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It's one of their last Sunday shows at the BBC, the Dani and Fiona Show, and it’s been a good one.
They’ve had interesting callers and banter, and a nice variety of song requests, and a funny Dani vs. Fiona (which Dani, of course, won). People like them (no, love them), and they’ve done their job so well for seventy-eight weeks now, and Fi is so proud of the way they’ve both come into their own, the way they’ll be leaving this show with more opportunities and as better presenters and people than when they started.
They’ve nearly made it through it all: this wild, stressful, beautiful year. They’ve nearly done it. Fi feels so happy, so relaxed.
Too relaxed, actually, because she slips up.
“What would you do, Mollie, if you thought that your partner was paying more attention to a cactus than you?”
Fi regrets the words as soon as they leave her lips.
In her peripheral vision, Dani inhales sharply, her eyes widening in that deer-in-the-headlights way before she exhales into a radio-friendly smile and huff of laughter.
“Wow, a cactus, really?” Mollie replies with a practiced astonishment.
“Yeah," Fi’s voice overlaps before she can stop it.
"A unique problem,” Dani says dryly, smirking, though her tone carries the slightest bit of subtle warning that Fi’s become familiar with over the years.
(For the briefest moment, she feels like she's drowning; her chest tightening, her lungs restricting in that awful way they do only when it gets really bad, but she can't feel that way, not right now, not on air. She has to play it off, keep that panic concealed behind the aloof and unbothered and innocent persona she's curated and hope that nobody can see the static crackling in her ears and the thousand worst-case-scenarios playing out behind her eyes in that moment.)
The studio breaks out in giggles, luckily, giving Fi the chance to claw her way out of the deep water she's in, back to the present moment.
“Yeah, a problem I have all the time, yeah,” Mollie continues through her giggles. "Uhm, I think I'd have to call it quits, girls."
“Really?" Dani encourages Mollie to continue, ever the professional presenter she is.
"I mean, come on, a cactus?”
"Yeah," Fi says as she briefly catches Dani’s eyes, before they flick down and away, “it's a little bit far, isn't it?"
“It’s a bit sharp," Mollie quips.
“Even if it was an expensive cactus,” Dani continues to the camera, "It’s- it's just, y’know, priorities."
Fi feels the blood draining from her face.
“Priorities," she affirms.
"Good advice!” Dani says, loudly over Fi, “Well, what numbers can people call to get in touch?"
The show goes on.
It's a good one, still, all things considered, but the energy shifts after that. The banter is stilted, and Dani trips over her words, and Fi silently wishes she could just crawl into a hole and die all through the remainder of the show and the debrief afterwards.
Fi still can't relax the entire way home; she's far too aware of herself, all wound tight with the exhaustion of presenting and the moment that hasn't left her alone since it happened.
She doesn't really consider herself to be a highly self-conscious person. All things considered, she's quite comfortable with who she is. She'd never really been able to conceal it. Ever since she was a girl, her soft boyishness gave her away before she could even begin to understand what it was that made her different from the other kids. As a teenager, she'd been able to laugh off the impersonal gifts of makeup caddies and nail varnish and "girl clothes” from family, and brush off the pleas for her to grow out her hair and the questions about when she'd start dating boys.
Here and now, well into her twenties and sitting on the Tube with the girl of her dreams, she feels more aware of herself than ever before. She’s pressed up next to Dani in a corner of a train car, both of them sitting in silence with their headphones on. She's all gangly limbs in her skinny jeans and bright blue flannel with a sports bra underneath, and her emo hair that she's started growing out past her shoulders, and the least amount of makeup she can get away with wearing on camera. She feels like she’s too much, too gay, too big in her seat, with her hands folded tightly in her lap and her bony legs tucked awkwardly against Dani’s to make room for standing passengers, and the contact between them that should feel so natural is burning her skin like a wildfire.
She replays that awful moment in her mind, unable to hear the music in her headphones past the crackle of radio static, imagining the scene again and again on repeat from every angle: the camera’s point-of-view, then Dani’s, then her own. She mentally scrubs the timeline and pictures exactly where she'd make the cuts. Snip. Snip. Select. Delete.
Partner. God, even the choice of words sounds so unmistakably gay.
