Marie sat on a bench in the park opposite Dave's office reading Cosmopolitan. She had been back to work for the first time since the trial began, because she had run out of annual leave and carer's leave and unpaid leave and the Federal-mandated witness duties leave. She had switched to a part-time contract which had been meant to start the previous week, if the trial had been shorter, so today she had only worked five hours. She wasn't sure how that was going to go, but she couldn't keep working full-time and look after Holly.
She had previously arranged this appointment with Dave to be for herself outside of those work hours, so it worked well. She was quite happy to sit on this bench and watch her niece go down a slide five hundred times, climb absolutely all over a small climbing net and jump up and down trying and failing to reach the monkey bars.
"Aunt Marie!" Holly called. "Can you help me?"
Putting her magazine down, Marie stood up. She bent her knees, grunted and lifted the child up so that she could hang onto the bars. Holly hung there for a moment, then tried to reach out one of her arms to the next bar, lost her grip with the other arm and fell off. Marie grabbed her, not catching her exactly but arresting the speed of her fall. Holly, completely unperturbed, raised her arms ready to be lifted again. This time Marie lifted her and kept holding her as her tiny arms moved from one bar to the next all the way along.
"And back!" said Holly excitedly.
"And back!" Marie made a dramatic gasp. "Ok. We'll turn around and back we go."
At the other end of the monkey bars were the steps up to the side, so after that Holly was quite happy to run off on her own to do that again.
Marie returned to her bench to find an older woman had now sat down to watch two boys, who were presumably her grandsons, swinging raucously on the swings. The oldest one launched off his swing and landed on the ground, then ran over to the monkey bars and swung expertly across them and back.
"They grow up so fast!" said the woman. "I remember watching my son-in-law do what you just did for your little girl. I think it was only a year ago, or maybe...maybe two, I'm not sure - not very long, anyway. But now Jimmy can do it all on his own!"
"Yeah. I can't believe Holly is three already."
"Three! Is she? Oh that's the cutest age."
"Yeah."
"Do you have any others?"
"Oh, well, Holly's my niece actually, and yes, she has an older brother so I do have, I guess, experience watching them grow, I mean I've been watching him his whole life just growing and changing and... It's amazing. Growing a whole new person is pretty amazing."
"It really is. How old is he?"
"Just turned eighteen. Fully grown and he knows it and he's milking and for all it's worth."
The woman laughed. "Oh yes, my daughter was just the same – 'Don't tell me what to do, Mom, I'm a grown-up now!'"
"That is exactly what he says."
The woman laughed again, and Marie joined her.
"Mommy!" yelled Holly, shooting off the end of the slide in one clear movement and running towards Skyler, who was making her way across the grass from the road. Marie and the woman turned to look, and Marie stood up as Skyler swept Holly into her arms.
Marie stepped towards her. "How did it go?"
"Good. I think."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, helpful. Thank you."
"You're welcome."
"Mommy, watch me go down the slide! I can do it really well now!"
"Alright." Skyler carried Holly to the steps leading up to the slide and put her down. Holly charged up the steps.
Marie stepped behind her. "She can do it really well because she's just done it about five hundred times," she whispered.
"Can you see me, Mommy?" Holly appeared at the top of the slide.
Marie moved back to the bench to grab her magazines and handbag. "That's the complete opposite of what we were just talking about, isn't it?" she said to the woman still sitting on the bench. "Now she wants her mother to watch and be part of everything. But when she's a teenager it'll be a different story, right?"
"Mmm," said the woman curtly.
The younger of the woman's grandsons made his way over to the slide, which Holly had triumphantly slid down and was now talking animatedly to Skyler at the bottom. The boy slid down after her and began to take part in the conversation. "Robert! Time to go home!" barked his grandmother.
The boy took no notice, running back up the steps of the slide with Holly.
"Robert!"
The two children appeared at the top of the slide. "We can go together," said Robert.
"Be careful," said Skyler. "You can only go together if you hold onto each other tightly."
"Yeah," said Marie, joining them. "Otherwise if one of you goes and then the other one goes, one of you will crash into the other one and that would be painful and not good." Marie turned and glanced at the older woman, who had stood up and was staring at them with an uneasy expression on her face. Marie looked back at the children.
