WHO: Gwen and Max WHAT: Catching up, advice, and some shopping WHERE: Bathos and then the mall WHEN: Backdated to last Friday WARNINGS: Swearing alert but not much else
Max had the afternoon off on Friday, which was a novelty. She’d just gotten off the phone with Thomas, and she’d left Amanda with Alina, and the distraction of shopping with Gwen seemed heaven sent. Leaving the baby was hard, managing a conversation with Thomas that didn’t involve begging was hard, and going home to Audrey’s disapproving and worried looks would have been even worse.
The radio was turned all the way up in the truck as Max drove, and Garth Brooks was trying to explain the value of unanswered prayers. She was pretty sure Garth was full of shit, but she let him try to convince her anyway, and by the time she reached Bathos she was in a better state of mind. Enough fucking sulking, she told herself as she pulled the truck out front and honked. She could see Gwen in the lobby, and she mashed the horn again (obnoxiously) with a grin. Garth was singing (loudly) about having friends in low places, and she rolled down the window and called out Gwen’s name.
Gwen was starting to get the hang of it all. The changes still took some getting used to, but she was making some amount of progress. Trying to change all that she could was cathartic at least. She had spent much of the week furniture shopping with Laura, talking about redecorating nearly every inch of the apartment. Her talk with Roger reminded her that she needed to get some transportation, something she hadn’t done in years. And that she needed some new clothes.
Gwen hadn’t gone out much since she crossed portal a few years ago, and her going out attire currently consisted of things that reminded her of men she would rather not be thinking of. When Max honked her horn and she climbed into her truck, her thoughts were immediately back on one of those men. “Do you mind if we change the music?” She tried not to wince so much. She and country music had come to an accord in recent months but now it just reminded her of Kyle. “Normally I don’t mind but right now it’s not the best idea.”
Max turned the music down when Gwen got in the car, and she turned the station to something resembling meaningless pop at the request. “Bad association?” she asked. She didn’t know Kyle well enough to know his music taste, but she could see him listening to some twang while drinking a beer, and she wondered if her friend had finally had a talk with Commissioner West. “West?” she asked, just the one word, pulling away from the sidewalk.
It was cold and rainy, like it always seemed to be in Seattle, and traffic was light. The swish, swish, swish of the windshield wipers filled in the silence that the music didn’t, and Max looked over at Gwen as she drove. “Car first?” she asked, glancing at the clothes Gwen wore. “Or clothes?” She smiled, looking back at the road. “I don’t care, as long as it keeps me out of the apartment for a long time,” she admitted.
“You mean my friend, Kyle? Yeah,” Gwen nodded sheepishly, giving an update to the last conversation they had about the man. She was glad for the change in music and she relaxed visibly and relaxed against the seats. “I guess clothes? Maybe we can swing by a dealership when the weather lets up a bit.” She wasn’t expecting it to get much sunnier than it was but car shopping didn’t seem very productive in the rain. “Plus I haven’t decided if I want a car or a bike. We can’t all be millionaires and have both.” Speaking of which she turned a careful eye to her friend and asked, “Things are still bad at home?” She would let Max elaborate on that however she’d like.
Max took the information that Kyle had been reduced to friend status without showing any surprise, because she wasn’t surprised. It had been coming for awhile, as far as she could tell. Before Gwen’s disappearance, even. “How’d that talk go?” she asked, because she knew all about emotional talks lately. She turned the truck toward the mall, and she glanced at the empty carseat in the rearview. “Depends on if you call home Bathos or Aubade. Bathos just means Audrey will look at me like I’m the biggest fucking moron in the world for still trying to make things work with Thomas, which I get from her point of view. But I can’t make her understand that this is hard for him, that figuring out how to be part of a family is something completely foreign. That he isn’t an asshole, even when he is being an asshole. As for me and him? I don’t know. We’d fixed it, but then this shit happened with him getting shot and the suit, and he thinks I don’t trust him to make decisions. Manda’s in Aubade, and I really want to go home,” she confessed, looking over at her friend. “Now, you. Darman?”
