((content warning: discussions of sexual health in a medical context, suicidal ideation, mental health issues, ableism, allusions to bullying. Will tag for extra possible triggers upon request.))
((also credit once again to Toben for Jewel bits))
She sat in the waiting room, getting the stink-eye from an older gentleman. Most probably for her clothes, she guessed? Right now she was wearing a black tank top with the caption “Ghoul’s Night Out”, and it depicted a bunch of zombies partying. She loved that tank, and it went well with black distressed shorts and spider-web patterned tights. Cap it all off with this skeleton hand bracelet she found around Halloween a few years ago (the same one from her outing with Seo-yun), her diffuser necklace, and, of course, a little choker, and she felt great despite her current circumstance. Well, great until this loser came in a minute ago and started staring at her. Judging her.
Honestly, she was kinda used to that sometimes? Like, sometimes she’d go into stores and stuff, and the old geezers would give her this look of ‘you better not steal anything you degenerate witch.’ Something about pink hair, dark clothes, makeup, and spooky jewelry made the old people cross themselves in horror. She got that from church, too. Might be why Dad made her ‘tone it down.'
In any case, she was used to grandpas and grannies giving her weird looks, but, sir? You are not helping. A small huff. Whatever, he was probably here for Viagra or something.
Mary had been done with the pre-screening questionnaire thingy some time ago? And now there was nothing else to do but wait. She listened to a bit of “911” by Lady Gaga on headphones, before she realized that, hey, maybe that wasn’t the best idea in a waiting room because if her name got called out, she wouldn’t be able to hear? So she turned it off, rested them on her neck, and started filing through the various pamphlets nearby. A lot of it was ‘do this, don’t do this.’ At least it was something, though. That said, it was only a matter of time before she put them back where she found them. Only so much.
She kicked her feet idly. The worst part about waiting, she decided, was that she had time to think. And time to think about her current little predicament, the reason why she was here to begin with. Mary could only distract herself for so long before she thought over all the possibilities. Even if it turned out things were okay, well, there was a chance that her classmates, or, heaven forbid, her family found out she was here.
Eventually, she was called up, and, smoothing out her shirt, she followed the doctor, a Dr. María José Martinez. Mary had maybe made a comment about them having similar first names, maybe she didn’t, but she only remembered the reason why she was there. Which, of course, she had to explain to Dr. Martínez.
See, Mary wasn’t… uh, how do you put this? ‘Pure’, ‘chaste’, definitely not ‘waiting’. She tried not to make a big deal about it, but the weirdest part of that wasn’t really the actual thing itself, but people’s reactions. It wasn’t just the people at Safe Harbors’, of course. It was like, whenever you try to talk about it, people were either ‘ew sex’ or ‘wow you filthy filthy lol high five.’ High school rumors were weird. Like, she once heard she gave a blowjob under the bleachers in exchange for drugs? Who even does that? Not her, not her. She drank, but didn’t do anything stronger, and like, she’d prefer a more… romantic? Sexy? Place to do it. School bleachers were kinky, sure, but uncomfortable if you think about it too hard. It was hilarious if anything. She was certain that was the reason why she spread the rumor about her meeting Kenny Yamana. It wasn’t even because she wanted to improve her reputation, she just thought it was funny seeing how people easily believed stuff.
Anyways. She wasn’t as risque as people claimed sometimes, but, well, there were a lot of things she wouldn’t realistically tell her Christian parents about for a variety of reasons. And, well, Miami had an active party scene, and sometimes that meant certain things they’d have a heart attack about.
Like the reason why she was there on that day.
She was invited out to like, someone’s house party, but it was loud and kinda chaotic. So she kinda wandered, chattered around. Felt on edge. She did eventually chat someone up, and, well, they left together. Talked some more. ‘Talked’ as well. Uh… hookups were weird. Especially since they went to different schools, and just met. It did feel kind of… well, that risque, she guessed. They exchanged numbers, texted each other. Nothing weird, just them talking about their day, she guessed.
Then, she got a text a week later. And, uh, it was a lot.
Apparently, her partner was having some trouble. It turned out she was on the rocks with her boyfriend because of him sleeping around, and they were separated when she hooked up with her. However, there was now a non-zero chance that he had an STD. Which she now possibly had. Which may now have been Mary’s as well.
Needless to say, Mary, after receiving the text, shut herself in the school bathroom and broke down. She wasn’t certain what to do, she didn’t want her parents to find out, she didn’t want anything bad to happen, she was scared.
Luckily, she had therapy that afternoon, and it came up during her appointment. It turned out there was a place where she could get free STD testing at a sexual health clinic nearby, so…
After days of psyching herself up, she finally went.
It was so awkward and humiliating, to fill out the questionnaire while she waited. It was a lot of listing her sexual history in the most clinical, least titillating way imaginable. A rough idea of who she was with recently, when, what acts, and what protection was involved.
