Chapter Text
Agatha looks around at her group of friends. They wanted sushi, they said. They wanted to take her out and enjoy a warm Friday evening, they claimed. Ten minutes in and Agatha is feeling betrayed. She feels like a dog who was promised a trip to the park only to be dumped at the vet.
"It's nothing crazy, we just thought that maybe-"Alice starts. Agatha cuts her off, having heard enough, already.
"I'd like some help from your mysterious friend whom I've never met?" She asks, tilting her head in feigned confusion. "That's interesting, because I already have a therapist, I talk to you people about literally everything, and I've told you at least a hundred times that I don't want to try any of Jen's psuedosciency bullshit!"
She might be acting out a little bit. Abby, her very young and very nonchalant therapist, says Agatha's tendency is to immediately lash out at any perceived threat to her autonomy. Probably something to do with her highly manipulative mother.
And it was fine. Until her kid died, anyway. She only had the one, so, it's pretty fucked up that that happened. Really makes a woman feel out of control in her own life, if you can believe it.
"Listen, you don't have to do it, but at least let us explain what she does!" Wanda chimes in. Agatha's about sick of her, especially. Wanda is constantly checking in, bringing her baked goods, and offering to clean her house. It's annoying.
"No, thank you," Agatha says, getting up from her chair. She's not feeling very hungry, anymore. She's been doing better than she has in months. She showers regularly, eats mostly normal, and she's back to work on a temporary part-time basis. Can't that be enough?
Lilia puts a hand out to stop her. "Here," she says. Agatha pauses briefly, looking down to see that she's holding a business card out between her fingers.
"I don't-"
"Just take it." Lilia has that 'don't mess with me' look in her eye, and Agatha knows better than to argue. She can take the fucking card and throw it in the trash when she's home, if that's what it takes. Anything to get them off her back.
She grabs it, and Lilia pulls back her hand to let her through. Agatha storms out, wondering if the whole sober thing is really worth it, after all.
For the next few weeks, Agatha maintains a strict routine. Get up, eat oatmeal, go to work for a few hours, eat lunch, take a walk through the park, nap, eat dinner, watch mindless television, and go to bed. Each day is the same, and each day gets lost in time the longer this goes on.
Agatha likes it this way. She's lived forty-five years on this planet and she isn't sure she has it in her to live forty-five more. At least, this way, she doesn't have to stew in constant question. What now? Where to? How the fuck do I get through this and onto the next thing?
There is no next thing. How could there be?
It's another Friday when her therapist calls. She's just finished her four hours of work, reviewing and approving a bunch of meaningless shit from the people working under her. It's ridiculous. She does the same amount of work that she used to, only now she isn't wasting another four hours of her day pretending.
And for less pay. A fucking joke.
She's dipping a carrot into her hummus when her phone rings. Usually it's on silent, but the ringer is still up from her work hours. Rookie mistake. She planned to shake things up by taking an extra nap today, and now her therapist is calling.
"Agatha?" Abby says, after a long silence. Agatha didn't feel like saying hello when she first picked up. She was starting to forget there was another person on the line.
"This is she," she says, bored in tone. In reality, she's sweating. So, maybe she ghosted her therapist! Sue her!
"I just wanted to check in on you. You skipped your last appointment and haven't answered any messages."
Agatha rolls her eyes, biting into her carrot. Everyone is so concerned. A woman uproots her life after a major traumatic event and a divorce and they treat her like she's a ticking time bomb. Moving into a new apartment was inevitable.
She'll take the time to decorate it, eventually. Just. Not right now.
Point being— she's fine! She's fine.
"Sorry, I've just been so," Agatha pauses, making a gesture that Abby obviously cannot see. "Listen, I'm busy. Work has been occupying my mind now that I'm back, you know how it is."
"It's an adjustment, yes," Abby says, "if it's feeling like too much, that's something worth discussing. Have you been spending time with your friends?"
