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GAY NOW
4.14.x.2
Holding hands with a girl you’ve realized you have a crush on is a sublime experience. Maybe not sublime in the speculative philosophy sense of experiencing the divine and being awestruck with the enormity of the revelation, though I guess logically it depends on how much you idealize her as a heavenly being herself. My girl, my angel, my goddess… I know it’s too soon for any of that. I really need to get beyond just holding her hand before I can call her my own personal Venus…
At least, though, it’s sublime in the heady feeling you get when you wanting her is recognized and, if not validated, then at least acknowledged as having even a slim possibility of being not completely out of the realm of the sane, and your soul just soars. But it’s also the sudden humbling recognition of the truth that you and your emotions are very, very small, while the real world outside, where the girl lives along with all the other objects and people in the world, perfectly fine oblivious of you and you wanting her, is just… ginormous. It’s like you have this interdimensional cocoon your want has made, separate but in the middle of things and you invite her in by offering her your hand. When she actually takes it, you’re suddenly outside yourself with wonder and hope and anxiety, so then, you’re everywhere, but nowhere, all at once, simultaneously.
The girl in question was holding my hand, which I was very self-consciously aware was damp and clammy and not very awe-inspiring on my part. I had just run a half mile in my anxiousness to find her, and hello, computer nerd here—my people are not known for our natural athletic abilities. Between the sudden exertion and the freaking huge rabid rodent bats trying to bore an exit through my stomach lining, I was feeling not a little queasy. To be honest, though, I think I would’ve run ten miles just to be in this very position, sitting on this bench in the middle of a public museum, with her holding my sweaty hand in her cool one. See, my finding her was necessary, having for the span of a day lost her, solely through my propensity to act stupid around her without even trying.
I want to do so much more than just hold her hand. But right now, just that simple act alone is almost enough to make me pass out.
When exactly did I start feeling this way for her? I mean, sure, when casting a spell together, there’s often the warm tinglies of the magic passing from her to me and back again, and the initial endorphin rush when the spell is successful. Doing spells with her often got really intimate. But this wasn’t that, though maybe that was the knock on the door to what I’m feeling now. And maybe knowing that she liked girls pushed me to crack open that door a bit, just to peek in? Then wham! Next thing I know, I’m kicking down the door and making myself at home on her gay couch in front of her gay television, looking through her gay bathroom cabinet, rummaging through her gay refrigerator. Hey, Tara! Guess what? I think I’m kinda gay!
But am I really? I mean, there was Oz, and before him, I wanted Xander. I still love them both, of course in different ways. I mean, Xander, he’s like a brother to me now, so ick, but then… and Oz… my first, in so many ways, even if he hurt me so bad it could make me… swear off guys.
That can’t be it, can it? Do I want Tara because she’s… safe? I gotta admit, my luck in Boystown? Not great so far. My first boyfriend was a killer demon robot. Oz cheated on me, almost ate me, then just left town without a word. Xander was clueless all those years up until our big formal wear fluke. I just don't get guys sometimes, and it sure seems the same in reverse. Spike couldn’t bite me for the uh, unlife of him. For a very, very smart man, Giles can be so clueless sometimes, like Dad—
Oh God. How the frilly heck am I going to explain this to Mom and Dad?
I should talk to Buffy. Nononono! Buffy will freak. I can’t tell Buffy. Buffy doesn’t know the first thing about liking girls…
Okay, okay, so the talk with the Buffster will have to wait. I should start with someone who won’t freak, or wipe their glasses and lecture me about doing spells. Someone who’ll listen calmly and give me sane advice.
That automatically rules out Mom. Maybe Mrs. Summers? Should I impose on her like that? I could call Aunt Debbie or ‘her good friend’ Carolyn, if I knew them a little better… Or the campus counselor. But I don’t want to talk to a stranger…
There’s no way in any of the innumerable hell dimensions this is easier than liking boys.
Hey, waitaminute… I’m research gal! The research gal. I can figure it out on my own. But, uh, later. I’ve got better things to do right now.
She’s beautiful. I can stare at her all day long. Except she might think that’s creepy.
So, okay. I like girls now. I seem to have a talent for putting myself in the company of a lot of pretty ones, some even beautiful ones, so yay on gay me! I guess I'm an overachiever at this, too… Except I don’t know if I could like like them, much less adore them. I mean, Buffy? See above, Xander, brother, except, Buffy, sister. So, no. Not even a little. Cordelia? God, no. The words “high maintenance” mean anything? Faith? Well, there’s the whole psychotic bitch thing working against her, though she did look good in those leather pants… Uh, I didn’t just think that. Anya? Oh my God, no. Xander’s short attention span can be a blessing, in the right situation.
Besides, none of them are Tara.
