#ace beth

The next meeting with Cosima rolled around, and Alison still hadn't plucked up the courage to talk to Beth about this thing between them. She knew she should have done it before now, and that this would make the meeting incredibly awkward for everyone. But she hadn't, and it was too late now.

Of course, if she didn't make up her mind and pick an outfit soon, she herself might be late for the meeting. That wouldn't be acceptable. She'd planned to show up a bit earlier than her usual 'on time' so that she could to talk to Beth before Cosima arrived. Now, she'd be lucky to make it to the café by noon.

At last, she settled on a thin white cabled sweater and jeans.

To her chagrin, she arrived at the coffeshop five minutes after twelve. She waited in line to give her order to a harried redheaded barista, then waded through the bustling crowd of midday patrons, looking for Beth. Finally she spotted her at a table by the window, her long coat draped over the back of her chair.

"Hey!" Beth said. She stood up and stepped forward as Alison approached, then hesitated, as if she'd meant to hug her but then second-guessed herself. Alison smiled in amusement as if at an inside joke, and pulled Beth into an embrace. Her arms felt so good, she couldn't help but linger there for a moment.

They pulled apart and caught each other's eyes. Then the tension broke as they dissolved into what could only be described as embarrassed giggles. They sat down opposite each other.

"So, running late today, Miss Punctual?" Beth said teasingly.

"You're hardly one to point fingers, Beth. You show up too early for everything."

"Yeah, so that I'm not late. Besides, I saved us a table. Even had to defend it from this angry girl in a leather jacket a minute ago. Could've used your backup, snail o'clock."

Alison scoffed and rolled her eyes, but she felt her lips smiling.

"I'm sorry I haven't called you about... you know," Alison said. Her voice felt small against the lively chatter of the coffeehouse.

"It's alright," Beth said amicably. "I figured you might need time to think, and you'd say something when you were ready."

"Yes, well... thank you," Alison said, looking at her hands in her lap. "I just -"

"Hey, guys!" said a mellow voice, followed by a clatter of beaded jewelry and a swath of color wrapped up in a red pea coat.

Alison and Beth looked up, startled.

"Oh - hey, Cosima," Beth said. Of course, Alison thought, she would pick today of all days to be less late than usual.

Cosima tilted her head to one side, regarding them from against the backdrop of her swinging hair. "Am I interrupting something?" she asked dryly.

"No, no, come sit down," Alison said, scooting over and patting the seat next to her.

She plopped into the chair and hung her oversized tote bag on the back of it.

"Hope you weren't waiting too long this time. I actually tried to leave early today."

"No, I just got here," Alison said. "I was running a bit slow, myself."

"Never thought I'd see the day," Cosima said wryly out of the corner of her mouth. "What about you, Childs, have you been here for an hour already?"

For some reason, Beth flushed slightly. "Two," she admitted.

"Dude, seriously?" Cosima said. "If you could, like, lend me half of your timeliness, we'd both get here before Alison."

"I don't always get here that early," Beth protested.

"Guess it's an anomalous day for all of us, then."

"I suppose it is," Alison cut in, determined to steer the conversation in a less awkward direction, which at this point was almost any direction. "So, did you talk to Rachel about the confidentiality clause?"

From there, they launched into discussion of the contracts that DYAD had made all its study participants sign. Cosima had gone over it with the lawyer Beth had contacted. So far, they'd found at least one clause that DYAD had definitely violated.

"You should have seen this lady," Cosima said in a conspiratorial undertone, clutching her latte close. "She was livid, but, like, icy livid. She's in, even talking about representing us when we go to court."

"Well, medical privacy is a very serious matter!" Alison said.

"You're telling me," Beth said with a snort. "Dozens of medical marketing calls a month, telling me they can fix... things that don't need fixing."

"Gosh, I'm sorry, you guys. I can't wait until I'm getting a paycheck that doesn't come from making you all miserable. On the down low, I've got an offer for a position at this big biopharmaceutical company, Primorez. As soon as I have everything we need - and I will, soon - I'm outta there."

"That's wonderful, Cosima," Alison said with a smile.

"Nice," Beth said appreciatively.

"Thanks," Cosima said, grinning. Then she pulled some files out of her bag. "So, I think we should approach some of these people from the 2011 studies next..."

They discussed some of the previous study participants they wanted to sound out as potential plaintiffs. Alison wrote their names (Katja Obinger, Anthony Sawicki, Danielle Fournier, Krystal Goderitch...) down on a notepad to enter in her records later.

Sooner than Alison expected, Cosima was hurriedly packing up the mess of files she'd spread over the little café table.

"Got somewhere to be?" Beth asked.

"Yeah, totally," Cosima said, waggling her eyebrows. "Got a hot date with that girl I met at the immunology conference last week."

"The one whose hair you kept sending me creepy covert pictures of, saying 'OMG drooling'?"

"Hey, I did not say that!" Cosima retorted with a grin, flapping a hand in Beth's direction.

"You might as well have," Beth said dryly.

"Oh come on! You know you think she's hot, too, don't deny it."

"Yeah yeah, very attractive," Beth said, rolling her eyes dramatically. However, to Alison, who was watching her more closely than usual, her over-acting seemed to carry an undercurrent of genuine irritation. It couldn't be because Cosima's date was a girl; she'd mentioned having female partners of her own in the past. It was odd. Alison didn't know what to make of it.

"Well, have fun, be safe and all that," Alison said aloud.

"Thanks, mom," Cosima said with a warm smile. "I'll leave you two to it, then. Bye."

"Later, Niehaus," Beth called as Cosima sauntered away. She waved a casual hand in acknowledgement without looking as she left the coffeehouse.

"Well. Always flamboyant, isn't she," Alison said, turning her attention fully back to Beth at last.

"Mmmhmm." Beth was staring at her mug of black coffee, not meeting Alison's eyes.

"Are you alright?" Alison asked concernedly. "You seemed kind of... put off just now."

Beth laughed humorlessly into her mug. "Yeah, I'm just fine. It's actually something I wanted to talk to you about, anyway."

Alison's heart beat a little faster. "There's something I wanted to talk to you about, too."

Finally, Beth looked up to meet Alison's eyes through her lashes. "You ready to do this, now?"

Alison braced herself. She'd faced off with snake poop and won. She'd defied her fear of crawling critters and held the snake in question. She'd even worn the edge off of that fear in these last few weeks. A nerve-wracking heart-to-heart couldn't be scarier than that, right? She could do this.

