The Christmas Pic

18. Jo

CHAPTER 18

JO

I miscalculated the threat posed by the peanut gallery’s burgeoning alliance. Unless Ava divulged our almost-kiss to Max, I doubt our assistants realize what’s already transpired, which makes their blind scheming all the more reckless and maddening.

Ever since our lips almost touched, Ava has adopted a cold, overly professional demeanor that has led me to second-guess the entire day at the mall and the dinner at my mom’s. I find myself rewriting each moment in my head, trying to convince myself that every longing glance and unspoken moment of connection we shared was a figment of my imagination.

Either she's in the closet and in denial, which, no thanks, been there done that (see: prom queen Wynnie), or she genuinely didn't recognize the signals she was sending. If that's the case, then I'm utterly mortified. Don’t mind me scrambling to walk back any response I made to what I perceived as signs of her attraction.

Where does that leave us? Seated across from each other at the four-star restaurant Max booked us into, poking at our pastas and trying to fill the air with polite conversation. Somehow our cordial exchange is more painstaking to endure than the barbs we traded on Aspen’s radio show.

“When is your sister due?” Ava asks me, twirling linguini around her fork.

“Imminently,” I tell her.

“Cool.” She sips her water.

Silence.

“How’s your bolognese?” I ask.

“A little spicy,” she admits.

“Want me to call the waiter over?”

She hurriedly shakes her head. “No, it’s fine… the spice, um, builds character.”

I'm surprised; I never pegged her as someone too timid to send a dish back. But pointing that out would mean acknowledging the fire in her that appears to have been extinguished approximately twenty-four hours ago. I’m not ready to dig into that.

Instead, I watch her grimace and take another heaping bite.

I rack my brain for something else inoffensive we can discuss to pass the time.

“Jolene Bean!” Thank goodness. Jamal Clements, one of my good friends since high school, strides over to our table in his maroon apron, saving my ass.

“And who’s this lucky lady…?” He sees Ava and I watch the recognition land. Thankfully he’s got enough upscale dining finesse (and self-awareness) not to call her out.

“Ava,” she offers, sputtering a bit.

“Ava!” he exclaims. She gives him a weak smile. “Well, Jo and Ava, I’ll be your server the rest of the evening, Kellan has clocked out for the night.”

He refills our glasses. “Would you like to see the dessert menu?”

Ava and I scramble to say no simultaneously and Jamal chuckles. “I take it you’ve got better plans than our chocolate soufflé?”

“Not exact–” I begin.

“Okay, well,” he leans in conspiratorially, “I’ve got a couple of extra tickets to The Jingle Balls party tonight. I have it on good authority that Captain Ho Ho Hooker will be debuting her first holiday performance of the season.”

Our local drag shows are one of the best parts of Harmony Springs, a realm of pure unadulterated queer celebration. Yet, it’s hard for me to imagine Ava fully immersing herself in such a flamboyant and unrestrained environment.

The contrarian in me runs with that thought experiment and before I can stop myself, I hear myself saying out loud, “Hand those tickets over, we’ll be there.”

Ava almost chokes on her pasta but she covers it up by chugging water.

Jamal beams. “Gorgeous! Ian says we need to stay in and catch up on wrapping presents tonight, so I’m glad they’re going to a good home.” He fishes two tickets out of the pocket of his apron and slaps them down on the table before sashaying off.

Ava stares down the two tickets like they’re going to bite her.

“You don’t have to come with me,” I tell her, suspecting that the challenge in my voice will speak to that defiant edge within her.

“I don’t?”

“I mean, it’s fine if it’s not your… scene,” I stumble.

Something–annoyance, maybe?–flickers across her face. “It sounds like a Harmony Springs institution. I might as well continue immersing myself in the town… scene .”

“Great.”

“Great!”

Great .

The Jingle Balls is Harmony Springs’ drag house, and I’ve been sneaking into their events since I was a sprightly sixteen-year-old baby lesbian. I wasn’t even there to drink, I simply felt at home amidst the artistry and the 80s glam and the musical soundtracks and the high camp. The queens’ jubilant embrace of otherness made me feel at home in myself even when I didn’t feel like myself at home.

