Five

By the time we step out of Northside Grill, not only has night fallen, the temperature has as well. A warm autumn day has given way to a chilly, clear evening, and I have to stop and inhale a deep breath of the crisp air. It’s cold enough to sting the back of my nose, but in a good way.

Next to me, I see Esmé quickly hide a small smile. “What?”

She shrugs. “You’re cute, huffing New England like that.”

I shrug back. “San Francisco definitely doesn’t feel the same when you breathe it in.”

Both Esmé’s tone and smile sharpen. “It certainly doesn’t feel like icicles stabbing you in the sinuses.”

“Well, true,” I laugh. “It smells different too. It surprised me how much I missed that pine, woodsmoke, leaf litter and oncoming winter undercurrent to everything.”

Esmé scrunches her nose. “I can’t imagine missing that.”

“Yes, well, when have you ever been away from here longer than a week?”

Esmé flinches, and I realize my own tone has sharpened past the point of civility. “I’m sorry,” I say, softly. “That was unkind.”

The tension that had suddenly frozen Esmé in place eases, and she sighs. “No… it was a fair shot.”

Rose finally comes outside to join us, her coat only on one arm as she unsuccessfully tries to punch her arm through where she thinks the other sleeve should be. Without saying anything and almost without looking, Esmé grabs the coat by the misbehaving shoulder and pulls the inside-out sleeve back into position, allowing Rose to put her arm through correctly. She beams gratefully up at Esmé before pulling her face back into a frown. “I don’t want to go home just yet,” she pouts. “It’s a lovely clear night, can we go somewhere we can see some stars?”

Esmé thinks for a second, then smiles. “I think I know a place. You down for a little side trip?” she asks, looking back at me.

“Sure,” I say. “It’s not like I have anything on my calendar tonight aside from being a charming and beautiful third wheel.”

“I will agree with the charming and beautiful,” Rose says, holding out an arm invitingly. “Third wheel is debatable.”

I let her fold me into her, noting that she is just tall enough that I can comfortably nestle my head under her chin and catch a whiff of whatever she had quickly dabbed onto her pulse points before we left; a warm spicy scent, like flowery gingerbread. “Technically I am,” I murmur, aware of my face heating.

“Except ‘third wheel’ implies something extraneous and unwanted,” Rose counters, pouting harder. “You are neither.”

If my face had been slightly warm before, it’s broiling after this.

“All right, you two,” Esmé sighs. “Can we get where we’re going before you start making out?”

I sheepishly pull away from Rose, who just winks at me and giggles shamelessly. “Where are we going anyway?”

“Little bit up the hill behind Smith,” Esmé answers.

Rose bounces excitedly. “Are we going to the playground?”

“If it’s still there. It’s a little bit of a walk, but that might be good for you both.”

Esmé starts walking and Rose and I fall in line behind her; with both Rose and I being at least a head and then some shorter than her, I’m reminded of ducklings following their mama. I glance down at her feet, specifically the strappy open toed sandals she is wearing. The heels look deceptively delicate, especially holding up all six-foot-hell-yes of her, even though Rose had gleefully pointed out their steel cores to me earlier. “How long of a walk are we talking?” I ask. “You gonna be okay in those shoes?”

Esmé responds with a positively feral grin as she stops on the corner of the major four way intersection downtown. “Wanna find out? I can probably still give you a piggyback ride.”

I get an uncomfortable flashback of a time when she had done just that. We’d been late to a mutual class, and she’d decided scooping me up onto her back and jogging across campus would be faster than if we’d both run for it separately. I had taken to being carried about as well as a cat takes to being sprayed with water unexpectedly and had no doubt drawn attention along the way by cussing her out the entire time.

I also remember riding her in quite a different way later that same day, in rather graphic detail. Maybe it wasn’t Esmé’s capillaries we needed to worry about.

“No thank you,” I mumble.

