Tea & Red Roses Part Five

*Before….Chris.

I’d have made my room up a bit better still like just in case but her car is pulling up and I head downstairs after a really fast check in the mirror one more time and I see Becky up and half-dressed drinking coffee and looking out the kitchen window and Nicole too who’s stopped eating her toast and is watching her too.

Nicole says. “Wow, like okay she’s pretty. I can sort of still see y’know but at the same time she’s pretty.”

Becky nods. “Yeah…and remember she was cool enough to like let us in on the cool shows.”

I’m not sure how to feel about the see y’know part and stuff because I didn’t and Niki might be seeing stuff because she already knows and stuff.

Rose rings the doorbell and I go and open the door and she’s…

Okay, pretty is kind of an understatement.

Her hair’s in loose pigtails in that kinda hot Harley Quinn way and she’s got a really nice job on her make-up too and she just can really carry off this perfect red lipstick and she has her choker on and her necklaces like last time and she…she has great breasts and she’s wearing this tee-shirt that’s from someplace called Inniskillin that really shows them off and she’s actually wearing these really hip hugging in a good way faded blue jeans that actually look like they’re faded from being old and not from like being bought that way….a nice shoulder bag and she’s wearing red and white sneakers, like the vintage cloth made ones.

And she has a large cup of coffee for me in one of those trendy place recycled brown cups which is really a plus for me instead of like Starsmucks but aside from it being someone really cute looking bringing me coffee she has a bunch of like really cute princess and skater girl dollar store stickers on it like you’d get at The Dollarstore.

Okay that’s really like super cute.

*And Now…Chris.

Actually it’s more than just super cute it’s really sweet too and I have legit never ever had someone bring me a coffee to me at my house before let alone decorate it with cool skater girl stickers.

And contrary to last night’s bullshit rose has no bulge going on downstairs.

And contrary to last night’s bullshit I’ve met bigger, bulkier and waaaaaay more butch women.

So yeah like all that stuff that gets said about passing is a bunch of bullshit too.

I take my coffee and sip it and smile because well yay coffee and it’s actually my order, a skim milk latte with a shot of cinnamon.

And she remembered from like us talking.

Which is better than some folks, who didn’t get that Chris was Chris for me and not Christina and definitely not Chrissy.

“Thanks this is perfect.”

She smiles and there’s some cute dimpling going on. “I figured, you sounded like you needed coffee.”

I smiles around the lid as I sip it through the hole, spout thingy. “Mmm…coffee if of the good…” I look at Rose. “You promised me food right?”

She smiles and it’s nice. “Yes I did, I promised you brunch.”

I pull a Homer… “Mmmm…Brunch.”

She smiles and she goes and she opens the car door for me and I get in and wave to the girls and they wave back and she gets in and then we’re off.

I have no real idea where we’re going but we’re headed down towards the lake and then we’re parking and she’s getting out a picnic basket, like a real picnic basket with all the trimmings and a blanket and things and she offers her hand and she takes me through and out onto a ferry!

I mean I kinda sort of saw this flying in and I pretty much sort of forgot that it was even there at all and I really don’t know much about it but she’s taking me on a brunch date to Center island.

I’d like tear up and cry if I wasn’t so excited and hyper about it all.

We’re getting some looks but like nothing really bad and then there’s the whole this, it’s one hell of a cool place and it’s way bigger than I thought and I see signs for all this stuff to see and to do and I’m sort of staring at rose who is smiling and she offers me her hand and says. “The picnic area’s this way.”

I’ve done the holding hands in public thing before but that’s different…it was like clubs or places where I was sort of like pretty confident that being a lesbian wasn’t going to freak folks out.

I reach out and take her hand and there’s an immediate benefit as a couple of guys that were sort of close get this pissed and disappointed look.

Okay Rose has been here before I think and she seems to know her way around and we’re taking our time too which is really nice.

We’re definitely getting looks since we’re now holding hands and while there’s some folks that are definitely not wanting to see us doing this at all there’s enough folks here just like us that are doing this here and some that aren’t but there’s a sort of like thing that you can sort of like tell if someone’s gonna be cool with things or not these days with like there being a lot of folks my age and Rose’s age and a fairly good mix of LGBT+ folks.

All those conservative like family values folks can just sort of like kiss my butt.

And no we’re not like being offensive we’re just walking, walking and holding hands and then we get to the picnic area.

The last picnic I was actually on was with my Nan on my dad’s side like when I was seven or something.

Rose is setting out the blanket and then taking things out for us including these black bento boxes with roses on them but they’re covered in cherry blossom petals like there were roses planted in one of those sakura parks.

*And Now…Rose.

I’ll be honest that when I was talking to Chris and when I had heard about the falling out at her house that the bottom of my stomach dropped to the floor.

I really try to just be myself.

And in a world that has people oh so more than ready to not let you be yourself and you get placed under misconceptions of who you are and what the trans community is it’s hard.

And then add in those folks with vested interests in proving you’re not normal or like some kind of deviant it just adds more layers of like garbage tossed over you.

