Chapter Text
The relationship’s perfect. It’s perfect, or so Ingrid tells herself. There’s nothing wrong, so it must be perfect. There’s an absence of imperfection.
She isn’t even sure it’s a relationship, anyway. They’re seeing each other, but they haven’t had the talk yet. It’s been two months…
It’s been two months. Ingrid wonders why they haven’t had the talk yet. She really likes Mercedes, and she knows Mercedes really likes her, so what’s stopping them? Ingrid’s mind races in a million different directions, and she settles on one destination:
Is she a kept woman?
.
“Surely not ,” Dorothea gasps. “What kind of person has a kept woman these days?”
“I don’t know man,” Ingrid grumbles, letting out a sigh laced with exasperation. “What else could it be? That she’s in the mafia? Sweet Mercie? I don’t think so.”
“I guess, ” Dorothea relents after a few moments, “but like… you? Who would want you as a kept woman?”
“Hey!”
A throw pillow lands squarely on Dorothea’s face, and they laugh it off.
(But the issue doesn’t leave Ingrid’s mind even for a second.)
.
Ends of dates always go like this: Ingrid says she had a good time. Mercedes says so, too. Ingrid will ask: your place or mine? Mercedes will laugh, and with a sheepish smile, answer your place, mine’s a mess.
(Once or twice, sure, Ingrid understands, but every single time? How messy is Mercedes’ place?)
“What, is she a hoarder?” Dorothea asks, putting her tea back down on the table.
“I mean, I don’t think so?”
“Does it matter if she is, though?”
“Um. I don’t know. Depends on how bad the problem is, I guess.”
Dorothea takes another sip of tea, not knowing what else to say. There’s really nothing to say: Ingrid knows she’d still like Mercedes a lot, and she knows that Dorothea knows this, and so they drop the topic. There are other things to discuss.
(Like Dorothea’s weekend getaway with a new girl.)
.
“I heard a guy’s voice on the phone the other day.”
“Just talk to her, dude.”
.
Ingrid doesn’t know why she’s so nervous: she’s been on the phone with Mercedes late into the night countless times before, and this is no different. She fidgets with the ring on her finger, taking it off, playing with it in the palm of her hand, and slides it back onto her ring finger.
“— this weekend would be nice, I think,” comes Mercedes’ voice from the other end of the line.
“Huh?”
“Hey, are you spacing out, sweetheart? It’s getting late, I guess we should sleep,” Mercedes remarks with a small laugh.
“Yeah—”
There’s a sound of a door slamming open. There’s a high-pitched squeak. There’s a high-pitched whine. There’s a high-pitched voice: “Mommy, Emile won’t let me play games with him!”
Mercedes whispers a sharp and hurried, “I have to go, sorry Ingrid,” into the phone and just like that the call ends.
Ingrid doesn’t know what bothers her the most: the lack of pet name or the childish cadence of the high-pitched voice, or that name… Emile.
She gets so lost in thought she doesn’t hear her phone vibrating on her night stand an hour later. She goes to sleep with a frazzled mind and a frazzled heart.
.
“I owe you an explanation,” Mercedes sits next to Ingrid and hands her a cup of coffee. No milk, two sugars. Steaming hot, so she has time to sit back and just think.
Ingrid has a small smile on her face. “You remembered,” she whispers, sounding a little in awe.
“Of course I do,” Mercedes replies. Ingrid can’t see her face but she can hear the smile in Mercedes’ voice.
“I like you so much,” Ingrid admits. “I like you a lot, and being a hoarder in the mafia won’t change that.”
“I’m— my Ingrid. The mafia?”
“I don’t know, Mercie, what else could it be?”
When Mercedes laughs, it’s the best sound she’s ever heard in her life. Ingrid wills herself to look up, and oh, Mercedes is the most beautiful sight she’s ever seen. The weather’s getting cold, cold enough for Mercedes to need an oversized jumper, and she warms her hands on the sides of her cup of tea.
(She wonders what Mercedes would look like in her green jumper.)
“See that girl right there?” Mercedes asks, pointing a finger at a nearby child, blonde hair past her shoulders, with bangs, playing with a much older and taller boy who has his long hair tied up in a ponytail. “That’s my baby.”
“Your—”
“Yes.”
“— Baby?”
Ingrid almost faints.
Mercedes is a mother? What does that make her then? A step-mother? She’s much too young to have children. Her world collapses in on itself. She wonders what to say. She wonders what to do.
(She doesn’t figure it out, so she does the next best thing: excuse herself and run away.)