Juniper dropped the sheet from her naked body and sat forward to crawl off the edge of the bed. She turned back andgave Rowan a sly smile. Rowan looked ravenous peering over her mug as she took a long sip. Juniper knew the game she was playing.
“It’s up to you whether we’re on time this morning. I set the alarm and made the coffee. Everything else is all on you,” she warned.
Juniper finished making her way over to the closet. She reached in all the way to the far right and pulled a white shirt on a hanger out. She turned back around and pressed it against her body.
“I did something to it.”
“Okay,” Rowan breathed out with a laugh.
“You don’t have to wear it if you don’t want to. I promise I won’t be upset. I just thought I’d show it to you now.”
“Show me, Junie.”
Her tone was so soft, Juniper wanted to melt. She took the few steps to Rowan’s side of the bed and turned the shirt around. Juniper had sewn a panel of rows of ribbon horizontally across the chest of the shirt in muted browns, greens, and blues. These shirts, called ribbon shirts, were typically worn by men as a visual sign of their culture but were increasingly being worn by LGBTQ and Two-Spirit people who felt it represented the way they wanted to express themselves better than feminine cultural garments. Juniper waited with baited breath for Rowan’s reaction. Rowan looked at the shirt contemplatively and a smile spread across her face as she brought her gaze to Juniper’s eyes.
“I know you have felt like our culture doesn’t include you in the ways you need it to. Or… the ways it’s supposed to but hasn’t. I thought maybe making you a ribbon shirt would feel more like you. I want to make sure everything about this place feels like home for you.”
Rowan set her coffee mug on the side table and looked into Juniper’s eyes. She sat forward to cup her face in her hands and brought their lips together. Then she pulled her the rest of the way onto the bed with her. Juniper laid her face against thecrook of Rowan’s elbow and looked up at her.
With glossy eyes, Rowan was emphatic. “I love it so much.”
“Yeah?”
Rowan traced her finger down Juniper’s cheekbone and kissed her so lovingly it made her breathless.
“You really think of everything, don’t you?” Rowan asked, beaming a smile at her. “Of course I want to wear it.”
“I wanted to give it to you a lot sooner, but since I’ve been over here so much, I couldn’t really hide what I was working on. I had to sneak around.”
Rowan laughed and pressed a kiss into each of her cheeks and then her forehead and then her nose.
“That reminds me, you haven’t given me an answer yet on if you want to live here with me.”
Juniper’s answer was an obvious yes, and they both knew that. They had made other life decisions together in the last few weeks, but she also hoped they’d have a long lifetime of these little teasing games.
“Have I really left you hanging for weeks on end like that?”
“You have,” Rowan pointed out with a smirk.
“I guess it’s finally time I finally said yes.”
Later that morning, Juniper and Rowan left their house together and picked up Wren and Wanchese on the way. Juniper hopped out of the passenger seat when she saw Wanchese flatten the blind slats he had pushed open to watch for them and dart out of sight.
“Nuqisus!” She exclaimed as she held her arms out for him to run into.
She kissed the top of his head and flattened his middle part against his scalp. She opened the back passenger door of the four-door cab of her and Rowan’s new Toyota Tacoma. Wanchese pushed his glasses up his nose and climbed inside.
“Nice truck!” Wren yelled out to them while she twisted the key into the lock of her front door.
“Juniper thinks it’s too much,” Rowan yelled through the open window.
“What are you talking about, Junie?” Wren scoffed, slid in beside Wanchese, and shut the door.
“I don’t know. I’ve never bought anything new before.”
“Dang, this is yours?”
“Well, technically it’s hers,” Juniper tilted her head toward Rowan.
