Nothing to Write Home About: Bad Habit

What you fear is your desire
It's hard to deal
I still love the way you feel
--Big Machine, GooGoo Dolls

Shane never said more than she had to.

She preferred to watch, cause people said a lot more with their eyes, their faces, their gestures than they ever did with their words.

A way with people, is what Mr. Bristow called it, and Shane never understood how she had come by the innate gift, but she had used it often enough, mostly in finding girls to bring home and screw.

The events in the room had taken her over so quickly she had lost perspective, but it came shooting back the moment Marina put her arms around the bitch, stuck her tongue in her mouth, and made her deal.

Sydney had been disgusted, the others had been shocked, but Shane had seen this side of her before, years ago, in West Hollywood, because just like Shane, Marina had used her gifts to seduce, just like she was doing now.

But Marina's games were dangerous; Shane had always preferred never to play them at all.

And this was why.

Fuck. FUCK.

Throat long since gone dry and shuddering erratically, she could feel herself sweating, anger dissolving into some sort of desperate, dreary emotion, unable to speak as Anna's demand lingered in the air, processed.

An innocent kiss – if she had asked Shane to do it, Sydney maybe, they would have been okay. It would have fucked with them, but they at least could keep score, keep their heads on straight.

But Anna knew what she was doing, and one look at Marina's face told Shane the entire story. Marina knew that they had fucked up, it was why she took over.

But even Marina couldn't stop this now – they had to play out Marina's game.

Eyes darting from Anna to the young heiress, Shane found herself shifting her balance, as Sydney found her voice, hard and angry.

"You're kidding me."

Anna's smile was wide, malicious. "Of course not, Sydney. Don't you think she deserves a little comfort?"

The person in question wore an expression of blank astonishment, face pale, haggard with exhaustion and emotion.

Still, she understood, glancing first at her Maggie, then at Lena.

"Bianca." Maggie's tone was husky, drained. "You don't have to do this."

"Oh, I beg to differ, little one," Anna interrupted. "She does."

"You fucking bitch," Shane breathed, and she got her and Marina's attention, one with a wide grin, her friend with a narrowed glare.

Don't make it worse, she could almost hear Marina whispering in her thoughts.

"She doesn't need this," Sydney breathed, and Shane reached forward, closed her fingers around her elbow and pulled sharply, cutting off her partner's sentence. Sydney's glare was dark and angry, but Shane held her firm, shaking her head slightly.

"The longer we wait..." Anna inferred, words rolling with her accent, tongue clucking. "Tick, tock. Tick. Tock."

"You are an animal," Lena managed, eyes moist.

"Who said I was anything else?"

Marina still her had arms around Anna, draped about her as if Marina had simply forgotten to remove them, chin resting against her shoulder, intimate with the killer.

Her expression was stony, passive. She said nothing.

"Just fucking kiss one," Shane managed, and when Sydney turned to glare, she only shook her head harder.

"Shane-"

"No." Bianca's interruption took her by surprise. She stood, the little mother, defiant and angry, eyes glistening with unshed hate, gaze on Anna. "We don’t have time for this."

On her left was Lena. On her right, Maggie.

Both women wore similar expression, horror and fear, and it occurred to Shane, the genius of this act.

Anna was the purest form of sadist.

When Bianca reached for Lena, her heart dropped within her, shuddering painfully when she took in Maggie's expression: the broken soul that splintered the minute Bianca turned from her and into Lena's arms.

Shane was frozen, eyes drifting close in frustration, opening again to see Bianca press her mouth against Lena, move her lips against the older woman's passionately, harshly.

"Good," Anna said, leaning back into Marina, smirk narrowing. "Mean it."

And Bianca did, opening her mouth for Lena, letting her kiss her intimately.

Shane couldn't watch it.

She shook her head in revulsion, the stupid, ridiculous game, and found herself muttering obscenities as she turned away, tried to control the ripples of emotion that fled from her soul, threatening to overwhelm her.

