Steph’s Mom

So Solomon Lauter probably sacrificed his wife to the Lords in Black, right?

All the Starry Children lore aside, Solomon’s scenes in Act Two of Nerdy Prudes tell us several things: Solomon believes that certain problems can only be solved by asking the Lords in Black for help, he knows that help comes at a huge price, and that the last time he had anything to do with the Black Book things went so painfully that he refuses to so much as touch it again.

Put all this together, and it seems highly likely that Solomon Lauter made his own deal with the Lords in Black, probably around 2005 when the book first came into his care. But what was his price? What do you want, Solomon? The things he seems to cherish—power, respect, influence—are all very much still in his life. But he doesn’t have the mother of his child. So she was the sacrifice. And Steph is forever a reminder of that guilt and loss, which could go some way towards explaining his behavior towards her.

This also adds an additional layer to the Lords in Black sacrifice sequence in Nerdy Prudes. While the Lords in Black are perfectly willing to accept a sacrifice from any of the three teens, they angle extra hard for Steph to shoot Pete. And yeah maybe that’s so Tinky can put him in the Bastard’s Box, or because murder is always best, or simply because Steph is the teen doing the most talking. But maybe it’s also because they enjoy the idea of a pattern—generations of Lauters summoning them to sacrifice someone beloved, Steph unwittingly putting Pete directly in her lost mother’s place. The Lauters summoned them once, now the Lauters have summoned them twice….

(Also how poetic would it be for Steph and her father, despite their many differences and conflicts, to have ultimately made the same decision? Though of course Steph was lucky enough that Max and Grace intervened.)

But this does raise the question—What was Solomon’s deal? What would he have sacrificed his wife for? His position of power? He seems far too worried about losing the election for that to be the case.

(The timeline on this doesn’t really work because there’s a lot between 1979 and 2005 to account for and we have no real record of ghosts wreaking Max-level havoc for 25 years, but I keep coming back to the fact Solomon knows a lot in particular about the Waylon curse and how to stop it. And if nothing ever truly dies in the Waylon House, then where are the Waylons themselves? The obvious answer is that Miss Holloway did them in back in the 80’s… but still…)

And did he make that sacrifice in all the timelines? Or just in the ones where Holloway died and wasn’t around to have the book? There’s no mention of Steph’s mother in Nightmare Time, implying that the answer is the former. So who got the book from who? How do Miss Holloway and Solomon Lauter know each other?

Idk there’s so much to think about. It feels like we know so much and so little at the same time. Thoughts?