11 Gemma
S ince the front door opens into the kitchen, I’m hit with the buttery smell of freshly made pancakes as soon as I slip inside my friends’ apartment. Val’s at the stove, singing along at the top of her lungs in Spanish to Fuerza Regida as she cooks breakfast, holding the spatula like a mic. She must have not heard me come in, because she doesn’t turn around.
For a moment, I stand there with my back against the door, watching my friend as she prepares two steaming hot plates of scrambled eggs, bacon, and chocolate chip pancakes.
Val and Kiara have a cute tradition where they—well, mostly Val—make a home-cooked breakfast every Saturday morning, a sacred ritual that goes back to the first time Kiara slept over. Val claims that that’s how she “got the girl,” because during that fateful meal, she promised Kiara that she would make the same breakfast for her every Saturday as long as they both lived.
I think about sneaking past Val, but then I spot a pancake currently cooking— smoking —on the pan. It’s dangerously close to being burnt.
“Need help?” I finally ask. “That pancake looks ready.”
Val startles, but then expertly flips the pancake before turning around to look me up and down. She lowers the volume of the music before saying, “So you’re alive after all.”
“Is Gemma back?” Kiara walks into the kitchen, holding Burrito. “Not to sound like an overprotective parent, but where were you last night, Gemma? You could have at least sent a text or something. Even the Financial District isn’t as safe as it seems. One time, a friend of mine got mugged there in broad daylight!”
Burrito lets out a small yowl of protest, and Kiara places him on the floor. He makes a beeline for his bowls, and after a few licks of water, he comes over to weave between my legs, purring.
I sigh. “Sorry,” I say to my friends, not the cat. “My phone must have died after I got shitfaced.”
“With who ?” Val and Kiara ask in unison.
I reach down to scratch Burrito in between his ears. He closes his eyes and lies down on the floor, enjoying the attention.
“It’s a long story,” I say. “I’ll tell you over breakfast? I already ate, so no need to make me a plate, by the way.”
“You sure you don’t want a chocolate chip pancake?” Val asks as she hands Kiara her plate. “We have extra.”
I eye the pancake. I’m still full, but the gooey chocolate chips do look good. “Okay, thanks. I’ll take one.”
“No problem, I got you!” Val smiles. “Go lock up Burrito and sit down with Kiara at the dining table.”
I carefully pick up Burrito from the floor. He lets out a small, indignant mew.
“Don’t worry, kitty cat,” I say. “I’ll bust you out of the room as soon as we’re done eating.”
As cute as Burrito is, he has a very naughty habit of stealing human food. Whenever we lock him up, he instantly goes from being “a manly, absolute unit” of a cat—Val’s words, of course—to, as Kiara says, “just a baby!” Puss in Boots wide eyes and all. I try my best to ignore his sad little mews as I put him in the bedroom.
After I close the door behind me, I join Kiara at the dining room table. Val comes soon after with our plates and exits out of the music streaming app on her PS5. She sits down at the head of the table. Kiara sits at her right, while I sit at her left. It’s the same seating arrangement we’ve been following for the last month or so, and it’s been pretty great. Especially now that I’m paying my share of the rent—I Venmo’ed Val and Kiara while I was back in Irvine—my friends’ apartment feels like a second home now.
When we’re all settled, my friends wordlessly turn to me with expectant faces.
I take a deep breath and finally say, “I was with Celeste.”
“Your ex?” Kiara asks, while Val says, “I thought she was in Korea!”
“She apparently moved back to LA a while ago,” I reply. “Which, I had no idea about until now.”
“But how did you run into her here in SF, of all places?” Val asks.
“Apparently she goes back and forth between the two cities a lot for jobs. Remember that photographer from my school? The one Horizon hired for the Valentine’s Day issue?”
Kiara gasps. “ No. ”
“Yup. It turned out to be her.”
Kiara shrieks, and Val gives me a pleased smirk.
“This is basically destiny!” Kiara says. “A match made in heaven by Sappho herself. When can we meet her? We can go on double dates!”
I fling out my hands in front of me before she can go on. This is exactly why I didn’t tell my friends about Celeste sooner. The last time I saw Kiara this excited was when Val surprised her with tickets to go see Megan Thee Stallion for her birthday.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I say. “Just because we’re working together doesn’t mean we’re going to date. She disappeared on me for eight years. And even if we were still interested in each other… we have to keep things professional for work.”
