Archive of Our Own

When Carmilla said that she wanted to take the Laura Hollis concert, her editor actually choked on his coffee. She smirked as he spluttered his way through the liquid, aware that all eyes in the room were now firmly locked on her face. So a smirk was all they’d get.

Stomach butterflies be damned.

“You,” her editor said at last, “You want to take the Laura Hollis concert.”

Carmilla rolled her eyes and pushed out from the conference table, locking her hands behind her head, “After the piece we ran the last time she was in town, you should be begging me to take the Laura Hollis concert.”

“Hey!” Sarah Jane’s complaint died when Carmilla shot her a look. The piece had been exactly what Sarah Jane was known for, a fluffy piece of happiness and sunshine that headlined the arts section of the Silas Times. Perfectly adequate for most pop singers if Carmilla was telling the truth but Laura Hollis wasn’t just another pop singer.

She could almost hear Laura in her ear, reminding her that she was ‘a country pop singer, Carm. It’s the best of both genres!’.

Her editor shuffled his notes, “You are aware, Miss Karnstein, that the Laura Hollis piece requires an actual interview and cannot just be one of your typical reviews.”

“I’m aware,” Carmilla said, “Although I’ll probably write the review part too. Maybe educate some of those pop culture robots on how a real concert review should look.” She pretended to clean her nails, “As in, it actually mentions the music and has no interest in what the musician is wearing.”

The murmurs in the room were just quiet enough that she couldn’t pick out any one person to glare at. So she settled for glaring at them all.

The glare quickly transitioned to her editor when she heard his tone. It was the ‘keep Carmilla calm but turn her down’ tone. “While you’re one of our best writers, this concert isn’t particularly within your realm of expertise. There’s a new pianist playing at the grand hall that I’d planned on assigning to you. Concerts like Laura’s demand a certain degree of exuberance and, while I appreciate your enthusiasm to ‘educate the masses’, that isn’t what our readers are looking for.”

His moustache offended her almost as much as Sarah Jane’s tight yet triumphant smile. Carmilla finally sat up straight, her cell phone weighing heavy in her jacket pocket. The pictures hiding deep inside the memory.

Instead of grabbing it, she leaned across the conference table, “I’ve made my reputation on having a vast expertise. No other reviewer specializes in both classical music and heavy metal.” The discordance was what had generated her following in the first place. “This is simply an opportunity to broaden that further. A press piece within itself.”

“I can’t give it to you, Carmilla.” her editor said.

She scowled.

“We don’t have a planned interview with Laura,” he continued, “we have to convince her to give us one and you are, quite frankly, abrasive. You’ve stormed into my office at least a dozen times and told me exactly where I can shove any interviews I try and give you. Now you want the highest profile tickets I have? My answer is no.”

He crossed his arms and watched her, giving her the smallest space for a response. Carmilla’s hands crumpled into fists below the table and her nails left marks on her palms. The cell phone still sat heavy in her pocket as she clenched her jaw and tried to think of anything else that she could say to get the interview.

Anything but the truth. Or the half truth.

He took her silence as agreement, “Sarah Jane will do the artic-”

“I can get the interview,” the words came out before Carmilla could regret them.

The editor sighed, “Karnstein, that’s enough. You can’t just-”

She grabbed her cell phone, flicked it open and slammed it down on the table as she stood, “Laura Hollis was my university roommate. We lived together for four years before she became famous. I can get the interview.”

The half truth then. Missing pieces.

Everyone was still staring at her but now it was with their jaws open, eyes flicking between her face and the old photo on the screen. One she’d chosen carefully. It was taken seven years ago, when she and Laura had moved into off campus housing together. Laura’s arm was slung around her neck, a smile on her face and a beat-up guitar in her hand as she leaned over Carmilla. Carmilla was looking at the camera, one eyebrow raised, but her forehead was pressed into Laura’s jaw as it hovered just over her shoulder.

A moment of silence and then a VIP press pass thumped on the table in front of her.

“Karnstein. You’ve got the Laura Hollis concert.”

#

A bigger than life-size poster of Laura and her ukulele met Carmilla as soon as she climbed out of the taxi. Fans were already winding around the block, waiting to get into the concert venue. Carmilla grimaced and, despite the fact that it was already around her neck, clutched her VIP pass tighter in her hand.

The VIP passes that you could buy had sold out in seconds. She would know. She’d been online for over an hour early when they first launched to try and get one and still missed out. Thus, the annoying begging at the office.

That was not going to do good things for her images as the badass rogue musical reviewer.

She walked past the line of fans, standing out in her black jeans and leather jacket in a sea of bright colours and giggling teens. Most gave her nothing but a quick look, however, a few of the older ones had her ducking away. The ones with Laura Hollis merch that was old and worn and faded. The most persistent face came from a girl with an old yellow shirt that simply said ‘Lauronica Mars’.

Carmilla had come up with that name and Laura had thought it was so funny that she’d made it the name of her YouTube channel.

That girl actually took a step forward, a frown flashing across her face as she tried to get a better look at Carmilla. Carmilla picked up her pace, flashing her press badge at the VIP entrance and breathing a sigh of relief when she was safely in the building. She was in a number of Laura’s old videos. Identified as nothing more than ‘Carm’ so no-one had made the connection to the musical reviewer but still visible.

Still Laura’s first girlfriend.

Ex-girlfriend.

The oldest fans would remember her being dragged into videos, lurking in the background of others, occasionally providing instrumental accompaniment when Laura decided she needed ‘more variety than Buffy. I mean, she’s a great guitar Carm but our audience needs more’.

