26. Chapter 26

"Lemy! Lemy!" Lyra tried to catch up to her little brother, but running in a skirt was never an easy task. He'd already gotten a big head start by leaping down the porch steps when she had to handle each step one at a time. She only caught him because he stopped at the end of the walkway to look around for their mom. "Come here." She grabbed his shoulder and spun him around, and was startled at the way he glared at her. "Just hold on." Her phone was still on the call, so she held it up to her ear. "Mom?" She asked.

"To you left." Lyra slowly started to turn her head. Down the street, in front of the second house that was, she could see someone with unmistakable brown hair standing in front of an open car door. Luna Loud. Her mother. And her aunt, she now realized. Lemy broke free from her arm and started running down the sidewalk. Lyra let him, rooted to the spot by sudden apprehension despite believing she was ready for this confrontation. She no longer was sure that she was.

She absentmindedly slipped the phone into her skirt pocket; she hadn't remembered to the end the call, but her mother had, so it was fine. She turned and slowly started plodding along the sidewalk, mind buzzing with nothing coherent. Her eyes were entirely locked on her mother, becoming more detailed as Lyra got closer. She watched as she came around to the front of the car, a nice sedan, so Lemy could run in and fling his arms around her in a big hug. Luna's natural speaking voice was so boisterous, Lyra could hear her from here.

"Hey, little dude! Missed you!" Luna held him against her. "Did you get taller?" The two embraced closely, and Luna's attention was only on her son as her daughter slowly moved closer. Resting his head sideways against his mother, Lemy was apparently talking to her, and Luna was answering, but she was speaking so softly all of a sudden Lyra couldn't hear her. Luna and Lemy stayed like that until Lyra finally reached them, which was when her mother looked up and locked eyes with her. Lyra stopped where she was.

"Mother." She addressed her. Her mom smiled and let go of Lemy.

"Lyra. Dudette." She approached with arms wide open. Lyra just stood there and let this woman that she wasn't entirely sure what to call now walk over and hug her. "Missed you guys!" She was greeting them like it was the end of any other visit. Should Lyra step back? Wouldn't it be counter-productive to everything if she let her mom act like everything was fine.

But then her mom was hugging her, and Lyra's myriads of mental conflicts dissipated in an instant. She reached out and hugged her back. In that moment, Lyra Loud was just an overwhelmed 15 year old girl hugging the woman that, for all her misgivings, was still her mother. She felt safer in that moment than at any time in the last few days.

Lemy, not happy at his own hug ending, came and wedged himself in between the space between his mom and sister, putting an arm around each of their backs and resting his head against each of their midsections. They in turn moved one arm each onto his back. Now it was a group hug between the three of them, a family, and the only family unit any of them had really known for the past 9 years. They stayed like that for close to a minute. Luna was glad to see her kids again, Lemy was glad to see his mom again, and Lyra lost herself in this momentary return to something normal.

"Bloody hell, you guys almost gave me a heart attack, running away like that." Luna squeezed them. Lyra was the first to pull out of the hug.

"We couldn't stay there." She justified their actions. What kind of confrontation was this about to be? Lemy, who Lyra wanted away from here now, used her moving away as an excuse to get a full hug again.

"I know, dude." Her mom met her eye to eye, and Lyra saw no anger there. Their mom had always been laid back, but here it seemed different. That look in her eyes… was that support for what she'd done? "I know." It really was. "I'm glad. I always wanted to explain things to you first."

"G-good. I wanted to hear them from you." When Lyra had envisioned this moment, she'd imagined herself demanding answers. Instead, she was just being given them. She felt relief, but also a small pang of annoyance at being denied a chance to act indignant.

Her mom nodded at her, and then looked down at Lemy. "Listen, little dude, I need to talk to your sis for a couple of minutes." His face fell. Only instead of looking grumpy like he always did with Lyra, this time it looked forlorn. "Trust me dude, it's about gross girl stuff that'll make you hurl. You don't want to hear it. Think you can go wait on the porch for us?" Instead of immediately agreeing like he always did when their mom asked him to do something, he looked like he was considering it. He looked over at Lyra for a brief moment before back up at Mom.

