DISCLAIMER: Guiding Light and its characters are the property of Proctor & Gamble. No infringement intended.
ARCHIVING: Only with the permission of the author.
AUTHOR'S NOTE: First in the Slow Burn series.

Slow Burn
By Wonko

The Babysitters' Club

Blake sighed as she paced back and forth behind the counter at Company, holding the screaming infant to her shoulder and attempting to hush him with the same nonsense phrases and snatches of rhyme that had quieted her own children when they were younger.  It wasn't working.  Colin O'Neill seemed determined to scream his head off.  If there was one mercy, and it was indeed a very small mercy, it was that he hadn't set off Henry.  Yet.  But the other boy was restless in his stroller, and it seemed like a tantrum was in the mail.

If anyone should be throwing a tantrum, Blake thought bitterly, it's me.  Apparently no-one had thought it odd that she wasn't attending the wedding of her sometime step-daughter.  And step-mother.  And sister-in-law.  Not even Dinah herself, who hadn't thought to ask her if she might like to come along and share her happiness.  So they hadn't always had the easiest relationship.  They'd fought, they'd hurt each other, they'd behaved badly sometimes, certainly.  But they were irrevocably linked by bonds of family and their shared love of Ross and the children.  Blake had thought that might mean something.

Apparently not.

She tried hard not to be stung by it all.  Dinah, getting married.  Half the town seemingly crammed into City Hall to witness it.  And she, Blake, left minding Company and holding the baby.

The screaming baby.

"Oh, hush Colin," she murmured, running her hand up and down his back as she bounced him in a vain attempt to comfort him.  "Uhm...let's see...Twinkle, twinkle, little star. How I wonder what you are..." She broke off when he began to wail even louder.  "Don't like that one?" she said.  "Okay.  Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall.  Humpty Dumpty had a great fall..."  Colin screamed his loudest scream right in her ear.  "Ow!" she exclaimed.  "Okay, I get it, you don't like my singing."

"Hardly surprising."

Blake whirled round to face the smirking figure of Doris Wolfe who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere.  "You scared me," Blake admonished.

"And I'm sure you're terrifying that child with...well, calling it singing would be charitable."  Blake ground her teeth.

"And we couldn't have you being charitable now, could we?" she remarked acidly.  Doris raised one elegant eyebrow.

"Give him to me," she said, holding out her arms.  Blake took an involuntary step back and Doris rolled her eyes.  "I'm not going to eat him," she said sharply.  "Let me hold him."

Blake forced herself to bite down the sarcastic response that immediately jumped to her lips.  "Fine," she said instead, and awkwardly manoeuvred Colin into the Mayor's outstretched arms.

Doris cradled him to her and stroked her hand over the downy softness of his hair.  Her whole face seemed to soften, hard lines melting, sharp edges blurring away.  Blake was mollified slightly by the other woman's obvious affection for the child, but was still secretly gratified that he hadn't stopped screaming.  His face was red and his chubby little legs kicked wildly, as if in an effort to buck himself free.  Blake almost began to smile at the other woman's failure to magically comfort the boy, but then Doris began to sing.

"My grandfather's clock was too tall for the shelf, so it stood ninety years on the floor.  It was taller by half than the old man himself, but it weighed not a pennyweight more..."

Blake's hand flew to her mouth to stifle a gasp.  She would never have imagined in a million years that the Big Bad Wolfe would have such a sweet voice.  It flowed from her lips like honey and seemed to wash over everyone in the room - babies and adult alike.  Colin slowly began to stop fidgeting.  Without missing a beat, Doris held out her hand for his bottle.  Blake scrambled to pass it to her, receiving a curt nod in acknowledgement.  Still singing, she offered the milk to the baby.  Blake had been trying to get him to eat for what felt like hours, without success.  He accepted the bottle from Doris on the first try, bringing his little fist up to tangle in the baby blue of her blazer.  And then...blessed silence, except for the soft notes of Doris's song as she continued to sing for him, gently and sweetly.

By the time she finished the song, Colin had finished his milk.  He released the bottle from his lips with a soft smacking noise and a tiny giggle.  Doris smiled down at him as she caressed his face.  She looked very young suddenly, and Blake could imagine her for the first time as a twenty something single mother, doting on a blonde, blue-eyed child.

"I think he's ready to go down now," Doris said softly.  Blake blinked once, then twice, and shook herself.

"Right," she replied, seemingly coming out of the same trance the baby had been in.  She pointed out the baby carriage Reva had brought him in and Doris immediately laid him down among his blankets and stuffed animals.  He clutched a plush rabbit and began to suck on its ear, but he was quiet and still and - after a very short time - asleep.

"That was amazing," Blake said, turning to Doris who had begun to blush.

"It was nothing," she insisted.  Blake put her hand on her forearm, curling her fingers round it easily.  She was surprised by the delicacy of the bones she could feel under her hands, and by the slenderness of Doris's arm.

"My budding migraine says it's not nothing," she said gently, but firmly, before releasing the other woman's arm.  "Now, what can I get you?"

"Coffee," Doris replied.  She slid into one of the barstools lining the counter and leaned her elbows on the smooth surface.  "Black."

Blake poured her a mug and held up her hands when Doris reached for her purse.  "It's on me," she said.  Doris cocked her head.

"Thanks," she said as she took a quick sip.  She winced at the heat, but went back for a second and third sip without waiting for it to cool down.

"So, is the wedding over?" Blake asked.  She tried very hard to keep the bitterness from her voice.  She wasn't sure what impulse had led her to even ask about it, unless it was the impulse that small children have to keep picking at wounds that were trying their best to heal over.

"It is," Doris said.  "I was expecting to see you there, to be honest."

Blake shrugged.  "Well..." she began, then trailed off.  It wasn't much of an answer.  But for some reason she couldn't quite bring herself to say I wasn't invited.  Mercifully, Doris didn't force the issue.

"That's why I'm here, actually," she said, taking another quick sip of her coffee.  "I wanted to talk to you about something."

"Oh?"  Blake was intrigued.  What could Doris Wolfe possibly want to talk to her about?  They had never been friends.  They'd barely been acquaintances, although of course Doris had worked with Ross for years in the DA's office so they had been aware of each other.  But Doris had never sought her out to talk to her before.

"Yes," Doris said, forcing Blake off memory lane.  "I wanted to talk to you about Natalia."

"Oh."  Blake's face fell.  That was a subject she would just as soon not discuss.  She hadn't agreed with her decision to leave town.  She'd thought it was a foolish, premature, cowardly thing to do.  And she'd known how badly Olivia would take it.  For a woman like her, what could be worse than this perceived rejection?

But Natalia was her friend and she'd trusted her.  She'd trusted her with her secret pregnancy and her doubts and her plans.  Blake couldn't break that trust.

"Do you know where she is?" Doris prodded, narrowing her eyes at the expression on Blake's face.

Blake shook her head.  "I can't talk about this," she murmured, turning away and busying herself with some cleaning that could easily have waited.

"Do you know why she left?" Doris pressed, not allowing Blake to escape from the conversation.  She sighed.

"Why do you care?" she asked sharply.  "You're not exactly friends with Natalia, are you?"

"No," Doris admitted.  "I find her quite insipid, actually.  But I do care about Olivia, and I'm sure you've noticed how Natalia's little disappearing act is killing her."

Blake certainly couldn't deny that.  Olivia was spiralling out of control and it seemed like nothing was going to stop it.  Nothing except maybe a soft smile and a pair of warm, brown eyes, but they were far, far out of reach.

"I know where she is," Blake said softly, shaking her head.  "And I know why she left.  But I can't help you.  I'm sorry."

Doris sat up a little straighter.  "I know we don't know each other very well, Blake," she said coldly.  "But you're not exactly well known for keeping secrets."

Blake rounded on her.  "Exactly!" she exclaimed, then quickly gentled her voice so as not to wake the slumbering babies.  "I'm trying so hard to be a better person," she continued earnestly.  "So you see?  I have to keep Natalia's secret.  Otherwise I'm just the same old Blake who no-one ever took seriously.  Blabbermouth Blake.  Not to be trusted.  The town joke."

She snapped her mouth closed and flush, embarrassed at how much she'd revealed.  Doris's face was unreadable for a long moment, and then she seemed to soften.  "I'm trying to be a better person too," she murmured.  The admission seemed to cost her a lot.  "I just...wish I could help my friend."

Blake shrugged helplessly.  "Me too."

Doris drained the last of her coffee.  "For what it's worth," she said.  "You sound like a good friend to have."  The corners of Blake's mouth tugged upwards in a smile.

"So do you," she replied gently.

Their eyes met and something seemed to pass between them.  Some kind of understanding, or maybe awareness...  Whatever it was, it made the hairs on the back of Blake's neck stand on end.

Henry cracked the moment with a loud scream.  Both women snapped their heads round to see him begin to squirm in his stroller, his chubby little face quickly turning red as he squealed for attention.  Colin took up the harmony immediately, crying what seemed like an octave or two higher, in time with his nephew.  Blake went immediately to Henry, mentally preparing herself for yet another round of pacing and fruitless comforting.  When she turned around again she was surprised to see Doris mirroring her actions with Colin.

"You don't have to stay," she began, but Doris simply shook her head.

"You don't actually think I'd leave you, do you?"

A burst of warmth spread suddenly through Blake's chest and her heart began to beat just a tiny bit faster.  As she smiled at Doris she allowed herself the thought that maybe Olivia wasn't the only one the Mayor could be a friend to.  Maybe this conversation, this small fragment of an afternoon, could be the start of something between the two of them, too.  Something friendly.  Something good.

When Doris returned her smile with a surprisingly beautiful and genuine one of her own, Blake was sure the Mayor was thinking the exact same thing.

Blake Marler, Keeper of Secrets

Blake emerged from Company, blinking against sudden, foolish tears and passed some people she knew without even so much as a fake smile.  She heard their voices turn into whispers as she walked away, but couldn't bring herself to care.  Let them talk about how they'd seen her running from Company like a jilted lover.  It was probably poetic justice that she be the one gossiped about for a change.

Deciding she wasn't really in any condition to drive, she bypassed her car and headed for the park.  Olivia's park.  The irony of running away from the woman herself and into the park named for her was not lost on Blake.  In another situation she might have laughed at herself.  Today she just felt sad.  And a little lost.

And crashing in behind those emotions like a tsunami was a white-hot pulse of embarrassment.  She clenched her fists together, leaving twin half-moon rows on her palms where her nails dug in.  Cut the cute talk, she heard again her head.  Cute talk?  Rambling more like.  Blabbermouth Blake had apparently been replaced by Babbling Blake.  Was that a step up?

She wandered aimlessly for a while, hoping not to run into anyone and glad when she didn't.  Eventually she found herself by the lake where she sank onto a bench, fully prepared to wallow in her misery.

Her cellphone sprang to life, blaring out the theme tune to Police Squad.  She sighed.  "Hi Frank," she said, raising the phone to her ear without looking at it.

"Blakey!" His voice was soft and concerned and Blake felt a little bit sick.  "Are you okay?"

Blake swallowed hard.  "I'm fine," she lied, hoping the last of her tears weren't audible in her voice.

"Are you sure?  I saw you were talking to Olivia before you left.  Did she..."  He trailed off, waiting for her to fill in what he was desperate to hear: that yes, Olivia had upset her and yes, she'd like him to tell her off.  A knot of something like disgust rolled around in her gut, shooting tendrils up into her throat that burned like bile.

"I just needed some air, Frank," she said firmly.  He paused.

"Still," he said at last.  "Maybe I should talk to her.  She's gotta learn she can't just treat people however she wants.  I oughta-"

A flash of anger made her snap.  "Leave Olivia alone!"  She closed her eyes, imagining the kicked puppy look on his face as she tried to reign in her racing heart.  Couldn't he see that the woman was in  pain?  Was he really so blinded by his own feelings, his own rejection, that he couldn't see how Natalia's absence was destroying her?

"What was that for, Blake?"  He sounded annoyed, maybe even angry.  She sighed.

"Just...let her be, Frank, okay?"  She opened her eyes, focusing on a point about halfway between her bench and the opposite shore of the lake.  "She's hurting."

"Not enough."

Blake's eyebrows flew to her hairline and she actually pulled the phone from her ear and stared at it, as if she half expected it to have turned into a scorpion in her hands.  That, surely, could be the only explanation for the venom that had just dripped from Frank's voice.

"Vindictiveness is a really unattractive quality, Frank," she said at last, and quickly pressed the end button, before he could reply.

She sat staring at a spot in the middle distance for a moment or two before a cheerful voice interrupted her melancholy thoughts.  "I'm glad someone finally told him that," it said.

Blake turned her head sharply.  Doris Wolfe was standing a few feet away, a tentative smile on her face.  She was dressed casually for once, in jeans and a pink tank top.  Her hair was tied back in a simple short ponytail.

"Hi," Blake said, managing an answering smile for the other woman, remembering the afternoon they'd spent together looking after Henry and Colin during Dinah's wedding reception.  Doris took a step forward.

"I didn't mean to eavesdrop," she explained, holding her hands up in a gesture of surrender.  "I just heard you mention Olivia's name and I wondered..."  She trailed off, noticing for the first time the redness round Blake's bloodshot eyes.  "Are you all right?" she asked softly.

Blake attempted another half smile, but the softness and apparently genuine concern in Doris's eyes made her face crumple.  "Not really," she admitted, turning away and staring out at the lake again so that the Mayor wouldn't see her tears.

For a moment she felt cold and wretchedly lonely, and then she felt Doris settling in by her side.  She didn't sit close enough to touch, but Blake could feel the heat radiating from her bare arm nonetheless and she found it strangely comforting.  "Here," Doris said, holding out a packet of tissues.  Blake took one gratefully and dabbed daintily at her eyes.

"Sorry," she murmured, a flush creeping up her chest as embarrassment took hold.

"Don't be," Doris replied, but made no attempt to find out what was wrong or urge her to talk.  Blake was grateful.  She was glad Doris wasn't taking the opportunity to make fun of her, but she was sure that if the other woman tried to be nice to her she might just fall apart.

"Men are such pigs sometimes," Blake said at last, when she could trust herself not to burst into tears again.  Doris barked out a laugh.

"I completely agree with you," she said, and something in her tone of voice made Blake look up.  Her old gossip instincts were tapping on the inside of her skull, telling her there was something here to find out, if she pressed.  But of course she wasn't doing that anymore.  Doris was looking at her speculatively.

"Have you eaten?" she asked suddenly.  Blake blinked.

"Well, I had breakfast with Clarissa at eight," she said.  Doris checked her watch.

"Time for brunch then," she said, standing.  "Come on."

Blake shook her head.  "I don't want to go to Company," she began, but Doris hushed her with a smile.

"I'm not taking you to Company," she said softly.  Blake looked up and saw concern and a hint of affection in the other woman's clear blue eyes.  But it was what she saw behind that - apprehension and a dash of fear - that made her nod and stand.

"All right," she said.  She fell into step beside the Mayor and allowed herself to be led to their mystery destination, which turned out to be Doris's house.  "Oh," she said in surprise when they arrived.  Doris kicked off her sandals as she passed over the threshold and padded towards the kitchen in bare feet.

"Make yourself at home," she called over her shoulder.  Blake followed her to the kitchen only slightly hesitantly, taking in everything about the Mayor's house with her sharp, observant eyes.  It was decorated in neutral tones and the furniture was modern and minimalist.  It didn't look particularly lived in - not like Blake's house with its overstuffed armchairs, shelves overflowing with books, and the normal clutter caused by a ten year old child.  But, while Doris's home seemed a little cold, it was far from impersonal.  There were photographs everywhere - Ashlee riding her first bike, Ashlee blowing out candles at a strangely sparse birthday party, Ashlee graduating from High School.  It was more than obvious who the most important person in Doris's life was.  Blake found herself smiling a little at that knowledge as she joined the other woman in the kitchen.

This too was modern and clean.  Doris was standing in the middle of the room like she wasn't quite sure what to do.  Blake laughed.  "You don't cook, do you?" she asked.  Doris blushed.

"Not as such," she admitted.  "I, uh...damn, this seemed like such a good idea twenty minutes ago."

Blake, delighted at seeing this side of the seemingly ultra confident Mayor, took pity on her.  "Let's see what you have," she said, opening the fridge to look around.  Not much, was the answer.  A box of eggs, a quart of milk, some vegetables, a little cheese...  "How about a couple of omelettes?" she asked.  Doris nodded gratefully.  Blake grabbed the eggs, milk and cheese and nudged the fridge closed with her hip.  "Okay," she said.  "Get me a bowl and whisk..."

"Am I going to be the soup chef?" Doris asked playfully.  Blake frowned.

"Huh?  Soup?"

Doris deflated slightly.  "Sorry," she said.  "Stupid joke.  I mean the sous chef."

Blake shrugged.  "Sure," she replied.  "Grate some of this cheese, would you?"

Twenty minutes later they sat down at the small kitchen table with two full plates.  "I don't think I've ever done that before," Doris admitted as she took a bite of her omelette.  "Oh, this is good."

"Thanks," Blake said, smiling.  "Done what?"

"Cooked with someone," Doris murmured around a second mouthful.  She took a quick sip of her water and Blake wondered if she was imagining the faint hint of a blush colouring her cheeks.

"That's a shame," Blake said carefully.  "Some of my happiest memories of Ross are of us just doing simple things, like cooking breakfast or fixing dinner for the kids..."  She watched Doris carefully as she spoke, taking in the hints of pain that a less observant woman wouldn't even have noticed.

"Yeah, well..." Doris began, then coughed.  "I've never really had anything like that."  This time Blake was sure she wasn't imagining the delicate pink flush creeping across the other woman's face.  "I mean, I've been loved.  Just not in the way that I'd find myself being domestic."  She fumbled with her napkin.  "Not like you and Ross," she said softly.  And then, softer still: "Not like Olivia and Natalia."

Blake flinched a little at the mention of Olivia's name and felt all the quiet misery of the morning come crashing back.  She'd almost managed to forget Olivia's razor sharp words, drowning them out in the simple task of preparing a meal and chatting with a...well, surely Doris qualified as a friend now.

"So, what did she say to you?" Doris asked, her lips slightly pursed.  Blake shook her head.

"It doesn't matter."  She pushed her plate away, suddenly losing her appetite.  "It's just..."  She trailed off, aware that she was about to sound like bratty child, but not sure how to avoid it.  "It's not fair."  She shrugged.  "Why should loyalty to one friend cost me another?  Is that what trying to be a better person means?"  To her horror, her lower lip began to tremble.  She clamped down on her emotions, determined not to cry again.  Doris regarded her with an enigmatic expression on her face.

"Olivia and I are a lot alike," she said at last.  She played with her fork as she spoke, pushing her half eaten omelette around.  "When we're hurting we hurt other people.  Whatever she said, I don't think she really means it."

Blake shook her head sadly.  "You didn't hear her."

"No, I didn't," Doris allowed.  "But I know her.  I bet she'll apologise within a week."

"How much?" Blake replied immediately.

"Huh?"  Doris frowned.

"How much do you bet?" Blake explained.  "Twenty?"  She stretched out her hand across the table.

Doris smirked.  "Twenty it is," she said, and slipped her hand into Blake's.  She shook it once and then released it.  The whole movement probably took five seconds at most.

Blake was still thinking about how soft Doris's hand was, how unexpectedly warm, how strangely comforting, when the Mayor stood and began to pace back and forth between the table and the kitchen island where they'd prepared their meal.

"You're probably wondering why I invited you here," she said with a smile that was a little too wide, a little too bright.  Blake blinked at the sudden change in tone and watched as Doris began to wring her hands together.  "The truth is I've been thinking about telling you something," Doris continued.  "And I'm a little bit nervous about it."

That was the understatement of the century.  Blake stood and placed her hands on Doris's shoulders, if only to stop her from pacing again.  Every muscle in her body seemed to be taut and Blake was surprised to find that she was trembling a little beneath her hands.

"What is it?" she asked, looking into Doris's eyes and seeing all the fear she'd seen before in the park, returned tenfold.  Doris bit her lip.

