HTTYD - Day 19, Part 1

SLIGHT CHANGE. Major enough that it took a decent amount of time to rewrite so some of y’all might wanna check it out. But the short version is: at the end of Veronica’s party, after she confesses everything to Marcus, instead of him allowing her to be friends with his daughter and giving the green light to hang out at their house, he forgives her but forbids her from coming over for both of their sakes. So he doesn’t think she’s schemey anymore but he doesn’t think it’s a good idea to let this classmate of his daughter’s who he knows has a crush on him, around their house for the forseeable future.

I just didn’t like how that chapter ended it felt too forced and awkward and weird and I think this makes a lot more sense with how someone would act in that situation. But obviously Veronica isn’t out of the story for good, she’ll still be around for the finale of the story. Just under slightly different pretenses. The rewritten chapter’s up on GiantessWorld for those who might really wanna reread it.

OK now on to the newest chapter :)

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Monday, November 2

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Monday morning signaled a return back to the regular schedule for Marcus and Jessie. The young girl’s father had all but forgotten about what had happened on Tuesday just under a week ago, when Jessie had gotten drunk and initially tried to hide it from him. But they had seemingly moved on, forgiven and forgotten. And after letting Jessie take him trick-or-treating on Saturday night, and then eventually bring him along to Veronica’s party, it seemed fairly evident that she pretty much was no longer grounded.

So when he mentioned that he was going to be taking her to school again today (which was a good excuse for him to wake up early anyways), she took it a step further and asked if he could take her to Starbucks on the way. “Sure, if you’re gonna pay for it, right?” was his response as they pulled out of their driveway.

“Yeah, of course Daddy, but what if in addition to me paying for it, you also raise my allowance by 4 bucks too?” she asked with a smirk, and he chuckled at her comeback.

“Well you already get 15 dollars a week, so an extra 4 dollars would be like a 30% raise. Which is a lot more than I ever got at my old job!” he said with a laugh. Obviously 4 dollars wasn’t a lot, but considering this was basically free money she was getting just so she could practice basic financial literacy and spending money wisely, it wasn’t bad for someone her age.

“Yeaaaaah, Daddy, but like… OK, what if, instead of you raising my allowance, you just bought the coffee for me,” she said with a cheesy grin, trying to appeal to him with her puppy dog demeanor instead. “I’m not old enough to get a job even if I wanted to, but I do help out around the house with things you can’t do.”

“Those are called chores, Jess. You don’t get a reward for doing what you’re supposed to as a part of the family.”

“Why not?” she challenged. He glanced over to her, and he could tell she honestly wanted to know, and wasn’t just arguing with him for the sake of rebelliousness. And admittedly, he couldn’t think of an immediate answer. Because ‘that’s the way it’s always been’ isn’t a really good response. And ‘because I said so’ isn’t any better. “We learned about something like that in science class last week when they were talking about experiments they did on rats and stuff,” she continued. “It’s called positive reinforcement I think. Or positive… something. Anyway, anytime the rats did something good, they would give them a little bit of cheese, and then the rats learned to step on the button or whatever and they’d get their food. But Ms. Yao was saying there are all these like, real world applications, like how being paid at a job is a kind of positive reinforcement because you do a good, and then they pay you, and if you do bad then they fire you so you wanna do a good job so you keep making money. Or when a crowd cheers at a football game, it helps motivate the team to play better. I mean, if you think about it, you already do it with me, kinda like her example with someone’s job. Because I get my allowance every week, right? But if I get grounded or do something wrong and you have to punish me, then you take it away. So I’m encouraged to have a good behavior because I know that I’ll like, keep phone privileges and get my allowance and stuff like that every week.” She looked to him to see what he thought of her little speech, and he glanced at her again, but with his eyebrows raised this time. He was impressed. Shit, she’s starting to get pretty smart. I’ve gotta admit, I think she’s right.

“So you’re saying you wanna be a rat then?” he finally said, and broke out into laughter as his daughter facepalmed and groaned at him purposefully having skipped over the point entirely. They pulled into the Starbucks drive-thru as Jessie looked back up with a more serious face, although with the hint of a smile on the edge of her lips.

“If it means getting a free coffee, then sure, I’d love to be a rat.” Marcus rolled his eyes as she giggled, but went on with her point. “You already buy my clothes and toiletries and other stuff. This is just coffee, it’s not like you’re actually paying me like a salary or anything for helping out around the house, that wasn’t what I meant.” The car ahead of them moved forward, so Marcus rolled down his window as he pulled up to the sign so she could order. The barista greeted her though the speaker, but Marcus interjected before she could make her order.

“OK, fine, I’ll get you your coffee,” he whispered, and she silently cheered to herself her fists before giving her dad a quick hug.

“Thank you thank you thank you!” she quietly squealed.

