One Small Step
Page 25
She angled her chair so that it was a little closer to the fire. “Maybe we can swap places when you start to smell my flesh burn.” Cam picked up her glass. She was trying to make things less tense. “To cozy British pubs.” She touched her glass to Iris’s, feeling a little feverish.
Iris sat back in her chair and lifted her face to the beamed ceiling, her eyes closed. If they weren’t indoors, in the half light of a pub, Cam would swear she was holding her face to the sun, hoping to catch some rays.
She waited for Iris to bring her attention back to the table, trying to find the courage and the right words to say what she needed to and convince her that they could have these feelings and still stay in each other’s lives. Her anxiety heightened by the sense that, if she got this wrong, it would cost her Iris. Iris was about to walk away, and Cam had to let her know there was no need.
“I am so sorry about the dance. I was a little drunk…”
Iris shifted in her seat. “Don’t—”
Cam put up a hand. “I’m not blaming that. I knew what I was doing. I wanted to do what I was doing. The drinking just stopped me understanding how wrong it was, but…” she hesitated. “I wanted to kiss you. And, if you’d listened to my voice mail you’d have heard me say that, and also heard me admit that somewhere along the way I caught feelings for you—”
“I don’t think we should—”
“Iris, I know you don’t want to talk about this, but I have to. I can’t let you just walk away from our friendship without trying to fix things, without trying to make you understand. There are things I haven’t told you, and I don’t know why I’m making such a fuss about it, why I’ve taken so long to tell you. You’ve told me lots about you, and I want you to know this about me. It doesn’t change things, not really, it’s just that—” Cam stopped.
“There’s no pressure from me, Cam. Whatever it is, you can tell me or not tell me. I’m not sure what difference it’ll make anyway.”
“It might. It might help you take me more seriously when I tell you that I’m not just some stupid straight girl crushing on her best friend.”
“Cam—”
“Just let me tell you, Iris.” She leaned forward. She thought she could trust Iris and had to hope that she wouldn’t be judged. And even if she was, Cam still wanted Iris to know.
“At college, I wrote for the student newspaper. I was a journalism major. They advertised for writers, and I figured it’d be great experience. The paper wasn’t exactly popular—it was a bit of a shitty gig to be honest—but I didn’t care, it meant I could call myself a journalist and I felt proud of myself. We were pushing out a paper full of arty reviews and pointless stories of campus life, but now and then we’d stumble over a proper story about college funds being misspent or how professors were neglecting their students, and I loved it. The editor—Mia—was this super confident, super accomplished student who was a real player. I mean player as in women falling at her feet, not player as in soccer.” Cam gave Iris a wry smile.
“Every other Wednesday, after we put each edition to bed in the early hours of the morning, she would head off into the night on her motorbike with her latest girlfriend on the back.” Iris raised an eyebrow.
“I know, I know, a motorbike, leathers, all of it. Ridiculous but also, well, kind of sexy.” Cam shrugged. “I used to try not think about the evening she was having and how badly it would contrast with mine. I always went home alone, and if I was feeling decadent, I might have a beer in front of the TV to unwind. I had friends, but I wasn’t really dating. Sometimes guys would show an interest, but I couldn’t really get excited enough about any of them to actually date.
“Meantime, I was feeling closer and closer to Mia and more and more bothered by those other women. I was surprised I was jealous but the feeling was unmistakable.
“And then at some point, I noticed that when we finished work on the paper, rather than zooming off into the night, Mia would wait for me. She started to offer me a ride home. We lived on the same campus so, once I’d admitted I didn’t have plans, it was hard to say no. Not that I wanted to. I loved being on the back of that bike, the feeling of being able to put my arms around her.” Cam watched Iris’s eyes widen.
“We started hanging out, outside of doing the paper, and one night, after she took me home, she said that she was sorry if it made things a bit awkward, but she’d fallen for me, and while she could keep being my friend if that’s what I wanted, she actually wanted more than that. I was so surprised, I just hadn’t seen it coming.” Cam blinked then and looked up to see Iris gazing at her.
