Dishonourable Discharge: Grace Augustine

91

Ivory was slumped on a chair in the lab with a plate of toast in front of her. She sighed and pushed the plate away, she wasn't sure that she could keep anything down.

"Can I have that?" Trudy asked, tearing her gaze away from the screen of her mobile for a second.

"Go for it."

"Thanks. Gotta go!" Trudy grabbed the toast from the plate and stuck it into her mouth. She disappeared from the laboratory leaving a trail of crumbs in her wake.

Grace immediately moved to take Trudy's place.

"We need to talk. Now." Grace pushed a steaming mug of coffee in front of Ivory.

"Now? Really? Can this not wait until it doesn't feel like I got a rock dropped on my head? Also you're not my favourite person right now." Ivory picked up the coffee and swallowed as much as she could in one go, barely noticing as the scalding liquid burned her tongue.

"It has to be now or I'm going to lose my nerve." Grace said firmly.

"Fine. Go on," Ivory's voice was grudging.

"I'm jealous." Grace said, her face screwed into a grimace as if admitting this was causing her physical pain.

"Of what? My horrific hangover?"

Grace snorted. "Funnily enough no. I'm-," she sighed. "Are you really going to make me say it?"

"Grace I'm hanging out of my arse I can't deal with anything cryptic right now. I need specifics."

"I'm jealous of the time that you're spending with Bindi. Which I know isn't healthy and I'm trying to get over it but I just- I can't."

Ivory blinked in surprise. "Jealous? Why?"

"Did I ever tell you why I got divorced?"

"No. You just said that you were."

"My husband decided that he wanted someone young and pretty and even back then I was the miserable old bitch that I am now. He found someone better than me at an office party and only thought he should tell me when he'd been sleeping with her  for months and they decided that they wanted to move in together," Grace was spitting the words. "And I just-" she paused, looking at her girlfriend to bring everything that she was feeling to the surface. "I care about you and I love you more than I have any other partner. I don't want to lose you, especially not to the younger, better version of me." Grace took the coffee mug out of her girlfriend's hands and drained the last of it. "I can't get cheated on again."

"That was mine," Ivory murmured.

"I know that this doesn't excuse the way I've acted, I've not been fair to either of you. But I wanted you to know why I've been acting this way. And I want to work through it. You're the person that I want to spend the rest of my miserable life with and I don't want to end up pushing you away."

Ivory was silent for a moment, her eyes fixed on Grace.

"I'm- I'm sorry." Grace added hastily.

The dark haired woman exhaled slowly. "Okay. I need you to understand that I won't ever cheat on you. I don't want to be with anyone else. Yes you're grumpy a lot of the time and sometimes you drive me insane it that doesn't mean I love you any less. Those things are what make you who you are."

"Do-?"

"I'm not done. I need you to communicate with me when you feel like this because it doesn't feel good when you're acting the way that you have been. You need to learn to trust that I'm not going cheat and you need to learn to communicate with me when you feel like this so that we can work through it in a healthy way and not be annoyed with each other," the woman paused for a second. "Or end up disgustingly hungover. I genuinely feel like I'm about to die."

"The hangover is entirely your own fault." Grace looked over her shoulder to make sure that the lab was still empty then pressed a kiss against her girlfriend's cheek. "You're not getting any sympathy from me."

Ivory looked up at Grace with what she hoped was a suitably pitiful expression. "Can I have another coffee at least? You finished mine."

"Yes. But only because I promised the other day that I'd make you coffee whenever you want for two weeks. Not because I feel bad for you because you're hungover."

Ivory rolled her eyes but she couldn't stop the small smile that crept its way onto her face. "Whatever. Now make with the coffee before I die on the desk and you've got to clean my body up. That would really derail your plans for the day."

Grace got up and caught hold of her girlfriends chin, giving her a quick kiss before she left the lab in search of the coffee pot.