Greg stood in the habitat’s quiet for a few seconds after his last words, the silence between them feeling heavier now that neither of them could pretend the conversation was still circling around something smaller.
Cindy sat rigidly on the little couch, her arms folded tightly across herself, eyes fixed somewhere past him rather than on him directly. The morning light filtering through Madison’s room did nothing to soften the space. It only made everything clearer. The carefully made bed. The vanity. The chosen outfit gone with Madison to school. The shoes they had cleaned now absent from the floor. The traces of her still everywhere.
Cindy let out a slow, bitter breath.
“So that’s it.”
Greg frowned. “What do you mean?”
“That’s your answer?” She looked up at him sharply now. “You just explain why this is happening to me like it’s business as usual and then we all move on?”
“That’s not what I’m doing.”
“It’s exactly what you’re doing.” Her voice stayed low, but it had picked up that tight, dangerous steadiness that meant the anger underneath it was real. “You keep acting like this is all inevitable. Like there’s nothing anyone can do. Like I’m just supposed to sit here and accept that McKenzie gets to remain gentle and distant and morally clean while Madison gets to treat me like some kind of doctrinal project.”
Greg rubbed at his face.
Cindy leaned forward.
“She listens to you, Greg.”
He looked at her and already knew where this was going.
“She still wants you,” Cindy said. “She still makes time for you. She still cares what you think. Fine. Good. Use that.”
Greg’s jaw tightened.
“Talk to her,” Cindy pressed. “Really talk to her. Get her to help me. Get her to say something to Madison. Get her to push back on some of this.”
Greg stared at her for a moment, then shook his head once.
“Cindy.”
“No.” Her eyes flashed. “Do not do that. Don’t give me that tone like I’m asking for something absurd. You know she could help if she wanted to.”
“That’s the point,” Greg said quietly. “If she wanted to.”
Cindy went still.
He kept his voice low, but there was frustration in it now, the kind that had been building for awhile
“She doesn’t want to.”
The words landed flat and hard between them.
Cindy looked at him with open disbelief.
Greg exhaled slowly.
“And I can’t make her want to.”
Cindy’s expression hardened immediately. “So that’s it? You just accept that?”
“What exactly do you expect me to do?” Greg asked. He was still trying to keep his voice down, but the strain in it was no longer hidden. “I’m four inches tall. I can’t force McKenzie to do anything for you any more than I can force Madison to do anything for me. What leverage do you think I have here?”
Cindy looked away for a second, jaw tight enough to show at the hinge.
Greg went on anyway.
“McKenzie doesn’t want to step in for you because you spent years teaching her that her instincts were wrong.”
Cindy’s eyes snapped back to him.
“That isn’t fair.”
“It’s true.”
“No, it’s your version.”
Greg shook his head. “No, it’s hers.”
Cindy laughed once, short and humorless. “Oh, so now you speak for her too.”
“I don’t have to speak for her,” Greg said. “I watched it happen.”
He moved a little closer, not aggressively, but with the exhausted certainty of someone tired of having to pretend everyone else had missed the obvious.
“She was gentler than you wanted. More patient. More willing to treat Littles like people. More willing to listen. And every single time she showed that side of herself, you acted like it meant she was weak. Or unserious. Or morally soft.”
“That is not what I said.”
“It’s what she heard.” His answer came so fast it seemed to catch even him off guard. He held Cindy’s stare anyway. “And honestly? It’s not even inaccurate.”
Cindy’s whole body seemed to tense at that.
Greg didn’t back down.
“You made her feel like a failed daughter for not believing what you believed. Like a bad person for not being hard enough. Like there was something wrong with her because she didn’t want to talk about Littles the way you did.”
Cindy opened her mouth and then shut it again.
Greg kept going, because if he stopped now he knew they’d both retreat into easier versions of the truth.
“So no, she doesn’t want to turn around now and tell Madison to stop honoring you with the very methods you spent years defending.”
That one landed.
Cindy looked away first.
