The trainer dressed in typical bay area lesbian fashion: cotton or knit shirts, jeans, khakis or cotton pants, and black shoes or boots. Sara had that type of thing in her wardrobe, but she didn't feel comfortable dressing that way for a date, particularly when she was consciously trying to impress. Well, if one of us has to change, it's gonna have to be me, she thought wryly. Ally would look like a cross-dresser in a dress and heels!

Sara smoothed her chocolate-colored velvet blazer into place and twitched the matching short skirt a bit. Looking at her reflection in the gla.s.s panel of Ally's front door, she fussed with the collar of her pink angora turtleneck, nervously cleared her throat, then rang the buzzer for Ally's apartment, feeling her heart rate pick up when the front door buzzed open.

She heard an interior door open, and then Ally's soft, lightly-accented voice floated down. "Hi, there," she said. "Do you mind coming up?"

"No, not at all," Sara replied, following the lilting voice. When she reached the unit, she was met with a warm smile, and she almost leaned in for a kiss, reminding herself at the last minute that they had both agreed to take things very slow.

"Did you have any trouble parking?" Ally asked. She was lacing up her shoes, and Sara took the opportunity to check her out from behind. As she had on each of their previous meetings, Ally was wearing a long-sleeved cotton blouse, this one a light blue. Slightly faded black jeans hugged her hips, and Sara spent a moment fantasizing about peeling those snug jeans off her body.

"Uhm... no, no trouble," she replied once she remembered it was her turn to speak. "Where should we eat? Do you want to go somewhere around here?"

"Yeah, let's do," Ally suggested. She stood up and let her eyes trail down Sara's body, her small smile growing larger as she progressed. "Boy, you look great," she murmured.

Sara just smiled at her, relieved that Ally didn't seem uncomfortable with the discrepancy in their styles. "Thanks. Not too dressy?"

"Mmm... not at all. I love your look. Feminine, soft... s.e.xy."

"Thanks," she mumbled again. "You look nice yourself. Blue is a good color for you."

"Well, I think pink suits you just great," Ally decided. She leaned in and said in a conspiratorial whisper, "Don't let it get out, but I have a secret fondness for pink."

"I'll keep that in mind," Sara smiled, trying to catch her breath while allowing Ally to take her hand to guide her back down the stairs.

"How about Indian food?" Ally asked as they walked down Castro Street.

Sara nodded and said, "That sounds good. Do you have a favorite place?"

"Yeah. I eat Indian a lot. I'm not a strict vegetarian, but I generally avoid meat. Indian restaurants usually have a lot of vegetarian choices."

"I should eat less meat myself. Maybe you can guide me towards some of the better dishes."

"I'd be happy to."

The place was just a few blocks away, and as they walked along the moderately crowded street, Sara marveled that she didn't feel uncomfortable holding Ally's hand in public. Deciding not to overa.n.a.lyze every element of their interaction, she tried to just allow herself to go with it and feel comfortable.

"Here we are," Ally said, holding the door open.

Sara led the way, but when the hostess saw Ally she gave her a welcoming smile and showed them to a nice table in a quiet corner of the restaurant. After a short recitation of the specials, she left them alone.

As an aficionado Ally knew a lot about Indian food, and she patiently described her favorite dishes to Sara, telling her the plusses and minuses of each item.

Smiling warmly at her, Sara said, "I can see why you're a good trainer. You're very adept at explaining things clearly."

"Thanks," Ally grinned. "My parents are both teachers, so I guess I learned how to offer cogent descriptions early on."

Sara closed her menu and gazed at her friend for a moment. "Would you order for me? I have a feeling that you'll do a better job than I would."

"Sure." Ally nodded to their server, and gave him their order. Then she leaned back in her chair and said, "That was strangely rea.s.suring."

"What was?"

"The fact that you trusted me to order for you. I've been a little worried that you might secretly be one of those fiercely independent lawyer types. You know, the ones who can't stand to let anyone lend a hand?"

Chuckling, Sara said, "I work with a lot of them, but I'm not one of them." She gave Ally an inquisitive grin. "Do you have any more misperceptions that I can disabuse you of?"

"Uhm... yeah, I actually might," the larger woman said. Their appetizers were delivered just then, and Sara's heart picked up a little bit as she waited for Ally to speak again. As the server left, Ally said, "I've been a little worried about how confident you are about claiming a lesbian ident.i.ty. I uhm... hate to be narrow minded, but I'm only comfortable dating women who are sure of who they are."

Sara nodded, then said, "I'll be honest with you, Ally, I've been fighting my ident.i.ty for years; but I haven't doubted who I am, if that makes any sense. I just didn't want to be who I knew I was." Ally raised an eyebrow in question and Sara explained, "I've known I was a lesbian for years, but I've tried very hard not to have to publicly acknowledge it. I haven't spent any time thinking that I might be straight. There's no way that's true. I just have to work on being open about my orientation."

"Are you sure that you're ready, Sara?" Ally asked gently.