When she hears the announcement stating they’re a stop away from where they need to get off, she wrenches her thoughts back to reality, and glances over at Dani to see if she’s awake. She's always exhausted after a show, and Fi always lets her rest. She’s earned it.
She looks so beautiful, like she always does, her body leaning away from Fi and against the metal wall of the car with her arms crossed over her chest. Her long straightened hair is starting to curl into waves around her ears, framing her little black studs, and her short black nails are pressing faint half-moons into the sleeves of her leather jacket. Her tired eyes are closed, lined with a smudged smoky black that she hasn't let go since 2009, below her furrowed brow and above her scrunched nose (still holding tension, she always does, never quite able to let herself relax). The freckles that she hates (but Fi loves) are peeking out under her hours-old foundation, dotted along her cheeks in constellations that Fi would spend all day tracing if she could. Her pursed lips are chapped under the muted pink lipstick she always wears on camera. Almost her natural shade, but not quite.
(Fi wants to kiss her. She kind of always does. But not here.)
Dani’s like that, a hard shell with all her manufactured sharp edges made to cover up the softness underneath. She’d needed that to survive. Fi reckons she might have a shell of her own, now.
A moment later, when their stop arrives, Fi gently shakes Dani’s shoulder, and they get off together to start their walk home.
The walk feels silent and still, even if the city is still alive with the sounds of cars and passers-by around them. A distance of no more than a foot remains present between their two bodies until they pass through the threshold of their door, though it feels more like a mile. They don’t hold hands. They never do. Maybe one day.
“I need a shower," Dani says, finally breaking the silence as they ascend the stairs to their shared flat.
"Sure,” Fi replies, nodding even though Dani isn't looking at her. She opens the door to the lounge and steps to the side to let Dani in.
Dani drops her bag and jacket on the dining table and pulls her shoes off, still pointedly looking away from Fi. (She’s upset with her, Fi can tell. God, she really messed up.) Dani brushes past as she heads towards the bathroom in haste, and Fi can only watch her as she goes, slinking down the stairs and out of sight.
She stands at the door, staring at the empty space where Dani was just a moment ago, and realizes then that she is completely frozen, a built-up tension holding her still despite the rush of adrenaline flooding her body.
Alone now, the static returns to her ears.
She pictures the moment again in her head, the moment she wishes she could take back.
She replays it again and again from every possible angle she can imagine, and analyzes every movement and expression and shift in tone of voice, what she could've said instead, what she wishes she’d said, what she wishes she could say, what she can't take back. With each replay, her vision of the stairwell narrows, growing grey around the edges and clouding over as she scrubs and rescrubs the timeline. Snip. Snip. Select. Delete.
They’re going to see it. They already saw it. They’re going to know. They already know. Oh, God, fuck, fuck, fuck, she’s totally fucked up. She’s always fucking up. Dani’s got to be so mad at her, fuck, she's ruined everything.
Somewhere far away, past the static, she hears her breathing picking up, short and quiet huffs in and out of her mouth, and even further away, she hears the muffled sounds of plastic bottles and tubes clinking against one another, then guitar playing loudly from a phone speaker, then a glass door sliding and the rush of water turning on.
Snap out of it. C’mon, snap out of it.
She can't. She can't stop. She replays the moment again. Again. Again.
Snip. Snip. Select. Delete.
Dani’s voice rings out through the stairwell, loud above the sound of tinny speakers and falling water, singing along, “I wanna scream I love you from the top of my lungs, but I’m afraid that someone else will hear me.”
Fuck. Fuck, okay. She can do this, it’s okay, she’s okay.
C’mon, c’mon, I’m alright. Get it together. Come back.
She tunes her frequency into the sound of rushing water, and wills herself, wherever her body might be, to take normal, deep, soothing breaths to chase the loud, crackling static away.
In, hold, out. In, hold, out.
She looks down. She’s sure this is her body. It has to be. The keys to their flat are still in her hand, her shoes are still on her feet, and she’s growing itchy under her clothes, with a layer of perspiration gathered between her skin and the fabric.
This is her body. These are her hands. C’mon, use them.
She drops the keys on the table and kicks her shoes off, and stumbles down the hallway in her mismatched socks to her separate bedroom as quickly as she can.
She haphazardly flicks the light on and closes the blinds on the window before she shucks off her clothes, letting them pile on the floor. As soon as they’re off, she hunches over and clutches the top of her chest of drawers, heaving, feeling with every breath as if she’s sucking in the thick static surrounding her.
