Kelly & Cassandra Ch. 01

Welcome to my new series. This is a spinoff of the ongoing A New Alexandra stories. The characters in this one appear primarily in Chapters 13 and 14 of that series. The first scene of this story is a scene in Chapter 14 of A New Alexandra, told from a different perspective.

As always, I love feedback, whether it's in the comments or via the private feedback tool. I might not always respond, but I do read it all. Thanks for reading. ~BE

--

It wasn't my fault that the words began tumbling from my mouth like a tiny waterfall of truth. I hadn't wanted them to, at least not so explicitly. Especially not so incompetently.

It was Alexandra who made them come out that way. Of course on some level I wanted this to happen, and that's why she was here in the first place. She sat there in the high-backed booth with her cat's-eye makeup and her side-shaved pixie and her all-knowing smile and waited for me to keep talking. I suppose that's easy to do when your vibe is cooler-than-you twenty-something gay chick and you have the girlfriend who looks like she just walked out of a fitness magazine to prove it.

But Kira - Alex's girlfriend - wasn't here to interrupt, so idiot that I am, I kept talking. Blushing and talking.

I'd invited her to this dark, sultry speakeasy not because I wanted to sleep with her - which, looking at the couples occupying all the dark wood booths around us, was on the menu for everyone except us - but because I couldn't come here alone.

And I desperately wanted to come here. I was in the midst of a shitty divorce from an unfaithful husband who'd wanted nothing from me besides conformity to his vision of life: two-car garage, joint last name and bank account, and absolutely nothing dynamic in our lives. My one weekly escape was a Saturday recreational soccer league team I played on with a loose group of friends. This was the two-person after-afterparty for our weekly match.

We'd won. Alex had scored twice. I think I touched the ball about eight times, and one of those had been an accident.

"I can't stop thinking about her," I said. Alexandra had joined the team just months earlier and hadn't lived down the New Girl moniker. She was good enough to merit a nickname; I was just Kelly. But I kept talking. "Like, if I could go on a date tomorrow night with one person in the entire world, that's her."

Her meant Cassandra, the bar owner who'd invited me to her retro speakeasy with no name and now stood behind the bar looking alternately bored and hyper-focused, but all the while with the same sharp clarity as the single painted blue diamond that adorned the joint's opaque door.

"Ooooh," said Alexandra. Her eyes flashed with a newfound energy that I found mildly disconcerting. She reached a hand across the table and placed it atop mine. The hand felt good. "In vino veritas, hmmm?"

"If only two rounds also imparted courage," I said. Three wouldn't be enough. Nor four, five, or... "I'm...well, a bit terrified. Like, how do I ask her out or something?"

It turns out that one perk of being female and straight amid heteronormative dating expectations is that one doesn't need to extend oneself and risk rejection. I hadn't really had a shortage of people asking me out, at least pre-marriage, and the thought of having to approach romance from a different angle was a major reason for the bead of sweat running between my shoulder blades.

"Are you scared that she'll say no, or scared that she'll say yes?"

Alex had asked the question I'd asked myself too many times, and now she was waiting for an answer.

Silence.

"You need another drink," she said. She stood up, grabbing her phone and card. "I'll be right back."

After taking one step, she turned and bent towards me.

"And I don't think you'll have any trouble with women." Her voice was low now, eyes at first searching for eavesdroppers. Then they locked on mine. "My first thought after you did that body shot off me was 'um, more where that came from, please?'"

Oh.

Yes, there was that New Years' party. Me, freshly separated from my cheating spouse, secretly bi-curious and in a room full of stylish and accomplished gay women. I felt like I stuck out like a rhinoceros at a flea market, and not least because my dress was too boxy and my hair was too suburbs and my manner was too timid. These ladies were badass.

And then it passed midnight Eastern time and the Times Square ball dropped. This led to something that Meg Riis - one of my soccer teammates and co-host of the party - described as the Golden Hour. One hour of absurd debauchery.

Part of that hour featured Alexandra Henderson and her six-pack abs reclined on the kitchen island allowing all comers to pour tequila down her exposed stomach, slurp it off said six-pack, and finish it with salt and a lime.

I hadn't been the first girl to do a body shot off Alex, and I wasn't the last. But if anyone was more nervous than me, they could shoot my boring ass dead.

