Archive of Our Own

Andy waves Roy off as she pauses in front of the Townhouse, shuffling The Book between her hands as she searches for the house key, infinitely glad there’s no dry cleaning on Friday’s. She feels weighed down enough without having to lug those bags around as well. 

The key glides into the lock and barely whispers as she turns it, her heart lifting slightly with the knowledge that she is so close to the end of her work day. She tiptoes across the foyer and heads straight for the table, grinning tiredly at the sight waiting for her. 

“I thought you guys would be in bed, it’s so late.” Andy whispers up the staircase as she carefully places the book down in its holy place. 

Cassidy and Caroline grin back at her from their perch on the second and third step of the Grand Staircase. They do that now, wait for her so they can fill her in on the melodrama and social going on of the teenage populace of Dalton, usually though, they only wait for her on the night’s Miranda is out late with dinner meetings which gives her pause. 

Miranda didn’t have any late evenings scheduled for at least a week. 

She shakes off the frown tightening her forehead and tries to give her whole attention to the girls. She had learnt, over the last few months, that they were both incredibly funny, and impossibly smart and generous when they weren’t using her to stop heated discussions between her boss and her boss’ husband. They could also be genuinely sweet with the people they deemed ‘safe’. Andy always leaves feeling considerably brighter after the interactions she has with the twins. She shakes her head again at the thought. The kindest interactions she has on any given day are with two eleven year old girls who are still learning to be kind themselves. 

It is both laughable and woefully sad. 

“Mommy went out. She said she would be late back. We have time.”

Andy is quick to push thoughts of Miranda’s disappearing act from her mind. The editor is her own woman. It isn’t any of her business what she gets up to after she leaves the office for the day. Andy’s chest tightens at that and she doesn’t know why, but she forces her heart to unclench and slips her heels off, hurrying to kneel at the bottom of the staircase, setting the timer on her watch as she does. The pain of her sharp knees pressing into the hardwood floors gives her something to focus on as she nods at the girls. 

Cassidy is quick to jump ahead of her sister, she speaks in excited bullet points and exclamations, barely stopping to breathe. It’s one of the biggest giveaways Andy used to tell them apart at the beginning. Cassidy can’t help the way she bulldozes through a conversation, she hadn’t even been able to curb the habit the time they swapped clothes and tried to trick her, all those months ago. It’s endearing, in a way. Andy hopes she’ll hold onto that as she grows. It’s so easy to lose your voice in this world. 

Cassidy’s day looks like this;

• Bridget H. got suspended for breaking a boy's nose. (“It was like, totally worth it, Andy. He’s a pig.”)
• Sasha kissed two people under the bleachers during third period. (Andy is not shy about expressing her concern because Sasha is eleven.)
• “I got a B+ in English!” (a three person dance party here because a B+ after months of C-’s is extraordinary.)
• “And oh! Andy, you’re probably going to get a call from Dalton to organize a time for Mom to match a time with Dad to go into school because I ditched third period.” (She gives Andy three guesses to where she was. Andy doesn’t need them.)

“Cassidyyyy.” Andy whines. “What have I told you about hanging out with Sasha? And you have Math third period. You love Math.”

“Not as much as she loves kissing people.” 

“I wasn’t kissing anyone!” Cassidy cries, her face flaming enough to match her hair. “I thought we were only going to get candy!”

“Caroline, leave your sister alone, Cassidy, ditching is ditching. Candy or kissing - it doesn’t matter. Try to stay in class, okay?”

The girl shakes her hands as if physically removing her day and any kissing accusations from her body. “Can’t you just come instead? Mom won’t come. She never comes into the school, even for disciplinary actions.” Cassidy begs and Andy understands, with stunning clarity, a little more than Cassidy would like her to. 

A heavy sadness drapes itself around her shoulders–it has been so much better between them and their mother lately. 

Andy had seen the single most area in Miranda’s carefully crafted life that was lacking and had done what she could, shuffled, postponed, and shuffled again, to get Miranda home at least three nights a week. As well as free weekends. The change in the girls had been monumental. There had even been a peacefulness about Miranda. But somewhere along the way, something happened. Miranda had changed again . And though something has changed between them as well, Andy wasn’t privy to every secret or her well guarded inner thoughts, and had no way to reassess. 

And now Cassidy is acting out. 

Again. 

“She’s right,” Caroline says with a bored roll of her eyes. “ But ,” she adds when Cassidy nods with the attitude of ‘told you’. “She only doesn’t like it because Mr Docherty hits on her all the time, you know that, Cassidy.”

“Uh,” Andy freezes when a flash of something white and hot slices through her stomach. “I’ll see what I can do, sweet girl.” She promises as she squeezes the girl's ankle soothingly. “But if Miranda is called in and she goes, you’ll face the consequences like a Priestly. Graceful acceptance and your head held high. Now, Caroline, tell me about your day.” 

“It was fine.” She shrugs. “School is school, volleyball is volleyball. Everyday I am surrounded by mediocre girls who can think only of being pretty and kissing boys. It’s gross , Andy. The house is warm and you’re here. What else is there?”

Caroline is so very her mother. 

“You’re right about one thing, Caro, kissing boys can be gross. You can catch cooties…or venereal diseases.” She mutters the latter under her breath though it’s covered by Cassidy’s cry of “I wasn’t kissing anybody!” as the girl points her toes up, trying to pinch the skin of Andy’s wrist between them while Caroline chortles lightly next to her.

“I believe you, Cass.”

The watch on her wrist beeps delicately and Andy feels a little sorrow filled that their time is already up for the night. But she has no idea how long Miranda’s impromptu, private outing is to last. 