Luckily, she was ‘asymptomatic’, or to say, she wasn’t currently in the process of bursting into pustules. It also, as it turned out, was the sort of thing that was easily treatable, so even if there was something wrong they could prescribe antibiotics. Which, again, would be tricky to hide from her parents, but at least she wasn’t about to keel over from AIDS or something. However, it did mean she’d have to get her blood drawn, just to be certain.
And Mary did. She talked with Dr. Martinez to distract her. Mostly about the buns. Ozzie and Ivy were funny because that morning they were fighting over a piece of veggie. It looked almost like they were playing tug-of-war until it snapped, leaving Ivy with the remaining slack.
Then, it was over. Mary had a blood sample to determine whether she had something going on.
Dr. Martinez also seemed kind of frustrated, because, like, it turned out that even with lesbian sex you should be more careful. Mary had no idea people used dental dams, or gloves, or took that level of precaution. Like, she was careful about condoms and birth control, obviously, but apparently, she still wasn’t doing enough. So, this resulted in an awkward convo where a middle-aged woman tried to talk to her about queer safe sex and all the things you apparently should and should not be doing. Mary swore, she felt herself bury her face in her hands out of embarrassment. She left the appointment with a little goodie bag full of various ‘protective aids’ and pamphlets going over what they talked about. Dr. Martinez even went so far as to give her a flyer for a queer sexual safety event that was going to happen in a month. All that good stuff.
When Mary left the appointment, the older guy who was staring at her was still there. And once again, he was staring at her. She felt her brow furrow, but then she waved, just to brush him off. Then she opened the door to leave and--
Mary froze. There was a group of girls from Mangrove Garden standing in the strip mall just outside the clinic, chittering. She didn’t hear what they were talking about, whether they were going inside themselves or going elsewhere. But her heart still leaped out of her chest.
They hadn’t noticed her yet. Take a breath.
And she walked outside, trying her hardest to stealthily move past them. But on cue, she tripped and fell, dropping her brown paper bag.
“Oh god, Mary, are you okay?” she heard a girl’s voice say.
Mary pulled herself to her knees, noticing that some of the items had slid out, including the brightly colored flyer. Without thinking, without responding, she began to push everything back inside.
“Do you want help?” the same girl asked.
Mary didn’t look at her, nor did she want to. She just put everything back, and, without even checking behind her, stormed away.
She wanted to cry.
_____
Mary remembered looking and re-looking at the results days later while drinking her favorite order at Allie’s: Banana milk tea, caramel boba.
She had a clean bill of health. So did the other girl, as she texted her saying such. Apparently, you were supposed to get tested more regularly, but she wondered if she’d ever be able to go through that ordeal again.
But she was safe. It might be hard to explain to her parents if they realized what had happened, but she was fine.
Mary shoved the results back into her voodoo bunny bag and idly sipped. She didn’t remember too much of what went on inside her head exactly nor of anything of note inside the restaurant. But once she felt like leaving, she paused when she crossed the parking lot. Mary ran her hand against the side of the restaurant in thought. There was a quirk about the street Allie’s was on. People, for whatever reason, loved to doodle on the buildings. She wasn’t just talking about the spray paint tags, of course. There were a lot of pencil and pen marks, various doodles and sayings, confessions of everlasting love, curses, well-wishes, everything you can imagine. Sometimes they’d intertwine, sometimes they would respond to each other.
She ended up adding her own contribution to the mess back in Junior year. It was a small doodle of… well, a bunny. Not a suggestive bunny, not a bunny saying vulgar things, but just, a bunny. It was kind of exciting to add to it in that ‘I know I’m doing something wrong but that’s what makes it fun’ sort of way.
Recently, they started cracking down on that, resulting in the various shops and restaurants getting a fresh coat of paint, covering up everything. Every single word and picture, every vulgar word, every love confession, every expression of hatred directed at ‘the man’, everything, even her rabbit doodle, was now hidden under a coat of paint. She heard that they were going to start putting up murals there as a way of discouraging people.
She let her hand rest on the spot where her doodle has been, thinking about that. Then, she turned and left.
_____
The next week was a blur.
Mary didn’t remember anyone talking about her leaving the clinic, so either those girls didn’t notice, they decided to keep it to themselves and not say anything, or she just didn’t hear what people were saying yet. But, oh, was it enough to keep her on edge. Sure, high school rumors were silly in how easy it was to get people to believe ridiculous stuff. But someone making up an obviously fake story about you giving head under the bleachers in exchange for drugs is so much worse than someone talking about you actually visiting a sexual health clinic. She did get a few ‘are you okay’s, so maybe it wasn’t hard to notice she was acting off, at the very least.
She didn’t always get along with her classmates. Always had trouble with that. Back in elementary, she was the butt of everyone’s jokes. In middle school things were okay, but she still had to work harder to make people like her. And in high school, it was getting more obvious by the day she was a mess, and stuff like the clinic thing-- and the reason why she was there in the first place-- proved it.
And she hated herself, even more, when she thought about it, because… how do you put this? When you hate yourself, you start to hate yourself for self-pity. How indulgent it was to wallow in misery, oftentimes stuff you created. How you should get over things everyone else does. How terrible you are for thinking certain things, or actually going out and doing them.
