one day, while Dallas is working...

August 2082 (mini-update) - Violet Deppiesse is 48, Lucy Harris is 16.

One day, while Dallas is working, Lucy needs somebody to talk to. She doesn't feel like she can talk to her own mother about this, especially because it's about Dallas. Her own mother "approves" of Dallas, but only in a necessary way. What Lucy needs is someone who really understands how great Dallas is, and who understands that better than his own dear mommy? So she climbs into the hot tub where Violet is relaxing, and Lucy pours her sweet little heart out.

"How far is it, like in miles?" she asks. "I don't earn enough in tips to buy a plane ticket, but maybe I could drive there? And how long would that take? I know there's an ocean and everything, but maybe I could drive up through Canada, and get a ferry across the Bering Strait?"

"Oh, no," Violet says, shaking her head. "I don't think you can do that. Especially not in your first year driving."

Lucy sighs hard. "Oh," she says.

"It's just that he's such a great boyfriend. I couldn't even imagine a better boyfriend. He's smart and he says the sweetest things to me. And he'll say that he's not funny, but really he is, and without even trying to be. And he's so cute, and he has the greatest smile, and he..."

This is his mother, she realizes, and decides to leave out the part about all the earth-shattering things he can do with his tongue.

"But he's been my best friend in the whole world since I was twelve, which is four years, and exactly one quarter of my whole life, and I don't want a different boyfriend."

Violet doesn't know what to say to that, but she supposes this is a compliment to her mothering skills that she raised such a charming young man. She takes a deep breath and says, "Well, you don't have to get a new boyfriend when he leaves. You don't have to have a boyfriend at all if you don't want to. You could just spend time with your friends."

"You know how good this will be for him, don't you?" Violet says. "Don't you want that for him?"

"Oh, I know," Lucy says. "I'm not trying to talk him out of it or anything."

The thing is, Violet is glad Dallas is going away to college. Her family is less conspicuous this way, and Dallas will be safer there, especially in light of what's going on now. There he will just be a little different. On his own, they might think he is too pale, sun-deprived, or a little malnourished. The five of them together is strange, and she knows this. And when the twins are old enough for college, she'll encourage them to spread out as well.

Violet knows from experience that Lucy would be better off to love another boy, even as charming as Dallas is. Life hasn't been easy for her being married to Orion. Even when people can't quite put their finger on what is different about him, even when they would never suspect, they still know he is different. The stares, the hushed whispers, and some of them even gain the courage to say things. Is your husband sick? Does he have cancer? Is he an albino? Was he malnourished as a child?

People don't mind different these days, when they can put a name on the origin. From India, Mexico, China, Lebanon, New Zealand? But that your husband comes from the stars, whether or not he was actually born right here in Lakeside Heights, how can that be explained?

They continue the conversation over sandwiches. Violet says, "You know what you need? You need to try something new, something to take your mind off of it. A new hobby."

"I like dancing," Lucy says. "I've always been athletic, like I should be a sports star or something, but I've just never been brutal enough for contact sports."

"Dancing sounds lovely," Violet says.

"I just don't know what I would do if he forgot about me. Or if he met somebody new and fell in love with her, and then he might hate me the way he doesn't like Vicky Garth anymore."

"Oh, honey," Violet says. "Whatever happens, I don't think he could ever hate you."

It's a lost cause trying to persuade them otherwise. If you could see them like Violet has, if you'd been around them so intimately, you can almost imagine seeing the tether like a tangible thing, a string from chest to chest, tying their souls together.

"I know you won't believe this right now," Violet says. "But two years in the scope of your whole lifetime is really not so long."

Lucy sighs. "Thanks," she says. "Maybe it won't be that bad."

*****

notes: OMG, as if Lucy couldn't break my heart a little bit more!!! I was just in there to age up Delphie and Dakota, Dallas was at work (Lucy never leaves, lol), and she just sat down with his MOM and unloaded all of this. Granted, she doesn't have the best relationship with her own mother. But all the speech bubbles were there - Dallas with the hearts, the love-heart bubble, the steady bubble, the best friends bubble, the world bubble, the enemies bubble. She's gonna make me cry, lol.

And poor Violet, what do you say to all that?

So there are actually going to be a few more of these mini-updates through the fall. This one started out unscripted, but the other ones are planned. You know, the story does what it needs to do ;)