Cassidy wasn’t expecting the knock at the door. It was too early for visitors, surely. The only reason she was up herself was because Butch had been singing in his sleep again and there was no way she’d squeeze another peaceful moment out of what was left of the night.

    Which was why she was eating breakfast at half past five in the morning. Of all the schemes they’d come up with in the past this was certainly not one of the better ones. It was simple enough – move into a house, pretend to be the perfect married couple and invite the neighbours and their Pokemon round for a house-warming barbecue. Then while their neighbours enjoyed the free food, they enjoyed the free Pokemon. The plan had been repeated in a couple of towns and all had gone well until Butch has started sleep-singing and suddenly it didn’t seem like such a good idea any more.

    Even as Cassidy left the table to answer the door she could hear a faint call of, “Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to karaoke night at Indigo stadium, first up it’s the fantastic Butch and his rendition of My Way, with Raticate on backing vocals….”

    That was how it always started.
    The performance was likely to go for at least half an hour.

    Wiping the toast crumbs from her fingers with a napkin she opened the door cautiously and peered through the open crack. First she saw pink hair. Then she saw a large green earring. That was all it took to give her heart a massive jolt of surprise. Opening the door to its full extent, Cassidy stepped back and fixed a glare on the pointed features of her visitor.

    “Jessie,” she said coldly, “this is a surprise.”
    “Not as much of a surprise as it is to me,” Jessie said breathlessly, “believe me – I never thought I’d actually be looking for you.”

    Cassidy’s brow furrowed as she tried to work out what was going on. Jessie looked dishevelled and exhausted. She must have walked all night. She was soaked and shivering, dirty and panting.

    “So what have you been doing? Running marathons in your sleep?!”
    “I came to see you.”
    “I figured that much,” scowled Cassidy, “what I can’t figure is why.”
    “I’m not even sure myself,” Jessie said curtly. She opened her mouth to continue but a snore-filled burst of My Way emanated from somewhere inside the house, turning abruptly into some kind of BeeGees medley halfway through. The two ladies fell silent as they both absorbed this rather odd serenade until finally Jessie cleared her throat. “Cassidy…. There appears to be a concert coming from your house.”

    Cassidy hesitated.

    “It’s all part of our plan,” she bluffed, “speaking of which, how the hell did you know we were here?! This is supposed to be top secret!”
    “Don’t worry,” Snapped Jessie, “I’m not going to blow your cover. We’re all part of Team Rocket aren’t we?”
    “In your case – only just.”
    “Anyway, I got your location from the boss.”
    “He wouldn’t tell you that.”
    “I told him we had information to help you,” said Jessie.
    “And do you?”

    Jessie bit her lip.

    “No.”
    “Then I go back to my original question,” began Cassidy. She gritted her teeth and tried to make herself appear as menacing as possible, “what are you doing here?” she peered behind Jessie, “and where are your blue-haired partner and your dumb Meowth?”
    “They’re not here. It’s just me.”

    The sleeping cabaret started on a rendition of Night Fever, which was so painful Cassidy had to clamp her hands over her ears and scream for him to stop. There was a strange snort and the music ended abruptly.

    “Oh, finally,” Cassidy sighed. A delicious moment of relief greeted her as silence filled the air but it was shattered all too soon by a cross cry from Butch, accusing Cassidy of waking him unnecessarily. Cassidy rolled her eyes and turned back to Jessie. “I think we’re on the verge of a domestic, so I suggest you leave before you get caught in the crossfire.”
    “A domestic?” Jessie repeated. She raised one eyebrow and ran her tongue across her top lip. “So are you two an item them?”
    “What’s it to you?” snapped Cassidy.

    Jessie took hold of her gaze and wouldn’t let go.

    “I miss you,” she whispered.

    Cassidy’s mouth dropped open before she had a chance of stopping it. She’d presumed a silent understanding existed between them, that neither of them would ever say a word about that stage of their lives. Such contempt had grown for each other in those final weeks of their relationship that Cassidy had stopped thinking about any love there had ever been and concentrated on the hate instead. Of every possible situation that could have arisen in her life, standing face to face with Jessie again was the one she’d thought least likely. It had never entered her mind.

    “I’m sorry,” she said tightly, “you must be mistaking me for someone who cares.”

    She gripped the door handle and started pulling it shut but found Jessie’s boot blocking its path.

