Stay With Me

Wallflower Blush

“Tell me about Sunset Shimmer.”

It’s the first thing Rosary asks after we sit down with our drinks at Cuppa’s. She has a ceramic mug in her hands, and her long, dextrous fingers are wrapped around it to take in some of the heat.

It’s a particularly chilly morning despite only being very early autumn, and I haven’t been able to see Rosary nearly as much as I’d have liked since my father died.

“What do you want to know?” I ask, cradling my wide-bellied teacup as I breathe in the fragrant steam.

The few times we’d managed to get together the past few months were spent trying to reconnect as much as possible. I tried to tell her as much about myself, about the person I had erased, as I could. The good things, mostly.

I told her about how she had taught me to take care of flowers when she babysat, and how she was probably one of the only good things in my life growing up. I told her about odd little stories she’d told that had made me laugh when I didn’t have much to laugh about.

So it was probably inevitable that we’d eventually get to present day, and that would have to involve Sunset.

“She seems… odd,” Rosary says thoughtfully, brushing back a few strands of blue and silver hair that have fallen across her face. “Not bad, mind you, but I can’t say I’ve ever met anyone quite like her.”

I make a small noise of agreement as I take a sip of my tea since I’m not sure how to say that there isn’t anyone like Sunset. At least, I don’t think there is. I can’t imagine someone that amazing being anywhere or anyone else.

“I suppose, knowing you a bit better now,” Rosary continues, gesturing towards me, “that she just seems a bit stormy for you.”

“What do you mean?” I ask, frowning.

Rosary shakes her head and chuckles around another sip of her coffee as she leans back in her chair. Like all the chairs in Cuppa’s, it’s a repurposed easy chair. The size of them means that there are only about a half-dozen tables, and only a few chairs around each, but they’re all comfortable and well-cared for, if a bit coffee-stained, but that’s probably inevitable.

“It’s not a bad thing,” Rosary clarifies. “I would call myself stormy… or maybe mercurial is better for me. Your Sunset is less prone to quick changes, I think.”

“She’s very… persistent,” I agree with a small laugh.

If she weren’t so persistent I don’t think she would have been able to deal with me.

“And patient,” I add. “She’s so patient with me.”

“You say that like you’re a burden.” Rosary’s tone is coloured with admonishment, but it’s my turn to shake my head.

“I’m just a lot,” I say. “I… Sunset is always trying to make sure I don’t think of myself like a chore or a burden, but-”

I sigh quietly and take another drink while I collect my thoughts. Rosary doesn’t interrupt to break in, she just waits as I try to get my head in order. It takes me a little longer than some people, I know. Certainly, it takes me longer than Sunset.

“I have a lot of baggage,” I say, finally, smiling wryly up at Rosary.

“Well, I suppose I can’t argue that,” she admits.

“It’s asking a lot for someone to deal with my night terrors and neuroses,” I continue. “And I have a lot of insecurities and quirks, and uhm, my therapist, Bright Eyes, helps me a lot, but… I’m a work in progress, and not everyone has the patience for that.”

Something Bright Eyes has always been very insistent about is what he calls ‘realistic expectations’. Thinking of myself as a burden isn’t being fair to me, but at the same time I also can’t pretend I don’t have a lot of work to do. Not everyone has the strength or energy or ability to be present for that work, but some people do, and Sunset is one of those people, and acknowledging that and letting her be there for that work is part of respecting her. If I push back every time she tries to help me, it makes it harder for her.

“But Sunset does,” I say, smiling a little more broadly up at Rosary, who smiles back. “She wants to help, and I… I’ve been trying to be better about letting her.”

“It’s not often I use this word but—” Rosary sets her mug down and meets my eyes— “Sunset loves you fiercely.”

A flush colours my cheeks, and I smile into my tea as I nod. She does love me, and it’s a powerful love. It’s the kind of love that I only ever imagined existed in places like storybooks and comics.

Sunset’s love shakes mountains.

“So where’s she at today?” Rosary asks.

“Working.” Sunset is working a lot lately, but I know she does it because she loves me and because she wants to take care of me.

I wish there was something I could do for her.

“She get home late a lot?”

“Mhm.” I nod. “She takes classes, then tutors, and she’s the best so her schedule is always full of requests.”

“No surprise there,” Rosary says with a chuckle. “That girl is the definition of ambitious and driven.” Rosary’s chuckle turns into a soft, but full-bellied laugh, then she leans conspiratorially and smiles. “Bet that makes her a lotta fun on cold nights, eh?”

I raise an eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

Rosary stares at me for a long moment, and I start to wilt back. I know this feeling. It’s the feeling that someone just told a joke and I didn’t get it.

“In… In bed, y’know?” Rosary says with a quiet chuckle.

Oh.

Oh.

I can feel my face go absolutely scarlet. If it were possible to try and drown in green tea, that would be what I’m trying to do. Instead, I just bury my face in my teacup and drink down the rest of it as I try to put out the fire that’s just ignited behind my cheeks.

“Kiddo?” Rosary sets her mug down and frowns. “Hey, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to embarrass you. Ain’t anything to be embarrassed about, anyway! You’ve been together for, what, more than a year?

“T… two years last June,” I answer past the rim of my mug. I haven’t put it down and I have no plans to. Maybe if I keep it over my face I’ll just fall into it.

