Chapter Text
And for a fortnight, there we were, forever
Run into you sometimes, comment on my sweater
Now you're at the mailbox, turned into good neighbours
My husband is cheating, I wanna kill him
— Taylor Swift (2024)
“I think we’re going to move to Florida.”
Shauna left the glass of diet coke on the table with a small slam. She turned to look at Jackie, giving her a long look. “What?”
“Chloe has been offered a new position in the company,” Jackie said. Her finger mindlessly caressed the rim of her glass— a gin and tonic at eleven in the morning. Jackie liked to call herself a ‘drinker on occasion,’ but she really was just a drinker, no matter the occasion. “We’d have to move to Florida.”
“Are you serious?” Shauna asked, pushing the glass away. Her mouth was dry, but she wasn’t thirsty for a drink: her body craved blood and pain and…
“Yes.” Jackie sighed. “It’s a good offer. She’s still considering it, but…”
“Your entire life is here,” Shauna countered. “Your family, your friends, your job…”
“There’ll be soccer teams to train in Florida.” Jackie shrugged.
“But your team is the Yellowjackets,” Shauna insisted. “It’s always been.”
Jackie gave her a look over the frames of her expensive sunglasses. She took an (un)healthy sip of her drink and sighed. “Maybe it’s time to change. Move to greener pastures, or whatever.”
“Mh.” Shauna looked to the side. “Well, good luck.”
“What about you?” Jackie asked. She pushed her glasses up, prohibiting Shauna from seeing her beautiful eyes. It felt like punishment for pushing her so hard. “Uh? Still trying for a baby?”
“God, no,” Shauna said. She snickered, shaking her head. “He… We are not going through a good time right now.”
“Mhm.” Jackie played with the straw absentmindedly. The sun hit her glasses at the perfect angle, making Shauna capable of seeing her eyes directly on hers. “That sucks.”
“Chloe goes out a lot lately,” Shauna commented, as uninterested as she could force her voice to be. “Without you.” Jackie scratched her eyebrow, making Shauna frown; she only ever did that when she was stressed over something. “Hey.” She leaned on her elbows. “What’s wrong?”
“She wants us to adopt a baby,” Jackie said, looking to the side. “Thinks it’s time for us to have a family. Wants us to do it as soon as we get to Florida.”
Shauna swallowed loudly. There was a desire to clap back or escalate the situation burning in her chest, but she held herself back; she shook her head, thinking of something she could say that would not make her look like a psychotic person. That was harder to do lately.
But Jackie, with a kid? A kid she shared with another woman? A kid she would raise away from Wiskayok, away from her? She had to stop it— she had to.
“Do you want a kid?” Shauna asked slowly. “You have never wanted one.”
“I don’t know,” Jackie said. “Whatever she wants, I guess.” She shrugged, entirely unamused.
Shauna leaned forward. “Be careful, Jackie,” she whispered. “This is a very important decision. Don’t let her force you into something you don’t want.”
“She’s not forcing me,” Jackie said. She was starting to get defensive, which was a bad sign; she needed her to be open and willing to listen to her.
“Okay,” Shauna said, softly. “I just don’t want her to hurt you.” She put a hand over Jackie’s, squeezing it when the touch didn’t stop her frowning.
“How’s Jeff?” Jackie asked, pulling her hand free of Shauna’s grasp. She gave her a look, one of those she would give her when they were playing an important match and Shauna was one hit away from being expelled. Don’t overstep your welcome, her eyes said. She didn’t deserve to know about her personal life after the treason she had committed in high school.
“Good.” Shauna thought for a moment. “Maybe a little too good.”
“Oh?” Jackie finished her gin and tonic. She moved the straw around, pouting, and Shauna rolled her eyes.
“Let me,” she said.
She stood up with the empty glass and left Jackie in the backyard to head towards the kitchen. She prepared another drink for her friend, adding a very healthy amount of gin, just how Jackie liked it. Shauna liked it too; it left a sweet, earthy scent on Jackie’s mouth, one that lingered even after she was gone for the day— sometimes, when she was alone and feeling lonely, Shauna would open the bottle of gin and sniff it to remind herself of her friend. Other times, she would take one gulp and imagine Jackie was giving it to her with her mouth, and her hands would travel south until her panties were a wet mess.
Shaking her head, she added ice and a new straw and walked back into her backyard. Jackie was waiting for her there, leaning against the chair so the sun could hit her face without the annoying sunshade getting in the way; Jeff had insisted on installing it, and Shauna regretted giving in after a year of hearing his annoying voice telling her it was a good investment, as she loved the tan the sun left on her friend’s face. She set the drink down, and Jackie opened her eyes. Her sunglasses were at the top of her head, and when the sun hit her irises, she could see little dots of brown within the green, like a little forest made just for her to get lost in.
