Chapter 30: Family Dinner
Megan paced around the house for a while. No brilliant ideas jumped out from the corners at her, so she stopped in the living room again. She went to look at the photo albums, to see her dad again, then paused, wondering if her mother had anything else left over from that other era.
She went into her mother's room and through the closet, finding her mother's old bass guitar tucked into the far back corner. As she was about to take it out for closer examination, she noticed a couple of old cardboard boxes on the high shelf at the back of the closet, gathering dust.
Megan fetched a chair, climbed, and dragged the boxes down. One was full of Christmas decorations that she'd never seen in use. The lights were all neatly coiled, and the holly, mistletoe, and ornaments were neatly separated and stacked. This was true to her mother's usual style, but they were all definitely decorations. She wondered how long it had been since they'd been put up. From the amount of them, she was pretty sure there was plenty for both a tree, and to put a few lights along the edge of the roof.
The other box was even more interesting. The more fragile contents of the box were protected by a handful of neatly folded 'Late to the Party' T-shirts, with tour dates along the West Coast on the back. Everything else in the box was equally neatly laid out and organized to make the best use of the space. Drumsticks, packs of guitar strings, extra guitar picks, two guitar maintenance kits—Megan somehow wasn't surprised her mother had spare items and repair kits for all sorts of emergencies.
What really caught her attention, though, were the CDs. There were almost a dozen in all, counting the ones showing as singles and a studio demo, in addition to the three full albums. She picked up the one on the top. The black cover bore a picture of an overturned red plastic cup and white letters reading 'Late to the Party: It Actually Is 1999.' Surprisingly in Megan's experience of such things, at least with her own computer software, the CD inside actually was the album labeled on the case.
Since the box obviously hadn't been disturbed in ages, she figured the CD wouldn't be missed. She returned everything in both boxes to their proper places and order, then put the boxes back. Then she took the CD to her room and put it into the player.
According to the liner notes, the first song was called “Complications.” The song opened on drums, steady as a heartbeat. Within moments, a few lines of bass were added, then silenced to let the heartbeat take center stage again, picking back up now and then, only to fade back to the drums. Twenty seconds in, Megan was a bit startled by a guitar wail, set against the steady background. The wail trailed off, and a slightly discordant, minor-key guitar line took its place. A few moments later the singing began. “Three months in my nightgown / after three of puke and sweat..."
It wasn't exactly high poetry, but Megan was transfixed. The voice was raw. Oh, it was tired. If it hadn't been, Megan might not have recognized her mother's voice at all. But under and around the weariness in the performance was an energy that was almost electrifying.
It took a moment, as the young Sheila O'Reilly melodically howled through a litany of physical, mental, and emotional horrors, for Megan to process what the song was about. She'd written it while pregnant. "So I'm crying into pillows, / and I'm screaming on your shoulder / and I know I had my options, / But I want to see you hold her."
Megan turned off the player for a while.
When her mother got home, Megan had supper ready. Kerr had done most of it, of course. Fortunately, it was pancakes and omelets, so Megan wouldn't have to explain why she was suddenly a gourmet chef. She wouldn't be asked to repeat anything impossible, either. Of course, standing there putting pancakes onto plates felt bizarre after everything that had happened—and everything at risk of happening. Still, why not?
Her mother's smile was thin and tired, but it was there. “Thanks so much, sweetie,” she said with a quick kiss to Megan's forehead.
They settled in at the table. “How's school?”
“School's good.” A nice faerie person filled in for me there while I was trying to save the monster-king who wore out that other you who liked music, the you I never got to know. But I couldn't save him, so now all the faeries might be like mystic-dinosaurs arguing whether the mystic-meteor is coming. I'm not even sure what regular people are in this analogy, but there'll be fewer movies. “My math project got an A. That should help balance things out if I have trouble on the tests again.”
“Oh, that's wonderful! I'm proud of you. And I'm so glad we finally have something that really fixes things. Might fix your trouble with math tests, too.”
“Maybe.” Or the orange pills might have made her write the same equation 27 times each for the first two questions and not answer anything else. Lani's having been right that there was a problem there wasn't very reassuring in terms of hoping she was wrong about Orlaith's attempt to Fix The Whole Thing.
Sheila O'Reilly, however, was just nodding and looking wistfully at the bottle from which she was removing a large lime green pill to take with her meal. Those had been at every supper for as long as Megan could remember. She now wondered if they worked better for someone whose depression wasn't magically induced.
"Hey, Mom," she said, pulling her mother's attention away from the pills. "Next week, can I study at Lani's for the big test on Thursday?”
“As long as you make sure you're focused on studying and not painting plates again, then of course.”
Megan offered no argument about the occasional pottery projects of the past. “Okay, thanks. Then after the test, if I'm feeling pretty good about it and caught up on my other homework, can I go out and do Halloween things with the Kahales? Maybe even spend the whole weekend?" Because as handy as Kerr had been, she didn't want to make the brownie have to miss the Dance, nor did Megan want to risk having to sneak out.
"You'll get all of your homework done first? And you're not going to stay out too late? There's a lot of strange people out that night."
