Sometimes after a disagreement or a fight that Gail knows is entirely her fault, she'll put on her favorite Smiths album and skip ahead to Track 11.

Sometimes like tonight.

The fight was stupid. Really, Gail was just in the mood to be stubborn. Sometimes she gets that way. Sometimes she just wakes up knowing that she's going to push and push and push until Holly, eternally patient Holly, can't take it anymore and gives in to the fight Gail is trying to start.

It happens less and less now.

But it still happens.

Tonight's fight was about, of all things, dishes. Holly's been talking about getting new dishes for the kitchen, mostly because Gail's kind of clumsy when she loads and unloads the dishwasher, and a bunch of the plates and bowls have little chips on them. And Gail, in one of her moods, refuses to help pick out new ones, insisting that the ones they have are just fine.

To be honest, she'd insist they were still fine even if the damned things leaked all over her every time she tried to eat her cereal or take a drink. They're just things. Gail would be fine eating out of tupperware and drinking straight from the bottle if it came down to it.

Eventually Holly had thrown up her arms in exasperation and left the room.

Gail figured she needed some time to cool off so she didn't follow.

Instead, she finished unloading the dishwasher that Holly had left half-undone.

The dishes really were getting kind of bad.

They were down to only having three usable dinner plates, actually.

Maybe it was time to get something new.

She puts the last dish away and wipes down the counter before moving into the living room.

Holly's sitting there on the couch, deliberately ignoring her. Gail lets her.

She flips on the stereo and slips the cd into the carrier, turning up the volume before queuing up the right track.

And as the strains of "Unloveable" start to fill the house she walks over to the couch, swinging her hips deliberately. She comes to a stop right before her girlfriend, swaying to the lazy-sounding chords.

Slowly, slowly, Gail starts to slide her hands down to the hem of her shirt, and then works it up, up, up over her stomach, her chest, her shoulders, her head. It lands on the couch next to Holly, who is trying hard to focus on the book in her hands and not the woman sexily stripping in front of her.

Gail knows she's got her as Morrissey starts to sing about wearing black. When Holly's fingers start to tremble as she turns the page and her mouth twitches with the effort of not laughing as the blonde swings her bra around like lasso and tosses it across the room. She moves to straddle Holly's lap, plucking the book out of the woman's hands.

"And if I seem a little strange," Gail starts to sing along, fingers working against the buttons of Holly's soft flannel shirt, "Well, that's because I am."

In the morning, after they track down all of yesterday's discarded clothing, they go shopping for new dishes.