Title: Twenty Years
Author: Sapphire Smoke
Beta: BellaRei713
Fandom: Will & Grace
Rating: T
Pairing(s): Grace/Karen
Series: "Liquor in the Front, Poke Her in the Rear" - PART 1/3
Summary: It's Grace and Karen's twenty-year working anniversary, but for once, the surprising thing isn't that Karen actually remembered it.
A/N: So this is angstier than my last one, although I really don't know how that happened. I suppose I just can't fight my nature, lol. I'm also still utter trash, though mostly cause I left this open for a sequel and will probably take it because, again, trash. Oh, and there's no porn in this one and I never do that, so I am truly sorry, lol.

Twenty years.

Sometimes, it didn't seem that long. Sometimes, it felt like forever.

Grace could still remember the day the booze-drinking, pill-popping socialite came to work for her. She was a terrible assistant then and she was a terrible assistant now, and yet two decades have passed and Grace suddenly found that she couldn't imagine a life without Karen Walker in it. And it was ridiculous, honestly, because she should have fired her ages ago but now the woman was so ingrained in Grace's life that she barely even batted an eyelash when she glanced over at Karen to see the woman face down on her desk, snoring.

And yet instead of getting frustrated or exasperated like she usually did when confronted with such a sight, Grace just looked at her and gently smiled. It was insanity, that she even continued letting someone like this work for her, and yet the familiarity in it was comforting in a way that Grace found she really needed right then. With her divorce being finalized soon and her step-backwards move into Will's apartment for the umpteenth time in her life, it was nice to have something that never changed, and Karen was certainly someone who never planned to change.

But as endearing and amusing as it was to watch one of the richest women in New York practically drool all over her desk at one-thirty in the afternoon, Grace also wanted to spend their twenty-year working anniversary with the woman when she was actually awake. So with a small exhale of breath, Grace finally put down her blueprints for a moment so she could approach Karen's desk.

Grace's palm hit the flat of the surface just next to the brunette's head, the sound no doubt deafening to the woman sleeping on it. "Karen!"

She might have found the entire thing a little more adorable than usual today, but that still didn't mean that Grace was planning to cuddle her awake or anything. Being sentimental only went so far.

Karen jumped at the sound, her eyes opening in a panic as she grasped the pills next to her, the rattling seeming to startle her even further as she let go of the bottle almost as quickly as she had grabbed it. It rolled across the desk and on the floor. "What?! What's happening? Did the monkey steal the piñata? Do I still have all my hair?!"

"What?" Grace asked, perplexed by the greeting she received. What the hell kind of fever dreams was this woman having anyway?

"What?" Karen repeated, blinking heavily before she seemed to realize where she was and noticeably relaxed. Running a hand through her hair that somehow, still, didn't have a strand out of place, Karen exhaled in relief, "Oh, honey, it's just you. I thought Jack was trying to run off again."

"You just yelled something about a monkey," Grace reminded her, not understanding how the two things were related. Karen just looked at her like she was being stupid though, however that was quite often her default and so Grace no longer took much offense.

"Uh, yeah, Grace. The monkey's name was Jack…? Jeesh, and you think I'm the one who doesn't pay attention."

Right. Okay. Because obviously she was supposed to know what was going on inside Karen's head at all times of the day. Why not?

"Karen, don't you think it's time to maybe try going to bed without downers?" Grace lightly suggested as she bent down to retrieve the other woman's pill bottle from off the floor. "Because honestly one of these days I'm afraid you're never going to return from that place you go to where Jack's a monkey and you don't have all your hair."

It was said lightly, but it was honestly a valid concern of Grace's. Karen wasn't getting any younger, and the constant stream of abuse she put her body through would eventually take its toll on her. Whatever pact she had made with the Devil to get this far was impressive, of that there was no question, but everyone's time ran out at some point and the more Karen did this to herself, the more Grace feared she might not see her tomorrow.

She always told herself not to think about it, that mentioning it wouldn't make any difference so why put herself through worrying, but sometimes Grace couldn't help it; the woman had to be nearing sixty now and while she probably harvested most of her body parts from a thirty-year-old, not everything in her was as young as Karen wished she still was.

