Author's Note I've been struggling with this chapter, trying to get the tone right. I'm still not sure I'm entirely happy with it, but it's as good as it's going to get I think. I hope that you enjoy it.

I sent messages to those of you who reviewed with user names. To those of you who posted anonymously,

Thank you.

Cele: lol. Maybe a good knock in the head would do her some good. But you know what they say, it's not paranoia if they're really after you.

Chapter 32

"What are you doing?" Emily hissed in her mother's ear as they trailed Paige and Mrs. McCullers through the fair grounds. "Are you out of your mind?"

"Relax, Em. It's going to be fine."

Relax? She shot her mother a look of disbelief. Fine? In what alternate universe was she living in where this scenario could turn out anything but bad?

"Trust me, okay? Can you do that?"

Emily deflated at her mother's words. When she put it that way, she had no choice but to comply. Sighing, she nodded. "Yeah, Mom. I trust you."

"Thank you, honey." Her mom squeezed her shoulders, and Emily leaned into the embrace, squeezing back as she rested her head on her mother's shoulders for a moment. "I know you're worried about Paige," she said softly, after a moment. "You have every right to be. She's in a tough spot. And, I wouldn't have suggested this lunch if I thought it was going to make it even harder on her."

"I know." Emily was quick to reassure her. There had been a time, not too long ago, when she would have thought the worst of her mother's intentions, but things had changed so much between the two of them in such a short period. And, she knew her mother genuinely cared for Paige, she wouldn't do anything to intentionally put her in harm's way.

"I know women like Maureen McCullers. I was just like her, until very recently."

"Mom-"

"It's okay, Em, You don't have to pretend to spare my feelings. I hurt you, when I had trouble accepting you when you came out. And I don't think I ever apologized for that. I'm sorry."

"Mom." This time, Emily was protesting for another reason. She could feel herself getting choked up at her mother's words. Her eyes were getting all misty, and she didn't want to go into this lunch with red rimmed eyes and a blotchy face.

Pam offered a small smile and squeezed her shoulders. "My point is, I think I know a little of what Maureen might be going through. It's mostly ingrained, over the years, the opinions of others, church, family, likeminded peers, they settle in, take hold. We form opinions about things without taking the time to really examine how we feel about them. All around me I heard how being gay was wrong, how it undermined the values of country and family that I held as an ideal. And I accepted it, without questioning whether or not I truly agreed. Until you came out. Then, I had to examine what I had previously believed. Also, before you came out, your father and I, we could feel you pulling away. And, when you came out, it felt like that was why. I thought, 'I'm losing my daughter because she's gay.' And, it confirmed my beliefs. It's only been in the last few weeks that I've realize the reason I was losing you was because of myself. How I reacted. How I was acting."

Emily was stunned. They had slowly been building back up to the openness that they used to share, but, this was unprecedented.

"I was so afraid of what you were that I was pushing you away."

She reached out, taking her mother's hand in her own, clinging to it where it lay, draped over her shoulder. She opened her mouth to speak, but no words came.

"I'm guessing that Maureen can probably sense that something is up with Paige," she continued, giving her hand a squeeze, but otherwise not acknowledging Emily's emotional state. "Even if she hasn't figured out exactly what, she likely knows there is something different about her daughter. Something wrong. And, if Paige comes out, it's only going make it harder for her to accept, to understand."

Emily nodded. She supposed that made sense.

"I just thought that lunch today might show Maureen that having a child who is gay doesn't mean she's going to lose them. And, that being gay doesn't change the child that they raised."

"Thank you, Mom." It was the only thing she could think to say, the words strangled by the lump in her throat.

She had managed to compose herself by the time they reached The Grill. Paige and her mother were standing just to the left of the door, chatting quietly as they waited for Emily and Pam to catch up.

"Shall we?" Pam asked, gesturing towards the door as they approached.

Before anyone could respond, Paige had hold of the handle and was pulling it open, stepping aside so they could all enter ahead of her. Emily shuffled in behind their mothers, using the opportunity of having their backs turned to give Paige what she hoped was a reassuring smile as she passed. Paige smiled weakly back at her and trailed closely behind her, her breath warming the back of Emily's neck, and her hand brushing ever so slightly against her hip as they followed the hostess to a table.

As soon as they were seated, Paige popped back up again, announcing she had to go to the bathroom. Emily followed her movements across the room with her eyes, wanting more than anything to get up and go after her, but knowing that would just raise suspicions. She reached for her phone instead, lying it on her thigh as she subtly swiped her thumb across the screen to turn it on.

"I'm just texting Aria and Spencer to let them know where I am," she said at her mother's pointed stare, nodding her head in the direction Paige had disappeared, hoping she would understand why she was lying.

Pam nodded, and turned her attention back to Maureen, the two of them exchanging small talk as they perused the menu.

You okay? She knew it was a stupid question. Paige was freaking out in the bathroom. They both knew it. Emily just wasn't sure what to do about it. She didn't know what to say to make her feel better. She stared at the screen of her phone, anxiously awaiting a response.

