Transformation: Day 13

Word Count: 78,042

Summary of Events:

Taylor was practise racing against Whitney's nephew, who took a shortcut and hit Taylor's horse with a whip to win, which drew Taylor's ire severely. Elianne was summoned downstairs and told that she would be moving in with her mom's parents, as Uncle Wade had told her was likely going to happen. Ian got home from work and was called by his mum, with whom he chatted while he made supper, telling her about Ms. Carlyle and his concerns about what she was doing to her family . . .

Excerpt of the Day:

“And then, on the other hand, there’s my own considerations,” Ian said. “For one thing, I’ve noticed that she’s almost hopelessly selfish, not even her children matter to her, she doesn’t see how they might be hurting. I’m sure they must be hurting, they probably don’t understand.”

“Very possibly, yes,” Mum agreed. “Although how does that affect you?”

“Well, it doesn’t really,” Ian admitted. “It just popped up.”

“But what are your own considerations?” Mum asked.

“My own,” Ian replied. “You know Mum.”

“My granddaughter?” Mum asked softly.

“Yes,” Ian replied. “And her mother.”

“I understand,” Mum said.

“So she took me out to dinner, bashed her husband and all that, and then she got this utterly hare-brained idea that she’d like to get a job with me at the stables,” Ian said. “And yet I had to tell her what a horse was.”

“Has she worked before?” Mum asked.

“She got a financial degree and wanted to be a CEO,” Ian replied. “She worked in finance somewhere in Christchurch until she decided her husband wasn’t thinking about her enough and came out here to live with her mum and dad.”

“Why doesn’t she want to work in that?” Mum asked.

“Because apparently her husband was in the business too,” Ian replied. “Thankfully — and this was why I attempted to take her out for dinner–”

“Attempted?” Mum asked.

“Yes, we never made it because she didn’t want to answer my one question, so I pulled over to try and coax her to answer it and our discussion went on so long the reservation time had passed and the table was likely given away, and I was just so exhausted from arguing with her that I didn’t even have the desire to dine with her in public,” Ian replied.

“Anyways, I’m sorry to interrupt,” Mum said.

“Thankfully I convinced her that, in order to get work at a stables she’d have to have a good ten years worth of horse knowledge, and she doesn’t even have a month’s worth, and so I urged her to find a job somewhere that she has more knowledge and experience so that she can make more money faster,” Ian finished.

“And you’re hoping that’s the end of it?” Mum asked.

“Yes, if I’m honest,” Ian replied. “But yet, well . . . for the sake of her husband and her children, recalling my own experiences in both positions, I’d almost like to try and do what I can do to get her to realise her folly and rebuild those bridges.”

“To be the sort of intervention that no one ever was for you,” Mum said.

“I guess, yeah,” Ian replied.

He set his plate down on the dining table and sat down.

“I do hope you can be successful,” Mum said. “But she may not want to see, she may be content, if not even revelling, in her blindness.”

“Hopefully then I’ll be able to get far enough away from her to be spared from watching,” Ian said.