A/N: Response time!
Gs33022, I think everybody believes exactly that, as far as Violet's attitude goes. In fact, her needing to give up being rude is the whole point; you hit the nail squarely on the head. For your theory on this chapter, you'll get to find out momentarily, sort of, if the part about meeting up and apologizing will happen here. I knew that bit of film trivia, but I may or may not have utilized it or had the outcome planned like your further theory, and in any case, the curse is still FAR from being lifted. No spoilers. ;-)
Turrislucidus, while the sun lamps sound ingenious in theory, they wouldn't work. Even if the daytime effect was emulated inside the lodging, the attempt wouldn't stop nighttime from approaching, and astronomical nighttime and daytime are what are triggering the form changes. (That's why they're still happening when Violet has a room light on.) Worse still, sun lamps are what people use for tanning and horticulture, and given the fact that she's part plant for about half the day, they might trigger unwanted effects at night, as well as posing a constant sunburn risk during the day. Switching to attending school in the summer would work (I knew about the daytime being very long then), but nobody thought of it before she moved in, and now her parents (who are still her legal guardians, no matter how much Mr. Wonka is filling in) are in a harder position to change this, now that they're getting only sporadic updates. It was very sweet of you to think up solutions, though! It comes across as a sort of empathy, at least to me. :-)
Violet's second mass try at impressing a few schoolmates was a complete failure. Everybody said the same things as the other boys from yesterday, and when she tried gum-related feats such as stretches to get their attention, it continued not to work. One even told her outright that he found the mere chewing to be disgusting, and since he didn't know her name up to this point, he had been referring to her privately as "Little Miss Cow Cud".
Violet continued to be dumbfounded. Why did everybody have these common opinions? The reveal by that one crush of his nickname for her also hurt besides. Oh, well, she was not intending to stop her ever-standing world record attempt, so who cared about that? Still, she was disappointed and confused by all of these rude awakenings.
She groused about these thoughts while heading back to the factory but let them go later, as she was getting close to becoming saddened over them, and if there was anything that Violet Beauregarde did not do in public, it was to get upset visibly. If people saw her like that, then she would be weak. A crybaby. A complete loser in the social sense. To deter herself from this possible emotional action, she started playing with her gum, attempting to see just how far she could stretch it before it tore in two. She didn't have any sort of a measuring tool as she was walking, so she had to make a rough estimate, but when the gum finally ripped, Violet guessed that it had achieved a good six to seven inches in string length. Gleeful now that she had found an entertaining distraction, she popped the gum fragment back into her mouth and chewed it together with the other half to mash them into one wad again. The whole time she was doing this experiment, she caught the attention of several grownups, most of whom gave her disgusted looks, but Violet did not notice any of them.
Today was Violet's first Friday since quitting her Friday afternoon shifts with Bill, so she had no need to head there. It still was on the way, though, so she just went down that stretch of sidewalk anyway. As she cleared the crosswalk, however, she decided impromptu to make a detour, as she saw a certain sight come into view unexpectedly.
As it turned out, her little bit of entertainment that she had created with her gum stretching, never mind the time taken in the schoolyard, had caused her to dawdle for a bit by walking more slowly. This had been enough to make her cross this same stretch of sidewalk just several minutes later than usual, and whom should she see but Charlie, talking to the man with the newspapers at the newsstand.
An overview of what everyone at school had been telling her raced through her head in one quick moment. The last time that she and Charlie had interacted, she had dismissed him abruptly after insulting his living quarters. Everybody had been right, she realized; she was less than polite to at least one person. That had been in a secluded area, though! How were they to know about that incident?
But no matter. Even if she couldn't see problems elsewhere, the reflection was enough to embarrass her. Charlie almost certainly would not want to see her again after she had behaved the way that she had. Quickly, so as to get out of his visual field before he looked in her direction, she turned a corner and walked down a less crowded street. She wasn't quite sure how she would get back from here, but she would figure something out. There had to have been a street nearby that turned back.
...
Violet kept a close eye on the small structures that provided local services. She was looking mainly for a street sign or two, but she also figured that she might as well memorize a few of these names, if only for reference purposes should she find herself out here again. She made out a small coffee shop, a small florist, and a few other rural-sized buildings whose businesses she could not figure out from the names or the window visuals. She doubted that she herself would need to use most of these places, figuring this somewhat narrow street to be good for today's detour only.
Being out of the view of any clock towers, Violet felt the need to pick up the pace somewhat, lest she wind up on the news and be mistaken for an escaped laboratory test subject or something. She had left the school only about half an hour ago, but even so, there was still the chance of getting lost down here.
She passed a building that wasn't very well stood-out, and she couldn't tell its purpose initially, but its door was open slightly, and two people were standing in it. A raven-haired man with a moustache was fully inside the building, facing in the direction of the street, while a dark blonde woman with a ponytail was standing directly in the doorway, her back turned. Beyond them, Violet could see what looked like bedsheets and a few shirts hanging on clotheslines, and she drew the conclusion that it was an old-school laundromat, the kind where everything still was done by hand.
"Oh, that's quite nice, thank you!" she overheard the woman, whose face was unseen, say to the man. "I don't remember if I've told you this, but today is one of Charlie's paydays for delivering The Evening Standard after school. What with his earning a little extra money and Dad recently deciding to quit smoking so that we could have a little more side change, suppers have started to feel a bit more promising around here! It's nice to know that I have second hands for this now."
Violet stopped in her tracks. The voice sounded eerily familiar, but she was struggling where to place it. One of Charlie's paydays? A little extra money?, she thought.
"You have told me very briefly, but I still think that it's wonderful!" the man, who raised no suspicions, said to her. "Why, if the economy would allow me to do so, I would raise your salary ever so slightly just so that you and yours could get extra help. You deserve better, you really do."
