Work Text:
Exploring the bubble of still being them, whilst navigating the new is not easy for Helen.
She’s insecure and overthinks the littlest of details. Feels like she’s consistently waiting for the other Madeline-sized shoe to drop. And with the complex history and feelings layered between them both, it’s not a matter of if, but when.
It’s at a friend’s birthday party when those feelings, those reminders of how truly complicated it is, start to really bubble up between them.
They’re both a little tipsy and loose. Madeline has dropped sideways across her lap, one arm wrapped around Helen’s neck and the other holding a drink that’s been splashing dangerously as they laugh for no good reason. It’s nothing new for those around them in the crowded apartment; they’ve been known to be codependent, and Madeline gets overtly touchy when there’s alcohol in her system, but it makes Helen’s skin tingle anyway. To know that there’s a different meaning behind their closeness now. It’s a little embarrassing.
Madeline clouds her vision, not just in her line of sight, but with her perfume, with her weight on top of her, the arm she has possessively wrapped around Helen. It’s grounding and hypnotizing all the same, and it’s why she doesn’t feel someone come up to them.
All of a sudden, Kevin appears from behind the couch, sporting the awkward shuffle Helen had become familiar with when they briefly dated.
“Hey, Helen.”
She sees it immediately when Madeline zones in on Kevin, the realization that a man has come up to their space and addressed Helen. The way Madeline’s whole demeanor shifts. It reminds her of endless times before, when men would always ruin their night. Sometimes Madeline’s fault, sometimes Helen’s.
Now that she knows more, why Madeline was the way that she was, Helen could understand a little better. But that didn’t mean she still wouldn’t get upset all the same.
“Sorry, who are you?” Madeline asks, perked up as if on high alert.
Kevin shifts a little under the attention, hand coming up to scratch the back of his neck.
“I’m Kevin.”
“Devon?”
“No, it’s Kevin.”
“Oh, yes, Kevin, sorry it’s a little loud in here,” Madeline says, fake laughter sprinkling her apology. “I’m Madeline.”
Helen catches it from the corner of her eye. How the blonde raises the hand that was curled up on the junction of her shoulder and neck, a charged movement she has seen the blonde do a million times. Gives the guy her hand to take, and it’s all Madeline needs to enthrall them. A little touch, a smile, direct eye contact, and the men would be hooked.
Helen fucking hated it then, and she hates it now. There was no need for Madeline to do that anymore. No need to prove herself to be better, no need to seize what could be— was— Helen’s.
Kevin takes her hand because even though Helen knows he’s a bit too naive to notice a pass directed at him by one Madeline Ashton, he’s still nice and has manners.
“You know my Helen here?” She asks, bringing her arms up to hold Helen once again. It’s more suffocating than it intends to be comforting, making her stomach flip.
Helen knows Madeline has pinpointed this was the same Kevin she briefly dated all those months ago, where the only form of communication between them was pen and paper.
“Yeah— uh, yes.”
Helen takes that as her cue to pipe up.
“Yes, we know each other. Hi Kevin.” She offers a small wave with her free hand, the other having found a place behind Madeline’s back to hold her steady.
“Sorry to interrupt, I just wanted to come by to say hello, maybe catch up…” He trails off, unsure, eyes drifting between her, Madeline, and their close proximity.
Helen didn’t know where he got the gall to think that would be okay. He broke up with her to focus on his job. There was really nothing to say beyond that. But she doesn’t get to respond, because Madeline beats her to it.
“We’re kind of in the middle of an important conversation, you know how us girls are. Maybe later?” The timbre of her tone was too sweet, eyelashes fluttering. Helen feels the urge to push her away.
Kevin, obedient as he is too, wordlessly walks away with a nod. Madeline slumps back against her, oblivious to Helen’s internal conflict. She rests her head on Helen’s shoulder as she takes a sip of her drink, trying to get close and comfortable again.
“I can’t believe you went out with that guy,” she sighs, “He looks so dull and beige.”
But Helen doesn’t say anything back.
“Hel?” Blue eyes lock with her own, looking up at her, inquiring for her attention. Their faces are close; if she leaned forward an inch, she’d be able to kiss Madeline. The thought doesn’t move her.
All it does is stifle her.
“Get off me, I need a breather,” Helen says, lightly pushing Madeline away. Her best friend yelps, the ice of her drink clanking as it sloshes around.
“What?”
