Chapter Text
It’s not that big of a deal, squinting to cut sweet potatoes and nicking her knuckle instead. The knife drops to the kitchen floor with a clatter, glinting in the blue-dawn light, and Claudia crooks the bleeding finger, presses it against her mouth on instinct—unhygienic (Dad’s words), impractical (Dad’s words), regretfully inherited instinct (her words), but instinct all the same. She winces at the tang of her blood as she sidesteps the fallen knife, moving to rifle through the drawers for a band aid, except:
She winces. She doesn’t move. It’s not that big of a deal, cutting skin. Not a big deal at all, except, okay, fine, fine: last time this happened, she was fifteen and peeling sweet potatoes in a stuffy kitchen, her neck itchy and damp with sweat, the potatoes nearly slipping out of her palm as she leaned out the kitchen to check on her parents, who stood tucked away in a corner of the dining room, shoulders stooped and heads bent toward each other so that the sliver of empty space between them was heart-shaped, both of them standing with tense limbs and even tenser frowns. Claudia doesn’t remember what they were upset over—or, no, she does, she thinks, maybe it had something to do with Grandma telling Dad that him getting married was the reason she was now experiencing heart failure, or maybe something to do with Aunt Grace uninviting them from Thanksgiving and being the reason why now Claudia was stuck helping her Dad decode a sweet potato pie recipe he had printed off the New York Times, or maybe something to do with Claudia getting a C- in AP Lit for reasons that were honestly and actually out of her control (secret boyfriends were hard to keep up with and Dad’s English minor degree from the 90s or whenever didn’t mean Claudia had to be getting a 5 on the exam), or maybe Dad had finally seen her side of things and realized he didn’t like the engagement ring, or maybe her parents were getting a divorce not even a year into being officially married (okay), or maybe they were disowning Claudia (less okay), or maybe—something. Claudia doesn’t remember. In at least half the memories she has of them, her parents are sulking and grumbling and acting like the world’s falling apart. So so so dramatic. So fucking dramatic.
Claudia’s still bleeding in the present day. She’s bleeding from what she thinks is the exact same spot where she had cut herself at fifteen, vegetable peeler jerked too far and too fast that the sharp sting of shredded skin had made her yelp, made her parents shout from the dining room, made the peeler and sweet potato fall into the sink, made her parents materialize next to her, one of them at each side, both of them talking too loud and too fast, Dad yanking her hand when she tried to lick the blood, Papa snatching her hand from Dad’s grip and squeezing the cut between his hand, like pure pressure alone would knit her skin together, and.
And now she’s here in a tiny apartment in Paris, blood souring in her mouth, aching viscerally for something, anything, everything, to take her back, back to home, back to the Thanksgivings where Aunt Grace gave her a slice of pie with a kiss to the forehead and a pinch of her cheek, back to the kitchen with her parents squabbling with each other over who put the band aids where, back to the tiny tiny tiny cage of a home she had spent a near decade scheming for a way out of, because said cage had just been that suffocating in spite of (or maybe because of) all that love, but, fuck, wasn’t it normal, a little, to miss cages when they were all you ever really knew anyway, wasn’t it acceptable to hate yourself to a level where the idea of apologizing to your supremely shitty father wasn’t all that rancid of an idea, even though cutting him out of your life had been one-part a survival gesture after he had fucked over both you and your dad with a long-term affair, one-part something you never actually did, one-part you reacting to him saying that raising you was just him enduring and enduring and enduring—
Madeline takes Claudia’s hand. Claudia blinks, lips still parted where her still-bleeding finger had been pressed. There’s blood lingering at the tip of her tongue. The knife is still on the floor, glinting white as Madeline wraps her hands around Claudia’s and squeezes, ever-so-gentle.
Madeline presses a kiss to the nail of Claudia’s crooked, slow-bleeding finger. When Madeline lifts her mouth away, Claudia’s blood is smeared against her bottom lip, dark and shiny. Claudia sucks in a sharp breath.
Madeline presses a bandaid against the cut. She presses another kiss, this time against the bandaid, soft and firm, her expression equal parts amusement and concern, and—Okay. So this really wasn’t a big deal at all. No-cage-required love was something that really could happen, and it really could happen to her. No biggie. None at all, none.
- Louis
- Good morning, beautiful. Be sure to dress warmly today, it says you’re scheduled for snow in the evening.
- By the way, at the exhibit I visited yesterday, the one I told you about?
- Saw this painting–wonderful colors here. Looked even more incredible in real life, the blues really popped.
- It reminded me of you—you have a dress just like this sitting in your closet here at home, remember? Do you want me to ship it over? It should still fit.
- Louis
- Claudia?
- Claudia
- hi dad
- sorry
- got busy
- Louis
- Too busy even for me, huh? :)
- Claudia
- yes :)
- ill dress warm you bundle up too it says youre due for rain in the morning
- and no on the dress
- im good without it