That was before the producers decided that the ukulele was better for Laura’s image. That was before Laura even had producers. That was when it had just been Laura and Carmilla and some broken instruments and a video camera and two girls in love.

Or one girl in love.

Carmilla shook her head at the old memories. She’d heard that Laura had named the ukulele Peggy.

Carmilla smiled as she slid into her seat, nodding at the VIP manager and pulling out her notebook. Of course Laura named it Peggy. The seats slowly began to fill as the press and the fans filed in. Carmilla sat in her seat, face impassive, but couldn’t stop her knee from bouncing up and down. There was some small chatter from her colleagues, most surprised that Carmilla Karnstein was here of all places.

She gave them the ‘real music review’ spiel and they left her alone.

There was a voice in her head that sounded suspiciously like Laura and reminded her that ‘all songs were made up of the same notes anyway and stop being such a snob Carm and just enjoy it’.

Then she didn’t have to imagine anymore because that voice, that same voice, was blasting through the speakers. High energy, high volume, and a song that was from her newest album. With the price of Laura Hollis tickets, the crowd was going to get their money and so their first look was a highly stylized shadow of Laura as she bounced behind a giant white screen.

Her most recent single was a deviation from her usual love songs, a well written statement song on being your own person and living for yourself.

She couldn’t believe that the record had let it slip through.

Better than the love songs and subsequent break-up songs on the last album that were apparently about Danny Lawrence, Laura’s old agent.

Carmilla hadn’t even gotten a break-up song. On her weaker nights, she’d spent time trying to find any trace of herself in Laura’s songs.

She never found them.

It was a hard fact to remember when suddenly Laura burst through the white screen and was right there, maybe twenty rows in front of her. For just a moment, she knew her impassive face fell away. Laura Hollis. Still, beautiful. Still, pulling on her heart strings. Still, keeping Carmilla in love with her. Laura’s hair was blonder now and pulled back around her face to leave the microphone free. Her smile was still wide as she waved to the audience through the words, sending a fist-pump to the sky and doing a crazy flail-like dance that many fans would call her signature.

Yet, even with the make-up and stylists, Carmilla could still see the changes. The smile that stretched just a little too big. The dead eyes above it. The little inhales before each song started. The slope of her shoulders. Those weren’t Laura. Not the real Laura.

Which was why she was here.

She wondered if anyone else could see the cracks behind Laura’s smile.

#

The press junket after the show was complete chaos. Carmilla sunk into an uncomfortable plastic chair, crossed her arms, and glared at her boots. Usually, she just disappeared into the night before this part rolled around. The music was what interested her. This was just a circle of fame-boosting for the celebrity. The music was what mattered.

Except tonight, the music was playing second fiddle.

She tuned most of it out, slumping in her chair because she didn’t really want to look at Laura. Not this Laura under bright lights and pasting a smile on her face that made Carmilla’s stomach churn. So she waited. She waited until Laura’s ginger PR manager called out, “We only have time for one more question.”

Then she got up and, quite calmly, hip checked the reporter with the microphone and stole it while he tried not to faceplant into the carpet.

“I have a question,” Carmilla said. There was a kerfuffle of noise behind her and loud protests from the reporter whose question she’d just stolen but Carmilla was looking at nothing but Laura.

Laura’s face had gone pale and her jaw had dropped slightly, eye locked on Carmilla. The curly haired ginger started coming at her and Laura just put up a hand to stop her, still looking at Carmilla.

She nodded. Once. Quick and short and jerky.

Carmilla tried to keep her voice from shaking at being caught in that gaze again, “Can I have five minutes of your time, cupcake?”

She only got a one word response but it was enough to cut away the years between them. The same aborted sob lived in Laura’s throat, identical to the one on that last day when Carmilla had walked out the door.

“Carm.”

#

The cry had apparently disappeared while Laura waited for the beefcake to drop Carmilla off at her dressing room. When Carmilla walked through the door, Laura was sitting in front of the make-up mirror and staring at herself. She got up and whirled around before Carmilla could say anything.

“Carmilla,” Laura said, extending a hand, “I wasn’t expecting to see you here.”

Carmilla looked at the hand and then looked at Laura’s smiling face, “Really? A handshake?” she asked. A hundred memories ran through her head of jump hugs and surprise hugs and speeches on the lack of connection in a handshake.

Laura’s smile dimmed and the hand dropped slightly. It wavered before she slipped it into her pockets. She spun around with her back to Carmilla. Hands busy with nothing.

“So, you’re a member of the press now?” Laura said.

“Musical reviewer for the Silas Times.” Carmilla said.

Laura picked up a wig and promptly put it back down, “I guess you want an interview? Sure. Anything for an old friend.” Her voice went high at the end of the sentence.

Carmilla stood in the middle of the room, “The promise of an interview is certainly how I convinced my boss to give me the ticket.” She said, “I usually write classical and hard rock.”

That got her a glance from Laura and the brief flicker of a real smile behind the fake one, “Of course you do.”

Carmilla said nothing. Laura pulled out five shirts and then stuck them back in the closet. Not one of which had any kind of animal print. Laura re-arranged the make-up on the table and then adjusted the line-up of ukuleles in a nearby suitcase. Her guitar nowhere in sight.

“Well,” Laura said, “this is certainly the least conventional interview I’ve had. Silence is definitely a new one. You’re not going to ask about my inspiration? My next album? Who I’m dating? ”

“Don’t need to ask. I know the PR words that mother would have you spin.” Carmilla turned her voice sickly sweet, “Your inspiration is your life and you write like your mother did. Your next album is currently in the works and you’re looking forward to getting in the studio again. You’re not dating anyone. No further questions please.” Carmilla raised an eyebrow. “Is there anything else you’d like to say?” Carmilla asked, “Because otherwise I really don’t care about the interview.”

