Chapter Thirty-Nine

Loncey

So this is what being front row of a fashion show is like.

I can barely breathe from all the perfume and cologne in the air. I'm squashed between a woman, who is wearing the most unnecessarily oversized puffer jacket considering it's 68 degrees in LA today, and an enviably androgynous-looking person who has been talking on their phone since they sat down. I've tried not to listen to what they're saying, but it's peculiarly fascinating as they rip the caller a new asshole for not selling all the tickets to my agender front-row buddy's "world-changing sustainable EDM festival 100% powered by solar and the dancers' energy." It's because of how forthright they sound on the phone that I don't ask them to close their legs and give me a bit more space when the show begins. The good news is that once I see Maeve walk out on the catwalk I forget that I'm folded up like a pretzel and instead focus all I have on her.

Wearing nothing but an oversized blazer that appears to be made out of old Santa outfits, she struts down the catwalk with her head held high and her shoulders back. The blazer has a white fur trim and a patchwork-style pattern made from various cuts of red velvet material, all in slightly mismatched shades of red. Her long slim, creamy white legs are shiny under the bright lights that hang above and I let myself think a couple of sinful things about where I would like those legs. The fact that having them wrapped around my face is likely never going to happen doesn't even dampen the joy of the fantasy. It's just nice to feel turned on again for the first time in so long. And it's nice to know that the person who turns me on that much has invited me to be with her today and tonight.

I feel proud that I get to be her date.

Shit.

Am I Maeve's date?

Can I call myself that?

Do I want to call myself that?

Just as the surge of pride confirms that yes, I want to be Maeve's date even if she won't give me the honor, she catches my eye and smiles. I don't know much about modeling etiquette but I'm not sure that is what she is supposed to do. And yet she does. She smiles and holds my eye contact until she walks past me and my eyes dutifully follow her strutting legs to the end of the catwalk. After she turns, throwing her hair over one shoulder, she begins her walk back and it gives me more joy than I likely deserve to see her catch my eye again and wink. The heat I feel from that wink in my cheeks, my chest and my groin lasts until she disappears and then reappears a few minutes later in another outfit.

*****

I wait patiently for Maeve in the lobby of the Art Deco mansion where the fashion show took place. Standing still, I gaze up at the intricate peacock feather details carved into the stone pillars that hold the tall ceiling up and I then glance around at the many people who are coming and going, or like me, waiting on others. Everyone here is so very painfully stylish and devastatingly beautiful. It's also impossible to tell if they spent a long time working on achieving such beauty and coolness, and it's even more unclear if they even like being so stylish and beautiful. In other words, they're a lot like Maeve.

Unlike how Maeve probably felt at XXXCon, I don't feel out of place here. I mean, I don't feel like I blend in. My skinny jeans, Converse and tight V-neck sweater are anything but the height of fashion, but I know that my queerness and my Blackness is not out of place here.

"There you are!" an Irish voice calls out behind me. I spin around and see her walking toward me, all golden hair flying out around her head, thick make-up still on her face but her clothes are more… Maeve. High-waisted denim bell-bottoms, a plain white tee and a vintage baseball jacket shouldn't look as good as they do on her.

"Hey," I say, and I feel my smile grow. "You were… amazing."

"Ah, shut up, would you? All I did was literally walk in a straight line a couple of times."

I narrow my eyes on her. "You were fucking good and you know it."

She gives me a hair toss. "I mean, modeling isn't one of the things I suck at."

I ignore what threatens to be a self-deprecating tone and I step a little closer to her.

"Can I… Can I hug you?"

I expect a wise-ass response or a flat-out refusal, but instead I get Maeve looking a little sheepish, and a little pink in her cheeks. She nods as she opens up her arms.

As my hands travel around Maeve's body I notice things I don't want to notice, but I can't even say they're unwelcome. My shoulders relax, my exhale lengthens and deepens, and then my chest fills with warmth. As my arms press her into my body, I feel my heartbeat get louder, but not quicker. It's more like it gets steadier, sturdier, more resilient. Maeve makes me stronger when she's in my arms. Like all my heart needs is to have her close.

