Drabble Number Tres: What If…

Summary: Anne would watch her mother grow old for a good twenty years, but the one question that always passed through her mind everyday was, "What if…?"

Warning: Slight angst.

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She watched as her mother slowly died from the inside out. Her green eyes had lost their bright laughter in them. Anne could remember when her mother would always have a bright smile on her face and her skin glowed with such love.

But now…now it was nothing but greasy, gray-black hairs and out-of-it looks as Faye looked out from her bedroom window and at the glistening sea. Anne would never bother her mother when she was having these moments, knowing nothing good would come out of it even if the phases lasted for days at a time.

Anne didn't know what to do. She couldn't make her mother laugh anymore; the person that had made that laugh come from her was long gone.

Anne would watch her mother grow old for a good twenty years, but one question that always passed through her mind everyday was, "What if…?"

What if her father had never left? What if her parents had never met that fateful day in the old shop that was now nothing but ruins? What if her father had stayed?

She would just sigh at these questions, not knowing the answers, and go on with her small daily chores.

"Anne…" At the sound of her name, Anne looked up from sweeping the clean floor and practically cried out when she saw her mother finally walking around the house again. "Oh my dear Anne…"

She knew the smile on her mother's face was not the one that she wanted to see, the bright one that was just waiting to let out a laugh, but if that was all she got she would take it. There was a small comforting moment between the two as daughter hugged mother, and then everything went back to normal.

Faye would just be pacing around the house with some type of fabric in her hands with fingers expertly embroidering or sewing up holes. Anne took in these moments so that if anything ever happened again, she would remember what her mother was like, and not the dead shell that she had watched for over three years.

Anne sat down beside her mother as the old woman hummed a random tune she had learned from her life at sea. Faye's fingers pricked and pulled at a patch of black and red fabric. The daughter would just watch her mother, listening to the hauntingly soothing sound of her soft hum. This was one of those moments where Faye could actually hold a tune.

And then… Anne questioned, "What if mother never came to be like this again?"

The sadness that leaked into her heart couldn't be seen easily from the mask of happiness that she put on. Anne would just have to keep questioning "What if?"

Even though Faye knew all the answers.

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A/N: Yes, yet another drabble. Today is drabble day for me. I don't feel like writing any more chapters for oMaM because today I get to go to the State Patrol Office and get my driver's book! In only a month's time, I will be able to take the test for my learners permit! WATCH OUT WORLD, Bri will be loose on the streets soon!

So, did you like it? It was one of those small, daughter-mother moments between Anne and Faye that no one would have known about unless I wrote this drabble… yeah.