Musical May - Broadway Style
I think now's a good time to start figuring out what I'm going to draw for Musical May this year. I do Sharpie art because it's easiest and quickest, but I always like to plan ahead of time.
Last year's theme was classic Disney songs. This year, I've decided to do classic Broadway songs.
I can think of a few songs right away that I would love to illustrate. For the remaining slots, now's your chance to toss up suggestions. Keep them clean and family-oriented, if you please.
**EDIT** And I got 'em all!
"Do You Hear the People Sing" from Les Misérables
"I Dreamed a Dream" from Les Misérables
"Bring Him Home" from Les Misérables
"Empty Chairs at Empty Tables" from Les Misérables
"If I Were a Rich Man" from Fiddler on the Roof
"Matchmaker, Matchmaker" from Fiddler on the Roof
"The Good Old Days" from Damn Yankees
"All I Ask of You" from Phantom of the Opera
"Endless Night" from The Lion King
"The Impossible Dream" from Man of La Mancha
"Oh, What a Beautiful Morning" from Oklahoma!
"The Sound of Music" from The Sound of Music
"Climb Ev'ry Mountain" from The Sound of Music
"My Favorite Things" from The Sound of Music
"Luck Be a Lady" from Guys and Dolls
"The Music of the Night" from Phantom of the Opera
"Into the Fire" from The Scarlet Pimpernel
"When I Grow Up" from Matilda
"Pure Imagination" from Charlie and the Chocolate Factory
"But Mr. Adams" from 1776
"Anything You Can Do" from Annie Get Your Gun
"Hello, Dolly" from Hello, Dolly!
"You'll Never Walk Alone" from Carousel
"Seize the Day" from Newsies
"I Feel Pretty" from West Side Story
"Heart" from Damn Yankees
"Tomorrow" from Annie
"Impossible" from Cinderella
"Stepsisters Lament" from Cinderella
"Any Dream Will Do" from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat
"I Am the Very Model of a Modern Major General" from The Pirates of Penzance
My DA Anniversary
Today marks 16 years since I joined deviantART for the very first time.
This was my first major social media platform. This was before I had Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, or even my own blog. I was a shy and nervous kid fresh out of high school, who hadn't fully decided on whether or not to go to college.
While I miss the old DA and most of my friends that have flown the coop, I still like it here (for the most part) and I definitely credit this place for the tremendous boost in the quality of my self-confidence in addition to my writing and art. There's no way any of my stories or characters would have made it this far otherwise, though college was a huge help, too.
So, happy anniversary to me! Let the fun times roll!
TV Tropes - Kaylee's Relatives
It’s been a while (a very good while) since I did this kind of list, and I’ve been kind of interested in doing another one. So, today, for the first TV Tropes list of 2024, we’ll be looking at the blood relatives of Kaylee Drummond, the girl who marries Reid and Lara’s youngest son, Troy, and—spoiler alert—eventually becomes Daire’s next Queen.
For a bit of context, Kaylee has a pretty good-sized family, which is why I’m lumping them all together here. On her mother’s side, there’s her grandmother, two aunts (one older and one younger than Lottie) and one uncle (the youngest and the only one unmarried) as well as two uncles through marriage and six cousins, only one of which is a boy.
On her father’s side, there’s her grandfather, two uncles (both older than Philip), one aunt (the youngest and the only living female), one aunt through marriage, and four cousins, all of which are boys.
They all show up when Kaylee and Troy get married, and then I’m planning a few more scenes for some of them in future stories. The first thing everybody says about the Drummonds and the Scarlets is, “This explains a lot.”
We understand why Lottie is such a selfish control freak who never admits her mistakes if she can help it, as well as why Philip used to be such a sarcastic misogynist. At the very least, Lottie is nowhere near the worst of the bunch (believe it or not) whereas Philip improves enough to earn the right to tell quite a few of them off to their faces. I won’t say Lottie becomes perfect over time but she does become more tolerable, enough to where Kaylee doesn’t cut her off, allows her to visit from time to time, and still calls her “Mother.”
For the most part, Kaylee’s relatives are good for a laugh, almost like that Battle of the Sexes you sometimes see in romantic comedies. That being said, there are some parts that are rather sad and even a little scary. Kaylee never had an ideal relationship with any of them, and although she’s gracious enough to invite all of them to her wedding with no strings attached and give their relationship with her one more chance, some of them only care about how they can benefit from her now that she’s joined the Royal Family.
If nothing else, she finds out once and for all who’s worth keeping around, she embraces the Lactantiuses, Wiles, Byrnes, and Windwillows as her true family, and there are a few blood relatives who make up with her for real, who don’t care about her social status either way.
I leave you to decide who makes up with her once and for all and who doesn’t. Some people need more time than others, just like in real life. But I will confirm right now that she does make up with three of her ten cousins, does not make up with her maternal grandmother, and her paternal aunt and maternal uncle have always gotten along with her beautifully and always will; she just gets to spend more time with them than she got before.
For those who fail, she quietly washes her hands of them and moves on with her life. She says, “At least I know who my real family is, and the most important thing is I’ve got a family.” When she has children of her own, she sees to it there’s no lack of love, so you could say she takes her family’s mistakes on both sides to heart.
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Abhorrent Admirers: Lottie’s not the only one who gets a little flirty despite already being married.
Both of Lottie’s sisters, Effie and Myrtle, make a few brazen passes at Mason Wiles since Mason is tall, handsome, wealthy, gentlemanly, and a lot more desirable than he was in his youth. Anyone can see he’s better than Bartholomew and Baldwin put together, that there’s hardly any spark between them and their wives.
At first, Mason expresses “concern” for the state of Effie and Myrtle’s mental health, which incenses both ladies right away. “We are not crazy!” they can barely splutter.
Then he quits his own game then and there and tells them with dead seriousness to knock it off, rendering them both silent. He further expresses his legitimate disgust at their gall for trying to cozy up to another married man (a perfectly happily married man) at a wedding reception, of all places. That’s about as slimy as it gets.
On a milder level, some of Kaylee’s not-yet-married cousins figure if she can nab a prince as easily as that, how hard can it be for the rest of them? They don’t take it too far but it’s enough to make most of Kaylee’s sisters, who used to pursue Troy in the same way, rather uncomfortable.
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Abusive Parents: If not physical, there’s plenty of verbal and psychological torment, all the way to the present day. It’s hard to say who got the worst deal.
If nothing else, Cousins Noreen, Cameron, and Walter are able to shake off their parents’ and grandparents’ toxic influence (with a little help from Kaylee herself) and Aunt Joan and Uncle Seth made their escape years ago.
It’s possible that neither Flannery Scarlet (the only surviving matriarch) nor Nicholas Drummond (the only surviving patriarch) had the most ideal upbringing, either. One way or another, nothing justifies keeping the vicious cycle turning. Sooner or later, everybody must take responsibility for their own actions, which ties in nicely to the overall theme of Reid’s story.
Lottie was as hard on her daughters as she was because her own mother was hard(er) on her, and she wanted revenge on her mother more than anything else. For a short while, Kaylee wanted kids so she could get revenge on her mother, but then she reconsiders her game plan and raises her kids to be truly good people for their own sake rather than for the sake of giving her mother the metaphorical middle finger.
Uncle Seth was only able to get away for good after learning for himself that his mother wasn’t as powerful as she claimed, while Aunt Joan’s mother (before she died) saved her from complete ruin until she was in a better position to take care of herself, since Joan refused to live her life in a way that suited her high-and-mighty father. Even when she visits, all her father wants to know is who she’s dating and when she’ll get her act together and tie the proverbial knot and give him more grandchildren, notwithstanding the nine grandchildren he has already.
For further insult to injury, Nick and all three of his sons treat Joan like she’s somehow unqualified to love kids just because she doesn’t have any of her own and doesn’t plan on it. They treat her genuine love for her nieces like it’s some kind of joke if not a downright crime. He doesn’t say two words about his son Harold being unmarried and childless, nor does he do anything about Harold’s awful sexist humor. Overall, if it weren’t for Kaylee, Joan wouldn’t have anything to do with anyone else under the Drummond name anymore.
As you can well imagine, Kaylee has also had it pretty rough, and not just where her parents and sisters were concerned. With the big exception of Aunt Joan and Uncle Seth, she always dreaded family get-togethers, holidays were hardly any fun, and she never could decide which relative was the worst.
Let’s just say she’d rather be in the same room with Catherine and her mother than with Aunt Effie, Aunt Myrtle, Uncle Bartholomew, Grandmother Flan, or Grandfather Nick, and that’s saying a lot.
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Affectionate Nickname: Uncle Seth, Lottie’s little and only brother, often calls Kaylee “Bookworm.”
Of course, Kaylee adores books, and Seth had a lot to do with it. Among her few fond childhood memories are those of going to the library with him, just the two of them, and she got excited whenever he gave her a brand-new book for Christmas or her birthday. Sometimes he sent her one just because; he figured she might like it, and he was right every time. While she enjoyed some books more than others, there wasn’t a single book from Uncle Seth she didn’t like. Aunt Joan sent her a few nice books, too.