“So.” Jackie wasted no time in grabbing the drink. She set the straw on her lips, and Shauna watched, greedily taking her in the same way Jackie was drinking her alcoholic beverage. “What were you saying about Jeff?”
“Oh.” Shauna took a sip of her Diet Coke. She hated the taste, but she had made the mistake of sending Jeff to do the groceries, and he had gotten the wrong kind; she was eager to finish them so she could get the normal ones. “I think he’s cheating on me.”
Jackie choked on her drink, but she didn’t spill a single drop. She never wasted alcohol, which was a shame; Shauna would love to lick the table dry, hopeful for some saliva within the liquid. “What?”
“A client.” Shauna sighed. “He’s been seeing the same woman for over a month. There’s too far new furniture goes.”
“Shit.” Jackie chuckled; it was an involuntary gesture, one she made whenever she was feeling nervous and a little too lightheaded from the drink in her hand. Shauna loved when Jackie got like that; if she was lucky, she might get a few naughty kisses on the corner of her mouth as a goodbye. “Are you for real?”
“Mhm.”
Jackie drummed her fingers against the table. She drank, only to slake a thirst that lived within her brain. “How do you know?” She asked finally.
“I went through his phone.” She shrugged, entirely unashamed of her actions. “Samantha. She works down the street from his shop. She’s an accountant.”
“Fuck.” Jackie bit her lip and then chuckled. “Well, you know what they say.” She grabbed her drink and leaned against the chair, smiling sardonically at Shauna. “A cheater always stays a cheater.”
For anyone else, Jackie’s tone would have been too soft and too playful for it to be considered a jab, but Shauna knew better than to think that: behind the sweet girl attitude, Jackie Taylor had the meanest of streaks Shauna had ever seen. She was ruthless in a way that flew over people’s heads constantly, her smile like a balm thrown over the fires she created whenever she was feeling rebellious.
Shauna looked at her half-empty can of Coke, listening as it fizzled. Shame washed over her body, and she slumped a little against the backrest, feeling like a petulant infant for even acknowledging her comment non-verbally; it was what Jackie had been aiming for, after all. A reaction, a little confirmation that her words had landed, and they had hurt. She deserved it, she knew; she had been the one Jeff had first cheated on someone with —and that someone was Jackie.
It would never suffice, no matter what she did or what she said. The betrayal might not have cost her her relationship with Jackie, but she paid the price of it in shame every single day. Not even with Jackie, but by forcing herself to marry Jeff to justify why she would ever hurt her friend like that. It was one thing to cheat and another to go behind someone’s back because you were in love but didn’t want to hurt the other person. It had been the only excuse Jackie had accepted before disappearing away to Europe, where she met a pretty girl on one of the many trips her parents paid for to keep her off their backs and to avoid sending her to a psychiatric ward.
Jackie had returned with a tan face that showed off the freckles in her cheeks and the green in her hazel eyes just to help Shauna with the wedding. She had even paid for the flowers, choosing poppies all by herself as she smiled cryptically at Shauna.
“So?” Jackie asked. When Shauna looked at her, she noticed her friend had already finished her drink and was smiling pleasantly.
“So what?” Shauna asked, pushing the can of Coke to the side. She would get the good ones the following day and leave the other ones for visits. She really hated the taste of it.
“What are you going to do?” Jackie asked. She raised an eyebrow, and Shauna frowned; she wasn’t asking— she was daring her to do something. It felt like it was all a test, one she had failed years ago.
“Divorce him,” Shauna said. “I’ve already told you.” Jackie huffed and played with the straw absentmindedly.
Shauna nodded, unsure of how to continue the conversation. She looked at Jackie, trying to guess what was going on in her mind. A beeping sound jolted her from her seat. Jackie raised her hand, looking at her wrist; her fancy and very expensive Apple Watch was shining light against her face, making her groan. “I need to go,” she said, standing up. “Work calls.”
Shauna stood up and walked towards her. She blindly searched for her hand, and Jackie offered it to her without even noticing she was doing so. Shauna’s finger wrapped around Jackie’s wrist, her digits pressing into her skin to feel her pulse. It relaxed her to know Jackie was alive and close.
“I’ll walk you to the door,” Shauna offered. She eyed the empty glass and made a face, pulling Jackie with her inside the house. “Do you want me to drive you?”
“No, it’s okay.” Jackie politely waved the offer off. “Worst-case scenario, I die,” she joked; it fell flat.
“Don’t say shit like that, Jax,” Shauna chastised, slapping her chest. Jackie stumbled a little, taken aback by the hit, but she only chuckled in response.
“I was joking,” Jackie said, putting her free hand (Shauna was still greedily clinging to her left wrist like a lifeline) on the back of her soft brunette hair. “Sorry. Bad joke.”
