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#their gaydars went off even when social distancing
recipe-for-thomathy · 4 years
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Defining Heartbreak: The Friendzone
I felt like writing and I guess could be a place to put it as it’s my only social media account where I have a bit more anonymity.    I feel hung over as fuck today, but noticed when I was articulating some deeper thoughts with someone that instantly felt better - so here goes with a story not of woe is me, but of the discovery I made about myself  Unrequited love over the years has reared it’s head a couple times.    In my early twenties, a guy I met online on Gaydar (is that site still a thing) - became a friend. I was actually his first gay friend and we hung out a lot.  We both went ot the same university and had one class that we both had in common - despite studying different degrees.   I thought he was super cute, intelligent and a catch - he had a certain confident swagger about him. Nothing sexual ever happened between us.   He then went overseas to live in France for a year - studying at the same university that the recently departed Kofi Annan.   Fast forward a year and over that time of missing him, I realised I had feelings for him and the cliche of distance only making the heart grow fonder certainly rung true.   When he finally returned to Australia, I was so happy to see him and a bunch of us hit the town together. A friend brought his rather cute pal along and joined me and my crush on a night out.   As it turns out, my friend’s cute pal ended up hooking up with my crush.  In a tree. IN A FUCKING TREE.  
I was crushed.      Like *spoiler alert* Captain America watching his best mate Bucky die or Tony Stark seeing a fading spiderman begging him not to go.   Yeah I was in my early 20s but it was defining moment of heartbreak. 
I dont remember how long after but I was moping around at my brother’s place and my sister was there.  She saw me dejected and withdrawn, asking me ‘what’s wrong?’ - I left out the front door and sat on the balcony and ugly cried.   And not the ugly crying I did when KFC stopped selling hot and spicy chicken, this was far far worse.  And a defining moment of heartbreak.  Sidebar:  I’ve always been a bit of a philosphical existentialist - mainly due to the the movie ‘The Matrix’.  The nature of reality fascinates me.    When I was 18, the philosphical book ‘The Celestine Prophecy’ came into my life... I actually ‘found’ the book on the street (I kid you not!) and it changed my life and the way I think abnd that’s where the true existentialist in me had an awakening. anyways. I’ve always been an introspective soul -- something perhaps most people I know don’t realise.  The cyclic nature of life (ok picture me holding my laptop up ala the Lion King pose as we sing the Circle of Life) - means that sometimes it feels like things repeat themselves.  I sometimes forget about the lessons that we need to learn and of course it came from another defining moment of heartbreak - this time in my mid 30′s.  I’d started chatting to this guy on a dating app mid 2016.    I thought he was super cute, intelligent and a catch - he had a certain confident swagger about him.   Feeling a sense of De ja vu?  No,it’s not a glitch in the matrix.    I tend to have a long lead time before I meet anyone online (I’m sure there’s a basis of fear of rejection in there but really are you that surprise after hearing that fucking sob story before!?) Anyways, we ran into each other at the gym and that was the first time we met.  We hung out a few times, and certainly these felt like dates.  We had a lot in common (and a lot in difference too), laughed alot and he was probably the first guy in a long time I met whose personality I loved.    He was witty at time cutting, his text game was super strong - but I’d usually own him face to face.   We’d spend our days jibing at each other trying to insult each other with memes (because Memes are life, right!?).  One time I was chatting to him via text -  describing a guy I used to like and how this dude and I had a lot common, was super nice... he replied to me ‘Kinda like us really?’  AND WHOA hold up this could be a romantasiced re-telling of my overthinking interpretation of a message - but that was sliding doors moment that would lead me to my next defining heartbreak.     I should have taken the bait.  But I was scared.  My absolute fear of rejection was scared to just tell this dude I like him - even if I was misconstrued in that message.    I do prefer voice messages over text because tone is a hard mother fucker to judge - thank god for emojis and ifs but still - just press that record button on whatsapp (He didnt’ like voice messages as he thought they were lazy) whereas I like to really convey my meaning.
