CHAPTER SEVEN

If I had a hard time speaking as I entered the locker room, I had an even harder time doing so as I left, because the moment I opened the door to the parking lot, in the annoyingly romantic early evening orange light, Lucia was standing there waiting for me, leaning against the wall with her equipment bag dangling from her elbow in yet another annoyingly romantic way that the world seemed to want to keep putting in front of me.

I’d denied myself looking at Lucia this way for so long, but I finally gave up and just looked at her in the way my brain was telling me to. She was attractive in a distracting way, her muscles smooth and hard under her dark olive skin, dotted with just the right number of freckles. Lucia had a habit of wearing shirts that were cropped a little too short at the waist with sleeves she immediately cut off or rolled up to show off her sculpted arms and the ornate tattoo of Metzli, the Aztec goddess of the moon, a playful rabbit jumping among the clouds in the night sky.

Yes, of course, I’d hung on to every single thing Lucia had said on our long bus rides to and from games, including an hours-long seminar on Mexican mythology, Why do you ask ?

“Hey.” Lucia said with a tilt of her head as I approached her, a tilt that shifted some of her shiny jet-black hair into her eyes. “Ready for our hot date?”

Whatever shade my skin was before, it was quickly replaced by something resembling a strawberry. “Lucia, umm…listen, I know Kim may have said some things to you, and said that I said some things…”

“Oh, I’m fully aware she was bullshitting me and trying to arrange this behind your back, she’s not as subtle as she thinks she is.” Lucia smiled, and I wondered how a person could have teeth so white, gleaming, and utterly perfect, framed by lips that were the shade of pinkish red that cosmetics companies probably spent millions on R&D to achieve, but Lucia just had naturally, since I knew she never wore makeup. The extensive catalog of things I knew about this girl should have been an indication of something to me.

My heart was thumping, my breath shallow, my skin crawling with a heat I knew Lucia could probably see on my face, but I didn’t want her to get the wrong idea…and more importantly, what was the wrong idea?

“Do you…not want to hang out? I’d understand, I’m sure she threw you into this literally ten minutes ago, so if she was just completely wrong about this, I’ll see you at the next practice, no hard feelings.”

How could a person be so charismatic? Why did every single move and gesture she made cause me to almost see stars?

“Lucia, I’ve just…never gone out with a girl, and I don’t even know…a lot of things, so I just don’t want you to get an idea about what the date, or whatever, might entail.” I twisted around on my heel, knowing how awkward and pitiful I looked, but right now I had no other way of being.

“Hey, look, we can go get food and watch a movie. That’s all it has to be. I’ve gone out with tons of friends on dates…straight, gay, something in between. I’ m pretty fun to hang out with even if you’re not planning on making out with me.” Lucia smirked.

But I was planning on exactly that, and maybe that’s what scared me. I was close enough to smell the soap on Lucia’s skin, cedarwood and citrus, and maybe the thing I was worried about most was that I wouldn’t be able to stop at making out.

“That, umm…that sounds lovely. Just two girls, and a fun night…” I said, the understatement of the year.

“Violet, you don’t have to be nervous, I won’t push to make this anything it isn’t.” Lucia said, our bodies close. I felt the urge to eliminate the distance and just kiss her, but I held back.

“Let’s just…have a good time, then.” I said, trying to keep my breathing steady.

“Alright!” Lucia said, stepping past me. Were I a cartoon, I would have spun into a small tornado in reaction to the speed. “Let’s go, we’ll take my car because it’s cooler.”

I smiled at Lucia’s ability to just move on. She never let things sit there long enough for them to be uncomfortable or weird, even if she left uncomfortable or weird people in her wake. Lucia led me over to a sporty Subaru, its dark blue paint and yellow accents glittering in the diminishing sunlight. I never really ‘got’ cars, but Lucia’s was always gleaming and pristine, and I could appreciate aesthetics as much as anybody else.

When Lucia opened the passenger door for me, my knees threatened to buckle. “Uhh…thank you, thanks.” I said.

“Of course.” Lucia grinned and raised her eyebrows slightly, so there was no doubt I was showing my emotions way more than I thought.

Once Lucia hopped in and pulled the car out of the parking lot, the air around us finally cleared and we were just two teammates and friends who happened to be hanging out together on a Friday night. Nothing more to it. Right?

Lucia messed with her iPod as she drove us away from the practice facility, somet hing that sort of terrified me since she wasn’t looking at the road, but there’s no way I wanted to call her out on it, not right now.

The speakers came to life with the thrumming beat and twanging guitars of Crystalised by The xx, and I don’t think this woman could have picked a worse choice for a song if she wanted this to be ‘just hanging out’.

“This song…oh my god.” I said, shaking my head, trying to hold back laughter.

“What?” Lucia said, looking over at me and giving a smile.

“No, no, it’s nothing…”

“You wouldn’t be looking like that if it was nothing.” Lucia took a turn with just a hint of aggression, tilting me in my seat, the g-forces making me feel even more alive.

“Ok, umm…this is on my, uh…intimate playlist.” I looked out the window, astonished I was letting this information out to Lucia so easily, but fuck if she wasn’t disarming.