When she went out to do things like go to the mall with Seo-Yun, it felt like maybe it was out of pity. Maybe she hated her all along and was only doing it because it was the ‘right’ thing to do. She seemed pretty irked with her and Amy, didn’t she? And it was her fault that Verity hated her. Like, sure, Verity was no saint, but Mary was a wreck. No, Verity definitely was no saint. It was just a lot of anger. And the way people like Chris looked at her, talked about her, was the worst. She had so much difficulty managing the party, it was surprising she didn’t break down by the end. Emmett was still probably bragging about the ‘progress’ he made with her. And what about Cris and Marielle? What was she thinking? Was it spite? Actual interest? Something else?
She tried. She tried to do better.
But ‘trying’ and ‘better’ wasn’t enough.
The idea of her dying as a loser who wrecked her own life was more than enough. And what would they say after? If she died right now, the most people would say is ‘Mary died, that sucks, bummer.’ Then they’d move on. All traces of her would eventually disappear. Even her own skin and bones would one day fade out of existence, much like a drawing of a bunny on the side of a restaurant. It was a scary thought, that other people were doing anything of note, being awake to the fact they were alive, enjoying life, being loved, and will genuinely be missed not because people felt obligated to, but because people wanted them there.
It got particularly bad one night. Night times were the worst times. Nothing to do, and you have trouble sleeping. And that means your mind gets to wander and hit things that hurt. She tried everything to keep herself focused, in the hopes she’d calm down enough to sleep. She listened to music on her headphones, in the hopes that she’d focus more on the noise. But it wasn’t enough. She scrolled through her Instagram feed, seeing all the lovely comments she had received. But she saw they were responding to a more positive image of her, not the real her. She stole some wine from the pantry, but it only numbed the pain, not ended it. She tried leaving messages in her group chats. Nothing worrying, just funny memes and goofy questions and all the most harmless things you could imagine, just to see if someone responded. But no one did. Eventually, she started googling again, where she learned about all the different ways you could potentially die from an overdose. She ignored the ‘Help is Available’ message with the hotlines and such listed.
All this wasn’t enough to calm her down. So she slammed her laptop closed, and curled up into bed.
Some time passed. She had no idea if she ever fell asleep. She sometimes heard notifications on her phone, but she didn’t move to pick it up. She just stared at her digital clock slowly making its way. Then, darkness turned to daytime, but she still didn’t move. But then, she heard a scratch at her door.
Mary jumped but took an extra minute to force herself up. She opened the door.
“What are you doing?” she asked the pair of rabbits on the floor.
She looked at the clock. 5:30 am. Her alarm didn’t go off. She looked back at Ivy and Ozzie.
“Are you bungry?”
Of course, they didn’t say anything, but she did feel they responded by getting on their hind feet. It was getting around that time, anyways.
And with that, she took their food bowl and prepared a salad for them. Made sure to fill up their water, too. It was getting even hotter now, so they had cold ceramic slabs and frozen water bottles to help them out. She liked watching them eat, to be honest. They were so cute and funny. She loved petting them, too.
Afterwards, she took care of herself. As she passed by the bathroom mirror, she couldn’t help but think how horrible she looked! A stained black shirt with ‘Mother of Rabbits’ in a Game of Thrones inspired font, pink pajama shorts, messy black and pink hair, no makeup. The night’s events were evident in her face. It took work to hide the evidence. She washed, she did her hair, she put on makeup, she dressed herself, she made sure to change the diffuser necklace so that she had a lavender-lemon smell.
The Mary who looked back at her in the mirror wasn’t the depressed human garbage wearing dirty PJs, but the cheerful alternative girl she always wanted to be. Curled black and pink pigtails, a crop top with black and white horizontal stripes, black overalls, fishnet arm warmers, her necklace, a tattoo choker, her skeleton tights. She added the finishing touches by putting on her usual makeup. She’d probably get sunglasses and a hat while she was out.
That was what she liked about fashion and aesthetics, admittedly. It was actually not too hard to change your appearance to what you wanted it to be, what you wanted to be. She usually felt better after she put on something cute or was being aesthetic.
She smiled and winked at the Mary in the mirror. If it wasn’t the real one, it should have been. Not the other one.
Mary still wasn’t feeling hungry, but she tried to force herself to eat oatmeal in the dining area. She stirred around the mixture in thought, before she heard her dad come in.
“Morning,” he said, getting a fresh pot of coffee ready.
She waved. She liked her dad. They didn’t always see eye to eye, but, well, it’s her dad. She didn’t like the idea of him knowing more about her, certain things about her.
“Did you see the flyer I put on the table?” he asked.
Her heart stopped.
“The what?”
“The flyer. I thought you would be interested.”
Mary saw what he was referring to. The flyer on the table was small and blue, not colorful. She picked it up, inspecting it.
“Oh, this is for the thing for like, building houses in Mexico, right?”