"Oh, that reminds me, I need to see Pharmacist," Karen responded as she rifled through her purse, of course not taking anything Grace had said about her destructive habits to heart. "I took the rest of my uppers last night making your present and now I'm starting to crash— Oh, honey! That's it, your present!" Karen exclaimed, looking excited now as she put her purse down and rose from her chair.

"Wait, my what?" Grace asked, momentarily thrown off by her assistant's sudden enthusiasm.

"Your present, honey, you didn't think I forgot, did you?" Karen was all smiles now as she went to the mini fridge that usually held nothing but her liquor and maybe, if Grace could find a place to fit it, the creamer for her coffee. Karen pulled out a cake though, which by itself made Grace's eyes bug out a little because Karen would have had to sacrifice valuable liquor space for that, which she was generally never willing to.

Seriously, there had been full-on shouting matches about it some days. Apparently, only cheap vodka could be drunk at room temperature.

"Oh my God," Grace gasped softly, both touched and surprised by the gesture, as she didn't even think Karen knew what year it was, let alone what day. That really meant more to her than she expected it to, and Grace's chest tightened with an emotion she hadn't let herself feel in a good long while. "You really…? Karen, that's… that's actually very sweet. But you really didn't have to—"

But then she stopped, noticing what was used as decorative edging.

"Um, Karen… did Cook make this, or did you?"

"Of course I made it, honey; what good's a gift if it's not from the person giving it to you?" Karen responded, looking at her like she was being ridiculous for thinking anything other than that, when she had never lifted a finger to do anything at all before this. Not at home, not in the workplace, never. And while Grace agreed with the sentiment, the fact that Karen was the one to say something like that was more than a little strange.

Still, the reason she asked was because... "I think I know where the rest of your uppers went."

Karen looked down at the cake, finally noticing the edging was decorated with pills, and not whatever she was supposed to put on there. Candy, no doubt. "Ohh… well that makes more sense," she responded with a little laugh, like her misplacing her pills in the cake was just a routine mishap that could happen to anyone. "I was wondering why I didn't wake up with Rosario's fingers down my throat; she always gets so touchy when I finish an entire bottle in a day, but that's a mistake you really only make twice… a year."

Grace tried to ignore that, as she knew more concern would be met with a deaf ear, and so she forced a small smile and focused on the nice thing her friend had done for her. "Well I appreciate the thought, Karen, thank you." Her grin widened as Grace shook her head, still a little overwhelmed by the gesture and admitted, "I didn't even think that you remembered it was our anniversary."

"Anniversary?"Karen repeated as she placed the cake down on the table, sounding confused. "What, did we get married when I was unconscious again?"

Again? When did that happen the first time?

But before Grace could ask, Karen corrected her assumptions with, "No, honey, I thought we were celebrating your decision to no longer wear yellow. It's been three months since that hideous blouse, I assumed you finally understood that you'd never be able to pull off that color, and I'm proud of you, sweetie, I really am! It must have been hard for you to finally face the truth, but I think we'll all be better for it."

Grace just stared at her, her brain short-circuiting for a moment because she—she had honestly thought…

"Oh, honey, I'm just kidding," Karen told her with a little hop in place and a giggle, apparently finding herself endlessly amusing. Sometimes Grace didn't know how to react when Karen was in one of her playful moods, and now was no different. "Of course I know it's our anniversary, Gracie. I remember everything that has to do with you, what kind of friend do you think I am?"

Grace's eyebrows rose at that, not really expecting that sentiment either. Was she the one who was actually passed out at her desk right now? Was this all a dream? Karen had her moments, sure; not all of them lucid, but they were still bordering on 'kind' or 'considerate' in their own right, yet this was… this was making Grace feel something, and she wasn't entirely sure how to take that.

"So you really…?" Grace just felt like she needed to check, for dream-her's sake; because if this was only happening inside of her own head, then she was fairly certain this was either going to turn into one of those shit dreams where suddenly she's stranded in public naked and humiliated, or it'd turn into one of those good dreams where instead she's naked right here in the office with Karen.

