by Jae
Del stared at her in surprise, but before she could answer, the doorbell rang. "Shit." Del stood and pointed a finger at Kade. "Hold that thought. I want a chance to answer that question in detail."
As Del walked away to answer the door, Kade rubbed her face and cursed herself. Uh-oh, you're in for it now, but no, you just couldn't let it go.
"Kade," Del called from the door. "I think it's for you."
Kade frowned. No one knew she was here. Her friendship with Del was not common knowledge. She stood and walked to the door, craning her neck to see around Del.
Hesitating in the doorway was Laurie, tears in her eyes and both of her hands clutching the straps of her backpack.
"Laurie!" Kade strode up to her and pulled her into the apartment. "What are you doing here? How did you even find me here?"
Laurie shuffled her feet. She bit her lip in an attempt not to cry. "I went to your apartment, but the doorwoman said you had just left in a cab. Luckily, she remembered the address you gave the cabbie. One of her neighbors," she pointed at Del, "let me into the building, and when I described you, she said you were Clarice's friend and told me which apartment Clarice lives in."
"Her name is Del, not Clarice," Kade murmured, still shocked to find herself face-to-face with her niece.
"Impressive detective work," Del said, giving Laurie an encouraging smile. "You'll make one hell of a detective one day."
"Or a first-class prosecutor," Kade said absentmindedly. It took her a second to realize she was putting Laurie under the same kind of pressure her parents did. There were more professions than just being a lawyer, even for a Matheson. "She'll be first-class in whatever she chooses to do," she added.
Laurie turned her head to throw a cautious look at Del, then whispered to Kade, "Can I talk to you?"
"I'll leave you two alone," Del said.
"It's your apartment," Kade protested. It seemed hardly polite to have Del stay out of her own living room, especially since she was still supposed to take it easy and do nothing but relax. On top of that, Kade wasn't looking forward to having a conversation about whatever had happened to Laurie. I could use a little help from someone who knows more about what Laurie is going through than I do.
Del was already on her way to the kitchen. "I don't mind," she said over her shoulder. "I'll make us something to eat."
Kade shook her head in amusement. Every time I see her, she's trying to feed me. Then she sobered and turned back to Laurie. "Come on. Let's go to the living room." She directed Laurie to the couch and took a seat next to her. "Now tell me what happened."
"It's horrible! They're ruining my life! I won't go back! Ever!" Laurie sobbed.
Kade hadn't felt so helpless since she had found the unconscious Del in front of her apartment. That was only two days ago, she reminded herself. Lately, her life seemed to spin out of control. "What happened?"
Laurie looked up, her tears now replaced by anger. "They forbid me from ever seeing Evan again. And when I called Evan to tell her about it, she said it's probably for the best! She said it's getting too complicated, and it's just not worth it." She began to cry again.
Oh, God! Why do I have to be the one to deal with her first broken heart? "Laurie, calm down!" She rubbed Laurie's back when she started to hyperventilate. "You're making yourself sick. Do you want a glass of water?"
When Laurie nodded, Kade hurried into the kitchen, glad to escape from the living room and the tense situation for a moment. "Can I have a glass of water for Laurie?" she asked.
"Sure." Del handed her two glasses. "Everything all right out there?" she asked.
"No! Nothing is all right!" Kade slumped against the counter. "She has homophobic parents and a girlfriend who I think just broke up with her – and she comes to me for advice! Suddenly, I've become the spokesperson for all lesbians! The gay Dr. Ruth! I can't do this, Del."
Del turned away from the stove and wrapped an arm around Kade's shoulder, pulling her against her comforting warmth for a second. "You can."
"But she thinks I'm an experienced lesbian – and I'm not!" Kade filled a glass with water and then drank it herself before she filled the second glass for Laurie.
"You don't have to be. Just be yourself. Don't try to be someone else." Del gave her an encouraging nod. "And if she has specific questions you can't answer, you can always defer to the more senior lesbian." She winked at Kade.
Kade took a calming breath and returned to the living room. She pressed the glass of water into Laurie's trembling hands and thought about what to say. Her first instinct was to tell Laurie that everything would be okay, that it was not as bad as it seemed, but then she remembered Del's words. Just be yourself. Don't try to be someone else. Dawn and Aiden were good at giving emotional comfort, but it was not Kade's forte. Kade was good at taking action, so she did. "Is there anything I can do to help?"
"Can I stay with you?" Laurie begged, clutching Kade's sleeve.
Kade had to fight down rising panic. Raising a teenager was not on her top ten list of things to do in the near future. She also didn't want Laurie to stay with her while a possibly dangerous stalker was watching her apartment. "Laurie, it's not that I wouldn't love to have you over a little more often, but I can't just let you stay without your parents' consent. I know it probably doesn't seem like it right now, but they're your parents and they care about you."
Laurie snorted. "Oh, yeah! They care about me so much that they threatened to send me off to a boarding school if they catch me seeing Evan one more time!"