“The talk went great,” Gwen replied honestly, though her eyes moved back to the road. “Though talk about a shitty time to finally agree with me. I know we’ve argued about how my job would always ruin things but.. yeah.” Though she tried to sound fine with it, she was still particularly sore about the entire thing. They hadn’t necessarily had a great thing between them but sometimes it had been good, and if there was someone she had wanted to be around when she came back, it had been Kyle. He had been so far removed from the Mockingbird situation that he was the only one she had wanted to see, and then he told her that she had come back to nothing. “But we’re friends? We were always great as friends.” She sighed and tried to get her thoughts and nerves back in line.
Gwen listened in to the developments of Max and Thomas with a frown. Roger had yelled at her earlier for worrying too much but it always came naturally to her, like now. “I’m sure Audrey just wants the best for you, her sister. And that probably constitutes as making sure you’re not letting yourself get run around by someone. He won’t let you see Manda?” Thomas was a great many things but he never struck her as unreasonable. Barring Max from seeing her daughter didn’t sound like him at all, but Max knew Thomas in ways Gwen didn’t so she deferred to her and delicately asked her questions. As for Roger, Gwen scoffed but it was a light one. “He’s been giving me shit about not going out so he’s making me. Hence the need for something to wear that won’t embarrass him. Or something that will mortify him so bad to be seen with me. I haven’t decided which yet.”
“Audrey does,” Max agreed. “She just doesn’t understand how he is. She wants him to be Corvus with poems at the ready. That just isn’t him,” she said, which she thought Gwen might actually understand, knowing Thomas as well as Max suspected she did. She was quick to correct the misconception about Amanda, however, rushing right into clarification. “NO! God, no. He thinks we should both be there for her, regardless of what is going on with us.” She shook her head, to illustrate how much he wasn’t trying to keep her from the baby. “But she’s living in Aubade, and I’m in Bathos, and I miss her. I miss him, Luke, too. It’s just hard.”
Max turned into the parking lot of the nearest mall, and she cut the engine once she found a decent space. “But enough of my whining. Today is about you. So, is this a date we’re buying clothes for?” she asked with a grin. She’d thought her friend and Darman should have stopped fighting their attraction to each other months ago, and the fact that Darman might have finally had the balls to ask Gwen out made Max feel like she was in high school again, cheering on the conquests of a good friend. She laughed at the thought. “We’re never getting out of high school teenager antics. You realize that, right? No matter how much we fucking grow up, we’re still sixteen-year-old girls with crushes on boys who don’t cooperate the way they should,” she said, opening the truck door.
Gwen relaxed visibly when she was assured that Thomas wasn’t making terrible demands of Max. “Then you need a better arrangement. It’s new for both of you. Neither of you have ever been parents and he’s, well, he’s not used to having to take everyone’s every little thing into consideration.” It wasn’t an excuse, though if there was anyone she would make excuses for Thomas would’ve been one of them. It was a simple fact as well. “This was always going to be a bit of trial and error. What you have right now isn’t working out so you need to change it and keep changing it until you have something that works better. Can she stay with you in Bathos instead? He can manage to visit there, same with Luke.”
As for Roger, she laughed and was very quick to remind her, “It’s not a date,” which made her chuckle again as she realized how incriminating it sounded. “He called me out for not going out. He’s got some thing he’s going to this weekend. Some music event so I said I’d go with.” She steered Max towards the mall with a mixture of anticipation and dread, opening the door and following her in. How she hated shopping, just like when she was in high school. “If I’m still stuck mooning after boys like I did when I was in high school you should probably just put me out of my misery now. We’re getting too old for this.”
