Sunsets and Shades

by Erica Lee

  Kinsley took a step back from me and wiggled her eyebrows. “Just so you know, I’m more than OK with that.”

  “Oh no, you don’t. You promised me a lavish dinner. We can save the dress ripping for after.”

  “Only if you promise.”

  “Promise what?”

  “That there will be actual dress ripping.”

  I rolled my eyes at Kinsley and forced her out of the apartment. As we walked through the streets of Philadelphia, Kinsley still refused to tell me where we were going. Finally, we arrived at a fancy looking restaurant I had never heard of before. “Have you ever been to a Brazilian Steakhouse?”

  When I shook my head, Kinsley just laughed. “Oh, you’re in for a treat. Get ready to have your mind blown.” It turned out that Kinsley was pretty good at blowing my mind and this restaurant was no exception. A Brazilian steakhouse is like an all-you-can-eat meat buffet, and the best part is that you don’t even have to get up from your table. As long as you turned the faux stoplight on the table to green, men dressed in very expensive looking suits would continuously stop by the table and offer all different types of chicken, steak, and sausage. Kinsley and I went to town, and our eyes lit up each time a new item was brought out. I don’t think there was ever a time in history that two lesbians were so excited about a bunch of meat.

  I found myself laughing out loud (and snorting) in response to my own internal joke. Kinsley tilted her head at me. “Mind sharing with me what is so funny that it turned you into Miss Piggy over there?”

  When I felt myself turning red, Kinsley reached out her hand and squeezed mine. “A very, very adorable Miss Piggy of course. Have I mentioned that I also really enjoy how you snort uncontrollably? I find all of your geeky quirks extremely sexy.”

  This was shocking to me. Kinsley Scott was the definition of sexy. She was the type of girl who turned heads when walking into any room. She could have walked into a room full of gay guys, and all eyes would still be on her. It’s just the type of presence she had. But, for whatever reason, she found awkward old me to be sexy.

  “Shall we go?” Kinsley spoke, interrupting my thoughts. “I thought maybe we could take a walk through the city before heading back to the apartment.”

  I smiled across the table at her, still feeling awestruck that she wanted to do something as simple as that with me. “Sounds wonderful.”

  Once we were outside, an urge came over me to take Kinsley’s hand, but I wasn’t quite sure if public hand holding was kosher in whatever it was that we were currently doing. I cleared my throat a few times and looked over toward Kinsley. “So, I would really enjoy holding your hand right now. Is that… Umm… something that is OK to do?”

  To my surprise, Kinsley reached out and immediately took my hand. “Of course it’s OK. The best part of this arrangement is that there are no rules. If you want to hold my hand as we walk down the street, you can. If I want to dance with you in the middle of Philadelphia, I can.” With those words, Kinsley used the hand she was holding to twirl me around in a circle. Once I was facing her, she pulled me in tight and swayed to the sounds of the city night. I rested my head on her chest, finding that I didn’t care if anyone was watching us. It was just Kinsley and I in this moment. Everyone else faded away. Which is why I also didn’t think anything of it when she desperately brought her mouth to mine and made out with me right in the middle of the sidewalk. When we finally pulled apart, her swollen lips had formed into a wide smile. “We need to get home. I believe I was promised some dress ripping.”

  By the time we had arrived back home, the food coma hit and within minutes, Kinsley was passed out on the bed snoring. There was clearly no dress ripping occurring. But, as I situated Kinsley’s body so I could crawl into the bed beside her, I didn’t care about that one bit. This right here was just as good.

  Chapter 17: Kinsley

  Just three days after our dinner, Grace informed me that she wanted to take me out as well. She wouldn’t tell me what we were doing, but told me there was no need to dress up and that she actually encouraged sweats. My mounting curiosity piqued when Leah and Liam came to the apartment to give us the keys to Liam’s truck. “Is it totally ready for us?” Grace prodded seriously.

  “Just as you ordered, my queen,” Liam joked, adding in a fake bow for good measure.

  Grace let out a cute squeal and pulled him into a tight hug. “Thank you so much for doing that.”