Agatha stares at her carrot. No, she hasn't been. Not since that Friday, anyway. Thinking about it makes her itchy, like she's trapped in a wool sweater and she can't get it off. Like it's always going to be this way with them. She'll be a wreck. They'll try to help her. She'll lose her head and cut them off for a while until they force their way back in.
One day, they'll probably stop trying.
"I was thinking of asking Jen if she wants to get coffee, sometime," she says. It's not an answer, of course. It's evasive, and Abby will know it. However, the reason Agatha has been able to keep a therapist this long at all, is because Abby knows her so well. She's not going to punish her. She'll take the small signals as she gets them.
"That's a good idea," Abby says. "Connection is your way through, Agatha. I want you to remind yourself of this when you feel like retreating."
Agatha spends the remainder of her day walking. She watches the people passing her, wondering about their lives. People running with their dogs. Playing with their children. Couples holding hands and lone teenagers with hands in their pockets and headphones on.
That's what always gets her— who knows what their lives are like, the things they go through? Maybe they have good parents who love them and kiss their heads and apologize when they lose their cool. Or maybe it's the opposite.
Agatha wants to hug them, or something. She wants to ask them about their dreams and let them talk for hours about the stuff they care about. All the things she used to do with Nicky. Just not enough. It never would have been enough.
When she's back home, she sits in her nearly empty apartment and breathes in the bland, stale air. There isn't enough stuff in here to cover the empty apartment smell, so it just smells like nothing, or, occasionally, mildew.
Her house in the suburbs smelled like Nicky.
In a moment of weakness, it gets to her. The reality that she's become a version of herself she can't recognize. It used to be her worry that she'd wind up like her mother— terrorizing everyone and leaving a stain everywhere she went. But Agatha is something else. She's… wasted.
Rummaging through her purse and coat pockets, she finds the business card. She doesn't know what she's meant to expect. Her only knowledge of this 'friend' of Alice's is that she's some mysterious redhead Wanda is always drooling over. No mention of her line of work.
Agatha slides on her reading glasses and takes a look.
Hold Me Closer
A Professional Cuddling Company
(Disclaimer: This is NOT a sexual service)
This can't be real, she thinks. Agatha looks at the card for a while, trying to conceptualize what it's advertising. Have her friends truly lost their minds? Agatha won't even let them touch her. Her protective bubble would stretch all the way to New Jersey if it could. She nearly ripped off a man's arm the other day for brushing his hand over the small of her back when she walked through a doorway.
Furious and annoyed, Agatha rips the card in half and tosses it in the pile of junk mail. It's all she can do not to call up Alice and yell at her over the phone. Instead, Agatha spends the rest of her night bundled in a layer of blankets and dozing off to Charmed.
She can handle herself. Even if it means spending the rest of her life eating cold pizza on a couch she found on Facebook Marketplace.
She'll just have to suck it up and be okay with that.
Agatha is late, of course. She hadn't meant to be, but as soon as she ran out the door she realized she'd left her keys, and then it was her purse, and then she had to pee. It was a whole thing. As per usual.
Jen, by some miracle, is unfazed.
"Hey," she says kindly, taking a sip of the tea she must have been nursing during her half-hour wait. Agatha eyes her suspiciously.
"What's wrong with you?" She asks. The seats at this place have tied on cushions that slide around when you sit, the plastic woven chair uncomfortable against her back. It's like an upper middle class patio out here.
"Sorry?" Jen questions. Agatha sighs. This friendship is an absolute anomaly, if you ask her. How can someone like Agatha— effortless, insecure, messy— be close with Jen, the textbook clean girl. Everything about that woman is perfectly curated. She's mean because she wants to be, not just to cope with the cruel realities of life.
Agatha hates her for it.
The waiter comes by and takes Agatha's order, returning with a tall glass of overly sweetened coffee that will probably be drained in minutes. For once, Jen ignores this.
