The Drumbeat Years (girlxgirl)

3

3

31st. October 1988 - 1st. November 1988

Tina knew it was a crush. A simple crush, unlike her previous one. The one that had ended in disaster and heartbreak. It wasn't love, or anything. Dawn was, after all, a tutor, someone in a position of authority and falling for someone like that could cause any number of problems for them both. She had no control over it, no matter how hard she tried, however.

Over the past couple of weeks, the mere presence of Dawn in that classroom gave Tina a surge of energy. A boost of creativity and concentration that Tina couldn't remember having at any other time in her life. Dawn gave her strength. She gave her an outlet to create. It even crossed into her other studies and assignments for all her classes became something that Tina found worth doing. For once in her wretched, unfocussed life.

Dawn had returned her notebook and, with a teacher's perspective, had written little notes in almost all the margins in pencil. Praising some areas, pulling up silly mistakes, berating Tina for gross inaccuracies. Tina didn't know how to feel about that, in truth. Both angered that Dawn had treated her notes as an assignment to mark, and flattered that she had gone through everything with a fine-toothed comb.

Every evening, Tina would wait, after classes, and walk with Dawn away from campus and into town. Every night, they would say little until they arrived at the doors of Brownies where Dawn would take her leave and Tina would stand, watching her, until she turned the corner, swinging her heavy briefcase.

"Eight o'clock. Be ready." Kyle jumped down from their wall and then scrambled back up again. They sat here for lunch every day. "No matter what the dude says, it's not hip to be square."

"What does that even mean?" She clutched her notebook to her chest and glared at him. He had tied his hair into a ponytail. It suited him. "And be ready for what?"

"The gig, man! God! Don't tell me. You haven't heard a word I said because you've been glommed into working out which dragon controls which city, or something." Falling back into the leafless, flowerless plant bed that sat in the middle of the wall, Kyle made a pained sound and then gave her a mischievous grin. "Or are you obsessing over something else? Someone else, perhaps?"

Her head dipped, hair covering her eyes as she started to pack her things away into her bag. Kyle wasn't stupid. He sat behind her in English class and, in his own, weird way, he noticed things others could miss. Still, she wasn't about to come out and admit it. Even with the plethora of pop stars and movie stars and whatever other stars that seemed to have started coming out, in recent years, gay people and lesbians still suffered if people found out.

She didn't need to hide it from Kyle, but, as her eyes flickered at the other students passing by, she wished he would show a little sense about it. She had learned, to her cost, that even people that seemed like friends, or, at least, not enemies, could turn on a penny if they thought someone was too different. She remembered those cruel whispers.

"Shut up. Idiot." Dropping from the wall, she hitched the strap of her bag onto her shoulder. "Lunch is over."

"It's her eyes, isn't it?" He made an exaggerated flicker of his eyelashes as he pressed an index finger up to his chin. Laughing, she gave his arm a back-handed slap. "I had that with a teacher, once. God! He had nice eyes. I didn't fancy him, or anything, it was just his eyes. Penetrating. In a wholly appropriate and not-at-all-sexual way."

With surprising grace, Kyle skipped, dancing, to the side and acted as though he held someone in his arms, bending over, pretending to brush hair from an invisible face. And then he acted as though he kissed them, tongue lashing out into an imaginary mouth, fingers groping an invisible backside.