Laura frowned, a plain travel mug in her hands that she was clutching a tad too tight, “But you said that you were here for an interview.”

“I say a lot of things.” Carmilla let that sit for a minute. Then she added, “I said that I told my boss I was here for an interview. I could write that in my sleep. I just needed the ticket.” She let a bit of pride drip into her tone, “Your shows sell-out quick, cupcake. I couldn’t get one the conventional way and your PR guard dog wasn’t returning my calls.”

Something different crossed over Laura’s face at the nickname and then flashed away again.

Carmilla waited for the question that never came from the girl who always asked questions.

“You want to know why I’m here?” Carmilla asked instead.

“If you’re not here for an interview,” Laura said and turned away from her again, “You really should go. I cut you a break because of our… friendship. But it’s probably best if you…”

“I came back for you.” Carmilla cut her off.

If she’d gone through all the trouble of getting that ticket then she was going to say her piece.

Laura shook her head, back still to Carmilla, “It’s been three years,” she said, “you don’t just get to come back here and-” Laura’s voice died.

“I know.” Carmilla said, forcing herself to stay in the center of the room. “I know. I loved you and you didn’t love me. You had to try and and take down my mother. I got that part down. I remember. I walked away and I’m not here to bring that back. I know you don’t want any of that crap.”

Laura’s voice was tight, “Just go Carmilla. You’re good at that.”

“I know,” Carmilla repeated, “What happened after I left. Everything with Danny and my mother and Vordenberg and the label and just everything.” Laura’s shoulders tightened at her words. “And I know what’s still going on. What the fans aren’t seeing. Mattie called to tell me.”

Another half truth.

As if she hadn’t seen it happening on Laura’s face long before Mattie made the phone call.

“You’re not okay,” Carmilla said.

“I don’t want to talk about this,” Laura said and aggressively started throwing shirts into her nearby suitcase.

Carmilla took a few steps towards her, tone gentler, “And that’s the problem, cupcake. You’re just ignoring it aren’t you? You fought and you lost and now you’re done. Barricading yourself away? Pretending you’re not my mother’s puppet? That this isn’t happening even though you know what’s all around. They own you and you’re just wrapping yourself up in these image-approved shirts and too-big smiles and letting the tide swing as it may. Pretending the world is something that it isn’t because you’re afraid to touch anything again?”

“I messed it all up,” Laura said, “I’m not touching it again. I’ll make it even worse.”

All she saw was Laura’s back but that couldn’t hide the tremble in Laura’s movements. “At least Laf got out.” Laura added.

With Laura’s back still towards her, Carmilla felt safe to reach out. Her fingers grazing the edges of Laura’s shoulder blade, “You know what I always loved about you?” She wasn’t sure if the flinch at the word love came from herself or Laura, “that you try. Sometimes you make a mess and you are wild and unpredictable but you always try.”

Laura wasn’t moving anymore, her hands tight around the shirt on her grip.

“Yes. You made a mess,” Carmilla said, “But I think, that it would be infinitely sadder if you stopped trying at all. If you let it turn you into me and just walked away. If you let them win.”

“We broke up,” Laura’s voice was soft.

“We did,” Carmilla agreed, fingers still on the edges of Laura’s shirt.

“So why do you care?”

Laura didn’t move away when Carmilla pressed her fingers to Laura’s back, five tiny points. Then she backed away and dropped her card on the vanity table, stuck in the only clear space between the bottles of make-up.

“If you need me,” Carmilla said, “Call.”

#

Carmilla jumped every time the phone rang for the next two days.

Laura didn’t call.

#

Two months later, Carmilla opened the door to find Laura Hollis and a suitcase standing on her front porch. She blinked in surprise, heart doing a traitorous flip in her chest. Laura’s head was down and her fingers were knuckle white around the handle of her suitcase.

“The tour is over and my apartment… the label owns it… I need a break.” she said, “Your mother could always…” she trailed away.

The suitcase in her hand was barely a carry-on.

Laura’s father lived on the other side of the country.

Carmilla opened the door a little wider and said nothing. She just watched as Laura trudged past her and then stopped at the edge of her living room. Stepping forward, Carmilla gently pulled the suitcase from Laura’s hand and set it on the ground. Then, giving Laura enough time to step away, she gently pushed her so that she was sitting on the couch.

Laura looked small on the couch. A far cry from the girl who bounced around a stage two months ago and blew kisses at the audience.

Except.

That Laura had a fake smile painted over her lips, clothes she didn’t own on her back, a face drawn over her real one, and ukuleles in every colour of the rainbow. This Laura had her knees together, her back bent forward as though she was trying to take up as little space as possible, and her arms hugging herself.

This Laura, as broken as she was, at least looked real. The empty eyes that kept flickering from Carmilla to Laura’s hands and back again were familiar.

Carmilla reached to the top of one of her bookshelves and pulled down a blanket, dropping it on Laura’s lap.

“Hot chocolate?” she offered.

#

By the end of week one, Laura had taken up permanent residence on her couch. Despite her best efforts, Carmilla couldn’t convince Laura to take her bed. Instead, the couch now resembled a small nest of every pillow Carmilla owned, the blanket she’d given Laura, and the tv remote.

If Carmilla never had to watch another episode of Gilmore Girls, it would be too soon.