She swallowed, then nodded earnestly.

"Talk to me."

***

Beth twisted her coffee mug on the table with the scrape of ceramic on worn wood. She switched the handle to her other hand.

Of course, the moment she had the opportunity to speak, her voice tied itself into a knot. Why was she this nervous now all of a sudden?

Because you went and fell for her, said a voice from the back of her mind.

She wrinkled her nose to dislodge the thought and tried to take a sip of her coffee to clear her tight throat.

Of course, to her mortification, she managed to choke on it, and consequently spent a few red-faced minutes hacking coffee out of her trachea.

"Why don't you go first," she wheezed when she could breathe again.

"Um. Okay," Alison said. She fidgeted, opening and closing her mouth a few times. She looked as nervous as Beth felt.

"Well, Beth... I like you."

Beth grinned. "I like you, too, Ali," she said in a muted voice hoarse from coughing.

Alison briefly gave another of those little laughing-inside smiles. But then she said, "I don't want to give you the wrong idea or lead you on, though. I like you, and I'd like to spend more time with you. But I don't think I'm really comfortable with our relationship ever getting... physical. Or at least, not much more than it has already." She was flushing deeply.

Beth's eyebrows flew up in surprise, then contracted in bemusement. This was what she was supposed to be saying. It couldn't be that easy. No way.

Evidently Alison took her confusion the wrong way, because she started babbling. "I know it makes no sense, it's completely weird, but it's never worked out for me, with girls - I mean, there's only been a few, it's been mostly guys - and when they wanted to go there, it just never felt right, I mean, I've liked some girls just as much as I've liked guys, just not that way -"

"Alison," Beth said, reaching out across the table to catch one of her fidgeting hands. It was a little chill with nervousness. Alison stopped talking abruptly and met her gaze with her wide greeny-hazel eyes.

"That's... actually, exactly what I wanted to talk to you about," Beth said, fighting off incredulity. "Because, well..."

Her heart was pounding with that not-so-irrational fear that came with saying what she was about to say, even if it sounded like Alison would understand better than most.

"...I'm asexual, and I'm really not into sex."

"A- asexual?" Alison repeated.

"Yeah." Beth felt a tentative smile creeping onto her face. "That thing you said about liking girls, just not that way? That's how I feel. About everyone."

"Really?" Alison's voice was high with nerves. "So, you don't like anyone that way?"

"Not sexually, no," Beth said. Alison's fingers twitched in her hand, and Beth realized she'd been squeezing hard. She immediately relaxed her grip. "I mean, I'm biromantic, not aromantic, so I do feel romantic attraction, but I am sex-averse..." she was the one babbling now, and Alison was looking confused by the onslaught of apparently unfamiliar words.

"Sorry," Beth said, slightly abashed. "I... I've spent so much time thinking about these things, but I hardly ever get to talk to anyone about them. I got a little overexcited."

"No, no," Alison said, waving her free hand at her, holding her gaze attentively. "Tell me more, I think... I think it makes sense. Did you say bi... romantic?"

Beth couldn't keep a grin from taking over her whole face. "Yeah, I did. You can like people in a romantic way but not a sexual way, or vice versa - it's not the same thing. For most people, they go together, but not everyone." She waited for Alison to nod, then continued. "I mean, for me, I've liked people in romantic ways - mostly girls, sometimes not - so I'm biromantic. But I don't like anyone sexually, so I'm asexual."

"So, you don't always have to feel the same way toward the same people? And that might be why I'm not..."

"Into girls sexually?" Alison went a little pink again but nodded earnestly. "Yeah, definitely," Beth said. "You could be biromantic, but still heterosexual. I mean, I'm not gonna try to tell you what you are. But maybe you should look into that."

"Oh my goodness, I will," Alison said, squeezing Beth's hand slightly. "I always thought I was so strange, how I never wanted... I thought I must be dealing with some subconscious homophobia or something, since I liked them, too, but I didn't have that problem with guys. But that never made any sense!"

"Tell me about it," Beth said. Her cheeks were starting to hurt with how widely she was grinning. However, she felt her face fall as a surge of old memories cut away the confidence supporting her smile. She turned their hands over on the table and ran a thumb back and forth over Alison's knuckles to comfort herself.

"I spent all of high school avoiding dates like the plague, because I knew I didn't want what everyone else did. I was so confused. I kept asking myself why I was acting so weird about it, when none of my friends were. Why I was being such a prude. What was wrong with me. I couldn't understand it."

She stared at one of Alison's polished nails. She didn't like to remember how incomplete, how inadequate she'd felt, before she'd been able to know and accept herself for what she was. Those had been dark times for her, some very dark times indeed. Sometimes, the ghosts of all those doubts still haunted her.

Alison brought her other hand over to cup Beth's between hers. She was watching her with sorrow and concern.

"That must have been so hard," she said softly.

Beth grinned wryly. "Well, it wasn't easy. It still isn't." She tangled her fingers with Alison's. Her shiny pink nails alternated with Beth's bare ones.

"But I just wanted you to know where I stand with... everything. And why," Beth continued. "It's just the way I am. That's all."

"And to think I was nervous about telling you what I wanted," Alison said. She shook her head slowly in wonder, looking down at their hands.

"Hey, it's always scary to say something people never hear, no matter who's saying it," Beth said.

"So you really wouldn't mind? If we... and we didn't..." For crying out loud, the woman could not say the word 'sex.'

Beth let out a bark of a laugh. "Ali, I'll let you hold my snake, but I'm not interested in having you in my pants."

"Beth!" Alison squeaked, attracting a few stares from the nearest tables. "For someone who has no interest in it, you can be so inappropriate," she hissed.

Beth was quaking with poorly suppressed laughter. "I'm sorry."

"No, you're not."

"Okay, I'm not," she admitted. "Really though, Alison, I don't mind. That's exactly what I want, honestly. I just never thought it'd be something you'd want, too."

Alison disentangled her fingers from Beth's to brush her thumb over the inside of her wrist, just like she'd done that day she touched Joker for the first time. Beth's heart, still pumping a bit faster than normal, skipped a beat as another chill flew over her skin.

Alison was smiling. "I suppose the joke's on both of us, then," she said.

"Damn right," Beth replied with an irrepressible grin.

Alison finally looked up to meet Beth's eyes again. Beth suddenly realized how small these café tables really were. Alison leaned forward until their noses were almost touching.

"Is this alright?" she whispered.

Beth tilted her head slightly in amusement, watching her lips. "Hell yes," she replied in an undertone.

