Helena meets Tracey sooner than you intend. She shows up with only two hours' notice on the day before the beginning of Rosh Hashanah with a bag of apples, looking twice as pregnant as she did the last time you saw her.

She wraps her arms around you and presses a kiss to your cheek before you even have time ask her why she's here.

"It's been so long since you've been home for the High Holy Days," she says. "I thought I'd come to you. I should have called sooner. I just got so excited about it. Is this okay?"

"Of cour—of course, it is," you answer. You wrap your arm around her shoulders and lead her into the Bed and Breakfast.

"This is so cute," she gushes as she crosses the threshold.

"The Secret Service pays to run this place. My whole team lives here," you tell her. "They're not all here right now. Steve and Claudia are out on a case. Claudia and I usually celebrate together, but I don't know if she'll be back in time this year. It's been almost a week."

"I'm glad you have someone," Tracey comments. "Here I was, picturing you slaving over a brisket all by yourself."

"It's hilarious that you think either of us knows how to make a brisket," you say as you round the corner into the kitchen. Pete is standing in front of the coffee machine yawning, despite the fact that it's almost noon, and Helena is leaning against the opposite counter with a cup of tea beside her, reading a book.

"You met Pete," you say. "I think you called him my work husband." She rolls her eyes. "And this is Helena."

Tracey almost knocks over the tea as she throws her arms around her. "Oh, I've heard so much about you! Well, not that much because Myka never returns my calls. It's so wonderful to meet you!"

Helena is holding the book, a paperback copy of Stranger in a Strange Land that she took off your bookshelf, out of the way and looking hilariously confused.

"This is my sister," you tell her.

"Ah, I see," she answers tightly.

"What up, Trace?" Pete holds up a hand for her to high five as she pulls away from Helena. "You're looking good. Have you lost weight?"

You slap him on the arm with the back of your hand, and he looks wounded for about two seconds before losing interest.

"You know the sad thing?" your mother asks as she sits down beside you.

You're in the living room of your parents' house in Colorado Springs, sitting on the couch against the window, watching Helena talk to Tracey and Kevin. The mirror in the hallway is covered with a navy blue sheet, and Tracey looks like she's been crying.

"What?" you ask. It comes out raspy, like maybe you've been crying too.

"If he'd ever been willing to meet her, he would have loved her," your mother answers. She sighs and shakes her head.

You nod. "She's a writer, and she could have told him things about turn-of-the-century science fiction that he couldn't have learned from anyone else. She has the most incredible perspectives on the work of H.G. Wells."

"Myka, your father was very stubborn, like you—"

You cut her off. "You're not going to make this my fault."

"No, I'm not," she answers. "I just… well, I hope you'll remember the good times you had together, instead of everything at the end."

"You mean the part where he wouldn't speak to me for ten years?" you ask. "The part where he had no interest in the birth of his granddaughter? Neither of you did."

"You never called here either," she points out.

"Because I wasn't going to apologize for falling in love." Your voice is growing louder, and your mother lays a hand on your arm. "And I knew that was…" your voice breaks and you rub furiously at your eyes as they grow wet again, "I knew that was the only way he would take me back. If I swore it was all a mistake and he was right all along."

"Myka…"

"Or maybe the part where I could practically feel the disappointment radiating off of him every time we were in the same room for as long as I can remember," you say. "I hate to break it to you, Mom, but I don't have that many good memories of him."

"He loved you," she says. "In his way."

"Did he ever mention me?" you ask. "Did he mention me at all at the end?"

Your mother sighs and looks down at her feet. Your stomach twists.

"—of course, Mom was upset that we wouldn't be there this year, but I told her, there's always next year. They aren't that old," Tracey is telling Pete.

"Right," he answers distractedly. You can tell he noticed that you were gone. "My mom gets like that too."

Without a word, Helena takes a glass from the cupboard, fills it with water, and hands it to you. You nod at her in thanks.

"But enough about me." Tracey pulls out a chair and takes a seat, heaving a loud sigh. "How did you two meet?"

Helena looks at you sideways, and you can tell by her mildly panicked expression that she's not sure how much Tracey knows.

"I met her on a case," you answer. "It was before she was hired. She was doing some… investigating… of her own."

