As Spring Break came to a close, so did April and its many rain showers that plummeted all over Washington State, giving May it's catch phrases of bringing May flowers out of the gloom. With May flowers also comes the incoming performances for the year. Whether it be ballet, Roller Derby, or the School Play, there were all so many things to look forward to if our characters are ready to meet them in stride. Over at the Emerson House, it was easy to say that every girl present there was not willing to go in stride to the incoming performances of the month..
It was a Saturday afternoon, almost a month since the wedding and Cody was very much wishing he could be back there, away from all the drama life had to offer. In this case, the world had placed more than enough drama for the day.
Cody was having a fabulous morning. He had woken up nice and early to drive his youngest daughter to an early rehearsal, and then after doing so, went to the gym and came back home at around 9 am, where he found some nice hot waffles waiting for him on a platter. Beth was awake and had made them for him with strawberries included.
"You spoil me, Beth. Thank you." Beth was happy to oblige as she was hoping to get her father happy before she broke the news to anyone else in the household of what she had planned.
Shortly after he started on his waffles, his lovely wife came out and promptly made some black coffee. It was while she was sipping on her coffee, and Cody was eating his second helping of waffles when Beth decided to announce to her parents that she was offered to take part in an exchange program next year where she would move to Paris for the next two years and she has already written to accept.
"You two will be alright with this, right? It'll give you both plenty of ways to come visit Paris and I'll be home during the major holidays unless you want to come out to Paris for one Christmas sometime.."
"I think that's wonderful-" Cody started but was quickly cut off by his wife who slowly lowered her coffee mug.
"Do you mean to tell me that you signed up to do this before telling us about it? How do you expect me to react about this information, Beth?"
Cody took that as the moment to escape the kitchen. It was also, unknown to Cody the start of one of the worst days in this house. He was quick to scoff down the rest of his waffles before putting his plates in the sink, ready to slink out when his wife screamed at him.
"For the Love of God, Cody. Put your dishes in the dishwasher! If you will not stay to go after Beth then you will at least keep this kitchen clean."
Cody then proceeded to slouch over to the dishwasher where he opened to find it packed with clean dishes.
"But Sara, the dishwasher has not been unloaded yet.."
If looks could kill... Cody would have been way past dead with the look his wife gave him.
"Excuse me, Cody I don't have time to play mother with you. Put the dishes away and help me with Beth or get out of here. But not until you FINISH THE DAMN DISHWASHER.
As if sad violin music played in the background, Cody slowly put all the dishes away and placed his dishes in the dishwasher when all was done. By this time, his wife was in tears, Beth was in tears and they were both screaming at each other causing Scar and Clary to wake up from up above.
Now on saturadays, the twins usually went to roller derby for their games but this time around, they were not invited to play, which Cody soon learned more on as he disappeared into Sara's office to escape the havoc of his wife and eldest daughter.
But of course, the office also happened to be right next door to the stairwell where Scar and Clary walked down from while they were shouting over each other about whose fault it was that got them kicked out of Roller Derby.
"No Derby girl is going to want to hear about us missing practicing over a fucking alice in wonderland rehearsal! No one!"
"Watch your language!" Cody called from the office causing both girls to stop on the stairs and scream "FUCK OFF!"
"Excuse me?" The sound of his wife, Sara stomping toward the stairs was heard followed quickly by the twins falling silent.
"Did I just hear that come out of your mouthes this early in the morning and directed toward your father? Is there no respect left in this house?"
Cody placed his hands to his head and almost begged for his wife to not call him out to join her but of course, that's exactly what she did.
"Cody, help me convince the girls, now." So Cody got out of his chair and walked out to meet them.
Scarlet and Clary were both wide eyed with lines for mouths, a sure sign of their anger. They were looking down toward the ground, and in Scarlet's case, was not looking at either one of us.
"What is the matter with you this morning?" Cody asked, trying to cool things down a bit by simple explanations.
"Nothing that you two would understand," Scar replied tautly. Sara made a tsking sound before turning back to Cody expectantly. But Cody was really not into this idea of going after the girls. Especially this early in the day. Sara sensed this and so she turned back to the girls and did it all herself.
