Author's Note: Hey everyone, I'm sorry this took so long but this chapter has been tough to write. It's a bit outside of my comfort zone, which is why I wanted to try it but also why it's taking me so long. It's not really done yet but I thought you deserved an update so here's what I've got so far and there will be at least one more part to this particular storyline.
I'd love to hear your thoughts, good and bad (constructive criticism only please).
And just in case you hadn't guessed, I still don't own Supergirl and I'm still not making any money on this story ;-)
Maggie looked around at her family, each of them fierce in their own way. How did I get so lucky she thought. "Looks like we're all going to Blue Springs, Nebraska to say good bye to Abuela Sofia."
They arrived in Blue Spring at 5 PM, the day before Sofia's funeral after spending the better part of the day in transit. They had flown from National City to Denver and from Denver to Lincoln Nebraska, where they had rented an SUV for the hour long drive to Blue Springs. Throughout the entire trip Maggie's stomach had been tied in knots.
Her knees had bounced so much on the flight from Denver to Lincoln that Alex had finally reached over and gently rubbed Maggie's thigh, "It's going to be okay sweetheart, we're all here with you."
Maggie visibly relaxed at her wife's touch. "I know babe, I'm really glad you're all here but that's also part of what has me so worried. My parents weren't the only homophobes in Blue Springs by a long shot. In fact, Tia Sofia's liberal attitude was definitely not the norm. I'm just worried about how people are going to react to my showing up to her funeral with my wife and kids, let alone what might happen if they find out about Jessie."
"We'll deal with whatever happens...together," Alex replied giving Maggie's leg a squeeze before releasing it so she could hold her hand. She rubbed her thumb over Maggie's knuckles and the expression on her face changed. Maggie could tell there was something she wanted to say but either she didn't know how to bring it up or she was worried about how Maggie would respond. Knowing her wife and how her mind worked, Maggie remained quiet, knowing Alex just need time to work through whatever it was that was on her mind before she spoke about it.
Finally, taking a deep breath and letting out slowly, Alex spoke. "Maggie, do you want to keep this kind of stuff in private?" she asked lifting their joined hands and pressing her lips briefly to the back of Maggie's hand. "It's my natural reaction to touch you in some way when your distressed and Sofia's funeral is going to be distressing for all of us but if PDAs are going to make things worse I can at least try to curb that instinct."
Now it was Maggie's turn to lift their joined hands and brush her lips against Alex's knuckles. She found she had to clear the lump from her throat before she could respond. "I love you so much for asking that question but no, I don't want you to fight that instinct. A lot of these folks may be homophobic but they're not stupid. If they recognize me they'll figure out that you are my wife or girlfriend and that Matt, Jessie, and Bertie are our kids. I doubt it will change any minds but I'd like to show them that we are just like any other family. We love and support each other during the hard times." She said this with the same determination Alex had come to expect from her wife when facing difficult situations.
"Okay," Alex replied smiling, "but I guess we'll have to keep the public make out sessions to a minimum," she joked.
"Especially if we want our kids to ever speak to us again," Maggie replied grinning, grateful to Alex for injecting a little humor into the conversation.
Once they had checked into the Motel 6, the only hotel in Blue Springs, Alex asked, "Shall we go out and get some dinner?" The kids all looked excited but seeing the look of panic flash across Maggie's face she added, "Or one of us could go grab something and bring it back. I saw a Pizza Hut just down the street when we drove in. We could have a picnic here in our room. We can eat dinner on our beds and see what movies are available on TV. It will be fun."
The kids all liked that plan. Maggie smiled gratefully at her wife. She knew they'd all have to face the residents of Blue Springs sooner or later. She just wanted to put it off a little longer so Alex went to the Pizza Hut to get them all dinner while Maggie and the kids took showers and changed in to PJs so they could be comfortable for their "picnic".
