Aberrant: 2011 - Possibly Maybe

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:40 AM

Aw! You're too sweet, Missy! I'm glad you liked that one, really. You're exactly who I had in mind when I made it. Keep flattering me, you, I might have to give you a live demonstration.

When I was a little girl, I first got started with stuffed animals. That kind of softness is good for all sorts of things.

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 4:42 AM

A live demonstration? O.o

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:44 AM

Sorry! I didn't mean to scare you!

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 4:49 AM

It's just that I've never had anyone offer to masturbate at me. O.o

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:50 AM

Well, I was mostly kidding...mostly...

Is that bad?

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 4:53 AM

Brit,

I'll reserve judgement on whether it's good or bad, if that's okay? It was just unexpected, that's all!

--Missy

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:55 AM

Missy,

Okay. I'm sorry, I feel like I kind of freaked you out or turned you off or something. I let my imagination run away with itself, sometimes. I apologize.

-Brit

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:01 AM

Brit,

Stop the remorse bus right here! It's not a big deal to me at all, really! It wasn't "OMG awful!" so much as "OMG unexpected and weird for LiberTeen to be talking to me about masturbation!" I mean, you're Someone Famous and I'm the anonymous faceless member of the vast sea of fans, so to be singled out for attention like that, and in that way was startling.

*hugs*

--Missy

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 6:12 AM

Missy,

Thanks. I was just afraid by the way you reacted that you found the idea somehow affrontable, which...well, a little scary, I won't lie.

And you're by no means just an "anonymous faceless member of the vast sea of fans" to me, Missy. I happen to like you a great deal. A lot of my fans are people who, while I appreciate their support, I doubt I would connect with on some personal level. You've already received a rather rare distinction, in that I'd be happy to call you my friend. You're not just an anonymous fan, and if I'd had a chance to know you before now, you never would have been.

Anyway, I'm sorry if I startled you. I thought you might enjoy having someone to talk to about these things, since I'm guessing that you haven't had somebody like that all that much in the past. The fact that you're very attractive doesn't hurt.

Hugs,

-Brit

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:20 AM

Brit,

Okay, I guess I'll buy that. I like you too.

I was going to say something about you only liking me because I'm a nova now, but you cut that off at the knees before I got the chance. Speaking of which, I don't know why you think I'm attractive. I'm pretty plain, really, and I didn't get any better-looking after I erupted.

I really haven't had anyone to talk to about things like this. That's partly because I roll a different way than almost everyone else in my school, and partly because this is not a very large town and if anyone blabbed, it'd be all over town in a heartbeat.

*hugs*

--Missy

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 6:28 AM

Missy,

Yeah, sorry to cut down any lingering doubts you may have had before they cropped up. I'm terrible like that. And I've seen photos of you from the local paper, girl. You're a far, far cry from unattractive. It takes all kinds, you know? I happen to have esoteric tastes. I also happen to think athletic tomboys are very sexy.

Anyway, I figured you didn't have many people to talk to. That's why I offered. I don't know if you wanted someone, but...if you do...I'd be happy to. I'm not going to pretend I wouldn't enjoy it.

Still really looking forward to Friday!

Hugs,

-Brit

[Pew Pew Pew]

from: pewpewpew@nprime.op

to: liberteen@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 5:37 AM

Brit,

Well, I assumed you'd seen photos of me, since we've never met in person!

I like talking to you too. I need to get a little sleep. I have to get up in a few hours for school. >.<

Good night!

--Missy

[Libertyne]

from: liberteen@nprime.op

to: pewpewpew@nprime.op

subject: I'm coming to Iowa soon...

time: 04/16/07 7:14 AM

Missy,

Sleep well! See you soon!

-Brit

[Pew Pew Pew]

Marshalltown, Iowa; Friday April 21, 2009, 3:50 p.m.:

Melissa "Missy" Stutzenbach, also known by her nova handle of "Pew Pew Pew," pulled back the living-room drapes and peered into the front yard again. In the adjacent kitchen, her mother Amanda heard the rustle and sighed.

"Stop tugging on the curtains, Missy," Amanda said from the kitchen. She wiped her wet hands on a dish towel and walked to the arched doorway to the living room.

"Sorry Mom," Missy replied, stepping away from the window. The afternoon light caught the highlights in her strawberry-blonde hair, which was pulled back into a short ponytail. Anxiously, she flopped into a comfortable recliner, sitting on the edge of the cushion.

"Your nova friend will get here when she gets here," Amanda said, "Are you sure you've picked up your room?" That Amanda could say "your nova friend" without stopping to boggle over the significance of meeting a nova, let alone befriending one, illustrated how quickly she'd come to cope with her family's new situation. Her teenaged daughter Missy had erupted into a nova only three and a half weeks earlier. Missy was, in fact, the first nova to ever set foot in Marshalltown, and already another was coming to visit from out of town. If Missy hadn't erupted, it was possible that no nova would ever visit Marshalltown. The sleepy town of 25,000 was situated in the middle of nowhere in rural Iowa, an hour from the very minor metropolis of Des Moines.

"My room's fine," Missy said ambiguously. While her bedroom was "clean" in the sense that there was no trash or garbage or dirty laundry laying about, it was still moderately cluttered. Even before she'd erupted, Missy kept busy enough with school and athletics that she could never completely tidy her room. Afterward, it was only that much worse. In addition to the piles of books everywhere, her baseball equipment bag, and a computer desk overflowing with discs and manuals, she had a new pile of nova-related material: her costume, a stack of opened fan mail, a stack of unopened fan mail, and the hefty collection of reference binders that she'd gotten at the Rashoud facility in Minneapolis.

