Chapter 12 – The Breakfast

A young wolf girl posed in front of her mirror, and the reflection she saw was that of Porsha, only nine years old. Strewn about her room was almost every piece of clothing she owned, the early morning aftermath of a tornado of inspiration. When she got that fashionista itch, there was rarely a time she didn't scratch it.

Her latest ensembled included a skirted shirt with the skirt being transparent and shorts underneath, along with a glossy pair of shoes. The rolling shades of turquoise across her outfit reminded her of the ocean, and it was a very deliberate reminder.

It was almost two whole years since her mother had passed, and she was stricken out of the blue by one of her favorite memories from when her family was still whole. They'd gone on a family vacation to Hawaii, just her and mommy and daddy. She'd fallen asleep on the plane, but when her parents woke her up in time to see the Big Island, the imagery would be emblazoned upon her young mind for years to come. She had no idea water could be so clear, vibrant and beautiful.

Porsha wanted to keep that feeling alive. Sometimes her outfits were chosen to use colors and patterns that evoked feelings and memories from within. Looking herself over in the mirror, she could almost feel the sun rolling across her fur, hear the crash of waves, inhale the scent of the ocean.

As much as she enjoyed reminiscing about that vacation, Porsha shook away the memories and was back in reality. She didn't just dress up to remember, but to look and feel good. And anyone that looked good as her only had one option left: Show off. Strutting around her room, Porsha walked an invisible red carpet, stopping occasionally to pose for the voracious cameras of the imaginary paparazzi.

"Porsha! Porsha!" she altered and threw her voice. "You look stunning tonight! What are you wearing?"

"It's a Porsha Crystal Ensemble," she said. With her finger, she wrote out the letters T & M in the air as she added, "Trademarked!" After a few more minutes of pleasing the adoring public, Porsha found herself back in front of the mirror, and the memories began to reach out to her once more.

She felt the warm sand under her feet and wiggled her toes as water rolled across the beach and lapped at her ankles. If she squinted, she could see the sun beaming high above. Somewhere in the distance she heard the relaxed voices of her parents calling out to her.

"Porsha! Get down here!"

Porsha nearly jumped out of her fur. Her father's yell could splinter wood and blister paint. It was too early in the morning to have done anything to get in trouble over, and she didn't remember any incident from the night before, so she was baffled by her father's mood. But she knew if she kept him waiting, it'd likely get worse, so she sprinted out of her room and down the staircase.

"Porshaaaaa!"

"I'm coming, daddy!"

Why did he have to be so impatient? It was like he forgot how big the Crystal Manor was.

Porsha followed her dad's voice to its epicenter, drawing her into their lavish kitchen. She was stunned at the sight of him; slacks and a button up shirt weren't all that unusual, but the apron around his torso was something she never recalled seeing before. The media would have a field day if it ever caught Jimmy Crystal in an apron.

"It's about time!" he said. "You don't want it to get cold, do ya?"

On the white marble countertop was an ornate glass cover over a plate. "Ta-daaaa!" he sang while raising the cover. Porsha let out a high-pitched squeal when he revealed what he'd been working on.

"Daddy! You made French toast!?"

"Here you go, baby," Jimmy said, grabbing some utensils before carrying the plate over to the table. He abandoned his apron and watched with anxious anticipation.

"Thank you, daddy!" Porsha sat down, scooped up the knife and fork, and immediately attacked her breakfast. The French toast was oddly resistant, and her suspicions were confirmed when she took a bite. "Daddy, did you burn some toast in the toaster and just toss some syrup and cinnamon on it?"

With a shrug and a sheepish grin, Jimmy said, "There's butter too!"

"Oh my gosh, that's not how you make French toast!"

"I'm gonna let you in on a little secret: I never really paid attention to how your mother used to make it," he admitted, then gave her a wink.

"Daddy, you could have just looked up a recipe!"

"I thought I knew what I was doing! It's toast! How complicated can it be?" He noticed the disappointment settling into his daughter. Scratching the fur on his head, Jimmy said, "Guess I screwed up, huh?"

Porsha perked up. "It's okay, daddy. I can work with this. Let's make a snack bomb!"

