Work Text:
Caitlyn Kiramman's favorite place in the world used to be the massive bay window on the north facing wall of her bedroom. The space was piled high with the most comfortable blankets and pillows she owned and she'd often passed hours reading a book or simply staring out into the expansive backyard, dappled with gardens, topiaries, and a pool.
Her fresh new living space lacked any of those things, as it was sandwiched into the third floor with five other apartments. No wide window, no backyard, no gardens, topiaries, or pools. Just a sitting room, bedroom, and kitchen. Just Caitlyn and her thoughts.
The adjustment had been difficult.
She had grown up in the manor, then found her own place as a police officer, before jumping back to her parents. The new apartment was different from both of those places with its leaky faucets, rattling pipes, and inconsistent air conditioning. Her fingers found walls where the paint chipped and her weight on the floorboards sent loud creaks into the air. The sounds of the neighbors were ever present and shook at her windows when she tried to sleep.
Worst of all, there was no pool. The sinks and her standing shower were her only opportunity to luxuriate in water for any length of time and her water bill quickly shut that down. For a few minutes every day, she would close her eyes and imagine a pair of hands with the water, earning a sense of calm and deep breath that fell away when she opened her eyes again.
It was a delicate balance between keeping herself afloat and drowning.
So she threw herself headlong into work.
“Great job on the last one, Caitlyn,” a coworker said as they walked by her cubicle.
Caitlyn only had a moment to mumble a “thank you,” caught off guard as she was. She blinked away the computer screen from her eyes and had just enough time to watch the person round the corner, the rest of the office filtering into sharp focus.
Of course that could only last so long. An hour to be precise.
Her phone burst to life on her desk, vibrating with a call as her mother's name flashed onto the screen. She answered with a sigh.
“Good morning, mother.” The phone was balanced carefully on her shoulder to keep her hands free for further typing.
“Good morning. Your father wanted to try and make Brisket this weekend and we thought you might like to join us. Do you have plans this weekend?” her mother asked.
Her tone fishtailed at the end, betraying an ulterior motive. In the weeks since the deterioration of Caitlyn's relationships, her mother had made a concentrated effort to bridge the gap between the two of them while also trying to present opportunities for Vi and Caitlyn to maybe bridge the gap. However, the first time Caitlyn accepted and kept her eyes open for pink on the patio, she was alarmed to find blue instead. Jinx had taken over the service of the Kiramman pool without a word.
Caitlyn didn't leave her room for the rest of the day.
“Sure. I can be there. No plans,” she answered.
She stopped looking for pink when she went home.
“Fantastic. Have a good rest of your week, dear.” The call ended and Caitlyn sighed, dropping her chin into her palm. Her fingers thoughtlessly tapped at her keyboard and the next thing she knew, the Lane Pool Services group photo hogged all the real estate on her screen.
Their smiles and affection for one another were easy and ingrained into the deepest recesses of her mind. She didn't have to zoom in on Vi's face to feel its full effect (she did anyway). She didn't have to stare at it for upwards of five full minutes (she did anyway). She didn't have to remember how it felt to hold or kiss her (but, obviously, she did anyway).
“She's hot.”
Caitlyn minimized the page on instinct and whipped around in her desk chair to find her red-headed co-worker smirking at her, her forearms resting on the top edge of the cubicle divider.
Sarah Fortune had been with the paper for more than a year and seemed pretty okay with her position in the company. Anyone with half a brain could tell the job was only a stop-gap for her until she made progress on her secret ambitious endeavors. Since Caitlyn had been assigned the cube next to hers, Sarah had made a habit of leaning over the top to tease, flirt, and generally disturb.
“She your crush?”
Caitlyn flushed and turned away sharply.
“No,” she bit. Vi was more than that.
“Right, because normal people zoom in, extra enhance in on pictures of people they have no feelings for. My second guess: an ex?”
There was no stopping the hunch of her shoulders or the redness that climbed up her neck, traitorously exposed by her ponytail. Sarah laughed.
“Please drop it.” The teasing was veering into painful territory that Caitlyn didn't have the energy to deal with. She just wanted to get back to her terrible apartment and…and what?
“Ah,” Sarah said, her voice softer than before, “someone you didn't want to be an ex.” A shrill phone rang a few cubicles down. “You doing anything to fix that besides staring longingly at her work picture?”
Caitlyn scoffed and pulled up a document to pretend she was working.
“Are you doing anything to find a better job?” She snapped back.
“Oh! Right for the heart!” Sarah didn't sound too torn up. “Sweetheart, I'm always hustling, you don't have to worry about me. If you want help with your woman or anything else, just let me know.”
The insinuation was heavy handed and Caitlyn might have had the capacity to be more embarrassed if she weren't already mortified at being caught. For the rest of the day, she kept her nose buried in her work, making calls, answering emails, writing drafts. She left no room for stray thoughts of red hair or teasing smirks.
On the bus home, she watched the city fly by. The massive picture frame windows showed snapshots of mothers wrangling their toddlers, lovers on their way to dates, groups of friends jostling one another to erase the time between them. Each one was a living, breathing love that the world was better for having seen.
Caitlyn stepped into her empty apartment and felt bereft.
As she laid in bed, willing herself to sleep, her phone chimed with the arrival of a picture. An empty swimming pool.
&
“Fine.” Caitlyn dropped her bag unceremoniously into Sarah's desk the next morning, jarring her co-worker out of a particularly deep daydream. “Take me out.”
Sarah raised one eyebrow.