She takes some of those books with her when she moves out, and she tells Juna, her illiterate maid who’s finally decided learning to read might be worth her while, to take good care of the rest.
When the man shows up at the wedding, he never hesitates to congratulate his little Bookworm and give her the biggest hug. The nickname remains music to her ears.
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All Take and No Give: The biggest problem with Scarlets and Drummonds alike. They’ll not only refuse to give you anything if they can help it, but they feel perfectly entitled to anything you could give them.
Aunt Myrtle and Aunt Effie in particular are abysmal gift-givers. They often recycle cheap, tacky gifts just to save themselves a shopping trip (and save their money at the same time), yet they seem to truly believe they deserve gifts that cost nothing less than an arm and a leg.
Aside from their tasteless wedding gifts, Kaylee gets another unpleasant reminder of her aunts’ greed and stinginess when she treats them to a nice shopping trip in town along with a nice lunch, and both ladies expect her to foot the bill for everything and then they complain bitterly when she only pays enough for herself.
All three of Myrtle’s daughters have a total meltdown when their princess cousin won’t cover their outrageous purchases, either, which forces them to choose between using their own money, putting their desired purchases back, or facing shoplifting charges.
The people who marry into this family are no better. Uncle Bartholomew, Myrtle’s husband, is probably the most glaring example; he tries to use his niece along with her special connections for his own publicity stunts, and he too gets his knickers in a bunch when she draws a definite line and keeps it there.
The fact that these vultures can no longer push this little mouse around like they used to only makes them nastier.
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Armor-Piercing Question: When Flan and Nick both claim they know Kaylee better than anyone else in the entire wedding hall just because she shares their blood, neither grandparent has a satisfactory answer when asked the following questions: “What’s Kaylee’s favorite color? What foods does she like? When’s her birthday? What’s her favorite flavor of tea? When was the last time you visited her, called her, or told her you loved her?”
If nothing else, Nick feels a rather sharp pang of regret when he sees for himself how close his granddaughter is to Tallis Lactantius—closer than she ever was to him by a long shot—as well as when he’s excluded from the bridal dance on purpose. Even Marlon Wiles and Nero Byrnes get along with Kaylee so much better and she heartily dances with them both.
On a smaller scale, Uncle Arthur, whose sexism makes Philip’s (former) sexism look tame, has no answer when his two youngest sons ask him to his face, “What have you got against women, anyway? What’d they ever do to you?”
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Arranged Marriage: The first question that springs to mind is why Effie would marry Baldwin, why Myrtle would marry Bartholomew, or why Arthur would marry Winifred.
The answer is simple: all of these couples were forced to marry, whether they liked it or not. Even Lottie and Philip were pushed together.
Why Harold Drummond isn’t married can only be explained by his crude humor and shoddy manners; no woman would marry him, even against her will, if he was the last man on Earth, and he attempts to soothe his own smarting ego by claiming it’s the women who have no taste.
Joan Drummond vehemently refused to be married by force, and she managed to break loose and live her own life without a husband, albeit with a long, terrible struggle. Her mother saved her from getting cut off until she got on her feet, but her father has never forgiven her for defying him and he refuses to let it go in the present day.
Philip was less likely than Harold to scare a woman off, and he didn’t totally resist Lottie. To some degree, he did like her until she became too much of a pain in his neck on her own and he fought fire with a little too much fire.
Seth Scarlet also refused to marry against his will or drag another woman into an unwanted relationship. He had less of a struggle for his independence than Joan did, and he finds his mother’s resentment more amusing than anything else. Any time Flan threatens to never speak to her son again, she knows it’s an empty threat because he can take care of himself and he doesn’t need her. If anything, he’d be quite relieved to be rid of her for good. She refuses to give him that satisfaction, and she also refuses to lose her only son, her baby and the only surviving male in her family besides her daughters’ husbands and her grandson.
We don’t see if Seth and Joan ever marry. But they interact with each other of their own free will, they like each other for themselves, and they both get a kick out of seeing their families burst a blood vessel between the urge to know if they really are romantically involved and the disbelieving fury if it were true.
Kaylee and most of her sisters are lucky enough to marry someone for love’s sake. Kaylee only wanted Troy if he wanted her as well, he finally told her he did, and the rest was history.
Likewise, two of Arthur’s sons choose their own wives who like them back and prove a good match.
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Awful Truth: Within these two seemingly elegant, respectable groups lurks a cesspool of snobbery, racism, sexism, bullying, abuse, insatiability, total disregard for others, and utter refusal to face reality. Some people wonder whether Flan’s bad behavior may be a result of senility, but it has more to do with calcified entitlement than anything else. Faith and Kaylee both admit their grandmother has always been a terrible person who’s only gotten slightly worse over the years. Seth couldn't agree with his nieces more.
Kaylee is a little disheartened that most of these people have never been proper family and never will be. On the other hand, this makes her relationship with her real family that much more meaningful. If there’s one thing she learns from all this, love defines a family so much more than mere genetics.
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Babies Ever After: Out of Uncle Arthur’s four sons, only two of them give him grandchildren and he barely sees any of them at all, much to his dismay. In contrast, his ex-wife has perfect access to her four grandsons and two granddaughters and she visits them as often as possible, with the kids looking forward to every visit.
Harold spends the rest of his life without a wife or kids, while Joan has never entertained the idea of kids of her own, though she still adores them and pampers them to pieces. It always rankled her that her father and siblings treated her like she wasn’t supposed to like kids if she had no desire to become a mother. It put an extra sour taste in her mouth when everybody acted like marriage and motherhood were all she could be good for. No wonder she was so put off.
On the maternal side, it’s only confirmed that Kaylee, Faith, Lavinia, and Daisy keep the family tree growing. Kaylee has five children, Faith has three, and Lavinia and Daisy each have two.
Ironically, Grandmother Flan has threatened Kaylee not to have any children at any time, on the basis that she’s not truly married to Troy and thus Flan’s “poor old heart won’t be able to bear the shame,” as Uncle Seth describes it. So, Kaylee keeps quiet about her pregnancies and lets her grandmother think what she wants if she ever finds out.
For the extra cherry on top, Kaylee asks Caleb Windwillow, the same faun who was her wedding officiant (and the main reason for Flan’s crazy obsession) to be the godfather to her children. Caleb is only too happy to agree.
Flan also flips her lid at Daisy having biracial twins with a black man, but Daisy cares as little as Kaylee does. There’s still plenty of love for these two darling girls, and then some.
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Because I Said So: That was the number one explanation Flannery and her daughters gave their children whenever the children raised a protest about anything, and so it was with Nicholas and his sons.
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Big Brother Bully: As awful as Cousin Raffy was to Kaylee, at least she didn’t have to see him every day or share the same house with him.
Noreen, being Raffy’s little sister, wasn’t so lucky. It’s witnessing Noreen’s personal suffering at the hands of her brother and mother (her big sister was also pretty nasty to her, with her father making nothing better) that makes Kaylee take pity on her and reach out to her a little more. Of course, it helps that Noreen still apologizes of her own accord for her poor treatment of Kaylee in the old days, which Kaylee warmly accepts.
Naturally, when Kaylee becomes a princess and Noreen becomes a big star, all of a sudden Raffy acts as though he’s their best pal. He all but disregards what he did to both girls back then and thinks only about what he can milk from them now—and then he becomes angry and perplexed when they drop him faster than a block of cement.
On a side note, all three of Joan’s brothers, who are all older than her, treated her pretty badly, too, and this bullying continued well into adulthood. Although Arthur, Harold, and Philip hardly ever lay a finger on Joan, their mistreatment is more of the psychological type, which was far worse. She was all too often on the unfortunate end of Harold’s crude jokes, with Arthur and Philip busting a serious gut every time.
If that wasn’t bad enough, Philip not only made it hard for Joan to visit her nieces as often as she would have liked but nearly every single visit was a disaster. So, Kaylee kept in touch with her nice aunt through phone calls, letters, and wonderful presents. She always knew for a fact Aunt Joan loved her.
At least Philip realizes his mistake at long last and does everything possible to make it up to his sister. Though it takes time, Joan is convinced to give Philip one last chance and he doesn’t disappoint.
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Big Eater: Whenever Aunt Effie swings by, there must be plenty of good food on hand. While that’s not the only reason for her incredible girth, it sure played a substantial role.
At the same time, the woman dares to criticize Kaylee for eating so much and she assumes Lavinia will eat herself into disgusting fatness after marrying a baker. Of course, Kaylee is an unofficial athlete and maintains a perfectly healthy weight, whereas Lavinia does get a little plumper over the years but she’s far from grossly overweight and she always carries herself well. Effie even criticizes her own daughter just because Noreen has a tiny bit more meat on her bones, and Noreen has no trouble seeing her mother is already as wide as she is tall.
