The One That Ran Away

by Hildred Billings

  “No.” Shannon pursed her lips. Both were pink from a light gloss. Did she really get dressed up for me? Or is she meeting someone else later? “We broke up a while ago.”

  “Boyfriend?”

  Shannon tensed. “Yes. His name was Andrew. We… ah… I moved here because he got a job up here, and I tagged along.”

  “Oh.”

  “I like Portland, though. It’s not quite home yet, but I’ve lived in worse places.” Shannon interlocked her fingers. “Anyway, how long have you been living here?”

  “About three years.”

  “Where were you before that?”

  “Home.”

  “Where’s that?”

  Jess sighed. “The coast. Real shithole, let me tell you.”

  Shannon’s nervous grin only grew wider. “Uh huh.”

  “Are you… okay?”

  Shannon inhaled a deep breath, hands laying flat against the table. “Sorry. I had way too much coffee earlier. I need to remember that I should drink less as I get older.”

  “Guess we’re both thirty now, huh?” Jess cocked her head. “Since your birthday recently passed.”

  “You remembered my birthday?”

  “You told me the other day at the teashop.”

  Shannon stared at her, eyes so wide that Jess feared they would freeze that way.

  “Sorry. I tend to remember birthdays more than anything else. Comes with the territory.” In truth, Jess had never forgotten Shannon’s birthday. How could she? It was such an important thing, that the moment she learned it, the date was committed to memory for the rest of her life. “Plus, you told me your birthday the other night. You don’t want to know how many birth dates I have knocking around my head right now.”

  “Do you make a living from your readings?”

  Jess guffawed. “I wish!”

  “So… what do you do, then?”

  Half the restaurant was staring at them after Jess’s outburst. With more decorum under her belt, she answered, “A bunch of things. I write online articles, mostly. Different topics, but my expertise is in religious matters and horoscopes.”

  “You were a religion major, right?”

  She remembers? “Yeah. Not a lot of jobs related to that, unless you think you have the chops to be a religious studies professor.”

  “Tell me about it. I feel like that was most liberal arts.” When Shannon shook her head, her soft hair gently whisked back and forth in the candlelight. Please strike me dead now, God. Jess no longer felt the same level of heart-thumping awe when in Shannon’s presence, but to deny she was as beautiful as she had been in college? (Perhaps more so, because some women only became more gorgeous with age?) Jess could never deny that. If only she could say the same for herself, though.

  “So you do photography now?”

  “Yup. Absolutely nothing to do with my degree, and my student loans make sure I remember that every month.”

  Jess couldn’t hide a small snort of derision. Shannon came from money. More money than Jess did. Odds were she didn’t have the amount of debt that Jess juggled every month. Still, loans were loans. Nobody wanted to pay them, and they were a burden upon the shoulders of almost an entire generation.

  Specifically, their generation.

  It was another one of those little things that made Jess feel older. The day of her thirtieth birthday hadn’t felt that weird. Another day. Another birthday. Another year gone by. She had always hoped that her thirties would be a vast improvement upon her twenties. Not off to a great start here, universe. Her twenties had started with the first appearance of Shannon Parker. Now her thirties were following suit.

  What had she done to deserve this?

  “Do you like it?”

  Shannon shrugged. “Taking pictures for a living? I guess. I don’t like most of my clients, but that’s the gig. My favorite part is touching up the photos on my computer.”

  “I don’t recall you ever taking pictures back in college.” Maybe that was one of many things Jess never learned about the love of her life. “Was that a recent development?”

  “I liked photography back then. I simply didn’t have a lot of time to do it. Was busy doing everything else I thought would look better on my cover letter.”

  “Like dorm councils?”

  Shannon cracked a small smile. “I sometimes question why I bothered with that. I only took that on because I knew I didn’t have a shot at student council.”

  “If you hadn’t, we probably would have never become…” Jess considered her words carefully. “Friends.”

