A/N: This will be my second foray into the HM/Liley world. I hope you enjoy ;-)
Disclaimer: I don't own HM or any of its characters. All such rights belong to Disney, etc. I just like playing with them.
Tuesday, April 7, 2009
Crowley Corners, Tennessee is a sleepy little hamlet of farms and ranches with a total resident population of slightly less than a thousand souls. It has a main street that sports all of two stoplights along with the usual fare of small stores, boutiques, shops, cafes and restaurants. Located about halfway between Nashville and Jackson, just south of where I-40 crosses the Tennessee River and twenty miles northeast of Lexington (the location of the nearest Walmart and shopping mall), it's a picturesque little town that could easily fit the definition of "Small Town, USA." It's one of those friendly towns where everyone pretty much knows everyone else by name and where nearly half the population turns out for the local high school football games.
The Girls' Softball team doesn't get anywhere near the same kind of turnout, but even they can usually count on somewhere between fifty and seventy-five rowdy spectators filling the metal bleachers at their home games. For star pitcher Lilly Truscott, a junior, when she was in her zone all the noise from the stands and the dugout faded away until it was just her, the batter, and the pocket of the catcher's mitt.
Lilly blew out a short breath of air, tossed her head to make sure her blonde ponytail was out of her way and focused her dark green eyes on that small, circular leather space just over forty-five feet away. She shook off her catcher's two fingers signal for a curve ball and then nodded her chin slightly when she got the angled, one finger signal. She wanted to end this now in a decisive manner. With a roundhouse swing of her arm and a loud grunt, she let fly the ball.
Pop!
"Steeriike threeeee," the blue-clad ump yelled as he called the last batter of the top of the seventh inning out as she swung at and missed Lilly's fifty-five mile per hour low-and-away fastball. You'd have thought that the Crowley High School team had just won the World Series with all the pandemonium that erupted from the stands rather than having simply beaten their perennial Perry County rivals, the Hazelton Hawks, in a tight 5-4 match. Lilly's teammates piled out of the dugout or ran in from the field to surround her, giving her huge pats on the back and hugs. She was grinning from ear to ear at their exuberance, but her eyes tracked back to the bleachers to try to find the one person out of all of them that meant the most to her.
Miley Stewart, also a junior and the school's head cheerleader, was jumping up and down behind the first baseline fence screaming her head off and flailing her pom-poms around while her short pleated skirt flapped around her hips showing off the light blue spankies she wore underneath. Lilly thought their eyes might have met for a split second, but it was too quick and there was too much going on around her to tell for sure. Not that it really mattered. Lilly watched sadly as Miley turned around and jumped into the arms of her star quarterback boyfriend and, as far as Lilly was concerned, total jerkoff, Jake Ryan. She turned away from the scene not wanting to watch the kiss that she knew the two would share. Her best friend and catcher, Joannie Palumbo, saw where her gaze went and, when she looked back, gave her a commiserating glance and a shrug of her shoulders.
Joannie was one of only two people that were aware of the fact that her best friend, the only avowed lesbian in Crowley High School, Lillian Truscott, was nursing an unrequited love for one Miley Ray Stewart, the most popular girl in school.
Miley, with her long, wavy brown hair and sparkling blue eyes, was not only head cheerleader, but had been homecoming queen for each of the last three years and had been prom queen last year when she went to the dance with then junior Jake Ryan. She was also the captain of the Equestrian team, the best singer in the school chorus, made decent if not great grades, and was the daughter of the most famous person to come out of Perry County, singer-songwriter Robby Ray Stewart. As far as anyone knew, her only major fault was her complete inability to play sports which actually only endeared her to everyone when she habitually messed up in gym class.
Conversely, about the only claim to fame that Lilly had was her athletic ability and her prowess on the pitcher's mound. Other than Joannie, she had very few people she could truly call her friends, her grades were only so-so, and due to her coming out in the eighth grade was pretty much a loner that was regularly teased and bullied by some of the other students. And the ringleader of those bullies was Miley's boyfriend, Jake.