Fuck.

Maeve says something I don't catch as there's still considerable noise from chatter and movement around us, all echoing in the tall space.

"What did you say?" I ask into her ear.

She pulls back and lifts her head up to look at me.

"I said, I fucking missed you, which annoys me more than I can explain."

I laugh softly at this. "I fucking missed you too which, yeah, annoys me too."

"Well, at least we're even," she says, and much to my dismay she untangles herself from me completely.

"There's an afterparty now," she says looking around us briefly. "In a bar just down the street. I don't have to go. I've already got lots of content that I can post later today or even tomorrow. But if you want to go…"

I don't want to go. I don't want to have my first few hours with Maeve in weeks to be in some busy bar where I have to do small talk with these painfully stylish and devastatingly beautiful people.

"You know, I don't really want to go," Maeve says before I can reply. "I'm still on Dublin time and I want to get this caked-on make-up off my face properly."

"So back to your hotel?" I suggest.

"Yeah," she says and pulls her phone out of her back pocket. "I'll get us a taxi and then go grab all my stuff from backstage."

"No, I'll get the taxi." I reach for her hand to stop her swiping and typing. "You go get your stuff."

"Okay," she says and tucks her phone away with the hand that's not now linking with mine. She squeezes my fingers, looks down at where our palms touch, and then she lets go and walks away. I curl my fingers into a fist as if to keep hold of the heat she just took away from my skin.

Fuck.

I am so fucked.

*****

Maeve in a rehashed Santa blazer is hot. Maeve in her jeans and a T-shirt is smoking hot. But Maeve in a pair of red and white plaid pyjamas, the make-up gone from her face and her hair all messily gathered on top of her head, that's like molten lava. And I know exactly what's at the source of me feeling this way. It's because she's relaxed. It's because she's peeled off some of the layers that make her MaeBae. It's because she's no longer that woman who ran away from me down a hotel corridor because she didn't want me to see her without make-up. She's a woman who thinks nothing of me seeing her naked, but not in the literal sense. She likes me seeing her just as she is.

I'm pretty sure a therapist would have a field day with it, but I have always found making people feel safe and seen so fucking sexy. Or maybe it's because that's how I like to be too. I like to be safe and seen as well.

So, is that what this is about? Does Maeve make me feel safe and seen?

There's no time to contemplate this at any great length because Maeve is hitting my knee with the room service menu.

"Answer me, Loncey, what do you want? Because I'm so fecking hungry I'm about to eat your left foot."

"I wouldn't do that. My right one is way tastier." I wiggle my socked feet.

"Would you just tell me what you want to eat." Maeve hits me again with the menu, this time around the back of my head.

We're sitting side by side on the bed. Maeve told me to make myself comfortable while she showered and got changed, so I sat down on the side I slept on when she was in my bed, and I got out my phone and replied to some DMs and comments on my MyFans account.

"Just get me the chicken Caesar salad."

"Don't you want to look at the menu?" Maeve frowns at me. "That's probably not even on there."

"It will be on there."

"How do you even—" She looks at the menu. "Fine. Whatever. I'll order you a chicken Caesar salad."

"Thank you, Maeve," I say a little pretentiously.

After she makes our order and replaces the phone, she returns to the bed but stops before climbing back on top of it. She stares down at the sheets, close to my feet, like there's a math puzzle there she has to solve.

"What is it?" I ask.

After a few more seconds of confused staring she looks up at me. "Don't you think it's weird?"

"White sheets on a hotel bed? No, I happen to find it really weird when there aren't white sheets on a hotel bed."

"You're right," she nods with a very small smile, "but that's not what I was referring to."

"What were you referring to?"

"Us."

"You think we're weird?"

Her eyes seem to darken a little as her gaze intensifies under a light frown. "Don't you? We didn't speak for weeks. Before that we… did stuff that I'd never really done with anyone else and now we're sort of back where we started, in a hotel room ordering room service, in our pyjamas."

