She could hear the paws scratching at the door, and she knew that Beatrice had to go out. So, heaving herself out of bed, still in her cloud covered pajamas, Amelia Burden headed downstairs, Beatrice by her side. Together they raced down the steps to the living room to find her parents sitting in the kitchen - her mother reading the newspaper while her father cooked and made coffee - and Amelia pulled the handle on the sliding glass door leading to the backyard so she and Beatrice could rush out together. Beatrice did her business while Amelia sat on the picnic table benchseat and let the morning sun warm her. It was another beautiful summer day out here, and she had nothing expected of her except to enjoy it.

As Amelia and Beatrice came back in, she took a seat at the table and Beatrice sat right beside her on the floor. Her mother, Gloria, set the paper down and smiled at Amelia as her father, Gordon, came and poured more coffee into Gloria's mug before heading back to the stove to work on his eggs. Gloria sipped her coffee carefully before looking back at Amelia.

"Any plans?" she asked, and Amelia nodded.

"I think we're gonna go down to the library and get some books," Amelia said.

"They let Bea into the library?" Gordon asked, and Amelia nodded.

"They don't mind, they love her down there," she said, smiling happily at the dog lying on the floor beside her feet. After breakfast, Amelia pulled on her overalls and her clogs and, Bea by her side, headed down to the small local library. Beatrice never wore a leash, she never had to, as Amelia knew she never wandered far from her side. Beatrice was an extremely well behaved dog. Entering the library, the librarian behind the desk smiled and waved at them as the usual guests they were, and then they set upon finding books. Amelia got a mystery book, always a fan of mysteries, and then a whole slew of books on the arts, be it dance, acting or painting. Amelia had always been drawn to the arts, thanks to her fathers painting work.

Once they were back home, Bea and Amelia holed themselves up in Amelia's bedroom on the floor and Amelia read through the books one at a time for Bea to follow along with, while she shared her string cheeses with her. It didn't matter that Bea couldn't understand what Amelia was saying, Amelia didn't care, because she had all she wanted in the world; friendship and literature. What more could a little girl ask for, really?

                                                                                             ***

"Miss Burden?" the man asked, still standing there, "Would you like a moment?"

She nodded, wiping at the tears on her face.

                                                                                              ***

Beatrice didn't seem to understand that Amelia wasn't going back to the house with her parents. Standing there in her dorm at the college, her father dropping the last box on the floor, Beatrice looked from one member of the family to the other, head cocked to the side, ears perked slightly up. She whined a little, which caught Amelia's attention, and she knelt down to stroke her head.

"She'll be in good hands," Gloria said, "You know we love her sweetheart, you won't have to worry about her."

"I know, it's just going to be weird not having my best friend here," Amelia said, "Bea's been with me for as long as I can remember. I can't imagine not having her around. That life seems completely inconceivable to me."

Gordon touched Gloria's shoulder and, after they patted Amelia on the back, they left her alone with Beatrice momentarily so she could say goodbye to her best friend. Amelia ran her hands behind Bea's ears and scratched lightly.

"This isn't goodbye, I'm going to come home for the holidays and stuff and see you and mom and dad," Amelia said, "But I have to do this in order to be an adult, I hope you understand and don't forever hate me for it. You know I love you Beatrice, you know you're the best dog and greatest friend anyone could ever ask for."

Beatrice barked and wagged her tail, making Amelia throw her arms around the dog, squeezing a bit, fighting back the tears. She promised she'd see her again, and she kept true to that promise. A year later, during summer break, Amelia came home and as she got out of her car and headed up the walkway, she could see Beatrice standing on the couch against the front window, yapping excitedly, so happy to see Amelia come home, even if only for a bit.

That summer was great fun, as Amelia and Bea fell right back into the same relationship they'd had since they were young girl and pup respectively. Running in the fields surrounding the house, exploring and playing fetch, lounging inside when it rained and listening to old jazz records, and Amelia always sneaking Bea an extra little treat here and there. Their friendship was a testament to the truth that distance, nor time, could destroy a connection as deep as theirs.

                                                                                               ***

Amelia entered the small room, its counters littered with metallic surgical instruments and the stench of less. She shut the door softly behind her and then looked at the slab table in front of her, centered in the middle of the room, completely unsure of what to even say.

How does one say goodbye to someone they aren't ready to lose?

                                                                                                ***

Amelia would've preferred literally any other kind of news to the kind she had received that Sunday morning. Drinking her tea and reading a book on bird watching, her landline rang only once before she scrambled to answer it, expecting a callback from a local theatre she'd auditioned for earlier that week. But it wasn't the man she'd auditioned for, no, it was her mother, and her voice was shaky. Immediately, without her mother even saying the news, Amelia knew something was wrong.

And as soon as the words left Gloria's lips, Amelia crumpled to the floor and curled into a ball of weeping pain and writhing grief. She immediately told her professors she had to go home for an emergency in the family, packed her car that afternoon and was on the road in no time. When she arrived, Bea was lying in Amelia's bed, but wasn't out of it enough to keep her tail from wagging like crazy upon seeing her. Amelia knew she didn't have much time, and that this was something she herself was going to have to do, so after spending an hour or so with her in her childhood bedroom, she loaded Beatrice up in the car and headed off to the vet.

She knew Beatrice wouldn't be coming back.

It had spread so rapidly, and Bea was full of tumors. There was nothing that could be done except put her to sleep, to end her suffering. But now, standing in this small sterile room, seeing her best and oldest friend lying on a table preparing to, likely unknowingly, face oblivion, Amelia couldn't conjure anything to say. She couldn't muster any words in her throat, and instead, she just stood there and held her paw. The doctor came back in, before realizing he'd left the shot in the other room and excused himself to go get it, giving Amelia one last chance to say something to Bea. She reached up with her other hand and stroked between the dogs eyes gently, forcing herself to smile.

"You're okay," Amelia whispered, "You're okay. You aren't alone. I wouldn't let you be alone, you never let me be alone."

And before she knew it, Beatrice was gone. Amelia went to the local courthouse the following week and legally changed her name to Beatrice, before going back and finishing college, majoring in theatre. Though she lacked most of the resolve to really try, and none of her auditions ever lead anywhere. After a while, Bea simply gave up and instead attempted her hand at writing, which didn't really go anywhere either. And then, a year after her dogs death, she had an idea. She set about going to the library, as she had as a child, and taking it upon herself to learn sewing and costume design. Within a few months, she had the suit and the head made, and the very first time she put it on, standing and looking at herself in the mirror, she finally knew what she was meant to do.

                                                                                                 ***

"I have to be honest with you," the station manager said, "I don't understand the appeal."

"That's because you're not 5," Liam said, "Trust me, this is the next big thing. Beatrice is determined to make this thing work."

"...how about we make a deal?" the station manager said, leaning forward and cupping his hands on the desk, "I am a part owner in a local chain pizzeria, and it doesn't really have proper theming. We want to really make it a bigger place, make a mark with it, so how about you let us use the characters you have to do that, and you get to make your show?"

Liam looked at Bea, who glared at him, and bit his lip. He thought momentarily before turning back to face the station manager and asked if they could have a few moments. He happily obliged, and left the two alone in the room. Bea crossed her arms and looked away as Liam stood up and paced.

"Look, as long as we aren't outright promoting it on the show, it shouldn't matter much, right? As long as we aren't blatant advertising, then-"

"It doesn't have to be blatant to be wrong," Bea said, "This is an incredibly personal creation, and you're willing to shell it out to a pizzeria for a shot at fame on a puppet show. You can't even begin to imagine what the character of Beatrice means to me."

"Bea, she's a dog," Liam said, "She's not even real. You made her up."

Bea didn't respond to this. Liam didn't know the origin, he didn't even know how intertwined the character of Beatrice had become to the newly minted Beatrice herself, and perhaps if she'd spoken about this in depth, Liam would've understood, and he wouldn't have somehow cajoled her into going along with the station managers plan. Maybe if she'd dug out the photo albums, brimming with imagery of young Bea and her namesake pup, Liam would get it. Maybe if she'd spoken, he would've listened. But she didn't, and he didn't, and the whole thing went off anyway.

As time went on, Beatrice grew to dislike what the creation represented, because in the back of her mind - despite her original intentions with the creation of the character to sift through her own life and help kids grow with their own - she couldn't help but remember she was really just there to hawk pizza. This only became more exacerbated when the animatronics were added to the pizzeria, and the whole thing was fused like some sort of horrible manufactured and poorly engineered Frankenstein; this bastardization of what Beatrice was meant to mean made her sick, and before long she loathed putting the head over her own. She wanted nothing but to be as far removed from Beatrice as she could be.

And it was all Liam's fault, at least that's how she saw it, because if there was one thing Beatrice was never good at, it was taking blame for things.

And 13 years after Liam met Bea in that alley after the show, Bea pulled the plug on the whole thing, and the pizzeria collapsed simply because of changing tastes in family entertainment for the decade. Soon enough, nothing existed of Beatrice Beagle, except for the memory it left in the head of one little girl, one little girl Bea never knew existed, named Michelle Helm.

                                                                                               ***

"Are you sure you don't want anything else to drink?" the dark haired, indian woman asked as she stood in Bea's kitchenette and poured a glass of wine.

"No thank you, I don't drink much," Bea replied, "And if you're trying to get me sloshed to get into my pants, rest assured, I'm asexual, so that won't happen."

This made the indian woman laugh, as she brought herself and her drink back to the couch to sit back down. This was their third date, Bea and the womans - whose name was Amad - after having met a few months ago in a crafts store Bea frequented. Bea had dated men and women in the past, but these days she leaned primarily to women when dating, mostly because as Liam had proved, men couldn't be trusted. Amad sipped her wine and smiled at Bea.

"You don't have to worry," Amad said, "I'm certainly not one to pressure anyone into anything, so you have nothing to fear. Honestly, at my age, sex doesn't interest me all that much anymore as it is. I'd much prefer spending time with someone and talking."

Bea smiled a little, feeling happy Amad understood and respected her.

"I love your apartment, it's so...old fashioned," Amad said, "Record player, oil paintings, the stained glass lamps."

"Those are Tiffany's," Bea said, "They came from my father. He's big into class."

"Well, he has good taste then," Amad said, "It's nice to see things people consider relics still be considered important. It's nice to know that the old things are never really gone, it makes you feel like perhaps immortality isn't impossible on some basic conceptual level."

"I've always believed in immortality, or at least certain ideas surrounding it," Bea said, turning to Amad, continuing she added, "Like...like how if you really love something, you'll always remember it, and therefore it can never really die, because if it can't be forgotten, it won't fade away. It'll always live on in some way through you, vicariously."

"I like that, that's beautiful," Amad said, "What is your stance on something like reincarnation?"

"I don't rule it out, and for those who hope it's real I hope it is for their sake, but I certainly wouldn't want to personally have it happen to me," Bea said, "I've had enough suffering for one life, and not nearly enough love."

This made Amad said, and she set her wine glass on the coffee table before running her fingertips on Bea's face and smiled at her, their eyes locking.

"I can fix that for you," Amad said, leaning in to kiss her. Beatrice didn't stop her. While they kissed, she heard her answering machine pick up, and it was Liam once again. Bea tried to block it out, but halfway through, she interrupted the kiss and unplugged the phone before coming back to the couch and continuing the romance.

                                                                                           ***

Liam hung up the phone slowly, trying to not take it personally. She'd always been a rather private person, and he knew he'd been dumb to even try and call her. Instead, he stood up, straightened his tie and walked into his bathroom. Liam opened his medicine cabinet, pulled out his prescribed sleeping pills and went into the bedroom where he sat on the bed and, after a few minutes of trying hard to untwist the cap, finally opened the bottle and - with a glass of water - downed the whole thing. He then laid down on the bed and shut his eyes, folding his hands on his chest. He couldn't help but think of Bea, and all the things he wish he could've said to her before he'd leave this world, but it didn't matter now. He'd be gone soon.

He felt something roll down into the center of the bed and push against his hip, and he smiled. It was Marvin's urn.

At least he didn't have to go alone.

"I like your hair," Michelle said, making Keagan smile as she ran her hands through her hair.

"Thanks, it's one of my better assets, quite frankly," Keagan said, going back to stirring her coffee with her stirrer as Michelle pushed her fork into her salad and dug around for a bite. Neither one spoke again for a few moments, but finally Keagan took a sip from her cup and then looked at Michelle.

"This is weird, isn't it?" she asked, and Michelle nodded, pushing lettuce attempting to escape back into her mouth.

"It's very weird," she replied, chewing.

"How did you, I mean if you don't mind me asking, get those episodes you showed me?" Keagan asked, and Michelle finished eating, then sighed, pushing her salad bowl away.

"I recorded them on VHS back when I had the chance. I wish I had more, but I only managed to get a handful of them," Michelle said, "Sometimes, if I was too sick to see it that day, I'd have a nurse in the hospital record it for me so I could watch it when I woke up."

"Hospital?" Keagan asked.

"I was in the hospital a lot as a kid," Michelle said, "I have serious bronchitis and lung problems. I have an oxygen tank at home that I use fairly regularly, and I can't do much without getting too winded, or it could make me faint."

"Jeez, I'm so sorry."

"It's just part of my life, you know how it is, you get used to things," Michelle replied, looking out the window they were sitting by and smiling as she added, "But having the show made everything seem alright. Made everything seem like....like I would be okay, because I always had someone there for me even if my parents weren't. Beatrice was always there, always ready to teach me something new."

"People become extremely attached to media in ways that don't make sense," Keagan said, "at least not to others, and I think it's beautiful that we manage to connect to fictional things so deeply. In fact, I seem to be able to connect to fictional characters far better than real people these days, it feels like."

"You think it says something about the human brain?" Michelle asked.

"I think it says that we're so very desperate to be understood that we cling to even the smallest examples of fake people understanding us, that we can relate to. So many people aren't understood by the people they so deeply wish they were understood by, that when we find a fictional character who seems to 'get us', we feel lucky. We feel as if they were made just for us, you know?"

"I know."

