Chapter 2 New Friends

Chapter 2: Making some new friends

I gave up my Friday night shift bar tending so that I could leave early. That's one of the best nights of the week so there were plenty of people eager to take it from me. And I knew I was giving up several hundred dollars in tips for the night. But as much as I needed the money to pay off my dobro, I needed to see Allie again even more.

Allie and I hadn't talked about any plans for the weekend, so I had packed a variety of outfits. I was running through my head about anything else I would need to bring, but wasn't too concerned; it was just two days. I decided to leave my laptop at home, the last thing I intended to spend my weekend with Allie doing was looking at a screen. But I did check my email first, before leaving.

And after deleting all the spam, ads, and other useless notifications about stupid shit, I saw one from Alex. She was the one I'd met with her fiance, they were at the World Championship last LDTS in Lexington. She let me know that she and Tammy had done what we discussed. They had organized a group for their District Group (to the extent that setting up a website for it is organizing one), and wanted to talk about next steps. Alex would be the DG organizer and Tammy wanted to compete this year. She asked whether we could have a call some time to talk more about it.

I was excited, I always love to see more people get involved in the game. And I felt like they would be serious competitors too. We have very few who really can compete at the level of me and Allie. I think that 9

th

grader from last year - what was him name, Ryder? maybe - he was going to be good soon. He had done really well last year. I had a feeling that Tammy was going to take this seriously, maybe even give Allie a run for her money. I sent Alex a reply, saying I'd love to talk with them about it, and copied Meri so she could get them added to the roster.

I was in such a hurry driving over to see Allie that I'm sure I would have gotten multiple speeding tickets, if the traffic hadn't been dense enough to hold me back. It was moving at a good rate though, so as impatient as I was, I just stuck with the same speed as everyone else. I couldn't wait to tell Allie about the email from Alex, maybe she would want to call them with me over the weekend.

I surprised myself by how excited I was to be going to see Allie, and I was still trying to wrap my head around her being my girlfriend. I had been telling myself for so long that I hated her, it didn't seem possible. Molly and I had been together for over 3 years and I couldn't remember a time I'd been actually giddy to be with her. Contrary to my sister's opinion, Molly wasn't a bitch at all. We'd had a lot of good times together, we just never seemed to be able to connect on an emotional level. Deep down I knew it's because I'm ace, I just couldn't satisfy that need of hers. I wondered if the same thing is going to happen now with Allie.

When I finally arrived and she she ushered me in I saw that Allie's apartment was small, but perfectly adequate. She didn't have much in the way of decorations, everything was functional. If it didn't have a specific purpose, it seemed like Allie wouldn't have it. That seemed so typical of what I knew about her.

She had a lot of books though, and I mean

a lot.

I was kind of envious; OK, a lot envious. I didn't have the money to buy so many books. And until a few months ago I would have had nowhere to put them. I'd had to content myself with spending a lot of time at the library, which I didn't mind at all. But now that I'd bought my grandmothers house maybe I could start acquiring a collection.

"Allie, wow, that's a lot of books. How many of them have you actually read?"

"Almost none of these. These are the ones I'm planning to read this year. All my other ones are at my parent's house because I don't have enough room here. I'll show them to you tomorrow, if you want."

I started to be surprised at first when she said she hadn't read these, but after her explanation it made perfect sense.

Figures, that is exactly something she would do,

I thought in my head. Obviously she would not have books on the shelf that she had already read, that would be superfluous.

"So I'm meeting your parents tomorrow then?" I wasn't sure if I was nervous about that or excited. We'd been dating not even one week yet, but then again, she had met my parents after less than one day. We hadn't planned that though, so it was different, I told myself.

"Yes, we're having breakfast with them, at 8:30. So we have two hours first for coffee together before we go meet them."

I didn't think coffee together in the morning was such a big deal to me (even though I've talked about it a dozen times already in this story), but hearing that Allie specifically planned that into our morning for me was overwhelming.

"Oh Allie!" I rushed to her and threw my arms around her and gave her the biggest, sloppiest kiss ever. "That will be so perfect, thank you!"

