I make it back down the mountain and enter the parking lot in late afternoon. It's been a long fucking day, I'm covered in trail dust, my thighs are burning, my arms are sore from pushing the bike, but I'm starting to feel like I might be able to patch the hole in my heart. It won't be as easy to fix as the bike's bent wheel, but I can do it.
Turning toward the far side of the lot, I see my van and - oh. Shit. A familiar Subaru Forester is parked next to it, a frantic redhead pacing back and forth. How did she find me? My feet grind to a stop about a hundred yards away, unsure of what to do next. Little gnomes run around, cementing them in place, as my heart starts to sob all over again, staring at her beautiful face.
She sees me and turns, hesitant, expecting that I'm going to walk toward her, but you see, the fucking gnomes glued my feet to the parking lot's gravel, so I can't move. So I don't move. I just stand there, unsure of what to do, and stare at her. We remain in this position, staring at each other across the hundred yards of parking lot, for what feels like hours but was probably only thirty seconds. Then she walks over to me.
I gulp nervously as Gwendolyn approaches, realizing that I have absolutely no fucking idea what I'm going to say to her. She comes to a stop about five feet away and I can see that she's been crying recently, her eyes are puffy and she looks like shit.
No, she still looks gorgeous, that was a lie. Breathtakingly beautiful, if I'm being honest about this. Which, for once, I probably should be.
"Are you going to refuse to walk over to your van?," she begins, and it's probably not the "Let's calmly talk things over" conversation opener that she'd been planning, because she immediately winces.
The brat in me takes charge, "So what if I am? Maybe I don't want to go back to my van. Maybe I like it right here instead." Yeah, that was mature. The inner Tiffany rolls her eyes at me.
"Can we please walk over there to get a little more privacy before we talk?," she begs, and I pout, crossing my arms and shaking my head. Anything she wants to say, she can say right here, because none of it is going to change my mind. "Please, Tiffany?" She makes puppy dog eyes at me and fuck it, okay, let's go.
I sigh, and the gnomes unglue my shoes, and I slowly push the bike toward the van. "Are you okay?," she asks, gesturing at the bike.
I know exactly what she was asking, but choose to misinterpret it. "Am I okay? I just saw my girlfriend making out with some guy last night when I came to surprise her after work. No, I'm pretty far from fucking okay."
She glares at me and I wince, feeling like an idiot. Why do I feel like the idiot? I'm not the one who was cheating. Fuck me.
"Yeah, I'm fine. I was being stupid and wasn't paying attention to what I was doing. Bike will be fine, just need a new wheel, no biggie." We reach the van and I stop, leaning the bike against the side and turning to face her, honestly curious about something. "How did you even find me? I didn't know where I drove to, I literally have no idea where we are right now. There's no way that anyone else could have. The only person who knew where I parked was ..."
I trailed off, glancing around the parking lot, as Gwendolyn looked sheepish. "Rebecca is one of my best friends, and I got a fucking earful from her the moment she got into cell service. She told me where you said you'd parked, and I got here as fast as I could. It took you a really long time to walk down the mountain."
Looking at my feet, I mumbled, "Well, I didn't think I had any reason to rush back."
Gwendolyn walked over to me, one hand on my hip, the other on my chin to make me look at her, and stared straight into my eyes. "I am a shitty girlfriend, Tiffany, and I am sorry. I have a boyfriend and we're in a complicated relationship. I should have told you. I didn't, and that's my fault, and if you hate me and never want to see me again, I understand that. But I would like to explain it to you before you go, if you'll let me."
Fucking hell, how could I say no to this woman? UGH. Here I was, trying to be angry and irrational, and she was mature and honest and apologetic. LET ME HAVE MY TANTRUM!
"Okay," I say, unable to look away from those beautiful hazel eyes of hers, her fingers holding my chin in place. "I'll hear you out."
She glances around, trying to find a place to sit, and I sigh. "I'll get us chairs." She releases my chin and I climb the ladder, passing down two camp chairs to her, and we set them up and sit, facing each other, and she scoots close enough that our knees are practically touching as she takes my hands into hers.
"I have a boyfriend. His name is Wyatt, he's a contract pipeline welder, and he typically travels for a week or two at a time. He knows that I'm bi, and he wants me to be happy while he's out of town, so he doesn't mind if I date women, with the stipulation that I have to ask him permission before I have sex with them."
"You should have told me before you asked me out," I grumble, a part of me fascinated by the details of her relationship.
Gwendolyn raises an eyebrow, looking at me, "And what would you have said?"
"I would have told you to fuck off," I admit. She nods, as if I'd validated her behavior, which obviously I hadn't.
"It would have been deserved, I'm sure," she admits to me. "You had - and have - every right to do that. But something about you, when I met you, it was like a bolt of lightning hit me. I've never met anyone like you before and I wanted to spend more time with you, refusing to take no for an answer."
"But you lied to me," I mumbled, staring down at our hands, fingers intertwined. Yeah, and you're lying to her, too, TIM, so what makes you so righteous? My inner voice could be a real bitch, sometimes. I really didn't want to hear from her right now. Besides, Tim died. He doesn't get a vote anymore.