"Were you in on it?" Agatha asks. She tries to sound less put out, but it doesn't carry. Everything feels so much harder than it used to. Everything. She's not the type to dread getting older, she never has been, but lately it's like she doesn't know where to turn for anything.
The women in her life are supposed to be her solid ground, her landing place. Yet, now, she's looking one of them in the eye and it feels like there's a thick glass between them— and it's frosting over in the winter.
Jen sips her tea, then sets the cup down, looking at Agatha very seriously. "I knew, but I didn't approve," she says.
Agatha groans again, leaning back in her chair. Her glass is mostly ice, now. She debates ordering a refill.
Jen continues, "except now, I'm starting to think it's not such a terrible idea." She says it quickly, like she's scared to say it at all. She should be, Agatha thinks.
"You have got to be kidding," she says. "This is the most ridiculous idea any of you have ever had. How do you think it makes me feel to have my friends conspire behind my back to convince me to pay for a stranger's body heat!"
The other tables turn in their direction, several sets of prying eyes and ears aimed right at Agatha. "Did no one ever tell any of you that it's rude to stare?" She snaps.
The murmuring returns, and everyone pretends to ignore her. She doesn't care.
"Agatha," Jen says slowly. "We know you better than you know you. You keep people ten arms lengths away, especially if you're close."
Agatha rolls her eyes, twirling the ice in her cup. "Your point?"
"My point is that you are notorious for letting in strangers when you won't let in your own friends. Can you blame us for taking your lead, here?"
Agatha can't. Jen is right, as much as it pains her to admit it.
There was this time in college she'd been sobbing at the bar with Wanda and refused to tell her what was wrong— only to spill everything onto the poor bartender who didn't even ask. Not to mention Abby, who got to hear Agatha's entire life's story in the first session, only to have to pry Agatha open like a clam as soon as they'd developed a genuine patient-to-therapist relationship.
Alice has her heart in the right place, no matter how maddening it is. Agatha is alone. She's isolated. Her friends love her.
Agatha doesn't argue further, but she does order a refill and a chocolate chip muffin. When they're finished, Jen pays the bill, gives Agatha a kiss on the cheek, and tells her to answer her texts. Agatha promises she will and walks home, feeling a chill against her skin.
Work tells her to take a few days off, and Agatha senses things might be over, soon. It's hardly believable they wanted her back in the first place, honestly. She'd practically begged. Unfortunately for her, remote work is on it's way out for some of these companies, and Agatha has no plans to leave New York and go back to Chicago.
She hated it there. Even more so, now.
Burying her feelings in a tub of Ben and Jerry's, Agatha sits on her couch with her knees pulled up. She's comfy and the windows are cracked. It's a small thing, but it's her anchor at the moment.
She has her phone open and messages pulled up. Group chats unmuted. Occasionally, she'll even send some ridiculous GIF in response to someone. She's been good about texting. Keeping up with it. Her friends seem to know it's out of a type of obligation, and Agatha doesn't deny it.
She wants to feel better. To open up and take her guard down. It's annoying, now, because every time she feels this way she pictures that business card in her head. What better way to let your guard down than inviting someone you don't know into your home to platonically touch you?
Agatha winces, glancing behind her at her pile of junk mail. She has yet to throw it out. Every time she's tried, she sees the ripped up card resting over the top of it and second guesses herself. She could just keep the card and toss the rest, but that would mean something. Agatha is very dead set on it not meaning anything.
Would it hurt, though? Just to call?
It's not like she has to do it. Just call, ask about the service and what it entails. Maybe find out about the rates and scheduling. Just to see? No strings attached, of course.
Agatha puts her ice cream away and gently pieces together the card, entering the number into her phone. Before she realizes what she's even doing, a woman answers.
"Hi, this is Natasha from Hold Me Closer, how can I help you?"
Agatha holds her breath. Her brain lights back up at the sound of another persons voice out of her phone, and she begins to wonder what the hell she was thinking. She is a grown woman inquiring about a professional cuddler? This is not real.
