“I know you will,” Jessie replied and turned to Gloria a little. “I also know I’m not exactly who they thought you’d end up with, and not just because I’m a woman.”
“What do you mean by that?” Harlow asked.
Larissa turned to her and saw just how into this whole thing she was again today. Initially, Harlow herself had beena psychology major in college before changing to poly sci and then, dropping out, and it was interesting to see her playing such a big role in these interviews. Larissa smiled over at her, liking this almost new version of her best friend who’d seemed uninterested in pretty much everything for the past several months.
CHAPTER 8
“What do you mean by that?” Harlow asked. “You’re not who they thought she’d be with?”
Harlow looked over and noticed Larissa staring at her. Maybe she should be taking more of a back seat in the interviews, but she couldn’t help herself. She had questions and wanted answers, but selfishly, she found that she also liked talking to these two couples specifically because they reminded her, in one way or another, of her relationship with Larissa. Yes, it was true that they weren’t a couple, where Jessie and Gloria obviously were one and had been for about a year, but they’d started out a little in the same way that she and Larissa had.
When she’d first read their application responses, Harlow had immediately thought of the first time she had walked into the classroom after meeting Larissa through Aggie at an academic conference, where both sisters had been present. Aggie, being an assistant to Harlow’s advisor back then, had been the one to recommend that she attend the event, which had been open to any student or faculty member, sharing that she’d attended it herself and made connections there. Harlow, noting that those connections had obviously worked out for Aggie, had dressed up in the best clothes she’d brought with her to campus and had met Larissa there.
“This is my sister, Larissa,” Aggie had introduced.
“I’m Harlow,” she’d replied and shaken Larissa’s hand.
“Nice to meet you. Freshman?”
“Yeah. That obvious?” she’d joked.
“No. Aggie just saw you come in and told me. You hide it well.”
“Thanks. I’ve been working on not showing up fifteen minutes early to class since I got here, hoping people might take me for at least a sophomore.”
Larissa had laughed, and that had been theendof her. Harlow had felt the butterflies then, and she’d been having them ever since. After the introduction and chat, she hadn’t been sure she would see Larissa again, but she’d walked into the classroom for her first section of the semester, and there Larissa had been, standing at the front of the room.
“Hey,” Harlow had greeted after walking up to her.
“Oh, hey. You’re right on time,” Larissa had said. “Not even fifteen minutes early.”
“How early were you?”
“Ten minutes. But I’m the TA, so I think I’m supposed to be early. Want to take a seat? I’ve got to get us started.”
“Oh, right. Sorry,” Harlow had replied.
It had been strange to her, making this transition from meeting a woman at a party, being totally into her, and thinking about asking her out, to having that same woman stand in front of the classroom, teaching her and her fellow freshmen, who were there for their introduction to psychology.
“Oh. It’s just that I’m only twenty,” Jessie answered her question, laughing a bit. “She’s thirty. I don’t think her parents would want her falling in love with a student she taught to begin with, and I happen to be a twenty-year-old woman on top of that. Besides, to them, I’d probably be a heathen.”
“They’re religious. She’s not,” Gloria added.
“I’m also poor, grew up on the wrong side of the tracks.” Jessie ticked things off on her fingers. “I don’t believe in God. We’re not married, and I have sex with their daughter. I–”
“I think they get it, babe,” Gloria said, chuckling.
“Would you say you were friends first atall, or was it always more?” Harlow asked.
“I think it was always more for me,” Jessie shared. “But we were technically friends first.”
“Yeah, I’d say the same,” Gloria added. “I was attracted to her right away, and I wasn’t exactly going on dates, despite my parents trying to set me up after my relationship ended. It just took us a minute to get together, given our circumstances.”
“Was the transition seamless, then? You say you knew it was more right away; you just weren’t together.”
“Not really. I wanted to kiss her that night we walked around after the movie, and I wanted her to come upstairs formorethan a kiss, but I was also a little embarrassed,” Jessie said. “I mean, she was twenty-nine. I was nineteen, and I had a dorm room that I shared with someone and a meal card for the cafeteria. She had her own apartment with a real kitchen. Like, she had a dishwasher, and I had an illegal hot plate in my room. So, I was really nervous about asking her to come up, and I was both glad and upset that she turned me down. I think it showed, too.”
“You were fine.” Gloria patted Jessie’s leg. “I could tell she was nervous, yeah, but I understood because I was nervous, too. It’s hard, wondering what the other person is feeling in the beginning. I knew I liked her and that I shouldn’t. She knew she liked me but didn’t think I’d want to be with her because of the same reasons Ishouldn’tbe with her.”