“I wanted to tell her that I felt the same way, but I couldn’t. I wasn’t brave enough. I said I was confused—which wasn’t really true—and needed time to think.
“The next time we saw each other, it was difficult. I couldn’t see past the declaration she’d made, and I knew I wanted her but I was terrified at the same time. I mean, I’d never slept with a woman. We passed a few agonizing days and then arrived at Wednesday. After submitting the paper to the publishers, Mia suggested going for some food, but I knew I couldn’t eat so I said I wasn’t hungry and asked her to take me home. I know she must have felt like she’d blown it, but I just couldn’t seem to find the right way to tell her she hadn’t.
“When we got home, I didn’t know what to do. I had all these feelings and I didn’t want her to leave, but I couldn’t seem to speak so I leaned across and kissed her. It was the only thing I could think of.
“We had sex that night. It was my first time with a woman and so kind of awkward but also kind of great.” She sipped her soda, feeling embarrassed, guessing that Iris hadn’t expected this.
“After a few weeks together, Mia wanted me to meet her friends and to meet my friends, but for some reason I found that very difficult to do.” Cam stopped talking and started to pick at the edge of the table.
“Go on.”
“It was all so new to me. I’d never thought of myself as a lesbian or bisexual, or whatever, and I struggled to imagine telling people I was. My mom was…is…conservative about most issues, but she’s at her worst when it comes to gay things. I hated that I let her affect the way I thought about me and Mia, but I was younger then and it wasn’t until much later that I understood just how much I must have internalized some of her crap.”
Cam lifted her eyes to address Iris directly. “I know you came out at seventeen and you probably think all this makes me a ridiculous coward, but this is who I was back then.”
Iris tried to say something, but Cam held up a hand, knowing she had to get to the end of this before she lost the courage.
“Anyway, Mia really wanted us to spend Thanksgiving together. She knew we couldn’t be ‘out’ about our relationship but said she really wanted to meet my family anyway. We’d been dating a few months, it seemed reasonable, and I was convinced I could pass her off as a friend.
“It was a disaster.” Cam couldn’t keep the hurt from her voice. She swallowed and made herself carry on. “I think my mom figured Mia was a lesbian almost straight away—I mean, she fit my mom’s stereotype after all—but it hadn’t dawned on her that we were dating. Why would it? She’d only seen me with guys and I’d introduced Mia as a friend.
“But we were careless. We thought my mom had gone shopping, we were making out and my mom walked in and caught us. It was awful.” Cam took in a breath.
“She blamed Mia for corrupting me. She blamed Chicago, she blamed the fact I was at a liberal arts college, she blamed everything and everyone but me. I tried to tell her it wasn’t like that, that I was just as responsible, that it was something I had wanted, but it was like she couldn’t bear to hear me say it, she just brushed it away. She was paying my college fees and she…she just stopped. She said I needed to come home and stop messing about with the kind of people I was hanging about with there and that it wouldn’t matter if I didn’t graduate because she hadn’t gone to college and it hadn’t hurt her. She said I’d thank her for it one day.”
“I know I should have stood up for myself, for Mia, and for my career, but I didn’t. I didn’t see that I had any choice but to do what she wanted—I couldn’t afford to pay my own fees after all—but it left me feeling like I was the worst kind of coward. I was scared of her disapproval and scared to be the person I wanted to be.”
Cam looked at Iris, waiting for her to speak. She could see her trying to process what Cam had just told her.
“Shall I get us another drink?” Iris stood.
“Don’t rush off, Iris. You’re gonna leave me thinking you can’t bear to sit here with me now that I’ve shown you how pathetic I really am.” Cam could practically hear the alarm bells going off in Iris’s head. She looked like she was ready to bolt.
“Not pathetic, Cam. Not at all. Please don’t say that. I…my head is so full of questions. I just don’t know what to say.”
