When Twins Take Charge Chapter 2
Tags: Miranda/Andy with help from Cassidy, Caroline and Nigel; Angst/Romance
A/N: Andy and Miranda meet again a little less than a year after Paris and both realize the feelings they have been hiding are in fact returned by the other. They come together for a few brief hours then lose it all.
A/N 2: The idea for this came from another story I read. The other was sad and I hate sad so using the theme of coming together and believing their time had passed I wrote this.
Disclosures: I own nothing. I’m just playing with them for a bit.
Previous chapters: 1 http://icequeen1955.livejournal.com/14851.html
Chapter 2 - The Twins Step In
Present Day - 10:AM, Andy Sachs’ Apartment
It was the right decision she knew it but she had died inside that day and doubted she would ever feel alive again.
She was brought out of her thoughts by the loud knocking on her front door.
Who the hell can that be? It’s 10 O’clock on a Sunday morning for god’s sake. Don’t people believe in sleeping in?
“Coming, hold your horses. Give me a minute.” She shouted.
She pulled on a sweat shirt and some sweat pants over her tee and boxers and headed for the front door. She looked through the peep hole and her eyes went wide. She quickly undid the locks and pulled the door open.
“Caroline, Cassidy. What on earth are you doing here at - wait your mom? Is she okay? Is she hurt or something?” The look on her face and the fear in her voice said more than she realized.
The twins looked at each other and both thought “Ok good, question number one answered.”
Cassidy quickly answered, “Hi Andy, and yeah mom is fine, well maybe not fine but she’s not in a hospital or anything. Uh, listen can we come in?”
“Good, good. Oh yeah come in. Uh the place is a bit of a mess. I’ve been uh distracted lately and working, yeah working so uh just a minute and let me clear a space for you on the couch. You two want anything?”
“No Andy we don’t and why don’t you just sit down.”
Andy stopped and realized she was acting like the thirteen year olds and they were acting like the 27 year olds. So she sat.
“Ok guys, it’s not like I am not happy to see you but what are you doing here and for that matter how did two thirteen year olds get here? You didn’t take the subway did you because if you did Miranda will kill both of you and then me?”
Why indeed were they here and how to explain all that had happened in the last two weeks to a woman who looked as out of it as their mother. Wow! This was going to be harder than they thought because Andy looked about to fall over and like she had been crying for as long as their mom. It all started two weeks ago when they got home from their dad’s.
Two Weeks Ago, 7:00 PM, Priestly Townhouse
The twins had been dropped off by their dad who refused these days to even come into the house. It never went well and that was mostly his fault. He could never just be civil with their mom, he always had to get in some snide remark about Stephen or Runway or her hair or their grades or even the dog. He was always ready to pick a fight so they were relieved when he told them he was running late and that Sherry was waiting for him. Now there was a waste of oxygen if they had ever met one.
They called out to their mom but got no answer. Since Paris last year she had been noticeably sad and melancholy a lot but she usually came to greet them and would spend the rest of the evening with them letting them go on and on about what they had done. For her to not even answer them when they called worried them both. Even Patricia failed to come greet them so they knew something was wrong.
They checked downstairs and not finding her they headed to her private study on the second floor. What greeted them chilled them to the bone. Miranda was sitting on the couch, a tray with a pot of tea, two cups and the stuff to go into the tea was sitting on the coffee table in front of the couch. Patricia was at Miranda’s feet and she gave no indication of moving. The both walked over and took in the condition their mother was in. Her eyes were red from crying, and they looked empty and sad, so very sad. They climbed on the couch on either side of her and wrapped their arms around her neck, laying their heads on her shoulders and just held her.
After sometime had passed Miranda became aware of small arms hugging her and the gentle breathing of her girls on her neck. She wrapped them in her arms, kissed their heads and said, “Thank you Bobbsies. Mommy is just a little sad tonight but no worries. It’s time for you two to go to get ready for bed. Is your homework done?”
