This was it. She was going to tell her.
The moment seemed to have been coming for months now, they'd even kissed the week before but she'd ran away, avoided the blonde like the plague whilst she came to terms with the feelings she could no longer deny. She'd fallen head over heels with a woman, but not just any woman. Her best friend, the incomparable Major Berenice Wolfe.
The pair had hit it off from the moment they both met in the car park over her broken car. They'd certainly had their downs for sure since then-Bernie lying about her infidelity, Serena thinking Bernie was trying to steal her job, the Cameron/Keeley debacle being a few of the lowest lows. But the highs, oh the highs were so wonderful. Every time they sat in Albies with a bottle of Shiraz laughing about this and that, the high fives they shared after they'd been amazing at work, the looks they shared when they they were teasing each other. The highs far outweighed the lows.
Of course the newest low had almost caused her to give up all hope. A week after the kiss that had lit her soul alight, she had made her way into Albies to find Bernie flirting with a woman at the bar. She'd fled towards her office and straight into Hanssen who had been getting out of the lift. Seeing the troubled look on her face he'd pulled her into his office and talked some sense into her. Now she was going to get her woman.
The moment was perfect. She'd made sure Bernie would be going to Karaoke, half the hospital were there so it wasn't hard. Steeling herself for what would be an uncharacteristically public show of emotion, she made her way up to the microphone.
'Hello. Sorry I don't usually do this but situations must. I recently kissed somebody so very important to me but ran away because I was scared. I tried to hide from my feelings but I just can't do that anymore. I'm in love with them. I messed up and I hope this will make some way toward making amends.
If I loved you,
Time and again I would try to say
All I'd want you to know.
If I loved you,
Words wouldn't come in an easy way
Round in circles I'd go!
Longin' to tell you,
But afraid and shy,
I'd let my golden chances pass me by!
Soon you'd leave me,
Off you would go in the mist of day,
Never, never to know how I loved you
If I loved you.
If I loved you,
Time and again I would try to say
All I'd want you to know.
If I loved you,
Words wouldn't come in an easy way
Round in circles I'd go!
Longin' to tell you,
But afraid and shy,
I'd let my golden chances pass me by!
Soon you'd leave me,
Off you would go in the mist of day,
Never, never to know how I loved you
If I loved you.
With the final note the audience began to applaud raucously. She was vaguely aware of the AAU team standing and cheering, but her eyes were only on Bernie. The blondes face was unreadable. Slowly she stood and made her way through the tables towards her, the applause dying off as they realised who the mysterious receiver of the usually composed former deputy CEO's affection was. A deathly silence fell over the room as Bernie approached the platform and stood before the brinette, her face still unreadable. Serena's heart was in her throat, every rapid beat of it thumping around her body like an elephant, to say nothing of the stone butterflies in her stomach.
Bernie smiled. She began to laugh.
'Goodness you don't do things by half do you?' She shot an arm around Serenas waist and pulled her flush against her so close she could feel the elephant sized heartbeats of the woman who had put everything on the line for her. Her other hand trailed up to capture Serenas face and cradle her cheek. 'I love you too. Idiot.' She leant forwards and captured the lips she'd spent so long dreaming of in her own. Fireworks didn't go off in the distance. There was no swelling orchestra to score the moment. There was just the two of them. Two women, both a little beyond their prime, who were deeply in love. And 30 of their friends and colleagues wolf whistling and paying up on bets.
So lost in the tender embrace of the other, neither noticed the crowd dying down and the slightly awkward silence that settled across the room as the pair continued to kiss passionately.
'As touching as this scene is, if you two could possibly unattach yourselves for the time being.' The commanding tone of one Henrik Hanssen broke the embrace. Blushing the women realised that they were front and foremost the entertainment of the evening. Bernie tried to look contrite but the shit eating grin she felt burst through and she buried her face in her, for lack of a better word, girlfriends neck giggling.
'Let's buy you a drink. And then I think we should talk. I have a lot of making up to do.' Serena muttered contritely. Peering up through through lidded eyes Bernie met Serenas own brown orbs, the telltale twinkle she had become known for back after a week of dullness.
'I can think of a few ways you can do that.'