Sorry about the length of this chapter but it would have been difficult to break up. Also, I put up all of To The Desert on my webpage. Go read it. It's not that long and it's gorgeous. Seriously.
As always, thanks for the reviews. Special shout-outs to Silence.is.the.Loudest.Scream and Vanessa Riverton for reviewing every chapter. You guys rock.
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You are thirst and thirst is all I know.
Break me,
I am bread. I will be the water for your thirst.
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Friday
Miley didn't sleep at all Thursday night. She couldn't, because every time she closed her eyes the kiss played out before them, so vivid and real it hurt. Only it didn't stop in her mind when it had before. In her mind it kept going, she kept going, sliding her arms around Lilly's back, pulling her closer, kissing her and kissing her and –
It kept going until she wrenched her eyes open, gasping for air, her body humming with desire. She knew that was what it was now. Except it couldn't be. She couldn't like Lilly. She couldn't want...that. What would her daddy say? Jackson? Mamaw?
No. She couldn't be like that. She wasn't. And she could even make herself believe that.
Until the next time she closed her eyes.
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She didn't go to school. She told her dad she was sick. She didn't mark spots on her skin or stick a thermometer to a light bulb, just rolled over when he came to wake her and said she was sick.
"Is this about Lilly coming over yesterday?" Robby Ray asked. "Are you two in a fight?"
Miley said, "Please don't make me go."
He put a cool, dry hand on her forehead, and Miley wouldn't have been surprised if she really did have a fever. After last night, she was weak and sweaty, and kept swinging between hot flashes and chills.
"I guess missing one day won't hurt you," her dad said.
She laid on her side and stared blankly at the wall after he left, only blinking when she absolutely had to. When she couldn't take being alone with her thoughts anymore, she got up and took a shower – cold – and put on clean pajamas. She sat on the couch with Beary Bear to watch trashy daytime talk shows featuring people whose problems all seemed easier to fix than her own.
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Oliver texted her right when first period would have been ending: whats going on?
Miley wrote back: sick
Her phone stayed silent for so long she thought Oliver wasn't going to say anything else, but it beeped again after second period. L will get ur work
Miley knew she shouldn't say anything. She should let Lilly do it. But if she did, she would have to see Lilly. And if she saw Lilly she'd know for sure that she –
She couldn't see Lilly.
She wrote back that she'd get the work herself on Monday. Then she turned her phone off and resolved not to let her brain think about anything other than the deadbeat dad skipping out on child support on Judge Judy.
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Her dad hadn't ever said anything negative about gay people. But he hadn't said anything positive about them either. And once back in Nashville a boy had petitioned the school board to take another boy to prom and he'd gotten beat up pretty bad by some of the other kids at his school. Ended up in the hospital. It was on the news for at least a week. Her mom had said it was a shame, but her dad hadn't said a word.
She could remember some of Jackson's friends making gay jokes. Jackson always laughed.
Mamaw went to church three times a week.
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She already knew what the rest of her family would say.
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Stuff like this wasn't supposed to happen to her. She was supposed to be normal.
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There were about twenty minutes when she couldn't stop laughing. She laughed until tears streamed down her face and she could no longer tell if she was laughing or crying.
A lot of Hannah's lyrics were about how important it was to be yourself, just that, just to be who you were, no matter what. And here she couldn't even bring herself to admit that she might –
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She was Hannah Montana. Hannah Montana couldn't like another girl.
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Oliver showed up around four. Jackson wasn't home yet, her dad had gone to the store, and Oprah was just starting her interview with Johnny Depp.
"Wow," Oliver said. "You look terrible."
Miley drew the throw blanket tighter around her shoulders. "Thanks a lot, Oliver."
"What?" Oliver said. "You're sick, you're supposed to look terrible."
"I'm not sick," Miley said, annoyed that he was playing dumb.
"I know," he said. He sat down on the other end of the couch. "So Lilly was right?" Miley didn't answer. She didn't know what Lilly had said about her, but it couldn't be worse than what she was thinking about herself. She was hurting Lilly because she was a coward. Because she couldn't see Lilly, because she couldn't –
"I don't understand this, Miley," Oliver said. "You were so worried about her on Monday, and now...she's going through a lot of tough stuff right now, but you acting like this is tearing her up the worst. She spent all of lunch crying on my shoulder out behind the school."