"Uh," Agatha's tongue ties up. "Sorry, I, uh. I don't know what I'm doing. My friend gave me your business card, and I just- I don't know."
There's a moment of silence, and Agatha feels her palms sweating.
"Okay, well let's start small. You're probably aware this is a professional service for physical touch. Is that something you're interested in?"
Agatha can't speak for a second, not sure how to answer. Is this something she's interested in?
"Um. Yes. I think so, yes," she says.
"Great! Usually you pay by the hour, and we can even do overnights if you like. We do require one regular session with your overnight cuddler to ensure safety and comfort," Natasha explains. "Our cuddlers are well protected and we do not tolerate any inappropriate behavior, is that understood?"
Agatha affirms, swallowing hard. Why is this so weird?
"Can I get your name?"
Stuttering, Agatha manages to give it, half-tempted to make something up instead. She ultimately decides she has to take some level of ownership over this. Who cares if she's hiring a professional cuddler? She's a grown woman.
Natasha pauses on the other end, and Agatha hears rustling.
"You know what? I think I have someone who can head over right now, if that works for you. She's a seasoned vet at this job," Natasha says.
Agatha doesn't know what to say. She expected to have to make an appointment. To have a few days to worry and change her mind. To cancel.
"That sounds perfect, thank you."
Fuck.
In an ideal reality, Agatha would have cleaned the place, showered, changed, and gotten a fresh blanket or something. In Agatha's reality, she's spent the last twenty minutes marinating in her stress sweat, entirely immobile as she's sunk to the floor. Natasha sent her some digital paperwork, which Agatha filled out in a daze, thinking the entire time about calling to cancel, but she figured this woman was probably already on her way.
The doorbell rings, right in the middle of her spiraling. Agatha sinks further, ready to hide under the couch or jump off the balcony. Another one of those thoughts she tries to forget so it doesn't come up with her therapist. Yikes.
Shuffling toward the door, Agatha's hand is slippery when it wraps around the knob, making it extremely difficult to actually open it. She takes a shaky breath to recalibrate, dries her palm on her sweatshirt, and tries again.
When it turns, Agatha is slow to pull the door open which makes it creak loudly. Just another layer of anxiety to add to the situation, she thinks. Standing in the hallway is, of course, a woman. A very beautiful woman. She's so beautiful that Agatha just stands there, mute, as she smiles softly at her.
"Is this the Harkness residence?" She asks. Agatha shakes her head a little, trying to snap out of it.
"Uh, not the first, that would be my mother, but um. She hates me and we don't talk, so…" Agatha stutters. She's going to have to start talking to Abby about bad thoughts, again. "Sorry, oh my God, sorry. I mean, yes. Agatha. Harkness. That's me and this is my-" she gestures around behind her before turning back and seeing the beautiful woman take on a very amused expression.
"Residence," Agatha finally gets out.
"Nice to meet you, Agatha," the woman says, extending a hand. "I'm Rio."
Agatha tries not to think about how ridiculously sweaty her hand is when she takes Rio's and shakes it. "Come on in," she says.
Rio walks past, and Agatha gets an actual look at her. She's in a big t-shirt and sweat pants, and she smells like a fall rain. If Agatha were to guess, she'd say she's somewhere in her mid-thirties. It doesn't seem to bother her at all that she's here. She seems relaxed, even.
"You have a nice view," Rio compliments. Agatha smiles meekly. The view. A simple but effective way of saying something nice about the place when it's bare bones and lacks personality.
"Yeah, it's nice," Agatha replies. Her palms are now sweating at a rate she can't keep up with, so she figures it might be a good time to do something normal. "Would you like a glass of water or… something?" She asks. Oh boy.
Rio turns from the window and smiles, again. Easy. Calm. "Sure, thank you," she says.
Agatha is pouring the water, taking deep breaths and trying her best not to absolutely freak out when she senses Rio's presence near her. She's leaning against the counter, twisting a strand of hair between her fingers casually.