She stands there in her pants and breathes; breathes slowly so her body can cool down enough to realize she isn't drowning, breathes until she can stand up on her own.
She brushes her sweat-damp hair away from her face, and flaps her hands in the air to try and shake away the suffocating grey static as her fringe falls back in front of her eyes.
Fi’s always been a bit of an anxious person, try as she may to maintain the illusion of always being content and unbothered. These days, it's been a bit harder, when there’s so much happening, when she has to be On all the time, their work and life bleeding together and carving away at all of their time and energy until only the skeletons of themselves remain.
She's also used to walking on eggshells to a degree, because Dani is much more sensitive than her, much more afraid and fragile, has much more to hide and much more to lose. She knows, she's accepted this, she wanted this.
Well, maybe not this specifically, but she wants this life, she’s worked so hard, she wants it, really, she does, she does, it's just… everything’s so hard, fuck, it's so hard.
A familiar voice echoes from the bathroom, up the stairs, through the open bedroom door.
”Change will come, oh, change will come, I will never believe in anything again."
Fi stares down at the floor, aware on some level that these are her legs, her feet, that this is her body and her life and she's here in the middle of it all. She's wearing boxers. Men’s boxers. God, she really is so fucking gay, huh? No shot at hiding it. Never was.
Should she want to hide it? Maybe she ought to make more of an effort. Doll herself up for the radio, for videos. Talk more about past “boyfriends.” Have a better answer for what she finds attractive in men. Change her vocabulary and accent and mannerisms, always be On, carve herself down and back and away until she's someone else. Maybe she should be more like Dani.
But she doesn't want that, does she?
Does Dani want that?
Fi shuffles backwards until her calves hit the edge of the bed, and lets her body collapse onto it. Her torso flops forward and her elbows come to rest on her knees.
She's fine. She's fine. She's not panicking. She's not crying. She's fine. I'm fine.
A drop trails down the side of her nose, lingers on the tip of it, then falls and disappears into the carpet below. She's sure it's just sweat.
Why is she worrying about this right now? She already has so much going on. They have so much going on, and so much they want to do, that they’re going to do, because people love them like this. She doesn’t need to worry about this too, right?
“I've got troubled thoughts and the self esteem to match, what a catch, what a catch."
Why does she care? Does any of it even matter when Dad might be gone soon? Shouldn’t she be with him now instead of doing all of this? He says he's so proud of her and what she's doing. Is he ever ashamed of her, though? Does he ever wish she could have turned out differently, been a normal girl instead? Is he still disappointed that Fi never used the makeup kit that he and Mum gifted her all those years ago?
Mum had asked if Dani was staying over for Christmas Day this year. She can’t. She never can. Did Fi ever call Mum back to say?
Beyond the static, the shower shuts off, and the music with it.
A minute later, a cheap hairdryer turns on for all of about thirty seconds before there's a loud, drawn-out, frustrated groan, and it switches back off, and heavy plastic hits a marble counter. A door opens and bangs closed, and heavy footsteps come up the stairs.
“Fi?"
A voice echoes down the hall into her room, the syllable stretched out long and melodic.
"Fi?”
How long has she been sitting here for? She should probably get up, get dressed, make dinner for them. It’s her turn to cook.
“Fiona?"
The voice is closer, by her bedroom door. C’mon, move. Get up. She can do it. She’s okay. Get up. Get up. Get up.
"Are you alright?”
Yes, I'm fine. C’mon, she's fine. She's fine. Say it. I'm fine.
She's aware, on some level, of the shift in pressure as a second body settles onto the bed next to her, and the presence of a hand on her bare back, but she doesn't really feel it. It's just there, it’s just what’s happening.
A hand cradles her face, tilts her chin up and to the side just ever so slightly, and those beautiful, dark doe eyes that she knows so intimately come into view, and they're flitting like a moth in flight, searching for signs on Fi’s face. Caring. Unsure. Scared.
“Fifi, what’s wrong?”
Suddenly, she’s not alone in the static, and it all feels a bit more real.
Dani’s eyes are so beautiful. Dark and sparkling like the vacuum of space. God, Fi could drown in them.