When we finally came up for air she was grinning at me.

"You're so easy Jenny, all I have to do is make you coffee and you will eat my pussy," she repeated her words from Sunday morning.

"I'll do it right now if you want me to Allie."

I was learning something about myself: the most important thing about a relationship for me was having my partner do something specifically for me. And it didn't have to be anything big either. Allie would have made herself coffee in the morning anyway so it was nothing special, but she made it special by turning it into two hours we would spend together instead of just getting a dose of caffeine. Molly had never done anything specifically for me, she had just brought me along with whatever she was doing for herself. I thought about what my sister had told me on Monday; then I remembered my mom saying she thought Allie would be good for me. I almost hoped that Allie would ask me to get on my knees and eat her out right there - I totally would have done it.

"I would like you to, if you want to do it later. But you're probably hungry, don't you want to eat first?"

I started to make the predictable lesbian reply to that but Allie saw it coming.

"Not me, Jenny, dinner. Should we have dinner first? We can decide what to do after dinner while we are... having dinner."

She already had dinner ready and waiting for me. And I could see she had put a lot of effort into it (did I mention that Molly rarely even helped me cook?), there was barbequed pulled pork, coleslaw, a bean dish of some sort I didn't recognize, green beans in some kind of sauce/ glaze. This girl was going to get me fat if she was going to make a habit of feeding me like this. And I wondered how she stayed so skinny.

We talked easily through dinner. The food was excellent and I asked her about all her recipes. She explained the way she made each of the dishes and promised to teach me. The bean dish was her own invention, but it was really just a very carefully balanced and prepared mix of standard ingredients. I was not surprised to learn that she kept notes while she was cooking and then again made careful notes of the results, so that she could slightly revise and improve each dish. I also noted that she did not touch the pulled pork, she had made that specifically for me only.

"Allie, about being a vegetarian, do you just not like meat or is there, like a philosophical reason?"

"Right, it's more of a philosophical reason. I like the taste of meat well enough, but I don't like the way that livestock is treated; I don't like the outsized impact that animal production has on the environment. I don't want to encourage that behavior. And I think that with a little imagination, I can make things without meat that taste every bit as good."

"I absolutely agree with you about that. This bean dish is at least as good as the pulled pork, and your BBQ is among the best I've ever had. I'm not going to let this pork go to waste, believe me, but you don't have to make if for me. Honestly, I never really thought about all the problems with animal agriculture, but now that you pointed it out I agree with you about that too. Not saying I'll never eat meat again, but I don't want to encourage it either."

I helped her clear up, and I really enjoyed being in her kitchen with her. I washed dishes while she gathered up the leftovers and put everything away. Nothing seemed like a chore when we were doing it together.

"Oh Allie, guess what? I got an email from Alex, she and Tammy are starting a group up by Pittsburgh."

"Who are they?"

"They are the couple we met at the World Championship last year, remember? They are both engineers, I did an interview with them for the article I wrote."

"Are you sure I met them? I'm pretty sure the only person I met there is you, and only because you made me go to that meeting that I didn't want to go to."

"What are you talking about, you and I met way before that? But I'm hoping to have a zoom call with them, hopefully this weekend. I'm sure you'll recognize them."

"Well I guess you and I did sort of meet before that, you were at the same competitions, but I don't call that really meeting." She paused for a moment, "Jenny you're going to think this is weird, but I can't recognize people's faces very well. Like I have to really know them to recognize them. When you told your mom on Sunday that the first time we met was three years ago, I was surprised. I mean, I remember being there, and talking to someone about joining, but I had no idea that had been you. Well and then....."

"And then, what?" it seemed like she was debating whether to continue.

"There was another woman there too, probably with who probably had been you. And she was kind of a bitch. You know I'm not good at reading people, but it was obvious even to me that she was pretty selfish and inconsiderate. So I kinda didn't like either of you."

"That would have been Molly. You saw Molly last Saturday night, was it her?"