“On a date or by assassination? I can be creative with either one.”
“Just for a drink. I'm not–” Ready or interested both danced on the tip of Caitlyn's tongue, but neither skipped off the edge. “I just want a night out with a friend.”
Blue eyes bore into her and not for the first time, Caitlyn was sure Sarah was hatching some kind of plan she wouldn't know about until long after it had come to pass. Then, a smug grin.
“Sure, sweetheart. I'll take you to my favorite place tonight. Get thirsty.” She winked and turned away, leaving Caitlyn to stare blankly ahead, wondering if she'd signed up for something she wasn't ready for.
Her day was rife with least leads, dissatisfied editors, and writers block. By the time the day ended and Sarah Fortune leaned casually against the opening of her cubicle, the top buttons of her shirt unbuttoned for a brief view of her bra, Caitlyn needed out.
“Your knight in armor is here to rescue you,” Sarah grinned as Caitlyn stuffed her belongings into her messenger bag.
“Not shining armor?” Caitlyn asked when she was finished. Sarah laughed.
“Hardly. Mine's all dinged up and fourth hand. Let's get out of here.”
Caitlyn resolutely did not react to the guiding hand at the small of her back.
The bar dubbed 'Sarah's Favorite' was nautical themed, stuffed to the gills with life preservers, thick ropes, and trophy fish. The shiplap walls were cracked and faded, clearly covered in decades worth of grime. It wasn't full, but the seats that were occupied had obviously been occupied for a number of hours already.
Sarah marched to the bar like a captain of her own ship.
“This is your favorite bar?” Caitlyn asked one she caught up. Sarah hummed as she watched the bartender turn around to grab her order.
“They do sea shanties during happy hour. And, when the old guys get really drunk, they start re-enacting their days on warships.”
The bartender set a dark glass in front of Sarah and a pink one in front of Caitlyn. Interesting. It was hardly her drink of choice, whatever fruity concoction it was, but she picked it up and took a demure sip as she followed Sarah to a scuffed table by a window. Her drink stuck to the wood when she set it down and the chair wobbled as she settled her weight.
Not the kind of place Caitlyn would have chosen.
“So,” Sarah said after a long pull from her glass, “tell me about your girl.”
The fruity drink went decidedly down the wrong pipe and Caitlyn immediately spent the next minute trying to cough air back into her lungs.
“My what?” she sputtered.
“Your girl. You know, the ex you wish wasn’t an ex. I want to know about her. Is she worthy of all this moping?”
“Of course!” The defense was out of Caitlyn’s mouth before she had a chance to stop herself. Blood rushed into her face and she scowled at herself, but she felt she had to continue now that she’d started. “Vi is the greatest person I know. She is kind, funny, sincere. She only broke up with me because she thought she was hurting my relationship with my mother.”
Sarah raised an eyebrow and scoffed.
“She broke up with you because your mom didn’t like her? If I broke up with every girl whose mom didn’t like me, I’d have– well, the same number of exes, but I would have done a lot more of the breaking up.”
“No, no, it wasn’t like that,” Caitlyn argued lightly. She couldn’t stand the thought of Sarah disliking Vi for such a stupid reason. “Her own mother is gone, you see, and she didn’t want to be the one to sour my relationship with my own, even though Vi herself had very little to do with the disagreement. It was well meant and noble, though misguided.”
Wet eyes and a soft voice rang in her head.
“How are you going to get her back?” There was something sharp in Sarah’s eyes despite her quieter tone and Caitlyn frowned again.
“Nothing. She didn’t want to be with me and there was nothing I could say to change her mind,” she shot, already anticipating the eye roll she received.
“If you’re both being noble, you’re both unhappy. Noble suffering doesn't win you cosmic brownie points. It just is what it is.” Sarah’s voice was sharp, laced with hidden pains Caitlyn wasn’t privy to and, likely, never would be. There was no denying she spoke from experience.
“I’m not trying to win ‘cosmic brownie points’ or anything. I only see no reason to chase someone disinterested in being chased.”
What value was there to sacrificing her time, energy, and heart when the effort was entirely unwanted? Sarah stared her down from over the rim of her glass. Such a long moment passed that Caitlyn wondered if Sarah had finally found fault enough to determine the end of their budding friendship. Her eyes blazed in the low-light of the bar, yet her thought process remained completely clouded. Caitlyn could only try not to squirm in her seat.
All at once the ice fell away into a teasing grin.
“Probably right. Then I guess all I can do for you is get you smashed. Drink up!”
The night quickly slipped away into the bottom of a glass. Sarah paid for every drink, and even though Caitlyn had a low tolerance with how infrequently she drank, she kept pace with Sarah who obviously had a much higher tolerance. It meant that she quickly dissolved into a giggly mess, half leaning onto Sarah’s shoulder for support.
“She sends me pictures, you know,” Caitlyn said as she polished off another drink. Sarah’s eyebrows shot into her hairline and she leaned across the table, a conspiratorial grin stretching over her face.
“Oh, pictures you say?” She waggled her eyebrows for good measure.
“Yes! I got one last night, see? I never know what to think of them, but I started the whole thing first, so maybe I should have thought about why I was doing it before I sent it.” Caitlyn rambled unwittingly as she unlocked her phone and held up the text thread with her ex. Sarah’s grin faded quickly when she realized there wasn’t a single sexy thing about it. The thread was empty besides a picture of pools from both participants. More questions than answers.
“Yeah,” she grumbled, “couldn’t tell you what that means.”
