[set during 5.06]
Trixie is more distraught than Patsy has ever seen her. She paces around their room, almost wearing a tread into the carpet, frantically chain smoking. Patsy's frankly amazed she hasn't reached for the bottle, and every time Patsy moves Trixie's eyes widen a little, wordlessly begging not to leave her by herself.
"Trixie," Patsy says gently, sitting at the bottom of Trixie's bed, "it's ghastly. It's terrible, it's-"
"I know what it is!" Trixie snaps. "It happened to me!"
Patsy is taken aback, and Trixie takes a few breaths, venom fading from her voice. "It wasn't the same; I shouldn't even compare them. But when I came home - crying, scared, blaming myself - Cynthia was there. She- she held me and told me it wasn't my fault."
Trixie's voice cracks, and Patsy reaches over and takes Trixie in her arms. Trixie returns the hug like a child clinging to a mother, an instinctive response to a world that doesn't make sense.
"I don't know what to do, Patsy," Trixie says, facade crumbling away, "she doesn't want to be touched, even! And I'm making this all about me-"
"It's all right," Patsy says gently. She knows the connection between Trixie and Sister Mary Cynthia is special; different, but as wonderful and profound as hers and Delia's, "you're allowed to feel like this."
Trixie allows herself to cry on Patsy's shoulder for a minute or two, then slides her mask carefully back into place, pulling back and delicately dabbing her eyes as if nothing has happened.
Trixie fusses with her makeup at the dresser, and Patsy watches her carefully, ready to take Trixie's lead.
"Right." Trixie says, turning away from the mirror, voice bright. "Let's go and make sure Sister Mary Cynthia's all right, shall we?"