A/N: I'm not terribly sure how this chapter turned out... I find it's much harder for me to write happiness and joy than angst. Hmm... oh, well. Tell me what you think.

I've calmed down since dinner, but I did lose my appetite so now a couple of hours later I'm starving. I don't want to impose on Margaret anymore, so I'll just handle it. We're watching TV now, some strange Christmas special, as Margaret says. Apparently out here Christmas is more secular than religious, though I still don't really understand how the birth of Jesus could be anything but religious. Margaret promises to explain when she's not so tired.

Currently, she's lying in one of the hotel beds, totally engrossed in a reindeer with a big-ass red nose that makes him sound like he has a cold all the time following around some really short kid who wants to be a dentist, which for some reason is absolutely horrible. And there's this guy with a red beard who keeps licking his pick-ax. What the fuck is this? I have no idea what's going on, but that's OK because Mitchie is snuggled against my chest, sitting between my legs, drifting in and out of sleep. It's very adorable when she wakes up because missing most of the movie leaves her even more confused. She likes to ask me questions about what's going on, though I have no idea.

"Alex... why is there a bird-fish?" The three "heroes" have moved onto the Land of Misfit Toys, and there really is a bird-fish jumping around.

"I have no idea. This movie is weird as shit," I reply, kissing right by her ear. I've noticed that she likes that, that she always seems more peaceful when I kiss her there. She takes this as a good enough answer because she turns away from me to look at the screen. It's still ridiculously magical to me, this whole television thing. I don't really understand it at all, but Margaret assures us that once we get enrolled in school, everything will start to make much more sense. I hope so, but at the same time, I don't want the magic to end.

Margaret shifts slightly and I can tell that she's been watching us giggle and cuddle over here. I am worried that if she notices the more than friendship component of our relationship she'll try to split us up or have a conniption or some other negative reaction. But it's not like either of us have attempted to be very discreet. So I don't know what she's figured out and I'd rather not for the time being. It's such a blissful, ignorant little fantasy we have going here. I must consciously push all thoughts of Max from my mind in order to enjoy anything, and even then it doesn't work very well. Though focusing on trying to figure what the heck is going on with this reindeer is certainly helping.

After the bird-fish does a couple of jumps into the bowl, the images flip to commercials, which are advertisements for things you can buy. Mitchie and I both got really excited when we saw one for Target- the whole collective experience of TV is totally mind-blowing. I mean, this country is about 3,000 miles across and the guy ice fishing in Maine could be watching this, as well as the woman living in Arizona. It's ridiculous. I can't wrap my mind around it.

"Hey, girls, you mind if I ask you a personal question?" Margaret looks as though she's been contemplating this for a while and even now there's a certain edge to her voice. I don't know why she would feel fear; she has much more power over us than we do over her.

Mitchie almost recoils, sinking deeper into me, making my chest a little tighter, my breathing a little shallower. She must think that Margaret wants to know about the rape, but that's not what I see in her eyes. "As long as we don't have to answer if it's really, really uncomfortable," I say, mostly to protect Mitchie. I can't imagine anything I would feel too uncomfortable to answer. She's already seen me at my lowest point, already watched me cry my eyes out over my dead brother, already seen the aftermath of my suicide attempt.

Margaret nods thoughtfully. "Fair enough. I'm just wonderin', though- are you girl lesbians?"

I just kind of stare at her, and Mitchie stops suffocating me. "I don't know what that means."

"Really? What about gay? Homosexual?" We both shake our heads. She's blown away by this. "Not even heterosexual? Straight? Anything about sexual orientation?"

Shrugging, I reply, "We didn't really learn much about sex at Havenwood."

Margaret becomes momentarily confused by this and then understands what I'm getting at. "Oh, honey, I ain't talkin' 'bout sex. I'm talkin' 'bout love."