“That’s right. I was wondering if you’d like to go this year? I know you don’t always like feeling chained to the church, but, maybe you’d like to go this summer.”
Mary narrowed her eyes as she read closer.
“Is this because I hosted that party back in September?”
Dad poured a cup of coffee.
“Oh no. I was thinking… maybe you wouldn’t like to be home alone, and would like something that’d give you something to do before college. Maybe it’d…”
Mary tensed up.
“It’d what?”
“Give you a bit of meaning, maybe. I was thinking,” he said as he sat down at the table.
She continued staring.
“I see.”
And she said nothing else as she finished her oatmeal. As she put the bowl away in the dishwasher, her dad spoke again from the table.
“Hey, Mary.”
“Hmm?”
“Are you alright? It feels like we haven’t talked much recently.”
She wanted to say something, but she couldn’t. So it was just:
“I’m fine. Just didn’t have a good night’s sleep.”
She pushed the dishwasher closed, a bit harder and louder than she intended.
“Mary, you can tell me anything. I won’t judge, I’m here to help.”
She breathed.
“Maybe later. I have to go to school, okay? I’ll see you later.”
And she quietly walked to the door, picked up her things, put on her shoes, and--
“Hey, dad? Have a nice day at work.”
Mary genuinely smiled. And left.
____
School seemed as chaotic as ever. All sorts of people bustling, rushing to their next class. Mary was putting something away in her locker when she heard someone behind her.
“Excuse me. Are you Mary Cheung?”
She let out an exasperated sigh. It was going to be someone who was going to waste her time, she swore. Maybe the rumor mill was finally circulating. Maybe a hall monitor had complaints about her outfit. But, better get this over with.
Mary turned. It wasn’t another student, or a teacher, or a hall monitor, or something else she’d expect. Mary looked at the man, trying to figure out who he was. He didn’t look like someone’s dad or anything. Too formal in dress, too showy in demeanor. Then again, it was Miami, so you never know. But she had an odd feeling about it.
She tilted her head.
“I’m her. What is it?”
My Biggest Enemy is Me, Pop a 911
Multishot, after Ninth Announcement (and a few things long before that). CONTENT WARNING
My Biggest Enemy is Me, Pop a 911
CYBERS:
HARERAISER (Winter Castillo)The synthwave bunnygirl programmer roller weeb!
Currently: Confused? Horrified?
SECOND CHANCES
Junko KurosawaThink Johnny Knoxville but a teenage girl.
Currently: Ridng a shopping cart (in-between threads)
Bella Bianchi
Ballet dancer with pressure.
Currently: In the student lounge
(Meanwhile in the past...)
Even to her own father, Mary Xueman Cheung was a tough nut to crack.
The truth was, as much Jie Cheung loved his daughter, he was starting to understand that he didn’t truly know her. He raised her, watched her grow up, sure. But, Mary had grown to be increasingly more evasive, with only a few hints of what her life was like being strewn here and there.
One of the funnier examples was when he came across a pan of ice cream in the freezer. He figured that, since the ice cream churn had been taken out, Mary had decided to make ice cream. So he got himself a small bowl, but didn’t recognize the flavor. It seemed too tangy and spicy, not like any flavor he recognized. He finished it, but it was admittedly hard. Later, he found out the answer when he looked at her social media: for some reason, she made a video of herself making and eating ice cream with mustard as an ingredient, tagging someone who he recognized as one of her classmates. Jie had no idea where exactly she came up with the idea, just that it was actually… well, kind of funny.
Then there were the more mysterious things. He’d been in her bedroom before, and he noticed that there were some clothes that seemed new and pricey. Mary went to thrift stores and DIY’d at lot of the time, so it seemed out of place. Admittedly, at first he was angry, because he thought she bought them personally. He’d been scheduling a talk about money, until he found out answers before that: it turned out a friend had bought them for her and had the disposable income to do so. From there, he wondered if Mary made sure she wasn’t taking advantage of this friend.
Then, there was the more difficult stuff. Around September, he and Laura went out of town, leaving Mary behind. He knew she was going to have people over since there was a hurricane brewing, but later, as he was unpacking, he received a call from one of the neighbors asking if they were having ‘a party.’ He called Mary, and at first she beat around the bush, not really answering his questions. But, it turned out more guests had shown up than she was anticipating, and she was having trouble managing them all. Was he angry? Of course. But he spent the trip trying not to fear for the worst, but being prepared if something came up. When they arrived home, the place was in the process of getting cleaned. There was no damage, thank god, and apparently what partly caused the neighbor to ask was someone loudly playing music from their car, no other notable noise complaints otherwise. Either that, or someone hadn’t bothered to report it. He also noticed a large amount of food, far more than the amount you’d expect from a potluck. The story behind that, it seemed, was that one of the rich kids went to every restaurant they could to help ‘cater’, resulting in more food than they had space for. Of course, some of the other kids took some on the way out, but Mary still needed to figure out what to do with the rest of it. What was able to be donated to shelters found itself there, but it was still a hassle to figure out what to do with everything. Mary did set down house rules, but it seemed people broke them pretty casually. Not everyone, but there was enough for Mary to vent about it. He later overheard her talking with a friend about someone playing fast-and-loose with smoking and fire hazards, and how someone was having an SOTF watch-a-long in the den. However, looking back, Jie was glad nothing worse had happened.
