Who: Max, Ella (and Beth), and Laura What: Introducing the new Roommates Where: Townhouse When: A little while ago Warnings/Rating: No?
It didn’t look like it cost four hundred a month. It didn’t look like it cost four hundred a month split five ways. It was clear the other side of town, a bus-ride that was hot and jolty and sticky and made her feel sick, even when she leaned her head against the window and thought hard about iced water and the ocean and the fountain in the atrium of the Aria, whilst Beth fretted in her lap. She’d taken care, knowing her sister, knowing how her sister had looked at her like maybe she’d done something bad she didn’t even know she’d done yet. All that blond tangle hair had been knotted up neat, back of her head and braided there, and the sundress was soft, worn cotton but it was clean and it was pressed and it looked like it had been expensive, once. Even Vegas had people who didn’t want their stuff any longer. She got off the bus nearest place to the address on her scrap of paper, and she walked past places that didn’t look like they got a visit from the cops all that often. The paving stones were mostly uncracked, scuffed smooth-white, and there were people, now and again. People who didn’t look worried. There weren’t bars over windows, and there weren’t dents in the doors.
It looked too safe to be cheap. It looked too nice to be cheap and Ella thought of her wallet and the chart she’d drawn out on a legal pad at the kitchen table last night at home, and her head ached adding things to one column and taking them away from the next. There was a call, in at one of the clubs, small place a little ways off the Strip. If that was regular cash, she could bump up the visits for rent, she thought and she looked up at the windows of the address on the paper, glitters of solid glass and no visible attempts to get in. Beth slumped on her hip, sticky-warm and dozing, her hand curled around her shoulder. It was too warm, sweat beaded between her shoulderblades, oozed down her back.
It looked like the kind of place maybe they’d have lived if it hadn’t been Louisiana. Other kids nearby, maybe. But Ella didn’t live any place like the place she’d grown up and the neighborhood was too nice for four hundred a month; too nice for her. Ella hung back, waited for Max, didn’t stand too close to the walls in case someone said anything.
Max had been running around all morning, and that was the only reason she'd given in and used the cane. Her hip and leg held out for short bursts, and they held out for runs, where momentum carried the majority of the work, but running errands made her ache, and she knew she couldn't afford to ache this close to the Mexico deadline. And, admittedly, she didn't want to use the cane when she met McKendrick for dinner, so she gave in and leaned on it throughout the morning. She parked the new truck, white and huge and a Hemi engine that said more about her than anything else could, and she let the cane lead her as she stepped onto her old driveway. She was dressed practically, which was typical. Thin cargo pants, a snug tank top in white, her long hair scraped back in a ponytail, and a pair of sensible boots on her feet.
Max noticed Ella as soon as she stepped away from the truck, and she waited, one arm curled around her middle, the other on the sleek cane of uninterrupted black. Her sister looked like she needed a car; that was the first thing Max thought, and she glanced at the truck and wondered how much Ella would complain about the gas mileage if she let her drive it around while she was gone. She didn't make any move to approach her sister; she waited. And there wasn't a hug or any affectionate greeting when Ella came near. Beth got a smile, warm for just a second, and then it was back to business. "I'll be out of town for a few weeks. Want to keep the truck so I don't have to stick it in a lot somewhere?" she asked. There was no similarity between the two women. Ella was blonde and soft, like their mother, and Max took after their father and his Italian heritage, dark skin and dark hair and dark eyes. They couldn't be more different, and she jerked her chin toward the house as she began to move. "Daniels was ordering pizza."
Ella felt like a kid caught with their hand in a cookie jar when she turned at Max’s voice, familiarly disciplined, same ways she’d always felt when the General came home and she heard his voice in the house; like she’d done something and it didn’t matter that she didn’t know it yet. The baby on her hip stirred and she settled and that was just lucky, because Ella didn’t pay Beth a second’s of attention at that cane, at Max up on her feet and standing straight. It wasn’t the same gut-punch as her sister low to the ground and immobile, it was all familiarity twisted out of kink. She looked capable, like any second she could drop-kick the boy from across the street if she wanted. Upright, there wasn’t anything to focus on but Max herself, at all that shiny-dark hair and the dead-to-the-point look in her eyes that was being half past nineteen and creeping through that shell of a house, listening to silence in the dead of the night. Down to business then, except down to business for Max was bossing things even when she wasn’t bossing them.
