the end of this chapter (the beginning of another?)
pg ; kelly pov ; one shot || i do not own charlie's angels.
All good things must come to an end. It's a well-known saying and perhaps one that has never been more relevant than it is right here, right now. Despite putting their lives in danger every day, this has been a good thing. A very good thing. Had it not been, they wouldn't be standing here, in a room decked out to the nines with an expensive band in the background, a whole crowd of people shedding tears over a man most of them never met. Hundreds more passed away long before this day could come, or else they'd be here too. Charles Townsend truly changed the lives of many. None more-so than hers. She doesn't recognise some of them, figures that they only met once or twice, and they had too many clients for her to recognise every last one of them even if she tried. Others, she may not have met at all. It's been a long time since she packed the job in, after all. She's grown up, settled down, become a mother. Done all she could to make the old man proud of her. She still sees these girls she grew up with occasionally, Sabrina and Kris more than the others, admittedly. They're like the sisters she never had, and even now, all of them standing there with their withered faces and housewife haircuts, they're still the same people. Just under the heavy disguise of normality. She knows it's the same for herself. Some days she stands and looks in the mirror and doesn't even recognise the woman staring back at her.
Kris never married. Kelly likes to think that she's still the same fun-loving girl stealing the hearts of many whilst forever being known and adored as Jill Munroe's little sister. Because even though Kelly worked with her for all those years, a part of her will always recognise her as just that: the little sister. The one they all teased and cooed over and worried about. Angels came and angels went, but for some reason, Kris was always the new girl. Despite having worked there longer than most. Now, in her late fifties, with greying blonde hair, and the same adorable little smile, she was still not a mile away from the little girl they'd come to know and love. Slap some dungarees on her, and she might have been the exact same person.
Kelly casts her eyes over to Jill. It's been a long time since she saw her, and she would have liked to have been able to say life treated her well, but it just isn't the case. A flame went out in her the day Steve was killed in that accident. She's carried on, and to the naked-eye perhaps she seems like the same person, but Kelly knows better. That was some thirty years ago now, and it has been a steady downhill race for Jill. Over the years, Kelly has watched her slowly fall apart. Even Kris seems oblivious to her sister's unwinding. She's worked her way through two marriages, both of which fell apart at the seams, and her health has gone with it, and now, if Kelly's observations serve her correctly, she's drinking herself to death. But they haven't been close in a long time, and Kelly can't find it in her to try and do something about it.
Where all the other angels have come alone, Sabrina is sitting in the corner of the room with a small child balanced on her lap, another standing nearby at the buffet table, and a woman who could practically be Sabrina sans about thirty-years is talking to somebody at the other side of the room, but keeps glancing backward at her mother. Kelly can't help but smile. Of all of them, Sabrina's the luckiest. Four children and eight grandchildren (another on the way, she doesn't mind reminding them every five minutes) later and she still looks as bright and brassy as the day she walked out of the agency. Her intelligence and wit hasn't suffered one little bit either. Kelly is proud to call herself the god-mother to two of her best friend's children, babysits for one of them on occasion. Some friendships aren't supposed to last the test of time, but there isn't a doubt in Kelly's mind that this one will. It already has, as far as she's concerned.
She looks away when Sabrina meets her eyes, waving baby Olivia's hand in her direction. Sure, she smiles before she does so; she's not avoiding her after all. She just doesn't want to draw attention to herself. Her heart feels heavy all of a sudden and she decides she needs to sit down.
Tiffany didn't make the celebrations. She's on a cruise somewhere, or so says Kris who is apparently in contact with her. Kelly never really got to know the girl enough to want to keep in touch, although she is ashamed to admit it. She was with the agency a year. A pretty uneventful year, as they go. And that was a lifetime ago. The same thing could have been said for Julie, she suspects, although she regained contact with her more recently, and she and Kris have been out for dinner a few times. She's blonde now, and her face looks almost exactly the same as it did back then. She's aged well. The fact that she's childless doesn't seem to bother her, and over-all she hasn't changed much. Perhaps that is why she and Kris are still good friends.
There's a portrait of Charlie over by the door and Kelly gazes over at it. It's odd. They only got to meet the man they'd been talking to for so many years in person once. She looks at the picture and she realises that it could be of anyone; she doesn't recognise him at all. She wonders how many other people in this room are thinking the same thing. Did they ever really know him at all? She owes the man her whole life, he crafted the woman that she is today, gave her the opportunity to grow as a person and make a career for herself. He followed her life, knew every little thing about her, and she spoke to him over a speaker every day for nine years. And yet, at the same time, she never knew anything about him, bar the basics.
As for herself... she has very few complaints, if not a few regrets. After marrying the man of her dreams – the only one who did not turn out to be a crook – she left the agency, and a year later was pregnant with her first and only child. Growing up, she'd always been alone. For that very reason, she'd cared for other people's children her whole life, and a part of her had expected to be one of those women who wound up with six or seven little ones running about the back yard. But life had a way of making its own rules, and complications with child-birth had meant she was incapable of having a second child. One of her own, anyway. After Emily had started school, they'd adopted a little boy, and the following year a little girl. It might not have been the conventional way of doing things, but Kelly knows better than anyone else what it was like to be stuck in a care-home. She would have adopted every single one of those children if she could.
People are beginning to make their goodbyes, and Kelly decided now is as good a time as any other for her to get going. If she leaves now, she might avoid having to make awkward small-talk with people she hasn't seen in decades. They might not even notice her departure. Gathering her belongings, she heads for the door, casting one last lingering look on each of her old friends. She catches Sabrina's eye, and her friend merely nods. She understands. She always did understand.
As she passed by the portrait, Kelly stops for a second.
"Thank you Charlie," she whispers. And she means it. From the bottom of her heart. And a tear rolls off her cheek involuntarily as she realises this chapter of her life is well and truly over now.