The girls stopped and Michelle pulled her bowl back to her, continuing to eat her salad as Keagan sipped on her coffee. They'd agreed to meet here at this little bistro downtown, to finally maybe formulate a plan on how to find Beatrice using the knowledge that they had accrued, but most of the conversation thus far had been primarily about their own connections to the show, to Bea, and to media in general. Keagan told Michelle all about her love for lost media, and her quest to unearth as much of it as she could, and Michelle told Keagan all about her adoration for Beatrice and why she was so very determined to track her down.

"So," Keagan asked, "How do you propose we go about this?"

                                                                                                   ***

"Thank you for shopping with us, have a nice day," the young checkout woman said as she dropped the change into the older womans hands. The older woman, dressed in a very long raincoat and a scarf, her blonde hair tucked neatly into a dark blue beanie, took her change and grabbed her bags before heading out to the parking lot. She put her things into the trunk of her car, got in and started the engine, then began backing out when she noticed she'd almost hit a woman - completely oblivious to her surroundings due to walking while looking at her cell phone - and her young child. The woman immediately began approaching her window, shouting.

"Don't you ever look where you're driving?!" she yelled, rapping her knuckles on the window of the car, "You could've easily killed us! You should be more aware of your surroundings when you're in a vehicle!"

She couldn't take it. She started slamming her fists into her steering wheel and screaming, looking the woman right in her face through the window.

"Leave me the fuck alone!" she shouted, loud enough for passerbys to hear. This seemed to work well enough, as the woman and her child quickly turned heel and rushed away. She collected herself, backed out of the parking lot, and headed towards her next errand.

                                                                                                 ***

"Liam told me he'd met her at a show she did downtown. Perhaps she still frequents local theatre," Keagan said, "We could just go down there and see."

"How would we know? She wore a costume," Michelle said, "We never saw what her face looked like. Unless he's got a photo he's willing to lend you, I don't think that's going to do the trick."

"Oh...yeah, you're right. Dammit," Keagan stirred her coffee again and thought, chewing on her lip, "How about...well, no, I don't want to bother him anymore than we already have."

"Sounded like the poor guy's been through the ringer lately, so that's probably the right choice," Michelle replied, before adding, "...damn, how do you find someone who doesn't want to be found?"

"Wait, you have those episodes recorded right? In the end credits of shows, they always say where they're filmed at, what sound stage, what studio. Maybe we freeze frame it, figure out where they shot it and then go there for more information?"

"That's...not a bad idea, actually," Michelle said, "We could go back to my place and I could load it up so we can screenshot it."

A plan now coming together, the girls seemed happy, and it felt like things were starting to look up.

                                                                                                   ***

"I'm sorry, we don't know where it is," the drycleaner said, "It's...it's somewhere in here, but we can't find it at the moment. I know this is probably extremely upsetting, but please just be patient and I'll call you immediately when we find it."

"How do you lose clothes?! Your entire business is based around clothing!" the woman shouted, clearly agitated as she rubbed her hands against her face, "Okay, okay, I'm sorry. It's a mistake, I know you didn't mean it."

"We really don't, you've been coming here for years, you know we rarely have mistakes like this," the drycleaner said, "Tell you what, next cleaning is on the house, okay? Does that sweeten the deal?"

"It does ease the pain a little, yes," she replied, smiling for the first time that day, "Alright Gino, just...please find it. It was very important to me."

She stumbled back through the door, hearing the little bell ring overhead, and stopped on the sidewalk as a couple walked by with a large dog on a leash. The dog stopped and tried to smell her hands, then licked them gently. She smiled at this, then looked up at the couple.

"He seems very sweet," she said, "What's his name?"

"Corky," the woman holding the leash said, "He's usually scared of strangers, I'm surprised to see him act like this."

"Dogs have always liked me," the woman said, "I used to have a dog myself, so he probably can sense that. They can sense a lot of things people can't. That's why when you see footage of haunted houses with pets in them, they can always see the ghosts, they stare at the walls, because they can see things we can't. They're brilliant, loving animals."

She knelt down and stroked Corky's face, scruffing his ears a bit and smiling at him.

"You're a good boy, Corky," she said, "Thank you for the kisses."

After the couple led Corky away, she got back into her car and, fighting back tears, started up again to head on home. Her day was done, and it was time to relax, destress and have something to eat.

                                                                                                 ***

"Leslie Swann Studios," Keagan read, squinting her eyes as she leaned as close to the television as she could, "Jesus it's in such small print and it's such an old recording, it was kind of hard to make out but that's what it says. Goddamn my eyes hurt now."

"Leslie Swann Studios?" Michelle asked, quickly typing away into her browser and hitting 'search'; she scrolled a bit before finding something, "here we go, Leslie Swann Studios, downtown, here's the address right here. Public Access Television, she's the current owner and president, we could easily make an appointment to speak to her."

"Really? That's an option?"

"Well it says studio tour, but I'm sure if I asked to speak to her specifically I could finagle that," Michelle said, opening her e-mail and copy/pasting Leslie's address into the to field, before looking up at Keagan and asking, "...do we really wanna do this? What if all she wants is to be left alone?"

"That coming from you?"

"I know, it's weird, but...I want to meet her more than anyone else, but what if we're violating her space? Didn't Liam say she was, like, heartbroken over losing control of her lifes work and how it'd been treated? What if she just doesn't want to see anyone ever?"

"Well, she should've thought of that before she became a public icon," Keagan said, "Once you're in that line of work you basically forfeit all rights to privacy."

Keagan sat on the couch beside Michelle, and together they cobbled together a little e-mail to Leslie Swann. After they hit send, they got some Chinese food delivered and spent the evening just watching television and eating, waiting for a response. Finally, right as Keagan was getting her jacket on the head to work, a response blipped into Michelle's inbox.

"She says to come down tomorrow," Michelle said, "3pm."

"Well then let's get this party started," Keagan said, grinning.

The hunt was on.

                                                                                               ***

The door to her apartment opened, and the woman entered, dropping her grocery bags on her counter before heading into the living room to take off her coat and scarf. She hung them up neatly on the rack against the wall and then headed back to the kitchen to put her groceries away when she heard something fall. She turned to see a framed photo on the ground. She sighed and walked over, picking it up, reminding herself internally to get a new frame. This had been happening for months because the standee on the back had been broken for ages, and it wobbled, constantly falling off the table.

She held the photo in her hands and she smiled. There she was, younger and vibrant, her dog sitting right there by her side, the two of them licking a Vanilla ice cream cone. Her absolute favorite photo of her now deceased dog. She sat on the couch and continued looking at the photo, and ran her fingertips down the glass in the frame. The dog had been gone for a number of years by this point, she was used to the loneliness, but she still missed her incredibly so. But despite being deceased, the dog had lived on. After all, she'd modeled the costume after her.

The phone rang and voicemail picked it up. Liam spoke.

"Bea, it's Liam. Um, thank you for your message, it's....been hard lately, for me, and now that he's gone, I...I guess I just wanted to hear a familiar voice. Anyway, you don't have to call me if you don't want to, but I'd sure like to hear from you. I miss you. Everyone does. Bye."

Beatrice looked back at the photo and shook her head, pulling the frame to her chest and starting to cry. She'd never really dealt with loss well, and her grief had, over time, eaten up the majority of what was left inside of her emotionally. She just couldn't handle it anymore. Where had all the years gone? Where had her creativity died? Where had her drive diminished to? She no longer wanted to do anything, but doing nothing was also just as equally bad. She felt stuck. Bea stood up and placed the photo on the table again, then went back to the kitchen to start cooking dinner.

That night she had a nice dream, though. She dreamt she and her dog were together again, playing in a field, the field near her house where she'd grown up, and she was a little girl once more. God how she longed to feel her fingers running through that dogs fur, feel the warmth of its body pressed against hers as they slept in front of the fireplace during the winter, hear its bark when she came home from school every day. God how she missed that dog.

God how she missed Beatrice Beagle.

The sound of the dial clicking as she rolled through the channels, flipping past each one until finally landing on the one she was searching for, that was a sound she carried with her throughout the rest of her life. Even after getting home from the hospital, she tuned into the new episodes of Beatrice Beagle every Saturday morning, like clockwork. She'd hold her stuffed Beatrice that she'd gotten at the pizzeria gift shop, and she'd laugh and smile and sing along with the characters who had kept her company lo those many lonesome months in her hospital room as she struggled to breath properly. Her oxygen tank beside her, her tubes in her nose, Michelle couldn't be happier every Saturday morning than she was, and it was good too, because the brightness and the songs distracted from the screaming that went on behind her.

God, when had things gotten to be this way? When had things gotten to be that television was the only form of escape for little Michelle? All she knew was she was grateful for it. Beatrice was the doting mother she wished she could have, even if she only knew her and could feel her love emanating from the screen of a television once a week (or daily in reruns). Beatrice's warms words of wisdom became pieces of advice to live by, things that Michelle followed to a hilt in her day to day life, even as a little girl. She didn't have much choice, it wasn't as if her parents were going to give her anything like that. Sometimes Michelle would throw a big blanket over the television and herself, to try and keep the sounds of screaming and crying from creeping into the perfected puppet world she was immersed in. It only worked to a certain extent, and Beatrice's show only lasted a finite amount of time for each episode, after which the credits rolled and Michelle was once again thrust back into the world of familial misery.

But Beatrice...god how Beatrice saved her life, even moreso than the oxygen tank.

                                                                                                  ***

The closest Michelle ever got to meeting Beatrice was the animatronics at the pizzeria.

Oh sure, they had people in full character costumes walking around, but they weren't Beatrice, even Michelle knew this, because despite looking like her, they didn't sound like her. Beatrice was nothing without her soft wilting voice, and this was the key difference. But on the stage? During the showtimes? That was Beatrice, visually and audio wise. The thing about the people from Beatrice Beagle is they never did shows. They never ever did live performances. They never even did public appearances, so this was the only way Michelle could ever manage to get even remotely close to meeting her hero, and she took it in stride.

One night, while the pizzeria was preparing to close down and her parents were, likely, arguing in another part of the restaurant, Michelle snuck backstage during the downtime for the animatronics, and as she stood gazing up at this enormous robotic Beatrice, she couldn't help but feel safer than she ever had in her entire life. Michelle threw her arms around it and squeezed it tight, crying against its fur, wishing she could just stay here.

The plush doll she took home was a nice substitute, but nothing ever matched the animatronics, and that's why, ever since those days, Michelle had spent countless hours scouring the internet for any information on them. Often times things like these come up at auction, but she never once ran across any of them, and it broke her heart. All she wanted was a Beatrice all her own, a guard dog for her heart.

                                                                                                    ***

Sitting on her couch, her mask tightly on her face, Michelle continued searching for the animatronics online. This was her day off, and she'd spent most of it right there on the couch since it was raining outside. She didn't feel good enough to go downstairs into the basement and work on her project, so instead she was taking it kind of easy. As she clicked through to yet another site selling off pieces from now defunct business - be they theme parks, restaurants or schools - her landline rang. She glanced over her shoulder at it and sighed. She knew exactly who it was, even before the machine picked up.

"Michelle, it's your mother. Call me back when you get this, I'd like to talk to you about something regarding your father, thank you."

The message lasted a measly 15 seconds, and Michelle had absolutely no intention of calling her back tonight, or anytime soon really. The way she saw it, her parents could deal with one another themselves, because she'd already put up with more than enough. She turned her attention back to the webpage loading in front of her and sighed, typing into the search field "Beatrice Beagle".

Nothing, as always, came up.

                                                                                                  ***

The banging had started again.

Curling up under her blanket in her closet, squeezing her plush Beatrice to her chest tightly, Michelle knew that they'd never hit one another or break anything. It was always slamming doors and foot stomping. She hated it, though, the context didn't make it any less horrible to be around. She shut her eyes and cried against Beatrices head, wishing she could be anywhere else, especially at the pizzeria right then. When her father finally left that night, he didn't come back, and from that point on it was only Michelle and her mom. Not that this made things any better, her mother didn't become anymore open with her than she had been before, but at least the fighting stopped. No more screaming was worth the change, and Michelle took it for what it was.

She only saw her father a few times a year after that, and one of those times was for her 11th birthday, when he insisted he take her to the last remaining pizzeria that was about to shut down that coming week, for, as he put it, "old times sake". The way Michelle saw it, though, was that in order to do something for old times sake, you had to have enjoyed the old times enough to want to relive them, and aside from being at and loving the pizzeria, she didn't. Sitting at the table, eating greasy pizza that was nowhere near as good as childhood her had once thought it was, her father loosened his tie and leaned across the table, cupping his hands in an almost prayer like act of forgiveness.

"You know it wasn't about you, right?" he asked her, "I mean, your health issues didn't make things any better, but...but it was never about you."

"I know," Michelle said, picking pepperoni out of her braces, "I know that."

She knew it, sure, but she barely believed it. He and mom only seemed to fight when it came to the fact of her health. That always appeared to be the catalyst for their fights, even if he didn't want to openly cop to it. Michelle set her pizza down and looked around the restaurant, at its aging and poorly maintained technology, and realized that once this place shut down, the only place she'd ever really felt safe at as a child would be gone, and this made her want to hide and cry. She wiped her nose on her sleeve and sighed.

"Dad?" she asked, and he finished chewing, wiping his mouth with his napking.

"Yeah?" he asked, mouth still half full of pizza.

"...what happens to all this stuff when they shut down?"

"I don't really know, honestly," her dad said, "I guess they probably sell it at discount prices to whoever is the highest bidder, or maybe break it down and repurpose it all."

"So they're going to tear the animatronics apart?" Michelle asked, the fear of what was about to befall her beloved icons evident in her voice. He shrugged and scratched his forehead, clearly unsure if whether what he said was even remotely true or not. That had just been what he figured, that everything got recycled in the tech world because it was so expensive to rebuild it from scratch.

"I don't know, Shell, I really don't," he replied, "I'm not in this business, I have no idea what they do with all this stuff."

