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More of my in the works Helacious fanfic. You know the drill, people. Comment if you like/dislike/love/hate the fic.
TITLE: Time Will Tell
SERIES: The L Word
AUTHOR: Dreiser
EMAIL: dreiser7@yahoo.com
YAHOO ID: dreiser7
MY WEBSITE: http://www.dreiser.net/
CONTENT: S3 spoilers. F/F romance. Alice/Helena. Helacious.
SUMMARY: Even years of separation can't take away the connection between Alice and Helena and the attraction they feel for one another.
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing but my undying Helacious love.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The idea for this fic and the title comes from a spiffy song from Anberlin.
This scene is happier than the others so far and so I decided to link a super happy song from one of my favorite happy lesbian movies Imagine Me & You. Enjoy it!
Feels Like I'm In Love by Kelly Marie:
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=3506386F5228F038
Time Will Tell
By: Dreiser
Scene Three
Big was the first thing that popped into Alice's mind as she stared at the massive white building in front of her. Heavy was the next word as she slowly tugged open the huge black doors to the building only to find her grasp slipping on the handle. Releasing a yelp as the doors suddenly flung open, Alice instinctively stepped backwards. She heard an embarrassed apology and tall was the next thing Alice thought as she stared up at the red haired teenage boy who was holding those heavy doors open.
"Wilson?" said Alice in disbelieving tones. This couldn't be the little boy she gave piggy back rides to and taught how to do the hokey pokey. There was no way he could possibly get this tall or grown up looking.
"Alice!" the teenager exclaimed, wrapping her up in a hug and immediately Alice knew that despite her disbelief this lanky goliath was indeed the little boy in sweater vests she had once known as Wilson Peabody. And for some reason that one time little boy felt that hugging her also should also accompany lifting her off of the ground. Which was more than a little disconcerting to experience. "Mom told me you were coming to dinner but I didn't believe her. It's so great you're here!"
"Wilson, let her go. You know that's like one step away from sexual harassment, right?" a girl's voice announced in a slow and mocking drawl that nonetheless held unmistakable affection. Poking her head just barely over Wilson's shoulder and putting her tippy toes on the ground Alice looked at the figure of a petite Asian girl who wore a lopsided smile and had a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. The girl's smile grew larger on having her attention and she gave a jaunty wave of her hand.
"Jun Ying?" Alice said, muffled against the cashmere sweater that Wilson had upgraded to over the years. Apparently wearing a vest just wasn't sufficing any longer.
"The one and only," said Jun Ying, clucking her tongue humorously. "Yo! Doofus," she declared, lightly whapping her much taller brother on the shoulder. "Let her go already. She might sue Mom and take away our ancestral fortune."
Giving another embarrassed apology, Wilson carefully put Alice's feet back on the ground only to then immediately scowl at his sister. "Mom's British. We don't have an ancestral fortune. It's a familial estate."
"Everybody has ancestors, Wilson," replied Jun Ying in dry tones, rolling her eyes. "Or else we wouldn't exist. You totally need to pay more attention in Ms. Lowsley's history class. If you did then you'd know this stuff."
"Maybe I'd pay more attention if I had a crush on her," said Wilson, forming a wicked smile.
"Shut up!" Jun Ying managed to yell and hiss at the same time, pinching her brother in the side and smiling triumphantly when he shrieked and leapt away from her.
Rubbing his side, Wilson looked to Alice and said lowly, "Watch out for her. She's got a temper and nails manicured to perfect deadly sharpness so they can be used for weapons."
"He's a big wuss for being so mammoth," said Jun Ying, hiding her mouth with her hand and feigning as if she was telling Alice some great secret although she said this more than loud enough for Wilson to hear.
"A wuss? The star fullback of London's Hemel Stags?" replied Wilson with a scoff. "Do you remember how many times I got tackled during the last match?"
"And precisely how does playing rugby make you not a wuss?" questioned Jun Ying, wiggling her manicured fingernails in a menacing manner and grinning as Wilson took another nervous step backwards. Forming a smug expression, she folded her arms over her chest. "I rest my case."