Then there was the worst stuff. The difficult stuff. Once, back in Junior year, Mary was in a major conflict with a girl over a boy, and the school had to get involved. When they went home, he shouted, she shouted, and then, Mary said the one thing that made him freeze on the spot.
She said she hated him.
Jie understood after the fact she didn’t mean it. She was scared, angry, didn’t know what to do. So she took it out on the closest person. But at the time, he just stood in shock, and Mary must have realized what she just said, as she immediately turned and ran into her bedroom a second later. Later that evening he heard her sobs from the room over. He knew, deep down, she regretted it. He knew he should have disciplined her. But to have your own daughter look you in the eye and tell you that she hates you, with every ounce of venom in her voice? He was too stunned to think of what to do.
The thing about Mary was, he could tell she didn’t mean it because otherwise she could act completely different. Back in December, there was the scare when she went missing after the dance, sure. But weeks later, she smiled and gave him and Laura their own personalized mugs. She spent a lot of time in the kitchen, making food not just for church, not just for humans, but for the rabbits. She helped out around Safe Harbors to the best of her ability.
People did judge her a lot. Sometimes he got whispers about her, from other members of the congregation, from other parents, even family. And he knew Mary picked up on it. He tried his best to make sure she was on the right track. That was why they came to the agreement about fashion at church and meeting with family, after all.
To be honest, Jie understood where she was coming from. He went through something similar when he was her age. He never told her this, but he felt there was something similar going on that he’d never got treated for. He may have had autism, he may have had learning disabilities, he wasn’t certain. But, like her, he was sad and angry a lot, too. He never received treatment, but there was a time in his life where he wanted it to be over. Things got better when he was in college. He found religion, not just Christianity. He loved to learn about all the theological beliefs across the world, the various ways scripture could be interpreted. It became his passion, his one thing. Then, he met Laura. Years later, he became a husband and father. And sometimes things were still hard, but he felt like he had a reason to live. He just never told Mary about any of this. Didn’t know how to tell her.
He still didn’t know why she refused to ride with him when her bike was broken, though.
All this played a part in why he offered the Mexico trip to her. Jie wanted to truly get to know her. He hated how, because of how he and Laura worked a lot, they couldn’t spend as much time with her as they wanted. One of his worst fears was, she’d find herself in a place she couldn’t get herself out of and he couldn’t reach.
After he talked to Mary about the trip, she was still on his mind, even after she left, even as he was driving over to Safe Harbors.
When he pulled up in the parking lot and checked his phone, he noticed a missed call, a voicemail, and a text. All of them were from Mary.
Whatever this was, he was prepared. Whatever it was, they were going to work through it together.
He listened to the voicemail. It was just a few moments of chatter in the background, what sounded like Mary trying to say something, then cutting off a second later. Then, he checked the text.
hey dad. i love you. take care of mom and the buns ok?
That really got him panicking. He tried calling her back, but she didn’t pick up. Jie’s entire body shook. One last resort.
He called the school. Explained the situation, as best as he could with a stammering voice. The receptionist told him to wait a few minutes. The time he spent in the car was agonizingly long before she came back to him with the news. Apparently, he would have gotten a notification soon before called, anyways. He pushed further.
It wasn’t what he expected. It was arguably worse.
The truth was, as much Jie Cheung loved his daughter, he was starting to understand that he didn’t truly know her. He raised her, watched her grow up, sure. But, Mary had grown to be increasingly more evasive, with only a few hints of what her life was like being strewn here and there.
One of the funnier examples was when he came across a pan of ice cream in the freezer. He figured that, since the ice cream churn had been taken out, Mary had decided to make ice cream. So he got himself a small bowl, but didn’t recognize the flavor. It seemed too tangy and spicy, not like any flavor he recognized. He finished it, but it was admittedly hard. Later, he found out the answer when he looked at her social media: for some reason, she made a video of herself making and eating ice cream with mustard as an ingredient, tagging someone who he recognized as one of her classmates. Jie had no idea where exactly she came up with the idea, just that it was actually… well, kind of funny.
Then there were the more mysterious things. He’d been in her bedroom before, and he noticed that there were some clothes that seemed new and pricey. Mary went to thrift stores and DIY’d at lot of the time, so it seemed out of place. Admittedly, at first he was angry, because he thought she bought them personally. He’d been scheduling a talk about money, until he found out answers before that: it turned out a friend had bought them for her and had the disposable income to do so. From there, he wondered if Mary made sure she wasn’t taking advantage of this friend.
