Chapter 11
Nikki’s brick-facade apartment complex looms over my gun-metallic Nissan Sentra.
The historic building was once a massive factory, but it was later preserved and converted into loft-style apartments and condominiums. Nikki’s studio loft may be tiny, but it has so much character and history that it almost makes up for its ridiculously high rent.
It also helps that she doesn’t have to share it with anyone else.
Jude
Nikki
For tonight’s date, Nikki and I decided on a quiet dinner-and-a-movie night at her place. She cooks dinner, I prepare dessert, we cuddle on the couch and enjoy a romantic movie before we inevitably end up screwing our brains out in her bed until we pass out from exhaustion.
The only catch? We both need to purchase ingredients for the aforementioned dinner and dessert.
Grocery shopping is an inherently domestic activity that certainly does nothing to ease my anxieties about our relationship.
Nikki and I giggle our way through the aisles, piling items into our cart with reckless abandon.
Here in the middle of a progressive city, we are free to be our unapologetic selves—a sapphic couple composed of an ethereal, tattooed princess and a tiny, genderless goblin.
We don’t receive dirty looks. We are hardly perceived at all.
It’s all the normalcy and acceptance I’ve searched for my whole life.
It’s intoxicating and terrifying.
At checkout, we divide our items and pay separately—a necessary reminder that it’s still only a casual date.
Nikki checks out first, making friendly small talk with the middle-aged cashier.
The much younger male bagger appears caught off guard by Nikki’s beauty and tries in vain to flirt with her while scrambling to bag her groceries.
She ignores him, choosing to wink at me instead.
Heat rises in my cheeks as I’m once again perplexed by how this gorgeous person could be interested in someone like me.
“Sorry, ma’am?”
I’m pulled from my lovesick daze to realize that the “ma’am” the cashier is referring to is me. “Hm?”
“It looks like that card was declined. Do you have another form of payment?”
My mind goes completely blank. Fuck. “Uh, can I try it again?”
The cashier throws me a pitying expression. “Sure.”
I tap my debit card again, desperately willing it to work, but the machine emits the same angry noise. The words “INSUFFICIENT FUNDS” taunt me from the tiny green screen.
Panic floods my veins, paralyzing me.
“Sorry, it looks like it was declined again,” the cashier announces, arguably louder than necessary.
Shit, the textbooks. Mom probably forgot about the massive expense of buying all the wildly overpriced reading material for this semester.
I typically don’t spend more than a few hundred bucks from my account per week on groceries, gas, and meals, but my textbooks set me back nearly $1,500.
I should have reminded her. Shit, shit, shit—
“Ma’am?”
“What’s the problem?” Nikki asks in the most professional tone I’ve ever heard from her. Her concerned eyes bounce between the cashier and me.
The cashier gestures to the machine. “The payment was declined. Do you have another form of—”
“Here, let me get it,” Nikki declares, pressing her own silver card to the machine. My gaze drops to the ground, shame quickly swallowing me whole.
The now satisfied machine dings a happy tone, followed by the chipper sound of the receipt printer. I continue staring at the floor.
“Thank you! Have a great day!”
“You, too.”
Nikki marches forward without another word, pushing our shared cart toward my car. We load our groceries into the trunk in silence, then climb into the front. I hesitate before starting the car, certain I should offer some explanation, but coming up empty.
“So, is everything okay?” Nikki finally asks.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m—I’m so sorry about that,” I mutter. “I’ll pay you back as soon as I have funds back in my account. I’m going to text my mom right now. I think she forgot that I had to buy textbooks this week.”
Nikki nods, understanding. “Oh, okay.” She offers me a sympathetic smile. “It’s all good. No rush.”
Embarrassed, I turn back to my phone and compose a brief message to my mom, explaining the situation and requesting more funds at her earliest convenience. “Not an emergency yet, just FYI,” I add, hopefully ensuring that Mom won’t interrupt my date with Nikki tonight.
Once I hit “send”, I put my phone away and start the car. My music resumes, Nikki rests her hand on my thigh, and at last I’m able to relax.
Just as we’re pulling out of the parking garage, the music is interrupted by an incoming call.
I don’t have to look to see who’s calling; nevertheless, MOM pops up on the screen, sending another surge of debilitating fear through my system.
If I answer, the call will automatically play through the car speakers, giving Nikki and my mother a direct, unfiltered line of communication.
But if I don’t answer, Mom might withhold the funds out of spite, and/or Nikki will view me as an ungrateful child.
Once again, I’m immobilized by indecision.
“Are you going to answer?” Nikki asks eventually, tossing me a confused look.