So far none of the bullying had been physical, only verbal or stupid pranks. Lilly attributed this to the fact that she was fairly well muscled since she regularly worked out on the school's weight systems as well as those at the local VFW and could probably take out just about anyone in school that wanted to try to have a go at her. Hefting and hauling around fifty pound bags of feed, seed, and manure at her job at Southern States Cooperative didn't hurt either. That, and the fact that she always carried a baseball around with her. Any boy that tried anything would soon find himself with a fifty-five mile per hour fastball to the groin. If they wanted to be able to have kids anytime in their lives they knew to leave Lilly well enough alone.
"Everyone's heading to DQ to celebrate," Joannie told her as the two of them walked back to the dugout to gather their gear. "You are coming, right?" she told the blonde with a face that would brook no answer other than "yes."
"Yeah, sure," Lilly sighed and earning herself a grin from her friend, "but I got to get over to my job right after that. Ed warned me that we got a truckload of grain and oats coming in later this afternoon and he's going to need a hand unloading."
"Fine, fine," Joannie laughed, pulling Lilly's ball cap down over her eyes only to have the blonde mock growl at her, "at least stay long enough for a burger and shake, my treat."
"Your treat!" Lilly gaped at her with overly exaggerated shock as she pushed her ball cap back up on her head. "Did you win the lottery or something? I'm pretty sure you haven't paid for a meal at the DQ ever since your boy toy Todd started working there."
"What can I say, he likes to indulge me," Joannie smirked.
"More like he's trying to buy his way into your pants," Lilly laughed, "one chili cheese fry at a time."
"Hey! It'll take at least a large Blizzard to get into my honey box," the dark blonde catcher exclaimed.
"Mmm, I wouldn't mind a taste of that sweet nectar," Lilly leered at her friend. As expected, Joannie blushed from her neck to her hairline.
"H-hey," she stammered, slapping Lilly on the arm, "none of that now."
"Oh, come on, baby," Lilly smirked, rolling her tongue and licking her lips suggestively, "you know you've always wondered what it would be like."
"L-Lilly!" Joannie gulped as her face got even redder, mostly because she couldn't dispute her best friend's claim. There had been many a night that she'd pleasured herself to just that image, not that she'd ever admit it. "You promised not to tease me."
"Hmm, did I?" the green eyed girl smiled up at her friend from where she'd knelt down to finish tying her cross-trainers. Her eyes strayed from her friend's flushed face, slowly down past her well-developed bosom, to the V at the apex of her thighs covered only by a tight pair of softball pants and sliders. She licked her lips again, more than amused to hear Joannie stammering above her while her hips unconsciously pushed out a bit closer to her.
"B-b-b-be good or…or I'll tell Miley," Joannie squeaked, using her last resort argument to get her best friend to stop teasing her. She knew as soon as the words left her lips that it had been the wrong thing to say. Lilly's head dropped to stare at her shoes and her shoulders slumped in dejection. "S-sorry," she started to say, but Lilly shook her head.
"No, I'm the one who should be sorry. I did promise not to tease you. It's just…I am so fucking jealous of you and Todd. You two are so great together. He loves you so much it hurts to watch. I've…I've never known someone like that. The way he looks at you…no one's ever going to look at me that way, not if I stay in this podunk village." She finished tying her shoes and moved to sit on the bench to put her cleats in her bag.
"That's not true!" Joannie yelped, sitting down and putting an arm around her distraught friend. "You'll find someone Lilly. I know you will."
"Yeah," Lilly chuckled sadly. "Like there are so many lesbians in town for me to choose from. Maybe Old Widow Godwin is looking for someone to replace her dearly departed husband and is willing to try out the town dyke."
"DO NOT use that term," Joannie spat. "You know how I hate it!"
Lilly laughed lowly. "I hear it every single day. I've kind of gotten used to hearing it."
