by Jae
"Okay." Dawn nodded slowly. If she suspected that there was more to it, she didn't say it. "Have you made a decision about whether to tell Evan about your father?" she asked, her voice carefully neutral.
"Don't use your shrink voice with me, please," Aiden gently admonished, tapping her lightly on the nose.
"Shrink voice? I have a shrink voice?" Dawn cocked her head in interest.
Aiden nodded. She knew Dawn was mostly unaware of using it in her private life, and there were times when she even appreciated it, but this time, she wanted an honest opinion and maybe even someone to make the decision for her. "Yeah. It's friendly and shows sufficient interest, but it's carefully clear of any judgment or emotion."
Dawn thought about it, and then nodded to herself. "You're right. I do that, huh? I put off my emotions to give you room for yours. I just don't want to influence a decision that is so unique and personal that only you can make it," she explained.
Sighing, Aiden sank onto the couch next to Dawn. "I wish someone would tell me what the right thing to do is in this tricky situation. If she doesn't know about her... our father, telling her might throw her back into crisis. But if she knows about him and I don't tell her, she'll feel isolated, like an aberration that should never have existed."
Dawn took her hand and entangled their fingers. "Do you think she knows?"
"I have no idea. I can't very well ask her if she knows her father is a serial rapist, can I? That would defeat the purpose." Aiden let her head fall back against the couch in frustration.
"You could ask her what she knows about her father," Dawn said.
Aiden looked at her doubtfully. "And you think she'll tell me if she's aware he's a rapist?"
"What would you tell her if she asks you about your father?" Dawn asked. "And for the record, I'm not using my shrink voice. I'm honestly interested in and nonjudgmental of your answer," she added with a smile.
Aiden grinned and allowed herself to relax a little before she thought about the answer. "I'm not sure," she finally said. "That's exactly what I'm struggling with. Should I tell her, or would it be better to forget about it?"
"Can you forget about it?" Dawn sounded doubtful and not therapeutically neutral at all. "I don't think a day goes by that you don't think about it."
"I work with the Sexual Assault Detail. Of course I think about it. I'm confronted with rape every day," Aiden said matter-of-factly.
"You chose that job," Dawn reminded. She held up her hand when Aiden started to answer. "I'm not criticizing your choice of profession. I'm proud of it and of you."
Aiden relaxed her tense shoulders. She could remember a few dozen similar conversations with her mother, but Robyn Carlisle had never supported her choice of jobs. She knew her mother only meant well, but it had always felt like a criticism of her, not just her job. It felt good to know Dawn was one hundred percent behind her.
"You chose that job," Dawn repeated softly. "It was your choice to be confronted with rape every day."
My choice. Aiden had never thought about it like that. It was true, of course, at least to a certain extent. She could have become a teacher, an artist, like her mother, a scientist, or a mechanic. Or she could have at least picked another specialty within the Portland Police. She'd had offers from vice and from homicide, but she had always said no. Maybe it is about choice. Maybe I had to take control where my mother had none.
"Then again, maybe it's not a choice at all," Dawn continued, tilting her head, deeply in thought. "Even without the job, I'm sure you'd think about rape every day of your life anyway – because you can't help thinking it created you and made you what you are."
"I wouldn't even exist without it," Aiden threw in. Thinking about the dilemma of her existence made her head throb.
"Maybe it's the same for Evan," Dawn speculated. "Maybe she thinks being conceived of rape is what decided her fate and determined her personality. That would explain a lot about her, wouldn't it?"
Aiden shook her head. "The 'violence gene' theory is not an excuse for bad behavior."
Dawn squeezed her hand. "I didn't say it was. It's not about genes or heredity. It's about making assumptions about yourself." She looked deeply into Aiden's eyes, her green irises glowing with intensity. "If Evan thinks she's bad and unworthy of trust, respect, and love, she'll act accordingly, and it'll cause people to treat her with distrust, frustration, and loathing. It's a self-fulfilling prophecy."
Could this be the cause of all of Evan's problems? Aiden wondered. She knew better than to ask Dawn if Evan had talked about it in therapy. She knew how hard it could be to feel conflicted about yourself and your sheer existence. It had caused a lot of problems in her life, and only since Dawn was a part of it had she begun to feel more balanced and content with herself. "So you think I should talk to her about... our father?"
"Don't make a decision yet," Dawn advised.
Not a problem. Putting off decisions... that has become a specialty of mine lately, Aiden thought grimly.
"Feel her out first," Dawn continued. "If she doesn't trust you enough yet to talk to you about what she knows about her father, maybe it's not the right time to tell her – if you want to tell her at all."
Aiden nodded and closed her eyes, slightly leaning her shoulder against Dawn's.
"Speaking of right times..." Dawn said quietly. "There's something I wanted to tell you, but with Laurie's accident, it was a little hectic yesterday. Do you have the time – and the nerve – now? If you'd rather not think about anything else, now that you're worrying about Evan, we could do this later."
