THE APOLOGY

A/N: This was something I wanted to write for a while now, and after recently watching Eat, Pray, Queef again I was finally inspired to do so. Hope you like!

Sharon went about the kitchen after dinner, head and heart feeling a little heavy that evening. Ever since a ban on queefing made the front page of the newspaper yesterday she felt at odds not only with herself but with her son and husband. She tried to explain to them why the ban was so degrading and just plain awful but didn't know if they took in a word of what she said. Sharon was too upset to want to stick around the house the rest of the day so she ended up going over to her best friend's house, Abbie Keilfer, and stayed the night there. But of course Sharon knew it would be short-lived and that her duties as a wife and mother would be needed the next day. Therefore she was slightly surprised to find the house empty that morning. Sharon ran into Shelley at the breakfast table.

"Where are your father and brother?" Sharon asked, placing a bagel into the toaster oven.

Shelley shrugged as she fixed her own breakfast. "Don't know. They were gone all day yesterday pretty much. They actually just left, saying they had 'stuff to do.'"

Sharon sighed and nodded before taking a seat and slowly began to eat. Just as she suspected- no big apology or kind gesture from Randy or Stan. Well, she didn't know if she should be as angry with her son about this whole queefing debacle anyway. Yes he was disgusted by them just like his father, and no doubt had some influence in the final law to ban them. Stanley was a rational and independent thinker but he did get influenced by his dad to think a certain way about things now and again. Sharon hoped he would have had the heart to at least go to her on his own because often times Stan would ditch what his father thought about an issue because he himself had his own opinion on it. But Stan had not done such a thing for her yet. Even though Stan was a sweet boy… he was still a boy. He found humor in farts and boogers and other bodily functions. Sharon could try all her might to instill some humanity and compassion in her son but he was still his father's son too and perhaps there were some things that were just a lost cause…

And so Sharon went about spending the majority of her day cleaning the house and picking up after everyone. Just another Sunday. Her expression was forlorn as she began a load of laundry that consisted of her son's things. Fishing into his pockets to make sure there wasn't anything inside. She ended up taking out two crumpled dollar bills, three dimes, two rocks, a crumpled slip of paper with a phone number on it, and a rubber band. She had lost count at this point at how many times she told her son to empty out his pockets before throwing his dirty clothes in the hamper. And now at age nine the chance that he would start doing so was probably not going to happen. Just as Sharon turned on the washer she heard a knock at the front door. She went out of the garage to see who was at the front door.

"Oh, hello," Sharon looked a little surprised to see a man standing there with some sort of bouquet in his hand.

"Good afternoon ma'am. Are you Sharon Marsh?"

"Yes…"

"Well I have something here for you then," the young man smiled and passed along the bouquet. Sharon noted it was composed of many fruits and chocolates and stems, resembling a floral arrangement. Sharon then took notice that the man was driving an Edible Arrangements van.

"Who is this from?" Sharon inspected the bouquet, looking for a note of some kind.

"Doesn't say. Well, have a good day ma'am." With that the man drove off.

With a small smile on her face now Sharon walked in with her gift. She took in the arrangement- it had grapes, cantaloupe, strawberries, and plenty of pineapple, some of them dipped in chocolate. She took hold of a flower made up from pineapples and grapes and went about cleaning the kitchen with her snack. When the day waned and night had fallen Sharon went to get dinner ready. She hadn't seen or heard from her husband or son all day but Randy did text her to tell her the two were on their way home soon. Even with the nice gift from earlier Sharon wasn't in the mood to cook up something from scratch so began to get things ready for Hamburger Helper. By 6 P.M. Randy and Stan finally came home.

"Hi Mom," Stan greeted and gave her a hug. Well, that in itself made Sharon's heart lift slightly.

"Hi sweetie," she hugged him back before Randy came over.

"Hello dear. How was your day?" Randy asked after they kissed.

"The same as most Sundays. A lot of cleaning. It would have been nice to have an extra pair of hands to help me…"

Randy noted the fruit bouquet on the dining room table.

"Oh this looks nice. Who gave you this?"