Alison leaned even closer, and Beth was about to fall into that kiss like a meteor to earth, public displays of affection be damned - when her phone vibrated and scared her half to death.

They broke apart laughing once again. Beth fished her phone out of her pocket with one hand, the other still warmly clasped between Alison's.

"Goddammit, Niehaus," she said as she unlocked it, seeing Cosima's name on the notification. When she read the text message, she started laughing so hard she had to slide the phone across the table toward Alison rather than explain.

So r u hooking up w/ Alison yet??? the text read.

"Oh, for heaven's sake!" Alison said, shoving the phone back toward Beth.

"Are we really that obvious?" Beth asked.

"Well, I don't know about that, but for her to assume that you even wanted..." Alison trailed off, suddenly looking thoughtful. "Wait, Beth, is that what you were put off by earlier?"

"Hmm?" Beth said, still dizzy with adrenaline.

"Earlier, when Cosima was talking to you about that girl... you seemed sort of annoyed, and I didn't understand why. Is it something to do with you being... a-asexual?" She stumbled slightly again over the unfamiliar feel of the word, probably because it ironically had the word 'sex' in the middle of it.

"Oh, that," Beth said unconcernedly. "That happens to me all the time. People telling me I've got to think whatever person is hot, like it's a rule, when I don't. Attractive, sure. Hot?" Beth shrugged. "Usually it doesn't bother me. But I'd already been sitting here for two hours trying to figure out how to explain all of this - all of me - to you. So it kinda got under my skin, being told I should be something I'm not. It's no big deal."

Alison's fingers stopped their caressing and her brows contracted slightly.

"Give me that back," she said, grabbing Beth's phone again with a determined look on her face.

"Hey, what are you doing?" Beth said, brows furrowing. "Don't tell her I'm ace, I'm not there with her yet -"

"Ace?"

"Oh, sorry, ace is short for asexual, but don't -"

"I'm not, Beth, I wouldn't. I'm just going to tell her to back off. Trust me."

Alison paused, phone in hand, to catch Beth's eye once more, waiting. The hand still wrapped around Beth's squeezed her gently. After a moment, Beth squeezed her hand back, and nodded. Alison set to work typing.

Once she had sent the message, she set the phone back down on the table between them so that Beth could read it.

Hello Cosima, this is Alison. Please mind your own business and stop making assumptions about what happens in our personal lives. And if you interrupt us one more time today, I will personally cover your beloved spectacles in glitter using industrial-strength glue. Have a nice date.

Beth gaped at her phone in amazement. Then she looked up at Alison, who was grinning smugly with one hand to her cheek.

"She's definitely gonna think something's up, now," Beth said.

"Let her," Alison said primly.

"You already might be the best girlfriend I've ever had."

Alison's grin grew into a rare genuine smile.

Beth turned her phone off and slid it into the pocket of her coat where it still hung on her chair. Then she stood up, her hand still linked with Alison's.

"What do you say you help me move Joker to the new apartment? I could use some help setting everything up for him."

"Are you inviting me back to your place?" Alison said in a tone of mock scandal.

"Yeah. Where we can do everything but the one thing everyone expects us to be doing."

Alison used her grip on Beth's hand to help pull herself to standing. With the extra momentum, she surged forward to lay a single soft kiss on Beth's lips. It lasted longer than a peck this time, but not long enough to do anything except make Beth want more.

"The kids have soccer until five. I'm free all afternoon," she whispered, standing very close.

"Then let's do this."

Although it would still be chilly outside, Beth merely slung her coat over her free arm so that she didn't have to let go of Alison to put it on.

When they walked side by side out of the coffeehouse, they still hadn't unclasped their hands.

This piece was written for Ace Beth Week 2015. I picked very specific orientations for Beth and Alison for the purposes of this fic. However, people are endlessly diverse, and the asexual community is no exception, spanning a wide spectrum from asexuality to allosexuality, aromanticism to alloromanticism, from sex-averse to sex-favorable, -repulsed, or -indifferent. All of these can occur in various combinations and ambiguous shades of gray, in concert with a wide variety of experiences with different types of attraction.

Also, since it's come up before: although I draw on my own experiences of being asexual for my Ace Beth fics, they are not autobiographical.

They tried to stay in touch with each other and Cosima about the suit via Skype and text. However, some things were just easier discussed in person, so they'd all three meet up for lunch or coffee somewhere every week or two. Alison had long since given up on the prospect of a quick and efficient meeting with Cosima always running late. She'd resigned herself to doing a lot of waiting with Beth, who always showed up before Alison herself did.

As it turned out, it had become a sort of relaxing ritual for the two of them. There was no point in going over new information for the suit before Cosima arrived, so they simply spent the time together, talking about whatever was on their minds. Or, more often than not, what was on Alison's mind; Beth tended to be more reticent. However, Alison managed to glean some things about her anyway. Long before formalizing the breakup, it had been evident that she was having relationship troubles with Paul, though the details were unknown. She'd made Detective at an impressively young age, but was too humble to brag about it. Whoever her partner was at work, she looked up to him and thought he hung the moon. For her part, Alison was just glad to have someone willing to listen to her endless woes with the kids, her spa business, the school. Most people brushed off her concerns as trivial. Beth didn't.

Alison always felt better, lighter, after these meetups, and was sad when they had to cancel because one or more of them had a scheduling conflict. This had been happening more and more lately, what with Alison's kids starting school again and Cosima taking on an entire new project at her job in the DYAD research labs. Perhaps because of this, Alison and Beth had lately ended up lingering over coffee even after Cosima had come and gone. Sometimes, Alison wondered if Beth was as lonely as she was.

In any case, it was nice to see Beth more often than those ever-more-infrequent meetings had permitted. And Alison ended up seeing even more of her than she'd expected, since Beth refused to allow Joker to be held either the day before or after she fed him, saying it was bad for his digestion. (Alison had tried to watch her feed him, but seeing her dangle a frozen and re-thawed dead mouse in front of him like a doggie treat was just beyond.) She came over to do handling sessions on separate days, like today.

She arrived that evening looking as fashionable as always, this time in a dark blue cardigan with a white collar and cuff sleeves.

"I might've finally found a place!" she told Alison with excitement as she came in the door.

"Oh, really?"

"Yeah, I should hear back about it tomorrow. It's a nice little one-bedroom for a decent price, not too far from here, actually."

