dahlia palmer (blindingly) wrote in horror_story, @ 2013-03-18 18:53:00 |
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Entry tags: | alternate universe, complete, dahlia, holiday: valentine, jenny |
act iii
Who: Jenny & Dahlia.
What: Valentine prompt of 'Love Potion # What?'
Setting: Valentine's day in 20XX. Jenny and Dahlia have been happily married and raising Jenny's son together for six years, in love with each other even longer, but career success and stress begin causing trouble in paradise. Until Jenny takes fixing her marriage into her own hands, with disastrous results.
Warning: Language and self harm.
(( ONE WEEK LATER ))
Dahlia was exhausted. She hadn’t slept in days, hadn’t eaten longer than that, but she didn’t seem to notice the way her stomach growled or the dark circles that crept underneath her hazel eyes, making her look weaker and stranger by the day. Sleep wasn’t important, and she couldn’t keep her eyes off of Jenny -- the way her lips parted in slumber, the gentle rise and fall of her chest -- long enough to sleep herself, but she was content to just watch. The same went for eating; she didn’t touch her food, didn’t even pretend to eat.
She just watched.
Today, she sat in the living room, perched on the couch. Her muscles were tense, her eyes trained on the staircase as she waited for Jenny to emerge from the study. Beside her, Dahlia’s phone vibrated, but she made no move to answer it. Work called every day, multiple times a day at that, and she couldn’t find it in herself to care. CEO of her company or not, Dahlia had more important things to worry about, like her wife. Her wife, who she hadn’t seen in nearly an hour.
Her fingers tapped the couch as she fidgeted, growing more uncomfortable by the minute. The second. What was taking her so long? Was she mad at Dahlia? Was she going to leave her?
Dahlia looked anxiously at the clock so that she could study the steady ticking of the second hand, a reminder of Jenny’s absence. Couldn’t she see that Dahlia was less without her? A moment without Jenny was a moment too long.
---
For someone who had spent the last week with her every whim being answered, having attention and affection lavished onto her at every turn, Jenny was fairly exhausted herself. Though nowhere near as pronounced as Dahlia’s were, the bags under the blonde’s eyes were still beginning to show. She slept, but over the last few days, it had been fitfully. It felt like she was running on fumes, and if it wasn’t Dahlia at her elbow, it was Chase asking for something, or it was Elaine calling her, shrieking at her about not having the latest pages done or submitted. Jenny had threatened to quit writing and hung up on her three times in the last forty-eight hours, but she couldn’t focus on Elaine, couldn’t think about her book.
There was something seriously wrong with Dahlia.
It had started the day after Valentine’s Day. She had slept well enough that night, Dahlia had more than tired her out enough for a great night of sleep.. but when she woke up, Dahlia was looking right at her. Not sleeping herself, not really looking like she had slept at all, really. Her wife was just propped up on her elbow on her pillow, just.. watching her. Her smile was fond, but her eyes were sharp, and Jenny couldn’t help but feel like the other woman was staring right into her soul. Or trying, at least. It was more than a little unsettling. Seven nights later, she knew Dahlia wasn’t sleeping, even if she didn’t have complete proof of it.
But unless she was sleeping when they weren’t around each other, she wasn’t sleeping. Or eating. Or working. There were very, very few moments when they were apart, Dahlia saw to that. Jenny couldn’t imagine where the other woman was fitting the rest of her schedule into her day. Because she wasn’t. No matter what Jenny was doing, Dahlia wanted to do it. No matter what Jenny said, Dahlia agreed. No matter what Jenny suggested, Dahlia had just been thinking that exact same thing, how convenient. There was no denying that it was getting a little eerie, a little.. obsessive.
