A/N: I have a few things that I would like to address after I respond to reviews. Let me do that first.
Gs33022, the grandparents will indeed have more dialogue here! Grandma Josephine actually did have a line in the last chapter, but I admit that this was easy to miss. (I referred to her as "the elderly woman with a ponytail", since the focus at that point was from Violet's perspective, and she would have had no way to know their names.) I think you'll like the fact that all four of them speak in this chapter. :-) Also, I think you'll be interested to know that Mrs. Bucket's first name was taken from "What Could Have Been", as Dahl came up with the name himself.
Now that that's been taken care of, on to the additional notes. I had an afterthought a few weeks ago and modified the very end of Chapter Two to add a few details that I felt were missing (NOT the ending Author's Note). Nothing was taken out, though. I encourage you to read the last bit with the added paragraph and extended prior paragraph if you haven't already. (For those of you who discovered this story after mid-August, don't worry about it; you saw the current version.)
For those of you who were curious about Montana and Charley Pride being mentioned as having a supposed connection in the last chapter, Charley Pride actually lived in Montana for a time. (You learn something new every day!) I looked up Montana artists for that scene, figuring that Violet likely would have some Montana memorabilia there, and I settled on Charley Pride after looking through and analyzing a series of results. (One of them, George Winston, was from Miles City, which I felt was perfect, but a closer look at his discography wouldn't let me use him; his first album was released in 1972.)
Lastly, I would like to give an open thank you to everyone who has reviewed so far! I am enrolled in a Persuasive Communications class this semester, and our first homework assignment was to keep track of all of the instances of persuasion, both obvious and subtle, that we faced throughout the entire first week, and then to analyze them in an essay. I would like to give a special shout-out to Gabe (AKA Gs33022) for his persuasive review of Chapter Twelve, since it was the one review I received within the specified week and was featured extensively in part of the essay. I got a 95% on it, by the way.
Charlie was understandably upset throughout a good portion of the rest of lunchtime. Between the time that the household was resuming the meal until Charlie had to go to Mr. Jopeck's stand, the rest of the Buckets could tell this. They couldn't blame him. While they all were feasting on their cabbage water, the surprise guest's attitude was all that was on anybody's mind.
"Why did she feel so humiliated by everything?" Charlie finally asked openly.
"Because, Charlie, she's a nitwit!" Grandpa Joe answered. "She probably believes in the old pecking order. You know what that is, don't you?"
Charlie nodded. "Almost all of my classmates have a similar attitude when they find out. It's gotten to the point where I never even let it slip out at any cost."
"Mr. Turkentine seems to like you well enough," Mrs. Bucket pointed out. "Yes, he knows that we're poor. I've had conferences where school taxes were discussed."
"Are you sure about that?" Charlie asked. "We were doing a chemistry demonstration in class when the semester started, and when he called on me to help him out, and I said that I didn't know the answer to a question he asked me before we started, he told me smarmily that he was glad, because otherwise, I would be rude because I was teaching him."
"I think Mr. Turkentine was bantering with you," answered Grandpa George.
Charlie made a sadder face. "Well, I smiled, but I couldn't tell."
"How about we just put that girl behind us and enjoy the rest of lunch?" suggested Grandma Josephine cheerily. "It's supposed to be a happy time where we all can enjoy our company."
Charlie shrugged, looking at his bowl of cabbage water. "Well, okay," he replied unenthusiastically. He stirred the spoon for a moment before continuing to eat.
"It's Sunday, by the way," Mrs. Bucket reminded her son. "You may have another bowl when you're finished with yours."
The reminder brightened Charlie's mood. He looked towards her. "It is! Thank you, Mom! And do you know what? Next week, I might even have enough paycheck money built up so that we'll have a second helping of bread with the cabbages!"
Mrs. Bucket grinned. "Well, there's always the hope."
"Well, think of something this way: if only your little acquaintance—what did you say her name was again?" asked Grandpa Joe.
"Violet," answered Charlie.
"If only Violet liked cabbages, she would have just missed out on a double helping by barging out! I wish I could say that at least something this afternoon was her loss."
"More soup, please, Mary?" Grandma Georgina suddenly asked politely, holding up her empty bowl with the spoon in it.
Mrs. Bucket nodded and got up to the serving pot. From there, lunch went on as any for the household, and Charlie more or less put Violet's behavior behind him for the time being.
...
