She slipped out during the recess, before the committee vote.
The hallway outside the hearing room was crowded with reporters and lobbyists and people who wanted to be seen near the action. June pushed through them blindly, looking for somewhere quiet, somewhere she could process what had just happened.
She found a small alcove near the stairwell—empty, silent, the noise of the capitol reduced to a distant murmur. She leaned against the cool marble wall and pressed her hands to her face.
She did it. She actually did it.
Part of June had expected more of the same. Another polished deflection, another careful pivot back to policy. That was what Senator Brandt did when things got difficult. She controlled the narrative. She managed perceptions. She didn’t stand up in front of a legislative committee and announce that she was bisexual and in love.
But she had. Melissa had done exactly that.
For me,June thought, and then immediately:No. For herself. For Lila. Because she finally understood.
It didn’t erase the hurt. Two weeks of silence. The press conference where Melissa had called their relationship unfounded speculation. The look on Lila’s face when she’d closed the door in June’s face.
But it changed things. And the disorienting part, what June hadn’t prepared for, was that she’d been so certain. For two weeks, she’d been convinced that Melissa had made her choice, that the silence was an answer, that she’d been wrong about all of it. And now the ground had shifted and she hadn’t caught up with it yet. She didn’t know what to do with being wrong about something she’d been that sure of.
“There you are.”
June looked up. Rachel was walking toward her, heels clicking on the marble floor, her expression a mix of relief and concern.
“You left,” Rachel said. “Are you okay?”
“I don’t know.” June’s voice came out rough, scraped raw. “I don’t know what I am right now.”
“I get that.” Rachel leaned against the wall beside her. “She really did it, didn’t she?”
“I think so. Unless we’re having the same wild dream.”
“I’ve known Mel for ten years. I’veneverseen her do anything like that.” Rachel paused. “She’s never been that brave.”
June stared at the opposite wall, trying to organize her thoughts. “It doesn’t fix everything. She still… I still…”
“No one’s saying it fixes everything. But it’s a good start.” Rachel turned to look at her directly. “What are you going to do?”
“I need to talk to her. Alone. Without cameras and reporters and—” June gestured vaguely at the chaos echoing from down the hall. “Without all of this.”
“She’s going to be tied up here for hours. Press interviews, strategy meetings, all the aftermath. But she’s staying at a hotel tonight instead of driving back.” Rachel pulled out her phone, checked something. “The Marriott on State Street.” She paused, and her voice softened. “And June, whatever you decide, whatever happens next… she meant what she said in there.”
June nodded slowly. “I know.”
“Do you?”
“I’m starting to.”
The Marriott lobby was generic in the hotel lobby way—beige carpet, artificial plants, the faint smell of coffee and cleaning products. June sat in a semi-comfortable armchair near the entrance, watching the door, her untouched tea growing cold on the table beside her.
It was after nine o’clock. She’d been waiting for almost two hours.
She thought about Lila’s face when she’d closed the door.You left, just like everyone.
She thought about Melissa’s voice in the committee room.I fell in love this summer. With a woman.
She thought about her father’s warning, all those weeks ago, and whether he’d been wrong.
The fear that lived underneath all of it was simpler and more embarrassing than any of that: that she’d built this up so much, in two weeks of sleepless nights, that nothing Melissa said would be enough. That she’d broken her own ability to trust this, and wouldn’t know it until she was sitting in this room trying to feel something and finding she couldn’t.
The lobby doors opened.
