Breaking The Barriers (GXG)

Chapter 4

A few days came and went in a flash, and I got to know Lily even more, while Ally was giddy with the fact she wasn't the only lesbian at school. She was certain I was too.

All the while I had been enjoying myself with Lily, it had been a taxing time for me emotionally. Emotions and feelings have never been something that I have ever dealt with well and considering my sexuality was a whole new ball park.

I had come to the conclusion that I was, in fact, a lesbian or perhaps even bisexual but I wasn't ready to admit this to the school, not yet anyway, and I certainly wasn't going to admit it to Lily at this present moment in time. I didn't want to scare her away from me. I had lay awake the last couple of nights, pondering about a lot of things, including thought about my sexuality, and every train of thought I had always came back to the same destination and that destination was Lily. She was forever on my mind. I couldn't stop thinking about the girl with the auburn hair and emerald eyes. Over the last few days, the more Lily accepted the fact she was now an outcast in the eyes of the enemy, that she would now never have the chance to fit in with them (not that that bothered her), she grew closer to me. She spoke to Ally a lot more and Ally replied scarcely, trying her best not to interfere with me and Lily. Ally was the one that had suggested that she kept to herself around Lily because she knew herself well enough to know how easily she can let her tongue slip. But Ally's disconnection from Lily didn't go unnoticed.

“Chloe?” Lily paused, sighing, “Does Ally have something against me? I mean she barely talks to me. I don't understand,” Lily said, the hurt was clearly present in her voice.

“Of course she likes you, silly! Why wouldn't she like you?” I exclaimed before mumbling to myself, “I mean what's not to like?”

“Hmm? What did you say?” Lily asked, confused.

“Oh, nothing. Nothing,” I smiled reassuringly.

“Oh, okay.” Nice save, Chloe, I thought to myself. “Well, if she does like me, why does she act so strange around me? Does she still feel bad about nearly making me fall?”

“No, no. It's nothing to do with that,” I placed my hand on her arm reassuringly, “It's just how Ally is.” I pointed out. Well, I wasn't exactly lying. She didn't talk a lot around new people, afraid to say something that could be used against her at a later date.

The fact was, something like this had happened before. It was a few months back, at the end of last winter. There was a new kid in our year, a boy as a matter of fact. On his arrival, as expected, the other kids basically chewed him up and left him for dead. Quite literally. On his second day, he got beat up pretty bad walking home from school. They tore his clothes, stole his possessions, and cracked his ribs. They had him on the ground and were kicking into his chest and face when we had showed up, we saw the situation unfold in passing. It didn't take much from us to get the guys to leave him alone; a couple of punches to their guts and a few swift kicks to the crotch. We got the kid to hospital and got him cleaned up and we took him under our wing. Marcus was his name but we called him Marc for short, to his much dismay. We kept him close to us in school and for a few weeks we walked him home, just to make sure he was safe. We got to know him and we began to trust him, and on more than one occasion Ally opened up to him. She confessed to him about her quarrels with her family and her indecisive conclusion about her sexuality. So, to cut a long story short, Marc told the entire school that Ally was, and I quote, “a disgusting lesbian freak.” Not long after Ally's public humiliation, she came forward and admitted to everyone that she was, in fact, a lesbian. It took a lot for her to open up to Marcus and for him to violate her trust like that, well, it made opening up to anyone else even harder harder for her. This was one of the main reasons Ally had stayed quiet around Lily. I knew eventually she would come around and talk to her normally and trust her but it would take time and a lot of it.

It was a Thursday night, and Lily an I had arranged to meet at her Dad's house and from there I would show her the general lay out of the town. There wasn't really much to show her, but I took all the time I could spend with her. I felt her arm snake delicately around my arm as we set off along the tarmac path away from her Dad's. Nothing but friendly affection, I told myself. As we walked I felt her relax against me, relieved to be getting away from her new house. The evening air was still around us, there was no wind blowing and the air was mild, typical weather for this time of year. The chime of the old church bell rang out in the distance. We walked up, along through the market which was eerie and quiet. There wasn't many people out tonight, the streets were practically deserted.

“This place is quite remarkable,” Lily breathed.

“Yeah, it's beautiful. It's a shame the people here aren't so great.” I confessed.

“I know. I mean, it's hard not to notice.” A cool wind began to rise and Lily came closer to me. “Where are we going?” Lily asked, noticing that we had left the path for an overgrown grass path, that me and Ally had made. The grass was flat, blades broken, from years of heavy footfall. I simply looked to her and smiled.

“Come on and I'll show you.”

A short walk later and we were walking along the path to the old oak tree by the lake. The sun was setting slowly and the last glimpses of light could be seen dancing across the water like fairies, so full of life as the shimmers of light skipped across the water. The oak tree itself stood solemnly by the side of the lake, it's trunk spiralling upwards as if reaching for the sky. It's leaves were beginning to brown as the autumn approached and some of it's leaves descended slowly to the grassy ground beneath it. The roots of the tree had broke through the soft ground and it looked as if they were crawling. Lily inhaled, taking a deep breath of the clean, earthy smell, letting it fill her lungs. She walked over to the water with me following silently behind her. Looking out across the water, you could see traces of the fish as they created ripples in the water as they searched the surface of the water for food. Lily turned to me, taking my hands in hers, her eyes a light with wonder.

“What is this place? Where are we?”

“My home away from home.”