How come she’s not with someone already? She’s so sweet and patient. She really listens and seems honestly interested in me. She’s smart and creative and a powerful witch. And she’s gorgeous. When she smiles, I feel so good inside, too. When I’m the one making her smile, oh my God, I’m in heaven… And that voice. I can imagine her purring in my ear in the morning, telling me to get up for class or to wake me from a bad frog dream, her warmth and scent surrounding me, her breasts pressed against my back, her arm around my waist, her front to my behind, her legs wrapped around mine…
Omigod. I’m having morning-after spooning fantasies about her. I am so out of control.
I think I’m Tarasexual.
What if she doesn’t want me back? Ohgodohgodohgod. I need to talk to someone. Someone who can relate to pretty girl rejection… Xander—!
“Willow,” Tara was saying softly.
I had totally spazzed and zoned out on her. The girl, literally, of my dreams. “Huh?” I said. Smooth, Rosenberg! Had I been drooling?
She’s trying to take her hand back. Why? She’s shaking her head… Please, Tara, stop frowning. I’m sorry I was such a dummy. I’m sorry I made you feel this way. Pleasepleaseplease, Tara, stop looking like that.
“It’s not going to w-work like this.”
My heart sank. I let go her hand and she put her sketch pad to the side while I started fidgeting with the pencils I had been holding for her in my suddenly nervous hands. I put them down and started fidgeting with my fingers instead.
“I need to know something…”
My throat was dry and I could barely speak. “Uh, what about?”
“W-Willow, you hurt me really bad. Y-you as much as said I-I’d play on my being gay to get ahead with my classes.”
“You have to believe me, Tara, that was so not what I meant! I only wanted to protect you…”
“Y-you assumed I can drop everything I’m doing, just because you w-want me to.”
“I know, I’ve been very selfish…”
“Y-You insulted someone who w-was only trying to be nice to me.”
“I’ll find her, apologize to her in person.”
“A-and you as much as-as outed me to my sociology professor.”
“Er, I don’t know how I’m going to fix that one.”
“Now you-you tell me it’s all because… you’ve got a crush o-on me?”
“Um… yeah?” She looked absolutely thrown for a loss. “Er… I know it was pretty presumptuous of me to just assume you would be available once I finally admitted that this was what I was feeling. Or that you would even have any interest in me if you were. I mean, look at you, all with the hotness. You probably have a girlfriend already. I just haven’t been a good enough friend for you to feel comfortable enough to tell me. I could see that. She’s probably beautiful and completely sane without any issues. While me, total geek, plus I’ve been a lousy friend and I’d be lucky for us to just be friends again, so… okay?” I took a breath, holding it.
She shook her head. “I-It’s not enough.”
My hopes deflated with my breath. The dread came up. It felt stronger than the awe just then. Much stronger. I felt like I was going to be sick. “I know, Tara, it’s totally not enough. But I swear, I’ll do whatever I have to to fix things, make them the way they were before.”
“That’s not w-w-what I-I…” She stopped herself, frustrated. I bit my lip to keep myself from jumping in and trying to finish her sentence for her in my eagerness to make her understand. She can so be insecure girl sometimes. I hate to hear her stutter—well, not hate meaning I don’t like her voice. I so do. Tara can make a swear word sound like a song. Not that I’ve ever heard her swear. She doesn’t like to talk about it, but I think she must’ve come from a pretty strict home. I wonder how they handled her being gay… Uh, Tara’s speaking again. Shut up, dummy. “I mean… I w-want more, too, maybe?”
Huh? “Huh?” I couldn’t have heard right.
She took my hand. I’m sure it felt like a cold dead fish in her hands, ‘cause that’s what the thing at the end of my wrist felt like to me.
“But… I-I thought you w-were straight. W-What about Oz? W-When he comes back?”
“Oz?” That made me pause. I’d almost forgotten I’d talked Tara’s cute little ears off moaning and crying over Oz weeks after he’d left me. This was after Xander and Buffy and Giles had had enough and couldn’t stand to be around me and I'd accidentally cast the my-will-be-done spell to cap off my self-pity party. But I couldn’t not be honest with her. She had a point. What would I do if Oz were to come back now? I honestly don’t know. The truth was, I hadn’t thought about Oz for some time. Most of that, I know, had to do with the girl sitting next to me, holding my one hand in the two of hers. It was starting to tingle, no longer cold and dead. She had brought it back to life, just like the rest of me. “I don’t know if Oz is ever coming back. To be honest, I really don’t know what I would do if he did. But I can’t keep waiting indefinitely, can I?”
She seemed conflicted. She struggled a few short moments, biting her bottom lip, before her face finally fell. She let my hand go before raising hers, I thought (I prayed) to cup my cheek, but no, she lifted it to feel my forehead instead. “A-Are you feeling okay? M-Maybe something has gotten in-into you.”