"Thank you!" the woman replied cheerily. "I'll see you on Monday!"
"Goodbye, Mrs. Bucket!" the man waved.
Mrs. Bucket?, Violet thought. Her puzzlement was solved a moment later when the woman returned the parting courtesies, waved goodbye back, and closed the door, turning around in the process. Now that her face was visible, Violet could see that it was none other than Charlie's mother.
The two met almost eye-to-eye, Violet staring stunned at Mrs. Bucket. They recognized each other immediately. Violet, worried that she might get reprimanded or something similar for her only encounter with the woman, tried to make a distraction of attitude fast.
"Oh, hello!" Violet said artificially, her gum being chewed at a faster pace than normally. "It's quite the nice afternoon…isn't it?"
Mrs. Bucket just looked at the girl, confused at the obviously fake sincerity.
"Ma'am? I mean, sure, the temperature could be better, but isn't it so marvelous that there's very little wind outside? Oh, and the daylight—you gotta love it right now!" When Violet said, "so marvelous", she changed her pitch momentarily to a singsong alto, throwing in a cheesy grin for good measure. She spoke the entirety of her last sentence as if she were her father speaking in a commercial for Beauregarde's Auto Mart, minus the cheerful fist swing that he usually did for them.
"What are you doing?" Mrs. Bucket asked patiently.
"Oh, uh…it's never the wrong time to discuss the weather, right? ... Ma'am?" Violet kept up the cheerful, used-car salesman charade, which was now sounding comically fake.
"My name is Mrs. Bucket. I understand if you don't remember."
Violet finally cut it out. Uh oh, she thought, feeling doomed. She remembers me.
"Violet, if you're worried about what happened on Sunday, just let me assure you, we decided to let go of it. Charlie is a very forgiving young man, and while yes, we were hurt for a bit afterwards, we decided not to hold a grudge." She smiled as she said this, surprising Violet.
"Wh—What do you mean? What grudge?"
"We don't have one. At least, his grandparents and I don't. Live and learn."
"Well, I really was hoping that you wouldn't remember who I was, but now that that's shot, I guess I'll just be on my way and stew in shame."
"Why? Everyone makes mistakes."
Violet crossed her arms. "Yeah, but isn't that a sign of weakness?"
Mrs. Bucket gave a small chuckle, smiling again. "No, it's a sign of learning, as long as people are willing to reflect on those mistakes and try not to repeat them."
The utter optimism and cheery nature of Mrs. Bucket was starting to feel sickening to the prideful gum-chewer. She wanted to leave right then and there, almost deciding that she had had enough of this family, but then she changed her mind. If Charlie had let go of the incident, then was all well with his feelings? Could she ask him if he liked her? Sure, it sounded unfeasible, what with the limited and admittedly bad impression that she had given him, but everyone else had rejected her.
No, Violet, what are you doing?!, her conscience nearly screamed in horror. Birds of a feather flock together! Shack and suburbia just don't mix!
Without warning, Violet started to have second thoughts. Yeah, well, remember two years ago when Cornelia had that slumber party, and you couldn't come? She acted just the way you did! You probably left Charlie with those same feelings!
Her mind snapped back with an excuse. You made up weeks later, though! Yeah, it took a while, and she seemed like a bullying frump for just that one day, but you would have said those same things to him! If you could forgive Cornelia, then Charlie could forgive you! You won't have to see him or even ask anyway! Besides, if Cornelia never moved in, she never would have pressured you to try your first gum so that you could compete with her with no shame despite your—
Exactly! Lifting your nighttime issue is this whole point! You may as well try to see him!
Finally having enough of the conscience ping-pong, Violet asked nervously, "Well, what about Charlie? Is he actually okay now?"
Mrs. Bucket was getting ready to walk off of the front porch. She answered, "He took longer than the rest of us to cheer up again, but seeing as he was the most directly affected, you might or might not have to make up. It's your call."
"How exactly would I do that?"
"Well, he loves Wonka bars, and he has a fascination with the company in general, but he can't get them except on his birthday. I think he would be thrilled if he got an extra one. Besides, the timing would be ideal, as it will be Halloween in just over a week. Charlie's never gotten to go trick-or-treating because we can't afford any Halloween costumes—even if my mom tried to sew one herself, we wouldn't be able to buy all of the fabric required at once—so I think it would excite him if he got a special treat, timed on Halloween or beforehand."
I've never gotten to go trick-or-treating, either, Violet thought. My parents had me go to my room for a little bit in the late afternoon while they hid candy around the house and turned off all the lights, and then I would get into my costume, grab a flashlight, and hunt around for the candy like an Easter egg hunt in the semi-darkness. Of course, Violet couldn't reveal this out loud, so instead, she told Mrs. Bucket, "I'll take some time to think it over."
"Excellent! Well, I hope you have a good evening!" Unlike Violet's similar quote when she had departed the Bucket residence, this parting from Mrs. Bucket was genuine and sincere. Of course, the wish for a good evening was futile, but she had no way to know that.
Violet waved very slowly with no verbal response before turning around and heading back down the street, in the opposite direction from her walk, towards the road where she took her usual path. She wasn't exactly sure whether she was going to attempt to make amends with Charlie or not, but she was going to be at Bill's Candy Shop tomorrow anyway. She would have decided by then.
She got back into the factory's courtyard, with plenty of time to spare. Being a Friday, she had no need to worry about a potential homework issue—she could get all of it done during the day on both weekend days—so this was going to be a nice break as far as Mr. Wilkinson's trips went.
Still, she had to decide practically overnight whether she was going to follow her secret desperation and try to make up with Charlie, or was going to follow her personality and comfort zone and let the whole issue be dropped entirely.
