search within (searchwithin) wrote in shadows_rpg, @ 2018-05-21 10:55:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | #october 2017, brianna, brianna x ophelia, ophelia |
Who: Brianna and Ophelia
When: After school, Wednesday, October 25th
Where: Home, Sebastian’s room, the kitchen
Status: Complete
James hadn’t been able to find any magical traces in Sebastian’s leather bracelet that he had bought the festival, so Brianna had allowed him to keep it. She still wasn’t pleased that he’d attended the festival, even with Greg, but she knew she would come across as irrational and nagging if she kept sniping at him about it. James had told her to ‘let it go’, and Brianna had, begrudgingly. But… today she was sitting in her home office, working on some new listings when a terrible nagging feeling tugged within her. What if Sebastian had been lying to her? What if he bought crystals or an athame? He was seventeen now, and Brianna understood how much of a pull magic had on someone with the gift. Maybe he had just bought a book on magic and considered it to be innocent curiosity?
Brianna sat in her chair for a long time, staring out the large window overlooking the front yard. The last time she had gone through Sebastian’s room he had been fifteen and she had heard from a few of the other mothers that their kids, Sebastian’s friends, had been caught with cigarettes. It was a filthy habit and she had searched high and low in his bedroom for any sign that he had taken up smoking. Brianna hadn’t found anything, thankfully. Because Sebastian was a good kid. He knew better than to destroy his body with nicotine. And she trusted him. Wasn’t that the important thing?
She waffled over this for several more minutes before finally standing and leaving her office to head down the hall toward Sebastian’s room. School was over, but he would be at football practice for a couple more hours, so she cautiously opened his door and peered inside. It was like she expected to find an altar right there on his dresser. Brianna stepped inside and began to look around, glancing over his desk and dresser, his nightstands. The room was neat enough for a teenage boy, and there didn’t seem to be anything out of place. That didn’t stop her from opening his closet to look through some things on the top shelf. Nothing.
Brianna started working a bit faster, as if something was telling her to keep looking because there was something hiding. Something Sebastian was keeping from her. She tugged open his dresser drawers, but was careful not to disturb too much as she moved his socks and underwear. Nothing.
Breathing heavily now, Brianna stood in the middle of the bedroom, her hands on her hips as she looked around. What was she missing? Her eyes ticked down to the bed, or rather, under the bed. Licking her lips, Brianna walked over and got down on her knees to peer underneath. Nothing out of the ordinary, but for a shoebox. Oh, gods. No way were there shoes in there.
Brianna sucked in a breath and got down onto her belly to shimmy beneath the bed, her legs still sticking out as she reached for the box. It was dark and musty under there - she really needed to remind Sebastian to vacuum - and Brianna tugged the lid off, not even bothering to come out from under the frame. She hadn’t really known what she expected to find, but condoms and a bottle of lubrication was not it. And yet, that’s what she dumped onto the dark floor in front of her.
Ophelia came home practically floating. She’d had lunch with Greg. All to herself. And it had gone well! Which was crazy, but he hadn’t laughed at her and called her lame or anything, and he’d smiled at her a lot, and that had just made the rest of the day fucking fantastic. She stepped off the bus in her neighborhood and walked home feeling lighter than air with her headphones in and her music up loud. She walked in the house, not bothering to yell a hello to anyone -- her dad was probably still at work, Bash had practice, and her mom didn’t like to be disturbed -- just heading for the stairs. Ophelia bounced lightly up them.
The path to her room took her past Sebastian’s door, and she noted it was open. It usually wasn’t, because teenagers, but this time it was. She spotted her mother’s butt and legs sticking out from under Sebastian’s bed and Ophelia stopped short. She pulled her earbuds out, worry spiking through her first and foremost. “Mom?” she asked with concern, stepping into the doorway.
Ophelia's voice startled Brianna and she lifted her head a bit too high, knocking it against the wooden slats of Sebastian's bed. Cursing, Brianna grimaced and then quickly shoved the condoms and lube back into the shoebox. It took her two tries to get the lid back on and she left it where she found it as she scooted out from beneath the bed. "Phee, you scared me to death," Brianna breathed, lifting her hand to touch where she bumped her head. She tried to look accusatory, but there was a bit of embarrassment and guilt mixed in there, her pale face pink with it. Yes, she was going through her son's things, but this was her house, and if it was in her house, it was technically hers. That sounded right enough. "I didn't realize you were home," she said, reaching for the bed to use it as leverage as she got to her feet.