I captured her hand in my own and looked her straight in the eye. “There’s nothing in me that needs to be chased away, Tara. I know this is very sudden for you. But no less so for me. It’s all so confusing. And scary. I don’t know if what I’m feeling makes me gay. All I do know is that I am having feelings. Very strong feelings. We’re talking freakishly gorilla-strength feelings. For you. And I know there’s no mistaking the fact that you’re a woman, and technically, I am too, even if I have the build of a fifteen year old boy—”
I wasn’t expecting her to shut me up by squeezing my cheeks with her free hand. She let go quick, though, un-puckering my lips. “I take back w-what I asked you earlier, a-about you being straight? I’m the last person to ask you to justify yourself, Willow. If you’re gay now, you’re gay now.”
My heart soared like an eagle.
“But…”
Then plummeted like a… a flightless bird. Like a big, big defenestrated chicken.
“I guess I’m not sure w-what this all means…” She withdrew her hand and cleared her throat, looking… embarrassed? “For us? W-What does this mean to me? Are you l-looking for a mentor? Because I don’t think I can be that for you. I’m not all knowledge-woman about being gay, just because I l-like girls.”
Oh. I hadn’t foreseen this. Didn’t she get it? Didn’t she understand that I had a major jones-on for her? Not for just any woman. Only her. “That is so not what I want, Tara. Unless by mentoring you mean providing hands-on training on the ways of Sapphic love!” I Groucho'd my eyebrows, trying to lighten the mood.
The deer-in-headlights look she gave me was really not what I was hoping for.
“Sorry, Tara.” I said, truly contrite. “I mean, as much as the thought of you disciplining me on the subject seems oddly appealing, I really wasn’t looking to make our friendship into some kind of educational experience. I was kinda just hoping you’d, like, want to go out with me sometime. Not to do spells. Not to study or go to a lecture. But maybe see a movie, or have dinner. And to talk? About anything and everything, not just the, uh, gay thing. And… hold your hand. And… maybe more, if you end up, like, like liking me? ‘Cause I know I like like you, you know? But if you don’t like like me, I would still want to be friends, anyway. But maybe I threw it all out of whack dumping this on you and now it’ll be too awkward and we’ll never be able to go back to just that… Oh God, I hope not. I mean, I hope you do, but if you don’t, I hope being friends is still an option? I guess I’m not making much sense. Besides, you haven’t even told me if you’ve got someone already and maybe I’m babbling on for nothing so I should just stop now.”
“No. There’s no one.”
I waited.
Apparently she was waiting, too, because then neither of us said anything.
Then it suddenly dawned on me. Strange as it seemed, this beautiful girl needed reassurance as much as I did. And maybe a little prodding. “So… would you like to, uh… with me, that is…?” Our faces were inches away from each other. I could smell her vanilla soap and the heat rose in me again. The scent reminded me of waking up in her bed, after an innocent night of casting spells. It made me wonder how it would be to wake up in her bed after a night of doing other things, not so innocent. With less clothes on. In fact, some downright naughty things, with absolutely no clothes on. Or maybe just an accessory or two. Uh, guess that really ought to come later, after I get the basics down—if she’ll have me. Oh, please have me. Oh! And what does vanilla soap taste like?
“I-I’ve… um, thought about it?”
“You have?” I reached out and found her hand with minimal groping while my eyes never left hers. My heart was beating furiously.
Tara nodded, turning her eyes down, though her fingers curled around my palm. She smiled shyly. Did I mention what her smile does to me? Oh God, I was going to melt. “There may have even been a dream or two…”
“Really?” My relief was almost physical. “Me too! In fact, just before I came over... uh, so to speak.” I squeezed her hand, feeling absolutely euphoric and literally giddy with her validation. “I think it’s what pushed me into finally admitting what I’m feeling.” I know I was grinning like an idiot.
“W-Why don’t w-we get some coffee?” She squeezed my hand back and smiled again. At me. For me.
YES! “Yes!” We let go briefly while she got her things together but as soon as her hand was available, I claimed it again in mine. “So…you’ve had sex dreams about me, huh?”
“Hm?” Her eyebrows scrunched up, cutely. “Oh! Uh, Willow, I mean daydreams. I’ve daydreamed about you?”
“Oh? Oh!” Think fast, you perv! Well, technically, I had the dream in the daytime, and that whole spooning thing just a few minutes ago… “Me too. I, uh, yeah. Me too.”
Tara giggled. “Don’t worry, Willow. I’ve had those kind, too.” She grinned teasingly and gave my hand another little squeeze.
Ooooh, yeah. All is right in the world.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that having your feelings validated by the girl you want by her interlacing her fingers with yours, pressing your palms together, feeling the heat of her through her narrow handspan, her strength in her long digits, her beauty in the softness of her fingertips, can be as awesome as being struck dumb by catching the briefest glimpse at the face of God. It doesn’t always come from staring at mountains or hermitting yourself in the woods. Sometimes it comes just from your girl holding your hand.
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