Could You Be Mine?

"Here I come to save the day-ay-ay-ay," he sang with gusto as he flung open the front door.

I grabbed his sleeve and pulled him into the living room.

"Here's the deal..." I began as we sat down on the couch.

Ian's eyes got wider and wider as I talked.

"Say something," I finally pleaded.

"I guess I now know the gestational period for gay-osmosis... Twenty some years of friendship with moi and you are finally exhibiting curiosity about Sapphic love."

I whacked him with a pillow, "Can you please be serious? What happens now?"

Ian shrugged, "Honestly, nothing. This could be one of those things... I can't believe I am saying this... It could be a flight of fancy. So just see where it goes. You don't have to declare your undying love tomorrow..."

"Even though I want to..."

"Lor, if you got a crazy crush on a guy, you wouldn't make it known immediately, right? You'd scope him out, figure out if there's compatibility..." Ian got up and grabbed his laptop from his backpack, "How about we do some web-sleuthing?"

I nodded as he fired up his computer. He opened up his web browser and struck out the first couple of tries on popular social media sites. Oliver was right about one thing, RJ had no social media presence. Ian tried again, typing 'Rowan Kan gay?' into the search box. Some results came up, as did some images.

"Woah," Ian raised his eyebrows.

"What?" I felt apprehensive immediately.

Ian pursed his lips, "You've got good taste, she's hot. Like, Jenny Shimizu hot. But she's got more euro DNA. Oh... uh-oh."

"What?"

Ian pointed at the thumbnails, "Different date in every shot."

We clicked through the images, and indeed, RJ had a different woman on her arm in every photo. And the women were all stunning.

"Here's an article about her from a couple years ago," Ian had clicked onto a story associated with one of the images. I leaned in and took a look.

"She was in a 30 under 30 article? Wow!"

The article was an uber-flattering piece about RJ's success trajectory. She took two companies from start-ups to lucrative sale targets before she was thirty. I wasn't able to finish the article before Ian moved on, clicking on another more recent article about RJ joining a venture capital firm on the west coast.

"Hmmm, that was just last year," Ian scanned the article, "So why did she leave?"

He adjusted his search terms but nothing came back, "Let's go back to those multiple girlfriends."

We couldn't really find out any additional information, and I really didn't want to see any more beautiful women next to RJ, so I leaned back and tilted my head and stared at the ceiling as Ian clicked and typed.

"I never thought it an option to be closeted..."

I sat up. It was RJ's voice. "What's that?"

Ian pointed at his screen, "An interview she did with the Pride Legacy Taskforce last year. They did a series of videos of out executives around the country. Most of these photos are from the Taskforce galas and dinners over the years."

We watched the rest of the interview, and my eyes clawed at the screen, desperate to connect to the image of RJ as she talked. I found every gesture mesmerizing; I loved the way her mouth skewed slightly left as she smiled; I loved the way she talked.

Ian waved a hand in front of my face, "Are you really into hearing about her being out at work or are you just staring at her?"

I blinked, "Was I staring?"

"Drooling," Ian shook his head, "I get that she's hot, but why her? You've never been interested in women before!?"

I held up my hands in surrender. "I don't know. That's what I'm trying to figure out. It was like a switch was thrown on in my head when I saw her. Is this what love at first sight feels like?"

Ian clucked his tongue, "Slow down, Lor. This is may be just a crush. It's intense because it's the first blush of attraction. All physical, based on nothing but first impressions. And you're straight! Maybe you won't feel this way once you've spent some time with her."

I was a little hurt by how easily he was dismissing this.

"If you're not going to help me, fine. But don't tell me what I'm feeling is a phase, okay? I mean, what the fuck, Ian, isn't that phrase the standing joke about clueless parents?"

Ian looked stunned, "Oh man, Lauren, I- I didn't mean it like that. I just don't want to see you throw yourself into something completely unknown... I don't want you to get hurt."

"So de-unknown it for me, you idiot! Teach me the ways. I want to learn."

Ian squinted his eyes at me, "Have you lost your mind? I haven't gone near a pair of naked boobs since Tanya Kettler flashed hers at us the summer of whichever grade it was. I still haven't recovered..." Ian waved his hands, "But I digress. I can't teach you that stuff!"