There it was: the offer to gracefully back out of the conversation Aiden had been dreading since Saturday. It would be so easy, but it wouldn't be fair to Dawn. I'll only hurt her if I reject her when she wants to talk. She sighed inwardly. That was one of her dilemmas. No matter what she did, it could lead to hurting Dawn and maybe even losing her. If she dragged her feet and refused to make all the steps of commitment Dawn wanted her to make, Dawn would begin to think that she didn't love her or at least that her love was not enough. If she made all the steps, moved in with Dawn, and shared her whole life with her, she could just as easily hurt her or scare her away with her little bad habits, major bad moods, and the demons of her past and her job.
"Now is fine," she finally said. "Evan won't be home from school for an hour anyway."
"It's nothing bad," Dawn said, picking up on Aiden's hesitation. "It's not a big discussion. We don't need to actually talk about it. I just wanted to apologize for cornering you on Saturday about moving in together and having kids."
Aiden could only sit and stare at her. The last thing she had expected from Dawn was an apology. Dawn had always clearly communicated her needs and had stood up for what she wanted, without trampling another person's rights or feelings to get it. It was one of the things Aiden admired so much about her. "You don't need to apologize," she assured Dawn. "You were honest about what you want, and I appreciate that." Unlike me, she added silently. She hadn't given Dawn much explanation about her reluctance to move in together.
"I'm not apologizing for wanting to build a life with you or for being honest about it," Dawn clarified. "I apologize for my timing and for not taking into consideration what you want. I sprang my plans of commitment on you without warning, after a very busy day. I shouldn't have done that, and I'm sorry."
Instead of making Aiden feel better, the sincere apology made her feel even guiltier. "It's all right," she said quickly.
"Really?" Dawn looked a little doubtful.
"Yeah. I just... it threw me for a loop. I think things are going great between us, so I guess it never occurred to me to change anything." Aiden gave a helpless shrug.
Dawn looked down and stroked Aiden's fingers. "I don't want to pressure you into anything you don't want," she said.
"I want it. I want you. It's just..." Aiden rubbed her face in frustration. How could she explain her complex feelings and unreasonable fears to Dawn?
Aiden nodded. "Okay." For now, it was better to let it rest. Her brain already felt like ground meat from the emotional grinder it had been through today. "I think I should go now. Driving to Evan's during rush hour might take me a while, and if I don't do it now, I'll chicken out."
Dawn leaned over and slid her arms around Aiden.
Aiden closed her eyes and enjoyed the warmth and the feeling of Dawn's breasts pressing against her. She wrapped her arms around Dawn and inhaled deeply.
After a few seconds, Dawn moved back a little and kissed her. "Is it okay if I stay here until you get back, or do you think you'll want to be alone after talking to Evan?" Dawn asked cautiously after their lips separated.
"No, please stay. It gives me something to look forward to." She playfully leered at Dawn, earning her a laugh and another kiss.
* * *
Aiden could hear the animated young voice from the living room as Roger led her into the house. It didn't sound like Evan's bored drawl.
"...and then she gently wiped away the blood and dirt from my arm and practically lifted me off the ground," Laurie continued her tale as Aiden and Roger entered the living room.
Look at that! Aiden thought, taking in the scene in front of her. Laurie was sitting at the place of honor, the head of the table, the glowing white plaster held like a prize in front of her. Jill LeCroix sat next to her, visibly impressed by the vivid picture the girl painted with her words. So there is a little bit of Kade in Laurie after all. That's exactly how most jurors look at Kade during closing arguments.
Only one person in the room didn't seem overly impressed. Evan sat at the other end of the table, rolling her eyes. For the first time, she showed real enthusiasm when she saw Aiden. "Great, you're here already! We better go. I want to drive while it's still light outside." She grabbed her jacket from the back of her chair, kissed the blushing Laurie, and sauntered from the room, practically dragging Aiden with her.
"Hey, maybe I wanted to say hello to Laurie and your foster parents," Aiden protested.
Evan didn't react. She kept walking until they had reached Aiden's car. "Keys," she ordered and then added more softly, "Please."
Aiden tossed them over to her. "So you introduced Laurie to your foster parents, huh?" Not as afraid of taking the steps of commitment as your big sister, are you?
With more force than strictly necessary, Evan fastened her seat belt. "That wasn't my grand idea. Laurie just came over, and the rest was inevitable. Did you hear what she told them about what happened Sunday? She told her parents the same fairy tale."
"Fairy tale?" Aiden repeated.
"Yeah. With me in the role of Prince Charming, rescuing the fair maiden," Evan said with a grimace. "I'm not a goddamn hero."