They kissed her back and said they had done it at Dad’s and then headed off to their rooms to get ready. They were both terrified something really bad had happened. Miranda Priestly never sat around crying and she never didn’t notice them. They had sat with her for nearly an hour before she seemed to even know they were there.
“Cass, this is bad. If Dad had seen her like that, well he would have called his lawyer just like he’s been threatening to and then well then who knows what would happen.”
They most certainly did not want to live with their dad but if mom was having some sort of a nervous breakdown or something they might not have a choice.
“Caro, we need to figure out what happened and fix it or we are going to end up with Sherry and Dad all the time and I might just have to jump off the GW if that happens.”
“Ok, let’s see how she is tomorrow and maybe we can ask her or something. If that doesn’t work we can always call old faithful. He caves every time.”
The first clue came later in the night when they both woke to the sounds of sobbing coming from their mother’s bedroom. Her door was closed but the sound was so heart wrenching they both immediately headed for her room. Standing outside they listened, not sure if she was awake or asleep and not wanting to intrude if the former or startle her if the latter.
Holding hands they listened and then she started mumbling something through the sobs, “Oh Andrea, I am so sorry. Please forgive me. I don’t know how to fix this. Oh God. Why now? When it’s too late? Andrea.”
She seemed to calm down after a few minutes so they crept back to Cassidy’s room and gently shut the door.
“Ok, well we know whatever happened it has to do with someone named Andrea and I for one can only think of one Andrea. THE ASSISTANT FROM PARIS.”
“I agree Caro but what does she have to do with mom? I mean it’s been almost a year since Paris and as far as I know they haven’t spoken or seen each other since the phone landed in the fountain.”
“When did mom start getting that newspaper, you know the one I’m talking about, oh what’s its - The Mirror. That’s it. I always thought that was strange because it comes here not the office and she reads it here not at the office. She even keeps some copies in her desk. I think tomorrow we need to check them out then we need to watch her for a couple of days and see how this goes. And I think it’s time for Uncle Nigel to take us to lunch - after we do our own investigation of course.”
“I agree Caro, so we better get some sleep or we will never make it through History tomorrow.”
“Right, night Cass.”
They hugged, now that they had a plan and a clue they would fix what was ever wrong with their mom and avoid having to do something really unpleasant to their dad.
Present Day - Still 10:AM, Andy Sachs’ Apartment
Andy was waiting for an answer so Cassidy, the appointed spokeswoman, spoke up.
“Right, so no, we didn’t take the subway. Roy brought us and before you get all hyper, Uncle Nigel told him to bring us here. Mom’s at some event at MOMA and Uncle Nigel is with her. Roy is supposedly out with the flu so she has another driver today. No worries.”
“Ok Cassidy, that tells me how you got here but not why and what did you mean when you said that your mom was not fine? What’s going on girls?”
Cassidy sighed and got ready to go ahead with the plan they had decided but she and Caro knew this could go sideways quickly if they didn’t handle it just right. After the last two weeks of watching their mom slip further and further into depression and listening to her crying all night, every night they had decided to take the bull by the horns.
They had found the copies of the Mirror in Miranda’s desk and after flipping through a few of them had come to the conclusion that the only ones she kept all had the same thing in common - a feature article by Andy Sachs. Realizing that was not nearly enough of an explanation they started searching her desk for more clues. They knew this was wrong and invasive but this was their mom they were talking about and they needed to help her.
They were rewarded five minutes later when they found a file at the back of a drawer that contained about two dozen photos - all of their mom and Andy Sachs back when she worked at Runway. In each picture their mom was smiling warmly - at Andy. Also included were four or five newspaper clippings showing the same Andy Sachs at various events she had covered as a reporter for the Mirror.
They looked at the photos, then at each other then back at the photos.
The realization that their mom was at the very least infatuated with the woman and more than likely in love with her was not lost on them. They may be thirteen but thirteen today was the new twenty.
“Andy we need to ask you a very important question and we need you to be really honest with us because it is really important.”
“Ok, I’ll try. Ask away.”
“Are you in love with our mom?”
TBC