—Damnit, no. That was not a thought she was supposed to be entertaining; after she and Leo had decided to split, Grace had sworn to herself that she wouldn't even acknowledge any kind of thoughts like that towards Karen anymore, as it wouldn't be fair to either of them. Because Grace wasn't stupid; she knew what the looks meant, the constant blaming of liquor in order to kiss and touch and be nearer to Grace than what they both knew was appropriate. Karen had despised Leo, and Grace never wondered why because she just knew. But the timing was never right, and even now it still wasn't; it was Karen who was married this time – Stan not currently in jail or faking his own death – and now it was Grace who was left looking through a window at something that somebody else had.

It had always been different with Karen though. In some strange way her mess seemed to compliment Grace's, and it would have always been an easy mistake for her to make. Because it would have been a mistake, Grace was sure of that; it would be something that could never really last, as their shared disfunction would probably tear one another down instead of building them back up, and yet the desire to immerse herself in something insane always arose when Grace felt that her own life was spinning out of control. She was almost fifty now and had divorced the same man twice; it was pathetic, and Grace actively hated herself for it.

And now, with Karen doing things for her like this and looking at her like that, it made Grace wish more than anything that she could pretend that things like other people's marriages and commitments didn't mean a damn thing to her. The problem was, she had been on the receiving end of that kind of betrayal before, and she knew it didn't feel good. Stan may not even know her dame name ('Grape Antler', her ass), but that didn't mean that she could do something like that to him either.

"Well… yeah, honey," Karen told her softly, looking up at her in this way that made Grace hate herself for wasting so much time with Leo when she could have made a different kind of mistake that probably would have felt a hell of a lot better than her last one. "I know I'm always buzzed, or hammered… or twatted, or blitzed, or—"

"Karen."

"On the chong, or…"

On the what? Oh, it didn't matter.

"Karen," Grace reiterated firmly, taking the other woman's hands into her own to get her back on track. Sometimes she got stuck; like a CD that was constantly skipping, no matter how out of date that reference might be now. Karen blinked, looking up at her again. She didn't really seem to realize what she had been doing though, and just continued.

"But how could I forget the first day I came into this little shindig of yours, with nothing but the dream of a working-class gal and the desire to tear those ugly butterfly clips out of your hair."

"Hey, those were in fashion back then," Grace defended, to which Karen just gave her a sympathetic smile as she gently shushed her and placed her hand briefly over the redhead's lips, before resting her palm against the warmth of her cheek.

"…Only if you were fourteen," Karen told her gently as she nodded, like she was giving her sage advice that should be taken only with utmost seriousness. Grace cracked a smirk; she couldn't help it. She hated when Karen crapped all over her fashion sense, but she supposed sometimes she really was right. Those probably were pretty horrendous on an almost thirty-year-old woman, even if it was the late nineties.

That smirk turned into an all-out smile though as she looked down at the woman whose brow had begun to crinkle a little at the unexpected response to her fashion-shaming. "What's up, honey? What's with the creepy Lezzie Borden smile? You know we don't own a fire axe, right?"

Karen laughed a little bit uncomfortably and tried to step away from her then, because of course she had to turn everything into some gay horror story. She never really did know how to properly read other people's expressions, but Grace just chuckled gently in response, not really bothered by her weirdness at all right now. "No, just… thanks for being here for me for the last twenty years, Karen," she told her honestly, tightening the grip on her friend's hand a little so that she'd stay with her. "I know I give you crap sometimes, but I really couldn't do this without you."

"…Oh."

Karen looked surprised and, if Grace was reading her Botox-addled face correctly, maybe even a little touched. She smiled, and it caused Grace's to widen in response.

"Well thanks, Gracie. That means a lot to me."

Grace looked down at her for a little while longer, the other woman's hand tightening in hers before she realized this might be getting a little too awkward, and she coughed lightly as she let go and turned around, running a hand through her messy curls. "Oh, I actually got you something too," she mentioned, remembering she had picked something up for her this morning. Going around her desk to grab it, she said, "It's just champagne, but—"

"Aww, honey, you even wrapped it for me!" Karen responded, sounding touched as she took it from Grace's hands. The redhead looked at her, amused.

"…Karen, that's just the paper bag they gave me at the liquor store."

