Narcissism

"It's a... It's... a..."
"A monstrosity."
"It's ridiculous."
"I don't know, I actually kind of like it."

The three Kane children stood at their grandmother's burial plot, their eyes glued to--or averted from--the rather bizarre sight that laid before them. Travis stared in disgusted amazement; Amelia tried to hide her face from embaressment; Bradley looked on with amusement.

When Amelia first heard the news of  her Grandmother's death, she took it rather badly--though that's no surprise, considering what she'd learned only minutes before that. On the red-eye flight from Bridgeport to Simissouri, though, she came to peace with the facts: her grandma had been old. Beyond old. People were probably using Farah Kane's bones as a geleological reference point to compare to dinosaurs.

Okay, maybe she wasn't quite that old, but, when Grandma Kane would "croak" was an often debated date between her three grandchildren. It wasn't that they didn't love her, but... She was just... you know. Old.

"I can't believe she's that self-centered, though," Amelia said as she finally glanced at what they were talking about: the life-sized effigy of their late grandmother, standing fixed right behind her tombstone. Apparently, Farah had commissioned the statue a few months before her death, to be unveiled at her funeral--much to the chagrin of her rather meek and unsophisticated descendents.

Less-than-thrilled would be a gross understatement of her family's reaction.

"You can't?" Travis scoffed back at Amelia. "Well, I sure can believe it. When was Grandma not within looking distance of a mirror?"

"I don't know..." Bradley slowly began, turning his head to the side for a better view. "I actually find it kind of funny. I mean, this is exactly the sort of joke Grandma would pull, don't you think?"

Travis rolled his eyes. "Brad, you couldn't tell what a joke was if it hit you right in the schnozz."

"Guuuyyysss," Amelia whined. "Could you please shut up? I'm kinda trying to mourn here?"

"Wait! Wait wait wait!" All eyes turned to Bradley when the blonde brother started jumping up and down a little on his toes. "I know what that is! It's that new weather-resistent, multi-purpose cosmetic fibroglass they've been developing down in Section Five--"

"BRAD!" Now it was Travis' turn to groan again, this time into the palm of his hand. "Could you please stop geeking out for one second of your life?! It's embarressing!"

"But it's--"

"I think I'm gonna cry," Amelia lightly sniffled, still trying not to look up at the glass-like face of her dearly departed grandmother.

"Wonderful sounds to hear again, aren't they, Jeb?" A couple of meters behind the three quarreling siblings, Meredith Kane smiled, quietly listening, as she reached down to take her husband's hand.

"Indeed," Jebidiah responded in a rather soft, monotone voice.

Both parents dropped into silence again just to listen; though they were still  bickering amongst themselves, having their children together again was still a wonderful occasion, despite the circumstances.

In fact--Jebidiah mused--this is likely how his deceased mother would have liked it. The woman could be insufferably stuffy at times, but there was nothing she would have disliked more than a cold, mournful service to commemorate her passing. Maybe Brad was right: maybe the statue was a joke.

... Or maybe it was just a self-absorbed present to her dead self. Who knows; Farah Kane was a mystery.

The bickering and moaning couldn't last forever, though. As soon as the quarreling between Brad and Travis had ceased, the silence became too much for Amelia to bear. Maybe it was the setting, or the fact that she'd been a horrible granddaughter and hadn't called Grandmother in ages; something, though, gave her the impulse to cry.

"Hey, hey now," the more sensitive of her two brothers began, turning his sister towards himself to try to look her in the eyes. "None of that, alright? There's no reason to cry. We should be happy for Grandmother. She's finally at peace."

"I know, but..." Amelia sniffled. "It just seems like nothing's going right, right now."

"Oh come on," Bradley said, frowning; he bent down lower to meet his sister at eye level, gentling grabbing her shoulders. "That's a bit of a drastic overstatement, isn't it? Your band is doing great, this whole town is buzzing now that you're back, you've got all sorts of friends and family that love you... And from what I gather, that skinny little shrimp over there in the sidelines is that Jerod boy we've been hearing so much about, right?"

"Shrimp is right," Travis scoffed, rolling his eyes several feet away.

"Jerod? Oh, yeah... That's him. He didn't want to intrude on the mourning, said he'd just wait 'til we were done..."

"Yeah, well, if things weren't going right, would he be here? Would you be lucky enough to have someone willing to follow you to this two-bit town to your grandmother's funeral? Things can't be all that bad, Mia."

