[Fiction] A Chemical Reaction [Completed]

[Mithril]

Meghan's featureless silvery eyes widened in surprise at Regina's sudden embrace, but she had the presence of mind to gently toss the heavy volume of The Fellowship of the Ring onto Regina's bed, where it sank into the thick comforter. Regina's arms pinned Meghan's shoulders, so she put her own arms around Regina's waist, putting one hand at the base of her spine and the other between her shoulderblades.

This is sudden, Meghan thought. She willed the rest of her numerous and quickly racing thoughts away, and she focused only on the physical sensation of being held closely in Regina's arms and kissed softly on the lips. To Meghan, Regina felt considerably fleshier than most of the people-- all novas, who she'd embraced recently. This different feeling drew out a memory she thought she'd buried, and Meghan flashed back to her high-school girlfriend Erin Lynch.

Meghan shut her eyes and squeezed Regina tightly, her fingers spread wide. Meghan returned the kiss, passionately, and she stepped closer to Regina, pressing their bodies together entirely.

In her mind's eye, Meghan saw Erin's bedroom in Bishkek, and it was as if she was there in that cluttered bedroom, surrounded by pop music posters and magazine covers. Erin stood with her back to the bedroom door, having just closed it, silently and slowly depressing the lock's button. Erin smiled mischievously and stepped toward where Meghan stood. Meghan swallowed the lump in her throat and tentatively held out her hand.

"Erin," Meghan whispered, unaware that she'd shed a single quicksilver tear.

[Regina Newcastle]

Regina pulled away with a sudden start, not forcefully, but deliberately. Somewhere in the middle of it all, the voice in the back of her head that was expressing joy over the fact that she was being kissed back starting mocking her, instead.

"Oh, oh! Meghan! Oh, Meghan! This is glorious! I was so worried you wouldn't kiss back, but you are, and you're holding me, and it's so much more wonderful than I could have even imagined, and oh, but--

She's not thinking about you, you silly twit. She's not kissing you. She's kissing someone else, someone she's kissed before. You got lucky. You got lucky and this whole thing reminds her enough of something she did with someone else, and that's why she's kissing you, so pack in your silliness, Genie, you're not special, you're not likeable, you're just convenient.

Wait, why is she sad? What-- Oh. Shite."

Regina cast her eyes to the floor, still mere centimetres from Meghan's face, but overwhelmed with emotions, both good and bad, totally unable to cope momentarily. She sighed through her nose and gulped, then looked up to Meghan through narrow slits of eyes. For the moment, Meghan's sadness was more important than her own insecurity. She caressed Meghan's cheek with her thumb, wiping away her tear, and whispered to her, "I'm sorry, Meghan...I'm...really...really..." With a choke, Regina sputtered slightly, her forehead collapsing against Meghans, and she began to cry freely, tears rolling down her cheeks in pendulously heavy drops. "I--I...I wish...I...feck...I'm so sorry...I'm so dumb...and...I...Meghan..." She tried to speak more, but all that came was a series of choking tears and almost desperate contact with Meghan's flesh, as if she was begging for Meghan to say something, anything.

[Mithril]

Oh, oh damn, Meghan thought morosely, what have I done? She gently took Regina's head in her hands, and stroked her hair soothingly. Their foreheads still touched, but this was a different kind of intimacy than either of them had countenanced a moment before.

"Ssh," Meghan whispered hurriedly, almost desperately, as if to stop Regina from going too far down that self-destructive path. She kept her gaze on Regina's downcast and tear-filled eyes, and refused to flinch.

"Listen to me," Meghan said, "Listen to me, okay? It's not your fault. Erin was my first girlfriend. I don't know why I thought of her just then. It's crazy. I didn't mean to."

With a smooth gesture, Meghan slid Regina's glasses off and set them on the adjacent desktop. She gently lifted Regina's chin with her fingertips and looked into her eyes with nothing in-between. Meghan was pleased to see that without her glasses in the way, Regina had particularly striking eyes. Meghan smoothly combed her fingers through Regina's hair with a gentle caress, and she smiled softly.

"You're Regina Newcastle," Meghan said, "And I think you're beautiful."

[Regina Newcastle]

Looking back in Meghan's eyes, Regina's sadness began to break apart, slowly. The tears stopped, but her eyes remained limpid pools that threatened still to overflow, and the nervous snorting-choking that accompanies a crying fit remained, albeit in a down-tempo that would run itself out momentarily. A scarlet flush still brightened her cheeks, showing a vague mess of freckles decorating the bridge of her nose. There was no doubt that she had taken the last few moments very hard.