"You know that Olivia's my friend," Doris began hesitantly.  Blake nodded.  She slid her hands down Doris's bare arms, stopping at the elbow.  Doris took a deep breath.  "I'm sure it's not a secret that I don't have many of those," she continued.  "I've been thinking lately about why that is."  She looked down at the floor, her breathing coming a little faster than normal.  Blake felt her heart clench at the obvious pain and terror written all over the other woman's face.  "And I've begun to realise that...it's me.  It's the way I am."

Blake frowned.  "That's not true," she began in an attempt to soothe, but Doris shook her head.

"Remember I said I was trying to be a better person?" she asked, looking up and meeting Blake's eyes again.  Blake nodded and Doris took a deep breath.  "So I've decided," she said.

Blake waited patiently and then smiled  a confused smile when Doris didn't continue.  "Decided what?" she said, squeezing the other woman's arms.  She remembered touching her the week before and being surprised at how fragile she seemed as she wrapped her hand round the other woman's forearm.  Without the protective layer of shirt and blazer she seemed more delicate still.

"To tell you," Doris said at last, her eyes fluttering closed.  She took a deep breath and swallowed hard.  "I'm gay."

Huh.  Everyone's coming out to me these days, was the first thought that passed through Blake's mind.  She dropped her hands to her sides and instantly realised her mistake when Doris flinched like she'd been slapped.  She brought her arms up again quickly to cover her error and pulled the taller woman into a loose embrace.  She still felt tense and didn't return the hug.  "Okay," Blake murmured, feeling the tension rolling in waves through Doris's muscles.  "It's okay."

Slowly, very slowly, Doris began to crumple into Blake's arms.  Her breath hitched in what might have been a sob and Blake pulled her a little closer.  She was very thin, Blake realised.  Very thin and so, so fragile.  In every possible way.  How strange she'd never noticed that before.  But then, Doris's everyday mask was a masterpiece.

When she pulled back from the brief hug the mask was not quite back in place, but it was getting there.  "Sorry," she mumbled, wiping at her eyes with her slightly trembling fingers.  "I haven't really told anyone that before."

Blake raised one eyebrow.  "Olivia?" she asked.  Doris shook her head.

"She kind of found out on her own," Doris explained.  "Long story," she added when Blake frowned.

"Another time," Blake muttered.  "Ashlee?"

The pain was back, Blake noticed, along with the fear and a hint or two of shame.  Doris shook her head tightly.  "I'm trying," she said.  "I just...never seem to find the right time.  Or the right words."

Blake didn't speak for a long moment, trying to imagine what Doris's life was like.  Hiding her true self from everyone, even - especially - the one she loved the most.  She imagined the loneliness of that existence, the terror of being uncovered, the dread of rejection.  And then she imagined the courage it must have taken for Doris to reveal herself to Blake like she'd just done.  A warm feeling of pride coursed through her.  "Thank you," she whispered in awe.  "Thank you for trusting me."

Doris shrugged as if it was nothing, but both women knew it wasn't.  It meant something.  It meant that the shy hope of a new friendship that Blake had felt when they were babysitting in Company last week had not been one-sided.  It meant that Doris had considered Blake's potential friendship worth the risk of rejection.  It meant that Blake's efforts to be a better person were, for the first time, paying off.  Blake smiled, widely, radiantly.

It meant, in short, that they were friends.

Doris Wolfe, Winner/Loser

Doris Wolfe was having a fairly good day, considering it was a Monday.  For her, most Mondays began in a haze of wine fuelled headaches and a vague sense of self loathing - particularly if the preceding weekend had involved Ladies' Night, a random conquest, and an awkward wait for said conquest to fall asleep so she could sneak out without incident.  She would never have admitted this if anyone asked, of course.  Partly for the sake of her pride, which was considerable; partly because that crushing, suffocating feeling had been with her for so long that she had begun to believe that it was how everyone felt.

The last few months or so had changed that, or - at least - had begun to change it.  She no longer felt that all consuming itch that led her out into the night, badly disguised and almost hoping to get caught.  A smile curled her lips upwards as she traced her cheek with her fingertips and thought of one of the reasons for that.  Olivia had kissed her.  Not the empty air kisses of political campaigns or Governor's receptions.  Not the wild, inflammatory kisses of faceless girls looking for trouble and a good time.  Not the slightly awkward, guilt laced kisses of a daughter who didn't really know her.  A simple kiss of gratitude, affection, friendship.  Nearly a full week after the fact, it still made her smile.

Another reason to smile arrived just then in the form of a buzzing Blackberry.  Lunch in the park? said the text message.  I have BIG news. B.

Ah.  Now there there at last was a sign of the Blake Marler of old - a woman with a secret buzzing around inside her like a bee trapped under a glass.  Doris imagined how desperate she must be to let it out, and grinned.  OK, she quickly tapped out in reply.  Half an hour, by the lake.

She finished up the last few pieces of urgent-ish paperwork on her desk before heading out.  Blake was already there when she arrived, and Doris took the opportunity to study her from a distance before she made her approach.  She looked good in white, she decided.  She'd have to tell her that one day - not today though, not so soon after coming out to her.  She might take it as a come-on.  Doris cringed inwardly at the thought.  That was the last thing she wanted.  Their friendship was so young, so delicate, so fragile.  The last thing they needed were...misunderstandings.

"You look happy," Doris breezed when she finally approached.  Blake looked up at her with a dazzling smile.

"Natalia's back!"

Doris did a slight double take.  Well well, Natalia Rivera, the performer of the Great Disappearing Act of 2009, had finally strolled back into Springfield.  "Has she seen Olivia?" Doris blurted, sitting down quickly beside the other woman.  Blake shook her head, holding her bottom lip between her front teeth.  Doris did another double take.  "Does she have a plan?"

"That's what I said!" Blake replied excitedly.

Doris shook her head.  "It'd better be a damn good plan," she muttered.  "I'm talking petitioning the Governor to change the law, buying the world's biggest diamond, and then proposing in the middle of Main Street with a sky-writer and a marching band good."

"I have a feeling it's not that good," Blake replied, frowning.  She bit her lip again.  "Doris, she has no idea how much she screwed up."

Doris rubbed her temples.  An ache was creeping in from the back of her skull.  "It's taken Olivia this long to even think about pulling herself together..."

Blake brightened suddenly.  "Oh!" she said, fishing around in the pocket of her jeans.  "Here.  You won."  She held her hand out.  Doris frowned as she took the twenty dollar bill from the other woman's outstretched fingers.

"What did I win?"

Blake smiled.  "The bet, remember?  You said she'd apologise within a week."

Doris's face cleared.  "Oh."  She smiled.  "So she apologised for being such a bitch, huh?"

"You know, I think those were her exact words," Blake replied.

Conversation stopped for a few minutes as Blake began to rummage in the paper bag she'd brought.  There were a couple of six inch subs and two iced teas.  Doris tore into the sandwich gratefully - she hadn't had breakfast and was famished.

"So," she murmured between bites.  "Why did she leave?"

Blake shook her head.  "I can't tell you that yet," she said.  "She hasn't even told Fr- I mean, she hasn't even told her family yet."

Doris looked up sharply.  "You were going to say Frank," she said levelly.  Blake flushed.

"Please don't ask me," she pleaded.  "I kept all her secrets for so long.  And I'm desperate to talk to someone about it, you have no idea.  I just..."

Doris quieted her by placing her hand briefly over Blake's where it lay on the table.  "Okay," she said gently, then grinned ruefully.  "I can't ask you to betray someone else's secret while you're keeping mine, right?"

Blake shot her a grateful look and Doris tried to stamp down on the anxiety that had suddenly gripped her.  Why would Natalia need to speak to Frank?  Was she going back to him?  Surely not.  Surely no-one - whatever their orientation - would choose that lump over Olivia Spencer.  But then why else would she need to speak to him?

An idea...a hideous, sickening idea...began to form.  She paled.  "Did she sleep with Frank before the wedding?" she blurted out.  One look at Blake's face was enough for her to get her answer.  She pushed the remains of her sub away, suddenly feeling sick.  "Oh my God!" she exclaimed.

"I didn't say anything," Blake said hurriedly, desperately.  Doris waved her off.

"Don't worry, I'm more than capable of connecting the dots," she replied, her face still a mask of barely controlled disgust.  "God, how stupid!  How could she let this happen?"

Blake shifted uncomfortably.  "Well, I don't think she let it happen," she reasoned.  "I think it just sort of...happened."

"Oh, so she fell over and just happened to land on Frank's frankfurter?"

For a moment Blake tried very hard to look severe.  But it was no use.  Her eyes began to twinkle first and then her shoulders started to shake and then, before she knew it, she had dissolved in a wave of uncontrollable giggles.  In the face of that, Doris found it hard to maintain her ire.

"It's not funny," Doris gasped through her laughter.

"No, definitely not," Blake replied, bending over almost double as she tried in vain to rein herself in.

"Olivia is so screwed," Doris said, trying to remind herself of just how serious the situation was.

"Not as screwed as Natalia," Blake quipped, and then they were lost again, clinging to each other desperately as they laughed at the ridiculousness of it all.

After the hiccups had passed and the tears had dried and the giggles had stopped bubbling up, Blake turned to Doris with a small smile.  "I have a feeling I'm going to have to help Natalia with a little damage control pretty soon," she said.  "I'm glad I have...well, I'm glad I was able to talk to you about it."

Doris nodded.  "I'll let you know if Olivia tells me anything that might help," she said.  "Hey," she added at Blake's slightly surprised look.  "I'm a romantic you know."

Blake still looked sceptical.  "You.  A romantic," she deadpanned.  Doris shrugged.

"Olivia and Natalia love each other," she said softly.  She looked away.  "If they can't get it right, what chance do any of us have?"

Her words sat in the still air for a long moment.  She couldn't quite bring herself to look at Blake, wary at having revealed too much.  She had a horrible feeling her voice may have been trembling as she spoke.  She closed her eyes when she felt a warm hand descend on hers.

"You'll get your chance," Blake said, and Doris was surprised by the warmth and sincerity in her voice.  "I know it."

It was too much.  Doris shook her head and plastered her best Mayor hoping for re-election smile on her face.  "I was talking about Olivia and Natalia," she said, in a tone that very clearly said back off.

Blake pulled back.  A trace of sadness flitted across her face and then was gone, chased away by a matching fake smile of her own.  "Well, I've got to get back to the restaurant," she said, a little too cheerily.  "Have to finish up the rest of my shift."

Doris watched her as she began to walk away, and the sick feeling was back.  Why did she always do that?  Why did she always push people away when they showed any kind of concern?  Why did she have to rely on sarcasm and jokes and prevarication?  What the hell was wrong with her?  "Blake!"

Blake turned round, a carefully controlled expression on her face.  "Yes?"

Doris managed a small, nervous smile.  "What time did Olivia apologise to you today?"

Blake frowned.  "Uhm..around ten, I suppose," she said, confused.  "Why?"

Doris stood and crossed the few paces across the grass to where Blake was standing.  "Then I didn't win," she said gently, holding out Blake's money.  She shrugged at Blake's confused expression.  "I met you in the park at ten last week," she explained.  "So Olivia must have spoken to you earlier.  She didn't apologise within the week."  Doris smiled lopsidedly.  "Fair's fair, right?" she said.

Blake continued to frown for a moment, and then a slow smile smile spread across her face.  "Right," she replied and reached out to take the money.  Their fingers brushed together as she grasped it and then, impulsively, she leaned forward.  "Thanks, Doris," she murmured, and pressed a brief kiss against her cheek.  Then she was gone, a twenty dollar bill in her pocket, a smile on her face and a spring in her step.

Doris gazed after her, a feeling of warmth spreading through her from the place where the other woman's lips had touched her skin.  Her fingers came up of their own accord to touch the spot.

She didn't even care that she'd lost the bet.  Standing there in the pork, with the sun shining, the birds singing, and the warmth of Blake Marler's lips lingering on her cheek, she felt like a winner.

She felt like she'd won the goddamn jackpot.

Mothers and Daughters

Doris Wolfe was not a cook by any stretch of the imagination.  Her mother had tried to teach her (cooking was, of course, a vital skill for a young woman to learn, or so her mother had said) but Doris never took to it.  She'd spent most of her childhood with her nose in a book.  Her parents wanted her to get good grades in school, of course, but they also wanted her to learn to cook and sew and sing in the church choir and find a nice, suitable young Catholic (definitely) Irish (preferably) man to marry and provide them with a troupe of grandchildren.  Burning every meal she was asked to cook was one of the few ways she managed to rebel.  Eventually her mother simply gave up trying to instil a culinary ambition in her only daughter.

There were several times in her life that Doris had regretted not developing the skill.  A young woman alone in a trailer park, effectively estranged from her parents, with less than fifty dollars to last her and her baby a month - she'd wished then that she knew the recipe for that Irish stew her mother made that sat in your stomach for hours and lasted a week.  After her mother's funeral, with her brother's wide eyes flashing in her mind and her father's harsh words still ringing in her ears - some comfort food would have been good then.  And now, alone in her pleasant, modern, tasteful house, her daughter out with her friends (like always) Doris found herself longing for something to do with her hands, something to make the time pass.

She sighed as she padded barefoot into the kitchen.  She had every gadget, every accessory, every piece of equipment known to man.  All as pristine as the day she'd bought them.  Opening the fridge door (on the front of which, held on with magnets, were takeout menus for every restaurant in Springfield) she surveyed the contents.  Two cans of diet coke.  An energy drink.  Half a quart of milk.  Some low fat yoghurt (Ashlee's).  A slightly wrinkled carrot.

Not exactly the ingredients for a cordon bleu meal.

A familiar wave of self pity immediately crashed over her and she had to hold on to the fridge door until it passed.  The thoughts were the same as always.  She was forty-two years old.  Shouldn't she have found someone to look after her by now?  Shouldn't she have someone who cared about her enough to nag her to keep her fridge stocked?  Even Ashlee didn't bother, instead choosing to simply bring her own food whenever she came over, knowing she'd find her mother's cupboard bare.  Was she just destined to be alone for the rest of her life?  Was this empty house, empty fridge, empty heart all she had to look forward to?

The moment passed eventually, as it always did, and she took a step back from the fridge.  She briefly considered calling one of the many restaurants arrayed on her fridge door but she quickly discarded the thought.  Eating takeout food (again) alone in her cold, silent house - the very idea depressed her.  So, shoving her feet into a pair of old sneakers and tying her hair back into a ponytail, she grabbed her car keys and took off to the one place in town she'd be sure of company.  That was its name, after all.

Her sharp eyes roamed through the diner as soon as she entered, searching for a familiar flash of green eyes and red hair.  But Blake was nowhere to be seen, and Doris quickly stamped down on the slight disappointment that welled up inside her.  She'd felt sorry for herself enough for one day.  So Blake wasn't there, so what?  She'd come there for food, not to see her.  It wasn't like she'd been getting a little lonely and melancholy in her big empty house and had needed to see a friendly face.  She was there to eat.  That was all.

"What can I get you?" Daisy asked as Doris slid onto one of the stools by the counter.  The girl was her usual cheery self, but her sunny disposition did nothing to lift Doris's spirits.  She opened her mouth to order - something horribly unhealthy, she thought.  That sounded like just what she needed.

"Oh, Daisy, did I leave my cellphone here earlier?"

Doris turned and couldn't help but smile as Blake climbed up onto the stool next to her.  The other woman looked slightly out of breath and vaguely harassed, like she'd been running around since morning and hadn't quite got a handle on the day yet.  But she still managed a smile for Doris as Daisy told her that yes, she had left her phone there and hurried off to get it.

"Are you having dinner?" Blake asked.  Doris shrugged with one shoulder.

"Sure am," she replied, as brightly as she could manage.  Blake looked around.

"Is Ashlee here?" she asked.  Doris narrowly avoided a flinch.  No, Ashlee wasn't with her - hadn't been with her for days, in fact - since that evening she'd taken her for dessert and then chickened out - again! - when she'd tried to tell her the truth.  Doris thought she was with Rafe Rivera tonight.  Brilliant.  Excellent company for her only child - a homophobic felon who couldn't handle his mother's (very much pending, at the moment) application for membership of the Sapphic Sisterhood.

"Nope," Doris said.  "I'm all alone."

The tone of her words was light and throwaway, but Blake paused anyway and turned a speculative gaze on Doris.  "Have you ordered yet?" she asked softly.  Doris shook her head, resisting the urge to squirm under her scrutiny.  Blake smiled.  "Great.  Because I was wondering if you might like to come and eat with us tonight."

"Us?"  Doris frowned.  Did Blake have a man in her life she didn't know about?  What an appalling idea - having dinner with Blake and her boytoy, watching them being all lovey-dovey and disgustingly heterosexual.

"Yeah, me and Clarissa," Blake explained.

A wave of something that felt suspiciously like relief flooded through the Mayor, but she refused to examine it too closely.  Instead she answered the question, quickly and without giving it too much thought.

"I'd love to."

And that was how she found herself standing in the middle of Blake's living room and feeling as out of place as it was possible to be, while Blake introduced her to her young daughter.  Clarissa peered up at her from her position half hidden behind her mother.

"You're Mrs Wolfe," Clarissa murmured.  Doris flicked a smile on and off.

"Miss Wolfe," she corrected.  "Very much a miss."

Clarissa seemed to absorb that.  "I've seen you on TV," she added in a small, slightly awe-struck voice.

A slightly strangled laugh was the response.  "Well, it adds ten pounds, don't forget," she said, and then cringed.  What a stupid thing to say to a child of...what, ten?  But Clarissa just giggled.

"You're funny," she said, and came out from behind her mother so she could take Doris's hand.  "You wanna see my room?"

Doris could only glance helplessly at a grinning Blake as she was dragged upstairs and subjected to twenty minutes of Clarissa's babble about Hannah Montana, the sleepover she'd just had with Maureen Reardon, and a "dreamy" boy at school called Billy.  She was saved by Blake's voice calling from downstairs, demanding that she come and help her with dinner instead of slacking off up there, dammit.  Doris smiled apologetically at Clarissa and bolted from the room.

"I figured you might need to be rescued," Blake said with a soft smile, holding out an apron.

Doris nodded, but looked at the apron like it was from another planet.  "What's this?" she said, curling her upper lip just a little.  Blake flicked the apron and smacked her with it, not hard enough to hurt, but hard enough to register the redhead's amused annoyance.

"Put it on," she instructed.  "And chop those onions for me."

Reluctantly, Doris did as she was told.  Within three cuts she was blinking hard and after five tears were streaming freely down her cheeks.  "Oh, I get it," she sniffled.  "You just invited me to do the dirty job, right?"  Blake laughed.

"You got me," she murmured warmly, and glanced up at Doris.  She was chopping the onions gingerly, like she wasn't quite sure if she was doing it right, blinking hard and biting her lip in concentration.  "This is nice," she said, nudging Doris with her hip.

"Torture is nice?" Doris replied, squeezing her eyes closed.

"Having someone to help me," Blake said, swatting Doris on the arm.  "I'd almost forgotten what it was like to have another adult in this kitchen."  She fell silent then, and Doris frowned.

"What's wrong?"

Blake shrugged.  "I don't know.  Just feeling a little melancholy, I guess.  I talked to my sons today - you know, I think by the time they come home they'll have forgotten what I look like."

Doris shifted uncomfortably.  She was no good in situations like this.  Comforting sad women was not her forté at all.  She couldn't even comfort herself when she got like this.  "It's hard to be separated from your children," she said, thinking of Ashlee's spell in juvie and of the secrets that kept at arm's length, even now.  Suddenly she was glad of the onions, because they meant that Blake couldn't tell which tears were because of them and which were because of her suddenly aching heart.

At least, that was what she assumed, but when she opened her eyes again she found that Blake was looking at her with a soft, sympathetic expression and it was nearly her undoing.  She forced a smile onto her face.  "What do we do with these now?" she asked, gesturing towards the onions.  Blake smiled a tiny little smile and closed her hand over Doris's.

"I'll deal with it," she said gently.  "You go and wash your face - it'll help make the pain go away quicker."

In the bathroom Doris splashed her face three times with blessedly cold water before raising up to stare at herself in the mirror.  God, she looked old.  The water had washed off what little make-up she'd been wearing and she found herself gazing critically at her red eyes and blotchy cheeks and crows' feet.  No wonder she didn't have a girlfriend.  Even if she did ever have the courage to come out - like out out, the kind of out that everyone knew about - she was hardly likely to attract anyone looking like this.  She remembered her mother admonishing her to be more feminine when she was younger ("How do you expect to attract a man looking like that?") and sighed.  Another thing to regret - not learning her mother's beauty tips.

