Second Chances (28 page)

When she caught up, she grabbed Reagan’s elbow to stop her.  She spun her around to face her. “Why do you have to be so stubborn?” she growled.

The short sprint had her blood pumping and her normally alabaster skin was slightly flushed. Reagan hated how attracted she was to this woman who had done nothing but reject her since they’d renewed a tenuous friendship.

“Are you the kettle or the pot?” Reagan said haughtily.

“In case you didn’t notice, it’s
snowing
.”

“Do I look like I care about the weather report?” Reagan snarled, getting uncharacteristically angry.  She felt like such a fool for traveling all this way only to be rejected once again. 

“Come back to the house,” Allison implored.  “It’s ridiculous to try to have a conversation out here.”

Reagan looked skeptical.  “Are we
really
going to talk?  Or are you going to get uncomfortable and shut down and ignore me the rest of the night?”

“We’ll talk.  I promise.” Allison linked their hands together and intertwined her fingers with Reagan’s.  “And I’ll make hot tea and we can change into dry clothes.”

Reagan looked down at their enjoined hands.  Her heart ached inside her chest at how well they seemed to fit together. “Fine.”

+++++

Reagan sat as quietly and as still as her body could handle.  Allison sat across from her at the small kitchen table with her head in her hands.  Reagan observed the elegant, pale fingers press into her hairline.  She looked down at her own hands and absently ran her index finger back and forth along the beveled edge of the wooden table.  She looked back up when she heard Allison push out a sharp breath from her lungs.

“I may have misled you about something.”

Reagan pressed her lips together, but said nothing.

Allison stared at Reagan with hazel eyes red around the edges. It seemed to Reagan that she had aged before her eyes. “You’re not the first girl I ever kissed.”

Reagan’s eyes widened, but she said nothing, sensing that Allison was gearing up for a long, important revelation.

Allison lightly ran the tip of her finger along the rim of her ceramic mug. “It was the summer before our junior year of high school,” she started.  “I was at team cheerleading camp, and there was this girl on another school’s squad.”

“Cheerleading camp?” Reagan interrupted. “This sounds like a story from
Esquire
or
Playboy
.”

Allison glared across the kitchen table. “Do you want to hear this story or not, Murphy?” she snapped.

“I’m sorry.  Continue.”

Allison sighed and her shoulders slumped forward.  “Her name was Daria Grey.”

“Pretty.”

Allison shot Reagan another warning glance.  Reagan held up her hands in retreat and mouthed her apology.

“Anyway, I guess we got close while we were at camp.  And one night, she kissed me.”  She swallowed hard.  “And I kissed her back.”

“Girls kiss their girl friends at that age,” Reagan said dismissively. “It’s all about exploring and experimentation when you’re that young.”

“Did
you
kiss any girls in high school?” Allison countered.

“Well, no…”

“When camp was over,” Allison continued, ignoring Reagan’s commentary, “we wrote letters back and forth for a good part of the school year.”  She took a deep breath.  “And everything was fine until my dad found her letters in the shoebox I kept under my bed.” 

“Why would he care if you had a pen pal?”

Allison flushed and grimaced.  “They were, uh, pretty
intimate
letters.”

“O-oh,” Reagan said, catching on. 

“He immediately tore them up and burned them in the fireplace, and told me I was never to have any kind of contact with her again.  He and I never talked about it afterwards, and I’m not sure if he told my mom about it.”  Allison’s voice broke.  “It was like it never even happened.”  She paused, collected herself and brushed at her eyes with the back of her hand.  “Around that time I started to date Chad, and then everything seemed forgiven.”  She bit her lower lip. “But then one of his
spies
saw us – they saw you and me together.  He called the night you stayed over at my parents house, when we….”

“Spent the night together?” Reagan supplied for her.  She felt her lips tilt in a half smile.  She thought it endearing, but a little strange that Allison still couldn’t say the words out loud.