Okay at least she wasn’t dead or unconscious or something halfway under the bed or whatever had worried Ophelia for a quick second. She pressed her lips together at her mother’s cursing and arched an eyebrow at her once she was finally free of the bed. Caught red handed and she knew it. She was going to have to warn Bash. “I just got here,” she told her mother, watching her get up. She didn’t feel inclined to apologize for scaring her, since she’d been doing something that wasn’t cool in the first place. Sebastian was almost eighteen, he deserved privacy, for fuck’s sake. “Looking for something specific?” It came out a little more snarky than intended, but Jesus, did Brianna hunt for stuff under her bed too? Not that Ophelia had anything to hide, really, not yet. She’d been keeping magic notes on her phone and laptop, but all of that was password protected.
Brianna rested her hands on her hips, unamused by Ophelia's tone. It wouldn't do any good to deny what she had been caught doing. Ophelia wasn't going to believe her if she said she had been cleaning, given Brianna generally hired a cleaning service to come in and do that kind of work. Still, she shouldn't have to explain herself to her sixteen year old daughter. "Bastian has been acting strange the last couple of weeks," Brianna said after a moment, sounding defensive because she felt defensive. "I was worried he might have gotten involved in something that could potentially be dangerous. Is that a problem?"
Ophelia’s heart gave that unpleasant squeeze that always came with that tone from her mother, the one that said she was about to be In Trouble. She hated being In Trouble. Still, it was kind of fucked up to catch Brianna invading her big brother’s privacy like that, when he wasn’t home to do anything about it. Ophelia happened to know the couple of reasons why Sebastian was acting ‘strange,’ but none of them were anything their parents should know. “No,” she mumbled, disgruntled at herself for not having the balls to stand up to their mother on Bash’s behalf. “Just kinda messed up, is all.” She turned to head down the hall to her room, her cheeks flushed with irritation.
Brows drawn together with her own irritation, Brianna walked to Sebastian's door where her daughter had disappeared. "Ophelia," she said sharply as she stepped out into the hallway. "I'm your mother, and this is my house, and so whatever happens under this roof is my business, especially if it's something that could cause either of you harm. I don't need the attitude on top of that, please." Oh yes, she knew Ophelia would tell Sebastian she had found Brianna in his room, but that didn't worry Brianna. If Sebastian had issue with it, he could come talk to her himself. They were still teenagers, not adults, and Brianna firmly believed that she knew best, especially in matters of magic.
The edge to her mother’s voice made her skin crawl a bit, but aggravation outweighed it, and Ophelia rolled her eyes at her own bedroom door as she kept walking. “Okay, Mom,” she said, unable to keep the exasperation out of her voice. Why did parents always throw that ‘it’s my house’ bullshit out, like they had any other choice of where to live? It was like they didn’t even deserve to be treated like real people until they moved out, it was fucked up. “He’s not even doing anything.” The defense of her brother came out before she could stop it, even though she knew it would just serve to aggravate her mother some more. Ophelia knew he was doing things she wouldn’t approve of, but so was she, so they had to have one another’s backs.
Brianna squinted at Ophelia's back curiously. How would she know what Sebastian was or wasn't up to? "Phee, come here," she said, the motherly irritation gone from her tone. But, oh how she hated it when she was talking to her kids and they started walking away from her. Her own mother would have locked her in her room for a week if she'd shown that kind of disrespect. "Something is going on with Sebastian. Do you know something?" Brianna doubted that if she did, she would tell Bri, but Brianna was good at reading her children and they were both terrible at keeping the blood from rushing to their face when they were experiencing a particularly strong emotion.
Ugh, dammit. Brianna didn’t sound annoyed with her anymore, but that wasn’t always a better sign. Ophelia turned back around, though she let her backpack slip off of her shoulders so she could thunk it down near her door. She took a few more steps down the hallway back toward Sebastian’s room, then stopped, crossing her arms over her stomach. “No, he seems fine to me,” she said, which wasn’t a total lie. Sebastian was stressed about being gay and all, but excited about Hunter and excited about learning magic from Reagan Kelly and everything else good that was going on. But Ophelia knew better than to think she could share either of those things with their parents. “Why are you all suspicious?”