“I said get off,” she snaps, her chest tightening.
Madeline looks like she wants to retort again, but still moves away obediently. Helen wobbles up, adjusting the tight top Madeline had put on her, and makes her way in the direction of the door.
She doesn’t have to look back to see Madeline follow her out to the hallway, party sounds fading away with the door closing behind them.
“Helen, what’s wrong?” Madeline calls out, heels clicking on the floor.
It takes her a moment to gather a coherent thought; her lungs seem to fail at inhaling air, fells her skin itch. Helen wraps her arms around herself, trying to ground her thoughts, her breathing, maybe ground her sanity too.
She sucks in a stuttered breath.
“I hate when you act like that. What you do when you’re around men who give me attention. It makes my skin crawl.”
“I barely did anything!”
“I felt it, Mad. I know how you get. I know you,” she says, punctuating her words with a stern gaze, maybe then Madeline could really understand.
“Then you know that these men have never mattered, Helen. It’s always been about you.”
“That’s a pretty shit excuse,” Helen huffs, both angry and embarrassed that she’s feeling this way because of Madeline once again. It was naive of her to think things between them would magically fix themselves; she knew it wouldn’t be easy, and had repeated it to herself multiple times. Helen just couldn’t help but dream a little.
Madeline huffs too, clearly frustrated, cheeks a little flushed from the buzz of the alcohol and the crowded space they were in. She hates herself a little more in that moment for still thinking about Madeline's stupid, pretty face despite the tightness she feels on her chest spreading to her shoulders.
The urge to strangle her is bigger, however, to bite and claw, to bitch.
“Madeline, look me in the eyes and tell me that if things were still like before, you wouldn’t have gone after him right there, beige and all.”
Her best friend looks at her, frowning, jaw tense. She doesn’t say anything; Madeline knows better.
“That’s what I thought,” she goes to turn around, but Madeline grabs her arm.
“Hey! It’s not like you’re entirely free of blame here. You’ve retaliated too.” She says, voice low, gripping her as if Helen would try to run away. “You think I didn’t notice how you’d parade your little boyfriends in my face? I know you were probably so happy that Ernest not only wanted you, but that he was studying to be a plastic surgeon, because you knew that would grate me. You’ve known how to play this game too, just differently.”
She’s not wrong. It still burns her, from her own shame at not holding her head high, at Madeline’s capacity to get under her skin. Now that their feelings were out in the open, they were saying these things, digging deep into the endless list of offenses they’ve put each other through.
Madeline takes her silence as a green light to continue, not relenting.
“I remember that time at Hart bar with a man who had asked you to dance in front of me. How you looked at me when he got close, whispering in your ear. You smiled at what he said and kissed him.”
Helen remembers that night. She felt like she was the one with the power, and it felt so good to be the watched, not the watcher. To see Madeline’s jealousy simmering on the surface, with dark blue eyes that wouldn’t let her out of their sight.
She also remembers crying herself to sleep whenever she had made it to her apartment that night, alone. Because she should have felt proud, Helen Sharp had won for once. But she didn’t understand why it burned her when Madeline had finally turned away from her for the rest of the night, barely sparing a glance, a word, afterwards. It meant nothing to win if her best friend’s eyes weren’t on her. It was fucked up, Helen hadn’t understood it completely in that moment.
She gets it now, though.
“Yeah, Madeline, you’re right,” Helen admits because it’s the truth, and she feels like letting it out, power struggle be damned, but not without biting back. “God forbid I copied your ridiculousness for one night.”
“Oh, that’s what it was then? Just copying me?”
Helen leans forward— Madeline still had her arm gripped— as she responds. “It was beating you at your own game.”
Madeline scoffs and lets her go with a little shove, not enough to do damage, but still enough to send a message.
“If you had done it right, you would have gone home with him and fucked him. I know for a fact you didn’t. You could never be me.”
Helen despised the reality of the statement, and it stung to measure herself against her best friend, but she refused to let it own her. There was no reason to try to live up to Madeline’s antics because things had changed, even as they were figuring out what those changes meant.
They stared at each other, unmoving. Madeline tilted her head, waiting for a response, for more pushback, part of their usual game.
Helen just shakes her head, any sliver of fight left within her leaving her body in that moment, tiredness making itself known.
“I’m going home, there’s no point to this,” she murmurs. She turns around, but not before the blonde stops her from taking a step to get her things inside.