“Ask me. That’s the point of us being here. We need to talk about this stuff.” Cam sounded surer than she felt.
Iris sat down. “How did you end up with Ryan after all that with Mia?”
Iris was biting the inside of her lip, her hands gripping her knees and Cam could only imagine the effort she was making to stay seated.
“I broke up with Mia, obviously. It was humiliating for us both and I couldn’t expect her to put up with my family, with how little I had to offer her. And I felt like I had no choice but to leave college. I went home to Seattle, left journalism behind, and got a boring job in finance that wouldn’t remind me of any of it. And I hated myself for giving in so easily. I hid for a long while, and then threw myself into dating. Into dating guys of course. I had dated guys before Mia. I mean, before Mia I didn’t know I was anything other than one hundred percent heterosexual. And after Mia, well, I felt that I’d proved I wasn’t ready to love women so I decided to go back to where it all seemed so comfortable, to where my mom wanted me to be.
“Ryan was a friend of a friend. We hung out as part of a group and we got along okay. Eventually, he asked me out and we started dating. I wasn’t sure at first and then, well, I guess I grew to love him and we found a way to be happy together. At least for a while anyway.”
Cam couldn’t help but connect with some of the humiliation she’d felt at the time.
“I think it must have been an awful decision for you to let someone go that you loved. I’m sorry and I really appreciate you telling me.” Iris sounded so formal, so cold, and Cam hated hearing it. She stood up, needing to compose herself. “I’ll go and get the drinks.” She rushed away from the table.
Iris couldn’t stop thinking about the story Cam had told her. She now understood Cam’s relationship with Ryan. He was Cam’s safe harbor when she’d needed one. A port in a storm, and even more importantly, someone Cam’s mother would never disapprove of. She sighed imagining just how painful it must have been for Cam to have a mom like that, and was even more grateful that her own father had loved her and her sexuality unconditionally.
Cam came back to the table with their soda waters and sat with a small shiver. The fire was dying and she slipped her coat back over her shoulders. They were silent together. Cam traced her fingers around the rim of her glass.
“So I guess that’s a kind of long-winded way of telling you I’m not straight. I mean we both have to face that fact. I wasn’t straight when I loved Mia, and the way I feel about you—wanting to see you all the time, wanting to kiss you—means I’m not exactly straight now.”
Iris reeled at Cam’s admission that she had feelings for her, that stone cold sober she still wanted to kiss her. She wanted to talk to Cam about it, to talk about her own feelings for Cam, but she made herself stop and tried to focus.
“Okay, let’s agree that you’re not straight.” She shrugged and Cam smiled shyly at her. Iris took in a breath as she felt her heart skip. She had fallen in love with Cam. She wasn’t prepared to admit it to anyone but herself, but that meant the stakes were too high for her to leave things hanging.
“It doesn’t really change anything. In fact, it makes it worse. We can’t—”
Cam interrupted. “It doesn’t change everything, but it changes something. I’m just trying to tell you I’m not some stupid straight girl crushing on you in a way I don’t understand. I know what these feelings are. I’m a grownup and I’ve spent a lot of grownup time with you that’s convinced me that you’re wonderful, and I know I did the wrong thing at the dance, but that was because I have all these feelings for you and I wanted to kiss you, but I only let myself do anything about it when I was drunk.” Cam slowed her speech. “And I still want to kiss you—so damn much—and I know I’m not supposed to but I want us to at least be honest about what’s going on. If we’re not honest, I don’t know how we can get past this, and I want to, because I miss you and I want to find a way to keep you in my life.”
Cam slumped back in her chair, and Iris felt her resolve weakening. It would be so easy to say yes to her, to pretend they could find a way past this, but Iris didn’t trust either of them now. Cam’s admission that she had feelings for Iris put them in even more in danger of doing something they shouldn’t. Now she just had to find the words to break both their hearts.
