Title: All Wet
Author: Misty Flores
Summary: Joanne Jefferson's defined, in control life is turned upside down when she comes across one Maureen Johnson. PRE-RENT
Rating: M for adult situations between two females

Notes: All done. Thanks for the feedback and for taking the journey with me. It's very much appreciated.

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Epilogue.

It wasn't that Maureen Johnson had wanted to fall in love with Joanne.

Joanne was bossy and a snob and damned inconvenient. From the moment she had first given Maureen attitude over a stupid piece of paper with a few drops of water on it, to the moment she had demanded on their engagement day that Maureen not even be friendly with a fucking bartender, she had been a completely exasperating nightmare to deal with.

Joanne wasn't malleable. It took much more than a simple pout and a sensuous kiss to get her to change her mind on anything and she judged things on the spot. If she didn't like something, she didn't like it, and even if Maureen tried like hell to get her to change her mind, she usually only had a moderate success rate.

Joanne had friends who drank martinis and carried thousand dollar hand bags and acted like being upscale lesbians in New York was like being royalty. Friends who stared at her like she was from another planet instead of from another part of the city, who gave her plastic smiles and didn't ever really loosen up until they got plastered with alcohol.

Being with Joanne was like being with different people. Maureen had always thought it was hilariously stupid that Joanne seemed to think she had some sort of personal schizophrenia when Maureen had to contend with GayJoanne, and LawyerJoanne, and BohemianJoanne, and BlackJoanne, and even DrunkAssGrabbingJoanne. She never knew who she was going to get, and when Joanne slid into her roles seamlessly, Maureen had to learn to deal with each one, like riding waves in the ocean and hoping not to drown.

Joanne saw nothing wrong with developing an intimate friendship with her ex-boyfriend and taking calls from Antonia Suddleson about her stupid foundation, which really was just an excuse for Joanne's ex-girlfriend to pry one more time to see if Joanne was still involved, and yet Joanne would completely flip out every single time anyone even LOOKED in Maureen's direction.

It had been easy, to let the bad pile up into an absurdly tall mountain of doubt, until all it had taken was one more push from Joanne, one more demand when Maureen had already made it clear time and time again that Joanne already HAD everything that she could give, for Maureen to give up.

Maybe she had been looking for a reason. Maybe she had looked into Joanne's eyes and seen the affection and couldn't quite believe it, because Joanne had never expected anything of her, and to go from that to something so momentous like the rest of their lives in consecrated commitment scared the living shit out of her. Maybe Maureen's mother was right and being with Joanne was simply one more act of rebellion, one more act of unpredictability for Maureen that she could never follow through with, because, as her mom would always point out, Maureen never finished anything she started.

Whatever it was, the relationship was over as quickly as it had begun, and when Maureen found herself outside of that damned stuffy country club, and the exhilaration and the fevered heat of emotions had died down, the reality of her situation had sunk in.

It wasn't just another fight. There wouldn't be any hot make up sex that same night, and Joanne wouldn't call her agent's office and hire Maureen to come sing at her office just so she could apologize and give her roses and chocolates. Maureen couldn't come home a little drunk and a little pathetic and watch Joanne give in with a shrug of her shoulders and an exasperated sigh, because more than anything else, Joanne liked to take care of her.

Joanne wasn't like that. Joanne wouldn't give in. This time wasn't like any of the others.

At first Maureen had deluded herself into thinking it was temporary, that it was going to be like before, and Maureen could continue with her newfound freedom and wait for Joanne to show up like she had the first time Joanne had admitted her love, sick and lost and broken.

She had even had her own fantasy about it. She was going to pretend to remain unaffected, as Joanne stood there and apologized and begged her to come home. Maureen would give in, but only after making Joanne suffer, because Joanne had hurt her immeasurably and it was only fair.

In the meantime, she could have her flings, get the bug out of her system, so when Joanne came back to her and they got back together, it could be like before, and they could have Joanne's stupid engagement party and get it out of the way, and then spend the rest of their lives making each other ecstatic and miserable.

But a month passed, and then two, and Joanne never showed up. And the flings Maureen wanted to get out of her system didn't seem so appealing, not when she spent her time looking around corners, waiting for someone who never did seem to appear.

She worked a lot, always going to work and looking on the strip with the address with a sinking heart, because it was never Joanne's office, never Joanne's building.

After a while, she began to hate Joanne. Only Joanne would be stupid enough to leave her and what they had over TALKING TO THE DAMNED BARTENDER, and Joanne had always been stupid like that. And it was almost easy to remember all the problems, all the little issues that had pricked at Maureen, like Joanne blowing up at her two weeks after they had gotten together when she found out Mark was still her production manager.

Leave it to Joanne to not CARE that Maureen NEEDED a production manager and Mark was the best at it. Fine. Joanne had bitten herself in the ass with that when Maureen had given her the job, instead.