Her answer was immediate and decisive. "Yes. Without question. Telling my parents was, by far, the biggest hurdle. I lost what I'd been afraid of losing, and yet, I'm still standing," she said, smiling gently. "I wish they'd been more understanding, but they've done their worst. I have nothing to lose at this point."

"You have a lot to gain," the larger woman a.s.sured her.

"I know that," Sara acknowledged. "I really do know that."

Ally took a bite of her appetizer and chewed thoughtfully, with Sara doing the same. "Delicious," the lawyer said, holding her fork up near Ally's mouth. "Bite?"

Taking the morsel, Ally nodded. "That's always a good choice. Glad you like it." She offered Sara a bite of her dish as well, smiling when the smaller woman's eyes widened. "Mine's a little spicy. I thought you might like a slightly tamer choice."

With a twinkle in her warm brown eyes, Sara said, "I've been opting for the safe choice for too long. It's time to be a little wild." With a flourish, she took a hearty bite of Ally's dish, then smiled and proclaimed, "Delicious."

"Tell me about the safe choices," Ally said, her eyes locked with Sara's.

Taking another bite, Sara considered her answer. "I guess it started not long after I discovered that I was a lesbian." She didn't want to tell Ally about her experience with Ryan, so she intentionally jumped over it. "After I had my first lesbian encounter, I decided that I just couldn't handle it. I really took the coward's way out, Ally, and avoided even a hint of temptation. I just concentrated on school, and my sport, and tried to forget that I had a s.e.x drive."

"Your sport?"

"Uh-huh. I played soccer at Cal for four years."

"Wow! I didn't know you were a jock!"

"Uhm... I'm gonna choose to think that's not a reflection on how out of shape I look," Sara chuckled.

"No! Not at all! You look great, Sara, really great," Ally a.s.sured her. "You've just never talked about doing anything athletic."

"That's because I don't at this point. I really want to start playing soccer again, though. I have to do something more athletic than just run along the bay every morning."

"Hard to do because of your job, huh?"

"Yeah, but that's no excuse. I have to make time, just like I do for everything else that's important."

"I have a few friends who play. Why don't I hook you up? You're not averse to playing in a lesbian league, are you?"

"No, that'd be great," she said. "I'd really like that."

"Consider it done. Now tell me more about these safe choices," Ally urged.

Sara nodded. "I still find this hard to believe, but I didn't touch a woman for more than three years after my first encounter. I went out with a few dozen men," she acknowledged, rolling her eyes, "but I refused to let myself even consider being with a woman again. I don't even remember what caused me to finally break free, but when I was a senior, I took the plunge."

"In high school?"

Shaking her head, Sara said, "No, college. I was 21, and I had yet to really have s.e.x."

"I see. But then you found a woman, right?" Ally asked.

Chuckling, Sara said, "You're jumping way ahead. I sucked up my courage and finally journeyed into the dangerous world of the Internet. I allowed myself the horribly guilty pleasure of going to a lesbian chat room on AOL."

"Wow," Ally said, shaking her head sympathetically. "You must have been terrified to have held off on your desires for that long."

"I was," she agreed, smiling wanly. "Ally, my hands were shaking so hard I could hardly log in. I didn't say one word that night, and as I recall the conversation was completely insipid. But I was so d.a.m.ned proud of myself." She shook her head as she recalled, "That night was the first time in a long while that I didn't feel disgusted with myself when I went to sleep."

"That must have felt great," Ally smiled.

"It did," she agreed, then laughed softly. "I developed a pretty heavy AOL addiction after that heady evening. The minute my roommate left the room, I was lurking in a chat room. Over time, I forced myself to interact with people, and within a few weeks I created another alias that indicated I was from the bay area. Finally, someone asked me to go into a private room, and much to my surprise, I did!"

"Did you hook up?" Ally asked.

"G.o.d, no! I was way too chicken for that. I played around in chat rooms for months before I finally agreed to actually meet a human being."

"Hey, don't be so hard on yourself. Everyone has to go at her own pace."

Sara nodded. "I guess you're right. My pace was just darned slow."

"So, did you have a date, or what?"

"You wanna hear the whole sordid story?" Sara asked, a little surprised.

"Of course I do. I'm interested in you, Sara. Your past is part of you."

"All right," she agreed. "I arranged to meet a woman who was a student at Stanford. d.a.m.n, I was scared. But I forced myself to get on the train and go down to Palo Alto on a Sat.u.r.day night. We agreed to meet at a coffee shop at 8 o'clock, and I think I got there at 7," she chuckled. "I sat inside an ice cream shop across the street and watched the place like I was a police detective. Lee showed up at 8 on the dot, and somehow I found myself walking across the street to meet her. I'm sure she knew how nervous I was," she said, rolling her eyes. "At one point I laughed, and I sounded hysterical!"

"I bet she was nervous, too," Ally guessed.

"You know," Sara said thoughtfully, "she really wasn't. She was only a freshman, but she'd been out to herself since she was 15. She was from Hong Kong, and her family had left partially to get out before China reclaimed the colony, and partially to be with her when she went to college."

