Work Text:
The lock clicked open with an unusually clumsy scrape.
Vi looked up automatically from where she was sprawled across the couch, one socked foot resting on the coffee table while she absentmindedly flipped through a catalogue one of the construction suppliers had insisted on dropping off that morning. The apartment smelled faintly of garlic and onions from dinner simmering on the stove, the evening sun stretching warm rectangles across the hardwood floor. Somewhere in the background an old jazz record crackled softly through the speakers Caitlyn insisted sounded "more authentic" than streaming music.
She smiled before she even saw her.
"Hey, Cupca—"
The rest of the greeting died in her throat.
Caitlyn stood in the doorway with her work bag hanging awkwardly from one shoulder, a navy-blue sling securing her right arm tightly against her chest. Her usually immaculate coat hung half off her body, one sleeve empty and folded over itself. A rigid wrist brace disappeared beneath the fabric of the sling.
For a second Vi simply stared.
"...What the fuck?"
Caitlyn looked up.
"Oh. Hello, darling," her tone carried the exact amount of forced normalcy that immediately told Vi something was very, very wrong.
She shut the apartment door behind herself with her hip before attempting to kick off one of her boots.
Nothing happened.
She frowned, trying again.
The heel caught stubbornly against the floor.
Vi watched her balance precariously on one foot, the movement stiff and awkward in a way she'd never seen before. Caitlyn made another irritated attempt, this one accompanied by a muttered:
"For fuck's sake."
Without a word, Vi crossed the room. Her fingers moved to the laces, working them loose with practiced ease.
Caitlyn stood very still.
"I can do that."
"I know."
"You don't have to."
"I know."
The knot loosened beneath Vi's hands. She pulled the boot gently free, setting it neatly beside the wall before moving to the other one.
Caitlyn watched the top of Vi's head in complete silence.
It shouldn't have bothered her.
People helped each other with boots all the time.
Except they didn't.
Vi tugged the second boot free and looked up.
"There."
"...Thank you."
The words sounded strangely formal.
Vi caught it immediately.
"So."
She rested one forearm casually against Caitlyn's knee.
"You wanna tell me how you got your new accessory?"
Something that might have been a laugh escaped Caitlyn.
"One of my patients lost their balance," Caitlyn said, sighing through her nose.
Vi frowned.
"Okay?"
"I caught him."
"And?"
"And unfortunately," Caitlyn continued with visible annoyance, shrugging carefully with her left shoulder, "he is a body-builder and weighs approximately the same as a small car."
Vi blinked.
"You got hurt catching him?" there was a badly concealed surprise in her voice.
"I prevented him from fracturing his hip."
"You dislocated your shoulder?"
"Sprained," Caitlyn sighed, looking down at her sling.
"Badly?"
Caitlyn looked away.
"Moderately."
Vi rolled her eyes at the vagueness.
"Which means?"
"The emergency physician described it as a Grade Two acromioclavicular joint sprain."
Vi stared.
"Cait."
"What?"
"I love you."
Caitlyn narrowed her eyes suspiciously.
"But?"
"But you know damn well I have no idea what that means."
For the first time since walking through the door, Caitlyn smiled properly.
"It means," she sighed, "my shoulder ligaments are partially torn."
"Shit."
"I have to wear this," she glanced down at the sling again with poorly concealed irritation. "For approximately three weeks."
Vi winced sympathetically.
"And no lifting."
"Okay."
"No driving."
"That’s okay, I’ll drive you."
"No shooting."
That one made Vi look up, watching the tiny change in Caitlyn's face. She had a perfectly still poker face on which let Vi know she was probably close to crying.
"Oh, baby," Vi came up closer to her, kissing her forehead, “I’m sorry.”
Caitlyn looked toward the kitchen instead.
"I'll survive."
Vi studied her quietly.
The words were correct. The tone wasn't.
"Come on," Vi laced their fingers together, “I’m making dinner.”
"I'm perfectly capable of walking to the kitchen," Caitlyn frowned but followed her anyway.
"I know."
"You're being very agreeable."
Vi smirked, shrugging.
"I learned from the best."
The apartment settled back into quiet around them. The pan on the stove hissed softly. Outside, somebody laughed on the street below before the sound dissolved into evening traffic.
Vi stirred the pasta while watching Caitlyn from the corner of her eye. She was standing by the counter attempting to remove her coat.
One-handed. The empty sleeve kept catching behind her elbow.
She frowned.
The movement twisted her shoulder just enough that the muscles around her jaw tightened involuntarily.
