Kat half-walked, half-dragged me down the street. I was terrified. My heart was in my throat, my cheeks were flushed, and I felt like I could barely breathe. I was so afraid of what would happen when I inevitably was dragged away from here, away from her, and that I knew I would hurt her, one way or another.
But, at the same time, I was ecstatic. This was the first time someone had held my hand in… god, it had to have been decades, at least. I lost count of how many realities I had been through after the 8th or so, so that was at least 4 years, but I had no idea how long ago that was. I still didn’t want to hurt her. Maybe I could just run away to a different town. It’s not like she’d ever be able to find me. Like I thought earlier, hurt her a little now to avoid hurting her a lot later. But for now… well, a one-off date wouldn’t change her life, right?
And besides, I didn’t see any way out of this. She seemed pretty determined, and I wasn’t sure I could say no to her. Better to just go with the flow for now.
“Where are we going?” I asked her. A coffee date was probably not the best option, considering that’s how we met.
“Just trust me,” she said, turning back to me and flashing that beautiful grin.
I do, I thought, but didn’t say it out loud. I took a few moments to look at her, now that I was out of panic mode. She was wearing a long-sleeved light grey dress, close-fit and about knee-length, with skin toned tights (hopefully fleece-lined, it was a bit chilly out), a pink hat with a white pom-pom, and a matching scarf. On most people, it would’ve looked plain, maybe even childish. But not on her. It made my leggings and hoodie look lame by comparison, and I felt a sudden wave of self-consciousness.
She brought us to another shop in the little town square, just a block or so away from Vienne’s. It was a used bookstore, the Bookworm. She marched through the front door, still holding my hand, with the confidence of someone who had been here countless times before. The clerk at the front desk confirmed that suspicion by waving at her and greeting her by name. She waved back and leaned in close to me. “I feel so bad but I have no idea what his name is,” she whispered in my ear. “I have to check his nametag every time I come in.”
As we passed by the clerk, she responded with “Hey, Kyle!” and then turned to me and shrugged slightly. In spite of myself, in spite of everything, I laughed out loud.
Kat brought me through the Bookworm to a specific shelf. She seemed to know exactly where she was going, and she quickly scanned the shelves.
“Let’s see here…” she murmured, more to herself than to me. “Ah, there we go,” and she grabbed a book off the shelf and held it out to me. I glanced down at the cover. They Both Die At The End, by Adam Silvera. I’d never heard of it. Come to think of it, I hadn’t even read a full book in who knows how long.
“What’s this?” I asked, taking it from her hand.
“It’s a book, silly,” she replied with a grin.
I rolled my eyes. “Yes I know that, but why are you giving it to me?”
“I’m getting it for you. I want you to read it. I think you’ll like it.”
I read the back to see what the book was about. Two young men who get a call that they’re going to die within a day and meet each other. It sounded sad, and powerful. I looked back up to Kat. “Why do you think I’ll like it?” I asked, confused.
She shrugged. “Just a feeling, I guess. Your turn though. Pick a book for me.”
I stared at her for a moment. I had no idea where to begin. “I haven’t read a whole book in… a long time. I don’t even know where to start. What do you like?”
“Well I can’t tell you that, silly. That’s the whole point. You’re supposed to guess.”
“I- okay. Um.” I looked around, trying to find anything familiar. I couldn’t find anything. Who even knows if the books I had last read however long ago would even exist in this universe? I sure didn’t.
As I look around, though, one book caught my eye. Those Who Wait by Haley Cass. I had never read it, but it looked like a romance novel, and the art of the two women on the cover looked sort of vaguely like Kat and I, if you squinted a bit. I grabbed it and handed it to Kat.
“Lesbian romance novel. Smooth,” she said with a smirk. I flushed. Was it too obvious? No, she was the one who literally dragged me out on a date. It’s not like either of us were trying to be subtle about it.
