Broken

Chapter 15

Morning had arrived by the time Ada got off work. It wasn't that a secretary at a mechanic's shop had that much work to do in a sparsely populated town; it was that her coworkers wouldn't allow her to leave. As Ada discovered, the mechanics she was working with were belligerent and argumentative. They wouldn't let her leave because their argument (the argument about whether or not they should offer service to the manager's wife) was so important that it had to block the only exit to the shop. The manager eventually came out, tried to break up the argument, but ended up being yet another obstacle blocking the exit.

However, her late arrival didn't explain why she didn't answer to Mabel's call to go to the hospital. That, she felt she should be ashamed of, but wasn't really. Her reason for not going was named Iris. 'In a relationship, especially a newly formed one,' she thought to herself, 'it's traditional for the two parties to see each other regularly. Even in the workplace.' Iris had visited to see Ada, and Ada alone. One mechanic in particular, Oliver, had creeped up behind her and called her 'babe'. While Iris struggled to find a comeback or explain that he should really back off, Ada stood up to him. She shoved Oliver off of her and quite literally dragged him away. Twenty minutes later, Mabel's phone call would come, but she wouldn't quite hear the instructions to go to the hospital when Iris is begging her to continue kissing. Ada had no idea of what Ford had done.

She spent a good two hours total with Iris. Ada couldn't say she regretted it, but Mabel would certainly be furious at hearing the explanation. With her moral compass already pointing steadily to the south, she decided to come up with a more noble excuse. 'I was doing work? Nah. Too transparent. Fixing a car? She knows I'm a secretary! There was a fire?' The consequences of lying were no stranger to her, but it was out of necessity.

Cigar smoke and tension were the two first things she sensed upon entering the Shack. The first sign of life was Dipper, sitting on the checkout counter of the gift shop, using an inhaler.

"Dipper, you're asthmatic?"

He shook his head. "Only when Grunkle Stan stress smokes for two hours straight."

She quirked an eyebrow. "Stress smokes?"

"Yeah, uh, it's pretty self explanatory."

Ada nodded. "Where's your sister?"

Dipper nudged his head toward upstairs before taking a big puff from his inhaler. Since he wasn't asthmatic, whose inhaler did he take? She concluded that it was best to not ask too many questions and go confront Mabel with lies.

Once she reached the top of the stairs, she heard a shrill voice. "Who's there? Don't come in!"

"It's Ada, Mabel."

There was no response for several moments before Ada finally forced herself in Mabel's room. Mabel was on her bed, crouched down with her face buried the head of her sweater. She could only see the signature butterfly clip in her hair.

"Mabel's not here," she lamented to no one in particular. "She's in Sweatertown."

"What?"

She didn't respond, but rather gave a whine similar to a wounded animal. Ada knew it was her job to comfort Mabel, to tell Mabel that it was all okay and that she shouldn't worry about what was bothering her. But she didn't feel that her words would help her. Even though Ada should have, the situation was foreign to her. So, she sat in silence on Mabel's bed, hoping that her presence would be appreciated.

It wasn't.

Ten minutes must have passed between the two young women, with Mabel wept softly into her sweater and Ada sitting, realizing the guilt she didn't feel. The tension between them could break even the sharpest of knives clean in half.

"Why didn't you come to the hospital?" Mabel stared up at her friend, her eyes still brimming with salty tears. Her face was still red, lips quivering, ready to sob again.

Ada's lies soon became useless when actually asked to step up to the plate. None of her excuses seemed like eligible options except one: the truth. She recalled the time she first came out to her youngest brother, Thomas. That was the winter that Ada got her first kiss with the girl next door, Ingrid. She and Ingrid had to be about 15 when they snuck back behind the shed in Ingrid's backyard. Thomas had caught a glimpse of the girls behind the shed, but had not witnessed the kiss. Later that day, he asked what business Ada had back there. After being unable to come up with a lie, she explained to Thomas that she didn't like boys. He took it well, thankfully. She found herself in a similar situation 12 years later.

"I...I was with Iris," she said, wincing. "And also at work."

"You said you'd come."

"I did, but I got a new girlfriend and the mechanics were using my desk phone all day long and-"

"Ford overdosed on drugs. He's in the hospital now."

"WHAT?!" She was either going to kill Ford the next time she saw him or confine him to house arrest to ensure that he never leaves again.

Mabel nodded, her sadness transforming to anger. "He could have died! But your crush of the week is obviously more important to you. Who's your new girlfriend?"

"Iris, from the party."

"I thought you regretted your dating history, Ada."

"I do, Mabel, but she's my chance to start over."

"Whatever. Go be with your girlfriend or whatever. She seems nice." Mabel was rapidly getting up to leave.

"Wait, where are you going?"

"Downstairs to watch Ducktective. Feel free to come along if your girlfriend doesn't hold you up."

Shocked and upset for making Mabel upset, Ada's first instinct to apologize. But how do you apologize for something you don't regret? She couldn't show Mabel that something like this would never happen again. She couldn't ensure Mabel that she would change for the better. Ada knew that she got carried away when it came to dating; she usually justified it by using rhetoric. 'Who doesn't get carried away when they're in the honeymoon phase,' she thought to herself. 'It's just a natural phase of falling in love.' So, instead of apologizing, Ada sat alone in that dusty attic, waiting for the storm to pass.