Beast of Burden
Chapter Seven
Family Matters
"those who escape hell, however,
never talk about it, and nothing much
bothers them after that."
― Charles Bukowski
From the time she'd turned thirteen, Mars had been a habitual joy ride taker. She'd gotten surprisingly good at it, and fortunately for her, the big 16 was only a few weeks away. Not many chances left to get in trouble.
Mars ran out of the Stilinski house with the cruiser keys in hand and a wide smile spread across her face. She unlocked it, jumped in and turned the key; the engine roared to life. Sheriff wasn't all that far behind her. He knocked on the window, she rolled it down. "Do you really want to add grand theft auto and another driving without a licence charge to your record, sweetheart?" he asked.
Mars batted her long eyelashes."Oh come on, Sher, it's not like you'd rat on me." She smirked her signature, smug little smirk. Confidence radiated off of her, convinced he'd let her get away with murder if need be- and she was probably right. Something about the way she'd said it got under Sheriff's skin. He needed to get her off that high horse she was sitting on, he just didn't know how. "Besides, its not theft if you're in the car and well aware." Sheriff stared at her, waiting for her to move. Mars licked her lips, waiting for him to waver. He didn't. "Fine." She rolled her eyes and got out, Sheriff took her place in the drivers seat.
"Look, Mars, you know I love you like my own, but you gotta pull your act together." Mars glared at him, he was supposed to be the one who didn't say that shit. "I don't mean it like that." She switched from glaring to averting her eyes, ignoring him. She immediately became lost in her own thoughts, questions spiraling around her. What did I do? Why is he saying this? She didn't know how to deal with a constant becoming variable… Change was… in a word? The enemy. And there was way too much fucking change happening around her right now. The one thing, the one thing she was always going to count on was Sheriff. She'd probably break completely, shatter, even, if someone took him away from her. "I'm just trying to say there are only so many strings I can pull before people take notice, kid." She still wasn't looking at him. He tapped his thumb against the top of the steering wheel a few times and looked ahead, unable to bear her silence. "Marks? Remember him? He's not letting it go." Sheriff tried to recover. "Just- behave. Even if it's only for a little."
Mar glanced back up at him, he let out a breath- at least she wasn't so upset she couldn't look at him… but he knew he'd said the wrong things. "I won't make any promises." Sheriff pressed his thumb and index finger against the bridge of his nose. "I love you." Mar smiled and kissed him on the cheek. He smiled a little, believing her, but doing his best not to excuse her.
"Have you seen Scott?" Stiles ran up to Mar in the hallway, clapping a hand down on her shoulders to stop himself from falling.
"Not since this morning." She continued on without so much as looking back at him.
"Have you tried calling him?" Stiles questioned, sounding annoyed.
"It's second period? Why? Is he not here?" She didn't seem to care all that much.
"Well he wasn't in class." Stiles informed her, over-expressing with his entire body as he so frequently did.
"He wasn't?"
"No." She seemed to be walking faster, Stiles struggled to keep up. "Wh- where are you going?"
"Home?" Mars rolled her eyes. She wasn't feeling today, it hadn't been going that well so far.
"Why?"
"Because I don't feel like going to mom's class?"
"Yeah, but it's your mom's class. She'll know you're not sick."
With a condescending expression, Mars stopped, turned around and faced Stiles. "And since when have I given a fuck what she does or thinks?"
"Never I guess…" He drifted. Scott was MIA and Mars was being a bitch. Perfect. "But come on. Don't leave me alone in there, I'm going to die without you, it's math. Your mom's math!" He tried. Mary was a notoriously tough teacher, to everyone.
"So skip with me, we can go catch a movie, get some food."
"I can't, conferences are tonight." He reminded her. "Stop giving me that look."
"What look." It wasn't a question.
"That look! The one that's all 'yeah? and?'. It literally makes me so angry." He threw his arms out towards her shoulders, but refrained from grabbing them by scrunching his hands into fists on either side of her head. "Use your words every once and a while would you?" The bell began to rang. "Lets just go to class." Mars walked towards the front door. "I'm not following you!" Stiles shouted after her. "I'm not that easy!" He waited for her to turn around and make a comment at the least. "God damnit."He tapped his foot against the ground before chasing after her. "One more class, then we go." He tried. "Fine, go without me." He continued shouting after her, waiting a second once she was through the doors before heading to class.
It took about an hour for Mars to walk home and get in the door. She went through the kitchen and dropped her bag on the bed before pulling The Bell Jar out from the box under her bed. Some faint footsteps could be heard outside her room, but she assumed it was Teta.
When she was about halfway through the novel, she became decidedly hungry. She made her way to the kitchen. Mars lost her appetite the second her bare feet hit the marble tile.
She let it go on for a second before she said anything, it took a moment to comprehend.
"Da?" Mars pulled Sayid's attention away from the blonde skank he was balls deep in. "What. The. Fuck." Her heart dropped. Well, maybe not her heart. Her stomach did. But her heart? It didn't break, Mars would never let it. All the cracks her father, and all the other men in her life had put in the muscles surface were now gone. Instead of breaking, it blackened, it callused. Mars' heart and hopes would never hurt her again.
