Sleep is for the Dead, GL, Olivia/Natalia (Complete)
Title: Sleep is for the Dead
Authors: Fewthistle and DiNovia
Fandom: Guiding Light
Pairing: Olivia/Natalia
Rating: R
Archival: P&P, Kimly, and AUSXIP of course. Everyone else, please ask.
Spoilers: for 9/10/09
Summary: Pregnancy hormones + 18 months of sexual tension + Olivia Spencer in her bed = the Natalia that nobody knows.
Source Disclaimer: I do not own Guiding Light or the characters therein depicted. I do not seek to profit from this story.
A/N: Fewthistle told me this little plot bunny she'd been having. We then spent an hour laughing and coming up with the rest of this story. This is all Fewthistle, especially the best, best lines. I am just her overqualified typist. And very, very lucky to be that. Oh. And yes, I'm watching the show again. The bastards got me back.
Thank You: To fewthistle for telling me about this plot bunny, for giving me all the best lines, for trusting Tanked Muse and I to write it and, finally, for beta-ing this story. You are seriously the bestest friend a woman could ask for. Love you to pieces!
7:00am on the day after the move.
"Mama?"
One of Natalia Rivera's brown eyes popped open and attempted to focus on the little girl standing patiently next to her side of the bed. "Emma? Honey?" she whispered back, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. Not that there was much there to begin with. She felt like she'd only closed her eyes ten minutes ago. "Emma, we talked about this. Now that Mommy and I are sharing the same room, you're going to have to knock before you come in here, okay?"
"But I did knock, Mama," said Emma, grinning. "Nobody answered!"
"Oh." Natalia blushed a little. She and Olivia had been a little tied up a couple of minutes ago. Well, Olivia had been. Natalia surreptitiously looked at the bedposts to see if the scarves they'd been using were still there. They weren't. She breathed a very heartfelt sigh of relief. "Well, then. I'm sorry we didn't answer you. What did you need, Jellybean?"
"I was going to get myself some cereal and then take some bread out to the ducks," explained the little girl matter-of-factly. "But I don't know which bread is the stale bread. Can you come show me?"
Natalia looked over at Olivia, who seemed to be rather...unconscious. And extremely beautiful. Enticing, really. She bit her lip as she made some mental calculations. Then she smiled at Emma. "Sure, honey. Let me just tell your mother where we'll be, okay?"
Emma nodded happily. "Okay!"
Natalia leaned over and shook Olivia's shoulder. The older woman whimpered plaintively.
"Not again, Natalia. Have some pity," she mumbled, throwing an arm over her eyes. "I just need an hour of sleep. An hour. Please...."
Natalia chuckled. It was a sound with little empathy. "You have ten minutes. I'm going to get Emma some breakfast, show her which bread to feed the ducks, make a phone call, and then I'll be back."
"Bring me a sandwich, will ya?" said Olivia, turning over on her side. "I don't care what kind. Need sustenance."
Natalia leaned over and nipped at Olivia's throat, ignoring her orders. "Ten minutes," she repeated. Then she hopped out of bed, shrugged into her robe, and led Emma from the room.
"Ten minutes," murmured Olivia compliantly. She had just begun to snore lightly when both her eyes snapped open, a look of terror overtaking her features. "Ten minutes?"
She threw the covers off her legs and stumbled out of the bed, lurching toward the bedroom door. After five seconds of rattling and fumbling with the doorknob, she cried, "Don't any of the doors in this house have locks??"
She whirled to look at the rest of the room, eying the bedroom window speculatively, when she suddenly thought Bathrooms! The bathrooms have locks!
That was enough for her. She grabbed a pillow, her purse--she thought she might have some Tic Tacs in there somewhere--and her robe and locked herself in the master bath. Two minutes later, she was rather uncomfortably cradled in the claw foot bathtub, well on her way to snoring again. She never heard the doorknob rattle or the soft footsteps padding away.
Olivia was, in fact, dreaming. Dreaming of birds frying up bacon as they tweeted and chirped trilling little songs that seemed to go on and on and on--
"What?" she blurted, coming awake with a start. Her heart pounded in her chest. The trilling birds didn't stop singing. Then she realized the birds were actually her cell phone which was ringing off the proverbial hook. She grabbed the strap of her purse and dragged it across the bathroom floor, pulling her cell out of the interior blindly. She pressed the talk button viciously, opening her mouth to say something scathing only to be cut off by the caller.
"Get your ridiculously perfect ass out of that bathtub right now, Olivia Spencer, and open the bathroom door," said a very acerbic voice. "Your girlfriend is looking for you."
Olivia stared at the phone for a moment. "Doris?" she asked incredulously.
"This early in the morning, that's Mayor Wolfe. And yes, it's me. I've had enough of you already, Olivia, and it isn't even 8am. Unlock the door."
Olivia whimpered rather confusedly. "Why? Are you on the other side?"
"Don't be absurd! Natalia is on the other side. You remember her, don't you? Your girlfriend? The one we all helped you move in with yesterday? The woman who makes a mean arroz con pollo? Unlock the damned door already."
"But she wants to have sex again," whispered Olivia, looking nervously at the door, half expecting Natalia to burst through it, wearing a cape or something.
"OF COURSE SHE WANTS TO HAVE SEX AGAIN!" shouted the overwrought mayor, causing Olivia to jerk the phone away from her ear. "She's six months pregnant! She's been in love with you for months now without so much as a goddamned kiss! She finally gets you to agree to move back in with her and then she gets you in her bed for the first time ever! What did you think you'd be doing--macramé? Unlock the door."
"I need to sleep!" pleaded Olivia.
"Sleep is for the dead," countered Doris harshly. "You have a girlfriend and she wants to have sex with you more than once a week. Some of us are not so lucky. Unlock. The fucking. Door."
"But--" Olivia started, only to hear her friend slam down her phone on the other end. She disconnected the call and looked warily at the door, huddling at the bottom of the tub.
No way was she opening that door. Not until she'd had at least an hour of sleep.
She had just closed her eyes when her cell phone began to chirp again.
"Doris, please," she begged, only to be cut off by a very different voice.
"Olivia, it's Josh. Honey, get up and unlock the bathroom door, okay? Natalia would really like you to come out now."
