SouffleGirl123

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

Lola had turned on her heel and started walking off to put her books away when her brother spoke up. Although he was often self-centred in his words and views he wasn't afraid to start up for his sister. Well, once wasn't. Although he'd stand for her on occasion those moments where becoming more and more fleeting and it'd take more harsh words for their mother before he intervened. As a result Lola started pushing back against him, ensiring to distance herself. She couldn't take the heartbreak of losing the care of the last of her family alive to do so, not on anyone or anything but her own terms.

She liked when he stood up for her, it felt like something their father would do. That was when he spoke that last line, Last I checked she scored higher than you did she not? It caused Lola to freeze in place. Her mother has always made a big deal of how badly Lola did, she never thought her mother would have done worse. "I sorry, you what?" she asks, turning back to her mither and brother

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

Lola wanted to respond to her brother, remind him if the many times he'd definitely made her feel like he had ill feelings toward her. All the times he dug deeper into the wounds make by his mother, or creating new ones himself. Or maybe how the small piece of childhood wonder she had left wanted him to be the big brother that stood for her the way their father had for him when she was the apple of her mother's eye. Yet she didn't get time to utter a word of it before Esme Leighton walked into the dining hall.

Her mother didnt waste a moment before going straight for Lola's throat. "Just putting my books away before dinner, mother," Lola mumbles, holding her textbooks tight to her chest. She'd be lying if she said her mother didn't scare her, not in the way ghosts or scary movies did but in a way she knew her mother could still shatter her heart into a million different pieces. "Or do you have a problem with that too, your highness," she follows up sarcastically.

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

At Al's initial response Lola shook her head. Her face became hotter with every moment, storing threats of tears. "And who do I have now, hmm?" she snaps back while standing. Her movement pushed the chair back with a loud squeak as it rubbed on the wooden floorboards. "So he loved me too, good. That doesn't change the fact I'm fighting a battle alone that you got to spend with him."

She slammed shut her textbook, looking her brother up and down. What she being childish, maybe, but Al acting like he was God's gift for offering a half-baked solution didn't ammuse his sister. She grabbed her supplies, tightening a fist around her pens. "I don't know if you noticed, Al, but I'm not an adult. I can't just up and get a house. I can't even take money out of the trust fun for another two years. At least here I know I'll be fed," she snaps, looking down at the man in the chair. It seemed no matter what Lola did it was her fault. Anything went wrong with the Leighton family's standing in the Guild? I was how low Lola scored. Was the verbal punching bag of her mother? Her fault for not moving out, even if she was still a minor. Everything seemed to come back to herself so much she was starting to think maybe they had a point.

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

Lola swallowed the lump in jer throat. "Don't act like what I'm going through is the same as what you did," she replies simply, her eyes still planted on the table. "Don't pretend she's not more vicious. Or that you have dad and I-" she cuts herself off. She knew if she said she had no one Al would make a whole grand speech about how she had him when she knew for a fact she did not. Sure, he wasn't their mother but he was never truly on her side.

At his offer the teenager snickered. "You act like that's any better," she replied. Perhaps it was but she felt it almost no different.

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

At Al's response Lola flashed him a dirty look. Maybe he was trying to comfort her but she knew he knew full well that was a lie. "You and I both know that's a lie," she responds dismally, pointing her face toward the table. She could feel her face become hot but blinked back the couple of tears threatening to fall. Her family didn't deserve those.

Silence fell between the pair for a short while before Al redirected the conversation to be about his standing with their mother once more. "And what flavour do you reckon for me? Blaming me for something that went wrong with her day or not even a look my way, hmm?"

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

When Aloysius threw the pen back Lola was ready for it. She threw her hand up and caught it, barely even glancing in her brother's direction. "Predictable," she grumbles under her breath, adding the pen to the pile.

At the young man's question the teenager looks up at him, annoyance written on her face. "I don't know if you noticed, Aloysius, but mum tends to have a 'pretend my daughter doesn't exist unless I need someone to blame for something going wrong' approach to parenting me. Why would I just see her? I guess the fact I haven't means she'd fine today, I suppose,"

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

At Aloysius' response Lola scoffed and grabbed a spare pen from her little collection next to her book and threw it at the man. "Please," she spits back angrily. "You work at the fixer's desk, it's really not a job to be all high and mighty about,"

Her eyes looked back down at her homework in front if her as she gave a exasperated sigh. It was never bad enough that her mother was acting like she was a dud but if course her dear older brother had to join in, rubbing salt into everyone of her wound left by their mother.

