It was dinner time at the Johnson family house, the night before Thanksgiving. Brenda Leigh had been in Atlanta for a day and a half, and this was the third interminable meal that she'd endured with a friend of Bobby's. A friend who was apparently Willie Rae's candidate for husband number three. And Willie Rae would never turn down an opportunity to meddle in Brenda Leigh's love life; though according to the elder Johnson (even Willie Rae was not above a little subterfuge), Bobby's poor friend didn't have any family to spend the holiday with, so he might as well spend it with them.
So Bobby's friend Neal was seated next to Brenda, intruding on their family meal. Neal Critchlow was an pot-bellied, balding tax accountant who smelled like stale body odor and too much aftershave, had weird, flakey patches of skin on his forearms, looked excessively greasy about the face and on his exposed scalp, and brayed like a horse at every word that came out of Brenda's mouth, which was ridiculous, because she certainly wasn't trying to be funny.
All that said, Brenda couldn't trust her objectivity - it was entirely possible that Neal Critchlow was a generally non-offensive and likable person, despite his smell, but Brenda was really, really missing Sharon. Sharon whose scent drew Brenda in like a moth to flame, even after the brunette had spent a 72 hour reporting cycle at the office. Sharon whose pale, perfect skin freckled lightly on her chest and shoulders when she spent even a little while by the pool in the late fall sun, weak as it was. Sharon, whose thick, lustrous hair slid like the finest silk between Brenda's fingers when she ran her hands through it. And Sharon, who had never made a sound that didn't make Brenda itch to touch her, and whose smirking, laughing, mobile, beautiful face had been so still and so sad when Brenda had told her that she was heading to Atlanta for Thanksgiving.
And now, for at least the fifth time since they had sat down for dinner, Neal Critchlow had his hand on Brenda's thigh, indecently close to third base territory. She brushed the offending extremity away and, not trying to control the volume of her voice, because she was done with this farce, growled:
"If you touch me again, I will break the hand that you dared to lay upon my person, Mr. Critchlow." She let her face freeze in a snarl, lip quivering in supreme contempt. Neal flushed scarlet; Clay and Willie Rae gaped at her; Bobby slugged back the remainder of his whiskey; Charlie smirked, but quickly hid the expression in her napkin. Brenda stood with enough force that her chair nearly tipped over, tossed her napkin on her plate, and stomped into the kitchen without a word or backward glance.
She stepped out on to the back patio, wrapping her arms around herself to ward off the slight evening chill. With practiced eyes, Brenda found Polaris and turned ninety degrees to the left. West. For the first time she could remember, Brenda's heart wasn't pulling her towards work, towards the rarely dull complexities of the murder investigations that were her calling, but towards a person - a lover and companion.
Brenda pulled out her cellphone and looked at it a moment. She made a decision she hadn't even known she was contemplating and opened her phone's web browser. Since her credit card information already saved into the website, it took only three minutes for Brenda to change her return flight to the red-eye leaving from ATL in four hours, even though it cost her an obscene amount of money to do so.
She would land in LA a little after midnight, then go straight to Sharon's, who was alone for the holiday. Sharon's parents were in Florida with her mother's east coast relatives, and her son was visiting his fiancé's family somewhere in the midwest and her daughter couldn't get away from her job with a non-profit in India for the holidays. Brenda had made her plans to spend Thanksgiving in Atlanta before she had started dating Sharon, and Sharon had been gracious and understanding when Brenda told her her itinerary, but Brenda had seen the carefully hidden hurt in her eyes, an expression Brenda was all too familiar with - she had put it there enough times to know the shadows it made in Sharon's malachite gaze. And the three days leading up to Brenda's departure had been much too…docile for Brenda Leigh's liking. They usually bickered and teased like they'd been together for decades rather than mere months, but Sharon hadn't been present with Brenda, not completely, and that fact caused a smoldering fear in the pit of Brenda's stomach - a feeling that had been plaguing her for days. She hoped this gesture would go some way to healing whatever wound she had inadvertently caused in Sharon.
She scrolled through her contacts to 'S. Raydor' and considered it a moment. She dialed. The phone rang and rang, then went to voicemail and Brenda frowned. She didn't think she'd ever gotten Sharon's voicemail before, even when they had been only colleagues - even when they had been unfriendly colleagues.
