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Chapter Text

Haley has always dreamed of leaving Pelican Town.

When she was five, their parents had taken them on a vacation to California. She and Emily had played in the sand on the golden beaches until their cheeks had burned to a bright red, and Haley had screamed and cried when they had gone back to the airport to go home, insisting that as soon as she was big enough to go on her own, she would come back and live in Los Angeles.

When Haley was eleven and started middle school, she stared out the window of the school bus every day with desperate eyes, taking in everything that wasn’t the boring little town that she already knew all too well. She made friends with some of the girls from a town over, who hated the countryside as much as she did, and started going out to Zuzu city as often as she could to shop and take in the far more interesting city life.

When Haley was fifteen, she had just about lost patience with waiting to leave their ridiculously boring town. She tried to fill her long, monotonous days with as much as she could, with trips out to the city and parties and her newest boyfriend. Emily had started to shoot her disapproving looks in the morning, when she left the bathroom after hours of doing her makeup, and their parents – never having taken much of an active role in their lives anyway – became more removed than ever, as if they’d already written Haley off as some sort of empty-headed floozy.

Well, maybe that’s all that her family would ever think of her, but at school Haley was adored, and she still had her deepest desire buried down within her – to graduate and move far away for college as soon as she could.

Haley never talked about this ambition to anyone, because she had been crushed enough when she was younger, scoffed at and told her grades would never be good enough for college if she didn’t dedicate herself to her studies like her sister did. Emily didn’t even want to leave Pelican Town, which made Haley near apocalyptic with rage.

By the time that she finally graduated, a deep wedge had already driven itself between Haley and her sister, and they did spend much time together anymore. And then Haley got her rejection letters.

She didn’t tell anyone – she hadn’t been stupid enough to tell anyone that she’d been applying, so instead she buried herself under her blankets and cried until her mascara ran down her face and stained her pillow black. It was on that same day that her parents came into her room and told her that they were moving away. Her mom was retiring, and they had decided to head to Europe and to travel the world now that both her and Emily were adults.

Haley had stared at them blankly and asked, “am I coming with you?”

Her mom had laughed as if she’d said something silly. “No, honey, of course not! Don’t worry, you and Emily are keeping the house here. You’re a homeowner now, Haley. All that’s left for you now is to find a job here, hmm? Might be time to consider dedicating yourself to something for once. You’re an adult now.”

Next to her, Emily had nodded importantly, as if her stupid part time work making clothes gave her some kind of adult authority that Haley couldn’t possibly comprehend, and something in her had snapped. She hadn’t mentioned anything about her college rejections, or her love of photography, or the makeup Instagram account that she’d been running for years that had been making her far more money than Emily earned, but she did scream at her parents that they were two of the most selfish people that she’d ever met and she hoped that they would never come back. And she had told Emily that she was so sick of her thinking that she’s so much better than everyone else, and that she wouldn’t care in the slightest if she died.

Things were different after that. Their parents packed up and left, and Haley settled into an increasingly monotonous life exactly where she didn’t want to be – alone in Pelican Town with a sister who she was barely on speaking terms with.

It’s the life that she is still living now, five years out of high school. She still goes to parties, when there are any happening, but most of her friends from school have moved far away and there’s rarely anything going on anywhere within an hour drive. Her only real friend is Alex, who also happens to be her ex-boyfriend, and Pelican Town isn’t exactly a place where new people to befriend tend to show up all the time.

She’d pretty much written off any chance of being friends with any of the other people her age around their town back in high school – she hadn’t been the kindest person back then, and had been all too eager to turn up her nose at anyone who hadn’t been floating in the same popular social circles as she had been.

So it’s just her, really. All on her own. Some days, she’ll go hang out with Alex, but more often than not, she just reluctantly drags herself out of bed in the morning, films new makeup tutorials for her Instagram, and then walks down to the beach to stare desperately out at the sea and to dream of escaping to lands far away.

Occasionally, if she’s feeling a little less hopeless, she’ll take her camera out and spend hours taking photographs of nature and the gorgeous scenery. It’s the only redeemable quality of the countryside, in Haley’s opinion.

It’s on one such day, a beautiful sunny spring day not long before her twenty-third birthday, that something happens that breaks Haley’s sad little routine. She’s deep in the Cindersap forest, trying to capture the image of a stunning yellow butterfly that’s landed on a daisy nearby. She’s on her knees in the mud, her skirt hiked up around her hips, holding perfectly still so she doesn’t scare the butterfly off as she hurriedly sets the focus of her camera.

“Wow, you are the last person I’d have expected to see in the dirt like this.”

The noise startles the butterfly, which immediately flies away, but it startles Haley more. She’s never ran into anyone in the forest before, and she realizes now that she’d gotten far too comfortable assuming that she was completely alone. The moment the words register, she surges to her feet, spinning around as she smooths her skirt back down.

It’s Abigail, leaning casually against a tree trunk behind Haley as if she didn’t just completely shatter her peace.

Instinctively, Haley lets her mouth curl into a sneer and she tilts her head back so that she can look derisively down her nose at Abigail, praying that her embarrassment doesn’t show on her face. “Yes, I suppose you’d fit the bill far more, hmm?”

Abigail doesn’t reply, simply raising an eyebrow with an unruffled expression on her face, and Haley is left feeling horribly exposed. “What do you want, freak?” she asks, hoping that Abigail doesn’t notice the way that her voice cracks a little on the familiar insult.

Abigail just snorts. “How old are you turning next week again? Twenty-three, yeah? Maybe one day you’ll manage to outgrow the insults from high school. Or not.”

“How do you even know my birthday? What are you, obsessed with me or something?”

Abigail rolls her eyes. “There are, like, twenty people in this town. Not to mention the giant parties you used to always throw for your birthday. It would be hard for me to forget, and believe me, I want to.”

Haley hates how hot her face feels right now, and the uncomfortable itchiness that is growing under her collar. When had a simple conversation with a dweeb like Abigail become a stressful thing for her? “I don’t understand why you’re bothering me. I’ve got better things to do than to talk to you, Abigail.”

“So you do know my name. Yoba, Haley, doesn’t it get exhausting to just hate everyone so much all of the time? How do you –”

“Wait, shh!” The beautiful yellow butterfly from earlier has just fluttered down and landed directly on top of Abigail’s head. The colour of it contrasts perfectly with the bright purple of her hair, and Haley has instantly zeroed in on it, previous conversation forgotten. “Don’t. Move.”

Miraculously, Abigail obeys. She holds perfectly still aside from the slightest tilt of her chin to face the camera that Haley has lifted to photograph her, and the attractive smirk that slides naturally onto her face.

Haley slides the lens into focus and starts taking photos. First, she takes a few from exactly where she is, but then, as the butterfly stays where it is, she moves in closer, taking some at different angles and featuring different parts of Abigail’s face.

By the time the butterfly finally flies off, Haley has taken dozens of photos. Glancing through them briefly, she can already tell that they’re some of her best.

“If you wanted photos of me that badly, you could have just asked.” Haley glances up just in time to catch Abigail’s wink, and she immediately feels her face heating up again. Fuck. She’d been so excited about the photographs that she’d forgotten that Abigail now knows way more about her than she should have let on.

“Whatever. I just wanted photos of the butterfly, not you. I’ll be lucky if you being in it doesn’t completely ruin it, actually. I’ll have to edit your ugly face out.”

It’s cruel, even for her, and regret is already setting even before she sees Abigail’s jaw tighten.

“Well, I’m terribly sorry for bothering you then, your royal highness,” Abigail snaps, voice positively dripping with sarcasm. “I hope you enjoy yourself up there so far above everyone that you’re completely alone.”

She turns on her heel to walk away, her hair whipping around behind her in a gorgeous purple wave. Haley opens her mouth to call after her, realizing that she’d never even asked why she’d been in the forest in the first place. Before she can speak though, Abigail suddenly stops and whips back around.

“You’re pathetic, Haley. Pathetic. You do know that nobody likes you, don’t you?”

There’s suddenly a lump in Haley’s throat, and the words die on her lips as she watches Abigail walk away.

It’s true, is the problem. She knows that it’s true. She’s pathetic, she’s failed at every single thing that she ever wanted in her life, her parents abandoned her and her own sister hates her, and she has essentially no real friends. Every day she’s just been trying not to think about it or to acknowledge it, but now that Abigail’s shoved it right in her face, it finally hits her full force.

She chokes on a sob and sinks to the ground. It’s been a while since she’s cried – years, maybe – but for once the knowledge that she’ll ruin her makeup isn’t enough for her to be able to bite the tears back. She curls up into a loose ball on the muddy ground and sobs until the sun starts to set, her camera cradled against her chest.

When it starts getting dark, she forces herself to her feet, still sniffling, and starts her long and lonely walk home.

Chapter Text

The next day doesn’t start any differently than any other. Yeah, Haley’s pathetic and everyone hates her, what else is new? She doesn’t want to get up in the morning, but that’s pretty much normal for her. She drags herself into the kitchen to make herself eggs for breakfast, working awkwardly around Emily, who’s washing dishes, without exchanging a single word with her.

Then, she locks herself in her room and replies to comments on her Instagram, then edits some videos and uploads a new one. After a while, she feels like she’s managed enough work, and turns to something she enjoys a lot more – her photography. She heads into her darkroom and spends the next few hours developing photos, including the ones from yesterday.