At the Pizza Hut, Alex went up to the counter to see if their order was ready. The 30 something man working the cash register, attempted to flirt with her. "Hey pretty lady, you must be new in town, I'm sure I'd remember such a good looking woman if I'd seen her before."
"I'm just visiting," Alex replied tonelessly, trying to shut down his unwanted attentions.
"Really!" He seemed genuinely intrigued. "We don't get a lot of tourists. What are you here for?"
Alex was surprised by the question. Maybe it was a small town thing but where she was from that question would have been considered a bit over the line. Maybe that accounted for the way she replied, or maybe it was her desire to know if anything had changed since Maggie had left Blue Springs. She couldn't say for sure but she simply couldn't help herself. "My wife and I are here for a funeral," she replied emphasizing the word "wife".
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. You have my condolences," he said apparently neither shocked nor upset to hear she had a wife.
The person standing behind Alex waiting to pick up their own order was another matter. "Filthy pervert." She heard the woman mutter.
Alex glanced over her shoulder at the woman. She looked to be in her early to mid-sixties with short grey hair. She was wearing blue jeans, a University of Nebraska sweatshirt and a sour expression. "Were you speaking to me?" Alex asked giving the woman her best, badass DEO Agent Danvers glare.
The woman seemed to consider her response for a moment then thought better of taking it any further. "No, I wasn't," she replied putting as much contempt into the words as she possibly could.
When Alex turned back to the counter her order was ready so she paid the bill and turned to leave. Before she got to the door she heard the woman laying into the cashier. "I can't believe you serve her type in here Bobby Randall!"
If Alex was hoping Bobby would stand up for "her type" she was disappointed when he replied, "Those pizzas were already made, you want me to just throw them out? Are you going to pay for them?" The woman huffed and Bobby said. "I thought not."
It could have gone worse, Alex thought as she drove back to the motel with their dinner. He could have refused to serve her. Back when Maggie lived here he probably would have. When she got back to the motel. Maggie and the kids were all showered and changed sitting in bed watching Sherlock Gnomes on pay-per-view. The sight of her family snuggled up together warmed her heart. It was just what she needed to put the incident at the restaurant behind her. She decided not to mention the exchange to Maggie. She was already stressed out about being back in Blue Springs and having to see her parents at the funeral tomorrow. She didn't need anything else to worry about.
"When's Sofia's funeral." Jessie asked the next day when everyone was up and dressed and thinking about what the plan was for the day.
"It doesn't start until 3 PM," Alex responded, "so I guess we have some time to kill."
As much as she would have liked to, Maggie knew she couldn't expect her family to spend the whole day cooped up in their motel room. "You know, there used to be a really great diner just down the street from here. They made the best banana nut pancakes you ever tasted. Why don't we walk down there and see if it's still there?"
"I could go for some banana nut pancakes," Matt replied.
"Yay! Pancakes!" Bertie shouted enthusiastically.
"Sounds like a plan," Alex concluded.
They set off down the street with Maggie pointing out places she remembered and a few she did not. The town had changed since she left but not much. She just hoped the same wouldn't be true of their attitudes towards homosexuality.
Within ten minutes they arrived at Grammy Donut's Diner. The name hadn't changed but the diner appeared to have recently under gone a renovation and expansion. Maggie told her family the last time she'd seen this place it was a tiny hole-in-the wall place with 5 mix and match tables. Now inside was brightly lit and tastefully decorated. There were booths along the outer walls and tables in the middle and through the swinging doors into the kitchen they could see shiny new appliances.
Seeing them standing just inside the door a waitress told them to set wherever they liked and they chose a booth in the front of the restaurant where they could look out the window at the quiet main street of Blue Springs. The same waitress, who looked to be in her early twenties with blond hair pulled into a ponytail and a sunny disposition sure to help her in the tip department, brought them menus and took their drink orders.
After they had placed their orders, the kids were asking Maggie about growing up in Blue Springs but it was clear her mind was not on the conversation. To Alex she looked more like she was on a stakeout watching for some dangerous criminal than having breakfast out with her family.
