Summary: Mary did not want to get involved with anything involving Pagford or the Fields. For she had made a life out of racing away from her guilt, fearful that it would swallow her whole. Yet this Yarvil counsellor will get a headache and an unwelcome reminder with her new client. SPOILERS for "The Casual Vacancy".
A/N: By the way, it's 'Mary' as in NOT Mary Fairweather. Different Mary. It works with the symbolism. Cool? Sweet.
So! After the crazy roller coaster ride that was the end of "The Casual Vacancy", I was really curious about the unseen counsellor. I had an idea, and since it was left open it's now my canon! Just to warn you THIS WON'T MAKE SENSE IF YOU HAVEN'T READ "THE CASUAL VACANCY" AND YES THERE ARE SPOILERS! BEWARE, HERE BE DRAGONS!
General Disclaimer: Not mine, none of it, nada. I just love finding Rowling's plot loopholes and exploiting them.
Mary had a headache.
This was no surprise, the dratted things came often enough that she had a constant supply of aspirin in her purse. Mummy dearest would probably say she was weak-willed, but she had also said far worse and really, who actually cared what the old bat thought? As it was, Mary knew that there was a perfectly good reason why it felt as though a drill was digging into her skull. While she wished more than anything to crawl home, kiss her daughter, and curl up into a little ball, she had never been one for crying. She knew enough about repression and projection to recognise the bloody symptoms.
Still, mistakes happened. Tragedies were part of life. People aren't meant to feel guilt over every little thing that, in hindsight, they should have done–it would eat them up alive. So yes, she should have made an effort, should have brushed away her unconcerns, and should have at the very least shown up to the funeral. But there was nothing she could do now but work.
Mary neatly side-stepped the idea that she was projecting her failures onto her clients (if she could save them, just one of them. Or two. Two, that was it), dismissed the notion that she was still hiding, ignored her nerves and brushed off invisible fuzz from her neat blouse. For she had always prided herself on staying professionally unattached from her cases. Though she had to wonder about this and what had possessed her to take these clients. Because so what if she broke her angelically perfect facade–screw it, screw all of this, all of the petty little problems her job placed before her, ramming into her head like a scar.
But she had still come into work today.
Personal problems be damned, perhaps she had been merely lucky in the past that Yarvil did not get many serious disasters. It was an idyll English town: as much as she would love to escape it, a clench of fear always tightened in her chest at the prospect of taking a train to London. For who knows what would be waiting for her there? Here it was simple, any counselling was contrite, and she knew precisely what the job would require from her. The worst she had to deal with on a frequent basis was concerned parents tugging their reluctant teenagers in, blabbering away about how they'd end up in gaol because they were caught smoking.
Sometimes it was concerned grandparents making the ruckus. Mary frowned as she shuffled the papers on her desk, studiously ignoring the schedule sheet almost hanging off the corner. If she ever saw Howard and Shirley Mollison again it would be too soon. They had dragged their granddaughter Lexie in, and though the gap where her front teeth had once been was still strained and a bright, deep red, the girl looked more set on vengeance than breaking down into tears. Counselling was the last thing the teenager needed. She was perfectly aware of who she was, how to grit her teeth against the pain, and how hard she'd have to punch Krystal Weedon back to properly repay her.
Mary's heart had given a little skip when the bully's name was mentioned, but she plastered on a smile and urged Lexie to talk. Her shrewish grandmother's rants trailed on for hours while her morbidly obese grandfather's raucous, inappropriate laughs swelled around the room. The girls parents were either too busy or too smart to drop by and complete the circus.
The counsellor had loved to see the back of that particular family once their month was up. She was very happy that Lexie was on her way to recovering and going to a new school, but the entire business brought up too many memories she'd prefer to ignore. For there was a reason she hated dealing with clients from Pagford.
She straightened her papers again, glanced around her bare, silky white office, swept over the list of appointments and, for lack of a better option, settled her gaze on the rosary beads raveled around the edge of a hanging Chinese painting. She loved the crisp green and red brushstrokes which danced and blurred along the edges of the winding snake; she despised the blasted prayer beads. Yet she kept it there just so her mum wouldn't have a screaming fit on the rare occasions she visited.
"Mary! What are you doing, you horrible child?" The vehement whisper splattered specks of spit on the bored little girl's face. "Desecrating the Lord's word–Jesus, if you tear one more page I'll–"
"Make me confess?" She ripped the corner to test. The abused Bible was instantly snatched out of her hands.
"Horrible child." Sue repeated, handing the book beside her to John, slapping her daughter's hand, and returning her gaze back up to the pulpit. "We rescue them and this is how they thanks us?"
"Ungrateful." The man agreed full-heartedly. It was in a hushed voice but Mary heard every word.
To try and distract her thoughts, Mary fantasised about what would happen if she let out the secret that had been tugging at her for years, making her chuckle in hidden relish at her mum's many repeated sighs and groans that she was a disappointment in God's eyes. Mary always bit her lip and ducked her head.
