TikTok posted by user prettymangled87
A basic video showcasing her bestie Cleo's manicure, gold and teal with charms and jewels, real Swarovski, and the clinking bangles up and down her brown arms, set to "Dissolve" by Absofacto.
View count: 500+
Caption: I love my boo's nails! Soooooooo EPIC!
Comments were mostly about details and charms, including a little gold Chanel logo on the thumb. And at least one saying; "Ew, I'm on straight-tok!"
Cleo's party had been… FABULOUS!
And Maggie, drab, crybaby little Maggie who once smelled like ashtrays and too many little brothers and sisters, had been part of it.
She and Draculaura had been trusted with the decorations and they had been FABULOUS, because Cleo said they were "Gucci".
If Cleo de Nile said something was "Gucci", it was FABULOUS.
Which meant that plain, dumpy little Maggie had MADE something FABULOUS happen – with Draculaura to cheer her on. (And inflate the balloons.)
She finished putting makeup on her heart-shaped face and combed out her new sparkling white ruff, Arctic fox ears, and matching tail, which flowed behind her like something Lady Gaga would wear down a red carpet. Frankie Stein's parents didn't think they were a good idea, but they'd engineered them for her anyway.
Frankie, who'd helped design them as part of AP Genetics even surprised her by having the ears pierced in all the right places before he'd installed them.
Frankie was FABULOUS.
And Melody?
Melody's band and Melody's voice last night was FABULOUS, and Melody's college age sister Candace's feet were the same size as Maggie's dainty new human feet, which replaced her gross, cartoonish mechanical ones; which meant that Candace, who was studying fashion merchandising didn't mind sharing shoes, was FABULOUS TOO!
And what about Clawdeen, the werewolf girl who lived next door and MADE HER OWN CLOTHESE?
Why, Clawdeen was FABULOUS, too!
She made Draculaura's hand-me-downs look good on Maggie's curvier frame while showing her how to make her new ears, ruff and tail FABULOUS even as she helped Maggie and Draculaura match: Maggie's blonde to Draculaura's brunette while making Josie look FABULOUS – which was. Which, was… FABULOUS!
No, GUCCI!
And the party?
Low-key EPIC!
Halfway through the party, Fred and Ted, the Predator brothers jumped up on the little stage in Cleo's back yard and surprised everyone by turning themselves into living beatboxes – who knew the two hulking non-verbal jocks were GUCCI?
And the three werewolf boys dancing to Prince on the stage in bright suits had been more than GUCCI! They'd been what could she say? High-key FABULOUS!
And Josie? Josie was GUCCI in high-waisted black jean shorts, a sunny yellow halter-top, some platform combat boots from Goodwill that she'd made FABULOUS by herself, locking herself for an entire weekend in her attic room with Clawdeen's old sewing machine, gold Krylon and LED lights in her box braids – FABULOUS!
Boys, RADs and Normies, all paid attention to her, asking to text her, asking to share SnapCodes on SnapChat, wanting to be seen with her – that was FABULOUS, too.
Puck tagged along, too.
Puck was NOT GUCCI.
Puck was EMBARRASSING.
Thank GOD Puck went home early. Puck was NOT FABULOUS.
But enough of NOT FABULOUS, Cleo and the rest of the girls were going shopping; MAGGIE was INVITED!
Maggie ran past where her aunt and uncle basked face down holding hands under the sunlamp in the living room and out the back door of the Stein's guest house, pausing by the garbage can.
Humming, Maggie lifted the paver, and pulled out the sealed pouch, opened it, and after counting them twice, slipped several large bills from it into the little Burberry clutch Draculaura had given her for her un-birthday last night.
It was time she had something new, something she picked out for herself.
Maggie paused, pulled a few bills out of the clutch, counted them three times, and slid them back into the pouch before penciling an IOU on the family running total sheet and making a note of it on her iPhone – Uncle Mike and Aunt Raina had given her permission to take a few bills, but Maggie's babysitting had slowed down since school started – she didn't want to look greedy.
Greedy was NOT FABULOUS.
Puck wandered sourly around the Stein's big back yard, grey sky overhead reflecting her curdled mood.
Cleo had been a real mega-bitch last night at the party. Who did little Miss "My Daddy's a hot shot antiquities dealer" think she was, kicking Puck out when Maggie and thick-lips Josie with her nappy hair got to stay when all he probably did was rent a musty booth full of other people's discarded shit at the South End Antique Mall?
Probably how he furnished his house – damn, the place looked like the tail end of a ghetto yard sale – hadn't these people HEARD of Target?
Aw, fuck, em, fuck 'em ALL! Puck angrily kicked one of those stupid imported round rocks that Mr. Stein decorate the edge of his koi pond with and stumbled, mechanical foot rasping against the hard black stone, a stone like the millions you could get for free from the ditch on the way to school.
