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Four things Esti kept secret, and one she couldn't
"What do you think?"
Ronit walked out of the bathroom stall and stuck her hands in the pockets of her trousers.
Her trousers.
Where had Ronit even found a pair of trousers, anyway? Esti looked around as if she was expecting one of their parents to suddenly pop up from behind a column and start screaming at them.
"Esti," Ronit said in that tone she used that sometimes felt like a very heavy blanket had been draped over Esti to make her feel calm and safe, "nobody knows us here."
And Esti knew Ronit was right, of course. They were far away from home, in one of their Underground Adventures (Ronit's idea, always) where they moved from one line to the next at random until they felt free. Until they could breathe.
"So?" Ronit tried again, and this time she turned around so Esti could take a proper look. "What do you think?"
The trousers were a bit big for Ronit. They were baggy and a little long even if she'd rolled them up at the ankles to keep them from dragging on the floor. They didn't fit right at all. And yet...
"They suit you," Esti finally declared, voice thoughtful and head tilted as she considered the picture in front of her, "even if they're not quite your size."
Ronit beamed at her best friend, clearly delighted with her assessment, and Esti wondered if maybe Ronit hadn't been asking just about the trousers after all.
"Dovid gave them to me. Well- he doesn't know I'm wearing them, of course, he thinks I've donated them." Ronit looked moderately guilty for the lie, but after a second of silent consideration she shrugged it off. "I suppose in a way I have donated them. Just... to myself."
Esti let out a quiet chuckle, even if she shook her head out of some kind of need to let it be known she didn't exactly approve of this whole thing. And yet...
"Let me see again," she heard herself say, cheeks tingling with what she knew was the beginning of a blush, "stick your hands in your pockets like before."
Because there had been something about that pose. And when Ronit smirked and stood like before, slouching slightly like taking off her heavy long skirt had relaxed every muscle in her body, Esti couldn't look away.
Suddenly the trousers looked like they'd been made for Ronit. Or maybe Ronit had been made for trousers instead. Ronit had always been beautiful, but now she was... was she handsome? Esti licked her lips, unable to find a word to pin to the feeling warming her up from the inside out.
"Do you really like them?"
Esti nodded, even if the more she looked, the more she realized she didn't like the trousers after all. She liked how they looked on Ronit. Not because they fit perfectly, like the ones Dovid or Aaron or any other boy wore day in and day out. She liked that they didn't fit quite right, because Ronit wasn't Dovid or Aaron or any other boy. She was Ronit, and she was a girl.
That was what she liked.
But Esti never said that out loud.
***
"Look what I've found."
They were sitting on Esti's bed, even if they should've been asleep already. Their parents didn't mind sleepovers. Esti knew they loved that she was so close with the Rav's daughter. Of course, her parents didn't know Ronit's sleeping bag had never been used, because the girls much preferred to share Esti's bed. Esti didn't know exactly why they'd have a problem with that, really - there was nothing inappropriate about two girl friends sharing a bed - but something told her they would very much oppose it if they knew.
There was something that felt a bit like danger lurking right under the surface every time Esti climbed into bed next to Ronit and felt her best friend's warm body beside her.
And that same sense of danger - or maybe it was excitement? - tingled up her spine as she looked at the object Ronit was currently showing her.
Esti knew what it was. A CD player, small and round, with its earphones dangling on the end of a long black wire. She'd seen plenty of them during their Underground Adventures, but she'd never used one.
Obviously. Why would she? Music like that was forbidden, after all.
"You've found it?" Esti asked with a hint of doubt in her voice. The same doubt showing in the way she cocked one of her eyebrows. "Really?"
Ronit shrugged. "Does it matter?"
Esti supposed it didn't. It was forbidden either way.
And maybe that's why she hesitated before reaching for it and placing a single fingertip on its smooth metallic surface. She was almost surprised when no lightning came from above to smite her right then and there.
"Has it got a CD inside?"
Ronit nodded, white teeth catching her bottom lip as if she was struggling to contain an excited grin. And truth be told, she likely was doing just that.
When she held one of the earphones out for her to take, Esti shook her head. It was one thing to see it and allow it to be in her room. But to actually use it...
"What are you afraid of?"
Ronit's question was simple enough, and yet Esti found herself unable to find a decent answer. What was she afraid of?
She didn't know. So she figured there was no reason for her to say no, after all.
"Ready?" Ronit could barely hide her excitement once they were each wearing one headphone and she pressed play.
It was a slow melody. Unsurprisingly, Esti didn't know it at all. But after a few seconds, she decided she liked it. It was nice. Warm, somehow. It made her want to...
"Dance with me," Ronit said, jolting Esti out of her thoughts like that lightning that didn't strike when she broke the rules earlier. By the time Esti fully processed what her best friend had just said, Ronit was already on her feet, one hand extended towards Esti as she kicked her sleeping bag out of the way.
"I don't know how to dance, Ronit. You don't know how to dance."
"I've seen people dance," Ronit said, holding Esti's hand and tugging lightly until she was also on her feet, "we can figure it out."
