Kira sat snug in a chair in the corner of the therapist's office, only being able to see slightly above the edge of the enormous cherry wood desk. She kept herself busy putting together a life size model of the different lobes of the brain while Cosima had her weekly session with Dr. Nealon. The dreadlocked woman realized that smoking pot helped to ease her racing mind only so much and had been going to therapy for just under a year. She found herself especially flustered by the events of the morning and could not stop the gorgeous blonde and what she had said from renting space in her head, grateful that she had an adult to process it with.
"So I can't shake the notion that people consider me to be irresponsible and unreliable, and I want to be able to prove to them that there's more to me than just their assumptions." Cosima had both hands raised, fingers spread wide to make her point. "I'm kind of like an Eskimo Pie, ya know, where I have this hard chocolate shell that makes me seem selfish and too career driven, but there's something deeper there if people would look hard enough. Like I've got this really sweet vanilla ice cream inside of me, and I wish I could find someone who appreciates that. I mean-"
"Auntie Cosima, I'm still hungry," Kira's soft voice chimed in from behind her.
"I know monkey. We'll get you something as soon as I'm done talking to Dr. Nealon." She glances up at the clock and with soft eyes looks back at her niece. "Only like ten more minutes, I promise."
"Lately I feel like I attract bitter, indignant...uh…" Cosima looks to Kira before finishing her statement, not wanting the little girl to be privy to information too mature for her young ears. She notices the bowl sitting next her niece on the desk, "...fish...who demand a lot from me but won't trust me enough to handle it. It's like they want to be taken care of but only on their own terms, and I feel like I have 'sucker' written on my face with the last few fish I've met."
The corner of Dr. Nealon's lip curls upward at his patient's frustration. "Well as they say, there are plenty of fish in the sea, Cosima," he offers smugly like he invented the statement himself.
"Obvs. I just wish I could find a fish who, who wasn't afraid of my vanilla ice cream layer. I think my ex may have turned me off to all other fish completely." She shakes her head, sighing. "I mean I met a true piranha this morning. She may be the most beautiful creature I have ever seen, with eyes you could get swallowed by and a smile that could melt anyone, not that I was allowed to see it much. But man were her teeth sharp as hell, and I'm still recovering from the bite. And to end it all, she shoved her fish in my face," Cosima trailed off.
"In front of your niece?!" Nealon piped up with an appalled expression resting in the wrinkles on his forehead.
"Yeah. What are you talking about?" Cosima questioned, eyebrows raised.
Gesturing to his chest with open palms, "She put her fish in your face? In front of children?"
"Fish? Oh! Oh no, fish-fish," Cosima chuckled as she pointed with her thumb to the classroom pets next to Kira.
This explanation appeared to appease Dr. Nealon as he did not push the topic further with his patient, fearful that the topic would become too difficult for him to follow, let alone the little girl. The two voiced their goodbyes to the therapist and made their way to the nearest restaurant to calm the child's rumbling stomach.
Delphine's heels clacked along the tile as she marched her way to her department, Robin in tow with the tips of his fingers being grasped by his rushing mother. The French woman was up for a promotion at the local university and was to preside over a seminar about the criminal justice system that could be a stepping stone to her becoming the department head.
"Ecouter, Robin. Today is very important for me, and I need you to be on your best behavior! Can you do that for me?" With an exaggerated nod of his head, they proceeded down the hallway. An older gentleman, heading into the same office, stopped to hold the door for them.
"Non, please after you," Delphine insisted.
"Oh it would be my pleasure. Please," the man said as his hand cut through the air offering passage.
"No really. I insist." At this assertion, the blonde's agitation was obvious. Sensing that it was a losing battle, the man rescinded his offer and went in ahead of the her.
Skidding to a stop in front of the reception desk, Delphine inquired about the mood of her boss to the young man working there.
"Mr. Chavalier is up to his usual antics. He's already huffing and puffing about you being late, and of course he has yet another ailment he is complaining on about. His grandkids visited this weekend, and you know his thoughts on them. 'Children are good for nothing but carrying disease!'" the man says in a deep, English accent.
Noticing Delphine's grimace at his words, the assistant looks down beside her and into the green eyes of the little boy. "Oh you've got to be kidding me! No, no way!"
"Please, Colin, you've got to help me. He missed his field trip, and I didn't have any other options. I just have to meet with Ferdinand for a few minutes to review the agenda for the seminar, and then we'll be out of your hair. He's got his backpack filled with toys. You'll barely even notice him!"
