Showered

(During 02 x 04, "Other Women")

The baby shower guests finally left after dinner. June wasn't sure how much longer she could have tolerated the Wives' falsetto cheer, Rita's surliness, Serena's fake sweetness, Lily's silence, or the other handmaids' accusatory glares. They took Lily's tongue out, Alma had told her. Not your fault, not that part. June wasn't sure where 'her' part started and ended. Somewhere between dropping the rock that should have killed Janine, and the airplane pilot getting shot in the head.

June had felt guilty, angry, and miserable all day.

Aunt Lydia mercifully went home after the baby shower. June saw Serena's shoulders relax as soon as the bitch was out the door; resentment towards Lydia was one of the rare things she and her mistress agreed upon. The Aunt's constant presence for the last two days—forcing June to drink those veggie smoothies, tsk-tsking at Serena for smoking, calling Rita "Martha," bossing everyone around—had upset the fragile balance of the Waterford household. Things were bad enough without a brown-clad mosquito buzzing around them all.

Despite the beautiful luncheon provided by the Marthas, June had barely eaten anything all day, guilt still gnawing at her stomach. By nightfall, though, hunger sent her down to the kitchen. Pots and pans clanged together. Rita was going to be cleaning up for hours. No dishwasher, of course, so she'd be doing all those dishes by hand. June thought of assisting, until she saw Rita in whispered conversation with the other households' visiting Marthas. Let her have time with her friends, June thought. Trying to stay unobtrusive, she took a banana and some leftover cornbread off the dining room table, then retreated to her room.

Waterford had been out all day, doing whatever Commanders did on their days off: hunting, drinking, whoring. Men weren't supposed to take part in a baby shower. Just as well for Nick, June thought. It would've been hard on him, as it was on her, to watch Serena open presents and talk about their baby as her own. Instead of that, Nick had probably spent the day idly standing by his car, chatting with the other drivers, waiting for their bosses to be finished. She hadn't had the chance to speak to him since she'd arrived home the day before. Aunt Lydia hadn't left her alone for a goddamned minute, even in the bathtub. Fuck Aunt Lydia, June thought, biting viciously into her banana.

The baby kicked as soon as the food hit June's stomach. "Hi there," she said softly. "You mad we missed dinner?" She caressed her belly. Lydia had been admonishing her constantly about the baby's health—eat this, wash here, rest now—so maybe June's little hunger strike this evening was her childish way of rebelling. But that gentle kick reminded her that the fetus did indeed need more nutrition. Guilt stabbed her again. She was five months pregnant now; she needed to start acting like a mother. "Sorry about that," she apologized to her belly. "We'll finish our corn bread, then go to sleep, okay?"

Munching, June wondered what sort of personality the baby would have. So far, he was very sweet. He didn't give her food cravings she couldn't fulfill in Gilead (except Twinkies—she longed for those). He kicked her gently, more like a tap, really, just to get her attention. Like Nick would reassure her sometimes by covertly brushing a finger against her hand in front of others. This was definitely Nick's child. The alternative—Fred Waterford—was simply unacceptable to her. Her mind would never be able to process that.

June brushed crumbs off her lap, then stood to go brush her teeth.

Headlights shone through her little window. She changed direction mid-step and sat down at her window ledge to peek out from behind the curtains. Waterford exited the car, looking tired. He didn't thank Nick for driving him. He never did. He just let his chauffeur close the car door behind him, dismissing Nick with a bored little hand gesture. June chewed her lip, waiting. As soon as the Commander entered the house, her love looked up at her. She moved to stand in front of the window, the lamp lighting her silhouette from behind, and waved hello against the cold glass.

Nick's lip twitched up in a slight smile, and just for a moment, he held up both hands, fingers spread. Ten minutes, then. She nodded, smiled back even though he probably couldn't see her face at all.

Once ten minutes had elapsed on her little analog clock, she slipped downstairs, boots in hand until she reached the back door. The October night was chilly. The wind sliced through her thin red dress as leaves blew wildly on the iron staircase leading to his room above the garage. She shivered as she ran.

