Catharsis

by poemsandroses

Catharsis is the purification and purgation of emotions—especially pity and fear—through art or any extreme change in emotion that results in renewal and restoration. What happens if a parallel universe existed and gave both women another chance to restart what they have ended? This is the parallel ending to Halo.

55. Note of Farewell - Part 1

September 18, 2019

While she's healing, I'm only getting worse…relapsing. I feel myself vanishing the more I spend time suck between these four walls. I love my children and I love my wife, but I don't think I love myself enough to put up with them. I don't know myself enough. I didn't know that a few therapy sessions could open up such wounds and send me back to stage zero. I truly detest the fact that I am rethinking every decision I have ever made, and I truly don't want to act upon what my therapist is suggesting, but what if it becomes my last resort and my only option? I truly can't take it here. I can't take being a mother anymore…not right now, not today. I don't want to be her wife. I don't even know what I want. I don't know who I am. I don't know anything. I am just lost and I don't know what to do. I wanna escape, but how? How does one escape a life they have chosen and a responsibility they have created?

They're her kids, too. Maybe I could just disappear and nobody will know.

Shaking her head and wiping a single fallen tear, Sara finished reading the last entry on that blog. There weren't any comments since it was one of the very few private posts that her wife hadn't offered for the public to see and feel free to provide an opinion regarding.

She looked at the two sleeping figures beside her and sighed while more tears escaped her lids. She pulled up the covers to prevent any unwanted cold and closed her eyes, blocking any unnecessary sound.

Sara didn't know how it had started or when, but she knew that the day the girls turned two and her wife had decided to wean Scarlet, their relationship took a surprising turn to an unexpected doom.

They celebrated their daughters' birthday in harmonious assemblage of close friends. The toddlers were ecstatic that each of them had a different Cocomelon cake. Rose sang along in jovial excitement while Scarlet giggled the more her mother kissed her cheek, holding her two arms to encourage her to clap since the child had refused to show any emotion at the beginning.

Then the girls ran wildly around the living room, answering to Ella's calls asking them to chase her. Their small size had worried their older mother at one point during those months. They were very short and small despite their obvious chunkiness that people around them swooned at, pinching their chubby pink cheeks whenever they got the chance.

The nights after were spent with Tegan resisting her toddler's cries every night before putting her to bed. She resisted with fallen tears as she felt her breasts aching while heating up some of the milk she had stored in the freezer. She had also stopped pumping and Rose's breast milk intake was reduced to one bottle before bed. It was Scarlet that gave both mothers a hard time with screeches, but they had to get her used to consuming more solids.

During those nights when Scarlet cried for hours before bed, the mothers grew exhausted and forgot about their scheduled sex until they remembered it no more. Scarlet ended up sleeping in the middle with her thumb in her mouth and when she woke up in the morning, she made sure she told her mother she was upset with her through repeating the word "sad" with tears streaming down her face a few times. That only put more pressure and anxiety on Tegan giving her bouts of panic here and there until one day she had a full anxiety attack at night when Scarlet's tantrum led her to scratch and hit her sister. Sara was the child's next prey when her mother picked her up.

Sara shared everything to her therapist who only listened and took a few notes. She had asked her a few times to see Tegan and when Sara cautiously asker her wife, Tegan only contemplated the question and marveled at the possibility before avoiding the answer and avoiding Sara until she asked again. Dr. Louis was concerned about Scarlet's abandonment issues, but Sara thought the woman was definitely exaggerating; their child took all the attention and love she needed, she had never been abandoned, and she was a spoiled toddler who was definitely high maintenance. Sara feared that her daughter was an image of her biological Aunt Audrey. She had not voiced her fears, but she thought about them daily.

"Do you think that maybe I should prove to her I don't have milk anymore so she could leave me alone like she did to you?" Tegan asked her wife over dinner the night after the tantrum. The girls were busy playing with their Lego far in the corner of the living room as Sara and Tegan dined on the couch, too lazy to force the kids down to the kitchen and disturb their rare quietude.

"She'll bite you," Sara warned. "It's not nice."

"She always did that right before I weaned her. She literally uses my nipple as a pacifier." Tegan made her point clear and sighed when Sara raised an eyebrow at her. "I don't know what to do, Sara. My heart hurts because of how crazy and sad she is. I don't know why she's like that." Sara had no answer. A despondent glance at her child was the only reaction she could give.

"I guess…" She had to be careful because whatever she said might backfire with Tegan's irritable mood. "We have to be patient maybe."

Talk was cheap, though. The tantrum was prepared and Scarlet certainly did not surrender. Rose stared with wide eyes as the girl lost her breath with screams and cries, her face turning red and her shoulder length hair sticking to her wet face. Tegan could only cry silently looking at her. Sara took the blow as Scarlet made her the object of attack. She sat down on the rocking chair and put the little girl on her lap, soothing the cries and gently talking to her. "You're a big girl now," Sara whispered. "You don't need boobies to fall asleep."

"No, no, no…I need," Scarlet insisted, kicking the air with her tiny legs in order to get down. "I need boobie," she cried loudly and hiccupped. Her eyes were so swollen that Sara could only tear up.

"But Tee Tee mummy is so tired and she can't give you that anymore. She has no milk." Scarlet responded with a screech. "Don't you love Tee Tee mummy?"

"I love Tee Tee mummy," affirmed the child, unable to comprehend her mother's words. All she wanted was to be soothed before she was put to bed. Sara kissed her sweaty forehead and enfolded her, rocking her to sleep despite the continuous crying. Eventually, the child exhausted herself to sleep and Sara fretted about her mental and physical health. "Maybe we should get some child counselling? I'm worried about her."

"Me, too," Tegan whispered in the dark. They both rested in the breezy room and stared up at the darkened ceiling due to the lack of light. "But then again, I've been reading about it and she's literally a baby still and doesn't understand what's going on except the fact that she had been deprived of a routine. Eventually, she'll get used it."

"My fear is that she thinks she's deprived of you, Tegan," Sara said what her therapist had suggested.

Tegan mockingly chuckled. "All the therapy is getting to you. She's just a baby." Sara could feel the shift of the body next to her as the woman turned around to the other side, declaring the end of the conversation of another sexless night.

It had been a month and Sara feared the beginning of another pattern they had spent so much time to get out of.

Tegan contradicted her words the next day. Her heart couldn't bear having another restless night. She had to convince her child whichever way possible and, therefore—while Sara was in the shower—she seized the moment and put Scarlet against her chest.

"You're going to see that I don't have milk, Soosie," she said. "I don't anymore because you're a big girl and you don't need mommy's boobies anymore." Scarlet didn't listen nor care about those words. All that on her mind was her mother offering what she deeply coveted.

Scarlet latched immediately and upon the latch, Tegan felt immense pain she had not felt before. She closed her eyes and hissed. She hadn't breastfed in over a month, so that was probably why. She pressed on her other breast to check, but the pain only surged from the one her daughter mercilessly suckled from.

Scarlet's attempts to draw milk came to no avail and next she was biting her mother. First Tegan tsked, and then she warned Scarlet with a gentle but stern "No." However, the toddler's anger and frustration at her mother was given in the form of one long bite with all the vigor the child had, making her mother's screech frighten Sara and thwart her out of the bathroom to a bloody scene from Tegan's right breast with Scarlet on the floor.

Once she realized Scarlet had bitten her with all her teeth and pulled with her power, the pain made her almost black out. She pushed Scarlet off her lap and cried heavily with loud screams of pain she could not tolerate. Rose's face was red with fear and her eyes teary as Scarlet cried. Sara left with a towel she grabbed and forgot to wrap around her body. She knelt down in front of her wife, shaking her to get her back to reality, but Tegan only repeated she was in pain.

"I can't…I can't…I can't…," cried and hiccupped Tegan as she squeezed Sara's wet hand. She looked down at her breast and wailed in horror at the sight of the tip of her nipple off its place while the bleeding continued.

Sara was horrified too because her breast swelled immediately and it wasn't the prettiest sight to see. She didn't want to direct the blame on Tegan for trying to prove to a toddler she had no milk because she, too, had probably been hurting before doing that.

"Shhh. It's fine. She did this to me, too. When we were in California…a year ago. Remember?" But it wasn't that bad. It definitely did not look that horrific and disturbing. Sara grabbed her phone and dialed up her best friend right away. She turned around to awfully quiet children who had cornered themselves and stared at their mothers with two sets of wide questioning eyes.

Stacy first suggested Sara would send a picture but Tegan objected with a scream followed by a loud cry of pain. She, then, offered to visit in order to help because what Sara described was definitely mastitis once again. Tegan informed Sara the first time she got it, it didn't look that awful and didn't hurt as horribly as now.