    “Don’t you dare slam the door on me! I’ve walked all night to see you!”
    “Why? You should have known you were wasting your time.”
    "You’ve not even given me a chance to say anything yet!”
    “Why the hell should I?!”
    “Because it wasn’t me who left someone bleeding and crying on the dance-floor.”
    “It wasn’t me who spent the night making eyes at every person on that dance floor,” spat Cassidy, trying desperately to keep her voice down, “and I wasn’t the one who lied about what we had.”
    “Huh?”
    “’She used to hang around with me,’” Cassidy mocked, “That’s what you said! You didn’t acknowledge a thing about what we…. What we really were.”

    Jessie looked down at the ground for a moment, her cheeks glowing as she started to feel ashamed.

    “Thanks for not telling James the truth,” she whispered.
    “Just because I’ve got no morals, doesn’t mean I’d humiliate you in front of the rest of your team,” Cassidy said quietly.
    “You must still care then.”

    Cassidy scowled.

    “Don’t flatter yourself,” she snapped, “I did it to save my own face as much as anything.”

    Jessie took a deep breath and sighed. This was getting her nowhere. Absolutely nowhere.

    “At least give me a chance,” she begged, “come and take a walk with me.”
    “Walk with you? Be seen in public with a girl who has half a forest stuck in her hair?!”
    “Cass, I just want to explain!”
    “Explain to the door,” sneered Cassidy. She tried again to close it but the boot was still stopping her. “Get your foot off my premises.”
    “Not until you listen to me.”
    “Then I guess you’ll always have a career as a door prop when you get thrown out Team Rocket!”

    Jessie grimaced as Cassidy pushed harder on the door.

    “I’m not leaving,” she said.
    “You bloody are!”

    Jessie tried pushing back.

    “I’ll make you listen to me,” she hissed.
    “Get lost!”
    “If you don’t let me in I’ll stand here and yell it at the top of my voice!”
    “So yell!”
     “You really want me to do that? Whatever will the neighbours think…?!” Jessie taunted loudly.

    “Hey!”

    Cassidy spun around, startled by Butch’s raw voice. The sight of him in grotty Rocket pyjamas wasn’t the most pleasant thing Jessie had ever seen and made her feel quite sorry for Cassidy for having to look at it every day, but it didn’t put her off enough to stop her taking the opportunity of the distraction to push the door wide open and march past Cassidy.

    “Get out!” Cassidy snapped.
    “What the hell’s going on?!” cried Butch, “some of us are trying to sleep around here!”
    “Help me get this intruder out, would you?” Cassidy sneered.

    Jessie smiled innocently at Butch.

    “Intruder? Me?” she laid her palm on her chest and fluttered her eyelashes. “Cassidy was just inviting me in for breakfast to stop me yelling all her dirty little secrets to your neighbours and spoiling your plans. Right, Cass?”

    Cassidy narrowed her eyes at Jessie and wondered where the obedient, impressionable young girl she’d loved so much had gone.

    “That’s right,” she said through gritted teeth, “put some toast on, Butch.”

    Jessie felt hot anticipation race through her body.

    “Nice singing,” she scoffed cheekily at Butch.

    Butch frowned in confusion, then gave her a plainly dirty look and loped ungraciously into the kitchen.

    Jessie glanced at the clock and sighed uncomfortably. Barely ten minutes had passed since her arrival but the silence that had fallen in the kitchen felt like it had gone on for hours. She watched as Cassidy picked at her cold toast and pulled it to pieces. She refused to even meet Jessie’s gaze. Butch sat and watched both of them with bewilderment.

    “Are you two going to say something or what?!” he asked.

    Jessie plastered a fake smile across her face and lifted the slice of toast she had been provided with.

    “Well, isn’t this lovely?” she said.
    “No,” muttered Cassidy.

    Jessie gave her a sideways glance.

    “I can think of something which is, though....”

    Cassidy glanced at her just for a moment then looked away crossly again.

    “Butch, why don’t you go back to bed?”
    “Why? I won’t get back to sleep after the rude awakening you gave me!”
    “Just try, OK?”
    “Look, what the hell is all this about?! You wake me up, you make me make breakfast for your friend…”
    “She’s not my friend!” spat Cassidy.
    “…Then you tell me to piss off! Someone tell me what’s going on, please!”

    Jessie raised an eyebrow at Cassidy.

    “We were just… talking over old times, that’s all,” she smiled slyly.
    “We were doing no such thing,” Cassidy scowled.
    “No? Then what were we doing, Cass?”

    Cassidy had never known this feeling before. The feeling of being so helpless. The feeling that for once she was not in control. She could only scowl and snap, and that hadn’t been doing much for her so far.