After they’re done and dried, she finally turns the lights on and looks at them properly, and her breath immediately catches in her throat. They’re not just good, they’re stunning. Definitely the best photos that Haley’s ever taken. She sees what she had seen when she’d taken them – the butterfly is gorgeous, the colours contrast brilliantly, the lighting is perfect.

Now as she looks at the photos, though, all that she can think is that Abigail is beautiful. The thought is so intense in Haley’s head all of a sudden that it makes her a little dizzy. She looks through all the photos carefully, trying not to notice the slight shake in her hands.

Her favourite is one of the ones that she took from a bit further away. Abigail gazes up at the camera from under her lashes, a sparkle in her eyes and an enticing smirk on her lips. It seems intimate, somehow, and Haley feels an unfamiliar twist in her stomach as she stares at it.

Eventually, she shifts it to the bottom of the pile and focuses on another of the photos. This one feels a bit less personal, taken from closer up and focusing more on the butterfly itself. You can still see the soft line of Abigail’s jaw and the glint of her blue eyes under the curl of her lashes, but it’s somewhat less obvious who the person in the photo is.

Haley scans the print and uploads it to her computer, then opens her photography blog page. Unlike her Instagram, she doesn’t make any money off of her blog, and only runs it anonymously as an outlet to show off her photos. The main page of the blog is dedicated to her portfolio, a collection of all of the best photos that Haley’s taken over the last six or so years. It’s always been missing something, though, always been in desperate need of a centerpiece to bring it all together. The photo she’d taken yesterday is perfect. She uploads it, then spends a few minutes just admiring her page smugly.

Haley feels so confident looking at it, actually, that a flash of motivation hits her. She’d been toying with the idea of entering photography competitions for years, but she’d always been too scared of facing the likely reality that her photos just weren’t good enough to win anything to do it. But the Zuzu annual photography competition entrance deadline is closing soon, and she’s just completed the perfect portfolio to enter it. She goes to the webpage and uploads her photos, arranging everything neatly and ensuring that the photo of Abigail is centered. She submits the portfolio and breathes a sign of relief the moment that it’s done. It feels like she’s finally done something, however small it might be.

No sooner had she started to relax again than there’s a knock on her door.

“Haley?” Emily calls.

She has the sudden insane urge to tell her sister about the photos and the competition, but bites the words back and instead snaps out a short “what?”

“Do the dishes tonight, will you? I’m sick of having to wash them in the morning after I have work.”

For some reason, the way Emily brings up her job at the saloon always irks Haley. It seems so condescending, as if it’s meant to make her feel stupid and useless. Some part of her knows that she’s probably just projecting, but she gets annoyed all the same.

“You don’t work until four, you have plenty of time to do the dishes in the morning.”

“It’s not fair that I have to do all the work, Haley. Come on, grow up. Just wash the dishes tonight, okay?” Emily sounds so exasperated, and Haley feels a tinge of guilt at the back of her mind.

“Ugh, fine, whatever.”

“Okay. Thank you. I’m heading out to work now.”

“Okay, and?”

Emily doesn’t reply, and Haley hears her footsteps fade away and then the door open and close. She’s glad her sister is gone. She’s glad, of course she’s glad.

She wishes they would have talked a little longer.

She’s lonely.

Haley turns off her computer and wanders back over to her dresser, where she left the photos from yesterday. She goes through them again, letting her eyes trail over Abigail’s form, examining her smile, her neck, the curve of her cheekbone.

‘You do know that nobody likes you, don’t you?’, she had said yesterday. Well, she certainly knows that Abigail doesn’t. Up until recently, that wouldn’t have bothered her in the slightest, and she would even have thought that she didn’t like the other girl either.

Now, though, she can’t stop thinking about those precious few minutes when she’d been taking photos of Abigail and had finally, momentarily, felt a little bit less alone. Before she had gone and ruined it with a completely unnecessary – and extremely untrue – insult, that is.

The thought gives her an idea. Yeah, she had hurt Abigail’s feelings, but that didn’t mean she couldn’t fix things. Hurriedly, she scans the rest of her prints and uploads them, saving them to her phone in her photography folder as well.

She doesn’t have Abigail’s contact information, but she finds her Instagram easily enough – they’re both following Alex. She attaches a few of the photos she’d taken, including that one that she’d really loved, the one that shows Abigail’s whole face and her upper body. She goes back and forth on what to write for far too long, but eventually manages to compose a message that doesn’t make her feel too stupid and raw.

I will not be editing your face out of any of the photos. Sorry I said that. They turned out great, thought you should have them too.

She waits anxiously by her phone for the rest of the evening, but Abigail never replies.

Chapter Text

The next day passes uneventfully, aside from an argument with Emily over the fact that Haley forgot to do the dishes, and the rest of the week is no better. Haley doesn’t go out to take photos even once, feeling awfully uninspired after the whole debacle of the last time she’d gone out. She just works on posts for her Instagram page, which continues to bring in the small but steady stream of money that she needs for any shopping she wants to do as well as to contribute her share of the household funds.

She used to be a lot more excited about her makeup page than she is now. She’s always enjoyed doing her makeup, but she doesn’t have any interest in making it her full-time career. She would much rather do photography, but her photo blog doesn’t make any money at all and she doesn’t know how she’d even start. So she sticks to what she’s already doing, to what’s simple and easy, like she always does.

That Saturday, it’s the town egg hunt, which is what finally drags her out of her house again. She doesn’t much care to watch a bunch of kids and idiots run around looking for eggs, but Pelican town is far too small for anyone to miss an event without it causing whispers. And people already whisper about her enough, she doesn’t need to give them any more reasons to.

She puts on her cutest outfit and makes sure she looks her absolute best – not letting herself stop to really think about why she’s so worried about it – and then marches out with her head held high.

Only to find that Abigail is practically in her backyard. She’s with Sam and Sebastian, standing near the edge of the town square that’s closest to Haley’s house. She falters, but Abigail doesn’t notice her immediately and she quickly spots Alex not far away. She beelines over to him and gives him a quick hug and her usual cheery greeting, although she’s feeling it even less than usual today.

“Ready to watch the same exact egg hunt that we’ve been watching for years?” Alex tosses his gridball back and forth absentmindedly as he talks, eyes wandering the square. “Wow, Shane looks like shit today, doesn’t he?”

Haley swallows uncomfortably. Their conversations often revolve around making fun of the other villagers, but it feels awfully mean today to her. Especially Shane. Yeah, he’s a mess, but he’s clearly going through something, and he’s currently just sitting alone on a bench, not bothering anyone.

She thinks, briefly, about telling Alex off, but instantly reconsiders and deflects instead. “I think I probably look the most like shit out of anyone. These bags under my eyes are just awful! Even my best concealer won’t cover them up properly.”

“Oh come on, Haley, you look hot and you know it.” She giggles, pleased at the compliment despite herself. She’s cut off by the sound of someone clearing their throat and finds that Abigail has come over to stand beside her.

“Hey?” Alex greets, a touch bewildered.

“May I talk to Haley, please?”

“Oh, yeah, sure.” Haley watches in horror as Alex turns and ambles off, leaving her completely alone with the girl who she presumes is still very angry with her, after ignoring her message.

“How long have you been doing photography for?”

What? Haley blinks for a moment, confused by the unexpected question. “Oh, uh, about six years,” she eventually manages. “It’s just a hobby, really.”

“You’re very talented. Those photos were done very well.”

“Oh.” Haley is surprised to find herself feeling flustered. She’s plenty used to people complimenting her looks and her clothes, but no one’s ever given her a compliment quite like this before. “Well, it’s really just luck, I guess. It’s not like I made that butterfly land there.”

Abigail’s brow knits. “But you’re the one who captured it. Not just anybody could have taken those photos.”

Haley feels more and more out of her depth with each passing moment. “Uh, you definitely made it easy for me. You’re very photogenic.” Shit. Had she meant to say that? She doesn’t think she’d meant to say that.

Abigail looks pleased, though. “Well then, if you need a model for any photoshoots you’re doing, let me know.”

Even though she knows that the offer is likely only out of politeness, a thrill runs up Haley’s spine at the thought of taking more pictures of Abigail, of what a photoshoot could entail.

“I’ve only ever taken nature photos and landscapes and stuff,” she admits, because she doesn’t know what else to say. “But I think I like doing people too. It’s, like, exciting.”

Abigail hums, watching Haley with a scrutinizing expression that makes her stomach twist up. “You post your photos anywhere?”

Haley always thought that she wanted her blog to be a proper secret, to be completely anonymous, but now she realizes that no one had ever actually asked her about her photos before. And now that someone has, she suddenly wants nothing more than to talk about it. Besides, she desperately doesn’t want Abigail to think that she’s been completely wasting her time away. She drops her voice to a whisper, just to make sure that no one else can overhear her. “Yeah, actually. I have a blog.”

“That’s awesome!” Abigail apparently didn’t get the memo about keeping her voice down, she’s practically yelling. “You gotta send me the link to that, I’d love to see all of your stuff.”

“Sure,” Haley replies, pulling out her phone. She notices Abigail’s eyes following her hands, lingering on her impeccably painted pink fingernails, and tries to ignore the way her heartbeat picks up in her chest.

