An iTunes Five
By Fewthistle

Author's Note: I know. This is supposed to be a ten iTunes thing. But when do I ever do the number I'm told? So, this is five. Hopefully, at least one will appeal to you. Betaed on the quick by the lovely DiNovia. All errors on me. I did write these in the time limits of each song, although I can't write with music, so I turned them off and timed myself. And I do edit. Sorry for not obeying the rules. Hmm. Imagine that. Me and authority not seeing eye to eye.

I.

Somewhere in the Vicinity of the Heart (Shenandoah/Alison Krauss)

She wasn't sure why they fought so much. They argued about just about everything, from which brand of laundry detergent to buy, to what to watch on television, to what constituted ‘too much to drink'. They didn't agree on music or politics. They definitely didn't agree on God, even on the days that Olivia grudgingly admitted there was one, because there was always a conditional clause to her admission: that if there was a God, He got a real kick out of fucking with her.

So they debated, and they discussed, and they weighed the merits of American Idol and universal health care. They talked about everything, talked it to death some nights, arms and thighs pressed against each other as they sat, steaming mugs in hand, on the porch bench.

Everything except the one thing that mattered. The one thing they skirted and hedged and tried desperately to ignore. The thing that drew them, night after night, to the same two feet of couch, where they half-reclined, limbs wrapped around other limbs, sharing the same space, the same air.

The thing that left fingers loosely intertwined long after propriety and casual friendship dictated appropriate. The thing that sent sparks shooting across tension fraught rooms, like so many Roman candles against a dark blue July night. The one thing that mattered.

The one thing they did agree on.

The one thing they didn't argue about.

The one thing they'd never say.

II.

White Flag (Dido)

She was so tired. So tired of pretending not to feel what she was feeling. So tired of pretending to love Frank. So tired of being good. Of being what Frank expected her to be. What Rafe expected her to be. What the church and Father Ray expected her to be.

She had offered up her surrender. Had given up everything that made her feel whole and real and happy. Had given up Olivia and Emma and the life they'd fashioned out of banana pancakes and baskets of freshly laundered clothes and borrowed hearts. Surely that was enough, wasn't it? God knows, she had nothing else to offer.

She had draped herself in it, her white flag, silk and satin adorned with pearls and lace, flowing behind her as she forced her steps down that aisle. Down the aisle toward Frank in his blue suit, face earnest, eyes shining like a small boy who's finally being offered the toy he always wanted, the new bike, chrome sparkling in the sun. The one everyone else had. The one he had longed for in the department store window.

The thing was, she wasn't a toy. Wasn't just a warm body to fill an empty space in Frank's life, in his family. She wasn't simply a pair of hard working hands to cook and sew and mend the torn places in Frank's life. In his family's life. She was more than that. At least to one person, she was. To Olivia.

Olivia, standing in her red dress, a slash of scarlet across the suddenly dull, beige future that Natalia could see for herself every time she looked in Frank's eyes. A reminder of life, of blood flowing through her veins. Of hearts and love and all the things this day was supposed to be about. All the things it wasn't.

How could she have been so misguided to think that this was what God wanted of her, her surrender? Trying to force the words from her lips, sacred words, sacred vows, sacred promises, she stumbled, faltered, felt the weight of them on her tongue like the wine and wafer, sanctified and holy. Tears slipping down her cheeks, she did the one thing she could do.

She surrendered. But this time, not to Frank, not to her dreams for Rafe, or the teachings of her church, or her own poisonous fears. She surrendered to love. To Olivia's love for her. To her sacrifice. To the yearnings of her own heart.

To God's will for her.

Running down the aisle, away from Frank and a lifetime of capitulation, she offered up her white flag, trailing behind her on the grayish-green carpet and out into the swirl of snow.

A white flag, indeed.

III.

Dog and Butterfly (Heart)

Emma raced across the meadow, the ground spongy and still damp from a brief, refreshing shower, springy blades of grass sticking to her shoes, to her legs. The summer air was thick and moist and laden with a thousands scents. It filled her lungs, sending the smell of a newly shorn lawn, of a hundred wildflowers, of the ozone from a far off storm, of hamburgers cooking on the grill on the porch all rushing through her bloodstream, microscopic bubbles of life and love and home.

She could feel the heat of the morning sun beating down on her head, the warmth seeping into her the way it did when Natalia pressed her hand to that same spot, when she pressed her lips there, sending Emma off into the world with a wide grin. The softness of a faint breeze stirred her hair around her cheeks, brushing them gently, the way her mother's fingers did as she tucked a stray strand of chestnut and gold behind her ear, a tender, loving caress.

The world was the same impossible green of her mother's eyes, bright and full of promise, full of possibilities. At the edge of the field, the trees marked the boundary between earth and sky, between the safety of her home and the often confusing world beyond. Here, there was no confusion, no fears, no questions.

Here, Emma was loved and cherished. Here, the house, her house, was filled with laughter and the scent of coffee brewing and the soft drone of the television downstairs after she had been tucked into bed, the quiet voices of her two mommies as soothing as a lullaby. Here, she was safe and protected. Here, she could race across a dew-laden meadow on a brilliant summer's day, the world, literally, at her feet. Here, she could tumble onto the cushiony carpet of green, lungs nearly bursting with running and laughing, knowing that she had only to reach up and firm hands would pull her up; warm, slender arms would embrace her.

Here, she was Emma Spencer, Mistress of the Universe. Best thing ever.

IV.

