Harcourt is contacted by a producer who wants to turn one of his older science fiction series into movies. Keeping any degree of control of his creation won't be easy, but Harcourt is excited all the same. This is going to be his new project.
Everything's looking up, Harcourt thinks, as if things had been looking down before, and completely unaware his life is soon to be unraveled.
Acheron visits Candace for a game of chess.
Candace isn't sure why she, Claire and Acheron have outlived everyone else their age. Jeffry, Nelson, Jamel, Amy and Cemre have been gone for a while now. Even Raven, younger than them, has passed on.
Candace hasn't been the same since her husband died. It's as if her identity wasn't her own, but part of a pair. She's a sock without its match.
Acheron hasn't devoted nearly as much time to considering his improbably lengthy life.
He wishes Candace wouldn't, either.
Acheron doesn't know if Candace now goes to rejoin Cemre or not. He only knows he will miss her.
Gwen La Mer is often left out, when the other girls her age go to... do whatever. But she is not as left out as Mab Archer. Mab Archer is always left out. Mab is pretty sure all those girls are stupid, anyway. She wishes Gwen would listen to her.
"I won't be caught kissing ass," Mab declares. "I shouldn't have to catch you doin' it either."
Gwen shrugs. Gwen wishes she were hanging out with the cool people, instead of with Mab, but beggars can't be choosers.
Sometimes after school they go to local club, where the bartender lets Gwen drink and her friend drink anything, knowing full well they're underage.
Tonight, they go upstairs and practice trick shots.
"One of my ancestors was a gnome," Mab says casually.
"Can't hold your liquor well, can you?" Gwen sneers.
Mab returns home too late, and must face her mother's anger.
Mara was prepared to let some of this curfew-defying behavior slide, when she knew her daughter liked to hang out at parks and look at the stars. But tonight, Mara can see signs of nectar abuse, and could not be more enraged.
Mab ignores her mother's rage, and continues to stay out as late as she pleases.
And even goes so far as to bring Gwen home to sleep off the hangovers.
(Gwen's parents think she's over here for a sleepover. Suckers.)
Mab isn't sure why she gives a damn about protecting Gwen. Gwen would throw Mab away like last week's moldy bologna sandwich, if given a chance to hang out with anyone else.
Mab redesigns her bedroom.
She hoped to get more of a reaction out of her father than this confused look.
Prom approaches. The girls are fighter over who has dibs on Finn Abe. Neither of them are related to Finn Abe, so he's a hot commodity. Mab agreed to let Gwen shoot the first shot, but Gwen totally saw Mab give Finn "a look" at lunch.
"Look at you. You're such a fashion disaster," Gwen sighs. "You don't even do anything with your hair."
"At least I don't try and fail to make it look like Ceth Archer's," Mab taunts.
"Take that back, whore!"
"Man. That reminds me. We should be focusing this energy on attracting guys."
"Yeah. Sorry."
The only guy around right now is Connor Inkbeard. Off limits.
He's already dating Gwen's cousin, Rachel La Mer.
Unfortunately, Mab has had enough drinks to try flirting with him.
They even experiment with bubbles. The bartenders at Ferry Lane may not serve nectar to minors (Mab and Gwen had to get their fix at the other place, before coming here), but they're lax about the bubble machines.
Gwen uses her cell phone to capture some photographic evidence of this incident.
When they go to say goodbye, Connor says Mab really can't just leave. Not after leading him on like this. And she laughs, and says she can, and he grabs her arm and twists, and pulls her in for a deep and invasive kiss when she gasps in pain.
Mab flails her arms, slams them hard against Connor's back, and then seems to give in, and lets them limply drop around his shoulders until he decides to release her from the uncomfortably long snog.
"Uh, sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to upset y-"
Mab punches him roughly in the arm and runs away. She caught the guilty and confused look on his face, sure, but she's not ready to forgive his lapse of... of... whatever that was.
When Mab gets home, unforgivably late, her father is ready for a very serious but kindly and sympathetic talk. He's gone over this in his head a thousand times, exactly what to say to make his daughter stop this crazy behavior. But he wasn't prepared to be greeted by a tirade of "shut the hell up and leave me alone, Dad!"
Feeling helpless, and honestly a little frightened by the screaming, he watches her grab some cookies from the kitchen and disappear into her bedroom.
When Mab finds her bicycle tires flattened after school the next day, she isn't too surprised to find Rachael La Mer nearby. Rachael wants to warn Mab away from Connor.
"Your boyfriend's an ass," Mab snarls. "I don't want anything to do with him."
"That's not what Gwen said!" Rachael points to her phone. There's a grainy picture there. It's Connor and Mab, kissing, just as Mab somehow knew it would be, before she even looked.
"Screw off, Rachael. It won't happen again."
"That's not good enough, you little slut. You're going to regret this. You do NOT cross me."
Rachael goes on to ask Mab what she thinks she's doing wearing a hat like that. Hats of this kind have been mandatory for the cheerleaders this year, and Rachael does not need Mab cramping her style.
Mab can't take much more of this abuse, so, even though it's a really bad idea, she attacks.
And the girls fight.
And Mab "wins".
Harcourt and Mara receive a call from the school; their daughter was in a fight and a flood of detentions are coming her way. The anxious parents sit on the couch and wait as long as they can stand, but of course, Mab does not appear, or answer her phone.
She'll be back at around 4 AM, probably. That's how it usually goes.
Mara is close to tears. Harcourt tells her they'll figure this out.
"Your parents fell asleep waiting for you," Claire says softly.