Furthermore, Effie has the audacity to get angry when Kaylee refuses to foot the hefty bill when they eat lunch together at an extravagant restaurant, which forces her to cough up her own precious money.
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Birds of a Feather: Joan and Seth are first drawn to each other when they learn they’ve both had to put up with an overbearing parent who cares more about looking good in the public’s eye than about their child’s actual wellbeing, and neither of them have ever been particularly close to their opposite-gender siblings.
They empathize with each other, they understand and respect each other perfectly, and Kaylee easily got along with them best.
So, they start spending more time together, with and without Kaylee by their side, and they enjoy each other’s company very much. Whenever anyone asks if they’re a couple, they neither confirm nor deny it. They won’t even tell Kaylee and she sees no need to pry for further details.
If they’re romantic, that’s great because it means they’ve found someone they want to be with. If they’re platonic, that’s also great because they’ve made a wonderful, reliable, enduring friend.
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Blood is Thicker Than Water: If there’s one thing the Scarlets and the Drummonds have in common, it’s their stubborn assumption that they know Kaylee better than anyone else does, and they deserve the best treatment because she shares their blood. Even Uncle Bartholomew and Uncle Baldwin feel entitled to special favors because they married into Kaylee’s bloodline.
Kaylee proves beyond a doubt that, while blood is indeed important, there’s a whole lot more to a true family than that. Such a powerful lesson sticks better with some than others.
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Break the Haughty: Just about everybody on both sides of the family gets smashed into smithereens, although only a precious few pick themselves up right away and are pieced into something better. It’s a sad, hilarious, and most cathartic sight to see.
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Breaking the Cycle of Bad Parenting: I don’t intend to show whether Cousin Noreen ever starts a family of her own (although she has a successful acting career) but Cousins Cameron and Walter do, and they both get it right.
Cameron has three sons and one daughter, whereas Walter has one son and one daughter. Both fathers teach their sons what it means to be true gentlemen, and they spoil their daughters in all the right ways. Although the Drummond kids hardly ever see their grandfather, they see plenty of their grandmother and Winifred is over the moon about her grandchildren. They always run to her in great excitement, give her as many hugs and kisses as possible, and call her “Gramma.”
Likewise, Kaylee and three of her sisters become more ideal mothers as well as genuinely fun aunts. At bare minimum, Lottie is a passable grandmother and the kids like her and Aunt Catherine enough to embrace them, though they can never get enough of Granddad Philip, Granddad Reid, or Nana Lara.
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Bullying a Dragon: Little do the Scarlets and Drummonds realize (or refuse to see) who they’re dealing with when they not only show incredible disrespect to the royal Lactantiuses, Wiles, Byrnes, and Windwillows, but also make the mistake of assuming Kaylee can be still be pushed around.
If Kaylee wanted to, she could have every last one of these people locked up the next time they blinked. Grandmother Flan was lucky just to be escorted to the door when her misconduct at the wedding party went too far.
Uncle Bartholomew is just as lucky Malachi doesn’t punch his lights out after he screws the faun over on purpose during a charity performance. When the man seeks compensation from Kaylee later, all he gets is a stony command to go away.
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Calling the Old Man/Woman Out: Joan has done this to her father and Seth has done this to his mother for many years, despite every word falling on deaf ears. So, they let their actions speak for them.
Noreen really rakes her mother across the coals for a whole host of things, basically unleashing years’ worth of emotional baggage all at once. It gets bad enough to where she calls her “Fanny” instead of “Mother,” which just about renders the older woman catatonic. Kaylee and Malachi get front-row seats to this epic discourse, with both of them heartily applauding Noreen at the end and she can only tell them with a smile, “Boy, did that feel good!”
Cameron and Walter soundly chasten their father and grandfather for teaching them all the wrong lessons about women, to say nothing of their horrendous treatment of poor Winifred. Winifred stopped talking a long time ago, to the point where she can hardly remember what her own voice sounds like anymore.
Faith also has some choice words for her grandmother when Flan kicks up an unnecessary fuss at Kaylee’s wedding, just because Caleb was the one to pronounce Kaylee and Troy husband and wife and Flan is utterly convinced that a faun could never be authorized for something like this. When Flan calls Kaylee a harlot for all ears to hear, Faith can only say with ice-cold fury, “That does it, Grandmother. You are most definitely out of here.” And she’s not just talking about the reception, either.
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Character Development: At least some members of Kaylee’s kin change for the better, with one of her maternal cousins and two of her paternal cousins serving as the prime example.
Her father also shows how far he’s come when he sincerely apologizes to his sister, who still holds an understandable grudge against him, and he tears a new strip and a half off the rest of his family. When his father and brothers remind him of his own sexism, he retorts, “I was wrong and I can assure you things will be very different from now on. I’ll bar the rest of you from my own life if I have to. I don’t need you telling me what’s what anymore, and I’m not exposing my daughters to any more of this horse crap.”
Winifred, who was more or less enslaved to Arthur, finally finds the courage to divorce him and walk away without looking back. Arthur and Nick used to threaten her if she left, but such threats finally lose their effect, since Cameron and Walter side with their mother and Kaylee sides with her aunt. Kaylee promises to help Winifred in any way possible, and she goes on calling her “Aunt Winifred.”
As a result, Winifred’s life is not only not ruined, but she’s happier than she’s ever been before. Cameron and Walter do everything possible to take care of her and show her more love and respect, Kaylee makes sure she’s got plenty of financial support, and when the time comes, she shares a beautiful bond with her grandchildren.
Arthur and Nick are lucky just to have their existence known among the next generation, while Anthony and Nolan’s disrespect of women also catches up with them and has more serious consequences than they’d anticipated. Cameron’s children are surprised to find out they have any other uncles besides Uncle Walter, and it’s the same way with Walter’s children.
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Clashing Cousins: In a way that would be a comedy for the ages if it weren’t so serious.
Kaylee’s cousins all want what she has, they’ll raise hell and high water to get it, and they’ll wage apoplectic tantrums when karma decides otherwise.
Only the nice cousins who don’t try so hard end up getting what they want, and then some.
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Coattail-Riding Relatives: Now that Kaylee has become someone really important (you don’t get much better than royalty), all of a sudden her family members, including the ones who hardly looked twice at her and virtually lived for making her as miserable as possible, can’t kiss up and down to her enough. They care much more about how they can benefit from her success. They expect huge favors from her at every opportunity and then get upset when she rightfully refuses.
Kaylee isn’t too surprised but a little disappointed and disheartened all the same. As Malachi puts it, a family shouldn’t be a meal ticket.
At least Cousin Noreen doesn’t take advantage of her. When she’s on her way to becoming a professional actress like she always wanted, she remains humble and grateful, the more so because Kaylee has made all this possible. Kaylee shares a special connection with Malachi Windwillow, she’s under no obligation whatsoever to help Noreen, but she helps her anyway, with Malachi being every bit as willing.
Noreen apologizes to Kaylee’s face in total sincerity, she would have apologized anyway under different circumstances, and she tries to treat her to something nice here and there, even if it’s no more than a cup of coffee. Kaylee sees these little kind gestures for what they are and appreciates them.
Of course, Uncle Seth and Aunt Joan never take advantage of her, either, and Cousins Cameron and Walter learn to be heaps nicer, too.
If nothing else, the new princess is able to determine once and for all who’s truly worth keeping around, separating the good wheat from the noxious weeds. For those who must hit the road for good, at least she can say, “Good riddance to bad rubbish.”
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Cool Aunt/Uncle: Fortunately, there’s one member on each side of the family Kaylee has always liked, who don’t need to be salvaged at all: her uncle Seth on her mother’s side and her aunt Joan on her father’s side.
Not only were they both nice to her all her life, but they understood her better than anyone else did, including her parents. Seth had a huge part to play in Kaylee’s love of books and how well she performed in school while Lottie was subtly trying to discourage her daughters from getting too intelligent. Seth often took Kaylee to the library, he always called her “Bookworm,” and birthday and Christmas presents from him usually included something new to read. Of course, Kaylee didn’t love every single book from Uncle Seth but she most definitely enjoyed them all. He had a pretty good idea of his niece’s tastes.
That’s partly why the girl’s so torn between what kind of career she wants when she grows up, whether she ought to pursue something more athletic or academic. But given the choice, she’d sooner forfeit swimming than reading. You’ll find her face in a book just as often as you’ll find it in the water, if not oftener. At the wedding, Seth gently quips about how Kaylee used to drag a book around “the way some kids would drag a doll.”
Aunt Joan was plenty nice in her own way. Unfortunately, it was because of Philip and Lottie that she didn’t get to see Kaylee as often as she wanted and almost every visit ended on a sour note. Still, Kaylee knew her paternal aunt loved her, and just like Seth, Joan often sent her special niece wonderful gifts suited to her tastes.
So, it was only natural that Joan and Seth were among the first to receive a wedding invitation. Neither would miss this big day for the world, but upon their arrival, both make it clear as crystal to everyone else they’re only here for Kaylee’s sake.
