InsaneJournal

Tweak says, "Tweak: the other white meat"

Maggie Jones (mother_maggie) wrote in haunted_roads,
@ 2008-07-27 15:59:00

Entry tags:

maggie, sophie

Week Twelve: Friday
Who: Maggie and Sophie
Where: Starting outside Sophie's school
When: Friday Afternoon

Time moved too fast sometimes. Other times it seemed to move too slowly. The years that Bastian had been gone had felt like she was stuck in molasses, dragging her feet through the motions of day to day life, trying her best to make Sophie happy but knowing that the girl missed her father and no amount of Maggie's actions could change that fact. The past few weeks though, they seemed to be on a lightening pace.

She couldn't keep up with it. Didn't know what to make of the immense changes that had come so quickly. All she could do was keep her feet moving and hope that she didn't stumble. She wasn't sure she could make it much longer without that stumble.

Extra shifts had been handed out to Maggie like they were candy, apparently there was a bit of a staff shortage too many pregnancy leaves all coming at the same time. Must have been something in the water. Maggie couldn't complain too much about the extra hours, money was always something that their family needed, especially trying to keep the bar up and going. Expenses never seemed to stop adding up. But the extra hours didn't help the situation at home.

She didn't like to think of it as a... situation, but she wasn't entirely sure what else to think of it as. A change in circumstance? A change in the way she had to view the world? Knowing that things... no beings she had never thought to be real were very much so... it fundamentally changed a great number of things. Almost too many things. Despite all that it did change there was one thing Maggie was determined not to let it change and that was their family. She prayed every night that it wouldn't, that they could somehow sort through it all and make sense of this new world. But she knew that prayer alone wasn't going ot manage it.

She had to make certain that it didn't. She knew that talking with Sophie was the only way and once that hurdle had been crossed a small amount of peace had settled into Maggie's heart. Things were far from simple and far from certain but it was the small things that were what mattered to Maggie. Knowing that Sophie had accepted this... change in the person that her father was meant a great deal to Maggie. It wasn't easy for her, it sure as hell wasn't easy on Bastian but knowing that Sophie was finding her own peace with the idea went a long way to curing those nervous motherly worries.

Of course that didn't last long with a teenager. The message that she'd received from Sophie that she wanted to talk had sent a whole new flurry of those through her. Overreacting... perhaps but it was one thing for the mother and daughter to talk another to receive the request (that she didn't put out first) from Sophie. The topic... a mystery. Left her mind entirely to wander which wasn't always the best thing despite the fact that Maggie trusted her daughter. She wouldn't be a mother if she didn't have the ability to think of the worst.

So even before the final bell rang at Sophie's school she had her old worn volvo parked directly in front of the school. She was waiting for the students to come spilling from the doors including her daughter.

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felonious_punk
2008-08-11 01:55 am UTC (link)

Maggie was a total freak like that when Sophie was behind the wheel. And she'd totally believed that maybe Maggie had done lost it, until she had the experience of riding with a friend that was an even worse driver than she was. After that she teased Maggie a lot less seeing as she'd done the exact same thing. Was instinct, pure and natural. Still, it just was weird, when she thought of it, Like... of course she knew stomping the floorboard was not going to do a damned thing to get the idiot in the driver seat to settle down.

But Sophie was sure she was a better driver than that girl had been. Maggie was just being Maggie's worrisome self.

She figured there were quite a few things that she hadn't completely screwed up, and that she even did well. She knew Maggie was proud about that, and might be proud of a lot more if Maggie had been more open about it. It was the things she just blew off altogether, and her attitude. Yeah, yeah... she knew all this. The same shit she got from her teachers, the counselors, and every single adult she knew. "Blah blah blah," they said. "Play the conformist game," was what they really meant. "Pick up your suit and tie here, drop off your soul to collect your first paycheck, and have a nice day Citizen 12877621487."

Was she the only one who saw the truth? Well no, not exactly. And that was why The Stepford Wives. Not that everyone they played to had the same ideals. Many of them were still conforming, just to a different machine was all.

Sheep. So many fucking sheep. And all all too happy to be that way.

"Yeah well..." She was buckling up again, slumping slightly. "Least I won't feel like I laid down for them. Most assholes are that way because no one ever stands up to them." She knew the type. Just like people in school stopped fucking with her when they realized she wasn't going to bend over for them.

Luckily, she still had the energy to exert all that anger. In fact, she felt like she still had plenty left to give.

She was ready to huff a bit, roll her eyes, and then Maggie gave in with some minor restrictions, and even a smile, and Sophie had no choice but to return it with a smile of her own. "I can already think of several that need to be reminded of that." Nevermind that it had nothing to do with what Maggie had intended, more just... Sophie thought they were pompous airheads with way too much muscle.

She kind of thought that might be the response, and so, she let it drop. Kind of late in her life to be giving her the guilt about how she was needed at home, even if she was. Sophie wasn't little anymore, after all, and that cookie-cutter life was way out of their reach. "Alright, I guess." She put her feet up on the dash and fiddled with a rip in her jeans. "School's school. So how was work?" She changed the subject, putting it right on Maggie. Let her talk about herself for a change. After all, wasn't it a more positive topic, given that she "enjoyed her work".

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