Ella curled her head and looked at that monster parked, and the look in her eyes was all doubt, fingers curled in the side of her dress. No would be safer, what looked like ten tons of white shiny metal, no was independence marked down in chalk on a line already scuffed by the house on the sidewalk. “You can drive that thing?” she said, dubious in syrup-soft voice, “Looks like something out of the Army.” And she didn’t doubt that ‘out of town’ meant something more than a vacation; a tentative smile, thin as silk. “You look real well.” And then she turned her head and looked up at that place that wasn’t close to four hundred a month, and wondered who the heck ‘Daniels’ was, other than someone Max had liked enough to live with.
As if Laura would actually just call for pizza for a lunch that was 2/3rds family and the other third prospective roommates. Or however the fractions sifted out - it didn't make much difference to Laura other than the fact that it was definitely not pizza sitting on the table for the three of them. A roasted chicken from the grocery store, pasta salad she'd made herself, and some fruit. It seemed safe enough, as long as Max's sister wasn't a vegetarian. Though she had no idea what to get for a baby, unsure even of how old Max's niece or nephew was other than "infant". She hoped that there would either be something in the (admittedly slightly bare) fridge, or that the sister would bring along something for the baby.
Laura had actually thrown on a short-sleeved shirt in deference to the heat outside, even though the air conditioning inside was central and set to a level that was just cool enough to be comfortable (but not too cold). Cool enough for jeans, but not enough for socks, barefoot and bare armed, scars faded but visible. She'd thought about covering up more, but that just wasn't going to be an option if she was living with this girl and her baby.
The door opened without a knock, and if Laura hadn't been expecting it, if she didn't know that Max still had her own keys, she would've been on guard for someone there that definitely shouldn't have been. As it was, she looked out of the kitchen, leaning casually but with the sort of presence that stated that she would be able to move again easily if needed, and shoved her hands in her back pockets. She saw Max first, very glad to see her up and about, even if it was still with the cane, and offered her former roommate with a grin. There was almost a quip about being on her feet for the upcoming date with Dylan, but Laura's attention switched to Ella and the baby instead. The very young looking Ella with her very young looking baby.
"If I didn't know that Mom would've sued the pants off him and then killed him, I'd think my dad was sleeping with your mom." A quick nod at Ella. "She looks more like my sister than yours. ...If I had a sister." Laura smiled, the statement a poke between friends that took into consideration none of the family's possible history or difficulties.
Max had only managed a quick nod at the verification that the truck was hers, a grin at the comment that it looked like belonged to the Army, and another nod (this one self-conscious) when Ella said she looked good. Then, the familiar door was opening beneath her fingers and the cool AC felt like a godsend after hours running around. Daniels chimed in almost immediately, and Max just moved aside to let Ella and the baby inside. The comment about appearances and genetics wasn't a surprising one. When Max was young and awkward, it had been an easy thing for kids at school to pick up and poke at her with. The teasing and taunting that Ella wasn't really her sister would have bothered her in a different way if she'd actually been close to Ella, but she'd never been (only coming home for holidays and random months during the year didn't create sibling bonds). She'd just brushed it off as another way Ella belonged to mom, and she belonged to the General. When she was older, she'd wondered, but she'd never asked. It wasn't going to make anything better to unearth secrets. Maybe her mom had found someone decent once, for a night or two. It should have made Max happy for the unloved woman who'd given birth to her, but there was too much hurt there for that.
"Ella got the looks in the family," Max quipped, casual and uncaring. "I take after the General." Simple, and if it wasn't bantering enough? Well, Max could always be counted on to miss an opportunity for joviality. She glanced toward the kitchen, which was visible from the entryway. "You cooked?" she quirked a brow, entertained, and her mood shifted. "You shouldn't have," she added, the familiar tease slipping back into her voice. "I already bought a dress, by the way. Total sabotage." Pause, and then she walked toward the kitchen to look in the refrigerator for a leftover beer. "Ella, this is Laura. Laura, Ella," she said as she moved, leaving the two women alone for their hellos.
