by Sacchi Green
The hands had spoken of a pond just west of where we had passed earlier that day, and I set out to find it. All I wanted was to wash off the thick trail dust and the sweat. I wanted to be entombed in enough water that my dammed tears would wash clean without being observed even by the critters before I continued back to the ranch, my tail between my legs. I wanted my big, soft bed and maybe a sweet pat on the head from my folks.
The sounds of birds and squirrels chattered through the stand of trees that shielded the pond. I reached it as the sun was beginning to set. It was particularly beautiful, but I thought it felt a lot like that day that the two telegrams had come. I had this feeling of surrender, of broken will. I was not just coming to terms, but embracing the very idea that I should run away, something I’d hated since I was a girl. I pulled my shirt from the top of my jeans, unbuttoned it, and tossed it on a rock. I kicked my boots off and pulled my jeans down to my ankles.
“Sometimes a lady just needs a nice bath.”
I crossed my arms over my bra and panties and turned around. “Lucy?”
“Hi, Edie. Or should I say Edith now?”
I let my arms relax. “Edie’s fine.” Lucy’s presence couldn’t be more welcome. “Shouldn’t you be back at the camp?”
“I think we must of had the same idea.” Lucy stripped away her shirt and jeans, and I watched as her skin emerged. I wasn’t sure if I should go on, but Lucy’s tall strong body was nude within a moment. I suddenly felt safer and removed my underwear. I joined Lucy in the water.
It was chilly, and somehow comforting. I gasped when my upper body disappeared into the softly lapping waves. We exchanged a bar of Ivory soap from my bedroll, and eventually we began to play like kids, splashing each other’s faces.
“Lucy?”
“Hmm?”
“What’s it like—to be with a man?”
Lucy just shrugged. “Well, it’s okay, I guess.”
“Are you and Earl lovers?”
Lucy let out a broad laugh.
“I’m betting that’s a no.”
Lucy paused. “We’re not lovers.”
The look in her eyes. The way she glanced away from me, then at me, then away. I started to feel this warming, swirling feeling. “You’re not too sweet on men, are you?”
“I’m a loner, Edie.”
“It’s something more.”
She simply looked at me. Her jaw gaped for a time. “Don’t make a fuss, Miss Edie.”
“You don’t like men, do you?”
“I like men fine. I like them to ride with, to drink with, and to tell stories around the campfire. I even like to cook for them.”
“But there are some things you’d rather not do with them?” My voice came out like a mouse’s squeak. It was good that it was a quiet evening.
“Let’s just leave it where it lies, Edith.”
“You’d rather—be like a man?”
She drew a deep, quivering breath like I’d never heard from this tough woman. “Not at all. I’d rather be a woman, and I’d rather be it with a woman. Clear enough? We best be going.” She turned away and started to walk from the water.
As her body emerged, all dark and shiny and warm, the feelings in my waist swirled deeper, harder. The dimple in her lower back, the firm shape of her butt, the strong curve of muscular thighs… There were those feelings I’d had since I was a girl, when I’d watched the pretty schoolteacher, the way her hips swayed when she erased things from the chalkboard. I’d always felt so wrong, or like maybe this was just some idea I was playing with, the kind of thinking a girl does to figure out how things work. It hadn’t occurred to me that another woman might feel this way. The feelings I’d had, watching Matthew dance with Rebecca, how my eyes drained down her every time they turned and Rebecca’s back faced me, lingered at her exposed shapely calves, and then raced to glare angrily at Matthew.
I’d never seen a thing from Lucy that made me think she might feel like me inside, at least not a thing that I could understand till then. “Lucy?”
She turned her head back over her shoulder, and as I looked in her eyes, a fog lifted from mine. Matthew had kissed me a few times, and the press of his lips to mine did give me a tiny squishy feeling. I’d waited for that feeling to grow. I was sure it was supposed to. Why didn’t it grow?
And finally, body cold, buried to the tips of my breasts in this clear pond, I felt it. I knew that even if I weren’t in a pond, I’d be plenty wet. I just wanted to touch Lucy a little. Her long black hair was still in the bun she set it to for the trail. “Can I wash your hair, Lucy?”