To create the illusion that she shared her mother's concern about her bedroom, Missy walked down the short hallway to her bedroom door and looked in. The costume atop her pile of "nova stuff" caught her eye and she sighed again. Shortly after she'd returned to Marshalltown, her mother had ordered the costume without her knowledge. It was bright red, made of a stretchy wet-look matrial, and in Missy's opinion, looked absolutely ridiculous. She'd agreed to wear it for a paid appearance at the opening of Jerry Lembacker's new car wash, and while nobody in the crowd seemed to find it too ridiculous, Missy was sure that her mortified crimson blush probably made it impossible to tell where the costume ended and her skin began.

Her father Raymond emerged from the hall bathroom, and he put his arm around his daughter's shoulder. He'd gotten over his remorse at never having had a son as soon as Missy had taken to sports in elementary school. While he was aware on a rational level that Missy was his daughter, he was constantly delighted that he never had to deal with "girl stuff" the way he had initially feared.

"Your room looks fine," Raymond reassured her. At the other end of the hall, Amanda pretended not to hear him. Missy was comforted by the gesture, and relaxed a little. In addition to erupting as a nova less than a month earlier, she'd come out to her family as lesbian just one week earlier. Amanda took it very poorly, but Raymond intervened and provided perspective. One of his best drinking "buddies" and co-workers at the Swift beef plant was a fireplug of a flannel-clad bulldyke, and he'd quickly learned that there was not a damned thing wrong with that at all-- after she'd blackened his eye one night with the butt of a pool cue at Ryan's Tavern.

"We'll set up some sleeping bags in the TV room downstairs," Ray continued, "Since there's not enough space in here for the two of you." Ray was briefly taken by the realization that his little girl was amost grown up, and he wondered where the time had gone. It was the weekend of Missy's senior prom. Missy was about to graduate from high school. Missy planned to go away to college in Ames that August. Missy had erupted into a nova.

The last, he decided, was pretty weird, so he decided not to include that in the list the next time he wanted to reflect on the changes in his only daughter's life.

[Pew Pew Pew]

5:00 p.m.:

For the sixtieth time in the past hour, Missy glanced again at the clock over the sofa. Liberteen was an hour late, and Missy was worrying herself sick. Had she run into bad weather, she wondered. Could she find Marshalltown from the air? Or had--a shudder passed through her--Cyn found a way to ruin their weekend before it ever started?

Missy wished she'd gotten Brit's phone number.

"I can put dinner on hold for a few minutes," her mother Amanda said, framed again in the doorway to the kitchen.

Missy looked up from the recliner.

"Okay, thanks Mom," she replied. "I wish I knew where she was."

"I'm sure it's nothing," Amanda reassured her. "She probably didn't plan on it being such a long flight or something."

Missy nodded, unwilling to share her worry about Cyn with her mother. Even the hint of such a thing would doubtless scuttle the entire weekend, she correctly guessed.

[Libertyne]

One thing Brittany had to say for commercial flight was that even with its notoriety for delays, cancellations, loss of luggage, layovers, and stayovers on the tarmac that could stretch into the hours, it was generally a lot more reliable than trying to do it yourself, especially when you’ve been doing it for all of two weeks.

Brittany had left Oregon earlier that morning in her eufibre costume and a day bag slung over her shoulder, giving Robert a light peck as she walked out the door. “Have fun”, he told her with a somewhat nervous smile, “And don’t do anything I wouldn’t.” The conflicted nature of that statement didn’t pass her by, and she giggled as she walked out the door, assuring him that she wouldn’t.

The hours since seemed to have gone completely to hell. First there were the headwinds in Utah, then the rain in Nebraska, to say nothing of apparently having wandered into somebody else’s flight path no fewer than four times, despite her best efforts. And then of course came the problem of finding the speck that was Marshalltown from the sky, something that she was learning the hard way would have been much easier had it been in Idaho or Washington or anywhere in the Pacific Northwest, where things tend to be more spread out. Half an hour as the crow flies outside of Marshalltown, she’d touched down in some outcropping of homes and stopped into a drugstore for a drink, and was rewarded for her break by getting mobbed by the locals. Another fifteen minutes waylaid, and she was late already!

After a few brief but terse photo ops and handshakes, Brittany sped away, finally managing to divest herself of some of Iowa’s local color, this time on the lookout for “the Roadhouse”, Marshalltown’s super-sized gymnasium, quite possibly one of the only structures in town identifiable from the sky. It was only moments before she spotted it, touching down at last into Marshalltown, maintaining a cautious distance that still afforded her the ability to read the streets as she wended through the veins of the small city, following her printed-out directions to Missy’s house.

With a heave, Brittany at last touched down at the house Missy’d described and consulted her watch. She was already over an hour late. Way to go, Brittany, she cursed herself. I’m sure you’ve really made Missy feel safe by not even being bothered to show up on time. A self-conscious bolt of reflection seized her, and with a fumbling hurry, she slipped off her goggles and checked her image in the window of the sedan parked in the driveway. She hoped desperately that the flight hadn’t made her look ridiculous, but her own assessment of the situation was less than favorable. Desperately, the tried to smooth out the errant strands of unkempt hair that had escaped from the simple tie she’d used to tame it and wiped what looked like the remains of an insect off her jawline. She remembered all the photos she’d just taken and cringed. Oh, wonderful. Late, windblown messy hair, and crusted in bug guts. Way to make a first impression. She produced a wet-knap from her bag and smeared it quickly across her face, thankful that she’d at least had the foresight not to wear makeup today. Satisfied as best as she could be with what she saw in her reflection, she looked at her smile once before turning away and climbing the last of the steps up to the front door.

