Things are going well enough, and Ava's having enough good days, that Sable feels comfortable encouraging her to push a little outside her comfort zone.

"Sweetie, d'you think you're up for doing disabiliity paperwork? I'll help where I can, of course, but a lot of it will need stuff specifically from you."

"Uff. That's going to be messy. Most of my medical records are still back in my old province. I'll have to send some emails."

"Still..." 

Ava sighs. "I've definitely been putting this off long enough, and if it goes through it'll be a big help. It's scary, but I'll try. For you."

"You'd better hug me about it though."

"I will hug you so much about it. No escape from the hugs."

In fact, she'll hug her about it right now.

Hug.

"I believe in you, sweetie. You've got this." She tips up on her toes and presses a soft kiss to Ava's forehead.

Ava lets out a tight breath and hugs Sable closer.

"Alright," she says. "I've got all the forms lined up already, it's just... a matter of starting the formal application process."

She hugs Sable tight. "You give me so much strength. Can you walk me through this? So I'm less scared?"

Sable nods softly and sits down with Ava, carefully going through the forms and the process together with her, helping her get everything sorted out. 

She is really so, so lucky to have this wonderful woman. 

It takes a few days, but eventually everything is squared away and submitted.

"Whew," Ava says. "Well, that's take one done. We'll still probably have to do this all over again in a few months, but..." She shakes her head. "We'll get there."

Sable hugs Ava close and strokes her hair. "I'm so proud of you. Good girl. I know it's hard, especially when we'll probably have to appeal it. But you did it."

"Thank you, Mistress. I couldn't have done it without you."

Well how about she rewards her precious girl?

Sable scoops Ava into her arms and carries her off toward the bedroom, peppering her face with kisses.

Several weeks later, there's an email in Ava's inbox from the disability office.

Ohhhhhhh this is gonna suck. 

"Pirates? Pirates I got the email, please, come over here, I want you here when I open it."

Hailey steps away from their computer and dashes over to Ava, wrapping her arms around her. "I got you, babe. Let's see what these assholes have to say for themselves."

She hugs Hailey. 

She screws her courage to the sticking point, to borrow a line from Shakespeare. 

And she opens the letter. 

Congratulations, Ava has been approved. She'll be getting this much money every month, here's where to set up her direct deposit, there's where she can file if she has new income or assets to report later on.

Guess she must've gotten lucky or something.

"Holyshitwhat????"

Ava almost falls out of her chair. She'd been expecting to have to fight this for months and maybe not get it even then!

Hailey cackles, hugging Ava tightly, tugging her tighter into her arms when she tips partly off the chair. "Fucking brilliant."