Whiskey and Melancholy | R | Major Crimes
Title: Whiskey and Melancholy
Prompt: New Year’s Eve pity party, table for one.
Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, Major Crimes
Rating: R
Word Count: 1505
Disclaimer: Not mine. Wish they were. Please don't sue.
Author's Note: Written for the Month of Love. I-must-go-first gave me the prompt “corkscrew” on a slow night at work, and this is what came of it. This is way more angsty than I originally intended. Comments are love. Enjoy.
-
As nights go, this one is a bust.
She’s never been one for New Year’s Eve, and this one in particular is rapidly verging on a pity party, complete with drowning her sorrows in booze. She cradles the overpriced bottle of Cabernet between her knees, poising the corkscrew at the center of the cork. She twists and, to her complete lack of astonishment, the cork chips, cracks, and fragments fall into the bottle.
Sharon sighs, setting the bottle down on the coffee table with more force than is necessary. She’s been looking forward to drinking that wine all day; it had been a treat to herself, her hot date for a solitary evening. Now it’s ruined.
Fitting, she thinks to herself.
She goes to the liquor cabinet and examines her choices: almond liqueur, whiskey, and a bottle of very expensive Merlot. The liqueur is out, obviously, and the Merlot she is saving for a special occasion and bought, rather impulsively, two years ago. That leaves the whiskey, and she reaches for the dusty bottle. She considers forgoing a glass altogether, but if she’s doing to get drunk in the privacy of her own home, there’s a line she will not cross. She grabs a glass, into which she pours a generous shot that is really more like two, and heads back for the sofa.
On almost any other occasion, the silence would be welcome after a long week at work, but now it is almost deafening. This is a night meant for couples, meant to ring in the new year with a kiss from the person she’s destined to spend her year with, only Sharon is going to be alone, and that does not bode well for the year ahead.
At least she doesn’t believe in silly superstitions like that.
Nevertheless, she’s starting to regret not taking Andy up on his suggestion of Chinese and a movie, if only to have had the company for a few hours. At least, she thinks, she doesn’t have to try evasive tactics to dodge an unwelcome midnight kiss.
Her phone alert signals an incoming text, and she smirks. Speak of the devil.
Andy: Not too late to change your mind. I could even give that Indian restaurant you keep talking about a whirl. Could be fun…
She taps out a brief thank you text, declining as nicely as she can muster. Andy Flynn has turned out to be a great friend, though she was surprised when she discovered that he needed to be handled with kid gloves. His overly sensitive ego is fragile at best, and Sharon treads a careful line not to lead him on.
She swallows one sip, and then another. The whiskey stings and burns its way down her throat, and she welcomes the sensation.
--
Sharon doesn’t realize she’s dozed off until her cell phone erupts in a series of rapid alerts, startling her back into wakefulness. She opens droopy eyes and blinks away the sleep, realizing that her empty glass has fallen out of her hand.
Pushing herself into an upright position, Sharon focuses her eyes on the clock. 12:01. She registers that incoming text messages have woken her up and her heart beats a little faster in hope.
She bites her lip. There’s no reason to get her hopes up because she knows, knows, that the one person she hopes to hear from will not have written, and yet she holds her breath anyway.
Rusty: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! NYC is so freaking cold but this is amazing! Wish you were here!
Emily: Happy New Year, Mom. Love you!
Andy: Happy New Years, Sharon.
Ricky: It’s 2015 and all we got was this lousy text message!
Sharon smiles at these greetings and still searches for the one she knows isn’t there. The last message she received from Brenda was at 7:23pm, in which Brenda said, I wish I were gonna be with you tonight instead of at some stupid party...I hope you know that.
She’s glad she slept through the countdown, the ball dropping, the warbled renditions of Auld Lang Syne. She’s glad she was in a whiskey-and-melancholy-induced sleep so as to not dwell on thoughts of Brenda kissing her husband at the stroke of midnight.
