"Crystal."
" Hey, Gemma." The woman replied, smiling weakly.
Gemma rolled her eyes. "Go get yourself cleaned up, you look like a train wreck." The words could have come out as judgemental, if it weren't for the almost motherly tone she had taken. She didn't sound like patronizing Crystal for the position that she was in. She had her moments, of course. She could however, be as concerned as she could be cold.
Her first couple of months in the MC world had been similar. She'd been the girl puking her guts out on the floor a couple of times. The parties hadn't been quite as grand…but enough illicit substances were consumed to make it seem like it the next day.
Compassion was something that John had taught her, once the club had started picking up the interest of a select female population. She'd definitely had a chip on her shoulder, she was with the president, a founding member. Other girls recognized that and she reaped the rewards; and if they didn't…well she wasn't always nice. She remembered the conversation, but not what had happened to spur it. Gemma guessed she'd probably said something to a sweetbutt's face, knowing her it had probably been judgemental as shit. John had pulled her aside and given her a talking to.
She didn't like being 'corrected', but he insisted. He'd said in some way the other girls were looking up to her, idolizing her. Most of them respected, and in turn she had to respect them just the same. Ultimately it had ended up being a more 'you catch more flies with honey than vinegar' type speech, but it had always stuck with her. John had put his foot down on that day, and she recognized it.
Women didn't seem to last too long around the club, the turn over rate was shocking. Very few of the guys had 'stable' relationships. If there was a marriage, it almost always ended in a messy divorce. She soon realized that the women needed to stick together, or at least tolerate each other, much like the men did. The MC was very much like a family - and whatever girl wandered through their doors and stuck around for a bit, seemed to get added into the equation by default. That wasn't to say that Gemma went out of her way to be best friends with everyone; she also didn't put them down or lord her position over every set of tits that walked through the door. It had occurred to her, that she'd been in the same position as them. At one point, someone could have, hell they probably had called her a sweetbutt. Only she was one of the few who made it to Old Lady status.
She had her moments. Every once and awhile there were a couple of stuck-up bitches that passed through the club, but for the most part she was civil. Tried to be anyways. Unless of course they'd earned anything less. If they had it coming to them…well then they had it coming to them.
Crystal was one of the girls Gemma actually liked. Not a first, she'd seen her rubbing up on Jax and it had left a bad taste in her mouth. When Gemma suggested that she look elsewhere, the girl suggested that she stop being such an over protective bitch. One of the guys had all but pushed the girl out the door before Gemma could get her two cents in. That didn't stop her from showing up a week later. Her car had been towed to the lot; and after a few moments of heavy silence - Crystal had said that she had been out of line when she'd freaked out. Saying that Gemma was just doing what mother's do; and apparently that incident with Jax had been a one time event brought on by a bottle of tequila - she wasn't actually interested in her son after all.
Crystal showed up every so often at the gatherings, she held jobs in at least two establishments that some of the Sons' frequented. During the day she waited tables at one of the nearby diners, and at night she danced around in lacy thongs at one of the not-so-rundown strip clubs. She knew she was a walking stereotype, but she didn't seem to care. It paid the bills.
It wasn't a surprise to see Crystal there, but Maddison wasn't a sight that she'd expected. Maddison helped Crystal up, making sure that the woman could actually stand on her own two feet before letting go of her arm. "Do me a favour, if you see the prospect tell him to get the mop out…and get this one a shirt." The brunette blushed at the remark. Crystal mumbled a quiet sure, and slowly began to make her way around the bar.
Maddison stood there looking like she wanted to disappear. It wasn't really a sight that phased Gemma. Besides the girl wasn't totally naked, she still had her bra on for Christ sake. "It's nothing I haven't seen before," Gemma remarked as she turned away. By the door, she'd left a few bags of groceries. Gemma picked two up, leaving one on the table. "Grab that and follow me." As she began to walk towards the kitchen, she noticed that there wasn't another pair of footsteps following her. When she glanced over the shoulder; she saw Maddison still in the same spot with her arms crossed awkwardly over her chest. "I don't have all day." Well, she did but…breakfast wasn't going to make itself. They only had a couple of hours before the garage opened; and the guys did in fact have work to do. Wordlessly, Maddison picked up the other bag and followed Gemma.