June's skin still had goose bumps as she embraced her secret lover, burying her nose against his neck. She inhaled him: the usual mix of stale cigarettes, lemon soap, shaving cream from Balms and Mandrakes. "Nick," she whispered. "Nick." Her touchstone.

"Hey," he said simply. He hugged her longer and tighter than he normally did. They hadn't held each other in two weeks, not since their last morning at the Boston Globe. Then she'd been in that disastrous near-escape at the airport, followed by solitary confinement at the Red Center. Seventy-one flowers on the bedspread, metal chain around her ankle. The Waterford home was a reprieve by comparison.

Nick had seen her only briefly that morning before the baby shower. Serena had him running around town, getting crates of illegal alcohol. Now, finally alone with June, he felt his whole body relax for the first time since the Globe. He removed her bonnet with practiced fingers and tossed it on the floor. Her hairpins went into his pocket. With one hand, he stroked the back of her head, while his other arm wrapped around her back to keep her close. For a long moment, he luxuriated in the warm breath on his neck, her silky hair tickling his face, the baby bump pressing against his stomach. "Are you okay?" he finally asked.

"I am now," she mumbled. "I was chained up for a while at the Red Center. Lights on 24/7, Aunts watching me." She moved her arms up, threw them around his shoulders. Nowhere in Gilead felt as safe as his embrace.

"I was so worried about you," he admitted. "Nobody could tell me where you were, but I heard about the plane. The pilot getting shot." He leaned back a little, scrutinized her face. She looked pale, smaller somehow than she had at the Globe, where freedom had transformed her into a powerful and confident woman. Now the red dress had diminished her again. "I'm sorry. We'll try again. We'll get you two out."

She smiled sadly. "I dunno, I think we blew our chance." She kissed his neck, his cheek. "But it's good to see you again."

"You too. Are you still shivering?"

"It's cold tonight."

"Yeah, winter's coming." Disengaging, Nick took her hand and led her over to his sole armchair, grabbing the gray quilt off his bed as he walked. He sat down, pulled June into his lap, then wrapped the blanket around her.

"Better," she said.

"Mm-hmm," he agreed. He ran his hands up and down her sides a few times, trying to warm her up, before caressing the solid swell of her belly. "How's our little guy?" They had gotten in the habit of alternatingly referring to the baby as a boy on one day, a girl on the next, trying to get used to either choice. Tonight, he was a boy.

"Well, he kicks now."

Nick raised his eyebrows at that. "He has…feet?"

"Oh, yeah. And muscular little legs."

"Why are you kicking your mom?" he asked the bump. "That's not very nice."

"Well, I think he's just working out, you know. Stretching." She placed her hand on her belly, entwining her fingers with his. "It's a nice feeling. He's reassuring me that he's healthy."

He caressed her fingers. "It must be weird, to be kicked from inside. Nothing you can do to stop it."

"It'll be even weirder when he gets hiccups."

"Babies get hiccups? In the womb?"

"Oh, yeah, Hannah used to get them for hours. It was hilarious. We'd try scaring me, making me drink water, jumping up and down. Nothing helped." When June told him stories about Hannah, she often slipped into the 'we' form, meaning Luke and her. She remembered them as one unit of three people. Nick didn't mind. He had already begun thinking of June and the baby the same way, as one family unit…at least, he did when he allowed himself to think about his 'family,' until he cut the thought off in his head. No sense wishing for what we're never going to be allowed to have, he told himself ruefully. You and June aren't going to bring up this child any more than Hannah.

Before she got melancholy about her elder child, he tried to change the subject. "How was the baby shower today?"

"Awful. I had to kneel in front of Serena and bind my hand with hers. And that bitch ate it right up; she really does like the spotlight. The Wives told her she was 'glowing' and actually felt her tummy. What a delusional load of bullshit."

Nick snorted in amusement. "Serena does not glow."

"Glower, maybe. Every time the Wives' attention wasn't on her, she glared at me."

His hands still on her belly, he tried kissing June's lower lip. She didn't respond. Too distracted. "She's jealous of you," he tried. " 'Cause you really are glowing." He kissed her mouth again, gently. "You're looking so beautiful."

"Thanks," she muttered, "but she knows she's gonna win in the end. She'll get our baby, I'll get sent to some other asshole Commander's house, you'll end up God knows where…."

