Bette said more.  It was like she reached out and caressed me with her words entirely.  She glanced at me with the brown gaze that occupied my thoughts – with or without direction. 

“I have to cook for you sometime.” 

Again, my heart broke.  She must have felt it then.  Bette walked right past me and it took all of my strength to hold back from reaching out and touching her. 

“Bette.”  I called out.  “Turn around.” 

My partner of yesterday did.  Slowly.

I think she would always heed my plea to look at me with eyes that shone with the history of our past and the difficult challenge of our present.  It’s not a secret.  I know I hold a piece of her that no one will be able to interfere with or claim.  Just like she did a part of me that I too could never give away.  Ever.

We acknowledged that she didn’t want to hurt anyone.  With few words we both know she didn’t want to make the same mistake.  And I certainly didn’t want to be the one to make it with her.

What now?  Where was this conversation taking us?

“There’s so much between us that I can’t…” 

Can’t what?

Let go?  Although I had.  For a while that was exactly what happened.  So much so that I encouraged her to go after someone else.   

Understand?  But I did.  I love her like no other and I know she has feelings for me too.

Forget?  How could I?  When she kissed me with so much emotion that night.  With so much passion.  The hunger was palpable in that moment.  Desire and longing.  Mine and hers.  Hers and mine.

Want?  I do.  I want her.  For myself and for Angelica.

Act?  And yet I’m here.  Hours before Kit and Angie arrive I’m here. 

We ended with her saying ‘I don’t know’ the last time we talked.  Days have passed but that reality is still with us.  Things were so complicated it was paralyzing. 

Why did everything have to be so hard?  Was this to be our mantra that halts us from moving forward?  Would it stop us from coming home to each other again? 

I want to be with her.  To lie next to her as the twilight descended on the quiet of each day we would share. 

With silver in our hair I want us to be next to each other.  Holding hands.  Breathing the night air that told us what season it was.  Remembering all we’d been through and everything that still remained.

“Tina,” Bette reached to steady herself with palms on the counter behind her, “remember the first time I told you the way I felt?”

“Yes.”  I easily called back the memory of how she held me.  How she succumbed to the love that seared a permanent connection between us.  And the way I felt.  How nothing would compare.

While it was not clear yet what we would do I knew she wanted me here.  It would not come quickly or easily but somehow the right path would be available to us if we took our time.

“Don’t slip away,” she said softly.

So I promised her exactly that.  If the timing were right I would have offered more.  For now, I looked her directly in the eye and said what we both needed to hear.  “I won’t.”