Everywhere Jenny looked, Dahlia was there. Her sex-drive was through the roof, and while the first night had been magical, Jenny was slowly getting tired, not to mention a little sore. Dahlia was not only more easily aroused, but she was rougher than ever, almost merciless. Quick sex, but frequent. When she did manage to get some time to herself, the minute that she was done, Dahlia was right there waiting. One night earlier in the week, the blonde had almost tripped over her wife on her way out of the study after vainly attempting to write a few paragraphs on her latest page. Dahlia had been sitting right up against the outside of the door. She looked like she had been crying. Jenny didn’t know what to do.
Chase had been noticing something was off, Jenny knew it, even if it wasn’t saying it in so many words. Neither of them had voiced anything to each other about the situation, but it was getting dire. Sometimes just the looks that her son gave his step-mother lately said it all. Dahlia wasn’t right, Dahlia wasn’t Dahlia. Jenny didn’t want to believe that she was responsible, that it had been her potion that had made her wife this way.. but what other explanation was there? Nothing she and Ella ever made when they were teenagers had ever gone wrong, maybe a bit awry, certainly not this wrong.. but they had rarely ever messed with something as serious as what Jenny had concocted for the Valentine’s Day dinner.
She had only left out one minor tiny insignificant ingredient. She had used the exact right amount of her blood, just three little droplets for the whole vial. She had been meticulous, but something hadn’t been right, it had been flawed. And she had fed it to her poor, unsuspecting wife. She didn’t know how to fix it.
Talking, she knew, was a wise first step. It was what she should have tried to do from the start of the entire mess, months ago, when she had first started writing that stupid book, when she had first begun to let her marriage to Dahlia fall by the wayside. The marriage that had made her so happy, the wedding that had been the best day of her life (other than the day that Chase had been born), she had neglected her own wife and then turned her into some.. overexcited, bug-eyed insomniac. What else could she do but talk to her? She didn’t know how to fix things otherwise, by that point. Things could already be too far gone.. it seemed like every day, Dahlia was getting worse.
Not to mention how concerned Jenny was, genuinely, for the brunette’s health. The strain of no sleep and no food was quickly showing on her wife’s body. Always fit and lithe normally, even just after a week, Dahlia was beginning to look sallow and weak, unsteady. Like her body was trying to tell her to take it easy, to sleep, but it wouldn’t let her. It was worrying indeed.
Jenny was hesitant as she slowly began to descend the stairs from the upper level of their house. She had said she needed some time to write, but what she had really needed had been a few minutes away from Dahlia, to herself. She had needed time to thing, to decide what she was going to say, what she needed to say, and how to approach the whole thing. She was glad that Chase would still be at school, for another hour or so at least. That would hopefully be enough time for her and Dahlia to hash out whatever needed to be said and done.
Unsurprised to find Dahlia waiting, somewhat patiently, for her at the bottom of the stairs, Jenny tried to put on her best smile. Hiding some of the discomfort on her face, as best as she could. Where the hell did she start? Sorry, baby, but you’re acting like a grade A nutcase so I think we need to have a talk like now? Or perhaps the ever popular I think we need some space because you’re freaking me the fuck out here? Decisions, decisions.
“Hey baby,” she settled on, once she was on the bottom step. Staying there, one hand holding the railing as she regarded Dahlia in her position perched on the couch. “Sorry, I.. took so long. You didn’t take a nap?” the blonde questioned. She had asked her wife to take a nap, to eat something, several times over the last forty-eight hours. To no avail so far.
---
Relief wasn’t the right word to describe what Dahlia felt as she heard the slight creak of stairs, her wife appearing just few seconds later. She drank her in - the blonde waves, the perfect curve of breasts and hips beneath the clothing she wore, the cupid’s bow that drove Dahlia crazy. In Dahlia’s eyes, Jenny was perfection incarnate.
But she also looked … worried? Dahlia knew her better than anyone, and the smile did nothing to hide the worry in Jenny’s eyes, setting Dahlia on edge at once. “Wasn’t sleepy,” she lied, shifting her weight on the couch. Of course she was tired; she hadn’t slept in a week. She would’ve thought her body was running on fumes if it had any left. What drove her now was something much more dangerous more unstable. It was obsession. Whenever she tried to close her eyes, she worried that Jenny would be gone when she opened them.
