A/N: Congrats to AidenHatterMoon! You got the answer for the little challenge in the last chapter.
The answer was Brea Grant & Angela Trimbur, who share the same first names as two of the characters in the last update. They played Harley & Mya in H2, who are featured in this chapter.
By the way, I hope you guys like this chapter; it's pushing 900 words.
The first day Laurie started work, Annie found it hard to let her go. She had honestly hoped that Laurie would just continue to do interviews around town and have no end result. So she was obviously upset when Laurie ran into the kitchen to answer the phone, and came back into Annie's room five minutes later with a grin plastered on her face.
"I got the job at the record & coffee shop!" She giggles excitedly, wrapping her arms around the shorter girl, who is sporting just a robe and a barely-visible frown. Annie half heartedly congratulates her girlfriend, who doesn't notice that she's not as sincere as she may seem.
The newly-employed girl is so excited that she's oblivious to Annie's change in mood that lasts for the rest of the night (despite certain celebratory events that take place in Annie's room) and increases the next morning.
"Baby, I'm off to work now!" Laurie shouts from the entryway into the kitchen. That's all it takes for Annie to get her slippered feet moving; she's in the room in a matter of seconds.
After several kisses, a drawn-out goodbye, and two hours later, Laurie is sitting behind the counter of Uncle Meat's Java Hole, making a cup of coffee for her third customer of the morning. It was a girl named Aiden who'd come in around ten and had been making small talk with Laurie over records. The blonde had to admit, this girl was pretty cute.
After the girl leaves, Laurie has a short fifteen-minute break. She makes a quick cup of coffee for herself and sits down with her fellow coworker, Mya Rockwell.
Five minutes into the conversation, Laurie is cut off in the middle of laughing at Mya's joke by the familiar clearing of someone's throat. She turns around and meets the jealous glare of her girlfriend, who had ditched her usual ensemble of yoga pants and a robe for jeans and a tank top.
"Hey Laurie," Annie says in a not-so-friendly tone, "I decided to stop by and see how your first day of work is going, but I guess there's not too much work actually going on."
Sensing the tension between the two girls, Mya attempts to help out her new friend, "Laurie's on a fifteen minute break, we were just having a cup of coffee."
Annie just shoots a glare in her direction while "oh, be quiet" slips out a little louder than intended.
"Annie!" Laurie exclaims, shock clear on her face at the dark-haired girl's sudden behavior.
"Okay, that's totally uncalled for. I'm just having a cup of coffee with Laurie. No big deal. You don't see my girlfriend freaking out." Mya says, jerking a thumb in Harley David's direction. Harley just shoots a wink at Mya before continuing to suck on a strand of hair and sort coffee cups. She realizes that it's probably not the best idea to bring up the fact that her and Mya's relationship is an open one.
While all of this unfolds, Laurie is silently studying her pint-sized girlfriend. She can tell that this is more than just a simple case of jealousy. So that's why she gets up and leads Annie outside, signaling to Mya & Harley that she'll be right back.
Once they're outside, Laurie instantly regrets not grabbing a jacket before coming out here, because as soon as they walk out, snowflakes start to fall rapidly. The first snowfall of the winter.
To compensate for her lack of clothing, Laurie wraps her arms around herself before speaking to the girl in front of her.
"Baby, I know what's going on. I'm not as oblivious to everything as you seem to think. I know how terrified you are of him and how it keeps you locked up. You almost never leave the house, Annie."
The girl she's addressing doesn't make any movement, if Laurie didn't know better, she'd say that Annie didn't hear her. But she knows damn well that she did, so she continues.
"That's why you got pissed off seeing me having a good time at work. I know you don't want me to go to work, and you definitely don't want me to actually enjoy it."
This hits a nerve for Annie; her gaze instantly shifts from Laurie's feet to her eyes, and Laurie doesn't like what she sees there. She sees a scared little girl, not the confident seventeen-year-old that used to reside there.
"I'm sorry, Laurie. It's just…I don't want to be alone in that house. It's only been a day and I'm already losing my mind not having you around." Annie replies, sounding so much like the scared girl Laurie saw in her gaze.
So the blonde girl reaches forward and grabs her girlfriend's hand to pull her closer and calm down the fear that she's keeping all bottled up.
"I know you're scared, Baby. I am too. But you can't just stop living and never leave the house because of it. No matter what, I'm always going to rush right home to see you, so promise me you'll try and leave the house a bit more?"
That's all it takes for Annie to agree with the blonde. As long as Laurie comes home to her every day after work, maybe this won't be so bad.