Unless that meaning is ‘cue Madonna’ “IM CRAAAAZY FOR YOU TOUCH ME ONCE and you’ll know it’s truuuuue I never wanted anyone like this it’s all brand new... you’ll feel it in my kiss, you’ll feel it in my touch because I’m crazy for you - touch me once and you’ll know its’ true’
Anyways sorry about that Australian Idol gone Karaoke wrong moment. If you’ve fallen asleep reading this, you can thank me for the cure to insomnia later.  Ok, cut to the chase Jimbo - fast forward a year and half of being friends with someone you secretly love.  I use the term’ secretly’ loosely - because OMG was I just coming across as the love sick despo girl - random presents in his mailbox, being the nicest most supportive, generous friend - because hey, maybe he’ll come around if I kill him with kindness.  There’s an excellent article on being in the friendzone you should read by the way - I’ll talk about that later. I’m not going to go into details out of respect for this guy, but I knew inherently and the truth of the matter was no matter what I did or who I was - he was still on his Rupaul ‘can’t love nobody unless you love yourself’ journey.   So the harsh reality, and the ‘hes just not that into you’ vibes as espoused by Oprah back in the day meant this defining heartbreak was a bit different to the first.   I knew it was too far into the friendzone (never say never, but yeah let’s be real).. if it’s in the friendzone, they have to give you something that’ll finally get you into the endzone.  Anyways, I’d do anything for this guy.  Despite actually rationally speaking he didn’t tick some major core values for me.  It’s funny how attraction works.   A close friend who is a counsellor told me about ‘attachment styles’ (look it up, I wont digress more than I already have) - but essentially I was a major victim (of my own doing, because people don’t cause us to feel - we cause us to feel - think about that for a sec).. I was a major victim of treat em mean keep em keen. And I kept coming back for more.   I even tried weening myself off him by disengaging and that was great, but then we re-engaged. His was of re-engaging was sending me a message that said ‘Welfare Check’.  If it was me, I’d be like ‘Hey dude, I miss you! whats up!?’  The last time we saw each other was almost 2 months ago - nothing dramatic went down, but after not seeing the guy for a few weeks - he could only afford me about 40 minutes of his time.    It was a pleasant catch up but neither of us have communicated since.   He’s stubborn and I’m stubborn too.  But ulimately, it’s not healthy for me to love someone who doesn’t know what to do with my love.   And I look back at my own behaviour and do a major eyeroll because I really should save that stuff for someone who likes me back. That article I mentioned above - which I’ll post the link to - had a very simple suggestion and rule to avoid unrequited love and being in the friendzone. Only like somone who likes you back. OH MY FUCKING GOD REGINA YOU COULD HAVE TOLD ME THAT A YEAR AND A HALF AGO! Anyways, I’ve had some amazing dates and met a couple awesome guys (there’s still a them of them not living in the same city as me but hey I can deal with that for the moment). I have a lot of love in my life and the love I give  is welcomed and I’m not feeling like I’m being treated as an afterthought.  I emphasis ‘feeling’ because the truth is, I may not be an afterthought to him.   But actions do speak louder than words, and his inaction has spoken to me.   That’s cool.   My love will always be there.   But in defining heartbreak, I defined myself and thank you for reading this I’d like to thank the academy and you for being you. You are loved. 
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aseriesofthrills · 3 years
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Suzie Is Back
Suzie is back, and so are long, overly emotional, rambling posts.
I matched with Suzie mid-October 2020. Caileigh and I had broken up earlier that summer after 3.5 years together, and my plan was to take some time off dating to “figure myself out.” Caileigh was the first person I ever dated, so I thought being single and out at the same time - for the first time - was a necessary step in figuring out my identity as an individual. Well, I’m not sure if you’re aware, but there’s this big thing called a Global Pandemic going on that’s forcing us all to choose between our physical health and a social life. Put simply, I was lonelier than America’s Dad Tom Hanks on a deserted island before he found Wilson. Or maybe even lonelier than America’s Dad Tom Hanks after he struck up a friendship with Wilson, because after all, Wilson was a volleyball. I wanted to find my Wilson.