He did not, however, quit being sad when he went to collect his newspapers. While being around his supporting family helped in part, going into town was another story. Out here, he figured, the chance that he would run into Violet again at some point was quite high, especially on Bill's Candy Shop days. If that came to pass, then what might she possibly do? Call him a loser? Avert him like he was a venomous animal and make it painfully obvious? Let him know that she had told her friends all about him? She had acted like she was anti-social around him before, but now it was different. Now she knew about his social standing compared to hers. She looked middle-class, sure, but it was higher than what he had. Pretty much everyone else he knew was middle-class.
Charlie's long face remained when he met Mr. Jopeck at the newsstand. Being one of the kindest, most sympathetic adults whom Charlie knew, the man couldn't help but notice.
"Hello, Charlie!" Mr. Jopeck greeted. "Is everything going all right?"
"Not really," Charlie admitted. "I've had a rough afternoon so far."
"Oh, dear! I'm sorry to hear that! What happened?"
Charlie sighed calmly. "I went against my better judgement and invited someone for lunch. As it turned out, I got another instance of poverty-shaming. I'm sick of them!"
Mr. Jopeck frowned in calm anger. "Darn kids! Yes, I unfortunately have had to deal with handfuls like those. You know what, though, Charlie?" The newsstand owner started to brighten up again. "I think that you are quite jolly good! Your grandfather and I, as you know, were pals growing up, and while I haven't seen him since he became bedridden all those years ago, you quite remind me of him, possibly even better! It has helped that I always can rely on you for this job."
"Thanks, Mr. Jopeck!" Charlie cheered. He accepted the stack of newspapers from his boss and shoved them into his large sack.
Mr. Jopeck nodded quickly. "Just the same. Never you mind what that insulter told you. You're better than that. I hope that your evening will go better!"
"I hope so, too. I'll see you tomorrow!" Charlie waved, hustling to get to his route.
...
Very late that afternoon, back at the Wonka factory, Violet was going through her now-premature partial routine. It was just barely after five o'clock. She had changed into sleepwear and was now looking at the mirror on her vanity. Keeping a close eye on the nearby window, she undid her partial ponytail, set the clip on the vanity, and proceeded to give her hair several strokes with a compact brush. She did this at a rather fast pace, as she noticed that sunset was imminent.
As was to be expected, her skin started to darken all at once until it was the familiar cobalt color. Out of curiosity, she looked toward the clock and saw just how early this was. Groaning, she finished the job on her hair quickly and set down the brush.
She then had a rapid afterthought. Remembering how much more difficult it had been to spit out her gum the night before, Violet very quickly took advantage of the last few seconds she had before she started to swell up. Dreading this action because it meant less time with the gum, she pulled it out of her mouth and stuck the wad on the far right-hand side of the mirror's glass.
The swelling stage began right after this. Violet never felt it safe to try to move during it in fear of possibly stumbling and becoming completely helpless, so her being in front of a mirror was quite the misfortune. Her only two options were to be forced to watch herself getting mutilated horrifically with no way to stop it, or to close her eyes the entire time. She opted for the latter. In either case, she would have to see her full blueberry self in the mirror anyway, since she would have to see where she was going when she pivoted and waddled away afterwards. Violet did open her eyes for a quick moment at one point, but she shut them again promptly upon seeing just how much bigger she had gotten, not daring to peek again. She made nervous chewing motions for coping with the blocked-out reflection, even though her gum had been taken out of her mouth.
When she sensed that the transformation was over, Violet opened her eyes very slowly. Her cursed reflection was staring back at her. It took up the whole width of the mirror, and she could just barely see her hands going off the sides. Before she could go into a crying fit that was the antithesis of pride, she pivoted and tried to waddle away as fast as she could, which was not a very efficient task. As her belly was now just brushing up against the front of the vanity post-transformation, the pivot caused Violet to scrape against the edge. She couldn't see any part of that level now, so although she was nowhere near one of the corners, she had no way to know and was glad that Mr. Wonka had made them rounded instead of the usual pointy shape that would have been a stabbing hazard. Her skin was still sensitive to the scrape, though. Not exactly sure where to go, Violet waddled towards the center of the bedroom, scanning the peripherals to make sure that nothing was begging to be tripped over.
She made it to the middle of the room in about five minutes. She paused, not having a plan afterwards. After thinking it over for a bit, she decided to play things by ear and see what would be available to do in her current state. She waddled to the door, opened it, waddled out of the doorframe, and, looking both ways for articles the way one might look down the street both ways for cars, proceeded to turn left and head down the hallway.
Violet had to stop to catch her breath by the time she got to the end. Lugging around all of that juice always took a toll on her if she moved around for too long. How she wished that she still had her gum with her for emotional comfort. Reflexively, she resumed moving her jaws as if she were still chewing the gum, despite nothing being in her mouth. After a moment, she started to gnaw on her tongue so as to get the sensation of something being there physically.
