Day Twenty: Comfort

Word Count: 2601

Genre: Hurt/Comfort/Family

Maddie shifted the laundry basket over her arm as she walked up the stairs. The clothes were still warm from the dryer and were folded crisply, arranged into individual stacks for each person. This load was mainly Danny's clothes (bleached t-shirts, frayed hems) and a few pairs of Jazz's pants (neat, immaculate jeans). Maddie tended to do most of her children's laundry for them, especially since Danny's clothes were a bit more… difficult to treat before washing. But, she couldn't expect her son to know how to remove blood and ectoplasm stains - it was just one of those little things she did for him without mentioning. Something else that they ignored since the reveal.

It wasn't that hard. They ignored a lot of things.

Maddie ascended up the steps and turned the the first door to her left, Danny's bedroom. She maneuvered the laundry basket again and used her free arm to open his door. Since she was focusing on keeping the laundry balanced, Maddie didn't think about knocking before entering. She pushed open the door and it swung with a silent groan. Maddie walked through the threshold to Danny's room and stopped cold in her tracks. At her sudden halt, the laundry basket tipped to the side and she struggled to maintain it upright.

Danny was casually floating several feet above his bed, parallel to the floor and partially sitting up. He was on his cellphone, listening to something with earbuds while he hovered. Green eyes sleepily scanned the screen, unaware of Maddie's intrusion. What particularly caught her attention was Danny's hair, splayed untidily as if it was immune to gravity. He was in his own little bubble, hovering as if it was the most normal thing in the world. Meanwhile, Maddie was frozen, unsettled.

This presentation of levitation was just another reminder that she didn't want. That Danny was capable of unnatural things that people shouldn't be able to do. That underneath her son's skin, resided a genuine, raw ghost. His entire physiology was wrong, wrong, wrong - a bastardization of two species that shouldn't be allowed to intermingle. A complete, utter frea-

Stop that. Maddie internally reprimanded herself. She was burdened with a surge of guilt; she was supposed to accept Danny for what - who - he is. He should be comfortable using his own powers whenever he felt like it because they were a part of him, essentially the equivalent of another limb. Maddie shouldn't condemn him for that, shouldn't feel… disgusted. And yet, she did. Because whenever he expressed his powers even scarcely, they repulsed her. She didn't want to feel that way and was doing her best to overcome her ghost-hunting instincts.

For him. She was trying.

Maddie inhaled and exhaled. She wouldn't… wouldn't let this bother her. She couldn't, she would just… let it go.

At her slight motion, Danny's eyes flitted away from his phone screen, realizing that he wasn't alone. When he saw Maddie, it was like someone had suddenly slapped him; his eyes bulged for a moment and it was clear he was startled. Almost instantly, he dropped like a dead weight - letting gravity pull him back onto his bed with alarming force. His bed trembled at the sudden impact, creaking in complaint. Danny awkwardly reoriented himself, looking between Maddie and the floor nervously.

"M - Mom," he greeted. "What's up?"

"I brought your laundry," she told him, forcefully softening her voice. With one arm, she reached and pulled out his stack of t-shirts and jeans, placing them beside him on his bed. She considered mentioning how she had gotten the stains out, but opted against it; the air between them was already awkward with what had happened. The tension alone was enough to compel Maddie to flee from Danny's room. That was easier than the strain that came from pretending that nothing had happened, that she hadn't just walked in on Danny floating above his bed.

"Thanks," he mumbled, eyeing his laundry like it was all that mattered, avoiding eye contact. In a way, Maddie was almost grateful for that; she couldn't face him either.

"You're welcome, sweetie," she said, balancing the laundry basket with Jazz's jeans. "Dinner is in an hour, alright?"

"I'll try to make it," he replied thoughtlessly, cringing at the unsaid implication. That if he couldn't make it to dinner it would be because he was out ghost-hunting as Phantom….

Maddie nodded, swallowing the lump that had settled in her throat. "Alright. See you then."

Neither of them said any more as she strode towards the doorway, one-handedly exiting with the laundry. The doorway closed behind her, and Maddie walked towards Jazz's bedroom with an uneasy impression.

Trying apparently couldn't prevent ghost attacks, Maddie inferred. When she called Jack in from the living room into the kitchen, she'd caught a glimpse of the TV. Jack had the TV muted, reading 'Billionaire Magazine's' column on Vlad instead of watching the news. However, on Channel 6 they were live broadcasting a ghost fight. Phantom was too quick for the camera, but Maddie still managed to catch a black blur in the margins of the screen.