"Once wasn't enough?" Olivia muttered darkly under her breath.
"What was that?" asked Josh.
"Nothing," replied the exhausted woman. "I can't unlock the door right now, Josh. I need to sleep. Just for an hour. That's all I'm asking for! Well, that and a sandwich. Maybe some bottled water."
"Anything else?" Josh's chuckle was as warm as it was amused.
"Not at the moment."
"Good," he replied, his voice sounding very patronizing. "If I promise you that Natalia will get those things for you, will you open the door?"
"No."
Josh sighed aggrievedly. "Why not?" he asked, trying to be patient. But really, it was way too early in the morning for his usual tolerance levels. He hadn't even had coffee yet.
"She'll say anything to get this door open. She's insatiable, Josh! We've been--"
"Yes, you can stop there, thank you. Any more and I'll have to start paying you $3.95 a minute. Open the door."
"Joshie," whined Olivia, trying a last ditch tactic. "I'm so tired...."
"You can sleep when you're dead." When that failed to move his ex-wife, he added, "Olivia, Natalia is just going to keep calling your fellow Springfieldians until you open the door. You know what that means, don't you, sweetheart? It means eventually she's going to get to Reva and then you'll never hear the end of it. I wouldn't be surprised if Reva took out a billboard with the words 'Open the damn door, Olivia!' emblazoned across it in twelve-foot high rainbow letters. So, please. For all our sakes. Open the door."
He hung up before she could respond.
Still, there was no way she was going to open the door. Ex-husband on the phone or not.
She settled back down in the tub and closed her eyes, jumping when her cell phone rang for the third time.
"Hello?" she said hesitantly.
"Olivia. Please. Open the door." Frank's voice was clipped and strained, as if he was maintaining tight control of a rabid dog.
"Frank, please listen--"
"I don't want to hear it!" he yelled. "I can take a lot, Olivia. Really, I think these past six months have proven that, don't you? I fell in love, got engaged, made it all the way to the altar and then--poof!--she ran off in the middle of her vows. Why'd she do that again? Lemme think.... Oh yeah! Because she realized she was in love with you!" He took a deep, calming breath. "It took me a while to get used to that. I'll admit it. I wasn't the most supportive person and I'm sorry about that. But then Natalia disappeared for a while and when she came back, she told me she was pregnant with my baby and I allowed myself to think for just one minute that things were finally going to go my way. Just a little bit! But no! Why is that? Oh yeah! Because Natalia has decided that she's going to raise my child with you! I'm just going to be the part-time daddy."
"Frank--"
"And you know, it took me a few days to get used to that, too, Olivia. But I was really starting to wrap my head around it when Natalia called me this morning. Do you know what she said, Olivia? Do you?" Frank's voice was rising higher the longer he spoke.
"Nooo...." said Olivia, shaking her head, dreading what his next words might be.
"She said 'Frank, please call Olivia and tell her to come out of the bathroom. I'm horny. I need to have sex now.'"
Olivia winced but said nothing. Really, what could she possibly say that wouldn't make that exponentially worse?
"She wants to have sex, Olivia," he continued, his voice becoming tighter and more strained with every word. "She wants to have sex with you! You, apparently, are falling down on the job. Open the door."
"But Frank, I really need to sleep--"
"No, you really need to open the door. Because I have had just about as much as one man can bear, Olivia. You want to sleep? Sleep when you're dead. There's a reason there are so many death-as-sleep metaphors. Death is very restful. You don't have time to rest right now. You have a job to do. And you'd better do it. Because when you do, she will stop calling me. Open the damn door."
"Frank--"
"Open the goddamned door, Olivia, before I open it for you."
He hung up. Olivia closed her eyes. Half of her wanted to drown herself in the tub. The other half wanted to let Frank shoot her. No part of her wanted to open the door.
She sank down against her pillow once again and was just about to drift off when her phone rang. She'd been expecting it this time and she stabbed the talk button with some force.
"Mother," said the very, very angry voice on the other end. "Do you have any idea what time it is here? It's 5:33am. I want you to get your sorry ass out of that goddamned bathtub right this instant and open the fucking door so your fucking girlfriend can fuck you already and I can go back to sleep in relative peace. Or as peaceful as three percocet can make me. Do you understand me?"
"Ava?"
"Yes, Mother, this is your elder daughter. Your elder daughter who lives in San Francisco. Where time is farther behind than in Springfield. Much farther behind. And yet the very first telephone call I get today comes at 5:23am and it comes from my brand-new step-mother, who is asking me to call my mother and convince her to come out of the bathroom so that she can resume having sex with her. Do you see what's wrong with this picture, Mother?"
Olivia took a deep breath. "Ava--"
"EVERYTHING is wrong with this picture, Mother! God himself isn't even up at this hour and yet your girlfriend calls me to tell me you've locked yourself in the bathroom to avoid your 'marital duties.' And then--AND THEN she mutters 'I shouldn't have untied her in the first place.' Mother? Mother, I don't care how much money you have. There isn't enough money in the whole fucking world to pay for the therapy I'm going to need after that. So fucking get up, fucking get out of that bathtub, and fucking open the door so your fucking girlfriend can fucking fuck you already!"
"I'm tired, Ava. I'm so tired. 'Sleep, sleep! Natalia has murdered sleep!'" she quoted, her eyes shutting practically of their own accord.
"If you're awake enough to quote Macbeth at me, Mother, you're awake enough to have sex with your girlfriend." Ava sighed as if she was arguing with a small child. "Listen, I'm only going to say this one more time. Open the door, Mother. Open the door or I will fly to Springfield on the next available flight, I will rent a car, I will purchase an axe, and I will come through the fucking door like Jack Nicholson in The Shining, okay?? And trust me, Mother, you do not want me to be armed when you see me next. Because I will tie you up myself and let her do whatever she wants with you. For however long she wants. You can sleep at your funeral. Consider yourself warned."
Ava hung up before Olivia could even say "I love you, too, honey!" Not that she was planning to say that, exactly.
