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The winter months were still a struggle for her. As many years she's put between her and the events of that fateful week in February, every snow month brings with it the occasional nightmare. A lonely floor of a three star hotel. An elevator that keeps opening and closing and opening and closing and the ungodly chime that accompanies this ouroboros until the world presses in on her from all sides, leaving Sophie dreading in anticipation of the loud noise that always rings out eventually. Sometimes it's a gunshot. Sometimes, it's a door being forcefully shut. Either way, she'd wake up with a start in her acolyte's arms and be instantly comforted by an often still-sleepy Andrew.
Today had started out as such a day, but devolved even more into familiar territory when a blizzard forced them to close up their bookstore and hunker down together in their apartment above. She didn't mind, however. Her mother was still seeking help for her dementia at the psychiatric hospital in Dorchester Blvd—which managed to get built despite William Weston’s best efforts, as Raymond Leduc had campaigned for it, even managing to move Mayor Fournier on the issue. She’d be safe and sound there. Andrew's sister Emma, who'd been living in Sophie’s old house for a photography gig she got in Montréal could hold down the fort there as well. She’d been living there ever since Sophie moved in with Andrew, and Sophie’s mother was moved to the hospital. The dangerous snowstorm outside would’ve felt deceptively cozy, like Before, if only it didn't come with a whole host of bad memories for her. Still though, the worst of those feelings hadn’t sprung up since she stirred that day. She was also keeping herself distracted with the book in her hands, which despite the subject matter, allayed her uneasiness somehow.
Andrew had looked so peaceful when she was unceremoniously ripped out of sleep that morning that she didn't have the heart to wake him up. Instead, she planted a kiss on his cheek and decided to get an early start on the day, carefully weaving her way out of his arms without disturbing him. She pushed the blanket over his shoulders and left for the kitchen to complete a bunch of chores left over from the previous day. Half-way through the work, she became aware that Andrew had risen owing to two arms that unexpectedly wrapped around her torso, a kiss on her neck and the gentle pressure of his chin resting on her shoulder afterward. “Good morning.” Unexpected, but absolutely not unwelcome.
“Morning, sleepyhead.” This boy.
He’d insisted on taking over the work from there, and she had agreed to start preparing their store to open instead. Some sweeping, dusting, nothing too fancy. Just an hour into the whole affair came the radio announcement that both interrupted her chore soundtrack and turned a work day into a peaceful stay-at-home day.
A breakfast, some Monopoly, an early lunch, some time spent unpackaging new books for the store, some more chores, even more stolen kisses and a bit of light reading had been their day so far.
“It's official. They're predicting it to last at least 12 more hours. Shut down Dorval even,” Andrew said, coming into the living room.
He'd gone to their bedroom to place some calls half an hour ago, let his family know that they were alright. She let herself feel a little proud of herself for having been an influence for that, having successfully persuaded him to talk to his folks more. It had done him a lot of good to have them in his life again. To talk, to be listened to by more people than just her and his friends here and not be judged. He had been so caught up in what random people back home thought of him that he’d completely missed what the ones most dearest to him believed. They understood the necessity of his brief stint at Syracuse and didn’t think anything more of it than that. It still wasn’t fair he was being treated as a danger to himself and others by people who’ve never even talked to him once in their lives, just because of any affiliation with a mental health hospital though, but at least he came to see that Ma would always have an Ossobuco ready for her little Ravioli every time he’d be stateside.
“Beth just called me,” he said, “She's at Manie’s. She says the folks stranded there are apparently having a good time. Free beers, setting up tents on the floor, getting to know each other... Some even getting frisky.” He chuckled a little at that, and Sophie caught the blush that crept up on his freckled cheeks.
“Good for them,” Sophie said, unable to suppress a smile at seeing the shades of red. “Pretty sure she's telling on herself with that last one though, you know how her and Amélie can be,” she added with a wry grin.
“Good lord, don't remind me. She may be one of my best friends but those two are insufferable,” he retorted, even though she knew he shared her love and happiness for them both at having found each other. “I just hope the police don’t give them a hard time over it.”