In a desperate bid to find another way to cope, she found Maggie, the smallest person in the room, naked betrayal on her face, her broken heart on her sleeve.

Maggie stayed, watched her partner give herself to another woman, choose her over herself, and Shane knew the moment it was too much, saw it in her glistening eyes, hardening mouth, when little Maggie crumpled in herself and walked away from all of it, leaving Bianca, Lena and the rest of them behind.

Before she knew what she was doing, she was already halfway out of the room, following her.

Marina felt numb.

She closed her eyes against the guilt, pushed it aside long enough to take a breath, say loudly, clearly, "That's enough," squeezing Anna's shoulder in the process, feeling the woman's shoulder's shake with mirth underneath her touch.

When she glanced up, Bianca had disengaged herself from her former lover, from Marina's lover, and said quietly, in a tone filled with spite, "Did you enjoy that?'

"Intimately so," Anna whispered. Marina felt the jerk in her fingertips, the instinctive reaction to snap her neck.

She pressed her lips to Anna's shoulder instead. "We're wasting time," she said crisply, and avoided Sydney's glare. More than ever now, her cousin could not understand her.

Once again, Sydney's fear had pushed her into judgment.

Marina was too resigned to care.

"May I be untied now?" Anna asked, voice warm, sultry, directed at her.

Marina's glare was littered with eyes. "Get comfortable," she told her, skimming her lips with her fingers, and then moving up, dismissing the woman. She had the room's attention, and yet, Marina had never felt more alone in it. "We have a lot planning to do."

It was just stupid.

It was stupid that of all the things that had happened, THIS would be the thing that could do this to her.

She clamped her palms to her mouth, eyes shutting tight, afraid to move, afraid to breathe, the trembling taking over her body so far and so hard she was suddenly frightened that if she even MOVED, she would lose herself completely, fall into a pit of despair and never come back out.

And she didn't even want to. She couldn't.

Even with her eyes closed, she still saw Bianca with Lena, and now she shuddered, a painful moan tearing out of her throat, and it was enough.

Maggie's knees nearly buckled, she crumpled, losing her strength in the aftermath of her broken heart.

Hands caught her, and Maggie barely noticed when slender fingers caught her shoulders. Too lost in her grief, Maggie was a puppet, malleable, turned in a strong grip and brought against a small, strong chest.

She reached blindly, clutching onto a black shirt, sobbing into cotton, afraid to let go for the very real fear that she would be forever lost.

Fingers stroked her hair, smoothed against her.

"Hey," she heard, above the din of her wracking sobs, "It didn’t mean anything. Allright? That was just for show."

Her entire body trembled and jerked, as Maggie absorbed the words and managed to find her voice.

"Are you kidding?" she breathed. "It doesn't feel like a show."

"No, no, listen!" Shane clutched her harder, jerked her back until suddenly, Maggie was looking into soft brown eyes, an intense, sharp featured face. "Anna fucks with people's heads. It's just a game to her. You can't let her get to you. She's playing all of us, and if you believe her, she's won."

Maggie never felt so small, so insignificant.

"I know who Bianca wants now," she whispered. "I've always known. I was kidding myself when... I just..."

And she closed her eyes and lost herself again to her pain and her fears, crumpling once again into Shane's arms.

"Toni."

Marina could almost see the expression on her friend's face, and it caused a small, bitter smile, as she kept the phone to her ear, walked the length of the Kane hallway.

"Marina, girl? This better be a social call or you better be offering me money."

She took in a small breath, kept her voice firm and even. "Get me a way to get into a DNA lock when the owner is dead and all we have is his child and you can put it on my tab."

"Honey," she heard after a pregnant pause. "Why the hell do you keep thinking I’m going to be working pro-bono for you and your goody-goody cous?"

Her friend would put up a fight, Marina was expecting that. But there was no time.

"Because you have a soul," she told the security expert, "And a child's life depends on it."

