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Once school was out for the summer, the bad kids camped out in the living room of Mordred Manor. Kristen had said it was because “Sleepovers are fun,” and no one had the heart to disagree. However, everyone knew how hard it had been to be alone the weeks since they had returned from spring break. Even if they didn’t speak about it, it was just easier to hang out with each other, barely sleeping, telling jokes, listening to Fig strum an old lullaby than face the issues head-on.
It was one of these nights, gathered together and piled on the floor of the living room, that Adaine had brought up her discoveries “It’s a common problem among adventurers. That once someone starts adventuring, they never really stop.” Fig wondered why no adult at Augfort had taught them that. It made sense. Fig figured she wouldn’t be part of the special few that had defied that fare. Now that they had started adventuring and saving the World, she never wanted to stop. She was never one for slowing down. She lived on the edge of constantly moving forward.
The hurry up and wait game never suited her, even before her horns grew in. But it never really hit her how much of a toll that would take until now. She was all curled up in the living room, unable to sleep without someone’s back pressed against her, reminding her she wasn’t alone. She wasn’t so sure being unable to stop moving forward was a good thing anymore.
The summer did not bring better and brighter things. The bad kids, as well as some of their extended group, only seemed to get worse. After Jawbone gently pointed out that continuing the trend of getting worse wasn’t the best pattern to follow, he suggested that the manor members should go to therapy just to check in with another adult after everything that had happened over spring break. Fig hated the idea. But it was Adaine who looked at her softly in the middle of the night while the rest of the group slept, who convinced her to try. And Adaine always seemed to know what was best.
So Fig went, and the routine settled. She would go and talk and do her time and hope that she just got better. It was late June when she was sitting in the little office, and she didn’t even know how she had gotten on the subject. She didn’t want to talk about the copy of herself today, and she didn’t want to talk about almost killing Riz. She didn’t want to talk about Gorthlax or Gilear or being on tour or nearly dying or making out with middle-aged men. Her therapist didn’t let her talk about Ayda for very long without trying to veer the subject somewhere else. In fact, like most weeks, Fig didn’t want to talk about anything. Instead, she decided to talk about Sandralynn and her almost break up with Jawbone. Hoping that if she made the story exciting and dramatic enough, she could tell a story focused on other people without it having to do with her.
“It was pretty dramatic,” Fig said, watching the woman’s face in hopes that she had been charmed by her performance. “I know Kristen and Adaine were worried about what would happen if they split up, but my mom assured us we would always have a place to live. She said that she would just leave if she and Jawbone had broken up.” The woman seemed to react that Fig could not read, and she didn’t say anything. It was the worst part, the moments where she would just let silence fit and expect Fig to fill it. These were times inferred that Fig had said something in need of dissecting, even if she didn’t think so. Fig blinked at the silent reaction, and the stillness was catching up. “But yeah, obviously they didn’t. Sandralynn and Jawbone are living happily together and in love.” She looked at the clock. Still 15 minutes. Fuck.
“I see.” The woman said, looking at Fig with curious eyes, letting the silence fill up the room. Fig still did not speak, “Do you think your mom would leave you if their relationship did end?”
The answer that Fig thought in her head was immediate and instantaneous and resounding yes. Sandralynn would pack her bag and leave the house if she messed up again. And she wouldn’t expect Fig to go with her. That would be…
Fig didn’t want to think about it or talk about it. Fig paused as if considering the answer carefully and plastered a smile on her face and then lied, like the liar she was. “Oh no, of course not. She was just being overdramatic. Besides - they won’t break up. My mom won’t cheat again.” The therapist asked something else about how she couldn’t control if her mom cheated or not. And she thought about telling the truth, that it was her fault. But she didn’t say anything. The woman just wouldn’t understand.
However, after she left the office and that silence filled room, those words echoed in her head. They haunted her every step. Even playing her bass at the max volume or wrapped in Ayda’s arms didn’t make her forget. She just heard it on a loop, over and over again. Never-ending.
Do you think your mom will leave you?
The earworm of truth remained spinning circles in her head. Of course, Sandralynn would leave her behind. It wasn’t because she didn’t love Fig, but Sandralynn, in her guilt and sadness, would be convinced leaving Fig behind would be for the best. And it would have been. After all, everything Fig had ever touched fell apart.
***
The hardest part of slowing down and life staying slow were the memories that have been haunting them all. The unstoppable rushing forward, the memories unable to be held back because nothing was risking her life right now; there was no hiding from them. It happened to all of them.
Kristen would stop in the middle of saying something and completely fixate on the morality of whatever action had taken place. Adaine’s breathing would be a little faster, Boggy by her side, unable to stop the memories from popping up. Fabian’s smile would feel see-through as if he was putting on a show and didn’t mean any of the words he said. Riz would disappear for days and spiral with no sleep, no food, no breaks. Gorgug would just break into a rage, randomly in the middle of a meal like he was 14 again. The horror on his face and the shame would overcome him by feeling so out of place and control.