Seemed like no matter where she was, something was always tearing down the things she wanted to stick around, and she was completely incapable of stopping it from happening.

                                                                                                 ***

"You know," Michelle said, on the phone with her mother the following morning as she poured cereal into her bowl, "I don't really care whether dad wants to see me or not. I'm busy, I'm working now, so he'll have to see me when I have time."

"And where are you working?" her mother asked, always needing to know each and every detail.

"I'm an assistant," Michelle said, sitting down and eating her cereal dry, "I have to go. I'm going to be late for work."

With that, she hung up, but she was also lying. She wasn't going to be late for work, she'd called in sick. She was sick too, it wasn't a lie, she was having trouble breathing that day, and really needed to take it easy. Thankfully David understood her medical condition, and didn't make any issue of it. She was beginning to appreciate David more and more, and was growing grateful that she'd lucked out being told to meet him. As she scooped up a bunch of cereal into her mouth, her doorbell rang, and she rolled her eyes as she stood up to answer it, only to find - much to her surprise - Delores standing there.

"Hello!" Delores said, pushing her way in, cheerful as always.

"What...what are you doing here?" Michelle attempted to mumble, trying to keep cereal from following out from between her lips. Delores strolled inside, set her purse and coat down on the couch and turned around, looking at Michelle.

"I hope you don't think of this as an invasion of your privacy," she said, "I don't want to make you uncomfortable."

"It's...fine," Michelle said, even though it was so very clearly not fine, "Um...can I get you anything?"

"Oh goodness no, I'm only stopping by on my way to work, I just wanted to check in on you and make sure you were doing well. David told me you weren't feeling well, so I thought I'd drop in and see how you were doing."

"Oh, um, I mean, yeah...my...my breathing isn't super great right now and my chest has felt tight," Michelle said, "But, you know, I have my tanks and stuff, and as long as I take it easy I should be okay."

Delores leaned against the couch and sighed, shaking her head.

"I'm sorry, maybe me coming here was inappropriate," she said, "I just...I worry about you because of your health. I know I shouldn't, I know we barely know one another and that I just help you find employment, but, I can't help it. Nobody should have to feel scared when they're sick."

Something inside of Michelle warmed at hearing this. It had been a long time since someone had been so unashamedly kind towards her, especially in regards to her health. She knew Delores was nice, she'd always been nice, but this was a whole other level. Delores sighed and looked at Michelle.

"Well, I guess I should get going. I'm glad you're doing okay," she said, gathering up her coat and her purse.

"Um, do you...want to go get something to eat?" Michelle asked as she approached the door, making Delores stop and turn to face her.

"That would be delightful, yes," she said happily.

There was something about Delores that Michelle had never been able to grasp exactly, but she was beginning to think it was the same warmth that she felt coming from Beatrice. That same comfort and safety she had radiating off of her that made Michelle feel like she was actually okay around her, and that Delores - like Beatrice - would never do anything to hurt her. Sitting in a pancake house a few miles away shortly after, Delores told Michelle all about herself, and they shared a lot of laughs. It was the first Saturday morning Michelle had spent in ages not watching Beatrice Beagle reruns, and she didn't regret it for a second.

                                                                                                ***

Michelle could remember when the final episode aired, and she cried all the way through it. She was never going to see Beatrice again, and she knew this. Her parents, fighting as usual in the kitchen, were confused when they saw her run to her room, sobbing, clutching her Beatrice doll to her chest, and thought she was crying because of their argument. They would never have, in a million years, guessed it was because her favorite show, her only comfort in this world among all the pain and anger and sickness, had just been taken away from her.

It's amazing sometimes, Michelle would later think, how very little parents can actually know about their children.

Liam Grearson was sitting at a table by the window, sipping his coffee, bundled up against the oncoming storm when he heard the bell over the door ring. He glanced in that direction and spotted a young black woman enter, a scarf dangling around her neck, a backpack on her shoulders. She seemed to scan the cafe momentarily until her eyes met Liam's, and he nodded. She smiled and began approaching his table, seating herself.

"It's freezing out there," Keagan said, "It's the middle of March but it's still like it's winter."

"Winters are getting longer and colder everywhere," Liam said, taking another sip of his coffee, letting the flavor rest on his tongue, savoring it, before he opened his eyes again and noticed Keagan had pulled out a tape recorder.

"You don't...mind, do you?" she asked, motioning to the device, "I'd like to put it up on the site."

"...no, not at all, it's fine," Liam said, "So what exactly do you want me to say?"

"I have no idea, honestly," Keagan said, "Anything, really, would be appreciated. I'd love to hear some stuff about the production, your relationship to Marvin - I mean, if you're, you know, comfortable going into all that - or even, like...Beatrice herself? Because nobody knows anything about her."

"Believe me," Liam said, leaning back in his chair, "That's exactly how she wants it."

This caught Keagan's attention, and she settled in, prepared to hear a story.

"So," Liam continued, "I guess I should tell you about how I met Beatrice."

                                                                                               ***

Liam Grearson was 19 years old, and attempting to live his dream of acting. He'd loved the theatre ever since he'd been a little boy, and the only thing he'd ever really wanted was to perform for people. He didn't care what the material was (so long as it wasn't absolute trash) and he wasn't picky, he merely did anything he could get his hands on, but lately things hadn't been going so well. Offers had all dried up, going to people much more handsome than he was, theatre boys willing to do the things that Liam wasn't willing to do in order to land the parts he so desired. So he began searching for work elsewhere, only to find it in the most unexpected place.

"You have to see this to believe it," his roommate at the time, a young woman named Hazel, told him, "It's this totally surreal thing, it's unlike anything you've seen on stage, I guarantee it."

"I still don't really understand what it is," Liam said as she dragged him up the street in the frigid fall weather to the small unknown theatre.

"I've been back like eight times already, just trust me," Hazel said, and Liam did.

They seated themselves, a small but thoroughly packed crowd surrounding them, and only after a bit did the lights finally dim and the curtain rose. A dog house was sitting on the stage, and next to it, in a full body dog suit, like a theme park mascot, was a adult sized Beagle. Instantly, Liam was hooked. Quiet music, not somber but uplifting, played in the background (clearly something that was on a loop on a CD player nearby, not being performed live), and Beatrice turned to face the crowd.

"We only live so long," she said, "And yet we feel so much more than you do. We know so much more than you do. We experience life on a grander more intense scale in a shorter amount of time. When you collapse seven years into one year, it's guaranteed to assume that life speeds up. Everything comes faster, everything feels stronger, and everything's over quicker."

Beatrice leaned against the doghouse and looked down at her bowl. She sighed and folded her arms.

"And then, we're replaced. You don't replace other members of your family. You don't get new grandparents when the old ones die. And while so many might claim that dogs aren't replaceable, that all you're doing is bringing another new friend home, we know that's bullshit. You miss the companionship, not the dog. You replace us for selfish reasons, not out of grief. We know this, and yet...we love you still the same. With the same ferocity that we always would've, because we're forgiving, loyal and understanding creatures."

Liam's jaw had dropped. Hazel wasn't wrong, this was unlike anything he'd ever seen before on the stage, and he was so thankful he had allowed her to drag him down here. After the show ended, Liam waited as Hazel went to the coffee house a few blocks down to wait for him. Liam wanted to meet the woman who had created this character, this magnificently deep and human like dog. When she finally exited out the back, she was surprised to find him waiting there. He almost didn't recognize her, until he noticed the dog head under her arm.

"Hey," Liam said, "I'm...I wanted to congratulate you."

"...oh," she replied, her voice low, her eyes flighty.

She had light skin and strawberry blonde hair, not exactly curly but bouncy; her face was adorned with freckles, and her eyes were home to the longest pair of natural lashes Liam had ever seen. She was so very the opposite of what he expected. He expected theatre girls, especially weird ones, to be quirky and boisterous, loud and obnoxious, but Beatrice...she was intensely reserved.

"Well, thank...thank you," she said, shaking his hand, "um...thank you for coming, I'm glad you enjoyed it."

"You just...you speak so eloquently, and with such depth, it was really something else," Liam said, walking alongside her now down the street, presumably to her car.

"I'm always surprised to find people on the other side of the curtain every time it parts. I always expect it to be empty, even after the sold out shows for the last few weeks," Bea said, "Can you hold this?"

She handed the head off to Liam, who looked at it. It was so expertly crafted, so intricately detailed. He was surprised, he'd never seen anything like this this well done before. He watched as she opened up a junky old beaten up car and began loading her things into the trunk. After a bit she turned and he gave the head back to her.

"Um, listen, would you like to meet sometime again, and, I don't know, discuss ideas for projects?" he asked.

"You're not an agent are you?" she asked, sounding cautious.

"Hah! No, thank god no. No, I'm just another theatre dork, looking to do what you're doing, honestly," Liam said, and this made her smile. She agreed to meet him again, and they exchanged phone numbers. Liam was so excited for whatever the future might hold that night that he barely slept, and he'd barely sleep for the rest of the time he knew her.

                                                                                                     ***

"The thing about Beatrice that you need to understand," Liam said, now leaning forward and cupping his mug tightly with his hands, "is that she doesn't...god, how do I put this...Beatrice isn't just a woman who created this thing that was bastardized. She really IS the Beagle. It's...it's not a character to her."

"What does that mean?" Keagan asked, probing a bit further, licking her coffee off her lips.

"Phew, um," Liam scratched his forehead with his pinky, "Beatrice was the most intense person I ever knew, which doesn't make sense because she was so quiet and collected. Intensity, when you think of it in a person as a trait, you think they're explosive and adventurous, but Beatrice wasn't like that. Everything was calculated to her. She didn't act on something without it being planned to perfection, beat by beat. That's what I admired most about her, was the fact that she...she was so dedicated to what she did. That's why I hate myself for meeting her, because...I ruined her life."

"What?" Keagan asked, surprised by this admission, "How could you have-"

"Because I'm the one who told her to take it wider," Liam said.

                                                                                                        ***

The last day Liam Grearson saw Beatrice was a week after the show wrapped indefinitely. The set still hadn't been broken down, and Bea was sitting on the reinforced foam wall next to the doghouse. She was in full costume, and the lights were low in the studio. Liam opened the door, coming back to pick up a few things he'd left the night before when he had been here with a few cast members partying when he noticed Bea sitting by herself. He shoved his pockets into his coat pockets and walked across the room, plopping himself down on the wall beside her.

"Everything's gonna be okay," Liam said.

"Do you know what it's like to watch something you love die twice?" Beatrice asked, pulling the dog head off her own and looking into its eyes, her hair still up in a messy bun, her glasses sliding off her face, "...something you...you never wanted to lose in the first place, but now you've lost it twice?"

"I'm not sure I understand," Liam said softly.

"...nobody would," Bea said, "...why did this happen?"

"The place went bankrupt, chains aren't bringing in money anymore, and so-"

"No, not that. Why did I allow you to trick me into selling it all to hawk some food?" she asked, sounding angry, an emotion he rarely heard her display, "...you turned something personal into...into a mascot. She wasn't a mascot, she was Beatrice. You bastardized her for the money."

"For you!" Liam said, "I did it for you! So you could go on and do something else! So you...you wouldn't be stuck doing this for years in the same dingy little unknown downtown theatre holes! You have so much talent, Bea! You just need to-"

"I liked what I was doing!" Beatrice said, standing up, her eyes emptier than they'd ever been before, "I was happy doing what I was doing! Then you showed up and ruined all of it!"

He didn't know how to react to that. Bea got out of the costume, now standing in just her leotard on the set, and slung the whole thing over her shoulder, the head under her arm as it had always been when not on her shoulders, and then she turned and walked out. Liam didn't follow her. He waited a bit, but she never came back. And they never spoke again.

                                                                                                  ***

"She wouldn't take my calls," Liam said, "She wouldn't talk to me, no matter what I did, so I just...I gave her her space."

"You loved her," Keagan said quietly.

"In a way, like a child, yeah. Even though we were about the same age, she...she was so much younger than me in so many ways. She has the brain of a six year old, she never grew up, really, and she's able to connect to children. I betrayed what she held most dear, and the only right thing to do was let her go. She was my best friend for a long time, but she wasn't wrong, I'd sold the whole thing under so we could hopefully make something more out of our lives afterwards, but that's the thing about Beatrice that I never once considered...she never needed more. She was fine playing that dog for as long as she lived."

"Jeez," Keagan said, her tape stopping. She took it out of the recorder and flipped it over, sliding it back in and starting again, "So...where is she now?"

"Far as I know, she could be anywhere. But, and I hesitate to show you this but I feel like I should, she did send me this after Marvin died," Liam said, pulling his cell phone from his pocket and, opening up his e-mail, pulled up an unlisted Youtube video. It was only a mere 45 seconds long, but it loaded instantly. It was her, Beatrice, in the suit, sitting in what looked like a childs room.

"Hello Liam," she said, "I know we haven't spoken in ages, and this likely isn't the most direct method of communication, but it's what I feel most comfortable with. I want you to know I am thinking of you in these hard times. Marvin was a good friend to all of us. I miss you, and I hope you are well. I hope you don't take this too hard."

And with that, the video cut to black. Keagan was beside herself, she couldn't believe what she'd just seen. She handed the phone back to Liam and wiped her eyes on her sleeve.

"I know," Liam said, commenting on her reaction, "She has that effect on people."

"I need you to help me find her," Keagan said.

"I don't even know how," Liam said.

"This woman needs to be spoken to," Keagan said, "She needs to understand the impact she had that she might be unaware of."

"I'm not disagreeing, I just have no idea where she could be," Liam said.

"Well," Keagan stated, "Everyone leaves a paper trail. We just need to find it."

                                                                                                ***

Keagan got home late that night, and then went to work. When she got off of work, she had only one thing on her mind. She stayed up late into the early morning, working on Liam's audio and cutting their conversation into something worthy listening to, but she didn't post it to the site like she'd claimed. Instead Keagan opened an e-mail and addressed it to Michelle, then added the audio as an attachment. She knew only one other person would truly appreciate what this was, and she was happy to have that person to share it with.

