Chapter Text
Willow usually prides herself on not falling victim to her deepest desires.
After spending the greater chunk of her teenage years yearning, she eventually learned that some things she’ll always miss by an inch. She stopped feeling miserable and sickly hopeful about it. There are no signs, no what-ifs, no secrets kept from her that would suddenly flip her world upside down.
She made her peace with that, truly. She came out a stronger person, too. Someone who can make do with what she gets.
It’d be greedy of her to ask for anything more anyway. What she has now is already plenty. The tiny, snotty version of her with the godawful bowl-cut would be thrilled to know she made it into art school and lives with her best friend in a relatively nice apartment in New York.
The not-so-pleasant detail that she’s still just as in love with said best friend as she was a decade ago? Well, that’s just a forever-present brushstroke across the canvas of her love life.
For too long she’d tried to paint over it, except it’s too dense and thick to cover properly. It breaks through every added layer—the colors might change, but shape stays the same. At least, it’s not hurting anymore, not since Willow accepted that she can’t erase it. More importantly, she doesn’t have to keep running her fingers over it, either.
The point is, all is well. She’s happy and content. She’s not waiting for the stars to align. She hasn’t for years.
Which makes this Friday evening deeply inconvenient.
It starts with Michelle barging into their apartment with the grace of a hurricane, her curls a mess and her shirt inside out. From her front-row seat on the couch, Willow watches as she nearly trips over her own feet.
“Oh, fuck.” Michelle bumps into the shoe rack as she tries to regain her balance, prompting another few curses in all the colors of the rainbow. It’s kind of like a train wreck Willow can’t look away from, even if she wanted to.
Michelle finally straightens, then, with a grunt, she kicks the rack in a vain attempt at revenge, probably. “Fuck!”
The rack tilts and stays that way, leaning slightly to the left. Well, they ought to have tightened the bolts a long time ago. It’s only the Holy Spirit that keeps the wood panels together, which is mostly true of everything they own.
Michelle is convinced that all their mismatched, second-hand furniture is what makes their apartment feel alive. Willow, on the other hand, thinks it’s one small disaster after another waiting to happen. Case in point, if the rack toppled over now, they’d have a whole mess to clean up, but even then Michelle would probably argue that a pile of shoes by the door isn’t fundamentally different from a pile of shoes on a rack.
Most likely, Willow shouldn’t worry about that yet. The rack is still standing, after all.
Michelle toes off her shoes, and the pair of Converse stays on the floor. It would be frustrating if Willow could find it in herself to care. Except she’s too busy watching Michelle stretch her arms above her head, and she groans too, tired and maybe a little pissed. The sound ends in another cuss, something that might be ‘fuck my life’, but Willow can’t make out the words, as they’re nothing but a low murmur.
“Hello to you, too,” Willow says, and the sketchbook on her knee wobbles as she shifts into a more upright position. There. Much better. Her back sighs in relief. Well, she’s been sitting with her spine hunched for too long. Since Michelle left to meet some guy hours ago. That leads her to the next question: “I assume your date wasn’t great?”
Calling it a date is probably too generous, but Willow hasn't found a better term yet. A casual sex experiment, maybe? What it certainly is, though, is a relatively recent development and just another thing for Michelle to complain about.
He smelt weird.
His laugh was annoying.
There was a huge fucking stain on the mattress—
So, really, Willow is just waiting for the routine to kick in.
Michelle takes a deep breath, and it escapes as a sigh. Only when she’s two more steps into the living room does she answer in actual words.
“Oh, no, it was great. Totally,” she says, her tone dry as ever. “Best lay of my life.”
“Bet,” Willow shoots back, and her heart aches only faintly at the implication. “I’m sorry that guys suck.”
Michelle pads further into the apartment, her socked feet softly thudding on the floor. She stops at the edge of the couch, heaves another all-too-dramatic sigh, then collapses next to Willow.
“I don’t fucking get it,” she says, her head resting against the armrest. She squeezes her eyes shut, brows furrowed as she continues, “I mean, it’s not rocket science, right? Yet these dudes treat getting girls off like it’s something you need three degrees in, and they dropped out after the first course.”