At least Philip gives his sister a sincere if awkward apology on the spot, and Joan gradually softens as she witnesses her brother’s change of heart for herself. Joan and Seth’s hugs at the reception are among the warmest, too, and Seth is most certainly included in the bridal dance.
After Kaylee’s marriage, Joan and Seth can visit her anytime they like (and vice versa) and they get along as famously as ever. They’re both over the moon when Kaylee announces her first baby, with Seth practically squealing for joy, “My little bookworm, a mum!”
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Deadpan Snarker: Like many of my characters, the sarcasm from both sides of this family can easily cut an apple all the way to the core.
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Defector from Decadence: Seth and Joan defected long ago. Then Kaylee takes a few leaves out of their books, and then her father, her paternal uncle’s wife, sixty percent of her sisters, and thirty percent of her cousins take numerous leaves out of her book.
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Dirty Coward: For all their bluster, nearly all of the Scarlets and Drummonds can dish out heaps more than they can take. They make a surprisingly hasty retreat when confronting somebody who can not only fight back but will not hold back, or when their unsavory actions prove to have unpleasant repercussions.
Cousin Raffy is probably the top example of cowardice. He’s like a small-scale version of Joffrey from Game of Thrones, minus the wanton sadism. He gives himself ridiculous airs for his self-styled masculinity, yet he curls up like a frightened hedgehog at the sound of his mother’s voice, he bawls like a baby when Cousin Faith kicks his butt with relative ease, and he goes white when Cousin Kaylee becomes a monarch and proves beyond a doubt she has more power over him than he ever had or will ever have over her.
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Does Not Want Kids: In the case of Uncle Seth and Aunt Joan, it’s more a matter of, “If I ever have kids, or marry, I won’t do it just to make my parents happy or appease society.” Each is the first to admit how important kids are, how marriage can be a good thing, and there’s no lack of love for their nieces and nephews, Kaylee most of all.
The problem is that’s all Seth’s mother and Joan’s father ever talk about anymore. All either parent wants to know at every visit is, “Who are you dating? When will you marry? You’re not getting any younger! Get a move on!”
No one says a word about how successful Joan and Seth are with their careers, or how they’re really feeling and what their lives are like behind closed doors. There’s even a limit placed on how much they ought to love Kaylee.
For further irony, both these people would have done a far better job at raising Kaylee if she were in their custody. They would have easily beaten Lottie and Philip out of the park.
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The Dog Bites Back: More obvious in Joan’s case, and only a little subtler in Seth’s case.
Then Kaylee finally gets her opportunity to even the score, as do Noreen, Cameron, Walter, and of all people, Winifred.
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Drama Queen: With such theatrics on a daily basis, these people should all have a decent shot at the actual theater.
I would say it’s Flan who takes the cake, carrying on as much as she does about Kaylee and Daisy’s marriages on top of Seth’s lack of marriage. Then she carries on even more about facing—gasp!—consequences for her actions, seeing with her own eyes all these people whom she assumed were nothing without her live perfectly happy, healthy lives without her.
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Earn Your Happy Ending: Besides Kaylee and Noreen, the turnout for Winifred Drummond is among the most noteworthy.
For more years than Kaylee was alive, Winifred was trapped in a marriage that was anything but loving, in a family that was the furthest thing from a family imaginable, with her own children treating her like she was worthless. And whenever she got the remotest opportunity to escape or stand up for herself, her husband and her father-in-law were only too quick to crush that opportunity like a grape under a millstone.
The only one who had it worse than her was Ida, Reid’s maternal aunt.
It’s because of Kaylee that Winifred can not only escape but her own self-worth is basically rekindled. She can finally tell her oppressors (in action if not in word) where they can stuff it, and half of her children realize the error of their ways, walk away with her, and do their best to treat her like a real mother from then on.
Her happy ending may be long overdue, but she finally gets it with ample interest.
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Family of Choice: As nice as Kaylee is to give her blood relatives one last chance when she’s already given them more chances than they deserve, she learned for herself a long time ago that family is more about love than anything else.
The Lactantiuses love her. The Wiles love her. The Byrnes love her. The Windwillows love her. In time, the Everharts learn to love her, too. And she loves them.
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Fantastic Racism: Lottie’s dislike of fauns and mixed-race couples is incredibly small fry compared to her mother’s blinding hatred. Flan makes a total exhibition of herself in front of Mason and Cecily, she only refrains from mouthing off to Nero when the giant man looms over her, and she really hits the roof when one of her granddaughters chooses a faun for her wedding officiant and another granddaughter falls head over heels for a black man.
At a charity performance, Bartholomew refuses to pay Malachi his rightful fee (Malachi had even negotiated for less) just because he doesn’t believe fauns deserve to be paid. A huge event that took months to put together is destroyed in a manner of seconds because a single idiot can’t let even a tiny bit of bigotry go.
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Feeling Oppressed by Their Existence: For whatever reason, Flannery Scarlet has the most irrational hatred of fauns, black people, and interracial couples any of the main characters have ever seen, and absolutely nothing will change her mind.
She’s bold enough to mouth off to King Mason and Queen Cecily, she renounces Daisy as her granddaughter after Daisy marries a wealthy farmer with dark skin (and has two children with him), and she somehow believes Kaylee’s marriage can’t be valid because a faun, none other than Caleb Windwillow, pronounced her and Troy husband and wife. There’s just no way a faun can be authorized to do something like that, so this means Kaylee isn’t Troy’s true wife, which means she shouldn’t have children with him if she knows what’s good for her.
For two years straight, the old bat won’t stop asking when Kaylee and Troy are going to have a proper marriage ceremony with a proper priest, and Kaylee already knows even if they did as she asked, she still wouldn’t be happy because then she’ll just talk their ears off about how she was right all along and she would always hold those two years of “living in sin” against them.
Besides, Kaylee likes Caleb, he’s much more proper family by himself, and she makes him the godfather for her children, so she’ll let Flan rant and rave until her old heart gives out.
Daisy hardly feels the loss, either, especially since her husband’s black grandmother (who’s older than Flan) welcomes her with open arms from the start. So, everyone else can see plain as day that Flan is just a ridiculous, hopeless bigot who’s not used to not getting her way for a change.
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Forgiveness: For those who honestly seek it and do whatever they can to earn it, it’s a thing of beauty.
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Get Out: What Kaylee has left to say to those who haven’t changed and refuse to do so, her grandmother above all.
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Gold Digger: If not for love, it’s safe to assume these people married for each other’s money, and they seek to acquire even more money with as little manual labor on their part as possible.
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Grew a Spine: Kaylee most definitely gets better at standing up to her relatives, after everything she went through with her mother and Sheena Everhart. She may be as kind and sweet as before, if not more so, but she’s no longer a meek little mouse and she refuses to take another ounce of crap from anyone, no matter who they are.
Then, of course, everybody has the nerve to get angry at this so-called insolence, with Uncle Bartholomew telling her to her face, “You’ve got a lot of cheek, little lady.”
Grandmother Flan is utterly flabbergasted when Kaylee dares to summon two soldiers on her and bar her from the wedding reception, notwithstanding her own shameless behavior in public. Two years later, the old woman refuses to let this go and acts as though Kaylee must earn her forgiveness before anything else can happen.
On the flip side, three of Kaylee’s cousins are truly inspired by her courage, which gives them the courage to stand up to their own terrible families and break away. Cousin Noreen will be forever grateful not only for Kaylee’s help in getting her acting career off the ground, but also for the much-needed help in escaping her overbearing mother once and for all.
Cousins Cameron and Walter finally learn respect for women, which not only saves their relationship with their mother (even if their relationship with their father goes down the drain) but also makes it easier to find good wives and start families of their own.
Furthermore, Aunt Winifred finds the courage to leave her sexist husband and make a new life for herself from scratch. At least she has two of her sons on her side as well as her niece-in-law, and she’s further blessed with the wonderful miracle of grandparenthood. Arthur doesn’t get to see the kids half as often as she does; it takes a while for the kids to learn of their grandfather’s very existence, as well as that of their two other uncles and their great-grandfather.
There’s something to be said for Philip’s character growth, too. He used to agree with his father and brothers in everything and laugh along with their nasty jokes. But now he tells them to their faces in all seriousness how wrong they are, how wrong he’s been, and he’ll drop each and every one of them like a load of bricks if he must. This is what salvages his relationship with his sister, and this plays as big a part in Cameron and Walter’s change of heart.
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Happily Married: Sadly averted with the majority of the Drummonds and Scarlets. It’s fairly obvious that all of these marriages came about because of sheer necessity, ensuring financial security and making more of a social statement than anything else.
Even Philip and Lottie were brought together by force, although they learn to sort of fall in love later. If nothing else, they reach the point of holding hands, occasional light kissing, and being a lot more careful of what they say out loud. The improvement in Philip’s relationship with his daughters and grandchildren is much greater.