Her face is bare, scrubbed clean of makeup save for the ever-present remains of dark eyeliner in her thick lashes. Her eyebrows are knitted together, scrunched up in concern, and her teeth worry at her chapped lower lip. She's hunched over to meet Fi’s eye level, her wet hair spilling over her shoulders and dripping onto the towel wrapped across her chest. It's wild and untamed, curling into messy ringlets that Dani hates but Fi loves.
“You're beautiful," Fi whispers, now feeling how hard it is to speak and hearing how rough her voice sounds.
Dani’s lips curl up slightly into a small incredulous smile, and her eyes widen, never taking them off of Fi’s. Fi could drown in those eyes, suffocate, and she'd love every second of it. She’d love it.
"Shush, I’m being serious.” Dani’s voice is low and gentle, that tone it takes on when they're alone together, just for them, but it's warbling, shaky at the edges. “You're crying."
Is she?
Dani’s thumb comes up and swipes gently along Fi’s cheek, gathering the dampness on her face.
Oh God, she is. How embarrassing.
She takes a deep breath in, exhales in a little whimper.
Is that what she sounds like? Is that what she's been doing this whole time?
She straightens up a bit and tries to take an even breath, suddenly self-conscious, suddenly so painfully aware of her body, and Dani follows her movements, keeping their eyes locked on each other’s and her hands on Fi’s back and cheek. She feels it now, the hand moving in soothing circles, Dani tracing the skin between her shoulder blades.
“C’mon, Fi, you never cry. What happened?" There's a wet redness starting to form in Dani’s eyes, that deep, wine-dark sea. Fi can’t have that.
I’m sorry, please don't cry, Fi wants to say, but instead she just sniffs and manages a little “I’m alright” in a flat, choked-out tone that she could’t even convince herself with.
Dani gives her a pout, playing up her puppy dog eyes, trying to wrap her bid for honesty in some semblance of levity so she can sneak it past Fiona and through the door. When Fi remains stony and silent, Dani concedes with a sigh. She pulls her tightly into her arms for a hug instead.
Fi lets her head loll over and slump into Dani’s chest. The rough edge of the towel is slightly scratchy and wet hair is sticking to her face, but she can’t be bothered to care, because Dani’s arms are wrapped around her, keeping her close, bringing her back down to earth, keeping the static at bay. She can hear Dani’s heart beating past the soft rise and fall of her chest, and she can feel the warmth of Dani’s still-damp skin.
She’s like that, all sweet and warm and soft and cuddly, a human teddy bear wrapped up in edgy jokes and sarcasm and dark clothes. Fi lets that warmth engulf her and thaw her out until she can wrap her arms over the small of Dani’s back. She breathes her in, slowly and deeply, all the way through her lungs, and breathes out the rest of the static.
They really were a match made in heaven, the girl who loves cuddles and her teddy bear. It was what had finally clued Fi’s parents into her sexuality back when they’d met, the way they’d always clung to each other. Mum had waved it away at first, because, well, girls are just like that with each other. That’s what she’d told Dad. After enough sleepovers, though, the casual hand-holding and hugging turned into cuddles on the sofa and kisses in the back garden, and they’d made an educated guess about Fi and her new “best friend.” They love Fi, they really do, and they love Dani. They love the two of them the way they are. She knows this. She knows.
Fi pulls herself up a bit so she can let her head rest in the crook of Dani’s neck. The dampness from her eyes is starting to bother her, every sensation is coming into focus too quickly and sharply. She buries her face in Dani’s collarbone, nuzzling against her so she doesn’t have to feel it all at once.
(Dani’s parents still don’t know about them. They might never know. If that’s what Dani needs, Fi understands. She just wants Dani. She wants her so bad.)
“I love you, Fi. Hey, I love you so much. You know that, right?”
Fi nods, feeling a little limp and fuzzy, wanting to say so much but unable to find the words to say it. I love you, too.
“I’m gonna make us dinner.”
Fi sniffles and shakes her head against Dani. It’s my turn to cook. A hand comes up from her back to Fi’s head, and gentle fingers run through her stringy hair in a soothing caress.
“It’s okay. You’re okay.” Dani sniffles. “I just… I just want you to be alright, okay? I’ll do it tonight, I don’t mind. It’s okay.”
“Okay,” Fi manages to whisper. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. I love you. God, fuck. I love you, okay?”
