"Are we going to your home Stella? Am I going to meet your mum like you met mine?"
.
Ellie bounces with excitement between the two women, nestled in the back of a hack.
.
"Can I tell you a secret?" She lowers her head closer to Ellie.
"Yes!"
"I am a foundling," She whispers dramatically, "I was hatched from an egg and raised on the wind."
"You are fibbing, Stella." Ellie exclaims with wonder. "Mum, she's fibbing. Make her tell the truth."
"I can't dearest." Reed explains, turning her head away from the two to watch London get washed clean by the rain. "Stella never fibs."
"Never?"
"Never ever." Stella confesses straight faced as she turns to the driver. "You can stop here."
.
They clamor out, trying (and failing) to stay dry between the car and the townhouse they've pulled up to. Stella leads them in and up, up, up the stairs to the top flat where she fumbles for a moment with the keys before she manages to opens the door and leads them in to her darkened flat.
.
She looks about her near-spartan surroundings as though seeing it for the first time - she does this, time to time, viewing her flat as if she's at work, trying to ascertain what can be gathered about her from her surroundings. Rather morbid, but then she's always had an unorthodox view of the world. There are large windows, white washed walls, large couch, books and blouses and records and half-finished coffee cups everywhere telling her of a woman who is either unaccustomed or unbothered by others in her space. She collects the more telling odds and ends as she lets the two women in behind her. She hears Reed tell her daughter to be careful, and Stella can't help but smile as she dumps the cups in the sink. "Don't worry, there's nothing precious to be careful of here." She explains as she puts on the kettle. She's not domestic, but she does insists on her tea being made in a pot, her water boiled on in a kettle. She steps out to see Reed standing out dark amongst the lightness of the room, anchoring it with her presence. She loves that even without sunlight, the city is…light. The fog and the streetlights casting everything in a dreamy haze. Surely that's what this is - a dream. Her flat hasn't seen a child in it during her time here and now there's one in the corner, face pressed against the large empty glass aviary. Not just any child, Tanya's child. And Reed? It's a collision of her worlds - and she doesn't know what to do. She's not good with children. She's not good with friends. Or with Reed. Or with her heart constricting slowly in her chest. "You ok?" Reed asks, stepping into her sightline, displaying concern. "Stella?" The little one asks, turning to them both. "Is this where you sleep?"
"Why yes Hatchling, this is my home." No need to explain her desires to sleep anywhere but here if she's alone.
"I'm not a hatchling, I came from mum. I meant, is this glass cage where you sleep?"
"Not in a very long time, not since I was your age." Stella smiles.
"I still think you're fibbing." She says, "You don't look like a bird."
"Don't I?" She purses her lips out as if shaping them into a bird's beak. "Mum," Stella turns around, "Don't I look like a bird?" She sees a look of terror pass through Reed's eyes then disappear just as swiftly as it appeared.
.
A moment passes between them, Stella trying to decipher the look while Reed tries to hide it.
.
"I'll check on the tea." Stella announces, breaking the moment. "Why don't you grab something dryer for… you both?" She suggests to Tanya.
"We should probably go, now that we've made sure you've made it home safe."
"You can, but you'll be hard pressed to find a taxi for hire during rush hour in the rain. My room is the second door on the left. There should be some sweaters in the bottom drawer."
.
She leaves the choice to Reed as she returns to her kitchen, pulling down the teapot and her favorite tea. She tries to remember being Ellie's age. It's hard, she doesn't like remembering anything at all. But she can remember toast soldiers with tea. Her fingers jammy and sticky from making them march along the table. She pulls the bread out from the fridge and ignores that it contains no more than a few carry out containers of undetermined age.
.
She keeps her mind busy. She keeps her hands busy.