"Shh," he admonished her. "Don't think about that stuff." Even if I was just thinking the same thing.

"It's true. We're not going to raise our baby. Today was the first time that really, truly hit me: it's all preparation for Serena's baby. Hers, not ours. The shower, the nursery, the little onesies and stuffed elephant and crocheted sweaters. Not for my baby. For hers. That's all I thought about, all afternoon."

"Well, stop thinking like that." He moved one hand up to her cheek, opening her mouth with a thumb. He kissed her again, then more deeply, until he got her undivided attention. "I'll get you two out," he promised again. "I know who to talk to now."

"Mayday?"

"No, not actually. They're kind of fed up with handmaids. Have you ever heard of the Underground Femaleroad?"

"The Underground Railroad," June corrected.

"Well, yeah, that was Harriet Tubman's thing. Nowadays, there's the Femaleroad. Quakers, Amish, a bunch of other people in small towns, farms, out of the way stuff, who serve as safe houses for women to get north. You move from house to house, til you're in Canada."

"Okay, sounds great. But maybe you could come with me this time."

"Can't. I'm not a woman." His lips were against her jaw. "But our baby's gonna be born in a Canadian hospital, with great doctors and all the drugs you want."

She shook her head in despair. "No, he'll be born here, surrounded by chanting handmaids and wives, with me screaming in pain. I won't escape. Serena won't let me out of her sight long enough. I'm going to deliver in agony, then she's gonna snatch the baby right out from under me."

"Stop that. You're supposed to be the optimistic one, cheering me up."

"Well, Nick, I guess you're just gonna have to fucking step up and be the caretaker for once."

He didn't respond to that. June got like this sometimes, snapping at him because she couldn't speak up against anyone else. He knew that. He also knew he was the only person she felt safe with. It usually didn't take her more than a minute to realize she was misdirecting her anger, so he just waited. He tucked the blanket more snugly around her shoulders, shifted his legs a little to make her more comfortable on his lap, stroked her hair.

"It's almost ten," Nick said after two minutes of silence. The Angels on their street had a shift change at ten o'clock and the incoming men were usually late, so June often used that as an opportunity to sneak back into the main house.

Instead of answering, she leaned into him, pressing her face against his shoulder. Her cheeks were wet; he hadn't realized she'd started crying. She was the only person he knew that could cry silently. "Are you throwing me out?" she whispered.

"No." He had never done that. And would never.

"Good. Let's go to bed, then." She looked at him. "You're not mad at me?"

He shook his head.

"You should be."

"No," he said easily, holding onto her waist to stand up with her. "You just had a shitty day."

"Yeah."

"So did I. But we survived." He looked deep into her eyes and repeated a phrase he'd used often. "We survived another day in Gilead, and now we're together."

After a deep, cleansing breath, she said, "I apologize for taking my anger out at you. I'm full of shit; you actually take care of me all the time."

He wrapped the gray quilt more firmly around her shoulders. "Love is patient, love is kind. It is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs."

"Are you quoting the Bible at me?"

"Just a little Corinthians." He took the passage seriously, though he didn't tell her that. His father had often abused his wife as well as his two sons; Nick had vowed never to become 'easily angered' and hurt June.

Her tone turned playful. "Well, I hope you're not, y'know, in a very pious mood. 'Cause I'm planning some unholy acts with you."

"Oh, are you now?" He grinned wolfishly as she took his hands in hers and pulled him to bed.

For two people who had only been dating (a ridiculous term, under the circumstances) for a few months, Nick and June always harmonized very well in bed. From the first time they touched—his thumb brushing her hand, her parted lips so close to his, their breath ragged—they had both known they'd end up lovers. Their compatibility had been unmistakable.

That initial magnetism had grown into something more. Since their time was short in his apartment and they were afraid of being heard from outside, their early sexual encounters were mostly quick, passionate, frenzied. For Nick, it usually seemed more an act of nihilistic desperation than fun. Alone for hours at the Boston Globe, however, they'd finally allowed themselves to indulge in long, languid sex. They played games, experimented with power dynamics, let themselves go in all sorts of ways. They got to know each other much more intimately.

