”You were…” Dominique confirmed, though she hadn’t at all minded the way the conversation was going either. She was hungry to know all she could about the woman walking next to her in fact. Perhaps a little too much so, she considered.

Elisa smiled. ”Okay, well, like I said, dad and Derrick went to a ball game, mom was away at work, so I was left in charge. Beth was bored, so I asked her what she would want to do if she could do anything. She said she wanted to go to the park. I told her mom and dad wouldn’t want us to, but she dared me to take her anyway, so I smiled and took her hand in mine and we went right then… I would have taken her anyway, even if she hadn’t dared me, but it was so cute the look she got when she thought she’d outsmarted me… She always had such a cute smile…” Elisa thought, laughing a little at herself for how many times Beth had suckered her with just that smile when they were growing up, and of course, she usually fell for it – hook, line, and sinker. Still though, Beth was her rock, the one she could always count on to listen when she needed to talk, needed cheering up, or a shoulder to cry on. And she liked to think she was that for Beth too. They talked on the phone pretty regular as it was now, but it wasn’t the same thing as being able to see her.

”You miss her, don’t you?” Dominique asked.

”Yeah, of course I do. We’ve always been really close.” She told her, wondering not for the first time if maybe that was part of the problem between her and Derrick, that she and Beth had always been like… a clique or something, and made him feel excluded without meaning to. ”I think you’d like her. I think you’d probably get along really well in fact.” She told Dominique.

”If she’s anything like you, I’m sure that’s probably true.” Dominique admitted, obtusely wondering just how much Elisa might be able to convince her to do with that smile of hers if they kept going like it seemed to her they probably would. It was somewhat unsettling to guess at, honestly. She already almost felt like she was losing herself a little to the feelings Elisa evoked in her, perhaps.