The bass is thumping from around the block as we approach the party. I’m thinking about the fact that neither of us is dressed right for the venue–not that the queens will care–when Ava unbuttons her cardigan and ties it around her waist, exposing her toned back and shoulders in the silky black spaghetti-strap top she’s got on underneath. My breath hitches from the sight.

A short-statured queen dressed like a sexy Tiny Tim in a Victorian-style coat over Christmas lingerie tips her beret at us. “Welcome to our holiday ball! I’m Tiny Tease, from Charles Dick- ens’ A Christmas Carol, which you’ll be seeing drag variations on all evening!”

As soon as I hand over our tickets, another queen, Ebenezer Screwed, leads us down a pitch-black hallway reverberating with the sounds of the party deeper within. Before she allows us in, she leaves us with her parting wisdom:

“There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter… and serving cunt.”

She pushes open a set of double doors and we’re blinded by the flash of strobe lights and disco balls. A remix of Pansy Division’s Homo Christmas is pumping, and queens and partygoers alike dance on the stage and catwalk that extends out across the center of the room.

It’s too noisy to speak, so I motion toward the bar and Ava nods. It’s hard to read her expression in between strobes, but she hasn’t sprinted out of here yet, so that seems promising.

We order our respective drinks of choice–a dirty martini for me, an old fashioned for Ava–and make our way into the thick of the crowd. It’s a relief to not need to make conversation. The music is loud and the bass is as intoxicating as our cocktails.

There’s a lot to take in and it feels safe to stare at strangers for once within the clipped flashes of light. Ava’s eyes roam the space as she sucks on the thin black straw of her drink. There are people of all genders grinding on one another, making out, dancing by themselves and in conga lines. A hauntingly good Jacob Marley queen dances with chains on stage as the music builds even further.

"I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will… I wore it, hennyyyyyy!”

The bass drops.

“YASSSS, HUMBUG!!” someone screams behind us.

Ava downs her drink. She shakes her empty glass and nods toward the bar. Fuck it. I sling back the rest of my martini and we march to order our second drinks.

“How are you liking it?” I ask her.

“WHAT?” she responds.

“HOW ARE YOU LIKING IT?” I yell.

She gives me two thumbs up as the bartender hands us our cocktails.

“I love your app!” they shout at Ava over the bar. “Don’t let the haters get to you!”

She beams at them as they line up a rack of tequila shots. Behind us, Tiny Tease drops out of the ceiling from a swing.

“God bless us!” she hollers, popping the end of her crutch open, turning it into a confetti cannon. POOF! The crowd goes wild.

Ava picks up her shot, spilling a little. “To our haters!” she shouts. Ava, the bartender and I cheers, throwing back our shots. I watch the tiny pieces of paper flutter down into her silken hair as she squinches her face.

“Sorry it’s not top shelf,” I laugh.

“Here.” She hands me a second shot from the bartender who nods our way. Another one down the hatch, I guess.

Maybe it's the alcohol, but the music gets louder, the beat taking root in my hips until I’m no longer content standing amidst the throng. I need to dance, and honestly, Ava probably does, too.

I lean in toward her, realizing this is the first time I’ve needed to put my face so close to hers. She smells like Santal 33 and fresh baked bread. Or maybe this is what two martinis and two shots do when you only eat half your pasta at dinner. Either way, it’s time to dance.

“It’s time to dance!” I shout, probably louder than needed because she flinches.

I clamor up onto the catwalk and crouch down, holding my hand out to her. She takes it, climbing up beside me and starts to move her body, and fuck, what the hell did I just speak into existence?

Watching Ava dance is pure torture. When she’s dancing, she’s not arguing with me, so that’s nice. But also. Also. The rhythm of her movements. The masterful sway of her hips. The way she closes her eyes to the music, her lips parting ever so slightly, lost in a sultry trance–I’m captivated by this version of her. I want desperately to hold her. To dance with her, not next to her, to touch her hips and pick up her pretty little hands and hold her face between my fingers. In the blur of drunkenness, I can fleetingly admit these desires to myself.