The mall wasn’t crowded, though teenagers skipping school loitered here and there and old women walked along the perimeter with old gentlemen. Max nodded toward the old people, and she grinned. “Could be worse. We could look like that while we’re mooning over boys,” she said, turning toward the large department store in the corner of the shopping center. “I want to go home,” she said, finally. “I left. Me. He didn’t kick me out, and he didn’t want me to go. Now he’s just gotten it into his head that it’s safer; I’ve got to find a way to change that particular opinion.” She smiled, very much like a teenager. “Maybe a stop by the lingerie department before heading home?”
“It’s a date,” Max said, once Gwen had finished talking. “Or, we’re going to treat it like one, at least.” She stepped into the huge department store, and she turned toward the younger adult items rather than the older matronly ones. Date clothes.
“No, no, no,” though Gwen was laughing as chased after her friend who was moving to the flashier, tighter, and shorter outfits of the department. “It’s not a date and we’re not treating it like a date.” She was momentarily distracted by a hideous and skimpy outfit that seemed to be several yards short of anything remotely decent. “And if you have to, then it’s a pity date. He’s just feeling bad because I’m feeling bad. It’s nothing.”
Gently, she nudged Max back in the direction of more appropriate and simple wear. “Lingerie will definitely help. You. Help you, not me. Help you.” She laughed at her slip and started to rifle through some dresses on the rack. “He’ll come around. You’ll have to be on your best behavior for a bit but he will. And if there’s anyone who can get through to him, it’s you. You know how to get to him like none of us can.” Though she wasn’t looking at Max, she didn’t sound at all hesitant. She had the utmost faith in her friend, and had no doubt whatsoever she’d be back in Aubade in no time. She pulled down a grey sheath dress and pressed it against herself before turning to Max for approval.
“Have you looked at yourself in the mirror?” Max asked, because it was ludicrous to think anyone would consider Gwen a pity anything. “Okay, so maybe the clothes could use some work, but you don’t,” she said, taking her friend (sheath dress and all) by the shoulders and moving her to one of the mirrors that dotted the floor. “You’re gorgeous,” she said over Gwen’s shoulder, and then she grinned. “But you should show more leg than that.” She moved to another rack of dresses, and she held one up that was just a little shorter, a deep brown instead of the gray. “And something to bring out that red hair,” she added.
Max laughed at the comment about the lingerie, even as she tucked the dress back onto the rack, deeming it too somber. “We can both get lingerie. It never hurts to be prepared,” she said. “And I haven’t bought a thing since I got rid of the baby weight,” she admitted. “I think Audrey thinks it’s not enough, what he can give me,” she said, and it made her think of someone she hadn’t heard from in at least a week. “I haven’t heard from Corbinian lately. Have you?” There wasn’t any jealousy in the question, even knowing what she did about what had happened in the maze.
Gwen frowned slightly as Max pulled her and her dress choice to the mirror, but at the compliment she smiled softly, leaning her head against her friend’s affectionately. Gwen knew she was kind of cute, funny and smart, but in comparison to some of the women in Roger’s life, she felt she paled. And they had been friends for so long, surely she would’ve known if he thought about her in a particular way. But she let Max pull up another dress and gaped appropriately at the length. “That would barely fit a toddler,” she said dismissively and rifled through the rack herself again.
She scoffed at the idea of needing lingerie for this outing but did frown as she realized what she had at home. Like her dresses, everything she currently had were very easily associated with someone else and so she muttered under her breath a soft, “Maybe,” but promising little else. Her question made Gwen shake her head. “Audrey just wants the best for you, and with that sort of mentality no one will be good enough. As for Jack, no, not much. I talked to him while I was away.” How delicately she could put be locked up in a bunker for over a week. “That was interesting and awkward,” she laughed softly and pulled something green and flowy and looked to Max for input. “And an email about you know who in lock up.” She had seen the files and knew Rorschach’s name but it was still odd to talk about them off comm. “But other than that no. Have you?”
Max laughed at Gwen’s opinion about the brown dress. She realized she had no real idea what her friend’s fashion sense was, but she suspected it didn’t match her own skinny jeans and dipping necklines and heels. “How about this one?” she asked, pulling up a simple black cocktail dress that went to just above the knee. “Might be good for something with music,” she said, holding it out to Gwen.
