Reality Bytes

by Jane Frances

  “Hang on a second.” Cathy laughed delightedly. “Are you planning on having me barefoot and pregnant from now on?”

  “Not just yet. I’m planning on having you all to myself for at least a little while longer.” Lisa’s voice assumed that delicious resonance as it lowered, husky with desire. “Can we go back to our room now? There’s things I need to do to you that just can’t happen on a hard patch of dirt.”

  Once standing, Cathy stayed Lisa from pulling her in the direction of the path. “Wait just one minute.” She walked to the middle of the clearing and did a slow three-sixty-degree turn. “I want to be able to remember this hard patch of dirt forever.”

  The wine bottle was retrieved before they left the clearing. Cathy didn’t care about the contents, but she didn’t want to sully her sacred spot with their litter.

  They held hands as they walked down the path, talking softly about life and love and happy-ever-afters.

  Lisa grinned slyly. “Speaking of happy endings, I wonder how Toni and Emma are going?”

  “Lisa,” Cathy reminded her, “we don’t even know if there is a Toni and Emma.”

  “I reckon there is,” Lisa said assuredly. “I reckon it was Toni who was there for dinner.”

  Lisa had finally made her phone call to Emma a few days prior, during their lunch stop at a tiny restaurant that made a goat’s cheese tart to die for. Her call proved unfruitful in terms of specifics, Emma admitting yes, she and Toni had become friends and yes, Toni had phoned Emma at home, but no, it hadn’t been late at night after Toni contacted Lisa for her number. Then Emma said she had to cut their call short because the friend she was expecting for dinner had just arrived, and no, she wasn’t going to tell Lisa who the friend was. But, Lisa should be happy to know, it wasn’t Justine.

  “It could have been anyone. Just leave it be, Lisa. You’ll find out in a few days’ time anyway.”

  “You could ask Toni when you call to remind her about picking us up from the airport.”

  “I could.”

  “But you’re not going to, are you?”

  Cathy laughed at Lisa’s pout. “Nope.”

  “Are you going to tell Toni our news when you ring?”

  “Nope.” Cathy stopped at the door to their room, standing aside to let Lisa turn the key in the lock. “That can wait until we get back too. But for now, you’ve got duties to perform.”

  “Oh, yes.” Lisa quirked her eyebrows. “I almost forgot.” She closed the door behind them and held out her hand, palm up. “Well, hand it over.”

  “Hand what over?”

  “A voucher.”

  Cathy just folded her arms, forming an expression to show exactly what she thought of that request.

  “Okay, then.” Lisa nodded generously. “I guess since it’s a special occasion you’re entitled to a freebie.”

  Cathy spluttered with mock outrage, pushing Lisa backwards onto the bed. “I’ll freebie you, you right little…”

  “So do you promise, Cathy?”

  Cathy snuggled into the crook of Lisa’s arm and breathed in the heady scent of sex. She still had Lisa on her fingers and could taste her on her lips. “Promise what?”

  “That once junior comes along we’ll still make time to be together, like this.”

  “Of course.” Cathy ran her fingers through Lisa’s hair. She grinned mischievously. “I’ll buy the entire Teletubbies collection and leave junior in front of the televis—” She laughed as she was pinned to the mattress, Lisa straddling her hips and grasping both wrists. Her laughter gurgled in the back of her throat as Lisa launched into her anti-Teletubbies tirade and then verbally voided the remainder of Cathy’s anniversary vouchers. “Okay, okay. No Teletubbies.”

  “Promise me.” Cathy’s wrists were pressed further into the mattress.

  “I promise.” Cathy laughed again. “But for your information I used my last voucher days ago, so I’ve been living on credit ever since.”

  “Is that so?” Lisa raised her eyebrows in surprise. Her eyes wandered down Cathy’s torso. They held a familiar glimmer when they returned to Cathy’s. “So how much do you owe me then?”

  “Let go of my wrists and I’ll show you.”

  Much later, Lisa flung her head into the pillow. “Oh, my God. I think we’re about even now.” She checked her watch and groaned. “Look at the time. I’m never going to manage the ride to Florence tomorrow.”