When she woke up the following afternoon, she had a one sentence e-mail response from Michelle, which read: "This is so sad. I wish I knew what happened to her."

Keagan responded back with a similarly simplistic message: "I'm working on it. Maybe we should meet."

That little red flashing light on her answering machine, something she rarely took pleasure in seeing, made Keagan nervous. It was usually reserved for bad news of one form or another from her parents, or yet another IT job turning her down after numerous interviews, likely because of her skin color. These were the breaks being a young, black woman in a predominantly white world (in general, but even of technology). She braced herself for whatever was about to play over the speakers as her finger hovered on the button and finally pressed "play", but nothing could've prepared her for what actually came out of her machine.

"You knew nothing about Marvin, or his life, and yet here you are proudly proclaiming his death like news instead of a personal loss for those who knew him," the voice said, clearly furious, "This wasn't an event for that should've been used for click throughs, he wasn't even famous enough for that sort of thing, and your immediate publication is abhorrent, quite frankly. Maybe think twice before you do this again."

Keagan sat on the arm of the couch in her apartments tiny living room, rubbing her face in frustration. She'd always tried to be so careful when doing her work, but occasionally it was bound to happen that she'd upset someone one way or another. Seemed no matter what she did, work or just existing, being a black woman made her irritate others, and this was so very unfair. But there was not much she could do but soldier on, and know she was better.

She didn't erase the message.

                                                                                                   ***

"Excuse me?" a voice asked, making Delores look up from her desk, stopping mid sentence scrawl.

"Yes?"

"There's someone here without an appointment," the man said, before stepping aside and allowing Michelle to present herself, looking timid as ever. Delores smiled and nodded, letting the intern know he could be on his way. Michelle pulled up a chair and seated herself, her hands wringing themselves.

"What are you doing here? We just met the other week," Delores said, then added, while checking her watch, "Hell, likely hasn't even been a week. Is everything okay?"

"I...I want to work in entertainment," Michelle said, "Do you have, like, any jobs in entertainment?"

"Well, do you have any skills that would help you in that field?" Delores asked.

"Um, I mean, I do a lot of work around my house, painting and hammering and stuff, I...I could build sets, maybe," Michelle said, embarrassed that, once again, she'd forgotten that, in fact, no, she didn't have any skills. None that would benefit her in gaining employment, anyway. Delores cupped her hands and sighed, smiling.

"Michelle, sweetheart, you know I'd love to help you find something, so maybe meet me halfway and do me a favor. Maybe take a course in media, something that could then help you access that field of work. I'll even help you, I'll pay for it."

This surprised Michelle, and this surprise apparently wasn't noticed by Delores, who couldn't help but laugh as she started to flip through her roladex and find an address, name and number she could copy down onto an index card for Michelle.

"I'm a helpful person, Michelle, otherwise I wouldn't work in a business dedicated to helping people help themselves," Delores said, "Take this information and meet this friend of mine, he runs a creative writing workshop, but he also has his hands in many other things. He'll be able to help you find your place, and, as I said, don't worry about payment, he'll charge me if he has to."

"...th...thank you," Michelle said, stuttering as she leaned across the desk and took the index card, slipping it into her bookbag. She looked back at Delores, who was watching her ever closely, her eyes wide and brimming with an emotion that Michelle somehow knew but couldn't recognize. After a few seconds, Delores smiled and told Michelle to let her know how it turned out, and that was that. Soon Michelle was back out the door and into the world, ready to try something new.

                                                                                               ***

"I'm so sick of it," Keagan said, eating from a leftover carton of misordered fries as she and her co-worker, Lexi, sat at a table together during their break; she wiped her salt and grease covered hands on her pants and continued, "like, I apply, I get nothing, and I can totally tell it's my race that's factoring in because when they call me to schedule an interview, they don't know I'm black, so they sound pretty interested in having a woman on their team, likely as a model example of 'progressiveness', but then when they see I'm black, all that enthusiasm is just gone, man."

"That's bullshit," Lexi said, parting her gorgeous blonde hair from her eyes and taking a handful of fries, shoveling them into her mouth, "I really shouldn't be eating this, this job is the worst, it's going to make me gain so much weight."

"Please, like you'd look bad even if you did," Keagan said, making Lexi smirk. She had a point, after all, Lexi was stunning, and wasn't the kind of woman you'd normally see working in what most of society considered 'low wage slave work', but because her father had been arrested on tax evasion and they'd lost all their money, it had befallen Lexi to help now earn money for her mother and little sister, while still trying to attend college for her physics degree. She was tall and lithe, had a jaw structure that mirrored any woman on a fashion show catwalk, and had piercing green eyes. Keagen was quite the opposite; not short, but shorter than Lexi certainly, with her frizzy black hair and large brown eyes.

"Well, at least you know there'll always be a place for you, among the fry lords," Lexi said, making Keagan laugh. Certainly, she had to admit that being a part of the late night shift team had its upsides, like all the excess food and, of course, the company of Lexi, who Keagan felt a little bad about liking more than she probably should.

"What are you doing this weekend?" Keagan asked, licking the hot salt from her fingertips.

"I'm actually going to spend most of this weekend holed up in what my mom calls my bedroom but I call a hovel, and try and catch up on some of the coursework I've been neglecting lately," Lexi said, "You're free to come by if you want, but it won't be very fun, I assure you."

"I think I'll pass, thanks," Keagan said, sighing as she glanced out the window at the darkness outside. She couldn't get the phone message off her mind. She knew exactly who it was too, thanks to her recently brief but spectacular obsession with Beatrice Beagle. It was Liam Grearson, the man who played Beatrice's Cactus. In fact, she recognized his voice instantly thanks to the few clips she'd managed to scrounge up in her search. But she'd never heard him be that mad at anyone on the show, despite playing a fairly cantankerous character.

So his tone had certainly unnerved her.

                                                                                                ***

Liam Grearson had only gotten more bitter over the years, since the show had gone off the air.

He'd never been this way during its production, so this change of attitude made even himself confused, let alone the few people from the cast he was still in steady contact with, like Marvin. The last time he'd seen Marvin Burgis had been a whole month before he'd unceremoniously shot himself in the head, at a deli between their respective houses where they often met for lunch. They were the only two who were in regular contact with one another these days, most of the rest of the cast had splintered off, and Beatrice herself? Nobody had heard from her in years. It was almost like she'd been a figment of their imagination, the way she so easily vanished into thin air. But Marvin and Liam paid no mind to that, they didn't even discuss the show when they had lunch together. To the two of them, that was a period of their life that they'd been hostage for, and now were meeting as POW's after being rescued by the gracious hand of cancellation.

Now, sitting alone at this deli, Liam couldn't help but feel like everyone who saw him here regularly could tell something was missing from the picture, that thing being Marvin. The two had been such a mainstay in the deli, together, that seeing only one of them almost made anyone who'd ever noticed them, and now noticed this change, immediately aware something had changed. It wasn't like Liam was going to stand up and give them all an explanation for why Marvin wasn't here anymore, or where he'd gone to (it was, after all, nobodies business but his and Marvin's alone, as he saw it), but he also didn't like being judged by their eyes and the sad looks on their faces. Liam set his menu down and folded his hands together, waiting for his waitress to bring his sandwich. The same thing he'd always ordered with Marvin, and it wasn't like Marvin wasn't here. He was. He was just in a jar across from him now, and ashes don't need to eat.

The gall of that girl, the audacity to think she had any right to print about Marvin's death as if anyone but a few random weirdos on the internet would even understand who he was, or why he did what he did. It wasn't like Beatrice Beagle had been a show that had widespread critical acclaim, a heavily well regarded darling of the Thursday night lineup. It had been a kids show, generally used to sell the viewing children on insisting their parents take them to the pizza place it was so shamelessly made for.

Yet...he couldn't help but feel a tad thankful that those few 'weirdos', as he so kindly put it, did in fact remember Marvin, and took a moment to mourn his life. His waitress set his plate with his sandwich down in front of him, and looked at him.

"Need anything else, Liam?" she asked.

"I'm okay, thanks," Liam replied, reminding himself to tip her generously before he left, before picking up his sandwich and preparing to take a bite before stopping, cutting it in half, putting the other half on a napkin and sliding it across the table, where it sat in front of Marvin's urn. He knew it couldn't be eaten. It was just a habit, and habits are the hardest thing to break.

                                                                                                   ***

"Delores sent you?" the man asked, sitting on his desk as Michelle sat in front of him, nodding almost apologetically, as if she were somehow stealing his time by doing what Delores had told her to do.

"Yes, I...I'm not sure why, because what you do, what you teach, that...that isn't something I'm looking into doing. I was more interested in set building, set dressing, that sort of thing," Michelle said, "I like working with my hands."

"And people who write things don't?" the man, whom Michelle had learned since showing up at his office unannounced, was named David, asked, definitely with a tone suggesting that he was joking with her; he continued, "I can see what I have for you to do around here, if you'd like, but I can't guarantee it'll be anything worthwhile or even enough to be considered employment. I suppose, in the meantime, you can work for me directly, be my assistant."

"Do you need an assistant?" Michelle asked.

"Not really, but I'm trying to do you a favor via Delores doing one for you," David said, "So if you want to stop going to her office and being sent to interviews for jobs you don't really even want that you can't even really do, then why not take the offer? I can pay you fairly well for doing next to nothing."

Michelle considered this. It would make her mother, on the rare occasion they spoke once a month, stop asking her about her employment, and it would also give Michelle something to do besides sit around and mope. Besides, David had a point, she was tired of winding up in jobs where she was forced to stand for hours at a kiosk in a mall trying to hawk shoddy electronics only seen on late night television infomercials. She smiled at David and agreed to take the job, which seemed to make him happy. Michelle figured she should call Delores and thank her for the suggestion and the help, but she also figured she might just know because David might tell her, they seemed to be close enough friends after all.

Michelle left the office that evening and headed home, thinking about her project in the basement. She would need to work on it for longer periods of time in her off hours now that she had employment, and she should likely stock up on materials too. She'd been running out of nails for a while now, but only hadn't bought more because she preferred to use the money she had for more "important" things, like groceries. So, Michelle stopped by the local hardware on the way home and bought a few boxes of nails, along with treating herself to a new hammer that felt better in her hands, thanks to its softer handle grip.

When she got home, she immediately checked her e-mail and noticed a response from Keagan, something she hadn't really expected. So opened the e-mail to find it had a file attached to it, and all Keagan had written with it was, "you aren't going to believe this".

Why she was sending this to Michelle, when they'd never even met, didn't make much sense, but perhaps Keagan simply enjoyed - much like Michelle did - the fact that they both knew about Beatrice Beagle. So Michelle pulled out her headphones, attached them to her laptop and downloaded the file, then opened it and listened. It was a re-recording of the message Liam had left for Keagan, and, much like Keagan had herself, Michelle too instantly recognized his voice, along with the ire in it. After the message ended, she didn't really know what to think, until a moment later when a new e-mail flew into her inbox, again from Keagan, again with a file attachment and a single sentence that read, "you aren't going to believe this either."

It was another voicemail from Liam, but much different.

                                                                                                     ***

when Keagan got off work that night, she drove Lexi home and then went home to make dinner. While she waited for her water to boil, she checked her cell phone and saw no response to her earlier e-mail to Michelle, so she walked into the living room to plug her phone in to charge when she spotted yet another blinking light on her answering machine. She pressed play, only to hear Liam's voice once again flood the room over her speakers, but this time...this was different. This was almost...jovial.

"I'd like to apologize for the message I left the other day," Liam said, in a voice far closer to his role on the show than his previous message, "I'd actually like to talk to you, if you're interested. I think I could help maybe give you more insight into Marvin, and the show. I looked into what you do, with lost media, and I think we could help one another out if you're interested. Give me a call please."

He left his number and Keagan jotted it down on her palm, then leaned against her couch.

What a weird few days it had been, she thought.

That's when she heard her water boiling over, swore loudly, and raced to the kitchen to save her dinner.

                                                                                                ***

That night, lying in bed with her tubes in her nose, breathing in best she could, Michelle replayed the second message Liam had left Keagan repeatedly. She listened to his voice, a voice she hadn't heard anything new in for years, and shut her eyes. Michelle smiled to herself and let Liam's voice carry her off to sleep.

When she was finally taken home from the hospital, she asked her mother if she could get a cactus, something her mother didn't understand but reluctantly agreed to nonetheless. She and Michelle visited the garden section of their local superstore, and Michelle picked out a cactus that most closely resembled Liam's character on the show, and named it after him. She kept it on her desk in her bedroom for years, and even now, it was seated in its pot on her current desk by her bed.

Now with this new voice, it was almost as if Liam had never left, unlike Beatrice.

And she was so grateful for it.

Michelle Helm, arguably, didn't have much to look forward to each day in the hospital.

Aside from the treatments that often took her out of her room and into a different, yet vaguely identical room, she didn't have much that lifted her spirits. She never had visitors, and she often was alone for long stretches of time, doing what little homework she could stomach to do on her own. But every day at exactly noon, she knew she could flip the television that was bolted to the ceiling at the end of her bed to Channel 3, and she'd be greeted by the familiar face of her only real friend...Beatrice Beagle.

Despite Michelle being almost ten now, and Beatrice Beagle having always been skewered towards a younger demographic, she still tuned in because it was the only thing that managed to continually brighten her spirits in these sad times. Beatrice Beagle was a kids show full of songs, puppetry and the lead herself, a large anthropomorphic beagle, who was always eager to help others and was kind to a fault. This was the sort of person Michelle wanted not only to be, but also to have around her. In a world so seemingly fraught with endless cruelty, Michelle craved kindness and niceties.

Perhaps that's why the news of Marvin Burgis's suicide hit Michelle so hard when she came upon it one afternoon.

"Star of forgotten childrens television show 'Beatrice Beagle' dies in apparent suicide" was all the headline read, and it had a picture of Marvin Burgis, the man who had played the ever friendly neighbor to Beatrice. Sitting there, staring at this photo - the only photo she'd ever seen of him - Michelle couldn't help but feel like someone close to her had died. Which was an odd thing to feel, she had to admit, considering she never felt that way when her father had keeled over months prior.

