Hey Elle Belle! You and Harlow got plans for today? We could catch a movie?

No plans. I need to swing by the house and get Harlow. Meet you for a noon showing?

Yea :-) my shout – maybe Harlow will finally get her macdonalds?

don't tempt her lol

She and Harlow arrived at the movies about ten minutes before the were meant to arrive for a Noon showing. Elle likes to be both prepared, and early. But Carmella was there, sitting on a bench playing on her phone. When she sees Elle, she grins happily and they join her. Carmella lifts Harlow right up onto her lap without so much as a flinch. She fits so nicely into Elle's life.

"Hi Harlow!' She said, happily as Harlow promptly took hold of her long, dangly necklace to examine the cross on the end very intensely. Thankfully, she's a little bit too old to be putting stuff in her mouth.

"Hi Darmella!" She took hold of Carmella's shirt with her other hand, and then said - "Daddy took me to the park to meet Elle!"

"Oh?" She wondered. Elle had given her a play by play that morning about her afternoon and had promised that she would go home that evening to see Dad and Julie and probably get kicked out of the house. She had traded Cameron's ashes to Leo, who had assured her that he'd get him home safe. She believed him.

"Yeah, we went on the slide twice but then we had to come to see the movie."

"How fun." Carmella grinned, "I was thinking we could go see the pony movie."

"I love ponies." Harlow said, happily, "Can we get iced cream? Elle never lets me get ice cream."

"You little - I don't deprive the child of ice cream." She said, as Carmella laughed, scooping Harlow up in her arms so that she didn't tug on her necklace. Elle smiled at her and she smiled back. Being around Carmella made her feel…Well it made her feel happy. She'd almost forgotten what it was like to look forward to meeting someone just to hang out on the couch.

"She's so mean, isn't she Harls?" Carmella wondered, "I bet she doesn't even let you have chicken nuggets."

"Only Daddy can make chicken nuggets just right." Harlow replied as they entered the cineplex. Elle sighed, and then glanced at Carmella.

"You can take Harlow to pick out some snacks, and I'll get the tickets?"

"Sure." She said, "Is she allowed –"

"She can have whatever she likes." Elle decided, "Well. Not the nachos. The salsa is too spicy."

"Like I was going to give the baby spicy salsa. Just for that, I'm going to let her get two ice creams."

"TWO Iced creams?" Harlow asked, "You my best friend now." Smirking, Carmella scooted away before Elle could start on her. Probably wise. She walked to the counter, and purchased three tickets for Harlow's desired Pony movie. She'd never been a pony girl growing up, more of a doll girl actually. Harlow had limited interest in dolls. She liked her stuffed pets and ponies. Occasionally, she had liked those monster girls. The pink one was her favourite. By the the time she made it back, Carmella and Harlow were watching someone else in the SnaxZone. To Elle's shock, it was Robert.

He was with the same girl from the fete, with the sharp face and tanned skin. He was dressed up too. He hadn't noticed them starring just the amount of diet soft drink the girl was pouring. She's familiar, perhaps she lives on the street? She doesn't know. Before she can say anything Harlow cries out -

"Daddy!"

"Harlow?" He asked, whipping around to see that he's being observed by the three of them. His face when ghostly white. Harlow is chattering on about how much she love Carmella and getting two ice creams. He doesn't respond, but his date touches his arm and says -

"Cam? Do you know them?" The whole world closed in on her, the top of her head burned and her vision was blacking out in pure fury.

"Cam?" She asked, deathly soft. Rob glanced between them and then said -

"Elle, I can expl-"

"Explain? Explain what, Rob? That you've stolen Cam's name to hang out with some girl? How could you?"

"Listen to me -"

"He's only been dead for three years! That's nothing! Is that why you want Dad to clean out his stuff? So that you could take over his identity for real? What is wrong with you?"

"Nothing! I just, I feel like -"

"I don't care! I just don't, Rob! You never cared about Cam before he could save your life. Killing him wasn't enough for you? Have to steal his identity yours is so unlovable?"