“Sorry,” Willow repeats, not quite sure what else to add. It’s easier when the ‘date’ ends in the bar, which happens a lot because Michelle is picky as hell, but sometimes, like today, apparently, it carried on. “Maybe next time?”
“But am I rightly pissed?” Michelle presses, though exactly what for Will doesn’t know. “It’s not that hard, right?”
Oh.
“I—I don’t know.”
Michelle cracks one eye open. “Don’t brush me off,” she says. “You’re gay.”
“Oh god," Willow sputters, and she knows, god, she knows how she must look right now. Her cheeks feel red, her eyes panicky and wild. What is Michelle asking for, anyway? A step-by-step manual to hand to the guys she’s hooking up with? Look, my lesbian best friend has some tips for you…
“What?” Michelle props herself up on her elbows. “Am I wrong?”
“About me being gay?” Willow asks back, and Michelle immediately cracks a smile. It helps, somewhat. The curve of her mouth is disarming, the twitch gentle. As if she’s telling Willow: hey, that’s normal, and you’re good, accepted, loved even. Maybe half of that is wishful thinking on Willow’s part, but that’s how it feels anyway.
“No, silly,” Michelle says, shaking her head. “About getting girls off. That it’s not that hard.”
Willow stares at Michelle, and Michelle stares back. Technically, it’s not a weird question. Or at least not completely out of the ballpark of their usual topics. After being friends for as long as they have, there aren’t many things left that feel off-limits between them. They’ve spent too many nights talking themselves hoarse for that.
That said, Willow always plays the role of best friend in these conversations, not the resident expert. Still, Michelle isn’t asking for a demonstration, just her opinion. Willow can handle as much.
“I guess,” she says, tearing her gaze away from Michelle’s face. She can still perceive the immediate change in Michelle’s posture, though. How she sits straighter now, waiting for Willow to continue. Okay. Okay. Okay. “It can be fairly easy if you listen and pay attention.”
“See!”
Willow knows that tone all too well. Somewhere between asking the question and receiving the answer, Michelle had already made up her mind. She’s probably a hundred steps ahead by now.
“Mich—”
“So how can this keep happening?” Michelle continues, throwing her hands up. “I know what I like. I tell them what I like. Somehow, they still manage to screw it up. I—”
“Maybe they get in their heads,” Willow cuts in, not necessarily to defend the straight male population, but to finish this conversation sooner.
Michelle narrows her eyes at her. “You know what’s crazy?”
“No, and I genuinely don’t want to,” Willow says, but god, she doesn’t want to guess either. It would be disastrous to let her mind run wild. Which would really be worse, though? Knowing or filling in the blanks?
It seems it’ll boil down to the latter, since Michelle doesn’t speak for a while. Instead, she worries her bottom lip, studying Willow. In that one long second, Willow almost convinces herself that Michelle will drop it, and that’s probably for the better.
Except she’s not that lucky.
“Well,” Michelle says slowly, “I genuinely think I'd do a better job.”
Okay, what? What, what, what—
Willow counts to five, trying to convince herself she’s overreacting. Michelle doesn’t mean it that way. She’s just ranting. Talking in hypotheticals. She has to be. Take it a step further, and Willow doesn’t need the mental image of—No. Bad, bad, terrible, enabler brain!
“You cannot say things like that,” Willow finally blurts, and that much is true, no matter how she looks at it.
“Why not?” Michelle asks, blinking at her as if Willow were the one being unreasonable. Which she is not. Surely.
The answer is simple, but how could she put it into words?
Here’s Michelle, sitting within arm’s length, her cheeks flushed, freckles dusting her nose, curls spilling over her shoulders, and that stubborn pout tugging at her lips, all while suggesting she’d probably be good at getting girls off. Which is admittedly the last thing Willow needs, now or ever.
There’s no universe in which she could tell Michelle that, so she shrugs and says, “Because.”
“You’re making a very strong argument there, Wills.” Michelle flops back against the couch cushions, eyes still fixed on Willow’s face. “I’m just saying, if all it takes is listening and paying attention, I could absolutely do that.”
The stupid thing is, Willow believes her, and because she’s apparently not as strong as she’d like to think, she lets herself imagine it. Michelle’s hand. Michelle’s focus. Michelle—No, yeah, no, she shouldn’t.
