Chapter 44
NOW: DIANA
The fireblight problem had finally been resolved and the orchard was fully open and functional just before the peak season. The summer had long been underway, and with the progression of August, you could feel the change coming.
It shouldn’t have come as a surprise when Maggie mentioned they needed to talk, preferably before Jay, Michaela, and Julia, and the kids, all arrived at the house.
Michaela and Jay had found a house between Maplewood and Burlington, where they would settle the kids into schools while they worked on getting their community center set up.
They had also worked with Julia and Maggie to set up a summer camp as part of the community center’s offerings, a camp that would use the additional property and facilities Julia was able to provide.
Maggie was planning on applying to a few master’s programs and was in the midst of getting her certifications in order to be able to help Jay and Michaela.
They had been communicating frequently over video calls on various platforms, but Diana was still nervous for them to meet in person.
So when Maggie had asked to talk before everyone’s arrival, Diana had been holding her breath.
A breath she’d been holding while avoiding Maggie altogether except to exchange surface level chatter.
Which, considering the uptick in business for the orchard and Maggie’s various endeavors over the last few weeks, hadn’t been hard to do.
Every night she and Maggie seemed to fall into bed, barely saying goodnight to each other before one of their alarms went off the next morning.
But Diana knew a talk was coming; she and Maggie had briefly agreed after Lily’s birthday dinner debacle that Maggie needed a little more time to talk with Lauren, to get her thoughts in order so she didn’t botch things up more than she felt she had.
Diana had just been relieved that the whole ordeal hadn’t spooked Maggie back into completely hiding.
So Diana didn’t push it, but truthfully, she knew her daughter knew something was up.
People didn’t give Lily enough credit for her observational skills.
Besides, it was hard to hide from anyone, let alone someone who has known you their whole life, that you’d suddenly gotten the one person you never thought you could truly have.
It wasn’t that Diana was deep in love; she had been all her adult life.
It was that she could finally experience and show it.
So Diana presumed that what Maggie wanted to talk about was Jay, and the fact that they were all now less than an hour from one another.
Diana wasn’t the avoidant type, but she couldn’t ever lose Maggie again, and so for once in her life, she had tried to put the conversation off for as long as possible.
Tough shit though, Diana thought to herself. Guests were set to be at her house for dinner in the next hour.
As if her thoughts had summoned her, Diana heard Maggie in the hallway from where she sat on the bed, a bed she now thought of as their bed.
“There you are.” Diana turned to see Maggie standing in the doorway.
She was dressed in what Diana had now come to learn was her “uniform” of leggings and an oversized shirt.
She didn’t look disheveled so she must have not been out on the grounds, but at the dining room table where she liked to get her work done.
Diana had offered her office or to make room for her somewhere else, but Maggie insisted.
“You found me,” Diana said, knowing Maggie knew she was in fact, hiding.
“What time is everyone getting here?” Maggie asked, walking into the room and sitting on the bed next to Diana.
“Should be here in an hour or two—you know, kids,” Diana said.
Maggie nodded. “I had one and couldn’t make it anywhere on time, I can only imagine four.”
“Well, they’re great, I think you’ll love them.”
“I am sure, from everything Julia has mentioned to me offhandedly and I mean, look at their parents.” Diana held Maggie’s gaze searching for any sign that had been a segue to what she needed to talk to her about.
“You know I think the world of both Michaela and Jay,” Diana said carefully.
“You know? Me too,” Maggie said, giving Diana a knowing look.
“Yeah?” Diana asked.
“Yeah. I do. I have obviously not always had the best approach to Jay, or to you and Jay, but I don’t know, I think I just needed to catch up is all.”
“Catch up?”
“Yeah, I mean. I cannot take all the credit,” Diana expected her to talk about Lauren but instead Maggie said, “Michaela and I found ourselves on a Zoom call to walk through some things while Julia dropped and Jay went to do bedtime with the kids.” Diana felt her eyebrows raise in surprise and Maggie blushed slightly. “It gave us a chance to uh, talk.”
“Oh?” Diana’s stomach swooped.
