I wasn’t a user or a squatter.
“There’s a place,” I explained, “that helps prostitutes get on their feet, a safe place…”
“Magdalene House.”
Shocked, I nodded. “Yeah. How do you know about it?”
“A friend of mine is involved with the project, and it’s one of the causes I support monthly.”
“Really? Well,” I moved the ice pack to my jaw, “I guess that makes sense. You’ve helped me out and other girls before.” I tried to smile but it hurt too much.
“Let me make a few phone calls, if you’ll let me. We can work this all out tomorrow. Will you let me help you at least with that?” She sat down next to me and kissed my head. I leaned into her with a sigh.
“Yeah. I will.”
“I have some ibuprofen I want you to take, but you’ll need to eat something first. I’ll make you a sandwich, then how about a hot bath?”
God, she made my toes curl. Her sweetness was something I still wasn’t used to. “Sounds great, Mia. Thank you,” I whispered, on the verge of stupid tears.
She kissed my head again and left me alone with my broken face and happy heart.
“So why birds?” I asked Mia. We were sitting up in her big, poofy bed, Mittens at our feet sleeping soundly. It was late, and I was warm and content, snuggled against Mia, who was rubbing Mittens with her toes.
She let out a laugh and started to blush. “You’ll think it’s stupid.”
I nudged her with my foot. “No I won’t.”
“Promise?”
“Promise.”
Tucking a wayward strand of hair behind her ear, she told me about a girl she had a crush on at summer camp back in middle school, the summer before starting high school. How the girl had broken Mia’s heart and shattered it. How it led to bullying and years of hell afterward. How being attracted to the same sex had been “viewed with disgust.”
My heart went out to her as she told me the story. It seemed that, even though our circumstances were much different, both of us shared being shunned by society, by the very people we had no choice but to be around every day, whether at school or work, even in our own families.
“I was so miserable when I came home that summer,” Mia went on. “Dad had put up with my moping long enough, he’d said, and sat me down, letting me talk it all out. He was proud of me, he said. Proud that I had the courage to tell the world who I was and what I wanted, no matter how different others were. That I was only sad because I had chosen the wrong bird.”
I frowned, not getting it. “Wrong bird?”
She smiled and turned to me. “Everyone has their own bird in life, sometimes a group of birds or a trio, but mostly that one special bird. When you find your bird, the one just meant for you, together you can fly. Adaline, the girl at summer camp, wasn’t my bird.”
Her eyes held mine, their blue depths like the ocean. Something fuzzy filled my heart and I reached over to kiss her, taking her bottom lip into my mouth. “Thank you.”
“For what?” she whispered, her breath catching.
“For opening up to me. Sharing that. I hate sharing stuff about myself. And I think you do too. Thank you for trusting me.”
She kissed me back, then looked at me, her dainty eyebrow raised. “So you don’t think it’s stupid? What my Dad said?”
“I think it’s beautiful. I think you’ll find your bird, Mia.
“I think you’re beautiful. And it’s true. I’m always looking for my bird, Devon. So… that’s the answer to your question.”
I grabbed her then and pulled her close. “Come ‘ere.” Even with my bruised and beat up face, she thought I was beautiful. She made me want to cry.
Sex with a woman was so much different than with a man. Not that I’d had real sex with anyone since I’d left home. Work and real sex weren’t the same thing. It wasn’t only condoms I used to protect myself when I fucked clients, but also a wall, separating me from the other person while he got his money’s worth. I was just a vessel.
With Mia, it was “all of me” I gave, just as I was certain she gave me all of her. When we came together, it was filled with love, the closest I’d ever come to sharing myself with another.
She went down on me, kissing and stroking every zone