Chapter Text
I couldn’t remember ever feeling so nervous having dinner with Bette before this evening. We had been attempting to sync our schedules for over a week, and the first opportunity which presented itself, was the 14th of February, Valentine’s Day, go figure. Angus had agreed to watch Angelica and had been offering to do so more frequently since his breakup with Kit. I placed the second earring in my ear, straightened my black dress, and smiled at the woman I had seen staring back at me. It had taken so long to find some confidence in myself, and after looking in all the wrong places for it, I finally took care of myself the right way and was a better woman for having done so.
“Hey, sweetie. You be a good girl for Angus okay?”
Angelica was growing up so very fast. I was prepared to have Bette come into our lives more now than ever before. It had taken so much longer than I had imagined it would, to learn to trust her completely. When trust is compromised, it can be so hard to recover it. Some might say that you can trust someone in one area, but not in others. I couldn’t separate it. I lost trust in my partner, my friend. I couldn’t let myself justify that I could trust her as a responsible parent, but not as a lover. The trust was compromised, and it took time, to feel her take on responsibility for the affair.
Angelica was playing inside her pack-and-play when Angus arrived.
“Knock Knock,” Angus said aloud as he looked through the screen door into the house.
“Come in Angus. You don’t have to knock silly.”
“Wow! Angelica close your eyes, your Momma is shining bright. You look great Tina.”
“Thank you, Angus.” I felt myself blush. “It’s not too much is it?”
“Well,” Angus smirked. “What message are you hoping to send?”
“Funny.”
“Let’s just say, I won’t be surprised if this turns into an overnight stay.”
“Don’t be ridiculous. This is the first official date we are going on. I may be a fast woman in most places, but this won’t be one of them.”
“Fast? Tina you and Bette have taken forever to find your way back to one another.”
Tina raised a finger. “Don’t. This is just a date, nothing more.”
“Uh-huh. I’m sure you’ve been trying to remind yourself of that all night now haven’t ya?”
I hated how Angus had gotten to know me so well. “Please tell me that it doesn’t show that much,” I pleaded, confirming his statement.
“Not too much. Tina, it’s going to be fine. You and Bette have been talking on and off since she moved back to LA.”
“It’s only been a month Angus.”
“I know, but you have at least gotten to this point right?”
“Yes, we have. I just need to see her. I need to be sure that she is ready to be in Angelica’s life, for good. I can’t have this yo-yo effect happening. She wants in, then she wants out. It shocked me when she just up and left for New York to be with Jodi.”
“Well, I don’t have a great history myself with the Porter women, but I can say that I think Angelica needs to know her other Mom.”
The words burned. It was true that Bette had missed out on so very much of Angelica’s young life. She was already a little over a year and a half, and Bette had only been a part of her life for about one-fourth of that time, and it wasn’t consistent.
“You know why I had to finally put my foot down.”
“I do. I just think she had felt pretty alone through it all. She didn’t experience the last part of your pregnancy. She was there for the birth, but you never went back to a home as a family. The small amount of time you tried to be together, it was like two ships passing in the night.”
“I wasn’t prepared to be with her yet.”
“Then came Henry, and……”
“Can we not go there, please? Henry was…he was simple. I didn’t want anything complex. I was tired of all the drama. Angus, you know that.”
“I know, but in the end, what happened? You ended up bored out of your mind. He wasn’t challenging anymore. You didn’t have that passion that fire that you and Bette always had.”
I remained silent as I heard him tell me the truth.
“Tina, gosh I remember when you and Bette would be in a room together, after 8 years being together, and all it took was a look. Just one look. It was there. It was always there.”
I remembered those moments so easily. He was right. All it took was one look from Bette, and I felt myself flush. I felt it happened much sooner for me than for her. I often wondered how much Bette was really “into” having a child together. Things had become so strained with us. We hadn’t been having sex much at all. The few times we did, Bette was having problems coming, and she was getting more and more frustrated, to the point she was beginning to avoid it altogether. She put herself into her job so that she could escape having to come home and face whatever sexual inadequacies she felt she had. The job provided all the recognition and ego boost she felt she was lacking at home. I wouldn’t have known a lot of this if it wasn’t for Kit. She had revealed so many things to me that allowed me to open my heart again once she returned to LA. We hadn’t seen one another since her arrival, just phone calls and emails.
“When I felt ready, I didn’t have much of a choice. She was already involved with Jodi, and then she ends up moving to New York.”
“I’m not sure she felt she had much here.”
I looked at Angelica. “She has a lot here for her.”
“Tina, you and I both had this discussion many times. You know if she had felt that she was a central part of Angelica’s life, she never would have left.”
“It still bothers me, to think she could have walked out of her life like that.”
“Could you honestly blame her? Whenever she was ready to come back, you weren’t ready to accept her. You kept her at a comfortable distance.”
“Angus, I let her into my life.”
“Yeah on your terms.”
I felt myself getting angry.
“Tina, look, there isn’t any need to go down this road. You know I love ya. I love you both, and I just try my best to keep a balance and stay in the middle.”
Angus hugged me. His embrace was reassuring, and warm. “Thank you,” I whispered.
“You’re welcome. Now you go and have a great time with Bette.”
“Angelica had her bath, and only needs to have a little milk which I left in the fridge before she settles down to sleep.”
“Okay, I got it covered.”
“I know you do.”
“Tina.”
“Yes?”
“Take a deep breath. You look beautiful, and I’m sure you will both have an incredible dinner.”
“I hope. It’s so ironic that the first chance we could get together was tonight, Valentine’s Day.”
“It sure is. Look at it like a sign or something. Cupid played with his arrows I think.”
I smiled at Angus. He was always a big supporter of both me and Bette, and never took sides when things deteriorated. He remained impartial, and often he pointed out a lot of things that I didn’t really take into consideration or see for myself. He became a good friend to me, and I guess in a strange way I to him, as he went through getting over his breakup with Kit.
“I should be home by 11,” I said as I grabbed my purse.
“I won’t hold my breath,” Angus said, winking at me before I closed the screen door.
As I walked down the walkway towards the driveway, Angus’s voice was becoming quieter as I heard him beginning a typical one-way conversation with Angelica. I got into my car and took one last look in the mirror before I began my drive to Speroni’s Italian Villa.