Fic: Different (3/?)
Title: Different
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Everything becomes different after an unexpected move by Alex.
A/N: Happy New Year to all. We appreciate all your feedback.
Disclaimer: We don’t own the characters that we don’t own. Everything else comes from our demented minds.
Previously on 'Different': The Prologue / Part 1 / Part 2
6. A New Year
When the door buzzer sounded, Alex knew that it was Olivia downstairs. She asked who it was anyway and buzzed the cop in after hearing the familiar voice coming through the speaker. Alex idled by the kitchen, listening to the chatter of her other guests in the living room.
The knock on her door came a few minutes later and Alex threw a quick glance at the mirror she was walking past and tucked away stray strands of blonde hair behind her ear. She opened the door to find Olivia behind a giant bag of munchies in one hand and half a dozen swing-top bottles in the other. The detective had a freshly-scrubbed look to her and Alex couldn't suppress the profound pleasure she felt seeing Olivia standing there.
"Grolsch!" Alex exclaimed as she grabbed the booze from Olivia. "You know what I like."
They set the snacks down along an already overflowing dining table filled with chips, dips and other nibbles. Alex stuck the bottles of lager in the refrigerator and extracted a cold one for Olivia. Then they headed out to the living room.
Looking around Olivia only recognized Elizabeth Olivet, one time consulting psychologist to the DA's office and a mutual friend of Alex and Olivia.
Alex made the requisite introductions for the rest of the group, pointing out Eli Zimmer and Tom Dobrowski from the DA's office, Tracy Ng, Alex's roommate from her final year at Columbia, and her husband Jerry. Alex grabbed Olivia by her arm and they settled in among the group.
The score was tied with seconds to go before half time. A broken up play at fourth down had the free safety blazing past the linemen to lay a bone crunching hit on the Stanford quarterback. The living room filled with groans of empathy.
"That's a strike... right?" Olivia asked blank-faced as the referee tossed a yellow flag onto the field. Everyone turned to look at her.
Alex noticed the twitching of Olivia's lips, and since her alcohol soaked brain was slow to come up with a retort she considered throwing the remote at the detective. By that time, everyone had caught on to the act. Elizabeth thanked Olivia for propagating the sports-ignorant female myth. The game played on but it quickly became secondary to the conversations and grazing, supplemented by an endless supply of spirits, that of camaraderie and the kinds imbibed.
At the sound of the final gun, the Stanford Cardinals celebrated their first big time bowl game victory in almost three decades. This caused Alex to break out more wine and - to mock grousing from her guests - Trivial Pursuit.
After a few games and tired of being trounced by Tracy, who turned out to be not only a cut-throat corporate lawyer but an apparent pop culture nerd, everyone began to take their leave. Alex stayed by the door to bid her guests goodbye. Olivia and Elizabeth remained, in silent adherence to some sisterhood code, to help clean up.
While getting out some trash bags Elizabeth received an emergency call on her cell and so she surrendered the receptacles to Olivia. With hasty hugs and promises to do lunch soon she dashed out the door. That left Alex and Olivia, and they surveyed a living room that looked like the aftermath of a high school gathering.
Alex turned to Olivia. "You don't have to stay, you know."
"It's fine. I don't have any where else I need to be."
"I owe you."
They divided and conquered. Olivia walked over to the entertainment center and Alex told her she could play anything she liked. She flipped through Alex's CD collection and decided on an illegally copied mix of sixties rock music. The stereo speakers came to life a moment later with the sound of John, Michele, Denny and Cass. The off-duty cop bumped along to the music as she walked the room with a trash bag.
Alex needs to talk to her guests about taking their plates to the kitchen, Olivia decided. She tossed plate after plate of half eaten snacks while Alex created her own snack mix by consolidating the mostly emptied bags of chips, pretzels and cheese covered shapes of all sizes into one bag.
"Do you dream of California?" Olivia asked during the musical interlude.
"I dream of riding through Napa Valley, you know, vineyard country and all, on the back of a motorcycle," Alex admitted. She picked up an almost empty wine bottle and finished it in two swallows.
Olivia smothered a grin at the completely unrefined behavior being displayed by Alex. "Sounds like fun."
