I'm not a hardship. I'm awesome.

It had been a very tense, hectic few hours in the Gregson household. There had been a few fights, though those had been had mostly away from Bod's immediate vicinity, even if sound carried well in this house.

First, there'd been a brief row between Tara and Max once she'd finally made it back. Thankfully, that hadn't lasted long, and then Tara had already been off to go get Kate.

Next, there'd been a slightly heated discussion between Max and Charmaine, who'd finally dragged herself out of bed and out into the house, though she wasn't helping much.

Then, once Marshall had gotten home, Courtney had turned up some time after, and they'd had... a discussion, outside. It was about as close to an argument Marshall tended to get, really.

And then finally, once they'd managed to break the vacuum cleaner and had had to call Max's friend Neil to bring his one over, Neil and Charmaine had ended having a major fight in the front yard.

So, it was no wonder that even though the house was starting to look like it could be lived in (the broken windows had been taped over with plastic, the garbage bags had been taken out, the yard had been mostly cleared) the people inside were extremely tense, right about now. It didn't help that Tara and Kate were still nowhere to be seen. It was less than an hour until the social worker was supposed to show up.

Max was vacuuming the floor, while Marshall and Bod had been tasked with putting the finishing touches to everything. Mostly, it meant making sure family pictures were upright and sofa cushions in order.

And Charmaine? She was in the kitchen, and she needed the wall socket for the appliances.

"Stop unplugging the vac!" Max yelled for what felt like the nth time.

( Click for endless drama. )

[ooc: NFB, NFI, TBC in the comments! Part three of three. Again, preplayed with the amazing there_was_life, and taken and modified from United States of Tara S02E07 'Dept. of Fucked Up Family Services'.]