—-
She couldn't help but notice how this was similar to what she'd done yesterday. Minus the fact that then, she had been fully clothed. Somehow she had ended up standing awkwardly in a kitchen while Gemma moved around her fixing a meal. This time she was of considerably less use, given the pounding headache. Crystal had abandoned her at Gemma's request. Maddison couldn't help but wish that someone else would intervene. Somehow she felt like she had just been caught after sneaking in past curfew; with the obvious smell of booze on her breath. It was kind of what had happened…only she was an adult, and she had been helping a disheveled woman clean the puke off of herself; while resisting the urge to vomit herself. Still, she could see the similarities.
"You can scramble eggs, right?" It seemed to be a rhetorical question because Gemma had placed a hard spatula in her hands before she could say anything. Gemma dumped the contents of a large bowl into a crackling pan. Maddison took over from there, granted she was reluctant as hell. The women didn't speak to each other. Gemma was busy getting everything else together, she did not seem the least bit bothered by the extra body.
The kitchen was heavy with a tense silence. Maddison kept wanting to say something but she had no idea what to say. She hadn't meant to stay here, or drink. It seemed a lot like both had happened. Maddison barely remembered what had gone on the night before. She could just vaguely recall dinner and feeling mortified at one point because she was sure she had just offended one of the members. Maddison scrapped the eggs around the pan while Gemma moved around her. She had seen the older woman work yesterday, she obviously knew her way around the kitchen. Something told her that this was a normal occurrence. "Don't dry them out." Gemma called over her shoulder.
Outside of the kitchen she could hear the sound of bodies moving, people cursing and coughing. It sounded like everyone was getting their wake up call.
—-
In less than half an hour Gemma had managed to put a whole damn buffet out on the bar; once the booze and the miscellaneous bodily fluids had been wiped off of it. Crystal had taken her sweet time with the shirt. By the time she had gotten around to handing it over Maddison was sure that most of the guys had caught a look or two at her. Thankfully most of them were too damn hungover to look for very long.
It wasn't long before almost everyone had a plate which Maddison noticed seemed to make Gemma extremely happy. The compliments flew and she accepted each and everyone.
She had taken the liberty of hanging back in the kitchen. Running out plates and utensils. Truth was Maddison wasn't sure that she belonged out there. It was funny how familiar it seemed. It was a different club, she had no ties here but…it was a club. Clubs were family. The dynamics were all the same it was just that they rode under a different patch. It was easy for her to picture Richard sitting at the bar with the president, laughing over some dumb joke. Karoline off in the corner surrounded by a few of the other Old Ladies, sharing their gossips and passing around smokes. She could see all of them in the faces of the Sons of Anarchy and it hurt. She'd lost her family and she sure as hell didn't belong in this one.
So she stayed in the kitchen.
—-
Eventually Gemma seemed to have grown tired of the daunting. Maddison was propped up against the sink and nursing a cup of coffee when the woman came in with a plate. "You eat anything?" She cocked her eyebrow, free hand on her hip. Maddison tried to avoid her gaze. Her tone sounded so…so much like her mother it was almost eerie. Maybe it was a Madock family trait. Why most of the women in their family were so damn imposing.
"Don't just stand there and stare. Just eat, before I give this to one of the guys." Too much like her mother. Maddison accepted the plate wordlessly. Coffee set off to the side, she began to pick at her breakfast. Even if she didn't really feel like eating she knew that she'd feel a hell of a lot better with something other than coffee in her stomach. Gemma began the cleanup, keeping a watchful eye on her like she didn't trust her not to dump the entire plate into the sink.
She knew Old Ladies took care of their men but Gemma was something else entirely. She didn't just take care of Clay, from where Maddison stood it looked like she took care of the whole damn club. That wasn't surprising. There had been a few late nights in her last life where she'd heard women proudly exclaim that they were the backbone to the whole damn club. Sure it was arrogant and cocky, the women didn't touch club business but they were still damn important. They took care of their men, they took care of each other. They were part of the system. They helped keep everything in line. It had always struck her as amusing, seeing big tough bikes wrapped around the fingers of their wives or girlfriends, hell sometime it was even a sweetbutt who was rubbing them the right way.