Though Sara attempted helping her wife to washup, the pain increased, causing the younger woman to curl in bed and weep with loud sounds of distress until Stacy arrived 15 minutes later with fear-stricken eyes advising that Tegan should seek urgent care at the hospital.

"Please no," mouthed Tegan with more cries.

"I really think you should go to the hospital right now because this doesn't look right. Your breast is infected and it doesn't look very recent…Did you not feel anything before?"

Sara wasn't going to sit around and do nothing. She covered up Tegan's chest, stacking more tissues inside her bra to absorb some of the bleeding. She was going to get Tegan checked and then deal with those babies who hadn't said a word since the incident. "Just regular pain which we thought happened due to weaning Scarlet and not pumping," Sara reported when Tegan didn't.

"I'm getting lightheaded," she whispered, grabbing her head while her tears continued to fall. "Why does everything bad happen to me?" she asked loudly with a sonorous cry.

What Sara could do was aid with an embrace and a kiss on top of the wet brow. She drove her to the hospital while Stacy stayed with the kids. There, it was affirmed Tegan's situation was more critical than it looked and that immediate care was needed to stop the infection.

"Am I going to…" She looked up at Sara and then at the doctor in the examination room before continuing due to a glance from the doctor signaling for her to do so, "…lose…umm…remove my breast if it doesn't heal?"

"It will heal," the doctor assured, smiling calmly. "You need to tolerate the pain and take all the medication I will prescribe. Your nipple will stitch itself back on naturally so I'm not giving you any stitches but it will make the healing process harder and longer because this mastitis you have is a shitty one and caused a serious infection." She sighed a little bit and cleared her throat. "You're going to lose the sensation though," she whispered that last sentence as if too timid to break the news. "Your nerves are damaged."

"Wha…" It was Sara who jumped in, but was soon interrupted with a shush from the nurse next to her.

"We can take care of that after you heal." A stern glance that Sara mistook for a glare was sent her way. The doctor then looked down at her wife and put a gentle hand on her arm, aiding with a squeeze. "It hopefully won't be permanent, but you really need to tolerate the pain because it won't be a joke."

The ride home was filled with silent tears, and when they arrived, Stacy was in a slouching position on the couch with disheveled sleeping Scarlet lying on her chest, a thumb in her mouth redness encircling her eyes.

Tegan excused herself to her bedroom quietly and Sara sat next to her best friend, unable to focus on one problem or to think of one specific thing in particular. All thoughts clouded her brain and left her lips in a heavy sigh. Tears rolled down her face as her friend called her name asking for a fill-in on the matter.

"Well, don't leave her alone," Stacy said after Sara had briefly and unbearably filled her in. "That's just…" What could she say more? Tegan was ascending from bad to worse. "And Scarlet…uhhh." What would she say? She hated when people used to tell her that Ella needed help when she was going through her divorce. One time she lashed at Tegan for suggesting that Ella's mental state wasn't its best. How would she say that about a two-year-old child? "I think she needs some consoling."

Sara wasn't even paying attention. She nodded and stared at her. Or maybe she was, but preferred not to provide any reaction.

"I'm afraid you need to talk to her about what happened because she cried herself to sleep thinking Tegan left her." She released a puff of air after finally letting it out, but Sara only responded with a single falling tear from her left eye. "It's gonna be alright."

Stacy's promises didn't even knock on Sara's closed hopes. She was aware at that point things were turning toward the opposite direction.

That night, she put Scarlet to bed and spent the night awake wiping Tegan's tears and making sure she took her meds. It was the cherry on top of a shit day that Tegan started one of the worst periods Sara had witnessed her get. Maybe cramps mingled with physical and mental pain increased the symptoms. But Tegan sought only her wife for comfort, placing her hand on her wife's cold upper arm and clutching that flesh for dear life as she moaned in restless sleep and sweaty delirium.

Sara called her work in the morning requiring an excused absence for the remaining three days of the week since Tegan needed constant support and care.

It was the first time the kids didn't show up to their bedroom and didn't get in bed with them. Through the monitor, Sara watched as Scarlet left her crib and got inside her sister's. In her tiny hands, she held her stuffed elephant which she placed next to her sister's stuffed teddy bear. They cuddled in the quiet and dark nursery which made their mother commence her tears for the morning. She turned around and planted a few kisses on Tegan's sweaty brow. Tegan held tightly onto her and shivered in pain and distress.

"Can you take me to the bathroom?" she whispered with closed eyes.

"Sure." Sara planted more kiss on her face, enjoying the need Tegan felt for her. "If I had the back for it, I'd just carry you and change your pad like I change our kids' diapers."

Tegan protested hearing Sara's inappropriate words with a loud groan and an embarrassed push. "I just feel too dizzy to walk." It was the medication and the heavy doses of antibiotics that crippled her completely. It required for Sara to mother her and both knew Sara loved nothing more than that.

Truthfully, Tegan craved Sara's mothering despite her unwillingness to share that information. When Sara told her she took three days off work, Tegan felt thankful that she had Sara in her life. She also felt thankful the meds made her sleep and forget her pain and misery because, otherwise, she would have lost her mind…and she did later on that day when her cramps grew worse and her flow grew heavier. She cried since every inch in her body ached. Stacy called to make sure she was alright and Sara answered that she wasn't. The babies didn't approach her. She felt empty but also better without them. She was aware of Scarlet's fear of rejection which resulted from her pushing her child roughly away. She could hear Sara struggling with Scarlet to talk or have food.

Suddenly, she stopped calling for Tegan's attention and, suddenly, she stopped calling for her breasts. That made Tegan weep at night.

"I'm going to put a towel underneath you," Sara informed. She was sick of changing the sheets whenever she leaked. "I also got you the nighttime maxi pads, so please let me help you to the bathroom to ummm change to those because we're running out of sheets and you're running out of clean sweats."

"Maybe I should try the cup again," Tegan suggested diffidently. "I have only bled like that during the miscarriage."

Sara aided her with a lopsided smile, reaching a palm to place it on a shaking limb to steady the quiver. "You're not comfortable with it and I don't wanna force you." She kissed her wife's brow for what seemed the hundredth time today. "You're on too many drugs, so it's fine if you're bleeding like this…I think." Paused Sara, pushing strands of hair behind Tegan's ear. "Plus, we can always ask our doctor." Tegan shook her head almost immediately.

In the morning, Sara played with her children while Tegan slept. Both girls were quiet and both didn't ask about their mother until Sara brought it up. "Wanna go see the Tee Tee mummy?"

The twins lifted up their heads to look at their mother, both clad in matching overalls that only differed in color. Scarlet's was sky blue and Rose's was peach colored. Sara had given the two small ponytails that matched hers with their bangs covering their brows.

"Sleep?" Rose asked happily. "She sleeps."

"Yeah. Let's wake her up," Sara whispered, brushing Scarlet's bangs off her face and smiling at the silent child. "Soosie, mummy love you, okay? She's just hurt and she knows you didn't mean to hurt her." She leaned in to kiss the soft brow then kissed Rose's after. "We're gonna get there to wake her up but let's not jump on the bed and let's not throw ourselves at her, okay?" She looked in the greenish hazel eyes both girls owned and tapped their little noses. "Her boobie still hurts so let's be gentle and try not to hug her." She hoped to God her girls understood. When she explained what had happened the day before, she could tell the toddlers projected honest concern and sadness. Scarlet's guilt silenced her for the rest of the day; her hyperactivity was abruptly lost as she preferred to sit in front of her Lego and build countless random shapes in various colors. The toddler made sure that each shape had one distinctive color and when she realized she would be running out of said color, she would restructure the shape to fit the amount of Lego bricks she had in that color. Sara's fascination made her watch for hours. She was sure by then her daughter held a distinctive gift and insurmountable intelligence. Still, however, when she remembered her attachment to Tegan, she felt queasy and concerned. Was that normal? She used to be attached to her mother, too, but what if Scarlet's attachment turned into distaste the way hers did? Especially that Tegan's fluctuating mood swings and never ceasing depression reminded her a lot of her mother's.

She woke Tegan up with soft and gentle rubs against one cold arm. The girls sat cross-legged watching their mother open her eyes while their other mother whispered sweet words in her ears. They had never objected to seeing them kiss. They would make out for hours and the girls wouldn't do a thing, which was a relief considering the amount of clinginess the girls usually portrayed.

Tegan whined and moaned about being abruptly awakened, but Sara insisted she'd get up so she could have something to eat and use the bathroom. "I'm in so much pain," cried the younger woman, looking at her wife with swollen slits and a sweaty face.

"Cramps?"