It’s no wonder that Joan and Seth were both turned off to marriage long ago, though they never lost their respect for it. They both made up their minds, “If I do marry, it’ll only happen because I want to, not because I have to.” Then they meet each other and tease everyone else with only a slight possibility that they’ll end up marrying each other. Either way, they make a great team and they prove they have nothing against the opposite gender after all.
In Arthur’s case, his wife ends up divorcing him and leaving him forever. There’s nothing between them to salvage and neither of them remarry. However, two of their sons do marry out of love and their marriages remain happy and rock-steady for life.
It’s like that with Kaylee, too, as well as three of her four sisters.
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Heel Realization: Some relatives learn almost right away how awful they’ve been to Kaylee, to the point where they’re amazed that she’ll talk to them at all anymore. Noreen is especially humbled when Kaylee does her an enormous favor just because, while Cameron and Walter never look at women the same way again and make sure their mistakes aren’t repeated in the next generation.
Some relatives who won’t admit their mistakes out loud will acknowledge to themselves that they’ve screwed up pretty badly. Such is the case with old Nick at Kaylee’s wedding. She’s his granddaughter but it finally dawns on him that he was never her grandfather.
Arthur also feels pretty bad when Winifred leaves him and has a good life without him, half of his boys cut him off, he stays on speaking terms with only one of his three siblings, and he must observe the few grandchildren he has from a distance.
Lottie is fed a little more humble pie when people see her mother’s bad behavior for themselves and they still tell her this does not excuse her bad behavior in any way. Lara in particular informs her with soft bluntness while Kaylee looks on with a tangibly hurt expression, “Clearly, you’d forgotten what your mother did to you, and then you did the same thing to your own daughters.”
It’s no accident that Lara’s the one who’s called “Mum” and “Nana” from then on, whereas Lottie is lucky enough to hear “Mother” and “Grandmother.”
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Henpecked Husband: You have to take just a teeny-tiny bit of pity on Baldwin and Bartholomew. It’s plain as day their wives rule the roost, with their children yielding much more easily to their mothers. Bartholomew does whatever he can to keep the ladies in his household happy and off his back, whereas Baldwin has as much backbone as a jellyfish.
Some people also pity Flan’s late husband, shuddering to think what married life to her must have been like. Seth, when asked about the relationship between his parents, can only say, “It wasn’t pretty.”
Which makes you shudder even more to think about Nick’s late wife and what married life to him must have been like. The best we can say about the woman is that she helped Joan when no one else would, and Joan remembers her a little more fondly.
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Hidden Depths: Noreen proves to be a surprisingly talented actress. She’s able to pull off a most entertaining piece alongside Malachi, who manages not to outshine her.
When she’s presented before Kelly Murphy, a half-elf who happens to be one of Malachi’s old friends and one of the most prominent executives in the moving pictures (your career’s pretty much in the bag if you manage to impress him), the first question he asks is, “Where was she years ago?”
Over time, she becomes popular enough and earns enough money to have no financial concerns for the rest of her life.
Cameron also holds a little flair for cooking, and Walter admits to liking flowers and knitting. For obvious reasons, these “unmanly” talents were quelled for the longest time. But when they’re married, Cameron is every bit as handy in the kitchen as his wife is, while Walter tends to a nice little garden at his own house and can just as often be found knitting by the fireside.
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Honor Thy Parent: Somehow, every parent in either side of the family, no matter how terrible they are, believes in all honesty that their children (and grandchildren) owe them and must submit to them in everything if those kids know what’s good for them.
Even Bartholomew gripes to Kaylee when she rightfully chews him out after a particularly humiliating spectacle and sends him on his way. “You may be a princess, but I’m still your uncle and your elder!”
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Hypocrites: People who not only don’t practice what they preach but see no reason why they should.
Aunt Effie gives Kaylee a hard time for eating so much, and Lavinia just as hard a time for her little sweet tooth. There’s no lack of commentary on her youngest daughter’s weight, and Noreen can hardly be called pudgy at best. Naturally, there’s rarely a moment when this woman is not stuffing her own face, she demands nothing but the best of food at every occasion, and she easily makes all three girls look like walking twigs. She seldom exercises, either; at least Noreen dances every so often, while Kaylee takes advantage of any opportunity for a swim or jog. Kaylee can even hold her own in a boxing match, and of course, Effie picks more holes in her niece’s unladylike hobbies than a piece of old cheese.
Aunt Myrtle and her three daughters act as though Kaylee is unforgivably selfish for refusing to foot the bill for their outrageous shopping.
Both Aunt Myrtle and Aunt Effie dare to feel insulted when Kaylee won’t shower them with splendid gifts that cost nothing less than a fortune, and these ladies are equally famous for recycling low-cost gifts that no one can spare a second glance. Even their wedding gifts were the used kind, which we all know is one of the biggest violations of wedding etiquette.
Uncle Bartholomew has the gall to get angry when he uses Malachi for a charity event and then retracts on the payment. Even though Malachi agrees to perform for a lower price than most, Bartholomew still gets the bright idea of not paying him at all and he fully expects the faun to follow through with the performance anyway.
Since Bartholomew hasn’t kept his end of the bargain, Malachi sees no reason why he should keep his, so all he gives the crowd is an explanation before heading home. The crowd immediately starts booing, Bartholomew is outraged, and Bartholomew’s even more outraged superiors almost have his head for this on the spot. Upon appealing to his niece, she just tells him this isn’t her mess to clean up and she goes straight home as well.
In the end, the entire fundraiser is a complete flop.
Bartholomew is lucky enough not to be fired, but there’s no way his superiors are trusting him with any more public events. They enforce a much stricter policy about proper payment for future performers, and they tell the man with all the subtlety of an anvil that they will fire him and blacklist him if he ever pulls a stunt like this again.
Bartholomew is utterly humiliated in every possible way—and from the way he sees it, this is all Malachi and Kaylee’s fault.
Flan is perhaps the Goddess of Hypocrisy. She disgraces her own granddaughter at her own wedding, but all she can think about (and whine about) is the way Kaylee kicks her out and humiliates her in the process. “Why, you insolent, degenerate child! I’m your grandmother! You can’t do this to me!”
Two years later, the old woman still refuses to forgive Kaylee (leaving people to wonder what Kaylee is supposed to ask forgiveness for) and she won’t rest until Kaylee does this marriage the proper way, with a priest that doesn’t possess hooves and a tail. Kaylee already knows even if they do as her grandmother asks, the old nag won’t be satisfied. Flan will then just go into yet another diatribe about how right she was and give everyone further grief for not adhering to her wishes sooner.
“One way or another, we’d never hear the end of it,” Kaylee tells Caleb.
Caleb can only respond with a dry laugh, “Flan sounds like a truly delightful woman.”
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I Have No Family: Contrary to Kaylee’s kin’s belief, they’re the ones to do this to her rather than the other way around. They’re the ones to cut themselves off and forfeit what they could have had with her.
When Grandmother Flan officially disowns Kaylee and Daisy, neither girl feels like it’s a loss at all. At least Kaylee has a much more proper grandmother figure in Ann, Adela, and Sabina (Nero’s wife and Cecily’s mother) while Daisy’s grandmother-in-law makes up the difference in spades.
When Noreen leaves her family behind, she finds solace in the company of Kaylee and Uncle Seth, although she gets along pretty well with Philip and Joan, too. Kaylee’s sisters sort of become Noreen’s sisters, too, and Troy beats Raffy as a brother any day.
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I Just Want to Be Special: That’s everybody’s primary aim, with some cases more sympathetic than others.
If nothing else, everybody wants somebody to love them just the way they are. They shouldn’t have to work so hard to prove themselves worthwhile, least of all to their own flesh and blood.
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I Want Grandkids: It’s a little funny how much Nicholas harps on his daughter for refusing to marry and add to his family tree, considering two of his sons have already given him nine grandchildren, and he doesn’t give his unmarried son anywhere near as hard a time.
In contrast, Flannery forbids Kaylee to give her any great-grandchildren until “a real priest” pronounces her and Troy husband and wife. Kaylee refuses to play her grandmother’s silly game and goes far enough to give Caleb, this “false priest,” full legal custody of her children.
If that wasn’t nuts enough, the only other thing Flan dwells on this much is when Seth, her son, is going to find a wife and grind out a few more kids, notwithstanding the eleven grandkids from her daughters. Seth responds to his mother’s demands the way Joan responds to her father’s demands, albeit in a calmer, cooler manner, “You have plenty of grandchildren already, and in the event that I ever have children, it will be because I want them, not you.”
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I Was Just Joking: Uncle Harold’s flimsy excuse every time someone calls him out for his misogynistic jokes, which only Arthur, Nick, Anthony, and Nolan find remotely funny these days. Not even Philip is cracking a smile anymore.
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Insane Troll Logic: Given how outrageous Flan is, to the point where Lottie only dreads the sight of her and she’s not afraid to speak her mind to several monarchs’ faces, Caleb expresses a little concern that the old woman may be mentally unwell.