She bit her lip. “Umm—okay.” She walked back in, one arm folded to her breasts, the other draped over her crotch, until she was submerged again. Her arms relaxed, and she slowly turned around and loosened her hair. I lathered the soap in my hands and began to rub Lucy’s scalp, then worked her hair deep in the water. I could feel her body stiffen as I grazed her strong back and ribs while I washed. I could feel that she had stopped breathing. “Edith—Edie?”
“Will you do my hair now, Lucy?”
Lucy took a deep breath and sighed loudly. “Okay.”
I released my hair and leaned my head back from an arched spine. But as Lucy began to wash, I leaned forward, forcing her to press closer, to where her hands had to gather my wavy tresses off my skin to scrub them. “My hair feels so grimy, please scrub it good.” The feel of her fingers, turning over and over in my hair, knuckles grazing the base of my waist, and then massaging into my scalp, put my hips to blaze.
“Miss Edith. I really shouldn’t—”
“Just Edie. Finish rinsing my hair, please?”
“Okay.” Lucy tried to keep her hands respectful of my skin, but there was no way she could avoid the contact. The feeling was so strong and deep that I turned around sharp and gripped around her waist like one of those smothering snakes.
“Miss—Edie!” I had never seen more than a nod of propriety from Lucy, but she seemed proper as an old-world lady for a moment. I still felt the way her heart beat, with my small breasts pushed under her full ones. We stood in the cold water, our bodies tight, and we stared into each other’s eyes. “Really, Edie, you need to think about this. It’s a hard thing to love other women. And me, I’m just a—”
“Are you saying you don’t feel stirrings for me?”
“I’m not saying that at—oh—at all.” She drew a deep breath and shook her head softly.
“I think you know I have those feelings for you.” I slipped my hand down her muscular stomach, into her thick pubic hair.
“Edie, you been through a lot lately.” But her hips drifted forward and accepted the way I softly combed her curls.
“Doesn’t change a thing.” I eased my fingers down and cupped her crotch. “Please, kiss me.”
Lucy’s arms lay like dead fish in the water as she shook her head with decreasing resolve. “Edie, you should—should think this through.” But her hips moved back and forth slowly when I eased one finger into her. She felt so perfect and hot inside.
“Please kiss me.”
Slowly her arms crept around me and she opened her stance. She drew her mouth down and gave me a closed-lipped kiss. She pulled back. “Okay?”
“More.”
“Oh, Edie.”
I pushed my face up to hers and kissed her. I pressed tighter and she moaned as I urged one of her arms around from my back down between my legs. As our mouths explored each other, her fingers slowly traced the outside of my nether lips in narrowing circles until she flicked at the sensitive little arrow at the front. Finally, with my hips nearly forcing down for more pressure, her long middle finger entered me. She swirled my clit with her thumb while the one finger opened me little by little. I’d pushed my fingers in myself before, and it felt nothing like this.
She knew things inside me I didn’t know. “Edie, I ain’t been with a woman in years.”
“How can you bear it?” In the deepening dusk we made love, our hands between
each other’s legs, our mouths wet and united. I fell limp in her strong arms and entwined my legs around her thighs. She pressed a second, then a third finger inside me and found a rhythm that was so furious I nearly passed out. Deeper and deeper swellings pushed down my waist as I writhed into a deep orgasm. The birds chirped like they were under attack at the depth of my scream.
Lucy carried my limp body from the water and laid me out on a huge rock, still radiating the warmth of departed sun. She kissed me deeply and then lay by my side.
“Lucy, I was running away, going back to the ranch.”
“I know. Are you going to keep running?”
“If I do, will you go with me?”
“No, I have to finish the drive. They count on me.”
The stars were beginning to blaze in the sky. “I don’t suppose I’m needed like that. I’m just along to gather the strays.” I laughed a little. “But I won’t break.”
“Damn it all, where you women been?” Earl walked up with an angry gait as we rode into the camp. I stood down from my horse on this moon-bright night. Lucy eyed Earl, but I held up my hand and she stayed put.
