A/N Can't even begin to wrap my mind around 4x12. So here is the next chapter of the new story, and I am going to go write smut, because I just need to! Is it May yet?**
As she led Bea out of Maude's office and down the hallway towards the bathroom, Allie repeatedly got caught staring at this beaten, yet somehow still beautiful woman who quite literally fell into her life. They had been holding hands since Maude's interrogation had spooked Bea. Allie had oddly never felt so complete, hands intertwined with this captivating stranger. If she wasn't in the first weeks of sobriety and living in this shit-hole, Allie would think her life was a fairy tale.
When Bea's eyes met her gaze once again, Allie hurried to make an excuse. "So...I...well...this is the grand tour." Really, the grand tour? And you're the tour guide of what, the Smithsonian? Dumbass...
Bea just looked at her expectantly, hopefully not judging Allie as harshly as she judges herself.
Allie hurried to point out their surroundings. Everyone needs to know where they are, and how to get out. "Right-o. Upstairs are the single bed rooms, everyone gets their own. There is also a bathroom upstairs. All the rooms down here have their own purpose. There is the kitchen and the dining room," Allie pointed through the open arched door, as she slowly led Bea down the hall.
"Down here is the library with WiFi so women can take classes, or look for a job. There's the rec room that has a TV. Only basic cable, but not too shabby. That's the laundry," Allie pointed at the second to last door before opening the final one. "And here's the showers."
As they walked through the doorway, Bea trailing behind her, squeezing hard on their interlocked fingers, Kaz calls out from in front of the sinks before them, "Still holding hands with your girlfriend, Allie?"
Bea dropped her hand and grunted, slamming on her brakes. Which might have been Kaz's intent, because she smirked before telling Allie, "I put everything she needs for the shower in the third stall. First aid kit is on the bench over there."
Allie nods before turning to look back at Bea and pointing at the showers to their right. Bea steps around her, taking small steps to her destination.
Kaz walked towards Allie and the exit. "The girls and I are playing cards, if you want to join us," Kaz offers to Allie when Bea was past them.
"I'm gonna..." Allie points to the showers.
Kaz sighs and calls her out, loudly. "Don't get too attached to this one, Allie. She'll go back to her husband, just wait. Don't let her bring you down with her, kiddo." Kaz patted Allie on the back and walked out the door, leaving Bea and Allie alone.
Allie went to see if she could help and found Bea, still fully dressed with her curtain open, staring at the wall.
"Do you need help?"
Bea jumped, and Allie wanted to kick herself. Bea just got the shit knocked out of her, of course she is easily startled.
"I...don't think...can't lift arms." Bea cried out without turning around.
"I'll help," Allie soothed, taking two steps forward to be right behind Bea.
Bea bristled at the contact. "I'm not gay..."
Fuck! Stupid fucking Kaz and her big mouth. "I don't care what you are."
Bea didn't say a word, though she didn't shrug Allie off either. "Look...Kaz...she just worries about me, okay? I'm not helping you because I'm gay...I'm..."
Bea cut her off with a heartbreaking whisper. "Then why are you helping me?"
"I've been here before, not that long ago really. Kaz helped me..."
Bea scoffed, and Allie giggled before defending her mentor. "I don't know what her problem is tonight, but she's a good woman. She's a good one to have your back. Her, Maude...and me..." Allie whispered the last part before finding her voice. "So, let me help you...okay?"
Bea gave the slightest nod before she turned around and faced Allie. As gently as she could, Allie pulled up on the bottom of Bea's t-shirt. When Allie's fingers accidentally grazed Bea's ribs, she gasped, and not from pleasure. Allie had resisted the temptation to look until then, not wanting to freak the woman out. Allie might happily be a lesbian, but she was not a predator. She wouldn't take anything that was not offered.
Allie looked down as objectively as she could and her gut clenched, bile terrorizing her sensitive stomach. Bea's midsection was covered in large angry bruises, some the size of a boot-print. That useless fucking bastard.
With Bea's shirt still in her hands, Allie looked up at Bea wide-eyed. "You need a doctor."
"NO!" It was Allie's turn to jump, unprepared for the sudden outburst. "They aren't broken. It's not that bad." Allie scoffed, but Bea didn't give her a chance to object. "Really...they just need wrapped. Please, just help me."
Bea might not be gay, but Allie was, and she had always been a sucker for a pretty girl in distress. Despite Allie's reservations about not taking her to the hospital, Bea should know her own body, so Allie grumbled, "okay."
"Thank you," Bea whispered.
"You won't be thanking me when I put alcohol on those cuts," Allie reminded, then cursed herself for being short with the wounded woman before her.
Bea didn't respond, so Allie resumed taking off Bea's shirt. With Bea's arms only able to go half way up, Allie had to do some wrangling, but she finally managed to get Bea's top off.
Allie refused to look anywhere but at Bea's bloodied face. She would not look at the breasts before her. Bea gave a gentle smile, and said, "I think I can get the rest. If you can step out for a minute..."
"Of course...of course I can."