Acting purely on instinct, Alex slid closer to Maggie, put her arm around her shoulder and kissed her cheek. "You okay, babe?" she asked, not realizing her mistake until she felt Maggie's body tense beside her. "I'm sorry!" she said immediately going to remove her arm from her wife's shoulders and put some distance between them.
Maggie stopped her, grabbing hold of the Alex's hand thereby keeping her arm wrapped around her shoulders. "No," she said, "I'm sorry. I told you I don't have to worry about PDAs. I shouldn't have reacted that way. It's just being back in this town. I feel like I'm 14 years old again and the teenage outcast. I refuse to act as if loving you is in anyway wrong." She leaned in and gave Alex a kiss on the lips.
As she pulled back she heard a woman seated at a nearby table call the waitress over. "Are you going to let those two go on like that right here in the restaurant!" she hissed indignantly.
The waitress who had been back in the kitchen checking on an order was confused. She glanced over in the direction the woman indicated but by this time all she saw was Alex and Maggie talking quietly with their kids. Alex still had her arm around Maggie's shoulders but she didn't see anything untoward in that. "I'm sorry ma'am, I don't understand. What is the problem?"
"Those two lesbos were kissing, right in front of those poor innocent kids!" The woman practically screeched.
"Oh um, I can't, I don't know…" the poor waitress stumbled over her words not sure what she could or should do. She knew a lot of folks in this part of the country were vehemently opposed to same-sex relationships but her personal philosophy was live and let live. Not that she'd given it a lot of thought. She didn't really know any one who was gay so it didn't really affect her.
But the the woman, and by now her husband, were both outraged by the waitress's lack of a response. "I want to see your manager right now," the husband shouted. "We won't tolerate this kind of behavior in our town."
Of course, Maggie, Alex and the children had heard the entire exchange. "Should we go?" Alex asked. She was all for standing up for LGBTQI rights but not at the expense of her family's safety.
Maggie looked like she was seriously considering it but then she looked across the table at her children, especially at her daughter and knew that some things were worth the risk. "No," she said, "we stay until management asks us to leave and maybe not even then."
Alex, looking first at Maggie and then at the kids, knew she was right. If they were to tuck their tales between their legs and leave at the first sign of trouble what message would that be sending to their children, especially their transgendered daughter? They had to take a stand against the bigotry and hatred and show their children that there was nothing wrong with their family and how they lived.
The waitress, who at the husband's insistence had run to find the restaurant's owner, returned now with a nicely dressed, blond haired, blue eyed woman who appeared to be in her early to mid-forties.
Alex felt Maggie's whole body go rigid beside her and heard Maggie curse under her breath "Shit!" Alex was shocked, Maggie never used bad language in front of the children. Who could this woman be to elicit such a reaction in her wife?
The woman went right over to the angry couple's table without even glancing over at the Maggie, Alex and the kids.
"I'm Eliza," she said in a neutral tone, "I own the restaurant. Is there a problem?"
As the angry couple repeated their rant to the store owner Alex kept hearing her name over and over in her head "Eliza" surely it couldn't be Eliza Wilke, the girl that had outed Maggie to her parents, but one look at Maggie told her that's exactly who it was.
Grabbing Maggie's hand and squeezing it Alex said, "Let's get out of here. We can explain it to the kids later."
Maggie gave her a grateful look and was about to tell the kids they were leaving when the raised voices at the other table caught her attention. "Are you telling me you condone that sort of behavior! It's disgusting and it goes against what it says in the Bible." The woman declared indignantly.
"That's exactly what I'm telling you," Eliza replied calmly but sternly. "If it bother's you so much you are welcome to dine somewhere else."
The shocked couple stood up, grabbed their things and stormed out of the restaurant.