And honestly it’s like that garbage juice gets all over you like it gathers seeping into the bottom of the bag until you get stained with it eventually and you feel like garbage.

Then you get to meet someone like Chris.

Someone that gets that sexuality isn’t identity.

And that just because you’re trans that doesn’t mean that you have to be any sexuality.

You really just don’t.

And getting spoken up for…hearing her say that she’s not really one of those people heaping on the garbage.

And that they like you.

That she likes you.

It lifts you up really high.

Which is why when I said I was going to feed her that things changed from just sort of feeding her to me actually wanting to do something really nice and since Chris was new to the city I thought of Center island.

It’s actually one of my favorite places, it’s been one of my favorite places since my first year in the city and it just makes me happy.

And if you’ve never been, seriously…in the words of Ferris Beuller. “I highly recommend it, it’s so choice.”

So I was feeling actually inspired when I started to make brunch.

I love brunch from the few restaurant gigs I’ve done but I really like the idea of a picnic too so last year I bought all the cute picnic stuff.

So with a quick run to Wholefoods I came back and I started cooking.

Cornbread was first, and I love cornbread in most of its forms really.

But for this I use a madeline pan so it’s sort of cooked like a cookie but it’s not and I use melted real butter and some heavy cream in there I go pretty neutral on the salt and the sugar going more for somewhere in the middle of a sweet or savory cornbread.

To go with the cornbreads I make pate and while some don’t like it I have a sort of soft place in my heart for it and mine’s nothing fancy. Cooked chicken livers done in boxed chicken stock, some butter, and some dried herbs de province, pink peppercorns and bacon fat that I have from when I last cooked bacon and poured it off into a Tupperware dish. It gets blended up in the food processor and then I put it in a ramekin dish and chill it so all the fat hardens. The only really trick is that I let the boxed chicken stock cook the livers down until it’s a glaze before blending everything.

I make next some small omelettes like those fold over cute kind that are folded around some long slices of portabellas that I cut really thinly and fried in butter and herbs then placed them carefully into Tupperware containers.

I make cucumber and watercress sandwiches and I do have a trick for those and that’s actually to take some of the cucumber that isn’t going into the slices for the sandwiches and buzz it up minus the jelly stuff with the cream cheese and some pepper. Other than that it’s butter your bread. It keeps them from getting too soggy and when you have them all cut and done wrap them in paper towels first and then waxed paper. The moisture will actually sink into the paper towel before it does the bread…and please just a little salt, pepper and lemon juice on the watercress.

Radishes with the skins only partly peeled but the leaves on and I put them actually full on into this dip that’s literally melted butter and salt, pepper and sour cream and chilled to harden. No I’m not kidding this is an actual country sort of French thing, you chill it and the butter re-hardens and then the sour cream is just lightly there with the butter.

And then I made dessert which is in the small ramekin dishes and with that I make tiramisu with round shortbread cookies that I bought instead of ladyfingers and I use a custard that I made with eggs and cream and vanilla but folded some mascarpone cheese into it as well and then there’s the top layer that’s the coffee syrup.

It’s all in the basket and it’s all chilled with blue-packs and I have a decanter bottle of green tea that I added some lemon to as well as some honey as our picnic drink.

And actually I don’t make a lot of any of it, just one sandwich each and one pot of the pate each and well the full dozen madelines since the pan has a dozen molds but it’s small stuff, but more than a few things so it seems like more…. Like it’s a big thing.

After that I get dressed and went for a sort of mix between comfy and cute and maybe a little fun casual. I want something that will actually look okay and keep the bugs off of me.

I don’t know what it is but blackflies and mosquitoes really like me and it’s not bananas because I like really rarely eat them because well transition meds and high potassium stuff really doesn’t agree with me.

I love my wine tee, it’s not the color but from a winery it’s actually a semi-fade black shirt and I picked it up at a wine and food thing that they had in the city here a few years back and I have a few cool things from that.

Once that’s all done I gave the car a de-cluttering and a wipe down with some spray cleaner and paper towels and then not having any Febreeze stuff I rubbed down the seats with a dryer sheet.

Too much?

Well I was kind of nervous.

After that it was getting a coffee for her since she sounded like she needed one and I don’t know the stickers well that was just sort of a spur of the moment thing while I was waiting for the coffee.

We didn’t talk a lot on the drive either. I was nervous and she was nervous and all at the same time there was her getting the coffee into her system and we just sort of listened to tunes on the radio as I drove up to the parking area.

It was still good through…the drive just sort of chilling and listening to tunes and smiling at each other every now and then.

Chris even hummed along with a few bars of the songs on the radio.

I was actually kind of thrilled at the look on her face when she started to figure out where we were at and then seeing the picnic basket.

I love the ferry and Chris is really excited by it all too and she’s looking at me. “This is really cool, I haven’t been here yet and I love taking the ferry.”

“You’ve been on one before?”

“I’ve been on the Halifax ferry lots and been to Prince Edward Island on the ferry.”

I look at her. “I though they built that bridge?”

“Oh yeah but that’s up in New Brunswick, I’m from Nova Scotia so it’s a lot closer.” Chris is leaning on the rail and looking out over the water at Toronto. It’s a good way to really get a whole other view of the city than you usually every get.

