Gerald and Millie looked as though they had been dunked in buckets of cold water. Their mirth vanished so quickly that it looked as though it had never been there in the first place.
They exchanged dumbfounded looks so profound that Maeve felt a rush of mirth of her own bubble within her, but it was quickly squashed by the realisation that what she had just said… was true.
She hadn't believed it when she said it, but the looks on Gerald and Millie's face…
Millie's head whipped over to Maeve, and the inner, distorted demon she kept hidden behind her decent, Baguette-shaped face lurched forth. She suddenly advanced towards Maeve and smacked her pretty face violently with the back of her large hand.
Maeve herself was surprised by the blow. She held her cheek and looked dumbfoundedly at her foster mother.
Millie's face turned red.
"You leave our house, rewarding our hospitality with fuck offs, fuck yous and fuck alls for all the care we gave your wretched little ass, and then return unannounced, not to get on your knees and beg for our forgiveness, no! You return to ask about those… those…?" Millie spat, shaking and failing to find the last word she needed to complete her vile sentence. "How many times must I tell you? You as good as sprouted from the ground, you little bitch!"
Maeve stumbled back.
She turned pale and gaped. The pain stinging from her cheek seemed to disappear when matched against the staggering implications floating around the lounge right now.
"So… so, it's true?" she murmured. "I am a…"
Gerald scowled. His eyebrows twisted like snakes. He slung his arm around his boiling wife, nostrils flared.
"Werewolves? Ha! Are you even listening to yourself? Who fed you this garbage? We've told you all that you need to know about those two. The only decent thing your parents ever accomplished was meeting us! We did good by them too many times to count and raised you as a last favour after they passed. They were nothing special and neither are you!" he barked.
But Maeve didn't buy it.
This wasn't the visceral reaction she expected from these two at all.
Their response, their attempts at denial were too…feeble. Her mention of werewolves – especially to this pair – should have backfired comically if it was at all unfounded.
It only occurred to Maeve now that the story Gerald and Millie always fed her about her parents was too stiff. Even now, it had no expansion, careful detailing or nuance.
In the past, each time she asked about her real parents, she had been punished for it. Millie would suddenly turn hysterical and Gerald would always look as though something fouler than Maeve had walked into the room. Only after this routine would one of them tell the story: that Maeve's real parents were newlyweds Gerald and Millie knew who had lost all their fortune on a honeymoon and got much-needed help from them. The two always added the dreaded, "So sad, so pathetic," when explaining that the two had died shortly after having a baby in a horrific car accident.
Before, Maeve had believed this somewhat. It was practically a certified bedtime story that she always recited before crying herself to sleep… in her dusty little attic. But now, doubt mounted her like a horse.
Maeve found strength in that doubt. Her emerald green eyes turned resolute.
"I want to know about them," she said firmly.
"We already told you. Your parents were good-for-nothing—"
"I don't give a rat's ass what you think about my parents!" she cried. She could practically taste the lie in Gerald's words now. "I just want to know who they were before they died! Everything! The truth, and not these stupid, hole-ridden lies!"
Maeve didn't give her foster mother a chance to recover from her reeling. She had been about to strike.
"I've started experiencing these… changes!" she cried desperately, and thought of Aaron and Ryan's eyes turning gold. "I'm changing. I know it's connected to my parents. They were special, and I am too!"
The looks on Gerald and Millie's faces were priceless. At the word 'changes', they recoiled. A shadow of fear seemed to pass through them. Gerald had him and Millie take a step back. His wife looked revolted as she sized up Maeve. It almost seemed as though to her Maeve had just transformed into a woman-sized slug.
Maeve's heart beat furiously.
"Tell me!" she cried, advancing.
"Get back!" Millie shrieked and grabbed a lamp nearby. She brandished it at Maeve impressively.
Maeve felt frustration simmering within her. Why wouldn't they just tell her? If they had known all along what she was… why did they keep her?
"Mom? Maeve? Dad? What's going on?"
At that moment, a small figure walked into the lounge, looking afraid. Little Jimmy had heard the shouting, screaming, the distinct clap of flesh on flesh, and before he knew it, he couldn't sit still in his room pretending to be the stupid, oblivious ten-year-old boy everyone thought he was. He'd have to have been especially dim to not know the staggering animosity between Maeve and her parents; there was no lack of hints.
Everyone in the lounge froze.
Maeve was lost for words. She looked at Gerald and Millie, and then at Jimmy.
"Jim, I—" she began but the shadow of something quick flew at her and smacked her in the face.
"DON'T YOU TOUCH HIM!" Millie screamed, having flung her lamp with great accuracy.
Maeve had shielded her face just in time, but the shards of the glass bulb in the lamp left a few cuts on her forehead and temple. She bled.
Jim looked horrified. He hurried to try and help Maeve, shaking.
"Jim, back away!" Gerald commanded. Jimmy froze.
What in the world was going on? The boy couldn't understand why his parents were treating Maeve like a bomb.
He looked at Maeve. Before he knew it, tears were swimming in his eyes. Maeve saw this and smiled at him.
"It's okay, Jim," she said and began backpedalling out of the lounge, watching to not get another lamp thrown at her.
Millie's half fearful, half furious visage seemed to lengthen all the more.
"Don't you dare come back here again or else I swear I'll get the authorities involved," she hissed.
Maeve gave no reaction to the threat. She looked at Jim one last time.
"See you around," she said softly and left.
Maeve was surprised by how light she felt upon walking back into the street and returning down the way she had come. She had thought the absurd revelation just now, however on earth it was even possible, would leave her in tears or rage; her initial reaction had been rather fierce, after all. But in the end, she simply felt… empty.
Her right hand shook and her neck seemed to spasm without end.
A couple of quarters later, Maeve had a lit cigarette between her fingers. She sat on a gloomy bench with chipped paint, alone. The bitter taste of smoke rushed between the ceiling of her mouth and her tongue, attempting for the umpteenth time to grant her comfort. It failed.
Maeve smiled. She had only expected that.
She laughed, but there was no happiness in her voice.
***
Bridget was rushing with orders to and fro. The long line of customers at Frank's Fried Friends was particularly unforgiving today. Why did she always draw weekends?
Contrary to her gloom and frustration, though, Chris worked the register with a smile that Bridget thought looked genuine, unlike the practised, soulless one she wore on when it was her turn to serve the customers a discount on health with their own money.
Chris was an oddball. He was always here, even when he wasn't supposed to be. It almost seemed like he loved the job.
As odd as he was, no one disapproved of him. Chris was loved by all, including the manager. Bridget could admit to giving him more than a dozen kisses for covering for her since he enlisted to work at this joint.
She always wondered why and how he was so good at something she loathed so much.
Right then, the short girl received a call. Deftly, she managed to get a moment of reprieve enough to answer it. Seeing the caller ID, Bridget sighed.
"I sincerely hope this is you calling to tell me you're coming to work early, Maeve," she said upon answering, her face screwed.
A moment later, however, the wrinkles on Bridget's face faded and she beamed.
"You're serious, you b-word?!" she cried joyfully.