LAO/LAO:TBJ Serena/Tracey fics
Stations of Joy
Fewthistle
Serena Southerlyn/Tracey Kibre (LAO and LAO:TBJ)
Rating: G to hard R
Archive: Ralst, if you want them, they're yours
Words: No idea. A lot.
A/N: First and last lines of all the ficlets written by the ever brilliant flying_peanuts. My eternal thanks.
A/N #2: These are all of the vignettes of Serena Southerlyn and Tracey Kibre that I wrote for even_angels_. They are little glimpses of an ongoing life, set in between, or after, or at the same time as my Between Bombay series featuring the same two. Take your pick. Except Breathe Me, which really should be part of the series, say as part number six, but gets ahead of itself. Oh, well. Enjoy. I don't know that anyone will even care to read these, but I was encouraged by racethewind10 and since I have nagged and threatened her all week, it seemed only fair.
Stations of Joy
Fewthistle
Serena Southerlyn (LAO) and Tracey Kibre (LAO:TBJ)
Rating: PG to R
Vignettes
First and last lines of all of these pieces by the brilliant Flying Peanuts
Attention to Detail
Seven floors, a thousand steps: everything in life is merely a matter of perspective. Serena knew this. She knew that life is measured in moments, in minutes, in miles. Dolled out with childrens’ sticky hands, with the dry, aged skin of a grandmother’s cheek, with the blood-boiling touch of a lover’s caress. Love in all of its comical, vaguely grotesque forms. We just have to learn to alter our perspective sometimes, in order to see it.
Serena knew that Tracey truly cared for her. Tracey had shown it in a thousand small gestures; in a morning cup of coffee, waiting for Serena on the bathroom counter as she climbed groggily out of the shower.
In a shared tub of popcorn, slathered with what the movie theaters euphemistically called “butter”, despite Tracey’s disdain for the “artery clogging wonder that is hydrogenated oil”.
In the last piece of the Entenmann’s raspberry danish that Tracey had been saving for a midnight snack, tucked safely in a baggie in Serena’s coat pocket.
Tracey had shown her feelings in a hundred everyday looks, smiles, caresses. But never in three little words. The three little words.
For months, Serena had craved those three words, felt the need for them of a dying man in the desert for a drop of water. She had looked for them so hard, her vision narrowed on one spot, that she had almost been blinded to the hundreds of other things that spoke Tracey’s love. The forest for the trees.
Seven floors. A thousand steps. They really were the same thing.
Sitting at her desk, Serena heard a snatch of conversation and the low, melodic tones of Tracey’s voice from Branch’s office, and smiled.
Love is walking past.
Redemisti
For my Latin Teacher
My name on your lips is a benediction. A whispered blessing that ruffles my hair like a soft summer breeze. A redemption from the hollowness of other nights, of other beds. It slips from between your parted lips, from a mouth dry from the shuddering gasps that have wracked your body. Your skin is damp, flushed with a heat that radiates from somewhere deep inside you, from the friction of our bodies.
I raise my head, gazing down into eyes unfocused with passion, pupils wide with desire. A hundred small moments flash across my mind like streaks of heat lightening, momentarily blinding as they strike along the horizon of my memory. And in the dark, empty spaces between them, I catch a glimpse of all the moments that never were, the everyday intimacies, the pedestrian landscapes we never visited.
I wonder if the sanctity, the inviolability of this present moment would be the same if it were merely another sunrise in a lifetime of sunrises. If we weren't instead on the dark side of the moon, with only the faint suggestion of light along the curve of this solitary satellite to give us faith in the possibility of the sun.
Words battle inside my head, bicker like recalcitrant children as I try to sort them out, find just the right ones. Discard the ones with dirty hands, unwashed faces, hints of scars as yet unseen. Find the ones with wet hair, parted just right, shirts tucked in, shoes tied. All the neat, tidy ones. The ones I think that you want to hear. That I hope you want to hear. The words to tell you that, in this moment, I am happy.
The words to tell you that the feel of your skin, slick and silken beneath my hands, the taste of your mouth, hot and yielding under mine, the sound of your voice, breathless and hoarse, are the only truths that I possess, the only realities that I own.
The words to say that, if I believed in such things, I would love you.
Strange to find words, my usual weapons of choice, to be my undoing; yet I find the irony somehow fitting. The best that I can offer is the gentle brush of my lips along your cheek, the teasing trail of my fingers across the tender flesh of your stomach, the reverent slip of my hand between the warm silk of your thighs. The unspoken answer to your benediction. Redemisti.
And your body holds my silence.
Flight
In a tormented delight of whispered touches, the tremble of your hips draws the confines of my freedom. I wish that this weren’t all, that I existed somewhere beyond this place, beyond this moment. Somewhere beyond the smooth cotton of the sheets beneath my knees. Beyond the scent of you, the subtle citrus of your perfume, and the richer, darker scent left behind on my hands and my face. But I don’t. Not really.
The sun is a pale golden memory of light behind the shades. Through the slats, I can see the iridescent blue of twilight. The room is in shadow now, with only a thin streak of yellow light that cuts across the framed print on the far wall, giving to Icarus’ fall the brilliance of color that no doubt Breughel intended. I can sympathize with the poor boy; seeking after heaven with only faith, hubris, and wings of feather and wax.
Your face is shadowed now as well. You look somehow older, your skin darkened to honey, the freckles faded and indistinct. I idly trace the whitish, uneven line of scar tissue along your ankle, half way up your calf; feel the indentations and ridges where slender bones are, and where bones used to be. Feel the slight stubble where the razor missed along the Achilles tendon.
You lie back on the pillows, hair tangled, a few stray strands clinging to your damp forehead and cheek. Your eyes are hooded, dark, their color indistinct. There is no modesty in your pose, no sense of impropriety in being sprawled here in this bed with your lover at this time of day. Indeed, perhaps there is something fitting, being here with you now; between day and night, between light and shadow. Murky, hazy. As imprecise as the two of us.
You reach a languid hand for me, but I ignore it, bending my head to brush my lips along the tender skin on the inside of your knee, smiling slightly to myself as I hear the small intake of breath that I knew was coming. I can taste the salt on your skin, the slightly chemical flavor of body lotion.
As you watch me, I make the familiar, yet exotic journey northward, my lips and tongue tracing a map only I can see along the smooth skin of your thighs. We both know my destination; there is no hurry, no urgency, only a slow-burning need. A need to feel; to feel my mouth on you and your hands in my hair, urging me closer. To feel the heat of the sun and the air rushing around us both as we plummet, wings melted, toward the deep, blue oblivion of the sea.
Looking along the fragile length of your body, our eyes meet, and for just an instant, I see the words that you will never say. Their unnatural absence occupies a space in this bed, in this room, that neither of us can deny. A space that holds me here, within the confines of your bed, your body. Foolishly, like a needy child, I believed that only when I heard you say them, would I be able to admit to what my heart has known all along.
Today, I'm not afraid to love you.
Breathe Me
I whispered my goodbye to the sunset-makers. I pulled the edges of my sweater tight across the front of me, a thick cotton straightjacket, the sleeves too long, covering the thin bones of my wrists, enclosing my fingers. Standing on the postage stamp balcony of my apartment, I watched as the shadows slipped through the already shadowy streets of the city, making their way covertly across the dully reflective waters of the Hudson, skimming past lonely tugboats, racing fruitlessly with the slender shoots of sculls barely glancing along the surface of the river.
I thought of taking a walk, but somehow the energy required to put on my shoes and find a coat were more than I could manage. Besides, the last time that I went walking, I found myself making the trek up 51st, to St. Bart’s. I don’t know why. God knows, God doesn’t figure into my life much these days. Habit maybe. Or curiosity. Or some remnant of that great incapacitator, hope.
The front of the church was lit up like the facade of Macy’s, with a huge banner proclaiming, “Explore St. Barts”; as if faith and religion had suddenly become no different than the paintings at the Met, or the monkeys at the Bronx Zoo. Come in and see our candelabras, our stained glass windows, the careful workmanship of another century. Come in and see the way the hypocritical penitent behave in their natural habitat. I had to chuckle. At least they were being honest.
