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The notes of Yasha's guitar drift quietly along on the soft breeze of the evening air, the defiant last stand of October's final hours giving way to the seeping chill of November, sending a small shiver through her bones.
The mournful wails of the sirens from the passing ambulances on their way to the hospital a couple blocks over echo hauntingly through the room and Yasha's gaze flicks to Beau's still form, nestled quietly beneath the blankets of her bed, one hand curled possessively around the fabric of Yasha's pants in a sleep slackened grip.
The room is quiet otherwise, save for Beau's soft breaths puffing quietly beside her and the gentle notes of the guitar as her fingers coax them from the strings.
Yasha's gaze roves over the bruise blackening Beau's eye, the old halloween mask that it's been hiding behind all evening now discarded on the pillow, the nearly empty bottle of wine Beau's been nursing all night.
Her doorbell had rang just after nine, a little late to be any of the kids from the neighborhood, and Yasha's brows had furrowed as she grabbed the bowl of candy and made her way to the door anyway.
She'd swung it open and immediately cocked an eyebrow at the sight of the familiar form on her doorstep, face hidden away behind an old halloween mask.
"Trick or treat?" Beau had asked playfully, but Yasha could hear the faint strain in her voice.
She wondered if anyone else would have been able to. Beau had always been good at hiding her pain. But never from Yasha.
Never from Yasha.
She doesn't quite know if that's on Beau or her.
"What're you doing here?" She'd asked, cocking her head to the side and studying the woman before her with soft eyes.
"Mm... Jester 'n Fjord went to some party and I didn't feel like third wheeling for the night." She mumbled, not entirely the truth, "I can get lost if you've got other plans though."
"I don't." Yasha answered softly.
"Cool." A grin. Faint. Relief and nervousness somehow all rolled into one. "So. Trick or treat then?" A genuine question this time.
"Treat." She'd murmured, powerless to stop the small smile that slipped across her lips as Beau pulled a pair of wine bottles out from behind her back.
"I was hoping you'd say that."
It's the first time they've seen each other longer than a few fleeting moments in passing or without the presence of another one of their friends since that night a week and a half ago when Beau had called Yasha in the middle of work to ask her if she could come pick her up from some dingy bar on the outskirts of the city.
Beau had looked a lot worse then.
Now, sleeping peacefully under the covers of Yasha's bed, all that's left of the myriad of cuts and bruises that had once completely covered her face are the remnants of a slowly fading black eye and a couple faded scrapes above her eyebrow.
She'd been doing her damnedest to avoid Yasha since that night. And normally Yasha would be content to play along, allow them both to pretend it was something less than it was, just another "oh that Beauregard" moment they could awkwardly avoid until it no longer felt weird to pretend like it never happened.
But something about that night had been different. Something had shifted as Beau had sat on the counter of Yasha's bathroom, Yasha tending her wounds and talking herself down from a rage she hadn't felt in a long time.
She knew Beau would eventually show up on her doorstep. Allow Yasha to pick gently at the yellowing scab over a wound she so desperately wants to hide. Trust her to attempt to heal it in whatever small way she can. Jester and Caduceus have always been the "Healers" of the group, it's never been Yasha's strong suit. Nurturing. But there's something to her unique and quiet brand of care that Beau seeks out whenever her wounds are too deep for Jester or Caduceus to understand.
And so Yasha knew she'd come to her when she was ready. It just had to be on Beau's time. So she waited.
She's always been good at waiting.
Especially for Beau.
She doesn't think it's something many others in her life have afforded her.
October's final countdown marches on, Yasha's fingers picking out a steady kind of tune as her mind wanders over the events of the last few weeks. Her thoughts circle like vultures, continuously returning to the same place no matter how many times she sets them off on other flight paths.
She doesn't want to think about it.
The anger she'd felt (still feels) upon seeing Beau's face, her bruises. It had flooded thick and heady in her veins and Yasha had seen red as she fought keep herself calm, prevent herself from stomping right out the door and off into the night to find the people who had done this.
She'd tended Beau's cuts with a storm rolling underneath her skin, a barely contained rage she knew had been making Beau anxious, and had only managed to reign herself in and tuck that anger aside for later inspection once the emotions Beau had been working so hard to control had finally cracked, and tears had begun to slip down her crumbling face.
Later that night, nestled under the covers of Yasha's bed, standing sentinel over Beau's sleeping form tucked protectively into her side, Yasha's mind had finally returned to prod at those carefully tucked away emotions.