This, though, was the first night by Nick's estimation that they'd truly made love. They didn't say the word love—she was, after all, still married to a man whom she'd return to, Nick assumed, as soon as she got to Canada. But this felt like love. Slower, gentler, peppered with soft kisses and whispered compliments. You're gonna have to be the caretaker was the phrase that kept repeating in Nick's mind, even though she'd apologized for saying it.

So tonight, he kept her needs, her pleasure, front and center. His goal for the evening was to undo all the damage that had been inflicted upon her since they'd last been together: getting so close to freedom, then being shot at in the airplane; the torture of the Red Center; the trauma of a baby shower for a child who was about to be kidnapped. To counteract all this, Nick wanted to shower June with attention, warmth, tenderness. He covered her with kisses and touches, making her come twice before he even took his boxers off.

He had never been in love with anyone before June, had never known before now what it felt like to value someone's life more than your own. But then again, he had never completely trusted anyone except her. Besides, impending fatherhood had completely shifted his worldview. Nick promised himself he would figure out a way to get her out of Gilead if it was the last thing he did, even if he couldn't go with her. He understood that meant his child would grow up without him, would never know his father at all, but that was okay. So much better than being raised by the goddamned Waterfords. His child's freedom was more important than Nick's desire to know his baby.

June woke up with the sun and was already half-dressed when the knock came. Two angry knocks, then again. Nick's eyes snapped open and he leapt out of bed. He gestured for her to hide in the bathroom, but she rushed towards him instead.

"What-?" he hissed at her, then stopped himself when he realized she was getting her bonnet, discarded on the floor. With a nod, he let her go, and put on his pants and undershirt before whoever was knocking burst in. "One moment, please," he called, aiming for a polite and stoic tone of voice. Once sufficiently dressed, he opened the door. "Mrs. Waterford," he greeted, hoping he was loud enough for June to hear.

"Where is she?" June definitely heard that: Serena was in tyrant mode.

"Who?"

"That little harlot. Is she here with you?"

He sidestepped the question. "Did…something happen?"

The bathroom door opened, and a handmaid in full uniform emerged. "Blessed morning, Mrs. Waterford," June said in that high-pitched way she spoke only when she was being fake. Nick loved that she had two voices: her Gilead-bullshit little girl tone, or the deeper, true voice which she used only with him.

Serena crossed the little room in three long strides, and smacked June hard on the side of her face. "How dare you sleep here," she snarled. "Your whoring isn't good for the baby."

June considered arguing the point, then thought better of it. In the last two days, Serena had choked her and even knocked poor Rita into an end table. June had never seen her mistress so full of fury. "The baby's just fine," she tried.

"How would you know?"

The obvious answer to that question—because I'm his mother—was not something Serena wanted to hear, nor a phrase June dared to say. She bowed her head. Blessed are the meek.

"Aunt Lydia is here. Rita and I couldn't find you; we looked like idiots. Don't ever embarrass me like this again." She hit June a second time, this time on the jaw, then drew her arm back for another strike. Before she could complete the action, however, Nick stepped forward and punched Serena on the side of her head, hard enough to send her crashing against the wall.

Serena looked at her driver in mute shock.

"Don't do that again," he warned her, his voice calm and steady. "Don't ever hit her again. I can open this door right now and yell at the Guardians that you came up here and came onto me while I was undressed."

"I'm a Wife," she managed.

"I'm a man," he countered.

Uncharacteristically, Serena conceded defeat. She averted her gaze, turned to leave. On her way out, she said, "Offred, Aunt Lydia is still in the sitting room. Rita is stalling her with tea, but I'm sure she would appreciate your presence." She closed the door gently behind her.

Slack-jawed, June shook her head at Nick. "Are you out of your goddamned mind? You hit her."

He shrugged. "Not on her face. It won't leave a mark." A trick he'd learned from his father.

"She could tell Waterford."

"Tell him what? That she knows all about our relationship and that he isn't this baby's father? Nah."

"Okay," she said, not convinced. "I think Serena's gonna find a way to get back at you for that, but we'll deal with that later. Right now, I've got to go." She gave him a quick, regretful kiss as a farewell, then hurried off to the house.