“Alright,” Willow says, shutting her sketchbook. They need to stop talking about this like yesterday. “How about we watch a movie? Maybe that’ll take your mind off your failed hook-up?”
Michelle hums. “You’re changing the subject.”
“Correct.”
“Why?”
“You reached your conclusion like five minutes ago.” Willow shrugs. “What’s left to talk about?”
Because there’s still some fairness left in the world, Michelle seems to consider it. She furrows her brows, staring into space, and Willow can practically hear the thoughts bouncing around inside her head.
“I guess you have a point,” she says, sounding almost defeated. Her gaze drifts, meeting Willow’s, and the corners of her mouth twitch into a smile. “So, movie?”
It makes Willow dizzy how quickly relief unfurls in her chest. They’re back in safe waters. Familiar waters. Thank god.
“You probably should shower first,” she says, gesturing at Michelle’s whole frame. “Put a shirt on the right way, maybe?”
“Oh, shit,” Michelle gasps, tugging at the hem, but only a second later she’s looking at Willow again. She barrels on like a bulldozer. “This is just further proof. I couldn’t even bother checking my clothes, I just wanted to get the fuck out of there. It was that bad, Wills.”
Willow snorts, because she knows how to navigate this. “Yeah, I think we already covered that.”
“Can’t say it enough,” Michelle sings as she stands. She stays by the couch, though, bottom lip caught between her teeth, staring down at Willow.
There’s something about her gaze, a weight to it, that makes heat curl low in Willow’s belly. Maybe that’s why she breaks so easily under the scrutiny.
“What?”
“Nothing, just—” Michelle takes a step backwards, then another. “I’m thinking if I were a guy, I'd be every girl’s dream girlfriend.” It comes out of her in a rush, so fast it almost gives Willow whiplash. Uh-oh. Oh no. Maybe it’s all written on her face, because Michelle frowns and adds, “Boyfriend. Whatever.”
That correction doesn’t help at all, but luckily Willow can freak out on her own as Michelle bolts for the bathroom.
She waits two solid seconds before pressing the heels of her palms into her eyes. It doesn't help. If anything, it makes things worse. Now she’s staring at the inside of her lids while her brain replays the conversation from start to finish. Oh, and what an annoying finish it is.
Every girl’s dream girlfriend. Boyfriend. Whatever.
Oh god. Who says that? Well, Michelle, apparently. Okay, no, it’s fine. So, so, fine. There’s a box for this; it’s ancient: ‘Michelle Wheeler, straight best friend, do not touch’.
In goes the girlfriend comment, the boyfriend correction, the whatever. Especially the whatever. The traitorous thought that ‘girlfriend came first’ immediately tries to climb out, so Willow shoves it down even harder.
Done.
She spends the next twenty minutes trying her darn best to think of anything else. Her first attempt is to return to her sketchbook and work some more on her hand study. Except the hands are all slender, with long palms, prominent knuckles, and bony fingers—Uh. Nope.
In the end, she just lies across the couch, one arm thrown over her eyes, and waits for her brain to get bored. Eventually, it happens, because, again, she’s good at this. She has a decade’s worth of practice.
What she doesn’t understand, though, is why all that skill is being put to the test now.
See, when Michelle reemerges from the bathroom, her hair is still damp from the shower, and she’s swapped her jeans and inside-out shirt for an old tank top and a pair of sleep shorts. On paper, that’s not something that stops Willow in her tracks anymore, except she can’t not look now.
Because Michelle is all bare legs and bare shoulders, freckles everywhere, and Willow kind of wants to trace the invisible lines between them. With her fingers. Maybe with her mouth.
Oh?
Willow sits up so quickly that Michelle gives her a puzzled glance, but luckily she doesn’t comment on it. Instead, they settle on the couch side by side. Willow pulls her legs to her chest as Michelle chooses the movie. There’s some conversation, easy and normal.
All is well, Willow reminds herself. Everything is fine. The stars are not aligning, and if her heart happens to skip every time Michelle laughs at something on screen, well, that’s hardly new.
By tomorrow, Michelle will have forgotten half of what she said anyway.
