‘Why did she kiss me?’ Dana asked herself for maybe the thousandth time that night, the memory of what had transpired between her and Alice the day before still fresh in her mind. She stared blankly at the ceiling thinking if she stared at it long enough the answer would appear to her in vision or something, ‘Well ***** that…’ Dana queitly said to herself as she laid in bed thinking, ‘this is getting stupid!’.

Dana felt an arm rest itself across her midsection, temporarily snapping her away from her thoughts. She turned to see that Tonya was holding onto her contentedly, her breathing was steady and even, clearly indicating that she was deep in sleep. Dana’s expression turned even more serious. She had a good thing with Tonya, her life seemed to be in place again, but she couldn’ t help but think she wanted something else, and part of her knew she didn’t want this.

‘What more do I want? Tonya has been so good to me, especially after Mr. P…’ she paused for a while, the thought of losing her beloved pet was unbearable and it meant the world to her that Tonya was there by her side.

‘But Al… Al doesn’t want me to marry her… ***** she even came here to declare it herself. But why couldn’t she give me a straight answer? Why did she have to kiss me?’ Dana shrugged, frustrated that she was back to the same question she had been asking herself over and over again that night.

‘That’s it! I have to talk to her… I have to clear the air, this is driving me nuts!’ she told herself, promising that she would talk to Alice first thing in the morning.
______________________________________________

It was 7 o’clock in the morning when Dana entered the Planet. She scanned the room for her friends, there was no sign of Shane, no Bette, no Al, but she saw Tina sitting alone staring glumly into her coffee cup.

“Hey” Dana said, walking over to Tina.

“Hey” Tina said, all her attention fixed on her coffee.

“Have you seen Al?” Dana said looking a little concerned.

“Yeah she was here a minute ago. She just forgot something in her apartment, she’ll be here any second…” Tina answered slowly stirring the hot coffee.

“What’s wrong Tina? Are you okay? Did something happen between you and Bette?” Dana inquired.

Tina finally stopped stirring her coffee and looked up at her friend, showing Dana the signs of strain that were visible in her eyes.
Tina wanted to tell Dana everything that had happened with her and Bette two days ago, she tried to speak but words failed her, it was all too much. Everything was too painful for her and before she knew it tears started flowing from her eyes. Dana just stood there stunned and though she didn’t fully understand the situation she instinctively pulled Tina closer to her, hugging her.

“Hey, it’s gonna be alright.” Dana said reassuringly, stroking her fingers through Tina’s golden blonde hair.

Tina was now sobbing into Dana’s shoulder, still unable to speak, all she could think was ‘Why Bette? After 7years, why?’
____________________________________________

Alice stood in her apartment, “What the ***** am I doing here?” she said under her breath, knowing full well no one could hear her. She felt a little bit of guilt surge through her, she made up some silly excuse to come back to her apartment so that she could avoid Dana but part of her knew she should be getting back to Tina. ‘Poor T, she seems so fragile’ she thought. Then her thoughts drifted to Bette, ‘I’m going to kill Bette…’ she thought. ‘ What the ***** was she thinking?’ she demanded, as she glanced over at her infamous white board where, just two nights ago, Tina had connected Bette’s name to another woman’s.

Alice was disappointed at Bette, but she also knew that as a friend she atleast owed Bette the chance to explain.

‘And what about Dana?’ she questioned herself, ‘Don’t I owe her an explanation, for that” that kiss?’

‘But she kissed me back didn’t she?… And… and…’ Alice was in mid-thought until she noticed her answering machine’s red light was flashing.

Alice pressed the machine’s play button and a familiar voice came through, “Hey Al, it’s me, I know you probably hate my guts right now, but I just wanted to make sure Tina was alright.”Bette sounded like she had been crying “She and I” uhm…” an uncomfortable silence followed until Bette finally broke down and said, “Oh god Al I fucked things up so badly…” Alice noticed the sorrow in Bette’s voice, as if she was pleading to be heard, to be understood. “Just call me when you get this.” and then the machine beeped, ending Bette’s message. Alice stood there at a loss for words, not sure what to do next.
___________________________________________

Bette hung up the phone, her whole body was shaking. ‘What have I done?’ but she stopped herself before she could ponder on the question.

‘You blew it Porter, that’s what you did!’ Bette scolded herself. She knew she loved Tina more than anything in the world and yet she was stupid enough to let her slip through fingers.

‘And for what?’ she implored. She didn’t even love Candace, their relationship, ‘***** who am I kidding? I don’t even think I can call it that?’”was nothing but an empty fling.

Bette pressed her back onto the wall and queitly let herself slip slowly onto the floor, she felt so lost. Just a few weeks ago she was the poster child for monogamy and now…

“Now I’m no different from Jenny and Marina…” she muttered, thinking of the hard time she gave Tina when she revealed that Jenny and Marina were having an affair behind Tim’s back, even calling her blas in the middle of their argument. ‘I’m such a ***** hypocrite!’ she berated herself, tears streaming steadily from her eyes.

Everything was pressing down on her, first she and Tina lost the baby, then the Provocations exhibit drove her to the edge. ‘Candace was willing to take the pain away, but I guess I let it get to the point where she just caused more of it.’

She thought about Tina and the questions that flowed naturally into her system:’Do I even have a chance? Does she even want to talk to me?’

Then it dawned on her, ‘I can’t loose her… I just can’t… but what if I already did?’

__________________________________________

Dana had finally managed to calm Tina down enough to stop her from crying.

“I’m sorry Dane, I didn’t mean to be such a mess.” Tina said apologetically, wiping the tears away from her cheeks.

“Don’t worry about it T…” Dana interjected.

“It’s just that I’m no good at these things. Where the ***** is Shane when you need her huh?”
_________________________________________

“Where am I?” Shane said a bit disoriented, still groggy from the bottle of brandy she had the night before. She soon realized that she was in her truck again, parked on the curb of her would-be barber shop.

‘Jesus, what has she done to me?’ She was ofcourse talking about Cherie Jaffe.

‘How could I let this happen? That ***** was just playing me and I couldn’t see it coming…’

‘It felt so real though. Like I was really in love.’ Shane sat there queitly reflecting on her thoughts.

‘You sure know how to pick ‘em Shane.’ She told herself sarcastically and let out a small laugh, but she quickly stopped herself as she suddenly felt her head throb.

‘Damn that hurt!’ Shane thought, feeling a major hang over coming into effect.

‘I need some coffee.’ and with that Shane drove off to get her daily dose of caffiene from the Planet.

TBC maybe…