Miley drew her knees up to her chest and turned away from Oliver. That made twice Lilly had cried at school this week, and both times were her fault. "What did she say?"
"Nothing," he said. "Just that you guys argued yesterday and that's why you weren't at school. And that she didn't think you were really okay with her liking girls."
"It's not that," Miley said.
"Then what?" Oliver said. "She needs her best friend to be there for her and instead you're skipping school to stay away. What happened?"
She kissed me, Miley thought. She kissed me, and now I don't know who I am anymore. "Nothing," she said.
"Yeah, well, that's not good enough," Oliver said.
"I just can't deal with seeing her right now."
"Oh, so now she's something you have to deal with?" he demanded. He shook his head and stormed to the door. "You know, I really thought you were better than this."
The door shook as it slammed shut behind him and Miley cringed. She had, too.
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Saturday
Not seeing Lilly hadn't helped. Miley still knew.
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Her whole world felt like it had cracked in half and tilted, like a slab of concrete caught in an earthquake. She was so used to running full-speed at the future, but now, suddenly, she couldn't see the future at all. She could only look back, back along the last week of her life at this new, terrifying angle, back at where everything had broken. She saw now that this was what she'd been afraid of. That it wasn't Lilly who had changed that Friday afternoon in her bedroom. It was Miley.
She saw that she had wanted Lilly, wanted all of her that she could get, since the second Lilly had opened the door to that possibility. Maybe even before. Maybe she had wanted this back and back and hadn't known, hadn't thought it because it was so unthinkable.
She liked a girl. She liked Lilly. But Lilly didn't like her back.
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That was probably for the best.
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Lilly called, once, late in the afternoon. Miley let it go to voicemail. The message said that she and Oliver and Cara were going to the beach if Miley wanted to meet them. Miley went out on the back porch and stared at the ocean as though she'd be able to see them.
They were probably having a good time. Cara probably surfed, so Lilly would get to spend a lot of time in the water instead of having to keep Miley company on the beach like she usually did. Cara Morris was better for Lilly than Miley was. A better match.
She told herself that over and over all weekend long, the way you kept prodding a sore tooth with your tongue to see if it still hurt.
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It did.
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She couldn't believe she'd ever been so selfish as to wish even a little of this on Lilly.
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Monday
Monday morning her daddy said she either had to go to the doctor or to school. Miley was tempted to pick the doctor, but that would only take a couple hours at best and land her back at school afterwards anyway, in addition to the hot water she'd be in with her dad.
She did make Jackson drive her. She couldn't walk with Lilly. What would she say?
Miley dawdled outside of school until the warning bell rang. She knew she couldn't put off seeing Lilly forever. But she'd take five more minutes.
It didn't work: Lilly was still at her locker. At least Cara wasn't there. Miley sidled up to her locker and opened it without looking at Lilly. She wished she had come in earlier when there were more students around to distract her. Everyone was rushing to class now and the halls were emptying and she was far too aware of Lilly standing only inches away from her. Had she always smelled that good?
"Feeling better?" Lilly asked.
No, Miley thought. Worse. "Yeah," she said quietly.
"Glad to hear it," Lilly snapped. And then, reproachful, "We missed you on Saturday." Miley's throat closed up with guilt. Lilly exhaled noisily when it became clear Miley wasn't going to answer. Lilly shut her locker and took a step down the hall.
"Lilly," Miley said. "I..."
Lilly turned around. "Yeah?" she asked hopefully.
Miley almost told her everything. She almost blurted it out right there in the middle of the hall at school, but she was too afraid. What if she wrecked their friendship even more than she already had? "I..." She grabbed Junior out of her locker. "I think we were supposed to turn these in on Friday. I took care of it all week, you turn it in."
Lilly crossed her arms over her chest, her face closed-off and hard. "You didn't take care of it, it sat in your locker all week. And if you hadn't been sick on Friday we could have turned it in then."
"So?" Miley said. "I still kept it! And you could have gotten it out of my locker Friday. Just turn it in, okay?" This was officially the stupidest thing they'd ever argued over. Except they weren't arguing over this, really.
