Together #3
Kate lingered on the snapshots of Abby’s mother.
Perhaps because they had the same smile and sparkle behind their eyes, and while Abby had come far, she looked happy in the photos in a way that Kate had never witnessed.
There was another photo too, one she always considered asking about but never did.
One of Audie on the Padres infield, Abby a toddler at his feet, wearing a matching uniform.
“You okay?” she asked when Abby flopped onto the couch next to her.
“Yeah.”
Abby wrapped an arm around her and rested her head on Kate’s shoulder. She knew it wasn’t just Isla’s news that unsettled her, but the rest. The future they kept avoiding.
They acted like Abby hadn’t failed to make plans, and like Kate wasn’t firmly set on her own separate path.
Like they weren’t a secret, like they wouldn’t remain a secret, at least to her family so long as Kate stayed in the closet, which she didn’t dare leave.
Like moving to a different city together didn’t seem recklessly fast and desperate, but like long distance didn’t leave them just as doomed.
“How about you?” Abby asked.
Kate rested her head atop Abby’s and laced their fingers together. “I’m not sure if talking to Luca made me feel better or worse about Berkeley. I thought getting in would be the hard part. It sounds like everyone’s so cutthroat and competitive.”
“So, you’ll fit right in.”
Kate’s mouth dropped open as she shifted to face her. “I will not.”
Abby grinned and Kate couldn’t help but mirror it. “Please—under that sweet, calm exterior, you are super competitive.” She tickled a few fingers up Kate’s side and she laughed while she swatted them away. “Need I remind you about our little clash over shortstop?”
“That wasn’t my fault! You weren’t supposed to show up.” Kate chuckled with Abby’s hands twisted into hers. She tilted her head, swooning for those big eyes and tempting lips. “Though now I’m glad you did.”
“Me too.” Abby drew her closer. “I love you so much.”
“I love you too.”
They kissed slowly but deep, unfurling into each other across the couch. Kate always craved Abby’s weight on top of her and the pressure of her rough but careful hands, holding her down. It counteracted the lightheaded sensation that accompanied Abby’s lips skating along her neck.
Unlike the rest of their peers, Abby never treated her like a fragile virgin, incapable of lust. She eased her closer to it, awakened more in her, bringing her to a place unfamiliar but safe.
Even without fully stripping each other down, Kate grew to know the nature of Abby’s desire too.
Her hitched breaths and tight limbs. The way her hips bucked when Kate’s thigh slid between them.
She knew a kiss beneath her jaw conjured a long sigh.
Most of all she knew Abby would stop herself before ever making Kate uncomfortable.
And that night, as they lost themselves in lips, their skin balmy in the warm apartment, a sensual pulse overtaking her lower stomach, Kate knew something else. She wanted all of Abby. She wanted to have her always.
“Come with me.” Kate pulled back as the idea struck her. It might’ve been a nonsensical byproduct of arousal but had also been budding for weeks. “Come to Berkeley.”
Abby’s gaze flickered. “What?”
“Play your last season at Cal.” Kate nodded, cupped her cheeks, growing more certain as the plan grew roots. “I can even tutor you through grad school.”
Abby gulped, her face falling with what Kate hoped was relief and not despair.
“You won’t have time for that,” she said.
Kate smirked. “No. I won’t.”
“Berkeley isn’t interested,” Abby said, though she grinned now.
“They will be if they know you are. Plus, Skip will put in a good word. He’d help you play for the Yankees if it means you’ll help him win gold.”
Abby brushed back Kate’s hair, eyes turning glassy. “You’re serious? You really want me to come?”
“I want all of you,” she whispered before pulling her back down.
Even after consent, Abby moved with caution.
She carefully suckled Kate’s throat, drawing out moans, but it was Kate who dipped her hands beneath her shirt first. And Abby, ever accommodating, removed it.
Kate shivered. She’d filched glances before, on the road and in the locker room, but never like this.
Never did she permit herself to ogle, let alone trace her breasts and the ripples along her stomach.
When it was Abby’s turn, her hands at the clasp of Kate’s bra, she pulled back for the question she would ask over and over that night. “Is this okay?”
Kate nodded. “Yes.”
Her bra disappeared in a flash. Kate resisted rolling her eyes at how easily Abby did it with a snap of her fingers because, in another flash, a light graze moved across her nipple.
She held her breath, stiffened, then thawed under the touch.
