Where Lizza goes, I follow.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s not like me.\u00a0 She\u2019s the most beautiful girl I know.\u00a0 She has hair as blonde as highway grass.\u00a0 She wears terrible clothes and is still the epitome of cute.\u00a0 She smiles at people and they give her everything she wants, except she only wants adventure.\u00a0 She eats whatever she wants and fits into her size two yoga pants.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s wonderful.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m gangly and I lean forward too much when I walk.\u00a0 I own two pairs of shoes: sandals for summer, hiking boots for winter.\u00a0 My eyes are different colors, which I can\u2019t even name.\u00a0 I never lost my high school acne.\u00a0 I smile at people and they ask me if I\u2019ve thought about brushing my teeth.<\/p>\n
I\u2019m awful.<\/p>\n
But Lizza loves me.<\/p>\n
So I follow her into the musty crawlspace.\u00a0 It smells like dead rats, just the smell we had to cover up with incense when I was a kid.\u00a0 In college, my MCU boyfriend Kato burned a lot of incense.\u00a0 He said it was for sex trances.\u00a0 I was still pretty sure it was to cover up the smell of rats.<\/p>\n
MCU wasn\u2019t my school, by the way.\u00a0 MCU is mutual cover-up.\u00a0 We were both gay and not really ready to traumatize our families.\u00a0 He met Reis around the same time I met Lizza, so our breakup was hones to god mutual.<\/p>\n
She\u2019s squeezing my hand and I\u2019m here and now\u2014she\u2019s saying it, too: \u201cHere and now, babe.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSorry.\u201d\u00a0 The fog starts clearing, though.\u00a0 When she first figured it out, Lizza insisted on setting a mental safeword for me.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I say \u2018here and now,\u2019\u201d she\u2019d said, her limeade eyes glowing across the dorm room at me, \u201cyou have to stop worrying.\u00a0 It\u2019s my promise that it\u2019ll be okay.\u00a0 Okay?\u201d<\/p>\n
That was when I\u2019d known I needed her.\u00a0 \u201cHere and now,\u201d I tell her, \u201cI\u2019m okay.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you sure?\u00a0 We don\u2019t have to do this.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI just\u2014a crawlspace?\u00a0 Couldn\u2019t we take a swim in a nasty community pool or something instead?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cBluejane,\u201d she says.\u00a0 I hate her for using my favorite nickname. \u201cI think it\u2019s where the ring went.\u201d<\/p>\n
We both heave a sigh.\u00a0 Her mom came to visit us last week, mostly to scold.\u00a0 Her ring disappeared just before she left.\u00a0 She walked out of the door calling me a thief at the top of her voice.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo you want me to go in there for your mom.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cNo,\u201d Lizza says, somehow turning around in the tunnel, because she\u2019s got my face in her hands.\u00a0 I melt.\u00a0 I always melt.\u00a0 \u201cFor me.\u201d<\/p>\n
Every time she kisses me, I want to write her name a thousand times in a notebook, surrounded by hearts and wedding bells.\u00a0 She\u2019s that intoxicating.\u00a0 We\u2019ve been kissing for eleven years.<\/p>\n
Shy as fox, I pinch my lips together and intertwine my fingers with hers.\u00a0 \u201cLizza, we\u2019re almost those thirty-somethings.\u00a0 We\u2019re supposed to hire nice muscley men to do this stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n
She ponders that, tilting her head and catching her lip under her just-too-big front teeth.\u00a0 I stare at her lips.\u00a0 She giggles.\u00a0 \u201cYou really wanna spend a little bit of savings just so you don\u2019t have to go under the house?\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d I say.\u00a0 \u201cMostly because I want to go inside and cuddle the fuck out of you until you want to eat me out.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cOh.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s too dark to see it, but I hear her blush.\u00a0 Her silhouette gets slinky and her voice is naughty-girl, and if I had a tail, well, it\u2019s wagging.\u00a0 \u201cDo it.\u00a0 Wait.\u00a0 This is why you were downloading Game of Thrones this morning.\u201d<\/p>\n
I start crawling backwards.\u00a0 I can see my hair frizzing out of my ponytail.\u00a0 \u201cMaybe.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cYou know I love you for many reasons.\u00a0 This is merely the most obvious at this moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cCome kiss me,\u201d I say.\u00a0 I\u2019m out of the crawlspace.\u00a0 The fresh air smells amazing and I don\u2019t even throw pebbles at the squirrel chattering on our oak tree.\u00a0 I run to the door, breathless like recess.\u00a0 I love that I hear her feet swishing in the grass behind me.\u00a0 We never mow.\u00a0 We\u2019re too busy kissing.<\/p>\n
Where I go, Lizza follows.<\/p>\n