Reaching an agreement with her blessing of a coworker, Delphine heads to her office to begin gathering the visual aids she had developed for the seminar to get approval from her boss. The majority of the materials were able to be brought to the reception desk in one trip, but she had to set them down there to retrieve the rest. Colin, seeing that she was having difficulty wrangling the items on her own, followed her down the hallway to be of assistance. A loud crash bellowed from the front and set the two jogging toward the noise. Robin stood with his lips sucked into his mouth and his brows knit together looking at the shattered coffee cup on the floor next to him. The coffee had managed to get on almost every square inch of the visual aids causing a squeak to be forced out of the blonde's mouth, which she quickly attempted to cover while crouching down in emotional pain.
"Don't panic! I have these saved on a flash drive in my drawer. You'll just have to run by the shop to have them printed off again," Colin suggested in an attempt to calm the woman.
Narrowing her eyes at Robin and pointing to a chair next to the desk, Delphine nearly shouted, "Sit. Down."
Letting out a puff of air, she huffed into Ferdinand's office. After devising a story about the posters not being ready yet after she made an attempt to pick them up this morning, Delphine was able to convince her boss that she would be prepared and confident when 2pm rolled around for the department seminar. Walking out of the office and motioning for Robin to join her, she grabbed the flash drive from Colin and journeyed toward the exit. Before reaching the door, a voice called out to her. "I want to remind you how important this seminar is for this department as well as for you, Ms. Cormier," her boss stressed to her, peering out from his office.
"Oh I'm aware, sir! It will be great."
With a frown on his face, Ferdinand appeared to notice Robin standing at the tall woman's side. He reached into his pocket to pull out a handkerchief, covering his mouth.
"Who is this?" he sneered.
Not wanting to add fuel to her boss' already blazing fire for her actions this morning, she attempted to distract from the situation. "He was wandering in the office. I was just going to help him find his mother."
"Do you know what I see when I look at him?"
"What is that, sir?" she questioned hopefully.
"A petrie dish."
"Oh I'm sure he isn't a petrie di-" she was interrupted by Robin coughing. Rolling her eyes she snapped, "I'm going to go find his mother."
Once outside in the fresh air, Delphine stopped as the sound of buzzing came from her jacket pocket.
"Allo?" Delphine spat, still frustrated by the events of the morning.
"You're late. Where in the hell are you? You better get right over here!" came a growling voice from the other end.
Confused by the accusations and unaware of who was calling, the blonde was unable to force out anything more than grunt.
"Rachel Duncan has called a press conference about a breakthrough with a new gene therapy technique that YOU were supposedly working on. While you were so busy talking to your coworkers about rainbow panties, your work was being stolen right out from underneath you!"
Recognizing the reason for the confusion, Delphine hung up without acknowledging the other person. She sneered at the phone thinking that insufferable Cosima continues to make my day harder! Because of her cheeky, nonchalant attitude, I have to take Robin to the drop in center. He is not going to be happy, but today's success will make it all worth it. I will be a better mom when I get the promotion. She took her son's hand again and looked to hail a cab. Once she was settled into her seat, she took out Cosima's phone, and made sure to text Krystal and Colin the number in case of an emergency. She figured she also should try to set up a way to get her own phone back, and she dialed her own number.
Cosima was laughing as she answered, "H-h-hello!"
"This is Delphine Cormier, we had the pleasure of meeting earlier."
"Oh hey Delphine. How did you get this number?" Cosima replied, trying to sound as charming as possible but also with an air of maturity laced through it.
"It's actually my phone I'm calling. The kids must have switched them up this morning," stated in the most polite tone she could muster for the woman.
"Classic you, Delphine" Cosima giggled trying to ease a laugh out of the blonde.
"Excuse me, but if you weren't so busy ruining my day and my son's along with it, this wouldn't have happened."
"Look I was just trying to play around with you. Let's move past our earlier problems and get a plan in place."
"Oui that sounds good. I also wanted to give you a message I got from someone calling from your work I'm assuming. A Rachel Duncan is having a press conference this afternoon about something sciencey, and your boss did not sound happy."
"Hmph I'll figure that out when I get to the lab in a few. Thanks for the message," Cosima smiled into the phone. "How about we plan to switch phones tomorrow morning when we drop off the kids to school?"