Meghan removed Regina's glasses with a gentle, loving gesture and slid them onto her desktop, and lifted Regina's chin with her fingers, looking her straight in the eye, compassion lighting them up like lanterns hidden behind seamless glass. She ran her fingers through Regina's dull, prematurely-grey hair and smiled, and told her "You're Regina Newcastle. And I think you're beautiful."

Regina had to halt herself from tearing up again, but so close to a moment before was she, her emotions still so stirred to tempest within her, that her eyes shone with water as she desperately tried to stymie the flow. "Meghan, I..." She was still having trouble talking, internally chiding herself for sounding like a blithering idiot but maintaining all control on not crying again. She looked back into Meghan's eyes and saw what she was so desperately hoping for. For a moment inside it all, past her attempted nobility at comforting Meghan rather than feeling sorry for herself, she had nevertheless been screaming inside at her own inadequacies as the demons inside her laughed and taunted her with her worst fears validated. But looking back into Meghan's eyes and seeing how she looked at her, the gentleness with which she caressed her skin, she started to understand. Meghan had been brought back to reality, and as much as Regina wanted to comfort her for her unspoken loss, she wanted with everything within her for Meghan to show her what she had just said. Praying to nobody that the moment had not been irrevocably ruined, she simply begged - not directed, not simply requested - "Kiss me." and fell into her.

[Regina Newcastle]

Time passed. Seventy-five minutes, twelve seconds, in fact, by Regina's approximation. She sighed deeply, a contented smile playing on her lips, only inches away from those of the figure that lay beneath rumpled sheets in the bed next to her. "I could get used to this", she whispered inside her own head.

The experience had been one unlike any she'd even imagined. She confessed to herself that she hadn't much considered dating girls as an option in the past, but lying in bed next to Meghan, she was liking the idea more by the moment. Another sigh.

She sat up a bit, putting on a nightshirt long enough to cover the knickers she had conspicuously insisted on leaving in place during she and Meghan's intimacy, despite the latter's prompting. Meghan crawled up the side of Regina's frame, in no way tired but expressing it naturally by uncountable hours on Flicker's sofa, the sedate happiness of post-coital bliss, and cuddled her. A warm arm found its way around her torso, pulling her closer. "That, um...that was pretty brilliant, Meghan", Regina found herself half-chuckling out.

Meghan smiled back, partially mocking. "Next time you'll have to be more open with me."

"Yeah, I...um...not really ready yet", Regina blushed, apologising.

"I can tell. It's all right", Meghan nodded. In truth, she was a little frustrated. What was it with her and nova girls with their hesitance? After Knockout left her wanting on the beach, this was nearly too much. It left her painfully perplexed, especially in Regina's case. Really, what's her excuse? It isn't like she just became a woman last week!

"So...", Regina began. "How do we...deal with this?"

"Deal with what?" Meghan asked, genuinely not knowing.

There were a lot of things Regina could have said that would have made perfect sense, and Meghan could have given her an honest, pragmatic, and straightforward answer. Instead, Regina asked what was in all likelihood that very last question Meghan wanted to hear at that moment;

"Well, we're dating now, right?"

[Mithril]

Ha, ha ha. . . oh, shit, Meghan thought, as she did her best to keep her sudden disorientation from showing on her face. For all her casual play with other novas, she had managed to become entangled in one long-term relationship, and that was one of her own choosing.

"When you say 'dating,'" she asked, still curled up against Regina's side, "what precisely do you mean? Long walks in the park? Lazy evenings reading together? Aerial tours of England?"

[Regina Newcastle]

Regina's eyes widened in sudden realisation, and reality hit her like a bucket of icewater. Meghan was doing all she could to hide it, but Regina could read her like twenty-point Oxford bold; "You...you have a girlfriend..." Her gaze lowered, her brow creased. "Don't...you... ..."

"Ha! Way to go, Genie! Bloody brilliant girl! Score one more for reality! Of course she's got a girlfriend, you stupid bint! You see how much you like her, don't you? What? You think you're the only one? Grow a brain, Newcastle! So what if she likes you? She obviously doesn't like you that bleedin' much, now, does she? What are you, daft? A girl like her could have a dozen girls like you! No, I take that back, a dozen girls far, far better. Hahahaha! Stupid, stupid girl! Way to go, stupid! Stupid! Stupid!!"