"Fine," Lilly huffed. "Whatever. I don't have time for this." She snatched the flour out of Miley's hands. Her arm brushed against Miley's as she did and Miley froze. She squeezed her eyes shut and had to bite her tongue to keep from moaning.
By the time she opened her eyes, Lilly was gone and the bell was ringing.
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She skipped first period. The school would call her dad once attendance had been tallied for the day and she would probably get grounded for a week, but...how was she supposed to go sit next to Lilly for fifty minutes after what had just happened?
She locked herself in a stall in the bathroom across from their lockers and put her head between her knees until so much blood pooled in it that it throbbed every time her heart beat. She came out of the stall and threw her bookbag on the counter. The thunk it made echoed in the empty room, underscoring how alone she was. She blinked back tears.
The door swung open a second later and Amber walked in, a bathroom pass dangling from her fingers. Fantastic, Miley thought. Exactly who she wanted to see.
Amber stopped dead and made a disbelieving noise in her throat. "Ms. Goody Two-Shoes is skipping?" she said. "Wait til Principal Fisher hears about this."
Miley just looked at her in the mirror and then twisted her hair into a knot at the base of her neck and bent over the sink to splash water on her face.
"Aren't you even going to try to stop me from telling?" Amber asked as Miley pulled paper towels out of the dispenser to dry her face. Miley shrugged. She didn't really care if she ended up in the principal's office, not today. "Oh my god, what is your problem? Does this have something to do with your dorky little gay friend? She's sitting in class right now looking worse than you."
Guilt overtook her again. "Look, Amber, I'm really not up for this today, all right?" Miley said. She had bigger things to worry about than whatever idiocy was going to come out of Amber's mouth. "Let's just pretend you insulted me, I insulted you, you insulted me again...We'll even say you won, okay? Just leave me alone."
Amber crossed the room and hopped up to sit on the counter. She studied Miley critically for a moment. Miley finished drying her face and did her best to ignore the other girl. "Just tell her."
Miley narrowed her eyes. "Tell who what?"
"Oh, please," Amber said, rolling hers. "Like it's not totally obvious that you're pathetically in love with her. You two have been making goo-goo eyes at each other since the day you met."
"What do you know about it?" Miley said icily.
"I know if someone loved me as much as Lilly loves you I wouldn't let anything stop me from being with them," Amber said. She sounded completely serious, and when Miley looked at her she couldn't see even a hint of teasing or malice. What she did see, lurking behind the mask of superiority and disdain Amber always wore, was jealousy. Amber was jealous. Of her and Lilly.
Miley remembered Amber's tearful confession to her on the set of Singing with the Stars and wondered who Amber really was, what she was like away from here. The bathroom, the whole school, seemed so small all of a sudden. It was just a building, Miley thought. Most of her life would go on outside of it.
"She's with Cara," Miley said, not really believing that she was trusting Amber with this. But it was somehow easier to say to her, to someone whose judgment wouldn't matter outside of this place.
"What-ever," Amber scoffed. "Like you couldn't drop-kick Cara Morris to the curb in two seconds flat. I thought all you hillbillies knew how to fight dirty."
Miley chuckled. "Why are you being nice to me?" She fiddled with the tie on the zipper to her bookbag.
Amber tapped her perfectly-manicured nails on the counter. "We all have our moments of weakness. Let's just say I'm paying back someone who was nice to me in one of mine."
Miley's head jerked around to stare at her. Amber couldn't possibly know she was Hannah. Could she?
Amber slid off the counter and went back to the door.
"Don't you have to go to the bathroom?" Miley asked.
"No," Amber said. "I just came in to look at myself in the mirror." She turned from one side to the other, checking out her reflection, then smiled in satisfaction. "I don't know why I bother. Perfect as always." She put a hand on the door. "Oh, and if you ever tell anyone about this? I'll kill you."
"Don't worry," Miley said. "No one would believe me."
Amber laughed and pushed opened the door. "Yeah," she said. "I know the feeling."
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First period had fifteen minutes left in it. Miley went back to their lockers. She had brought duct tape, and she got it out and opened Lilly's locker. Two of the pamphlets Lilly had mentioned were there, right on top. Miley slipped the roll of tape over her wrist like a bracelet and looked at them.
They were slick, glossy, with warnings against homosexuality and quotes from Scripture and black-and-white line drawings. She'd seen them before. Her church in Tennessee had them on a table in the fellowship hall.