The words pull a sob from Fi’s chest, and she clutches tighter, holding onto Dani like she’s afraid she might float away, because sometimes it doesn’t feel real. Sometimes she can’t believe she has this, because what could she have done to deserve a girl who loves her so much, who looks at her like she hung the moon? God, she loves her so much, it hurts. It hurts.
Fi’s so tired. Everything’s so, so fucking hard, but she has Dani. Dani has her, she’s holding her steady. She’s there to catch her when she falls. She’ll catch her.
A while later, she’s burnt way too much energy on getting showered, and she’s dressed again in an old t-shirt and loose boxer shorts and her silly spare glasses.
Fi stands outside their glass kitchen door, peering in at Dani. The kitchen is a mess, and Dani’s got her lounge clothes and headphones on, and her hair has air-dried into wild curls all around her face in a lion’s mane that Fi knows she’ll spend ages trying to “fix” tomorrow. She’s singing something under her breath while she cooks, but the sound’s too muffled by the door between them for Fi to make the words out. She’s always listening to music, or watching something, or letting it play on in the background of whatever she’s doing. She’s been like that since they met. She’s joked that she just doesn’t like to be alone with her thoughts, but Fi doesn’t think it’s a joke.
Part of Fi wants to go in and wrap her arms around Dani, but the rest of her walks to the lounge instead and collapses onto the sofa. Maybe she should put something on the television for them to watch, but she’s not really in the mood. Doesn’t feel like doing anything, really. She just sits, staring at the blank screen, barely able to make out a faint reflection in the void. That’s her. That’s me.
She closes her eyes, and breathes in slowly, trying to sink as deep into the uncomfortable cushions as she possibly can. She wants to be swallowed whole, to dissapear.
Maybe she just wants things to be different.
Some time must pass, because when she opens her eyes again, Dani is walking up to the sofa with two bowls and forks in her hands, then sets them down on the coffee table.
“Feeling any better?” she asks, in the same tone of voice you use to soothe a crying child.
Fi shrugs. She doesn’t feel much of anything right now, just tired.
“You wanna talk about it yet?”
Fi shakes her head. Dani sighs, then gives her a little smile and reaches down to ruffle Fi’s hair.
“Okay. I’ll be right back,” she says, ambling back to the door.
Fi watches her until she’s out of sight, then trains her eyes down at the bowls of stir fry in front of her. Somewhere, distantly, she knows that she must be hungry. It’s late, they haven’t eaten in hours. That would make sense. Still, she can’t really feel it. She hears some noise from the kitchen, some faraway crinkling or clinking, and then slow footsteps, and then Dani is back in view, precariously balancing two glasses of Ribena in one hand and a little bowl of crisps in the other. She steps in front of Fi, holding the two glasses in front of her, and says, “Take one, quick.”
Fi’s arm feels unnaturally heavy as she moves to take a glass from Dani, who sets the rest of her burden down on the table, then stands up and nods towards the television.
“Something you wanna watch?”
Fi simply shrugs in response again, offering neither confirmation nor suggestion, and Dani smirks and scoffs, in that fond faux-annoyed way she does.
“Princess,” she mutters as she looks through their DVDs.
Fi takes her eyes off of her, lets them fall on the glass still in her hand. She tries to momentarily focus in on the sensation of condensation gathering between her palm and the surface of the glass, and wills her arm to move, move, ‘til the rim of the glass touches her lips. As the first sip hits her empty stomach, she’s suddenly aware of how painfully hungry she is. Huh.
The television in front of her springs to life with a familiar episode selection screen, and Dani’s clearly made the choice for them already, wielding the remote with purpose as she saunters back to the sofa. The musical episode. Of course. The gay episode. (Well, one of the gay episodes.)
She plops down next to Fi and gives her shoulder a little squeeze as the opening song begins to play, then leans forward to grab their bowls off of the coffee table.
“Eat,” she demands as she holds one out to Fi. When Fi looks at the bowl but doesn’t move, she summons her best puppy dog eyes again. “C’mon, Fi, please,” she pleads, drawing out the last syllable.
Fi sighs, because Dani knows her so well, knows she’s so weak for her in every way. She sits up as much as she can and takes the bowl, to which Dani gives a satisfied smile. That smile says “let me take care of you.”