She messages Abigail the link to her blog, and waits with baited breath while she gets it open on her own phone. She watches her scroll through it, that same scrutinizing look on her face, and Haley feels exposed, as though every part of her is being weighed.

“This is incredible, Haley, holy shit.”

For once, she hasn’t been found lacking. “Th – thank you.”

“Wow. Have you thought of going into professional photography? These are seriously some of the best photos I’ve ever seen.”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” She’s lying. Of course she’s thought about it.

“Who made this webpage for you? I love the design, too.”

“Oh, I made it myself.”

Abigail’s mouth opens and closes a few times, her eyes wide. “Haley –” whatever she was going to say is cut off by Mayor Lewis, calling from the center of the square that the egg hunt is about to begin.

She hesitates for a moment, glancing down at her phone and then back at Haley again. “Sorry, uh, I’d better go. You know, I haven’t lost the egg hunt once in the last eight years, that’s not about to change now.”

Haley snorts. She’d forgotten that Abigail still participates in the egg hunt every year. Someone had really ought to tell her that she’s far too old for it now. “Bye, weirdo.”

Abigail smirks. “Cya, princess.”

A sudden heat crawls up Haley’s neck, and she quickly turns away before her embarrassment is noticed, walking back over to Alex as quickly as she can without running. Why does she feel so weird all of a sudden?

“Since when do you talk to Abigail?” Alex asks her as she comes over to stand beside him to watch the hunt.

“Since never. She was just asking me about something, it’s nothing.”

Haley focuses on the ground so that she doesn’t start staring at Abigail, and prays that Alex can’t see her blush.

Chapter Text

The next day is Haley’s birthday. She remembers the times when she’d have huge, over-the-top parties, but now she just stays at home like any other day. She gets a few messages from old high school friends, but not many. Her parents don’t call. She tries not too let it get to her too much, especially when Alex drops by to give her a set of shimmery nail polishes.

In the late afternoon, she hears Emily leave for work, and finally leaves her room to make dinner in the kitchen. On the counter is a beautiful pink cake, decorated with heart shaped sprinkles and smelling tantalizingly of melon.

It’s Haley’s favourite. She just stares for a minute, feeling sick to her stomach. When had Emily had time to make it? She hadn’t even left a note or anything, hadn’t wished Haley a happy birthday.

She should thank her. That’s what Emily wants, she’s sure. For Haley to shower her with praise and acknowledge that she is just so much better than her, so much kinder and more patient and more talented.

Bitch.

Teeth gritted, Haley marches across the house with the beautiful cake in her arms, shoves open the front door, then wrenches open the trash can and dumps the entire cake inside.

The feeling of inadequacy fades for a moment, and she breathes a sigh of relief. Then regret hits her like a truck a moment later. That cake would have been delicious, she knows it. She stares down at the smushed pink icing in the trash and wonders why the hell she did that.

“Hey, Haley!”

Haley jumps, closing the trash can and turning to face Abigail, who’s just walking up her front steps. “What do you want?”

“Chill out, holy shit. Just brought you a birthday gift.” Before Haley can even begin to comprehend that, Abigail hands her a beautiful paper sunflower.

“How - ?”

“I saw you took a lot of photos of sunflowers. Couldn’t get you a real one, since it’s spring and all, but I’ve been practicing paper crafts for a while so I thought I could make you one. Sorry if it’s dumb.”

It’s Abigail. Haley should definitely tell her it’s dumb. It’s not though, is the thing. “Sunflowers are my favourite.”

Abigail grins at her, and she notices that her smile is a little lopsided in a way that is terribly attractive.

Strange. Haley’s never spent so much time thinking about how attractive another girl is before. Whatever.

“I’m sorry about what I said in the woods.” Abigail brushes her hair behind her ears nervously as she speaks, shifting from foot to foot. “It was uncalled for.”

Haley blinks, taken by surprise. “No, it’s – it literally was called for. I was being rude first. And besides, it was all true, anyway.”

“No! No, it’s not.”

She rolls her eyes. “Come on, I know everybody thinks I’m dumb, but I’m not that dumb, okay? I know that nobody likes me.” She doesn’t like the way that Abigail is looking at her, so she quickly regains her composure and forces an unaffected sneer onto her face. “Which is stupid of them, of course.”

“You’re not dumb, Haley. I don’t think that. And for what it’s worth, I really do like you. See you around!” With that, Abigail flashes her another of those awfully attractive smiles and then turns and walks away.

Haley slinks back to her room and spends a few hours on her blog, uploading photos and making posts. If her eyes somehow keep drifting back to her pictures of Abigail, what of it? They’re just very good photos. Besides, the more she looks at them, the more she feels inspired. She loves all of her photos, but a collection featuring human models could really round out her portfolio, especially if she was looking to get paid photography gigs in the future. Already, ideas are rushing through her head – she could have her pose all over Stardew Valley, there are so many areas that would be perfect for nature shots, people go crazy for that kind of photo. She could do her makeup, get her dolled up in some of Haley’s vast collection of nice clothes. She’s still grinning just thinking about it by the time she drifts off to sleep.

The next morning, Haley wakes up earlier than normal and heads to the kitchen for breakfast with a bounce in her step. Emily s there, eating cereal and laughing with someone on the phone, and Haley falters. She doesn’t remember seeing Emily so happy – she never laughs like that when Haley’s around. In fact, her laugh dries right up the moment that their eyes lock, and then Emily drops her gaze and stands up, bringing her phone and cereal with her into her bedroom. The door closes with a firm click behind her, and Haley swallows down the lump in her throat. She worked too hard on her makeup this morning to ruin it by crying, damn it.

She makes herself some eggs, then heads down to the beach for a morning walk, slipping her camera into her purse as she leaves just in case inspiration strikes her. She spends a while just sitting in the sand, staring out at the waves like she normally does. She wonders what it would be like to just get on a boat and sail off in into the sea, to never come back. For the first time it strikes her that maybe there are one or two things that she’d miss.

Just as she thinks it, Haley spots some movement out in the ocean, and gasps out loud as she realizes that it’s a pod of orca whales, not far at all away from the shore. Excited, she runs out to the pier, scrambling to yank her camera out of her purse as she stares out at the orcas. In her haste, her hand catches on the strap of her camera, and it goes flying straight into the water.

She freezes, staring in horror at her most precious possession as it floats away out of reach in the waves. It might not be destroyed, it was supposed to be ‘water-resistant’, whatever that means. Just as she’s steeling herself to jump in after it, she feels a hand on her shoulder, holding her back.

“Girl, wait. The water’s cold. Here.” It’s Willy, the grumpy old fisherman that Haley has never once had a proper conversation with, even though they’ve both lived here for Haley’s whole life. He’s got a fishing rod on him, a really fancy looking one, and as she watches, he casts it out, catching the hook of it on her camera strap. He pulls it in and hands it back to her with a kind smile. “Hope it still works alright.”

Haley gives it a careful shake, then tries turning it on. It seems to work fine still, miraculously, and she breathes a sigh of relief.

“Thank you, Mr. Willy.”

“Heh. Just Willy, please.”

Haley gently wipes her camera dry with her jacket. “Okaaay then. Thanks, Willy. That was a good catch.”

“With practice, it’s easy.” He pauses, regarding her. “You ever wanted to learn to fish?”

She hadn’t, but it seems rude to say so. “I don’t think I’d be any good at it.”

He chuckles. “Anyone can be good at fishing. Here, let me teach you.”

Haley is surprised by the offer, and by how genuine it seems. She would have thought that Willy would have written her off immediately. “Okay,” she finds herself saying, to her own surprise.

Willy teaches her how to prepare the line and how to cast it correctly, and then he shows her how to reel in a fish, and just like that, she’s caught a halibut. It’s gross and slimy, but Willy seems so excited about it that she can’t help but get excited too. He helps her wrap it up in plastic to take home, insisting that it’ll make the perfect fish dinner if she just fillets it and cooks it up with some herbs.

“You can keep the rod. Come by and fish anytime.” Willy tells her as she tries to hand the fishing rod back to him. To her utter shock, she finds herself actually considering it.

Chapter Text

The rest of spring passes by no more eventfully than normal for Haley. She tries, multiple times, to write Abigail messages to ask her to model for her, or even just to hang out, but she always chickens out of sending them – coward that she is – and Abigail never messages her either. She falls back into her normal, boring routine of uploading makeup tutorials, avoiding her sister, hanging out with Alex, and sometimes going out to take photographs in the forest.

The only addition she’s made is the occasional trip out to the docks to fish with Willy, trips that she usually returns from with a fish to cook for dinner in tow and an unexpected smile on her face.

The annual flower dance comes and goes, and Haley dances with Alex like she always does and tries not to trip over her own feet every time that she glances over at Abigail. It’s difficult because she looks absolutely stunning in the flowery white dress that they all wear for the dance, and because she’s dancing with Sebastian, who is holding her in a way that makes Haley grit her teeth. For some reason. She doesn’t think too much about why.

But it sure would be nice to dance with Abigail, wouldn’t it? That’s a weird thought, and she just keeps thinking it.

Haley’s been having a lot of weird thoughts recently.

The days have grown hot and long, heralding the imminent arrival of summer, when Haley gets a letter that changes everything.