“Yeah, I—I just—” I swallow, accepting my fate. “Yeah. Okay. I’m answering.”
I press the “answer” button on the screen and, in a shaky voice, utter a greeting. “Hello?”
“DEADNAME?”
My stomach churns. Great. Now my girlfriend knows my deadname. “Hey, Mom.”
“I’m so sorry your card got declined! I’m transferring the money to your account right now.”
“Th–thanks. My, um…” I gulp again. “My friend covered my grocery tab, so I’ll need to pay her back.”
“Of course, sweetie,” Mom replies. “Tell her your mom says ‘thank you’.”
I glance over at Nikki and immediately regret it. She’s putting the pieces together, and it’s not exactly the most flattering picture.
“So, it was the textbooks, you think?” Mom continues.
“Yeah,” I answer. “They’re always so overpriced. My Leadership scholarship covered them in my first semester, but it ran out pretty quickly.”
“I’ll say,” Mom agrees. “My goodness. Why are these books so expensive?”
I bark out a laugh. “Great question. I wish I knew the answer.”
Mom sighs into the phone, causing an auditory distortion that slightly pops my car’s speakers. “Well, at least you won’t need any more books until January, right?”
“Right.”
“Alright, well, I think this should hold you over for a while,” she says. “Just keep a closer eye on it from now on, okay? I don’t want the bank to fine us for an overdraft or anything.”
“Will do. Thanks, Mom.”
“You’re welcome, DEADNAME. Your dad and I love you!”
“Love you, too.”
I eagerly press the “end” button on the screen, and my familiar music resumes once again. The music fills the uncomfortable quiet between Nikki and me, and I brace myself for however Nikki decides to react.
To my surprise, Nikki doesn’t speak until after I’ve parked in the visitor lot of her apartment complex.
“So, I take it that…was your deadname?”
The tension in my chest loosens. At least she didn’t say the name out loud. “Yeah.”
Nikki considers this for a moment before continuing. “Are you not out as nonbinary to them yet?”
I release a shaky breath. “It’s…complicated.”
Another pause. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“Not particularly,” I admit. “I’d rather not ruin what could still be a lovely evening.”
Nikki places a gentle hand on my thigh. “You’re not going to ruin anything, Jude. You can talk to me if you want, but I won’t make you.”
I take a few seconds to contemplate her offer. “I really appreciate it, and I’m sure we should talk about it at some point. But for tonight, I’d much rather forget about it and focus on enjoying our date.”
Nikki smiles warmly before leaning forward to press her lips to mine. We kiss slowly, gently, and sweetly, and my chest aches. She smells like jasmine and patchouli. Her soft lips part, and the tips of our tongues brush, sending my nervous system into overdrive. I want, I want, I want—
She pulls away with a dreamy grin. “Shall we continue our date, then?”
Dizzy with desire, I can only nod.
Dinner is perfect. We enjoy delicious vegetable lasagna and creamy tiramisu. Nikki also pairs our meal with a bottle of pinot noir that her older sister gave her as a housewarming gift. It’s a bit dry for my taste, but it definitely gives me a nice, warm buzz.
I’m not sure whether it’s the wine that gives me the confidence or the looming anxiety about what Nikki must be thinking of me after overhearing my conversation with my mom, but I finally muster enough courage to bring it up.
“So, you may have noticed earlier that I referred to you as my ‘friend’ to my mom.”
From across the table, Nikki glances up from her tiramisu to look at me. “Yeah, so?”
I swallow. “I—I don’t want you to think that’s how I think of you.”
She chuckles softly. “I know, silly!” She reaches for my hand, and I eagerly take it. “I would have been surprised if you had referred to me as anything else.”
“Oh. Really?”
“Yeah, I mean, we’ve only been together for, what, like, six or seven weeks?”
There’s a sinking feeling in my chest. “Two months as of the twenty-second.”
She furrows her brow. “Wait. Seriously?”
I nod.
“Damn, time really flies. Well, still, two months isn’t quite the ‘meet the parents’ stage. Right?”
I can only shrug. This isn’t exactly my area of expertise. Being a year older than me, I’d assumed she’d have more wisdom in this department.
“My parents sure as hell don’t know who I’m dating,” Nikki continues, letting go of my hand and scooping another bite of tiramisu with her fork. “They don’t need to know until it’s like…serious.”
There it is. Celeste was right.
Shit.
“You know what I mean?”
I stare past her into her tiny kitchen. My trembling jaw prevents me from answering. Fuck, why am I so upset? Why am I being so pathetic about this?
“Jude?”
“Hm?”
