April 11th 2023

Chapter 101
We Move A Hidden Treasure

The next morning felt very much like the one before, everyone waking up excited for the day to come. They had done a wonderful job on the house, all of them together, and now they would do the same for the ranch, only with a lot more ground to cover and a lot more hands to help. Before they could do all of that though, they needed to get other things done ahead of the next day and the week that would begin. The big one was the groceries run, but also Marianne had her riding lesson, so after some debate about who would do what and go where, it was decided that Lucas would be accompanied by Gracie and the rest of the girls as they went to the store, while Maya would take Marianne to the ranch, accompanied by Nellie and baby Finn. Wyatt was working that morning, so he would join them at Sullivan Stables as soon as he was done.

As the small group arrived at the ranch, they soon found some of their fellow decorators had arrived. The Munroe-Friars couldn't make it the day before, for the house, but there was no missing this one, and so here they were. They were early for the same reason the others were. Tori was now taking lessons, too, same as her aunt, and same as her mother, who no longer split her lessons between Houston and Austin and now solely rode at the family ranch. She now rode a horse called Salty, along with Tori's Maple. They got to go and see those horses along with Truffle, and Hopper, before the girls went and had their lessons.

Marianne was very understandably the most at ease of the two, but Tori absolutely held her own. Her instructor was very good with her, one of the ones they would call on the most with their more uncertain new young riders. The seven-year-old was making great strides already in the few short months since she'd begun, and none were prouder than her mother and father, her stepfather, her father's girlfriend, and her grandparents.

"You were amazing out there! You did that last bit, and I would have been scared, but not you, come on!" Taylor held out his hands, and Tori very happily gave him a double, crossed high five, which he returned to her as soon as she uncrossed her arms and presented her hands. She laughed now, and she hugged him, the natural conclusion to their 'handshake.'

With lessons done and the rest of the group not yet inbound, Marianne wanted to go to the archives, and so she was allowed to run off, taking her niece with her.

"Dad, come on!" Tori called back, and Maya, Ella, and Nellie collectively bit back a laugh, seeing the humble smile that claimed Taylor's face before he jogged after the girls. No matter how many times she'd called him that since the wedding, it still hit him like the first time.

"She started saying she wants us to call her Victoria," Ella told her mother and her aunt. "Except she can't make up her mind whether she actually wants us to do it or if she wants to stay Tori."

"Gracie and I did that, too, a couple of times," Nellie recalled, making her sister nod as she recalled it. "Never really stuck. Anytime someone calls me Penelope, I think I'm in trouble," she frowned. Maya snorted.

"Funny, I think the same thing when I hear it, too."

More and more of their group started to gather, grandparents, great grandparents, siblings, and nieces and nephews, aunts and uncles and cousins, friends… In time, Maya volunteered to go and collect the trio from the archives, along with Carson and Lee, who would of course want to pitch in. She found Taylor and Victoria taking in the downstairs exhibit together – her granddaughter seemed to like it when she called her by her full name – and was told that Marianne was upstairs, so she climbed up to find her. She had a growing stack of folders in one arm as she dug through a drawer, and as determined as she was, it looked to Maya like she was this close to losing her grip, so she hurried to help her.

"I had it, Mom," Marianne promised, moving to follow her to the table where she set down the stack for her.

"I'm sure you did, but can't blame me for wanting to help, huh?" Maya pointed out with a smile. Marianne agreed, if nearly reluctantly. "What's all this?" Maya asked now, looking back to the folders, the labels peeking out of each one's top.

"I don't know, just reading, I guess," Marianne replied, as though she couldn't tell when she was evading an answer. Maya tipped her head until she could see into her eyes, all this to remind her daughter – even though she never really needed to – that she didn't have to hold back, whatever she was either too embarrassed to say or felt wrong for doing… "I wanted to find things about Granny Mel," she finally said. "And then I started looking for other things, too, about other people, like her parents, and their parents… Everyone that we know, and their families… I just find it interesting."

"It is interesting," Maya agreed, taking her daughter's face in her hands. "Pumpkin, you don't need to hide that. I know your dad would love to hear about all of that, too, and your Pappy Tom, and Uncle Mike? Why didn't you want them to know?"

"I don't know, it was just this thing and…" Marianne shrugged again. To Maya, the words weren't as unreachable as they were to her daughter. It was something that had been all hers, and she'd liked it to be her thing alone, not because she wanted to keep it from others but because she'd started off on this thing by herself, and it had felt good that way.