"Honey, YOU have a soul," Toni twittered back, "And it's been showing." Marina sucked in her breath, paused to inhale, try to stop her fluttering heart. "Your cousin and that heart she's opened up are gonna get you killed, Marina. I'm telling you this as a friend."

"This friend is the one who recently married her very own do-gooder," Marina said crisply, antagonism bleeding into her tone. "How is Weiss?'

"That was for an alibi," Toni insisted.

Toni was a good liar, but Marina had no time to play the game. "If you're happy with that charade, then I won't contest. Get me the key."

"Give me ten minutes – and it's your last free pass."

"Thank you."

She lowered her phone, glanced at it thoughtfully, curiously.

Heels clattered their way noisily too her, and Marina's soul prickled in annoyance when she turned to discover Sydney's stony figure moving fast.

"Okay," her cousin breathed. "What the HELL was that?"

Everything about what she was about to do was innapprpriate. This was the wrong time, the wrong place, the wrong feelings.

But Bianca's kiss burned on her lips, and Lena's lovesick heart refused to give up her hope.

She pushed into Bianca's study, found her lowering her cellphone, and when her former lover looked up and saw her, she only stiffened.

"Lena," Bianca breathed, turning away from her with an upraised hand, "Not now."

And yet, Lena couldn't stop it. "Yes, now, Bianca," she snapped. "You chose me. You kissed me. Am I supposed to believe it meant nothing?"

"YES!" Bianca snapped, fingers threading through her hair erratically. "You are, LENA! I didn't want to MAKE that choice! It wasn't mine to make, and I was FORCED into it."

A cold chill ran down Lena's spine, and she was suddenly struck with an image of Michael Cambias, and suddenly her eyes drifted closed, shame creeping down her spine.

"Bianca," she managed. "I'm sorry."

It was the wrong time, the wrong place, the wrong feeling.

Defeated, she wrung her hands, gaze cast down on the floor.

"Lena." She glanced up, a jolt in her heart suddenly painful, to find Bianca, in her black power suit, fingers against her temple. She had never looked so young in her life. "I didn't kiss you because I loved you," she whispered. "I kissed you because I love Maggie."

Lena blinked, unable to process the words, found them connecting in her brain, and still, they made no sense.

"Maggie and I... we haven't..." Bianca's eyes shut in frustration, opened again with a deep intake of breath. "I wasn't going to do that to Maggie. I didn't want our first real kiss to be... like that. A price to pay. It would haunt us for the rest of our lives and that wasn't how I wanted it. I wouldn't have Maggie remembering it like that."

Bianca was defeated, her words ending in barely a whisper, and Lena's heart tore inside of her, selfish emotion clouded, dissipating at the look of quiet desperation on Bianca's face.

"Oh, Bianca," she whispered.

"I love Maggie, Lena," Bianca whispered. "I love you, but Maggie is who I want to spend the rest of my life with."

She was in no mood to deal with this now.

"I was doing what had to be done," she said firmly, clipping her phone back into place, avoiding her cousin's incriminating glare. "Ten minutes in that room and all that you were doing was giving Anna more information than we were getting." She shifted her glance, met the glare head on. "Already Anna has figured out so much that she can use."

Sydney let out a disbelieving chortle. "Do you realize what you've done?" she whispered. "You may have just ruined a relationship! You've broken hearts-"

"It is nothing that I haven't done before, and frankly, I would do it again," Marina snapped. "It was either that or lose the baby. No one would play the game Anna wanted to play, so I played it."

The word was a trigger for her cousin. Sydney threw up her hands, nearly spat in disgust. "GOD," she breathed. "You and your games, Marina." Marina took in an unsteady breath, glanced away. "You're not your mother. You're better than that."

"No, Sydney," she interrupted. "I'm not. You and Shane were doing nothing in there but giving Anna a glimpse into your sexually confused life. Someone had to take it there, so I did."