Vi turned the stove off, walking over.
"Cait."
"I have a system."
Caitlyn finally managed to free one side before the entire coat bunched beneath the sling. She stopped moving. For several seconds she simply stood there, staring blankly at the floor.
Vi recognized the look immediately.
It was the same expression she'd worn herself a year ago while sitting on the edge of the bathtub, staring at a sock she'd been physically incapable of pulling over her own foot.
Not anger.
Not sadness.
The horrible, disorienting realization that something absurdly ordinary had suddenly become complicated.
Vi stepped closer.
"May I?"
Caitlyn didn't look at her.
"Yes, please."
The words were so quiet Vi almost didn't hear it.
She slid one hand beneath the collar, easing the fabric carefully around the immobilized shoulder before lifting the sleeve free millimeter by millimeter. Every movement was slow, deliberate, the same patient rhythm Caitlyn herself had once used during therapy sessions.
The coat finally slipped free.
Vi hung it over the chair beside them before turning back.
Caitlyn was still standing exactly where she'd left her, looking at absolutely nothing.
"You alright?"
"Yes," Caitlyn murmured, rubbing absentmindedly at the edge of the sling with her free thumb.
Vi smiled faintly.
"Liar."
Caitlyn let out a tired breath that sounded suspiciously close to a sob.
"I dislike this immensely."
"I gathered."
Finally she looked at Vi.
"There was a period after I lost my eye," her voice had gone quieter. "where every object in my apartment seemed to require renegotiation. I knew where everything was. I simply... no longer knew how to reach it."
She laughed once. Her gaze drifted toward her immobilized arm.
"I had forgotten what that feeling was like."
Vi didn't answer immediately. She stepped forward instead, resting one hand lightly around Caitlyn's waist.
"This isn't that, Cupcake."
Caitlyn frowned, shrugging weakly.
"This isn't permanent," Vi came even closer to her, her lips against Catlyn’s temple.
"I know," Caitlyn whispered.
"In three weeks you'll be complaining about work again."
"I already am," Cait said, taking a deep breath. “My work fucking sucks.”
Vi smiled.
"There she is."
Caitlyn leaned her forehead against Vi's shoulder with a tiny exhale.
"I hate feeling... incompetent."
Vi rested her cheek lightly against Caitlyn's hair.
"I've spent years figuring out how to exist inside my own body again."
"You did."
"That is why," Caitlyn swallowed. "not being able to take my own coat off really fucking sucks."
Vi stayed quiet long enough that Caitlyn almost thought she hadn't heard.
"You know," her thumb drew one absentminded circle against Caitlyn's side. "I remember telling you almost exactly that."
Caitlyn frowned.
"What?"
"'I can't even put my socks on anymore.'"
Recognition slowly spread across Caitlyn's face.
Vi smiled.
"You know what you told me?"
"I imagine something unbearably insightful."
"Oh, you were incredibly annoying," Vi laughed, stroking her back slowly.
A reluctant laugh escaped Caitlyn.
"You looked me dead in the face and said," Vi adopted an almost offensively accurate imitation of Caitlyn's measured voice, "'Temporary pain has a remarkable tendency to masquerade as permanence.'"
Caitlyn actually groaned.
"I said masquerade?"
"You absolutely said masquerade."
"Oh God."
"You were insufferable," Vi looked up at her. "So let me return the favor."
She reached up, tapping the edge of the sling gently with one finger.
"This?"
Another tap.
"This is temporary."
Her hand slid higher until it rested lightly over Caitlyn's heart.
"This..."
She smiled.
"...isn't."
Caitlyn looked at her for a long moment.
Then, very quietly, almost embarrassed by the admission, she whispered:
"I don't think I realized how frightening temporary injuries can feel when you've already survived a permanent one."
Vi felt something twist painfully inside her chest.
She lifted Caitlyn's free hand, pressing a kiss into her knuckles.
"I know."
Another silence.
"Although,” Vi said, her grin slowly returning. "I do feel obligated to point something out."
"Proceed carefully, you know I am already pissed."
"You are now, technically a physical therapy patient."
Caitlyn closed her eyes.
"Don't."
Vi's smile grew wider.
"I'll have to design you a home exercise programme."
"I refuse."
"I'll print little diagrams."
"Violet."
"I'll even laminate them, so they’re neat, just like yours!"
Caitlyn opened her eyes just long enough to flick Vi's forehead with her only functional hand.
"Patient-on-therapist violence! I will complain to the board!" Vi yelped dramatically, clutching her head.