When her resting break was over, Violet waddled very carefully into the common room straight ahead. Unfortunately for her, the light wasn't on. By this point, the night sky had made its full transition, plunging the room into darkness without the light fixture on. She knew that the switch was quite a distance away, and even though there was some light coming in from the hallway behind the room, Violet felt that the prod risk and fall risk weren't worth it.
She just barely had time to stew in her frustration, as she heard the Wonkavator arrive in the living room just minutes later. Violet assumed it to be either Mr. Wonka or an Oompa-Loompa at first, but when she heard her name being called, the voice gave away that it was instead Mr. Wilkinson again.
Violet did not want to see him. True, he had helped tremendously last night, but he was now another figure who knew her secret, and unlike Mr. Wonka or the Oompa-Loompas, she presumed that Mr. Wilkinson had a home outside of the factory and would explain to at least one other person what he had been doing the whole time he was out. She just ignored his voice.
Mr. Wilkinson just presumed that Violet couldn't hear him. He walked out of the living room, turned off the lamp he had been using for light by the sofa, and, like last night, searched actively for her.
It didn't take long before he finally saw her in the common room after flicking the overhead switch. "There you are!" he exclaimed, startling Violet. "Did you hear me or not when I called?"
"I did," Violet admitted. "I just didn't think that I needed the extra help for tonight. I thought that last night was a one-and-done deal."
"Little girl," Mr. Wilkinson explained, "Mr. Wonka has tasked me with helping you every night until the early sunsets stop, not just yesterday. He told me just how you found it too early to do anything to enjoy the evening yourself."
"I'm not little!" Violet scoffed. Immediately, she bit her tongue, looking around her diameter. Oops. She definitely didn't mean her claim like that. "I mean, in age!"
Mr. Wilkinson gave an apologetic nod. "Well, then, excuse me. Getting back to the point, I will be back every night for a few months. The late afternoon sunsets won't be gone until sometime in February, probably just before the middle of the month."
The news hit Violet like a brick. True, Mr. Wonka had mentioned the timespan already, but now that it was officially her new reality, and having experienced semi-helplessness from it for a while, only now did the news truly sink in. She had noticed that the whole weekend, including Friday, had each sunset arrive a bit earlier than the last one, too.
Violet glared slightly, raising one eyebrow. "Are you telling me that I will be stuck needing extra care like I'm two years old again for four months?"
Mr. Wilkinson nodded. "I'm afraid so. Would you like me to do anything with you before dinner is ready? It shouldn't take but half an hour."
Violet groaned. "One of the only things I can think of that wouldn't require much help would be watching TV. Why doesn't Mr. Wonka have one?"
"He actually does, but it's in a highly dangerous factory room where he uses the set for test runs of a new process that he has asked me to keep confidential. The television doesn't have any channels. Mr. Wonka himself never liked television; he considered it to be a waste of time, so as it was, when he built the lodging originally for himself before a secondary one near his office was built, a television was never installed. I hope that this isn't too disappointing."
"It's not," Violet answered. She never had gotten addicted, thank goodness, but she felt that Mr. Wonka was embarrassingly behind on the times this way.
Speaking of addiction, Violet was starting to miss her gum again. She moved her jaws on an imaginary piece once more, causing her spit to make false smacking noises.
"Can you spit out your gum without help somehow before dinner? You appeared to have been able to do so last night, or so I assumed."
"Oh, I actually did already," Violet corrected. "This is an improvised coping mechanism."
Coping mechanism? thought Mr. Wilkinson. This doesn't sound to me like just a fascination like Willy said. This sounds like she's bona fide addicted.
"Well, as long as it's out already and you don't need help, then that's good," he stated. He offered to roll Violet to the living room and turn on the radio while dinner was being made. Seeing few alternatives, Violet agreed. After arriving her there and making sure that the volume was okay, Mr. Wilkinson left for the kitchen.
...
The following afternoon, immediately after school let out, Violet stormed over to a phone booth. She had only two goals on her mind: to report and to complain.
After going through the tedious process of paying to activate the switchboard, telling the operator where she wanted to call, and then paying the long-distance fee, Violet waited and listened to the familiar "ringy-dingy" noise for a moment.
Finally, somebody picked up. "Hello?" It was her mother.
"Hi, Mother," Violet responded unenthusiastically. Her gum echoed into the receiver.
"Oh, hi, sweetie! Is everything okay?"
"Is Dad there? I need to report something to both of you."
"Yes. You managed to catch both of us just in the nick of time before he left for work! Let me get him really fast." Scarlett set down the phone for a moment.
