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There in the unremarkable shelter of her apartment kitchen, Franziska is unraveling.
Or, rather, she has been for quite some time now. Maya can pinpoint exactly when that first thread came loose. Early—but not that early—in the bed they often shared.
Like all things in her life, Franziska’s sleep schedule was rigid, unmoving. Ever the light sleeper, one alarm near daybreak was all she needed—and yet she woke before it regardless, earlier than even the birdsong. This alarm existed only in the event of some worst case scenario—a failsafe, should the ever-punctual Franziska face some sudden, unimaginable lapse.
That lapse was something Maya had never thought would come to pass in their lifetime… and yet...
That unmistakable, pre-sunrise blue painted itself across the bedroom. What exactly had woken Maya up was anyone’s guess—whether it was the alarm blaring, or Franziska shuffling around. Quietly furious, whispered German sentiments in the dying darkness that did not, at all, sound very polite. Only curiosity kept Maya from simply rolling back over… what mysterious circumstances were afoot, that Franziska von Karma could be possessed to do something as egregious as sleep in?
Maya found she didn’t need to ask. Franziska had barely managed to swing her legs over the bed’s edge before the very air in her lungs was hijacked, a fierce spate of overlapping sneezing that was, from the sound of things, just barely stifled into the elbow of her silky sleep shirt. Things began to recontextualize in Maya’s sleep-dizzy head—a croakiness the night prior that Franziska had attributed to a long day at trial, nonstop talking and stale, recycled air. A persistent clearing of her throat, intermittent sniffles she blamed on the stubborn windchill that blew around her afternoon investigation. Excuses that Maya hadn’t thought to challenge, not until that previously unheard alarm had cut through the breaking night, heralded their truth. With the way Franziska carried herself—like less of a person, and more of a swirling hurricane—Maya didn’t entirely blame her for forgetting that she could catch a cold.
That didn’t make it any less astounding, though, how phenomenally she kept a lid on the whole thing—Maya’s attempts to coax her back to bed were met with disinterested hand waving. She was as meticulous in this façade as she was in all else—holding delicate little coughs behind her tongue, reigning the itch in her sinuses in through pursed lips and watering eyes. Most sneaky of all, Maya’s name seemed to vanish from her mouth—pet names and endearments took its place entirely. That condemned consonant at the front of it beckoned and taunted, daring Franziska to let the world know exactly how congested she was. Sure enough, her vocabulary grew eclectic—the n’s and m’s disappeared, every sentence began with a pause to think phrasing through.
Back in the present, she’s worn her voice down. A low, hoarse phantom of its domineering tenor is all that remains. There’s this cute thing she does when she’s frustrated—furious chores, Maya had mentally nicknamed it—where she begins to angrily tidy whatever’s nearby. Right now, she’s unloading her dishwasher as she rants, lips curled into a snarl and reddened nose scrunching.
“The nerve of that man,” Franziska simmers, “to send me off without even a shred of remorse—”
“Kinda whack, yeah,” Maya agrees, fiddling with the electric kettle on the countertop. “Didn’t realize Edgeworth could do anything without acting like every crime in the history of the freakin’ world was his fault.”
“Precisely!”
Make fun of her brother, remain on her side—there was method to this. Maya had started puzzling it out the second Edgeworth sent her that text—expect a very irate Franziska in approximately twenty minutes. She’s edging into biohazard territory, so I’ve made the executive decision to send her home.
The pair of them are still new. Maya’s never seen what Franziska’s like when she’s ill, but she has seen her at the tail-end of fifty-hour work weeks, all-nighters and long investigations and even longer trials. Within Franziska’s restless outer shell is a small, exhausted animal that’s desperate to lay down, and Maya remains stalwart in her mission to learn exactly how it howls.