"If you two can't learn the way to treat your parents of all people then you don't even deserve to go to dance this week." That spoke volumes, even if it was really not what Cody wanted to deal with as a punishment.
"But mom! If we don't go to ballet then we don't get to keep our parts!" Sara shrugged casually.
"Maybe you two should learn manners first and then worry about your dancing careers. My word is final." Clary screeched and turned to her dad pleadingly, something that Cody always had trouble fighting off. Clary really had a way for making people feel bad for her. Or maybe she was just good at manipulating her father.
Suddenly Beth appeared from the kitchen, her eyes still red from crying but a defiant look shone on her face.
"Mom crushing your plans too twins?" Sara whirled on her eldest daughter and started pointing fingers, calling out about how "I just don't want you to go when you are still so young!"
"I'm not your little girl, mom! I'm 22! I'm out of college!"
While this was going on, Scar and Clary ran up the stairs; Clary in tears while Scar started muttering darkly to her sister about this being her fault too.
Seeing as the office was no longer a safe place for him, Cody ran up to his room where he found paperwork from work. Maybe he could finish this up here and when he comes back down everything will smooth over.
Two hours later and the house was on fire thanks to Beth no longer paying attention to the waffles she was supposed to be attending too.
A fire engine came, the waffle maker was destroyed and thrown out. Beth cried. Sara cried. Cody cried for his waffle maker. And the twins screamed bloody murder at each other.
"Oh and so if you had to grab one thing out of this house you wouldn't grab your skates? They cost more than a pair of pointe shoes!"
"Yeah but you use those for years! A pair of pointe shoes are used in a day! I would waste a hundred dollars in the fire if I did that!
"That makes no fucking sense, Clary!"
"I'm going to pick up Aria from theater practice," Cody called out to his family, before stumbling to the car. No one seemed to have heard him and no one seemed to really care which at the moment was fine with Cody.
Now when Cody arrived at the school, he was hoping for Aria to be in his state of mind and be willing to help him diffuse the tension in the house. But the moment she entered the car, to Cody's horror he found that she was crying.
"Jeremy is such and imbecile!" She cried. Cody had to take a moment before he started the car again to regain his composure. He could not be annoying to his daughter if she was crying. He had to be a good dad and help out.
And yet, Cody found it really hard to hear about Aria's problems with her co-actor, Jeremy. Especially when he found out that Jeremy was a child of Harper's. Only Harper would use such a cheesy dreamy boy name for her son.
"He doesn't learn his lines, his form is sloppy, all he cares about is baseball and he drives me up a fucking tree!"
"He must have good arms though.." Cody said casually.
"What?" He turned to see his daughter looking at him in utter confusion.
"Uh, you said he was into baseball. So he has arm.. muscles..." She took a deep breath before muttering,
"Dad, I don't give a fuck about his arm muscles. The boy is too thick in the head for me to care about how thick his arms are."
Even boy talk was off the table with Aria. How amazing.
When Cody got home, he had little hope in things being restored in the house, and he was correct in that matter. His wife was still yelling at Beth who was defending her reasoning. Scar and Clary were throwing things at each other upstairs and Aria kept crying crocodile tears as she rushed up to her room, and went on to blast heavy metal music at probably the worst time.
It came to such a degree of hell that Cody suddenly felt the need to flee the house for a bit.
He took his phone out and dialed a call to Chris who answered on the first ring.
"Hey there Cody! What's up? Long time no see... or hear..wait, no- er yeah. You get what I mean.."
"Chris I need to get out of my house for a few hours. Everyone is going through a meltdown. You free?"
Chris was laughing on the other side of the phone for a few minutes before telling him to come over and bring some beer. A baseball game was going on soon and he was more than welcome to sit and join. And so that was it.
Cody ran down stairs and grabbed a box of beer, and tried his very best to sneak out of the house with said beer when he was caught by his wife.
"Where are you going?"
"To Chris's house for a game." Sara huffed and then muttered an okay.
"But be back in time for tomorrow. We have brunch with my parents!"
Brunch. God forsaken brunch! Cody hated brunch and hated even more the people he has to talk to at brunch. But he could never duck out of it. Almost never. And this was no excuse.
He raced the rest of the way to the car, threw the beer in the back and drove straight to Chris's house, only to be stopped once by a police officer to get a speeding ticket.