Jimmy grimaced. "For breakfast?" he said, his voice nearly a whisper. But Porsha had already dashed inside the massive pantry and began raiding it for snacks. She returned with a large bowl and every kind of snack she could fit in her arms: potato chips, popcorn, nuts, tortilla chips, crackers, and more. She cut the "French toast" into pieces, slid it into the bowl, then began adding copious amounts of each snack to the mixture.

"You're just standing there!" Porsha complained as she continued building the unholy menagerie. She pointed to the pantry as if ordering her dad to contribute. Oddly enough, he obliged, returning with a bag of pretzels and cheese puffs. Porsha snatched the pretzels, but Jimmy had a death grip on the cheese puffs.

"Even the cheese puffs?" he asked, apprehension etched all over his face.

"The whole shaboodle!" Porsha demanded, finally wrestling the bag away.

Once she finished mixing everything together, Porsha fetched bottles of chocolate syrup and marshmallow sauce, drizzling them all over the snack bomb. She completed her masterpiece with a sprinkling of cinnamon.

Porsha took a step back to admire her work for a few seconds before scooping up a handful and shoving it into her mouth. She let out a guttural, almost bestial moan of ecstasy.

"Uuuuugghh, so good! It's like a vending machine exploded in my mouth," she said through a mouthful. Jimmy forced a smile.

"You wanna watch cartoons?" he asked, throwing his arm around her and pulling her in tight. The involuntary sneer she gave him was enough of an answer. "Or not. I guess you've outgrown them."

"No, that's not it," Porsha said. "I wanna watch some housewives get their wigs snatched! There's a marathon today! Twelve hours!"

"Fantastic," Jimmy replied, struggling to keep his sarcasm in check. Twelve hours of those banshees scratching and screaming at each other. "Whatever you want, baby."

Porsha took the bowl and practically skipped into the family room, her dad following behind with a stack of napkins. They settled onto the couch, with Porsha frantically fiddling with the remote to power up the TV and flip to The Real Housewives of Redshore City marathon already in progress. They were just in time to watch a heated argument break out between two of the housewives at an upscale restaurant. The argument escalated when a drink was thrown, followed by the table being flipped in retaliation.

"I will step on your neck, bitch!" one of the housewives screamed in the chaos.

"Step on her neck!" Porsha yelled at the TV, then pulled on her dad's arm. "You're not eating breakfast!"

Jimmy managed a smile, grabbed a fistful of the snack bomb, silently apologized to his stomach and stuffed his face. "Mmmmm!"

Satisfied, Porsha nuzzled against her dad's side and under his arm, and he kissed her forehead. With a grossly unhealthy breakfast on her lap and housewives brawling on the TV, she knew there was no place on Earth she'd rather be.

Porsha curled up in her bed, hugging her Narly the Narwhal plushie. How could such good memories be so painful now? It felt like her heart was being wrenched by a ghostly hand determined to rip it out of her chest. Cleo was here for less than half an hour and had deftly sent her world spinning off its axis.

The tantrum she had when Buster "fired" her and the fallout that resulted was something the Moon troupe mercifully never dwelled on, not even through whispers or hints of spite. She realized that avoiding the subject lulled her into a false sense of security; just because her friends wouldn't touch it didn't mean no one else would. And now that Cleo brought it up, the guilt was clawing away at her insides more than ever before.

Buster had been put in mortal danger because of her, Porsha understood that. But she never truly considered it from her father's perspective, how she manipulated him like that. She was always daddy's little princess, taking whatever she wanted whenever she wanted, and getting daddy to step in when that didn't work. It was her word against Buster's, and the poor koala never stood a chance. If she had the ability to peek into other realities, what would she see in the reality where she took her "firing" with poise and grace? Would her father be free? Would he and Buster have reached common ground and worked out their problems?

Was this all her fault?

Burying her face in her pillow, Porsha wondered if she'd end up in a jail cell too. If a jury convicted her dad for something the prosecutor would tell the world he did because of her, would that make her culpable? She lit her dad's fuse and threw him in Buster's direction. There were witnesses—Suki and Jerry were there to see it. It was undeniable. The jury would look at her with contempt.

Spoiled, selfish little brat. That's what you are.