Week two saw Laura’s tiny suitcase run out of clothes. Laura just kept wearing them until Carmilla woke at two in the morning and stole everything. All the blazers and high waisted skirts and heels that reeked of her mother’s PR team. She replaced them with a pair of slippers and yoga pants and t-shirts with the tag still in the neck.

Tentatively, she added one shirt that had a bunch of tiny toucans flying over it.

It took two more days before Laura put any of it on but when Carmilla came home from the paper, Laura was curled up on the couch with the yoga pants and the slippers. She couldn’t say what shirt because Laura had apparently found the energy to go upstairs, dig through her closet, and find her old, worn Silas U hoodie with the permanent food stains still on the sleeves.

Her heart flipped a little as it was transported back in time to days when Laura would steal her sweater and try to eat spaghetti, leaving sauce dripping down the sleeve.

Carmilla made meatloaf, took both plates, gave one to Laura and sat on the couch beside her. She pretended not to notice whenever Laura would bury her nose in the sweater.

In the middle of the night during week three, she woke up to the sound of the shower. When it lasted for an hour, she tentatively stuck her head into the bathroom. Laura was standing, fully clothed, under the stream. Carmilla’s sweater neatly folded on the toilet seat, dry. Carmilla said nothing, she just sat on top of the sweater and waited until Laura came out.

The next morning she found a familiar ukulele with all the strings cut in her garbage.

That night, she brought every file she had on her mother and vordenberg and silas and danny and the recording company home. She woke up with her face smushed against the papers.

Week four marked a month since Laura had stepped in her home and they’d barely exchanged more than a few words in that entire time. So naturally, Laura decided to surprise her as Carmilla passed her the orange juice.

“You haven’t asked me to leave,” Laura said.

“I haven’t.,” Carmilla took a sip from her glass.

Laura stared down at the juice, “You left before.”

“I didn’t want to.”

Laura’s head snapped up to look at her and Carmilla just shrugged, taking her juice and her cereal and sitting down at the table with her newspaper. She held her breath as she turned the pages. It took a moment but, for the first time, Laura sat at the table instead of returning to the couch.

Carmilla exhaled and passed her the sports section.

She hide her smile at Laura’s huff at the content behind the papers. Laura hated the sports section. But Carmilla knew what it was to be whipped for Laura Hollis and, as much as she still loved her, she refused to give up herself again.

Laura never complained beyond the huff and she ate breakfast with Carmilla at the table every morning after. Carmilla always gave her the sports section. Only the sports section.

Week five was uneventful at home but busy at work. Her mother stopped by the office, demanding to know why Carmilla was talking to various recording studios. Carmilla flipped her off, went home, and added more names to the stack she was assembling in her bedroom.

It was one thing to know that you were the heir to a music empire, it was another to try and understand that empire. Two days after her mother, Mattie showed up at her office and forced Carmilla to go to lunch with her. Somehow, when Carmilla got back to her desk, a complete file on Silas’s link with Vordenberg records was stashed under the keyboard.

That night, she came home and started playing scrabble with herself. Just to see. For the first game, Laura just watched her from the corner of her eye over the couch. By the third night of self-scrabble, she had a tiny Hollis perched on the stool beside her and berating Carmilla for her word choices.

Laura touched her hand five times that night.

Week seven was when Carmilla realized that she wasn’t getting anywhere with understanding the files. Which was okay, that wasn’t why she had them. Still, two days later, she came home and slowly added a package of papers simply labelled ‘Elle’ to the stack.

That night, Carmilla pulled out her oldest acoustic. It had gone untouched since Laura moved in, gathering dust beside the others. She played quiet melodies, intricately fingerpicking tunes that had no words yet somehow said everything she was feeling.

The notes switched from minor to major when she realized there was light breathing come from just outside her door. Footsteps padding away when she returned the guitar to its case.

Week eight Laura asked about Lafontaine and JP. She was standing by the backdoor leading out to Carmilla’s patio, the last drips of the sunshine highlighting the wisps of her hair and glinting off the silver eyelets on Carmilla’s Silas sweater. Her eyes were big and wide and Carmilla’s breath caught.

So she told Laura the truth. Lafontaine and JP were free of the record company but they still weren’t getting a dime for their work, left untouchable by any other studio or producer. Laura’s eyes went glassy as Carmilla explained that, last she’d heard, they were living at a shelter rather than cave and take the studio’s housing.

Laura spent week nine almost exclusively on the couch.

Carmilla spent it almost sleepless. Files in hand and a mystery board pinned to the back of her closet.

But in week ten Laura was waiting for her at the front door and asking to borrow a pair of real pants. As Carmilla handed over the ripped jeans that were just a little too long, Laura informed her that she was going to shelter.

“Can I come?” Carmilla asked.

Laura gave her a long look that Carmilla didn’t know what to do with.

“Okay.”

She was glad she did. JP was silent but Laf was angry. Laf’s eyes looked like Laura’s had except where’s Laura’s had been dead, Laf’s were filled with fire. Laura stood there. Laura stood there in Carmilla’s sweater and Carmilla’s jeans and listened. Somehow, in a way that no-one but Laura would have been able to pull off, Laf’s anger somehow ended in Laf just crying into Laura’s arms. It ended in hugs and tearful goodbyes and promises of optimism.

Carmilla set her chin and refused to cry any tears of her own as she watched from the corner.

That was her Laura.

Laf caught her eye on the way out and give her the smallest salute.

Two days later, all of Carmilla’s laundry was waiting for her on the kitchen table. Neatly folded and cleaned. Frowning, Carmilla looked over to the couch only to find it empty.

For a moment, her throat closed because Laura had left. Had left.