  Leah rolled her eyes at the interaction. “Don’t let him fool you. It was all me. I’m all about making sure you guys enjoy each other,” she mocked.

  “Well, thank you both,” Grace grinned. “We’ll definitely enjoy it. At least I hope so.”

  She looked to me for confirmation, and I nodded my head even though I had no clue what was going on. The truth was that it didn’t really matter what we were doing. I knew it would be fun because I always had fun when Grace was involved. Normally, I would have found this fact concerning, but I was honestly enjoying myself too much to care.

  We said our goodbyes to Leah and Liam, then headed to our unknown destination in Liam’s truck. A little over an hour later, I saw a sign that read Old Tyme Drive-In. “No way,” I screamed. “I haven’t been to the drive-in movies in forever. We actually had one of these about a half hour from my house, and I loved it when I was younger.”

  Grace grabbed my hand and squeezed, causing me to momentarily lose my breath. “I was hoping that was the case. I kind of figured it might be since you’re a small town girl. This is actually the one I used to come to as a kid. We’re about 25 minutes from my hometown right now.”

  Grace laughed as I raised an eyebrow at her. “I know what you’re thinking, and don’t worry, I didn’t bring you out here to meet the folks. You’re totally safe.” Of course she had read my mind. Grace seemed to be able to do that. Although, being so close to Grace’s hometown did give me the strange urge to go explore it. I wanted to see where she went to school and where she liked to hang out. I was interested to know exactly what shaped her into the girl she was today, which is exactly why it was probably good we weren’t doing that. Those were a lot of lines that I shouldn’t be crossing.

  Grace backed the truck into a parking spot so the tailgate was facing the screen. Once she unlatched it, I realized that there had been an air mattress set up with blankets and pillows to lay on while we watched the movies. If I was the type of girl to swoon, I would have been swooning in that moment.

  Once we were all situated under the blankets, my mind flashed back to the last time I was at the drive-in. Thinking of these memories filled me with equal amounts of sadness and happiness. “You know, the last time I was at the drive-in was actually with my grandma,” I divulged.

  Grace looked over at me with apologetic eyes. “Oh Kinsley, I’m sorry. I didn’t know…”

  I shook my head. “No. No. This is a good thing. It brings back all happy memories of my grandma. We used to go to the drive-ins together a lot. I think the last time we came was when I was in 8th grade. I lost interest when people from my class used to come just so they could hook up. I didn’t really want to be sitting in a car with my grandma when my classmates were in the car next to us giving hand jobs under a blanket.”

  When Grace laughed softly at my words, I felt myself becoming overwhelmed with emotions. She was beautiful when she laughed, and right now, she was laughing with me over how pathetic I was as a teenager. I never shared these stories with anyone, and the way she was responding to them was exactly how I hoped someone would. I forced these thoughts from my head. There was no reason to be getting all sentimental. “Just so you know, I’m not that girl anymore. I’m totally ok with you getting handsy under this blanket,” I joked, feeling more like myself again.

  ”What kind of girl do you think I am? We are at a family establishment surrounded by children.” Grace’s teasing tone told me that she wasn’t actually offended by my words.

  “I’m honestly not sure what type of girl you are, Just Gra
ce. One day you’re telling me that you were practically saving yourself for marriage, and then suddenly, it’s last night and you’re begging me to…”

  Grace slapped a hand against my mouth before I could continue. “Some things that happen in the heat of the moment, should stay there and never be brought up again.” Even though it was dark, I could tell that her face was just as red as her hair. I ran my tongue along the hand that was still over my mouth.

  Grace tore it away and wiped it off on her sweatpants. “Ew. Who said you could lick me?”

  Oh, this girl made it way too easy to mess with her. “Technically, you did this morning,” I smirked.

  The shades of red continued to deepen as she shoved my shoulder. “What did I just say?” she whisper-scolded. She then turned away from me, but instead of looking toward the movie that had just started, she laid on her back and looked up at the sky. “The stars look beautiful tonight.”

  I joined her, laying on my back as well and reaching out to take her hand. “This is one thing I miss about small town life. All of the lights of the city really drown out the stars.”