Dear Haley,

We are pleased to inform you that you have placed first in the Zuzu annual photography competition. Your portfolio was stunning and showed great talent. Your 10000g cash prize is included.

You are also invited to participate in the Zuzu photography exhibition in fall with the opportunity to showcase a fresh collection of work. Your travel costs and accommodations will be arranged. Please fill out the included form and send it back to us if you will be attending.

Sincerely,

Zuzu photography competition judges

Haley has to read the letter several times before it sinks in. She won the competition. She actually won. Before she can contain it, a squeal escapes her lips, and then she’s jumping up and down on the spot, laughing with pure exhilaration. She needs to tell someone. Immediately.

Her first thought is Alex, but she’s never talked to him about this. No, he wouldn’t care. She’s already heading north through the town square, towards Pierre’s shop, before it sinks in that she’s going to find Abigail. It’s stupid, why would she care?

But Haley’s feet take her through the door at the back of the shop all the same, to the door that she knows leads to Abigail’s bedroom, though she’s never been inside. After a moment to steel her nerves, she tentatively knocks on the door.

“I’m in the middle of a level, mom!” Abigail yells from within. “One minute!”

“Uh, it’s Haley, actually.”

There’s a moment of silence from within, and then the door flies open. Abigail is standing there with a game controller in her hand, her hair mussed up and wearing fuzzy blue pyjamas. For the first time, it occurs to Haley that it’s barely past nine, still pretty early in the morning for an unexpected visit.

“Oh, I could come back later –”

“What? No. Come in!” Abigail steps back, holding the door open for her, and Haley steps into her room while trying hard not to look too interested in it. She’s got a big game console and a fancy computer, a fish tank and a bookshelf full of fantasy novels. The walls are plastered with posters featuring a mixture of video games and rock bands. The whole place smells nice, like lavender incense.

Abigail sits on the corner of her desk and folds her hands in her lap, looking expectantly at Haley, and all at once she remembers why she came. “I won a photography competition. Like, a big one. I’ve got a showing in Zuzu city. "

Haley expects at best a half-genuine congratulations. Instead, Abigail shrieks, one of the last sounds Haley would have expected her to make, and throws her arms around her shoulders, dragging her into a crushingly tight hug.

A chain of realizations dawn on Haley one after another. One, Abigail is warm. And soft. Two, she smells really good - the same subtle lavender of her room as well as something even subtler, uniquely Abigail. Three, Haley hasn't been properly hugged in a very long time.

"That's amazing! You're going to get to display your photos?" Abigail asks as she pulls away, far sooner than Haley would have liked.

 "Yes, I -" she breaks off, suddenly remembering that the letter had specifically requested a 'fresh' collection. She'd need new photos.

The words spill past Haley's lips before she can think better of them. "Is the offer to model for me still open?"

Abigail grins. "Anytime."

Haley’s heart is racing again, inexplicably. “Tomorrow?”

“Deal.”

There’s a slightly awkward pause, the air between them crackling with a strange sort of tension, and then Abigail gestures broadly to her game console. “Want to play?”

“Sure, okay.” Haley sits carefully back on her heels next to Abigail and takes the controller that she’s handed. She doesn’t remember the last time she played a video game of any kind.

Journey of the Prairie King loads on the TV screen, which Haley only knows because they have it in the arcade in the saloon – not that she’s there often. She certainly doesn’t have any idea how to play it.

She mashes buttons in frustration as Abigail’s avatar runs around, shooting all of the enemies around them.

“The X button to shoot, Haley, the X button!”

“I don’t know which one that is!!” She cuts off with a scream as her avatar dies and disappears off the screen, Abigail’s following soon after. Haley stares down at the ground, embarrassed, waiting for the other girl to tell her to leave.

But Abigail doesn’t seem annoyed – she starts laughing. “You should have told me you’d never played. Here, let me show you.”

She starts a new game, this time with only one player, and gently guides Haley’s hands onto her remote. She leaves her hands over Haley’s, the soft skin of her palms skimming over the backs of her knuckles. Well, this certainly isn’t going to help her concentrate.

“So this joystick is to move, see?” Abigail’s voice is soft and low, and she guides her fingers as she speaks. Haley is breathless. “And this button to shoot. That’s all you really need to do. Think you got it?”

“Ah,” Haley licks her lips. “Maybe show me one more time?”

Abigail giggles. “Sure.” This time, her hands press a bit more firmly over Haley’s as she shows her the buttons, and she swears she isn’t imagining the way that Abigail’s thumb caresses intentional circles across the back of her hand. Before she can be certain that she isn’t imagining it, though, Abigail has pulled away, putting a few respectable inches of space between them.

“Ready to try again?”

“Sure, yes.”

The second time, it goes a lot better, and Haley actually manages to be a help rather than a hindrance. They’ve almost won when she makes the mistake of glancing over at Abigail, and promptly proceeds to forget how to play the moment that she sees the way that she’s biting her lip in concentration.

“Oh, so close!” Abigail exclaims as they fail the level, turning to face her. Haley hadn’t managed to tear her eyes away, but quickly does so as their gazes lock, looking down at the floor instead. Her stomach is doing somersaults and she doesn’t know if she’s ever felt quite like this before.

The closest comparison she could make would be to the feelings that she had when she had crushes back in school, but that doesn’t make any sense. Abigail’s a girl, and Haley would definitely know if she was into girls. Which she isn’t. Clearly not.

She’d had boyfriends! Multiple boyfriends! Sure, she’d never really clicked with any of them and it had been years since she’d dated anyone, but still. Even if she was bi or something surely she would have noticed before now that she was attracted to women. No. It’s not possible. Her weird feelings around Abigail must be something else – it’s probably just that she wants to be friends with her really badly. That would make a lot more sense. Yes.

Satisfied with the conclusion that she’s reached, Haley nods to herself and rises to her feet. Even though she definitely doesn’t have a crush on Abigail, a bit of space right about now might not go amiss, just to make sure she doesn’t do something stupid that might make Abigail think she had a crush on her, like grab her hand or kiss her or something.

“You gotta go?” Abigail sounds disappointed, to Haley’s surprise and secret delight.

“Yeah, I, uh, I just remembered that I have to do some work. But I’ll see you tomorrow morning? Come by my house around ten and we’ll go to the woods.”

“Okay, see you then. Bye, Haley.” She says Haley’s name in way that makes her shiver, all warm and breathy.

“Bye,” she replies hurriedly, already halfway out the door as her heart hammers in her chest.

Chapter Text

It’s ten past ten when Abigail knocks on the door. Haley rushes out to get it, a bag full of clothes and makeup slung over her shoulder.

“Who’s that?” Emily says, the first words that she’s spoken to Haley in days, stepping out of the kitchen.

“Oh, hi Emily!” Abigail greets brightly, peering into their living room. “We’re just going out to take photos.”

“Photos?” Emily comes closer, her brow knitting with confusion and her eyes darting back and forth between the two of them and Haley’s bag.

“Nothing that would concern you,” Haley interjects smoothly as Abigail opens her mouth to reply, pushing herself out through the door.

“Photos of what? Why?” Emily asks, following them out.

Abigail turns to face her. “Didn’t Haley tell you about the competition –”

“Buzz off, Emily.” Haley snaps, grabbing Abigail’s arm and pulling her away before she can say anything else. “Come on.”

She marches down the street until the house is far behind them before she finally slows and forces down her annoyance enough to give Abigail an apologetic look. She feels like she needs to say something, to explain somehow. “Emily and I don’t really get along.”

“Oh. Sorry. I mean, I never really see you two hang out, but I figured you were close.”

“No. Not at all. We don’t talk. She doesn’t know about my photos.”

“Like, at all? Why not?”

“She would think it’s dumb.”

Abigail hesitates. “I really don’t think Emily would think that.”

“Yeah, well, you don’t know her like I do!”

“Sorry, of course, you’re right.”

Haley winces. “I shouldn’t have snapped.”

“It’s alright, I shouldn’t have pressed.”

Haley dares a glance at Abigail out of the corner of her eye, and is surprised to find her already looking back. She’s even more surprised to notice that she’s blushing as she quickly looks away. Feeling brave, Haley allows her gaze to rest on Abigail’s face for a few seconds longer before looking away too, taking in how pretty she looks when she’s blushing like she is.

Not that it matters, if Abigail is pretty, other than for the fact that she’ll make a great model for Haley’s photos. She forcibly pushes the fluttery feelings away and focuses on talking to her like a friend.

She’s surprised, in the end, by just how easy it is to do that.

They chat for the next half hour or so as they walk deeper into the woods, and Haley finds herself laughing more than she has in years. Abigail is funny. She can’t believe she never realized that before. She can’t believe that, if they hadn’t run into each other in the forest that one time, she might have gone her entire life without hearing Abigail’s hysterical Mayor Lewis impression.

An uncomfortable squirm rises in Haley’s gut at the thought. Willy is funny too, as it turns out, which she’s realized after many days spent fishing with him at the docks in the last few weeks.

She’d gone and written off everyone in Pelican Town as being boring and lame, and now she’s been proven wrong on two accounts. Who else could she be wrong about? Harvey? Shane? Emily?

She shakes her head to clear the thought, bringing them to a stop at one of her favourite spots, where a rock juts out of the river underneath a huge oak tree.