Since the Beauregardes' end had been left with the receiver facing up, Violet could hear her mother calling out from the kitchen, somewhat faintly. "Sam, we have a phone call."
Pause.
"No, it's not an Auto Mart customer, it's Violet! There's no need to give out an advertising pitch!"
Violet could only guess what her father had said during the five seconds that her mother had stopped talking, but it was clear that he almost certainly had gotten excited for a moment. She hoped that news of it being their own child instead of a sap to plug wasn't a disappointment.
In any case, his rapid, excited voice soon spoke into the receiver. "Hello, Violet! What's up?"
"Are both of you hearing this? I have something to report."
"Yes," Scarlett responded. "We have the receiver tilted between us."
"Mr. Wonka blabbed."
Her parents were confused. "Blabbed about what?" asked Scarlett.
"You know…" Violet trailed off. She cupped a hand over the side of her mouth to prevent any passersby from possibly lip-reading. "The spell."
There was an awkward silence. Then, without warning, Violet suddenly heard Sam practically exploding with rage. On his end, his face would have made him aptly named had he been his wife.
"WHAT?! WE SPECIFICALLY TOLD WONKA TO KEEP THIS CONFIDENTIAL! IT WAS IN ONE OF OUR LETTERS THAT NOBODY BESIDES THE FAMILY KNOWS, AND WE FOLLOWED UP LATER THAT WE WANTED TO KEEP IT THAT WAY! DOES HE HAVE NO RESPECT FOR OTHER PEOPLE'S WISHES? HE HAS MESSED WITH THE WRONG POLITICAL FIGURE! I'LL BREAK HIM FOR THIS!" On his end, although Violet obviously couldn't see it, he was wagging a fist, and Scarlett had to use her free hand to restrain it as best she could. She finally resorted to backing away for a moment.
"I'm sorry about that," she apologized in embarrassment. "To whom did Mr. Wonka blab, and what was the context? If it was unnecessary, then I share your father's feelings, to an extent."
"He has a worker I didn't know about, who is not one of those little people. Mr. Wonka blabbed the whole situation to him, and now he has been giving unwanted help."
"What kind of help? If it is unavoidable but the secret never leaves this worker, then I won't be quite as upset."
Scarlett saw out of the corner of her eye that Sam was getting madder at his wife's response, even though he couldn't hear what Violet had said. Scarlett took a moment to excuse herself again. "Sam, even if this was a breach, what good is suing him going to do? We would have to explain why she was there, and then everyone would think that we were nuts. There was no legal binding that we worked into the living transfer anyway."
Sam was shut up from this. Scarlett was right; taking legal action would be pointless.
Scarlett came back to Sam so that they could hear Violet together again. "Well, it just so happens that I'm now getting sunset at ridiculously early times! It's getting dark at five, and I was told that nighttime will just come even earlier until February! Mr. Wonka blabbed to that guy to help me eat and do all of that other stuff, so it's like I've become even more helpless than I was at home!"
Both of her parents were shocked. Scarlett finally said, "Violet, come to think of it, I can't say that I'm surprised. You're at a higher latitude now, hence this seasonal shift. I'm very sorry that we didn't think of this earlier. If it's for an extra hand, and this person won't tell, then that's fine."
"I want to come home now!" Violet whined. "I was less helpless at first, but now it's shifting to the worst it's ever been! Please?"
"We wish," said Sam. "Your mother and I never wanted to do this in the first place, but if you came home now, all of our infrastructure accommodation problems would come back."
"Oh, and another thing is, I'm worried that when he's helping me, this worker might throw out my gum I've worked so hard to chew for a world record. I can't spit it out myself when I'm a blueberry, but my only other option is to spit it out too early, and then I'm wasting time that I could be spending chewing it and working towards my record!"
Scarlett was diplomatically silent. She never approved of Violet's chewing habit at all, and she didn't know what to say to spare Violet's feelings. Sam always encouraged it, though, so he started to respond. "I understand your concern. How about if you simply explain it to him, and then he could—" The beep from the switchboard cut him off, ending the connection suddenly.
"Curse you, stupid 10-minute time limit!" Violet groused, slamming the receiver back into its cradle. She exited the booth after this.
As she headed back to the factory, she at one point saw Charlie running along his paper route on the other side of the street. She did not acknowledge him, and fortunately for her, he wasn't even looking in her direction anyway, far too busy with his job. Knowing him a bit better, she wanted it to be that way, without interaction again.
When getting back to the Wonka factory, Violet had to wait for a few minutes for everyone to be cleared from the gates' vicinity, and then she slipped back in and had a normal mid-afternoon.