"My breast," she whispered. "And cramps," she added loudly. Her gaze shifted to her bewildered children who struck her with their eerie silence. "I miss them," she said with a loud and sudden sob that Sara attempted shushing with a gentle hold.

"Ma…mama," Scarlet said, opening her arms, ready to receive a hug that was not given. Sara picked her up and put her on her lap quickly. "Soawyyy," she said with a heavy lisp, eyes wide at her mother's crying ones.

"Tee Tee mummy loves you," Sara whispered in her ears and kissed her temple. "Right, Tee Tee?"

"Yes," said Tegan, taking a hold of her daughter and putting her on her lap. Sara stared apprehensively, putting her palm as a barrier between her wife's chest and her daughter's tiny frame. Tegan kissed the little girl's nose and cried more, tears slipping down her eyes into her rubicund cheeks and falling down inside her parted chapped lips. "I'm so sorry I pushed you like that. I love you so much, Soosie."

It was Rose that whined next, feeling neglected and left out. She had a sizeable frown and teary eyes. Sara noticed the change in her demeanor and held her closer, kissing her head and giving her the love she, too, deserved until Tegan paid attention to her.

"What do you want for your birthday?" asked Sara that night while helping Tegan change into her pajamas. It was almost impossible for Tegan to lift her right arm; the pain made her screech. Sara had to help getting her into her clothes, which both truly didn't mind. In fact, both found such sentiments lovingly intimate.

Tegan thought a little bit while Sara slowly put her arm into the string of a pastel pink tank top. Her birthday was tomorrow and she felt nothing but misery about turning twenty-five. It was supposed to be a big birthday; everyone told her so. She was turning quarter a century, Sara said. Sara had told her that her 25th birthday was full of drunken sex with Stacy due to her own misery back then. It was before Jack, before Alice, before her PhD, before Tegan, before Scarlet, before Rose, before everything. It seemed so long ago…and, really, it was; Tegan was only 11 and too young and innocent to predict how her life would be. At 11, Tegan still needed to be tucked into bed by one of her parents, she still held her famous teddy bear "Angel," and she still watched cartoons every day at six while having dinner so she could go to bed at eight. She started crying when she remembered her old self.

"Why are you crying?" Sara asked. She sat next to her, put a hand behind her back and rubbed. "Did I hurt you?" Tegan shook her head. "Is it because of your birthday?" Tegan nodded.

A kiss on the mouth paused her tears and made her swallow the emerging sob. She sniffled and wiped the newly fallen ones. "I'm just emotional, I guess."

"It's fine." Another kiss caught Tegan off guard and that time it was deepened by both women which did shock the two of them that neither pulled away until they both needed some air. "Mmm. I love kissing you."

Tegan only smiled.

"So, you don't want anything in particular or should I just get you something I think you might like?"

Tegan's jaw clenched as she thought about what she wanted. She took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "I want sex," she said the moment she opened her eyes and looked into Sara's sunny ones.

Sara rejoiced the answer immediately, face blushing and a smile growing. Her eyes twinkled and her body relaxed. "That's a gift for me, not you." Tegan rolled her eyes with half a smile.

"I'm on my period, Sara, so it's gonna be period sex."

"Like I care." Sara beamed. "I'll just put a towel under your legs and do you." Both had a vision of Sara going down on her right after Sara said that. They both stared at one another until they burst in laughter.

Sara wanted to start that night, but Tegan ended up sleeping so she postponed her idea until the next day when their kids took their nap after lunch. She had an entire day planned for Sara now that her original plan of taking her out to a fancy hotel and fucking her there didn't work out. She hadn't told anyone about the plan, but when she told Stacy that night, the woman offered to babysit the toddlers after work until the next day. Sara consented right away.

In the morning, Stacy passed by to drop some homemade macarons and French toast, which Sara was thankful for because the kids were a tad whinier than every day. She figured they were bored. They were always used to go to the park with Tegan where they played and walked and wasted time until Sara was home.

Rose had a very terrible diaper rash that Sara didn't know how to deal with. "Time to potty train you two," she said to herself while the kids cried loudly in the bathtub. Even bathing them was the hardest she could ever do.

Luckily, Tegan was awakened by the cries and walked in right after, sat on the closed toilet seat, and directed Sara.

They had breakfast and Tegan chugged in three glasses of water with every painkiller and drug she needed to consume for her infection. Those pills made her lightheaded as every day and she ended up napping until seven in the evening when Sara woke her up with kisses and fondling.

The kids were not there and her head buzzed while her uterus protested her wakefulness. She felt every limb in her body beg for refuge but when Sara offered a glass of tequila, she couldn't resist not to consume alcohol for the first time in days.

Another glass was handed to her and another after as Sara made out with her and rubbed her above her clothes.

Surprisingly, the alcohol and the drugs got her wasted faster than ever, laughing and joking freely like the young soul she was supposed to be. Sara sang her happy birthday and cut up a slice of a small cake she had just baked. They had the cake together and kissed until Sara dragged her to the bathroom and undressed her, asking her to use a tampon; she was going to fill up the tub with warm water and rose-scented bubbles to have her relax before she fucked her.

She helped Tegan in the tub, making sure her left breast was well-covered with adhesive square gauze pads that she had been changing for her every few hours in the last two days. Sara prepared two sex toys while Tegan closed her eyes, her hand hugging a wine glass. Sara was scared she would drop it and fall asleep because only she knew how woozy her wife was.

Therefore, she kept talking to her.

"What do you feel about Emy and Stacy getting married?" she asked since they had just been informed about Stacy's proposal a few days before. It was sudden and rash, Sara thought. They still had the eggs and future baby issue to deal with but who was she to meddle?

"I don't know," said Tegan, opening up her eyes to watch her wife washing their favorite pink phallus, giving it the hand job that made Tegan's clit jump. "They love each other, so why not?"

"Yeah, but it's super quick. The wedding's in July which is in a couple of months from now. I just…"

Tegan laughed loudly, interrupting her wife's words, making the woman turn around to face her. Sara was fully naked. "You can't say anything about quickness, Sara. We married after knowing each other for a few months not three years."

Sighed Sara, turning around again to put the toy on the sink to dry.

Her nudity stirred her wife's needs. It had been so long since she saw her standing like that in stark nakedness under full light. She sat up well, feeling the convulsions in her hole. She wanted to remove the tampon and get fucked, but she also wanted to see Sara fuck herself right in front of her eyes. It was the lack of the masturbation she had been so used to that caused her libido to ignite her body despite the mental and physical turmoil.

When Sara faced her again, her breath hitched. "Sara," she said in a sharp tone that alerted her wife.

"What's up?" Sara stood in her place, no redness covered her face, no fear masked her eyes. She stood there as if she was fully dressed, something Tegan still wouldn't manage to do after all those years and all that they'd been through together. "All's good?" she asked again when Tegan stared with parted lips.

"Your pussy is so beautiful," said the younger woman unabashedly. It was clear to both of them alcohol was to be credited for Tegan's need and honesty. Her words made Sara giggle a little bit, a hint of bashfulness finally touching her body, making her close her legs as she stood there, yet still failing to cover up the beginning of her inner lips and clitoris showing through the enfolding outer lips. "I love it."

"Thank you," Sara said. She cleared her throat and stood there still. "Umm…I was thinking…"

"Play with it," ordered Tegan, taking a sip of her wine. "Please."

"Here?" asked the older woman, feeling her moist cunt dripping against her inner thighs. Tegan nodded and motioned for her wife to come closer. "Okay," Sara said, but didn't know how to begin.

"I want you to stick a finger inside and I wanna see it." The no filter was definitely the alcohol and Sara honestly wondered if Tegan was going to remember all that the next day.

Who cared! She was going to do what Tegan wanted. The kids weren't there, Tegan was in a good mood, and she desperately craved an orgasm even if she had to give it to herself. At least it was sensual and felt like a nice game she'd love to play.

Tegan directed in every way, making her touch her nipples, pinch them, and rub them. She asked her to part her legs but standing and fucking herself was hard that way so she decided to sit on the ledge of the top and place one foot in the water and the other on the floor of the bathroom as her pussy faced her wife's and her two fingers plunged inside.

"Suck your tits," Tegan ordered, reaching a hand to give her clit a nudge.

"I can't," Sara breathed. She held in her breath and released it with every push. "It's hard."

"You've done it before," Tegan insisted. "Try."

Sara nodded and obeyed, holding one breast and lowering her face, slowly taking her nipple inside her lips and sucking them with a loud moon when she felt Tegan's fingers inside her own pussy now that she had to hold her breast.

"Keep sucking and I'll fuck you."

And Tegan did that. And Sara came with a soft scream.

