Sordid Affairs 4/?
Title: Sordid Affairs
Author: outuendo_11
Rating: PG...for no reason.
Show: Guiding Light
Pairing: Otalia, Doris
Spoilers: um...Frank is mentoring Rafe.
Summary: Olivia and Natalia struggle to make their relationship work with Rafe at home and Olivia finds a confidant in Doris Wolfe.
A/N: If you're behind you can go here> http://outuendo-11.livejournal.com/8164.html and I've posted links to all the other chapters. :)
A/N: And you might all hate me after this, but hey I'm down with that. Hate me. Tell me about it. :)
Chapter 4
“Let’s do something nice for Natalia,” Emma suggested that lazy Sunday afternoon.
“Like what, bean?” Olivia inquired, busy typing up memos that she needed to send out by Monday morning.
“Let’s go on a picnic!” Emma exclaimed.
Olivia paused, weighing the pros and cons of attempting to go on a picnic with Natalia so soon after their slight disagreement the following evening. Natalia’s saddened voice had replayed over and over in Olivia’s mind all night, and she’d scarcely been able to sleep. Perhaps a Sunday afternoon picnic would be a good idea. She could show up on Natalia’s doorstep, wrap the other woman in her arms and she and Emma could whisk her, and possibly Rafe, away to the park.
“All right.” Olivia gave in to her daughter’s suggestion.
“Can we order Chinese?”
“Chinese for a picnic?” Olivia laughed, “sure, why not?”
~*~
And an hour later they showed up at the farmhouse. But Olivia could immediately sense danger when they pulled up the driveway and a foreign, although familiar, car sat in the driveway. Olivia cursed under her breath, hoping Emma had not heard.
“Wait here, bean,” Olivia instructed, shutting off her car.
Emma started to protest, but Olivia gave her that motherly look that said ‘don’t cross me’ and Emma quickly quieted in her seat.
Olivia found herself walking quickly towards the front door of the house she had once called home. She knocked politely on the door, waiting, as patiently as possible, for her brunette ‘friend’ to answer the door, eager to see what was happening at the farmhouse. Waiting and wondering why his car was there.
“Olivia,” Natalia was all smiles when she pulled open the door, as if she had just been enjoying herself. Olivia’s stomach churned. “What are you doing here?”
“I thought Emma and I would take you out for a picnic, but it looks like you’re busy,” Olivia tried to peer past Natalia’s shoulder.
“Oh!” Natalia exclaimed, eyes darting back inside. “I would love to, but I just…” she pointed over her shoulder, “I just made lunch for Rafe and Frank. They just got back from a hike out in the woods,” she explained, noticing as Olivia’s face fell.
“Hey,” Olivia tried to look happy, tried her hardest to look as if she was okay with Natalia not coming with her. After all she should have called beforehand. “It’s fine, Emma and I can just go have a picnic. No big deal,” Olivia shrugged.
And before Olivia could turn and race to her car and away, Natalia reached out and grabbed her hand, holding it firmly. “Hey, I’m sorry, Olivia.” Natalia whispered, lowering her voice so no one inside could overhear. “I want to go, really. I do. I just-“
“Can’t right now,” Olivia shrugged, wishing Natalia would let her go. “I get it.”
“Olivia,” Natalia sighed, impatiently.
“Have fun with him-them,” Olivia raised her eyebrows, looking Natalia straight in the eye. “It’s all right. I should have called. Okay?” Olivia tried to look convincingly all right with the situation.
Natalia gave her a quizzical look and finally sighed, “all right. Let’s have dinner. Sometime this week,” she pleaded.
Olivia got out of her grasp and began backing away, “yes, dinner. Sounds nice.” Olivia backed off the porch. “Bye,” she awkwardly waved.
“Bye.” Natalia had a sad, pained expression on her face as she watched Olivia return to her car.
“She’s not coming with us?” Emma small voice inquired from the backseat of Olivia’s car.
