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Vic has nightmares about finding Cady after the accident.
She’s seen dead bodies before. She’s seen injuries that are unspeakably painful and grotesque. She’s even caused some of them. She’s never been daunted, but something about seeing Cady, someone she knows, so prone, so vulnerable, so helpless﹘ it shakes her up inside in ways she can’t explain. The image catches her in weird moments, knocking her off-balance not just mentally, but physically, too. Vic finds her heart racing, her stomach throbbing, her lungs not filling up quite right when she draws breath.
She doesn’t like it, this caught-up-in-the-gut feeling.
The dream is the same every night: Cady’s blue eyes wide open, staring blankly ahead, arms and legs lying at strange angles to her torso.The tall grass at the edge of the culvert scratches skin so pale that Cady could be a life-sized porcelain doll.
Every time the dream ends, Vic wakes up with tears in her eyes and a low ache in her belly that twists when she turns over in bed. She always ends up staring at the back of her husband’s head until she has to get up for work.
She goes to the hospital once or twice while Cady’s still out cold to assure herself the dream’s not real﹘that Cady’s not out there anymore, lying helpless and nearly dead in the dirt. It doesn’t help much with the dreaming. When Vic visits, Walt is sitting in the chair closest to his daughter, shoulders sagging, and Vic knows there’s nothing she can do or say that would bring him any comfort. Cady’s just as defenseless here﹘ surrounded by tubes and machines and with gauze wrapped around her head﹘ as she was in the ditch.
Vic doesn’t sleep well for days and days and days.
But then, within a month or two, it’s like nothing happened. Cady cracks jokes about her head injury and smiles like nothing’s wrong. A hospital stay followed by a few weeks resting up at her father’s cabin have brought her fully back to life.
Vic still finds herself awake some nights, staring at her husband like he’s a stranger in her bed, like she’s only just realized he’s there.
Cady is not afraid of people. It’s one of the few things she likes about herself. When she was a kid, she knew her father fought bad guys all day, and he was never scared of them. If he wasn’t going to be scared, well, neither was she. Most days she’s not sure if it’s a learned or genetic trait, and some days she’d do well to work with a little more caution. The car accident reminds her of that. The customers at the Red Pony remind her of that. Branch Connally reminds her of that when he grabs her by the throat in his hospital room after he’s been shot. He thrashes her around like she’s a pesky animal, some kind of pest, an insect to be swatted and squashed.
Afterward she coughs and sputters for days. She feels totally unable to breathe free and clear for a long time after that.
Cady keeps what happened in that hospital room a secret. She reminds herself that she’s not afraid of people. But after that trip to Denver, Cady realizes that she is afraid﹘ she’s afraid of Branch. Without thinking too far ahead, she ditches her car with him and takes the train back to Wyoming﹘ and calls Vic on the way up.
“Hi Vic,” Cady says quickly. “I need a ride.”
“Your dad’s not here with me right now,” Vic replies. “Should I put you through to Ruby?”
Of course Vic would think Cady was calling for Walt. But Walt is not the person Cady wants to talk to right now. She had thought she was keeping what happened bottled up inside because Walt already disliked Branch for dating his daughter. She had thought she would jeopardize his job. But she wasn’t worried about Branch. She was ashamed of herself. She had blamed herself somehow for what had happened. She isn't yet ready to admit that to her father. “Can you do it?” she asks.
“Yeah, sure,” says Vic. “I’m on my way.” Cady’s sure she hears some muttered expletives before Vic hangs up the phone, but that’s just the way Deputy Moretti normally ends a phone call.
Cady’s not sure why, on the way back to Durant, she spills the whole story to Vic. It’s just… Vic would know, right? She’d understand? She’d know why it was something to keep secret, maybe. She’d understand why Cady was ashamed. Ashamed that she let it happen. Ashamed that she’d kept it secret for so long. Ashamed that she thought Branch could change, somehow, or that the events were somehow less threatening than she imagined.
They’re quiet in the car together for a long time after Cady comes clean, but at least she can finally breathe free and clear again.