But she didn’t hand back the phone and flipped across to a different application. Caitlyn’s eyes were too blurry to focus on the details. Then, Sarah threw an arm around her shoulders, held up the phone, and pressed a raspberry to her cheek. It caught her so off-guard that she couldn’t help but laugh and press a hand to her shoulder.
“I think–” Caitlyn held out her hand for her phone, burped a little, and nodded gratefully when she received the device back. “I still want her. That’s what I mean by it. She is so…so…good a person. When we first met, I nearly cracked her in the head with a hand-held vacuum!”
“A vacuum!” Sarah mused, leaning in on her elbows.
“A vacuum! Yes! And she laughed at me and looked at me with these big gooey eyes and I don’t think I stood a chance after that.”
Caitlyn’s mood plummeted. The smile fell out of her voice and her brows knit together. Her blue eyes floated far away, riding a river of memories and feelings that threatened to sink her if she wasn’t careful. But she wasn’t careful. She was five drinks deep and thinking about the relationship she hadn’t wanted to end. Tears formed on the ends of her eyelashes before she was even aware she’d shed them.
“Okay,” Sarah announced, rising to her feet, “I think it’s time you get home before you say or do something stupid, like calling her.”
Caitlyn gasped.
“I could call her!”
“Nope!”
It was immediately clear Sarah was not out of shape. She hefted Caitlyn up by her side with ease, but Caitlyn’s superior height and drunk enthusiasm meant she had a hell of a time wrangling her to her apartment a number of blocks away. The pair staggered along the streets, passing by other rowdy participants of nightlife, many of whom could barely keep down the contents of their stomachs. All through their journey, Caitlyn babbled about the shape of Vi’s nose, the sound of her laugh, the slope of her shoulders and how much she missed her. She slumped against her front door when it was available as Sarah rooted around her pockets for keys.
Only when Caitlyn was dropped bodily into her bed did her tongue finally rest. The evening had caught up to her and the only remedy was to fully and completely pass out.
“Sleep well, Cait.”
Sarah’s voice led her to the deepest recesses of her pillow, down the rabbit hole of dreams and into a softer world.
In the softer world she weighed nothing. Her body existed in the emptiness of space, floating and drifting, untethered and free. The void around her was dotted with white specks of stars and the shifting glow of nebulae in the impossible distance.
But the void wasn’t an empty blackness, it was blue.
Beams of light speared it like the sun in a pool and Caitlyn understood. With her hair haloed around her, she shifted, turning this way and that to look for a direction, any sign of where to go. There, leagues below her feet, a planet, blue as the oceans deep, twinkled merrily. The mass was hardly more than her finger at this distance, but Caitlyn moved, putting her whole body into each concentrated effort to swim and cross the emptiness. Yet the planet never grew any closer.
Panic bubbled up in her throat. Was she doomed to this one spot? Was her existence pinned to looking from afar and yearning to touch the world and breathe its air? Was she stuck? This couldn’t–
Caitlyn shot to wakefulness at the insistent beeping of her phone. She slapped a hand over it and breathed a sigh of relief when her bedroom fell quiet. Morning sunlight streamed through her windows and the scratchiness of her work clothes grated against her skin. The busy street outside buzzed with life that didn’t care for her hangover or the way her heart thumped loudly in her chest. She sighed.
The world was right where she left it; under her feet. Her phone was still under her hand so she turned it to look at the screen and promptly froze. Six separate notifications from Jinx and one from Ekko didn’t disappear when she blinked. Ekko’s was easiest so she opened that first.
Today, 12:32am
when did you get a girlfriend?
Caitlyn blinked again. A girlfriend? She opened Jinx’s.
Yesterday, 11:09pm
the fuck
who is that
how long have u been fucking her
y do u need to flaunt it in her face
r u dating her
the lighting is terrible in tht pic
What. Picture? What picture? What girlfriend? What was going on? All seven notifications had come through the same app and Caitlyn tabbed over to her own profile to look for any new posts. There was nothing on her wall since she’d started dating Vi (and she hadn’t had the heart to delete any of them either) but there was a colorful ring around her profile picture to indicate a new story.
She tapped it and a picture popped of her and Sarah in the bar from the previous night. Caitlyn’s face was flushed and laughing as – most damningly – Sarah pressed a firm kiss to her cheek. There was a sticker in the corner of three animated hearts. The lighting was bad.
Swimming and struggling and not moving and –
The panic from the dream returned.
She swiped over to Ekko’s conversation first.
Today, 10:48am
She’s not my girlfriend! Just a coworker
Then Jinx’s.
Today, 10:49am
She isn’t my girlfriend, we are NOT in ANY kind of relationship, she’s just a coworker. She took the picture and posted it without my knowledge. I’m not trying to flaunt anything.
Caitlyn collapsed back against her pillows. So Sarah had posted something to force a change. Caitlyn being dissatisfied but content in her situation wasn’t good enough for someone who was always on the move with her own goals. With a sigh, she tabbed back over to the story and looked at the list of users who had seen it and sure enough, Vi’s username (vi_olent) was second.
Fuck.
Today, 10:54am
oh ok you might want to tell red that
Ekko’s text was succinct and clear and gave Caitlyn a whole new set of fears. She was hardly close with Sarah outside of her coworker’s casual annoyance at work, but she had come to rely on it as her only real source of socialization. Her own friendships were few in numbers and once Vi– well, after everything, the friends she’d made didn’t want to interact with their best friend’s ex. Understandable for sure, but still hurtful. To lose Sarah would just be another painful jab.