Delphine scoffed. "On time?" she said annoyed.
"I can't promise anything. Like I said, kinda always late. But I will do anything for you, Delphine!"
"D'accord!"
Before Cosima had a chance to try to impress the exotic beauty any further, the line was disconnected. She let out a sigh and grabbed Kira's hand to hurry, already late for work.
Cosima and Kira skip into the building and head toward her lab while giggling at cheesy science jokes the older woman has been cracking on the trip over. Up ahead, they notice a couple of lab techs and return to a normal walk.
"Hey Cosima!" a blonde haired woman with glasses purrs at her as she passes by.
"Oh good morning Bobby!" Cosima says as she flashes her smile with her eye teeth highlighting her best feature.
"Lookin' good, Cos," a shorter woman with sparkling blue eyes whispers in the brunette's ear loud enough for her niece to hear. With a wink, the woman turns the corner and into their lab.
"Heyyy Cosima. Lookin' good," Kira imitates while batting her eyes up at her aunt, giggling. "Seems like a lot of the girls around here like you, Auntie Cosima."
"Yeah well they'll grow out of it," Cosima hoped, trying to change the subject. "Wait till you see my top secret lab! Don't worry. I'll protect you from the mutants!"
With a beep from her key card, the door to the lab swung open. Sitting in the chill zone holding a cat on his lap, Scott smiled goofily up at them as the two strolled in.
"Hey Scotty boy! What's Denise doing here today?"
"Oh her asthma's really been acting up, and I thought a sterile environment could really help her out. You can come pet her if you'd like. She loves cuddles," he said while motioning for Kira to come sit with him.
Cosima sets the fish bowl down that she'd been carrying for blocks and got a report from her lab partner about the message she got from Delphine.
"Leekie is not happy. Like at all. He is thinking that there may be a mole in our lab."
"I've got a lead for you, Cosima," Shay, the shorter woman flirting with her before, offered. "Evie Cho defected from Duncan's corporation on bad terms and is willing to go on the record about how Rachel has been stealing our data."
Scott chimed in. "That would be huge. Do you think she would be willing to speak at the press conference?"
"She might be. I'm sure if Cosima was able to talk to her, she'd definitely do it. You can be quite charming, and most people would be willing to give you anything you want," Shay said as she brushed up against the dreadlocked woman's side.
Cosima backed away a bit. "Okay yeah. Shay if you could get me her information, I will make it a point to track her down today. Can you guys let Leekie know that I'm on it, and that I'll be there with Evie at 5pm for that press conference?" Her coworkers nodded.
"Auntie Cosima?"
"You guys are the best. Thanks for helping me out with this. I've got so much on my plate today with the little one and all, so thanks!"
"Cosima?"
"Yeah Kir? What's up?"
"Um…" Kira looked worried but busted out into a chuckle. "Denise ate my class fish."
Delphine is gonna KILL me.
"We'll figure it out, kiddo. Alright, time for plan B. I know you're not gonna like this, but you're going to have to go to the drop in center while I run around for work this afternoon."
"But-" Kira started.
"I know. I'm sorry. What I want you to do while you're there is think of 500 things you want to do this week, and I promise I will do at least 400 of them. Deal?" Cosima smiled with pleading eyes.
"Deal!"
Cosima walks over to Shay and hands her a post it with Delphine's number on it. "This is how you can reach me today. I'll have my own phone back tomorrow. You get any more leads about Evie or Rachel, call me!" she shouted as she gets in the elevator, and the doors begin to close.
Delphine kneels down to look her son in the eyes as she takes off her watch. "I will be back to pick you up at 4:45pm. That's when the big hand is here," she says pointing to the watch, "and the little hand is here."
"I'm sorry, maman."
"Ma cherie, you are not being punished. I just have a lot to do today, and it's not a fun day for a little boy. I will be back before you know it!"
They walk hand in hand to the outside fence of the playground where it appears that the kids there are dressed up as Disney characters.
"He can't come in. He isn't even dressed up," a rude Buzz Lightyear yells at them.
"Don't listen to them, Robin. We'll figure something out when we get inside," his mother assured him, leading the way into the building.
Delphine and Robin venture into the lobby of the drop in center to check in where they notice a little girl sitting with a large knit beanie on her head watching a puppet show. The voice of what Delphine believes to be the Swedish chef from the Muppets comes from the puppet talking to the child.
