Noreen Stack was sitting on her bed, as two strange teenage girls and a grown man stood in front of her, waiting for her to answer. She couldn't stop smiling at them, even with as awkward as she felt, which only made them feel weirder about this whole situation they suddenly found themselves embroiled in.
"Look, all we want to know is why you're leaving comments like that on my friends videos," Jay said, making Noreen blush. "I...I'm sorry...I didn't mean to make anyone upset," she said, still grinning uncontrollably. "We went through all this trouble to track you down, you could at least give us an answer, your comments are upsetting my friends daughter," Jay said, motioning with his hand to Violet. Noreen and Violet locked eyes, and suddenly Violet didn't even need an answer. Suddenly she somehow knew everything. Her lip quivered, her eyes filled with tears, as Noreen nodded, almost as if she could telepathically understand what Violet was thinking. Almost like an admission of sisterhood or something. Suddenly everything about Violet made sense, in relation to her and her mother, and her placement within her family. "She gets it," Noreen said, pointing at Violet. Yes. Yes she did. *** "Well," Jay said, sitting with the girls as he clicked through the comments, sighing, "this is strange, you're not wrong about that. I mean, they don't come off as threatening or anything, but they do come off as...alarming? Stalkerish, almost? I don't know how to describe it, I just know it feels icky somehow." "Icky is such a great word," Courtney said, standing behind Jay with her arms crossed. "Isn't it though?" he asked, grinning at her. "But, like, what...what do I do? Can we, uh, can we find out who it is?" Violet asked, and Jay shrugged. "That's...you know, a little harder, honestly. I can see the e-mail address associated with their comment, because they had to sign up to the site in order to make a comment. This was how we decided to combat spam comments and trolls and bots. Not full proof, but it's something at least. So from there I could simply plug in her e-mail somewhere else, see what pops up if she's used it for anything else, or just e-mail her straight up." "How could we guarantee a response?" Courtney asked, biting her lower lip. "That's the thing, we can't, but it's better than just sitting here waiting for it to get worse, or having Nat discover it herself," Jay said, making Violet nod in understanding. "I'll do it," Violet said, "I'll e-mail her. They, like, would, ya know, probably, um, respond to her kid? Cause I'm not, like, an adult or anything that she works with? I have no authority. That's less scary." Courtney smiled. She was proud of Violet for showing this level of intelligence. She'd always known she was smarter than everyone gave her credit for, even herself. Violet, however, was terrified, admittedly, and unsure if she could even put into words how she felt. Could she even say anything that would warrant any type of response, or would she simply be dismissed and the comments would stop as a result? All she knew was she had to try. *** "Here's to the first day of real sobriety," Nat said, clinking her glass with Sharla as they sat at a table in a small restaurant, adding, "I can't believe I'm drinking fruit juice, but I suppose there's a first time for everything." "Well, your liver will thank you," Sharla said. "And really, don't they deserve better?" Nat asked, the both of them chuckling as a third chair was pulled up and Corrine seated herself, her black frizzy hair pulled back and tied up, her glasses constantly slipping down her nose. "God, people actually come here to socialize?" Corrine asked. "Where do you normally socialize?" Sharla asked, sipping her drink before setting it back on the table and leaning back, crossing her tan legs in her jean shorts. "Chat rooms," Corrine said, "Sometimes I go to a seminar at the local library." "You know how to have a good time," Sharla mumbled, making Nat smirk. "Why am I even here?" Corrine asked, "I could be doing something for school right now." "Because if we're all going to work together, we all need to really get to know one another," Nat said, "All I really knew about Sharla before a few weeks ago was how much of a health nut she was, and that simply isn't acceptable if she's going to be someone I see every day for god knows how many years on." "All you need to know about me is that I wash my hair once a week, I only eat microwaved cup of soups and I collect glass animal figurines. I give my all to the work you assign to me, I don't drink and I can't talk unless there's an actual conversation. Small talk doesn't interest me in the slightest, and I'm not a big fan of politics. There, do you feel like you know me any better now?" "Sadly, yes," Sharla said under her breath as she lifted the glass to her mouth. Nat sighed and scratched her forehead. She was beginning to think that perhaps she wouldn't get the girls night out she'd so desired after all. *** "This is the place," Jay said as they pulled up to the small, old looking home. Violet had e-mailed the commenter, and surprisingly gotten a near instant response, giving them their address. Then Courtney, Jay and herself piled into Jay's little car and headed on over to the address in question. An old man was standing in the yard, watering the