                                                                                          ***

"Miss Helm?" the voice asked, bringing her back to the moment. The voice belonged to the woman sitting across the table from her, an older woman with big hair and a lot of jewelry on who was smiling at her; she continued, "I was going to ask if you'd been looking for work since we last spoke."

"Uh, y-yes," Michelle said, handing her a handful of papers clipped together, which the woman happily took and quickly thumbed through.

"Lots of applications here," the woman said, "Seems you've been busy. Anyone called back or e-mailed you yet?"

"No, not yet," Michelle said, looking down at her hands in her lap, playing with her press on nails.

"Well, don't get discouraged. Somebody will, it just takes time," the woman said, filing the applications into a manila folder and sliding it into her desk drawer before cupping her hands on the tabletop and leaning on it, lowering her voice, "...is everything else okay with you right now Miss Helm? You seem distracted. How's your health been?"

"It's been, you know...okayish," Michelle said, embarrassed to discuss this with someone in the unemployment office. She never could understand why this woman seemed so interested in her personal life.

"Well, just monitor your health and keep on trying, I'm sure something will turn around eventually," the woman said, smiling at her as she began wrapping their meeting up. Afterwards, Michelle walked down the stairs of the unemployment office and headed across the street to the pharmacy, needing a refill on her medications. She stood in the dental hygiene aisle as she waited for them to be filled, closely examining every type of new toothpaste she had never seen. Once her medications were filled and bagged, she headed back to where she'd parked her electric bike, climbed aboard and started the motor, heading home.

By the time Michelle Helm got home, it had just started pouring, and she was grateful for having avoided getting soaked. She hung her coat and trapper hat up on the coatrack by the door and then headed to the kitchenette. She made a cup of coco and took out a small piece of cheesecake she'd kept in the freezer before sitting in front of a long vertical mirror leaned against the wall in the living room and watched herself eat and drink, never once saying a word. Afterwards she sat and continued to stare at herself, almost as if waiting for her reflection to do something.

After a while, she finally stood up and went to take a shower. Once out of the shower, she sat on her bed and played the same record she'd had since she was a little girl - one which featured original songs by the cast of Beatrice Beagle that was only given away as promotional item at the pizzeria - while she painted her nails and ate from a large tub of black licorice she kept by her bedside. For all intents and purposes, Michelle Helms was not a well woman, but she was trying at least.

                                                                                            ***

The last job Michelle had held was selling high powered juicers at a small booth in the mall.

It hadn't paid a lot, and it wasn't all that glamorous, but it was a job and she had always been told to be "appreciative of those who would hire a cripple", even if she wasn't outwardly physically disabled.

Standing behind this little booth, Michelle would people watch; stare down the couples sitting at the food court enjoying lunch, or watch the groups of pre-teen girls huddled around the fountain gabbing with all their friends. She liked people when they weren't involved with her. She enjoyed studying them from afar, like she was a biologist deep in the jungle, taking notes on a species she didn't understand.

During her lunch breaks, she would sit out back by the dumpsters and eat soft pretzels while watching her digitally transferred episodes of Beatrice Beagle on her phone, until one day when a few other employees came out for a smoking break and found her doing this, and thusly made so much fun of her that she quit that very day.

She kept a juicer for collateral.

These days, when she wasn't sitting at home with tubes in her nose so she could breath, Michelle was often working on her project in her basement, or rather, the basement that was in the house she (or her mother, actually, but she tried to forget that as often as possible) was renting for her. It took a lot of time, a lot of power tools and materials, but she was going to see it through to the end. Sometimes she'd get so tired and overworked by her own project she'd almost faint and would wind up crashing on the couch for a few hours, breathing apparatus hooked up while she made smoothies in her stolen juicer and watched kids shows on PBS.

Michelle still had the occasional doctors appointment to check in on her health, make sure her oxygen levels were adequate, and get refills for things, but for the most part, she didn't go to the doctor often. Not like she had as a child, anyway. It was just another way to pass the time, or at the very least that's how she saw it, and while she acted cordial during these routine and extremely mundane visits, she couldn't help but be thinking how unfair it was that she had to be doing this at all. So many other people didn't have to do this, and that frustrated her. The audacity of those people, with their 'clean bill of health'. Made her want to wretch.

And then came the day she turned on her laptop and saw the headline on the top of a news aggregator.

""Star of forgotten childrens television show 'Beatrice Beagle' dies in apparent suicide". Marvin Burgis's face front and center. Sitting there, staring at the photo of a man she'd never met yet somehow felt she knew deeply was...unsettling. Michelle wanted to cry. Instead, she began to furiously do research into Marvin Burgis, but - as always was the case when researching anything Beatrice Beagle related - she came up with virtually nothing. Nothing except the same old things that always cropped up; old ratty commercials that were barely viewable through the television fuzz and an occasional mention when the pizzeria inevitably popped up on another list article about "10 unknown defunct chain restaurants". Nobody ever mentioned the show, nobody ever mentioned the mascot, nobody ever mentioned Beatrice. It was always only the pizzeria, and for a long time this complete lack of utter acknowledgement began to make Michelle question from time to time whether or not she'd simply imagined the whole thing.

Until the day Marvin Burgis died, and that article finally, after all this time, finally mentioned something of note:

"He was most known for playing the role of the kind neighbor Mr. Buckler on the Saturday morning kids show Beatrice Beagle. Nobody from the show has commented as of yet on this."

Nobody from the show may have commented yet on what had happened, but someone had written this article, and someone had remembered the show. Michelle scrolled back up to see the name of the person who wrote this piece up was, and was granted her wish.

The name read simply "Keagan Stills".

                                                                                               ***

Keagan Stills was a 22 year old black woman who, during the night, worked at a local fast food place.

But in her spare time, she dedicated her waking hours to drudging up whatever she could about lost media. Keagan had always been fascinated with media, but especially the concept of lost media. How could anything recorded go missing? It just seemed impossible to comprehend. Isn't the whole concept of recording something for the sake of posterity? So that we, collectively, remember it? Didn't seem right that something of that nature would up and vanish. But a few years ago, Keagan ran across some information in regards to a virtually unknown Saturday morning kids show called Beatrice Beagle, and was hooked instantly.

Sadly, as Keagan knew full well by this point, becoming obsessed with something that was virtually unknown and universally forgotten, it made it hard to find anything in regards to it. She scoured the internet, occasionally finding clips and whatnot, until she finally came across an interview with a local theatre in Chicago where Marvin Burgis was performing in a play, and the interviewer had asked him about his role in Beatrice Beagle. He laughed it off, talked briefly about it, and that's when Keagan knew she had an opportunity to find out more. So she tracked down Marvin Burgis and they spoke on the phone a few times. But that had been years ago. She hadn't heard from him since by the time he'd took his own life, and still...having to write that report hurt deep inside.

But when she read through the comments posted to her article, she saw one that caught her eye.

Who was this Michelle Helm? Why did she seem to know exactly what Keagan knew about the show? And how could they work together to track down more? Turns out Marvins suicide would be a rather warped blessing in disguise.

                                                                                                ***

"How's your breathing?" her doctor asked, sitting in front of her, looking over her chart.

"It's okay. Sometimes it's labored, like if I exercise or do something physical, but it's mostly okay. Though I've started using the tank more in general," Michelle replied, "Is that bad? To rely that heavily on it?"

"No, not at all, whatever makes you feel better," her doctor replied, setting the chart down and looking at her, smiling, he added; "What are you doing that's so physically demanding, if you're not working, might I ask?"

"I'm...building something," Michelle said, almost smiling, "um, it's a personal project. But yeah, it takes a lot of effort to saw wood and hammer stuff, so. But I make sure to take breaks, and I make sure to get my tanks refilled and stuff."

"Good, good, that's good to know that you're taking it seriously," her doctor replied.

As Michelle exited the doctors office and back out onto the street, where her electric bike was parked, she received an e-mail from malarky@lostandfound.net and opened it only to discover it was from Keagan. She hadn't expected the person who wrote the article to actually reach out to her and make contact, but she did, and as Michelle's eyes hovered over the text, skimming it carefully, she couldn't believe what she was reading.

"My name is Keagan Stills. I'm contacting you because of a comment you left on an article I posted. We should talk. I've also been looking for people who know about Beatrice Beagle, and if you'd like to, I think we could work together to find out more, possibly. Here's my phone number, and here's my work schedule. I'd like to meet you, Michelle. I think we could find Beatrice."

All that time people watching, Michelle thought, and it finally paid off.

Standing at the podium in the gymnasium, looking out at the faces of all these kids, Natasha couldn't help but feel awful as her eyes, after scanning the crowd, finally landed on her own daughters face, and she saw how fraught with worry and fear it was. It broke her heart to see Violet feeling that way, and Natasha finally knew what she had to do.

"I don't know why I'm here, honestly," Natasha said, "I've been asked to speak because, apparently, I know how to take care of myself, and therefore I must know how to teach others to take care of themselves too, and take care of one another. But...if your own parents couldn't do it, then what makes someone think I can?"

The room had all the air sucked out of it, and you could've heard a pin drop. Courtney and Violet looked at one another, and Courtney broke out in an enormous grin. This was going to be a good assembly.

                                                                                                  ***

Natasha awoke the day of her school speech with a feeling of absolute dread in her gut. She exhaled slowly and then wearily climbed out of bed. As her feet touched the floor, she could just sense today was going to be different, but she wasn't entirely sure why. So Natasha took a shower, got dressed and then headed downstairs to make some breakfast. She cooked up some bacon and hashbrowns and eggs and then called back up the stairs to Violet, who came down momentarily afterwards, seeming somewhat deflated and quiet. Violet sat the table as her mother served her breakfast, and she picked at the food, nibbling a bit here and there. Natasha seated herself across from Violet and ate as well, neither of them looking at one another.

"please don't do it," Violet finally managed to whisper, still refusing to look up at her mother.

Natasha opened her mouth to respond, but instead shook her head and continued eating. She knew there was absolutely nothing she could say short of agreeing to back out that would make Violet happy. All she wanted was a chance to reach kids with her message of taking care one themselves and one another, and this was a good starting point. She wasn't ready to give up on that just yet, even if Violet pleaded with her. After breakfast, Natasha cleaned up her things and did all the dishes before getting into the car to drive Violet to school, but Violet decided to walk instead. This act of indifference really said something to Natasha about just how deeply upset Violet was with her decision, and that stung her heart quite a bit, but she ignored it, put the car in drive and took off for the station.

Violet spent a good hour just trying to get to school, and was about 15 minutes late when she finally arrived on campus. She told her homeroom teacher that their car had had trouble, and the teacher didn't give her any flack. Violet seated herself at a table in the back, empty and away from all her peers, and decided to read while the morning announcements ran over the loudspeaker. Once the bell rang, Violet got up and went to her first class, but - and this would be the trend for the day - she didn't pay any attention. She merely coasted through class, and didn't care two bits. Way she saw it, if her own mother didn't care enough about her to not speak at her school, why should she care about herself?

                                                                                           ***

"I'd be so paranoid if I were you," Jay said, sitting in the stations kitchen with Natasha as he ate his breakfast that he'd brought from a local nearby fast food place. Natasha shook her head and pushed her hair out of her eyes.

"I am paranoid, please don't think I'm not," she replied, "But I think it's a worthy thing to do. I'm more annoyed, actually, at how Violet is reacting to it more than I am worried how well I'll get through to the other kids."

"Kids are weird, who knows why she's acting that way," Jay said, biting into his sandwich as Sharla came in and poured herself a cup of coffee, then leaned on the counter and sipped it as she watched them.

"Don't you usually bring coffee?" Natasha asked, and Sharla nodded.

"Yeah, but I didn't have the time this morning," she said, "Which is a shame, cause I really hate office coffee."

"Well, good thing for you is that we're hardly an office and that's hardly coffee," Jay said, making Natasha crack up, which she greatly needed and appreciated. Sharla chuckled a bit as she nodded and continued sipping then took a seat at the round table with them.

"So what are you paranoid about?" Sharla asked, "I could hear you from the hall."

"I'm giving a speech to kids at my daughters high school today," she said, "But I just...she's so mad at me doing it, and I can't understand why. I mean, I guess I sort of get it, cause they're teenagers and they're not very nice, but that's why I'm doing it, to try and make them nicer, you know? That's my whole shtick is to get people to be better people, to themselves and one another."

Sharla sighed and leaned back, letting her ponytail down and running her hands through her perfect hair, sifting her fingers through each strand while Jay and Natasha watched, both rather surprised by her inherent beauty, as they rarely saw her outside of her stage persona.

"It's hard being a teenager, don't take it too personally," Sharla finally said, "I'm sure it'll all work out."

"Gee, thanks for the parental platitude," Natasha said sarcastically, making Sharla smirk and raise her cup.

"My pleasure!" she responded.

                                                                                             ***

Courtney found Violet sitting in the dugout of the baseball field at lunch. She was reading when Courtney found her, and Courtney took her seat by Violet's side, not saying a word for a few minutes until it became clear Violet wasn't going to acknowledge her. Courtney then cleared her throat and touched Violet on the shoulder to get her attention. Violet shut her book and looked at her.

"Is everything okay?" Courtney asked, "I didn't do something wrong, did I? I've been looking for you all day. Are you avoiding me?"

"No," Violet replied, "I'm not avoiding you, I'm just...not...good at being friends."

Courtney sighed and slumped on the bench. She wanted to be a good friend, she wanted to tell her that it was fine to not want to be around her friends sometimes, everyone was entitled to their personal space, but she also wanted Violet to know she was there for her whenever she needed or wanted someone. After a moment of chewing on her lip, Courtney opened her mouth to respond, but Violet interrupted her.

"My mom is coming to talk today," Violet said, "She's going to stand in the auditorium and talk to all the kids, and when I asked her not to, she wouldn't stop. She told me it was something she had to do. I asked her a lot and she said she was going to do it no matter what."

