Disclaimer: I do NOT believe this as a storyline, I in fact have spent years arguing against this, but, according to a talk Winnie Holzman gave at UC Berkley, she did see this in the characters' futures, so this is me playing at what that might have looked like. Though again, I still do NOT think this is where MSCL was heading. [If you want to read an account of the talk you can visit mscl com forum, go to "The Afterlife of Cast and Crew" go to "Winnie Holzman" and open the "I met Winnie Holzman!" thread]
Angela knocks lightly, waits, then pushes open the door to her parents' room. It feels so different now, that end of the house, now that her father is gone. In some ways she'd seen it coming, but really, it'd taken them all by surprise. Not one of the Chases had seen this for themselves. Even while the separation was happening, it didn't seem real. It was as if it was happening to some one else, to some other family. But it did happen to them. Graham Chase moved out.
It wasn't because of Halle. Hallie Lowenthal was a symptom; she'd merely slipped into the cracks of the growing divide between Patty and Graham. The divide that had maybe shook their foundation at different times, but had never seemed to threaten to unroot and collapse their entire world. Until it did.
No, it wasn't because of Hallie; it had started before her. It had started before the girl who grabbed his tie. Graham honestly couldn't say when, or why it had started. And who was to say where it would end? Graham had long thought of it as something he had to — and would — get over on his own. For one thing he never saw it as inherently to do with Patty. Not fully. It was something inside of him, something that was missing or somehow off, outside their marriage. He had never planned to leave. He wanted the marriage, their family, to work, and to last. But she grew suspicious and things came to a head in a way they were never meant to. And he couldn't walk it back from there. He's been gone now for three weeks. And in that time, the Chase home has descended into the bell jar.
Tepidly Angela turns the knob, and pushes open the door. In bed, Patty lies curled on her side, lying like dead weight. A scene grown too familiar to her older daughter. It's not her mother there on that empty queen bed, it's a shell; an empty husk, a hollow waif unequipped to reconcile the reality of her circumstances with the vision of her life she'd built for eighteen years.
If she makes herself look at it objectively, Angela knows this hasn't been anything close to easy on her father. She might even recognize that her mother might have played some limited part in all this, but Angela is not in the least inclined to look at this objectively. Objectively, she has been left. And alone as she is, it doesn't matter to her that it had been hell on Graham to tell the girls. In truth it had been hell on him to leave, to leave all three of them, but it doesn't matter to her. She has been left. It doesn't matter to her that nothing about the separation made him feel free — not even the end of fighting. She just doesn't care.
Other things are taking precedence.
The room Angela steps into feels dark and closed in; it is not a mess — Angela's been straightening up — but everything about it feels different. The room, the house, their lives, have shifted; it's only right to her that guilt should consume her father.
The room is desolate, and emotionally void — it is no longer a place that is lived in. "Mom," Angela says softly, like she's reaching out to her across a vacuum. Patty doesn't speak. She does not stir. Angela, her eyes wide and brow furrowed, tries again, even softer. "Mom."
Patty's glazed eyes blink. Her head shifts just fractionally. "Angela, please," she sighs. At this point she doesn't know what she's asking for. To be left alone? To be allowed to sink back into the darkness? To not have to have or be reminded of the state she's descended into? For the girls to go it on their own a little longer? She summons enough wherewithal to lift her head and say, "Make sure you girls eat." Then her jaw sinks back into the pillow. "And the garbage," Patty rubs at her eye, "is someone making sure the cans go out and in?"
"Mom." Angela's brow knits tighter. "Please…" But no further response comes. She's disappeared again. And Angela, still in the threshold, waiting, eventually retreats, and silently shuts the door behind her.
Okay, now that that is done, I just have to say: 'Patty + Graham Forever!'