Rose snorts. “Why on earth do they call it a piggyback ride anyway?” she muses. “Like who is out here in these streets riding pigs? Insert obligatory cop joke here, I suppose.”

I laugh, and Esmé rolls her eyes. “You do have a level five magic item in your pocket that will tell you the answer,” she points out.

“Nerd,” I giggle.

“Pot,” she retorts.

Rose ignores us, already so deep in her phone that Esmé has to gently reach over to guide her forward when the walk sign finally lights up and begins squawking imperiously. “Ohhh, it was never about pigs. The term evolved from ‘pick-a-pack’ which just meant to carry something on your back. Which might have been a pig, depending on what origin story you end up subscribing to. Hey,” she fusses as Esmé jerks her out of the way of a lamppost on the other side of the crosswalk. “I would have gone around without you yanking on my arm.”

“Uh-huh,” Esmé says dubiously, “Except I have literally watched you walk directly into a telephone pole playing Pokemon Go. Stone cold sober, I might add. Which you are not at the moment.”

“True,” Rose pouts, then brightens. “At least I’m wearing sensible shoes instead of whatever that strappy nonsense is,” she says, preening over her bright purple Docs before catching her toe on a raised bit of sidewalk and swearing as she stumbles.

“And yet somehow you’re still tripping over your own feet while I’m perfectly fine,” Esmé chuckles. “Your put-downs are weaksauce when you’re drunk, babe.”

Rose positively inflates with outrage. “They are not put-downs! I’m just pointing out— mmmf.“

She is abruptly cut off as Esmé quickly turns, somehow swoops her up onto an empty bench we happen to be passing, and kisses her, taking full advantage of the sudden level placement of their faces. “No fair,” she protests.

“Agreed,” I say. “Take a -1 disadvantage to your WIS stat for an unorthodox and insidious use of terrain until end of scene.”

“I refuse, on account of GM abuse,” Esmé says, grinning. But she does offer Rose a hand, which Rose takes before hopping down off the bench. “Truce?”

“I guess,” Rose groans huffily. “Absolute rat bastard.”

Esmé laughs as she turns the next corner, causing both Rose and I to rapidly course correct. “I love you too,” she says over her shoulder.

Rose puts up both her middle fingers, but there’s no heat behind the gesture. “You’re lucky you’re gorgeous,” she mutters. “Was she always this infuriating?”

“I told you how we got together,” I giggle. “That should answer your question.”

Esmé’s face turns pink. “Which version?”

“Oh, the uncensored one.” I scrunch my face up, screwing my voice squarely behind my nose. “We wish to welcome you to Munchkinland,” I sing pointedly in her direction.

“Ah, shit.” She instinctively ducks her head, momentarily forgetting that her hair is pinned up and useless for hiding her rapidly reddening face.

Rose chuckles. “It’s all well-deserved punches to the teeth under the bridge at this point, isn’t it?”

Esmé sighs. “I’m allowed to regret being an asshole. And I was, back then.”

“Back then?” I mutter, then laugh as I hear Rose say the same thing simultaneously. “Jinx,” she immediately chirps.

“Goddamn it.”

Rose wags a finger. “You don’t get to talk until I say your name. Or kiss you,” she adds wickedly.

Esmé rolls her eyes. “I can just go home if you’re both gonna be like that,” she says, jingling the car keys.

“You’d miss us,” Rose immediately shoots back, unfazed.

I nod and point at her, confirming the validity of the point.

Esmé sighs, pivots on her toes, and keeps walking. Rose, laughing, pecks me on the cheek. “Saoirse,” she says into my ear for good measure.

I turn my head to the side and up, and she makes a soft surprised sound as my lips brush hers. “Hey, now,” she giggles, pulling away. “Esmé said wait until we get where we’re going.”

“Oh for fuck’s sake,” Esmé grumbles in front of us. “I swear, next time one of you gets to be designated driver. I don’t think I can deal with both of you being twitterpated lumps of giggly jello again.”