Andy sends the girls back to bed with forehead kisses and a promise to see them the next time Miranda has a late meeting. She wrangles a promise out of Cassidy - ‘No more ditching, no more Sasha’ with only minor grumbling. And a promise to let her know when her next volleyball game was from Caroline. The girl was notorious for not letting anyone come watch her games but Andy had been allowed to come to the last two. 

The hallway is so quiet it’s oppressive, once the girls have scurried off to bed. She thinks she can hear her own heartbeat echoing back to her as her thoughts linger on the home's owner. Something has been going on with Miranda, for the last few weeks at least. She’s been more explosive. Where before she would fume in her quiet vicious way, her anger would at least pass. Now when she spews acid all over the entire building, and a few between as she goes for out of office meetings, it lingers. Like a bright and furious geyser who never runs out of infernal steam. 

It sticks to her like a wispy cloak. Ebbing but not flowing. Spluttering. Burning. 

And Miranda wears it as one. 

Nobody can do anything right. Not Nigel, not Jocelyn. Definitely not Emily. Andy herself had been fired and rehired at least three times since Tuesday. 

It’s been an awful–even more so–work environment to cohabit when they spend eighty-seven percent of their week together. 

The sharp coolness of a frigid Autumn night that lights Andy’s skin as she exits the townhouse, almost mirrors the feeling she has with every one of Miranda’s mercurial moods. She does everything she can to make Miranda’s days run smoother. To make her daughters happy. To give Miranda a few moments of joy. She does it because she cares. Because she wants to. 

Andy sighs heavily as she heads home wondering if all of this is even sustainable. 

“Come on, Andy. It’s Sunday–we finally have the same day off and you’re still one hundred and ten percent focused on that woman. I thought we were actually going to hang out today.”

Andy grits her teeth, she knows what his kind of ‘hang out’ is and she’s not at all interested. She’d managed to block out his nasally whine for most of the morning and a quick glance at the clocks tells her he’s been going for at least the last three hours. 

“I told you Nate, I need to research this subject and it’s for me and my knowledge, not Miranda.” Her tone is firm, the harshness due to being sick of having this conversation. “I also told you that I would only need the morning and if you left me alone I would be done by two o’clock. Please, Nate. Stop.”

“What is it even?” He leans over the back of the couch to try and catch a glimpse of her laptop screen but Andy snaps it shut before he can make out more than bright colors. 

“It’s personal.”

“To you or her?”

Andy sighs heavily as she tucks her laptop under her arm and stands. “Why does it matter, Nate? If I say it’s personal, it’s personal.”

“It matters because you’re my girlfriend and I deserve to know!”

Andy freezes on the spot. “I beg your pardon?”

“I get to know.” 

His foot almost stomps and she has to take a deep breath, holding it in to stem the instinct to gag at his tantrum. “You might be my partner, Nathaniel Allan Cooper, but that does not give you the right to demand something like that.” Never mind that it is about Miranda. 

“It does if it affects me!”

Andy counts to ten and tries to swallow her anger when the whine in his voice grates on her eardrums. “Well it’s a good thing it doesn’t, then.”

“Andy, baby. I just want to make sure you’re okay.” He steps closer to her and she forces herself to stand still. To not flinch when his hand wraps around her arm. To not pull away when he leans into her. 

“I promise that I am.” She is so very tired of pretending. “I asked for the morning, Nate. Just the morning. If you had given it to me, I would have finished by now.” She adds, feeling very much like a kindergarten teacher. 

His mouth opens and a strange chirping sound comes out. Andy blinks and it isn’t until Nate’s mouth snaps shut that she realizes it’s her phone. 

“Sorry, I need to answer that.” She shakes his arms from her waist and runs to scoop her phone off the kitchen table. “Hello, Miranda?”

Nobody replies but Andy can hear sniffling and heavy breathing and clutches the phone tighter as she pulls it away to check the caller I.D. 

“Andy?” 

“Cassidy?” Andy can physically feel her heart skip a beat. “Hi, sweet girl, are you okay?”

“Andy.” There’s a sobbing in the background and Andy can feel sweat prickling her hairline. 

“Cass, honey. Tell me what’s wrong, where’s your mom?”

The floodgates open closer to the phone. “Andy, you have to come quick. They were right, they were all right. She is a Dragon Lady!”

“What!?” Andy turns and without thought starts to gather a bag. She has no idea what she’s about to walk into but she’s been worried about Miranda for a while now and had tried to be prepared for anything. She had a hunch about what it could be and spent the day researching it. The more she read, the more everything about Miranda’s behavior had started to make sense. 

“Andy, you can’t seriously be about to run over there on the whims of a pre-teen.”

“Stay on the phone, sweet girl, I’m just packing a bag and I’ll be right over as fast as I can.” Andy lowers the phone to press against her chest as she hisses at Nate. “Something is wrong and she’s scared, Nate. I can’t not.”

Andy doesn’t stay longer to argue. She pushes past him and tears through the door, whispering words of comfort to Cassidy as she runs down the stairs. 

“Please hurry, Andy. Caroline won’t stop crying and I think mommy will hear.”

“What happened, Cassidy?” Andy thanks the taxi Gods that she hails one as soon as she leaves her building. She would have knocked someone off for their bike if she had too. 

“We were supposed to go to the park today to walk Patricia and hang out because mom was out of town yesterday and we didn’t get to see her.” Cassidy’s little hiccups break Andy’s heart and her fidgeting leg halts as she registers the girl's weepy words. Again, Miranda’s Saturday excursion wasn’t a scheduled one.

