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Flirtin' with the Enemy (MouseNoises & Kalissacolyte)



Parker was a shudder with internal quakes, the chasm left behind spreading so wide she felt she might implode into it, into herself. . . But Moe held her, Morgan kept her together. I got yah, what else could she ask to hear? That was the exact perfect phrase to cling to in her head, a dose of dopamine on demand should she play it over, she did too. She felt so secure, like all her vulnerabilities had been met with kind & protected trust that would soon be utterly shattered. Fingers in her hair, so soft, splaying & running through. Parker coulda' died happy then & there.

Then she was leaving, a pang of regret came as her fingers clenched a little, not willing to release just yet; though ultimately they did. "Right back," Parker echoed with an exhausted sorta smile, trying not to let her needy bullshit come into play, she was still but young.

Oh, she watched. Watched every motion as Moe escaped, only to return moments later with water and something else. Something less considerate less special, less perfect like everything else had been. How foolish she'd been to make this anything more than a wild fuck with some. . . "Y'ah." Parker took the water first, a few greedy gulps, a drip running down her throat, though it might be hard to tell the difference from her chilling sweat.

A moment's reprieve, a moment was all she'd get though. Amazing. The sex? Was it the sex or everything else that was amazing?

maybe this was a bad idea.

She coulda' just said it. Parker, was a bad idea. She knew that. But. . . somehow she'd romanticized this to be something other than a bad idea. The best idea. The best feeling. She'd felt so whole. So complete, being held. Was she being over dramatic? "Y'ah, no. . . uh. For sure, eh?" Rhetorical Canadian roots bleeding into her nervous state, she wouldn't fight back tears, too hollow to produce any just yet. Why be surprised? Parker shut down a little, sliding over the edge of the bed, wobbly post orgasm legs, they barely carried her out of the room, she felt like a ghost collecting her things on the way.

"Probably a bad idea." She echoed, unsure if Morgan even followed her "I know." She hummed absently as she retrieved and slipped into her pants, blouse over, not bothering with her bra, just bunching it up and shoving what of it she could in her pocket at this point, did she even have her panties on? Parker just wanted to be gone. . . gone because as soon as the elevator ping'd to greet her she knew the tears would come and. . . well, she didn't want Moe to know, bad idea's didn't get to have a goodnight kiss & that was tragic to her, she didn't want Moe to know that it hurt more than all get out to be just another bad idea.

Parker didn't blame her. She was right, she just kinda' thought for a second it didn't matter.
 


Moe reached out as Parker was getting up, but her fingers missed Parker's skin by an inch, and instead she clenched her hand into a fist and pulled the blankets up over herself with her other hand. Watched as Parker got dressed, gathered up whatever she didn't put on. "I, um," she started to say, but didn't actually know how to end it. Why was Parker heading out so quickly? Was it something Moe had said? Was she...

...was she just done?

Moe barely managed to ask "I'll... see you tomorrow?" before her apartment's door shut behind her.

Leaving her.

Alone.

Well, maybe not exactly alone. Curry, her cat, jumped up onto the bed, sniffing around where Parker had been and looking at Moe with another accusatory glance. Moe scritched the cat behind the ears, but wasn't really paying much attention to her actions. She was trying to hang on, hang on to the feelings she'd been experiencing just a minute ago, trying to hold back the silence and darkness and emptiness that was filling the room in Parker's wake.

"Maybe it... was a bad idea," Moe said. "Maybe this couldn't go anywhere."

But then. It's not like Morgan was anywhere right now, anyway. She looked around her apartment, still largely unpacked, still not really a home. For awhile, for maybe...what had it been, 45 minutes? Less than that? It had felt like a home. Hell, it had felt more like a home than the old house had, the last few years. Now it was just... the place where she was.

She got up. Drank more water. Stared at the floor. Stared at the ceiling. Considered killing what was left of a six-pack and forcing herself into unconsciousness, but she didn't want... she didn't want to forget. She didn't want the alcohol to dull this night, not even the pain, not even the loss and confusion she felt right now.

Once again, Parker made her feel more than she had in a long, long time. Even if what she felt right now was... awful.

Curry twined around her ankles, staring at the door.

"It's okay, you," she said to the cat. "I don't think the stranger's coming, mmm, mback..." Then. Then the tears came.

She never went back to bed that night. She curled up on the couch instead, turned on mindless murder-show TV, and sometime around three in the morning, drifted off to sleep. She woke up less than two hours later, with her eyes crusted over with dried tears.

She got up. Showered (cried a little, told herself she'd gotten soap in her eye). Pulled on clothes, too many layers even for the season. Took the bus to the streetcar, took the streetcar to the new plaza, and walked from there to... the Lifestyle Center.