"Technically, I'm not in my pajamas," I point out.

"Well, maybe you should be. Did you bring a camisole or something to sleep in?" She asks the question like it's the most normal inquiry in the world and I could reach for her and squeeze her tight with gratitude.

"I did," I reply, feeling a little heat in my cheeks.

"Then get changed, get comfortable." She perches on the end of the bed. "And then we can keep talking about why I think we're weird."

"I can't wait," I deadpan as I get up, grab my bag and head to the bathroom.

I don't look in the mirror until I'm changed. I'm wearing a lace-trimmed red silk slip which is a little small for me and barely covers my junk and my ass. It's undeniably sexy, provocative even. But that's not why I'm wearing it, or rather, it's not the only reason I'm wearing it. I like how it looks on my skin tone. Also, it's vintage, from the 1960s I believe, and I think Maeve will appreciate that. I panic briefly as I take in the outline of my dick which pushes through both the briefs I'm still wearing under the slip and have a weird, disconcerting moment where I wish it wasn't there, that Maeve didn't have to see it, but then I push that thought away because it feels like even thinking it is making what's happening between Maeve and I tonight a sexual thing. I don't want that and I definitely don't want her to think that's my take on this evening.

That's why I straighten my shoulders, gather my belongings and walk out of the bathroom with my head held high.

"Oooh!" Maeve stands up as soon as I walk into the room. "Let me see!"

She grabs my hand and spins me around. "You like?" I ask, a little shyly.

"I love! Is it vintage? It must be. And is it silk or satin?"

"Silk. And yes, it's vintage. From the Sixties, I believe."

"I don't remember seeing this one in your collection that night. I would have remembered and absolutely stolen it for myself."

I laugh gently. "No, I ordered it online about a week ago."

I almost add that I did so because I wanted something new to wear if I ever saw her again. I wanted to show her that I was working hard on accepting this side of myself, at being more comfortable with sharing it with others too.

"Can I touch it?" she asks, inching closer.

"Sure," I reply and find my breathing slows as her hand reaches out and plays with one of the straps.

"It's so delicate," she says in little more than a whisper.

"I know. It feels like I'm wearing air."

Maeve's hand drops to lift the lace hem slightly and her knuckles brush against my thigh as she does. My sharp intake of breath has us both locking eyes, our lips parted like we want to say something about the noise I just made, but neither of us do.

She drops her hand and continues to look up at me.

"And then there's this," she says, eventually.

"What?"

"This thing between us. I can't explain it. It's weird."

I smile wanly. "Just because you can't explain or understand something doesn't make it weird."

"I know, but I don't know what else to call it. I feel like there's something between us that shouldn't, can't possibly exist."

I swallow. "What do you think it is, Maeve?"

"It's not, it can't be desire, because you know," she points at herself, "asexual. But it also can't be like, you know, a romantic attraction, because," she points at me, "aromantic."

"Yeah, I've been thinking about this too," I admit.

"Have you?" Maeve's eyes widen with surprise. "Like a little bit, or like a whole fucking lot?"

"A whole fucking lot," I admit.

Her face softens with what I'm pretty sure is relief, because that's also exactly what I'm feeling.

"I hope I didn't confuse you too much. With the kissing and sex stuff we did. I know that's something you need from a partner, and I also know it's not something I can offer a partner, at least not in the way you have had it before. And I hope you didn't feel like you had to be with me because we did that stuff. Or maybe worse, that you felt like you had to keep your distance so as not to confuse me because I know where you stand with relationships." The words rush out of Maeve's mouth quickly and clumsily.

Is Maeve rambling?

I find one of her hands and tangle her fingers with mine.

"You know where I stand with relationships?" I ask.

"Yeah, I mean, you're aromantic."

"Aromantic people can still have relationships. In the same way some asexual people still have sexual relationships or experiences."

