Chapter 119: Chase!

 It's going to take more than a new toy before Harcourt feels safe again.

In fact, he may never feel safe again.

 

The bunny is appreciated, though.

Claire feels very strange going up on stage again. Her son was only missing for two days, but those two days might as well have been spent living on another planet. Resuming her life as if it didn't happen, and as if her husband hadn't made the strangest confession ever, is surreal.

She actually doesn't want to be here.

For the first time, her performance feels dishonest. But you wouldn't know that from the sound of her cheering fans.

Harcourt retreats more and more into his books.

Later in life, he might come to the conclusion that in this time, he was desperately trying to understand why people do what they do. Understanding is a step towards control. 

Harcourt and his friend Pedro go to one of the beach parks after school.

"I used to go in my cousin's tunnels," Pedro says. 

Pedro Pesce is Walter Inkbeard's cousin, through their mothers, and he's wanted to talk about this for weeks now (even though, or maybe because, his mother told him not to). "I thought they were kinda neat... like the way the support beams worked, so the top wouldn't fall. It was like a mine."

Harcourt's hands twitch. The number he was writing down turns into a scribble. He stares at it for a moment, then flips his pencil around to use the eraser. Harcourt is a problem solver. "It wasn't much of a tunnel. Just a big hole."

Pedro goes on rambling, trying to relate to Harcourt in some way. "Well there used to be more to it I guess. I liked to write cuss words on Walt's stuff down there. My mom really freaked out though, she didn't like us playing in there." 

Like Kasey, Sommer thought those holes were apt to collapse at any moment.

"I don't wanna talk about it..."

"Um. Sorry. Walt and me aren't friends or anything." Pedro looks at his feet. Damage control! Damage control! "My mom said what he did was horrible and stuff. He's back home and in therapy now. I'm glad you're okay."

Harcourt stands up and glares at his friend. He's not okay. He may not have even realized it until just this moment, but he's not okay. Even moreso now, reminded that Walter is no longer locked up, and may eventually be back in school with them...

Seeing the rage on Harcourt's face, Pedro backsteps once, then just stands there like a dummy, staring back at him, trying to look innocent.

"Chase!" Harcourt announces loudly, trying to break the tension. When Pedro doesn't move, Harcourt follows up with a, "Tag! You're it!"

They play tag until the sun goes down, and their fathers arrive from work to take them home.

Nigel passes away, not without bumping his head on the umbrella first.

Nigel is not unhappy to die. He's always wanted to know more about ghosts.

His family mourns anyway.

Claire writes a few songs in memory of her father. 

She's not upset, only confused, when a crazed fan decides to nominate herself as "part of the band".

These out-of-towners love it. Two pirate women > one pirate woman.

Things take a turn for the worse when the fan decides she can sing.

The venue owners are forced to drag her away.

Claire makes more money than she needs, and donates large amounts to good causes.

Harcourt doesn't want to see this particular park anymore, the one where he saw the hedgehog, but he doesn't want anyone to know about those feelings, either, so he accepts Mara's invitation to play. 

Thoughts of going to the same school as Walter Inkbeard pop into Harcourt's head when he'd rather be having fun. How could the school, and his parents, allow something like that?

"Where are your real parents?" he asks Mara.

"Candy and Cemre are my real parents now," she says, uncomfortably.

"But I mean before," Harcourt presses. "Did your real parents die? Or did they abandon you?"

"The second one I guess."

He's doing the same thing Pedro was doing, and he realizes that, but he can't stop himself now.

"What was that like? Were you mad at them, for not protecting you?"

"Well yeah." She tears up. "But I was mostly mad at myself, because they didn't love me anymore, even though I loved them. I had to go to lots of counseling where they told me there wasn't anything wrong with me."

Even when she's an adult, far in the future, the pain will be fresh. Whenever Mara doubts herself, she will remember her own parents abandoning her, rejecting her. She has pushed past that time in her life to become someone else, with a new last name. But for a second, she's a younger girl, and it just happened, and the hurt is sharp and stabbing, and the counseling hasn't happened yet, or it was never believed in the first place.

"They were right," Harcourt speaks up. 

Whatever he wanted to hear from Mara, about how to deal with stuff, he went about it the wrong way.

Mara wipes her face with her sleeve. "Nuh?"

"You're cool." Being a child, he can't think of a better, more reassuring compliment to give another child. "There's nothing wrong with you."

Mara smiles shakily. "Thanks..."

Cemre and Candace sometimes work late into the evenings. Though the blood relation is distant between Candace and Acheron, they were raised as family, so leaving Mara here for a few hours sometimes seems like a more caring alternative than leaving her home alone.

Mara giggles loudly over a joke book while Harcourt plays with his toys.

Claire and Acheron worry about their son entering high school.

 No amount of dread can stop the passage of time.

Harcourt's teen birthday arrives.

He's developed the rebellious trait.

Hurling the teddy bear off his bed is how he starts this morning, and it makes him feel a little better.

He proceeds to the kitchen, where his mother tries to brighten his day.

He smiles at her. She's such a cartoon character mom, always chipper and sweet.

The "real world" isn't that nice. It's like his mother doesn't even live on the same planet sometimes.





_____________________________________________________________________
Etc.: Nigel outlived everyone else in his generation, but he still had nothing on Chervil.

Having a mad scientist as his only living grandparent surely helped shape Harcourt's fascination with understanding the world around him.

As for generation 9's roll... Claire is at the top of her career. The only skill associated with the singer career is a hidden singing skill, which she's maxed according to MasterController. Acheron will get his next promotion the next time he goes to work, and he'll be at the top of his career, too. He's maxed guitar, but still needs four levels in logic. For live your trait, I still have Acheron play piano or some other instrument every day. Usually he'll wake up and go straight to an instrument autonomously, so I let him do that until his need bars drop and he wanders off to eat breakfast. I also send him to Claire's shows when I can.

"Where the !@#$ is Waldo?!"