    “Butch,” she began dryly, “would you go outside and check the barbecue is ready for this afternoon?”
    “Now?!” Cried Butch.
    “Just do it!”

    Butch narrowed his eyes at the pair of them.

    “There’s something very screwy about you two,” he said but had grown so bored of this strange behaviour by now that to avoid any more he stood up and left, slamming the back door on his way out.

    “Now, what was that all…” Cassidy began. Jessie cut off the end of her sentence, swooping at her the moment Butch left the room and pressing her lips against Cassidy’s so hard that it almost hurt. She grasped each of Cassidy’s breasts and squeezed them gently, pressing her so far backward that the chair nearly toppled over. When she was out of breath she moved back her head but kept her hands right where they were.

    “Remember this?” she whispered.

    Cassidy was paralyzed. It was too early in the morning to work out what to do for God’s sake. It was too damn early to even think. She’d dreaded the thought that this day would ever come.

    “Jessica, get your hands off me,” she whispered.

    In reply Jessie squeezed her tighter until it hurt.

    “Remember the nights we spent wrapped up in those old sheets?” she whispered, “remember staying up until five in the morning, talking about life? Remember the way this used to make you feel?” she ceased her violent squeezing and started to run her fingers rhythmically along the curves of her chest. Cassidy flinched and tried to back away but there was nowhere to go. How could she have forgotten how good that felt? But how could she let herself remember, either?

    She slapped Jessie’s hands away violently and scrambled out the chair.

    “Why now?!” she cried, “why after all this time?!”
    “Because I’m sick of trying to forget.”
    “I’ve managed it - why can’t you?!”
    “I was doing fine until we... bumped into each other.”
    “All that stirred up for me was bad memories.”
    “All it stirred up for me,” Jessie hissed, “was this.”

    She stood up and gazed at Cassidy for a second or two which seemed to feel more like a year. Then slowly, gingerly she reached to her face and cupped it in her hands. She felt Cassidy twitch in her grasp as she narrowed the distance between them. This time she let her lips be gentle, touching hers as softly as a whisper. She grew frustrated at Cassidy’s lack of response. Why wasn’t she kissing her back? What was she doing wrong?

    She lowered her left hand, ran her fingers down the soft skin of Cassidy’s neck and slid them down the neckline of her uniform.

I want this.
I want Cassidy.
I will not be beaten.

    Her mind ran over the promise she made to herself over and over.

Today, I am going to make her mine.

    She felt a hand rest against her cheek and slowly but firmly push her face out of the way. She blinked at Cassidy, the beautiful girl who was wearing a rotten frown.

    “No,” she said firmly.
    “No, you won’t, or no, you can’t?” Jessie hissed.
    “Is there a difference?!”

    How could Cassidy even question that?

    “Tell me you won’t do this because you’re with someone else and I’ll leave,” Jessie began, “tell me you won’t do it because you’ve never thought of me since the day we split and I’ll go. But tell me you can’t - you can’t because you’re scared or you can’t because you’re ashamed -and I’ll have to show you that you can.” She could hear Cassidy swallow audibly. She had never seen someone look so unsure. “Is there a reason I shouldn’t do this?” She moved her head to the side of Cassidy’s and pressed her lips tenderly to her neck, then sucked gently and sent shudders down her spine. She paused to whisper, “are you with Butch?”

    Cassidy’s words came out awkwardly as Jessie’s kisses shifted further back.

    “No. Never... never have been.”
    “Or anyone else?”
    “No.”
    “Then,” Jessie let her lips rest against Cassidy’s ear, “there is no reason at all why I can’t do this.”

    The second Jessie’s tongue brushed the rim of Cassidy’s ear an almighty explosion rocked the house and sent the strong, overpowering Jessie into a quivering wreck in Cassidy’s arms.

    “....Except for the fact the world has just exploded,”  she sobbed.

    Cassidy took a moment to adjust to the strange occurrence, then prised the shivering head of Jessie from between her bosoms. She looked into her eyes and licked her lips.

    “Or was that the earth moving?” she wondered. Jessie caught a glimpse of the old Cassidy in her eyes right then. The risk taker. The passionate girl who’d held her tightly years ago. She relaxed into the feeling of the arms around her from their involuntary embrace and felt the corners of her mouth twitch upwards.

    “Remind you of that thunderstorm?” she whispered.
    “What?”
    “You held me tight. Rain soaked us through, but we didn’t care.”

    Cassidy’s voice had tamed now. No longer angry or nervous; but normal and natural.