"Well you shouldn't," her friend huffed with indignation. "And I firmly believe that you'll find someone who will love you, and you won't have to go all the way to Nashville to find them."
"From your lips," Lilly said with a small smile that didn't quite reach her green eyes, knowing that it was a false hope in Crowley Corners.
"So, let's go get those chili cheese fries, a burger and a shake," Joannie grinned widely, giving Lilly a big hug in hopes of raising her spirits. "The team is waiting for us." She knew better than to say anything about Miley maybe being there as well. The pretty brown haired girl might be required to come and cheer for the team, but she wasn't required to hang around with them afterwards. Even if she did she'd be sure to bring Jerkoff Jake with her. That's the last thing Lilly needed today.
"All right," the green-eyed pitcher said, standing and putting on her best happy mask, "but you're going to actually have to pay for my burger and shake," she pointed a finger at her friend. "I don't want to be beholden to Todd or make him pay for my food out of his salary. He's allowed to do that for his girlfriend, but not me. Otherwise I'm paying for my own."
"Yes ma'am," Joannie saluted her stiffly. That at least brought a bit of a real grin to Lilly's lips as the two headed toward the gravel parking lot and Lilly's old pickup.
-oo-
"Hey Lilly. Got a delivery for you to make," Ed Weaver, the manager of the Southern States called out to her as she finished stacking the last of the fifty pound bags of horse feed onto wooden pallets and covered them with a clear plastic tarp. Lilly glanced at her watch to see that it was almost seven P.M. She'd been at it for nearly four hours, first quickly unloading the semi that had delivered the feed so the driver could head off to his next destination, then restacking the bags so that it would be easier for customers to get to and so that there would be less chance for spillage. She wiped the back of her filthy glove across her forehead before she called back to him.
"I'm just about done with my shift, Ed," she yelled back. "Can't Billy do it?"
"He had to head home early," Ed replied as he stepped out the wide back door of the co-op. "His ma called to remind him he had choir practice tonight."
"Oh," Lilly sighed. She used to be in a choir herself until eighth grade. That was when they'd made it clear to her at the small church she'd attended that she would no longer be welcome within that particular house of worship. It seemed that the priest was perfectly willing to allow both the town drunk and the town slut past those hallowed doors so that they could receive absolution, redemption, and salvation, but he drew the line at the town lesbian. "All right, but I got to get home right after that. And you'll be paying for my time until I finish unloading," she told him while poking a gloved finger in his chest.
Ed chuckled. "Of course."
"So…what and where?" Lilly asked as she glanced around the yard wondering what her old pickup would have to haul.
"Twenty bags of this horse feed you've just finished stacking so nicely," he smirked at her and then laughed as she rolled her eyes, "and you'll be delivering it to the Stewart place."
Lilly's eyes narrowed. "Which one? Mamaw's?" she prayed, but there was no such luck for her today.
"Robby Ray's place," the forty-five year old balding manager grinned. He watched Lilly almost literally deflate. He'd seen her eyeing young Miley every time she came to the store so it came as no surprise to him when she seemed less than enthusiastic over the delivery. He knew better than to say anything about it though. "Sorry Lilly," he said with a bit more compassion. "I'd do it myself, but," he patted his softening belly, "too much of Tanya's good cooking and not enough working out has kind of put me out of the delivery business. I'd get a hernia after the second or third bag."
"I told you you needed to cut back on how much of her country fried steak and sausage gravy you ate," the blonde chuckled. "You used to be solid muscle," she poked him in the belly, "now you're more marshmallow."
"I know, I know," he complained. "What can I say, Tanya likes her man with a bit of meat on his bones."
"Meat?" Lilly laughed wide-eyed.
"Don't you dare say what you're thinkin' young lady," he admonished her with a shaking finger but with a sparkle of mirth in his eyes. "Just get your truck loaded and get on up to Robby's place. I'll pay you time-and-a-half for it."
