It Was Never Just About the Fries
Suggested Theme:
Main Theme- Daddy, Why Did You Eat My Fries? By Marceline
It was cold when Marceline woke up. Lately, she has woken up cold. But this time the cold feels different, sort of insane. She gets up from the dirty couch and kicks away her thin blanket, accidently knocking Hambo off in the process. She quickly scoops up Hambo in her arms and sings an apology to her old friend. She then hears a whistling sound like the tea kettle and gently puts Hambo back on the couch. She goes into the kitchen, the kitchen is dirty and the pain is peeling like every home nowadays. She can see the old tea kettle on the stove and the steam rising from the spout, she shuts off the stove. She then turns her head to see Simon in the corner of the kitchen. Simon is sitting on top of a small, iced patch and is rocking back and forth like he is trying to contain himself. Simon always makes the house cold, or whatever place they were sleeping at, cold when he is about to enter another memory lapse. It is okay; no really it is, because Simon always finds his way back to her. This time though, it seems different. Marceline just can't put her fang on why it is, but Simon made tea. So Simon was still here, with her. Marceline goes over and puts her arms around him, even though she knows that it won't stop Simon from having another bad day. Simon stops rocking and he can feel him twitch.
"Hey, Simon, remember what I told you yesterday? I got to meet my dad today. I bet he just wants to bother me or something, but then you told me I should go. So I will go, but the tea is on the stove. I will be back soon, and Hambo will keep you company. He's on the couch, lounging like the Vampire Prince that he is. When I come back, we can have another tea party like we always do." Back in the old days, Marceline could just claim that she was the Vampire Princess and Simon would pay attention to her. Now, Simon would mutter about a Candy Princess, a Ghost Princess, or a Doctor Princess. But Simon was not muttering about princesses this time. He wasn't saying anything. And she feels those hands, the same hands that wiped away her tears all those years ago, and it feels like warm blood has never pumped through his veins. The icy hands more cold than his snowy beard were firmly cupping Marceline's pale face. If she didn't know who Simon was, then she would have thought Simon was about to kiss her. Without Simon's glasses, Marceline can see a blizzard of emotions blanketing his eyes an icicle-glossy color. Those were Simon's eyes, those have always been the eyes that Marceline knew best.
"Look, I found a coin in your ear. Go and buy some fries with it." Marceline didn't even feel the cold piece of metal being pulled out of her ear because she was so distracted by Simon. Simon has dropped the coin in Marceline's small hand and encloses it with said hand as if to say it was time to go. And Marceline did go.
She got the fries, lukewarm at best, from a strange green guy with a huge yellow hat. She probably should have avoided such a character but the strange man had fries. She hadn't had fries since…..the Great Mushroom War. Maybe even before that because her mom would never let her eat too much grease as a kid. If her mom was still alive, and that was a mighty big if, then she would also nag her daughter not to take unhealthy food from strangers. Too bad that Marceline will only adhere to strangers' counsel, like Simon, rather than her own parents. Speaking of parents, she gets to have a happy fucking family reunion with the asshole that left her in the ruins of civilization. If Simon was in his right mind right now, he would have chastised her like her mom at her cussing. Honestly, she would have just bought the fries and gone straight back to Simon rather than have a one-sided conversation with her dad. But she made a promise to Simon, a promise that she still wonders if Simon was crazy then to make her agree to it, and she will uphold it for Simon. Besides if her dad pisses her off in any way, then she could just go back to Simon.
"There's my little monster, how are you, Marceline?" Her dad seems happy to see her, but he always smiles like that when he gets a new victim to mess with. They were at a rundown diner with more broken windows than lights on the big "EAT" neon sign outside. Hunson Abadeer is still in the black suit and red cowboy boots that Marceline remembers from her childhood; well it wasn't much of a childhood because of the war. She will never understand how her mom fell for a face that made evil look good.
"Fine, until you turned up." Her dad left a business card with the address to meet him at; there was not even one word about why he left her or how sorry he was. Getting an apology from him was like getting this dirty table fixed.
