#normalizing that shit hurts ppl cause it makes kids think thats a regular thing when its NOT.

[sneeg-snag]

listen i may be all for non-censorship and shit like that but i draw a hard line at incest and underage stuff- with a lot of things going around if ur into that PLEASE block me. im not and i dont want to be interacting with those who do

[unproduciblesmackdown]

s2g that moss has even been foreshadowing that lars was gonna get briefly killed like…not that specific but since we’re shown that the moss is lars and the flowers have a bit of gem in them…………

ppl are always weird about stuff everywhere smh but like…theres been obviously weird things like being way more ok with ancient beings ready to destroy all life on the planet than lars being too ill-tempered or doing something selfish like…i see that…. like lars doesnt need to be redeemed for anything jeez. every episode where he does something crap its on a minor scale vs like endangering lives or something and he gets k.o’d for it and then makes some sincere form of apology like? theres your redemption…i guess maybe people expect him to become acceptable overnight maybe but thats how people work and then every episode is like The Lesson of the Week instead of a closer look at a character and another step in their development as people figuring themselves out

like literally every character has issues smh! in like this and everything also but like….honestly lars has been a super self conscious and anxious teen from the start and really unhappy and like sometimes he does dumbass shit but who hasnt. if you think youve never hurt people you havent been paying close enough attention

anyways one of the things i really dont like? despite general overall stuff like teenaged lars momentarily losing his patience and realizing he’s in the wrong and immediately trying to make amends = him being judged more harshly than like….every millenia-old actually murderous actual antagonist introduced…. is that overall? its like really really clear really early on that he’s always struggling with a lot of mental health issues, and a common theme is irl people who really do have disorders pointing this out. like, that point can be made for every character in su and lars isnt The Mentally Ill One who alone represents the whole of the universal mental illness experience because obviously that doesnt exist and its a very unique and personal experience, and people dont have to directly relate to lars or any other character with such problems to verify their own. but lars and the cool kids is like super upfront about anxiety and he obv has really low confidence and low self worth and i’ll fight anytime about island adventure hinting strongly at depression—in addition to having him state outright that he feels lonely and isolated all the time. and like, he hates the job he works all the time, he’s not good in school, he and sadie feel an early connection but they obviously had to do a lot of work on that and step on each other’s emotional fingers along the way to finally get to where they are now—which i’m guessing is dating but without acknowledging so or at least not to others, he isn’t very close to his parents currently, he starts the series with 1.5 friends maximum and cant even approach the cool kids besides being desperate to be friends with them

like clearly he’s unhappy and for a while sadie and steven are probably the people closest to him even tho he is a lot more annoyed by steven at the start of things when steven is more little-kiddish than he is now…..but lars still acts mostly like himself around them But at the start him and sadie have too many complications and uncertainties to be really comfortable and again steven doesnt really come across as very mature, with lars pointing it out just now how stevens changed in that way, and it being difficult anyways for lars to confide in anybody

so like lars is and has always been super super defined and restricted by his fear of everybody he encounters, specifically being afraid of being hurt by them / fear of being disliked. i like to say that i think the way he prevents himself / his image is meant to be a way of controlling the reactions he expects people to have: i.e. making people dislike him is less scary/painful than being judged badly while hoping for the opposite. but i also never like saying that anyone who consciously cultivates their Look is faker than someone who doesnt put any thought into it, or is lying to themselves or others or whatever, i just would bet thats a part of it. but moreso than that, the fact that he’s irritable and ill-tempered all the time fits really well as a result of being so unhappy and afraid and trying to deal with it solo. it’s not about him not caring about people, when on an unrelated note but related-to-the-universal-human-experience he does something thoughtless or mean or just generally crosses a line, he notices immediately when someone feels hurt, and he’s shown to immediately feel bad, arguably to a fault and going too far with how guilty he feels. but anyways clearly even though he has the capacity to hurt people’s feelings, he’s very sensitive to that, he cares deeply when it happens, and he doesn’t want to hurt people. like apologizing with any genuine depth to it right off is an incredibly difficult task even for grownass adults, and lars is already really good at it. its wild that people think of him as super cruel and selfish when it’s clear that he’s very emotionally vulnerable and doesn’t have the capacity to callously disregard other people’s hurt feelings