So when Alexandra turned and headed off to get us another round of drinks, my mind was torn in two directions. There were Alex's taut abs, now facing the bar. The abs, the dress that had been hiked up to her chest, and the long legs that my mind wanted to...

Yeah, I'd had some dreams about Alex. But not as many as about the chick she was talking to now.

Both those facts scared the fuck out of me. And while they talked, my mind wandered. About where this conversation had been (me, openly admitting my attraction to another woman for exactly the first time ever; an almost-flirty banter ranging from Shakespeare to Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries; me standing and spinning my appropriately-vintage dress in the dark, Prohibition-era bar). About where this conversation was going (no idea). About how nice it was to be in a bar that smelled of crisp night air, of old varnished wood, and most decidedly not of stale beer.

Yes, I was drunk. Not falling over, slurred-speech, hello-ocifer-my-Kelly-is-name drunk, but tipsy enough to talk about my sexuality and feel like I was actually on the cusp of following through on any of it.

Did I mention I was scared as fuck?

Alexandra returned, a Dark and Stormy in one hand and a dark beer in the other. She placed the former in front of me, then folded herself into the booth's opposite side. The dark wood framed her beautifully in the low light.

I swallowed hard. Smoothed my dress over my thighs and thought about how earlier I'd given it a quick twirl at Alex's insistence. How I'd tried to ignore the eyeballs I felt flick in my direction.

She didn't say anything for a long moment. Just took one sip of stout and then another.

I felt my jaw loosen and the beginnings of speech in my throat, but she beat me there.

"Why me?" she said, cocking her head to one side, cheek resting on her open palm.

"Pardon?"

"Why me? Why am I the one you chose to come over here and - let's face it, sweetie - basically come out to." She took another swallow of beer and blushed. I felt the color rise in my own face. "Not that I'm not flattered, but you've known Kira and Mette and Meg and, well, pretty much all of them much longer than me. And trust me, all three of them are much greater authorities on female sexuality than I am."

"You listen."

She laughed, eyes glinting. "That'd be news to Kira."

"Seriously, though, you do. Remember New Years', when we sat on the couch and I blatantly used you as an unpaid therapist for far longer than you should have put up with?"

"I remember a couch and you feeding me drinks, yes." She spun the pint glass between slender fingers, examining it as if it held some great secret of the universe. "You looked like you needed a friend."

"I did." I waited for her to make the connection.

"And I was the one who actually sat there and listened."

"Correct. And more importantly, didn't judge what must have been a pathetic story for someone like you: suburbs, meathead husband, infidelity, divorce."

It was my turn to sip some alcohol and wash away the bitter taste of my wasted twenties.

"Actually," she said, "it didn't seem pathetic. It just seemed like you got played. Shit happens." She said it with such a casual shoulder shrug that it almost made me forget it was my own crashed marriage she was describing.

I moved from a sip to a gulp, and the ginger beer and rum did their job again.

"Why'd you choose to move where you did?"

I didn't know whether she meant the specific building, Fulton Market as a neighborhood, or the city as contrasted with suburbia. But it didn't matter, not really, as the answer was the same. "I work walking distance from here."

"I know," she replied. "That can't be the whole story."

"It's not. Every day when I left the office, I'd see these people in the streets, walking to and from dinner or their apartments or whatever, smiling, carefree, looking like they belonged here and knew it. And I realized two things. One, I wanted to be them. Desperately, jealously. Two, I would never be cool enough, cute enough, whatever enough to hack it as a Fulton Market full-timer."

She opened her mouth to protest, and I shocked myself my presenting her with a flat palm.

"Except at that absurd New Years' party, somehow you and Kira and Lucía and the rest made me feel like I could do it. Like I could fit in. I signed my lease the next day."

She lifted her glass.

"To you, Kelly," she said. "And to realizing at a gay-as-fuck New Year's Eve party that you might be comfortable in some unexpected places."

--

Twenty minutes later I was unsteadily exiting the ladies' room when my phone lit up with a pair of texts.

312-555-2277: Hey, it's Cassandra. Hope you enjoyed your evening.

312-555-2277: Your friend wrote your number on the receipt, so I really hope she wasn't pranking either you or me.