"Hey, it's cool if you're sort of freaked out by this whole thing," she says, "I won't push in the slightest, and we can even spend the whole hour just hanging out and watching TV."
Agatha passes her the water, taking a sip out of her own glass. It's cold and refreshing as it cascades down her dry throat. Nerves makes everything hard to swallow.
"I'm just usually not very, um. Touchy. With people," Agatha admits.
Rio studies her for a moment. It doesn't feel prying, but there's an intensity in her brown eyes that puts Agatha on guard. Rio sets her glass down and turns her body to face Agatha, reaching her hand out, palm facing up. "Can I see your hand? I think this might be an easy start," she says.
Agatha can't help herself when she wipes it on her shirt for good measure, shakily offering it to Rio.
"You have really good nail beds," Rio says, taking Agatha's hand in hers. Agatha raises an eyebrow at her, a little taken aback. "Sorry," Rio says, "my mother was a nail tech."
Agatha laughs nervously.
"You want to know something?" Rio goes on, applying pressure to Agatha's palm with the slow drag of her thumb. "Some people think it's best to start light when they aren't used to being touched. But the thing is, light contact creates tension. Deeper contact, like, say, a massage, releases it."
Agatha skin is tingling a bit where Rio presses into it, now with both thumbs. What she said must be true, because Agatha can feel her muscles relaxing all the way through her forearm. She almost sighs into it, but stops herself.
"Is this alright?" Rio asks. "Tell me if something isn't, and I'll always ask first, okay?"
Agatha nods, which earns her a smile and a silent request for her other hand.
There's a surprising ease to it. The apartment is silent, and the only light comes from above the kitchen sink, but Agatha is slowly being released from her paralyzing panic. It's a good tactic on Rio's part— leave no time for settling into something awkward and formal, just get straight to the thing everybody is so nervous about.
"See? Not so bad," Rio says. She gives Agatha's hands a squeeze before releasing them. "Do you wanna go sit?"
Agatha follows Rio's gaze over to the couch. She looks at it warily, feeling strangely as though it belongs to someone else— like she's the one who walked into a stranger's house just to touch them. She shakes her head.
"This is… I don't know about this. I feel weird," Agatha admits. Rio smiles, leaning against the kitchen island and mindlessly tapping her fingers against it.
"But you called, right? Why is that?" Rio asks. She sounds sincere.
Agatha chews on her lip, crossing her arms over her body protectively. She can't ignore the magnetism Rio has. This look in her eye that suggests she can really see you, even through the layers and layers of armor. Agatha doesn't like feeling exposed.
"I don't know," she flounders, "my friends wanted me to do it and I just…" She sounds like a middle schooler getting in trouble with her teacher. Her whole world is shrinking down around her as she stands in her kitchen with this woman, wishing nothing more than to find the guts to ask for something as simple as a hug.
Rio softens. "Yeah?"
"I haven't been able to get close to people, as of late" Agatha says softly. "My son died a while ago, and-" Agatha stops herself, planting her face in her palm. "God, I'm doing it right now, aren't I?"
"Doing what?" Rio asks, confused.
"My friends keep pointing out how I'm more likely to open up to a stranger than to someone I know."
A flicker of amusement lights up in Rio's eye, "I see," she says. "Well, since we're here, do you want to talk about it?"
Agatha finds herself nodding.
They're on the couch, sharing a blanket. Agatha's legs are still a fair distance from Rio's, but she supposes mingling body heat is a gentle start. She's already stalled enough by brewing tea and popping popcorn and flipping through movies, all while Rio sat back and relaxed, making idle conversation.
"Are you always this calm?" Agatha asks her. Rio's feet shift under the blanket.
"Not always," she emphasizes. "But pretty much, yeah."
Agatha snickers, feeling a socked foot press against her ankle. It isn't clear if Rio knows she's doing it, but Agatha supposes she'll allow it.