"It was. Jay and I used to spend weekends riding his bike. Up the coast, down the coast," Alex said as she chucked the bottle in the glass-recycling bin Olivia had dragged in from the kitchen.
"Jay?"
"Jason Oliver. Brilliant financial guy, built like Thor, loving and thoughtful.”
"Yeah? What happened to him?"
"I left him in California. Neither one of us was willing to relocate," Alex said, frowning at her own stubborn refusal to compromise. She pointed to a picture that hung on her wall with a slew of others. “That's Jay and his family."
"Nice looking family." Olivia didn't comment on the fact that Jay's wife looked a hell of a lot like Alex.
"If you're into that sort of thing."
"And you're not?"
"Someday maybe. I'm more interested in protecting other people's children right now…" Alex said with a lopsided shrug. Her face broke into a grin when the next song came on. "Oh cool."
"Cool?" Olivia asked, a little stupefied.
"My youth slipping out I suppose. Just shows you how drunk I must be," Alex mused. She hadn't stopped her effort to clean so Olivia started in again.
"I never pegged you for 'cool'. Maybe 'righteous' or 'wicked'."
"Never wicked. I'm from New York not Massa chewiest," Alex told her.
"Only Massachs… Massachu…"
"Massachusettans?" Alex supplied.
"Yeah that. Thanks. Only can they used wicked?"
Olivia thought about her word order for a brief second but they must have been right because Alex kept up her end of the drunken conversation.
They chatted on about past loves, likes and wishes unfulfilled as they cleaned the room. It didn't take long to finish up. Olivia sung with Janice Joplin under her breath as she took the last bottle of wine and the Trivial Pursuit box to their homes in the closet and fridge. She retrieved the last two cold bottles of Grolsch and met Alex, who was returning from the restroom, at the couch. They plopped down together.
Alex sipped the cold beer and felt a wave of dizziness. She closed her eyes briefly and let the feeling pass. She quickly discovered that Olivia's shoulder made nice pillow and unintentionally she sighed with contentedness.
Olivia turned and regarded the lawyer briefly before she took a closer look at the label on the beer. It was inexplicably fascinating so she stared longer. Finally, she asked, "Isn't this stuff made in the Netherlands?"
"I dunno," came the slurred response.
"I think it is. So... why's the bottle green. Fake Irish beer?" Olivia asked as she continued to watch light bounce off her bottle.
"Probably some marketing research somewhere that suggests beer sells better in green bottles. Maybe it tastes better in a green bottle," the drunk lawyer tried to posit.
"Like blue M & M's tasting different than the others?"
"Blue and red taste the same. Too much dye. Yes, green beer... green bottles make the green beer better," Alex said.
"Green beer batter?" Olivia asked in bewilderment. She turned slightly and Alex slid off her shoulder. Olivia found herself face to face with Alex. Alex who was wearing a half smirk. Olivia blinked as Alex became serious and leaned in.
The kiss was brief. Too brief and too long. Olivia didn't respond until it was too late. Alex pulled back.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that," Alex told her, turning away.
"Then why did you?" Olivia asked.
"I think... Think it's the alcohol," Alex replied after an intimidating pause.
Olivia scowled. She hated that excuse but the anger dissipated in seconds. She had been staring at her beer bottle in fascination a minute earlier.
"Oh."
"Yes, oh. I'm sure that in the morning we'll laugh about it but right now laughing may make us puke. That would be bad. Real ba..."
Olivia tuned out Alex's ramblings. Olivia didn't want to laugh. She wanted to remember that all too brief a kiss, savor it and - to hell with consequences - do it again. She was about to tell Alex that when she realized that the blonde had fallen silent. Fallen asleep actually. Passed out on Olivia's shoulder to be precise. Olivia watched Alex for a moment then debated as what her next move would be.
She didn't want to wake Alex and Olivia was too drunk to carry her to the bedroom. She debated, planned, worried and then gently moved so that Alex would fall to the couch. Olivia caught her and laid her on the sofa. The NYPD throw that Alex kept on her rocking chair covered her perfectly. Olivia watched her sleep for a minute and then realized she was about three minutes from her own exit to slumber.
