"I know you're angry, Irene, everyone is," Trix begins hollowly, and her thoughts flit back to Jett. She almost wishes they had kept her in that prison cell, her concrete refuge, so wouldn't have to face the fallout.

"Now I know why you're called Trix," he had said, with such hurt in his previously-playful eyes, like a child wrongfully sent to the naughty step, that Trix felt her old rage return to her, burning away her fog and it was a mercy. She fed on it like fuel. If only you knew, really knew, she had thought, if only I could find a way to let you know. She had been the one tricked - always - not Jett, and for as long as she has breath in her body, the perpetrator will pay.

She slams the passenger door shut and turns to Irene as she collapses into the driving seat, "Hell, I'm angry, and I can't take your wrath on top of mine and everyone else's, everything else; not one word." Agitated, she picks at her chipped nail polish and dark flecks pepper her fingertips. She had applied it a few hours before the fire; a mere four days ago. Toby had watched her do it, intently, like he hadn't watched her for years. His undivided attention had flustered her, and she had smudged the black cherry paint.

Irene mutters incoherently as she starts the car and pulls away from the station.

As the disgruntled pair return to the Bay, they pass an irate Brax gesturing wildly at Ricky in the Surf Club parking lot, and slouches in her seat so as not to be spotted by either of the pair.
"What in the who-ha is goin' on there?" Irene wonders aloud.
"Goldilocks must've eaten the three bears' porridge," Trix remarks, before adding, under her breath, "Had to have been better than mine."
"You mean the Braxtons?" Irene replies, and missing a beat, represses a snigger. Trix offers a thin smile. "You do know there are four of them?"
"Wasn't always."
"Did Jett tell you about...?"
"Killer Casey and Kidnapper Kyle, yes, that thrilling saga," she answers untruthfully. Blood must really be thicker than water, after all, she thinks.
"Speakin' of porridge, you must be starvin'," Irene says, changing the subject, resuming normal service. "I can't imagine the breakfast you were served was very appetising - do not be getting used to it, girlie. Now, I've got to get back to work, so you're coming with me, darl'. You can make your own pancakes this time."

Trix is too distracted to argue; as they leave the Surf Club behind, she looks back over her shoulder to see Ricky take Brax in her arms, cradling his head like a child, while he is pinching the bridge of his nose with his eyes squeezed shut.

After devouring her homemade pancakes and a fry-up (minus the egg), and falling into an easy sleep at one of the Diner tables, resting her weary head on her folded arms, Trix starts awake. Someone is breathing down her neck. Impulsively, her fist rises swiftly to connect with a nose. Her stomach sinks with dread as she anticipates who the yelp belongs to.
John staggers back and the chairs behind jarringly scrape the floor in protest. Trix only gawps, horrified, but then a little smug. At least she knows she has quick reactions.
"Holy cricket!" John gasps, as dark crimson blossoms from his nostrils. "I wish I'd let this sleeping dog lie now!"
"Excuse me," Trix begins calmly but emphatically. "But you should know better than to sneak up behind a young girl - while she's asleep - like some sort of pervert!"
"Excuse me," John counteracts, "But I was doing no such sneaking, I actually had to restrain myself from shaking you awake- "
"-Watch what you're saying, Palmer-"
"-And, and, I was not behind you-"

"-You were literally breathing down my neck; that's my back, that's behind."

"How could I be standing behind you when you're sitting right in the corner?!"

"That's enough now, you two, you're scaring off customers," Marilyn totters into the foray, "Oh, John, darling - your nose!"
Trix offers him a serviette for his bleeding nostrils, with a flourish like Princess Fiona might a handkerchief, somewhat proud of her handiwork. He hesitates. "Come on now, don't cut your nose to spite your face," she smirks.
Marilyn scowls and accepts the serviette from the hostile teen.
"You are a real piece of work, young lady," John grumbles. "God help Irene!"
"I'm sure Beatrix - Trix - knows what she's done and is remorseful," Marilyn levels.
With great effort to keep calm and carry on, Trix inhales deeply, before continuing.
"Yes, for what it's worth, I am sorry for your unnecessary anxiety and pain, but it does not mean I apologise, because I am not to blame."
Before either of them can object, Trix stalks off, knocking into a chair on her way out, and purposefully shoves it over to emphasise her frustration. She knows it is a childish thing to do, but her impulses want to get the better of her, and this time she lets them.

Something draws her like a magnet towards Angelo's, as she nears the beach, and she can't help herself. There'd be little chance of avoiding any of the Braxton clan at the beach either, anyway, after all. She could've went for a walk along the pier to cool off but something in her desires - requires - waves washing over her feet sunk into sand.
"Oi, watch it!" a gruff gaunt middle-aged woman apprehends, as Trix rounds the corner of the restaurant to collide with her and her open bottle of beer. "Not again!" Trix exclaims in her head.
"You watch, lady," Trix challenges, and the woman regards her, then creases up laughing.
"Hope thawazn't your besshirt," she slurs, between cruel laughter, and doubles over. As she does so, she shifts the open crate of beer she carries, balanced against one slight hip. Trix suspects she is already drunk.
"It's not mine, don't worry," Trix replies, dryly. She squints at the woman, who somehow looks familiar. "I thought Angelo's didn't open for another hour?"
"Perkzoff bein' the owner's m-mother," she replies, before adding, either as a hazy afterthought or a weak comeback, "And ooeryou; theffun p'leec?"
She begins to saunter away in the opposite direction, taking a swig. Trix feels the weight of gravity as her centre drops like a stone. She knows why this woman looks familiar. She has seen her photograph.
"Actually, I'm your daughter," Trix blurts out, feeling the impulse to flee, but her guts seem to have melted down into her shoes, sticking them in place. There is a moment of silence, as if for their formerly indifferent identities. Trix knew this meeting was bound to happen eventually, transforming them both.

