Piggy had been more than a little shaken up by Kermit’s unexpected phone call, and she wanted to steady her nerves before the mob returned. They would be even madder than usual, and she just wasn’t feeling up to them yet.
In times of stress, Piggy often turned to mindless, yet involving routine to distract her. Often, this meant fussing with her hair or her make up. Sometimes, when she primped publicly, it irritated those around her, particularly Kermit, who thought she wasn’t taking things seriously, but… there was something soothing about being able to control how she looked. Even if she could control nothing else, her hair was hers, and, with her extensive experience in modeling, television and movies, she could order it around to her exact demands.
Nothing else around her was so co-operative.
Piggy did return to her room and settled herself in front of her vanity. She stared into her own reflected eyes and frowned at her pale skin and listless expression. “If you think I’m going to let you get away with looking like something Animal dragged in, you don’t know Miss Piggy at all.” She spoke aloud, calling up some of her natural fire and nodding in muted approval at her reflection’s increased liveliness.
Satisfied with at least that little bit of progress, now Miss Piggy glared haughtily into the mirror, before adding, sweetly, “And it’s a good thing no one’s caught me talking to you or they’d haul me away.” She lowered her eyes and a wry smile curved her lips, “And then, they’d haul me straight back here when they couldn’t find anywhere crazier.” She shook her head and frowned at her reflection. “Don’t give me that look! Moi am not going crazy. In this place, if anything, moi am going stark, raving sane.”
Leaving go of her momentary lapse in sanity, she turned her attention to more serious matters. Pulling out a tiny pair of snipping scissors, Piggy carefully clipped away the bandage for the last time. She’d been told it could be removed after twenty-four hours, but she’d had more than enough of it to want to wait any longer. The bandage on her ear was best left on, or, barring that, re-covered with band-aids until the stitches could be removed, roughly in a week’s time. Piggy had already made an appointment to go in to her general practitioner.
She meant to be looking as close to normal as possible by the time Kermit came home.
It was with great satisfaction that the blonde let the bandages drop airily into her wastebasket before returning to her reparations. She frowned, with a clinical air, at the wreck they’d made of her head, studying it the way Steven Hawking looked over scientific formulae and Bunsen looked over plans for a wildly dangerous, Beaker-frazzling invention.
They had, at least, tried to spare as much as they could… the problem with those efforts was that the comb-over look was so not going to be the next fashion craze, even if a trendsetter like herself tried to get it working. Piggy was going to have to cut it short to even it out in the end… but perhaps she could pin it to hide the shaved spot until enough of it had grown out for her to style it short.
Giving a quick look over her various styling implements, Piggy selected a strong pick and began ruthlessly working the tangles out, tip to root in order to avoid damaging her locks. Tomorrow she would wash and condition it properly, but for now she settled for a few squirts of her favorite leave-in conditioner. It was soothing, the physical motion of the brush, the muscles working in her arm, and even the occasionally painful tug. It was a return to normalcy for Piggy and for the first time since the accident, she began to feel like herself.
Yes... she was fine.
With the worst of the tangles wrestled into submission, Piggy switched to a brush to tackle the fine little knots that had tried to evade her swift fingers. As she worked, her mind cast back over Kermit’s phone call, what he’d said, how he’d said it… looking as always for those subtle currents of caring burrowed in casual comments. It was good to hear that soulful voice again, so mellow and gentle and calm and… and Kermity.
Tears filled her eyes all of a sudden, catching her off guard as her heart gave a painful lurch. Piggy brushed faster as the drops tracked down her face and tickled her chin before falling away. She let them roll, unchecked.
There was no one to see.
How she missed Kermit! Piggy began to tremble and shake as grief took hold of her fully, soundless sobs seizing her as did thoughts of her frog. She clung tightly to her brush. He, she was sure, would have made things better; Kermie always did. Now, though, he was so far away and everything seemed to have fallen apart. She felt strangely separated from him in spirit, and it was by her badly kept secret, rather than by the meaningless numbers of miles. Part of her wished that he had been there, even to see the accident and what it had done to her.
At, least then, she would know.
There would be no reason for hiding things if he’d only had the decency to be there when that thing had come crashing down. She was lying on the floor like a rag doll while he had been off gallivanting around Europe, probably having the time of his life. How dare he?!
No… that wasn’t fair.
Piggy tried to stifle her unheard anguish with anger, but she just couldn’t work up enough to do it. She wanted her frog too badly at that moment to be angry at him, even if she’d had a legitimate reason. Perhaps, when he got home, it would be alright. Perhaps she could keep it from him, or maybe, if he did find out, perhaps Kermitwouldn’t see her weakness as yet another excuse to put distance between them.
He was her friend, after all… right?
Piggy raised her head and looked blearily into her own red-rimmed eyes. So much for her pep talk. Things hadn’t been going well for them, even before Kermit left, even before she’d had her head knocked in. They’d been arguing, more than usual, sometimes fiercely, and those treasured moments of tenderness that she lived for had been few and very far between of late.
Maybe this would be the last straw.
Maybe Kermit would finally get tired of her.
A terrible thought made its way out of her distraught mind, and as it hit, she threw down the brush and buried her head into her arms against the desk, weeping and trying desperately to regain control.
Maybe, it was time to finally let him go, before he could do it first.
Her stomach twisted with nausea at the thought, but it niggled and teased and tormented her, crawling over her skin and making her want to curl up into a ball. Piggy was frightened, trapped by her own blithe assurances that everything was alright, and her fight or flight reflexes were beginning to kick in, violently.
Perhaps it would be better… to let him go, before he had the chance to really say goodbye.