"Well, that's great! I hope it comes through." Alison was happy for Beth. She was. She needed a place of her own, away from Paul and his apartment. She'd miss her when she packed up her snake and left, though.

"Yeah, me too. How's my boy doing?"

"Good, good," Alison said as she entered the laundry-craft-snake-room. "I had him out with Gemma and Oscar yesterday. It'll break their hearts to see him go."

"Oh no!" Beth said in mock horror. "Well, tell them I said sorry. But I'm glad they like him so much. Too many kids are taught to hate snakes for no reason."

Alison undid the lid of Joker's cage and tentatively reached in to lift him out. Beth nodded her approval at her cage-side manner. She stood next to Beth and held him while he slithered off of Alison's hands into her gentle grasp. He always had a tendency to move back toward Beth, as if he really did recognize and miss her.

Alison spot-cleaned Joker's cage while they chatted, as had become their custom. (Beth did the major cage cleanings.) The Von der Somethings had moved in two doors down from Alison. Yesterday, Beth had questioned a witness who was nearly her doppelganger. Alison wanted to fight somebody over the new dress code regulations at Gemma and Oscar's school.

The two of them wandered to the kitchen for tea with Joker in tow. They had a bit of fun letting him roam on the kitchen table, which Alison sanitized as soon as his colorful scales left the woodgrain. Beth tried to get him to settle coiled around her own neck like a scarf, which freaked Alison out, but Beth didn't seem the least bit perturbed. She acted as if she let predatory reptiles lean against her jugular all the time. Maybe she did. However, when Alison showed her that month's school newsletter so she could appreciate the outrageous double standard of the new dress code outlined in it, Beth had to put on her reading glasses. The wire-rimmed frame must have held some inexplicable attraction for Joker. He insisted on climbing across her face so that his body was slung over the lenses, his wide belly scales resting on the bridge of Beth's nose. Beth had to peel him off time and again, eventually giving up and stowing her glasses back in her bag, all the while laughing that wholesome, from-the-gut laugh of hers.

All too soon it was getting quite late, so they headed back to the room-of-all-functions to put Joker to bed, as it were.

"Well, hopefully you can get him settled somewhere that isn't also a laundry room soon," Alison said, snapping the last clamp back into place.

"We'll see. But I have a good feeling about this place."

"I'll deny I said this, but it's been nice having him here."

"Alison Hendrix, you do like snakes."

"Not snakes, snake. That snake. That's all I'm admitting to."

Beth laughed softly. Then her face grew more serious.

"Really, though, Alison," she said. "I can't tell you how much it means that I've been able to leave him somewhere safe and taken care of. Thank you."

Alison waved her away. "It's nothing, Beth. I don't mind helping you at all."

"Well, I don't know if I'd say that. You nearly bit my head off when I showed up on your doorstep with a snake in a box."

"I did not!" Alison said indignantly.

"Sure you did," Beth said, laughing again. "But you helped me out anyway. Thank you."

Alison rolled her eyes with quickly fading exasperation. "Don't worry about it, Beth."

Beth smiled and pulled her into another one of her hugs. They'd been getting more frequent, lately. Alison hugged her back gladly but gently.

This time, though, Beth only pulled back halfway as she released her, her hands still resting lightly on Alison's upper arms. She was uncharacteristically shy as she met Alison's eyes through her lashes. She was far too close for comfort, and simultaneously much too far, somehow, to satisfy Alison's inexplicable sudden need to be closer. Without thinking, Alison darted forward to peck a kiss on her lips, then felt herself flush horribly.

Holy shit, she thought, panicking. I just kissed her. I just kissed Beth.

Beth, however, merely gave a breathless laugh and leaned closer. She hovered with her lips right next to Alison's for a moment, the small distance left between them rife with quiet tension. Then she kissed her back, slowly, softly. After a compressed eternity, they pulled a little ways apart. They simply watched each other in the late-evening quiet. Alison's face was still burning, but she was fairly certain that she was also grinning foolishly. Beth was giving her a crinkle-eyed smile, close-lipped, secretive. She leaned forward again to tap their noses together, then pulled away completely, though not before giving Alison's shoulder a gentle squeeze with one hand.

"Good night, Ali," she whispered. She headed out the door and down the hall.

Alison stood where she left her and waved at her retreating back. Once she heard the front door open and shut again, Alison commenced pinging about inside her own head like a ricocheting bullet.

Oh my word, that just happened, oh no, I like her, now what, I like her a lot, oh God, what if she wants to do things now, oh no, this is not, I am not, oh Jesus Murphy, her lips were really soft, oh God, I don't want her getting the wrong idea....

She leaned back against the counter and held her face in both hands.

"What am I going to do?" Alison whispered to herself, heart pounding.

She turned to see Joker resting his nose against the wall of his cage, almost as if he had been watching avidly.

"Oh, shut up," she snapped at the snake, despite the fact that he had neither moved nor made a sound. His tiny, scaled face looked far too smug.

***

They spent a few days communicating only in brief, casual texts. Mostly, they were about what they needed to prepare for their next meeting with Cosima, or the new apartment that Beth had indeed snagged. Alison sounded a little more stilted and formal than was usual, if that was possible: she always texted in full sentences anyway. Beth didn't mind terribly; they could both use a little time to collect their thoughts about this. In all honesty, she'd thought Alison was straight. Maybe Alison had, too.

For her part, Beth was simply rolling with it. She did like Alison, always had, but she'd long since dismissed her as way out of her league in more ways than one. Now, however, things were different. Alison herself had been the one to break the ice, and Beth was no longer trapped with Paul. She still had a lot of things to pack up, but she had moved into her new apartment last night with the bare necessities. Tomorrow, she was going back to get the table she'd set Joker's cage up on. For now, she stood in her nearly-empty tiny closet, staring idly at its sparse rails and wondering how she was going to fit her coat collection into it.

Beth was a little bit apprehensive. She straightened one of the few shirts she'd brought on its wire hanger, so that its collar lay smoothly. She was interested in exploring something with Alison, if she was game. This time, though, there could be no misunderstandings, no more assumptions. Beth would have to set the record straight from the beginning. She couldn't waste more of her time on people who only wanted parts of her, not her as a whole. She'd spent too many years of her life on unhealthy relationships. Often enough that it made her sick to keep asking herself why she'd allowed it, she'd been convinced to compromise her self in ways that were expected, not desired. As if her body were a card to be traded for love.