The woman standing in the doorway was tall, same way Max was tall, like it was something about the loose and easy way they stood, instead of much to do with height. She was blond, but that was the only similarity Ella could see, baby on her hip and a world in between them, as soft, cool air parted ways from the house and crossed the threshold to the street. Ella didn’t know Max beyond orders, barked out low and the bite to her voice that said she wanted to give ‘em but wasn’t - she didn’t know jokes and she didn’t know teasing, not Max who was sober the same way as commands and bed-corners tightly folded. She was wide, wide blue eyes as the woman - Laura - teased and even wider, head turning like someone watching a game of tennis as Max tossed back something that clearly made sense right to them both, same laughing way of talking.
She’d been five, chasing after Max’s heels, streamers of blond braids and the kind of socks her mom liked to buy, fresh white and lacy, falling down her ankles. There’d been some boy, neighborhood kid who’d been happy as hell to make forts in the dirt with Max. They’d laughed as they ran, long legs cutting over dirt and it had been that way, long as Ella could remember. She was certain now, watching Max slide in like it was effortless, the laughing and the ease, that she’d never make her sister like her all that much.
She didn’t notice the scars right up until she reached for Laura’s hand, awkward around the baby. Her hands were smaller, less strong than Max’s but the same kind of callouses, made by different things. “Good to meet you, Laura.” All that growing up South spilled like sunshine, made warmth where the greeting might have been tentative, as Max slipped past.
Ella had more of the South in her voice than Max did even on a bad day, and Laura’s eyebrows raised for a brief moment as she reached out and shook the other woman’s hand. It wouldn’t have been necessary, but after the effort had been made (especially with juggling a baby), Laura couldn’t refuse. Her own grip was firm, a handshake that was taught by a businessman father and an attorney mother, but it was softened by her own nature and the fact that Ella didn’t need to be intimidated by a woman with a firm handshake. Her hands were clean, not exactly soft, though lotion went a long way to counteract what could have been sandpaper skin. The thumb and first two fingers of her right hand were just slightly green, even after a good scrubbing, but there was no sign of dirt anywhere.
Laura rolled her eyes at Max’s response and looked over after pulling her hand back from Ella’s, not actually saying anything to her yet. “Please tell me that it hugs or dips or shows some skin somewhere. Because you know I was joking, and if you got a turtleneck sack I’m going to be so disappointed in you.” She followed Max to the kitchen, shaking her head as she reached for the food. “Top shelf, left back,” she told Max before returning her attention to Ella. “I didn’t know what your munchkin would be into eating. If you didn’t bring anything, poke around and see what’s around. Anything’s up for dibs.”
Max walked to the kitchen with a heavy lean on the cane, and with the certainty of someone who didn't feel like they were a guest. She pulled the fridge open, and she pulled out a beer and popped the top with an opener on her keychain. She took a long swig, grateful for the cold after Vegas' endless heat, and then she grinned an easy grin at Daniels. "It doesn't cling to anything. Loosest thing I could find on the rack that wouldn't get me kicked out of a place that requires reservations. No turtleneck. I still want to get sex out of the date." She turned her attention back to Ella and Beth, and her expression softened a little. Physically, Beth didn't look anything like Amanda, who took after Max in almost everything (save Brandon's grey eyes), but she remembered what it was like to hold something that small. It had been a rough time in her life, but Amanda wasn't something she would ever regret. As for a childhood boy and playing in the dirt, Max remembered being five very differently than Ella remembered it. Five was learning how to unload and disassemble a firearm in under sixty seconds. Five was the concept of military corners on the sheets, and it was the realization that mommy wasn't going to keep her home. Five was the beginning of traveling, and any laughter and little boys had been forgotten by now. "Daniels, at that age? Just shove something in a blender and called it lunch." Not that she'd ever made lunch for Amanda; they'd had a nanny for that.
