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MONDAY WAS A DIFFICULT TIME FOR ALL INVOLVED. In the morning, her father was talking to her mother about work and how they had gotten someone new on the team, and had someone abruptly leave, which had been unexpected, but they were making it work. Brooke had glowered at him the entire time, holding onto how he never said anything specific and her mother simply took it as truth, Liz asking questions and being happy with his vague answers.
But it made sense. Her mother wanted to keep the family together and Liz had too much on her plate to feed into Brooke's notions of their father being less than the man that he was, the man who had worked hard to get them into an expensive school like Midtown, who was paying for their education in full and wanting them to just experience their lives and enjoy it. If anything, Brooke was being the difficult one.
But she didn't want to live her life under a lie. So she kept her mouth shut and her thoughts to herself, racing up to her room and getting ready for when Flash was going to pick them up and take them to school. She caught sight of her canvases and took her sketchbook with her, hoping that she'd be able to get most of the planning finished with her during break and lunch.
As she waited at the bottom of the steps for Liz, her dad approached her, rubbing his mouth and glancing back to his wife who motioned for him to go with an encouraging smile. Brooke pretended not to notice, letting them play the routine of trying to break through to her.
"Hey, pumpkin," he greeted, "How're the paintings coming along?"
"They're good," she replied shortly, adjusting her bag strap so it was fully covering her sketchbooks.
"Listen, so, uh, it's just gonna be you and your mom this weekend, since I'm leaving on Thursday for another business trip and Liz is gonna be doing her Decathlon thing, and we decided that this weekend is your weekend. Whatever you want, don't worry if it's ridiculously expensive, just have fun with it, okay? I-I don't know, go see an art show, I don't know if they have any of those. Are there any concerts you want to see, any new bands?"
Adrian was rubbing the back of his head and fidgeting as he struggled to connect with his daughter, looking at her desperately for help, and she inwardly sighed; it was clear her parents were really trying, and she wasn't so terrible of a daughter to force her father to flounder, especially when he was offering to potentially pay hundreds of dollars to make her happy.
Brooke figured that her father had never expected to be the one to convince his da
"Thanks, dad," she said, "I mean, I don't think there are any concerts playing near me, but could I get some markers at the art store?"
He nodded, looking rather surprised. "Yeah! Yeah, if that's all you want, sure, but if you can think of something else, go ahead. Maybe you can go somewhere, invite your friends. That Ned kid?"
"Ned's in Decathlon with Liz, so he won't be around for the weekend," she explained, sighing as she caught onto his thinly veiled hint at her to get out of the house, "But whatever, I can try to find a concert to go to or something, I'm sure someone's playing on Friday night."