"I just told you Jenny, I can't recognize people. If Molly walked in the door right now I'd have no idea who she is."

"Seriously? Wow. But you can remember like, everything!"

"Weird, right? So if you told me every single fact about her: eye color, height, weight, birthday, shoe size, whatever, I would remember it. But I wouldn't recognize her when I saw her. The label for it is prosopagnosia, but I don't like labels. I get labeled too much. Usually I recognize people by their voices, if I take the trouble to remember them. But for most people, I don't put in the effort to actually add them to my memory. So I'll remember an event, and I'll probably remember what people said to me, but I'll have no idea who the people are."

By now we had finished cleaning the kitchen and were sitting on the couch. She had grabbed a few bottles of Redd's out of the fridge for us on the way. Again, I was touched by how she remembered to stock up on Redd's for me.

"Allie I think we really are going to be good for each other. This is exactly like the rivals-to-lovers trope. The first time you met me you hated me, and then eventually we end up together."

"No, this is the friends-to-lovers trope, because I didn't know that was you. And you never hated me. So the first time we met, in my mind, we became friends, and then after three months, lovers."

I wasn't going to correct her on that, and admit that I had hated her for over two years before she even knew I existed, apparently. So I skipped over that part and went to the happily ever after part.

"Regardless how it started, then we both fell in love with each other," I said blithely.

"Did we? Are we both in love with each other?"

Oh shit! Did I just say that out loud? We've been dating for exactly six days, and I just dropped the L word. Not only did I imply that I'm in love with her, but that I also believe she's in love with me. Well at least I do hope she is in love with me, right? I do? I hope that? I would only hope that if I really am in love with her. What to say now.... she takes everything very literally, no jokes now.... choose your words carefully. I clearly am taking too long to answer.

"Jenny? Are we?"

"Allie," I took a deep breath. "You told me you're not good at reading people so I'm trying to be careful to say the right thing, and not give the wrong impression. I like you, a lot. I know it's usually a bad idea to use the L word only six days into a relationship, and I hope I didn't scare you off."

"But-.... I'm sensing a 'but' coming next."

"No, I do. I like you a lot and I hope I didn't scare you off. I hope you don't want to dump me now because this is going too fast, or something. I know this is your first relationship, and you were a virgin until six days ago. Maybe you think I'm being to pushy and you aren't ready for anything more yet."

"You said you planned to marry me less than 12 hours into our relationship and that's usually supposed to happen after the mutual declaration of love part, which is supposed to happen after the meeting the parents part. You clearly have everything out of order, Jenny, but you still didn't answer the question. Now, you get a one word answer: yes, no, or maybe. I wouldn't expect you to answer for me, so for yourself only: are you in love with me?" Sometimes Allie's direct manner was extremely nerve wracking.

I only get one word, I need to make sure I choose carefully, "....... yes...."

Allie was silent for a long time. I wondered if I had scared her off after all. Should I have said 'maybe?' I thought about that and decided no, I was going to start telling her the truth. I'd lied to her and to everyone else for so long, pretended to be nice, pretended to be what I thought people wanted me to be. But Allie is real-honest; maybe painfully direct at times - after all she just now cornered me into admitting that I was in love with her. But I was absolutely sure she had never said anything to me that she didn't absolutely believe to be true.

Finally she spoke. "I'm not sure I can say the same thing Jenny. I do like you a lot, and I like being your girlfriend. But I have no experience to judge what 'being in love' feels like. So my answer will have to be 'maybe'."

My heart sank, I hadn't realized I had been so hopeful for a 'yes' answer. But I shouldn't be disappointed, after only six days it was entirely unreasonable to think she would be in love with me. Yet my heart was entirely unreasonable in this matter; it didn't matter what my brain told me. I had a lot of years dealing with an asymmetric emotional connection from being with Molly, so I had a repertoire of coping tools that were honed to perfection. I went with my favorite:

just give her time, she will fall in love with me soon.

I decided to change the subject. "OK, but how about Alex and Tammy? Do you want to call them with me? I'm really excited that they are starting another group. And you are an actual officer, whereas I'm not. So it would be more official if you're on the call."