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She plates some biscuits. This is … making her uncomfortable. Tanya's children, Tanya's life outside of what she knew of her was a deterrent, a barrier between her and the other woman. If she was honest, she didn't want to know more about the other woman than she already knew… and even that was too much. She wanted her. She wanted her that night, she wanted her every night she was in Belfast, and if she's honest, there are nights where she still wants her. She tells herself it's because she was thwarted in her pursuits of the other woman, she tells herself it's because she doesn't accept failure in herself The truth is, there is something about Tanya Reed-Smith that makes her chafe, that makes her feel trapped, even here in her own home, in her own skin. She rolls her shoulders back and takes a deep breath as the kettle whistles and the toaster 'dings' completion. She pours the hot water into the pot and turns to fetch the jam when she notices Tanya leaning by the fridge, watching her. She's in a large knit sweater - wine colored. "Looks better on you than it ever did on me." Stella smiles as leans in and kisses her softly, nipping the other woman's lower with her teeth. One of them hums with approval - she can't tell who. She pulls away after a moment and opens the fridge and grabs the jam.
"Stella?" Ellie calls from the other room, "Can I put on a movie?"
"If your mother says yes." She starts to butter the toast.
"Mum?"
"Ah - yes." Reed doesn't take her eyes off Stella. "What was that?"
"Thought I'd break the ice." She spreads the jam.
"Yes, well, that certainly did it. My daughter's in the next room."
"So she is." She slices them bread into strips. "Can you get the tea?" She asks, nodding towards the teapot, her own hands filled with plates and cups. "Sugar's in the jar beside it, milk is…well…" Before she can leave the room, feels Tanya's lips press against hers artlessly, but most definitely earnestly. "I've wanted to do that for a very long time." Tanya whispers before pulling away fully and turning her attention to the teapot and sugar. "Well." Stella mutters to herself, taking a deep breath to squelch the tugging of desire before heading out.
.
She sets the plate on the coffee table and watches Ellie, crosslegged on the floor, enraptured by the action on the screen. "Goblet of Fire?" Stella asks.
"Prisoner of Azkaban." Ellie replies, her eyes not stirring from the screen, "Goblet of Fire wasn't in it's case."
"I wonder where it could be?"
"Harry Potter? Really Stella?" Tanya teases, setting down the pot of tea and pausing the screen. "Wash hands please." She reminds her daughter, pointing to the sink in the kitchen. "Nieces and nephews?"
"Mine actually, Doctor. It's a rich illustration of the battle of good and evil, the choices one is faced with and…oh shut up." She gives in, watching Tanya fail in containing her laughter.
"And here I was thinking you were in it just for Bellatrix ."
"Narcissa Malfoy if you please," Stella smiles, pouring the tea into three tea cups. "Are you both dry enough? Warm enough?"
"Plenty. Isn't that right Elle?" She asks her daughter, returning to the room. "All washed?" Ellie holds her hands up for her mum to smell, her little arms drowning in Stella's old sweater sleeves. "Alright then, tea and toast. And say thank you to Stella for having us over."
"Thank you Stella! Can we watch Goblet of Fire next?"
"I'll see if I can find it." She says. "I'm just…going to change into something dry myself." She excuses herself and makes her way into her room and sits on the edge of her bed.
.
She looks at her hands, clasped in her lap.
.
She needs a moment. She'll be fine.
.
She just needs a moment.
.
She can tell someone else has been here. Reed was careful, the drawer is shut tight, but after Spector, she's aware of these things. Paranoid in a very understandable way. And she knows herself - she's exhausted at performing for Reed, for her daughter. This is not who she is, not really, not deep down. This is a coat she puts on, no different than her trench. A slight knock at the door pulls her out of the depths of her thoughts as she rises, reminding her she came in for a reason. "Everything ok?" Reed asks, slipping through the door, but staying close to it.
"Yes, I just needed a moment."
"Alright." She watches Stella pull a pair of wool pants from her closet, a dry shirt.
"You do like to watch me, don't you?" Stella teases, as she undoes her skirt and steps out of it. As she pulls her damp blouse off over her head. She simply shrugs as she watches the other woman get dressed, watches as she quickly braids her damp hair. She looks so different like this, still beautiful, because there's nothing that can mar that, just different. "Well, shall we go out?"
"In a minute." Reed murmurs, stepping towards Stella. She wordlessly opens her arms and wraps them around the slight woman. "I've always…wondered…" She begins, breathing in the scent of Stella, "What this would feel like. After that night, after that morning. I just…wanted to know." She doesn't let go, she just holds the other woman, until she feels her shifting, and loosely bringing them to Reed's waist.