Rose and I exchange a glance and a smile, and without any coordination, simultaneously step up to hook one of Esmé’s arms in ours. “You could just ask to be included next time,” I laugh.

“She could,” Rose agrees from Esmé’s other side. “But that would involve actively identifying something she wants and then asking for it.”

“Hey. Getting better about that,” Esmé scowls.

“Yes, you are.” Rose drops a kiss on Esmé’s shoulder. “There’s always room for improvement, though.”

I smile up into Esmé’s thunderous face. “I think you’re doing amazing, for what it’s worth. I remember what you were like before, and it’s really nice to not have you follow up every single request with ‘is that ok?’ ‘Cause it always was. Still is.”

Esmé’s face eases. “Thank you,” she says softly, meaning it.

We walk for a little bit arm in arm. No one else is walking down this particular street at this hour so we’re free to keep doing so without worrying about blocking the entire sidewalk. I hold onto Esmé’s arm, enjoying the brisk October chill on my face contrasted with Esmé’s warmth radiating through her coat. She always did run hot, and I briefly wonder if Rose also has challenges sleeping next to her in the summer.

Rose’s giggle breaks the reverie. “Speaking of The Wizard of Oz,” she says, “Y’all remember how to skip?”

I catch where she’s going with this and laugh; Esmé looks mystified, then annoyed as Rose and I stop walking while still hanging onto her. “What the —”

“Weeeeeeeeeeeeee’re…” Rose begins singing, holding the note and shifting her weight to one foot in preparation.

“Oh, fuck,” Esmé groans, finally catching on.

“Off to see the Wizard!” Rose and I sing, skipping forward and dragging Esmé along with us. She stumbles, catches herself, shakes her head, and begrudgingly joins us on the third line. We manage to get most of the way down the block before Rose detaches herself and begins running around us in circles as Esmé and I continue skipping. “I’m Toto!” she crows.

At this point I’m laughing too hard to continue either skipping or singing, but luckily we’ve reached the corner. I pause, wheezing a bit as I lean over to catch my breath. “Ooof, getting too old for that sort of silliness,” I gasp.

“While perfectly okay for walking, these shoes are definitely not made for whatever the fuck that was,” Esmé says, picking up each foot to reposition her soles.

Rose just giggles.

We cross the street after a moment or two of recovery, cross another street perpendicular to the first and walk around a sprawling Tudor building before coming to a set of chain-link tennis and handball cages. Rose and Esmé slip through an open gate, then out the other side into a sharply inclined grass field. When I catch up, I see a wooden fortress of a playground looming atop the slope, its towers poking up into the sky.

Rose lets out a small shriek of delight. “It’s still here!”

Esmé smiles. “You say that every single time we visit.”

“I’m always afraid they’re going to tear it down. Let’s be real, they probably should have a decade ago. Look at it!” She runs up and scrambles onto a small platform, the terminus of a sliding metal handle meant for someone much smaller. It still obediently scoots her forward as she swings across the ten foot gap to the opposing platform. “They don’t make playgrounds like this anymore. It’s all safe, boring plastic crap now.”

“Probably for the best,” I laugh uncomfortably, thinking of the numerous times Remi and Jas nearly caused me a coronary incident or three leaping or falling off one of the plastic structures Rose was maligning. “Less splinters and trips to the ER.”

“I guess,” Rose grudgingly concedes. “I suppose actually having kids does alter your perspective on this sort of thing. But I do miss these old wooden structures. They were coming into fashion right when I was growing up, and now they’re disappearing because some of them are as old as I am. And I guess playground architecture keeps moving onward.” She tromps merrily across a wobbly bridge of wooden planks fastened together and scoots up onto a higher platform, from which a yellow spiral slide descends. “Oh yay, stars!”