The older woman sighed and dropped her phone in her lap. If Natalia was desperate enough to call Ava in San Francisco, then Reva wasn't far behind. There was also the horrific possibility that the next caller on Who Can Get Olivia To Open The Door? might be Father Ray and, honestly, Olivia thought her sex drive might be obliterated on the spot if that happened.
She levered herself out of the bathtub and crept to the door, pressing her ear to the distressed wood, hoping to hear whether or not Natalia was on the other side. She heard nothing.
Shrugging, she unlocked and opened the door. The bedroom was empty, but the most delicious smells were coming from downstairs. Olivia followed her nose straight into the kitchen where Natalia was just putting a plate of pancakes and bacon down on the table.
"You have five minutes to eat your breakfast, Olivia Spencer," said the brunette, not bothering to turn around. She retrieved a cup of coffee and put it at Olivia's place, too. "Make the most of it."
Before Natalia could get completely out of the room, however, Olivia tentatively asked, "What about Emma?"
Natalia gave her a very tolerant grin. "She's out feeding the ducks. Rafe is on his way over to pick her up. They're going to spend the day together! Doesn't that sound nice?" Then she narrowed her cinnamon cocoa eyes. "Five minutes."
She spun on her heel and headed up the stairs.
Olivia wasn't about let all that delicious food go to waste so she sat down to her breakfast, stuffing half a pancake into her mouth without even thinking about it. She was ravenous. She felt like she had never eaten in her entire life. She followed the pancake with a slice of bacon and a gulp of her coffee when she noticed a little statue of the Virgin Mary on the counter by the refrigerator. She rose and leaped for the little statuette, grabbing it up in greedy hands.
"Help me," she begged, looking into the tiny, blandly smiling face. "Please help me! I'll go to church! I'll confess my sins. All of them! But I need some sleep! Woman was not made to live on sex alone, ya know what I'm sayin'?" She chuckled self-consciously, thinking that no, actually, the Virgin Mary had no idea what Olivia was saying. Literally or figuratively. "Anyway, you know what I mean. I'm begging you. You've got to help me!"
She waited desperately for some sort of sign or something. Nothing happened.
After a minute, Natalia called down from upstairs. "You have 31 seconds, Olivia. Put the Virgin down and get up here."
Olivia glared at the statuette. "Thanks for nothing," she whispered, slamming the little piece of porcelain on the table. She grabbed her cup of coffee, dipped her fingertips in the still-warm liquid, and flicked droplets in her face. That would have to do as a pick-me-up. She climbed the stairs and entered their room as if walking to the gallows. When Natalia saw her, she lobbed a bottle of Gatorade at her. Olivia was so tired, she didn't even try to catch it. It hit her shoulder, bounced off, and landed on the floor with a thump, rolling a little bit.
"Better pick that up," advised Natalia, nesting amongst an obscene number of pillows propped up against the headboard. She was as naked as the day she'd been born and she was already lazily tugging at one nipple, grinning lasciviously at her lover. "You're going to need it," she promised.
Olivia could only whimper.
-----
The next day.
Doris Wolfe sat placidly at her desk, going over some councilman's proposal for a new stretch of sidewalk that was going to cost the city somewhere in the vicinity of $1 million. It was not the most subtle piece of pork-laden infrastructure improvement the mayor had ever seen and she really felt like laughing at the new and inexperienced councilman. If he thought for one minute that she'd let him get away with using materials from his brother-in-law's concrete and gravel company, well, he was just dumber than she thought he looked. She was reaching for the phone--intending to give said councilman a free lesson in humiliation--when it rang. She picked it up.
"Doris Wolfe," she said, her tone professional. She listened for a moment and then said, "Yes. Okay. I'll tell her." Then she hung up and went back to her paperwork.
"That was for you," she said to the half-asleep woman curled up in her visitor's chair. "It was Natalia. She says you need to be home in ten minutes and if you're not, she's going to send Frank over with a squad car."
Olivia just groaned piteously and reached under Doris' desk for her shoes.
-----
The day after that.
Olivia turned on her side, trying to get as comfortable as she could with a gear shift pressed against her knee. She was parked under a tree on a very sleepy little street very far away from the farmhouse. No one knew where she was. No one could possibly know. She'd told her staff she was going home. She'd told her girlfriend she was going to work. She'd turned off her cell phone. It was a foolproof plan. She was finally going to get three hours of blissful, uninterrupted sleep. She sighed happily and jammed her hand under her head.
Just before she fell asleep, though, she heard a tiny tap tap tap at her window.
She looked up to see Josh motioning for her to roll down her window, which she did.
"She has all five of your ex-husbands out hunting for you. You should be glad it was me and not Alan who found you. He wants your head on a platter."
"I'm sorry. Olivia is not here at the moment. She's sleeping for the first time in three days. If you'd like to leave a message, go fuck yourself." She rolled back over, intending to ignore Josh.
"I'm supposed to tell you that she has Reva on speed dial now. Something about bonding over babies recently at Company?"
"God fucking dammit."
She sat up.
-----
The day after that.
Now this? This was the life. Quiet. Dark. Relatively comfortable. And no one would think to look for her here. Olivia would finally be able to get a couple of hours of shuteye. More if she was lucky. She let the rumbly background noises from the next set over sing her to sleep. She had just started dreaming about being in a restful little coma when something nudged her leg. She opened one sleepy green eye only to see Dinah Marler and Ashlee Wolfe standing over her with nearly identical grins.
"Hi there, Ollie," said Dinah gamely. "Comfy?" Ashlee waved jovially but said nothing.
"Name your price," Olivia said desperately.
"Excuse me?"
"Name your price. I need three hours of sleep. You own this desk that I'm hiding under. How much is it going to cost me?"
Dinah smiled, hoping that it conveyed a sense of sympathy. She doubted it was working. "Normally, I'd find that an offer I wouldn't be able to refuse," she said. "But Natalia called. She told me to tell you that she's on her way to pick you up. I told her I wasn't even aware that you were at the station. She just laughed and hung up. And look! Here you are!"
Olivia closed her eyes. "Goddammit!" she cried, exasperated. "She must have me tagged or something. I'm just too tired to find it!"
"Too tired from what?" asked Ashlee innocently. Olivia pinned her with a malignant emerald gaze.