garden out front, while they could see an old woman through an open window, vacuuming. "Are you sure you wanna do this? This might be weird," Jay said. "I have to," Violet said, "I have to, um, make sure my mom is, you know, like, uh, safe and stuff." Jay smiled. Violet, just like her mother, had a heart of gold. The three of them got out of the car and headed up the pebbled walkway to the front, passing the old man and knocking directly on the front door. The sound of the vacuum stopped, and the old woman opened the door, smiling at them as she wiped her hands on her house dress. "Hello," she said, "Can I help you?" "We're here to see Noreen Stack," Jay said, "Is she home?" "She's upstairs," Doris said, "...what is this about?" "She's been leaving comments on my friends videos, and they are making us somewhat uncomfortable. We just want to check in on her and make sure that everything is alright," Jay said, "Can we come in?" "I think you'd better," Doris said, opening the door further for them, allowing them to enter as she straightened her apron, pulled it off and hung it over the chair, then said, "Noreen is our daughter. Well, adopted daughter, but still. She becomes obsessed with things easily, she gets very invested in people she's never met, but this is...different from those other times. Please, have a seat." Jay, Courtney and Violet all sat on the long couch, as Doris sat herself in a big lounge chair, sighing. "We adopted her when she was just a few weeks old," Doris continued, "she'd been given up, but no reason was ever given why. All we got was the name of the parents, and all we knew was that they didn't want her, but we wanted a daughter and we had had a number of miscarriages over the years while trying, so we figured adoption was the best route. After a few years, John - that's my husband you saw outside - and I noticed she wasn't progressing the way other children progressed. By the time she was a teenager, she was in therapy, constantly, and on heavy medication that she still takes to this day. But that isn't to say that those things make a person bad, because they don't, and because she's not. She's the most lovely young lady, and even if she isn't really capable of making it on her own or...or really being an adult, well, that's fine. As long as we can keep her safe, keep her medicated, keep her relatively happy, then life is good. But the laptop, the internet, is her only real access to the outside world. It's how she communicates with people. I mean, she can speak, but it's her main forum of socializing, and because of this she can become extremely interested in subjects, obsessed with people, and so on." "...so she's got a fascination with my mom?" Violet asked. "In a sense, yes. She's right upstairs if you'd like to speak to her. I'm sure she'd love to speak to you," Doris said, making Violet's heart drop into her stomach as she glanced at the staircase behind them; Doris added as they got up to head upstairs, "I figured this day would likely come, where someone would track her down, and I should be happy, but I also hope it doesn't change how she views the world too much." With that, the three of them headed upstairs, bracing themselves for what revelations were in store. Unfortunately, the revelation they'd receive was something they couldn't have prepared for. *** "Yeah, but what is a toxin?" Corrine asked. She and Sharla had been arguing about this for the last 15 minutes, and at first it was entertaining, but by this point, Natasha was growing irritated, despite staying quiet and simply listening to the back and forth. "You have these negative energies in your body, they make you sick, and you need to do regularly flushes to rid yourself of them to allow for more positive things to enter," Sharla said. "That doesn't tell me what a toxin is! Draw a picture of a toxin! Explain to me in great detail what it is, because right now all you're giving me is vague pseudo science new age health mumbo jumbo!" Corrine shouted, almost laughing at the absurdity of the request, which in turn made Sharla laugh. "I...I can't draw a toxin! First of all, I'm not a skilled artist, okay? Secondly, it...it doesn't really have a visual representation, it's more like-" "If there's no visual representation then it isn't a real thing, is it? I mean that's the whole idea behind God! You just believe it's inside of you. Really, what you're selling is not medicine or a better lifestyle, but the idea that you're sick, and if you don't do something about it, you'll remain sick. The people you tell have toxins inside them could be sick for wildly different reasons, but because of your generalized statement, they'll likely never check up on it!" "Okay! Shut up!" Natasha finally shouted, "Shut the hell up! Corrine, a toxin isn't real, yes, you're not wrong, and yes it's ridiculous to peddle such bullshit but that's the health and beauty industry for you, okay? They're so convincing because of all the lobbyists they have that sometimes they even manage to pull the wool over well meaning health gurus eyes like Sharla. And Sharla, you're perfectly willing to argue for what you believe in and ask that it be respected, but Corrine clearly is doing this not just because she disagrees with you - understandably - but also because she wants to see how far she can push you? She