  “You’re right about that.”

  The waiter brought their appetizers. Shannon had ordered cooked seasoned greens. She offered a bite to Jess, who turned it down. What am I doing? The old me would’ve cried real tears to have Shannon Parker offer her some of her own food.

  The whole situation was surreal. Here Jessica Mills was, living out a fantasy she had constructed as early as sophomore year of college. Her. Shannon. Sharing an intimate dinner in one of Portland’s nicest Asian fusion restaurants. They talked of old times. Their dreams. What they wanted, and what they couldn’t live the rest of their lives without. This should’ve had Jess catatonic in wonder.

  Instead, she was numb. Even when she acknowledged that this was actually happening, for some reason, it could’ve ended right then, and she wouldn’t care.

  I’m over you.

  That’s what she thought, yet it sounded wrong. Was it possible to be over Shannon? The woman Jess fell in love with at first sight so long ago? Was maturity and a healthy dose of cynicism responsible, or had the rose-colored glasses been off long enough for her to move on?

  Shannon was still beautiful – that would probably always be true. Yet she had a nasty habit of chewing her nails. She was a bundle of nerves that would never be happy with simple harmony. She said things without thinking. Her privileged youth meant she would never know what it was like to be impoverished, like Jess had been growing up. Like she could be any moment now.

  Also, she was obviously straight. That had been more obvious back in college, but all this talk of her ex-boyfriends was enough to numb more of Jess’s heart.

  I’m over you.

  Truth bloomed inside of Jess’s heart, like the first few flowers of spring. Maybe it was a weaker flower. Maybe it didn’t have the same vibrancy as blossoms appearing in late spring, but it didn’t make her truth any less real. Jess Mills had been freed from the tyranny of being in love with a woman she could never have. Maybe it was entirely possible for them to be friends now. Maybe it took a few years and a dearth of maturing into the women they now were to make her see it.

  How freeing was it to look at Shannon’s exquisite facial structure and think, “I don’t need you anymore?”

  Chapter 8

  Shannon

  The transformation was instantaneous. Jess went from caged and reserved to more like the old her that Shannon used to know. A girl – no, she was a woman now – who was bubbly, friendly, and likely to crack a joke at any moment. She didn’t even have any wine! Shannon always needed wine to loosen up enough to make jokes she honestly thought were funny.

  That was what I liked about you, Jess. Shannon had gone so many months ignoring Jess, because there were so many other people out there needing her time and attention. Yet it was because of Jess’s outgoing personality and her constant offers of help that made Shannon start to recognize her wherever she went on their small campus. It was what made her go to Jess when she did need help and Kelsey wanted nothing to do with it.

  Kelsey… if she knew this was going on right now, what would she say? Would she squawk at Jess to leave the table? What was her problem, anyway? What had always been her problem?

  “How’s your food?” Shannon asked halfway through dinner. “You know more about Asian cuisine than I do, so I thought your opinion might be good.”

  “I do, huh?”

  Shannon laughed. “Of course! You studied abroad in China, didn�
�t you?”

  “Taiwan.” Jess shrugged. “They like to make the distinction for obvious reasons.”

  I have no idea why. Shannon’s laughter only grew more awkward with each passing second. She was a Politics major, yet she couldn’t remember why Taiwan wouldn’t want to be called China? Certified idiot. That’s me. Jess was officially the smart one at the table. Shannon would be lucky to remember the capital of Oregon by the end of dinner.

  It helped that Jess had loosened up and talked with the ease of old. Much easier to remember college. Those nights in the dorms, when hanging out with friends was as much fun as going on a date with the boyfriend or sitting in the downstairs lounge, watching pretty girls walk by and wondering what it would be like to…

  Shannon almost choked on her bite of stir-fry. Those were thoughts she had suppressed for so long.

  “Where did you study again?” Jess asked. “Belgium?”