And boy did I find a lot of Wilsons. Unfortunately for me, I found a lot of off-brand Wilsons that were the wrong color, didn’t hold air well, or came out of the box with fabric missing. This is not to say these Wilsons are undesirable. I’m sure any of them would provide solid companionship to the next unfortunate soul whose fallen plane renders them a castaway. They were just not for me.
There was Emily, someone who I had strong feelings for and made me realize I’d really like to date someone who’s also Jewish. I was wowed by her philanthropic agenda of making candles and donating half the proceeds, until she did a very gay thing™ and got back with her ex, which was when I began to wish I instead had simply donated that $100 directly to charity and didn’t have to stare at her Tender Flame (more like Tinder Flame, amirite) candles sprinkled around my house. Looking back, we really were not compatible. Emily taught me that just because you have good banter with someone and a shared belief system, it doesn’t mean you wont clink teeth when you make out for the first time. It might even mean she will be extremely silent while you go down on her for what feels like hours, then not reciprocate because she is… probably thinking about getting back with her ex.
Then there was MK, someone who I’d actually met once before at a Hollywood Ladies Drinks Night Before The World Shut Down We Used To Have It So Good Oh My God. I remember wondering that night if she might be queer, but my gaydar couldn’t figure her out and I was in a relationship so it was a moot point anyway. I was hesitant to send her a “like” on Hinge because what if she didn’t feel the same way and then I ran into her at a work thing in 2023 and she KNOWS I liked HER but we BOTH know SHE didn’t like me BACK and -
It took me 3 seconds to get over that existential crisis because I remembered that thousands of people were dying every day and nothing actually mattered. So I liked one of her photos, and she matched with me in literally 4 minutes. I normally like to talk to someone for at least a few weeks - pandemic or not - before meeting in person, but she almost immediately suggested getting together the following weekend. Maybe that’s just her, or maybe she felt confident that I’m most likely not a serial killer since we have mutual friends, but she went for it and I agreed because I hadn’t yet figured out how to assert my own boundaries. But also, why not. It was just a picnic.
It was not just a picnic. It was a picnic conveniently a few blocks from her apartment. It was a picnic and then it was dinner and sex. I enjoyed spending time together at first, but the more we talked and hung out the more my feelings dissipated. In the middle stretch I thought for a second that I had perhaps cracked the mythical Friends With Benefits code, but after a few more dates I realized the code was far more complicated than I’d originally anticipated and what I thought was the treasure map key was actually just meaningless hieroglyphics and OK I will stop this metaphor now. It was time to take the high road and be honest, which for me manifested in telling her I was going to quarantine the next 2 weeks before flying home so this would be the last time I saw her before 2021 and we should check in when we’re back in LA in January - and then I texted her once I got to Florida to say lets just be friends. Not my proudest moment, but we’re learning.
There were a few other short-lived dalliances, but we all have places to go and people to see (from a distance). Just know I somehow managed to make the Pandemic Year my own personal Slut Year. And we’re using the term slut lovingly, simply to describe that 2020 was the year I managed to sleep with more people than any year prior. Tell me I can’t do something, then watch me work.
If you pay attention to detail, as I’m sure my 2 consistent followers do, you’ll remember Suzie and I matched mid-October which was in the midst of my MK chronicles. I am not exaggerating when I say that I was lovestruck by Suzie just from her Hinge profile and pictures. I don’t mean like, “Oh, she’s pretty, I hope she likes me back.” I mean like, something happened to my brain immediately that can only be described as some version of virtual pheromones invading my bloodstream. It felt uncontrollable and biological. And if we learned anything from Dr. Fauci this year, it’s that science knows best. The first real conversation we had - meaning that sweet sweet moment someone on a dating app finally admits that they, too, were looking at the app at the very same moment you messaged them - felt engaging and electric and right. At the end of the conversation I gave her my number and she immediately texted me “Talk to you tomorrow *kissy emoji*,” which probably made me precum. 