"Is this about our dad?" He asked, making Lyra cringe inwardly.

"Yeah." Luna didn't hide it, which made Lyra feel even more ill despite the fact she'd covered this with Lemy before. "We can talk about it later dude. Right now, I need to talk to Lyra." With implicit trust in their mom, Lemy did what she asked, getting one last hug before he went. His mom and sister both watched him trudge back towards the house, and noticed someone else was already standing on the porch.

"That's Lily, huh?" Luna asked, leaning back against the hood of the car. Lyra's cousin was watching them, but kept her distance.

"Yes." Lyra tried to decipher the other teen's expression, but it was hard to see from here.

"She grew up nicely." Luna commented, waving at her estranged sister. "What's she been up to?" Lily did not wave back.

"...Journalism." Lyra said after a beat. Her mother's interest sounded genuine. Like Lincoln, Lyra figured she did genuinely miss her. "I'm sure you'll get a chance to talk to her later. But first, we need to talk."

"Yeah, I guess we do." Luna stood up. "C'mon dude." Luna motioned to the car and started walking around to the driver side door. "Let's talk." She opened it and climbed inside. Lyra, more slowly, opened the passenger door and eased her way inside. The interior was still cool, indicating an air conditioner had been on until just recently. "So," Luna was still looking at the porch through the windshield, although Lyra was sure Lemy and Lily couldn't see them now, "what did you want to know?"

Where to start… God, where was she supposed to start? It seemed silly to bring it up when it's had already been confirmed twice, but hearing it from her own mom would give some finality.

"So he's really our dad? Uncle Lincoln?"

"Yeah." Luna Loud admitted. "He is."

"So you two are…" Lyra couldn't finish that repulsive sentence.

"No." Her mother didn't admit to that. "Not exactly. Not together." She was still looking at the front porch and the two people on it instead of Lyra. Was she just really interested in those two, or did she just not want to look her daughter in the eye? Lyra found some of that indignation she'd wanted to feel earlier.

"What does that mean?" Lyra's voice was steady in her first sentence, but once she grabbed her mother's shoulder and gave it a shake to try and make her look, her voice rose. "How does this happen then?!" Lyra did succeed in making her mother look at her. The casual expression was gone, replaced with one that betrayed some agitation.

"Look, dude. It was 10 years ago. We did some stupid things, alright?"

"Stupid?" The teenager repeated in disbelief at such a drastic understatement.

"Yeah, stupid." Luna repeated. She turned back to look through the windshield. "It ended a long time ago. I haven't even seen Lincoln at all these last ten years. I've been with Sam." Lyra knew for a fact her mother's relationship with the other woman was nowhere near the same level as one that had sired two kids. And it didn't answer her question.

"I asked how." Lyra stressed. "And why? All of you. Doing this…" Lyra didn't finish that sentence, she just let out a sound of revulsion.

"Lyra, listen." Luna leaned on the window on her side. "Being totally honest, I don't even know why when I think back. It was just this thing we all ended up in. Leni was first, and then we all just fell into it after we saw each other getting away with it. We were all pretty close as siblings. I guess we just thought that was a good way to express it and have fun." She did look back over at her daughter then, but it could've very well been because she felt the disgusted look drilling into her, almost exactly the same Lincoln had gotten when he made the same excuse almost verbatim. "It wasn't cool. I've known that now for 10 years."

"And which one were you?" Lyra demanded, struggling to reconcile her own memories of her aunt Leni with this image her mother had given her of one malevolent instead of just ditzy. "I'm the second oldest." She stopped for a second to catch her breath. "You were a teenage mother, he was four years younger than you. You were almost an adult and he was a child!" She had to stop to catch her breath again. Just talking about these awful things were making her shake. "You're evil. If anyone knew, you would've gotten arrested."