Today, 11:01am
k
Jinx’s response was enough to make Caitlyn groan and bury her face in her pillow. She knew how close Jinx and Vi were and if anyone was going to give Vi a worse impression of the previous evening, there was no one better suited than Jinx.
There was nothing for it. However the sisters chose to interpret the picture, Caitlyn couldn’t change their minds one way or the other. She had told Jinx the truth and that was all she could do.
Demoralized and grumpy, Caitlyn pulled herself from bed and set about cleaning herself up for her promised trip to her parents’ house. She loaded up a small backpack of necessities and shifted her car to life. Her mind wandered during the drive, never stuck in traffic like she was, and miles away in realities that never happened. She was almost caught off guard when she pulled into the driveway and put her car in park. Her mother met her at the front door and pulled her into a tight hug, hoping she could convey the things she wouldn’t say.
“Your father is at the shop. He was missing a few things for dinner tonight. Please relax.” Her mother moved out of her way and gestured inside, allowing for Caitlyn to step out of the summer heat and into the air con.
The house was exactly as she’d left it, full of old antique paintings pinned to the walls and priceless sculptures on custom shelving. A new one caught her eye as she set her backpack down by the stairs. It was a painting in a gilded frame. The paints were layered so thickly that they almost looked 3D, as if each ocean wave were cresting before her eyes and were going to crash right through the frame to drench her. A tiny boat in the distance bobbed in the great waves, on the verge of disappearing.
“Where did this come from?” Caitlyn asked breathlessly.
It felt like something she couldn’t afford to feel.
“Jayce dropped it off. He saw it at an auction and said it reminded him of us.”
Caitlyn stared at it. And stared. And stared.
“It’s nice,” she mumbled absently, feeling anything but honest.
The afternoon progressed, Caitlyn’s father returned, gathered her into a tight hug, and her parents talked all about the upcoming party they were hosting, but Caitlyn was never present for more than five minutes. Her mind kept slipping back to the painting and who it made her think about and how annoyed she was with herself that things were over and done and wasn’t it time she should start to move on?
Eventually she got so fed up with her own wallowing that she excused herself from the living room and slipped out the back door to the pool and promptly froze. The one place she expected to be utterly alone and bright hair and brighter eyes blinked back at her, neatly wrapped in an ugly beige polo.
“And here I thought you were gone from here, yeesh.” Jinx rolled her eyes and gave the pool skimmer in her hands a particularly vicious jerk into the trash bag.
“Sorry,” Caitlyn apologized instinctively, “I wasn’t aware you’d be here. I just wanted to get away from my parents for a moment.”
“As long as you don’t get in my way, I don’t care where you are.”
The patio went quiet. Jinx trailed the edge of the pool, pulling out leaves and bugs (and one frog) as Caitlyn sat in one of the pool chairs, silently taking in the shape of someone who was just too lanky, a few inches too short, and far more languid than she was hoping for.
It might have been easier if that was all there was, but there were things that did ring true.
The crease between her eyes as she focused on reading a small pH number, the concentrated shake of her shoulders when she finished a task, the stubborn set of her jaw as she waited for the perfect moment to say something.
“So you’re fucking this girl.”
Caitlyn’s face flushed instantly.
“No! I’m not in any kind of relationship with anyone.” She ignored Jinx’s disbelieving snort. “Sarah is a coworker and we are just friends. I just wanted someone to laugh with. My social life has been rather…bereft as of late,” she sighed.
It was the truth. Jinx cocked an eyebrow and twisted her lips into a cartoonish frown, but Caitlyn could see some of the tension fall out of her shoulders.
“‘Friends’, sure. You let all your friends kiss you like that?” It might have hurt if it weren’t so pointedly untrue.
“She caught me by surprise. And it was just on the cheek.” She leveled Jinx with a heavy stare, willing all of her sincerity into a tangible connection that couldn’t be ignored. “I have no interest in anyone but one right now, and I’m not going to bark up a tree when it is decidedly unwanted.”
Caitlyn flopped back into the pool chair. The plastic weaving was hot to the touch in the summer heat and scalded her skin when her arm touched it, but she didn’t jerk away stiffly. She would get used to the sting in only a few minutes and Jinx was someone who looked for those weaknesses. There was no room to show more vulnerability than she already had. Would Jinx run home after her shift and laugh loudly about how Caitlyn hadn’t moved on? Would she laugh at Caitlyn’s moony eyes and sad mouth? Would she give away the confidential information that the pool patio was Caitlyn’s sacred hideaway, the place she felt safest?
‘Yes’ and ‘no’ were equally terrifying responses.
“Are you mad? At her, I mean. I’m sure you’re pissed about stuff all the time. You look like someone who’s always angry about something.” Jinx dropped the skimmer back onto its hooks on the wooden fence.
“No, even though I should be. It was inappropriate of her to take my phone and make a post–”
“No dumbass.” Caitlyn’s jaw clicked shut and Jinx rolled her eyes. “Vi. Are you mad at Vi?”
Mad? In all fairness, Caitlyn had never really considered it. She was so struck by her own despair that anger had never really factored into it. Was she mad? Maybe a little. Vi had made a decision for her without asking based on a presumption and that wasn’t what relationships should be. If she was nervous about getting in the way of Caitlyn and her mother’s relationship, that conversation should not have been the first time she voiced them. Caitlyn was certainly upset. But mad?
