Thanks, thecardboardunicorn :') though, I must warn you, she's strong now, but things generally go downhill I think. :L I'll try to make sure she doesn't get too whiny though.

...

Hypocritical

Mia sighed loudly as she entered her small bungalow. Not that anyone could blame her for this after the first few days of work she'd gone through. She felt almost close to tears; from stress; from sadness, and she couldn't help but think about poor Penny. Obviously this was hardly Mia's hugest regret of things that had come to pass recently and as she changed into her sweats and put her fluffy, brown slippers on she pondered how different she'd be feeling had she not taken State vs. Fawles, or even just stayed at Kurain and trained to become the Master.

This was a fate that instead now belonged to Maya who she knew would be easily capable of achieving it. It seemed very unlikely that her mother would be returning after her reputation had been ruined. Before, Mia had been able to believe that she would someday return but now that tiny ray of hope had been diminished. She missed her mother which was understandable as she'd not seen her in six years.

All this work to find out what happened to my mum and now I find out there's nothing I can even do about it. I can't find her …Somehow none of this seems worth it. I miss my family; especially Maya…I bet she'd know exactly what to do to cheer me up. this thought triggered off a sudden wanting to ring her sister. She stood up and walked to the kitchen grabbing her phone and a huge slab of chocolate on the way back to the couch. Maya was on speed dial despite how Mia had not had the phone long. Mia broke of a chunk of chocolate as the phone began to ring and she popped it into her mouth, unfortunately this limited her movement of her mouth.

"Hello?" She heard from the other end of the phone "Who is this?" the voice said somewhat abruptly.

Recognizing the voice she replied "Oh, hi Aunt Morgan."

"Ah Mystic Mia, why I haven't heard from you since you visited to tell us you passed the bar test?" Her aunt sounded friendly, but Mia knew her aunt well enough to know there was an underlying seriousness to what she'd said.

"I'm so sorry, I've had a lot to do recently…I have a job now!" Mia added happily.

"Good to hear, how's that going for you?" Morgan asked.

Mia was slightly unsure of whether to tell the truth now; was it really necessary that she told her Aunt all the misfortunes that had taken place since she got the said job? Deciding it wasn't, she went with the answer "Fine, fine. I'm quite busy actually. Can I have a quick word with Maya?"

"Maya is in training at the moment. I can tell her to ring back you'd like?" she said accommodatingly.

"What? Err no, no it's okay. It was nothing important anyway. Besides I have a lot of paperwork I should be doing now. I'd better go, bye."

"Very well, I'll still tell her you called. Goodbye Mystic Mia."

That was when Mia hung up. Great so my little sister's too busy to speak to me anymore. How did I get here? She thought chewing her Cadbury's which was, for the first time ever, failing to cheer her up. Living on her own was proving to be harder than she'd expected. She felt sad and alone and more than anything she felt she needed to keep busy to stop her self thinking about Terry Fawles, Dahlia Hawthorne and even Diego Armando; who she was finding was like a constant reminder. After all he was there through the whole ordeal with her. For some reason thinking of him made her feel angry. Here she was alone eating comfort food (which still wasn't working) and right now he was out with Penny. Albeit he was breaking up with her, which she found was a small comfort. Why should he be so unaffected while she'd been potentially traumatized?

"Well done Mia, by thinking that you feel selfish…" she said out loud. "Just because I'm miserable I want everyone else to be…" she continued, trailing off. Mia groaned. Great! Now I'm talking to myself… she thought as she pressed down the remote to see if there was anything good on TV. She jumped as the phone rang, accepting a little too quickly to be considered cool.

"Hello?" she answered jumpy now for some reason.

"Whoa…err hi?" the voice replied clearly surprised by the speed she had picked up. "Mia?" it asked.

"Yes…Who is this?" Mia asked trying to relax.

There was a pause before "Hi Mia, its Diego Armando; from work."

It was her turn to pause. "How did you get my number?" This wasn't helping her relax. Especially as she'd wondered how he'd got her address as well.

"Oh well, you know, Penny's a sectary and I'm technically "dating" her…" he replied exasperatedly as if he had something else he wanted to discuss.

This did a god job of distracting her "What?" she asked starting to feel borderline angry "I thought you were going to break up with her and not string her along?"

"I'm sorry…It just wasn't happening…I sat her down with a nice meal, hoping to soften the blow and well…It just made it worse. She kept saying how great I was and how much trouble I went to I was about to say...well y'know…let her down gently something like "I'm sorry but I don't want to be in a relationship right now" or "I'm still not over my ex…" I'm sure you've heard the kind of thing before right?"

"Oh, you mean lies?" Hang on . . .what does he mean by that? she thought indignantly.

Realizing how bad he sounding saying that he suddenly paused "No, no I didn't mean- I bet people haven't said that kind of thing to you. I mean, why would they? You're great; beautiful, clever. I just meant…"

"Get on with the story will you?" she said, knowing full-well he was trying to butter her up for the finale of his story. She had a feeling she wasn't going to like this much.