The playground is tucked into a dark area of the field away from everything else, and it’s only just light enough to pick out vague outlines of things until our eyes adjust. Once they do, Esmé and I carefully make our way up to where Rose has perched, Esmé with some difficulty because of both her height and her shoes, which she ends up unbuckling and kicking off. There’s also the issue that the platform is a little cramped for three grown adults, especially when two of them are taller than average. We make it work somehow, ending up lying in a closely woven triangle, heads pillowed on each other’s stomachs, legs in various attitudes of either braced against the platform walls, resting on the slide, or dangling off the edge.

Once settled Rose points to the zig zag of stars directly overhead. “Hey, Ez, it’s your birthmark,” she says, tracing the shape of Cassiopeia in the sky.

“So it is.” Esmé scoffs. “Still just looks like a W to me.”

I frown, trying to remember which birthmark she was referencing, gaining a hazy memory of five moles above one of Esmé’s hips, but I’m no longer sure which one. I also pick up what appears to be a celestial smudge in my peripheral vision, but it disappears when I try to look directly at it. “Think I see the Pleiades.”

“Ah yes, the cosmic thumbprint,” Rose giggles. “The Seven Sisters, which is appropriate because we’re technically on the property of one of them.”

I snort. “Oh right, Esmé said you went to Smith.”

“Alas,” Rose confirms cheerfully. “Pretty campus, met some of the best friends I will ever have here. Pretty sure the workload and the absolutely wild level of drama happening on campus on a daily basis are the reasons I’m currently in therapy though.”

“Tracks with everything I’ve heard about it. I remember some excellent house parties here from the undergrad days though.” I squint up the hill. “Pretty sure the most infamous one was in the house right up there.”

Rose giggles. “Immorality?”

“Yes! Oh god,” I laugh. “I think that may still be the least amount of clothing I’ve ever worn in public.”

“‘Least you were wearing some,” Rose snorts. “So many people just went starkers except for body paint.”

“Fuck, how did I never hear of this party?” Esmé grumbles.

“Well, I went long before we got together, but also how often did you leave Amherst while we were at UMass? Did you ever visit the other colleges?”

“Not really. I remember Pete came over here once while he and Sheryl were on a break, and the story he told about visiting put me off the idea of trekking out here.”

“Oh no, what happened?” Rose asked.

“Ehhh, something about walking alone through the quad and being ogled from literally every angle like a prize cow being sized up for slaughter.”

“Oh, well,” Rose says dismissively, “the rest of Smith isn’t The Quad. That’s where they put all the extremely thirsty straight white girls. But also aw, poor Pete, having to experience once what women go through so often it becomes background noise.”

Esmé’s mouth twists. “Fair, but in my defense, I didn’t know that then. The eggshell was still pretty solid at the time.”

“Also you probably still don’t get it as much,” I grumble. “I imagine if men had to target one of us, they aren’t going to go for the Amazon that outstrips them in almost every dimension.”

Esmé winces. “You’d be surprised.”

“Yeah, gonna have to concur with Esmé on that point,” Rose sighs. “My sister’s roughly about the same size as she is, and she just has to deal with a slightly different flavor of harassment. Let’s not even get into the racist angle.” She makes a disgusted noise with her teeth. “Sometimes a bigger woman’s just seen as a bigger challenge.”

“Or a bigger target,” Esmé adds softly.

“Ew,” I say, face reddening. “I’m sorry. And thanks for the perspective check. Sometimes I get really caught up in the ‘being short is the worst’ viewpoint.”

Rose waves the apology off. “How the hell did we even get here?”

“Seven sisters,” Esmé reminds her.

“Ah right, the Pleiades.” Rose perks up. “Get this, they’re known in Japan as Subaru.”

“Bullshit. Are you serious?” Esmé asks incredulously.

“No, Sirius is over there, I think.” Rose points up again. “Other side of Orion. Speaking of which, hello, big boy,” she adds, addressing the sky. “Looking handsome this evening.”

