“Yes, ma’am.”
Cherry clenched her teeth and made a face, which made Ellis laugh.
“What? It was great. I love this new angle, this new path.” She waited until Cherry looked at her. “The real life of a real lesbian.” Her air quotes were not sarcastic. At all. “It’s unique.”
“Shea said the same thing.” Cherry swallowed—Ellis saw it. Then she watched her face, watched her clearly debate whether to tell Ellis what was on her mind, and saw exactly when she decided she would. “I think this could be good. I have a lot of ideas.”
“Yeah? Like what? Tell me.” Ellis turned on the bench, bent one knee and rested it near Cherry’s thigh as she faced her, and in that moment, it hit her. Like a two-by-four to the head. She wanted this. She wanted to sit and listen to Cherry talk, listen to Cherry tell her what her ideas were, listen to Cherry give her opinions on life. She couldn’t stop smiling.
“Why are you grinning at me like that?”
A laugh burst out of her. “Sorry. I was just enjoying the moment.”
Cherry seemed to like that, to hold it and roll it around a little bit before getting back to the subject. “It’s the real life of a real lesbian, right? So I want to do recipes. Real recipes, even if they don’t work. I want to not only test makeup and clothes, but be honest about it, tell the truth. I want to go places and see how they treat LGBTQ folks. I want to mix drinks and bake cookies and go to Pride and document it all, but truly document it. No filters. No convenient edits.”
“I think that’s fantastic.” And she did. Plus, the excited light in Cherry’s eyes was contagious.
“Do you think…” Cherry nibbled at her bottom lip for a moment, as if debating whether to continue. “I think you have a unique angle, given what you and your sister went through. Would you be willing to sort of…help me? Review things before I post them? Let me know if I’m veering offtrack?”
The request took her by surprise, but her brain apparently neededno time to even think about it because it made her answer immediately. “I’d love to.”
“Yeah?” Cherry’s smile grew.
“Absolutely. Love to.”
“I think we would make a good team.”
“I think wedomake a good team.” She held out her hand, palm up.
Cherry didn’t even hesitate. She laid her palm against Ellis’s and intertwined their fingers, and it honestly felt like their hands were made to be linked together, they fit that perfectly. “Thank you,” Cherry said softly.
“For what?”
“For showing me there’s a better way.”
She took the words to heart as they sat quietly, holding hands and watching summer life around the lake, and Ellis knew one thing for certain—nothing had felt so very right in a really long time.
Chapter Twenty-six
Cherry was bummed that it was already mid-August because that meant September was just around the corner, and then they would be headed toward fall. She liked fall just fine, but fall meant winter and winter meant cold and she hated to be cold. Couldn’t summer stick around for just a bit longer?
She sat in the diner at her usual corner table working on the latest claims she’d received. She only had another half hour before she’d have to head off to her first appointment. Until then, though, she was perfectly happy to nibble on the deliciously warm biscuit in front of her, the one that had been brought to her by the very sexy fill-in waitress with the blond hair and fabulous legs. She drizzled some honey over the butter she’d spread on it and took a bite, watching as Ellis topped off somebody’s coffee and then laughed at a joke one of the old gentlemen at the table must’ve told. When those blue eyes met hers across the diner, everything south of Cherry’s stomach tightened pleasantly.
Ellis had that effect.
They’d been moving very slowly and doing a ton of talking. On the phone. Over text. Face-to-face.Slow and steady wins the race, she’d said to herself more than once. And at this point, it wasn’t even a strategy. It just was. They were learning and growing, and they were doing it together. What more could she ask for?
Ellis approached her table. “Warm that coffee up for you, ma’am?”
“Please,” Cherry said, holding up her cup. “And if you call mema’amone more time, we are over.”
“Liar,” Ellis said with a wink. She glanced around at the remaining customers and, seeming satisfied, sat down next to her. “It’s Friday.”
“All day.”
“Wanna come over for dinner?”
Cherry blinked at her. They’d spent the past month talking and meeting, but they hadn’t been to each other’s homes again yet. So this felt like a step. A big one. “I very much want to, yes.”