doesn't socialize, so this is all the fun she has, got it? Great! Now shut. the hell. UP!" Natasha flopped back into the booth and sighed, lifting her glass to her lips and groaning. "Of all the fucking weeks I could've started sobriety," she mumbled. "Jeez," Corrine said, "Way to kill the mood." "Yeah, lighten up Nat, bitches can't even catfight around you for fun?" Sharla said, both she and Corrine smirking, as if this was a huge joke they'd now played on her. "I really regret starting this business venture with you," Natasha said, half smirking herself. *** "Look, all we want to know is why you're leaving comments like that on my friends videos," Jay said, making Noreen blush. "I...I'm sorry...I didn't mean to make anyone upset," she said, still grinning uncontrollably. "We went through all this trouble to track you down, you could at least give us an answer, your comments are upsetting my friends daughter," Jay said, motioning with his hand to Violet. Noreen and Violet locked eyes, and suddenly Violet didn't even need an answer. Suddenly she somehow knew everything. Her lip quivered, her eyes filled with tears, as Noreen nodded, almost as if she could telepathically understand what Violet was thinking. Almost like an admission of sisterhood or something. Suddenly everything about Violet made sense, in relation to her and her mother, and her placement within her family. "She gets it," Noreen said, pointing at Violet. Yes. Yes she did. "What? What do you 'get' Violet?" Jay asked, looking at her. "Do you know what it's like to be called stupid?" Noreen asked, before Violet could even answer, "Do you know what it's like for everyone around you to assume that you're incapable of any level of intelligence? It's even worse when you managing to string together coherent sentences and sound like you aren't disabled, because the only disabled anyone respects or even believes are the ones where it's visible." "I'm...I'm sorry," Jay muttered, "I didn't..." "She knows," Noreen said, looking at Violet again, "She knows what it's like, don't you? You stutter, you stammer, your brain doesn't fire as fast. I'm lucky, I know that. I have my mental blockages, but overall I don't instantly come across as challenged, like people assume you to be. I don't know why my parents didn't want me, and I...I guess it doesn't really matter, but it made it feel like the world itself didn't want me. Made it feel like maybe I didn't belong to existence because of my mental instabilities, my poorly functioning brain, and then I found Nat's videos." Violet smiled, tears rolling down her face as Noreen crawled off the bed and walked to the window, looking out as she continued. "Nat tells the world we all belong, she tells the world that we're better than it's made us believe to be. All the lies it's told us, they're just that...lies. I'm not 'stupid'. I'm different. That helped a lot. But you know what helped even more? Was realizing that I knew Nat from somewhere else. I did a lot of research after becoming aware of her, gathering information like her birthday, what hospital she was born at, and realizing her birthday and mine were similar, and we were born at the same hospital. I'm a few years older than her, obviously, but...it made it feel like I had a real connection with someone who truly wanted me to believe the best about myself." She turned and looked at Violet, before walking across the room, getting on her knees so they'd be eye level and putting her hands on Violet's shoulders. "You always wondered, didn't you? Why you had problems but your parents didn't? Because it should be genetic, shouldn't it? Your grandma died before you could meet her, didn't she? You never got to know it came from her. That she had issues too, like you do...like I do. Now you know, don't you? You know where it comes from? I'm so sorry to have burdened you with this." "Wh...what does that even mean?" Courtney asked, pulling Violet away from Noreen, almost as if she were protecting her. But Noreen just smiled and wiped her eyes on her shirt sleeve. "But we're both still here. We're both proving everyone wrong. And at least now you get to know where you came from, which is something I'll never really get," Noreen said, "You get it, right?" "Violet? What is she talking about?" Jay asked. "...she's my aunt," Violet said flatly, trying to hold in tears as Noreen nodded. "Tell your mother she lost a sister when her husband left, but she has another chance," Noreen whispered, and without any warning, and against any and all expectations to her actions in the past, Violet flung her arms around Noreen's shoulders, feeling Noreen squeeze her tightly as they sobbed together while Jay and Courtney stood in awe. This was going to change....everything. But Violet didn't care. She did finally understand herself, and she finally felt good about herself in ways Courtney and even her mother could never make her do. This, Violet realized, this is what home feels like.
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Public Access follows Natasha Simple, a self qualified "self help" instructor with her own show on local public access. But when she makes a sudden and surprising statement on air, her entire life changes, for the better...and the worse. Archives
December 2022
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