But then there was movement in her peripheral and she spun around fast enough to smack right into Laura. Teetering, she reached out to anchor herself and grabbed Laura around the hips. Laura’s breath light on her cheek as her hands reflexively grabbed at Carmilla’s waist.

Carmilla froze and then stepped back, clearing her throat. Then she froze again. Laura was wearing a button-up with tiny cats all over it and smiling a tiny shy smile as she nervously smoothed the bottom of the shirt down over jeans that actually fit her.

“Cupcake.” The nickname was easy.

“I went shopping. I’m keeping your sweater though,” was all Laura said in return.

The next day, Carmilla left the stack of files alone to re-string a ukulele. She wasn’t making any progress on them anyway.

Week eleven, her phone rang over her lunch break.

“What?” she snapped into the line.

“You have all of my CDs,” Laura didn’t seem bothered by her tone. Still, Carmilla froze and her feet automatically fell off her desk to slam to the ground. “And they’re in their own special section.” Laura added when Carmilla didn’t say anything.

Carmilla kept her voice light, “Snooping through my office, cupcake?”

She hoped so. Snoopy Laura was her Laura. She’d kept the files in her bedroom for a reason.

“If they’re my CDs then it’s hardly snooping,” Laura said, “Seriously though. They’re even in order of release date and you’ve got all the special editions with like one extra song.”

“Well now, I had to see if you were writing about me. Can’t have my well earned, fear inducing name being associated with the bubbly Laura Hollis,” Carmilla drummed her fingers against her desk and prayed that Laura couldn’t hear the nervous tick. “Besides, some of it’s not the worst I suppose.”

She could hear Laura breathing. Then, “I thought you hated my kind of music. I was expecting this to be all Bach and Led Zepplin like when we were in school.”

“Neither of us are the same as we were in school,” Carmilla said. The same as when they were a we and not two separate I’s.

Carmilla missed her next meeting because Laura spent the next twenty minutes talking about absolutely nothing. She got assigned some amateur music night and her boss almost fainted when she just smiled and nodded.

Week twelve and Carmilla took the CDs and put them on the kitchen table, one in the CD player as the softest background music.

Laura bolted down the stairs and slammed it off. The words pouring from her mouth to barrel into Carmilla in a speech that seemed like something kept inside for too long.

When she was done, it was hardly yelling at all. “I just can’t listen to them, Carm. I can’t. I hear those melodies and it just cracks me open and everything I used to hope when I listened to them just comes crawling out and I can’t do that! I can’t do that to you!”

Laura froze, her hands flying to her mouth.

Carmilla’s eyes widened and she took a step forward, “To me?”

Laura just shook her head, wildly, “I can’t talk about that. Not today.”

“Cupcake.”

Laura took a step back, “Not today. Maybe. Someday.”

“Someday,” Carmilla repeated as she watched Laura flee back to the couch. She’d heard someday before. That night she drank half a bottle of whiskey and stumbled down to her office at four in the morning to throw the CDs in the back of a cupboard.

Then she walked out the door.

She’d heard someday before.

She came back the next morning with a wicked hangover but as she stumbled to the kitchen for an advil, Laura’s head popped over the back of the couch, eyes red and glassy.

“You came back.” she croaked.

Carmilla snorted, too hungover to care, “I always come back.”

Laura pushed her hair out of her face and she looked so young that Carmilla ached all over again, “You didn’t last time.”

“What do you think this is?” She pointed to the couch and let herself laugh, just a little. Hard and dry and everything that a hangover is. “Takes awhile but I always come back.”

She had another file stuffed in her bag when she got home two days later, late enough that the stars were out. Laura was waiting for her on the stairs. She said nothing, she just watched Carmilla take off her shoes and her jacket and drop her bag. She didn’t move when Carmilla sat beside her on the stairs.

Laura’s first CD playing in the background. The old ep that they’d recorded in Perry’s basement with Carmilla playing every instrument.

They got through three songs before Laura pointed to the skylight and starting telling Carmilla about the stars as though Carmilla hadn’t been the one to once tell her. She got the story of Orion slightly wrong and, when Carmilla pointed it out, Laura had shot her a look and told her to shush.

It was the most Laura Hollis thing she’d ever seen.

So Carmilla said nothing else, even when Laura’s pinky softly wrapped around her own.

The rest of the week nothing played in the house except Laura’s CDs. She’d often come home to find Laura sitting and staring out the window or curled up in a corner or even on the couch.

But the TV was never on. Gilmore Girls lost.

Week fourteen and Carmilla threw a collage of photos on the floor of her bedroom and fought the impulse to set them on fire. Vordenberg or her mother lurking in every one. With anger in her bones, she threw herself onto the piano bench in the study and let her fingers play every composer she could think of. The pounding of the chords. The repetition of the delicacy of the notes. That was all that mattered.

Until the room smelled like cupcakes.

She opened her eyes just enough to see a vanilla cupcake get placed on the edge of the instrument and closed them again as someone warm and real and right tentatively sat on the bench next to her. Carmilla kept playing Brahms and Mozart fading into Tchaikovsky and Mendelssohn. Debussy snuck his way in without her realizing and Laura’s favourite, Clair de Lune, whispered it’s way across the keys.

She wasn’t sure when Laura moved closer, the heat of her presence becoming the pressure of her thigh next to Carmilla.

When Carmilla opened her eyes, fingers red at the tips. Laura’s left hand was on the keyboard. Her fingers unmoving but on the keys.

Carmilla watched her.

“You should play more,” Laura said at last, withdrawing her hand but keeping her leg pressed tight. She gave Carmilla a look that was almost confident, “I was worried you’d forgotten how. Too busy criticizing innocent musicians.”