She nods at the rock. “Hope you’re not afraid of your feet getting a little wet.”

“Wow, this is pretty.”

“Yes, I know,” Haley replies drily. “That’s why we’re here.”

She gives Abigail a once over. She’s gorgeous, of course, like usual, but her blue tunic and black skinny jeans don’t exactly scream ‘photoshoot’.

She knows exactly the look she wants to go for, and she’s got the perfect outfit for it. From her bag, she pulls out a simple black dress with a long, flowing skirt. “Can you go put this on for me?”

“Oh, sure thing.” Abigail takes the dress, already yanking her tunic off. Haley yelps and squeezes her eyes shut.

“Go behind a tree or something, oh my god!”

Abigail snorts. “Didn’t think you’d be such a prude. Well, I’m done, you can open your eyes now.”

Tentatively, Haley does, relieved to see that Abigail is now fully covered by the dress, which luckily seems to fit her well.

“Okay, let me just change up your makeup a little.” Abigail already has on fairly dark makeup that compliments the dress well, but Haley wants to make sure it’ll show up the way she wants it to on camera. She darkens her eyeliner and adds a thick silver shimmer to her eyelids. She also adds some brighter lipstick, which maybe isn’t strictly necessary, but she likes the idea of her own lipstick touching Abigail’s lips.

Damn it, there she goes again with the weird thoughts.

She does not have a crush on Abigail.

Abigail stands still and waits patiently, eyes drifting slowly back and forth between Haley’s face and her hands in a way that make her feel hot under the collar. Soon enough, she’s done, and she steps back to admire her work

“Perfect,” she breathes, walking around Abigail to take her in from a few different angles.

She looks ethereal, but in a dark way, like a shard of glass so sharp that it’s too dangerous to touch.

“Do I look hot?” Abigail asks, tilting her head to the side and smirking up at her.

Yes. God, yes. “You look very nice,” Haley replies instead, a paradigm of professionalism. “Now get on the rock.”

Abigail’s smirk grows. “Well, when you ask like that, princess…”

Haley presses one shaking hand against her chest for a moment as Abigail wades through the water to the rock with her skirt hiked up, trying to stop her heart from leaping straight out of her ribcage like it feels like it’s about to.

She doesn’t have a crush on Abigail.

Haley pulls out her camera as her model settles into a pose, trying to find the perfect spot to capture her pictures from. She ends up laying in the dirt so that she can get a low angle, making the water of the river look like an infinite ocean and Abigail seem almost godly as she rises up above it.

Haley has her take a bunch of different poses as she photographs, but her favourite is one with Abigail’s head cast back, gaze directed up at the sky, her dark skirt spread out around her like a waterfall. A beam of sunlight filters through the trees and illuminates her face, and in a stroke of genius, Haley thinks to kick some dirt up into the air, giving the final image a faint dusty film that really gives it the magical quality that she was going for.

After almost an hour, she’s finally satisfied, and Abigail wades back over to her to peer at the photos on the camera from over Haley’s shoulder. She stands so close that Haley can feel her breath on her shoulder, and it takes all of the willpower that she has to resist the urge to step back so she can feel Abigail’s body against hers.

Which is an odd urge to have, yes, but she doesn’t have a crush on Abigail.

They clean up the area and Abigail changes back into her own clothes, apologizing profusely for how dirty the dress got even though Haley repeatedly tells her that she had fully expected that.

“You ruined your own clothes more anyway, lying in the dirt like that.” Abigail pokes at Haley’s shirt, which has gotten pretty stained from lying on the muddy ground, and then starts trying to brush it clean. Everywhere that her hands touch, Haley feels phantom golden sparks skitter across her skin.

She doesn’t have a crush on Abigail.

Haley has forgotten how to breathe normally. Abigail finally draws her hands back, and when they lock eyes, she winks at Haley.

Oh. Well. Okay then.

So, she has a crush on Abigail.

Chapter Text

Haley has never pined before. She’s had crushes, sure, but she’s always been able to flirt her way into dating any guy she liked within days. With Abigail, things are completely different. They’ve become something akin to friends, almost, and Haley has found herself enjoying her company far too much to risk losing it over something dumb like the fact that she would very much like to kiss Abigail senseless.

Besides, she has no reason to think that Abigail would feel the same way. She’s not even into girls, as far as Haley knows.

So Haley keeps her mouth shut and her hands to herself and pines.

Outside of their trips a couple of times a week out all over Stardew Valley to take photos for Haley’s new collection, they’ve started spending more time together doing other things as well. She goes to Abigail’s house to play games with her, and they walk to the beach together sometimes too.

One week towards the end of summer, Abigail invites her to join her and her friends at the saloon on Friday. Haley finds herself worrying about what everyone will think of her, to see her there and with dweebs like Abigail, Seb, and Sam, no less.

Just a few months ago, she wouldn't have been caught dead hanging out with Abigail, Seb and Sam in the saloon.

Just a few months ago, she was a lot more miserable than she is now, though.

So, despite her misgivings, Haley finds herself tentatively opening the door to the Stardrop at 6 on Friday. It's busy inside - half the town is there. Her sister is behind the bar, her blue hair tied back out of her face and an apron around her waist. Their gazes lock and Emily's eyebrows shoot up in surprise.

“Is everything okay? Do you need me?” Emily calls across to her as she walks in, and a few people glance over, to Haley's dismay. Why does Emily always have to assume everything is about her?

Haley ignores her entirely and walks purposefully towards the adjacent arcade room, relieved to find it far quieter. Sam and Sebastian are at the table playing pool, and Abigail's on the sofa behind them.

She grins when she sees Haley. “You came! Come here, sit, sit!” She pats the space next to her on the sofa, and Haley hurries over to sit down beside her. The fabric of her green sundress rides up to her mid thigh as she settles in, and she doesn’t think that she’s imagining the way that Abigail's eyes linger on the bare skin of her leg.

“Hi, Haley,” greet Sam, and she remembers abruptly that they're not alone this time.

“Uh, hi.” Haley didn't used to be the type to ever get uncomfortable around other people, but recently she's been feeling it more and more. What the hell is she supposed to say to Sam? They've known each other since they were babies but they've never once had a full, cordial conversation. How are they supposed to start now? “Thanks for inviting me to join you.”

“Abigail invited you.” Sebastian interjects, not looking at her as he speaks.

“Seb!” Abigail snaps. She glances over at Haley and then brings her hand down to rest reassuringly on her knee. More quietly, she adds, “don't mind him. I'm glad you're here.”

Haley keeps her eyes averted, watching Sam fumble a shot. “Uh, yeah, thanks I guess.”

Sebastian snorts, and Haley has to bite back the instinctual urge to snap at him. That wouldn’t help anything, as good as it would feel. To her surprise, she really wants Abigail’s friends to like her.

Figuring that anything she says will probably irk someone as prickly as Sebastian, she mostly stays quiet and tries her best just to listen for a while. Sam and Seb shit talk each other like nothing Haley’s ever heard before – which is saying a lot – but it’s obvious that they’re only joking around, and Abigail laughs along, throwing in an insult of her own every now and again.

Haley suddenly finds herself wishing she had a friendship like that – she can think of so many great comments to throw in to their repartee, but she’s pretty sure any attempt at joking insults would not go over so well if they came from her. Still, despite her discomfort, she finds herself genuinely amused by the lighthearted argument happening around her, and catches herself laughing more than once.

“Does Sam ever win?” she asks Abigail at one point.

“Not that I can remember. Doesn’t stop him from talking shit, though.”

“Clearly not. I can’t believe how big he’s talking for someone who can hardly even score a single point.” Haley cringes as her own words register, worried that Abigail will think she’s being mean.

Luckily, she seems to receive the words in the spirit they were intended in. “Hmm. You have a lot to say for someone who hasn’t even played a single game.”

“I could beat any of you three any day.”

Abigail’s eyes light up. “Oh! A challenge! Seb, you and Sam against me and Haley, right now.”

“We are in the middle of a game -”

“Yes, yes, we all know you win it, Seb, come on.”

“Ugh. Fine. You two are about to get absolutely wrecked.”

Haley marches over to the pool table, grabbing a cue stick with a flourish. “Oh, sure, we’ll see about that!”

Haley hasn’t played pool in a while, but her confidence hadn’t come from nowhere – it takes her a few minutes to get the hang of it again, but after that it’s actually a very close game. It gets heated fast, although Haley can still sense a kind of tension lingering in the air as a result of her presence. Despite that, Sam and Seb are yelling and jumping around, occasionally grabbing at each other in ways that raise Haley’s eyebrows a little, though she resists the urge to comment on it.

Once or twice, she catches Sebastian cast a wary glance at her before shifting further away from Sam. She doesn’t quite know what to make of that, until Seb and Sam just barely manage to get the win and then they leap into each other’s arms, whooping with excitement. Seb quickly pulls back with another glance at her, but not before she sees the way that Sam had grabbed his face as if he was about to kiss him.

“Wait!” Haley almost drops her cue stick as it suddenly hits her. “Wait, wait, wait! You two, you’re together?”

Sam blushes and looks down at his feet awkwardly, but Sebastian stiffens and his face goes cold. “You have a problem, Haley?”

“What? No, of course not. Of course not! I’m not – I’m not homophobic, why would you think that?”