While Kaylee won’t rule out senility, she admits Flan has always been a loud, demanding woman who had to have everything her way or else. Then Faith says that, from her point of view, the old woman has only gotten a tiny bit worse over the years. Seth, who has the misfortune of calling Flan “Mother,” doesn’t deny it.
Besides, Daisy’s grandmother-in-law is even older and she has no problem whatsoever; she falls in love with Daisy (in a grandmotherly manner, of course) the moment she lays eyes on her.
It’s also true that Flan has always hated fauns with the fiery passion of a thousand suns and won’t see them as anything less than inferior. Even though Caleb is the current High Priest and he fares better than his father did, Flan flat-out won’t accept it. She only asks Kaylee with dark smoke coming out of her ears and nostrils, “You don’t expect me to believe that man-goat hybrid could possibly stand in place of a real priest and put the seal on a marriage, do you? It’s out of the question!”
No matter how patiently Kaylee tries to explain it to her, the old hag’s outrage drives her to call her own granddaughter a harlot in front of everyone, which proves the final straw. When Flan is escorted from the premises, she screams at full lung capacity even though the soldiers are nothing but gentle with her and take her to someplace comfortable instead of locking her up.
For the next two years, all Flan can think about is how unfair it is that her granddaughter would kick her, of all people, out like that, and that girl had better get another priest to do this marriage the proper way and there had better be no children until then. Seth, who was there to hear this threat, told Kaylee that he found this behavior both amusing and a trifle scary. However, he’s nothing but overjoyed when Kaylee tells him her first baby is already on the way, and everyone else is truly happy for her. Kaylee’s sisters are especially thrilled and her father doesn’t care what the gender is; Philip’s just proud to become a grandfather for the very first time, though he sheds plenty of tears of joy when it turns out to be a boy.
On a smaller scale, Grandmother Flan is outraged when Faith starts wearing her long hair in a billowing ponytail instead of a tidy braid more often. She claims the girl is sending men the wrong message, as if Faith were wearing much more revealing clothes instead, and she also doesn’t approve of any of her granddaughters finding a job and earning their own living.
She officially renounces Daisy as her granddaughter when Daisy marries a black man and it’s for this very reason she wasn’t invited to the wedding at all. As mentioned earlier, Daisy’s husband’s grandmother is the exact opposite; she practically sprints up to Daisy at the reception, half-chokes her in a surprisingly strong hug, kisses her a dozen times in a row, and sings her praises up and down. It’s enough to make the grandson facepalm on the spot, despite smiling all the same.
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It’s All About Me: As unbecoming a selfish streak as any other character I’ve written yet. Let’s just say the only people worse than them are Ann’s blood relatives, and not by much.
Marlon and Adela Wiles, who have long since turned over a new leaf, grimace at the sight of them.
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Jerk Realization: This happens in the open for Philip, Cameron, Walter, and Noreen, and behind closed doors for Lottie, Nick, Arthur, and Harold.
There are a few hints that Baldwin and Bartholomew are aware of the less-than-ideal things they’ve done over the years, but they don’t know what to do about it and they’re not too inclined to try.
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Jerk Woobie: Even at their worst, you have to pity the Scarlets and Drummonds to some extent or another. It’s fairly obvious that something happened to each and every one of them to make them this way, most of them aren’t where they want to be at all, and where they run into trouble is giving the vicious cycle another turn and actively refusing to take responsibility for themselves. Most of them would rather go on playing the Blame Game in a useless effort to vindicate themselves.
Lottie has no answer when Lara tells her, “Clearly, you’d forgotten what your mother did to you, and then you did the same thing to your own daughters.”
Then Noreen tells Kaylee of her own accord, “I was a pretty big jerk and I have no excuse for what I did.”
And Cameron and Walter admit to themselves as well as their mother, “I’ve been a pretty sorry excuse for a son. I just hope it’s not too late to try again and get it right this time.”
Effie and Myrtle would have no need to try to flirt with Mason if they got along with the men they were actually married to, while Baldwin and Bartholomew can’t even pretend to like their wives.
Even Arthur might have treated Winifred a little better if not for his father’s meddling and woefully erroneous teachings. Philip was lucky he wasn’t as exposed to his father’s company as his brothers were, and you can only applaud Joan for running away as soon as possible. When at last Winifred runs away, too, both Nick and Arthur are forced to take what they’ve done to her into account and reevaluate everything they thought they knew about women.
Harold, too, realizes a little too late why he hasn’t found a wife by now and never will.
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Laser-Guided Karma: For both good and bad.
Some of these fine folks have eluded karma for a long time but absolutely none of them get away. In some cases, a whole flood of karma comes rushing in at once and knocks them off their feet. While some eventually learn to swim, others would rather drown while complaining to the bitter end about nobody else rescuing them.
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Maybe Ever After: It’s quite possible that Seth Scarlet and Joan Drummond have finally found their significant other in each other, but they’ll neither confirm nor deny it, not even to Kaylee.
They do bond over dysfunctional families, overbearing parents, social pressures, and the long uphill struggle for their own independence. They listen to each other and relate to each other, and Seth remains a polite, open-minded gentleman whereas Joan remains a calm, agreeable woman who can think for herself without being pompous about it.
And, of course, these two have their dear niece in common above all. Joan rather likes how Seth calls Kaylee “Bookworm” and treats her like a grown-up, whereas Seth very much appreciates how Joan doesn’t smother the girl or tell her how “a proper lady” should act.
Even if they’re nothing more than good friends, this proves neither of them have anything against the opposite sex. All they really want is to be themselves, to go their own pace, to be with someone they want to be with and who wants their company as well. Either way, they’re able to look each other in the eye and tell each other with complete honesty, “I like you.”
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My Beloved Smother: If you thought Kaylee’s mother was a piece of work, both of Lottie’s sisters are far worse, and their mother makes all three of them look tame.
Kaylee cuts Cousin Noreen a little slack upon seeing how awful Aunt Effie has always been to her, to the point of sabotaging Noreen’s dreams of professional acting. As much as Effie despises the entertainment field, decrying it every time she opens her mouth as a shady, slimy underworld and whatnot, the truth is, she’s bitter because she once aspired to be an actress as well. But Flan crushed that dream to powder in no time and Effie had no real talent anyhow; it only took one audition for her to be shown the door.
So, Effie decided, “If I can’t do it, why should it be any different for my daughter?”
Once Noreen gets away from her mother, that’s when she begins to truly thrive, and not just where her career is concerned. When her mother tells her she’s just a child and that she, herself, won’t stand for this insubordination, Noreen merely retorts, “Mother, I’m twenty-nine years old. I think I know how to take care of myself by now.”
Eventually, it gets so bad that Noreen stops using “Mother” altogether and calls Effie by her first name, much to Effie’s horrified outrage. Her first name is Fanny and nobody gets away with calling her that.
Even then, Noreen remains mature enough to admit her own mistakes, to give Kaylee a long-overdue apology and put forth much greater effort to be a nicer person. She would have done this if Kaylee never helped her with anything, but of course, Kaylee’s help inspires her to apologize a little sooner in a more heartfelt manner. Either way, Cousin Noreen is a definite keeper.
For Raffy, Noreen’s older brother, it’s the exact opposite. He’ll always be a Mama’s boy, and not in a good way. He never quite gets out from under her thumb, he can hardly hitch a ride on his sister’s coattails, and he never marries or finds his own place in the world. Maureen, the oldest sister, never really escapes her mother’s toxic influence, either.
Aunt Myrtle is no better. She has all three of her daughters under her thumb and they respect her just a tiny bit more than they do their father. Not that Bartholomew has ever really tried to keep his daughters in line; for the most part, he’ll just give them what they want to keep them quiet, or ignore them long enough for them to go away.
Of course, as mentioned earlier, Flan takes the cake. Even in her old age, she dominates her children and grandchildren’s lives as much as she can, with no tolerance whatsoever for any aspect that doesn’t suit her.
Lottie is downright horrified to see her at Kaylee’s wedding reception, and everyone finds out soon enough that the real reason Lottie became such a control freak was because she hadn’t a shred of control over anything in her own life, including her marriage. While this only grants Lottie so much sympathy, at least it all makes sense now. Lottie can’t say she’s too sorry to see her mother get kicked out of the reception later, whereas she gets to stay until evening’s end.
Only Flan’s son has been able to shrug her off ages ago and make an honest, worthwhile life with or without her. One day, Seth tells his nieces his secret to survival: “It was quite simple, actually. Mother is one of those people who only think they’re more powerful than they really are. Once I learned the whole universe didn’t cater to her every whim, I simply learned not to give a flick of a flea what she thought, especially after I gained steady employment and my own circle of friends and found my own two feet.”
The only threat the old woman can make anymore is to never speak to her son again, and he’s not afraid to tell her that such a threat might be quite beneficial, which immediately forces her to backpedal a little. He’s still nice enough to visit her once in a blue moon but it’s clear as glass that she has no power over him anymore.
