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Her father’s eyebrows had gone up when she’d told her parents over dinner one night. Maybe he might have had some trouble adjusting. Maybe he might have said something that hurt her feelings. But before he could say anything at all, Mom had said,Oh. Does that mean there’s a girl you like? You should bring her over so we can meet her, and that had set the tone for Dad, too.
Sadly, Ella had been extremely heterosexual. In fact, she’d started dating Kieran when he asked her to homecoming, and they’d still been together at graduation.
That had cooled Petra’s crush a tad. But it didn’t make her doubt her sexuality.
Any criticism or bullying Petra had experienced as a bisexual woman had come well after she was comfortably out. And a lot of it came from the LGBTQ+ community. There were those who thought being bisexual was akin to cheating, or maybe just pretending. That got worse when she was with a man.
Petra tried to think of it as a useful tool for being sure who her real friends were.
Friends like Max, for instance.
Stepping back, Petra did a turn to show off her costume for tonight’s Halloween party: snug black pleather jumpsuit, her old Docs polished to a sheen, her hair gelled back to a severe bun at her nape, her eyes cloaked in heavy black makeup.
She asked Max, “Don’t you know?”
Max shrugged. “Sexy plumber?”
“Oh my god! I thought you were a sci-fi geek! You go to Comic-Con every year!”
“I’m a Trekker, not a sci-fi geek. If you’re trying to be a character from anywhere in the Federation, I can tell you definitively that you failed.”
“I’m Camina Drummer. FromThe Expanse?” Petra was not a sci-fi geek, but during her weeks of wanting to do nothing but lie in bed with Jake and stream shows, they’d discoveredThe Expanse.That show wasawesome. So many badass women, Drummer chief among them—and Drummer was bi and polyamorous, something that simplywasin the show, as unremarkable as any straight, monogamous relationship.
If more shows and books like that existed to be discovered, maybe Petra was a sci-fi geek after all.
Max blinked. “Don’t know her. But she’s hot, I’ll give you that.”
“Hey, Petra?” came a voice from the swinging door. Darcy, their new head bartender. She was dressed as 1970s-era Dolly Parton, complete with huge blonde wig, huge fake tatas, and enough rhinestones and sequins to generate their own heat.
“Yep, right here. What do you need?”
“I think we’re finished with decorations out front.”
“Excellent. I want to see!”
“You said we had two boxes of holiday swizzle sticks, but I can’t find them.”
“They should be on the shelf with the coasters and paper napkins.”
“Yep, I didn’t see ‘em there.”
Petra knew exactly where they were—right where she’d said they were. But in a few days of employment Darcy had already proved herself to be excellent at mixing drinks but not so great at the boring details of the bar. “Okay. I’ll go back and dig them up and then come out and see the pretties.”
Darcy grinned. “Cool! I got the mail, too. It’s on the shelf by your office door.” As she slipped back out of the doorway, she called out, “Great costume, boss! Drummer is hardcore!”
Petra turned to Max, vindicated. “See? This is an excellent costume. Where’s yours, anyway?”
With a broad, sly grin, Max lifted her toque. There was a rubber rat on her head.
“Ratatouille! Very nice! Very meta!” Petra laughed and gave her cook a squeeze.
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~oOo~
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The swizzle stickswere exactly where Petra had said, except they werebehindthe cartons of Gertrude’s coasters (printed with the pink logo of the bar on one side and one of an assortment of six Stein quotes on the other). She opened a box, grabbed two bundles of Halloween swizzles (glittery plastic sticks—black cats, orange pumpkins, white ghosts) and worked the box closed with one hand.
