by Tara Wimble
Oliv pushes against the door. Bella, and Jacque who’s standing behind her with her hand between Bella’s legs, adds her weight behind the door. “I’ll be two- five-”
“Fifteen.” Jacque whispers.
“Fifteen minutes.” Bella disguises the gasp she makes as Jacque rolls her fingers over her clit.
Oliv isn’t having it. “Kathryn is hogging our shower, like you’ve been in here for a while, and I just need to grab-”
Jacque doesn’t mean to but she lets up on helping to close the door and Bella weakens thanks to what’s going on and Oliv manages to push the door open. “See that wasn’-holy shit!”
There’s a scramble that Bella makes, grabbing towels and throwing them in Oliv’s face, giving Bella just enough time for her to hide behind the shower curtain and for Jacque to wrap a large towel around her body. Oliv throws the others to the floor, the door is now wide open, and she looks between them.
“Are you fucking-”
“Oliv!”
“You are!” Oliv actually pushes her way into the bathroom exclaims. “Jesus Christ, Jacque.”
Jacque has a death grip on her towel and curses her luck because of course this would happen.
“So this is a thing again?” Oliv asks. “Like, you’re fucking so I assume you’re back together- you were fucking just now right? You don’t need to share a shower to save water while you’re here-”
Bella’s mortification can be sensed in the actual feeling of the bathroom.
She won’t be deterred even as Jacque tries to usher her out of the bathroom again. “When did this happen? Were you fucking at camp?” Oliv wears the expression of someone attempting to pick up all the clues in their last few meetings.
“Can you stop saying that!” Bella grabs the curtain and covers her body with it.
Oliv shrugs. “If you can’t say it then you’re probably not mature enough to be doing it-”
“Oh she’s mature enough-” Jacque utters.
She gets a sponge thrown at the back of her head for that.
“You can’t tell anyone!” Bella peeks around the shower curtain until Jacque whispers that it’s see through and she presses her body away from it.
Oliv is still wearing that ‘oh shit I knew something was up’ look on her face and the more flustered Bella gets, the less chance Jacque has of finishing what she started. “Oliv, give us a few alright?”
Her request gets her a mischievous grin from Oliv and she murmurs something too quiet for Bella to hear. “I’ll keep my mouth shut but, uh, you two are gonna have a hard time keeping this from Kathryn.”
Jacque starts to close the door just as Oliv yells out. “Nice ass, Bella!”
The door is slammed shut quicker and Bella’s ‘fuck off’ response if muffled through the door.
She expects Bella to be shaken up from Oliv walking in on them, now knowing they’re together in some way, but there’s two sides to it. She reads the slight humiliation in Bella’s expression, trying to counter it as she presses Bella against the tiled wall again, but then she definitely feels something else.
“Shut up.” Bella breathes hotly against her neck.
“Oh god.” Jacque’s rumbling laugh echoes against her body. She rubs her fingers over Bella’s clit again. “That turned you on. Getting caught-”
“Fuck-” Bella’s protests die in her throat. “No.”
“Oh really?” Jacque asks. She slides deeper, dipping the tip of a finger inside of her. “So, I won’t mention that I forgot to lock the door then?”
“Don’t.” Bella moans, definitely meaning the opposite.
“Anybody could walk in. At any moment and just find us here.” Jacque pushes on. “That doesn’t turn you on at all, does it.”
There’s a certain smugness that comes with being right when Bella’s ‘oh’s and ‘fuck’s bounce around the room when she sinks on her fingers.
Jacque bites down on her neck and Bella comes with a scream that more than likely reverberated past just their room.
She can’t help but laugh.
“What?” Bella gasps out, barely catching her breath.
Jacque hums after sucking her fingers clean. “Nothing.”
“Jacque-”
“Nothing. I’ll just file that away for later.” Jacque reaches to the side and turns the shower knob. The water comes down cool and Bella gasps again.
Thank you Olivia Andreoli.