It was better for everyone that Lilly was with Cara.
Miley threw the pamphlets away in the bathroom. Then she used the duct tape to tape over all the slots on the inside of Lilly's locker door.
She went to stand outside her second period class early so she wouldn't have to see Cara walking Lilly down the hall.
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In third period, Lilly passed her a note. Miley risked looking at it when Mr. Owens turned to write something on the whiteboard.
Thanks for the tape job, it said.
Miley looked up, and they smiled at each other for the first time in a week. Miley's heart jumped. Lilly was so pretty when she smiled.
Under the cover of her desk she dug fingernails into the soft skin of her wrist. She had to stop thinking like that.
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Everything would be normal at lunch. Miley was determined. She would sit next to Lilly and talk to her and talk to Oliver and even talk to Cara Morris. Normally.
Because that was what Lilly wanted their relationship to be. Just a normal friendship. And Miley wanted that, too. Her head did, anyway, and if she faked it long enough she was sure the rest of her would fall in line.
Her resolve held while she went through the lunch line and found Oliver at their table. "You know Lilly's going to sit with me, right?" Oliver said meanly. "Are you sure you want to be associated with us? In public?"
"Please don't yell at me right now, Oliver," Miley said. "You can do it later, I promise. You can call me anything you want. Just not right now."
Oliver actually put down his fork to focus his full attention on her. "Are you okay?" he asked. "You aren't really sick, are you?" He said it with such concern that Miley knew she must look terrible.
"No," she said. "I – "
Lilly came out of the lunch line. Cara was right behind her. Jealousy tore through Miley, so strong it stole her breath. She had thought it was bad seeing them together last week, but now that she knew what she was feeling it was so much worse.
She couldn't do this. She couldn't sit here and act like everything was normal when nothing was. Nothing was. "Oliver, I – I can't," she choked out. "I can't do this, I'm sorry." She stood up and grabbed her bookbag. "Tell her something for me. Make something up. Just tell her – "
"You have to take another book back to the library?" Oliver said.
Miley left her tray there and ran.
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Now she knew what it was like to spend all of lunch crying.
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She went late to gym, and god, she knew what Lilly must be thinking, but she couldn't trust herself in the locker room. Couldn't trust that she wouldn't betray their friendship by ogling Lilly like some dirty old pervert. They had changed in front of each other so many times that Miley had a pretty good idea of what Lilly looked like without clothes on, and now she wondered if that was normal or if she had been looking more than she should all along.
The class was divided into teams for field hockey when she got outside. Coach McDemott tossed her a blue armband and she was relieved to see Lilly and Cara were on the red team. Miley jogged over to blue team, who all groaned when they saw her coming. The team captain told her to just try and stay out of the way, which was fine with Miley. From now on, she would stay out of everyone's way.
They played for about twenty minutes with Miley hovering uselessly around the edges of the field. She didn't even know what the score was, too caught up trying not to think about Lilly, about kissing Lilly, about Cara kissing Lilly. The effort absorbed so much of her attention that she didn't see Maria Bennett heading straight for her.
Maria's shoulder slammed into her chest and Miley went flying backwards, her hockey stick getting torn out of her hands. She landed hard on the ground and all the air left her lungs. She coughed weakly to get her breath back. There was a high-pitched ringing noise in her ears and she shook her head, trying to make it stop. Ow, she thought. No more head-shaking.
"Miley," she heard through the whine in her head. She pushed herself up on her elbows and saw half the class standing around her. Maria was crouching next to her head, looking extremely worried. "Are you all right?" Lilly was the one who had spoken. She leaned down and offered a hand to help Miley up.
"Don't!" Miley said, scrambling backwards in a quick crab-walk. She didn't think she'd be able to control herself if Lilly touched her. She'd either grab Lilly and kiss her right there in front of everyone or she'd break down crying again. "Don't touch me!"
Lilly looked like she'd been the one to get knocked down. She jerked upright like a puppet on a string. Her mouth opened and closed. She stared first at Miley, then numbly at her still-outstretched hand until Cara took her arm and gently moved it back to her side. No one else said anything, or moved.
Miley shut her eyes. Lilly probably hated her now. Maybe that was best. Maybe if Lilly hated her, Miley wouldn't be able to hurt her anymore.