"Love?" My eyes instantly dart to Mitchie, her face slowly being drained of color. We've been caught, pretty much. We're fucked, I just know it. My brain starts thinking of ways to run, of ways to get out of here, where we could go, anyone we could talk to-

"You're in love with each other, right? I think it's adorable." I feel Mitchie sigh against me, relieved by this reaction. I, on the other hand, am just thrown into shock. For some reason, it feels as though she has shattered our secrecy, shattered the incredibly close bond we formed, the safe cocoon we've been living in together.

"Is that... weird?" Mitchie asks quietly. Even though Margaret's reaction is positive, others' might not be. This world is enormous- it's impossible to predict everything, where as in Havenwood you pretty much knew everything six years before it actually happened. Events here are exhilarating and bone-chilling all at the same time.

Margaret sighs in response to Mitchie's question. "It used to be, people are comin' around. It's everywhere now- on TV, in the movies, in books, in schools, in everyday life. Most people are learnin' to accept it; there's still patches of hate some places, but you'll have as much help as you will trouble."

Mitchie's scared now, like people might try and hurt us. Leaning down close to her, I quickly whisper, "Don't worry. Anyone tries to hurt you, I'll smack 'em sideways." She giggles in this happy sort of twinkling way, enjoying the kiss I place right behind her ear. Then to Margaret, I question, "What about those words you were saying earlier- lesbian, gay- what does all that mean?"

She shakes her head, and I can almost see the tears coming in her eyes. "You poor girls... To have to know you're different from everyone else, but to not even have the words to describe how... My heart hurts for you." Interesting choice of words, though I don't complain since she's being really nice and she is right. "But here, those words describe what you are. A lesbian is a girl who is attracted to other girls, who wants to form romantic relationships with them. 'Gay' is the same thing, only it covers boys and girls who feel that way, same with homosexual. Heterosexual and straight mean people who are attracted to the opposite gender."

Lesbian. Gay. Homosexual. All words to describe me, Alex Russo. I'd thought this part of me was indescribable, something no one but Mitchie would ever understand. Though here it is, displayed for everyone to see. Everyone out here knows about it, and there are other people like me. Lesbian. I test it out in my head, a smile forming on my face each time. I can't possibly describe how amazing it feels to know that there is a word for this, that I don't have to go around feeling weird and isolated from everyone. To know that there's a word for this part of me that I never really understood... I feel like part of the world again, less of an outcast, more optimistic about this whole thing. "So then I would be... a lesbian?"

"Unless you like boys, too. That would be bisexual- if you like boys and girls," Margaret explains.

I make a face. "Ew. Nope. Just girls for me. Actually, just one girl for me." Mitchie only responds with a smile and a shake of her head, and I take that as enough.

It's later that night, the movie has ended, and Mitchie and I are snuggled up together under the covers. She's on her side, back pressed against my chest, hand holding mine. Her breathing is soft once again, but I still can't fall asleep. I don't know why. I think it has to do with Max and this whole whirlwind of new experiences and how I haven't had much time to grieve, after that first night. Even now, just thinking about him, the skin on my wrists begins to itch and I feel the intense need to scratch them, to hurt them, to punish myself, but I can't get at them- Mitchie's in the way, I just want to get there, to hurt myself somehow to-

"I can't. I can't keep... no..." I'm crying now, little droplets of water sliding off my body and onto Mitchie's. I pay no attention as they reach her face and she goes to wipe them off, waking herself up in the process.

"Alex...?" Bits of concern etch themselves into her face, overriding confusion and exhaustion. "Not this again, Alex. You know he wouldn't want that..."

I can't contain my tears even as she speaks to me, my wrists still itching to be touched. "M-Mitchie. Can you just- just hold my wrists? I can't, I can't... not again." She does exactly what I ask, shifting so that's on her back and I'm crumpled on her chest, bawling. She takes my wrists in her hands, slowly rubbing them with her thumbs. This feels amazing, so much different than attacking them with glass like I tried before. Eventually, it's calming me down enough to ease the pain just to crying, even though that's unpleasant, too.

"Alex... when you said earlier, that you were a lesbian..." There's a hint of uncertainty, a twinge of fear, a smidgen of something I can't identify.