"I'm not sure. A mystery gift from someone. It's very lovely thought isn't it? Whoever sent it must know me somewhat, look at all the pineapple and chocolate in it," Sharon smiled.

Stan smiled back before reaching for it. "Can I have something?"

"Only if it's the fruit. You don't need chocolate right now; dinner will be ready in ten minutes."

Stan took up a couple strawberries and not long after, Sharon presented dinner. Dinner was a quiet affair, with each family member glancing around at each other the entire time.

"So, what were you boys up to today?" Sharon asked in a flat tone, taking small bites from her plate.

"What? What makes you think we were up to something?" Randy shot back.

"Dad!" Stan glared his father's way.

"Huh? Oh, right. Um, nothing much. Just went to the park. Shot some hoops. Went to watch the game with the guys. Nothing much," Randy shrugged.

Sharon nodded but said nothing. Stan frowned as he glanced at his watch but didn't want to appear too suspicious. He coughed.

"Do anything… yourself Mom?" he looked uncomfortable.

"Just housework, like I said. Did the laundry and found junk in your pockets, as usual Stanley."

"Oh, right. Sorry. I'll try to throw that out next time."

"Hmm…"

The rest of the dinner was silent. Only then did Randy offer to take the dishes to the sink.

"I don't want them sitting in the sink, you have to soak the skillet," Sharon said exasperated.

"I know, I know. Just- let me handle it right now Sharon. Stan? Do you want to go in the living room and watch some TV with Mom and Shelley?"

"Yeah, let's see what's on. Jeopardy starts at seven as usual," Stan smiled.

"That show is so boring. I don't want to watch anything with the stupid turd," Shelley complained.

"Shelley, go watch TV with your mom and brother right now!" Randy shot back.

Sharon took up a seat on the couch with her kids as Stan reached for the remote. "It's 6:46. Let's watch the last bit of Cops before Jeopardy," Stan suggested as he punched in the number for a TV channel.

Sharon honestly didn't feel like watching the game show, much less the last ten minutes of a Cops rerun but she said nothing. Her son appeared to want to watch TV with her so she wasn't going to complain.

"Dad! It's 6:58!" Stan called to the kitchen minutes later.

Randy hurried in, drying his hands on a dishtowel.

"Why do you want to watch Jeopardy so bad?" Sharon had to ask.

But at the last minute Stan was shushing her as he switched to the local news station.

"Good evening residents of South Park," spoke the news anchor with a broad smile on his face. "My name is Morty Plume and this is your Evening News Center. Before we get into tonight's headlines I have an announcement to make to all the men in town: gather up the lovely ladies in your life right now and have her gather here in front of the television. That's right men young and old- I want all of you to get your wives, sisters, aunts, grandmothers, and most importantly mothers into the living room. Because let's face it, where would any of us men be if it weren't for our mothers, am I right?" the man chuckled.

"What-?" Sharon looked confused but Stan and Randy looked excited.

"Without further ado, here are some of our very own South Park men with a special treat for all you ladies tonight. An original recording titled: Queef Free. Enjoy."

Suddenly a shot of Randy in a recording booth shown on the screen as he began to sing.

"There's a time in our life when we must listen to the oppressed…"

Stan joined in right after. "And realize we've been keeping women dooowwwnnn…"

"Oh, you guys…" tears instantly filled Sharon's eyes and for the next couple minutes she and Shelley were treated to the music video dedicated to them, and to other women around the world. As she watched Sharon pulled Stan to her and she squeezed his shoulder as she continued to watch.

After the music ended the group of guys gathered around and with smiles on their faces rang in a big, "On behalf of us guys in town, we'd like to say 'we're sorry'."

A second later Morty Plume returned to screen. He sniffed and dabbed an eye. "Wasn't that beautiful ladies? Ex-excuse me, I have to call up my own mother. Rick here will tell you the weather." With that the man broke down and the channel cut to commercial.

Randy turned to Sharon, rubbing his neck. "So…? What did you think?"

Sharon gave her son a squeeze again and kissed his cheek before going to kiss Randy. "That was such a nice surprise, thank-you so much you two."