"You okay, Stewart?" Coach McDemott asked, finally reaching them. "Come on, walk it off."
"I think I need to go to the nurse," Miley told her. She looked back when she got to the gym door. Cara had an arm around Lilly's shoulders, consoling her.
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In English they were supposed to be working in pairs, peer-reviewing the first draft of the paper they'd been assigned last Wednesday. Miley hadn't written one. She grabbed Oliver while everyone was pairing off and pulled him over to the desks in one of the back corners.
"Listen," she started.
"I don't want to hear it," Oliver interrupted. "Lilly told me what you did, and I don't want to hear anything you have to – "
"Lilly kissed me," Miley said. She kept her voice quiet. This wasn't something she wanted the rest of the class to know. But she knew Oliver heard her, because he stopped talking and stared at her, and stared, and stared some more.
"She kissed me," Miley repeated.
"I heard you the first time," Oliver said. "I just...but she...why?"
"We were arguing, and I was being a jerk, and then...she just kissed me. And when she did, I realized..." She took a deep breath. "That I like her." She felt light-headed saying it. "I like her a lot. As more than a friend. And that's why I've been acting like this."
Oliver shook his head, then sat still a minute, then cleared his throat. "You...you like Lilly?"
"I know it doesn't excuse what I did," Miley said quickly. "But I can't – I'm not like Lilly, okay? I can't handle this like she did. I can't just figure out something like this and then go on like everything's – I'm sorry, Oliver."
Oliver nodded. "Are you going to tell her?"
"No," Miley said immediately. "I can't tell her, and you can't either. You have to promise me."
"But she kissed you," Oliver said. "Maybe – "
"No." Miley stressed the word as much as she could. "She doesn't like me. She told me she didn't. She can't know, Oliver. Promise me."
"I promise," he said. "But, Miley...I'm sorry, but you can't keep doing stuff like this. You can't treat her that way. She's still your friend."
"Do you think she is?" Miley asked. "Still my friend?"
Oliver looked down at the paper on his desk. "You'll have to talk to her about that."
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The silence between them seemed magnitudes louder than the tumult of the post-final-bell hallway around them. Miley kept her face hidden behind her locker door. She was trying to hurry, but she was shaking too badly and kept dropping papers.
Lilly shut her locker and Miley swallowed. She wanted to apologize but she wasn't sure if she still had that right.
"I'm going to Rico's with Cara and Oliver," Lilly said. Her voice was flat and emotionless. "I want you to come."
Miley nodded. She kept her eyes fixed on spine of her Algebra book.
Lilly took a step away and then stopped. "Miley?" Miley looked at her. Lilly's face was as impassive as her voice. "If you don't show up, I'm not going to ask again."
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Miley tried to go to Rico's. She took her stuff home, and changed her shirt and brushed her hair, and did a better job redoing her makeup than she had after her crying jag at lunch.
Oliver called to ask if she was coming and she told him she was, that she'd be there in ten minutes. She went downstairs and let her dad know where she was going and she walked to Rico's. She'd never noticed before just how hard walking was, how much effort it took to put one foot in front of the other.
The other three were already there, sitting at one of the tables. Miley stood on the boardwalk and watched them. She kept seeing Lilly's face when Miley had said not to touch her, kept hearing Lilly's voice say she wasn't going to ask again. This was it. If she wanted to salvage her friendship with Lilly, she had to go over there.
Cara picked up Lilly's hand and started playing with her fingers. She said something and Lilly laughed. Miley pushed down a surge of jealousy. When was the last time Miley had made Lilly laugh?
Last week, she told herself. Just last week. That wasn't so long ago. And she would do it again. She would get over this crush, or whatever it was, and she would learn to like Cara Morris and whoever Lilly dated after her, and she would be happy for Lilly. She would be happy for her best friend.
She just had to go over there.
Cara leaned over and brushed her lips across Lilly's cheek. Lilly blushed and smiled, and Miley forgot about everything but trying to get home before she started to cry.
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"Whoa, hang on a minute there, Miles."
Miley slowed her headlong hurtle through the living room. "Not now, daddy, okay?"