Modesty, she chided herself as her knuckles met the door, and with a hurried thought, adjusted the length of her skirt another three or four inches down and hid her natural cleavage beneath a sheer veil she stretched across the top of her bodice. Footsteps could be heard scurrying up to the door before she’d even finished knocking, and she realized how eagerly she’d been expected. Without having to even think about it, a look that was equal parts prostrated apology and radiant sweetness overcame her, and the door swung wide.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Missy opened the front door and then froze momentarily, overcome by a bashfulness unlike anything she'd recently experienced. Despite being a nova herself, Brittany was the first nova she'd met socially, and Brittany's nova-caliber physical beauty overwhelmed her. Missy continued to stand framed in the open doorway as she took in Brittany's appearance. Despite being disheveled from the long flight, Brittany was still stunning beyond compare in person. The difference between a photo of her online and seeing her in person was like the difference between shooting someone and just throwing a bullet at them.

"Hi," Missy began breathlessly and wide-eyed, "You're here! And, in costume. . .!" Missy hadn't expected that. Missy wore blue jeans and a sleeveless volleyball polo. Stockinged feet peeked out from under her flared jeans.

Her father Raymond joined her, standing midway between the foyer and the kitchen wearing khaki Dockers and a golf shirt, and casually holding his first Miller of the night. The petite Brittany was obscured from his sight by his taller daughter, but he thought that he noticed the swirl of a flag-red skirt.

"Well don't just stand there hon," he chuckled, "Invite your friend on in!"

[Libertyne]

Brittany winced slightly. She wasn’t sure if Missy was pleased or if she was simply shocked. “I…um, yeah, I…is that okay?” She smiled a bit and hugged the other girl gently, having to reach up to do so. Missy had a good few inches on her, something that Brittany realized, at that moment, was unbearably endearing, and she looked up to meet Missy’s gaze with all the bashful vulnerability of a first date. Between feeling totally gross from the flight, finally meeting Missy face-on, and very suddenly being put in a position to meet her family and be invited into their home, she was, in fact, feeling awfully vulnerable, but persuaded herself to reaffirm her confidence, at least while she was in Missy’s parents’ home.

Stepping out from behind Missy with poise anew, she smiled over at the handsome, homey man in the adjacent room, inviting her in. She waved her hand gently to the man, genuflecting slightly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Stutzenbach!”

[Pew Pew Pew]

Raymond involuntarily waved back, nearly sloshing his brew. My God, he thought, To be eighteen again.

"Good to meet you too, Brittany," he said pleasantly. Ray took a half step toward the kitchen to meet Amanda as she joined him and reminded him that thirty-nine had its advantages, too.

Missy recovered quickly, returning Brittany's hug. Despite having seen her online and in photos, she'd expected Brittany to be taller. Her height advantage counteracted Brittany's one year of age advantage, and Missy felt more like Brittany's peer again.

"Come on in," Missy said, unconciously echoing her father's instruction as she ushered Brittany inside. "You're just in time for dinner. Are you hungry? We're having--" she hesitated, remembering that her mom had just cooked enough for two adults and two novas, "--we're having a lot." Missy smiled.

[Libertyne]

“Great!”, she returned. “I actually haven’t eaten all day, only a drink about a half hour out on my way in. Oh, Missy!” she laughed, bracing her hand on Missy’s shoulder gently. “There was rain, and fighting against the wind, and bugs, oh gawd, Missy, the bugs! Trust me, you’re better off not flying. I must look like a mess!” Her eyes purposely met Missy’s as they strolled to the kitchen, the look on Brittany’s face a total endorsement of the sincerity of her statement that at once rendered it objectively completely untrue. “I’m sorry I was late”, she said softly. “I hope I didn’t worry you.” She knew she probably had, but didn’t want to give that fear validation by assuming it so plainly in front of her parents.

Brittany left her sack in the foyer, seeming the most obvious place for it, and took advantage of the fact that she was bringing up the rear to shorten her cape to a few short feet from her shoulders, having learned long ago that long, flowing capes and sitting down rarely mix well.

As they entered the kitchen, Brittany spied Missy’s mother, and gave her a polite smile. From what Missy had told her about the last several days, she admitted she had no idea how to behave around Mrs. Stutzenbach. She didn’t want to seem affable or cold, but she hardly wanted to seem saccharine, either. Mr. Stutzenbach seemed genuinely glad to have her around, but his wife could still easily be another story, and with as much emphasis as Missy seemed to indicate she placed on appearances, chances were that if she didn’t like Brittany, she wouldn’t show it. Still, certain conventions of courtesy were nearly immutable, and the warm, open atmosphere of Missy’s home, which reminded her so much of her own back in Montana, was quickly putting her at ease. “Hello, Mrs. Stutzenbach”, she smiled, casting a glance towards the well-stocked dinner table. “Thank you for having me for supper in your home, ma’am. Everything looks quite wonderful.”

[Pew Pew Pew]

"No worries," Missy quietly lied to Brittany, acutely aware of the importance of maintaining perfect secrecy around the subject of Cyn. Reluctantly stepping away, she helped her mother remove the covers from the bowls and dishes of food.

