Scent of Vanilla

Every time I thought about it, I thought about Henrietta. I had been down every avenue of defensive thinking, from trying to blame the alcohol, to trying to argue that I hadn't actually done anything that was 'really' lesbian. But all arguments led to the same conclusion: I had felt attracted to Henrietta, she was so feminine and I found that sexy, and we'd had sex. Dirty, amazing, kinky sex. The best sex of my entire life. I still liked cock and I was attracted to Tom, of course, so it was the word 'bisexual' that was bouncing around in my head. I knew that eventually it would have to come out.

"Are you feeling okay, Lucy?" Tom asked in a quiet voice, too quiet for his family to hear, looking over at me.

I swallowed a bite of potato. "I'm okay," I told him. "Can we talk, later? Away from your family?"

He just smiled. "Of course we can." And then his dad asked him a question and he looked away.

My phone vibrated in my handbag and, despite not wanting to appear rude at the table, I eased it out of the bag and checked the notification. It was a text from Henrietta. Although I'd given her my number in the morning before I left, if I ignored her messages I would probably never see her again and I could erase the whole night from my life, just keeping it as a sexy memory. But if I opened the message, I'd be opening the door to that whole side of me I had only just discovered. And that scared me.

But I knew that no matter what I chose, whenever I came across the scent of vanilla, I would always be transported straight back to Henrietta's room, and those feelings I couldn't pretend I hadn't felt.

I glanced at Tom, then back at my phone. I opened the message.