 “Only mom slept in super late, like really late. We made her breakfast but her door was still closed so we waited in the kitchen. Caroline must have left the element with the pancake pan on and I might’ve left a pancake in there and it may have caught on fire. It was only a little one, we panicked but we put it out and then Patricia was going crazy and the kitchen was a mess and mommy stormed down when the fire alarm was going she screamed at us, Andy. Screamed.” 

“Oh Cass, she would have been panicking too, I think.”

“I know, I know that but when Caroline tried to apologize, she grabbed her arms and shook her. Her eyes were so scary, Andy. And her face was really red. Where are you?”

The crying in the background had quietened but now Cassidy’s in the foreground had picked up again in her retelling. “I’m right around the corner, honey. Can you or Caroline unlock the door for me? I forgot my key.” She hadn’t, but Andy figured it’d be easier to have the girls meet her at the front then her having to hunt for them. 

“Okay. Okay we’re going now.” Her quick breaths are so loud against Andy’s ear. 

“Good girls, thank you so much. I’m paying the cab, okay? I can see your front door.”

“Okay.”

“Okay, I’m gonna hang up now, I’ll be right there.”

The dial tone trills back to her and Andy is quick to shove her phone into her pocket, fingers barely finding purchase on her little bag as she throws herself out of the still moving vehicle, using the momentum to bound up the steps. The door swings open as soon as her feet land on the stoop. 

Cassidy’s blotchy face greets her and Andy feels her heart ache at the girl's obvious despair. “Oh, sweetie.”

The little girl doesn’t even wait for Andy to step inside, she throws herself at Andy and winds her short arms tight around the brunette’s waist. 

“Andy,” she sobs. “She was so m-mean.”

The slightly frayed assistant scoops her up and kicks the door shut, crossing the foyer quickly. “Where’s your sister?”

“Stairs.” Cassidy mumbles against her neck. Andy is both dismayed and incredibly grateful her hair is up in a bun as she feels evidence of Cassidy’s upset soaking her hairline. She rounds the entrance and zeros in on the Grand Staircase. Only five steps up is Caroline, hunched and huddled over her knobby knees. Andy shifts Cassidy to her left arm and holds up her right, beckoning Caroline down. An insane amount of relief rushing through her now that she can see them for herself. 

The youngest girl, in the same state as her sister, is quick to rush down to them. “It was an ac-accident, Andy.”

Both of them look like such different girls to the ones she had left on Friday night it’s almost dizzying. Gone are the little pre-teens who snark and barter their way through conversations, replaced by little girls. They look so fearful she’s struck by the resemblance–they look almost exactly like Miranda has since the end of September. 

“I know, baby. Oh I know.” She coos to her. “We’re going to make everything better. It’ll all be okay.”

If somebody had told Andy even three months ago that she would love and care for these kids beyond the niceties you give to strangers kids – she would have laughed so hard she passed out. But ever since they tricked her into going up the stairs and she’d done the impossible and given them the unattainable, all three had grown on each other. Not unlike mold at first, but they’re a team now, the three of them. 

“She’s really upset, Andy. Like worse than that time we cut one of Stephen’s ties up and used it to give Patricia bows in her hair.”

Andy remembers what an episode that had been. Miranda and her had been working at the kitchen table when Stephen had ripped down the stairs, screaming into the heart of the house and flinging pieces of frayed material towards the silver haired woman. And while it had been amusing to see her boss’ husband turn three shades redder than natural, even Andy had been cowed by the stillness in Miranda as she called the girls down and proceeded to tear strips off them, never having seen or heard Miranda do anything like it before, not to her children.  

If the girls are saying she was worse than that day…she shivers, allowing a solitary woeful thought for herself knowing she’ll be heading, running , straight into the danger zone in a few minutes. 

“Why don’t we calm you guys down and then I’ll go and help your mom, hm?” Her voice quails only slightly as the realization of her being here with a furious Miranda finally hits her. 

It’s fine enough to think you know what might be afflicting her boss, it is quite another to have to present what she hopes could be a solution. 

Both girls nod sadly so she drops on the stairs, cradling them both to her. 

“Where is your mom?”

“In the kitchen.” Caroline mumbles around her fingers. Andy has only seen her do it under extreme bouts of stress. She knows Miranda is trying to break the girl out of her finger sucking habit and by extension, so should she, but it feels too cruel to rip away the girl's comfort after the morning she’s had. Instead, she doesn’t mention it at all, only brushes her hair off her sweaty forehead and presses a kiss there. 

“Did I ever tell you guys about the time when I was fifteen and I tried to trick my mom by moving her car and accidentally hit someone else's?”

Once the girls were calm enough to stand on their own Andy had sent them upstairs with firm instructions to wash their faces and stay in the family room until she came to get them. Honestly, they hadn’t been that hard to convince and she realizes how awful the morning must have been for them. 

A quick glance at her watch tells her she’s been sitting on the stairs for over fifteen minutes and though her knees are weak at the thought of facing a fire-breathing Miranda, if she wants to reassure the girls that their mother is in fact, not a dragon, she’ll have to. 

She counts to ten and then counts to ten again but hauls herself up and slowly starts down the hallway. The den that she’s been in over a hundred times by now is tidy, unchanged. It’s remarkable how much it calms her by being so. 

The acrid smell hits her before she enters the kitchen and she doesn’t know how she missed it earlier. The girl’s had said that it was only small and they had put it out fast but the lingering stench of charcoal pancakes has her eyes stinging. 

 “Miranda?” She calls timidly through the entryway before she enters. “Miranda, it’s me. Andy–Andrea.”

Only silence greets her so she takes a deep breath and wipes her hands on her jean covered thighs, stepping through on an exhale. 

“Oh, Miranda.” 