Side-by-side, it was plain that Missy took after her mother's leggier and leaner features than her father's lantern-jawed and thoughtfully-browed ursine aspect. Amanda had defied the group norm for her friends and not become a typical overweight sedentary Iowa mother. Her age was difficult to guess as a result, and she frequently passed for mid-to-late twenties. Her fashion was typically up to date as well, without being jarringly out of her age range. "I'll dress like a Land's End model when I'm forty-five, and not a minute before," she was fond of saying. Amanda would laugh as if it were a joke, but the underlying meaning was quite serious. Old age would have to capture her; she would not embrace it willingly.

"Okay," Amanda said, setting the last of the pot lids onto the counter, "Everyone have a seat already and we'll dig in. We've got a smoked ham, a pork roast, baked potatoes, salad, baked beans, cooked carrots, dinner rolls, and broccoli with cheese." Amanda took the seat closest to the business end of the kitchen. Ray sat at the other end, leaving opposite-side seats for Missy and Brittany.

Missy had opened the refrigerator and retrieved a pitcher of iced tea. Joining everyone else, she set it on the table and took her seat. Missy smiled shyly to Brittany, as if to suggest that something amusing (or embarassing) was about to happen.

"We don't say grace," Ray explained amiably to Brittany as he forked a cartoon-thick slab of ham onto his plate, "So help yourself and don't be shy to ask for anything you can't reach. Can I get you some ham or pork roast?"

[Libertyne]

Brittany returned Missy’s gaze with a pleased smile at her father’s declaration. She still felt uncomfortable navigating the perilous territory of how to behave around the customs of others, especially when she was a guest in their home. Saying “grace” before a meal was a concept that had remained foreign to her until the age of ten, an ignorance that precipitated a rather awkward mealtime at the home of a childhood friend. She’d since taken an ever-waffling position of simply remaining respectfully quiet during such exchanges between people and the mythical man in the sky they for whatever reason felt beholden to for their prosperity, and finding that she could easily dodge that potentially very awkward bullet in this already somewhat volatile situation relaxed her considerably. “Thank you”, she smiled to Missy’s father, who was unaware that he was not being thanked for the simple invitation to serve herself. “I’d love a little of both.” She smiled courteously as Ray slabbed a few weighty pieces of meat onto her plate before serving herself a few eager, nova-sized portions of everything else that sat on the table, decorum demanding she take somewhat less than she knew she could eat.

Respectfully waiting until everyone had served themselves and passed a few minutes eating, Brittany at least chirped up, “So, Mr. Stutzenbach, Missy tells me that you work at a local beef processing plant. How do you find the work there?” The question was eager and sincere, but she silently wondered if she might be out of her depth. She cast a sidelong glance to both Missy and her mother, giving a passing worry to the thought that Mrs. Stutzenbach might bristle even more at a young, beautiful nova chatting pleasantly with her husband than with her daughter. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time she’d have been accused of being a homewrecker by virtue of simply being pleasant. The meat packing industry, however, was something she knew a little about, thanks to her interest in the American labor condition, and hoped that her knowledge in the area might serve as an area to showcase the aspects of her character that didn’t involve masturbating on camera or condoning consensual incest.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Ray nodded and gestured with his fork to Brittany to indicate that he'd heard, but he finished his mouthful of potatoes before replying. Amanda spoke into the gap:

"Ray's a general at Swift," she explained, not mentioning that Swift was a beef processing plant. "He's a supervisor of supervisors on the production floor."

"We're doing okay at Swift," Ray added, picking up his glass of iced tea. "We have the usual challenges, but we get 'er done." While truthful, his answer was obviously less than complete. Boasting that they'd killed 80,000 head of cattle and cut them up into steaks in the preceding week was not good dinner conversation.

"We, uh, actually don't talk a lot about dad's work," Missy explained. "We learned a long time ago that most people don't like to hear about what goes on there while they're eating." She smiled impishly. "Some of the words put people off, like 'neck breaker.'"

Amanda's focus softened, as if she were thinking of being somewhere else for a moment. She'd been in this conversation before, and knew what Ray and Missy were about to do.

"Bung gun," Ray said, upping the ante. He watched Brittany's reaction.

"Viscera dropper," Missy countered.

"Back saw," Ray replied, savoring the words.

"That's enough," Amanda interrupted firmly but good-humoredly, putting a sudden end to their game of verbal chicken. She knew that if she'd allowed, her husband and daughter would soon be talking about piles of cow heads and boxes of kidneys.

"So, yeah, that's what I do." Ray summarized. He glanced at his wife, who nodded. He continued. "We know what you do, too, Brittany; but you're here eating dinner at our table, so you can probably guess that we're okay with that." Ray's expression was open, but guarded. Amanda, on the other hand, looked as if she'd bitten into something sour. Whatever they had decided as a couple, it had clearly come only after serious discussions. Ray squeezed Amanda's hand, reaffirming that they were a couple.

"Yeah, there's been a little bit of drama this week," Missy understated. She'd come out to her mother as lesbian, but once Amanda had gotten over her initial surprise, she'd adjusted her viewpoint reasonably well.

Whatever had happened in the Stutzenbach household in the preceding week, the four of them--the two thirty-something Generation X parents, their tomboy recently-erupted only daughter, and her prom date patriot and libertine nova friend--were all seated around the same dinner table. Amanda had been considering this very line of thought as she considered the surreal tableau and realized how much her family had changed in the past few weeks.

"Yes, we have our challenges," she smiled, "but we get 'er done."