Feeling thoroughly sorry for herself, Puck limped off to the back steps of the guest house and began to unbend her now bent toes, thinking, dumbass rocks aside, that maybe, just maybe, Raina was sorta okay, but she missed Uncle Mike.
Who, it turned out, really was her uncle.
Mr. Stein said so – Mr. Stein would know, hell, when putting Uncle Mike back together, he'd had to open him up.
Where he found the part of Uncle Mike that made Uncle Mike, wellllll, Uncle Mike.
He'd been… horrified.
Which was saying a lot for a dude who could whip up both his and Puck's daughters from scratch like you'd bake a cake and was unfazed by the source Josie's DNA.
But he'd taken some of that stuff and used it to grow more stuff; stuff that would let Uncle Mike blend in as long as he kept his batteries charged.
Puck wasn't sure how she thought about this. Seeing Uncle Mike as he'd been before he'd allowed himself to get fat and sad and she and Maggie'd murdered him was… unsettling.
Hell, he made a better a great big clumsy pink and white animatronic bear than a great big buff dude in his late thirties covered in tatttoos who took care of himself.
Oh well, it's not like anybody asked her.
Worse, after Raina let Mr. and Mrs. Stein work on her, Maggie, the stuck up bitch, decided she was tired of being a goofy looking pink and white animatronic fox and let the Steins do their magic.
That was when Mr. Stein did whatever it was he did and told them that Maggie was undoubtedly Uncle Mike's niece. Puck being Maggie's fraternal twin, was too. He'd confirm it if Puck would only give him a sample of what made Puck, Puck.
Puck had soundly told Mr. Stein to "Fuck off."
Speaking of missing, so was her beloved bomber jacket. Puck couldn't figure out where it'd gotten off to since she'd put it across the back of Uncle Mike's big easy chair, the one with all the duct tape holding its insides in. It had been her favorite garment since before she'd died the first time and had been glad to find it stuffed behind a bank of lockers at Freddy Fazbear's years later. It had been dusty and crumpled, but oil and wear had soon fixed that.
Toes fixed, Puck picked a bit of fluff out of her hair.
Ugh, pink and white fuzz.
From Josie's big pink and white fluffy overstuffed winter coat.
Had Josie's brand new store-bought coat been in her hair all morning?
The same new coat Puck ripped to shreds last night, leaving it all over the Stein's five car garage covered in old motor oil?
Fuck! Oh well, like it would missed by Josie –who, along with Maggie had joined the Bitch Patrol at dawn for one of their all day shopping expeditions to Portland.
Like they needed more shoes.
Anyway, where had her bomber gotten off to?
Maybe Aunt Raina picked it up and put it in the closet. For somebody who'd once been a hotshot Navy chopper pilot, she was weird about messiness.
Another thing that made Aunt Rain weird were the Post-It notes.
All over the damned house.
Reminders, like,
'Shave Mike's head", or "Buy milk for Josie", just random reminders and shit like that. It was annoying!
Worse, Raina and Mike were convinced they had to pay the Steins' back, either with money or chores or some shit like that. Bomberless, Puck retrieved a portable battery pack and her sketchbook from the kitchen and thumped down the back steps past Jeremy the dog, grumbling. Why did they have to pay? The Steins were rich. They could afford it!
Carrying her sketchbook and the charger, Puck ambled across the Stein's back yard, ears and tail twitching freely in the privacy the surrounding fences provided because RAD or not, she'd decided to finally put the baggy skater's pants, oversized beanie, and loose shirt she usually wore to hide what she was in the wash.
Stripped down to a pair of cutoffs and one of Aunt Raina's tank tops despite the growing chill, Puck steered towards the thick stand of rhododendron bushes at the back of the property in the early morning sunlight.
There was a place back there that Puck liked because it was private and quiet. She could doodle and daydream there undisturbed on a forgotten bench beneath the Autumn reds, oranges and golds while recharging her batteries for when the tailor shop she made deliveries for opened around ten in the morning.
Puck ducked under a branch, going from full sun to gentle twilight, the servos in her legs managing to keep her upright on the rocky, branch-strewn ground with Jeremy, the dog, who charged ahead of her, panting and yapping.
Funny, he didn't used to do that.
Pant.
Gross.
And what was that smell?
It reminded her of the big girl she'd been sharing a table in science with her borderline manic teacher, Ghiaccio, and at lunch, what's her face, Terry? Tina?
Something squidged under Puck's bare paws, ewww, sticky!
Jeremy's barks were becoming frantic – he almost sounded like a real dog, now. The Steins' must have been tinkering with him.
Pieces of shit. Don't they know what boundaries are?
"Shut up, Fitzg— wagh!" Puck yelled, as sticky became slippery and slippery sent her flying for the second time that day, to land like Charlie Brown in the funny papers, sketchbook going one way, battery charger another.
Tina, munching on something black, leaned over Puck. She had gone from six feet to easily ten feet in only a week. Swallowing hastily, she said, "Puck, I didn't know you lived in this neighborhood. Are you okay?"