Little Pink Pills

Part Seven, by Michelle Wilder

Take this pink ribbon off my eyes
I'm exposed
And it's no big surprise
Don't you think I know
Exactly where I stand
This world is forcing me
To hold your hand

(Just a Girl, by No Doubt)

(Revised and reposted)

----

I dreamed I touched her, Carson... I remembered her face. I touched her, it felt like, but I couldn't see anything but her eyes. But I could feel her, too. I remember that I felt her, touched her, but there was more.

When I woke up, it was a lot later, after the dream, but I'd made a mess again. And I couldn't remember the dream except that part, and that I'd felt her and couldn't remember where, or why I needed to remember.

I went back to sleep hugging my pillow again and wondering why... if hugging Carson could feel like a dream.

----

When Carson came over next afternoon I got her up to my room right away and almost bounced, I was so excited to tell her about Val.

She looked half like she wanted to run away and half like she wanted to faint, even though I told her fast, and that Val was great about her.

She doesn't really faint, but I could tell she was scared.

But she was happy too, I think at how happy I was.

She told me about trying to talk with her sister too, but she hadn't really told her much, maybe just about- that Jerri was seeing the therapist, and Carson asked her if she was okay.

And Jerri had left or cut it short or something. Not bad, but not all done.

Her face, her expressions were more... well, more than she said.

I could tell what she felt more from her eyes and the way her mouth was than her tone of voice. Maybe from before, when she'd hardly ever said anything. But I still could.

And she was worried about Jerri, what she'd told her, or asked.

-

Instead of asking more about that, I told her Val thought we were boy and girlfriends, just to see her laugh or smile.

She got red.... So I didn't laugh, or say anything or even move. Just watched her.

-

How she looked at her hands, how she looked down so I couldn't see her....

That she was... she was shy. She ~did~ think that, or had thought about it, anyway!

But that meant she liked me, that way. Or before. Or maybe it was just that she'd thought about ~if~ I was her... if she was my girlfriend. Or was playing at it, and us.

I mean, I did that too... in my head, I mean. And my dreams.

-

And I was the one who asked if she wanted to go to the movies.

-

What if she ~really~ wanted to be my girlfriend?

I looked at her that way, or tried to. It's hard to think about something like that. To think about the real thing. It's different than thinking, more like ~seeing~.

She looked like a boy, but I knew she was a girl. I thought of her like a girl, and had for a long time, weeks. But it... I wasn't looking at her that way.

-

Really, to me, she looked like a girl. Like Carson, a girl.

-

I've never had a girlfriend.... I've only even been on just a few dates.

I didn't even know what to do. I could screw it up for her....

She'd be so easy to hurt.

But she'd be hurt if I said no, if she wanted.

And I liked her.

Was that it?

She was the girl I liked most, of any girl, ever.

-

All the thoughts and circles and the dreams and what we'd talked about from the magazines and the stories and what Val said... all that.... I almost asked if she knew what to do.

-

I was sitting half back on my bed with my leg up on pillows, and she was at the other end, almost the same position. But she looked pretty uncomfortable.

She was my best friend, ever, and I was making her feel rotten and I... I hadn't even known.

Before.

I did know, now.

I just was scared.

-

I sat up a bit and made whatever noises and motions I made to get her to shift around over to me.

When she finally did (and she ~was~ sad) I put my arm around her waist....

I pulled her, made her shift over closer against me, on my pillows....

She didn't get mad or whatever she might've gotten.

Anything was better than her being sad.

-

"If you were my girlfriend...."

She stiffened all up and away and looked at me like I was being mean, or maybe just was stupid, but I smiled at her. She wasn't sad.

"Would you still like to go to the movies with me?"

I felt really good that I asked her, or asking her. Whatever, I felt good, even before she smiled.

When she smiled, I felt great.

----

We talked about it. Understatement of the year. We talked a LOT about it.

We talked about all the movies, and which ones we wanted to see, and even if they were good first date movies, which we hadn't before.

She talked about some of the magazines, about the dating stuff and how it wasn't.... like us. I said it was, too. We talked about that.

She was all suddenly too scared to even try going to McD's drive-through, even though we'd gone to dozens of movies before and ~hundreds~ of drive-thrus. We talked about that.

She was even worried what my sister would think, even though Val ~already~ thought I was her boyfriend and that it was great. We talked about that.

But we didn't talk about the girlfriend word.