"I have no professional relationship with you anymore," Caitlyn said, holding back her laughter.
"So this is personal?"
"It is becoming increasingly so."
Vi burst into laughter, wrapping her arms around Caitlyn carefully to give her a gentle kiss. Caitlyn relaxed into her, exhaling.
“You’re gonna be okay, Cupcake. It'll pass.”
Caitlyn swore as she was trying to wedge a baking tray into the oven one-handed.
She had refused, rather stubbornly, to accept Vi's suggestion that they simply order lunch.
"We are perfectly capable of feeding four adults."
Vi rolled her eyes.
"Cait."
"Are we not?" Caitlyn asked matter-of-factly.
"You physically cannot hold the tray with both hands, baby."
"I only require one."
"The tray disagrees," Vi said after hearing the tray bang against the oven for the fifth time.
"It has no authority here."
Vi leaned against the kitchen island, arms folded, watching the increasingly uneven negotiation between Caitlyn and gravity. She knew better than to interfere too early. Over the past week she'd discovered there was a very narrow window during which Caitlyn accepted help willingly. Before that window, assistance was interpreted as an attack on her competence. After it, she became quietly frustrated with herself.
The tray tipped. One corner dipped lower.
Without saying a word, Vi stepped beside her, slid her hands beneath the opposite side and together they guided it onto the rack.
Then Vi simply nudged the oven shut with her knee.
"Thank you," Cait exhaled.
"You're welcome," Vi said, kissing her forehead once.
The words were so ordinary that they barely registered before the doorbell rang.
Cait closed her eyes.
"They're early."
"You've literally told me your mother has never once been early," Vi said, raising an eyebrow.
"I know," Caitlyn nodded, sighing.
"So?"
"Which means they've been waiting downstairs to arrive exactly on time."
Vi laughed, turning towards the hallway.
"That is the most Kiramman thing I've ever heard."
When Vi opened the door she immediately understood where Caitlyn had inherited her posture. And her face.
Cassandra stood with perfect ease, one hand resting lightly on Tobias' arm. Neither of them looked imposing on purpose. They simply occupied space as though they'd spent their lives being welcomed in every room they stepped in.
Tobias smiled first.
"You must be Violet."
She shook his hand.
"And you must be the famous parents."
"Oh?" Cassandra’s eyebrow rose.
"Cait's mentioned you enough that I was beginning to suspect she made you up," Vi joked, offering to take their coats with a gesture.
Tobias laughed.
Cassandra didn't.
She was still looking at Vi.
Studying wasn't quite the right word. Observing, perhaps. As though quietly comparing the woman in front of her to the one she'd imagined over the past six months.
Vi stepped aside.
"Please, come in."
The apartment smelled like rosemary and a scented vanilla candle. Music played quietly from somewhere deeper inside.
Cait warily appeared in the hallway to greet her parents. Her hair had escaped whatever careful arrangement she'd attempted that morning. The sling rested against a faded navy sweater. She looked comfortable.
Comfortable in a way Cassandra couldn't immediately remember ever seeing.
"Mother,” she nodded, coming closer. “Father."
"We survived driving in your neighbourhood," Tobias answered.
"I was hopeful," Caitlyn’s chuckle echoed softly through the apartment.
"Caitlyn."
Her mother stepped forward, instinctively reaching to hug her before stopping herself at the sight of the injured shoulder.
Vi watched the tiny hesitation.
So did Cait.
"It's alright," Caitlyn shifted automatically, turning her uninjured side toward her mother. "You can hug me."
The embrace lasted only a moment.
When they stepped apart, Cait reached for Tobias next.
He hugged her much harder.
"You frightened your mother," Caitlyn’s dad said quietly, eyebrows furrowed.
"I gathered."
"You frightened me too."
"I suspected as much," Caitlyn smiled, nodding.
Vi disappeared quietly into the kitchen to give them a moment.
Even though Caitlyn had become almost inseparable from Vi's family over the past months—Sunday lunches at Vander's, Jinx showing up at their apartment without warning, family group chats Cait pretended to hate but secretly read from beginning to end—the opposite had happened much more slowly.
The Kirammans lived differently.
Not unkindly, just... at a distance.
Tobias and Cassandra travelled frequently, often disappearing for weeks at a time without much ceremony. They loved their daughter deeply, Vi had no doubt about that, but they had always respected the life Caitlyn built for herself enough not to orbit it constantly. Visits were arranged weeks in advance. Phone calls happened every Sunday evening without fail. Affection existed, though it wore a more restrained shape than the noisy, overlapping chaos Vi had grown up with.