After a trip to the bathroom she snuggled down in Alex's extremely comfortable bed. She curled a pillow under her arm while muttering, "Shoulda been more specific with that birthday wish. Wanna be in Alex's bed. You've got a shitty sense of humor, Fate. Damn you, Alex… why'd you have to go an' do that? I finally quit thinking about you fifteen hours a day and now I'm gonna dream about you five hours a night. Fuck me..."
The room fell silent as Olivia passed out into an alcohol fueled dream state.
* * *
Alex groaned into the crook of her elbow. It was way too painful to move. She wondered if someone had hit her in the head and caused a concussion. She wondered if the drumbeats would ever lessen. She even wondered how the room could spin like that. She groaned again and decided that passing back out would be a blessing from God.
Apparently he was listening because the next thing she knew it was later and she felt a tiny bit better. Alex managed to open her eyes enough to see the fairly clean apartment. The last time she had a party she had awakened to a roach colony having their own celebration on her coffee table.
She remembered Olivia helping her clean before she had passed out. She sighed knowing that she owed the detective a big thank you. She was contemplating what she could do to show her appreciation when the kiss came back to her.
I kissed her, she thought. Alex contemplated her stupidity as she closed her eyes again. She liked Olivia. She was a good friend. Alex had never been in a relationship with a woman before and had no intention of starting now.
So why'd I kiss her? Alex wondered. After a few minutes of thought her still fuzzy brain came to the same conclusion it had in the midst of having entirely too much to drink. It had to be.
Alex sighed again and pushed it out her mind. A quick search of the apartment found herself alone. Olivia had left a note. It thanked her for the invitation and apologized for leaving so stealthily but the squad had called and she was needed.
How can she possibly function? Alex wondered as she opened the refrigerator for a bottle of water to wash down the Advil. She used her hip to shut the door and opened the bottle and downed it with the tablets.
Alex was almost back to the couch when she frowned. She retraced her steps, opened the refrigerator and peered into it to confirm what she'd seen earlier - the Trivial Pursuit game was sitting snug between a takeout box and an expired gallon of milk. She shook her head in amusement but stopped quickly as it made her slightly nauseous. She reached for the game but then decided that sitting down was more important.
The couch was as comfortable as she had left it. She was contemplating the game box when she fell asleep again.
* * *
END ACT I
Rating: PG-13
Summary: Everything becomes different after an unexpected move by Alex.
A/N: Happy New Year to all. We appreciate all your feedback.
Disclaimer: We don’t own the characters that we don’t own. Everything else comes from our demented minds.
Previously on 'Different': The Prologue / Part 1 / Part 2
6. A New Year
When the door buzzer sounded, Alex knew that it was Olivia downstairs. She asked who it was anyway and buzzed the cop in after hearing the familiar voice coming through the speaker. Alex idled by the kitchen, listening to the chatter of her other guests in the living room.
The knock on her door came a few minutes later and Alex threw a quick glance at the mirror she was walking past and tucked away stray strands of blonde hair behind her ear. She opened the door to find Olivia behind a giant bag of munchies in one hand and half a dozen swing-top bottles in the other. The detective had a freshly-scrubbed look to her and Alex couldn't suppress the profound pleasure she felt seeing Olivia standing there.
"Grolsch!" Alex exclaimed as she grabbed the booze from Olivia. "You know what I like."
They set the snacks down along an already overflowing dining table filled with chips, dips and other nibbles. Alex stuck the bottles of lager in the refrigerator and extracted a cold one for Olivia. Then they headed out to the living room.
Looking around Olivia only recognized Elizabeth Olivet, one time consulting psychologist to the DA's office and a mutual friend of Alex and Olivia.
Alex made the requisite introductions for the rest of the group, pointing out Eli Zimmer and Tom Dobrowski from the DA's office, Tracy Ng, Alex's roommate from her final year at Columbia, and her husband Jerry. Alex grabbed Olivia by her arm and they settled in among the group.
The score was tied with seconds to go before half time. A broken up play at fourth down had the free safety blazing past the linemen to lay a bone crunching hit on the Stanford quarterback. The living room filled with groans of empathy.
"That's a strike... right?" Olivia asked blank-faced as the referee tossed a yellow flag onto the field. Everyone turned to look at her.