Sebastian scoffs. “Oh, I wonder why I would think that?”

She looks desperately at Abigail for support, but her eyes are fixed firmly on the ground.

Sebastian must see the helpless confusion on her face because he laughs, sharp and dry. “Figures you wouldn’t even remember. Freshman year? You and your friends used to call me an ‘ugly queer’ any time you saw me in the hallway?”

Haley doesn’t remember. At all. The worst thing is, though, she doesn’t doubt it for a moment. She’d said a lot of awful, thoughtless things when she was fourteen.

“It fucked me up for years,” Sebastian continues, eyes narrowed. “I was always trying to act ‘less gay’ after that. Turns out you were right about me after all, though. Bet you’re happy.”

Haley feels like the floor has disappeared out from under her feet. “I’m not happy,” she manages, her voice quiet and wavering as she fights back tears.

She tries not to think about the mean things she’s done, generally, but now the guilt hits her full force. Not just over Sebastian, but for everyone she’d treated like shit back when she’d been younger.

She still sometimes does it now, too, she realizes, although she’s pretty aware that it’s mostly just a defense mechanism for her. People are going to look at her and make judgements anyway, she’s always figured that she may as well give them a proper reason for them.

It hurts less that way, when she knows it’s deserved.

Not that it’s any excuse for what she’s done, or for all the mean things she said to people like Sebastian that she doesn’t even remember. Or Abigail. She used to call her a freak all the time, now that she’s thinking about it. She’d assumed it was all in the past, but it occurs to her that maybe she had slightly underestimated the impact of her words.

Haley isn’t much of one for apologies, most of the time. It feels hugely overdue now, though. “I’m really sorry, Sebastian.”

He blinks at her, seeming genuinely taken off guard by that. “Oh. Uh. Yeah, it’s whatever, I guess. Thanks.”

Haley swallows. “I’m happy for you two, really.” She means it. She’d never really thought much about Seb or Sam, but now that she is thinking about it, them being together just makes sense. Plus, a little part of her rejoices at the realization that this means that there definitely isn’t anything going on between Sebastian and Abigail.

“Right.” Sebastian seems a bit bewildered. “Well, just don’t tell anyone, please. Not everybody knows yet.”

“Of course,” she rushes to reassure him. “I won’t tell anyone, I promise.”

She looks at Abigail again and is relieved to find that she’s not longer staring at the ground. She’s smiling now, looking both relieved and pleased, and Haley feels oddly buoyed. “I’ll go buy us a round of drinks. Be right back.”

She practically skips across the saloon to the bar and orders four drinks from Gus. Emily prepares them and brings them over to her, watching her with a curious expression.

“Here you go, Haley,” Emily says, and Haley can tell that she wants to say more, but is biting it back. Probably something judgmental and superior, as usual.

Still, she’s currently on an apologizing kick, so she might as well continue it. “I’m sorry for calling you weird that one time,” she rushes out, as if it hadn’t been significantly more than one time. Okay, maybe that wasn’t the best apology. She grabs the drinks and hurries off before Emily gets a chance to respond. At least she’d tried.

She hands the drinks out to everyone and then collapses down on the sofa next to Abigail again, letting herself shift close enough that their bare legs touch. Her skin is warm.

“I’m sorry about all the mean things I’ve said to you.”

“Don’t worry about it. You weren’t ever that rude to me, really. Besides, we’re friends now, it’s in the past.” While she speaks, Abigail reaches over and squeezes Haley’s hand with hers.

Haley grins, but she isn’t too sure if friends would be the word that she’d use.

Chapter Text

The hot days of summer fade into fall, marked by the changes in colour of Haley’s photographs from bright greens to soft oranges and browns. Abigail makes for an even more captivating subject with the new scenery, and Haley has her posing all over the valley, meeting with her almost every day. Sure, Haley has far more photos than she could possibly need for the relatively small exhibition she’s going to be holding at the end of the season, but she’s got to make sure she get the absolute best photos. This could be her chance to actually start the photography career that she’s only dreamed of until now.

If it’s also a convenient excuse to spend more time with Abigail, well, so what?

Between photoshoots, the two of them spend long hours walking around the valley, talking about pretty much everything under the sun. Haley even tells Abigail things that she’d never told anyone before, like the dream that she had once had of living in LA and that all of her university applications had been rejected.

Abigail never reacts with the judgement that Haley fears, and she gives her the same understanding in return, listening to her complain about her strict parents and express her desire for adventure. She even miraculously manages to resist the urge to call her a weirdo when she admits that she wants to explore the old mines, one day as they’re walking through the woods after a shoot.

“Just be careful if you go in there. I’ve heard there are, like, monsters and stuff.”

“Aw, Haley, are you worried about me?”

“Not even the tiniest bit,” Haley lies drily.

“Oh sure, as if you wouldn’t be sad if something happened to me,” Abigail teases, a smirk quirking up the corner of her perfect mouth.

“I wouldn’t be sad at all. Really. I’d be happy, actually –”

Abigail shoulder checks her lightly, jostling her into a tree. “You liar! You care about me, deep down! You do!”

Haley doubles down. “No! I’ll never admit it!”

“So there is something to admit!” Abigail’s eyes glint with triumph. Moving quickly, Haley jerks forwards and shoves her gently, revealing in the brief moment of contact. Abigail immediately retaliates with an escalation, pushing Haley back and sending them both tumbling to the ground.

Her head hits a pile of dead leaves and she gasps, and then laughs in delight. Dry leaves flutter up into the air around them as Abigail settles with her knees on either side of Haley’s hips, pinning her down on the ground. “Say it. Say you care about me.”

“Never,” she repeats, but her voice is breathy and her stomach is in knots. There’s a slight pause, a single second that feels like an eternity.

Then Abigail reaches down and snatches her camera from around her neck, laughing lightly in a way that quickly dispels the tension. “Stay still. I’m the photographer now.”

Haley shrieks and squirms until she eventually shoves Abigail off, but not before she can take several photos of her that are probably extremely embarrassing. A different version of her would have been upset, but right now she’s covered in dirt and leaves and they’re both giggling, and she finds that she’s happy. Happier than she thinks she’s ever been before in her whole life, maybe.

Abigail hands Haley’s camera back with an adorable little pout. “You know, you should be the model, not me. You’re so pretty, have I mentioned that before?”

Haley feels her skin grow hot and knows that she’s immediately gone beet red. She’s been called pretty lots of times before, but it’s different coming from Abigail. The compliment feels less shallow, somehow.

“Thank you. But you’re prettier.”

Abigail’s eyebrows arch up. “When the hell did you become modest? Come on, you don’t need to lie.”

“I mean it!” Haley insists, crossing her legs and scooting a bit closer to Abigail in the dirt. “I mean, I certainly wouldn’t be a good model for the kinds of photos that I want to take. I don’t fit in here. Not like you do.”

“I’m not quite sure if I should take that as a compliment or not. Given how much I know you hate it here.”

Haley sighs. “I meant it in a nice way.” Not sure what else to say, she stands up and offers Abigail a hand, pulling her up too. “It’s getting late.”

“Yeah. I guess we should head back before my mom gets all mad again.”

“I suppose so.” Haley doesn’t really want to go home. Her house is cold and lonely. Emily’s always locked up in her own room and she always finds herself missing Abigail the moment that they separate. Still, she starts walking back towards town, knowing that it wouldn’t be a good idea to still be out in the woods when it gets dark.

They’re almost back, just approaching Marnie’s ranch, when Abigail suddenly stops, turning to look out at the river. “Want to sit for a bit?”

Haley shrugs. “Okay.”

They sit down by the river bank. Abigail slips off her shoes and dips her feet into the rushing water, while Haley tugs the sleeves of her jacket down to cover her hands and keeps all of her limbs far, far away from the cold river.

Abigail looks at her and laughs. “Come on, put your feet in.”

“Not if my life depended on it.”

“Are you too cold? Sorry, we can go back.”

“No, no,” Haley is quick to dissuade her of that idea. “It’s fine. I don’t mind.”

Abigail glances at her, looking a little worried. “I don’t want you to turn into a popsicle. You’re far too cute for such a tragic death. Here.”

Haley doesn’t even have time to reel from Abigail’s words, because she’s too busy reeling from the fact that she’s pulling off her dark leather jacket and handing it over to her. Her fingers brush against Abigail’s as she takes it. As she pulls the jacket on over her own, she notices that it smells like her.

God, she really, really likes Abigail.

As the weeks have passed, she’s only gotten more and more sure of it. Now that she knows that Abigail definitely doesn’t have any kind of relationship with Seb, she’s started wondering at length if there is anyone that she’s interested in, if there’s any way that she could be attracted to women. Or to her.

“What are you thinking about?” Abigail asks, tossing small stones one after another into the river as she speaks.

Haley bites her lip, considering how much to reveal. “You know, I thought that you and Seb might have been dating, before.”

“God, no. He’s a great friend, but really not my type.”

“Oh yeah? What is your type, then?”

Abigail throws another handful of stones into the water. “I don’t know.”

Haley doesn’t say anything, busy watching her out of the corner of her eye. Sure enough, she catches Abigail’s eyes flick over in her direction several times, which is enough to give Haley the confidence to press a little more. “Oh come on, there must be something you’re into.”