  “Well, aren’t you quite the romantic?”

  “Ew, no. Just because I can appreciate the stars, doesn’t mean I’m a romantic. I’m a romance writer. It’s my job to appreciate this stuff.”

  “Kinsley,” Grace whispered, her voice now serious. “I don’t want to push anything, and I want you to know that this doesn’t change a thing about what we are or what we’re doing, but nights like tonight and Wednesday just seem too special to not acknowledge them for what they truly are - a date.”

  Grace must have noticed the way my body tensed up in response to that word, because she grasped my hand a little tighter. “Calling this a date doesn’t mean that we need to start planning our wedding or even planning for next week. It just acknowledges the fact that this moment right here is special.”

  Between the stars, my memories, and her words, I thought I might actually start to cry. The sensation was both scary and freeing at the same time. I was falling hard and fast for this girl, but like she said, I wasn’t planning a wedding or even a future for that matter. I was completely capable of enjoying this feeling while it lasted and leaving it at that. I realized that as I was lost in my thoughts, Grace was watching me intently, waiting for an answer. “I think it’s perfectly acceptable to call this a date.” I brought our linked hands up to my lips and kissed her knuckles. Except it didn’t actually feel acceptable to call it a date. Time with Grace shouldn’t be reduced to a term also used by horny teenagers at a school dance. Shit, I was losing it.

  Grace squeezed my hand, interrupting my internal dialogue once again. “What is going on inside that head of yours?” she asked. “I know you’re not watching the movie because your eyes are closed.”

  “Here’s the thing. I could tell you now or show you later.”

  “Fine,” Grace conceded, leaving us in silence again.

  Silence with Grace was oddly comfortable, but I also found myself longing to share more with her. “My grandma’s birthday is next Friday,” I finally spoke into the silence. “I spent every single birthday with her up until college. I still feel guilty about missing those last two.”

  Grace pulled me closer and buried her face into my neck, saying more with that action than any words could have said. I leaned in close and we stayed like this for a few minutes, until Grace suddenly sat up, staring down at me. “So I have an idea. Please don’t get freaked out. You can absolutely say no. But what if you and I visited your grandma’s grave on her birthday? I know you probably think I’m crazy, but I just thought maybe it would be good for you to spend that time with her. And I’d like to be there to support you. That is, if you want me there.”

  My mind started to spin from just thinking about her idea. What made her think that she even had the right to suggest that? She was correct about one thing though. I absolutely did think she was crazy for suggesting it. Asking me to do something that was clearly going to be hard for me was a sure fire way to get me to pull away. But it was also the sweetest damn thing that anyone had ever volunteered to do for me, so the following Friday afternoon I found myself driving Grace and I back to my hometown.

  “Just so you know, my town is really small. I do love my family, but they’re a bunch of rednecks,” I warned Grace. Somehow, our day trip to my grandma’s grave had turned into a weekend visit with my family. That was my fault for mentioning it to my mom when she called me the other day to see if I was doing OK. I should have known that she wouldn’t have let me come without her seeing me, since my presence in this area wasn’t a normal occurrence.

  “Kinsley, calm down,” Grace laughed. “Have you forgotten that I’m also from a small town? My parents are obsessed with me and are 100% supportive of me being gay, and they still voted for Trump. I get it.”

  “So, how did you and Leah become friends?” I asked, wanting to change the subject so I didn’t have to think about everything that was coming.

  A reminiscent smile appeared on Grace’s face. “I feel like we’ve been friends forever. We grew up on the same street, just a few houses down from each other. From the time we were five or six, we did everything together.”

  My mind shifted to Leah talking about how they were childhood best friends, and I wondered when things had changed between them. “So, how did you guys end up drifting apart? I remember Leah saying that you guys hadn’t seen each other much in the past few years.”

  “We stayed pretty close throughout the time we lived in our hometown. In high school, we each had a different core group of friends. Leah was a cheerleader and liked to party, while I was more into sports and academics at that point. We were still close though. You know how it is in a small town. But once we went away to college, we just kind of drifted. Nothing specific happened. Life just got in the way. Leah is the type of friend that I could see every day or once every two years and there would be no difference. We always just pick up right where we left off.”