Holly, listening intently, nodded. Robert sat behind her and put his legs either side of her, and put his arms around her middle. Holly wrapped her arms around his and looked at her mother. "We're holding on, Mommy," she said earnestly.
"Ok," said Skyler. The two children moved their bottoms, but didn't go anywhere because they were not sitting on the slippery part of the slide. They kept trying to move forward, which was quite difficult when they were still earnestly holding onto each other, so Skyler stepped forward to give them a push.
"Don't you touch him!" screamed Robert's grandmother, charging towards them.
Marie and Skyler turned, Marie's face showing complete surprise, Skyler's fear. The two children, having been pushed onto the slide, slid down it with their faces turned towards the adults, contorted in confusion.
"Get away from him!" yelled the woman, reaching Skyler and grabbing her arm roughly, pulling her away from the slide.
"Hey!" yelled Marie. "What are you doing?"
"Holly!" called Skyler as calmly as she could. "Time to go!" She stepped towards the slide but the woman stepped between her and the children, snarling.
"Hey!" Marie stepped between the woman and Skyler, staring her down.
Skyler kept looking at Holly, whom she now could not reach because the child was still sitting dumbstruck at the bottom of the slide in the arms of the malicious woman's grandson. "Holly, come this way!" she called, her heart in her throat and her breath in her voice. She stepped away from the slide and towards the lawn, looking at Holly and beckoning her to come with her. "Let's run across the grass, come on!"
The older woman's eyes followed her, her scowl deepening.
"Do not look at my sister like that," hissed Marie.
Holly jumped off the end of the slide and ran towards her mother. The little boy followed her.
"Robert!" barked the woman, lunging towards him.
"Hey! He is just trying to have fun with his new little friend, stop being such a -"
"Marie! Come on!" yelled Skyler desperately as she began to run across the lawn with Holly.
The older woman caught Robert and plucked him up, giving him an earful while doing it.
"MARIE!"
Marie gritted her teeth and ran after her sister and niece, yelling, "Bitch!" at the woman as she passed her.
...
"What the hell was that?" said Marie as she arrived, panting, at the car.
Skyler didn't reply, instead miming pushing a car lock button at her until Marie took her keys out of her bag and unlocked the car.
Skyler quickly opened the back door and began installing Holly in her car seat.
"Skyler?"
Skyler finished buckling Holly in, stood up and closed the door. She found Marie standing next to the hood of the car, looking at her quizzically. She made eye contact, then looked in the direction of Holly, and then shook her head.
Mary sat silently into the driver's seat and drove the three of them home. Skyler didn't say a word, so Marie responded to all of Holly's declarations and questions.
"Hey Holly, I got you a new DVD today," said Marie as they pulled up outside her house and she turned off the engine. "It's Tinkerbell."
Holly gasped.
"Do you wanna watch it now?"
"Yeah yeah yeah yeah!" Holly began jiggling up and down excitedly, which was a bit disruptive for Skyler, who was trying to undo the clips on her car seat.
"Holly. Just keep still for a second," she said breathily.
Holly stopped moving her legs. "Was the doctor good for you, Mommy?"
"Yeah. Thanks."
"Are you better now? You can run! Sick people normally can't run. Does that mean the doctor made you better?"
"I wish it was that simple." Skyler unclipped the last of the buckles, and Holly jumped out of the car and darted inside after Marie. Skyler shut the car door, leant on the car and took a deep breath. In and out. In and out. She smoked a cigarette, then clasped her shaking hands together and walked slowly towards the front door. She could hear Holly talking excitedly to Marie about the DVD, over the sound of the Disney "When You Wish Upon A Star" music.
"Are you ready?" said Marie. "It's starting now."
"Is Mommy coming?"
"Mommy and I are going to have a grown-up talk now."
"No!"
"Why not?"
"Grown-up talks upset Mommy! She should watch Tinkerbell instead!"
"We have to have grown-up talks. Talking about bad things is what makes them better. Don't worry, Mommy will be fine."