"Yes sir!" Lilly grinned widely. She could surely use the money. Her 4X4 pickup needed a new set of off-road tires after the harsh winter they'd just gone through. Including drive time and unloading she could count on at least a full hour's worth of overtime pay.
Despite what he'd claimed, Ed helped her load the back of her truck with twenty bags of feed before she hopped in the cab and headed on down the road to the Stewart place, the throaty growl of her hemi filling the early evening twilight.
"Damn that Billy," she muttered angrily under her breath. "Why tonight of all nights? Why couldn't he have made this run instead of me? The money's nice, but," she spit a sunflower seed out the window in disgust at her situation.
It was nearly a quarter of eight by the time she pulled up at the illuminated, ornamental wrought iron gate to the Stewart estate. The gates were closed but Ed had told her that Robby was expecting the delivery so she pressed the button on the intercom mounted on a short pole next to the drive. Her driver's door window was taller than the intercom so she'd had to climb out of the truck to call up to the main house.
"Yes?" came a feminine voice from the speaker. Lilly knew that Miley's mother, Susan Stewart, had passed away back when they were both ten years old and she didn't think they had a maid, so that voice could only belong to one person. She tried to get her suddenly dry mouth to work properly without much success.
"Uh, um, I…I have a delivery…of feed…um…from Southern States," she stuttered, nervously.
"Oh, I'll tell Daddy," came the bright reply. "I'll open the gate. Just drive up the road 'til ya come ta the main house. You can't miss it."
"Uh, okay," the blonde teen replied but the static from the intercom had already cut off. The gates started to move so Lilly jumped back in her truck and headed up the long drive. The road wove gently through a small copse of woods which then opened up to wide fields on both sides fenced with three-board fencing. Horses were in the pasture to her right while the one on the left had been allowed to go a bit wild until the horses were moved over to it. One thing was for certain, Miley hadn't been exaggerating when she said that you couldn't miss the main house. It was huge! Essentially a three-story mansion of red brick with white columns holding up a drive-through portico over the front door.
"Singing and song-writing must pay well," Lilly observed with a whistle. She pulled her truck up outside the overhang of the portico not wanting to get her dirty truck anywhere near the pristine house. Before she had a chance to cut the engine off Miley was coming out the front door and heading her way with a bouncy step.
"Don't drool, Lillian," the blonde commanded herself as she took in the sight of the pony-tailed girl she'd been dreaming of for over five years. Despite the chill of the early April evening Miley was dressed in a pair of short cutoff jeans and a tight white t-shirt that barely covered her belly button. To complete the ensemble she wore a pair of brown, hand-stitched cowboy boots that surprisingly looked as if they had seen a lot of wear and tear. The brown haired girl slowed as she came up to the truck, her steps faltering a bit as she saw who was sitting in the driver's seat. "Yeah," Lilly mumbled to herself, "it's just your friendly neighborhood lesbian. Don't get too close. You don't know what you might catch."
"Uh, hi," Miley smiled softly, pushing a loose strand of her wavy hair back behind one ear as she slowly approached the window. "You're Lilly, right?"
"Yup," Lilly smiled broadly, "that's me." When Miley didn't say anything else, just looked at her with a crease between her brows, the green-eyed girl sighed, her smile disappearing as if it had never been. "Look, I'm just delivering your feed since Ed's not up to it tonight. Where do you want me to unload?" she asked with a defeated tone.
"Oh!" Miley shook herself from some kind of stupor. "Y-yeah. Sorry. You can drop it down by the stables. It's not that far, but you have to make a couple of turns." The girl that had been filling Lilly's dreams jogged around the front of the truck and opened the passenger's door. "It's easier if I show you," she said as she climbed into the truck and slammed the door shut. "Just head down here," she said while pointing out the windshield," and take your first left."
