Chapter Text
Ginger glances over at Katya who has been making laps around the bench they’re meant to be resting on for the past ten minutes, “Can you settle down, you’re making me dizzy.”
“Sorry, I’m just nervous,” Katya responds, coming to a stop in front of Ginger and bouncing on her feet while she shakes out her nervous limbs slightly.
Katya doesn’t even know why she’s nervous. She is pretty sure that Ginger and Trixie will get along, or at the very least respect each other, but something about them potentially not getting along has Katya’s stomach in knots for a reason she can’t quite place. She’s had a small swarm of butterflies in her stomach all morning and she woke up hours before her alarm, too wound up to stay asleep.
She chalks it up to the fact that Ginger has been an important person in her life for a6many years and is someone that she relies on to keep her sane. She would probably, no definitely, be in a much worse place if it weren’t for Ginger not allowing her to become completely paralyzed by her anxiety. Meanwhile, she only met Trixie a handful of weeks ago, but she has quickly become one of her favorite people because they just seem to click, Trixie understands her and can keep up with her in a way that ¹1qinii in her apartment and self destructing. On the other hand she feels weird telling Ginger what is actually bothering her, and she isn’t even sure she understands it herself. She forces the first excuse she can think of out of her mouth, “I’m just worried, Trixie isn’t usually late.”
It’s not a total lie, Trixie is usually annoyingly on time. It’s the biggest cause for arguments in their friendship since Katya runs on her own time, which is usually an hour or so behind everyone else. Trixie is constantly having to remind Katya of when they are supposed to meet up, often telling her to be somewhere fifteen minutes before they are actually set to meet.
Ginger narrows her eyes, checking her phone for the time, “girl, she is only five minutes late,” she says, a bit incredulously. “Also have you met you? You’re never on time to anything.”
Katya resumes her laps around the bench, causing Ginger to sigh before she responds, “yeah, yeah I know I’m the worst, but Trixie isn’t, she’s always on time down to the exact second, this isn’t like her.”
Now that Katya puts more thought into it, her excuse has only added to her anxieties. What could be happening that is making Trixie late for the first time since Katya has known her, and today of all days.
“It’s a wonder she’s able to put up with you then,” Ginger teases back.
Katya wheezes, “don’t I know it.”
From behind her Katya hears Trixie’s voice call out, “God, I can hear your smoker’s laugh from here, you hag!”
Katya wheezes again as Trixie walks over to them. Katya feels her breathing start to come a little easier now that Trixie is here, there’s no more time for anticipation and worry.
Trixie reaches them and immediately wraps Katya up in a hug, squeezing her waist lightly. Katya feels herself calm down almost immediately and get swept up in the good mood that being around Trixie always manages to put her in. She returns the hug just as tight and lets out a quiet moan right near Trixie’s ear. Trixie screams and pulls away, lightly hitting Katya on the arm.
“You’re the worst,” she says, with a fond smile that betrays her sentiment.
Both girls snap their heads toward Ginger when she clears her throat, a light blush spreading on Trixie’s cheeks when she realizes she forgot to introduce herself.
“Uh, hi, I’m Trixie,” she says awkwardly, putting her hand out for Ginger to shake.
Ginger raises her eyebrow at her hand, but shakes it nonetheless. “I’m Ginger, and I was starting to think Katya was making you up, but you really are a living barbie doll with the laugh of a banshee.”
Trixie screams out a laugh again, looking over to Katya who is looking anywhere but at Trixie, and she thinks she can see a small blush on the tips of her ears.
“I wouldn’t be surprised to find out she made up a whole person to be honest,” Trixie responds.
“Well from what she told me, you two have spent a lot of time together, and anyone that can tolerate her for that long is as good as made up,” Ginger says, laughing.
Katya should probably be afraid that her two best friends are teaming up against her, but all she can feel is relief that they’re getting along, even if it’s at her expense. The nerves have left her body only to be replaced by a newfound excitement and warmth.
“I know I’m stunningly gorgeous and you can’t help but talk about me, but we need to get going,” Katya interrupts.
Katya turned and started walking ahead of the other two before they can say anything else, missing the way they both rolled their eyes fondly at her. Katya makes it to the door first and holds it open for her friends. The restaurant itself is nothing too fancy, it has dark wood floors and light walls with that generic abstract art that restaurants hang up to make it appear fancier than it really is.
There aren’t many people inside, probably because it’s a random Tuesday in the middle of the day, so they get seated immediately at a small booth near the back of the restaurant. Ginger and Trixie both slide into opposite sides of the booth, leaving Katya with the decision to choose between which of her friends to sit next to. It shouldn’t be a difficult decision, neither of them will take offense to where she sits, but for some reason it feels like the biggest decision in the world to Katya in this moment. She has a weird feeling in the pit of her stomach that leaves her with sweaty palms, and she can’t figure out what it is about this decision that seems so difficult. Maybe it just feels like she has to pick a favorite friend, even though she knows that isn’t true. That must be it.
She stands there for what should definitely be considered too long, but before she can come to a decision, Trixie smiles lightly at her and pats the seat next to herself, making Katya’s mind up for her. Relieved, she sits down next to Trixie and feels her hand squeeze her knee lightly, calming her down from her brief panic. From across the table, Ginger is looking at her with her eyebrow slightly raised to which Katya just shrugs, because she doesn’t know what just came over her either. Ginger just shakes her head and looks up to the waitress who is passing out menus and silverware.
The hostess leaves them with their menus, and shortly after, a friendly looking lady walks over to their table to take their drink orders before leaving them again to go and get their drinks.