"You're right, I did lie - even if by omission," Gwendolyn said. Just like you are, that inner bitch continued. A lie of omission about magically turning into Tiffany is still a lie. Oh, come the fuck on. It's not like I can explain it, she'd think I'm a lunatic and dump me all over again. I'm justified in this, okay? Gwendolyn continued on while I was arguing with myself, "I am truly sorry, Tiffany. I will do anything to make it up to you. I've fallen so hard for you in these two weeks and I can't imagine going on without you."
I fucking swooned, okay? Don't at me, my heart decided it didn't give a shit about the betrayal anymore and just wanted to do whatever it took to get that redhead happy again. Luckily, my mouth interceded before the heart could say some dumb shit about forgiveness. "What about Wyatt? What does he have that I don't? Why don't you dump him and just be exclusive with me?" See? Good thing the mouth spoke first. Facepalm.
"Tiff, that's not fair." She was right, it wasn't fair. I was being a bitch. "I'm trying to be an adult about this. I know it's complicated, my relationship is a fucking mess to explain even in the best of times. Feelings are hard. Relationships are hard. I want to make this work with you, but I also love him. He travels for work so much and I'm so lonely while he's gone, and you fit that hole in my life perfectly, I didn't want to do anything to mess it up."
Yeah, I knew exactly how she felt. And fuck, she was right. I'd do anything to not mess this up. I sniffled, my voice coming out as a bratty whine, "But I love you, and you love him. It's not fair."
She leaned in, kissing me gently on the lips, and I tried not to respond as the tears started pouring from my traitorous eyeballs. "I love you too, babe. But love isn't finite. Let me prove it to you." The words hung between us like a dare and my heart leapt into my throat, squeezing it so tight I couldn't say anything. The inner bitch shut up for once, nodding her head in approval. I let Gwendolyn lead me to the van, where I opened the door, pulling her in behind me.
And then we had make-up sex. The end.
Just kidding.
Latching the door behind us, Gwendolyn slowly stripped my sweat and dirt-stained riding clothes from me, wrinkling her nose slightly as she did. "Babe, you stink. You got a shower in here?" I grinned sheepishly, nodding, and duck-walked my way into the cramped quarters, rinsing the trail grime from my body while Gwendolyn sat and watched. "Too bad it's not big enough to fit us both," she teased and I blushed, thinking of the apartment I'd rented, specifically picking one with a big shower for just that purpose.
Wrapping a towel around myself, I walked out and sat on my bed, staring at her, waiting for her to make the first move. And she did, easing forward, kissing me as I felt myself unconsciously scooting further back in the bed, making room for her as she climbed on top of me, one hand stripping my towel away and grasping my breast while her tongue and mine proceeded to reacquaint themselves.
My hand grabbed a handful of red hair as Gwendolyn started kissing her way down my neck, finding the spot where she'd left me a hickey the previous week and repeating the process as my pussy turned into a water hazard and I made what an unbiased observer would agree were "delightful moaning noises." She clamped her lips around my nipple and teased it with her teeth, running her tongue around the sensitive flesh as it gleefully stood at attention, before repeating that on the other nipple.
Before long, she was leaving more hickeys on my pubic bone and then that tongue was lapping at my clit like it owed her money and I'm pretty sure the rest of the parking lot knew exactly what we were up to in this van. Her fingers teased my insides, hitting sensitive spots inside of me that I was still only just getting acquainted with myself, and I gasped, nearly ripping a handful of her hair out as I came, a series of shrieks defeaning the two of us briefly until my breathing calmed down.
I was going to return the favor but she flipped me over, placing a pillow under my stomach and proceeded to finger me from behind, doggy style, while I howled in glee. Another three or four orgasms later and I regained my senses, my sweat-stained body sprawled limply across her bare chest, her clothes having vanished at some point.
"You're too good to me," I mumbled. "I've never felt anything like that before. That was amazing."
I could feel Gwendolyn smiling, even if I couldn't lift my head to look at her, and she patted my head. "I'm sorry for hurting you. I don't ever want to do anything like that again. Let's try this again, focusing on complete honesty."
I nodded my head in agreement. Except, you know, for the whole lying about your identity part. You know, the part where you died. Then woke up with tits, the inner bitch chipped in. Fuck. I wasn't ready to have that conversation. Maybe another time. After a few more orgasms. Or never, that worked too.
"Can I introduce you to Wyatt?," Gwendolyn asked, startling me. "I promise, you'd like him if you met him. I'm not saying you need to be friends, or even hang out on a regular basis, but you're the two most important people in my life and I'd love for you to get along."
I could feel myself starting to hiss like a cat sprayed with water, my hackles rising confrontationally, and I tried to do my best to meet her in the middle. "I'll meet him, but I'm not going to like him." See? That was a mature way to meet in the middle.
Gwendolyn decided the wiser choice was not to indulge my inner brat and started kissing me instead, apparently taking that as a victory. I was not going to like him. He was a guy and he was fucking my girlfriend, and guys get stabbed for fucking another man's girlfriend. But then Gwendolyn's mouth found my pussy and I started screaming again, and somehow it didn't seem to matter all that much anymore.