God, this is a mess. I'm not equipped to deal with this. How can I sit here and tell her that her parents will learn to accept her when I avoided exploring a possible attraction to women because I knew it was not acceptable for a Matheson? Kade desperately searched for something to say.
"Need more time to talk, or are you ready for some pancakes?" Del asked, sticking her head around the doorjamb.
Laurie looked up with red-rimmed eyes. "Pancakes are breakfast food," she said, sniffling.
"They're also one of three things I can actually cook." Del came in and set a tray with pancakes and maple syrup down on the coffee table.
"I'm not hungry," Laurie said, hunching down and crossing her arms over her stomach.
Kade had also lost her appetite, but she was glad to have Del's company anyway.
Del began to set the table. "I can understand that. I didn't feel like eating after my parents threw me out either."
Laurie's head shot up, and she stared at Del. "Your parents threw you out? Because you...?"
"Because they caught me with another girl, yes," Del answered with casualness that Kade could only admire.
She was glad that Del had come in and was now taking over this difficult conversation. Del had more experience from which Laurie could gain.
"Did it ever get better?" Laurie asked with hope in her eyes.
"My parents are not like yours, Laurie," Del said quietly. "They grew up in Puerto Rico and were raised to believe that homosexuality is a mortal sin. They didn't just sit me down and yell at me after they found out I was gay. My father beat me black and blue while my mother said one Hail Mary after the other. I haven't seen them since."
Kade forgot Laurie for a moment and just looked at Del in shock.
"Wow, that's awful! I'm sorry that happened to you," Laurie said. "At least I don't have to worry about that. My parents are too genteel to ever lay a hand on me. They deal with their problems by sweeping it all under the rug." She turned curious blue eyes on Kade. "It's a wonder they didn't tell me I couldn't see you again, too. How did they take you being gay? How come no one ever told me? I haven't heard even one peep about you being gay from anybody!"
There it is. Kade had known the question would come sometime, but it didn't make it easier to answer now. How could she tell Laurie the truth without making it feel like a betrayal? "That's really... complicated, Laurie."
Laurie looked at her with a bitter expression on her young face. "Why is
everything I want to talk about 'too complicated' in this family?"
Kade sighed. Laurie was right. She had heard the "that's complicated" excuse much too often growing up too. She looked at Del, who gave her a nod and mouthed, "Tell her."
"Your parents don't know that I... that I'm interested in women." Every single word was hard to say. "In fact... no one in the family knows."
Laurie leaped to her feet, almost toppling over the coffee table. "You forced me to tell my parents while you stayed safely in the closet?"
Kade lifted her hands in an appeasing gesture. "It's not like that, Laurie." Isn't it? she asked herself. Is that not exactly what you've been doing? She stared helplessly at Laurie, not knowing what she could say.
"I thought I could trust you!" Laurie grabbed her backpack and ran to the door.
"No." Del quickly blocked the way to the door. "You're not leaving like that. Not before you hear what your aunt has to say." She gently but firmly dragged Laurie back to the couch.
That's the problem – I don't have anything to say. Nothing that could reestablish her trust in me. She looked from Laurie to Del, silently asking for a little help.
"Coming out to someone you know will probably react badly is not an easy thing to do," Del said. She was looking directly at Laurie, but Kade could feel that her words were directed at her too. "It should be an individual choice whenever possible. With you, it just wasn't possible. If you had kept quiet about what happened between you and Evan, she would have gone to prison. I know you wouldn't want that."
"Of course I didn't!" Laurie forgot her shyness when she snapped at Del.
Del only nodded calmly. "Do you think it would have helped the situation if Kade had told your parents that she's not straight either?" Laurie immediately opened her mouth, but Del cut her off. "Take a moment to think about it. How would your parents have reacted?"
"They would have kicked her out of the house for being a bad influence on me," Laurie said, the sarcasm in her voice barely hiding the bitter sadness.
Kade stared at Del. She makes it sound like it was the rational thing to do. But was it really? Wasn't it just cowardice?
"Okay, so maybe Sunday was not the right moment," Laurie finally conceded, "but why didn't you tell them before? You didn't just start being a lesbian on Sunday!"
Kade barely resisted the urge to get up and pace around the room. "You're right. My sexual orientation didn't change overnight. I've noticed women all my life. I also noticed men," she added slowly, watching Laurie for her reaction.
Laurie just looked at her, waiting to see where she was going with that explanation.
"For a lot of years, I didn't act on either attraction. Relationships seemed like too much of a distraction. My job... my career has always been the most important thing in my life. I never met a woman who seemed worth the risk." Kade fell silent, listening to the echoes of her own words. She could feel Del's gaze on her but avoided turning around to face her. She didn't want to tell Del she could be the woman who was worth the risk even though she admitted to herself that she was beginning to think more and more in that direction.
Laurie frowned. "What are you saying?"
Kade sighed. She knew Laurie would take it as a rejection of her own sexual orientation, as a betrayal by her one ally, but she had to say it anyway. "My interest in women never played an active part in my life, so I never thought it necessary to come out."