A fresh chill snuck along my spine and I beat a hasty retreat to the relative warmth of the living room, any thoughts of a walk firmly banished. I thought about calling you, asking you if you wanted to come over for a drink, or even take-out, but I couldn’t. I picked up the phone a couple of times, even went so far as to dial the first six digits of your number, but I could never push that final button. The last thing that I ever wanted was to become someone you pitied.
It wasn’t as if I had some claim on you, beyond the right to kiss you senseless, to catch your bottom lip between my teeth. That I had any entitlement beyond pushing you back on the cool sheets of my bed and taking you, slowly, reverently, feeling you tighten around my fingers as you threw your head back, one hand clutching the sheet, the other in my hair. Your body was always fair game. It was your heart and mind that had never belonged to me.
The thing was, I knew that if I called, you would come over. Knew that you would say all the right things, make all the right gestures. Threaten to march into Branch’s office. Even threaten to quit yourself, even though both of us would have known it was merely a generous bluff. Play the part of the supportive girlfriend perfectly.
But you weren’t. My girlfriend, that is. My lover, yes. Perhaps, in moments of shared amusement, even my friend. Nothing more. We had sex on a regular basis. I believed that you cared for me, in your way. But you were never going to make a declaration of undying love. Never ask me to move in with you. Never introduce me to your family. Or even your friends. Never hold my hand as we strolled through the park on a warm Spring evening.
So I didn’t call.
Pride, that was all it was I suppose. Like when I ran for president of the sixth grade and lost. I didn’t tell my parents for a week, not until I could muster the nonchalance to pretend I never cared and only ran because Mrs. Gibbs had asked me. A week of enduring what I imagined were the looks and the snickers in the hallway. Well, at least this time, I didn’t have to worry about actually seeing the pointing fingers, the whispers as I walked by.
Besides, the only looks that I worried about were yours. So I didn’t call.
I was still awake at one, lying in bed, staring at the horizontal slats of light from the window blind that fell on the opposite wall. One slat was wider than the others, where the cat broke off one end in her quest for a view of the ledge outside, a favorite roosting spot for an exceptionally robust example of pigeon. The feline in question was curled up beside me, paws and whiskers twitching away. Perhaps in her dreams she managed finally to capture the fat bird. I envied her the sureness of her fantasy.
In the silence of the apartment, the rapping of knuckles on the door sounded eerily like the pounding of a gavel. Or maybe I was simply dreaming.
You were still wearing the red suit that I saw you in earlier in the day. Yesterday. You looked tired, and compassionate and a little angry.
“Why didn’t you call me?” You asked without preamble, as you moved past me into the kitchen. You flipped on the light and took down a wine glass, pouring a generous amount of Cabernet, with a familiarity that hit me with a hard blow in the sternum.
“I don’t know. And say what? Hey, how was your day? By the way, Branch fired me?” I asked, an edge of defensiveness to my tone that I didn’t intend, but there it was.
“Serena.”
“Dammit, Tracey. I didn’t know what to say. Part of me feels disconnected from the whole thing, like it happened to someone else. At the same time, I’m so amazingly pissed at Arthur for being such a lying, hypocritical S.O.B. I’m so hurt that Jack didn’t even stay to witness my dismissal, or to offer me a drink before I left. And the last thing that I wanted was for you to feel like you have to comfort me, or feel sorry for me,” I blurted out, the tears that I had been holding off for hours streaming unchecked down my cheeks.
“Baby, come here,” you murmured gently, setting the glass down to pull me, somewhat unwillingly, into your arms.
You smelled of perfume, and the slightly musty smell of the office, and the faint scent of exhaust and fresh air from outside. For a moment I allowed myself to be comforted, before the reality of us came back to me.
“You don’t have to do this, Tracey. I appreciate it, I really do, but I don’t want you to feel obliged to let me cry on your shoulder. It isn’t like we’re in some sort of relationship,” I told you a little petulantly, my face warm and wet from crying.
I watched the planes of your face alter, become somehow softer, more malleable, your eyes seeming to grow larger. I wasn’t prepared for the look of surprised hurt in them.
“I see. Well, forgive me. I was apparently laboring under the false impression that we have been sleeping together for the past ten months,” you stated slowly, each syllable clipped and rigid.
“We have. Sleeping together. Having sex. Fucking. But can you honestly tell me that it meant more to you than that? That I mean more to you than that? Can you tell me you love me, Tracey?” I could almost see the words whirling at you, sharp edged dervishes cutting through the space between us and there was nothing I could do to save either of us from them.
“Yes. I can. I do.” There was no challenge in your voice, just a statement of fact, and the eyes that met mine held nothing but truth. The moment hung suspended, the ticking of the clock seemed to slow to a stop. “Now that we have that little issue cleared up, let’s go to bed. You have an interview at ten tomorrow.”
“Interview?” I asked stupidly, my mind still caught on the not quite admission of love. “And did you just say that you love me?”
“I called a friend at the ACLU as soon as I heard what that hillbilly bastard pulled, and I got you an interview. It’s more of a formality than anything,” you replied, taking my hand and leading me into the hallway and toward the bedroom, flipping the light out as we passed the switch. “And, yes, I love you, Serena. I should have told you sooner, but I guess I just thought that you knew.”
I didn’t reply, just let you lead me to the bedroom, let you pull me close under the thick down of the comforter, my face buried in the curve of your neck. You smoothed your hand along my hair, the caress gentle, tender. Only then did I murmur a response, my words nearly lost in the darkness of the room, and the pressure of my lips against the soft skin of your throat.
“I love you, too.”
And already it’s the day after.
Aubade
Set after “Breathe Me”.
Slow raindrops carved the gates of their sorrow. Her sorrow, at least. They matched the slow fall of tears that left a faint trace of lines on her cheeks. She could hear the rain on the skylight in the bathroom as she stood in the shower. It was the reason that she had taken the apartment. She loved to be able to stand and imagine that above her there was no layer of plaster and wood, but only the gray sky.
She loved to imagine that the water cascading over her was lukewarm New York rain instead of lukewarm New York tap water. Cleansing, washing away all the accumulated grime of her day, of her life. There were enough of the lessons she had learned at St. Bart's left clinging in her mind, like the dried, stubborn leaves of late November to the branch, to make her long for the rain to wash away her sins as well. St. Bart's was a long time ago and prosaically, she knew that she would have to settle simply for the dirt. And the tears.
The pounding of the rain beat a staccato rhythm against the thick Plexiglas cover; slow, erratic, a one-handed snare drum. She reached out blindly, her eyes closed, the only light the faint gloom that shone in through the skylight as dawn broke over the water-logged city, and slowly opened the lid of the jar of sugar scrub. The grapefruit and peppermint scent of it mingled with the thin layer of steam. She scooped out a handful, the oiled liquid seeping through the cracks between her fingers.
She wiped a thick layer of it up the length of her arm, the hardness of the crystals rough against her skin. She began to rub in narrow circles, the pressure of the heel of her hand painfully scraping the scrub up and down her arm. Even in the dull light, she knew that her skin was growing pink. She enjoyed the feel of it. She wondered sometimes if she scrubbed hard enough that perhaps she could uncover not just a new pristine layer of skin, but another her, less hardened, less cynical, less corrupted by the world.
Tracey was gone. Granted she was only working hard on a case and had slipped out of bed sometime in the still dark hours of the morning. She wasn’t gone for good. Not yet. But Serena felt at moments like this that it was only a matter of time. Everything always ended badly. She had known that all along; and she had more than a faint suspicion that Tracey knew it as well. Had known it when she stood in the kitchen that night and told her that she loved her.
Liars, both of them. Well, maybe not liars. Lawyers, definitely, well schooled in half-truths and carefully omitted admissions. Tracey had meant what she said. Tracey always meant what she said. Serena knew that, knew that her own declaration of love was as true as any of the other truths she could claim, all subject to review and subtle alteration.
Still, as the shower rinsed away the salt-water of her tears along with another layer of her, Serena couldn’t help the small, sad smile that touched her lips. If Tracey were there she would laugh at her, tell her she was being ridiculous.
Silence all of her doubts with that bourbon and honey voice that glided like smooth jazz against her eardrums. Erase all of her fears with the not-so-gentle slip of her hands along Serena’s body; each trail of her fingers across the curve of Serena’s breasts, each slow swipe of her tongue against tender, sensitive flesh like an eraser on a whiteboard, leaving behind only dust and the faint suggestion of what might have been words.
