Work Text:
“I want a divorce.”
They were happy. Miranda could swear that they were. She could bet with her soul that they may not have been perfect, but they. were. happy.
It had been 6 months since Andrea had asked for a divorce. She took Miranda out to dinner, candlelit and all that bullshit.
It made her so happy. So hopeful. It had been a rocky patch since she and Andrea lost their first baby boy. She had hoped that maybe, this dinner could be it. This could be what saves their marriage. She should have known, by how quiet it was on their way to the restaurant. That should have been a tell. The tell.
They were fine when they arrived. Or at least that was what Miranda thought. They ordered, and per usual, she ordered for Andrea. She never did like directly asking people for what she wants, but it was okay, because Miranda knew. She always did.
Miranda had barely taken a bite of her steak when Andrea took out a brown envelope. That made her heart drop. She’d gone through enough divorces to know what the envelope contained.
She handed it to Miranda, and the other woman took it with shaking hands.
“I know you know what’s in there.” Andrea said flatly.
“Andrea–”
“I want a divorce.” Miranda Priestly just died. Right there, at a fine candlelit dinner, prepared by her beloved wife.
“Why?”
“‘Why’?” Andrea repeated tightly. “All we do is fight, Miranda. I don’t see any other way. We need to end this.”
“No. No, we’re not. We’re not done. We still have so many plans, so many–”
“We are done. It’s over. It had been since that moment you decided to kill Theo.”
Miranda wanted to scream. To argue. To make Andrea come back to her senses. To tell her that it isn’t over. Because it can’t be. This can’t be it.
They have so many things planned for the both of them. So many vacations to take. So many places to go to, events to attend, achievements to celebrate. Miranda wanted to say that they’re not done. But it was what Andrea wanted, and through Miranda, Andrea always got what she wanted.
Who was she to deny her wife something that could make her happy? Happier than she ever would be with her. Not like she didn’t know this would come. She did. She just hoped it didn’t. So, the moment they got home, she opened the envelope and signed it.
It had been hard explaining to a pair of teenagers why the only person who decided to stick around had to leave. They blamed Miranda, because who else was there to blame? Andrea wasn’t the one who got married and divorced thrice already. So, she let them hate her. She let them believe that Miranda was such a monster. That she did kill their baby brother.
Andrea left that same night, and Miranda never saw her ever since.
The past 6 months had been hell for Miranda, and Nigel was there to witness it. The woman didn’t eat, consumed too much coffee, and overworked herself.
He tried to talk her out of it. Tried to tell her that what she was doing could potentially kill her, not like it mattered to Miranda. She did stop. For a whole day, she stopped. Nigel thought that was it, that his best friend would try to stay alive again. But of course, Miranda had to prove him wrong again.
The twins had been with their father since the morning after Andy left. They didn’t want to stay with him, but he promised that they would be able to see Andy. Miranda said they couldn’t even look at their mother, that she didn’t even get a proper goodbye. What she got though, are glares from sharp blue eyes, and a “you did this to yourself” from Cassidy. Nigel had to force himself into the townhouse that night to bring Miranda to the hospital after drowning herself in alcohol.
He wanted to call Andy, to tell her how bad it was for Miranda. How much she’s been suffering since Andy left, but Miranda insisted he didn’t. Not because she couldn’t bear to see her love look at her with so much hatred again, but because she knew seeing her hurts Andy.
It was a day like no other in Runway, Miranda barking out orders to Emily and whoever that new second assistant is.
Nigel made a great sacrifice and went to Miranda’s office without being called. Hell, he didn’t even knock. He can’t let his fear get the better of him, not when Miranda needs him this much. Not when he knows his best friend is suffering and needs someone on her corner, despite continuously denying it.
“Miranda?”
“Nigel. What is it that you need now?”
That is what was different. Instead of the dragon breathing her fire, she didn’t even dare to release smoke.
“What I need,” he paused, stepping closer to his best friend. “Is for you to go out tonight. With me.”
“And where could we possibly go? Are you thinking of a place where no one would recognize me? Where I would hear no whispers about the Ice Queen’s third divorce?”
“No, but–”
“Then you would not be seeing me.”
“Okay.” He took a deep breath. He was about to willingly offer Miranda his head for her to cut. “I have been giving all the support you need. I have been patient. You need to move on, Miranda. I know that Andy–”
“Don’t you dare utter her name, Nigel.”
“I know that she was the love of your life, but for heaven’s sake, she’s moving on, and you need to move on too.”
“She is not. She will come back.”
“She is, and she is not coming back, Miranda. Andy is dating someone new. She’s seeing someone, and your daughters know about it. They know that their dearest Mama is seeing someone while their Mother is drowning herself in her sorrows.You need to move on, Miranda. Because, this thing that you’re doing could kill you. Fine, don’t go out. But, you need to stop, or I will call on the board and report you, because, I love you, Miranda. But I will not love you to death.”