“She thinks Madison is too much,” she said finally, but the line sounded weak even to her.
Greg gave a tired shake of his head. “She thinks Madison is Madison. That’s not the same thing.”
Cindy’s eyes narrowed. “That’s convenient.”
“It’s horrible,” Greg said.
The answer came out blunt enough to make her blink.
“It’s horrible,” he repeated, quieter now. “But it’s still true.”
The room sat in silence for a few seconds.
Cindy stared at the clear wall of the habitat, though Greg could tell she wasn’t really seeing it. She was looking at something further back than that. Years back. To speeches and arguments and fights at the dinner table and that particular look McKenzie used to get when she was too angry to keep talking.
Greg lowered himself onto the opposite side of the couch, but he didn’t soften what he was saying.
“You keep talking like this is some random cruelty that just fell on you,” he said. “And some of it is just Madison being Madison. Sure. She likes control. She likes feeling important. She likes that her approval matters. Madison doesn’t agree with all your methods and reasoning but shes using your methods, your styles specifically on you. Becasue i dont know maybe one your 600 podcasts or lectures, or fundraisers, or political money raising to ensure littles have no rights, no voice, and are nothing more then pets has taught her that this is what you believe, what you want, and what you expect. ” He paused. “But the reason it matters the way it does with you, the reason she thinks this is love, the reason she thinks this is what honoring you looks like…”
He didn’t finish the sentence.
He didn’t need to.
Cindy sat very still.
For a moment, even her breathing seemed to quiet, as if the truth of it had landed somewhere too deep for immediate reaction. Her face did not change much at first. That was what Greg noticed most. Not shock. Not outrage. Just a kind of terrible stillness, the kind that came when something did not merely hurt, but fit too cleanly into place to be argued with.
When she finally spoke, her voice was low enough that Greg almost missed it.
“Because she thinks she’s giving me what I taught her a Little should want.”
Greg said nothing.
Cindy looked down at her hands.
“She thinks this is love,” she said, more to herself now than to him. “Not in spite of what I believed. Through it.”
The words seemed to cost her something.
Greg watched her carefully and then nodded once.
“Yes.”
Cindy gave a small, bitter shake of her head, but there was no real disagreement in it.
“That’s what makes her worse,” she murmured.
Greg frowned slightly. “Worse than what?”
“Worse than simple cruelty.”
She lifted her eyes at last, and there was something exhausted and deeply humiliated in them that hit harder than anger would have.
“If she hated me, if she was doing this to punish me, if this was just rebellion or spite or some twisted teenage revenge fantasy, I could understand that.” Her mouth tightened. “I could fight that. I would know where to put it.”
She looked away again, toward the clear wall of the habitat, toward Madison’s room beyond it.
“But she doesn’t think she’s hurting me,” Cindy said. “She thinks she’s doing right by me. She thinks she’s taking me seriously.”
Greg let that sit.
Cindy’s fingers curled tighter against her arms.
“She thinks she’s honoring me.”
That was the line that hung there.
Not loud. Not dramatic.
Just final enough to hollow the room out around it.
Greg leaned back slowly, the weight of it settling over him too. Because that was the part he had been circling without wanting to say too directly. Madison was not simply using Cindy’s teachings because they were available. She was using them because she believed that was what fidelity looked like. What respect looked like. What love looked like when directed toward someone Cindy had always defined as beneath, dependent, and in need of control.
And Cindy knew it.
That was the unbearable thing.
She knew Madison was not misremembering her.
She was remembering her too well.
Greg let the silence stretch for a few seconds.
He could see Cindy trying not to let it settle too deeply, trying to keep some hard edge of herself intact under the weight of what she had just admitted. But there was no arguing with it now. Not really. Once the truth had taken that shape, it was too complete to shove back into something smaller.
And still, Cindy was not done fighting.
She looked up at him again, and what returned to her face this time was not denial but anger redirected.
“So what?” she asked. “That means I’m just supposed to accept it? That because she’s sincere, it’s somehow better?”
