[CuriousCombat]

Damn! I wish there were a hype button like a 'like' button here. Since, I'm very hyped for this part of this series.

Looks like it'll definitely be in my top 3 of your stories. Perhaps on the same pedastal as "Taylor vs Jordyn", one of the absolute best!

Looking forward to how it all unfolds. Wonderful pacing.

Taylor vs Jordyn is a personal favorite because Jordyn drove to Taylor's house on a sleepy Sunday afternoon with the intentions of being a peacemaker, but ended up launching a multi-front war.

The road to hell was paved with good intentions.

I really like the parallels this series is having with that classic saga.
The well done buildup - checked
The fight over a guy - checked
The introduction of the mom(s) - checked
Taylor's mom vs Brittany, I loved that subplot!

Monique's discovery/discussion about her mom's Wednesday afternoons....Mmmm, well her mom can't expect Monique and Andrea to be friends, then!

Oh, the irony.
Her mom's intentions/inquisitions and expectations thereafter. Let's see what happens further.

[sinclairfan]

My catfight-over-a-boy Rite of passage fight with Andrea, combined with the encouragement from Mary Ellen's mom, must have triggered some sort of hormone release in me, as I was now completely in touch, or tapped into, with the women's intuition I had heard so much about.  I decided to listen to the hunch it gave me to check under my Mom's bed, which was normally forbidden--it was typically reserved for Christmas presents, and ruining Christmas was taboo in our household.

(Now that I think of it, maybe I was now more open to breaking taboos.  Andrea and I yesterday have tried to break several.)

I immediately noticed 2 pairs of boxing gloves.  Why did my Mom need boxing gloves?  And why 2 pairs?

The question simultaneously had no obvious answer....and yet answered itself.

If that makes any sense.

I was tempted to call her and ask.

Or to ask Mary Ellen.

But instead....

I called Mary Ellen's mom.  I remembered my Mom had her listed as an emergency contact on my school profile (a paper copy, not electronic....this was 1975, remember?).

I called her at her 'Office' number.  I was so nervous.

> Hello.

> Hi...it's ....umm....Monique.

> Are you and Andrea fighting again?  Did she send that bitch cousin of hers over?

> No....ummmm....it's ok.... but.... when you fight.... do you ever use boxing gloves?

> Honey....I think you and Andrea are the definition of 'gloves off'.  Right??

> Right .... ummm.... I don't mean Andrea and me.  I mean my Mom.

> Well, well.  This just got interesting.

To be continued....

[CuriousCombat]

Well, Well this just got interesting.

[sinclairfan]

1975 was a very different world from 2025 in many ways. 

One of the most important was the way separated women, especially separated mom's, were treated.  The shunning was very intense, almost to the point of total exclusion from polite society.  (I suppose that there's another difference right there:  pre-internet, there was such a thing as polite society.  But that's a topic for another time.)

My mom's separation from my dad was a very difficult time for her, and she was trying desperately to roll back the clock--to win my dad back.  She was contesting his motions for divorce every step of the way, and trying to find out who the other woman was.  In 1975, dad's didn't leave unless there was another woman.

The other woman....my mom's rival....was named Bonnie.  She was a client at my dad's job.  Bonnie hated her job....and, working at all for that matter.... and saw my dad as her ticket to housewife-dom.

She did up her hair like my mom's--big, curly, tinted auburn....and began seducing him.  She had been working on this since 1971, and in 1973 got my dad to move with her.

But my mom wasn't going down without a fight.  Literally and figuratively.

Bonnie lived on Long Island.  Enough of a distance where she could duck my mom's challenges of a woman-to-woman showdown.  (This was 1975--gasoline was very very expensive.)

But my mom was persistent.  She kept throwing sand in the gears of the divorce proceedings.

And then Bonnie got laid off from her job.  And her savings started to run out. 

She was living off of unemployment.  But that was about to run out too.  Something had to give.

Bonnie agreed to fight my mom.  But not a catfight.  A no-rules boxing match.

My mom started training for her fight.  With Mary Ellen's mom.  They had been training for a couple of weeks.

Mary Ellen's mom filled me in that's where my mom had been Wednesday afternoons.

> Ummm .... when's the fight?

> Wednesday before Thanksgiving.  At my place.  You dad is driving Bonnie up.

> ......

> You're being quiet.

> It's.... a lot.

> But Monique, sweetie....didn't you just do the same thing?   Fought for a man?

> Yes....and.....that was a lot.

> I suppose it is.

> Can my mom .... fight?  Is she good at it.

> We'll find out, won't we?

To be continued....