    “It’s not going to work, you know,” she said, “I know what you’re doing.”
    “What do you mean?” Jessie blinked innocently.
    “Get me to remember the old times, then I’ll get wrapped up in nostalgia and recreate them. It’s not going to work.”

    Jessie almost smiled.

    “You can’t blame me for trying.”
    “You can’t blame me for wavering,” whispered Cassidy. Her face echoed Jessie’s cautious smile and she pulled Jessie gently to her, just as she used to so long ago. She closed her eyes as her lips met Jessie’s, moved slowly against them and brought back a million tiny memories she’d kept away from her waking thought for so long.

    She wanted to stay like that, to freeze the moment forever, because she knew while it was going on there was no time to think about what they were doing, or what would come after. But the moment was cut short far faster than was fair by the sound of loud, scuffed footsteps edging closer. They broke the kiss together and looked round in time to see a burnt and charred Butch appear at the door.

    “No,” he said in slow, measured tones, “the barbecue is not ready for this afternoon in light of the fact that I just destroyed it by over-enthusiastic use of certain flammable liquids.” He stopped his rambling as realization of what he was seeing slowly dawned on him. He blinked heavily and tried to put the image down to charcoal formations floating around his head but the two, embracing figures didn’t go away.

    “Butch -” Cassidy began, fearing the only way she could complete the sentence was with a corny ‘it’s not what you think’, but he interrupted before she had a chance.
    “So-o-o-o-o-o-o,” he began, “You’ve started the party early, I see. Not sure it’ll impress the neighbours though.”

    Cassidy took a good few moments to realize that continuing to hold Jessie in her arms was probably not going to help her case when she started on the excuses and tried to push her away.

    “Don’t you say a fucking word,” she warned Butch, “don’t talk to me about it; don’t talk to anyone else about it.”

    Butch developed an involuntary, sideways grin and folded his arms.

    “It’s like Team Rocket training all over again!” he said.
    “What the hell’s that supposed to mean?” Cassidy demanded.
    “Everyone knew about you two, but you always carried on like it was some great secret!”
    “You knew?!”
    “Everyone did!”
    “Cassidy!” cried Jessie, “you always said no one knew what was going on!”
    “I knew you’d freak out if you knew they did,” said Cassidy.
    “I’d what?!”
    “That was always your problem!”
    “Problem?!!” screamed Jessie, “I don’t have a problem!”
    “You’ve always been paranoid!”
    “Me?!! I’m not the one who attacked someone for dancing with a guy!”
    “You’d been coming on to him all night!”
    “I had not!”
    “Liar,” screamed Cassidy, taking a firm grip of Jessie’s long locks and tugging them viciously. Jessie gave out a high pitched scream and grabbed for Cassidy’s hair but her fingers missed by millimeters and her nails skimmed the skin of her cheek. Cassidy screamed and let go of Jessie’s hair in an instant. “Look what you’ve done!” she cried, dabbing at the tiny trail of blood running down her cheek. Jessie folded her arms indignantly.
    “Well, I guess that makes us even then,” she snapped.
    “Even?!” screamed Cassidy, “we’ve not even started yet...”

    She grabbed for the hair again and brought Jessie down to the ground in a flurry of screams while Butch looked on, bemused but well and truly entertained. Despite the charring and trail of ash he left wherever he went he sat down to watch the show.

    “Yeah! Lesbian bitch-fight!” he cheered, looking around in the hope of pop corn.

    Two sets of angry eyes rested on him and momentarily their own fight was forgotten.

    “You’ll be next if you don’t fuck off in the next five seconds,” Cassidy screamed.
    “Be a lesbian?” Butch asked innocently. His joking was called off immediately by fire in Cassidy’s eyes and not wishing to end up scarred and scratched he scrambled to his feet and went to rejoin the ex-barbecue in the garden.

    Cassidy turned back to Jessie and they locked gazes. Both were angry, a little too much so. Jessie couldn’t keep it together and giggled softly. It broke Cassidy’s anger and she shook her head, unable to continue with the argument. Her head flopped down as she laughed gently. Where the hell had that petty fight sprung up from anyway?! Now she saw how their break-up had started in the first place.

    When she got her breath back a little she looked up at Jessie again. Her normally immaculate hair flopped heavily over one eye and a scratch ran down one cheek.

    “You’re a worthy opponent these days,” she remarked.

    Jessie’s face warmed with a half-smile.

    “You mean I wasn’t always?!” She brushed her hair back, then touched the side of Cassidy’s face. “You’re bleeding.”
    “So are you.”
    “Things weren’t always like this, were they?”