It was easier just to watch her, even if that meant the occasional hallucination brought on by a lack of rest.
“I missed you,” Dahlia added, beaming even through the dark circles and sallow tint of skin. “It felt like you were gone for days.” It didn’t matter that Jenny was gone less than hour, because it literally felt like days to Dahlia. She wasn’t exaggerating in the slightest. “Did you get some work done?” Work was a foreign concept to the brunette after a week of not giving a single shit about it. Employees depended on her, the entire company looked to her as a beacon, a compass, and now that she was gone? Well, the company would just have to fend for itself.
“You look worried, baby. What’s the matter?”
You did something, you stupid bitch, she thought to herself, worrying at her lush lower lip. You ruined it. “You’re not mad at me or anything, are you?” She desperately went over everything she said, every little move she made to try and find something that she’d done to upset her wife. For the past week, all Dahlia did was try to be the perfect wife. She surprised Jenny with flowers, made her perfect baths and fucked her to both of their hearts’ content.
What had she done wrong?
---
Of course she hadn’t been sleepy. She kept saying that, but Jenny didn’t believe it, because it couldn’t be possible. The signs of exhaustion were all over the other woman, they would have been obvious even if she didn’t already know the brunette like the back of her own hand. “You should really take a nap,” Jenny suggested again, automatically. It seemed that the only time Dahlia didn’t want to do what Jenny wanted, it was when it involved something good for Dahlia. She had managed to get the brunette to lay down with her on the couch all afternoon a couple of days ago, but while Jenny had almost been the one to almost drift off, with her head resting comfortably on her wife’s chest, listening to her steady breathing.. Dahlia herself hadn’t slept for a wink. Her eyes never closed.
Sometimes, Jenny could swear she was even blinking less lately.
“Missed you, too,” she answered automatically, trying to sound sincere about it, because returning the sentiment was natural. They said it to each other all of the time, normally. Usually when they had at least spent the day apart. But she hadn’t really missed the other woman all that much, not after just sixty minutes apart. Not after spending the last week practically attached to her. She had just been upstairs. It had been a welcome moment of silence, of being able to just sit with her head in her hands and think about what she was going to do next.
She hadn’t come out with the concrete answer she had been seeking, but still, talking it out was going to be a start. How could she not return the words anyway, when Dahlia looked at her like that and told her that she missed her? Even if missing someone after an hour, under normal circumstance, was more than a little strange? Sick.. no, lovesick. That was the word she wanted to use to describe the woman sitting in front of her. She looked pathetic, like a lost puppy.
“I got a little done,” Jenny lied, her own expression turning immediately sympathetic as Dahlia’s face went from looking like a lost puppy to a kicked puppy. Dahlia was always doing that lately, assuming that she had done something wrong, getting upset over some imagined slight against Jenny. Her Dahlia would have never been such a pushover, she’d never be so quick to accept the full blame on.. well, much of anything.
“Oh, baby no.. it’s not like that, I swear. It’s not.. honestly, it’s nothing you did,” she quickly assured the brunette, finally stepping away from her place on the stairs. It took her only a few seconds to join Dahlia on the couch, sliding onto the cushion beside the other woman, a gentle hand reaching up to push some dark hair away from her beautiful face. It’s something I did, baby. Jenny swallowed thickly, feeling herself getting choked up, but trying to hold it together. “I’m just.. I made a big mistake,” she tried to explained, trailing off momentarily, trying to think of what to say next, “But I’m going to fix it. We’re going to fix it. Because I love you, okay?”
She’d find out what to do, no matter what. She didn’t care if she had to go to her mother’s house, dig out the old leather bound book that she and Ella had hidden in the attic after they had grown bored of practicing the pages of spells within, and read the whole thing again. Refresh her memory, if that was what it would take. She’d go get the book, or whatever book she needed. She’d find out what went wrong, how to fix it, how to stop it. There seemed to be a potion for everything out there. There could be a potion designed just to counteract badly brewed potions, she didn’t know. But she’d find out, somehow.
