inappropriate with little boys.
- Domestic Abuse: Tommy's specialty. He represents the dark shadow that physical and sexual abuse casts over families unfortunate enough to experience them.
- Eating Optional: While he joins families for dinner, Tommy is stated to never actually eat anything.
- Faux Affably Evil: Tommy rarely ever drops his friendly demeanor, even when threatening or hurting people. When he shows up to houses of people he'd previously "helped" as children, he will greet them as old friends.
- Humanoid Abomination: It's never made clear exactly what Tommy is. He vaguely resembles a man, but is stated to have impossibly smooth skin, a seamless white strip where his teeth should be, and a small bump for a nose.
- Karmic Death: After spending the entire series brutalizing and torturing people, Tommy finally receives a beatdown of his own at the hands of one of his former victims before being killed with a snapped neck.
- Kill It with Fire: Averted. In 1969, the townspeople try to get rid of Tommy this way, but it doesn't work. He comes back completely unscathed, but even more violent.
- Mind Rape: If parents attempt to get rid of Tommy in some way, either by trying to kill him or just demanding that he leave, he will begin to act in a sexually aggressive manner towards their children. It's implied that he does this because he knows he's pushed the parents to their limit and now just wants to see how far he can take things.
- Not So Invincible After All: As it turns out, Tommy needs the children in the families he inserts himself into. It isn't clear what purpose they serve for him, but if anything were to happen to them, Tommy will be able to be harmed.
- The Omnipresent: Tommy can be in multiple places at once. On one occasion during one of Tommy's lectures, Spence looks out the window and sees an identical Tommy giving a lecture at a neighbor's house.
- Slasher Smile: This seems to be Tommy's default expression.
- The Sociopath: Tommy's got all the makings of one. He tries to be charming and likable, flies into violent rages when angered, has no respect for people's personal boundaries, and enjoys playing sick mind games with the parents of the families he's forced himself into.
- The Thing That Would Not Leave: Tommy is a non-comedic example. He barges into homes and declares himself to be part of the family. Put up any resistance to this? He'll kick your ass. Try to get rid of him? He'll kill you. Involve the cops? He'll burn down the entire neighborhood. Tommy isn't going anywhere. He's staying whether you like it or not. The only ways to get rid of him are either to just put up with him for five years, after which he'll leave on his own, or to kill the family's children, which will allow you to hurt and kill him.
- Theme Twin Naming: Stephanie names her newborn twins Jack and Jill.
- Would Hurt a Child: Children are not safe from Tommy. He often behaves inappropriately towards them, such as by making siblings bathe together and touching them inappropriately. It's heavily implied that he raped Stephanie as a five-year-old, and years later he threatens to grind up her newborn son in a garbage disposal. One little girl who called the police on him got a mouthful of thumbtacks for her troubles, and Tommy also apparently mutilated her privates in some way, the details of which are not described.