"From the sex, Ashlee. The endless, hot, lesbian sex. I haven't slept in four days. Not since I moved back to the farmhouse. I'm exhausted. I'm probably dehydrated. I think I'm getting carpal tunnel in my right wrist. All from the fucking sex, okay?!"
"Ooh, redundant," scolded Dinah, wagging a finger at her friend. "'Fucking sex.' Very redundant."
"I could lend you my wrist splints," offered Ashlee kindly. She smiled hopefully, her natural desire to help people somehow squelching her innate instinct for self-preservation.
"Stop. Talking. To. Me." Olivia groaned and rolled onto her knees, pushing herself upright and into a standing position with no small difficulty. "I'll just wait out front for my keeper."
-----
The day after that.
Olivia Spencer, wild-eyed and unsteady on her feet, walked into the Springfield Police Department and up to Frank Cooper, grabbed him by the lapels of his bark brown jacket and said, "Arrest me."
"What?" said Frank, none too pleased to see the woman who was sharing his ex-fiance's bed.
"Arrest me. For the love of God, Frank, arrest me!" She shook him, her knuckles white where they gripped his jacket.
"For what?"
"I don't care. Tell them I don't pay my taxes. Tell them you caught me jaywalking. Tell them you caught me jaywalking naked. I mean, that wouldn't be far from the truth, would it?" She laughed but it was a laugh one usually heard from someone wearing a straitjacket. "I don't even wear underwear anymore," she explained. "After all, what would be the point?"
"Olivia--"
"Frank, please. I'm desperate. I haven't slept in five days. I walk funny, my right hand is numb, and I don't care if that's too much information for you and your wussy little police department! You have a cell with a bed in it. I want to be in that cell. What do I have to do? Because I'll do anything. I'll kill someone if you want me to. I'll kill you if you want me to. I can do it with your tie." She grabbed his ugly navy tie with the purple stripes and started cinching it around his neck. His eyes started to bulge out of his head. "Please, Frank. Arrest me. For three hours. Just arrest me for three hours."
"Mallet," he gasped, trying to wrench Olivia's hands off his tie. "Mal...let. A...little help...here.... Mal...urghhh...."
-----
Three weeks later.
Olivia Spencer shuffled through Springfield's little corner market. At random intervals she dropped an item in her basket, not really looking at it, just plopping it in with the rest of what she was buying. Her eyes were sunken. Her skin was pallid. Her clothes, normally form-fitting, hung loosely on her body. Her hair wasn't as lustrous as usual. In short, Reva had never seen the bitch look better.
"Well, hello there, Olivia. Fancy meeting you here."
Olivia's green eyes focused on Reva O'Neill with some difficulty. She said nothing.
"My. Aren't you looking pale and drawn. And what have we here?" Reva looked into Olivia's basket only to see iced coffee drinks, bottled water, ten cans of Red Bull, and a variety of energy shots and pills. "You and the sorority planning an all-nighter?"
"Fuck you, Reva," said Olivia dully. "You wouldn't understand."
"Oh?" One of Reva's brows arched high over her eye. "Try me. What's got you looking like the Crypt Keeper's wife?"
"Natalia. Natalia's done this to me. I haven't slept in weeks. I've lost count of how many. I hardly get to eat. I drink only this." She raised her basket to indicate its contents. "I'm wasting away. And the hell of it is, she hasn't slept either, but every morning she looks like a goddamn goddess while I look like something that the cat refused to drag in. Reva, I'm going to die. I'm being fucked to death by Mary Poppins."
Reva O'Neill blinked once and then burst into long peals of raucous laughter, doubling over with it, wiping her eyes as streams of tears flowed from them. "Oh, my God!" she squawked, trying to catch her breath. "Natalia Rivera? Catholic saint of Springfield? Is fucking you to death? Priceless!"
"If I can just make it one more week," said Olivia, looking as if she could see the Promised Land in the distance. "Just one more week. Everything will be fine."
"What happens in a week?"
"She'll be in the third trimester. She'll lose interest in sex."
"Oh, really. And who told you that?"
Olivia's look of happiness faltered. "Personal experience?" she squeaked, terror licking at the irises of her eyes.
"Maybe for you that was true. But I've had how many kids? Five?" Reva counted on her fingers, looking up at the ceiling for a moment. "Yeah, five. Anyway, I wanted sex all the way until the day those puppies popped out. Except with Colin, of course."
"That's what you get for making an omelet with expired eggs," quipped Olivia. Reva regarded her coldly.
"All I'm saying is that what was true for you may not be true for Natalia. What will you do if she still wants sex next week?"
"I'll shoot you," deadpanned Olivia. "I'll be so sleep-deprived that I'll plead insanity and I'll win. They'll send me to Ravenwood where some nice Nurse Ratched will give me a tranquilizer and I will finally, finally get some fucking sleep! Now if you'll excuse me," she said, straightening herself as best as she could, "I have to go pay for these so I can get home to my wife. Who loves me very much. Even if she is trying to kill me."
Olivia turned and headed toward the cash register.
"This is payback, you know that, right?" called Reva after her. "For all those years you used sex as a weapon? Natalia is finally meting out Springfield's revenge!"
"Fuck you, Reva," said Olivia, shooting her the one-fingered salute. "Go home and try to figure out how you're going to explain to Colin why you're living in a nursing home before he goes on his first date."
"You should talk," retorted the blonde. "That baby Natalia is carrying has seen your fingers so often she'll be able to recognize you by your fingerprints!"
"Drop dead, Reva."
"You first, dearest!" sang Reva, waving daintily at Olivia's retreating back. Olivia suddenly stopped and turned, her grin looking more like a grimace.
"I can't die," she said, laughing hollowly. "Don't you know? Sleep is for the dead. And I'm not allowed to sleep." She turned back around, picked up her purchases, and walked out of the shop in as dignified a manner as she could manage.
"And if Natalia has her way," whispered Reva, her eyes twinkling with a warm smile, "you'll live forever, Olivia Spencer." She sighed, thinking of Jeffrey, her heart aching.
"Make the most of it, kiddo," she added. "In the end, you're not going to say 'I wish I'd slept more.'"
fin
-----
Thank you, Fewthistle! This was an absolute blast to write!
