Overland Park, KS, A Weekday in October (Thursday Fandom Time)
After her bit of texting with Luke, Kate had taken Hubbard's old red Cadillac and gone off to meet the prospective buyer. While the guy had been a little apprehensive about the fact that Kate had no paperwork with her, in the end the meeting had been a success (though Kate was willing to attributing that to her flattering clothes and dashing smile, along with the reasonable price she'd asked for the car), and afterwards she'd spent a while counting the money and celebrating the sale with her brother over some coffee.
They'd inevitably gotten to talking about her plan. Obviously, she was still going ahead with it, even without their parents' monetary help: she was 18, they couldn't stop her if she paid her own way. But it still made her feel a bit bad that she didn't have their support. Especially her mom's since Kate had seen how proud and happy and strong Tara was feeling over going back to school, and how supportive everyone was of her. She wanted some of that for herself, and didn't get why she wasn't getting it. So, she'd asked Marshall.
"Why are you asking me?" he'd retorted. "What am I, the fucking Buddha? Go talk to Mom."
So, she'd gone to do that. Or, she'd gone to her parents' place but no one was home, so she'd gotten some food from the fridge and sat on the stairs that faced the front door. It was a good place for waiting. And also texting Bod, because someone besides Moosh needed to know the joy of her having successfully sold Hubbard's car. And, okay, offer a little support for her plan to have big serious talk with her mom. But mostly to squee over the money.
She was still texting when there was the sound of a car pulling up in the driveway. Excited, she looked up at the door. But then she heard her mother's voice through it.
"Thanks for the ride, Astroglide!"
It wasn't hard to know who coming in before the door had even opened. "T," Kate said, evenly, as the fake teenager made her fumbly way in. "What's up, sista from another mista?" T greeted her, loose and unwieldy in her movements as always as she pulled her hoodie off and threw it haphazardly into the living room where it fell into a pile on the floor. "I've been hangin' with the J-Dog, tweakin', jankin', givin' up stank for beer money..."
Great, she was drunk. Drunk and heading for the kitchen. Kate pushed herself up from the stairs, leaving her phone behind and forgetting completely about texting anyone, now. "Who's J-Dog?" she asked, as she followed T. "I don't know," T shrugged, grabbing a tub of ice cream from the freezer and a big wooden spoon from the counter she ended up leaning against. "Guy with a truck."
So informative. "Okay, T, I gotta talk to my mom."
"Aww," T drawled, mocking, "Katie wants her mommy."
"What are you doing out, T?" Kate asked, resisting an eyeroll. She really didn't feel like dealing with this right now. "Did something bad happen to my mom today?" Hadn't she just gone to school today? No big deal? "Nothin' we can't handle," T replied. That didn't sound so convincing, though, what with the fact that T was, y'know, here. And scrunching her face up in disgust, now. "Old donkey dick's trying to twist up her head. Teach say I ain't real?" She put the spoon down, a picture of defiance. "I'll show you what's real. One-eight-seven real!" She straightened up and turned around. When she whipped back around she was holding a long, sharp kitchen knife. "Payback time!" she declared, looking like she thought it was funny, with a gleam in her eyes. It was not a good look.
Kate's eyes widened. "T," she said, trying sound assertive instead of alarmed, "simmer down." T just snorted, so Kate reached out to grab her wrist, careful to keep herself away from the blade as she used her other hand to try and twist the knife out of T's grip. "Let go," she said, as authoritatively as she could. T rolled her eyes but did what she asked, and she moved away, towards the counter, to set the knife down there. "Do you have any idea where my father might be?"
"I don't know," T shrugged, seeming to be just wandering closer to Kate for no particular reason. "He ain't my job." Kate pulled the knife away from her grasp just in time, having been expecting that just from the way she'd been moving, all deceptively idle and shit. She'd seen the lunge coming a mile away. It was weird. She hadn't exactly ever expected to be reminiscing her salle days with Luke while dealing with T, of all people.
"Fine, bitch," T said, raising her hands and looking like she wasn't even bothered. "I don't need no shank. I'll get myself a boom stick." Because that was such a reassuring thing to say, sure. There was an uneasy feeling in the pit of Kate's stomach and it was only getting worse. "I gotta roll," T continued. "Where the fuck are the keys?"
