As the day wore on I got more and more upset. I stayed in my room the whole time, trying to study and both hoping for and dreading Mitch getting home. But when the door opened, and I looked at the smiling face of my best friend, all my resolve broke.
“Hey, Cindy. What a drive.” Her face was tired, without her customary grin.
“Hi.” I stood up as Mitch dropped her bag on our bed. I took a hesitant step forward. “You okay?”
A tired smile. “Yeah. Long weekend. It’s good to be home, though.”
“I’m glad you’re back.” My voice cracked as I said it. Mitch’s face was concerned, and she put her hand on my shoulder.
“You okay?”
I went towards her, my face screwing up in emotion as she pulled me into her embrace. I rested my head on her shoulder as her strong arms went around me. It had been literally only two days, and I had missed this so badly I was almost crying. “I missed you.” I don’t think I let her go for the rest of the evening, and we cuddled together until the sun was long down, only stopping long enough to find some dinner at some point.
When Mitch finally pulled the covers around us for bed she whispered in my ear. “I missed this.”
I held her arm. “You didn’t, I mean, with anyone?”
She pulled me a little tighter. “No. No one else.”
I let go of the metaphorical breath I’d been holding since she’d left. She was still mine, and only mine. And that made me giddy inside, just for a moment, before I remembered how selfish that was. If I were her girlfriend I’d turn around and kiss her right now. I’d let her roll me onto my back as she nuzzled my neck, her hands running over my body as I breathed in her scent.
And as I thought about it, and as my body relaxed toward sleep, I felt a tingle build deep inside me. My lips hummed at the memory of our one kiss; my skin was electric everywhere we were touching.
***
I had a dream that night. I walked into a house from the garage. I didn’t recognize it, but it was my house, I knew it was. Something smelled amazing, and I set down my briefcase on the counter.
“Mommy!” A little voice sounded and little feet ran towards me, and I scooped up a little girl who kissed me on the cheek. “Mama’s making pasghetti and me-balls!”
“She is?” I spoke with mock astonishment and made my way into the kitchen where a tall, short-haired woman was standing at the stove. She turned towards me, and she smiled.
“Hey, sweetheart. Dinner’ll be ready soon.” She stepped toward me and I kissed her, like it was the most natural thing in the world. Suddenly we were standing in our living room, and there was music, and we were dancing slowly together.
Mitch whispered in my ear. “Think she’s asleep?”
I looked upstairs towards our daughter’s room. “I hope so.”
“Then it’s time for me to take you to bed.”
“Yes, please.”
She leaned forward and my eyes closed as she kissed me, and I woke up. My heart was beating fast. I shifted slightly, and I could feel the wetness between my legs. Mitch’s arms were still around me, where they always were, and it took me a second to remember that we weren’t married.
But that little girl had been our daughter, the two of us, together, somehow. And I wanted it. I wanted to come home to Mitch and our children, I wanted her arms to be waiting for me every night. Mostly, I wanted to know what it was like to be with someone I loved.
And I did love Mitch. That wasn’t even an issue. The question was could I be what she needed? Not just someone to love, but a lover. That thought plagued me over the next two days, and I thought about it a lot. And, of course, me being me, I did research, finding the quietest corner of the library and typing in a search I never, in my life, thought I would.
I looked at the positions on the screen, closing my eyes at times and imagining the drawings were Mitch and I. I got those tingles again, and they were getting stronger. And when we went to sleep at night, and Mitch would touch me, I wanted more. What we were doing was starting to feel, well, incomplete, I guess.
I wasn’t sure what else I wanted, exactly, but the more I studied lesbian sex, the more I was starting to get an idea. To be honest, the thing that scared me most was whether or not I could do the things I kept seeing for Mitch. I mean, let’s face it, you don’t really have to do much to keep a boyfriend happy. Usually just lying there and letting them do their thing is good enough. But that definitely wasn’t the case here. I was going to have to be a lot more, um, proactive about things if I was going to be the lover Mitch needed.
The surprising thing was, to me at least, that I wasn’t revolted by the idea of going down on her. I wasn’t sure I could do it, but the more I read about it, the more I was willing to try. And, additionally, the more my knees went weak at the thought of Mitch doing it for me.