It was too easy to appeal to her sense of duty; her desire to be loyal and committed to the people she cared about was strong. However, she reminded herself, that didn't make it okay for others to exploit that in ways that made her act unlike herself. She knew that intellectually, but had trouble remembering it emotionally.

She couldn't allow herself to break her heart again on the shores of someone's inability to accept her. It might not heal after so many shatterings. It was already hard enough for her to remember that this wasn't actually her fault. That being this way wasn't something to be blamed for.

Beth flicked off the light switch in the closet. She left its blank-slate emptiness to flop onto her half-made bed with a sigh.

So for now, she would wait. She would wait for Alison to make the next move, and if it came to nothing - or if something came of it, but Alison couldn't respect the boundaries Beth needed - then she would wait for someone else.

"Whoa! Mom, is that a snake? Can I hold it?" Gemma demanded, nose pressed to the side of the cage. Her thick curls flared out around her dark face as she leaned forward.

"Absolutely not," Alison said.

"Don't be stupid, girls don't like snakes! Let me hold it," said Oscar, crouching down in front of the cage with her.

"Oscar, language!" Alison said. "Nobody is going to be holding it, because nobody is opening the box, got it? As it so happens, he belongs to a female... colleague of mine, and he's only staying here for a few days. Now, go put your things away and wash up for dinner."

"Aww..." they said in chorus, but they complied.

After a healthy dinner of baked chicken and steamed vegetables, the kids kept wandering back to the laundry room to simply stare at the snake as it slithered around its enclosure. Around and around the cage it went, narrow tongue flickering, red stripe after black stripe after cream stripe after black stripe again, and again, again. Alison eventually had to pull the laundry room door shut while they did their homework.

After she'd seen them off to bed that evening, Alison ventured down the hall to crack the door open once again. She couldn't see the snake. She took a few steps into the room, staring intently through the clear plastic sides of the box. She could just see a spot of color protruding from the hollow log.

She could also see a messy splotch of black and white in one corner of the cage.

"Oh no," she whispered out loud.

Could she leave it there? Did she need to clean it up? Was cleaning out the whole cage necessary, or was it possible to scoop the mess out adequately?

She sent Beth a text inquiry, but she was working the late shift at the station today, and Alison probably wouldn't hear back from her before she needed to go to sleep.

"Fishsticks," she muttered. She paced back and forth in the laundry room for a few minutes, silent phone in hand. Finally, she left and shut the door firmly, deciding to put off the decision until tomorrow.

***

Despite Beth's assurances that morning that the cage would be fine until she could come clean the mess up the next day, it wouldn't leave Alison's mind. It tugged at the corners of her eyes while she worked. She curled the pastel ribbons on top of spa gift baskets and buried them in boxes full of packing peanuts. She'd considered moving the whole packing operation out to the living room, but it was really more trouble than it was worth, if the snake was only staying for a few days. In the meantime, she'd just have to deal with labeling bottles of bubble bath next to the snake and its poop, and at the moment she wasn't sure which bothered her more.

She could see that the curls of shaved aspen bedding around the little pile had sunken slightly, as if with moisture. What if it started moldering? The humidity was stifling at this time of year, surely it was only a matter of hours. What if it made Beth's snake sick? As little as she liked the thing, he was obviously very dear to Beth. She'd never be able to live with herself if something happened on her watch.

"Oh, fine," she finally snapped at herself. She sat the scissors she'd been using to curl ribbons down on the counter with some force, and stood up from her chair.

Ten minutes later, she stood poised in front of the box, armed to the teeth with an apron, dishwashing gloves, tongs, and paper towels. The snake appeared to be fast asleep in its hollow log again, so if she was quick and quiet about it, she could be in and out before it noticed a thing.

"Alright, Alison," she said, steeling herself. "You can do this."

She stood there for a moment more, then went into action.

It took her a minute to figure out how to remove the extra clamps. She hesitated once more before undoing the latches just as she had the day before. With one hand, she cautiously cracked the lid open.

The snake still hadn't moved. As quietly as she could, she slipped the tongs into the gap between the box lid and the rim of the enclosure, and tried to scoop the poop up. To her satisfaction, her arm was only trembling slightly, but enough to make the necessary precision difficult.

Somehow she got most of it on the first try, but more of the bedding was wet than she had realized. That won't do, she thought. After wiping the tongs off with a paper towel, she went back in. Even if she sanitized the tongs thoroughly, she wasn't sure she could convince herself to ever use them in the kitchen again. She might have to buy new ones.

It wasn't long before she realized that there was newspaper underneath the aspen shavings, and that it was damp, too. Maybe she could just rip off the soiled corner? This was going to be a two-handed task.

She set the lid of the cage aside and very carefully tried to pull up the corner of the paper. It was no good: she couldn't catch the edge of it in her gloves. She'd have to do without one.

Once she'd peeled one glove off, she managed to lift one the edge of the paper loose with her bare hand. Now, however, it was stuck to the base of the cage. She pressed her lips together in silent frustration.

Soon enough though, she got the paper unstuck. With single-minded focus, she slowly ripped the soiled portion out of the corner of the sheet of newsprint, as carefully as a coupon that she was removing without scissors.

As she was tearing the last half-inch, she felt something flicker against her bare wrist.

With a stifled shriek, she ripped the paper free and leaped back from the cage like it held a live grenade.

The snake had silently extended half of its body out of the hollow log. It must have licked her with that little forked tongue. Now it was inspecting the bare spot she'd left in the corner of the cage.

Alison shuddered from head to toe, more from the adrenaline rush than from the sensation itself. Then, setting the scrap of paper down, she seized the lid of the box and snapped it back onto the cage with a plasticky echo. She redid the latches and clamps shakily, before the snake could get any ideas about going for a stroll outside its cage. Or, well, a slither.

She stood there for a moment, breathing heavily.

She did it.

Alison felt a grin blooming on her face. She did it.

"Not so tough now, are you?" she said, bending down to look at the kingsnake. It ignored her, and crawled back into its log. It wasn't all that big, really. Not much thicker than her thumb at its widest.

She watched the snake coil itself back up in the hollow log, then straightened up. She went about cleaning up with a bit of a spring in her step. (The tongs she left in the laundry room wash sink: they were permanently banned from the kitchen now.)

Maybe this wouldn't be so bad.

***

Beth felt herself finally relaxing as she approached Alison's apartment the next evening. It had been a long day. She'd pulled an unending and unpleasant shift at work. On top of that, she'd had the conference call with Jennifer early that morning, and it had stretched out for hours. On the one hand, Jennifer was definitely interested in joining their cause. On the other, Beth was now thoroughly exhausted. However, she perked up at the prospect of seeing Joker (and Alison) again.