It was then Tegan's turn. She took her to the bedroom and placed her on a towel. Fondling her body was hard because Sara didn't want to touch her breasts and she also wasn't sure about doing her when she was casually bleeding on the towel. Therefore, she made out with her and rubbed her clit in order to avoid watching the scene that disturbed her.

After the first orgasm, Tegan asked, "What about the toy?"

"Yes," Sara could only say. She looked at the blood between her wife's legs and cleared her throat. "Are you sure? I don't wanna hurt you."

"Are you disgusted?" Tegan asked. "Does my breast disgust you? You didn't touch the good one at all."

Her wife was genuinely hurt which sparked up guilt and shame in Sara's guts. She shook her head and leaned in to kiss her. "I was just not sure what you would be comfortable with. I'll get the toy."

"I'm sorry I'm bleeding that much," Tegan said when Sara returned fully strapped and ready. She held the small vibrating ring and switched it on to play with Tegan's clit and nipples. "I just really want sex."

"Don't apologize," Sara whispered and kissed her again, beginning to tease her good breast with the ring and descending down to her clit. "Is that good?"

"Mhm," said Tegan with closed eyes. Her breathing was soft and relaxed. She was definitely falling asleep, which worried Sara because she had to push now and she wasn't sure Tegan could take it. "Come on," she whispered to make hesitant Sara to get the tip inside.

"If you fall asleep, I'll pull out," Sara said. Tegan giggled. She was too drunk to focus, Sara thought. She finally pushed in and Tegan's breaths halted for a second before she took a hold of Sara's arm as the older woman skillfully and dexterously swayed her body above the one she adored the most. Both closed their eyes as their lips locked in love and lust. Tegan played with her left breast and Sara made the ring suck on her wife's engorged clit.

"Sara," Tegan whispered, half asleep, half wasted.

"Yes, babe."

"I'm almost there."

Sara pecked her lips. "Good. Get yourself there."

"If I fall asleep, don't pull out. Make me cum. I wanna cum while sleeping."

Sara stopped thrusting and Tegan protested with a groan. She looked for her wife's nipple and pinched it, making Sara scream and resume her thrusting.

Indeed, Tegan was almost asleep but her orgasm shook her awake and immediately sent her into a relaxed slumber.

Now Sara had to deal with the blood and the cleaning up. She truly didn't know what to do. She pulled out and rested next to Tegan. She parted her legs and plunged two fingers inside herself until she came a second time. After that, she decided she was going to deal with Tegan's mess. She grabbed clean period underwear and put a pad inside it. After she wiped her wife's vulva with a wet towel to get rid of the fluids and the blood smeared on her inner thighs, she put on the underwear, hearing her soft groans in her sleep. She put a shirt on her and tucked her in. Next, it was cleaning up time which was what she did all night long until the room stopped smelling like sex mixed with blood and sweat. She slept next to her wife after making sure her kids were alright.

But that was the last time they had sex before the catastrophe. Tegan woke up with shame the next morning. They were still affectionate despite the awkwardness. Sara provided comfort and reassurances that caused her wife to seek that the entirety of May and June when Sara was overwhelmed with wrapping up the school year and grading her students' papers and exams.

What made matters worse was Tegan's body's inability to heal. The sensation was permanently numb in her right nipple which caused bouts of heavy cries to occur every other night. They saw many doctors and too much medication was provided but to no avail. The last doctor told Tegan she needed to be patient and give her body and self a break.

Sara, not giving up, advised therapy. Her wife offered a voiceless refusal to that suggestion. When Sara narrated their issues to her therapist, the other woman told her that she needed to set boundaries for herself and help Tegan gain independence.

"Her co-dependence is alarming. She views you as her mother, a caretaker."

"I know," Sara said. "I don't know how to stop it."

"You must set boundaries. Say no. Get her to take care of herself."

Sara took that advice, and that was the start of the end.

Tegan had left the room because her insomnia irritated her. Sara was seated outside still grading papers and still drinking coffee at midnight. "When are you coming to bed? I can't sleep."

"I need to finish this," whispered Sara, taking a quick look at the small figure as her glasses sat on the bridge of her nose, masking redness that required serious artistic makeup skills to cover up.

"You've been correcting all day." Sara didn't answer. "Sara," whined Tegan, but Sara didn't answer again. "I can't sleep when you're not in the room and you know this. I become anxious and…"

"I'm not your fucking babysitter," lashed Sara.

Both stared at one another in silence. The echoing sweet sound that's Sara's repeated itself in Tegan's ears as she slowly felt herself back away to the bedroom.

The next morning, Sara addressed the situation. She knew what had happened the night before was not what her therapist meant. She prepared her speech in the bathroom while showering and practiced her breathing.

Tegan was in the kitchen preparing breakfast and watching the kids eat on their high chairs. Sara cleared her throat to have her turn around, but she didn't.

"I'm sorry about last night," she said to Tegan's back. "I was tired and struggling with the time, but I need to talk to you about it and about why I said that."

Tegan turned around. Her lower lids were watery and puffiness blanketed the areas underneath. "Two eggs or one?" she asked with the spatula in her hand. Sara's apron was wrapped around her white pajamas.

"Tegan," Sara said with a sigh. "Please let's just talk."

"Two or one?"

Sara closed her eyes and sucked in her breath. "One." She sat on a chair and began shaking her legs. "If you don't wanna say anything, that's your issue, but I deserve to say what's bothering me." She waited for an unmet response that she didn't know why she waited in the first place. "I meant it when I said I am not your babysitter, Tegan. I didn't mean to say it in that demeaning way, but I meant saying it because lately you've been treating me like that. You need a mother, make up with your own mum, but I am not your mother and I can't stand just tucking you in and hearing you cry and whine all the time. I'm your fucking partner and I need to feel that and I've told you this before. I have boundaries and I have needs and things that bother me, too. You're too attached to me but not in a healthy way. You want me to be there for you, but you're rarely there for me."

She hadn't noticed that she was crying. She sniffled and hiccupped. Her girls stared at her and frowned. Tegan was still turned around. She knew she was crying, too. She could see the shake in her body.

"When's the last time you asked me about my day? How I am doing? How do I feel?"

Rose calling her name was the only sound she received.

"All I do is make you feel better about your situation and you literally can't do anything without me. You're so scared of your own shadow, Tegan. Every decision you make, you ask me about it…and, don't get me wrong, I love that your trust me, but…I wish you'd understand that you're doing this because I represent that maternal voice you can't stop requiring."

Tegan finally turned around. She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and put the scrambled egg on Sara's plate. She looked down into Sara's eyes. They were so ordinary, so dull, just a dirty brown with dying autumn leaves inside. "You taught me how to find comfort in you and now you're telling me I shouldn't." She nodded. "I won't."

"No, Tegan, that's not…"

"You're not my mother. Thank God you're not, but, honestly, this whole thing you said made it feel like you are." Sara furrowed her brows. "No hard feelings. I got your message."

Sara knew then that Tegan was not going to let that go easily.

Tegan promised herself that day that she was never going to tell Sara anything, never share her feelings, never ask anything from her, and never need anything from her.

The silent war was declared between them; their weapons were their stubbornness and arrogance, their site was their own house because they were talented actors in front of strangers and friends, their sacrifice was their children who grew disheveled and restless as the summer dragged on in its lonesome misery.

Stacy noticed the departure since she and Emy were no longer invited to spend the evenings there. She warned Sara that what both were doing was just irresponsible and needless.

"I don't know what to do," Sara said. "I really don't." She was on the verge of tears but her heavy heart swallowed up the pain because it was just pointless. Tegan had made up her mind and they had gone on for five weeks without any word.

"Your anniversary's coming up," said her best friend over the phone. Sara was having coffee alone in a small and secluded coffee house. She had to get away from the house. The girls were too much and Tegan had put on the new season of Stranger Things and wanted nobody to bother her. "You should do something."

"Yeah, I'm dreading that." She took a deep breath. "My mom's visiting on the day since you planned your wedding three days after." Sara rolled her eyes to herself. "So I don't know what to do."

"Oh, please, the perfect date would have been the day of your anniversary but I know your wife so well to think she would assume I made it on that day just take the day away from her and piss her off."

Stacy was right; Tegan would have definitely thought that. Sara wondered if Tegan expected anything for the anniversary. She hated the no speaking unless it was necessary rule, so she decided to slowly cut it off. She bought Tegan's favorite iced caramel macchiato and brought the girls two bags of chips on the way home.

Tegan thanked her, not moving her eyes away from the television in the living room except for the time she shushed the girls who had started fighting over the chips.

"I bought two so each of you gets to have one," Sara said sternly as she stood beside them. They looked up at her with big green eyes, each crunching on a potato chip.

