“Hey, Clairebear, wake up,” Skylar whispered as she shook her sister almost out of bed, “I’m leaving. Tell Mom and Dad I came home and you met Felicia and everything is fine. I’m going to stay at her place tonight.”
Claire woke up and shook her head to get some clarity. She looked at her phone and realized only thirty minutes had gone by since she turned out the lights.
“What? You’re seriously going to leave right now? How will you get there?”
“We’ll walk. I love you,” Skylar said as she closed the bedroom door.
Claire plopped back down on her pillow and closed her eyes. She didn’t feel responsible for keeping Skylar at home. Whatever her consequences might be, it was up to their parents to decide.
“Hey,” Felicia said in a whisper once they got outside, “Claire seems cool.”
“Hey,” Skylar giggled, “she is cool, baby, but you don’t have to whisper. We’re outside now.”
Felicia took in a deep breath and let it out, “You’re right. We are outside. Tipsy and free… and I’m so ready to make love to you, Skye.”
Felicia grabbed Skylar’s ass then smacked her lips. Skylar was feeling the alcohol and enjoying the physical attention, but the whole thing about making love snapped her out of it enough to question where the evening was headed.
“Felicia, don’t you think we’re rushing that part of things?”
“I just feel so close to you and I want to share that kind of intimacy with you, that’s all, Skye. Don’t be scared... I can wait until you’re ready.”
Skylar grabbed Felicia’s hand, “I want to do this right, Felicia. I’m not scared. It’s just all so new to me, you know?”
They held hands as they continued to walk down the sidewalk in the cool summer night.
“Maybe you shouldn’t sleep over tonight, Skye. I don’t know if I can control myself.”
A flash of headlights came up behind them as they strolled in the cool summer night. They leisurely turned the corner, but noticed the car had followed them. Skylar turned around and squinted enough to make out her mother’s car.
“Christ. It’s my mom.”
Sarah pulled over and opened the passenger door window, “Skylar, what are you doing out here in the middle of the night?”
“I came home with Felicia and decided we’d stay at her parent’s house tonight. I told Claire to let you know. Everything is good.”
“Well, everything is not good, dear. You’re seventeen and you have a curfew and you broke it. A curfew doesn’t mean check in and leave while your parents are sleeping.”
“Hi, Mrs. Sinclair, I’m Felicia.”
“Hi, Felicia, are you from around here?”
“No, my parents are, though.”
“Well, it was nice to meet you, but Skylar is coming home with me. Can I give you a ride to your house?”
“Actually, my house is just right around the corner, but thanks.”
Sarah and Skylar drove home in silence. Sarah didn’t know what to say and Skylar was far too irritated with her mother for ruining her night.
“I guess we’ll talk about this in the morning, especially since you’ve been drinking.”
“All right, Mom… good night.”
Sarah watched as Skylar went up the stairs. She silently admonished herself for not paying closer attention to her daughter while she spent an inordinate amount of time getting Claire ready to leave for college. Skylar peeled her clothes off and hopped underneath her covers.
“I guess you’re feeling a little lonelier than you were a couple of hours ago in your bed,” Claire whispered in the darkness.
“Yeah, I would say so.”
“So, what’s going on with you? For the first time ever in our entire lives I felt separate from you tonight. It was weird,” Claire lamented.
“Wow, I felt it, too. It’s me, Claire. I’m really confused right now.”
“Why? What’s happening? You seemed so happy when Felicia was here, granted you were tipsy, but so what?”
“I don’t know where to begin. I had a totally different experience with Felicia tonight. I know I’m not going to be eighteen for another few months, but I felt so alive tonight in a different way than ever before.”
Claire realized just how much her conservative, play-it-safe side ran in contrast to the whimsical, free-spirited side of her sister. Although Claire was anxious to hear about Skylar’s adventures, she couldn’t help feel a little envious of the circumstances. She started feeling very vanilla.
“Ugh,” Claire couldn’t hold the thought inside her head any longer.
“What? What did I say?” Skylar asked.
“You didn’t say anything, it’s just that I feel like I haven’t lived at all and you take chances and have these cool experiences and I’m just….”
“Don’t forget, Clairebear, I’m sure there will be consequences to my bad behavior tonight.”
Claire thought about what Skylar said, “Who cares? Mom and Dad get over everything. Jesus, tonight when you said you weren’t going to finish high school, Dad said you could present an alternative plan.”
Skylar chuckled at the thought of that conversation. She knew even before talking to Felicia that she was done with high school. But now she knew for sure. Even without her parents’ blessing, Skylar was going to New York.
“Okay, here’s the thing, sis, I think I’m falling in love with Felicia and I want to move in with her and finish high school at a local community college.”
“What?!? You can’t be serious. When you wake up tomorrow, you’ll see things more clearly.”
“Look, if it doesn’t work out, I’ll move in with Rachel until college next fall. Besides, finishing my last year of high school at a college gives me a better shot at getting in to Vanderbilt.”
Claire couldn’t argue with that. While she played the game and followed all the rules to get into an amazing college; Skylar was coming up short with joining clubs, volunteering and packing in an overflow of after-school activities. Going to college for senior year most likely gave her a better shot at getting in, Claire thought..
