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Sharon Raydor stares at her phone.
She remembers the time she was in love with Brenda Leigh Johnson vividly.
It had been three years since she’d last seen her. Six years since they’d first met. She’d been infuriating. Petulant. Impossible to work with. Sharon had been attracted to her right from the start. Though of course it had taken a while for her to admit that, even to herself. And by the time she did, she was head over heels in love.
Nothing had ever really happened between them. A hand on a shoulder, a celebratory hug, a shoulder bump, those were the little moments of pleasure that Sharon had gotten from an otherwise strictly professional relationship. She sometimes wondered if she’d pushed things a little further, whether Brenda would have reciprocated. But in the end Sharon Raydor always wanted to do the right thing. Pursuing a physical relationship with a married superior officer was definitely not that.
Sharon remembers this as she stares at her phone. 1 missed call.
She’d erased Brenda’s entry from her phone book, not wanting to be reminded every time she scrolled through it. But she had not managed to erase Brenda’s phone number from her memory.
1 missed call.
Sharon hits the return call button. Brenda answers after two rings. “Hi, Sharon.”
“Hello,” Sharon says a little unsurely.
“How are you? I’ve missed you,” Brenda continues, as if they are best friends. As if they’d been on speaking terms the past three years.
“I’m fine, thank you. Good, actually.” Sharon realises how true this is. How much better she’s been since the millstone that is Jack Raydor was removed from her neck. “How have you been, Brenda Leigh?” And why are you calling, she adds silently. Surely not just to exchange pleasantries.
“Um… I’ve been better. Listen, I, I mean, we should talk. I mean I want to talk to you. Can we talk?”
“Yes, of course we can talk. Are you alright, Brenda?” Sudden concern floods her mind. Brenda is sounding somewhat discombobulated.
“I am, I just want to talk to you. Can we meet for a drink or somethin’?”
Sharon is taken aback, meeting Brenda face to face is the last thing she expected to be doing this week. “Are you in LA?” she asks. After all, isn’t Brenda supposed to be at a safe distance in WashingtonDC.
“Oh. Yes, I am,” Brenda answers. “Just takin’ care of some stuff. I’ll be here until the end of the week.”
They agree to meet that evening, in a coffee bar across the street. Sharon feels restless and on edge the rest of that day. She has missed Brenda, but also, not. She has not missed feeling forlorn and hopeless and desperately clinging to feelings that would never be reciprocated.
There was Rusty and all the complications that came with him. His drug addicted mother. Philip Stroh. There was her divorce from Jack. All those things distracted her enough to forget about Brenda Leigh and her feelings. She’d moved on, tentatively started seeing Andy, though she is not sure she should let that go any further than it already has. She’s not in love with him and she never will be. And at the same time she seems incapable of turning him down. He is safe and sweet and obviously infatuated with her.
And what is Brenda? What is Brenda other than a painful memory? Sharon is already regretting saying yes to meeting her. She contemplates calling her back to cancel, but instead she finds herself in the bathroom checking her hair and make-up.
Get a grip, Sharon Raydor, she berates herself. You’re meeting with an old friend who might need your help with something. That is all.
As she exits the building, the LA sun beats down on her without mercy. Though it is early evening and the sun is already setting, it is still hot as an oven. She quickly crosses the street and slips inside the air-conditioned coffee bar. Brenda is already there, looking just like Sharon remembers her. Soft blonde curls tumbling over small shoulders clad in some pink contraption that should have never made it past the design stage. A floral skirt flows around her shapely legs, that impossible hideous bag dangling from her shoulder. Sharon feels her stomach flutter at the sight and gets irritated. You are over her, she tells herself, willing her stomach back in to submission.
“Sharon!” Brenda has turned around and flings her arms around her. She smells sweet, like roses or lilies or some other overbearing flower scent, mixed with what is quintessentially Brenda.
Sharon is not ready for this, she realises. This meeting was definitely a bad idea. She’s feeling dizzy and disorientated. Brenda leads them to a table, says she’s ordered her a cappuccino. Sharon is glad to sit down, she focuses on the feeling of the seat fabric against her skin to calm her mind.
