Helena gets home after practice one day to find Sarah on her doorstep.
Sarah with a tear scarred face. Sarah looking up at her with smudged eyeliner eyes. Sarah cracking a shy smile, Sarah saying: "Oi, meathead. Long day you've had, huh?"
Sarah, sitting on Helena's doorstep, after two months without a call. Without a word. Without a trace.
Helena bends down and hugs her other half breathless. She's missed her so much.
It's happened again, Sarah tells her. Sarah tells her a lot of things. Not that she had to. Helena still remembers the first time. Still remembers all of it. She sees.
Helena fixes Sarah orange juice and listens, just listens. Sarah talks for two hours straight, only stopping for more juice and a trip to the loo. And Helena wonders.
Helena wonders who denied Sarah to speak for so long. Who spoke for her. Who made her feel like all the words she's now saying had to stay hidden inside. If she gets her hands on him, she will crush him. And she won't feel sorry.
"Sarah?"
"Mh?" Sarah blinks her eyes, furrows her brows, looks, smiles. "Oi, 'lena."
"I have to go to my trainings now", Helena tells her, "There's over-left lasagna in the fridge, you can make it warm again in the microwaver."
Sarah smiles, rubs her eyes. "You're telling me that you weren't hungry enough to eat it all?"
Helena shrugs. "Things change, I suppose."
What she doesn't say in all her words is: stay. She can only hopes Sarah hears her. And listens to her.
Sarah wanders around her sister's flat, she's so bored. And since they're one in a way (they are) it's almost like it's her own flat.
She hasn't talked to Helena in two months, but it doesn't seem like her life has changed as much as Sarah's anyway. But that's two months of talking. The real thing, that hits her, is that she hasn't been to Helena's flat since she moved in a few years ago.
She only always picked her up or dropped her off. But she never went inside for that infamous coffee. (Helena's got a nice coffee machine, too bad it's no use to Sarah now, but hey – you can make hot chocolate too – that might work).
The place is so neat and tidy that's in a way not Helena at all. But then she shares this place with Jesse, when he's not working. In a way she always shares with him. He's everywhere. On the wall – framed – ice skating on wobbly legs with Helena snickering next to him; on the fridge – held in place by a heart-shaped magnet - kissing Helena, Sarah's sister, on the cheek and taking a selfie; on the table where the letters lie – just a name – Mr. Jesse Towing; in the closet – where his clothes are hanging; in the shower – where Sarah almost uses his shampoo. (Obviously her hair will do much better with the products her twin uses; their hair is the same).
Mr. Jesse Towing is everywhere and it caves Sarah in, makes her grab for her jacket, hair still wet from not-with-Jesse's-shampoo-hairwash, makes her open the door...
And then there's the thought of Helena.
How she looked like telling her about the food. How she smiled when she found Sarah on her doorstep. How she didn't say "stay" but meant it.
So Sarah shakes her head, closes the door, takes off the jacket, reheats the lasagna, adds a picture of her and her sister to the fridge and stays.
They fall into rhythm easily. Because this is what they do.
Helena still goes to training, but not to a lot of her university classes. (She doesn't have to anyway, sports people get an easy pass, but usually she goes, because she appreciates school and she likes to learn new languages). She would. If she knew for certain she'd return to Sarah sitting on the sofa and complaining about cable tv, she would. But she cannot be sure of that.
Sarah has left one too many times and it's left Helena scarred like that. (they're one, they belong together, there's no place for mistrust). Yet there is.
Sarah spends her days at the apartment, mostly. She might go out for some light shopping, but that's about everything she'll do by herself. Everything else (shiny clean rooms with uncomfortable plastic chairs and many people, so many people, sitting, waiting, waiting, reading, boring) she does with Helena.
It's nice like that, really, because neither of them really know what it's like to be alone. Helena maybe more than Sarah, with Jesse being away for months and her boarding school past. (but both of them, together, they don't, they just know this, together, twosome, wholesome).
Sarah would take crashing at Helena's other her other possibilities (S, Felix, strangers, so called friends that really aren't) any day. And Helena would have Sarah. Always.
"'lena", Sarah calls. She's sitting on the sofa watching some movie she found on Netflix. All blood and gore. They love those. Helena's making dinner.
"Yeah?" She doesn't look up to see where Sarah is, what Sarah does. She knows.
"When's Jesse coming home?"
Helena cuts the carrots. The water is already boiling. She adds some butter. "You can stay", she says.
Sarah sighs.
If it came down to them of course Sarah could stay. Forever. But there's him now, too. There's Helena and Sarah. Obviously. But now there's also Helena and Jesse. There's Sarah and her daughter.
They know now that Sarah will have a girl. Thank god, Sarah thinks. Growing up without a dad surely must be harder for boys than for girls. Felix always complained about the lack of a male figure. (Benjamin is hardly a substitute). Her daughter will be fine without a dad. She'll have a good mum, a good aunt, a good uncle and probably a good grandmother (If Sarah ever tells her, but that's her thing, Helena won't interfere, that's her decision to make). Sarah's child, Helena's niece, will be fine.
But where will she stay?
If it was Sarah and Helena (like it's supposed to be) then they would stay with Helena, surely. A baby doesn't need a room to herself and when she's older they could always move. Maybe S would switch her house for a flat (she always complains how much work a whole house is). Then they could live there. With the playground and the school nearby. They would raise the baby together, Helena would play her sports, Sarah would play her games. They would be perfect.
But there's Jesse.
Jesse, whom Helena loves. Jesse, who wants to marry Helena (hey – Sarah was looking for a shirt in what she thought to be her sister's drawer, which is basically hers, they share everything, how was she supposed to know that the drawer was Jesse's secret hiding place for the ring box – and he'll probably be grateful, because the size is wrong and now she can tell him, though maybe she'd rather not, but how will he know then and the ring should fit, because Helena deserves everything, Helena deserves perfect). Jesse, who will come home soon.
And so Sarah leaves. But not without saying goodbye. Not this time.
"You can stay", Helena says for the hundredth time.
Sarah nods. "I know."
"Why don't you, then?" Her sister looks wounded, sad. She doesn't understand. Sarah is doing this for her. But even If she explained, she wouldn't want to understand. So there's no use.
"I just think the city's not the right place for a child", Sarah lies.
Helena looks down at her shoes. Dirty with mud from the running track. It has been raining for days now. "I don't think you should be alone right now, Sarah."
Sarah shakes her head. "No, you're right. I won't."
"Where will you go?" Helena stares at her with big brown eyes. "Will you go back to him?"
Cal. The baby's dad. Sarah screwed him in too many ways. He'd be so angry. She couldn't. Not even If she wanted to (she doesn't).
Sarah shakes her head. "Home."
A/N: Hmmm, I wonder where that is. :) Thank you for reading. Let me know your thoughts.
Edit: I really try to get spaces where I want them - it's not working somehow. So we'll have to do with lines.