Room 505, Before Graduation

[thatsamilkshake]

Separation of beds? Check. Francine's bed was pushed back over to the window, and neatly made.

Mostly because it hadn't been slept in last night. The other bed? Ahahaha. Pile of rumpled blankets, pillows, and girl-in-a-slip struggling with the second pair of panty-hose this morning. Francine swore -- the Katchoo way and then the oathy way -- that one more run and she was just saying screw it and going bare-legged.

[OOC: For the girl and the Mom of Dooooom]

Comments

[thatsamilkshake]

Face. Palm.

"No, I broke up with him. At Homecoming. Sort of." Maybe lots of words would get through on sheer number where a few didn't seem to be doing the tricko? "It was both of us. All of us. I was just the one who finally said it."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"But Francine! You would have made such pretty babies together!" There was even photographic evidence to that extent. Framed.

Hope there was more facepalm where that came from, Francie.

[thatsamilkshake]

Oh, there was more. So, so much more. "We might still, someday." Okay, shoot her if she kind of hoped to see Lily again, yes. Kind of a lot. "Just not as a couple."

She ducked her face down as she fiddled with the zipper at the back of her dress. Could she get clearer than that? Seriously?

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

Well, yes. Yes she could get clearer than that, but would it work? That was the question.

"Then as what?" Marie dropped down onto the edge of the neatly-made bed. "Is this because he's from Camelot, honey? Wouldn't that be hard on a child? Single parenthood would be hard enough, but imagine the joint custody problems."

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine took a moment with her fingers poised on the zipper to actually imagine the joint custody problems if--- why, why was she taking that moment? Gah. The sheer force of the Peters avoidance power?

"It wouldn't be single parenthood, Mom. Katchoo and I were raising the little girl who came this year."

THERE.

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

Now witness the power of this fully armed and operational Peters avoidance battlestation!

"It's nice of her to not leave you to handle that alone, sweetheart," Marie conceded, quite graciously under the circumstances. "Goodness, that poor child's language habits . . ."

[thatsamilkshake]

"Her language habits were just fine." Mostly. Kind of. Dress zipped, Francine ran a brush through her hair for the fourth time tonight. "She was adorable. And it wasn't nice of Katchoo; she was ours."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"If you were both raising her, of course she'd think so," Marie said quite agreeably. It was a big step for her. Following the rest of the logic . . . that step was a little too big.

See above re: fully armed and operational avoidance battlestation.

[thatsamilkshake]

Yeee-es. Sigh.

And another sigh. There were plenty of those to keep coming. "Well, I think so too. I mean." Sigh. See? "I mean, I like that to happen someday. For real."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"That's because you would be a wonderful mother, honey." The dense. The dense is strong with this one. Willfully.

[thatsamilkshake]

"Thank you." What did you say to something like that when it came from your own mother, besides thank you? "But I don't just mean having a child. I mean the whole thing. Being a family."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"Well, that's a given." Marie smoothed out a nonexistent wrinkle in the bedspread. "You and this new person you're with, maybe?"

. . . yes, Marie. Actually, yes.

[thatsamilkshake]

...Francine was going to take a moment to actually bang her forehead against the mirror a couple of times.

[thismaskiwear.livejournal.com]

Good time for Katchoo to get back from the shower, wasn't it?

"Francie?" she asked, pushing through the door. "What's going o -- oh."

That headbanging was looking kind of good.

[thatsamilkshake]

"Oh," Francine agreed. "I was just telling Mom about Lily." She did the best she could telepathically add HINT, HINT to that statement. With the telepathy she didn't have.

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

And the mind-reading Katchoo didn't have to go with it!

Nor did Marie, for that matter.

Although she did notice --

"Lily?"

[thatsamilkshake]

"Her name was Lily. Lillian," Francine explained. "We named her after your grandmother, I think."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"Oh." Blink. Blink.

And then, finally, "Well, that's a bit morbid, honey."

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine turned to give her a look of confusion, which was at least a change from loving frustration. "Why? People name their kids after ancestors all the time."

[marieofsuburbia.livejournal.com]

"Oh, honey." Marie shifted awkwardly, glancing toward the door and back in clear, if mild, discomfort. "We don't talk about her much . . . it's such a sad story. She died so young."

[thatsamilkshake]

Francine frowned. It couldn't have been that young; she'd at least had a son first. "I didn't know that. What happened to her?"