Scars, wrapped around the woman’s arm like she’d met trouble in a bramble bush recently or something darker, more significant. Ella’s eyes flitted from those white traceries to her sister, who walked into that kitchen like she still lived there (and, Ella realized, Max was comfortable in a way that looked like a home) and who was all things that got buried under paperwork and medals, things that didn’t get talked about out in public. “I got something,” she said to Laura, but the soft washed-rain looking smile became a little more substantial, like hospitality firmed things, gave her roots to stand on. “But she’s right. It’s nothing but food all mushed up,” and it was buried at the bottom of the diaper bag, where it had a hope of staying cool, but Beth was awake, cool air kissing up against kicking legs and there was no managing handshakes now, let alone juggling baby and bag.
The handshake had been solid, and she’d heard the General talk of handshakes like they were semaphore, some signal you learned how to interpret, to tell you things. There wasn’t anything Ella knew to read, except Laura smiled and she looked at Max like friendship linked them firmly as telegraph wire and she didn’t mind one bit Max digging through her things. It felt a lot like prying, like seeing things she wasn’t supposed to.
“What dress?” There were no nannies, to cook things that were nutritious and balanced and probably organic. Just recipes, printed out from the library and hours idled reading about the kind of thing ten month olds were supposed to eat. Beth disagreed with a lot of what the books said, Ella balanced a hip against a countertop, dug in the bag and handed the baby something to gum all over.
Laura rolled her eyes at the description of the dress. "It's like I haven't taught you anything," she joked about it, truly hoping that Max hadn't sabotaged herself. But that was Max's concern, no matter how much Laura might want to pry or help, or whatever it was being called these days. She was tense enough with a child in the place, even though she hid the steel in her shoulders as best she could. Children reminded her of that last discussion with Gabe, and so concerned was she to not offer any sort of opinion on anything regarding the baby, that it also bled over into not following up too much with questions on Max's dress or advice about the upcoming date.
"And I would know that how?" She asked of the talk of lunch and blenders and baby food. She didn't know, and she wasn't meant to know. She realized and accepted that there would likely be times that she would have to step up to watch this baby, but that didn't mean she had to know anything about baby food going in. "Come on, it's going to be easier for both of you to sit down." She gestured at the table, already set and ready to go, and carried over the plates while everyone else managed their own burdens.
Max's response to the question about the dress was a noncommittal lift of one shoulder. "Just dinner with a friend," she said, pointed look in Laura's direction, but there was a slight flush to her cheeks that countered the claim. But Max didn't linger on it. She didn't linger there at all. Instead, she took another long swig of the beer, downing half of it this time and then pressing the cool bottle to her forehead. The cane rested against her leg as she leaned a hand on the counter, and the rest of the beer was downed before she added anything to the conversation about baby food. "See? You should've babysat every once in awhile when Amanda was small," she teased, giving Laura shit, and then she glanced toward the dinner table, because Laura was right about Ella sitting down, especially with Beth squirming on Ella's hip. "I was going to leave you two alone. I still have to get some work done, and I need to buy shoes, unless you want me wearing boots, Daniels," she added, but she didn't move right away. "Are you two alright together?"
Ella had stood on the stairs at night, nightdress around her ankles and her teddy left behind her, back in bed. Listened to the General’s low rumble and Max sliding in and out of it. It had sounded like a kind of music, like a bass and descant that knew the words. Ella could read sheet music right off, but she didn’t know the melody then and she didn’t know it now, the pattern to the friendship that hummed knowingly through the kitchen. She sat, a careful slide, and she didn’t say one thing about the flush in Max’s cheeks, didn’t say anything about dresses and dinners and friends. She looked at the spread on the table, all that would-be hospitality and she smiled at Laura like her sister wanted to stick around more than five minutes.
“Y’all don’t have to know a thing about babies,” she said calm and sweet as tea and she straightened in the chair, pried Beth’s fingers away from the cutlery without looking. “I guess I’m grateful you even want to live with one,” a look, slid sideways, all blue eyes and soft knowing, “If Max even gave you a choice.” Because she was grateful, she was, but she knew her sister a little bit, all arrangements made and done and dusted.