anyways a point i’m taking a really long time to come around to is that lars is a really good example of someone who’s young and unhappy and isolated and really struggling with a lot of things and afraid of everything and the fact is that usually when youre looking for characters who are struggling with this kind of shit you get one-dimensional, maybe even one-episode characters like the person who shows up for the very special episode where everyone has a serious talk and learns a serious lesson and the Depression Character never shows up again, having gone off to be depressed somewhere else since we already know about depressed people. or depression and anxiety is something that can be solved literally overnight if you just confront the root cause, like eliminating the life problem that made x depressed or giving y a makeover or throwing them a surprise party to show them they have friends or something. or you learn that joe the bully is actually just physically violent because he is insecure, whoa man. or the Sad Kid is a running joke and a periphery character and their parents are getting divorced etc etc etc etc

the point is that lars is a main character and even when he learns things about himself that put him in a better place than when the episode began, his issues still don’t vanish (and i wouldnt be surprised if people use that as evidence that his character doesnt “grow”). and dealing with / revealing some of his issues arent a special episode, its just an episode, and its about him. he’s developed over and over and he’s shown to be a complicated person. he’s shown to enjoy things and have interests and a life. he’s a regular character as much as anyone else is, he isnt set aside in a special category

but the thing is that maybe people expect Mentally Ill™ characters to be more of the hamfisted media clichés with zero nuance and about as much accuracy to them? because there’s always the sweet-and-soft kind of person who’s surely dealing with mental illness acceptably because they make up for it by being pure and noble and something approximately like a newborn lamb. like depression is being maybe a bit cagey and avoidant and crying a lot and writing poetry (which will later be revealed as their secret talent!!) and sighing and generally just waiting for someone to approach them, very gently because they are shy and nervous like a fawn, and that savior will cure them with love and also with showing them how beautiful life is!!! and then they will start wearing more colorful clothes and they will be happy and the depression is over now, because someone just had to show their delicate, beautifully wounded soul the light

trauma? you can tell someone has Trauma because they act very stoic and strong 1000% of the time no exceptions but it is just a façade. they will never talk about The Thing. they will finally talk about the thing because someone pries about it with pure intentions and it is a big dramafest and theyve never talked about this before and everyone cries and its super serious and heavy and the person is a bit softer after that because they could finally let it out that one time. thanks, another savior. having disorders is just having turned away from the light

the point is that irl obviously things are very different and its rare to see people with such issues being treated the same as any other character and being able to grow in a realistic way and being able to have flaws the way that everyone else does, not having to be a pure defenseless dewy-eyed baby kitten who someone strong and Normal needs to rescue and put on the right path away from these problems forever. being pissed off and frustrated and confused but trying a lot of different ways to figure things out anyways is a lot more common, the way lars reacts to and deals with his vulnerability is a lot more realistic than just being a fairy-tale in-distress type figure. his character feels a million times more like he was developed by people who understand what its like to be experiencing what he does and developed for people who can relate to him, rather than being made by and for people who cant directly relate and who tend to make content thats wholly inaccurate and treats that kind of thing like an Other issue for Others that you only need to learn bullet points about because if its going to be a part of your life it’ll be a fleeting, one-time thing, not your everyday reality

i mean, its unsurprising that lars is actually pretty comfortable with steven now, given how long theyve known each other, but also how relentless steven is in being supportive of lars and treating him like a friend. its not surprising that it took lars this long to accept that, or that it was in part forced along by being stuck in a “we might die” scenario with steven. and its important to point out that this wasn’t just lars changing that made their relationship better, but steven growing as a person as well. if you put both if them in that situation during the start of the series, they could probably get along better than usual still, but you cant say that this is the first sign of lars developing any more than you can say this is stevens first development. lars has been struggling with himself just as steven has, although not in a fate-of-the-world way till now. lars couldnt be so conscious of his own fear and frustrated with it, and steven wouldnt have the maturity to do stuff like freakin sacrifice himself for earth by separating himself from the other crystal gems, much less lend lars the emotional support needed to give lars enough confidence to protect the off-colors