“Without me?” Madeline asks, suddenly smaller and vulnerable, edge gone from her voice.
For a second, she wonders if Madeline is asking not because of the party, but in relation to them. If Helen has finally decided there is no point to continue exploring what they have going on.
She could leave her. Helen’s apartment was still solely hers, even though Madeline was there more days than she wasn’t, and the space was filled with them both.
Helen looks down at her wrist, at the little woven bracelet Madeline had sent her for her birthday months back, her initials present on the metal piece between deep colored string.
“No,” she murmurs again, pushing that very same hand out to take without looking back at her. Madeline doesn’t hesitate to take it.
They would figure it out, Helen thought, and needed to hope they would.
They’re kissing languidly, open-mouthed, something they occasionally do now. Madeline’s weight is pinning her down, so warm everywhere they touch since their tops have been thrown away. Helen is quite content.
She comes to the humiliating realization that she enjoys being bowed like that; below Madeline and her head tilted back, plush against the pillows beneath her, in a way that allows the blonde to lick into her mouth and run her tongue over her own.
Helen opens her mouth again and lets out a soft, needy sound, one that she knows Madeline catches. Takes it as a sign of contentment, she hopes.
She’s pliant, embarrassingly so, allowing herself to be pressed more against her bed. Helen thinks she’s been too easy in this discovery period, that she’s been a little too forgiving when it comes to Madeline, as if she already wasn’t before.
They continue to kiss like that for a while longer. Helen sucking Madeline’s bottom lip into her mouth, both exchanging needy sounds. The distance between them is nonexistent, blonde hair haloed around her like a soft curtain. Madeline breaks the kiss to dip down and suck a mark into her pulse— she can’t help but tighten her grip on the blonde, an action that gets rewarded by a content hum. Somehow, Madeline presses against her more, spurned on, before relenting some space to let her hands wander.
Through the haze, Helen starts feeling too breathless, not exactly pleasurable, just feels a little claustrophobic. Maybe she needed to take a breather. Madeline’s wondering hands meant she could feel her body, feel every dip, every plush give, see every imperfection Helen tortures herself over when she looks at herself in the mirror. But it was okay, she could push it down, because she was still partially covered, and Madeline was in a similar state of undress.
That is, until Madeline tries to sneak her hand around her back, reaching for her bra, and suddenly she’s not okay.
“Wait, no—,” Helen huffs, unable to stop feeling Madeline everywhere, wet press of lips back under her jaw as the blonde tries maneuvering her hand on the clasp of the bra again. “Mad, stop.”
It’s as if all the warmth between them gets sucked out of the room when Madeline pauses and looks at her, slowly settling back on her knees in the bed. Looking at her with a very confused expression as Helen gathers her breath. She was being rejected, and Madeline Ashton did not do well under rejection.
“You don’t— You don’t want me?”
Helen never thought Madeline was stupid. A little reckless and clueless at times, but never dumb. She didn’t think the same in that moment. Lying back against her bed, Madeline resting between her legs, both their tops off. It was a terribly indulging sight. Of course, she wanted her.
“Madeline, you are on top of me with just your bra and shorts,” she retorts a little breathless, curling an index finger underneath the gore of Madeline’s bralette.
The blonde looks down at her hand and scoffs before trying to move away, but Helen doesn’t let her get far and locks her in.
“I do want you,” she says, and means it.
“You don’t have to force yourself to like me.” There’s a pout on Madeline’s face, and Helen pushes down the urge to kiss it better, definitely not the time.
“It’s not like that.”
“Then what is it? Please tell me so I can fix it right now,” the blonde says, pleading.
Helen doesn’t know how to tell her the truth. How to tell her best friend— whatever they were these days— her person, that yes, she fucking wants her, but she’s too self-conscious in front of Madeline. And that, if she really thinks about it, a big part of it is all Madeline’s fault.
“Hel Belle?”
Her grip on Madeline’s back loosens, drawing her hands towards her waist instead.
“I’m— I feel self-conscious.”
“Why? You’re gorgeous.”
Helen feels that familiar fire burn in her chest, a little angry and defensive.
“Well, a while ago I wouldn’t have thought you meant that. You once said I was a four at best, Madeline. A fucking four.”
The words land how she knew they would; she knows Madeline feels them like a slap to the face.
She goes to move away again, and Helen tries to keep her close, but Madeline is stronger for a moment, and the blonde gets to fall on her back in the bed next to her. Not daring to spare a glance at her, gaze focused on the ceiling above them.
