"New Year's Eve hasn't been the same since Guy Lombardo died," Ray says sullenly from the sofa.
"Are you old enough to remember that?" Martin quips.
It's New Year's Eve. Stuffed into Mick and Amaya's (and Ray and Jax's) tiny living room, the makeshift family of six, including Leonard and Martin, are half-crammed on the sofa and half-sprawled on the floor. They find themselves missing not their usual one, but two members this year. Lisa is still in a coma, and nobody has heard from Sara since their last dinner together.
Sara has been doing a great job of filling the Lisa-shaped hole in most of their lives — most being everyone but Leonard. For Leonard, well, it's a different, much sadder, story.
"I love a clarinet," Martin mumbles to no one, probably having seen one onscreen. Then he addresses the room, "You know, no one plays the clarinet anymore."
"Guy Lombardo didn't play the clarinet," Ray replies, confused.
"I didn't say Guy Lombardo played the clarinet," Martin clarifies.
Usually, Leonard is on Martin's side when these miscommunications occur. Tonight, he'll have to give it to Ray — not that he's going to tell Ray that.
But, before Ray can argue, Amaya returns from the kitchen after taking a phone call.
"Uh, everybody," she says shyly.
Mick pauses the TV and grunts for everybody to shut up, even though the room is silent.
Amaya continues, "I have some probably good news. Lisa is pregnant."
"What do you mean she's pregnant?" Jax jumps up from the couch.
Normally Leonard would immediately take his spot, but he's already getting up to grab his jacket and head for the door. The family is talking over each other as Amaya explains that it was the hospital that called. He can hear someone calling for him, trying to get some clarification — he is the only one Lisa would confide in about trying to conceive — but before they can get the question out, Leonard closes the door behind him.
.
Someone knocks on Sara's door as she's lacing up her boots and getting ready for Thea's New Year's Eve party. It's across the courtyard in some unit that Moira hasn't been able to rent.
"Who is it?" she calls.
"Oliver."
Sara sighs, confused and curious, and heads for the door. When she opens it, Oliver is holding a ginormous bouquet.
"Um," is all Sara can get out.
"Mom got them for all the tenants, don't worry," Oliver concedes. "She's already at Thea's, so I thought I'd deliver these before walking you over."
"You're walking me over?" Sara asks, grabbing the flowers from Oliver and placing them on the kitchen counter.
She doesn't have a vase.
"I heard you running around as I was getting ready to leave," Oliver explains with a shrug.
Sara looks at Oliver in his button-down and winter coat, hands in his pockets as he looks at anything but her, and feels a tinge of love in her chest. There are moments like this where Sara can see the man that Laurel fell in the love with; the man he was and the man Laurel had hoped or known he would become. Sara steps across the threshold of her doorway and leans in to hug him.
She doesn't see Leonard watching them from downstairs.
.
After grabbing her coat and scarf just to walk across the courtyard, Sara and Oliver find a familiar figure pacing on the sidewalk. Oliver slows to a stop next to her as they both notice him.
"Leonard," Sara greets her fake-fiancee's brother with surprise.
"Hi," he says shyly.
Sara likes how it looks on him.
"What are you doing here?" Sara asks.
Leonard stalls, placeholders leaving his mouth before he points at the bottle of champagne she has tucked between her crossed arms. "You're going to a party," he states.
"Yeah, my friend Thea is having a party tonight." She gestures to the noise coming from across the courtyard.
"I'll walk you," Leonard says, oblivious to Oliver's presence until Sara turns to look at him.
Oliver simply shrugs and leaves the two of them behind — well, after waiting for a nod of agreement on Sara's part. Leonard watches Oliver go until the latter is out of earshot.
"Is everything ok?" Sara asks as they start their under-a-minute journey.
"Why? Why wouldn't it be okay?" Leonard immediately replies.
"Because this is weird. You're acting really weird."
"No, I'm not being weird."
"Yes, you are," Sara insists as they near the party.