lars has been developing the whole time and even if people look at individual episodes and think lars learns nothing during them, i cant see how anyone could deny that this isn’t a turning point for lars as much as its the culmination of a gradual path he’s already been on. not to mention that “turning point” has implications like “redemption arc,” as if lars was inherently bad or worthless at the start of the series. he wasn’t; none of the characters were, but each character and all of their relationships were least developed of course. we see details and different sides of the donuts right away, and they both care enough about steven to treat him more as a little brother than a customer and to humor him sometimes. theyve always been important, and the fact that lars has always been a main character in the set of protagonists and that steven has always been a friend means that he cannot be converted by a “redemption” arc. he’s already there smh he’s always been there. seriously name one episode where he’s done something shitty and didnt do anything to make up for it. the only thing unresolved rn is he couldnt fight topaz for sadie, and he said himself he felt guilty over it, and it was already at that point the boldest thing he’d done and like, its not that unreasonable for a wisp of a teen to be terrified by a giant gem warrior that he had zero chance of doing anything to anyways. it wasnt glistening heroics but if thats gonna condemn lars like throw me in the pit too i guess. then he went and died for twelve individuals and left himself defenseless in hostile unfamiliar territory so that steven can go back to earth so thats something. but before all this alien drama like, again…..he’s always directly apologizing for shit and he’s just making everyday kinds of fuckups. he beats himself up about stuff. and gets beat up. and really like doesnt ever require an apology when he’s the one to get hurt, which isnt a requirement by any means and which is probably part of him thinking too badly of himself

the point? that maybe i still havent made besides saying i was gonna make it like half a dozen times?? is that lars is a really real portrayal of a person dealing with things in a real way. and its not the “pain is transcendent” thing where if someone is Suffering from mental illness it makes them wiser and kinder and holier than us regular people. its not where all you need to help someone with mental illness is one incidence of reaching out and telling them you love them and look at the stars and isnt it lovely. its not where disorders themselves are an arc and at the end, people’s personalities will be indistinguishable from that of those who never experienced what they did. its where dealing with this shit is normal and human and everyday and its not beautiful and its not gonna make other people “inspired” or get to feel good about themselves as your savior. its about pushing people away or having them avoid you anyways because they can hurt you in ways they can’t understand as being hurtful and shits confusing and sometimes kids will lash out and i bet lars was a lot more Difficult closer to stevens age than he is now. its about characteristics that seem ugly or repulsive or otherwise don’t directly cry out for help. its about shit staying with you even while you’re trying to figure out how to work through it. its about the unpleasantness of it all but also the real humanity behind it, not just using it as some device. lars’s problems are about lars and belong to him

and yeah of course he hurts people, but literally all the characters do; it has nothing to do with having disorders or not. everyone hurts each other even though they love each other, sometimes with the best intentions or 0% knowingly because they just have to figure out more things about themselves and each other. everything is about people making mistakes. lars is no worse in that matter than any of the other characters, he just happens to have a less appealing/inviting personality, god forbid less relatable. in the recent episodes he didnt have his usual defensive abrasiveness, even his frustration with steven in “stuck together” wasn’t that significant, and wasnt even much directed at steven. after that he was just scared, without it being masked by anger. he could be brave for the other gems because he knew he wanted to be brave and he knew how it felt for them to be so afraid and he was finally told that it was an okay thing that he still felt terrified. he could be completely himself with steven because of all the ways steven has gotten to know lars and refused to stop valuing him and how steven has grown to be someone who could protect others on his own in serious situations—which in this case included supporting lars emotionally as well as protecting him physically. if lars was dropped in that situation with the kid who just learned to summon his shield and was having an ice cream crisis five minutes ago, he couldnt trust or rely on him or count on him for encouraging advice. the way lars is in the wanted arc being so different from earlier episodes is as much about stevens development as lars’s really

like the real lars is and always has been deeply sensitive to peoples feelings (to the point he feels extremely vulnerable to them e.g. afraid of being hurt by being regarded negatively) and he’s always cared about the people he feels close to and he’s always been capable of moments of bravery for the sake of others and he likes wrestling and he’s good at cooking and he’s a dumbass sometimes and he watches scary movies and plays video games and sucks at school and is grumpy and is passionate and is scared and is a huge nerd with nerd parents and he never got over feeling hurt by the explorer club incident and he doesnt like fries and he and his coworker like each other and relate to each other and he sees steven as his annoying little brother and he doesnt know what he wants and also he’s a bi icon, it must be exhausting