"That was… weird. But um, thanks… I guess," Shelley shrugged. "I'm going to my room."

Randy was smiling now. "Well Stan and I felt pretty horrible after what you said two days ago. We wanted to do something to hopefully show all the ladies out there that, well…"

"We're sorry," Stan finished off.

"Well I forgive you then. Yes it wasn't how I think you would apologize but sometimes it is the surprises that are the most meaningful, right? And Stanley sweetie, your voice was beautiful. Maybe it's just been a while since I heard you sing but you sounded really good."

"Thanks," Stan smiled.

Sharon then glanced behind her. "Were you the ones that sent the Edible Arrangements bouquet earlier?"

"Stan's idea," Randy chimed in. "I wanted to just leave things be for a while, make you think we didn't care about what happened. Give you time to cool off perhaps. But Stanley said it was best to send you a little something in the meantime. Just in case you were really pissed off before we came home."

"Well thank-you you two. Everything was very thoughtful."

The family enjoyed some ice cream for dessert before it was time to start winding down for bed. For Stan this consisted of looking over his homework that was due tomorrow before taking a shower and brushing his teeth before climbing into bed. He was about to hop on before he bit his lip and walked over to his bookshelf. He pursued the books that were there (not like he had a big collection) before finally pulling one out from the middle of a stack and crawling under his covers. He waited like this for five minutes, tapping his feet together under his blankets before his heart lifted and his mother walked in.

Sharon looked in amusement at the picture book by her son's hand and the smile on his face. She took up the book titled If I Had a Rocket…

"Hmm, I haven't read this one in a long time."

"I know," Stan simply shrugged.

Sharon sat by his side and opened the book and began to read. She was finished with it in fifteen minutes. She frowned at the troubled look on her son's face after.

"Is something wrong honey?" she asked, touching his face.

Stan sighed. "I still feel kind of awful about what happened before."

Sharon sighed. "What's done is done baby."

"Still, I don't like seeing you cry. Honestly there's no worse feeling than making your own mother cry…"

Sharon looked at him for a second. "I know you didn't mean to have things go as far as they did. I didn't either. I was simply trying to have fun myself for once. I think I'm allowed to do that now and again."

"I know."

Sharon squeezed his hand now. "I know you Stanley; you're a very good person. But you are your father's son too and when Randy Marsh is your father… certain things are to be expected. You are a boy and I hate to say it but sometimes boys and girls are different. You are going to see some things in Dad's point of view. And that's okay. It doesn't mean that you're wrong; you just see things in a different way than how I might, or how your sister might. I'm glad you and Dad got everyone together to do something for all the women out there. That was very sweet."

Stan rolled a loose thread from his blanket over his finger. "Well Dad thought of getting all the guys together for a grand statement thing. I came up with most of the lyrics."

Sharon smiled and bent down to kiss his forehead before getting to her feet. "Good-night sweetie. I love you."

Stan yawned as he grinned back. "Love you too. 'Night."

Sharon shut his door, warmth spreading up and down her body. Really, she couldn't stay mad at her son for too long. Her husband yes, and even if part of this apologizing thing was his idea she could still find fault with Randy simply because he was an adult. It was a great gesture on his part but as an adult she hoped he would set a better example for their son. She wished that about all the fathers in town. All Sharon could do was know that in the end her son had an overall good head and heart of his own and that she had to have had some positive influence on him so far. She loved her son and she did love her husband and with that meant accepting that they would share the same point of view on specific things that she wouldn't. As long as they understood life was more than just farts versus queefs Sharon felt things could go back to normal. At least for now.

I know, another 'mother-son' moment. Honestly is it that much of a surprise at this point? I feel I have to explain myself each time, I just enjoy writing moments that we don't get to see as often in the show itself. 'Filling in the blank' moments I guess you could say! Stan obviously respects his mother in the show, and seems to take her side on issues, or at least, doesn't seem to mind telling on his dad to her. I am in the works of another chapter in this series that takes place when Stan is three. After, I should be able to finally get my newest chapter story in the works and I am really excited to show ya'll what it will be.

Please do review, it makes my day. Thanks!

Lots of love: Rose, February 20, 2020