The sales clerk at the last shoe store came back out with the perfect shoes. I loved them. I wanted them for myself. But they were for Lola. Every perfect silvery shiny six inch heel lace up bit of perfection that they were.
"I need them," I told her before she'd even brought them to me. I reached out my hands and made grabby motions. I couldn't help it. I was like a magpie. I needed those shinies and I needed them now.
She looked stunned. Maybe my earlier desperate tirade had scared her. Maybe not. I hoped not. I didn't want to be a horrible customer. I'd probably already fallen well away from that line though.
"Are you sure you don't want to try them on first?" she asked me. It was probably something she had to say. She definitely looked done with me. Exasperation was not a good look for her. I'd have to come back and apologize when I wasn't feeling quite so stretched thin.
"They're not for me. My girlfriend is five-five, if that. She can rock these." I was a little over six foot. I would have been a giraffe in these heels. I tended toward ones that weren't over two inches. Ever. I wished that I could have worn the heels though. Heels made her ass look amazing.
I could be jealous about my girlfriend's body later. I had to get going now.
I quickly paid for them, they were bagged up, and then I was off to my next stop. Shoes were nice, but this was my girlfriend's fortieth birthday. Two pairs of shoes were not going to cut it, as pretty as they were.
With forty minutes to spare before I needed to go get Lola's sister and kids from the Springfield airport, I hit the perfume store at the other end of the strip mall. It was also a makeup store. Nice makeup too. A bit expensive, but the good stuff generally was. Just like wine.
Thankfully perfume didn't only come in tiny sizes and hide in the back room if they were anything bigger so I didn't need immediate help as I browsed the different offerings. My girlfriend wouldn't smell like dead roses, but something lavender based was right up her alley. It didn't take me long to find something.
I could have left it at that, but this was my last chance to get Lola something for her birthday and the makeup was definitely calling me over. Two pairs of shoes, a bottle of sweet perfume, and some new lipstick would be a good combo.
I was browsing the deep reds that would have looked fantastic with Lola's gorgeous dark skin when my phone starting buzzing. Micah was at home cleaning the house in preparation for the party, but apparently my boyfriend was also worried all about me too. Are you at the airport yet? The flight might be early.
He really needed to relax. Micah, my love, I'll be there soon. I'm shopping right now. Relax.
I had hoped that would help him get over his need to micromanage everything around him, even when none of us were home, but apparently not. It's half an hour before the plane is set to land. You can't still be shopping. Buy it and go.
He was crazy. There was no ‘just buying' with me. He should have known that by now. Still, to get him to chill out, I grabbed the lipstick and went to the counter. It was moisturizing. It promised incredible color and all day wear. I wondered if it would survive being kissed by four people. We would see.
Moments later I had that little errand done and I was back in my car. It was probably the quickest of my makeup related shopping trips. Micah should have been proud of me about that.
*~*~*
The Springfield airport was tiny, but that made parking awesome. I stood there in the waiting area looking at Facebook and Twitter and wondering how everyone else was doing with their portions of the party when something small and warm wrapped around my waist.
I looked down, surprised to be caught so off guard, at the sight of my niece's smiling face. Kiley was five. She was perpetually smiling. "Hey kiddo."
I glanced around, expecting to find Emily, Lola's sister, and Todd, her son, as well. They weren't far behind.
"Auntie Tiffany?"
"Yeah?" I put my phone back in my purse and carefully picked her up. Carefully because I didn't want to risk my skirt riding up. My underwear tucked everything in nicely, but the people around us didn't get a peek.
"You're so pretty. Will you teach me how to do makeup? Mom says I'm too young."
I knew better than to step in that ever so welcoming pile waiting to happen. "When your mom says it's okay, I'll give you a full makeover. But not before then. Deal?"
She held up her pinky and I took it, wrapping mine around hers. We'd made a solemn pact in her mind. I had to be good about keeping them if she was still going to trust me with my promises when she got older.
"Hey," Emily said, coming up to us.
Lola's sister was subdued gorgeous. Small, perky, and managing to hold down the single mother and corporate life gig just fine without even messing up her perfectly natural hair.
I kissed her cheek. "Hi. I promised Kiley that I'd give her a makeover once you said it was okay for her to start wearing makeup. We pinky swore."
"So it's final," Kiley piped up.
Emily gave me a strained smile. "Thanks. You'd be the one to show her so I'm good with that. When she's older. Like fifty."
Laughing, I put Kiley down. She pouted, but I wanted to give Emily a proper hug. We hadn't seen her or the kids in almost eight months. That was far too long to go without seeing Lola's family. She was the only one of us that had any kind of connection to the family we were born into. The rest of us had kind of adopted Emily and the kids as our own. It helped that the three of them were fantastic about everything. Our pronouns, not asking horrible questions... everything. They made being around cis people easy.
"Is everything set for the party tonight?" Emily asked me as we made our way to baggage claim.
"I highly doubt it. But we'll come together in time. We always do."
