AN: So then, after countless requests, over a period of two years, I have finally obliged and produced a sequel to 'Winter's Shadow.' This story picks up where we left off the previous tale and does contain elements of domestic Vauseman.

As I'm working on other writing projects too, I'm hoping to update this one every 2/3 weeks as a rough guide. But if you follow the story you'll get a notification anyway.

Finally, thank you to 'imissedyourpatronage' for her help with various bits and pieces.

Enjoy.

…

The snow catches her off guard, after all, it's only late October, but it doesn't slow her pace, or weaken her resolve to get as far away from the charred remnants of her clothes store as she can manage.

When her fingers no longer feel as though they're her own and the ground becomes too treacherous under foot, she hails a cab and tells the driver to take her down town. He tries to make small talk and when that doesn't work, he cracks a joke about global warming and the freak weather they're having. Alex nods in perfunctory fashion, but her brain can't process anything past the fire.

She stares out of the window, observing the world whirr past her in a neon lit smudge of Halloween lanterns and fairy lights and toys with the idea of calling Piper right now and blurting the whole thing out, in one laboured breath, but she knows that wouldn't be fair, Olivia is with her after all.

They drive around aimlessly for a little while longer ('I'll tell you when to stop okay?') and finally the car ends up outside a bar she used to frequent, back when she was struggling to make the rent, when her heart was less full, when the stakes were much less high.

'You know this establishment well?' the driver says, pocketing the cash and dubiously eyeing up the place.

'Well enough,' she mumbles. She climbs out of the cab and stands under the stoop of the bar, lighting a cigarette and watching the smoke unfurl towards the ungodly sky. She imagines Bill and Carol Chapman;

I told you so.

And Polly Harper;

This can't be a surprise Piper?

And bile coats the back of her throat.

She stands for a little while longer, watching delicate, watery snowflakes, morph into more permanent, menacing snowdrifts.

Winter's shadow has never been so prevalent.

…

She's two shots of Bourbon down, willing the world to become softer around the edges, for a pleasurable numbness to descend, but everything still seems too vivid, a brutal Technicolour and oh how she longs for sepia.

She removes her glasses, tossing them onto the coffee table so they land with a soft thump on top of a messy pile of bank statements; exhibit A.

And then she hears the click of the front door latch.

Piper.

And she's swooping up all the evidence and shoving it by the fistful into the drawer of the end table. After all, too many questions spoil the broth.

She barely has time to re-position herself on the couch, before she hears the gentle padding of tiny feet.

"Can you guess who it is?" Olivia says, sticky hands curling around Alex's head, covering her eyes.

'Um…is it Santa?'

Olivia giggles heartily, 'no silly, how can it be Santa, it's not Christmas yet?'

'You're right, you're right,' Alex says, shifting her position slightly, 'let me think….who else's hands would smell of Cherry Jolly Ranchers…mmmm….one second…I think it's coming to me…' She taps her temple as if assisting the cogs of her brain. 'Is it….Liv?' and she stands up and turns and swoops the 6 year old up in her arms, blowing raspberries against her cheek.

And the room is a cacophony of laughter and candy kisses and for a second, Alex feels like herself again, the unbroken version.

'Come on you,' Piper says grabbing Olivia from the brunette, 'it's late, what did we say?'

Olivia looks up at her, blinking blue eyes wide, 'um…I don't remember…'

'I bet you don't,' Piper says, trying not to laugh, 'well luckily I do remember, we said pyjamas, brush your teeth and then bed, okay?'

Olivia turns to Alex (her usual ally) for support, but none is forthcoming, not tonight. 'You heard what your mom said kiddo.'

'But..,' she begins to protest, not sure how to continue so that she gets her way.

'I tell you what,' Alex says, 'if you're quick, I'll come up and read you a story, okay?'

'The one about the princesses and goblins?'

'Sure, kiddo, whatever you like, now come on, the sooner you get ready, the sooner it's story time.' Alex has barely finished her sentence before the 6 year old has squirmed free of Piper's grasp and is bolting up the stairs.

'You doing alright?' Piper says, putting her arms around the brunette and pulling her in for a kiss. She jerks her head away after a few seconds, sniffing the air, 'you smell of smoke Al.'

'No shit Sherlock, that'll be the cigarettes,' Alex grins, hoping for a subject change, 'I know I said I'd quit,' she continues, hands in the air in mock surrender, 'but what ya gonna do?'

'Funny, but it isn't that sort of smoke.' The blonde pauses, regards her curiously, clearly waiting for her girlfriend to fill in the gaps. Flesh out the parts to make the story more palatable.

'I just went to the store, it's still pretty smoky down there, that's probably what it is.' She untangles herself from the embrace, a feeling of claustrophobia beginning to cloak her. 'I'll take a shower before bed,' she says opening the fridge, the sickly yellow light spilling out and illuminating her face so that she has nowhere to hide. 'How were your parents?'

'They were fine, the same….it's probably a good job you didn't come along though, my mother was in fine 'form.'