"I'm never calm, which is strange, since I'm so empty inside," Agatha say, deadpan.
Rio laughs softly. "Is that why you called?"
Agatha shrugs. Truthfully, she called because she was afraid she never would. She was afraid she'd sit in this empty, sterile apartment until she rots in forty or fifty years— if she makes it that long. Her terrible diet is probably actively killing her, anyway.
"I was never very physically affectionate, myself," Rio confesses.
Agatha raises an eyebrow. "Seriously?"
"I lost my mom and felt just like you do. Sort of lifeless, like I couldn't interact with the world. I started doing this for my friend, hoping I could fix that feeling."
"Did it work?"
Rio presses a bit closer. Their knees lightly touching.
"It helped. Along with some other things," she says.
Agatha breathes out a puff of air, shifting uncomfortably. It brings their shins together where their legs fold up onto the couch. Rio's skin is warm and her bones are sharp, and for a moment it's the only thing Agatha's brain can tune into.
"I think I called because I just, um," Agatha forces out, already sweating from nerves. "I missed being hugged without all the pity attached."
Rio smiles mischievously, slowly opening her arms from the other end of the couch. "I feel absolutely no pity. Not an ounce," she says. It sounds like sarcasm, but something tells Agatha that it's true. Maybe because of her own loss, or maybe some other reason.
She considers it, genuinely. The itch to be held by someone is constant and persistent, she won't deny it. Plus, if she's crazy enough to make the call, she's crazy enough to follow through. It's not like her friends will judge her. It was their idea, after all.
"Okay…" Agatha says. "How do we do this without kneeing each other in the stomach?"
Rio smiles like shes won and shifts down a little, nudging Agatha's legs with her foot. Stretched out along one side of the couch, she beckons Agatha forward, encouraging her to lie in her arms. "I'm ready when you are," she says.
Agatha swallows, grabbing onto the back of the couch for stability as she scoots down, letting Rio's earthy, soothing scent envelope her as she tucks into her arm. There's no sign of fright or anxiety from Rio. Not a bit of tension. No threat of trembling.
"Everything okay?" Rio asks her.
"Peachy," Agatha chokes out. She tries to relax. Tries to sink in. It's not as easy as she wants it to be, which only increases the volume of her racing thoughts. She can't seem to push past how wrinkled her shirt is or how long it's been since her last shower. On top of it all she's thinking of the crumbs on her floor and that it would be a good idea to open a window.
"You wanted to talk about your son, before," Rio mentions. "Want to tell me about him, now?"
Agatha breathes. She can do that, she thinks. It's been a long time since she has. People don't ask very often, and when they do they look so sad and put out. Agatha doesn't want them to be sad. The sad part was his death, not his life.
She thinks back to the beginning, recounting all the things that made Nicky, Nicky. His quirks and interests, everything Agatha has stored away from an easier time. She describes him like a character from a book. The clothes he liked to wear. What she knew of his inner world.
His friends, his school, his hobbies, his everything. She doesn't keep track of how long she talks about him, and she doesn't notice the way her body relaxes into Rio's as her hair is raked through and her arm caressed.
Rio asks her questions and responds sincerely to the answers. She isn't watching the TV or distracting herself with other things, she just holds Agatha loosely but firmly and gets to know Nicky through the eyes of his grieving mother.
It's ridiculous, Agatha keeps thinking. She doesn't know this woman. She's paying her to lie in her arms and tell her about her dead kid— and yet, Agatha is drifting away, here. Her eyes are growing heavy and her voice is getting hoarse. Rio's heartbeat is steady under Agatha's ear and she counts the rhythm like sheep.
Briefly, she wonders if there was something she was supposed to remember. Something ticks like a cuckoo clock in the back of her brain, and she thinks of waiting for the little wooden bird to pop out and tell her what it is.
The thought passes, however, and Agatha smells cedar wood after a fresh rain as she slowly sinks into a deep and dreamless sleep.