Which now made her feel a bit shitty, as there Karen was baking her a cake that, alright, probably wasn't edible even without the pills decorating it, as she had almost had to eat Karen's cooking that one time they went to her cabin in the woods and honestly, Grace would have rather eaten a live bear than put that monstrosity anywhere near her mouth, but it was the thought that counted and Karen's thought seemed to be so much more than hers at that moment. It didn't exactly paint Grace in the best light.

"Well it's beautiful, honey, I love it. Brown's in this year, you know; might want to jot that little tid-bit down," Karen told her, pointing at her with her brow raised. Grace rolled her eyes.

"Well, actually, I was thinking… why don't we go out tonight and celebrate?" Grace suggested, wanting to do something more. It was twenty years, after all. "My treat, for once."

So long as it was affordable. Unlike Karen, she wasn't actually made of money.

(And even if she was, she'd probably still be cheap anyway, so it didn't really matter.)

"Ohh, fun!" Karen exclaimed, looking actually excited about it. Was she sure she didn't take any uppers today, because she seemed a lot more upbeat today than any other, and Grace doubted it was just because of their workiversary. Karen was a lot of things, and her interest in Grace might have never been purely platonic, but Grace really doubted that just something to do with her made Karen this happy without the help of pills.

Or cocaine.

"Oh, but, honey… have Wilma pick out your outfit; I don't want to sit through our little date trying not to hurl the entire time," Karen amended, shooting her a look of warning. "It's hard enough for me to keep solids down as it is without having to witness your bad taste through dinner!" She laughed, thinking she was the most hilarious person to set foot on this planet, but Grace just narrowed her eyes at her. She really wasn't as funny as she thought she was.

"It's a… business dinner, Karen, not a—my clothes are not that bad."

"Oh, honey, we're both going to end up flat on our backs regretting our life choices anyway once you take me to whatever cheap, Jew-approved restaurant your wallet decides is affordable, so really, what's the difference?"

That… was offensive. But probably true.

"Because one I probably wouldn't regret as much as the other," Grace mumbled, feeling a little idiotic for even asking Karen out in the first place on her own dime. They never did that, and for probably good reason, but still. She had wanted to do something for her for once.

That stupid cake really got to her, okay?

"Oh, yeah?" Karen asked, eyebrows rising as she took the bait Grace hadn't realized she had offered. "Which one?"

Oh, no. They were not playing this game.

"Not the one you're probably thinking," Grace responded flatly as she finally went back to her desk, intending to just give her that and nothing more. In the end, what did it matter anyway? They could flirt till the ferkakte cows come home, but that didn't change anything. It never would.

Karen, however, either did not get that memo or chose to ignore it outright.

"Honey, you'd be surprised what I could think of," Karen responded, tongue in cheek and a smirk on her lips as she leant over Grace's desk, giving her an ample shot of her cleavage. Grace looked down, pursed her lips, then rolled her eyes before her gaze landed once more on Karen's face. Grace blinked a few times to try to clear her mind from the image that was attempting to sear itself into her corneas, and she smiled patiently at her assistant.

"Uh, Karen? Have you forgotten you're married again?"

Karen's expression crumbled, and she exhaled an annoyed breath as she slumped over the other woman's desk, her chin hitting her hand heavily. "Ugh, I'm so bored of that." Grace's eyebrows rose.

"You're bored of Stan?"

"No, honey, I'm just bored of being tied down. Bored of marriage. Bored of this. It's been twenty years, Gracie, how much longer do you want to keep doing this? You almost cried when you found out I baked that stupid cake for you, so let's just make a rotten go of it until everything falls to the crapper again, huh? What'dya say?" Karen smiled at her, like she had just solved all their problems and was handing her the solution on a silver platter, but Grace couldn't do much else other than stare at her.

That was blunter than Karen had ever really been about the subject, and she wasn't entirely sure how to take it, because they didn't do this. They had inappropriate jokes and even more inappropriate touching and sometimes they kissed for one stupid reason or another, but in the end they both just accepted that their timing had never been right. So what the hell was this all of a sudden?

"I didn't almost cry…" was all Grace could think to say with an offended scoff, as nothing else seemed to make much sense at the moment.

"You almost cried when I gave you the cake, and if you don't want your emotions written all over your face, sweetie, you should start investing in Botox," Karen told her bluntly, getting off of her desk to come around it, effectively trapping Grace in its little nook as she placed both hands on either side of the surface. "Grace, I'm bored."

