If anyone had asked me about my sexual orientation before I met Carly I would have answered 'straight' without a moment's hesitation, but after our encounter in the park I had to admit to being more than a little bisexual. I've wondered since why I had never recognised that aspect of myself before, because it must always have been there - and presumably Carly spotted it, but then maybe she was more attuned to it. Carly wasn't bi, she was out and out gay, and she'd deliberately set about seducing me when I'd been stood up by my boyfriend and so when I was at my most vulnerable - not that I'm complaining.
I'd been sitting in a cafe having just decided that my boyfriend was definitely now my ex-boyfriend and as a result I was feeling lonely and depressed. Then this blonde spiky haired tomboy had joined in conversation with me, lifting me from my gloom. She eventually asked if I minded if she walked back to college across the park with me, on the grounds of descending darkness and mutual safety. I realised afterwards that was simply an excuse to get into my company, among other things. Maybe Carly sensed the latent bi streak in me, or maybe she just chanced her arm, but whichever it was, it worked and an unexpected embrace turned into a sudden kiss, and that kiss became the full on session that made me happily aware of my own tendencies. Afterwards I had gone home shocked but delighted at having found that my love life didn't need now to rely solely on perfidious men. My new lover promised that we would meet again, often, and enjoy more girl-on-girl loving, and I looked forward to it. No, I'll correct that. I didn't just look forward to it, I longed for it. But it didn't quite work out that way.
I'd given Carly my number but the expected call never came and my calls to her phone were never answered, nor in fact did I ever see her around. It was as if she had dropped out of existence altogether, either that or she had become extremely adept at avoiding me. She had seemed so enthusiastic about us meeting again and then she had let me down in the most cold-blooded manner. Girls, it seemed, could be as treacherous as men. It seemed to me that I had been offered the most wonderful pleasure, only to have it snatched way before I'd even had the chance to taste it properly. But I would taste it, I promised myself bitterly, I definitely would. And if it couldn't be with Carly, then it would be with some other girl. I could be cold-blooded too.
But I had fallen under Carly's spell and I would have given anything for us to continue together, so much so that I took to sitting in that same cafe at roughly the same time each evening in the hope that I might chance upon her again. If we couldn't pick up where we left of, I reasoned, then at least I might find out why I'd been dropped so callously. For over two weeks I sat there each evening, sipping coffee and gazing morosely at the entrance, waiting and hoping until it became obvious that she wouldn't be there that night either, and then I'd wander back across the park feeling lost and abandoned, especially when I passed the spot where we had shared that fateful kiss. Eventually one day I came to recognize that Carly wouldn't ever be putting in an appearance and so I decided to cut my losses and consign her to the same waste bin that contained my former boyfriend. I downed my coffee and set off back to college along that same damned path.
At first I walked back slowly, meandering along, head down, immersed in my own melancholy and ignoring everything around me. But then I gave myself a mental shake, put on a confident air that I barely felt and deliberately picked up my pace. That way, I figured, if by any chance Carly saw me she wouldn't realise the misery she had caused. I suspected she probably wouldn't care anyway, but I wasn't going to give her the chance.
I almost marched along the path then, resolutely determined that I was taking that walk for the very last time, and it wasn't long before I was approaching that spot again. But this time, as I rounded a curve in the path I found that I was catching up with another solitary girl. My heart leapt as, just for a moment, I thought it was Carly, but it wasn't and disappointment quickly replaced excitement. I blamed my mistake on the fading light but in my heart I knew it was really wishful thinking. This girl was nothing like Carly, taller and slimmer, skinny really, with long straw coloured hair hanging loosely down her back. She wore a white top and faded blue jeans, a much more rational outfit than Carly's mismatched attire, and she didn't walk with the same devil may care attitude that Carly had displayed either.
I scuffed my feet deliberately as I came up behind her, trying not to catch her unawares. The result was exactly what I didn't expect. She looked around sharply, jumped noticeably and clapped her hand to her mouth in shock. I didn't think I'd seen her before, but she clearly recognised me.
'Oh my god.' She gasped out. 'It's you.'
I had intended just overtaking her and walking on, but that reaction astounded me so much that I stopped dead in my tracks and stared at her in surprise.
'Have we met?' I asked, feeling certain that we hadn't. I wasn't in the mood for this sort of thing.
'No.' The girl shook her head, still staring wide eyed at me in apparent bewilderment. 'Well, yes. I mean no. Well, sort of.'
'Go on.' I prompted, frowning in confusion. 'What sort of sort of?'
She just stared at me as if unsure what to say and I took advantage of this pause to look her over. She was thin, there was no doubting that, and pale too, but it seemed to suit her, making her look like the heroine in some Victorian gothic novel - you know the sort, the kind of heroine who is locked away by some domineering husband and never gets to see the light of day. Having said that, she was quite attractive in a strange elfin kind of way. She looked to be a year or two older than myself, but her awkward movements belied that, making her look like a gangly teenager, and a flat-chested one at that.
'We haven't actually met, but I've seen you.' The girl stuttered out, easing the confusion not at all. 'But you didn't see me when I saw you.'
'Where was that?' I asked, thinking it the quickest way to make sense of things.
'Here.' She said after a pause. 'Well, I heard you actually. So I didn't see you, not at first anyway.'
A dreadful thought formed in my mind. 'Here' was near where Carly and I made love that night.
'When was this?'
'Two or three weeks ago.'
Adrenalin began to pump. 'Right here?'
'Well a little bit further along and in the park itself, but yes. You were with a blonde girl.'
'You spied on us.' I stated flatly, knowing what the answer would be and with anger replacing confusion.
'I didn't intend to.' She was sounding worried now. 'I was walking home like today and I heard you - I think it was you - and I thought it was somebody in trouble, and I went to see if they were all right. Then I saw what was happening.'
I remembered my far from silent first orgasm that day and I could see how it might be interpreted. Perhaps the girl was right to investigate, but even so she shouldn't have spied on us.
'So then you just stayed and watched us?' I asked sharply.