"Now, Marceline, don't be like that. I had business that I needed to attend to. The Great Mushroom War caused a lot of problems for me in the Nightosphere. You were like five or six at the time when I left, so you must be like eleven or twelve now? I bet you didn't even notice how much time has flown by since then for a kid like you." No, you motherfucker, I was seven at the time and it's been six years since YOU ABANDONED ME! I was plenty old enough to realize that my Daddy left me in the middle of a broken city for his work, you prick! It was amazing at how much control Marceline is exerting over herself from going screaming obscenities at her dad, but she reigned in her pain and anger. She could use those emotions to finish a song that she has been working on for awhile. Maybe she could get Simon to sing it with her, if he's up to it after the tea party.
"What do you want?" Marceline could feel the heat fading fast from her box of French fries. She probably should eat them soon.
"What a father needs a reason to see his own daughter?" Yeah, you have every right to say that! His self-righteous sarcasm is boiling Marceline's anger.
"Okay, then answer me this. Why now? You had plenty of chances to come and find me, so why now?" Instead, you chose work over me as always. Simon said something that everyone deserves a second chance, even though he never got his from the one that he loved. Marceline disagrees with him on that, he did receive his second chance but from her instead.
"I want to keep a promise I made to your mother. She wanted me to be involved with your life, if she died. Well, I needed to settle some matters back in the Nightosphere before I could do that. And that is why I had to leave you all those years ago." Whoa, heavy. Marceline knows the weight of promises like the heart has to hold up the world while doing somersaults. Her anger is gone and replaced with conflicted feelings of wanting to believe her father and wanting to just make the ache go away. Her stomach rumbles and Marceline reaches for a fry. The fry is cold and Marceline hates cold food because the flavor is overall bland in cold foods. She needs ketchup, and there is a bottle back at the house.
"I need to go and get some ketchup, but I'll be right back. Would you watch my fries and make sure no one eats them?" This is her first baby step for her dad, a test of trust.
"Sure, Marceline, I promise no one will eat your fries." And Marceline believes him. She leaves the diner and sees how gray the sky is. She smiles up at the sky and walks back to the house that she, Hambo, and Simon are squatting in. Today might actually turn out to be a great day for Marceline.
When she got home, she notices that the house is warm. The house is never warm when Simon is around. She hurries to the kitchen, the last place she saw Simon, and sees Simon's backpack and the tea kettle are gone. She finds her duct-taped and cracked mug filled with cold tea and Hambo right next to it. Marceline tears through the kitchen for a hint of where Simon could have gone, and then searches the rest of the house for clues. She finds nothing, not one shred that Simon was even here. Simon left. Simon is gone. Simon, the closest thing she had to a good father, abandoned her like her father. Why? Marceline fulfilled her promise; she went to see her father like Simon wanted her to. She could have chickened out and lied that she did, but she really did meet her father. She did that all for Simon. Yet, Simon went away like her mom. She did not understand and she did not want to because no matter what Marceline could theorize, it all resulted in Simon leaving her and making Marceline feeling lonely. She did not like to be alone like she did not like fries without ketchup. Her stomach moans and Marceline is snapped back into reality. Her dad is waiting for her, while Simon isn't anymore. She heads to the kitchen and wordlessly grabs a bottle of ketchup from the fridge. She heads out the door and leaves just like Simon did.
It began to rain on Marceline's way back to the diner. She remembers a time when a rainy scene would usually give a movie a sort of ambiance, or at least that is what Simon told her. Simon told her a lot of things. Some of things he said sounded mature or cruel like "I'm hurting you because I love you." Simon did hurt her, so Simon still loves her? She wants to apologize to Hambo for ever saying that to him because she now feels like shit for ever believing that. If you love someone, you wouldn't hurt them. So how come everyone she loves hurt her? They all hurt her by leaving her behind or pushing her to the ground. She feels hurt, no wounded, like someone set her on fire and just kept squirting her with lighter fluid. People don't hurt people, Simon also told her that. So does that mean she's not a person either? It doesn't matter anymore. She still has her dad. Her dad is better than nothing. The diner is dark because of the rainclouds. She almost didn't see it, but she heard it. Oh, she heard it all right. She heard a crunching sound like someone eating fries. She saw her dad, her dad that promised that no one would eat her fries, eating her fries. He broke his promise like tears breaking through Marceline's emotion dam.
"Daddy, why?" She cries. It wasn't just because of her dad eating her fries; it was also because of Simon leaving her without even one note on why.