  Cathy slid back up the bed and kissed Lisa hard on the lips. “Poor tired baby.” She snuggled back into the crook of Lisa’s arm. “Good night, honey.”

  “Good night, lover.” Cathy was squeezed then released, Lisa sliding from the bed to make a bathroom stop. On her return Cathy found herself gathered into a hug. “Sweetheart.”

  “Yes?”

  “Thank you for saying yes.”

  Cathy smiled and snuggled deeper into Lisa’s arms. “Thank you for asking me.”

  Totally happy, Cathy fell quickly into a deep, dreamless sleep.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Emma and Lisa stopped at one of the water fountains dotted around the lake. They were halfway through their second circuit, it taking that distance for Emma to tell Lisa what had been happening in the month she’d been away.

  It was Tuesday morning, a full thirty-six hours since Emma had accompanied Toni to the airport to meet the flight from Rome. Emma had clearly read Lisa’s “I told you so” look to Cathy as they entered the arrival lounge, and she laughed at the “You sly little fox” Lisa had whispered in her ear when they hugged hello. But once the ring on Cathy’s finger was spied, attention was taken immediately from new bonds, focusing instead on the strengthening of existing ones. Despite the excitement, Emma and Toni both noticed the yawns of long-haul travel creeping in and, not long after reaching the house by the ocean, left Cathy and Lisa to unpack and settle back home in peace.

  Cathy had returned to the office this morning and, technically, Lisa should also have been at work, but a mix-up with a tile delivery meant a reprieve until at least lunchtime. So Emma had been both surprised and delighted at Lisa’s phone call, asking if she was free for a visit. Both of them avid joggers, they had decided to go for a run around the lake near Emma’s home.

  “Jeez, and I thought we had some news for you.” Lisa laughed as she dropped to the ground. “Now let me get this straight.” She watched as Emma filled the shallow doggie trough that adjoined the fountain. “In the last four weeks you’ve resigned from one job, declined another in Sydney, accepted one in Albany and been offered a partnership in a Perth practice. You’ve fallen out of lust with your neighbor, agreed to be bridesmaid at her wedding, had an Internet affair and fallen in love with my partner’s best friend.”

  “Well, I had to do something to keep myself occupied while you were away.” Emma plopped next to Lisa on the grass and wrapped her arms around her knees, “Although I wouldn’t exactly call it an Internet affair. All we did was talk. And,” she said guardedly, “I never said I was in love.”

  Lisa snorted. “You’d make a rotten poker player, Em.” Emma pretended she was in sudden need of a stretch. She held her hands high in the air and twisted her torso from one side to the other. She purposely held her stretch as she looked toward the fountain, away from Lisa’s penetrating gaze.

  “You can’t not look at me forever.”

  “I can try,” Emma said stubbornly, still intent on the fountain. She had fallen in love with Toni, but if asked to pinpoint the moment it happened, Emma would stumble over her answer. The beginnings of love were there the night she paced Toni’s cat run design. They grew roots the first night Toni came over for dinner, and they sprang into life over the course of their dating. Now, each time they kissed, each time they were together, each time Emma even thought of Toni, her love flowered.

  The trouble was, her love came with such damnable timing. Ever since the feeling emerged, Emma had been a referee in the fight between her emotive side and her logical side. Emotion told her what she and
Toni were sharing was too new, too fresh to survive so early a separation. The promise of regular visits from Toni, and vice versa, might be pure in its intent, but in reality the promise would prove difficult to keep. So her emotive side told her to stay in Perth, to keep her two days at Tricia’s and continue her local job search. Her logical side said she would be foolish to pass up Albany and such a good job offer. Logic also told her that, if Justine could survive Paul leaving for three weeks at a stretch, then surely Emma could survive her own separation. Then emotion kicked in again and reminded her how Justine got Paul for a whole two weeks out of five, whereas Emma would be lucky to see Toni on alternate weekends.

  So Emma’s internal struggle continued.

  At present, logic was winning. And it was logic, however warped, that told her so long as she didn’t voice her feelings out loud, they didn’t really exist and hence could be ignored.

  “So I was wrong then?” asked Lisa.

  Emma gave a tiny little nod.