Her mother didn't know the half of it, and Megan certainly wasn't going to tell her. More importantly, the answer hadn't been 'No,' even if it came with conditions. "I think her little brother wants to go trick-or-treating. We'll be indoors before it gets too dark, though." The ballroom was indoors, after all.
"All right, I know you've been working hard. We'll see how you're feeling after the test. If you're all caught up, I suppose a sleepover is reasonable. The Kahales know you'll be there?"
"Yes, Mom." That, at least, was true. She was more than a little envious of Lani being able to be so open with her parents. At least it meant there would be so-called responsible adults to cover for them when they carried out the plan. Not that she had a plan yet, but there was no way she was missing the Dance.
Chapter 31: Back to School
Megan almost wished the week would go by in a haze, but going back to her old dosage failed to produce one. After a day or two of the multicolored pills, she was in a middling ground: concentration was sometimes a struggle, and she still saw Ashling often out of the corner of her eye, but she felt... functionally human. Work could be done. She would study alongside Lani on the bus, then exchange anxious glances, as neither of them still had any real plan.
School happened. The margins of her composition books got more varied, occasionally with thorn-vines and highlighter-yellow eyes. In art class, Mrs. Chang looked at Megan's in-class work—a pastel sketch of moths and butterflies dueling with knitting needles—and was more pleased than Megan had seen her in weeks.
At home, she had another butterfly picture pinned above her desk, the one covered in conic-section equations and a large red 'A' with a note of “Interesting presentation!” Even if it had been triple-checked and turned in by a brownie, she still felt proud, and that helped her feel confident as she reviewed the process.
Math, chemistry, and art weren't her only renewed focuses of work. The music teacher, Ms. Dahl, found herself beset with a lot more questions than usual. Megan's questions on the history of music
theory seemed to come out of nowhere. Megan was grateful that at least her accounts of ancient and medieval musical terms balanced out Ashling's random etymologies.
Sometimes the pixie's accounts made sense. Sometimes they made too much sense. Sometimes they weren't helpful at all. And sometimes Megan was pretty sure they weren't involved in the same conversation. Despite all of it, she had been learning, and learning quickly. She had no idea why particular songs, whether from the songbook or internet radio stations, worked to do what they did. Some songs very much matched up with certain effects in pace and feel; some seemed almost opposite.
A few of the songs in the book didn't seem to do anything at all, which Ashling mostly wrote off as not being Megan's 'thing.' She couldn't tell if the healing magic was any more effective or not, since she wasn't quite willing to injure herself to test it over the week, despite Ashling's urging, but she still felt better when she used it. Inspirational songs had been easier, other than the times Megan's mother had had to visit to tell her to keep it down. She quickly found out that those worked better the louder they were sung.
Most interesting to Megan, in part because they came the easiest, were the winds. With a few different songs, both old ones from the books, and some personal favorites she experimented with, she was able to direct gusts of wind. With practice came finesse.
The majority of academic studying took place at Lani's. Between bouts of chemistry homework and algebra notes, Mrs. Kahale occasionally found it necessary to give Megan a hug.
Justin was there, both an issue and not an issue at all. The Kahales had welcomed him with open arms. He was soon installed, sharing the hastily-but-sturdily-built bunk bed in Mack's room. Mack was not nearly as put out by this imposition as Justin was confused by the fact that the five-year-old had previously had his own room. Justin was understandably confused by a lot of things. He and Mack went to bed at the same time each night, as Justin was unused to staying up late.
School was not yet a possibility for Justin; paperwork was being secured, but he was obviously foreign, and the appropriate channels for exchange students in the school system would take a while. Which was just as well. It would take a lot to make Justin remotely ready to tackle high school. So while the Kahales were all either in class or at work, Justin had apparently been sitting around the house trying to absorb information. Whenever Megan and Lani had study sessions, Justin would sit with them and listen intently, but obviously unable to contribute—or really comprehend much.
Cassia wasn't around much during the study sessions. She'd tried to brainstorm with Lani, Justin, and Ashling the initial weekend, but according to Lani, was too champing at the bit to think of any good ideas.
Ashling's ideas were all over the board, but tended to veer off in an angry direction as well. When not trying to insert snippets of bardic advice into chemistry homework, she had some strong theories as to why the Gray Lady may have been so 'reasonable' to Orlaith's plans. Perhaps the seneschal had gotten too used to running all things Unseelie and resented the King. Perhaps the queen had promised her something. Perhaps the bean sidhe's grief had fueled jealousy, since even after leaving his human family behind, Riocard still had a daughter out there. Still, the pixie had no concrete thoughts about what to do.
Megan's mind jumped around too, though not to pixielike degrees. She knew now that they couldn't simply wait Orlaith's coup out. But whenever she and Lani seemed to be making small amounts of progress after schoolwork was done, it was always time to get home for the evening. Ashling would follow her home and pick up on the magic advice. The evenings had turned out best for this. At the points her medication was at its best effect, she had more trouble with her magic.