“Someone funny, you know? And, like, bubbly. Someone more outgoing than Seb, I dunno.”

Abigail’s eyes still keep darting back and forth between Haley and the river. She leans back, flicking her hair over her shoulder as she turns her body to face Abigail, batting her eyelashes up at her in a way that has never failed her before. “Yeah? What else?”

There’s the briefest moment of hesitation. “Blonde.”

“You do know that Sam is dating Seb, yes?” Haley jokes, and the unspoken tension between them eases somewhat as Abigail lets out a choked laugh.

“Funny? Sam? Come on.” She tosses another stone at the river, but doesn’t even watch it this time. Her gaze is still jumping back and forth, but it’s on Haley most of the time now. “No, Sam definitely isn’t my type either.”

Haley bites her lip, slowly, deliberately. “Then who is, Abigail?”

They’re sitting close enough to each other that Haley can hear Abigail’s breath catch, and a shiver of satisfaction runs down her spine. The hesitation drags on a bit longer this time, but Haley waits patiently, head tilted, smiling sweetly up at her.

“Like, pretty.” Abigail’s voice cracks and wavers. “Sweet.”

Though she stays still and carefully doesn’t show it, Haley’s thoughts are a jumbled mess as Abigail hesitates again. Please please please please. Come on. Please. Say me. SAY ME.

Abigail leans in, just a fraction of an inch closer. “Someone who I’m always happy to be around,” she continues in a whisper.

Haley blinks, feeling wrong-footed all of a sudden. She had been expecting a ‘you’, maybe. Now she’s suddenly doubting if Abigail actually is talking about her. Is she really always happy to be around her? Haley would certainly think not, except Abigail’s moved even closer and is speaking with more confidence now, in a lower, more intimate tone.

“Creative, too. I don’t know, someone who likes photography, maybe. Whose favourite flowers are sunflowers, who loves the beach and the sea and who deserves all of her dreams to come true, even though she doesn’t think she does.”

Haley opens her mouth to ask Abigail what the hell she’s talking about, but her throat is dry and the words won’t leave her lips, not when Abigail’s mouth is now hovering barely a centimeter away from hers.

“Do you know anyone like that, Haley?”

Suddenly, as easy as falling into a dream, they’re kissing. Haley isn’t sure who actually closed that final sliver of space. She’s terrified that it might have been her.

Abigail’s lips part against hers and they press together, hot and frantic. She feels a hand curl into her hair, a thumb resting firm on the nape of her neck. Her own arm somehow winds itself around Abigail’s back, pulling her in.

She’s being kissed in a way that she’s never been kissed before. It’s passionate and desperate, but somehow still gentle. It’s the best kiss of Haley’s life, frankly. It feels right.

But it’s not right, Haley thinks to herself, even as she bites down on Abigail’s lip. It’s not right, because Haley is straight, she’s supposed to be straight and it’s one thing to have a crush on a girl, but it’s another entirely to pursue it. She didn’t mean for this to happen.

This shouldn’t be happening.

She curls the hand on the small of Abigail’s back into a fist around her shirt and pulls her away, gently, careful not to hurt her. Far less gently, she shoves herself backwards, scrambling away from the enthralling feeling of touching Abigail and simultaneously planting herself halfway into the icy river water. She quickly scrambles back out, but keeps her distance.

“Haley.” Abigail has her hands in front of her, palms out like she’s trying to tame a skittish animal. “You okay?”

Haley blinks. She feels hot, in her face, in her gut. It had been a pleasant heat a moment earlier, when she’d been flirting with Abigail, when she’d – fucking coerced her into kissing her, but it’s not at all pleasant now. It feels like she’s burning.

“What the fuck? Why did you do that?” She doesn’t even realize that she’s speaking until the words are already out, and then she winces. The sick feeling in her stomach worsens.

“Why did I do that?” Abigail looks absolutely incredulous, hands still frozen in the wide space between them.

“Listen, I’m not homophobic.” Her voice is shaking. “But I’m not – like that. Like you are, apparently.”

Haley is a filthy fucking liar. Just a moment earlier she was all but praying for Abigail to kiss her and they both know it. She doesn’t feel like she has any control over what she’s saying anymore, though.

“Don’t do this, Haley.” Abigail speaks firmly, moving towards her.

She steps backwards, heel dipping back into the icy river water. “I’m not doing anything. You’ve just gotten the wrong idea.”

“I know you’re scared, but this isn’t going to help anything.”

It’s true, she is scared. She hadn’t thought that someone as incredible as Abigail would ever actually like someone like her back, she hadn’t thought the stupid crush that she’d had would matter, in the end. Now, all of a sudden, it feels like it really, really does, and it’s terrifying. Some part of her is back in high school, in a too-tight shirt and painful stiletto heels, laughing along after Megan Park called Jennifer Cartridge a dyke even though her stomach is twisting itself into knots.

Haley shakes her head, trying to dislodge the memory, but it won’t quite go away.

“You just need to calm down. We can talk about this,” Abigail ventures, stepping closer again.

Haley really hates the measured, even tone that Abigail is using. She sounds like her sister when she’s telling her off for not helping out enough. “I didn’t want you to kiss me!” she shrieks in a sudden burst, voice coming out high and panicked. “Maybe we shouldn’t be friends anymore if you can’t control yourself.”

It’s cruel, unnecessary, and most of all, it’s obviously complete bullshit. Abigail looks like she’s been slapped in the face, though.

“You’re – you don’t mean that.” The hurt in her voice makes Haley’s stomach drop, but the buzz of the panic in her ears is more insistent than the already growing guilt – for now.

“I do mean it. You’re going to have to go find some other poor girl to kiss. Just leave me alone! All of this – us being friends – it was stupid anyway. It was never going to work.”

“Stop it, stop it,” Abigail hisses, and her voice is far from even now, but she still hasn’t lowered her hands or stepped away.

“I don’t need you, Abigail. My life was much better before I started hanging out with you. Just – just don’t talk to me from now on.”

Haley has never managed to tell so many lies in such a short amount of time before. She drops her gaze from Abigail and grabs her bag, shaking so badly that she nearly drops it a couple of times before she manages to get it over her shoulder.

“Haley, you can’t –”

“Leave me alone!” She’s screeching, and the sound of it makes her cringe as she realizes that she’s fully lost control. She has to get out of here, fast. “I’m going home. Fuck off.”

She doesn’t even have the dignity left to try to hide the fact that she’s running away. She just turns her back on Abigail and makes a break for it.

She hears Abigail let out a frustrated scream behind her, but she doesn’t follow.

Still, Haley keeps running until she makes it home and locks the door behind her.

Chapter Text

Haley doesn’t talk to Abigail for three days. Abigail sends her a few messages the morning after they kissed that sound increasingly pissed off, and then nothing. Haley doesn’t reply to any of them. She feels like shit – guiltier than she thinks she’s ever felt in her life, and lonely, and sad.

She doesn’t want to lose Abigail, but she hasn’t quite been able to shake off that scared teenage version of herself, wearing uncomfortable clothes, faking laughs and batting her eyelashes at boys she doesn’t even like.

She’s not so in denial that she doesn’t recognize that she’s scared of facing the idea of her sexuality, of letting everything she thought she knew about herself change. If she pursed Abigail, if she dated her – assuming that she’d even want that, which is a massive assumption even ignoring the most recent of Haley’s many fuck ups – it would make it all so real. She’s not sure that she’s ready for that, to be queer.

Underneath that fear, though, there’s another fear entirely, something deeper. She keeps turning her face from it, but it chases her, a whisper of what if she would be worth staying for? What if she made you stay? What if you never escape this goddamn town?

For three days, she tries just about everything that she can to keep herself from thinking about it. She ignores her photos and camera, not wanting anything to remind her of Abigail. She’s only got a week left to finish the collection for the competition, but she tries not to think about that either.

Haley doesn’t leave her house, not even to go visit Alex at his ice cream stand like she normally does on her free days. She throws herself into work for her makeup account, using up all of her foundation and lipstick with the number of looks she’s designing. She cleans her room, top to bottom, twice, and then moves on to the rest of the house during the hours when Emily’s out working at the saloon. She spends a frankly ridiculous amount of money on new clothes, jewelry and makeup, and fills hours up trying it all on in her room.

Whenever she lets herself stop for a moment, she opens her phone and looks at her chat with Abigail, staring down at the keypad and blinking cursor until her vision goes blurry. She’s paralyzed, trapped between her desperation for things to go back to how they were before, her intense desire to kiss Abigail again, and the awful pit in her stomach at the acknowledgement of her desire to kiss Abigail again.

She hasn’t left her house in three days. She’s fucked everything up.

It’s six a.m. on a Sunday, the fourth day after Haley had kissed Abigail, when the gravity of what she had done suddenly hits her full force. She’d been trying so hard not to think about it because of the fear that she’d almost managed to suppress her guilt, too. That night, though, she’d dreamed about it, about pushing Abigail away and telling her that they shouldn’t be friends and that she preferred her life without her in it.

She wakes up in a cold sweat, remembering for the first time just how wet Abigail’s eyes had looked when Haley had grabbed her bag and ran off that night by the river. Abigail, who reads dorky books about monsters in her free time, who knows how to use a sword, who laughs so hard and loudly that she gives herself hiccups sometimes. Abigail, who Haley had treated like shit in school but was willing to give her a second chance anyway.