Studying Ophelia closely, Brianna searched for any of the tell tale signs that her daughter was lying. It made sense for siblings to want to protect each other, so she didn't really expect Ophelia to be honest. "A mother knows when something is off," Brianna said simply, glancing back in Sebastian's room before she reached in to grab the door knob and close it. "Believe it or not I don't spend my time searching for things to get angry about. I just want the both of you to be safe." And at least if Sebastian was sexually active, which it was quite obvious that he was, he was being careful about it. Honestly, sex was the least of Brianna's concerns when it came to her kids. Magic was so much more dangerous.
That sounded like a bullshit excuse to Phee, but she resisted rolling her eyes. Granted, she wasn’t a mother, she didn’t know for sure, but she didn’t want to think that her parents could just sense things. It made her worry a bit for Sebastian and herself though. They’d been doing little bits of magic here and there at home, what if their parents had some kind of detector set up? Like they could tell when magic was being used? But Phee had been magic-ing her plants for a while now and nothing had happened, so ... maybe they were just watching Bash? Or Brianna had picked up on the gay thing? Ophelia didn’t know, but she wanted to warn her brother to be extra careful. “We’re fine, Mom,” she said, trying to sound reassuring about it. “Bash is just ... being a seventeen year old boy, he’s still like, perfect golden child.”
"Nobody's perfect," Brianna murmured, studying Sebastian's door before she sighed and turned her attention back to Ophelia. Was she telling the truth? Maybe it was just hormonal boy things. Maybe he had a new girlfriend he was keeping a secret for now. She wasn't thrilled about the idea of her son having sex under her roof, but if he was being careful... Brianna reached out to brush some of Phee's hair back from her face. "Did you two have any friends over this weekend?" she asked, aware that Greg had been there, because Sebastian told her, but Greg was around so often he didn't really count, if you asked her.
Sure, nobody was perfect, but Sebastian was as close as it got. At least that was how Ophelia always thought her parents saw him. He was smart, he was popular, he played football, he was a Good Kid, and he didn’t sass as much as she did. He had secrets now of course, but whatever. “Greg came over,” she answered, another not-lie. “I don’t have any friends to have over, Mom.” That wasn’t entirely true, but better to deflect onto herself than swear that nobody else came over. They’d made sure the guest room looked like nobody had used it and all the booze-evidence was thrown away. “Did you guys have fun?”
"Oh, don't say things like that," Brianna admonished with a frown. It was probably true. She rarely, if ever, saw her daughter with anyone who wasn't there to see Sebastian, and it wouldn't have bothered her much at all if Phee had had friends over. She doubted she would have to worry as much about Ophelia's friends as she did Sebastian's. Sighing, she smoothed down Ophelia's hair again before letting her hand drop back to her side. "But, yes, we enjoyed ourselves," she told her, a small smile playing at her lips. She and James rarely had the chance to get away together, given how busy their schedules were, so on the occasion that they did, they made sure to make the best of it. It had only been a weekend away in Bar Harbor, but the town was beautiful this time of year and it felt necessary to rejuvenate their relationship. At least the question distracted Brianna from her purpose, and she realized that given the time, she probably needed to get dinner started. Bash and James would be home soon, and she was sure both would be hungry. "Lasagna tonight?" Bri asked Ophelia with a raised brow.
Phee was relieved to see that she’d successfully diverted her mother’s attention for the moment. She didn’t want to talk about not having any close friends, or what they’d gotten up to that weekend, or anything having to do with Sebastian. Really, she didn’t want to talk to Brianna much at all, so getting her to back off and go make dinner felt like an accomplishment. “Sure, sounds good,” she answered with a small smile, resisting the urge to reach up and muss her hair again. Her mother was always fussing with her appearance, trying to fix what didn’t need fixing, if you asked Phee. But she didn’t ask Phee, that was the thing. She almost offered to help, but that would mean more mom time and less time to text Bash and let him know his privacy had been violated.
Oh, Brianna was well aware that Ophelia would probably text Bash what had happened, or tell him when he got home, but it didn't worry her. In her mind, she was justified, especially after the knowledge that he had gone to the Sixer's festival. It made her nervous, and she was not going to back off from checking up on them just because her teenage children believed they were due unquestioned privacy. She smiled at Ophelia, her eyes gazing over her daughter's lovely, full face. "Why don't you clean up and then come downstairs to help me. You can cut the onions for the sauce," she said, turning away to head for the stairs without waiting for Ophelia to answer. They so rarely spent mother-daughter time together, and maybe it was time Brianna changed that.