She tapped gently on the green front door. Alison soon ushered her in with a quiet greeting.

"So, how's it been with Joker?" Beth asked with a grin.

"Alright, actually," Alison said, to Beth's surprise. She hadn't seemed too keen on the idea two days ago, and her numerous frantic texts about poop in the cage had come across as anything but alright.

"Oscar and Gemma can't stay away from him, though," Alison continued, leading her down the hall again. "I have to make them finish their homework before letting them anywhere near the room he's in. Otherwise they'll stay there watching for hours. They want to play with him."

"That's great!" Beth said enthusiastically. "You want me to show you how to handle him, so you can show them when I'm not here?" They were already asleep now, and Alison was very particular about nobody in her life knowing about Beth, as part of her paranoid security regime to protect the investigation.

"Handle him?! No, he licked me while I was cleaning up the mess he left yesterday and I nearly had a heart attack."

"You what?" Beth asked, doing a double take. "I told you that you didn't have to!"

"I know," Alison said, wringing her hands self-consciously. "But it was dirty, and I was worried that it would start going moldy, and that he might get an infection from it... it's not sanitary to leave that sort of thing laying around."

Sure enough, Beth could see a bare spot in the corner of the cage where Alison had obviously taken vengeance upon the mess.

Beth laughed and laid a hand on Alison's shoulder. Alison glanced briefly at her hand. "You are so sweet to worry," Beth told her. She squeezed her shoulder in its soft pink cardigan, then went to open the cage.

"Hey there," she said gently as she lifted Joker out of the box. He wrapped his tail end around her wrist, flicking his tongue at her. "You settling in alright?" She turned to see Alison watching her. Her eyes were wide below the brown fringe of her bangs, but she wasn't retreating.

"Here, you wanna hold him?" Beth asked her.

Alison made a noncommital noise.

"Come on, so you can show the kids later. It'll be a great learning experience for them," she coaxed.

Alison rolled her eyes with another of her little huffs. "Maybe I'll just touch him." She stepped closer.

"Sure." Beth held him out, facing him away from Alison, so she could reach the loop wrapped around Beth's wrist like a bracelet.

"Don't move suddenly, you'll scare him. And don't grab his head. Just be gentle," she said. Alison extended a hand to run a cautious finger over the smooth scales. Her thumb barely brushed against Beth's wrist as she did so. Beth felt a faint chill run over her skin, and it wasn't from Joker's cooler body temperature.

Joker suddenly brought his head around to investigate what was touching him. She saw Alison start to jump, but suddenly freeze, remembering her instructions not to make any sudden moves. They both held their breath.

The snake brought his black-and-cream patterned head closer to Alison's immobile finger. He flicked his tongue against her pink fingernail. Alison twitched, but didn't pull away. Slowly, he rested his chin on her finger, then started slithering over her hand.

"Look at that, he's feeling social today," Beth said, trying to lighten the mood. Alison's eyes were locked on the snake. "He's very docile, just let him do his thing."

"...Okay." He was wrapping around Alison's wrist now with his front half, and sliding off of Beth's with the back. Soon, Alison was holding all of his weight.

"I'm holding a snake," Alison said in a monotone voice.

"Yeah, you are," Beth said, grinning widely. "Look at you."

They watched him wind his way up Alison's arm in silence for a minute, until he tried to crawl under the cuff of her sleeve.

"Okay can you take him back now," Alison said rapidly.

"Sure," Beth said, smiling. She gently unwrapped him from her arm, pulled his head back out of her sleeve, and settled him back into his box.

Alison took a deep, shaky breath.

"Great job," Beth said. "I've never seen him take to anyone that fast before."

"Yes, well," Alison said. "Didn't you have to check on the temperature or something?"

Beth took a moment to check the thermometer reading and the thermostat settings. "It looks fine," she said. "Thanks again for letting me keep him here," Beth said sincerely.

"You're welcome," Alison said neutrally. Then, "He's actually not so bad."

She met Beth's eyes to give her one of those compact, understated smiles.

"Did you want a cup of tea or anything?" Alison asked.

"Sure, maybe a quick one," Beth said immediately. "Let me just wash up."

After Alison had heated water and assaulted Beth's nose with her citrus-scented soap, they sat down at the kitchen table with a cozy cup of tea each. The only light came from the bulb over the stove and the streetlamps outside the window.

"So, do you think we'll actually be able to take this suit against DYAD?" Alison asked her.

"Well... If we can get enough people together - and it looks like we might - there's a good chance. I'm getting in touch with another one next week, this lawyer named Rachel. She might be able to guide us through the legal rings, if I can convince her."

"Well that's something."

"Mmm."

"How is it with... Paul?"

"Mmm," Beth said again. "We'd been falling apart for months... breaking up was just a formality. I'm just glad I don't have to worry about Joker being stuck around him now. He never liked him."

"Paul, or Joker?"

"Both," Beth said with a laugh. "They never liked each other. I should've known then. People who can't keep a snake's good opinion..." She smirked. "I shouldn't have bothered in the first place."

Alison gave that little smile that meant she was laughing inside. For a moment, they just watched the steam swirling above their teacups in the late-evening dimness.

Alison soon spoke again.

"I think it's amazing, what you and Cosima are doing," she said quietly. "All this, just to make life a little easier for people you don't even know. You could lose your jobs."

"Well, not really," Beth said. "I'm not technically doing anything I could get fired for. I'm not using station resources for this, just my training and contacts. And Cosima, she's been dying to get out of there for ages. Sometimes I think she just wants to go out with a bang."

"She would," Alison said, obviously thinking about Cosima in all her tattooed, shawl-trailing, bespectacled raging individuality.

Beth couldn't help smiling at her.

"You've put so much time and work into this, too," she added. "We wouldn't have gotten as far as we have without you keeping us in line. And with you being a full-time working mom... I don't know how you do it."

"Well, I've had to learn to manage my time carefully, since I've been on my own with the kids," Alison said. "I do miss being able to coach their soccer team and everything, like I did back then. Before the divorce. But at least they still get to play on the team."

"You're a good mom," Beth said.

Alison smiled self-deprecatingly. "What about you? Do you ever want kids?"

"Uh..." Beth hedged. Why did it always come back to this? "I don't know... I don't mind the idea, in general, but the idea of having them myself... it's just never really been something I see myself doing."

