When did this get so complicated?
Who: Alice and Rachel What: Having a breakup of sorts When: The other day Where: Alice's flat Status: complete Rating: PG-13
Alice had greeted Rachel wearing nothing more than her imagination. It let her forget about all the thoughts she'd been having, most of them that involved Rachel being things she wasn't supposed to be thinking. Like dates (what did people do on dates anyway? She'd never been on one!)
She was becoming overly fond of the other woman, she knew this. And maybe she thought, splashing water in her face while Rachel recovered in bed, maybe she needed to cut ties before she lost a friend over it.
It was still a relief to Rachel that she could enjoy sex with someone, despite what they'd done to her in her dream world to make her really, really wary of it. Maybe it was just a matter of who she was doing it with. Rachel thought that definitely had something to do with it.
Alice was an earnest lover and she had a way of making Rachel surrender herself completely. All of her seemed laid bare when we were in bed with each other, and instead of being terrifying, Rachel thought she was getting used to it.
Probably a little too used to it. Rachel glanced at the bathroom door Alice had escaped behind, and chewed on her lip. They probably really needed to talk.
Alice stepped out a few moments later, running her fingers through her soft curls and smiling shyly when she saw Rachel looking at her. That definitely didn’t help her conflicted feelings about the woman. “Already up for more?”
"Oh, I don't know. I think you've knocked all the energy right out of me." Rachel grinned tiredly at Alice. She loved it when the woman ran fingers through her own hair like that. Alice's tumble of blonde curls were unbelievably soft and beautiful. Sometimes Rachel daydreamed about them.
“Pity,” she said, deadpanned. She took a seat on the bed and leaned in against Rachel, letting her hair brush against the woman’s freckles.
"Is it really a pity?" Rachel's eyes rolled up into her head a bit as the hair brushed against her skin, then closed as she let out a happy sigh.
Without thinking, she mumbled, "You make everything I'm going through so much better. It's like it just goes away."
“I’m told I have that effect on people. I’m really a goddess given mortal life,” Alice joked, still trailing her hair along Rachel’s skin. “I’m glad I help.”
"You really help. My dreams are universally horrible and the things that happen to me in them..." Rachel sighed a bit, nuzzling herself up against Alice's hair, "You've seen the scars. You like licking them. And the marks. But you just... I'm so grateful that you're here."
“They happened, we can’t change that, but we can make it better.” Her fingers threaded through Rachel’s. They needed to talk, but she’d rather not. She didn’t have many friends, she didn’t want to lose the only one she had.
They definitely needed to talk. It seemed to Rachel like Alice was trying to avoid talking much at all. Normally she was okay with skipping the talking and getting right back to it, but she was actually starting to feel a little...
Used? Or like Alice was being used. They were mutually using each other, maybe. But that didn't seem fair, "We don't always have to make it better like that, though."
“I like it. I like to make you smile. I want you to not be scared. I want…” Alice lowered her head. “Oh bugger. What are we doing, Rachel? What is… this.” She gestured between them. “I didn’t want to bloody say anything because I’m fond of you...”
"No, I know you do. You're wonderful and I have fun with you and sometimes it's more than fun. Sometimes it's a lot more than that and I mean it when I say I'd never get through this without you." Rachel pulled Alice against her, but in a way that was more cuddly than anything sexual.
It was a valid question, and Rachel wondered, "What do you want it to be?"
Alice rested her head against Rachel’s chest. She already knew she was too close to the other woman. She didn’t want to tie her down. “I don’t know. I don’t know what I want, or what I need. Or if I even need anything more than this. I know it’s not fair to keep...using you. So maybe we need some boundaries.”
"That's not what you want," Rachel breathed. She knew that tone. It was - very awkwardly - the same tone that Kitty had used the other day. Her and Kitty would never, ever happen, and she didn't want them to. But Alice wanted more than this, and it was clear.
She ran her hand up into Alice's hair, gently, and pet at it lightly, "You don't want to tie me down, but you do. You don't want it to be using, you want it to mean something."
“I think we should see other people.” Alice wasn’t sure those were the right words, and they weren’t the words she actually wanted to say, and she felt compelled to explain. She waved her hands. “What I mean is you expanded my horizons but I haven’t really explored those horizons yet.” And part of her didn’t want to.
Rachel frowned, "You really... want to see other people? That's really what you want?"
She tried not to sound hurt about it. She was more hurt about it than she even realised. Her heart felt like it was sinking into the bed.
Alice didn't respond right away. She looked at her hands, and started to pick at her nails. "I don't even know what we are. I thought you were just a fun shag, but then I realized..."
She sighed, and lied through her teeth. "Yes. I should at least sow my oats."
"... then you realised what?" Rachel felt like her heart was being ripped out of her chest now, not just sinking into the floor somewhere. She pulled away from Alice to get a good look at her, "You realised you should sow your oats? That doesn't even sound like you."
“This isn’t easy!” Alice dug her nails into her legs, realizing she’d have to be the strong and mean one. Which didn’t really suit her, but she could at least be blunt. “You deserve better than a flighty english girl who’ll go back to London in a year or two and never see you again. We were just supposed to be a fling and then things got intense.”
Rachel reached down to Alice's hands and pulled them away from her legs, "Shut up. I deserve better!? Who the hell are you to decide what I do and do not deserve? What if I was completely okay with something long distance? What if I was completely okay with going back to England with you? What if I asked you to stay? You don't get to just fucking make decisions like that without talking it through!"
“I thought we were just shag friends!” Alice snapped. She struggled to meet Rachel’s eyes. “What’s with all the bloody yelling! What’s with...Stop looking at me like that, it’s disconcerting.”