"Doris!"

Blake's voice snapped her out of her reverie and she jumped.  "Coming," she called back, realising with a start that nearly ten minutes had passed.  She dried her face off and quickly trotted back to the kitchen to finish helping Blake prepare the meal.

After dinner - a very acceptable spaghetti bolognese that Doris was frankly amazed she'd had any hand in - Clarissa insisted that both adults join her in the living room for a movie.

"Oh, I don't know," Doris tried to object, but was shouted down by two very insistent Marlers.

"Oh come on, Doris, don't tell me you've got something better planned," Blake teased.

"Come on, please!" Clarissa squealed simultaneously.

Doris held up her hands in surrender.  She never could seem to say no to kids, even though - by the time they got to Clarissa's age, anyway - she wasn't exactly comfortable with them.  Babies she liked.  Babies she could handle - just feed them clothe them, love them, and they depended on you.  She was good with babies.  Give her a kid that had mastered the powers of walking and talking though...then things got a little awkward.  In her experience, once kids could walk they walked away, and once they could talk they said things like You're suffocating me, mom!  Let me have my own damn life!

Still, the movie Clarissa picked wasn't that bad.  Doris actually quite liked it, and wondered if she could send an mp3 of Sebastian singing Kiss the Girl to Olivia and Natalia, as a hint.  A huge great anvil of a hint.  The time for subtlety was long past with those two.  She turned to say as much to Blake.

Only to find that the other woman had fallen asleep.

Doris couldn't help the soft smile that spread across her lips as she studied Blake's peaceful face.  The tired, harried look had gone - replaced by stillness and contentment and a small smile.  She looked younger suddenly, and infinitely more fragile.

A sound from the armchair across the room distracted her attention and she looked up.  Clarissa had also fallen asleep.  A second tiny sigh escaped her parted lips as she shifted slightly, seeking a more comfortable position.

Doris's gaze flicked between mother and daughter for a few moments.  She bit her lip, wondering what to do.  Clarissa needed to be put to bed, but she was loathe to wake Blake and destroy that perfect expression of contentment and peace on her face.

In the end she simply shrugged and got up.  "Time for bed, sweetheart," she murmured, lifting Clarissa into her arms with no small effort.  She'd forgotten how heavy ten year olds were.  Clarissa sighed and mumbled something under her breath, but she clung to Doris, wrapping her arms round her neck and her legs round her waist.

It took ten minutes to escape after she laid the girl down.  Clarissa had revived somewhat on the way up to bed and had, when they got there, demanded a story.  For some reason she couldn't quite fathom, Doris found herself telling the story of how Cuchulain got his name - the story her father had always put her to bed with when she was a child.  She even found herself slipping into a slight Irish accent as she spoke, something she never did these days.  She shook her head to clear it.  Obviously these old thoughts of her mother's cooking and her father's stories were affecting her worse than she'd thought.

Back downstairs, Doris found a pad and pencil next to the phone and scrawled a quick note for Blake.  You and Clarissa fell asleep during the movie, it read.  I put Clarissa to bed, but I'm not about to try carrying you upstairs, so you can resign yourself to having a sore back in the morning.  She paused, holding the pencil a few inches above the paper as she considered what to write next. Thank you for having me tonight, she wrote at last.  You're a good friend.  D.

Blake hadn't moved since Doris had left.  She was still sitting half upright on the couch, breathing deeply and evenly through her nose.  Doris stole another moment to simply study her.

Hard to believe that a few short weeks ago they were barely acquaintances.  Blake had become so much a part of her life since that day at Company when she'd gone steaming in on Olivia's behalf, demanding to know the whereabouts and condition of the hotelier's best friend/girlfriend/family/true love (or whatever they wanted to call themselves.)  So strange that a real friendship had developed from that meeting.  What an unexpected gift.  A gift which Doris was finding increasingly precious.

Doris looked at Blake's sleeping face for a moment more, thinking of Clarissa upstairs, warm and safe and secure in her mother's love.  She wondered when Ashlee would next stay with her, and wondered too if she would enjoy the easy slumber that Blake's daughter had slipped into.  Would the secret be out by then?  Would her daughter be able to see the real Doris Wolfe?  Would she have found the courage?

Yes, a voice in her head said; a voice that sounded suspiciously like Blake's.  You need to do it.  You need to tell her.

It wasn't the first time a little voice had whispered that to her.  It was, however, the first time she'd really believed she could follow through with it.

Gently, Doris knelt in front of the couch and slipped her arm around Blake's shoulders.  The other woman sighed and leaned into the touch, but she didn't wake as Doris slowly moved her and laid her down on her back.  She grabbed a cushion from Clarissa's vacated chair and slipped it under Blake's head.  Blake mumbled something under her breath as she nestled in to the soft fabric.

With a smile, Doris reached for the blanket draped over the back of the couch and covered her friend, tucking it gently round her shoulders.  "Goodnight, Blake," she whispered.  "And thank you."

Ode to Joy

It was dark when Blake finally closed over the laptop.  She hadn't realised how long she'd been chatting; the time had flown so fast.  It had been...nice.  Almost like talking to someone she'd known for years.  It was all very comforting, very safe, very familiar.

So why did she feel so damn lonely?

She threw herself back onto the bed and closed her eyes tight against sudden tears.  God, this was pathetic.  Sitting in a hotel room, chatting to some random guy online, and actually being happy that it felt like talking to a big brother.  Where was the spark?  Where was the excitement?  Where was the magic, the sense of an adventure just beginning, where was the damn joy?

Joy.  Now there was something that had been missing from her life for some time.  Since...well, since Ross died, if she was honest.  His loss had left a hole inside her that she'd tried to fill with so many different things - running for Mayor, sleeping with Jeffrey, blogging about half the town's secrets, chasing after Coop, publishing books...the list went on and on.  Nothing worked.  No-matter how much time passed, it was still there.  That...emptiness.  She was beginning to believe that it was going to be with her for life.  She couldn't imagine what would finally fill it.

It certainly wouldn't be the bland, inoffensive man she'd spent the last few hours chatting to.

Right, Blake.  Time to pull yourself together.

Slowly, like tying a pair of comfortable old sneakers, she pulled taut the laces of her self-control.  The self-pitying tears dried.  She got up and washed her face. Re-applied her make-up.  Stared at herself in the mirror.

She could go home.  Clarissa was staying the night with Maureen again so the house was empty.  She could have a long bath, drink some wine, read one of the mediocre manuscripts she was thinking of publishing.  Or heat up some leftovers and veg out in front of the TV.  She didn't feel like cooking, and she was sure she still had some of that bolognese sauce she and Doris had made the other night.

Ah.  Doris.  Now there's an idea.

Maybe her new friend would be able to cure a little of the restlessness that had been building up inside her of late.  She'd managed it a couple of times already after all - in Company with the babies, or in her kitchen cutting onions.  A new plan began to take shape in Blake's mind.  Instead of going to her own house to while away the evening alone, could it hurt to go and visit Doris instead?  She could take wine, maybe some take-out...  She smiled as her spirits began to lift.  Yes.  That was a much, much better plan.

She remained convinced of that for exactly thirty-three minutes, which was how long it took to collect some food and wine and make her way to Doris's door.  As soon as she rang the bell she began to feel unaccountably anxious.  She listened to the chime echoing through Doris's empty hallway and watched a light come on in the depths of the house.  A flutter of nervous excitement twitched deep down in her stomach.

"Hi!" she said brightly when a slightly confused looking Doris finally answered the door.

"Uh...hi," Doris replied, frowning.  Blake's smile faltered a little.

"So, I've had kind of a strange day," she explained, resisting the urge to shift nervously from one foot to the other.  "And I was wondering if maybe you'd be interested in some company?"  She held up the wine and takeout with a hopeful expression on her face.  "I brought provisions."

Doris hesitated for a few seconds.  "Okay," she said at last, and Blake released a breath she hadn't known she was holding as she followed Doris into the house.

"So," Doris said a few minutes later over a plate of surprisingly good (for Springfield) chicken satay with rice.  "Why has your day been strange?"

Blake didn't answer.  Her attention was fixed on her food which she was trying her best to get from her plate to her mouth, without a great deal of success.  "Oh, sorry!" she exclaimed as a piece of chicken slipped from between her chopsticks and landed on Doris's perfectly varnished hardwood floor.  She scrambled in her purse for a tissue to clean it up.

"You could have just said you can't use chopsticks you know," Doris said, halfway between annoyed and amused.  Blake's cheeks coloured slightly.

"I can use them," she protested.  "Just...you know, not well."

Doris pursed her lips, but eventually decided that amused was probably the most appropriate reaction.  "Let me show you," she murmured, reaching out to take Blake's hand.  "The problem is you're trying to move both sticks.  You should hold the lower one steady with your ring finger like this..."  Gently, she manoeuvred Blake's fingers where she wanted them to be.  "And then grasp the top one between your thumb and middle finger like this..."  She pulled her hand away, satisfied that Blake was holding her chopsticks correctly.  "Try that."

Blake took a moment to steady her nerves.  For some reason Doris's gentle demonstration had left her feeling slightly flustered.  "Okay," she murmured, re-directing her attention to her plate.  This time she did as she'd been told and, surprisingly, found that she could actually transport her food quite easily.  "I did it!" she crowed jubilantly around a mouthful of chicken.  Doris smiled.

"It's pretty easy once your fingers know what to do," she said.  Blake raised one amused eyebrow and Doris rolled her eyes.  "Oh please," she scoffed.  "You have a dirty mind."  Blake laughed as she raised her hands in surrender.

"Hey, I didn't say a thing," she reminded her.

"Yes, I noticed that."  Doris took another bite of chicken.  "You were supposed to tell me why your day was strange."

"Oh, right," Blake replied, and quickly took a gulp of wine.  "So, I'm signed up to this dating site," she began and, in a slightly meandering fashion, began to explain to Doris what had led her to her door that night.  "And so I'm sitting there, in a room at the Beacon," she finished at last, "talking to this guy and it was like...I don't know, it was like I was outside myself suddenly  Like I could look at myself and see just how pathetic my life has become.  I mean, come on.  Since when do I need to hide behind a laptop to get a man?"

Doris shrugged, a small smile playing over her lips.  "Lots of people meet dates online these days," she said.  Blake sighed.

"I know, I know," she said, and rubbed a hand over her forehead.  "And I guess that's not really the problem anyway.  It's just..."  She trailed off.  The smile faded from Doris's lips.

"What's wrong?" she said softly, leaning forward.  Blake raised and lowered one shoulder in a parody of carelessness.

"It's just...what do I need a man for anyway?" she said at last.

Doris laughed, but gently.  "You're very much asking the wrong person," she said, her eyes twinkling.

For a moment Blake looked slightly dismayed at having said something so silly, but soon she was laughing too.  She dropped her chopsticks and grabbed Doris's arm, holding on to her as her shoulders shook silently.

"Oh my God," she gasped, and then dissolved in fits of giggles again.

It took several minutes for them to compose themselves, and even when they began to speak again a stray chuckle would occasionally bubble up.  "So," Doris said, wiping her eyes delicately with the corner of her napkin.  "You're looking for a man, huh?"  Blake shook her head, then nodded, then sighed and shook her head again.

"I have no idea what I'm looking for," she admitted.  "But I don't know.  I mean..."  She bit her lip, and then rushed ahead, letting the words pour out of her mouth without thinking about them.  "What if Ross was it for me?" she said tightly.  "What if there's no one else who'll ever love me like he did?  What if I have to go through the rest of my life alone?"

Doris smiled sadly.  Blake had looked away as soon as she finished speaking, and Doris fancied she could see the hint of tears glistening unshed in her eyes.  "You have your sons and your daughter," she said, remembering that Olivia had seemed to find this advice comforting.  "They love you, right?  And you'll always have them."

Blake closed her eyes, and now Doris was sure there were tears.  One escaped and slid down the other woman's cheek.  "That's true," Blake said softly.  "But I need more than that."  She turned to face Doris, fixing her with a steady gaze.  "Don't you?"

Doris swallowed hard.  The air seemed suddenly thick.  "I suppose I do," she said at last, and turned away.  Long, silent moments passed as both women picked at their rapidly cooling food.  Eventually, Doris shook her head.

"So," she said briskly.  "What would make you happy tonight, Blake?  If you could do anything at all.  What would you choose?"

A soft, slow smile spread across Blake's face.  "Why?  Are you gonna make all my wishes come true, Doris?" she asked, her tone light and teasing.

"If I can," Doris replied seriously, and Blake stopped short.  The smile froze on her face.

"I think that might be the nicest thing anyone's said to me in years," she said at last.  Doris looked away, her cheeks colouring with a gentle blush.  Blake laughed and shook her head.  Well, well.  Doris Wolfe - a marshmallow.  Who would have thought it?  "I'd like," she said, answering the question, "to go someplace I've never been before."  Her eyes twinkled.  "Have a little adventure.  Can you arrange that?"

Doris tilted her head to one side and thought for a moment.  Finally she smiled.  "You know," she said.  "I think maybe I can."

"Farley's?"

Blake couldn't conceal her disappointment.  Doris had all but promised to take her somewhere new.  But everyone in town had been to Farley's.  In a small town like Springfield, there wasn't a lot of choice.  If you wanted a burger you went to Company.  If you wanted cocktails you went to Towers.  And if you wanted to drink beer and shoot pool you went to Farley's.  Boring, everyday Farley's.  Her dismay was written all over her face, but Doris just smiled and grabbed her arm.

"Give me some credit," she admonished.  "You don't think this is just any old night at Farley's, do you?"

With that she dragged Blake forward and into the bar, so quick that she almost didn't manage to read the garish Ladies' Night poster adorning the door.

For a moment Blake was frozen in the doorway, a vague feeling of cognitive dissonance stopping her from moving forward.  Doris just laughed at her blank expression and headed towards the bar while Blake cast her eyes around the room.  Strange to see such a familiar place looking so...well, unfamiliar.  What was usually such a preserve of maleness was, for tonight at least, completely turned on its head.  Everywhere she looked she saw women.  Women talking, women drinking, women playing pool, women dancing, women kissing...  She tried very hard not to stare at that last group, surprised by her own interest.

"Okay," Blake said when she finally managed to cross the room to join her friend.  "You were right.  This is something I haven't done before."  Doris smirked.

"So I guess it'd be pointless to ask if you come here often?"  She laughed at her own joke, and then flagged down the bartender.

"Do you?" Blake asked after Doris ordered a couple of beers for them.  "Come here often I mean."  She took a swig straight from the bottle and slid onto a barstool.  Doris shrugged.

"Not as often as I used to," she said.  Blake frowned.

"Aren't you worried about getting caught?" she asked.  "I mean...okay, that made it sound like you're hiding something bad.  I mean...well, don't you ever get recognised?"  Doris smiled ruefully.

"Sometimes," she admitted.  "By Olivia, most recently."  She took a sip of her beer and looked around the room.  "But I've found that most people are willing to keep each other's secrets here."

Blake followed the line of her friend's vision and nearly choked on her beer.  "Is that the Congressman's wife?" she spluttered.  Doris grinned.

"Uh huh."  Doris and the woman's eyes met.  Doris gave her a small nod and then turned her attention back to Blake who looked as if someone had permanently lodged her mouth open.

"Have you..." she whispered furtively.  "You know..."

"A lady never kisses and tells," said Doris, but the smile in her eyes was all the answer Blake needed.  With a grin, she necked the last of her beer and stood.

"Get me another, would you?" she said.  "I'll be right back."

The bathroom was yet another new experience for Blake.  She was familiar with the concept of women going to the bathroom in pairs...it was just that - so far, anyway - she'd never had anyone actually go into the stall with her.  But that seemed to be the main purpose of the stalls tonight.  Not exactly romantic, Blake mused as she washed her hands.  If it were her she'd want something nicer.  Flowers, candles, a bed - definitely a bed.

Her mind was still following that thought to its natural conclusion when she left the bathroom and started to head back to Doris.  But someone had beaten her to it.  The Congressman's wife was already there, talking to Doris in hushed tones.  Blake hesitated, not wanting to interrupt.  But then she took in the stiffness of Doris's posture and her reluctance to make eye contact.  Blake started forward again, and was soon close enough to hear some of the conversation.

"Come on, Dory," the woman was saying.  "You can't say you didn't have a good time."

Blake caught Doris's eyes over the woman's shoulder.  "Dory?" she mouthed, suppressing a laugh at the murderous look that spread across her friend's face.  She had a feeling it was directed more at the Congressman's pushy wife than at her.  She took the last few steps forward.

"Hey sweetie," she said.  The Congressman's wife narrowed her eyes as Blake slipped her arm's round Doris's waist from behind and rested her head on her shoulder.  With Doris seated and Blake standing, they were the same height.  She nuzzled gently at her ear, and then placed a soft kiss onto her cheek, perilously close to the corner of her mouth.  "Who's your friend?"

Doris made no reply.  She seemed to have completely frozen under Blake's touch.

"You're Ross Marler's widow, aren't you?" the other woman said coldly.  Blake stiffened slightly.

"I am," she replied proudly.  Doris seemed to come to life again, and she fixed the Congressman's wife with a dangerous glare.

"What of it?" she demanded.  The other woman turned a simpering smile onto Blake.

"Just that you seem to be sticking to type, dear," she said, every syllable dripping with saccharine sarcasm.  Blake smiled back, showing all her teeth.

"As do you, Mrs McNeil."  Her smile became a grin as the other woman paled.  "And how is your husband these days?  Still fund raising for re-election?"

For a long moment there was no response but then the fuming woman turned on her heels and stalked away.  Blake laughed, briefly tightening her hold on Doris before letting go.  "God, she is such a bitch," Blake said, moving round to reclaim her place on the barstool next to Doris.  "She used to spread horrible rumours about Ross when he was in Congress.  Just because her idiot husband lost the party nomination to him."  She rolled her eyes.

Doris blinked once, then twice, opened her mouth to speak, and then closed it again.  Finally she just shook her head.  "Two more beers over here," she called, in a slightly hoarse voice.

Blake giggled as she stumbled up to her front door, nearly tripping on her own heels for the third time.  Doris tightened her hold on her elbow.  "Careful," she admonished.  She hadn't had nearly as much to drink as Blake and was much steadier on her feet.  Also, like a good little lesbian, she was wearing sensible shoes.

Blake leaned back against her front door, smiling blearily up at Doris.  "I had a really good time tonight," she said, slurring only slightly.  Doris smiled.

"I'm glad," she said.  Blake giggled again and reached out to take her hand.

"You know what the bartender said?" she murmured.  "When you were in the bathroom?"  She leaned forward and began to whisper conspiratorially.  "She said you were a heartbreaker."  The giggles returned as Doris rolled her eyes.  "But you know what else?"  Her eyes softened.  "She said there wasn't a woman in that bar tonight who wouldn't have killed to be in my shoes."  She raised her hands and cupped her friend's face between her palms.  "You're beautiful, you know that?" she whispered.  "I'm not sure I ever noticed before."

Doris took a deep breath.  The air between them practically buzzed.  "Goodnight, Blake," she said firmly, and took a step back.

Blake smiled slowly.  "Don't I get a goodnight kiss?" she asked.  Her tone was playful, but there was something else there, beneath the surface.  A hint of...what, interest?  Curiosity?  Doris wasn't sure what it was, but it made her palms start to sweat.

"Goodnight, Blake," she said again.  She took one step forward and curled her hand round the back of Blake's head, tugging her forward.  Blake's breath caught in her throat as Doris's face hovered an inch from hers.  Doris smiled.  "Sweet dreams."  With that she leaned closer and pressed a soft, sweet kiss onto her friend's forehead.  Blake's eyes fluttered closed.  When she finally opened them again Doris was gone, but the memory of her lips lingered on her skin.  She smiled.

Later, as she climbed into bed and turned off the light, Blake was struck with the sudden realisation that something was different.  She lay awake for a few minutes, wondering what it was.  Wondering what was missing.  Then it hit her, and she smiled a joyful, blissful smile.

Nothing was missing.  For the first time in years, nothing was missing at all.

Whatever Comes Next

"Can I give you a ride somewhere?"

Blake smiled up at Ed and shook her head.  "I've got my car," she said.  "But thanks.  It was...it was good to see you."

