Resignation to the end; always the end

It's after your last show in Toronto; you'll be moving on not tomorrow but the next day. Betty didn't come again, but Gladys and Kitty were just as welcome and you feel relieved and disappointed, both at once.

You're out of time. You're out of luck.

When Betty was in jail, you packed up all her things, cleaned her room out yourself. The other girls let you; they knew why she was in there. Evenings you used to spend with Ivan were now spent trying to resist going through her things, trying to catch her scent on her clothes, the marks of her fingers in her books. You used her perfume on your pillow when you couldn't sleep and the smell of her tricked your brain into thinking you were safe.

You were ashamed of yourself, hoping she wouldn't just look at you and know what you'd done, when you handed back her things.

This picture was in her things. You found yourself staring at it, wondering. You find yourself staring at it, still wondering when there's a knock on your hotel door.

"I didn't realise that last night was the last night, or I would have come too." Betty, even though you've just opened the door, is already leaning on the door frame, casually, like she doesn't have a wife and child to get home to. You step back and she brushes past you and you lean against the door a moment after you close it. Even that little contact has left you shaken. How can she have this effect on you? You remember lying next to her in a tiny bed and it didn't feel half as... indecent as her shoulder nudging yours.

"I would have sent another pass," you say eventually, as she watches your suddenly clumsy hands try to fill a saucepan. She takes it from you, puts it on the stove with such a sense of ease that you're the one that feels out of place in your own hotel room. You turn to fidgeting with the hem of your shirt.

"Oh no, they let Kitty in without one," Betty says breezily. She leaves the saucepan and steps toward you. You're not sure what she wants so you step back hesitantly, grasping the firmness of the counter behind you.

Betty turns the last of her guest passes over in her hands, her bravado fading for a moment before she thrusts it at you.

"Obviously I can't use this, but I was wondering if I could trade it."

"Trade it? What for?" You ask, and she steps towards you, puts the pass down on the counter behind you. Her face is so close right now, her lips wet and inviting and you weren't really expecting it, but you weren't not expecting it either, so when her lips meet yours a stifled exclamation comes from you; not of alarm, but, to your great embarrassment, of pleasure. Your hands grasp hungrily for her, you can feel her warm beneath her dress, her shoulder blades, her spinal column, the softness of her hip. Her mouth is as soft as it always was; softer now you have the time to appreciate it. One of Betty's hands still rests on the counter beside you but now that she's more certain of herself she opens her mouth a little, brings a hand up to your face.

"Gladys," you manage to gasp out. Betty looks hurt, removes her hands where they were wrapped in the lapel of your shirt.

"What about her? Do you wish she was here instead of me?" Betty huffs. She pulls away and that's the last thing you want, but you know it's for the best so you somehow manage to unclasp your hands where they're firmly gripping her dress at the waist, the material scrunched in your wake.

"No, but aren't you... aren't you..." You can't bring yourself to say it. Lovers. Partners. Married. You still don't know what to do with your hands, so you pick up the pass, glance over it nonchalantly.

Betty looks taken aback then laughs heartily. You're a little offended.

"What's so funny?"

"You thought Gladys and I were... together?" She laughs still more and it's your turn to huff.

"You live together; you have a child together and given your tenancies I thought it was a safe assumption that..."

"I love Gladys; always will. But she's not..." Betty trails off and shrugs. "Not... like you, to me. You know what I mean, don't you? I mean, I'm sure there's some men that aren't... like Ivan for you... men that are just... friends," she says and you're wondering why she's talking about men when you've just had the most earth-shattering kiss of your life. It'd have been devastating if you weren't so absolutely sure you could get her to do it again.

"There's only you."

"You sure took your time," Betty says, exhaling, and she's still close enough that it brushes the skin of your throat; Betty watches it goose-pimple.

"I wasn't ready for you yet," you tell her and it's been about her all this time, the one person you could never shake from your mind.

"I know you're leaving soon and you have a huge career to get back to and Toronto is just a speed bump on that road to fame, but I couldn't let you go without letting you know that you still have a home." She looks at you with those ever-expressive eyes and you can see the uncertainty in her now, you can see how she had been steeling her for the impact of your rejection and you can't help but feel ashamed of yourself. You were just a kid, sure, with a head of religious dichotomy, but you still knew it was wrong the moment you let those vile words slip out of your mouth and hit her in the face as surely as if you'd hit her with your fist. It's comforting to think she's been waiting for you all this time and you don't want to make her wait any longer but you have another tour booked after this, and another after that, and a Christmas booking in California. Your life is all laid out for you and you love singing, you really do, but there's something here that means more to you than that.

She's said what she wanted to say; she turns back to the saucepan. "What were you planning on doing with this, anyway?" She asks, and you explain awkwardly how there's no kettle and you were going to try to make her tea and her laughter fills that place that's been empty for far too long.

You feel like singing for the first time in years. It's been a job so long you forgot what it was like to feel something and want to sing.

Author's note: I have no ceiling. The kitchen is my bed.
Not sure if this is done yet. Does it seem done? Can I go to bed now?