Eliza took a deep breath and let it out slowly then turned to address the object of her former patrons' scorn. "I apologize for that, not everyone in town is so backward in their thinking. Please, your meal is on the house and…" she stopped mid-sentence taking a closer look at the woman in the booth seated closest to her. "Maggie? Is that you?"
"Hello, Eliza." Maggie said stiffly. "It appears your attitude toward homosexuality has changed since the last time we saw each other."
"Maggie, I'm so glad to see you. I've wanted to apologize to you for the longest time but I didn't know where you were or how to find you. I tried searching the internet for Maggie Rodas and Margarita Rodas but I never found anything. I even tried asking your Mom once but she said she didn't know where you were." What she had actually said was that she no longer considered Maggie to be her daughter and she didn't know or care where Maggie was but Eliza saw no reason to pass along something so hurtful.
Stunned by this turn of events all Maggie could think to say was "I changed my name to Sawyer after my parents kicked me out."
Eliza actually winced at the reminder of what she herself had set in motion. "I'm so sorry Maggie, I didn't understand back then. All I knew was what my parents and our pastor told me. They said you were perverted and you were going to hell. I never thought your parents would kick you out! Then everyone turned against you and I was scared because some of the other kids found out that I was the one you liked and they started teasing me and saying I must be a dyke too. I didn't even know what's dyke was but I knew they thought it was bad so I started being nasty to you to so they'd leave me alone. I'm so sorry Maggie, I don't expect you to forgive me but you deserve to hear my apology even if you can't accept it."
Maggie sat for a long moment taking in what Eliza had said. She wondered, if their roles had been reversed, if she would have acted any differently than Eliza had. She liked to think she would have but she knew that the chances were good she would have reacted in exactly the same way. "I forgive you Eliza, It was a long time ago and we were both kids."
"Thank you Maggie, that's more than I deserve," Eliza replied with tears in her eyes. "You must be here for your Aunt Sofia's funeral. I was so sorry to hear about her passing. She was a special lady."
"That she was," Maggie replied.
"Wait, did she know where you were this whole time? I never thought to ask her, talk about dense!" Eliza gave herself a little shake and seemed to notice Alex and the kids for the first time since she realized who Maggie was. "Is this your family?" she asked with genuine curiosity and not a trace of scorn in her tone.
Maggie smiled in spite of herself and said "Yes, this is my wife Alex and our children Matt, Jessie, and Bertie."
"It's so nice to meet you." she said offering her hand to Alex and smiling at each of the children in turn.
Their meal came just then and Eliza said, "I'll leave you in peace to eat your meal but if you have time while you're hear I'd really like to catch up".
"Actually, the funeral is this afternoon and we're leaving first thing in the morning," Maggie said with genuine regret.
Hearing it Alex leaned over and whispered in Maggie's ear. "We're not in a hurry right now."
Maggie stared back at her wife trying to read how she was really felt. "You sure?" Alex just nodded and Maggie turned back to Eliza, "You could join us for breakfast if you have the time?" She said, making it a question.
"I'd love that!" Eliza replied then turned to their waitress, "Kelly, would you bring me the Farmer's Breakfast Special." With she pulled a chair from a nearby table and placed it at the end of their booth. "You all start without me. You don't want those banana nut pancakes getting cold."
As everyone tucked into their breakfast Maggie asked, "Since when do you own Grammy Donuts'?"
"I worked here summers and weekends while I was going to school. I went to the University of Nebraska in Lincoln, got a degree in marketing. I know most folks hate waitressing but I kind of liked it. I enjoyed interacting with the customers, well most of the time." She she gave a a small laugh glancing at the table the couple had just vacated. "After school I spent 15 years working for a small advertising company in Lincoln. I met and married my ex there but I got tired of the business and things went south with my husband so I decided to come home."
"Grammy was looking to cut back some. I mean she had to be close to eighty by then so she hired me to manage the restaurant for her. Five years later I bought the place and used some money I'd invested when I was working at the advertising company to make renovations. It's paid off, most of the small towns around here don't have much in the way of restaurants so we pull folks in from all over this area, especially on the weekends."