Fixing Dahlia, making sure that she lasted long enough for Jenny to reverse the spell over her, was most important. She had to make sure she slept, ate, took care of herself. She needed time to relax, to be by herself, away from her wife. Jenny needed time alone to do research, for one, and the time apart could do Dahlia good. It wouldn’t be for too long. It wasn’t like they wouldn’t still be living in the same house together, just.. less intertwined. She needed space to work. She had danced around the inevitabilities in her mind already, that when the glamour was lifted, it wasn’t likely that Dahlia was going to just forgive her. It was more likely that their separation would happen as planned, possibly even permanently once she realized what Jenny had done to her.. but Jenny had never meant for it to turn out this way.
She’d explain herself, beg if she had to. She could see the error of her ways, putting herself and her work before her family. She’d tell her that, tell her everything, whatever it took. Something in Dahlia’s stare, there and not there all at once, told her that it might be too late.
“You know that I love you, and I love.. all of the really, really special things that you’ve been doing for my lately. And the.. um, all of the great sex, of course,” the blonde smiled. “You’ve just been absolutely perfect, sweetheart.” But I want my wife back, she didn’t add, just trying to reign in her smile a bit as she reached over to push more hair away from Dahlia’s face, tucking it behind her ear affectionately. The hot baths and bouquets and sex were lovely, but she wanted her Dahlia, the sassy girl that she had fallen in love with. “But you know, wouldn’t you be happier if we sort of.. did our own thing for a bit? We’ve had a really great week together,” Even though it was only meant to be a do over day.
“Shouldn’t you go back to work soon, though?” She hadn’t missed the fact that Dahlia’s phone rang daily, unanswered. “Why don’t we go out to dinner tonight, the three of us, and we’ll start fresh in the morning. We can have a little quickie before you get up,” the blonde tried her hand at cracking another smile, her fingers tickling along Dahlia’s neck to punctuate her point. “Then I’ll make you some fresh coffee, just like you like, and you can go to work, and think about me all day at your office, and then I’ll be here waiting when you get home. Just like always, right? I promise.”
---
Jenny could have been pouring out declarations of love and adoration, and the only thing Dahlia would have heard was, “--did our own thing for a bit?” She went tense, her full mouth thinning in … not anger, but something like it. Betrayal, maybe. Jenny wanted to do her own thing. Dahlia was lovesick, not dumb, and she knew what that meant. It meant Jenny needed time away. Away from her.
“You want to leave me,” Dahlia spat, obviously hurt as she pulled away from Jenny, from the soft little touches of affection and those big, beautiful eyes that she could get lost in. “I knew it. I could -- I could feel you pulling away from me these last couple of days.” Her hints were subtle enough, but Dahlia picked up on everything, even things that weren’t there in the first place. “I knew it,” she said again, standing to her feet in a flourish of a yellow dress and dark hair.
Dahlia didn’t say anything else before she practically stomped her way upstairs to their bedroom, slamming the door behind her hard enough to make the walls shake. She wasn’t angry; this went beyond that. She was hurt - the kind of hurt that made her stomach turn in on itself. After locking the door, she put her back against it and wrenched her eyes closed. I really messed it up this time, she thought, lower lip trembling with the promise of a sob. She’s going to leave me, and I’ll be all alone. No, that couldn’t happen. If Jenny left her, Dahlia would have nothing. She would die.
She didn’t even remember grabbing the pair of scissors from their nightstand drawer, but within seconds she had them in her hand and was sitting in the center of the bed, legs crossed and hands gripping the scissors so hard that they were trembling. Have to make this right, Dahlia thought, pressing the sharp tip of the scissors into her thigh. Make it right.
The pain was intense, searing as she drug the blade in long, deep strokes, but it didn’t stop her. Even when her thighs were slick with blood and the comforter beneath her, usually a spotless white, was stained red, she pressed on, moving to the other leg when she was done with the first.