A whole week passes, and Willow herself almost fully gets over it and loses sight of their discussion about the female orgasm, about whether it is easy to deliver.
Scratch that. She’s over it. Full stop. Losing sight of it, on the other hand, proves to be a much more difficult task. It’s not that she’s actively thinking about it, but somehow it lingers in the back of her mind like a pebble in her boot. No matter how hard she shakes it, it stays stuck.
The worst it gets is when Michelle is close. When she places her hand on the small of Willow’s back as she reaches for her mug in the drainer. When she leans her head over Willow’s lap while they watch TV. When she marches into the bathroom while Willow is sitting in the tub because she’s in a hurry and needs to brush her teeth.
All these things have been happening for years because Michelle has no real concept of personal space, or boundaries, for that matter. On paper, Willow is used to it. She doesn’t stop any more to micro-analyze every touch or gesture. Except that now she kind of wants to, and that is concerning.
Maybe, possibly, she’s not over the discussion either.
She rolls over and presses her face into her pillow. If she were a weaker woman, she’d be screaming into it, but she tries to maintain some dignity, so no, she can’t do that. She just stays there until her lungs ache for air, and even for a few seconds more, before she tilts her head to the side.
She takes a shuddering breath.
It’s not fair.
Michelle can write in her room in peace, without giving a second thought to the bullshit she was spewing, while Willow here is losing brain cells over it. She’s just about to reach for the last portion of weed hidden in her nightstand, which she keeps for emergencies, when the door of her room slams open.
Not fair. Not fair. Not fair.
“I need your insight,” Michelle announces, and Willow can’t even protest. She’s already hopping on the bed. “Scoot over.”
In a lot of ways, Willow considers herself a strong person. See, she didn’t even scream earlier, but Michelle is giving her best puppy eyes right now, and some all too familiar feeling in Willow’s chest tightens, willing her body to move before she can decide.
Michelle flops onto her back, and technically there’s just enough space for them not to touch. The bed is big enough. Yet Willow can’t bring herself to shift closer to the wall. This way, their arms are pretty much lined up, shoulders pressed together.
For a long, stuffy second, neither of them speaks.
“Okay, I’ll bite,” Willow mutters. “What is it?”
Michelle sucks her bottom lip into her mouth, then releases it a heartbeat later as a grin blooms across her face. “Do you want to get high?”
“You said you needed my insight,” Willow says, working herself up on her elbows to look at Michelle properly.
“That I do, yes.” Michelle nods, then she does something utterly unfair, after already being that by coming here. She lifts her hand and tucks a strand of hair behind Willow’s ear. “But first I need to create the right environment.”
Her fingers skim along Willow’s jaw, absent and feather-light. Normally this wouldn’t even register. Normally Willow doesn’t have the words ‘I genuinely think I'd do a better job’ flashing inside her head like a neon sign.
“And the right environment is us being high?” Willow sputters, but even to her own ears she sounds nothing but a squeaky toy.
“Yeah, don’t you trust me?” Michelle asks back, and Willow doesn’t really mean to, but she gulps anyway. Michelle seems to follow the movement, her thumb pressing into the ridge of Willow’s throat.
A break, that’s all Willow is asking for, but it seems she doesn’t care about her own well-being, as she gestures towards the nightstand.
“Alright, roll one,” she says, then shifts and moves around till she’s lying on her back, too. “You’re buying me a new batch, by the way.”
“I’ll get you a whole plant,” Michelle says, and she’s already up and about, digging into the drawer. “I’ll water it and make it grow lush and pretty for you.”
“Yeah, sure,” Willow huffs, because the idea is ridiculous. That Michelle would be able to keep anything green alive. Well, she can’t even handle it when it’s dry and chopped up. “Hey, try not to make it look like a fish.”
Michelle glances at her. “Normal people call that a pregnant roll.”
“It’s a fish to me.” Willow shrugs, her eyes drifting to Michelle’s lap, or rather to her hands.
Michelle’s fingers are nimble, faintly stained with ink from whatever she’s been working on earlier. A small scar runs across one knuckle, so old that Willow can’t remember a time before it.
Wrong train of thought.
She tries to concentrate on the rolling, and okay, the joint looks terrible. Michelle keeps licking the paper too much, pinching one side tighter than the other. Every few seconds, her tongue peeks out between her lips, brow furrowed in concentration.