Less-than-a-minute walk.
"So, what about Lisa?" He says as Sara knocks on the apartment door.
"What about Lisa?"
"Lisa is going to have a lot to deal with when she wakes up," Leonard says ominously.
Sara doesn't have a moment to ponder it, though, because Thea opens the door with an excited scream and a bottle of tequila that she's splashing on the floor. She pulls Sara in for a hug full of shouted greetings, and Sara thinks she feels drops of tequila on her back.
"Sara and her fiancee are here!" Thea drunkenly shouts.
Leonard is pulled into the apartment before he can run out the door.
Inside, Sara finds Rip drinking near the entrance, obviously ready to make a mad dash when the moment excites him. She doesn't see Miranda though; Sara thinks she's probably here and hopefully not asleep at home with their son, Jonas.
Sara pulls Rip away as someone forcibly takes off Leonard's coat, hoping for a moment to talk some things through with Rip.
"Jeez, he bounced back quick!" Rip yells.
Sara rolls her eyes.
"That's not the fiancee! Lisa is the fiancee! That's Leonard!"
"Who's Leonard again!"
"Lisa's brother!"
"And Lisa's in the coma!"
"Yeah!" Sara rolls her eyes again.
"So then why did you bring Leonard!"
"I didn't bring Leonard," Sara says, lowering her voice as the loud song transitions into a quieter one and everyone calms down. "He followed me here."
"So Leonard's the fiancee?"
"No, Rip, Lisa is the fiancee."
"Lisa doesn't know you exist," Rip replies.
Sara realizes his breath smells like a full bottle of whiskey and sighs.
"I know," she says.
"Sara." He states. And then nothing else.
"What?"
"They have doctors for this kind of thing!"
And then Rip walks away.
Sara takes her time finding the drink table, shoving through the crowd of acquaintances and strangers. And Oliver, she notes, who she can finally admit is a friend. She watches him talking to a beautiful blonde in the corner and smiles before continuing her journey.
"Hey," Leonard says from behind.
He finds her as she's filling up on whatever combination of juice and liquor is in a giant tub. It feels more like the few college parties she went to during her year at CCCC — Central City Community College.
"I need to talk to you!" He shouts. The music is loud again.
"Later!" Sara chides, trying to get drunk.
"It's urgent!"
"It's New Year's Eve!" she laughs. Leonard is not laughing.
"Your fiancee is pregnant!"
The whole room grows silent, and Sara can even see Oliver stop his conversation and look their way. She can see Rips actually put down his bottle and Thea stop grinding on Roy. And she can see the sea of acquaintances and strangers foaming at the mouth for gossip.
She shoves Leonard and rushes out of the party.
.
It takes him longer than Sara thinks it should to find his coat and meet her outside.
Sara immediately starts walking again, her short legs somehow creating a pace that he has to work at to match.
"This whole evening did not work out well at all…" he says.
"And I'm supposed to share some responsibility in that?" Sara scoffs.
"No." Leonard sighs. "Could you slow down a bit?"
Sara stops in the middle of the courtyard, her final steps looking more like stomps.
"Look, I didn't know you and Lisa were trying, and on top of the whole Oliver thing —"
"Excuse me?" Sara laughs. It comes out more maniacal than she intends.
She can feel her eye twitching because of the freezing winds and finds herself glad she put on a jacket and scarf just to walk across the courtyard. Leonard has his parka in his hand, a tight black sweater stretching across his lean muscles, and Sara wishes he wasn't pissing her off or her fake fiancee's brother so she could invite him upstairs. She starts fidgeting to get out the nervous energy.
"It's nothing." Leonard backhands the air as if tossing the comment away.
"No, there's no nothing now," Sara insists. "What Oliver thing?"
"The leaning thing," Leonard says as if it specifies anything.
"The leaning thing?" Sara stops her nervous fidgeting for a moment. "Were you in my building earlier? Before you walked me over there?"