What ensued was months of talking every day. I’ll drone on for paragraphs if I let myself, so I’m not going to let myself. I’ll just say for a while it felt amazing. I liked her so deeply. It took us a good stretch of time before we broached the subject of seeing each other in person, but then a combination of her horrific time management skills (her words), a potential Covid exposure, and a highly contentious presidential election got in the way and lead us down a windy path ultimately culminating in a Zoom first date… a week and a half before I was supposed to fly home for 2 months. The Zoom date was everything I hoped it would be and more. I’d never felt more sad to click “End Meeting For All” but was too giddy to notice. She asked me about my holiday plans, so I told her about my impending travel, and then she more or less said we should have sex before I go. So we did. And it was the best sex of my life. And then I left the state of California, our mutual residence, for 2 months.  
Things were somewhat fine at first - we were still talking every day, with a few more Zooms sprinkled in - but then she went home to New Jersey, and suddenly we weren’t talking every day. It was more like every 3-4 days and rarely in actual conversational form. It was more like me waiting for her to reply, then waiting to respond since she’d waited so long, then we’d do it all over again. I felt anxious and tortured and dejected and had no appetite and my mom asked me on more than one occasion if I was ok. I was not ok. But I told myself to bE cHiLL, something that is often diametrically opposed to my natural state of being. I reminded myself that, despite the fact that we had spoken every day for 2 months - which is practically one step away from engagement in LesbianLand - we had only had one in-person date. I was careful to not make It seem more serious than It was, so instead I workshopped a lot of dramatic WHAT ARE WE? texts that I sent to all of my friends and never to Suzie.
We had mutually agreed upon “See you in January,” so I told myself I’d just ask her to hang out when we got back. Then she postponed her flight to LA for 2 more weeks because our Covid numbers were at a scary peak, the worst it had been since the beginning of the Pandemi Lovato. Finally she told me she’d rebooked her flight for the 15th, and I optimistically thought to myself, “You simply don’t tell someone the exact day you’re getting back into town if you don’t plan on seeing them! Right?” Wrong. I shot my shot, and she shot me down. She replied with a long series of texts explaining that her mental health wasn’t in a good place, and she couldn’t be accountable for communicating effectively. She sprinkled in some compliments for good measure, making sure to take a pit stop in “I think you are so wonderful so please don’t think this has anything to do with you” Town, which was reassuring but did not override my brain’s instinct to rethink everything I’d done and said the past few months. But I felt connected to her on a human level, and I didn’t want to lose that simply because she didn’t want to bump butts anymore, so I suggested we be friends and she enthusiastically agreed. End of conversation.
Until later that night, when she texted me Greetings after landing at LAX. I was confused, but I assumed that just meant she was taking me at my word, and this friendship started n.o.w. What followed was some of the most perplexing behavior I’ve witnessed as a living person and hands down the most confounding I’ve ever experienced in my dating career. She’d text me about a new vibrator she bought, or send me a song link then simply “heart” my response and be done with the exchange. It felt like she was just reminding me she existed, as if my small brain could forget. Sometimes she’d ask me how I was doing and we’d have semblances of a real friendship, but other times she’d tell me that I’m SO HOT or send me DMs of a sexy Phoebe Bridgers photo or a Normal People instagram post of Connell telling Marianne she’s pretty. Somewhere in the middle of all that my patient friend Caroline finally hit me with some tough love and told me I needed to block Suzie’s number and hide her on social media. For all intents and purposes, Suzie couldn’t exist anymore. Caroline was right, but I couldn’t do it, so I compromised that for the next week I wouldn’t reach out to Suzie first. Caroline told me “Alcoholics have to quit cold turkey, they don’t get to say well I drink on the weekends” but I decided I was simply not able to do anything more drastic than not text this freshly 25 year old girl who was slowly unraveling my emotional stability first for a week.