"Children?" Helena's voice rang out in the air, sounding out of sorts and almost tinny. Only when she saw Wilson and Jun Ying walk over to a nearby intercom did Alice realize the reason behind that. "You aren't squabbling again, are you? I do hate when you pretend to fight with one another, no matter how amusing you do find it."
"We aren't squabbling," Wilson and Jun Ying sing songed their response in perfect synchronization and exchanged grins.
"You're certain?" Helena asked skeptically.
"We're certain," Wilson and Jun Ying sing songed again.
A long pause and just the sound of tinny breathing then Helena asked rather hesitantly, "Has Alice arrived?"
Wilson and Jun Ying turned to Alice with a matching gleam in their eyes and returning their smiles, she hopped over to them and leaned closer to the intercom. "I'm here," she sing songed, doing a fair impersonation of the teenagers.
Another pause then Helena said wryly, "And you're getting on splendidly, I would suppose."
"You're supposing right, Peabody," drawled Alice in teasing tones, looking to Wilson and Jun Ying and winking. "Your kids are just as cool as I remember. But one of them is a hell of a lot taller."
"It is disconcerting to think on it," Helena murmured in tinny contemplation of her son's impressive height. "Children, do be good and bring Alice upstairs. Dinner is almost ready."
There was a buzz to signal the end of their intercom conversation and the teenagers moved towards the private lift. "How come no one ever talks about how much taller I got?" Jun Ying grumbled. She irritably punched in the key code to the lift which led directly inside their flat that occupied the top two floors of the building. "I mean, it's total height discrimination because I so got taller from when I was a kid but nobody notices because Wilson got freakishly tall."
"Nobody says anything because you've barely grown a foot since you were ten," remarked Wilson, leaning against the back of the lift and crossing his long legs one over the other. "While I've gained at least two and half feet. You should really accept that 6'2" will always dwarf 5'3" in height impressiveness. It will totally help your ego out and maybe rid you of your tiny person rage at the world."
"For the last time, I don't have tiny person rage!" Jun Ying declared, giving her brother a swift kick which he didn't bother to avoid. Instead he simply lifted an eyebrow at Alice as if to say, 'See what I mean?'
Chuckling softly, Alice shook her head and decided that Helena was definitely right. They were putting on a perfect parody of sibling rivalry. One that couldn't help but be somewhat amusing because you would have to be deaf, dumb, and blind not to see there was no real malice behind their words. It was just a strange game they played.
A game that their mother clearly didn't appreciate nearly as much.
Or at least that's the impression Alice got when the lift opened to a stern looking Helena wielding a large wooden spoon. "Did they behave on the ride up?" Helena asked, focusing her attention on Alice. Though the question was directed at the blonde, Jun Ying immediately opened her mouth only to be silenced by the spoon being pointed her way. Jun Ying snapped her mouth shut and scowled as Wilson began giggling under his breath. Helena turned her attention back to Alice and formed a slow smile as she tilted her head to one side. "Well, darling? Did they behave?"
"They behaved," said Alice, forming her very best charming smile.
"I'm rather sure I don't believe you," said Helena in staid tones, though her eyes twinkled. "However," she drawled as a slow smile spread on her features. "As there isn't anything I can do to punish you I suppose we will have to let the matter die." Turning sharply on her heel to walk back into the kitchen, Helena then called playfully over her shoulder, "For now!"
"Busted," Wilson and Jun Ying sighed with grim resignation.
"Busted?" asked Alice, following after the teenagers as they led her into the foyer of the penthouse. Peering up at the winding staircase that led to the top floor, Alice wondered if that was where Helena's bedroom was. Then she wanted to smack herself for having those kind of thoughts. Hearing her name called, she grinned nervously at the expectant faces of Wilson and Jun Ying. She felt strangely as if they somehow knew she had been having almost but not quite naughty thoughts about their mother. "Sorry," Alice chuckled, avoiding their eyes and looking at that twisting staircase again. "What did you say?"