"Well, now you know."
"It feels nice."
"You certainly are crossing a lot of things off your to-do list today, aren't you?" Stella mumbles into Reed's skin, her face nestled in the tender curve between neck and shoulder, itchy wool against her cheek. She eases out of the embrace after a moment, unable to breathe, to think. "Shall we?" She asks, leading the way out the door.
.
hr
.
She yawns.
.
A glimpse at her wrist watch reveals it's almost 40 minutes after she last checked the time - apparently she had dozed off. She needs to go. She needs to leave. She needs to be anywhere but here. A glance reveals a domesticity she's never desired in the form of a sleeping child at her feet, a movie near-muted on the screen, a partner laying beside her on the couch. She has spent the last few hours imagining this was her life - like how she imagines she's never seen her apartment before; her childhood was a dream; she can save people and stop the gross evils of the world. In this case, she doesn't like it. The flat that at times feels too big for one seems to have the walls close in on her with every sleepy blink. She imagines escape routes she can take - but none of them seem right. Just a few more hours of this and her existence will be restored to her. She can make it, she thinks to herself as she slides away from the sleeping Reed's feet and rises. She gently repeats Eleanor's name until the little girl yawns to life. "Good morning?"
"Still night I'm afraid. Don't you think you'd be more comfortable in bed?"
"hmnnnahhh" Ellie mumbles.
"Come along anyways." Stella coaxes her up, leading her to the guest room at the end of the hall and settling her into bed, tucking the sheets around her. She smooths her hair back, as dark as her mother's, and places a light kiss on her forehead. Performing maternal care as drag. "Good night Hatchling."
"Night Stella."
.
She returns to the main room and begins her nightly rituals as if Reed's not on the sofa asleep. The television gets shut off. The doors and windows get checked. The lights go off one at a time, until she's left standing alone in the room, lit only by the streetlights. She's tempted to leave Reed there on the couch until she feels something, someone watching her through the dark. "You're awake?"
"Yes."
"Why didn't you say anything?"
"Wanted to see what you'd do. You're a curious bird Stella Gibson."
"So you believe I'm a hatchling?"
"I'm starting to, yes." Tanya yawns and rises. "Do have a spare blanket?"
"I can bring it out -"
"I'll get it - I'd like to check on Elle. Did she give you any trouble?"
"None. She was still half-asleep though."
.
They walk down the darkened hall, the air between them vibrating with…so many different emotions and sensations. "She's in there." Stella whispers, pointing to the room at the end of the hall while she turns left, towards her bedroom. She turns on the lamp at her bedside, then the radio, tuning the knob until she gets a steady stream of static. This is her ritual here between these walls. She removes her bedclothes from beneath her pillow, then after a moment's thought, pulls another clean set from the drawers and sets them on the bed. She chooses to forget the spare blanket, moving to the bathroom instead where she brushes her teeth, washes her face. What is she doing? She silently asks herself as she looks at her reflection in the mirror, allowing herself a moment of doubt before she steps out and becomes unshakable Stella Gibson once more.
.
She dries her face and turns off the bathroom light. She pauses to watch Reed from the doorway, standing in the shadows by the window, flipping through a book. She focuses on the dull roar from the radio to keep her heart from swelling. "What does Stella keep by her bedside, I've often wondered." Reed says, not bothering to look up from the book. "I'm ashamed to admit how often I think of that, what do you read when it's too early to wake? Poetry was not one of the options that crossed my mind I'm ashamed to admit." She finishes the page. Shuts the book and returns it to it's rightful place. "Are these for me?" She asks, gesturing towards the clothes Stella put out earlier. "Yes." She grabs her own clothes from beneath her pillow and turns her back, changing in front of the other woman for a second time today. She hears the water running, Reed must be in the bathroom. Funny, she prefers to think of her as Reed. It's not her first name, but it's her name - the one that suits her in Stella's eyes. "Did you check on Ellie, is she alright?" She busies herself, returning her clothes back where they belong.