How she wished she had beaten Liam in confessing. It had almost been a thing of beauty, how he had nonchalantly mentioned that he was shagging his partner Henry, and how John instantly clutched at his chest. The next few hours were filled with frantic 999 calls, pacing and waiting and grieving and black black black...but Mary couldn't help but feel satisfied when looking back.
Oh, she knew that made her a 'bad person'. The heathen and the freak that her 'loving' adoptive parents had also claimed she was. But so what? And if her admission of atheism would, one day, give Sue a coronary, than fine. That wasn't her fault. After all, family should–family should stick together.
Mary felt her throat clog up at the thought, as though water was streaming through it in a rapid wave. She clumsily grabbed for anything and so, before she could prepare herself, she was looking straight at the lines for her next appointments.
She gulped. The water barely began to trickle down into her stomach.
Christ, she would even prefer to have another meeting with Colin Wall. Absolutely anything was better than thinking about her, the girl she had heard so much about but always raced away from meeting, running fast and clear away from the past. So even the poor, paranoid man would be better than the alternative.
("Breath Colin, breath. That's right, low deep inhales, don't pay any attention to the fears. They're not real, they're beneath you, focus on actual life, real life; if you give way to these thoughts than they've won. I know that Tessa will help you. Okay? Do you want a spot of tea? Some water? No no, please believe me, I swear that you haven't done any of these things. You aren't a monster. You are a good, brave man." She then pretended not to notice Stuart's scoff, Colin's continued hiccoupy sobs, or Tessa's look as though her world was consistently on the brink of shattering to pieces.)
Colin had been coming to her for so long that his familiar presence would almost be comforting, especially with his wife Tessa's friendly, open smile and their son's refreshing sarcastic wit. She had always had the sense that they were hiding something–perhaps even from each other–but unlike her esteemed colleagues she understood that some secrets were best left kept out of sight, locked away with the key tossed out the window.
Mary had no delusions that the Walls were a perfect family, but she was not one to judge. She had seen the loving glances Tessa couldn't help but throw her son's way as she clutched onto Colin's shaking hand. She couldn't help but notice the slight, scared and worried glances Stuart would send his parents when they weren't looking, as though he was convinced they would disappear in a poof of magic. A part of her desperately wished that her daughter would, at times, look at her like that someday. In the dark of the night when her worries would pound into her skull and she'd find herself next to her baby's crib (just to see her, make she was here, alive, and hadn't slipped past her fingers), and maybe she'd gently brush her soft hair to the side, but more often than not she would merely watch Sophia in wonder.
If she were to pray for anything, it was that her little daughter would never see her like Sue. She'd give her choice in her beliefs, she wouldn't be a tiger mum–she'd be the cool mum. If her baby snogged a boy or girl they'd giggle together like best mates. If her baby wanted a fag she'd bloody well get a lecture about the horrid health effects, but then would be driven to the store if she'd like. If she ever caught her baby with drugs–
Mary once again pulled herself from these thoughts with a shudder. She glanced at the clock; the appointment wouldn't be here for a few minutes. Her hands twitched, her head pounded. She wasn't sure if she'd prefer them to be early or late and–like the Mollisons–she was deeply considering explaining to them why it might be best if they switched counsellors. But no, she could be unbiased. Yes, of course she could. Everything was deeply buried away and there was no reason why she couldn't act normal, professional, and there was no reason why anyone should know.
To escape her musings she dwelled on the other few clients she'd taken from Pagford. She tried to avoid them in general, but Yarvil wasn't big enough for her to cleanly break from the small satellite. It was because of this that she had gotten a sudden influx of clients with the death of Barry Fairweather.
She had never actually met the man, yet from the way everyone seemed to wax poetic about him she was quite certain she would have disliked him. But that was neither here nor there, and it was not her place to speak ill of the dead. So she found herself listening sympathetically to the different sides of the small town war that had bubbled up with his death.
Mary's first new appointment had been with Samantha Mollison. She had been quite surprised to see this name, having assumed that the woman scoffed at the idea of therapy since she had not supported her daughter. The sessions had quickly changed her mind: Sam didn't mind therapy, it was her family and "Bloody Pagford" which drove her mad.
Even when Sam had come in with a bronze tan that actually looked painful, mid-riff baring jeans, and a too-tight t-shirt which blared the name of some teenage band, Mary couldn't help but feel a companionship with her. Oh sure, the case was a clear mid-life crisis and it was obvious that Sam did actually love her husband, adore her children and despise her in-laws, but it was all too easy to be sympathetic to her problems. Goodness knows that she'd felt like the odd one out more times than she could recall.
(Children leering on the playground as she clutched onto the football that was as big as her torso; "Dirty Fielder!" "Pagford! You going back to the Piggies? Or your whore of a mum?" And she ranranran and only cried and never said a word)
After Sam–who had finished by leaning towards giving her husband Mike an ultimatum of a divorce or a move to London (failing bra shop and parish council seat be damned)–the true grief counselling had begun. Yet it was odd, for though Mr. Fairweather's best friend Gavin Hughes had come in, he was determinedly ignorant of his actual problems.