In just a few minutes’ time, Dahlia had Jenny’s name cut into her legs. She only paused long enough to wipe some tears away, smearing her cheeks with her own blood in the process, before she moved to her arm.
---
Jenny barely had time to protest, “Dahlia, wait a second! That is not what I was saying at all,” before the brunette was already gone from the room like a flash, the slamming of the door echoing through the house in her wake. The blonde was shaking as she sank back against the couch cushions, pressing her hands over her face. She could already feel a headache coming on. She had been having more than her fair share of them in the last week, today looked already like it would be no exception. It only spurned her to do something, to find a way to fix things.
But she had to think in the now, the immediate, for at least a little while. She would start looking for a solution tonight, but in the meantime, Chase would still be home in an hour. She really didn’t want Dahlia acting like that in front of him, or saying anything rash in front of him. She hadn’t been expecting her wife to lash out at her like that.. and what was that nonsense that she was saying?
Why would Jenny leave her? Selfishly, she needed Dahlia, that was why they were in this mess in the first place.
She knew that she had to go up there, but she tried to wait the brunette out a little. Dahlia had such a hard time being separated from Jenny lately, the blonde kept expecting to hear the other woman descending the stairs again at any second.. but time ticked on, Dahlia didn’t come back. Why was she so pissed? What in the world was she doing up there? Jenny looked at the clock above their mantle, biting her lip. Three o’clock, only thirty minutes until Chase would be home now.
Standing from the couch, Jenny was careful and quiet as she headed for the stairs, going straight for their bedroom once she saw that it was the only closed door in the hallway. She tried the knob first, but to no avail. Swallowing her pride, how could Dahlia lock her out of their bedroom, the blonde finally knocked firmly. Her tone was stern, almost like the once she scolded Chase with. “Dahlia? Open the door, I’m serious. You misunderstood me.”
---
It didn’t once occur to Dahlia that this was a bad idea, not even as the blood dripped sluggishly down her arms and thighs. If anything, she felt better. Jenny would see how much she loved her when she saw what Dahlia did. She had to. Their love wasn’t like anything else; it was forever. And now Jenny’s name would forever be apart of Dahlia’s body.
She didn’t stop until Jenny’s name was carved at least five or six times into Dahlia’s flesh, and once that was done, she dropped the scissors onto the bloody sheets and stood to her feet. If she was shaken up by what she’d just done, it didn’t show in her sure, steady steps as she crossed to their full length mirror to admire her handy work.
Much better, she thought, not at all bothered by the bloodstains on her relatively new yellow dress. She turned to the side to get a better look, studying her arms and thighs with an artist’s eye. Much, much better. Content, she finally crossed over their stainless white carpet so that she could open the door. Dahlia opened it with an easy, playful little smile as if she hadn’t just carved into herself with a pair of aging scissors.
“I’m sorry I stormed out,” she told her sincerely, the throbbing in her limbs ignored because Jenny was back. Nothing was more important than her wife, not even her own body. “And I’m sorry I lost my temper. That wasn’t fair of me. It won’t happen again, I promise.”
---
Patiently, Jenny had waited for Dahlia to open the bedroom door for her. Over her chest, the blonde had loosely crossed her arms, weight shifted to one leg while she waited, wondering what the brunette was up to in there. Despite the occasional sound and shuffling from behind the door, Jenny couldn’t actually discern what the brunette was up to.. but she hoped it didn’t involve anything rash. She wouldn’t break anything, would she? Destroy Jenny’s laptop that she had left on the end of the bed or something. It seemed out of character for Dahlia’s recent penchant for only wanting to do things to please Jenny.. but Jenny had seen Dahlia’s face when she stormed out of the living room.
She had been furious.