He got up from the couch and circled around it to her. "No, it's not okay, not when you come in here lookin' like you're about two seconds away from cryin' enough to fill the Pacific. What happened? I thought you were just going to meet Oliver and Lilly."
She lost her battle with tears at the mention of Lilly's name.
"Hey, hey," Robby Ray said softly, pulling her against him. "It's all right, Miley. It's gonna be all right." He helped her over to the couch and let her cry against him, her tears soaking into the fabric of his shirt and making it chafe her face where it was pressed into his chest.
She got a hold of herself after a few minutes and sat up. He handed her a tissue from the box on the end table. "Time to let me in on what's been going on with you this past week," he said while she dabbed at her eyes and then wadded the mascara-stained tissue in her fist.
He wouldn't take no for an answer. Not after she'd cried all over him. And she didn't know how to lie to her dad, but she didn't know how to tell him something like this either. What would she do if he hated her?
"Come on, Miley," he coaxed. "What's got you so upset?"
"Daddy, did you ever...did you ever really want something that you know you can't have?"
He sat back against the couch. "Once or twice," he said. "There something you can't have that's got you crying like this?"
Miley shrugged. "I guess."
"This ain't about a pair of shoes, is it?" Robby Ray asked.
"No." Her attempt at a laugh turned into a cough. "No."
"Then..."
"Have you ever wanted to be with someone and you couldn't?" Miley said. She tore a little rip in the tissue to give her hands something to do.
"Ah," her dad acknowledged. "That is a tough one. Is this about that Jake Ryan boy again?"
"No," she said. "I'm over Jake." She'd been over Jake the day he left for Romania. Somehow she didn't think it would be so easy to get over Lilly.
"Well, then, have you told this boy how you feel?" he said.
"No, but it doesn't matter," Miley said. "H-he doesn't like me."
"And how do you know that?" Robby Ray asked.
"I just know."
"So you're just going to give up?" he said. "That's not like you. Seems like you almost did the same thing with Jake, and look how that turned out. Turned out he liked you, too."
Miley shook her head. "This is different."
"Different how?" her dad said. "I know there's no guarantees this boy will like you back, but, Miley, you know when you have a problem you have to do something about it. Tell him how you feel. See what he says. If you really like this boy, you need to at least make an effort."
Miley took a breath, held it. She scrunched the tissue into a tiny little ball. She couldn't keep something like this from him, not even if he hated her for it. "Even if the person I really like...is Lilly?"
A minute passed and he didn't say anything. Miley made herself look up from the tissue in her hands. His eyes were fixed on her face. "Huh," he said. "Didn't see that one comin'."
"I'm sorry, daddy," she blurted. "I didn't mean to, it just – "
"Hold on there, bud." He put a hand on her shoulder and she almost cried again with relief. He couldn't hate her too much if he was still willing to touch her. Then she remembered what she'd done to Lilly in gym and felt her face burn. "I think you're forgetting I know Lilly."
"What?" Miley said.
"So I know she's worth more effort than just about anything else in your life," he finished.
She gawked at him, her mouth hanging open, then lunged forward to hug him. "Thanks, Daddy."
"No problem, darlin'," Robby Ray said, wrapping an arm around her. "And I don't ever want you thinking you need to apologize to me for loving someone, you got that?"
"Yeah," she said. She hugged him tighter. He didn't hate her. She almost started crying again with relief. She could deal with the rest of her family disowning her, as long as her daddy didn't.
"Now I'll admit this is a bit trickier of a situation than I'd imagined," her dad allowed.
"Lilly has a girlfriend," Miley said. The wet spot from where she'd cried earlier was damp under her cheek.
Robby Ray pulled away. "Since when?" he asked, surprised.
"Since last Monday," she said, rubbing at her cheek.
"You see what happens when you don't talk to me for a week and a half?" he complained. "I miss out on all the important news."
"Daddy," she said.
"You sure she doesn't like you?" he said. "Y'all're so close..."
"She told me she doesn't," Miley said. "But it's more than that. I've been so messed up over this that I...I've been avoiding her, and I've been a horrible friend, and I think she hates me now."
"Aw, now, Mile, I'm sure it can't be that bad," he said.
Miley sniffled and blew her nose into the tissue. He didn't know what she'd done.
"I think you need to explain things to her," Robby Ray continued. "From what you've told me, it sounds like she might understand what you're going through."