“Cam, you’re engaged, to a man you’ve been with for more than four years and a man you’ve always said you’re planning to marry. You sat by his side a week ago at the dance as his fiancé talking about your wedding venue. It doesn’t matter if I have feelings for you, it doesn’t matter if you loved Mia five years ago, or even if you want to kiss me right now.” She couldn’t help the twist in her insides as she acknowledged Cam’s desire for her. “You’re not in a position to be kissing anyone but Ryan, and you know that or you wouldn’t have run back to him the way you did that night.” Iris said the words in a rush, feeling the truth of them land deep and hard in her own chest. Cam had nothing to offer her and she had no right to expect her to.
Knowing about Mia made it clear to Iris that Cam could love a woman—and her body couldn’t help but react to that—but it didn’t change a thing. They couldn’t feel like this about each other and expect their friendship to survive.
“It’s late. We should probably go.” Iris said the words as she stood. There was no point carrying on, no point telling Cam how she felt about her. It would only make things worse.
“Iris…don’t…it’s got to be possible for us to at least stay friends. I want us to be in each other’s lives. I can fight these feelings if you can—” Cam stopped when Iris held up her hand.
“We should go. Ryan will be wondering where you are.” Iris felt actual physical pain in her chest as she said the words. The look on Cam’s face said she wasn’t doing much better. This was hard for both of them.
Cam picked up her bag and Iris waited for her to pass by before following her out of the door.
* * *
Outside the pub, they leaned on Iris’s car and looked up at the sky. It was jet-black and full of bright stars. London’s pollution meant the stars were rarely that visible in the sky, but the Heath was one of the few places where it was possible, on a clear night like this, to get a really good view. Iris had already unlocked the doors to her car, but neither of them was making a move to climb inside and begin the process of going home. The drive would take barely a couple of minutes along the main road to Cam’s house, and Iris wondered if, as she had, Cam had figured out that this was it. This would most likely be the last time they would be able to be together like this, just the two of them. Their friendship could not survive the feelings they now knew they had for each other and the fact of Cam’s relationship with Ryan meant the feelings couldn’t take them anywhere. Iris felt numb, but she knew that the pain would follow as surely as the sunrise.
They had stopped staring at the sky and were now just looking at each othe
r, neither of them speaking. Iris knew that if she moved forward just a step, it would be all that was needed. The momentum, their desire for each other, would carry them together into a kiss, the kiss they had both wanted on the dance floor, the kiss Cam had admitted she still wanted. They could kiss against this car and then go their separate ways, neither of them having to talk about it ever again.
Iris wanted to sit with Cam in the car, wanted them to make out like carefree teenagers, wanted Cam to reach under her clothes and caress her like a lover would, to allow Iris to do the same. She wondered if these thoughts were visible to Cam in the dark of the car park, wondered what she would do if Iris spoke them out loud. She took in a breath, knowing she’d never let it happen.
Cam took her hand and she shivered as Cam gently stroked the back of it with her thumb. They were standing so close, Iris only needed to take a step. She knew Cam would respond, could only imagine how sweet the kiss would be, but she didn’t move. One small step. To show Cam how much she actually meant to her, before it was too late.
Cam sighed, pushed herself off the car, and let go of Iris’s hand. Iris felt a wrench inside at the idea that this was it, Cam was ending the evening.
“I don’t want to go home, but I’m cold. Can we sit in the car?” Cam sounded calm, but Iris could hear something underneath the words.
They got in the car, the light stayed on for a while and then left them in darkness.
“You said I meant something to you, that you had feelings for me. That has to mean something. This can’t be the end for us, Iris, it can’t.”
“Don’t.” Iris had her hands by her side, and she moved them to the steering wheel, feeling agitated, knowing she should just drive Cam home and put an end to this.
“Can you drive us somewhere? Can we please keep talking?” Cam’s voice caught as she spoke. She was suffering just as much as Iris was at the idea of them saying good-bye.
Iris knew she needed to sound a warning. “We agreed that staying away from each other is—”