I laughed. Ian had gone six shades of pink as he talked. "I wasn't talking about sex. I was talking about, oh, I don't even know what I am talking about. Like, how do I hit on a woman without, you know, being off-putting?"

"You want to pick up women? What have you done with my best friend?"

"I don't want to pick up women," I ground out, "I want to go out with one particular woman, and I want to get it right. Because..." I pointed to his laptop, "... she is a total enigma right now, both in terms of who she is and why I reacted the way I did. I mean, Ian, the sight of her stopped everything for me. Have you ever fallen for someone in that way?"

Ian shook his head, "No, and I certainly haven't fallen for someone who seems determined to go out with a different woman every night."

"Might not be every night," I said defensively.

Ian shrugged, "Fair, but all indications point to the fact that she's not a one-woman woman. And don't you go breaking your heart over someone who won't ever fall for you like you've fallen for her. It's a one-way trip to madness."

My stomach twisted uncomfortably.

Ian leaned over and gave me a big hug, "Leave it to you to land neck deep in lesbian drama before you've even kissed a girl!"

I went limp in his arms. He hugged me tighter, "Help me get dinner ready, I'll distract you with my dazzling culinary skills."

I looked up at him, "You're having people over for dinner?"

Ian sighed, "You said you were going to be drowning in work all week. I made plans. Come!" He gestured towards the kitchen.

Ian started pulling out ingredients and utensils. I followed, "What are you making?"

"A panoply of Middle Eastern delights. You, my dear, with your limited skills, can start on the salad."

I tried to look annoyed, but I knew he was right. I was a total failure in the kitchen. For whatever reason, any high-functioning multi-tasking ability that I could claim would evaporate the moment I tried to make food.

I picked up a knife and started chopping up the pile of vegetables Ian placed next to the cutting board. Think, Lauren, think. Don't just react. Think.

"Help me strategize," I said, mostly to myself; I processed things better when I talked out loud.

Ian was rattling away on the stove, "Are you sure you can chop and talk at the same time? I don't want to deal with missing fingers or arterial blood spatter..."

I threw a piece of chopped red pepper at him, "You faint at the first sight of blood. You'd be useless. I'd be dead by the time you returned to consciousness."

"Asshole."

"The truth hurts, my friend."

"Yeah, well, so does falling for someone who's one hundred percent not interested."

I pointed a cucumber at him, "Don't make me stick this where the sun don't shine."

Ian wiggled his eyebrows. I couldn't fight the smile off my face when I realized what I'd just threatened. "Fuck off," I protested, and attacked the cucumber with my knife.

Ian shuffled over to inspect the carnage, "Ouch," he whimpered. After a beat, he nodded, "That's a pretty good dicing job you did. Carry on, Ms. Calder!"

I rolled my eyes and kept chopping.

"So what's your strategy?" Ian slid a red onion towards me.

"Okay, here's what we know: I have one specific desired outcome..."

Ian poured a bunch of lentils into a pot, "And that outcome is?"

"Happily ever after," I said without hesitation. I surprised myself by how clearly I felt that need. It wasn't the typical, knee-jerk boy-meets-girl-white-picket-fence-and-two-and-a-half-kids happily ever after though. It was the for-better-or-worse-richer-or-poorer ever after version.

Ian's eyebrows shot up.

I ignored it and kept going, "However, there are a great number of unknowns, and deep uncertainty of whether RJ would or could share the same desire for said outcome."

"I would say it's actually a deep certainty that RJ wouldn't want said outcome."

That earned him another red pepper in the face.

I sniffed a little as I worked through cutting the red onion. The thin layers of red skin became striations of color as my knife sliced through again and again. That's it!

"I got it," I looked up triumphantly, "I got it. I just treat it like a puzzle that needs to be solved one layer at a time."

Ian handed me a tissue. I blew my nose and warmed to my theme. "First, I find a way to get as much information as possible. The more she knows about me, and the more I know about her, the easier it'll be to assess and solve for compatibility, commonalities, et cetera."

"You just described what two people with social skills do when they meet each other," Ian muttered.

I ignored him and went back to the onion, "Second, figure out what the big hurdles are and break them down between temporary obstacles and immovable issues. Third, and most importantly... I need to be clear about my walkaway terms."

"You're forgetting one thing," Ian washed his hands and wiped them on a towel, "RJ's a total wildcard. She might not go along with this three-step plan of yours."