Ophelia opened her mouth to protest, but Brianna was already walking away, and she hadn’t phrased the suggestion as anything Phee could actually say no to. Sighing and rolling her eyes once her mother was out of earshot, she turned to stalk into her room. Ophelia changed out of her school clothes and into something more comfy -- pj pants with little koalas on them, and a gray tank top -- and pulled her hair back so her mother would stop petting it. She washed her hands and then sent a quick text off to her brother. Caught mom snooping under your bed. She thinks you’re acting strange. Just FYI. Phee tucked her phone into her pocket and headed downstairs and padded into the kitchen, grudgingly ready to help her mother fix dinner.
Brianna already had everything out on the island for Ophelia to cut and slice into the prepared bowls. She was placing a pan on the stove to start browning the beef when her daughter appeared, already in her pajamas. Clearly she had no plans for the rest of the evening, but that wasn't a surprise. "Go ahead and dice that onion there," Brianna instructed, nodding toward the island. "And the peppers when you're finished. Why don't you tell me about school? I feel so out of the loop sometimes. How are your classes?" This was probably torturous for Ophelia to have to spend time with her, but it was what it was. She didn't want to become the kind of mother that completely neglected her children. It was easy enough to see how some of their neighbors parented and realized she ought to do the complete opposite.
Ophelia walked over to the island and picked up the knife. She cringed internally at the question, of course. It wasn’t one she ever really knew how to answer. She liked school, she loved to read, she did well academically, it was just hard for her to talk about in any interesting sort of way. Ophelia already got the impression that her mom thought she was boring, and chatting away about reading Chaucer probably fell into that category. She started chopping the onion. “Uhh ... I dunno, they’re okay,” she started with, wishing that she could leave it at that. She definitely couldn’t gush to Brianna about eating lunch with Greg Wheeler, or being told she was really hot by a cute-but-weird new senior girl. “We’re reading The Canterbury Tales in English ... Mr. Lutz said he might make me first chair next semester.” Band was at least something artistic to be good at, even if people still thought it was kind of dorky.
"Might?" Brianna asked absently, listening to the beef sizzle in the pan once she dropped it in. "Let's work hard enough to make sure to erase all doubt in Mr. Lutz's head." Dorky or not, band was still the kind of extracurricular that looked good on college applications. She wanted her children to be as involved in school and the community as they could, even if their interests were so very different. "I do remember reading The Canterbury Tales when I was a junior," she continued. "I was never a big Chaucer fan, but I'm sure you already knew that." Brianna did well in school, but some of the classics had honestly bored her. She had been more drawn to the trashier novels, ones she had to hide under her bed from her mother. It didn't really improve her grade in English class, but at least she was reading.
Ophelia rolled her eyes at her mother’s back for that ‘let’s’. She hated it when Brianna phrased stuff like that, like they were a team when really her mother just pushed her to always do better and that was it. Her phone vibrated in her pocket, and Ophelia pulled it out and glanced at Sebastian’s reply to her text. She was still chopping, so she didn’t answer yet, going back to the onions. “I like it,” she told her mother. Brianna had never seemed dumb to her or anything, her mother was sharp, but she just wasn't a big reader like Ophelia was. The fantasy of books was better than reality to her, and maybe Brianna had just never felt that way. “It’s weird and old, but it’s still funny in parts.”
Brianna hummed in acknowledgement before she lifted her spatula and half turned toward Ophelia. "Oh, you know which book I loved my junior year? The Great Gatsby. As part of my book assignment, I had to create a soundtrack to the novel. That was probably the most fun I had with an English project that whole year. It was a welcome change after having to dredge through The Scarlet Letter. Are they still making kids read that in high school? It melted my brain, I must say." The story itself had been interesting, but she hadn't been able to follow the way it was written. Just dull and boring, like so many things in school.
“I read it last year in American Lit,” Ophelia answered. “But ugh, I know, right? It was so boring.” And that was coming from someone who liked a lot of books other people thought were boring. “Our teacher told us Hawthorne got paid by the word back in those days, so that was part of why it was written ... like that. We haven’t done the Great Gatsby yet, but it might be next year. We’re mostly doing like ... British literature this year. We’re doing Shakespeare later and all.” Which reminded her of something Elodie had pointed out, and Ophelia gave her mother a curious look. “Did you name me and Bash after Shakespeare characters on purpose?” she asked.