Maybe he was right. Maybe if she told Lilly everything, it would be enough that Lilly could forgive her and they could still be friends. Maybe not like before, but...anything would be better than losing her completely. "Yeah," she said. "I'll try, daddy."
He pulled her into another hug. "That's all you can ever do, bud."
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Miley lay on her back in bed, worrying her lower lip between her teeth and trying to figure out something to text Lilly. She would tell her everything, tomorrow, if Lilly would give her a chance. But she couldn't think of anything to write that would make Lilly be willing to talk to her.
She didn't have to. The cause of all of this arrived in her doorway. "Why don't you just say it?" Lilly asked as Miley quickly moved to sit up. Lilly shut the door but left her hand on the doorknob.
"What?" Miley said. Did Lilly know? Had Oliver told her?
"You don't want to be my friend anymore. It makes you sick that I like girls."
"No, Lilly," Miley said. "It isn't that."
"It isn't?" Lilly sat next to her on the bed. She left space between them. On purpose, Miley knew. "Oliver said that, too, but I didn't believe him." She slowly leaned across the distance separating them. Miley held herself still, muscles taut and tense, bracing herself. She wouldn't move away. She wouldn't react.
"You're afraid to touch me," Lilly whispered. Her breath was warm against the side of Miley's face. Miley flinched. Lilly straightened. "You can't even look at me when I'm around Cara."
Miley opened her mouth to explain, to protest.
Lilly stood up. "I shouldn't have kissed you," she said. "I'm sorry for that."
That stopped Miley a moment. If Lilly hadn't kissed her, Miley wouldn't've had to deal with any of this. Everything would still be normal. She would still be normal.
"It's okay," Lilly said. She sounded sad, and worse, resigned. She was back at the door, her hand on the knob, ready to leave. "I know you tried."
But she hadn't. "No," she said, "but I will, Lilly, I promise I'll try." She propelled herself off the bed and over to the door, putting a hand on it so Lilly couldn't open it, couldn't leave. "Just let me explain. It's not what you think, it – "
Lilly was looking at her, a question in her eyes. Miley didn't want to tell her, but she couldn't let Lilly walk away thinking what she did.
"I can't look at you with Cara because every time I do it kills me," Miley said. Her voice came out low and jumbled, urgent. "I'm afraid to touch you because I don't know what'll happen if I do, because ever since you kissed me – because of this, Lilly. This is why."
And she did what she had been wanting to do for days. She kissed Lilly. She knew it would be the last time, so she tried to put everything she felt into it, to say without words how sorry she was, and how much she loved her. Lilly's mouth was soft under hers, tender, but her lips didn't move and after a moment Miley broke the kiss.
Lilly's eyes were closed. They blinked open; otherwise she didn't move, and Miley couldn't see anything in her expression but a kind of empty shock. The room seemed too small suddenly, the air suffocating. "Lilly?" Miley said. "Lilly, say something." Lilly stayed frozen.
"I'm sorry," Miley said. "I know you don't want this, and I know it doesn't justify how awful I've been..." Lilly remained silent.
It wasn't enough. She'd been stupid to think it was. This wasn't reason enough to absolve her of what she'd done, of the pain she had caused Lilly. That she was still causing, because she didn't know what else to do, how else to apologize.
"I'm sorry," she forced out again. She couldn't breathe in here. She had to get out.
Lilly's hand was still on the doorknob. Miley had to lay hers on top to open the door, and she felt it, that shiver of pleasure and need that she felt every time they touched now, every time they kissed. That feeling that told her normal was gone.
She ran down the stairs, out the back door, and over the sand. She ran around sunbathers and surfboards stuck upright in the sand. She ran and ran and kept running until her legs gave out. Then she knelt in the sand, her chest heaving.
No, she thought, sucking in air. This wasn't trying. She was going to try. She would find some way to make things up to Lilly. She would beg, or plead, or even grovel. She wasn't above groveling. She would get her best friend back. That was what Lilly had wanted. That was what Lilly would get.
As soon as she could stand she went straight to Lilly's house.
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No one was there. Miley waited on the steps to the front porch for over an hour before Lilly showed up. She didn't seem surprised to see Miley, or upset, but she didn't seem happy either. She didn't seem anything, and she didn't say anything, just went past Miley and unlocked the front door, and Miley started to think that maybe this hadn't been a good idea.