“She’s with someone else?”
“She is. So, please. I cannot keep watching you deteriorate. I can’t keep watching my best friend slowly kill herself.”
“Then don’t.”
“What?”
“I don’t need you looking out for me. I am a grown woman, Nigel. I have lived my life. My twins hate me. They have Anr–. They have her to take care of them. They don’t need me.” She choked out. “I don’t need you saving me each time, when I don’t want to be saved.”
“Miranda.”
“Get out.”
A year has passed since Andrea left her.
It’s not long now, Miranda thinks. Nigel kept his word, he went to the board and reported her. But, with Irving no longer living–bless not his soul–nobody is praying for Miranda’s downfall. The board was just happy about the amount of work she’s getting done.
It will happen any day now. Andrea would come back. She would knock on that door, and she would hug her tight. She would have their baby girls with her. Things would go back to the way they were before.
That night, Miranda went to sleep with a smile on her face, dreaming yet again of Andrea, and their perfect life with their twin daughters.
The next morning, she woke up feeling light. She had a feeling that today is the day she will hear of Andrea again. Then after that, they will pick up where they left off and be happy. Today is the day.
Nigel walked in by her desk, storming into Miranda’s office, holding a newspaper in hand.
God, this man has got to have a death wish.
Emily knew what that paper contained. She wanted to stop Nigel, but just like the man, he wanted her boss to see that Andy is not coming back. She needed this.
Andy got engaged to a non-celebrity man. He was tall, blonde, and had a perfect smile. Their engagement was featured in the front page of New York Times. The girl really made a deal out of herself.
The picture—along with the article of her engagement—included the twins on both sides of Andy. The man was hugging her from behind, bright smiles etched across their faces. They looked like the perfect family.
It didn’t take long before a gut-wrenching sob was heard from Miranda’s office. It was followed by Nigel, screaming for an ambulance to be called. Emily knew it was for the best, but she couldn’t help but wonder if there was a better time of telling her boss. After all, the woman came in smiling today. That was pretty rare for Miranda Priestly.
Miranda woke up in an unfamiliar room. Bright lights glaring at her. She tried to move but figured out that she couldn’t. Then, a familiar scent greeted her.
Andrea.
She’s here.
Miranda turned her head to the side, and there she saw her. Her Andrea, sitting on the sofa at the far side of the hospital room. She expected some excitement. Some happiness, maybe. After all, she did spend a whole year waiting for the woman. But it didn’t come. Instead, all she felt was rage.
Andrea walked towards her. She was crying, Miranda could tell. It almost made her heart melt.
Almost.
She wanted to scream, but found that she did not have the strength to do so.
“Go.” She said when Andrea was close enough.
“What?”
“Go.”
“Miranda, you—”
“I know what happened, and I want you to go. I don’t know why they called you. Everybody knows we’re divorced.”
“You had me as your emergency contact.”
“And now I want you to go. I will fix it when I’m out of here. Just please, go.”
She didn't hear the door open. Didn’t see her daughters come in. Didn’t see the broken look on their faces when they saw her tear stained cheeks. Didn’t see how that broken look turned into a worried one when the machines connected to her started beeping obnoxiously. What she did see was Andrea leaving her, again.
“Darling, come on out. Nigel is going to hate us if we’re late.” Miranda knocked at their bedroom door.
“Do you really care if he gets mad?” Andrea asked, opening the door.
“You look fabulous, my darling.” She replied, completely ignoring the question. Miranda leaned up, pressing a soft kiss on her wife’s lips.
“Do you?”
“Do I, what?”
“Care if Nigel gets mad, silly.” Miranda Priestly isn’t silly. Andrea was the only person who could call her silly and live to tell the tale.
“Absolutely not, darling. But you do know how much I hate being late.”
“I do.” Andrea replied softly. She pecked Miranda’s lips, before dragging her down the stairs.
Roy was out sick that night. Miranda insisted on driving them instead of calling for a new driver, which could take too long.
She opened the passenger door for Andrea, letting her in first, before rounding the car and getting in.
“Are you settled, love?"
She got a hum as a response. Miranda took that as her cue to start driving.
Halfway through, something that she had been planning to ask her wife popped up in Miranda’s head. She turned to Andrea briefly, calling out to get her attention.
“Andrea.”
“Hm?”
“How do you feel about getting married again?”
“About what– Miranda watch out!”
That was the last thing she heard before it all went black.
Next thing she knew, she was laying on a hospital bed, no Andrea in sight. She tried to get up, but the nurses who were currently taking her vitals, held her back.