"My motives may not have been entirely pure." You expect Helena to elaborate, but she lets the sentence hang in the air as Tracey draws her own conclusions. "I was hired shortly thereafter."

"Did you fall in love right away?" Tracey is clutching the back of the chair she's sitting sideways on like a child being told a bedtime story.

Helena looks at you, waiting for an answer.

You sigh and look down at the tile floor. "Yeah, it was pretty much right away. It just took me a while to realize it. I was a little thrown off by the…" you gesture towards her, "woman thing."

"You didn't know you were gay?" Tracey asks, and, god, she makes it sound so simple.

You shake your head. You can feel yourself blushing.

"It certainly took me by surprise," Helena says, and you're so thankful to her for taking the attention off you that you could kiss her. "Not for the same reasons, but you could say I had a lot to think about while I was… while I was away."

"I'm sorry," you say as you close the door to Helena's bedroom behind you.

She looks up from where she's sitting cross-legged on top of the comforter. "Whatever for?"

"I shouldn't have told Tracey about us without talking to you," you say as you sit down on the side of the bed in front of her. "I just told her about me, and she asked me if I was seeing anyone, and it just kind of came out, and I never thought she'd show up unexpectedly like this. I thought we'd have more time, and—"

"Myka," Helena says firmly. "It's alright."

"It's not alright. I outed you," you reply. "I know everyone at the Warehouse knows but that's different, and I know you're not—I mean, you can't be used to being open about it like this, not where you're from."

She sets Stranger in a Strange Land down on the bed. "No, I suppose not."

"I shouldn't have told my sister without talking to you first," you say. "Were you even ready for anyone in my family to know?"

"Well, I admit it did take me by surprise," she answers. "But she's your sister. And I may have only recently arrived in this century, but I have been at ease with my affections for women far longer than you have, so it seems to me that we're not on terribly uneven ground."

You nod. "You're right."

"I don't mind that you told your sister," she says. "I trust your judgment. You have always been the more cautious one."

"Okay."

"But when did you do it?" she asks. "I was under the impression you wanted to keep it from your family."

"I want to keep it from my parents," you answer. "It was right after you got shot. I was sitting in your hospital room watching you sleep and it just felt like the time."

"Ah, yes. Traumatic situations do have a way of making up reexamine our choices." Helena leans forward and covers you hand with her own. "I'm glad her reaction was so positive."

"Kate?" you say into the phone you're holding to your ear.

"Yeah, Mom, who else?"

"Other people call me," you say.

"Other than me and Uncle Pete, who calls you?"

"Aunt Leena calls me sometimes, and Aunt Tracey. And your mother."

You take a sip of coffee from the University of Oregon mug you're holding. You didn't go to Oregon, and you know Helena can't be teaching there because you're standing in your kitchen in Colorado.

"Sure," Kate says. You can almost hear her rolling her eyes.

"So what's up?" you ask.

It takes her a moment to answer, but you hear a deep sigh on the other end of the line.

"So, it turns out Austin's gay."

You grimace. "Wow, you really know how to choose them, huh?"

"It's not funny, Mom," Kate snaps. "God, I should have called Mama."

"Hey, hey, I'm not laughing," you answer. "I know how much you liked him." You pause to see if she'll respond. She doesn't. "How did you find out?"

"He told me," she says. "Last night."

"That was brave of him," you comment. "Kate, I know this has to be hard for you, but I hope you were supportive. It's not easy—"

"I know, I know. It sucks more for him," she says. "Of course, I was. How could I not be? He said you guys were the reason he knew he could tell to me first. I just… couldn't be mad at him."

"Does he… have you talked to him about how he thinks his family will take it?" you ask.

"He's from Sacramento," she answers. "He's got a cousin who's trans. He'll be fine."

"Good," you say. "He doesn't deserve…" You trail off. "He deserves to have everything go smoothly."

Kate is silent for a moment. When she speaks again, her tone is different, careful. "Mama told me Grandma didn't talk to you for like, ten years before I was born."

The statement takes you by surprise. You collect your thoughts for a moment before you answer.

"Yes." You take a slow breath. "The next time I spoke to her after I told them your mother and I were dating was at your grandfather's funeral."

"Is that why you never talk about Grandpa?" she asks.

"That's… one of the reasons," you answer. "He and I never had a good relationship. It started long before that."

