Absence

Nine

As Maria wakes up, she's feeling much lighter. Even amidst the darkest of moments, she senses a certain relief of being aware of all the pitfalls that await her. Of having all the pieces in front of her; even if they present a horrible picture. Chaos beats uncertainty. Maria would always quote a phrase that says "the worst place to be is one step away from rock bottom because once you hit rock bottom, there's only one thing you can do: climb it back".

She stretches and tans by the pool. Lorne wakes up. In the kitchen, she smiles and chit-chats with him about the weather over a glass of milk and toast. She gets called to the diary room to breastfeed. She goes, breastfeeds in silence, breathing slowly, looking around, registering everything. "How are you feeling, Maria?", Big Brother asks. Now, it is Maria who takes a while to respond, leaving Big Brother anxious: "With a purpose".

Once her milk runs out, she kisses her baby goodbye, leaves him in the crib and returns to the house by herself. Showers. Eats watermelon slices. Has a heated discussion with PJ over "Ghost" being a movie or a film. Gets called to change her microphone batteries. Breastfeeds once more. Eats mashed potatoes, chicken breasts and coke with a lot of ice for lunch. Annoyingly munches on ice to bits once the coke ends, while she and PJ go at it for round #2 of their Ghost argument. Eats Jell-O for desert. Sings backing vocals to Lorne over "Always something there to remind me" while doing the dishes. Sleeps. Rinse and repeat.

It's party time, the night before chopping block.

Maria is enjoying herself - not as much as the other houseguests, but more than she's ever had. She dances, laughs, eats, chats. Houseguests cheer on her, for the first time making a connection with them.

Halfway through the party, Maria gets called to breastfeed. She checks her microphone battery before she goes. She sees it still has one bar left. She inhales and exhales deeply, and proceeds to the diary room. Inside the baby's room, she gets her son from the crib, starts breastfeeding. Without giving it away, she discreetly checks the battery again. Still at one bar left.

Time is running out when, finally, a producer comes in with charged batteries on his hand to change hers. This was one of the few things the production team wouldn't let houseguest do it themselves. In other editions, participants had broken several microphone receivers and/or batteries by incorrectly replacing them. And besides the nuisances and monetary losses caused by the constant damage, it would harm the show itself, as audio would get compromised on crucial parts due to their lack of expertise. So, whenever a battery would die, participants would be called to the diary room to have theirs changed, and a person from the production team - usually wearing a crash test dummy mask - would enter and, without saying a word, remove the participant's battery, insert a new one and re-pair the receiver device.

As the producer kneeled by Maria's chair to level with her arm and change her battery, he suddenly felt something sharp on his neck. The mask killed his peripheral vision, so he did not know what was there, but as soon as his eyes looked up, he found Maria looking at him, partially afraid, wholly engaged. Her arm led to the place where pressure was being applied. She had a knife to his neck.

"Big Brother!", she shouted angrily after swiftly rotating behind the crash test dummy masked producer; one arm holding the baby, the other with the elbow pulling the producer tight against her chest, and the hand pressing the knife uncomfortably against his throat: "I'm leaving this house right now. Open the fucking door, let us through, I'll deal with every-- every fine, every legal whatever once I'm out. But you cannot force me and my baby to stay. Free will! I- I take full responsibility and promise to release this guy unharmed once I'm outside. Don't fucking test me, though! You have 1 minute!"

But "Big Brother" could barely hear her speech. The new batteries were still in the crash test dummy masked producer's hand, who, throughout, didn't shed a sound - which made it all the more creepy and unsettling for Maria. Part of her wanted to tell him it wasn't about him; that she meant no harm, that she would release him after she was free. But another part felt he was also part of the problem - working and accepting a situation like that didn't make him any better. This line of thought brought another set of questions: What about the rest of the country; how is all of this acceptable to them? Are there "Free Maria" riots happening? There has to be. What is my husband doing to free his wife and son and why is he not succeeding?