Then, there was the more difficult stuff. Around September, he and Laura went out of town, leaving Mary behind. He knew she was going to have people over since there was a hurricane brewing, but later, as he was unpacking, he received a call from one of the neighbors asking if they were having ‘a party.’ He called Mary, and at first she beat around the bush, not really answering his questions. But, it turned out more guests had shown up than she was anticipating, and she was having trouble managing them all. Was he angry? Of course. But he spent the trip trying not to fear for the worst, but being prepared if something came up. When they arrived home, the place was in the process of getting cleaned. There was no damage, thank god, and apparently what partly caused the neighbor to ask was someone loudly playing music from their car, no other notable noise complaints otherwise. Either that, or someone hadn’t bothered to report it. He also noticed a large amount of food, far more than the amount you’d expect from a potluck. The story behind that, it seemed, was that one of the rich kids went to every restaurant they could to help ‘cater’, resulting in more food than they had space for. Of course, some of the other kids took some on the way out, but Mary still needed to figure out what to do with the rest of it. What was able to be donated to shelters found itself there, but it was still a hassle to figure out what to do with everything. Mary did set down house rules, but it seemed people broke them pretty casually. Not everyone, but there was enough for Mary to vent about it. He later overheard her talking with a friend about someone playing fast-and-loose with smoking and fire hazards, and how someone was having an SOTF watch-a-long in the den. However, looking back, Jie was glad nothing worse had happened.
Then there was the worst stuff. The difficult stuff. Once, back in Junior year, Mary was in a major conflict with a girl over a boy, and the school had to get involved. When they went home, he shouted, she shouted, and then, Mary said the one thing that made him freeze on the spot.
She said she hated him.
Jie understood after the fact she didn’t mean it. She was scared, angry, didn’t know what to do. So she took it out on the closest person. But at the time, he just stood in shock, and Mary must have realized what she just said, as she immediately turned and ran into her bedroom a second later. Later that evening he heard her sobs from the room over. He knew, deep down, she regretted it. He knew he should have disciplined her. But to have your own daughter look you in the eye and tell you that she hates you, with every ounce of venom in her voice? He was too stunned to think of what to do.
The thing about Mary was, he could tell she didn’t mean it because otherwise she could act completely different. Back in December, there was the scare when she went missing after the dance, sure. But weeks later, she smiled and gave him and Laura their own personalized mugs. She spent a lot of time in the kitchen, making food not just for church, not just for humans, but for the rabbits. She helped out around Safe Harbors to the best of her ability.
People did judge her a lot. Sometimes he got whispers about her, from other members of the congregation, from other parents, even family. And he knew Mary picked up on it. He tried his best to make sure she was on the right track. That was why they came to the agreement about fashion at church and meeting with family, after all.
To be honest, Jie understood where she was coming from. He went through something similar when he was her age. He never told her this, but he felt there was something similar going on that he’d never got treated for. He may have had autism, he may have had learning disabilities, he wasn’t certain. But, like her, he was sad and angry a lot, too. He never received treatment, but there was a time in his life where he wanted it to be over. Things got better when he was in college. He found religion, not just Christianity. He loved to learn about all the theological beliefs across the world, the various ways scripture could be interpreted. It became his passion, his one thing. Then, he met Laura. Years later, he became a husband and father. And sometimes things were still hard, but he felt like he had a reason to live. He just never told Mary about any of this. Didn’t know how to tell her.
He still didn’t know why she refused to ride with him when her bike was broken, though.
All this played a part in why he offered the Mexico trip to her. Jie wanted to truly get to know her. He hated how, because of how he and Laura worked a lot, they couldn’t spend as much time with her as they wanted. One of his worst fears was, she’d find herself in a place she couldn’t get herself out of and he couldn’t reach.
After he talked to Mary about the trip, she was still on his mind, even after she left, even as he was driving over to Safe Harbors.
When he pulled up in the parking lot and checked his phone, he noticed a missed call, a voicemail, and a text. All of them were from Mary.
Whatever this was, he was prepared. Whatever it was, they were going to work through it together.
He listened to the voicemail. It was just a few moments of chatter in the background, what sounded like Mary trying to say something, then cutting off a second later. Then, he checked the text.
hey dad. i love you. take care of mom and the buns ok?
That really got him panicking. He tried calling her back, but she didn’t pick up. Jie’s entire body shook. One last resort.
He called the school. Explained the situation, as best as he could with a stammering voice. The receptionist told him to wait a few minutes. The time he spent in the car was agonizingly long before she came back to him with the news. Apparently, he would have gotten a notification soon before called, anyways. He pushed further.
It wasn’t what he expected. It was arguably worse.
CYBERS:
HARERAISER (Winter Castillo)The synthwave bunnygirl programmer roller weeb!
Currently: Confused? Horrified?
SECOND CHANCES
Junko KurosawaThink Johnny Knoxville but a teenage girl.
Currently: Ridng a shopping cart (in-between threads)
Bella Bianchi
Ballet dancer with pressure.
Currently: In the student lounge
(Meanwhile in the past...)
((Mary Cheung continued from Blue Monday))
Mary hated the announcements, but not for the same reason she imagined everyone else did.