Step one had been taken care of—Franziska could no longer deny her current state. When Maya turns back around to face her, there’s a voyeuristic sense of fondness that blooms warm in her chest at the sight of her girlfriend. Still in her day clothes, to the average observer, Franziska probably looks perfect as always—meticulously put together, chin high and brow sharp. Maya’s got honed eyes, though—Maya sees the rumpled state of Franziska’s waistcoat, pulling at the buttons and in need of straightening out. Maya sees the flyaway hairs, shining silver like tinsel and mussed up from countless attempts to pull them back into place behind Franziska’s ears. The millimeter’s asymmetry in winged eyeliner that’s dotting at the corners of a sore, pinkened gaze. A barely-there slump in her beloved’s shoulders, a near imperceptible change. That word unraveling pops back into her head, a thread-by-thread vanishing of that steely denial at dawn. With each layer that falls, it feels like she’s seeing more of Franziska—laid bare, uncovered.
Maybe she ought to feel guilty for worshiping this study in her girlfriend’s misery. But there’s something about the idea of it that’s just so—
Maya snaps back to her senses at the sound of Franziska sneezing mid-sentence. Usually, they’re such delicate things, deceptively small against that bold personality of hers. They’ve sanded themselves down to something more heavy and forceful, though, bursting from her chest rather than her head. That flowery, fluttery feeling in Maya’s heart begins to spill over at how lousy she sounds, and all she can do to combat the fullness of it is wrap her arms around Franziska’s waist and hold her from behind. There on her tiptoes, Maya presses a long, slow kiss into the ailing prosecutor’s shoulder.
“You sound like hot trash, babe.”
Franziska pulls out of her overworked handkerchief, after a second, vigorous attempt at clearing herself out. “Most well-adjusted people just say bless you, my dear.”
“Well, you chose me instead.” Another kiss, sweet and lingering. Maya’s eyes flutter shut as she speaks. “Why don’t we get you off your feet?”
She punctuates the statement by slowly undoing the buttons on Franziska’s waistcoat, meandering and chaste. Perhaps as a testament to Maya’s incredible power, Franziska hesitates.
“There are things to be done.”
“Yeah, by someone who isn’t sneezing more than they’re breathing.”
“I’ve… certainly been better,” Maya feels Franziska instinctively straighten her spine, “but there’s absolutely no reason that my work should suffer for it.”
A welcome change from this morning, leagues better than the annoyed rasp in Franziska’s voice as she insisted she was perfectly fine. Maya wiggles Franziska out of her waistcoat, finally, draping it imperfectly across the chairback nearby. The kitchen is quiet, save for the growing bubble of the kettle, the whispery tones of Franziska’s noisy breathing.
“Hey, how's about a plea deal?”
“How’s about, I am generally the one who proposes such.”
“Shh, we’re doing a metaphor, Franzy.” Maya curls around her side, tilting playfully over. “I’m the prosecutor.”
“Oh, are you now? Very well, Prosecutor Fey.” An attempt is made to narrow her eyes, stoke faux-intimidation, but between the dark circles and how red they are, she mostly just looks worryingly exhausted. “What are your terms?”
“If you can lay down for twenty minutes without conking out,” Maya says, “I’ll call Edgeworth myself and yell at him to let you come to work tomorrow.”
Franziska’s lips press together, brow crinkling in thought. That’s unexpected—Maya was picturing something more… immediately decisive. After a beat, Franziska crosses her arms, sticks her nose high into the air. Haughty as ever, betrayed entirely by the angry pink stain across her features, Maya tries not to explode with the pressure of her affection for this strange, beautiful, contradictory creature.
“I accept your proposal.”
Heart full, Maya grins big, standing up on tiptoes to stamp a fat, clumsy kiss at Franziska’s greying crown. Right on cue, the kettle clicks itself off.