“Corvus,” Max said with a sigh, eschewing the vigilante name. “He says he doesn’t know how to talk to me anymore,” she admitted, finding another dress, this one shiny and silver and handing it to Gwen. “Try it on before you bitch,” she said, smiling, and then going back to the conversation. “He kissed me while I was in the hospital with Amanda, right after she was born, and things have been all fucked up since. Now, they’re just worse.”
Rorschach. Max nodded. “I turned in my comm after that. Sort of. It’s complicated,” she said, shrugging a little apologetically. “We should help him, but if he’s unstable, he can’t just be out there running wild. He’s been falling apart for awhile now,” she said, which was true, even if she understood more of his past than she wanted to explain. “You know, talking about getting you laid is much better. Try those on, and lets go find you some underwear.” Smile.
Gwen eyed the black dress approvingly, holding it up against herself and checking in the mirror. To be fair, she didn’t mind the other dresses so much, and if this was a date, she would’ve tried them. But this was just an outing between friends and the black dress suited her well enough. When Max showed her the silver dress and insisted she try it, she scowled but took it, muttering something about mistaking her for another redhead but ducking into the nearby dressing room. She could hear her friend through the door well enough but only answered when she came through the door.
“I’m guessing he knows now about how you feel for him?” Or lack of feelings, she supposed. “You might need to give it a bit more time. Give it some distance.” The words came out slightly twisted since her lips were an exaggerated frown. The silver dress was stopped mid-thigh, the metallic fabric draping over one shoulder and all her curves nicely. It was flattering and eye-catching, and Gwen was ignoring those facts completely in favor of frowning at her friend.
“As for our friend,” she sighed and shook her head. “He’s always been something of a wild card in terms of demeanor but he hasn’t been very far off the mark. Several times he’s told me of hunches that always amounted to something. There’s something that’s missing but hopefully he’ll talk to him and let us know what brought this on.” She did a slow turn for Max, showing off the dress from more angles. Then she was back into the dressing room to try the one in black. “And we’re getting undies for you. No one’s going to see mine.”
Max sat down on the bank of chairs intended for tired and bored husbands and children that was outside the dressing room, and she laughed without any real mirth. “Oh, he knows. Trust me. We keep going over it and over it. He, too, thinks Brandon sucks for me. It’s like the theme song in Seattle these days,” she said, the frown turning into a smile when Gwen came out in the silver. “That’s fucking gorgeous,” she said, adding a low whistle to the end of the sentence that was more Army male than Army male. “To dressy for Darman’s date, but definitely something you should have in your closet.”
The door to the dressing room closed again, and Max sat back in the chair. “Rory,” she said, shortening Rorschach’s name for use in public. “It’s tough, because certain friends of ours would say it didn’t matter what he did, that it was wrong. Granted, certain friends have definitely done worse than that themselves to people. We need to find out what he did, especially if we want some money and muscle, and I think we might need both.” She groaned then, and she let her head drop back against the wall. “I can’t ever stop fucking meddling.”
“Non-date,” Gwen feebly corrected but the way her lips pursued together meant she was giving Max’s suggestion some serious though. She took another look at the dress in the mirror and shrugged before slipping out of it. Fine, she’d get it. But not for this weekend.
“You don’t need to stop,” Gwen called out from behind the door, a soft hint of amusement since she realized she wasn’t denying the use of meddle. “But I don’t think it would hurt to take it down a notch. And I bet our friend could agree to that.” When Gwen stepped out again, it was in the sleeveless black dress. The dark color highlighted her hair nicely and the chiffon fabric was light enough to swish and flare just above her knees with every step and turn that she did. Gwen was certainly more than pleased with the result, flashing Max a grin and thumbs up as she awaited approval. “I’m not excusing what Rory did but it still stands that he usually has reasons for doing things. It’s still necessary to get the whole story, and that goes for the police as well as us. We act with all the knowledge available, so if it proves that there was nothing instigating then...” Her previously bright expression faded slightly, for if there was no good reason, then leaving Rorschach in prison was their only option.