Fig just didn’t sleep. After all, who knew what would take her over if she did. She was always up late writing a song in the living room. The lighting dim and the usually loud house silent. It was difficult on the nights that Adya didn’t sneak through the portal, didn’t come and stroke her hair and hold her. But she convinced herself that was when she got her best writing done anyway. Besides, she wouldn’t be alone for long. These days, a few months into “getting better,” The Bad Kids at least started their evening in their rooms, even if it was certain they would end up in the living room eventually.
It was still early, only around midnight, when Sandralynn came in quietly, the way she had been trained as a Ranger and spoke Fig’s name into the darkness, so surprisingly, so suddenly that for whatever reason it sent Fig back.
She had refused to admit it. When they were in the nightmare forest and Sandralynn had been taken over, she had been scared of her mother. A longbow arrow pointed in her face, cold and disappointed eyes watching her, stalking her. The words ‘I’m awake for this’ echoed in her ears as she took shot after shot. At the time, it just seemed like another nightmare, like the version of herself that she wanted to be. At the time, it wasn’t real, but the further away from it Fig got, the more it solidified. She learned that some monsters were just scarier in a bright room and with distance than close up in the darkness of mayhem.
Fig knew that the flash of fear must have shown on her face because her mother froze. She went wide-eyed and moved in closer. And still reacting, still seeing the version of her from months ago, Fig tried to scramble away, shaking and catching her breath. While also trying to change it, to cover it up. She didn’t want to show her mom fear. Not back then and not now either.
After shaking away the fear and ignoring the trembling, she hugged her mom. She was apologizing profusely, trying to explain she had been lost in thought. She knew the words were not convincing even though her mom said it was okay before heading back up the stairs, forgetting whatever had brought her down in the first place. After a quarter of an hour, Fig walked up the stairs to see if Ayda could help her calm down. She hoped that maybe her mother had just gone back to bed, but as she passed her and Jawbone’s room, She heard her mother’s sobbing.
“Maybe it’s me. I’m just making her relive that nightmare. Maybe that’s why she won’t sleep.” Sandralynn sobbed, “Maybe if I go, she’ll get better.” Fig moved away quickly and started to unravel faster.
***
It occurred to Fig shortly after her bad reaction that her mom, even considering leaving originally, was all Fig’s fault. Fig had encouraged her to cheat and had needed the lesson in flirting. That had caused Sandralynn to seek out Garty that night. Then instead of keeping it a secret, she had told Kristen, who had told Tracker, and suddenly everyone knew, and it was Fig who caused the stress of everything over the trip. If she had just kept her big mouth shut or had been better at flirting, everything would have been fine.
It became obvious to Fig that when Sandralynn left, it would be because Fig couldn’t keep her fucking feelings in check. So Fig tried. She tried keeping it all inside, tried not to step out of line in a way that was the opposite of Fig. It felt like everything she had learned from the Nightmare King’s Forest was fool’s gold, something that seemed so real but was hollow anyway. She wasn’t better being herself; people didn’t love Fig, they didn’t stay: they left. So, she just needed to be better. She needed to smile more and laugh. She needed to stay in her room at night and not make it anyone else’s issue. Not her mom’s, or Ayda’s, or that Bad Kids, no one had to fucking know.
***
The end of summer was approaching, and after weeks of playing pretend and not sleeping properly - Fig felt so tired. Most of the evenings, when Ayda came over, they did nothing. Her bass had been untouched. Not a single song had been written. She didn’t even know if Adaine and Kristen slept in the living room anymore. She couldn’t hear if the roar of the Hangman came up the driveway at 3 am or if Riz snuck through the window. So she stayed in her room, and she handled it alone.
She did all the things she was supposed to do. Even therapy every week. Until one afternoon, mid-August, she laid in the bed above the covers, ignoring Jawbone’s shouts up the stairs. Ignoring everything. She was so tired, but her eyelids refused to close. She didn’t want to go. She didn’t want to sit in that office and feel ten times more terrible than she would have if she had just stayed here and never left. Jawbone knocked on her door. She didn’t move. She just stared at the wall. “Kiddo, we got to go.” He said, treading carefully from behind the door. Ever respecting privacy. His voice was soft in a way that Fig knew it was because she was a landmine. Silence. He knocked again. “Fig… I can hear you breathing.” Damn werewolf sense.
She whispered into the air, “I’m not going.” stubborn as ever. She couldn’t help but remember a conversation similar to this before school started freshman year. You’re not my dad! had Fig spat out angrily back then. Those four words had been the very first weapon she had ever yielded. They had come to life in the moments she meant to hurt Gilear right where he stood, making him feel a fraction of what she had felt when he declaimed her. She always seemed to fuck up and cause more pain than she meant to.
She was missing all of that fight. “I’m not going.”
“Can I come in?” He asked, and she wanted to say no; she wanted to shut him out. But that painfully selfish part of her, the part that used to run away when she was 8 years old just to see if Gilear would follow her, agreed that he could.
Her door opened and Jawbone, all kind and understanding, sat on the edge of her bed and just waited, patient as ever. He brought a different kind of silence with him than the heavy moments in the therapist’s office. It occurred to her that she almost lost him too. If Sandralynn left, surely even his never-ending empathy would run dry and he would see that she had caused all of this. The idea made something curdle in her stomach. She wished Ayda was here. The thoughts weren’t so confusing when her girlfriend held her, saw her, understood her. Her hand went to the feather on her nightstand, kept there or behind her ear. Always within reach. Whenever she needed it.