Alex noticed the twitching of Olivia's lips, and since her alcohol soaked brain was slow to come up with a retort she considered throwing the remote at the detective. By that time, everyone had caught on to the act. Elizabeth thanked Olivia for propagating the sports-ignorant female myth. The game played on but it quickly became secondary to the conversations and grazing, supplemented by an endless supply of spirits, that of camaraderie and the kinds imbibed.
At the sound of the final gun, the Stanford Cardinals celebrated their first big time bowl game victory in almost three decades. This caused Alex to break out more wine and - to mock grousing from her guests - Trivial Pursuit.
After a few games and tired of being trounced by Tracy, who turned out to be not only a cut-throat corporate lawyer but an apparent pop culture nerd, everyone began to take their leave. Alex stayed by the door to bid her guests goodbye. Olivia and Elizabeth remained, in silent adherence to some sisterhood code, to help clean up.
While getting out some trash bags Elizabeth received an emergency call on her cell and so she surrendered the receptacles to Olivia. With hasty hugs and promises to do lunch soon she dashed out the door. That left Alex and Olivia, and they surveyed a living room that looked like the aftermath of a high school gathering.
Alex turned to Olivia. "You don't have to stay, you know."
"It's fine. I don't have any where else I need to be."
"I owe you."
They divided and conquered. Olivia walked over to the entertainment center and Alex told her she could play anything she liked. She flipped through Alex's CD collection and decided on an illegally copied mix of sixties rock music. The stereo speakers came to life a moment later with the sound of John, Michele, Denny and Cass. The off-duty cop bumped along to the music as she walked the room with a trash bag.
Alex needs to talk to her guests about taking their plates to the kitchen, Olivia decided. She tossed plate after plate of half eaten snacks while Alex created her own snack mix by consolidating the mostly emptied bags of chips, pretzels and cheese covered shapes of all sizes into one bag.
"Do you dream of California?" Olivia asked during the musical interlude.
"I dream of riding through Napa Valley, you know, vineyard country and all, on the back of a motorcycle," Alex admitted. She picked up an almost empty wine bottle and finished it in two swallows.
Olivia smothered a grin at the completely unrefined behavior being displayed by Alex. "Sounds like fun."
"It was. Jay and I used to spend weekends riding his bike. Up the coast, down the coast," Alex said as she chucked the bottle in the glass-recycling bin Olivia had dragged in from the kitchen.
"Jay?"
"Jason Oliver. Brilliant financial guy, built like Thor, loving and thoughtful.”
"Yeah? What happened to him?"
"I left him in California. Neither one of us was willing to relocate," Alex said, frowning at her own stubborn refusal to compromise. She pointed to a picture that hung on her wall with a slew of others. “That's Jay and his family."
"Nice looking family." Olivia didn't comment on the fact that Jay's wife looked a hell of a lot like Alex.
"If you're into that sort of thing."
"And you're not?"
"Someday maybe. I'm more interested in protecting other people's children right now…" Alex said with a lopsided shrug. Her face broke into a grin when the next song came on. "Oh cool."
"Cool?" Olivia asked, a little stupefied.
"My youth slipping out I suppose. Just shows you how drunk I must be," Alex mused. She hadn't stopped her effort to clean so Olivia started in again.
"I never pegged you for 'cool'. Maybe 'righteous' or 'wicked'."
"Never wicked. I'm from New York not Massa chewiest," Alex told her.
"Only Massachs… Massachu…"
"Massachusettans?" Alex supplied.
"Yeah that. Thanks. Only can they used wicked?"
Olivia thought about her word order for a brief second but they must have been right because Alex kept up her end of the drunken conversation.
They chatted on about past loves, likes and wishes unfulfilled as they cleaned the room. It didn't take long to finish up. Olivia sung with Janice Joplin under her breath as she took the last bottle of wine and the Trivial Pursuit box to their homes in the closet and fridge. She retrieved the last two cold bottles of Grolsch and met Alex, who was returning from the restroom, at the couch. They plopped down together.
Alex sipped the cold beer and felt a wave of dizziness. She closed her eyes briefly and let the feeling pass. She quickly discovered that Olivia's shoulder made nice pillow and unintentionally she sighed with contentedness.
Olivia turned and regarded the lawyer briefly before she took a closer look at the label on the beer. It was inexplicably fascinating so she stared longer. Finally, she asked, "Isn't this stuff made in the Netherlands?"