Blake watched him walk away, then turned her head to bestow one last longing glance at Ross's headstone.  Immediately her forehead wrinkled in a frown.  Someone was back there, standing over her husband's grave.

Someone with whom she'd become quite familiar over the past few weeks.

"Now what are you doing here?" she whispered to herself.  She glanced at her watch, thinking of Olivia and her mother waiting for her back at the Beacon.  For a moment she hesitated.  Then she saw Doris lean down and lay some flower's on Ross's headstone and the curiosity overtook her.  As quickly as she could, she started to head back to the grave, eyes fixed on Doris the whole way.

The question nipped at her, making it impossible to lift the frown from her face.  Why was Doris here?  She and Ross had worked together, sure, but they'd never been friends.  Hell, Doris hadn't had any friends.  Until Olivia.  And, now, Blake herself.

Blake was finally beginning to understand why that was.  It wasn't, as she'd always assumed, that Doris didn't need people.  In fact, Blake was beginning to realise that Doris needed people profoundly.  She still remembered the utter terror on the other woman's face when she'd come out, and the understanding that this fear of rejection was always with her.  The possibility that any friend she made could abandon her after discovering her secret.  How different she'd been, how much freer, how much warmer, since Blake had proved that she wasn't running away.

"I'm not sure why I'm here."

Doris's words drifted to her across the breeze.  Blake opened her mouth to speak, ready to announce her presence.  She didn't want to sneak up on Doris like Ed had done to her.

"I suppose I wanted to talk to you about Blake."  At the mention of her name, Blake snapped her mouth closed and stopped walking.  Doris twisted the heel of one of her Jimmy Choos into the grass.  "She's pretty great, you know that?"  She laughed softly.  "Of course you do - you married her.  Twice."

A slow smile spread across Blake's face, at about the same pace as the warm, affectionate sensation suffusing her chest.  "You're not so bad yourself, madam Mayor," she whispered.

Unaware of her audience, Doris continued.  "I like her...a lot.  She's funny.  She's kind."  She crossed her arms across her chest and laughed again.  "I don't know why I'm saying all this," she admitted.  "For some reason I just felt like I should..."  She trailed off and hugged herself closer.  "She's a very, very good...friend," she continued at last, and there was something in her voice that Blake didn't quite understand.  Something melancholy, something wistful.  "She's been a wonderful friend to me."

Shaking herself out of her stupor, Blake took a few steps back before she called out.  "Hey there!"  She quickly began to stride forward, hoping she was giving the impression of having just arrived on the scene.  "I didn't expect to find you here."

Doris turned to her with wide, slightly frightened eyes.  Within seconds she pasted an expression of nonchalance over the top, but Blake saw it.  That fragility she'd been so surprised at, the vulnerability.  She wondered, not for the first time, who had hurt her friend so badly that she was so afraid all the time.

"Hey," Doris said.  "I was just...uhm, making sure Ross had some flowers."  She gestured to the bouquet of white lilies she'd brought.  Blake looked down and smiled.

"They're beautiful," she murmured, and glanced up again to catch Doris's eyes.  "Thank you."

Doris blushed.  "Don't mention it," she murmured.  Blake laughed softly.

"No, God forbid I thank you for doing something nice," she scolded.  "Couldn't have people knowing what a marshmallow you are, huh?"  Doris stood up a little straighter.

"I am not a marshmallow," she said, appalled.  Blake swatted her on the arm playfully.

"If you were any more of a marshmallow you'd need police protection from all the boy scouts who wanted to toast you on their campfires," she teased.  Doris's lips twitched.

"You think you're pretty funny, huh?" she said accusingly, but the gleam in her eyes gave her away.

"Uh huh," Blake replied happily.  Hard to believe that just minutes ago she'd been crying.  Doris let out a huff and Blake actually giggled.  A raised eyebrow was her response.

"Well, aren't you giddy," Doris said archly.  Blake shrugged.

"My mom's in town," she said.  "It's...good to see her."  She smiled, and quickly spread her blanket back out on the ground before dropping down to sit, Indian style.  She patted the spot beside her.  "Sit with me," she instructed.  Doris hesitated, glancing at the headstone and the blanket's proximity to it.  Blake just laughed.  "It's okay, Doris," she assured her.  "Ross is in here-" she tapped her heart, "-not under there."

After another brief hesitation Doris shrugged and kneeled awkwardly in her severe pencil skirt.  "If I'd known I'd be picnicking in a graveyard I'd have worn pants," she quipped.

"It's not a picnic," Blake replied immediately, and held out her empty hands.  "No food."  Doris rolled her eyes.

"Ha ha," she muttered, and then they lapsed into silence.  Blake even closed her eyes for a moment, allowing her skin to drink in the sunshine, listening to the breeze and the bird song, and the comforting sound of her friend breathing beside her.

"I've never had what you and Ross had," Doris said softly at last, breaking the comfortable silence.  Blake opened her eyes and turned to Doris who was staring at the headstone without seeming to see it.  Idly, the Mayor picked at some fluff on the blanket, flicking it onto the grass with her forefinger.  "I mean, there was someone once," she continued.  She blinked twice in quick succession and took a deep breath.  "A long time ago.  But she...well, let's just say it was unbalanced.  She never loved me like I loved her.  And since then...I haven't let that happen again."  Her face hardened, and Blake suddenly understood why she always seemed to be holding back.  It was hard to want to give of yourself when someone had squandered that gift in the past.  Just like Olivia couldn't trust Natalia.

"What Ross and I had is pretty rare," Blake replied gently.  She sensed she needed to tread carefully here.  Doris had a tendency to close up, like a hermit crab retreating into its shell, after revealing more than she'd meant to.  She didn't want that to happen now.  "I've been thinking about it a lot lately, as a matter of fact.  Love, I mean."

Doris glanced up, then quickly looked away again.  "You have?"  Her voice sounded a little hoarse.  Blake nodded.

"Yeah," she said.  "I've been thinking about how lucky I was.  Ross and I...well, it's hard to believe I'll ever get that lucky again."

Doris cleared her throat, keeping her eyes trained on the grass.  "Maybe not," she allowed.  "But...maybe you'll find something different instead.  Something...unexpected."

Blake grinned.  "That's pretty much exactly what Buzz said."  She shifted a little closer to Doris and linked her arm through hers.  "Maybe you will too."

Doris laughed bitterly.  "Love and I haven't been on speaking terms for some time," she muttered.

Blake paused for a solid minute before she decided it was safe to respond to that.  Doris was tense beside her, but she hadn't yet run away.  That was something.  "That's not true," she said softly.  "People love you."

"Yeah," Doris mumbled in a tone that clearly said yeah, right.  Blake reached down and grabbed her hand.

"They do!" she insisted.  "There's Ashlee, and Olivia..." she squeezed her friend's hand gently, "...and me."

Doris looked up sharply.  "What?"

Blake smiled.  "I think it's pretty amazing," she said firmly.  "What a good friend you are.  How close we've become.  How much I care about you, after such a short time."  She rubbed Doris's knuckles with her thumb.  "Don't you?"

Doris swallowed hard.  Blake could see her pulse fluttering like a butterfly in her throat.  "Yes," she murmured.  "I do.  You're a very good...friend."  She faltered a little over the word friend.

Blake nodded, seeming not to notice the slight hesitation, and then grinned.  "You know what else Buzz said?  Live in the moment."  She leaned in closer to Doris and rested her head on her shoulder, sliding her arm round her waist.  Tentatively, Doris's arm came up to curve round Blake's shoulders, pulling her close.  The redhead sighed in contentment.  That feeling was back; that sensation that all was right with the world.  Her chest felt full to bursting.  "That's what I'm going to do," she murmured happily.  "Just take each day as it comes and look for the blessings.  That's what you should do too."

For a long time Doris made no reply.  Then, just as Blake was sure the other woman had decided not to answer at all, she felt the soft press of warm lips on her forehead.  "Maybe I will," Doris said softly.  "Thank you."

Blake smiled and shifted yet closer, so that their sides were pressed up against each other.  She closed her eyes as she felt Doris rest her cheek on the top of her head.  Once again, she was thinking about love.  The crazy love of her parents.  The fire and passion of her early years with her husband.  The comfortable love she'd eventually shared with Ross.  What would she choose, if she could do it all again, she wondered.

Fire and passion, with some comfort thrown in, she decided.  Despite what she'd said before, she knew she wanted it all.  It would be hard to settle for less.  She might have to.

But then again, she thought to herself, she might not.

There was, however, one thing of which she was sure.

She was looking forward to whatever came next.  Because there was something coming.  She could sense it.  She could almost taste it.

Doris sighed gently, so gently that Blake wouldn't have noticed if she hadn't been so close, and Blake tightened her hold on the other woman's waist.  Olivia and her mother were waiting for her, but she didn't care.  For the time being, all she wanted to do was stay where she was, sharing this moment with Doris.  This moment in the sunshine, with the breeze and the bird song, and the strangest feeling that Ross was close-by, and that he approved.

So she settled herself more comfortably against her friend and let her thoughts turn once more to love.

Currents

Doris achieved consciousness that morning through a foggy haze of dreams.  She never remembered the images that came to her in the night - only the mood they left behind them.  After a nightmare she would be scared and irritable.  After a work dream she'd be tense.

This morning she was...happy.  Warm.  Loved.  And for the first time she could remember something about her dreams.  This time there was a very clear image - a small, slight woman with soft red hair and laughing green eyes.

"Blake..." Doris whispered, rolling over and hugging her pillow close, still lost in the limbo between sleep and wakefulness.  The part of her that wanted to stay in the dream fought with her waking mind for as long as possible but, at last, a car honked outside and she twitched awake.

For a long moment she stayed stuck in the dream world and was confused by the pillow in her arms where she had expected a woman to be.  But then reality crashed in on her like a car wreck and she groaned.

"Oh no," she murmured, slamming the pillow on her face.  "Please...please, no."

This wasn't supposed to happen to her.  She'd spent her whole adult life making sure that it didn't, since that disastrous affair with her Family Law professor that had led to her dropping out of college, getting kicked out of her parents' house and living in a trailer park.  It had taken her years to drag herself back out of the deep, dark hole that mess had created - by taking night classes and working three jobs to pay for them, and by building up layers of defences like bitchiness and sarcasm to keep any of her sexual conquests from worming their way into her heart.

Except Blake wasn't a sexual conquest.  She was a friend.  And in that guise she'd easily bypassed every defence, breached every levee.  Hurricane Blake.  No wonder Doris felt like she was drowning - flooded with unfamiliar sensations like concern and affection and tenderness.  Maybe even...but no, she couldn't bring herself to complete that thought.  She refused to give a name to the cocktail of emotions licking under her skin like a slow burning fire.  If she named them they were real and if they were real...

If they were real, she was lost.

Routine.  That's what she needed.  Shower, clothes, food, in that order.  Then, work.  No meetings today thankfully, but she had a pile of paperwork roughly resembling the Himalayan range in her office to get lost in.  That would do.

She turned the shower to a slightly colder setting than normal, and scrubbed herself until her skin turned pink.  It was probably a hangover from her Catholic upbringing - this need for mortification of the flesh to take her mind off of inner pain.  Her knees still ached a little in the cold sometimes because of all the hours she'd spent down on them in draughty churches, sent there by her mother as penance for getting a B on a test or burning dinner.

Choosing an outfit took a little longer than usual.  She really wasn't in the mood for anything brightly coloured and suddenly that seemed to be all she had.  A rainbow of blazers stared out from her closet - baby blue, bright red, emerald green.  She bypassed each one and finally laid her hands on a pantsuit in deep chocolate brown.  That was better.  Something muted to suit her mood.

Her Blackberry buzzed just as she entered her clean, barely used kitchen. Do you want to meet for breakfast?  My treat.  O.

Doris felt herself smiling involuntarily.  She hadn't seen Olivia in a while and it would be good to catch up.  She'd been letting her friend have her space since Natalia came back, reasoning that she'd make the first overture if she wanted to talk.  And now it looked like she did.

OK, she sent back.  But not Company.  She definitely didn't want to run into Blake this morning.  The images from her dream were too fresh and - more to the point - the feelings they'd stirred up were too raw.  No, some time alone with Olivia sharpening her sarcasm was definitely what she needed.

The answering text arrived in seconds.  Definitely not.  Are you at home?  I'll pick you up.

Olivia's tell-tale white Nissan pulled up outside her house ten minutes later.  Doris smirked at her friend as she slid into the passenger seat.  "Are we going to be the entertainment at a kegger?" she asked, taking in Olivia's sparse outfit of very short shorts, tank top and flip flops.  Olivia rolled her eyes.

"You're hardly dressed for it," she replied in an accusatory tone - as if Doris had ruined all her carefully laid plans for the day - as she pulled away from the kerb.

"Well, if you'd warned me I could have dressed like a hungover co-ed the day after a frat party too," Doris said with a grin.  The good natured sniping continued back and forth for several minutes, until Doris noticed that they were definitely headed out of town.  "Where are we going?" she asked, glancing over at Olivia.

"Somewhere Natalia can't show up to harass me," Olivia answered cryptically.  That seemed to be the end of that conversation.  Doris leaned down and turned on the radio, content to listen to the chatter of a DJ until Olivia wanted to talk again.

But that didn't seem like it would be happening any time soon.  They drove in companionable silence down the Interstate for ten minutes, and then Olivia took an exit onto a quiet, country road.  A few bends and turns later and they were following the course of a slowly meandering river, with farmland on the left glowing golden in the early morning light.  Doris leaned back and closed her eyes.  "This is pretty," she murmured, and suddenly was struck by the intense desire to come back here one day with Blake by her side instead of Olivia.  She imagined how her friend's eyes would widen in delight at the landscape spread out before her like an oil painting.  She could practically hear her sigh of contentment and her shyly whispered I never thought you of all people would take me somewhere like this, Doris.  And then Doris would smile and say I'm just full of surprises as she trailed her fingers along Blake's cheek and tilted her head up for a slow, sweet kiss-

"Wake up sleepyhead, we're here."

Doris jerked out of the fantasy and flushed darkly.  Luckily for her Olivia wasn't paying any attention to her and she managed to steal a few seconds to get her wildly racing heart under control.  Blinking hard as she stepped out of the car, she took in her surroundings.

They had stopped at a small, quaint cafe set back from the road in the meander of the river.  The parking lot at the side was surprisingly busy for such an out of the way place.  A sign by the door announced that it was imaginatively named Riverside Cafe and that it was open for breakfast, lunch and dinner from 9am to 10pm, six days a week.

"Nice place," Doris said as she followed Olivia.  Olivia threw a smile over her shoulder.

"They do the best breakfasts here," she replied.  "And you know the best thing about it?"  She waited until Doris caught up with her.  "No Natalia.  No baby.  No Frank.  No Springfield."

Doris prudently decided not to respond to that outburst.  She could have mentioned that she was the Mayor of Springfield, that she actually (as much as she tried to hide the fact) cared about the much maligned little town.  She could have pointed out that Natalia and the baby and Frank were likely to be in Olivia's life for the long haul.  But she didn't.  She just followed her friend as she wandered round the side of the building and found a table under the shade of a willow tree, just yards from the babble of the riverbank.

"Two menus and two coffees," Olivia ordered from the perky waitress who appeared as if by magic the moment they sat down.  Doris slid her jacket from her shoulders and draped it over the back of her chair.  Olivia had the right idea as far as wardrobe was concerned.  It was way too hot out for a suit.  She was wearing a cream, sleeveless blouse underneath the jacket, and she was glad of the breeze on her bare skin.

"What's good here?" Doris asked the waitress when she returned with the menus.  The girl smiled.

"Oh, everything," she said with a wink.  She leaned down over Doris's shoulder, and grinned when the Mayor's eyes widened slightly.  "But I recommend the pancakes, myself," she said softly.  "People tell me they come from miles around for a taste of our...pancakes."

Doris swallowed hard when the girl made no effort to move away.  "Okay, thanks," she replied, and prayed the squeak in her voice was just her imagination.  From the look in Olivia's eyes, she sensed that it was not.

"I guess we'll have the pancakes then," Olivia said with a smirk.

The girl straightened up at last and tucked her long blonde hair behind her ears.  "Excellent choice," she said chirpily, and took the menus back.  Olivia waited until she was out of earshot before she rounded on her friend.

"A little jail bait, madam Mayor?" she teased.  Doris rolled her eyes.

"Hardly," she muttered.  "She's definitely over the age of consent."  Olivia barked out a laugh.

"Well, if you want to get her number don't let me hold you back," she said magnanimously.  "Someone should be getting some..."

Doris considered the idea as Olivia trailed off.  It was exactly the kind of opportunity she'd always taken in the past, that was true.  The waitress was absolutely her type.  Very pretty, very forward, a little dumb and - most importantly - much too young to want anything more lasting from her than a roll or two in the hay.  That was the clincher.  She was known as a bit of a cougar at Ladies' Night, although she made rare exceptions for women like the Congressman's wife - women with as much to lose as she had.  She turned and took a quick glance at the departing waitress and allowed herself to think about what it might be like to take her to bed.  The expected rush of heat arrived on cue.

But then, rolling in behind that like a wave, came an unfamiliar rush of emptiness and despair that made her head spin and her eyes water.  Sure, she could have a little fun with the waitress.  But it wouldn't change her dreams.  It wouldn't change the fact that she woke up alone every morning.  It wouldn't change the way her heart sprouted wings every time she heard Blake laugh.

"What's wrong?"

Doris glanced up into her friend's concerned face and blinked furiously. Get it together Wolfe, she screamed to herself.

"Some dust blew into my eye," she lied, fishing through her pocket's for a handkerchief.  Olivia didn't look convinced, but didn't press her.  Doris was thankful for that.  She wasn't ready to give voice to any of these feelings.

"You're probably wondering why I dragged you out here," Olivia said after a few minutes.  Doris shrugged and shook her head.

"Not really," she replied.  "Natalia's back.  She's pregnant.  She wants you.  You don't know what to do.  And I'm your Fairy Gaymother."

Olivia lasted for a good ten seconds before she burst into laughter.  "Fairy Gaymother?" she spluttered, and then dissolved into giggles again.  Doris glanced around at the nearby tables and, once she was satisfied that no-one was staring at them in particular, she allowed herself a small smile.

"You ladies seem very happy this morning," the waitress said, reappearing at that moment to deliver their pancakes and refill their coffee.

"Appearances can be deceptive," Olivia murmured.  The girl's perky exterior was pierced briefly by a frown, but her face soon cleared.

"Well, enjoy your meal," she said cheerily and left, pressing something into Doris's hand as she did so.  Before Doris had a chance to even glance at it Olivia swiped it from her hands.

"I could get lost in those baby blues," she read in a teasing, sing-song voice.  "Call me."  She recited a number.  "She's signed it with three exes and four hearts.  How sweet."

Doris rolled her eyes and grabbed the paper from her friend's fingers.  "Had enough yet?" she said.

"Not a chance," Olivia shot back, her eyes gleaming.  "I should go over there and kick her ass, actually.  For all she knows, you and I are together."

"If I was with you I hardly think she'd be competition," Doris replied without thinking.  Olivia sat back, a slow smile spreading across her face.

"Why, Doris - if I didn't know better I'd say that was a compliment."

Doris blushed.  "Good thing you know better then," she muttered and stuffed a forkful of pancakes and maple syrup into her mouth.

Conversation halted briefly as they began to eat, but Olivia was talking again within four bites.  Bit by bit the whole sordid story spilled out - Natalia's pregnancy, the devastation of her absence, followed by the almost equal devastation of her return.  And, since her return, the campaign that Natalia had waged against her with her flowers and cookies and rooftop breakfasts, all without ever seeming to understand how she had absolutely cleaved Olivia in two that day she left her holding the rice-krispie treats at the barbecue.

When it had all finished spilling out Doris took a long sip of her coffee, and then shrugged.  "You have two choices," she said firmly.  "Option one: forgive her and move on."  She waited for the protests to die on Olivia's lips.  "Option two: don't forgive her, and cut her out of your life altogether."

Olivia paled.  "I can't do that," she said instantly.  "Cut her out of my...I can't.  She's...she's too important to Emma."  The excuse sounded lame even to Olivia's own ears.  Doris rolled her eyes.