But Lilly paused halfway through the door and said, "Come upstairs."
They went to Lilly's room. Miley sat on the floor with her back against the bed. Hope started to sputter in her when Lilly sat next to her, their sides barely brushing.
"I broke up with Cara," Lilly said.
Miley inhaled sharply. "You didn't have to do that," she said. "I meant what I said, Lilly, I'll try harder. I'll get used to it."
"I didn't break up with Cara because of that," Lilly said. "I broke up with her because of this." She put a hand on Miley's cheek, turned Miley's head towards her, and kissed her.
Miley leaned into it in spite of the surprise and confusion swirling through her. She gasped slightly when Lilly pulled away. "I thought you didn't like me."
The left half of Lilly's mouth curved up. "I lied," she said. "I thought you were already freaked out about me liking girls, and I didn't want to make it worse. You don't know how mad I was at myself for losing it and kissing you. I thought I'd ruined everything."
Miley let out an hollow laugh. "You did. I had no idea what was going on, except that I really didn't like Cara Morris, and then you kissed me and...I was so scared, Lilly. I never thought I could be like that. Like this. Never. I mean, I'm Hannah, Hannah can't like girls, and my family...and you know how much I want to stay normal, that's why I have Hannah in the first place, and – "
"You can't do this," Lilly said. She moved so that there was a gap between them.
"No," Miley said, and when Lilly went to move farther she wrapped a hand around Lilly's forearm. "No. I want you more." It was the scariest thing she'd ever said in her life. But it was true. And saying it was less scary than thinking about what might happen if she didn't.
Lilly subsided, her body relaxing. The space between them disappeared.
"But are you sure about Cara?" It didn't seem like this was possible. That Lilly liked her. That she wouldn't spend the rest of her life feeling everything in her shrivel up every time she saw Lilly with someone else. "I know you liked her."
"You've been my best friend for years," Lilly said. "I've only known Cara a week. Besides, we weren't really that serious."
Miley thought about how Lilly had said it would suck for her to be in love with Miley and not have a chance, and she wanted to ask if they were serious. But maybe that should wait until they'd been together more than five minutes. "I knew there was no way you couldn't like me," she said smugly instead.
"Oh, god," Lilly groaned. "There'll be no stopping your ego now."
"Did she ever kiss you?" Miley wasn't sure she wanted to know, but her jealousy had to.
"No," Lilly said.
Miley's smugness kicked up a notch. Miley Stewart: 3, Cara Morris: 0. Her hand was still on Lilly's arm. Miley moved her thumb back and forth over Lilly's skin. "Can I kiss you?"
Lilly smiled. "You didn't ask before. Why start now?"
Miley leaned over and kissed her gently. Lilly's eyes were closed when Miley pulled away and Miley watched her until they opened. Lilly's cheeks flushed pink when she saw Miley looking at her. Miley grinned. Normal was gone, but she was starting to think this might be better.
"You'd think we would know better by now than to keep things from each other," Lilly said.
"Think we learned our lesson this time?" Miley asked.
"Probably not," Lilly said, and Miley chuckled.
"At least we finally got this right," Miley said. She drew her fingers down Lilly's arm and smiled when goosebumps followed them. "Which is good, because I think I was going slowly insane. And I missed you."
"Me too," Lilly said. Miley didn't stop her stroking and Lilly sighed happily.
"Plus, we still have to write that report together for Mr. Myers's class," Miley said. "And that would have been really uncomfortable."
Lilly laughed and bumped Miley's shoulder with her own. Miley's heart beat faster. She'd made Lilly laugh again. "I guess we really have Junior to thank for this," Lilly said.
"Junior and Amber," Miley said.
"Who ever thought we'd be thanking Amber for something?" Lilly said, still laughing. "I just hope we never have another week filled with as much drama as this one."
"Uh, yeah," Miley said, remembering something. "Lilly?"
"Yeah?"
"I think Amber might know I'm Hannah Montana."
Lilly's face went pale. "She...what?"
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Okay, glad that's over with. I will probably put up a oneshot sometime next week, and then I'm going to start in on a cracked-out AU that no one will want to read. So, you know. That should be fun.