She took the book from me and read the back. “I’ve never read it, but it sounds cute. I can’t wait to read it.” She smiled at me again, and I felt my heart skip a beat. “Come on, let’s go check out. And then I’ve got some more places to take you.”
I followed her to the counter and we bought the books for each other. The clerk whose name Kat could never remember (and whose name I now forgot) definitely knew Kat, if only in the way that an employee knows a regular visitor. “So, Kat, who’s the new girl?” he asked her.
“Her name’s Adrianne,” she said. “We’re on a date.” I felt my cheeks flush yet again.
“Oh really? Good for you two.” He scanned the two books and put them into a bag for us. “Have fun on your date,” he said.
“We will!” Kat responded, and shot me a wink. My cheeks grew even hotter, and I found it hard to breathe for a moment. She took the bag from him with one hand, and with the other grabbed my own hand once more and pulled me out of the store.
The next few hours were… amazing. The best time I’d had in as long as I could remember. She brought us to an adorable little shop where we bought some cheese, bread, fruit, and a bottle of red wine, and then to an idyllic little park (complete with a burbling stream) where, after stopping at her car to grab a blanket, we had a picnic. I had never been one to eat outside, but I went along with it just to make this date last as long as I could.
Kat spread out the blanket under a tree near the bank of the little stream in the park. We broke open the bread and cheese and fruit, and we managed to pry open the wine with her car keys (with some difficulty and a lot of laughter). The food was delicious, and before long we had eaten most of it and made it halfway through the bottle.
“So, Adrianne. Who are you?”
I stared at her. “Um. Well. I just got into town. I started working at that convenience store by Mel’s.”
She shook her head. “No I mean, like, who are you? What are your dreams, your regrets, your favorites? I want to know Adrianne, not just a list of facts about you.”
“I… I don’t really know, to be honest with you,” I stammered out. “I haven’t really ever had the chance to figure that out.” It was true. I’d been trapped in this cycle for so long… I didn’t really have dreams anymore, beyond a vain hope of getting out of this cycle eventually. I had plenty of regrets but… none that I could explain to her.
She looked at me, and I couldn’t quite decipher her expression. I rushed to give her something as an answer, and blurted out “I like cappuccinos, I guess.”
She narrowed her eyes a bit. “Adrianne, can I ask you something serious?”
Suddenly even more nervous, I answered with a nod.
“Why are you hiding from me?”
It wasn’t a question I ever expected to hear. I would have expected “what are you hiding” or something, but why? I gaped at her, trying to process it. I could tell her, I thought. She would get it. But would she? And even if she did, what would telling her do? All it would do is worry her or scare her, right?
I picked up the bottle of wine and took a couple of swigs, way too much at once, but I needed the liquid courage. “I… I’ll be gone soon. I’ll leave, whether I want to or not, and I… I’ll hurt you.”
“Okay. And?” she asked, not rudely, but as if she were expecting more.
I didn’t know how to respond to that. “So I don’t want to do that. I’ll be gone, I’ll leave and I-”
She interrupted me with a hand on mine. “Adrianne, I’m not asking for a lifetime commitment. I just want to spend time with you. I like you, and I want to know more about you.” Her eyes softened. “I’m not going to try and force anything out of you if you don’t want to talk about it, but you’re safe with me.”
I wanted to believe her, so badly. I wanted to believe that she would believe me, that she wouldn’t care, and that she could care for me anyway, but that huge part of me that has learned from experience wouldn’t let me.
I felt tears coming to my eyes. She let out a soft “oh” and leaned in to hug me, and I didn’t stop her. I let myself cry, let myself sob, in her arms. I realized suddenly how lonely I had been. How long had it been since I had been held like this? I couldn’t even remember if I ever had.
After what felt like hours, but was probably no more than a few minutes, I calmed my sobs and wiped my tears on my sleeve. Kat leaned back and helped me clean my face and smooth out my hair. I couldn’t meet her eyes, suddenly embarrassed. She sat back down across the blanket from me, and we sat in silence for a few moments.