"Mom knows when anyone lies," Jun Ying informed, plopping down at one of the oak chairs at the dining room table that currently seated six. While the table and its chairs were obviously high quality and expensive pieces, there was something warm and familial about them. Even the penthouse itself had the same friendly and lived in feeling that Alice remembered so fondly from all those years ago. And it made her impossibly happy to see that hadn't changed about Helena. That she retained this wonderful ability to make the often cold world of money and privilege she had grown up in and transformed it into something completely different for her children. Loving and welcoming and everything a child could possibly want from their mother. Well, except for the being able to tell when anyone is lying part. "It just sucks. Especially when Wilson tries to cover for me about curfew and fails miserably."
"It's not my fault my ears turn red when I'm nervous," said Wilson peevishly, looking off to one side and folding his arms over his chest, already demonstrating this behavior as the tips of his ears became slightly pink.
"But no way do you get nervous when you play rugby, am I right?" Alice asked teasingly, drawing back on their conversation from the lobby. As much as she did find the sibling squabbling amusing it had to come to an end eventually and now was as good a time as any. Besides, she had some knowledge of the sport from having seen a few games when she dated a girl who was involved in the all lesbian league in California. "That would just get you tackled."
"Pretty much anything gets you tackled," said Wilson, forming a brilliant smile that reminded Alice entirely of Helena. "I mean, I love the sport but no matter how good you are tackle, tackle, tackle. At least for fullbacks."
"And you don't get tired of it," said Alice doubtfully, unconsciously wincing as she pictured Wilson getting tackled again and again and again. Resting her chin the palm of her hand she grinned at the redhead and drawled, "At least tell me you get bruised and think better of the tackling. It would really reassure me about your sanity, Wilson."
"Sorry," Wilson said with a hearty laugh, holding up his hands in playful surrender. "I have to admit I'm totally insane when it comes to rugby and I sadly must also say I love the tackling."
"He's a rugby sadist," offered Jun Ying, smirking.
"I'm thinking you don't play rugby do you, Jun Ying?" Alice asked, unable to help chuckling when the girl looked startled to have the attention turned to her.
"She sits alone in her room and writes just another sad love song," said Wilson, singing the end of his sentence in off key but boisterous tones and delighting in the grimace his sister wore on recognizing the lyrics. Giggling and dodging the swipe Jun Ying made at him, he exclaimed, "Come on, Jun! You know you love Toni! It was a gift from your future Sugar Mama and current unrequited crush." Turning his attention to a curious Alice, he informed, "Her favorite teacher, the lovely Ms. Lowsley, is also in charge of the music club. Where our little Jun loves to spend most of her time. Best of Toni Braxton was a gift given this last Christmas."
"Toni is excellent," said Alice, giving Jun Ying a reassuring smile. Jun Ying ducked her head out of embarrassment and not wanting that to last too much longer, Alice asked, "Do you only write music or can you play too? I could always play but the writing was the hard part with me."
"But you're a writer," Jun Ying replied in astonishment, her head lifting. "I mean, that's why you're here. You're on a tour for your book. So how can you say that writing is hard?"
"Writing words for detailed sentences is super easy to me. But writing words for song lyrics that can make people feel things without deep explanation? That is what I consider hardest to write," Alice revealed. She looked sheepish then confessed, "I've tried to write songs in the past and they were pretty horrible. Just the prime example of cheesy. And," Alice looked thoroughly shamed as she leaned across the table. "Some of them even rhymed."
"Oh god," said Jun Ying, laughing and shaking her head a bit. "That's really bad. Rhyming is just totally wrong, Alice."
"I know, I know," said Alice, leaning back in her chair and waving her hands around. "I told you I sucked with the song writing, didn't I? I admitted the wrongness. Give me slack here."
"Children!" Helena called from the kitchen. "Could you help me bring out the meal?"
"Okay, Mom," Wilson and Jun Ying shouted, moving in perfect synchronization towards the kitchen.
"I'll help," said Alice, starting to follow suit only to have three pairs of disapproving eyes fixed on her as Helena poked her head out of the kitchen.
