“That reminds me, I’ve been meaning to ask you something. What’s it like being bi?” Tate asks from the backseat.
I snort. Kenny chides her like she’s nine, but I know Tate well enough to know she’s just really bad about phrasing the thoughts in her head before they come out of her mouth. She’s honestly funny as hell.
“What’s it like being straight?” I ask back.
“Well, I don’t know. If I think other girls are pretty, am I bi?”
Kenny’s brows rise in surprise, but Tate’s looking at me so she doesn’t see them, thankfully. Perhaps Tate’s just curious, but if she’s queer, this could be a conversation she’ll remember forever, which is a bit of pressure.
“Maybe,” I tell her. “I can only speak for myself, but for me, it’s more than just thinking, ‘wow, she’s pretty.’ It’s more like, ‘Wow, she’s fucking gorgeous. What do I need to say to get her to sit on my face and let me worship the ground she walks on?’”
Laughter fills the cab of the pickup, even though I wasn’t really joking. I have a complicated relationship with admiring women. I always feel pervy doing so, even though I’m not catcalling or harassing or saying those X-rated things going through my head out loud. I think it’s because a part of me still associates liking women as a ‘man thing’ and the way most men admire women is usually pretty pervy. Whatever the reason, it makes me act much more awkward with women than I do with men.
“Probably straight then?” I ask Tate when their laughter quiets down.
“Yeah, probably. No offense,” Tate says.
I roll my eyes. “Why would you being straight offend me?”
She shrugs with a hapless smile. “I dunno. Do you have a preference? Like, are you more gay or more straight?”
“I’m always queer, never straight,” I tell Tate pointedly, knowing she meant no harm, but wanting to correct her so she doesn’t say it to someone else thatwouldn’tknow that. “You don’t really want to ask about preferences that way because it erases my identity. I prefer women. I am, unfortunately, also attracted to men.”
She laughs and then apologizes for the way she worded her question, but I wave her off and everyone moves on. Kenny tells us about something she learned in school that she thinks could help Callie with her selective mutism diagnosis and a few toys to help her communicate without talking when she doesn’t feel up to it.
Tate talks about how excited she is to go with Jameson tomorrow and visit Colt, going on and on about the horses they’re picking up and the arrangements she’s already made for them at the ranch. When Kenny brings up Tate taking someonline college courses, she sort of dances around answering, but I think we all know college isn’t for her. She’d be content training horses on the ranch til she couldn’t anymore.
Both of them are so sure of themselves, of their futures. They’re so rooted to Cedar Creek and happy on the ranch. I can picture what both of their lives will look like five years from now, even if they’re a little too close to see the bigger picture themselves.
Tyler will get tired of waiting for Tate to realize he’s in love with her, and finally just say something. They’ll get married on the ranch under the treehouse they used to play in as kids and have a kid of their own. Tate will probably expand her training to more than just the ranch’s horses, taking on clients as well.
Kenny will finish school in a few months and become a kindergarten teacher at Cedar Creek Elementary come September. She’ll fight to get Callie in her class so the little girl won’t have to suffer through her first year of school with someone she isn’t comfortable around. Once Theo’s grief isn’t so heavy, he’ll realize Kenny has been right in front of him the whole time.
And then there’s me. Kenny doesn’t know it yet, but I won’t be here in five years—or even one, god willing. I’ve been saving to leave this town since the second I turned eighteen, but there’s always been something that gets in the way—an emergency with my truck or Dad finding my stash or some other way the universe screws me over.
A year ago now, Dad quit going to work and my money became the only income keeping a roof over our heads. I quickly realized bartending wasn’t gonna make ends meetandlet me save money, so I started camming. It’s not something I enjoy doing, but it’s easy enough.
Beyond a very vague ‘leave Cedar Creek’, I don’t have any plans. No clue where I’ll go when I leave, no idea what I’ll do for work. That’s why it’s so important to me to save so much, because I’ll probably have to live off those savings for at least afew months til I can find a little apartment and a decent-paying job.
Kenny and Tate daydream about their future plans. I call those thoughts nightmares.
We pull up at the mall and Kenny parks her old Dodge about a million feet from the doors. I grumble about how far we’ll have to walk good-naturedly and she pats my cheek with a mocking pout, handing me back my phone. I slip it into my back pocket without checking to see if Maddox replied. Kenny was right—no boys during girls’ day. I didn’t know how many more girls’ days we had left together. It’d be stupid to waste this one texting her brother.
The prices at the mall make me even more aware of how desperately I need to start camming again. Even with the uptick in business from the seasonal ranch hands arriving, I wasn’t refilling my old coffee can quickly enough for my liking. The bruises on my side hadn’t lightened enough yet, but I figured I’d buy a couple teddies and babydolls to hide them so I could start bringing in that income again. Maybe since the men had already seen everything, they’d find the tease of hidden skin sexier somehow.
I just needed something that would start bringing in more clients and more tips as soon as possible, so I was grasping at straws. If nothing else, the other night proved to me that Dad was only getting worse and there would come a day I wouldn’t walk away from his abuse, just like Mama. Whether that was at my own hand, like it was for her, or by Dad’s, I wasn’t sure yet.
In the dressing room with horrible lighting and his sisters only a stall away, I snap a mirror selfie wearing a black lace teddy, sheer enough to show a glint from my bellybutton andnipple piercings, but dark enough to mask the bruises. I look over the picture, adjust my tits in the plunging neckline and try again. A few pictures later and I also have one taken over my shoulder to show off the thong in the back. I send both to Maddox.
Austin
Purchase approved?
He doesn’t answer right away, but I’m already changing out of the teddy and replacing it with a bodysuit in red. I think it’s a common misconception that redheads don’t like to wear red, but I think I look hot as fuck in it. I take pictures in that one and send those his way too.
Austin
Or should I get this one instead?