Comments are love!
DiNovia
Authors: Fewthistle and DiNovia
Fandom: Guiding Light
Pairing: Olivia/Natalia
Rating: R
Archival: P&P, Kimly, and AUSXIP of course. Everyone else, please ask.
Spoilers: for 9/10/09
Summary: Pregnancy hormones + 18 months of sexual tension + Olivia Spencer in her bed = the Natalia that nobody knows.
Source Disclaimer: I do not own Guiding Light or the characters therein depicted. I do not seek to profit from this story.
A/N: Fewthistle told me this little plot bunny she'd been having. We then spent an hour laughing and coming up with the rest of this story. This is all Fewthistle, especially the best, best lines. I am just her overqualified typist. And very, very lucky to be that. Oh. And yes, I'm watching the show again. The bastards got me back.
Thank You: To fewthistle for telling me about this plot bunny, for giving me all the best lines, for trusting Tanked Muse and I to write it and, finally, for beta-ing this story. You are seriously the bestest friend a woman could ask for. Love you to pieces!
7:00am on the day after the move.
"Mama?"
One of Natalia Rivera's brown eyes popped open and attempted to focus on the little girl standing patiently next to her side of the bed. "Emma? Honey?" she whispered back, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes. Not that there was much there to begin with. She felt like she'd only closed her eyes ten minutes ago. "Emma, we talked about this. Now that Mommy and I are sharing the same room, you're going to have to knock before you come in here, okay?"
"But I did knock, Mama," said Emma, grinning. "Nobody answered!"
"Oh." Natalia blushed a little. She and Olivia had been a little tied up a couple of minutes ago. Well, Olivia had been. Natalia surreptitiously looked at the bedposts to see if the scarves they'd been using were still there. They weren't. She breathed a very heartfelt sigh of relief. "Well, then. I'm sorry we didn't answer you. What did you need, Jellybean?"
"I was going to get myself some cereal and then take some bread out to the ducks," explained the little girl matter-of-factly. "But I don't know which bread is the stale bread. Can you come show me?"
Natalia looked over at Olivia, who seemed to be rather...unconscious. And extremely beautiful. Enticing, really. She bit her lip as she made some mental calculations. Then she smiled at Emma. "Sure, honey. Let me just tell your mother where we'll be, okay?"
Emma nodded happily. "Okay!"
Natalia leaned over and shook Olivia's shoulder. The older woman whimpered plaintively.
"Not again, Natalia. Have some pity," she mumbled, throwing an arm over her eyes. "I just need an hour of sleep. An hour. Please...."
Natalia chuckled. It was a sound with little empathy. "You have ten minutes. I'm going to get Emma some breakfast, show her which bread to feed the ducks, make a phone call, and then I'll be back."
"Bring me a sandwich, will ya?" said Olivia, turning over on her side. "I don't care what kind. Need sustenance."
Natalia leaned over and nipped at Olivia's throat, ignoring her orders. "Ten minutes," she repeated. Then she hopped out of bed, shrugged into her robe, and led Emma from the room.
"Ten minutes," murmured Olivia compliantly. She had just begun to snore lightly when both her eyes snapped open, a look of terror overtaking her features. "Ten minutes?"
She threw the covers off her legs and stumbled out of the bed, lurching toward the bedroom door. After five seconds of rattling and fumbling with the doorknob, she cried, "Don't any of the doors in this house have locks??"
She whirled to look at the rest of the room, eying the bedroom window speculatively, when she suddenly thought Bathrooms! The bathrooms have locks!
That was enough for her. She grabbed a pillow, her purse--she thought she might have some Tic Tacs in there somewhere--and her robe and locked herself in the master bath. Two minutes later, she was rather uncomfortably cradled in the claw foot bathtub, well on her way to snoring again. She never heard the doorknob rattle or the soft footsteps padding away.
Olivia was, in fact, dreaming. Dreaming of birds frying up bacon as they tweeted and chirped trilling little songs that seemed to go on and on and on--
"What?" she blurted, coming awake with a start. Her heart pounded in her chest. The trilling birds didn't stop singing. Then she realized the birds were actually her cell phone which was ringing off the proverbial hook. She grabbed the strap of her purse and dragged it across the bathroom floor, pulling her cell out of the interior blindly. She pressed the talk button viciously, opening her mouth to say something scathing only to be cut off by the caller.
"Get your ridiculously perfect ass out of that bathtub right now, Olivia Spencer, and open the bathroom door," said a very acerbic voice. "Your girlfriend is looking for you."
Olivia stared at the phone for a moment. "Doris?" she asked incredulously.
"This early in the morning, that's Mayor Wolfe. And yes, it's me. I've had enough of you already, Olivia, and it isn't even 8am. Unlock the door."
Olivia whimpered rather confusedly. "Why? Are you on the other side?"
"Don't be absurd! Natalia is on the other side. You remember her, don't you? Your girlfriend? The one we all helped you move in with yesterday? The woman who makes a mean arroz con pollo? Unlock the damned door already."
"But she wants to have sex again," whispered Olivia, looking nervously at the door, half expecting Natalia to burst through it, wearing a cape or something.
"OF COURSE SHE WANTS TO HAVE SEX AGAIN!" shouted the overwrought mayor, causing Olivia to jerk the phone away from her ear. "She's six months pregnant! She's been in love with you for months now without so much as a goddamned kiss! She finally gets you to agree to move back in with her and then she gets you in her bed for the first time ever! What did you think you'd be doing--macramé? Unlock the door."
"I need to sleep!" pleaded Olivia.
"Sleep is for the dead," countered Doris harshly. "You have a girlfriend and she wants to have sex with you more than once a week. Some of us are not so lucky. Unlock. The fucking. Door."
"But--" Olivia started, only to hear her friend slam down her phone on the other end. She disconnected the call and looked warily at the door, huddling at the bottom of the tub.
No way was she opening that door. Not until she'd had at least an hour of sleep.
She had just closed her eyes when her cell phone began to chirp again.
"Doris, please," she begged, only to be cut off by a very different voice.
"Olivia, it's Josh. Honey, get up and unlock the bathroom door, okay? Natalia would really like you to come out now."