“I promised to back him on his decisions, as long as he talked to me about them first. Let’s see how that goes,” Max said, lifting her head back up when she heard the dressing room door open. She whistled, even louder than before, calling the attention of an annoyed saleswoman. “Perfect,” she said, even as the woman shook her head and walked out of the dressing room. “Darman won’t be able to keep his fucking eyes off you.”
Max knew she was right about Rorschach, but that didn’t make it any easier, and she stood with a sigh. “Let’s hope there was a really good fucking reason. I think he’d tell Corvus, if there was. Which means talking to Corvus, I guess. I’m ready for a break. Can’t we have a week without the world caving in on itself?” she asked. “Just one?” It was a pipe dream, and she knew it, but it would have been nice just the same. “A week of lots of skimpy dresses and fruity drinks and lots of sex,” she suggested with a wink. “And a babysitter,” she added, her expression sobering immediately after. “Anything from Quinn?”
Though she rolled her eyes, Gwen couldn’t stop the pleased little grin as she turned back to the dressing room. Dresses acquired. The trip wasn’t as painful as she feared. “Talk to him and keep it light,” she called from behind the door and above the sound of rustling clothes. “Try not to stray into the heavy topics, like you know who.” She was aware how likely that was going to happen but she had hope.
When Gwen came out, her arms were full of both dresses and her expression tightened at the last question. “A bit. I don’t know whether to be proud or pissed off that she listened to all my tips on how to fall off the grid. I couldn’t get a lock on her signal. She’s not giving up, even though the trail’s gone cold...” Her frown deepened with many things unsaid. She didn’t want to say that she had a very strong feeling that Quinn wasn’t coming back, not anytime soon anyway.
Gwen shook her head and steered them away from the dress racks. “To the lingerie, for all your argument winning needs. And I can’t promise a week of it, but how about a night? Skimpy dresses and booze, though sex is going to be up to you to handle,” Gwen laughed softly. “I’ve got someone I want you to meet too, my old friend from New York. I think you’d like her. And she could use a good night out too.”
Max took the dresses from Gwen’s arms and handed them to the annoyed salesgirl. “We’re getting those,” she told the exasperated looking woman, before turning toward the lingerie department with Gwen. “I could go for a night of dancing and drinks that are too sweet,” she said truthfully. “Who’s your friend?” She hadn’t met any of Gwen’s friends, at least not any who were old enough to drink, and she found herself extremely curious about the kind of woman her friend liked and trusted.
In the lingerie department, she paused in front of the wall of colorful offerings, and she picked up a pair of panties with ruffles and held them out to Gwen. “Even the underwear makes me feel old,” she said, but she was smiling. “Basic black? Red? Virgin white?” she asked. “And maybe I should actually buy a bra,” she mused, putting the ruffled concoction back.
“I think Darman seems the racy type,” Max added.
At that, Gwen threw something cotton and plaid and much too pink at Max’s head with a smirk.
Then she turned back to the underwear she was rifling through, picking out a cute pieces that she liked and if she found anything particularly racy, she tucked them to the bottom of her pile, hopefully before Max could see. “You’d love her,” she said, going back to the topic of her friend. “I’ve known Laura since we were in high school. She can’t type to save her life. Only I would be best friends with a technophobe. But she’s funny and ballsy as all hell. Reminds me of someone.” She cast a quick glance at her other best friend. Clearly Gwen had types in men as well as female friends.
She peeked around to see what Max was considering and couldn’t help, “You can’t go wrong with black but red I think would look great on you. What does he like, anyway?” In that moment she was more Max’s friend than anything else, her friend’s lover nothing more than just that, not anything associated with Gwen herself.
