Linda McQueen/Season 1

### The Shorter Way

Haverhill, Massachusetts, Linda McQueen and her daughter Vic clean houses. They're cleaning the Brewster's house. Vic was childhood friends with the daughter, Willa Brewster. After cleaning the Brewster’s house, Linda tells Vic how much of a help she had been throughout the summer and was hoping that Vic could continue to help post graduation. While cleaning houses for a living wasn't ideal, Linda made her own hours and was well compensated. She hoped she and Vic could go into business together. However, after finishing her final year of high school, Vic was hoping to go to college, though unlike Willa, Vic’s family wasn’t well off.

Linda and Vic returned home to find her husband Chris working on his Harley. As her parents began to argue as they typically would, Vic headed inside the house. Once inside, Chris and Linda start arguing over a lost credit card. A loud bang is heard shortly after her mother calls her father a drunk.

Linda, Chris, and Vic spend the day at Aunt Carrie's dinner near Lake Winnipesaukee. Chris looks over Vic’s drawing journal and is amazed at her progress. She claims that she has more time to practice now because she doesn’t have any friends since Willa left for Exeter and Craig started getting high all the time and skipping school. Drawing is something that Vic can do by herself and when she really gets into it, it’s like being on a bike, she describes. She then shows her father her drawing of the Shorter Way Bridge. Just looking at Vic’s drawing brings Chris back. He recalls all the trouble he used to get into on that bridge. He helped demo it when Vic was a kid. Felt like he was blowing up his youth. The Shorter Way was one of a kind. Chris shows Linda the drawing, but she doesn’t seem to enthusiastic about it or Vic attending college. On that note, Vic decides to take off for Willa’s party at the lake house.

At Lake Side motel, Linda, Chris, and Vic, along with Tiffany Jones and several others, surround a camp fire and wait for the fireworks. Vic returns the credit card that Angela found to her mother. Vic and Linda join Chris as he plays the guitar and sing. While singing, Vic notices the bruises on the right side of her mother’s face, presumably inflicted by her father.

The following morning, Linda and Chris get into another argument over a lost watch. As the fight continues, the insults they hurl at one another worsen. When Chris calls her an ugly person, Linda questions how she could ever have a kid with a drunk, selfish, bastard such as himself. Vic barges in and the fighting stops abruptly.

Vic wakes up to find her mother sitting on the edge of her bed. Linda reveals that Chris left. She doesn’t know where he went or why he left. She tried her hardest to keep him. She kept liquor out the house, but she can’t compete with the bar and she can’t be 24 anymore. That’s how old the last one was. Vic refuses to accept this, but Linda insists it's the truth. Still, Vic would rather be with him, even as Linda tells her that he left both of them behind.

### The Graveyard of What Might

Linda’s smoking a cigarette in the kitchen as Vic returns home. Vic informs her that Tiffany Jones is the woman he left her for. Linda asks if they were drinking, which Vic claims they were. Linda questions how Vic knows this, but Vic doesn’t answer.

As Linda and Vic clean houses together, they discuss her father and how he may be right about them being better off without him. Linda expects Vic to help her out in the afternoons and on weekends, but Vic has bigger plans. Angela interrupts after learning from Willa that Vic is applying to RISD. She has a sorority sister who works in the registrar’s office and is willing to put in a call if Vic needs help.

Afterward, Linda and Vic stop by a diner to eat. During which time, Vic explains that RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) is a fine arts college. Linda remarks it would’ve been nice to hear that for the first time from Vic rather than Angela Brewster. Furthermore, she sees Vic’s plan to go off to college as nothing more than a pipe dream. Once home, Vic packs her bags as she plans to move in with her father. Linda expresses her pain in watching Vic leave her for her father, who left them both behind. Linda makes Vic promise her to come back home if there’s hard liquor in Tiffany’s house. She proceeds to cry as Vic leaves.

Linda unexpectedly pulls up to Tiffany's and demands that Vic come home with her, though Vic refuses. Chris and Tiffany’s involvement only escalates Linda’s rage. Linda warns Vic that in staying with her father and Tiffany, the closest she’ll come to college is tending bar while pregnant next to Tiffany. Linda then confronts Tiffany, demanding to know how long she and Chris have been together. With Linda shoving Chris and him threatening to call the cops, Vic jumps on her bike and rides off.

### The Gas Mask Man

Linda is gardening in the front yard as Vic arrives. Linda apologizes for her actions from the night before. Vic asks for a copy of her mother’s tax return for financial aid. Unfortunately, Linda cleans houses for a living, meaning much like Chris, all her earnings are under the table. Linda explains that maybe this is a sign. They’re not the type of people who go to college. Linda suggests Vic look into Trade School, which Vic turns down. Linda still needs help cleaning the Gates’ and the Brewsters’ houses on Friday if Vic wants to make some money.

### The House of Sleep

Vic shows up at the house and ca barely stand. She explains that Haley and Sharon Smith are missing, though Linda’s more concerned with Vic, as her eye is red, and she appears to be in pain. Linda takes Vic upstairs and puts her in bed. She insists that Haley and Sharon are fine, surmising they’re likely in Florida with Sharon’s mother. As she sleeps, Vic envisions the Wraith and Haley with sharp fangs.

Linda checks in on Vic while she sleeps. Craig knocks on the front door in search of Vic. Linda tells him that Vic’s not feeling well. While she sympathizes with Craig, given his mom’s situation, but she believes that Craig is sending Vic down the wrong path and refuses to allow that to continue. Linda remarks that Vic came home with red eyes, leading her to believe that Vic and Craig were smoking weed in the woods. Craig insists that Vic would never do that and that Linda doesn’t know anything about Vic. Still, Linda asks that he stay away from Vic.