Morgan told the two old women -- not that old, Morgan was nipping at their heels, and had never felt that more acutely than right now -- that the store wouldn't open for another hour, and ignored/placated them as she unlocked the front door. Entered her security key. Left the lights off, and went to the office.

(Cried a little there, too. Told herself the cold was thawing in her eyes).

No breakfast. Her stomach hurt too much. She was too hungry to eat.

Waited for someone else to clock in for the morning shift. To give her an excuse to act like... like a responsible grownup. Like Morgan.
 
Parker wanted to say she didn't cry, like, it didn't matter. . . she wanted to say a lot about Moe, but she didn't call her that. Parker didn't call Morgan at all, not that night. She bawled in the elevator, managed to get that far. She thought three times over that night that she'd pull the steering wheel if she cried any harder. It wasn't. . . it wasn't every day someone accepted her like Morgan had, scars and knicks, tracks & dysfunction; she thought Moe did. Bad Idea. The more she thought it the more she manipulated it, the more she misremembered, the more she. . . it felt like Morgan had used her, like she hadn't had the regard to explain herself when that wasn't exactly fair, that wasn't exactly true, it wasn't exactly like Moe had thrown her out.

She didn't leave, not right away though. Her heart was palpitating in the lobby, she needed a minute there, the cool air hit her like a brick wall when she exited the building to make the icy walk back to her car. It was somber, pathetic, she hid her face from people passing by, not that there were many in the dead of night.

For a while, before she pulled out and off Parker just wrung her wheel with the radio & heat sucking away her fuel. She didn't care. She couldn't drive.

Why did she give her so much power? She'd almost walked away from her entirely with success. Don't touch me!

But then there was so much more than that to them now. Was that really such monumentally fabulous sex? -or was it just her sensitive, dope deprived ass making it more? She didn't know. . . frankly she didn't want to. She didn't want to dissect it yet,

Finally the car started, she was still rotating between heaving breaths and hard sobs but she couldn't sit in the parking lot anymore. She felt like she was insane for being there this long, it was deep in the AM by the time she managed to reach her own, far from safe. It wasn't just for Morgan she cried, once she started it all came out, it all poured through her eyes in the worst way, her living arrangements, her job, her need to fuck everything up, Morgan being right about her, Morgan seeing her so soon after, well, seeing her. That might have been what hurt the most. She really thought she was accepted.

In her spartan flat, sans pet, she laid on her futon mattress; lights on, clothes on. . . eventually sleep would take her, when she could cry no more. In some ways? ? ? It was a good thing. Get it out. All of it. 'cause tomorrow, Morgan would get nothing from her. She'd protect herself, she'd return to her cutting glares and get back stares. She didn't need to go to the bar with them for them to like her the next week, nor the week after that, she didn't need Morgan's protection to keep herself afloat because Dick-smack-Dan himself seemed keen on teaching her this & that for a few days, a pet project, maybe just to threaten Morgan with the idea Parker could replace her as work wife of sorts, not that it was any sort of loving relationship.

Parker didn't know what else to do. Every time she saw her, she was reminded of those two words she so awfully aimed at herself.

You're just a bad idea Parker.

"Fuck off."

"I will not fuck off, I'm your boss & she's. . . she knows her shit with the handhelds, spot inventory is easy! -frankly I can't be assed. The boys Parker, auh." A bravado exhale, balled fists and beer belly out, the skinny fat-ass that was Dan chortled with glee, he had plans to go out on the town with the boys, friends of both of theirs that Parker no longer assosciated with, as if it were supposed to invoke jealousy they'd be going out to grab ass and snort lines off stripper tits. . . OK she was a little, part of her, the smallest part of her, maybe.

"She thinks she's like, hot shit. If she's so good, she can do it herself."

"Fritz, this is not up for debate." He laid down the law and his hands on the desk, "Tomorrow, 5 am, spot inventory."

So it was.

The sun was still somewhere on the other side of the world, Parker, parked out front of the store smoking dart after dart in her car, awaiting Morgan, who she'd have no choice but to spend the morning with, for more than snarly faces & short answers could stave off. fuck.
 
Morgan pulled in, winced at the sight of another car already in the employee parking lot. No one else was supposed to be here, unless Dan had decided to actually help her for once, and Dan drove a busted-ass, might-have-been-fancy-back-in-the-Reagen-years Lincoln. This car, wasn't that.

This car was the one where Morgan had started to feel alive again. For a little while. Once. What seemed like decades ago, now.

Morgan had weathered the sting of Parker's words (worse, the words she hadn't said) with as much humility and pride as she could manage, which really just meant that she had managed to not let it show how much it hurt. To this day, Morgan couldn't be sure if something she'd said had set Parker off, or if this was just... Parker. If Morgan wasn't the first person she'd done this to.