"Because you..." Rachel grimaced a bit and climbed out of Alice's bed, "Because you yelled first and you're saying all of this crap and I don't even think you mean it!"
“I don’t even know what I mean.” She tugged at her curls and slipped out of bed too. This hadn’t gone the way she’d expected it to go. (what was she expecting? She’s daft, she knew it!)
"Alice..." Rachel actually sounded like her heart was breaking now, "What if it was more than shag friends. Would that really be so bad?"
She darted her eyes, still not able to look at Rachel. “Are you sure you wouldn’t rather a man? Or someone a little less eccentric?”
"Rather a man? Really?" Rachel laughed, that's how ridiculous that idea was. Sure, she'd played around with them a bit and she couldn't say she'd never be interested in one again, but she definitely leaned more heavily towards the female population. She shook her head, "Since when was eccentric bad? It's not bad. You're different, and unique, and I like that about you!"
Alice raised her head, looking at the roof. Why was this so hard? Couldn’t she just...kick Rachel out? Except she didn’t want to. She really didn’t want to. “What if I don’t want us tied down, then?”
She didn’t sound one hundred percent convinced. “I care about you so much, Rachel…” In fact, she sounded scared.
"Well either you care about me or you don't want to be tied down. I wish you'd pick one," Rachel growled. This whole thing was confusing and upsetting. She hadn't known what she even wanted until Alice had decided to take it away from her.
But she realised that Alice sounded scared, and sighed, raising a hand up to rub against her own head, "Is the idea of a relationship scary, is that it?"
“A little. Yes. I don’t know what any of it means and I don’t want to close any doors. But then there’s this big door that might open and it’s just a little…” She flailed her hands a little. “Overwhelming. There’s responsibility there.”
"But only to each other."
Rachel walked around to Alice's side of the bed, and folded the blonde woman into her arms, "But if you want doors open for... for someone else, then... I can get that, but just don't close this one."
“Is that what you want?” She looked up into Rachel’s eyes. “Open doors?”
The truth was complicated. Rachel chewed on her lip, "I want... you to be happy. I want you to have what you need, but I don't... want to lose you."
Alice slid her hand around the back of Rachel’s neck, then pulled her in and kissed her. “I hate labling things. I’m..sorry, I didn’t mean to hurt you. I mean I should have known it would, but. This ...us….is scary.”
"I am a little hurt, but..." Rachel sighed, and nuzzled a bit at Alice before pulling away from her. If they were going to see other people, she needed to give the other girl some distance, "I don't want you to be afraid. And maybe you do need to get out there and... sow your oats. I got that chance, so I know how it feels."
“I’m not fair,” Alice said. “I want to keep you too. But I want to experience more. But that’s not fair.”
"Well..." Rachel started pulling her clothing on, "You better believe I'm not just letting you go entirely. You're too good a friend."
Rachel getting dressed was just a little depressing. Alice put her hand on Rachel’s shoulder. What she wanted to say died on her tongue. Instead she pulled her into a hug. Her voice was muffled against Rachel’s shoulder. “I’m not a good friend. I’m shite at this.”
Rachel squeezed her, "You're a great friend. You deserve the chance to sow oats. You deserve the chance to... get out there. You deserve the chance to experience more than me. That's fair. It's right. And I'm not going to stand in your way or make you feel bad for it."
Her voice sounded a little hoarse, though, like she was trying desperately not to start crying.
Then why did she feel horrible? Why did she feel she was going to cry? Alice never cried. She never let herself feel these kinds of things. Life was for living and having fun and experiencing things but she didn’t want to experience what this felt like.
She reached up, stroking her fingers along the marks on Rachel’s face. She worried that she’d just undone everything that they’d worked for with this.
God, no. Not the marks. Rachel squeezed her eyes shut and chewed on the inside of her cheek. She was going to cry and this sucked. Alice deserved better than that, "I don't regret any of this."
Alice sighed, and bit her lip, sucking it into her mouth. “When did this get so complicated?”
"I don't know... life does that sometimes," Rachel whispered.
Alice searched Rachels eyes. “What if...what if we had an open relationship?”
Something inside Rachel's brain suddenly sounded like a car hitting the breaks. She'd just wrapped her brain around the idea of Alice and her not being anything, now this? Her brow wrinkled a bit, "Alice... you want me, but you don't want me, but you do, but you don't?"
“I want you. I keep thinking about you. It’s scaring me how much.” Oh great, she was waffling, or backtracking. Alice didn’t think that was particularly attractive. “You’re like … home.”
"It's not supposed to be that scary. Maybe a little scary, but… If it's scary, then it's okay to wait. It's okay to do whatever you need to do to make it less scary. But just PLEASE make up your mind." Rachel was putting her foot down, that was it.
Alice leaned in and kissed Rachel, as though she could find out what answer she needed that way. Her eyes fluttered closed.
Part of Rachel just wanted to push her away. It felt like Alice was waffling again or trying to convince herself to stop, and it just irritated her. She let out a bit of a sigh, instead, and rested her forehead against the other girl's.
“Maybe you should go,” Alice whispered, her eyes still closed. It was easier with her eyes closed, she couldn’t see the look on Rachel’s face. It could be another year before she saw her again. She hoped not. But it could end up that way.
Those words might as well have been the words that sung the song that ended the universe. Rachel smooched her lips against Alice's cheek, and started walking out the door. She didn't trust her voice to say anything aloud.
Alice opened her eyes in time to see Rachel walk out the door. When it closed there was a depressing finality to it. She folded her arms and hugged herself. “Shite.”