"So what are you going to do?" she demanded.  She trailed the last piece of pancake around her plate, soaking up the last remnants of syrup.  "Be friends?" she scoffed.  "You and her can never be friends.  You're too much under each other's skin for that."

Olivia sat back in her chair, her face stricken.  "You're right," she murmured at last after a long moment.  "She came to see me yesterday.  She was upset.  She just wanted me to hold her.  To comfort her, that's all.  I should be able to do that for a friend, right?"

Doris tilted her head to one side.  "You couldn't do it?"  Olivia shook her head tightly.  "Why not?"

Olivia took a deep breath.  "Because if I put my arms around her," she said softly, "I'll kiss her.  And if I kiss her I'll take her to bed.  And I know she won't stop me, so I have to stop myself."

They lapsed into silence then, listening to the chatter of the other diners around them and the music of the running water dancing over the mossy stones on the bank.  Doris took a deep breath as she thought of that night, just over a week ago, when she'd taken Blake to Ladies' Night.  She'd had no ulterior motives then...at least, she hadn't acknowledged any.  But maybe she'd subconsciously been trying to introduce Blake to her world, to test her level of comfort with women being together.  If that was why she'd done it then Blake had passed with flying colours.  Doris felt her body suffuse with heat as she remembered a slightly drunken Blake leaning against her door, looking up at her with hooded, come hither eyes.  Don't I get a goodnight kiss?  The remembered words caused a trail of fire even now, just as they had that night when they'd pierced the last defence around Doris's heart and lit her up with the sudden awareness that she wanted this woman.

And she could have had her.  Doris was certain of that.  If - instead of pressing that goodnight kiss to her friend's forehead - she had taken Blake up on the unspoken invitation of her lips, she could have taken the redhead to bed that night.  Blake wouldn't have stopped her.

So Doris had needed to stop herself.  For much the same reasons as Olivia had needed to stop.

Self-preservation.

Doris didn't want to be Blake's experiment.  She didn't want to be a drunken mistake.  She didn't want to be a hazy memory.  She wanted...so much more than that.

Before she realised what she was doing, Doris threw her napkin onto the table and stood on suddenly wobbly legs.  "Hey," Olivia called as she swept past her, but Doris ignored her.  She just kept walking until she got to the river's edge and stared out across its meandering currents, her eyes glittering with sudden tears.  She didn't even bother to hide them when she felt Olivia sidle up beside her and wrap her arm round her waist.  Instead, she allowed herself to crumple slightly against her friend and closed her eyes.

"When did you know?" she gasped, and two tears escaped from her eyes and trailed down her cheeks.

"Know what?" Olivia replied softly.  Doris swiped at her eyes with trembling fingers.

"When did you know she was more to you than a friend?"

Her question sat between them like a solid object.  Olivia tightened her hold.  "Oh, sweetheart," she said softly, and the quiet affection in her voice nearly made Doris cry again.  "Who's got a hold of you, huh?"

Doris shook her head tightly.  She couldn't say it out loud.  Not yet.  Olivia seemed to understand.

"It was a gradual thing," she whispered, staring out at the river.  "I can't tell you exactly when it happened.  It just...grew.  By the time I noticed it, it was too late.  I was already hers..."

Doris's eyes flickered open.  The river rushed on, uncontrollable, unstoppable.  Beside her Olivia sighed, lost in her own thoughts and her own pain.

"I'm in so much trouble," Doris whispered.  Olivia managed a small laugh.

"You and me both, friend," she said.  Doris brought her own arm up to slide round Olivia's waist and sighed as they leaned against each other, closing her eyes again as a sudden realisation hit her.

She'd been wrong before.  Blake wasn't a hurricane.

She was a river.

And Doris was nothing but a twig floating on her surface, being drawn helplessly by her currents, moving inexorably forwards towards the wide open sea.

Risks

Blake looked from Cyrus to Ashlee and back again before quickly reaching a decision.  "You know what?" she said.  "I think you two can manage without me for a few minutes."  She started backing away, holding up a hand to halt their protests.  "I'll be back before you know it," she assured them.  "You'll be fine."  With that she dumped her things on the bed and sped from the room, her mind stuck on Doris and the pain she'd seen on her friend's face as she left.  Ashlee's voice followed her into the hallway: Doesn't she know we're working to a deadline here? but she ignored it.  As important as the book was, she had a feeling that what she was doing now might be even more important.

Doris had surprised her when she'd wandered into the room.  She hadn't seen her since that day by Ross's grave, although she'd be lying if she said she hadn't been thinking about her.  In fact, Springfield's Mayor had been the object of many of her thoughts lately.  When she heard a funny story her first thought would be I must remember to share that one with Doris.  Or if she saw something interesting or pretty she'd immediately think Oh, I wish Doris were here to see that.  She'd begun keeping a little store of quips and anecdotes that would make Doris laugh the next time she saw her.  Doris had an amazing laugh, when it was genuine.  Not the polite titter she saved for city councillors or television interviews.  A real, deep, throaty chuckle that seemed to go on forever.  Blake wondered how many people had been privy to that side of Doris over the years.  Not many, she assumed.  Doris had a wall up between herself and the rest of the world.  And especially between herself and her daughter.

It had been...well, awkward was the only word for it...back in the room.  Such a seemingly innocuous statement.  I don't know anything about you.  Ashlee hadn't meant any malice, she hadn't been trying to hurt her mother, she'd just been stating a fact.  But it had struck Blake in that moment that it was true - Ashlee didn't know Doris.  In fact, she, Blake, knew the Mayor better than her own daughter did.  It was that knowledge that had made her get up without a second glance to her friend.  But she'd looked over at the door just as Doris was leaving and she'd read every syllable of the hurt and rejection in her eyes.  Her heart had clenched in sympathetic pain and she'd suddenly known that she couldn't let her go.  Not like that.

"Doris?" she called as she hurried down the corridor in the direction she thought her friend might have gone.  "Doris?"

No reply was forthcoming, but as she passed the junction of another hallway she spotted a flash of flowery purple out of the corner of her eye.  She snapped her head round, and there was the object of her search, sitting on the floor in a nook where an ice machine rested.  Her knees were drawn up and held against her chest and she was clearly crying and just as clearly trying not to be seen crying.  Blake approached her gingerly.

"Doris?"

Doris looked up, furiously wiping at her eyes.  She attempted a smile.  "Hey Blake," she said, in a parody of casualness.  Blake let her eyes drift from her face to take in her hunched shoulders, her trembling hands, her shapely, attractive calves.

Hang on.  Where had that come from?

She shook her head just a little and dropped down to sit next to her friend.  On an impulse she reached out and linked their arms together and laced her fingers through the Mayor's.  "Hey Doris," she replied sadly.

Doris stiffened, but didn't pull away.  She continued wiping her eyes with her free hand, but it was like trying to bail water out of rowboat with a hole in it.  "Don't you have a deadline to meet?" she asked.  Blake nodded.

"I do," she said.  "But Ashlee can handle it for now, and I wanted to see if you were okay."

"Me?  I'm fantastic.  Just peachy," Doris muttered, earning a rueful smile and a chuckle from the redhead.

"No you're not," she corrected her gently.  "Don't try this with me.  I know you too well."

A dry, humourless laugh was torn from Doris's throat.  "Yeah, I guess you do," she said.  "You probably know me better than anyone, you know that?  We've been friends for a month and you know me better than my own child."

Blake smiled and leaned her head against Doris's shoulder.  "But we're not just friends," she murmured as she tightened her hold on Doris's hand.

Doris's breath caught in her throat.  For a long moment she was silent and her reply, when it came at last, was breathy and tremulous.  "We're not?"

Blake looked up, feeling her heart begin to flutter.  Why had she said that?  She hadn't consciously thought about it.  It had just come out and now Doris was looking at her with a glint of something she didn't recognise in her eyes.  "Well no," Blake whispered, and attempted a smile.  "We're...good friends.  Close friends.  Aren't we?"

Doris looked away, but not quickly enough to hide the flash of disappointment that she quickly damped down under a mask of nonchalance.  "Of course we are," she agreed.

Blake frowned.  There was something vaguely unsatisfactory about what had just passed between them.  She should have been pleased that Doris had agreed with her - she wanted Doris to feel the same way she did, didn't she?  Of course she did.

"Come on," she said firmly, standing up and holding out a hand to lever her friend into a standing position.  "You need to pull yourself together."

Doris sighed as she allowed herself to be pulled to her feet.  "Yeah, I'm a stranger to my daughter, it's not the end of the world, right?"

Blake rested a hand on her friend's shoulder.  "No, it's not," she said gently.  "Because there's still time.  You can still fix this.  You could tell her in month, or a week, hell, you could tell her tomorrow.  There's nothing stopping you."  She tried to inject some confidence into her voice, even though she knew she wasn't quite speaking the truth.  There was something stopping Doris, and it lived in the dark place in the pit of her stomach, the place that whispered to her all the time that she had to maintain the mask and the pretence, because no-one could ever love the real face of her underneath.  "It's not true, you know," Blake murmured.  Doris frowned.

"What isn't?"

Blake swallowed and blinked once, then twice.  "I think," she began slowly.  "That you think people won't like the real you.  That you have to keep up this hard, impenetrable image of yourself that you project to the world.  Well, I've seen the woman underneath, Doris.  I've seen the woman who looks out for her friends, the woman who sings to babies, the woman who brings flowers to my husband's grave.  I've seen you, Doris.  And I like you.  So...don't be scared."  She reached up and wiped away the new tears sliding slowly down her friend's cheeks.  "Don't be scared anymore."

Her fingers slowed and stilled, but remained resting on Doris's cheeks.  They were both breathing a little more heavily than normal.  Blake suddenly remembered the night she'd gone with Doris to Ladies' Night, remembered teasingly asking for a kiss when she got home.  The air had seemed thick between them then.  As thick as it did now.  Something passed between them as their eyes met, something exciting and electric and just a bit little scary.  "Blake..." Doris whispered softly.  Her voice was low and thready and Blake felt it like the first drops of a summer rainstorm.  She shivered and moved ever so slightly forward.

"Yes?"

Her heart thudded against her chest as she waited for Doris to do something or say something to break this sudden tension.  She licked her lips.  Doris's breath hitched and then she closed her eyes and turned away.  The moment was gone.  Blake stepped back, fighting a wave of disappointment.

"I have to get back to Ashlee and Cyrus," she stammered.  Doris nodded without looking at her.

"Right," she said.  "Good...good luck with that."

"Thanks."  Blake reached out for her friend's arm, but dropped her hand when Doris began to move away.  "I'll see you soon, right?" she called out to Doris's retreating back.

"Yup!" Doris replied, waving at her over her shoulder.  Blake tried to smile as she watched her walk away.

What just happened? she thought to herself.  Easy answer - nothing.  Nothing at all.  And yet, somehow...everything.

Without thinking about it she broke into a run, tearing after Doris like her life depended on it.  She found her waiting by the elevator.  "Blake-" the stunned Mayor managed to choke out, but then she found herself wrapped up in the other woman's arms and she forgot how to speak.

Blake clung to her friend, standing on her tiptoes so she could rest her head on her shoulder.  Doris's body was stiff and uncomfortable but she held on, listening to Doris's breath and her own heartbeat.  Eventually her friend began to soften under her touch.  She slumped slightly, and slowly brought her hands up to circle Blake's shoulders.  The redhead let out a sigh of pleasure and relief.  She needed this.  She needed this badly.  To hold and be held, to feel the warmth of another person against her.

But no, not just any other person.  Doris.  Her good, close friend Doris.  She turned her head so she could whisper in her ear.  "If something's important, really important," she murmured.  "Then take a risk.  Otherwise you'll never know.  Do you understand?"

Doris was trembling in her arms.  "Yes," she breathed and Blake shuddered.  "I understand."  She pulled back and managed a weak smile.  "I'll tell her.  I will...I'll tell her."

Blake stepped back as the elevator doors slid open.  "I'll see you soon," she said again as Doris stepped inside.  She stared into watery blue eyes until the doors closed, blocking the Mayor from view.

Slowly, she began to trudge back to the room where she'd left Cyrus and Ashlee.  Take a risk, she'd said to Doris.  Take a risk.

She hadn't meant Ashlee, she realised as she walked.  She'd meant...she'd meant...

"About time!"

Ashlee's voice crashed into her consciousness, knocking the tantalizing end of that thought completely out of her mind.  She flushed.

"Sorry," she mumbled, and recovered her glasses and papers from the bed.  She took a deep breath, trying to focus on the task at hand.

Right now, they had a deadline to meet.

Débutante

Blake smiled at Natalia over the rim of her coffee cup.  "What's with all the cookies?"

Natalia looked up from her mixing bowl where she was preparing yet another batch of peanut butter/chocolate chip.  "I just felt like baking cookies," she replied with a shrug.  Blake glanced around the kitchen at the explosion of baked goods that seemed to have appeared and shrugged.  She wasn't really in the mood to press the issue.

"So things are finally starting to work out for you, huh?" she said, dragging them back to the topic she'd been invited over to discuss.

Well, not so much discuss.  More like 'listen to Natalia rapturously describe'.  She'd already heard all about how wonderful Olivia was, how forgiving, how beautiful.  In fact, she'd heard the sonogram story at least three times and Natalia didn't look like she was about to stop anytime soon.

"Yes," Natalia said, beaming.  "When she walked into that hospital room I..."

Blake drifted off as Natalia began her story yet again.  She could practically recite it along with her now.  Not that she blamed her friend for being giddy.  Olivia had caved in at last and now they were free to start their life and raise their family.  She was happy for her friend, truly, even if hearing about her and Olivia's relationship did remind her of how crushingly alone she was.  And of how much she wanted...something.

"When did you know?" she murmured absently.

Natalia stopped short, her flow cut off.  "Huh?  Know what?"

Blake shrugged and picked a little dirt from under her nails.  She didn't look up.  "When did you know she was more to you than a friend?"

Gradually, Natalia's incessant mixing slowed, then stopped.  Blake still refused to look at her.  "Uhm...it was a gradual thing, I guess," Natalia replied warily.  "I don't think I can say exactly when - maybe we were just talking, or looking after Emma, or making dinner together...it just felt right."

Blake concentrated furiously on her nails.  "And you'd never...you'd never been attracted to a woman before, right?"

Natalia abandoned her cookies and crossed from the counter to the table.  "No," she said.  "Never.  Blake why are you asking me all th-"

Blake's cellphone interrupted the question.  Blake fumbled for it gratefully, happy to have an excuse not to tell Natalia what was going on in her head.  She needed to process it herself for just a little while longer.  And then...well, then she'd talk about it to whoever would listen.

"Hello?" she said into her phone.

"Blake?  It's Daisy."

Blake blinked in surprise.  "Oh, hi Daisy.  Is everything okay?"

"Oh...fine.  Well, you know..."  The girl sounded nervous and hesitant.  "You're friends with Doris Wolfe, right?  I mean, you took her to your place for dinner that time, didn't you?"

Her heart began to beat a little faster at the mention of Doris's name.  "Yes," she said.  "Daisy, what's wrong?"

Daisy let out a little nervous giggle.  "Um...well, she's here  At Company.  And she's...drinking."

Blake was already on her feet and reaching for her jacket before Daisy finished speaking.  "I'll be right there."  Daisy sighed in relief.

"Thanks, Blake.  I didn't know who else to call.  I tried Ashlee but she said she didn't want to see her mom right now."

A shiver of concern slithered down Blake's spine.  That didn't sound good.  "I'll be there before you know it," she said, then added, urgently: "don't let her make a fool of herself, okay?"  Flipping the phone closed, she turned to Natalia with an apologetic smile.  "Sorry," she said.  "I have to go and rescue Doris from the bar at Company."

"Doris?"  Natalia was frowning like someone had just asked her to work out the cube root of two hundred and sixteen in her head.

"Yeah, Doris," Blake replied distractedly as she pulled on her jacket and hunted for her car keys.  "You know - blue eyes, beautiful face, terrible taste in jackets?"  Laying her hands on her keys at last, she leaned over and gave her friend a quick peck on the cheek.  "Congratulations," she murmured.  "I'm really happy for you and Olivia."

With that she was gone.  Natalia stood at the door watching her car disappearing down the drive.  Her mind was busily connecting the dots, but she couldn't quite accept the picture it was creating for her.

Blake and Doris?

The smell of burning cookies dragged her attention back to the real world.  She shook her head.  She was being fanciful.  Ridiculous.

"Just because you've switched teams doesn't mean every woman in the world's going to follow you," she admonished herself.  She returned to her baking, wishing Olivia had taken her up on her invitation to come back to the farmhouse after the sonogram.  Losing herself in an elaborate fantasy involving Olivia, the kitchen table, and some peanut butter - smooth, not chunky -  she let her crazy notions about Blake and Doris slip completely from her mind.

Blake pulled into the parking lot at Company about fifteen minutes after her abrupt exit from the farmhouse.  Doris's car was there.  Good - at least she hadn't attempted to drive drunk.  Locking up the car, she quickly made her way into the restaurant.  Her eyes found Doris the moment she entered, training onto the other woman like a magnet.

Doris was sitting alone at the bar, her shoulders slumped, with a quarter full bottle of Jack Daniels and a shot glass.  "It was full this afternoon," Daisy whispered in her ear.  Blake started and whirled round.

"How could you let her get into this state?" she hissed.  Daisy stepped back, holding up her hands.

"Hey, don't blame me," she said.  "Buzz let her keep the bottle before he went out.  What am I supposed to do?  She's my best friend's mom.  She's the Mayor for God's sake.  I can't just go up there and tell her I'm cutting her off."

Blake sighed and flashed Daisy an apologetic smile.  "No, I guess you can't," she murmured.  Her shoulders straightened.  "But I can."

Daisy judiciously decided to make herself scarce.  Blake was barely aware of her departure as she gingerly made her way to Doris's side.  "I think you've had enough," she said gently, closing her hand over her friend's where it rested on the bar.  Doris shook her head tightly.

"I'm still conscious," she slurred.

Blake slid the bottle away, feeling Doris tense beside her.  "What happened?"

For a long moment Doris's muscles remained tense and taut, but then she seemed to crumple.  She looked small and lost and Blake wanted nothing more in that moment than to ease her pain.  "Blake..." she whispered bleakly and Blake suddenly realised that the other woman was just one word or one touch away from breaking down completely.

"Come with me," she hissed urgently, tugging on her friend's arm.  Doris blinked at her uncomprehendingly, her eyes filled with tears.  Blake's voice hardened slightly.  "You don't want to do this here, Mayor Wolfe."

The reminder of her title and status and where she was finally penetrated Doris's foggy consciousness.  She looked around, blinking hard.  "Oh God," she groaned and nodded, allowing her friend to gently lead her out of the restaurant.  She seemed to sink into herself after that and didn't protest when Blake bundled her into the passenger seat of her car and slid on her seat belt.  Instead she just closed her eyes and turned towards the window as Blake got in and silently drove her home.

Blake shut off the engine and listened to it tick for a long minute, waiting for Doris to react or say something.  For a while she thought the other woman might have fallen asleep, but then the moon emerged from behind a cloud and illuminated the shiny streaks of tears on her friend's cheeks.  "Doris," she gasped, leaning forward and cupping her cheek with a trembling hand.  Doris flinched away from her touch.

"I told her," she wailed.  "I told her and she...she..."

Blake felt tears nipping at her own eyes as Doris slowly fell apart.  "Let's get you inside," she murmured.  Doris nodded slowly.  Blake wrapped her arm round her friend's waist as they walked to her front door.  For once Doris didn't object to being helped.  Indeed, she seemed to need the support badly.  Blake moulded herself to her friend's side as she fumbled with the lock.  "Okay," she whispered when the door finally swung open.  "You're okay, sweetie.  You're okay."

Gently, Blake deposited her friend on the sofa and repaired to the kitchen to make coffee.  Strong coffee.

She needed it as much as Doris did.  She felt a little drunk herself - slow, sluggish, emotional.  She tried to concentrate on the familiar ritual of coffee preparation, but a million worst case scenarios insisted on stampeding through her mind.  Why was Doris in this state?  What had gone on between her and Ashlee?  With a sinking feeling in her gut, Blake finally acknowledged that there was only one thing that could possibly have led to Doris drinking away her pain all day at Company.

She must have told Ashlee.  And Ashlee must have freaked.