lars has always been good and complex and i might be willing to forgive my slight disappointment in people realizing he’s good only now if and only if they go back and acknowledge that he’s been good this whole time. like obviously he doesn’t have to be your Fave or even “liked” to just be not hated or to be recognized as a complex, solid character. lars is so, so developed, probably more than any other human. he’s always been important, even before his importance had direct cosmic significance. he’s always shown signs of being thoughtful and caring and soft, and the fact that he’s hurt people he cares about and who care about him isnt evidence that he’s bad, not only because of the fact that literally all the Good characters hurt each other, but because irl hurting people you love isnt even necessarily evidence of a failure, its just an inevitability, and what happens following the event is whats a lot more telling than the fact any negative emotions were ever a part of a good relationship

anyways what’s definitely true is that lars didnt need to die. it wasnt a necessary atonement for anything lars has ever done. he didnt and doesnt need to be redeemed. he just was willing to risk his life for gems in a situation he could immediately relate to, and that risk happened to win out momentarily. besides, what lars was overcoming in that situation was his own fear, it wasnt anything that caused the stuff in the past that people seem to think so badly of him for. he was also protecting steven, sure, but steven was pretty much fine by the end of it coz of his shield. but he also hadnt ever really Not protected steven or anything so he didnt really need to make up for that or whatever

also one more thing ive always meant to bring up is that lars doesnt think much of himself and is prone to being too hard on himself but i know there are probably plenty of people who believe him when he says he needs to “deserve” being alive again. nah!!!! lars always deserved it

[leaughrilke]

how do the kiddos/Lena and kara react to the bad relationship Maia is in?

like..........not well.  like they react v well for her, in that they’re supportive and caring and do all the right stuff but it also tears them apart

not as in the family is torn apart, like they still are v much a family and v much a unit, but it rips kara and lena apart and it eats at finn and stella bc they all feel like they could have done more??  noticed before it got so bad, been more present

but basically maia is feeling v overlooked and forgotten abt, like classic middle child where she feels like stella’s the baby and finn’s the prodigal son and she’s just.......there??  like she feels like she’s the Angry One or whatever, not anything to be proud of.  but she’s not one to ever be forthright with her feelings??  like fuck that, she’s going to bottle that shit up so you never know the real reason for her getting upset.  so she’s feeling weird with her family, right??  and she’s in kind of a vulnerable place bc of it, always feeling like the black sheep, always feeling like a bit of a burden and high school is weird and everything is Weird, thats like the best way to put it.  maia’s in a state of flux, where she’s not the kiddo that anyone is expecting to go into the superhero business but she’s the one that desperately wants to (like stella will want to later, but rn??  its all maia) but no one acknowledges it bc she never says it

a lot of her problems are rooted in miscommunication tbh like she’ll just........not say anything but be like stewing over it for months ya feel?

so she’s feeling Weird and starts acting out a little, starts letting her grades drop and starts missing curfew and like that sort of puts a bit of a wedge between her and her family, bc her moms are like??  where is this coming from??  and her siblings are trying to talk to her but maia’s started looking at the world like it’s me vs everyone else so she shuts them out, refuses to talk to them abt anything important.  so there’s this distance btwn her and the rest of the family, this uncomfortable tension btwn her and her moms and it only feeds into this Weirdness more, leads maia to make more Bad decisions like cutting class to hang out more with these kids she met at the skate park over the summer and its rlly nice??  like she feels heard, feels validated and like her friends from school are nice, are rlly good, but they sort of are like??  it sucks you feel bad but your moms do love you??  talk to them abt this maybe??  and maia’s like lol no, just spends more time with the ppl that are validating her feelings, not asking her to analyze anything, just letting her be

and she has rlly intense chemistry with this one boy in the group??  like its immediate and maia’s dated a little bit but she’s p intense, scares ppl off p often but this boy isnt intimidated, seems to see right through her, seems to see that she’s angry bc she’s scared of a lot, that she’s not as hard and sharp as she acts

and he likes her and she likes him so they get together and maia feels so normal??  like for a hot second she just feels like a regular kid and its so addictive that feeling, she’s not willing to give it up.  and her bf is so sweet at first, texts her a couple times a day and calls her after school and brings her snacks when they meet up at the park