And Joanne had been adorable. Fussing with wires and snapping at poor Steve, looking so out of place in her trenchcoat and suits, coming home so crabby, claiming she 'wasn't a theatre person', obsessed with every perfect detail, because that was how her baby was.

Her Joanne was also sweet, and kind, and she had passion for everything she did. Joanne was all about hidden depths, exploring beneath the surface. Joanne liked to listen, and she liked to feel, and when she would make a mistake, she wouldn't make it again. Joanne never backed down from something she believed in, and for a few months, she believed in Maureen. Even if countless times, she told Maureen she had no idea what the hell to do with her, she believed in Maureen long enough to stick by her, put up with her, love her. Because Joanne was loyal and stubborn to a fault, and only when someone let her down so completely that Joanne couldn't believe in them anymore, did she give up.

And Maureen hated Joanne for giving up on her.

When Angel got sick, and Mimi had called to let Maureen know that she was in the hospital, Maureen saw Joanne again, the first time since she had strong armed Mark to get her things out of Joanne's apartment. Standing stiffly to one side, her pookie wore tired eyes and a firm pressed suit, and when Maureen locked eyes with her lover for an instant over the bed of their personal dying Angel, Joanne had looked away.

Just like that, Maureen's bleeding heart had flared in pain, and she realized Joanne wasn't ever coming back.

It had taken a moment to gather herself, suck in her breath and straighten her spine, and smile for Angel, because she was dying, and somehow it made all of it that much poignant. There was so much death in that room – the stench of it had hit them all, as Mark looked exhausted and disgusted, and Mimi looked paler than she had seen before, and Roger looked like he just didn't care anymore.

Maureen wasn't throwing up. She hadn't since the break up, because she had deluded herself into thinking Joanne was just moments from coming back and it killed Joanne when she threw up. She was working more and getting better scenes in her acting classes and she had done it all while loving Joanne and then while hating her because with each one came the direct need for a response.

But her pookie would respond, because she wasn't ever coming back, and that afternoon, Maureen wasn't immune to the heavy fog of death: something inside her died the moment Joanne looked away.

Joanne had left soon after, stating in a softer-than-she-remembered voice that she had an appointment she couldn't be late for, never once looking at Maureen when she did it.

Maureen's smile was plastic and her heart was breaking, so she made a cruel crack about her workaholic ex-lover that drew a glare from Mark and a rather stiff, pained smile from Mimi.

It was uncomfortable and awkward for them, but expected: none of them acted surprised, and Maureen almost took offense to that. Not one "Maureen, you can't really hate her that much" or "Maureen, come on, you almost married her". Not one.

She threw up again, at home in her tiny studio that she could barely afford, and she cried, for the first time in months. On the floor of her bathroom, Maureen curled into herself and sobbed so hard it physically hurt just to breathe. She hated Joanne for killing her, not once, but twice, over and over again, and still, months after they had broken up, she kept killing her.

And even while Maureen thought it, she hated Joanne for not gathering her into her arms with wild, concerned eyes, asking what the hell she was going to do with her, and begging Maureen not to be so melodramatic.

Maureen picked herself up and she made it through the night, because she was Maureen Fucking Johnson, and she could live without Joanne Jefferson, over attentive snob.

She did. She went out and fucked as many women she could find, and then she met and dated Charlie, a nice guy who managed a pizza joint. He was nice and sweet and had no problems with her dramatics, partly because he was so in awe of her he would let her do whatever she wanted, partly because she didn't care enough to muster to effort.

Maureen had to concentrate on living, on breathing, and she did, she worked and she smiled and the Joanne-sized hole in her heart shrank every day.

When Angel died, she cried again. She got the phone call from Collins, who was almost too choked up to breathe, nevermind speak. He whispered the news, and then said he was inviting Joanne, because that's what his baby would have wanted: would Maureen be cool?

She stuttered and smiled a plastic smile, even if it was a telephone she was speaking into and Collins' couldn't have possibly seen it. Of course, she told him, anything for Angel.

It was selfish, she knew, to use Angel's funeral as a chance to do anything but celebrate her life. And she was devastated over Angel, really she was. But her heart was beating furiously, and her red eyes were searching the church furiously, and when she saw Joanne, for a full minute, she couldn't breathe.

Her baby hadn't changed. She still wore her hair in those tight little ringlets, and she still had on one of her perfectly tailored suits with knee high boots. Her eyes were wet with unshed tears, and as Maureen sat in the pew, feeling Collins' palpable pain for sweet Angel, she remembered how much she hated it when Joanne cried.