"Did he?" Brianna's brows at that bit of information, because she had never heard that before. Oh well, one learned something new everyday, right? Even if it was pointless information, it was still information. It was understandable, but a shame, because that book had been so wordy and boring, though the plot itself had been fascinating to her. Brianna pushed some of the browning beef around in the pan, glancing briefly at Ophelia's question. Her lips curved. "Shakespeare was the only classic literature I enjoyed in school. I studied him in college too, mostly for fun. Your father insisted on naming Trip after himself, so I decided that I got a bigger say in what we named you and Sebastian. Twelfth Night is my favorite Shakespeare play. And Ophelia was a character that always spoke to me, and I just loved her name, so there you have it. Can you bring the onions over?"
It was interesting to hear. Ophelia had never asked about their names before, though she’d known that hers was in Hamlet. Maybe she would have to actually read it now. And Twelfth Night, since it was her mother’s favorite. Maybe it was something they could actually bond over. There seemed to be precious little of that. She set the knife down and brought the cutting board with the onion on it. She put it in Brianna’s reach so she could put them in however she wanted, glancing at her mother’s face for a moment before she went back to cut up the peppers too. Before she actually did, she shot off a reply to her brother. “I liked actually reading Romeo and Juliet,” she continued. “Like, it wasn’t as stupid as I thought it would be. We talked a lot about like, the social situation they were in and stuff. I think we’re going to read The Tempest and Julius Caesar this year.”
Brianna set the spatula down and moved to drain the grease from the beef. "I romanticized Romeo and Juliet in school, but I think I have a deeper appreciation for themes behind it now, as an adult. I have to be honest though, Julius Caesar bored me to tears." She set the pan back on the stove top and scooped up the onions to drop them in the pan with the beef. It was nice having a conversation with her daughter that didn't include snark, frustration or the rolling of eyes. "I've always leaned more toward his romances and comedies than the tragedies. Twelfth Night, A Midsummer Night's Dream, Much Ado About Nothing." Brianna sounded wistful. "It’s been awhile since I've read any of them, or watched their adaptations. Let me know what you think, though, when you do read them."
A lot of things seemed to bore her mother to tears, so Ophelia wasn’t going to take that as a legitimate criticism. Maybe she would love Julius Caesar. She tended to like tragedies more than romances, they seemed more true to life. But maybe that was just her being melodramatic. “Okay, I will,” she told her mother for the time being. Whether she did or not kind of depended on how she was feeling about Brianna at the time -- it kind of changed week to week. She finished chopping up the peppers and brought those over to her mom as well. Ophelia wasn’t sure what else to talk about, and she was kind of itching to text Sebastian back, but she didn’t want to run out on the conversation yet.
Brianna thanked Ophelia before adding the peppers into the pan. She would add it all to the sauce in a few minutes, and then it was just a matter of putting the lasagna layers together and slipping the pan into the oven. Brianna glanced at her daughter, aware now that their time of 'bonding' was over. Ophelia seemed eager to leave. Brianna supposed she was lucky Ophelia had come downstairs to help in the first place. "You can go," she told her before turning back to the pan. "Since I'm sure you'll be texting Sebastian, let him know I want him home for dinner tonight, please."
And just like that, Ophelia was annoyed again. She hated it when her mother predicted her behavior like that, nevermind if she was right or not. It was aggravating. But she wasn’t going to feel guilty for ratting Brianna out to Sebastian. Her house or not, that was what she got for snooping around under beds. Ophelia didn’t have a lot of physical stuff to hide, but she was definitely going to be moving her journals from where they were currently stashed. “I’ll tell him,” she said as she turned to leave. Whether or not her brother listened would be a whole different story, but that wasn’t Ophelia’s problem.
Even if they didn’t talk or have a super close relationship, Brianna still felt like she knew her children enough to know that they would watch out for one another. On one hand, it was admirable and warmed her. On the other hand, it was annoying as hell when it directly affected her. But Brianna understood it. She and Grayson had been the same way as kids. Sometimes it made her miss him more than usual. Brianna watched Ophelia leave before sighing and turning back to dinner. It was going to be an awkward evening at the McCarthy dinner table later that night. What else was new?