Coffee and Rain

This was written for Hodgerhosen, my lovely roomie, who requested a Mark/Joanne. I suppose it's more of a friendship fic than anything else, but their relationship has such a fascinating dynamic that I had to try it out. It's post-musical and movieverse.

The door of the loft slammed. Mark had been sorting out his, Roger's, and Mimi's dirty laundry for tomorrow's excursion to the Laundromat. Roger and Mimi were currently down at Mimi's apartment, doing God-knows-what.

It was Joanne, who Mark knew had a key to the loft. She was wearing one of her typical pants-suits with high heels and a tailored jacket that indicated she had just come from work. She was wet and her hair was flat, and she looked thoroughly miserable. Obviously she had not been expecting the sudden downpour that had begun about an hour ago.

"Joanne?" he asked, confused. She never came here on her own, not without Maureen.

She just stood in the doorway. Her miserable expression gave way to an uncomfortable one. "Uh…hey, Mark."

"You can come in," he told her. It was strange; he'd never before felt like he needed to give someone "permission" to enter the loft.

She entered with a mumbled "thanks," stripping off her dripping coat and folding it neatly over a nearby chair. She ran her fingers through her short hair, pushing back the dripping strands from her eyes.

"Do you need something?" he asked. "If you were looking for Maureen…"

"No," she responded, an edge to her voice. "I'm decidedly not looking for Maureen."

"Okay," he began. "Then, erm, why…" He trailed off, unable to think of a polite way to phrase What are you doing here.

She understood. "Honestly, I have no idea." She heaved a sigh and sank to the couch, her face in her hands.

Mark stared at her for a moment. He didn't exactly know what to say or do- his relationship with Joanne had always been- well- an awkward one. "Is everything okay?" he asked tentatively.

She shook her head. Joanne was always stressed out about one thing or another, but tonight was different. Her shoulders were slumped, and she looked…defeated. An emotion he'd rarely seen from the shrewd, ever-resourceful Joanne. And he knew that there was only one person who could break her down like that.

"Maureen," she said quietly.

"Maureen," he repeated, not needing any further explanation. He sat down next to her. "What happened?"
She turned to face him and scowled. "I don't want to talk about it."

Okay, maybe now isn't the best time for sympathy… He jumped up, off-put by her death glare. "Sorry," he muttered, and occupied himself with the laundry once more. She said nothing.

He was soon in the middle of sorting through Mimi's clothing, feeling his face get hot as he tried to decide which items qualified as clothing and which pieces were lingerie. He made a mental note to ask her later to sort through her own delicates before laundry day as he frowned down at the frilly, leopard-print thong that he now held gingerly between his thumb and forefinger.

Her abrupt voice interrupted these thoughts. "Y'know who it was this time?"

"Who?" he asked. He knew this routine all too well.

"Alexi Darling's secretary," she growled, drawing each syllable out. "Alexi fucking Darling's goddamn secretary." He winced. He was a bit taken aback by the hostility in her voice.

"Oh," he said dumbly. He vaguely remembered how upset Joanne had been that day, Maureen chatting up the secretary while Joanne negotiated his Buzzline contract.

"Apparently, they traded numbers that day," she said, her voice now more weary than angry. "And she kept it. And to think…fifteen minutes later, she was down on her knee, swearing to me that she…" She shook her head vigorously as if to clear it. "Ah, screw it."

He knew he was treading dangerous waters, but he was morbidly curious now. "Did you walk in on them or something?" That had happened to him more than once. And it made him feel slightly better to know that he wasn't the only one who'd had to undergo the kind of humiliation or devastation that only Maureen could inflict.

"No. Not this time. We had a date planned for tonight, and she cancelled on me, typical Maureen. So I decided to work late. And I stopped by the diner on my way back to get some dinner, and…" She sighed. "She was there. Sharing a veggie burger with her new 'friend,' Kendra."

"Ouch," Mark muttered.

"Yeah. Well when we got home, we…fought. Mo kept swearing that she and Kendra just happened to bump into each other at the diner tonight, but..." Her eyes clouded over, and her jaw clenched. "But I found the number lying on her bedside table."

He took a step towards her. "I'm sorry."

"Me too," she said, staring at the floor. "I guess I should've seen this coming. But we fought, and she told me that if I still can't trust her after all this time, that it's not gonna work anymore." She looked up at him, and to his surprise her eyes were full of unshed tears. "And this time, she might be right. I just thought…" her voice cracked, and she cleared her throat. "I just thought that after… That a-after Angel…things were gonna be different. That we were okay. I guess we're not."

He looked at her for a moment, and then awkwardly placed a hand on her shoulder. She half-smiled at him before wiping her tears on her sleeve, embarrassed. "I'm sorry. I know you don't wanna deal with this. I should- I should go."

"No, you can stay if you want," he said quickly. He didn't exactly know how to comfort her. Sure, he'd gone through his own nasty breakup with the exact same woman, but somehow this was different. What Joanne had with her was different. It had been beautiful, and it had been real, and as much as his own breakup had hurt him, he knew without a doubt that this was much worse. Especially given everything that they'd all gone through in the past year.

"No, I should probably go and try to make this right," she said, getting to her feet. But she didn't move to get her coat. She just stood there rooted to the spot with her arms wrapped around herself, looking at it. "I should. But I don't know if I can do this anymore."

"Well," he said. "In some ways it's just easier that way. But in some ways, it's-"

"It's really not," she finished with resignation, plopping herself back down on the couch. "I love her. I do. She's…" Joanne trailed off, trying to think of the right word.

"She's something," Mark said.

"She certainly is." Joanne said nothing for several minutes after this, staring off into space again and frowning. He wondered if he ought to back off and start doing laundry again, but she just looked so sad…

"Hey," he said, standing up. "Why don't you go out and do something tonight? Get your mind off things."

She didn't move, and he tried again. "This is kind of the last place you wanna be if you're depressed. Well, unless you're Roger." This time she did look up at him, and he felt a bit more confident. "Y'know, Collins made an ATM run for us earlier. I could buy you a drink or something."

Her expression quickly became incredulous. Well done, Mark, he thought sarcastically. That's what you get for asking a lesbian out.

But after a moment, incredulity faded into a sort of intense curiosity, and she was staring at him beneath a furrowed brow as if he was a complicated algebraic equation she was trying to solve.

"Drinks?" she said.

"Yeah."

She rolled her eyes, but the corners of her mouth tugged upwards. "Coffee," she said with finality.

"Okay," he laughed, surprised but pleased that she had agreed to it.

"And I'm buying."

"Even better."

She shook out the last of the water from her coat before sliding it back over her damp clothes. "And wash your hands before we go."

"Why?" he asked, reaching for his own coat and scarf.

She eyed Mimi's lingerie pile. "Because there's no telling where those things have been."

He snorted, but complied. "Okay, Mom."

That earned him a genuine smile.

***