She felt ruined. The lonely days and nights she spent contemplating eternity alone, were no longer hers to drift off without Tara rearing her head. In the form of a memory or a quirk Pam remembered involuntarily. She would admit it only in her underground bedroom, at night, with the room dark and with whispered musings for her ears alone. She missed Tara.
As much as Pam would like to believe she kept her feelings about Tara's absence quiet, Lafayette knew. She had a tell one she wasn't aware of. Her fingers would begin to play with the band on her hand. He had thought about how odd it was to have Tara and Pam together, married. He didn't they made and unattractive couple. And while he knew they were sexually compatible, marriage was a long term commitment that didn't suit either one of them in his opinion.
He eyed a cute Italian he's been playing cat and mouse with for over a month. He could confidently approximate how long since it began when Tara left. For a month the blond had been impossible to work with or for. She paid her employees well. They would take what she gave no matter how much she made them hate coming to work. After being the topic of rumors, long winded diatribes, and threats that were never uttered within earshot, Pam came to work that night on a mission. She wouldn't be stopped and by the end of the night there was a frazzled Mocha skinned vampire who walked funny all the way to the back door where Lafayette escorted her when Pam was done. After he let her out, he checked on the blond.
She was buttoning her jacket when he walked in. He got comfortable on the couch as she made it a point to look distracted straightening her hair and reapplying her makeup. He tried not to judge, but his pursed lips gave him away. Unfortunately for him, Pam didn't entertain feelings like guilt. That was a mortal flaw she was happy to let go of.
"How'd we do tonight?"
"Good."
She turned from the hanging mirror beside her office desk. "You're still here?"
"Don't got nowhere to be. The crew can clean up without me looking over their shoulders."
"I don't want to talk."
"I don't want to see you fuck up something special," he challenged.
Pam scoffed. "I don't have time for this."
"You will fucking live forever you got all the time in the world to listen, cause I'm trying to tell you some good shit here. Some life changing shit."
"I don't want my life changed."
"Since when you bring bitches up here? I can count how many times," he held up one finger. "And I bet I can guess why. I see a lot of changes since Tara left. I pegged you for the type that fights dirty—not a coward running scared."
"You do know I can string you up like a piñata over the dance floor, and pass out bats and straws to let the regulars beat and drink you within an inch of your life?"
He delivered with more courage than he felt, "and after I'm dead and gone you still won't be able to take off the ring."
The ring was a sensitive subject. No matter how hard she tried, and she had tried, to get it off it wouldn't budge. She didn't think it would. Perhaps absence did make the heart grow fonder. She could indulge in fantasies of torturing a certain immortal, but they were just that, fantasies. If Tara walked through the door she knew she would be at the mercy of her smile, her smile, her wit. She didn't want to be one of those women, but Tara made her one of those women, by existing.
She dropped her head. If it had been anyone else he would have thought it might have been a sign that he had broken through her walls. But, it was Pam. She wanted him unsuspecting before she sped toward him and held him up by his throat. She didn't make a habit of physically admonishing Lafayette. Usually she took his mouth in stride. He would be him without it. Though, now all she wanted to do was rip it off.
Her ring sparkled tauntingly. She dropped him unceremoniously to the floor. He felt to his feet dropping to his knees.
"I don't know why you're not dead right now," she growled. Her fist opened and closed. She looked at the couch glaring at the shine of the leather where her company had shown just how much fun she had.
Lafayette couldn't say anything. He used the arm of the chair to help him up. Then he leaned his back against the door frame watching Pam warily. The dark skinned man knew he was defenseless, but out of habit he watched and tensed for another physical outburst.
In the midst of their arguing his phone fell.
Pam who was already looking down, happened to be standing over it. She was wiping her brow and noticed the name on the phone. It was Tara, a text message. Lafayette didn't reach for it still recuperating holding his throat. He was curious to know it was, but not enough to close the distance between him and Pam.
She crouched and picked the phone up.
Hey bitch
Pam looked over at Lafayette, "Tara's says hello." She turned as she answered the text message with a similar greeting adding a question. The first time she wrote it she reread it and realized Lafayette would have been blunt. She erased her message replying the way she knew Lafayette would.
Still stealing shit?
She sat at the edge of the desk. She didn't have long to wait for the answer.
Yes. How's Pam?
The blond quirked her brow raising a questioning gaze to Lafayette dropping his hand from his throat. The sound of a loud crash made him curse under his breath. He hesitated when his first instinct was to run out yell and then investigate. Lafayette looked strangely at his partner. She didn't look like she wanted to relinquish his phone. And she wouldn't have if he made it an issue, but he didn't. Instead he left closing the door after him.