i’m putting this under the cut bc the subject matter can be v triggering, pls check the tags and pls pls pls dont read this if any of the warnings apply to you.  be safe, i love you

and then, bc it starts so calmly, so carefully, she doesnt rlly worry when it starts to change, when he starts telling her that she’s exhausting, that her negativity is killing him.  like??  she already thinks that abt herself, knows she’s intense and moody and angry more often than she’s not, knows she’s a lot to handle, already thinks she’s too Much.  so she changes a little, stops venting to him, starts bottling it up again.  then its him blaming her for arguments they have, so she tries hard to not start any.  then its demanding that she text him back immediately, even when he’s texting her hundreds of times in a day, so she starts keeping her phone on her at all times.  then its this, then its that and through it all, maia’s getting a little smaller, a little quieter, a little Less.  she’s trying to fit herself into the box he’s drawing around her and she’s not happy with it but she loves him, right??  and he loves her??  he’s the only one that rlly understands her, he’s the only one that rlly cares how she’s feeling, even if sometimes he’s too upset with his own stuff to listen to her, even if sometimes he makes fun of her in front of their friends even when she tells him it makes her uncomfortable

and she hides this all from her moms for a long time, makes up excuses for why she’s missing family dinners and movie nights, says she’s just stressed, just tired.  she avoids finn bc he’s always known her tells, avoids stella bc her little sister can literally see into ppl’s minds and she doesnt know why, but she doesnt want ppl to know abt her relationship.  she avoids lena bc lena’s got this knack for figuring out when her kids are keeping secrets, avoids kara bc kara believes so wholeheartedly in her that it makes her feel set on edge.  she keeps skipping school until it becomes a Problem, until the school calls her moms but they’re both in the middle of something, miss the call, so they call Emergency Contact #1 aka alex and alex is like ???  wtf like maia’s a bit of a hothead sometimes but she’s not reckless necessarily, especially when it comes to school, so she goes to campus, sees maia’s car and is like mmmmmm this is Wrong.  so when maia comes back at the end of the day, alex is sitting on the hood of her car and is like hey.  we’re going to talk.

and maia’s like.......rlly sensitive??  like somewhere deep down, she knows there’s something off about the situation, that’s why she’s so desperate to hide it, but she’s not like conscious of it, she just gets rlly defensive, gets rlly prickly, and she’s not great at hiding it when she’s displeased or upset but its so muted when alex confronts her and that, in of itself, is a giant fucking red flag bc maia should like??  be arguing, getting irritated like maia weirdly takes after alex in a lot of respects and alex Knows something’s wrong.  so she kind of drops it bc maia’s just giving her this look like she’s begging her not to press too hard

like obviously alex doesnt Drop It, she just backs off maia directly for a bit, goes over her head to kara and lena and they’re like SHIT this makes a lot of things make sense and its like, ok, we can handle this

FALSE

maia reacts v badly when her moms sit her down to like.....gently ask what the fuck is happening.  like there’s a lot sort of just simmering below the surface, like her bf has been rlly difficult recently and she’s stressed abt that and she’s angry that alex found out, that alex told her moms, she’s angry that she’s getting called on it, that it feels like the only time she gets attention is when she’s fucked up, and it all comes to a head during this one moment.  like.  it’s the worst fight any of the kiddos have ever had with their moms.  like maia’s full out screaming at them and they’re just completely caught off guard bc there’s usually some lead up??  something that builds to a meltdown but nope, not this time, she goes zero to one hundred in a blink and stella and finn are just like hunkered down upstairs, staring at each other like HOLY SHIT maia never yells at moms like that

like its awful, terrible but it kind of makes things better for a while??  like maia screams it all out, her anger, her feeling of being left out, how hurt she feels sometimes, all the things that she’s never let her moms know and then its kind of like.  oh.  its over now.