“But remember, this is a privilege,” he replied. “Your clothes are necessary, but this something you’ve earned, so I’ll take it away if I need to. Sound good?” She nodded up and down approvingly; it sounded fair to her. “And I’m only paying for a tall, anything bigger you can buy yourself.” More nods of agreement. “Alright, you can order now,” he said, and her joyful spirit returned, putting a smile on his face at seeing her so giddy already before her caffeine.

“Hi, can I get a tall matcha green tea latte,” she proudly proclaimed.

“Sure, anything else?” the man on the other end replied.

“That’s it!”

“Great, that’ll be $4.24 at the next window.”

“Thanks!” With a content smile on her face, Jessie sat back as Marcus pulled ahead. She always got a satisfying feeling whenever she was able to convince her dad to buy her things.

* * * * * *

Later that day, Marcus was waiting in the parking lot of her school, as he had also agreed to picking her up since he had plenty of free time. So after her practice, she came up to his car and shrugged off her gym bag and backpack in the backseat. But looking at her in the rear view mirror, it seemed like something was off. Not in the way she was acting, she seemed to be in a good mood, so practice must’ve gone well. But it looked like something was on her neck…

“Hi Daddy,” she chirped, hopping into the passenger seat as he started up the car, “thanks for picking me up.”

“Hey hun…” He was practically staring at her neck as she got in though, and she hadn’t even buckled in her seatbelt by the time she noticed he was looking at her funny.

“Uh… everything OK?” she asked, and he furrowed his eyebrows.

“Everything’s fine with me Jess, is everything OK with you though?” He was pretty confident he knew what he was looking at, but he didn’t want to accuse her of anything again without asking some questions first. “Did practice go okay, did you get injured at all?”

She shrugged, “No. I mean, yeah, it went fine and no I didn’t get hurt.” She returned his quizzical look. “Daddy, it’s obvious something’s wrong, what is it? Why do you keep looking at me like that?”

Marcus sighed, “Well, I don’t wanna accuse you of anything, but there’s some kind of bruise on your neck, and it looks like a hickey.”

Her eyes immediately grew to the size of saucepans, with panic overtaking her expression. “Oh my god, are you serious? Wait, really?” She quickly fumbled for her phone and opened up the camera, but couldn’t see anything right away. So then she folded the sun visor down to see herself in the mirror, while leaning forward and holding up the camera behind her neck. Now it was visible. Seeing her screen in the mirror’s reflection, she could make out red and purple discoloring on the are where her shoulder met the backside of her neck. “FUCK! I can’t believe that’s been there all practice, oh my god, why did nobody mention it to me!” She slid further into her seat and practically curled up into a ball, hiding her face between her legs in embarrassment.

“So… it is a hickey?” Marcus asked. She silently nodded, still keeping her head buried between her legs that were wrapped up in her arms. “I was… UGH, I can’t believe I’m about to tell you this… but I was like, flirting with one of the boys at Veronica’s party on Halloween, and then we were texting some of yesterday but I don’t have any classes with him this semester. But then I saw him after school and he like…” she sighed out of exasperation. “I don’t even wanna— this is so awkward, Daddy… I literally, just like…” She let out a muffled scream into her hands. “AHH, and I can’t believe nobody told me!”

He had to keep himself from laughing at how much his daughter was freaking out over a hickey. He felt bad for her, of course, but he knew she was good at makeup, and would be able to hide it until it went away in a few days. That’s what his girlfriend did in high school when he gave her one, and back then she seemed more annoyed than embarrassed. “Jess, I’m not mad at you if that’s what you were thinking, I just wanted to make sure you were OK. You don’t have to tell me the details, I don’t need to know. And tomorrow morning I can help you put some concealer on it if you can’t reach behind there yourself, it doesn’t look that dark.” He wasn’t mad, but he was still surprised. He had had “the talk” with Jessie before, but he didn’t know when she’d start growing into that part of herself, or if she had already.

His daughter sighed, but collapsed her little ball of shame and sagged in her seat, reluctantly putting on her seatbelt. “Whatever. I guess.” He grimaced with a tinge of a smile as he pulled out of the parking lot and turned onto the main roads. She stared out the window, and he wished he was still big enough to be able to reach over and rub her back. I guess she’s getting to that point though. I’m surprise at how quickly she’s grown up. Here was his daughter, starting to kiss and lightly mess around with boys, and after over a decade of dozens of hopeless dates and short-stinted relationships, he was still single himself. It put a pang of hurt in his heart, especially knowing how much harder it would be to find someone at his size. What if I never found someone? That thought scared him, and he glanced over at his daughter again, memories of her growing up over the years flashing by in his head. But I’ll always have her though. And I wouldn’t trade anything in the world to have it any other way.