"Mars, sweetheart, I can explain." Sayid tried as he pulled his pants up. His daughter backed away from him. Mars may have hated her mother, but did her dad hate Mary, too? Were things between her parents really so bad? But more importantly, why did he have to do this in her family's home?!
She wanted to scream, she wanted to hit something. Anything. "Don't bother, Sayid." Mars spat. She'd never called him by his first name, not once. A surge of energy coursed through her when the two syllables passed through her lips. She half expected him to slap her, she almost wanted him to.
"I am your father, you will speak to me with respect." He knew he'd slipped as soon as he said it, just made his situation worse. He was in a state of panic, A.j. had known for weeks, but Mars? He couldn't bribe her to keep her mouth shut like he could with his son. This was the end of the line. In his head, he already started making plans.
"How can I when you lost any respect you ever had?" Mars pointed out, her demeanor hard, cold- even for her. Sayid was surprised she was speaking at all, also a little horrified. It was terrible, that he would wish her silent. That he would wish his own flesh and blood couldn't speak even after he'd seen the silent struggle of her youth. Yet, something in him was willing her to go back to speaking Martian, that strange gibberish tongue no one but the Stilinski kid ever understood. "Don't fucking speak to me again, got it?" She threatened. Her dad looked back at his mistress, then back at Mars.
"Understood" he agreed. Mars nearly spat in his face. Was he fucking serious right now? What was so fucking great about blondie's cunt that he would pick her over his own family?
"I'll be going now." Mars went into her bedroom and packed a bag. Enough for a week, the pre-packed wouldn't be enough. She knew Stiles wouldn't mind her staying there. It was almost time he was out of school anyways. He had the jeep, so by the time she walked there he would be home. Right? It didn't matter. She had a key anyways. Mars pat her cat. "Sorry, Doc."
She thought about the fact that she'd be leaving A.j. alone before she slammed the door behind her, but she couldn't stand being in that house for a second longer. Not even for the only man she was certain she could ever fully love.
Neither car was in the driveway of the Stilinski house, so she let herself in, going right for the medicine cabinet. She didn't know what it was she needed, but she needed something. Anything. There was some vicodin, and that seemed to be the only thing worth grabbing among all the advil and non-drowsy tylenol.
What do I want for lunch? Sheriff asked himself while walking through his front door. He had half of a sub left over from a few nights ago, so he thought maybe he should finish that up before it went bad. Normally he would have stayed at the station, brought food with him, but to be honest- he needed out of there for a few. Too much was going on.
He grabbed the sandwich and unwrapped it. The sub was a little soggy, but still edible for the most part. It was then the smell hit him. It was faint, but enough to notice, and he hoped it wasn't what he thought it was. He went upstairs, Stiles didn't smoke pot? At least, he didn't think his son did. In fact this was a conversation he hadn't quite prepared himself to have. When he opened the unlocked door smoke wafted around him. Mars was laying on her back in silence, looking at the ceiling, a bowl in one hand and lighter in the other. One of his old prescription bottles was open and spilling out on the bed beside her; He didn't want to know how many she took.
Mars had heard him come in, but she didn't acknowledge him at all. Just lit up again. "Fuck, kid." Sheriff breathed in the hot boxed air and approached her, cleaning up the pills in silence because he had no idea what to say. This was a new level of bold, even for her. She had to know she would get caught, there was no way she didn't want to get caught when she did this. He took the lighter and the bowl right out of her hands.
"Give it back." Mars squeaked holding out her hand, he looked at her completely and utterly astonished. "Give it back." Her voice cracked at the end. "This is the only way I can get away from- the only way I can handle… Don't take it away from me." She began crying, he still wouldn't give the weed back to her.
All Sheriff could see was the three year old version of Mars when he looked at her most of the time. With the bright smile and untouched by life. Today was different. Today he saw a shell, a girl who was battered, broken, desperate. He wondered what happened, how he could make his little girl happy again. So he made the decision to be a father before he was Sheriff yet again. A decision that he was bound to keep making, and a decision that would inevitably cost him dearly. "Dad's fucking some blond nurse bitch." Mars spat and wiped her nose with her sleeve. "Just- just why?" Her voice cracked yet again. "Why am I not good enough, not enough?" Sheriff sat beside her and pulled her into a tight side hug, trying to form words. But what could possibly be said?
"Mom hates me, I'm an afterthought to my dad, a burden he doesn't want to bear." She pulled a cigarette from her pack on the nightstand and tried to light it, but Sheriff took that from her too. It seemed like she didn't notice. "I just want to know what I did, I don't understand. Maybe if I just- If someone could just tell me where I fucked it all up I can fix it. I know I can change. If I could fix things I could change."