She allowed herself to feel disappointed in her young friend for a few moments, and then pushed the feeling away.  She had to concentrate on Doris now.  She needed her.

When she returned to the living room, Doris had drawn herself up onto the couch and was lying in a foetal position, her knees pressed against her chest.  Her shoulders were shaking with the sobs racking her slender, fragile body.  Blake's heart shattered into a million distinct pieces and she abandoned the coffee on a convenient table as she rushed to her friend's side.

"Blake," Doris gasped, allowing herself to be folded up in her friend's arms.

"Sssh."  Blake stroked Doris's hair back from her face.  "Talk to me.  What happened?"

So - haltingly and with many pauses - Doris did.  She told her the whole sorry tale, from her first crush to her attempts to be who everyone wanted her to be to her disastrous affairs.  And then she told her about having Ashlee and how she'd filled in every hole, every empty space, every black pit that had ever existed inside her.  She told her about teaching her to walk and she told her about going to the beach and she told her about the terrible, paralysing fear that had gradually hardened her and embittered her to such a degree that she could barely even stand to look at the beautiful, good young woman her child had become.  She was undeserving, after all.  She had been lying to her for so long that she barely even remembered what truth felt like.

"I wanted to protect her," she murmured through her tears, rocking slightly back and forth in her friend's arms.  "From boys, from the world, from things that would hurt her.  But most of all I wanted to protect her from me."  She spat the last word bitterly into the air.

"Why?" Blake whispered, running her fingers through the other woman's hair and registering on some level that it was full and soft and silky.

"Because I hurt her," Doris all but screamed.  She scrambled away from Blake, pulling a sofa cushion to her chest.  "I'm poison.  I just hurt people over and over.  I don't even know how to...to-"  She trailed off, choking under the weight of fresh sobs.

Blake leaned forward and cupped her face between her palms, ignoring how her friend tensed under her touch and tried to pull away.  "Ashlee loves you," she insisted.  Doris shook her head.

"She has to," she replied bitterly.  "I'm her mother.  She'll love me whether she wants to her not.  She'll love me even though she doesn't like me.  She'll love me even though she's furious with me."  She swallowed hard and looked away.  "No-one's ever loved me because they wanted to," she murmured sadly.

Blake's breath caught in her throat.  Her hand slid through Doris's hair to curl round the back of her head.  "That's not true," she whispered earnestly.  Doris let out a short, bitter laugh.

"No?"

"No."  Blake leaned forward.  "It's not."

Doris realised what was about to happen a split second before it did.  "Blake," she managed to gasp, but then her words were stopped by Blake's lips moving insistently over hers.  For a moment she was frozen, but eventually the warmth and softness of Blake's lips and the strength and surety of her hands made her respond.  She moaned softly into her friend's mouth as she began to kiss her back, slightly sloppily, slightly desperately.

Blake's heart was beating like a drum.  She could hear the blood rushing in her ears, urging her on, pushing her forward.  How long had she been craving this?  She couldn't point to a particular moment.  Just like Natalia had said - it was gradual.  She combed her fingers through Doris's hair as she claimed her lips over and over, barely allowing the other woman to breathe.  All she wanted, all she cared about in that moment, was communicating to her friend that she was not alone.  That she was cared for.  That she was wanted.

That she was loved.

With a gasp Doris tore herself away from Blake's mouth, pushing hard against her shoulders when she tried to lean in again.  Blake blinked past a haze of arousal and need, taking in the fresh tears and the pain in her friend's eyes.  "What..." she mumbled, trying very hard to remember how to form words.  "Doris?  Don't you...don't you want..."

"Of course I want!" Doris exclaimed, then squeezed her eyes closed.  "I can't.  I can't, Blake."  She began to sob again.  "Oh God, why did you do that?"

"I'm sorry."  Blake scrambled to catch up with what was going on.  "I thought it would make you feel better."  She pulled back a little, seeming to shrink.  "I thought...I thought you wanted me."  Her words just made Doris cry all the harder.

"Maybe you," she managed to grind out after long moments of bitter tears and gasping breaths, "have so many friends that you can risk throwing one away.  But I don't.  I don't."

Blake leaned forward, reaching for her friend.  "Doris," she whispered, but the Mayor held up her arms to prevent her from touching her.

"I already took one risk today, Blake," she said.  "It didn't work out so well."  She covered her face with her hands and when she spoke again her voice was low and broken.  "Can you go please?"

"I don't think I should leave you alone," Blake began, but trailed off when she saw the shaking of her friend's head.

"Please," Doris whispered.  "Go."  She turned away, facing the back of the couch and showing Blake her back.  The redhead's hand flew to her mouth as tears began to nip at her eyes.

"I'm sorry," she murmured. "I...I didn't mean to hurt you."

Doris made no reply.  With a shudder, Blake raised herself up to a standing position.  She stood over Doris for a moment, fighting the urge to turn her around and kiss her again until all her fears and pain were blocked out or erased.

But it didn't work like that.  This wasn't a fairy tale, and a kiss wasn't going to make everything better.

But she knew something that would.

"I'll be back," she promised, trying to pour as much love and affection into her voice as she could.  She grabbed a blanket from the back of the couch and wrapped it tenderly round the Mayor's shoulders.  Her hands were gentle, and Doris leaned into her touch involuntarily.  A surge of hope rose up in Blake's chest.  Maybe she could fix this.

Her jaw set into a hard line as she stepped out into the night and headed towards her car.  She knew what she had to do; who she needed to see.  She was a woman on a mission, and God help Ashlee Wolfe when she found her.

A New Beginning

Springfield was a quiet town at the best of times but at ten on a Friday night it was deader than usual.  The people who'd gone out were still in the bars and restaurants; the people who'd stayed in were firmly ensconced in their homes.  Blake passed exactly two other cars on her way to Ashlee's apartment.  The short journey did nothing to ease her throbbing headache.  It had started soon after she'd left Doris's house as a twinge behind her eyes, but it had evolved.  It really wasn't fair - Doris was the one who'd had a skinful, but Blake appeared to be the one suffering for it.

Not that Doris wasn't suffering too.  Blake felt her stomach clench as she remembered how utterly lost and wretched her friend had been when she'd left her.  And it did a tiny experimental back flip when she remembered how she'd tried to comfort her.  Her lips still tingled with the memory of their kiss.  It had been wonderful, perfect - until Doris had pushed her away.  But she'd kissed her back, if only briefly.  Blake clung to that like a limpet.  Doris had kissed her back.

She hadn't thought much about what those few, precious moments meant.  In fact, she had made a conscious decision not to think about it.  She wasn't interested in examining her motivations.  She knew everything she needed to know about those - she'd kissed Doris because she wanted to.  Because the other woman had, subtly and gradually, got completely under her skin.  Because she liked her, and because she was beautiful, and because she made her feel good.  She'd decided she didn't need to think any further than that at this stage.  She didn't want to think about what any of it meant.  Her immediate goals were simple.  One - convince Ashlee to talk to her mother.  Two - convince Doris that more kissing was a good idea.  A very good idea.

"Right," she murmured to herself as she strode up to Ashlee's door.  "First thing's first."  The light was on, so Blake persisted in knocking, despite a noticeable lack of response.  Finally, after about two solid minutes of knocking, the door flew open.

"Mom, I don't wanna talk to you!" Ashlee snapped, then stood back, chastened when she saw who was actually on her doorstep.  "Oh," she muttered.  "Uh...sorry, Blake."  She stood slightly to the side, allowing the redhead to breeze past her into the apartment.  "What's up?  Is something wrong with the book?"

Blake blinked.  She'd barely thought about the book for hours.  Doris had pushed it from her mind like a cuckoo superseding a young fledgeling.  "No, this is nothing to do with the book."  She took a breath.  "It's about your mom."

Ashlee's spine stiffened.  "What about her?"

Blake looked around the room instead of answering.  "Nice place," she commented blandly.  "Can I sit down?"

"Yeah," Ashlee replied warily.  "What do you mean, it's about my mom?"  She took a step forward, a sudden sense of urgency infusing her.  "Is something wrong with her?"

Blake almost laughed.  "Well...yeah," she said, a tiny bit of incredulity creeping into her tone.  "She's a mess, Ashlee."

Ashlee flushed.  "How would you know?" she snapped.  "Do you even know my mother?"

"Doris is my best friend," Blake replied without hesitation, and only then did she realise that it was true.  Somehow over the last month the Mayor had become her confidante, her comfort, her first thought in the morning and her last at night.  In fact, given the kiss they'd just shared and her hopes to repeat the performance in the future, best friend didn't really seem to cover it.

Ashlee's mouth opened and closed like a fish out of water for a long minute before she finally managed to sputter: "she's your what?"  Blake sat up a little straighter and set her jaw.

"My best friend," she repeated proudly.  To her surprise, Ashlee began to laugh - a long, bitter, humourless laugh.

"Well, congratulations.  You probably know my mom better than I do."  She slumped down into a chair and covered her face with her hands.

Blake frowned.  She'd been ready to be angry with Ashlee.  She'd been ready to yell at her and rail against her for hurting Doris so deeply.  But her old gossip's instincts were tapping on the inside of her head again, telling her there was something else to this.

The tapping wasn't helping her headache.

"Ashlee," she said softly.  "What happened between you two?"

Ashlee peeked out from between her fingers.  Blake almost smiled - her eyes were absolutely identical to Doris's.  So deep and clear and blue.  Gorgeous, really.  The kind of eyes Blake could happily get lost in.

"My mom's gay," Ashlee blurted suddenly, jerking Blake out of her reverie.  Ashlee continued before she had a chance to react, which was lucky because she wasn't quite sure what reaction would be best.  The news wasn't exactly a surprise to her after all, but she doubted Ashlee would be happy to know that someone else had known her mother's secret before she did.  "She kept it from me my entire life, can you believe that?  What the hell kind of secret is that to keep from your own kid?"

Blake's eyes narrowed.  "This isn't about her being gay at all, is it?"  Suddenly she felt like the playing field had shifted somewhat - Doris's drunken explanation had convinced her that Ashlee was upset about the whole concept of Doris being a lesbian.

"Of course not!" Ashlee exclaimed.  "I don't care about stuff like that.  She could have told me anytime, it wouldn't have mattered."  She leaned forward, pointing a finger wildly in the air at nothing.  "That's the point!  She could have told me and she didn't!  She kept it a secret!  Just like Rafe's mom."

Blake did a double take at the mention of Natalia and her son.  "Natalia didn't keep anything a secret from Rafe," she said, feeling the need to defend her friend against the implicit accusation.  "She was building up to it."  She shook her head.  "It was a big deal for her.  She wanted to wait for the right time."

"Like Doris?" Ashlee snapped.  Blake felt the temper she'd come in with flare up a little.

"What was she supposed to do, get a rainbow flag tattooed on her ass and go marching in a Pride Parade?" she retorted.  "Natalia had barely figured the whole thing out herself."  Her nostrils flared.  "Did Rafe ever tell you how he reacted to that bit of news about his mom?"

"He was upset," Ashlee began, but Blake cut her off with a hollow laugh.

"Upset?" she repeated incredulously.  "Yeah, and the rest."  She set her jaw.  "After all the heartache and worry and pain he put her through...after all the mistakes he's made...you know what your friend Rafe told his mom when he found out that she was in love with a woman?"  Blake leaned forward and her voice lowered.  "He told her she was going to hell."  She let that sink in for a moment, watching shock and hints of disgust spread across Ashlee's face.  She'd had a similar reaction herself when Natalia told her about it.  "People like Rafe Rivera are the reason people like your mom are still living in the shadows," she said at last.  "So...just take whatever he says with several great big honkin' grains of salt, okay?"

Ashlee's face crumpled as she threw herself back against the chair.  "But I'm not like that," she insisted.  "I wouldn't have judged her.  I just want her to be happy."

Blake's expression softened.  The last remnants of her anger melted away like wax as she reached out and clasped the blonde's knee.  "I think she knows that, deep down," she said quietly.  "If she didn't she wouldn't have told you, would she?  She trusted you today."  Ashlee shook her head.

"Is that supposed to make up for everything?" she whispered bleakly.  "You have no idea what it's like to be her child.  She wouldn't let me have friends.  She wouldn't let me date.  She tried to destroy anyone who got close to me.  Did you know she had my guidance counsellor arrested?  She trumped up some charges and ruined his life.  Just because he was nice to me."  She trailed off as tears began to track down her cheeks.  "She's always pulled me close with one hand and pushed me away with the other.  I always thought it was my fault, but it's not.  It's her.  She just didn't know how to be herself with me.  It's...it's..."

"Sad," Blake finished for her.

"Sad, exactly," Ashlee replied.  "She says she loves me.  She says I'm everything to her.  If that's true then why couldn't she come to me with this?"

"Because her life choices affect you," Blake said, feeling a slight sense of deja vu.  "Sometimes the last person you can go to with the big stuff is the person you love the most."  She squeezed her hand down on Ashlee's knee.  "And I promise you, she loves you.  She loves you so much."  Ashlee nodded.

"I love her too," she murmured, and Blake couldn't suppress a smile.

"Don't let this come between you," she urged.  "You've both got such a great chance here.  You can start again.  Have a new beginning."  Ashlee looked up at her and attempted a watery smile.

"You think so?"  Blake nodded.

"I know so," she said firmly.  "Because I know Doris and I know you.  And you can work this out."  Her smile widened.  "You know one of the first things Doris ever told me was that she's trying to be a better person," she said.  "And she is trying, Ashlee.  She's trying so hard.  Help her.  If anyone can, it's you."

Ashlee's eyes fluttered closed.  "Okay," she murmured.  She looked tired all of a sudden.  The fight seemed to have drained out of her.  "Tomorrow.  I'll...I'll see her tomorrow."

Blake nodded once and stood.  She'd got what she came for.  "Thank you, Ashlee."  She made as if to head to the door, but Ashlee pulled her up short.

"You really care about my mom, don't you?" she asked.  Blake stopped just by the door.  She didn't look back.

"Yes," she murmured softly, her heart thudding in her ears.  "I care about her...very much.  Very much."  She chanced a look over her shoulder and saw a question rise up in Ashlee's steady blue gaze before it was dismissed with a brief shake of the head.

"That's good," Ashlee said finally.  "I don't ever remember her having a friend.  It's...it's kinda nice.  That she has someone to stick up for her."

Blake nodded firmly.  "I'm trying to be a better person myself," she admitted.  "And I can honestly say that your mother's friendship is the best thing to happen to me in years."

Ashlee's lips twitched.  "I think this'll take some getting used to," she said with a gentle laugh.  "Doris with friends.  Wow."

For an instant it was on the tip of Blake's tongue to say I want to be more than her friend.  But she swallowed the words.  It wouldn't be fair to Doris.  If anything was going to happen between them - and oh how she hoped it was - Doris deserved the chance to tell her daughter herself.  "Goodnight, Ashlee," she said instead.

She sat in her car for several long minutes after she left the apartment, just thinking.  The conversation hadn't gone the way she'd expected.  But it seemed to have come to a satisfactory conclusion.  She considered going back to Doris's house to tell her that.

But no...Doris had asked her to leave, and she would respect that.

For now.

The next time she saw her though...all bets were off.  She'd be pursuing the second part of her plan.  With a vengeance.

Stepping Up To Bat

Doris and Blake's eyes met for the first time since The Kiss (Blake had taken to mentally capitalising it) in Natalia's bedroom over a heavy cardboard box.  "That doesn't look light," Doris said after a brief moment of frozen hesitation.  Blake rolled her eyes.

"It's not," she admitted, dumping it on the floor with a thud.  "God knows what she's got in there."  Wincing, she rubbed the aching muscles of her upper arms.  Doris swallowed hard.

"What happened to those professional movers Olivia hired?"

Blake barked out a laugh as she slumped down on Natalia's bed.  "They offered Olivia a discount if they could just dump the boxes outside for her to deal with herself," she said.  "She didn't get rich by wasting money you know."  Patting the space beside her, Blake looked up at Doris with half-lidded eyes.  "You wanna play a little hooky with me?"

Doris took a single step forward, then stopped.  "Maybe that's not such a good idea," she hedged, biting her lip.  Blake just shook her head and reached forward to grab her friend's hand.

"Just get over here," she ordered, pulling Doris gently.  Doris allowed herself to be tugged forward with a tiny, experimental smile.

"I wanted to thank you," she said after a moment or two of slightly awkward silence.  "For...for making sure I got home last night.  And for stopping me from making a fool of myself at Company."

"That's what friends are for," Blake replied softly.  She edged ever so slightly closer to Doris, feeling the warmth from her bare arm soaking into her skin.  Doris smiled tremulously, but didn't meet her eyes.

"Okay friend," she murmured.  The happy glow that had been radiating from her seemed to slip just a little.  Blake reached for her hand.

"We're not just friends."

Doris shrugged.  "I know," she said.  "We're good, close friends."

"Best friends," Blake added.  Doris's head whirled round.

"Really?"  Her surprise was both endearing and heartbreaking.  Blake smiled.

"Oh, Doris...of course we are."  She squeezed her hand.  "I know we haven't been friends very long but...it feels right, doesn't it?"

Doris looked away.  "Does it?  I don't think I'm the kind of person you'd normally be...friends...with."  Her discomfort was palpable.  Blake ached to ease it, but wasn't sure how much would be too much.  She didn't want the Mayor to push her away like she had after The Kiss, after all.

"You're the kind of person I want to be...friends...with now," she said eventually, then rolled her eyes at her own uncharacteristic reticence.  "Oh for God's sake, why are we pussyfooting around this?  I kissed you."  She leaned forward.  "And you kissed me back."

Doris flinched.  "I know."  She looked down at the floor.  "Please, don't feel you have to say anything."  She paused for a moment, her eyes fluttering closed.  "I don't want to lose you, Blake," she admitted.  "I've never had a friend like you."  She took a deep breath.  "So can we just...pretend it never happened?"  She looked up, expecting to see relief flitting across her friend's face.  Instead there was nothing but affection and a gentle amusement.

"I don't think so," Blake murmured.  "You know why?"  Doris shook her head dumbly and Blake smiled.  "Because I'm not sorry I kissed you," she said steadily.  "I really liked kissing you.  I want to kiss you again."

"Oh..."  The air left Doris's lungs in a rush.  "You...you do?"

Blake nodded and edged a tiny bit closer.  "And you know, I know what you said about risks," she said.  "But...I think the last risk you took actually turned out pretty good, right?"  She reached up and trailed her fingers through Doris's hair, pushing a stray strand behind her ear.  "I think this is worth taking a chance on."

Doris didn't speak.  For a long minute she didn't even move.  "Blake," she began at last, but then Olivia's voice shattered the moment.

"Hey, slackers!" she yelled from the foot of the stairs.  Her clear, happy tones drifted into the bedroom and seemed to physically push the two women apart.  "Come on down.  Frank took the last box so you don't have to hide anymore."

Doris leapt quickly to her feet.  "We'd better go," she said, with forced cheer.  Blake sighed.

"Okay," she agreed, trailing after Doris as she escaped into the hallway.  "But we're gonna talk about this later, okay?"

But that talk was destined to be delayed.  Natalia wanted to cook dinner - and Blake never said no to a free meal - but before that all the helpers, along with various passers-by, got roped into a softball match.  The group was divided into two teams, and Blake and Doris found themselves at opposite ends of the friendly rivalry.

"Come on Doris!  Give it a good whack!"

Blake grinned as Doris glanced towards her, making her completely miss the ball.  "Strike one!"

Doris glared at her.  "Ms Marler, please try to remember that you and I are not batting for the same team."

Blake's grin widened.  "I actually don't care which team I bat for, Mayor Wolfe," she replied, and laughed when Doris missed her shot again.

"Strike two!"

Doris set her jaw.  "I'm ignoring you," she ground out.  Blake wisely stayed quiet for the next pitch, and Doris managed to get the bat to it this time.  It wasn't a great strike though, and she only managed to get as far as first base.  Which was, co-incidentally, where Blake was stationed.

"Well, well, who'd have thought I'd get to first base with the beautiful and mysterious Mayor Doris Wolfe," Blake whispered, for Doris's ears only.  "I mean...again."

Doris flushed.  "Stop it," she scolded.  And then...shyly, and even more quietly, she added:  "Beautiful?"