She had perked up on the first day when they first came on, only to realize an issue right off the bat: she had a hard time following them. It was a lot of information being thrown around at once, spoken by a jovial DJ-person, on loudspeakers that sometimes crackled and distorted the sound. So, when it was over, she had to take a few extra seconds to attempt to process what she heard. After a certain point, she had decided to give up trying to figure out what Ritzy-- was Ritzy her name?-- was trying to tell them.
In retrospect, she was lucky! Mary had admittedly been too embarrassed to ask for summaries of the announcements a lot of the time, even from Jewel, but she only had to deal with danger zones one time that she could remember, and people ended up telling her what she apparently needed to know, anyways. She found out about things like the Purge cult from Akeno and Chris, Anthony’s little witch hunt from Leah and his own testimony, what happened to Amy and Bethan and Amanda from Kaya, and everything she knew about Seo-yun either from interacting with her or hearing people talk about her. Junji turning out to be particularly dangerous, of course, was a given! Everyone knew what he was like, so it wasn’t surprising he’d jump in the second she saw him come up. It was still frustrating, though, because she didn’t know who he killed other than Dale. Let alone who else Seo-yun killed, or who was in the Purge Cult, or anything else that’d be majorly useful.
Again, she was lucky. Not only was she having trouble with the announcements, not only did she have a ton of what she imagined were close calls, but she made it this far.
Looking back, she remembered how she expected to kill. When she first woke up, she was primed for it. Felt it was the best thing to do strategy-wise. She knew it was what the audience was expecting, too. So, as she left the Captain’s Quarters for the first time, she was expecting her first run in to end in violence. Then, she met Leo, and reached for that oar. But then she held back, and that’s when they exchanged the food and decided to look around. Doubts had already started to creep in, about whether she’d be able to do it. Then, she ran into Seo-yun and Mandy, and she guessed reality sunk in, much like the pan sunk into Leo’s arm. In the back of her head, she knew she was probably going to kill, and was still primed to hit someone over the head with that oar until they stopped moving. But, well, it was becoming clear that she didn’t have the nerves, or had more of a conscience than she thought, or something else entirely.
Maybe all that preaching about ‘thou shalt not kill’ stuck with her harder than she thought.
But the worst thing was, now that she made it this far, it gave her less excuses. If you think about it, SOTF was a way for her to get everything she wanted. It was an excuse to die without planning out how to do it. She could have gotten revenge on people like Emmett and Laura and Marielle and Junji and who knew who else. Obviously, don’t get the wrong idea. She didn’t necessarily want them to die back home, just that she wanted to find a way to take out her anger on them without any sort of legal or moral consequence, and SOTF provided a way.
Finally, she could become famous.
Mary loved the notification she got whenever someone sent her a message on Instagram, telling her how pretty she was. She loved it whenever she got a role in a play, or another small modelling gig. She loved it when people laughed at her jokes. She loved it when people were paying attention to her without insulting her. She loved all of it.
Let’s face it, Mary loved attention. She only denied it because it was the ‘good’ thing to do, but really, she wasn’t always good at being ‘good’.
In that sense, she related to Seo-yun.
And here? It was the only thing that remained what she expected. No cool revenge, and it looked like if she lived, she’d have to deal with the fact that she no longer had an ‘excuse’ to die young. And when she got back, she’d have to face her issues head on.
Somehow that was scarier. The fact that she’d have to deal with the dull, tedious, difficult task of living.
But she wasn’t entirely scared.
Mary had been idly thinking earlier. She thought about prom, and what kind of dress she’d wear, and who she’d ask out. She wondered if she would be allowed to attend Mangrove Garden events after this all cleared. She thought about how she’d pick up acting and modelling roles, use her fame to start a career. She thought about maybe getting an education after high school, not because she ‘had’ to, but because she wanted to. She thought about visiting Disneyland during a visit in L.A., see their take on the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean and how it differed from the ones in Orlando. She thought about all sorts of cute outfits she’d like to wear.
And then she realized she had actual plans and dreams for the future. It was a weird thought. But it was a sign that she wanted to get out of here alive, to finish this. And that task of ‘living’ might not be as bad as you’d think.
_____
Mary had stepped aside into another room, out of earshot of anyone she knew of. She sat on the floor, adjusted her hair, and spoke again.
-------
She wondered if Jewel was just trying to be polite.
If she was just trying to make her feel better.
If she was being truly honest.
There were a lot of things Mary, in retrospect, could have told her. How parts of what she said in her book spoke to her, a lot more than she mentioned. How she didn’t just read the bit she recommended. How there were a few things Mary might have wanted to say, now that the game is almost over.
But she had to focus more on the important stuff right now.
Mary went back to join Chris.
((Mary Cheung continued in Tinnitus))
Mary hated the announcements, but not for the same reason she imagined everyone else did.
