“Like she’s.. she is like.. pretty but more,” Marlene stutters, seemingly unaware of her thoughts.
“She’s more?” James asked, relaxed.
“She’s so pretty but that word doesn’t do her justice,”
James didn’t say anything just watching Marls trying figuring herself.
“She’s like.. everything.” Marlene said becoming more aware of how terrible she is at expressing her thoughts, or maybe they’re just unexplainable.
Nonetheless James is listening, figuring them out, sorting them, and that means enough to her.
So at least someone is trying to figure them out, even if it isn’t their problem.
“Every nice word, she.. fits. It’s like.. her name fits her but so does like ‘pretty’ or ‘brave’.”
“So it’s like she’s..?” James asked, trying to understand.
“It’s like she’s some perfect person. Like I mean she’s pretty, brave, strong, smart, independent and she’s glamorous! It’s almost unfair, she makes me feel hot and sweaty and I don’t know what to do!” Marlene was blabbering now but James sat and listened to every word.
“Do you think you’re jealous of her?”
“Like I don’t think I’m jealous but I might be, I mean it makes sense if I was but I don’t think I am. She’s like very similar to Lils like they’re both so pretty and smart and interesting but I don’t think this way about Lily,” She finally stopped speaking and took a breath.
“So she’s amazing and so is Lily but, you feel different towards Lils and her?”
“Yea! It’s like when I see her it’s different,” Marlene gets more confused the more she speaks, in her head it makes sense but aloud it’s insane.
“How does she make you feel?” James questioned, he crosses his legs still sitting beside Marls’ side.
“It’s hard to explain,” She doesn’t even know where to start.
“Try me,” James says looking over at her.
“It’s almost like I want to be close to her but I get.. nervous. I felt the need to like.. impress her and like she gets me motivated to do better, I don’t know if it’s cause I wanna seem cooler or something.” She has more to say but feels the need to stop.
“So it’s like you see her as a very cool person and you want to be seen as cool too?”
“I mean I guess so, but I also don’t want to, like I don’t think I can.” That would be a good reason but Marls doesn’t feel like that’s it, she wanted to be friends with Lily and Pandora but it wasn’t such a difficult thing to talk to them, why’s it different with her?
“Let’s say you are jealous, what would you be jealous of?” James question, slowly.
“I mean there’s like.. uh. Like I like the way I look I wouldn’t want to change my looks for hers cause they wouldn’t fit me, they fit her perfectly. Like she has beautiful eyes, a lovely dark warm chocolate brown, but I wouldn’t say I’m jealous of them. Her nose is the cutest button nose and, like I think it’s very cute but I wouldn’t be jealous of it. Like everything about her is like gorgeous; her eyes, her nose, her lips, her glare, her hair like.. I like it but I don’t think jealousy is the word,” Marlene spoke rather slowly really trying to find the problem, it sounds like jealousy but it isn’t, so what is it?
It’s like, Marlene wants to see her eyes in a mirror but just not on her own reflection.
“What do you,” James paused, thinking of how to voice the words. Marlene looks over at him. “How does she make you feel? Is it a bitter or sweet feeling?”
“I don’t know.. it’s weird. It isn’t a bitter feeling but it isn’t exactly a sweet feeling..?”
“What do you feel when you see her?”
“I feel.. kind of..” Marlene waits, maybe for herself, maybe for James. “Pure. It’s like a full feeling, not like an after.. meal full, but like a content full.. I guess.”
“So you feel almost sincere?” James says more as a statement than a question.
“Yea, I mean I guess. Well.. mainly, like if I’m looking at her then yeah, but if she’s looking at me, it’s different.”
“How? How ‘different’?” Marlene knew he would ask than but she didn’t really want to answer. To be honest it’s a strange feeling and she isn’t sure that she dislikes it.
“Like when she’s looking at me, and I can feel it, it’s just like,” Marlene thought for a while, reenacting those moments in her mind. “I feel kinda small, my heart feels fast but also so slow, my hands get sweaty and jittery and all I want to do is to do something to not think about her staring.”
James stayed quiet, Marlene wanted him to speak badly.
“Do you like the staring?”
“No.. well yeah, well,” Marlene grunted out in frustration and put her head in her hands. “I don’t know,”
“Well, do you want her to stop staring?”
“.. no,” Marlene was getting so frustrated and confused, it’s her thoughts why can she figure them out? “Like even the thought of her staring makes me squirm, I don’t like her staring at me but I don’t want them to stop. I like the idea of her giving me attention but I feel like I’ll collapse under it.”
“So it’s almost like, you need it but she’s giving you too much?”
“No like she’s giving me barely any attention but when she does I’m not prepared, but like I’m never prepared.” Marlene feel likes she needs to give him more explanation but she isn’t sure she can. “I want her eyes on me but I want to seem normal when she does,”
“So she makes you nervous when she looks?” This was a normal and innocent question, the main question he could say but Marlene didn’t know how to answer.
Yes, she makes me nervous but I feel great, I feel worse when I don’t have it.
“Maybe, I feel exposed with her eyes but I feel.. lonely, I guess,” Is she even making sense, she doubts it. “Without her staring,”
“So she makes you pure, and you feel better with her staring but you get nervous under her eyes,” James said recapping, it makes Marlene feel loved knowing James is really trying to understand her.