Grace swallowed hard, suddenly much more nervous than she had ever really been around Karen, and that was saying something. She was pretty sure the woman had murdered someone before, accidental or otherwise, and yet this moment was the one Grace didn't know how to act during. "…So you've said."

"And you've finally gotten rid of Lebron—"

"Leo."

"—So what are you doing? Waiting for a written invitation? Because I can have Rosario write one up for you, honey, if that's all you need."

"No, that's—I…" Grace stumbled, unsure of what to even say anymore. She assumed she missed the window of denying that she wanted something like that anyway, so she wasn't even going to bother pretending that she didn't. "Karen, you're married. And I—you know how much it destroyed me when I found out that Leo cheated on me; I can't do that to someone else. I thought you understood this window thing, that we kept missing ours, but that we don't talk about it. Why are you doing this now?"

"Because all windows close, and you're not getting any younger, honey."

"You mean we're not."

"Oh, no, sweetie, I just mean you," Karen responded with that little smirk that said that she always knew she was going to win. Lightly patting her stomach, Karen informed her, "I got the liver of a twenty-two-year-old put in me last week and a loophole-free pact with the Devil; I'm going to live forever."

Grace rolled her eyes at that, but smiled a little despite herself. Still, nothing that Karen was saying made any of this sound appealing. Well, okay, that wasn't necessarily true, as Grace was sure she'd enjoy whatever it was that Karen was offering exactly, but at what cost?

"But what would be the point, Karen?" Grace finally asked her, voice barely above a whisper. She hated that she sounded so defeated by the prospect, when she never really considered the entire reality of it before now. She had just wanted to steal kisses in the supply closet at work, to touch her and fuck her and fall into her for maybe once or twice or three times before they realized they made better friends than lovers, but now she was thinking broader and God, she shouldn't be.

"We'd make an awful couple; we're both too self-involved, both too bitter when it comes to relationships. It could jeopardize our friendship, our jobs. It could destroy your marriage and mess with my head, and in the end we both know it can't last, so why would we even bother in the first place?" Grace asked her, needing Karen to realize that this wasn't something they could just do without consequence. It was much more complicated than that.

Karen glanced up at her, and for all of Grace's supposed self-control in this area, the intensity of the look the other woman gave her right then made her goddamn weak. "Because it's been twenty fucking years, Gracie," Karen told her, voice deadly serious as she closed the remaining distance between them, sliding a hand through Grace's hair so sensually that it caused the redhead's eyes to flutter closed for a moment as Karen finished, "and I've run out of patience."

Karen's fingers wrapped around the base of her neck then, pulling the other woman towards her into a searing kiss that left Grace lightheaded and unsteady on her feet. Karen kissed her like she owned her, like she just knew she had won, and Grace didn't know how to stop it. The other woman's tongue slipped against hers and all Grace could taste was gin, desperation, and need, and whatever protest she might have had left her mind as she allowed Karen to shove her up onto her desk, spilling pens and blueprints and what was left of the sanity in her life.

It was so much different than the other times they had kissed. They were such silly, meaningless things and yet this didn't feel meaningless at all as Karen pulled on her hair and bit down on her bottom lip. Grace groaned against the heat of her mouth, hoping that Tony had taken her suggestion of a day off seriously, because the last thing either of them needed right now was for someone to bear witness to this mess that was sure to leave them both worse off than when they began.

But as Karen's fingers started frantically undoing the buttons of her cardigan, Grace finally found some shred of decency and morality inside of her, and broke the kiss as she inhaled a shuddered breath of air. "Wait, Karen—" she tried, but Jesus, now the woman's lips were on her neck and her underwear was most certainly ruined. "Karen, what about… Stan…!"

Karen exhaled a frustrated growl, pushing herself off of Grace in a huff. She looked mad, which wasn't something Grace often saw considering the woman's face was generally frozen in one singular expression. "I'm leaving him, alright?!" she shouted suddenly, causing Grace's jaw to drop a little in shock. "Is that what you want to hear? I'm leaving him, Gracie, are you happy now?"