"There's nothing in the bylaws that requires an officer to give permission to anyone who starts a new group."

"Yeah, but.. I'd just like you to be with me, when we call them. Please?" I worried that it sounded like I was pleading desperately, I sort of had the feeling I was. I'm not usually so needy.

"Sure. If you want. When do you want to do it?"

"I don't know when will be convenient for them. We should email them and ask, and send a Zoom link. Can we use your computer? I didn't bother bringing my laptop."

"OK, I'll turn it on. You could get us another Redd's, if you want one." She got up and walked toward a door that I had thought was a closet.

I grabbed us each another bottle of cider and joined her. I gasped when I saw her setup. There were three huge monitors that took up the entire wall of the tiny room, the computer itself was a towering thing, almost 3 feet high with all sorts of colorful lights inside of it. There really wasn't a desk, just a large chair that had some sort of built in bench with a keyboard, mouse, and some other things I didn't recognize. Allie was standing by the chair.

"It will finish booting in a minute," she gestured to the chair and took the bottle of cider I handed her.

But when it did finish booting, everything on the screen looked unfamiliar, nothing like any computer I'd ever used. So I asked, "Ah, what do I do?"

"Well this is a variation on Linux, with a kinda customized GUI. So click on that there," she pointed to an icon that looked like a dragon, "and that will open a browser. Then it should make sense from there."

I was doing that, then suddenly she stopped me.

"Oh, I forgot. I have a keystroke logger running. So if you log in to your email I will technically be stealing your login credentials. I should turn it off first."

"Allie, the last thing I'm worried about is you hacking my email. And even if I thought you were the sort of person to do that, I don't have anything worth stealing."

"OK, well I'll delete the log files after you finish anyway."

I sent Alex an email suggesting we have a Zoom call, and to send me a text with a time they wanted to do it. I didn't want to be checking my email all the time, so I gave her my phone number. I was pretty sure that Tammy already had it, but that had been months ago.

We spent the rest of the evening practicing. I felt like I was learning a lot from watching and listening to Allie and trying to find some notes that sounded good with whatever she was doing. She taught me a few standard licks and I started to throw one of them in every once in a while. Most of the time I did that she grimaced and I could tell it was completely the wrong thing, but every once in a while I'd get a smile from her. It seemed like she had an exquisite ear for sounds, and I thought it must be to compensate for her trouble with visual recognition.

We'd played for well over an hour when I was beginning to flag. My wrists were tired, my neck hurt, and I was losing focus. Trying to keep up with Allie, and think about which key she was in, what notes I should hit, anticipate the chord changes - it required a huge amount of concentration. But I didn't want to quit for the night, I was enjoying it too much.

"Allie, can we rest for a minute? I need to stretch my neck out." I set my dobro on the floor beside me and stiffly stood up. I rolled my head around, trying to work out the kinks and rubbed my wrists.

"Oh, yeah. Sorry, I didn't notice you were getting tired. Maybe we should quit for the night and I'll give you a massage again."

That sounded just as good to me as practicing for another hour. "You do that, and I'll probably eat you out again." I grinned at her; she grinned back even more.

We put our instruments away and were naked on her bed three minutes later.

While she worked over my neck and back I reflected on why I'd offered, volunteered to go down on her so much lately. I know what you're thinking, twice in six days hardly qualifies as a lot. But I never initiated sex, not with Molly nor with the very few other girls I'd had short term flings with on occasion. Maybe it was because Allie had been a virgin our first time, and I was a few years older than her? I didn't think that was it. I think it was because of how she made me feel, the small acts of consideration that showed me she cared, that she was thinking of me, the decisions that she made always took my interests into account. She made me feel noticed and validated, and that made me want to pleasure her however she wanted me to.

Allie was apparently wondering the same thing. She asked,"You say you're ace, Jenny. What exactly does that mean to you? Because you seem to want to have sex a lot. I don't know what normal is though, since you're the only girlfriend I've ever had."