"Now, that's a close family," Ally laughed.

"You have no idea! We had a really nice time, but at 10:30 she said she had to go to her dorm room so her parents could call her. Apparently, they called every night at 10:30, and she had to be in the room or they'd freak out!"

Ally laughed and said, "Even if that wasn't true, it's a good way to get a woman to go home with you."

"It worked," Sara agreed. "And I'm sure I wouldn't have gone if she'd just flat-out asked me to."

So... did you enjoy yourself?"

Sara nodded. "I've never made a decision that I was happier with."

"Wow, she was that good?"

Laughing, Sara said, "At the time, I had no idea if she was the worst or the best. All I knew was that I'd taken the biggest risk of my life and done something that I'd been mortally afraid of. The world didn't stop, the sun came up the next morning, and I didn't have a lavender 'L' tattooed on my forehead." She shook her head, still in awe of how she'd felt that night. "In retrospect, Lee was a wonderful lover for someone as inexperienced as I was. She was gentle, and considerate, and she really knew how to help me express myself. I've slept with women who were technically more proficient, but no one has ever made me feel as comfortable as she did."

Ally reached across the table and took Sara's hand in hers. Brown eyes shifted to meet compa.s.sionate gray/blue ones gazing at her. "That was very brave of you. I know how hard it can be, Sara."

Her eyes darting from Ally's large, warm hand to her intense gaze, Sara's heartbeat picked up, and she felt a faint shiver roll down her spine. "It was brave," she admitted, "but my bravery didn't last very long. We got together two more times, arranging things just like we had before. But when Lee wanted to exchange phone numbers and see each other more often, I panicked. I still can't believe I did this, but I changed my screen name and never spoke to her again."

"You just weren't ready," Ally soothed, her fingers lightly caressing Sara's hand.

"That's no excuse," she said. "That was the second woman I'd run away from, Ally, and I can't imagine that Lee wasn't deeply hurt." She looked up at her friend, her gaze level and intent. "I was a coward, and I let my cowardice hurt another innocent person." She shook her head, and said, "It took me a long time to forgive myself. But I finally did so by promising myself I would never hurt someone like that again. I'm glad to say that I haven't," she added quietly.

"That's all that you can do," Ally said. "You can just try not to repeat your mistakes."

"I know," Sara agreed. "I made sure that from then on every woman I met knew that I wasn't in a position to be in a relationship."

"Did you go out with a lot of women?" Ally asked.

Sara's head shook decisively. "No, I didn't. I uhm... really didn't date at all. I'd chat with a woman until we decided that we wanted to get together, and then we'd go to her place and have s.e.x. I got together with a couple of women quite a few times, but I wouldn't really call it dating since we didn't really go out in public together." She laughed softly and said, "I managed to find women even more afraid of disclosure than I was."

"Was the s.e.x satisfying for you, Sara? Was it worth what you had to go through?"

Giving her a wry smile, Sara asked, "Wanna know the truth?"

"Yeah, I do."

"What I really needed was the closeness. I just wanted a woman to hold me and kiss me." Her eyes fluttered closed and she sighed. "That was worth it. That was worth anything."

Ally's hand shifted, and she linked her fingers with Sara's. "I predict that you will have a lot of kissing and cuddling in your future."

Her chin dropped slightly, and Sara gazed at her friend through half-hooded eyes. "I hope that's true. And I hope you're the one kissing me."

"That was part of my plan... I mean, prediction," Ally grinned slyly.

On the way back to the apartment, Ally shot Sara a quizzical glance and asked, "I don't think you've ever told me what led you to become an attorney. Do you mind talking about it?"

The smaller woman smiled at her and replied, "I discovered that I had a certain talent for law. Not an overwhelming interest by any means, but I took the LSAT's on a whim, and did remarkably well. I figured that I needed a profession, so I might as well pick the one that came easy to me." She shrugged and said, "I certainly don't dislike what I do, but it doesn't fill my soul."

"What would?" Ally asked.

"I'm not sure yet," Sara admitted. "I haven't been doing it long enough to know if I could carve out a little corner of the law that I would love. I think I'll discover that over time, if it exists at all. How about you? Do you love what you do?"

"I don't normally think of it in those terms, but I guess I do," Ally said thoughtfully. "Training people really suits me, and I have no plans to change careers now, or in the future." Tilting her head, she asked, "Are you at all bothered by the fact that I don't want to do something more challenging?"

"G.o.d, no!" Sara gasped. "I respect people who find something they love, and then learn how to do it well. That's all that matters to me, Ally. I'd respect an expert ditch digger much more than an inept neurosurgeon."

Ally dropped Sara's hand, and slipped an arm around her shoulders, "I like you," she said softly, inclining her head until it rested against the smaller woman's.

"Ditto, Ms. Webster. It's unanimous." Sara tucked an arm around her friend's waist, and let her fingers play across the tight muscle she felt along her flank. "Good lord, Ally, how much do you work out?"