Oh, Kate knew where the keys were. They were standing at one end of the kitchen island; the keys were at the other. While T was doing a little twirl, looking around herself, Kate glanced quickly over and confirmed this. Shit. Now she needed to keep T away from them, and here she went with her attempt at an assertive voice again. "Um, I don't think you should go anywhere, T. You're completely wasted."
"Who's gonna stop me?" T asked, amused. And somehow, that amusement annoyed Kate in a way that steadied and steeled her voice. "I am," she said. "I don't want you doing anything that's gonna get my mom in trouble." That just made T shake her head, and even that was unwieldy, somehow. "Aw, Kay-Kay," she said, like talking to someone who was not getting a very simple thing. "That's where you got it all wrong. Momsy and I are working together, she wants me to do this."
Yeah, no. "I don't think so."
That was when T spotted the keys, too. Kate saw her eyes dart that way, saw the half smirk briefly cross her face.
About a second later, then they both lunged that way, on either side of the little kitchen counter island. T managed to get a hold of the keys, but they had reached for them at the same time and Kate managed to grab her hand with both of hers, and refused to let go, trying to wrestle the keys out of T's grip. T snarled for her to back off but she had no intention to. So, T snapped, "Back the fuck off, bitch!" and grabbed Kate's ponytail, yanking her head back, hard. The pain made her let go, but T didn't get more than a step away before Kate was already grabbing her by the arm. And then T spun around.
It seemed to Kate like the sharp pain that started at her nose and spread outward from there came before her brain had time to process the visual of T's fist coming at her. She staggered back, holding her face. But just for the few seconds it took for her to get what had happened. "...Son of a bitch!" And then she was running after T, not that she'd gotten far, just the front yard. It was far enough, though, considering she was now only a few feet away from the Green Hornet, Tara's car.
"Don't get in that car!" Kate yelled. It didn't seem to have much of an effect, though: T kept walking. Maybe she didn't think Kate would actually do anything. She hadn't, two years ago, at the tattoo place by the motel. All she'd done was talk. Maybe that was why T didn't even bother turning around when she said, "You fucking cu--" She didn't get to finish that insult because Kate had tackled her to the ground. It was an impulse thing, a show of just how desperate she was to stop T at any cost. She knew she couldn't let her leave. Not when she was like this. Drunk and angry about something Kate didn't even know for sure what it was. All Kate knew was that she couldn't allow anything bad to happen tonight. She refused.
"Don't fuck this up for my mother!" she yelled at T, keeping her pinned to the grass and the cold ground beneath. "She's put up with too much, and she's worked too hard!"
T snarled at her, trying to struggle her way free. Kate had a hold on her wrists, though, and was using her weight pretty efficiently to keep the woman pressed to the ground. "Get the fuck off me!" All she could do was be angry. And Kate didn't care if T was angry. She found she was far more angry. "If you fuck this up for her, you fuck this up for me, and I need her to do this!" she screamed down at T, her voice already growing hoarse. "You hear me?! I need her to do this! Don't take this away from her!" Her voice was breaking. "Don't take this away from us!"
As a red drop fell on T's chin, she stilled, stopped struggling, and suddenly the face looking up at Kate no longer looked like the person wearing it would scratch her eyes out if given half the chance. It just looked devastated. Further little droplets of red appeared, and it took Kate a second or two to figure out it was blood. Hers. Her nose was bleeding. Now that she'd noticed that, she thought she could even taste it. It was quiet, and she realized she was panting. The sudden stillness had made her loosen her hold on the other woman's wrists, and as she reached up to wipe blood off the top of Kate's lip, she flinched away a little, both out of instinct and because of the pain. But, voice broken and heavy with the tears of shock and relief that were already welling up, she asked, "Mommy?"
"Yeah," Tara replied, quietly. Her voice sounded small, smaller than Kate had ever heard it sound. "I'm here."
Kate drew in an unsteady breath, and shifted off of her, slumping down on her back next to her mother on the cool, wet grass. "T punched me," was all she could think to say.
Tara put her hand over her daughter's and shook her head. "I know."
For a moment, they were silent. Kate could really think of nothing at all so she just stared at the sky, stared at the stars. This was all fucked up. Fucked up.
Slowly, Tara turned her head towards Kate. "Japan?" she asked, barely louder than a whisper.
"Japan," Kate agreed.
Another brief silence went past. "Go."