"That's...unlike her," Courtney said, furrowing her brow, "She's usually fairly agreeable. I can't imagine why she wouldn't-"

"Who cares," Violet said sternly, in a voice so cold that Courtney was surprised it'd come from her at all. She'd never heard Violet sound this empty and dark, and her tone upset her a bit, she had to admit. Courtney stood up, sighed and turned to walk away. As she left, she glanced back over her shoulder at her friend and thought about how badly she wanted to help her, but she just wasn't sure how. Still, she was determined to find a way.

                                                                                         ***

When Natasha pulled into the school parking lot, she could feel the anxiousness in her stomach and was having trouble swallowing. Everything she did was on a sound stage, without an audience (aside from the crew, she guessed), so perhaps her nerves just came from the fact that she wasn't used to speaking in front of large groups whose entire focus was on her. She picked up her water bottle from the cup holder and took a large healthy drink before wiping her mouth on her sleeve and convincing herself she could do this.

Natasha climbed out of the car and, after opening the trunk to get her supplies, started preparing for her walk into the school auditorium when she heard someone come up behind her. She thought it might be a teacher who had come to help - or god forbid a fan - but when she turned around, instead, she was faced with Courtney who was staring at her.

"Oh," Natasha said, "Hi Courtney. How are you?"

"Why are you doing this?" Courtney asked, surprising Natasha with her brashness.

"Doing what? Speaking here?" Natasha asked, "Because it's my chance to try and teach your peers to appreciate themselves."

"I have news for you, most already appreciate themselves far too much. Their egos are half the problem," Courtney said.

"Well, nobody else is doing it, they have parents who work all the time, there's no role models anywhere anymore. I'm just trying to show them that they can be healthier people, for themselves and for one another," Natasha stated, starting to sound annoyed, "I don't know why Violet can't see that."

"Maybe she doesn't think they deserve your advice, your help, your generosity because they won't give any to her," Courtney said, shrugging and holding her books to her chest, "Just a thought."

And with that, Courtney turned and walked off, leaving a somewhat stunned Natasha standing there, feeling downright ashamed. As she watched her daughters best, and seemingly only, friend walk away, she felt a twinge of respect for her. Nobody besides Natasha herself had ever publicly stood up for Violet, and now here she was, her own mother, needing to be put in her place for forgetting how her daughter had been treated and slightly treating her that way herself. Natasha waited a moment, then took all her things from the trunk and headed inside to the auditorium. Once inside she set her materials by the podium and looked around at all the teachers, all the students, and began to feel a terrible churning feeling in her gut, like the one she'd felt this morning.

Standing at the podium in the gymnasium, looking out at the faces of all these kids, Natasha couldn't help but feel awful as her eyes, after scanning the crowd, finally landed on her own daughters face, and she saw how fraught with worry and fear it was. It broke her heart to see Violet feeling that way, and Natasha finally knew what she had to do.

"I don't know why I'm here, honestly," Natasha said, "I've been asked to speak because, apparently, I know how to take care of myself, and therefore I must know how to teach others to take care of themselves too, and take care of one another. But...if your own parents couldn't do it, then what makes someone think I can?"

The room had all the air sucked out of it, and you could've heard a pin drop. Courtney and Violet looked at one another, and Courtney broke out in an enormous grin. This was going to be a good assembly.

"I...I'm supposed to care, right? That's my whole brand, man. Caring. But even the kindest people can be selfish. Even the most caring people can be rude. Nobody is a bastion of perfection and genuine empathy, no matter how hard they might try to be, and the ones who claim they are the most dangerous. So, yeah, I care. I don't think people take care of themselves. I think they often throw themselves under the bus for others. And there's nothing wrong with putting others before yourself, that's a noble idea, certainly. And you should care about others, obviously. But the thing is, you don't. Nobody really does. Because to care about others would mean accepting that there are people who might mean more than you, and that's a blow to our ego, and that's not something we're willing to accept. That's why you bully, isn't it? To make yourself feel better, to make others recognize you're better than them."

The students didn't say a word, they were seemingly captivated by her speech, which shocked the staff, none of whom were trying to stop Natasha.

"And if you won't care about others, why should I care about you? Your parents obviously don't, or they'd be doing this job, they wouldn't leave it to some public access TV host. They're the ones whose job it is to teach you these things, things they've obviously failed to teach you because, frankly, they probably never learned it themselves. I'm not mad at you for acting out, I'm not judging you for behaving this way. It's inevitable when you come from a family whose forgotten you. I'm mad at society for allowing it to get this way. And more than that, I'm sad. I'm sad for you. I'm sad that you can't feel for others, and I'm sad that you don't think you deserve better. My husband left me earlier this year, because...now that I think about it...I put my daughter before him. He felt neglected, and I understand that now. But I did what my own parents refused to do. Raise their child. Which, in some warped way, means raising myself."

Natasha took a long deep breath and looked back at her supplies, which she'd never set up, and then shook her head.

"I was supposed to come here today and teach you all how to be nice to yourselves, nice to one another, but what's the point? Look at this useless crap. Charts and graphs and stupid anecdotes don't mean jack all in the face of abject runaway hormones. So many of you harass my daughter because she's a bit slower than you, or because she talks a bit funny, or because she's just not as 'with it' as you all seem to think you are. But there's one thing she has that you don't, and that's kindness. She knows how to love herself, and how to love those around her. You've all shown us that you don't, and it's not your fault. It's the adults around you. They're the ones who failed, because people failed them. It's learnt behavior. Generational inhereted trauma and uncaring. Hands off parenting isn't hands off, it's not parenting at all. I feel like I'm expected to be there for you, and I wanna be there for you, because you should have someone, but...I have my own daughter to focus on, and you've all been nothing but cruel to her, so why should I extend an olive branch of kindness to a garden filled with thorns?"

Natasha finally shook her head and looked up again, staring directly at Violet in the stands, and smiled.

"My daughter is a better person than any of you will ever be," she said, "She could be that person for you, if you just stopped being so goddamned cruel. They say kids are taught to hate, but they aren't. Humans are innately and inherently evil from the offset. They have to be taught to not hit, taught to share, taught to love. Maybe it's time you all learned too."

Natasha turned, grabbed all her supplies and walked out of the auditorium, leaving everyone at a loss for words. After a moment, Violet stood up and, grabbing her bookbag, raced down the steps and after her mom, chasing her out the doors to the parking lot. As she reached the car, she saw her mother shoving her things into the trunk, and once she closed it, she turned to face her daughter.

"Mom-"

"Thank you," Natasha said, approaching her and putting her hands on her daughters shoulders, "...thank you for being who you are. Thank you for...just...being the best child. Thank you for staying. I'm sorry I didn't listen to you. I always want to listen to you. I got blinded and I'm sorry."

"It's okay, mom," Violet said, "Everyone makes mistakes."

Natasha chuckled, tears rolling down her cheeks, as she looked at Violets face.

"Can I hug you?" she asked, and Violet nodded, feeling Natasha pull her in close for a firm hug. Violet dropped her bookbag and hugged her mother back. Standing there, in the school parking lot, hugging one another, nothing else mattered now. Her show was public access, her relationship with her child was publicly known, and it was fine. She was fine with it all. For the first time since her husband had left, Natasha felt like a whole person, because she allowed the only other person that mattered to be a part of her whole self.

Because, in the end, the thing Natasha had learned was most important about taking care of yourself...was learning to take care of others.

A surprisingly simple thing, really.

"Simply Clean?" Natasha asked, holding the bottle in her hand, turning it over to look at the ingredients on the back, an eyebrow arching somewhat in surprise as she added, "mmm, organic. I don't...I don't know how comfortable I feel in hawking organic soap."

"I'm not going to try and tell you some corporate lie like 'it grows the brand' or whatever, Miss Simple," the man in the suit sitting across from her at the table said, "but put aside 'the brand' and think about it like this; think what you could do with the money. You're a good person, don't you want to bring in money to help the station? Donate to charities? Give back to underfunded schools? Hell, what about helping your daughter? You could easily send her to college with what you'd make off this in a single year, I guarantee it, and the time to do it is now, when everyone knows who you are. The heat is on and turned up, now is the time to sell it."

"I just...it feels so...dishonest," Natasha said, setting the soap down on the table and wiping her hands on her shirt, "Ironically enough it makes me feel dirty. Lawrence smirked at this and looked away from the table as Nat tried not to laugh herself.

"A lot of people don't trust advertising. They believe we want to pervert their message, betray their beliefs, their ideals and ethics and morals, but I'm only bringing you things I think would be right for your name, your brand. Things that are, as you would say, good for you. Organic food or household items, a modest and affordable fashion line, things that are for the person and helping them feel better about themselves."

"I just...how the fuck, pardon my language, does organic dish soap help someone feel better about themselves?" Natasha asked.

"Because by using it, they know they're doing good for the environment," the man said, leaning back in his seat and straightening his tie, "It makes them feel good about themselves to know they're taking care of the world, and by that extension of others."

"I...guuueeesss," Natasha said, "Let me think about it, can I just think about it?"

"Absolutely!" the man said, standing up and, leaning across the table, shook Natasha and Lawrence's hands before leaving the room. Natasha turned in her rolling chair to face Lawrence, who simply shook his head and chuckled as she exhaled and shrugged.

"You know, you'd think people would want to make millions of dollars, but...I don't know, it just doesn't appeal to me," Natasha said, "I mean, the money is appealing, of course, but I don't like the idea of my face on lots of stuff for people to buy. I'm selling peace of mind, not organic Cranberry Juice."

"Natty," Lawrence said, leaning forward, "You know I trust you, you know that I believe only you know what's best for you and what you do, and you know I won't push something if you really feel that uncomfortable about it, but I think it's time to tell you that you're...really...the only one capable of bringing funds into this station at first. I mean, sure, we've got Sharla but her workout DVDs and other merch only does so well, honestly, but I'd never say that to her face of course. But you...you've created a persona that people really relate to, and that's what sells things. Something people can relate to."

"...is that all I am now? A persona?" Natasha asked, looking at her nails, as Lawrence thought.

"Of...I mean....no, of course not, but...god, you know what I mean, right? People see you, they relate to you, because you're trying to help them and-"

"I'm trying to genuinely help them, yes, and then I'm going to betray that trust to hawk some fucking natural laundry soap?" Natasha asked, "Don't you see how pseudo scummy that is? Don't you see how snake like that is? I'm using that trust, that trust they've put in me because I actually care, to sell them shit they don't really need. I mean, I'm all for helping the planet, I'm all for people using organic products to promote the longevity of the planet and themselves, but Larry, I'm not...I'm not going to sell them things I don't believe in when the only thing I do believe in is helping them help themselves."

Lawrence leaned back and sighed, folding his arms.

"Alright," he said, "It's up to you, like I said, I just wanted you to see it from the stations point of view."

"And, quite frankly, that's somewhat unscrupulous, you're putting its future in my hands, you're making me feel responsible for its poor profits. That's way too much pressure, especially for someone who has nothing to do with the business itself and is just a person who has a show on the network. I thought you were better than that."

With that, Natasha stood up and exited, leaving Lawrence to sit there and think about what she'd said. Out in the hall, she leaned against the wall and exhaled, feeling a bit bad about having been so harsh towards her friend who'd so often defended her, but she also felt somewhat disgusted by his rather shallow behavior. Standing there, Sharla stopped walking by, sipping on a iced coffee and looked at her. Natasha looked up at Sharla and Sharla smiled and waved at her.

"Hi," Natasha said, chuckling.

"Everything alright, champ?" Sharla asked, and Natasha shrugged, as they started walking down the hall together.

"I don't know, I feel like everyone is starting to try and use me," Natasha said, "I'm starting to regret having done what I did because, even if I made a point and got through to people, look at what it's done. Now I'm being molded into nothing more than another commodity used to further a market that frankly is already rather inundated with shallow minded people selling things nobody needs. Before all this, I was just another employee. I could do my show and nobody would bat an eye, but now everyones eyes are on me all the time, just waiting to try and milk whatever it is I do for their own profit margin."

"That's deep," Sharla said, "I know what you mean, I feel sort of bad for selling my shakes and exercise equipment and stuff because I don't want to be a sales person, I want to be an exercise coach. I want people to do this for themselves, not buy it and do it because I told them to. But sadly a mass uninformed public has to be told what to do and how to do it, and often what to do it with, and soon, before you know it, your good intentions have become nothing more than yet another marketing tool."

"Exactly," Natasha said, "I just..."

They stopped and Sharla sipped from her coffee, tilting her blonde ponytailed head to the side, waiting for her to finish.

"I just want things to go back to normal, this is all too stressful for me," Natasha said.

                                                                                           ***

Violet and Courtney were sitting in Violets bedroom on the bed as Courtney flipped through a fashion magazine and Violet read a book. Neither had said a word in a while, but that was fine. They were happy to have the sort of friendship where they didn't have to speak often in order for anything to matter. They merely enjoyed being in one anothers company. Finally, after a few minutes, Courtney exhaled loudly and flipped yet another page.

"You know," Courtney started, "it's really frustrating trying to find something to wear when you know that a lot of stuff isn't going to fit you solely because your body shape is just moderately different enough to make a difference."

"You look fine," Violet said, not looking up from her book.

"I mean, yeah, thankfully I was able to start HRT before anything really happened, and that staved off a lot of problems, but there's a lot of other minor things that couldn't be avoided, like, for example, the size of my feet. They aren't huge by any means, but still bigger than most girls and that's annoying."

Violet lowered her book and looked at Courtneys feet, swinging in the air on the bed as she had her legs up; Violet shrugged and said, "They look fine too. Shoes aren't something to be that self conscious about, I think."

"Well, but it's annoying when I find a pair of shoes I really like but can't wear simply because my feet are just a smidge too wide, you know? I don't know, it's annoying to me at least, especially with as into fashion as I am," Courtney said.

"Stop finding things to not like about yourself," Violet said, "Enough people will do that for you."

"Hah!" Courtney laughed, "Sometimes you make a really good point!"