I walked up real close to Earl and looked up. Earl towered over everybody, but especially short little me. “Sometimes a lady needs a bath,” I said, and rested my hands on my hips.
Earl folded his arms across his ribs. His jaw set. “When we’re out on the trail—”
“Sometimes a lady needs a bath, and I won’t hear another word of it, are we clear, Earl Miller?”
Earl squinted; then the slightest hint of a smile cut one side of his thin lips. “Yes’m.”
A round, balding man in a big black suit stepped from the office when we reached the stockyards. A huge smile crossed his face. “Well, Earl, you seem to be right on time. Is Harry Senior lagging behind?”
“Harry couldn’t make the ride this year, Chuck.”
Chuck’s eyes widened. I recalled Dad talk about negotiating with Chuck, and I could see that hungry wolf look in his eyes for a brief minute before he eased into an earnest, sad expression. “Never thought I’d see the day. I heard tell about the boys. They was good boys. It’s sad that so many good ones gotta go so young nowadays.”
“Yeah, it’s a shame. This here is Edith.”
“Oh, sure, Harry’s little girl. You shore are a fine filly, little lady. Spittin’ image of your ma.” Chuck tipped his Stetson. He turned back to Earl with a bit of a wry smile, dismissing me in turn. “Guess we best get inside and do a little business.” He patted Earl’s shoulder and began to turn him toward the office.
Earl stopped him and turned back to me. “You do business with the ‘little lady’ there.”
Chuck tilted his head and smiled.
Earl leaned in close to me and whispered. “Edith, there’s a reason I’m a foreman and not a boss. I may be tough and know how to ranch, but I ain’t business smart like your Pa. Like Chuck. Like you. Do your Ma and Pa proud.” He turned and patted Chuck’s shoulder. “Good luck, ol’ boy.”
Within a few years, we weren’t driving the stock down by horse-back but by truck. I’d lived through a small space in time where the old world butted right up against the new. Two fronts, just like the war that took my brothers.
Lucy was right; these were not easy times to be a woman who loved women. I had to act like Aunt Dottie and Lucy, more interested in the ranch than men. But every night I crept down to the room just off the kitchen.
Lucy quenched the fire that lay beneath my flannel shirts and worn blue jeans. We twined legs, pressed together from hips to faces, lingered on each other’s breasts and mouths, keeping our voices down as if there were somebody in the house who really didn’t know what was going on.
Back then, there were no real places to get sociable with those who loved their own kind. But after Ma and Pa died, I stopped worrying that loving a woman would lose me the ranch, and worse still lose me Lucy somehow. Lucy moved into the master bedroom. Lucy was my lady, my heart, and my life, then and always.
WHEN THE RODEO COMES TO TOWN
Jove Belle
The bell above the door rang two minutes before closing, as if propelled by Murphy and his damned laws. Ronnie had just cleared away the last of the blue plate special—fried catfish and hush puppies because it was Sunday—and scooted out the back door with a wave goodnight, leaving me to explain that only an asshole shows up this late expecting something to eat.
An F-350 with a built-for-comfort horse trailer, the kind that will hold six horses, all the gear, and even a passed-out cowboy after a rough day, stretched across the far side of the gravel lot. Rodeo’s in town. I flipped the sign on the door from “open” to “closed.”
“Don’t forget the lock,” a soft voice directed from somewhere behind me. “And the lights.”
Suddenly, it didn’t seem so late.
“I thought you were out of town.” I turned slowly, praying my once-solid knees would hold me. Her voice, like spiced rum dripping with molasses, always liquefied several parts of my anatomy.
“Just got back.” Lauren sounded tired, but not tired like she wanted to go to sleep. Tired like she was restless and looking for someone to wear her out completely. “Come here.”
I slid the deadbolt in place and hit the light switch. Moonlight streaked through the plate-glass window, lighting the path from me to her. I moved slowly, not trusting my legs, or the shadowed, seductive smirk on her face.
“You’re too late for dinner. Kitchen’s closed.” I tried my best to sound annoyed, but mostly I just wanted to strip her naked, lay her out, and make a feast of her.
“So, you’re alone?”