“We’ll be fine,” she said to Max and she looked, calm blue and steady smile, and she wondered if the place would feel like home to her, much as Max obviously felt there, “Y’all don’t have to babysit us. Besides. How’re we going to gossip about you with you stood right there?” A smile, hair pushed from her face, a look that said fine sure as she could say it out-loud.
"Max gave her the choice," Max said, empty beer in the trash and her cane back in the palm of her hand. Her keys were fished out of her pocket, and she walked up to Ella just long enough to touch the back of one of Beth's hands. "I'll be in touch before I leave town," she said, thought it wasn't really clear which of them she was talking to. Daniels got a leg tap with the cane as Max backed away. "Tell her about your relationship, not the one I'm not in," she teased, but she really didn't care what Laura and Ella talked about, so long as they got along. This was a neat solution to her guilt about matters with Reed forcing her to move out, and it let her sleep easier about Ella and Beth. Selfish motivations, both of them, but Max knew herself too well to pretend it was anything other than what it was.
One last look at the old townhouse, and Max was out the door, the Vegas heat seeping in for just a second before the AC cooled it down. The truck was loud as it left the driveway, rumble and country music filtering in through the cracks in the townhouse's garage.
She hadn’t listened to country once, since leaving home. It had been classical music, pure and sharp and sweet as rain and then it had been Coop’s eighties rock, cranked so high the neighbors had hammered on the ceiling and laughing until she was sick. Ella listened, sat there with Beth crowing her heart out for having grabbed at a fork from the table’s edge, and she figured country was her sister, something to it that was sweet, wrapped around in a lot of heartache. She didn’t think a bit that Max meant her at all, not with that I’ll be in touch; Max didn’t give warnings or promises, she showed up when it suited her fine and maybe that was her sister, Ella thought but it didn’t seem like maybe it was, when you were her friend. She looked across the table quiet at Laura, meek as a mouse nestled up to someone else’s cooking, and she didn’t say one word, not until the truck’s roar pulled out and the music slid away into ear-ringing nothing.
“I guess,” she said, into the quiet, and she began on prying the fork out of Beth’s fist, “Y’all can already see, we’re kinda different.” A small, strained smile. Different was one way of putting it and these days, there weren’t a whole lot of Coop, ready to jump in and tell her why it didn’t much matter she was like Mom, ready to bend in strong winds where Max would stand on tall. “I don’t know what she’s said about me. Except she takes after our dad and I don’t.” She said dad carefully as stepping around broken glass; Max was the apple of his eye but they both said ‘General’ like it was easier, natural.
Laura had only smiled at Max's discomfort over the dinner, and did her very best to not embarrass her friend in front of family. She made a face at being told she should have babysat when Amanda was younger. Because she was at a place at that point in her life that she should have been caring for kids on her own. Right.
Max's bailing on lunch didn't completely surprise her, though she did roll her eyes at the swift departure, letting the sisters say their goodbyes without interruption. The command to discuss her relationship got a raised middle finger when she was certain the baby wouldn't see it, and she simply sighed at the close of the door and the roar of the truck leaving. She laughed a little, shaking her head, and watched the baby grab a fork, delight in the capturing of it. She leaned toward the kitchen counter as Ella fished the fork away, and provided a wooden spoon instead. Less of a hazard, she hoped, than a metal pointy thing.
"I think anyone you're going to meet in this city is different. Especially if it's someone that Max knows." She smiled at Ella and finally sat down at the table. She didn't dish up the individual plates, but she did gesture toward the food and raise her eyebrows. She could (and would) help if it was needed, but if any of Max's stubbornness ran in the family, Ella might wnt to do everything on her own. "She didn't tell me much of anything, so I'm guessing the opposite is true. I don't know how much you actually want or need to share. I mostly trust your sister's judgement about certain things, which is why I agreed to give things a try." One of the reasons, at least.