“I’m sorry I said that,” Madeline murmurs. Helen can see the frown on her face.
“I know.”
There’s silence for a moment.
“I never thought you were actually a four. I just— Fuck.”
Helen doesn’t say anything, still feeling a little uncomfortable. The cold in the room makes itself known now that the heat between them has dissipated, it causes her to bring the covers up her body.
Madeline turns to her suddenly, pushing herself up with one arm.
“I really am sorry.”
“I know, Mad. But I can’t. I need time, it’s not easy.”
Helen really wished it was.
Madeline nods and tosses her free hand flat over Helen’s stomach. It’s not unwelcome, it’s not pushy; Helen accepts it by covering it with her own.
They stay close, pinkies linking a little awkwardly. Madeline seems pensive, and Helen can’t help but focus on every little detail of the blonde in front of her.
“You remember the showcase event our art department had senior year? All the way in Long Island, right at the heart of the Hamptons.”
Helen tilts her head confused, but nods, memories flashing from that weekend. It was an important night for their university’s art center, a way to let the rich be entertained, but also donate to an already rich institution. She and Madeline took it as a fancy excuse to really dress up, mingle, and have fun.
“You wore that floor-length red gown with the sweetheart neckline, fitted through your body and flaring out at the knees…” Madeline trails off, eyes downcast. She focuses on their hands again before continuing.
“You looked divine. It was torture, and I refused to accept the feeling, because deep down I knew I wouldn’t be able to move on. I wanted you so desperately, Hel. All I thought about was kissing you the whole night. Kissing you in some private corner, on the rooftop, in the bathroom.”
Madeline lets out a shaky exhale, finally meets her eyes with a wet smile.
Helen smiles a little too, feels her face and her chest flush, exposed for Madeline’s eyes to witness from the praise, the detail— it’s almost devotion. It makes her feel seen, but all she wants is to hide under the covers and not look Madeline in the eye. She knows they always held a certain type of attention towards each other, the competitiveness, the obsession, but she never really considered the extent of what that might have actually meant for Madeline. Something that wasn’t entirely mean and cutting, but instead, something genuine.
She wants to retort with a joke, a jab maybe, something to stop feeling so raw, but Madeline beats her to it.
“Don’t say anything,” she says, tone serious. “It wasn’t just then, I find you attractive all the time. With glasses, or without. When you’ve just woken up or when you’re dolled up. If I could, and just hear me out, I would want to have my way with you even when you’re wearing your stupid robe around this apartment.”
That gets a real laugh out of her, free and unreserved.
“You really hate that robe.”
“Because there’s no reason to wear it over pajamas, grandma. If only you’d let me see your tits under the camisoles you sometimes sleep in,” Madeline sighs dramatically, turning away from her, hand against her forehead.
“Madeline!” Helen gasps at the lack of restraint, how Madeline is so open in her desire towards her. She’s grateful for the sheet covering her.
“I’m just being honest right now.”
Helen laughs again, letting the moment sit between them before speaking up.
“You really think about me like that?”
“And more.”
Helen hums, feeling another blush creeping up on her. She pulls on Madeline’s arm, the one bent holding her head. Maybe just wanting to be a little closer, definitely out of mischief as a way to shift Madeline’s center of balance, the way she’s done to Helen’s whole being.
Helen gifts Madeline tickets to see Moulin Rouge a little while after Christmas. They hadn’t celebrated Madeline’s birthday before; it was when things were confusing between them, and Helen wasn’t in a state to be friendly or say happy birthday. It only felt fitting to make up for it, even if a while later.
“Did you like the girl who played Satine? She was perfect. I loved the redhead wig she had on.”
“She really was. And Christian? I think I fell in love,” Helen sighs longingly, thinking back to the show as she takes off her shoes by the door.
“I guess he was alright too,” Madeline grumbles, moving away into the living room.
“He was more than alright and you know it,” she rolls her eyes, hopping the opposite way into the attached kitchen, while Madeline’s turned away looking out the window, attention taken by the little snowflakes falling outside.
“Well, as the performer of the two, I would know if he was any good.”
“He was good, though,” she laughs, a little confused at the unnecessary pushback, not catching Madeline’s furrowed eyebrows and souring expression against the reflection of the window.
“I can’t let you give credit to mediocrity, Hel.”