A second chance that she’d never deserved, that Abigail surely regretted giving her, now.

Haley suddenly feels like she’s about to throw up.

She pushes open the door to the bathroom and stumbles a few steps over towards the toilet before freezing in her tracks. Emily stands at the sink, her hands sticky with the blue dye that she’s halfway through applying to her hair.

“Oh,” Haley says, stepping back. “Oops, I – why are you awake?” Emily worked until past midnight, so she normally didn’t get up until later in the morning.

Emily snorts. “Is it a crime now? Should I apologize for being in the bathroom, your highness?” The sarcasm is positively dripping from her voice. Another time, Haley would escalate the chance encounter into a screaming match for far less, but today she just sinks back against the wall and closes her eyes.

Her stomach is still turning, but she’s not about to crouch over the toilet bowl with Emily right there. She presses her forehead to the cool window on the cabinet next to the door instead. Neither of them say anything for a while, but she can hear the slick sound of the dye being dragged clumsily through Emily’s hair.

When she feels slightly less nauseous, Haley rolls her head back around and looks over at Emily by the sink. She looks exhausted, her lips dragged down into a deep frown. Come to think of it, it was very unlike Emily to be so confrontationally rude to Haley, whether she deserved it or not. “Hey,” she says. Her voice sounds very loud in the quiet room, and Emily jumps. Haley swallows and tries again in a softer tone. “Are you okay?”

“Um.” Emily’s eyes meet hers for a moment in the mirror, wide as saucers. “Yeah, um, just – it’s nothing. Are you?”

“Me?”

“You don’t look so good.”

Haley raises a brow. “You see me without my makeup and you think I look like crap, is that it?”

“No!” Emily says hurriedly. “No, no, sorry. I didn’t mean it like that.”

“I’m kidding. Chill, Emily.”

“Oh, right. Uh, no, I just meant you look, I don’t know, sad.”

“Says you,” Haley returns, gesturing broadly at Emily’s face, her red-rimmed eyes.

There’s a moment of hesitation, both of them unwilling to explain themselves. Eventually, Emily huffs out a long sigh and says, “I’m being dramatic. It was just a tough day at work, that’s all. Busy, you know how Saturdays are.”

Haley nods and makes a vague sound of agreement, though she doesn’t actually really know how Saturdays are. She almost never goes to the saloon and has very little idea about what it’s like to work there. “What made it tough?” she asks.

“Oh.” Emily sounds surprised. Fair enough – Haley doesn’t think she’s ever willingly asked Emily about anything before. “Pam went on some drunken rant, and then Pierre yelled at me because I was taking too long with his food. Shane and Alex got into a fight over something, and Alex smashed a glass, and I cut myself cleaning it up, and then Shane was in an awful mood after that and I spilled his drink on him by mistake and he yelled at me too, and he’s always grouchy but he never yells! And Clint was there the whole time just, like, staring at me like he always is, but it really bothered me last night. I don’t know, it felt like I was an animal at the zoo or something, the way he was watching me.”

Emily got carried away part way through her explanation and is rambling at full speed, keeping Haley from even being able to interject with a question about Alex of all people being at the saloon, and then she starts crying by the end of it and Haley forgets all about that.

“Clint is a creep. Fuck him,” she says firmly. “I can go put some of that hair remover stuff I use on my legs in his shampoo if you want, just give me the word.”

Emily laughs wetly, but she doesn’t dignify that with a response. “Just feels like everything’s going wrong,” she mutters. “And I know I missed a spot with the dye but I can’t see the back of my fucking head!”

Haley doesn’t think she’s ever heard Emily swear before. She puts a hand on her sister’s shoulder and squeezes, the closest she dares to come to giving her a hug. It’s still the most physical contact they’ve had in probably about a decade. “I can get your hair, Emily, geez. Turn – here.” She moves Emily and tilts her head forward, grabbing the dye bottle.

“Thank you,” Emily says as Haley starts in with the dye in her hair. “So, what about you? What’s going on?”

It’s weird, to be asked. It feels like Emily actually cares, too. She can’t remember the last time that someone had, with the exception of maybe Abigail, up until recently. A warm feeling rises up in Haley’s chest and her eyes prickle. “Nothing,” she mumbles. “Just had a fight with – with a friend.” She waits for the obvious, low-hanging fruit response – since when do you have friends? – but it doesn’t come.

“That sucks.” Emily is watching Haley in the mirror, brow furrowed. “Alex?”

“No, um.” Haley rubs more dye through Emily’s hair, taking her time. “Abigail.” In the mirror, she can see herself going red as soon as the name leaves her lips, feeling as if she’s exposed everything just by saying it.

“You’ve still been spending time with her, huh? That’s nice, she seems great.”

“She is,” Haley says, so quickly that she almost manages to cut Emily off. “But, uh. I probably won’t be spending time with her anymore, I guess.”

“Don’t be silly, Haley. A fight can be resolved. Abigail clearly likes you, she made you that paper sunflower, didn’t she? That one that’s been on the kitchen table since your birthday?”

Haley blinks in surprise. She didn’t realize that Emily had noticed. “Yeah, but that was ages ago.”

“Exactly. It was ages ago, and you’ve been friends the whole time since then, right? Look – I don’t know what happened, obviously, but just try talking to her.”

“I fucked up. I need to – like, apologize, not that I’d forgive me if I was her.”

Emily’s mouth twists to the side, scrunching her cheek. “Well, you have to at least try, don’t you?”

“Yeah, you’re right.” replies Haley, swiping her hands through Emily’s hair one last time. Then: “It is a nice sunflower, isn’t it?”

“Very pretty,” Emily hums. There’s something distant in her voice, though, and her face has fallen back into a frown. “Thanks,” she says absently as she twists to look at the back of her head in the mirror.

“Anytime,” says Haley, surprised to find that she actually means it.

Emily caps the dye bottle and then looks back over at her, expression hesitant. “Haley?”

“Yeah?”

“Why did you throw out the cake I made you? On your birthday?” Her voice is very small.

Haley flinches. She doesn’t even – there wasn’t even a good reason, was there? She can hardly remember, but there never was, with her. She was just an asshole, the same as she’d always been. “I didn’t realize you saw that.”

“It was just right there in the trash can, you didn’t exactly hide it,” Emily points out. “Was there… something wrong with it?”

Haley closes her eyes for a moment. She feels like a monster. “No, it, it was perfect, Emily. That’s why.”

“I don’t understand.”

“Everything you do is just so perfect, and I’m so –” not. She can’t say it, though. She can’t talk about this. She just can’t. “I’m really sorry I did that. I was in a bad mood, I guess.”

Emily pauses for a moment. “Alright,” she says finally, and Haley’s shoulders sink with relief.

She’s immediately tensing up again a moment later, though, when Emily’s face suddenly tightens with worry. “Oh no, Haley, your bathrobe.”

“What?” She looks down, and realizes that she’s somehow gotten blue dye all down the left side of her robe.

“This stuff does not wash out. Oh, I’m so sorry, I know that’s your favourite robe.”

“Um. How do you know that?”

“You’re always wearing it in the morning. I know you have, like, four other ones, but you always choose that one.”

There’s that warm feeling in her chest again. “Yeah, it is my favourite. But it’s just some fabric, Emily. Really, it’s okay. Needed some colour anyway, I like it better like this.”

Emily laughs, but she looks astonished. “Really? You’re not mad?”

“Not mad,” Haley assures her quickly.

“Huh.” Emily pauses for a moment, watching Haley like some bug she’s scrutinizing. After a moment, she just shrugs and turns back to the sink, wiping up the last traces of blue dye from the porcelain.

Haley reaches over to wash her hands, scrubbing at the blue until it fades to nothing but a slight greenish tint against her skin. She helps Emily clean up the last of the mess, then watches as she tests the dye in her hair to make sure it’s mostly dry before wrapping it lightly in a dark-coloured towel. “I haven’t slept yet,” Emily tells her as she ties off the towel. “So I think I’m going to go to bed.”

“That’s a good idea,” Haley says, stupidly, feeling incredibly awkward. She’s suddenly painfully aware of the fact that Emily is practically a stranger to her even though they live together, that she has no idea what to say to her.

“Do you, uh, are you doing anything today?” Emily asks, and maybe she feels the same way, because she’s shifting nervously from foot to foot.

“Yeah, actually, I have plans.”

“Oh? What are those?”

Another time, Haley might have read judgement into the tone of the question, but now she sees it as just genuine curiosity. She still instinctively opens her mouth to tell Emily to mind her own business before realizing that maybe she doesn’t have to. She’s never told her sister anything that she’s been doing before, but she supposes there’s no real reason to avoid it at all costs like she has been. She shrugs. “I’m going fishing with Willy.”

Emily tosses her head back and laughs. “Sure. Alright, keep your secrets then, Haley. You have a nice day. I’m going to go get some sleep.”

She’s gone before Haley can double down and explain that she’s not joking, although she supposes it’s not surprising that Emily assumed that she was. She giggles a little to herself, the absurdity of it striking her – her, Haley, fishing with Willy down at the docks. Even a year ago, she’d never have believed it either.

It’s pouring rain outside. She sighs and heads back to her room to dig through her closet for her raingear. It’s going to be a cold, wet day.