Beth occupied banging at the edge of the table with all the delight of a tiny tyrant from her perch on Ella’s lap, the woman herself, timidity folded into a chair was finally able to look away from the infant and over at the would-be roommate. It didn’t surprise Ella none that Max hadn’t said anything, or if she had, that she’d said enough to make Laura listen to her. It was Max all over, an easy way of taking hold of things and making them happen. Her stomach yawned at her, and the food on the table smelled warm, homely, like someone else’s cooking always was better than that you’d made yourself. “We’ll be quiet,” Ella said, over the din of wooden spoon smacked against the table, and her lips pulled a little bit like there was a smile in there trying to hide, as the futility of it made itself known. “Guess maybe not. We’ll try to be quiet. I guess when things settle,” a vagueness that alluded perhaps to Ian, perhaps to Max, perhaps to Ella her own self, “We’ll leave you be.”
Her stomach snarled itself into a knot and Ella reached over and spooned some of the food onto her plate, with a quick look at Beth. “How long have y’all lived here?” It was a nice place outside, but it was real nice inside and it looked clean and lived in all at the same time. There were no shaky rails on the windows, she would bet, and A/C prickled the back of her arms with a pleasant shiver. It was far too nice a place, it made sense on Max’s salary but it meant thinking on jobs and work, and a quick, worried look at Laura over the food. But Max had said they stuck to their own floors, and maybe that would be okay.
“I don’t know what you want to know.” A small shrug.
“You’re fine,” Laura replied, dishing up her own lunch and sitting down. “Long as I can get some sleep, I’m up early usually anyway. I’d let you have the upstairs to yourself, but it’s probably better to not have stairs if she’s moving around, right? Plus this way you get the kitchen and everything down here.” She pushed the plate of fruit closer to Ella, but on the side that was farther from Beth, less likely to end with mushed fruit between toddler’s fingers.
“I’ve been here a few months. I think Max got the place only a few weeks before I showed up. Really not long.” And she’d been thinking of leaving it, up until Max had asked for this strange favor. Max still took care of the majority of the costs, not that she was going to tell Ella that. She paid her own share of the rent, and as long as Ella or Max kept feeding the landlord money, then she didn’t care what whoever was her roommate was doing for money. ...to an extent. “I suppose I don’t really need to know anything. Things will come up as we live here, but that’s fine. We can deal with it as we go.”
“She’ll be walking soon,” Ella said and she dipped her head over the plate like she was trying real hard to see through the unchipped china, but gratitude flooded her voice like ink poured into water, until there was nothing left but all that was unsaid. There’d been stairs, the old place back in New York; Coop had grand ideas about baby gates and improvisation even if their neighbors would have minded. The other place - the small, stifling apartment Ella thought of when the word ‘home’ slipped into her mind like sugar to melt on the tongue - there were no stairs at all. “Thanks. I don’t know what all I’d do without someplace to cook.” She didn’t look much look a cook, right there with one foot curled under the opposite knee and the baby in her lap far more interested in the food than Ella herself, but it was warm, and it was another piece of things she owed, Max and now this Laura woman.
She lifted her head, and the fork stilled in its progress pushing food around the plate. “Y’all really don’t mind.” It sounded wondering; she’d seen Max take control, seen her shoulder in and prop things up like if she didn’t take charge maybe they’d all come tumbling down. But that Laura yielded, didn’t give a darn whether Ella was some stranger moving in with a kid that cried nights and was noise downstairs, and didn’t ask a single question - that was something worth wondering at.
“I guess we’ll do okay.”
“Might need to get a gate then. Once she’s up and around. I’m afraid of what Max would do to me if your munchkin took a tumble.” Laura said it with a smile and then looked down, not offering any more suggestions. The look on her face was calm enough, nothing really ruffling her outer feathers too much, and she set in on dishing and grazing on her own plate of lunch. “You’re welcome to the kitchen. I can do easy things, even if Max does maintain that I burn toast. That was only the once, and the toaster was turned up way too high because she either sabotages me or likes hers nearly charred. I’m not sure which.” The smile that came with the comment was still fond, a wry little quirk of lip that slipped out when Laura talked about her friends. “If you start making things, we can figure out grocery stuff because I might steal some from you.” Another smile, this one directed at Ella instead of just a thought.
She gave a shrug at Ella’s question. “It was Max’s place first, and she was good enough to let me stay here when I was crashing somewhere else. I figure I can turn the favor around. We’ll just make it work, right?”