“Hey! Don’t be mean,” Helen calls out, as she looks inside the cupboard for her favorite mug with the intent to make some tea.
“It’s not being mean, it’s the truth. He was okay. Satine was better.”
“Alright Madeline, whatever you say,” she feels a little annoyed by Madeline’s insistence, but not in the mood to really go at it over a performance as they did sometimes. They were having a good night, and she didn’t want it ruined with their usual back and forth.
“I just think that as an aspiring writer, you can’t just praise anyone, Helen. You need to latch onto the substance. Like me,” it’s punctuated with such a dramatic hair flip that Helen can only stare at her unamused.
Madeline then fully joins her in the kitchen, finding a place to lean on the counter next to Helen.
“You’re being a bit of a bitch right now for no reason,” she says, walking around Madeline, pointedly avoiding the blonde’s hands when they try to reach for her.
“I’m not!” Madeline snaps, perhaps a little too quickly, voice high. Helen looks back at her before turning to the microwave.
“Feels like you’re trying to turn this into an unnecessary argument,” she mutters, more to herself than Madeline, a little upset by how quickly her mood has been dampened since walking through the threshold of the apartment.
“Because you liked him Hel, and—“
“And what?” Helen snaps back, louder than she intends to, it’s practically a yell. Madeline flinches and looks down, keenly interested in her nails.
She presses her lips together and shakes her head, still not meeting her gaze.
“It’s stupid.”
“Madeline.”
“I said it’s stupid.”
“Then why bring it up at all?” Helen throws back, exasperated.
“You don’t get it!” Madeline bursts, voice sharp all of a sudden. “You’re just sitting there talking about him like—”
“Like what?” Helen cuts in, her patience having reached its limit. “Like a normal person who watched the fucking show?”
Helen doesn’t quite see the issue. It feels like they’ve moved to another conversation she didn’t realize they were having. Were they not talking about Moulin Rouge?
“That’s not what this is!”
And she was annoyed, getting more annoyed by the second with the petulant and stubborn attitude Madeline was filling the small kitchen with.
“Then what is it?”
Madeline laughs then, fake and almost mocking, the way she does when she feels cornered by a weaker player, in this case, Helen.
“You liked him.”
“Yes, I thought he was good.”
“No, you liked him,” she repeats, more serious than she’s been in the whole conversation. “Like you always do.”
Helen blinks, still infinitely confused, mug forgotten inside the microwave in exchange for whatever absurd fight she was trying to level with Madeline.
“What does that mean?”
“It means you,” Madeline points at her haphazardly, eyes steely. “You look at them like that, and I can’t.”
“You can't do what, Madeline?”
Madeline stops, she steps closer to Helen, really looks at her, searching for something, but then looks away.
“I can’t compete with it.”
Helen tilts her head. “Madeline, what the hell are you talking about? There’s nothing to compete with here."
“There is,” Madeline insists. “There always is.”
“You’re still not making any sense,” Helen says, a little harsher than she means to, and over it all the same. “It was just a performance.”
“It’s not about the performance!” Madeline snaps again, voice loud. “It’s about you liking men at all.”
“I’m not a man, Hel. I can’t be.”
For a second, Helen just looks at her plainly, mind reeling, finally feeling like she’s catching up to the conversation.
“Mad,” she starts after a moment, slow and careful. “Is this what it’s all about? Because I don’t need you to be a man.”
Madeline lets out a small, broken laugh, shaking her head, strands of blonde falling forward to her face, that have her dragging her hands aggressively back through her hair.
“But it means you’re capable of wanting something I can never be for you,” Madeline says, and Helen can see in her face how she cringes, how it pains Madeline to speak those words between them.
The implication behind it makes her frown immediately.
“That’s not true.”
“It is,” she insists, quieter now.
Helen exhales, puts her glasses down on the counter beside her in favor of running her hands through her face to gather herself.
“Madeline, I haven’t asked you to be anything.”
“You don’t have to ask. It's just a fact,” Madeline says, looking up at her, eyes glassy.
She stops again, swallowing hard.
“And I hate it, Helen,” she continues, barely above a whisper. “I hate the possibility of not being everything you want and need, because that means one day soon you’re going to realize I’m not worth all the trouble I’ve caused you and you’ll leave me for good.”
That makes Helen pause, the way she says it, something hidden and raw Madeline must have been torturing herself with in secret.
Helen steps closer to her, but not too much, in case the blonde chooses to run away again.