The silence needed to be fed, or else it would consume her. And after weeks and weeks and weeks of trying to be perfect, she said the first real thing. “Therapy isn’t helping me. Everything is getting worse.”
And those words felt like a dam releasing, acknowledging that not only was she not okay, but the weeks of tapping into the things that made her broken only cracked her more. ‘I’m getting so much worse, and if I keep going, I’m going to shatter, okay? I’m going to be a mess all over the floor and no one is going to be able to put me back together again. She keeps asking my questions. I don’t want to talk about it; I don’t want to think about it.” She was crying now, feather clenched in her hand, a safety net to the shore in the storm of chaos. “It’s all falling apart and if I fall apart, then I won’t have anyone.”
“We’re not going anywhere.” Jawbone said softly, but to Fig, the words were hollow.
“Mom will.” And there it was. The pretty truth in two words echoed around her head for days unending, unsaid. Finally, the unarguable fact set out right in front of them. Undeniable truth. “She’ll go if she knew the stuff that I was thinking. And don’t say she wouldn’t - she already said she would leave, to you, to me.” She was trying to stop herself from crying, trying not to break. She didn’t want to be doing this. Adaine and Kristen were the ones who got to break down in front of others. They could do this. She couldn’t. She had to stay fun and relaxed and tough, for them, for herself. “She’ll go, and you’ll go, and Gilear will stay at Fabians, that’s if I didn’t do something to kill him already, and Gorthlax will get trapped in a gem, and it will be all my fault. It’s always my fault.” It felt like a plea, a wish for him to understand, to see the truth in what she was saying. She wasn’t some kid overreacting. It had already happened. She had already caused the damage.
It was inevitable.
There was silence after her confession, and the longer it went on the more she struggled to keep her sobs to herself. She felt the warm body move closer to her, and she didn’t care who it was. She clung to it. Jawbone was so good at giving hugs, not as good as Ayda, but a close second.
She let him hug her but refused to let herself sob into his shoulder. “Sometimes, Kiddo, you gotta shatter before you can be glued back together. But keeping it all in, it’s like pretending there ain’t a leak when water is spilling out all over the floor.”
She looked at him, tears still streaming down her face but the anger that she had forgotten filled her belly. “If I shatter, there isn’t anyone in the house who will be okay. If I have to be okay so that everyone else breaks, then fine.”
Jawbone shook his head. “That’s bullshit, and you know it. This house is filled with people strong enough to survive” She knew he was right. “Some people ain’t built for the fight as naturally as you are.” He said into her hair. “They aren’t ready to stand their ground against the impossible. When adversity comes knocking, sometimes all people can do is run in those first moments.” Jawbone looked at the door, but Fig didn’t. She kept playing with the feather, head leaning onto his shoulder. “Your mom is a runner,” He admitted in a way that was so soft and full of acceptance that from him, it almost sounded like he was saying I love her. “but she also is brave and bold and gives a shit more than most people I know. So she might take a few steps away, but then she turns back around to observe the situation. To see where her arrows can hit. Because even though her first instinct is to run, the thing that makes her Sandralynn is that when she’s ready for a fight, not a fucking thing can take her down.” He looked at her Fig, and Fig looked at him. She knew by the look on his face that he was about to say something that would break her wide open.
And she let him.
“Fig, there is nothing in this world she is ready to fight more than to fight for you.” And it was the perfect words, the perfect truth, that Fig knew but needed to hear anyway. Her mom had always been there to fight tooth and nail, anyone or anything that had ever hurt her.
She remembered her mother yelling, shoving, and kicking Gilear out when he said that Fig wasn’t her daughter. Putting herself in between them so that his hurt would be directed towards her. She remembered the way her mom fought for her to get out of jail freshman year, how she took one look at Fig and asked what she needed to help with Goldenrod. How she did not hesitate to go with them on a dangerous mission to find the Nightmare King’s Crown. How she blocked and saved and shot anyone that hurt Fig. How she had talked about leaving, fighting herself because her actions were the ones hurting Fig.
Fig was sobbing uncontrollably. For the first time in months, she did not think about how it would look or affect anyone. She just sobbed and sobbed and sobbed when she heard the truth that she needed. And her mother appeared. She must have had heard the words that Jawbone said, and in that Sandralynn way, she knew that Fig needed someone to fight for her- her mom was there. As soon as Fig realized, she latched on. She clung to the familiar smell of Griffin, of dirt and floral shampoo.
There was still so much darkness to sort through. So much further to go. But at that moment, Sandralynn whispered into Fig’s hair that nothing and no one could make her leave exactly where she was supposed to be. Fig clung to her first, fiercest, and most constant protector as she cried and cried and cried and cried. Until finally, wrapped in her mother’s arms, blankets all askew, Fig fell asleep to her mother petting her hair, humming an old lullaby, and promising to keep the nightmares away.