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

Lola had been sat at one of the seats near of of the heads of the dining table, textbooks sprawled out ahead of her as she wrote out math equation in a notebook. Math tended to come easily to Lola and the fact her mother had shoved her into after school tutoring most days of the weeks just as a way to keep the girl 'out of her hair'. As if she didn't fuss over her only years ago. Unfortunately, she wasn't powerful enough for her mother's liking and a shift happened in that moment. Instead of just shift her attention to her son, Esme Leighton seemed to take out her frustration on Lola. Initial it started with yelling and blaming but nowadays Lola felt disowned in all but name and dwelling space. For the most part her tended mother ignored her, only talking to her to correct her or to use as a pawn in whatever plan she had for Al.

As she heard footsteps in the loungeroom she looked up briefly, her eyes redirecting back to her homework at the smallest glimpse of her brother. Some part of her instinctively expected her father to walk through that doorway just like he used to every night. He'd try to hide the hollowness of his face cast by the exhaustiveness of his job and gently say Good evening, my little cherry blossom. Although with Al being closer to their father considering Lola was graded not long before the man's death they still had somewhat of a special bond. She'd wonder how much closer they'd be if he was still alive through her mother's shift.

It wasn't until Aloysius threw himself in the chair across from Lola with a dramatic sigh did she look at him properly after giving a roll of the eyes. "And what's got you in a tizzy?" she asks somewhat scornfully. Despite having now pent the majority of her life in America, remnants of a Cambridge British accent still played on her tongue, courtesy of her mother. Her relationship with her brother was far from the best in what it seemed like a competition from their mother for her care that neither of them truly wanted. What always got Lola was that high horse he was always on about her.

Family Matters (A Hedgehawk & SouffleGirl123 1x1)

Yay

The Witches & Warlocks of Tanner 2.0

_{A @SouffleGirl123 & @HaleyTheRandom collab; Featuring Mary & Lilith.}

As the morning sun peeked through the blinds, Lilith yawned, reaching her arms above her to wrap them around the pillow that her head rested on. Taking a deep breath in, the young woman quickly noticed a few things in her pre-awakened daze.

First and foremost was the pounding sensation in her head. Next was the scents surrounding her - familiar, but not the ones of her own bedroom. She couldn’t hear the morning news on the TV, nor smell of pancakes being made on the stove. The realisation was enough to startle Lilith’s eyes open as she was met with the scene of painted walls and carpeted floors.

”Fuck,” she breathed, starting to put the puzzle pieces together in her head.

Sitting up, Lilith fumbled around the bed trying to find her phone.

That was when she spotted the pile of clothes beside the bed.

”Fuck”,” she hissed again, giving herself a quick once over. It only took a moment's notice to realise that she was wearing Miles’s t-shirt. If she wasn’t in her own room, wasn’t wearing her own clothes -

Glancing around the room once more, Lilith shouted one last ”Fuck!” before immediately regretting it as her head began to throb.

Doing the best that she could to collect her jeans off the floor, Lilith fished her phone out of her pocket before putting on her pants. She had multiple missed calls from her grandfather - no doubt that he was pissed. Notifications for multiple social media platforms danced across her screen, confirming what she already knew - last night had been one for the books.

Sitting back down on the bed, Lilith unlocked the device and began to scroll through her most recent photos, doing the best that she could to remember the events from last night. She barely had a moment's notice before her stomach flipped, making her jump up from the bed. Muscle memory took over as she raced to the bathroom, quickly slamming the door shut behind herself.

Mary had just returned home from her night shift and swung open the front door to immediately be greeted with the slamming of another. She didn't have to investigate, she already knew it'd be the bathroom. Although Miles seemed to rarely need to spill his guts the morning after a party anymore it would still happen on occasion.

"Mi-" her callout was quickly cut off as a simple No floated into her head from her divination magic. Whatever poor girl he dragged back with him? she thought back at the voice. Her divination just felt like a game of 20 questions most days.

Yes The word seemed to miss something, as if there was something more to that yes. Mary sucked in a breath as it seemed to immediately hit her. Lilith?

Yes

Mary gave a sigh, dropping her bag by the door and making her way to the bathroom. She wished she could say she was surprised but with all the workarounds to keep Lilith and her son separated she expected to either find Lilith in his bed or Miles half-dead eventually. She just didn't expect it to be so fast, or honestly for it to be the first option. She gave the bathroom door a couple of hard knocks. "Lilith, sweetie? Can I come in?" she calls in through the door.

Behind the closed door, Lilith was sitting with her legs pulled up to herself, her arms resting on her knees as she buried her face in the dark corner she had created. Thoughts ran through her head at a mile a minute, only making the splitting headache that she had worse. She had half a thought to just sit there for as long as she could until she heard the knocks, quickly followed by the sound of Mary’s voice.

If Lilith wasn’t currently in the situation that she was, Mary’s presence would have been more than welcomed - just like always. For now, however, Lilith reached up to open the bathroom door before re-burying her face.

”I think I fucked up,” she groaned.