“No,” Greg said immediately. “I didn’t say that.”
“It’s what you’re doing.”
“No.” He leaned forward again, tiredness sharpening the line of his mouth. “What I’m doing is telling you why McKenzie isn’t stepping in for you.”
Cindy’s eyes narrowed slightly.
“Because she doesn’t want to,” Greg said. “And I can’t make her.”
Cindy looked away from him, jaw tight.
“She doesn’t want to speak to Madison on your behalf. She doesn’t want to pull Madison back from your methods. She doesn’t want to turn around and say, ‘Actually, Mom shouldn’t be handled the way Mom spent years saying Littles should be handled.’”
“That’s convenient for her.”
“It’s consistent,” Greg said.
Cindy gave a short, humorless laugh.
“Oh, for God’s sake.”
“I’m serious.”
He sat back and rubbed at his face again, then forced himself to keep going.
“She doesn’t want to help you that way because she never believed in your methods to begin with. Not really. Not the way you did. And when she pushed back, when she tried to be gentler, more reasonable, more… human about it, you made her feel like that softness was failure.”
Cindy’s face tightened.
“She alienated herself,” Cindy said. “Not me.”
Greg held her gaze for a long moment.
“No,” he said quietly. “You alienated her.”
The words landed harder for how simply they were said.
Cindy stiffened immediately, that familiar reflex of rejection rising before she could even decide if she believed it.
Greg didn’t let her move past it.
“She tried to meet you somewhere softer,” he said. “More patient. More understanding. And every time she did, you treated that like it was failure.”
“That’s not what I said.”
“It’s what she lived with.”
Cindy’s jaw tightened.
Greg leaned forward slightly.
“She learned that her way of caring wasn’t good enough for you. That it wasn’t strong enough. That it wasn’t serious enough. And now you want her to turn around and tell Madison that your way is too much?”
Cindy didn’t answer.
“From her perspective,” Greg continued, quieter now, “Madison isn’t misunderstanding you. She’s doing exactly what you always said should be done.”
The habitat felt smaller with that in it.
Cindy’s shoulders dropped, just a fraction.
“So I’m just abandoned, then.”
“No.”
“That’s what it sounds like.”
Greg exhaled slowly.
“It sounds like I can’t make anyone be something they don’t want to be.”
Cindy said nothing.
“I can’t force McKenzie to advocate for you,” he said. “I can’t force Madison to change. I can barely exist in this room without help.” He spread his hands slightly. “What exactly do you think I can control?”
That one didn’t come out defensive.
Just tired.
The question didn’t come out cruelly. It came out as the exhausted truth it was.
Cindy was quiet for several seconds.
Then she said, without looking up, “I think you could keep trying.”
That landed harder than everything else.
Greg stared at her.
“I am trying.”
“No,” Cindy said. “You’re trying in ways that don’t cost you anything with them.”
His mouth opened slightly, then closed again.
“You’ll smooth things over. You’ll say the right thing. You’ll stay likable. You’ll keep your place with both of them intact.” Her voice had gone low and painfully steady. “But you won’t risk what you have with either of them for me.”
Greg felt something in himself recoil at that.
Not because it was fully fair.
Because it wasn’t.
But because it was close enough to a truth he didn’t want named that he had no easy answer for it.
Cindy saw the hesitation.
Saw the silence.
And her expression changed.
The anger in it drained, leaving behind something flatter and more tired.
“That’s what I thought.”
For a moment neither of them spoke.
Then Greg said, quietly, “I do see it.”
Cindy didn’t respond.
“I see that Madison treats us differently. I see that McKenzie treats us differently too. And I see that none of that is equal for you.”
That reached her enough to make her glance up.
“And I see,” he continued, “that the version of this house that might still have somewhere else for me in it doesn’t have somewhere else for you.”
Cindy lowered her eyes again.
“Yeah,” she said.
Just that.
Yeah.