I stared at her lips, ripe and full and begging to be sucked. They were the kind of lips that need to be kissed, the kind a girl like me could get lost in, and Lauren knew it.
“Bryn?” She smiled that private, knowing half-smile that promised she knew exactly what I was thinking.
“Yeah?”
“Are you alone?”
I nodded and sucked air. My brain, too sidetracked by the sight of her, forgot to keep track of silly things like breathing when she was near. Lauren—her long, long legs in faded denim; her dust-covered boots worn for function, not fashion; the curve of her lean body, slight, unpronounced, but unmistakably feminine beneath my touch; the dangerous spark in her eyes daring me to forget the large window that would display our actions to anyone who drove by—overwhelmed me, as always. Six weeks felt like forever when she was gone, chasing the rodeo over the map. And I had stayed here, waiting, eager for her to call, to write, something.
Instead I got nothing. Lauren left me with painful silence and the memories of her sweat-covered body hovering over mine, pushing me higher, begging me to come for her. I should have been mad as hell to have her show up, presumptuous lust in her eyes. I should have held the door open, foot tapping in righteous anger, and sent her away. I should have been a lot of things, but God help me, I was happy to see her.
Lauren pushed herself up off the green vinyl bench and buried her fingers in the short hair at the base of my neck, loosening the braid I’d managed to keep tight through my shift. “I missed you.” She exhaled—a hot gush against my neck, in my ear, tangled in my hair, and down my spine.
I melted into her, molding myself to her will. The room spun, or maybe Lauren moved, circling, drawing me around with her. Then she eased me against the edge of the table. The intoxicating mixture of hard muscle and soft girl flush against me, with the rigid table biting into my backside, set my heart racing.
“Did you miss me?” She punctuated the question with a sharp nip, followed by a slow, sensuous lick along the length of my ear.
Did she want me to answer? How could I, with her hands gliding up my legs, under my skirt, smoothing around to cup my ass? So strong, her hands, the flex of her biceps as she lifted me and then roughly set me on the table. She pushed between my knees, and my uniform hiked up, gathering around my waist.
“Answer me, Bryn.” Her
voice was hard, bridging the gap between love and demand, jarring my vocal chords into action.
“Yes.” I’d forgotten the question, but it didn’t matter. Whatever she wanted, wherever she wanted it, I wanted to give it to her.
With a half growl, half moan, Lauren looped her fingers around my panties and started their painfully slow journey to the floor. “I thought about you, about the arch of your back.” She traced a wet, scorching trail from my neck to the open vee of my uniform collar, dipping her tongue as deep in my cleavage as it would go. The slick glide of my satin panties and her work-worn hands passed my knees and stretched to my calves. “I thought about you, the way you shiver when I kiss you here.” She knelt and placed a small, fleeting kiss on the inside of my thigh. The light pressure traveled through my body in a flash of nerves and excitement.
I gripped her head with both hands and tried to pull her closer. God, I wanted her mouth on me, her tongue, liquid smooth and determined, wrapped around my clit.
Lauren’s hands flew to mine—panties forgotten, dangling around my ankles—gripping me hard around the wrists. “Careful, Bryn.” Her eyes, dark and lust-filled, warned me. She didn’t like to be rushed in her seduction.
Something in the set of my jaw, the rise and fall of my chest, the quiver traveling across the exposed skin of my legs, told her I was not ready to lie back and take it. I wanted—no, needed—to grind my hips against her face, to force that beautiful mouth of hers where it belonged. My fingers twitched beneath Lauren’s grip, and she tightened her hold.
“My rope is in the truck. Do I need to get it?” The slight flare of her nostrils was the only indication that she wanted to do just that as she guided my hands to the edge of the table on either side of my body.
Lauren didn’t say “Don’t move,” but the message was loud and clear. The one time I’d dared to push too far, she’d tied me, face down and spread wide, to the long banquet-style table running the length of the dining room. Unable to move, I’d begged for her merciful touch as she stroked and fucked me to the explosive brink over and over again, only to stop before I could tumble into star-blind oblivion. Then Lauren sent me soaring. The orgasm had ripped through me, drowning reality in a pulsing black sea of “Oh, God” amazement.