She'd seen the tracks. Sure she had -- Morgan had seen pretty much all of Parker, but the love-drunk had kept her from thinking about it. What they meant, what they implied, what it could make Morgan mean to Parker. Morgan had had some bad nights, weekends... some bad months, where she'd used a stupid app to order a magnum bottle of scotch and opened it just seconds after the delivery person had left her door, and three nights later done the same thing. Did that make her an addict? She didn't know. She didn't know a damn thing about it, but she knew about need. She had seen that kind of need in Parker's eyes. Decided that what Parker needed was her, what she needed was Moe.

Bullshit. That's just what Morgan had wanted her to need. What a stupid thing, wanting someone else to need something, when need was what ruined your life.

For example. Right now, this morning, Morgan needed to do spot inventory, so they could report it to District Management. And she needed Parker's help. Well, she needed someone's help, anyway -- even Morgan couldn't do the whole store in four hours, and Dan had picked Parker for it. God only knew why.

Morgan gripped her steering wheel. Envied Parker her smokes, just for the sake of having something to do with her hands. Listened to a few more seconds of her podcast, then turned the car off, scooped up her phone and her lanyard, zipped up her jacket.

She started towards the loading dock doors, then paused. Winced. What was she going to do, go in there without at least saying "hello?" Not talk during the entire procedure, when they'd need to at least be on walkie-talkies all morning to track progress? This was stupid. This was...

Morgan chewed her lip.

This was the first time she'd spend alone with Parker since she'd left Morgan's apartment.

She turned back to Parker's car, tapped a finger on the window. "My key," she said. "It unlocks the loading dock door, there's a shortcut up to the office." She sighed. "And I know where Dan keeps his fancy coffee stash, the one he doesn't think we all know about." She shrugged. "You don't... have to have coffee with me, but if you want... come up with me, and I'll make you a cup."

Bullshit apologies are 50% bullshit by volume. She'd said that to Henry a time or two, and now she said it to herself. Was this an apology? Or just an attempt to... get along to get along?

Whatever. She wanted coffee.

And even as bad as things had been, as certain as Morgan was that one and maybe both of them had fucked up... she actually kind of did want to have coffee with Parker.

It might make up for the coffee she wished they'd had the morning after.
 
Parker's heart sunk a little when she saw Morgan through the smoke screen in her car. Dressed in a combination of one of the few outfits she'd bought since starting at the store - she had a rotation of maybe five actual outfits and a few that worked well with each other to mix and match, she still felt self conscious about the idea of it all, about having clothes specific to the store and very little if any others, a pair of jeans and a tank top she'd picked out just for her. Morgan had been the first good thing in this new life, now she wasn't sure if it was her who ruined it all or if she was the perpetrator, she knew she was only making it worse but for whatever reason she couldn't stop. She still felt wounded by the idea, she was just another bad idea.

Briefly her eyes stung, a catch in her throat that made her gag on smoke. She let the sting die then and there, she wouldn't let Moe wriggle back into her mind for now. She'd smoke her next cigarette, 4:46, there was time. Then came footfalls, closer and closer on the pavement outside. She could hear Morgan approach through her open window, disarmed for the moment. Parker looked to Morgan without her usual snarl but rather more vulnerability than she cared to show. . . this was a battle after all, wasn't it?

"Yah, no. . . OK, for sure." Parker stumbled over herself unintentionally, she was nervous, it was the most she'd really said to her in what felt like weeks, not that she gave her much chance.

It was so exhausting.
Parker rolled her window up and slipped out of the car after turning her key and discarding her cigarette. In slacks and a blouse, some comfortable shoes (for once) Parker followed Moe, for the moment, silent.
 
Morgan remembered the last time they'd walked through cold like this together -- except it hadn't been walking, it had been running. They'd had someplace to go, and they were going to go there together. Now, it was all Morgan could do not to drag her feet, to draw out this moment.

And, why draw it out, anyway? Parker's expression gave Morgan no clue about what was going on in Parker's mind, and that was just the problem: Morgan had no idea what Parker was thinking, ever. Parker probably felt the same way about Morgan. That's what had gone wrong, hadn't it? Maybe. Or maybe that was wishful thinking. Maybe Parker had understood exactly what Morgan had meant, and understood that it meant Morgan wanted... something... from her.

That was a shitty way to feel about someone whom you had held tightly in a dark bedroom. But, Morgan was practiced at that, as both perpetrator and victim. Why should this new thing, almost almost-new, almost thing, be any different?

She got the loading bay unlocked, jabbed in her keycode to kill the alarm, and offered Parker a hand up. "Careful, there's a big sheet of black ice on the top step," she said, she'd almost eaten it herself the day before. Maybe a warning would have sufficed, but Morgan couldn't help herself -- the hand extended, covered by a driving glove, but an offer of help just the same.

She wondered if Parker would even want to touch her.
 