"You could always adopt. Not everyone has to have them the regular way like I did."

"Yeah, I guess. But whenever we'd talk about it, Paul was always so into the idea of doing it that way."

"Well, soon you won't have to worry about Paul anymore."

"That's true," Beth said with a bittersweet smile.

It was. However, it wouldn't mean Beth's problems were solved. She'd always have to worry about any partner being okay with her not wanting to sleep with them.

"What's wrong?" Alison asked her. She looked concerned; evidently Beth's bitterness showed.

"It's nothing," Beth said, feigning unconcern. It's true, she thought. There isn't anything wrong with me. The world just likes to think that there is.

"Are you sure?"

Beth dredged up a casual grin. "Yeah, I'm sure," she said with mild amusement. People asked that so often. She took another sip of her tea and found herself into the dregs already.

"Did you want another?" Alison said, already halfway out of her chair.

"Nah, I should get going. It's been a long day for me." Beth stood and went to wash her cup in the sink with more of that awful citrus dish soap, brushing off Alison's protests as hostess.

Soon enough, Beth was stepping out into the night again. Internally, she debated whether she ought to take a shortcut back to the apartment, or take the long route, to put off arriving back at a place she could no longer call home.

"Beth?" Alison called after her from the doorway.

"Hmm?" She turned around with a swirl of her coat.

"Do you... want to come back sometime this week, and show me how to hold Joker again? I'd love to let the kids see him, but I don't think I can do it by myself yet."

This time, the smile on Beth's lips appeared of its own accord. "Of course. I'll have to stop by to feed him soon, anyway."

"Great. Maybe one night this weekend?"

"Sure. See you, Alison."

"Good night, Beth."

Alison rolled her eyes, shaking her head with a little flick of her ponytail. “What do you need?” She asked briskly, eyes on her presumed knitting.

"Well," Beth began, breaking off with a frustrated sigh.

"Out with it, Beth. I haven’t got all day."

Beth grimaced and began again. “Things are kinda rough here with Paul since we broke up. We keep fighting about everything. And he hates having pets in the apartment. It kinda is his place, so… I was hoping things might cool down a bit, so I can focus on apartment-hunting… if I could keep Joker at your place for a week or two?”

"I don’t have a lot of extra time to look after a pet, Beth," Alison said, briefly glancing up at her.

"No no, he’s super low maintenance," Beth said earnestly. "He’s little, hardly takes up any space, you won’t even have to feed him, I could stop by and do that." She heard Alison let out a breath of air. She brought her handiwork up close to her face to frown at a dropped stitch; she was definitely knitting.

"Please?" Beth added in a small voice. "The way things are going with Paul, I’d be a lot happier if he didn’t have to be here."

Alison sighed and closed her eyes, hands pausing in their repetitive motions. “Alright,” she said, relenting. “I know this whole thing has been difficult for you lately, so I’ll do what I can to help. But only for a week or two, alright?” She looked directly into the camera and wagged a cautionary, stitch-laden needle at Beth.

Beth beamed. “You are the absolute best, Alison. Can I drop him off today?”

Alison rolled her eyes again. “Only for you, Beth. Stop by at two this afternoon.”

"Alright! I'll see you soon then. Nice afghan, by the way."

"It's a mitten!" Alison said indignantly. "How you became a detective with observation skills that poor I don't know, Beth..."

Laughter bubbled out of Beth's chest as she reached out to hang up the call. She could have sworn she saw the beginnings of a smile on Alison's lips, too, as she realized that Beth was teasing her. Beth waved her fingers at the screen as the call ended.

***

Alison had just opened up a package of chicken breasts to slice and marinate them for that night’s dinner when she heard the knock on the door at a quarter til two.

"Drat," she said to herself. She knew she should have waited; Beth was always early. Between her and the ever-tardy Cosima, the trio's clandestine meetings dragged on into hours-long affairs, which were much harder for on-time Alison to work into her very busy schedule. They could have been contained in half-hour coffee breaks with stricter organization, but both of Alison's co-conspirators ran on their own clocks.

Cosima had recruited Beth, a detective, to help her find witnesses in a whistleblower case against the company she worked with, the DYAD Group. That was how Alison had met them: both she and Beth had participated in their medical studies in the past. Since then, they'd gotten numerous strange and unnecessary follow-up calls from sources that should not have had their contact information. The potential suit probably wouldn't come to anything - DYAD was a big company - but their disrepect for patient confidentiality could really get out of hand if allowed to continue. It was just the sort of thing that set a bee buzzing in Alison's bonnet. So, because Cosima was appallingly disorganized, and Beth was too busy seeking out former members of DYAD studies to keep track of all the information, Alison had taken over as a sort of note-keeper for the investigation. Since they'd met a few months ago, the three had become fast friends.

Alison set the chicken back on its yellow styrofoam tray and began washing her hands hurriedly. She slowed herself down to scrub any potential traces of salmonella from under her fingernails. "Coming," she called toward the door, patting her hands dry with a dish towel. She trotted over to the door and opened it to see Beth's hair flying. Evidently she'd just turned her head to face Alison abruptly, caught in the act of taking stock of the surroundings. What looked like a medium-sized plastic storage bin sat right in front of her feet, like she'd set it down while waiting for Alison to answer the door.

"Sorry, I was just getting out some chicken breasts to marinate for dinner," Alison said. She looked curiously at the box. "What's this?"

"Oh, uh, that's Joker," Beth said. She shuffled her feet and readjusted the tote bag slung over her shoulder. Alison wondered at what looked like power cords sticking out of it, but was distracted by the matter at hand.

"You put him in that box to come here?" Alison said incredulously. She immediately knelt down to undo the latches on the box. "That's so unnecessary, Beth," she said as she lifted the opaque lid. "I get that you have a nice car and you don't want him running around and -" she broke off with a strangled and embarrassingly high-pitched yelp.

All she glimpsed before the lid fell from her hands back into place was a narrow black-and-white face on a long neck, and it was scaly, and that was enough.

Alison recovered from her shock enough to straighten up and glare at Beth in speechless outrage. Beth had the decency to look sheepish even while she sent one of those stupid nervous toothy grins Alison's way.

"You brought a snake to my home?!" Alison hissed angrily. "I thought Joker was a small dog, or at least a cat!"

"Of course he's not, I never said that!" Beth said, all wounded innocence. "Look, you don't even need to open the box while he's here, I'll just stop by once a week to feed him myself -"

"No, I am not having a snake in the house!" Alison snapped.