"Wait, what?" Grace asked, shocked beyond belief. "Of course I'm not… I mean, that's not what I—Karen, you can't leave him for me, that's just—"

"Oh, it's not about you," Karen spat, like she was almost insulted by the suggestion. She wasn't very good with emotions though; especially ones she didn't know how to dull without the use of some heavy-duty narcotics. "I'm just… I'm…"

"Karen," Grace implored softly, concern in her voice as she reached out for the other woman. "What's going on?"

Karen looked on the verge of tears, which just didn't… that didn't happen. Grace had probably only seen Karen cry a handful of times in the two decades that she had known her, and the sight still caused everything in her to break because she had no idea how to fix it. Grace looked at her helplessly, not knowing what to do or say, but it didn't matter because whatever anger Karen had in her seemed to evaporate, and suddenly she just looked very, very defeated.

"I love Stanley," Karen admitted softly, her saddened gaze meeting Grace's as she finished, "But I'm just not happy anymore, Gracie…"

"Oh, Karen…" Grace breathed, feeling awful for her. She had known that Karen barely spent time with her husband anymore, but they seemed to always go through these phases. She didn't realize it was so bad that she wanted to get out of a relationship she spent the better part of her life in. Still, she had to tell her, "I… I understand how you must be feeling; I just left who I thought was the love of my life too, but I don't… Karen, I really don't think I'm your happiness either…"

Karen just laughed bitterly at the declaration, and that actually hurt Grace more than when she was shouting at her. "Because it's a mistake, right, honey? I've always just been a mistake waiting to happen for you."

"What? No, Karen, that's not what I meant…"

But Karen stepped away from her, and Grace could practically see every wall that Karen once built slam right back into place again. "No, you know what, Grace? You're right. This was a mistake. I'm going on lunch."

"Karen, no, don't—" Grace tried, desperation seeping into her voice as she reached for the woman who was turning away from her. Karen dodged her though, heading towards the door without even a glance backwards, and Grace's voice broke in her throat as she got off her desk and practically ran after her. "Karen, please, just… stop."

Grace didn't know why, maybe it was because she sounded on the verge of tears herself, or maybe it was because Karen really didn't want to go, but the other woman did actually stop just shy of the threshold. She didn't, however, turn around.

Grace swallowed the lump in her throat, feeling it go down her esophagus like knives. She didn't know what this feeling was, but it was shredding her up inside. "I never meant to hurt you," Grace told her softly, sounding so terribly lost and small. "I just don't know… I've never known what this was," she admitted, "between me and you. It never made any sense. Half the time I never knew if you even really liked me, or if you were just high."

"Oh, honey," Karen responded softly, sounding as though she were chiding her. "I'm always high. That's what made it hurt less."

There was a smile then; Grace could hear it in her voice even though Karen was still facing the door, but it was saddened, defeated. It left Grace in tatters.

Because those were words that Grace had never expected to hear; Karen never talked about her addictions, she just continued to have them, and in that moment, despite feeling far more than she knew what to deal with, Grace didn't know what to say to her.

So she did the only thing she could think to do, and crossed the distance between them.

One gentle tug on Karen's arm turned the other woman towards her, and then the brunette's face was cupped in warm hands as Grace kissed the sadness from her lips, the force of it so bruising, so desperate to just fix it, to just fix it all, that Karen had to take a full three steps back until her back collided with the door. But Karen grasped for her like she needed her touch, needed her warmth, needed her comfort, and in that moment, Grace knew that she wasn't making the biggest mistake of her life after all, because maybe they could make each other far better, instead of far worse.

"You don't need pills to be happy, Karen," Grace breathed against her lips, needing her to truly understand that happiness was more than just some cheap high dipped in vodka and misery. It was more than just a blanket to cover the darkness, it was more than just laughter to hide tears. It was more. It was more. God, it had to be more…

"Then show me happiness, Gracie," Karen pleaded, her hand tangling in a mess of curls and bringing Grace flush against her, fingers slipping underneath fabric as her touch burned, ached, consumed. Grace shuddered against her, her breathing uneven and thoughts clouded.

"Sex isn't happiness, Karen," she breathed, needing her to realize, needing her to know that this wouldn't fix it; that it might take a very long time until it was fixed.

"No…" Karen agreed softly, her gaze searing into Grace's as her eyes begged for her to try anyway. "But it's a start."

- FIN -