A/N: Enter Naomily (who I know some of you are probably reading for). I have to say (pay attention E4) that there are lots of things that can happen in relationships apart from cheating, and lots of those are related to other people, and some of them are trying and some of them make you even stronger as a couple. I sincerely hope that in gen 3 there's not a big "cheating" storyline and that they try to take a different route (because honestly: Tony/Michelle, (probably other gen 1 things that I'm not including cause I haven't seen it all *hangs head*), Freddie/Katie, Effy/Cook (in a few ways), Thomas/Pandora x2, Naomi/Emily...it's fucking been done, E4, got it?)
This chapter's dedicated to everyone who doesn't think Naomi would have cheated. (Also I wish you could all read this on LJ with the pretty pictures and the quotes and the icons for each character. :( )
Disclaimer: I don't own Skins, but if I did there would have been no Sophia's or Mandy's.
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Emily
She had thought it would be easier than this. She'd thought that after Katie's talk with her, after she'd finally seemed like she'd gotten the message that if she didn't learn to accept and to change, she might lose both her daughters, that she'd come around, really come around and start to change. She'd thought everything would finally start to get better.
It seems her mother has some short term memory loss or something, though.
Katie, too. She'd been so much better for the span of about a week, and then something had shifted again and now it seems like Katie can barely look at her. It's never been this bad, and Emily doesn't understand it at all.
She had thought Katie was over the whole gay thing. She'd thought she was over the whole Naomi thing, too, because yeah, okay, she gets that they've never exactly been best friends and old relationships are hard to change.
Change is always hard, she recalls her dad saying to her once upon a time.
She wishes it weren't so bloody true.
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"On the bright side, she didn't slam the door in my face, and Katie was notably silent on the bitchy comments. That's something, right?" Naomi soothes, running slender fingers through her hair, and Emily knows she's attempting to make light of the situation, attempting to make her laugh or smile or anything so she'll feel better about the complete shite that was their family dinner.
"Katie didn't look directly at us once all night. And my mum is the biggest fucking bitch on the planet. I don't fucking understand why she can't just try to be civil to you. Does she not get that we don't fucking have to go over for dinner?"
Naomi sighs and pulls her in tight, kissing her hair. "We do, though. They're your family, Ems."
"Wish they'd remember that," Emily mutters sullenly, but Naomi's fingers are stroking through her hair again, and Naomi's lips are placing light kisses on her forehead and then her nose, and it's remarkably calming, that.
"They do. They will," Naomi whispers before placing a tender kiss on her lips, and it sounds like a promise, but Emily knows it's just wishful thinking.
She breathes in deep, breathing in everything that's Naomi, and she reminds herself that all of this, every single second of it, is worth it because of her.
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"Look, I know we haven't been like close or whatever, but if I stay in that fucking caravan for one more day with Mum and Dad and James I might actually kill one of them, and I don't really want to take my A-levels from prison."
She's tempted to just close the door, except her sister's holding a duffel bag over one shoulder and trailing a rolling suitcase behind her, and she looks absolutely frazzled.
If she thinks she can just waltz in here and move in like she owns the place, though-
Naomi's hand on her shoulder kills the sarcastic response she's about to give.
"Come on in. We've got that spare room still," Naomi invites, guiding Emily back out of the doorway so that Katie can step inside, and Emily's flooded by a wave of overwhelming love for her girlfriend because sometimes Naomi's really just perfect and knows what she needs better than she does.
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They're letting her live there, so Emily can't help thinking that her sister should be a little more fucking grateful for it. Instead she still barely looks at them, not when they're together. And the fucking snarky comments just keep coming, and okay Naomi prods her on a bit by being just as sarcastic and bitchy back half the time (and Emily secretly suspects that they both enjoy that a bit), but it's wearing on her nerves.
It's when she and Naomi are making French toast, and Naomi leans in for a tender kiss after she's cracked an egg and Emily can't resist the urge to spray a little of the confectioner's sugar she's just gotten from the cupboard at her unsuspecting girlfriend, who then pretends to pout and looks so fucking adorable that Emily has to kiss the pout (and the sugar) off her face, and she catches Katie standing in the doorway out of the corner of her eye just for a second before Katie's face is masked in a sneer and she's grumbling something about " fucking lezzer displays of affection" that Emily finally cracks.
She leaves Naomi's warm and oh-so-inviting embrace, and catches her sister just before she can head up the stairs, grabbing her by the wrist and spinning her around.
