Title: Picture Perfect

Author:Sabrinasmom3

Rating:PG

Disclaimer:I don't own Joan of Arcadia or the actors, blah, blah blah.

Summary:Luke and Grace do normal, everyday things together that end up meaning much more and that someone else sees as picture perfect.

Chapter 12

It was a very "pre-Luke" Grace that plodded through school on Monday. Confrontational, defiant and distant. Although she and Luke did go to the Biology closet that morning, neither of them spoke, she just sat there with her head on his shoulder. It was the only time all day that she felt almost normal.

The Girardis offered to let Grace stay a couple weeks longer, until she figured out exactly what she was going to do, so after school Grace and Luke planned on going to Grace's to get some more of her things. Her father would still be at the synagogue and Monday was her mother's garden club meeting. That morning, she took one of the photos Luke had taken of her injured face and put it in a frame. She intended to leave it on her father's desk.

As they approached Grace's house, she steeled herself for the task ahead. Luke squeezed her hand and they went inside.

Grace was shocked to see her mother coming out of kitchen. She was walking steadily and talked without trouble. She must have gotten there right before Grace and Luke and hadn't had time to start drinking yet.

"Grace! I'm so glad to see you! You're dad said you were staying a friend's house this week, but he didn't say when you were coming home. It has been so quiet here without you." Grace just stared at her. "Gracie, are you alright? You look confused."

"How can you act so normal! How can you act like everything is fine and nothing has changed?" It was her mother's turn to look confused. Realization finally set in. "He didn't even talk to you. He didn't tell you why I was staying at a friends house, did he!" Her mother shook her head.

Grace pulled the framed photo out of the inside pocket of her jacket and handed it to her mother. A look of concern and outrage transformed her mother's face. "Oh my…are you alright? What happened, Grace?" She rushed over intending to pull Grace into an embrace when Grace's words stopped her.

"You. You did this to me, Mother."

Grace's mother stopped short and looked again at the photo, then back at Grace. "I…I did this?"

"That wasn't all you did," Grace yelled at her. She stood tall, looked her mother in the eye and let everything out. "After you knocked me down the stairs in your drunken rage, you chased me to my room and called me names and said hurtful things to me. What you see in the picture is just the damage you did to the outside. I'm only here today to get more of my things, but we'll come back another time…when you're not here."

Once again Grace and Luke found themselves leaving the Polanski house with high adrenaline and heavy hearts.


Sarah Polanski stood there staring at the door. Her mind was telling her to run to the door and throw it open. To go and get her only daughter and make everything better, like mothers do. But she was too much in shock and her body wouldn't obey. She looked back down at the photo of her battered child. Both her mind and her body went numb then and she crumpled to the floor in torment. The only awareness left to her was the sensation of the single tear that trickled down her cheek and landed on the picture in her hand.

How much time passed, she didn't know. She had lost all sense of time. The next time she had a coherent thought it was already dark outside. She got up, walked into the kitchen, took a glass down from the cupboard and unscrewed the bottle before she even realized what she was doing. Getting a drink was an automatic response for her, like breathing or blinking. How had that happened? When did she go from being a devoted wife and loving mother to…to this? An oblivious, self-absorbed, hurtful harpy. She turned the bottle upside down in the sink and put the glass back in the cupboard.

Sarah spent the rest of the evening going through old photos and remembering the way Grace used to look at her, like she was her hero. There was a time when Grace's eyes held something other than pain and contempt. For the first time, Sarah realized that it hadn't been Grace's choice to alienate herself. She had earned Grace's distrust and disdain. She had pushed Grace away with her drinking.

Maybe it wasn't too late. Her husband had assumed that she either wouldn't want to or couldn't handle the truth. He was wrong. The truth was exactly what she needed to hear. Sarah picked up the phone and started making calls.