You Finish the Puzzle.
Summary: One-shot. A little look into Jade's past. "You didn't have a happy childhood?" "My favorite toy was a hammer. You finish the puzzle."
Warning: I will forever have trouble with tenses. Bear with me as we go from past-perfect to past to present-perfect, all while talking about Jade's childhood.
Disclaimer: I'm not the wonderful, all-powerful Dan Schneider, although sometimes, I really wish I were. But because I'm not, the only claim I have to this is some of the storyline. Characters and such do not belong to me.
Jade West was a neglected child. Her father was always working, never had time for her, and seemed annoyed by her existence whenever her five-year-old self would approach him with the simplest request of a hug. Her mother, an actress whose trade lay in commercials and commercial voiceovers, was perpetually on the job hunt, not willing to be backtracked by the cry of her daughter.
The Nanny. She was not completely ignored. A nanny her parents hired came to their house everyday and took care of the little West, and was responsible for purchasing whatever the girl's heart desired. However, the teenage nanny had interests of her own, which mostly included John Hughes marathons complemented by raiding the fridge for Lichterz ice cream every time she broke up with her on-again-off-again boyfriend. Even worse, when she and her boyfriend got back together, they were either making out on the couch or doing unmentionable things on the second floor of the West's house.
But Jade found their relationship intoxicating. She decided that if she were to ever get a boyfriend, she wanted her relationship to be just like theirs. The only other example of a relationship she'd seen was her parents', and they made it obvious that there was little to no legitimate love there. And the relationships in the John Hughes movies, but frankly, she didn't understand those. But her nanny was noticeably happier and more excited whenever her boyfriend surprised her with chocolates or flowers or a new movie they could watch together. Although her boyfriend being there meant there was less Jade-Nanny time, the girl still found it fun to watch the teenage lovebirds and pretend they were a prince and princess in a Disney movie.
There were times, however, when her nanny would make Jade her number one priority, and tell her stories of a little princess named Jade. She would make the princess out to be the most talented, pretty, and sought-after girl in the kingdom. Sometimes the princess would go out on adventures, always accompanied by a mystery boy on a white horse; other times, the princess would go to balls, just like Cinderella. Jade had decided that when she grew up, she was going to be princess Jade: she was going to meet her prince, go to a dance, get married, and live happily ever after, just like in her nanny's stories.
Those stories made the young girl love her nanny like a sister, and when she left the summer job to go to college after Jade turned seven, Jade got very upset. There was no more princess Jade to go on adventures, and when she asked her parents to come up with a princess Jade story, they rolled their eyes and told her to go to sleep.
Greener Grass. There were few days when one or both of her parents had the day off. Of course, her mother could always willingly take the day off, but she seldom did, unless there was promise of a vacation. On an August day before Jade started second grade, her family went to the beach for a vacation day, which consisted of her parents on beach chairs in bathing suits, shielded from the sun by umbrellas, and little Jade West all alone on the beach, attempting to build a sandcastle with a shovel and pail.
There was another family on the beach in close proximity to the West's. The looked like an average family: a little boy, a little girl, two parents; the one thing that made them different from Jade and her parents was their bonding. The whole family was participating in making a mermaid out of the little girl, who had half her body buried in the sand. Jade found herself jealous of the other girl, and looked up at her own parents. Her mother had her nose buried in a People, and her father was reading some large, boring-looking book. She tugged at her mother's arm. "Momma, I want to be a mermaid, too." Her mother, who wasn't really paying attention, responded, "Uh-huh, that's nice, sweetie," and turned the page.
Little Jade dug her feet in the sand, and started to pile more and more sand on herself. As soon as she had sand up to her waist, she attempted to lean over and design it so she looked like a mermaid, but it was so dry that her slight movement caused the sand to drop off of her. Tears started forming in her eyes, but she moved a little closer to the wet sand and tried again. Unfortunately, her efforts offered the same result. Stubborn, she moved down the beach again and tried one last time. She was so close to the water this time that when she finally got wet enough sand onto her legs, the waves came in and took it all away.
Frustrated, she went over to the other little girl and her family (she was never afraid of strangers), and, in the sweetest voice she could muster, said, "Excuse me? How did you do that?" She pointed a tiny finger at the little mermaid girl. The girl's parents looked up at her with a sweet and patient smile.
"Do you want to be a mermaid, too?" The woman asked. She nodded. Her parents were only about seven feet away and could easily see her from where she was; not that they cared. She could have been kidnapped by that family and her parents might not have noticed until they wanted to leave the beach.
Jade lay down next to the girl – who had super curly (almost permed-looking) brunette locks – and smiled at her. "I'm Jade," she said.
"I'm Cat!" The eccentric girl said. "But right now I'm a mermaid!"
"Where are your mommy and daddy, sweetie?" Cat's mother asked. Jade pointed over to where her parents were sitting in their beach chairs. The woman quickly walked over to where the Wests were, pointed to their little girl, and then came back to join her family. She had been asking permission to have their daughter play with the Valentine family, not wanting them to be alarmed if they couldn't find their daughter. Mr. and Mrs. West hadn't really blinked and waved the stranger off, assuring her it was no problem.
"Well then," she said to Jade, "let's make you a mermaid, too!"
Jade only saw the girl – Cat – a few times after that during playdates their parents set up. But the two lost touch by the time Jade turned eight.
Birthday. Jade and her father shared a birthday. It was her eighth and his… well, she didn't know; she just knew he was older. Jade's birthdays – because they were not just her own – never included a party or big celebration. Sure, the whole family would go out to dinner, but it was usually a place her dad picked, and they never told the waiters that it was either of their birthdays. She and her father usually shared a cake, too, from a cake box place down a couple blocks. The only things that they didn't share were cookies – bought from the same cake box, but with their names on them – and gifts.