Heartbreak Town (Dixie Chicks)

She should have known. Should have suspected that things wouldn't be easy. After all, it was Springfield. And if there was one thing that Ava knew for certain, it was that Springfield wasn't an easy place. Still, she had hoped, for her mother's sake, for Emma's sake, that for once the fucking town would defy her expectations.

So much for hope.

It seemed to her that there must be something in the city ordinances that outlawed being happy within the city limits. Maybe she'd ask Mayor Wolfe if there was some particular bylaw that made it illegal and undesirable to find love, real, honest love, in Springfield. Who knows, maybe they could get it repealed, this prohibition on happiness. She wondered if Doris knew about the proscription. She wondered if Doris had written it in herself.

She wished that she could convince her mother and Natalia to move, to get the hell out of that place, to just pack up the car, put Emma in the backseat with enough video games to last her to the California border and just leave. It wasn't as if there were anything keeping them there. Well, nothing but ex-husbands and ex-lovers and fair weather friends. Nothing but that damn house and two of the most obstinate, intractable people in the world. As her friend Ian was always saying, those two could play for England when it came to stubborn.

So they stayed. Stayed and endured Frank's pathetic, accusing glares, and Rafe's pathetic, accusing glares, and the narrow-minded whispers of various Coopers. Stayed and put up with Alan's malicious invective and Father Ray's pointedly judgmental sermons. Stayed and tried to ignore the occasional canceled play-date for Emma, the occasional birthday party invitation that must have gotten lost in the mail.

Ava knew that her mother would never leave until she no longer needed to. Until she no longer wanted to pack up her family and get the hell out of Dodge. And how fucking unbelievable was it that Olivia Spencer had managed to fall in love with the one woman in that god-forsaken town that was as pig-headed as she was? The one woman who was willing to fight the good fight with her, just on principle?

Still, standing in the doorway of the farmhouse, Ava had to sigh as she watched her mother watch Natalia cook, the love in her eyes and the smile gracing her lips transforming Olivia Spencer from merely beautiful to impossibly gorgeous. Springfield might well break the hearts of the rest of its citizens, but Ava decided that somehow, her mother and Natalia had figured out how to break those ordinances, how to live quite successfully as outlaws. Very happy outlaws.

V.

The Riddle (Five for Fighting)

“So, Jellybean, what'd you learn in school today?” Olivia asked, her eyes meeting her daughter's in the rearview mirror.

“We learned about the moon and Apollo 11 and one big step,” Emma replied, grinning. “Mom, were you alive when they walked on the moon?”

“Yup. I was only a couple years old, but I was around,” Olivia chuckled, amused at her daughter's curiosity. Usually.

“So how old was Natalia?”

Yeah, usually.

“Well, Bean, Natalia wasn't born yet. She's a little younger than I am,” Olivia responded, giving her child a lopsided, you-got-me grin.

“How much younger?” Sometimes Olivia could swear her kid enjoyed jerking her chain.

“So, did you learn anything else today? Did you watch the clips of the astronauts on the moon?” Olivia countered, trying a little diversionary tactic.

“Derek says his dad says that we didn't really walk on the moon and that it was all a government con…conspircacy,” Emma informed her, going for the bait, although Olivia suspected that her daughter would eventually make her way back to her topic of interest.

“Of course he does,” Olivia muttered disgustedly, under her breath. “Freakin' right-wing conservative asshole. He probably thinks the Earth is flat, dinosaurs and humans coexisted and Rush Limbaugh is the smartest man in America.”

“What, Mommy?” Emma inquired, having heard her mother's sotto voce mumbling. “Mrs. Jennings said that Derek's dad was mis..miss informed. What does that mean?”

“Thank God for Mrs. Jennings. Apparently diversity doesn't include humoring crackpots,” Olivia again muttered. Turning her attention back Emma, she replied. “It means that Derek's dad is wrong about this, honey. He got the wrong information. Apollo 11 did land on the moon and Neil Armstrong did take a giant leap for mankind.”

“How do you know?” Emma asked, serious face staring back at Olivia in the mirror.

“Hmmm?” Damn it, why did she have to have a smart, inquisitive kid? And why the hell had she told Natalia she'd pick her up today?

“How do you know they walked on the moon? You said you were little. How do you know Derek's dad is mis-unformed?” Emma asked patiently, a small frown marring her forehead.

Olivia opened and closed her mouth a couple times, but no answer sprang forth. She considered her options, considered telling Emma that she knew it because Walter Cronkite said it, and that made it so, but then she'd have to explain who the hell Cronkite was. She considered telling her child that the government wouldn't lie about something like that, but she'd made it a policy to never lie to her kid, and of the two of them, she knew who to trust to keep that promise.

She knew Emma was smart enough that the mere mention of photographic evidence and moon rocks would never make it past her questions about Photoshop and how did we know it was a moon rock. So she did the only thing a mother could.

“How about we stop at Company for some ice cream and pull it all up on your laptop and you can decide for yourself?”

“Okay. Can I get extra fudge?” Emma asked, honing in immediately on the truly important topic.

“Yeah, you can get extra fudge, Bean,” Olivia laughed, pulling the car into a spot just down the street from Company. “Just don't tell Natalia, or we'll both be in serious trouble, okay?”

“Deal.” Emma agreed readily, knowing that a mad Natalia was not something either of them wanted.

As they made their way up the sidewalk to the restaurant, Emma slipped her hand into her mother's. Olivia smiled down at her, pulling her daughter close as they strolled along.

“I love you, Jellybean,” she said softly, bending to place a kiss on top of Emma's head.

“Love you, too, Mom.” A pause. “Mom, how much older are you than Natalia?”

Stepping into the restaurant, Olivia laughed. And laughed. And laughed.