"Alison, please, Paul was there when I was packing him up, and I told him he'd be out of the apartment for a bit, I can't take him back right away." Beth's face fell as Alison showed no sign of budging. "Please, can't we at least talk about it inside?"

Alison sighed and rested her forehead in her hand briefly. If she let Beth bring the thing inside the door, it was less and less likely that she'd get it back out again. However, there were too many nosy neighbors in her apartment building to let Beth linger on the doorstep.

"Fine," she said shortly. She turned on her heel to hold the door open for Beth, who squeezed past her with the box in her arms. She came close enough with the box that Alison shied away from the loop of colorful red-black-and-white scales pressed up against the clear wall, a repressed squeak caught in her throat. She re-locked the door and glanced out the blinds before closing them.

"Beth, I can't believe you didn't tell me you want me to look after a snake."

"Alison, he's just a kingsnake, and you don't - you wouldn't even have to do anything with him. Just let me set his cage up somewhere. All you'd need to do is check on him once every day, just to make sure that the temperature's right. And that he hasn't gotten himself stuck in his paper towel roll again."

Alison glared at the snake in its box where Beth had sat it on the coffee table. It had just stuck its face out of the paper towel roll in question. It looked less threatening when it was safely behind a plastic wall. It lifted its head a few inches above the floor of the cage and paused, looking absurdly like a tiny scaly periscope.

Alison sighed. "Beth, I don't do things that don't have legs." Her mind immediately jumped to the myriad other crawling, leggy things Beth could have showed up with. "Four of them," she added hastily.

"I know, I know, but... It would only be for a little bit. I don't want him to have to listen to Paul and I fighting anymore. Please?" Beth looked so crestfallen that Alison felt her resolve weakening.

"Can it hear that?" she asked, stalling for time. She tossed her hair in discomfort. "Do snakes even have ears?"

"Well - no, not exactly, but they still pick up vibrations. You know what I mean, though. Bad environment."

Alison sighed again. Beth was just trying to look out for her pet.

"Fine," she said resignedly, looking away. "Try to keep it to one week. Absolutely no more than two."

Beth's face lit up with a genuine smile. Alison went stiff with surprise but merely stood there as Beth wrapped her into a brief but tight hug, feeling more than moderately pleased. Beth wasn't usually the most tactile person.

"Thank you, Ali!" she said brightly. She let go and spun away, scarf fluttering, to pick up the box again. "So, where can I put this, it's got a heating element on the bottom, so it has to be on top of something that won't warp with the heat..."

"No no no, not over there," she said as Beth started toward the kitchen. "Way too much traffic that way, I don't want the kids bothering it. You can put it on the counter in the craft room, over here." The craft room was actually the laundry room doing double duty. Alison missed the periwinkle-painted craft room she'd had all to herself in the big house, before the divorce, but she'd made do with this smaller space, as she did with everything.

She led Beth down the hall and leaned against the doorframe to watch her set everything up on the work counter. That was multipurpose, too: she used the flat surface alternatively as a folding table for clothes and a work table for her crafts. Beth bustled about with her long hair swinging, plugging in wires, fastening probes, opening the cage to settle a heavy bowl in the shaved aspen bedding, and filling it up with water.

"This looks really involved," Alison commented from the sidelines.

"All I'm gonna need you to do is check the temp daily, make sure it's in range," Beth said. "The thermostat should take care of it."

"And if it doesn't?"

She could tell Beth was rolling her eyes even with her back turned. "I can come back the day after tomorrow to make sure it's holding up. In the meantime, you can just tweak this little dial if it gets too hot or cold."

"I don't need to open the cage, do I? He can't get out, can he?"

"No no, you're good," Beth said, tugging at the extra clamps she'd put on the lid to show her how secure they were. "You won't even know he's here."

"Yes, I will," Alison said darkly.

"Aw, come on, Alison, snakes aren't all that bad. They're actually really sweet."

"I don't care, I am not touching it."

"Alright, alright," Beth said placatingly. "Don't worry, you won't have to feed him or anything."

"Wait, what does it eat?" Alison asked in a horrified stage whisper.

"Mice. But I'll take care of that." Alison's eyes must have been popping, because Beth gave her a look. "What? Joker's a snake, he eats meat!"

"Oh my God," Alison said, shuddering. She rested a hand against her cheek. "I am not going to think about this. And you named it Joker?"

"Well, yeah. He's got that bright clown coloring, and I'm a cop, so it seemed appropriate at the time, terror of Gotham, you know..." Beth sounded slightly embarrassed.

Alison couldn't stop herself from letting out an incredulous huff of laughter. It was a little bit hilarious. For all her gruff demeanor when she was on business, Beth could be quite ridiculous.

"Well, is there anything else I need to know?" Alison said.

"Nope," said Beth. "Thank you so much for doing this, Alison. I really appreciate it," she said earnestly.

"You're welcome," Alison replied briskly. "Any luck yet finding the girl from the Midwest?"

"Yeah, Jennifer, I've got a video chat with her on Thursday," Beth replied. "She sounds like she's in, from what she's told me already. We might actually find enough people to pull this thing together."

"Well, we'll see." Alison still had her doubts about this whole enterprise. However, the idea that any corporation might continue frittering away people's personal information until they were constantly plagued by nonsense calls, as she still was to this day; it simply irked her to no end. It was fortunate for Cosima and Beth that they'd teamed up with her, really. Cosima had absolutely no instinct for subtlety, and Beth was far too straight of an arrow sometimes to think in terms of espionage. However, Alison had grown up among the gossip of the suburbs; she knew how to keep a secret. And for the sake of Cosima's career, they had to keep wind of this from reaching DYAD.

Beth was standing there awkwardly.

"Well, I'd better get going," she said. "Thank you again, Alison."

"You're welcome, Beth."

Alison showed her back to the door and peered out between the blinds. "All clear," she whispered. The last thing she needed was her relentless neighbors questioning her about her mysterious Jag-driving visitor. Keeping anyone from wondering what she was hiding in the first place was the best way to keep a secret.

"Okay. See you in two days?"

"That’s fine. Make it nine-thirty at night," Alison said as Beth slipped past her out the door.

"Right. See you soon."

"Goodbye." Alison shut the door on the sight of Beth padding down the stairs in her trenchcoat.

She went back inside to brine the chicken, thinking she could catch up on packaging bath bombs for her spa business before the kids got home from school, and doing everything she could to forget about the reptile that was very temporarily living under her roof.