Andy goes through a rapid fire series of emotions and finds herself blinking back tears at the sight that greets her. Miranda is huddled in the far corner of the kitchen, back against the cupboard, head buried in her knees and her arms covering her head as if to protect it. Or hide. Even from the doorway Andy can hear her pained, labored breathing and feels her own arms ache with how hard her heart is beating. 

“Miranda?” She calls again as she takes a step forward. “Can you hear me?”

“Why are you here?” Miranda whispers and Andy can tell by the thickness in her voice that she’s been crying for a while and it’s that single fact that chases whatever fear still lingering. Miranda is just a woman. Miranda is in pain. Andy can fix this.

“I was worried.” Andy says honestly as she takes a miniscule step closer. “May I sit next to you?”

She’s aware enough to not react when her boss lifts her head and drops it back. Her usually vibrant eyes are swollen and bloodshot, her hair looks as though it hasn’t been washed in a week and her lip is bleeding where she’s bit it. A stiff shoulder jerks and Andy takes it as a confirmation. Andy finds herself infinitely glad she didn't stop to remove her jacket when she first arrived and shrugs it off now, draping it her boss, ignoring the way her mouth pulls at the sight of it.

It’s one of her warmest and it isn’t that ugly . 

“How long have you been sitting here? You’re likely to bring the house down with all the trembling you’re doing.”

Miranda looks at her from the corner of her eye. “You’re awfully fresh, today.”

Andy smiles and it’s only a little bitter. “You’ve fired me more times this week than you’ve actually fired people. We’re practically besties, at this point, Miranda.”

A light blush paints Miranda’s temples. “I rehired you more times than anybody else as well, you’ll recall.”

“Like I said,” Andy repeats quietly. “Practically besties. And I was really worried about you.”

Miranda inhales sharply, quickly pressing a knuckle to her mouth as she whimpers. Andy, without thinking, is even quicker to gently catch her hand and pull her fingers away when she sees how hard Miranda is mashing her lip on her teeth. 

“What’s going on, Miranda?”

“I think–I–” she shakes her head and her sweat soaked hair flicks. “I think I may actually be losing my mind.” The confused rasp in her voice strikes Andy like a match. 

“How do you mean?” Andy asks even though she has a fair idea. 

“I–nothing makes sense, anymore. I can’t concentrate, it’s like I can’t see , but I can, it just doesn’t make sense in my brain,” the words fall from her mouth like a rapid, Andy almost can't understand her for how fast she speaks as she taps her palm against her temple. “My body aches all the time but no matter if I stretch or soak or take something, nothing touches it. And I shake , tremble like you said, all the time, all over. I’m furious, always,” she mumbles as she covers her face with both hands. “And I can’t stop fucking crying!”

“Sh,” Andy soothes, moving to sit in front of Miranda. Her hands carefully cup cool wrists, lowering them when Miranda lets her and tries to keep her voice soft and open when she asks, “do you have any idea at all what this might be, Miranda?” 

A thin lip curls as Miranda glares at her. “Do you?” 

Andy nods once and looks down, only registering how her thumbs are stroking the soft hands in her lap as she does. “When was the last time you saw a doctor?”

Miranda stares incredulously at her but to Andy’s surprise, doesn’t pull her hands away. “You made the appointment, Andrea. It was before–”

“No, I know. I know, Miranda,” she squeezes the hands in hers. “Did they not talk to you about the changes your body will go through?”

“What on earth could you possi–” her head jerks back as her eyes widen and Andy sees the light flick on in them. “You’re kidding.”

“Your doctors never spoke to you about any of this?” Andy asks, trying to keep a lid on her own growing incredulity. How could her high-end medical experts not explain any of that? 

“You’re saying that I’m–I–what exactly is it you are saying?” 

“I think–I think you’re perimenopausal, Miranda.” Andy says with a certainty that loosens her shoulders. “You are. I don’t think–I know.”

Miranda’s head drops back, thumping against the cupboard. Her eyes glaze over and Andy knows she’s doing a quick assessment of her behavior and feelings over the last month or so. “How could I not know?” She mutters to herself. 

“It happens more often than you think,” Andy says quietly. “It’s not as though we’re told what to look for,” she scoffs remembering something a doctor told her aunt. “All everybody seems concerned about is dryness –”

“You knew. You…guessed?” Miranda says, cutting Andy off from what would be a very impassioned rant, she’s sure and shakes her head. “No, not guessed. Knew .” 

Andy takes a look around the kitchen as Miranda’s eyes grow hazy again. It’s a shit show. There is flour over every flat surface and what she thinks might be egg dripping from the counter a foot away from Miranda’s silver head. The stench of burnt metal makes her gag if she thinks about it too long and then Miranda herself. Wilted on the floor as if she just couldn’t possibly stand any longer. 

“How did you know?” Miranda wonders out loud. 

“There were signs.” Is all Andy says. All of this makes Andy feel so far removed from herself, not unlike an act of self preservation. “We need to get you up. Can you walk?”

“Mm,” Miranda nods in a distant sort of way. “I am unsure how long I have been sitting here–” she gasps as her fingers squeeze Andy’s. “The girls–Oh, I was irreversibly horrible to the girls, are they–do you know–”

“The girls are fine,” Andy promises. “They were a little upset but they’re calm and okay. I sent them up a bit ago.” 

A pained exhale leaves her body and when she speaks her voice is thin with understanding. “They called you.” 

“Yeah.”

“And you came.”

“Yes.” Blue eyes lock her in place but Andy lets them. Lets Miranda look. 

“You’re a funny little thing, aren’t you?” Miranda mutters mostly to herself. 