Cheryl splutters on her mouthful and the beer bottle greets the ground with a smash. No taking it back now. Fortunately, the place is deserted for the moment although Trix's conscience wishes someone were there to hold her back from herself and her own truth. Cheryl coughs incessantly, but Trix does not come to her aid and continues her verbal assault.

"Who you gave away as a newborn and told your family had died," Trix reminds her mother, with an edge to her voice like that of a razor. "My family. I'm Taylor - thanks for having the decency to name me, at least."

After all this time wondering, wishing, imagining, as she had discovered more and more about her biological family, it all comes down to nothing but the facts and the one painful fact (otherwise a blessing) that they knew nothing of what had become of her. But the facts are of no comfort to her, they can't present her side of the story - that, she is on her own with, and she does not know where to begin. They can't know everything, at least, not yet.
But before she can string another sentence together, Cheryl, suddenly revived, launches herself at Trix, knocking her to the ground. They struggle, as Cheryl attempts to pin her daughter down by the throat, with her bony knees digging into her thighs. Although Cheryl is slight, with her full weight on top of her, Trix is gasping for air, though more from shock than anything else. She had expected her to cry, or run away, or beg for her forgiveness, but not this. Is it for making her choke? Does she even register any of this? Her birth mother's distant eyes frighten her; is this her future? She is gripping Cheryl's skeletal wrists in each of her hands, holding them off, but in the struggle they slip and Cheryl's lithe fingers grab her throat. Struggling to breathe, she feels her lungs flare in protest, reminding her of the time she almost let herself drown in the ocean, after falling from her board into a rip current, because she was too exhausted to reach the surface. Toby had saved her. A thought creeps into her mind unbidden; It would've been better for both of us if he hadn't. And maybe it would be better in the long run for both Cheryl and I if she actually succeeds in killing me. For a moment, Trix ceases her kicking and struggling, until a kick inside her reminds her to keep going.

"Cheryl?! Stop! Stop!" a male voice steps in to intervene. "Trix?! Are you okay?"
Between wispy strands of Cheryl's wavy hair, Trix recognises Kyle's bewildered expression. He calls to Brax, who is a way behind, carrying stock, but immediately drops his load to race towards them. Groaning, he wrenches his deranged mother, who ceases her struggling, up off of a winded Trix.
"Get 'er 'way fromme," Cheryl mumbles, blearily.
"Crazy - ass - bitch," Trix mutters hoarsely, between coughing fits.
Brax's lifted eyebrows ask if she's okay. She nods, curtly. He reaches out a hand to help her up, the other still clamped around his mother's upper arm, but Trix declines.
"What the hell was that about?!" Kyle interrupts their silent communication. Brax's widened eyes tell her even he is a little shocked.
Trix sits upright slowly, rubbing her neck, where Cheryl has left her mark. She stares intently at Trix, as if she were the wild animal on the loose, now her fury has subsided. With a jolt, Trix recognises something of herself in her mother, drunk though she is. Her eyes intermittently lose focus and she is unsteady on her feet, her mind swimming through many memories. Again she asks herself, is this my future?

"Did you steal her pokie money?" Kyle laughs nervously.
"No, I- I," Trix pauses to clear her throat, "I'm your sister."
"Flamin' well is nottt," objects Cheryl.
"What?!" Kyle looks from one to the other.
"It's true," agrees Brax. "Tayl- Trix is telling the truth."
Cheryl swears at her son, adding for good measure, "Darryler you deaf? That'sss not 'er! It can'be her; Taylor. is. dead. DEAD!"
"Give it up, Mum," Brax urges, gently.
"I bettt she's one a those goofer nothin' P-Pirovics, isn't she?" spits Cheryl.
"Oh, don't be ridiculous!" Trix replies, knowing full well of the man who shot Darryl's now-deceased lover; she had done her research. As for the tattoo on his hand, she had merely guessed at; a lucky guess, and she needs all the luck in the world right now.
"Hey, what's all this?" Casey interrupts the showdown, approaching from the side of the beach. "Trix, did you faint again? Here, let me- "
"I can manage," Trix replies shortly, feeling very much like the opposite, but pushing herself to her feet. She can feel the scales tip ever so slightly in Cheryl's favour, after having sown the seed of doubt. Maybe if half the bay didn't no doubt know, thanks to John Palmer, of her murky association with the criminal underworld, she would have a leg to stand on.
"You sure? You are a bit of a klutz."
Casey senses a tense atmosphere when no-one returns his laughter.
"What's going on, Brax? Mum? Kyle? Well, come on, start talking!"
"This isn't the place," Brax replies, firmly, and ushers them inside.

Trix senses the family closing ranks against her.