Parker followed, trying not to. . . trying not to think about what she couldn't have. Flashes of that night playing back to her, she swore for a second she could taste her, smell her, feel her whispered words 'I see you, now see me,' stinging in her mind, usually she just thought about being called a bad idea - or at least, that was how she remembered it now, manipulated by her own doubts and the bully stick in her head she beat herself with regularly. Right now though? She didn't feel that. Not at all. She felt. . . she didn't know what to feel!

Confrontational words rung through her mind as they neared the building, confrontational words and actions and desires. Parker had felt the need to chew her out since that night, not like bubblegum either - she wanted to scream in her face. She felt used. She felt hurt. She was wounded and no amount of tissue paper could solve that crying fit, she'd wadded up too many to count on the drive home, her entire purse stash effectively snotted. Parker really did want that, to snap, every bone in her body felt ready to spring into splinters and propel her forward like the mess she was right into Morgan and whatever game she was playing that night.

. . . it hurt being told she was acceptable, just to be thrown out into the cold, or at least *suggested out*.

Nearly missing the offer for help Parker stopped. She looked up at the hand and paused, looking further still to the face behind it. Parker's snarly resting bitch face broke to something more pensive, more worried even. Her nostrils flared with a huff, sure, she'd take the help. But that didn't mean she wasn't seething behind it. "Y'ah. Thanks." monotone, deadpan, passive-aggressive fuck-you-bitch, hand in hand she avoided the black eyes and brushed passed Morgan.

Why was she so mad? -it was fair. It was all fair. Morgan didn't need Parker fucking up her life, she'd fuck up her own soon enough. . . it was good. This was good. It was good and fair.

. . . so why did it fucking sting? Why didn't it feel fair?

Cringing Parker stood off to the side and hugged herself a little, trying to keep it in. She was distressed but not visibly so. They'd been together two seconds and she was already on the verge of a panic attack. . . how the fuck was she gunna do this? Another cigarette, would certainly calm her nerves. . . it wasn't possible though. She knew that was out of the question. A sobering, shaky breath rattled her thoroughly before she released herself and took off her coat.

She could feel herself sweating already. Maybe she should apologize, for how she'd been since. She should have been more mature than standoffish, accept that it wasn't meant to be or whatever and move on, she didn't need to be this snarling cunt she'd become whenever Morgan was close by. . . no wonder she wanted nothing to do with her, she was so fucking overdramatic. Wasn't she?

"Well, let's get it over with." she instead croaked with derision dripping from every syllable. "Y'know. . . after coffee." looking off to the side, trying not to look impressed - it wasn't hard in this instance, but then, it was hard not to look completely devastated too.
 
"Yeah," Morgan agreed, trying not to look at Parker, but unable to resist the temptation presented by Parker looking... elsewhere. How many times had Morgan stared down the aisles at Parker, her attention drawn like a magnet, making up excuse after excuse to be near her, even when at the same time she wanted to be in... god, Australia would have been a good start. Anywhere, but where Parker could see her. Could... affect her.

Like now.

She led the way up to Dan's office. Jimmied the pitiful cupboard lock open, revealing both the pint of Smirnoff and a little cigarillo box that smelled like sweet weed, which Dan kept hidden between years-old employee handbooks... but more importantly, the the mostly-full bag of fresh beans from Oaxaca, Mexico, smelling like one of those chocolate oranges Morgan remembered sometimes getting from her parents for Christmas. Wordlessly, focusing like a surgeon on the process, she ground the coffee, poured it into the filter, measured out the water from a bottle in Dan's mini-fridge -- not caring if Parker saw the cans of Nattie Bo in there, too, because fuck it, right? -- and got the machine going.

Smell of coffee. Florescent lights, flickering. The hard edges and flat planes that made up the entire world before six in the morning.

Morgan wanted to be the one to say something. Wanted Parker to be the one to say something. Wanted to start a fight, wanted to break down crying, wanted...

...wanted to not say a goddamn word, and just pick back up right where they'd left off, right here in the office with nothing between them but their work clothes...

Which was stupid. Worse, it was wrong. Parker wanted nothing to do with her, she'd made that clear.

But Morgan was choking. She could feel herself turning blue from the silence.

"I wish..." Morgan started.

The coffee machine burbled. Hissed.

"I wish... we hadn't met... like we had," she said, wincing the words out, pushing them out through clenched teeth and clenched fists. "Maybe things wouldn't... maybe I wouldn't..."

Emotional black ice. She was slipping on it now, losing her footing, her position. She was going to fall, and she had no reason to believe that Parker would catch her. Had every reason to think she might, instead, give Morgan a push.

Maybe she might even like it. That's how fucked up she was over this beautiful mess in the almost-matching blouse and jeans, still smelling deliciously of cigarettes. Morgan's lips puckered, waiting for the push. The hit. The end she deserved.
 
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