Max caught sight of something definitely racy at the bottom of the pile of cotton that Gwen carried, and she tugged it out with a wide smile and held it up, shaking the panties a little before throwing them back atop the pile. “Your friend sounds like a good catch,” she said honestly. “Anyone ballsy is okay in my court. I spent a week drinking alone, and dancing with friends sounds fantastic. Name the time, and I’m there. Assuming she doesn’t mind my cursing which, for the record, I’m fucking working on.” She grinned. “Language,” she said, in a tone that was all imitation of Thomas’ constant chastising.
Max was holding up a red bra when Gwen asked the question about what Thomas liked, and she considered not kissing and telling for all of two seconds. “I wish I fucking knew. I think the key is to get him so worked up he can’t fucking think, in which case it’s against the walls and rough and so hot. But getting him there doesn’t have anything to do with me. It’s generally something about the job,” she said, keeping it vague. “I’d give my left fucking ovary to figure out how to get him that worked up with a bra,” she admitted, shaking the red fabric between her fingers. “Maybe the fact that I don’t wear one is the problem?” she asked, looking down at her chest and grinning.
Gwen turned a bright red as Max held up the little flimsy something from the bottom of her pile and the blush didn’t go away once she put it back. The glower also remained but so did her embarrassed grin but she was glad Max pulled out that one. Out of all the racier ones she had picked out, at least that one had the most fabric.
“She definitely won’t mind the cursing. Considering how often she’s told me to fuck off this week, I think you’re fine. In my defense though, she needs to get over her computer fear and learn how to type.” There were other similarities too, like who Max was involved with and who Laura had been involved with, but that wasn’t any of her business to say here. Who knew, maybe after a few margaritas someone would start gabbing.
Gwen frowned softly as Max described her and Thomas, and she was more than glad that vague details were enough for her. She didn’t need specific mental images but she did have some advice for her friend. “So wear one,” she insisted, giving an approving glance to the red bra Max held up against her. “Try a new tactic. I always think it’s better about what you’re concealing than what you’re showing.” From a former cop to a former army girl, the advice was sound on and off the field.
“Oh, God, he’ll die,” was Max’s completely unguarded response as she reached for a bustier and underwear that had less fabric than anything in Gwen’s pile. She grabbed stockings and a garter, and she glanced down at Gwen’s legs and tossed over some very attractive black stockings. “Might as well show those off,” she said, grinning. “Think it’ll feel different? Sex, now that you can walk? Or have you already tested it?” she asked. “And you can blush and smack me over the fucking head with that thong you’re trying to hide, if you want.”
Max grinned, then, calling over the saleswoman. “She wants all of these, too,” she said, not caring whose attention they drew. “Your friend sounds like my kind of girl. Did she just move to town?”
The blushing continued although Gwen decided to take Max’s route and gave her the finger instead. “Haven’t really tested anything out. Kyle cut me loose before we could try. But it was fine in the maze. Way more than fine.” She bit her lip as she realized what she just said and blushed even deeper. “I’m going to strangle you with this thong at this rate,” she laughed.
“She just got in a few weeks ago. Right when I was out, I think.” It was getting easier, referencing that time, as long as she kept it in passing. “She just opened up a flower shop. Petal to the Nettle.’?” She wasn’t sure if Max had seen it but she figured she’d throw it out there.
Max quirked a brow at the comment about the maze. “You could always take Corvus off my hands,” she said with a wink, completely nonplussed by the finger or the threat to strangle her with a thong. Impulsively, she grabbed a deep, red dress from a nearby rack, and she tossed it on the counter along with her own undergarments. “Petal to the Nettle. That’s fucking romantic,” she said with a smile. “Drinks and dancing. For sure. And you can tell me all about how Darman likes that dress,” she said, adding. “And what’s underneath.”
Gwen shook her head and set her own pile of underthings on the counter, smiling politely as the woman brought over her dresses as well. “I’m never going to hear the end of this,” she said softly to no one in particular.