“I know.” Casey’s smile is wolfish. “Because you aresucha good girl.”
I come with a scream. Both my hands are on her,accidentally scratching up the length of her back as my body convulses.
“Fuck,” I breathe as I regain the ability to speak. My body jerks with aftershocks. “Why have we waited so long to do this? We should’ve been doing this the whole time.”
I think I’m seeing stars. Casey crawls back up to my side and pulls me toward her so she can hold me. “I don’t think your girlfriend would have approved.”
Oh.Oh, shit. I facepalm. So stupid. But then a tiny spark of happiness comes as I realize I haven’t thought about Nina in hours. I don’t actually remember the last time I thought of her. Maybe this afternoon? I don’t know, but I smile. This is a first for me, and I’m filled with a sense of satisfaction. This weekend really is helping me move on.
I curl into Casey, wrapping my arm around her warm body. She kisses my forehead.
“Do you think,” I start and stop. Casey plays with my hair, and I relax into her touch. It gives me the confidence to continue. “If you didn’t miss the first week—if I didn’t meet Nina first—do you think me and you would have gone out? That we’d be together?”
Casey doesn’t answer for a while. Her fingers in my hair are the only reason I know she didn’t fall asleep on me. Slowly, like she’s picking each word with care, she says, “I think everything happens for a reason.”
It’s not an answer, but I don’t force it. I don’t know the answer for myself. As much pain as my breakup with Nina has brought me, would I really wish we never were together? Would I really want to erase all the good times?
I don’t know.
But there is one thing I do know.
“I don’t want to leave the lake house.”
Casey’s fingers leave my hair as she wraps her arms around me. I squeeze her tighter.
“What if,” I say. “We keep doing this even when we’re back home?”
“Dakota,” Casey starts andfuck. I never should have asked her that. Tears cloud my vision, and I start untangling myself from her arms, bracing for her inevitable rejection.
Casey won’t let me go. She grabs me by the elbows so I can’t escape. “Hey, look, it’s not that I don’t want to. I definitely want to.”
“But?” Because of course there’s a but.
Casey sighs. “But I think you’ll regret it if you don’t try to date other people.”
I reel back. That is not at all what I was expecting.
“Nina has you convinced you could never fall in love with anyone else. She’s manipulated you into thinking you could only be happy with her, and I don’t think you’ll ever know she’s wrong until you start seeing someone new.”
I sit with that. Casey and I talked a lot the past twenty-four hours while our bodies needed a break. Heavy, emotional conversations about our exes and the feelings and fears that come from them. Casey knows everything. How I’m afraid I’ll never feel a spark with someone new. How growing up, I always thought I was broken since all my friends had crush after crush, and I was never interested in anyone until Nina. How I doubt I’ll ever feel even a fraction of the love I felt for her for someone new, so why bother dating at all?
“I made you a profile on SapphicSingles if you want to see it?” Casey says cautiously.
I rub my eyes with the palms of my hands. “There’s no point.”
“You don’t know that,” Casey says.
I shake my head and look at her.
Casey scoots closer so she’s sitting in front of me. She takes my hands and intertwines our fingers. “How about this? You give it the summer. Go on dates. Hook up. Whatever. Just make a real effort to find that special spark with someone.”
“And when it doesn’t happen?”
“If,” Casey corrects. She glances around and grabs her phone off the nightstand. She forgot to plug it in, and it’s at seven percent battery life. “When do you go back to work?”
“August twentieth.”
Casey smiles. “Okay, so we’ll come back here the weekend of the fifteenth through the seventeenth. And if you didn’t hit it off with anyone new then we can pick back up where we left off.”