I blinked once, twice. The messages on the screen didn't disappear. I looked across the room to Alexandra, who was typing something on her own phone. Behind the bar, Cassandra was mixing a drink, hands a flurry of activity except for when she paused to tuck a sheaf of lip-length raven hair behind her ear. My heart skipped a beat. She still didn't see me.

My legs felt unsteady as I passed other patrons, all engrossed in their own conversations. Alex, that ballsy little bitch, had just tossed my number to my crush - my lesbian crush - without warning me.

I could have either slapped her for giving out my number without permission or wrapped her in the biggest thank-you hug for getting me past the get-the-digits hurdle. Instead, I buttoned my coat as calmly as my nervous energy would allow and allowed Alexandra to slide her arm through mine.

"Let's get you home," she said.

I nodded dumbly but then paused before putting on my gloves. I took my phone back out and swallowed hard.

Kelly: It's me! I had a great time. See you soon I hope?

I hit send. I saw Cassandra's head flick to her phone sitting face-up on the bar.

Two seconds felt like an hour. Was the exclamation point too girly-girl? The question mark too indecisive? The compliment too perfunctory?

Then a massive, pearly smile crossed her face and she followed it with a quick wave.

Within seconds I was standing on a frigid Chicago street, but the warmth glowed from within me. She smiled. She waved.

Then reality hit. It's not like she actually asked me out or something. She just texted me a friendly hello. Maybe she did that for lots of customers. Maybe not. How was I to know?

I didn't. And the warm glow wasn't holding out against a Great Lakes winter.

I found myself hugging Alexandra. When I pulled back, I found myself wiping a tear from my cheek. "Thank you," I said. "For your advice. But mostly for listening. That was really hard."

Alexandra gripped me by the shoulders. Not hard, but hard enough to make a point. "It's okay to be afraid," she said. I could see the breath with every word she uttered, drifting into the night air. "Shit's different than an unfaithful hetero spouse in the suburbs, but there's a reason not everyone has an unfaithful hetero spouse in the suburbs. Or, you know, any of that."

"Thanks." It was all I could manage. I was completely drained. I didn't want to think of how Cassandra could change my life. Assuming, of course, that this wasn't all in my stupid, confused head.

"She's super-hot, by the way," said Alexandra.

"I know," I said, stifling a laugh. "And it's super fucking cold out here. I'm going that way."

"And I'm that one," Alexandra gestured. "Night. Drink some water before bed."

A few seconds later, I was alone on the sidewalk, a block from my apartment and utterly freezing. I thought of going back down the stairs, past the doorman, and back into the warm embrace of the Blue Diamond.

Instead I checked my phone. There was a single text.

Cassandra: How about tomorrow? I'm free all afternoon and evening.

I put the phone back in my pocket. Took it back out. Removed my gloves.

Kelly: Tomorrow sounds great. Maybe 3:30?

The response came instantly.

Cassandra: It's a date! 3:30 in the lobby?

Kelly: It's a date.

"It's a date. It's a fucking date," I said to myself. The butterflies began to build in my stomach, right then and there. And when a couple exited the subterranean door that led to the speakeasy and gave me a glance of confused recognition, the damn bugs still didn't calm down.

--

They still hadn't settled by the next afternoon.

Cassandra had gotten to the lobby first. She was standing against a pillar in a grey belted overcoat with a long black dress, white stockings, and ballet flats pretending to read something on her phone. But the way her eyes flicked towards the elevator the instant the doors opened, I knew she wasn't paying the device much mind.

Somehow, she stood up even straighter as she approached me, and it made me fully conscious of my height. I'm not short, mind you: five-six is well above average for an American woman. But even in flats Cassandra had a good three inches on me as she leaned in for a brief hug.

"It's so nice to finally meet you properly," she said. Her voice was the same crisp alto I remembered from when we'd spoken in the past. The smell was one I recognized: Chanel No. 5, that most classic of perfumes.

"You too," I squeaked back. "I'm Kelly, though obviously you know that."

"I do," she said, pulling on the neckline of her coat and pretending to check the label. "But it's always nice to have confirmation that one has the right item. Shall we?"

"We shall," I said, trying to breathe normally and also begin to step towards the lobby door, neither of which my body seemed to want to do.

Cassandra pretended not to notice the sheen of sweat building on my forehead and headed through the revolving door first. By the time I'd emerged on the far side and pulled a wool beanie atop my head, she had held out an arm for me to loop my arm through.