Blake smiled.  "So, so beautiful," she said softly.  Doris turned to her, opening her mouth to speak.

"Oh, nice one Ashlee!" Rafe called out.  Doris turned just in time to see her daughter throwing the bat aside and barrelling towards her.  Shooting Blake an apologetic glance, she turned on her heel and ran for second base.

The game progressed through the hottest hours of mid afternoon, with all the participants getting sweatier and sweatier, and happier and happier.  Especially Doris, who was being bombarded with compliments every time she spent longer than ten seconds at first base.  Beautiful had evolved into sexy, and to that had been added intelligent, funny, caring and loyal.  By the time dinner time rolled around she was practically giddy, and accepted Blake's offer of her arm as they wandered into the house to eat the roast chicken and salad Natalia had painstakingly prepared.

"Come for a walk with me after we eat," Blake whispered into her ear as they sat down.  Doris could only nod dumbly, and dinner progressed in a daze, with nothing penetrating the fog of nervous but happy anticipation but Blake's twinkling green eyes and thousand watt smile.

"So," Blake said, when they were finally alone and walking aimlessly towards the pond.  "How does it feel now you've told Ashlee?"  She grabbed her friend's hand as they walked, twining their fingers gently together.  Doris took a deep breath.

"It's like..." she began, then trailed off, searching for the words.  "It's like all my life I've had this big rubber band wrapped round my chest," she whispered at last.  "And I didn't even notice it was there until it was suddenly just...gone."  She closed her eyes, thinking back to the moment she'd felt it disappear - when Ashlee had come to her office that morning and she'd known, at last, that everything would be all right.

"I'm so happy for you," Blake said, squeezing her hand.  They reached the edge of the pond and stopped.  Doris stared out at a family of ducks gliding across the smooth surface of the water.  "And I'm so, so proud of you."

Doris blushed.  "I should have done it years ago," she muttered.  Blake waved that off with a sweep of her free hand.

"You did it now," she said.  "That's what's important.  Don't beat yourself up over things that are in the past."

A gentle breeze rose up, hissing through the trees and creating tiny ripples in the pond.  Doris took a deep, slow breath.  "What did you mean when you said you don't mind what team you bat for?" she asked.  Her tone was deceptively casual, but Blake could feel her tense up beside her.  She smiled as she turned to face her and slipped her arms around her waist.

"Just that I am...letting myself become whoever I'm going to be next."  She smiled up at the woman who'd come to mean so much to her in such a short time, and couldn't help but melt at the shy, hopeful look on her face.

"And who do you think that is?" she asked gently.  Her hands came up hesitantly, curving round Blake's elbows and pulling her ever so slightly closer.  Blake's answer was simple.

"Yours," she said.  Doris's breath caught in her throat.  Blake leaned forward, and her next words were whispered up against her friend's lips.  "I want to be yours."

This kiss was gentler than their first.  A little hesitant, a little reserved, but sweet and slow and heartbreakingly gentle.  Blake melted into Doris's arms as it went on and on.  Their bodies moulded together, curves matching with curves as perfectly as if they'd been made for each other.  And the kiss continued to deepen, to explore, and to affirm.

"Oh, Blake," Doris breathed, and Blake took the opportunity to strengthen the connection with her lips and her tongue and her hands which were tangled up in Doris's hair and curled round the back of her head, holding her in position while she took possession of her mouth.

When the kiss broke both women were breathless and grinning.  Their foreheads bumped together and then their lips sought each other out seemingly of their own accord to start the dance again.

"What's happening to us?" Doris murmured blearily long minutes later.  Her hooded gaze was slightly glazed over, her lips swollen with kisses.  Blake laughed, her eyes shining with happiness and excitement.

"Oh sweetie, don't you know?"  Glee bubbled up from the pit of her stomach, flowing into her chest and making her heart sing.  "We're falling in love."

Doris froze.  And then, slowly and gently, like the first thaw of Spring after a long, bitter winter, she began to smile.  Tears sprang to her eyes.  "We are?" she whispered in wonder.  Blake nodded.

"We are."

She barely had a moment to brace herself before her arms were full of Doris.  With a happy sigh, she snuggled against her friend's chest, listening to the thunder of her heartbeat beneath her ear.  For long, silent moments they simply stood together, content to say nothing and do nothing but revel in the sheer joy of having found something so rare, so precious, so wonderful.

"We'll take it slow," Doris murmured at last, pressing a soft kiss to the crown of Blake's head.  Blake nodded.

"All right," she replied.  Her own lips found the soft skin of Doris's neck unerringly.  She felt the flutter of the Mayor's pulse jump under her kiss and grinned.  Just not too slow, she thought to herself.

After all, they weren't Olivia and Natalia.  And a glacial pace would not be their style at all.

Stargazing

"Goddammit!" Doris cursed, throwing yet another blouse onto an ever increasing pile on her bed.  She glanced at the clock.  6.50pm.  Shit, shit, shit.

Doris Wolfe didn't go on dates.  She had sex - good sex, often, but she didn't go on dates.  She didn't agonise over what to wear for an hour before going on the prowl.  She didn't worry about how much make up was too much or too little.  She didn't think about what underwear to wear - because she always knew where her little outings were headed.

She wasn't sure where tonight was headed.

"Get it together, Wolfe," she muttered to herself, pulling out yet another blouse.  After brief consideration, that one ended up on the bed too.  With a deep sigh, she flopped down onto the bed herself.  Surrounded by a rainbow of discarded clothes, she thought back to how she'd arrived at this rather depressing state.

"So...what happens next?" she murmured, dropping another kiss onto the top of Blake's head.  Blake smiled.

"What happens is that I pick you up on Sunday night at seven.  Wear something nice."

Doris tried to look offended.  "I always wear nice things," she said.  A low chuckle was the response.

"Like that red and black and white jacket you were wearing everywhere for a while?"  Doris raised one eyebrow.

"I like that jacket," she said.  "What's wrong with it?"

"Nothing, you just look like someone from Knots Landing when you wear it."

Doris flushed.  "Oh," she murmured, and Blake chuckled.

"Can we burn it?"

Needless to say, her formerly favourite jacket had definitely not been a contender for her first date with Blake.

She looked at the clock again.  6.55pm.  Throwing caution to the wind, she lunged for her cellphone and pressed the first speed dial.  "Ashlee," she said in a rush as soon as her daughter answered.  "I need your help, sweetie - I have a date in like five minutes and I have no idea what to wear."

A moment of stunned silence greeted her verbal flood.  "Uhm..." Ashlee said at last.  "I like that powder blue blouse?  With the white linen pants..."

Doris quickly pressed the speakerphone button on her cellphone and dived for her closet.  "Let me see if I can find them..." she muttered, digging through layers of clothes.  "Yes!  Ashlee, you are brilliant."  She discarded the skirt she'd been planning to wear and quickly threw on the outfit her daughter had recommended.  "Wait!  What about shoes?"

"The white strappy sandals," Ashlee replied instantly.  Her voice was tinny and far away.  "Mom, who are you go-"

The doorbell drowned out the rest of her question.  Doris jumped and squealed slightly.  "Gotta go!"  She grabbed the phone.  "See you at the wedding!"

Doris slowed to walking pace when she got to the hall, consciously controlling the rate of her breathing.  She could see the outline of Blake's upper body through the frosted glass of the door.  Her heart began to hammer.

"Calm down," she muttered to herself, taking a moment to check her hair and make-up in the mirror.  "It's Blake.  Your friend."  She swallowed.  "Your straight friend.  Who wants to date you."

Her reflection's eyes widened.

"Oh God, I am so screwed."

The doorbell rang again, shattering her reverie.  Before she lost her nerve completely, she stepped towards the door and opened it.

"Hi," Blake said shyly.  Doris looked her up and down, swallowing hard.  She was wearing low cut jeans and a green shirt exactly the colour of her eyes.

"Oh," Doris breathed.  "Blake, you're..."  She finally managed to meet her eyes.  "Beautiful," she said at last.  "You're beautiful."

A slow, happy smile spread across Blake's face.  "You're pretty damn special yourself," she said as she stepped forward into Doris's personal space.  "You look amazing."

Doris licked her lips and swallowed.  "I had help," she admitted.  "You should see the pile of clothes on my bed."  She smiled wryly.  "Ashlee gave me some advice."

Blake stood on her tiptoes and pressed a soft, sweet kiss onto her date's lips.  "Good for you," she said firmly.  Doris frowned.

"What did I do?"

Blake smiled.  "You got your daughter's advice about a date," she said.  "At least...you did tell her it was a date, right?"

Doris nodded.  "Yeah," she said, then her eyes widened.  "Oh shit, I told my daughter I was going on a date!"

A low laugh bubbled up in Blake's throat.  She slid her hand down Doris's arm and tangled their fingers together.  "Come on," she said, dragging Doris out the door.  "And for the record?" she added, throwing a grin over her shoulder.  "I think every outfit I've ever owned is lying on my bed right about now."

It took Doris a few minutes to realise where they were headed.  Truthfully, she'd been a little bit worried about where Blake might choose to take her.  She wasn't sure yet exactly how out she wanted to be - or, indeed, how out it would be prudent to be.  Springfield was a very small town.  A very small, mostly conservative town.

Still...she'd been pleasantly surprised by the show of support Olivia and Natalia had received since they'd got back together.  They'd been building themselves up, getting ready for a backlash that just...never came.  Anyone who hadn't already assumed they'd been together for months didn't seem to care.  And now that her own secret was partially out, she'd begun to be hungry for more.

Being out if the closet was freeing in a way she'd never imagined it could be.  For the first time in her life she had friends.  She had a social life.  She had a clear conscience when she talked to her daughter.  And she had a date.

That was the crux of it.  She had a date.  A date with a devastatingly beautiful woman who said she was falling in love with her.

Doris, of course, was not falling in love with Blake.

She was already there.

She'd been there for some time.

"A picnic?" Doris said softly when they drew up outside the park.  Blake turned off the ignition.

"Yup," she replied with a smile.  "I...well, I wasn't sure if you'd want to go out out.  I mean...I don't know how much you want people to know about..."  She trailed off, then shook her head.  "I wanted you all to myself anyway," she said at last.  Doris smiled.  "Come on," Blake said.  "I've got a few things set up on the sand down by the lake."

Doris followed her silently, keeping Blake's hand clasped gently in hers.  In her mind, she weighed up the two sides of her that were fighting for dominance.  On the one hand, she was immensely relieved that she didn't have to think about the issue of coming out to the town at large for a little while longer.  On the other, she was a little...disappointed.  It would have been nice to have had the issue taken completely out of her hands.

But Blake would never do that to her, she realised.  She wouldn't force her into doing something she wasn't ready for, and she wouldn't try to make her feel guilty if she hesitated for a little while.

Not for too long, of course.  Doris wasn't stupid enough to believe that Blake would put up with a hidden life for long.  She'd need to be out in the open.  She wouldn't accept being a secret.

Doris was surprised by the exhilaration that flooded through her at the thought.  She tightened her hold on Blake's hand.  She loved this woman.  And yes, okay, it was a brand new love, still in its original packaging.  But she didn't want to give it up.  Not for fear - not for anything.

"So, what do you think?"  Blake smiled up at Doris as she swept her arm out, indicating the blanket and picnic basket spread out on the beach.  There were some candles buried in the sand, poking their heads out and waiting to be lit.

"It's lovely," Doris replied, and pulled Blake close to her for a kiss.  "But not as lovely as you."

Blake flushed.  "Well..." she murmured, then coughed.  "Thanks.  I'm...I'm glad you think so."

The atmosphere began to thicken, but before it became uncomfortable Blake turned away and busied herself lighting the candles and setting up the picnic.  Doris sat gracefully down on the blanket and sighed gently when Blake settled in against her side.

"Here, I brought cheetos," Blake said, tossing the snack into Doris's lap.  Doris blinked once, then twice, then burst into laughter.

"Cheetos?"

Blake smiled.  "God I love your laugh," she said breathlessly.  "It's like...winning the goddamn jackpot in Vegas."

Doris immediately stopped laughing and flushed.  "Hmm," she coughed.  Blake covered her hands with her own.

"Olivia said your taste in food was pretty simple," she explained.  "I want to give you the best of everything...but I don't want to be pretentious.  How I feel about you..."  She stroked Doris's fingers gently.  "It's honest.  It's real.  I don't want to get caught up in glamour.  I just...want to be with you.  Whatever we do."  She trailed off and shrugged, suddenly self-conscious.

If Doris hadn't known for sure it was impossible, she'd have thought her heart actually skipped a beat.  "I want to be with you too," she murmured.

A slow smile lit up Blake's face.  "All right then," she said, grabbing a bag of cheetos for herself.

Early evening turned into twilight as they sat together companionably; sometimes talking, sometimes not.  Doris had expected it to be a little bit awkward, but it wasn't.  It was natural, and comfortable, and hardly scary at all.  It felt like a completely inevitable extension of everything they'd been through over the last month - the edgy, adversarial beginning, the gradually developing friendship, the slow burning attraction simmering just beneath the surface.  All of it had led them to this moment together: curled up on a blanket beneath a darkening sky.

"Oh, the stars are coming out," Blake sighed, leaning her head on Doris's shoulder.  Doris wrapped an arm round her waist and dropped a kiss onto the top of her head.  They watched quietly as the light faded and more and more tiny fairy lights began to pierce the inky blackness of the sky.  Blake stared upwards, finding familiar points of light like landmarks on a map.  "I've always loved stargazing," she murmured.  Doris tightened her hold on Blake's waist.

"I wouldn't have pegged you as an astronomer," she said softly.  Blake chuckled.

"Oh, I'm a total amateur," she said.  "I know a few things, but mostly I just like to look."  She tilted her head up and gazed at Doris's profile.  "Don't you like the stars?"

Doris smiled.  "They're very pretty," she said indulgently.  Blake leaned up for a quick kiss.

"They are," she said.  "But it's more than that."  She turned her attention to the sky and, after a moment's hesitation, pointed up at the brightest star in the constellation Orion.  "You see that one?  That's Rigel.  It's about...uhm...eight hundred light years away."

"Okay," Doris murmured, frowning.

Blake continued as if she hadn't spoken.  "That means the light you're seeing shining out of that star right now actually left it eight hundred years ago," she said.  She swept out her hand to encompass the whole of the night sky.  "Every time you look at the stars you're looking into the past."

Doris stared at her, taking in the slightly sad expression on her face, and the faraway look in her eyes.  "And that's attractive to you, I suppose," she said gently.  Blake nodded.

"I feel..." she murmured.  "I feel like I've spent whole years of my life looking back...wishing for things that I can't ever have.  And ignoring all the wonderful things I can have, right in front of me."  She sighed and pressed herself more firmly against Doris's side.  "I don't want to look to the past anymore.  I want the future."  She swallowed and her eyes flickered closed.  When she spoke again it was in a gentle whisper.  "I want a future with you."

Doris blinked hard against sudden tears.  "I-"  Her voice cracked, and she was forced to cough to clear her throat.  "Blake," she tried again.  "Do you want to come to Billy and Vanessa's wedding with me?  I mean...as my date?"

For a long moment Blake didn't answer.  Doris held her breath.

"Yes," Blake breathed at last, and leaned up to kiss the other woman hungrily.  "I would love to go with you.  Thank you."

Doris wrapped her arms round the redhead and pulled her close.  She should have been scared.  She should have been out of her mind with worry.  What would people say?  Would anyone ever vote for her again?  Would Ashlee be okay with it?

But she didn't care about any of that.  For now, she was happy.  For now she was content to sit on the beach, wrapped around the woman she loved, bathed in star light.  Thinking about the future.

And, for the first time in years, she allowed herself to entertain the belief that her future might be...bright.

Out At The Wedding

Loitering was considered a misdemeanour charge in Springfield Township, punishable by a small fine and a little slap on the wrists from a judge.  No-one was likely to punish this particular offender, however, given that she was, in fact, the Mayor.

"Oh God," Doris mumbled as she paced for the tenth time past the double doors leading to the hall where all the other wedding guests were assembled.  Occasionally someone would go in or out, allowing the sound of happy chatter and clinking glassware to leak out into the street where the flustered Mayor and her worried companion lingered.

"Doris," Blake said for what felt like the millionth time, reaching out to grasp her hand.  Doris was tense - unutterably tense - but she didn't pull away.  Blake smiled a little sadly.  "Do you want to go in separately?" she asked, with a tinge of disappointment lacing her tone.  Doris turned to her with a stricken expression.

"No!" she insisted, tugging on Blake's hand and pulling her a little closer.  "No," she repeated, a little more softly.  She brought her other hand up to caress Blake's cheek, and smiled when the other woman leaned into the touch.

"You just seem a little..."

"Terrified?"

The two women broke into nervous laughter, but Doris's face soon turned serious again.  "I am," she said.  "I'm scared.  This," she gestured to the door and the gathered townspeople beyond it, "is scary."

Blake took one step closer.  "What about this," she said softly, drawing Doris's hand up to rest over her heart.  "Is this scary too?"

Doris swallowed hard.  Yes, she wanted to say.  But then again, no would be equally true.  What was happening between them was, in many ways, the scariest thing that had ever happened to her.  And yet, when she allowed herself to get lost in the shining green of Blake's eyes, she realised that she had never felt so safe, or so sure.  "I'm not afraid of this," she said firmly, and was rewarded by a shy smile.  "I'm just...not used to telling the truth."

"Well, you are a politician," Blake quipped.

"Oh ha ha," Doris deadpanned.  She pressed her fingers more firmly against Blake's chest for a brief moment before reaching up and curling them round the back of her neck, threading into a few loose strands of hair that were whisping down from the bun.  "I'm not afraid of being with you," she said, softly but firmly.  "It's...everything else.  But this...you and me?...this is what I want, Blake.  I promise."

Blake smiled and took another step forward, moulding their curves together and tilting her head up for a kiss.  "It's what I want too," she murmured, and Doris could do nothing but lean down and accept the invitation of her lips.

It was a brief kiss, neither explosive nor incendiary, but it was a step of gargantuan proportions.  "All right," Doris said when it broke.  "I'm ready.  Let's do this thing."

Blake grinned and linked hands with her date.  "Okay," she said.  "Ashlee and Emma and Mr-I-shot-the-DA-and-screw-up-constantly-but-my-mom's-going-to-hell-for-falling-in-love are just inside the door.  Is that okay?"

Doris took a deep breath and squared her shoulders.  "Okay."  She squeezed Blake's hand.  "Let's go."

Ashlee was busy playing with Emma when they entered and it took a few moments for her to notice them.  "Hey mom," she said when Doris called her name at last, turning to face her with a smile.  "Wow, that's a great dress, I like it a lot."

"Thank you sweetie," Doris replied, and then seemed to stall slightly.  Blake looked between Doris and her daughter for a few awkward seconds before taking matters into her own hands.

"I like your dress, Ashlee," she said, drawing the girl's attention.

"Oh, thanks Blake - you too."

Blake waited for seven seconds - she counted - before Ashlee's gaze travelled down.  Blue eyes bulged.

"I'm going to get a drink," Blake said, sending that the moment had come for her to leave mother and daughter alone.  She ran her hand down Doris's bare arm, and smiled when she saw a trail of goose flesh erupt in the wake of her fingers.  "Do you want anything Doris?"

Blake squeezed her date's hand one last time when she demurred, and headed over to the bar.  Olivia and Natalia were there already so she smiled and greeted them warmly.  When she looked over her shoulder again she was heartened by the sight of Ashlee embracing her mother while Rafe looked away with a gentle flush on his cheeks.

But then she found Ashlee's eyes and was surprised by the look of...open hostility with which she was met.  Her jaw dropped slightly.

What the hell was that about?

"What's wrong?" Doris asked her when she arrived, reaching out and taking her hand.  Blake shook herself.

"Nothing," she replied, and forced herself to smile.  "Nothing at all."

After the ceremonies were over and the revelry had begun, Blake found herself standing alone by the bar again, nursing a glass of champagne and watching Frank dancing with her date.  He'd blustered into their conversation a few minutes before, saying that the new Chief of Police ought to dance with the Mayor.  Blake pursed her lips.  He had seemed disturbingly oblivious to the fact that he was interrupting.  Had no-one spotted Doris's quiet attempt to stick her foot out of the closet door?  How disappointing would it be to try to tell the truth for once, only to have no-one notice?