Franziska’s ferried to the couch, which has been mysteriously prepped for a cozy day inside. A freshly opened box of lotiony tissues lives on the dark wood of the side table, alongside those disgustingly saccharine lozenges she’s dreadfully predisposed to adore. Her favorite blanket’s draped across the backrest—the faded brown throw Miles stole from Munich, the one she’d stolen back, deep into 2017 when comforts of a kinder time were few and far between. Despite all its years, it still feels like home.
When she finally resigns herself to shucking her hose and crawling into the tantalizing embrace of their couch, the golden midday light that breaks through the rare California overcast almost feels like a lullaby. It pulls at her eyelids, and she sets her jaw firm. Off in the kitchen, Maya’s prayer beads jostle without rhythm as she moves.
“Here,” says Maya when she finally rounds their sofa, presenting Franziska with that mug she pretends to hate—the chipped, off-white, gifted one that says, we can’t fix stupid, but we can give it a court date. Steam billows up into Franziska’s face, loosens the congestion, warms her itchy eyes. A cursory sip bruises her tongue, but the burn of it feels good sliding down her sore throat, honey-rich and sickeningly sweet. An affront to tea itself, Miles always said to her childish tastes, but Maya had no such judgements—about this, about anything.
The internet-TV drones on at low volume, panning shots of open forests and ticker-tape as some velvet-voiced, amateur narrator reads off a script, stories of unsettling oddities found around the web. Maya throws the blanket across both their legs, pulls Franziska to her side, and curls an arm around her. Outside, she can hear a light drizzle starting, rapping against still-warm blacktop and shaking dewy palm leaves.
Beside her, Franziska has stopped pretending.
Is it so cruel to love this, Maya wonders, once more. Not to love that she’s unwell, but that her veneer has crumbled? This close, Franziska smells like menthol, above the fading kiss of rose perfume. Her hair’s ruffled itself out, her blouse is wrinkling and wilted. She lays there against Maya, fever-warm and mouth-breathing, crushing more miserably relentless sneezes into her elbow. Unraveling, unraveling, unraveling.
Hands wander. Maya’s bitten-down fingernails find Franziska’s silvery tangles, and then she’s carding through them on instinct entirely, breaking apart their shape. A barely-there sigh of relief falls from chapped lips, its heat ghosting Maya’s collar and glowing like stolen sunlight there in her chest. Perhaps she’s already caught whatever Franziska has, the way her cheeks grow warm.
Sitting still like this, just watching, Maya’s never been good at doing just that. Her brain goes too fast, her body even faster, she’s just as restless as her girlfriend, in all the most inconvenient ways. Naturally, her eyes wander, too—to the space Franziska’s crafted around them, impeccably arranged without a single feature out of place. Pieces of art and family photos, certificates and degrees hung on some invisible grid against an oddly pleasant eggshell white. The sofa and loveseat at a flawless ninety-degree angle, not a speck of dust or dirt to be found on the polished, shining hardwood. Even in the kitchen, every inch of the counter is used efficiently.
And yet still, there in the center… Franziska, just for today, exists in beautiful contrast. Some time, long ago, Maya knows Franziska made some promise to herself: to always be guarded, flawless and untouchable. To never allow that mask to slip, through every tear in her heart and bullet through her flesh.
Is it so strange? To love her like this?
Only on that thought does Maya realize how quiet Franziska’s been. Her eyes wander back to this wonderful woman at her side, and sure enough, Franziska’s out. Bruising eyes shut, chest rising steadily, stuffy breathing puffing out against Maya’s neck. With rare, careful intent, Maya pulls her phone off the side-table and stares at the timer she’d set…
Nineteen minutes and thirty-two seconds ago.
Her laugh is a buried hiss behind her teeth. Eye for an eye, if Franziska can allow herself a little dishevelment, Maya can allow herself a little quiet while her poor, sick darling rests. Switching the timer off, Maya presses one more kiss into Franziska’s fraying bedhead. As the rain warbles outside, Maya stares beguiled at that chip on the half-drank tea mug’s lip.
Almost perfect.
What a lovely thing to be.