“Did I lose you?”
I clench my teeth together, stifling a sob. “I’m here.”
Nikki shifts in her chair, and I hear the clink of her fork on the plate. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
I shake my head, willing myself to stop crying, but it doesn’t work.
“Hey, hey,” she moves her chair to my side of the table and takes my hand. “Talk to me. What’s happening?”
What can I say? That I thought we were serious? That two months is a long time for me to be this happy? That I never imagined I would ever end up with someone as perfect as her, and now I’m risking everything because I’m too needy and clingy?
“Jude, what—”
“It’s stupid,” I whisper. “I’m fine.”
Nikki wraps an arm around me. “You don’t seem fine.”
“I just thought—I mean, I guess I thought this was serious. I don’t know.”
Nikki goes quiet for a few moments. “We could be serious.”
“What?”
“I mean, it sounds like you’re not even out as nonbinary to your parents. Do they know that you’re into girls?”
“It’s complicated.”
“Yeah, that’s what you said before.”
I sigh. “I tried to come out a couple of years back. It…didn’t go well. They think it’s just a phase.”
“You being gay or being nonbinary?”
“Both.”
“Oh, shit.”
“Yeah.”
We sit in silence for several minutes before Nikki finally speaks again. “So, what does being serious look like to you?”
I take a moment to mull it over. “Honestly, my friends are more like family to me than my parents, so maybe meeting and spending time with them?” I pause for a response, but Nikki stays quiet.
“They’ve actually been bugging me for a little while because they want to get to know you better.
They can be a little overprotective, especially given my dating history. ”
“Yeah,” Nikki says with an exhale. “I guess that makes sense.”
“So, would it be okay if we plan some time to hang out with them, too?”
Nikki hesitates. “Can I be honest?”
Uh oh. I nod, bracing myself.
“I don’t particularly enjoy hanging out with guys. Like, at all.”
My heart sinks. “Oh.”
“Yeah.”
It’s tempting to inform her that Max is gay, so hanging with him doesn’t exactly feel the same as hanging out with a typical straight man, but that’s not my business to tell.
Not to say that Max isn’t open about it himself, but I don’t feel that it’s appropriate for me to talk about it without his explicit permission.
Plus, I don’t know how deep Nikki’s aversion to men goes.
She gave me a glimpse into one of her past relationships with a toxic guy in high school, but she didn’t linger on the details.
Which, in retrospect, doesn’t seem fair given how explicit I was when I told her my story, but again, it’s only been two months.
She’ll open up more as we grow closer. Right?
“But I’d be comfortable hanging out with your friend Celeste,” Nikki continues, rubbing little circles into the back of my hand. “She seems pretty cool from what I can tell.”
I chew on my bottom lip as I consider how I will explain this to Celeste and Max.
Max will likely shrug it off and respect that Nikki’s had a bad history with men.
Celeste, however, will be furious. Celeste has known Max for years.
She was one of the few friends who stuck around before, during, and after his transition.
She knows firsthand how much pain Max has endured because of gender presentation, preferences, and prejudices.
To her, this is yet another instance of Max being rejected because of who he is.
But how can I explain that to Nikki without outing Max as trans?
“So, does that work?” Nikki asks, gently caressing my arm.
“I think it’s a start,” I say.
Nikki goes still, then pulls her hand away. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“I mean–”
“Look, it’s a compromise,” she snaps in a much sharper tone than before. “I like you, and I really enjoy spending time with you. But men make me uncomfortable, and I shouldn’t have to—”
“Would it help if I told you he’s gay?” I blurt.
Nikki clicks her tongue but considers it. “Like, how gay?”
“Extremely gay,” I reply. “The gayest man I know. Or, how does the quote go? ‘Gayer than a tree full of monkeys on nitrous oxide,’ or something like that.”
Nikki blinks, confused. “I don’t know what that is.”
“Good Omens?” I gape at her. “Really?”
She shrugs.
“Anyway, yeah, Max is hella gay.”
Nikki thinks about it, then takes a deep breath. “Okay, I can work with that.”
I release the tension in my shoulders and let out a sigh. “Thank you, Nikki. It really means a lot to me.”
Nikki’s bright blue eyes are back on mine, and she grins deviously. “Is it safe to say that you owe me?” she asks, voice deepening into a velvety, breathy rasp.
Arousal rockets through me faster than should be humanly possible. Is that normal? To go from crying about whether our relationship is serious to practically melting into a horny puddle in a matter of seconds?
Honestly, who cares? When my perfect, gorgeous girlfriend looks at me like that, I can’t possibly care about anything ever again.