"Hello."

Blake jumped, startled out of her thoughts by Ashlee appearing at her side.  "God, you startled me," she said with a flustered smile.  Ashlee didn't return the gesture.

"What are you up to?" the blonde said, without preamble.  Blake frowned.

"I don't underst-"

"Don't play dumb Blake, please," Ashlee interrupted.  "What are you doing with my mother?"

Blake flushed darkly.  "What, do you want details?" she snapped.  Ashlee's lips curled in distaste.

"I think I can live without those," she replied.  The sharpness of her tone was attracting attention.  She looked around briefly, then grabbed Blake by the elbow and dragged her out to relative quiet of the veranda.  A chill wind suddenly made itself felt, causing the lake to ripple as if frowning.  Blake pulled her wrap around her shoulders.

"What the hell is this about, Ashlee?" she demanded.

Ashlee rounded on her.  "You know what this is about," she hissed.  "What do you think you're doing?"

Blake stepped back defensively.  "I think I'm on a date," she replied.  "What do you think you're doing?"

Ashlee shook her head.  "And since when were you dating my mother?"  She crossed her arms across her chest.

Blake grimaced.  "What does it matter?"

Ashlee threw her hands in the air.  "Oh, nothing I suppose.  I'd just like to know exactly how long you've been going around behind my back-"

"Behind your back!"  Blake barked out a laugh.  "How histrionic can you get?"

"That night you came to my apartment," Ashlee challenged, as if Blake hadn't spoken.  "Was this," she gestured vaguely between them, as if Blake and Doris's relationship was a solid object lying between them, "going on then?"

Blake shook her head.  "No," she admitted.  "Not then." Not exactly.  She shook her head to clear the traitorous thought and went right back on the offensive.  "What the hell is your problem anyway?" she demanded.  "It's OK if your mom's gay as long as she doesn't have a girlfriend?"

Ashlee pulled a face.  "Don't be ridiculous."

"Well, that's how it looks from here."  Blake set her jaw and crossed her arms.  Ashlee turned away and began to pace.

"Maybe I'd just prefer if my mom was seeing someone...appropriate."

Blake's eyebrows shot into her hairline.  "What does that mean?"

Ashlee stopped moving and turned to her.  "You're not gay," she said, as if talking to an exceptionally stupid child.  "So what is this - an experiment?  A little research from some book you're writing?"  Blake let out an outraged yelp, but Ashlee ignored it.  "She's not some project you can pick up and put down.  My mom is sensitive."

"I know," Blake replied immediately.  "Believe me, I of all people know that.  I'm the one who comforted her when you walked away from her last week, remember?"

Ashlee raised herself up to her full height.  She had a good four inches on Blake at the best of times, and in heels she towered over the older woman.  "And I'll be there to comfort her when you've got whatever it is you want from her," she snapped.

"I don't want anything from her!" Blake retorted, flushing darkly.  "Except-"

"Except what?"

Blake turned away, staring out across the lake before closing her eyes.  She thought of all the little moments that had characterised her friendship with Doris - listening to her singing to the babies in Company; sitting in companionable silence on the grass by Ross's grave; making dinner in her kitchen with her daughter upstairs; even looking out over this very lake, accepting comfort and companionship offered freely.  She swallowed hard.  "Her," she murmured at last.  "I just want her."  She opened her eyes and caught Ashlee's gaze, holding it as she spoke.  "I love her, Ashlee."

A soft gasp made them both spin round.  Doris was standing in the arch leading from the main hall to the veranda and there were tears glittering unshed in her eyes.  Blake couldn't look away.  Ashlee glanced between them, sensing the currents flowing between them and unsure quite what to make of them.  "If you hurt her," she began uncertainly, but Blake interrupted.

"I'm not going to hurt her."  She hadn't torn her eyes from Doris's, and the promise seemed to be as much for the Mayor as her daughter.

Ashlee coughed, a little embarrassed by her tirade, and a lot embarrassed by being a part of what was so obviously a private moment.  "Right.  Okay, well...sorry if I was a little...anyway, I have to go to Company.  Rafe's leaving soon.  Uhm...I'll talk to you both later."

She brushed past Doris, who barely seemed to acknowledge her departure.  Her eyes were riveted on Blake.  "You..."  She took a step forward, then stopped, hesitant.  Blake's eyes drifted down to the pulse visibly thundering in her throat.  "You...love me?"

Blake nodded once, then erased the space between them in three strides.  She wrapped her arms round Doris's shoulders and pulled her close.  "I love you," she whispered in her ear, and followed it up with a sprinkle of kisses on her cheek.  Doris trembled in her arms, so Blake pulled back and cupped her face, forcing her to meet her eyes.  "I love you," she said again, brushing away the two tears that had dripped from the other woman's eyelashes.

"Blake..." Doris whispered.  "I...I..."

"Sssh," Blake soothed, pulling her back into a gentle embrace.  "It's okay, sweetie.  It's all right."

They stood holding each other for what could just as easily have been minutes or hours.  When Blake became aware of the outside world again she noticed that the band inside was playing a slow song.  Her lips curved up in a smile.  "Wanna dance?"

Doris shook her head.  "Not here," she murmured.

Blake tried not to let her disappointment show in her voice.  It was asking a little much, perhaps.  After all, they were in public, even if there was no one around on the veranda right at that moment.  Baby steps and all that.  "Okay," she said.

Doris pulled back so she could look into Blake's eyes.  "Not here," she said again, holding out her hand.  She threw a nod in the direction of the main reception where all the other couples were already dancing.  "In there."

Blake blinked once, then twice.  "You...you want..."

Doris silenced her with a kiss.  "I want to dance," she murmured gently, "with the woman I love."  She kissed her again.  "On a dance floor.  Just like everyone else."  She tugged on Blake's hand.  "Come on."

Blake hesitated.  "You're sure?  You can't go back after this.  This is...a statement."

Doris threaded their fingers together and squeezed gently.  She caught Blake's eyes and smiled.  "I've never been more sure of anything in my life," she said seriously.  "I want to dance with you.  In there.  In front of everyone.  If..." she hesitated a little, "...if you want to."

A slow smile spread over Blake's face.  "You're amazing," she whispered.  "You know that, right?"  Doris blushed, and Blake's smile widened into a grin.  "Come on," she said, leaning forward and kissing her soundly.

"Let's make the evening news..."

Touchable Dream

They did not make the evening news.

On any other day, the inevitable grainy cellphone footage of the Mayor dancing with and kissing the former Mayor's widow would have been top billing at WSPR, along with the shrill wail of the telephone demanding quotes and interviews, the self-righteous crowing of her political opponents, and the cries of hypocrisy from all and sundry - bearing in mind said closet-case Mayor's self loathing anti-gay voting record.

But today her story had been eclipsed by the death of Alan Spaulding and it was that to which all the news reports were dedicated.  Blake sat, stunned, watching it all play out in Doris's clean, cold living room, her shoes kicked off by the door, her feet drawn up under her on the sofa.

On the screen, they cut to a jostling crowd of journalists trying to get a line or two from Phillip as he left the hospital, his face drawn and pale.  Blake's lips curled in quiet disgust at the intrusion on her ex-husband's obvious grief.  True, she had never quite managed to forgive Phillip for his role in Ross's death, but her heart ached for him just the same.  She knew what it was like to live out a private tragedy in the glare of the spotlight.

She glanced up as Doris entered the room, the phone pressed to her ear.  "Well, I'm here if you need anything," she was saying softly.  "I know he was a bastard sometimes, but..."  She trailed off, and smiled sadly.  "But he was our bastard, exactly."  She sighed, dropping gracefully next to Blake on the sofa.  "Yeah, I'd like that," she said after listening for a beatt or two.  "In a couple of days.  Let me know."  She was quiet for a few moments more, then said a gentle: "Goodbye," and hung up.

Blake slid closer and linked their arms together as Doris laid the phone down on the coffee table.  "How's Olivia?" she asked.  Doris shrugged, and leaned in to her touch.

"A little stunned," she said.  "Like all of us, I suppose.  She said Emma is sad.  And of course Natalia's a mess, because of Rafe."

Blake nodded.  "I can imagine," she murmured.  "It's hard...when your children are out of your reach..."  She trailed off, thinking of her sons and wishing - not for the first time - that she hadn't allowed her mother to take them off to that snooty European boarding school.  Perhaps it was time they came home...

"Yes," Doris replied, snapping her out of her reverie.  "I...I got Ashlee into Berkeley.  She doesn't know yet, but...I think she'll go.  I think she will."

Blake turned her head slowly and took in the other woman's troubled expression.  "That's...a big step for you," she said, in something of an understatement.  Doris just shrugged.

"She's twenty," she said flatly.  "I need to...let her be her own person.  Have her own life."  She turned to Blake and managed a slow smile.  "I've begun to appreciate the desire to have something that's...yours."  She reached for Blake's hand and threaded their fingers together.  "I think it's time we both had our own lives, she and I."

Blake swallowed hard.  "I think you might be right," she murmured before leaning forward for a kiss.  It was a long, slow kiss - slightly awkward because of their positions, but no less perfect for all that.  "Oh, I do love you," Blake whispered when they parted, sounding equal parts surprised, sincere and joyful.

"I love you too," Doris replied, but without any surprise.  Her tone was pure joy - the joy of a woman who had given up on ever feeling like this and been proven happily, spectacularly wrong.

They shared a tremulous smile and another kiss, and then Blake rested her head on Doris's shoulder, leaning on her and breathing her in.  "So, what are you and Olivia plotting?" she asked, watching as WSPR went back to the studio and began an interview with a member of the board of Spaulding Enterprises.  Doris managed a light chuckle.

"Oh, nothing.  Just a meeting of the Alan Spaulding ex-wife club," she said.  "Wanna come?"

Blake laughed.  "Hey, I slept with him, but I didn't marry him," she protested.

"Well, I married him and never slept with him, so you could balance me out," Doris retorted, with a smile in her voice.

They lapsed into silence, watching the drama play out on the TV for a little while longer before Blake heaved a sigh and reached for the remote to turn it off.  "God," she murmured.  "It seems so...so..."

"Pointless," Doris finished for her.  "He was trying to be a better person."

Blake looked up at her with half hooded eyes.  "Like us."

Doris nodded slowly.  "Like us," she agreed.

Blake pushed Doris's hair behind her ears.  It was down now, released from the clasps that had held it up earlier in the day, and falling around her face in gentle waves.  "You make me a better person," she murmured.  She watched Doris swallow, mesmerised by the movements of muscles in her throat.  Suddenly she wanted nothing more than to press her lips to that elegant white neck: to kiss, to breathe, or perhaps both at once.  So she did, finding the other woman's pulse and nipping there gently, feeling her own heartbeat rocket to match that of the suddenly trembling woman in her arms.

"B-Blake," Doris stammered, then moaned when the redhead found a particularly sensitive spot, just behind her ear.  Before she could speak again Blake was in her lap, straddling her thighs and combing her fingers through her hair as her kisses became more urgent, less tentative.  Her hands came to rest almost automatically on Blake's hips, and another moan was dragged over the barbed wire fence of her self control when those same hips rolled against her.

"I love you," Blake whispered in her ear, before taking her earlobe between her teeth, nipping hard enough to leave a mark.

"I...I love...oh God, Blake," Doris replied, mere inches away from getting lost, giving in.  She had an image of rolling Blake onto her back on the couch and taking her then and there, loving her, and marking her, and possessing her.  Her eyes flickered closed at the thought, but at last she gathered every last shred of her formidable will and pushed lightly on the other woman's shoulders.  "Wait."

Blake pulled back, confusion darkening her eyes.  "What?" she husked, before trying to lean in again.  Doris stopped her.

"This is not taking things slowly," Doris said shakily, thinking back to that seemingly endless moment by the pond at the farmhouse when she had finally tasted Blake's lips and vowed that they wouldn't rush, wouldn't spoil the tiny, tentative steps that had characterised their relationship.

For a long moment, Blake didn't speak.  Then, at last, her shoulders slumped.  "You're right," she admitted.  "I just..."  She trailed off, searching for words.  "It's Alan, I guess," she said at last.  "He'd just started living - really living, they way he wanted to live.  And it all got taken away, in a few moments.  In the blink of an eye.  And Ross-"  She stopped again, this time choking on what she was trying to say.  Doris slid her hands back and pulled the redhead into an embrace, comforting this time, rather than incendiary.  Blake nestled into her gratefully.  "Ross," she said again.  "I lost him...from nowhere.  Randomly.  One minute I was getting ready for him to come home and the next...Jeffrey was there with that...that look on his face.  You know that look?"  She felt Doris nod against her cheek, then take a breath.

"I'm not going anywhere," she whispered.  "I'm right here."

Blake closed her eyes.  "I know," she replied, but clung to Doris more tightly than before, nonetheless.  "But I want to be with you, Doris.  I don't want to wait.  I'm too old and life is too damn short."

Doris laughed gently, leaning back against the couch so she could look into her eyes.  "You're not old," she said gently.

"That's not what my daughter says," Blake replied, smiling now.  "Forty four...practically a dinosaur."  Doris quirked an eyebrow.

"What does she know?"  She cupped Blake's face between her palms.  "I think you're the perfect age," she said, and then, quietly: "I think you're perfect."

Lips curled into twin shy smiles before meeting and resting together, barely moving.  Neither woman pressed the issue, seeming to be content to share the same suddenly thick air.  And then Doris's lips twitched and suddenly they were kissing, but with none of the urgency of the past few minutes.  This kiss was both question and answer in one, and when it broke they both knew exactly what was going to happen.

"I want you," Doris murmured, "in my bed."

Blake nodded.  Their first time couldn't be some desperate, sweaty grope on a couch.  She'd had her fill of sex like that.  This time she wanted...more.  So much more.

She stood, holding her hand out to Doris.  As if by mutual assent they went first to the bathroom to clean off their make-up.  It seemed to be understood that there could be no hint of artifice in this, no hiding behind paint or posturing.  Blake turned to the other woman, her face a little red from cold water and scrubbing.  "You're beautiful," she murmured.  She thought Doris blushed, but it was hard to tell for sure.

"You're beautiful," she replied, threading her fingers through soft red hair.  "I don't know what you see in me."

Blake shook her head, and reached for the other woman's hand.  "Then let me show you."

The bedroom was warmer than the other rooms.  At last Blake seemed to have found Doris's sanctuary, the room which best reflected the heart of her.  Decorated in shades of warm beige and chocolate brown, with a view of the immaculately tended garden, it was a lovely room that Blake utterly failed to notice.  Her eyes, her mind, her heart, were focused on one thing, one woman, standing before her as nervous as a schoolgirl.  "What's wrong?" Blake asked, and Doris managed a small, self-deprecating smile.

"I feel like that should be my line," she said, stepping forward and drawing comfort from the solid reality of Blake in her arms.  "Aren't you nervous?"

Blake considered the question, then shook her head.  "No, not really," she admitted.  "I feel like maybe I ought to be.  I expected to be...I mean, I've never done this before.  But...I'm sure.  I'm so sure about this...about you."  She smiled softly.  "This is so right," she murmured, bringing one of Doris's hands to her lips so she could kiss the palm, before resting it gently over her heart.

Doris exhaled tremulously.  "It is," she agreed.  "I just..."  She looked around the room, her eyes resting on the bed.  "I've never...not here...not with someone..."

"Not with someone you love?" Blake finished for her, and smiled when she received a silent nod in reply.  "So it's a first for us both then?"

Doris smiled ruefully.  "In a way," she granted.  "I think that makes me look bad, doesn't it?"

Blake laughed.  "God, Doris, if we decided to take a trip down Blake's sexual history lane you'd find worse.  I mean..."  She leaned forward conspiratorially and dropped her voice to a whisper.  "Did you know I once slept with Frank?"

Doris's eyes widened.  "Okay...mood is most definitely getting lost...kiss me quick before it disappears out of sight altogether."

Blake laughed and swatted her arm, but leaned forward and kissed her regardless.  For long moments they got lost in each other, rolling on a wave of fiery crests and heart clenching troughs until finally Doris felt her knees make contact with the bed and she fell back onto it, pulling Blake with her.

Instantly she rolled the redhead onto her back, lying above her half on and half off, never breaking contact with her lips.  Slowly she trailed her fingertips down Blake's side, sliding over the soft layers of her dress and soon finding the even softer skin of her thigh.  She slipped her hand under the dress on its way back up, making it ride a little higher.  Blake's breath caught, and she arched her back just a little, allowing the dress to ride up even further.  She hooked one smooth, naked leg around Doris's, deepening the embrace as she tore her lips away to breathe.  "Oh," she exhaled softly, and seemed to tie up all the hope and expectation and desire in that one, shining syllable.

Doris was confident now, her nerves dissolving in the liquid certainty of the woman and the moment.  She sat up, pulling Blake with her, and slowly, gently, lifted the other woman's dress over her shoulders.  Her own required a little more effort - a zipper, a few restrained tugs - but it found itself on the floor easily enough.

Blake's breath caught in her throat at the sight of her nearly-naked lover stretching out, leonine, above her.  She opened her arms and moaned when Doris settled between them, momentarily struck dumb by the warm sensation of skin caressing skin.  It was a feeling she hadn't experienced in years, and never like this - soft, smooth, hot.  "So this is what all the fuss is about," she murmured as Doris moulded against her, nuzzling her throat and sliding strong, sure hands down her arms.

"This is very much what all the fuss is about," Doris replied, making short work of the last few barriers between them.  "I've dreamed of this," she murmured.  "Having you here."

Blake cupped her lover's face between her palms.  "I'm not a dream," she whispered.  "I'm real.  I'm here.  I'm yours."

Doris drew in a deep breath through her nose.  "You're mine," she growled.  Blake felt the words travel down her spine and settle lightly in the pit of her stomach.

"I love you," she murmured.  Doris kissed her once then met her eyes, and she didn't need to say the words back.  Blake could see them written all over her face, hear them in the ragged edge of her breath, feel them in the warm caress of her hands.  Her back arched and she sighed, moving in perfect time with her lover as the sky shaded from azure, to sapphire, and finally to black.

The stars were just coming out when Doris finally pulled the comforter around them both, holding Blake's smaller body against hers protectively.  She dropped a kiss onto the other woman's forehead, noting the faint hints of cooled sweat under her lips.  "Wow," she murmured, and was rewarded with a laugh.

"Wow is right," Blake agreed, tilting her head up for a kiss.

They lay together in silence for a while, feeling each other's warmth, breathing each other's air.  Blake had just begun to drift into sleep when she heard Doris's worried voice.  "This wasn't too soon, was it?"

Blake looked up, blinking away the first hints of sleep from her eyes.  "No," she said.  "This...you and me...it feels like it's been building and building.  One tiny step after one tiny step until suddenly...here we are."

"Here we are," Doris repeated softly.

Blake smiled.  "Do you feel like this whole thing has been really fast...and really slow at the same time?"

Doris laughed.  "Exactly," she agreed.  "Exactly."

Blake's smile widened into a grin and she tightened her arm round Doris's waist.  Doris sighed contentedly.  "I suppose I'll have to make a statement tomorrow," she murmured sleepily, after a few moments of silence.

Blake laughed.  "What, about this?" she giggled.  "Doris Wolfe and Blake Marler wish it to be known that they are madly in love and yes, the sex is fabulous."

"No," Doris replied, swatting her lover lightly on the hip.  Then, shyly, she added: "fabulous?"

Blake nodded.  "It's epic."

Doris laughed, but couldn't hide the hints of slightly cocky pride that crept into her expression.  "No," she said after a moment or two, turning serious.  "I meant about Alan.  I am the Mayor...not to mention his ex-wife.  I ought to say something."

Blake nodded.  "Well, I can help you with that," she said.  "I'm sure between us we can rustle up something appropriately sorrowful and sincere."

"Yeah," Doris replied, and yawned.  "For now...sleep."

"Sleep," Blake agreed, and kissed her one last time before they closed their eyes.  Doris slid into slumber almost immediately, her breath coming in deep, regular sighs.  Blake listened to it for long minutes, marvelling at the deep, abiding feeling of love and safety and protection she felt, wrapped up in this woman's arms.

Goodnight, Doris, she thought sleepily.  And goodnight Alan, wherever you are...  She dropped a gentle kiss onto Doris's collarbone.

Goodnight...

The End

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