"Oliver gave you flowers," Leonard states instead of a response. "And then you leaned."
"And then I leaned." Sara puts on a fake smile as she nods, rage building within her.
"Yeah."
"Ok! How did I lean when I leaned?"
"It was a lot different than hugging," Leonard tells her, stepping closer, backing her against a pillar with a small statue atop it. "Hugging's very different. That involves arms and hands, and leaning is whole bodies moving in like this."
He stands over her, her head bumping against the ambiguous statue as he rests a hand beside it, his face mere inches away from her, face full of charisma and that air of cool always hanging around him. Sara tries to let it hang around her, too, as she straightens her face and lets nothing show.
"Leaning involves wanting," he says — and she's losing it — "and accepting. Leaning."
She tries to respond, but then he looks at her lips and she's gone. He could grab her hands and pull her upstairs and have his way with her. She forgets everything — Lisa and the family and babies and complications — and the entire world is just Leonard, leaning over her, eyes cool and honest and beautiful. You could drown in those eyes, she thinks.
"Sara," Oliver calls, and the spell is broken. "Is he bothering you?"
The blonde from the party is a few steps behind him. Sara thinks she must be the person that tricked Oliver into putting on the ridiculous cone hat he is currently sporting. Leonard doesn't step away, but he does adjust his angle a little, giving Sara more space to breathe.
"No, no," Sara says with a smile.
"Are you sure? Because he looks like he's leaning." Oliver does a stupid gesture with his hands to describe the motion.
Sara snorts and Leonard laughs.
"Thank you," Leonard says to Oliver. "See?" he asks Sara.
"I'm here if you need me!" Oliver calls, taking the blonde under his arm and rejoining the group that has formed outside.
Sara and Leonard look back at one another, faces filled with amusement instead of lust as reality sets back in. Sara is disappointed, but she knows this is the mess she made for herself.
"Alright," she clears her throat. "What about the other thing?"
"The other thing?" Leonard asks, then his face lights up before he disappears back into himself and takes a step away from Sara. "The other misunderstanding?"
"Why do you think Lisa's pregnant?" Sara asks.
"Because the hospital called and said Lisa's pregnant," he replies.
Sara is thrown for a loop, and she pushes off the statue before taking in a deep breath. She's thinking, reeling, thinking.
"Were you two not trying to conceive?" Leonard asks.
"No," Sara declares instinctively.
She internally kicks herself because now she's created a story where —
"Oh, Sara, I'm sorry," Leonard says when he realizes it. "I'm so sorry."
He takes a step towards her but she turns away. He must mistake her self-loathing for sorrow because he takes another step and rests a hand on her shoulder.
"You've only been together three months," he reasons. "Maybe she doesn't know. Maybe it's from before."
"Maybe," Sara says, turning around, trying to keep her voice sad and not hopeful.
God, she hopes it's more than three months old.
"I'm gonna go," Sara points to the door. "I'm going to bed."
"Sara, wait, maybe we can —"
"You know what?" Sara blurts, frustrated more with herself than anyone else as she walks around him and toward the door. She's tired of the games and the lies and obvious something between the two of them that she had made impossible with the games and the lies. And now there's an innocent fetus that will probably turn into an innocent baby. Or not, if Lisa so chooses. Either way, it's a wake-up call. "I've had a pretty lousy Christmas, and you just managed to kill my New Year. If you come back on Easter, you can burn down my apartment."
"Hey, come on Sara —"
"What do you want from me, Leonard?"
"I want you to not be unhappy."
"You're six years and two death late on that one. You couldn't fix me if you tried. With your big family and the love that surrounds you, you have no idea what it's like to be alone."
"You're not alone; you have Lisa."
"I don't have anybody. Good night."
Sara opens the door and promptly shuts it behind her, forcing Leonard's hand and ending the night. She stands there, just on the other side, listening to the crunch of his boots in the snow, hating herself. She stays for a while, or maybe a few seconds, or maybe a few minutes.
It doesn't matter either way.