The smirk sprung up on her own face, “Please. I only criticise people who deserve.”

Laura shook her head, the tinge of a smile on her lips, “Just enjoy the music, Carm.”

They both stilled. Trapped in the silence of a melody that was stuck on the pauses, just waiting for the next note to start but uncertain as to what it would. Major or minor. Chord or single note. Forceful or gentle.

“I made cupcakes,” Laura murmured.

Carmilla nodded, “I can see that.”

She waited but Laura said nothing else, fiddling with piano keys that she refused to play. So Carmilla reached out to grab the cupcake. No use letting good food go to waste. She never made it. Her fingers were just closing around the baking when Laura was in her space, no pause as kissed Carmilla.

Her mind blanked.

Carmilla’s hands reached out of their own accord, tangling in Laura’s hair and pulling her against her mouth. Hard. An urgency to her actions as though her body had realized that Laura might pull away before her brain could register anything more than Laura. Laura and kisses and softness and the promise of an unfinished melody.

Laura was the one to pull back. Carmilla’s fingers still tangled in Laura’s hair, unwilling to let go until she had to. The silky strands slipping through her fingertips like Laura herself had so long ago. She waited. Just waited.

She was getting good at waiting.

Tentatively, Laura moved back in. Her hands moving to Carmilla’s arms as she landed a kiss that was softer. Built on eye contact and slow in a way that was somehow still desperate. An active choice instead of a burst of passion.

Then they turned and Carmilla’s arm hit the piano, releasing a discordant jumble of noise.

They broke away.

As always.

“I’m sorry,” tumbled off Laura’s lips, “You deserve better.” Then she was gone, leaving Carmilla with nothing more than a cupcake and the whisper of a melody.

She spent the night in the piano room, trying to find it. Fingers touching her lips as though they could recapture something she couldn’t even identify. Carmilla tumbled into bed with a sheet of half-filled music on her hand and pile of photos still on the floor.

Laura spent three days ignoring her and Carmilla came home to her entire kitchen re-arranged and a cake in the oven.

On the fourth day, Laura was sitting on the couch and Carmilla’s heart dropped. But the TV was off and Laura looked at her when she walked in the room. “I saw the files in your room.” She said.

Carmilla swallowed but forced to tone to be light, “Snooping again, Hollis?”

“Carmilla.” Laura said.

She sighed, “So I’m investigating. Isn’t that what you always wanted? It’s my company one day, maybe I can do something.”

“Don’t do it for me.” She almost missed Laura’s words, “I’m not worth it.”

Carmilla smiled and shook her head, “You’re always worth it.” Then she gathered up the files and held them to her chest, “But it’s not just about you. My mother needs to be stopped. Silas Records does need to be held accountable. I don’t need a musical apocalypse on my hands.”

She turned to walk out.

“Carm,” Laura stopped her. “I… we… the kiss.”

“It’s okay,” Carmilla cut her off, “You’re not the first girl to kiss me to make herself feel better.”

“I wasn’t-” Laura started.

Carmilla couldn’t let her continue. Her heart couldn’t handle hearing Laura say it was anything else. She needed to believe her own words, “Laura. It’s okay. You’re sacred and sad and you’re trying to find yourself again and you kissed me because I remind you of days before all of this started. And that’s okay.”

She left Laura with what she hoped was a reassuring smile.

Laura still spent the next few days walking around Carmilla like she was on eggshells. So on Sunday, after dragging herself from her usual 2pm sleep-in, Carmilla grabbed her violin and started running through the scales. Rarely played, the instrument squeaked under her fingers before she found her bow-hand again and started playing Led Zepplin on the classical instrument. The world smelled of rosin and the strings pressed under her fingers. Four strings feeling clumsy and small after so much time playing six-stringed guitars.

But violins were like Laura catnip.

When Laura appeared outside her open door, there was something nice in knowing that hadn’t changed.

“I thought you hated the violin,” Laura said.

Carmilla shrugged, winked, and switched to the Harry Potter theme.

“Show-off,” Laura muttered. She walked in and dropped into the highback chair in the study, “Also. That’s not even the good Harry Potter song.”

Rolling her eyes, Carmilla kept playing, “I apologize. I’m sorry my repertoire of nerd songs isn’t what it used to be. How is the literal theme not the good one?”

She’d expected anything but what happened.

Laura hummed the theme.

Her voice spilling over notes like they hadn’t in months.

She trembled part-way through but didn’t stop. Eyes locked on Carmilla’s as the bow hovered in the air, strings silent.

When Laura finished, Carmilla played the music back to her. Eyes still locked.

Laura bullied her into playing scrabble when she got home from work the next day. Carmilla lost. She didn’t touch her stack of files that night, instead, she picked the lock to Laura’s old apartment. Moving carefully, she only took one item from the house. An old, beat-up guitar with the word ‘Buffy’ scrawled across the body in sharpie.

She hadn’t touched her stack of files but when she came home, exhausted from her late night excursion, someone had left the pile slightly mis-aligned. Carmilla smiled and brushed the cookie crumbs off the desk. She gave up on the files and pulled half written music from it’s place hidden in her nighttable. Trying to capture soft lips in the beat of a piano.

She should have realized the repercussions of snoopy Laura. A week later, Carmilla came home and found a harmonica immediately shoved in her face. She blushed instantly.

“You play the harmonica now?” Laura said, giggling.

The blush didn’t fade but it felt worth it.

Throwing her hair over her shoulder, Carmilla tried to glare, “It’s a valuable instrument. Great for practicing breath control.”