"You're the guest, darling," insisted Helena, pointing the large wooden spoon in Alice's direction. Although it was nearly as intimidating as when Jun Ying faced it down. "Guests sit."
"Yeah, you sit," agreed Wilson with a vigorous nod of his head, causing his wavy red hair to go flying about.
"You will sit because you are a guest and you will obey the Peabody's weird hosting rules," Jun Ying teased, waving her fingers at Alice and giving the half hearted impression that she was trying to hypnotize the writer.
Chuckling softly at this, Alice did as she was asked and sat back down. When the family returned, Wilson hefting a silver tray with roast duck resting on it, Jin Ying carrying a bowl of mango salad, and Helena holding glasses and a large jug of sparkling apple cider something in Alice died a little.
Just because she knew she could have had this herself. That this could have been her family. This could have been her life if she hadn't been so fucking scared having it only to then lose it like it seemed she lost everything in her life. All those years ago she thought it was better not to have it because the pain caused from that having and then losing was too much to go through again. And it was ineveitble it would happen again, Alice had thought. After all, there was such an established track record for that happening to her right?
But looking at her family that could have been, Alice knew she was wrong. She was a coward, plain and simple. Afraid of the possibilities and running from the ghosts of her past. This time things would be different, Alice vowed, watching Helena carve the roast duck while she gently teased her children and asked them of their day.
Because this time Alice knew what she wanted and she wasn't going to let anything get in her way. Especially fear. Or so Alice thought until she heard the sound of loud clumping steps, a booming announcement of 'I'm home', and a strategically placed kiss on Helena's lips made her think otherwise. And looking into the face of the person who had done all of this, Alice felt her heart sink and her mind cry out a desperate why. Why was this person here? Why did they deserve this second chance? Why had things turned out this way? And why did she only now realize what she felt for Helena when it might be too late?
On the outside though, Alice smiled politely and managed to say halfway pleasantly, "Winnie. Good to see you."
To be continued...
TITLE: Time Will Tell
SERIES: The L Word
AUTHOR: Dreiser
EMAIL: dreiser7@yahoo.com
YAHOO ID: dreiser7
MY WEBSITE: http://www.dreiser.net/
CONTENT: S3 spoilers. F/F romance. Alice/Helena. Helacious.
SUMMARY: Even years of separation can't take away the connection between Alice and Helena and the attraction they feel for one another.
DISCLAIMER: I own nothing but my undying Helacious love.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: The idea for this fic and the title comes from a spiffy song from Anberlin.
This scene is happier than the others so far and so I decided to link a super happy song from one of my favorite happy lesbian movies Imagine Me & You. Enjoy it!
Feels Like I'm In Love by Kelly Marie:
http://www.yousendit.com/transfer.php?action=download&ufid=3506386F5228F038
Time Will Tell
By: Dreiser
Scene Three
Big was the first thing that popped into Alice's mind as she stared at the massive white building in front of her. Heavy was the next word as she slowly tugged open the huge black doors to the building only to find her grasp slipping on the handle. Releasing a yelp as the doors suddenly flung open, Alice instinctively stepped backwards. She heard an embarrassed apology and tall was the next thing Alice thought as she stared up at the red haired teenage boy who was holding those heavy doors open.
"Wilson?" said Alice in disbelieving tones. This couldn't be the little boy she gave piggy back rides to and taught how to do the hokey pokey. There was no way he could possibly get this tall or grown up looking.
"Alice!" the teenager exclaimed, wrapping her up in a hug and immediately Alice knew that despite her disbelief this lanky goliath was indeed the little boy in sweater vests she had once known as Wilson Peabody. And for some reason that one time little boy felt that hugging her also should also accompany lifting her off of the ground. Which was more than a little disconcerting to experience. "Mom told me you were coming to dinner but I didn't believe her. It's so great you're here!"