Bitterness burns like acid in her stomach, and she pours herself another drink. It isn’t like her to be so maudlin and pitiful, but on this holiday, she’s giving herself permission to stop trying so goddamn hard. After all, there’s no one around to witness it.
--
This time, when Sharon wakes up, it’s 2:51 and her phone is ringing. She almost chooses to sleep through it, to turn her back on the damn thing because she’s not in the fucking mood to talk to anyone. However, it is a night known for drunk drivers, and Sharon’s eyes snap awake at the thought of one of her children in an automobile accident. When she snatches up her phone, she blinks in disbelief to see that it’s Brenda.
She shouldn’t answer it, but she does. She doesn’t speak after she connects to the call.
“Sharon? You there?” she asks, her voice hushed.
“Yes.” She adjusts the pillow beneath her head but doesn’t bother sitting up. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the car. We just got home...I said I forgot my phone in the car.”
“Sounds like you found it.”
There’s a brief, painful stab of silence. “Sharon, I miss you. I kept thinkin’ about you all night. I needed you to hear me say it.”
Sharon imagines Brenda in her pretty party dress, her makeup worn off throughout the night, sitting in the darkness of her car while her husband is inside, getting ready to get into bed with her. It hurts like hell and yet, there’s a certain comfort in knowing that after all this time, Brenda is still taking risks for her. “I miss you too, Brenda Leigh.”
“Really?”
“You know I do.”
“I thought about you at midnight, wishin’ I were kissin’ you instead.”
Instead. So she did kiss her husband. Does that mean Brenda will spend yet another year with him?
Sharon feels nauseous. What she wants to say is that if Brenda wishes she could be kissing her instead, she should leave her husband. What she actually says is, “Yeah. Me too.”
Brenda sighs. “When can I see you again?”
“Whenever you want, Brenda. You know that.” It’s the wrong thing to say because she once again gives Brenda all the power, allowing her to dictate the course of the affair. But she says it because it’s the truth, because if Brenda were to say she wanted to come over right that second, Sharon would let her.
“Can I come tomorrow night? After work?”
“All right.” A pause, and then: “Please text me to let me know if you’re going to change your mind.”
“I’m not going to change my mind. I miss you. I wanna be with you.”
“Okay, Brenda Leigh. You’d better get inside now before he starts asking questions.”
Brenda reluctantly agrees. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
She hangs up, and Sharon downs the rest of the whiskey in the glass she set on the coffee table before going back to sleep.
--
Brenda does not change her mind, and they spend the evening wordlessly fucking, saying everything they feel with their bodies. Sharon nearly cries when she comes.
They lie on the bed, over the sheets so they’ll be too chilly to fall asleep. They stare at each other. Brenda traces the edge of her nose with a fingertip, a gesture Sharon has always found soothing. “What’re you thinkin’ about?”
“You,” Sharon says, feeling more like herself. It’s unsettling. She’s always thinking about Brenda.
“What about me?”
“About how I kept my end of the bargain with Jack, and you still haven’t told Fritz that you want a divorce.”
Brown eyes look away. “It’s not that easy for me, Sharon.”
“Why?”
“Fritz is an alcoholic...I have to be careful in how I approach this or it’ll push him off the wagon.”
“Jack’s an alcoholic too. How he chooses to respond to divorce papers is not my fault and it won’t be yours. It’s not your responsibility to stay in a marriage just so your husband won’t drink.”
Brenda closes her eyes and lets out a resigned sigh. “I know.”
“Brenda, please don’t make excuses. Either you’re going to tell him or you’re not. Please don’t drag it on. There’s no right time to leave your husband for the woman you’ve been fucking for three years.”
“It’s not just fuckin’ for me.”
Sharon raises an eyebrow, as if to tell Brenda that she’s proving her point.
“I’m going to do it, Sharon. I said it and I meant it.”
Sharon doesn’t want to believe her, but she does, and she kisses her.