Regina had done enough crying for the day. She wanted to, desperately, but stopped herself, using her quantum gifts to stop the reaction even before it began, so she wouldn't betray a hint of it. She pulled the blanket slowly up to her clavicle, a gesture of defense. She couldn't speak for a moment, her mouth hung open like a wooden marionette. When the words finally came, they were dry and whithered things, a quiet rasp that could barely be heard over the din of the monitor on her desk. "I'm a fool. I... I should go away."

[Mithril]

Before she could stop herself, Meghan had already rolled toward Regina's side and propped on her elbow. So taken was she by Regina's pitiable display that her momentary reluctance was overcome. Meghan gently laid her free hand on Regina's where they clutched at the blanket.

"Oh please," Meghan said softly, cocking her head and smiling reassuringly. "You think that's all there is to it? One girl for one girl and everyone else is just out of luck?" Meghan shook her head. "Nova's very special to me, you're right," Meghan continued, "but does that mean that I am required to shut out everyone else? That seems like a foolish waste, to me."

Meghan chose her words carefully as she spoke, not to deceive, but because she was treading near Regina's heart: "Are we dating? Not yet. Dating implies an ongoing relationship." Meghan fixed her gaze on Regina's eyes and stroked her cheek softly. " Am I correct if I guess that's what you want?"

[Regina Newcastle]

Regina didn't move her head or her gaze, but after swallowing a lump in her throat the size of an egg, she felt as if she could speak. The words came out hoarsely at first, but easier the more she got out. She wasn't stupid, no matter what her taunting inner monologue told her. Okay, so she was wrong about Meghan, but she wasn't stupid, and she wasn't naive. Just wrong. It happens. The world-ruining moment passed, and Meghan's good cheer was infectious enough to get Regina talking again, which she did, frankly saying;

"I'm sorry. It is rare - very, very rare - that I take much of a fancy to anybody. It's not within my nature to have a shag with anybody I'm not committed to, and what we did was a good deal more than anything I've much done before, I'm afraid. I supposed that you operated the same way, since...since I've nae much of a basis for comparisons. And...", she sighed through he nostrils, blinking hard, "because it's what I'd hoped. And yeh, Meghan, you're right. That's what I want. And please understand, from me, thas' saying quite a bit. But..." She wanted to sound diplomatic. She understood the dynamics of open relationships, she just knew she wasn't ready to be a part of one. "Ah guess...ah don't want my first real relationship to include the complications that a third person would bring. I, uh...ah don't think I have it in me to be that un-jealous. And..." Her face creased into a deep frown, one of patient understanding. Meghan noticed that her Oxford proper english had been slowly slipping into a gutteral accent that spoke more of Scotland. "Ah wish ah'd known, because this...what we've done, 'ere...it means something to me. It's significant. It's not just play. And ah feel rotten and pretty bloody stupid about it all, now, because ah don't think you feel that way."

Another deep, nasal sigh came, and Regina stopped her monologue. Part of it she just had to get out so she could sort it all out for herself. Part of it...well, she really did feel pretty rotten, after all.

[Mithril]

Meghan listened carefully to Regina, stifling the urge to interject until Regina was finished. In the meanwhile, she listened and nodded thoughtfully and continued to stroke Regina's hair gently.

At least she recognizes that she can't overcome her jealousy of Flicker, Meghan thought. Still, Meghan couldn't let Regina beat herself up over it.

"Okay," Meghan said at last, punctuating her word with a single thoughtful nod. "At least you recognize that you can't--" she stopped herself from saying share, "can't do a relationship like this one. That's all right." Meghan tilted her head and smiled again, to indicate a shift in the topic.

"However, I think you're underestimating how significant this is to me," she explained patiently. "Having a relationship with more than one person is in no way less involved than--" she struggled to find the word monogamy and failed, "than having an exclusive relationship. What I feel for you is not reduced or cheapened in the least just because I also love Flicker, and my reverence for what we've done together this evening, physically and emotionally, is most sincere. I wouldn't undo a thing."

Meghan leaned forward and kissed Regina on the lips, softly, letting the touch linger.

[Regina Newcastle]

Regina returned the kiss with a passion borne out of the knowledge that it may be the last. Already, fear and doubt had clouded her troubled mind. This was all so easy for Meghan: it was not easy for her. She desperately wanted for this to work, to have this with Meghan, but already she had begun to feel as though she may have made a mistake. She hoped she had not. To be sure, the days that followed were going to require a lot of delicate mediation, and there was much to resolve between them.

For now, though, she had someone she cared about in her bed and cradled in her arms, and no matter what happened from here on out, this was pretty bloody wonderful for the time.