'No surprises there,' she says, laughing sardonically, 'what's the latest gossip from the country club? Who's fucking the gardener?' She closes the fridge, the tinkling of bottles adding a strange juxtaposition to the conversation.

'Al,' Piper says so gently, it makes Alex's heart feel like a soft, useless thing.

'I know what you're going to say Pipes, can we leave it for tonight please? I've just had a tough day.'

'I figured,' the blonde says, nodding towards the empty tumbler on the table.

'So now you're judging me?'

'No, of course not, but you need to stop visiting the store, it's like a barely healed scab you won't allow to settle. Yes the fire was upsetting, but the insurance company are sending an assessor around aren't they?'

She pauses pointedly, and this is when Alex should jump in and tell her about the deposit money, about how she forgot to renew the insurance last year, about how years of hard work and thousands and thousands of dollars of stock are nothing more than ash and scar tissue. But then Olivia is shouting for her bedtime story and it's such an easy out, that she takes it without hesitation. After all, at least one of them deserves a fairy tale ending.

…

Monday is blue; Monday is what she's been dreading.

Olivia is sitting munching her cereal with such a fierce concentration that it always makes Alex's chest pang in a way she'd never before thought possible.

'You enjoying that Liv?' she asks, leaning against the kitchen countertop and taking a deep sip off coffee.

She nods and then shovels another spoonful into her mouth. 'It's brain food, Finn says so.'

Alex is wondering whether or not she should correct this statement, but then Piper walks in with a white envelope and everything she's been biting back for the last few days, bursts back through to the surface, sending her adrift.

'It's from the clinic,' she says beaming, holding the letter aloft, 'we've been accepted for the fertility treatment, we just need to transfer the rest of the funds within the next week or so and they can start.' She's bouncing on the balls of her feet with crazy, childlike enthusiasm and the fear, the thing that sits at the very pit of Alex's stomach, dormant for the most part, is alive, knifing its way up through her lungs and lodging itself firmly in her throat.

'Can you go to the bank and transfer the money later today Al?'

Well you see honey, i'm running a little low on funds. I (not so) cleverly put down a huge deposit to buy the store, it was meant as a surprise, and now it's nothing more than a charred carcass with no insurance to cover it. Ain't that fucking grand!

She needs to buy time, to try and find a way out of this tar like mess she's gotten herself into.

'Might be a bit later in the week,' she finally says, turning to pour the remnants of coffee down the sink, pointedly ignoring eye contact. She mumbles something about waiting for a payment to clear, a Chinese buyer. But there is no reprieve, because Piper is right by her side, holding her hand and she whispers a song they used to play over and over, back when Larry was still in the picture and stolen moments in the shadows were all they had;

Until I first met you, I was lonesome

And when you came in sight, dear, my heart grew light

And this old world seemed new to me

And she laughs and Alex feels the slight fracture of her heart crack a little deeper.

'Remember Al? My dear Mr. Shane…' and she carries on singing the song, so light and sweet it feels like summer again.

'How can I forget? You violated my ear drums with it all the time,' she smiles.

'What's viy-ow-layt mean?' Olivia says, scraping the chair legs across the kitchen floor as she removes herself from the table.

'It means stop listening to adult conversations missy, now go get your stuff ready, it's nearly time for school.'

Olivia wanders out of the room, still whispering the word under her breath.

Viy-ow-layt, Viy-ow-layt.

'If she uses that word incorrectly, you're gonna be the one at fault,' Piper says, punctuating the end of the sentence with a kiss.

'She'll have forgotten it by the end of the day,' Alex says, 'trust me.' She only wishes everything was so easy.

…

Alex spends the rest of day pouring through paperwork, trying to unearth even the merest sliver of hope to try and remedy the situation, but the numbers merely taunt her, blurring into a singular black smudge by late afternoon and she's no further along than when she began.

And before she knows it, Liv is back from school and Piper is complaining about how quickly she's outgrown her shoes. 'This is the third pair in as many months, I swear,' she sighs, planting a kiss on the top of Alex's head. 'Makes me think I should go back to working fulltime, that would just about cover the cost of having her.'

She says it in such a carefree way that Alex feels stupid for even thinking what she is, but there's a darkness marbling her thoughts and seemingly long forgotten words float into sharp focus, so they're no longer harmless, spectral things of Christmas past;

Your shoes are bobos

And then the confession is back, precariously balanced on the tip of her tongue, waiting to take the leap into the abyss. But then Liv comes bowling in, shows her what they learnt in history class today and so Alex swallows it back down for another day. But the shadows are drawing in, she's running out of time, earth crumbling beneath her feet. She just has to hope she can make it.

…

AN: The song lyrics in this chapter are from 'Bei Mir Bist du Schoen' (My Dear Mr. Shane) by the Andrews Sisters.

Feel free to leave comments- they are most welcome. Or you can come chat to me on tumblr about it, where I'm orthodox-swing.

Cheers.