"Once wasn't enough?" Olivia muttered darkly under her breath.
"What was that?" asked Josh.
"Nothing," replied the exhausted woman. "I can't unlock the door right now, Josh. I need to sleep. Just for an hour. That's all I'm asking for! Well, that and a sandwich. Maybe some bottled water."
"Anything else?" Josh's chuckle was as warm as it was amused.
"Not at the moment."
"Good," he replied, his voice sounding very patronizing. "If I promise you that Natalia will get those things for you, will you open the door?"
"No."
Josh sighed aggrievedly. "Why not?" he asked, trying to be patient. But really, it was way too early in the morning for his usual tolerance levels. He hadn't even had coffee yet.
"She'll say anything to get this door open. She's insatiable, Josh! We've been--"
"Yes, you can stop there, thank you. Any more and I'll have to start paying you $3.95 a minute. Open the door."
"Joshie," whined Olivia, trying a last ditch tactic. "I'm so tired...."
"You can sleep when you're dead." When that failed to move his ex-wife, he added, "Olivia, Natalia is just going to keep calling your fellow Springfieldians until you open the door. You know what that means, don't you, sweetheart? It means eventually she's going to get to Reva and then you'll never hear the end of it. I wouldn't be surprised if Reva took out a billboard with the words 'Open the damn door, Olivia!' emblazoned across it in twelve-foot high rainbow letters. So, please. For all our sakes. Open the door."
He hung up before she could respond.
Still, there was no way she was going to open the door. Ex-husband on the phone or not.
She settled back down in the tub and closed her eyes, jumping when her cell phone rang for the third time.
"Hello?" she said hesitantly.
"Olivia. Please. Open the door." Frank's voice was clipped and strained, as if he was maintaining tight control of a rabid dog.
"Frank, please listen--"
"I don't want to hear it!" he yelled. "I can take a lot, Olivia. Really, I think these past six months have proven that, don't you? I fell in love, got engaged, made it all the way to the altar and then--poof!--she ran off in the middle of her vows. Why'd she do that again? Lemme think.... Oh yeah! Because she realized she was in love with you!" He took a deep, calming breath. "It took me a while to get used to that. I'll admit it. I wasn't the most supportive person and I'm sorry about that. But then Natalia disappeared for a while and when she came back, she told me she was pregnant with my baby and I allowed myself to think for just one minute that things were finally going to go my way. Just a little bit! But no! Why is that? Oh yeah! Because Natalia has decided that she's going to raise my child with you! I'm just going to be the part-time daddy."
"Frank--"
"And you know, it took me a few days to get used to that, too, Olivia. But I was really starting to wrap my head around it when Natalia called me this morning. Do you know what she said, Olivia? Do you?" Frank's voice was rising higher the longer he spoke.
"Nooo...." said Olivia, shaking her head, dreading what his next words might be.
"She said 'Frank, please call Olivia and tell her to come out of the bathroom. I'm horny. I need to have sex now.'"
Olivia winced but said nothing. Really, what could she possibly say that wouldn't make that exponentially worse?
"She wants to have sex, Olivia," he continued, his voice becoming tighter and more strained with every word. "She wants to have sex with you! You, apparently, are falling down on the job. Open the door."
"But Frank, I really need to sleep--"
"No, you really need to open the door. Because I have had just about as much as one man can bear, Olivia. You want to sleep? Sleep when you're dead. There's a reason there are so many death-as-sleep metaphors. Death is very restful. You don't have time to rest right now. You have a job to do. And you'd better do it. Because when you do, she will stop calling me. Open the damn door."
"Frank--"
"Open the goddamned door, Olivia, before I open it for you."
He hung up. Olivia closed her eyes. Half of her wanted to drown herself in the tub. The other half wanted to let Frank shoot her. No part of her wanted to open the door.
She sank down against her pillow once again and was just about to drift off when her phone rang. She'd been expecting it this time and she stabbed the talk button with some force.
"Mother," said the very, very angry voice on the other end. "Do you have any idea what time it is here? It's 5:33am. I want you to get your sorry ass out of that goddamned bathtub right this instant and open the fucking door so your fucking girlfriend can fuck you already and I can go back to sleep in relative peace. Or as peaceful as three percocet can make me. Do you understand me?"
"Ava?"
"Yes, Mother, this is your elder daughter. Your elder daughter who lives in San Francisco. Where time is farther behind than in Springfield. Much farther behind. And yet the very first telephone call I get today comes at 5:23am and it comes from my brand-new step-mother, who is asking me to call my mother and convince her to come out of the bathroom so that she can resume having sex with her. Do you see what's wrong with this picture, Mother?"
Olivia took a deep breath. "Ava--"
"EVERYTHING is wrong with this picture, Mother! God himself isn't even up at this hour and yet your girlfriend calls me to tell me you've locked yourself in the bathroom to avoid your 'marital duties.' And then--AND THEN she mutters 'I shouldn't have untied her in the first place.' Mother? Mother, I don't care how much money you have. There isn't enough money in the whole fucking world to pay for the therapy I'm going to need after that. So fucking get up, fucking get out of that bathtub, and fucking open the door so your fucking girlfriend can fucking fuck you already!"
"I'm tired, Ava. I'm so tired. 'Sleep, sleep! Natalia has murdered sleep!'" she quoted, her eyes shutting practically of their own accord.
"If you're awake enough to quote Macbeth at me, Mother, you're awake enough to have sex with your girlfriend." Ava sighed as if she was arguing with a small child. "Listen, I'm only going to say this one more time. Open the door, Mother. Open the door or I will fly to Springfield on the next available flight, I will rent a car, I will purchase an axe, and I will come through the fucking door like Jack Nicholson in The Shining, okay?? And trust me, Mother, you do not want me to be armed when you see me next. Because I will tie you up myself and let her do whatever she wants with you. For however long she wants. You can sleep at your funeral. Consider yourself warned."
Ava hung up before Olivia could even say "I love you, too, honey!" Not that she was planning to say that, exactly.
The older woman sighed and dropped her phone in her lap. If Natalia was desperate enough to call Ava in San Francisco, then Reva wasn't far behind. There was also the horrific possibility that the next caller on Who Can Get Olivia To Open The Door? might be Father Ray and, honestly, Olivia thought her sex drive might be obliterated on the spot if that happened.