"Elle!" Carmella put her hand on her arm, "Why don't we let the man talk?"

"Listen to your girlfriend. She speaks the truth. I wasn't-"

"Cam, who are these people?" The girl asked, and Elle couldn't stand it any longer. She turned, and she walked away before she said something she regretted in front of his daughter. Carmella stumbled next to her, Harlow still tight in her arms. She walked all the way to the car where Carmella finally stopped her with a hand on her arm.

"Where are you going?"

"I don't know. Get off me."

"No. No way. Elle, you're fuming, I've never seen you this red."

"Well, I'm pissed off. He's impersonating our dead brother."

"Daddy says Uncle Cam was nice." Harlow said, and promptly stuck Carmella's cross in her mouth.

"You should be pissed off, but you're shaking." She hadn't even realized. Looking down, she realized she was. She was trying her best not to crack it in front of Harls. "You're not in any state to be left alone right now, and you know it. So I'm coming with you. We'll put Harls in the booster and we'll just go somewhere not here for a while."

Elle said nothing, but did open the door so that Carmella could put Harlow in the backseat, and then slide off her necklace so that she could hold it. It doesn't seem to be a rosary, but rather, rosary adjacent. She slid into the front seat, turned off the radio, and then drove.

It was an hour later, and driving had done little to improve her mood. She can't even string together a series of thoughts that make sense other than that she's angry. Her phone has been buzzing in the center console. Occasionally Carmella reads off the name but she doesn't reply. Can't bring herself too. How dare Robert? How dare he take Cam's name in vain like that? After what he went through to save him?

It boils her blood, truly. She can only sit there and stew in it, because Carmella wouldn't get it. She can't go home and talk to Aunty Julie or Dad, or even Leo though all three have apparently tried to get in contact with her, as well as both Amy and Andrew, though in Andrew's case it's probably Dad using his phone. So Rob probably told them all what happened. They kept driving, the sun slowly crossing the sky up ahead of them. She knew Cam hadn't wanted her to be mad at Rob. One thing he's always been very good at, no matter what happened, was forgiving people. Including her - Sometimes when she didn't deserve it. But how can she forgive this? How can she move past this? Right now, her life is a huge mess with seemingly no way out. So who cares? Maybe she should just keep driving forever, like she and Riley used to always say that they would one day. Keep driving until they got out of this town, away from it's insane inhabitants and his annoying family and her absent father. But they never did.

And she probably never would. Because despite it all. She loved them. She loved Dad. She loved Aunty Julie. She loved Leo, and her siblings, and she loved Rob. You don't share a womb with someone and then not love them. Which was why she wanted to forgive him. She wanted to be in Harlow's life, she wanted to be in his! He was the only one who understood what losing Cam was like, even if he didn't love him the way that she did. But she can't go home now. She's well and truly locked herself out of that door. It all seems hopeless.

"We should pull over." She glanced at Carmella.

"Why?"

"Because Harlow's just a kid and she needs to stretch her legs. I get you're angry, but Harlow shouldn't be suffering because you and Rob are having a little tiff."

"This is more than a little tiff." It might be the end of their relationship as Elle knows it.

"But she still needs to stretch her legs, have a drink and go to the bathroom. She's just a baby, Elle." There are few things she hates more than being wrong about something, but…She was right. After a minute, she pulled into a park, not recognizing where exactly it is that they are. In the backseat, Harlow seems excited. Or, she's not let down over not seeing her movie at least. When she stopped the car, Carmella wasted no time sliding out and collecting Harlow, leading her away from Elle. She sat in the car, looking at her hands on the wheel. The half moons of her nails, and the pink still in the creases of her fingers.

She couldn't do much, other than think left alone with her thoughts as she was. Their whole life, Rob had hated them. They couldn't separate, but they couldn't be together either. And now, she just wishes that they were closer but she knows why they can't be. Her phone starts to buzz. She looked at the screen, and saw a picture of herself and Dad laughing together that she used as his photo in her contacts. He's wearing a polo shirt, and holding the phone above his face to take a selfie as she, in her bikini top cuddles up close. Their last vacation with Cam. Maybe the last time she was ever that happy.