After Vic’s divorce and eviction, Walt and Cady have an awkward conversation about the possibility of letting Vic stay in Cady’s spare room. “I’d feel weird,” Cady says. “Can she stay in a hotel? Can she stay with you?” But the answer to both questions is no. Later in the day, Cady changes her mind. She’ll do it, she decides, as a favor to her father.
It won’t be for long, Vic insists. Just until some hotel room becomes available. The casino couldn’t have opened at a more inconvenient time.
They don’t make good roommates; that much is clear from the outset. Cady keeps things neat, while Vic’s shit spreads like wildfire. Cady tries to keep regular hours﹘ as regular as she possibly can, at least, while she’s tending bar and rendering legal aid﹘ whereas Vic comes in really late and leaves really early, somehow making enough noise to wake the neighborhood. But then there are times when Cady’s fixing dinner and Vic comes in with a six pack of beer, and when they sit down to eat together, it doesn’t seem so weird after all.
Then Vic calls Cady to get her from the hospital. She’s waiting beneath the entryway’s awning with crutches and a boot on her foot. “Fell,” she says by way of explanation, climbing into the passenger seat before Cady can get out of the car to offer help.
“There’s got to be more to it than that,” Cady says. “You really are picking up Dad’s speech patterns. I don’t think he’s a good influence on you, Vic. At least you went to the hospital and got it looked at.”
“Your dad dropped me off.”
“Funny,” Cady replies. “Now, if he would just get himself to the doctor now and then…”
“He goes,” says Vic. “For, you know, autopsies and shit like that.”
Cady can’t help but laugh.
When they arrive at the house, Cady leaps out of the car and runs to the passenger side before Vic can attempt to do it on her own.
The table is set, the food is hot, and the beers are cold. “Dinner’s ready,” Cady calls from the kitchen. “Come and get it!”
Cady sits down while Vic hobbles in, a crutch hooked underneath one arm and her cell phone in her opposite hand. “I just called around again,” Vic says, taking the seat next to Cady. “There might finally be a vacancy at Two Pines Motel after the weekend, but I have to book soon. I think I’ll give them another call after we eat. God, this smells delicious. I’m starving.”
“Leaving so soon?” As the words come out of her mouth, Cady’s not sure how well she’s masked her the disappointment in her voice.
“I was only gonna stay here a night or two anyway,” Vic says, shrugging as she cuts into the sautéed asparagus and takes a bite. “I still have all my stuff in boxes.”
“And you can’t carry all those boxes when you’re on crutches,” Cady points out.
“Yeah, well, the crutches weren’t part of the original plan,” Vic says. “Can you help me move? No big deal if you can’t, I know it’s a hassle. I could always ask the Ferg. I know he’s dying for an excuse to drop by and see you.” Vic raised her eyebrow suggestively and couldn’t stifle her laughter. “But seriously I would have thought you’d be dying to get rid of me.”
“Should I…” Cady pauses, not sure how she wanted the question to end. There’s a part of her that’s been annoyed with Vic since the moment she arrived - annoyed with Vic’s volume, her brashness, her unrefined edges. But Vic had been there for her when she needed it. She can barely remember the accident that brought her to the hospital, but she read the reports. She was the only one Cady felt comfortable opening up to about Branch, as well. And even with all her issues, Cady isn’t sure she wants to go back to living alone.
Should I try to convince you to stay? Should I let you leave? Should I say something? She instead starts the question over again. “Did I give you that impression?”
“No.” Vic puts her fork down and cocks her head to one side, suddenly serious. “It’s not you. It’s me.” She sighs and forces a smile back to her face. “You know, when I was growing up, my dad called me ‘The Terror.’”
Cady shakes her head and looks down at the untouched food on her plate. She’d never considered that Vic hadn’t had the same strong, positive influence from her parents that she had been lucky enough to receive. “That probably says more about him than it does about you, you know.”
“I grew up with four brothers,” Vic continues. “We’re not close. Or rather, <em>I’m</em> not close with any of them. They get along fine with each other. I mean, they’re in Philly and I’m all the way out here, but even so...”
Cady doesn’t like to hear Vic denigrate herself this way. “That doesn’t mean there’s anything wrong with you.” Cady swallows back all the other words that want to slip forth from her mouth at that moment: You’re beautiful. You’re fantastic. I like you. You should stay. The realizations are piling up fast. Cady quickly shovels another forkful of food into her mouth before she says something she might regret.