The phone rang downstairs and both girls got up and headed down the stairs to listen to the message. Courtney had once asked Violet why she didn't answer the phone, and Violet had told her it gave her anxiety to talk to people she didn't know and couldn't see, which Courtney felt was a valid enough reason, so they stood in front of the answering machine and waited for the caller to leave a message. Finally, after what felt like 7 rings, the machine finally clicked on, and a voice came over the speakers.

"Hello Miss Simple, this is the principal of your daughters school," the voice said, "I'm calling to ask if you'd be interested in giving a speech for Career Day in the auditorium. We've been aware of your recent publicity, and with your show being the beacon of positivity that it is, we think you'd be a perfect candidate for doing such a thing. Please call me back and let me know as soon as possible so we can make arrangements and fit you into the schedule, thank you."

The call ended and Violet and Courtney glanced at one another somewhat uncomfortably.

"Well," Courtney said, "I guess it's better than him calling cause you're in trouble. Maybe she'll decline."

"Only if I beg," Violet said, turning and heading into the kitchen, leaving Courtney to feel like she'd struck a nerve of some kind.

                                                                                               ***

Sitting in her car, listening to quiet jazz on her radio while she waited at a red light, Natasha couldn't help but feel like now she'd been guilt tripped into doing something she didn't want to do. She didn't want to promote products, she didn't want to sell things. She just wanted to help people. But, if the station was in need of money that badly...just then another car pulled up beside her and honked its horn. This startled her out of her thoughts and brought her back to reality. Nat looked towards the car and rolled her window down.

"You're Miss Simple, yeah?" a woman in the passenger seat asked.

"Uh...yes?" Nat replied, unsure of where this was headed.

"I love your show! You're putting out such a positive message, and it's really great to see when the rest of television is littered with evil and hatred, so thank you!" the woman added, before rolling her window back up and driving off as the light changed.

Natasha sighed and started driving as well. She couldn't deny her presence was something that had become sought after recently, but she was beginning to feel like it was being sought after for all the wrong reasons. She turned into a nearby parking lot for a small drug store and stopped the car, then sat there in her seat and breathed slowly, heavily, trying to take all the weight she felt off her shoulders even just momentarily. She was having a panic attack. She hadn't had one in ages, it felt like, but now she was having them again, and she knew it'd only become fairly regular the more people bothered her for things like brand deals.

And the longer she held off on actually giving the go ahead with these deals, the more she felt Lawrence, and presumably the rest of the network emboldened by him, might be breathing down her back or giving her the evil eye, especially if she, in the end, decided against it. Natasha didn't know what to do, what to think, all she knew was she needed to relax. She needed to stop her brain from spinnin a mile a minute, and her chest to untighten. Just then her cell phone rang, and she answered.

"Hello?" she answered as calmly as she could, "Yes, this is she. I...I can't talk about this right now. Call my boss, he'll set up a meeting, thank you. Goodbye."

Natasha hung up and stared ahead at the car parked in front of her in the parking lot. She didn't even know what she was staring at exactly, or why, or even how long she stared, she just knew she had to draw the focus away from her anxiety and instead to something else, something in her immediate visual vicinity, and this car was what she had chosen. After a few minutes she could feel her pulse slow again, and her breathing returned somewhat to normal, and she felt hungry. She wanted to eat, so she pulled out and headed to a nearby fast food drive through.

She felt like anytime anyone wanted to talk to her anymore was just to get her to sign off on some deal, some sort of marketing gimmick, and nobody wanted to actually care to listen to her real message. She wasn't anti capitalist or anything, she wasn't against buying things, she just wanted to prove that what she was offering could only come from the person themselves and not a thing they were sold. Inner turmoil is rarely solved completely by impulse purchases. She got her bag of burgers, pulled into the lot of the fast food place, parked and wolfed them down one by one. God, if only she'd had known this was what her life would turn into, she may never have decided to break character and speak openly.

She needed to get home. Her daughter never wanted anything from her that had to do with work.

                                                                                               ***

"The school called," Violet said as they stood in the kitchen.

Courtney had gone home moments earlier, while Natasha made some pasta for the two of them to eat and Violet stood next to the fridge, drinking out of a juice box.

"The school?" Natasha asked, somewhat distracted by her cooking.

"Yeah, they want you to come talk, in the gym, about, um, career day?" Violet finished, taking a few sips from her juice box before sitting down at the table, "I don't know that I want you to do it though."

"Well, sweetheart, that's the sort of thing I could actually get behind," Natasha said, "That's...that's actually pushing a real message to impressionable kids who might need to hear some positivity. You know what I've done the last few weeks? Take meetings with people who want to slap my name and face on products and sell them. That's not listening to what I'm saying. But this? This is."

"Yeah but they already make fun of me enough," Violet countered, "If you came and did this, they'd make fun of me even more. That isn't fair."

"Sometimes, Violet, I'm going to do things that you aren't going to be happy with. I go out of my way to support you and listen to your concerns, because I love you and I care about how you feel, but this is one of those times when I think it's actually in my best interests to go ahead and go speak to the kids at your school. If I could just get through to one kid, it would be worth it."

Violet sat and stared at her mother. She'd never once heard her talk like this. Usually, if Violet said something would make her uncomfortable or unhappy, Natasha abided by that and decided not to partake, but this...this was different. Something had changed. Violet stood up and left her juice box on the table before heading to the doorway of the kitchen.

"Hey! Aren't you hungry?" Nat called out after her.

"No."

Violet stomped up the stairs, leaving Natasha to eat her pasta and watch TV all by herself. Up in her room, Violet sat on her bed and cried, thinking about how things had been just in the last year. She'd had a family, or at least the concept of one. Maybe her father hadn't been as great as she'd always thought he was, but now she was beginning to miss having a dad around, especially now that her mother was seemingly turning her back on her as well. Violet laid down and, despite her usual disgust towards the idea, picked up her phone to make a call. Courtney answered on the other end.

"Are you okay?" Courtney asked, "You sound...sad."

But, after a few moments, Violet decided, instead of responding, to hang up and cry herself to sleep. Natasha came in a bit later to check on her, and then headed to her bedroom herself. She'd always put Violet first, but this was the one time she wanted to do something for herself. Why couldn't Violet understand or accept that? In the midst of all these ridiculous brand deals the network was trying to make with her, this was the one thing that felt...real. That felt like it mattered. She could maybe get some kids, not adults, to listen to her, and if, as she said, even one single kid took a solid lesson away from the things she had to say, it would be worth it.

She didn't like upsetting Violet. It was her least favorite thing in the world. But after a lifetime of doing things for others, Natasha felt like she deserved to do at least one thing for herself, especially right now in this time of personal crisis.

She laid down on her bed and looked up at her ceiling.

Violet would understand eventually. She'd come around.

Or at least that's the lie Natasha told herself that night to get to sleep.

Natasha hadn't been through some of these clothes in what felt like years. Surprisingly enough, and much to her enjoyment, all of them still fit her. She was happy to discover that she hadn't lost her figure, but a lot of that had to do with the fitness routine she did often to stay in shape for her show and the fact that she simply didn't gain weight much. Her metabolism had always been rather high. She ate like someone about to face execution, stuffing her face, but never managed to put on any weight. But when she pulled some of these stacks of clothes out of her closet and laid them on her bed, she was astonished to see just how many articles of clothing she hadn't worn in ages. Some of them she'd had since before Violet had even been born.

It was sort of like seeing old friends again, and it brought a warmth to her heart, put a smile on her face. She started thumbing through old articles of clothing, tossing a few into a nearby open plastic bin she'd set out to take to the station for their annual charity drive. She started yet another pile for things she wanted to keep. Natasha was going to make good on her promise to herself this year to finally start fresh, and try and get rid of as much stuff as possible, and after a half hour or so, the bin was nearly full. She pulled yet another stack out and started a second bin after finishing the first, but at the very end of the second stack...was the sweatshirt.

It wasn't a very unique looking sweatshirt by any means. Just a normal zipper hoodie that was medium purple and had two front pockets. But Natasha stood there, staring at this thing, and moments she'd long forgotten about, moments she'd tried to forget about, came rushing back at her full force. This sweatshirt wasn't just an article of clothing.

This sweatshirt had some history.

                                                                                                   ***

They'd first found it in a thrift store.

"What do you think of this?" Stephen asked, holding up the sweatshirt on a plastic hanger. Natasha put down whatever she was looking at, tossing it aside instantly to approach this purple hoodie, and touched the fabric between her fingers.

"Oooh, it's soft," she said, "That would feel good. I wonder how warm it is on the inside."

Nat took it from the hanger and pulled it on over herself, smoothing it out after doing so, only stopping to slip her hands into the front pockets and then glancing back up at Stephen, who stood there admiring her new look.

"Well?" he asked.

"It's cozy, that's for sure. What do you think?" she asked, before adding, rather sarcastically, "I really value your opinion on my wardrobe."

"If that were true you would never have bought those shoes last week," Stephen replied, the both of them laughing now as others in the store began to look their way. She took it off and put it back on the hanger, saying it was perfect. Stephen kissed the side of her head as he tossed it into their basket of other clothes from the store, and eventually they checked out. It was cold outside, so she immediately put it on once they were back outdoors, and walking back to their car. They'd only been married for a few weeks and were still trying to save money where they could, which is why they had been shopping at a thrift store; that and the fact that Natasha simply loved thrift shopping.

Stephen preferred more high end clothing stores. Turns out, Stephen would prefer a lot of things that were the opposite of Natasha.

                                                                                            ***

"Hey," Jay said, knocking on her bedroom door and looking at her, "Any of these ready to go?"

"Huh...uh, yeah. Yeah, sorry, that first one is totally ready to go, you can load that up," Natasha said, pointing at the first tub she'd filled. Jay nodded and then walked to it, knelt down and attempted to lift it, struggling somewhat. Natasha chuckled and got up to help him. Together they carried the box down the stairs and outside to his car where they loaded it into the backseat.

"Phew, that stereotype about women having too many clothes is not a stereotype at all," Jay said, wiping his brow on his sleeve.

"You don't own many clothes?" Natasha asked him.

"Please," Jay said, taking a swig from a water bottle, "I'm a guy. All men own like approximately three halves of an outfit."

Natasha laughed as Jay got into his car and started it up. She leaned in through the passenger window and looked at him.

"So, you're gonna come back?" she asked.

"Yeah, I'm gonna drop this by the station, toss a label on it with your name, then come on back for anything else. Why? You wanna come with me?"

"...I suppose it couldn't hurt to get out of the house for a bit. I've already got a second box near completion anyway," Nat said, climbing into the passenger seat and buckling herself in as Jay pulled away from the curb and started driving. For a bit the two sat there in silence as they headed down the street, towards the station downtown. Natasha chewed her lip and thought about the sweatshirt.

"Do you ever keep stuff you got during a relationship after the relationship ends?" Natasha asked and Jay thought for a moment, adjusting the brim of his hat before responding.

"I...yeah, actually, I have. There's this cool beer glass this girl I dated got me for my birthday when we were on vacation somewhere together, and I still have that. But it's usually very small stuff that isn't really tied to the relationship proper, not something huge," Jay replied.

"What about an article of clothing?" Nat asked, and Jay shrugged, thinking.

"I...don't think so, no...I know I have a ring that my first serious girlfriend bought me back in college, but that's about it, and that's more jewelry than clothing, so," Jay said, taking a sharp turn and making Nat hold herself in place as the car lunged around a corner.

She thought back to the purple sweatshirt, and why she still had it, after all this time. Especially now that Stephen was gone, why was she keeping it? Well, there had to be a reason, after all. The sweatshirt had to have more memories attached to it than just her life with him.

                                                                                                   ***


Natasha had been completely unprepared to go to the hospital when Violet had been born, mostly because Violet was about two weeks too early, and nobody had anticipated this. When getting rushed down the stairs by Stephen, she noticed how cold it was outside, and he quickly grabbed the first jacket he saw lying draped over the couch. He pulled the purple sweatshirt on her and then helped Natasha to the car where he sped to the hospital.

Violet's premature birth was one of the reasons, they believed, she was somewhat mentally handicapped, but sitting there in her hospital bed, holding her newly born daughter in her arms, Natasha didn't care one way or the other. She simply knew she loved her no matter what, and that that would never change. On the car ride home a few days later, she wrapped Violet inside the purple sweatshirt, and held her the entire way home. Sitting there in the car, looking at her sleeping daughter in her arms, Natasha smiled and looked up at the windshield momentarily.

"...I think I want to name her Violet," Natasha said.

"Violet? I thought you liked Hailey," Stephen said, and Natasha shook her head.

"I did, I mean, I do, but I...I also like Violet. I think it's more fitting," she said, and Stephen smiled and shrugged.

"Hey, whatever you want. You want to name her Violet, we'll name her Violet," Stephen said.

Natasha looked back down at Violet nestled in the sweatshirt, and she smiled again. Violet would be bringing her years of smiles down the road, while Stephen would wind up bringing her pain and anger. He may have been the one to find the sweatshirt, but she was the one to wear it.

                                                                                                    ***

Jay parked in the station parking lot and he and Natasha got out of the car and began unloading the boxes he had with him. Together, one by one, they carried them inside the station and set them down in the spare empty office with all the other boxes that had been brought in thus far. Natasha stood there and looked at all the boxes of clothing and books and whatever else was being donated and she smiled.

"Look at all this charity," she said, "This is wonderful. I can't believe I'm shocked at peoples kindness, but I suppose in todays modern world kindness has become shocking. When hatred becomes so normalized, kindness becomes the surprise."

"Well put," Jay said, cracking open a soda and sipping it before handing it to Natasha who took a few sips herself.

"It makes me glad to see people giving things they don't need anymore to people who might need them. We're not dragons, for fucks sake, we shouldn't hoard things, you know? If you don't wear a piece of clothing anymore or you don't have a particular attachment to a book or a movie, then give it to someone who might, you know? I mean, I'm all for collecting things. I understand why people hold onto personal libraries and film collections and, hell, even pieces of clothing. But...I think Stephen leaving honestly really forced me to start looking at moving forward instead of being continually stuck in the past."