Well, too bad for full family dinner tonight; Danny could eat whenever he got back home. According to Jazz, Maddie needed to insist that Danny ate since taking care of his health was especially vital with all the stamina he needed. Even though Maddie was having a difficult time adjusting to all the changes in their family dynamic, she was more than pleased to encourage healthy eating habits.

Danny returned from his fight moments after Maddie finished doing the dishes. In human form, he looked exceptionally normal for someone returning from an airborne brawl against a malevolent specter. Sure, his hair was bit scruffier than usual and he smelled like smoke and rubble. And his lip was split, undeniably smudged with dried ectoplasm. Maybe there was a mottled bruise on his forearm that was already healing, a temporary prize from his fight. But by all accounts, Danny Fenton stood as he normally did, sagging with a drowsy yet content demeanor. His stance could easily be written off as regular teenage fatigue, so that's what Maddie told herself.

Hypocrite, a nasty little voice nagged at her, just tell yourself the truth.

If Maddie wanted to care about Danny, engage in his life, then she had to face what was really happening. Acknowledge what he was really doing instead of sitting at the dinner table with his family. If this awkward rift continued between them for any longer, their relationship may not be salvageable. It was just so hard, especially with what had happened earlier.

"I saved you a plate," she told Danny. She gestured to the stove, where she'd left his dinner; spaghetti, asparagus, and garlic bread. By now, the pasta was surely cold.

He livened, suspending his weary exterior, "You mean Dad didn't eat it all? Wow, and here I thought I'd have a freezer dinner," he joked. "Thanks, Mom."

"I wouldn't let you miss out on spaghetti night, especially when you can't help it," she acknowledged. He flustered for a moment before letting it dissolve, ignoring what she had meant.

"I appreciate it," he crossed the kitchen to get a glass from the cabinet. Meanwhile, Maddie figured that she'd go ahead and microwave it for him - it was the least she could do. She started the timer and watched as Danny poured himself a large glass of Dr. Pepper-

"Should you be having that much caffeine before bed on a school night?" she asked. "It's almost already eight o'clock."

He shrugged, "With my metabolism caffeine is practically ineffective. Learned that the hard way when I tried to drink coffee in the mornings and kept falling asleep anyway. I don't even like how coffee tastes so that was a bust."

"Oh." Every now and then she would learn something small about what it really meant to be half-ghost; how much being a hybrid affected Danny's life with even the most mundane things…. It was a dizzying perspective. She knew that he was acquainted with that side of himself, but to her it was just so… negative that it was hard to view Danny's changes as if they were normal. "Just…" she struggled for words, "don't drink the entire two-liter tonight."

"Okay," he nodded, twisting the cap on the bottle and placing it back inside the fridge. Moments later, the microwave beeped behind her, startling her. She didn't react visibly but her pulse definitely spiked. Maddie shook off the adrenaline rush, opened the microwave, and set Danny's plate on the table.

She sat in the seat beside him, which was usually Jazz's seat. However, she wanted to sit with him tonight and it would be awkward if she sat on the opposite side of the table. Danny grabbed a fork from the dishwasher (since he kept forgetting to put the dishes away) and sat next to his Mom. He dug into his dinner while Maddie watched.

"Can I ask you something?" Maddie didn't recall asking the question, almost as if she had subconsciously decided to do something about the divide that hadn't stopped grating on her.

Danny set his fork of spaghetti down and reached for a sip of soda. "Yeah?"

"Well," Maddie started. Her mouth was dry and she didn't know exactly how to word this, how to begin this conversation that she'd been avoiding. She wasn't ready, neither of them were ready - this was too prompt. But… if she wasn't ready now, she'd never be. "Are you not comfortable using your powers around me and Dad?"

Processing her words, Danny swallowed harshly, momentarily gagging on his Dr Pepper. He set his glass back down and forcibly replied, "No, of course not!"

They both knew that was a lie. She gave him a deliberate look until he gave in. "... yeah," he admitted, anxiously soothing the back of his neck.

It didn't need to be said, but she also confessed, "I'm uncomfortable with it too."

Danny looked down and stabbed his spaghetti, slowly swirling the noodles around his fork, "I know."

