Serena isn't quite sure how she had come to find herself in this position. It's a strange position to find herself in, at her time of life. She's twenty four, for cripes sake, which is far too be old to be acting like a teenager, especially if you ask her. Drinking far too much at a house party, so much so that the room spins around her, in Stepney of all places.
She knows it's silly. It's a silly thing for her to be doing. She knows that if Mother could see what she was doing, she would be in for the scolding of her life. Despite the fact that she is, indeed, now an adult. Because it is neither ladylike nor dignified to act in such a way, Serena. It isn't becoming of a young lady, especially not one fighting to establish and distinguish them self in the medical profession. She can almost hear her mother reminding her of how much harder the fight is, all because she is a woman.
So God knows why she's drinking in a strangers' house at one in the morning on a Wednesday. Especially when she has work in the morning. God knows why she'd agreed to go to a house party in Stepney. God knows why she had stayed all this time, because she certainly isn't enjoying herself in the way that she should be. God knows why she'd stayed so long, when politeness dictated that she could have left hours ago.
Despite the late hour, and the fact that she is sure most of the people in the crowd have jobs to go to in the morning, she is still surrounded hubbub of people. Almost out of nowhere, she begins to find the crowd too rowdy, too overwhelming. So she slips out onto the patio, through the French doors in the kitchen. She's not a snob, she's really not, but this house isn't very nice. She had to admit to liking the French doors though, thinks absently that they must let in a lot of light. She thinks they make a very nice touch.
Still, dizzy with the suffocating feeling of the crowd pressing in around her, mixed with the alcohol coursing through her system, she turns her back on the light shining from the kitchen window. Half formed thoughts about the air helping to settle her raving mind flee when she finds herself faced with the back of a woman. Serena notes that she is much taller than herself, possibly by several inches. Hard to tell, what with her being hunched over the railing separating them from the grass.
Serena can't help but think, as she takes the woman in, that she looks like just maybe, she might be hiding from something too. From the crowds perhaps, as she is herself, or from something else. Before she turns away, to go and hide away somewhere else, she finds her eyes lingering on the other woman's hair. She has rather unruly blonde locks. Tousled in a way that seems almost effortless, curly and unkempt, but thick and rather lovely.
After duly noting this observation she turns to go, to leave this stranger with lovely hair in solitude. She must make a noise, and not realise it though, because with a start, the it her woman turns to face her. And Serena finds herself struck by the other woman's eyes. Expressive and brown and deep enough to fall into, perhaps. It might just be the alcohol talking, that wouldn't surprise her in the least, but she thinks that they may be the most expressive eyes she has ever seen. The woman has only been looking at her for a moment (though it feels like a very long moment), but her eyes are so open and honest and dark.
Her gaze lingers, Serena can feel it, curious and questioning. She's almost certain that isn't just the alcohol. Finally, after a very long moment, the woman looks away, back across the railing toward the grass. She gestures for Serena to join her, indicating that she is willing to share her hiding place. She moves over to her side, and when the woman glances sideways, they share a smile.
And so, Serena finds herself in a rather odd situation. She spends the rest of the early hours of the morning on a patio in Stepney, laughing and talking and joking with a strange woman she doesn't even know the name of. Leaning against the railing of some strangers garden in Stepney, she has the best night she can remember having in a very long while. And she feels guilty for it, because she's certain it's in the company and not in the alcohol. And she's never felt this at ease, this alive, when she's with Edward.
Even through the haze of alcohol in her slowly sobering system, she knows that what began as a peculiarity has morphed itself into a situation, with a capital 's'. Because this woman, whose name she doesn't even know, has made her laugh more in the past hour than she thinks she's done in a lifetime. Made her smile so much that her cheeks her. Made her stomach feel fluttery and strange and her palms go clammy.
Still, she supposes that it doesn't matter all that much, because she's likely never going to see her again. In the next few hours, the two of them will part ways. Cordially, wishing each other the best. She likes to think that both of them will look back in the evening with fondness, remembering a stranger who vastly improved an altogether too easily forgotten evening. So, if she ignores the fact that the gap between them has become nominally smaller and smaller over the passing hours, she pretends not to notice. Even as their shoulders are brushing, and the sounds from inside are dying down, she ignores it. Because really, what harm does it do?
If it walks the line between flirtation and friendly, well that's a line she's very familiar with. If it borders more on the flirtation side, well she can tell herself that it's all very casual. And if her shoulder burns from where it brushes against the blonde strangers, well it's just a very warm morning, isn't it?
Eventually, the sky begins to lighten, and Serena feels far more sober than she has all night. Which is probably a good thing, given she has work in a mere matter of hours. The sky is beginning to turn grey, and inside the house is silence. They should probably take that as their cue to leave, but both of them seem reluctant to move. Serena knows that it's not just her.
Still, something has to give. And an evening of stolen laughter with a complete and utter stranger can't last forever. So somehow, they end up facing one another, both reluctant to start the process of saying goodbye. Serena blatantly ignores the voice in her head that whispers it shouldn't possibly be this hard to say goodbye to a complete stranger.
She's not quite sure how it happens, but the other woman's head is suddenly much closer to hers. And for some reason she's standing on her tiptoes, and their lips are almost touching. Serena's eyes are fluttering shut, and she is certain she is about to kiss a woman for the first time. Excitement bubbles up inside her, and she almost grins at the thought of it being the woman in front of her. Instead, lips graze her cheek and breath ghosts across her face and a hand squeezes hers. Then the presence of another person is gone.
When she opens her eyes, she is alone on the patio in a random back garden in Stepney. The other woman is nowhere to be seen, and if her cheek wasn't still tingling, she'd be certain she'd imagined the whole thing. Alcohol could do that to a person. Bring on hallucinations and imaginings and such is the like.
When she leaves through the side gate, left open for stragglers, she finds a taxi waiting for her. It takes her home, and she manages to stumble to bed, even though the sun is on its way up. It's funny, really, that she finds herself dreaming of brown eyes shining in the half light from a kitchen window every night for the next week. It's funny how it becomes a recurring dream over the years that follow. It's very funny, Serena thinks, that she dreams of brown eyes instead of blue on her wedding night. It's just one of those things though, she supposes.