The paper sticks briefly to her lower lip.
Willow’s gaze snags.
God.
Michelle wets her thumb and smooths down the seam. “Okay, I think this is the best it gets,” she says, holding it out for Willow. “First hit is yours.”
“It’s the most pregnant fish I’ve ever seen,” Willow says as she takes it, but only to appear like a normal person who didn’t spend the past minute aggressively staring at her best friend. “You know, it won’t burn evenly, right?”
“Have some faith,” Michelle prompts, then scrambles up from the bed, and beelines for the window to pull it wide open. The sounds of the city stumble inside the room along with the cold evening air. On the way back, she picks up a glass jar from the desk. “C’mon, why don’t you light it?”
Willow tilts her chin towards the nightstand. “You didn’t give me the lighter.”
Now, Michelle would have every right to call Willow out. How she could’ve reached for the drawer and get the lighter herself. Except Michelle doesn’t do that.
“Oh, sorry,” she says instead, and grabs Willow’s starry-patterned lighter.
It takes one flick of her finger before the flame flares up, and another second for the joint to sizzle into life as Willow inhales around the filter. She holds the smoke in her lungs, counting up to seven.
“Thank you,” she breathes out.
The white waves curl between them, slow and languid. Michelle leans forward, her eyes a little wild as she steals the joint from Willow for a drag. They pass it back and forth in silence for a few minutes until Willow’s head feels heavy and her body like jelly.
Or maybe the latter is not about the weed, but about Michelle lying right next to her, with her touch lingering at every handover.
“Okay, the right environment is set,” Willow mumbles, probably taking the last drag of the joint. Still, she hands it back to Michelle. “What do you need my insight on?”
Michelle hums. She drops the joint into the glass jar, watching the flame die down. “I’ve been thinking a lot.”
“About?”
“What we talked about last week.”
“We talked about a lot of things.”
“It’s this one specific thing,” Michelle says, then a deep breath later, she adds, “Getting girls off.”
Alright, cool, so Michelle hasn’t forgotten about it either. Maybe being high is indeed the right environment for this conversation, because otherwise there’s no way Willow could survive it.
This way, she can just shrug and ask, “Aren’t we done with that?”
“No, yeah, maybe not? Let me tell you about my thought process—”
For Willow, it’s a blur of truncated sentences and words bitten in half, but maybe the main problem is that she can only focus on the way Michelle’s lips move rather than on what actually leaves her mouth. It goes on and on for a good while, and, cross her heart, Willow tries to scramble back up onto the train, except, well, she’s not sober enough and Michelle is hot as always and—
Michelle flicks her forehead. “So what do you think?”
“Huh?”
“Oh god, you completely zoned out on me!”
Willow turns to her side too, so they’re face to face, mirroring each other.
“It’s your fault,” she says, or rather whispers, for a reason unbeknownst to her. “You wanted to smoke first.”
“Yeah, I forgot what a cheap date you are,” Michelle says, scooting closer, her hand coming up to catch a strand of hair. Again, nothing to overthink. She’s just gets like that, more touchy and weirdly keen on playing with Willow’s hair whenever they end up in these conditions. “Anyway, I’m starting over, concentrate.”
Willow hums. “Go ahead.”
“So at first, I was thinking I’d have an advantage,” Michelle says, and honestly Willow already has a hard time following. The words register a moment too late, and it seems she’s replying, but she can’t tell if she’s just thinking it or the thoughts are translated into spoken words.
“Advantage on what condition?” Okay, yeah, they’re probably out and loud.
“That I’m also a girl,” Michelle explains, and she tugs at the strand that’s now curled around her finger. “Keep up, Wills.”
“But different girls like different things.” Willow’s not entirely sure why she’s entertaining the argument, but then Michelle’s knee bumps into hers, by accident or on purpose, it doesn’t matter. It still pushes all the remaining rationality out to space.
“Exactly!” Michelle half-yells, but it’s still too loud. Makes Willow flinch away an inch. Until Michelle’s hand slides to the back of her neck to pull her right back. “Sorry. But yeah, exactly. It’s one thing that I know what works for me, but you, for example, I’d have to ask or figure it out.”