I gave him a death stare.

"Actually, I take it all back. You have an amazing plan!" Ian put on the fakest smile ever, "Now that's all taken care of, what date should I block out for the wedding?"

I gave him an appreciative chuckle, and said, in a Boston Brahmin accent, "Ah, my darling, I predict Nantucket in the Spring..."

Joking aside, I felt better. I had a plan. Sort of.

Later that night, I laid in bed, my mind still whirring from everything. Ian's feast was delicious, and I loved spending time with his friends, despite the fact that he casually dropped in a request for the lesbians among our guests to help bring me up to speed on girl-on-girl sex. They demurred, but one of them, Jo, promised to send me an email with some stuff she said I might find 'useful.'

Honestly, I didn't need any help. My imagination was doing just fine.

Chapter 2: Simmer - Thursday

The x-rated fantasies aside, the next several days added encouraging data points to my plan of action. I wouldn't say I was being super flirty with RJ (I didn't want to be too obvious), but I was putting my best foot forward. As it turned out, me not having a gay bat signal didn't matter, because it was clear that RJ and I were definitely going to get along. She was just the right blend of sarcastic and earnest, and we picked up on each other's random quips and obscure references in a way that was deeply satisfying. Not to mention, of course, the fact that she was just delicious to look at. And to my heart's giddy joy, I felt her eyes on me several times, too. Although I might have been reading too much into it.

On Thursday morning, Ian caught me hyperventilating in our bathroom before work.

"Did you burn a hole in your scalp curling your hair?"

I flipped him the finger, "That was YOU, ass-wipe. You burned a hole in my scalp after yammering on about how you'd done it for your sisters a million times..."

He rolled his eyes, "That was, like, ten years ago. Anyway. What's your problem?"

I braced myself against the sink and dropped my head, "I have a three hour one-on-one with RJ this morning. Starts at nine. I'm freaking out... and I look like a mess..."

Ian took a discerning glance at my appearance and gave me a thumbs-up, "Nah, you look fine. Exactly the right mix of alluring and professional. Not too different from how you usually dress, but different enough to highlight your assets..."

I blushed a little as I fiddled with the collar of my shirt, "I was debating whether I'd left too many buttons undone..."

Ian waved away my concern, "It'd look too obvious if you undid more, but this is good. And your legs are killing it in those pants. Go turn some heads."

"Singular. I just need to turn one head."

Ian rolled his eyes again and shooed me out of the apartment. My commute to work zipped by in a flash and before I knew it, I was knocking on the door to RJ's office. I knew she was in there; the office was essentially a glass cube.

She waved me in, "Morning!"

I didn't think it possible, but she looked even better today than she did yesterday. Her smile almost undid me.

She frowned when she saw the massive pile of documents I'd carried in. Her eyes rested on my cleavage for a fraction of a second longer than they should have. I leaned forward a fraction of a second longer than I needed to as I laid the documents on her desk. I winked at her, "You said you wanted to get caught up. I thought I'd share the pain!"

She held my gaze and I promise you I could almost feel my clothes falling off me. At that moment, I heard myself thinking, screw the walk-away terms. If this is how she's going to look at me...

RJ grinned, "And there I was, thinking that I was just going to cruise through..."

I gave a chuckle, "I doubt you've ever allowed yourself to cruise through anything."

RJ seemed to appreciate that, "Okay, fine. So how much pain are you going to put me through? I am fully in your hands... be gentle."

I ignored the innuendo, "Depends. How finely tuned do you need your bullshit sensor to be?"

She dropped the playfulness immediately, "Bring it. I want it all."

"I thought so," I nodded my approval and grabbed an old presentation from the middle of the pile, "Let's start here."

For the next two hundred glorious minutes, I navigated RJ through my research of the firm's history of revenue sharing. She was sharp, no doubt about it. But what I appreciated more was the fact that we were entirely in synch; we were doing an intimate dance through intricate facts and figures and she never missed a step. We'd only known each other for four days, but my shorthand was her shorthand. It felt miraculous.

It was a little after 12:30 when RJ leaned back and rubbed her eyes, "I need a break."

"I think we've covered everything I wanted to," I threw my pen onto her desk, "Good job keeping up!"

Oh, she liked that.

Her wonderful smile returned, "You did the lion's share of work here. I just came along for the ride."