“I haven't compared you to anyone,” she says. “I’m not even thinking about any man like that. You’re the one I—”
Helen falters, just for a second, all the words in her vocabulary exiting her brain. It sends the wrong message, because Helen can see the way Madeline’s expression sours, her mouth tight.
“See?” she says bitterly. “You can’t even say it.”
Helen’s expression hardens then. “That’s not fair.”
“Isn’t it?” Madeline retorts, quick and defensive. “You won’t even sleep with me, a woman.”
The words feel like they knock the wind out of Helen, something mean and humiliating dropped at her feet.
“That’s—” she starts, caught off guard. “You know that’s not why.”
“Then what is it?” Madeline shoots back, desperation seeping in. “I’ve felt you pull away on me at moments, hesitate. I’m supposed to pretend that doesn’t mean anything?”
“No!” Helen snaps, the frustration rising quickly again and breaking through her. “You’re asking me to prove something I don’t fully understand yet. Something, this— us, that you’ve known much longer than me.”
Helen exhales, shaking her head, the fight draining out of her just as quickly as it came, like an ocean wave.
“We’re trying, together,” she adds. “I'm still here, aren’t I?”
Helen feels Madeline stare, assessing her, searching for any tell that may indicate she’s being dishonest. Anything to throw back at her, Helen surmises. Madeline’s shoulders finally drop when she finds nothing not that there had been.
“I know,” she murmurs.
Helen hesitates, then reaches for Madeline, wrapping her arms around her frame. Doesn’t take it as another offense when the blonde doesn’t return the hug.
“I don’t need you to be somebody else. Especially not some mediocre man,” Helen says finally, voice soft.
“That might just be the toughest role for you to take on,” she adds, knowing it’s going to dissolve their tension and grief a little quicker, and it’ll get a funny bite from Madeline.
Which it does, Helen can feel the rumbling of a laugh against her.
“No role is impossible for me,” she murmurs, voice muffled by her place atop Helen’s shoulder. They stay in place, silence stretching between them. Madeline sniffles against her occasionally, and Helen holds her tighter when she does.
“You know Mad, we have years of trouble. It’s never been about you being a woman. The thought hadn't crossed my mind,” she starts, and feels her Madeline tense against her. “But like I said, I'm still here with you, doesn’t that matter? Can’t you trust me in this? I’ve been choosing to trust you.”
Madeline leans away from her, blue eyes seemingly a darker hue and a little bloodshot. There’s a stray tear that tries to slip away from the corner of Madeline’s eye, and Helen’s thumb quickly comes up to catch it.
Her best friend nods, catching Helen’s hand on her cheek with her own to place a short kiss before turning away wordlessly and grabbing a napkin.
Helene accepts it as a response, feeling there’s nothing right to say in that moment, not that everything was fixed. Things between them sometimes didn't end, they were said, they'd hurt, they'd stick, and then they’d circle back around it another time. She steps back too, returning to the microwave, clicking on the numbers to finally heat up her mug.
She’s distracted typing away at her computer when a perfectly manicured hand enters her vision, offering her a note. Helen takes it, easily unfolding it to read its message.
Date at Hugo’s (your favorite), you & me? Tomorrow at seven.
She chuckles and turns around to face Madeline behind her.
“You’re sticking to the love letters and notes?” Helen asks, moving to grab a pen from her desk that she can scribble with.
“Just a little,” Madeline sing-songs. When Helen looks up, she sees her best friend focused anywhere else in the room that isn’t her, the seemingly perfect face of nonchalance.
Helen smiles at the thought and glides her fingers over the note after writing her response, trying to stop a real grin from spreading across her own face. It’s useless, she knows Madeline could sense it from just a twitch, if she were looking at her, that is.
She holds the paper out again, the blonde snatching it out of her hand to read it.
Madeline goes to move out of the room again, but Helen’s voice carries.
“You came in just for that?”
The blonde stops before exiting the threshold of the room, quickly spinning and making her way back. She bends down, note to her chest, and presses a sweet kiss on the corner of Helen’s mouth.
“Yeah, just that,” she whispers, leaning back when she does, but still close enough their noses practically touch.
Helen rolls her eyes as Madeline scurries off again, turning back towards her computer.