"Do you want us to go on a vacation for our anniversary?" Sara asked that night when they were both in bed. "I was thinking we could go to Prince Edward's Island."

"How?" came the defensive response. "Stacy and Emy are getting married after three days." She rolled her eyes. "Because Stacy couldn't have chosen another date."

So expected. Sara was about to laugh.

"Yeah…I was thinking when they come back from their honeymoon since we're taking care of Ella, right?"

"Hmmmm. So we'll throw the kids at them and go together?"

"No," Sara said. "I mean…" When her wife eyed her with those thundering spheres, she stuttered. "What do you want?"

"Let's take the kids," Tegan said. "They're bored and miserable."

Like the two of them.

It had been forever since Evelyn criticized Sara, but when she arrived to whiny, messy babies and a house that required serious cleaning, she had to voice her discontent.

"What's going on with you? You don't even have work," she addressed her daughter but Tegan sat on the navy ottoman in the corner of the room where the Christmas tree should be if it were winter.

Sara didn't respond. She helped her mother move the girls to the bathroom to give them a shower.

"You're potty training them starting today," she ordered. "They're old. I'm gonna help you."

"Yeah, I was planning to." Sara had her tears locked in her eyes. Her nose was red and her lower lip quivered watching her mother bathe the children. She had only arrived the night before and noticed the chaos.

Evelyn quizzed her with those eyes she abhorred so much when she was a teenager. She sat on the toilet seat watching her mother undress her children and talk to them. She did nothing but watch knowing Tegan was probably losing her mind, too.

Tegan was in the kitchen cooking breakfast, though. It seemed to Sara cooking and baking began to calm her down. Sara rarely cooked anymore. Sometimes she missed having her food, but Tegan always cooked and she always felt too bothered and too tired to do anything.

"What's going on between you two?" asked the mother later on that day when Tegan disappeared into her bedroom and the kids napped.

Sara shook her leg and closed her eyes. She released a puff of air to assuage her cries, but too late because those tears fell like waterfalls.

"Oh, my God," whispered Evelyn. "Tell me what's up!"

"I don't know where to begin," she said, wiping her nose and taking a deep breath. "I think I fucked up and you can go ahead and tell me how much of a bad wife I am, but I swear to God I just want her to get back to her old self…"

"I can't understand anything like this. You need to tell me what happened."

So Sara narrated the entire issue the way she had to her therapist, whom she stopped seeing right after the problem that caused the rift.

Evelyn, for the first time, had no thoughts to provide but, surprisingly, had solace to aid with. It was a tricky situation she did not want to get into. She encouraged the vacation, volunteered to babysit the children, and told Sara that the heavy cloud would pass.

Stacy's wedding went smoothly because both women realized they needed to behave maturely in order for their friends to have a good time. Scarlet and Rose were flower girls which had required so much training and practice because the children got distracted easily. Tegan put them both in white dresses that matched their shortness of height and brushed their growing hair down, adding two flower clips on each side for both girls. She kissed their rosy cheeks and tickled them for a little bit, asking them to do the job required. The girls were beginning to get potty trained and, though it had only been three days, everyone in the house noticed the stark difference between Scarlet's reception of instructions and Rose's lack of comprehension. The mothers wanted no accidents, though, during the wedding so both were put into diapers even though their eldest objected with a repetition of a mispronounced 'stinky.'

It was also Scarlet that made everyone laugh when she spotted her grandmother sitting as she was walking with her sister and Ella. "Ebieee," she squealed pointing at her grandmother. Evelyn waved and Scarlet took that as an invite, leaving her flower basket and running toward her grandmother to be held and given love as she was used to.

"No, Soosie, go," Sara said with frustration. "You can't be here, babe."

Scarlet whined with a screech and pushed her mother's hand away, preferring to hug her grandmother.

"Rosie, come on, come on," Ella called because Rose was distracted, about the follow what her twin had done. "Come here." She motioned for her to follow and smiled when Rose continued walking with a giggle so that the brides can follow down the aisle hand in hand.

Sara cried watching her best friend get married. She hadn't cried during her first wedding, but now she did because she knew that was out of pure healthy love. She also felt a little bit envious during the reception, wishing she and her wife had a wedding, had affection, had a bond. What had happened to them? Was it a mistake all along?

Tegan was slipping away like every lover of hers and she didn't want to cry about it during the wedding.

She cried about it later that night, gently confronting Tegan.

"I don't want us like this," she said with a sniffle. After crying for a while in the bathroom, she had decided to leave and talk it out.

Tegan was already in bed, phone in hand scrolling through the pictures she took earlier. "Can we fight tomorrow?" she said, sighed, and turned around.

"I'm not trying to fight," Sara whispered. "I just wanna know why you're cold like that with me. We haven't had sex since your birthday…actually, we haven't kissed or hugged for over a month. Why? Is it because of that morning?"

A laugh resonated in the room; mocking, echoing, and eerie.

"Really?" She faced her wife again, tears already slipping down her face. "You wanna start this now?"

"I wanna understand."

"There's literally nothing to understand. You wanted me to grow up and stop annoying you with my childish shit, and here I am just doing that. There's nothing wrong."

"I didn't say that." Tegan rolled her eyes. "I was just concerned about you."

"No. You were being selfish." She closed her eyes and opened it. A tear slid down her cheek and fell into her lips. She sniffled again. "I don't want to talk about it. I don't want us to go on vacation alone. I want the kids there. I don't wanna have sex with you."

It took Sara more than five minutes of silence to absorb what Tegan had said in order to respond with her fearful thoughts. "Is this you breaking up with me?"

Tegan didn't respond at first. When Sara said and got into bed, she said, "I'm going back to my own therapist after our vacation."

There was hope, Sara thought. She could finally breathe. "Thank you."

"For me, not for you."

"For us? The kids?"

Sara didn't get a response that night.

The vacation eased some of that tension off and left more room for wandering thoughts to gnaw at Sara's mind watching her wife rest on the beach with her glasses covering her eyes and her book facing her chest, covering the unwanted abnormalities that would catch the attention of the rare spectators and passersby.

The kids played on the sand, built houses and castles, squealed and ran. Sara chased them wherever so they wouldn't get into the water. Tegan had lathered generous amounts of sunscreen on their sensitive skins. They had the best time of laughter and joy until their stomachs churned, their faces burned, and their bickering sounded the hour.

Sara put their shorts and shirts on, gave them each their snacks and made them lie down against her legs as they ate and drank their milk from sippy cups. That was the last portion of breast milk Tegan had stored in the fridge.

Tegan slept right there on the beach. Earlier before they arrived, she confessed to her wife she was dreading wearing a swimsuit even though it was modest enough to hide her body. Sara told her to put a top over it.

Sara smiled because of that short conversation. Tegan trusted her again to voice her concerns.

They left to the hotel in the old BMW Sara had rented.

"The wheels on the bust go round and round, round and around, round and round" the kids and Sara sang while Tegan closed her eyes in disturbed annoyance, the tops of her cheeks sun-kissed and attractive. Sara grinned watching the reaction. "The wheels on the bus go round and round, all the way to…"

"HELLLL," the twins and their mother simultaneously shouted.

"Don't teach them that," Tegan scolded. "God." She puffed, fanning herself with her palm despite the AC being on.

A crib inside the hotel room would raise the price and Sara was too cheap to ask for one, so the girls slept in the middle of their mothers, kicking, pushing, and fighting in the mornings while the mothers slept for the five nights they stayed there.

Sonia asked them to visit that summer, but Tegan didn't show any interest, Sara was going back to work, and the kids were about to start Pre-K.

"I have worked well on your resume' and I want you to send it to whatever editing firm you want," Sara informed her wife one summer night right before she went back to work. "The kids are starting Pre-K in two weeks and you have no excuse to be a stay-at-home mum anymore. We can manage the work and share the burden." She smiled at her wife because those were Tegan's words years before.

Tegan was sitting on the same couch with her favorite black and white mug in her hand. Her knees were up to her chest where her chin rested between them. Sara touched the empty space and caressed her right cheek. "Hmmm, okay. I'll do it. Thanks."

"How's therapy going?" Sara asked like she did every night though she expected the answer because she always received the same one.

"Good." She wished Tegan would say something else. If it were so good then why wasn't Tegan getting any better? Why hadn't they had sex since May on her birthday? She knew Tegan was sex-obsessed, so what was the problem? Why were her kids all over the place? Why did she lock herself up in her room and sob heavily? Why did she take long walks alone in the early morning?

Her own therapist—which she visited only once after the trip—told her that healing was a long and hard journey and people healed differently.

Sara knew she healed by having her loved ones beside her, but Tegan—it seemed like—only healed by distancing herself even more.

During mid-August, Sara went back to work and Tegan didn't apply to any job.