They lean against each other as they watch and eat. Dani’s not the best cook, but it’s hardly her fault. Nobody really taught her how to do anything before Fi did, and Fi’s certainly no Gordon Ramsay. The chicken is slightly overdone and the veggies are slightly underdone, and everything’s a little too salty, but at least Fi can taste it, and she can feel herself coming back to life bit by bit with each passing minute, and Dani is there next to her, and she loves her. Dani loves her.
After they’ve been eating in silence for a bit, Dani points with her fork at the screen as it’s playing that one scene, and asks over the music, “So, which one of us do you reckon is more like Willow and who’s more like Tara?”
Fi pauses thoughtfully as she chews and swallows, looking over at Dani’s profile lit by the screen. She could give a real and thoughtful answer, sure, but she knows what will make Dani laugh.
“Well,” Fi starts, “you go down on me more often.”
Dani’s head snaps towards Fi, her eyes wide as they meet each other’s gaze. Fi can’t keep herself from grinning.
“You make me coooome-plete,” Fiona sings along with the television.
A moment later, the words sink in, and Dani breaks out in laughter, her voice bright like the ringing of a bell, spilling out light and warmth with every breath.
“Oh my god, shut up, you stupid bitch,” she giggles as she tries and fails to conceal her flustered smile behind her hand.
It’s something close to midnight by the time they’re finally in bed, but they’re not sleeping, night owls that they are. Dani doesn’t really like sleeping alone, and neither does Fi, so they curl up together in Dani’s bed, lit by the fairy lights around the headboard and the orangey glow of her amber lamp. It’s still a bit warm with the final stretch of summer holding onto London by the very ends of its claws, but neither of them show any intention of moving away from the other. Fi’s holding on to Dani’s waist, head resting against her chest, listening to that familiar hummingbird heartbeat, and Dani’s hands are tracing soothing swirls across Fi’s back as she hums softly, mostly to herself.
I’m under your spell…
Fi cranes her neck up so she can look at Dani. The light is drawing out those reddish-golden specks in her dark eyes, bouncing off her curls and her serene face as if she’s lit by a bonfire. It’s been nearly five years now, and she’s still every bit the girl Fi fell in love with and, somehow, so much more. She’ll never tire of this view, never tire of Dani, and she’d never want to. Sometimes, she earnestly wishes they could both just live forever, so she’ll never have to stop looking at her. So beautiful, so perfect. Her best friend, her partner, her soulmate, her Dani.
Everything feels right with her. This is the way things should be.
Dani’s eyes meet hers, and the humming stops as a little smile forms on her perfect, chapped lips. Fi feels like a little kid with the way her heart skips a beat as she shifts her body up to meet Dani’s level.
“Hey,” Dani says, voice warm and soft as the rest of her.
“Hey,” Fi whispers back. Her eyes flick down to Dani’s lips, then her eyes, then her lips again.
Dani reads the signal, and leans down to kiss her, long and sweet and slow, and Fi’s heart could just break. She loves her so much. She loves her so much it hurts. Please. Please don’t go. Please stay.
Radio static crackles in her ears.
Fi turns her head away from Dani’s, breaking the kiss inelegantly and sucking in a harsh breath that stings her throat.
“Fuck, sorry,” she breaths out, eyes squeezed shut. “Sorry.”
She feels Dani’s hand come up to her chin, thumb rubbing slowly at the side of her cheek. Familiar, calming.
“It’s okay.”
“No, it’s…” It’s not okay. “I- I can’t.” I don’t deserve it. I don’t deserve you.
“We don’t have to do anything. You know that.”
“No, not... no,” Fi hears her own voice distantly, sounding more like a whine or a whimper than words, and she can’t help but feel frustrated with herself, her own inability to articulate and explain everything she’s feeling, because she wants so badly for Dani to understand, but it’s all so much.
Everything is so much and it’s all happening all at once, and there’s so much still left to do, no respite in sight, and everything is changing, and it all feels so much bigger than her, and maybe she thought things would be different by now, but not different like this, because everything is falling away from her so quickly, the house she grew up in and the people she grew up with, and now the radio show, and she’s not ready, and then there’s the thing that she said, the stupid thing she said that she can’t take back, can’t edit out, and everyone saw it, and she’s always the one who’s messing this whole thing up, and she doesn’t want to lose Dani, she can’t lose her, she can’t.