She rolled her eyes at that. Even before her own arrest and interrogation, she’d known they weren’t so much interested in solving crimes as they were finding people to blame. Their open contempt towards people like her, Beth, Marcella, Anne and Paul were easy enough to see in the papers. Shortly after being cut loose by Bernard, the always diplomatic and persuasive Beth had gotten the idea of studying law to help people like them get out of unjust situations like the one she’d been in. In this self described mission, she’d found a kindred spirit in her classmate Amélie. Andrew and Amélie had hit it off instantly owing to them both being bookworms, much to Beth’s teasing mock-jealousy (“stop hogging my girlfriend, Rossi!”) and she’d loved Amélie for being as kind as Beth was, and also for making her best friend happy. Beth would later confide in her that she’d been afraid if they’d like Amélie, something she confessed were ridiculous considering how perfect she thought they were for each other.
“Me too. I hope Beth sues their asses when she’s a big shot prosecutor.”
“Trial of the century, that’d be. I’ll bet she wins too. If any one of us could take on the state and win…” She nodded. It’d be Beth. She’d always had a talent in talking to people, convincing them to change tacts or sassing them without getting caught on it, defusing situations with ease. She saw it on display almost every day at the Clarington. Many customers had attempted to best her but ended up playing right into her conversational traps. Give her a jury and she’d swing the most conservative of them in an hour, she was sure of it.
“How's Mrs. Rossi? Leo doing alright?”
“They're fine. Just worried about us. Mentioned they wanted us to visit again when spring comes around.”
“So soon? It feels like we were just there for the Christmas.”
He gave a shrug at that. “What can I say, you're a hit with Ma. Everyone can't help but love you. I sure couldn't.”
It was her turn to blush now. He said it effortlessly, without any prompting—apparently without any planning either, if his own flush was anything to go by—as if it's a fundamental truth. Their bond may have been forged in fire that week at the Clarington, but it was when he volunteered to look after her mother after she was arrested and subsequently sentenced to a year in prison that she started to really imagine them as a unit, together. He had proven himself dependable. Steady. Her rock. Even these days, almost two years after The Incident now, she finds herself falling more and more in love with him every day, at the little things like these. It was all-consuming, overwhelming and she loved that it was. God, how she wanted to marry him.
They’d discussed marriage before, of course, something they both were ecstatic at the prospect of. It was money that made them put it off for the future, however, but moments like these slowly but certainly ate away at her resolve to not just blurt out the question, traditions and monetary situations be damned. They could always stay engaged and wait until they had enough for a proper marriage, couldn’t they? Wendy and Jacques were planning on that, after all...
Oblivious to the train of thought that she'd hitched a ride on, and seemingly broken out of his own sheepishness at that admission of his, Andrew sat down on the couch next to her, put an arm around her shoulder and kissed the side of her head and pointed at the book in her hands, “How is it?”
“Very... autobiographical, I'd say. I think it’s Marcella's best work so far. Her prose is so much more beautiful now, and even more hopeful than before. She also uses French a lot, which is new.” She mused, setting down her copy of Hold Me Close and Hold Me Fast by Brigitte Boswell on the coffee table and resting her hand on his thigh.
“Star crossed lovers finding each other and making each other better. Is there any kind of story in all of human existence more beautiful than that?” She still remembers their conversation at the hotel, the day she was arrested. He had not hesitated to imagine a future where Anne, Marcela and Paul were free to happily be their best selves and comfort her dark thoughts regarding the three getting caught with said story. Even though she hadn’t known completely why this meant a lot to her back then, she did know now, and she loved him all the more for it.
“Andrew, I swear, you really should take up writing.”
“Tell you what, I'll try my hand at a romance-mystery-thriller like our dear friend Ms. Boswell here, when you start at McGill. All those hours being apart might get the creative juices flowing,” he teased.
They'd been saving for her to study to become a therapist for close to six months now. A product of a conversation they’d had months ago after particularly bad nightmare that left her hyperventilating at 3 in the morning. She was good with people and observation, and it was a logical leap from there toward being someone that could heal others’ traumas, he’d said. Evidently, she’d been convinced seeing as she’d agreed to put aside a portion of their profits toward the Sophie Fund. As it stood, her psych course started in the Fall, and business has mercifully been good so far. Certain 'frowned-upon' titles associated with "sexual deviancy" that rarely get stocked anywhere else helped, no doubt, especially in the queerest neighborhood in Montréal. They even managed to get a business partnership going with the Clarington, now under Raymond, who was all too happy to help the employees that his brother had cut back from their jobs with no warning, in whatever ways he could. Eugene, Wendy and Jacques had even managed to hold onto their jobs in the end, and the hotel had somehow been able to bounce back although mostly serving a different kind of clientele now like it used to from Raymond’s first tenure as Manager. It was yet again, something that made them no friends of law enforcement for reasons that had nothing to do with law adherence.