Meeting the parents simply hadn't happened yet.
Then Caitlyn had sprained her shoulder, and suddenly her parents insisted on seeing her before the week was over.
Cassandra noticed everything. Not in the obvious way some people did, openly scanning a room. She noticed quietly.
A chipped mug with a motorcycle print drying beside the sink.
The leather jacket draped carelessly over the back of a dining chair that otherwise looked as though it belonged in a furniture catalogue.
The half-finished crossword lying open between them with two completely different styles of handwriting filling the squares.
Evidence accumulated without announcing itself.
This wasn't a girlfriend who visited often.
This was someone who lived here.
Vi'd just begun arranging the plates when she heard footsteps behind her. Caitlyn caressed her waist lightly with her hand, stepping next to her to poor tea.
She was still taking it all in when Cait reached for the tea pot.
The movement was instinctive. So was the wince that followed.
Before the pot had tilted more than an inch, Vi's hand appeared beneath it, steadying the weight while continuing the conversation she'd been having with Tobias about motorcycles.
"I think you'll need two hands for that."
She didn't ask. Cait didn't thank her.
The tea was poured. The conversation continued.
It happened so naturally that Tobias barely glanced up.
Their fingers brushed. Cait glanced at her, smiling incredibly softly.
There was no embarrassment or stubbornness in it, nothing like what Cassandra was used to seeing in her daughter throughout all of her life.
Just familiarity.
"You've become terribly efficient, Violet," Caitlyn said, bumping her with her hip.
"You've become terribly stubborn, Caitlyn."
"I've always been stubborn," Caitlyn shrugged.
"Fair," Vi laughed, handing her some cutlery.
Lunch unfolded more comfortably than Vi had expected.
Tobias was endlessly curious, asking Vi about the specifics of her work and the inner dynamics of Vi’s family. Cassandra spoke less, but whenever she did everyone else seemed to listen.
Vi found herself liking them.
Or rather—
She liked Tobias immediately.
Cassandra she found... interesting.
There was intelligence in every question. Nothing casual. Every topic gently peeled another layer back.
Eventually Cassandra rested her knife beside her plate.
"There is something I've been wondering."
"I imagine there is," Caitlyn sighed quietly.
"I hope you won't mistake curiosity for criticism," Cassandra said, straightening a napkin on her lap.
Vi could see Caitlyn growing tense, squeezing her hand under the table.
"My understanding," she said carefully, looking first at Cait before turning to Vi, "is that you met professionally."
The room became very still.
"Yes," Cait answered.
"And your relationship began not long after treatment ended?"
"Yes, it began after treatment ended," Vi stated, choosing not to specify that the “after” was approximately a week.
"Mhm," Cassandra folded her hands loosely together. "What I'm asking is slightly different."
Vi watched Cait carefully.
She knew that expression. Cait wasn't angry. She was preparing an argument.
"I spent quite a long time," Cassandra continued, "trying to understand how my daughter—who has always been almost painfully conscientious—could decide that pursuing a former patient was worth the risk."
Silence.
"I wondered whether she'd allowed emotion to cloud her judgement."
Cait answered before Vi could.
"It did."
Her mother blinked.
"It absolutely clouded my judgement."
Another pause.
"I fell in love with her," Caitlyn said, feeling Vi’s hand squeeze hers harder, "And that's precisely why we ended treatment."
She didn't rush. Didn't defend herself emotionally.
"I knew I could no longer promise complete objectivity."
"You could have ignored it," Tobias suggested, sounding more curious than accusing.
"I could have," Caitlyn nodded calmly.
"Yet, you didn't," Cassandra responded, crossing her arms.
"No."
"Why?"
Cait looked at Vi.
Then back at her mother.
"Because she deserved a physical therapist whose decisions weren't influenced by wanting to kiss her, Mother."
Vi nearly inhaled her tea, turning to look at Caitlyn with wide eyes.
Tobias coughed violently into his napkin, trying to conceal a surprised laugh to not further piss off his wife.
Cassandra looked momentarily speechless.
"That sounded more direct aloud," Caitlyn said, a faint blush creeping across her face.
"It certainly did," Tobias murmured.
Vi reached beneath the table and squeezed Cait's knee. Cait's fingers found hers immediately.
"I said I would transfer," Vi said quietly.
Cassandra looked at her with a surprised expression.
"You did?"
"It was the only rational solution," Vi shrugged, feeling Caitlyn’s gaze on her. “I didn’t want my feelings to cause me to completely lose Cait.”