"Well, anyway. In the end I…couldn't do it." he replied hurrying the last part of the sentence "I gotta go now, bye!"

"DON'T YOU DARE HANG UP THE PHONE DIEGO ARMANDO!" she shouted hoping to stun him into doing so by shouting.

After not hearing the beep she continued, "So, you mean to tell me that instead of doing the right thing; and breaking up with her…you did the opposite and decided you'd string her along a little longer?" Mia replied, feeling both irritated and sad; for Penny being used to comfort Diego in this way.

"Kitten, listen. I'm sorry but I can't be such and upstanding moral figure as you are." Diego answered down the phone with a hint of sarcasm "I didn't do the right thing okay? I slipped up…again…"

"Yes, yes you did. So I'm going to tell Penny you kissed her when you knew she liked you. But you didn't care and did it anyway… " Mia paused "Well not exactly like that because that's too harsh…"

"Why can't you just stay out of this? Why do you even care anyway? What are you jealous or something?" he asked heatedly.

"Jealous? That's actually absurd! I've known you what? Four days? I don't think so, more like outraged at how little respect you seem to have for women!" Mia exclaimed, shrilly.

She could hear Diego breathing down the phone, clearly thinking of something to say back "You know what I'm outraged at? That anyone could actually be as bigger busybody as you are! Keep your nose out of my business!" he yelled.

She gulped, this actually had stung her. So she liked helping people. Was that such a bad thing? Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind. Why couldn't he understand that? Mia knew she had shortcomings, same as anyone else but she had always learnt to work at them herself until they had gone. She knew she'd never be perfect because no one is and yet what Diego had said had hit a raw nerve. She gulped back tears and replied in her steadiest voice, "Fine, if that's what you really want." She flinched realizing that her voice had croaked giving away she was close to crying. Mia hung up ignoring the voice travelling out of the receiver.

"Wait Kitten, I'm sorry, I didn't-" It said as she pressed the red button shutting him out. Clearly he knew he'd hurt her feelings, clearly he expected her to be stronger than this. Perhaps he'd meant it as a small throw-away bitchy comment and he'd not meant it at all? Mia could try and convince herself he'd said it because he was angry but she knew it was true. She'd always had a habit of sticking her nose in where it was not wanted but she didn't need this pointed out to her at such a trying time in her life. Was it perhaps possible that Diego was blaming her for getting him involved with that case? And yet how could Mia not stand up for everything she believed a lawyer should be?

She got up and turned the TV off at the switch and yet found she felt slightly reluctant to go upstairs. Perhaps she did have a habit of attempting to sort out other peoples problems but should she really be criticized for that? And she'd been criticized by, of all people *Diego Armando?*. He's hardly angelic, she thought. If he has any decency at all, he'll ring up and apologize in a moment.

As time went on, Mia sat there, perhaps half hoping he wouldn't call; so she could scald him for that tomorrow. As the phone finally sounded she let it ring for a moment not wanting to seem as though she was near. Eventually she answered it.

"Hello?" she said biting her lip.

"Hi, it's Maya." the voice replied.

She shook off the slight disappointment that he hadn't called to apologize and answered "Hey Maya, I thought you were channeling?"

"I was…an hour ago…"

And hour ago? Wow, surely it's not been that long since I rang her. I must have been talking to Diego for ages "Oh…right." she agreed, frowning a little.

"So anyway sis, what did you want to talk to me about?" Maya asked.

"Oh…that? Oh it was nothing really…just stuff…" she lied. She wasn't exactly in the mood for talking now. It bothered how annoyed she felt that he hadn't ringed to apologize.

Clearly not believing her Maya continued, "Aw, no fair! Tell me, err…about your day? How was it?"

Mia gulped "It was fine…Listen, Maya I have something I thing you ought to know…"

"Ah, see! I knew you rang earlier for a reason. There's no tricking me Mia Fey! I know you much too well!"

"This is very difficult for me to say…" Mia said truthfully. How was she meant to tell Maya what terrible events had befallen their mother? How do you tell someone something like that over the phone? "I…" she felt herself tighten up, chickening out. She just couldn't bring herself to say the words. "I…" she started again "…I'd like…for you to come and stay with me for a few days. I feel like I haven't seen you in ages!"

"Wow! I'd love to, why did you find that hard to ask though? You know I'd be completely happy to come and see you!"

Mia felt disgusted with herself, she felt like a coward as she knew it wasn't fair to keep something as important as this from Maya; even if she knew Maya would be more hurt than she was. "I know…I just felt nervous in case you were too busy, that's all!"

"No! I can make it in about two weeks, I'll see you then?"

"Of course, it's fine! No problem, Bye then!" She said hastily, beginning to sweat from the dull feeling in her stomach, she knew she had from lying.

"Bye! Love you!" Maya answered sounding overjoyed at the prospect of seeing Mia again.

I wonder if she'd still want to come if she I was hiding something as big as this from her. It's so lucky Magatamas don't work down phones… she though as she hung up, feeling incredibly hypocritical as she realized that perhaps, deep down she was really no different from Diego Armando.