Esmé sighs. “Serious about Subaru, babe.”

“Swear to God,” Rose smirks. “Look at the logo sometime. But tying back to Smith, it’s appropriate considering it’s the stereotypical queer ladymobile.”

“Nice,” I laugh.

I feel more than hear Esmé’s deep chuckle as it resonates under my head. “You are an endless wellspring of random factoids, love.”

“This is why I destroy bar trivia games,” Rose acknowledges with a giggle before changing the subject. “I think the outside is definitely helping. I’m feeling a lot less buzzed. How about you, Sor?”

“I’m good. A little floaty still but not like… drunk drunk.” I turn my face back up to the expanse of sky above us. A few seconds later I feel Esmé start idly combing through my hair with her fingers. It was something she used to do before, and the gentle intimacy of it suddenly chokes me up. “This is nice though,” I say after a brief fight to keep my voice from wobbling. “I wouldn’t mind staying a little while longer if you two don’t mind.”

“I certainly don’t.” Rose wriggles a little, repositioning her legs so that one is dangling off the edge of the platform and bracing the other one up against one of the support poles. “There, that’s a bit better for long-term, I think. You ok, Esmé? You’ve got the longest torso.”

“I’m fine.”

“Like, actually fine or you just saying that because we want to stay?” Rose prods.

“Actually fine,” Esmé says, “but good looking out.”

“‘Smy job,” Rose sighs. “Stupid grown-up life. Why can’t we just stay here forever?”

“We’d get really cold,” I point out. “Also I imagine actual children want to use the playground during the day.”

“Pfffff. Imagine the people a structure is built for actually using said structure.”

“Also my leg is eventually going to fall asleep,” Esmé puts in. “I would like to request a change in venue if we’re looking at an escape from adulthood longer than, say, the next 20 minutes.”

“Ugh, I’m trying to whine about going back to real life, why are you being practical all over it?”

“‘Smy job,” Esmé echoes in a serious tone of voice before cracking a smile.

“Touché, pussycat,” Rose grumbles.

“I hear you, though,” I sigh. “There is so much right now I do not want to deal with, but am going to have to.”

“Yeah about that. How can we support you?” Rose asks. “Flirtations aside, of course… though we can keep that up if it’s a good distraction?”

I smile. “That is hella distracting. In a good way. Though I do wonder if you’re just doing it for the fun of it or if you have a greater target in mind.”

Esmé’s hand freezes in my hair, and I see her and Rose exchange one of those quick glances that seem particular to them; I am mostly just impressed they can still manage it with the almost nonexistent light.

“I don’t mind the flirting or innuendo,” I continue before either of them say anything. “I can’t say I wouldn’t be down to clown if it came to that. God knows it’s been a long while since I had any sex at all, let alone any that didn’t feel like a chore. But I’m not even sure I want anything more than that. Not just with you two but with anyone really. I think I’m a little burnt out on the committed relationship thing.” I sigh. “Even if I weren’t, I am so not ready. Hell. I haven’t even made up my mind as to whether I want to completely extricate myself from my current one.”

“Bullshit,” Esmé says. “You’ve pretty much decided, you’re just avoiding the process of making that happen ’cause it’s gonna suck.”

I glare at her. “I’m not sure I like this greater level of perception you gained post-transition.”

Esmé shrugs with a smile. “Hormones are wild. No one told me estrogen was going to notch up all of my senses.”

“That’s not what I mean.”

“No, but it’s a very convenient excuse.”

“One you are quite fond of using,” Rose groans, before looking back at me. “So what I’m hearing is let you take the lead on taking things further than just chat, but in the meantime keep on keeping on with the casual filth?”