Abby massaged her breasts, tender enough for trust, but bold enough to build her up to more.
To harder kisses and heaviness, as if to match the hammer in her heart.
When she adjusted to the thrill, leaving her certain of the next step, she drew back for two important words.
“The bedroom,” she whispered.
They kissed on the bed, and then it was time for Abby’s bra.
Kate fumbled on the first try, a little shaky, but Abby never stopped kissing her.
She simply reached back to help. Kate shivered at the first trace of her breasts.
At Abby opening Kate’s hand to grab more.
At their chests pressing together and heaving as one.
And between the shallow breaths, Kate knew she needed the rest. All of Abby’s skin on her skin.
Their legs linked, so that a light, equal pressure hit the perfect spot, and when Abby’s hand paused at the hem of Kate’s dress, she nodded.
“Don’t stop,” Kate whispered.
But Abby paused anyway. “Are you sure?”
Kate grabbed her cheeks and pulled her face back down, bringing their foreheads together. “I want you.”
Abby’s chin wobbled before the corners of her mouth twisted upward. “Okay,” she whispered. “But we can stop whenever you want.”
“Abby.” She caught her breath and smiled. “I don’t want you to stop.”
In response, she groaned a rough, sex-charged rumble that lit fire in Kate’s stomach.
Abby’s hand made a slow journey beneath her dress, settling at her hip, fingering the edge of her underwear.
Kate wished she hadn’t worn something so chaste, cotton and sexless, just as she also wished that she’d shaved, but she hadn’t planned for this.
In fact, she was certain that if she had planned for it, set a date and discussed it, she might’ve backed out.
Plunging in, playing the game without that mechanical form, was exactly what she required.
More questions, more yeses gasped into Abby’s mouth, and soon her underwear slipped away. Her clothes vanished. She was naked for the first time with someone else. The first hint of fear hit her. But Abby met her in the same place. Removed her clothes and lay beside her.
“You’re beautiful.” Abby traced her cheek, eyes ablaze and a little watery.
Kate swallowed through tightness in her throat. “So are you.”
They stayed there a beat, facing each other on their sides.
If Kate ever doubted her sexuality, for all the times she told herself it was just infatuation and curiosity, this confirmed otherwise.
The curves, lines, joints, the plush and taut that could only be of a woman, left her ravenous.
She craved it, dripped for it, nearly balked at its beauty.
Kate gasped when all of them aligned and touched.
Abby kissed her forehead, confirmed she was okay as Kate caught her breath in her neck.
They stayed there, arms around each other, as if adjusting to new waters in the light sweat and shaking.
When her body leveled out, she cupped Abby’s cheeks and nodded.
Then Abby touched her. Two, maybe three fingers, she wasn’t sure.
They skated across in a precise, slick stroke and Kate moaned from somewhere deep and unknown.
She clutched Abby’s back and buried her face in her.
Abby asked again, and Kate could hardly choke out, “Yes.” Her hips choked it out too, pushing, searching for those fingers.
And when they returned, her ever-active brain short-circuited, bringing it to the most beautiful of silences, allowing the rest of her to simply feel.
Her hips widened to welcome the pressure, the careful circles, and the dance that her body somehow knew the rhythm of.
And just as she fully freed herself, eyes sealed, her mouth parted for an unavoidable hum, Abby brought herself lower.
A gentle suck on her breasts, then a trail of kisses down her stomach, and lower, until another move would bring her to the very spot.
Fingers didn’t make her feel as inexperienced as Abby’s face inches from her. “You trust me?” She fluttered a kiss to the inside of her knee.
Kate gulped and nodded.
“You’re perfect.” Abby uttered it like a melody and followed it with a husky coax, the same one from the field. “Relax for me.”
Abby’s tongue drifted across her. She whimpered first. Then her hips released around Abby’s dark head.
She lapped her gradually, up to her center, then down to her opening, and back again.
Kate clawed at the comforter, moaning between gasps.
She thought Abby’s tongue satisfied when they kissed, but this melted her.
And then it happened. The last groan as she held on to whatever part of Abby she could reach.
Her entire body tensed against all that bliss, holding it for one breathless earthquake, before dropping into weightlessness.
All that was hard turned soft. All that was loud turned quiet.
A second of nothing that became her everything.
When she returned, Abby held her. Kissed her temple and murmured into her hair. “I love you.”