Aiden had to think of the journalist who had picked her as the subject of his article a few months earlier. She hadn't been pleased either when she had seen the sensational headline depicting her as a hero. She had given the same reason for being grumpy about the article all day: I'm no hero. Dawn, of course, had protested, calling Aiden her personal hero. "Looks like you're a hero to Laurie," she said, using the same words Dawn had used with her.
Evan grimaced again and started the car.
Aiden didn't try to make much conversation during their drive through the city. Evan needed to concentrate, and she needed time to think of an inconspicuous way to ask about Evan's father.
When Evan finally stopped the car at their usual spot, Aiden didn't suggest they practice parking as usual. Instead, she asked, "You want to walk over there and get a coffee?" She nodded at a little coffee shop at the corner. She didn't want to be confined to the cramped space inside the car for this conversation.
Evan gave the half nod, half shrug that was so typical for her, and they slowly walked toward the coffee shop.
Aiden was still searching for the best way to broach the subject when Evan broke the silence, "How's the doc?"
Aiden looked at her in surprise. Evan wasn't normally one to ask questions like this. It wasn't that she didn't care. She just didn't want to let people know she cared. "She's fine," Aiden answered. "Probably curled up on the couch with her nose in a book." She grinned indulgently.
"Did she... say anything about skating practice?" Evan asked cautiously.
Why is she tiptoeing around this? Having a rapist for a father is the problematic subject here, but skating? Why is she afraid to broach that subject? Aiden tried to remember what Dawn had said about skating. "I think she mentioned something about 'kicking your sorry little ass' the next time you run a race," she reported.
Evan grinned widely. Aiden had never seen anyone appear so happy about the prospect of getting her ass kicked. "Oh, she said that, did she?" Evan laughed.
"It's an exact quote," Aiden confirmed. She studied Evan, curious to find out what made her so happy about it. "Did you think she wouldn't want to skate with you anymore after Laurie's accident?"
"Well, she gave me the new pair of skates we had agreed on as payment, and she made it down the half-pipe like a pro, so that means the skating lessons are over." Evan was trying hard to sound indifferent about it, but Aiden saw through the act quite easily. In her opinion, no one who knew Dawn was indifferent about spending time with her.
"Evan, I'm sure Dawn enjoys skating, as hard to understand as that is for me." Aiden gave an exaggerated shudder. "But what she really likes about these afternoons is spending them with you. She could be the world's best skater, with nothing left to learn anymore, and she'd still want to spend time with you."
Evan didn't look entirely convinced. "Did she say that?"
"She doesn't have to. It's the same for me. I'm not here because I enjoy being stuck in a car. I'm here to spend time with you," Aiden said.
Evan snorted, something Aiden hadn't heard from her in a few weeks. "You're here because you feel obliged to spend time with me, not because you like it."
Under all that bragging and bravado, there's a lot of insecurity and self-doubts, Aiden realized. She can't believe anyone would want to spend time with her and like her just for who she is. She can't believe we're here to stay because everyone else in her life walked away sooner or later. How do I reassure her? She wished Dawn were here to take over or give her advice but knew she had to deal with it on her own. Honesty, she finally decided. Evan will sense it if I try to bullshit her.
"Maybe it was like that when I first met you," she admitted. "You didn't make a very good first impression, and I jumped to conclusions about you. Only after a while did I realize the problem wasn't with you – it was with me. I was thinking like a stubborn cop, not like a caring sister. I learned how to be a stubborn cop, and I'm good at it. I know nothing about being a caring sister, and I suck at it."
Evan stared at her and then laughed. "Yeah, you do! You didn't leave a stellar first impression either. I couldn't figure out what made the doc want to be in a relationship with you."
They ordered their coffees and took the paper cups with them on their walk around the block.
"Could? Past tense? Does that mean you figured out what she likes about me by now?" Aiden asked with a playful grin.
"Must be your good looks. You look a lot like me, you know?" Evan preened.
Aiden wildly shook her head. "No. You look like me." Then Aiden remembered where their similarities were coming from, and she sobered.
Evan stopped laughing too. "Did you ever meet your... or our, I guess, father?" she asked with such subtlety that Aiden, who had searched for an inconspicuous way to broach the subject for hours, heard the alarm bells ring.
She knows! Aiden was suddenly convinced. "No," she said over the roaring in her ears, "I never met him. What about you?" She wanted to be sure before she went any further, but now she knew her decision. If Evan didn't already know about their father, she wouldn't tell her.
She didn't want to put her through all the self-doubts, the shame, the anger, and the guilt that she had been through. But if Evan already had her suspicions, she had to get them out in the open and talk about it.
"Never met him either," Evan mumbled.
"But you know a few things about him," Aiden made it a statement, not a question. She was almost sure now that Evan knew their father was a rapist.
Evan turned her head. They stared at each other. "What do you know about him?" Evan asked cautiously, clearly not willing to give up any information before Aiden had done so.