Vic comes downstairs and overhears her mom on the phone with her dad complaining about her bike. Linda claims its the reason that Vic’s been sick. She wants Chris to try and get through to Vic in spite of them not being the best example. Vic joins her mom in the kitchen and asks when was the first time her father hit her. Linda claims she doesn’t remember. They were so young and wild when She first met Chris. Even wilder when Chris got back from the Gulf. They liked to get drunk, and when they got drunk, they’d fight. And sometimes Linda would wake up with a fat lip. She stayed because it wasn’t all the time. Also, because sometimes she’s the one who started the fight. He also used to promise her he would lay off the hard liquor, and she’d believe him.

Suddenly, it had been years, and she had Vic. At that point, her life with him had been longer than her life without him. So, she stayed. She tried to keep believing that he’d change. She asks how long Vic has known. She replies not that long, but looking back, she always had a feeling. She kept it a secret because she needed to believe her dad was a good guy. Linda explains that Chris is both a good guy and bad. People can be both. The trouble is, you only ever see the good. Linda then leaves for work, though she’s packed Vic a bag with some of her things that she’d want over at Tiffany’s. Inside the bag is a comic book, among other items, bringing Vic’s suspicions of Bing back to the surface.

Linda and Vic don’t speak on the ride back to Tiffany’s after Vic uncovered Sharon Smith's body in a field. Chris greets them as they arrive, and Vic heads inside without so much of a word.

### The Wraith

Chris and Vic stop by the house on the way to dropping her off at school. Linda suggests that maybe it’s time Vic get a car. However, Vic prefers her bike. Linda questions what Vic was doing in that field where she found Sharon. "Where you with Craig?", she asks. Vic explains that she wasn’t and that she doesn’t have time to argue right now. Linda turns her frustrations on Chris, blaming him for ever buying Vic the bike, which Linda attributes to her eye problem. They are interrupted by Detective Tabitha Hutter, whose been assigned to the Sharon and Haley Smith case.

### The Dark Tunnels

Linda brings Vic an overnight bag to the hospital after she agreed to a voluntary commitment. When Vic asks about her dad, Linda reveals that he wasn’t at the house and that he was likely at a bar in town.

### Scissors for the Drifter

Linda is watching TV late at night as Vic comes down from upstairs, claiming that the phone is ringing. Linda catches Vic talking on the phone and tells her to go back to bed as no one is calling. The following morning, Linda tells Vic that she sold her dirt bike while she was in the hospital.

### Parnassus

Linda gets the call that Vic was accepted into RISD. A full scholarship, while cleaning the Brewster house. Willa is close by, and Linda informs her of the news. In celebration, Willa plans a party. That night, Linda and Vic head off for a party at the Brewsters. Linda is skeptical. They arrive at the party, where Vic is greeted by Willa, Simon, and Brenda. Linda goes to the kitchen and starts cleaning. Linda reminds Vic that the Brewsters aren’t her family. She worried what Vic attending RISD will mean for the family. More over, the fancy living that the Brewsters are accustomed to is not meant for people like them, and Linda wants to protect Vic from finding that out the hard way.

Chris arrives at the party and congratulates Vic on getting a full ride into RISD. He’s offered a drink, which he turns down, announcing to Linda and Vic that as of recently, he’s quit drinking. Linda is amused and doubtful that it will last, though Vic seems to at least appreciate that her father is trying.

Chris joins Linda outside for a smoke. They watch Vic and Craig through the window. Chris is impressed and proud of Vic. However, Linda is concerned with Vic moving to such a big city like Providence. However, Chris knows Vic to have a good head on her shoulders.

Linda returns home. She hears a door creek and concludes that Vic beat her home, unaware that Bing Partridge has broken into. While Linda is distracted, Bing creeps out the front door unnoticed. Linda enters Vic’s room and on her bed finds the alcohol, weed, condoms, and pills that Bing left out. Vic returns home and finds her mother waiting for her in her room. Linda confronts her over the alcohol and drugs. As punishment, she’s taken away Vic’s art supplies and computer. While Vic may be 18, she lives under Linda’s roof. So long as she continues to do so, she will abide by her rules. School, work, home. She denounces any partying as well as boys. Linda claims this is for Vic’s own good. She doesn’t believe Vic is ready to be on her own. However, Vic sees this for what it really is. Her mother is jealous, referring to her as an ignorant, small-town loser. It’s why Vic’s dad left her. Linda becomes enraged and throws a glass a Vic, which shatters as it hits the door.

Vic arrives at her house and asks her mother where she put her bike. Linda insists that she sold it, but Vic knows she’s lying. Linda is afraid of being alone, and Vic knows it. With both Vic and Chris gone, she would only have herself to blame for her life. Linda starts to cry, repeating that it’s not fair and that she won’t know what to do once Vic is gone. Linda reluctantly reveals that she hid Vic’s bike in the basement.

### Gunbarrel

Linda and Vic attend Craig’s funeral and later his reception after he was killed in a car explosion. Linda holds Vic close as she struggles with the possibility of it just as easily being Vic who died. Vic looks over to her dad and asks her mom what she would’ve done without him. Linda used to think about that a lot when he was in the Gulf. She remembered thinking she would die without him. In reality, she’d have to stay with her mother for a while, which wouldn’t have ended well as Linda has always had a strained relationship with her mother.