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She hadn't been this organised for years. Honestly, probably not since her own dad had sat down and put a wall calendar in front of her with a red pen and told her to pull herself together. Last night though Fig had cried with her head against Sandra Lynn's shoulder and then fell down the stairs with her foot stuck in a bucket of cement, and this morning she had come downstairs to find Adaine sniffling as Kristen slept with her head in her lap, and she had had more than one meeting with the Thistlesprings or Sklonda about how horrifically busy their kids were. She took the silence from Seacaster manner to mean something equally as troubling with how often Fabian was crushed under a puppy pile of other bad kids in one bed or another.
It didn't take a genius to know that they were tumbling towards burnout.
So she had called off of work, asked Jawbone to email her all the kids' schedules, and then called the school to talk to the rogue teacher about paying better attention to their students because Riz's schedule was insane. After that, she drove to the local art store and picked up the biggest corkboard they had and a million different things in sets of six. Six balls of yarn, six journals, six diaries, six wall calendars, six sets of gel pens, and six boxes to fill with snacks at the local hobby shoppe.
It was maybe silly, but she was careful in assigning colours, one for each kid so they could keep their stuff straight. Even if they didn't use the planners and the bags of chips went stale, she could figure out their favourite colours.
She chose a light purple for Gorgug, who was so kind and gentle, but so good at letting his friends in on how deep the recesses of his mind went when he was left alone for too long. Red was for Fabian, who was so confident and uplifting but bled emotion and love and care for his people. Riz got a deep, emerald green because he was so energetic and smart and freely affectionate. Her intelligent, careful Adaine got cornflower blue, a softer, less brash version of the colour that Sandra Lynn hoped was calming. Her loud, thoughtful Kristen got a yellow that reminded her of honey and buttercups because Kristen was a mess of tangles and wanted to be there for everyone who needed her to catch them. Fig got pink because sometimes she caught her little demon picking at the paint on the walls as if it would still be that same blush underneath. Like it had been before they moved to Mordred Manor. As if she could go back to before everything was messy, or at least tidy it up again.
On a whim (or call it mother's intuition), she picked up stickers and tape as well so everyone could decorate theirs if they wanted to, and smiled at the halfling who checked out her cart.
It was late, nearly nine, by the time the last few bad kids trickled in through the doors and her shoulders sank at the lack of lame excuses or too-innocent grins. Instead, Fabian and Gorgug sighted practice, and Riz was covered in honey for some reason. They followed her instructions and sat themselves around the kitchen table like she asked, and she wished whichever deity was currently listening to make this easier for them. Hadn't these kids died for this world enough times?
There were nachos and hot cookies thanks to Lydia — who had squeezed her arm so tight that it hurt when she explained and dragged her right back down to earth — and she had dropped a paper bag in front of each of them, their names scrawled on in sharpie. She didn't know how to do this, how to be the mom who kept everyone's shit together, but she had tried the passive thing and the wedge between her and Fig had been brutal; that wouldn't happen again. It was time to muddle through the hands-on approach.
"I know you're tired," she started and grasped at her mug of coffee like a lifeline, "and I know everything is piling up, but I'm not gonna lose you kids to highschool, so we're gonna deal with it together."