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“Despite my dislike of public transport, yes, I would.”
Aisha turned to Gabi, her imagination running wild. “We could go to America.”
Gabi stroked the hair from her face and stared at her. “You could dance in Mexico.”
Aisha laughed. “And Australia.”
“I’ve never thought about Australia. I’d like to go to India. I met a man at the market here, and he told me about his family in Kashmir. We could go anywhere.”
“We have roots in India. Many generations back.”
“You have to visit England. You’d love Nana’s farm.”
They walked along the shoreline, and Aisha took their dreams and locked them in her heart and felt richer for them. They would do all these things together and much more. Gabi had said so. She would make money dancing and teaching, and Gabi would sell her jewellery, and they would be happy together. She picked up a tiny shell that the sea had cast aside and wondered what journey it had taken to get here. She looked towards the horizon and pondered what it would feel like to be on a boat, sailing away from here, from her family and the life she’d known. She looked at Gabi and the tug to be with her was stronger, though her heart ached for all that she would leave behind.
“Shall we swim?” Gabi asked.
“I don’t know how.”
“Would you like me to teach you?”
Aisha’s stomach fluttered, and she laughed. The sea would be deep, and she worried about what lurked beneath the surface. The couple who had been basking in the sun were now splashing about with the water up to their waist. They looked like they were having fun. Fear gave way to excitement. “Maybe,” she said.
They headed back to the spot on the beach they’d claimed as theirs, and Gabi handed Aisha a bathing costume. “I didn’t know if you had one,” she said. “I’m ready.”
Heat expanded in Aisha’s chest as she thought about getting changed in the open, even though she couldn’t be seen by other people. She inhaled deeply, wrapped a towel around herself, and removed her skirt.
Gabi watched her and grinned while searching blindly for something in the rucksack. “Would you like me to hold the towel in case it—”
Aisha gasped as the towel fell to the sand. She grabbed it quickly and wrapped it around her lower half again. Her heart raced.
Gabi laughed. “I’m enjoying the view, and no one else can see us.”
Aisha held the towel in one hand and removed her knickers. She stepped through the leg holes of the costume but couldn’t put it on without revealing herself. Whether anyone else was looking or not, there was comfort in having a shield around her.
“Here,” Gabi said and took the ends of the towel. She stood in front of Aisha and held the towel around Aisha’s back to protect her from the eyes of the sea.
Aisha wrestled the elastic material over her lower half. Gabi’s perfume, proximity, and steady gaze made the task even more challenging, and her breaths became shallow and fast, and her heart raced.
Gabi pulled the towel towards her, bringing their bodies together.
Aisha’s breath faltered with the desire she saw reflected in Gabi’s eyes. Her kiss was firm and deep, and Aisha wrapped her arms around Gabi’s neck. The towel fell again, but she didn’t care. She might dream of being with Gabi, but if she only had this day with her, she wanted to understand what it was to enjoy the freedom to love someone openly. Delight expanded inside her. It was as vast and deep as the ocean and the sky above it, and seemingly indestructible. The euphoric feeling was the reason for her heart to beat and her soul’s purpose. Withoutthis, she would float like an empty vessel tossed around at sea, aimlessly grabbing snippets of fulfilment through her work but always feeling incomplete. This was love. And this was the life she wanted.
“I don’t want to stop kissing you,” Gabi whispered.
The warmth against Aisha’s ear sent a shiver down her neck that spoke to her core in a language she now knew intimately. “Then don’t,” she said and allowed Gabi to coax her to lie down on the matting. She opened her legs a little so that Gabi could lay on top of her and connect with her.
She’d never imagined not being able to get enough of someone. The deeper Gabi kissed her, and the more completely Gabi’s body covered hers in warmth, the more she craved her intimate touch. She groaned at the sensation that spiralled low in her stomach when Gabi caressed her covered breast, and she arched as Gabi tweaked her nipple. Tiny sparks of electricity and heat moved through her in waves and still, it wasn’t enough.
She held Gabi’s waist and tugged her closer, arched into her, and kissed her harder. The sweet salty taste more delicious than wine. “I want you,” she whispered, intoxicated.
Gabi unbuttoned Aisha’s blouse to halfway as she kissed her, and when she lifted the cup of her bra and took Aisha’s nipple into her mouth, Aisha put her hand at the back of Gabi’s head and pressed her closer, urging her to take more. Another shower of stars, another surge of heat burning at her sex, and Aisha tensed and gasped as the feeling eclipsed all her senses. Gabi kissed her tenderly while gentle waves rolled through her, and still she wanted more. “Will it always be like this?” she asked.
Gabi lay on her front now, resting on her elbows, and smiled. “It can be.”
Aisha lay on her side and ran her fingers across the back of Gabi’s neck. She loved stroking her short hair, the way the hairs sprang back though her fingers, and tracing the shape of her head. “But people change. Things like this, good things, come to an end.” She was sure that was the case because so many poems were about loss, and death, and longing. It was just the bad things, like waiting for her parents to accept that she wasn’t going to marry, that seemed to persist.
Gabi faced Aisha. “People change, and we can change together, and we can deal with stuff together. You said that I could do anything if I wanted. Well, anything is possible if we want it enough.”