"I don't want to," she told Sara.

"Why?" asked her wife defensively.

"I just don't," her voice rose up.

"But why?" Sara's also became louder. "I don't understand you. Tegan, you need to do something about your life and this situation you're in because therapy's obviously not working."

Tegan began crying. Sara rolled her eyes. "Stop telling me to do this and that. Just stop controlling my fucking life. If I'd wanted that, then I'd have done it. I know how to get a job. I'm not stupid. I just don't fucking want to and you can't force it."

The kids were asleep, but Sara knew they would wake up with Tegan's loud cries and voice.

She decided she wasn't going to yell.

"I don't wanna force you to do anything," she said calmly. "I love you and I'm worried about you." Tegan's cries were only increasing. "I'm not controlling you. I just…" She sighed. "We have some expenses, Tegan. We're getting the kids into the kindergarten you want; it's expensive."

Tegan just left the room and went into her bedroom, locked the door, and left Sara outside.

In September, the kids left for Pre-K. Tegan cried hugging both of them and Sara knew Scarlet was going to make a scene. They had agreed that Sara would drop them off and Tegan would pick them up since it was a walking distance from their house. Sara wished her wife would fucking drive already because no way she could pick them up during the snowy days. Though Tegan always walked during the stark cold winter days when she was a university student, Sara just didn't wish for her kids to get sick because of the cold.

When she returned that day, she saw Tegan on the couch and both girls on each side of her. She was feeding both of them even though they were independent enough to have their meals on their own.

Tegan later informed her that Scarlet had a terrible tantrum when they both left and the kindergarten called her. She picked them both up earlier and talked to them in hopes the next day would be better.

Sara forgot to ask how the next day or two were because the load of work that she received made her cry in her office's bathroom alone. She also surprised her wife that she was taking evening Masters classes to teach.

"Are you serious?" screeched Tegan. That was the first reaction: just a scream.

"Yes," she still answered calmly and shortly. "I have to."

"Why? Why the fuck do you have to? Explain to me. I already spend the entire fucking day here and then take care of the kids and you don't do shit, Sara."

"It's not my fault you don't wanna get a fucking life or a job," Sara shouted back, face red, eyes blurry with anger. "Stop blaming me for shit when I'm trying literally everything, Tegan. I need to keep a roof over this house and I can't do this unless I take more load or for you to work."

"You're as manipulative as you've always been. You'll never change," she spewed those words and that time she left to the living room, slamming the door behind.

At least they only fought when the kids slept. Other times, they just avoided each other like two strangers in mysterious streets.

Sara still took the evening classes, which distanced her fully from everything that happened in the house. Her birthday came on a Thursday, so whatever her friends suggested, she had to decline because of her job. She received plenty of birthday wishes from her friends and family. Everyone texted, even Audrey who wrote her a rather suspiciously nice message, encouraging her to enjoy the last year of her thirties.

Tegan didn't do that, though. She didn't kiss her in the morning. She didn't tell her 'happy birthday,' and she didn't text her, too. Sara didn't wait because Tegan was angry with her, or maybe she'd forgotten. But how? She heard Sara talk to her mother on the phone in the morning. Even Sonia and Stephen wished Sara a happy birthday.

"I'm going out," Tegan announced the moment Sara opened the back door of the kitchen. She was dressed up for once, not in a hoodie, not in sweats. She wore her old pair of mom jeans and a sky-blue sweater. The sweater was still oversized in order to hide what Tegan was struggling with, but it was still an apparel that differed from her usual casual wear. Her hair was also brushed despite the fact her face was still free of makeup. "You're babysitting them."

"Where are you going?" Sara asked, hope trickled in her mind—hope that Tegan was planning a surprise party for her—hope that things were about to become better.

"Oh…uh…I'm meeting Emy and Jeremy in the diner. We haven't gone out…just the three of us."

The hesitance still made Tegan seem like a liar, but the wide eyes and innocence told Sara a different truth.

"Have fun," Sara said.

She waited for the surprise, but nothing happened. She then called Stacy and cried, telling her about Tegan deserting her on her birthday.

"Emy's here, Sara," Stacy whispered. "She didn't leave. We're planning to visit. We have a cake and Jack brought the drinks and Dana the food…uh…I…"

"What?" Sara sniffled and wiped her eyes. Rose sat on her lap and pushed her head back to rest on her chest. Scarlet wiped her eyes the way her mother did and yawned, leaning in to have Sara's affection and attention. "So where's Tegan?"

"I don't know," she said. "I asked her what she's doing today and she said nothing. She said you'd be home."

"Did you ask her what we'd be doing for my birthday or just ask her in general?"

Stacy paused and didn't answer. Scarlet let out a loud whine, grabbing her sister's hair and pulling it with all the force she owned. Rose screeched and Sara groaned from her place on the carpeted floor.

"I didn't mention your birthday and her Facebook has been deactivated. I think she forgot."

Sara didn't notice that Tegan had deactivated her Facebook. She surrendered to the fact that her wife had forgotten about her birthday, but what annoyed her more was the lie Tegan told. She didn't want to call her and check. Her friends were coming over an she had to get the girls into bed because they were becoming a menace to her quality time. She heard chatter and noise the entire day every day and at nights she craved silence and solace.

Her friends came to throw her a small party, but she ended up sobbing about her life. Jack saw her cry and speculate her wife cheating on her. He heard her voicing how they hadn't slept together in months. He saw the tears she had once shared for him fall for a different person.

"Maybe I'm the problem," she said, but everyone stayed quiet. Nobody could say anything. "Yeah. It can't be Kat, and you Jack, and now her. You all…all of you got away from me, cheated, and she's doing it, too."

"Sara, no," he said, attempting to put a hand on her knee, but the door opened immediately and Tegan came inside.

She stood there and watched all the people. Emy shook her head at her friend and Sara noticed it. She must have texted her. Sara cried more.

"We should leave," Stacy whispered. Dana stood up. Jack rubbed Sara's back but eventually stood up too when Tegan's eyes burned through him.

They all left quickly and Sara stayed seated, facing the ire seeping from the eyes that faced her.

"Why was his hand on your body," she asked with confidence shredding Sara's insides.

Sara stood up, ready to leave without picking up the mess on the dining table.

"I'm taking to you," yelled Tegan.

"Because it's birthday and my wife just ignored the fuck out of it," she yelled back. "Are you really making yourself the victim in this situation, too, Tegan?"

Tegan didn't answer. She closed her eyes and breathed in and out. Sara watched her chest heaving up and relaxing. She spectated her fists clenching and unclenching. She waited until the witnessed panic to dissipate with tears in her eyes before she left because she still loved the woman who clearly didn't love her back and still felt concerned whenever those bouts of panic hit that troubled woman and, recently, they had been occurring frequently.

"I'm sorry I forgot about your birthday," Tegan said with brokenness Sara hadn't heard before. "I fucked up."

"Where were you and why did you lie to me?" She really didn't care about her birthday as much as she cared about Tegan's lies and deceit.

"My therapist said I should try to change the way I dress and go out alone. It's umm…a form of healing and getting out of this whole situation. I was too embarrassed to tell you."

Sara nodded. She left the room and went upstairs.

Tegan met her in the bedroom where she was reading a book. "You really couldn't clean up after you? Do I have to do all the cleaning up now just because you're working all day long?" That was the first time Tegan spoke gently to her which made her realize how negligent she had been around their house—the dust had covered the furniture of their bedroom and she had thrown a comment about it earlier that day, a comment that Tegan dismissed. Her clothes were never ironed and she had no time to iron them. She asked Tegan a few times to do it after she finished doing the laundry and when she realized Tegan sighed and puffed whenever she asked her, she stopped doing that. It wasn't her responsibility anyway and she knew that.

"I'll do it in the morning," Sara promised.

When they were in bed, she was going to ask Tegan to touch her. It was her birthday and she deserved that, even if she couldn't cum easily; it didn't mean Tegan should give up on her just because her sexual desire didn't match her wife's. When she turned around, she noticed Tegan wasn't in bed. She switched on the lamp beside her and took a look at the time on her phone. It was past three in the morning and she hadn't noticed herself sleeping like that the moment she hit the mattress.

"Tegan?" she called. "Tegan?" No response.

She left the bed and knocked on the bathroom's door, but the door was pushed open through her knocking and nobody appeared inside. She took her phone and left to the corridor.

Tegan was in the living room.

She was sobbing.

"Tegan?"

It made her jump. She wiped her eyes and sat up straight.

"Why aren't you sleeping?"

"I couldn't." Tegan attempted a smile but only cried more. That was one of the rare times she smiled at her within the past few months.

