This story was written on the spur of the moment, while I was looking at some revisions to my fanfic archive. I spotted its tenative title/placeholder on the "Oddities" page and remembered I hadn't done anything with it. Since "To The Mystery That Is Human" was stalled, how about writing this one instead?

So I did. Oh, it helped that I'd been working on my Schultzes anyway, so I was in the right frame of mind. And one of the stories in the Schultz Family saga that I'm working on, "The Biggest and Best Plan in the World", was ultimately the one that gave me the glimpse into why Graeme might be acting the way he was.

I apologize for everybody's fascination with glassware; it just kinda spiralled out of control. Yes, it was a part of the story... but more than I wanted it to be. Incidentally, the glassware that Vikki owns at home is commonly called "Forest Green", which also gives you an indication as to its color. The little plate that Liam gets for Vikki is in a pattern called "Recollection", which is a reproduction of a 1930's pattern called "Madrid". (Much to the annoyance of those of us who collect glass of that era, several companies have taken it upon themselves to reproduce our glass.) I call "Recollection" "reproduction Madrid"; I refuse to dignify it with its pattern name except when needed.

Graeme, I should point out, is merely not in a good mood during the whole story. In some ways, he's like me in that he likes a stable home base. And he does long for his mother's stable life. Nevermind that all his mother really wanted was to get out of the rut that had become her life.... Yes, he really is mixed up at the moment, and like me, does have a tendency to stick his foot in his mouth.

Vikki's comment about the balanced diet stems from the fact that I can't seem to have Ha'gel feed her anything from any other food group most of the time.

I couldn't quite figure out what Liam and Graeme would call each others' mothers. It wasn't until I had Liam open his mouth that "aunt" might be the easiest to use.

As noted at the beginning of the story, I accidentally appropriated the 'one-year-every-hour' growth rate for Liam in Tina Price's "The Hidden" for Liam in this story, as well as for Graeme in "Quietest Change". Knowing that, you can tell how old Liam is in the various portions of the story, as well as telling how much time has passed during different portions of the story.

I'll say here that sharings lasting longer than about a millisecond are hard to write, which is also why I'm not alltogether pleased with the last, massive one. Oh, well, I can always rewrite them.

I realized while I was writing Vikki's conversation with Graeme that she'd probably break her nice glass plate when she hugged him (despite my family's amused contention that reproduction Madrid would break the floor instead of itself if you dropped it), so I had her put it in her suitcase when she put her suitcase in the minivan.

I'm still finding out what Graeme means by "proper mate". I don't think Vikki would have a big problem going along with it, although I know Marianne Schultz (in another universe) does have big, big problems with it. (The Schultz Family saga is where I originate most of my ideas about the Kimera.)

The reasons that Graeme gets his full name handed to him by Siobhan is because I wanted to introduce Siobhan, and because I wanted to canon his full name. (And, incidentally, his mother's last name, for I don't think I ever gave it in "The Quietest Change", except in the disclaimer.)

Liam's quote is from the King James Bible, from Matthew 5:25-26. I was originally going to have him quote Matthew 5:23-24, which does have to do with brothers, but 25-26 sounded far more ominous and relevant to the story. I chose the bible because it seemed Liam would be familiar with it thanks to Siobhan's memories. (We know he can quote things from both parents' memories.)

The last part of this story was written during one of my evening help desk shifts (I work for a community college, and that's one of my duties two days a week.) My boss is pretty lenient about what I do, as long as I stay near my desk to answer the phone, so I can surf the web and write stories and so on. During the time I was writing it, the president of the college called up, putting in a request to get some minor things on his computer fixed. As you can probably guess, you drop *everything* when the president of the college calls up, including your story. This is, no doubt, why part of the great sharing is a little disjointed as well.

And, finally, I wrote two little pieces that happen about a month after "Leaving", called "Shivering in the Night" and "Waiting for Hope in the Morning", which are on the "Oddities" page. I do hope to add more to this series, stuff happening between "Leaving" and "Shivering".