“It’s been mentioned a time or two.” Andy says, smiling at the older woman. “Right, since we don’t know how long you’ve been sitting like this we’re going to go slowly, okay?” 

Miranda nods, a gruff “fine” slipping from her mouth as she does. 

“We’re going to extend your legs, slowly, and go from there.” 

Before she can even think about it, her fingers are releasing Miranda’s chilled ones–her jacket is still over Miranda’s front so she lifts it enough to gain access to the woman's knees–before dropping to her legs. 

One burrows beneath her knee and the other slips around her ankle. 

“We’ll go slow.” She murmurs as she carefully starts to pull on the slim ankle, pausing at Miranda’s sharp inhale. “Is it pain or just pins and needles?” She asks, eyes assessing the leg in hand but when she looks up Miranda’s eyes are locked on her hands and Andy starts. “Oh! I’m–”

Miranda’s eyes roll as she flexes her toes. “Now you grow a conscience? You can monitor and pay, what I’m guessing, is an excessive amount of attention to my changing bodily functions but this is too much?” 

“I–”

“You’re a funny little thing, yes we established that.” Miranda’s voice is cool but her eyes are almost gentle–if Andy ignores the laughter in them. 

“Oh my God.” Andy mutters, closing her eyes and counting to ten. “Let’s just get you up.”

Miranda snorts but agrees so Andy continues the slow process of extending her leg. Her boss is wearing a robe, it’s silk and thin and it shifts when the back of her knee is touching the floor. 

“ Miranda .” Andy breathes as her eyes are glued to a pale thigh. 

“What?” She barks before looking down as well, gasping so viciously her whole upper body knocks back. “Don’t–Andr–get out.”

“What?” Andy rears back. “No, Miranda. I’m not leaving you like this.”

“Get. Out.” She growls, a bright flush creeping from her chest to her ears. 

“Miranda.” Andy says firmly as she strokes her thumb under her knee. “I’m not leaving. But I may need to run and get a towel or something.” She looks around again and spies the laundry door, half open on the other side of the room. “I’ll be right back.”

It’s nothing at all to grab the first dark towel she sees before she’s racing back to Miranda’s side. She’s lowered her other leg on her own and Andy can tell by the way she’s squeezing her knees together that the bleeding has gotten worse. Her heartbreaks at the obvious embarrassment shrouding the older woman. 

“Miranda,” Andy tries as she drops to her knees next to her. “It’s okay, we’re okay.”

“Nothing about this is okay , Andrea.” Miranda growls again but she doesn’t flinch away when Andy removes her jacket and swaps it for the towel. 

“You’re right. It’s awful, what is happening to you. But it isn’t anything to be ashamed about. I promise you, there is nothing going on that I haven’t dealt with before. You trust me, Miranda.” Andy finishes and knows without a doubt how true that is. 

Miranda’s eyes squeeze shut and Andy sees two heavy tears roll down her burning cheeks as she grips the towel to her waist. 

“Okay, we’re going lift up slowly again, I’ll do all the heavy lifting but you’ll have to help me, okay? I need you to put your arms around my neck and hold on, can you do that, Miranda?” Andy asks gently. 

“I can’t–the towel.” 

“Don’t worry about the towel, Miranda. I won’t let either of you fall.” 

A giant sigh flits across Andy’s face but she nods and lets go of the towel one finger at a time. By the time her hands are free her eyes are still tightly closed so Andy leads them to her neck, trying not to enjoy the feeling of Miranda’s hands cupping it. 

“Okay, we’re okay.” Andy whispers in her ear as she locks her knees in place. “Here we go,” she stands as slowly as she is able to with the added weight. As soon as her boss is away from the cupboard door her hands drop to hold the towel at her waist, keeping her promise. 

Once they’re both upright Miranda’s grip tightens and she cries out, forehead dropping to Andy’s shoulder. “Oh, wait. Wait.”

“Okay, we’re stopping.” 

They stand like that, fronts pressed together as Miranda works to steady her breathing. 

“I hate this.” Miranda cries quietly. 

“I know.” Andy says and again, without thinking, runs a hand up and down Miranda’s tense back. “Is it pins and needles or–”

“Yes. All of it.” 

“You need a bath, or something but–”

“I don’t think I will make it upstairs either.”

Andy knows there’s a bathroom downstairs with a bathtub, it’s smaller than any of the ones on the upper floors but it’ll do for now. She doesn’t stop to think about how crazy it is that she can lead them to that bathroom backwards. Like fully walking backwards dodging all the furniture and doorways and tables without having to look. 

Maybe it’s something she should be thinking about. Who else does she know who knows the entire layout of their boss’ homes and can navigate it without their eyes?

Once in the bathroom she kicks the toilet lid down and sets Miranda there with a gentle squeeze and hurries to start the bath. She hasn’t opened her eyes once since Andy picked her up but her breathing is less rapid than it was. 

“You must think I’m thick or something.” Miranda sighs, adjusting the towel. “How could I not know the signs?” 

“I could never think that about you, Miranda.” 

“I know what menopause is , of course I do. But I–Do you know,” her voice lowers, barely audible over the running water. “My aunty had to give me the ‘woman talk’. My mother refused, she said I was ‘that way’ – she said I would be chasing boys and ruining her life if I understood what I was. If I was aware of being a woman.”

Andy keeps an eye on the tub even as she kneels in front of her boss. There’s a wistfulness in her voice that doesn’t suit her words, it makes her skin crawl as she listens intently. 

“My aunt was a midwife. A midwife , and do you know what she did? How she explained to me what happens to a woman for over half her life?” Her eyes snap open and find Andy’s immediately, the younger woman is taken aback by the emptiness there.