-

Then she talked about it, sort of. A thing she was afraid of, about it.

"I'm ugly...."

"You're not ugly!! Don't say that!"

I knew from her face, even sideways, that the feeling she had sometimes was on her, that she almost ~always~ had, before. Like a flash, that not-talking face.

That she was a mask, a boy mask.

"You are ~not~ ugly!" I pulled on her arm and waist to get her to pay attention. When she did look, she had tears in her eyes.

I saw her face, maybe like she did. Her dark eyebrows and her beard shadow and her nose... like a boy.

And I saw her dark green eyes and her hair and cheeks and chin and her mouth that was... that smiled. The way her cheeks were.

"You're not ugly."

I was too embarrassed to say what I really just thought. That she was beautiful. That I could look at her forever.

I had to think so I ducked so she couldn't see me.

-

Maybe I had to duck so I couldn't see her. What if she was my girlfriend? What if she already was? Was Val right? What would I do, if she was? What if....

I had the warmest feeling in me.

-

I took a breath.

I leaned my head on her shoulder, slowly, feeling it. It felt good. I knew just from there that she was tense.

I sat up and turned a bit so I could see her. "Is it okay, if I do this?"

I'd leaned on her a million times, but I wanted it to feel it like a girlfriend, maybe.

She still looked freaked, but nodded a teeny bit, so I leaned back or relaxed a bit again and thought... mostly about what I was feeling.

Like that she was vibrating, or shivering. I had to look again. She was looking straight ahead, stiff and all tense even leaned back on my pillows. Her shoulder still felt nice, so I leaned back on it, part way, so I could see her.

"Can I tell you something?"

She nodded again and looked at me sideways. I remembered she'd get a headache so close-up without her glasses, so I sat back and stopped hugging and just took her hand.

Okay....

I let her hand go and just looked at her. I had to really think. Hard to do when all your blood is in your face.

"If... if you were... If we were... my girlfriend... then we'd... hold hands and hug and... we'd be together a lot."

She looked at me. Huge eyes. It got easier to think what I was thinking. Or to say. Even if her face was funny.

"Val said you were like my girlfriend... because you visited me all the time and brought me stuff, and I told her you were my best friend."

I smiled even though she looked scared and a bit hurt. So she was right.

"But she said if I asked you out, that was something I'd only do... with my girlfriend." I watched her face change more.

"I know it was only... before, what we were going to do before, like going to the movies... so you could stop, pretending...." I smiled because the whole idea was finally in my head.

"Remember I said you weren't ugly?" I nodded for her and took her hand. It was scary. I was major red. Her too.

"I think you look wonderful."

-

I had a really hard time still looking at her and was afraid to touch even her hand any more, for a long time. But I finally did.

----

We practiced holding them. I did, anyway. I tried all sorts of ways. They all were wonderful. Beautiful.

Carson had beautiful hands.

----

We argued about how she looked until I told her she was stupid and she told me I was blind and I pointed out that ~she~ couldn't see without coke bottles.

She said something like ~I~ was a liar and so I told her her eyes and mouth and cheeks and nose and hands and her hair and her chin, and where it... it met her, her neck... was beautiful.

Were all beautiful.

-

That shut her up.

----

When Mom got home she thought I had a fever again but I was just still red. She didn't say Carson was sick, and ~she~ was red, too!

----

She stayed for supper, and after we ate I asked Valerie to come with us up to my room.

I was able to walk pretty well with crutches by then, up steps, even if I was slow, but for a joke Carson picked me up and carried me upstairs and I laughed and held on to her neck, not for a joke, mostly. A new, wonderful... thing.

She put me on my bed backwards, which was kind of funny but that's the way she was holding me, and when I got turned around Valerie was leaning on the door frame and smiling at us like she was the smartest of them all.

I was suddenly too embarrassed to say anything, which was stupid since I invited her up in the first place....

But holding Carson's neck... had been, well... one of the best feelings I'd ever felt, and it was still vibrating in me and making all my emotions sort of... flare up.

"I gather you two have worked some things out?" Val sounded a little sarcastic, but she was smiling all over too, when I looked.

I realized I was still holding Carson's hand, and I'd been, maybe... careful or something... but ~not~ holding or touching her when others were around, before. Because she was a secret.

But not from Valerie any more. And neither was I, if she wasn't.