You will not believe this but I survived the week and actually felt better, so I did it again the next week. And the next. And the next. Until it had been a month and I hadn’t reached out to Suzie first. She was still texting and DMing me, but I felt my feelings finally waning! Gone were the days of finding her high school ex-boyfriend’s blog in the depths of the internet or looking her up on Venmo to see who she’d gotten Chipotle with the night before. I absolutely still liked her - those fucking pheromones are relentless - but it felt less fresh, so I started to formulate a plan. Once I felt FULLY (lol) over her, I’d text her the next time I was horny. Best case scenario she’d come over, worst case scenario she’d be so disgusted or insulted that she’d never want to talk to me again and I’d actually get over her, not pretend-get-over-her-so-I-could-trick-myself-into-safely-bootycalling-her. But then she sent me potentially the most flirtatious message yet, and I took my opening at 12:53p on a Wednesday and simply said “when are you going to fuck me.” She fucked me that Saturday night.
So. Suzie is back, and Saturday night (and Sunday morning, *wink* she slept over) was great. But now it’s terrible, horrible, no good, very bad again, to borrow some words from Judith Viorst.
How we left things this time is that she does want to see me again, but it can’t be a talk-everyday-thing because she’s ~bUsY* and moving to NYC this summer anyway for grad school (did I forget to mention that? Oops!) and for whatever other reasons that exist that are preventing her from being obsessed with me. She asked what my boundaries and needs are too, and both her actions and words that night really felt clear that she still liked me. I asked if she thought she’d ever see me again. There are some things you really can only ask while cuddling post-sex, and that’s one of them. She paused and said yes. She explained the context around her poor communication and that she never wanted to stop talking to or seeing me, and the way she was holding me felt like she was feeling just as connected to me as I was to her. You can tell when someone just isn’t there with you, and this was not that. We were both right there.
But we were also right back to there being a power imbalance between us. There’s no escaping the fact that this is really on her terms in its present configuration. Our best plan was to promise to be honest moving forward, which felt like it had a lot of potential at the time, but it turns out being honest is hard. Things sort of reverted back to how they were, except with all of my feelings and expectations that I’d worked hard to push down rushing back to take their place on the frontlines of my brain.
It’s been almost 2 weeks, and we’ve talked a few times every 2-4 days. I’m fighting the urge to memorialize exactly what’s transpired, but there’s simply no use in holding onto the details. What finally made all of these not-at-all latent emotions bubble up to the surface and inspired this Intense Feelings Word Vomit is two pronged. First, because I love to torture myself, sometimes I look at Suzie’s Hinge profile to see if she’s changed anything. For some reason, if it stays the same, I feel safe that she’s not seeking out anyone else but me. Which is somewhat logical but also farcical in this particular situation, and I fully understand that. I guess I was really wanting to invite some pain into my life tonight, because even after she texted me yesterday and then proceeded to stretch a very short conversation into something that still is in limbo, I decided it would be fruitful to check her Hinge profile. I’m here to report that all 3 of her prompt questions & answers were different. And readers, I had previously checked it recently enough to know this was a very fresh edit.
The second thing that pushed my feelings over the top, out of my mouth, and directly onto my keyboard is that when she finally texted me back at like 11:30pm, she seemed to entirely brush over two clear attempts, in my opinion, at relaying that I’d like to see her again. And that feels not good. My instinct is to tell myself that maybe my comments weren’t as overt as I first believed them to be, but I think that’s a thinly veiled excuse and a defense mechanism. If someone wants to see you, they will.
I’m almost certain (I am certain) all of my friends - ALL of them! I have A LOT! - are up to their eyeballs in Suzie-flavored-shit, so before writing this I must admit I did the loneliest thing of all: instead of being honest and sharing my feelings directly with her, I texted them… to myself. Raw, unedited emotions that I hope to never re-read one day but probably will and when I do I sure hope I’m in a healthier place and can laugh about it and think about How Far I’ve Come.