Sara sat beside her and placed her palm above her bony knee. She squeezed and Tegan flinched at the gesture. "I want whatever you're going through to go away," she said. "I know I can be really mean and terrible sometimes but I swear I love you so much and never intend to hurt you." Sara's words only played a bigger factor to Tegan's increasing tears. "I'll do anything to get you better. I really am ready to do whatever…even, even quit my evening classes and hand them to someone else. Jack could take them. I asked him."

"He'd really do anything for you, wouldn't he?" Tegan said through tears, sniffling some more.

"Sometimes…" Sara stopped herself from finishing the sentence that hit her brain. Tegan wouldn't like it. But she looked at her in a way that pushed her to continue. "Sometimes when you lose the person that you took for granted, you regret it and try to do your best to get them back."

"So he's trying to get you back."

"Wh…why are you asking this now? Of course not." Sara took a hold of her wife and kissed her head. "You're acting jealous when you're the one pushing me away. I really don't understand it."

Tegan still pushed her away. "I'm trying to know what you're telling our friends about us that they all know we don't have a sex life or a relationship anymore."

Sara was baffled by that sentence. She attempted recalling everything she had said around their shared friends and she surely had whined a lot about Tegan's latest behavior. "Did Emy tell you about tonight? Because, yes, I cried and talked about it…but I haven't done it before." Tegan nodded with a chuckle. "I don't talk about our sex life to Jack. I only mentioned it around Stacy."

"You know your best friend very well now to know that she's not to trust with something so personal like that."

She definitely succeeded shushing Sara up. She was genuinely hurt and Sara truly understood it.

"I'm sorry," Sara said. "I'm really sorry." She could find millions of excuses to tell Tegan why she had done what she had done, but she knew that only fueled the flame. "Even if Jack did everything to get me back, which I know he's not doing, I won't ever be his. I'm always yours, you know."

She had wished Tegan would reciprocate those words, but Tegan didn't. A nod was the only response she received before she got up and left to the bedroom.

Sara forgot to clean up in the morning. She had an urgent meeting. She took the kids to kindergarten quickly.

"Mrs. Clement," a woman in administration called her before she ran out after hurriedly kissing both girls on the cheeks and sending them off with their teacher whom they both hugged. "Please wait."

Sara turned around, heart racing because she was already late and tired. "What is it? I have some urgent work thing."

"Mrs. Clement, please, take our urgent and demanding requests to speak with you seriously."

"What?" She furrowed her brows at the woman, ready for the attack.

"We need to talk to you about your girls. We've been trying to reach out but you never pick up the phone."

"My wife's phone is with you and I've already told you she'd be handling those things." Sara looked at her watch and huffed. "Look, I have to go. Just talk to her and I'll discuss whatever it is with her later on." She was already walking out. "Or you know what? Just leave me a voicemail. I'll get to it later."

She could hear the woman's "Impossible" behind her back as she walked out of the building. "Fuck you," she said and one parent with her toddler heard her. She ignored the glare she received, lowered her sunglasses even though there was not a single hint of sun in that morning. She got into the car and drove far away.

"Hey. Why is the kindergarten telling me they've been trying to reach out to me? Did they talk to you about the girls?" Sara sent the first voice message the moment she drove away. "We agreed you'll handle whatever's going on in there because you told me you didn't want me to be bitchy and rude to people taking care of our children." She finished recording and pressed send again. While driving, she remembered not cleaning up the drinks and food on the dining table from last night. "Fuck," she mouthed to herself. "Hey, Tee, don't clean up what's on the table. I'll do it once I'm home. I'm gonna cancel my evening classes today to take you and the girls out." She had decided spontaneously. Maybe they could talk about everything. But she also didn't want Tegan to make a scene in a public place. It was just necessary they talked about it and she showed Tegan that she cared.

Tegan didn't respond to any of her wife's messages despite reading and listening to them. It only made Sara crankier in her classes and meaner to her students.

"How are you?" Jack asked her on the way out of her last class.

"Shit," she truthfully answered. She didn't have to lie to him or fake having a great marriage life and he'd seen everything the previous night. "I'm cancelling my evening classes today to take Tegan and the kids out."

"I still stand by my offer."

"Yeah. I'll see what she tells me tonight. If she doesn't say anything about it but I can still sense her tension, I'll just hand you my classes and be frugal for the rest of the year."

He nodded and, before she left, put a hand on her bony shoulder to stop her. "Sara, don't take it out on the students. You did this, too, when I was…ruining your life, so…"

"You know…" She swallowed the lump in her throat and closed her eyes to block the tears from running. She allowed her hand to stay there. "If you hadn't ruined my life, I would have been a normal lovable person that people didn't run away from." She finally shrugged his hand off and walked away when he couldn't provide a comeback to her words.

She dialed up Tegan on the way home, but Tegan, as expected, didn't pick up. When she got there, the food from the night before, the half empty cups, the wine bottle, and the sliced-up cake were all still seated on the table. She could hear the twins screaming from the floor above. She walked to the kitchen; Tegan hadn't cooked. Good, her plan was still on. She washed her hand with soap very well and dried it up with a maroon towel that rested on one of the kitchen's chairs.

She climbed up the stairs to find the girls still in their clothes from earlier and Tegan nowhere in sight. They were fighting over a piece of Lego, crying with snot covering their noses.

"Tegan?" Sara shouted. She grabbed a tissue and knelt down between them, ready to wipe their noses. "Hey, hey," she yelled and glared at moving Scarlet. "Let me get the boogers out." Scarlet surrendered in fear, eyes wide at her mother as she cleaned up her face. "Tegan, where are you?" she shouted again. It was Rose's turn to get her nose wiped. She smiled brightly at her mother. "Let's stop fighting and see where mummy is."

"She poops," Scarlet said, lisping heavily on the S.

Sara knocked on the bathroom's door. "Tee, Scar said you're pooping. Are you ready to go out?"

The door opened quickly. Tegan was in her towel but her body was not wet and her hair was as dry as ever. "Okay, umm, give me ten minutes. I need to get into the shower quickly. Just umm…" She pushed her wife out of the way. "Get down and clean the mess, please." She took a deep breath. Her eyes were swollen and bloodshot. Her brow was sweaty. Her nose was red. Her breaths were quick and frequent.

"Oh…Okay. Sure." Sara turned around and took the girls with her downstairs. She made them both sit on the couch and handed them a bag of vinegar and salt chips which they loved very much.

She began cleaning up what was on the table and the tiny girls stood up on the couch in their shoes. "Hey, sit down. Don't stand up on the couch." They always stood wherever they could. They rarely sat down. They walked, ran, jumped, and talked. "Girls, sit down."

They sat down when Sara's timber became a bit more serious. Soon, though, they began fighting over the bag. They cried and pulled each other's hair until Rose screeched with a loud cry. Sara was in the kitchen washing the dishes. She ran out to the spacious reception room to find pieces of crumbled up chips all over the couch and the floor, the two girls with their hair all over the place, and their other mother just standing there with shock on her face.

"I couldn't leave them with you for ten minutes without them destroying the place," she mouthed and it almost seemed like she had done it to herself.

"I'll clean it up," Sara said. "I was washing the dishes." She eyed what Tegan was wearing, the jeans from last night with a leather jacket and a baggy white shirt underneath. "You look good."

"We have a dishwasher for a reason," Tegan said. "I don't wanna go out," Tegan abruptly blurted out right after. With pieces of chips in her hand, Sara looked up from the floor where she had bent down. Tegan's fists were opening and closing. Her breathing was measured. The panic had arrived.

"Why?" Sara asked, spectating the scene while blocking the continuous fighting the girls displayed around her and her wife. She tsked and glared at them, but to no avail. "Is it because of the mess?" No answer came. "I'm cleaning it up." She looked at how disgusting the girls looked. She hadn't even thought about changing their dirty day clothes or brushing their hair. "I'll change for them." Tegan's panic was increasing. She held her chest and sat on the bottom stair. "Tegan…" Sara sighed and walked up to her. "You know they were alone, too, when I arrived." Tegan nodded. "Do you want me to drop them off at Stacy's? I know she'll receive them. We can…"

"I want you to leave," Tegan said, looking up at standing bewildered Sara.

"What?" Her heart raced. "What do you…"

"Take the girls and leave," she elaborated, wiping her nose with the back of her hand. Both of her legs shook and her voice trembled, too. "Please. I wanna be alone. Just…go. I don't care. Get them dinner, go to the park, to Stacy's. I just wanna be alone for a while. Like for the night. Come back later…umm, I'll calm down." She got up from her place and began pushing Sara back.

"Whoa, wait," Tegan said strongly. "Let me just."

"Please, just leave." Her panic attack was strong and Sara could tell she struggled breathing. The kids watched her lose control over her emotions, too. They had fear in their eyes, Sara could tell.