--
Prompt: New Year’s Eve pity party, table for one.
Fandom: Brenda/Sharon, Major Crimes
Rating: R
Word Count: 1505
Disclaimer: Not mine. Wish they were. Please don't sue.
Author's Note: Written for the Month of Love. I-must-go-first gave me the prompt “corkscrew” on a slow night at work, and this is what came of it. This is way more angsty than I originally intended. Comments are love. Enjoy.
-
As nights go, this one is a bust.
She’s never been one for New Year’s Eve, and this one in particular is rapidly verging on a pity party, complete with drowning her sorrows in booze. She cradles the overpriced bottle of Cabernet between her knees, poising the corkscrew at the center of the cork. She twists and, to her complete lack of astonishment, the cork chips, cracks, and fragments fall into the bottle.
Sharon sighs, setting the bottle down on the coffee table with more force than is necessary. She’s been looking forward to drinking that wine all day; it had been a treat to herself, her hot date for a solitary evening. Now it’s ruined.
Fitting, she thinks to herself.
She goes to the liquor cabinet and examines her choices: almond liqueur, whiskey, and a bottle of very expensive Merlot. The liqueur is out, obviously, and the Merlot she is saving for a special occasion and bought, rather impulsively, two years ago. That leaves the whiskey, and she reaches for the dusty bottle. She considers forgoing a glass altogether, but if she’s doing to get drunk in the privacy of her own home, there’s a line she will not cross. She grabs a glass, into which she pours a generous shot that is really more like two, and heads back for the sofa.
On almost any other occasion, the silence would be welcome after a long week at work, but now it is almost deafening. This is a night meant for couples, meant to ring in the new year with a kiss from the person she’s destined to spend her year with, only Sharon is going to be alone, and that does not bode well for the year ahead.
At least she doesn’t believe in silly superstitions like that.
Nevertheless, she’s starting to regret not taking Andy up on his suggestion of Chinese and a movie, if only to have had the company for a few hours. At least, she thinks, she doesn’t have to try evasive tactics to dodge an unwelcome midnight kiss.
Her phone alert signals an incoming text, and she smirks. Speak of the devil.
Andy: Not too late to change your mind. I could even give that Indian restaurant you keep talking about a whirl. Could be fun…
She taps out a brief thank you text, declining as nicely as she can muster. Andy Flynn has turned out to be a great friend, though she was surprised when she discovered that he needed to be handled with kid gloves. His overly sensitive ego is fragile at best, and Sharon treads a careful line not to lead him on.
She swallows one sip, and then another. The whiskey stings and burns its way down her throat, and she welcomes the sensation.
--
Sharon doesn’t realize she’s dozed off until her cell phone erupts in a series of rapid alerts, startling her back into wakefulness. She opens droopy eyes and blinks away the sleep, realizing that her empty glass has fallen out of her hand.
Pushing herself into an upright position, Sharon focuses her eyes on the clock. 12:01. She registers that incoming text messages have woken her up and her heart beats a little faster in hope.
She bites her lip. There’s no reason to get her hopes up because she knows, knows, that the one person she hopes to hear from will not have written, and yet she holds her breath anyway.
Rusty: HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!! NYC is so freaking cold but this is amazing! Wish you were here!
Emily: Happy New Year, Mom. Love you!
Andy: Happy New Years, Sharon.
Ricky: It’s 2015 and all we got was this lousy text message!
Sharon smiles at these greetings and still searches for the one she knows isn’t there. The last message she received from Brenda was at 7:23pm, in which Brenda said, I wish I were gonna be with you tonight instead of at some stupid party...I hope you know that.
She’s glad she slept through the countdown, the ball dropping, the warbled renditions of Auld Lang Syne. She’s glad she was in a whiskey-and-melancholy-induced sleep so as to not dwell on thoughts of Brenda kissing her husband at the stroke of midnight.