But I can’t touch her, so I channel all that electricity into my own dancing instead. The music pulses around us, a throbbing heartbeat that matches the one in my chest. We’re lost in it, hands and elbows and thighs brushing accidentally. Each contact sends a jolt through me. Fuck, I have got to get a hold of myself.

I widen the space between us and scan the dancefloor, desperately seeking a distraction to soothe my longing for the unattainable. A pixieish redheaded femme in a leather corset and mini skirt snags my roaming gaze with their penetrating one. Crooking a smile, they push through the crowd toward me with a confident stride.

"Gemma, she/her," she shouts over the music. "You're hot."

I give her a flirtatious once-over. Behind me, I can sense Ava’s gaze. I’m not sure why she’s watching me so eagle-eyed, but my bruised ego sees it as a cue to perform, to show her how swiftly I can move past her rejection.

I extend my hand, Gemma uses it to pull me closer. "I'm Jo. Same pronouns."

She’s so close I can see the tiny rhinestones she applied over her winged eyeliner. “You’re hot and you look like a steampunk wood nymph,” I tell her.

Gemma throws her head back and laughs, her top riding up to reveal a belly-button ring. She brings her lips close to mine, then pulls back teasingly. She loops her arms around my neck and begins to move to the rhythmic thumps of the bass.

I steal a glance toward Ava, only to find her… completely gone. I whip my head around, causing Gemma to take a step back.

“I’m so sorry, I need to find my friend.” I excuse myself and attempt to navigate through the throng of dancers, my head on a swivel searching for Ava. As soon as I start to move across the room, I realize I’m tipsier than I thought when I was swaying in place on the dance floor. But I’ve pushed through drunker nights and harder tasks, so I forge on.

After a mildly dizzying search indoors, I spill out into the chilly night air, scanning the street until I see her standing on the dimly lit sidewalk. Her cardigan is back on and she’s holding her phone aloft in a futile attempt to catch a signal.

"Going home?" I venture.

She turns around, startled. Her face clouds when she sees me. “Yeah. It seems like you’ve got your night figured out.” She shivers as she checks her phone again. “One Uber in this town and it’ll be at least forty minutes, or so my app said before I lost reception.”

I crack a slight smile. “Then you’re having a truly authentic Harmony Springs night out.”

Her expression doesn’t soften in the slightest. “You were, too.”

“Do you have a problem with that?” I shoot back.

Not even a flinch. “You can go back inside, Jo. I don’t need a babysitter.”

“Why are you leaving?” The alcohol emboldens me to speak my mind. “Does it gross you out, two women kissing?”

Ava scoffs. “You’ve got little Tinker Hell in there waiting to blow your mind. Why do you care that I’m leaving?”

I’d rather not get into that answer, so I forge ahead with my single drunken talking point. “You won’t answer my question. Do I have to ask it a third time?”

Annoyance flickers across Ava’s face. “No, I do not have a problem with it, nor do I find it gross ,” she says quietly.

Jeffrey pulls up in George’s car, his glaring headlights cutting through this weird, tense moment. He waves through the rolled-down passenger window. “Evening, ladies! My next rider canceled, so the George-mobile is all yours. Did that queen of mine pull off his number tonight?”

Ava offers up a compliment about George’s drag performance but I’m not listening. I’m frozen on the sidewalk in indecision as Ava opens the back door and slides in, slamming the door shut behind her without so much as a goodbye to me. After this exchange with Ava, I want to call it a night. And my place is on the way to her hotel, would it be the worst thing if I just…

“Can I get a drop-off at mine?” I blurt out.

Jeffrey, thankfully oblivious to any tension, beams back at me. “The more the merrier! Hop in, love! ”

I sit in the passenger seat, ignoring Ava in the back as the car makes its way across the snowy midnight roads of Harmony Springs. I make small talk with Jeffrey, only half-listening to his responses, the rest of my mind devoted to the confusing swirl of annoyance and frustration churning within me.