No.

Paige's reply was blunt. But, she supposed, at least it was honest.

3 XOXO

3

If it makes you feel any better, things are going well out here.

They are?

The conversation had slipped away from small talk, the two of them talking about the difficulties of their husbands being away so much, Wayne overseas and Nick on frequent business trips. Emily felt like it wasn't a conversation meant for her ears, so she didn't feel guilty about continuing to text Paige.

Yes.

You're not just saying that to make me come out there, are you?

Would I lie to you?

Yes.

Emily bit back a chuckle. Rude

Sometimes the truth hurts.

:p

She was glad that Paige seemed to have relaxed enough to joke a bit, and only hoped that she would be able to maintain that when she came back out.

I'll be there in a minute.

3

She tucked her phone away and picked her menu, holding it in both hands so that they would be occupied when Paige returned to the table, so she would, hopefully, not reach out to her. It went against every instinct not to try and comfort Paige when she was upset, but she knew that in this instance, it would only make things worse.

She barely looked up when Paige approached, thought it was an effort to keep her eyes trained on her menu. She wasn't even reading the words, just skimming them as, through her peripheral vision, she watched Paige settle into the seat beside her, not close enough to raise suspicion, but just close enough that their elbows brushed as Paige reached for her water, and then again when she set it back down.

"So, Paige. You're on the swim team with Emily?" Pam asked, as if she didn't already knew the answer to the question. As if they hadn't already had this conversation before.

"Yes, Ma'am." Paige answered softly.

"I thought so. I've seen you at some of Emily's meets. You're very good."

"Thank you, Mrs Fields."

Emily thought she detected a hint of a smile in her voice.

She glanced over at her mother, and saw her eyelid twitch. She bit back a smile of her own, knowing how much it was probably driving her mother nuts that Paige had reverted to Ma'am and Mrs Fields, and knowing that Paige probably knew that too.

"You play field hockey to, as well, don't you?" She glanced subtly over at Mrs. McCullers for confirmation, as if it were something she had heard from her.

"Yes, I've been on the team for the past few years."

"Much to her father's and my dismay," Mrs. McCullers added. "Such a violent game. See the lovely bruise she's sporting right now? Courtesy of a practice last week."

Maureen gestured for Paige to turn her head, and she obliged, pulling her hair back out of the way to reveal the bruise Spencer had given her. The very same bruise her mother had tended to, but was now acting shocked upon seeing.

"That looks awful. Does it hurt?" Pam reached out and probed it gently with her fingers. Paige tensed slightly beside Emily, but submitted to the touch.

"Not much."

Pam tsked and turned to Mrs. McCullers. "I don't know how you handle it. If Emily came home with a bruise like that, I'd probably have a heart attack."

Mrs. McCullers snorted. "You think this is bad, you should have seen Paige when she was doing martial arts."

Emily banished the image of Paige in one of those karate outfits from her mind, and shot a glance over at Paige, who looked embarrassed to be the focus of conversation, but not out rightly uncomfortable, the way she expected. She was blushing lightly, and shaking her head, but her posture was more relaxed than it had been since they sat down.

Pam winced. "Wayne always wanted to sign Emily up for karate, but I put my foot down. There's no way I was going to let my baby have someone taking shots at her face."

"I used to get bruises worse than that when I was dancing," Emily allowed herself to get drawn into the conversation. "Remember that one time Sam Braun dropped me from a lift? I ended up with a black eye."

"You're a dancer?" Mrs McCullers turned to Emily, and she saw none of the usual wariness in her expression, just open interest. It relaxed a tension inside her that Emily hadn't even realized she'd been carrying around. She'd been so worried about how Paige was going to handle these interactions that she hadn't given a second thought to how she herself would manage if Mrs. McCullers said something, or acted cold, with her.

"Used to be. I gave it up when I got serious about swimming."

The lessons and performances along with the swimming training quickly became too hard on her body when she started to swim competitively in middle school.

Mrs. McCullers nodded. "It's a lot of hard work. Takes a lot of dedication."

Emily nodded as well. "Sounds like you speak from experience."

"Yeah. I used to be a dancer as well. I had dreams of going to Julliard and being a Prima Ballerina, until I hit high school."

"What happened then?"

She shrugged. "Lost interest, put my focus into other things."

Emily could understand that. Even though she didn't dance anymore, and she loved swimming, she missed it sometimes, and wondered if she'd done the right think in giving it up. "Do you miss it?"

"Sometimes. But, I make Nick take me out dancing when I get the urge."

"Really?" Somehow, Emily had a hard time picturing it.

"Yeah. He grumbles a bit, but he's always been an athletic guy, so he's up to the challenge. We've taken lessons in salsa and tango and ballroom. Even hip-hop once, though, that didn't really end well."

Emily couldn't help but laugh. "Well, I did mostly jazz, with a bit of ballet. But, there were a few hip-hop classes along the way. I could probably show you a few things."