Most of my tears stop at this point, more interested whatever trouble she's going through right now. "Yeah. What about it?"

She moves awkwardly. "What if... I don't like only girls? What if I'm- that other thing Margaret said? Bisexual? But I'd never- not with a boy, not for a while, and not with I have you... but what if I just think they're, like, attractive or handsome or something? Is that... weird? Does is bother you?"

My first instinctive reaction is to tell her it's wrong and strange and that she should choose between boys and girls and that she's only supposed to care about me right now, but then I stop- stop and think. "I guess not. I mean... you still love me, right?" I try to keep my voice from crackling, fear dripping from those last words.

"There should never be a doubt in your mind," she assures me, kissing me just to prove it. "I don't w-want anything with them... not with other girls, either. I just- didn't want you to feel w-weird or get upset or any-anything?"

I think on it some more, not really getting why it would be different. "No. Not really. You can't help that you might like boys and girls, anymore than I can pick to like just girls. Or that I can pick love you, specifically. And as long as it's just me, right now... no, it doesn't bother me."

There must have been an invisible weight pressing down on Mitchie's chest because she takes a deep breath, like she's breathing for the first time. "Good. I..." She looks back down, the words unspoken. She wonders what it would have been like if I had flat out refused, told her that it made me upset, told her that I couldn't handle that. But I don't care one bit- hell, I don't care who else she thinks is attractive just so long as she still loves me, just so long as I'm still at the top of her list.

"I know. Don't worry. I love you." I kiss square on the lips in a more dominant, reassuring way than I ever have before. Almost like I'm claiming her as mine. I think she enjoys this because I feel her letting me dominate her, letting me reassure her with these kisses, kisses that deviate from her lips down to her jaw onto her neck, down to her collarbone. Her breathing increases its pace and, remembering what happened last time she made those noises, I stop and pause just for a moment.

But the reaction I get is much different this time: "Don't stop, Alex." I smile as I go back in for another kiss, back on her lips. My hands slide over her stomach, hers rest on my back, moving all up and down it, slipping under the fabric of-

Margaret gives a loud snort from the bed next to us. We stop instantly, giggling at her noise. She's not awake, though; just a light sleeper. I notice Mitchie's face flushing from all of this, and I find it so cute. "Perhaps we should continue this some other time."

"OK."

I give her one last kiss on the top of her head and then adjust myself so that she's lying on my chest and I'm on my back. It's our favorite way of falling asleep, one that allows us to be in the positions we're most comfortable. "I love you, Mitchie."

"Love you, too, Alex."

I wake up once again, later. At first, I can't put my finger on why, but then I hear it: crying sounds coming from the bathroom. Panicked, startled, scared, I hop out of bed and hurry into the tiled room. All of the lights are off but I'd know those tears anywhere.

"Mitchie...?" She's somewhere by the toilet, I can tell from her sobs, but I don't know exactly where.

"It hurt me, too, Alex. I... he became my brother. I miss him, and I miss all I never knew about him, and I miss everything that he could have been, and every time I see something I think, 'Oh, Max would love that,' but he's not here and dammit, Alex! I can't be strong all the time- I don't know how you do it; you're always there, and now it's my time to be there for you and I just can't do it! And every time I let you down, I feel like I'm letting Max down, too, and he deserves someone who can be strong for his sister, who can help her-"

"No. Shh... You're brilliant, Mitchie, don't be so hard on yourself. Max..." I choke on his name, trying not break down completely before I tell her what she needs to hear, what I know to be true. "Max would be happy just to know that you're still here for me, and that we're both... OK. He loves you, too. He-he loves us... loves us both. Remember... where-wherever he is, he-he loves us."

I fumble through the darkness, my tears not obscuring what I can't even begin to see. I don't trip on the toilet or the towels on the floor and I don't take a misstep when my foot finds hers. And when I collapse next to her, I don't try to do anything but sit beside her.

Nothing touches but our hands- mine covering hers- and our slowly falling tears, mingling atop our hands.