[Libertyne]

Brittany smiled impishly all the while at the father and daughter Stutzenbach’s exchange. Missy was right; most people tend to get mildly squicked by that kind of conversation, especially at the dinner table. Brittany wasn’t among them. Her father, bless him, was a loudmouth cur who enjoyed a good hunt, and while Brittany hadn’t spent any appreciable length of time on the kill floor of a slaughterhouse, the physical butchering of for-real animals was something she was no stranger to, the end result being that Brittany was neither afraid of nor ignorant of the most visceral aspects of where her meat comes from. She sat sifting through her own mind in a shameless effort to join in on the fun when Mrs. Stutzenbach put a jarring halt to the exchange, and at that point Brittany decided that a little discretion was in order. For her part, she hoped the fact that their discussion in no way upset her meal and her request of more dead pig once the quiet had descended again upon the table spoke for itself.

“My father hunts deer and foxes in Montana, Mr. Stutzenbach. He’s taken me along a few times, too. I think he always wanted a son”, she giggled good-naturedly. “I knew how to clean a rifle from the age of twelve. Mostly I was just curious as to how your end of the industrial sector is holding up in this area. It’s shameful how many jobs have been exported away from Americans over the last few decades.” She shook her head somewhat bitterly, but with an academic calm. “I haven’t been there, of course. I can’t pretend to know what it’s like. My father was a military man, retired. But all you have to do is read the statistics, look at the facts. It makes me feel a portion of some great national shame that so few of us can afford to do so well. Millions of Americans aren’t fortunate enough to become anything better than working poor.” Brittany cringed internally, realizing she may have just committed a social faux pas in the way of polite dinner conversation. There were happier things to talk about than radical social reform and socioeconomic disparity. “Sorry”, she said apologetically. “I sometimes go on without thinking about where I’m headed. Anyway. I’m happy to see that you’re dong so well, sir.”

Feeling more than a touch awkwardly out of place, Brittany rolled things around on her plate for a moment and hoped desperately that dinner was about to be officially commenced so she could stop feeling like such an idiot.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Ray, Amanda, and Missy alike were all momentarily stunned by Brittany's unexpected outpouring of patriotic protectionist pro-labor proletarianism. Pained, Pew Pew Pew paused to ponder her predicament.*

"Yes, I do hunt," Ray said slowly, dodging the contentious issues of social and economic justice. "I like to bow hunt for deer in the early season on Mark's farm-- the one where you're four-wheeling tomorrow. He's my brother." The Swift beef packing plant which Ray helped manage employed many Mexican immigrant workers with dodgy papers. It was an unspoken rule in Marshalltown that the topic need not be mentioned. He glanced to his wife, and caught her return glance. Where did that come from? their eyes asked each other.

"The ham's really good," Missy said into the awkward pause, cutting another bite from the thick slab. Missy watched Brittany and wondered if she uttered these kinds of outbursts frequently. She resisted the urge to crawl under the table. "It came out really juicy. The ham, I mean."

(* Sorry.)

[Libertyne]

"Sure did." Brittany swallowed, shoving another mouthful of ham into her mouth as an alternative to wincing in embarrassment. She'd clearly either touched on or approached a topic that was less than welcome at the dinner table, and dutifully backed off as quickly as was reasonable. "It's, um...really good", she grinned somewhat sheepishly, her eyes plainly giving away her realization.

A few more polite utterances were exchanged over the quality of the meal, but Missy and Brittany both silently agreed to remain virtually mute for the remainder of the meal as a means of further avoiding any further social gaffes on Brittany's part. Brittany was reminded that she was trying to endear herself to these people, and being her usual, firebrand self might not serve her best at the moment. She thanked Missy's mother again for the wonderful meal and offered to help clear the table and clean the dishes as an attempted gesture of friendship. Mrs. Stutzenbach seemed to appreciate the offer, but declined.

Missy, her guest, and her father shambled back out to the living room, the awkwardness of dinner more or less over, but still leaving a vacuum of what to discuss in its place. "So!", Brittany chirped in. "I saw a Dairy Queen a few blocks away on my way in, Missy. You feel like heading over there for some ice cream? My treat!" If nothing else, at least it would give her a chance to get Missy alone and apologize.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Ray was momentarily taken aback, but he winked conspiratorially to Brittany.

"You're not a mind reader are you?" he asked good-naturedly, "Because that is exactly what I was thinking-- minus the 'your treat' part I mean." Ray considered treating his daughter and her friends to ice cream as one of the perks of being a father. "I'll be right back."

Ray returned to the kitchen, leaving Missy alone with her new friend. Missy glanced toward the kitchen to make certain her father was out of earshot, then she tiptoed closer to Brittany.

"Wow, that was awkward," she giggled with nervous relief and smiled. "I'm glad that's over with. No matter what else happens this weekend, it'll be better than that." Missy could already taste the Peanut Buster Parfait.

"Dairy Queen will be cool," Missy explained out loud, "On Friday nights practically everyone in the neighborhood is there." What Missy left unsaid was that the local hot-rod auto club and motorcyclists gathered there as well. She wondered briefly if it would be any different now that she was a local celebrity.

[Libertyne]

A giggle came out of Brittany's lips as Mr. Stutzenbach joked with her and walked back to the kitchen. She had to admit, Missy's dad seemed to be a pretty decent guy. And cute, too.

Missy consulted the kitchen to make sure her parents were out of earshot before leaning over to Brittany, her voice just above a whisper. "Wow, that was awkward. I'm glad that's over with. No matter what else happens this weekend, it'll be better than that."

"I'm really sorry about that", she smiled apologetically. "I hope I didn't give any offense. I was trying to show your parents I'm more than just a vapid teenage idol, and I guess I kinda bombed." Her eyebrows knitted themselves into a self-depricating, regretful little smile, but Missy smiled back at her, setting her at ease.