“Yeah, I guess,” Marlene knows it doesn’t make sense, but she isn’t sure how to make sense of it.
“So in your eyes she’s almost..” James begins.
“No cause, like everyone thinks that,”
Marlene looks at James, he’s looking at her with a somewhat.. knowing smile. She doesn’t understand, well maybe because it’s her thought and they don’t understand her and more importantly she doesn’t understand them.
“What?” Marlene asks, cautiously turning her head sideways.
James just looks at her still, with that smile. Marlene knows James’ smiles, but this one was different. Still was a somewhat somber knowing smile but he’s normal bright sunshine smile.
He moves closer to her now, he’s legs with cross but now sideways facing her side, she turns to face him too.
“People think do like that, but” James begins, Marlene feels like she’s missing crucial information. “Most people feel that.. about their opposite.. sexes.”
Marlene sits up straight fixing her posture, she takes a breath, she knows what he’s saying.. but she needs a moment for it to truly kick.
“Are you saying.. that girls don’t.. like.. girls?”
“Not that they don’t, it just isn’t spoken of a lot. Some people frown at it, but some people don’t.”
James voice was the opposite is hers, his voice was relaxed, calm and slow almost trying to relax Marls and not spook her, while her voice was breathy, fast and quiet.
She didn’t know how, or what, to feel. She was feeling all too much right now, she should be happy finding apart of herself but it just felt like she was losing apart.
It felt wrong, it was her birth right to be able to find a man, love together, be happy, have children but that was all gone.
All the stories she read growing her, she can’t have that.
“I don’t.. what?” Marlene, knew but she needed confirmation.
“Marls, I think you’re a lesbian,” James said calmly, sweetly. Like he was breaking some bad news to a baby. He was being so openly soft and caring, why doesn’t she like that? She should, but she doesn’t.
She doesn’t get it. He has everything; looks, personality, charm, affectionate, brains and yet she doesn’t want it?
She does want it though, but just not him or apparently anyone that’s a him.
“Why?” It’s a useless question with no real answer, but it’s the only word she can think of and really the only question she needs an explanation to.
James stares at her, with an unreadable expression. “Why do girls like boys?”
That didn’t answer anything. Maybe scratch the part of James Potter having brains.
Marlene didn’t trust herself to speak, there’s a lump in her throat and she doesn’t need to be crying right now, or really ever, instead she gave him a confused look and turned her eyebrows down.
“It’s a useless question, people just do” James waited a moment before continuing, trying to find the right words.
“People do things and sometimes there’s no explanation, most of the time there is but, sometimes you don’t need a reason. You love cherries, why?”
Marlene didn’t know why they needed to speak about cherries, they’re not related to the conversation at all, or to her question. “I just do?”
“Exactly. You like cherries because you like cherries, I like mango because I like mango. You like women because you like women. Sometimes there’s a reason, sometimes there isn’t and, sometimes, the reason isn’t important.”
Marlene looked at James, letting the words sink. She likes women, and it doesn’t matter why. It makes sense why she looked at the some girls without knowing, why she’d want to be closer with some girls, why she didn’t want to be around some boys and why she was disgusted and distant from the boys that liked her.
She didn’t get an answer, but she made one.
She looked up at James, being so lost in thought she looked into her lap. He just stared back, with a small smile.
“I like girls,”
“You do,” James said with a bigger smile.
“And it’s fine,” Marlene knew it was, but she wanted someone she cared about to tell her.
“It’s completely okay.” James held her hand.
Marlene let the tears build up more, she also felt James’ finger wipe the tears with such care, and the tears started flowing.
Marlene opened her eyes, she’s never been more vulnerable but she’s also never been more safe.
“If you were a girl I’d totally make out with you,”
James burst out laughing, removing his hands from her face to on top of her knees, and laughing. His carefree, bubbly laughing, a true stomach laugh.
Marlene looks at her best friend, seeing him so happy made her happy, but knowing she did it, make it so much better. She joined in on the laughter soon after.
James’ hands on her knees and his head hovering above his right hand, Marlene’s hands on James’ head and shoulder, laughing loudly.
She felt peaceful and happy, she found apart of herself and there’s no one she would rather do it with than James.
As the laughter slowed down, she wiped her eyes from the tears from before and the new tears of laughter.
Marlene is a lesbian, and that’s alright. And she doesn’t need a reason. She likes women and that’s that.
“I’ve just realised who my lesbian wakening is,” Marlene tells James with a smile on her face.
James knows it’s a trap but curiosity always gets the better of him. “Who?”
“Your Mom,” Marlene burst out in laughter, grasping her stomach, leaning down and roared.
James has a massive smile on his face, he sat up and jumped on top of Marlene and began wrestling with her.
They were tumbling and rowing around, the sound of their giggles, and their laughs can be heard all around.
“Leave my ma alone Marls!”
“No! She’s my wife!”
“She’s my Dad’s wife! She’s happy and married, leave her alone!”
“I’m gonna be your step-mom Jamie, you have to listen to me!”
“NUH UH!!”
“YUH UH!”