“You sure? Maybe you should ask my last roommate.”
Cady doesn’t look up. She’s afraid she will betray herself if she looks Vic in the eye. “I wish you weren’t so hard on yourself,” she says quietly.
“I can be a pretty shitty person. I’ve done some pretty shitty things.”
“So have I,” Cady offers.
“Really?” Vic asks. “I’m having a hard time picturing you up to no good. Like what?” She doesn’t wait for Cady to answer. “No, don’t tell me. I have to work with your father. I need another beer. Can I get you one?” Vic rises to her feet and leaves her crutch leaning against her chair.
“Yeah, sure. I could go for that.” Cady watches Vic limp her way back into the kitchen.
Six beers later, Vic finally dials the Two Pines Motel again, and by the time she gets through to the front desk, they tell her that they’re all booked up.
Vic’s dreams come back that night. But this time they’re worse than before. Vic wakes up with a start. Her skin is cool. Her face is flushed. She squeezes her eyes shut but the image of Cady lying prone, nearly dead, floods her conscious mind, and opening them to stare at the digital display of the clock seems the safer bet if she wants to keep from going crazy tonight.
There’s a gentle knock at the door. Vic almost misses it for her heavy breathing. “Come in,” she says, shifting in bed until she’s sitting upright. The covers fall away, but she’s wearing a tank top, and besides, she doesn’t have anything to be embarrassed about. Does she? She brushes a hand self-consciously against her breast - her nipple’s gone hard from the cool air in the bedroom. Maybe it’s dark enough that Cady won’t notice.
Cady opens the door just slightly. The features of her face are highlighted by the dim light streaming in through the window from the street. “Are you okay?” she asks. “I heard you yell.”
“Holy shit, sorry.” Vic heaves a sigh. “I’m fine.” Her hair falls loose from her ponytail holder, falling down around her shoulders. She runs her hand through it absently, shaking her head. “Jesus. Sorry. I’m fine. It was a dream.” She looks up, staring at the face she sees in her sleep. It is the opposite of what she fears﹘ Cady’s eyes stare at her, not vacant, but full﹘ full of what? Vic doesn’t dare venture a guess. She is only good at criminal intent; she can’t reliably discern what Cady might be thinking.
“Must have been a hell of a dream,” Cady says.
“It… it was.” Vic nods quickly, looking at some corner of the bedroom that suddenly seemed deserving of attention.
“Are you sure you’re okay?”
No. “Yes.” Not really. “Go back to sleep.”
“Can I come in for just, like, a second?” Cady asks.
It’s so unexpected that Vic looks back towards her and nods. “Uh, sure. Yeah.” She pulls her legs up toward her torso as best she can without hurting her ankle and pats the part of the bed in front of her. “Have a seat.”
Cady sits down and sets a hand on Vic’s knee. “I want you to stay.”
“Could’ve said so earlier, before I started making the rounds, calling all the motels again.”
“I want you,” Cady says, adding weight to her words. “To stay, and… otherwise.”
Vic looks at Cady intently, rolling the meaning of what she’s saying over in her head, considering what she means. As if to allay any confusion, Cady leans forward and presses her lips to Vic’s. For a moment Vic can feel every nerve in her body tingle with excitement. Her fingers itch to run themselves through Cady’s hair, along her neck, down the crook of her arm, and elsewhere.
But Vic pulls away.
She feels her stomach drop. “I’m sorry,” she says immediately, shaking her head, thoroughly embarrassed. “I shouldn’t have done that.”
“It’s fine,” Cady says, adopting that too-normal tone of voice she uses sometimes when trying to calm other people down. “It’s fine.”
“That was weird,” Vic says. “That was very weird. That was so, so, so very weird.” She reaches a hand to Cady’s shoulder and grabs it, rubbing her thumb beneath the strap of Cady’s camisole. “It was a good kind of weird.”
“Yeah?” Cady asks.
Vic nods. “Yeah.”