There. They'd had the conversation. Tara turned towards Kate and pulled her in for an embrace which she returned because she couldn't not. Tara was already crying; it didn't take long for Kate to start, too. They stayed there like that for a long time, despite the cold.
[ooc: NFB, NFI, warning for some minor violence. Taken and tweaked from USoT S03E02. This is the part that always makes me wibble.]
They'd inevitably gotten to talking about her plan. Obviously, she was still going ahead with it, even without their parents' monetary help: she was 18, they couldn't stop her if she paid her own way. But it still made her feel a bit bad that she didn't have their support. Especially her mom's since Kate had seen how proud and happy and strong Tara was feeling over going back to school, and how supportive everyone was of her. She wanted some of that for herself, and didn't get why she wasn't getting it. So, she'd asked Marshall.
"Why are you asking me?" he'd retorted. "What am I, the fucking Buddha? Go talk to Mom."
So, she'd gone to do that. Or, she'd gone to her parents' place but no one was home, so she'd gotten some food from the fridge and sat on the stairs that faced the front door. It was a good place for waiting. And also texting Bod, because someone besides Moosh needed to know the joy of her having successfully sold Hubbard's car. And, okay, offer a little support for her plan to have big serious talk with her mom. But mostly to squee over the money.
She was still texting when there was the sound of a car pulling up in the driveway. Excited, she looked up at the door. But then she heard her mother's voice through it.
"Thanks for the ride, Astroglide!"
It wasn't hard to know who coming in before the door had even opened. "T," Kate said, evenly, as the fake teenager made her fumbly way in. "What's up, sista from another mista?" T greeted her, loose and unwieldy in her movements as always as she pulled her hoodie off and threw it haphazardly into the living room where it fell into a pile on the floor. "I've been hangin' with the J-Dog, tweakin', jankin', givin' up stank for beer money..."
Great, she was drunk. Drunk and heading for the kitchen. Kate pushed herself up from the stairs, leaving her phone behind and forgetting completely about texting anyone, now. "Who's J-Dog?" she asked, as she followed T. "I don't know," T shrugged, grabbing a tub of ice cream from the freezer and a big wooden spoon from the counter she ended up leaning against. "Guy with a truck."
So informative. "Okay, T, I gotta talk to my mom."
"Aww," T drawled, mocking, "Katie wants her mommy."
"What are you doing out, T?" Kate asked, resisting an eyeroll. She really didn't feel like dealing with this right now. "Did something bad happen to my mom today?" Hadn't she just gone to school today? No big deal? "Nothin' we can't handle," T replied. That didn't sound so convincing, though, what with the fact that T was, y'know, here. And scrunching her face up in disgust, now. "Old donkey dick's trying to twist up her head. Teach say I ain't real?" She put the spoon down, a picture of defiance. "I'll show you what's real. One-eight-seven real!" She straightened up and turned around. When she whipped back around she was holding a long, sharp kitchen knife. "Payback time!" she declared, looking like she thought it was funny, with a gleam in her eyes. It was not a good look.
Kate's eyes widened. "T," she said, trying sound assertive instead of alarmed, "simmer down." T just snorted, so Kate reached out to grab her wrist, careful to keep herself away from the blade as she used her other hand to try and twist the knife out of T's grip. "Let go," she said, as authoritatively as she could. T rolled her eyes but did what she asked, and she moved away, towards the counter, to set the knife down there. "Do you have any idea where my father might be?"
"I don't know," T shrugged, seeming to be just wandering closer to Kate for no particular reason. "He ain't my job." Kate pulled the knife away from her grasp just in time, having been expecting that just from the way she'd been moving, all deceptively idle and shit. She'd seen the lunge coming a mile away. It was weird. She hadn't exactly ever expected to be reminiscing her salle days with Luke while dealing with T, of all people.
"Fine, bitch," T said, raising her hands and looking like she wasn't even bothered. "I don't need no shank. I'll get myself a boom stick." Because that was such a reassuring thing to say, sure. There was an uneasy feeling in the pit of Kate's stomach and it was only getting worse. "I gotta roll," T continued. "Where the fuck are the keys?"
Oh, Kate knew where the keys were. They were standing at one end of the kitchen island; the keys were at the other. While T was doing a little twirl, looking around herself, Kate glanced quickly over and confirmed this. Shit. Now she needed to keep T away from them, and here she went with her attempt at an assertive voice again. "Um, I don't think you should go anywhere, T. You're completely wasted."
