Bearbearbear

I don't believe that she was a good mother, and I am not going to defend her abuse. However, I think it's different to defend her than it is to attempt to understand her character.

She grew up in one crime family, to then be married off into another one. The second, from what we can infer, is greatly more violent. From what we know about Nathan, It would not be a reach to say that she spent the entirety of their marriage being abused.

Nathaniel was her solace. When she learned that he was either to be sold to the moriyamas or be killed by Nathan himself, she didn't hesitate to plan a full fledged escape, which most likely took a great deal to plan.

It's also important to understand the mindset she had before they ran. I know that one of my first thoughts was “why didn't she run before?” I thought about it for a long time, and I'm sure a lot of people thought the same. To Mary, the abuse both her and Nathaniel suffered was able to be pushed to the side because she had no reason to fear that either of them would be killed. Whether she understood that no child should have to suffer that form of abuse or not, it wasn't death, which was enough for her. For someone like her, anything short of death was sufferable. When it was Nathaniels actual life at stake, that's when she realized that she had to do something. That's when she couldn't look the other way anymore. She knew what would happen if she took Nathaniel and ran, she knew they would be continually hunted down. In her mind there was no reason to run before because she knew that would be putting an immediate target on their backs, when their hadn't been one before. Then that changed, and there was a target on Nathaniels back either way.

It's never stated whether or not she was abusive towards Nathaniel before they ran away, or if it was simply just the only way she knew how to get him to fully understand the stakes. I don’t condone either, but I personally believe that it’s the latter. We never hear of Mary being abusive when they were in Baltimore, only while they were on the run. This is where we have to look back on how she was raised. Mary grew up in a crime family, which means she was undoubtedly exposed to violence, even if it wasn’t directed towards her specifically. This is also similar to her mindset while living in Baltimore as well. I believe that her background and trauma mixed with the stakes of their situation made it an easy choice for her; Nathanial taking a hit was sufferable so long as it meant he was alive. She wasn’t going to cry, and plead for him to understand, so she used the one method she knew without a doubt would make the information stick.

like it or not, everything Mary ever did was for Nathanial. She wanted him to have nothing to do with the mafia in any way, shape, or form. Even turning her own family away after they offered to protect them.

Sleepin in a bed half empty daydreaming???

The Harvard track team runs past my truck stuck on Storrow???

I never ask for much, but I hope that Logan (Boston’s airport) crumbles and gets hit by a tornado???

As I was, how you were, what was there before me???

Never mind, never mind, I’ll forget about it???

I’ll be good, I’ll be fine, I can laugh about it???

Realistically, the Foxes would never go to a pride festival (except probably Nicky).

And then the other one (who just assumes that they’ve been together the entire time) is just like:

Jean never really had anything good going for him. There was nothing keeping him alive, until a beautiful boy with green eyes asked him to teach him French in secret. Then that beautiful boy with his beautiful green eyes left. Jean knew that it was the only option for Kevin, he knew that he himself would never leave the nest willingly, and he knew Kevin would never come back, not for him. But he waited anyway. He waited for Kevin, kept his ear to the doorframe, and prayed for his downfall every single day.

I’m thinking about the line: “I’m hoping that the view ain’t nice, that the streetlights bleed into your bedroom.”

All Kevin and Jean ever knew was the dark. Dark walls, hallways, clothes, hair… blood. There weren’t windows in the nest, they couldn’t see outside. He wants Kevin to be inconvenienced by the small things, wants him to get annoyed by light coming in through his window at night, because obviously, he’d think about everything that could make Kevin’s life a living hell, rather than how Kevin made his life a living hell. But really he doesn’t like to think about it much at all, because when he thinks about it too hard he doesn’t know whether to be happy that Kevin can be annoyed by such things, or jealous that he can’t. If he thinks about it too hard, he starts to wonder if he could ever truly be inconvenienced by the light, if it meant he was no longer trapped in the dark.