She chose to stick with the warmth held within the sheet rather than search for her robe in Tina’s bathroom. She’d wrapped a crumbled corner around her chest and walked out into the hallway, Tina’s house was always so dark and quiet, a big difference from her bedroom. Bette was going to try and look in the kitchen first but as she passed Tina’s office she saw that Tina was seated at her desk, sat back in her chair, gazing at the computer screen. She wasn’t working and the scowl that usually sat on Tina’s face wasn’t there. The way her eyes nearly penetrated the screen would suggest that she was bewildered. Bette knocked gently on the door frame and was finally noticed by Tina.

“You still don’t like what you wrote?”

Tina, now biting her thumb nail, simply shook her head. It wasn’t that she didn’t like it, she couldn’t believe that she’d remembered it, let alone written it down.
“Can I read it?” Bette asked taking a step into Tina’s office, hoping that she’d say yes. Tina just stood up, grabbed her untouched glass of bourbon and walked pass Bette.

………………………………………………………………….

Tina was standing in her living room, looking down at the liquor she was swirling in the glass. She didn’t want to drink but she also didn’t want to put it down. Maybe she needed a cigarette that would bring her back down. Tina pulled out a square and sat in her low profile chair in front of the fireplace and began to flip the cigarette up and then down against the arm of the chair. All of a sudden she felt panicked, and giddy at the same time. This feeling hadn’t come to her in a long time, she’d felt this way when she finished her first book and had fallen in love with her written words. Thinking of it now gave her a quiet laugh that she quickly muzzled. She couldn’t believe that those words had come from her and even better how good it felt to get them onto the screen in front of her.
Not more than twenty minutes later Bette walked into Tina’s still and nearly dark living room. She could see Tina was sat back in her favorite chair with a cigarette twisting between her thumb and forefinger. She rubbed the top of Tina’s head to get her attention before she moved to stand in between her outstretched legs.
“What is that?”
Tina just looked up to her, she was perplexed. She could tell her girlfriend a lie, she had no problem doing that, she’d done it before. The only problem is that, she’d have to continue to lie in order to keep going with what she’d written so far. Still looking up to Bette without an answer, she soon felt the soft brush of Bette’s hand pushing the hair on the side of her face back. She turned her head to follow the movement of Bette’s hand, she didn’t want to lie, not right now. Instead she sat forward and pulled Bette’s hips forward to bury the top of her head into Bette’s stomach. That soft crumbled sheet still tucked around her, made an odd noise as Tina tried to stroke her head into Bette’s body.
Tina found an opening in the sheet and roughly pulled it from Bette’s body, the sheet fell to the floor behind Bette’s feet. With a squeezing grip on Bette’s hips, Tina pulled her forward again, this time trailing her lips along Bette’s skin.

………………………………………………

The morning sun was dull on their naked bodies as it shone in across the living room floor. Tina was back in between Bette’s legs having her hair stroked.

“You still haven’t told me where that story…”

“It’s not a story.” Tina spoke up for the first time that morning. She squeezed Bette a little tighter and began to tell her the truth behind the small story she’d written a few hours ago. “That was the night Papa lost his second Oscar nomination.” She felt Bette begin to shift, trying to sit up, but Tina squeezed her a little tighter halting her attempts. “We got all dressed up together. Papa taught me how to tie a bowtie that night.”

“Tina?”

“He hit… when he hit her, her head slammed into the wall in the hallway and knocked a picture of my grandfather off of my bedroom wall. I knew not to get up, because they always fought like that. My mother took the crystal ashtray my father walked around with and broke it across his forehead.”

“Jesus, baby.”

TBC………………………………..