Deciding she had enough of admiring her new ink, Chloë walked past Sienna to the clothes racks. She needed to start getting dressed for her shift at La Vida Mocha.
“We went for drinks at a bar near the shop,” Chloë told her. “Then we just walked around downtown for a bit. It was very chill.”
Chloë smiled to herself. It was very chill, but also very…surreal. Chloë wondered if she would ever get used to hanging out with the Morgan Banks, star of many of her teenage fantasies. Last night, Morgan had gallantly paid for Chloë’s drinks to celebrate the new tattoo and while drinking, the two of them had talked like old girlfriends, not like former teacher/former student. And every time Morgan’s leg brushed against hers under the table, an electric thrill would shoot from the point of contact and just spread all over Chloë’s body before settling in the one place that mattered.
After drinks, they had just wandered around downtown San Diego, window shopping, people watching, just enjoying the mild weather and each other’s company, not even really caring where they were going. More than once, Chloë had wanted to just stop, press Morgan against the nearest wall and kiss her deeply.
What was odd, was that she was certain Morgan wouldn’t have minded.
“She’s definitely into you,” Sienna said, as if reading Chloë’s mind.
Chloë, after fastening the blue bra she had just put on, turned to Sienna.
“Seriously? You think?”
Sienna stood to pull up her jeans.
“I’m not saying she’s a lesbian,” she began, “but she’s definitely curious. Or at least curious about doing things with you in particular.”
Chloë’s heart thumped.
“I mean, eventually I just had to start concentrating on doing your tat and nothing else, but from what I did see, you’ve got that sexy schoolteacher flustered. The question is, what are you going to do about it?”
Chloë stood there, wearing only a bra, not
hing else, and wondered how to answer Sienna’s question. Should she do something? Make a move?
But what if that backfired? What if Sienna’s read on Morgan was all wrong? It was, after all, the first time Sienna had met Morgan. What did she know? And Morgan had stated quite clearly the other night that she was straight. How did a woman get to be thirty-six and not have any idea what her sexual orientation was? Chloë just couldn’t wrap her mind around that.
“I don’t know that I’m going to do anything about it,” she finally told Sienna. “Morgan told me she’s straight and so far, I don’t have any reason not to believe her.”
“But you do suspect she’s not entirely one-hundred percent straight, don’t you?” Sienna goaded.
“Dude, stop it!” Chloë said, laughing. “I don’t even want to think about it because I actually like being friends with her, you know? She’s cool to talk to and hang out with and if I make a move on her and it weirds her out, she’ll banish me.”
This was true. Chloë liked being friends with Morgan. Morgan was funny, told interesting stories and—surprise, surprise, considering she was a schoolteacher—incredibly smart, which Chloë found sexy as hell.
But Chloë had also caught the way Morgan was staring at her ass last night when she was on Sienna’s chair and her dress was lifted up. The look on Morgan’s face wasn’t the look of a woman who was just keenly watching everything that was happening because it was her first time in a tattoo parlor. No. The look on Morgan’s face, Chloë knew, was the look of a woman who saw something she wanted.
God damn it.
Chloë didn’t know what to do and so, as she finished getting dressed, she decided to seek the advice of the wisest lesbian she knew.
***
“I’m the wisest lesbian you know?” Vanessa asked forty-five minutes later in La Vida Mocha.
Chloë nodded.
Vanessa sighed and put her hands on her hips as she stared at her employee.
“You know, you have this annoying habit of making me feel ninety-years-old,” she stated.
“Dude, it’s a compliment!” Chloë protested.
The coffeeshop was due to open in less than an hour and they had been busy doing some prep work, with Vanessa loading pastries into the chilled display case next to the ordering counter and Chloë in charge of starting the first brews of today’s coffees, when Chloë told Vanessa she needed advice, adding in the line about Vanessa being such a wise lesbian.
“A compliment, right.” Vanessa said, crossing her arms. “So, what can this wise lesbian do for you?” She suddenly gasped and, fluttering her hands in front of her body, said, “Wait, wait! Before you tell me that, tell me how that night out with your ex-teacher went! She looked positively yummy!”