  “Yes.” How had she remembered that? Incredible! “My foreign language was French, but the school didn’t have a French exchange program. The closest we could get was a program out of Belgium. So that’s where I went my junior year.” Shannon giggled. “Remember that thing we exchanged before we went off to study abroad?” She snapped her fingers as she attempted to recall it. “What did you call it? Oceans Away, or something?”

  Jess wanly smiled. “Yup. I only had one to give, and I gave it to you.”

  What was that falling across their table? That strange sensation gripping Shannon by the heart and dragging her toward Jess? That realization that they had so much between them, most of it never shared or indulged? “Why did you give it to me? Didn’t you have closer friends going off to study abroad?”

  “They were in my program. I saw them anyway.”

  “Oh.” Shannon’s hand touched her chest. “I see.” She had given her Ocean’s Away to Kelsey, who had been accepted to a program in London. We were so close, and it was so cheap to travel in the EU, that we met up three times during that semester. She didn’t see Jess again until senior year.

  But Jess was one of the only ones to give her an Ocean’s Away book. A contact card so they could keep in touch. Photos of their first two years at college. A short paragraph about what she would miss the most about Shannon.

  She remembered when that card almost came in handy.

  ***

  Memory #8

  I had been in Belgium for over two months. Long enough for me to realize I was a different woman than I had been back in the States. Studying abroad changes you, yeah? So I dumped Nick over email. Told him I didn’t want to be with him when I came home. He sent me some threatening messages about what a slut I was and how I would be pregnant with some “Belgian Waffles” by the end of my term. I had known about his true colors for a while. Subconsciously, I knew to wait until I had been in Belgium for a long while, so I wouldn’t have to dump him face to face and incur wrath.

  Risk assessment. That’s what I hear it called now. Back then, though, I felt like such a coward.

  I didn’t think breaking up with Nick would be so hard, but once I did it, I didn’t feel the wave of relief I had anticipated. I suddenly regretted it. Depression hit me. Probably not just the breakup, but being so far away from home and wondering if I would survive yet another day in Belgium. Typical study abroad drama.

  My host family didn’t know. I hid it from everyone, including my friends at the program. The only time I purged my emotions was late at night, holed up in my room in the attic of a 17th century townhouse that had been renovated more times than anyone could count.

  Kelsey wasn’t responding to my messages. I pulled the covers around me in that drafty room and searched for any sign of home. Something that didn’t remind me of Nick.

  I ended up finding Jess’s Oceans Away book in the bottom of my suitcase. I grabbed it because, indeed, it did not make me think of Nick. It made me think of something else entirely.

  Kelsey had claimed that Jess was gay and interested in me. Until then, when I started thinking about a rebound to get my mind off Nick and the shitty way he had sex, I never thought about it. A lesbian having a crush on me wasn’t on my radar, unless she became a problem. Jess hadn’t been a problem, so I didn’t care.

  Suddenly, I cared.

  Where was she now? Taiwan? What was she doing there? Did she have a girlfriend? Did she have a girlfriend back at our school? I knew so little about her, yet she gave me this book. This one book every person got. Out of everyone she could have given it to, why me? I never considered us real friends until that moment.

  I picked up my phone and thought about messaging her. That email was right there on the contact card, after all. I could’ve sent her a hello. Ask her how she was doing. Ask banal questions about Taiwan, feigning interest in a desperate bid to stop caring about Nick and his tiny dick.

  “You nasty slut,” one of his last texts to me had said. “You weren’t worth all the cum. Better spent on Jenna Jameson videos.”

  Tears slid down my face. How could a man who once said he was in love with me be so cruel? Were women this cruel to each other in lesbian relationships?

  That was the first time I thought about Jess in a romantic context. A context I didn’t know existed until that lonely, cold night in Belgium. I hadn’t seen her in months. I had barely thought about her. So why was I thinking about her now?

  Why did I wonder what it would be like for her to hug me and say I never had to deal with men again?

