14Danny was downright exhausted when he came home that night. He had to deal with another pesky ghost after school but it did little to fix all the pent up aggression and stress he had picked up at school that day. Sure it felt nice to have a punching bag for a bit but it ended too quickly. And the look on his friends faces made him apologize profusely afterwards. Had he been beating up the ghost too hard? Was that a problem?
Apparently it was.
Danny ended up going home early tonight, one for his homework.
And also, because he couldn't stand the look on their faces anymore. They knew he had every right to be upset today! Why weren't they letting him vent?
Was it because he didn't want to actually talk about it? Why would he want to talk? They saw what was bugging him! What more was there to say?
He had been publicly embarrassed beyond redemption and after trying to defend himself his powers acted up and he dropped his pants!
He swore he'd gotten over that problem.
And what a better time to lose your pants than when everyone finds out you used to wear dresses.
After just shouting out that you just didn't like wearing pants sometimes.
As a kid.
But they didn't understand. They didn't care. They all just laughed. Danny didn't know his face could get any redder than it did that day. Learn something new, hu?
He was so frustrated that he wanted to cry! But no! He's a boy, and boys don't cry! Not that anyone believed he was a boy anymore! So maybe he could?
Screw it he wasn't embarrassed anymore.
Heck he wasn't even frustrated.
He was pissed!
WHY, OUT OF ALL THE THINGS THAT COULD HAVE GONE WRONG TODAY DID THAT HAVE TO BE THE THING THAT HAPPENED?!
Danny, blinded by his outburst of rage, hadn't noticed that he had slammed front door open. He was so beyond angry right now that he had to stop in the doorway just to get his breathing in order.
"Danny? Is that you?" a soft voice called.
Danny looked up at the sound of his name almost ready to yell at whoever was calling him. He didn't care who it was, just as long as everybody left him alone.
But then he saw who it was. And he saw the look on her face. The gentle look of parental concern. His mother's loving gaze halted all thoughts in their tracks.
He couldn't be mad at his mom. Not when she was looking at him like that. It's not like it was her fault. Heck it really wasn't anyone's fault.
Well, except for Dash, it was totally his fault.
But that didn't really matter right now. All that mattered was that his mom was worried about him.
And, for once, he wanted her to be.
Her gazed gained an even more worried look as she raced over to him pulling him into a tight hug. And softly spoke into his ear, "shh, sweetie, there's no need to cry."
She pulled back but still held onto his shoulders, "What happened? You wanna tell me about it?"
Danny hadn't noticed that he really had started crying in frustration. He must of looked pathetic. "s-sorry mom." He sniffed. "I just had a bad day." He casually reached behind him and closed the front door.
Maddie lead her son to the kitchen and sat across from him hoping he'd continue to open up to her, but not wanting to push him for fear that he'd recoil back in on himself.
"Bad day?" She repeated. To her it sounded like an awful day. She knew he only had Sam and Tucker as his friends and sure he was getting close to his sister again but that was still such a small group. Sometimes she wondered how unpopular he was among his peers. Sure she was never the most popular girl in school with her interest in the paranormal, but sometimes she wondered if that effected him more. She knew he was a really sweet kid and with such a friendly and sweet personality she wondered why he didn't have more friends.
It took Danny a moment to decide if he had wanted to tell his mom about his day after all. Maybe Jazz was right and he did need to talk about his problems? Bottling them up all day sure hadn't made him feel any better, that was for sure.
And beating the snot out of some random ghost didn't really help either.
Well he knew he couldn't tell his mom about the essay. It wouldn't make any sense anyway. That and it really wasn't bothering him anymore. It was just what happened at lunch. And having to go through the rest of the day after that that had ripped him up inside.
Now that he thought about it. He really hadn't had mother-son-talk-about-your-problems-time-cuz-you'r e-crying since he was in the 6th grade. Wow he hadn't de-stressed with his mom since he was 11? Why was that again?