It was very hard to argue with Ronit Krushka when she had made up her mind about something. And clearly, she'd made up her mind about this.
"I'll be the man," she said, and Esti could've sworn Ronit's voice sounded a little lower than normal, "so you just have to follow my lead. Okay?"
Esti nodded, feeling a little like she'd lost all her words somewhere between the moment when she stood up and the second she felt Ronit's hand pressing against the small of her back.
"A bit closer," Ronit's voice was barely above a whisper, so quiet Esti was surprised she could hear it over the beating of her heart. She let Ronit's hand guide her closer and closer, until there was only a sliver of hair between their bodies. And then, even though Ronit didn't tell her to, she took another step forward.
She could feel the warmth of Ronit's skin even through their nightshirts.
"Ready?" Another whisper, and Esti nodded once again. Ronit led them as they swayed slowly to the beat of whatever song they were listening to. Esti didn't care. All she cared about was Ronit, and her warmth, and how solid she felt against her. How her breathing seemed to be a bit shallower than normal, and what it felt like when Ronit's blunt fingernails gently scratched against her back.
They'd been dancing for three and a half songs when she felt Ronit's hand move in a different way. Softly, almost hesitantly. Ronit never hesitated, but she did right then, for just a second, before her fingertip slowly traced a heart on the small of Esti's back.
She never told Ronit she'd noticed what she'd drawn.
***
Ronit was leaning against their tree, eyes closed as the sun hit her face and made her look like something out of a painting. It was early Spring, still chilly enough outside for both of them to be wearing coats over their sensible dresses. Lighter coats, though. Not quite the heavy affairs from mid-winter that made Esti feel like she was lugging an entire bed spread around.
Esti loved that early Spring sunshine in an almost protective sort of way. It felt so fragile and small, never quite strong enough to actually warm you up properly, but still there. Bright in a very different way from the warm sunlight from later on in the year.
"I thought you wanted to go over your notes before the test," Ronit said without opening her eyes, voice a little lazy like it always was in their early morning walks to school. She'd never been a morning person, but she still woke up a half-hour earlier than she had to just to walk with Esti. Esti thought about that quite a lot.
"I did. I do. I have them right here," Esti waved the cards in the air, as if that would somehow make the many History facts written on them fall off and enter her brain.
"And yet you're staring at me like a little creep."
Esti felt her cheeks flush. She'd been caught, hadn't she? She just didn't know how, when Ronit's eyes had been closed the whole time. Still, there was really no need to call her a creep.
"You're so unpleasant in the morning. I should stop talking to you before lunch time."
"You could never. You'd miss me far too much."
Deep down, Esti knew Ronit was right. Just the thought of going a day without seeing Ronit was enough to make something twist uncomfortably in her chest, to the point where she simply refused to even entertain the idea at all. It'd never happen, anyway. She wouldn't allow it.
"I'm sorry I called you a little creep," Ronit said after a few moments in silence, and when Esti looked at her she saw her friend's eyes were no longer closed, "I didn't sleep well last night."
Esti no longer cared about her exam, or the facts in the cards. All she cared about was the hint of something very close to sadness she swore she saw in Ronit's eyes.
"What's wrong?"
"Nothing. Nothing, I swear!" Ronit reached for Esti's hand and gave it a squeeze, as if that would make Esti believe her. "I was just up thinking until late, that's all."
Ronit didn't let go of her hand, and Esti didn't pull away. Instead, she found herself taking a slow step forward, as if Ronit in that early Spring light was a star she couldn't help but gravitate towards.
They'd had this conversation before, with some very minor variations. Ronit would say she'd been worried or preoccupied or thinking about something, and Esti would read the rest right there in hazel eyes. Because it was obvious, wasn't it, the thing that was keeping Ronit up at night. The very same thing that wouldn't let Esti look her mother in the eye after spending time with Ronit, even if nothing happened. And nothing ever happened. They made sure of that by never discussing it out loud.
Esti and Ronit could have entire conversations in complete silence. They'd speak in class and at Temple and right in front of their parents without saying a word. Who needed those? It was all right there in looks and slight brushes of hands and even in the empty spaces between the words they did say.
And that was enough. That was safe. Like a wall of bulletproof glass between and around them.
"What were you thinking about?"
Esti's voice was so quiet it may as well have been a whisper, and yet she could've sworn the sound of that safety glass shattering was loud enough to be heard all the way back in her house.
And Ronit heard it, too. Her eyes rounded and she straightened her back, no longer leaning against their tree.
"What?"
"Last night, when you couldn't sleep," Esti let the pad of her thumb brush over Ronit's knuckles, "what were you thinking about?"
Ronit looked down at their hands for a moment before she met Esti's eyes again.
"You."
Esti felt the air in her lungs disappear as if her heart needed the extra room in her chest. It wasn't beating. Not quite. It was throwing itself against her rib cage like it needed to be set free.
And maybe it did.
Ronit was waiting for an answer. A comment, a reaction, something. And Esti had so many things she could say to free up even more space for her heart.
She could've said she thought of Ronit at night, too, and the way she felt kept her up for hours past her bedtime.