“Ooh, a romance, mystery and a thriller? I sure hope that's not autobiographical,” she teased back. “It'd almost be plagiarism, considering we're in this already,” she said, pointing to the book with a momentary flick of her eyes and tilt of her head.
His eyebrows predictably shot up at that. “Really?” She'd wanted to read Marcella's latest work first and had called dibs on their copy when they stocked it, but neither of them had gotten around to it till she started on it today, after the nightmare from the morn.
“Yep! The Maid and the Concierge are indeed background characters, and they’re sweet on each other. Nothing’s really said but their conversations have that something about them. We don't–they... don't solve any mysteries or anything though. And... you're a woman.”
“Am I a handsome woman?” he asked, wiggling his eyebrows.
“A dashing knight,” she said, smiling, and gave him a peck on the lips. “Though, we weren't all that close until that week, right? Maybe she based them off of Wendy and Jacques instead. She probably saw them sneak into Eugene's closet for one of their little rendezvous. It was near her room, near their vent after all.”
“They made the fifth floor one of their spots?”
“I think they did, yeah! I remember finding a heart with the letters “W+J” there when I had to- after I saw Mr. Cruz…”
She felt him rub circles on her back at the shift in mood and was thankful for the comfort. He knew all about that evening of course, she’d recounted everything she’d experienced that day multiple times to him and Beth, more thoroughly than she had to the authorities. Not to mention all the aftermaths of nightmares from which Andrew had soothed her through .
“I wish we’d started talking even before that week. If only I’d known earlier that you’d turn out to be my best friend eventually…” He said with a mock-wistful sigh, hoping to move the dark cloud that had settled over her.
It worked.
“We’re a little more than that now, aren’t we?” She decided to tease back, the memories quickly taken over by happier ones with him. A picnic at the park, trying out the skate rink with him, an afternoon together at the local library, stay-at-home days like these, working at their store together, visiting his family home together… She wanted to make a million more of these happy memories, wanted a family with him, gaze into the face of their daughters and see the mingling of her and Andrew’s features that lie therein. Suddenly a different set of feelings threatened to overwhelm her. These ones were very welcome however.
“Yeah, yeah,” he chuckled, and planted a kiss on the back of her hand. “My guess though, is that you’re probably right, but she must’ve based the maid and the concierge on you and Beth, not Wendy and Jacques,” he said, seemingly mulling it over. “You two were closer than we were during her stay at the Clarington like you said, and both her and I were almost always at the reception, so she must’ve seen you two chatting a couple times.”
She went stiff for a moment at that. A reflexive fright at having been "found out." Even though she knew she had nothing to worry about, it was Andrew after all. It still didn’t change the fact that she hadn't told him yet though, and the prospect of telling him still felt weighty and scary. Saying it also made it true, and part of her was afraid at the truth being a tangible thing because of her saying it out loud.
“You know, that would explain your being a brunette in the book,” she managed to say.
“Something wrong?” So he had apparently caught the turmoil in her face after all, eyebrows pinched with concern at the question. Oh, well, no time like the present.
“Andrew, I’ve... came to a conclusion about myself, recently. I’ve known for a few months now, and I've been meaning to tell you but I guess I’ve felt... a bit scared at the idea of it.”
“You can tell me anything, Sophie. Murder-conspiracy investigations, running a bookstore, or living a life together, you're my partner. I love you, and nothing you have to say will change that.”
She held his hand in both of hers, wanting to assure, and somewhat slightly emboldened by his injecting humor into her indecisiveness with the prospect of being Watson to her Sherlock, and his unerring sweetness and belief in her all the same. “No, no, I know that, Andrew. I love you too. It's not that I don't trust you or think that you'll trust me less if I tell you or anything. It's just... it's a lot for me. You're right, me and Beth were close. She was very kind to me since my first day at the Clarington and it was always so easy to talk to her, and it never went anything beyond that but—I noticed certain things about her, you know? These feelings, I couldn't really describe them all that well back then but now, I feel like I can. I love you, Andrew, make no mistake. I want to marry you. I want to spend my life with you. I want you to write books and for me to get a job as a shrink and for us to get a house together, white picket fence and all, and raise our daughters together. I want to grow old and gray with you. But it'd be a disservice to myself if I hid away a part of myself from you during all that, Andrew. I am attracted to men and women. I am bisexual.”