*
Oliv keeps giving her thumbs up whenever they look at each other and Jacque is reconsidering this whole surf lessons on Christmas Day thing but here they are and now Oliv knows so it feels like a magnifying glass on everything they do.
Even if that turns Bella on just a little bit it’s mostly just a mixed bag of stress.
It’s not that they’re ashamed of each other and more than ever on this important of a day they want to be together. It’s just that it’s complicated.
But when hasn’t it been.
Their surf instructor probably also has a side job as like an athletic model or something, the point is that she’s a gorgeous woman, and the way Bella’s side eyeing her right now makes her flashback to their honeymoon and the ski instructor and what is even happening right now.
This was supposed to be their fun, in lieu of presents, Christmas morning and now it’s like an episode of Glee if it was shot on HBO.
By the time they actually get in the water, Jacque wants to go back to the hotel.
It’s not her fault that curls get the girls, it really really isn’t, and after the sixth time the instructor corrects her form she itches for the old days with the ring on her finger and the ever present tan line and the giant ‘back off’ sign that presented.
But that’s an entirely different can of worms.
Her saving grace comes from glaring at Oliv enough for her to feel sorry for her situation and help. It might piss Sadie off but putting a tall glass of Andreoli between hot surf instructor and Jacque certainly changes the woman’s mind fast.
It’s still the curls. She gives Oliv a return thumbs up, who flips her off in turn, and picks up her board to join the others in the water again.
Kathryn is precariously managing to sit on the board and make Instagram videos of them failing epically at doing anything that could be remotely close to being called surfing. At the end of the day the best they managed is a little bit of a tan, or at least for some the lack of a burn, and a few great videos of Sadie completely wiping out that they’ll always treasure.
They retreat back to their respective rooms after their absent teammates all tweet and call to tell them how jealous they are of their Christmas holiday. It soothes the irritation on Bella’s face from all the attention Jacque has been trying to avoid.
But Jacque still drags them into the alcove behind the ice machine to clear the air because she doesn’t want shit like this to hang between them and fester and Bella has to know by now this is the real deal, even if she has to tell her sometimes. Remind her.
Bella has her back to the wall but she crosses her arms in between them, not letting Jacque lean up against her like she wants to. “We need to shower.”
“We need to talk first.” Jacque asserts.
“I don’t think there’s anything to talk about it, I’m over it.” Bella answers back, still leaning back into the wall.
“There doesn’t need to be an ‘it’ though. Bella, look at me.” She gets the attention she asked for. “I’m not going to up and leave you for some sexy instructor at a resort somewhere. Not here, not anywhere.”
“You thought she was sexy?” Out of everything she just said, all of the importance she laid out and that’s what Bella chooses to take away from it all.
“No.” Jacque shakes her head in confusion. “Just ignore that part. Listen to the rest of what I just said.”
“Jacque.” Bella uncrosses her arms and puts her hands on Jacque’s hips, pulling her closer. “I was annoyed. Alright. It’s petty and stupid but I was jealous,
just a little-”
“You were jealous?”
“Can’t you tell by my content expression?” Bella deadpans. “But it was more because I haven’t- we didn’t-”
Jacque is trying to figure out what Bella is saying before she says it but there’s no clue that comes up and Bella throws her off completely. “You’re my boo.”
“I’m your what?” Jacque’s eyebrows just about meet her hairline.
“Boo. Lady. So no sexy surf or ski instructors or bar girls or Oliv-”
“Woah there.”
“Because I love you, okay, a lot actually. So I’m not about to lose you to any of those things.”
And leave it to Bella to finally say that she loves her next to an ice machine in Hawaii on Christmas Day after having previously sounded like she was quoting a rap video in the middle of a jealous diatribe about various sexy instructors.
But Jacque couldn’t really think of anything that was more like Bella so it maybe, just kinda, fit.