  “Strange.” Lisa flopped backwards onto the grass. “I could have sworn I was right.”

  “Well, you weren’t.”

  “Okay.” There was an audible sigh, then a good long moment of silence. From her peripheral vision, Emma saw Lisa sit up again. “Hey, I’m a bit broke after my holiday. You want a game of poker?”

  Emma’s left obliques were begging an end to her torso twist. She complied with their wishes, giving a relieved expulsion of breath as she straightened up again. “I have no idea how Cathy puts up with you, Lisa Smith.”

  “Which translates to…”

  “You were right,” Emma said quietly.

  “Sorry.” Lisa leaned obviously closer. “I didn’t quite catch that. What did you say?”

  “You were right about Toni.”

  Innocence was feigned. “What about Toni?”

  Emma took a deep breath. She was about to make it real. “I do love her.”

  “I knew it!” Lisa laughed gleefully as she launched across the grass, rolling Emma over with her. “I just knew it!”

  Kayisha, who until that moment had been lazily snapping her jaw at passing bugs, leapt up and bounded around the pair, barking excitedly. Swans that had been peacefully paddling the calm waters of the lake turned long necks in alarm and took to quieter waters with a swoosh of water against outstretched wings. The male half of an elderly couple passing by muttered, “Disgraceful,” and his wife nodded in acquiescence. But, once past the kafuffle Emma, Lisa and Kayisha were creating, the wife turned for a second look and smiled a secret, pleased smile.

  “Get off me!” Emma half-heartedly tried to push Lisa away. As predicted, just by saying the words out loud, they crystallized, gained form, became real. The reality struck Emma right to the core. She had fallen in love. Fallen in love with a woman who wore paw-print pajamas and fluffy slippers, and who went through toothbrush heads twice as fast as the average person. A woman who loved her pet to the point of designing and building an extension to the house for its comfort. A woman who surrounded herself with every conceivable gadget, who grumbled every morning as she headed sleepily for the shower, and who was invariably at least a little late for work. A woman who was at once self-conscious about her appearance, yet uninhibited in the most intimate of settings. Yes, Emma was in love with a fabulously quirky and expressive woman, and it felt so damn good she had to join Lisa and laugh out loud. “You’re squishing me!”

  Once they’d finished rolling around on the grass, and Kayisha had calmed down enough to slurp the last of the water in the doggie trough, they resumed their lake circuit. Lisa was suddenly full of questions about Emma’s planned relocation, forcing her to admit she had not yet done anything about canceling her lease or finding accommodation in Albany. When asked why, Emma explained she was only required to give four weeks’ notice on her house and that Albany was sure to be bursting with empty rental properties, so there was no rush. That received a sideways look but no comment. Which was just as well. Emma knew her procrastination was purely to delay solidifying the fact she was actually leaving.

  Finally Lisa spoke again. “I don’t get it, Em.”

  Emma glanced warily to her companion. Obviously Lisa had discovered the gaping holes in her argument. “What?”

  “Why you’re going to Albany when it’s quite obvious you want to stay here.”

  “Of course I’d rather stay here, but like I told you, Leese, Albany offers the chance for me to get a financial kick-start.”

  “In a year.”

  “Yes,” Emma admitted.

  “Why waste a year, and maybe have Tricia take on someone else as a partner, when you could potentially get in now?” Emma sighed. Halfway through their first circuit of the lake her mouth had gone into autopilot and—despite promising herself not to say anything to Lisa—Tricia’s offer became common knowledge. Lisa’s initial reaction had been exactly the same as Toni’s, and she suggested approaching Cathy. Emma paraphrased what she had told Toni, “I already told you, Leese, I can’t risk losing a friend over money.”

  “Look, Em.” Lisa spoke slowly as if explaining to a child. “I really can’t see that happening. Cathy didn’t get where she is today by being a financial slouch. She wouldn’t just give you a pot of money without doing all the checks and balances. She’d expect you to present a business case and she’d want projections and cash flow and all that stuff. Then, if she’s happy with what she sees there’ll be proper contracts drawn up and if she’s not, she’ll let you know it’s a no-go.”

  “But—”

  “Tell me one thing, Em,” Lisa interrupted. “If money wasn’t an issue and you had a choice between the Albany gig and the partnership, which would you choose?”