"Wilson, let her go. You know that's like one step away from sexual harassment, right?" a girl's voice announced in a slow and mocking drawl that nonetheless held unmistakable affection. Poking her head just barely over Wilson's shoulder and putting her tippy toes on the ground Alice looked at the figure of a petite Asian girl who wore a lopsided smile and had a mischievous twinkle in her eyes. The girl's smile grew larger on having her attention and she gave a jaunty wave of her hand.
"Jun Ying?" Alice said, muffled against the cashmere sweater that Wilson had upgraded to over the years. Apparently wearing a vest just wasn't sufficing any longer.
"The one and only," said Jun Ying, clucking her tongue humorously. "Yo! Doofus," she declared, lightly whapping her much taller brother on the shoulder. "Let her go already. She might sue Mom and take away our ancestral fortune."
Giving another embarrassed apology, Wilson carefully put Alice's feet back on the ground only to then immediately scowl at his sister. "Mom's British. We don't have an ancestral fortune. It's a familial estate."
"Everybody has ancestors, Wilson," replied Jun Ying in dry tones, rolling her eyes. "Or else we wouldn't exist. You totally need to pay more attention in Ms. Lowsley's history class. If you did then you'd know this stuff."
"Maybe I'd pay more attention if I had a crush on her," said Wilson, forming a wicked smile.
"Shut up!" Jun Ying managed to yell and hiss at the same time, pinching her brother in the side and smiling triumphantly when he shrieked and leapt away from her.
Rubbing his side, Wilson looked to Alice and said lowly, "Watch out for her. She's got a temper and nails manicured to perfect deadly sharpness so they can be used for weapons."
"He's a big wuss for being so mammoth," said Jun Ying, hiding her mouth with her hand and feigning as if she was telling Alice some great secret although she said this more than loud enough for Wilson to hear.
"A wuss? The star fullback of London's Hemel Stags?" replied Wilson with a scoff. "Do you remember how many times I got tackled during the last match?"
"And precisely how does playing rugby make you not a wuss?" questioned Jun Ying, wiggling her manicured fingernails in a menacing manner and grinning as Wilson took another nervous step backwards. Forming a smug expression, she folded her arms over her chest. "I rest my case."
"Children?" Helena's voice rang out in the air, sounding out of sorts and almost tinny. Only when she saw Wilson and Jun Ying walk over to a nearby intercom did Alice realize the reason behind that. "You aren't squabbling again, are you? I do hate when you pretend to fight with one another, no matter how amusing you do find it."
"We aren't squabbling," Wilson and Jun Ying sing songed their response in perfect synchronization and exchanged grins.
"You're certain?" Helena asked skeptically.
"We're certain," Wilson and Jun Ying sing songed again.
A long pause and just the sound of tinny breathing then Helena asked rather hesitantly, "Has Alice arrived?"
Wilson and Jun Ying turned to Alice with a matching gleam in their eyes and returning their smiles, she hopped over to them and leaned closer to the intercom. "I'm here," she sing songed, doing a fair impersonation of the teenagers.
Another pause then Helena said wryly, "And you're getting on splendidly, I would suppose."
"You're supposing right, Peabody," drawled Alice in teasing tones, looking to Wilson and Jun Ying and winking. "Your kids are just as cool as I remember. But one of them is a hell of a lot taller."
"It is disconcerting to think on it," Helena murmured in tinny contemplation of her son's impressive height. "Children, do be good and bring Alice upstairs. Dinner is almost ready."
There was a buzz to signal the end of their intercom conversation and the teenagers moved towards the private lift. "How come no one ever talks about how much taller I got?" Jun Ying grumbled. She irritably punched in the key code to the lift which led directly inside their flat that occupied the top two floors of the building. "I mean, it's total height discrimination because I so got taller from when I was a kid but nobody notices because Wilson got freakishly tall."
"Nobody says anything because you've barely grown a foot since you were ten," remarked Wilson, leaning against the back of the lift and crossing his long legs one over the other. "While I've gained at least two and half feet. You should really accept that 6'2" will always dwarf 5'3" in height impressiveness. It will totally help your ego out and maybe rid you of your tiny person rage at the world."