I think about this every day.\u00a0 Four thousand, three hundred and eighteen times, at least, I think about why Lizza follows me.\u00a0 Not one of those times did I think of a good answer.\u00a0 But she does: through the grocery store.\u00a0 \u201cYou have magical veggie-picking powers.\u00a0 Hippy cred to your momma.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0 Into the house.\u00a0 \u201cI can never get the stupid door unlocked.\u00a0 Also my brother always told me as a kid that the Skog would get me if I went in first, because he wanted to be first.\u00a0 I have no idea what the Skog is.\u201d<\/em>\u00a0 To church on the three big ones, Easter, Christmas Eve, Christmas.\u00a0 \u201cLook, it doesn\u2019t hurt to bribe <\/em>all the deity-things, and if there\u2019s a one reason why I might believe in a loving god, Bluejane, it\u2019s you.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n Me.\u00a0 The androgynous tangly geek spending half her time watching anime and Invader Zim and the other half learning about marine biology.\u00a0 Somehow, we were stuck together in a dorm room, and she stuck with me for a year before I found out she was gay.\u00a0 It didn\u2019t take me long to remember I was, too.<\/p>\n That first night, we slept together.<\/p>\n That wasn\u2019t first.\u00a0 First, we lay in the dark in our bras and underwear, staring at the red numbers on her alarm clock.\u00a0 She reached for me and my whole body was on fire where her skin pressed against mine.<\/p>\n \u201cThere\u2019s a reason I\u2019m doing this,\u201d she whispered against my forehead.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s a reason I say what I\u2019m about to say.\u201d<\/p>\n I held my breath.\u00a0 I probably felt like a dog on the Fourth, I was so tense.\u00a0 I thought of all the worst ways it could go.<\/p>\n \u201cI love you, Jane Lee, because you really, truly don\u2019t give a fuck.\u201d<\/p>\n I never swore back then.\u00a0 I thought she was angry, so I started to cry.\u00a0 She sort of laughed, sort of said, \u201cAww,\u201d and hugged me tight.\u00a0 Her hands wandered up to the back of my head and sifted through my oily hair.<\/p>\n \u201cNo, Bluejane.\u00a0 Okay, I want to be serious, but that\u2019s what I\u2019ve called you in my head all this time, and I\u2019ve really wanted to call you that out loud, too, but\u2014I didn\u2019t know if you loved me.\u00a0 Now it doesn\u2019t matter.\u201d\u00a0 She kissed my forehead.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t the first time she\u2019d ever done that, but it was the first time it made me tremble.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019m telling you anyway, you beautiful girl.\u00a0 Well!\u201d\u00a0 She squeaked with delight and my arms squeezed involuntarily, because my heart seized up when she laughed like that.\u00a0 \u201cThere\u2019s another thing I\u2019ve waited too long to say.\u00a0 No, listen to me.\u201d<\/p>\n I did.\u00a0 I could barely believe my ears.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve always thought I was good at not caring what people think, and then I met you.\u00a0 First thing I noticed about you was your Zim notebook.\u00a0 Really,\u201d she insisted when I frowned, \u201cand I thought it was really\u2026I couldn\u2019t believe it.\u00a0 Cute.\u00a0 I thought it was adorable, and amazing.\u00a0 I started following your lead sometimes, speaking my mind and really not caring.\u00a0 Then I realized you<\/em> were adorable, and amazing, always there across the room from me.\u00a0 Especially when you came under the blankets.\u201d<\/p>\n Ohhhh<\/em>.<\/p>\n I started to shake again.\u00a0 \u201cShit,\u201d I said in a tiny voice.\u00a0 I never swore.\u00a0 I wasn\u2019t angry.\u00a0 The tears started up.<\/p>\n Lizza put her face very, very close to my cheek.\u00a0 We just barely didn\u2019t touch.\u00a0 Her lips burned my ear.\u00a0 \u201cI love you, Bluejane.\u00a0 I love you and everything you do, and you should never be ashamed of yourself.\u201d<\/p>\n She began to kiss her way down my cheek.\u00a0 Her tongue took my tears away, one by one, like a soft sponge.\u00a0 She found my lips and I drank her in.\u00a0 She had a little bit more spit than I expected.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t know what was hotter, my face or my desire to put her nipples in my mouth.<\/p>\n \u201cLizza,\u201d I breathed into her flowery hair.<\/p>\n \u201cMmm,\u201d she said.\u00a0 She kissed my neck now, my collarbone now.\u00a0 I braced when she kissed where the car accident had broken the bone, but she was so gentle.\u00a0 My chest heaved under her.<\/p>\n Without another word, I reached behind her back and flipped her bra clasp open.\u00a0 The shape and lace fell away and I saw her breasts as if I had never seen them before.\u00a0 They were mine now.\u00a0 I hadn\u2019t seen them that way before.<\/p>\n They swung away from her, the perfect size for my hands.\u00a0 I fumbled like a bad receiver but I got a nipple to my mouth.