But Tracey wasn’t there.
As she turned off the faucets, the level of noise dropped, so that the only sound was the fingers of rain drumming rhythmically on the skylight. The light in the morning sky was just bright enough now that she could make out the scratches and faint gouges in the thick plastic of the skylight. She wasn’t sure why she was up. It was Saturday.
She didn’t have to work today. Her new job was far less intense than being an ADA, and for now at least, weekends weren’t a regular thing. Still, her body’s internal clock had awoken her at the regular time, and considering the empty coolness of the sheet beside her, she had decided to simply get up.
Maybe she could get done some of the twenty things on her perpetually growing and never accomplished to-do list. Laundry. Dry cleaning. Pick up a new flash drive for her computer. Exchange the sweater a friend had given her for a “Hey, I know you just got fired, but this might make you feel better” present, the reddish orange one that Tracey had laughingly said made her look choleric.
It wasn’t until she had slipped off her night shirt and had stepped under the spray of the shower that it had hit her; the tightness in her chest, the feeling of something weighing her down, like the heaviness of a wool coat and hat in a warm room; claustrophobic, confining, dragging at her arms, restricting her breathing.
Sending tears to slide over the soft curves of her cheekbones.
She and Tracey had made love last night, after Tracey arrived home, spent and exhausted at 1 am. She had slipped into the bed beside Serena, her hands cold as she curled up behind her and reached around to cup Serena’s breasts through her thin nightshirt. Her mouth however was warm and insistent along the slender curve of Serena’s throat as she sleepily turned to meet Tracey’s lips.
They had fallen asleep wrapped around each other, legs tangled, brown and gold hair intermingled on the pillow.
Life was good.
And yet, stepping out of the shower, the tears continued, as if they had a right to be there, some claim on her morning. She’d have to recheck her schedule, but she was quite certain that she hadn’t made an appointment with this brooding, misplaced melancholy. At least not for today.
She was being an idiot. She knew that she was. She knew that Tracey loved her. Despite the snide looks and the derisive comments from some colleagues, Tracey was very open about their relationship. Serena had a great new job, that she genuinely loved, where she had the very real opportunity to do some good. She had everything that she had always thought that she wanted. Life was good. Too good.
It couldn’t last. Twenty years of witnessing first hand the rewards of having it all; the brittle silences, the dinners where no one spoke, the Christmases spent at some exotic resort, because anything was better than having to fake another season of familial joy. Her parents had it all.
Their life was good, wasn’t it? They had had security and fulfilling careers and someone always there at night. So where had it gone wrong? When had it all been reduced to a sad mockery of what it had been?
Serena realized that she was overwhelmed by the fear that this wasn’t real, that what she had now with Tracey wouldn’t last. That was it. That was the reason that she sat on the edge of the tub, eyes red and nose running. Scared that all good things must end.
She watched the tears fall from her down turned face to the tile floor of the bathroom. And reflected in each tiny drop were moments of time; Tracey laughing; the slender line of her throat thrown back in abandon; the gentle precision of Tracey’s hand moving over her skin; the tangle of fingers in her own hair, urging her closer; Tracey’s face, sweet and happy as she bought Serena a pretzel from her favorite stand. Random, inconsequential moments. A film by Virginia Woolf.
And with each drop of moisture that fell went one more of her fears. Tumbling, they unraveled on a fleeting reel.
Pilgrimage
A/N: I originally intended this to be 15 parts, for the 15 stations of the cross, but to be honest, this was all that I could manage.
I.
She traced her profile behind closed lids. Fingers swept gently, just grazing along the high forehead, the sensation of the silken hair at her temples almost too soft for Tracey to register. She let her hands slide slowly down, her fingers forcing Serena’s eyes to flutter shut as she caressed gently across the closed lids. Her fingers just skimmed the bristly line of lashes, the thin definition of eyebrows, before returning to the softness of her lids.
Sometimes, when Serena looked at her, Tracey could swear that she could see all the way down to the soles of her feet. See all the mess, all the turmoil, all the uncertainty that swirled around inside her, clouding, distorting what she did, who she was.
In the half-light of Serena’s bedroom, those blue eyes were always shadowed, and yet Tracey knew that she was seeing her, truly seeing her. Those eyes took in all the flaws, the lines that had appeared around her eyes, the sprinkling of freckles across her chest that seemed to have gotten darker, more pronounced, the pattern melding into itself.
They missed nothing. They saw her fears, her doubts, her insecurities, and yet when the clear blue of them met her own, there was only love.
II.
“Good morning, Sunshine.” The too, too cheerful voice cut through Tracey’s consciousness like a straight razor through butter, pulling her from a delicious dream of a beach, and Serena’s naked ass as a pillow, and mojitos in fishbowl glasses served by scantily clad women.
“What?” Tracey growled back, refusing to open her eyes, burrowing her face into the plush softness of the pillow.
“I made you breakfast. Bagels, cream cheese, lox, fresh melon and blueberries, and coffee. Of course, if you’re not interested, I’m sure that the woman in 12-B would be more than happy to join me,” Serena replied, plopping down unceremoniously on the edge of the bed.
“Tell her to put my damn coffee mug back in the right place and your undies back on right-side out,” Tracey muttered into the pillow, turning her head a bit and cracking open one eye to glance sideways along the edge of the bed.
All she could see from that angle was Serena’s right hand. Her skin was tan against the pale mint of the sheets. Tracey loved Serena’s hands, loved the slender length of her fingers, the nails slightly rounded, with just a thin edge of white at the tip. Those hands had the ability to slip along her skin and arouse in her a trembling heat like nothing Tracey had ever known. They could also soothe and calm another heat, smoothing back the hair from Tracey’s forehead when she had the flu a couple of months ago; a cool, gentle touch against her feverish skin.
Now one of them reached out and rubbed tenderly along the length of her back, a welcome, wondrous weight against her spine. Rolling over suddenly, dark eyes open and flashing, Tracey sat up.
“On second thought, the price of good lox is way too high to waste on that philistine in 12-B. She’s not even from Scarsdale,” Tracey laughed, picking up Serena’s hand and bringing it almost reverently to her lips.
III.
“Do you think that my ass is getting bigger?” Serena asked from a half-turned contortionist position in front of the full-length mirror in the changing room, surveying said behind with an expression of displeasure.
Tracey didn’t reply for a moment, until her silence caused Serena to peer at her suspiciously. The fact that an amused smile graced Tracey’s lips added nothing to Serena’s state of mind.
“Tracey?” Serena asked, a little peevishly.
“Oh, sorry,” Tracey replied, her gaze returning to her girlfriend’s less than happy face.
“Sorry that my ass looks bigger, sorry that you didn’t lie to me fast enough, sorry that you and the couch will be forming a closer relationship? What exactly are you sorry about, Tracey?” Serena inquired, hands now firmly planted on her hips.
“None of those. I was just thinking that I owed my ex-husband and several other people an apology. Until you asked that, I never quite understood the look of abject terror and the stammering that used to appear whenever I asked that same question. Now I know,” Tracey chuckled, rising from the bench in the changing room to cross to Serena’s side.
“For the record, your ass is perfect. See, it fits into my hands as if it were made for that purpose alone. In all the world, there is no other ass as sublime nor that I love as much as yours,” Tracey answered firmly, reaching around Serena to grasp the item in question, pulling Serena against her, backing them both into the stall, and closing the door with her foot. “If you will allow me to demonstrate, I will prove my complete and utter adoration of your ass.”
Laughing, Serena responded, “All I wanted was a ‘no, it doesn’t look huge in those pants’, but I never turn down free demonstrations.”
IV.
The living room was dark except for the flickering, incandescent light of the television. They were watching The Sea Inside; outside a late Spring storm dropped snow on an unsuspecting city. Tracey reclined on one end of the sofa, propped up on several throw pillows, as Serena lounged back against her, Tracey’s legs wrapped around her as she leaned back between them. Tracey felt, rather than heard, the nearly inaudible sob from the slender body between her legs.
Leaning forward a little, she could see the steady stream of tears that made their singular journey over the smooth, rounded curves of Serena’s cheekbones. Each drop hung suspended for an instant, reluctant to leave the warmth of smooth skin, before plummeting to the edge of the thick cotton blanket that covered them both, catching the light from the screen as it fell.