“Oh, you mean for like…sex?”

My throat was so tight I couldn’t breathe, and my palms were sweating enough I could barely keep a grip on my knees, “Uh…yeah. That’s exactly what I mean, but umm…it’s a good song! Hey! It’s great! Awesome album overall!” I was basically shaking from the tension now.

“Do you have someone else you usually listen to it with?” Lucia passed a slow moving Toyota as we got onto the highway, the Subaru’s tires screeching slightly and pawing for grip under Lucia’s wild but assured handling.

“Well, uh, I’ve been listening to it solo for about the last three months…” I said, again wondering why I was just offering this to Lucia.

“Ouch. So your relationship is officially over? I know it’s been dragging for a bit.” Lucia merged into another lane with a quick motion that would have made my head spin if I hadn’t already felt like it was already goin g to pop off and fly into the stratosphere. “Guess that’s why you thought it was high time to try out women, right?”

My mood went dark as I felt judgment from Lucia, whose eyes were fixed on the road, her expression flat. Fuck. I knew she’d see me as a tourist, and by all accounts, I saw myself the same way. No matter how much affinity I had for it in my head, I had no idea if being with a woman would be enjoyable to me or not, and here I was, expecting Lucia to just play along while I tested the waters.

“Lucia, I’m sorry, it’s just…I’m confused, I don’t know what I want, and I feel bad bringing you into it…”

“Why?”

“Just…I feel like I’m being such a fucking stereotypical college girl, being experimental, and I know you don’t--“

“--If you’re going to say I don’t like being with girls who might be gay, Violet, you are so, absolutely wrong.” Lucia smiled, pulling off the exit that lead further into town. “And it doesn’t matter how you define your sexuality, if you’re interested, that’s all that matters. Are you interested?”

My body and mind screamed at me for being so hard on myself and denying what I knew was my truth. The fact that Lucia was being unequivocally supportive of my awkward state was that much better. She was handing this to me on a plate, and I still was sitting here trying to get out from under it.

“I…I know I have feelings for women. I think I sort of always have. But…doing things with one, I don’t know how it would go.”

“Oh, leave that to me.” Lucia smirked. She came perilously close to clipping the bumper of a meandering SUV, the combination of my internal thrill and the external insanity of how Lucia drove was leaving me feeling overwhelmed and wrung out, but it was the most anything I had felt in so long, I didn’t want it to end.

“If you want to learn things, Violet, I can teach you exactly what to do. ”

My face and neck felt so hot, my ears were humming. Was this how people flirted? Should I be flirting back? “Umm, sure.” I said.

We stopped at a light at the south edge of town, one that was always agonizingly long, and right now felt even longer. I looked out the window, trying to not focus on Lucia as the light sat there on red, forever.

“How about we just get it out of the way, see how you feel about it?”

“About what?”

“About kissing a girl.” Lucia said. “Because we’re sitting here at a stop light, and the way you keep staring at me, I don’t want it to hang over you all night long if that’s what you’re worried about, if you think you’re going to suck or whatever.”

“Umm…ok…” I said, my voice meek.

Lucia turned toward me and leaned forward, and I did the same. The moments leading up to the kiss felt like an eternity, but the moment where our lips met felt like two eternities, even if it was only for a couple of seconds. When I kissed Lucia, I felt my world untangle, questions I’d been asking myself for so long being answered in an instant. She was so soft, so warm, so delicious.

She pulled back the moment the light turned green, looking at the road with an understated grin on her face. “So?”

My heart was pounding in my chest, and my mouth was dry. My entire body was buzzing with anticipation and need, and my brain felt like it was packed so tightly with possibilities that I couldn’t move. I felt so…fuck. “Lucia, that…umm…I don’t think I have to question whether or not I’m into girls any more, because that was maybe the best thing I’ve ever felt.”

“Oh, god, Violet, don’t give me that much credit, that was barely a peck.” Lucia smiled and looked at me. “What would you like to do next? Get something to eat, maybe get dessert, then a movie?”

I nodded slowly. My mouth was still so dry .

“Cool. What are you hungry for?”

You…you…YOU! I wanted to scream it at her, but somehow I managed to maintain my composure. I’m sure my face was still as red as it could possibly be, and if Lucia noticed how labored my breath was, she was polite enough not to mention it. “Anything. You know the town, just…umm…whatever sounds…”

And then something switched in me. Something deep down, something that had lurked within me for so long. I was always wishy-washy about stuff, never wanted to ruffle feathers, never wanted to say what I really wanted. But as I tasted Lucia on my lips, and felt the unbridled energy that one kiss from her sparked within me, I didn’t feel a need to hold back.

“…actually, I would really like to order delivery to my dorm and make out with you on my bed. I don’t have a roommate.” That last part was awkward as fuck, but at this point I was laying all my cards on the table.

Lucia kept her eyes on the road as we stopped at a red light. I saw her swallow and lick her lips. “You’re being forward, Violet. I like it.” Lucia glanced at me from the corner of her eye.

And, god, I liked it too.