"Why didn't you tell me?"

You sigh. "When Grandma came back into my life, she seemed genuinely sorry about what that happened, and she was obviously committed to having a relationship with you, and I didn't want to color how you thought about her."

"Oh," Kate says. "Was it… was it hard for you? To let her back in?"

"What are you thinking about?" Helena asks. You realize that you're staring down at your socks.

"Did anyone in your family know?" you ask. When you look up at her, she's grimacing at the comforter.

She sighs and reaches over to move a stack of papers sitting next to her. She pats the mattress beside her and you crawl across the bed and sit.

"I was very careful about it when Christina was alive," she says. "I worried that if my family found out they would take her from me. It wasn't exactly hard to keep quiet. I was never in a long-term relationship with a woman, and the women I slept with, for the most part, were as invested in secrecy as I was. After she died, I became more reckless. My sister found out."

You raise your eyebrows. "You had a sister?"

"Of course, darling, it was the last nineteenth century. You didn't think Charles was my only sibling, surely."

"Right," you say, even though you did.

"Well, she confronted me about it. It's a sin against god, unnatural, the rhetoric has hardly changed. I had started writing by that point, and I became aware that if Charles found out, he could hold it over me, given our arrangement, so I told her I was wrong, went to church with her, made sure I mentioned all of my male paramours to her. She eventually decided I must have gotten over it." She shrugs. "It was what it was. I can't say I'm terribly sorry to be rid of that particular aspect of having a family." She looks up at Myka and smiles thinly. "No one to disappoint."

You exhale slowly. "That must have been a lot to go through."

"We were all going through that back then," she answers. "It didn't seem like a big deal at the time. I mean it was terrible, of course, but not out of the ordinary. Those possibilities were the knowledge with which we lived our lives."

"I can't imagine what that must have been like."

"Can't you? Are you not living in your own fear as we speak?" she asks. "We found community with each other. It just wasn't something to mention in mixed company. But many thought of women as inherently asexual at the time, so we could be much more physically affectionate without anyone the wiser."

"So, I guess we're both a little out of our depth here," you say. You scoot closer to her and rest your head on her shoulder. She finally seems to give up on her book, and sets it on the nightstand.

"Where's your sister?"

You groan. "Asleep in my bed."

"You could have put her in Steve or Claudia's room," Helena points out. "Unless you were looking for an excuse to spend the night here."

You smile. "That was the plan."

You've been knocking on Pete's bedroom door for what feels like five minutes before he finally opens it.

"What's up?"

"Can I talk to you?" you ask. You nod towards the room behind him.

He steps back to let you in. "Oh! Yeah, sure. What's going on?"

You close the door behind you as he sits down on the end of his bed. You cross your arms and then uncross them and start to pace.

"I want to… I want to tell Helena… that I love her."

Pete leans back, bracing himself with his hands, and blows an exhale out through his mouth. "Wow."

"Yeah," you reply.

"Wow, this is—this is big." He leans forward again, elbows on his knees. After a moment, he looks up at you.

"Yeah, I just don't know…" you take a deep breath, try to slow yourself down, "how or when or… whether I should."

"Chhhh," Pete murmurs as the thinks. He furrows his eyebrows and then unfurrows them again. "You think she won't say it back?"

"No, I—I—I think she will," you say uncertainly.

"Then what's the problem?" Pete asks.

"I just…" You cross your arms again. "I want it to be right."

Pete looks up at you. "If you love her and she loves you, why wouldn't it be?"

You shrug as you study your socks.

Pete stands up and rests a hand on your shoulder. "Mykes, she's crazy about you. She always has been." He gives you a jiggle. "What are you so worried about?"

You pull away from him and turn to look out the window. "We just haven't been together that long," you explain. "What if I seem… I don't know, clingy or something? What if she thinks I'm trying to trap her?"

"Why would she think that?" Pete asks. "I mean, no, you haven't been together that long officially, but you've been together so long emotionally that you're practically married."

You look at him over your shoulder, your eyebrows raised. "We've been together emotionally?"

"You know…" he gestures toward you and then in the general direction of Helena's room, "clearly in love, mutual pining, long, significant looks that make everyone else feel awkward?"

You turn back toward the window, lean to the side against the wall. "I don't know. Have you ever wondered why someone was with you at all?"