“Kat… I… I’m lonely.” I heard myself saying. “I’ve been alone for so long, I’m not even sure I know how to do this anymore.”
“Do what, Adrianne?”
“Do… people, I guess. Relationships, opening up to people, not being alone. But I think I want to. With you. And I think I’m just as scared of what that means as I am of hurting you and losing you, but I don’t know if I can help myself. That’s why I didn’t text you, before. I told myself it was because I could only hurt you, but I was afraid.”
She nodded slowly. “Do you want me to leave?”
“No,” I responded instantly, surprising myself.
She nodded again, more intently, and smiled softly. “Good. Because I don’t want to leave.” She stood up and reached out a hand to help me up. “Come on. I have one more thing to show you.”
I took her hand, and I knew that I would never be the same.
We quickly packed up our picnic. She offered me the last few sips of the wine, and I downed them quickly. Less thinking seemed better right now.
The sun was starting to go down, but Kat wasn’t done with me yet. She smiled at me and took my hand, and led me deeper into the trees. We followed a small trail up a low hill, and the trees parted to give a beautiful view of the sunset over the town. It was gorgeous, the orangey-gold light of the setting sun leaving the town awash in warm colors. She brushed off a rock and sat on it and beckoned me to join her. I did, and we sat in silence and watched the sunset for a few moments.. She broke the silence first.
“I think I understand you, you know,” she said, still looking off into the sunset.
I flinched, as if someone had hit me. “What do you mean?” I asked.
“I think I understand you. More than you understand yourself, maybe. You said you were afraid you didn’t know how to not be alone anymore, but I think there’s more to it than that.” She turned to face me and our eyes met. I hadn’t been looking at the sunset for a while already. “I think something happened to you, or is maybe still happening to you, that makes it so hard for you to open up. And it’s not just because of whatever it is, but because you feel like you deserve this. Like, you’ve hurt people before and you feel like this is what you deserve because of that, and you’ve resigned yourself to the fact that you’re going to hurt everyone. But just because you’ve hurt people in the past doesn’t mean you deserve to be hurt yourself. If that was how the world worked, it would be nothing but pain all the time for everybody.”
I shook my head. “No, you don’t understand-”
“I don’t need to,” she interrupted me. “You can tell me when you’re ready, if you ever are.” She reached out and put a hand on my cheek. “Adrianne, you’re allowed to stop hurting. I don’t know if anyone has ever told you that, but you don’t have to keep punishing yourself. I know that’s easier said than done, but you don’t. Sometimes the hardest thing to do is forgive ourselves, but we have to. A life spent blaming yourself isn’t living. It’s just… pain.”
I put my hand over hers on my cheek, and I felt tears coming to my eyes again. “I don’t know how,” I choked out.
“I wish I could help you with that, I really do, but I think you need to figure it out for yourself. I want to be here for you, though, when you need it.”
I bit back my tears and nodded, and squeezed her hand. She squeezed back and looked back into the sunset, never letting go of my hand. After a few moments, it was my turn to break the silence.
“Kat, can I ask you something?”
“Anything,” she said, and I could tell she meant it.
“Why do you like me?” I asked. She turned back to face me, but I couldn’t meet her eyes this time.
“Your eyes,” she said, surprising me yet again. “When I asked to sit next to you in Vienne’s it really was just because there were no other empty seats. But when we started talking, there was something in your eyes that made me want to know you. It was this like, kindness that you were trying to hide, and I wanted to know why, and I wanted to experience it for myself. I could tell there was something wonderful in you but you couldn’t or wouldn’t let it out.”
“Do you still think that?”
“I do,” she said, without hesitation. “You’ve shown it to me. You carry so much pain, but your biggest worry was hurting me. You’re a good person, Adrianne. You’re kind and smart and funny and adorable.” She squeezed my hand again and leaned in a bit closer to me. “Can I kiss you?”
