[Open - Folly Cemetary - Father's Day]

[irishcoffee]

It was without a doubt, Maggie's least favorite day.

Mother's Day wasn't far behind it but she only had vague memories of her mother. She'd been six when the woman had dropped back out of The Folly. Long enough for Maggie to remember her, but not long enough for anything to remain in her mind beyond little shadows in her mind.

Her father's exit. That she remembered clearly, considering she'd been the one that found him when the last of his attempts to bring her back to the Folly had failed. Magic drained after five years of these attempts, he'd been unable to fight the depression, unable to see anything beyond the loss of the love of his life.

Unable to see the daughter he'd be leaving behind.

She'd seen first hand what magical exhaustion did now that she was fully in her magic now. When she'd been eleven and sent to her foster home, it hadn't been as easy to see at all. She still hated him for leaving, still wished she'd been enough to keep him from giving up, but now, she was a little more accepting of it all.

When she saw a vaguely familiar woman at his gravesite, it took everything she had not to pull the earth, wind and water to her to blast the woman, and the trash around the headstone, into the forest so deep even Bella wouldn't be able to find her.

"Excuse me, but who are you?"

Comments

[revyourengine]

Alex didn't remember Mr. Donnelly all that much. She had only met him a handful of times, most notably the first time Alex had arrived in Folly with her parents. They had been here before but it was her first time. She was only 7 at the time but she remembered how friendly he had been. He'd given her hot cocoa and a cookie which pretty much endeared him to her forever.

She was sad to hear what had happened to him, or what he had done. She remembered he had a daughter near her age and how sad it must have been for your father to do something like that. Alex recalled wanting to draw her a picture to cheer the girl up at the time before realizing that would have been useless. Nothing could cheer a child up after something like that.

When a detective had asked her if she would like to be part of a community that honored the Donnelly's and did their best to support them, Alex and her entire family had been happy to volunteer. It was pretty much a given that someone would trash Mr. Donnelly's grave the night before Father's Day, knowing his daughter would be here. That's why Alex had come out early to clean it up. It hadn't been too bad, actually, so she had decided to pick up around the rest of the cemetery too. There wasn't much trash, but some.

Hearing the voice behind her though and the tone with it, she winced, wishing she had thrown the trash away directly before coming back here to clean up a bit more.

"Hi, you must be Maggie," she said, standing up and turning around with a smile. "I'm Alex. Sorry, I was hoping to be done before you got here. I think, technically, you're not even supposed to know we exist. I'm probably in big trouble with the Detective now."