“A little, I suppose. I wish she’d talked about her fears and told me what she was feeling before it became an issue, but I also understand her thinking and where she is coming from. I don’t think I was ever really mad.”
It’s almost a baffling epiphany for her to come to. Weeks of a broken heart and not once did she actually blame Vi.
When she looked up, Jinx was staring at her, the crease between her eyes prominent as she chewed on her lip. There was some comfort to be found in the knowledge that she didn’t seem to know what to make of that either.
“You’re both fuckin’ weird,” she grumbled.
The conversation had reached a clear end and Caitlyn didn’t press. She pulled her legs up into the chair and tucked her knees under her chin, listening to the shifting movement of the water as it formed its own patterns and succumbed to the will of Jinx’s instruments. She closed her eyes and felt weightless in their rhythm.
When she woke up from her impromptu nap an indeterminate amount of time later, Jinx was gone and her mother was sliding the door open.
“Caitlyn dear, dinner is ready. Please come in,” she said, already slipping back into the comfort of the air con.
The conversation with Jinx followed her for the next week. It rang in her ears and rattled behind her eyes. Her hands would come to a slow stop over her computer keyboard at work to register what exactly she’d said and heard. All that time and she reached no conclusions. No picture slid into her messages those first few days after Sarah’s post, but on Friday morning she awoke to Vi’s pool, lit only by the underwater lights and surrounded by the darkness of night.
It was a sigh of relief she carried with her the rest of the day. She hadn't fucked up irreparably without even knowing she'd fucked up.
“You’re damn near glowing today, something fun happening tonight?”
Caitlyn turned at her desk chair to find Sarah leaning over the top edge of the cubicle, her elbows completely off the edge and dangling as her hands supported her chin. There was mischief in her eyes and Caitlyn could smell the trick question from down the corridor.
“No, nothing fun. Just in a good mood,” she answered. That was apparently the trap, since Sarah grinned devilishly.
“Great, then we'll continue your good mood at the bar tonight. I wanted to try a new place.” She flashed her pearly whites and ducked out of view back into her own workspace.
For a full thirty seconds afterwards, Caitlyn stared blankly into the space Sarah vacated. A bar? Tonight? The previous week had been full of anxiety about the LAST bar outing, worried she’d ruined everything even more than it already was. And Sarah wanted to go out again?
Well, Caitlyn just wouldn’t drink a lot. Or let Sarah within five feet of her.
That would save her from any mishaps, right?
Right?
She spent the rest of the day in a nervous jitter. Her body and mind felt paralyzed by the possibility of something else going wrong, by messing something up. So much so that one of her bosses came by and asked why she hadn’t sent him the draft he’d asked for. She hadn’t so much as started it. The article provided an adequate distraction however, and she’d finally sent the draft out when Sarah leaned in her doorway with mischief on her mind.
The bar was a lot more crowded than Sarah’s previous choice.
Music could be heard bumping even from the outside, all thumping bass that reverberated in her organs, and Caitlyn was sure her throat would be sore from screaming to be heard. People milled about on the curb with cigarettes and the thick smoke slipped into Caitlyn’s nose and lungs and there was no stopping her face from scrunching in distaste.
She carefully stepped around them to stay at Sarah’s side as they strolled up to the bouncer. He barely glanced over their IDs and waved them through the door.
The inside was not what she was expecting. The music was loud, sure, but it wasn’t oppressive, with conversation and laughter overpowering any beat. People were scattered aimlessly through the massive, wood paneled room that opened up at its back to an open outdoor patio area, warmed by the sun and cooled by a pair of massive fans.
Sarah pulled Caitlyn through the crowd, dodging bodies and carelessly held drinks through the stuffy heat of too many people in a space. The first breath of fresh air into Caitlyn’s lungs was a relief.
“What do you want?” Sarah asked as she dropped Caitlyn’s hand and led the way to the bar at the back of the yard.
“Whiskey please.” There was no small satisfaction in watching Sarah’s eyebrows shoot into her hairline and her lips twist into delighted surprise. “What? You didn’t ask last time.”
Sarah nodded. “On that you are correct. It’s on me.” She tucked herself into a vacant space between a small crowd of chattering patrons and Caitlyn slotted in next to her.
The drinks came quickly enough and Caitlyn let the whiskey seep into her nerves and relax them. Sarah’s complaints about their coworkers and bosses were funny enough that the burdens on her head and heart melted, allowing her to enjoy herself more than she had all week. She watched impressions and listened to stories and laughed at jokes. All the while, her body felt warmed by the sinking sun and cooled by overhanging trees that casted wide nets of shade over the yard.
“Sarah! Hey!”
Caitlyn paused mid-word in some story about her previous police job to catch a burly man with dark skin, buzzed hair, and scars through both of his eyebrows waving genially at Sarah as he approached from the other side of the yard. A number of his companions whipped their heads around and grinned at the sight of red hair.
“Rafen, hey,” she returned easily once he was close enough. He threw an arm over her shoulder.
“Tryin’ out a new place without us?” he laughed with a surreptitious glance at Caitlyn. She didn’t miss it.
“I have other friends too. Caitlyn, this is Rafen, my best friend. Rafen, Caitlyn’s my cubicle buddy at work.” She gestured between them as they shook hands politely.
“Nice to meet you. Sarah, Illaoi is trying to convince us she was on the run from the cops for a year. You have to tear her apart.” Rafen was already backing away towards the friends he’d left, an insistent hand on Sarah’s shoulder.