When she saw the doorknob finally begin to turn, the blonde let out a sigh of relief, immediately loosening up her posture as she saw the door begin to crack open. There was even a little smile, apologetic, on her own face at first. But it quickly turned to a look of wide-eyed horror as Jenny actually saw the other woman standing in the doorway. She didn’t even hear a word Dahlia said. She took her in, the deep gashes covering her limbs (jenny jenny jenny), the beautiful yellow dress now tarnished with blood, the trail of blood dripped across the carpet. With her lips trembling, Jenny’s mouth hung ajar, words escaping her entirely. She made her living on words, but staring at the bloody.. person (someone, not her wife, it couldn’t be) standing in front of her? Jenny had absolutely no idea what to say.
Chase had fallen off his bike when he was ten, went face first into the pavement. He had been wearing his helmet, but it had been an awful mess, she had been hysterical. He had been so bloody. She had never seen so much blood before, not in person, until now. Her face was fine, that serene smile making it so much worse, but the rest of Dahlia was an awful mess indeed. There was hardly a beat before the first sob bubbled out of Jenny’s thread. “Oh Dahlia, Dahlia! What- what the hell did you do?!”
She rushed forward into the room, unsure where to put her hands at first (so much blood), before grabbing Dahlia by the shoulders, shaking her. There were tears running freely down her cheeks then, taking her make-up along with them. “What did you do?” Speaking of Chase, he was still due home in thirty minutes, maybe less by now. Jenny couldn’t judge how long she had actually stared at Dahlia before finding her voice. She didn’t want him to see this, she couldn’t let him see it.. but how was she going to hide it? What was she going to do about it?
The hospital. They had to go to the hospital. But the hospital was going to ask questions, too many questions. Her name, her name, carved all over her wife’s body. That easy, nonchalant smile, like she didn’t even feel it. She let Dahlia’s shoulders go, her hands shaking as she firmly took the brunette by her wrists, slicking her fingers red as she tried to examine the damage Dahlia had done to her forearms. It was bad. Out of her level of skill bad. She needed stitches, the blonde was almost certain of it. But the hospital would just ask so many questions.
---
Instead of making anything better, Dahlia just made it worse. When Jenny began to sob, Dahlia’s features contorted into an expression of confusion. She reached out, bloody fingers wrapping around Jenny’s arms as if to comfort her. “Hey,” she mused, voice low and soothing, quite the contrast to the actual situation itself. “I’m fine. Everything’s fine.” Just a week ago, Dahlia hated blood. She wouldn’t even watch a horror movie, much less cut herself.
But it was safe to say that the woman standing in front of Jenny now, all bloody limbs and eager smiles, was not the same woman that had stormed out of Jenny’s office just a week ago. Dahlia had been hollowed out and replaced with one thing, and that was the need to make Jenny happy. It was all about Jenny. The fire was gone. Everything that made Dahlia herself had disappeared to make room for the magic.
“It’s not a big deal. C’mon, why don’t you sit down?” But even the bed was bloody - stained with evidence of what Dahlia did to herself all because Jenny suggested she go back to work. Now, with Dahlia smiling comfortingly and urging Jenny to sit down as if she was the one who needed attention, it was almost as though Dahlia didn’t even remember cutting into her own skin, and she certainly didn’t remember being furious just minutes ago.
“You don’t look well, Jenn. Maybe you should lie down? Take a nap or something?” Fingers, still slick with red, reached up to push some blonde waves from Jenny’s face and tucked them behind her ear. “Everything is going to be fine. You’ll see.” Everything was fine. Dahlia couldn’t feel anything, though a normal person (a person not imbued with a potion) would have been writhing in pain. If Dahlia so much as felt a twinge, she didn’t show it.
“Want me to make you a sandwich? I could make that soup you like so much.”
---
If Jenny didn’t look well, it was probably because she didn’t feel well. It was so much blood, she almost felt faint at the sight of it all, and she could swear that she could smell it seeming to permeating the room. She had to think quickly, time was a factor, but her brain felt sluggish as it took in the fact that this was reality. It was actually happening. She kept wanting to pinch herself, praying she might wake up. “I can’t-- Dahlia, I can’t.. no, no, sit!”
