(mary) francine goldstein (francen) wrote in disorderic, @ 2017-11-13 16:11:00 |
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Entry tags: | mary francine goldstein |
WHO: Francine Goldstein and surprise guests!
WHAT: A Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
WHEN: November 13, 2017
WHERE: Knockturn and then wherever I said her parents' house was
WARNINGS: Super self-indulgence??????????????
Already ten minutes late to meeting Tobias for her pickpocketing lesson, Francine almost didn't go home. She'd debated with herself about the need to do so, but decided that the clothes she was wearing just didn't suit a pickpocketer. That was one of Tobias' first lessons. He'd understand why she was late. But she still hurried inside. Although she'd never seen Tobias do anything but sit around and steal other people's things, she didn't want to waste his time. It'd been hard enough to convince him to mentor her in the first place. Francine was nothing if not persistent. Flinging open her closet doors, she pulled one of her boring shirts out and flung it onto her bed. Before she could retrieve it, she stopped short at the figure on the ground, looking just as she had on the day she'd last seen her. "M—Mum?" Her voice cracked. It didn't make sense, but she was there and it was exactly as she remembered her. The same short hair and the same mole just above the corner of her mouth. She even had the same earrings on. Except she was lying still and she wasn't breathing. Francine dropped down and inched slowly closer, her breath caught in her throat. "You can't — you can't be here." There was no response. "You're not here," she said, louder this time, a counter to the way the panic had paralyzed her. "Because — because you're —" Francine reached a hand out, tentatively, touching her mum's — or whoever, whatever — shoulder. It was solid and cold. "You're not —" She fell back suddenly, eyes wide as she couldn't tear her eyes away. There was no way her mum would be here, because she wasn't supposed to be, and there was no way she was dead because she was still alive, and they would've let her know, because they would've wanted to gloat about it and — It couldn't be her. Francine ran as fast she could. It took her ten minutes to focus on her destination, but she finally did. Arriving just inside of her family's house, she took a deep breath and steadied herself. It wasn't real, she reminded herself. It couldn't be. There. She breathed in, then out, and repeated the process. It was okay now, because that wasn't real and she was safe here. Danny was home. She saw his shoes and could hear his voice, but even if she hadn’t noticed these details, she wasn’t surprised. Danny was always home these days. “I’m home!” She yelled, flinging her coat onto the couch as she passed it. It didn’t occur to her that her dad was asleep — but then again, he was always asleep these days too. She quieted her steps as an apology for her volume, but as always, hurried past the chair that she’d always called her mum’s chair. Her brother was in the kitchen, sat at the table, poring over some boring looking documents. Francine didn’t need to know what they were; anything Danny had was bound to be boring. He barely looked up when she bounded in, sweeping past him to fling open the fridge. “Why is there nothing here?” Francine demanded, looking over her shoulder expectantly at Danny. He finally looked up over his glasses and blinked at her. “I haven’t done this week’s shopping yet,” he answered, turning back to his papers. She scoffed and rummaged through the fridge again, as if a second look through would yield something new suddenly. “Maybe you should stop looking at whatever you’re looking at and do it then,” she suggested, a bite to her voice. “I’ll do it later. Order something if you want.” Francine slammed the fridge door shut. “I didn’t come home to order something.” “Then I’m not sure why you’re home,” Danny said. “It’s not as if you haven’t seen Dad in weeks — oh wait...” “Dad’s asleep.” Her hand was clutched around the handle, the grip tighter than it’d been before. “You certainly don’t have any qualms about interrupting anything else,” Danny pointed out, but in true Danny fashion, it was bland, delivered without any hint of emotion behind it. Francine took offense anyways. “What kind of person would I be if I just woke Dad up like that?” “Someone who wants to visit her dad, I would expect.” "I'll come by when he's awake," she said, with a glare. "He's always asleep." "Not everyone can be as energetic as you," Danny said blandly, making a note of something while he did. She heard the dig anyways. Crossing her arms, she stomped over, pulling the paper from under his pen, leaving a long line on the paper. Even that only induced a sigh from him. "It's not nice to be doing something else while someone's trying to have a conversation with you." "Give that back." "No." Danny pinched the bridge of his nose and took his glasses off. "Francine, give me that." "No," she repeated defiantly. "I want to talk to you without you being distracted by something stupid." "It's not something stupid. It's a budget." "Oh my god," she said, rolling her eyes. "You don't need to look at it this instant." "Just give it back to me." A fleeting pause, and then, "Please, Francine." "No, you won't listen to me otherwise." His jaw clenched in annoyance. "I'm a good multi-tasker, Fran. I can listen and write at the same time." "But I don't want you to be writing right now." "You can't have everything you want, Francine," Danny said. "I don't want to be here doing this, but I am. Maybe you stop doing everything you just want to and start thinking beyond that." There was no trace of the mild-mannered brother that she knew, that she sometimes hated, in his words. He was frustrated, or he was angry, and he was frustrated or angry at Francine. "I'm sorry, did I do something to you? Because I definitely didn't come here for you to just start shouting at me for something I didn't do but you're going to blame on me anyways." "No, you just came here to get something to eat and ignore Dad, like always." "That's not even true," she retorted, "I came here to see him! It's not my fault he's —" "Nothing's ever your fault, Francine." "What part of Dad being too sad to see anyone is my fault?" Francine asked, disbelief making her words sound more demanding than usual. If Danny was going to accuse her of all sorts of things, then she deserved a chance to defend herself. "You know that's not what I meant." "That's not what I heard." "That's because you twist things around so you're never doing anything wrong." "Oh, that's —" "It's true. Don't deny it." "I'm going to because it's wrong." She didn't think she never did anything wrong, but she clearly hadn't done anything wrong in this case. This was about Danny and how he was just annoyed that he was spending his time making a budget. "What's actually wrong is that you're never around and you never call Dad and you're, what, shouting on the Winternet instead?" Francine floundered for an explanation. What she settled with was weak. "I'm busy a lot and it's not shouting. I can't let them win." "They've already won." Danny looked exasperated. Well, she was exasperated with him. "Of course you'd say that. You hate putting effort into anything that isn't related to numbers." "And you're going to get us killed." "Shut up, Daniel," she bit out, crumpling the piece of paper in her hand. "Sounds more like something you need to learn how to do." "That's what they want me to do." "And they're right." She gaped at him, eyes blinking rapidly, heart beating to the fury that was animating her. "How can you say that? You can't believe that. That'd mean —" "I don't believe they're right about what matters — but I'm not going to disagree with them about this," he explained, a pointed look aimed right at her. There was a long silence. Then, before she could stop herself, "Mum wouldn't agree." "Mum's gone," he said, his mouth set in a thin line. Briefly, the image of her mother's lifeless body came to mind. "Don't say that," she said, immediately, shakily. "She's okay and —" "I didn't mean it like that." "I don't care." "Francine —" "I'm leaving." She threw the ball of paper at him and barely registered Danny's flinch before she turned around and stormed out of the kitchen, grabbed her coat, and — unnecessarily — slammed the door behind her. That had to have woken her dad up, but she didn't care. If he was still awake later, she'd come back, but she wasn't about to spend another minute with Danny. |