"Werdy berdy ber. I vill be back at 4:30pm. You get to vear my VitBit so that you vill know ze time," the puppet announced as Delphine watched, chuckling with Robin.
"But I don't have a costume," the child pouted.
"A costume? Vhat can ve do for a costume?" As the blonde woman smiled on, the voice changed as the puppeteer lifted above the stage. "I'm sorry, sweetie. I don't have a costume."
Delphine's face fell, replaced by an instant scowl, as she saw Cosima peer out from behind the curtain.
"Oh" is all that the French woman could say at the surprise.
"H-hey!" Cosima said softer and less confident than she sounded earlier in the day.
Ignoring the brunette, Delphine turned her attention to the little girl with her head half hidden by the hat. "Kira! Kira, ma cherie. Look who it is. You and Robin will be here together. It will be so much fun!"
Cosima fully stood up stretching out her back as she turned toward those beautiful hazel eyes. "I thought you told your friend that you weren't going to bring him here?"
"Je sais. But things got out of control, and I am desperate."
"Ditto. Obvs." Cosima offered a half smile toward the obviously stressed woman.
Turning toward the two forlorn children, Delphine attempted to offer fun and hope to them. "So it looks like we need two Disney characters, and fast, non?" Two smiles beamed up at the adults in return.
The resourceful blonde started digging through her oversized purse, searching for any materials she could use to build worthwhile costumes for the desperate children. Out comes two different colors of duct tape, pantyhose, headbands, poncho, toy gun, and other random items that Cosima could only stare in bewilderment.
"Where do you get a bag like that? You're like a magician!" Cosima praised Delphine.
For the first time all day, Cosima was rewarded with a genuine smile that she swore she wouldn't come back from. She felt a rush of adrenaline course through her body at the sight, and the hair on the back of her neck stood at attention. This woman is so unpredictable. Not only is she angelic, but she makes me speechless. Why am I so drawn to her?
"Voila!" Delphine presents the two kids to Cosima as she's lost in thought about the blonde. She coughs and straightens up as they walk toward her. "May I present to you Woody the cowboy and Princess Anna!"
"Wow guys! You look really great. Nothing is in your way of having a great time now!" She crouched down to them and gave each a high five. Delphine tilted her head and sighed at the glowing smile on her son's face at the attention.
Watching them walk into the playground, Delphine shouted after them, "If you're hurt or if any of these mean kids picks on you, call me on my cell phone. And if you can't reach me, call 911!"
Cosima chimed in, "And if any boys give you trouble, kick 'em in the balls!" Robin and Kira looked at each other and burst out laughing as the brunette threw them a wink.
Delphine scoffed at the crass statement from her short companion but giggled under her breath as well. "Ciao!"
"Bye!"
Delphine and Cosima walked in unison as they set off to handle their business. The brunette, still in awe of the other woman's generosity and imagination offered, "Thanks for that back there. I don't know what I would've done without you."
"You're welcome. It's hard enough being a kid!"
"Oh c'mon. Being a kid is awesome," Cosima joked as she unwrapped a sucker.
"You would know!" Delphine retorted with raised eyebrows.
"My mom used to tell me to find a person who would love me like a little kid because that way I would learn how to grow into a woman. I've yet to find someone to truly love my playful side. I was hoping she was out there, maybe somewhere close," Cosima injected expectantly through a wide smile.
"Good luck with that. Maturity is what is sexy, and most people already have their own kids to raise."
Cosima stopped walking and shouted after the blonde, "Maybe if you weren't so damn focused on being mature, you'd actually be able to have some friends!"
Delphine whipped around and leered down at the shorter woman. "I don't have time for friends!"
The brunette, glancing at the French woman's lips, licked her own. She leaned up toward her ear whispering "Good thing I'm not looking to be your friend." Cosima tipped her head back enough to offer Delphine a wink and a smirk.
With a growl, frustrated by the relentless woman as well as the response her body had to being so close to her, Delphine marched at least five steps away as she heard "Don't you want your phone back?"
Cosima stood waving the phone in her hand, smiling with her tongue peeking out from behind her teeth. With her long legs, Delphine closed the gap in seconds and snatched it out of the shorter woman's hand. Turning on a dime, she went back to near running away from the situation. She could hear Cosima yell to her from a distance.
"You're welcome. Oh, and Delphine! Good luck with your seminar!" She could almost picture the smirk on Cosima's face. Merde!