"You're not a lesbian?" Laurie jumped up again. She stared down at Kade, trembling with anger, confusion, and feelings of betrayal. "B-but you said –!"
Del gently cleared her throat. She stepped between the two Matheson women. "Laurie, contrary to what some people think, sleeping with another woman is not what makes you a lesbian. Your feelings are. Some people seem to know they're only attracted to people of the same sex from a very early age, and they come out to everyone and their dog before they're even through high school. Others take a little longer, and some may never explore these feelings at all. Sexuality is a very complicated thing." She gave Laurie a smile. "And I'm not just saying that because I don't want to talk about it. I promise you can always talk to me, whenever you want, about whatever you want."
Kade exhaled. The tension in the room seemed to dissipate slowly. She knew Del had basically offered to be Laurie's lesbian mentor, and Laurie seemed to accept. She could just leave it at that, but she knew it would be the easy way out. "Just because I chose a different path from yours doesn't mean I'm not willing to support you in any way I can. Do you want me to talk to your parents?"
Laurie shrugged. Now that her anger was gone, tears reappeared in her eyes. "Could you talk to Evan? Convince her to see me again?" she begged.
God. Kade rubbed her eyes. Just when I thought this situation couldn't get more complicated. "I'm not sure if that's a good idea, Laurie. I was involved in getting her arrested and almost charging her with rape. I might not be the best person to talk to her. For now, let me concentrate on your parents, okay?"
* * *
Kade had almost forgotten how uncomfortable she could feel in a Matheson home. Is this how Laurie feels in her own home? She sat on the edge of her chair, playing with her teacup while she waited for her brother to come home.
Her sister-in-law kept her company, but they didn't have much in common, and Kade wasn't in the mood for small talk. As a result, they sat in silence.
When Doug finally arrived, he politely kissed Kade's cheek before he sat down for a cup of tea. "Where's Laurel?" he asked his wife.
"That's what I came to talk about. She came to my apartment an hour ago," Kade said. There was no sense explaining why Laurie hadn't found her there and where she was now.
"She's not in her room?" Doug's teacup rattled as he swiftly set it down. "She went out even though I grounded her for the week?"
Kade stared at him. She felt her cheeks grow hot as anger bubbled up. "You grounded her?" She couldn't believe it. "Punishing her is not going to change the fact that she's gay, Douglas. It won't just go away. That's something you have to deal with."
"She's not gay!" Doug boomed. "She's just confused right now."
How can he just dismiss his daughter's feelings like that? "Confused?" she repeated. "Like you were confused at seventeen when you fell in love with each other?" She looked from Doug to Eleanor. At least her sister-in-law had the decency to lower her gaze. "Laurie might be confused about your reactions, but she's old enough to know her own feelings."
"She is confused," Doug insisted. "She's so confused that she sees homosexual people everywhere. She even thinks you are gay!" He laughed and lifted his teacup to his lips.
Kade froze. She told them. Of course she did. I expected she would at some point. She shook her head at the irony. She'd had sleepless nights about her family's reaction, and now that they knew, they didn't believe it. "Laurie is not confused," she told him once more, very quietly, trying to keep control of her voice and her emotions. "I told her I'm a lesbian." She actually hadn't said those words to Laurie, but the distinction was too subtle for her brother to understand. Kade took a deep breath. She had said it, and now she was waiting for the inevitable explosion.
But it never happened. Doug just stared at her with a disapproving frown. "Why would you tell her that?" he asked, clearly confused.
He still doesn't understand. He doesn't want to understand. "Because it's the truth," Kade answered quietly.
"What the...?" Doug's chair scraped over the parquet as he jumped up. "What kind of stupid game is this? You are not gay! You dated my best friend in high school and –"
"Technically, I'm bisexual," Kade said before Doug could list all her former boyfriends, but then stopped herself. Wait a minute, why am I defending myself? I'm acting as if I'm a suspect, as if I've done something wrong iShe squared her shoulders and raised her head to stare them right in the eyes. You're a prosecutor, so prosecute! Take the offensive! i"I'm not here to talk about me. I'm not even here to talk about Laurie. I'm here to talk about yo
u!" She stabbed her finger at both of them. "There's nothing wrong with me or Laurie. You are the ones with the problem!"
Doug bristled. "I don't have a problem! I'm just trying to do what's best for my daughter, and I don't need my single, childless, younger sister to help me with that!"
Kade ignored the dig and took a step closer, getting into her brother's face. "You think you're acting like a good father?"
"Of course, I –"
"You're treating Laurie like our father treated you!" Kade noticed that Doug went pale, but she didn't stop. "You were a good kid with fantastic grades, a bright future, and a lovely girlfriend, but it wasn't enough in the eyes of our father. Your plans and dreams meant nothing to him because he wanted you to become a lawyer and marry the daughter of one of the partners in his firm. He never acknowledged any of your achievements over the years. He barely even commented when you opened your own clinic – and I know you suffered all these years."