I thought my heart was going to stop. “I- yes, plea-” I didn’t even get to finish the word before she pressed her lips against mine. If I could have lived in that moment forever, I would have. After what felt like at the same time an eternity and an instant, she broke the kiss, and she was just as flushed as I’m sure I was.
“Wow,” was all she said, once we both caught our breath. We laughed together for a few moments, and then she kissed me again. When this one broke off, she laughed again and leaned away.
“Okay, we really should stop here, because if we don’t I don’t think I will at all,” she said, and I felt a rush at her words. I nodded, and murmured out a noise that she hopefully understood as agreement.
We stood, and returned down the trail back towards her car. She drove us back to town, and I directed her to my apartment. She walked me up to the door, and before I entered I turned back to face her.
She took my hand. Her fingers had grown cold in the cool night air. With her other hand she pulled me in for another kiss, and when she broke away she looked at me with a stern look.
“Text me, okay? For real this time. I know where you live now,” she said, and the serious look cracked into a smile. I found myself smiling back.
“I will,” I told her, and I meant it. “Before I go to sleep, I promise.”
She nodded. “Good.” She kissed me a final time. “Goodnight, Adrianne.”
“Goodnight, Kat. And, thank you.”
She squeezed my hand. “Always.”
Kat walked back to her car, and I entered my apartment building. I watched her drive away and made my way back up to my unit. I put on pajamas, brushed my teeth, and climbed into bed, finding myself exhausted from the long and emotionally taxing best day of my life. As I felt my eyelids droop, I remembered my promise and, already half-asleep, sent a single text to Kat: thank you. Her reply was instant.
Always.
The next few weeks were… incredible. Kat and I spent nearly every day together, when neither of us were at work. We went out to eat, got coffee, and went on a few more picnics, but more than anything, we talked. We got to know each other. She told me about how she works at a restaurant during the day, but she really wants to be a writer. She’d even already published a collection of short stories. I read them, and they were brilliant. She told me about her friends and her family, especially about her younger brother, Andrew, that she was very close with.
I opened up to her, too. A little bit. There was only so much I could tell her, obviously. But I told her about my family, my original family, as much as I could remember them, and I fibbed around the truth of my situation. I talked about “moving around a lot” and the like, staying as close to the truth as I could without having to tell her the whole crazy truth. I’m not sure how much she bought it, to be honest. I think she knew I was still hiding something, but she didn’t seem to care.
I visited her apartment a few times, mostly just stopping by to pick something up with her. She came to mine, too, mostly for the same reason. One day, a few weeks into our relationship, we were at her apartment before heading out to dinner.
“So Adrianne,” she began.
“So Kat,” I answered. It was a little ritual we had picked up at some point.
“I’m going out with some of my friends tomorrow night. We’re going to this karaoke bar downtown. I want you to come.”
I flushed. Meet her friends? I fretted to myself. What if they hate me? Or what if I hate them? Or, worst of all, what if I like them? It would be devastating enough when I left here in what was now just a little over four months and had to leave Kat. But leaving friends too?
Kat knew me well enough by now to recognize my hesitation. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to. But I’d like you to meet them. Plus, it’s Kylie’s turn to pay for drinks,” she said the last sentence in a singsong-y voice.
I laughed a little. “Okay, okay, I’ll come. Especially for the free drinks.”
She flashed me with her brilliant smile. “Good. I wasn’t gonna let you say no anyway.”
The next day, Kat drove us downtown to the karaoke bar. Her friends had rented out a private room, which I was thankful for. There were three of them there.
“Kaaaaat, tell Kylie that Jason is bad for her,” said one of her friends as soon as we entered the room. “She won’t listen to me.” He was a younger-looking guy with curly brown hair that wore a mostly unbuttoned dress shirt that seemed perfectly tailored for him.
