Page 58 of Serpentine Valentine
Luna’s voice was worn with exhaustion and slumberous pleasure. It made me feel proud to know I’d given her that. Her first orgasm with a woman.
Of course, she didn’t know it was my first time giving an orgasm to a woman, too. It felt too enormous to voice it, to acknowledge that I’d lost another first to her even though Morgan had taken such a milestone one from me last Halloween. It felt too much like healing to thank her for the gift she’d given me, too much like leaving my rage behind to acknowledge that she was saving me much more than I had saved her tonight.
“I knew I was gay like I knew the sky was blue. I never thought to question it until someone taught me to,” I told her, giving her at least a small piece of honesty because she’d earned it with her easy trust in me tonight. To save her, protect her, andnow, to cherish her.
“Who?”
“We lived in the mountains on a homestead without most modern amenities. An outhouse, animals to tend to if we wanted milk, cheese, butter, and meat. We had alpacas and sheep to card for wool and a rainwater collection apparatus for water. It was a very earthy lifestyle, and I didn’t hate it, except it came along with a strict set of rules. No education outside the home, and the only books we had were the Bible, a practical guide to survival, my great-grandfather’s old copy ofThe Odyssey, and a children’s textbook my mum taught my brothers and I from until we were ten and old enough to help full time around the house.
“I felt caged from a very young age, which might seem strange because I had the run of our land and the forests around me. I’d escape into the trees and make up games for myself with imaginary nymphs and woodland creatures.” Absently, I stroked over the bumps in Luna’s spine, traversing them like I’d walked the mountains, peak after peak, from skull to tail bone. “The closest neighbor shared the forest with us, and they had two daughters. One of them was Penelope.”
“Was she pretty?”
I laughed a little. “No, not really. But I was so used to men with two brothers, a father, and an uncle who passed through all the time. I think I was eager for femininity, and Penelope was so sweet, so kind and fragile. I was only seven, but I claimed her for my own. I think my parents thought I meant her to be my best friend, but even back then, before I had words to label her, I knew she was more than that.”
“Do you think she felt the same?”
“Yes.” I could still remember Penelope’s big eyes as she’d asked me if I wanted to play pretend as man and wife. We didn’t know better. We’d never been taught there could be two brides or two grooms. “But my father found me one day after I didn’t come for evening chores and I was cuddled with her in a hollow beneath a tree. He didn’t like seeing us so close, even though it was innocent. He dragged me away through the dirtas I kicked and cried, promising me I’d never see Penelope ever again. Later, I heard him on the phone with her father. He called me a faggot and warned that Penelope was the same.”
Luna shivered in my arms, and I pulled her closer to me subconsciously.
“What an awful man,” she whispered.
“Yes, he was a tyrant. I think that’s why he settled us all the way out there. So he could rule uncontested over his own little kingdom. My mum was the daughter of immigrant parents from Turkey, and when they died, she had no one left. Sometimes I wondered if she was truly happy with him or if she was just more scared of being alone.”
“How did you get away?”
“I ran away four times before it took, and they stopped looking for me or calling the police,” I admitted, remembering that final time, the triumph I’d felt squatting in the library overnight, hiding until they locked the doors at closing and left for the night. “Agatha Gorgon found me one day hiding in the supply closet when she was trying to close for the night.”
“Grace, Effie, and Juno’s mom?” Luna had her pointed chin propped on her fist so she could look into my face as I told my story.
The quality of her attention felt like sunlight on my skin.
“Effie is her adopted daughter from her first marriage. She got custody because her husband was abusive. Her second husband died in a car wreck two weeks after she had the twins. When she found me, she took me in without question even though she was already raising three kids on a librarian’s salary.”
“Wow, that’s pretty amazing.”
“She’s an amazing woman,” I agreed, my heart clenching at the thought of my chosen mother. “I wouldn’t still be here without her.”
“What do you mean?” Alarm seeped into her tone, and she graspedmy chin between her wet fingers to force me to look at her. “Did you try to…were you suicidal after what happened to you last year?”
I shrugged, but the old ghost that haunted my soul gripped it tight in his fist.
“Lex,” she said sorrowfully. “I’m so sorry. Will you…I’d love to hear about what happened to you from your lips if you feel comfortable sharing it with me? I would never share it with anyone else.”
“I’m sure you know enough already. Someone attacked me the night of Halloween and left me to rot.”
There was a long pause, crackling with intensity. My skin burned where it met hers, and I gave in to the compulsion to push her off and away. Luna went without hesitation, moving to the other side of the bathtub to rest her head, but she tangled our legs together so that we made a Gordian knot.
“Someone…or Professor Morgan?” she shocked me by asking.
I blinked at her.
“I was at home the following night so I could watch the new season ofDiscovery of Witcheson Mom’s Sundance account,” she explained, keeping wary eye contact with me. “I heard her speaking to someone about what happened. That you…” She sucked in a deep breath. “That you said it was Professor Morgan who assaulted you, and you’d gone to his office to attack him in retribution the next morning.”
“Thatwasn’t my retribution,” I murmured darkly.
It was her turn to blink. “So it’s true?”