“Where is my wife?”
“Could you maybe tell us your name first, Ma’am?”
“I would once you tell me where Andrea Sachs is!”
“Call a doctor.” The nurse on her right nodded to the other one on her left.
A few minutes later, the doctor came.
“Mrs. Priestly.”
“Where is my wife?”
“She’s currently in an operating room. I’m glad you’re awake, I’m sorry if it’s too sudden but I need to ask you a few questions.”
Miranda nodded. She prayed, though to God she did not believe, Andrea did. So, she prayed.
“We might not be able to save them both. If it ever comes to that–”
“Save her.”
“She said she wants you to save the baby.”
“I cannot lose her. Please, save my wife.”
And save Andrea, they did. But not Miranda’s Andrea.
Her wife woke up hysterical. Telling Miranda that she killed her son.
It was never the same after that. There were more fights. Andrea would always bring up Theodore, and how Miranda killed her poor, innocent, sweet boy. Miranda prayed for them to fight past it together, but alas, fate has other things planned.
Cassidy called a week after she got out of the hospital. It was mostly just apologies. Caroline, being the more emotional one, apparently could not bring herself to talk to Miranda. It was Cassidy that told her about the guilt that was eating her sister alive.
“Hello?” Her mother’s tired voice crackled through the phone. Cassidy prayed that her voice wouldn’t break.
“Mommy?” She called back.
“Cassidy.” Miranda breathed out.
She wondered how her mother could tell them apart through their voices. Cassidy thinks she and Caroline sound the same.
For a moment, nobody spoke. If it weren’t for the breathing she could hear from the telephone, Cassidy would have thought her mother already hung up. She understood that Miranda might now know what to say to her. After all, they didn’t let her even utter a goodbye, instead, they threw hurtful words over their shoulders and never looked back. She knew that her mother was threading on eggshells.
“I’m so sorry.” She whispered, her voice cracking. “Please don’t hate me, Mommy.” She sobbed.
She couldn’t hold it in anymore. She had hurt her mother so much. Broke her into tiny pieces, that she was sure Miranda had yet to put herself back together.
She remembered that day at the hospital, when Andy ushered them away from their crying mother, who looked helpless in that hospital bed. She asked Andy why, but the woman did not give her an answer. She tried to visit the next day, but a nurse at the door told her that Miranda wasn’t accepting visitors.
“Mommy?”
“I’m here, bobbsey.” That made her cry harder, the sobs coming out as if she was being choked.
She had missed this. The soft voice Miranda would always use when regarding her and Caroline. The way it was so different to the one she used when talking to her employees. The nickname. God, the nickname. The one she used to hate. She never thought she would be this relieved to finally hear it again. Her mother doesn’t hate her.
“Mommy, I’m so sorry.” Cassidy felt like she was five years old again, apologizing for getting herself wet in newly bought clothes or her favorite dress, and her mother taking her in her arms and telling that it was fine. That they were just clothes.
“I’m not mad, baby. Mommy missed you so much. You and your sister both.” She could tell Miranda was crying now.
“Can I go there, please? I tried to see you at the hospital but the nurse said I can’t. I want to see you, Mom. Please.”
There was quiet again, then came the answer:
“Do you need me to pick you up?” She nodded, despite knowing that Miranda can’t see her.
“Are you nodding, bobbsey?” She let out a sound that was half-laugh and half-sob.
“I am.”
They fell silent again.
“Mommy?”
“Yes, baby?”
“Care isn’t coming. She said she can’t face you yet. That she couldn’t forgive herself for how sad you were when we left you. When she said those mean things.”
“Tell her it’s okay. Let’s give her time, okay? Do not hate your sister for it.”
“Okay. I’m ready now.”
“I’m leaving. Wait for me, okay?”
“Drive safely, please.”
The first thing Miranda does when she saw Cassidy was to run up and hug her. She buried her face in the crook of her mother’s neck, apologizing again.
“I’m not mad, love. I understand you.”
“Where do you want to go?”
“Home?”
“Ice cream first?”
Cassidy nodded delightfully.
They agreed that Cassidy could stay wherever she wants to, whether it’s Andy’s, her father’s, or at home. She liked the sound of that.
It took a while, but Caroline managed to finally bring herself to finally talk to Miranda. After a few encouragement from her sister, she asked their mother to meet up at a local café near her. She insisted on going on her own instead of being picked up by Roy. Miranda was already seated when she got to the café. When she spotted Caroline, she jumped up her seat, waiting for her to approach.
Caroline ran to her mother like a toddler after finally hearing the front door open after a long day of waiting.
“Mommy.” She sobbed, her grip tight on her mother’s coat.
“Bobbsey. I missed you, baby.”