and things get a little better after that??  maia takes the inevitable grounding with no argument, but that is like......Another Problem.  like maia without any fight??  with no indignant anger???  that’s a maia that none of them have ever encountered and it sets everyone on edge, how quiet maia is, how small she makes herself.  but there’s no like??  cause as far as anyone but maia can see.  so her moms are a bit more careful with her, her siblings are a little more gentle, kara and lena go out of their way to arrange things to do with maia on her own, to make sure she feels seen and included but by this point, her boyfriend’s been filling her head with really toxic shit, feeding into her venting and solidifying the idea that she’s less than her siblings in someway, so even their best efforts are shrugged off.  maia has a million excuses prepped and ready for why she can’t make it to the planetarium with lena, why she has to miss stella’s soccer game, why she turns kara down when she offers to go flying, just the two of them.  she’s become a great liar, really, was always a little clumsy with out and out lies when she was a child but now she’s almost as good as stella

speaking of stella.  she sees him first.  in maia’s mind, when she finally shows up to family game night and finn shouts a little bc they’re playing monopoly and maggie just bought the property he wanted and maia doesnt so much flinch as she does freeze for one, nearly imperceptible moment and stella sees this face, this boy in maia’s mind but he’s smiling??  and she brushes it off at the moment, but it nags at her for a while until she’s asked maia to help braid her hair for her seventh grade dance and they’re up in maia’s room, out of lena’s hearing and kara’s out on a supergirl mission so stella sort of asks are you dating anyone?  and there’s that freeze again, that moment and stella feels the dilemma as maia navigates it, as she decides if she should lie when stella will definitely be able to tell, and then finally maia says kind of quietly yeah, i am and then stella’s asking for details, when’d they meet, does he go to school with maia, when is she going to introduce him to the family and maia just shuts her down.  switches subjects in a manner that is v final and stella’s not going to push, she’s never been one to push

but now maia’s thinking about it and there’s no way stella’s going to be able to keep this a secret from their moms for very long, so she bites the bullet, tells them in a v blunt way

quite literally walks into the kitchen one morning and is like hey.  im dating someone and then just runs out the room before anyone can say anything else

so obviously kara and lena are like ???  ok!!  we wanna meet them!!  invite them over for dinner!!  and maia’s like SHIT i didnt think this through but she cant tell them no straight out without them being like why, whats going on, so she says she’ll invite him and so she mentions it to her bf the next time she sees him and he’s like Upset and Hurt that she wants to burst their little bubble, but he “loves her enough to meet her family” (said with a sigh and a glare that has maia shrinking, apologizing)

so he comes round for dinner and stella’s the one that gets to the door before maia, that pulls it open to meet her sister’s mystery man and she immediately gets a bad vibe from him.  like straight off the bat, she looks him up and down and is like No but then maia’s pushing her to the side and pulling him into the house and stella’s just sort of standing there like This is Wrong, I Dont Like This, just trails them after a moment, follows them into the kitchen where everyone’s doing the whole meet n greet thing, the Boyfriend is presenting the flowers he brought and keeping one hand around maia’s waist and he’s shaking hands with finn and smiling all wide and bright and smug, as if he’s already won something and all stella can hear from maia is please like him please like him please like him which wouldn’t be super weird???  but there’s this intense desperation behind it that sets stella on edge

so when she gets the chance, when finn’s chatting with maia and her bf, stella pulls her moms into the kitchen and tells them what she feels, that something is Wrong.  and like???  she doesnt have the words for it bc she’s thirteen and hasn’t ever really been exposed to anything like this, but she knows this guy is a bad dude and she says as much and kara and lena are like shit okay our empath/mind reader of a daughter is getting Bad Vibes, we should keep an eye on him, so they do the entire night and its like.  there arent any red flags or anything, isnt any bad behavior, but maia is too tense and this dude is too smooth and they’ve both???  been through this???  can see the subtle signs??  can see the way maia freezes a little when this boy puts his arm around her, the way she keeps watching him out of the corner of her eye, how she’ll switch subjects if there’s even the slightest change in his expression like.........maia’s never been a jumpy person, has always been sure footed and confident since she was very little, and kara’s got kill bill sirens going in her head and lena’s got this sick feeling in her stomach, stella’s sitting next to maia and refusing to move, glaring at her boyfriend whenever he’s looking a different direction and finn, godbless him, is looking from his moms to stella to maia sitting so stiffly on the couch, looking entirely uncomfortable in her home, in her own space and he catches stella’s eye, raises one eyebrow and then all he gets in like the in-mind version of all caps is stella just yelling BAD VIBE over and over again