"I think that's a perfectly healthy way to live," Jay said, sitting on top of one of the clothing tubs, "honestly, I'm...admirable of your newfound viewpoints, and wish I could as easily incorporate them into my own life as you seem to have in yours. I have a lot of trouble moving on. It's nice to have some sort of guide for that."

Natasha smiled and sat beside Jay, holding his hand.

"...we should hang out more," she said, "I could really use a friend."

Jay smiled and nodded, "I couldn't agree more."

After they finished their soda, they both got up and headed back to the car so he could drive Natasha back home. Once there, he helped her pack together the second box, and then a third smaller one, they made plans to get lunch together and then Jay went along his way, leaving Natasha to herself. She spent the remainder of her afternoon doing things around the house, things she'd been somewhat neglecting to do. She filled the dishwasher, she did some laundry, some general cleaning in various rooms, and then she sat down on the couch and she looked at the purple sweatshirt. Holding it in her hands, feelings its fabric and texture against her skin, she knew what she should do with it.

                                                                                             ***

The day Stephen left, Natasha curled up on the floor of her bedroom - thankfully Violet was at school - and screamed until her lungs hurt. She wrapped herself in the purple sweatshirt as it was the only place she felt safe anymore. It held all these beautiful memories, and she needed those memories then more than ever to console her in this time of great distress. After a while, she fell asleep on the floor, her head resting against the balled up sweatshirt.

When Natasha awoke, she went downstairs, made some coffee, ate some eggs and then thought about what to do with her life. Should she even bother telling her parents her marriage had just ended, and, even worse, because her husband had run off with her own sister? God, she'd likely never see any of her family again, only because of the awkwardness that would ensure from such an event. Natasha headed back up the stairs and froze in the doorway to her bedroom, staring at the wadded up sweatshirt now sitting on the ground in front of her.

She waited a moment, then she picked it up, hung it on a hanger and placed it inside her closet, where it had remained since.

                                                                                                  ***

Violet was sitting on her bed that night, headphones on, when Natasha entered the bedroom. Violet pulled her headphones down around her neck and looked at her mom, who sat on the bed beside her. Violet turned to face her, a look of concern on her face, but Natasha smiled at her.

"How was your day?" she asked.

"It was okay," Violet said, "How was yours?"

"Same, okay. Donated a lot of boxes of old clothing to the station for the charity drive and stuff. Um, that's actually why I wanted to talk to you for a moment, if you don't mind. When I was going through some clothes, I ran into this old sweatshirt I found. It was a favorite of mine, and I brought you home from the hospital in it."

She handed the sweatshirt to Violet, who took it and immediately liked the way it felt against the skin of her fingers.She pressed it against her face and rubbed gently, making Natasha smile.

"...I was so happy that day, I couldn't even remember a life without you suddenly. Felt like I'd never even had one, really. You were born prematurely, and so we hadn't settled on a name. We'd come close on a few, but none of them ever really stuck the way we wanted them too. But then, looking down at you, the little body of my favorite person swaddled comfortable in my favorite sweatshirt, it dawned on me to call you Violet, because of the color."

Violet looked from the sweatshirt to her mom and raised an eyebrow.

"I'm named after a sweatshirt?" she asked, rather flatly, making Natasha crack up.

"Yes, I know, I know, I'm sorry," she said, "It just...it felt right. I know it isn't the most creative way to come up with a name for your newborn child, but...you were both important to me. I want you to have it now. It gave me a lot of comfort and good memories, but I think it's best if it moves on to someone who really deserves it. Who's been with it just like I have."

Natasha put her hand on Violet's face and lightly brushed her cheek.

"You are my favorite person in the whole world, and that was my favorite piece of clothing in the whole world, so it only seems right to stick you two together," Natasha said, "You won't make me upset or anything if you don't want it, I just thought I should-"

But she didn't even get to finish. Violet threw her arms around her mom and hugged her tightly. Natasha, taken somewhat by surprise by this act of physical affection, hugged her back and smiled, shutting her eyes.

It's amazing sometimes what joys and pleasures the simplest things can bring to us, she thought, and how it's our duty to pass that on to others.

Violet pulled the sweatshirt on and zipped it up, then pulled the hood up over her head and smiled, making Natasha laugh.

"Will you help me with my homework?" Violet asked.

"Of course," Natasha said.

So they sat there, the three of them, mother, daughter and sweatshirt, and did their best to keep one another afloat in a world fraught with cruelty. Sometimes, Natasha realized, she appreciated the sake of being a Simple.

"Hello," Natasha said, smiling at the camera, "Welcome to Simple Living. I'm Natasha Simple, and I'm your guide to feeling good about yourself, or at least better than you usually do. If you only feel good once a week while watching my show, then that's better than nothing I'd say. I'm happy to be of some sort of service."

Natasha sighed and leaned forward on the couch, clasping her hands and thinking.

"You know, it's an unusual week this week, because it's the annual birthday show I do," Natasha said, "and as such, today is my sisters birthday. Actually, the birthday show was created as a way to honor my sister, because, as those of you who have siblings are likely aware, having a sister is a real blessing. Sure, sometimes they can be a nuisance, but in the end its always worth it isn't it? Have you ever had a fight with a sibling? You can admit it, it happens, we all know it. Well I had many fights with my sister growing up, but we always wound up coming together again even stronger because of them."

Natasha stood up and walked around to the small table beside the couch and smelled the flowers in a vase atop it, before exhaling, smiling widely and looking back at the camera.

"...relationships are important, and all relationships have their hard times. Not everyone needs them, granted, plenty of people leading perfectly full lives without the companionship of others romantic or platonic. Some people cut off their family for being toxic, or chose their friends wisely because of poor past interactions. All completely valid things to do, honestly. There's no room for undue negativity in your life. Lord knows we get plenty of negativity we can't escape so no reason to openly invite more in if you don't have to. But I always found my relationships to be worthwhile, especially my relationship with my sister. And her birthday was always one of those special days, hence why I created an entire episode based around it."

Natasha walked across to a wall on the set and gently dusted then straightened a painting hanging somewhat askew, before sighing and looking back from the painting to the camera.

"This episode was once a loving tribute, and an open love letter itself, to the girl I so luckily got to call my sister. Someone who was always there for me, even during a fight, someone who never questioned me, even when I likely warranted questioning, someone who simply understood that being a sister meant just being there. Understanding and accepting, helping and loving. And my sister was extremely good at loving, moreso than I thought apparently, because she was so adept at it that she wound up stealing my husband."

The air in the room got sucked out as Jay gritted his teeth and stayed in focus, trying not to think about whatever Natasha was about to say or do.

"I can remember my sister hosting my wedding her own backyard. A small personal wedding, and she hosted it herself, because that's how happy she was for me. She was thrilled to see me finally find someone I wanted to settle down with. Well, to be fair, my husband and I had been together for ages by that time, but still, she always wondered if we'd ever finally tie the knot, so to speak, and she was so happy when he finally proposed that she offered to organize the shindig herself. I can't imagine that she could go from appreciating my husband to be to stealing my husband to be, but that's how it worked out I suppose. Sometimes in life crap just happens and it hurts, a LOT, but you deal with it. Now it's her birthday, and she's spending it with the man who will be my ex husband, and all I'm left with is this annual birthday episode, created for and often dedicated to my sister. The very same sister."

Natasha sighed and walked back across the stage and sat back down on the couch. She pulled her hair back and tied it into a messy bun, then cleared her throat and grinned.

"I know sibling rivalry is a thing that exists, but I think stealing your sisters husband might be taking that concept much too far, don't you? When I got pregnant with my daughter, Violet, I thought about how sad it was that she wouldn't have a sister. My husband and I never planned to have another child, we only wanted the one, and I thought about all the great things she'd be missing out on by being siblingless, but, in hindsight, perhaps I inadvertently saved her. Who can hurt you more than those who know you best, and who knows you best other than a sibling? I think that maybe my daughter got off easy in that regard, as I didn't set her up for a lifelong disappointment of having what you think is a best friend so easily become your worst enemy. I'm not even that mad at my husband, that's the sickest part. His betrayal? I'm over it. I'm mad with my sister."

Natasha leaned back on the couch and ran her hands down her blouse, straightening it.

"Men cheat. It's just a universal thing we all have accepted, terrible as it is. And, so as I don't come off as a misandrist here, plenty of women cheat too. It isn't a thing only men do, lots of women have been known to break up marriages, relationships, whatever by cheating. But it's a universal thing we all have accepted is that men generally cheat for one reason or another. Sometimes the reason is, understandably, somewhat valid. I know that may shock you to hear come out of the mouth of someone who was cheated on, but let's be honest, ending a relationship is hard and scary, and sometimes the easier thing to do for some people is just cheat, and hope that eventually that's what ends it instead of owning up to your unhappiness with one another and ending it willingly. I'm not condoning cheating, for the record, I'm just saying that there's layers to this sort of thing. But, because men cheat, it didn't come as that much of a shock to me when it happened. No, the shock came when I learned who he cheated with."

Natasha looked at the nails on her hand and took a long breath.

"And that's what hurts the most, honestly, is when someone you trust, someone you've dedicated a portion of your work to, decides to turn around and hurt you. I gave her a part of something that is from my soul, this show, and she tainted it with her cruelty. This show, which was always only ever meant to be helpful and loving and full of kindness, now has this stench of irrevocable hatred to it, and that makes me so sad. And that's the weirdest part of all is finding out what matters most to you in these sorts of times. I was upset my marriage failed, I was mad my sister hurt me, but really I'm most upset that she damaged my show forever, something that was meant to be so pure and good and now will forever be tinged by this moment."

Natasha sighed heavily and rubbed her face with her palms, clearly trying to keep her cool, before dragging the ottoman from the couch over to the edge of the stage and sitting as close to Jay's camera as she could. She smiled again and continued.

"I guess what I'm telling you is that you can absolutely do things for those you care about, those you love, even let them into your innermost personal and private projects and desires, but don't be surprised when they throw them right back in your face. And don't feel bad if you don't want to let people in because of that. There's absolutely nothing wrong with keeping what you love the most close to your heart and for your eyes only, especially if its something you made, that's important to you. I created a thing for beauty, and she, with a simple decision, turned it into a thing of ugliness. I will never forgive her for that. I started this show around the time my daughter was five or so, and it's been a very personal and important aspect of my life since then. It's almost like a second child. And I feel like the people I maybe help are my friends in a way. You obviously like me enough to take what I say to heart."

Natasha breathed heavily and wiped the tears rolling down her face before shaking her head and soldiering onward.

"And that's what makes me happy. Knowing that even without her, the birthday show still has meaning. It's a rebirth. It can be the birthday of something new now. Something better. Something she had no say or part in. Something that no longer represents her or her incredibly unspeakable act of pettiness and selfishness. Now the birthday show belongs to all of you. All my viewers, my friends, the people I've somehow managed to help, the people who might have turned to me in a time of need. This is our episode now. Your episode, and nobody can ever take that away from you."

Natasha stood up and walked over to a picture hanging on the wall behind the couch with two women in it, one of herself, and the other, presumably, of her sister. She touched it before taking it down from the wall.

"A lot of people will tell you that cutting out family members isn't right to do, but toxicity isn't specific to any one kind of person, nor is it specific to any one kind of toxicity. It comes in many shapes and sizes, many colors and forms. And you're perfectly fine if you decide you don't want your parents to know your children, or something to that effect. This photo of my sister and I on my first day of shooting has hung on this wall on this set since the day it was taken. It was meant to commemorate our bond, as sisters, as friends, and - with the addition of the birthday show - as creative partners of one kind or another. But she doesn't deserve that anymore, so let's destroy relics of the past so we can welcome icons of the future."

With that, Natasha started smashing the photo against the small table beside the couch, as Lawrence watching off set ran his hands over his face in both disbelief and incredible appreciation of her growth and acceptance of her situation. Jay shook his head and exhaled, grinning himself as he tracked her movement back across the stage.

"So if you're at home, and you wanna celebrate this new birthday show, your birthday show, dear viewer, then help me with a special birthday chant we can say. I'm thinking something along the lines of 'Dear Ashley, screw you!'. Come on, we can all shout it together at the top of our lungs! Or, if you'd prefer, substitute my sisters name for the name of a relative you personally have cut out of your life or hurt you in the past! Fuel your growth with the ashes of your burnt bridges! 3 times we'll shout it!"

With that Natasha cupped her hands around her mouth and shouted, 'Dear Ashley, screw you!' three times, each time with members of her crew joining in even, surprising her by their support. Afterwards she looked at the camera and she smiled, looking happy as can be.

"You may have taken my husband, you may have been the favorite, but you know what you'll never have? My show. MY show, and now OUR show, mine and the viewers. Let's read some birthday mail, shall we?" she asked, sitting down and beginning to open a small pile of letters on the couch beside her.

The television clicked off in a household, and Natasha's image faded from the screen, leaving only Ashley and Stephen to stare back at the now black television screen ahead of them. Stephen exhaled and ran his hands through his hair as he stood up and began to pace. Ashley chewed her lip and looked at her shoes.

"I...I didn't expect that," Stephen finally said, "That was, uh...something else."

"...I can't even blame her," Ashley said quietly, "...I really can't. What I did...what we did...was just awful. You left a daughter, not just a wife. You left a whole ass family for me."

"You'd think someone would take that as a compliment," Stephen said, sliding his hands in his pockets.

"I mean, I...I do, and I love being with you, but she's unraveling on television, and she's gaining more and more popularity. Can you imagine what might happen if someone picked her up to do a national show? She's becoming unhinged."

"I don't think she's unhinged, Ash, I think she's just extremely angry," Stephen said, "As she has every right to be."

"...I need to lay down," Ashley said, standing up and heading to the bedroom, leaving Stephen to stand there alone. He turned the television back on but put it on mute as he watched his soon to be ex-wife go through fan mail, and he sat back down on the couch. He covered his face with his hands and sighed heavily, shaking his head.

"...this is not going to end well," he said under his breath.