"I dunno," came the slurred response.
"I think it is. So... why's the bottle green. Fake Irish beer?" Olivia asked as she continued to watch light bounce off her bottle.
"Probably some marketing research somewhere that suggests beer sells better in green bottles. Maybe it tastes better in a green bottle," the drunk lawyer tried to posit.
"Like blue M & M's tasting different than the others?"
"Blue and red taste the same. Too much dye. Yes, green beer... green bottles make the green beer better," Alex said.
"Green beer batter?" Olivia asked in bewilderment. She turned slightly and Alex slid off her shoulder. Olivia found herself face to face with Alex. Alex who was wearing a half smirk. Olivia blinked as Alex became serious and leaned in.
The kiss was brief. Too brief and too long. Olivia didn't respond until it was too late. Alex pulled back.
"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have done that," Alex told her, turning away.
"Then why did you?" Olivia asked.
"I think... Think it's the alcohol," Alex replied after an intimidating pause.
Olivia scowled. She hated that excuse but the anger dissipated in seconds. She had been staring at her beer bottle in fascination a minute earlier.
"Oh."
"Yes, oh. I'm sure that in the morning we'll laugh about it but right now laughing may make us puke. That would be bad. Real ba..."
Olivia tuned out Alex's ramblings. Olivia didn't want to laugh. She wanted to remember that all too brief a kiss, savor it and - to hell with consequences - do it again. She was about to tell Alex that when she realized that the blonde had fallen silent. Fallen asleep actually. Passed out on Olivia's shoulder to be precise. Olivia watched Alex for a moment then debated as what her next move would be.
She didn't want to wake Alex and Olivia was too drunk to carry her to the bedroom. She debated, planned, worried and then gently moved so that Alex would fall to the couch. Olivia caught her and laid her on the sofa. The NYPD throw that Alex kept on her rocking chair covered her perfectly. Olivia watched her sleep for a minute and then realized she was about three minutes from her own exit to slumber.
After a trip to the bathroom she snuggled down in Alex's extremely comfortable bed. She curled a pillow under her arm while muttering, "Shoulda been more specific with that birthday wish. Wanna be in Alex's bed. You've got a shitty sense of humor, Fate. Damn you, Alex… why'd you have to go an' do that? I finally quit thinking about you fifteen hours a day and now I'm gonna dream about you five hours a night. Fuck me..."
The room fell silent as Olivia passed out into an alcohol fueled dream state.
* * *
Alex groaned into the crook of her elbow. It was way too painful to move. She wondered if someone had hit her in the head and caused a concussion. She wondered if the drumbeats would ever lessen. She even wondered how the room could spin like that. She groaned again and decided that passing back out would be a blessing from God.
Apparently he was listening because the next thing she knew it was later and she felt a tiny bit better. Alex managed to open her eyes enough to see the fairly clean apartment. The last time she had a party she had awakened to a roach colony having their own celebration on her coffee table.
She remembered Olivia helping her clean before she had passed out. She sighed knowing that she owed the detective a big thank you. She was contemplating what she could do to show her appreciation when the kiss came back to her.
I kissed her, she thought. Alex contemplated her stupidity as she closed her eyes again. She liked Olivia. She was a good friend. Alex had never been in a relationship with a woman before and had no intention of starting now.
So why'd I kiss her? Alex wondered. After a few minutes of thought her still fuzzy brain came to the same conclusion it had in the midst of having entirely too much to drink. It had to be.
Alex sighed again and pushed it out her mind. A quick search of the apartment found herself alone. Olivia had left a note. It thanked her for the invitation and apologized for leaving so stealthily but the squad had called and she was needed.
How can she possibly function? Alex wondered as she opened the refrigerator for a bottle of water to wash down the Advil. She used her hip to shut the door and opened the bottle and downed it with the tablets.
Alex was almost back to the couch when she frowned. She retraced her steps, opened the refrigerator and peered into it to confirm what she'd seen earlier - the Trivial Pursuit game was sitting snug between a takeout box and an expired gallon of milk. She shook her head in amusement but stopped quickly as it made her slightly nauseous. She reached for the game but then decided that sitting down was more important.
The couch was as comfortable as she had left it. She was contemplating the game box when she fell asleep again.
* * *
END ACT I