Anytime he ever shows up is because he wants to.
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Never My Fault: By far, their number one trait and their most fatal flaw.
Getting some of them to admit they’re in the wrong is like trying to alter the rotation of the Earth. No matter what you do, no matter how hard you try, it simply can’t be done. Even with all the evidence in the world shoved in their faces, they would sooner die than accept the blame.
I won’t confirm or deny that Nick is a lost cause, but Flan is. Flan remains both unaware and unrepentant of her wrongdoings all the way to her dying day.
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Nice Guy/Girl: Thankfully, Seth and Joan are as nice as they come, in spite of it all, and they both adore Kaylee to bits. Not once did Kaylee have cause to question their love, so there’s no question they’ll always be a part of her family as well as her life.
In fact, that’s how they’re drawn to each other. Whether they’re romantic or platonic partners (keeping everyone guessing becomes a rather fun game for them), he does think she’s a very nice woman while she’s glad to find a very nice man who likes her just the way she is.
On the side, Seth proves how nicer he is than his mother when he shows Caleb nothing but respect, speaking to the faun from the start with perfect amiability. Once Joan knows that Kaylee likes and trusts Caleb, she asks no further questions, either.
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Parental Favoritism: It’s heartbreakingly clear that Nick favors his three sons over his only daughter, just because of his lifelong belief in the inferiority of women. Joan had to work tooth and nail to make something of herself and all her father can give her is disapproval for daring to develop a mind and will of her own. He acts as though her refusal to marry is the worst crime she can possibly commit, while Arthur, Harold, and Philip get away with murder with a mere pat on the head.
Flan is also more involved with her three daughters than with her only son, if only because her son was the one to break away from her a long time ago, not at all unlike Kaylee. Seth only interacts with these ladies anymore because he feels like it, and the old woman can’t ever follow through with her constant threats to cut ties with him. He seems to get a bit of genuine pleasure out of calling her bluff every single time.
In the next generation, unfair treatment is the most glowering in Effie’s family. Effie blatantly dotes on Maureen and bosses Raffy around while keeping Noreen under her thumb with all the firmness of a hammered nail. If Effie had her way, all three of her children would stay in her house, under her jurisdiction, until they wrinkled with old age.
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Pet the Dog: Before turning over a new leaf, Cameron Drummond and his little brother Walter prove they’re the nicer, more salvageable cousins by behaving themselves at Kaylee’s wedding, so much better than their big brothers Anthony and Nolan do.
Both boys sincerely congratulate Kaylee, compliment her on her pretty appearance, and admire Faith’s hair skills since Faith was responsible for Kaylee’s lovely updo. “She’s really good!” Walter says, sounding like he honestly means it.
They also don’t laugh at Uncle Harold’s sexist jokes and even ask him to his face, as well as their father and grandfather’s faces, just what’s so wrong with women. “What did they ever do to you?”
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Refuge in Audacity: If Flan isn’t as mentally ill as some people suspect, she’s certainly hoping that the extent of her audacity will serve as a protective shield from all repercussions. If she raises a big enough fuss, people will be that much more inclined to give her what she wants, like a perpetually whiny toddler in an old woman’s body.
Most of Flan’s daughters and granddaughters are like this, too. While Nick and his boys have a bit more restraint, they’re not so far behind.
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Rich in Dollars, Poor in Sense: Most people can only dream of having the kind of money Kaylee’s relatives have. Yet, with a few obvious exceptions, none of these relatives have a teaspoon’s worth of common sense.
Suffice it to say that Adela and Marlon get unpleasant flashbacks when they look at them, and Tyrell palms his own face more than once. “Tell me I wasn’t this deluded.”
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Screw the Rules, I Have Connections: The biggest problem Kaylee runs into after the big reunion.
A shopping trip with her maternal aunts and cousins becomes a colossal headache when everybody assumes she’ll pay for everything. When she only pays enough for herself and a couple of others, the entitled relatives—teenage girls and grown women who are long past the age of knowing better—throw a full-scale tantrum in public. The people in the ritzy stores and restaurants, who have dealt with situations like this more times than they care to count, can only roll their eyes as they tell Kaylee’s relatives to pick a number and get in line.
This is how Kaylee figures out who’s worth keeping in her life, those who don’t use her like this. While she’ll do a nice favor here and there, she draws the line at nepotism and refuses to erase it.
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Screw This, I’m Outta Here: There’s a heartbreaking and rather horrifying implication as to why Winifred, Arthur’s wife, never says a word when she arrives for Kaylee’s wedding. Her sons make cracks about how they can’t remember what her voice sounds like anymore, how the sound of her own voice would surely frighten her to death.
In a short time, however, the woman musters the courage to divorce her husband and forge a new life without him. One of the reasons she stayed with him this long is because he and her father-in-law threatened to ruin her in every conceivable way if she left. These weren’t empty threats, either.
But with Kaylee’s help, Winifred is finally able to walk away with her head held a little higher, and two of her four sons join her. If she can’t tell her husband or his father what she really thinks of them, she lets her actions do all the talking.
Of course, Kaylee still considers Winifred her aunt and she can visit whenever she wants. Cameron and Walter also do whatever they can to help their mother, and now she has a much happier, healthier life with a parcel of grandchildren who not only respect her but adore her. It’s worth mentioning that nearly all of her grandkids are boys, though she gets two darling granddaughters as well. Every single one of the kids is always thrilled to see Gramma and the feeling couldn’t be more mutual.
On a slightly less dramatic scale, Noreen tells her nasty parents and her two nasty siblings where to shove it, and she too strikes out on her own and never looks back. Kaylee’s the only family she’ll ever need anymore, although she grows closer to Uncle Seth and Uncle Philip, who become her unofficial adoptive fathers. She gets a bit of a maternal figure in Aunt Joan, too.
The funny thing is, all of their abusers have told them in no uncertain terms for years, “You’re nothing without me.”
Then the day comes when they can tell their abusers in no uncertain terms, “I’m everything I ever wanted to be without you.”
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The Scrooge: Few families in the province are as wealthy as the Drummonds and Scarlets…and few wealthy families pinch a penny as tightly as they do.
None of them will spare a penny for anyone else if they can help it and they never miss an opportunity to haggle. They’re an especially dreaded sight in restaurants and shops, more so when they assume Kaylee will back them up since she now has more money at her expense than all of them put together. Kaylee sings an entirely different tune, much to everyone’s disbelief and ire.
On the side, Kaylee sarcastically notes, “I think I know their secret to staying rich all this time.”
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Ship Tease: It’s uncertain whether Flan’s son and Nick’s daughter become a romantic couple. Both sides of the family freak out about that, Nick and Flan most of all, and Seth and Joan rather enjoy such reactions and like to leave everybody guessing. They refuse to tell Kaylee on the side how they really feel about one another, and they take it a step further with occasional kissing—Seth kissing Joan on the hand, Joan kissing Seth on the cheek, and both of them sharing a quick, chaste kiss on the lips.
But either way, Seth and Joan most definitely respect one another and enjoy one another’s company. He thinks she’s a very nice woman, she thinks he’s a very nice man, and they love their niece to the moon and back.
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Skewed Priorities: So woefully skewed that you don’t know whether to laugh or to be very, very afraid.
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Stay in the Kitchen: That’s all Joan ever heard from her father’s lips for as long as she can remember, and somehow, he believes that she has offended him when she goes against his wishes and makes a fine life of her own as a single woman.
Never mind all those years of cruelty, neglect, and deliberate inaction. Never mind all those downright damaging jabs from the man’s own lips that would have long since broken other girls to pieces. Even in the present day, in her own house, Joan can’t forget what her father put her through and she often cries herself to sleep at night.
On the other hand, Flan’s side of the family is no better. No one believes that Kaylee should participate in athletics, that Noreen stands a snowflake’s chance in the acting field, that any of the girls should take school that seriously, and the very idea of mixing a career with marriage and children is all but incalculable.
Kaylee proves everybody wrong when she not only becomes a great scholar, a wonderful athlete, and a devoted wife, but she’s an excellent mother with three sons and two daughters of her own. When the time comes, she’s more than worthy of the title of Queen of Daire, and not once do any of her kids become an afterthought.
Kaylee’s sisters also capture the perfect balance between motherhood and worldly business. Faith becomes a popular fashion designer and hair stylist, with two lovely daughters and a fine son.
Lavinia helps her baker husband, gaining only a little weight with this constant exposure to cake, pie, bread, and other sweets, and she has all the time in the world for her son and daughter.
Daisy becomes quite handy on her husband’s farm, able to till the soil, nurture the plants and trees, and tend to the animals as well as any hired hand, and on the side, she dabbles in a little accounting, birdwatching, and art on the side; she learns to sketch, paint, and even sculpt birds beautifully. And not once is she too busy for her twin daughters, with her husband pulling plenty of his own weight.