    Cassidy shook her head slowly.

    “’Course not.” She whispered.
    “Then how come this is how we’ve ended up?” Jessie asked sadly. It was more of a rhetorical question than anything and Cassidy was glad of that because she sure as hell didn’t have any answers.
    “What did you really come here for?” she asked seriously.

    Jessie looked into her eyes and wished there was a straight-forward reply.

    “I guess I...” she began. The sentence didn’t seem to lead anywhere. She paused but Cassidy’s eyes continued to ask the same question. She wasn’t letting her off without a proper reply. In the end she looked away. “I can’t get you out of my mind.”
    “That’s no reason to walk all night out the blue.” Cassidy reminded her.

    Jessie knew that.

    “I don’t want you in my mind,” she whispered. Her eyes looked up while the rest of her head hung low. “I want you in my bed.”

    Cassidy hadn’t realised until that moment how very dry her throat was. She swallowed and licked her lips but it didn’t seem to help.

    “Jess,” she whispered. She reached out and raised Jessie’s face to look directly into her eyes. “You could never handle ‘us’.”
    “I could handle ‘us’. It’s you I couldn’t handle.”
    “You were always too scared of what people said,” Cassidy said firmly, “you weren’t sure it was what you wanted. Don’t you realize what that was like for me? I felt like I had to watch every man in case he took your interest. That was a constant threat.”
    “Cass, it’s not the gender that matters. When you fall in love, you fall in love, regardless of that.”
    “You weren’t in love.”
    “How do you know that?”

    Cassidy blinked.

    “Were you in love with me?!” she whispered.
    “More than you’d ever know.”
    “Why the hell did you never say?!”
    “I wasn’t sure I knew what love was.”
    “Then what’s changed?”
    “I’ve grown up.”
    “So have I, Jess. Water’s passed under the bridge.”
    “Not that much.”

    Cassidy ran her fingers across Jessie’s cheek.

    “I’m too mature to be running around in secret,” she whispered, “I don’t want a hidden romance, with you or anyone.”
    “Aren’t you listening?! I don’t care any more! I can’t carry on the way I am now. I need you.”
    “I can’t risk it.”
    “Risk what?!”

    Cassidy took a deep breath.

    “Risk losing you again,” she said quietly, “and risk you developing paranoia about us again.”
    “I won’t do that.”
    “How do I know?! I don’t know a thing about you any more!”
    “Then tell me what the fuck I’ve got to do to prove it, and I’ll do it!” cried Jessie.

    Cassidy found need and desperation in Jessie’s eyes. They pleaded with her. So did her own heart. It seemed to jump straight into her mouth and spoke for her.

    “Prove you don’t care what they think,” she said slowly, “take me back to your home, make love to me, then sit me down at the table and introduce me formally to James. As your lover.”

    Jessie swallowed while her heartbeat raced.

    “I walked all night to get here,” she whispered, “it’ll be night again before we get there.”
    “We have a stolen Pidgeot somewhere,” Cassidy told her, “that’ll get us there in no time.”
    “We don’t have a proper place to stay,” Jessie bluffed, “it’s practically a shed. Can’t make love there.”
    “Why not? Wouldn’t be the first time.”

    Jessie opened her mouth to speak but found it full of Cassidy’s tongue before she had a chance. She closed her eyes and like Cassidy before her, she wished the moment could just last forever. No choices to make if life was one big kiss. No excuses to be made.

    As though reading her thoughts, Cassidy pulled away and whispered,

    “No excuses. You either prove it, or lose me.”
    “I’m not losing you again,” Jessie whispered quickly, “no way.” She paused, Cassidy’s fingers creating sensations around her neck. “I’ll do it. If it’ll prove it, I’ll take you there.”

    Cassidy pulled right back and gazed at her. For the first time that day she flashed her a true smile and took Jessie right back to the times they’d spent together so long ago.

    “Right choice,” she whispered.

    Feeling a hand slip under her top as she pressed her lips against Cassidy’s one last time before they took off, Jessie certainly hoped it was. Her future and happiness - everything rode on this. Too late to back out now. She couldn’t if she tried. Not when a touch made her feel like this. Soon there would be far more to come.

    “Jess?”

    Cassidy broke both the kiss and Jessie’s train of thought.

    “Yes?”
    “When we get to this... shed... thing of yours...”
    “...Yes?”
    “Just tell me one thing.”
    “Anything.”

    Cassidy bit her lip.

    “James doesn’t sing in his sleep, does he?!”
 

    To Be Continued.