“Kylie, Jason is probably not good for you,” Kat responded without hesitation.
“Mateo, you aren’t allowed to judge me,” said another, presumably Kylie. She was a tall, slender woman with long, straight black hair who I remembered was also the one paying for drinks tonight. “Remember Jean-Luc?”
Mateo gasped, mock-offended, and then shrugged. “Guess you’re right. He was still hot though.”
“Yes, yes, you both have terrible taste in men,” said Kat, and the three of them laughed.
The third friend had stood to give Kat a hug at our entrance, and then turned to me. “So, you’re the girlfriend we’ve been hearing so much about,” they said, and I blushed. Girlfriend? She’s been telling them I’m her girlfriend? “Adrianne, right? Call me Moon.” Moon was androgynous and elegant, with short, platinum blond hair, and they wore slacks with a sleeveless top that made them look at once comfortable and stylish.
Kat’s friends were such interesting people. Mateo and Kylie spent much of the night talking about men (their tastes seemed to somehow be both exactly the same and completely opposite at the same time). Kat jumped into their conversations often, mostly to tell them that they were both wrong and both had terrible taste, and Moon spent more time on the mic than anyone else. Nobody complained, though: they had an amazing singing voice. I did my best to socialize, but I spent a lot of time feeling awkward. I felt like I was an intruder in this group of old friends.
That changed, though, when Moon stepped off the stage and walked up to me.
“Come sing a duet with me,” they said.
I blanched. “I, uh-”
“Yeah, come on Adrianne, show us what you’ve got!” said Kylie, encouraging.
Kat smiled at me and squeezed my hand. “You should do it, Adrianne. Have some fun!”
Mateo slid a shot across the table to me and shot me a wink. I took a deep breath, downed the shot, and headed to the stage. Moon followed, and handed me a mic.
They picked “Under Pressure,” by David Bowie and Queen. Thank god I knew this one (and thank god for tequila), because I felt awkward enough already. Moon took the Freddie Mercury part, which left me to take Bowie. It didn’t take long for me to loosen up a bit (the alcohol certainly helped), and by the end of the song we were belting the lyrics and having a blast.
After that, the night was amazing. Kat’s friends welcomed me into the group like I had always been part of it. I learned that Kat and Moon had been college roommates, and that Mateo and Kylie were lifelong best friends. The two pairs had met at a department store a couple of years ago, where Mateo insisted on helping Moon pick an outfit. They had all hit it off, and had been close friends ever since. Of course, my past inevitably came up, and I tried to play it off in the same way that I had been doing with Kat. Kylie and Mateo didn’t seem to notice how much I was hiding, but Moon definitely did.
“Where are you from, Adrianne?” they asked me, a few hours into the night.
“Kind of all over. I’ve moved around a lot for most of my life,” I responded, waving my hand in the universal gesture for “here and there.”
“Right, but like, originally? Where did you grow up?”
“Well, uh, I was born in Delaware, but my family moved up and down the East Coast for most of my life.” It was true. Of course, I left out the part that it was in an entirely different universe and who knows how long ago from my perspective.
“How’d you end up here? Kinda middle of nowhere for an East Coast girl, yeah?” they asked. I was starting to get nervous again. Kat noticed, though, and jumped in before I could respond.
“Moon, sing a duet with me, c’mon!” she said, running up to the stage. I wanted to kiss her so badly in that moment.
“Oh shit, Kat wants to sing?” said Mateo. “You get a rare treat, Adrianne.”
Moon’s face lit up, and they quickly followed Kat up to the stage, all their questions forgotten. The two sang “Don’t Go Breaking My Heart,” by Elton John and Kiki Dee. Kat had a horrible singing voice, but she didn’t seem to care.
I managed to avoid difficult questions for the rest of the night, and the alcohol helped me to stay relaxed. At one point, I stood up to go to the bathroom, and realized I had had way too much. I stumbled off towards the bathroom anyway, and Kat jumped up and helped me walk.