She’s drowning. She’s drowning again. Fuck. This is it. She’s going to die.
“Fi.”
There’s a voice, distant and choppy through the crackling interference.
“Fi, breathe. Breathe with me.”
Is that me? Is that me who’s hyperventilating? It can’t be. Fi’s not breathing. Her lungs are filled to the brim with heavy static. She’s dying. She’s going to die. It’s too late.
“Fi, look at me.”
She’s sitting up, legs tangled up in monochrome bedsheets. When did she sit up? Dani’s hands are on her shoulders, not grasping but firm, holding her steady.
“Breathe with me.”
Dani’s face is all blurry and snowy, crackling away into fuzzy pixelated grey, but she’s looking at Fi and breathing in, slow and steady, then exhaling even slower.
In, out. In, out.
In, out. In, out.
In, out. In, out.
Inhale warm air, exhale static.
“That’s it. That’s my girl. Keep breathing.”
Fi drops her head as she coughs on an exhale, choking on the burning static, and Dani’s hand moves from her shoulder to her chin, tilting her head up to meet her gentle gaze and pulling Fi back into the steady rhythm. Fi’s shaking hands reach up, feeling blindly until they grasp at Dani’s wrists, hanging on because she needs her. She needs her.
In, out. In, out. Repeat.
Again, again, again.
As many times as it takes.
Eventually, when Fi can breathe on her own again, Dani’s hands slide down from her shoulders to her wrists, until they’re holding each other’s hands, fingers interlaced in amber glow.
Safe. Always safe with Dani.
“Fi, are you…” Dani’s voice trails off, that way it does when she rewrites a sentence in her head midway through. “Do you… wanna talk about something?”
Fi shrugs, because yes, she does, but she can’t. She just can’t. The words won’t form on her useless tongue, dying in her throat before they ever had a chance.
“Is…” Dani pauses again, swallows, "is this about what happened on the radio earlier? The… cactus thing?”
Crackle.
Fi nods, because yes, it is, and it’s about everything else, too, but right now it’s mostly about that stupid bleeding cactus.
Dani sighs, sounding a bit exasperated. “I- okay, look, Fi, I wasn’t mad about it,” she slowly rubs her thumb over Fi’s, an attempt at tenderness. “Okay, maybe I was a little angry, but not at you, not really. I just- I don’t know. I’m mad at the situation, I think. Maybe at myself. The entire world. Something like that.” She exhales in a huff and shakes her head like a dog. When she looks back up at Fi, her eyes have softened into something dark and bittersweet like molasses. “The point is, I don’t want you to feel bad about it. Especially not-not like this. It’s not your fault, alright? Look, we’ve-” she shifts her bodyweight to get more comfortable, folding her legs underneath herself so she can sit back onto her heels, never letting go of Fi’s hands. “We’ve said and done much stupider, much gayer things on camera already. It’s fine. We’ll be fine. I just… I got scared for a moment, but I know you wouldn’t out us, out me, on purpose. I just got scared.”
Fi swallows hard and nods, trying to let the words sink in, rewrite over the moment she can’t erase, and breathes in slowly, then out.
“I-” Fi feels like she might choke, voice barely audible. “It's all just so hard.”
Dani’s face falls. Because she knows it’s hard. Because she feels so guilty about it all. Because she feels like it’s all her fault, too.
Dani leans forward and pulls Fi into her arms, holding on so tight and so suddenly that Fi gasps for air, then exhales slowly as she wraps her arms around Dani in turn.
“I love you, okay, Fi?” Dani sounds like she might cry. “Fiona, I love you so much. Please. I love you so much.”
Fi knows what Dani’s thinking, because she’s thinking the same thing.
Say it back. Please, please, God, say it back. Please don’t go. Please don’t leave. I’m sorry. Say it back. Please.
“I-I love you, too.” And she does. Fi loves her so much that it might kill her.
Dani sniffles, exhales in a little shaky laugh.
She pulls back, enough to look Fi in the eyes, but not enough to untangle their bodies from one another. A solitary tear trails down her cheek.
“I’m not going anywhere without you, alright?” Dani asserts, in what she used to call her lawyer voice, though her sniffles somewhat betray her veneer of confidence. “And you’re not, either.”
Fi nods, then leans back in for another kiss. Slow, sweet, deep.
She’s not going anywhere.