Another day, another disgusting, gag inducing breakfast with Tula.
Tula's concern over Haliya's grades has not abated. Despite her sister's complaints that "it's fine" and she'll "do it later", Tula is much firmer than her father ever was.
Somehow, coming from her older sister and not her mother, Haliya doesn't view these homework sessions with as much hostility. However, Tula does notice that her sister chatters on instead of working much of the time.
"...And I told Uriah I'd go out on a date with him later!" Haliya gushes breathlessly. A date! She never thought this day would come.
"Haliya, you can tell me about it once you're done with your work," Tula reminds her sister patiently.
"Oh...sorry. I just...got distracted. You know what it's like, when you have an idea and you just have to tell people about it?"
"How about ideas on geometry?" Tula tries, again, to redirect her sister's wandering attention. "Are you still on problem two?"
Haliya looks down at her homework. "Just started number three."
A few minutes go by, the problem is slowly, painfully worked through. Just before she finishes, Haliya suddenly thinks of something else.
"Hey, when Yana starts kindergarten, what will you do with her room?"
"Haliya..."
"...sorry, focusing, right..."
She tries, desperately, to refocus on her homework. Behind her, the TV softly plays a commercial jingle. She can hear the sound of the dryer upstairs tumbling away and Yana making babbling noises at William.
Tula looks at William. "Can you come back in about an hour? Haliya's doing her homework."
"Oh, sorry..." William turns off the TV and heads upstairs.
"Ok Haliya, tell me, what's problem four about?"
***
Tula goes upstairs to work on a chemistry lesson plan she'll have to teach the next day. This leaves Haliya under the guidance of her mother and father for her physics homework.
She finds it hard to focus with her mother there, eating and staring with slight disapproval. Why did she have to pick now, of all times, to just pop on over?
"Haliya, you know if you miss more assignments that you'll fail the course. And if you fail the course that's another year of this homework. Focus!" Sun snaps.
Paolo glowers at his ex-wife.
"Don't be so pessimistic. Just try and power through, Haliya..."
"Gosh, you don't help out with her homework for years and just tell her to 'power through'? That's so unhelpful!"
As her parents descend into a passionate argument where they point out each other's worst flaws, Haliya rubs her forehead. There's no hope of her focusing now.
She pushes away from the table. "I don't feel well. I'm taking a break."
"Haliya, get back here!" Sun calls after her daughter.
"Let her go, she's obviously hurting!"
"Oh, so now this is my fault!?"
Haliya turns out the lights in her room and lays down on her bed. She looks at the family picture hanging above her. It was taken at the summer festival back in her elementary school days.
"That was a nice day," she sighs to herself. Why can't everyone get along anymore?
***
Haliya only creeps out of her room once she hears her mother's car pull away from the house.
"Not such a good study session, huh?" Tula says sympathetically. She could hear the yelling from upstairs.
Haliya nods sadly.
"I just don't get it. When I was a kid they seemed happy! What went wrong? Dad's explanation makes 0 sense."
"Well, what did he tell you?"
"That they just fell out of love, and they were always bad at talking, or something? But...I don't remember them like that..."
"It happens, Haliya. After my mom died, dad just checked out on me. I had to do a lot of things myself. When I was about your age, he met Sun. He was really sad, still, but he tried to move on. He and Sun did their best to make it work, but some things you don't get over so easily."
Haliya frowns. "So...he was still in love with your mom when he met mine? Why...why would he marry someone he wasn't in love with!?"
Tula smiles sadly at her little sister. "Emotions are complicated. I think...he liked Sun. She made him happy at first. They had you. Getting married made sense," she shrugs, "But if the feelings aren't there...they just aren't there."
Haliya looks down at her plate. So her happy childhood...it was all a sham? Just two people who had a baby by accident trying to "make things work"?
"Don't be so down, Haliya. Not every couple loves each other."
Haliya, predictably, retreats to her room after their conversation. Tula spends some quality time with Yana.
"Can't have you peeing on me anymore," Tula mutters as she sets the toddler on the potty.
Not every couple loves each other... true words, of course. From her observations, her father only had Sun move in when her roommates kicked her out. Then they only got married after she pressured him for it. Not to mention, Sun's apparent affair. She frowns a little. She'd been waiting to use that information for something, maybe to get Sun to make some harvesters for her operations back in Bridgeport, or to get her out of the way if she got too troublesome. She really beat me to the punch, Tula thinks with a sigh. Not every plan works out.
Thankfully for William, his fitness trainer plan has worked out. The gym accepts him as a trainer pretty much immediately. Anything to boost business at their sleepy establishment.
His first regular client is Rocky Marshall-Curley. William doesn't know it yet, but Rocky is actually one of Tula's uncles.
"Ah, the fellow from Bridgeport! I was curious about you," Rocky introduces himself with a cheerful smile.
"...really? Why? Scared I'll suck your blood dry or something?"
Rocky laughs lightly, "Not at all. We just don't get many out-of-towners here. It's always nice to see a new face."
After a surprisingly lengthy training session with Rocky (seriously, what elderly man can bench press 80kg??) William has another training session with Nadia Pelly here.
"Keep running! Feel the burn!" William tries every motivational cliché he can think of. For once, his words have the desired effect.
"I'm almost at the two kilometer mark," Nadia says in-between breaths.
"Yeah, keep going!" Even though William finds his words unconvincing, they give Nadia the motivation to reach her goal.
"Let's take a 3 minute break for water then start on some weights," he says to her after she's hopped off the treadmill.
"Sure, sounds good."
This might be so bad, after all.
***
Meanwhile, Haliya is having a very different kind of day.