Bitterness burns like acid in her stomach, and she pours herself another drink. It isn’t like her to be so maudlin and pitiful, but on this holiday, she’s giving herself permission to stop trying so goddamn hard. After all, there’s no one around to witness it.
--
This time, when Sharon wakes up, it’s 2:51 and her phone is ringing. She almost chooses to sleep through it, to turn her back on the damn thing because she’s not in the fucking mood to talk to anyone. However, it is a night known for drunk drivers, and Sharon’s eyes snap awake at the thought of one of her children in an automobile accident. When she snatches up her phone, she blinks in disbelief to see that it’s Brenda.
She shouldn’t answer it, but she does. She doesn’t speak after she connects to the call.
“Sharon? You there?” she asks, her voice hushed.
“Yes.” She adjusts the pillow beneath her head but doesn’t bother sitting up. “Where are you?”
“I’m in the car. We just got home...I said I forgot my phone in the car.”
“Sounds like you found it.”
There’s a brief, painful stab of silence. “Sharon, I miss you. I kept thinkin’ about you all night. I needed you to hear me say it.”
Sharon imagines Brenda in her pretty party dress, her makeup worn off throughout the night, sitting in the darkness of her car while her husband is inside, getting ready to get into bed with her. It hurts like hell and yet, there’s a certain comfort in knowing that after all this time, Brenda is still taking risks for her. “I miss you too, Brenda Leigh.”
“Really?”
“You know I do.”
“I thought about you at midnight, wishin’ I were kissin’ you instead.”
Instead. So she did kiss her husband. Does that mean Brenda will spend yet another year with him?
Sharon feels nauseous. What she wants to say is that if Brenda wishes she could be kissing her instead, she should leave her husband. What she actually says is, “Yeah. Me too.”
Brenda sighs. “When can I see you again?”
“Whenever you want, Brenda. You know that.” It’s the wrong thing to say because she once again gives Brenda all the power, allowing her to dictate the course of the affair. But she says it because it’s the truth, because if Brenda were to say she wanted to come over right that second, Sharon would let her.
“Can I come tomorrow night? After work?”
“All right.” A pause, and then: “Please text me to let me know if you’re going to change your mind.”
“I’m not going to change my mind. I miss you. I wanna be with you.”
“Okay, Brenda Leigh. You’d better get inside now before he starts asking questions.”
Brenda reluctantly agrees. “I love you.”
“I love you too.”
She hangs up, and Sharon downs the rest of the whiskey in the glass she set on the coffee table before going back to sleep.
--
Brenda does not change her mind, and they spend the evening wordlessly fucking, saying everything they feel with their bodies. Sharon nearly cries when she comes.
They lie on the bed, over the sheets so they’ll be too chilly to fall asleep. They stare at each other. Brenda traces the edge of her nose with a fingertip, a gesture Sharon has always found soothing. “What’re you thinkin’ about?”
“You,” Sharon says, feeling more like herself. It’s unsettling. She’s always thinking about Brenda.
“What about me?”
“About how I kept my end of the bargain with Jack, and you still haven’t told Fritz that you want a divorce.”
Brown eyes look away. “It’s not that easy for me, Sharon.”
“Why?”
“Fritz is an alcoholic...I have to be careful in how I approach this or it’ll push him off the wagon.”
“Jack’s an alcoholic too. How he chooses to respond to divorce papers is not my fault and it won’t be yours. It’s not your responsibility to stay in a marriage just so your husband won’t drink.”
Brenda closes her eyes and lets out a resigned sigh. “I know.”
“Brenda, please don’t make excuses. Either you’re going to tell him or you’re not. Please don’t drag it on. There’s no right time to leave your husband for the woman you’ve been fucking for three years.”
“It’s not just fuckin’ for me.”
Sharon raises an eyebrow, as if to tell Brenda that she’s proving her point.
“I’m going to do it, Sharon. I said it and I meant it.”
Sharon doesn’t want to believe her, but she does, and she kisses her.
--