Allison swallowed hard and nodded. “He called during the movie.  Someone told him they’d seen us holding hands or something at the coffee shop.  He told me,” she took a sharp breath, “that I wasn’t to spend time with you anymore.”

“You’re not a little girl anymore, Allie,” Reagan tried gently.  “He can’t dictate who you spend time with.”

“But that’s the thing…he
can,”
Allison insisted.  “He pays for my tuition, my rent, all my bills.  And until I’m financially independent, he has control over me.”

“So why not become financially independent?”

Allison rolled her eyes and sighed.  “You make it sound so simple.”

“It could be simple.”

“I’m so sorry, Reagan.” Allison’s bottom lip trembled.  “I wish things could be different.”

“You’ve really made up your mind about this, haven’t you?” Reagan looked down at her hands.

“I don’t want you to hate me.”

“I could never hate you, Allie. I…” Reagan stopped and swallowed.

Allison looked down at her lap and picked at the fabric of her grey yoga pants.  “Do you still want to stay the night?” She sounded defeated.  Far from the girl Reagan had known in high school, Allison Hoge was vulnerable and broken. It made her heart ache to see her like this.  But she didn’t know how to fix her.  She could only be patient and empathetic, a talent she didn’t think she possessed. She thought about going back outside and divorcing herself from this uncomfortable moment.  But she wasn’t a runner.  She wasn’t going to abandon Allison just moments after revealing this.

Outside, the weather had turned from a light snow to a thundering rainstorm.  A violent gust of wind rattled the old windowpanes in the drafty kitchen, and an echo of thunder rumbled in the distance. She flicked her gaze toward the kitchen window.  Raindrops had accumulated on the glass pane, distorting the view of Allison and her roommates’ backyard. “I think the weather’s getting worse,” she said in a quiet voice.

“Then you should stay,” Allison said in an equally soft tone.  “My mother would be disappointed in my manners if I sent you out into this weather.”

A strange smile passed Reagan’s lips.  “You and your mom are awfully concerned about the weather and me.”

Allison said nothing in reply.  Instead, she stood in a single, graceful motion that startled Reagan, and removed her teacup from the table.  She set the cup, still full of liquid, into the kitchen sink.  She rubbed at her face and sighed.  “Are you coming to bed?” she asked with her back still turned to Reagan.

She heard the unmistakable noise of a kitchen chair scraping against the tile floor.  Reagan’s ballet flats padded lightly, her steps delicate and purposeful.  “Are you tired?” Reagan asked.

Allison turned and her breath caught in her throat.  She hadn’t expected to find Reagan standing so close.  She also hadn’t expected the sadness in Reagan’s bright blue eyes.  “Exhausted.”

+++++

Reagan stared up at the ceiling fan that slowly rotated above Allison’s bed.  In the adjacent bathroom she could hear the sounds of water turning on and off as Allison got ready for sleep.  She’d tried to contain her disappointment when Allison had scooped up her pajamas and promptly marched to the bathroom to change.  It wasn’t that she wanted to ogle Allison’s naked body; but the fact that Allison was hiding herself didn’t bode well.  But at least for now, Allison hadn’t retreated to the living room couch.

She looked away from the lazy ceiling fan when she heard the bathroom door creak open.  Allison teetered uncertainly in the doorway.  Reagan sat up slightly on her elbows in bed.  “Which side do you want?”

Allison looked away.  “The left, I guess.”

Reagan shifted beneath the blankets to make room and pulled back the top layer.  She frowned when she sensed Allison’s hesitance. “It’s just sleep, Allie.”

Allison visibly swallowed and nodded curtly.  She took a deep breath as though summoning her resolve and finally slid into bed next to Reagan.

Reagan rolled onto her side and grabbed Allison’s arm to drape it over her waist.  “Is this okay?”

Allison breathed out through her nose.  “Yeah.”  The heat radiating from Reagan’s body was driving her crazy.  Her scent lightly perfumed the air, but Allison felt like she was drowning.  There was no way she was going to be able to sleep spooning her like this. “Why is this so hard, Rea?” her voice sounded pained. “Why can’t I just lay next to you without wanting to devour you?”