“How did she explain?” 

“She told me that when the bleeding comes you're dirty and that men will start looking at you and while they’re allowed to look, you mustn't let them get you.” She laughs but it isn’t a happy sound. “Then she dragged me to some poor woman’s bedside while she was in labor and told me that when my bleeding came this is what happens if you do.”

“How old were you?” Andy whispers cautiously, heart heavy for a younger Miranda.

“Oh,” she breathes, letting go of the towel to wave a hand. “Ten or so. She thought she was helping, I suppose, since my mother would have let me bleed and not know anything at all, but I don’t know–it was something shameful, I learnt, they didn’t talk about their changes and I didn’t talk about mine.”

“Miranda.” Andy chokes and it’s the only thing she manages because what can you say to something like that? Instead she dips a corner of a washcloth in the tub, squeezes the water out and gently runs it over her eyes. She repeats the process and dabs the damp cloth on her tear-stained cheeks, not thinking about Miranda allowing her too. 

“I figured it out,” she sniffs. “On my own–like I figured out the rest of it.” She laughs caustically and adjusts her grip on the towel. “But–by the time I made it to New York I didn’t have a lot of ‘older women’,” she rolls her eyes, “around me…even as I got older I didn’t have a support system that included perimenopausal women to ask or talk about ‘The Change.” 

And Andy understands how she could know about menopause in a distant sort of way but not what it can look like. “You didn’t know.”

“No,” Miranda says, eyeing her. “But you did.”

Andy shrugs, trying to put the image of a scared, teenaged Miranda trying to figure out her own body out of her mind. “My mom is a teacher. And I was raised with my grandmother, they were very determined that I knew more than I ever needed too.” 

“Well,” Miranda says as she fidgets the towel. “Remind me first thing in the morning to send flowers that they did.”

Andy huffs a laugh and turns to stop the tap. “Sure, funny lady. Do you need help in?”

Miranda is nibbling on her bottom lip when she looks back, accidentally reopening the small wound from earlier. 

“Wou–would that be okay?” She sounds as though someone has a gun to her head but she asks so Andy nods. 

“Of course.” 

She keeps her eyes politely averted as Miranda slips her robe from her shoulders and loosens her hold on the towel. Her arms are steady as they wrap around Miranda, offering a stronghold for the woman to lean against as she stands, moving as one towards the tub. 

“It isn’t your fault, Miranda,” Andy starts as she lowers the woman into the bath and hands her a large hand towel to cover herself with. “The women in your life failed you, in a very big way.”

“But I’ve–the girls, I’ve failed the girls.” Her eyes are teary again as her head drops back. “I suppose I should be kinder to my aunty, her talk left much to be desired but I fear I didn’t do much better when talking to my own girls.”

Andy knows. She hadn’t been there when Miranda talked to the girls about their changing bodies–thank God–but the twins had told her later that night all about how flushed their mothers face had gotten and how awkward she had been. Andy had giggled with them at the time but now her heart just aches. “I could talk to them, if you want. Let them know that you’re okay and why you’ve been…off.” Miranda skews her with a look. “They notice things, Miranda, they’re worried about you.”

“Fine,” the older woman huffs. “In a bit…Will you stay? Just for a little while?” Her voice quakes and she lowers her head as she shifts in the bath.  

“For as long as you want.” Andy says and means it. She settles on the floor again with her back against the porcelain. It’s nice. Being here with Miranda. Being somebody Miranda trusts and wants around. There are a lot of things she isn’t thinking about that she should, Andy supposes, being wildly comfortable sitting in an intimate bathroom with her naked and vulnerable boss should be one of, if not the number one thing to analyze. And she will, she promises (lies) to herself. She’s always been great at compartmentalization. 

She stays until Miranda’s hands stop shaking but leaves her in the bath to do a quick tidying sweep of the kitchen, sending up a quick thank you prayer to her nana that Miranda’s blood hadn’t spilt on the rug or across the floor. 

It hadn’t taken her long to get the kitchen back to its usual stunning display or gather some comfortable clothes and a mix of period products from her own bag for the older woman, placing them next to the sink. She tells Miranda she’ll be upstairs with the girls, to come find them when she is ready. 

She makes one last stop in the kitchen to make a fancy coffee for herself, if she’s to tell her boss’ children about menopause she can supply the goods.

“Come here, Chickens,” Andy says as she plops herself on the wide couch. “We need to have a chat.”

The twins are quick to rush over to her, sitting on the coffee table in front of her so she can talk to them both at the same time. “Do you know what’s wrong with mom? Did you fix it?”

“Okay,” Andy blinks but sets her coffee on the side table and takes a deep breath as she nods. “So you know how your mom sat you down and talked to you about periods a couple months ago?" Caroline had her first period three months ago. Cassidy a month later. Both had had really rough firsts but they haven't been exactly regular. And they won't be for a while yet.  

"Yes." 

"You know how you were feeling a bit yucky and you were really angry and weepy but you didn’t know why, a few days before your first one?"

"Yes." More mumbles. Andy kind of misses the days where talks like this were embarrassing. A wave of nostalgia rolls through her and she makes a mental note to call her own mother tonight.

"Well that’s what’s happening to your mom except on a much heavier scale. There's this thing, menopause, that happens when our period's stop."

"And that made mom mean?" Caroline asks, fingers creeping towards her mouth. Andy reaches out to lower it, holding it on her own knee. 

"Kind of. It's a big change. Huge. Your moms body has been having a period every month for thirty five years. That's a long time to get used to something huh."

"I guess." They both shrug but Andy can see it’s more to do with their hurt than an unfeeling towards their mother. 