The word sat there in the warm stillness of the habitat, not loud enough to echo, but heavy enough to feel like it did.
Greg leaned back and let the silence come.
Then, from downstairs, came the unmistakable sound of the front door opening.
Both of them froze.
It was too early for Madison.
Too early for McKenzie too.
A second later footsteps moved quickly through the entryway below, accompanied by the rustle of a bag and the clipped, distracted rhythm of someone who had come back in a hurry.
Then a voice drifted up through the house.
“Hello? Mads?”
McKenzie.
Cindy’s head turned sharply toward Greg.
His heart kicked hard in his chest.
They could hear her moving through the house, faster now, the sound of her steps hitting the stairs, then climbing. There was something energetic in it. Intentional. Not the slow return of someone who had just forgotten one small thing, but the momentum of someone who had made a decision on the way back.
A shadow crossed the gap beneath Madison’s door.
The handle turned.
And McKenzie stepped into Madison’s room with her bag over one shoulder, phone in hand, and the unmistakable look of someone who was not supposed to be home this early.
Her eyes found the habitat immediately.
Then Greg.
And her whole face softened.
“Hey,” she said, smiling. “Guess who’s playing hookie.”
Ohhhh McKenzie you rule breaker! Can’t wait for tomorrow
Some were doubting her but here she is proving doubters wrong
man Kenzie has no clue what she just interrupted lol i wonder how that’ll go over in the coming chapters.
Still think the divorce theory might happen or something similar?
somewhat, but either way i think it’d be metaphorical. like even if they tell madison and kenzie, those two would probably shrug it off like nothings changed cause to them Greg and Cindy were never married since they were underbreds and became littels lol which is crazy to me, but thats how i think they see it
This is complete madness, I’m just curious, how do they see their birth from underbreds? That they descended from underbreds 🙂
that’s a good question. i think culturally, the metamorphosis from human to little is basically seen as a rebirth, so it could stand to reason that they think of themselves as born from human parents, but now no longer have human parents, just parents that are littles, and their human parents no longer exist lol
the other question is how would the look at their siblings if Greg and Cindy ever were to have kids. We won’t see it in the story, but it’s a good thought experiment
Nailed it, I’m pretty sure it was madisons world but it may be another story that talked about how when you become a litlte it is viewed as the humanity dying.
So people will even have funerals in some cases but becoming a little viewed a rebirth culturally into what you were always meant to be.
So their kids would view them as nothing but littles. Anything pre-little is basically another life.
That’s a great question
That a probably a correct theory from what we have read
Sometimes timing is everything. They could probably do with some time to cool down.
Get her ass, Greg! Cook this fool. Mckenzie playing hooky as well? Something feels odd.
She ls not a squeaky clean person as far as rules. She will play bookie here and there but it’s for reasons not just because.
Wait! Madison will call and ask where Greg is! Ohhhh
Madison is always lurking
Damn is it too late to ask for a marriage counseling session lol man this has to be …. I can’t even describe it… perplexing family dynamics I’ve ever seen…. I WAS PROMISED MORE POSITIVE STUFF THIS SEASON!!!!! And so far it’s been cruel truth, Greg being put on the spot between daughter and wife, Cindy emotionally torn apart, and so on
I rather see Dayton and Ezra again hell even charity !!!!
…..sigh …. Man this season has started off heavy as fuck and I just want something light now lol this is a lot but thing again very compiling writing so far so I can’t be mad at that
Truth is positive though as they aren’t lying or being dishonest.
Sometimes the only way forward is with the truth
Fuck !!!!! You got me there !!!
I have been lead astray, hoodwinked, and quite frankly bamboozled!!!!
Why ASUKA! WHHHHHYYYYYYYYY!!!!
Honest conversations are great, of course, but why are they happening only now? I wonder, why did Greg keep quiet until now? Why didn’t he intervene and heal the rift between Cindy and Mackenzie? Why did he simply watch in silence as she confronted her mother, and then go to her and take her side? Comforting, supporting. He always wanted to be a good dad to his daughters, as opposed to their strict and harsh mother? So who’s the hypocrite here? What a wonderful family.