"Sharon, darlin', you were terribly civil and gracious about my holiday plans, but I made a horrible mistake, comin' out here instead of staying with you for Thanksgiving. I'm missing you like crazy, and I feel like an idiot for not realizin' sooner what I wanted. And I'm an insensitive ass for not doin' right by you, and doin' the right thing for us. Please, I hope you'll give me a chance to make it up to you. I love you baby, and I'll see you soon."
Brenda hung up and swiped at the tears that had welled into her eyes. Behind her, Willie Rae cleared her throat. Brenda jumped.
"Is there something I can do for you mama, or are you just going to stand there, eavesdroppin' on my private conversations all night." Brenda was feeling raw and angry that she couldn't come home for a quiet visit with her family without being set up with some totally unsuitable man. Honestly, she was a little offended that her family thought her standards were that low. But she was angrier with herself for not staying with the woman who had possession of her heart, and angrier still that she hadn't been brave enough to include Sharon in her holiday plans with her family, even if it was only as her friend.
"Brenda Leigh, why don't you come back inside." Brenda shook her head and sniffled.
"Is Mr. Critchlow gone? If I come back inside, and he's still there, I'm going to get my nine millimeter and run him off."
"There's no reason to be rude, not now and not earlier, Brenda Leigh. Bobby and I thought that you might like Neal, and of course none of us knew you were seein' someone." Willie Rae's tone was wheedling, trying to placate her difficult daughter. Brenda was in no mood to be placated.
"I was rude, mama, cuz that man you were trying to set me up with had his hands all over me under the table. And I have never, not once, asked you to find dates for me, or even liked the men you try to set me up with." Brenda's body was rigid, her shoulders square, spine straight.
"And I haven't told you I'm seeing someone cuz it's new, and special, and you and daddy always meddle and pressure me, and I needed to do this my way, on my own time table." She stood, her bearing almost military in its erectness.
"I gotta go pack and say my goodbyes. I'm leavin' on the red eye at 10." She wiped the rest of the wetness from her face with the sleeve of her sweater.
"Leavin'? But you're supposed to stay two more days!" Willie Rae exclaimed. "What am I going to tell your father?"
"Tell him I caught a case. He'll probably assume that anyway." She turned to face Willie Rae, her face serious. "Please don't tell daddy about what you heard, mama. I don't need him badgering me."
"If that's what you want, him thinkin' that you chose your job over your family again."
"I don't care what he thinks, I've just gotta get back to LA." She brushed past Willie Rae and into the house, ignoring her glowering father and half-inebriated brother and practically vaulted up the stairs. She would pack now and spend four hours waiting in the airport before she sat around the house and let her father bully or intimidate or judge her for her decision.
In her childhood room, now a guest room, she threw her carryon onto the bed and started scooping up the clothes that she'd strewn around the floor. It was a shame she actually had to fold her clothing to fit it in this suitcase. Sometimes, the convenience of flying without checked luggage just wasn't worth the time it took to pack. She folded her pants and skirts, and then moved on to her shirts, arranging everything neatly in the small bag. She was scrounging under the bed for a missing pump when there was a knock on the door jamb. Brenda froze.
"Aunt Brenda?" Charlie stepped tentatively into the room. "Grandma said you were leaving tonight to go back to LA." Brenda finally got a finger around the shoe and dragged it out from under the bed. She got up from her knees and dropped the wayward item in the suitcase.
"That's right, Charlie." Brenda plopped on the bed and looked at the young woman hovering in the doorway. "I've got something I need to take care of."
"Do you have a case or some work thing." Charlie's gaze on her was penetrating, taking Brenda's measure. Brenda sighed. She hated lying to Charlie - she'd prided herself on being truthful in her relationship with her niece, even if things had been a little tempestuous during her extended summer stay a few years ago.
"I left someone alone for the holiday, and I shouldn't have. And I have to go back, to make sure I didn't foul things up." She smiled apologetically. "I'm sorry I'm cuttin' out early, Charlie. I was lookin' forward to spending some more time with you." Brenda was concerned with how Charlie would react to the news that she was dating again; her niece had been rather close to Fritz.
"So you're dating again? Someone special?"
"Yea, very special." Brenda couldn't help but smile when she thought of Sharon. Her 10pm flight wasn't soon enough. Charlie was silent for a few moments, then curiosity got the better of her.
"So who's the new man?" she asked slyly. Brenda flinched and pushed up off the bed. Charlie raised an eyebrow and cocked her head at her aunt. "Sorry. You don't want to talk about it."
"No, it's not that." Brenda tried to reassure her niece, who had grown into an admirably empathetic young woman. "I don't really feel comfortable dumping my issues on a nineteen year old, Charlie."
