Evidence
Chapter 3: Grace
Grace woke up in the middle of the night.
She had been dreaming about something she couldn't quite remember, but surely involved Freud explaining some important issue to her.
She hated when it happened: she had got the idea so perfectly, it had made so much sense… and then it was gone!
She sat on the bed, looked around and thought, for a moment, about waking up someone to talk about it.
To her right, she had Maggie, probably dreaming of her overcrowded dating life.
She was not a person with whom Grace could discuss any frustration over loosing a revolutionary analytical concept.
To her left, she had Fran, probably dreaming of Grace's father finally making his move.
Or her own mother moving. Sometimes it was hard to say what would make Fran happier.
The girl decided to get out and have a glass of water. Fran was not stupid, but her current mental state was not adequate to discuss Grace's frustration.
(Not that Freudian issues were that out Fran's mind. Grace just felt she was not habilitated to deal with Fran's level of difficulties with Freudian issues, as motherly figures and the need for men's approval.)
She got up from the bed, more or less waking Fran in the process, but managed to climb out without much turbulence than a nasal brief comment.
Grace circled the bed, curious to see how the boys were doing on the floor, and noticed two things that called her attention.
First, her brother was kicking crazily. She thought he would be over it with the years going by, but it didn't seem to be the case.
Wasn't it lucky she had brought her recently bought camera?
Second thing (and she mused over it while she searched the camera in her bag), Niles was not there.
He could have just gone for some water, too, but Grace knew Miss Babcock was alone in the living room, and who knows which idea he could have come with, to seize the opportunity.
She opened the curtains to let the moonlight enter, snapped a shot of her brother in a ridiculous fighting position while in his pajamas, and got out of the room.
The blast of cold made her tremble when she reached the corridor.
She got the camera more steadily in her hands. She was carrying with her lately to every place she went, interested in registering people's spontaneous reactions in everyday interactions, in order to analyze them afterwards. She has been reading a lot about body language, what she found a fascinating subject.
What she really wanted was a video camera, but she couldn't make her mind on either hiding it in some place (what she thought was wrong) and telling people the thing was there (what she thought ended up useless).
This trip had already proved great to her amusement, with Brighton's shot, but now she had an even better possibility – you can always count on a prank, when Niles and CC Babcock are around.
And blackmail is something she had learned from Fran that can be useful.
(She liked Niles and CC, but she had to think of her future needs. Who knows what kind of thing she could register, and how worth cookies and warm milk in bed or lessons over martinis it would be?)
She had to admit that she liked when Niles had some time just for her. He was very clever, and she enjoyed the kind of mental challenge that chatting with him brought up. Sometimes, she asked for milk and cookies just because it gave her the opportunity to deal with sarcasm.
In the same note, Miss Babcock was very funny, with her strange approaches on people, and the (usually mean) things she chose to show about herself. Grace found her deeply interesting, but knew she was the kind of person you must get closer slowly, and often step back to a safe distance at the minimal sign of danger.
That little dance the producer and Niles had was a very interesting one, and Grace had great interest in learning about it.
She arrived at the living room and noticed the big lump of covers on the sofa.
She approached to look curiously at the immense amount of covers Miss Babcock must have got to reach that size, and prepared the camera to snap a shot. Niles could figure out something over the woman sleeping under a mountain, like a legendary monster.
He had a lot of cultural references for that.
She looked for a position that could capture the light of the kitchen, and got closer to the sofa.
The lump moved, and she put down the camera, waiting for it to stop, so she could take the shot.
Grace noticed the lump had a pair of heads surfacing from it.
One of them was Miss Babcock, as expected.
The other was Niles.
He was turning to his side, on his sleep, making the covers slide from his shoulder.
Grace noticed he had CC's hand in his, and when he moved, being with his back to her, he took her hand with him, pulling her.
Following his movements, she turned too, and snuggled against his back, resting their joined hands on his chest.
The process made the covers slide to their waists and, even with the cold air, they didn't seem to notice.
Grace smiled at their cuteness.
They fought so hard to maintain that façade of hate and pestered each other so much, and a cold night was enough to melt them into cuddling partners.
The girl stopped smiling at that thought.
Their said little dance made them two very lonely people, if you really think about it.
Niles has been taking care of her family since forever. She can't even think of life without him in it, ready not just to serve her, but to teach her things she needed to know. Fran had brought lightness to her life, but Grace owed Niles the stability and wit she learned how to use.
He had never had a life out of the mansion. He spent even some of his days off, there. He was, in fact, like an uncle who lived with them and dedicated his life to care for the family, as if there was nothing else that mattered to him.
Miss Babcock had her life around the Sheffields, too. She just worked, tried to please her partner and bantered with Niles. Grace liked her independent attitude, and always got confused by the fact that the woman found necessary to be mean (or to pretend to be) to be seen as an important and respected person.
Niles has been provoking her about it for years. He included her in the things going on in the house through the banter. Grace could think of a number of situations when Miss Babcock was pretending she was not paying attention, just to react as soon as Niles threw a barb at her.
And, lately, she had been saying what she thought about things, even when he didn't bring her in.
Grace frowned – so, Niles made efforts to bring Miss Babcock into the familiar affairs; he had turned himself into a part of the family, and he wanted her to be, too, making her show that she cared.
And tonight he had come to not leave her alone in the cold, once she was not ready to change her attitude even when it made her suffer…
It meant Niles did not just care for Miss Babcock. It meant he made consistent efforts to be closer to her. He generally forced her to move and get closer, but tonight it was necessary for him to move. And he did it.
Sometimes he would not serve Grace cookies because he had to do all the work of fetching her and bringing to her in bed; however, for Miss Babcock, he would sleep in the cold, even if he knew she was being just stubborn and snobbish.
And, for her part, it was easy to notice she was letting him, little by little, crumble her reserves. She still got a lot of things wrong in terms of personal relationships, but the fact she accepted the contact he offered – verbal in a day to day basis, physical at this moment – was proof that something was changing inside the businesswoman.
Grace pouted. Both were changing because of the other, but it seemed that Niles was taking the most of the effort of it on him; Miss Babcock could easily just pretend she didn't know what was happening.
And, for years, they kept their little dance alive, in a choreography that demanded them to get close and then pull apart.
Well, if Grace could do something to help them to find a better way of doing it, she would.
She chose a better position and took a shot of them just like that: sleeping together, hand holding, as if they fitted together naturally.
She was still not sure how she would use it, but she was sure what she had in her hands was conclusive evidence about those two, and that someone had to act.
Maybe this someone was her, the Freudian versed little girl.