"Kid, look at me." Sheriff lifted her chin so she was forced to do so. "Nothing your parents do is your fault. Your dad cheating? Nothing to do with you." Mar was disbelieving. "I love you the way you are, Stiles loves you and Aje. You don't need to change." He looked at the drugs in his hands. "Okay, maybe we could try to get a handle on this whole thing." He held up the bowl. "But I can help you. You just have to promise you'll try." Mars nodded, knowing good and well she wasn't even going to make an effort after the first day-but very well aware that if she agreed he wouldn't bring her into the station.
"I promise." They hugged tightly. "I promise, I promise."
"Good." He let her go. "You know you have to go to the conferences tonight, right?" He reminded her. She sighed deeply.
"Yeah, I guess."
And she did go. For a little anyways.
She felt a little funny in a way she couldn't quite place. The same way she had felt the night of the party at Danny's. Airy, not all there, not quite in the way drugs made her feel… it was more like a void, like she didn't quite have control. She was aware that she was moving, but she wasn't aware of much else; her ears rang as well. "Mars! Babe, hey." Don caught up to the girl wandering aimlessly down the hall, looking rather lost. He stood in front of her now. "Are you okay?" He stroked her cheek with his thumb as she closed her eyes, smiling.
Ethereal. That was it. That was how she felt.
Her response to Don was noticeably delayed. "Fine." She kissed him, a small sort of giggle accompanied it. "Want to go shag?" She was floating just above the ground in her mind.
"Uh." He hesitated and looked back at his mom pushing his dad down the hallway. "Yeah come on." He grabbed her hand and pulled her into the nearest classroom, and crashing their lips together. Don was completely sure she was wrecked, but he wasn't about to pass up sticking his dick in her.
As they made out, and Mars floated farther and farther from reality, voices could be heard on the other side of the classroom wall. Mars broke the kiss and approached the door, not opening it yet, just listening.
"A truancy officer, Mary!" Sayid bellowed outside. "You work at the fucking school! How do you let this happen?!"
"At least I speak to her! When is the last time you did anything as a father?! Huh?"
"How is she failing YOUR class?!" Sayid went back to the subject of school. "Please tell me how that is?"
"Because she doesn't fucking show up! I'm not going to pass her just because she is my kid!" Mary shouted, drawing more attention. "She has to earn things, a lesson you never let her learn! You think you can buy her? Seriously?"
Sayid glanced around at the bystanders, embarrassment swelling in his chest before walking away from his wife. Mars had left the classroom, and she stood at the foot of the crowd in his path, just watching. She stood to the side as he approached and let him pass, wordlessly. Which was worse than if she had said anything.
Don kissed the top of her head and rubbed her shoulder. "I gotta go," she whispered and pulled away. Don wouldn't have let her go if he'd known she was going off on her own, she was too out of it. And he did care. Unfortunately, she followed her father's path, so no one stopped her. Once outside, Mars branched out towards the preserve. Something pulled her to it. It was that ethereal feeling, whatever it was. Like some sort of divine presence had possessed her, was influencing her. Mar couldn't call it possession, because she knew what she was doing, she knew she was following that subconscious lull, that gut feeling.
And then everything was black, as it was entirely too often.
"Last night local campers discovered a body- or rather- what was once a body, by the lake. With all the chaos that happened at the high school, it's no wonder that the investigation escaped the publics eye." "Though we don't yet have access to all information at this time, what we can say is grim." "Here's Lindsey correspondence from the scene."
"Thank you John. It was here that sometime in the last 48 hours an unfortunate jogger met his grim end. Now, again, we don't yet have all the details, but from what I understand this was no cougar attack, but it shared that very same ferocity with a much smaller bite. Beacon Hills may be rid of a killer mountain lion, but has it been replaced with a murderer that walks among us?" "Stay tuned to channel 3 for your first looks into the lakeside killer case! Back to you John."
"Bunch of bullshit is what that is." Aje turned of the television. "It's all about the rating game. We all know it was probably just a cub from the same family tree as the dead one, but America wants to be scared. They want a story." Mars looked at Aje, feigning interest.
"What the fuck are you saying you pretentious son of a bitch." She blinked, she just came back to check on Aje, then she was out of here.
He pushes his sister a little. "I'm just saying, they don't even know if it was a person that killed the guy and they already gave the killer a name? Load of bollucks if you ask me."
"Well no one asked you." She rolled her eyes.
"What's with the attitude?
Mar stretched. "You didn't tell me." She changed the subject.
"Tell you?"
"About Dad and that nurse bitch." Mars couldn't quite place the look that passed over his features. "We're supposed to tell each other everything." She sighed.
"Are you going to tell Mum?" Was the first thing that escaped his mouth even though it wasn't the best thing to say.
"Maybe. I'm not sure yet."
"Please don't." He pleaded and reached for her hand, she let him take it. "Mar, I don't want them to split, Nes would say the same thing, I know it." He sighed. "I don't want things to change right before I go to college, it's supposed to be the most important time of my life." Mars pulled her brother into a hug.
"Okay." She agreed.
"Okay?" He asked pulling away.
Mars nodded. "Okay."