Mary took a step back as the door slowly swung open revealing the rather pitiful sight of Lil on the bathroom floor, face lowered at the ground. It caused a knot to form in her stomach, she hated seeing Lilith like this. She gave Lilith a half-smile. "Darl, I love you but I ain’t sitting on the bathroom floor with you. I’d never get up,” she half jokes, keeping her spot in the doorway. That was when Lilith finally spoke up. "Well, is someone dead, dying or pregnant?” she asks.

As Mary spoke, Lilith put all of what little energy she had into getting herself up off of the floor. She would have fallen over if it hadn’t been for catching herself on the sink. When Mary had finished speaking, Lilith began laughing. Tears threatened to spill from the corners of her eyes as she tried to catch her breath.

”Actually, yeah,” she managed to get out between manic laughs. ”Carlisle and I’s friendship is six feet under, and gramps is goin’ right down with it.”

With so little words Lilith had seemed to overload Mary with information. She took a moment to just process all of it, blinking a couple of times as she wrapped an arm around the young woman’s shoulder to stabilise her. "Let’s- uh- let’s get you some coffee and an aspirin first,” she says softly, trying to not let the effect Lilith’s announcements had on her.

She remains silent as she directs Lilith across the hall to the dining room, the question of her statement about John nagging at her. As she pulls out the chair she failed to hold it in any further and quietly asks "What’s happened to John?” her voice small, moreso to hide back emotion more than anything else. She knew it was a fruitless endeavour with Lilith’s empath abilities yet she tried all the same to quell her fear in anticipation.

Focusing on putting one foot in front of the other, Lilith had finally stopped laughing. The feeling of shock still lingered in her bones, but at least she could act composed again. Sitting down, the young woman took a strong interest in the pattern on the table cloth. Watching Mary move around was a difficult task.

”He um…” Lilith hadn’t expected to break the news to Mary - especially like this. ”He has stage two pancreatic cancer. Said he’s been driving back and forth to Seattle so you wouldn’t know.” The thought made Lilith half-smile before slipping away. ”They offered him chemo, and he told them no. He said that he doesn’t want to fight it… and that I shouldn’t fight him about that.”

Mary exhaled a sharp breath. She suspected something had been amiss with her godfather but she never put a finger on it, nor did she expect it to be this bad. "Asshole," she mutters under her breath. Starting a pot of coffee, she used her back being turned to her advantage to let stray tears run down her face. That man had been a second father to her her whole life. After her parents returned to North Carolina he'd been the one watching Miles and making the meals until Claire moved to Tanner. That fact that she was going to lose him stung. The Montgomery clan seemed to be slowly dwindling in size and Mary wasn’t sure how much more of their losses she could take.

After taking a moment she composed herself, wiping the tears from her eyes as she pulls 2 mugs and a packet of aspirin from the shelf. Juggling them all to fit in one hand she grabs the pot in the other and carries it all to the table. After the coffee is poured she takes a seat before Lilith with a sigh. "And what did you do so wrong to wind you up on my bathroom floor in a fit?"

While Lilith was grateful that Mary hadn’t pushed the subject of her grandfather, her stupid empathy powers couldn’t help but pick up on the other woman's emotions. Feeling Mary’s sadness was enough to make Lilith start crying too. Quickly wiping her face while the older woman opened the cabinet, she began picking at the skin around her thumbs as anxiety settled in.

Coffee and aspirin were more than a welcomed sight right now, and Lilith gratefully helped herself to both. Taking a sip of her coffee, Lilith crossed her legs in the chair with a sigh of her own before turning her attention to Mary.

”So last night, Carlisle threw this welcome back party or whatever for the Coven members because morale was low when we met yesterday morning. It started earlier that day, because Carlisle tried to confess that he had feelings for me or whatever, and then here comes Miles out on the veranda and there’s this whole conversation where he’s all like ‘I miss you Lili’” Lilith began on her ramble, doing the best Miles impression that she could. With a deep breath, she continued on, still talking rapidly. ”So then because of those awkward ass moments, I went home and told gramps that Miles was coming to Sunday dinner, and we argued about that and I ended up drinking so he drove me to the party. Then shit happened and I wound up kissing Carlisle and telling him I didn’t feel the same way. He freaks out. I throw the bottle of the tequila I just drank at his head. At this point it's getting hazy, but I do remember me and Miles drinking on the couch and me telling him about John… then something about the barrier falling and Carlisle dying but not really dying. Also something about werewolves. Next thing I know, I wake up pantsless in your son's bed.”

With another sigh, Lilith raised her mug in a sarcastic cheers like fashion before taking another drink of her coffee, waiting on her second mothers reaction.