"Probably, yeah." Her mom didn't argue there.

"You don't even feel guilty, do you?" Lyra challenged.

"No." Her mother said unflinchingly. "I'm not going to feel bad about the thing that gave me both of my kids." He turned the conversation back on Lyra. What had happened was undeniably evil, but Lyra knew she and her brother were innocent. She could never suggest they should have missed out on life due to the sins of others. "We didn't hurt him." She went on. "We were all wise beyond our years. He understood as well as any of us."

"Even if you were all okay with it," Lyra truly wasn't sure if that had been the case despite hearing it from both adults. "That doesn't change the fact that it was wrong. It doesn't change the hurt it caused. Our family was torn apart by what you did." Lyra did not accuse, she blamed, letting actual bitterness seep into her voice.

"No." Her mother stopped her there, becoming not averse, but defiant. "No way. Not my fault. Not ANY of our faults." She waved a finger in front of Lyra's face. "That was Lincoln's fault. His and Lucy's. That's why the others hate her." By 'any of us' Luna meant herself, Luan, Leni, and Lynn. Suddenly intrigued, Lyra kept quiet. Her mother saw her silence and used it to lay out the truth. Or what she believed to be the truth.

"Look. By the time we all moved out, we'd all realized how messed up we'd made things. All of us." She emphasized. "Lynn was still messing around, but we were talking her out of it. Me and Luan hadn't done anything with him for a while. Leni wasn't around as often. It just kind of died out after we all moved out."

"After you got pregnant with Lemy." Lyra interrupted. Maybe she couldn't remember much, but she remembered leaving this town while her mother was still pregnant.

"Right." Irritatingly it was not an 'aha!' moment. Her mother just acted like she was helping the story. "Mom and Pops were still peeved about the whole single mom thing, but they were still cool with all of us. The bunch of us were going to try and make something with our lives despite that, and Lincoln was going to help however he could. Make the most of it without giving up what was important." She reached over and touched Lyra's shoulder. "Then those two got caught and everything went to shit." Lyra, not forcefully but slowly, removed her mothers hand.

"Is that why you never let us see him?" Lyra asked, putting it all together. "Because you think it's his fault?" Lyra understood the logic, but she didn't accept the excuse. What right did she have to throw around unequal blame when it was at least half her fault she was that vulnerable to begin with?

"It was his fault." Luna Loud didn't back down. "He promised us he wasn't going to do anything with any of us again. Things wouldn't be perfect, but we all figured they'd be alright. You guys would get to grow up with your cousins-" Luna said that word like it was the only thing they were, but then it was a half-truth she'd been stating for years now. "-in a nice little town. Mom and dad would've had a bunch of grandkids to dote on. You guys would have a pretty normal life." Lyra tried to digest what her mother had just said to her, taking the thing she was most bitter about and laying it at her feet as the fault of almost exclusively two people, one who'd admitted to this with far more sadness. But her mother wasn't done ranting.

"We didn't find out about Lucy until that night. Everything got blown open and we had to get out of there. He just bailed on his own. We had kids. Lynn and Luan managed. I'm still surprised Leni managed." Luna kept talking, not giving enough time for Lyra to dwell on the callousness of that statement. "I had my axe and that was it." She turned back to look out the windshield, but her gaze suggested she was looking at something in her memories. "I honestly wasn't sure we were ever going to make it. I spent a long time worried we were going to be stranded in the Rockies forever."

Lyra's mom had tried. Being there was her own fault. But just like Lincoln, she'd tried all the same. For her sake. For Lemy's sake. Her family had made mistakes, but they didn't revel in them. They didn't try to justify them. They'd tried to move away from them. But…

"Do you really think you're all excused just because you feel sorry about it? Because you suffered?"

"We did the best we could. Don't try and tell me we didn't. Look," Luna grabbed her shoulder to make sure Lyra was looking at her. "I know I'm not perfect. But are you really going to say you're mad at me for trying?"