After a little practice, she started to see Ashling's point regarding study and concentration. It really was coming easier when she just went with what felt right—and the more fully she let herself get into the music, the better. Likewise, concentrating too much, or trying to work out the exact whys something did or didn't work seemed to make everything come harder. Her best results came just before her mother got home or in the brief times before her mother came to tell her to turn down the music or tone down the singing. A few times, she wondered what she might be able to do if she left off the pills entirely again. The combination of the test and their lack of a plan stopped her... for now.
On Thursday, the math test came. Megan had done the job studying; she understood the concepts. She just had to make sure to stay focused enough to not screw up the problems. When it was over, she felt she would get by. She celebrated in a dance of whirling leaves behind the house that night. It was a little incongruous, having Ashling being the one to tell her she had to be careful, mid-dance, but she supposed she couldn't have her mother thinking treatment wasn't working.
Chapter 32: Pre-Halloween
When Megan walked in Friday after school, the traditional Kahale Pre-Halloween was already underway: Mack had halfway completed a hard hat made entirely out of LEGOs.
Justin sat on the bed in some of Mrs. Kahale's gardening clothes. They and some hand-me-downs from Cassia made up his entire modern wardrobe so far. Megan could see why he preferred the gardening clothes to the 'Let's Do Something Wrong' T-Shirt. The chain mail was in the closet, and the sheath of the Sword of Light was hung neatly on one of Mack's brightly-colored plastic coat-hooks. Thankfully, when they went back, he'd be able to wear the chain mail.
She gave Lani a brief hug, then sat down next to Justin and let Lani get back to work on her Firefly-inspired spaceship mechanic costume. Megan was well aware that the costume pieces Lani hadn't been able to find second-hand had been hand stitched over the course of the week. Her red cape and picnic basket were feeling a little inadequate, but she'd had other channels for her artistic leanings this week. Megan didn't do nearly so much with so little time as Lani did. "How are you adjusting?" she finally asked Justin.
"Well enough. They've been trying to get me ready for school, but I'm uncertain how quickly that will proceed. There's no lack of things to do, though. Especially while we try to save as much of the final crop as possible."
"Final crop? So you've been introduced to the pumpkin mausoleum?"
He grinned at the designation for Mrs. Kahale's garden. "There are some survivors. I think the radishes may be a lost cause, though. Perhaps they would be best left in their graves."
"Not for lack of effort."
"Certainly not. She puts in plenty of time. I'm just not quite certain how to tell her that she's a terrible gardener."
"I think she'd be the first to agree with you," Lani said, taking a break in her preparations, "It doesn't really matter. That's not the point. It relaxes her, gives her something to do when not at work, and, well, we eat the survivors, so there's no witnesses."
Megan laughed. "So what's it going to be this year when it gets too cold to salvage anything else from the killing fields?"
"I don't know yet. She's mentioned poetry. She might try to spend more time battling the spinning wheel. Or maybe the pottery wheel. Or getting the two confused and making a mess."
Justin looked back and forth between them quizzically.
"Have you been down into the basement?"
"With the wheel and full furnace and all?" he asked.
"Ah, good. So you did find the island of misfit vases. Two of those are from when Lani and I were really little. The others... yeah, that's Mrs. K.”
"I'm not sure I understand. She seems so happy with these things, but they all turn out so badly?"
Lani grinned. "She's exceedingly happy to be gardening, or playing with her pottery wheel, or baking... fortunately, the 14th Century seems to have produced iron stomachs.”
“Chocolate... is weird,” Justin said simply.
“By most people's standards, you still haven't eaten chocolate yet. But anyway, enjoying her collection is the whole point. Mom works hard. She's a very good office manager. It's a nice, boring break away from living with a faerie and two half-faeries. W
hen she gets home, she can indulge in something fun, and no one, most especially herself, cares if she's any good at it."
"Collection?” Justin asked. “There's collected sickly plants and collected malformed pottery...”
"And you haven't seen her photography or heard her poetry. You weren't around when she accidentally shaped the rock garden into an obscene gesture. Mom collects hobbies.”
Justin still looked confused, but nodded his agreement. "I will do what I can to help save some of the gardening victims, then."
"We'll all be glad for the help. I couldn't help but notice you seemed to know your way around growing things in general."
"I helped some with that at home, yes. Along with a lot of whatever else was needed. Tending the dogs and horses, cleaning boots and armor, maintaining weapons, and general repairs. Though I will admit, your house is definitely not in need of any general repairs."
"Lack of dogs and horses too. Don't mention those to Mack. Mom only recently convinced him that cowboy-telephone-line-repairman as a costume might be a little too complex for most people to recognize what he was. Thank goodness for LEGOs."
"And you're getting dressed up even though we're going to the Dance instead of out to a party or something?" Megan asked Lani.
"It doesn't matter what costume I wore, I'd still stand out a lot less than most things at the Dance. And I enjoy it. I still think Justin's knight costume ought to win most accurate, though."
"I'm not a knight yet," Justin replied, "and may never be. I'm definitely taking the armor back to Faerie, though."
"I'm guessing the Kahales were able to patch it up and replace the shield?”
Lani looked at Megan like she was crazy. "Patch? We upgraded it. And his new shield is lighter and twice as durable." Justin nodded his agreement.
Foul is Fair Page 14