Until she met Carmella.

Speaking, of, she could see her sitting on a bench, watching Harlow climb on a climbing frame. With a sigh, she slid from the car, locked it, and crossed the park to her. She was beautiful, that couldn't be denied. Regretfully, Elle was in love with her. She hadn't meant to, hadn't even wanted to. She just…Did. Maybe she'd been in love with her since the very first time she darkened the doorway of the tea shop in her Taylor Swift t-shirt and hadn't realized it as caught up in her own misery as she had been. But she knew the truth, now, as she watched Carmella watch Harlow on the play frame. She sat next to her, and when Carmella took her hand it was her who threaded their fingers together tightly.

"You know." Carmella began, "I could fix my face."

"What?"

"My scar. I could fix it. The money for plastic surgery is there. Fraser raised the money, but I said I didn't want to."

"Okay."

"My scar, it's a reminder you know. It's like saying, this is what happened to me, maybe it got my face, but it didn't get me. If this scar is the worst thing that ever happens to me than I'm pretty lucky."

"I guess so."

"Of course, he was pissed when I told him that. But he didn't mean anything by it. His idea of what me being healed look like, and my idea of what me being healed look like…Are just different. I think it's the same with you and your family. They think that a healed Elle looks one way, but you think she looks another."

"That's a good way of putting it. I think Elle Robinson…Needs to work more on moving on. I think I've only just stared, but you're right. I won't go back to being who I was. I'm someone else now."

"I've prayed a lot on it. I was desperate for God to give me answers. He didn't. I just had to accept, eventually, that this was what I looked like." Carm said, "What do you think?"

"About what?"

"About my scar, silly." Elle turned to face her, and using her free hand, she haltingly reached up to touch the side of Carmella's chin, bringing her face to the left so she could see it better. Her skin was warm under her hand, and soft. The topography of the scar was raised, and bumpy under her thumb, like a map of the Himalayas. Slowly, carefully, she leaned in. Carm's breath caught, then she leaned in too. Gently, she pressed their lips against each other. Carm's hand that wasn't caught in her own came up to the side of her face, her palm a warm welcome weight as she pushed their lips together with a little more firmness. When they parted, Elle could taste Carmella's pineapple lip gloss. It was sweet, and sticky, and possibly a little tart.

"I'd keep it. I think it makes you look totally hot." Carmella laughed, and pulled her in for another kiss, before pulling back, leaning their foreheads together.

"You already know that we have to go back to Erinsborough."

"I know."

"And you have to make up with Rob, and your Aunt Julie and your father."

"I know."

"I love you, Elle."

"I knew that, too." Carmella smiled, and then let their hands sit between them on the wooden bench facing the playground.

"I don't expect you to say it back."

"When Cam died…" She started, "When Cam died, it felt like the sun was extinguished, and everything inside of me worth keeping shriveled up and died. And it felt like that for years. I just…Stopped being me. Because without Cam, what was the point? When he died, it was like looking down the barrel of eighty years on my own. I thought…I guess I thought I was protecting myself from ever feeling like that again. But, now, when I'm with you…I wonder…If maybe the sun didn't go out…It just went behind a cloud. And you're the wind blowing it out of the way. And maybe that's the point. Maybe the point is you."

"I'm not the point of you living. You have to live for you."

"I am going to live for me. But I mean, maybe the point of all the misery was to meet you. Maybe that's God's plan for me."

"God never does anything by accident." Carmella confirmed, and smiled at Elle. "I prayed to him, I asked him to send me someone who would understand about my addiction and not let it change how they saw me. Someone who wouldn't let me scar define how they saw me and I think he answered with your brother, hiring me to deliver fruits and veg to the store. You're my angel."

"First time anyone's ever told me that." Said Elle, "Usually they go with princess."

"Okay, you're my princess is that better?"

"Yeah, it is." She said, "And you can be the queen." And as Carmella kissed her again, the sun was warm and bright on her shoulders.