Heck a lot of the time unless you’re up someplace high Toronto is this sort of middling high urban sprawl.

It’s got a lot of great parts to it but it’s still a sprawl city.

But from the view of the lake it just sort of rises and it actually looks amazing.

I smile at how much she’s enjoying the trip and we get a few looks from folks and of course we get a few looks from some guys too.

There’s always looks from guys and often it’s like trans or not.
And whether they’re wanted or not.

Chris has noticed and she’s sort of noticed the kinda vibe that they are giving off and we just sort of keep away from them until the ferry lands and I offer my hand to her and she takes it and there’s some more stares and some muttering I think from the couple of guys about lesbians.

And I’m sure we scandalized a few other folks but at the same time we’re in Toronto and there’s a whole lot more of us queer folk than bigots are accustomed to.

And we catch a few looks from a trio of girls that definitely are in that whole Chris’s vibe with the septum piercings and the tattoos and the colored hair with two of them having variations on that whole undercut sort of thing.

Not that I mind at all, it like takes all kinds and I actually think that some of those looks and haircuts are actually pretty cool. They’re definitely not for me but they are pretty cool as are some of the tattoos.

And as much as Toronto can really seem like it’s conservative and whitebread it’s really not. So the three girls gather close to Chris and I and we sort of group it up enough to walk out all together unharassed and make our way together for a while and we stop long enough in the park to exchange information and they head off to Pizza, Pizza while Chris and I make our way to one of the picnic areas near the Swan boats.

Her eyes get huge at looking at them.

It makes me smile and get a little wistful. “We could go on them if you want later.”

She looks at me. “Really?”

I nod. “I’d actually love it, they’re sort of a date thing, well a lot of things here are really good as date things so I’ve never really done a lot of things here.”

I love the look on her face that’s part getting to do something new and part her getting me to do something new too.

We settle in to eat and take in all of the sights around us. Centerville has a lot of cool stuff and yeah it’s great for kids but there’s just a lot to do here as adults too even if we’re not all that dignified and like all the stoic version of adults that seems to be the actual definition for some folks.

We take a spot on the lawn near some willows close to the picnic tables and I set out the blanket that I have and then use the table cloth that came with the basket too and start to set things out and Chris’s eyes keep getting huge.

“You really made all of this?”

I nod arranging this and then pouring us lemonade. “I did, when I was younger and out on my own before I had my ID’s after transition I worked a bunch of kitchens in some restaurants. A lot of folks don’t care past being able to cook in back of house.”

She laughs a little. “Anthony Bourdain says stuff like that a lot.”

I laugh. “You watch him?”

“My dad does and he got me into it plus one of the roommates is a foodie and watches the food network all the time.”

I fold my legs and pass her a small plate and cutlery. “Help yourself.”

She digs in getting some of everything but tucking into the pate and cornbread madelines first making that sound that I did right with the pate.

It’s nice to cook for someone; it’s nice to have this chance and company.

I get some food too and I eat with her and we talk about some of the things that I know that are here as things to do, that we want to do.

It gets better when Chris moves picking up her plate and she sits beside me close enough that our thighs are touching and we’re talking but there’s this really nice closeness, this smiling at each other and taking these little silent chewing breaks to just be…and well there’s the chewing smiles too and lots of eye contact.

I know I blushed a few times when Chris was honestly checking me out.

And there’s this certain kind of feeling of when you pass or it doesn’t matter if you pass and she’s still looking your way and smiling and still really close to you.

The little dishes were a good idea too as we’re not leaving really any leftovers and we pack everything away except the last of the lemonade and the blanket and we’re more than full and I have a happy sigh and Chris falls back onto her back and uses her free hand to pull me back too and we just lay there staring up at the sky.

Actually she’s still holding my hand.

She looks over at me and she smiles. “This is awesome Rose. It’s the stuff that I really never thought I’d get to do out here but it’s stuff that I never thought that I’d really get to do as a gay girl y’know.”

I look at her then up at the sky through the dancing willow fronds. “I get that. I keep looking at my life now and it’s so not perfect but it’s so much just more and different than the hell I was living through before transition.”

She’s looking up at the sky too now. “Halifax and Dartmouth are okay they really are but a whole lot of my life was school and work and then going to University down home would have been more of the same stuff and same crowds really in the lesbian community down there and the same drama or worse I’d have gone to small Podunk town university because it’s sort of got a good rep and be stuck in this little town for four years with a great chance of rednecks and phobic people and the same small as heck dating pool.”

I look at her and she’s looking at me. “Well I’m really super glad that you’re here and that we met.”

She says. “Me too Rose, nothing is like I ever thought that it was here.”

“I hope that’s a good thing?”

She rolls to face me and she’s really, really close to me and she’s actually sort of over top of me and she has this look in her eyes that makes me achy and makes me feel vulnerable all at the same time.

“Right now it’s kind of the best thing Rose.”

I was expecting it sort of…hoping…wanting but almost not daring to but it happens.

Really actually happens.

Chris leans down and she softly and sweetly kisses me.