"Okay, so now your moms body is trying to stop her periods because she doesn't need to have them anymore and it's kind of making her body go haywire. But that's what I mean. She and her body have had thirty five years to get used to having a period, and now she and her body have to learn how to function without them but her body isn’t being very kind to her while they figure that out.”

"Her body is being mean to her ?" Cassidy asks, head tilting. 

"In a way. Sometimes it might make her really sad, or grumpy. Sometimes her mind is gonna be really tired even when her body isn't. Sometimes she's gonna forget things or not be able to concentrate and sometimes this is all going to happen all at once. But you have to remember, just like when your body freaked out learning how to have one, maybe two periods after never having experienced one before–she's never been through menopause before so she's still learning her own cues. But none of that, none of it is ever your guys fault.”

The girl’s head’s droop and they look at her through their long lashes. “You promise?”

“I promise, you guys. Nothing about the way she’s been acting has anything to do with the two of you. It doesn’t make it right, how she’s been, but now we know why. Miranda loves you both very much, she’s just having a rough time because her body isn’t listening to her–and you know how she gets when something isn’t listening to her.”

They all three giggle at that. 

“Okay. That makes sense.” Caroline nods thoughtfully. 

“How come you know so much about it? Is it happening to you too?” Cassidy questions with a slight weariness as she leans back. 

“No, sweet girl,” Andy laughs softly. “It’s not happening to me yet. I was raised and surrounded by a horde of incredible women. My mom, aunts, older cousins, my grandmothers! It was just there, and while it was awful to watch it had been even worse, I imagine, for them to go through.” She shrugs and blows hot air up, bangs fluttering on it. “I also did a lot more research on my own when I thought I saw the signs in Miranda.”

"I have two questions." Cassidy says, raising a hand as though she’s in class. 

"Go ahead, Cass." Andy smiles as she lowers the girl's hand. 

"How long will the menopause last and will we also have to have periods for thirty-five years?"

"Well, Miranda is perimenopausal at the moment and it could last anywhere between a few months to a few years." Caroline's eyes widened in horror. "It takes a long time for the body to unlearn, girls." She adds gently. 

"And the other thing?" Cassidy's pale face crumples when Andy tells them they most likely will have periods for that long. She doesn't have the heart to tell them they might have them for longer. 

"You're joking." Caroline spits and Andy bites her lip to hide her smile, Miranda's period talk might not have been as detailed as hers, but she wants them to be prepared. Especially with Miranda’s hormonal changes happening in front of them.  

"'fraid not, sweet girl. It's both a blessing to be a woman and a stone cold curse."

"You’re saying that we,” she makes a wide circle to indicate all three of them, “Will bleed for five to seven days for thirty-five years and then our bodies will flip on us and then menopause will happen for an undetermined amount of time? I want to hit something." Caroline growls. 

"So did I, when my aunty first told me." A new voice says from the doorway. They all start and turn as one to face Miranda where she leans casually against the frame. Andy can tell she’s heard the majority of her talk if the faint blush she wears is any indication. She also looks incredibly shy. 

Andy motions her over to the couch with a gentle head tilt, smiling when Miranda wanders over to sit next to her. When she sits so close their thighs touch, Andy tells herself the shiver she feels run through Miranda is merely a menopause symptom. 

She’s in too deep to monitor her own physical reaction. 

“I’m so sorry for this morning, my love’s. I was all out of sorts and reacted terribly to an easily remedied accident.” Her trembling hands slowly reach out towards the girls, laying her now overly warm ones on theirs. Nobody mentions the fact that Andy still has hold of them on her knee. “I was distressed but I should never have yelled and I definitely should never have shook you like that, Caroline. That isn’t okay for anybody to do to you. Can you forgive me?”

“We don’t know yet.” Cassidy says bluntly. 

“Why didn’t you just tell us why your body was being mean to you?” Caroline asks, pinning Miranda with a gaze made of steel. 

“I didn’t know.” She says slowly and Andy knows how difficult it must be for her to admit something like that. “I was born and grew up in a time where the women around me didn’t speak of things like that. Ever. It was something to be ashamed about. ” Miranda starts, cheeks still flushed. “I mentioned my aunt, she was a midwife and even then her talk was less detailed than the one I gave you. I am sorry for that as well. I feel I have undereducated you both.” 

Her voice is as warm as her body and Andy feels herself leaning into both. 

“Okay, so why did your body just decide to stop having a period?” Cassidy asks without a single trace of embarrassment now.

Andy can feel Miranda glance at her but sits back, letting Miranda navigate the question in a show of trust. She must still feel horrible for how lacking her ‘woman talk’ with them went and then again with how she spoke and reacted to the girls this morning but she needs to believe she can still talk with them. 

A throat clearing and short sigh later and Miranda opens her mouth. “We have periods because our bodies are amazing. We make and then carry life itself inside them. Mommy’s body already knows that it housed and loved the two most perfect girls her body could create–” she releases their hands and strokes the back of both along both girl’s cheeks. “And decided I don't need it any longer.”

Andy smiles at the answer as well as the shy grumbling and epic eyerolls in front of them. Miranda sits back as the girl’s turn to face each other, a silent conversation happening that neither Andy and Miranda are invited to. 

They sit quietly, Andy and her boss, as they watch the magic happening in front of them. Miranda shifts enough to cross her left leg over her right, inadvertently making her press even harder into Andy’s side. It’s shocking how not uncomfortable Andy feels. Though she avoids making eye contact of any kind with the woman, she actually feels very, very comfortable. Both with the weight of Miranda against her as well as accidentally handling a ‘sensitive chat’ with her children. 

It’s a dangerous way to feel. 