I looked at her, and at Carson. Mom and Dad were downstairs. I wanted to put my arms around her neck again and feel that way, and then, suddenly, I was ~REALLY~ scared.

What anyone else would say, what they would do, if they saw us like... that....

"Carse?"

She looked. I think I had a shaky voice. I almost had to whisper. "Is this what it feels like? With people... if you... tell?"

She nodded and held my hands tight in both of hers, so hard it almost hurt. I don't know what Valerie thought, but she came and sat on the bed too and at least touched my back while Carson hugged me and I cried for her.

-

I thought about how scary it was to be a secret and tell someone.

Or if they found out, even if they wouldn't hurt you... something that might make them hate you, or even just go away, and... it was so... hard. Painful. It hurt my chest, like a heart attack or something.

It didn't make any sense at all. How the secret was hard, but telling it was almost worse. Carson rocked me, or we both rocked, and Val sat with us.

-

Thinking, feeling them and knowing none of the bad stuff had happened, I finally felt better. I could breathe.

-

"Thanks." I sniffled and Val passed me some hankies.

"Better?" Carson was almost as upset as I was. I nodded. Whatever I am after crying. When the feelings go away and make me feel emptier.

Carse hardly ever cried compared to me, and she had way bigger stuff.

-

"Why were you crying?" Valerie sounded like it was just a question, and like she was scared, and her hand stayed there.

I didn't want to say. As if the feelings would come back if I figured out the words for them. But I had to know, and I really already did have the words.

I held on to Carson and closed my eyes.

"If we, like... if I kissed her...." I had to breathe really carefully and I still felt tears. "Would you laugh... at us?"

Val's hand changed on my back. Then, after a few more seconds, she rubbed it in a circle and talked really quietly.

"I'm allowed to laugh at ~you~, I'm your big sister," she pretend-joked, but she was serious.

"But I promise I'll never laugh at you for kissing anybody." She sounded like she was thinking hard.

"Either of you."

----

We talked about what we'd talked about the night before. Probably because I couldn't think any more about- about what just happened. I hung onto Carson.

-

Carson still wanted nobody else to know and at the same time she said she knew it would be better, and she was already better, after Val.

But it was so scary for her that someone else knew that she could hardly stand it and it was only because I ~already~ told Val that she could even be there. I guess it just took time to get used to such a big thing.

-

Val said she thought Brenda would be cool with us, and she knew her pretty well, but she was ~absolutely~ certain Mom and Dad would be great.

She said they already were pretty suspicious that I was gay, just because of before. And so they figured that Carson probably was too. Or something, because of me... and the Carson's mom thing that happened.

She said she'd figured that all out just from what they said when they thought she wouldn't hear them and the way they looked at us and we looked at each other.

Carson nearly freaked but Val said she was being too sensitive because they only thought that stuff because of the way ~I~ was.

I said "Hey!" or something and she looked at me like I was still being the problem.

Being as I was wrapped around Carson, as she pointed out, I couldn't argue too much. Then she looked at Carson.

"Besides, if you do Gone With the Wind, what are they supposed to think? I mean, that stunt on the stairs? Puh-leeze!"

"What stunt!?" It felt like she was picking on her!

"Carson ~carrying~ you? And ~you~ with your arms around his neck? Duh? Dad nearly ~choked!~ The only reason I think he didn't...."

I wasn't paying attention any more since Carson went stiff as a board with her eyes out of focus.

She started breathing fast, little pants, and I'm pretty sure she was close to a panic attack, but it only lasted a few seconds and then she sorta consciously breathed and un-clenched.

I breathed too. And my arms hurt.

-

"I'm sorry, guys, I'm really sorry... I wasn't thinking, and Dad really wasn't ~mad~ or anything, I was just... I'm sorry!" Val sounded almost panicked worse than Carson'd been.

-

She was sorry. But she was just normal, and right, too. I'd be a little freaked too if I saw two guys kissing in school, or something like that. And that's what Dad saw. Or what we would've almost looked like, I guess. I had to think about that. I had to look at Carson that way.

And weirdly, it looked like Carse had changed right then to just thinking, too.

She looked at me and did a tiny shocked face and I woulda laughed if I still wasn't so close to crying or freaking out again.

----

"Are you guys gonna... are you going to be like this, I mean, together, for a... for... you know?"

We both looked at Val. She listened to herself too, I guess, and snorted. Model of femininity, my sister, even if my mom snorts too.