"Every day I was with Kelly," he answers. "Wait, is this about you not thinking you're good enough for her?"

You shrug. "She travelled through time, Pete. I took an entire class on her writing in college. She could do anything she wanted."

"So why should she want to stick around here and date you?" he asks. He comes to stand beside you.

"I just wonder if… if she wasn't here for the Warehouse, where we would be," you admit. "What if I tell her I love her, and she thinks it's stupid? Just some girl with a crush on her childhood hero."

"She is not going to think that," Pete tells you, and you're not sure you've ever heard him sound so serious in his life. He wraps his arm around you and gives your shoulder a squeeze. "Didn't you stop her from destroying the world because she couldn't bear to kill you?" he asks. "People don't do that for just some fan."

"What if she thinks I'm trying to replace her life with her daughter?" you ask. "What if she doesn't say it back?"

"I guess she might not," he says slowly. "It's not like H.G.'s got a great track record when it comes to dealing with her emotions. But, Myka, listen to me."

You look up at him.

"It won't be because she doesn't love you, and you shouldn't take it that way when it's so obvious she does."

By the time you tell her, you've really told her a dozen times: murmured it to her as she slept, whispered it into her thigh during sex, said it while the blow-dryer was running. Just to get used to saying it. Just so you know you'll be able to get it out.

In the end, you've gotten so used to saying it that it comes out on accident. Later, Pete will tell you that your tendency to overthink everything finally came back to bite you.

You're walking her out of Leena's. She's leaving for her first field mission since being shot, and you still feel like it's too soon.

"It's been more than six months," she's tells you. "Stop worrying. I'll be fine."

"Stop worrying," you mutter with a shake of your head, as if that's ever going to happen.

"I mean it," she tells you, turning to face you as she hits the bottom of the stairs. "I am just as capable now as I was before. If you ask me, Dr. Calder was too cautious. Where I'm from, I would have been back in the field as soon as the pain dulled to an ache."

"Where you're from, you would have been dead within the first twenty-four hours," you remind her.

"Probably," she admits. "All the more reason to get back to doing what I love as soon as I can."

"Just be careful, okay?" you tell her. You give her a quick kiss. "I love you."

You see her eyes go wide before you realize what you've said.

"Shit," you mutter. "I didn't want to tell you that like this. I was planning this whole thing. There was going to be a dinner and probably candles—"

She pulls you into another kiss, a deeper one. Your breathing is heavy when you finally separate.

"I wasn't sure—" she breaks off and looks away.

"Wasn't sure… what?" you ask, furrowing your brow.

"I worry that… when you say that, what you're really talking about is…" she sighs heavily, "some idea of me, and not…" she gestures at herself, "me."

"What do you mean?" you ask.

"When you think of H.G. Wells, you think of this person who created these worlds in her head, who built machines no one else was even dreaming of, who's books are still read more than a century later," she says.

"You did all those things," you point out. "You remind us all of that at least once a week."

"Yes," she says. "But more recently I've been the woman who left you to die in Egypt, who tried to kill you a second time, who nearly ended the world." She laughs darkly. "I'm afraid where I'm from, they would have called me hysterical. What's the current terminology?"

"Mentally ill," you answer.

"Yes, that," she replies. "It's not glamorous at all. It's messy. I worry that you're so caught up in the first part of me that you can't see the second."

You smile and shake your head.

"What?" she asks. "I'm failing to see the humor in this conversation."

"Two weeks ago, I was in Pete's room telling him I was afraid I wasn't good enough for you," you tell her. "I never imagined that the feeling could be mutual."

"How could—"

You stop her with another shake of your head. You pull her into a tight hug and feel her relax in your arms.

"I know who you are. I was there when you tried to kill me, remember?" You turn your head to kiss her neck. "When I say I love you, I mean all of you. That includes the messy parts."

She sighs and wipes at her eyes as she pulls away. "This case seems simple enough. I'll see you in a few days."

You smile and nod as she picks up her duffle bag and opens the front door. Steve is already waiting by the SUV. The screen slams shut behind her with a clatter.

You're lying in bed. It's dark, and you can feel the warmth of someone else's skin pressed against you.

"I love you, Myka," Helena whispers.

She climbs into the SUV as Steve waves at you. You wave back.