School has been a major drag lately. Though her homework grades have improved, her class participation has not. She feels sick of going into class just to get scolded for not paying attention, or for her binder being "a mess", or hearing the sighs from teachers as she struggles to find her homework in the mountain of papers in her backpack.
She doesn't like being disorganised and she doesn't mean to daydream in class all the time. Why does everyone keep treating her like she's doing it on purpose? She looks up at the school building. Class for the day has just finished. She should be going home now, instead of stewing in her thoughts here.
Just a few more semesters, Haliya tells herself, taking a deep breath. You'll graduate soon.
She comes home and sees the chores she's let pile up- the laundry she promised to do laying on the floor, the toys she took out to play with Yana, her dishes from breakfast- and she feels overwhelmed and exhausted.
I'll do it later, she promises herself as she lays down for a nap, I just need to rest first.
Meanwhile, Paolo comes home from work in a cheery mood. He's been promoted to squadron leader, meaning he's just two steps away on the military ladder from becoming an astronaut. At his age, they won't be sending him on any deep space missions- probably just the routine patrol around Lunar Lakes- but he's still happy about the promotion. Besides the increase in his paycheck, it also gives him more time to spend at home.
"I should be home more often with you, Nana," Paolo tickles his granddaughter. Instead of calling herself Yana, she seems to prefer "Nana".
Yana giggles. "Stay home all day!"
Tula and William have finally come home.
"How was your first day?" Tula asks.
"Tiring. You know me and social interaction..."
"I know how you feel. Dealing with ten children all day was exhausting. All of them so distracted!"
"How'd you get them into line?"
I threatened to take away their recess, is on the tip of Tula's tongue, but instead she says, "Oh, the other teacher left a movie we had to watch. Nothing too crazy."
"My first client was a pretty cool guy. Older, maybe in his 70s? His name was Rocky. He could bench press like you wouldn't believe!"
"Rocky, like Marshall-Curley?"
"Yeah, how'd you know?"
"He's my uncle."
"I didn't know your dad had a brother. Unless...oh." He doesn't know the full story about Tula's mother, but he knows enough to know that her life of crime with the Parrotts killed her.
Tula shrugs. "It was a long time ago. Besides, Rocky didn't do any time. I don't think he was actually involved."
"Right..." William's cop instincts are kicking in. "Are you sure about that?"
Tula looks at him questioningly. "If it makes you nervous you could always look at the public record of court cases. I did ages ago. Anyone involved with that fiasco was put in jail. I trust our justice system enough to believe that."
William squeezes her shoulder. "That's very...admirable of you."
"Well, the alternative is just too depressing," Tula says, without a hint of irony.
***
Haliya wakes up from her nap, and gives herself some time to get re-oriented.
Hmm, what was that camera called again? The one we talked about in drama club...
Haliya finds their old photography book. True, she could look it up, but the bookshelf was right in front of the computer and well...
About an hour later, she realises how late it is. Shoot, my homework. And the laundry! And the toys!
She gets downstairs, her homework in hand, when William passes by.
"Hey, me and Tula got invited to a dinner with your aunt Xara. Would you mind looking after Yana while we're gone?"
"Oh....um...of course," she agrees quietly. By now her homework would normally be done. Of course he'd ask her, instead of her elderly, exhausted father.
Haliya wonders how she'll pull this off. First, she needs to eat.
"Dad, you're home! Would you mind helping me with Yana while Tula and William are gone?"
Paolo looks at her, bags under his eyes. "Oh...never mind, I'll manage," Haliya mumbles.
Her father helps her feed her niece, but after that he's knocked out like a light.
Chores forgotten, Haliya focuses on keeping Yana entertained.
"My dad's an astro-naut. Can you say that?"
"Astro!" Yana says happily.
"No, aaaastro naaaaut..."
Hours later, Tula and William finish dinner with Xara.
"Are you upset with me?" William asks uncertainly.
"I mean, you did ask my aunt if she could remember the names of my cousins' fathers," Tula says bitterly, not looking at him.
"I was just curious!"
"You were being rude, for the millionth time!"
William winces. "...sorry."
When Tula arrives home, she finds Haliya talking about some...interesting...topics with her daughter.
"Grim is a spirit who takes people's souls, like the dream I had about my grandma. I never met my grandma, you know. I heard she liked to garden and paint..."
"I wish there were photos of her," Haliya continues, though Yana has long completely lost the point of Haliya's story. She also hasn't noticed Tula returning home.
"Ahem," Tula clears her throat.
"Oh, Tula! Didn't realise you came in," Haliya says with a start.
"No worries. I need to shower, do you mind putting Yana to bed? It is...very late."
Haliya looks at her phone, and frowns. It's already 11? How did that happen. "Sorry, I lost track of time..."
"Just...make sure it doesn't happen again. And get her to bed, alright?"
Eager to fix her mistake, Haliya dutifully changes Yana's diaper and sets her down in her crib. She kisses her niece's forehead.
"Good night, Yana."
"Night night," Yana says back to her.
By the time she's finished, it's nearly midnight. With a regretful sigh, Haliya gets ready for bed herself.
I'll get my homework done on the bus tomorrow morning, she promises herself, and then I can throw the clothes into the washing machine before I leave for school.
----------
AN:
I don't have ADD or ADHD myself, so I have done some research on how the condition presents itself in girls (since this is usually very different from how boys exhibit it). I hope my depiction of Haliya's experiences aren't too far off the mark. I was going to go with the sims 3 portrayal of absent-mindedness, but I really didn't want to write Haliya as being dumb or literally incapable of any tasks (like absent minded sims in the game tend to be).
Anyways, Xara did invited Tula over for a party. When I sent her and William there, no one was home so they left as soon as they arrived.
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