“It’s really good to see you, Sharon, I mean you look really good,” Brenda blushes a little as she says it.
Sharon has to clear her throat before she can speak. “Likewise, Brenda. It’s been a long time.” But not long enough, evidently, judging from how flustered Sharon is feeling right now. This is ridiculous, she tells herself. You are over her.
Brenda is quiet for a beat, stirring whatever sweet smelling coffee concoction she has ordered for herself vehemently. She looks up, her brown doe-like eyes locking with Sharon’s. “Look, I’ll just come right out and say what I want to say, before I lose my nerve, ok?” Sharon nods slowly. She is feeling a little trepidatious. “You know, back when, you and I… I mean, I don’t know about you, but me, well, I think I was in love with you, Sharon. Or at least… I don’t know, there were feelings that I couldn’t explain away. I don’t even know what it is frankly, I have never felt this way ‘bout anyone else. At first you were just so irritatingly perfect that I just wanted to smack you, and then, I wanted other things. You know?”
Sharon opens her mouth. Closes it again. She knows. She feels hot and very, very cold. She is sweating profusely and it is making her shiver. What is going on here? What is happening?
Brenda is still talking. “And of course I had to tell Fritz because I didn’t want to lie to him, you know, I couldn’t bear the thought of mucking up another marriage. It was tough, but he understood, to a point, and we tried to make it work.” Brenda takes a sip of her drink. She stares past Sharon, her brow furrowed. “But the thing is, I’ve never quite managed to stop thinkin’ about you and wonderin’ what it would be like… and it put a strain on my relationship with Fritz. He could sense that my heart just wasn’t in it anymore. I tried, I tried real hard to love him properly, to forget about you. I took this job in DC, to see if a little distance would give me clarity. But I found myself missing you more than him. So,” she sighs. “We got divorced.”
Sharon inhales sharply. “I’m sorry, Brenda. I had no idea”. Though it explained a thing or two about Fritz’s recent behaviour.
“That’s ok, I’m ok. Most of the time.” she fumbles with a napkin, her eyes stare down at the table. Sharon doesn’t want to think it, but she thinks it anyway. She is so adorable.
“Anyway, the reason I’m tellin’ you all of this is, before I make this thing permanent, this move, I want to see if there’s any chance here. I mean, I’ll understand if you’ve moved on or maybe you never even liked me in the first place, but here I am, a grown woman, not a teenager anymore. I don’t have to drop hints and waste time waitin’ around for things to happen, do I?”
Sharon’s mind is racing. Too much conflicting information is going through. In the span of about half a second she thinks ‘Brenda is available now.’ ‘I am over her.’ ‘She liked me all along.’ ‘I don’t need this complication in my life.’ ‘I’m feeling really quite nauseated.’ and various other opposing thoughts. Brenda reaches out over the table and takes Sharon’s hand in hers. It is comfortably warm, her hand.
“Sharon Raydor, will you date me?”
Sharon blinks rapidly, fighting the tears that are welling up in her eyes. Tears of what? She wonders, relief? She swallows the lump that has formed in her throat. But before she can say anything, Brenda is talking again.
“I’m sorry, I overwhelmed you. Obviously I’ve been thinkin’ about this for a while. I’ve had this scenario in my head where you smile and nod yes and we walk off hand in hand into the sunset.” Brenda grins.
“I thought you said you’re not a teenager,” Sharon retorts. They both laugh. It alleviates the tension somewhat.
Sharon just needs a moment. Or a day. A week. To think this over. On the one hand, there is this impossible woman that she thought she was over. On the other hand, they are two unattached middle-aged women with an obvious attraction to each other, and absolutely nothing standing in their way. What harm is there in dating? Except that she doesn’t want Brenda not to move permanently to DC just so they can date. Or does she?
“I don’t want you to put your life on hold for me, Brenda. I am not sure what it is I’d be able to give you.”
Brenda waves her hand, like that is just not an issue. “But you would date me?”
“Well…” What harm?
“If I asked you to have dinner with me right now, would you say yes?”
What harm? “Yes.” Sharon lets out a breath she hadn’t realised she was holding. Actually, dinner with Brenda Leigh Johnson seems like an excellent plan.