Michelangelo, in his dearest fantasies, no doubt dreamt of carving from marble something akin to the perfection of Serena’s cheekbones, Tracey decided. Her eyes were drawn back over and over from the beautiful film on screen to the sculpture of bone and pale honey skin, now wet with tears.
Serena must have felt her stare; suddenly, she turned her head, watery eyes darkened to deep sapphire in the faint light.
“What?” She asked softly, followed by a slight sniffle.
“Nothing,” Tracey chuckled gently, reaching up to brush away a lingering teardrop with the pad of her thumb. “You’re just adorable.”
“Why?” Serena asked, her tone that of a small child, confused and just a trifle petulant.
“You just are,” Tracey replied, pulling Serena’s head back to rest against her shoulder.
“Because I still cry at sad movies?” Serena asked, turning her face to bury it in the hollow of Tracey’s throat.
“Because you can still cry at all,” Tracey whispered, tenderly cupping Serena’s cheek, not sure if Serena heard her, and not even sure if she wanted her to.
V.
A stream of gold silk trailed down over Tracey’s face, carrying with it the clean scent of lemon and chamomile, blurring her vision, until she was all but blind, the world awash in a golden light. It kept traveling, slipping down her chest, whispering over exposed flesh, tickling as it flowed down over already hardened nipples, over the taut muscles of her abdomen.
It reached her thighs, tumbled over them like a sunlit river overflowing its banks to lie against the pale green of the sheets. Tracey slipped her hands down, her fingers tangling in the length of it, at once cool and warm under her fingers, the ice of platinum and the heat of the sun.
Rich girls’ hair, someone had joked once, when they thought that she wasn’t listening. Straight and blonde, a crown of gold for the daughter of the king. Lying there, leaning back against the headboard, Serena’s wealth of hair clasped in her hands, as her lover worked magic with her lips and tongue, Tracey couldn’t help but wonder what that made her the lover of the king’s daughter.
Lucky, she decided, as all other thought was washed away.
VI.
Spring weather finally came rushing into New York City on the wings of robins and the caressing breezes of May. The sky was as blue and clear as Serena’s eyes, Tracey thought idly, leaning back against the hard wood of a park bench and tilting her head back toward the flooding warmth of the sun. Beside her, on the ground, a small flock of pigeons caroused, jerkily strutting in circles, the iridescent glow of their feathers pearl blue and white and pink against the gray of the sidewalk.
The air inside her office had been stifling, the heaters still belching out puffs of fetid hot air. After a morning spent pouring over depositions and motions by the defense, Tracey had to get out. She had stopped at her favorite pretzel vendor and picked up a fat curlicue of dough and salt, and a Snapple Raspberry Iced Tea, and made a beeline for the small park near Hogan Place.
Now she and her pigeon friends were slowly savoring the wonder of a New York City pretzel and discussing the weather and the remarkable similarity between the May sky above and the eyes of a certain attorney she knew rather intimately. Tracey took on faith that the cheerful cooing of the birds was an affirmative response to her musings and not merely the satisfaction of a free meal.
Glancing down the sidewalk, Tracey watched as the figure of a woman approached, blonde hair blowing slightly in the breeze, hips swaying with each step. The legs that were responsible for those steps were discreetly revealed by the skirt that didn’t quite reach her knees. And nice legs they were.
Exceptionally nice legs, Tracey thought, as the woman approached and dropped gracefully onto the bench beside her and crossed the shapely limbs. Reaching out, Tracey ran a hand up the length of one leg, from the slender ankle to where the thigh disappeared under the crisp fabric of her skirt.
“I could have you arrested for that, you know,” the woman stated matter-of-factly.
“But you won’t,” Tracey replied, her fingers skimming along the firm skin just under the edge of fabric, completely unconcerned if anyone were watching.
“No? And why not? All I have to do is yell for that nice policeman on the horse down there,” the woman answered, her breath catching just a bit as Tracey’s fingers moved slightly higher.
“I’d offer you the rest of my pretzel as a bribe, but unfortunately, I already shared with my other friends here,” Tracey told her, indicating her small winged harem with her head.
“Did they let you feel them up on the bench?” There was a definite hitch in the woman’s breathing now, as Tracey slid her hand up underneath the skirt to tease along the crease between the crossed legs.
“No, but then, I didn’t ask. I prefer leggy blondes,” Tracey murmured, leaning forward to whisper against the length of a slender throat.
“Well, since I don’t get any of your pretzel, I’ll take dinner at Pigalle. Eight sharp. Don’t be late, or I might have to find some other woman who likes my legs,” the woman answered, standing suddenly, to stare down at Tracey, blue eyes sparkling in the Spring sun.
“Trust me, baby, that wouldn’t be hard to find,” Tracey laughed, shaking her head in amusement as Serena turned and walked back up the path toward the courthouse, hips swaying in time to the breeze.
VII.
“Hi there,” Serena’s voice was low and warm even over the phone line.
“Hi there, yourself,” Tracey chuckled, “No one’s civil rights being violated today?”
“It’d be easier to count the people whose rights weren’t trampled on today,” Serena replied, and Tracey could almost see the quirked eyebrows and the smile bringing out the dimples at the corners of Serena’s mouth. “But I had a few minutes and I wanted to call you. I miss you.”
Tracey took a moment to savor the sound of Serena’s voice. There was something she adored about it, about the inflection, the clipped cadences, the slight hint that Serena chose her words carefully, each syllable enunciated clearly, as if the words held a value to her too precious to rush or slur.
“You miss me? You just saw me four hours ago,” Tracey teased.
“I did indeed see you. All of you. Every glorious inch. And I touched every glorious inch. Repeatedly. With my fingers. With my lips. With my--,” Serena voice had lowered, taken on the husky tones that Tracey normally only heard in bed.
“Hey, is this an obscene phone call?” Tracey interrupted, feeling a flush of heat along the back of her neck.
“Uh-huh. In a minute I’m going to tell you what I plan on doing to you when I get you home tonight,” Serena inveigled, amusement in her tone at the audible hitch in Tracey’s breathing.
“Serena,” Tracey breathed unsteadily, warningly.
“I know: behave, right? Alright; I will, for now. But later? Later I will just have to demonstrate all those things you won’t let me say. Have a good day, Counselor,” Serena laughed.
As Tracey hung up the phone, she glanced at the clock. Eleven a.m. As images of what Serena planned on showing her flashed across her mind, Tracey wondered how the hell she was going to make it till five.
VIII.
It had taken a while for Tracey to figure it out. It was one of those vague, sensory memories, like smelling bread baking and thinking of her grandmother. She remembered the first time she had visited the country with her parents, driving upstate in late September, the flash of orange and red and gold past the windows of her father’s Nash station wagon, a moving kaleidoscope river, undulating in waves of color.
They had stopped at a roadside stand that sold pumpkins and apples and touristy knick-knacks. It had rained a little on the way up, and the air still held a hint of moisture, a freshness that she had never experienced in the city. Arrayed along the stand were basket upon basket of apples. Macs, Granny Smiths, Empires, and Romes, all round and plump and red and green and glistening with a layer of moisture.
Picking one up, Tracey remembered licking the rain drops off the crisp skin of the apple, tasting the sweetness of the fruit in each tiny droplet, the scent of the apple and the rain and the grass behind the stand and the sheer wonder of being twelve and alive rushing into her nose and mouth.
That was what Serena’s lips tasted of, and every time Tracey kissed her, the wonder of that moment came rushing back to her.
IX.
Her hands moved with slow precision, fingers mapping every curve, every turn in the road, memorizing, claiming. They smoothed over the gold of silken hair, traced the gentle sculpted curve of eyes and cheeks and lips. They felt the vibrations of words against skin, words murmured in tones meant only for them.
They trailed over the soft mounds of breasts, the hard muscles of arms, the tendons of legs, the slender grasp of hands. They listened to the unspoken voices of bone and skin, learning the cadences of language in their touch.
Hair. Skin. Bone. Lips. Arms. Hands. Breasts. Stomach. Thighs. Tracey moved slowly, reverently, to each, every touch a pilgrimage; hands and mouth searching, tender, offering sacrifice, offering passion, offering love.