I laugh. “Certainly a way to put that. But yeah.” I stretch forwards, easing a cramp between my shoulders, before finding one of Esmé’s hands with one of mine, and one of Rose’s with the other. “It’s the distance primarily, I think,” I say, squeezing both. “I’m curious to know what being your… not-a-third-wheel would be like. But,” I continue, looking up at Esmé, “considering an inability to do a bicoastal relationship is what broke us up in the first place…”

Esmé smiles sadly. “Yeah, I get it,” she says, her voice trailing off into a whisper.

The flashback to the last time I’d seen that expression on her face is sudden, vivid and painful: standing just outside of the security checkpoint in Bradley Airport, my whole life in the process of shipping across the country, and me about to walk away from the person I loved for a very very long time, if not forever. There’d been a tight, almost desperate hug, a last lingering kiss, and then we’d let each other go. I remember crossing into the checkpoint area and looking back to see Esmé, in boy mode, her hand still up waving goodbye, a brave but sad smile on her face even as tears streaked down it.

It had taken every ounce of will I had to keep walking rather than run back across the belt and stanchion barrier and into her arms, but I had managed to march through the checkpoint and onto the plane, forbidding myself to fall apart until we were taxiing to the runway. It was kind of funny, looking back; everyone sitting around me had of course assumed that the near silent yet nevertheless ugly meltdown I’d had once there was no chance of turning back was due to an extreme fear of flying, not a fairly ordinary broken heart.

I blink away the memory, realizing I’d been staring at Esmé the whole time I’d been caught in it. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, throat suddenly too tight to speak normally, unsure whether I’m apologizing for the staring, for leaving her in the first place, or for whatever had just been proposed and rejected.

Both of them sit up and enfold me in a double hug. “No apologies,” Rose says fiercely. “You gotta do what you gotta do. I know I’ve said this before, but we’re here if you need us.”

Esmé doesn’t say anything, just presses her cheek into the top of my head as she hugs me.

I sniffle, scrubbing at my eyes with my jacket sleeve. It makes an astoundingly poor substitute for a tissue. “I’ll let you know if I do.”

“You better,” Esmé growls. Her arms tighten around me, and I wilt against her, letting her squeeze for as long as she needs to. She does let go after a minute, and very nearly sets me off again by lowering her chin to plant a kiss at the very top of my forehead. It’s something only she’s ever done, and not in a long, long time. “Cut it out, gorgeous girl, you’re going to make me cry for real.”

Somehow the three of us all end up in a huddle, foreheads pressed together. I take a deep breath, holding it until the vise of emotion stops strangling me. “You both are reminding me of the end of Labyrinth with that ‘should you need us’ bit,” I say shakily.

Rose chuckles. “The sentiment stands. And I do love that movie.”

“And David Bowie’s ‘area,'” Esmé snickers.

“Hush, you.”

“Haven’t seen it in a dog’s age. The boys are still a bit young for that much ‘area.'” I smile a little. “Would you two be willing to watch it with me when we go back tonight? I think I remember seeing it on your DVD rack.”

“Indeed,” Esmé smiles. “Been a bit for me too.”

“I’m game. And not just for area-ogling purposes, contrary to popular belief,” Rose giggles. “Shall we away, ladies?”

We somehow manage to untangle ourselves from the Gordian knot we had formed, then slide down from the tower. We take a couple minutes to help Esmé find her shoes, then set off back downtown to retrieve the car. As we walk Rose and I loop our arms though Esmé’s again, giggling once we notice what we’ve both done.

“Please, no more skipping,” she groans.

“Of course not,” Rose pledges solemnly before catching my eye behind Esmé’s back and grinning. “Hey, Saoirse?”

“Hmm?”

“‘You remind me of the babe.’“

“Oh, hell,” Esmé mutters.

We mostly ignore her as we both start singing “Magic Dance,” trading off the different parts when they come up. Esmé joins us after a bit, dropping her voice to do that one baritone goblin’s line, then following up with a shockingly good impression of a cooing baby at the appropriate moment, both of which delight Rose and I.

The inconvenient and uncomfortable reality of being a grown up can definitely wait until the morning.