"So, a couple weeks ago in the elevator when I made some crack about the Sears Tower and you said you'd never been to the top?"

"I do." I remembered every second of it, from the stylish hat she was wearing to the smoky eye shadow, the Chanel perfume. The long limbs, the long fingers, the bow-shaped lips with the red lipstick. The eye-catching haircut with its straight-across fringe and blunt, short length.

"So you've really never been up the Sears Tower?" She said it with a sort of bemused amazement.

"Nope, been a suburbs girl since I moved here." And I looked like one: cream-colored J. Crew sweater, dark jeans, black ankle boots, wavy hair down in what might be called a "lob," a useless portmanteau of the opposing concepts "long" and "bob." "And isn't..."

"Yeah, yeah," Cassandra replied, with a wave of a black leather-gloved hand. "They can call it Willis Tower, they can call it 233 South Wacker Drive, they can call it that absurdly tall building that looks like it's made of Lego blocks, but it's still the same damn thing." She skipped a beat. "And I've never been to the top either."

"Wait, really?"

"True story," she said. "I'll tell you why when we get there, in case it's not obvious then. But no, I've never been up."

"Oh," I replied. The sun was bright for a Chicago afternoon in January, but it was beginning to dip in the west. Cassandra had set a bold pace with her long strides, and I was glad for once that my proportionally short torso meant I had proportionally long legs. "The view from up there is spectacular, I've heard." I coughed. "I got asked to go once before and passed on it. Although, to be honest, I was pretty drunk and on a bad date with someone I married anyway."

She smiled, and I could have sworn she gave my arm a little squeeze. "I was going to ask how long you'd been divorced, but...well, you know, I didn't want to ask how long you'd been divorced."

I felt all the color drain from my face. "How, um, how did you know?"

Now she definitely squeezed my arm. We had come to an intersection. Traffic zoomed past.

"Honey, I own a bar. I notice everything about everyone who walks past. See that guy across the street in the bomber jacket?"

I craned my neck to where a pasty-looking dude shuffled along, looking at his reflection in the ground-floor windows.

"Yeah?"

"Carrying something heavy inside the left side of his jacket, probably a gun."

When I looked closer, I saw that she was right: one side of the coat hung lower than the other.

"That woman just getting out of the Uber?"

I saw an expensively-dressed but frazzled-looking blonde fishing a rolling suitcase from the trunk of a silver Camry.

"Doesn't like big cities, probably has never been to Chicago before, and is about to head for the corner when the hotel she's staying at is right in front of the car."

Sure enough, the woman strode confidently in our direction before looking around, whipping out her phone, and then turning towards the chic-looking boutique hotel whose lobby was still visible over her left shoulder.

"And where do I come into this?"

"When I see an attractive woman I've never seen before in the lobby of my building, it's hard not to give her a second glance. When I see the faint impression of a ring that had been worn a long time but isn't there any longer on a very significant finger, it's hard not to go for a third. When she looks up and sees me and her pupils go to the size of saucers, it's hard not to know that she doesn't hate my looks and wonder who, exactly, messed up a marriage with her."

"His name was Brad. Or is, I guess. We're not actually even divorced yet, though his girlfriend's car is already a fixture in the driveway of the house I still own half of. But I'm past it." I paused, scratching my nose with my free hand. "I think, at least."

She fixed her large brown eyes on me. "But it's over, as in over-over?"

"It's about as over as the Roman Empire is over," I said.

She laughed. It was a surprisingly high-pitched titter, far from what I would have expected. I liked it.

"So, Kelly, presumably you have a last name. I know Alexandra's from her credit card, but not yours."

I matched her stride as we measured off pace after pace. "Harder question than it should be. Ainsworth, for now. Morretti, the once and future."

"Ah," she said. "Well, Kelly Morretti has a better sound to it anyway."

"And you?"

"Vann. It was originally van Riemsdyk, but my father got tired of all the middle-school level jokes one can make with a name like that."

"Sorry?"

"Rims dyke, reams dyke, rims dick," she said. "Basically pick an off-color sexual reference, preferably with a side of homophobia, and you're there. So he changed it to Vann. Cassandra Vann."

"Do people listen to your predictions?"