Vic leans in closer for another gentle kiss and is surprised by Cady’s hand at the back of her head, pushing her forward.Cady’s other hand had made it’s way down Vic’s neck, twisting its fingers in the tendrils of her hair and caressing her clavicle with her thumb. Then Cady pulls away, sucking in breath as though she might suffocate, but now Vic is on the offensive. Vic only gives her a moment’s quarter before she grabs the hair at the nape of Cady’s neck and presses her lips against her own once again.
“Hold on.” Cady places a hand on Vic’s chest and putting some distance between them. “I can’t breathe.”
Vic immediately lets go. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.”
“A little aggressive, that’s all,” Cady says.
“Fuck me,” Vic mutters to herself. It’s not a command. It’s just her being disparaging again.
“But that’s fine, if that’s how you like it,” Cady insists, but the moment is gone. Vic has already turned inward with self-loathing. “It doesn’t have to be like that, you know.”
“What?” Vic asks.
“It can be… soft.” Cady runs her hand along Vic’s curves until it reaches the small of her back. Her fingertips play against the bare flesh exposed between the hem of her camisole and the top of her panties. “It can be… slow,” Cady continues, letting her other hand wander across the front of Vic’s torso, smooth against the fabric of Vic’s underwear. “It can be…. gentle.” To demonstrate this, Cady leans in close and presses her cheek against Vic’s, slowly nibbling on her earlobe. She leans on one hand while the other works its way beneath Vic’s camisole and up along her tense flesh there. “Relax. If you can let yourself, relax.”
“So like making love,” Vic whispers, unsure of what to do with her hands. “Instead of, you know, fucking.”
“Not how I would say it.” Cady laughs softly. “But that’s basically the gist of it, yeah.” She moves her mouth to meet Vic’s and kisses her gently with a passion Vic’s never known. Vic, for her part, lets her hand wander from Cady’s belly down towards the cleft in her legs.
“I’m not exactly sure about what I’m doing,” Vic confesses breathily. “But I sure as hell am committed to trying.”
Cady kisses her forehead in reply. “Don’t worry too much about it. It’s not that different from what you already know. Just do what feels good.”
“I know that,” Vic says. “But I’m always the fucker. Never the… fuckee.”
“I don’t know if that’s a word.”
“It is now.” She presses her mouth against Cady’s again to prevent any lawyerly arguments from making themselves known. They battle it out not with words, but with hands, lips, and tongues.
When Cady wakes up the next morning, it takes a moment for her to realize what bed she’s in, which room. It hadn’t been a dream after all.
The next thing she realizes is the scent of burning wafting through the air. She snaps to attention and hurries out of the room.
“Vic!” she yells. “Are you here?”
“Yeah.” Vic’s voice is coming from the kitchen. Cady puts two and two together - that’s where the smell is coming from as well. “I was trying to make breakfast. You know, cook something for you for once. Fucking pancakes.”
“Is there coffee?” Cady asks hopefully.
“Sure as shit there’s coffee.” Cady rounds the corner to the kitchen and sees Vic, still in her underwear, with batter in her hair. “It’s the only goddamn thing I know how to make without fucking it up.”
Cady pours herself a cup, and she and Vic clink their mugs together like they’re champagne flutes. “Cheers,” Cady says, feeling her cheeks flush.
“Cheers.” Vic takes a swig of her coffee the same way she does with beer, drinking deeply, no matter the temperature. After she swallows, she tries to crack a smile. “So breakfast is cancelled. Sorry.”
“I think I can make do with coffee for now,” Cady replies. “But you know what I can’t deal with?”
“What?”
“All the boxes in your bedroom.” Cady bashfully returns Vic’s gaze. “I want all that cardboard to go. You should unpack and stay a while.”
Vic smiles wider, more genuinely, and almost doubles over with laughter. “Shit, I knew I was good,” she says, “but I didn’t know I was that good.”
Cady blushes deeply. When she laughs, tears spring to her eyes. Vic claps her on the back, and then runs her hand up to the back of Cady’s head and pulls her in for a deep, light-roast flavored kiss. She takes Cady by the and and leads her back into the bedroom ﹘ maybe to unpack, maybe not. In any case, the first time Vic is up this early is the first time Cady’s late for work, and neither of them would have it any other way.