Those were the stations of joy.
Fewthistle
Serena Southerlyn/Tracey Kibre (LAO and LAO:TBJ)
Rating: G to hard R
Archive: Ralst, if you want them, they're yours
Words: No idea. A lot.
A/N: First and last lines of all the ficlets written by the ever brilliant flying_peanuts. My eternal thanks.
A/N #2: These are all of the vignettes of Serena Southerlyn and Tracey Kibre that I wrote for even_angels_. They are little glimpses of an ongoing life, set in between, or after, or at the same time as my Between Bombay series featuring the same two. Take your pick. Except Breathe Me, which really should be part of the series, say as part number six, but gets ahead of itself. Oh, well. Enjoy. I don't know that anyone will even care to read these, but I was encouraged by racethewind10 and since I have nagged and threatened her all week, it seemed only fair.
Stations of Joy
Fewthistle
Serena Southerlyn (LAO) and Tracey Kibre (LAO:TBJ)
Rating: PG to R
Vignettes
First and last lines of all of these pieces by the brilliant Flying Peanuts
Attention to Detail
Seven floors, a thousand steps: everything in life is merely a matter of perspective. Serena knew this. She knew that life is measured in moments, in minutes, in miles. Dolled out with childrens’ sticky hands, with the dry, aged skin of a grandmother’s cheek, with the blood-boiling touch of a lover’s caress. Love in all of its comical, vaguely grotesque forms. We just have to learn to alter our perspective sometimes, in order to see it.
Serena knew that Tracey truly cared for her. Tracey had shown it in a thousand small gestures; in a morning cup of coffee, waiting for Serena on the bathroom counter as she climbed groggily out of the shower.
In a shared tub of popcorn, slathered with what the movie theaters euphemistically called “butter”, despite Tracey’s disdain for the “artery clogging wonder that is hydrogenated oil”.
In the last piece of the Entenmann’s raspberry danish that Tracey had been saving for a midnight snack, tucked safely in a baggie in Serena’s coat pocket.
Tracey had shown her feelings in a hundred everyday looks, smiles, caresses. But never in three little words. The three little words.
For months, Serena had craved those three words, felt the need for them of a dying man in the desert for a drop of water. She had looked for them so hard, her vision narrowed on one spot, that she had almost been blinded to the hundreds of other things that spoke Tracey’s love. The forest for the trees.
Seven floors. A thousand steps. They really were the same thing.
Sitting at her desk, Serena heard a snatch of conversation and the low, melodic tones of Tracey’s voice from Branch’s office, and smiled.
Love is walking past.
Redemisti
For my Latin Teacher
My name on your lips is a benediction. A whispered blessing that ruffles my hair like a soft summer breeze. A redemption from the hollowness of other nights, of other beds. It slips from between your parted lips, from a mouth dry from the shuddering gasps that have wracked your body. Your skin is damp, flushed with a heat that radiates from somewhere deep inside you, from the friction of our bodies.
I raise my head, gazing down into eyes unfocused with passion, pupils wide with desire. A hundred small moments flash across my mind like streaks of heat lightening, momentarily blinding as they strike along the horizon of my memory. And in the dark, empty spaces between them, I catch a glimpse of all the moments that never were, the everyday intimacies, the pedestrian landscapes we never visited.
I wonder if the sanctity, the inviolability of this present moment would be the same if it were merely another sunrise in a lifetime of sunrises. If we weren't instead on the dark side of the moon, with only the faint suggestion of light along the curve of this solitary satellite to give us faith in the possibility of the sun.
Words battle inside my head, bicker like recalcitrant children as I try to sort them out, find just the right ones. Discard the ones with dirty hands, unwashed faces, hints of scars as yet unseen. Find the ones with wet hair, parted just right, shirts tucked in, shoes tied. All the neat, tidy ones. The ones I think that you want to hear. That I hope you want to hear. The words to tell you that, in this moment, I am happy.
The words to tell you that the feel of your skin, slick and silken beneath my hands, the taste of your mouth, hot and yielding under mine, the sound of your voice, breathless and hoarse, are the only truths that I possess, the only realities that I own.
The words to say that, if I believed in such things, I would love you.
Strange to find words, my usual weapons of choice, to be my undoing; yet I find the irony somehow fitting. The best that I can offer is the gentle brush of my lips along your cheek, the teasing trail of my fingers across the tender flesh of your stomach, the reverent slip of my hand between the warm silk of your thighs. The unspoken answer to your benediction. Redemisti.
And your body holds my silence.
Flight
In a tormented delight of whispered touches, the tremble of your hips draws the confines of my freedom. I wish that this weren’t all, that I existed somewhere beyond this place, beyond this moment. Somewhere beyond the smooth cotton of the sheets beneath my knees. Beyond the scent of you, the subtle citrus of your perfume, and the richer, darker scent left behind on my hands and my face. But I don’t. Not really.
The sun is a pale golden memory of light behind the shades. Through the slats, I can see the iridescent blue of twilight. The room is in shadow now, with only a thin streak of yellow light that cuts across the framed print on the far wall, giving to Icarus’ fall the brilliance of color that no doubt Breughel intended. I can sympathize with the poor boy; seeking after heaven with only faith, hubris, and wings of feather and wax.
Your face is shadowed now as well. You look somehow older, your skin darkened to honey, the freckles faded and indistinct. I idly trace the whitish, uneven line of scar tissue along your ankle, half way up your calf; feel the indentations and ridges where slender bones are, and where bones used to be. Feel the slight stubble where the razor missed along the Achilles tendon.
You lie back on the pillows, hair tangled, a few stray strands clinging to your damp forehead and cheek. Your eyes are hooded, dark, their color indistinct. There is no modesty in your pose, no sense of impropriety in being sprawled here in this bed with your lover at this time of day. Indeed, perhaps there is something fitting, being here with you now; between day and night, between light and shadow. Murky, hazy. As imprecise as the two of us.
You reach a languid hand for me, but I ignore it, bending my head to brush my lips along the tender skin on the inside of your knee, smiling slightly to myself as I hear the small intake of breath that I knew was coming. I can taste the salt on your skin, the slightly chemical flavor of body lotion.
As you watch me, I make the familiar, yet exotic journey northward, my lips and tongue tracing a map only I can see along the smooth skin of your thighs. We both know my destination; there is no hurry, no urgency, only a slow-burning need. A need to feel; to feel my mouth on you and your hands in my hair, urging me closer. To feel the heat of the sun and the air rushing around us both as we plummet, wings melted, toward the deep, blue oblivion of the sea.
Looking along the fragile length of your body, our eyes meet, and for just an instant, I see the words that you will never say. Their unnatural absence occupies a space in this bed, in this room, that neither of us can deny. A space that holds me here, within the confines of your bed, your body. Foolishly, like a needy child, I believed that only when I heard you say them, would I be able to admit to what my heart has known all along.
Today, I'm not afraid to love you.
Breathe Me
I whispered my goodbye to the sunset-makers. I pulled the edges of my sweater tight across the front of me, a thick cotton straightjacket, the sleeves too long, covering the thin bones of my wrists, enclosing my fingers. Standing on the postage stamp balcony of my apartment, I watched as the shadows slipped through the already shadowy streets of the city, making their way covertly across the dully reflective waters of the Hudson, skimming past lonely tugboats, racing fruitlessly with the slender shoots of sculls barely glancing along the surface of the river.
I thought of taking a walk, but somehow the energy required to put on my shoes and find a coat were more than I could manage. Besides, the last time that I went walking, I found myself making the trek up 51st, to St. Bart’s. I don’t know why. God knows, God doesn’t figure into my life much these days. Habit maybe. Or curiosity. Or some remnant of that great incapacitator, hope.
The front of the church was lit up like the facade of Macy’s, with a huge banner proclaiming, “Explore St. Barts”; as if faith and religion had suddenly become no different than the paintings at the Met, or the monkeys at the Bronx Zoo. Come in and see our candelabras, our stained glass windows, the careful workmanship of another century. Come in and see the way the hypocritical penitent behave in their natural habitat. I had to chuckle. At least they were being honest.