"For the last time, I don't have tiny person rage!" Jun Ying declared, giving her brother a swift kick which he didn't bother to avoid. Instead he simply lifted an eyebrow at Alice as if to say, 'See what I mean?'
Chuckling softly, Alice shook her head and decided that Helena was definitely right. They were putting on a perfect parody of sibling rivalry. One that couldn't help but be somewhat amusing because you would have to be deaf, dumb, and blind not to see there was no real malice behind their words. It was just a strange game they played.
A game that their mother clearly didn't appreciate nearly as much.
Or at least that's the impression Alice got when the lift opened to a stern looking Helena wielding a large wooden spoon. "Did they behave on the ride up?" Helena asked, focusing her attention on Alice. Though the question was directed at the blonde, Jun Ying immediately opened her mouth only to be silenced by the spoon being pointed her way. Jun Ying snapped her mouth shut and scowled as Wilson began giggling under his breath. Helena turned her attention back to Alice and formed a slow smile as she tilted her head to one side. "Well, darling? Did they behave?"
"They behaved," said Alice, forming her very best charming smile.
"I'm rather sure I don't believe you," said Helena in staid tones, though her eyes twinkled. "However," she drawled as a slow smile spread on her features. "As there isn't anything I can do to punish you I suppose we will have to let the matter die." Turning sharply on her heel to walk back into the kitchen, Helena then called playfully over her shoulder, "For now!"
"Busted," Wilson and Jun Ying sighed with grim resignation.
"Busted?" asked Alice, following after the teenagers as they led her into the foyer of the penthouse. Peering up at the winding staircase that led to the top floor, Alice wondered if that was where Helena's bedroom was. Then she wanted to smack herself for having those kind of thoughts. Hearing her name called, she grinned nervously at the expectant faces of Wilson and Jun Ying. She felt strangely as if they somehow knew she had been having almost but not quite naughty thoughts about their mother. "Sorry," Alice chuckled, avoiding their eyes and looking at that twisting staircase again. "What did you say?"
"Mom knows when anyone lies," Jun Ying informed, plopping down at one of the oak chairs at the dining room table that currently seated six. While the table and its chairs were obviously high quality and expensive pieces, there was something warm and familial about them. Even the penthouse itself had the same friendly and lived in feeling that Alice remembered so fondly from all those years ago. And it made her impossibly happy to see that hadn't changed about Helena. That she retained this wonderful ability to make the often cold world of money and privilege she had grown up in and transformed it into something completely different for her children. Loving and welcoming and everything a child could possibly want from their mother. Well, except for the being able to tell when anyone is lying part. "It just sucks. Especially when Wilson tries to cover for me about curfew and fails miserably."
"It's not my fault my ears turn red when I'm nervous," said Wilson peevishly, looking off to one side and folding his arms over his chest, already demonstrating this behavior as the tips of his ears became slightly pink.
"But no way do you get nervous when you play rugby, am I right?" Alice asked teasingly, drawing back on their conversation from the lobby. As much as she did find the sibling squabbling amusing it had to come to an end eventually and now was as good a time as any. Besides, she had some knowledge of the sport from having seen a few games when she dated a girl who was involved in the all lesbian league in California. "That would just get you tackled."
"Pretty much anything gets you tackled," said Wilson, forming a brilliant smile that reminded Alice entirely of Helena. "I mean, I love the sport but no matter how good you are tackle, tackle, tackle. At least for fullbacks."
"And you don't get tired of it," said Alice doubtfully, unconsciously wincing as she pictured Wilson getting tackled again and again and again. Resting her chin the palm of her hand she grinned at the redhead and drawled, "At least tell me you get bruised and think better of the tackling. It would really reassure me about your sanity, Wilson."
"Sorry," Wilson said with a hearty laugh, holding up his hands in playful surrender. "I have to admit I'm totally insane when it comes to rugby and I sadly must also say I love the tackling."
"He's a rugby sadist," offered Jun Ying, smirking.
"I'm thinking you don't play rugby do you, Jun Ying?" Alice asked, unable to help chuckling when the girl looked startled to have the attention turned to her.