so the night is tense to say the least and stella insists on maia sitting next to her at dinner, leaving her boyfriend sandwiched between finn and lena who both have like.........impressive death glares and maia’s getting more and more agitated, like pushing for the meal to wrap up quickly and it finally does, after her moms grilling this guy to get like a better grasp on the type of awful he is and maia’s like saying she’ll walk him out and kara and lena are both like we’ll come with you and maia’s like No but her bf just squeezes her shoulder and is like nah, it’s fine with this smarmy smile and stella’s still glaring but now finn’s glaring too

so he leaves finally and he reels maia in for a kiss that she v obviously is uncomfortable with so kara like straightens to her full height, crosses her arms and tells him she’s sure he needs to be home and he must sense somethings changed bc then he like just stops putting on a smile for kara and lena, turns fully to maia and tells her to call him tonight and maia sort of nods quickly, seems intent on just getting him to leave, get out of her mother’s view

as soon as he drives away, maia’s like speed walking to the house and trying to run up the stairs, to her phone, but kara kind of catches her hand and is like hey.  we need to talk about something.  and maia’s like ??  can it wait, i need to text him and stella’s like um he just left, which is when lena shoos the other kiddos out of the house, handing finn some cash and telling him to take stella to get ice cream.  so then its just them and maia and maia’s fidgety, wont keep eye contact for very long and kara mentions that, mentions how maia’s changed over the last few months and lena’s saying that they’re worried for her, about her, worried that maybe this boy isn’t healthy for her and maia’s like what do you guys know, he loves me and then lena's explaining darling i've been there, i know what you're feeling, but this isn't love and you deserve better and kara’s thinking about that one time maia came home with a bruise (thanks to the supplement, she can bruise) and she said she got it in gym but now kara’s wondering and they’re being v gentle, asking if she’s happy, asking if he’s kind to her and maia so desperately knows they’re right on some level but that’s buried v deep down and she doesnt want to have to drag it to the surface so she just........flips out

like screams and cries and leaves, storms out and flies away before the conversation can get too far, just yells  that she cant believe theyre trying to ruin the one good thing in her life trying to take away the one person that actually give a shit about her

and she flies to meet up with bf at his place and is telling him about their fight and he's like yeah your moms are fucked up, we're in love obviously, they just dont want to see you happy, they like your brother and sister more like all this really toxic shit that he's been feeding her for months, slowly poisoning her against her family and friends

but now she's got this seed of doubt at the back of her head like wait my mothers were really great when i was a kid, did they really change?

is this love or was i just happy for attention?

my moms always tell us that no matter what we do, as long as we're happy and safe they'll support it and they've never proven that wrong right?

so she's having a crisis and he's like pushing to have sex (it's not their first time, and it's not the first time he's had to convince her) and maia's like wait no i need a minute let me riddle this thing out

and he's getting like majorly pouty and upset like right, pick them over me, leave me just like everyone else and maia's staring at him like what the fuck and so she says as much, says that her moms do love her and he’s like ??  really maia?  and it goes from there, turns into an argument and he’s saying some really awful things to her 

and he’s in the middle of telling her that she’s nothing, that she should be grateful he’s wasting his energy and time trying to fix her when kara breaks the door and says flatly whoops and lena marches in and essentially tells this guy to fuck off (actually she quite literally tells him to fuck off, how dare you speak to my daughter like that) as she wraps an arm around maia and guides her out and maia’s sort of shellshocked??  like shit.  shit holy shit 

she just like.  breaks down in the car.  like the moment lena’s pulled the door closed behind them, maia’s just falling apart in a way that lena’s never seen her, like shaking and rocking and full body sobs and kara’s still inside the boys house, having a Talk but then she hears maia’s crying and is just like.  you’re garbage, we’re going to ruin your life before she leaves 

maia cries most of the night.  like suddenly everything bad that’s been happening is at the forefront of her mind but her self esteem is so shattered, she’s just blaming herself.  she has like??  three panic attacks and her moms stay with her through it all, keeping her tucked between them, petting her hair and telling her that none of this is her fault, that they’re sorry for not seeing what was happening.  when finn and stella come back, they follow the sound of sobbing up to their moms room, drop everything to join the cuddle pile that’s happening.  stella tucks herself right next to maia, takes her hands and as much of her pain as she can, tries to give her as much peace as she can.  and finn’s never been so close to violence in his life, feels an itch in his fists that is entirely unfamiliar, finds himself struggling to be in the same room with maia bc she’s his little sister???  he’s supposed to keep her safe, you know??  