"I was out getting my hair cut."
"I'm sorry, Grandma. You must think I'm a horrible problem child."
"I would never. Mab... you're very smart, and a very special little girl."
"Not so little," Mab mumbles.
"I know you'll always do the right thing when it really counts," Claire continues, as if Mab hadn't spoken.
Mab is harrassed and heckled by her classmates. They paint "SLUT" on her gym locker and leave a flaming bag of poo in her regular locker.
"Why aren't you getting any flack?" she complains to Connor.
"Why'd you get your hair cut like a dyke?"
"You made me realize I'm not into men, obviously."
"I don't have time for this. I'm graduating soon. Call me back when you're legal."
"Please just go to school today," Mara pleads.
She thought things were bad when her daughter was a straight A student who stayed out all night drinking and dancing. Now her daughter skips school, too!
"Sure. That's where I'm going," Mab promises hollowly. She smiles and makes a show of boarding the bus. On the way, three spit balls land in her hair. And when the bus rolls to a stop at the school, Mab strolls off into the bushes and wanders through the forests, to the campgrounds, where no one will find her hanging out and doing nothing.
Mab experiments with a lot of hairstyles.
Then she lets it grow out.
She pursues painting... but nothing really takes the sting away. And solitary activities make it worse.
Mab's peers continue to reject her, and her family sees the poor grades and bad behavior and just doesn't understand.
She writes letters when no one is looking.
Dear Mom & Dad, & Grandpa & Grandma, I'm running away because I'm sick of this pirate shit.
No. Scrap. Trashcan.
Dear Mom & Dad, and Grandpa & Grandma, I'm running away because I hate all of my classmates.
No. Scrap. Trashcan.
Dear Mom & Dad, and Grandpa & Grandma, please don't look for me. I'm never coming back. I'm sorry. I love you. I'm okay. I'll be 100% better when I leave this island and go somewhere no one knows my name.
No. Scrap. Trashcan. She can't do this.
Mab still goes out every night.
Just not with Gwen. And not to clubs.
She goes to meditate. To find solace in nature.
But as time passes, she grows to hate this island. A beautiful cage is still a cage.
Harcourt decides he must drive his daughter to school.
Any more absences, and someone's likely to end up in jail.
People open up in cars. Cars are enclosed spaces; neither party can get away, no matter how painful the conversation.
"You want to know what's up, Dad?" Mab demands, after several minutes of silence. "I'll tell you what's up. They put dog shit in my locker. They call me a whore and a slut because a popular girl's boyfriend forcibly kissed me. I started riding the bus because they were slashing my bike tires, and I couldn't tell you because you'd make a scene at the school and it would be WORSE. I replaced my tires with my own money."
Mab's story goes on and on.
"I can't get you out of school," her father apologizes. "It's the law. Please... it's not much longer. You need your education. I'll talk to your teachers about setting up a private space for you."
"You want me to sit in a room with a counselor all day to do my schoolwork," Mab says flatly. "You think that's healthy."
"What else can I do?"
"Aren't we rich? Can't you solve this with money somehow?"
They've outside the school now. Other cars are honking their horns. Before Harcourt can respond to his daughter's rage - rage he can empathize with so well from his own experiences; rage he feels now, knowing his little girl suffers - she steps out of the car and slams the door.
With her father watching, all Mab can do is enter the school building. Maybe she can escape at lunch hour.
Whatever happened in school that day, it was enough.
Maybe it wasn't even much, but the thought of being dragged to school by her father again tomorrow is intolerable. There's no escape now. Unless she can make one herself.
Mab tidies up her bed, and puts away toys that were carelessly decorating the floor.
She cries.
She won't look at her parents, but says goodbye to her grandparents in her own way.
(War is over, if you want it.)
Mab startles Acheron with a tight hug.
"What's the occasion?"
"Nothing." Mab smiles. "I love you."
Mab puts on her favorite shoes and stuffs some simoleons and granola bars into the pockets of her favorite jacket. It feels fuzzy, worn, soft and warm against the cold night. She packed nothing else. She won't be the first runaway teen to catch the last ferry ride of the day off of this island.
She won't even be the first Archer to leave Barnacle Bay, but she will be the last.
All of Ace and Wren Archer's descendants either belong to Mab's immediate family, have left town, or have died without continuing their bloodlines.
Harcourt and Mara discover the note their daughter left for them, days after her disappearance. Mab left it on the bookshelf, inconspicuous. It wouldn't be noticed until someone thought to look, specifically, for some note, some clue. Harcourt wonders how long Mab has been planning this, and what pushed her over the edge. He can only think of their conversation in the truck. He can only wonder what he did wrong.
"We will find her," Acheron promises.
They don't know it will be many tears, and many years, before they hear from Mab again.
Long after she is gone, her father still goes into her room and carefully holds her toys and thinks.
"Send word sometime, Mabs," Harcourt whispers, pleading, to a bedraggled stuffed rabbit.
It hurts so much here. He won't write a single happy thing, for the rest of his life.
______________________________________________________________________
Etc.: And so, Miss Mab goes off to find her own adventures.
I'm sorry if this end was rushed and unsatisfactory. It certainly felt that way for me. To get the pictures, I had to fight through waves of lag and glitches. Things were bad in my save before, but towards the end they were really, really, really bad. I'm just glad I got to the end at all.
And, just like last time, my generation 11 will go on to become generation 1 of my next legacy. I'll post a link for that when it's ready!
Thank you for reading. All of you have been wonderful.