Oh right, his pet gerbil Neil had died. He had been so upset because he had spent all afternoon making a moon landing replica for his gerbil to explore and then suddenly it was all for nothing. He had been so happy and then suddenly so crushed that he couldn't take it. He remembered he had just busted up balling over it.
But then his mom came up to his room, explained that all things died, and if he was lucky it wouldn't come back as a ghost. Which at the time Danny didn't quite understand, he thought she just meant that because all ghosts were evil, so they thought. But he was starting to think that maybe it was because she didn't want him to see his parents destroy the soul of his beloved pet gerbil astronaut.
And after she had hugged him and his tears had stopped they had gone down to the kitchen and he had helped her make cookies.
That's right! They used to bake when he was upset! How did he forget that?
"Can we bake while we talk?" Danny asked abruptly after several minutes of contemplation.
The sudden question surprised Maddie but then realization dawned on her. He wanted to start their old tradition back up! "Shall I get us something to drink?"
"Only if we can share it!" Danny asked his mood already lifting. How could he forget how much he loved his mom? She was the best mom ever! Sure she embarrassed him sometimes, but hey that's what parents are for.
Maddie chuckled at the response and was happy to see such simple things could make her beautiful baby boy so happy. She was so glad with all the changes over the years, this wasn't one of them. She got up and grabbed a cup from the cupboard and a drink, as she asked for Danny to get the baking supplies.
He more than happily obliged the request and was quickly gathering the tools and ingredients that they needed.
"So," Maddie asked casually and curiously, "how much chocolate are we going to need?" If Maddie still knew her son like she thought she did, the more chocolate he requested the worse he day had been.
The last time they had done this Danny had asked for Chocolate Chocolate chip cookies. That was the day his gerbil died. She always found it innocently amusing that he had been more upset over not having the gerbil to play with any more than the fact that it had died. Then again, it was space related.
Danny paused as he had place most of the ingredients on the counter, "hmmm," then the little light of inspiration came to his eyes, "I'm thinking triple chocolate fudge cookies?" he nodded in agreement to the idea and turned to look to his mother for approval.
"Triple chocolate fudge?" Maddie repeated in disbelief. "That bad, hu?"
Danny nodded, "yeah, I've been chalking it up as the worst day ever. And I've had some pretty rough days." Danny stiffened as if he shouldn't have said that last part.
"You have?" Maddie asked concern once again showing on her face. How had she been so oblivious to her own son? Sure he'd been looking stressed and tired lately but she thought it was normal high school pressures. Something he'd phase right through. He had really been pushed past his limits?
Danny quickly shot up his hands in a defensive manner, "i-it's just normal high school stuff. And well with the town-er school having all those ghost attacks... it doesn't make it any easier." Danny finished defeated.
It suddenly struck Maddie that after his accident in the portal the ghosts had not only started attacking more frequently, but usually her son was around when it happened. Where the ghosts drawn to him the same way her equipment was? She needed to look into this more. But now was not the time.
"I see." Maddie said simply hoping to steer the conversation back to the present problem. "So what made today so bad?"
Danny heaved a sigh, and busies himself with gathering all the chocolate supplies as he spoke, "well remember how me and Jazz used to play dress up when we were really really little?"
Maddie smiled at the memory. He children had seemed so innocently happy that she didn't find anything wrong with Jazz dressing up her little brother like a baby doll. "Yes. You two used to have so much fun with that."
Danny nodded absently as he started to add all the wet ingredients into a mixing bowl, mostly by just eyeballing it. Since when was he so good at that? He was silent for a little while longer as if he wasn't sure how to word what was to come next. He continued to mix the ingredients, adding pinches and dashes of things as he went. It was almost as if watching a professional.
Maddie couldn't help herself as her curiosity got the better of her, "When did you learn to do that so well?"
