Chapter Text
Between 1x02 - 1x04
It started as a survival strategy: seeing if I could make Nick smile.
Seeing if I could trust him. Seeing what he would do, if he would report me for small indiscretions or if he would turn a blind eye.
The tuna joke was the first, and I got my first smile. A small one but it was there. I’ve counted 4 more since then, so 5 in total, and they’ve gotten progressively wider with each one.
And the black van hasn’t come for me yet.
At some point, I realized I had stopped testing him, and I was just playing. We’re playing a game together. And, unlike Scrabble with Waterford, this game is actually fun — and makes me smile too. Real smiles, not strategic ones. On the outside they may look the same, but on the inside, the real ones somehow make me feel fuller and lighter at the same time. I feel more like June and less like Offred.
At night, when I can’t sleep and don’t want to think about Hannah or Luke — or else I’d never be able to sleep — I lie in bed planning how I can make him smile next.
He likes it when I make contemporary references. Or is it past references, if the contemporary is now Gilead? Whatever the fuck it is, I can usually get a smile out of him that way.
While we were sitting alone at breakfast one day: “So how about them Sox, huh?”
That was Smile #3.
I wonder if he likes the Red Sox. Is he from Boston? I’ve never noticed an accent, but then again I don’t have one either.
He’s been trying to get me to smile as well...I wonder if he lies in bed thinking about me too...
Today’s the day of my annual Pap smear. Fucking Serena’s been reminding me about it all week. Gotta make sure my uterus is in tip-top shape. Even though I resent it, I’m not gonna say no to an opportunity for me to get out of this wretched house. Who would have ever thought getting a Pap smear would be the most exciting part of my day? Hell, my week? I swear, if there was a way for Serena to send just my uterus to the doctor and leave me home, she would, just to deprive me of this miniscule moment of escape.
As I walk down the stairs, I find the Bitch Queen herself standing with Nick, waiting for me by the front door.
Please God, tell me she’s not coming with me.
“Offred, it just started raining so Nick will be driving you.”
And...my day just got more exciting.
My eyes shift from hers to his, and somehow I just know that if Serena wasn’t here, and I had smiled right then, he would have smiled back. It would have been Smile #6. He’s ripe for the picking. This should be fun.
Nick opens the front door and walks through first, popping open the umbrella before stepping to the side for me to join him underneath.
When I hear the soft click of the door closing behind us, leaving us alone, I huddle closer to him, under the guise of avoiding the rain. I honestly don’t mind the rain — but he doesn’t know that.
“Blessed day,” he says. His head shifts slightly to the right in my direction, his eyes resting on a spot about 6 inches in front of me. He wants to look at me but we’re standing too close together. It would be...too intimate.
“Blessed day,” I respond. Neither of us have moved from the top of the stairs. “We’ve been sent shitty weather.”
It’s the first time I’ve cursed around him. The first time I’ve cursed in Gilead with anyone except Moira.
His head moves sharply to face me this time, his eyes holding mine. My breath hitches, and catches in my throat — maybe I went too far.
But then he laughs — the faintest and quickest of laughs. It was there and gone before I know it, leaving only a smile behind in its wake.
I wasn’t expecting a laugh, hoping just for a smile...but, God help me, I could listen to him laugh all day.
I think I’ve just found my new game: seeing if I can make Nick laugh.