“How are you going to tell Mom and Dad about your plan?”
“Well, they don’t need to know all about Felicia… just that we’re friends. Rachel will be my backup and I’ll look into colleges in the City.”
“So,” Claire sighed, “you’re going to move to Manhattan. Felicia lives in Manhattan? What does she do? How will you afford to live? How old is she?”
“God, I feel like I’m talking to Mom… she’s twenty-four, I think. She works at an advertising agency in the art department, but she’s really an artist looking for her big break. I’ll wait tables and pay part of the rent.”
“So, this is what you did tonight? You made plans to move in with a girlfriend you barely started dating? Christ, you’re barely a lesbian.”
“I’m barely a lesbian to you, maybe. Look, I just feel it, Clairebear. I can’t explain it. But no, to answer your question, I didn’t make plans to move in with her. I started thinking about getting out of here before I ever met Felicia. Now it makes perfect sense.”
Claire got up out of bed and went into their bathroom. She pulled her hair back in a ponytail and nervously began splashing her face with cold water. She grabbed a towel and patted her skin dry before coming back into the bedroom.
“Can you just be happy for me? I want you to get to know Felicia. She’s so cool. She’s also lived a couple of places in Europe. I know she’s been to Italy a bunch of times, too.”
“Oh, God, I’m sorry I’m being so hard on you. My life is so planned and boring….”
“You’re dating a guy who just got drafted by the Giants. I hardly think your life is boring.”
“You know what I mean. You always choose something out of the box and cool and I always do the right thing.”
“Well, come to New York and Felicia and I will take you out on the town. We’ll hit every gay bar and dance the night away!”
Claire couldn’t help but notice the silence between them.
“Oh my God, you’ve already done that, too?!? Please don’t tell me you’ve had sex.”
“Yes and no, to both questions. The gay bar was awesome. Everyone was so chill and I felt like I was with my people. Felicia knows I want to wait to be with her. Although I wasn’t explicit about being a virgin, but I don’t know, do I tell her, does it matter?”
“I don’t know, either, I’m over here drowning in my vanilla sea. Can’t help you with that, Skye.”
“So, you and Ryan?”
“Nope. And I’m glad I didn’t because he’s leaving right after graduation. I’m sure I’ll never see him again.”
“Really? Your intuition doesn’t say otherwise?”
Claire didn’t know how to answer. She may have been the self-imposed boring girl in the family, but she was acutely aware of her ability to see through people and to catch glimpses of future events or was at least realize she had met someone before from another time and place. Ryan, as far as she was concerned, fit into that category. She was sure she knew him from a past life. But she couldn’t help but wonder if that were indeed the case why he was leaving her in this lifetime so suddenly. Surely, their time together was not meant to be so limited. She wondered how she could be wrong, but she knew in all things psychic, the margin of error could occasionally be quite large.
“I don’t know, Skye. Just when I’m sure I have all the answers or at least some of the answers, circumstances change and all my parading around touting the virtues of my knowledge about the other side begins to fade. I feel like I don’t know anything anymore.”
Skylar got out of her bed and crawled into bed with Claire. They fell fast asleep and didn’t move until the summer sun blasted them through blinds, opened at the courtesy of Sarah.
“Mom! What are you doing?!?” Claire sharply asked as she pulled her pillow over her head.
“Time to get up girls. We have some talking to do and we need to get you a dress for graduation, Claire.”
“Ugh,” Skylar groaned as she, too, pulled a pillow over her head.
“No rest for the wicked, and definitely no rest for the wicked who happen to be a little hung-over. You have some explaining to do, missy. So, take a shower, girls, I’m going to run your sisters over to sports camp, but I’ll be back for breakfast and a good mother-daughters talk.”
Chapter Eight
Claire popped out of bed first and got in the shower. She headed downstairs to make a big pot of coffee when she heard a knock at both doors. She leaned in to the window to see Felicia at the back door and motioned her to come in. She ran to front door and opened it to see Ryan holding some flowers.
“Are those for me, Ryan?” Claire coyly asked.
“I got the feeling with my big news that you were feeling a little bummed out, so I thought I’d pop in and see what you were doing today.”
“Hmmm,” Claire thought about the best way to get him to stay knowing Sarah had a day of dress shopping planned for her, “Well, I really want to hang out, but my mom wants to take me graduation dress shopping.”
“Awww, well, that’s too bad. Maybe we can get together tonight? I really need to see you as much as possible before I go.”
“Really?” Claire asked.
She felt disappointed in herself for seeming so flirty and weak and coy, and she wondered what had gotten into her. She wondered why would she act so surprised that a great guy felt the need to see her as much as possible before he left for the West Coast. She was a great catch, after all. Her newfound insecurity about a boy was less than becoming, she thought. She had to work on that.
“Claire?” Ryan asked, “Are you still with me?”