There was something about Bradley's insistence--the insistence of a man who had a hard time seeing the bright side on anything sometimes--that finally made it all click. Yeah. She was lucky.

"You're... you're right," Amelia finally relented. "I guess I'm just kind of overwhelmed right now." She paused for a moment, but only to smile wider. "He's cute, isn't he?" she asked, giggling.

"Oh brother," she heard Travis moan behind her as he began to walk out of the fenced burial plot. With a weak smile, Bradley soon followed, leaving Amelia standing by herself before Farah's tombstone.

She had to turn around again when she heard her mother's voice speak from behind her.

Despite the fact that she knew her parents had been there the entire time, it wasn't until she heard her mother's squeaky voice that the reality of it finally sunk in. She'd been in another world there for a moment with her big brothers; now, the real world was finally coming back.

"I know this isn't the best time to talk to you about this, Mia," her mother began. "But I wanted to bring it up before you left town again, and before the lawyers got ahold of you."

"L...Lawyers?"

"Yeah, I know, crazy stuff huh? Look, we all know your grandmother was... well-to-do," was Meredith's cute way of saying 'filthy rich'. "So it shouldn't come as a lot of shock that she had a fair bit of money to will off when she died."

Amelia slowly began to nod; she figured as much, yes, but she'd never really thought about it at length.

"Well," her mom sighed. "Since your father and I have most of our affairs in order, your grandmother elected to will most of the money to you grandkids--and I wanted to let you know, with your brothers not around, that she's left you a rather... decent sized portion."

"You're... You're joking, right? That's kind of unfair, isn't it?"

"Farah never was one to be fair, was she?" Meredith smirked. "Still, that shouldn't concern you. It was her choice to do what she wanted with her money, and according to her will you were the benefactor she thought deserved it the most. Since you two were so close when you were younger, and since you were the one with the hardest time getting jump-started out of school... Having a lot of money problems..."

"I--I don't even know what to say. I don't know what to do with that kind of money, Mom! Travis could have bought his whole baseball team, Brad--Brad--we all know he could've put the money into research to cure cancer or something--"

"Look, Mia," Meredith said, cutting her daughter off. "You're a smart girl in a profession that doesn't always see a lot of payoff if things go downhill. She just loves you and doesn't want you to ever be poor. Okay? Try not to think too much on it."

"But..." Amelia paused for a moment. "How... much exactly are we talkin' about here?"

Meredith took a deep breath and barely managed to make eye contact. "I don't know the exact number off the top of my head, but we're talking about... 400. Thousand. Simoleans."

"Mom... That's... That's not security. That's..." For the first time, Amelia really didn't know what to say. Her grandmother, who she'd barely talked to in over two years, had suddenly left her almost half a million Simoleans. "That's like, I'd never have to work again if I didn't want to sort of money."

Meredith shrugged. "Sweetheart, this family has never been poor. It's time you get used to that."

"Can... can I have a moment alone, with Grandma?" Amelia wasn't sure what she was saying until she said it; yeah, having a moment alone with a dead person was a bit odd... But it seemed like the right thing to do.

"Of course," her mom responded, trying to smile. "Just remember Mia, this is something you should be happy about, okay?"

Amelia nodded as her mother turned away, but the churning feeling in her stomach said otherwise.

Amelia could feel the way that her father's eyes bored into the back of her head. She knew he hadn't left; he'd stood there the whole time, silent, just seeing how she'd react. React to having a family fortune dumped on her shoulders--one she hadn't the faintest idea what to do with.

He was still there, but she began to cry. She couldn't tell if it was because she was happy, or if she was scared. Scared, that she would never live up to the expectations her Grandmother had for that money.

Or, wait--did she leave her so much because she expected that Mia would never achieve greatness on her own? Did she recognize that her granddaughter would be a complete failure before anyone else knew it? Did Farah really believe that Amelia was that incompetent?

"Oh, Gramma," Amelia moaned into her hand. "You just like to complicate everything, don't you?"

And, yet: the Grandmother she remembered was not like that. Sure, she knew that the immensely brilliant Farah Kane--genius surgeon and public figure extraordinaire--was a bit of a snob, but her childhood memories weren't of Farah's twisted, complicated mind games.

They were of warm laughter, hot tea, delicate desserts she couldn't pronounce, shopping sprees and long nights sleeping in a luxurious feather bed. She always heard jokes that to be a Kane was to be burdened by the complex riddles of previous generations, but she'd never stopped to consider how true it was until now.