it’s a hard night.  it is.  maia cant sleep, just keeps crying, keeps sobbing out that he’s good, he is, it’s her fault, so no one sleeps that night, they all stay up and try and find something, anything to make it better for her

and thankfully it’s just nearly break, so kara calls their schools, says there’s been a family emergency and the kids wont be in for the last couple days of term, calls works and says much the same for her, and lena calls in to request all meetings be postponed until further notice, to take a leave of absence.  stella won’t leave maia’s side even when the bags under stella’s eyes get too deep, when it becomes clear this is taking too much of a toll on her to keep acting as a sponge for maia’s turmoil, for her pain.  maia’s her big sister and they fight a lot but she knows all the shit maia’s done for her, loves her sister enough to bear some of the burden.  

lena finds the number for her old therapist, the one she saw when she finally realized her first relationship had been emotionally abusive.  they’ve retired, but they recommend someone for maia.  kara v quietly lets alex and maggie know whats going on, grabs alex’s hand when she breaks and god, alex feels so guilty, feels like she should have known, seen it, done more.  they dont tell anyone else, decide to leave it up to maia if she wants to give out specifics to anyone else in the family, but they do tell the rest of the superfriends that maia’s going through something right now

and through these awful first weeks, maia’s ex keeps calling her, texting her and she always reaches for the phone, so finally finn takes it when she’s napping, goes to the deo and asks winn to reroute incoming calls from this number to go through his phone first.  he starts picking up the calls, switches off with stella to threaten the guy, tell him in no uncertain terms that he’s never coming near their sister again

and maia’s??  not handling well.  she’s doing as well as can be expected, i guess, but there are some days where she’s okay-ish and can be logical and removed enough to acknowledge that there were unhealthy dynamics (she wont call it abuse, refuses the term for now), but most days she cycles between sobbing and saying she loves him, misses him, wondering if he’s okay without her and other times she’s angry and tells everyone that its their fault he’s ignoring her now

the therapy helps??  it helps a lot actually, not only with this but with her anger issues and other stuff too.  it also helps repair her relationship with her moms, who are honestly so so steadfast in their support like kara or lena always pick her up after therapy bc she’s always a little raw afterwards, shouldnt rlly be alone, and one time its kara and maia walks out, gets into the car and says rlly abruptly that her therapist thinks she should do group sessions with her moms separately and kara doesnt even hesitate, she’s just like yes okay what day what time, i’ll text lena to let her know her session

it takes like a Long time for maia to feel even a tenth like her old self.  like a Loooooong time.  but she eventually does and that’s mostly due to how good her moms and siblings are in the aftermath.  like kara and lena both have been where she’s been so they know what to say, how to say, what not to do and they’re so careful to walk this delicate tightrope where they make it clear that this guy was bad for maia but also acknowledging that she was in love with him, that she was v invested in this relationship

and when they go back to school, there’s some rumors bc its high school, but finn sort of fills in maia’s friends a little and they step the fuck up, circle around her and protect her as fiercely as she’s always protected them and finn runs interference whenever it looks like someone might give her shit for the way her ex has mysteriously been stripped of his scholarship to his school, or how his sat cheating scheme was somehow uncovered (*finger guns* uncle winn to the rescue)

stella’s room shares a wall with maia’s; their beds line up with the other bc when they were younger, they used to tap morse code to one another.  maia, even as she grew older, never bothered to move it, so stella’s in close proximity to maia every night, close enough that any strong emotion maia feels is enough to wake her up, so whenever maia’s having a crying jag and cant get out of bed to get kara or lena, its stella that comes to her, crawls up beside her v carefully and presses all the softness, all the warmth and peace she carries inside her to maia, tries to give her as much of a break as she can manage, just enough for maia to sleep

it fucks them all up for a rlly long time.  like.  a Rlly long time.  maia has to work through everything she’s been through, has to slowly relearn herself, build up her belief in herself and trust in others.  her family has to process the guilt they carry, the grief for all the pain maia’s gone through.  its hard, but they love each other and they come through it together, bruised but intact, still whole, still a family