Mallory and her Children
Mallory Mace should be the poster girl for success. An orphan with no family or support, she managed to graduate from college with a degree in Philosophy and still raise her daughter. Mallory had dreams of becoming a master chef, but got waylaid with a husband – Mali’s husband- who Mallory had loved since living with him and his wife years ago. Mallory continued to see John, getting pregnant again by him. She bore him a son, and still, he did not leave his wife. Mallory was not deterred, but she did start to date others, even managing to get engaged to someone who loved her and the two children she begat by John. But her fiancé was not John, so Mallory walked out on the wedding, secretly wishing she could have the man of her dreams at the altar instead.
Life quickly spiraled downhill for Mallory. She wallowed in her love for John and began to have 2 more of his children, one right after the other. She never really enjoyed the pregnancies and was too depressed to raise her children, but hoped that each new baby would bring John closer to her. Her plan did not work. John did not even try to raise them. They were not Mali’s kids. Perhaps in his mind, they did not really count.
Mallory did not think of herself as a fool. She knew John had a wife. She knew he had other lovers. She also knew that she loved John, more than life itself, and she would make a home for him if he let her, but he never did. Now, she is a woman, embittered and in love with a man who isn’t her man, saddled with kids who she has not raised and who do not all like her; stuck with a life she did not plan. Recently, she opened a beauty salon that is quickly gaining success but can she have that success in her personal life? Will she be able to move on from John, a man who only brings sadness and disappointment, a man who won't even acknowledge her kids? Will she ever stop wanting a man who is barely grateful for her willingness to keep such a huge secret from everyone they know.
Four huge secrets...her children
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Ryan Mace needed a way out. The oldest of the Mace children, she has always been stuck being the caregiver of her siblings that her own mother, Mallory, would not be. Mallory has been either pregnant or depressed for most of Ryan’s childhood, forcing Ryan to fend for herself and her younger siblings in the best way she knew how. When the kids needed food, Ryan cooked. Baths - Ryan gave them. Homework – Ryan helped them complete it. Cleaning the house– Ryan did it all. Ryan didn’t give birth to any children, but she felt like a mother, and she wanted a way out of her life before it swallowed her whole. College was her way out. She ran as soon as she could get the chance, but the siblings she raised wishes she would come back. Ryan has often asked her mother about her siblings, about their fathers, about her own. She has often wondered why her mother continued to become pregnant time and time again when there no man around who took care of the house, took care of the kids, took care of Mallory. As a little girl, Ryan asked her mother about her father, and was told that he died a long time ago, but Ryan began to doubt this story when she looked at her younger siblings. They all looked alike, all had the same high cheekbones, angular faces and deep blue eyes – and none of them looked like Mallory. Mallory claimed random ‘boyfriends’ fathered the children over the years but it was not adding up, especially considering the one man who had been making any appearances in the home was Uncle John, and he was there all the time. Ryan tried to put it out of her mind, but things are starting to fall into place, and she’s beginning to develop a theory about her mother’s mysterious pregnancies and who her own father might be . . . |
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Reese Mace's feels no love lost between him and his mother. Living with her makes his life miserable. His friends all talk about how sexy she is and come to the house just to see her parading in her tiny tops, short skirts and high heels – sometimes wearing less than that. People always gossip about Mallory, and it embarrasses Reese, especially when they talk about the infamous lesbian affair she had with local celibrity DJ Adina Bellringer, the woman who took better care of Reese than his own mother. And then there are his mother’s numerous pregnancies, and the missing father in all of this. When it comes to the topic of his mother, Reese would rather keep his head buried in the sand, just to not hear what the world thinks of her. Mallory frustrates her son, Reese. He is tired of her flightiness and irresponsibility. He is tired of her inattentiveness to him and all of his siblings. He needs his mother to be a mother, but she hardly spends any time with him, and since his older sister, Ryan is in college, now no one pays him any attention. Reese is tired of his mother’s seeming promiscuity, having numerous children pop up with no father around to claim them. He is not as suspicious of John as Ryan is, does not notice how all his siblings look exactly alike, yet completely unlike his mother. He does know that his mother is no real mother. He believes she is a slut, and he could do just as well without her as he does with her. He can’t wait until he leaves his home for good. |
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Roman Mace,
Mallory’s third child, is too young to understand everything that has gone
on around her. She knows the sister who raised her is in college now, and
she misses her. She knows she loves her mother Mallory, and has no problem
with her. She knows no disappointment from Mallory, so far; does not know
about her Mallory’s less than motherly ways, so Roman is not disillusioned
with her mother, which makes for a happy relationship between the two.
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Rikki Mace is the youngest of the Mace family and she is growing up during the time of her mother's beginning "renaissance". Mallory is working two jobs, one at a restaurant and the other at her home salon, trying to make something of herself. Now, Mallory walks around with purpose, instead of waddling around with child and wallowing around in her own sadness, so, naturally, Rikki is not as bitter toward her mother as some of her other siblings. Then too, Mallory’s guilt about how she raised her first two kids has led to be a better parent to her last two, giving Rikki a better chance to become a happier adult. She is already a happy child. |