"Let me just finish cleaning up the…"

"It's fine. I'll do it. Go."

"You can't even breathe," Sara objected, but Tegan insisted, now pushing the girls out toward the door, too. She gave Sara the keys that rested on the shoe closet they had at the door.

Sara took one last look at her before grabbing the girls' hands and leaving the house. She sat in the car for more than fifteen minutes, just staring blankly out of the window. The girls were eerily quiet, too. She looked at the two of them from the rearview mirror and wiped her silently falling tears.

"Are you hungry, girls?"

"Poopy," Rose whispered. That's what they called the bathroom. As much as the mothers tried to teach them to use the codes for number 1 and number 2, the girls couldn't learn that.

"Aww, babe." Sara looked back at her girl. "Number 1 or number 2?"

Rose held her index and waved it in front of her mother's face.

"Shit," Sara mouthed to herself, knowing that Rose had an issue controlling her bladder and that she had to either get inside the house right now, which would most likely trigger Tegan, or drive up the nearest gas station or to Stacy's house. "Can you hold it until we get to Stacy's house?"

"Okay," answered Rose with a nod.

Stacy was called so Sara could make sure she was home. She had just got home from work. Perfect. Sara told her she and the girls were coming.

"Rosie, if you hold it in, I'll get you a bag of candy all for yourself." Scarlet groaned in protest. "And for Soosie, too, of course."

"And Tee Tee mummy," Rose said with a giggle.

"A big bag for Tee Tee mummy."

Sara picked up Rose and ran toward the bathroom right away. Both Stacy and Emy chased her here. "What happened?" Stacy asked. Scarlet squeezed herself in the middle between the couple and walked up to her mother kneeling down in front of the toddler to rid her off her jeans and seat her on the toilet.

"I'll tell you," Sara answered, wiping the sweat above her brow. "Scar, let go, please." She shook away Scarlet's tight grip on her leg. "You wanna go number 1, too, baby?"

The couple walked out to give her and her children privacy when they heard Scarlet answer with yes to her mother.

Sara sat at the kitchen table with Stacy and Emy. Ella had been ordered to take the kids out and play with them so the adults could talk. Sara narrated it all and poured her heart and tears out. Her face swelled up and her hiccups and sobs increased. Her best friend hugged her, allowing her head on her chest. She caressed her red cheek and stroked her hair.

"And her phone's still locked," Emy whispered after many attempts to dial up her own best friend to check on her because at first she didn't pick up Sara's calls, but moments after she locked her phone. That made Sara weep some more. "I'm kinda scared that…" Emy hesitated.

"What?" Sara said, sniffled, and wiped her runny nose with the back of her hand.

"That, umm…" Her eyes scanned Stacy's matching seas. She wasn't sure she could say this in front of Sara and just feed into her anxiety. "It could be, umm, she might harm herself. She used to self-harm when she was a teenager."

"Shit, no," Sara exclaimed and got out of Stacy's grip, bending down to put her shoes on. "No, no…she wouldn't do that."

"Relax," Stacy whispered, placing a gentle hand on Sara's back. "Emy, she wouldn't do that now, would she?"

"Uh…I don't think she would. She hasn't done it ever, but I know she used to."

"I know that, too," Sara said. "I just never thought she would. She used to do it at 16."

"Shit," Stacy mumbled. "Sara, just relax, please." Sara was already a shaking mess, getting ready to leave. She had been out of the house for more than three hours and the phone's been locked for more than an hour. "Sara, I just wanna tell you something before you leave."

"What is it?" She was putting on her dark navy blazer on top of her half unbuttoned and wrinkled white shirt.

"I always tell you that, uhhh…" She looked down at her seated wife and back up again at standing Sara. "That Tegan will leave if you kept treating her that way, but this time I really wanna tell you that she's doing you wrong." Sara looked at Emy to find her agreeing with a nod. "The whole birthday thing, the kicking out of the house even when you're trying…I know her mental health is a lot right now, but you also need to be gentle with yourself."

"What she's trying to say is that this time it's not your fault."

But every other time it was, and it all had accumulated, Sara knew that.

She drove as safely as she could until her kids whined about the promised candy. She stopped at the grocery store quickly and got three bags of mixed gummies for the girls and one for Tegan.

"I give it to Tee Tee mummy," yelled Scarlet, snatching the bag from her mother's hand while Sara was closing the garage door. The house was too dark which made her heart drum as Emy's words played a ringtone in her mind. Tegan had not switched on the backyard's lights and had not closed the curtains nor switched on the lights in the house.

Sara entered through the back door of the kitchen and immediately switched the light on.

"Mummy," Scarlet shouted and ran outside. "We got you gummies."

"You lub gummies, mummy," Rose added, following.

"Tegan?" Sara followed maniacally. She switched on the lights in the entire house and ran upstairs, passing Scarlet on her way to get to the bedroom and bathroom where a catastrophe might be waiting for her. "Tegan? Tee?" Her voice of panic arose when she discovered her room empty and the bathroom's door closed. "Oh, my God, Tegan," she hollered through the house until she pushed the bathroom's door open only to discover the emptiness inside. "Tee?" she mumbled quizzically.

"Where's Tee Tee mummy?" Rose asked as she roamed the bathroom around Sara's leg.

Sara grabbed her phone and dialed up her wife again. Still no signal. Still locked. She looked around the bedroom in detail only to notice Tegan's side of the closet empty. She walked inside the walk-in closet for the realization to hit her that Tegan's clothes, shoes, and two suitcases were gone.

"Tegan, oh my, God." Her panic struck her all at once and her heart raced as she left the room and ran downstairs. Her tears competed with her comprehension as her vision blurred when she reached the kitchen and was met with the paper stuck with a donut's magnet on the fridge. She held it in her hand and trembled mercilessly.

She read the first words and her feet stopped supporting her, so she sat on the floor and sobbed as she read the entire note of farewell.

September 20, 2019

Sara,

This isn't a love letter like the ones you've taught me to compose so delicately. I am writing this with my tears dry and my will to continue this marriage gone. I know you won't forgive me for this, but at least make our kids do. I am doing this now because they're still very young, and it will be easier for them not to remember who I am later on.

I failed as a mother, Sara. I failed as a wife. I am failing constantly. I can't learn to love this life and I've been trying for three years now. I love you, sure, and I certainly love them so much which makes it even harder for me to make this decision, but I have to make it before I err more; before it's too late.

I've never thought I'd be one of those mothers who would leave her children and walk away; I've always criticized parents walking out on their children, but here I am doing the same.

The last four months have been hell on Earth for me. I watched my physical and mental health deteriorate and you watched it, too. I killed our sex life but it wasn't something I could control because the pills I took to heal the damaged nerves in my breast just annihilated my body…and I still need more work done. I didn't tell you because it wasn't your fault and I felt like a dead weight you're carrying.

But you did me wrong, too. You left me hanging, Sara. I wanted you to feel what I felt when I couldn't say it and you ended up leaving everything for me to do only because I physically and mentally wasn't able to work and spend like you. I watched you getting closer to Jack and I read your messages to him and his messages to you and, sincerely, they broke me.

Though now you're free. You can be with whomever you want.

I know you love me. I love you, too.

I love our girls so much and if they ever get to read this, I want them to know it wasn't fully your fault I ran away; it's just a marriage that shouldn't have happened in the first place.

But, hey, you have the kids you've always wanted, so raise them the way you want. I know you'll get the hang of it eventually. They're yours.

If you're wondering where I am, I'm back to the States, but I want to start a new life far away from the life that was slowly killing me.

Take care!

PS: Your credit card is in your bedside table's drawer. Scarlet likes to be held in fetal position and rocked before she's put into bed and Rose still pees herself at night so put on a nighttime diaper on her if you can't wake up to change her. They both love strawberries but are growing a rash recently so be careful. If they're fussy or chaotic, it means they're just overwhelmed so just hold them and kiss their temples and they'll calm down. They're very sensitive girls like me so don't force them to do anything they can't do and love them the way they are like you loved me.

Farewell for now.

Sara lay on the floor and cried the loudest cry she had ever let escape her. Her girls stood at her feet, scared and bewildered as she wailed and screamed, not able to believe that the woman she had wrestled death for just chose to leave her and their kids.

In her life she had feared two things: dying and leaving Tegan to fight life on her own or Tegan dying and leaving her and the kids alone.

She had always wished and predicted the first option would happen but hoped for it to happen far away from now. Instead, the second fearful imagination just presented itself in the most curling way life had decided to grant her.

She wished she had died out of cancer. She wished she hadn't put Tegan through that.

And now two small girls were forever going to pay the price.