  I ended up putting down my phone before I messaged her. Instead, I went to school the next day and set my sights on some guy in one of my classes. By the end of the weekend, I was blowing him behind some historical monument, and by the end of my exchange, I had completely stopped wondering why I always focused on women more in sex scenes.

  Except it was the beginning of the end, wasn’t it? The first time I ran from Jess. It wouldn’t be the last.

  ***

  Shannon was the only one drinking that night. Jess had politely turned down a glass of wine or a bottle of beer, though one of the reasons Shannon picked this place was because it had an excellent reputation for its selection of IPAs and Willamette Valley wines.

  Is she a teetotaler? Wouldn’t be the first time Shannon wondered that about Jess. Nor the first time she wondered a lot of things about the girl who was once in love with her.

  Right. That’s why Shannon had invited her out for dinner.

  “I wanted to talk about what happened.”

  Jess’s muscles tensed right back to where they were when they first reunited in the teahouse.

  “About what, exactly?”

  Shannon heard the crack in Jess’s voice and chose to ignore it. “About what happened senior year. I… I want to apologize. For all of it.”

  “You didn’t do…”

  “I did. I was terrible about how I ended things.”

  Jess ceased the eye contact she had maintained for most of the meal. Now she stared at something on the table, as if nothing Shannon had to say was worth hearing.

  “It was understandable. You weren’t like that, right?”

  “I shouldn’t have led you on.”

  “No,” Jess agreed. “You shouldn’t have. But for what it’s worth, I don’t regret any of it.”

  “Can you say that to my face?”

  Blushing, Jess lifted her head and forced a smile. Her hair, as short and silky as it had been back in college, perfectly framed her round face. She had always gone on about Shannon’s hair. You made it sound like the whole world should see how beautiful I was. In truth, you’re the only one to have ever said those things. None of Shannon’s boyfriends made her feel hot until her clothes came off. Jess could make her feel like the prettiest girl in the world with one furtive glance.

  That was real admiration, huh?

  “I don’t regret any of it,” Jess said. To her credit, it wasn’t through clenched teeth.

  “Me neither,” Shannon said with a relieved sigh. So good to get that off he
r chest after so many years!

  “Really?” Jess snorted. “You seemed to regret it back then.”

  “I was young and dumb, okay?” Shannon instantly regretted putting it like that. “I mean… I didn’t understand what I was feeling. I don’t think I was ready for that kind of experi…”

  She caught a renewed look of disbelief in Jess’s countenance. Oh, shit. Wrong thing to say. Shannon was never good at this. Professors commended her for her speeches and paper writing, but she didn’t know anyone better at putting their feet in their mouths, especially around people from different lifestyles. I would do it. I would find the most insensitive thing to say to a lesbian. Experimentation. What were the speech centers of her brain thinking? They were fired.

  “Experience. I wasn’t ready for that kind of experience yet.” Great save! Hopefully. “Before you, I never had a single reason to believe that I was anything but straight. I was so stressed out by school that I didn’t know what to do. I shouldn’t have been in any kind of relationship. Definitely no new territory. So I…”

  “So after you were done using me to get high, you dumped me to focus on your life.”

  Shannon pressed her lips together. “That is one way to put it.”

  “You said so yourself.” Jess uncrossed her legs, hand on her jacket. “Being with me was like getting high. Only instead of smoking weed with the kids in our dorm, you were kissing me.”

  “I’m sorry. That was insensitive.”

  “Oh, boy.” Jess placed her palms on the table, a sour look claiming her demeanor. “If I knew you wanted to talk about this tonight, I would’ve… I dunno. Not come?”

  Shannon had to think fast if she didn’t want to push Jess any farther away. “We don’t have to talk about it. I’m sorry. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

  “You never did, huh?”

  She deserved that. Even so, Shannon couldn’t help but put up her defenses and pretend that was the worst thing Jess could’ve possibly said. The indignity!