There it was, everything out in the open. She was surprised at herself when she let out the breath she'd been holding at Andrew's reply. “Yes.”
“What?”
“Yes, I will.”
“Yes, you'll what?” Did he not hear what she’d said?
“Marry you.” Oh. She'd let her heart do the talking on this one, and her heart had no filter apparently. They both burst into laughter at that, tears accompanying hers. “You did just propose to me, didn't you?”
He was impossible. “Andrew-”
“I heard you, Soph.” He cupped her face with both hands, his aquamarine eyes meeting hers. “Thank you for trusting me with something so personal. I will protect your secret as if it were my own. You’re in control here, you get to choose who knows about you. And for what it’s worth, I think it’s absurd that you have to hide away a part of yourself from most people, because I think everything about you is perfect that doesn’t deserve to be locked out of sight like that. You're a brave woman, and I'm proud of you. And I did mean what I said earlier, nothing you say will ever change the fact that I love you. All of you. I want to spend my life with you too. I want to marry you.”
She's sure she must've been a soppy mess by now, which was affirmed not long after by Andrew gently wiping her tears off her cheeks. This boy... She kissed him soundly taking him by surprise, leaving him dazed for just a moment before he kissed back just as intensely. They had to part for air eventually, and embraced each other tight. She could not think of any other place she'd felt as safe in as she had at the moment in the arms of her acolyte, her partner.
“I guess we have a reason to meet your folks again now,” she chuckled as they parted from the embrace, still holding onto him.
“That we do,” he agreed, beaming. “Ma was talking about giving me her ring last time we were there, said she wanted me to ‘put a ring on it already.’ Her words!”
It warmed her heart to no end to hear that Mrs. Rossi had approved. Still, the prospect of being trusted with Andrew’s dad’s ring felt daunting. “Oh, that's fine, Andrew. Honest-”
He interrupted her by kissing her senseless before replying, “Nonsense. You deserve it, Soph. You deserve everything. You're the most smartest, the most resourceful, most beautiful woman I've ever known, and you deserve the best, always.” He paused, before continuing “Besides, the one who asks the question is supposed to buy the ring right? No way we’re dipping into the Sophie Fund for that. You have to go to college soon.” he said, winking at her.
This boy.
“I love you so much.”
“I love you more,” he said, before adding, “Girls, you said? Multiple?” He opened.
“Problem, Mr. Rossi?” she raised an eyebrow teasingly.
“No, ma’am!” A warm laugh, “Just wondering. I for one, would love to be outnumbered by two more brilliant girls like you running around the house.”
“They’d be firebrands like their dad, too,” she mused. “They’ve practically got an entire library to grow up with downstairs. ‘Forbidden knowledge’ and all.”
“I hope they get your eyes.” He brought up his hand up to her face again and stroked her cheek with his thumb, lost in her hazel orbs that radiated warmth. The first time that happened was during their talk in the basement of the Clarington, waiting for plaster to set into the mould of a key. Now it had turned into kind of daily routine for him. He doubted whether she truly knew the sheer amount of power that she held over him.
“I hope they get your freckles and hair,” she brought up her own hands and straightened some errant locks before continuing “They’d be so spoiled by their Aunts Beth and Amélie.” They both laughed at that, anticipation and fear from a moment ago faded away and replaced by giddiness at talking about their future.
Spoiled, sure. At the same time, he had no doubt that they’d grow up surrounded by love always, they’d make sure of it.
As the sun came down, they lit candles and built a pillow-fort in the living room and slept soundly in each other's arms. She let out a silent prayer wishing nothing but the best for Anne, Marcella, Michael and Paul. All of them thousands of miles away from her, but somehow connected to her—to them really. They’d never known her as more than a maid in a hotel they stayed at once but they’d managed to save each other all the same. She’d secured them their freedom, and they’d brought her and Andrew and Beth closer together.
The morrow brought with it a decent day of sales, celebratory champagne from Beth and Amélie, a visit from Jacques, Wendy, Eugene and his wife, and more fussing from Mrs. Rossi to come visit and even offers to help plan the wedding—before finally being convinced that the actual wedding wouldn’t happen till at least a year or two from now.
Things were looking up for Mrs. Sophie Roy-Rossi, if she’d say so herself. A life to look forward to and a partner and a bunch of good friends to walk it with her, surrounded by people that love her for who she truly was. Could someone ask for anything better?