Val gives me a much-deserved eyebrow raise. “Professional? Is that why you got shitfaced with her?”
I sigh. “I know, I know. I wanted to set clear boundaries and expectations. But that meant we had to talk about the past… and then I got so stressed out, I got blackout drunk for the first time in years! Which is why I stayed over at her place afterward.”
Kiara looks like she’s about to scream again, so I quickly add, “ But she slept on the couch. She did make me Korean hangover soup for breakfast but—”
“ She made you breakfast! ” Kiara gestures at our now lukewarm plates of food, and I realize it’s game over. Nothing I say now will convince her that Celeste and I will never date again, because to Kiara, breakfast equals love. And I guess in a way, that’s true for her and Val and probably many other couples, too. But not when it comes to me and Celeste.
“Well, I’m surprised you even came back home today,” Val says with a laugh.
“What do you mean?”
“You know what they say about lesbians and U-Hauls.”
At my confused expression, she goes on, “Come on, you know, that one stereotype about how us sapphics move so fast in relationships that we move in together after the second date or something? Which, I mean, isn’t exactly wrong considering…”
She gives a pointed look in Kiara’s direction, and we all laugh.
“Oops,” Kiara says with a grin. “Sorry not sorry.”
Val gives her a light peck on the cheek before taking a bite out of her eggs. “Shit,” she says, “the food is already cold.”
“Sorry,” I say. “I had a lot to catch you guys up on.”
“Don’t apologize for that,” Kiara replies, waving me off. “We can reheat everything.”
We form an assembly line from the table to the microwave, with Kiara handing each plate of food to me and me handing it off to Val so she can reheat it. As I wait for the food to warm up, I recall how baffled I’d been when, just a week after the three of us had met for the first time at the company mixer, Kiara and Val told me that they were dating. By the end of that same month, Kiara had posted on socials that she was looking for someone to sublease her room in her apartment so she could go live with Val, her new girlfriend.
I thought it was my friends being their usual, spontaneous selves. I didn’t realize there was a whole stereotype behind it. Celeste and I jumped over all that by being roommates to begin with. For better or worse.
“The U-Haul thing…” I say when we sit back down at the table with our now hot plates of food. “It worked for you guys, but Celeste and I are different. Not only did we start out as roommates, but she still ended up leaving me in the end.”
Kiara squeezes my hand, and Val frowns.
“Maybe you need to establish firmer boundaries with her then,” Val says, a protective edge in her voice. “So something like that doesn’t happen again.”
“Yup,” I reply. “I think that’s what I have to do, too.”
I feel like I’ve brought everyone’s mood down, because after we finish eating, my friends and I just sit there for a few awkward minutes.
Finally, I say, “You know what? We should go out tonight. Not to a bar like last time but, like, actual clubbing. It’s a Saturday! I won’t drink this time around, though. Since I need to take a break after last night.”
My friends stare at me with expressions that say, Are you for real? Although Kiara, Val, and I went out a couple times when we first all became friends, we eventually stopped going out together as a group. I’m kind of to blame, since initially, it was because I was too busy doing other stuff with James. But then, as we reached our late twenties, Val and I stopped going to clubs altogether, opting for more chill activities, instead. Kiara sometimes still went out, but with her other friends.
“Gemma,” Val says. “I don’t know if you realize this, but we’re all turning thirty next year.”
Kiara holds up a hand. “For the record, I still occasionally go clubbing and see people older than us out and having fun all the time. But Gemma, baby, are you sure? No offense, but when’s the last time you even stepped into a club?”
My face turns red. Honestly, I don’t even want to do the math.
“It’ll be fun!” I say, dodging her question. “Or at the very least memorable. Come on, guys. Before we get any older. Like Val said, thirty is just around the corner!”
Kiara and Val exchange a look. Kiara is practically bouncing up and down at the very prospect of clubbing with the two of us, but Val glances longingly at her PS5 as she says, “You two go ahead. My club days are over.”
“Oh, come on, Valentina!” Kiara says, using her girlfriend’s full first name. She grabs her arm and pulls her toward her. “You can game any night you want. Come out with us! It’s not every day that Gemma wants to go clubbing. Or that we can all go out together!”