It caused the older woman to jump in her seat, having nearly forgotten her daughter was with her. She sniffed, masking unshed tears. “She can’t. Sorry Em,” Olivia shrugged.
And suddenly a new thought crossed her mind.
“I have another idea. Do you want to go visit Ashlee? Remember she babysat you that one time when Jane couldn’t come. Remember?” Olivia absently stated, knowing the exact person she needed to turn to. Though their last meeting had been less than amicable, Olivia knew that she needed her true ‘friend’ to talk this through.
~*~
Olivia rang the bell, fixing her hair in the window of the large stained glass windowed front door. The mayor had gotten rather excessive with her home, Olivia decided, impressed by the grandeur of the whole place. She hadn’t been over to the house in almost a year, when the mayor of Springfield had hosted a large gala fundraiser event.
It was no surprise that Doris Wolfe was home. She answered the door in jeans and a navy blue button up shirt. She looked, surprisingly, casual.
“Well hello there, Emma,” Doris greeted the girl warmly.
Olivia smiled, also surprised by Doris’ warmth towards her little girl. “We thought you might like some Chinese?” Olivia held up the bag of nearly cold Chinese food.
“She canceled on you?” Doris looked up into Olivia’s open eyes.
Olivia’s eyes widened, surprised that Doris could tell that just by a bag of Chinese food. But Olivia supposed it figured. She only seemed to run to Doris when her world with Natalia was falling apart.
Sadly nodding her head, Doris gave her a sympathetic look and opened her door wider, ushering the two Spencer’s in.
“Is Ashlee here?” Emma inquired as they walked down the expensive looking marble hallway towards the kitchen.
“Yes, I think she’s up in her room.” Doris stated. And after giving Emma directions on how to get to said room, Emma went darting off to explore the massive expanse of house and find her old one-time babysitter.
Olivia and Doris entered the sprawling kitchen that overlooked a beautiful pool followed by the thick forest. Doris looked nonplussed by the view as she made her way towards the couch that was in a little sitting area off the side of the kitchen. It appeared, by the upside down book on the coffee table and black framed glasses sitting next to it, that Doris had been reading. And a book on law, nonetheless, Olivia noted.
“Sit,” Doris instructed, watching as Olivia sat before taking a seat relatively near her.
Olivia began pulling out cartons of noodles and rice and chicken and beef and broccoli.
“Talk to me,” Doris sounded ever the business woman, even as she attempted to socialize. And for some reason it made Olivia feel at ease.
She talked and talked and told about everything. Everything that had happened. She let go of the doubts and fears she’d been holding in and by the time she’d finished talking she felt ten pounds lighter and for some reason at peace.
She found herself smiling at Doris.
Doris gave her an odd look as she twirled noodles around her chopsticks. “Why are you smiling?”
“I have no idea,” Olivia shrugged, biting a piece of orange chicken off her own chopsticks.
Doris withheld judgment and further comment on Olivia and Natalia’s relationship, not wishing for Olivia to run away as she had only night’s before. So instead of furthering the conversation, she reached out and stole a piece of orange chicken from Olivia, returning the odd smile. “Are you feeling better now?”
Olivia nodded. “Oddly, yes.”
“Good.”
And just then Ashlee and Emma appeared in the doorway. “Hey, Emma wants to go see that movie that I wanted to see last weekend. Would you care if I took her?”
Doris looked from her daughter to Olivia.
“Sure, why not?” Olivia smiled. “Here, let me give you some money.”
“No, I’ve got it.” Ashlee shrugged.
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah, we’ll be fine. Right Emma?”
“Right.”
“Okay have fun girls,” Doris chimed in.
Olivia and Doris watched the girls leave, Olivia turning to give Doris a rather ecstatic smile. “They’re getting along rather well.”
“Yes, perhaps you should further employ Ashlee as your babysitter as well.” Doris laughed.
