Fan Fiction
This story has been set to a rating of R. Age verification is required to proceed.
Why Are You Here?
Login to add story to favorites
(4 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)You need to be a registered member to rate this post.
Loading ...
Tina: You asked why did I decide to get a divorce?
Bette: Before you get into that, let me say this. Tina, you and I are divorced, therefore you have no obligation to tell me things about your life after our divorce. I am not asking you to reveal anything that you do not want to tell me about. But I think you do owe me answers to questions which relate to our married life or affect me or Angie particularly when you were a member of our household.
Tina: Thank you for saying that. And I agree that I do owe you answers for my behavior which led us to where we are now. Frankly, I hadn’t considered the consequences of what my actions had on you or Angie. For that I am truly ashamed.
There was a long period of silence….
Tina: Let me go through what happened after I left. I remember that I decided to leave the same day that I left. That was a Friday. After I took Angie to school, I came back to the apartment and packed my bags and I made reservations with an economical hotel in New Jersey. I gathered what paper work I would need for obtaining a job. I had an interview scheduled for Showtime on Monday morning. I’m not sure why I decided I needed to get away. There was no particular event which happened which was unusual. We were getting along just fine. You were being very attentive to me and to Angie and you were getting home rather consistently between 5:30 and 6:00. I would have dinner ready. We would all sit down to eat. You would then help me clean the kitchen and then go an spend a half hour or so with Angie. So, when you came to the living room to spend time with me, that is when I announced I was leaving and I would let you know what was going on.
Tina: I decided not to talk to you or to let you know where I was for a few days. I ignored all your voice mails and text messages. You were angry and I could not deal with you angry at that moment. Over the weekend, I found a furnished studio apartment which rented on a month-to-month basis. It was immediately available, so I moved in on Sunday. I had my appointment with Showtime who hired me as a writer and associate producer for “Winter Winds.” It was the initial season. It was a big success and I received a promotion to executive producer due to my past work and I showed some skills in managing people and schedules. I was basically the liaison between Showtime and the showrunner. It became my job to keep the project on schedule and on budget. Now that we have finished Season 3 and it had a larger audience than the first two seasons. But with each succeeding season, the job gets harder. The actors are all prima donnas and believe their own press on how good they are and how much they are needed for the project. It became my job to bring them back in line with our budget requirements or terminate them and ask casting to find another actor. Not a very pleasant part of my job. Anyway. I was asked to be in Toronto within a month of my interview. That is when I decided to call you and check in with what was going on with Angie. I decided that I was not going to allow you to know where I was because I believed you would come after me and try to convince me not to take this job. But I was thrilled with this job. Toronto is not that far away. Once I got settled, I thought I would return home for weekends and commute to Toronto. After the call, I went to Toronto and rented a two-bedroom apartment and went to a furniture store and furnished my apartment. I ordered linens, dishes, pots and pans and things for me to live in Toronto. It was winter time, so I had my winter wardrobe. I ordered some more clothes to work in and then left my New York studio apartment and settled into my Toronto apartment. I then called you again. I then told you that I was going to work in Toronto. But I did not give you any details about anything. I went to work as scheduled and I was working some 10 to 12 hours per day and then off on the weekends. I attended some of the after-work get-togethers and that is where I met Carrie Walsh. Carrie was a lawyer who was employed by Showtime and was at the studio taking care of some legal matters and attended one of the after-work get-togethers. She was an unusual character. Born and raised in Queens and had that accent. She asked me out to dinner one evening and then she expressed the desire to date me. Well, I explained that I was recently separated but still married, she suggested that maybe we get together just to have dinner or go to a movie. Well, I thought about it and decided that I really didn’t want to violate my marriage vows. So perhaps it would be best if I divorced you and that way, we would both be free to see other people. She referred me to a divorce lawyer in New York and I proceeded to get a “quickie” divorce.
Comments
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
It is a challenging task to take on the Generation Q nonsensical plot line, especially Bette and Tina ever having gotten divorced. You have written an interesting “moment in time” offering the readers one possibility of what happened. I would imagine from your description that the cabin is a small claustrophobic place and Bette and Tina are both nervous and somewhat kinetic in the way they interact with one another and move about. Neither able to relax. Trying to respect each other and each other’s space. Watching the clock. Watching the snow. With nowhere to go. Also, it is next to impossible to make sense of the Tina that Marja gave us. No one recognizes her. I think you have given it a very good shot. I also appreciate the way you wrote Bette struggling with her emotions and all of the hurt. Tina is a mystery. Why would she ask Bette if she loves her? Bette’s reply is spot on. She loves Tina but no longer knows her. She loves her because she is Angie’s biological mother. She was able to remain respectful to Tina but also get to the heart of the matter: Why did you leave me? Why did you leave Angie? That’s tough stuff. It would have been much easier to write a story that pretended away the fiasco that was Gen Q. You took it on. Well done, Martha.
Billy,
Thank you for reading and commenting. Gen Q, for me, simply decided Bette and Tina were divorced and never fleshed out why that happened. IMO, the writers never believed that they would need this backstory when they put it into the script. But for a couple as iconic as Bette and Tina, they should have known that sooner or later, they might have to reveal that backstory. But in true Gen Q fashion, it never was addressed.
So when Laurel returned for Season 1, the writers have Tina give an explanation to Angie that she needed to find herself. And then another explanation to Bette which said that Bette simply overshadowed her very existence. Neither explanation rang true for me. And I accepted Bette’s declaration to Shane under the influence of marijuana, that she did not know why Tina left and that Tina had never offered an explanation. So, when they brought in Carrie, I was even more confused as to why Tina left and who Tina Kennard was. And despite some of the fan’s responses of adoration for Carrie, that relationship simply did not reflect the Tina Kennard I so adore and love. And then in Season 3, where we get our reunion and wedding which I desperately wanted, but the path seemed more like a fairey tale than anything which could be close to reality or reasonable. The conflicts were between Bette and Tina seemed artificial and were put aside with a few soft words. Determining what the conflicts were required the most vivid of imaginations and the ability to take the darkest moments of their past and project it to their present. Bette and Tina have a long and rocky history. But the Bette and Tina I know would never dig into that bag of history and use their bad behavior as a club to justify current behavior. I feel this is particularly true for those issues which they had analyzed, apologized and forgiven the other for. Whatever the reason for Bette and Tina’s divorce, it had to be something new or something we are completely unaware of. And I do not completely explain why the separation and divorce happen, I at least ask the question. And I still believe that question can only be answered by Tina.
I am glad you mentioned the cabin. It’s a place designed for no more than 4 people as a temporary getaway. I imagine the dining table has 4 chairs in a standard square shape. The kitchen is a galley style kitchen in which it starts to get crowded with a second person. I imagine that the main purpose is to provide housing for skiers visiting the area during the winter and hikers during the summer.
Addressing this aspect of the Gen Q story is not easy. I think that getting into Tina’s mind and understanding her motivations, her thought processes, and the environment surrounding her when she made her choices is a difficult place to go. For me, the things which might explain this seem so unfathomable that I cannot make my mind go there. Things such as cheating, falling out of love, mental illness or shear boredom with the relationship simply cannot be possible in my world for these two. And they are far too intelligent to allow a misunderstanding to keep them apart. Bette and Tina have been through too much and have weathered too many storms to believe they would ever purposely pursue a path that would destroy their relationship. I also believe that it is simply not possible for the two of them to make any decision in which they did not consider the impact of such on the other. They simply love each other too much for that. So, the bottom line is that we the writers are left to try to explain the unexplainable….
My thanks for your continued support….
Well thought out and literate reply. I totally agree.