And that's when she felt it.

The warm fingers touched her frigid elbow and brought her back to reality from her sobs. It was a gentle touch, but it just made her feel more bitter.

"Please, Dad. Please. Just go away." Amelia tried to shrug away the fingers, feeling disgusted under their pressure. "And take your stupid family riddles with you."

She heard a brief 'ahem' from behind her, but she still didn't turn around. How dare her father approach her like this, anyways? He's a liar--a dirty liar!--and nothing, not even his mother's death, would make her feel pity for him.

"Mia... Mia, it's me," she finally heard.

It wasn't her father's voice. It was Jerod's. At that moment of realization, her sobs suddenly doubled; suddenly, there was no more anger in the world than she experienced that moment.

She swung around and collapsed into Jerod's arms. She heard him ask if she was alright, but it was a distant, like he was trying to talk to her in a noisy, crowded room.

Amelia suddenly realized something so pitiful that it made her feel even worse: she was more upset that it wasn't her father who had come to comfort her, than how upset she would have been if it had been him.

It took some time, but finally her crying ceased. Jerod tried to pull off his tear-soaked shoulder as being sexy somehow ("What kind of manly man wouldn't comfort a damsel in distress, huh?") which finally made her laugh, but that nagging feeling in her stomach that her grandmother actually had expectations for her--good or bad--just wouldn't go away.

"So... That's her, huh?" Jerod said, looking up at the statue with a smirk. "She's kinda hot for an older lady, isn't she?"

Amelia rolled her eyes. "You're disgusting. But, yeah--that's my Grandma, Farah Kane. My bizarre, self-absorbed grandmother." She sighed.

Jerod, however, shrugged. "I don't know. If you've got the money, you may as well have fun with it, right?"

Amelia smirked. Right.

---

She tried not to notice the sweat dripping off her brow, but Amelia couldn't help but feel like the Steel Stallion had it's heat cranked up to the max. Sure, they'd been dancing their poor little hynies off, but the heat from the flames and the lights and the other dancers had a hard time escaping through the saloon doors at the front of the establishment.

It wasn't even that crowded, either; it was just hot, enough to make both Jerod and Amelia groggy and tired.

"For a back-water dance joint, this ain't so bad," Jerod chuckled with a slight leer on his lips. "Could give The Grind a run for it's money if it weren't so far in the middle of no-where."

"I know Twinbrook's pretty far off the beaten track, but it's not the middle of no where," Amelia drawled. She could feel her accent coming back the longer she stuck in this town, and it wasn't exactly something she'd missed.

Though their flight was to leave early in the morning--they were here for so short a visit that Mia didn't even have a chance to stop by to see any old friends--she still was insistent that if Jerod was a true party boy, he'd come take a look at the type of places Amelia grew up in. He didn't seem all that impressed, but he also didn't seem all that unimpressed; indifferent, perhaps.

"At least they know how to kick it," he remarked as he leaned in closer to his girlfriend. "Still... It's not exactly my kind of town. I belong in the city, if you know what I mean."

"Oh, I do," Amelia smirked. "Trust me. I belong here just as little as you do."

As they scrunched closer together--despite the sweltering heat--Amelia felt herself relaxing for the first time since she returned home this trip. The Steel Stallion wasn't much, but it was still a little piece of heaven to her--and right now, with the week she was having, she'd take what she could get.

She shuddered a little when Jerod broke the silence. "You know, I'm not so sure. In fact, I think this whole joint has 'Amelia' written all over it. At least, the Amelia that I met two months ago."

"Oh yeah?" Mia said a little bit bitterly. "You think so, huh?"

"There's nothing wrong with that. I think you look sexier in black, but I wouldn'tve fallen for you in the first place if I didn't like a little bit of cowgirl, if you know what I'm saying."

"You're a piece of work, you know that?" Amelia chuckled back at him; she couldn't give him lip, because he was right. In fact, she'd even packed her cowboy boots for the trip home just to have an excuse to wear them. As much as she resisted it, it still felt right.

"You like every bit of it," Jerod responded, but his expression began to change as his mouth opened--and closed again--while he looked off towards the direction of the bar. "Well well well... I believe we have a visitor."

"Wha? ... Oh."

Amelia wanted nothing more than to close her eyes and hide. Of all the people she had to see when she returned to Twinbrook, he had to be one of them. Lamont. The other red-head in her life.