But at least she wasn't all misery and apology any more.

"I ~mean~, are you two going to be an item?" She said it very, very politely.

"Oh."

Carson hadn't said much all evening. "Oh" said a lot.

Like, as Val told us, if we were an 'item' then maybe we ~needed~ to tell Mom and Dad. And hers, Carson's, even more, because even if they knew all about her, she kinda said they saw it as a problem, and not really, well... her.

And ~me~.

Like if she was here ~with~ me, then that was way different than just her being here.

And it would matter about ~how~ we were together, like alone and stuff... or like her carrying me.

-

An item.

-

"Do you want to be an item?" I tried to make it funny, and it was, a little. An item in the school paper?

"What's that mean?" She knew what it meant, but I guess it was still a good question. Like, what would it ~really~ mean?

Valerie sat up and then leaned back. We both looked at her and she grinned at us.

"Being... affectionate? In front of Mom and Dad, and me? And your family?" She smiled then, and kept smiling bigger.

"And all their rules and questions, like where you're going and when you'll be back and who you're going with and what age everyone is and will there be a 'responsible adult' there, and they'll want to meet with the ~parents~ after a few dates and you'll probably get a bit of 'You're not wearing ~that~ are you?'" She poked me.

I'd thought she was talking to Carson.

"You know, an item!"

She said it ~exactly~ the same time as Carson whispered, "Your own leash!"

----

Carson wanted to wait. Val thought we should tell Mom and Dad right away because she said it'd just get harder if we waited, after the stairs.

I think I sort of agreed with that, but it was still too scary for her. Maybe me too.

-

Val said we should tell Brenda too, just because she knew she was feeling left out and she was my friend.

But she only hung out with Carson when I was there, too.

-

"It'd be about ~him~ coming out, not really you," Val told Carson and poked me.

I didn't think it was about me, but I could see what she meant. And I thought I ~had~ to tell her, Brenda, so she wouldn't feel so alone, if that's what she felt like.

-

"She'd never do anything to hurt you, you know."

I knew Carson knew that, but I knew that wasn't the whole problem, either. Our parents had found out about us, sort of. Almost. But it just happened. Valerie found out the same, even if we'd told her most of it. And ~I~ told her. And then just 'cause it happened, really, the stuff... like more than Carse having to, or all by herself.

That makes about as much sense as my thinking....

-

Except for Val, it just happened, before. But we'd be ~telling~ Brenda.

-

It was all too much for one night and we decided not to do anything yet. Valerie left and closed the door again. First, she gave us both a hug.

----

"Are you really okay?"

Carson nodded, but seemed down.

"What's wrong?" I tried to make it a normal question. She didn't say anything for a moment. Then she looked at me.

"You don't have to do any of this... I really appreciate it and you're the best friend I could-"

I touched her face... put my hand on her cheek, and she stopped talking and looked at me. I think she was scared mostly.

I could feel her beard on my palm and she was really warm. It ~was~ scary. But it felt... perfect. Like my dream.

"I've thought, about you, for days and days and days and I never thought I could just ignore you... or that I could stop caring about you."

I smiled because as serious and important and true as it was, it felt ~so~ good to say.

"I care about you."

She managed a real smile, even if her voice didn't work.

"Me too."

----

We decided we had to talk more about being an item, if we wanted to be one, or to tell people that.

But when she left I wanted to try something so bad I did it without asking her.

I stood up (all by myself), hugged her down and put my cheek on hers. Right where I'd touched her.

----

Valerie pounded up the stairs about two seconds after I felt the front door close. I was still getting my leg comfortable, or thinking, which was the same thing. Or I was thinking about thinking. I needed to think. I wasn't thinking yet.

She fast-closed my door, quietly, and jumped on my bed and wiggled my whole body with both hands. "What'd you ~DO~?!"

I tried to look all normal, even if I was totally, bouncing-up-and-down HAPPY!! But I tried.

"I hugged her." I grinned because I couldn't not.

"NOT!! You hug him all the time! What'd you do? H-h... s-she looked like... like, she was on cloud nine! And ~LOOK~ at YOU!!"

I spazzed a tiny bit. She shoulda ~FELT~ like me!! I broke out in a huge smile because it was almost as nice just thinking about it.

"Wow... You have it bad!"

"What?" I didn't really care. She grinned even more.

"Girl, you're in love...."

-

End of Part 7