Reagan whimpered in agreement; she pushed her backside flush against Allison.

“Reagan,” Allison growled in warning.

“We don’t have to do anything,” Reagan said. “We can just sleep.”  The fingers holding onto her hipbones stiffened and dug in.  She could feel Allison’s short fingernails bite against her flesh.

Allison silently cursed.  Reagan wasn’t even wearing anything provocative to warrant these feelings – or at least not conventionally so.  How anyone could look so temping in a matching flannel pajama set was beyond her.  But maybe because the sleepwear made her look so innocent and so unassuming was precisely the reason she felt the urge to corrupt her.

“It doesn’t count if our clothes stay on, right?” she asked thickly.

“What?”

“If our clothes stay on, it doesn’t count?” Allison seemed to be pleading with her.  Without Reagan looking directly at her, she felt a little braver.

Reagan arched her backside against Allison again in a wordless answer.

Allison’s breath tickled the fine hairs at the base of Reagan’s neck.

“Please, Allie,” Reagan pled. “Don’t tease me.  I can’t take it.”

A surge of intoxicating power overcame Allison.  Experience told her that she craved this, to see Reagan writhing and whimpering because of her.  Perhaps it was just one of the myriad reasons she had enjoyed tormenting her in high school.  But this – this was infinitely better.

She palmed Reagan’s pert, braless breasts over her pajamas.  Even through the thick flannel material, she could feel her nipples pebble beneath her ministrations. Allison slid her hand down the front of Reagan’s pajama pants and beneath the elastic band of her underwear.  Her fingers traveled past tightly cropped and groomed curls and through warm, slippery wetness.  With her ring and pointer finger, she delicately separated Reagan’s lips and ran her middle finger up the length of her smooth slit.

Reagan breathed out harshly and bit down on her lower lip to keep from crying out and alerting Allison’s roommates.  She hadn’t seen them, but she assumed they were in their respective bedrooms.  They really needed to stop doing these things with parents and roommates just in the next room.

“I want to taste you,” Allison husked. “I want to suck on you.”  She licked along the outer shell of Reagan’s ear.

Reagan whimpered again, uselessly pressing her back against Allison’s front.  She desperately wanted to turn around and face her, but worried Allison would stop touching her if she did. 

Allison’s middle finger ghosted along her outer lips and flirted with her inner folds.  Reagan could feel herself getting wetter with every pass and dip. But then the hand shoved inside her pajama pants abruptly disappeared.

Allison rolled onto her back.  “I’m sorry.” She pulled a twisted cotton sheet to cover her even though she was still wearing her clothes. “This can’t happen.”

Reagan stared up at the ceiling unblinking.  “I know,” she said, still a little breathless.  The ache between her thighs wasn’t going away even though Allison’s hand had.

Allison rolled onto her side so she could look at Reagan. “I’m not saying I regret having sex with you,” she clarified.  “But I can’t do that again.  It’s not fair to you if I can’t do this 100%.”

“We don’t have to be Out and Proud,” Reagan said.  “I don’t need you to hold my hand in public.”

Allison shook her head.  Salty tears stung her eyes and clung to heavy eyelashes.  “Don’t sell yourself short,” she rasped. “You deserve more than I can give you.”

“But it wouldn’t always have to be like this,” Reagan stubbornly declared.  “When you graduate and you don’t need your dad’s money anymore, things will be different.”

“You shouldn’t have to wait for me, Reagan,” Allison said with heat, angry with herself, angry with Reagan.  “I’m too much of a coward,” she spat out.  “I don’t know if I’d ever be able to do this with you.”

“And why do you get to make decisions for me?”

Allison growled in frustration.  “This isn’t up for debate,” she snapped.  “It’s just not going to work.”

Reagan opened her mouth to once again protest, but her words were cut off by Allison.