The truth is, I’m sitting here all over again picturing the dates I could take her on (the Carlsbad Flower Fields), what restaurants she should experience before leaving LA (Pace), and what fun at-home activities I could plan for us before the world fully returns to a post-Covid society (the DIY pottery kit I bought for myself, fully aware she loves to make clay art). Dare I admit I even daydream about the cross-country road trip that I’ll offer to accompany her on when she moves back East. I look at the contents in my fridge and think, “Maybe I wont use that ingredient tonight in case I need it to make us dinner next time she comes over.” I was ready to plan trying to get vaccinated this weekend around her availability, which is actually insane. You look up simp in the dictionary, and there I am. I took the crumb she gave me and turned it into a huge fucking Mrs. Fields birthday cookie cake that serves 20. No wonder I feel sick.
Unless I’m entirely miscalculating, which I can safely say I am not, Suzie is not sitting in her home thinking the same about me. I think she does like me - I have to allow myself to believe she does, because she said she does, and if I don’t believe it now I never will - but I also have to admit that 6 months into this game of Suzie Mental Gymnastics, I can recognize that all signs are pointing directly to the fact that I like her far more than she likes me. I don’t say that as a form of self-flagellation; it’s just a fact that I need to finally accept. Not just accept, but also let go of the possibility that it’s going to change. That’s the hardest part. I naively thought we were getting back on the ride again, and I buckled up for what turned out to be just a detour.
It can feel nearly impossible to pull yourself away from someone, especially when it feels like their claws are deeply embedded in your brain and your heart. That sounds wildly dramatic, but it is genuinely how I feel. What’s doubly hard is being able to trust my own instincts. I can get attached very quickly, and then it’s almost indecipherable whether someone is actually mistreating me or if my unrealistic expectations don’t allow the other person a chance to actually meet them. This whole essay could potentially be described as an overreaction, but the more I think about it, the more confident I feel in the validity of my feelings. Even if part of the issue is setting my expectations too high, the bigger issue is how I’m being treated. Suzie and I did agree on a low-pressure situation, but it doesn’t take much more than the bare minimum effort to consider another person’s feelings. And I don’t think my feelings are being considered all too much.
Not that Suzie ever really left my life in a real way, but I’m starting to think she came “back” for me to get a second chance at prioritizing my boundaries, my feelings, myself. I don’t want to overreact and call a party foul too soon, but perhaps I need to readjust my idea of what constitutes too soon. After all, maybe it was a mistake to not have asked for clarity sooner the first time. It would have probably allowed me to enjoy my time at home with family more and saved my brain a heck of a lot of overtime I am still saving up to pay. A not-no doesn’t mean a yes, and waiting does not change the outcome. It’s a natural reaction to hold on tighter to someone while loosening your grip on your own needs when you feel them pulling away, but it’s often something you can’t stop from happening. And that’s a tough pill to swallow. Sometimes you have to assert your needs when they’re not being met and watch things fall apart, not because you have those needs but in spite of them. You start again. I will start again.
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renaroo · 6 years
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Cass and Harper, #4
A Gentle Stroke
Disclaimer: Batman and associated characters are the creative property of DC Comics. Warnings: Bi Butterflies and feeeeelingsRating: TPairings: Cassandra Cain/Harper Row
A/N: Sorry for the wait, this week got crazy but this was fun to write and it’s been a good while since I wrote this ship or even just Harper in general so thank you so much for the prompt! It was a lot of fun!
When it happened, Bluebird was almost certain it had been an accident.
They were celebrating, in the short breathless way that vigilantes of Gotham did after finishing off a particularly dangerous mission together. It had been a long time since Harper Row and donned the suit she once crafted with her own hands and got herself dirty for the sake of the city, but she remembered how these sorts of things went. A wisp of condensed breath in the brittle harbor winds, the easy glances between friends behind masks, smiles of accomplishment hidden underneath labored breaths.
There was a real sense of you did good, kid, hanging between herself and the enigmatic Orphan.