You didn’t want me, and then you’re gonna make me feel bad for being wanted by someone else? I believe Ava knows she’s supposed to say she doesn’t find girls kissing to be gross or weird, but I don’t trust that she means it. I already humiliated myself laying in the snow beside her, moving in for an unwanted kiss, so why does she need to twist the knife of rejection any deeper? My brooding sobers me up faster than an IV drip.

Jeffrey pulls up in front of my mom’s house. I thank him and get out, not looking back. I begin to walk briskly up the snowy driveway toward where Emma parked Chrissy after she shooed Ava and me off to dinner.

There are footsteps behind me in the snow. I whirl around to see Jeffrey driving off, and Ava standing in front of me, wide eyes, face flushed, expression wild.

“What are you–” I start.

Before I can process what’s happening, she pushes me up against the side of The Photo Truck and presses her warm plush lips against mine.

The moment she kisses me, my overactive mind short-circuits. Any resentment I had is drowned out by lips on lips. I try to remind myself to focus, focus, focus, to capture whatever fleeting bliss is being offered to me so I can savor it.

Her lips part ever so subtly, and I take her invitation to slip my tongue into her mouth, tasting her sweet orange-whiskey flavor. I caress my hand over the side of her head, flexing my fingers over her glossy hair. I’m not sure breathing is necessary if it means breaking this kiss even for a moment.

Ava is pressed up against me, her urgency spoken through her fingers twisting in my hair, trying to pull me deeper in every way. My hands move downward, tracing repeatedly over the swell of her hips from her waist, holding her as she squirms desperately. Our mouths still plastered together, I can feel her moan, and that unravels me. I don’t care if it’s the worst idea I’ve ever had, or if I can never have her again. I’m letting this animalistic lust take over, because life is too short not to take whatever she will give me tonight. Dignity, business, heartache be damned.

I break our kiss. Ava’s pupils are so blown out her eyes look black. “Shall we do this somewhere warmer?” I ask, my breath fogging the air between our barely parted mouths.

Ava doesn’t respond. Instead, she starts walking toward the backyard.

When I don’t follow, she turns around. “You said you had a backhouse.”

Do I? Nothing seems real right now, so I nod and let Ava Garcia-Greene lead me to my own home, where she has never been before. I might be useless, but she’s the most competent tipsy person I’ve ever encountered.

“Key?” she holds out her hand.

At the very least, I can unlock the door myself, so I do.

I try to calm my racing mind. I do this all the time. I take women back here plenty.

Ava steps inside, taking in my space, studying the artwork on my walls. She leans forward, studying my cyanotype portrait of Emma. She strolls over to an oak console and picks up the ship in a bottle my dad and I built together one summer. I have to look away.

I was wrong, having Ava in here is different. I’m exposed. Is my art stupid? Do I even have taste? I busy myself, turning on lamps for ambiance. Oh god, ambiance? Who am I?

“I’m parched,” she states, squinting at an O’Keeffe print that has never appeared more yonic.

I fill two water glasses and hand one to her. She gives me a hm. We’re past pleasantries, duly noted.

I walk over to my vinyls and thumb past Jeff Buckley and Leonard Cohen. Sexy, but more cry-after-sex sexy than hot-one-night-stand sexy. Is this a one night stand? I wish she would kiss me again and force-quit my racing thoughts.

My fingers land on Janelle Monae. Les-bingo. Dirty Computer fills the backhouse. I’m grateful for something to drown out the voice in my head telling me that this is a bad idea.

Ava comes up behind me at the record shelf. She sets down her glass of water. I turn to face her and she unabashedly checks me out, head to toe, for once not trying to hide it at all. My stomach flutters, then drops through the floor when she very slowly and deliberately lifts her silky camisole up and over her shoulders, revealing what I’ve suspected all night–no bra and the two prettiest, perkiest, perfect-mouthful tits I’ve ever seen. Force-quit, achieved.

“Oh, fuck,” I murmur. She looks smug. I can’t hold back. I kneel on the ottoman right beside the record shelf and get to work, tonguing and teasing her taut nipples with gusto.

Only when her hips begin to move desperately, seeking something more, do I pull back.

She’s offended, and I huff out a little laugh at her frustration because it’s so not warranted. I take her hand and lead her to my bed.