The Dairy Queen sounded delicious, and Missy really seemed excited about going, so she was happy of that. The words "everyone in the neighborhood is there" carried some special resonance to her, and Brittany quirked an odd little smile, giving a passing thought to the kind of looks the two of them would get together, even aside from the normal spate of autograph hounds and (ugh!) cheesy propositions she got when she normally went out in public.

[Pew Pew Pew]

The Dairy Queen was crowded on this early Spring evening. Rows of plastic-clad sportbikes gleamed like a brightly-colored school of fish, black and chrome cruiser motorcycles slouched in less neat rows, surrounded by their scruffy owners, and classic hot rod cars filled many of the other parking spaces, more than a few with their hoods open wide. The motorheads gathered at Dairy Queen, and the atmosphere was noisy and delightful with revving motors and the happy buzz of socializing.

Missy's usual Friday night DQ experience lasted all of ten seconds before going off the rails. Halfway across the parking lot--Brittany and the Stutzenbachs had walked there--the usual din of laughing, talking, and revving motors had abruptly ceased. As if on gimbals, scores of heads swivelled in unison to witness the approach of the single most beautiful girl to ever set foot in Marshalltown--

and her friend Missy, too.

"Um, hi everyone!" Missy said, waving to her friends. She recognized almost everyone present. Dairy Queen had a very regular crowd.

Nobody spoke.

"I think they're looking at you," Missy murmured to Brittany.

[Libertyne]

Brittany waved politely, the weak move of her hand indicating that she was more than a little embarrassed to so suddenly be the unwitting center of so much attention. It was clear that this was a regular hangout for Missy, and to her dismay, she realized she'd just trumped her companion's grand entrance merely by existing. "Nice to meet you all...!"

"Um, Missy...?" she squeaked out of the corner of her mouth, her eyes still foward to the crowd. "You want to lead in?"

[Pew Pew Pew]

Ten minutes later, Missy and Brittany shared a faded fiberglass picnic table in front of the Dairy Queen. Ray had excused himself as soon as he'd finished his plain ice cream cone, once he'd seen that his daughter would be okay on her own. The reception she and Brittany had received reassured him that there would be no trouble at all. Missy had been venturing to Dairy Queen alone on Fridays since she'd turned thirteen, but now that she was a nova Ray wondered if it would be any different.

Knowing that she was now capable of vaporizing a truck and stopping a bullet helped ease his mind.

After a nearly unending series of introductions around the small parking lot--Missy really did know almost everyone present, it turned out--their social circle had reached equilibrium with a half-dozen of Missy's peers seated or standing at their table. Unsurprisingly, Brittany found herself at the center of attention despite Missy's standing as the new local celebrity. Familiarity takes a back seat, Missy observed, to otherworldly attractiveness and charisma. Still, she reflected, it was nice to be able to pass for normal. She wondered if Brittany ever got tired of being mobbed everywhere she went.

Two hours later Missy and Brittany sprawled on their sleeping bags on the floor of the TV room in the finished basement. They finally had time together alone. Upstairs, Ray and Amanda Stutzenbach were in their bedroom, probably asleep.

"So," Missy asked while kicking her feet absently, "what do you think of Marshalltown so far?"

[Libertyne]

After the fun but somewhat awkward stop at the Dairy Queen, where Brittany had been mobbed by Missy's local cohorts, it was terribly comforting to get back to her little home and crawl down to the cool dark of the basement, where a slumber party atmosphere awaited them and did wonders to take the edge off. Missy's internal question was answered in Brittany's eyes, if one looked close enough; she endured the attention with good cheer, and clearly had gotten used to it, but the way her eyes always seemed to very slightly look past whatever she was looking at told the story of someone who might not mind simply being left alone every once in a while.

But things were calm, now. Brittany curled up like a cat on top of the sleeping bag, having only just dropped herself onto it to mockingly convey her exaustion.

"So," Missy asked, kicking her feet absently, "what do you think of Marshalltown so far?"

"I really like it", Brittany smiled back. "It reminds me of Missoula in a lot of ways. It's quaint, people aren't in such a hurry, things are quieter. I like those kinds of places, towns like this. I feel more myself, more at ease. Like sometimes, I can just be Brittany, and not 'LiberTeen', you know? I mean, I still get mobbed in public, whether it's Arco or Missoula or Sarasota or Wichita or San Francisco, but here...or at home...smaller towns...there's actually a chance for privacy, something I pretty much don't even get at all if I'm in a city. Visiting New York or Los Angeles, places like that, I'm being constantly followed. Here," she smiled, "I can relax. So thanks for having me out, Missy."

[Pew Pew Pew]

Missy waved dismissively and smiled self-consciously.

"I'm glad you were able to come," Missy replied, unable to bring herself to say what was really on her mind. She'd only just come out to Brittany, and now they shared a cozy basement floor with her parents fast asleep behind a closed upstairs bedroom door.

They chatted well into the night, discussing their respective lives, the state of the world, what it's like to be a nova, and a hundred other more mundane topics germane to teenaged girls discovering they have more in common than they had suspected at first. Still, Missy never did manage to overcome her shyness, despite the desire that rose in her like a fever complete with ringing ears and near-giddiness. As sleep eventually overcame the two girls, she resigned herself to being content with sleeping immediately adjacent to Brittany, albeit in her own sleeping bag. When she put her finger to the light switch at bedtime, Missy made sure that she was looking at Brittany so she'd have that image in her eyes as she slept.

The next morning:

Ray Stutzenbach awakened first, and without waking Amanda slipped into a pair of old sweatpants and a tee-shirt. As softly as he could, he padded down the hallway to the open stairwell that overlooked the basement. He creeped down three steps, avoiding the creaky step, and paused there. At the other end of the finished basement he saw his daughter and Brittany, sleeping soundly in their sleeping bags. For a moment he reflected that they looked as innocent as angels.