Of course, Mad. ♡
Hugo’s Inn, of the many times Helen has been there, becomes an intimately dangerous romantic affair. They take to their usual nook by the window, the bottle of wine Madeline got off the specials menu flowing through their glasses with no care. The candlelight between them flickers in such a beautiful, warming way on Madeline’s face, who hasn’t taken her eyes off of Helen for a single moment.
Madeline’s respectfully kept her hands to herself mostly, but there’s a foot wrapped against Helen’s ankle hidden underneath the table, not demanding, and very restrained.
She feels intoxicated, and it’s not just the wine or the delicious food. It’s the ambiance, the proximity, the way Madeline keeps looking at her.
They share the restaurant’s signature chocolate dessert at the end, it’s melted and gooey, and the thought of how much better it might taste right off Madeline’s tongue reaches her tauntingly. Helen lets it.
It feels good to live in a city that doesn’t care what two women are up to, not a second glance. It’s both of them, in their own world.
“You’ve had this look on you the whole night,” Madeline says once they’re walking on the sidewalk away from the restaurant.
“What look?” She asks, Madeline’s hand interlocked loosely around her own. Helen doesn’t think she has ever felt more at ease in her entire life.
“You’ve got something different about you,” Madeline shrugs, swinging their hands carefree between them.
“What do you mean?”
“It feels like you’re looking at me with new eyes.”
“Haven’t we been doing new things together these days?” she asks, tone playful. “You just took me to my favorite restaurant on a date.”
“Ugh, so not the time to be a smart ass,” Madeline groans, but there’s no bite to her tone, no real fight. It’s just a statement, punctuated by a little shoulderbump without letting Helen get too far away.
They keep walking in the direction of her apartment, Helen waiting for Madeline to speak up again; Madeline trying to find the words.
“It felt like you were looking at me the way that I’ve been feeling for a long time now.”
“Which is?”
“Like I’m the only person that matters.”
Helen nods slowly, not really understanding her best friend’s line of thought. She thinks the sentiment rings true to their entanglement, or whatever it is that has transpired between them since Helen’s last letter and Madeline returning to the city. She still's not quite sure what to call it.
“All I care about is you, Hel.”
Madeline stops them abruptly in their path after that, lightly guiding her to the side where they’re not right on people’s way, the lights above illuminating them with the long streets surrounding them.
She just stares at Helen, who still feels happy to be close just for tonight without worrying too much about where they’re headed. Maybe it’s the wine’s doing, but she doesn’t notice that she’s closed her eyes, her lips formed into a smile, until Madeline calls her out.
“Helen, open your eyes, just so I’m sure that I’m not making a fool out of myself.” Helen does what she’s told, leveling her gaze with Madeline’s.
“What are you looking for, Mad?”
“The look, Helen.”
She rolls them, but relents. Her contacts have started drying out her eyes, making it a little annoying to stare any harder, but Helen doesn’t really care about that.
Madeline looks at her, blue eyes focused on green and everywhere else on her face.
"I love you, Hel."
Her best friend’s hands come up to hold her face with a soft, warm touch. Helen can’t find the words to even begin explaining how it fills her heart and soul.
“Maddie.”
Madeline lets out a shaky exhale, a thumb coming up to rest on the apple of her cheek.
“You haven’t called me Maddie in a year,” she whispers a little breathlessly, bringing her face close to Helen’s. “I thought I’d never hear you say my name like that again. I don’t think I deserve to.”
Helen doesn’t know who leans in first, all she knows is that they’re suddenly kissing off the sidewalk, and then she's pressed against a wall, sturdy and unmoving behind her.
She obliges, feeling giddy. Madeline tastes sweet, the lip gloss she reapplied before they left the restaurant, the wine on her tongue. Helen feels daring in that moment, free to commit to the feeling.
Madeline's lips feel warm and soft on hers. Smiling, she bites and licks Madeline’s lower lip, and it must cause something within the blonde because she outright whines and practically slumps against Helen.
For the first time, Helen doesn’t feel shy or nervous or scared, but emboldened, can’t help forget herself in the moment, and brings her own hands to cradle Madeline’s face, plush beneath her hands. She knows Madeline loves it, feels the smile threatening to interrupt their kiss.
Madeline’s hands fall down to rest at her waist. Helen can feel she’s itching to touch everywhere on top of her clothes, even if they never go further.
“Mad— Maddie,” she gasps, breaking another kiss, but Madeline leans in again for one more before relenting, forehead pressed against her own. “I think it’s time to head home, don’t you think?”