I give Val a pleading look. She rolls her eyes and sighs. “Fine, I’ll go out. But I am not dressing up.”
That night, after my friends pregame with some shots of tequila and I drink a glass of sparkling cider, I realize that I don’t have anything to wear to the club. I left most of my clothes at James’s, and I’m probably never going to get them back because I don’t want to talk to him ever again. But even if I still had everything, I doubt the clubbing dresses from my early twenties fit me now—thank you, slower metabolism.
Val’s closer to me in terms of size, but since she doesn’t have any dresses, I end up having to borrow from Kiara. She’s a few inches taller and has a totally different body type than me, but luckily she has a plain, loose-fitting black dress that doesn’t look too bad on me. Meanwhile, Kiara herself wears a stunning white dress that accentuates all her curves, while Val wears an oversized black T-shirt and jeans. Like she warned us, Val doesn’t dress up, but she does style her hair, slicking it back in a way that makes Kiara smile.
When we’re all ready to go, we get a car and head downtown. Even though I didn’t drink any alcohol, the sheer excitement of going to a club for the first time in a while with my friends sends a thrill down my spine. The lights of the city are blindingly bright, and as sirens erupt from a distance, I open the car window to feel the cool, salty San Francisco night air on my face.
That’s the one thing that I like more about San Francisco than back home in Orange County. The air. Although we also have coastal areas in Southern California, up here, the cool air is so crisp and fresh in a way it never gets in Irvine.
As we approach our destination, the streets get more and more crowded with people headed out for a good time. It’s eleven p.m. on a Saturday, and the city is very much alive.
Inside the club, loud EDM bombards my senses, making every cell in my body vibrate. Everything’s lit up by floor-to-ceiling lights that flash and pulse to the music. Bright splashes of color shine over the entire room as throngs of people scream, laugh, and dance. The vibes and energy are so top-notch, I’m ecstatic. And I can tell my friends are excited to be here, too. Kiara is grinning from ear to ear, and even Val nods and pumps her fist along to the beat.
“Come on,” I say, leading my friends to the dance floor. “Let’s get closer to the stage!”
The crowd gradually makes way for us as we push closer to the front. I definitely haven’t missed the stench of sweaty bodies, but being in close proximity to so many other people makes me feel alive in ways I can’t explain. Kiara and I dance back-to-back, reaching our hands high in the air, while beside us, Val rocks and grooves to the music.
The club crowd is a lot younger than I remember it being, although I see a handful of middle-aged couples as well. Kiara was right. There are lots of people who are older than us, including a man in his seventies sporting a fedora and sunglasses. So I don’t feel too old.
The DJ puts on a remixed version of Rihanna’s “Only Girl (in the World),” a throwback from when I was in high school that makes people hoot in recognition. I close my eyes and raise my hands as I sway from side to side.
Kiara and I sing along to the lyrics, throwing Val a pointed look.
“Come on!” I say. “I know you know the words!”
Val rolls her eyes in mock disgust. But at the next chorus, she belts out the song with so much force that Kiara and I fall into each other, nearly collapsing with laughter.
Fuck, this is fun , I think. Why did I stop going out with my friends, again?
But of course, I know exactly why. When James and I first moved to San Francisco, we went out to pretty much every club we could get into. But as we got older, we started doing what he said were more “normal” mid-to-late-twenties activities like trivia nights and wineries. Since I did enjoy most of the things we did together, I never really complained.
Now, as I’m dancing in the middle of the dance floor with my friends, I realize that what James said was a “normal transition” isn’t normal at all. At least, it wasn’t for me. The heart-pumping music… flashing strobe lights… I still love all these things now, as much as I did in my early twenties. This is who I am. Not board games and escape rooms.
I resent James. But if I’m being honest, I resent my past self, too. Why didn’t I speak up for myself more? Why did I let a man dictate what I should or shouldn’t do? He still randomly decided he didn’t love me anymore and replaced me with a Victoria’s Secret model look-alike.
Never again , I think. Fuck men!
We’re now all bouncing to a more recent EDM song with a hammering beat. The music crescendos, and the DJ throws up his arms. Smoke blows up into the air, and I’m momentarily blinded by lasers as confetti rains down from the ceiling.
Kiara and Val cheer, and I scream, for the first time in ages, with unreserved delight.