“Sure,” Laura was still laughing, “Do you have a cowboy hat tucked away somewhere too? Bandanna? Boots?”

“It’s not that easy to learn,” Carmilla crossed her arms.

“Please,” Laura snorted, “It’s a harmonica.”

“Says the girl who plays a baby guitar,” Carmilla said.

“Hey now!” Laura pouted and Carmilla had to fight to keep her glare from turning to mush, “The ukelele is it’s own instrument and playing it well isn’t easy either.”

“At least you finally found something that fits your tiny body,” Carmilla said.

Laura scrunched her nose, “You are like an inch taller!”

“Still taller cupcake.”

It was a conversation they’d had a hundred times before.

“Alright,” Laura got right in her face and for a moment, Carmilla almost thought Laura’s breath caught, “If it’s so easy. We’ll swap. One week. I’ll learn the harmonica. You learn the ukulele. Loser gets the sports section first for the next month and has to make breakfast.”

She never backed down from a challenge. Carmilla winked, “Easiest pancakes I ever earned.”

Five days later she was cursing the tiny instrument. The chords were all wrong. What was the point of being a tiny guitar if it was going to make her try and remember a whole new set of chords? She kept trying to play everything wrong.

“You have four strings,” Carmilla muttered at it, “At least be a violin or something.”

“Arch your fingers more,” Laura’s voice was soft but Carmilla almost leapt off the couch, trying to jam the evil ukulele behind the cushions. She hadn’t realized Laura had come in from the backyard.

Laura apparently practiced while Carmilla was at work. She hadn’t heard the harmonica once.

“A little late,” Laura was clearly trying to hide her smile, “I already heard your, um, exquisite playing.”

Scowling, Carmilla pulled it out. The tiny neck feeling odd in her hand.

Laura’s mouth twitched as she tried to talk Carmilla through it. Eventually, she slid beside her on the couch. Her hands first correcting Carmilla’s before eventually constantly touching them in something nearer to a caress.

Which did nothing for Carmilla’s concentration.

Then, it happened. Suddenly the ukulele was in Laura’s hands and she strumming a beautiful pattern, eyes closed as though playing was the easiest thing in the world. It wasn’t a song Carmilla recognized but Laura’s fingers flew over it like it was something she had played a hundred. None of the marks of improvisation. Just something worn and old yet that felt like something calm.

She said nothing when Laura repeated it, eyes still closed but her mouth moving. Barely. But moving. Voicing words that never made it past her vocal chords.

Carmilla didn’t move until Laura stopped.

Then eyes still closed, Laura said, “I did write you songs, you know. I just. I could never publish them. I wouldn’t let her have them.”

She plucked a few more notes.

“Sometimes,” Laura said, “I think you might have been right to leave. Not because of your mother but, because, we couldn’t love each other properly then. I thought we’d have so much time to figure it out. I didn’t know how to love you and you made me your everything. You’re better now.” Her eyes fluttered open, “I’m sorry, I’m still so broken. I always wanted to talk to you about it.” Laura’s laugh was watery, “I wrote songs instead.”

Carmilla’s throat closed. So she nodded, touched Laura’s knee, and then fled to the safety of the shower.

She spent all night pouring over the files, still making no headway but determined to try. Taking a break, she went to the kitchen and her eyes were drawn to Laura sleeping on the couch. Yellow pillow under her head and blanket tucked under her chin.

Against her better judgement, Carmilla brushed the hair from Laura’s face.

They kept going. Carmilla made breakfast and Laura read the arts section aloud, gloating in her victory. Carmilla’s insistence that Laura played an awful harmonica dying in the face of the fact that Laura had to give her lessons.

She learned that Laura still liked 3 scoops of sugar in her coffee but no longer took cream.

The same. But different.

Laura asked her what she thought about what Laura should do next. She listened when Carmilla answered.

She listened.

Carmilla gave up on the files after she came home again and found them slightly askew. A ring of a milk hastily half wiped away. She smiled and let them be.

She’d never brought them home for herself anyway.

She was rubbish at mysteries. They were in the hands of the expert now. Even if Laura didn’t want to admit it. Everyday the files moved slightly.

So Carmilla went back to her piano, the notes of her unfinished melody still haunting her dreams. She spent nights sleepless, trying to find the notes. In desperation, she started cycling through instruments from violin to piano to her tenor saxophone.

The guitar came the closest.

After a week of sleepless nights, she gave up. Tumbling into bed after spending the evening listening to Laura read aloud from the second Harry Potter book. Apparently it was a travesty that Carmilla still hadn’t read them. She refused so Laura just read them aloud whenever Carmilla was in the room.

She found herself in the room a lot. Smiles between them had grown easier. Born in pointless arguments and heated scrabble games and messy kitchen cooking moments.

Laura smiled and it hurt too much to let herself remember it every night. Hunched over piano keys and trying to remind herself not to let herself love too much. Love too hard. She couldn’t keep searching for a melody that refused to be finished.

So she left it.

So Carmilla finally slept, the day becoming even more of a success when she found another file to add to her stack. She paused in her office and, instead of dropping it on the pile, turned and went to the kitchen. She handed it to Laura directly.

“Here.” She said then spun around to look in the fridge. For what? She had no idea.

There was a pause, those unfinished notes hanging in the air.

Then a quiet, “Thank you.”

“I wasn’t getting anywhere,” Carmilla said.

Another pause. Then, “Yeah. Actually. You really weren’t. It was frustrating to watch, you didn’t even use any yarn on your mystery board!”