“I’m so sorry. I’m sorry for being mean. I didn’t mean what I said, I was just hurt about Andy leaving.”
“I’m not mad, baby. I promise.”
“I’m still sorry.”
“I know, love.”
Miranda pulled away slightly. “Let’s eat? What do you want?” She sniffled slightly, wiping the tears off of Caroline’s face. She stayed the night at the townhouse, sleeping with her mother. She had missed this so so much.
Miranda finally accepted that Andrea is not coming back. She had her daughters, and she was grateful for that. Although she missed Andrea, she knows the woman has moved on, and she should too. But how could she, when Andrea was the love of her life? When she loved the woman more than any husbands or lovers she had in the past, combined. Sure, she accepted that she will never see her again, because Andrea is no longer hers to have, but that didn’t mean that it didn’t hurt.
It did.
It felt like being stabbed to death multiple times until the knife won’t go through anymore.
So, when Andrea called, she told herself that she wouldn’t answer. But alas, Miranda is just a woman longing to be loved.
“Hello?”
“Miranda.”
“Yes.” She couldn’t say her name. It hurt too much.
“C-can we please talk?”
“Aren’t we already?” She managed to say without her voice cracking. Miranda felt proud.
“N-not on the phone. I’d like us to meet.
“And if I don’t?”
“Then I… I would… stop. I would stop. But not now. Maybe eventually, but not now.”
“Fine. Text me the details.” She said before hanging up.
It wasn’t like Caroline and Cassidy told her it would be. Miranda didn’t welcome her with open arms. Andy didn’t know why she expected her to. Why would she? She broke Miranda’s heart, asking her to dinner only to serve her divorce papers before the meal even began.
“Miranda,” she greeted anxiously. “You’re late.”
“I’m sorry. There was traffic.”
“I didn’t ask you for an explanation.”
“You’re right.”
“So?”
“So?” Andy parotted.
“You wanted to talk. So talk.”
“I’d like to apologize for everything. I know I should have talked to you first, we had the twins to consider. I also apologize for them turning against you, that was the last thing I wanted to happen. But Miranda, why didn’t you fight? I can understand not fighting when we were out, but why didn’t you fight when we got home? Why didn’t you fight for us?”
“Did you?”
“Did I, what?”
“Fight for us. Do not forget that you were the one who served the papers while we were out. I thought that would be our chance to fix us, but no. I was wrong.”
“I know, and I apologize for that.”
“We’ve fought enough.”
“That was different.” That made Miranda sigh.
“Andrea, you must understand that I am old, I couldn’t keep fighting for us when you refuse to meet me halfway. And take into account that you served the papers. A divorce was what you wanted, so I gave it to you. I did tell you before to just ask for something and I will give it to you. Not like I could deny you anything, anyway. I loved you too much. I would never force you to stay with me when you clearly didn’t want to. You wanted to be free of me, didn’t you? Free of me you are now.”
“And the girls?”
“I would never corrupt our girls of their happiness, Andrea. Or you, for that matter. If being away from me is what makes you all happy, then so be it.”
“And now?” Andy wasn’t sure what she was asking Miranda. She didn't miss the way she still referred to the twins as "theirs".
“And now, you’re happy. The twins are too. It’s a closed book.”
“But–”
“You were grieving, Andrea. Most importantly, you blamed me. The mere sight of me crushes you, I could tell. So I let you leave.”
Andy didn’t speak for a minute. She was about to when Miranda opened her mouth again.
“When I was in the hospital, I realized how much I wanted to live. Apart from that though, I also realized how much waiting for you was killing me, and how slowly and painfully it was doing so. I needed to realize that you’re happy now, and you’re not coming back to me.”
Andy wanted to say that Miranda was wrong. That she was not–even in the littlest bit–happy. She had broken off her engagement a week before she called Miranda.
She wanted to tell the woman that she still loved her, that it was still her in Andy’s heart. She wanted to apologize for blaming her, to say that she didn’t mean it. She was just grieving her son. She wanted to say so much more. She wanted to beg for Miranda to take her back. To get down on her knees and beg, but Miranda was already standing up, wiping the non-existent wrinkles off her clothes.
“I still love you, Andrea. I think I always will. But not enough to keep killing myself for you to love me back. I wish you and that man a very happy life.”
With that, she turned around, leaving Andy at their table with tears rolling down her cheeks.
Miranda loved her still.
She didn’t realize it then, but she did now. Miranda was grieving too. Theodore James Priestly-Sachs was her son as much as he was Andy’s. The only difference was that, not once, did Miranda let her grief hurt her.
Andy watched as Miranda walked to the waiting car. She watched it drive off the pavement, until it disappeared from her sight.
She watched the love of her life walk away.
Now, she knew what Miranda must have felt the day she left.