"Promise?"
"Sure. Of course."
"Will she really be fine?"
Skyler, still standing in the entrance way, melted into the wall and buried her face in her elbow.
"Shh shh, it's starting!" She heard Marie's footsteps come out of the living room and walk along the hallway towards her. Marie turned her head when she reached the entrance way and stopped. She gingerly reached out a hand and placed it on Skyler's shoulder. "What the hell was that? What a bitch! Her kid and our kid were having a perfectly lovely time together, and she just-"
"Don't, don't, don't. It's not worth it."
"Can we... take it to the police? It was harassment!"
"Don't be ridiculous."
"That's not ridiculous, I mean she… before you showed up, she was being really friendly. Is there something wrong with her that she can just flip like that? What if she's dangerous?"
Skyler pulled her face away from the wall and stood up straight. "Well, the variable factor there was that I showed up. Don't worry about it, Marie, it happens all the time." She walked through to the kitchen and poured herself a glass of water.
"What do you mean all the time?"
"I mean all the time."
"It can't happen all the time, it's-"
"It is all the time now, every single time I go out in public. And I always let my guard down when I'm with Holly, I shouldn't do that!"
"Oh, she made a new friend, they were having a great time, you can't stop them doing that! It's only that crazy lady who stops kids from having-"
"Can we just forget about it, please."
"What do you mean every single time?"
Skyler shrugged.
"No, is that an exaggeration or is that -"
"No."
Marie's mouth fell open, and her arms flailed for a moment. "Where?"
"Anywhere. It's not always that bad. But there are always looks and comments and sometimes things like that happen."
"What impact does that have on Holly?"
"Not much, usually I get out of there well before the person can speak to me. But it means now that there's almost nowhere I can take her. We go places and then have to leave and she doesn't understand why. So I stopped taking her places. The last time I was in a playground with her was months ago. That's why I let my guard down."
"I… I'm so sorry, that's horrible."
Skyler looked Marie in the eye and gave her an awkward half smile. "Thank you. Make sure you take her to plenty of playgrounds, huh? And the library and the mall and Chuck E Cheese and... I haven't been taking her to any of those places. We've been playing games at home, and sometimes we take a walk around my block - that's not usually as bad because at least people on my block expect to see me."
"Oh my god. That is so horrible and that is so unfair. We have a court system to punish people for doing the wrong thing, it is not the job of society to punish you, not just random people on the street - they don't even know anything, it's like -"
"Marie."
"It's not even any of their business!"
Skyler's phone began to ring. Marie continued talking. "They don't even know anything about it - I know about it, but they don't -"
"It's Kim, I gotta take this," said Skyler.
"- it's like the people on TV, they don't know anything either!"
"Hello?"
"Hi Skyler," said Kim. "Just called to give you a quick update."
"Sure."
"As I suspected, it's gonna be a while. Today the jury requested four additional pieces of information, which is a lot for the first day, and they will probably ask for more. And then of course they have to digest it and debate it and whatever else juries do."
"What did they ask for?"
"Yours, Flynn's and Marie's full interviews after Walt left, and Ted Beneke's interview with the IRS."
"Oh Jesus."
"Oh Jesus what?" whispered Marie.
"I wouldn't worry about that, I read it. He says it was all him. Anyway, what it means for you is that you have time off now. I can't say this for certain obviously, but I highly doubt they will reach a verdict before next week."
"What about um… The um..." Skyler knew exactly what she was trying to say, but couldn't bring herself to spit it out it, especially not in front of her sister.
Her sister said the exact thing she was thinking of. "Ask her about the Jesse Pinkman thing."
Skyler screwed up her eyes, and put the phone on speaker phone. Her skin tingling and her ankle bouncing, she nodded at Marie.
"Kim hi, it's Marie. We wanted to ask you, what about the Jesse Pinkman thing? Are they gonna lay charges?"
"Still not sure about that one. Listen, Skyler, take this break and use it. Recharge yourself, recover yourself as much as you possibly can while you can. Mental health care is not good inside, and you have just been through a three week-long trial which has dredged up the worst pieces of your life and gone over them with a fine-tooth comb. It's made you feel like shit and it would me too. Please take a break and give yourself time to recover."