A fresh chill snuck along my spine and I beat a hasty retreat to the relative warmth of the living room, any thoughts of a walk firmly banished. I thought about calling you, asking you if you wanted to come over for a drink, or even take-out, but I couldn’t. I picked up the phone a couple of times, even went so far as to dial the first six digits of your number, but I could never push that final button. The last thing that I ever wanted was to become someone you pitied.
It wasn’t as if I had some claim on you, beyond the right to kiss you senseless, to catch your bottom lip between my teeth. That I had any entitlement beyond pushing you back on the cool sheets of my bed and taking you, slowly, reverently, feeling you tighten around my fingers as you threw your head back, one hand clutching the sheet, the other in my hair. Your body was always fair game. It was your heart and mind that had never belonged to me.
The thing was, I knew that if I called, you would come over. Knew that you would say all the right things, make all the right gestures. Threaten to march into Branch’s office. Even threaten to quit yourself, even though both of us would have known it was merely a generous bluff. Play the part of the supportive girlfriend perfectly.
But you weren’t. My girlfriend, that is. My lover, yes. Perhaps, in moments of shared amusement, even my friend. Nothing more. We had sex on a regular basis. I believed that you cared for me, in your way. But you were never going to make a declaration of undying love. Never ask me to move in with you. Never introduce me to your family. Or even your friends. Never hold my hand as we strolled through the park on a warm Spring evening.
So I didn’t call.
Pride, that was all it was I suppose. Like when I ran for president of the sixth grade and lost. I didn’t tell my parents for a week, not until I could muster the nonchalance to pretend I never cared and only ran because Mrs. Gibbs had asked me. A week of enduring what I imagined were the looks and the snickers in the hallway. Well, at least this time, I didn’t have to worry about actually seeing the pointing fingers, the whispers as I walked by.
Besides, the only looks that I worried about were yours. So I didn’t call.
I was still awake at one, lying in bed, staring at the horizontal slats of light from the window blind that fell on the opposite wall. One slat was wider than the others, where the cat broke off one end in her quest for a view of the ledge outside, a favorite roosting spot for an exceptionally robust example of pigeon. The feline in question was curled up beside me, paws and whiskers twitching away. Perhaps in her dreams she managed finally to capture the fat bird. I envied her the sureness of her fantasy.
In the silence of the apartment, the rapping of knuckles on the door sounded eerily like the pounding of a gavel. Or maybe I was simply dreaming.
You were still wearing the red suit that I saw you in earlier in the day. Yesterday. You looked tired, and compassionate and a little angry.
“Why didn’t you call me?” You asked without preamble, as you moved past me into the kitchen. You flipped on the light and took down a wine glass, pouring a generous amount of Cabernet, with a familiarity that hit me with a hard blow in the sternum.
“I don’t know. And say what? Hey, how was your day? By the way, Branch fired me?” I asked, an edge of defensiveness to my tone that I didn’t intend, but there it was.
“Serena.”
“Dammit, Tracey. I didn’t know what to say. Part of me feels disconnected from the whole thing, like it happened to someone else. At the same time, I’m so amazingly pissed at Arthur for being such a lying, hypocritical S.O.B. I’m so hurt that Jack didn’t even stay to witness my dismissal, or to offer me a drink before I left. And the last thing that I wanted was for you to feel like you have to comfort me, or feel sorry for me,” I blurted out, the tears that I had been holding off for hours streaming unchecked down my cheeks.
“Baby, come here,” you murmured gently, setting the glass down to pull me, somewhat unwillingly, into your arms.
You smelled of perfume, and the slightly musty smell of the office, and the faint scent of exhaust and fresh air from outside. For a moment I allowed myself to be comforted, before the reality of us came back to me.
“You don’t have to do this, Tracey. I appreciate it, I really do, but I don’t want you to feel obliged to let me cry on your shoulder. It isn’t like we’re in some sort of relationship,” I told you a little petulantly, my face warm and wet from crying.
I watched the planes of your face alter, become somehow softer, more malleable, your eyes seeming to grow larger. I wasn’t prepared for the look of surprised hurt in them.
“I see. Well, forgive me. I was apparently laboring under the false impression that we have been sleeping together for the past ten months,” you stated slowly, each syllable clipped and rigid.
“We have. Sleeping together. Having sex. Fucking. But can you honestly tell me that it meant more to you than that? That I mean more to you than that? Can you tell me you love me, Tracey?” I could almost see the words whirling at you, sharp edged dervishes cutting through the space between us and there was nothing I could do to save either of us from them.
“Yes. I can. I do.” There was no challenge in your voice, just a statement of fact, and the eyes that met mine held nothing but truth. The moment hung suspended, the ticking of the clock seemed to slow to a stop. “Now that we have that little issue cleared up, let’s go to bed. You have an interview at ten tomorrow.”
“Interview?” I asked stupidly, my mind still caught on the not quite admission of love. “And did you just say that you love me?”
“I called a friend at the ACLU as soon as I heard what that hillbilly bastard pulled, and I got you an interview. It’s more of a formality than anything,” you replied, taking my hand and leading me into the hallway and toward the bedroom, flipping the light out as we passed the switch. “And, yes, I love you, Serena. I should have told you sooner, but I guess I just thought that you knew.”
I didn’t reply, just let you lead me to the bedroom, let you pull me close under the thick down of the comforter, my face buried in the curve of your neck. You smoothed your hand along my hair, the caress gentle, tender. Only then did I murmur a response, my words nearly lost in the darkness of the room, and the pressure of my lips against the soft skin of your throat.
“I love you, too.”
And already it’s the day after.
Aubade
Set after “Breathe Me”.
Slow raindrops carved the gates of their sorrow. Her sorrow, at least. They matched the slow fall of tears that left a faint trace of lines on her cheeks. She could hear the rain on the skylight in the bathroom as she stood in the shower. It was the reason that she had taken the apartment. She loved to be able to stand and imagine that above her there was no layer of plaster and wood, but only the gray sky.
She loved to imagine that the water cascading over her was lukewarm New York rain instead of lukewarm New York tap water. Cleansing, washing away all the accumulated grime of her day, of her life. There were enough of the lessons she had learned at St. Bart's left clinging in her mind, like the dried, stubborn leaves of late November to the branch, to make her long for the rain to wash away her sins as well. St. Bart's was a long time ago and prosaically, she knew that she would have to settle simply for the dirt. And the tears.
The pounding of the rain beat a staccato rhythm against the thick Plexiglas cover; slow, erratic, a one-handed snare drum. She reached out blindly, her eyes closed, the only light the faint gloom that shone in through the skylight as dawn broke over the water-logged city, and slowly opened the lid of the jar of sugar scrub. The grapefruit and peppermint scent of it mingled with the thin layer of steam. She scooped out a handful, the oiled liquid seeping through the cracks between her fingers.
She wiped a thick layer of it up the length of her arm, the hardness of the crystals rough against her skin. She began to rub in narrow circles, the pressure of the heel of her hand painfully scraping the scrub up and down her arm. Even in the dull light, she knew that her skin was growing pink. She enjoyed the feel of it. She wondered sometimes if she scrubbed hard enough that perhaps she could uncover not just a new pristine layer of skin, but another her, less hardened, less cynical, less corrupted by the world.
Tracey was gone. Granted she was only working hard on a case and had slipped out of bed sometime in the still dark hours of the morning. She wasn’t gone for good. Not yet. But Serena felt at moments like this that it was only a matter of time. Everything always ended badly. She had known that all along; and she had more than a faint suspicion that Tracey knew it as well. Had known it when she stood in the kitchen that night and told her that she loved her.
Liars, both of them. Well, maybe not liars. Lawyers, definitely, well schooled in half-truths and carefully omitted admissions. Tracey had meant what she said. Tracey always meant what she said. Serena knew that, knew that her own declaration of love was as true as any of the other truths she could claim, all subject to review and subtle alteration.
Still, as the shower rinsed away the salt-water of her tears along with another layer of her, Serena couldn’t help the small, sad smile that touched her lips. If Tracey were there she would laugh at her, tell her she was being ridiculous.
Silence all of her doubts with that bourbon and honey voice that glided like smooth jazz against her eardrums. Erase all of her fears with the not-so-gentle slip of her hands along Serena’s body; each trail of her fingers across the curve of Serena’s breasts, each slow swipe of her tongue against tender, sensitive flesh like an eraser on a whiteboard, leaving behind only dust and the faint suggestion of what might have been words.