  “I never had a friend like that,” I admitted. I never gave anyone enough of a chance to form a bond like that. Just like romantic relationships, I was afraid if I got too close to a friend that it would hurt me too much to lose them. I hated the thought of losing someone because I didn’t measure up to someone’s expectations. Leah was by far the closest I had gotten to someone since my grandma and Nikki, but I even had a lot of walls up with her.

  “How about you and Leah? How did you guys become friends?” Grace returned the question.

  I started to laugh, thinking back on that time a few years ago. “I actually hit on her in a bar, believe it or not.”

  Grace lifted an eyebrow at me. “Elaborate, please.”

  “So, after about a year of living at home, I connected with this girl who helped me get my book into some libraries and other LGBT spots throughout the country. Her name is Rory. She’s ridiculously smart and developed this whole app to connect small businesses with big businesses and so forth. It wasn’t in her normal scope to do what she did for me, but she is also gay, so it was important to her. Plus, she was still getting things off the ground at that point. Anyway, we sort of became friends because we were both lady killers, so I came down to visit her a few years ago, and we went to the same club I took you to. Of course, Leah was there, which isn’t shocking. She would be that basic straight girl who chose to hang out at a gay bar. When I tried hitting on her, she told me she was straight then jokingly said ‘I’m not looking for a girlfriend, but I am looking for a roommate. Pretty close, right?’ The rest was history after that. A few months later, I left my hometown to move in with this girl that I barely knew and almost seven years later, here we are.”

  Grace let out a low whistle at the realization of how long Leah and I had been roommates. “You guys are practically in a common law marriage at this point. What happened to the other girl? Rory? You said you guys were friends, but I haven’t seen or heard anything about her in the two months I’ve been he
re.”

  I rolled my eyes thinking about Rory and what a sucker she was. “She lives in LA now. She fell madly in love and moved across the country for a girl. Apparently, it worked out for her though. She recently got engaged.”

  “Aw that’s so sweet,” Grace gushed. “What an adorable love story.” I only grunted in response. Grace and I had grown so close that sometimes I forgot just how different we were. I should have known that she would somehow find that pathetic story sweet.

  I became quiet as we got closer to the cemetery, completely lost in my own thoughts. There were a lot of different directions this could take, and I was worried about how I was going to respond to it. After parking, I led the way to her grave. I knew where it was since she was buried beside my grandpa, and I had visited his grave with her many times while growing up. I laid down the flowers we had bought on our drive and stared at the gravestone that I had avoided for the past ten years. My eyes wouldn’t move from the name in front of me. I was laser focused, following the curves of every letter. My eyes moved back and forth across the letters about a thousand times until I wasn’t able to focus on them anymore. The focus was replaced by a blur, which I soon realized was from the tears that had started to fall from my eyes.

  Soon, I felt a hand latch onto mine and looked over to Grace standing next to me. “I… Umm... I’m not quite sure what I’m supposed to do.”

  “Talk to her.”

  “You want me to talk to a stone with words carved into it?”

  Grace smiled sweetly and gave my hand an extra squeeze. “No, I want you to talk to your grandma. Say the things that you left unsaid.”

  I took a deep breath and looked back at the grave. “Sup, Grams. I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to say. My lady friend here tells me that I should talk to you though. First of all, in case you didn’t realize this, I’m gay. But I guess if you’re truly watching over me all the time, then you know that. If that is the case, I’m sorry by the way. You’ve probably seen a lot of shit you’d rather not see. What can I say? I got needs.” I laughed awkwardly, before taking another deep breath, hoping I could make it through the next part without completely breaking down. “What I really wanted to say is that I’m sorry that I let you down. You were my best friend, and I should have been there for you at the end. I was running away from a life that scared me, but I shouldn’t have run away from you. You were always there for me, and I hope you know how much I appreciated that. I still think about you everyday. I love you. Happy birthday.”