So Carmilla got to turn, wink, and say, “I almost jammed all the files together into one big stack but I figured that might get you too frustrated and overplay my hand.” Then she waltzed out the room, an aggravated Laura shout following her.

Laura trounced her at scrabble that night.

When Carmilla came home the next night, Laura was still in her study. She shoved some yarn at Carmilla and gave her a look, “Would you helping me this. Right now. Connections must be displayed.”

Laura smiled every time Carmilla swore at another knot in the yarn.

They spent the evening stringing yarn all across the back of Carmilla’s closet, red wool twisting from one picture to the next. One file to the next.

Eventually Laura stepped back to admire her work. Carmilla stretched, trying to work the crick out of her neck, and started walking to the door to start on dinner.

Laura stopped her. A light hand on her arm, “Would you help me?”

Carmilla looked around the room, “With what cupcake? I swear, if you pull out more yarn then I’m never taking you to an arts and crafts store.”

“With your mother,” Laura said.

Carmilla’s eyebrows shot up, “What did you think I’ve been doing?”

“No. I know.” Laura shook her head. “I just. I meant. Last time, I never asked you. I just told and assumed you’d follow. I never asked. And I want to. I want to do it right this time. It’s okay if you don’t. I get it. You don’t have to. Totally. Like no pressure at all. But. I want to ask. To do it right. So, Carmilla, would you like to help me?”

Carmilla laughed and booped her nose, Laura’s serious face dissolved, “Of course, cupcake.”

It was just past 3am when Carmilla woke up to the piano. Stumbling from bed, she found Laura sitting at the piano. The melody familiar. Carmilla’s unfinished piano piece in front of her. Rubbing her eyes, she tried to cover the stutter in her chest at Laura being anywhere near that particular piece.

Laura finished as far as she’d gotten, the notes hanging uncomfortably in the air. She looked over at Carmilla all doe eyes and oversized pajamas in the light of the moon. “It’s beautiful.” she said.

“It’s not done.” Carmilla responded automatically.

“I know.” Laura looked back at the piece. She played the last few lines again, “Still beautiful. If you could just figure out how to finish it.”

Carmilla shrugged.

“Why’d you stop trying?” Laura said. She spun around the face Carmilla, feet on the wrong side of the bench.

Carmilla felt heavy, unable to move.

“You played this for weeks,” Laura continued, “Trying to figure it out. Only at night. When you thought I couldn’t hear you. And then you just stopped. You just left it alone.”

“I don’t think it wants to be finished,” Carmilla said at last, “Maybe it was always meant to be half a song.”

She almost expected Laura to roll her eyes and call her dramatic.Instead, Laura shook her head, “It’s too beautiful to let it go.” She patted the bench beside her, “You have to come back to it.”

Carmilla hesitated.

And Laura’s eyes widened, “But only if you want to of course. It was just a suggestion. I didn’t mean that you had to. I was just. Trying. I don’t want it to end. I think I know. Now. It’s just that it’s such a pretty song and songs like that deserve second chances and you said that you always come back and I was hoping that you’d really meant it except i would totally get it if you don’t because I-the piece was being stubborn and foolish and-”

It was the rambling that did.

The smallest smile on her face, Carmilla walked to the piano and sat down beside Laura. She looked over, “Ask me.”

Laura took a breath, “Play it, please?”

So Carmilla played. Every fumbling note and 2am pencil mark. She let her fingers dance across the keys, holding every note like a caress until she reached the unfinished portion. Frowning, she pushed on. With Laura’s warmth beside her, she managed a few more struggling bars. Backing up, she played them again. Pulling a few bars further. Each roughly coming forth.

Then Laura’s warmth disappeared and Carmilla stopped playing. Eyes closed and head down over the keys. The mental exhaustion taking its toll.

“I just don’t think it was meant to be,” she whispered.

But Laura’s warmth returned, this time her back facing Carmilla’s side as Laura straddled the bench. Carmilla’s breath caught. There was a guitar neck poking from her silhouette. The moon catching familiar gouges in the wood and glinting off shiny tuning pegs.

Buffy. Laura had the old guitar in her hands again.

“Play it again, please?” she whispered.

So Carmilla played. She turned away from Laura and just played. Six bars in and the gentle strum of a guitar joined in. Soft and quiet. Floating on a moonbeam, the music twisted easily together. Entwining so the pauses of the piano were filled by a pluck of guitar strings. The lingering vibrance of a chord carried along by the delicacy of a sweep of grace notes.

She missed a note when Laura started singing. Words she’d never heard before yet fit beautifully. Words born at 2am while she laboured alone over notes and hadn’t realized that Laura could hear every fumble. Every triumph. Writing her own words to match what Carmilla was trying so hard to say.

Carmilla hadn’t been writing it alone at all.

Laura had been listening.

Laura had listened. Laura had taken. Laura had built. Something together that tore down none of what Carmilla made and asked for nothing more than what she had already given. Laura sang and the guitar hummed and Carmilla kept playing. With Laura singing words that she’d never been able to speak, only feel, everything just came out. She wasn’t playing it alone. Feeling it alone. Every time she didn’t know what to play next, Laura did. Everytime Laura didn’t know what to say, she played.

So they wrote a song. Together. Something they’d never been able to do in a run-down university apartment, no matter how hard they had tried. It had always been one writing and then telling the other what to do.

So they wrote a song. Together.

Listening.

When they finished, Laura turned and Carmilla found herself turning with her. Face to face. Guitar between them.

“I told you i wanted to do it right.” Laura whispered, “All of it, Carm. All of it.”

She couldn’t have said who moved in first.

So they kissed.

Together.