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Straw Feminist: It’s great that Flan’s family has been blessed with so many beautiful ladies. The ladies’ ridiculous notions of womankind, coupled with their blatant disrespect of mankind, not so much.
They go so far as to claim they deserve a break because they’re women, and it’s plain enough they have their own interests in mind above all. Where the rest of the women in the world are concerned, they really couldn’t care less.
Kaylee and her sisters are only too thankful that they were rescued from such a mindset in time.
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Straw Misogynist: Only Nick’s family in their disrespect of women can outshine Flan’s family in their disrespect of men. As far as the Drummonds are concerned, women are only good for making babies, good for keeping house, good for a laugh, and nothing else.
I do my best to make it clear from the start that both sides are dead wrong. Neither gender is any more superior to the other than they are inferior, and absolutely no one deserves a free pass.
Furthermore, Seth and Joan prove they have nothing against the opposite sex when they strike up a special rapport with each other. Seth is every bit as ready to call Joan the nicest woman he’s ever met as she is to call him the nicest man she’s ever met.
When Kaylee and her sisters have children of their own, Philip is just proud to be a grandpa, as over the moon about his granddaughters as he is about his grandsons.
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They Just Don’t Get It: There’s no earthly way a human being can be that oblivious or stupid. So, pretty much all of the trouble the Scarlets and Drummonds run into can be chalked up to simple, unrelenting stubbornness.
To borrow a phrase I found online that I really liked, these are the kinds of people “who would cause the Apocalypse with a rubber duckie and blame the whole world for overreacting to the duckie just happening to sit on the big red button.”
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Took a Level in Kindness: That’s what happens to Noreen, Cameron, and Walter for certain and they take the quickest time to come around. Within a year, they’re all on their way to new and better lives.
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Upper-Class Twits: It’s a safe assumption that everybody believes their wealth and social prominence exempt them from any and all consequences of their actions, no matter how reprehensible.
They may not be royalty, but they’re more or less the next best thing to it. It’s just enough to where they have a handful of servants to call their own and none of the children really have to worry about getting a job. Given Myrtle’s houseful of shopaholics, this is a bit of a surprise. Seth didn’t have too much trouble building up his own financial cushion, and Joan’s mother had the wherewithal as well as the kindness to support her until Joan could support herself, since her father told her not to expect a single cop from him.
If Kaylee and her sisters hadn’t married, Philip still had a trust fund set up for them so they would all keep a roof over their heads and want for nothing for the rest of their lives. The thing is, Kaylee wants to do something useful with her life, as does Faith, and Noreen’s sheer love for acting eclipses any desire to become (more) rich and famous.
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What Have I Done: Besides Kaylee’s father and the majority of her sisters, Cousins Noreen, Cameron, and Walter’s consciences catch up with them and hit them where they live.
Noreen feels especially bad for picking on Kaylee and not standing up for her when they were growing up. Even though she was also bullied (worse, even), she finally understood nothing excused her from being a bully. She’s truly moved when Kaylee helps her realize her dream of acting since Kaylee has a special connection with Malachi, who has plenty of special connections all his own, and this is before Noreen even considered apologizing for anything.
There was nothing in it for Kaylee, either. When asked why she was doing this huge favor, she only said, “You deserve to do what you love to do.”
Though she would have apologized anyway, Noreen apologizes to Kaylee to her face from the bottom of her heart when she gets the chance. Afterward, Noreen makes an honest effort to make it up to her cousin by treating her to a few nice things from time to time, like coffee and frozen cream, or a moving picture, or a nice lunch. When they shop together, unlike the rest of the family, she never takes advantage of Kaylee in any way and uses her own money without fuss.
As for Cameron and Walter, they realize how wrong their family’s views of women are and have always been. They see their father and grandfather in a much less favorable light, and they both feel especially awful for what they’ve done to their poor mother.
After Winifred divorces Arthur, only Cameron and Walter stay with her, relying more on Uncle Philip (and, to an extent, Seth) as a more dependable paternal figure. When they marry and have kids of their own, only Winifred really gets to interact with the kids, although it affects Arthur more than he admits to be cut off from his grandchildren, since neither Anthony nor Nolan ever marry or become parents.
Arthur’s abuse of his ex-wife comes back to haunt him as well. It slowly but surely sinks in how horrible he was to her, how she has every right in the world to leave him and forget about him.
On the side, Grandfather Nick feels an authentic pang of regret when Kaylee doesn’t dance with him at her wedding, as well as when he sees her embracing Tallis, Nero, and even Marlon as if they were her true grandfathers. While Kaylee keeps calling him “Grandfather,” she readily calls Tallis “Granddad,” just like how she always uses “Mum” on Lara and only “Mother” on Lottie. She takes it a step further by calling Marlon “Pop” and Nero “Papa Nero.”
It also wounds Nick to see how these older men all know Kaylee better than he does, like what her favorite foods are, what flavors of tea she likes best, when her birthday is, and so on, not to mention they talk to her more frequently of their own accord than he ever had before. Beyond that, he’s rendered silent after Philip, Cameron, and Walter all tear a particularly painful strip off him and vow to cut their own ties with him for good if he doesn’t get it together.
Furthermore, like Arthur, Nick realizes the true magnitude of what he’s put Winifred through all this time.
Whether the old man has a true change of heart in the end or not, this alone is more than can be said for Grandmother Flan, who somehow can’t conceive the notion of being remotely in the wrong. For the rest of her life, the old woman not only won’t apologize but doesn’t see (or simply refuses to see) what she has to apologize for in the first place.
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Would Hit a Girl: To the credit of most of the male members of Kaylee’s family, they’d never lay a finger on a girl even if they had no qualms about verbally and psychologically ripping her to shreds. All but one of Kaylee’s male cousins hurt her by word alone.
Cousin Raffy was another story.
Kaylee’s worst memory of this particular cousin was during a family picnic, when he hit her harder than usual and knocked her into a mud pit, for no other reason besides his own twisted pleasure. While she was crying her eyes out, he was laughing his head off.
Almost immediately, big sister Faith came to the rescue. Contrary to her demure feminine appearance, Faith punched Raffy hard enough in the stomach to knock his breath away and punched him hard enough in the face to give him a bloody nose. They both ended up in the same mud pit, and now he was the big crying mess. As terrified, embarrassed, and sickened as Faith was, she was rather proud of herself as well. Just before their folks arrived on the scene, she dared Raffy to tattle on her and he didn’t, partly because no one would have believed him and partly for the sake of his manly pride.
So, none of the three kids could provide a satisfactory answer as to how they got so dirty or why Raffy’s face was bleeding.
Despite the heap of trouble the trio got into, Philip softened the blow by making sure both his daughters were okay, and later, he took them on a pleasant sort of father-daughter date. Of course, Kaylee saw Faith in a heroic light for a long time after that, Faith was always a little smug despite her shame in her unladylike behavior, and Raffy never dared lay a finger on either cousin or any other girl again.
My New Year's Theme
And so begins a brand-new year. I'm well aware that 2024 won't be perfect, but there's still something refreshing about a new chapter. You already know all is not going to be well in the book you're about to read or the movie you're about to watch, but you still look forward to the story.
What are my resolutions for this year?
Well, it's more like a New Year's Theme, actually. I got the idea from a news story years ago, where a woman used a specific word to revolve her whole year around, like "hope" and "dream" and "believe."
This year, my special word will be "Finish."
I've always been great at starting things. Getting those things done, not so much. And so I aim to see certain tasks all the way through in 2024, or at least make a better effort.
This includes the completion of:
1. My driver's license
2. At least one short story and at least one novel
3. More artwork 4. More books for personal reading (don't know how many, but there are some books I started to read for fun and then dropped) 5. The organization of my bedroom Good luck to the rest of you, and once again, Happy New Year!
'Twas the Night Before Christmas
'Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse; The stockings were hung by the chimney with care, In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds; While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads; And mamma in her 'kerchief, and I in my cap, Had just settled our brains for a long winter's nap,
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter, I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter. Away to the window I flew like a flash, Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow, Gave a lustre of midday to objects below, When what to my wondering eyes did appear, But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny rein-deer,
With a little old driver so lively and quick, I knew in a moment he must be St. Nick. More rapid than eagles his coursers they came, And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name:
"Now, Dasher! now, Dancer! now Prancer and Vixen! On, Comet! on, Cupid! on, Donner and Blitzen! To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall! Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!"
As leaves that before the wild hurricane fly, When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky; So up to the housetop the coursers they flew With the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too—
And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof The prancing and pawing of each little hoof. As I drew in my head, and was turning around, Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.
He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot, And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot; A bundle of toys he had flung on his back, And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.
His eyes—how they twinkled! his dimples, how merry! His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry! His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow, And the beard on his chin was as white as the snow;
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth, And the smoke, it encircled his head like a wreath; He had a broad face and a little round belly That shook when he laughed, like a bowl full of jelly.
He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf, And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself; A wink of his eye and a twist of his head Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work, And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk, And laying his finger aside of his nose, And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight—
“Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!”