Skyler rubbed her hand across your eyes. "I don't have time."
"You have at least five days."
"Is she allowed to leave Albuquerque?" asked Marie.
"Yes, as long as she stays within the county. You just need to be able to get back to the court within a couple hours when the time comes."
"Oh, why didn't we think of that before?" exclaimed Marie. "We could go away! A family trip!"
"I think that's a great idea," said Kim.
"Oh, except I have to work. But you could go away! I could join you on the weekend!"
"Anyway, I'll keep you informed. Don't go anywhere without cell phone reception and don't break your bail conditions, obviously. Do you have any questions?"
"No, thank you, Kim," said Skyler calmly.
"Alright. Call me anytime."
"Thanks. Bye."
"Bye."
"Bye Kim!"
Skyler hung up the phone and put her face in her hands. She slid her fingers gradually down her face, and then opened her eyes to see Marie looking at her with a grin on her face.
"That's an excellent idea. Let's go away. At least for the weekend, but you and Holly could go away for longer."
"I don't feel well, Marie."
"Exactly. You need a break. Oh my god, we could go to Delaney's!"
Skyler's eyes snapped shut.
"That place is so fun, but also relaxing - it was so helpful for Hank in his recovery, the staff were so understanding and there was always -"
Skyler cried out and hunched forward.
"There's plenty of privacy there too, and…"
Skyler began to cry.
"So I can't talk about Hank at all now, can I?"
"You shouldn't forgive me," Skyler sobbed.
"I'm not. I haven't. At this point, I am trying to keep you alive and as well as you can be, and like Kim says, there's not much chance to get do that in prison, so we have to do it now. Also I am trying to minimise the impact on Holly, which by association rolls onto me, because if you go and she doesn't wanna be with me, then my life will not be very fun. I can do perfectly well with her when she's happy, but I don't know how to control a kid who's misbehaving or who just doesn't wanna be with me, I mean if she pushes me away then what do I do?"
"What's happened between you and Holly?"
"Nothing in particular, she's just sticking to you. Like Flynn is."
"What do you mean?"
"Well Flynn's upset with me, and Holly, I don't know, nothing I can put my finger on but she takes her lead from him and you, so."
"Flynn's upset with you?"
"Yeah. Didn't you notice?"
Skyler looked at her in shock.
"You've got other things on your mind. It'll be fine, I mean it makes sense, when I think about it, because I am just the aunt and I'm not -"
"Why is he upset with you?"
"I assume because I slapped you in the face, I'm not sure exactly."
"You haven't asked him."
"No, it's just a feeling I get - he hasn't said anything but he just isn't interacting with me like he normally would. I don't know if Holly is too - maybe she is, maybe she isn't, but either way it makes sense that she could and that that would be difficult for me if -"
"But Holly has to be with you, she has to be happy with -"
"Alright, calm down, we'll talk to Dr Jensen about it tomorrow. I might be just imagining things, I don't know, I just felt both of them pushing back at me a bit... You and I had a fight and both of them went to you. Which, again, makes sense - I'm just trying to manage it because you're not gonna be here and I am, so…"
"I need a smoke." Skyler began walking towards the kitchen door. "Just… follow me and tell me what you mean. Like what actually happened."
"Nothing big, just...Kids can tell when there's tension, and they don't react well to it. That's another reason I think we should go on holiday. We're all pretty frayed, Sky, it's not just you. I know I could use a break." Marie reached the edge of the balcony and leaned over the railing. Skyler walked to the other end of it, opened the door of the living room and looked through at Holly. Holly didn't notice. She seemed happily distracted by the movie. Skyler left the door open and walked back over to Marie, putting a cigarette in her mouth as she did so. She lit it, and drew deeply. "Is Flynn ok?" she asked as she exhaled.
"He's fine, he's just… God dammit, why did you do this, Skyler, it is such a freaking mess!"
Skyler looked down and took another drag, if possible even deeper than the last. She blew out silently. The crickets chirped. Tinkerbell sang on the television. Everywhere else was silence.