Just the Ticket

"Damn it!" The curly haired woman swears as she catches the sight of red and blue lights flashing behind her. Carefully pulling over her dark silver Subaru Legacy, she pulls out her registration and proof of insurance from the glovebox. She was already late for work on this Monday - and this was not going to help.

"Good morning," a dark blue uniformed cop greets at the Subaru's window.

"Good morning, officer." The curly haired woman replies, briefly awestruck by the image before her. She had been expecting a middle-aged, pot-bellied, gray haired man. Instead, she was faced with a young, blonde woman with a sporty pixie cut.

"Do you know why I pulled you over?" The cop asks, all business.

"Speeding?" The other woman hazards a guess with a nervous smile.

"Yes, ma'am." The cop smiles back.

"I'm sorry. I'm the vice principal at Anchor Beach Charter School and I am running terribly late today." Lena apologizes.

"Can I see your registration and insurance?" The curly haired woman hands the papers over to the blonde cop, who promises to return in a few moments before returning to her squad car.

"Well, Ms. Lena Adams," the cop begins. "I'm going to let you off with a warning this time since you have a clean driving record. Just drive safe." She hands back the papers to the curly haired woman with a gentle smile.

"Thank you," Lena replies, taking the papers back and setting them on the empty passenger seat beside her.

The sun was already going down when Lena's school day was finally over. She loved being the vice principal at Anchor Beach Charter School here in sunny San Diego, but this wasn't the first day she had spent nearly twelve hours on the school's campus. And it would not be last. With a heavy sigh, the tired woman plops her purse down on the passenger seat. The crinkling of paper makes her reach over, remembering now that she never returned her registration and proof of insurance to the glovebox. A string of handwritten numbers and a name catches her eyes and she smiles, thinking about the sexy cop that had let her off easy this morning. Letting out a nervous breath of air, the curly haired woman dials the number and places her phone to her ear.

"Hello?" Stef answers her cell phone, cradling it with her shoulder as she pours herself a second glass of red wine.

"Um, hi, this is Lena," a chirpy but nervous voice says on the other end. "You, um, pulled me over this morning."

"Ah, yes, going forty-five in a thirty in a Subaru," Stef answers, her heart palpating in her chest. She truly hadn't expected the woman to call her.

"Yeah, sorry about that again." Lena replies awkwardly, not really sure how to go about the rest of this conversation.

"How can I help you, Ms. Adams?" Stef says, somehow keeping her voice from shaking.

"You can call me Lena. And I was wondering if we could get a drink sometime?" Lena asks, twirling a strand of her thick, curly hair around her index finger.

"Oh," Stef says. "That would - that sounds lovely."

"Friday night, at the Laurel?" Lena asks, referring to one of the lesbian bars in San Diego.

"It's a date," Stef agrees, her mouth suddenly going dry.

"It's a date." Lena confirms. "I'll see you on Friday. Goodbye." After Lena hangs up, Stef stands in her kitchen, glass of red wine in one hand and her cell phone in the other, a look of disbelief on her face. Never, in a million years, did she think that the little risk she took of writing her personal cell phone number on Lena Adam's warning notice this morning would result in her first date with another woman.

For most of her twenty-six years, Stef had been trying to convince her father, the Catholic church, and herself that she was straight. After being caught cuddling with her best friend on the couch at sixteen, her father had sent her to a youth pastor to, essentially, straighten her out. Ever since then, Stef had been pushing her real feelings deeper and deeper down, never letting herself ever truly be herself.

Until recently. Six months ago, Stef had started going to therapy following being shot in the leg on the job with the San Diego Police Department. While going over the shooting, the therapist had begun digging into Stef's past and her repressed homosexuality had reared its head. So, for the last few months, Stef had been learning how to deal with her own internalized homophobia and the homophobia she was surrounded by growing up.

Today had been the biggest step Stef had ever taken - actually asking another woman out on a date. Well, rather, Lena had actually done the asking, but Stef didn't think that semantics would matter that much when she discussed this at her therapy session this week. Regardless, Stef had a date with a gorgeous woman this Friday and her heart was pounding out of her chest. She didn't know the first thing about going on a date with a woman. She'd been able to fumble her way through the few dates with men she'd been on - men were easy and predictable. As long as they got laid at the end of the night, they didn't care much about the date itself.

And that was another thing Stef was terrified about - having sex with another woman. The few times she'd done it with men, she had mostly just laid there and waited for it to be over. But with another woman, she would be expected to be more participatory - and she hoped that she would want to be more participatory. Because if not, then was she even really a lesbian? And if she wasn't a lesbian, then what was she? Stef had been searching all her life for a place where she belonged, where she would be accepted, where she would be loved. Thinking back the Lena's curly brown hair and chocolate brown eyes, Stef couldn't help but wonder if maybe she had found what she was looking for.