…….. oh shit …. You kinda got a point there
The thing about about that is the person has to be willing to listen to what is being said. Greg could have said alot of that before but she hadn’t walked in a littles shoes. She didnt have the perspective of being actually powerless for the words to mean anything.
So if he had said it before now. She wouldnt have been wiling or ready to hear it. If her own daughter couldnt get through to her what hope would greg have.
Cindy believed fully she was right and even now she thinks she should be seperate from other littles.
Its not being a hypocrite at all. Its about the reality you can’t help someone until they are ready and wanting to be helped. Just like you can tell an alcholic its going to ruin there life but they have to be receptive to hearing it. Otherwise its just noise and your wasting your breath.
0) May the fourth be with you all
1) “You just explain why this is happening to me like it’s business as usual and then we all move on?” his other option being…?
2) “I’m just supposed to sit here and accept that McKenzie gets to remain gentle and distant and morally clean while Madison gets to treat me like some kind of doctrinal project.” Accept it? bitch you taught it.
3) “She still makes time for you. She still cares what you think. Fine. Good. Use that.” Right, but trying to force McKenzie to change her mind is a good way to change that.
4) “Really talk to her. Get her to help me. Get her to say something to Madison. Get her to push back on some of this.” McKenzie has pushed back on some of this.
5) “She doesn’t want to. And I can’t make her want to.” That’s what I’m saying
4) “I’m four inches tall.” damn, still lugging around that extra inch
5) “I can’t force McKenzie to do anything for you any more than I can force Madison to do anything for me. What leverage do you think I have here?” Dude makes a valid point, a point past Cindy would have agreed with
6) “McKenzie doesn’t want to step in for you because you spent years teaching her that her instincts were wrong.” Loving Greg’s more assertiveness is calling out and blaming Cindy
7) “She was gentler than you wanted. More patient. More willing to treat Littles like people. More willing to listen. And every single time she showed that side of herself, you acted like it meant she was weak. Or unserious. Or morally soft.” Cindy really tried to ruin a good one
8) “So no, she doesn’t want to turn around now and tell Madison to stop honouring you with the very methods you spent years defending.” Damn, this is fucking great to read.
9) “She thinks Madison is too much,” yeah, too much like Cindy!
10) “You keep talking like this is some random cruelty that just fell on you.” What’d you expect? Cindy to accept the consequences with maturity and grace?
11) “shes using your methods, your styles specifically on you. Because I don’t know, maybe one of your 600 podcasts or lectures, or fundraisers, or political money raising to ensure littles have no rights, no voice, and are nothing more than pets has taught her that this is what you believe, what you want, and what you expect. ” Greg’s going in for the kill, damn
12) “The words seemed to cost her something “Accountability often does with Women like Cindy
13) “But she doesn’t think she’s hurting me, She thinks she’s doing right by me. She thinks she’s taking me seriously.” Isn’t that what you thought about Littles?
14) “She was using them because she believed that was what fidelity looked like. What respect looked like. What love looked like when directed toward someone Cindy had always defined as beneath, dependent, and in need of control.”
15) “That was the unbearable thing. She knew Madison was not misremembering her. She was remembering her too well.” and if Cindy was still big she’d probably think Madison was too soft on her Littles
16) “So what? That means I’m just supposed to accept it? That because she’s sincere, it’s somehow better?” It’s what you’ve wanted millions of Littles to accept
17) “She doesn’t want to turn around and say, ‘Actually, Mom shouldn’t be handled the way Mom spent years saying Littles should be handled.’” She isn’t interested in validating Cindy’s hypocrisy,
18) “She doesn’t want to help you that way because she never believed in your methods to begin with. Not really. Not the way you did. And when she pushed back, when she tried to be gentler, more reasonable, more… human about it, you made her feel like that softness was failure.” Greg’s leaving no room for confusion here
19) “She alienated herself Not me.” – “No, you alienated her.” Greg’s not letting her dodge any accountability here.