And, apparently, not a very happy one at present.

"Soooo... You must be the Lamont I've been hearing so much about," Jerod began with a suave toss of his hair from his eyes. "Amelia's given me the pleasure of enlightening me all about you."

Lamont did not look pleased. For a moment, Amelia thought that he might burst out at Jerod in some way, but she also knew Lamont was too much of a goody-two-shoes to do something like that. Instead, he just kept glaring.

"Um... Hi, Lamont," Amelia said sheepishly, trying to keep the cold, uncaring attitude that Jerod had been fostering in her--but in this case, it just wouldn't stick.

Lamont ignored Amelia; instead, he turned to Jerod, who was quickly rising from the couch to approach the disgruntled newcomer. "And who are you?" he asked in an unpleasant tone of voice.

"Who are yoooou?" Jerod responded in a mocking voice. "Who the heck cares who I am? I'm Amelia's boyfriend, and you can either stay the heck out of her way or answer to me, little science geek boy."

"Jerod, Jerod please--" Amelia tried to interject, but her voice was quickly lost beneath Jerod's insulting taunts.

"Oooh, look who's getting aaanngry. I'm so scared! What you gonna do, pretty boy, zap me with your freeze ray?"

As mild-mannered as Lamont usually was, the red in his face began to show even under the hot glow of the lights, and the fury shone in his eyes. "I don't know what the heck Amelia is doing with someone like you, but before you get yourself in real trouble, I suggest you leave. You aren't welcome here."

"How convenient," Jerod responded with a growing sneer. "'Cause I was just on my way out. I don't like to tread in such cheap, grimy establishments."

"Yeah well we... don't... like you either!" Lamont's attempt at a comeback was pathetic; dignified so little in Jerod's eyes that he began to pretend that the other redheaded man simply didn't exist.

"What's that? Did you hear something, Mia? Thought it sounded like 'Dork, dork dork dork dork..."

Amelia, however, had had enough. "Please, Jerod, let's just go," she responded, reaching out a hand to pull her boyfriend towards the exit.

Jerod didn't need any more insisting; he was already a step ahead of her towards the exit by the time she turned to leave. She didn't get much of anywhere, though, as Lamont swiftly cut her off.

"I can't... I can't believe... Of all the people in the world, you're with... With that low life?! I thought you were smarter than that, Amelia!"

"You don't know him! You don't know him like I do!" Mia felt frantic; she knew she had nothing to explain to Lamont--it was none of his business--but there was something more in his eyes than just anger.

"Look, I'm sorry," she tried to explain. "We've just had a long day, we only flew in for a funeral, I didn't expect..."

"Didn't expect to see me? Is that it?"

"... Yeah. I... honestly didn't."

He paused for a moment; in one glance from his piercing blue eyes, she felt as if he was piercing into her soul. "You didn't want to see anyone that cares about you, did you? You don't give a damn about anyone here anymore... do you?"

She slowly backed away; she didn't want to respond to that. She wasn't sure that she could lie.

In that moment, something in Lamont's face changed. There was still the sweetness of his round, jovial face and piercing eyes, but the mere frustration at Amelia's choice of partner was nothing--nothing--compared to the intense pain she saw him suffer by admitting she wanted absolutely nothing to do with him.

"You know what," he said, his voice quiet and cold. "I don't care that you don't want me in your life. I don't. I wanted to be your friend, but I knew that was too much for you. Instead, I let you go, because I knew there'd be someone better out there for you. But him..." Lamont carefully shook his head, not once looking away. "If that's really what you want?"

For a moment, Amelia thought he was going to turn to leave, and that she was going to be rid of him finally--but as he turned away, he looked back--just once--to say: "I should have never believed you deserved my sister."

There was no drink in Amelia's system, but she still stumbled from the building. Her heart was racing, and the tears she held inside threatened to strangle her in her throat if they weren't released. She couldn't fight the feeling that she couldn't breathe; in a way, she didn't want to.

He knew. All this time, he knew. Lamont knew his sister loved her... And he let Amelia go because of it.

'Who doesn't know?!' she cried deep inside. 'Am I really the only one who never knew?! Am I that thick headed, that everyone I know can lie to me?'

"Come on," she heard rumble from the chest she leaned against. "This place is lame. Gets go crash, and then go home."

"Yeah..." Amelia choked. "Home."