The conflicting emotions were clear in Sarah’s eyes. She so obviously wanted to tear down this Illaoi, to put the fear of god in her at the sight of red hair, but Sarah’s eyes flickered to Caitlyn and her lips twisted in discomfort. So Caitlyn made the choice for her.
“Go, I won’t miss you. I have my drink.” She raised her glass a little off the bar top and watched the indecision sink away.
“I’ll be right back, sweetheart,” Sarah promised with a wink, slipping out of her spot at the bar and following Rafen to their pack of friends. Caitlyn laughed at the way her walk became something more sinister and threatening and turned to face the bar completely. She didn’t need to see a man eviscerated.
Instead, she chose to lose herself in the feeling of the gentle breeze, the late summer heat, and the barrage of happy voices. All around her, people were enjoying their nights, living their lives how best suited them in that moment, and finding pleasure in the simple act of appreciating someone’s company. Caitlyn was content with that.
She opened her eyes and took a sip from her glass, letting her gaze wander down the line of the bar and promptly froze.
Blinking back at her in abject shock (that Caitlyn felt in her core) was Vi.
There was nothing different about her. Still the tattoos, still the hair, still those wonderful eyes and Caitlyn couldn’t decide whether she should be relieved or distraught that seemingly nothing had changed. That the time had no toll on the body, like this Vi could have existed concurrently to their relationship and it would have all been the same.
At the corner of the bar, Vi’s hand gave a small jerky wave.
The whole thing was so absurd and ridiculous that Caitlyn couldn’t help but sputter a laugh. It was awkward! Vi had broken up with her only a handful of weeks before! She raised her own hand in a similarly small wave and it seemed to strike Vi just as stupidly. Her face blossomed into a wide grin as she ducked her face to hide her laugh.
It really was unfair to look at her. The setting sun struck her bright hair in a contrast and set her skin in warm tones and Caitlyn’s fingertips still remembered how that felt. She looked like some sort of classical painting in a museum: the centerpiece in a room of masterpieces that she would come back and stare at, day after day, just to get lost in her colors and textures.
Vi lifted her glass, a question on her quirked eyebrow as she mouthed, ‘whiskey?’
Caitlyn nodded. It was an old favorite of hers that she didn’t often indulge in just because beer was much easier to come by. She pointed at Vi’s glass.
‘Vodka sunrise?’
She received a slow nod in return. Vi’s favorite was another one that was not usually a crowd favorite. The sweetness covered the cloying taste of alcohol and the few times Caitlyn had snuck a sip, she’d been delighted by the taste. Vi’s family often made fun of her for it since it was such an exceptionally girly drink, but she stood by it.
Caitlyn tilted her head, asking, ‘alone?’ This time Vi shook her head and gestured off in a direction behind her. There, Caitlyn caught sight of blue, white, and spiky brown hair. How she could have missed three of the most boisterous individuals she’d ever known was really a feat to be proud of.
Vi tipped her chin. ‘You?’
And that was the question Caitlyn was most afraid of. Because in what world would Vi interpret her and Sarah as anything other than a date? Even if Jinx had told Vi about their conversation, who could tell for sure if she hadn’t been sardonic or dishonest? But Caitlyn was honest so she shook her head.
The amusement dropped out of Vi’s face instantly and it splashed into the lowest depths of Caitlyn’s stomach, roiling and sending waves of distaste up the back of her throat.
‘Coworker,’ she mouthed but Vi’s eyebrows pinched and she tried again. ‘Friend.’
Relief flooded her system as the intensity melted from Vi’s jaw. She nodded in hopeful understanding and bit her lip. For a long moment, they just looked at one another, taking in how they looked like they were the only two people alone in the world.
The longer the moment dragged, the more Caitlyn was convinced Vi was going to approach her, but hesitance kept her anchored to the spot.
The longer the moment dragged, the more Caitlyn hoped VI would approach her.
The longer the moment dragged, the more Caitlyn was just going to do it her damn self.
Vi pushed away from the bar and angled her body in Caitlyn’s direction and a body slipped right in front of Caitlyn’s vision.
“Caitlyn, a drink can’t keep you company if you don’t drink it,” Sarah teased as she tapped the rim of Caitlyn’s glass with her nail.
Frantic, Caitlyn struggled to see around her, looking this way and that, trying to catch a glimpse of pink. Alas, the space where she’d been was awash with brown, black, and blond hair. Her heart dropped.
“Wasn’t thirsty,” she grumbled, pushing the glass away.
“Hey.”
Her insides seized and she whirled around, greeted by the shining sight of Vi standing beside her, one hand holding her drink and the other hanging awkwardly at her side as her eyes skipped from Caitlyn to Sarah. The three of them were locked in the most neck-scratching cycle of looking from one to the other.
“You’re the ex,” Sarah announced, leaning casually against the bar.
“I’m Vi. Yeah, the ex.” God, Caitlyn had never seen her so awkward.
“Vi, this is–”
“Sarah Fortune, pleasure to meet you,” she said, holding out her hand. Her eyes were sharp and calculating and Caitlyn was sure Sarah squeezed harder than she needed to when she saw the lines in Vi’s forearm jump into sharp relief. “I work with Caitlyn.”
“Oh, cool. That’s cool.” It sure sounded less cool when she said it like that, but she shifted her attention and Sarah could have been completely gone. “How are you?” she asked in that soft voice that had been reserved for stargazing nights and kisses in door frames.
“I’m well.” Caitlyn’s tongue felt heavy and thick in her mouth. “And you?” she returned breathlessly.