This is not her family. These are not her children. Miranda is her boss. Her very married, older, female boss. Who is perimenopausal and was not dealing with it well at all. Not that she could or would blame her. 

The writer-cum-assistant had questioned her motives all weekend. Why. Why was she so obsessed with finding the problem and solutions to whatever was ailing her boss? And then why, when she knew she was on the right track, did she painstakingly spend hours putting together a food plan that would help Miranda’s hormones as her body changes?

Miranda has nutritionists and doctors and naturopaths on hand who are, Andy can admit, paid a shit-ton more than she is to do that for her. 

It had hit her right between the eyes sometime around the witching hour last night. 

A breakdown of epic proportions had exploded as she paced her tiny apartment. Well, as epic as you can be for a middle of the night epiphany and your live-in boyfriend sleeps soundly a room over.  

Andy had woken this morning and continued building a plan as though she were just an assistant helping her boss with a personal issue. Because it didn’t matter. She decided. She’ll do it because she cares. Because she can. 

That’s all. 

Miranda has a husband . 

Andy has a Nate. 

She picks at a piece of lint on her sleeve as she ponders that. She has a Nate that she’ll have to apologize and grovel to. 

“Okay,” a sigh bigger than the body it exits sounds through the quiet room, pulling Andy from her head. “We forgive you but there will be changes going forward.” Cassidy’s eyebrow hikes as she turns back and it’s adorable. 

“State your terms.” Miranda says seriously. 

“You talk to us. We don’t have to know everything all the time, you’re still allowed your privacy.” Cassidy says, hands laid primly on her lap. “But if you are struggling or having a bad day or the menopause is being mean to you, you will tell us so we can help you.”

“This is the 21st Century, mom,” Caroline picks up. “We’re women and we’re here and we will talk about our bodies and the crazy, amazing things they do. I’m sorry that you grew up in a time where our bodies were something to be ashamed of, but you are not there anymore. Something big is happening to your body but it’s normal . Tell Andy, if you don’t feel comfortable telling us. But you cannot lock yourself away because your body is hurting you.”

“It isn’t fair for you or us.” Cassidy says and Andy sits forward again in awe of these little girls who love their mother enough to lay down their own boundaries. “We were very worried about you for a long time and if we didn’t have Andy we wouldn’t know how to help you. You have a support system, use it.”

Miranda looks taken aback but fiercely proud by the unified front her daughters present. “Well,” she breathes, sounding just as awed as Andy feels. “None of that sounds impossible. In fact,” she sniffs, eyeing them down her nose. “You both sound perfectly reasonable.”

“Good. Because that was scary, what happened this morning.” Caroline says, clutching Cassidy’s hand when her sister reaches for it. “I don’t want that to happen again.”

“I’m sorry, baby,” Miranda says immediately, reaching for their joined hands. “I’m so incredibly sorry that I scared you. I can’t, in good faith, no matter how much I wish it, promise that I won’t get very cross like that again. But!” She adds when the girls rear back. “But I can promise to tell you when and why I’m upset. I can promise that we’ll all be women and be proud to be so.”

The minutes pass slowly but Caroline relents first, a slow smile lifting her mouth as she climbs up on Miranda’s lap. Cassidy stares at her mother a few moments longer before nodding and situating herself on Andy’s lap, reaching a hand out to hold Miranda’s. 

“While I have you and we’re on the subject of talking ,” Miranda says, her arms wrapping around Caroline and Andy recognizes the glint in her eyes immediately. “I received an interesting email from Dalton’s administrative team.”

Andy feels Cassidy’s entire body stiffen on her lap. “Oh?” The girl says, voice steady even as she trembles. It’s impressive, Andy thinks. Not even Nigel could hide the wobble in his voice when Miranda looks at him like that. 

“Mm.”

“Oh my God , mom. I wasn’t kissing anybody.” Cassidy cries, shifting to hide her hot face in Andy’s front. 

“I should hope not. Do we need to discu–”

“No! No, I know, I know. Andy already talked to me about ditching and hanging out with Sasha.” She grumbles from Andy’s chest and Andy freezes, way to go, Cass!  

“Did she, now?” Miranda queries seriously but Andy sees the way her lips twitch at the corners. 

Caroline nods happily. “It was pretty funny.”

Andy, flushed and only slightly terrified that she had actually over stepped and Miranda would rip her a new asshole for hiding something like that from her, glances at the older woman and wants to gape at the new softness in her eyes as she stares back at her. 

“Well then, everybody say thank you, Andrea. We are very lucky to have her.” 

Andy really does gape now, stomach rolling pleasantly as two quiet, though heartfelt ‘Thank you, Andy’s’ and one even gentler, ‘Thank you, Andrea’ echo around her. 

Her eyes are wet, and her mouth is still open but she manages a teary, “you are very welcome,” when Miranda’s perfect eyebrow raises. 

The room grows quiet again and the heavy sunbeams stream in through the tall window in front of them. Cassidy’s weight is holding her to the couch but it isn’t oppressive. 

Miranda’s cool gaze is still pinning her in place but not out of fear. 

Caroline is grinning at her from under her mothers chin, the girl’s fingers nowhere near her mouth and Andy tremulously smiles back. 

“We’re kind of like a galaxy, aren’t we, of wonderful, impossible women.” The youngest Priestly whispers, snuggling closer when her mother runs a gentle hand through her hair. 

“I suppose we are.” She whispers back, voice loaded with the sacredness of the moment. 

Andy breathes it in. 

This isn’t her house. Nor is it her family. 

Miranda has a husband and Andy has a Nate but neither of them is here right now. This moment is for them. 

For the galaxy of wild, wonderful, women they’re forming.