She had perked up on the first day when they first came on, only to realize an issue right off the bat: she had a hard time following them. It was a lot of information being thrown around at once, spoken by a jovial DJ-person, on loudspeakers that sometimes crackled and distorted the sound. So, when it was over, she had to take a few extra seconds to attempt to process what she heard. After a certain point, she had decided to give up trying to figure out what Ritzy-- was Ritzy her name?-- was trying to tell them.
In retrospect, she was lucky! Mary had admittedly been too embarrassed to ask for summaries of the announcements a lot of the time, even from Jewel, but she only had to deal with danger zones one time that she could remember, and people ended up telling her what she apparently needed to know, anyways. She found out about things like the Purge cult from Akeno and Chris, Anthony’s little witch hunt from Leah and his own testimony, what happened to Amy and Bethan and Amanda from Kaya, and everything she knew about Seo-yun either from interacting with her or hearing people talk about her. Junji turning out to be particularly dangerous, of course, was a given! Everyone knew what he was like, so it wasn’t surprising he’d jump in the second she saw him come up. It was still frustrating, though, because she didn’t know who he killed other than Dale. Let alone who else Seo-yun killed, or who was in the Purge Cult, or anything else that’d be majorly useful.
Again, she was lucky. Not only was she having trouble with the announcements, not only did she have a ton of what she imagined were close calls, but she made it this far.
Looking back, she remembered how she expected to kill. When she first woke up, she was primed for it. Felt it was the best thing to do strategy-wise. She knew it was what the audience was expecting, too. So, as she left the Captain’s Quarters for the first time, she was expecting her first run in to end in violence. Then, she met Leo, and reached for that oar. But then she held back, and that’s when they exchanged the food and decided to look around. Doubts had already started to creep in, about whether she’d be able to do it. Then, she ran into Seo-yun and Mandy, and she guessed reality sunk in, much like the pan sunk into Leo’s arm. In the back of her head, she knew she was probably going to kill, and was still primed to hit someone over the head with that oar until they stopped moving. But, well, it was becoming clear that she didn’t have the nerves, or had more of a conscience than she thought, or something else entirely.
Maybe all that preaching about ‘thou shalt not kill’ stuck with her harder than she thought.
But the worst thing was, now that she made it this far, it gave her less excuses. If you think about it, SOTF was a way for her to get everything she wanted. It was an excuse to die without planning out how to do it. She could have gotten revenge on people like Emmett and Laura and Marielle and Junji and who knew who else. Obviously, don’t get the wrong idea. She didn’t necessarily want them to die back home, just that she wanted to find a way to take out her anger on them without any sort of legal or moral consequence, and SOTF provided a way.
Finally, she could become famous.
Mary loved the notification she got whenever someone sent her a message on Instagram, telling her how pretty she was. She loved it whenever she got a role in a play, or another small modelling gig. She loved it when people laughed at her jokes. She loved it when people were paying attention to her without insulting her. She loved all of it.
Let’s face it, Mary loved attention. She only denied it because it was the ‘good’ thing to do, but really, she wasn’t always good at being ‘good’.
In that sense, she related to Seo-yun.
And here? It was the only thing that remained what she expected. No cool revenge, and it looked like if she lived, she’d have to deal with the fact that she no longer had an ‘excuse’ to die young. And when she got back, she’d have to face her issues head on.
Somehow that was scarier. The fact that she’d have to deal with the dull, tedious, difficult task of living.
But she wasn’t entirely scared.
Mary had been idly thinking earlier. She thought about prom, and what kind of dress she’d wear, and who she’d ask out. She wondered if she would be allowed to attend Mangrove Garden events after this all cleared. She thought about how she’d pick up acting and modelling roles, use her fame to start a career. She thought about maybe getting an education after high school, not because she ‘had’ to, but because she wanted to. She thought about visiting Disneyland during a visit in L.A., see their take on the Haunted Mansion and Pirates of the Caribbean and how it differed from the ones in Orlando. She thought about all sorts of cute outfits she’d like to wear.
And then she realized she had actual plans and dreams for the future. It was a weird thought. But it was a sign that she wanted to get out of here alive, to finish this. And that task of ‘living’ might not be as bad as you’d think.
_____
Mary had stepped aside into another room, out of earshot of anyone she knew of. She sat on the floor, adjusted her hair, and spoke again.
-------
She wondered if Jewel was just trying to be polite.
If she was just trying to make her feel better.
If she was being truly honest.
There were a lot of things Mary, in retrospect, could have told her. How parts of what she said in her book spoke to her, a lot more than she mentioned. How she didn’t just read the bit she recommended. How there were a few things Mary might have wanted to say, now that the game is almost over.
But she had to focus more on the important stuff right now.
Mary went back to join Chris.
((Mary Cheung continued in Tinnitus))
CYBERS:
HARERAISER (Winter Castillo)The synthwave bunnygirl programmer roller weeb!
Currently: Confused? Horrified?
SECOND CHANCES
Junko KurosawaThink Johnny Knoxville but a teenage girl.
Currently: Ridng a shopping cart (in-between threads)
Bella Bianchi
Ballet dancer with pressure.
Currently: In the student lounge
(Meanwhile in the past...)