Rosary lets out an impressed whistle. “Damn, kid, that’s pretty good. I don’t think I’ve ever managed to stay in one place that long. So seriously, especially bein’ that long in, you’ve got nothing to be ashamed of.”

“It’s not that,” I mumble.

“Hm?”

Slowly, I lower the mug. My face is still scarlet. I can feel it.

“What’s wrong, kiddo?” Rosary asks.

“I’ve uhm…” I swallow hard as I try to work the words out in a way that doesn’t sound completely nuts. “We… We’ve… that is… Sunset and I… we’ve uh… n-never…”

Rosary’s eyes go wide and her mouth forms a small, shock ‘o’, and for a long, silent moment she just stares at me, and if the moment weren’t so mortifying I’d actually be a little proud of myself. I think this is the first time I’ve ever managed to render Aunt Rosary completely speechless.

Unfortunately, I’m a tiny ball of repressed anxiety and panic at the best of times, so instead I just curl in on myself around the tight ball of shame that’s burning in my chest right now.

“Two… years?” Rosary clarifies incredulously, blinking like she’s trying to get something out of her eye. “Not… not that you, or anyone, owes someone that, but… Lord, girl, two years?”

I wrap my arms around myself, trying to sink into my hoodie and jacket as best as I can. To be honest, I’ve always tried not to think about it. I don’t know what kind of preferences Sunset has, sexually speaking in terms of lots or very little, but I’d always had a feeling that I wasn’t exactly ideal in that sense, for her.

“I just… sh-she’s never pushed it.” The words are gumming up around my lips, but I force them out anyway. “And uhm, I… I don’t know how… or even if I… I’d want to… so, uhm—”

“Hey, hey, kiddo, I’m sorry,” Rosary leans forward to put her hands over mine. “I should’ve thought about… I can’t say I’m surprised you’ve pulled back on that kinda thing. And the first thing’s first on this, if you’re not ready, then you’re not ready, okay? And if you’re never ready? That’s okay, too.”

I tighten my grip on Rosary’s hands and nod shakily.

“And I’m sure Sunset knows that,” Rosary continues. “I toldja, that girl loves you fiercely. Clearly, she’s decided that she wants to be with you, whether or not you decide ya wanna that particular step.”

Nodding silently, I cling to Rosary’s hands as I lower my head. I can’t stop shaking because this is one of the ‘things’. There are ‘things’ I try not to think about too hard, or too often, or at all if I can help it. A lot of them are things that I have no control over, like bad memories, or things like not being able to work as much as Sunset can.

Things like not being enough for Sunset as a partner.

That’s a ‘Big Thing’.

Not being enough is a ‘Big’ ‘Bad’ ‘Thing’, and I know that dwelling on it will throw me into a spiral way down deep into a dark hole that Sunset will have to dig me out of.

Bright Eyes says that isn’t even necessarily unhealthy. Ignoring trauma is bad, but dwelling on things we can’t change, and losing ourselves in them, can be just as damaging if not worse.

So I focus on fixing what I can reach. Taking little steps forward each time I feel like I’ve put the pieces of something back together so I can fix something else.

But this…

“I don’t even know if I’m ready,” I say weakly. “I don’t even know how to know.”

Rosary sits back in her seat and gives me a long, pensive look as she runs a thumb over the knuckles of my hand she’s still holding. After a moment, she lets out a breath and nods to herself.

“Well, there’s two ways y’could go about it, kiddo,” Rosary says calmly. “One is t’wait for Sunset to make the move, but honestly I doubt she’s ever gonna.” Rosary chuckles softly and shakes her head. “Nah, that girl’s too terrified of hurting you or pushing you too far, especially on something like this.”

“What’s… what’s the second way?” I ask quietly.

“You make the move,” Rosary replies, nodding towards me. “And trust that, if you’re not ready, that Sunset will step back and keep waiting.”

On the first point, I definitely agreed with Aunt Rosary. For better or worse, this is something that Sunset would never be pushy about. She’s always so careful and so gentle with me, that I can’t even imagine her trying to bring something like this up. If I left it to Sunset, she would probably just ignore it and never bring it up, come hell or high water she would just leave it be.

But making the first move?

I’ve never made the first move.

When we first got together, it was Sunset who planned everything. She’s the one who asked me out. She was the one who asked me to be her girlfriend. She was the one who asked if she could kiss me.

Obviously I said yes to all of it, but it’s always been Sunset who initiates things.

“I don’t know if I can do that,” I say, and the words come out brittle.

“And you don’t have to,” Rosary says firmly, giving my hand a squeeze. “But if you are curious? If you don’t know if you’re ready, but think you might be? You owe yourself some happiness, kiddo. You don’t have to do this, certainly ain’t gotta do it now if it’s too much, but at least think about it.”

I nod miserably, and Rosary gives my hand another squeeze before flagging down Cuppa at the counter and ordering me a refill of my green tea, for which I’m thankful.

We sit in silence for almost half an hour as I mull over the thoughts in my head. The ones that Rosary dug up, albeit unintentionally.

Am I ready?

Could I be?

I wasn’t at the beginning of our relationship, and I’m so grateful to Sunset for never pushing the issue, but now… now I wonder if I might be and if Sunset’s penchant for treating me gently might be backfiring a little.

“Uhm, th-theoretically,” I start, breaking the long silence and drawing a curious smile from Rosary. “If I uhm, if I did want to… to make a move. How would I do it?”