"I know," Maeve says thoughtfully and her gaze drops to the space between us. "But I also think I definitely want a something like a romantic relationship."

Right. She wants what I can't give her.

Or what she thinks I can't give her.

"Maeve, can we play Honest Answers Only again?"

Her eyes lift to mine and they sparkle a little, like they're coming alive again. "You remember that?"

"I remember a lot," I say, and I mean it in both an active and passive sense. I do remember a lot, and I also spend a lot of time remembering.

"Okay, let's play Honest Answers Only."

"Ask me where I stand with relationships. Romantic relationships."

"You're not supposed to tell me what questions to ask." Her hand goes to her hip as she cocks it.

I roll my eyes at her, but smile with it. "Okay, ask me a different question."

She bites her lip as she thinks and I doubt she knows how attractive that is.

"Where do you stand with romantic relationships?" she finally asks.

I give her a very accusing look and mirror her pose with a hand on my cocked hip.

"Honest Answers Only," she says with a challenging smile.

"I don't know. That's my honest answer. I broke up with Miko and Harley because I didn't feel like a romantic relationship was working for me, which I now know is not the same thing as being aromantic. But I can't deny that in the past I've felt sort of uncomfortable, not fully myself in a serious romantic relationship. I also assumed that meant I was aromantic. But now…" I stop talking deliberately, wanting Maeve to fill in the blanks.

But I should know better.

"Now what?" Maeve asks, her eyes searching mine.

"Now there's you," I say simply.

Maeve flashes me one of the wide smiles she doesn't share with everyone else and it feels like the sweetest reward for my vulnerability. It also feels like a facepalm moment as I could have made her smile like this a month ago, before she left Vegas, had I just been honest with her then.

"Do you still feel like a romantic relationship wouldn't work for you?" she tells me.

"I think I'm a bit confused," I say and pull in a much-needed steadying breath. "I just think I've tangled up the way I'm aro with the fact my previous relationships haven't worked. I think I've come to the conclusion I'm better off out of a relationship because I'm aro and I just… I just don't think that was true. I think that was kinda fucking stupid of me."

Much to my shock, Maeve starts to giggle.

"What's so funny?"

"I did the same thing," she points a pointed red fingernail at her chest. "I told myself that I couldn't enjoy sex because I was asexual. I told myself I didn't need sex, and fuck, I still don't know if I need it but I know now I can enjoy it. Or well, my version of sex."

"Our version of sex," I smile at her, feeling a new lightness in my heart.

"So maybe we do that with a relationship too?" She suggests so hesitantly and quietly it's heart-breaking. "Maybe we make it our version of a relationship."

I blink at her and I swear the light in the room gets a little brighter.

"Because…" She clears her throat. "Wait, one more question. How do you feel about me? Honest Answers Only."

I hold her stare and I'm momentarily confused why she can't see what I feel for her in my eyes. Surely they tell her all there is to know?

"I feel everything about you," I say eventually recalling how I said the same thing to my mother.

She blinks and pulls her head back slightly. "You do?"

"Yes, Maeve, I do."

"I think I feel everything about you too," she says, and she squeezes our fingers which are still intertwined. "Well, not everything, of course. But I still sort of feel everything. I feel everything that I could possibly feel, if that makes sense. And I don't," she looks down at our feet again and this shy, coy version of Maeve is taking me by surprise a little, "I don't feel like anything's missing either."

"That's good," I say.

"But I know it could feel like something's missing for you," she says and her eyes go big and wide. "Because I know you expect and want sex in a relationship."

I sigh. "I don't expect or want anything in a relationship."

She flinches and I know I've said the wrong thing. But it was still my honest answer.

"I don't mean that in a I-don't-want-a-relationship kind of way. I mean it in a, I never expected to have a relationship again so I haven't been thinking about what I would want from it, or how I would want it to look, way."

Maeve chews on her bottom lip again and I'm almost distracted by how perfect and pink and plump it is. "So you haven't been imagining what we would look like as a couple?"