"Yes, thank you for putting her to bed, you didn't have to."
"You looked too comfortable to wake."
"I admit I was." Reed's voice is closer. Stella turns to see her sitting on the edge of the bed, dressed in her clothes, watching her.
"Well," She begins, "This looks familiar."
"Too much so, I'm afraid."
"What did you want to talk to me about that morning?" She asks, no need to specify which morning, which moment.
"Nothing in particular," Reed shrugs, her dark hair sliding off her shoulders to her back. "I just wanted to see you."
"It was early in the morning. What if I were asleep? Or otherwise engaged?" She makes her way over, one step, one word at a time, until she's a step away from Reed, who shrugs once more to her question. "I just wanted to see you. I just wanted you that morning"
"Wanted?" Stella asks, eyebrow raising, smile forming.
"Still want." Reed confesses, reaching out her hand to Stella and bringing her close. From her seated position, she wraps her arms around Stella's waist, burying her face in the gentle swell of her stomach. She can feel the other woman breathing rapidly, which amuses her because her own breath has all but slowed to a stop. She places a kiss through the thin cotton, on Stella's side, then slowly and deliberately works her way up. She knows she can lift the hem of the tank, but she's not ready for the skin to skin contact. She's not ready for that intimacy. It's not that Stella's a woman she thinks to herself from the fog of desire that seems to overcome her in this woman's presence.
.
It's because she's Stella Gibson and she is dangerous.
.
Grown men cower in her presence and monsters shake at the thought, so what chance does she stand of surviving the onslaught that is Stella? She drowns her mind in these thoughts to combat her body's growing desire, but it does nothing to stop it. She moves her mouth up her side, luxuriating in the curve at the side of her breast, that small and gentle slope, before she follows the strap of the tank top like a path up Everest, up over her clavicle, then across her trapezius. She focuses on these, the anatomical components that make up the woman beneath her mouth. She focuses on reciting these as she kisses up the path then drags her teeth down it once more. She focuses on these instead of the labored breathing from the other woman, the warm air of her breath on her ear, her hand on the back of her head guiding her mouth up, where they meet in a clash of teeth and lips.
.
Oral commisure, Tanya thinks to herself.
.
Lower vermillion border, she recites as she feels Stella tug on it with her teeth.
.
Cupid's bow. She all but laughs at that one, as she traces it with her tongue. Cupid's bow.
.
She feels herself being backed against the bed until she's eased back to sitting, then lying, Stella straddling her. In this dim light, she can't make out anything except for the golden glow of her hair. "My bed's more comfortable than the couch anyway," Stella all but pants, her words coming out in halts and starts as she reaches across Reed to turn the lamp off. From this vantage point, she could just raise her head and brush her mouth against Stella's breasts, collar of the loose tank hanging low. Again, she reminds herself that that is a line she cannot cross back from. She chooses instead to raise her hand and trace the tops with a light and gentle touch. She relishes the fact that Stella goes stiff in the dark, that she can hear the other woman take a sharp intake of air. She's satisfied in knowing that it's not only her that's affected by this. "Stella - as beautiful as you are right now…" She slides herself up under Stella, so she's now sitting, back against the pillows, "And you are…" She places a tender kiss on her lips, "I think we should stop."
.
She feels Stella's weight shift back, then off of her. She's kneeling on the bed, looking at her. At least she thinks she's looking at her. She can't quite see the other woman's eyes in the darkness of the room, just the lightness of her hair, her night clothes. "Are you ok?" She finally asks.
"I'm fine." Stella says, or at least she thinks she says that. She can't be certain what she hears over the quiet static from the radio.
"You sure?"
"Yes."
"Yes?"
"You asked me to stop, and I'm stopping." She feels a hand on her leg to reassure her. "I just - need a moment."
.
They stay like that for a moment. She's never been in a situation like this before, usually when she sets her mind to something, she commits, but this is altogether another beast.
.
"I'm a little chilly, do you mind if I…?" Reed motions to the blanket they're on top of.
.
Stella clambers off the bed and watches as Reed slides in between the cold sheets.