Joanne rarely broke down. She was strong, everyone always thought she was the rock, certainly stronger than Maureen. Joanne had only broken down, really broken down, twice. The first time she remembered was one she would remember forever: when Joanne came to her performance space, sick and weak, and confessed her love. The second time, was after Joanne had found out about her bulimia. When Joanne had found her, and Maureen had explained it all, and Joanne had sunk to the floor, haunted and broken. Just the look on her baby's face, the pain because Joanne blamed herself for it, blamed their fight for Maureen's relapse. The expression on Joanne's face was what made Maureen swear she wouldn't ever do it again, get down on her knees and gather Joanne to her, and promise she would take care of herself because she couldn't bear to see Joanne suffer that much.

Joanne had told her that it wasn't enough: that Maureen had to want to get better for herself, not for Joanne, and maybe she was right, but in Maureen's head, it was good enough.

Both times, she had held her baby, kept Joanne together when one more hurdle would have torn her apart, and it was both those times that Maureen understood that she was truly in love. She loved Joanne, not just for her strength, but for her weakness. It was a different feeling: to want to take care of someone as much as she wanted to be taken care of, to want to hold Joanne and wipe her tears away and not think about how much longer she had to do it.

Collins had held Angel until his lover had wasted away, and that was love. Collins, her beautiful friend who had experienced so much tragedy and had always kept smiling, now could hardly keep from standing up right, clutching onto that coat like it was his own personal crutch.

In that church, it was what they celebrated: Collins' love, Collins' devotion. They felt Collins' pain and Maureen's own eyes watered with subdued regret as his song lifted through the church as if on a bird's wings. It was Joanne who carried Collins through, and Maureen own heart burst with feeling as she joined in with the rest of the grievers, standing and losing herself in the memory of Angel and the memory she presented.

In that moment, they were all together again: Roger and Mimi, Mark and Collins and she and Joanne, once again a family, if only to remember Angel.

It didn't last. Benny was there with Mimi, not Roger, and he was being a judgmental ass, butting his head into what Maureen was sure was Mimi and Roger's argument. Then of course, Joanne, who up until then hadn't spoken to her at all, decided to say she was basically doing the same damned thing.

That the first words Joanne said to her in months were accusing and patronizing caused such a strong rush of emotion that she snapped at her before she quite knew what she was doing.

It was enough for her ex-lover to suddenly come to life, her and Mimi, with such rage and emotion Maureen found herself, for the first time in what seemed a lifetime, speechless. Joanne ranted and raved about her, screaming at her that Maureen never even gave an inch to Joanne's mile, comparing her to fucking ROGER of all people.

She couldn't stand it. The attack on her senses, the assault of Joanne and the clear trembling emotion in the rich, deep voice was enough to make her turn away, stare at nothing for the sake of not having to look at Joanne, as the words beat into her.

She crossed her arms, tried hard to control her own numbness, when Roger began to rant back at his own Mimi. It was Collins that stopped them snapping at each other like a pack of dogs, reminding them why they were there, reminding them once again of the death of their own.

"I can't believe our family must die."

And it was there, said out loud, it was goodbye.

In that statement, in those words, was a truth Maureen couldn't accept, not when she glanced back and saw her baby, her pookie, sitting there lost and haunted and broken, tears streaming down her cheeks.

There wasn't a need to think. Maureen didn't sit there and process what she was doing. All she knew was that her boots began to sink into the soft grass, each step carrying her closer to her lover, to wipe the tears from her face. Maureen couldn't stand it when Joanne cried.

Maybe the family was dying, maybe Joanne had given up, but the hell if Maureen was. She wasn't ready to say goodbye. She didn't want to say goodbye. She wanted mornings with Joanne. She wanted fights and make up sex and she wanted to hold her when she cried.

Everyone said that Joanne was the strength of their relationship, the glue that held them together, and Maureen let them all think it, because for the most part, that was true.

It wasn't as if Maureen Johnson wanted to fall in love with Joanne. And Joanne hadn't wanted to fall in love with her.

But it wasn't about what she wanted, not exclusively, not selfishly.

She grabbed hold of Joanne's hand and wiped her tears, pulling her baby close and holding her as tightly as she could, and as she did, and their family walked away, leaving them behind, she whispered in her ear what she thought was the most beautiful monologue she had ever heard, imprinted to memory the first time the words burned into her soul.

"Sometimes I think I know everything and this time, I know that I know nothing. All I know is that I've loved you forever, and my life won't be better, until you tell me you love me too." Joanne's sob soaked breath sucked in, and Maureen leaned back, thumb tracing against an ebony cheek. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I hurt you. I've never felt so incompetent in my life. I'm a complete mess, and it's because of you, and I don't want it any other way. You are beautiful and funny and crazy and nothing like anything I've ever seen and it makes insane, but it makes me crave. You make me want to hold onto you forever, never let go." She managed a shaky, sincere smile. "I want a chance to make you feel the same way."

Brown eyes met green, fingers tangled, and for all their flaws, Maureen and Joanne didn't let go. Not this time.

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FIN