Oh god.
“Me?” Willow gapes, unable to keep the images away from flooding her mind. It’s completely involuntary, out of her control how in her head Michelle moves closer, pushes her onto her back to crawl over and—Please, no. Willow presses her thighs together, willing herself to stop trembling.
“Yeah, for example,” Michelle repeats, shaking her head. “So technically, I don’t have a head start.”
Willow squeezes her eyes shut, lips parting around a sigh. What heinous crime did she commit in a past life to go through this now? She draws another exasperated breath, letting the oxygen flow through her lungs in a vain attempt to ground herself. It doesn’t help one bit.
“No, yeah, but riddle me this,” she starts, lifting her gaze to meet Michelle’s curious eyes. “Why do you care?”
That seems to do the trick, because suddenly Michelle looks taken aback. With her mouth working around nothing and eyes widening comically so.
“What?” is all that finally makes it out of her.
“You’re hooking up with guys, right?” Willow asks, gesturing at the space between them. “So maybe you should focus on getting those guys to understand what you like, and not—thinking about what would you do if you’d, well, what? Having sex with a woman? I don’t get it. Why are you so obsessed with this?”
For another long, stuffy second Michelle keeps her quiet. Her eyes dart around Willow’s face as if the answer were written there, but she couldn’t translate the words. Actually, it might be Willow who’s unfamiliar with the language they’re currently speaking.
“I guess, it’s an ego thing,” Michelle ends up saying, which clears up exactly nothing. Or well, no, it actually explains a whole lot. Of course, it’s an ego thing. It’s always that with Michelle, in one way or another.
For Willow, though? “That still makes no sense to me.”
“Look, I don’t know.” Michelle shrugs. “It’s just important to me.”
In that nervous flutter of Michelle’s voice Willow hears the truth. She truly doesn’t know. Still, it’s not enough.
“What is?” Willow presses. Unfortunately, literally as well without meaning to. She ends up too close. Close enough to see even the faintest freckles over Michelle’s nose, the golden specks in the darkness of her eyes. Except Willow is there now, and she has to finish what she started. “That you’d be good at getting girls off?”
“Yeah? No?” Michelle sputters, and her grip tightens over Willow’s shoulder. “It’s—”
“Oh god, you’re so weird,” Willow cuts in, because whatever Michelle was about to say probably would do no good to Willow’s already crumbling sanity. “Either way, you’ll never know.”
“What, why not?” Michelle asks, and she sounds almost incredulous now. As if the answer weren’t utterly obvious. Still, Willow will gladly spell it out if that’s what it takes to push the conversation over the finish line.
“Because we can talk about this all night,” she starts, scrambling up till she’s sitting cross-legged with enough space between them to think. “And like, we could claim that in theory you’d be good at it.”
Yes, sound argument, except Willow can’t escape the proximity. Michelle follows, mirroring her in the position and once again their knees press together.
“Okay?”
Willow shakes her head. She can still do this. It’s something she thought about before, after all. On sleepless nights when she was a more hopeful, more pathetic version of herself.
She lifts one hand, ticking them off one by one. “You’re attentive, focused and pretty stubborn.” She could go on till her fingers run out, but maybe three is just enough. “Which could mean something, I guess, but that’s it.”
“What do you mean, that’s it?” Michelle cocks one brow. “You’re already proving it.”
“May I remind you, it’s still just a theory,” Will says, forcing her face and tone into something resembling disinterest. Admittedly, it’s not working as much as she’d like. “You’d never actually know unless you’re willing to sleep with a woman.”
In approximately two seconds, Willow regrets opening her mouth and joining this debate. Partly because the words escaping her register in her head, and what is she even thinking speaking her most securely locked-up fantasy into the world? Mainly because Michelle doesn’t seem repulsed or scandalized by the idea. If anything, she almost looks—Willow doesn’t even dare to name it.
Michelle tilts her head. “Huh.”
“Don’t do that,” Willow warns, which at least prompts a breathy laugh from Michelle, and she flops back onto the bed, her hair spreading out on Willow’s pillow like a dark halo.
“I’m not doing anything,” she says, but it’s so obviously a lie.
“You’re thinking.”