As Lilith talks Mary nods her head between sips of coffee just trying to pick up the barrage of information coming her way from Lilith’s mouth. "Well…” she says simply, trying to figure out what response to give as she was left almost wordless in the information overload. She wasn’t even sure if she picked up on it all. "Sounds like you had the hell of a night,” she takes a sip of coffee as she mentally shifts through all the information again.

She had questions, so many questions, but she knew barraging a hungover Lil with them probably wasn’t the best thing to do right now. "Ok, so how are you holding up? Any wounds?”

”None that I’ve noticed, really,” Lilith replied quietly, still trying to piece together the parts of the night that she remembered. ”Mary. How do you know if you have alcohol poisoning? Because I’m pretty sure I drank way more than I was supposed to last night.”

"Darl, if you had it bad enough you’d be in a gurney in the ED corridor by now. Why, how much did you drink?” she asks, taking another mouthful of coffee.

Taking a moment to think, Lilith sorted through her memories and did the best math with what information she had. ”A few shots with John… the bottle I had while talking to Carlisle, and I think I drunk at least another half bottle while talking to Miles?”

As Lilith recounts the amount of alcohol she drank the night before Mary couldn’t stop herself from spitting all the coffee in her mouth out in shock, a couple of coughs escaping her after. "I’m sorry, you- what?!” she splutters looking the girl over. She seemed fine. Hungover and emotionally wrecked, sure, but fine. "Child, how the hell are you still standin’- well, sittin’- right now?”

Unable to stop herself from laughing, Lilith took another sip of her coffee while shrugging her shoulders. ”No idea, honestly,” she replied, a small smile still lingering on her face as she reached for her phone.

Scrolling through the notifications once more, she couldn’t help but sigh. She had messages from anyone and everyone - all except for Miles.

”Do you mind me askin’ if you’ve heard anything from Miles this morning?”

Mary just looks over Lilith once again, shaking her head with a scoff. "You Montgomerys never cease to amaze me,”

As Lilith asks about Miles, Mary pulls out her own phone and looks at her notifications. Nothing. Not that she expected anything. "Nah. Take it he hasn’t sent a word to you? Knowing how these mornings go he’ll be on autopilot mode most of today anyway, you probably can’t count on a message,”. She purses her lip before taking another sip of coffee. The question that played on her lips became too hard to contain anymore. "What exactly is goin’ on between you 2? I ain’t your pawpaw, if you get back together you ain’t getting a talking to from me I just want to know. Are we still avoidin’ or what?”

Watching Mary reach for her phone, Lilith couldn’t fight the giant knot growing in her stomach. Did she even want to hear from Miles? Why did she care if he had messaged his mom or not? This was just a one time thing, right? Some weird glitch in the matrix? As Mary confirmed what Lilith already knew, the girl nodded her head in silence.

Notch in the bedpost routine. Got it.[ she thought.

With another sigh and the shake of her head, Lilith answered Mary’s question.

”I don’t know what this is,” she grumbled. ”I don’t think I’d have any problems seeing him around, and he is coming Sunday, after all. We have to work for the Coven…” Catching herself as she noticed that she was thinking out loud, Lilith rolled her eyes at herself. ”I don’t want to avoid him - I never did. I was just scared of what would happen if we saw each other, and well… now we know. So no,” she added with a laugh. ”I’m relieving you from your guard duties.”

Mary gave a soft chuckle at Lilith's words, topping both of their mugs up. "For what it's worth, he does miss you." For as much as they had hurt each other in the past, a selfish part of Mary had always hoped Lilith and Miles would find each other again. It'd sure make her life a hell of a lot easier but she also knew Lilith brought out the best in Miles.

”Thanks,” Lil said as Mary filled their cups. ”I think it’s reasonable to say that we could be friends again, if we tried. Don’t know about much else, but…” Shrugging her shoulders, the young woman sipped another drink of coffee from the mug in her hands. Replaying Marys words over in her head, Lilith’s mind ran wild. What would have happened if things hadn’t happened the way that they did; what if Lilith had followed Miles off to college?

”I’ve missed him too. I know that might be hard to believe with me avoidin’ him and all, but it’s true. No matter how many other guys I liked, I always found myself comparing them to Miles n’ such. My mind always seems to drift back to him, in one form or another.”

"I know. You've been pining after him just as much as he has you for as much as neither of you would admit it," she says, sipping her coffee. "Does your paw paw know where you are or should I be expectin' a call soon?"

As Mary’s words settled in, Lilith’s face burned red. ”He was expecting me home last night… hasn’t heard anything from me. I have a couple missed calls myself, but my head hurts way to bad to hear him yell at me right now.”

"Want me to tell 'im you were feeling sick as a dog so I picked you up on my way home? I can fix you some breakfast, pop on a movie, whatever will get you over the hangover,"

Pondering the thought for a brief moment, a small smile crept across the young woman's face. ”That would honestly be perfect. Thank you Mary, really.”