“I’m good, yeah. I just wanted to check in. I’ll leave you to your night. It was good to meet you, Sarah,” she tacked on like an afterthought. Her eyes were glued to Caitlyn even as she walked away, even after the crowd swallowed her whole and she disappeared, her eyes lingered on Caitlyn’s skin like a drop of water as it fell down, down, down, down.
“Okay, yeah.” Sarah’s voice snapped her back to the present to find the red-head watching the space Vi had disappeared into. “I get it now.”
The rest of the night passed in something of a haze. Caitlyn’s brain was stuffed to the gills with the image of Vi with soft eyes at the end of the bar and the breathless way she asked how she was.
Sarah didn’t have much to say about it either, her jaw constantly jutting out in a thinking pout and her brain moved a million miles an hour. They sat, the pair of them, in a corner of the bar’s yard for the next twenty minutes, each of them trying to find a way out of their heads.
“Welp,” Sarah slapped her hands against her thighs suddenly, “I think this lovely summer day is wasted on both of us. May I walk you home?” She stood from her lawn chair and held out a hand for Caitlyn who took it without argument. She wasn’t much company either.
The pair meandered back to Caitlyn’s house, unhurried and relaxed. The sun and alcohol had done its job of mellowing them out, but there was no coming back from Vi. When they finally did come to a stop outside of Caitlyn’s building, she didn’t rush inside and Sarah didn’t sprint away. Instead they just stood there listening to the children down the block play in the street again.
Someone somewhere honked.
“I don’t think it’s over.”
Caitlyn blinked at Sarah’s blunt statement.
“You don’t?”
Sarah shook her head. “No one acts like that to someone they’re over.” She lifted her gaze from the pavement to level Caitlyn with a stern stare. “If you get a chance, take it. So few people have an opportunity to really be happy that it’d be a real shame for you to wave goodbye as you run past it. If you try again and it fails again,” she shrugged, “it was worth the try and effort.”
Caitlyn nodded.
“Thank you.”
“All in a day’s work.” The sincerity slid from Sarah’s face and the smirk she wore instead felt much truer to her features. She offered a two-finger salute and turned down the street. “See you at work, sweetheart.”
Caitlyn watched her go.
The pool picture on Caitlyn’s phone the next morning was in full blast of the morning sun, its blue as bright as ever, the tiles lining the edge more vibrant, and the patio surrounding it clean and crisp. It felt like the previous night, standing next to Vi and existing in tandem with one another, even if the conversation was short lived. There was something there to grip with both hands and hold on to.
And Caitlyn would cling to that with her last breath.
There was no guessing what it all meant outside of the obvious. Vi had wanted to talk to her at that bar and see how she was. At face value, that was all very well and good and not at all confusing.
So she threw herself headlong into other things. Her work ( she received a commendation from her boss), making her apartment feel more lived-in (she found the loveliest painting at a rummage sale), and her family’s biggest pool party of the year (she still needed her dress) all kept her sufficiently busy that her brain wasn’t fogged up any moment she paused for too long. There was always something else to look for, something else to adjust. She reveled in it.
All at once, she’d finished a backlog at work.
All at once, her apartment felt like home.
All at once, it was the night of the party and she was behind schedule.
The Kiramman house had always been the most stately home in their already outrageously expensive neighborhood. Strangers frequently walked by for the express purpose of taking a photo and posting it for proof. Most of the time, the house was majestic and understated. But when an event was planned, the house took on a new life.
Lights lined both the driveway and the hard angles of the house, each balcony was draped with a dark velvet cloth, valet drivers stood straight-backed in the entranceway to receive visitors as they arrived. Also impossible to ignore that each car the rolled up was sparkling clean and worth more than Caitlyn made at her job in two full years.
She stepped out of her own considerably less impressive car and carefully smoothed out the dress her mother had gotten for her. She liked it (the dark blues reminded her of the ocean and it was comfortable) so she felt good as she passed into the crowded foyer of her own home in search of her parents.
Caitlyn moved with practiced ease to avoid her mother's old business partners who 'just want to know how she's doing!' and politicians' sons who didn't know the first thing about her beyond the length of her skirt. All she wanted was to find her parents.
Unsuccessful inside, Caitlyn passed through the open sliding glass doors to the pool patio outside. She instantly felt better. The patio furniture had been hidden away, allowing more space for jovial voices with no hardwood or tiles to ricochet off of, making the conversation muted and less abrasive. Her parents were also easily recognizable on the other side of the patio, perfectly intertwined with her mother's jeweled gown and her father's matching suit. They were striking to behold and Caitlyn loved them for it.
As she made her way to them, she was pleased to find the guests left her alone aside from congenial nods and greetings.
“Hello, darling,” her mother said with a kiss to her cheek.
“Caitlyn! You made it!” Her father enveloped her in one of his warmest hugs. She felt it all the way down to her toes.
“I couldn't miss the party of the year. How is it so far?” Caitlyn asked, letting her eyes pass over the party-goers. There were a few she recognized from years of being dragged out of her room, but many were a newer, younger crowd; people her age finally finding a footing in their political or business aspirations. At least it introduced new life into a party that was frequented by people satisfied and emotionally secure in their positions.
“Very well, dear!” Her father’s enthusiasm was infectious. “The house has been full since this afternoon!” He beamed and gestured widely to the people crowding their home.
“I must say, however,” her mother began with a disapproving frown, “there is one guest absurdly late.” Her shrewd eyes swept over heads and didn’t find whatever detail she was looking for.