Mary had spent the first five sessions listening attentively as Gavin bemoaned the loss of his friend, worked through his shock of the funeral, looked lost at talking about the four kind and perfect kids he'd left behind, and angrily ranted about the hassle the insurance company was giving his mate's widow.
It was only on the sixth meeting that Kay Bawden had been mentioned at all. Mary had given a little start at realising that she'd missed that her client had a serious girlfriend, but he seemed disinterested in the topic as a whole. He only continued talking about his friend's widow, his open house, and his lovely kids. She realised with dawning incredulousness that he had barely spoken about himself or his own life at all.
She bit her tongue when Gavin came in one day, shell-shocked and heart broken, exclaiming that he'd broken up with Kay and confessed his love to Mary Fairweather only to be rejected. As he reprimanded himself for his stupidity of ever telling the widow his secret, she had struggled to keep from shouting the truth at his face. For one couldn't just dive in the deep end and bluntly tell a man that he'd been trying to imitate his dead best mate's life. This things had to be eased into.
As fate had it, Mary had also met Kay. Not at a counselling meeting, but when Mary had to travel to the social workers' offices in Pagford. Another woman had practically shooed her away, but then Kay appeared like an angel and ushered her open to her crowded desk. During their quiet conversation about the suspecions Mary had had after counselling Ruth Price for her stress disorder, she glanced down and noticed a picture frame amidst the piles of bundled papers. Kay paused in her notetaking, followed Mary's line of sight.
"My daughter, Gaia." Kay explained in her chiming London accent, a smile lighting her face and chasing away the gloom from the topic of possible domestic abuse. Mary struggled to smile as well, for it was only in that moment that she had made the connection between the wonderfully helpful Kay, and 'Gavin-and-Kay-and-the-latter's-delinquent-daughter-Gaia'. She stole a further glance at the photo of the laughing, beautiful young women. Her take on Gavin Hughes took another plunge.
The photo lingered in Mary's mind for long after. In it Kay had looked a few years younger. Her teenage daughter had climbed onto her back and had flung her hands in the air in some unknown victory pose. Gaia's beauty was glaringly obvious, something which streamed effortlessly from her olive skin even through the worn picture. This was only multiplied by the uproarous laughter in the way mother and daughter had their heads thrown back, hair cascading, and facial features stretched and distorted in a way which should be unpleasant, but was instead lovely for some indeterminent reason.
Back in Mary's own office, back in the present, her fingers lightly touched the folds of skin on her stomach, like a crumpled sheet. But it was fine, it and the blinding pain of labour was fine for it had given her Sophia. Her perfect, precious baby, who she should be cuddling right now instead of at work. Getting a babysitter was a horrible idea. Right now she craved, needed to feel her child's reassuring pulse beneath her fingertips, hear the coos as her wondrous mouth formed sounds, take in her fragile blonde hair and tiny pink figure, knowing that she had made this miracle. Of all her mistakes in life, of all the situations she had avoided or refused to remember, Sophia could redeem her.
She wasn't aware that her touch had trailed away from her belly to clutch at the round, circle of a scar on her arm that a lit cigarette had made so long ago. She blinked, she shook her head, realised she was being ridiculous and pulled herself back to the present just as a sharp knock rang on the door.
"Come in!" Mary called out with forced happiness, her hand jerking away from the scar. A purposeful woman entered, likely Indian or Pakistani, her features were pretty as though they had been chiselled from stone, oddly matching her dark clothes and the challenging frown that lit her face as she assessed Mary. Yet her expression instantly softened as her gaze shifted over her shoulder as a teenager–slightly short, with wavy dark hair and a mound of bandages up her leg–shuffled into the room. She had a nervous limp, as though she was not used to the balance of the world.
"Parminder Jawanda." The woman shook her hand formally. Her grip was strong, unsurprisingly. "Here with my daughter Sukhvinder."
Mary glanced up at the clock. Her clients had come into the room exactly on time, precisely at noon. She couldn't help but think of an inverted fairy tale, for if everything ended at midnight then would everything begin at...
She wondered if her half-sister and brother had, once upon a time, liked those stories.
"Little Liam." Sue had said with true love in her voice. "You'll never have to come back here. Ever ever ever. We have a lovely house, you'll have your own rooms, toys, and every Sunday we'll go to the pretty church. Wouldn't you like that? You and Anne-Marie are coming with us and we'll live happily ever after."
John chuckled as he bounced his new daughter (laughter in her eyes, oblivious to the hospital and worried care workers) on his lap. He was careful to avoid looking at the bandages around her arm, afraid that his anger that the bastard who'd done this to her would boil over. "You won't ever go back there, I promise. We'll be far away from the Fields. You'll be our Anne-Marie, our little Mary, our miracle."
A/N: Yep, the mysterious Anne-Marie! I did rush through this a bit to try and get it online before any other regular "The Casual Vacancy" fanfics, so I hope the plot's details are more or less correct. I still have to add a bit on Nana Cath, but other than that it's about done. That is, unless anyone wants to see this expanded from just a oneshot?