Chapter Text
“Well I started to look for a place so I could be here during the hiatus.”
Tina very suddenly had all of Bette’s attention. Tina was moving back. Her ex-wife, the love of her life, was moving back to Los Angeles.
“Wow! Well it…um… if you wanna… if you wanna stay here until you find someplace…” Bette trailed off, the words bursting out of her before she could think twice about it.
There was a silence for a moment, and Bette was sure she’d fucked up somehow, that asking that question had crossed one of those unspoken lines she seemed to keep stepping over where Tina was concerned. “I didn’t mean… It was just an offer, Tina, you don’t have to…”
“I’d like that, actually.” Tina, much like Bette, just blurted the words out.
Such was the way with them. All these years later and they still made each other tongue-tied.
She said yes, Bette thought, a smile gracing her lips, lighting up the entire kitchen. She said yes, she said yes, she said yes. She could have danced, could have scooped Tina up in her arms and twirled her around the room, but right now, just knowing that she was going to have the blonde under the same roof again, it gave her hope.
She had tried, earnestly, to get over Tina, but it hadn’t worked. Bette had realized that no matter who else she might meet that intrigued her, Tina was it. Her one great love, the only woman she would ever give her whole self to.
It was why she kept their wedding ring around her neck, always hidden but ever-present. When Bette felt adrift, all she had to do was pull out that ring and she felt at home again, and that was just a ring. To have Tina herself here, under her roof, made her so excited, she could nearly scream.
However, after decades of practice keeping her cool under pressure, Bette kept it contained to her radiant smile. “Angie will be so excited!”
That made Tina smile as well, and Bette loved that about her, loved that she was so caring, so invested in their daughter’s well being. Tina had always been the more natural mother. They both loved Angelica, of course, and the girl knew that, but Bette and Angie clashed in a way that Tina and Angie did not.
Seeing the way Tina cared for Angie, so warm and gentle and kind, sent a pang of deep adoration for the blonde through her heart.
“I promise,” Tina’s hazel eyes were sincere and determined when they looked at Bette, “I’ll try not to be in your hair for too long.”
Yet again, the words welled up within Bette, but this time, when she spoke them, it wasn’t a violent blurting of words. No, rather, she was sure of her next words as sure as she’d been of anything in her life.
“It’s no trouble, Tina, really. You’re welcome for as long as you need.”
In fact, if Bette had her way, she’d stay forever.