It had scared her. How angry she'd been. But it wasn't the anger itself that had shaken her. It was that it had come from a place of love. To love Beau so much that she was so willing to cause someone else so much harm. To love Beau so much she wanted to cause someone, anyone, all the pain Beau had been made to feel and then some.
It's a mixture of emotions she hadn't experienced in a long time. A feeling she'd nearly grown unfamiliar with. She'd felt it after Molly. Beating herself bloody against the walls of the room they'd thrown her into the moment she'd started screaming.
She'd felt it with Zuala. The way she found herself powerless to keep from drowning in it after her wife had taken her final breath. Zuala had always been good at that. Reconciling the love and violence that both ran so deep in Yasha, their roots twisted and intertwined. Zuala had always soothed that ache. Nurturing gentleness where there was once so much anger.
It'd taken her a long time after Zuala's passing, to realize that it didn't have to be either/or.
Protective.
That's what Molly had called it.
It doesn't have to be a bad thing, he'd said. Not if you choose to use it for something good.
She'd liked that.
Thinks Zuala would have liked it too.
Protective.
So Yasha protects.
But she doesn't know what to do with Beau.
There's a self destructiveness in Beau she can't protect her from. She could drive back out to that bar, find those guys who had hurt her, and beat them until the rage finally seeped from raw and broken knuckles. But it wouldn't solve anything. There would always be another bar. There would always be another fight. There will always be another night spent crying on the countertop of Yasha's bathroom as long as Beau keeps looking for it.
All Yasha can do is try to protect her from herself.
Whether that be answering her call in the middle of work. Leaving her shift to pick Beau up from a bar halfway across the city. Tending her wounds under the too bright lights of her bathroom. Holding her while she cries and says she can't apologize for something that she's going to do again. Tucking her into a bed that isn't hers, against a body she doesn't belong to, once she's tired herself out, and watching over her while she sleeps. Pretending to be asleep as she sneaks out with the dawn the next morning in an attempt to hide her shame. And waiting for her to show up however much later on Yasha's doorstep with a couple bottles of wine and a mask to allow her a sense of anonymity as she seeks penitence for the lingering wounds of a past she's still trying to heal from.
"D'you ever wish you could be someone else?" Beau had asked her eventually as they sat on her couch, half drunk on nearly empty wine bottles, picking through the remains of the Halloween candy, the screams from some old monster movie filling the silence they're both so desperate to hide from.
She mulled it over for a moment, weighing her answer against the answer Beau needed to hear, "sometimes. Yes."
"What would you be?" She'd asked quietly, "If you could be anything else, anything in the world, what would you be?"
"I don't know," Yasha had whispered, "I don't know that there's anything else I'd want to be right now."
"C'mon, Yash." Beau had murmured, pulling away, just enough to lower the mask that had been sitting at the top of her head down to cover her face once again. Hiding the lingering bruises and glassy eyes leftover from the wine, "It's Halloween. That's the point of Halloween isn't it? You can be anything."
"I'd be a better person." She eventually murmured after a moment of thought.
"Hm." Beau had chuffed, not quite a laugh, nodding thoughtfully, "Yeah. I'd be a better daughter. And a better sister. A better roommate. A better friend. Someone who doesn't fuck up all the time and run from her problems and generally make everyone around her more miserable just for being in her presence."
"I think you're already all of those things." Yasha had whispered, studying the old mask, envisioning the face behind it. Free of bruises. Soft. Content. Safe. The face she wants so desperately to see on Beau.
There's an honesty to Beau like this. Uninhibited. Hidden. Aching. Yasha knows Beau in that moment would have told her anything she asked.
And that's why she didn't.
Beau had fallen asleep not long after that.
Beau's phone lights up briefly on the bed between them now and Yasha's eyes glance from her sleeping form to watch as October finally gives way to November, her fingers finally stilling against her guitar.
She sighs, gently pulling herself free from Beau's light grip, puts her guitar away, moves Beau's discarded mask to the nightstand, shoots off a quick reply to Jester, letting her know Beau's safe.
Flicking off the lamp, she settles in beside Beau, watches the gentle rise and fall of her deep even breathing for a minute as she feels her own eyes growing heavy.
"I'd be someone who could protect you." She whispers, reaching out to tuck a wayward strand of hair behind Beau's ear, fingertips lingering so light above the shadow of the bruise still marring her cheek, "from anyone who would wish to cause you harm. Physical... and emotional. Even when that means it's you, yourself. I'd be someone who could protect you."
Another siren echoes hauntingly around the room as another ambulance goes rushing to the hospital.
She falls asleep not long after that.