"I think we should try to change that," she said. "I know it's weird for both of us since this whole half-ghost thing is weird with how we used to be about ghosts. I'm still trying to correct myself whenever I think about ghosts in general, but hating anything ghost related is so innate that it's difficult for me to unlearn."

Danny didn't seem offended, he nodded with practiced recognition. "But you're trying though." He didn't look up from his plate.

"I'm not trying enough," she corrected. "That's why neither of us are comfortable with this. I want to… want to just overcome all this awkwardness whenever you do something ghostly or - or talk about Phantom." She hesitated, "Because I do love you and neither of us should have to live this way.

She hadn't realized how thoroughly she had thought about this. She'd been pushing it down for so long that saying it to Danny just felt… unreal.

"What should we do then?" Danny's voice was steady, but small.

"I…" once again, it was something that she hadn't realized she'd known, a subconscious solution, "we can talk about things more. We've both avoided talking about your powers deliberately so I suppose… we just start? Like this conversation?"

Danny swallowed his bite of spaghetti. "I guess?" he shrugged. "Still weird. I'm just not..." he struggled for words, "I never thought that if you found out, that you'd accept me at all. This is just so strange for you to know and not want to kill me. I never expected for you to really… try to understand - so even though this is awkward, it's more than I thought I'd get."

Her stomach sank. She already knew that Danny had expected she and Jack to disown him. That he'd been scared of them experimenting on him for months. But for him to bring that up again, was like a hard blow. Regrets that she'd battled since the revelation swung back in full force, reminding her how she'd made him feel. Trapped inside his secrets, inhuman enough to be experimented on, an abomination to his family. She'd caused him to feel that way. And what was worse is that some parts of her wanted him to feel that way, still. Yet, she pushed them down - as she always did.

"I'm sorry," she apologized. Her timing was off-kilter and they'd already apologized so much but it felt necessary.

"Don't be," he said shortly. "We're working through this and… I'm glad I'm not the only one who wants things to change," Danny confessed.

She nodded, "I admit that it was getting me. Today… was…" she paused, "yeah. Talking about things feels like it might help more, and if you're okay with it, using your powers more might help as well."

"That's… I'll think about it," he fidgeted. "What about Dad, though?"

Maddie froze. She had spoken to Jack about some things with Danny's secret, but he for the most part thought everything was in the clear. He simply hadn't picked up on the same awkward moments that Maddie had perceived. That was just sort of the person that Jack was. "Your father…" she breathed, "God bless him, he wouldn't mind either way because he doesn't read social cues well."

"I picked up on that," Danny admitted. "I just didn't know what you…"

"Yeah," Maddie agreed. He didn't have to say it. "Yeah."

By now, Danny had eaten most of his food. There were only a few strands of asparagus left on his plate. In a beat of silence, Danny caught her looking at the vegetables. "I don't like those," he said, sheepishly.

"I think you should eat them," Maddie pressed. Breaking the dire tone of the conversation, a smile played on her lips, "After all, what would Sam say?"

"Moooom," he complained. "That's betrayal."

"I just want you to eat healthy," she assured.

"Betrayal," he repeated, stabbing and pointedly eating the asparagus with a hint of disgust. "Happy?"

"Very," she said. "Especially with your metabolism you need to eat vegetables to get all the nutrients you need."

"Science is really against me, huh?" he asked rhetorically. "In about every way possible too."

If he'd said earlier that day, Maddie might've fallen silent and ignored the double meaning in his words, but not now. Not after their latest conversation. "I think you're probably more against science than science is against you," she replied.

He snorted, "So now you're blaming me for physics?" He faked being hurt, "I feel the love."

"Ha ha," she deliberated. She tentatively ruffled his hair, "I don't blame you for anything, you know that, right? I blame most of everything on me."

She'd told him before, yet it never seemed to register. He looked at her, perplexed, "It's hard to remind myself that."

"Then I'll keep reminding you until it sinks in," she decided. "Even if things get awkward like they have been, I will always love you as my son first - ghost, boy, or scientific anomaly."

For the first time in their conversation, Danny actually looked comfortable. "Thank you, Mom."

After that one talk, the next few conversations about Danny's ghostliness were rough, difficult - but they eventually all ended in the same place. It took a few months of conscience effort and with Danny dabbling with openly using his powers. Despite the tension and awkward moments in between, in the end they reached a place where both parties were comfortable with Danny naturally exhibiting his duality.