Making herself comfortable in her chair she turned her back on the couch.
Pam is Pam
The answer was simple and vague and Tara didn't like it sending a message asking whether or not she'd been eating, working, and behaving. Had Lafayette been talking to her? Probably, it made sense that he would share, but it filled her with distinct warmth that Tara would ask. The warmth was short lived, because in the month Tara had been gone she hadn't tried to talk to her once. Pam had even called. Building up the courage without a script or even an inkling of what she might say. Though, she had done at a weak moment when she wanted to hear Tara's voice. When she had worn through the images of Tara in every face and shape she picked up the phone. Her irritation when Tara didn't answer passed. It was the days that turned to weeks where Pam didn't get a call back that infuriated her. That inspired her to find a distraction, a woman that didn't remind her of Tara. She wanted to abuse the woman and in turn the woman welcomed that rage in Pam's thrust, the lust in her kisses and the bites that were probably now healed inside her thigh.
Why don't you ask her? Didn't she call?
Pam used her leg to create a lazy momentum as she moved her chair back and forth.
She needs to figure out what she wants without me distracting her.
The blond frowned.
Sounds like bullshit.
Pam swiveled her chair to her desk. There was paperwork she had come in to do. She needed to be somewhere else and feel something instead of loneliness. The vampire had been a welcome distraction. She didn't want to seem desperate for a message staring the screen as if sheer will, would make the answer appear.
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"Beautiful day," Sookie greeted Tara laying on her and Bill's couch. The sun shining through the effervescent curtains bounced off each surface. It 's wash had a warming affect on the frown Tara wore when she walked in.
She focused on the phone.
"Texting anybody interesting?"
"Fuck off Sookie."
The dark skinned woman was still angry with her. She knew what she had done was unforgivable, but they had too much history to let a little thing like bringing out her inner beast ruin a friendship. She had been working gradually to rectify the mistake in judgment. Tara wasn't making her apology easy. And Bill wasn't helping.
"You're talking to me that's a start," she had become accustomed her the dark haired woman's silence.
Tara didn't look up from her phone, but she didn't give Sookie the satisfaction of a comment. Sookie blew a breath before she stood and snatched the phone from Tara. She wasn't interested in the messages. Tara would have to acknowledge she existed, she didn't mind if Tara slapped her around for her effort.
"Give it back," Tara glared as she got up to reclaim her property.
"No," she answered petulantly.
Tara reached for it and every time she did Sookie was a little bit quicker and pulled away. Drinking Bill's blood gave her that little bit of an advantage. Tara would have to work for it, not hard, but she still felt indignant from the effort of fighting.
"For fuck sakes Sookie," she pushed the woman until the back of her legs hit a seat. A little more pressure and she was on the chair looking up at Tara and wondering how much more fun this game would be without clothes.
Tara noticed her hooded eyes and pulled away quickly. Sookie had made her choice. And Tara had made hers with the help of a ring. "I don't want to play. I want to be angry at you for a while longer."
"You will have plenty of time to be angry at me. Does it have to be today? It's beautiful and bright and—"
"And I'm not interested."
"You love to eat."
"I can't even say the word appetite around you without thinking I might be sick."
This angered the playful woman. She was fine with taunting others, but Tara's comment hit close to home. She pulled the phone out and threw it at Tara's chest. She hoped it hurt and she half hoped the woman would drop it so it would break. The immortal's reflexes were too quick to drop it much to Sookie's dismay. She returned to the couch settling in the corner wary of the blond who sat on the opposite end.
"Who are you texting?"
"Santa Claus," Tara informed randomly.
"Requesting anything special for Christmas?"
Tara looked up meaningfully, "a few things come to mind," she bit her lip sexily. "But that's nothing Santa needs to worry about."
Sookie was affected by the implied seduction. The wonders of her imagination came to an end when she realized she nor Santa would be providing Tara with those few things. Undoubtedly it would come down to that blond she groused in her head. Fucking Pam.
The annoyed blonds' gaze fell on the ring. Its match was somewhere across the ocean on a pale thin finger.
"The vampire and the thief, you think you're going to live happily ever after?"
"Stop."
The blond opened her mouth, but shut it when Tara sent her an intolerant frown.
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"She tell you what you wanted to hear?"
Pam looked up from her desk then to the phone she had been looking at every minutes to make sure she hadn't missed a message. She slid the phone to Lafayette looking nonchalant. Though, her eyes gave her away, because even as she handed it off she couldn't help, but look at the screen one last time. He smirked knowingly as he took the phone stifling the urge to flip through messages to read them.
"She misses me," Pam answered thoughtfully.
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I told you this weekend, I got inspired a little sooner.