Chapter Text
"Damn, that was fast. New record?" Carole's legs nearly gave way as she sank down into the grass by the river bank, her back pressed against Tuesday's.
"May- huff- be," Tuesday panted, struggling to catch her breath. "It certainly- huff- felt that way, at l- phew- at least."
"In my book, it's all thanks to that adorable dog we passed. That precious grin totally motivated you too, right?"
Tuesday's panting morphed into an exaggerated gasp. "A cute dog? Where'd you see it?"
"Just by the river stairs; what, you missed it? It's not like you to miss something that cute."
Carole sighed and leaned a bit heavier backwards, feeling every tiny detail of Tuesday's back connecting with her own.
"I know, I know." Tuesday pushed back slightly, and turned her head to get a glimpse of Carole. "Running with you just puts me so at ease, I lose focus on things like that."
She splayed the fingers of her left hand outward on the grass underneath them, as if to signal its emptiness.
"When we're out like this, everything kind of fades into the background. Well, everything but you, you know?"
Tuesday’s casual tone saying something so cheesily sweet caught Carole completely off guard, and she thanked her workout-flushed face for hiding the blush that would otherwise have betrayed her reaction.
In between breaths of her own, Carole felt Tuesday’s breathing calm down after the run, then pick up pace again as she let her own fingers slide underneath Tuesday’s palm and softly grip her hand. Tuesday couldn’t help but let out a quiet giggle and pushed their interlaced hands closer to her side, tightening her grip.
The softness of Tuesday’s fingertips brushing against the back of her hand, despite the slight calluses from her diligent guitar practice, filled up Carole’s mind and relaxed her body even more. If they hadn’t had plenty of song revision work to do today, she would’ve been perfectly content staying like they were, this close together, for hours.
Carole took a deep breath of the crisp morning air to clear her head and stood up, pulling Tuesday to her feet by her still-held hand.
“Home?”
Tuesday nodded cheerfully and, fingers still intertwined, they slowly took off again.
Kind of a pointless thing to say, Carole thought to herself and lightly stroked Tuesday’s thumb with her own; more than the dingy storage-room apartment or Alba City or all of Mars or Earth or any other place, this feeling, being connected to Tues like this, was home.
The apartment door creaked open to the now-familiar sight of their two-man management team, propped up against the kitchen counter.
“Morning!” Roddy waved to the girls, while the clearly either morning-tired or hungover Gus made no such effort.
“Didn’t we tell you to text before letting yourself in?” Carole protested, knowing full well it’d fall on deaf ears.
“Yeah, yeah,” Gus responded dismissively. “How was your workout?”
Tuesday set down her water bottle on the frame of the pale-pink sofa next to her, and smiled back at Gus.
“I think we beat our best time! Running in the morning is really helping me get going early.”
Gus raised his right eyebrow. “The earlier the better, I say. Less risk of getting caught by the camer-ow!”
As Roddy’s elbow drew back from being forcefully lodged in the big gut next to him, Gus cleared his throat and continued. “Anyway, I’ve got-”
“Good news,” Carole cut in. “As usual.”
“...Fine, have it your way. The Allen Show team emailed me last night. Apparently tomorrow’s guest is dropping out, so they asked you guys to be top of the reserve list.”
“Th-the Allen Show?” The colour drained from Tuesday’s still-flushed face, and Carole’s mouth popped open in puzzled surprise. “They really want us back after last time?”
“First-timers’ nerves, happens to everyone,” Gus assured them. “Hell, happened to me too. Go into hell once, and the second time’ll be like heaven.”
Carole ignored his platitude and continued, her tone of voice rising with her confusion.
“Besides, we barely have anything to promote right now. What could we even talk about?”
“...The bad news.”
Roddy ruffled through his backpack and pulled out a copy of the Mars Gossiper. Lining the sides of the glossy cover were gaudy bold-font headlines describing drama with Joshua (as always), Angela’s skin care routine, and - in the bottom corner, next to Roddy’s stretched-out finger - a candid photo from right outside their apartment.
Carole couldn’t remember when she and Tuesday had started kissing. It was never capital-K Kissing, definitely not lip to lip - Carole’s cheeks flushed at the thought of it - but at some point the shoulder-leans had started wordlessly continuing into pecks on the cheek. Or on the nose. Or anywhere they felt like.
Come to think of it, they’d never as much as mentioned it to each other; there just… hadn’t been any need to? Actually, was that a problem to begin with, should she have been checking with Tuesday before quietly going along with taking things further?
“But I’m sure it’s going to be fine! I mean, acceptance polls on Mars have been looking really good recently, and…”
Roddy’s hasty attempt to soften the blow snapped Carole back to attention.
“I-I didn’t even realize, we had no idea people were-”
Carole glanced to her right, saw Tuesday’s wide-with-shock eyes and the trembling hands covering her mouth, and stopped herself mid-sentence.
“Anyway, I know this is none of our business.” Gus cut through the silence Carole’s pause had left. “But these goddamn gossip writers clearly don’t, so we have to think of some way to deal with ‘em.”
Why? Carole couldn’t help but snap at him in her mind. What she had with Tuesday was between the two of them, all worked out with no words, totally self-evident. She probably couldn’t even explain it properly to Tuesday herself if she needed to, let alone to anyone prying in from outside of their bubble.
At the same time, she knew where Gus was coming from - what happened to Ertegun had made it all too clear how scarily far even a single tabloid story could reach.
“This’ll sound really bad, but we have to start controlling the narrative.” Roddy handed the magazine to Gus, who promptly tossed it away over his shoulder.
“Spin it, basically. That Allen invite couldn’t have come at a better time, am I right?”