Jade's family was on the wealthier side, so she tended to get a healthy amount of gifs, but they mostly consisted of stuffed animals or paints or school supplies. She received things her parents thought she wanted because she was a little girl, but didn't pay enough attention to her to ensure she got what she actually wanted.
Jade always opened her presents in private because her parents never really cared for her reaction to the gifts. But there was something odd about this set of presents; she got a teddy bear, a stuffed giraffe, some butterfly clips for her hair, and a few scrunchies, but she also got something unorthodox for an eight-year-old girl: a hammer.
It wasn't a claw hammer – although it did have a claw on the back – or a gavel, but almost a tinner's hammer; just a tiny, plastic, hammer-shaped toy, with a black, grip-covered handle and a gray, smooth head. It wasn't hollow, but it didn't weigh a lot, either. It was an unconventional present, but she found it was her favorite. On the stuffed animals she had of two or more – her parents were, indeed, that neglectful that they forgot which presents they had already given her (sometimes twice) – she used the claw to take their eyes out just far enough to where they almost fell out and then attempt to hammer them back in. It usually resulted in toys with broken eyes and noses, as the hammer was plastic and couldn't do much, hard as she tried.
Relief. Jade kept the hammer with her at school every day, hidden in her backpack, until she turned nine. She had it with her all the time, and even got in trouble at school some days for hitting people with it when they ticked her off. She didn't think it would actually hurt anyone – although sometimes she hoped it would – because it was made of plastic. But kids were wussies and got her in trouble anyway by feigning serious injuries when they told on her to the principal.
She was given warnings, many of them, including some saying they would take away her hammer and throw it away if she didn't stop. So she'd stop for a while, and kids would stay away – except her friends, of which she had many, oddly (probably because people were scared not to be her friend) – for a while, then she'd get ticked off again and the process would repeat itself.
In addition to hitting her classmates with her hammer, Jade would also hit her food and smash her vegetables. Anything she didn't want to eat – or did, but wanted it smashed instead of whole – she hit with the hammer.
The reality behind hitting anything with her precious hammer wasn't just out of boredom or annoyance from other students; every time her parents said some generic reply to something she asked or said to them – just as her mother had that day on the beach with Cat – Jade would hit something, or someone, and release the anger.
But there was a day when she hit a boy in his ankle, and he twisted it and blamed it on her. In her defense, he was trying to steal it, and she needed to make a break for it or she would lose her favorite, therapeutic toy. Unfortunately, the principal finally came through on his threats to throw away her hammer and did just that, right in front of her, in his office. Because the hammer helped Jade release her emotions – in however an unhealthy way it was – she hadn't cried in a while. But seeing the hammer at the top of his trash can, and being unable to grab it or have it again no matter how many apologies she offered really got to her, and tears stung at the corners of her eyes.
She didn't talk to anyone the rest of the day until she got home and her father was at the kitchen table, fixing a loose screw.
"Daddy," she said, quietly. "The principal took away my birthday hammer."
Her father sighed and reached into his toolbox to find his spare hammer. "Here," he said, and handed it to her. "Play with this one." It was shiny, and metal, and had a larger claw than her plastic hammer had. She beamed at her dad. "Thanks, daddy!" She wouldn't take this one to school – she knew better than to lose another hammer to the principal – but she kept it near her bed and with her until she turned eleven.
Scissors. On her eleventh birthday, Jade received another bizarre gift from her parents: scissors. She'd received them alongside middle-school-level school supplies and a few gift cards. The scissors were the brightest red she had ever seen and the blades were so shiny that she had to test them out immediately.
She grabbed a wide-ruled notebook and tore a few sheets out of it. Using the scissors, she carved out the letters of her name, and was astounded by how smoothly the blades glided over the paper. They sliced through with no problem, unlike the kiddie scissors Jade was used to using.
She went to the store a couple days later and bought four more pairs just like them – really, Mom, a gift card to Staples?
High School. Jade got into the performing arts high school she wanted (and worked so hard) to get into. Within the first week of school, it was required that all freshmen try to make their lockers unique.
Jade knew just how she wanted to decorate her locker. By now, she had a little scissor family – about twenty scissors total of all colors and sizes – and stuck them to her locker after painting it completely black. It was opposite of her friend Beck's locker – his was completely transparent – but she liked that her locker was completely opaque and guarded by the scissors.
Every time Jade met a friend that penetrated her wall, she took her favorite hammer that her dad gave her, unglued a pair of scissors, and hammered them through the locker surface so the blades were inside her locker and the only things sticking out were the handles.
The first friend to do this was a girl with pink hair named Cat Valentine. Jade remembered her face and her eccentric and outgoing attitude, and the girl remembered her, too. Though polar opposites – cat feared pain and sharp objects, wore bright colors, and sang soprano – the two became fast friends.
The next was Beck Oliver, who made her weak in the knees and was basically her best friend. He didn't find her love of scissors weird – although he didn't trust her with a pair in her hand – and he understood her parental problems. His friendship reminded Jade of that of her nanny and her boyfriend, and that in itself gave her a fuzzy feeling about him.
The most recent was Erwin Sikowitz, her acting teacher. Albeit he wasn't exactly a friend, but he was always a mentor there to listen to her bitch and moan, and taught her more than she ever thought she could learn about acting.
But her favorite pair of scissors – the red ones she'd gotten for her eleventh birthday – and the hammer she got from her dad lay in her messenger bag, still with her.
Authors Note. Well, there you have it: Jade's childhood as I see it. No abuse, just neglect (which is almost as bad as emotional abuse) and a pair of scissors. I'm sorry that I rushed the ending, but I saw the word count and said 'woah' out loud, so I figured it was time to wrap it up. Constructive criticism and any kinds of reviews are always welcome. Let me know what you thought!