Finding Myself

The blonde nodded as she stepped out of the embrace. “Yes!” she grinned, sidestepping and spinning around in a lazy dance, “now ice cream. I’ve been good and haven’t gone to our place yet. Serious! It hasn’t been a complete cleanse but store bought isn’t the same.” She scrunched her nose at Poppy. Her eyes caught the remainder of the luggage. She reached out to grab more and pouted at Poppy. “Let me carry more. You’ve had a long trip, Flower.”

"Oh don’t be silly. You could have gone!” She shook her head lightly. “I’m glad I got here when I did then... You might have ended up with withdrawals.” She laughed and nudged Nora lightly. “I’m not going to fight you on that. And this is packing light...” She laughed and handed off one of the smaller bags to Nora. “One of the lucky things... getting through security was easy. They know me fairly well. We flew a lot. So it made it easier. Especially with all this luggage.” She didn’t have a TON but she had enough to be annoying when traveling. She was uprooting her entire life though. It was reasonable she’d had a fair bit with her. She looked around the small portion of Woodridge they could see. “It hasn’t changed much... has it?”

Nora’s nose scrunched as she giggled at Poppy’s delight. She grabbed one of the luggage bags and turned to walk towards the street. As she took her first step, she halted and presented the bouquet of flowers to Poppy. “I totally forgot!” Her thought was interrupted and she drew out her lower lip in a small pout. “Aww. AWWW! That makes my cold little heart so happy!” she teased with a giggle. “I can’t wait to see it! But yeah! These are for you, my dear.” Nora, forever a goof with her closest friend, got down on one knee and squinted at the afternoon sun as she shoved the flowers at Poppy. They weren’t anything special but the contrast of colors and odd beauty of the bunch reminded her of Poppy’s love for odd beauties. She got back up to her feet with a grin.

Poppy grinned as they started to walk off with Nora towards Ice Cream. Suddenly Nora exclaimed and was shoving flowers at her. This caused Poppy to start laughing, even more so when Nora got down on her knee in front of her. She took the flowers and hugged Nora quickly, but tightly once again. “Thank you~” She chimed happily and stuck her nose right into the flowers. Thankful allergies never really took hold of her. “Now, Ice Cream?” She tilted her head, she could almost still remember the familiar pathways to the ice cream shop.

Nora’s lips pressed into a thin line when Poppy said she didn’t blame the psychotic woman that attacked her. If anyone should have been beaten to the point they needed medical attention, it was the cheating husband/client. It wasn’t anyone’s fault but his. The entire situation made Nora’s blood boil just thinking about it. Why do women always turn and fight one another when it’s a man that drove them to the point of destruction or heart break? Her blue green eyes closed as she took a shaky breath. She cleared her throat softly as she opened her eyes to focus on the strong woman before her but she couldn’t think of anything to say in response to Poppy’s bravery or ability to let go. “Well I guess we should start things off the right way and get some ice cream, right? Tradition after all.” A soft smile returned to Nora’s face as her hand gently ran through Poppy’s hair again. “What shampoo are you using now? It’s so soft and smells really good,” she commented in an attempt to lighten their moods.

There was a small part of Poppy that knew, despite the man being the problem, that the blame fell to the woman. You want to blame the woman who seduced your husband, you don’t want to blame the man you made your vows too. Somewhere deep down in her heart though, Poppy knew she didn’t want the woman to turn her attacks on Poppy’s former lover. The man had a special place in her heart. “Yes! Please! Nothing like ice cream in Woodridge on the first official day of summer.” Because as children, summer didn’t start until they hit Woodridge. She laughed lightly. “It’s called Aveda actually, it’s not cheap so it better smell good and make my hair feel like a goddess’!” She grinned widely, letting the scent of the sea air in Woodridge bring her back to carefree days as children. The sea breeze picking up a few strands of hair. “I got you some for your hair, different kind because you have different hair but I thought you’d like it. It’s cruelty free too.”

Hearing Poppy almost whisper that she missed her was enough to start the wells of tears in Nora’s eyes. Her mind grazed over thoughts of the hell week her friend went through. She wasn’t a fan of hospitals to begin with, adding the fact Poppy was there alone after the wife’s attack. Her arms around Poppy tightened as she imagined finding the woman and bashing her face into a cement wall a couple of times. Tears rolled down her cheeks and she started to sniffle. “I’m never fucking leaving you again. Where you go, I go.” A hand close to Poppy’s hair smoothed over some of the soft curls before she pulled away enough to look at her. Sniffling again, she wiped at her own tears and weakly chuckled at herself, “are you okay?” Nora rolled her eyes, “I mean, like… better? Are you better now? Because, I swear, I will find this bitch and skin her like Mimi skins a trout.”

Poppy hushed Nora quietly, not out of annoyance or anything but she hated feeling like she’d hurt her best friend. She didn’t like seeing Nora cry, especially knowing she was partially the reason. “Nora...” She said softly with a gentle smile. When Nora finally pulled back enough to look at her Poppy nodded gently. “I’m fine, I’ll be okay. I don’t blame her... Do you?” She spoke softly, brown eyes sad but honest. “I don’t like her either, but I don’t blame her. Not with what happened. I would have been pissed too...” She didn’t want to give details out in the open, but if she’d come home to find the man she’d married with another woman she wasn’t sure she’d keep her cool either. She might not try to... kill them or whatever the woman was aiming for. But she wouldn’t have kept her cool by any means. “I’m fine, I’m here. It doesn’t matter anymore. It’s the past. Now does.”