"And if it had?"
"I would've just transferred anyway, I guess."
"You wouldn't have minded?"
"Oh, I would've hated it," Vi smiled sadly. "I just would've hated it less than watching Cait compromise something she'd spent years building."
Both Cassandra and Tobias stayed silent, surprised expressions on their faces.
She continued.
"Honestly, it wasn't really about rules for me. But I didn't want Caitlyn choosing me or not choosing me because she was afraid of hurting me," Vi glanced toward her girlfriend. "I wanted her to choose freely."
Cassandra sat back slightly. For the first time since arriving, the certainty she'd carried into the apartment seemed to shift. Her eyebrows were furrowed like she was deep in her thoughts, trying to register how a half a year of carefully-built assumptions all crumbled, turning out to be wrong.
Which she very rarely was.
"I owe you both an apology."
Vi frowned.
"You don't."
"I do," Cassandra said, shaking her head slightly.
She looked at Vi.
"I imagined someone persuasive," she said, making Vi feel like the intensity of her gaze was burning her. "I imagined someone encouraging Caitlyn to bend her principles."
Cassandra looked at her daughter, smiling slightly.
"It appears she was protecting them."
Later, Tobias and Caitlyn disappeared onto the balcony to inspect a plant Caitlyn insisted was dying.
"It looks healthy to me."
"It has fewer leaves."
Their voices faded outside.
Vi smiled to herself while loading plates into the dishwasher.
"You know," Cassandra said quietly from behind her, "Caitlyn never asked us for help after she lost her eye."
Vi turned.
The older woman stood by the window now, watching her daughter through the glass.
"I don't mean she became independent," Cassandra’s voice was softer than it had been all afternoon. "I mean she stopped allowing herself to need anyone."
Vi rested a plate in the sink.
"The shoulder’s been harder on her than she's admitted."
"I thought it might be."
"The first night..." Vi smiled faintly. "She stood in front of our wardrobe for nearly ten minutes trying to take off a jumper."
"Our?" Cassandra raised an eyebrow, smiling.
Vi blinked, realising what she just said.
Then laughed quietly.
"I guess it is ours now."
The realization seemed to surprise both of them.
Vi continued.
"She'd gone into the bedroom because she thought I was asleep on the couch."
"And?" Cassandra asked, handing her a plate.
"I waited for a bit," Vi said, nodding in silent “thanks.”
"You waited?"
"I wanted to see whether she'd ask," Vi shrugged, wiping the plate.
Cassandra understood immediately.
"Did she?"
Vi nodded.
"It took her ages," she said, fidgeting with a tea towel in her hands. "And a few nights ago, she apologized three times for waking me up because she couldn’t open a water bottle.”
Cassandra looked down completely silent.
“I don’t think she was apologizing for waking me. I think she was apologizing for needing me.”
Something in Cassandra's expression broke. She looked close to tears.
Vi felt a little ball of panic raise inside of her. She didn’t really have instructions for what to do when your slightly scary potential mother in law that you met for the first time was crying in front of you.
"I used to think," Cassandra admitted after a long silence, "that strength meant never becoming someone other people had to carry. I am afraid, in hopes of modeling independence, I have taught my daughter to believe the same thing."
Vi looked through the window.
Outside, Caitlin was pointing accusingly at a perfectly healthy rosemary bush while Tobias nodded with exaggerated seriousness.
"I think strength is trusting someone enough to let them carry the kettle before you get to the point of dropping it," Vi said quietly. “You’ve made her ambitious and strong and… powerful. You couldn’t have done everything perfectly. All parents fuck up.”
Vi’s eyes widened at her accidental use of profanity. She mouthed “oops”, shrugging.
A quiet laugh escaped Cassandra. She wiped quickly beneath one eye before the tear could fully form.
"I haven't heard her laugh like that in years," Cassandra said, coming closer to Vi to put a hand on Vi’s shoulder in a very motherly way. “Thank you for that.”
Vi patted her hand in acknowledgment, looking outside again.
Caitlyn had thrown her head back laughing at something Tobias had said.
She looked so much lighter than when Vi hand just met her.
Life hadn’t become easier. She just no longer seemed to believe she had to meet it alone.
"It’s all her," Vi said softly. "I just stayed long enough that she eventually believed me when I said she didn't have to do everything by herself."
Neither woman spoke again for a while.
They simply stood together in the kitchen, watching the person they both loved laugh through the balcony window, each recognizing a version of Caitlyn the other had helped make possible.