Bette nodded, “No…no…I didn’t tell you.  I think it re-awakened something in me, though, so probably something I should talk to Dan about when we get back.  Um… it also made me think about a lot of things; made me remember scenes about death that I’d encountered before.  Particularly deaths of people who’d passed at a young age.” 

She hesitated, not knowing how to continue, “I was thinking I would tell you once I’d processed it, so that I could tell you in a way that wouldn’t worry you.” 

She bit her lip. 

“Why are you telling me now?,” Tina asked, released her embrace of Bette, and sat up. 

“Because we shouldn’t keep things from each other,” Bette answered. “And I was keeping that from you.” 

She paused, then continued, “I was wrong.  I should have told you earlier. I’m sorry, Tina.” 

Tina drew her knees up, to rest her arms on them, then lay her forehead on her arms. Bette straightened up further, stretched her legs out, and clasped her hands together on her lap.  She turned to look at Tina. 

After a few minutes, she asked, “T…?” 

Tina didn’t respond immediately, then murmured, with her head faced down still, and leaning on her arms, “I’m wondering whether you trust me, Bette.  And I’m wondering also if we’ll always be doing this, getting to this uneasy, black hole, where things disappear, and I don’t know how we then come out of it.” 

She paused, hanging her head, “I wonder whether there are still taboo topics between us.  And I’m wondering, if that was going to be the case, how long I would be ok with it?” 

They fell quiet.

After a few minutes, Tina continued, “But I love you…so much that it hurts.  So I’m answering my own question right there, I guess.” 

“I’ll probably be ok with it for a long, long time…but it hurts that, maybe, at some level, you still don’t trust me.” 

Bette hesitated, then gently laid her hand on the back of Tina’s neck.  She didn’t sense any resistance from the blonde, so she began to massage it gently. 

“I trust you T, with all that I am,” she responded quietly, “I know I didn’t let you in…didn’t let you feel what I was feeling, and didn’t do you right by not sharing with you much earlier about what had happened.”