“That’s your fault,” Michelle shoots back, her lips stretching into a grin so wide it’s baring teeth. “Because let’s say I do that. Sleep with a woman, I mean.”
Admittedly, Willow’s stomach performs an entire gymnastic routine. “You wouldn’t.”
“I could, hypothetically.” Michelle shrugs. She lifts her hand, shifting over the mattress until she can place it over Willow’s knee. “This hypothetical woman should be someone honest, someone who tells me if I’m good or not.”
“I’m done with your hypotheticals,” Willow says, the words coming out choked and wobbly. Her cheeks are burning, and god, she wishes she could evaporate, curl towards the ceiling like the smoke of their joint earlier.
“Someone I trust,” Michelle, ever the oblivious, adds. Her thumb presses into Willow’s leg, drawing slow circles into the skin. “Someone I can tell it’s for testing a theory without it being weird.”
“That would be weird with anyone.” If only Willow could sound truly bothered, not just flustered.
Michelle hums, her eyes on her own hand as it travels higher onto Willow’s thigh. “With you it wouldn’t be.”
Willow’s breath catches. Good god. How did they even end up here? Where are they, anyway? What’s Michelle implying is—no, no, no.
“You’re talking about having sex with me,” Willow blurts, panic settling in her stomach at once. She’s jumping to conclusions. She must be. She’s making everything awkward and—
“Yeah,” Michelle says, still smiling. Her hand is still on Willow’s thigh. “I am.”
Maybe Willow suffocated herself with her pillow twenty minutes ago, and this is nothing but a weird purgatory where they’re trying to decide whether she’d make it into the good place.
“Michelle, that’s crazy,” she whispers. Yeah, that’s the right answer here. She’s passing the test.
Michelle flutters her lips. “Why?”
“Because it’s me,” Willow says, gesturing at her entire frame. On instinct, Michelle’s eyes follow the movement, drifting from Willow’s chest down to her lap.
Finally, her gaze lifts to meet Willow’s. “I know it’s you.”
Willow’s heart leaps into her throat, beating so hard, so loud.
“And that’s not weird for you?” she forces out, somehow, talking around that pathetic excuse for an organ.
“Not really,” Michelle says. “Is it weird for you?”
Willow can’t answer that. It’d demolish ten years of hard work.
“Imagine it,” she says instead, because Michelle is being impossible. If Michelle actually pictures it, she’ll finally realize that, too. She’ll see how absurd this conversation has become. She’ll remember that Willow is her best friend. She’ll recoil.
Michelle’s brows pull together. “Imagine what?”
“Us—like that.” Willow gulps, squeezing her eyes shut. She’s simply incapable of finishing that thought and looking at Michelle at the same time. “I’m naked. You’re naked. We’re—having sex.”
For a long, long moment, Willow can only listen to the blood roaring in her ears and to the screaming of some sober part of her, deep in the back of her mind. Unfortunately, she’s doing exactly what she asked Michelle to do. That she should’ve predicted, honestly.
It’s not the whole thing because her brain refuses to cooperate to that extent. It offers flashes instead. The weight of a hand settling at her waist. Warm breath against her neck. A laugh, low and breathless.
Willow exhales, and the sound that escapes her is mortifying at best. Her eyes fly open with it, which, really, is only one of the many mistakes she’s made this evening. Except this particular misstep steers her straight into the trap of looking down at Michelle. At the flush of red climbing her cheeks. At the slight part of her lips.
“Mich—”
“I—”
They stop at the same time. Willow swallows around the lump of her heart in her throat, takes another breath, letting it escape her in a loud, sharp laugh.
“Oh god.”
Michelle groans. “Stop.”
“There you are.” Willow points at her. “This is what I was trying to tell you. The second it stops being hypothetical—”
It happens all too quickly. One of Michelle’s hands shoots up, catching Willow’s wrist. “Can you not?” she asks, still rosy-cheeked, still flustered.
“Oh.”
“Yeah.” Michelle tightens her grip once. “Thank you.”
Willow knows she should pull away. If she had any regard for her own sanity, she would. Instead, she’s staring at Michelle’s fingers wrapped around her wrist, sinking back into habits she spent far too many years learning to break.