"Who's gonna stop me?" T asked, amused. And somehow, that amusement annoyed Kate in a way that steadied and steeled her voice. "I am," she said. "I don't want you doing anything that's gonna get my mom in trouble." That just made T shake her head, and even that was unwieldy, somehow. "Aw, Kay-Kay," she said, like talking to someone who was not getting a very simple thing. "That's where you got it all wrong. Momsy and I are working together, she wants me to do this."
Yeah, no. "I don't think so."
That was when T spotted the keys, too. Kate saw her eyes dart that way, saw the half smirk briefly cross her face.
About a second later, then they both lunged that way, on either side of the little kitchen counter island. T managed to get a hold of the keys, but they had reached for them at the same time and Kate managed to grab her hand with both of hers, and refused to let go, trying to wrestle the keys out of T's grip. T snarled for her to back off but she had no intention to. So, T snapped, "Back the fuck off, bitch!" and grabbed Kate's ponytail, yanking her head back, hard. The pain made her let go, but T didn't get more than a step away before Kate was already grabbing her by the arm. And then T spun around.
It seemed to Kate like the sharp pain that started at her nose and spread outward from there came before her brain had time to process the visual of T's fist coming at her. She staggered back, holding her face. But just for the few seconds it took for her to get what had happened. "...Son of a bitch!" And then she was running after T, not that she'd gotten far, just the front yard. It was far enough, though, considering she was now only a few feet away from the Green Hornet, Tara's car.
"Don't get in that car!" Kate yelled. It didn't seem to have much of an effect, though: T kept walking. Maybe she didn't think Kate would actually do anything. She hadn't, two years ago, at the tattoo place by the motel. All she'd done was talk. Maybe that was why T didn't even bother turning around when she said, "You fucking cu--" She didn't get to finish that insult because Kate had tackled her to the ground. It was an impulse thing, a show of just how desperate she was to stop T at any cost. She knew she couldn't let her leave. Not when she was like this. Drunk and angry about something Kate didn't even know for sure what it was. All Kate knew was that she couldn't allow anything bad to happen tonight. She refused.
"Don't fuck this up for my mother!" she yelled at T, keeping her pinned to the grass and the cold ground beneath. "She's put up with too much, and she's worked too hard!"
T snarled at her, trying to struggle her way free. Kate had a hold on her wrists, though, and was using her weight pretty efficiently to keep the woman pressed to the ground. "Get the fuck off me!" All she could do was be angry. And Kate didn't care if T was angry. She found she was far more angry. "If you fuck this up for her, you fuck this up for me, and I need her to do this!" she screamed down at T, her voice already growing hoarse. "You hear me?! I need her to do this! Don't take this away from her!" Her voice was breaking. "Don't take this away from us!"
As a red drop fell on T's chin, she stilled, stopped struggling, and suddenly the face looking up at Kate no longer looked like the person wearing it would scratch her eyes out if given half the chance. It just looked devastated. Further little droplets of red appeared, and it took Kate a second or two to figure out it was blood. Hers. Her nose was bleeding. Now that she'd noticed that, she thought she could even taste it. It was quiet, and she realized she was panting. The sudden stillness had made her loosen her hold on the other woman's wrists, and as she reached up to wipe blood off the top of Kate's lip, she flinched away a little, both out of instinct and because of the pain. But, voice broken and heavy with the tears of shock and relief that were already welling up, she asked, "Mommy?"
"Yeah," Tara replied, quietly. Her voice sounded small, smaller than Kate had ever heard it sound. "I'm here."
Kate drew in an unsteady breath, and shifted off of her, slumping down on her back next to her mother on the cool, wet grass. "T punched me," was all she could think to say.
Tara put her hand over her daughter's and shook her head. "I know."
For a moment, they were silent. Kate could really think of nothing at all so she just stared at the sky, stared at the stars. This was all fucked up. Fucked up.
Slowly, Tara turned her head towards Kate. "Japan?" she asked, barely louder than a whisper.
"Japan," Kate agreed.
Another brief silence went past. "Go."
There. They'd had the conversation. Tara turned towards Kate and pulled her in for an embrace which she returned because she couldn't not. Tara was already crying; it didn't take long for Kate to start, too. They stayed there like that for a long time, despite the cold.
[ooc: NFB, NFI, warning for some minor violence. Taken and tweaked from USoT S03E02. This is the part that always makes me wibble.]