She levered herself out of the bathtub and crept to the door, pressing her ear to the distressed wood, hoping to hear whether or not Natalia was on the other side. She heard nothing.
Shrugging, she unlocked and opened the door. The bedroom was empty, but the most delicious smells were coming from downstairs. Olivia followed her nose straight into the kitchen where Natalia was just putting a plate of pancakes and bacon down on the table.
"You have five minutes to eat your breakfast, Olivia Spencer," said the brunette, not bothering to turn around. She retrieved a cup of coffee and put it at Olivia's place, too. "Make the most of it."
Before Natalia could get completely out of the room, however, Olivia tentatively asked, "What about Emma?"
Natalia gave her a very tolerant grin. "She's out feeding the ducks. Rafe is on his way over to pick her up. They're going to spend the day together! Doesn't that sound nice?" Then she narrowed her cinnamon cocoa eyes. "Five minutes."
She spun on her heel and headed up the stairs.
Olivia wasn't about let all that delicious food go to waste so she sat down to her breakfast, stuffing half a pancake into her mouth without even thinking about it. She was ravenous. She felt like she had never eaten in her entire life. She followed the pancake with a slice of bacon and a gulp of her coffee when she noticed a little statue of the Virgin Mary on the counter by the refrigerator. She rose and leaped for the little statuette, grabbing it up in greedy hands.
"Help me," she begged, looking into the tiny, blandly smiling face. "Please help me! I'll go to church! I'll confess my sins. All of them! But I need some sleep! Woman was not made to live on sex alone, ya know what I'm sayin'?" She chuckled self-consciously, thinking that no, actually, the Virgin Mary had no idea what Olivia was saying. Literally or figuratively. "Anyway, you know what I mean. I'm begging you. You've got to help me!"
She waited desperately for some sort of sign or something. Nothing happened.
After a minute, Natalia called down from upstairs. "You have 31 seconds, Olivia. Put the Virgin down and get up here."
Olivia glared at the statuette. "Thanks for nothing," she whispered, slamming the little piece of porcelain on the table. She grabbed her cup of coffee, dipped her fingertips in the still-warm liquid, and flicked droplets in her face. That would have to do as a pick-me-up. She climbed the stairs and entered their room as if walking to the gallows. When Natalia saw her, she lobbed a bottle of Gatorade at her. Olivia was so tired, she didn't even try to catch it. It hit her shoulder, bounced off, and landed on the floor with a thump, rolling a little bit.
"Better pick that up," advised Natalia, nesting amongst an obscene number of pillows propped up against the headboard. She was as naked as the day she'd been born and she was already lazily tugging at one nipple, grinning lasciviously at her lover. "You're going to need it," she promised.
Olivia could only whimper.
-----
The next day.
Doris Wolfe sat placidly at her desk, going over some councilman's proposal for a new stretch of sidewalk that was going to cost the city somewhere in the vicinity of $1 million. It was not the most subtle piece of pork-laden infrastructure improvement the mayor had ever seen and she really felt like laughing at the new and inexperienced councilman. If he thought for one minute that she'd let him get away with using materials from his brother-in-law's concrete and gravel company, well, he was just dumber than she thought he looked. She was reaching for the phone--intending to give said councilman a free lesson in humiliation--when it rang. She picked it up.
"Doris Wolfe," she said, her tone professional. She listened for a moment and then said, "Yes. Okay. I'll tell her." Then she hung up and went back to her paperwork.
"That was for you," she said to the half-asleep woman curled up in her visitor's chair. "It was Natalia. She says you need to be home in ten minutes and if you're not, she's going to send Frank over with a squad car."
Olivia just groaned piteously and reached under Doris' desk for her shoes.
-----
The day after that.
Olivia turned on her side, trying to get as comfortable as she could with a gear shift pressed against her knee. She was parked under a tree on a very sleepy little street very far away from the farmhouse. No one knew where she was. No one could possibly know. She'd told her staff she was going home. She'd told her girlfriend she was going to work. She'd turned off her cell phone. It was a foolproof plan. She was finally going to get three hours of blissful, uninterrupted sleep. She sighed happily and jammed her hand under her head.
Just before she fell asleep, though, she heard a tiny tap tap tap at her window.
She looked up to see Josh motioning for her to roll down her window, which she did.
"She has all five of your ex-husbands out hunting for you. You should be glad it was me and not Alan who found you. He wants your head on a platter."
"I'm sorry. Olivia is not here at the moment. She's sleeping for the first time in three days. If you'd like to leave a message, go fuck yourself." She rolled back over, intending to ignore Josh.
"I'm supposed to tell you that she has Reva on speed dial now. Something about bonding over babies recently at Company?"
"God fucking dammit."
She sat up.
-----
The day after that.
Now this? This was the life. Quiet. Dark. Relatively comfortable. And no one would think to look for her here. Olivia would finally be able to get a couple of hours of shuteye. More if she was lucky. She let the rumbly background noises from the next set over sing her to sleep. She had just started dreaming about being in a restful little coma when something nudged her leg. She opened one sleepy green eye only to see Dinah Marler and Ashlee Wolfe standing over her with nearly identical grins.
"Hi there, Ollie," said Dinah gamely. "Comfy?" Ashlee waved jovially but said nothing.
"Name your price," Olivia said desperately.
"Excuse me?"
"Name your price. I need three hours of sleep. You own this desk that I'm hiding under. How much is it going to cost me?"
Dinah smiled, hoping that it conveyed a sense of sympathy. She doubted it was working. "Normally, I'd find that an offer I wouldn't be able to refuse," she said. "But Natalia called. She told me to tell you that she's on her way to pick you up. I told her I wasn't even aware that you were at the station. She just laughed and hung up. And look! Here you are!"
Olivia closed her eyes. "Goddammit!" she cried, exasperated. "She must have me tagged or something. I'm just too tired to find it!"
"Too tired from what?" asked Ashlee innocently. Olivia pinned her with a malignant emerald gaze.