"What is it? What is your fucking problem? What do you find so fucking repulsive about the love that Naomi and I have for each other that makes you unable to even fucking look at us? Because you don't have to live here, yeah? If I wanted family members being all superior and disapproving and not really looking at us, I'd go round the caravan more often and spend time with Mum!"
Maybe it's because part of Katie still doesn't expect her to stand up to her, but suddenly her sister is standing before her looking so incredibly small with tears springing to her eyes, and she just looks so sad that Emily just wants to take back everything she's just said.
Except she can't because everything she's said is true, and she's really reached the limit of what she can tolerate of her sister's recent behaviour.
"I didn't- I don't-"
"Don't lie, Katie," Emily says, and she can hear her own exhaustion with the situation in her voice.
Katie stares back at her for a moment, and Emily thinks that she might be trying to recover a little because there's a spark of defiance there, but then a tear trickles down her sister's cheek and she thinks maybe her sister was just trying not to cry.
"Do you have any idea what it's like to be around the two of you? To see that love's real and can make you so fucking ridiculously happy that you're blind to what's going on around you? Do you know how hard it is to see that and know I'll never have it?"
The words break her, just as her sister's breaking before her. "Katie-" she gasps out, but she can't get any farther than that because Katie's shaking her head and pushing her away and slipping out the door before she can get another word out, before she can even reach out and pull her into a hug.
She stands there stunned. She didn't realise, she didn't know. And Katie's wrong. She knows that. Katie will have this one day. Everyone should have this, she thinks, looking up at Naomi who's appeared in the doorway to the kitchen and has obviously overheard everything by the sympathetic expression on her face. It breaks her heart to think that Katie might not find the type of love that she's found in Naomi. It breaks her heart again to think that Katie is sure she never will.
Naomi opens her arms wide, holding them open in an unspoken invitation, and Emily falls gratefully into them.
Naomi's soothing her with kisses and whispered 'it's okay's before Emily even realises that she's crying.
"She's so wrong, Naoms. She's wrong."
"Of course she is," Naomi agrees, voice sounding sure, certain.
It's that right there that makes Emily love her so much.
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They don't openly talk about it. Emily tries, but Katie doesn't want to listen, so Emily resigns herself to simply holding Katie in her bed that night, and kissing her gently on the forehead like they always used to do when they were little and one of them was upset. She hopes that Katie will come to understand that there is so much in her to love that it's impossible she won't find somebody to love her like she deserves.
When her sister's drifted off to sleep in her arms, and there's a small damp patch on her shirt from Katie's tears, she kisses her sister on the forehead again and whispers, "I love you," into her hair.
She looks up to find Naomi peaking in through the door, open just a crack, illuminated by the light from the hallway and making the blonde of her hair appear more like a halo around her head. "Everything okay?" Naomi asks softly.
Emily smiles at her and nods.
"Sleep well, okay? I'll miss you," Naomi offers, and it's just another mark of how far she's come since last year that Emily's heart swells just a bit.
Emily blows her a little kiss and Naomi catches it and pretends to put it in her pocket then sends one back.
"I love you," Naomi whispers with a soft smile that never fails to make Emily melt.
"I love you, too," Emily replies as Naomi turns to go.
As Emily settles back down beside Katie, she realises there are tears welling up in her eyes just a bit, but, unlike earlier, these are happy ones. Sometimes she just can't believe how lucky she is, even if her mother still can't accept her, and her sister's a bit of a mess which makes her act like a bitch, just because she's got Naomi in her life.
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The further proof of that is the way that, without them even needing to have a discussion about it, they both just automatically tone down the PDAs around Katie.
Her sister never thanks her directly, but Katie's quips about them lose some of their bite, and the bitchy banter with Naomi starts to seem mildly entertaining to Emily, and the biggest concession is that Katie looks at them both a bit more.
It's not until they're sitting at breakfast one morning, all in a bit of a rush to make it to college on time, and Naomi'd gotten up early just to cook for them, so all Emily really wants to do is pull her into the biggest hug in the world and kiss like there's no tomorrow, but she settles for a peck on the cheek, and Katie just looks straight at them and rolls her eyes.
"Honestly, Ems, if that's all the thanks you're going to give her, I'll fucking kiss her, because these pancakes are to die for, and I promise I won't like break or something if you kiss the love of your life."
As Emily kisses first her sister on the cheek and then Naomi right on those absolutely delicious red lips of hers, she thinks, Yep! Luckiest girl in the world, me.