Emily laughed. "You have no idea how much I envy you all with the relationship that you have. I could never be that open, but there's so much to be said for five adults working together. It's cohesive. Your bills get paid. If the kids are sick, there's someone to take care of them. You'd save a ton in daycare costs alone. It sounds like paradise."
Todd was only two years old, still clinging to her constantly. I took him from her while she got one giant red Hello Kitty suitcase off the conveyor belt. How she managed a weeks' worth of clothes in just one suitcase was beyond me. Whenever I went somewhere, which was rare, I always had to pay extra to check more bags.
"Thanks," I said, unsure of what else to say. She was right, I did love the relationship the five of us shared. But it wasn't for everyone. I knew there were drawbacks. I'd known that before I'd ever fallen for any of them. The biggest drawback, for me at least, was that I couldn't legally marry the four people that I loved. We'd had a big party, but that wasn't quite what I'd wanted. But it was what worked for me. On every level possible.
There were always going to be people who didn't understand. There would always be emergency contact forms to fill out and people who looked at us strangely when one of us asked for more forms for the rest of their contacts. I'd always been in poly relationships, but even I caught myself getting more than a little upset at someone when I caught them staring at us. We were in love and happy. We weren't hurting anyone. That should have been enough to keep people from looking at us like we were some kind of sideshow attraction.
"Let's get you all back to the house. Unless anyone wants lunch first?" I was trying to get my mind off those dark thoughts with my offer. Food and family were both very good distractions to get my mood back up to where it needed to be. I was not normally a grumpy person. Erratic and demanding, yes. Absolutely. Any of my partners would have said that about me. But I was not the grumpy kind. I was punch a laughing bitch in her face for trying to take a picture of my girlfriend and then go back to eating my sushi kind. But I was not grumpy.
"Food!" Kiley practically screamed at us, drawing the attention of more than a few people around our little circle. She wasn't starving by any means, but people might have thought so. It was more than about time to get them out of the airport and into my car.
I rolled my eyes at them. The kid was always hungry. It was kind of cute, in a way, and I was damn jealous of her metabolism. "Yep. We're getting food." I was always down for some food too.
Emily sighed and gave me another one of her tired mom smiles. She made being a parent of two little kids seem so easy but I was sure that it was anything but. I loved the kids, but I didn't want to be a parent. I was quite happy being the fun aunt with all the pretty clothes and makeup.
"Thanks. She's been talking about that Mexican place that you all have by the house. I think she misses chocolate filled churros. We don't get a lot of them in Maine," Emily said.
That was easily done. Taking them to get Mexican food might have just been the simplest part of my day today. "Then that's where we're going. I just have to send a quick text to Micah before we go. He's at home right now and he was worried that I wouldn't get here in time. Like I'd ever be late to pick up you three." I rolled my eyes.
I took out my phone and sent a fast message off to my boyfriend so that he'd stop being so anxious and worrying about me getting them. Got the fam. Going for lunch. Kisses.
"How is he doing?" Emily asked as we left the airport. Sure, we'd been together for years, but it always made me just a bit more happy when people used the right pronouns for the people I cared about. It was the little things, and Emily, as far as I could remember, had never once slipped up with any of us. She had always asked when she'd met each of us the first time, and she'd been so nice and loving with us since.
"He's good. Anxious as always, but he's working on getting better. There is hope for him yet." We piled into my car and then it was off to get us all some churros, and also some actual food too because if anyone found out that all I fed the children after a long plane ride was sugar and fried dough I worried I'd never be able to babysit them again, even though Emily was right there with me.
*~*~*
I was more than a bit surprised to see Sasha sitting there at the counter. I had thought that they would have gone right home to help Micah with the decorations after getting off of work, but there they were, eating tacos.
"Sasha! What are you doing here?" I called over to them as the hostess took us to a table.
They turned and looked at me, their eyes going wide for a moment, before they picked up their plate and drink and followed us over to the big round table toward the back of the restaurant.
"Hey," Emily said, giving them a hug before they joined us at the table.
They kissed my cheek as soon as Emily had let go of them and then I was stealing tacos off their plate. They had gotten the fried avocado kind which was the best because it always came with extra cheese and lots of lime wedges.
"I thought you'd have gone straight home to see Micah," I teased them.
Sasha grinned at me. "I had to get more streamers. Six packs just weren't enough. We've got a big house to decorate for tonight."
I could just imagine how very little Micah was going to enjoy putting up decorations. He kept a clean house and disliked anything that made it messy. He made an exception for the kids though. They got a pass on making messes that none of us would have gotten away with.
"I want churros," Kiley demanded.
"You need lunch first. Then you can have dessert," Emily said. Her voice was firm, but it was mom firm and not an ounce of mean.
I caught Sasha's little grin and knew that they'd probably started with fried ice cream before moving on to tacos. I kissed their cheek and took their hand.
"Since the house isn't decorated yet, why don't you four go to a movie or the zoo or something?" Sasha offered.
It was a great idea, and I was glad that they had thought of it as Kiley started chanting that she wanted to go see the lions at the safari park again.