Katya starts to feel the nerves that Trixie and Ginger won’t get along with each other come back, and scrambles to find something to start a conversation about. Her mind draws a blank on anything she could possibly talk about, and Trixie once again saves her from her spiral of thoughts by moving her hand back to her knee and softly saying, “Kat, you have to look at the menu,” reminding Katya that they are here for lunch and that requires her ordering food.
Trixie always has a way of sensing Katya’s discomfort and defusing the situation and she has never been more grateful for it, even if she is, in a way, responsible for the discomfort in the first place.
Katya’s eyes come back into focus and she reaches for her menu to find something that she will actually eat. She only notices that Trixie’s hand has been on her knee the whole time when their waitress comes back with their drinks and Trixie needs to use her hand to grab her drink. The loss of contact causes an empty feeling to spread in her stomach, but she chalks it up to hunger considering it is lunch time after all. The waitress takes their orders and leaves to place them in the kitchen, once again leaving Katya to struggle to come up with a conversation to start.
“So, Trixie, what is it exactly that you do, all Katya told me is that you’re country barbie, but coming from her that could mean anything,” Ginger starts a conversation before Katya can freak out about it anymore. She smiles gratefully at Ginger, relief evident on her face.
Trixie smiles a bit before she answers, “I’m a makeup artist mainly, but I also sing so I perform at open mics sometimes.”
“She’s selling herself short, she has a regular gig at a bar and she writes her own music, she’s a songstress mama,” Katya interjects, jumping at the chance to sing her praises about Trixie.
Katya watches as Trixie blushes slightly and looks down to her lap, uncharacteristically bashful in contrast to her usually unabashedly confident self, who has no problem letting everyone know exactly how talented she is. Before Katya can question her or talk further about her musical talents, Trixie redirects the question to Ginger, who Katya almost forgot was there at all while she was lost observing Trixie.
“I’m a singer too actually, and an actor, I do musical theater,” Ginger answers.
Trixie perks up at that, sitting up a bit straighter as she excitedly responds, “Oh I love musical theater! What shows have you been in?”
Katya tunes out the rest of their conversation, instead focusing on the fact that the two most important people in her life are getting along, and her fears from earlier in the day are thankfully not coming true. She gets lost in her own head again, thinking about how her friends are becoming friends and how she couldn’t be more thrilled. She also feels a little stupid, of course Ginger and Trixie would bond over musical theater, how could she not have thought of that. Katya doesn’t tune back into the conversation until she feels Trixie grab her arm excitedly and say, “right Katya?”
“Sorry, what?” Katya asks, completely oblivious to anything the two just talked about. It’s not her fault she doesn’t like musical theater, they should both know she wouldn’t follow their conversation.
“I was just telling Ginger that we watched Rocky Horror together and you liked it, Ginger said she didn’t believe me,” Trixie replies.
“Oh yeah that movie was wild,” Katya responds, tethering herself back to the moment so she can be present in the conversation. She actually did like Rocky Horror, but she is certain that at least part of the reason she liked it at all was the way Trixie knew all the words to the songs and sang along unabashedly. Her enthusiasm for the film was palpable and she couldn’t help but get swept up in her enthusiasm.
Ginger looks at Katya with a surprised expression, “I thought you hated musical theater, you have never once agreed to watch a musical with me,” she accuses Katya pointedly.
“But none of the musicals you want me to watch have sexy crossdressers and aliens in them,” Katya fires back. Ginger just narrows her eyes at Katya, not believing that was the reason she would watch a musical with Trixie and not her.
“You didn’t shut up about Frank N. Furter for weeks,” Trixie groans.
Katya grins and wiggles around in her seat, “how could I, did you see all that eroticism?” Trixie just groans again and rolls her eyes.
The rest of their meal goes in much the same way, Trixie and Katya getting wrapped up in each other, while Ginger just watches on, confused and intrigued by the way Katya is behaving toward Trixie.
They finished their food a little while ago, but stuck around to enjoy each other’s company a little longer. Trixie eventually asks Katya to scoot out of the booth so she can get up to use the bathroom. Katya lets her out of the booth before she scoots back into the booth that suddenly feels very big and empty without Trixie’s grounding warmth next to her.
Ginger and Katya sit in silence for a few seconds, Ginger observing the way Katya watches Trixie walk away from the table.
“You know you could’ve just told me you were dating her, right?” Ginger asks.
Katya lets her eyes linger on Trixie’s retreating form for a second before they snap to meet Ginger’s, registering what she just asked.
“Who am I dating?” Katya questions back, trying to catch up on something that she clearly missed.
“Trixie, obviously.” Ginger responds like it’s a fact, and not a speculation that came out of absolutely nowhere.
Katya just sputters repeatedly, “What, what, what?”
Katya thinks back through the day, wondering what Ginger possibly could have picked up on that would make her think she is dating Trixie. They get along well and make each other laugh, but so do lots of other people that she is just friends with.
“Come on Katya, I know you, I love you,” Ginger sighs.
“Yeah you do,” Katya interrupts, “and you know that I don’t lie to you. ”
They sit there staring at each other for a few seconds, Katya trying to stand her ground, and Ginger looking for any sign that Katya is lying.
“Alright, whatever you say,” Ginger relents after finding nothing but conviction in Katya’s stare.
Katya leaves the conversation at that, but she can’t seem to stop wondering what gave Ginger the impression that her and Trixie are more than just friends. Before she can think too hard about it, Trixie returns to the table, bringing Katya’s good mood back with her and making her forget about Ginger’s mistake.