“Have faith, my love. I imagine this crowd would be nerve-wracking for anyone,” her father assured with a gentle touch to his wife’s shoulder.
Caitlyn stared at them both, puzzled.
Never in all her life had she seen them speak about someone that way. If someone was late or failed to show up to any kind of meeting, it was their own fault regardless of the circumstances. It was a way of thinking that had been deeply entrenched to Caitlyn growing up and she went out of her way to be early to every appointment in her life, no matter how trivial. For them to be on the edge of their seats waiting for one specific person? Unusual, to say the least.
“Ah! Look, see? I told you.”
Her father dipped his head in the direction of the sliding glass door and Caitlyn turned just in time to swallow her tongue.
The most Caitlyn had ever seen Vi dressed up was the beige polo she wore for her work uniform, but that was both ill fitting and distractingly colored. Outside of her work hours, Vi wore t-shirts and tank tops and cut-aways. Her shoes were never less than falling apart and her shorts were stained with chlorine and mud from her years and adventures.
But this. This was something else.
Brand new shiny dress shoes, perfectly tailored dark slacks, a pristine dress shirt with the sleeves rolled to her elbows, a gray waistcoat to pull it all together, and her freshly dyed hair combed back.
She was a vision. A vision with her powder blue eyes trained on Caitlyn.
“Hi.”
Caitlyn blinked. She and Vi stood toe to toe at the pool’s edge, Vi’s soft voice just bridging the gap.
“Hello. You look– very nice.” Caitlyn managed to swallow the lump in her throat as Vi ducked her head with a laugh.
“I got some help.”
On instinct alone, Caitlyn turned to her parents well behind her and found them watching raptly, equal parts ecstatic and fearful.
“Ah,” she said.
“Your friend Sarah, too. Said there was no way I could show up looking like a slob, or something. The vest was her idea, the shoes were mine,” Vi laughed and it was then that the nerves were instantly obvious.
Her famous tell of laughing through discomfort with darting eyes were a dead giveaway and Caitlyn devised a quick solution.
“Come with me,” she instructed, taking Vi by the wrist and leading her back through the sliding door, around the house, and up the stairs, slamming the door closed behind them.
Vi had never been in her room. It was surreal then, for Caitlyn to watch inspect each photo tacked to the walls and trail her fingers over freshly dusted surfaces. Caitlyn leaned against her bed frame with a nail in between her teeth and ignored the way Vi in her space made her stomach flip flop.
Finally, the woman came to a stop. She paused in the middle of the room, her face soft as she waited patiently to find the guts to start. Caitlyn took a mental snapshot of her in that moment; so utterly beautiful while framed from behind by Caitlyn’s huge windows, the pillows in them offering a safe place to land in case of a harsh fall.
“Is it okay? That I’m here. I know your parents invited me and whatever, but if you don’t want me here–”
“No,” Caitlyn stopped Vi firmly and without reservation. “I want you here. I always do. I just didn’t think you wanted to be here.”
Apprehension settled heavily between them and Caitlyn was afraid to open her mouth again, to say the things she’d been thinking about for so long–
Vi burst into shocking, unrestrained laughter.
“We’re a pair, huh?” She doubled over and wheezed in a failed attempt to catch her breath. Caitlyn didn’t know what to do with it. Eventually Vi straightened up, her chest drawing in a deep, slow breath to kill her wild amusement. “First, I’m sorry. I didn’t say things I should have and used your mom as an excuse for my own fear. That was never fair to you.”
Her sincerity was breathtakingly real.
“I’m sorry as well. I never should have made you feel as if I were choosing between you and my mother. My relationship with her is not your responsibility.”
It felt good to air the feelings that had sat like a tangible weight beside her heart. For weeks, she had lugged it around, convinced it would simply become part of her for the rest of her life, a growth her chest would grow around.
At first, they started small: telling each other what they'd been up to, the things that they'd wanted to show and hadn’t been able to. Then, achingly, the times the distance felt too far and they desperately wanted to reach out. They never spoke about the pool pictures.
They spent hours talking. Nothing but them and the hushed sounds of their voices in Caitlyn's room, the rumble of the party a distant concern. All the while they migrated closer and closer until somewhere along the line, Vi’s hand fell into Caitlyn’s and deft, sure fingers traced the old scar that curved from her wrist.
All at once they realized the rumble had faded entirely and Caitlyn glanced at her clock to find hours had passed and the house had emptied of party goers. Cautiously, she slipped out of her bedroom, Vi's hand in hers and her ears pricked for any noises. Quiet conversation and clinks of glass said the catering company was still packing up in the kitchen, but the halls were silent and clear so she navigated them to the outside patio.
The backyard was serenely quiet. The world outside of the fence had ceased to exist beyond over-eager crickets and procrastinating birds. Lights warmed the patio in a soft spotlight and the pool water was the stillest Caitlyn had ever seen.
Only one thing could remedy that.
And when she turned to Vi with a questioning gaze, she found herself on the receiving end of the most ready and willing eyes she'd ever seen in her life.
So they jumped.
The water engulfed her in a loving embrace, surrounding her with all the reassurance the universe had at its disposal. She didn't feel the pressure against her lungs or the sting of chlorine in her eyes. She didn't worry about the forecast of rain for the rest of the week or how her nice dress was invariably ruined. She didn't think about her lack of a towel or the smug look Sarah would have waiting for her on Monday morning. She didn't worry about any of it. It hardly mattered.
She just felt the tether of Vi's hand pull her in close for a kiss disturbed by too-big smiles.