Then he noticed that his daughter's arm was out of her sleeping bag, and draped over Brittany.

Hello, your daughter is lesbian, he reminded himself, remembering that this was not supposed to be a bad thing. With a sigh, Ray retreated quietly back up the stairs and went to the kitchen. There, he turned on the oven and range, and covered the countertop with boxes and bowls of breakfast ingredients. Still moving quietly, he unhooked the heaviest cast-iron skillet from the hanging rack and lobbed it into the air, allowing it to crash loudly to the carpeted kitchen floor where it rang like a gong, shattering the silence.

Missy awakened startled and wide-eyed. With an alarmed squeak she realized where her hand was* and quickly retrieved it and disappeared into her sleeping bag, with only her face peeking out.

Ray appeared at the top of the basement stairway almost immediately, and peered into the basement again. He feigned ignorance.

"Good morning, sleepyheads," he said affably. "Breakfast in fifteen minutes?"

"Okay," Missy replied, pretending that nothing had happened. She looked at Brittany.

(* Yes, there. Whether it is the right one or the left one is up to the reader's imagination.)

[Libertyne]

Brittany had sprung up from her sleeping back at the tolling bell like a frightened cat, her blue eyes opened wide and wary. She gulped and gathered her bearings with a quick mental inventory of where she was and why, part of which included the new inclusion of Missy’s hand resting on her even as it jolted away in mute surprise.

She felt uncharacteristically good upon waking, in spite of her somewhat comically rude awakening, and as her mind returned to the present, her features soften, and she smiled, stretching her arms up with a yawn and a smile. “Good morning, Mr. Stutzenbach!”, she chirped out. “Sounds great, thanks!”

Ray gave the two girls a courteous but mildly knowing smile and took the two steps back to the kitchen to give the two young women a little time to get up. As conflicted as he was trying so very hard not to acknowledge he was, he knew the futility of hawking over his daughter while she and her little friend got up. After all, his daughter was a good girl he’d done his level best to raise right, and besides, he remarked, if anything was going to happen, it would’ve happened last ni— He abandoned the line of thought just as it was reaching its natural end and shook it off like a buzzing fly. Comfortable with his daughter’s sexuality or not, that line of thought was a really uncomfortable dead end. Silently, he invested himself in cooking breakfast, instead.

Something about waking up that morning next to someone she liked a lot and hadn’t yet pounced on was leaving Brittany feeling curiously good that morning. Not that sex made her feel bad, but the months since her eruption had left her so accustomed to being desired, so frequently propositioned, and in most all ways able to have whoever she wanted that the night she’d spent close to Missy, with its air of uncertainty, coy flirting, restrained urgings and all, had firmly planted an impish seed of thrilling doubt in her breast that she admitted she was enjoying nursing. Missy, she’d found, was for more interesting and far more like her than she ever could have guessed, and as the hours of shyness-tinged discourse wound on, Brittany had found her restraint very nearly exhausted. She was enjoying her night talking to Missy immensely, but it was very nearly a courtesy when her companion at last got up and, deliberately sending her one last flirtatious glance, switched off the light.

Given Brittany’s mood that morning, and the events of the previous night still fresh in her mind, waking up with the ghost of Missy’s arm draped across her body was about as good a way to wake up as she could have asked for. She smiled radiantly to the girl next to her, who’d retreated into her sleeping bag except for her face, making her look like a startled girl wearing a parka. “Good morning!”, she smirked, adding “I wish I’d been awake to enjoy that…”

[Pew Pew Pew]

With a rustle of nylon and stuffing, Missy sat up in her sleeping bag and let it fall away from her, revealing her fuzzy flannel pajamas. She rubbed her eyes and smiled.

"Morning to you too, Brittany," she said sheepishly. She lowered her voice to a whisper and glanced at the ceiling. Above, she could hear her father cooking breakfast and humming loudly in the kitchen. "Sorry about the hand thing."

[Libertyne]

"Perfectly alright", she smiled back, making it uncertain as to whether she was oblivious of what the perceived sleight might imply or whether the gesture was so trifling to a girl of her superior sexual experience that it couldn't even be bothered to register as somehow inappropriate. With a slow, still sleepy calm, she rose up from her sleeping and crouched to curl it into a tight roll, doing her best to be the most conscientious guest that she could be in both that and peppering it with a calculated wiggle in her host's direction.

Both young women were coming to wakefulness slowly, taking their time as they picked up their things and changed into day clothes as the sounds and smells of breakfast wafted in from the door at the top of the stairs.

At last, Ray's voice came from the kitchen with a shout of "Girls, breakfast!"

Seizing the initiative, Brittany rushed up next to Missy's idling position in the basement room as they tended to the last minor details of the morning's preparation. A small shudder ran down Missy's spine as slender, gentle fingers nimbly found the small of her back, and before she could adequately process the sensation or lodge any form of reaction, she found her lips being pressed against by those of her guest. It was scarcely a peck, but it was a peck with intent, and a moment later, when Brittany drew her lips away, there was no mistaking to Missy's mind that she had just been kissed in a way that in no uncertain terms conveyed more than mere friendship or gratitude.

Brittany, as unphased as ever, smiled at Missy and chirped "Race ya up the stairs!" before giggling and taking off the stairs.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Flummoxed as she was by Brittany's sudden kiss, Missy had no chance to win the race to the kitchen. Brittany's scent--she smelled different up close--still lingered in her imagination as she took two plates from the cupboard and handed one to Brittany.