"Classes? Or music videos on MTV?" There was an amused glint in Mrs. McCullers eyes that reminded Emily of Paige. She wondered if Paige got her sense of humour, that dry, sometimes sarcastic wit, from her mother. She thought she'd seen a hint of it that night at Paige's house, when they'd first gotten together, but then Paige had kept the apart so deliberately that she hadn't thought much of it until now. It would make sense though, she didn't see her getting it from her father. A stern, no-nonsense man, from the little Emily had seen from him at swim meets and around town.

"Okay, so more MTV than formal training. But, I did do a boot camp the summer between eighth and ninth grade."

Across the table, Pam snorted.

"What?"

"I remember when you were taking that class. You and Hannah." She turned to Maureen with a laugh. "You should see the pictures from when they were taking that class, big, baggy t-shirts, jeans practically falling off them, backwards baseball caps. The whole nine yards. It was precious."

"You promised me you were going to get rid of those pictures."

"Oh, please honey. There was no way I was destroying that evidence."

Both Mrs. McCullers and Paige laughed. Emily felt her cheeks burn, but she couldn't say that she minded being the butt of their joke at the moment, not with the way Paige seemed to be relaxing beside her.

That's not to say that she wasn't relieved by the arrival of their waiter. It was lucky she knew the offering of the restaurant so well, so she could order without even having looked at the menu, selecting an appetizer instead of an entrée, seeing as how she had finished lunch with the girls less than an hour ago.

He disappeared with their orders, and Emily expected awkwardness and tension to rise in his wake, but it didn't. Her mom peppered Paige with questions about school, swimming and field hockey, casual small talk, the same type of questions a parent would ask any of their children's friends, pretending that this was all news to her, and they hadn't covered much of this same ground over dinner almost every night this week. It was a little disconcerting for Emily, to watch her mother play so clueless.

For her part, Ms. McCullers inquired about Emily's time with Habitat for Humanity, seemingly impressed with the amount of dedication she had for the organization and its work. They also talked a little more about dancing, as well as athletics in general.

She did her best to be sweet, and charming, and found that it really wasn't much of an effort. Whether it was her mom's influence, or the glass of wine she was drinking, or the succulent smelling meal in front of her, Mrs. McCullers seemed to have dropped her guard around her.

The conversations over their food, when it arrived, was light and easy, if not a little shallow. Of course, it probably helped that nobody mentioned her sexuality. It was the proverbial elephant in the room. And she struggled a little with not putting it in Mrs. McCullers face, to yell at her about how her attitude was affecting her daughter. But, her mother had asked for her trust, so Emily was doing her best to give it to her. Subtlety was more her mother's strong suite, and she could see that it was working. The meal passing more pleasantly that Emily could possibly have imagined.

Even Paige had loosened up enough to joke a bit with their parents a bit. She hadn't said much directly to Emily, given the situation, Emily couldn't exactly fault her for it.

By the time the check came, Mrs. McCullers and Pam were chatting like old friends and making plans to get together for coffee later in the week. Emily's head was actually spinning a little, at how well the afternoon had gone.

They stood from their table, moving as a group toward the door, where they paused just outside it, before heading their separate ways.

"Are you heading home?" Pam asked. Emily nodded. She had seen as much of the fun fair as she was interested in. And, despite her desire to spend the rest of the day hanging around Page's booth, she respected that it made Paige uncomfortable and she would refrain.

"You heading back?" She jerked her thumb in the direction of the fair.

Pam nodded. "For a little while. I have a few things to take care of."

"Paige, why don't you drive Emily home?" Mrs. McCullers suggested. "You've been at the fair all day, I'm sure you could use a break."

Paige's eyes went wide at the request, darting from her mom, over to Emily, then back to her mom. "Um. Okay," she rasped. "Em…ily, if you want a ride?"

She winced a little at the slip on her name, a little bit to familiar for team-mates and barely friends. But neither adult seemed to notice it, they had already started down the street towards the fun fair, without waiting for a response from either daughter.

"Only if it's okay with you," Emily said, shrugging to make it seem like it wasn't a big deal. "I don't want to, y'know, put you on the spot or make you uncomfortable."

Hurt flashed across Paige's expression. "I'm sorry, about earlier. Em. I told you. I just…overreacted."

Emily shoved her hands into her pockets so she wouldn't reach out and take Paige's. "And I accept your apology. I'm not trying to make you feel guilty. I wasn't thinking, earlier, when I just showed up. So, I'm telling you, now. That if you giving me a ride is going to make you uncomfortable, I can go catch up with Spencer and Aria."

She held her breath, awaiting Paige's response. She knew what she wanted Paige to say. That it was all right, that she was okay being seeing waking through town with Emily, that she was okay with people seeing Emily climb into her car. But, she wouldn't hold it against Paige if it would all be too much for her.

"No, it's fine." Paige nodded her head towards the church. "I'm parked around back. C'mon."

Emily shoved her hands deeper into her pockets and fell into step beside Paige, doing her best to bite back a grin that threatened to overtake her face.