Only one of my boyfriends had been willing to try, and that one experience had lasted less than thirty seconds. But even so, it might have been the best thirty seconds of my sexual life. Granted that wasn’t saying much, but still. I’d never asked again, because I knew he hadn’t liked it, and good girls didn’t request such things.
But I’d heard Mitch talk about how she’d sent girls screaming into the heavens, and I knew she’d spend a hell of a lot longer than half a minute on me if I let her. And god, I was beginning to be sure I wanted to let her.
Thursday night, after we got ready for bed, after Mitch pulled the covers around us, she whispered in my ear.
“Cindy, you okay? You’ve been nervous.”
I cringed inside. “Really? I’m not nervous.” Oh, hell, I was so nervous. Especially since every night I’d been relaxing a little more into Mitch’s embrace, wanting to get closer and closer to her.
“Uh-huh.” She clearly didn’t believe me. Damn, why did she have to be so good at reading people? “Is this okay? Do you, do we need to stop doing this?” There was real concern in her voice, and a bit of hurt, though she was trying hard to hide it. Okay, maybe she wasn’t reading me as well as I thought.
“No, I, uh, I love doing this. I mean,” I snuggled closer to her. “You know what I mean.” I hesitated for a second and took a deep breath. “Do you really want to go to that party tomorrow night at Epsilon Chi?” She’d mentioned it tonight at dinner, but I decided, right at this moment, that I couldn’t have another week like this one, and it was time to fish or cut bait, as my grandfather would say.
“Mm, take it or leave it. Why? Do you have a better idea?”
Oh, so many ideas. “I kind of just wanted to hang out with you. Just the two of us.” God, my heart was in my throat.
“Okay, sure. Just me and you. Maybe some Buffy?”
“That sounds good. Goodnight.”
The next day was absolutely interminable. I was going to try to seduce Mitch tonight. Holy crap, what the hell was I thinking? I was completely insane! I couldn’t do this. But I knew I really didn’t have to. If Carrie were right, and I thought she was, all I had to do was give Mitch permission, and she’d take it from there. At least for the first part, the her going down on me part. I assumed that’s what would happen, anyway. And I’d made the decision I was going to reciprocate, no matter what. I’d run across the term ‘pillow princess’ in my studies, and I was not going to be one of those.
My classes dragged on, and I studied in my off hours. I wanted nothing schoolwork-wise hanging over my head this weekend, in case things went really well.
I was changing at the sports complex for our usual, and generally abbreviated, Friday workout when Mitch walked into the locker room. She smiled at me, and I felt the butterflies erupt in my stomach. She was so handsome. And those eyes. God, I could lose myself in those eyes. Any question in my mind about whether I was doing this evaporated. I wanted this. So help me, I wanted her.
I just wanted dinner to be over. I had almost no appetite, although I made myself eat something, just to keep Mitch from asking if there was anything wrong. I was scared to open my mouth and talk, lest everyone at the table figure out something was up. Mitch wasn’t fooled though, and she asked about it as soon as we got back to the room.
“You’re quiet tonight. I’m gonna figure out what’s going on in that ridiculously pretty head of yours. You know that, right?” She had mischief in her eyes, and I couldn’t help but smile back. If only she knew.
“If you’re nice to me maybe I’ll tell you.” I put a tease in my voice that made Mitch cock her head in curiosity.
“Fine, be mysterious.”
I threw in some popcorn as Mitch connected her computer to our little TV and started up Buffy.
I emptied our buttery snack into a bowl and snuggled up to Mitch, holding it in my lap and leaning back against her. “Is this a good one?”
“Absolutely. ‘Hush’ might be the best episode in the whole series. The only other stand-alone episode even in the conversation is the musical episode from season six.”
“There’s a musical episode?”
“Yup, it’s amazing. But we’ll get there.”
She started the show and put her arms around me, and I made myself relax. It wasn’t nearly as hard as I thought it was going to be. I was with Mitch, after all. My favorite place to be.
We watched two episodes before I decided it was time. The sun had gone down, and we hadn’t turned on a light other than the TV.
Mitch pressed her cheek against the side of my head. “Another one?”