“Yeah, it was,” Shauna murmured.
“Sorry,” Jackie whispered. Her nose pressed against the side of Shauna’s cheek, and she lowered her head slightly, stretching her face in an awkward position that was a distant reminder of when little kids put their fingers against the tip of their nose and pulled up to imitate a pig. “You stay, yeah? I’ll see you later.”
“Mhm.” Shauna, always so greedy and needy when it came to Jackie, wrapped her arms around her torso and pulled her closer. She pressed her nose against the front of her shoulder, smelling her scent mixed with the alcohol. “You should change.”
“Will do,” Jackie promised. “And I’m not drunk. Don’t worry.”
“Let me see,” Shauna whispered, nudging Jackie’s lips apart with her nose. She breathed her breath, with a clear alcoholic aftertaste, and hummed. “You need to brush your teeth,” she said.
Jackie’s lips closed around her nose, and she pulled away, leaving a sloppy kiss on her skin. “I will.”
“Can you come over later?” Shauna asked her, her fingers digging into Jackie’s back as she started to pull away. “We can make dinner together.”
Shauna was setting herself up for failure, and she knew it; Jackie never risked being in Shauna’s house when Jeff wasn’t working. She avoided him like the plague and had done so even when Jackie was still dating him— something about him made her withdrawn and quiet. Still, she would risk the rejection.
“I can’t,” Jackie said, rubbing her back. “Chloe has a work dinner thing today. She asked me to come.”
“Oh,” Shauna said. She didn’t try to mask her disappointment. “Well, tomorrow, then.”
But Jackie was a people pleaser, or just a Shauna pleaser. She always hated seeing her hurt, even though sometimes Shauna knew she had purposely wanted to hurt her. Like when she found out about her thing with Jeff and she had punched her square in the face without even talking; she had then picked her up from the ground and carried her to Shauna’s car and had taken her to the hospital. She even paid for the hospital bills with a fancy swipe of her father’s card before she was gone, and Shauna had nothing but a broken nose.
It never healed quite right even after the operation, making it a little lopsided and bumpy at a certain angle, but Shauna loved having a mark on her body of how much she could get under Jackie’s skin.
“I can come have lunch with you tomorrow,” Jackie offered. Her index finger absentmindedly pressed against Shauna’s nose, going up and down the bridge with a softness that seemed almost surreal. “Or— how about we have a girl’s day, huh? I’ll take you to that nice place that has opened recently. It has kosher food. I checked last time I went with Chloe.” Shauna smiled thankfully. “You’re gonna love it. And we can talk about… him properly.”
“Yes,” Shauna said, a little too fast.
She grabbed Jackie’s hand, which was still caressing her nose, and she turned it over to leave a kiss on her palm. Jackie observed through hooded eyes that were not the product of alcohol and then moved her head forward to leave a kiss on the side of her lips. Modest enough to be considered platonic, but Shauna knew it was a kiss meant to slake Jackie’s thirst for her— she knew because she felt that need every single second of her life, a need that never left no matter how many fingers she pushed inside her cunt as she closed her eyes and moaned Jackie’s name.
“Pretend everything is okay with Jeff,” Jackie whispered in her ear, as if there were someone else around that could hear them. But there was nothing, only a moderately big house that was always empty. “Gather information about his infidelity. And when you have enough, you come to me. I’ll pay for the lawyer.”
Shauna hated when Jeff offered to pay for something for her or when he rushed to pull out his credit card from his ugly faux-leather wallet during date nights, but she felt a thrill every time Jackie did. Even if it was a lettuce she had gotten for her at the supermarket on her way back from home because she had noticed she was out of them, every single time she got so turned on by it she always needed to excuse herself to the bathroom to take care of the problem throbbing between her legs. She wasn’t sure why she liked it so much, but she wasn’t about to go to therapy to find out.
“What about Florida?” Shauna asked with a raised eyebrow.
“That can wait until you’re done with the divorce,” Jackie said. Because maybe Jackie had unintentionally forced Shauna into the marriage the same way she had intentionally broken her nose, but she also was there for the aftermath and to solve things. “Chloe can move in first, and I’ll go once it’s all taken care of.”
“Really?” Shauna asked, her eyes sparkling and hopeful.
Jackie left another kiss on the corner of her mouth, that time closer than she would ever have dared when she was completely sober. “Really.”
She chose me, Shauna thought as she hugged her tightly. She’d choose me over her own wife. I’m still her girl no matter what.
“Thank you, Jax.”
Jackie made a sound in the back of her throat; apparently she always liked it a little too much when Shauna called her by her childhood nickname. Shauna always made a point to call her as such when they were over at the Taylors’ house, eyes inconspicuously on Chloe’s face as if to say, “Look, you can have her in your bed every night, but I’m still in her mind, bitch.”
