”So are you going to see Lisa again?” Alice asked, looking over her coffee mug at Shane.

”I’m not sure, but ya know how it is.” Shane said dismissively, looking at Bette, hoping her thoughts were not noticeable. Trying to hide anything from these two was a challenge.

Bette could see that Shane had more to say, but was holding back.  She looked at both the women sitting at her table and thought how far they had come. She wasn’t sure how she would have handled the very hard and emotional break up with Tina, without them. Coming back to Los Angeles, home, she thought would have solved all their marital problems but it only added to the emotional turmoil.  Now trying to start over, without Tina, she thought feeling her eyes begin to water again, it just wasn’t the same.

”What are you leaving out?” Alice said laughing at Shane.

Shane looked at both women. She had only been back for a few weeks. Her move from Europe prompted not only by Bette’s need for support after her divorce and untimely death of her older sister, but also Shane’s own emotional turmoil from her separation from Quiera. Things had changed a great deal since her last visit to Los Angeles. Alice was happy, happier than Shane could ever recall thanks to Natalie Bailey. Angie was older emotionally and Bette was more sensitive all because of the missing person in their family. The watering up of Bette’s eyes didn’t go unnoticed, by Shane.  Clearly Bette was thinking about something and she was sure it had to be about Tina. No one saw their break up coming. They had such a tough time on their journey to being together, but finally things worked themselves out and they were the perfect family with Angie, at least that is what everyone thought. Bette was struggling more than she let on from loosing Tina and loosing her older sister Kit so soon after, this left the usually strong confident Bette an emotional mess. Shane would do anything to help her, she was family and that is what family does.

Alice slowly drank her coffee, sensing something serious. She stayed quiet while she watched Shane stare at Bette. The three of them had been through so much, Alice tried to hide her own eyes welling up. West Hollywood (WEHO) had been a special time for them and the circle of friends they had built around them. Alice looked across the room at Sophie and her friends, we were so much like them when we were young, yet so different. The times were different, God the politics were different. Alice recalled flying to Washington, DC to hold a sign in front of the Supreme Court the day the United States made same sex marriage legal, she chuckled to herself. Bette and of course Tina were the heart of this group that became a family. But like everything, life has a way of changing things, she thought sadly.