"Uh, yeah, thanks," Lilly swallowed visibly, her eyes tracing the long, muscular, and gorgeous bare legs so close to her. She gulped again and then forced herself to face forward and put the truck in gear. She considered herself lucky that she hadn't stalled the thing she was shaking so badly. She followed Miley's directions until they came to a well-lit ten stall stable, also of red brick. Miley reached into her shorts pocket and pulled out a remote. When she pressed the button a dark brown painted door about half the width of a normal garage door on the left side of the building started sliding up to reveal a storage area. An overhead light kicked on at the same time. Lilly just shook her head. Rich people! What's wrong with a regular damn door?
Lilly backed her truck up to the opening and shut off the engine. She grabbed her work gloves from the dash and pulled them on before opening her door and stepping out and down. Where most people would have found dirt, Lilly stepped onto black asphalt. The entire drive from the road to the stables, something over a quarter mile, had been paved. She shook her head again at the waste of good hard cash. "Where you want it?" she called out to the girl just jumping down from the cab as she dropped the dented tailgate.
"This is the tack room. There's a door to your left just inside where we keep the feed," the pretty girl told her.
Lilly trotted over and glanced inside and saw the door off to her left. She walked in and flipped a light switch to her right. Inside was a neatly laid out room, about twelve-by-twelve, with various types of feed and shelves or cabinets of equine veterinary supplies that were safe for an owner or trainer to administer.
"We can put them over against the right wall," Miley said as she came up behind her carrying the first of the twenty bags.
"I can get that!" Lilly exclaimed as Miley walked past her and deposited the first of the bags onto a wooden pallet that would keep the expensive feed off the floor in case of water seepage.
"I'm stronger than I look," Miley smiled at her, flexing a thin arm to show off a fairly decent bulge of muscle. "I'm not just a pretty face," she grinned. "I do a lot of work around the farm. It keeps my muscles in shape for cheerleading and riding."
"So I see," Lilly chuckled, her eyes once again running appreciatively from the brunette's calves all the way up to her face before turning and heading back out to the truck to grab the next bag. She had to slurp up the drool she felt in the corner of her mouth. "Still, this is my job," she called out over her shoulder. "You shouldn't have to help me unload."
"It's no trouble at all," Miley grinned as she came up from behind and grabbed another bag for herself. "Besides, two will get the job done faster than one."
"Yeah, but I'm getting time-and-a-half for this run," Lilly smirked.
"I won't tell if you don't," Miley returned with her own devilish grin. "By the way, good game today. I didn't get a chance to congratulate you. That homer in the third, and the winning run you knocked in in the bottom of the sixth; that was good going. Not to mention the seven strikeouts."
Lilly was beyond shocked. She didn't think Miley was paying any attention to the game, let alone Lilly's contributions to the win. Her surprise must have shown on her face because Miley gave her a look and rolled her eyes. "I may not be all that great at sports myself, but that doesn't mean I don't like them," the blue-eyed girl smiled somewhat shyly.
Lilly shook her head. "Isn't cheerleading a sport?" she asked as she grabbed another load.
Miley laughed. It was an uninhibited, earthy sound that sent shivers down the blonde's spine and straight to her fingertips such that she nearly dropped the bag of feed she was carrying. "When you see competitive cheerleading in the Olympics I'll consider it a sport. Until then I just think of it as a relatively athletic hobby. At least it keeps me in shape." She showed one of her guns again causing Lilly to laugh. "Oh, you think you're so hot? I've shown you mine. Show me yours," Miley demanded, again with that rough laugh. Lilly dropped her bag on the growing stack inside the feed room and flexed her right arm. "Jeez Louise," Miley gasped softly. She dropped her own bag somewhat haphazardly and reached out to gently feel the hard muscle of Lilly's bare bicep. "You're bigger than Jake," Miley said softly with a touch of awe.
Twice in a single day, it was exactly the wrong thing to say. Lilly had felt a spark run from Miley's fingers through her bicep and directly to her core, sparking a heat that she'd only felt late at night while lying in her own bed and thinking of the cheerleader. That heat died a cold death with the mention of Miley's boyfriend's name. "Yeah," she sighed, dropping her arm and walking back out to the truck for the last load.