  Emma had already had this debate in her head. Guaranteed income aside, there really was no competition between being an owner over being a salaried employee. Whichever she chose, her skills would be used to the benefit of the animals she treated, but in hard, fiscal terms, ultimately they would either benefit someone else’s pocket or her own. In a non-mercenary sense, being part owner also gave her the opportunity to contribute in a very real way to the overall direction of the practice. As an employee, she was constrained by the motivations of her employer, and her experience with Colleen illustrated the extent to which employer/employee motivations could be at odds. “The partnership.”

  “And tell me another thing. If Toni was out of the equation, which would you choose?”

  This was another debate Emma had already had with herself. It usually wove into the argument over logic versus emotion. Well aware she tended to make emotional decisons, and how in the past those decisions usually blew up in her face, Emma was determined not to make the same mistake again. But despite trying desperately to separate Toni from the decision-making process, she couldn’t. “I can’t take her out of the equation, Leese. She’s in my life now and I can’t pretend she isn’t.”

  For a moment at least, that comment seemed to satisfy Lisa, her nodding and giving a crooked “I hear you” smile. But the moment was short-lived. “So, if the mountain won’t go with Mohammed, then Mohammed must stay with the mountain.”

  Emma picked up on the twist in Lisa’s phrasing. Emma had never even considered what had just been implied. “I’m the one without my own home or a job. Why should Toni move?” she said defensively.

  “I’m not saying that, Em.” Lisa stopped running and stood with hands on her hips. “I’m saying everything you want is here in Perth, and if you’d get your head out of your arse for one minute, you’d do the figures and find out once and for all if this practice thing is a possibility.”

  Emma fought to keep a suitably insulting response from falling out of her mouth. Everything Lisa said was true—well, maybe not the head up the arse bit—so she had no argument. “I’ll think about it, okay?”

  “Better think fast. You’re due in Albany in five weeks.” Lisa did a couple of quick leg stretches and turned back to the path. She sniggered loudly as she picked up
speed.

  “What’s so funny?” Emma asked.

  Lisa sniggered again. “I was just thinking about you being a bridesmaid. What on earth prompted you to say yes?”

  Emma cringed. The bridesmaid business was a prime example of how she acted on emotion instead of logic…and ended up the worse off for it.

  “Shut up, Lisa.” Emma adjusted her hold on Kayisha’s lead and quickened her trot.

  Lisa hooted with laughter. “Has Justine picked out your dress yet?” she called from behind.

  Emma ignored both Lisa and her continued bridesmaid taunts for the remainder of their run. Once back in front of Emma’s house she shooed Lisa into the cab of her tray-top utility. “And to think I actually missed you while you were gone. Go home and leave me alone. I’ve got things to do.”

  “Like go practice walking in high heels?”

  “No. Like start checking out the rental market in Albany.”

  The disappointment in Lisa’s expression was obvious.

  Emma shrugged. “And maybe go work on a business plan.”

  Lisa visibly brightened. “Okay. I’d better leave you to it then.”

  It was Emma’s turn to stand with hands on hips. She hoped she looked menacing. “Now, you promise you won’t say anything to Toni about any of what I told you today?”

  Lisa crossed her heart. “I promise.”

  “And you won’t breathe a word to Cathy about the practice thing? If I do anything about it I want it to come from me.”

  Lisa turned the key in the ignition and the engine roared into life. “I won’t. I promise.”

  Emma waited until Lisa’s utility disappeared around the corner before letting herself into the house and booting up her computer. It was ten a.m. By ten-thirty she had scoured the sites of all the Albany-based real estate agents she could find. One had detailed rental listings, complete with photos, so she bookmarked the site for easy reference. The others advised that rentals were available but provided only a contact e-mail address or phone number for further information. By eleven a.m. Emma had e-mailed all the real estate agents, advising of her requirements. Now she sat, thrumming her fingers on her desk, address book open, considering the number that stared back up at her. It was the number of her landlord. One simple phone call and she’d be on the countdown to vacating her home of the last ten years. Instead, pages of her address book were flipped and a different number considered. This time Emma did dial.