She could've said the reason she couldn't look her mother in the eye were the things she wished would happen, even if they never do.
Never did.
Because Esti didn't say any of those things out loud. Instead, she held on to Ronit's hand a little tighter and leaned in until her lips brushed against her best friend's.
The only reason Esti was sure it wasn't all a dream was that in her dreams, it was always Ronit kissing her. But once that first step was taken, who did what and in what order seemed to stop mattering altogether.
Esti had never kissed anyone before, and she didn't need to to know Ronit was the only person she ever wanted to kiss. Ronit's hands were the only ones she wanted in her hair, Ronit's body was the only one she wanted to feel pressed against her own, and Ronit's teeth were the only ones she wanted nipping at her bottom lip.
She decided, right then and there, that she didn't ever want to have another first kiss.
She just never said it out loud.
***
They hadn't even bothered pulling Ronit's sleeping bag out of its case.
It would have felt silly at that point.
And Esti knew they had been right. The Rav, the scriptures, her parents, the well-meaning elders who sometimes handed out free advice for young women just like Esti. They had all been right, because now Esti knew it was true: the first sin was the hardest.
After that - once that line had been crossed - nothing ever felt the same. What had seemed unthinkable was suddenly not quite that big a deal after all. A mountain became a step. And the scariest part of it all was Esti wasn't sure where it had all started.
What had been that first sin? The one that started the snowball effect that had landed her on her back in her bed, nightshirt up around her waist and a hand pressed over her mouth to keep herself quiet while Ronit moved between her thighs?
She didn't know.
She didn't care.
What she felt for Ronit was wrong, but true. Ending up right there in that moment, feeling Ronit's fingers inside her while Ronit's taste still lingered on her lips and tongue felt inevitable. Of course they'd end up like that, as together as two people could possibly be. There had never really been any other options. Not really.
Ronit's fingers hooked inside her, and Esti's back arched off the mattress, the quietest hint of a whine just barely making it past the hand against her mouth.
"Shhh," Ronit whispered, muffling a giggle against Esti's inner thigh, "you'll get us caught."
"Don't stop."
"Never."
And Esti let her eyes flutter closed, as hearing that was a relief and not just further proof that she was going to keep sinning. Over and over again. Straying further and further away from what was right.
But Esti didn't care.
Not when Ronit's mouth joined her fingers between Esti's thighs and Esti felt the first waves of pleasure crashing against her. Not when her fingers fisted in Ronit's hair to keep her right there as Esti struggled to keep herself quiet and her lungs breathing through it all. Not when she was absolutely sure, without a shadow of a doubt, that that was Heaven, right there.
And as long as she had that, she didn't need the one everyone else kept talking about.
But she never would've dared say that out loud.
***
Ronit looked pale as a ghost, hazel eyes wide in a panicked look Esti had never seen in her life. Her cheeks were flushed from the effort of running from her own house to Esti's, her chest heaving with the effort of trying to catch her breath.
Esti was so shocked she couldn't even ask what was happening. All she could do was stare.
"They know."
"What? Who?"
"They know, Esti."
She took a step back, one of her hands feeling around for something to hold on to just to give her a sense of reality after the world had been knocked off-center. Her fingers gripped the edge of a nearby table as if it was the only thing keeping her feet on the floor.
Ronit was still talking. About someone seeing them and telling the Rav. About her parents being at Ronit's house right then, and the three of them talking about how to fix it. Fix them. She talked about running away. About savings, and cameras that could be sold. About plane tickets.
"Together?"
Esti heard the word as if it'd come from someone else instead of out of her own lips. It was small, just like Esti felt. A little desperate. A lot scared.
"Of course," Ronit looked like the mere question was unthinkable, like there had never been any other option, "always."
Esti felt herself nod.
"Hey," Ronit said, stepping close enough to hold Esti's hand in her own, and then close enough to press a lingering kiss to her temple. She didn't say anything, but it was all right there in her eyes for Esti to see when she pulled back. They'd never really needed many words.
The silence stretched for a few moments, just enough for all those unspoken things to wrap around Esti's heart and get it beating properly once again.
"Pack a bag," Ronit finally said, taking a step back and popping the bubble she'd created around them just seconds before, "we'll meet at our tree in fifteen minutes."
"Okay," she felt like she was slowly regaining control of herself. Like she could think again, finally. Like she could wrap her head around what was happening.
They weren't a secret anymore. And they were running away.
Together.
"Okay," she repeated, a little more solid this time. They were going to be okay. And Ronit nodded, because she didn't need Esti to say it out loud to know exactly what she meant.
But as she watched Ronit walk towards the door, Esti suddenly felt like they'd left enough things unsaid.
Some things just had to be said out loud.
"Ronit," she called out, and the look in Ronit's eyes made her feel like she'd never been more right in her life, "I love you."
Out loud.
Ronit nodded just once, a hint of a smile pulling at the corner of her lips. She was too scared for anything more, Esti knew.
"Fifteen minutes," Ronit finally said right before she left, and Esti knew she meant she loved her, too.
And after tonight, they wouldn't have to keep anything secret anymore.