Their bodies fall together easily. Like the barrier between them has collapsed and Jacque presses her forehead onto Bella’s with a soft sigh. “You love me?” Like actually, truly, genuinely.
“I really really do.” Bella whispers against Jacque’s lips. She follows through with three kisses. Each emphasizing the three words.
They forget themselves for a second and the kissing gets too heated. So heated that Bella knocks into the ice machine and triggers the ‘on’ option causing an avalanche of crushed ice to burst through the dispenser.
It’s the universe literally telling them to cool off and remember that they’re now on course to be extremely late for dinner.
“We should probably go shower now.” Jacque breathes out still pinning Bella to the wall, flicking back between looking at her eyes and her lips.
“Probably.” But Bella makes no move to leave, just surges back to steal another kiss. “The reservation isn’t for another hour.”
“And Kathryn won’t be out of the shower yet.”
“There’s no point going back.” Bella let’s Jacque pin her arms against the wall.
“No point at all.”
As it turns out ‘I love you’ sex is even better than ‘Oliv just caught us’ sex.
Jacque files that one away too but it’s not like anything would ever ruin her hearing it even if it wasn’t.
*
The hotel restaurant serves their own take on Christmas dinner. When they all get down there five minutes late, thanks to Kathryn insisting on documenting all of their outfits for the internet, they’re shown to their center table in the middle of the surprisingly bustling holiday crowd.
Candles are lit in the midst of the perfectly laid dinner set. There are brightly coloured flowers arranged as the centerpiece and it doesn’t feel like Christmas until the music being played over the intercom reveals itself to be a continuous string of holiday songs.
It’s a rare occasion that sees them all wearing dresses and it’s only the wink from Oliv that has her stalling as she pulls out Bella’s chair. She justifies that she would have done that even if they hadn’t just been scrambling to get dressed and in the throes of their post-confession sex.
Their friends scrub up well too. Kathryn practically cooed as Oliv and Sadie walked out of their shared room in complementary colours and heels. It was her very own Christmas present. Oliv has her hair down, trailing black curls and as much as she keeps throwing Jacque an amused look, Jacque can’t stop herself from complimenting her. That sets of a chain reaction of Sadie and Kathryn crying out for their own personal comment and the waiters walk into a very confusing scene with four girls all preening for their friend.
It almost goes to hell when Oliv asks who looks the best but she’s quickly cut off by Kathryn claiming that Bella has an unfair advantage. “Considering they’re fucking.”
Then everyone forgets about their food and Bella chokes on her water.
Oliv tries to start a slow clap at the table but a sharp look from Sadie has her tucking her hands underneath the table cloth.
Kathryn continues, oblivious to the nuclear bomb she just casually set in the middle of dinner. “Oh, was that a secret? I thought you wanted people to know, that’s why you were being so obvious we just weren’t talking about it.”
By now Bella is trying to cover her face with a napkin and Jacque doesn’t want to be the one to point out that she’s unconsciously making an awkward palm tree gesture.
“I think Sadie looks the best.” Jacque feebly tries to steer them back to their old conversation but it just leads to raised eyebrows and Bella swatting at her with the napkin. She sighs and her shoulders drop. “We’re fucking.”
She gets swatted with the napkin again. “Making love?”
“Ew.” Sadie groans, staring forlornly at the food.
“Together.” Bella half laughs, half sobs. “We’re together.”
Sadie scratches the back of her neck. “You guys got divorced like five minutes ago.” There’s a tough pause. “I vividly remember the aftermath.”
Suddenly everyone is remembering the aftermath and it’s threatening to ruin their meal. Jacque doesn’t want to recycle the words she used in their divorce speech but it’s hard to put it any way. It’s the truth this time. “I couldn’t, um-” She glances at Bella. “I couldn’t give up on her.”
Underneath the table Bella lays her hand on Jacque’s thigh. “We were gonna get around to telling everyone but this is pretty new to us both-”
“How new?” Oliv asks curiously.