“Anything you need, Shipman,” Jackie said. She never called her Sadecki, not even on her wedding day. It was still Shipman to her, as if she was still greedily clinging to what had once been a Shauna who wasn’t property of a man. “I mean it.”
“You know I love you, right?” Shauna asked, pressing their noses together. “And that… and that I’m sorry. For… for what happened.”
Jackie’s relaxed face suddenly twisted in pain, as if she had been stabbed right in the guts, and she pulled away from Shauna. The distance was abrupt and hurtful, but Shauna swallowed her whines down. She didn’t have any right to complain— it wasn’t as if she was her wife. No, that title belonged to someone else.
She hated it, but she bit her tongue until venom filled her mouth and killed her from the inside out.
“I’ll pick you up tomorrow,” Jackie offered, trying to stitch back a bleeding wound; she always acted too fast, bending things when they weren’t still fully broken. “Okay?”
“Fine.” She put a hand on her shoulder and squeezed it. “Drive safely, yeah?”
“Of course.” Jackie smiled at her. “I’ll text you later, when the kids are on their snack break.”
“Okay,” Shauna said. “Brush your teeth.”
Jackie rolled her eyes. “I will, mom.” Shauna was thankful when Jackie turned around to open the front door, as she had to bite her lip hard to hold back a moan. Mom… She hated the thought of having kids, but she liked the name coming from Jackie’s lips.
“You better,” Shauna said, once she had gathered her bearings. “I love you, Jax.”
Jackie smiled at her over her shoulder. “Love you too, Shipman.”
She never intended for it to happen. At least not in that way. She truly, utterly did not. But no one would believe her if she spoke her mind, of course; the title of ‘Most Likely to End Up In Jail’ had been assigned to Shauna Shipman for four years in a row in their school yearbook, even though she had only been a senior once.
But she really, really didn’t mean to kill her husband. Not even the knife poking out of Jeff’s chest seemed to believe her, but in all honesty, she didn’t care. Only one person would believe her if she were to say, ‘I didn’t mean to do this,’ and that person was not picking up the damned phone even though it was already four am and Shauna had heard her come back home in her fancy car she never drove; only her wife did.
“Pick up, damn it,” Shauna said, biting hard on the cuticles of her finger as a sign of nervousness. “Fucking hell, Jackie!”
Beeping. No sign of her friend. Shauna pulled the phone away from her ear and cursed loudly. She threw it to the wall, taking pleasure in the crack that could be heard as it fell to the ground, the screen shattered and useless.
Shauna jumped when she heard a knock on the front door and then put a hand on her chest, feeling embarrassed by her own reaction. She looked at her hands, covered in red, and thought to herself, ‘Fuck it,’ and reached for another knife on the kitchen counter. She grabbed the handle harshly and hid the knife behind her back, trying not to think too much of how easy it was to cut through skin and muscle. The palms of her hands were warm, but not from her own doing— it was all thanks to Jeff’s blood, pleasantly hot as it kept the cold of the night away.
“Don’t be the police,” Shauna begged the door before she opened it. She tightened her hold on the knife and looked up, getting ready to swing her arm around and kill and— “Jackie.”
The tone of relief made the woman in front of her tense. She grabbed Shauna by the shoulders and pushed her to the side, entering the house with the purpose of someone willing to fight an entire army with their bare hands. “What happened?” Jackie asked, looking around the dim-lit hallway. “Jesus, Shauna— you’ve been blowing up my phone for hours!”
“Why didn’t you pick up?” Shauna demanded to know, raising a hand to point a finger at the honey-blonde.
“It was a work dinner for Chloe. I told you.” She waved her arms around her body, and Shauna’s blown-open eyes unconsciously inspected her entire outfit. Jackie was wearing a pretty and long green dress split at the side to show off one of her legs, with modest makeup and sparkling jewelry that probably cost more than Shauna could ever fathom. “And you— are you bleeding?”
Her heels, a matching color to Jackie’s dress, clicked as they hit the marble floor, snapping Shauna out of her ogling. “What?” She looked at the hand she had used to point an accusing finger at her. “Oh. It’s— it’s not mine. Don’t worry.”
“Not mine—” Shauna grabbed her hand and turned it around. She looked at her with questioning eyes, trying to analyze her face. “What do you mean?”
“I killed Jeff,” Shauna said. She moved her other hand to show her the kitchen knife, and Jackie’s eyes opened in surprise.
Jackie gave her a long look, alternating between the knife and Shauna’s face. “Well— I should’ve seen that coming.” She set her expensive purse on the console table and put her hands on her hips. “Where’s the shovel?”