“Whoa, girl. Had a bit too much?” she asked, soothing, but with a laugh in her voice.
“Mhm,” I said, too focused on trying to walk straight to get a coherent word out.
“Let me help you,” she said, walking me to the bathroom. She didn’t follow me into the stall, which I was grateful for. “Are you ready to go home?” she asked. “Because I’m gonna be honest with you, I am. I love my friends, but they can be a lot.”
I nodded. “Yeah, we should go before I drink too many,” I said, my words slurring.
She laughed. “I think you already did, dear. C’mon, let’s go say bye.”
We headed back to the private room and Kat announced we were leaving. There was a chorus of boos from Kylie and Mateo. Moon stood and gave Kat another hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“Drive safe, love. Text us when you’re home,” they said. Even in my drunken state, I could tell that there was a deep anxiety in their words.
“I will,” Kat responded, hugging them back. “Later losers,” she called out to Kylie and Mateo.
“See ya, Kat. Nice meeting you, Adrianne,” called out Kylie, and Mateo waved casually. Moon gave me a hug too, which was unexpected but not unwelcome.
Once we were out of the room, Kat took my hand and we started walking back to her car. “Moon’s mom died,” Kat started to explain. “When we were in college. She got hit by a drunk driver on the way back from visiting us on campus. Moon has always blamed themself. That’s why they were so concerned about us getting home.”
I nodded. “That sucks. I hope they can feel better about it some day.”
She squeezed my hand. “What did you think of my friends?”
“They’re great. Really. After you all made me do that duet I felt so comfortable with them. They’re all so nice and cool. Do you think they liked me?”
She smiled at me. “Definitely. They’ve not liked some of my exes and they’ve made that clear enough. I think you’ll fit right in.”
I flushed slightly, and distracted myself by focusing on walking straight.
“Moon called me your girlfriend,” I said suddenly. I didn’t even mean to say it. The alcohol must have been getting to me even more than I thought.
She looked at me sheepishly. “Well, I mean, aren’t you? I know we haven’t said it officially or anything, but we’ve spent basically every day together for the past like three weeks.”
I flushed again. “I just wasn’t sure if you, y’know, wanted to be my girlfriend.”
She stopped walking and turned to face me. “Of course I do, Adrianne. Why don’t we make it official?” She put a hand on my cheek and the other one around my waist. “Adrianne, will you be my girlfriend?”
I flushed deeper and stared at her, speechless for a moment. “I love you,” I blurted out instead of answering, and immediately regretted it. My cheeks felt like they were on fire, and I felt like I had made a fool out of myself.
She flushed slightly in response, but with barely a moment’s hesitation, responded “I love you, too,” and kissed me. After the kiss ended, she met my eyes again. “So… is that a yes?”
I laughed and kissed her again. “Yes, Kat, I’ll be your girlfriend.” She beamed at me, and I had never been happier.
By the time we got to my apartment, I had barely sobered up. She walked me up to my unit and helped me brush my teeth and get into bed. She tucked me in, gave me a cup of water and a bowl in case I vomited, and kissed me on the forehead. “Goodnight, girlfriend.” I flushed. “I’ll see you tomorrow, okay?”
She turned to walk out, but I reached out and caught her hand. “Wait. Can you stay?”
Her eyes softened, and she nodded. “I was hoping you’d ask me that. I’m borrowing your toothbrush, though.”
“Mhm, thassfine,” I said, slurring half from alcohol and half because I was already almost asleep. A few moments later, she came back to my bed and slid in under the covers next to me.
“I borrowed some pajamas, too,” she said as she settled in. I sort of grunted in response. She sent a few texts and then put her phone on the nightstand next to the bed, and I wriggled over and pressed my body against hers. She kissed the top of my head and wrapped an arm around me.
That night, I slept better than I had in as long as I could remember.
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