But Tracey wasn’t there.
As she turned off the faucets, the level of noise dropped, so that the only sound was the fingers of rain drumming rhythmically on the skylight. The light in the morning sky was just bright enough now that she could make out the scratches and faint gouges in the thick plastic of the skylight. She wasn’t sure why she was up. It was Saturday.
She didn’t have to work today. Her new job was far less intense than being an ADA, and for now at least, weekends weren’t a regular thing. Still, her body’s internal clock had awoken her at the regular time, and considering the empty coolness of the sheet beside her, she had decided to simply get up.
Maybe she could get done some of the twenty things on her perpetually growing and never accomplished to-do list. Laundry. Dry cleaning. Pick up a new flash drive for her computer. Exchange the sweater a friend had given her for a “Hey, I know you just got fired, but this might make you feel better” present, the reddish orange one that Tracey had laughingly said made her look choleric.
It wasn’t until she had slipped off her night shirt and had stepped under the spray of the shower that it had hit her; the tightness in her chest, the feeling of something weighing her down, like the heaviness of a wool coat and hat in a warm room; claustrophobic, confining, dragging at her arms, restricting her breathing.
Sending tears to slide over the soft curves of her cheekbones.
She and Tracey had made love last night, after Tracey arrived home, spent and exhausted at 1 am. She had slipped into the bed beside Serena, her hands cold as she curled up behind her and reached around to cup Serena’s breasts through her thin nightshirt. Her mouth however was warm and insistent along the slender curve of Serena’s throat as she sleepily turned to meet Tracey’s lips.
They had fallen asleep wrapped around each other, legs tangled, brown and gold hair intermingled on the pillow.
Life was good.
And yet, stepping out of the shower, the tears continued, as if they had a right to be there, some claim on her morning. She’d have to recheck her schedule, but she was quite certain that she hadn’t made an appointment with this brooding, misplaced melancholy. At least not for today.
She was being an idiot. She knew that she was. She knew that Tracey loved her. Despite the snide looks and the derisive comments from some colleagues, Tracey was very open about their relationship. Serena had a great new job, that she genuinely loved, where she had the very real opportunity to do some good. She had everything that she had always thought that she wanted. Life was good. Too good.
It couldn’t last. Twenty years of witnessing first hand the rewards of having it all; the brittle silences, the dinners where no one spoke, the Christmases spent at some exotic resort, because anything was better than having to fake another season of familial joy. Her parents had it all.
Their life was good, wasn’t it? They had had security and fulfilling careers and someone always there at night. So where had it gone wrong? When had it all been reduced to a sad mockery of what it had been?
Serena realized that she was overwhelmed by the fear that this wasn’t real, that what she had now with Tracey wouldn’t last. That was it. That was the reason that she sat on the edge of the tub, eyes red and nose running. Scared that all good things must end.
She watched the tears fall from her down turned face to the tile floor of the bathroom. And reflected in each tiny drop were moments of time; Tracey laughing; the slender line of her throat thrown back in abandon; the gentle precision of Tracey’s hand moving over her skin; the tangle of fingers in her own hair, urging her closer; Tracey’s face, sweet and happy as she bought Serena a pretzel from her favorite stand. Random, inconsequential moments. A film by Virginia Woolf.
And with each drop of moisture that fell went one more of her fears. Tumbling, they unraveled on a fleeting reel.
Pilgrimage
A/N: I originally intended this to be 15 parts, for the 15 stations of the cross, but to be honest, this was all that I could manage.
I.
She traced her profile behind closed lids. Fingers swept gently, just grazing along the high forehead, the sensation of the silken hair at her temples almost too soft for Tracey to register. She let her hands slide slowly down, her fingers forcing Serena’s eyes to flutter shut as she caressed gently across the closed lids. Her fingers just skimmed the bristly line of lashes, the thin definition of eyebrows, before returning to the softness of her lids.
Sometimes, when Serena looked at her, Tracey could swear that she could see all the way down to the soles of her feet. See all the mess, all the turmoil, all the uncertainty that swirled around inside her, clouding, distorting what she did, who she was.
In the half-light of Serena’s bedroom, those blue eyes were always shadowed, and yet Tracey knew that she was seeing her, truly seeing her. Those eyes took in all the flaws, the lines that had appeared around her eyes, the sprinkling of freckles across her chest that seemed to have gotten darker, more pronounced, the pattern melding into itself.
They missed nothing. They saw her fears, her doubts, her insecurities, and yet when the clear blue of them met her own, there was only love.
II.
“Good morning, Sunshine.” The too, too cheerful voice cut through Tracey’s consciousness like a straight razor through butter, pulling her from a delicious dream of a beach, and Serena’s naked ass as a pillow, and mojitos in fishbowl glasses served by scantily clad women.
“What?” Tracey growled back, refusing to open her eyes, burrowing her face into the plush softness of the pillow.
“I made you breakfast. Bagels, cream cheese, lox, fresh melon and blueberries, and coffee. Of course, if you’re not interested, I’m sure that the woman in 12-B would be more than happy to join me,” Serena replied, plopping down unceremoniously on the edge of the bed.
“Tell her to put my damn coffee mug back in the right place and your undies back on right-side out,” Tracey muttered into the pillow, turning her head a bit and cracking open one eye to glance sideways along the edge of the bed.
All she could see from that angle was Serena’s right hand. Her skin was tan against the pale mint of the sheets. Tracey loved Serena’s hands, loved the slender length of her fingers, the nails slightly rounded, with just a thin edge of white at the tip. Those hands had the ability to slip along her skin and arouse in her a trembling heat like nothing Tracey had ever known. They could also soothe and calm another heat, smoothing back the hair from Tracey’s forehead when she had the flu a couple of months ago; a cool, gentle touch against her feverish skin.
Now one of them reached out and rubbed tenderly along the length of her back, a welcome, wondrous weight against her spine. Rolling over suddenly, dark eyes open and flashing, Tracey sat up.
“On second thought, the price of good lox is way too high to waste on that philistine in 12-B. She’s not even from Scarsdale,” Tracey laughed, picking up Serena’s hand and bringing it almost reverently to her lips.
III.
“Do you think that my ass is getting bigger?” Serena asked from a half-turned contortionist position in front of the full-length mirror in the changing room, surveying said behind with an expression of displeasure.
Tracey didn’t reply for a moment, until her silence caused Serena to peer at her suspiciously. The fact that an amused smile graced Tracey’s lips added nothing to Serena’s state of mind.
“Tracey?” Serena asked, a little peevishly.
“Oh, sorry,” Tracey replied, her gaze returning to her girlfriend’s less than happy face.
“Sorry that my ass looks bigger, sorry that you didn’t lie to me fast enough, sorry that you and the couch will be forming a closer relationship? What exactly are you sorry about, Tracey?” Serena inquired, hands now firmly planted on her hips.
“None of those. I was just thinking that I owed my ex-husband and several other people an apology. Until you asked that, I never quite understood the look of abject terror and the stammering that used to appear whenever I asked that same question. Now I know,” Tracey chuckled, rising from the bench in the changing room to cross to Serena’s side.
“For the record, your ass is perfect. See, it fits into my hands as if it were made for that purpose alone. In all the world, there is no other ass as sublime nor that I love as much as yours,” Tracey answered firmly, reaching around Serena to grasp the item in question, pulling Serena against her, backing them both into the stall, and closing the door with her foot. “If you will allow me to demonstrate, I will prove my complete and utter adoration of your ass.”
Laughing, Serena responded, “All I wanted was a ‘no, it doesn’t look huge in those pants’, but I never turn down free demonstrations.”
IV.
The living room was dark except for the flickering, incandescent light of the television. They were watching The Sea Inside; outside a late Spring storm dropped snow on an unsuspecting city. Tracey reclined on one end of the sofa, propped up on several throw pillows, as Serena lounged back against her, Tracey’s legs wrapped around her as she leaned back between them. Tracey felt, rather than heard, the nearly inaudible sob from the slender body between her legs.
Leaning forward a little, she could see the steady stream of tears that made their singular journey over the smooth, rounded curves of Serena’s cheekbones. Each drop hung suspended for an instant, reluctant to leave the warmth of smooth skin, before plummeting to the edge of the thick cotton blanket that covered them both, catching the light from the screen as it fell.