"You don't share things with Grandma and Grandpa, Aunt Brenda. Or any of your brothers. And I understand why you don't, but I'd be happy to listen, if you want to talk about it. You've done that for me more than once." Brenda considered the young woman sitting on the bed. Charlie had really grown up since she'd visited LA a few summers ago. Charlie traded calls and emails with her aunt regularly, and Brenda found herself regularly charmed and impressed by Charlie's burgeoning sense of self and thoughtfulness. She picked up her smartphone and opened her pictures, choosing a snapshot she'd taken of Sharon leaning her elbows on the kitchen counter, smirking at Brenda, green eyes sparkling, hair tousled enticingly.
Brenda knew every detail of that picture - of all the pictures she had of Sharon - with such thoroughness that she could close her eyes and chain all of those details to one another and bring herself back to those moments. She could link together the worn seams of Sharon's favorite white button down, and the glow of the overhead lights in the bowl of the wineglass at Sharon's elbow, and the smile lines around Sharon's mouth and eyes, and the long fingered hands interlaced on the buff granite countertops and be back at that instant, with the taste of one of Sharon's favorite cabernet's on her tongue, and smell of the scallops Sharon had sautéed for dinner still in the air, mingled slightly with the sandalwood candles Sharon liked to burn, and Sharon's half-hearted protestations about being photographed in her ears. This picture, and the others, were how Brenda put herself to sleep on nights she couldn't spend with Sharon. Brenda handed the phone to Charlie.
"Who's she?" Charlie asked.
"Sharon." Charlie swiped a finger across the screen. Brenda tensed - bracing for the impact of her niece's disapproval or scorn. She took a deep breath and attempted to relax herself as she exhaled. The next picture was of a bikini clad Sharon, drowsy eyed and smiling softly, stretched out on her stomach on a lounger. Charlie raised an eyebrow at her aunt and swiped again. Another picture of Sharon in her bathing suit, on her side, head propped on her hand, backlit by the afternoon sun. Brenda loved that photo - Sharon's hand threaded through her hair, lips quirked up in a secretive smile, her curves barely constrained by her brief black halter-top bikini. Charlie looked at Brenda squarely; she didn't appear particularly perturbed.
"She's who you left?"
"Yea, I did." Brenda sighed. "Her family isn't around this Thanksgiving, and I left her alone. And I shouldn't have." Charlie swiped to the next photo. A ridiculous one that Brenda had taken of them with her arm extended; Brenda grinning into the camera, nose wrinkled, and Sharon in profile, eyes closed and looking almost serene, kissing her on the temple.
"And she's your girlfriend?" Charlie asked the question like she was uncertain of the word she should use and Brenda lifted an eyebrow at her.
"Hey," Charlie protested teasingly, eyes glinting. "I'm not hip with how you older types classify your relationships, Aunt Brenda. I mean, I'm pretty sure your generation doesn't go in for Boston marriages, but I could be wrong and that could be the term you prefer."
"Older types! Boston marriage!" Brenda squawked. "No more history classes for you if you're going to use what you learn to make age jokes about your poor Aunt." Charlie smirked and Brenda pulled a face at her. They were quiet for a few moments; Brenda buttoned up a cardigan rolled it into a neat, wrinkle free sausage shape and tucked it in her bag.
"Does Grandma know why you're really leaving?" Charlie asked in a small voice and Brenda sighed.
"She knows it isn't work and that I'm seein' someone, but I didn't go into any detail." The emotions and vulnerability involved in coming out, coupled with Brenda's long cultivated reticence to share anything at all personal with her parents had her wallowing in a swirl of guilt at not being truthful and shame that she wasn't brave enough yet to shout her love for Sharon from the roof tops.
"You think that they'll be upset? Because I don't think Grandma will be, Aunt Brenda." Charlie said, certainty in her tone.
"She'll be confused, honey. Grandpa is the one who will be unhappy, but he's usually unhappy with me for one thing or another." She grimaced. Clay was still holding a grudge about her divorce from Fritz. He hadn't talked to her for nearly a month after she had told them - had even sent a letter, full of disappointment that she was throwing away a good marriage to a good man. Brenda hadn't ever tried to explain the wherefore's of the split to her parents as she knew that they'd probably have very little sympathy for her issues with the man.
"How did you know?" Brenda cocked her head at Charlie, but her niece wouldn't meet her eyes; was staring intently at her chipped orange nail polish, picking at a thumbnail. "I mean, wasn't it confusing to like a woman?" Brenda schooled her face into a sort of bland pleasantness - there was something else going on here.