"You have a choice," Sydney said stiffly. "Just like me. Just like Shane."

"Your choice?" Marina spat. "You only have your choice because the minute you taste the darkness in your blood Shane is there to pull you back from it." She took another step, closer to the cousin. "You use her like a safety net – you do what you wish and you don't care because you know you can't ever get too deep because Shane promised you like a good little puppy to reel you in, to keep your head above water. I have no such luxury." She shook her head, eyes narrowing. "Tell me, Sydney? What will happen to you if one day Shane isn't there?"

Shane hated when chicks cried.

She really hated it when they actually had something to cry about.

It was some weird thing in her – a chick cried and she was suddenly crumpling like a piece of paper, doing whatever she could to make it alright.

If that ended in sex, she was fine with it.

That, however, was probably not the smartest remedy to this situation.

She took in a haggard breath, and tried again. "Look," she began. "You gotta talk to Bianca, okay? Sort this out."

"I can't," Maggie sniffled, arms pressed against her chest. Her tear stained eyes were suddenly wide with fear, insecurity. "I don't want to. I can't see her right now, okay? I'm just... I'll do something stupid, or I'll say something or I'll RUN-"

"Hey..." Shane pressed hard on her shoulders, bringing her gaze back up to her. "I know what it's like to hide behind a broken heart, okay? I know what it's like to be afraid." She sighed, trying to find her words, trying to rip them out of her conflicted heart before she let them hide away again. "But I think you really got a chance here, okay? And I want someone in this fucking house to end up happy. Don't let fucking Anna beat you. You want her? Fucking tell her you do. If not, you're going to look at her and regret it for the rest of your life."

The girl in her arms had gone still, and Shane found herself surprised when surprisingly clear eyes suddenly bore into her, as if Maggie was suddenly seeing her for the very first time.

"Why haven't you ever told Sydney you're still in love with her?"

The question completely blindsided her, and at first, Shane just stared blankly, mouth dropping open like a fucking idiot.

"What?"

"You heard me."

Shane blinked, arms dropping to her side. "Look," she shook her head firmly, heart suddenly in her throat. "Whatever you think – it's not like that with Syd and me."

Maggie studied her, voice surprisingly clear. "I think it is."

Shane took her in, and glanced away, a forced laugh coming out of her. Grabbing her head, she jerked Maggie to the door, suddenly desperate to get out of there. "Let's just concentrate on your lovelife right now, okay?"

"Bianca..." Lena found herself lost now, unsure of what to do now that Bianca had spilled her heart so completely, and laid it before her, broken and honest.

"I'm sorry," Bianca whispered, voice tainted with apology, regret.

Lena found herself smiling bitterly. "And if I had stayed in Pine Valley?"

Bianca pressed her lips together. She glanced away.

"I don't know," she said finally. "I'd like to think we would have made it work."

It was Lena's turn for bitterness, shaking her head in disbelief. "Except that Maggie was there, too," she whispered. "Maggie was always there."

"Lena-"

"No, Bianca." Lena shook her head, shoulders falling in defeat. "You're not telling me anything I don't already know. I understood it. I knew this, in Poland, when you wouldn't come to me."

"Lena."

"I deserved more than you were willing to give me."

Bianca understood it, and she accepted it, with dignity and grace. "You're right," she said quietly.

Lena sighed, her soul fragile, on a precipice, knowing exactly what this was for her and Bianca: the end.

She could live with it. As long as Bianca was happy.

Lena had never expected to have this conversation with Bianca, not about Maggie, but truthfully, she had feared it, in her insecurity, feared that one day Bianca would wake up and Maggie would stop denying, and leave her behind.

It was ironic, that she was now in this position, struck by the difficulty of this.

"Bianca..." Lena sighed, headache forming at the complication of the situation. "Do you realize what you've done? By doing what you did – your relationship with Maggie... You've broken her."

