October PrepMo 2015

Protagonist Background Story

Margot bumped her front door open with one of four heavy tote bags that she lugged all of her school things in. She lumbered over to the couch and just dropped them, her forearms and wrists throbbing. Her purse had fallen from her shoulder and had gotten tangled in with the mess and she was too tired to free it. She walked around the coffee table and plopped down on her recliner, sliding out of her flats. The need to sit for just five minutes overwhelmed the need to take a hot soapy bath.

The day had been one from hell, ending with a parent who felt her Robert hadn't deserved the 64% on the multiplication tables test from the previous week. Felt that maybe she was just too harsh and should regrade the exam. She had stared at the door once the mother had left feeling bereft. This was the third grade right? Parents were making excuses already? She had believed the third grade was going to be the best to teach as they were still young and eager to learn and yet they understood they were in school and needed to pay attention. She still felt that way, but today was giving her a giant throbbing headache.

Sure it was Friday, but she had this week's tests and other things to grade. Her weekend was going to be busy and not in the way she wished it. She missed hanging out with Jacqui and Charlotte and doing their thing on the weekends. It seemed to become a quick update phone chats on the phone and she was feeling as if she was becoming her father in the way she let herself become so absorbed with her work. That kind of frightened her. She had always thought that if she had kids, she wouldn't be the way her father was, but at the rate she had been going for the last four months, she wouldn't meet a guy much less have children.

Sighing, Margot got out of her chair and headed towards the bathroom but stopped when she heard her cell phone go off deep within her purse, tangled with the tote bags. Of course. The phone stopped ringing just as she managed to get into her purse and put a hand on her cell phone. Then it started ringing again and Margot noticed it was her mother calling. A chill ran down her spine. Something was wrong.

"Mom?"

"Margot? I...I..." Her mom was crying. She could hear it in her phlegmy wet voice. The chill seemed to be spreading. Was it her father? Maybe it was Alyssa or Wade? One of Alyssa's children? Her husband? Wade's unborn chid?

Realizing her legs were shaking, she sat down on the couch. Not paying attention to the fact she was sitting on one of the totes and that another of the totes, one that was filled with the "need to grade" papers in it (of course), had fallen to the floor and half the contents spilled out. "Mom, what's happened? What's wrong?"

"Your father. I...I think your father is cheating on me with his secretary from work."

Two things seemed to happen simultaneously: the chill dissipated and relief flooded her body but also there was a snap of anger that seemed to burn in the wake of relief. She wasn't sure who she should be angry at and suddenly that brought about clarity.

"What happened mom? What did you find?"

"I was unpacking for your father. I was bored and I like doing it for him. Not that Luisa wouldn't do a good job but—"

"I get it mom. What did you find?" Luisa was their housekeeper who worked for them five times a week and did their laundry and basic cleaning things. The woman was basically a saint in Margot's opinion.

"His clothes. On his clothes. Lipstick and...and foundation. I'd swear to the Pope it was foundation. It was on his collar and his pants. They smelled...a perfume that...that isn't mine."

Margot stood and began to pace her living room floor. How dare he? Anger seemed to fill her and she wasn't sure where or what to do with it. Her mother lived and breathed Phillip Baxter and owed her good life, the upper middle class stature to him. She had never had to work once she'd married him. Margot and her older siblings had gone to private school and never had to worry about student loans when they went to college. There had never been a worry in their life. They had moved out of downtown Albany to the more expensive richy neighborhood of Bridgeton and that's where she had lived until she'd moved to Pleasantgate Point.

"Have you confronted him?" She wanted to know what he had to say for himself.

"No, not yet. I...I just found it this morning. I wanted your opinion, advice."

Sighing, she sat down on the arm rest of her recliner and rubbed her forehead. Even though she was the baby and nine years younger than Alyssa, her mother would always call her and ask for advice or just to talk to and vent on. Margot had always wondered if it was because she was the last unattached child. Alyssa married Walter just before she got her doctorate and then gave birth to their daughter shortly after. Wade had always desired to follow in their father's footsteps (with some encouragement by not only dad, but by grandfather as well) as far as being a lawyer and then in the process married his longtime girlfriend, Kelly and now within the next month or so, were expecting their first baby (Davis Dylan). They were all involved with their careers and their families and she wasn't any closer to family life than she was finding love. Either way, she enjoyed having the closeness with her mother she hadn't had much growing up.

"Mom, you need to ask him about it. You need to find out what happened."

"It seems pretty apparent what happened, Margot Louise."

There was some of her mother's fire back in her voice. The despair seemed to only be at the edges.

"Mom, if it's apparent, then you need to leave. You could come stay with me at my place and—"

"No! I-I will talk to him. As much as this hurts..."

Margot stood and walked into the kitchen, grabbed herself a glass tumbler and filled it with some water. Taking a sip she set the glass on the counter. "You need to know your facts mom. You know as well as I do that his appearance is just as important to him as that valise he carries around. You need to talk to him and hear his side and talk it out and see where you guys stand." Biting her lip she looked out the small window above her sink at the small backyard she owned. "Are you going to tell Alyssa and Wade?"

There was silence for a few moments. Long enough that Margot was afraid her mother had hung up on her. "Not yet. They have so much going on...and Kelly is due at any moment..." There was another long pause. "I will have a talk with your father. It feels so surreal, Margot. I know there isn't any perfect relationship out there, but I thought I did well as a wife."

Her heart felt heavy in her chest. The anger seemed to flame up at the soft voice her mother used. She hated that her mother felt her life was her father's hands. Her mother hadn't worked in over 30 years and the only experience she possessed was two years as a waitress. There would be no way her mother could survive on her own, not without a man. That hurt her more than she realized. "You did a wonderful job as a wife mom. You're a great mom too. Just...you need to talk to him. Find out what's going on. Call me when you've talked to him, okay?"

"Okay. Thank you Margot. It makes me feel...better to be able to talk to you. I felt foolish that I should have to call my youngest child for support, for advice and that I didn't have a friend or a close sibling that I could call instead. Thank you for making me not feel silly."

Margot downed the rest of her water and kept staring out the window. Her mother had hung up, but she just kept staring. The view outside began to blur and then she shook her head and sighed. She had a bath that was now desperately calling her name and work that needed to be graded and lessons to be planned. Life needed to keep going, regardless of how boring and plain it was at the moment. Setting the tumbler in the empty sink, she set her phone on the counter and then walked out of the kitchen and down the hall to the bathroom.