“Yeah, it was late and we were talking and it dawned on us that we’d never actually spoken one on one before, so we decided to chat even more and one thing led to another and—”
“And?” Diana asked, trying to encourage Maggie to get to the punchline.
Maggie looked back her for a second and then nodded her head slightly and said, “I joked that I used to be so jealous of Jay—”
“Used to be? You showed up at my house and freaked the f—”
Maggie raised her hands in front of her chest and closed her eyes in what Diana saw was shame.
“I know, and I apologized for that. I told her the highlights of why and she was great, super kind.” Maggie opened her eyes and looked back at Diana, whose heart was now thundering in her chest. “She said that she enjoyed the time you spent with her and Jay back in college—”
“We were broken up and—” Maggie didn’t close her eyes this time but raised her hands again. Diana closed her mouth.
“I know, she told me she enjoyed their time with you, and also that you were a bit of a mess.” Diana didn’t even attempt to deny it.
“She told me that it was fun but she isn’t poly, and needed there to be boundaries.
I told her I am not poly either and struggled with even the concept until well, you, and now, Maya, crazy right?
” Maggie chuckled to herself. “Anyway, you both respected her boundaries and that meant the world to her because she knew what she was asking you both. It meant the world to her that Jay would make that kind of sacrifice for her, but also, that you would too, for Jay,” Maggie smiled warmly at Diana and Diana felt her chest grow warm as her heart rate evened out.
“That so?” Diana heard herself say.
“Yeah. And there’s more. She said that she didn’t have it easy when she was younger.
” Diana nodded and raised one eyebrow because that was putting it mildly.
“She said that her life never would have been as bright and vibrant if she didn’t have Jay and the way Jay loved her.
Loves her. And she also said she knew that Jay never would have had that if she hadn’t had such an amazing first love, hadn’t had you, so she never felt threatened, only grateful.
” Diana felt her eyes grow hot. “And that just clicked everything into place for me, you know? I mean, I have Damien, and this whole life and relationship that I’m grateful for, because it gave me Maya, and my best friend.
And so I’d been working with Lauren on how that’s similar, but I was never in love with Damien like you were with Jay.
So it always felt different. But now? In that moment I realized I never should have felt threatened either.
You were able to love me, you are able to love me too because of your relationship with Jay, your first love.
And for that, I can only be grateful. For that, I can only love her too. ”
Tears began to spill from Diana’s eyes and Maggie slid on the bed to embrace her. “So what you’re saying is you’re down for a four—”
“Obviously I don’t love her the same way you do or Michaela does,” Maggie said laughing, “but love is such a fucking powerful thing. To think what two teenagers forged could help someone like Michaela or save someone like me, I can’t help but hold some love for her, for Jay.
So you keep her, please, never let her go. ”
Diana squeezed Maggie, feeling a relief wash over her she hadn’t expected today.
After a moment they pulled apart and Maggie wiped her eyes. “So is that what you needed to talk to me about?” Diana asked.
“Hmm? Oh, no, sorry, I wanted to tell you that I think it’s time. I mean, like I am not all the way there yet, and neither is Damien, but I can’t ask you to hold out any longer. It’s okay, and I am overdue for a conversation with my daughter anyway.”
Diana looked back at her, asking with her eyes to understand exactly what Maggie was saying.
“Look, it's August, the girls are settling in, but I think, you know, if you have the chance to tell Lily before I get a chance to talk to Maya, I am not going to ask you to hold back anymore. I already told Maya that we need to chat at some point, and I get the sense she knows its big, and wants to do so in person, but that won’t be till the holidays so—”
“Okay. If it comes up, it comes up. If not, we have the holidays,” Diana said, her chest further loosening and even more relief washed over her. “So does that mean you're moving in soon?” Diana asked, feeling her cheeks strain with how wide she was smiling. “Like officially?”
“If you’ll have me,” Maggie said, and Diana tackled her on the bed, planting kiss after kiss on Maggie, taking a second to relish the fact that she was now sure and secure that she was not losing Maggie. Not anytime soon.
