Amy #2
“Over time I refined the approach, I suppose. This sounds awful when I say it, but the initial chat, the drinks or dinner, the reveal of the quid pro quo. I’ve got good at spotting and tapping into any latent tendencies, creating the right environment.
” Sarah smiled wryly. “You might recognise some of that.”
“I think I might…”
“By the third or fourth I’d stopped even questioning whether it was right, because nobody complained and everybody seemed happy.
Their careers genuinely benefited and I’d built all these safeguards in my head.
You asked me how many the other night. Eleven, including you.
Eleven women. And I was so convinced the system worked that I never once stopped to look at it from their side.
I turned heartbreak into a system, Amy. That first mentee nearly destroyed me, so I made sure it could never happen again by stripping out the feelings and making it transactional.
No one gets too close, no one gets hurt.
Clean.” Sarah paused. “Until you made me look at it properly.
“And here’s the core of it. When you asked me on Monday how I’m different to the senior associate, I couldn’t answer.
I can now. I’m different because my motivations are different…
I’m not trying to get another notch on the bedpost. I’m not trying to make myself feel good just because the hot twenty something associate with a boyfriend performed some sex act on me.
I’m not trying to fuel my ego. All I’ve been trying to do is make the most of my time while I’m still young enough, driven by fear.
” She grimaced. “That’s not pretty, is it?
But it’s true. Not ego, not conquest, just fear.
Fear of getting old and fear of regret.”
Amy instinctively reached out to take Sarah’s hand in hers.
It was something about the searing honesty in her voice that made her want to comfort her.
Sarah looked surprised for a moment, then she smiled and held on tight.
Amy couldn’t deny it felt good, to feel physical contact, even if anything more was firmly off the table that evening.
“I know that doesn’t justify it, I know that some women’s personal lives have blown up, I know that I’ve been selfish and that the power imbalance is wrong.
I know all of that. So here’s what I’m going to do…
while you’re away, I’m going to speak to the other four current mentees and end the sexual side of it.
No more quid pro quo. If someone wants to keep seeing me, then of course that’s different, but it’s entirely separate.
Same for any new mentees, it’s a strictly non-sexual arrangement. Does that work for you?”
Amy nodded gratefully. “Yes, it does. I’m pleased you’ve seen it and that you’re going to do something about it. How about… the rest of it?”
“Hugo?”
“Yeah. Or, your idea of how we could look.”
Sarah looked down and when she looked back up there was a hint of defiance.
“Amy… I like you a lot. A lot. You feel like you could be another Jess or Chloe to me. You are, I think. But I can’t blow up my marriage, mess with my children, all of those things on a possibility.
That’s too much, particularly when I know you’ve got someone else in LA and…
you said on Monday night you were going to date people now. ”
“If this could be real, you need to treat it like that.”
“I will. But you need to understand what you’re asking. Think about you and James the last few days, I can tell how agonising that’s been even if you seem certain it’s actually the right thing. Now imagine adding two children and a marriage and an entire life built around that.”
“I’m not asking you to tell him tomorrow,” Amy said carefully. “But I’m asking you to be honest with yourself about the endgame. Know what it would look like and tell me how you see it. I need to know if we started dating seriously that there’s a future that’s viable.”
“I know.” Sarah’s voice had dropped almost to a whisper. “Give me time. Please. Give me until you’re back from LA to work out how I’d see the endgame. I owe it to you to be able to tell you something that can work, but I need time to think.”
Amy considered it. It wasn’t the full set of answers she’d demanded on Monday, it was only a partial fulfilment of her terms, but it was absolutely a start and a huge step in the right direction. It was honest, and Amy could see that she was taking it seriously.
“Ok. That’s fair. It’s enough for now.”
Sarah visibly relaxed. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me. Just do it. The mentees I mean… actually do it. Don’t tell me you’re going to and then find ways out.”
“I will. I promise.”
Sarah looked at Amy and a faint hint of something crossed her expression.
They were still holding hands, but nothing more.
Sarah’s fingertips started to drag, ever so slowly, across Amy’s hand and Amy felt herself responding in exactly the way that she always responded.
Alone, no one to disturb them, the evening ahead of them…
it would be so, so easy to close the gap between them. So easy.
“I should go and leave you to pack,” Sarah said, not moving a muscle.
“You should.”
“Or…” Sarah hesitated. “Or I could stay here tonight? Enjoy the evening together before you go.”
Amy felt it pull at her. Sarah in her bed, Sarah’s body against hers, one more night before three weeks apart. It would be so easy to say yes. So easy, to remind each other of what they had.
“I’m tempted,” Amy heard herself say. “God, I’m so tempted. But no, not tonight.”
“Why?” Sarah looked surprised.
“Because you need to do what you’ve said you’ll do. I can’t say what I said on Monday then jump into bed with you two days later before you’ve done any of it. That’s not how this works.”
Sarah let go of her hand and stood. “You’re right. I know you’re right. I just don’t want you to be right.”
Amy stood too. “Neither do I.”
She walked Sarah to the front door, and paused with her hand on the latch.
On instinct she leaned across and hugged Sarah, a hug that Sarah returned with interest, a tight hug that neither woman wanted to let go of.
There was a moment, brief, when they pulled apart where they were close, a pause, and Amy realised she was holding her breath…
if Sarah leaned in that would do it, she’d kiss her and common sense be damned.
But then Sarah smiled and said, “Have a safe flight.”
Amy opened the door. “We’ll message and talk while I’m there?”
Sarah nodded, smiled a smile that didn't quite reach her eyes, and walked towards the lift. Amy closed the door, leaned back against it, and let out a long breath before reaching for her phone. She’d had several messages come through while she was talking to Sarah, but had resisted the temptation to check.
A message from James, practical, checking on when she was flying and whether he could move her clothes to the spare room while she was away. Hardly an unreasonable request given the circumstances, and she had no objections.
And then a couple of messages from Luisa, her excitement palpable:
Remind me what time your flight lands? I’ve got a great weekend planned for us xx
And then a second message accompanying a selfie of her in her gym kit looking really very good indeed:
Can’t believe I get to see you tomorrow, soooo excited!! xx
Amy smiled to herself. She really, really liked Luisa.
Really liked her. Fun, easy going. And the physical attraction was, well, wow.
But… they’d known each other for, what, a week in person?
Apart from that it had been video calls and a constant stream both ways of pictures and messages.
The next three weeks would be the acid test, she knew…
whether this was real, or whether this was a holiday fling mixed up with a lesbian awakening where the reality didn’t stack up.
And there was so much to discover still about Luisa, about her friends, about whether she had anyone else on the scene (they’d explicitly agreed that whatever they had was open, after all), about her life.
She was determined to give it the very best go though.
How have I ended up like this? Amy thought.
Two women that I like very much, one married and with what could best be described as a history of moral complexity but who has promised to make amends, one seemingly perfect but five thousand miles away and who I know much less about than I do Sarah.
Still, one step at a time. Pack. Reply to Luisa. Avoid the deep, deep temptation to go over to Sarah’s flat tonight. Fly to LA.
Amy stood there for a couple of minutes, still leaning against the door, eyes closed… simply taking a few moments to gather herself.
Then she went back to the bedroom to finish packing.