20) “Madison isn’t misunderstanding you. She’s doing exactly what you always said should be done.” damn right she is.
21) “So I’m just abandoned, then.” No, you’re cared for exactly as you preached
22) “I can’t force McKenzie to advocate for you, I can’t force Madison to change. I can barely exist in this room without help.” Greg knows his limitations
23) “No, You’re trying in ways that don’t cost you anything with them.” He asked about seeing McKenzie and Madison put him on punishment. How do you think she’d react if he started trying to give instructions?
24) “But you won’t risk what you have with either of them for me.” Not without assessing the risk first, chance of success isn’t worth the risk.
25) “I see that Madison treats us differently. I see that McKenzie treats us differently, too. And I see that none of that is equal for you.” They both treat Cindy in accordance with how she treated them
26) “Not the slow return of someone who had just forgotten one small thing, but the momentum of someone who had made a decision on the way back” well there goes my theory
27) “Guess who’s playing hookie?” Fuck yeah, McKenzie time!
27) I thinking she took off school to by little stuff for her parents and is waiting for Madison to set it up
0) happy star wars day to you as well. on this holiest of days.
1) Defending Cindy to bitter the end. Screaming as loud as he could the praises of cindy.
2) She didnt just teach it she mastered it. Publicized it and made it popular.
3) yeah that would probably 100% happen if he tried that or worse case he could possibly get her to maybe do it but hten ruin his relationship with her forever or atleast a long itme.
4) She has. She has kept madison from things here and there. Madison hasnt gone full cindy or anything.
5) Greg has very little leverage. the only leverage he has is tha this daughters love him still as their father and not a little.
6) he is preaching what you have been saying.
7) She did. She tried to get her tentacles deep into McKenzie. then shifted to madison
8) I picture you popping popcorn for this read.
9) exactly, but madison is sitll young enough she could be turned or atleast not fully cindy.
10) I dont know if Cindy knows how to do that or what those words mean together in that order.
11) He;s like lethal hold my beer.
12) yup. its one of the few things she has.
13) yup Cindy is exactly what Cindy wanted littles to be and she hates it.
14) Yup cindy always believed littles are beneath humans in every way . they exist to serve people. So by cindys own teachings she exists to serve madison. Whatever Madison wants is what Cindy should want and idolize.
15) If cindy was big she would be applauding madison. Claiming her to be her greatest pupil and throwing it in McKenzie’s face.
16) yes millions of littles but not her.
17) nope. She would give Cindy hte one finger salute.
18) He is not mincing words when it comes his daughters. No stone left unturned
19) He’s locked in. Full dad mode.
20) Madison took good notes.
21) yup she is given the level of care she wanted littles to be cared for. Hard to be upset that she is given the level of care she preached.
22) He understands he’s a little and is reliant on his daughters.
23) I mean it wouldnt go well with Madison. McKenzie may entertain it for a bit but it wouldnt go like Cindy wants it too.
24) definately not. I can see greg saying something but it would need to be strategic and not going to fuck him over.
25) What a shame.
26) what was your theory
27) the best time. atleast in the wessen household. I knwo you’d rather see Sara time.
1) lol
2) and now must endure it
4) Indeed, Cindy’s downplaying her eldest still
6) I know, I’ve been waiting for someone to wise up.
8) Oh, fuck yeah. Now I’m just waiting for certain other characters to get verbal lashings like this
10) Probably not
11) It’s so good to read, I hope Sara is next on the chopping block after Cindy.
13) Good
14) I’m glad she lived to regret it.
15) I could see that.
17) Nice
18 & 19) I love to see it
20) She had an “inspirational” teacher
21) And yet she finds a way
23) McKenzie has already refused this request, I don’t think she wants to be asked again
24) exactly
25) What a shame.
26) That she’d forgotten something as was just gonna get their hopes up momentarily