"Charlie, the first person I ever fell in love with was a girl." Charlie looked at her now, startled.
"Really?"
"Really. I was your age, actually, in my freshman year of college, and we were together till the summer after graduation." Charlie didn't need to know that Brenda's heart had been horribly mangled by that first love.
"And you never told Grandma and Grandpa?" Shame sloshed in Brenda's stomach again.
"No, but mostly because she asked me not to - her family was very religious and wouldn't have taken it well at all."
"So are you going to tell them about Sharon?"
"That's the plan, honey. We work together, so we wanted to make sure we were solid before tacklin' that mess."
"You love her a lot, don't you?" Charlie asked softly, though it wasn't really a question.
"Yea," Brenda croaked. "I do."
"She'll forgive you for leaving for Thanksgiving." Charlie said with certainty. "Though she should make you work for it."
Brenda spritzed a laugh. "That sounds about right, kiddo.
"Will you tell me about her? Is she an investigator like you?" Brenda smiled despite her worry, happy to talk about Sharon while she finished packing her bag.
It was nearly eight when Brenda and Charlie descended the stairs with Brenda's luggage. They had talked for over an hour, mostly about Sharon and the changes that had been wrought in Brenda's life due to the divorce and the lawsuit and her new relationship. Charlie really wanted to meet Sharon - she had suggested, pointedly, that the next time the holidays rolled around, Brenda should include Sharon in the family activities. Brenda fervently hoped that would be possible.
Brenda found her parents and brother sitting in the living room watching Bowl coverage on ESPN. Her father didn't even look away from the television when she said goodbye. Willie Rae and Charlie walked her out to her rental car and she hugged them both before driving away with a lighter heart than she'd had in days.
After seven hours traveling, Brenda had finally arrived at her destination. She pulled her Crown Vic to the curb in front of Sharon's house. The house was dark excepting the front porch lights. Her hands were aching from her white knuckled grip on the steering wheel, and she sent a hosanna to the heavens for grace or luck or something to get her successfully through this night. She exited her car, leaving everything behind, even her cellphone.
Brenda fingered the key that Sharon had given her a few weeks ago, unsure if she wanted to use it and risk getting shot by the Captain, who kept a pistol in her bedside table, or if waking Sharon with the doorbell was the better idea. She decided to use the bell.
It took nearly two minutes of leaning on the button for Sharon to answer the door in her short, silk robe, gun in hand. Her brows shot up when she saw Brenda's blonde head through the window in the door. She put the gun on the table and unbolted the door. Sharon planted herself in the entryway, arms crossed, face still, eyes hard and pained behind her glasses.
"Hey," Brenda greeted tentatively.
"I thought you were supposed to be in Atlanta until Saturday." Sharon's voice was impersonal, chilled - her Captain Raydor voice - and a crack snaked through Brenda's heart. Tears formed in the corners of her eyes. She fought them because it was Sharon's feelings she had hurt, and Sharon she needed to convince of her sincerity before she could break down.
"I changed my ticket. I wasn't feeling particularly festive without you." Sharon pursed her lips.
"Do you even understand why I'm upset with you, Brenda Leigh?" Brenda detected a throb of sadness in the brunette's tone, just like she couldn't completely suppress the pain in her green eyes.
"Yea, I do. You canceled your plans with your family to stay in LA with me didn't you? Thinkin' I was stayin' too." Sharon cocked her head just a fraction. "And I was inconsiderate and didn't tell you about my plans 'til the last minute even though I knew you were going to be in town for the holiday - and I shouldn't have just told you about my plans, I should have discussed them with you, and we should have decided what to do for Thanksgiving as a couple."
"It really hurt, Brenda, that you didn't take my feelings into consideration. Things have been so good and so easy between us, and then you completely shut me out of an important decision." Sharon had tears tracking down her cheeks now.
"I'm sorry, Shari, I really am. I shoulda known you would rearrange your holiday to be with me, and I shoulda invited you come to Atlanta, even if I'm not ready to come out to my parents." Brenda swayed forward, wanting desperately to be close to Sharon. Gathering her courage, she took that last step and she was relieved that Sharon opened her arms to enfold Brenda in a hug.
"I love you, Sharon." Brenda murmured, enveloped in the warm scent that was Sharon Raydor. "I thought I had really broken what's between us."