"No." Her mom really loved her. Her dad really loved her. Lyra wasn't upset about that. "But so much is still messed up. I think I would've wanted to stay here too. That's what I'm upset about."

"Your dad's fault, dudette." Luna tried to remind her.

"No." Lyra fought back against that. "All of you did something terrible. All of you deserve some blame." But staring into her mother's eyes, she just knew the other woman didn't believe that.

"Lyra, you can think I'm an idiot. I think I'm a huge fucking idiot for trusting Lincoln. But I love you guys. I did everything I thought I could to make things better. Call me an idiot. Call me a whore. Call me a nonce if you really want to. But I'm still your mom."

Now it was Lyra's turn to look back at the porch and think. A lot of this conversation sounded almost exactly like the one she'd had with her father. Both of them regretted what had happened. Both of them seemed to have earnestly tried to right their wrongs since then. Both of them still wanted Lyra to love and forgive them for that. But her mother wasn't as humble. Her mother tried to shift the blame, even if she rightfully put some of it on herself.

At that moment, Lyra realized she might have more pity for her father than her mother just for that.

"I know. I just need time before I can forgive you. Both of you."

"So," her mother was quiet for a second. "What do you really think of your dad then?"

"I think he's suffered a lot. More than you." Her mother scoffed at that. "Because of you." Lyra got just a little heated. "He said almost the exact same things you said." That took Luna aback, giving Lyra her first real satisfaction. "I think he really wanted to make things right, just like you. You didn't want to let him, did you?" She accused.

"Lyra, he was gone for years. He had other kids to take care of. I was doing him a favor."

"He still managed to."

"So you're taking his side."

"Between both of you, I think he's the most humble."

"Yeah." Luna Loud leaned back in her seat. "Lincoln was always good at being apologetic after screwing things up. Runs in the family." Lyra said nothing, because that comment did hit a nerve; she'd already decided them being sorry about it wasn't going to make her instantly forgive them.

"I think he's trying to be a good dad. Just like you're trying to be a good mom. But that doesn't mean I'm going to be okay with either of you. You must've thought he was being truthful, or you wouldn't have let us come here."

"If I knew he was going to bollocks it up this bad, I wouldn't."

"I'm the one that brought Lily over." Once again, Lyra took a side.

"Mhm." Her mother heard her. "Lyra, look. Do you want to come home, or not? We'll have all the time in the world to talk." Her mom offered.

Home? What was home? The tour bus? One of hundreds of thousands of motel or hotel rooms. None of those gave Lyra a sense of comfort or security. This place did, despite how short her time there had been. But more importantly, she hadn't forgiven her mother yet. Nothing in this conversation had given her the desire to either.

"No." Lyra shook her head. "I'm sorry mother, but no. Not yet. I need to think about it more. And…I want to talk to my dad again before we leave." Her mother looked down, then up, and finally away from her. Lyra had gotten the confessions out of her mother. She'd gotten her mother's perspective on what happened. She needed to think about it now.

"Alright. I get it dudette. You need more time to think about it. But I am going to ask your brother too."

"I think it's best he stays with me." Lyra said quickly. She didn't want their mother talking to them about this; he was too young. "He should be as far removed from this as possible." Somewhere that wasn't either of their parents-or their parents 'collaborators'-was perfect, and he was already there.

"I'm going to ask him. Let him decide" Luna sounded more forceful, and Lyra backed down. She did not have the will or the means to oppose her mother if she was really tried. What could she have done, anyway?

"Well, let me ask him for you." Lyra offered instead. "I won't lie about what he says." If Lemy did, regretfully, want to go with her, Lyra wouldn't even be able to stop him running back here towards the car. But she hoped-she silently prayed even-that saying she was staying would make him too.

"I'll ask him myself." Again, she was refuted. "Besides, if you're staying, I'm going to have to talk to them anyway." By them, Lyra realized her mom meant her family-Lily and her own parents. "Might as well get it over with now." Luna opened the driverside door. And just like she had with Lemy, Lyra scrambled to follow her mother to another confrontation.