\u00a0 I imagined what I would want her to do with mine and I did it.<\/p>\n She rose and fell over me like a snake.\u00a0 I kept a determined hold on her breast and flicked my tongue in every direction.\u00a0 She was stronger than I\u2019d thought.\u00a0 She lowered herself on top of me slower than I could see, and then my bra loosened too.\u00a0 Her hands didn\u2019t stop their slide down my back.\u00a0 I tugged her panties off too.<\/p>\n For a while, we didn\u2019t really move.\u00a0 I wanted to remember how it felt to be a lesbian for the first time for\u2014forever, I guess.\u00a0 I thought very hard about how I would describe the moment.\u00a0 I thought about Lizza\u2019s exact smell: lavender lotion, cornbread, the air after a rain in May.\u00a0 That\u2019s what I thought about hardest.<\/p>\n She began to slide down me like a fireman\u2019s pole.\u00a0 I still couldn\u2019t believe what was happening, so I let her.\u00a0 She kissed above my bellybutton.\u00a0 Kissed my bellybutton.\u00a0 Kissed my little lumpy tummy.\u00a0 Kissed above my hairline.\u00a0 Kissed the hairy places, and then spread my lips with her fingers.\u00a0 The warm, hard tip of her nose touched my wetness.<\/p>\n She made the sound again: \u201cMmm.\u201d\u00a0 Then her velvety tongue began to move across me in tiny strokes.\u00a0 In my head, in my heart, I promised her everything.<\/p>\n Sometimes, Lizza lifted her head just long enough to say, \u201cI love you, Bluejane.\u201d\u00a0 She always went right back to me.\u00a0 Sometimes she slipped a finger inside me where I was wettest.\u00a0 Mostly she sucked me and licked me and stroked me with her impossibly soft tongue.<\/p>\n I was afraid to come.\u00a0 Just at the right moment, she said, \u201cCome, or else,\u201d and I had to.\u00a0 I did a lot of coming under covers, but this was a new level of tender satisfaction.<\/p>\n I heaved and squirted.\u00a0 I arched my back while I hoped I wasn\u2019t splashing her chin.\u00a0 I heard Lizza\u2019s perfect lips smack together and her giggle filled my ears as she tumbled forward onto me.\u00a0 \u201cYou are delicious<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n I touched her over and over.\u00a0 I kept trying to think of ways to assure myself she was real, but only her skin satisfied me.\u00a0 \u201cOh,\u201d I said.\u00a0 Shame was the most natural reaction.\u00a0 \u201cDo I need to\u2014\u201d<\/p>\n She put a finger to my lips, then kissed me like a butterfly.\u00a0 I tasted my lips and my own orgasm\u2014unafraid, I thought.\u00a0 I don\u2019t care what she thinks.\u00a0 \u201cI don\u2019t mind that,\u201d I said.<\/p>\n \u201cThen whenever you\u2019re ready,\u201d Lizza said, \u201cwe\u2019ll see if you like how I taste too.\u00a0 But I don\u2019t care if it never happens.\u00a0 I want to taste you and kiss you forever.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d I said.\u00a0 I didn\u2019t feel afraid with her.<\/p>\n She pulled the blanket up around us and tucked it beneath my other side.\u00a0 \u201cForever is a long time,\u201d she said.\u00a0 It was the only time that night she sounded anything but happy.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is the best thing I\u2019ve ever had,\u201d I said.\u00a0 It was true.\u00a0 \u201cUntil further notice, I\u2019m going to keep it.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cOkay,\u201d Lizza said, wriggling like a puppy in my arms.\u00a0 \u201cLucky me.\u201d<\/p>\n Lucky me, I think.\u00a0 Every day, for four thousand, three hundred and eighteen days, I\u2019ve thought about these words.\u00a0 I still can\u2019t believe it.<\/p>\n She\u2019s in the house now, too, shutting the door.\u00a0 I walk backwards towards the couch, watching.\u00a0 She loves to pounce.\u00a0 \u201cCheat,\u201d Lizza says, and laughs and pounces anyway.\u00a0 We tumble onto the couch in a tangle.<\/p>\n I squirm so I\u2019m behind her all the way.\u00a0 I\u2019m usually the big spoon.\u00a0 \u201cConsider yourself cuddled the fuck out of.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s a terrible sentence.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cShut up.\u201d<\/p>\n She giggles and I squeeze her tight to me.\u00a0 I feel so protective of my little Lizza.\u00a0 I\u2019m small, too, but I\u2019m wiry.\u00a0 My brothers forced me to learn how to fight.\u00a0 She only had one brother, and he was always sick, so she knows how to be gentle.<\/p>\n She settles in.\u00a0 My fingers just barely roll her nipple between them through her shirt as she flips on the Apple TV and we start debating what we are least<\/em> against watching.<\/p>\n To be continued…<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Where Lizza goes, I follow. She\u2019s not like me.\u00a0 She\u2019s the most beautiful girl I know.\u00a0 She has hair as blonde as highway grass.\u00a0 She wears terrible clothes and is still the epitome of cute.\u00a0 She smiles at people and they give her everything she wants, except she only wants adventure.\u00a0 She eats whatever she … <\/p>\n