"Did you want to join me, Stella?" Reed asks, her voice taking on a forced jovial quality. "Or are you going to stand guard all night?" She holds the edge of the blanket up, inviting the other woman into her own bed, which she wordlessly joins. It's not a large bed, but it feels enormous with the gulf between them. "Stella I'm sorry-"
"There's nothing to be sorry about."
"It's not that I don't want this, want you. Just the opposite," A wooden laugh erupts from her. "It's just…"
"Croydon?"
"I wish it were that simple. Stella, I care for you a great deal, but I feel like one of us needs to be level-headed."
"We're two consenting adults, I'm afraid I don't understand what I'm not being level-headed about."
"I don't see you as just a fuck, Stella. If I did, I wouldn't care - I'd have you on your back in seconds." They both ignore the sharp pain of desire pulling them inside out at the thought. "I see you as - I don't know, a friend?" She turns on her side to face the other woman, stiff as a board as she lies on her back. "Do you understand?"
"No. Not particularly." She huffs, shifting her shoulders, trying to make her bed comfortable. "But I don't have to understand, Reed. I just need to accept it." She shuffles again.
"You're really terrible at this," Reed laughs.
"Friendship?" Stella asks, turning on her stomach.
"Amongst other things." Reed watches with amusement, Stella's frustration evident. "You're not accustomed to sharing a bed, are you?"
"Not awake, no."
"Do you want to come closer?"
"I'm…not a cuddler." Stella states, turning from her stomach to her side, back to Reed.
"I'm sorry if I made it awkward."
"Don't be. I appreciate you stopping us when you did."
"Do you?"
"I do, remember, I don't fib." She smiles, over her shoulder.
.
A moment of silence. It's not yet morning, but it's well past midnight.
.
"My father would take me to the Gallery when I was young. Ellie's age - younger maybe?" She speaks. The words are heavy on her chest. She doesn't know how to talk to Reed about the gulf between them, she doesn't yet have the words. She can, however talk to her about this. The pain of one is somehow adjacent to the other. "We would walk by the statue. That's how I knew we were close." She feels the warmth of the other woman's hand as it brushes her hair back, soothing in the way mothers can do. "At home, he would put me on his back like that horse, and I would feed him sugar cubes and carrots."
"That sounds lovely." Reed says as she continues to smooth Stella's hair.
"It wasn't anything, not really." Stella shrugs, but she feels the weight against her chest lighten, ever so slightly. She breathes deeply, knowing the feeling of lightness is momentary and will pass. She shifts closer to Reed, closer the other body in bed, and then closer still, until the other body moves closer to her, as the bridge the gap between them, until Reed wraps an arm loosely around Stella's waist. "Think you can sleep now?" Reed whispers, the words half lost in Stella's hair. She tries not to think about the word that almost made it out of her mouth, caught at the last second.
"Only if you can stop smiling, Doctor?"
"I''ll try, but you know, it's a natural response to being right, which I am, constantly."
"Shut up!" Stella laughs softly.
"Good night Stella."
"Good night."
.
Stella stays awake long after Reed. She uses the time to think about so many things: Why she let her in her bed in the first place? Why she has a preference of calling her Reed instead of Tanya? Where, in the clear division of herself, did the other woman lay? She didn't quite fit one or the other, somehow managing to straddle the divide, pull together the pieces that Stella had worked so hard to remain as separate and distinct. This was an uncomfortable thought. One she was thankful for not having to ponder for much longer.
.
The sun will rise, and Reed and Eleanor will leave.
.
She will make a cup of strong coffee, dark and smooth.
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She will wash the soft scent of the other woman out of her clothes, out of her sheets and out of her home.
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She just needs to make it through the night. This barter with herself in not unfamiliar. She knows she can do it.
.
She takes a breath, releases a breath. She does this to quell the desire gnawing in her belly. She wants this woman, more and more. In part because she can't have her and in part because she doesn't, deep down, want to hurt her like she's hurt so many others. That's what she does. She hurts them and she doesn't know why and she doesn't know how to stop and if she's honest, she doesn't know if she really wants to stop except she doesn't want to hurt Reed.
.
She just needs to make it through the night.