Gemma seemed to thrive off the adoration. Something told her that the dinners and the early morning breakfast buffets were a regular occurrence. She cared. She couldn't picture her mother ever doing something like this, not for anybody and her grandmother? Forget it.
Maddison cleared off her plate. It took forever but she did it. Mostly for fear that Gemma might try to force feed her the rest if she set it down with so much as a scrap left on it.
"You've got some interesting decorations."
It took her a second to click in to the remark. Was Gemma trying to make conversation? She had spent half an hour working topless in a kitchen, just about everything on display. The older woman was talking about the tattoos, at least she hoped. It slowly occurred to Maddison that other things had been one display that Gemma might have found 'interesting'
"I uh…thanks." Maddison reached for the clean stack of plates, standing there doing nothing was making her feel kind of like an idiot. She was also positive Gemma would tell her to put them away, anyway. "I used to work at a shop. I wanted more but…money was tight." She shrugged. Richard would have done something for free, he'd done her wrists afterall. There were a few other artists that she was sure he would have 'swayed' to work for next to nothing too, but Maddison had always hated that. She got why the club could get their work cheap or completely free. That had never bothered her. The club had done so much for them after all, it seemed like a fair exchanged. She hadn't earned it though. Richard put his heart and soul into his work and she didn't have anything to repay him with. Most of her ideas were put on a back burner until the day she could afford otherwise, at least that was what she told herself.
To her surprise Gemma looked like she was actually paying attention. Maddison silently thanked the god that she hadn't asked about the other things. The scars on her chest. Instead Gemma swiftly changed up the topic. "Read your mom's letter. She was a piece of work, wasn't she?" Maddison let out a shallow laugh and Gemma cracked a smirk from behind the sink. Gemma had grown up in the same house as Rose, and Karen had been an exact copy. "Shit…can't blame you for leaving. I did the same damn thing." Now it was Gemma's turn to shrug. "Bet you know all about that, though." Oh she did. In detail. Gemma's departure had left a hole in the Madock household, one that had never really healed over.
"So you staying in town long?" Something about the question put her on edge. It sounded innocent enough but the Madock's had always done innocent well. It had come up a few times the night before.
Maddison deposited the rest of the plates into the cupboard. "Just until I figure out what's happening next." It wasn't like she had many options. She needed a job, a roof that didn't charge her by the night. She needed to put down roots again. It occurred to her that perhaps Gemma was digging for something. "I wasn't trying to start anything by giving you that letter. I swear," Suddenly she feels like she's a kid and in deep shit again only she doesn't know why that feeling is there. "I don't want anything from you. You don't know me, just like I don't know you. I wasn't searching for anything." The look on Gemma's face instantly makes her regret speaking. She'd sounded standoffish, defensive and she knew it. All Gemma had done was ask her a question.
The woman let out a small laugh. As if Maddison had just told her a joke instead of jumping down her throat. "Yeah, yeah. I've got it." Had she just offended her? The floor opening up and swallowing her would have been ideal in this situation. "I know you aren't here for anything. You've made that abundantly clear. I got a feeling you're a shitty liar anyway."
Maddison let out a breathe she hadn't known that she was holding. Good. At least they were on the same page.
—-
Once she had found her shirt Gemma had offered her a lift back to the motel. She had tried to give back the one Crystal had handed her but the guy she had tried to hand it off to, the prospect, had awkwardly told her to keep it. That some of the guys had thought it looked good on her.
Once she was back at the motel she showered and sank down onto the bed. Bus schedule and wallet in hand. She opened the worn out leather expecting to find a small wad of bills. They'd played some mean pool last night and she'd been up on it. Only…the money wasn't there. She had been up on it. She had gotten a little too cocky. The crowd and the alcohol had fuelled her, she'd lost what she had to Tig. Now the remnants of the rest of the night were coming back to her and it made her cringe. Every last dollar she had she had put down on that table.
Unless she could get a bus ticket with promises and off the good will of her fellow man, she knew she was screwed. Maddison let out a loud groan, flopping back against the bed. She had no plan and now she had no money. She'd lost it all playing freakin' pool.
If somehow her mother was up there watching her, she was sure that the woman was getting a kick out of this.