“Ugh, yeah, just one of those days with too much internal dialogue. I guess I was thinking why you’d want to spend so much time with me, considering you’re leaving for good, forever. I don’t know, Ryan. I guess I sometimes feel insecure about being so straight and so vanilla-like. You’re going to meet so many interesting hot babes when you’re in California… you know, girls that have really lived. Skinny, blonde, blue eyes… whatever, maybe I’m just tired after last night.”
Ryan rolled his eyes and kissed Claire on the cheek.
“Baseball before babes, Claire. I’m going out there to work and bust my ass to move up from a farm team… before you go on with any more stream of consciousness stuff, maybe we could put these flowers in water and sit down?”
Claire let out a genuine, heartfelt giggle, “See, I’m impossible. Yes, come in, Ryan, I just made a fresh pot of coffee.”
Claire took Ryan by the hand and led him toward the kitchen. He gently pulled on her hand and brought her body back into his. He laid the palm of his hand against her cheek and kissed her softly on the lips. Claire could feel the energy between them, confirming the possibility that outside of the hormones flowing through her bloodstream, something much deeper moved between them. She flashed back to the cool days of early spring when she first went to his baseball practices. The girls would fawn all over him and he would sit on the bench, his jacket covering his pitching arm only, ignoring all of them while occasionally turning to smile and wink at Claire. The air was cool and damp, but smelled of the beginning of spring. It was the smell that would always stay with her. Always… whatever might happen. It was clear that Ryan was very serious about baseball. She knew girls were secondary. And she knew they were connected.
Claire turned from the sound of a little commotion coming from the kitchen.
“Oh, I forgot. Skye’s girlfriend knocked on the backdoor when you knocked on the front door. I let her in, but forgot all about it.”
Claire walked toward the kitchen doorway where she found Skylar sitting on the counter sipping a cup of coffee. Her legs were wrapped around Felicia while they faced one another. Felicia was busy alternating between kissing Skylar’s chest and sharing her cup of coffee. Claire cleared her throat to warn them of her presence.
“Hey, Clairebear, do you want to meet Felicia in the light of day?”
“Are you alright with me interrupting?”
“Uh,” Skylar said, “why would we care? Do you think lesbians need more privacy making out than you guys do? I saw you lip-smacking each other before you came in the kitchen.”
“Fair enough. Hi, Felicia, I’m Claire. So, you’re the one taking my sweet sister away, huh?”
Skylar interrupted, “Um… Felicia and I haven’t talked yet, Claire.”
“God, I’m sorry,” Claire said in a sincere voice, “I just figured….”
“What? You’re coming to New York with me?!?! Really?!?”
Skylar’s face turned red, “If you’ll have me. I mean, I have to do some research, but I really need to be there.”
Sarah walked in and tossed her car keys in the basket on the counter without looking up, “Where do you need to be?”
“Here it comes, Skye. I don’t know if now is the best time to work this out,” Claire said sighing.
“What’s going on here?” Sarah asked when she looked up and saw Skylar’s body wrapped around Felicia’s.
Claire grabbed Ryan by the hand and said, “Hey, Mom, maybe you can visit with Skye and Felicia for a little while. Ryan and I will go find something to do until we’re ready to leave.”
“Uh, no, Claire,” Sarah said, “I think… we need to talk to your sister together. Maybe make plans to see Ryan later?”
“That’s fine with me, Mrs. Sinclair,” Ryan agreed.
“Mom,” Claire protested, “Ryan and I have such a limited amount of time to spend together before he leaves, why do I have to stick around?”
Claire looked at her mother. She knew Sarah was open-minded, but maybe the sight of her daughter with an older woman threw her back. Claire’s mind raced contemplating all the possibilities that could potentially freak out her mother. First, she wondered if a moth
er would know her daughter were gay without ever asking. Claire then wondered if Felicia were a boy if it would have been different. Certainly, Claire thought, if Felicia were a twenty-four year old man casually making out with her seventeen year old daughter in the kitchen, Sarah would have yelled for Earl to do something. Claire finally surmised that the best case scenario in all of her speculations was indeed that Felicia was a woman and Skye was simply discovering her sexuality. Sarah could handle the gay part and maybe be okay with the age difference, but the moving to New York part to finish high school while living with Felicia would be a stretch. Maybe it was an impossibility. All the variables considered, Claire knew her mother needed her in this moment.
Oddly enough, Claire thought, Felicia seemed unfazed by the situation. She took a step back away from Skylar and leaned against the counter with her body now facing forward, but she didn’t budge from between Skylar’s legs. Claire couldn’t help but admire her confidence, but she detected something else... a shade of arrogance. Claire couldn’t get a good read on her as she stood in the kitchen, her thoughts disrupted by her mother’s mildly irritated voice.
“Claire, please, we’ll go dress shopping another day and you can go hang with Ryan whenever, alright?”
“Sounds good to me,” Ryan said, “Claire, just stay here and text me when we can hang out.”
He kissed her on the cheek and said his goodbyes to the women in the room.
Sarah turned first to Felicia, “It would have been much nicer to meet you under better circumstances, Felicia, but I have to tell you after last night and walking in on the two of you today is a little much for me.”
Twist of Fate Page 7