She looked at her watch, "How about lunch? My treat."

Oh, yes, please!

I tapped my finger on my chin and pretended to think about it, although my grin clearly indicated my enthusiasm. RJ tilted her head as she waited for my answer.

"Okay," I said, "But if you're going to treat me, I'm going to treat you, too."

"Not sure how that's going to work," RJ's head shifted inquisitively, "But you've got a deal."

Turned out it worked perfectly. We strolled down to the Food Court on the ground floor of our building and, agreeably, we both indicated the same preference for the taco bar. We scanned the menu and ordered the same thing. We paid for the orders, and then exchanged take out bags.

"My treat," I said, as I handed mine to her.

She laughed and handed me hers, "And here's my treat."

I was blissfully and totally content in that moment. We walked back up to Win-B and returned to her office.

I moved my notes out of the way, but I pointed to them as she sat down, "Do you want me to turn your changes in the model for tomorrow? I think I can get it done."

RJ unwrapped her lunch, "Nope, take your time. I'm headed to DC tomorrow - Mona's LGBT non-profit is doing its annual gala... I'm doing a panel thing for her. We can pick this back up on Monday."

"Oh - the PLT - what a great organization!" I smiled, "It's so good that kids can have role models like you... that visibility is important." I remembered how hard it was when Ian struggled with his coming out, and we were already in a better place than even ten years earlier.

RJ's head snapped up, "You know the PLT?"

Mostly because of that video they shot of you.

"My best friend's gay; the last guy I dated was bi. I've been to a lot of Pride events," I explained, and - maybe it was wishful thinking - I saw RJ's eyes register disappointment. My heart skipped a beat. I continued, "Didn't go down well with his gay friends when we started dating. They thought he was being a traitor to the cause."

RJ cocked her head thoughtfully as she finished chewing, "Seems so hypocritical."

I think I could watch RJ chew on food for days and not get bored. Her jawline was a fucking orgasm in the making.

I nodded, "Andy said it was less about 'love is love' and more about having one fewer ally in the ranks or something like that."

"Did he rejoin ranks?" RJ's curiosity was beyond cute.

I shrugged, "Don't know. He moved to Salt Lake. We broke up on good terms, but there wasn't much incentive for us to keep in touch. C'est la vie."

RJ wiped her mouth, "That's why I don't do relationships."

Oh.

My eyebrows crunched up, "What do you mean you don't do relationships?"

"Because they end. Well, first, they get complicated... then they end. I'm no good at them, and they're no good for me. So, I generally just date and have fun... but I never expect anything to work out."

"That seems incredibly fatalistic... "

RJ rubbed the back of her neck, "I think of it as being realistic. Romance is some lofty ideal that belongs in the pages of a novel. In reality, relationships lose their shine once the romance wears off."

"Not all of them."

RJ looked at me carefully for a second. It looked like a sentence was fighting to get out.

I squinted at her, "You disagree, obviously..."

"I do. In my experience, chasing after the notion that love conquers all can be futile."

What kind of eff-ed up relationships have you been in? I let out a slow breath, "Abandon hope, all ye who enter here...?"

"Nothing that dramatic," RJ's tone was gentle, but I heard the edge behind her next sentence, "I have fun and I move on. Simple."

There were about a thousand raunchy and suggestive things I could have replied with, none of which was appropriate for a work conversation.

I decided to lob out my first test probe, "You gotta go with what works, I guess..." I paused as I dug for a chip, "Maybe I've been lucky with relationships, but I have faith in romance and I buy into the idea of a soulmate. You know, a person who just gets you and wants you... in the same way that you get them and want them."

RJ crumpled up her paper wrapper and side-armed it at the trash can across the room. It hit the wall and went in. Of course it did.

"How did we get on to this topic?" She asked - a little grumpily.

"You told me you were going to DC." I replied. I crumpled up my taco wrapper and lobbed it towards the trash can. She shoots, she scores!

RJ's beautiful left eyebrow went up, "I bet you can't make that shot again with the paper bag."

"Challenge accepted; what do I get for making the shot?"

"Lunch on Monday. On me. For real this time." RJ crossed her arms and leaned back in her chair.

I mashed the bag into a ball, "Burning a hole in your wallet... as we speak..." I turned and made my shot. It hit the rim of the trash can and fell in.