“Just after the end of the season.” Jacque answers. Kathryn picks at her food but her interest is definitely on them both. “We were figuring some stuff out.”
For them, it’s the fact that Bella wanted to be with her whereas all but Kathryn believe that they were figuring out how to get past Bella cheating on her. Kathryn purses her lips with interest.
“And you figured it out?” Kathryn leads the questioning. “All of it?”
“Yeah.” Bella clears her throat, looking at her pointedly. “We talked it out.”
“All it took was a talk and you’re just over it?” Sadie questions, not with malice, well just a little underlying, but mostly with a note of curiosity.
Jacque wasn’t sure whether or not to say this but Bella is more confident in the answer than she is. “I moved back in with Jacque last Christmas.”
That has them all reeling. “You’ve been living together again since last year?” Sadie wears a look of disbelief.
The implication that they’ve been talking through this for the better part of a year in between all their national team duties and league matches has them quieting a bit more.
“We haven’t taken any of this lightly.” Jacque reassures them.
“Well no wonder you were so pissed with me.” Sadie says mostly to herself. “Now I feel like even more of an asshole.”
It’s easier to shrug it off in hindsight. “I think it helped. Made us confront a lot of things. Not just about our relationship but with the team as well.”
All the same Sadie reaches for Bella and places a hand on her elbow. “Don’t.” Bella laughs. “I’ll start crying and I’m wearing mascara.”
“Heaven forbid.” Oliv jokes. “Nobody invites a clown to Christmas dinner.”
Sadie starts singing ‘Send In The Clowns’ before anyone can stop her and the conversation finally dies down enough for them to actually eat. Bella shares a glance with her and in that moment it’s like they’ve finally let the lies be put to bed.
For good.
*
Hawaii sees them through the rest of the holiday.
New Year explodes in fireworks across the sky and the strange glee at their friends seeing them kiss, in love and truthfully, for the first time.
There’s no cameras pointed at them, despite Kathryn’s plea, just the five of them walking on the beach ringing in the New Year with the first burning orange sky and the sun peeking over the horizon.
> 2015 awaits them.
Chapter 11
2015
*
OLIV had dropped a few hints while they were in Hawaii about wanting to come and visit them in Toronto before they got the pre-season call in Chicago. They see each other before that, with the few call ups to National Camps and the Cyprus cup, but Bella finds coming back after that she has a two week gap to fill.
One that Jacque isn’t there for.
It turns out that Jacque has been summoned for a last minute family vacation conveniently planned around the break they get before the NWSL starts back up. That leaves Bella unexpectedly hanging out in the apartment in Toronto by herself.
As much as they’ve gotten back together and that’s great Bella doesn’t think that springing that on Jacque’s family just as the dust has started to settle on them getting a divorce is exactly what she wants to do right now.
So she decides to stay home and on a whim texts Oliv to see if she’s free for the next two weeks. The answer is an exuberant, and far too quickly answered, hell yes.
When the time comes, she waits outside the airport and prepares herself for two weeks of whatever Oliv has to throw at her.
Which turns out to be a mixed bag.
The first morning Oliv wakes her up at the crack of dawn, throws some of her workout clothes at her, and tells her they’re going for a trail run. It’s within the first few minutes that Bella wonders if she should have braved the awkwardness of reintroducing herself into the lives of her ex-in-laws versus enduring Bro Week 2015 with Olivia Andreoli.
She can hardly move for the rest of the day after and the only redeeming grace happens to be the delicious meal that she cooks for the both of them. It puts her in a slightly better mood.
And then she’s woken up again on day two, a few hours later but just as abruptly.
This time instead of her workout clothes she’s thrown sweats and a loose tee.
“I’m gonna stretch you out.” Are the first words she hears in the morning.
She shakes her head to make sure it’s not a nightmare. Once she gets her bearings she answers quickly because Oliv has something in her hand that looks a lot like a needle. “You absolutely are not.”