Foundations of friendship, embittered ties tested by a twisted past. They were young women, but they carried the aged old souls of soldiers from their lives.
Harper was never really one who was lost on words so she began to say something in turn toward Cassandra. Ask her how much of her larger perp count came from watching over Harper’s rusty back. But those were words which didn’t come out because the aptly named Orphan was moving in toward her first.
The question of what was in Harper’s throat and she was ready to turn around expectantly for someone they missed coming at her. But there was no time for thought or movement or even response because…
Cassandra’s mask had been lifted, just over to the bridge of her nose, over her chin and her chapped lips.
And then her gloved hand was on Harper’s cheek, presenting the most gentle of caresses while a small but certain smile of thanks matching on Cass’ face.
The other girl had wanted Harper to see her mouth, the slight flush in her cheeks or the way the cold air steamed out from between her teeth. And she wanted the unguarded parts of Harper’s cheeks to feel the roughness of leather wrapped around her fingers and the texture of the stitches which held the glove together.
It was the most gentle of touches, a stroke with the palm of Cassandra’s hand, and it was so tender and warm in the moment that Harper forgot they were behind a warehouse on the Dixon Harbor surrounded by unconscious felons with a penchant for illegal firearms.
And then Cass moved on, probably certain of some alert system or police contact or something that was about to break up the moment between them anyway. It was hard telling with Cass sometimes.
So Harper was left instead, a bit dumbfounded and oblivious. She was taken off guard because there was almost nothing that could be counted as normal with the situation at hand. After all, when had it ever been normal social etiquette to do that let alone then?
Overthinking like it was her third major, Harper considered that Cass’ understanding of social norms was something they were still working on even a few years later and that there was a certain loving nature with the girl that had endeared her to everyone in spite of or even because of the horrors of her past. It wasn’t as if she could just assume what was meant by Cassandra’s caress. It was just a gentle touch, a stroke, a gesture that was going to cause Harper to lose every semblance of sense in her very, very bi mind at that moment.
The dumbfounded nature she was showing was more than a little uncharacteristic and as such, she was quick to snap herself out of it once she glanced up and saw that Cassandra, fully masked again, had actually double backed from her disappearing trick and was looking worriedly toward Harper for having not already followed. A well deserved amount of scrutiny to say the least.
Plus, the police sirens were closing in.
“Keep your shit together, Row,” Harper grimaced, smacking herself in the forehead before jogging toward the very shadows that Cass had already picked for their escape.
Once they left the scene of their triumph, an uncomfortable silence fell between Bluebird and Orphan. The kind where one was not quite sure what to make of the other’s without thinking to break they own vow.
Awkward, Harper’s mind finally decided on. Awkward was the name of their game. And Harper kind of hated it.
One of the things which had most defined their friendship and, in turn, had made Harper the happiest about having gotten Cass in her life, was the fact that there really hadn’t been anything left to get awkward about. The bonds they forged in spite of how the past tried to define them and their relationship had put them beyond those sorts of things.
It was why a retired Harper Row, rusty and sleep deprived from a few semesters of engineering finals, was willing to take a week night and roam streets and rooftops as Bluebird. Because that was just how comfortable that Cassandra, the Orphan, made her.
No one in the world was safer in those days than they were under Cass’ wing.
So why did that same generosity and gentleness make everything so damn awkward back there.
A far enough distance away from their fighting grounds, Harper, already a few strides behind Cass, skidded to a stop and held up her hands as her head shook. “Okay, okay, okay. Stop. Wait. Reverse. We need to go back to a few moments ago.”
Gracefully, Cassandra turned on her heels and faced Harper. Even beneath her face mask, there was a notable sense of confusion.
“What did you… lose? Cass asked, fumbling a bit with the last word from a lack of regular use.
“I didn’t lose anything,” Harper assured her. “We don’t have to, like, physically get back there. I just. Well. I might have to recalibrate some of my meters here.” She knew the analogy was utterly lost on Cassandra, but the girl showed the usual patience of a saint anyway. Harper made a distinct note in her mind to cash in some of her IOU’s built up from Tim and Steph to demand one of them explain the concept of gaydar to their friend.
