𝖈𝖔𝖒𝖕𝖑𝖊𝖝 𝖒𝖔𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓𝖘 - 𝘰𝘤 𝘪𝘯𝘴𝘦𝘳𝘵 *

𝖋𝖆𝖙𝖍𝖊𝖗𝖘 𝖗𝖚𝖎𝖓 𝖕𝖆𝖘𝖘𝖎𝖔𝖓𝖘 || 03.

Summer was in full swing throughout Freeridge, block parties and drunken cookouts were constants throughout the hot and humid days. And Quinnley Jinkerson went to almost every single one, not because she was some kind of party girl, just because she could, so she did (why not? There was really no one there to stop her).

Jinkerson is a strange and uncommon last name in the Freeridge area, but there was a simple explanation as to why it was apart of Quinnley's name. Quinn was the bastard child of her deadbeat white father and his black secretary. Quinnley's father, Derek Jinkerson, was a mildly successful man in his car dealership business, doesn't seem like a deadbeat. And he wasn't. To his original family, his first wife and two kids at least.

That's right, he cheated on his wife with Quinn's mother. Quinnley Jinkerson hates her father and everything associated with him including her last name.

Now Quinn's mother (whose name was Iris) she was a saint, an angel on earth. She was the kind of mother who'd tell you bed time stories and bake you cookies when you're sad. Iris was not only a kind woman, but a strong woman. When Derek wanted to remove himself from Iris and their little baby problem, she said no. There was no way in hell she was going to let some barely attractive white man leave her high and dry. So, she demanded a house, child support, and for him to spend time with their child every now and again. Derek would've said no, of course, but Iris was also smart and blackmailed Derek into getting what she wanted.

A house in Freeridge and some low maintenance support was a small price to pay when you want to sweep things like infidelities under the rug.

This was how Quinnley lived for the majority of her young life. She'd play out on the concrete jungle that was her neighborhood, come home to a nice meal her mom prepared, and every once and while her father would come around. Though she hated when he did. Even as a child she could tell their was no warmth or love in his eyes when he saw her. Derek always looked bored like Quinn was a pest that didn't deserve his attention or care.

But, Quinnley tried so hard to obtain just that. She'd talk about her day, which wasn't very interesting as a seven-year-old, so she'd embellish her stories just to grab his focus. 

None of her stories did. 

So, she moved on. Iris loved cooking and she was good at it too, so naturally she wanted to pass her knowledge down to her daughter (who actually had just as much passion for it as she did). Quinn never served any of her meals to her father, she never thought they were good enough, she wanted to perfect her skills first in hopes of getting that fatherly approval she desperately craved. At age ten, she thought she'd done it. It took her months to plan for this dish, she took into account the smallest of details, all for her dad who didn't deserve a drop of love.

Quinn made her father fried tofu with black-eyed, collard greens and cornbread. Quinn was determined to win her dad's heart through his stomach, she learned that her father was some rich and snobby type of vegetarian. Quinn didn't even knew that word existed as a ten-year-old, she looked it up in the dictionary just for him, but she heard him say it one night after making a comment (a rude one at that) about her mother's cooking. She saved up all her money that she got from in between couch cushions, her tooth fairy money, and even selling her pretty pink tricycle to some girl named Jasmin. She used that money to buy quality ingredients from an over priced grocery store near Brentwood.

It took her hours to make and it was good, better than good, it was mind-blowing. And Quinn served it up to him with a smile only a cold-blooded snake couldn't return, Derek Jinkerson didn't return the smile. He hadn't even tasted her cooking, claiming it was made by her grimy little hands so it'd automatically be no good. He told her to give up on cooking, her passion, so she could instead get out the house and leave him alone as much as possible.

Quinnley Jinkerson gave up cooking that day.

Along with any attempts of connecting with her father. She didn't point out when her father's visits were become less and less frequent until he never stepped foot in her house again. And she was happy about it, she had her loving mother and that's all she needed. Until she didn't.

The reason Quinn can go to any party or cookout she desires, her mother got sick. Well, sick emotionally? In the head? In the heart? Quinnley became second place to the drugs and alcohol her mother consumed to feel so kind of happiness that Derek took away from her. It was awful, Quinn blames her father mostly, but also herself. What 11 year old wouldn't though? With her mother being unstable, being in and out of rehab, she was going to be taken away and placed in Derek's care, but thankfully Derek'd never let that happen, so he lied to the state. He told them Quinnley was living in that house with her Uncle Keith (named after Derek's work friend who has never met Quinn a day in his life), the authorities didn't bat an eye and went along with the story. Quinnley lived in her now empty childhood home ever since, while her mother was living outside Freeridge boarders, becoming independent quickly using child support checks to survive and commute to biannual visits to her mother.

But, no one knew her little family secret except a certain Santo with, in Quinnley's opinion, a really dumb name of Spooky.