Progeny's Pain

26 July

She lay on the bed - bewildered. The room seemed to spin so she closed her eyes and sobbed. She didn't want anyone to hear her anguish. She was always overly conscious of peoples perceptions and it bothered her the most for people to see her cry, so she often held it in, waited for the right moment. Sometimes it never came and she would bawl like a child at the most minute thing. This was not one of those times. This time the pain was too much to hold back. She was thankful she made it to her room in time to avoid her fathers inquests - fearful that she would lay it all out without knowing the entire truth.
"Truth? Fuck the truth!"
The sobbing subsided and rage captured her. She had been run through the emotional ringer early on in her life too and the effects of it have still plagued her, but she wasn't about to let it mess her up this time around...she was going to stand her ground.
"Secrets - I'm so damn tired of all these secrets!"
******
< .......wanted to remind you that my flight gets in at 7 PM sharp on the 26th.>
"Yes mom - wouldn't forget that"
<....Please be on time>
"bejesus look who's talking"::giggle::
<.....I know I just got here but am anxious to return. Not especially happy with things surrounding CFFC......would rather be home.>
"That's weird! But then again, she hasn't been herself recently from what I've seen -and what everyone keeps bitching at me about! Sometimes I wish people didn't see me as Ms. Fix It! It really does a number on my damn nerves!"
She closed the email and sighed "I'm really worried about Mom...something is just not right!" She looked over at Matt, he knew what she meant and just shrugged.
"Think I'll call dad and see what he's up to. I'm sure he's bouncing off the walls by
now..."
She smiled and thought of past conversations with her father - still head-over-heels in love with Mom - even if he can't say exactly why. "Makes all the more sappy if I do say so myself," she thought. She picked up the phone and dialed.
"De---- residence, Thom speaking"
" Hey mon pere, que pasa?" - damn, I can never remember my French!
"Nada," he replied " How are you?"
"Hangin in..."
The conversation went especially well for a while - then she could tell something was bothering him
"Dad what's wrong?"
"Oh, I don't want to bore you with your mothers and my trouble"
"Troubles? I thought everything was going pretty well?"
"Yeah, well, you know how your mom is sometimes..."
"I suppose - what do you mean?"
She came to find out her mother had been invited to England to represent the fan club she had put together with a friend of hers for Colin Firth. Only something was strangely absent - her desire to go.
"I just don't get it Dad you'd think."
"Ahhh, I know. Thing that bothers me is she has become so distant lately - unlike anything I've seen."
"Yeah, Jason mentioned that to me last week but didn't go into any detail."
"So what did this letter say that may have upset her?  Did you see it? Read it?"

"Nothing that I could see, they want to pay for everything to have her and Livi come over there for about a week, for a meeting or meetings."

Thinking back, she recalled a bygone conversation from not long after her mothers return before. "Mom, so tell me about this meeting?  How did it go?  What did you talk about? Did you just die over the Firther?"  Her reply had at first been "Which meeting?"  It had gone unnoticed, until now.

"I don't get it."

"Neither do I. I tried to hash it out with her before going to Livis', but she couldn't explain her animosity."

"Dad, you said Livi, not Olivia."

"Hahaha, I know....figured I should start being correct."

After a bit of reassurance to her father that it was probably just a phase she hung up - unsatisfied with her own explanation of things.

***********
Her and her mom had always been close and she could often sense when things were wrong. Funny she hadn't noticed but then again - her mother hadn't been talking to her much - if at all - as of the past few weeks. She decided she would get to the bottom of this one way or another and when she set out to do something, seldom did she let anything get in the way of her.

**********

"7 pm sharp and? Plane Delay!  Always when I'm actually there on time things get fucked up!"
She had a propensity for procrastination and was often straggling in wherever she needed to be - work, school - so she hated to be on time for nothing! She pulled out her phone and noticed her dad had called - again. He was growing increasingly upset about her mom ever since their conversation a few nights before. She went to call him again when the phone rang with a number she didn't know - out of state even.
"Hello?"
It was Livi - her moms friend whom she had been spending another Firth-O-filled few days with. Another uncertain voice crying out to her for explanations. She had come to like Livi - it was about time mom had a friend who wasn't more out for a good one-up contest than a real friendship. She pulled out the photo as she talked to Livi. The roses - something was strange about those roses...pink in Livis' hand, coral and red in her mothers. She was like her mom, she knew what the colors correlated to in unspoken words. Pink was joy and gladness, nothing spectacular.  That would have been fine for both, but he had given mom coral and dark red...desire and unconscious beauty.  It perturbed her.  It also made her more angry that she hadn't thought of it sooner after that Premiere.
"....I'll get to the bottom of it .."  Just then she heard her mother and stashed the photo in her jeans. It was beginning to fall into place in her mind and she knew she had to cross a line with her mom she might never forgive herself for doing but she just had to know...
"Mom!" In a word: ragged. She looked at her mom and almost didn't recognize her. Even on her worst days at home she looked more chipper.... It was obvious she wanted nothing more than to go home, but with the thoughts brewing in her mind Adele had to have truth of some sort to gather herself upon.
The ride from the airport was rough. It hurt her to see her mother that way but her lack of enthusiasm - actually her lack of everything about her stirred up uneasy feelings in Adele she tried to avoid. Anger was something it took a lot of effort for her to control. In fact growing up it seemed to be the means of getting attention from her parents when they didn't have her brothers problems to worry about - that and grades she smirked. So here begins the fire that will eventually spill out and she couldn't even explain where it was coming from. Her gut hurt and it was almost as if she was looking on her and her mother driving. She couldn't bear the excuses any longer and decided to go for a drive - she would get something out of her mother if it took everything she had. It also bothered her how quickly it had festered into this. Normally she would think nothing much of her mothers awkward behavior, but something in her made her feel quite different about this situation...
She popped in a CD - the latest of her collection of soundtracks - in order to clear her mind but it didn't work. It was hard to keep her mind clear with her mom next to her - almost not even there - with her head slumped against the window feigning interest in the conversation. More thoughts entered her head. The letter. London. She really hadn't been quite the same as she was before that trip. Not a dramatic difference but she sure wasn't sharing the dirty-minded rapport with me as much as she used to - if at all! It's hard to pinpoint it really but now that she thought on it, things started to come together - and she felt like she was going to be sick. She could control it no longer and the fire came out. Normally being terse with her mom wasn't something she did lightly, but now it was too late. Her thoughts got the best of her and now she could only infer the worst, perhaps in hopes of being discounted wholly. It was her hope that it was as dad had said - just a phase and that she was again overreacting as she often did. She had decided on a favorite spot of reflection to do her duty - Mt. Bonnell - a beautiful spot overlooking the city. Funny - it seems a lot of her worst moments came to an end here, but this was only the beginning.