"If you want to keep it to yourself a little longer, I don't have to say a word. I can just say I found you up here looking up Scout Anderson," she leaned to whisper, and Marianne's cheeks turned a barely noticeable pink.

"Mom…" she pleaded.

"Or something else, I'm sure I can find… Oh, want to see this one picture of your dad when he was about your age? It's the funniest thing… Let me see if I can find it."

Marianne's genealogical curiosities were left to remain between her and her mother for the day, though Maya suspected that Carson had caught on and tried to ever so discreetly help her along. Now, as the various members of the ranch decorating committee gathered in front of the main building, the workload could be divided among their many volunteers. Garlands, and string lights, pumpkins, and figures of various materials, so many other items, and they all had to go up, in the buildings and outside of them, out on the property… Some of them were definitely not as new as they used to be, which wasn't always an issue, no, but in some cases, it did feel like they should start and think about tossing the too worn and faded and possibly refresh their stock. Lucas decided not to do any of that this year, but very possibly this was due to his getting the sudden thought of what next year would be. Next year, his pumpkin, his firstborn girl, would be turning ten… and wouldn't she just love to celebrate by going on a big Hallowannie shopping spree?

The biggest and most important part of the Halloween preparations at the ranch, as far as the Friar girls were concerned, could only be the box of numbered figurines. The hunt was their favorite part, and this year their aunts and uncle had come up with an idea in order to help make it so that they could be involved both in the hiding and the searching. They loved both parts but couldn't usually do one if they'd done the other. The way out was actually very simple if they stopped and thought about it, which Nellie, Gracie, and Wyatt had done, one night after a late study session up under the skylight.

They could split up, only hide some of the figurines, say all of the witches, or all of the pumpkins, or the cats, or the vampires, or the ghosts. That way, they would get to hide some of them, but seek out so many more. The idea was presented to Maya and Lucas alone, first of all, instead of directly to the girls, so they might get some input. They'd liked it at first, though they'd been able to see as well as the trio had that there could be some problems along the way. Especially with the younger girls, the concern was that, while they'd be told that they needed to put the figurines back where they'd found them, to let non-family members find them, they might not want to do that, in which case they could all be in for some very loudly disappointed rebuttals. It wouldn't matter that they also had hidden things at home and those didn't have to be put back, not when they'd be so pleased to have found something.

They'd all been confident enough in the end, after figuring out a few things together, that they had to try it. If it all went wrong, they could try and do better for next year, but it could also go right and make it so that their girls had a great hunt around the ranch. They could already picture the hinting, the subtle and not so subtle, the intentional and accidental…

The teams were quickly assigned. The pumpkins, to no one's surprise, would be hidden – and marked down on the master list, which would be placed in the care of Carson and Lee over at the archives – by Marianne, along with Mackenzie and Maya. The witches would be hidden by Lucas, Lucy, and Aubrey, and the black cats by Remy, Kacey, and Gracie. The vampires would be given over for Ella, Taylor, and Tori to hide, while Nellie, Maisie, and Wyatt would hide the ghosts. Watching them all, especially their smallest team members, the big wait to get going already had them barely able to stand still. Aubrey held the bag where they'd transferred all the little witch figurines, and it was a good thing that it was cinched closed because, even as she held it tight, she was jumping around and waving her little arms and the bag along with them, making the figurines click and clatter together.

"What if we all run into each other? Or we see where someone hid one of the others?" Marianne asked Maya as they walked along. Mackenzie was busy looking into the bag of pumpkins, so just as well that her mother was carrying her.

"We just have to be a bit sneakier," Maya told Marianne, turning a grin to Mackenzie. The three-year-old looked up, no idea what they had been going on about, so Maya kissed her nose, which made her giggle. "Then we can say 'I saw you! Do over!'" she intoned.

"Do over!" Mackenzie repeated.

"There, see? Not a problem," Maya smiled. "Where should we hide the first pumpkin? Any ideas?" The girls looked around, seeking, before Marianne went up to Mackenzie and directed her to look in one direction to get her opinion. She nodded, so Maya set her down and watched her run along with her big sister, nearly drop the bag of pumpkins, and carry on until they reached their chosen spot, looked around to make sure no one was there to see, picked out a pumpkin, and hid it away.

"Mom, write it down! Pumpkin number nine!" Marianne called out as they ran back. Maya snorted, marked it on her paper.

"Got it. Next one?"

TO BE CONTINUED

See you tomorrow! - mooners