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She sounds cynical, which is not how she normally is. She can be a bit of a contradiction at times. She usually sees the best in most people she meets and then in other glimpses of her she has a hardened cold view of the world. We still dance around talking about her childhood, I still don’t know the details or any real information except that her mother is still alive and she never knew who her father was. Her mother from what I can gather is still in the city but they have had no contact since Arya left as a teen, and that is the way Arya wants it to remain. I haven’t pushed her.
I have no real experience in family controversy. I had a completely normal childhood, I felt loved by both my parents. My father wasn’t a drinker, my mom was quiet and kind-minded. My brother was born a few years after me and there was love, bickering, normality.
Studying and my job inevitably pulled me further and further away. I studied for years in a different city and then I never returned home, building my life here with Matt instead. My family visited me. I visited them. It has always been warm and pleasant; they are proud of me. My dad sure likes to boast about his surgeon daughter, and my mom quietens him but I can see the pride in her eyes too. It makes me feel good. I had expected a little backlash when I told them about Matt and me but they were very calm.
“You know what is best for you, better than anyone else sweetheart.” My dad had told me and that was that. We continued in the same manner as we always had. John, my brother, had been a little more shocked. I think because he saw my life as this perfect picture of hard work and stability. He didn’t say anything out of line, but he called more. He checked in more often than birthdays and Christmases and Mom let slip that he was a bit worried now about me living in the city alone.
I rolled my eyes at his typically masculine need to protect a woman complex but I assured her and everyone else that I was just fine.
And as I walk around the park with Arya … I am actually starting to feel just fine again. They weren’t just hollow words that I am hiding behind. Better than fine, even. Like I said, summer always makes me feel better. But it is more than that. It is her too.
We connect on so many levels. Working with her is effortless. I don’t even need to use words, I can read her body and it is like she can read my mind. We work in sync, anticipating each other flawlessly.
The other doctors and medics have noticed too. They comment on how we perform surgery together as though it is art. I feel a spark of something the moment our names are mentioned in the same sentence. I look for our names on the roster, and hope we will be scheduled together. I try not to make adjustments to force it to happen, even though I do have that power. I let it happen naturally, I would never abuse my power in that way, but when it aligns … my heart beats a little faster.
“Juliet, are you even listening to me?” Arya cuts through my thoughts and I turn to her with a glazed expression.
She laughs, “Well, it wasn’t that important anyway … just … please, Juliet. You have to think about yourself a little bit more. These people who don’t invite you, well for want of a better word, fuck them. They are the ones that lose out on your total fabulousness.”
Now it is my turn to laugh. “My total fabulousness?” I reply with a raised eyebrow as I look down at my mismatched outfit. My shoes have been chosen for comfort, not elegance. My shorts did made my ass look good in the mirror but the tight black denim didn’t quite pair up with the light loose vest I had pulled on in a rush. My hair had started down, but as I felt the heat, I had scraped it back in a half-up, half mess pony. I am the definition of un-fabulousness.
“It baffles me how un self -aware you are.” She replies with a shake of her head, I let the silence come, not sure how to respond.
“The thing is, Juliet …” she pauses as though treading water and unsure of the depth. “You are completely oblivious to the effect you have on people. I get that when you look in the mirror you see the flaws. We all do. But you know, it is important to find the balance. Look.”
She reaches for my hand and I tense … the shock of surprise at her touch makes me hold my breath as she turns my palm over in her hands. “You look at your hand it is like all you see are the signs that you are older. The scars. The lines. But no one else sees them, like for me … all I see is how steady they are, your elegant fingers, the softness of your fingertips, how you can hold a blade-like it is an extension of you. Your hands move deftly and easily as though with no thought … they have saved so many lives, they will save so many more. They’re beautiful, soft, special, sexy …”
She pauses again as she looks up from my hand and her gaze meets mine, our eyes lock. It is like the air stills around us. My pounding heart thuds so loudly I can hear it in my ears. My pulse races and I feel her thumb brush over the artery in my left wrist … I know she can feel it, and she will read the quickening of my pulse. She bites down on her lower lip, she is hesitant.
But it is not only that she can read me, I can read the physical change in her too. Her pupils dilate and her cheeks flush a rosy pink. I feel the tiny tremble in her grip, see the quickening of her breath as she releases her lip from the grip of her teeth.
I move without thought, and certainly without consideration for the consequences. My hand turns to hold hers. My other hand reaches up to run through soft blonde wisps of her hair. I brush the strands back from her cheek and I lean in. My head moves with a certainty that I rarely possess outside of work.
Her head tilts, resting in my palm, letting me draw her into me as I move into her space. Her eyelashes flutter. I am so close I think I could count each one… and then our lips meet.
It isn’t an explosion, there are no fireworks, but something shifts deep inside of me. There is a tenderness to it, the kiss is so soft I feel like I could melt into her. My fingers thread, entwining with hers and we draw closer. She tastes like honey and almonds, creamy and sweet. She gasps a little as my tongue presses and swirls, desperate to taste more of her. We speak a language without words. It is our desires, our bodies that are talking for us now.
In the same way that we anticipate each other in theatre, we anticipate each other now. My leg slides outwards as hers presses in, giving me a brush of the bare skin of her calves. I shiver and as I do, she squeezes my hand tight until her short nails mark my palm.
It is dizzying. I don’t know how I stay standing. I don’t know how long it lasts. But the moment it ends, I only wish it would start all over again. We look at each other, still holding hands, breathless and with swollen lips and she smiles. Then I smile … then I giggle. Fuck, I feel like a teenager. Except I am not.
6
That is all the time it takes for my doubts and insecurities to rise. I allow myself a few minutes of perfection and then my own thoughts spoil it all. I step back and I move to pull my hand from hers but Arya holds on tight.
“Don’t do that.” She says softly with a light squeeze, she moves, still holding my fingers. She guides me to a bench where we both sit. “Don’t shut me out. Talk to me.”
“I haven’t … the thing is I don’t … Well, I am not sure … I just don’t think …” I stop and start and she laughs softly giving my hand a gentle rub of her thumb in reassurance.
“Deep breaths, one at a time. Tell me the biggest thing. Then the next. Don’t stop, just tell me all of them. All of the doubts. Then we will work through each one. Ready … go …”
I nod and take a deep breath in. “I have never been with a woman. I don’t know what I am doing. I’m not even gay. I am way too old for you. You are too beautiful for me. I am your boss, it isn’t appropriate. I just don’t think I am good enough for you.”
“Ouff.” She replies, her eyebrows raised in absolute shock. “I mean, I thought it was probably about work. I had guessed you hadn’t actually been with a woman before … but not good enough for me … Juliet … You are amazing, beautiful, smart, intelligent. You literally take my breath away every single day. You don’t need to think like that at all. Ever. I was thinking that you might think I wasn’t enough for you, I never imagined …” Her voice trails off and I blush a little.
“Oh, come on Arya. You know how beautiful you are. I have literally seen people stop in the corridors when they see you. How many people ask you out a week?” She frowns at me.
“You mean … how many middle-aged men leer at me, corner me, and hound me to go for a drink with them? Then if I tell them, I am gay … I see the ding ding ding, behind their eyes of wow, porn star lesbian fantasies which inevitably slide into … ‘I am cool with that; I have always wanted a threesome.’ And I am actually a little bit sick in my mouth at the thought of it. You mean those people that ask me?”