“I might just keep her mind.” Olivia laughed, noticing that somehow the two of them had become closer in the last half-hour or so since Olivia had arrived.
Leaning back on the couch, Olivia extended her box of orange chicken out so that both she and Doris could eat from it.
As they ate, thoughts of Natalia came flooding back to Olivia. How the last real meal she’d had had been with Natalia. She wasn’t sure if this meal quite compared to her summer dinner with Natalia, but this was still rather nice.
And then the almost kiss flooded her senses and Olivia felt her stomach churn. She was no longer hungry. Shoving the box towards Doris, Olivia set down her chopsticks and pulled a pillow towards her chest.
Doris paused, wondering what had just gotten into Olivia. One minute she was fine and smiling and the next she was moping. “Okay Spencer, what is it?”
“It’s nothing,” Olivia waved her off.
Doris sighed, setting down her own chopsticks and orange chicken. “It is not nothing, Olivia.”
“We almost kissed,” Olivia sighed, playing with the tassels on the edge of the pillow.
“What?” Doris exclaimed. “We did?”
Olivia looked up at Doris, realizing her words had been random. She let a slight smile grace her features and she hit Doris with her pillow. “Not us, me and Natalia. We,” Olivia’s smile faded, “we almost kissed.”
“Oh,” Doris seemed to relax again. But then suddenly she frowned. Turning back towards Olivia’s face with a rather confused look clouding her own features, she quietly inquired, “you two haven’t even…”
“Nope. Not since...this all began anyway.”
“Not even…”
“Nooo,” Olivia groaned.
“Not…I mean,” Doris’ eyes widened as Olivia’s head firmly nodded from side to side. “Fuck.”
“Exactly.”
Doris fell back against the couch so that they were shoulder to shoulder. There was an awkward moment of silence in which Doris realized why Olivia was so extremely frustrated. She could see the no sex part of the Olivia/Natalia relationship, but the no kissing…it seemed implausible. Especially for Olivia.
“What’s it…like?” Olivia shyly inquired.
“What?” Doris’ mind was still reeling with the revelation.
“Kissing another woman?” Olivia stated, turning to look at Doris, breaking her from her contemplation of Olivia’s relationship which was devoid of physicality.
“You mean you’ve never…” Doris turned to meet Olivia’s eyes. “Oh come on Spencer, not even in college?” Olivia shook her head. “Nothing?”
“All boys.” Olivia shrugged.
“So you’ve never kissed a woman?”
“Correct, Mayor Wolfe. I think we’ve established this fact.” Olivia swallowed, a slight grin tugging at the edges of her lips.
“Well,” Doris exclaimed, “I certainly think you should try it sometime.”
“Should I?” Olivia laughed.
“Yes, you should. It’s very nice. Nothing at all like men,” Doris visually looked disgusted.
“What does it feel like?” Olivia pushed, wondering how she had gone so long without trying it.
“It’s soft.” Doris explained, looking momentarily as if she were recalling her own previous experience with women.
“How soft?” Olivia prodded.
“Very soft.” Doris grinned.
“Oh really?” Olivia laughed.
“Yes,” Doris nodded. “And it feels like, like…”
And suddenly blue collided with green and there was no stopping the unavoidable. Doris had something that Olivia needed. It was a sampling, an experiment. At least at first.
Lips hesitantly came together. Neither knew who initiated the kiss, but soft, pink lips moved together in an easy, slow motion. It was surprisingly sensual, not rough like all of Olivia’s past kisses had been. Doris was good, very good. She braced either side of Olivia’s face, holding her so that she could easily press her lips against the other woman, her tongue soon sliding between willingly parted lips. And soon Doris’ skill was easily matched by Olivia’s own, and it became like a teasing tug-of-war between them and it felt like hours passed before they let somewhat swollen lips part, leaning their foreheads together, breathless.
“That felt good.” Olivia breathed.
“It shouldn’t have happened.”
“No. It shouldn’t have.”
But neither moved from their contented spot.