Gillian was early and waited for Caroline in the dim light of the car park. The cold was starting to seep into her bones, despite the thick coat she wore over her blue jeans and wool jumper. Normally she would wait for Caroline inside the pub, but this time she wanted to greet her in private and wore warmer clothes in anticipation of the arctic wind.
It had been nearly a week since they'd consummated their relationship, a word she thought far too clinical for what they'd done. Gillian rolled it around in her head, using it to avoid her anxiety about whether Caroline had changed her mind about them since last Saturday. It had felt really special to Gillian, but she still had trouble imagining someone as smart and fancy and gorgeous as Caroline being interested in her, a poor sheep farmer with a dodgy reputation and an ex-husband in limbo.
Gillian had had a quiet week, mostly shifts at the supermarket, winter maintenance and waiting for the weather to clear. Caroline, by comparison, had been frantic at work and dealt with a sick Flora at home, so they hadn't had a chance to see each other since Saturday. The few phone calls late at night had been fairly awkward and they hadn't sorted anything out between them. It resulted in a nervous farmer waiting in the cold for a tired head teacher to arrive.
Gillian was wearing a path into the stones when she saw Caroline's Jeep turn into the car park. She bolted over to the car, yanked open the passenger door and climbed in the front seat, startling a yelp out of Caroline.
"Gillian!" She closed her eyes and leant against the car window for a moment, recovering. "You scared the..." Caroline breathed in slowly and turned to look at Gillian, this time with warmth. "Hi."
"Hiya Caz." Gillian was on a mission. She closed the distance between the two of them, brought a hand behind Caroline's neck and pulled her in for a kiss. The kiss went from 'hello' to 'holy fuck' in the time it took for both of them to become desperate for air. When they pulled back from each other, both were breathing hard.
"Well," Caroline cleared her throat. "That was one way to say 'Hello'."
"I didn't want to do that in the pub, for obvious reasons, so I thought I'd meet you out here." Gillian was still staring at Caroline's lips, not quite finished with them yet.
"Good thinking. I like your..." Caroline's words were cut off by another bout of kissing, this time involving wandering hands and some moaning, leaving them both wet and wanting.
"Bloody hell, Gillian." Caroline's voice was hoarse. She thought she was going to have to wipe down the seats of the Jeep if they'd kept going. She'd had to wash the blanket and all the covers of the couch last weekend and had considered throwing out one of the cushions before she found a way to salvage it. She was going to have to start carrying around towels, she thought.
Gillian laughed, a little smug that she'd been able to fry Caroline's brain a little.
"So... I guess you want to continue this?" Caroline asked quietly, when she could formulate sentences again.
Gillian stared at Caroline, trying to figure out if she really was this emotionally daft or was being obtuse. "I just snogged the hell out of you and you want to know if I want to continue?"
"Okay. Okay. It's been a big week and I'm not...we haven't...I really wasn't sure if you still want this."
"Yeah, I do. And so do you too, you pillock. Don't tell me the sex wasn't great."
Caroline was hedging. "Well, it was...good, so..."
"Hey! It was only a couple of weeks ago you told me about Annafrid and how you wanted more pleasure in your life. Am I missing something here, Caz?"
"No. No. You're...no." Caroline sighed, eventually coming clean. "Okay, it was great. You were great." She closed her eyes for a moment, "And god, I really do miss it." She looked at Gillian, who could see just how hard it was for Caroline to admit that.
"So this is just sex for you, Caz. Nothing more?" Gillian held her breath, hoping for a different answer to the one she was expecting.
"I don't know. It's...it's...regardless of how we feel, I don't see how it can be more. We can't tell our parents; they can't know about this. It would kill them." As soon as she said it, her eyes shot to Gillian. "I'm sorry. That was thoughtless of me. Sorry."
Gillian looked out into the night, fighting off the vision of her dad having another heart attack. She swallowed loudly, burying the pre-emptive grief.
Caroline struggled for the right words. "Look, I know that this isn't normal for you Gillian, that you don't usually go for women. I understand that you want us to keep seeing each other, but not seeing each other really isn't an option either, is it? It's not like we can avoid family functions if we stuff it up."
Why was it that even during complex educational strategy meetings she was never short of words, but for this, she was stumped? Caroline was having trouble understanding what she really wanted, let alone what was possible for the two of them. She'd been thinking about this for days, but no resolution had settled in her head. She was going to have to talk to the counsellor about it.
"I want to see you too Gillian, but I can't see how this can ever work and not be a nightmare for both of us."
"Caz, we can do this. We just have to be quiet about it. If we're careful, we'll be right." Gillian was thinking of all the methods of persuasion that had worked for the blokes she'd seduced, but then, they were all so easy. None were as complex, or as challenging, as the blonde sitting beside her. Different rules entirely, she thought to herself.
"There's always Fridays nights..." Gillian smirked. Her weekly Caroline fix could be something else entirely. The possibilities sent her blood south, and she squirmed a little in her seat.
Caroline's head snapped up. "Oh really? A weekly shag? Is that how you want to play it?" Something about the regularity of it, the order of it, called to her organised nature. It felt more controllable if it was a regular thing.
The more she thought about it, the more she thought it possible. "Okay. We could give that a go."
Gillian beamed. It was a start. It gave her an opening to keep working on Caroline. It could develop into something more, if she was smart. And lucky.
"Great. Now that's sorted, let's have some dinner because I'm starving."
Caroline laughed. "Sure. Let's go Madam Farmer."
.
.
Gillian was enjoying her steak and the company of Caroline, but kept dropping her eyes to the tantalising breasts sitting across from her. It really was very distracting, she thought, more so now that she knew just how spectacular they really were.
Caroline was starting to be a bit exasperated by Gillian's lack of focus. "Gillian. You do really have to pay attention to this. We are going to need to work out what to do here. If Mum finds out and we don't have a plan, it could get really nasty."
Gillian sighed. Caroline was right. "I know. I don't want me dad having another heart attack either. That terrifies me." She ate another mouthful of potatoes and spoke around it, "So what do you suggest?"
"How about your place? If Mum and Alan are at mine looking after Flora, then we could go to yours." Caroline was thinking she'd rather be in her own bed; better sheets for a start, and she liked being at home. There was always a sense of safety about it. Then again, if her mum came into the room afterwards with her sensitive nose, it would be a dead giveaway. The scents of sex always lingered in the air for hours. She sighed. The disadvantages of having her mum living inside the house with her were becoming glaringly obvious. It really was going to have to be at Gillian's.
"That could work. Most weeks at my place it's just me. Some Fridays I babysit Calam, as you know, but not often."
"I'm normally home by 10pm, so how early..." Two or three hours were just not going to be enough for what Caroline was planning. She tried to hide the smile when she started to think of the things she and Gillian could get up to.
"Whenever. When could you be free?"
"I could leave school early most Fridays, with a little planning on my part. That could work."
They were both thinking about those few hours and all of the possibilities.
"It's still early." Caroline said meaningfully. "I don't need to be back until ten."
Neither had finished their dinner, but they looked at each other and realised the two hours they had left could be better spent. Caroline threw some cash on the table, they both stood up, grabbed their coats and bolted for the door.