"How are your folks?" Maggie was just being polite. After the incident with the Valentine's Day Card, Jeff and Amanda Wilke had been down right vicious to her. If they saw her walking down the street they hurled all manner of homophobic epithets at her. If she happened to be in a store or restaurant and Maggie was there they demanded she be made to leave or they would take there business elsewhere, permanently. It generally worked, never mind that it was a baseless threat in most cases because they would have had to drive over an hour to find a similar business.
"Oh, ah," Eliza stammered, "I uh, I don't see them much anymore."
"Oh?" Maggie was curious but she didn't push it. Eliza seemed reluctant to talk about it.
But then she sighed and said, "I haven't seen them since my son came out. That's what broke up my marriage too. Bill wanted to find a doctor who could, and I quote, 'treat David's mental health issues'. I tried to get him, and my parents for that matter, to see that David was exactly as God intended him to be but, well you of all people can guess how that went."
"I'm so sorry that happened to you…and your son." Maggie reached over and gave Eliza's forearm a sympathetic squeeze.
"That's very kind of you, all things considered," she responded with a watery smile. "A lot of folks would consider it bad karma and well deserved."
At this point Alex joined the conversation. "I have to ask, although feel free to tell me it's none of my business, but why would you come back to Blue Springs, knowing the prevailing attitude towards homosexuality here?" She looked genuinely perplexed.
"That's a fair question. Things are better here than they used to be, despite what happened here today. Even so, I discussed it at length with my son. I told him why I wanted to come here but also what he was likely to face if we did. I told him we could move somewhere else if he preferred, somewhere more accepting of who he is." She shook her head and laughed, "My little know what he said to me? He said 'Mom how are places like Blue Springs ever going to change if nobody ever pushes them to change. They need to meet and get to know people like me or they'll never learn that all their preconceived notions are crap.' It's been hard sometimes but he's made some good friends and whenever I ask if he's had enough and wants to move he just says 'This is home now, where would we go?'"
"He sounds like an extraordinary young man!" Maggie said squeezing Eliza's forearm again, Alex nodding beside her.
"Enough about me," Eliza exclaimed, giving herself a little shake. "I want to hear about you. What happened to you after you graduated from High School and got the heck out of this town?"
Maggie spent the better part of an hour telling Eliza about going to school, joining NCPD, becoming a detective and working in the Science Division. She described meeting and falling in love with Alex (the non-classified version), losing Alex, becoming guardian to her brother's children, getting Alex back, getting married and adopting the children. She even, at Jessie's insistence, told Eliza that Jessie was transgendered and that she and Matt were born identical twins.
"Wow, Maggie, you've lived an incredible life so far and done so well for yourself." She was genuinely happy for Maggie and impressed by what she had accomplished despite her difficult teenage years.
They'd been talking for close to three hours and Bertie was clearly getting restless. "Sweetheart," Alex said leaning into Maggie's side, "I hate to break this up but I think we better let this little guy get outside and do some running around or there's no way he'll sit still during the funeral service."
"I'm sorry!" Eliza exclaimed, "I've been monopolizing your time. I'm sure you have things you'd rather be doing."
"Nonsense!" Alex replied. "We've had a great time."
"Yes!" Maggie agreed wholeheartedly. "You've helped me put a piece of unpleasant history behind me. You have no idea what a gift that is." She stood up and pulled Eliza up into a tight hug. Then she reached into her jacket pocket and pulled out one of her cards handing it to Eliza. "If you're ever if in National City call me. You can come to family dinner and meet the rogue's gallery we call family, And we'd love to meet David."
Alex gave her a quick hug and whispered "Thank you, I'm so glad we ran into you today!"
Matt put his hand out for Eliza to shake and Jessie and Bertie followed his example. Then they all headed out to get a little fresh air and exercise before heading back to the hotel to change for Sofia's funeral.