"Did I say something wrong?" Miley asked with concern as she followed the blonde out to her truck to grab the last bag.
"No, nothing," Lilly mumbled as she turned and hustled the bag into the stables and dropped it on the pile, now happy that Miley had helped with the unloading. That meant she'd be able to get out of there all the sooner. She fixed the one that Miley had messed up and then turned to take the last one from the brunette's arms, dropping it on the pile with another sigh. "Thanks for the help," she mumbled again as she walked back past the confused and worried girl and out to her truck. She started up the engine and then sat there while Miley closed the tack room door with the remote and then climbed in the truck for the ride back to the house.
"Look, Lilly, I'm sorry if I said anything wrong," Miley said more to the hands she held in her lap fiddling with the remote control than to the girl sitting next to her in the cab. "It's not like I was trying to say you look like a guy. You don't. You look…good. Cute! I was just a bit surprised that you had so much muscle, but I guess I shouldn't have been. I mean, I know you work out, and haul around heavy bags of stuff at your job, and your pitching has to have built up muscle. I just,"
"It's not a problem," Lilly sighed, interrupting the apology as she slowed down for the first turn back to the main house. "I'm used to it. I hear it all the time, how I'm so 'butch' and stuff."
"But that's what I mean!" Miley exclaimed loudly as she turned to her. "You're not! You've got a great figure! You're definitely feminine!"
"Tell that to your boyfriend," Lilly said under her breath, but not softly enough it seemed.
"Jake? Jake calls you 'butch'?"
"That and many other things," Lilly sighed as she took the final turn. "He's been calling me names like 'butch,' and 'dyke,' and 'lezbo,' and," she trailed off not wanting to voice some of the other things Jake and his friends had called her over the years. "He's been calling me things ever since I came out. It's like I'm his personal verbal punching bag…and not only him. All his friends as well. Everyone that wants to stay on his good side or be in his crowd. For nearly four years it's been like that. So feel free to compare me to just about anyone but Jake Ryan. I. Am. Not. Like. Him!"
"I don't believe it," Miley gasped softly. "He's never said anything like that around me." She looked up at the girl sitting next to her. "I'll talk to him. Tell him to stop," but Lilly just shook her head, unable to decide if she wanted to laugh or cry at the other girl's naiveté.
"Don't bother. He won't stop, even if you tell him to. That's just who he is. I can take it."
"But you shouldn't have to!" Miley complained loudly.
"Just part of being gay in a conservative southern town," Lilly shrugged again.
"It's still not right," the brunette pouted, crossing her arms over her chest. Lilly pulled the truck up to her front door.
"Thank you, Miley," she said, turning to look at the now upset girl. "I really do appreciate it, but there's nothing you can do. If it wasn't Jake it'd be someone else. That's just the way things are around here."
"It's still not right."
"Life's not fair," Lilly shrugged. "It's nice just to know that you don't hold my orientation against me." She chuckled softly. "I figured you'd be just like the rest of them. Too scared or too disgusted to ever be willing to get to know me."
"I'd like to," Miley whispered.
"Huh?"
"I'd like to get to know you better," she said a little louder. "That is, if you'll let me."
Lilly sat there a moment, too stunned to answer. First, because it was Miley saying it, and second…because it was Miley saying it. And yes, there was a story as to why both reasons seemed to be the same, even if they really weren't. The blonde bit her lip, silently debating before she allowed a small, almost shy smile to grace her features.
"I think maybe I'd like that as well."
Miley held out her hand and gave her a grin. "Hi, I'm Miley Stewart."
Lilly nearly started bawling at that, but forced herself to keep that small smile on her lips. It was one of the hardest things she'd ever done.
"Lilly Truscott," she replied softly, taking Miley's hand in her own.