“Thank you, Diana, for everything, and Julia too, please tell her,” Michaela said as she, Jay, Diana, and Maggie sat in the living room, finishing their dessert wine.
Julia had wrangled the kids outside with the eldest, Cole, as it was almost time for the twins to get ready for bed.
“I wish we could stay longer, but once we are settled we want to take you and Julia to dinner, we cannot thank you enough,” Michaela continued.
“Well, I mean, thank you? Julia and I will always take a dinner. But really we are just utilizing our connections.”
“Yeah,” Maggie agreed. “You both are doing the hard work.”
“Well, we are happy to have your help too, Maggie,” Jay said, smiling.
“I don’t know how to repay you, Diana, you have always—” Michaela choked up and Jay reached out a hand to comfort her wife.
“No, no, like I have always told you. I move through a world of less resistance than you. Hell, if it had been a level playing field this whole time, who knows if my family would have been able to swing it as big as they did. I mean, it is no secret why Jay’s family has a stake in the orchard business, they were instrumental, especially around the hard cider business.
And yet, they would have never had a chance to start their own business, even if they’d been born here in America.
Not like my family did. All entrepreneurs in the margins have skills without resources” Diana said and she looked over at Maggie who nodded her head.
Diana knew this was important to acknowledge for Maggie.
“Well we aren’t looking for a handout—”
Diana raised her hands and said, “You aren’t.
Privilege means your hard work gets recognized.
Let me give that to you. You aren’t asking for a handout, though I’d argue after everything you’ve been through you deserve one.
You have outlined a plan to try to dismantle the very systems that terrorize you and let me sleep at night.
Remember, dude bros get funding and support for less,” Diana said, and on this she held Michaela’s gaze, putting so much into her look that she hoped the other woman understood.
Diana thought it was always crazy that the people who didn’t want to be seen as getting a “handout” were usually the folks who deserved one.
Besides, people were literally being killed for being immigrants, trans, and more.
These people were dying when they didn’t deserve it.
The world was going to get a little kinder because of the work they were doing.
At the end of the day, no matter how much Diana helped them she would still have her name, her assets, she didn’t need to gatekeep based on some capitalist principle.
“You’ll never talk her out of it,” Jay said, standing. “Let’s just do what we have to do to be successful. For those who come after us.”
“And those who never got the chance to become us,” Maggie added.
Michaela nodded and beamed. “Maggie, it will be so great having you on the team, and can’t wait to continue working together.
Let us know if you need any recommendations or anything as you maneuver the certification and education side of things,” Michaela offered.
Diana turned to see Maggie flush and smile back at the other woman.
“I will, and I am thrilled to be a founder with you all. It means so much.”
“Well, let’s get the kids in bed before they eat Julia,” Jay joked.
Jay turned to give a hug to Maggie, the sight bringing a smile to Diana’s face, and then turned to give Diana a small chaste kiss and hug goodbye as well.
Then they pulled apart so that Julia could begin rounding up the kids.
Diana looked back at Maggie, who beamed back at her, her eyes full of fondness.
They all then said goodbye to the kids, and Michaela.
Julia was staying for the night, and Diana was looking forward to hanging out with two out of three of her favorite girls, like old times.
A piece of a puzzle had been completed, and she was full of the anticipation of being able to finally see how the rest of it would come together.
“I am going to go for a walk around the grounds before I turn in,” Julia said as Jay and Michaela’s car disappeared down the long driveway.
This took Diana back some. “Oh, okay, do you want company?”
“Could be like old times,” Maggie said beside her.
“No, I just wanna think some things over, I’ll be back in time to hang with you two, so don’t go getting all hot and heavy while I’m gone.” Julia offered a smile, but Diana noticed it didn’t reach her eyes.
“Okay, we will be here when you get back.”
Diana closed the front door and turned to Maggie, who asked, “Is she okay?”
Diana knew something was bothering Julia. Her mind flashed to her playing around with the kids and being the only adult without a significant other at dinner and thought she knew. Diana’s puzzle pieces had begun to fit together, but Julia’s puzzle was still missing pieces.