A knock on the bedroom door broke her out of her thoughts. The door opened a smidge and Johnny slipped his head through.

"Porsha, you okay?"

She lingered for a minute, pushing back the tears. They'd all been doting on her since they took her in, it was embarrassing. She wanted to prove she wasn't some emotionally fragile child but lying didn't really seem to be the best way to do it right now.

"Not really," Porsha finally admitted.

Johnny came into the room and sat at the foot of the bed. They remained in silence for a few minutes, which Porsha greatly appreciated. No lectures, no prying, just the comfort that came from the unspoken company of a friendly and gentle soul.

Porsha broke the silence. "I bet everyone thinks I'm just a mess."

"Y'know, it's okay to not be okay," Johnny said. "If you don't realize you're hurting, how can you heal?"

Porsha scooted down the bed to sit next to Johnny. "I'm hurting because of my dad, I just don't know how to heal. I get why you guys feel the way you do about him, but it's hard for me to accept what I saw that night in the theater with the dad I grew up with. I know he can be... ferocious at times, but isn't that most dads?" She leaned her head on Johnny's shoulder. "And to top it off, Cleo basically said it was mostly my fault. She's right, I shouldn't have tried to manipulate my father like that..."

"You can't blame yourself for what he did. He's responsible for his own actions. You didn't make him try to hurt Mr. Moon."

"I know, I never meant for things to go so far. Sometimes I feel like I never really knew who he was."

"Parents are complex, and they're definitely not perfect," Johnny murmured as if reminding himself.

Porsha threw him a skeptical look. "Yeah, sure. I wish things between me and my dad were more like it is between you and yours."

Johnny winced a bit, knowing he'd have to broach the subject. "We didn't always have the best relationship. I don't really talk about this since everyone else in the house already knows, but not that long ago my dad disowned me."

That was enough to shock the grief out of Porsha. She looked him over as if seeing him for the first time. "Why would he do something awful like that?"

"Long story short, he wanted to me to be part of the 'family business,' I wanted to sing instead. He went absolutely mental when I told him. Came around when he heard me perform."

"No way!" Porsha exclaimed. "You two get along so great now! No one would be able to tell."

"My point is, I was in a bad place with my dad. We're past that now but it still hurts thinking about how he turned on me like that. I knew he wouldn't like my decision, but I didn't think he'd go so far, throwing me away like rubbish. Now, after that little bump in our relationship, things've been better than ever between us. If your dad truly loves you, I think there's a path for the two of you to get back to each other."

Porsha suddenly pulled Johnny into a hug, which he returned, and they held that quiet embrace for a while.

As they pulled away, something mischievous flashed across Porsha's face. "So, the 'family business'... you were a criminal, huh?"

Johnny tugged at the collar of his shirt, eyes darting about. "Uh, ah... I guess you're technically only a criminal if you get charged with a crime? I was the getaway driver, so I helped with the operation, but I was never arrested or anything, so literally I committed a crime, maybe? But technically I..."

Porsha flopped back onto the bed as she burst into hysterical laughter. Watching Johnny sweat and squirm, his voice cracking as he went in circles trying to explain away his past misdeeds, was almost too much. Tears of laughter replaced what once threatened to be tears of sorrow. Johnny frowned, but eventually joined in on the laughter at his expense.

"I needed that," Porsha said, wiping her eyes. "Thanks, Jonjon."

Johnny hid his face in his palms. "Bloody hell! Who told you about that one?"

With a giggle, Porsha slid her fingers across her lips like she was zipping them shut.

A/N

Jimmy being a bad cook is going to be a recurring thing (much to his chagrin).

Porsha and Johnny connecting over their difficult fathers is a no-brainer. Johnny and Marcus have this wholesome relationship now, but I know some people that never forgave Marcus for what he did to Johnny even after he made it up to him in the first movie. I wanted that to still haunt Johnny on some level, because you don't just get over your parent disowning you for being yourself (even if it didn't last very long).

Chapter 12 marks the midway point of Volume I. Chapter 13 is going to be a doozy. Without giving anything away, all I can say is that the development of the story can be seen as "before chapter 13" and "after chapter 13."