"She sits alone in her room and writes just another sad love song," said Wilson, singing the end of his sentence in off key but boisterous tones and delighting in the grimace his sister wore on recognizing the lyrics. Giggling and dodging the swipe Jun Ying made at him, he exclaimed, "Come on, Jun! You know you love Toni! It was a gift from your future Sugar Mama and current unrequited crush." Turning his attention to a curious Alice, he informed, "Her favorite teacher, the lovely Ms. Lowsley, is also in charge of the music club. Where our little Jun loves to spend most of her time. Best of Toni Braxton was a gift given this last Christmas."
"Toni is excellent," said Alice, giving Jun Ying a reassuring smile. Jun Ying ducked her head out of embarrassment and not wanting that to last too much longer, Alice asked, "Do you only write music or can you play too? I could always play but the writing was the hard part with me."
"But you're a writer," Jun Ying replied in astonishment, her head lifting. "I mean, that's why you're here. You're on a tour for your book. So how can you say that writing is hard?"
"Writing words for detailed sentences is super easy to me. But writing words for song lyrics that can make people feel things without deep explanation? That is what I consider hardest to write," Alice revealed. She looked sheepish then confessed, "I've tried to write songs in the past and they were pretty horrible. Just the prime example of cheesy. And," Alice looked thoroughly shamed as she leaned across the table. "Some of them even rhymed."
"Oh god," said Jun Ying, laughing and shaking her head a bit. "That's really bad. Rhyming is just totally wrong, Alice."
"I know, I know," said Alice, leaning back in her chair and waving her hands around. "I told you I sucked with the song writing, didn't I? I admitted the wrongness. Give me slack here."
"Children!" Helena called from the kitchen. "Could you help me bring out the meal?"
"Okay, Mom," Wilson and Jun Ying shouted, moving in perfect synchronization towards the kitchen.
"I'll help," said Alice, starting to follow suit only to have three pairs of disapproving eyes fixed on her as Helena poked her head out of the kitchen.
"You're the guest, darling," insisted Helena, pointing the large wooden spoon in Alice's direction. Although it was nearly as intimidating as when Jun Ying faced it down. "Guests sit."
"Yeah, you sit," agreed Wilson with a vigorous nod of his head, causing his wavy red hair to go flying about.
"You will sit because you are a guest and you will obey the Peabody's weird hosting rules," Jun Ying teased, waving her fingers at Alice and giving the half hearted impression that she was trying to hypnotize the writer.
Chuckling softly at this, Alice did as she was asked and sat back down. When the family returned, Wilson hefting a silver tray with roast duck resting on it, Jin Ying carrying a bowl of mango salad, and Helena holding glasses and a large jug of sparkling apple cider something in Alice died a little.
Just because she knew she could have had this herself. That this could have been her family. This could have been her life if she hadn't been so fucking scared having it only to then lose it like it seemed she lost everything in her life. All those years ago she thought it was better not to have it because the pain caused from that having and then losing was too much to go through again. And it was ineveitble it would happen again, Alice had thought. After all, there was such an established track record for that happening to her right?
But looking at her family that could have been, Alice knew she was wrong. She was a coward, plain and simple. Afraid of the possibilities and running from the ghosts of her past. This time things would be different, Alice vowed, watching Helena carve the roast duck while she gently teased her children and asked them of their day.
Because this time Alice knew what she wanted and she wasn't going to let anything get in her way. Especially fear. Or so Alice thought until she heard the sound of loud clumping steps, a booming announcement of 'I'm home', and a strategically placed kiss on Helena's lips made her think otherwise. And looking into the face of the person who had done all of this, Alice felt her heart sink and her mind cry out a desperate why. Why was this person here? Why did they deserve this second chance? Why had things turned out this way? And why did she only now realize what she felt for Helena when it might be too late?
On the outside though, Alice smiled politely and managed to say halfway pleasantly, "Winnie. Good to see you."
To be continued...
My hero
Re: My hero
Re: My hero