"From the sex, Ashlee. The endless, hot, lesbian sex. I haven't slept in four days. Not since I moved back to the farmhouse. I'm exhausted. I'm probably dehydrated. I think I'm getting carpal tunnel in my right wrist. All from the fucking sex, okay?!"
"Ooh, redundant," scolded Dinah, wagging a finger at her friend. "'Fucking sex.' Very redundant."
"I could lend you my wrist splints," offered Ashlee kindly. She smiled hopefully, her natural desire to help people somehow squelching her innate instinct for self-preservation.
"Stop. Talking. To. Me." Olivia groaned and rolled onto her knees, pushing herself upright and into a standing position with no small difficulty. "I'll just wait out front for my keeper."
-----
The day after that.
Olivia Spencer, wild-eyed and unsteady on her feet, walked into the Springfield Police Department and up to Frank Cooper, grabbed him by the lapels of his bark brown jacket and said, "Arrest me."
"What?" said Frank, none too pleased to see the woman who was sharing his ex-fiance's bed.
"Arrest me. For the love of God, Frank, arrest me!" She shook him, her knuckles white where they gripped his jacket.
"For what?"
"I don't care. Tell them I don't pay my taxes. Tell them you caught me jaywalking. Tell them you caught me jaywalking naked. I mean, that wouldn't be far from the truth, would it?" She laughed but it was a laugh one usually heard from someone wearing a straitjacket. "I don't even wear underwear anymore," she explained. "After all, what would be the point?"
"Olivia--"
"Frank, please. I'm desperate. I haven't slept in five days. I walk funny, my right hand is numb, and I don't care if that's too much information for you and your wussy little police department! You have a cell with a bed in it. I want to be in that cell. What do I have to do? Because I'll do anything. I'll kill someone if you want me to. I'll kill you if you want me to. I can do it with your tie." She grabbed his ugly navy tie with the purple stripes and started cinching it around his neck. His eyes started to bulge out of his head. "Please, Frank. Arrest me. For three hours. Just arrest me for three hours."
"Mallet," he gasped, trying to wrench Olivia's hands off his tie. "Mal...let. A...little help...here.... Mal...urghhh...."
-----
Three weeks later.
Olivia Spencer shuffled through Springfield's little corner market. At random intervals she dropped an item in her basket, not really looking at it, just plopping it in with the rest of what she was buying. Her eyes were sunken. Her skin was pallid. Her clothes, normally form-fitting, hung loosely on her body. Her hair wasn't as lustrous as usual. In short, Reva had never seen the bitch look better.
"Well, hello there, Olivia. Fancy meeting you here."
Olivia's green eyes focused on Reva O'Neill with some difficulty. She said nothing.
"My. Aren't you looking pale and drawn. And what have we here?" Reva looked into Olivia's basket only to see iced coffee drinks, bottled water, ten cans of Red Bull, and a variety of energy shots and pills. "You and the sorority planning an all-nighter?"
"Fuck you, Reva," said Olivia dully. "You wouldn't understand."
"Oh?" One of Reva's brows arched high over her eye. "Try me. What's got you looking like the Crypt Keeper's wife?"
"Natalia. Natalia's done this to me. I haven't slept in weeks. I've lost count of how many. I hardly get to eat. I drink only this." She raised her basket to indicate its contents. "I'm wasting away. And the hell of it is, she hasn't slept either, but every morning she looks like a goddamn goddess while I look like something that the cat refused to drag in. Reva, I'm going to die. I'm being fucked to death by Mary Poppins."
Reva O'Neill blinked once and then burst into long peals of raucous laughter, doubling over with it, wiping her eyes as streams of tears flowed from them. "Oh, my God!" she squawked, trying to catch her breath. "Natalia Rivera? Catholic saint of Springfield? Is fucking you to death? Priceless!"
"If I can just make it one more week," said Olivia, looking as if she could see the Promised Land in the distance. "Just one more week. Everything will be fine."
"What happens in a week?"
"She'll be in the third trimester. She'll lose interest in sex."
"Oh, really. And who told you that?"
Olivia's look of happiness faltered. "Personal experience?" she squeaked, terror licking at the irises of her eyes.
"Maybe for you that was true. But I've had how many kids? Five?" Reva counted on her fingers, looking up at the ceiling for a moment. "Yeah, five. Anyway, I wanted sex all the way until the day those puppies popped out. Except with Colin, of course."
"That's what you get for making an omelet with expired eggs," quipped Olivia. Reva regarded her coldly.
"All I'm saying is that what was true for you may not be true for Natalia. What will you do if she still wants sex next week?"
"I'll shoot you," deadpanned Olivia. "I'll be so sleep-deprived that I'll plead insanity and I'll win. They'll send me to Ravenwood where some nice Nurse Ratched will give me a tranquilizer and I will finally, finally get some fucking sleep! Now if you'll excuse me," she said, straightening herself as best as she could, "I have to go pay for these so I can get home to my wife. Who loves me very much. Even if she is trying to kill me."
Olivia turned and headed toward the cash register.
"This is payback, you know that, right?" called Reva after her. "For all those years you used sex as a weapon? Natalia is finally meting out Springfield's revenge!"
"Fuck you, Reva," said Olivia, shooting her the one-fingered salute. "Go home and try to figure out how you're going to explain to Colin why you're living in a nursing home before he goes on his first date."
"You should talk," retorted the blonde. "That baby Natalia is carrying has seen your fingers so often she'll be able to recognize you by your fingerprints!"
"Drop dead, Reva."
"You first, dearest!" sang Reva, waving daintily at Olivia's retreating back. Olivia suddenly stopped and turned, her grin looking more like a grimace.
"I can't die," she said, laughing hollowly. "Don't you know? Sleep is for the dead. And I'm not allowed to sleep." She turned back around, picked up her purchases, and walked out of the shop in as dignified a manner as she could manage.
"And if Natalia has her way," whispered Reva, her eyes twinkling with a warm smile, "you'll live forever, Olivia Spencer." She sighed, thinking of Jeffrey, her heart aching.
"Make the most of it, kiddo," she added. "In the end, you're not going to say 'I wish I'd slept more.'"
fin
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Thank you, Fewthistle! This was an absolute blast to write!
Comments are love!
DiNovia