Sharon pulled away to look Brenda searchingly in the eye. "Brenda Leigh, when my feelings are hurt, I shut down. That only means you're in the doghouse, not that I don't love you." She kissed Brenda on the forehead. "And I wasn't entirely blameless here, either. I should have told you that I was changing my plans and been clear about what I wanted. You read me so well that sometimes I forget that you aren't actually psychic." She stepped away from the blonde, pulling her into the house.
"Come on, let's go to bed." Sharon shut the door behind them, threw the deadbolt and palmed the gun off the table, flicking the safety on. "You have to be exhausted." She headed up the stairs, Brenda trudging along behind her.
"Yea," Brenda agreed sleepily. Now that the adrenaline rush of her frantic flight back to LA was over, she felt completely drained.
In the bedroom, Sharon removed her robe and slid under the covers into the slight hollow left by her previous attempt at sleep. She watched as Brenda mechanically shed her clothes down to bare skin and shuffled into the bathroom, heard the sounds of her brushing her teeth and relieving herself. Sharon had very nearly drifted off to sleep listening to the domestic noises of Brenda Leigh - the comforting indicators that Sharon was no longer alone in her own life, that there was someone there with her.
Finished with her ablutions, Brenda crawled into bed, into Sharon's arms, tucking her face into the curve where Sharon's shoulder joined her neck and worming a thigh in between Sharon's legs. They both sighed in contentment and relief.
"Sharon," Brenda murmured, and the tension drained from her slender body like the air being released from a ballon. Brenda inhaled noisily through her nose and Sharon felt the blonde snuffle along her hairline. "Love you."
Sharon ascended into wakefulness in the same muzzy haze of warmth and pleasure that had accompanied her descent into sleep. The light bleeding around the edges of the thick curtains illuminated Brenda, legs still twined with Sharon's, an arm around Sharon's waist, the other tucked up under the pillow. She still looked exhausted - last night Brenda had to have been running on caffeine and fear when she fell gratefully into Sharon's arms in the doorway - the delicate skin beneath the blonde's eyes was a diffuse purple, even after the - Sharon glanced at the bedside clock - eight hours she'd slept.
The ease with which Brenda could read her moods had been a blessing for Sharon up until this incident. She had been hurt that Brenda hadn't though to include her in her holiday planning, and had resisted just telling Brenda what was wrong (not terribly mature, she could admit to herself), prolonging the hurtful situation for both of them. But now she had Brenda for Thanksgiving, and she intended to make the past few days of uncertainty disappear for both of them.
Sharon took a deep breath, wrapped herself around Brenda, and closed her eyes, prepared to doze off again until Brenda was ready to rise. The blonde snuggled deeper into Sharon's body and began to move with purpose, her lips trailing over Sharon's shoulder and her tongue dipping into the hollows of Sharon's collarbones.
"Mornin'," she purred, hips shifting into Sharon's, teeth nibbling at her earlobe. Sharon's head fell back, allowing Brenda better access to her neck.
"Hey," Sharon groaned as Brenda's bare thigh flexed against her sex. "I didn't mean to wake you." Brenda didn't answer, just captured her lips in a searing kiss, rolling them so she was perched on Sharon's hips. She slid down Sharon's body a bit and bent her head to Sharon's breasts, teasing her nipples into hardness with lips and tongue. She cocked her head to apply her molars lightly and Sharon gasped, her hips trying to buck up under Brenda's weight.
Brenda relinquished her position atop Sharon, slipping alongside a little to more easily cup Sharon's cunt, fingers trailing along her slit, dipping into the moisture that had gathered there. Her mouth still at Sharon's breast, Brenda moaned in chorus with Sharon at the feeling.
"Fuck me, Brenda Leigh. Go inside, please." Sharon begged breathily. Brenda detached her lips from Sharon's nipple and dragged her lips back to Sharon's. She paused there, her lips a hair's breadth from Sharon's, noses brushing; her eyes were intent, pupils as dilated as Sharon imagined hers were. A brief pause, and then Brenda sheathed two fingers in Sharon. Sharon arched up, constrained by Brenda's leg curled over one of hers, and connected their lips…
Curled sweaty and sated around her blonde love, Sharon kissed her temple. Brenda hummed in pleasure.
"I'm thinking…" Sharon was contemplating breakfast. Something that would appeal to Brenda's sweet tooth. "I'm thinking nutella pancakes with bananas and real maple syrup." Brenda made a noise that wasn't dissimilar from the sounds she made when Sharon was eating her out. Sharon laughed.
"I love it when you talk chocolatey foods to me, Sharon.