In only fifteen minutes' time, Ray had managed to produce a prodigiously appetizing breakfast: twin stacks of round waffles and pancakes, a rasher of bacon, sausage links stacked like Lincoln Logs, a bowl of fried potatoes, and a mound of scrambled eggs. By the unadorned kitchen table, it was easy to see that breakfast was an informal affair in this home. A stack of silverware and napkins made it plain that helping oneself was the rule of the day.

Amanda came into the kichen last, her nightclothes* concealed underneath a fuzzy white spa robe that doubled as her bathrobe.

"Good morning Mom," Missy said cheerfully, trying to shake off the remaining vestiges of Brittany's kiss. Brittany, she reflected, was a hell of a kisser. Even that simple chaste kiss on the lips had packed a wallop. She wondered briefly if it was fueled by some kind of nova ability, and then set that aside, as she realized she'd missed what her mother had just said to her.

"Sorry?" Missy said, dragging her attention back to reality.

Amanda noticed that her daughter was unusally distracted, and glanced to Ray. Ray caught the glance and arched his brow almost imperceptibly in reply as he heaped potatoes onto Brittany's plate.

"All I'd said was 'good morning,'" Amanda said patiently, taking up a plate of her own. "Still sleepyheaded, I gather?"

"Yes, sleepyheaded," Missy echoed quickly. She dared not look to Brittany now, and concentrated instead on pouring a tall glass of orange juice for herself from a plastic pitcher.

(* Possibly sexy, possibly not. We'll never tell.)

[Libertyne]

Brittany couldn't help but feel just a bit like the cat who ate the canary. After leaping upstairs and taking a seat at the well-stocked breakfast table, Missy dazzled and dumbstruck, limply in tow, it became progressively and rapidly clear that Mr. and Mrs. Stutzenbach were savvy enough to gather that their lesbian, teenage daughter and her sexual iconoclast, teenage, bisexual friend very probably did not pass their sleepover away in chaste complacency. To be fair, the very notion took all the savvy of a stoned puppy to tick on; the irony was that if Missy's parents really knew what had gone on overnight, how friendly and platonic the night had actually been, they'd probably be less concerned.

But as Missy blushed and stammered away from her mother's otherwise innocuous questions, Brittany shined, interjecting pleasant comments wherever possible and showing not the least bit of consternation over what was an otherwise rather awkward conversation. After all, Brittany ruminated, considering the possible ways that she and Missy could have spent the previous evening, how she had in many ways wanted to spend the previous evening, it was awfully hard for her to manufacture some sense of guilt or shame for a only-somewhat-less-than-innocent kiss.

Breakfast continued and ended in much the same fashion, Brittany doing a rather decent job of charming over Missy's parents, all things considered, while Missy continued to play the Perseus to her Gorgon parents. Brittany offered to help clean up again, but Roy waved them both on, "No, no, that's alright. You're a guest in our home, Brittany. And besides, shouldn't you two be getting ready?"

Brittany smiled, thanked him for a wonderful meal, and dragged Missy's still physically stammering form away to prepare for the day.

[Pew Pew Pew]

Shortly after breakfast:

"So," Missy said to Brittany, "The prom's at seven. We probably ought to be back home by four to get ready." At the wheel of the family's second car, a plain four-door sedan, Missy drove her new friend and prom date out of Marshalltown and into the surrounding countryside. The transition had been an abrupt one; well-manicured lawns butted against seemingly-empty expanses of cultivated crops. Missy turned off of the U.S. highway and onto a narrow county farm road and gunned the motor, speeding toward her uncle's farmhouse.

"We'll be there in about fifteen minutes," Missy explained. "I think you'll like Uncle Mark and Aunt Claire."

Missy stole a glance at Brittany, whose attractiveness and charisma in person continued to astonish her. Missy had a hundred things she wanted to say to her, but bashfulness prevented her from saying any of them.

What is it about her that does this to me? she wondered. Why is it so hard for me to just talk to her? She glanced again. And what could she possibly see in me?

[Libertyne]

The remainder of the morning had passed with a terse sensitivity that Brittany had nevertheless seemed unmarred by, and her attitude was nothing short of joyful and expectant, having taken one quiet moment after the morning's feast to shift her chimeric threads into a creamsicle-stripe summer top and pair of suggestively form-fitting jean shorts, her golden hair tied back with a hair band. As they left the urbanized confines of Marshalltown proper and ventured out into the country, she bounced constantly in the passenger seat of the old sedan, and it wasn't just because the shocks had seen better days.

"I think you'll like Uncle Mark and Aunt Claire", Missy finished, taking the opportunity to give her passenger a glance from her peripherals.

Unfettered by a need to keep her eyes on the ride or the hesitance of a healthy sense of shyness, Brittany looked back and smiled, silently wondering if her laconic cheerfulness was helping to put Missy more at ease or simply adding to her anxiety. "I'm having a really nice time", she assured her, "And I'm sure I'll like your uncle and aunt. Just like your parents, and your friends from the DQ last night, and Marshalltown...and you..." She smiled gently, and brushed the other girl's shoulder with her hand affectionately.

Missy smiled a wrinkly smile in return, but remained mute, eyes forward to the expanses of barely tamed land that yawned off into the distance.

"Missy?", Brittany peeped after another thoughtful silence, "You seem awfully pensive. Penny for your thoughts? Nickel? Quarter? Dollar?" She giggled softly, knitting her eyebrows together apologetically. "You don't have to talk, I just thought I'd ask."