Michelangelo, in his dearest fantasies, no doubt dreamt of carving from marble something akin to the perfection of Serena’s cheekbones, Tracey decided. Her eyes were drawn back over and over from the beautiful film on screen to the sculpture of bone and pale honey skin, now wet with tears.
Serena must have felt her stare; suddenly, she turned her head, watery eyes darkened to deep sapphire in the faint light.
“What?” She asked softly, followed by a slight sniffle.
“Nothing,” Tracey chuckled gently, reaching up to brush away a lingering teardrop with the pad of her thumb. “You’re just adorable.”
“Why?” Serena asked, her tone that of a small child, confused and just a trifle petulant.
“You just are,” Tracey replied, pulling Serena’s head back to rest against her shoulder.
“Because I still cry at sad movies?” Serena asked, turning her face to bury it in the hollow of Tracey’s throat.
“Because you can still cry at all,” Tracey whispered, tenderly cupping Serena’s cheek, not sure if Serena heard her, and not even sure if she wanted her to.
V.
A stream of gold silk trailed down over Tracey’s face, carrying with it the clean scent of lemon and chamomile, blurring her vision, until she was all but blind, the world awash in a golden light. It kept traveling, slipping down her chest, whispering over exposed flesh, tickling as it flowed down over already hardened nipples, over the taut muscles of her abdomen.
It reached her thighs, tumbled over them like a sunlit river overflowing its banks to lie against the pale green of the sheets. Tracey slipped her hands down, her fingers tangling in the length of it, at once cool and warm under her fingers, the ice of platinum and the heat of the sun.
Rich girls’ hair, someone had joked once, when they thought that she wasn’t listening. Straight and blonde, a crown of gold for the daughter of the king. Lying there, leaning back against the headboard, Serena’s wealth of hair clasped in her hands, as her lover worked magic with her lips and tongue, Tracey couldn’t help but wonder what that made her the lover of the king’s daughter.
Lucky, she decided, as all other thought was washed away.
VI.
Spring weather finally came rushing into New York City on the wings of robins and the caressing breezes of May. The sky was as blue and clear as Serena’s eyes, Tracey thought idly, leaning back against the hard wood of a park bench and tilting her head back toward the flooding warmth of the sun. Beside her, on the ground, a small flock of pigeons caroused, jerkily strutting in circles, the iridescent glow of their feathers pearl blue and white and pink against the gray of the sidewalk.
The air inside her office had been stifling, the heaters still belching out puffs of fetid hot air. After a morning spent pouring over depositions and motions by the defense, Tracey had to get out. She had stopped at her favorite pretzel vendor and picked up a fat curlicue of dough and salt, and a Snapple Raspberry Iced Tea, and made a beeline for the small park near Hogan Place.
Now she and her pigeon friends were slowly savoring the wonder of a New York City pretzel and discussing the weather and the remarkable similarity between the May sky above and the eyes of a certain attorney she knew rather intimately. Tracey took on faith that the cheerful cooing of the birds was an affirmative response to her musings and not merely the satisfaction of a free meal.
Glancing down the sidewalk, Tracey watched as the figure of a woman approached, blonde hair blowing slightly in the breeze, hips swaying with each step. The legs that were responsible for those steps were discreetly revealed by the skirt that didn’t quite reach her knees. And nice legs they were.
Exceptionally nice legs, Tracey thought, as the woman approached and dropped gracefully onto the bench beside her and crossed the shapely limbs. Reaching out, Tracey ran a hand up the length of one leg, from the slender ankle to where the thigh disappeared under the crisp fabric of her skirt.
“I could have you arrested for that, you know,” the woman stated matter-of-factly.
“But you won’t,” Tracey replied, her fingers skimming along the firm skin just under the edge of fabric, completely unconcerned if anyone were watching.
“No? And why not? All I have to do is yell for that nice policeman on the horse down there,” the woman answered, her breath catching just a bit as Tracey’s fingers moved slightly higher.
“I’d offer you the rest of my pretzel as a bribe, but unfortunately, I already shared with my other friends here,” Tracey told her, indicating her small winged harem with her head.
“Did they let you feel them up on the bench?” There was a definite hitch in the woman’s breathing now, as Tracey slid her hand up underneath the skirt to tease along the crease between the crossed legs.
“No, but then, I didn’t ask. I prefer leggy blondes,” Tracey murmured, leaning forward to whisper against the length of a slender throat.
“Well, since I don’t get any of your pretzel, I’ll take dinner at Pigalle. Eight sharp. Don’t be late, or I might have to find some other woman who likes my legs,” the woman answered, standing suddenly, to stare down at Tracey, blue eyes sparkling in the Spring sun.
“Trust me, baby, that wouldn’t be hard to find,” Tracey laughed, shaking her head in amusement as Serena turned and walked back up the path toward the courthouse, hips swaying in time to the breeze.
VII.
“Hi there,” Serena’s voice was low and warm even over the phone line.
“Hi there, yourself,” Tracey chuckled, “No one’s civil rights being violated today?”
“It’d be easier to count the people whose rights weren’t trampled on today,” Serena replied, and Tracey could almost see the quirked eyebrows and the smile bringing out the dimples at the corners of Serena’s mouth. “But I had a few minutes and I wanted to call you. I miss you.”
Tracey took a moment to savor the sound of Serena’s voice. There was something she adored about it, about the inflection, the clipped cadences, the slight hint that Serena chose her words carefully, each syllable enunciated clearly, as if the words held a value to her too precious to rush or slur.
“You miss me? You just saw me four hours ago,” Tracey teased.
“I did indeed see you. All of you. Every glorious inch. And I touched every glorious inch. Repeatedly. With my fingers. With my lips. With my--,” Serena voice had lowered, taken on the husky tones that Tracey normally only heard in bed.
“Hey, is this an obscene phone call?” Tracey interrupted, feeling a flush of heat along the back of her neck.
“Uh-huh. In a minute I’m going to tell you what I plan on doing to you when I get you home tonight,” Serena inveigled, amusement in her tone at the audible hitch in Tracey’s breathing.
“Serena,” Tracey breathed unsteadily, warningly.
“I know: behave, right? Alright; I will, for now. But later? Later I will just have to demonstrate all those things you won’t let me say. Have a good day, Counselor,” Serena laughed.
As Tracey hung up the phone, she glanced at the clock. Eleven a.m. As images of what Serena planned on showing her flashed across her mind, Tracey wondered how the hell she was going to make it till five.
VIII.
It had taken a while for Tracey to figure it out. It was one of those vague, sensory memories, like smelling bread baking and thinking of her grandmother. She remembered the first time she had visited the country with her parents, driving upstate in late September, the flash of orange and red and gold past the windows of her father’s Nash station wagon, a moving kaleidoscope river, undulating in waves of color.
They had stopped at a roadside stand that sold pumpkins and apples and touristy knick-knacks. It had rained a little on the way up, and the air still held a hint of moisture, a freshness that she had never experienced in the city. Arrayed along the stand were basket upon basket of apples. Macs, Granny Smiths, Empires, and Romes, all round and plump and red and green and glistening with a layer of moisture.
Picking one up, Tracey remembered licking the rain drops off the crisp skin of the apple, tasting the sweetness of the fruit in each tiny droplet, the scent of the apple and the rain and the grass behind the stand and the sheer wonder of being twelve and alive rushing into her nose and mouth.
That was what Serena’s lips tasted of, and every time Tracey kissed her, the wonder of that moment came rushing back to her.
IX.
Her hands moved with slow precision, fingers mapping every curve, every turn in the road, memorizing, claiming. They smoothed over the gold of silken hair, traced the gentle sculpted curve of eyes and cheeks and lips. They felt the vibrations of words against skin, words murmured in tones meant only for them.
They trailed over the soft mounds of breasts, the hard muscles of arms, the tendons of legs, the slender grasp of hands. They listened to the unspoken voices of bone and skin, learning the cadences of language in their touch.
Hair. Skin. Bone. Lips. Arms. Hands. Breasts. Stomach. Thighs. Tracey moved slowly, reverently, to each, every touch a pilgrimage; hands and mouth searching, tender, offering sacrifice, offering passion, offering love.
Those were the stations of joy.