“Okay?” Cassandra said, shifting her weight on to the balls of her feet then resting back.
Like everything else Cassandra did in her life, each motion was calculated, every muscle restrained. There was purpose in the stretch of every fiber of her being.
Which was the issue or the not issue of the moment because if everything had purpose and meaning then there was a purpose or meaning behind the stroke of a hand and if that happened then, well, Cassandra had done something vey deliberate. But why. Because Harper wasn’t sure if anything Cass meant was what Harper and most people would think was meant and—
She was overthinking again.
“Harper?” Cass asked curiously.
There was caution and control in Cassandra’s voice. She said Harper’s name and not her codename which was also layered in meaning and personalbility not often used in the field. And then there was the simple emotion of the moment, like she didn’t understand what Harper was doing either. Which was bad, because Harper didn’t know what she was doing or why she was so thrown by a moment of intimacy which was…
And that was when Harper’s mind hit pause again and the reason she was so startled was because that touch and that moment felt like something truly intimate and more than anything Harper had shared with another person in a very long time and she—
Her very, very bi brain needed to know if she was misreading things. Because that was what very, very bi brains sometimes did.
“Orphan,” Harper started, but then realized that it was misleadingly formal since the formality ice had been broken by Cass already. “Cassie,” which was way too casual and honestly she couldn’t remember if anyone had ever non-jokingly called Cass that before. There was something very broken about Harper’s incredibly bi brain at that point. “Listen. Cass.”
For her part, Cassandra stood quietly and patiently, head somewhat tilted. She said nothing, but it wasn’t like that was exactly abnormal.
“Cass, you and I. What I mean. Back there,” Harper waved toward the docks and froze because coherency was suddenly far more difficult than her physics homework. “Shit.” And when that made Cassandra’s head tilt in the other direction, Harper’s heartbeat increased almost tenfold. “Uh. Good job?”
That, at least, earned a soft smile and Cass nodded. “You too.”
They stood opposite of each other for a few more moments, awkwardness on top of additional awkwardness.
“So. You like,” Harper paused again and sorted through nerves before motioning to her cheek that still felt a bit warm despite thermodynamics not quite working that way. “You touched me.”
“Yes,” Cass answered back in a sort of very nonchalant way that could have gutted a lesser bisexual immediately.
Harper, by necessity though, was built of stronger stuff. “Was that like… what kind of touch did you think it was?”
Suddenly, Cassandra looked incredibly confused. “… types of… touches?” she tried to clarify.
“Yeah, sorry, this is weird, but I won’t sleep for the next two days already because of that coffee habit I can’t kick and if I’m thinking about this and not, like, exams coming up then I will be an actual bisexual disaster and no one really wants to see that, let’s be real,” Harper chattered on like a deranged woman with blue hair and a taser built like a bazooka strapped to her back.
“Okay?” Cass continued. “Still don’t… really understand?”
“The touch, the hand… thing. I need to know. Why? Is it just… something you do or is it like… offering a hand in marriage? Or… more likely it’s very mild and something in between there?” Harper pressed.
Cass’ chin tilted up and she nodded sagely. “Ah, yes.”
“Yes what? Cass, I’m going to have a breakdown here we need specifics,” Harper nearly hyperventilated.
“I want you to know… you did good. And I’m proud,” Cass explained. “So… showed you.”
And, in that moment, Harper could not have been more deflated. “Oh,” she said. Then, internally, she used very bad words to curse her stupid very, very bi brain for the teases.
“Because I like you?” Cass continued, suddenly adding some of her own awkward by rubbing at her neck. “So… yes?”
Harper’s heart nearly grew three sizes that day as she straightened up and felt her cheek warm up. “Oh! Yes!” Harper laughed, turning to a puddle of feelings as Cass reached over again and stroked her cheek once more. “I knew it the whole time.”
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