Danny's head popped up in surprise and it took him a moment to realize what his mother was talking about. "oh the cookies? I don't know? Awhile I guess. Thought you knew I could bake? Learned it from you? And I've been making the cookies for Christmas for the past few years now." Danny blinked in simple disbelief at his mother's obliviousness and then went straight back to mixing, adding a bit more chocolate to the mix and smiling into the bowl satisfied with his creation.
Maddie blinked a few times. Why was it that every time she thought she had figured her boy out that it seemed like there was a whole other side to him that was completely foreign?
She had always just assumed he had bought them. Never questioned that he might have made them himself. And it made sense now. She and Jack had been fighting for years over Santa, that seemed to scream de-stress baking sessions!
"Right... so back to this bad day of yours..." Maddie hoped he didn't think she was as much as a failure as a mother as he was starting to think she was.
"Oh right!" Danny perked up and brought the cookie dough over to his mom, "but first, wanna taste?" Danny asked with a perky and somehow slightly mischievous glint in his eyes.
Maddie smiled as she grabbed a nearby spoon and scoped a small taste for herself. Her eyes widened and she nodded quickly to show that she really enjoyed the taste. Usually she didn't like having too much chocolate at once but somehow these cookies were perfect! And they weren't even baked yet!
"Oh sweetie this is delicious!" Maddie gave her son a tight one armed squeeze careful of the bowl in his arms.
Danny let out his trademark chuckle, "Really? I haven't even cooked them yet?" he took the spoon from his mom and scooped out a large spoonful for himself. Oh how that hit the spot.
Danny smiled as he carefully put the bowl down, he was really tempted to just sit there and eat all the dough but knew it would be even better once it was fresh out of the oven. So he quickly went to preheat it.
"ok I guess I should stop stalling," Danny said looking to his shoes. Part of him was hoping that the distraction of baking itself would be enough, but his thought's kept wondering back to what was causing this baking session in the first place.
"Well those pictures you and Jazz took of me, then ended up at school." Danny paused in his talking and went to making balls of dough for the cookies and placing them neatly and evenly on the tray.
"Turns out that everyone at school saw them and thought it was the funniest thing in the world that a boy was dressed up like a girl. And they all just started to-" Danny sighed not sure if he wanted his mom to know how badly he was being bullied. He had never really told her before that Dash was one of the main reasons his high school career sucked.
Well that and ghost fighting, but she wasn't ever going to know about that one!
He decided to keep it simple, "they all laughed at me. Everybody had a name to call me or a mean joke to say. I think even some of the teachers found it amusing!" Danny bit his lip at that last part. He hadn't of meant for that to slip. He knew his mom could go into full combat mode if he had said the wrong thing.
"What?!" Maddie was outraged! Her son was being bullied over something he did as a small child? Didn't any of them have embarrassing secrets?
But what made her madder was the thought that Danny was still holding some of the truth back. There was something in this story that was missing. For a moment there it seemed like this wasn't the first time Danny had been pushed around in school. Was he son the usual target of bullies? "This isn't the first time something like this has happened is it?" her tone was gentle but his reaction surprised her.
Her jerked into awareness and quickly looked at her with a small trace of fear in his eyes. He let out one of his surprised sounds and quickly tried to explain "it's not that bad really! I mean there's a bit of stuff that happens usually but it was only bad today cuz everybody else joined in." Danny quickly turned his attention back to the cookies. He had dropped one of the dough balls back into the bowl in his surprise and he went to retrieve it and continued his work a bit more feverishly. Filling the tray in no time and noticed that the oven was ready for his stress relief desserts.
Maddie sighed but decided for once to back off. By the sounds of it, Danny didn't come to her to help fix his problems. He had just wanted to get them off his chest.
Danny came back from the oven with his face still down cast. "You're not gonna come to school tomorrow and kick all their butts are you?"
Maddie smiled. Her son was so innocently clueless sometimes. "No dear, but I'm always here if you want to talk about it."
With that Danny smiled and quickly hugged his mother. That was all he had wanted.
Well that and the cookies that were in the oven.
~END!
