[Hidden Love] /Phillipa Soo& Sara Barreilles

Embrace

Phillipa's POV

I've always loved to rehearse especially when it was something as beautiful and inspiring as 'into the woods'. So I really enjoyed it, even though Sara and me still had this distance between us, which I couldn't explain. We were separated now for years and it shouldn't be an issue to neither of us, but for me it seemed like Sara still had problem with me. Which is weird since she was the one who broke up with me.

Either way the rehearsals were doing fine, until that one day. It was a Wednesday and it was only one week until our first preview on Broadway, I came into the rehearsal room and was as always greeted by everyone nicely, except Sara. She sat on her chair, didn't talk to anyone in the room and seemed to be off in her thoughts. I decided to walk towards her and also greet her and to check on her if she was doing alright.

"Hey Sara." I said gently, as I was standing right infront of her. "Oh.. Hey Pips, I didn't notice you." She said, while she was slowly looking up at me. "It's alright. I just wanted to make sure, if you're doing fine." I explained then with a nice but worried smile on my face. I really only asked her, because I was worried about her as a friend and colleague. Because if she's not doing OK, then we can't rehearse properly. "Yeah, I'm fine, don't worry." Sara answered me with a weak and forced smile on her face. I could tell that it was forced, since that was the smile she always put on, when she had to listen to any interviewer who was being rude to her. Of course I didn't buy her answer and decided to sit next to her on a chair. "If you want to talk, I'm here for you, you know that, right?" I said, as I was starting to hold her hand. But I immediately regretted my move, since she took her hand away, stood up and turned to me. "I don't think you can help me." She said coldhearted, before she left the room.

Ten minutes later the rehearsals began and Sara came back into the room. Throughout the whole rehearsals she didn't even look at me at least one time. It shouldn't have bothered me but I thought we made really good progress throughout the last past weeks and it almost felt like we were friends again. But stupid me had to mess it up and start to hold hands with Sara, who made it clear that she wasn't comfortable with physical contact with me.

After the rehearsals, Sara left the room immediately again, so I didn't even have the chance to talk to her. I sighted, as I took my fanny pack from the chair and was about to leave the room, as Julia started to talk to me. "Hey Pippa, wanted to ask, if you wanna go grab a drink with Patina, Gavin, Joshua and me?" I knew that a drink would lighten up my mood a little bit but at that moment I thought about the morning and how awful I'm always feeling afterwards, if I drink something. "Thanks for the invitation but I've got other plans." I lied, not wanting to harm Julia's or anyone else's feelings by saying that I just didn't want to go. "Alright. Maybe next time."  Julia said while shrugging with her shoulders, before she left the room with the others. I also wanted to go but before I'd go home, I had to go to the bathroom. As I went down the aisle to the bathroom door, I heard little sobbings coming out of the women's restroom...

Sara's POV

I knew that I I wasn't myself on this day. I drove to work and some dumb emotional song came on and I started to cry again. I hated to be such an emotional person, especially if I was going through a rough time, like I was in this moment.

The night before:

"Hey Honey, I'm home!" I said, as I entered my apartment with my dog Louie while I was expecting Hannah to sit on my couch as usual. I went into the living room to look after Hannah, since I didn't get a response from her. But as I was walked into the room she was surprisingly not there. I took my phone and started to text her.

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Hey, where are you?

I'm at my apartment.