“Lay back for me,” I instruct, and shockingly she obeys without hesitation, her hair fanning out on my pillow.

I caress the waistband of her pants. “May I?” I ask teasingly. She nods. I hook my fingers in and pull them off, revealing her lacy red thong.

Lying mostly naked before me, Ava’s eyes catch mine and then flit away. “Jo. I…” she trails off. Self-doubt twinges in my gut.

I lay down beside her, my face next to hers. “We don’t have to do anything you don’t want. ”

She shakes her head. “I want you .” She says the final word so softly it’s practically a whisper. “I’m just… new.”

She seems almost disappointed in herself, and I can’t allow that. I lean in, offering her my lips as reassurance. She meets them halfway, her mouth trembling as our tongues start their dance again. I pull back to say, “Let me do my thing,” which elicits a tiny laugh and the cutest little blush from her. Who knew this stoic goddess could blush?

Time to wow the CEO of Gramsta with everything I’ve got.

I begin working my way down her body, peppering her with kisses on her collarbone, the round of her shoulder, the space between her breasts, each nipple, then the smooth warm skin of her belly, abs flexing beneath the surface as I run my tongue across it.

I arrive at her red panties and I inhale her intoxicating scent. I don’t take them off, opting instead to continue planting kisses over the fabric, making her squirm, desperate for friction.

“Mmm, Jo, please…” her eyes are closed and her hands are making circles on my head.

I press the flat of my tongue over her pussy through the red lace and apply pressure. I’m teasing myself at this point, too. I’m hungry to fully taste her, to hear her lose speech and go wild for my tongue. But I also want to draw this out as long as possible. I suspect this will be my one and only chance to have Ava in this way, and I selfishly want to drive her so crazy that she thinks about this night–and me–for years to come.

She’s so wet the panties have practically melted away, so I get rid of them. I pull the fabric to the side, exposing her glistening pussy and swollen clit. I swipe my tongue quickly over all of it, once, twice, three times, then plant a kiss directly on her most sensitive spot.

Ava’s hands roam my hair, twisting and pulling hard enough to hurt, except right now my pain transmutes into arousal because she simply can’t help herself .

I draw her clit into my mouth and suck ever so gently while she uses her hips to press herself against my face, asking for more. I give her what she wants–a harder suck, for about ten seconds–and she starts to moan and shake. Right on the edge where I want her. I pull back again, then drop another teasing, pecking kiss onto her pussy while she wriggles beneath me.

She’s frustrated, eyes dark, face flushed.

“Tell me what you want me to do,” I coax. I could be pressing my luck, but I can’t not indulge the part of me that needs to hear her vocalize her desire.

She gives me another moan and raises her hips toward me but I shake my head. “I want words.”

“Unnnnngh,” she whines, “I need, I need…”

“You can do it.” I give her pussy an encouraging little kiss. I can’t deny that stealing her power of speech has me feeling good about myself.

“I need your mouth. All of it. Please.” So polite.

I lick a stripe across her slit. “Like this?”

She squirms. “Mmmm.”

I think I’ve drawn out as much verbiage as I’m gonna get, so I relent and dive into her pussy, running my tongue around her opening, suckling her clit, riding the waves of her mounting pleasure with (dare I say) expert rhythm.

Soon her hips are rocking to a beat of their own, and I’m chasing the orgasm with her. When her hands begin to tighten my hair into such impossible knots that my eyes are leaking tears, I know we’re arriving, so I keep my tongue consistent and firm.

The sweetest jus floods my mouth as she cries out, letting go of my hair to hold her hands over her face as she cums beautifully for me.

I kiss her pussy three more times, for good measure, and then I army-crawl up the bed to lay beside her. Her eyes are closed, but she snuggles up against me, nestling her head under my chin.

We lay like that for a while, entwined, until I notice her breathing getting deeper and heavier.

I whisper her name. “Ava?” No response. She’s escaped into dreamland, sated and snuggled up with me.

I stay awake for a long time after, holding her as her chest rises and falls. I wish I could capture this euphoric peace and save it for later. But as sleep overtakes me, my final thought is that, come the morning light, will it all be ripped away?