Allie stepped back quickly, nearly tripping over her own feet. It almost sounded like Bea giggled. Allie couldn't be sure though, so she let it go, pulling the curtain shut behind her. Like a guard dog, Allie stood outside the stall for a good couple minutes before the shower turned on, and steam rose to the ceiling.
It was a few minutes later when a towel clad Bea opened the curtain, with the shower still running behind her. "Can...can you help with my hair?"
"Sure," Allie said, probably a little too eagerly. She hadn't really thought about how Bea couldn't raise her arms to wash those luscious locks.
She tried to remind herself that it is just hair as she stepped into the shower behind Bea once again. "I'm not sure how..."
"It's okay, its just your hair," Allie repeated aloud. Bea sighed, obviously not convinced. "Leave that towel around you. There is another one here," Allie suggested, smiling at the instant relief on Bea's face.
Bea stepped into the shower stream and closed her eyes, letting the water run off her head, down her hair and onto the towel. It might not be the best idea Allie ever had, but it seemed to work.
Allie grabbed the shampoo and conditioner and sat them on the ground by Bea's feet. She then stepped under the shower too and began slowly rinsing Bea's hair.
Bea looked at Allie and gasped, "your clothes!"
"They'll dry," Allie calmly explained, never stopping the massage of Bea's head. When Allie believed all Bea's hair was rinsed, she reached for the shampoo, and repeated the process. By the time Allie was rinsing out the conditioner, Bea was putty in her hands, making noises not of her own volition.
Allie took longer than necessary to stop, not wanting to miss out on any chance she had to help Bea. Before she risked the chance of freaking the adamantly straight woman out, Allie stepped away. "All done. I'll let you finish."
Allie scurried out of the stall, clothes dripping wet from the shower, panties wet from Bea's moans under Allie's fingers. She was screwed, she was so screwed.
A few moments later Bea came out, dressed in sweat pants with her second towel wrapped around her top half, and she pointed behind her. "There is another set of dry clothes."
"Right-o." Allie said. "I'll be right back to clean your cuts." Allie hurried into the stall, dressing like she was a firewoman heading out on a call. She didn't have time to waste. Not when Bea was right there, needing her.
When she finished, she found Bea on the bench, first aid kit open in front of her. "We have everything we need?" Bea jerked and then quickly nodded. "Alright, let's see what we have here." Allie grabbed a stack of paper towels before joining Bea on the bench.
Pouring a generous amount of alcohol on the disposable cloth, Allie took her time, slowly dabbing each cut on Bea's face. Both corners of her mouth, the small cut on her right cheek, then the gash over her right eye, which itself was nearly swollen shut.
Since the mouth heals the fastest, Allie let those go, but put a small band-aid on Bea's sterilized cheek, and a butterfly on her eyebrow. None of those cuts needed stitches; they would heal on their own, in time.
"All done," Allie said cheerfully, though there was nothing cheerful about cleaning up a beat to hell woman.
"Now...just the wrap," Bea squirmed.
Allie didn't blame her. The pressure of cracked ribs being wrapped was almost unbearable, but something had to be done to hold them in place.
"I'll give you enough room to breath. I swear it won't be as bad as a corset..."
"A corset? Really?" Bea teased.
"What? I saw it in a movie. They look like a bitch. I couldn't imagine having to wear a dress anyways, let alone one with that underneath."
"You'd look pretty in a dress," Bea whispered, so lightly that Allie would have missed it if she wasn't hanging on every word.
"Uh...thanks." Allie blushed, not used to such meaningful compliments. The most she usually heard is that she was a hot broad, worthy of a quick fuck.
Allie swore Bea must be at least ten shades darker red than her. Interesting...
Before things could get too awkward, Allie suggested, "Let's get you wrapped, yeah?"
Bea stood, slowly and not very gracefully, and Allie hurried to grab the ace bandage before joining Bea on her feet.
Allie wrapped Bea's ribs as lightly as she dared, knowing it wouldn't work if it wasn't secure enough, but not wanting to cause this woman any more pain. In fact Allie would do anything in her power to make sure Bea would never hurt again, if Bea would just let her. That scared Allie to no end. She had just met Bea, but the woman came with a force that swept Allie away and had yet to let her settle. Maybe Kaz had a point, but before Allie could think too much on it, Bea was thanking her again. "Thanks...I mean...really...thank you...no one has ever..."
"It was my pleasure...truly."
Bea smiled, the first genuine one of the night. "I've never had a gay nurse before."
"Well, I've never had a straight patient. I guess that makes us even." Allie quipped back.
When Bea shifted, in obvious discomfort, Allie came crashing down to Earth. Bea wasn't here for Allie, she was here for help. Despite everything in her screaming to find an excuse to spend more time with this woman, she did what was best for Bea.
"Let's get you to your room, yeah? A good night's rest, and you will be a brand new woman."
One that still wouldn't be Allie's. If straight people always insist that the good ones are married or gay, hows come every time Allie finds a good woman, one that speaks to her on another level, they are always straight? Life's a bitch.