Once again, the blonde seized her wife by the shoulders to stop her, almost flinching away from the bloody fingers so close to her face; the brunette’s hand left a smear of gore across the blonde’s cheek, staining every blonde strand of hair she touched. “Don’t,” Jenny replied automatically, taking a deep breath, trying to regain her composure and take control of the situation. She had to stop crying, but the effort of trying to hold it in and hold it together made her tremble all over. “Dahlia, just stop. Listen to me.”
The first aid kit, that was what she needed. She could fix this, fix everything. But she’d start there. It was in the bathroom closet, where it was always kept. Jenny insisted that they have one in the house, she had insisted on owning one since Chase had been born. One could never tell what might happen, especially with kids, and it was best to be prepared. But Jenny didn’t know if some gauze and bandages was enough to prepare her for all of this happening, and so suddenly.
Dahlia had gone off the deep end. There was no question about it now. And it was Jenny’s fault. She had fucked up, and badly, and now her downhill slope of problems seemed to be coming to a drop off, taking some of her sanity over the cliff with it.
“Sit, just sit, please sit down,” she urged the brunette, guiding her back to the bloody bed by her shoulders, pushing her down to sit on the edge of the mattress. Her stomach lurched at her wife’s suggestion of food. Hah, food. Like she could eat. Like she’d feel like eating at all after what she was seeing in front of her. Even when she closed her eyes to block it out and regain focus, she saw blood. “Sit, just.. stay and sit, please, Dahlia. Sit still.”
She sounded like she were addressing a dog rather than a woman, but she didn’t know how else to get her point across. She had to be firm. Dahlia had to listen, she could fix this if Dahlia just worked with her on it. How could she smile like that? How couldn’t she feel what she had done to herself, or at least acknowledge it? Slowly, she let the brunette’s shoulders go, backing up toward her bedroom door and keeping her watery eyes on her wife. “You’re not fine, you’re not, so don’t move.”
With that, Jenny disappeared down the hall and toward the bathroom, taking a brief moment to retch before retrieving the first aid kit. She didn’t have the stomach for this sort of thing. She wasn’t a doctor.
---
Dahlia honestly couldn’t understand why Jenny was acting this way. She was fine. Everything was fine. Jenny was just making this bigger than it needed to be, that was all, and Dahlia was about to tell her as much when her wife visibly grimaced, flinching away from the fingers that reached out to touch her hair. Her voice was sharp - far sharper than it had been before, causing Dahlia to take a hurt step back, like a puppy that had just been kicked in its side. Her hands dropped to her side, and she fell quiet.
She wanted to wipe away Jenny’s tears and wrap her in her arms, but she couldn’t. She couldn’t, because Jenny obviously didn’t want to be touched. It was a sobering thought - one that would haunt her for days to come, though Jenny had no way of knowing that. Without arguing, without doing much of anything, Dahlia listened to what Jenny told her to do. She stayed motionless and still, but her eyes - those wide, dark eyes that stared straight ahead - were mercurial and ever changing, sliding in and out of one emotion to the next.
One second, she was wounded and betrayed. The next, she was angry.
How could Jenny not see that Dahlia did it for her? Everything Dahlia did was for her, and it was like she didn’t appreciate any of it. She didn’t want to be around her anymore, didn’t appreciate the art Dahlia created - on her own body, no less - for her. What was Dahlia doing wrong? Whatever she was doing, it was driving Jenny away, and that was unacceptable.
When Jenny emerged from the hall, she’d find Dahlia slumped over, tear-stricken face buried against her own knees. She was sobbing uncontrollably, not because she was in pain (not the physical kind, anyway), but because she disappointed Jenny. “I just wanted to make you happy,” she sobbed, words muffled and strange. “That’s all. I just want you to be happy.”
If she couldn’t make Jenny happy, what was she good for?