"I know..." Bianca closed her eyes, as if reliving the moment, shuddering against the memory. "I'm going to work the rest of my life to make Maggie forgive me if I have to. To give her a reason to trust me again, and make her understand."

Sydney's heart was pounding, but she refused to give into the emotion, refused even to accept the fact that for the first time in months, Marina had actually scared her.

"You're not one of them," she said stubbornly, ignoring Marina's question. "You're not like Katya, you're not even like Irina. You're like ME."

Marina shook her head, lowered her eyes against her cousin's stare. "Only you believed that," she said flatly.

"NO," she snapped, shaking her head blindly. "NO. Because you PROMISED me we wouldn't be like them. You PROMISED."

"Do you think I don't break promises?"

"That would be easy," she managed. "Wouldn't it? To pretend like you don't care? Like you're so caught up in this world you're losing your soul in the process? Except I know," she whispered. "I know you still sleep with Fran when you run into her, and I know you're sleeping with Lena, and I know why." Marina's glare was dark, angry. "You can't stand to just FUCK someone anymore, Marina. You need to feel something in your heart – so you screw women you care about because it's safe. Because you're too scared to make love to anyone ever again. You left Jenny in West Hollywood and you've been bleeding ever since and you're so SCARED you'll die from that, that you're closing yourself off. Justify it however you want, but don't hide behind the Derevko name just because you're afraid to fucking feel."

She caught something, in Marina's eyes, and with a jump of her heart, she thought maybe she was getting somewhere. FINALLY.

Until Marina's eyes shifted and her glare narrowed, and her voice darkened into a dangerous lilt. "I'll admit I’m afraid," she said slowly, methodically. "When you admit the only reason you're not with Shane is because you're afraid." Sydney's chest suddenly tightened, so painful she had to gasp. "I hide behind my sex and my games, but you, Sydney – you hide behind a person." Marina stepped closer now. "And you haven't just wasted your own life, but you've wasted Shane's and Vaughn's. Admit it, Sydney. And I'll admit it too."

Sydney's throat closed and the world pulsed around her, pushing the room further and further into her that she felt like she was suffocating.

Marina's cellphone rang, and Marina took her in again, glare never wavering.

"Get ready," Marina said, and then answered it, walking away from her, leaving Sydney with her fear.

She hadn't looked to see Maggie's face when she had kissed Lena.

She couldn’t have.

But now, in the stillness of the moment, Bianca's thoughts were consumed of Maggie, and her already fragile soul was just so tired, so desperate, so scared.

So close to getting Miranda back, so close to losing Maggie.

"Bianca." She looked up, discovered Lena was still there. "Tell me," she said softly. "Tell me what you're feeling."

She shuddered, eyes closing in despair. "I'm scared," she admitted. "I'm scared of losing my daughter. I'm scared of losing Maggie. I'm scared of being alone all over again, and never being able to make things right. Anna made me choose, and I don't want to, Lena – I can't imagine neither of them here..."

Lena came, encircled her in her arms, and Bianca was grateful for the familiar comfort. She sank into Lena's arms, swallowed against her emotion.

"Maggie loves you," Lena whispered against her cheek. "She'll love you forever."

Bianca closed her eyes at the words, willing to believe it, willing to believe that Maggie would stay with her, wouldn't run from her, even if Bianca had given her every reason.

"I love her so much, Lena," she whispered. "I just don't know-"

"She'll understand," Lena promised her. "She'll understand if I have to make her."

The door rattled, opened, and Bianca lifted her head from Lena's shoulder to discover Maggie with Shane, expression unreadable.

It was a mimic, a horrid, horrible joke, of a face she had seen nearly a year ago.

Just like before, Maggie only registered the scene before she shuddered, and without another word, walked out.

Oh, God.

"Maggie," she breathed, pulling out of Lena's arms, already moving after her.

Her steps faltered when Marina blocked her way, coming in behind Shane, head shaking ever so perceptively.

"It's time, Bianca."