"Oh, I've been doing that," I answer with a wry huff of laughter. "I've been doing a lot of that, but it hasn't been very successful."

"What do you mean?"

I draw in a slow breath. "Every time I think about us, together, I find it hard to think about us actually being together. In the same place, I mean. I live in Vegas and you live in Dublin. They're thousands of miles apart."

"I know. I think about that too."

"I would never ask you to leave Dublin, to leave your family, especially with you becoming an aunt soon."

"I would never ask you to leave Jessica, or your mum."

"I know you wouldn't." I slide my hand out of her grip and cup her face. "That's one of the many, many things I like about you."

Like feels like the weakest word in that sentence, but I'm not about to detonate the bomb that is the other word beginning with L. Not now when we're at a perfect and agonising stalemate.

"So that's why when I think about us, and about what I want from a relationship, I come up blank."

Maeve leans into my palm. "But if those things didn't matter. If we lived in the same city. What would you want from me, from us?"

I can't stop my sigh as it hollows out my chest. "But we don't live in the same city."

"I asked you a question. Honest Answers Only." She pouts at me.

"Maeve, I would want to be with you, whatever that looks like." I give her my honest answer and wait for the radical truth that lives in those words to physically hurt or scar me. But that doesn't happen. Instead, I feel my lungs expand a little quicker and easier than they have in weeks. "I would want us to do exactly what you just said, to make our own unique version of a relationship."

"Even if that means no sex?" Maeve's voice cracks just before the word ‘sex' and she winces. I want to wince too, for her unnecessary embarrassment and whatever shame there is inside her that deems this a question she needs to ask. "Honest Answers Only, Loncey."

I don't take my time to answer because I don't know what to say, or because I don't know how I feel. I take my time replying to Maeve's question because I want to find the right words, the final words, the words that will end this line of conversation once and for all.

I bring my other hand to the other side of her face and I hold her like this for a moment, running my eyes over her features and taking in her messy hair and the natural glow of her skin.

"For the last four weeks, I haven't had sex. And I haven't had you either. Can you guess which one I have missed most? Can you guess which one I have been thinking about without end? Can you guess which one has kept me awake at night, kept a dull ache in my stomach, and a tension headache in both sides of my temple? Can you guess which one makes me want to totally upend my life just so I can live in the fantasy I only sometimes allow myself to think about?"

I watch as tears mist up Maeve's eyes.

"But sex is so important to you. You love sex," she tells me in a fragile voice. "It's what you do, for work and well, in life."

"You're right. I'm not going to argue with you. But I am starting to question a lot of that. Yes, I still love sex. I can't lie about that. And if I'm being completely honest with you, which I have to be, because Honest Answers Only…"

"Honest Answers Only," Maeve repeats as a single tear snakes down her cheek.

"I will always want to have sex with you, Maeve. I can't and won't deny how attracted to you I am, sexually, but I know in my bones that I don't have to act on that. I may want it but I don't need sex with you. I know enough about desire to know how it works so please trust me when I say, I can and will be okay not having sex with you."

"But how?" Maeve croaks and she starts to shake her head like she doesn't believe a word I'm saying.

"Because to do so would hurt you. And I can't live in a world where I hurt you."

"But I don't know if I can live in a world where I deprive you of something so—"

"Stop, Maeve." I tighten my hold on her face and it jolts her eyes up to mine. "Stop. Don't you dare say that being with you would deprive me of something. Being with you would be a gift I would treasure and celebrate every damn day. You are so much more to me. You are close to becoming everything to me. You are a solar system of fascinating planets and shooting stars and shimmering moons. You are a galaxy I will never get bored of discovering. You are a whole universe of wonder and surprise. Fuck, Maeve, you are too many stars to count."

Maeve's face cracks as more tears spill out of her eyes.

"Hold me, Loncey," she says and I hear it in her voice. Her own vulnerability, something that Maeve protects fiercely, but there it is pouring out of her eyes and her mouth, and it's asking for me to hold her.

So I do.